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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/2524-0.txt b/2524-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..12d1141 --- /dev/null +++ b/2524-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7408 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of My Lady Ludlow, by Elizabeth Gaskell + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you +will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before +using this eBook. + +Title: My Lady Ludlow + +Author: Elizabeth Gaskell + +Release Date: May 17, 2005 [eBook #2524] +[Most recently updated: December 22, 2021] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +Produced by: David Price and Richard Tonsing + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY LUDLOW *** + + + + +MY LADY LUDLOW + +by Elizabeth Gaskell + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + +I am an old woman now, and things are very different to what they were +in my youth. Then we, who travelled, travelled in coaches, carrying six +inside, and making a two days’ journey out of what people now go over +in a couple of hours with a whizz and a flash, and a screaming whistle, +enough to deafen one. Then letters came in but three times a week: +indeed, in some places in Scotland where I have stayed when I was a +girl, the post came in but once a month;—but letters were letters then; +and we made great prizes of them, and read them and studied them like +books. Now the post comes rattling in twice a day, bringing short jerky +notes, some without beginning or end, but just a little sharp sentence, +which well-bred folks would think too abrupt to be spoken. Well, well! +they may all be improvements,—I dare say they are; but you will never +meet with a Lady Ludlow in these days. + +I will try and tell you about her. It is no story: it has, as I said, +neither beginning, middle, nor end. + +My father was a poor clergyman with a large family. My mother was always +said to have good blood in her veins; and when she wanted to maintain her +position with the people she was thrown among,—principally rich +democratic manufacturers, all for liberty and the French Revolution,—she +would put on a pair of ruffles, trimmed with real old English point, very +much darned to be sure,—but which could not be bought new for love or +money, as the art of making it was lost years before. These ruffles +showed, as she said, that her ancestors had been Somebodies, when the +grandfathers of the rich folk, who now looked down upon her, had been +Nobodies,—if, indeed, they had any grandfathers at all. I don’t know +whether any one out of our own family ever noticed these ruffles,—but we +were all taught as children to feel rather proud when my mother put them +on, and to hold up our heads as became the descendants of the lady who +had first possessed the lace. Not but what my dear father often told us +that pride was a great sin; we were never allowed to be proud of anything +but my mother’s ruffles: and she was so innocently happy when she put +them on,—often, poor dear creature, to a very worn and threadbare +gown,—that I still think, even after all my experience of life, they +were a blessing to the family. You will think that I am wandering away +from my Lady Ludlow. Not at all. The Lady who had owned the lace, +Ursula Hanbury, was a common ancestress of both my mother and my Lady +Ludlow. And so it fell out, that when my poor father died, and my mother +was sorely pressed to know what to do with her nine children, and looked +far and wide for signs of willingness to help, Lady Ludlow sent her a +letter, proffering aid and assistance. I see that letter now: a large +sheet of thick yellow paper, with a straight broad margin left on the +left-hand side of the delicate Italian writing,—writing which contained +far more in the same space of paper than all the sloping, or masculine +hand-writings of the present day. It was sealed with a coat-of-arms,—a +lozenge,—for Lady Ludlow was a widow. My mother made us notice the +motto, “Foy et Loy,” and told us where to look for the quarterings of the +Hanbury arms before she opened the letter. Indeed, I think she was +rather afraid of what the contents might be; for, as I have said, in her +anxious love for her fatherless children, she had written to many people +upon whom, to tell truly, she had but little claim; and their cold, hard +answers had many a time made her cry, when she thought none of us were +looking. I do not even know if she had ever seen Lady Ludlow: all I knew +of her was that she was a very grand lady, whose grandmother had been +half-sister to my mother’s great-grandmother; but of her character and +circumstances I had heard nothing, and I doubt if my mother was +acquainted with them. + +I looked over my mother’s shoulder to read the letter; it began, “Dear +Cousin Margaret Dawson,” and I think I felt hopeful from the moment I saw +those words. She went on to say,—stay, I think I can remember the very +words: + +‘DEAR COUSIN MARGARET DAWSON,—I have been much grieved to hear of the +loss you have sustained in the death of so good a husband, and so +excellent a clergyman as I have always heard that my late cousin Richard +was esteemed to be.’ + +“There!” said my mother, laying her finger on the passage, “read that +aloud to the little ones. Let them hear how their father’s good report +travelled far and wide, and how well he is spoken of by one whom he never +saw. COUSIN Richard, how prettily her ladyship writes! Go on, +Margaret!” She wiped her eyes as she spoke: and laid her fingers on her +lips, to still my little sister, Cecily, who, not understanding anything +about the important letter, was beginning to talk and make a noise. + +‘You say you are left with nine children. I too should have had nine, if +mine had all lived. I have none left but Rudolph, the present Lord +Ludlow. He is married, and lives, for the most part, in London. But I +entertain six young gentlewomen at my house at Connington, who are to me +as daughters—save that, perhaps, I restrict them in certain indulgences +in dress and diet that might be befitting in young ladies of a higher +rank, and of more probable wealth. These young persons—all of +condition, though out of means—are my constant companions, and I strive +to do my duty as a Christian lady towards them. One of these young +gentlewomen died (at her own home, whither she had gone upon a visit) +last May. Will you do me the favour to allow your eldest daughter to +supply her place in my household? She is, as I make out, about sixteen +years of age. She will find companions here who are but a little older +than herself. I dress my young friends myself, and make each of them a +small allowance for pocket-money. They have but few opportunities for +matrimony, as Connington is far removed from any town. The clergyman is +a deaf old widower; my agent is married; and as for the neighbouring +farmers, they are, of course, below the notice of the young gentlewomen +under my protection. Still, if any young woman wishes to marry, and has +conducted herself to my satisfaction, I give her a wedding dinner, her +clothes, and her house-linen. And such as remain with me to my death, +will find a small competency provided for them in my will. I reserve to +myself the option of paying their travelling expenses,—disliking gadding +women, on the one hand; on the other, not wishing by too long absence +from the family home to weaken natural ties. + +‘If my proposal pleases you and your daughter—or rather, if it pleases +you, for I trust your daughter has been too well brought up to have a +will in opposition to yours—let me know, dear cousin Margaret Dawson, +and I will make arrangements for meeting the young gentlewoman at +Cavistock, which is the nearest point to which the coach will bring her.’ + +My mother dropped the letter, and sat silent. + +“I shall not know what to do without you, Margaret.” + +A moment before, like a young untried girl as I was, I had been pleased +at the notion of seeing a new place, and leading a new life. But now,—my +mother’s look of sorrow, and the children’s cry of remonstrance: “Mother; +I won’t go,” I said. + +“Nay! but you had better,” replied she, shaking her head. “Lady Ludlow +has much power. She can help your brothers. It will not do to slight +her offer.” + +So we accepted it, after much consultation. We were rewarded,—or so we +thought,—for, afterwards, when I came to know Lady Ludlow, I saw that +she would have done her duty by us, as helpless relations, however we +might have rejected her kindness,—by a presentation to Christ’s Hospital +for one of my brothers. + +And this was how I came to know my Lady Ludlow. + +I remember well the afternoon of my arrival at Hanbury Court. Her +ladyship had sent to meet me at the nearest post-town at which the +mail-coach stopped. There was an old groom inquiring for me, the ostler +said, if my name was Dawson—from Hanbury Court, he believed. I felt +it rather formidable; and first began to understand what was meant by +going among strangers, when I lost sight of the guard to whom my mother +had intrusted me. I was perched up in a high gig with a hood to it, +such as in those days was called a chair, and my companion was driving +deliberately through the most pastoral country I had ever yet seen. +By-and-by we ascended a long hill, and the man got out and walked at +the horse’s head. I should have liked to walk, too, very much indeed; +but I did not know how far I might do it; and, in fact, I dared not +speak to ask to be helped down the deep steps of the gig. We were at +last at the top,—on a long, breezy, sweeping, unenclosed piece of +ground, called, as I afterwards learnt, a Chase. The groom stopped, +breathed, patted his horse, and then mounted again to my side. + +“Are we near Hanbury Court?” I asked. + +“Near! Why, Miss! we’ve a matter of ten mile yet to go.” + +Once launched into conversation, we went on pretty glibly. I fancy he +had been afraid of beginning to speak to me, just as I was to him; but he +got over his shyness with me sooner than I did mine with him. I let him +choose the subjects of conversation, although very often I could not +understand the points of interest in them: for instance, he talked for +more than a quarter of an hour of a famous race which a certain dog-fox +had given him, above thirty years before; and spoke of all the covers and +turns just as if I knew them as well as he did; and all the time I was +wondering what kind of an animal a dog-fox might be. + +After we left the Chase, the road grew worse. No one in these days, +who has not seen the byroads of fifty years ago, can imagine what they +were. We had to quarter, as Randal called it, nearly all the way along +the deep-rutted, miry lanes; and the tremendous jolts I occasionally +met with made my seat in the gig so unsteady that I could not look +about me at all, I was so much occupied in holding on. The road was +too muddy for me to walk without dirtying myself more than I liked to +do, just before my first sight of my Lady Ludlow. But by-and-by, when +we came to the fields in which the lane ended, I begged Randal to help +me down, as I saw that I could pick my steps among the pasture grass +without making myself unfit to be seen; and Randal, out of pity for his +steaming horse, wearied with the hard struggle through the mud, thanked +me kindly, and helped me down with a springing jump. + +The pastures fell gradually down to the lower land, shut in on either +side by rows of high elms, as if there had been a wide grand avenue here +in former times. Down the grassy gorge we went, seeing the sunset sky at +the end of the shadowed descent. Suddenly we came to a long flight of +steps. + +“If you’ll run down there, Miss, I’ll go round and meet you, and then +you’d better mount again, for my lady will like to see you drive up to +the house.” + +“Are we near the house?” said I, suddenly checked by the idea. + +“Down there, Miss,” replied he, pointing with his whip to certain stacks +of twisted chimneys rising out of a group of trees, in deep shadow +against the crimson light, and which lay just beyond a great square lawn +at the base of the steep slope of a hundred yards, on the edge of which +we stood. + +I went down the steps quietly enough. I met Randal and the gig at the +bottom; and, falling into a side road to the left, we drove sedately +round, through the gateway, and into the great court in front of the +house. + +The road by which we had come lay right at the back. + +Hanbury Court is a vast red-brick house—at least, it is cased in part +with red bricks; and the gate-house and walls about the place are of +brick,—with stone facings at every corner, and door, and window, such as +you see at Hampton Court. At the back are the gables, and arched +doorways, and stone mullions, which show (so Lady Ludlow used to tell us) +that it was once a priory. There was a prior’s parlour, I know—only we +called it Mrs. Medlicott’s room; and there was a tithe-barn as big as a +church, and rows of fish-ponds, all got ready for the monks’ fasting-days +in old time. But all this I did not see till afterwards. I hardly +noticed, this first night, the great Virginian Creeper (said to have been +the first planted in England by one of my lady’s ancestors) that half +covered the front of the house. As I had been unwilling to leave the +guard of the coach, so did I now feel unwilling to leave Randal, a known +friend of three hours. But there was no help for it; in I must go; past +the grand-looking old gentleman holding the door open for me, on into the +great hall on the right hand, into which the sun’s last rays were sending +in glorious red light,—the gentleman was now walking before me,—up a +step on to the dais, as I afterwards learned that it was called,—then +again to the left, through a series of sitting-rooms, opening one out of +another, and all of them looking into a stately garden, glowing, even in +the twilight, with the bloom of flowers. We went up four steps out of +the last of these rooms, and then my guide lifted up a heavy silk curtain +and I was in the presence of my Lady Ludlow. + +She was very small of stature, and very upright. She wore a great lace +cap, nearly half her own height, I should think, that went round her +head (caps which tied under the chin, and which we called “mobs,” came +in later, and my lady held them in great contempt, saying people might +as well come down in their nightcaps). In front of my lady’s cap was a +great bow of white satin ribbon; and a broad band of the same ribbon +was tied tight round her head, and served to keep the cap straight. She +had a fine Indian muslin shawl folded over her shoulders and across +her chest, and an apron of the same; a black silk mode gown, made with +short sleeves and ruffles, and with the tail thereof pulled through +the pocket-hole, so as to shorten it to a useful length: beneath it +she wore, as I could plainly see, a quilted lavender satin petticoat. +Her hair was snowy white, but I hardly saw it, it was so covered with +her cap: her skin, even at her age, was waxen in texture and tint; her +eyes were large and dark blue, and must have been her great beauty +when she was young, for there was nothing particular, as far as I can +remember, either in mouth or nose. She had a great gold-headed stick by +her chair; but I think it was more as a mark of state and dignity than +for use; for she had as light and brisk a step when she chose as any +girl of fifteen, and, in her private early walk of meditation in the +mornings, would go as swiftly from garden alley to garden alley as any +one of us. + +She was standing up when I went in. I dropped my curtsey at the door, +which my mother had always taught me as a part of good manners, and went +up instinctively to my lady. She did not put out her hand, but raised +herself a little on tiptoe, and kissed me on both cheeks. + +“You are cold, my child. You shall have a dish of tea with me.” She +rang a little hand-bell on the table by her, and her waiting-maid came in +from a small anteroom; and, as if all had been prepared, and was awaiting +my arrival, brought with her a small china service with tea ready made, +and a plate of delicately-cut bread and butter, every morsel of which I +could have eaten, and been none the better for it, so hungry was I after +my long ride. The waiting-maid took off my cloak, and I sat down, sorely +alarmed at the silence, the hushed foot-falls of the subdued maiden over +the thick carpet, and the soft voice and clear pronunciation of my Lady +Ludlow. My teaspoon fell against my cup with a sharp noise, that seemed +so out of place and season that I blushed deeply. My lady caught my eye +with hers,—both keen and sweet were those dark-blue eyes of her +ladyship’s:— + +“Your hands are very cold, my dear; take off those gloves” (I wore thick +serviceable doeskin, and had been too shy to take them off unbidden), +“and let me try and warm them—the evenings are very chilly.” And she +held my great red hands in hers,—soft, warm, white, ring-laden. Looking +at last a little wistfully into my face, she said—“Poor child! And +you’re the eldest of nine! I had a daughter who would have been just +your age; but I cannot fancy her the eldest of nine.” Then came a pause +of silence; and then she rang her bell, and desired her waiting-maid, +Adams, to show me to my room. + +It was so small that I think it must have been a cell. The walls were +whitewashed stone; the bed was of white dimity. There was a small piece +of red staircarpet on each side of the bed, and two chairs. In a closet +adjoining were my washstand and toilet-table. There was a text of +Scripture painted on the wall right opposite to my bed; and below hung a +print, common enough in those days, of King George and Queen Charlotte, +with all their numerous children, down to the little Princess Amelia in a +go-cart. On each side hung a small portrait, also engraved: on the left, +it was Louis the Sixteenth; on the other, Marie-Antoinette. On the +chimney-piece there was a tinder-box and a Prayer-book. I do not +remember anything else in the room. Indeed, in those days people did not +dream of writing-tables, and inkstands, and portfolios, and easy chairs, +and what not. We were taught to go into our bed-rooms for the purposes of +dressing, and sleeping, and praying. + +Presently I was summoned to supper. I followed the young lady who had +been sent to call me, down the wide shallow stairs, into the great hall, +through which I had first passed on my way to my Lady Ludlow’s room. +There were four other young gentlewomen, all standing, and all silent, +who curtsied to me when I first came in. They were dressed in a kind of +uniform: muslin caps bound round their heads with blue ribbons, plain +muslin handkerchiefs, lawn aprons, and drab-coloured stuff gowns. They +were all gathered together at a little distance from the table, on which +were placed a couple of cold chickens, a salad, and a fruit tart. On the +dais there was a smaller round table, on which stood a silver jug filled +with milk, and a small roll. Near that was set a carved chair, with a +countess’s coronet surmounting the back of it. I thought that some one +might have spoken to me; but they were shy, and I was shy; or else there +was some other reason; but, indeed, almost the minute after I had come +into the hall by the door at the lower hand, her ladyship entered by the +door opening upon the dais; whereupon we all curtsied very low; I because +I saw the others do it. She stood, and looked at us for a moment. + +“Young gentlewomen,” said she, “make Margaret Dawson welcome among you;” +and they treated me with the kind politeness due to a stranger, but still +without any talking beyond what was required for the purposes of the +meal. After it was over, and grace was said by one of our party, my lady +rang her hand-bell, and the servants came in and cleared away the supper +things: then they brought in a portable reading-desk, which was placed on +the dais, and, the whole household trooping in, my lady called to one of +my companions to come up and read the Psalms and Lessons for the day. I +remember thinking how afraid I should have been had I been in her place. +There were no prayers. My lady thought it schismatic to have any prayers +excepting those in the Prayer-book; and would as soon have preached a +sermon herself in the parish church, as have allowed any one not a deacon +at the least to read prayers in a private dwelling-house. I am not sure +that even then she would have approved of his reading them in an +unconsecrated place. + +She had been maid-of-honour to Queen Charlotte: a Hanbury of that old +stock that flourished in the days of the Plantagenets, and heiress of all +the land that remained to the family, of the great estates which had once +stretched into four separate counties. Hanbury Court was hers by right. +She had married Lord Ludlow, and had lived for many years at his various +seats, and away from her ancestral home. She had lost all her children +but one, and most of them had died at these houses of Lord Ludlow’s; and, +I dare say, that gave my lady a distaste to the places, and a longing to +come back to Hanbury Court, where she had been so happy as a girl. I +imagine her girlhood had been the happiest time of her life; for, now I +think of it, most of her opinions, when I knew her in later life, were +singular enough then, but had been universally prevalent fifty years +before. For instance, while I lived at Hanbury Court, the cry for +education was beginning to come up: Mr. Raikes had set up his Sunday +Schools; and some clergymen were all for teaching writing and arithmetic, +as well as reading. My lady would have none of this; it was levelling +and revolutionary, she said. When a young woman came to be hired, my +lady would have her in, and see if she liked her looks and her dress, and +question her about her family. Her ladyship laid great stress upon this +latter point, saying that a girl who did not warm up when any interest or +curiosity was expressed about her mother, or the “baby” (if there was +one), was not likely to make a good servant. Then she would make her put +out her feet, to see if they were well and neatly shod. Then she would +bid her say the Lord’s Prayer and the Creed. Then she inquired if she +could write. If she could, and she had liked all that had gone before, +her face sank—it was a great disappointment, for it was an all but +inviolable rule with her never to engage a servant who could write. But +I have known her ladyship break through it, although in both cases in +which she did so she put the girl’s principles to a further and unusual +test in asking her to repeat the Ten Commandments. One pert young +woman—and yet I was sorry for her too, only she afterwards married a +rich draper in Shrewsbury—who had got through her trials pretty +tolerably, considering she could write, spoilt all, by saying glibly, at +the end of the last Commandment, “An’t please your ladyship, I can cast +accounts.” + +“Go away, wench,” said my lady in a hurry, “you’re only fit for trade; +you will not suit me for a servant.” The girl went away crestfallen: in +a minute, however, my lady sent me after her to see that she had +something to eat before leaving the house; and, indeed, she sent for her +once again, but it was only to give her a Bible, and to bid her beware of +French principles, which had led the French to cut off their king’s and +queen’s heads. + +The poor, blubbering girl said, “Indeed, my lady, I wouldn’t hurt a fly, +much less a king, and I cannot abide the French, nor frogs neither, for +that matter.” + +But my lady was inexorable, and took a girl who could neither read nor +write, to make up for her alarm about the progress of education towards +addition and subtraction; and afterwards, when the clergyman who was at +Hanbury parish when I came there, had died, and the bishop had appointed +another, and a younger man, in his stead, this was one of the points on +which he and my lady did not agree. While good old deaf Mr. Mountford +lived, it was my lady’s custom, when indisposed for a sermon, to stand up +at the door of her large square pew,—just opposite to the +reading-desk,—and to say (at that part of the morning service where it +is decreed that, in quires and places where they sing, here followeth the +anthem): “Mr. Mountford, I will not trouble you for a discourse this +morning.” And we all knelt down to the Litany with great satisfaction; +for Mr. Mountford, though he could not hear, had always his eyes open +about this part of the service, for any of my lady’s movements. But the +new clergyman, Mr. Gray, was of a different stamp. He was very zealous +in all his parish work; and my lady, who was just as good as she could be +to the poor, was often crying him up as a godsend to the parish, and he +never could send amiss to the Court when he wanted broth, or wine, or +jelly, or sago for a sick person. But he needs must take up the new +hobby of education; and I could see that this put my lady sadly about one +Sunday, when she suspected, I know not how, that there was something to +be said in his sermon about a Sunday-school which he was planning. She +stood up, as she had not done since Mr. Mountford’s death, two years and +better before this time, and said— + +“Mr. Gray, I will not trouble you for a discourse this morning.” + +But her voice was not well-assured and steady; and we knelt down with +more of curiosity than satisfaction in our minds. Mr. Gray preached a +very rousing sermon, on the necessity of establishing a Sabbath-school in +the village. My lady shut her eyes, and seemed to go to sleep; but I +don’t believe she lost a word of it, though she said nothing about it +that I heard until the next Saturday, when two of us, as was the custom, +were riding out with her in her carriage, and we went to see a poor +bedridden woman, who lived some miles away at the other end of the estate +and of the parish: and as we came out of the cottage we met Mr. Gray +walking up to it, in a great heat, and looking very tired. My lady +beckoned him to her, and told him she should wait and take him home with +her, adding that she wondered to see him there, so far from his home, for +that it was beyond a Sabbath-day’s journey, and, from what she had +gathered from his sermon the last Sunday, he was all for Judaism against +Christianity. He looked as if he did not understand what she meant; but +the truth was that, besides the way in which he had spoken up for schools +and schooling, he had kept calling Sunday the Sabbath: and, as her +ladyship said, “The Sabbath is the Sabbath, and that’s one thing—it is +Saturday; and if I keep it, I’m a Jew, which I’m not. And Sunday is +Sunday; and that’s another thing; and if I keep it, I’m a Christian, +which I humbly trust I am.” + +But when Mr. Gray got an inkling of her meaning in talking about a +Sabbath-day’s journey, he only took notice of a part of it: he smiled and +bowed, and said no one knew better than her ladyship what were the duties +that abrogated all inferior laws regarding the Sabbath; and that he must +go in and read to old Betty Brown, so that he would not detain her +ladyship. + +“But I shall wait for you, Mr. Gray,” said she. “Or I will take a drive +round by Oakfield, and be back in an hour’s time.” For, you see, she +would not have him feel hurried or troubled with a thought that he was +keeping her waiting, while he ought to be comforting and praying with old +Betty. + +“A very pretty young man, my dears,” said she, as we drove away. “But I +shall have my pew glazed all the same.” + +We did not know what she meant at the time; but the next Sunday but one +we did. She had the curtains all round the grand old Hanbury family seat +taken down, and, instead of them, there was glass up to the height of six +or seven feet. We entered by a door, with a window in it that drew up or +down just like what you see in carriages. This window was generally +down, and then we could hear perfectly; but if Mr. Gray used the word +“Sabbath,” or spoke in favour of schooling and education, my lady stepped +out of her corner, and drew up the window with a decided clang and clash. + +I must tell you something more about Mr. Gray. The presentation to the +living of Hanbury was vested in two trustees, of whom Lady Ludlow was +one: Lord Ludlow had exercised this right in the appointment of Mr. +Mountford, who had won his lordship’s favour by his excellent +horsemanship. Nor was Mr. Mountford a bad clergyman, as clergymen went +in those days. He did not drink, though he liked good eating as much as +any one. And if any poor person was ill, and he heard of it, he would +send them plates from his own dinner of what he himself liked best; +sometimes of dishes which were almost as bad as poison to sick people. He +meant kindly to everybody except dissenters, whom Lady Ludlow and he +united in trying to drive out of the parish; and among dissenters he +particularly abhorred Methodists—some one said, because John Wesley had +objected to his hunting. But that must have been long ago for when I +knew him he was far too stout and too heavy to hunt; besides, the bishop +of the diocese disapproved of hunting, and had intimated his +disapprobation to the clergy. For my own part, I think a good run would +not have come amiss, even in a moral point of view, to Mr. Mountford. He +ate so much, and took so little exercise, that we young women often heard +of his being in terrible passions with his servants, and the sexton and +clerk. But they none of them minded him much, for he soon came to +himself, and was sure to make them some present or other—some said in +proportion to his anger; so that the sexton, who was a bit of a wag (as +all sextons are, I think), said that the vicar’s saying, “The Devil take +you,” was worth a shilling any day, whereas “The Deuce” was a shabby +sixpenny speech, only fit for a curate. + +There was a great deal of good in Mr. Mountford, too. He could not bear +to see pain, or sorrow, or misery of any kind; and, if it came under his +notice, he was never easy till he had relieved it, for the time, at any +rate. But he was afraid of being made uncomfortable; so, if he possibly +could, he would avoid seeing any one who was ill or unhappy; and he did +not thank any one for telling him about them. + +“What would your ladyship have me to do?” he once said to my Lady Ludlow, +when she wished him to go and see a poor man who had broken his leg. “I +cannot piece the leg as the doctor can; I cannot nurse him as well as his +wife does; I may talk to him, but he no more understands me than I do the +language of the alchemists. My coming puts him out; he stiffens himself +into an uncomfortable posture, out of respect to the cloth, and dare not +take the comfort of kicking, and swearing, and scolding his wife, while I +am there. I hear him, with my figurative ears, my lady, heave a sigh of +relief when my back is turned, and the sermon that he thinks I ought to +have kept for the pulpit, and have delivered to his neighbours (whose +case, as he fancies, it would just have fitted, as it seemed to him to be +addressed to the sinful), is all ended, and done, for the day. I judge +others as myself; I do to them as I would be done to. That’s +Christianity, at any rate. I should hate—saving your ladyship’s +presence—to have my Lord Ludlow coming and seeing me, if I were ill. +’Twould be a great honour, no doubt; but I should have to put on a clean +nightcap for the occasion; and sham patience, in order to be polite, and +not weary his lordship with my complaints. I should be twice as thankful +to him if he would send me game, or a good fat haunch, to bring me up to +that pitch of health and strength one ought to be in, to appreciate the +honour of a visit from a nobleman. So I shall send Jerry Butler a good +dinner every day till he is strong again; and spare the poor old fellow +my presence and advice.” + +My lady would be puzzled by this, and by many other of Mr. Mountford’s +speeches. But he had been appointed by my lord, and she could not +question her dead husband’s wisdom; and she knew that the dinners were +always sent, and often a guinea or two to help to pay the doctor’s bills; +and Mr. Mountford was true blue, as we call it, to the back-bone; hated +the dissenters and the French; and could hardly drink a dish of tea +without giving out the toast of “Church and King, and down with the +Rump.” Moreover, he had once had the honour of preaching before the King +and Queen, and two of the Princesses, at Weymouth; and the King had +applauded his sermon audibly with,—“Very good; very good;” and that was +a seal put upon his merit in my lady’s eyes. + +Besides, in the long winter Sunday evenings, he would come up to the +Court, and read a sermon to us girls, and play a game of picquet with my +lady afterwards; which served to shorten the tedium of the time. My lady +would, on those occasions, invite him to sup with her on the dais; but as +her meal was invariably bread and milk only, Mr. Mountford preferred +sitting down amongst us, and made a joke about its being wicked and +heterodox to eat meagre on Sunday, a festival of the Church. We smiled +at this joke just as much the twentieth time we heard it as we did at the +first; for we knew it was coming, because he always coughed a little +nervously before he made a joke, for fear my lady should not approve: and +neither she nor he seemed to remember that he had ever hit upon the idea +before. + +Mr. Mountford died quite suddenly at last. We were all very sorry to +lose him. He left some of his property (for he had a private estate) to +the poor of the parish, to furnish them with an annual Christmas dinner +of roast beef and plum pudding, for which he wrote out a very good +receipt in the codicil to his will. + +Moreover, he desired his executors to see that the vault, in which the +vicars of Hanbury were interred, was well aired, before his coffin was +taken in; for, all his life long, he had had a dread of damp, and +latterly he kept his rooms to such a pitch of warmth that some thought it +hastened his end. + +Then the other trustee, as I have said, presented the living to Mr. Gray, +Fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford. It was quite natural for us all, as +belonging in some sort to the Hanbury family, to disapprove of the other +trustee’s choice. But when some ill-natured person circulated the report +that Mr. Gray was a Moravian Methodist, I remember my lady said, “She +could not believe anything so bad, without a great deal of evidence.” + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +Before I tell you about Mr. Gray, I think I ought to make you understand +something more of what we did all day long at Hanbury Court. There were +five of us at the time of which I am speaking, all young women of good +descent, and allied (however distantly) to people of rank. When we were +not with my lady, Mrs. Medlicott looked after us; a gentle little woman, +who had been companion to my lady for many years, and was indeed, I have +been told, some kind of relation to her. Mrs. Medlicott’s parents had +lived in Germany, and the consequence was, she spoke English with a very +foreign accent. Another consequence was, that she excelled in all manner +of needlework, such as is not known even by name in these days. She +could darn either lace, table-linen, India muslin, or stockings, so that +no one could tell where the hole or rent had been. Though a good +Protestant, and never missing Guy Faux day at church, she was as skilful +at fine work as any nun in a Papist convent. She would take a piece of +French cambric, and by drawing out some threads, and working in others, +it became delicate lace in a very few hours. She did the same by +Hollands cloth, and made coarse strong lace, with which all my lady’s +napkins and table-linen were trimmed. We worked under her during a great +part of the day, either in the still-room, or at our sewing in a chamber +that opened out of the great hall. My lady despised every kind of work +that would now be called Fancy-work. She considered that the use of +coloured threads or worsted was only fit to amuse children; but that +grown women ought not to be taken with mere blues and reds, but to +restrict their pleasure in sewing to making small and delicate stitches. +She would speak of the old tapestry in the hall as the work of her +ancestresses, who lived before the Reformation, and were consequently +unacquainted with pure and simple tastes in work, as well as in religion. +Nor would my lady sanction the fashion of the day, which, at the +beginning of this century, made all the fine ladies take to making shoes. +She said that such work was a consequence of the French Revolution, which +had done much to annihilate all distinctions of rank and class, and hence +it was, that she saw young ladies of birth and breeding handling lasts, +and awls, and dirty cobblers’-wax, like shoe-makers’ daughters. + +Very frequently one of us would be summoned to my lady to read aloud to +her, as she sat in her small withdrawing-room, some improving book. It +was generally Mr. Addison’s “Spectator;” but one year, I remember, we had +to read “Sturm’s Reflections” translated from a German book Mrs. +Medlicott recommended. Mr. Sturm told us what to think about for every +day in the year; and very dull it was; but I believe Queen Charlotte had +liked the book very much, and the thought of her royal approbation kept +my lady awake during the reading. “Mrs. Chapone’s Letters” and “Dr. +Gregory’s Advice to Young Ladies” composed the rest of our library for +week-day reading. I, for one, was glad to leave my fine sewing, and even +my reading aloud (though this last did keep me with my dear lady) to go +to the still-room and potter about among the preserves and the medicated +waters. There was no doctor for many miles round, and with Mrs. +Medlicott to direct us, and Dr. Buchan to go by for recipes, we sent out +many a bottle of physic, which, I dare say, was as good as what comes out +of the druggist’s shop. At any rate, I do not think we did much harm; +for if any of our physics tasted stronger than usual, Mrs. Medlicott +would bid us let it down with cochineal and water, to make all safe, as +she said. So our bottles of medicine had very little real physic in them +at last; but we were careful in putting labels on them, which looked very +mysterious to those who could not read, and helped the medicine to do its +work. I have sent off many a bottle of salt and water coloured red; and +whenever we had nothing else to do in the still-room, Mrs. Medlicott +would set us to making bread-pills, by way of practice; and, as far as I +can say, they were very efficacious, as before we gave out a box Mrs. +Medlicott always told the patient what symptoms to expect; and I hardly +ever inquired without hearing that they had produced their effect. There +was one old man, who took six pills a-night, of any kind we liked to give +him, to make him sleep; and if, by any chance, his daughter had forgotten +to let us know that he was out of his medicine, he was so restless and +miserable that, as he said, he thought he was like to die. I think ours +was what would be called homoeopathic practice now-a-days. Then we +learnt to make all the cakes and dishes of the season in the still-room. +We had plum-porridge and mince-pies at Christmas, fritters and pancakes +on Shrove Tuesday, furmenty on Mothering Sunday, violet-cakes in Passion +Week, tansy-pudding on Easter Sunday, three-cornered cakes on Trinity +Sunday, and so on through the year: all made from good old Church +receipts, handed down from one of my lady’s earliest Protestant +ancestresses. Every one of us passed a portion of the day with Lady +Ludlow; and now and then we rode out with her in her coach and four. She +did not like to go out with a pair of horses, considering this rather +beneath her rank; and, indeed, four horses were very often needed to pull +her heavy coach through the stiff mud. But it was rather a cumbersome +equipage through the narrow Warwickshire lanes; and I used often to think +it was well that countesses were not plentiful, or else we might have met +another lady of quality in another coach and four, where there would have +been no possibility of turning, or passing each other, and very little +chance of backing. Once when the idea of this danger of meeting another +countess in a narrow, deep-rutted lane was very prominent in my mind I +ventured to ask Mrs. Medlicott what would have to be done on such an +occasion; and she told me that “de latest creation must back, for sure,” +which puzzled me a good deal at the time, although I understand it now. I +began to find out the use of the “Peerage,” a book which had seemed to me +rather dull before; but, as I was always a coward in a coach, I made +myself well acquainted with the dates of creation of our three +Warwickshire earls, and was happy to find that Earl Ludlow ranked second, +the oldest earl being a hunting widower, and not likely to drive out in a +carriage. + +All this time I have wandered from Mr. Gray. Of course, we first saw +him in church when he read himself in. He was very red-faced, the kind +of redness which goes with light hair and a blushing complexion; he +looked slight and short, and his bright light frizzy hair had hardly a +dash of powder in it. I remember my lady making this observation, and +sighing over it; for, though since the famine in seventeen hundred and +ninety-nine and eighteen hundred there had been a tax on hair-powder, +yet it was reckoned very revolutionary and Jacobin not to wear a good +deal of it. My lady hardly liked the opinions of any man who wore his +own hair; but this she would say was rather a prejudice: only in her +youth none but the mob had gone wigless, and she could not get over +the association of wigs with birth and breeding; a man’s own hair with +that class of people who had formed the rioters in seventeen hundred +and eighty, when Lord George Gordon had been one of the bugbears of my +lady’s life. Her husband and his brothers, she told us, had been put +into breeches, and had their heads shaved on their seventh birthday, +each of them; a handsome little wig of the newest fashion forming the +old Lady Ludlow’s invariable birthday present to her sons as they each +arrived at that age; and afterwards, to the day of their death, they +never saw their own hair. To be without powder, as some underbred +people were talking of being now, was in fact to insult the proprieties +of life, by being undressed. It was English sans-culottism. But Mr. +Gray did wear a little powder, enough to save him in my lady’s good +opinion; but not enough to make her approve of him decidedly. + +The next time I saw him was in the great hall. Mary Mason and I were +going to drive out with my lady in her coach, and when we went down +stairs with our best hats and cloaks on, we found Mr. Gray awaiting my +lady’s coming. I believe he had paid his respects to her before, but we +had never seen him; and he had declined her invitation to spend Sunday +evening at the Court (as Mr. Mountford used to do pretty regularly—and +play a game at picquet too—), which, Mrs. Medlicott told us, had caused +my lady to be not over well pleased with him. + +He blushed redder than ever at the sight of us, as we entered the hall +and dropped him our curtsies. He coughed two or three times, as if he +would have liked to speak to us, if he could but have found something to +say; and every time he coughed he became hotter-looking than ever. I am +ashamed to say, we were nearly laughing at him; half because we, too, +were so shy that we understood what his awkwardness meant. + +My lady came in, with her quick active step—she always walked quickly +when she did not bethink herself of her cane—as if she was sorry to have +us kept waiting—and, as she entered, she gave us all round one of those +graceful sweeping curtsies, of which I think the art must have died out +with her,—it implied so much courtesy;—this time it said, as well as +words could do, “I am sorry to have kept you all waiting,—forgive me.” + +She went up to the mantelpiece, near which Mr. Gray had been standing +until her entrance, and curtseying afresh to him, and pretty deeply this +time, because of his cloth, and her being hostess, and he, a new guest. +She asked him if he would not prefer speaking to her in her own private +parlour, and looked as though she would have conducted him there. But he +burst out with his errand, of which he was full even to choking, and +which sent the glistening tears into his large blue eyes, which stood +farther and farther out with his excitement. + +“My lady, I want to speak to you, and to persuade you to exert your kind +interest with Mr. Lathom—Justice Lathom, of Hathaway Manor—” + +“Harry Lathom?” inquired my lady,—as Mr. Gray stopped to take the breath +he had lost in his hurry,—“I did not know he was in the commission.” + +“He is only just appointed; he took the oaths not a month ago,—more’s +the pity!” + +“I do not understand why you should regret it. The Lathoms have held +Hathaway since Edward the First, and Mr. Lathom bears a good character, +although his temper is hasty—” + +“My lady! he has committed Job Gregson for stealing—a fault of which he +is as innocent as I—and all the evidence goes to prove it, now that the +case is brought before the Bench; only the Squires hang so together that +they can’t be brought to see justice, and are all for sending Job to +gaol, out of compliment to Mr. Lathom, saying it his first committal, and +it won’t be civil to tell him there is no evidence against his man. For +God’s sake, my lady, speak to the gentlemen; they will attend to you, +while they only tell me to mind my own business.” + +Now my lady was always inclined to stand by her order, and the Lathoms of +Hathaway Court were cousins to the Hanbury’s. Besides, it was rather a +point of honour in those days to encourage a young magistrate, by passing +a pretty sharp sentence on his first committals; and Job Gregson was the +father of a girl who had been lately turned away from her place as +scullery-maid for sauciness to Mrs. Adams, her ladyship’s own maid; and +Mr. Gray had not said a word of the reasons why he believed the man +innocent,—for he was in such a hurry, I believe he would have had my +lady drive off to the Henley Court-house then and there;—so there seemed +a good deal against the man, and nothing but Mr. Gray’s bare word for +him; and my lady drew herself a little up, and said— + +“Mr. Gray! I do not see what reason either you or I have to interfere. +Mr. Harry Lathom is a sensible kind of young man, well capable of +ascertaining the truth without our help—” + +“But more evidence has come out since,” broke in Mr. Gray. My lady went +a little stiffer, and spoke a little more coldly:— + +“I suppose this additional evidence is before the justices: men of good +family, and of honour and credit, well known in the county. They +naturally feel that the opinion of one of themselves must have more +weight than the words of a man like Job Gregson, who bears a very +indifferent character,—has been strongly suspected of poaching, coming +from no one knows where, squatting on Hareman’s Common—which, by the +way, is extra-parochial, I believe; consequently you, as a clergyman, are +not responsible for what goes on there; and, although impolitic, there +might be some truth in what the magistrates said, in advising you to mind +your own business,”—said her ladyship, smiling,—“and they might be +tempted to bid me mind mine, if I interfered, Mr. Gray: might they not?” + +He looked extremely uncomfortable; half angry. Once or twice he began to +speak, but checked himself, as if his words would not have been wise or +prudent. At last he said—“It may seem presumptuous in me,—a stranger +of only a few weeks’ standing—to set up my judgment as to men’s +character against that of residents—” Lady Ludlow gave a little bow of +acquiescence, which was, I think, involuntary on her part, and which I +don’t think he perceived,—“but I am convinced that the man is innocent +of this offence,—and besides, the justices themselves allege this +ridiculous custom of paying a compliment to a newly-appointed magistrate +as their only reason.” + +That unlucky word “ridiculous!” It undid all the good his modest +beginning had done him with my lady. I knew as well as words could have +told me, that she was affronted at the expression being used by a man +inferior in rank to those whose actions he applied it to,—and truly, it +was a great want of tact, considering to whom he was speaking. + +Lady Ludlow spoke very gently and slowly; she always did so when she was +annoyed; it was a certain sign, the meaning of which we had all learnt. + +“I think, Mr. Gray, we will drop the subject. It is one on which we are +not likely to agree.” + +Mr. Gray’s ruddy colour grew purple and then faded away, and his face +became pale. I think both my lady and he had forgotten our presence; and +we were beginning to feel too awkward to wish to remind them of it. And +yet we could not help watching and listening with the greatest interest. + +Mr. Gray drew himself up to his full height, with an unconscious feeling +of dignity. Little as was his stature, and awkward and embarrassed as he +had been only a few minutes before, I remember thinking he looked almost +as grand as my lady when he spoke. + +“Your ladyship must remember that it may be my duty to speak to my +parishioners on many subjects on which they do not agree with me. I am +not at liberty to be silent, because they differ in opinion from me.” + +Lady Ludlow’s great blue eyes dilated with surprise, and—I do +think—anger, at being thus spoken to. I am not sure whether it was very +wise in Mr. Gray. He himself looked afraid of the consequences but as if +he was determined to bear them without flinching. For a minute there was +silence. Then my lady replied—“Mr. Gray, I respect your plain-speaking, +although I may wonder whether a young man of your age and position has +any right to assume that he is a better judge than one with the +experience which I have naturally gained at my time of life, and in the +station I hold.” + +“If I, madam, as the clergyman of this parish, am not to shrink from +telling what I believe to be the truth to the poor and lowly, no more am +I to hold my peace in the presence of the rich and titled.” Mr. Gray’s +face showed that he was in that state of excitement which in a child +would have ended in a good fit of crying. He looked as if he had nerved +himself up to doing and saying things, which he disliked above +everything, and which nothing short of serious duty could have compelled +him to do and say. And at such times every minute circumstance which +could add to pain comes vividly before one. I saw that he became aware +of our presence, and that it added to his discomfiture. + +My lady flushed up. “Are you aware, sir,” asked she, “that you have gone +far astray from the original subject of conversation? But as you talk of +your parish, allow me to remind you that Hareman’s Common is beyond the +bounds, and that you are really not responsible for the characters and +lives of the squatters on that unlucky piece of ground.” + +“Madam, I see I have only done harm in speaking to you about the affair +at all. I beg your pardon and take my leave.” + +He bowed, and looked very sad. Lady Ludlow caught the expression of his +face. + +“Good morning!” she cried, in rather a louder and quicker way than that +in which she had been speaking. “Remember, Job Gregson is a notorious +poacher and evildoer, and you really are not responsible for what goes on +at Hareman’s Common.” + +He was near the hall door, and said something—half to himself, which we +heard (being nearer to him), but my lady did not; although she saw that +he spoke. “What did he say?” she asked in a somewhat hurried manner, as +soon as the door was closed—“I did not hear.” We looked at each other, +and then I spoke: + +“He said, my lady, that ‘God help him! he was responsible for all the +evil he did not strive to overcome.’” + +My lady turned sharp round away from us, and Mary Mason said afterwards +she thought her ladyship was much vexed with both of us, for having been +present, and with me for having repeated what Mr. Gray had said. But it +was not our fault that we were in the hall, and when my lady asked what +Mr. Gray had said, I thought it right to tell her. + +In a few minutes she bade us accompany her in her ride in the coach. + +Lady Ludlow always sat forwards by herself, and we girls backwards. +Somehow this was a rule, which we never thought of questioning. It was +true that riding backwards made some of us feel very uncomfortable and +faint; and to remedy this my lady always drove with both windows open, +which occasionally gave her the rheumatism; but we always went on in the +old way. This day she did not pay any great attention to the road by +which we were going, and Coachman took his own way. We were very silent, +as my lady did not speak, and looked very serious. Or else, in general, +she made these rides very pleasant (to those who were not qualmish with +riding backwards), by talking to us in a very agreeable manner, and +telling us of the different things which had happened to her at various +places,—at Paris and Versailles, where she had been in her youth,—at +Windsor and Kew and Weymouth, where she had been with the Queen, when +maid-of-honour—and so on. But this day she did not talk at all. All at +once she put her head out of the window. + +“John Footman,” said she, “where are we? Surely this is Hareman’s +Common.” + +“Yes, an’t please my lady,” said John Footman, and waited for further +speech or orders. My lady thought a while, and then said she would have +the steps put down and get out. + +As soon as she was gone, we looked at each other, and then without a word +began to gaze after her. We saw her pick her dainty way in the little +high-heeled shoes she always wore (because they had been in fashion in +her youth), among the yellow pools of stagnant water that had gathered in +the clayey soil. John Footman followed, stately, after; afraid too, for +all his stateliness, of splashing his pure white stockings. Suddenly my +lady turned round and said something to him, and he returned to the +carriage with a half-pleased, half-puzzled air. + +My lady went on to a cluster of rude mud houses at the higher end of the +Common; cottages built, as they were occasionally at that day, of wattles +and clay, and thatched with sods. As far as we could make out from dumb +show, Lady Ludlow saw enough of the interiors of these places to make her +hesitate before entering, or even speaking to any of the children who +were playing about in the puddles. After a pause, she disappeared into +one of the cottages. It seemed to us a long time before she came out; +but I dare say it was not more than eight or ten minutes. She came back +with her head hanging down, as if to choose her way,—but we saw it was +more in thought and bewilderment than for any such purpose. + +She had not made up her mind where we should drive to when she got into +the carriage again. John Footman stood, bare-headed, waiting for orders. + +“To Hathaway. My dears, if you are tired, or if you have anything to do +for Mrs. Medlicott, I can drop you at Barford Corner, and it is but a +quarter of an hour’s brisk walk home.” + +But luckily we could safely say that Mrs. Medlicott did not want us; +and as we had whispered to each other, as we sat alone in the coach, +that surely my lady must have gone to Job Gregson’s, we were far too +anxious to know the end of it all to say that we were tired. So we all +set off to Hathaway. Mr. Harry Lathom was a bachelor squire, thirty +or thirty-five years of age, more at home in the field than in the +drawing-room, and with sporting men than with ladies. + +My lady did not alight, of course; it was Mr. Lathom’s place to wait upon +her, and she bade the butler,—who had a smack of the gamekeeper in him, +very unlike our own powdered venerable fine gentleman at Hanbury,—tell +his master, with her compliments, that she wished to speak to him. You +may think how pleased we were to find that we should hear all that was +said; though, I think, afterwards we were half sorry when we saw how our +presence confused the squire, who would have found it bad enough to +answer my lady’s questions, even without two eager girls for audience. + +“Pray, Mr. Lathom,” began my lady, something abruptly for her,—but she +was very full of her subject,—“what is this I hear about Job Gregson?” + +Mr. Lathom looked annoyed and vexed, but dared not show it in his words. + +“I gave out a warrant against him, my lady, for theft,—that is all. You +are doubtless aware of his character; a man who sets nets and springes in +long cover, and fishes wherever he takes a fancy. It is but a short step +from poaching to thieving.” + +“That is quite true,” replied Lady Ludlow (who had a horror of poaching +for this very reason): “but I imagine you do not send a man to gaol on +account of his bad character.” + +“Rogues and vagabonds,” said Mr. Lathom. “A man may be sent to prison +for being a vagabond; for no specific act, but for his general mode of +life.” + +He had the better of her ladyship for one moment; but then she answered— + +“But in this case, the charge on which you committed him is for theft; +now his wife tells me he can prove he was some miles distant from +Holmwood, where the robbery took place, all that afternoon; she says you +had the evidence before you.” + +Mr. Lathom here interrupted my lady, by saying, in a somewhat sulky +manner—“No such evidence was brought before me when I gave the warrant. +I am not answerable for the other magistrates’ decision, when they had +more evidence before them. It was they who committed him to gaol. I am +not responsible for that.” + +My lady did not often show signs of impatience; but we knew she was +feeling irritated, by the little perpetual tapping of her high-heeled +shoe against the bottom of the carriage. About the same time we, sitting +backwards, caught a glimpse of Mr. Gray through the open door, standing +in the shadow of the hall. Doubtless Lady Ludlow’s arrival had +interrupted a conversation between Mr. Lathom and Mr. Gray. The latter +must have heard every word of what she was saying; but of this she was +not aware, and caught at Mr. Lathom’s disclaimer of responsibility with +pretty much the same argument which she had heard (through our +repetition) that Mr. Gray had used not two hours before. + +“And do you mean to say, Mr. Lathom, that you don’t consider yourself +responsible for all injustice or wrong-doing that you might have +prevented, and have not? Nay, in this case the first germ of injustice +was your own mistake. I wish you had been with me a little while ago, +and seen the misery in that poor fellow’s cottage.” She spoke lower, and +Mr. Gray drew near, in a sort of involuntary manner; as if to hear all +she was saying. We saw him, and doubtless Mr. Lathom heard his footstep, +and knew who it was that was listening behind him, and approving of every +word that was said. He grew yet more sullen in manner; but still my lady +was my lady, and he dared not speak out before her, as he would have done +to Mr. Gray. Lady Ludlow, however, caught the look of stubborness in his +face, and it roused her as I had never seen her roused. + +“I am sure you will not refuse, sir, to accept my bail. I offer to bail +the fellow out, and to be responsible for his appearance at the sessions. +What say you to that, Mr. Lathom?” + +“The offence of theft is not bailable, my lady.” + +“Not in ordinary cases, I dare say. But I imagine this is an +extraordinary case. The man is sent to prison out of compliment to you, +and against all evidence, as far as I can learn. He will have to rot in +gaol for two months, and his wife and children to starve. I, Lady +Ludlow, offer to bail him out, and pledge myself for his appearance at +next quarter-sessions.” + +“It is against the law, my lady.” + +“Bah! Bah! Bah! Who makes laws? Such as I, in the House of Lords—such +as you, in the House of Commons. We, who make the laws in St. Stephen’s, +may break the mere forms of them, when we have right on our sides, on our +own land, and amongst our own people.” + +“The lord-lieutenant may take away my commission, if he heard of it.” + +“And a very good thing for the county, Harry Lathom; and for you too, if +he did,—if you don’t go on more wisely than you have begun. A pretty +set you and your brother magistrates are to administer justice through +the land! I always said a good despotism was the best form of +government; and I am twice as much in favour of it now I see what a +quorum is! My dears!” suddenly turning round to us, “if it would not +tire you to walk home, I would beg Mr. Lathom to take a seat in my coach, +and we would drive to Henley Gaol, and have the poor man out at once.” + +“A walk over the fields at this time of day is hardly fitting for young +ladies to take alone,” said Mr. Lathom, anxious no doubt to escape from +his tete-a-tete drive with my lady, and possibly not quite prepared to go +to the illegal length of prompt measures, which she had in contemplation. + +But Mr. Gray now stepped forward, too anxious for the release of the +prisoner to allow any obstacle to intervene which he could do away with. +To see Lady Ludlow’s face when she first perceived whom she had had for +auditor and spectator of her interview with Mr. Lathom, was as good as a +play. She had been doing and saying the very things she had been so much +annoyed at Mr. Gray’s saying and proposing only an hour or two ago. She +had been setting down Mr. Lathom pretty smartly, in the presence of the +very man to whom she had spoken of that gentleman as so sensible, and of +such a standing in the county, that it was presumption to question his +doings. But before Mr. Gray had finished his offer of escorting us back +to Hanbury Court, my lady had recovered herself. There was neither +surprise nor displeasure in her manner, as she answered—“I thank you, +Mr. Gray. I was not aware that you were here, but I think I can +understand on what errand you came. And seeing you here, recalls me to a +duty I owe Mr. Lathom. Mr. Lathom, I have spoken to you pretty +plainly,—forgetting, until I saw Mr. Gray, that only this very afternoon +I differed from him on this very question; taking completely, at that +time, the same view of the whole subject which you have done; thinking +that the county would be well rid of such a man as Job Gregson, whether +he had committed this theft or not. Mr. Gray and I did not part quite +friends,” she continued, bowing towards him; “but it so happened that I +saw Job Gregson’s wife and home,—I felt that Mr. Gray had been right and +I had been wrong, so, with the famous inconsistency of my sex, I came +hither to scold you,” smiling towards Mr. Lathom, who looked half-sulky +yet, and did not relax a bit of his gravity at her smile, “for holding +the same opinions that I had done an hour before. Mr. Gray,” (again +bowing towards him) “these young ladies will be very much obliged to you +for your escort, and so shall I. Mr. Lathom, may I beg of you to +accompany me to Henley?” + +Mr. Gray bowed very low, and went very red; Mr. Lathom said something +which we none of us heard, but which was, I think, some remonstrance +against the course he was, as it were, compelled to take. Lady Ludlow, +however, took no notice of his murmur, but sat in an attitude of polite +expectancy; and as we turned off on our walk, I saw Mr. Lathom getting +into the coach with the air of a whipped hound. I must say, considering +my lady’s feeling, I did not envy him his ride—though, I believe, he was +quite in the right as to the object of the ride being illegal. + +Our walk home was very dull. We had no fears; and would far rather have +been without the awkward, blushing young man, into which Mr. Gray had +sunk. At every stile he hesitated,—sometimes he half got over it, +thinking that he could assist us better in that way; then he would turn +back unwilling to go before ladies. He had no ease of manner, as my lady +once said of him, though on any occasion of duty, he had an immense deal +of dignity. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +As far as I can remember, it was very soon after this that I first began +to have the pain in my hip, which has ended in making me a cripple for +life. I hardly recollect more than one walk after our return under Mr. +Gray’s escort from Mr. Lathom’s. Indeed, at the time, I was not without +suspicions (which I never named) that the beginning of all the mischief +was a great jump I had taken from the top of one of the stiles on that +very occasion. + +Well, it is a long while ago, and God disposes of us all, and I am not +going to tire you out with telling you how I thought and felt, and how, +when I saw what my life was to be, I could hardly bring myself to be +patient, but rather wished to die at once. You can every one of you +think for yourselves what becoming all at once useless and unable to +move, and by-and-by growing hopeless of cure, and feeling that one must +be a burden to some one all one’s life long, would be to an active, +wilful, strong girl of seventeen, anxious to get on in the world, so as, +if possible, to help her brothers and sisters. So I shall only say, that +one among the blessings which arose out of what seemed at the time a +great, black sorrow was, that Lady Ludlow for many years took me, as it +were, into her own especial charge; and now, as I lie still and alone in +my old age, it is such a pleasure to think of her! + +Mrs. Medlicott was great as a nurse, and I am sure I can never be +grateful enough to her memory for all her kindness. But she was puzzled +to know how to manage me in other ways. I used to have long, hard fits +of crying; and, thinking that I ought to go home—and yet what could they +do with me there?—and a hundred and fifty other anxious thoughts, some +of which I could tell to Mrs. Medlicott, and others I could not. Her way +of comforting me was hurrying away for some kind of tempting or +strengthening food—a basin of melted calves-foot jelly was, I am sure +she thought, a cure for every woe. + +“There take it, dear, take it!” she would say; “and don’t go on fretting +for what can’t be helped.” + +But, I think, she got puzzled at length at the non-efficacy of good +things to eat; and one day, after I had limped down to see the doctor, in +Mrs. Medlicott’s sitting-room—a room lined with cupboards, containing +preserves and dainties of all kinds, which she perpetually made, and +never touched herself—when I was returning to my bed-room to cry away +the afternoon, under pretence of arranging my clothes, John Footman +brought me a message from my lady (with whom the doctor had been having a +conversation) to bid me go to her in that private sitting-room at the end +of the suite of apartments, about which I spoke in describing the day of +my first arrival at Hanbury. I had hardly been in it since; as, when we +read to my lady, she generally sat in the small withdrawing-room out of +which this private room of hers opened. I suppose great people do not +require what we smaller people value so much,—I mean privacy. I do not +think that there was a room which my lady occupied that had not two +doors, and some of them had three or four. Then my lady had always Adams +waiting upon her in her bed-chamber; and it was Mrs. Medlicott’s duty to +sit within call, as it were, in a sort of anteroom that led out of my +lady’s own sitting-room, on the opposite side to the drawing-room door. +To fancy the house, you must take a great square and halve it by a line: +at one end of this line was the hall door, or public entrance; at the +opposite the private entrance from a terrace, which was terminated at one +end by a sort of postern door in an old gray stone wall, beyond which lay +the farm buildings and offices; so that people could come in this way to +my lady on business, while, if she were going into the garden from her +own room, she had nothing to do but to pass through Mrs. Medlicott’s +apartment, out into the lesser hall, and then turning to the right as she +passed on to the terrace, she could go down the flight of broad, shallow +steps at the corner of the house into the lovely garden, with stretching, +sweeping lawns, and gay flower-beds, and beautiful, bossy laurels, and +other blooming or massy shrubs, with full-grown beeches, or larches +feathering down to the ground a little farther off. The whole was set in +a frame, as it were, by the more distant woodlands. The house had been +modernized in the days of Queen Anne, I think; but the money had fallen +short that was requisite to carry out all the improvements, so it was +only the suite of withdrawing-rooms and the terrace-rooms, as far as the +private entrance, that had the new, long, high windows put in, and these +were old enough by this time to be draped with roses, and honeysuckles, +and pyracanthus, winter and summer long. + +Well, to go back to that day when I limped into my lady’s sitting-room, +trying hard to look as if I had not been crying, and not to walk as if I +was in much pain. I do not know whether my lady saw how near my tears +were to my eyes, but she told me she had sent for me, because she wanted +some help in arranging the drawers of her bureau, and asked me—just as +if it was a favour I was to do her—if I could sit down in the easy-chair +near the window—(all quietly arranged before I came in, with a +footstool, and a table quite near)—and assist her. You will wonder, +perhaps, why I was not bidden to sit or lie on the sofa; but (although I +found one there a morning or two afterwards, when I came down) the fact +was, that there was none in the room at this time. I have even fancied +that the easy-chair was brought in on purpose for me; for it was not the +chair in which I remembered my lady sitting the first time I saw her. +That chair was very much carved and gilded, with a countess’ coronet at +the top. I tried it one day, some time afterwards, when my lady was out +of the room, and I had a fancy for seeing how I could move about, and +very uncomfortable it was. Now my chair (as I learnt to call it, and to +think it) was soft and luxurious, and seemed somehow to give one’s body +rest just in that part where one most needed it. + +I was not at my ease that first day, nor indeed for many days afterwards, +notwithstanding my chair was so comfortable. Yet I forgot my sad pain in +silently wondering over the meaning of many of the things we turned out +of those curious old drawers. I was puzzled to know why some were kept +at all; a scrap of writing maybe, with only half a dozen common-place +words written on it, or a bit of broken riding-whip, and here and there a +stone, of which I thought I could have picked up twenty just as good in +the first walk I took. But it seems that was just my ignorance; for my +lady told me they were pieces of valuable marble, used to make the floors +of the great Roman emperors palaces long ago; and that when she had been +a girl, and made the grand tour long ago, her cousin Sir Horace Mann, the +Ambassador or Envoy at Florence, had told her to be sure to go into the +fields inside the walls of ancient Rome, when the farmers were preparing +the ground for the onion-sowing, and had to make the soil fine, and pick +up what bits of marble she could find. She had done so, and meant to +have had them made into a table; but somehow that plan fell through, and +there they were with all the dirt out of the onion-field upon them; but +once when I thought of cleaning them with soap and water, at any rate, +she bade me not to do so, for it was Roman dirt—earth, I think, she +called it—but it was dirt all the same. + +Then, in this bureau, were many other things, the value of which I could +understand—locks of hair carefully ticketed, which my lady looked at +very sadly; and lockets and bracelets with miniatures in them,—very +small pictures to what they make now-a-days, and called miniatures: some +of them had even to be looked at through a microscope before you could +see the individual expression of the faces, or how beautifully they were +painted. I don’t think that looking at these made may lady seem so +melancholy, as the seeing and touching of the hair did. But, to be sure, +the hair was, as it were, a part of some beloved body which she might +never touch and caress again, but which lay beneath the turf, all faded +and disfigured, except perhaps the very hair, from which the lock she +held had been dissevered; whereas the pictures were but pictures after +all—likenesses, but not the very things themselves. This is only my own +conjecture, mind. My lady rarely spoke out her feelings. For, to begin +with, she was of rank: and I have heard her say that people of rank do +not talk about their feelings except to their equals, and even to them +they conceal them, except upon rare occasions. Secondly,—and this is my +own reflection,—she was an only child and an heiress; and as such was +more apt to think than to talk, as all well-brought-up heiresses must be. +I think. Thirdly, she had long been a widow, without any companion of +her own age with whom it would have been natural for her to refer to old +associations, past pleasures, or mutual sorrows. Mrs. Medlicott came +nearest to her as a companion of this sort; and her ladyship talked more +to Mrs. Medlicott, in a kind of familiar way, than she did to all the +rest of the household put together. But Mrs. Medlicott was silent by +nature, and did not reply at any great length. Adams, indeed, was the +only one who spoke much to Lady Ludlow. + +After we had worked away about an hour at the bureau, her ladyship +said we had done enough for one day; and as the time was come for her +afternoon ride, she left me, with a volume of engravings from Mr. +Hogarth’s pictures on one side of me (I don’t like to write down the +names of them, though my lady thought nothing of it, I am sure), and +upon a stand her great prayer-book open at the evening psalms for the +day, on the other. But as soon as she was gone, I troubled myself +little with either, but amused myself with looking round the room at my +leisure. The side on which the fire-place stood was all panelled,—part +of the old ornaments of the house, for there was an Indian paper with +birds and beasts and insects on it, on all the other sides. There +were coats of arms, of the various families with whom the Hanburys +had intermarried, all over these panels, and up and down the ceiling +as well. There was very little looking-glass in the room, though one +of the great drawing-rooms was called the “Mirror Room,” because it +was lined with glass, which my lady’s great-grandfather had brought +from Venice when he was ambassador there. There were china jars of all +shapes and sizes round and about the room, and some china monsters, or +idols, of which I could never bear the sight, they were so ugly, though +I think my lady valued them more than all. There was a thick carpet on +the middle of the floor, which was made of small pieces of rare wood +fitted into a pattern; the doors were opposite to each other, and were +composed of two heavy tall wings, and opened in the middle, moving on +brass grooves inserted into the floor—they would not have opened over +a carpet. There were two windows reaching up nearly to the ceiling, +but very narrow and with deep window-seats in the thickness of the +wall. The room was full of scent, partly from the flowers outside, and +partly from the great jars of pot-pourri inside. The choice of odours +was what my lady piqued herself upon, saying nothing showed birth like +a keen susceptibility of smell. We never named musk in her presence, +her antipathy to it was so well understood through the household: +her opinion on the subject was believed to be, that no scent derived +from an animal could ever be of a sufficiently pure nature to give +pleasure to any person of good family, where, of course, the delicate +perception of the senses had been cultivated for generations. She would +instance the way in which sportsmen preserve the breed of dogs who have +shown keen scent; and how such gifts descend for generations amongst +animals, who cannot be supposed to have anything of ancestral pride, +or hereditary fancies about them. Musk, then, was never mentioned +at Hanbury Court. No more were bergamot or southern-wood, although +vegetable in their nature. She considered these two latter as betraying +a vulgar taste in the person who chose to gather or wear them. She was +sorry to notice sprigs of them in the button-hole of any young man in +whom she took an interest, either because he was engaged to a servant +of hers or otherwise, as he came out of church on a Sunday afternoon. +She was afraid that he liked coarse pleasures; and I am not sure if +she did not think that his preference for these coarse sweetnesses +did not imply a probability that he would take to drinking. But she +distinguished between vulgar and common. Violets, pinks, and sweetbriar +were common enough; roses and mignionette, for those who had gardens, +honeysuckle for those who walked along the bowery lanes; but wearing +them betrayed no vulgarity of taste: the queen upon her throne might be +glad to smell at a nosegay of the flowers. A beau-pot (as we called +it) of pinks and roses freshly gathered was placed every morning that +they were in bloom on my lady’s own particular table. For lasting +vegetable odours she preferred lavender and sweet woodroof to any +extract whatever. Lavender reminded her of old customs, she said, and +of homely cottage-gardens, and many a cottager made his offering to her +of a bundle of lavender. Sweet woodroof, again, grew in wild, woodland +places where the soil was fine and the air delicate: the poor children +used to go and gather it for her up in the woods on the higher lands; +and for this service she always rewarded them with bright new pennies, +of which my lord, her son, used to send her down a bagful fresh from +the Mint in London every February. + +Attar of roses, again, she disliked. She said it reminded her of the +city and of merchants’ wives, over-rich, over-heavy in its perfume. And +lilies-of-the-valley somehow fell under the same condemnation. They were +most graceful and elegant to look at (my lady was quite candid about +this), flower, leaf, colour—everything was refined about them but the +smell. That was too strong. But the great hereditary faculty on which +my lady piqued herself, and with reason, for I never met with any person +who possessed it, was the power she had of perceiving the delicious odour +arising from a bed of strawberries in the late autumn, when the leaves +were all fading and dying. “Bacon’s Essays” was one of the few books +that lay about in my lady’s room; and if you took it up and opened it +carelessly, it was sure to fall apart at his “Essay on Gardens.” +“Listen,” her ladyship would say, “to what that great philosopher and +statesman says. ‘Next to that,’—he is speaking of violets, my dear,—‘is +the musk-rose,’—of which you remember the great bush, at the corner of +the south wall just by the Blue Drawing-room windows; that is the old +musk-rose, Shakespeare’s musk-rose, which is dying out through the +kingdom now. But to return to my Lord Bacon: ‘Then the strawberry +leaves, dying with a most excellent cordial smell.’ Now the Hanburys can +always smell this excellent cordial odour, and very delicious and +refreshing it is. You see, in Lord Bacon’s time, there had not been so +many intermarriages between the court and the city as there have been +since the needy days of his Majesty Charles the Second; and altogether in +the time of Queen Elizabeth, the great, old families of England were a +distinct race, just as a cart-horse is one creature, and very useful in +its place, and Childers or Eclipse is another creature, though both are +of the same species. So the old families have gifts and powers of a +different and higher class to what the other orders have. My dear, +remember that you try if you can smell the scent of dying +strawberry-leaves in this next autumn. You have some of Ursula Hanbury’s +blood in you, and that gives you a chance.” + +But when October came, I sniffed and sniffed, and all to no purpose; and +my lady—who had watched the little experiment rather anxiously—had to +give me up as a hybrid. I was mortified, I confess, and thought that it +was in some ostentation of her own powers that she ordered the gardener +to plant a border of strawberries on that side of the terrace that lay +under her windows. + +I have wandered away from time and place. I tell you all the +remembrances I have of those years just as they come up, and I hope that, +in my old age, I am not getting too like a certain Mrs. Nickleby, whose +speeches were once read out aloud to me. + +I came by degrees to be all day long in this room which I have been +describing; sometimes sitting in the easy-chair, doing some little piece +of dainty work for my lady, or sometimes arranging flowers, or sorting +letters according to their handwriting, so that she could arrange them +afterwards, and destroy or keep, as she planned, looking ever onward to +her death. Then, after the sofa was brought in, she would watch my face, +and if she saw my colour change, she would bid me lie down and rest. And +I used to try to walk upon the terrace every day for a short time: it +hurt me very much, it is true, but the doctor had ordered it, and I knew +her ladyship wished me to obey. + +Before I had seen the background of a great lady’s life, I had thought it +all play and fine doings. But whatever other grand people are, my lady +was never idle. For one thing, she had to superintend the agent for the +large Hanbury estate. I believe it was mortgaged for a sum of money +which had gone to improve the late lord’s Scotch lands; but she was +anxious to pay off this before her death, and so to leave her own +inheritance free of incumbrance to her son, the present Earl; whom, I +secretly think, she considered a greater person, as being the heir of the +Hanburys (though through a female line), than as being my Lord Ludlow +with half a dozen other minor titles. + +With this wish of releasing her property from the mortgage, skilful +care was much needed in the management of it; and as far as my lady +could go, she took every pains. She had a great book, in which every +page was ruled into three divisions; on the first column was written +the date and the name of the tenant who addressed any letter on +business to her; on the second was briefly stated the subject of the +letter, which generally contained a request of some kind. This request +would be surrounded and enveloped in so many words, and often inserted +amidst so many odd reasons and excuses, that Mr. Horner (the steward) +would sometimes say it was like hunting through a bushel of chaff +to find a grain of wheat. Now, in the second column of this book, +the grain of meaning was placed, clean and dry, before her ladyship +every morning. She sometimes would ask to see the original letter; +sometimes she simply answered the request by a “Yes,” or a “No;” and +often she would send for lenses and papers, and examine them well, with +Mr. Horner at her elbow, to see if such petitions, as to be allowed +to plough up pasture fields, were provided for in the terms of the +original agreement. On every Thursday she made herself at liberty to +see her tenants, from four to six in the afternoon. Mornings would have +suited my lady better, as far as convenience went, and I believe the +old custom had been to have these levees (as her ladyship used to call +them) held before twelve. But, as she said to Mr. Horner, when he urged +returning to the former hours, it spoilt a whole day for a farmer, if +he had to dress himself in his best and leave his work in the forenoon +(and my lady liked to see her tenants come in their Sunday clothes; +she would not say a word, maybe, but she would take her spectacles +slowly out, and put them on with silent gravity, and look at a dirty or +raggedly-dressed man so solemnly and earnestly, that his nerves must +have been pretty strong if he did not wince, and resolve that, however +poor he might be, soap and water, and needle and thread, should be used +before he again appeared in her ladyship’s anteroom). The outlying +tenants had always a supper provided for them in the servants’-hall on +Thursdays, to which, indeed all comers were welcome to sit down. For +my lady said, though there were not many hours left of a working man’s +day when their business with her was ended, yet that they needed food +and rest, and that she should be ashamed if they sought either at the +Fighting Lion (called at this day the Hanbury Arms). They had as much +beer as they could drink while they were eating; and when the food was +cleared away, they had a cup a piece of good ale, in which the oldest +tenant present, standing up, gave Madam’s health; and after that was +drunk, they were expected to set off homewards; at any rate, no more +liquor was given them. The tenants one and all called her “Madam;” +for they recognized in her the married heiress of the Hanburys, not +the widow of a Lord Ludlow, of whom they and their forefathers knew +nothing; and against whose memory, indeed, there rankled a dim unspoken +grudge, the cause of which was accurately known to the very few who +understood the nature of a mortgage, and were therefore aware that +Madam’s money had been taken to enrich my lord’s poor land in Scotland. +I am sure—for you can understand I was behind the scenes, as it were, +and had many an opportunity of seeing and hearing, as I lay or sat +motionless in my lady’s room with the double doors open between it +and the anteroom beyond, where Lady Ludlow saw her steward, and gave +audience to her tenants,—I am certain, I say, that Mr. Horner was +silently as much annoyed at the money that was swallowed up by this +mortgage as any one; and, some time or other, he had probably spoken +his mind out to my lady; for there was a sort of offended reference +on her part, and respectful submission to blame on his, while every +now and then there was an implied protest—whenever the payments of +the interest became due, or whenever my lady stinted herself of any +personal expense, such as Mr. Horner thought was only decorous and +becoming in the heiress of the Hanburys. Her carriages were old and +cumbrous, wanting all the improvements which had been adopted by those +of her rank throughout the county. Mr. Horner would fain have had the +ordering of a new coach. The carriage-horses, too, were getting past +their work; yet all the promising colts bred on the estate were sold +for ready money; and so on. My lord, her son, was ambassador at some +foreign place; and very proud we all were of his glory and dignity; +but I fancy it cost money, and my lady would have lived on bread and +water sooner than have called upon him to help her in paying off the +mortgage, although he was the one who was to benefit by it in the end. + +Mr. Horner was a very faithful steward, and very respectful to my lady; +although sometimes, I thought she was sharper to him than to any one +else; perhaps because she knew that, although he never said anything, he +disapproved of the Hanburys being made to pay for the Earl Ludlow’s +estates and state. + +The late lord had been a sailor, and had been as extravagant in his +habits as most sailors are, I am told,—for I never saw the sea; and yet +he had a long sight to his own interests; but whatever he was, my lady +loved him and his memory, with about as fond and proud a love as ever +wife gave husband, I should think. + +For a part of his life Mr. Horner, who was born on the Hanbury property, +had been a clerk to an attorney in Birmingham; and these few years had +given him a kind of worldly wisdom, which, though always exerted for her +benefit, was antipathetic to her ladyship, who thought that some of her +steward’s maxims savoured of trade and commerce. I fancy that if it had +been possible, she would have preferred a return to the primitive system, +of living on the produce of the land, and exchanging the surplus for such +articles as were needed, without the intervention of money. + +But Mr. Horner was bitten with new-fangled notions, as she would say, +though his new-fangled notions were what folk at the present day would +think sadly behindhand; and some of Mr. Gray’s ideas fell on Mr. Horner’s +mind like sparks on tow, though they started from two different points. +Mr. Horner wanted to make every man useful and active in this world, and +to direct as much activity and usefulness as possible to the improvement +of the Hanbury estates, and the aggrandisement of the Hanbury family, and +therefore he fell into the new cry for education. + +Mr. Gray did not care much,—Mr. Horner thought not enough,—for this +world, and where any man or family stood in their earthly position; but +he would have every one prepared for the world to come, and capable of +understanding and receiving certain doctrines, for which latter purpose, +it stands to reason, he must have heard of these doctrines; and therefore +Mr. Gray wanted education. The answer in the Catechism that Mr. Horner +was most fond of calling upon a child to repeat, was that to, “What is +thy duty towards thy neighbour?” The answer Mr. Gray liked best to hear +repeated with unction, was that to the question, “What is the inward and +spiritual grace?” The reply to which Lady Ludlow bent her head the +lowest, as we said our Catechism to her on Sundays, was to, “What is thy +duty towards God?” But neither Mr. Horner nor Mr. Gray had heard many +answers to the Catechism as yet. + +Up to this time there was no Sunday-school in Hanbury. Mr. Gray’s +desires were bounded by that object. Mr. Horner looked farther on: he +hoped for a day-school at some future time, to train up intelligent +labourers for working on the estate. My lady would hear of neither one +nor the other: indeed, not the boldest man whom she ever saw would have +dared to name the project of a day-school within her hearing. + +So Mr. Horner contented himself with quietly teaching a sharp, clever lad +to read and write, with a view to making use of him as a kind of foreman +in process of time. He had his pick of the farm-lads for this purpose; +and, as the brightest and sharpest, although by far the raggedest and +dirtiest, singled out Job Gregson’s son. But all this—as my lady never +listened to gossip, or indeed, was spoken to unless she spoke first—was +quite unknown to her, until the unlucky incident took place which I am +going to relate. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +I think my lady was not aware of Mr. Horner’s views on education (as +making men into more useful members of society), or the practice to which +he was putting his precepts in taking Harry Gregson as pupil and protege; +if, indeed, she were aware of Harry’s distinct existence at all, until +the following unfortunate occasion. The anteroom, which was a kind of +business-place for my lady to receive her steward and tenants in, was +surrounded by shelves. I cannot call them book-shelves, though there +were many books on them; but the contents of the volumes were principally +manuscript, and relating to details connected with the Hanbury property. +There were also one or two dictionaries, gazetteers, works of reference +on the management of property; all of a very old date (the dictionary was +Bailey’s, I remember; we had a great Johnson in my lady’s room, but where +lexicographers differed, she generally preferred Bailey). + +In this antechamber a footman generally sat, awaiting orders from my +lady; for she clung to the grand old customs, and despised any bells, +except her own little hand-bell, as modern inventions; she would have her +people always within summons of this silvery bell, or her scarce less +silvery voice. This man had not the sinecure you might imagine. He had +to reply to the private entrance; what we should call the back door in a +smaller house. As none came to the front door but my lady, and those of +the county whom she honoured by visiting, and her nearest acquaintance of +this kind lived eight miles (of bad road) off, the majority of comers +knocked at the nail-studded terrace-door; not to have it opened (for open +it stood, by my lady’s orders, winter and summer, so that the snow often +drifted into the back hall, and lay there in heaps when the weather was +severe), but to summon some one to receive their message, or carry their +request to be allowed to speak to my lady. I remember it was long before +Mr. Gray could be made to understand that the great door was only open on +state occasions, and even to the last he would as soon come in by that as +the terrace entrance. I had been received there on my first setting foot +over my lady’s threshold; every stranger was led in by that way the first +time they came; but after that (with the exceptions I have named) they +went round by the terrace, as it were by instinct. It was an assistance +to this instinct to be aware that from time immemorial, the magnificent +and fierce Hanbury wolf-hounds, which were extinct in every other part of +the island, had been and still were kept chained in the front quadrangle, +where they bayed through a great part of the day and night and were +always ready with their deep, savage growl at the sight of every person +and thing, excepting the man who fed them, my lady’s carriage and four, +and my lady herself. It was pretty to see her small figure go up to the +great, crouching brutes thumping the flags with their heavy, wagging +tails, and slobbering in an ecstacy of delight, at her light approach and +soft caress. She had no fear of them; but she was a Hanbury born, and +the tale went, that they and their kind knew all Hanburys instantly, and +acknowledged their supremacy, ever since the ancestors of the breed had +been brought from the East by the great Sir Urian Hanbury, who lay with +his legs crossed on the altar-tomb in the church. Moreover, it was +reported that, not fifty years before, one of these dogs had eaten up a +child, which had inadvertently strayed within reach of its chain. So you +may imagine how most people preferred the terrace-door. Mr. Gray did not +seem to care for the dogs. It might be absence of mind, for I have heard +of his starting away from their sudden spring when he had unwittingly +walked within reach of their chains: but it could hardly have been +absence of mind, when one day he went right up to one of them, and patted +him in the most friendly manner, the dog meanwhile looking pleased, and +affably wagging his tail, just as if Mr. Gray had been a Hanbury. We +were all very much puzzled by this, and to this day I have not been able +to account for it. + +But now let us go back to the terrace-door, and the footman sitting in +the antechamber. + +One morning we heard a parleying, which rose to such a vehemence, and +lasted for so long, that my lady had to ring her hand-bell twice before +the footman heard it. + +“What is the matter, John?” asked she, when he entered, + +“A little boy, my lady, who says he comes from Mr. Horner, and must see +your ladyship. Impudent little lad!” (This last to himself.) + +“What does he want?” + +“That’s just what I have asked him, my lady, but he won’t tell me, please +your ladyship.” + +“It is, probably, some message from Mr. Horner,” said Lady Ludlow, with +just a shade of annoyance in her manner; for it was against all etiquette +to send a message to her, and by such a messenger too! + +“No! please your ladyship, I asked him if he had any message, and he said +no, he had none; but he must see your ladyship for all that.” + +“You had better show him in then, without more words,” said her ladyship, +quietly, but still, as I have said, rather annoyed. + +As if in mockery of the humble visitor, the footman threw open both +battants of the door, and in the opening there stood a lithe, wiry lad, +with a thick head of hair, standing out in every direction, as if stirred +by some electrical current, a short, brown face, red now from affright +and excitement, wide, resolute mouth, and bright, deep-set eyes, which +glanced keenly and rapidly round the room, as if taking in everything +(and all was new and strange), to be thought and puzzled over at some +future time. He knew enough of manners not to speak first to one above +him in rank, or else he was afraid. + +“What do you want with me?” asked my lady; in so gentle a tone that it +seemed to surprise and stun him. + +“An’t please your ladyship?” said he, as if he had been deaf. + +“You come from Mr. Horner’s: why do you want to see me?” again asked she, +a little more loudly. + +“An’t please your ladyship, Mr. Horner was sent for all on a sudden to +Warwick this morning.” + +His face began to work; but he felt it, and closed his lips into a +resolute form. + +“Well?” + +“And he went off all on a sudden like.” + +“Well?” + +“And he left a note for your ladyship with me, your ladyship.” + +“Is that all? You might have given it to the footman.” + +“Please your ladyship, I’ve clean gone and lost it.” + +He never took his eyes off her face. If he had not kept his look fixed, +he would have burst out crying. + +“That was very careless,” said my lady gently. “But I am sure you are +very sorry for it. You had better try and find it; it may have been of +consequence. + +“Please, mum—please your ladyship—I can say it off by heart.” + +“You! What do you mean?” I was really afraid now. My lady’s blue eyes +absolutely gave out light, she was so much displeased, and, moreover, +perplexed. The more reason he had for affright, the more his courage +rose. He must have seen,—so sharp a lad must have perceived her +displeasure; but he went on quickly and steadily. + +“Mr. Horner, my lady, has taught me to read, write, and cast accounts, my +lady. And he was in a hurry, and he folded his paper up, but he did not +seal it; and I read it, my lady; and now, my lady, it seems like as if I +had got it off by heart;” and he went on with a high pitched voice, +saying out very loud what, I have no doubt, were the identical words of +the letter, date, signature and all: it was merely something about a +deed, which required my lady’s signature. + +When he had done, he stood almost as if he expected commendation for his +accurate memory. + +My lady’s eyes contracted till the pupils were as needle-points; it was a +way she had when much disturbed. She looked at me and said— + +“Margaret Dawson, what will this world come to?” And then she was +silent. + +The lad, beginning to perceive he had given deep offence, stood stock +still—as if his brave will had brought him into this presence, and +impelled him to confession, and the best amends he could make, but had +now deserted him, or was extinct, and left his body motionless, until +some one else with word or deed made him quit the room. My lady looked +again at him, and saw the frowning, dumb-foundering terror at his +misdeed, and the manner in which his confession had been received. + +“My poor lad!” said she, the angry look leaving her face, “into whose +hands have you fallen?” + +The boy’s lips began to quiver. + +“Don’t you know what tree we read of in Genesis?—No! I hope you have +not got to read so easily as that.” A pause. “Who has taught you to +read and write?” + +“Please, my lady, I meant no harm, my lady.” He was fairly blubbering, +overcome by her evident feeling of dismay and regret, the soft repression +of which was more frightening to him than any strong or violent words +would have been. + +“Who taught you, I ask?” + +“It were Mr. Horner’s clerk who learned me, my lady.” + +“And did Mr. Horner know of it?” + +“Yes, my lady. And I am sure I thought for to please him.” + +“Well! perhaps you were not to blame for that. But I wonder at Mr. +Horner. However, my boy, as you have got possession of edge-tools, you +must have some rules how to use them. Did you never hear that you were +not to open letters?” + +“Please, my lady, it were open. Mr. Horner forgot for to seal it, in his +hurry to be off.” + +“But you must not read letters that are not intended for you. You must +never try to read any letters that are not directed to you, even if they +be open before you.” + +“Please, may lady, I thought it were good for practice, all as one as a +book.” + +My lady looked bewildered as to what way she could farther explain to him +the laws of honour as regarded letters. + +“You would not listen, I am sure,” said she, “to anything you were not +intended to hear?” + +He hesitated for a moment, partly because he did not fully comprehend the +question. My lady repeated it. The light of intelligence came into his +eager eyes, and I could see that he was not certain if he could tell the +truth. + +“Please, my lady, I always hearken when I hear folk talking secrets; but +I mean no harm.” + +My poor lady sighed: she was not prepared to begin a long way off in +morals. Honour was, to her, second nature, and she had never tried to +find out on what principle its laws were based. So, telling the lad that +she wished to see Mr. Horner when he returned from Warwick, she dismissed +him with a despondent look; he, meanwhile, right glad to be out of the +awful gentleness of her presence. + +“What is to be done?” said she, half to herself and half to me. I could +not answer, for I was puzzled myself. + +“It was a right word,” she continued, “that I used, when I called reading +and writing ‘edge-tools.’ If our lower orders have these edge-tools +given to them, we shall have the terrible scenes of the French Revolution +acted over again in England. When I was a girl, one never heard of the +rights of men, one only heard of the duties. Now, here was Mr. Gray, +only last night, talking of the right every child had to instruction. I +could hardly keep my patience with him, and at length we fairly came to +words; and I told him I would have no such thing as a Sunday-school (or a +Sabbath-school, as he calls it, just like a Jew) in my village.” + +“And what did he say, my lady?” I asked; for the struggle that seemed now +to have come to a crisis, had been going on for some time in a quiet way. + +“Why, he gave way to temper, and said he was bound to remember, he was +under the bishop’s authority, not under mine; and implied that he should +persevere in his designs, notwithstanding my expressed opinion.” + +“And your ladyship—” I half inquired. + +“I could only rise and curtsey, and civilly dismiss him. When two +persons have arrived at a certain point of expression on a subject, about +which they differ as materially as I do from Mr. Gray, the wisest course, +if they wish to remain friends, is to drop the conversation entirely and +suddenly. It is one of the few cases where abruptness is desirable.” + +I was sorry for Mr. Gray. He had been to see me several times, and had +helped me to bear my illness in a better spirit than I should have done +without his good advice and prayers. And I had gathered from little +things he said, how much his heart was set upon this new scheme. I liked +him so much, and I loved and respected my lady so well, that I could not +bear them to be on the cool terms to which they were constantly getting. +Yet I could do nothing but keep silence. + +I suppose my lady understood something of what was passing in my mind; +for, after a minute or two, she went on:— + +“If Mr. Gray knew all I know,—if he had my experience, he would not be +so ready to speak of setting up his new plans in opposition to my +judgment. Indeed,” she continued, lashing herself up with her own +recollections, “times are changed when the parson of a village comes to +beard the liege lady in her own house. Why, in my grandfather’s days, +the parson was family chaplain too, and dined at the Hall every Sunday. +He was helped last, and expected to have done first. I remember seeing +him take up his plate and knife and fork, and say with his mouth full all +the time he was speaking: ‘If you please, Sir Urian, and my lady, I’ll +follow the beef into the housekeeper’s room;’ for you see, unless he did +so, he stood no chance of a second helping. A greedy man, that parson +was, to be sure! I recollect his once eating up the whole of some little +bird at dinner, and by way of diverting attention from his greediness, he +told how he had heard that a rook soaked in vinegar and then dressed in a +particular way, could not be distinguished from the bird he was then +eating. I saw by the grim look of my grandfather’s face that the +parson’s doing and saying displeased him; and, child as I was, I had some +notion of what was coming, when, as I was riding out on my little, white +pony, by my grandfather’s side, the next Friday, he stopped one of the +gamekeepers, and bade him shoot one of the oldest rooks he could find. I +knew no more about it till Sunday, when a dish was set right before the +parson, and Sir Urian said: ‘Now, Parson Hemming, I have had a rook shot, +and soaked in vinegar, and dressed as you described last Sunday. Fall +to, man, and eat it with as good an appetite as you had last Sunday. Pick +the bones clean, or by—, no more Sunday dinners shall you eat at my +table!’ I gave one look at poor Mr. Hemming’s face, as he tried to +swallow the first morsel, and make believe as though he thought it very +good; but I could not look again, for shame, although my grandfather +laughed, and kept asking us all round if we knew what could have become +of the parson’s appetite.” + +“And did he finish it?” I asked. + +“O yes, my dear. What my grandfather said was to be done, was done +always. He was a terrible man in his anger! But to think of the +difference between Parson Hemming and Mr. Gray! or even of poor dear Mr. +Mountford and Mr. Gray. Mr. Mountford would never have withstood me as +Mr. Gray did!” + +“And your ladyship really thinks that it would not be right to have a +Sunday-school?” I asked, feeling very timid as I put time question. + +“Certainly not. As I told Mr. Gray. I consider a knowledge of the +Creed, and of the Lord’s Prayer, as essential to salvation; and that +any child may have, whose parents bring it regularly to church. Then +there are the Ten Commandments, which teach simple duties in the +plainest language. Of course, if a lad is taught to read and write (as +that unfortunate boy has been who was here this morning) his duties +become complicated, and his temptations much greater, while, at the +same time, he has no hereditary principles and honourable training to +serve as safeguards. I might take up my old simile of the race-horse +and cart-horse. I am distressed,” continued she, with a break in her +ideas, “about that boy. The whole thing reminds me so much of a story +of what happened to a friend of mine—Clement de Crequy. Did I ever tell +you about him?” + +“No, your ladyship,” I replied. + +“Poor Clement! More than twenty years ago, Lord Ludlow and I spent a +winter in Paris. He had many friends there; perhaps not very good or +very wise men, but he was so kind that he liked every one, and every +one liked him. We had an apartment, as they call it there, in the Rue +de Lille; we had the first-floor of a grand hotel, with the basement +for our servants. On the floor above us the owner of the house lived, a +Marquise de Crequy, a widow. They tell me that the Crequy coat-of-arms +is still emblazoned, after all these terrible years, on a shield above +the arched porte-cochere, just as it was then, though the family is +quite extinct. Madame de Crequy had only one son, Clement, who was +just the same age as my Urian—you may see his portrait in the great +hall—Urian’s, I mean.” I knew that Master Urian had been drowned at +sea; and often had I looked at the presentment of his bonny hopeful +face, in his sailor’s dress, with right hand outstretched to a ship +on the sea in the distance, as if he had just said, “Look at her! all +her sails are set, and I’m just off.” Poor Master Urian! he went down +in this very ship not a year after the picture was taken! But now I +will go back to my lady’s story. “I can see those two boys playing +now,” continued she, softly, shutting her eyes, as if the better +to call up the vision, “as they used to do five-and-twenty years +ago in those old-fashioned French gardens behind our hotel. Many a +time have I watched them from my windows. It was, perhaps, a better +play-place than an English garden would have been, for there were but +few flower-beds, and no lawn at all to speak about; but, instead, +terraces and balustrades and vases and flights of stone steps more in +the Italian style; and there were jets-d’eau, and little fountains that +could be set playing by turning water-cocks that were hidden here and +there. How Clement delighted in turning the water on to surprise Urian, +and how gracefully he did the honours, as it were, to my dear, rough, +sailor lad! Urian was as dark as a gipsy boy, and cared little for his +appearance, and resisted all my efforts at setting off his black eyes +and tangled curls; but Clement, without ever showing that he thought +about himself and his dress, was always dainty and elegant, even though +his clothes were sometimes but threadbare. He used to be dressed in a +kind of hunter’s green suit, open at the neck and half-way down the +chest to beautiful old lace frills; his long golden curls fell behind +just like a girl’s, and his hair in front was cut over his straight +dark eyebrows in a line almost as straight. Urian learnt more of a +gentleman’s carefulness and propriety of appearance from that lad in +two months than he had done in years from all my lectures. I recollect +one day, when the two boys were in full romp—and, my window being +open, I could hear them perfectly—and Urian was daring Clement to some +scrambling or climbing, which Clement refused to undertake, but in a +hesitating way, as though he longed to do it if some reason had not +stood in the way; and at times, Urian, who was hasty and thoughtless, +poor fellow, told Clement that he was afraid. ‘Fear!’ said the French +boy, drawing himself up; ‘you do not know what you say. If you will +be here at six to-morrow morning, when it is only just light, I will +take that starling’s nest on the top of yonder chimney.’ ‘But why not +now, Clement?’ said Urian, putting his arm round Clement’s neck. ‘Why +then, and not now, just when we are in the humour for it?’ ‘Because we +De Crequys are poor, and my mother cannot afford me another suit of +clothes this year, and yonder stone carving is all jagged, and would +tear my coat and breeches. Now, to-morrow morning I could go up with +nothing on but an old shirt.’ + +“‘But you would tear your legs.’ + +“‘My race do not care for pain,’ said the boy, drawing himself from +Urian’s arm, and walking a few steps away, with a becoming pride and +reserve; for he was hurt at being spoken to as if he were afraid, and +annoyed at having to confess the true reason for declining the feat. But +Urian was not to be thus baffled. He went up to Clement, and put his arm +once more about his neck, and I could see the two lads as they walked +down the terrace away from the hotel windows: first Urian spoke eagerly, +looking with imploring fondness into Clement’s face, which sought the +ground, till at last the French boy spoke, and by-and-by his arm was +round Urian too, and they paced backwards and forwards in deep talk, but +gravely, as became men, rather than boys. + +“All at once, from the little chapel at the corner of the large garden +belonging to the Missions Etrangeres, I heard the tinkle of the little +bell, announcing the elevation of the host. Down on his knees went +Clement, hands crossed, eyes bent down: while Urian stood looking on in +respectful thought. + +“What a friendship that might have been! I never dream of Urian without +seeing Clement too—Urian speaks to me, or does something,—but Clement +only flits round Urian, and never seems to see any one else!” + +“But I must not forget to tell you, that the next morning, before he was +out of his room, a footman of Madame de Crequy’s brought Urian the +starling’s nest.” + +“Well! we came back to England, and the boys were to correspond; and +Madame de Crequy and I exchanged civilities; and Urian went to sea.” + +“After that, all seemed to drop away. I cannot tell you all. However, +to confine myself to the De Crequys. I had a letter from Clement; I knew +he felt his friend’s death deeply; but I should never have learnt it from +the letter he sent. It was formal, and seemed like chaff to my hungering +heart. Poor fellow! I dare say he had found it hard to write. What +could he—or any one—say to a mother who has lost her child? The world +does not think so, and, in general, one must conform to the customs of +the world; but, judging from my own experience, I should say that +reverent silence at such times is the tenderest balm. Madame de Crequy +wrote too. But I knew she could not feel my loss so much as Clement, and +therefore her letter was not such a disappointment. She and I went on +being civil and polite in the way of commissions, and occasionally +introducing friends to each other, for a year or two, and then we ceased +to have any intercourse. Then the terrible Revolution came. No one who +did not live at those times can imagine the daily expectation of news—the +hourly terror of rumours affecting the fortunes and lives of those whom +most of us had known as pleasant hosts, receiving us with peaceful +welcome in their magnificent houses. Of course, there was sin enough and +suffering enough behind the scenes; but we English visitors to Paris had +seen little or nothing of that,—and I had sometimes thought, indeed, how +even death seemed loth to choose his victims out of that brilliant throng +whom I had known. Madame de Crequy’s one boy lived; while three out of +my six were gone since we had met! I do not think all lots are equal, +even now that I know the end of her hopes; but I do say that whatever our +individual lot is, it is our duty to accept it, without comparing it with +that of others. + +“The times were thick with gloom and terror. ‘What next?’ was the +question we asked of every one who brought us news from Paris. Where +were these demons hidden when, so few years ago, we danced and feasted, +and enjoyed the brilliant salons and the charming friendships of Paris? + +“One evening, I was sitting alone in Saint James’s Square; my lord off at +the club with Mr. Fox and others: he had left me, thinking that I should +go to one of the many places to which I had been invited for that +evening; but I had no heart to go anywhere, for it was poor Urian’s +birthday, and I had not even rung for lights, though the day was fast +closing in, but was thinking over all his pretty ways, and on his warm +affectionate nature, and how often I had been too hasty in speaking to +him, for all I loved him so dearly; and how I seemed to have neglected +and dropped his dear friend Clement, who might even now be in need of +help in that cruel, bloody Paris. I say I was thinking reproachfully of +all this, and particularly of Clement de Crequy in connection with Urian, +when Fenwick brought me a note, sealed with a coat-of-arms I knew well, +though I could not remember at the moment where I had seen it. I puzzled +over it, as one does sometimes, for a minute or more, before I opened the +letter. In a moment I saw it was from Clement de Crequy. ‘My mother is +here,’ he said: ‘she is very ill, and I am bewildered in this strange +country. May I entreat you to receive me for a few minutes?’ The bearer +of the note was the woman of the house where they lodged. I had her +brought up into the anteroom, and questioned her myself, while my +carriage was being brought round. They had arrived in London a fortnight +or so before: she had not known their quality, judging them (according to +her kind) by their dress and their luggage; poor enough, no doubt. The +lady had never left her bed-room since her arrival; the young man waited +upon her, did everything for her, never left her, in fact; only she (the +messenger) had promised to stay within call, as soon as she returned, +while he went out somewhere. She could hardly understand him, he spoke +English so badly. He had never spoken it, I dare say, since he had +talked to my Urian.” + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + +“In the hurry of the moment I scarce knew what I did. I bade the +housekeeper put up every delicacy she had, in order to tempt the invalid, +whom yet I hoped to bring back with me to our house. When the carriage +was ready I took the good woman with me to show us the exact way, which +my coachman professed not to know; for, indeed, they were staying at but +a poor kind of place at the back of Leicester Square, of which they had +heard, as Clement told me afterwards, from one of the fishermen who had +carried them across from the Dutch coast in their disguises as a +Friesland peasant and his mother. They had some jewels of value +concealed round their persons; but their ready money was all spent before +I saw them, and Clement had been unwilling to leave his mother, even for +the time necessary to ascertain the best mode of disposing of the +diamonds. For, overcome with distress of mind and bodily fatigue, she +had reached London only to take to her bed in a sort of low, nervous +fever, in which her chief and only idea seemed to be that Clement was +about to be taken from her to some prison or other; and if he were out of +her sight, though but for a minute, she cried like a child, and could not +be pacified or comforted. The landlady was a kind, good woman, and +though she but half understood the case, she was truly sorry for them, as +foreigners, and the mother sick in a strange land. + +“I sent her forwards to request permission for my entrance. In a moment +I saw Clement—a tall, elegant young man, in a curious dress of coarse +cloth, standing at the open door of a room, and evidently—even before he +accosted me—striving to soothe the terrors of his mother inside. I went +towards him, and would have taken his hand, but he bent down and kissed +mine. + +“‘May I come in, madame?’ I asked, looking at the poor sick lady, lying +in the dark, dingy bed, her head propped up on coarse and dirty pillows, +and gazing with affrighted eyes at all that was going on. + +“‘Clement! Clement! come to me!’ she cried; and when he went to the +bedside she turned on one side, and took his hand in both of hers, and +began stroking it, and looking up in his face. I could scarce keep back +my tears. + +“He stood there quite still, except that from time to time he spoke to +her in a low tone. At last I advanced into the room, so that I could +talk to him, without renewing her alarm. I asked for the doctor’s +address; for I had heard that they had called in some one, at their +landlady’s recommendation: but I could hardly understand Clement’s broken +English, and mispronunciation of our proper names, and was obliged to +apply to the woman herself. I could not say much to Clement, for his +attention was perpetually needed by his mother, who never seemed to +perceive that I was there. But I told him not to fear, however long I +might be away, for that I would return before night; and, bidding the +woman take charge of all the heterogeneous things the housekeeper had put +up, and leaving one of my men in the house, who could understand a few +words of French, with directions that he was to hold himself at Madame de +Crequy’s orders until I sent or gave him fresh commands, I drove off to +the doctor’s. What I wanted was his permission to remove Madame de +Crequy to my own house, and to learn how it best could be done; for I saw +that every movement in the room, every sound except Clement’s voice, +brought on a fresh access of trembling and nervous agitation. + +“The doctor was, I should think, a clever man; but he had that kind of +abrupt manner which people get who have much to do with the lower orders. + +“I told him the story of his patient, the interest I had in her, and the +wish I entertained of removing her to my own house. + +“‘It can’t be done,’ said he. ‘Any change will kill her.’ + +“‘But it must be done,’ I replied. ‘And it shall not kill her.’ + +“‘Then I have nothing more to say,’ said he, turning away from the +carriage door, and making as though he would go back into the house. + +“‘Stop a moment. You must help me; and, if you do, you shall have reason +to be glad, for I will give you fifty pounds down with pleasure. If you +won’t do it, another shall.’ + +“He looked at me, then (furtively) at the carriage, hesitated, and then +said: ‘You do not mind expense, apparently. I suppose you are a rich +lady of quality. Such folks will not stick at such trifles as the life +or death of a sick woman to get their own way. I suppose I must e’en +help you, for if I don’t, another will.’ + +“I did not mind what he said, so that he would assist me. I was pretty +sure that she was in a state to require opiates; and I had not forgotten +Christopher Sly, you may be sure, so I told him what I had in my head. +That in the dead of night—the quiet time in the streets,—she should be +carried in a hospital litter, softly and warmly covered over, from the +Leicester Square lodging-house to rooms that I would have in perfect +readiness for her. As I planned, so it was done. I let Clement know, by +a note, of my design. I had all prepared at home, and we walked about my +house as though shod with velvet, while the porter watched at the open +door. At last, through the darkness, I saw the lanterns carried by my +men, who were leading the little procession. The litter looked like a +hearse; on one side walked the doctor, on the other Clement; they came +softly and swiftly along. I could not try any farther experiment; we +dared not change her clothes; she was laid in the bed in the landlady’s +coarse night-gear, and covered over warmly, and left in the shaded, +scented room, with a nurse and the doctor watching by her, while I led +Clement to the dressing-room adjoining, in which I had had a bed placed +for him. Farther than that he would not go; and there I had refreshments +brought. Meanwhile, he had shown his gratitude by every possible action +(for we none of us dared to speak): he had kneeled at my feet, and kissed +my hand, and left it wet with his tears. He had thrown up his arms to +Heaven, and prayed earnestly, as I could see by the movement of his lips. +I allowed him to relieve himself by these dumb expressions, if I may so +call them,—and then I left him, and went to my own rooms to sit up for +my lord, and tell him what I had done. + +“Of course, it was all right; and neither my lord nor I could sleep for +wondering how Madame de Crequy would bear her awakening. I had engaged +the doctor, to whose face and voice she was accustomed, to remain with +her all night: the nurse was experienced, and Clement was within call. +But it was with the greatest relief that I heard from my own woman, when +she brought me my chocolate, that Madame de Crequy (Monsieur had said) +had awakened more tranquil than she had been for many days. To be sure, +the whole aspect of the bed-chamber must have been more familiar to her +than the miserable place where I had found her, and she must have +intuitively felt herself among friends. + +“My lord was scandalized at Clement’s dress, which, after the first +moment of seeing him I had forgotten, in thinking of other things, and +for which I had not prepared Lord Ludlow. He sent for his own tailor, +and bade him bring patterns of stuffs, and engage his men to work night +and day till Clement could appear as became his rank. In short, in a few +days so much of the traces of their flight were removed, that we had +almost forgotten the terrible causes of it, and rather felt as if they +had come on a visit to us than that they had been compelled to fly their +country. Their diamonds, too, were sold well by my lord’s agents, though +the London shops were stocked with jewellery, and such portable +valuables, some of rare and curious fashion, which were sold for half +their real value by emigrants who could not afford to wait. Madame de +Crequy was recovering her health, although her strength was sadly gone, +and she would never be equal to such another flight, as the perilous one +which she had gone through, and to which she could not bear the slightest +reference. For some time things continued in this state—the De Crequys +still our honoured visitors,—many houses besides our own, even among our +own friends, open to receive the poor flying nobility of France, driven +from their country by the brutal republicans, and every freshly-arrived +emigrant bringing new tales of horror, as if these revolutionists were +drunk with blood, and mad to devise new atrocities. One day Clement—I +should tell you he had been presented to our good King George and the +sweet Queen, and they had accosted him most graciously, and his beauty +and elegance, and some of the circumstances attendant on his flight, made +him be received in the world quite like a hero of romance; he might have +been on intimate terms in many a distinguished house, had he cared to +visit much; but he accompanied my lord and me with an air of indifference +and languor, which I sometimes fancied made him be all the more sought +after: Monkshaven (that was the title my eldest son bore) tried in vain +to interest him in all young men’s sports. But no! it was the same +through all. His mother took far more interest in the on-dits of the +London world, into which she was far too great an invalid to venture, +than he did in the absolute events themselves, in which he might have +been an actor. One day, as I was saying, an old Frenchman of a humble +class presented himself to our servants, several of them, understood +French; and through Medlicott, I learnt that he was in some way connected +with the De Crequys; not with their Paris-life; but I fancy he had been +intendant of their estates in the country; estates which were more useful +as hunting-grounds than as adding to their income. However, there was +the old man and with him, wrapped round his person, he had brought the +long parchment rolls, and deeds relating to their property. These he +would deliver up to none but Monsieur de Crequy, the rightful owner; and +Clement was out with Monkshaven, so the old man waited; and when Clement +came in, I told him of the steward’s arrival, and how he had been cared +for by my people. Clement went directly to see him. He was a long time +away, and I was waiting for him to drive out with me, for some purpose or +another, I scarce know what, but I remember I was tired of waiting, and +was just in the act of ringing the bell to desire that he might be +reminded of his engagement with me, when he came in, his face as white as +the powder in his hair, his beautiful eyes dilated with horror. I saw +that he had heard something that touched him even more closely than the +usual tales which every fresh emigrant brought. + +“‘What is it, Clement?’ I asked. + +“He clasped his hands, and looked as though he tried to speak, but could +not bring out the words. + +“‘They have guillotined my uncle!’ said he at last. Now, I knew that +there was a Count de Crequy; but I had always understood that the elder +branch held very little communication with him; in fact, that he was a +vaurien of some kind, and rather a disgrace than otherwise to the family. +So, perhaps, I was hard-hearted but I was a little surprised at this +excess of emotion, till I saw that peculiar look in his eyes that many +people have when there is more terror in their hearts than they dare put +into words. He wanted me to understand something without his saying it; +but how could I? I had never heard of a Mademoiselle de Crequy. + +“‘Virginie!’ at last he uttered. In an instant I understood it all, and +remembered that, if Urian had lived, he too might have been in love. + +“‘Your uncle’s daughter?’ I inquired. + +“‘My cousin,’ he replied. + +“I did not say, ‘your betrothed,’ but I had no doubt of it. I was +mistaken, however. + +“‘O madame!’ he continued, ‘her mother died long ago—her father now—and +she is in daily fear,—alone, deserted—’ + +“‘Is she in the Abbaye?’ asked I. + +“‘No! she is in hiding with the widow of her father’s old concierge. Any +day they may search the house for aristocrats. They are seeking them +everywhere. Then, not her life alone, but that of the old woman, her +hostess, is sacrificed. The old woman knows this, and trembles with +fear. Even if she is brave enough to be faithful, her fears would betray +her, should the house be searched. Yet, there is no one to help Virginie +to escape. She is alone in Paris.’ + +“I saw what was in his mind. He was fretting and chafing to go to his +cousin’s assistance; but the thought of his mother restrained him. I +would not have kept back Urian from such on errand at such a time. How +should I restrain him? And yet, perhaps, I did wrong in not urging the +chances of danger more. Still, if it was danger to him, was it not the +same or even greater danger to her?—for the French spared neither age +nor sex in those wicked days of terror. So I rather fell in with his +wish, and encouraged him to think how best and most prudently it might be +fulfilled; never doubting, as I have said, that he and his cousin were +troth-plighted. + +“But when I went to Madame de Crequy—after he had imparted his, or +rather our plan to her—I found out my mistake. She, who was in general +too feeble to walk across the room save slowly, and with a stick, was +going from end to end with quick, tottering steps; and, if now and then +she sank upon a chair, it seemed as if she could not rest, for she was up +again in a moment, pacing along, wringing her hands, and speaking rapidly +to herself. When she saw me, she stopped: ‘Madame,’ she said, ‘you have +lost your own boy. You might have left me mine.’ + +“I was so astonished—I hardly knew what to say. I had spoken to Clement +as if his mother’s consent were secure (as I had felt my own would have +been if Urian had been alive to ask it). Of coarse, both he and I knew +that his mother’s consent must be asked and obtained, before he could +leave her to go on such an undertaking; but, somehow, my blood always +rose at the sight or sound of danger; perhaps, because my life had been +so peaceful. Poor Madame de Crequy! it was otherwise with her; she +despaired while I hoped, and Clement trusted. + +“‘Dear Madame de Crequy,’ said I, ‘he will return safely to us; every +precaution shall be taken, that either he or you, or my lord, or +Monkshaven can think of; but he cannot leave a girl—his nearest relation +save you—his betrothed, is she not?’ + +“‘His betrothed!’ cried she, now at the utmost pitch of her excitement. +‘Virginie betrothed to Clement?—no! thank heaven, not so bad as that! +Yet it might have been. But mademoiselle scorned my son! She would have +nothing to do with him. Now is the time for him to have nothing to do +with her!’ + +“Clement had entered at the door behind his mother as she thus spoke. His +face was set and pale, till it looked as gray and immovable as if it had +been carved in stone. He came forward and stood before his mother. She +stopped her walk, threw back her haughty head, and the two looked each +other steadily in the face. After a minute or two in this attitude, her +proud and resolute gaze never flinching or wavering, he went down upon +one knee, and, taking her hand—her hard, stony hand, which never closed +on his, but remained straight and stiff: + +“‘Mother,’ he pleaded, ‘withdraw your prohibition. Let me go!’ + +“‘What were her words?’ Madame de Crequy replied, slowly, as if forcing +her memory to the extreme of accuracy. ‘My cousin,’ she said, ‘when I +marry, I marry a man, not a petit-maitre. I marry a man who, whatever +his rank may be will add dignity to the human race by his virtues, and +not be content to live in an effeminate court on the traditions of past +grandeur.’ She borrowed her words from the infamous Jean-Jacques +Rousseau, the friend of her scarce less infamous father—nay! I will say +it,—if not her words, she borrowed her principles. And my son to +request her to marry him! + +“‘It was my father’s written wish,’ said Clement. + +“‘But did you not love her? You plead your father’s words,—words +written twelve years before,—and as if that were your reason for being +indifferent to my dislike to the alliance. But you requested her to +marry you,—and she refused you with insolent contempt; and now you are +ready to leave me,—leave me desolate in a foreign land—’ + +“‘Desolate! my mother! and the Countess Ludlow stands there!’ + +“‘Pardon, madame! But all the earth, though it were full of kind hearts, +is but a desolation and a desert place to a mother when her only child is +absent. And you, Clement, would leave me for this Virginie,—this +degenerate De Crequy, tainted with the atheism of the Encyclopedistes! +She is only reaping some of the fruit of the harvest whereof her friends +have sown the seed. Let her alone! Doubtless she has friends—it may be +lovers—among these demons, who, under the cry of liberty, commit every +licence. Let her alone, Clement! She refused you with scorn: be too +proud to notice her now.’ + +“‘Mother, I cannot think of myself; only of her.’ + +“‘Think of me, then! I, your mother, forbid you to go.’ + +“Clement bowed low, and went out of the room instantly, as one blinded. +She saw his groping movement, and, for an instant, I think her heart +was touched. But she turned to me, and tried to exculpate her past +violence by dilating upon her wrongs, and they certainly were many. +The Count, her husband’s younger brother, had invariably tried to make +mischief between husband and wife. He had been the cleverer man of +the two, and had possessed extraordinary influence over her husband. +She suspected him of having instigated that clause in her husband’s +will, by which the Marquis expressed his wish for the marriage of the +cousins. The Count had had some interest in the management of the De +Crequy property during her son’s minority. Indeed, I remembered then, +that it was through Count de Crequy that Lord Ludlow had first heard +of the apartment which we afterwards took in the Hotel de Crequy; and +then the recollection of a past feeling came distinctly out of the +mist, as it were; and I called to mind how, when we first took up our +abode in the Hotel de Crequy, both Lord Ludlow and I imagined that +the arrangement was displeasing to our hostess; and how it had taken +us a considerable time before we had been able to establish relations +of friendship with her. Years after our visit, she began to suspect +that Clement (whom she could not forbid to visit at his uncle’s house, +considering the terms on which his father had been with his brother; +though she herself never set foot over the Count de Crequy’s threshold) +was attaching himself to mademoiselle, his cousin; and she made +cautious inquiries as to the appearance, character, and disposition +of the young lady. Mademoiselle was not handsome, they said; but of +a fine figure, and generally considered as having a very noble and +attractive presence. In character she was daring and wilful (said one +set); original and independent (said another). She was much indulged +by her father, who had given her something of a man’s education, and +selected for her intimate friend a young lady below her in rank, one +of the Bureaucracie, a Mademoiselle Necker, daughter of the Minister +of Finance. Mademoiselle de Crequy was thus introduced into all the +free-thinking salons of Paris; among people who were always full of +plans for subverting society. ‘And did Clement affect such people?’ +Madame de Crequy had asked with some anxiety. No! Monsieur de Crequy +had neither eyes nor ears, nor thought for anything but his cousin, +while she was by. And she? She hardly took notice of his devotion, so +evident to every one else. The proud creature! But perhaps that was +her haughty way of concealing what she felt. And so Madame de Crequy +listened, and questioned, and learnt nothing decided, until one day she +surprised Clement with the note in his hand, of which she remembered +the stinging words so well, in which Virginie had said, in reply to +a proposal Clement had sent her through her father, that ‘When she +married she married a man, not a petit-maitre.’ + +“Clement was justly indignant at the insulting nature of the answer +Virginie had sent to a proposal, respectful in its tone, and which was, +after all, but the cool, hardened lava over a burning heart. He +acquiesced in his mother’s desire, that he should not again present +himself in his uncle’s salons; but he did not forget Virginie, though he +never mentioned her name. + +“Madame de Crequy and her son were among the earliest proscrits, as they +were of the strongest possible royalists, and aristocrats, as it was the +custom of the horrid Sansculottes to term those who adhered to the habits +of expression and action in which it was their pride to have been +educated. They had left Paris some weeks before they had arrived in +England, and Clement’s belief at the time of quitting the Hotel de Crequy +had certainly been, that his uncle was not merely safe, but rather a +popular man with the party in power. And, as all communication having +relation to private individuals of a reliable kind was intercepted, +Monsieur de Crequy had felt but little anxiety for his uncle and cousin, +in comparison with what he did for many other friends of very different +opinions in politics, until the day when he was stunned by the fatal +information that even his progressive uncle was guillotined, and learnt +that his cousin was imprisoned by the licence of the mob, whose rights +(as she called them) she was always advocating. + +“When I had heard all this story, I confess I lost in sympathy for +Clement what I gained for his mother. Virginie’s life did not seem to me +worth the risk that Clement’s would run. But when I saw him—sad, +depressed, nay, hopeless—going about like one oppressed by a heavy dream +which he cannot shake off; caring neither to eat, drink, nor sleep, yet +bearing all with silent dignity, and even trying to force a poor, faint +smile when he caught my anxious eyes; I turned round again, and wondered +how Madame de Crequy could resist this mute pleading of her son’s altered +appearance. As for my Lord Ludlow and Monkshaven, as soon as they +understood the case, they were indignant that any mother should attempt +to keep a son out of honourable danger; and it was honourable, and a +clear duty (according to them) to try to save the life of a helpless +orphan girl, his next of kin. None but a Frenchman, said my lord, would +hold himself bound by an old woman’s whimsies and fears, even though she +were his mother. As it was, he was chafing himself to death under the +restraint. If he went, to be sure, the wretches might make an end of +him, as they had done of many a fine fellow: but my lord would take heavy +odds, that, instead of being guillotined, he would save the girl, and +bring her safe to England, just desperately in love with her preserver, +and then we would have a jolly wedding down at Monkshaven. My lord +repeated his opinion so often that it became a certain prophecy in his +mind of what was to take place; and, one day seeing Clement look even +paler and thinner than he had ever done before, he sent a message to +Madame de Crequy, requesting permission to speak to her in private. + +“‘For, by George!’ said he, ‘she shall hear my opinion, and not let that +lad of hers kill himself by fretting. He’s too good for that, if he had +been an English lad, he would have been off to his sweetheart long before +this, without saying with your leave or by your leave; but being a +Frenchman, he is all for AEneas and filial piety,—filial fiddle-sticks!’ +(My lord had run away to sea, when a boy, against his father’s consent, I +am sorry to say; and, as all had ended well, and he had come back to find +both his parents alive, I do not think he was ever as much aware of his +fault as he might have been under other circumstances.) ‘No, my lady,’ +he went on, ‘don’t come with me. A woman can manage a man best when he +has a fit of obstinacy, and a man can persuade a woman out of her +tantrums, when all her own sex, the whole army of them, would fail. Allow +me to go alone to my tete-a-tete with madame.’ + +“What he said, what passed, he never could repeat; but he came back +graver than he went. However, the point was gained; Madame de Crequy +withdrew her prohibition, and had given him leave to tell Clement as +much. + +“‘But she is an old Cassandra,’ said he. ‘Don’t let the lad be much with +her; her talk would destroy the courage of the bravest man; she is so +given over to superstition.’ Something that she had said had touched a +chord in my lord’s nature which he inherited from his Scotch ancestors. +Long afterwards, I heard what this was. Medlicott told me. + +“However, my lord shook off all fancies that told against the fulfilment +of Clement’s wishes. All that afternoon we three sat together, planning; +and Monkshaven passed in and out, executing our commissions, and +preparing everything. Towards nightfall all was ready for Clement’s +start on his journey towards the coast. + +“Madame had declined seeing any of us since my lord’s stormy interview +with her. She sent word that she was fatigued, and desired repose. But, +of course, before Clement set off, he was bound to wish her farewell, and +to ask for her blessing. In order to avoid an agitating conversation +between mother and son, my lord and I resolved to be present at the +interview. Clement was already in his travelling-dress, that of a Norman +fisherman, which Monkshaven had, with infinite trouble, discovered in the +possession of one of the emigres who thronged London, and who had made +his escape from the shores of France in this disguise. Clement’s plan +was, to go down to the coast of Sussex, and get some of the fishing or +smuggling boats to take him across to the French coast near Dieppe. There +again he would have to change his dress. Oh, it was so well planned! His +mother was startled by his disguise (of which we had not thought to +forewarn her) as he entered her apartment. And either that, or the being +suddenly roused from the heavy slumber into which she was apt to fall +when she was left alone, gave her manner an air of wildness that was +almost like insanity. + +“‘Go, go!’ she said to him, almost pushing him away as he knelt to kiss +her hand. ‘Virginie is beckoning to you, but you don’t see what kind of +a bed it is—’ + +“‘Clement, make haste!’ said my lord, in a hurried manner, as if to +interrupt madame. ‘The time is later than I thought, and you must not +miss the morning’s tide. Bid your mother good-bye at once, and let us be +off.’ For my lord and Monkshaven were to ride with him to an inn near +the shore, from whence he was to walk to his destination. My lord almost +took him by the arm to pull him away; and they were gone, and I was left +alone with Madame de Crequy. When she heard the horses’ feet, she seemed +to find out the truth, as if for the first time. She set her teeth +together. ‘He has left me for her!’ she almost screamed. ‘Left me for +her!’ she kept muttering; and then, as the wild look came back into her +eyes, she said, almost with exultation, ‘But I did not give him my +blessing!’” + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +“All night Madame de Crequy raved in delirium. If I could I would have +sent for Clement back again. I did send off one man, but I suppose my +directions were confused, or they were wrong, for he came back after my +lord’s return, on the following afternoon. By this time Madame de Crequy +was quieter: she was, indeed, asleep from exhaustion when Lord Ludlow and +Monkshaven came in. They were in high spirits, and their hopefulness +brought me round to a less dispirited state. All had gone well: they had +accompanied Clement on foot along the shore, until they had met with a +lugger, which my lord had hailed in good nautical language. The captain +had responded to these freemason terms by sending a boat to pick up his +passenger, and by an invitation to breakfast sent through a +speaking-trumpet. Monkshaven did not approve of either the meal or the +company, and had returned to the inn, but my lord had gone with Clement +and breakfasted on board, upon grog, biscuit, fresh-caught fish—‘the +best breakfast he ever ate,’ he said, but that was probably owing to the +appetite his night’s ride had given him. However, his good fellowship +had evidently won the captain’s heart, and Clement had set sail under the +best auspices. It was agreed that I should tell all this to Madame de +Crequy, if she inquired; otherwise, it would be wiser not to renew her +agitation by alluding to her son’s journey. + +“I sat with her constantly for many days; but she never spoke of Clement. +She forced herself to talk of the little occurrences of Parisian society +in former days: she tried to be conversational and agreeable, and to +betray no anxiety or even interest in the object of Clement’s journey; +and, as far as unremitting efforts could go, she succeeded. But the +tones of her voice were sharp and yet piteous, as if she were in constant +pain; and the glance of her eye hurried and fearful, as if she dared not +let it rest on any object. + +“In a week we heard of Clement’s safe arrival on the French coast. He +sent a letter to this effect by the captain of the smuggler, when the +latter returned. We hoped to hear again; but week after week elapsed, +and there was no news of Clement. I had told Lord Ludlow, in Madame de +Crequy’s presence, as he and I had arranged, of the note I had received +from her son, informing us of his landing in France. She heard, but she +took no notice, and evidently began to wonder that we did not mention any +further intelligence of him in the same manner before her; and daily I +began to fear that her pride would give way, and that she would +supplicate for news before I had any to give her. + +“One morning, on my awakening, my maid told me that Madame de Crequy had +passed a wretched night, and had bidden Medlicott (whom, as understanding +French, and speaking it pretty well, though with that horrid German +accent, I had put about her) request that I would go to madame’s room as +soon as I was dressed. + +“I knew what was coming, and I trembled all the time they were doing my +hair, and otherwise arranging me. I was not encouraged by my lord’s +speeches. He had heard the message, and kept declaring that he would +rather be shot than have to tell her that there was no news of her son; +and yet he said, every now and then, when I was at the lowest pitch of +uneasiness, that he never expected to hear again: that some day soon we +should see him walking in and introducing Mademoiselle de Crequy to us. + +“However at last I was ready, and go I must. + +“Her eyes were fixed on the door by which I entered. I went up to the +bedside. She was not rouged,—she had left it off now for several +days,—she no longer attempted to keep up the vain show of not feeling, +and loving, and fearing. + +“For a moment or two she did not speak, and I was glad of the respite. + +“‘Clement?’ she said at length, covering her mouth with a handkerchief +the minute she had spoken, that I might not see it quiver. + +“‘There has been no news since the first letter, saying how well the +voyage was performed, and how safely he had landed—near Dieppe, you +know,’ I replied as cheerfully as possible. ‘My lord does not expect +that we shall have another letter; he thinks that we shall see him soon.’ + +“There was no answer. As I looked, uncertain whether to do or say more, +she slowly turned herself in bed, and lay with her face to the wall; and, +as if that did not shut out the light of day and the busy, happy world +enough, she put out her trembling hands, and covered her face with her +handkerchief. There was no violence: hardly any sound. + +“I told her what my lord had said about Clement’s coming in some day, and +taking us all by surprise. I did not believe it myself, but it was just +possible,—and I had nothing else to say. Pity, to one who was striving +so hard to conceal her feelings, would have been impertinent. She let me +talk; but she did not reply. She knew that my words were vain and idle, +and had no root in my belief; as well as I did myself. + +“I was very thankful when Medlicott came in with Madame’s breakfast, and +gave me an excuse for leaving. + +“But I think that conversation made me feel more anxious and impatient +than ever. I felt almost pledged to Madame de Crequy for the fulfilment +of the vision I had held out. She had taken entirely to her bed by this +time: not from illness, but because she had no hope within her to stir +her up to the effort of dressing. In the same way she hardly cared for +food. She had no appetite,—why eat to prolong a life of despair? But +she let Medlicott feed her, sooner than take the trouble of resisting. + +“And so it went on,—for weeks, months—I could hardly count the time, it +seemed so long. Medlicott told me she noticed a preternatural +sensitiveness of ear in Madame de Crequy, induced by the habit of +listening silently for the slightest unusual sound in the house. +Medlicott was always a minute watcher of any one whom she cared about; +and, one day, she made me notice by a sign madame’s acuteness of hearing, +although the quick expectation was but evinced for a moment in the turn +of the eye, the hushed breath—and then, when the unusual footstep turned +into my lord’s apartments, the soft quivering sigh, and the closed +eyelids. + +“At length the intendant of the De Crequy estates—the old man, you will +remember, whose information respecting Virginie de Crequy first gave +Clement the desire to return to Paris,—came to St. James’s Square, and +begged to speak to me. I made haste to go down to him in the +housekeeper’s room, sooner than that he should be ushered into mine, for +fear of madame hearing any sound. + +“The old man stood—I see him now—with his hat held before him in both +his hands; he slowly bowed till his face touched it when I came in. Such +long excess of courtesy augured ill. He waited for me to speak. + +“‘Have you any intelligence?’ I inquired. He had been often to the house +before, to ask if we had received any news; and once or twice I had seen +him, but this was the first time he had begged to see me. + +“‘Yes, madame,’ he replied, still standing with his head bent down, like +a child in disgrace. + +“‘And it is bad!’ I exclaimed. + +“‘It is bad.’ For a moment I was angry at the cold tone in which my +words were echoed; but directly afterwards I saw the large, slow, heavy +tears of age falling down the old man’s cheeks, and on to the sleeves of +his poor, threadbare coat. + +“I asked him how he had heard it: it seemed as though I could not all at +once bear to hear what it was. He told me that the night before, in +crossing Long Acre, he had stumbled upon an old acquaintance of his; one +who, like himself had been a dependent upon the De Crequy family, but had +managed their Paris affairs, while Flechier had taken charge of their +estates in the country. Both were now emigrants, and living on the +proceeds of such small available talents as they possessed. Flechier, as +I knew, earned a very fair livelihood by going about to dress salads for +dinner parties. His compatriot, Le Febvre, had begun to give a few +lessons as a dancing-master. One of them took the other home to his +lodgings; and there, when their most immediate personal adventures had +been hastily talked over, came the inquiry from Flechier as to Monsieur +de Crequy + +“‘Clement was dead—guillotined. Virginie was dead—guillotined.’ + +“When Flechier had told me thus much, he could not speak for sobbing; and +I, myself, could hardly tell how to restrain my tears sufficiently, until +I could go to my own room and be at liberty to give way. He asked my +leave to bring in his friend Le Febvre, who was walking in the square, +awaiting a possible summons to tell his story. I heard afterwards a good +many details, which filled up the account, and made me feel—which brings +me back to the point I started from—how unfit the lower orders are for +being trusted indiscriminately with the dangerous powers of education. I +have made a long preamble, but now I am coming to the moral of my story.” + +My lady was trying to shake off the emotion which she evidently felt in +recurring to this sad history of Monsieur de Crequy’s death. She came +behind me, and arranged my pillows, and then, seeing I had been +crying—for, indeed, I was weak-spirited at the time, and a little served +to unloose my tears—she stooped down, and kissed my forehead, and said +“Poor child!” almost as if she thanked me for feeling that old grief of +hers. + +“Being once in France, it was no difficult thing for Clement to get into +Paris. The difficulty in those days was to leave, not to enter. He came +in dressed as a Norman peasant, in charge of a load of fruit and +vegetables, with which one of the Seine barges was freighted. He worked +hard with his companions in landing and arranging their produce on the +quays; and then, when they dispersed to get their breakfasts at some of +the estaminets near the old Marche aux Fleurs, he sauntered up a street +which conducted him, by many an odd turn, through the Quartier Latin to a +horrid back alley, leading out of the Rue l’Ecole de Medecine; some +atrocious place, as I have heard, not far from the shadow of that +terrible Abbaye, where so many of the best blood of France awaited their +deaths. But here some old man lived, on whose fidelity Clement thought +that he might rely. I am not sure if he had not been gardener in those +very gardens behind the Hotel Crequy where Clement and Urian used to play +together years before. But whatever the old man’s dwelling might be, +Clement was only too glad to reach it, you may be sure, he had been kept +in Normandy, in all sorts of disguises, for many days after landing in +Dieppe, through the difficulty of entering Paris unsuspected by the many +ruffians who were always on the look-out for aristocrats. + +“The old gardener was, I believe, both faithful and tried, and sheltered +Clement in his garret as well as might be. Before he could stir out, it +was necessary to procure a fresh disguise, and one more in character with +an inhabitant of Paris than that of a Norman carter was procured; and +after waiting indoors for one or two days, to see if any suspicion was +excited, Clement set off to discover Virginie. + +“He found her at the old concierge’s dwelling. Madame Babette was the +name of this woman, who must have been a less faithful—or rather, +perhaps, I should say, a more interested—friend to her guest than the +old gardener Jaques was to Clement. + +“I have seen a miniature of Virginie, which a French lady of quality +happened to have in her possession at the time of her flight from +Paris, and which she brought with her to England unwittingly; for it +belonged to the Count de Crequy, with whom she was slightly acquainted. +I should fancy from it, that Virginie was taller and of a more +powerful figure for a woman than her cousin Clement was for a man. Her +dark-brown hair was arranged in short curls—the way of dressing the +hair announced the politics of the individual, in those days, just as +patches did in my grandmother’s time; and Virginie’s hair was not to my +taste, or according to my principles: it was too classical. Her large, +black eyes looked out at you steadily. One cannot judge of the shape of +a nose from a full-face miniature, but the nostrils were clearly cut +and largely opened. I do not fancy her nose could have been pretty; but +her mouth had a character all its own, and which would, I think, have +redeemed a plainer face. It was wide, and deep set into the cheeks at +the corners; the upper lip was very much arched, and hardly closed over +the teeth; so that the whole face looked (from the serious, intent look +in the eyes, and the sweet intelligence of the mouth) as if she were +listening eagerly to something to which her answer was quite ready, and +would come out of those red, opening lips as soon as ever you had done +speaking, and you longed to know what she would say. + +“Well: this Virginie de Crequy was living with Madame Babette in the +conciergerie of an old French inn, somewhere to the north of Paris, +so, far enough from Clement’s refuge. The inn had been frequented by +farmers from Brittany and such kind of people, in the days when that +sort of intercourse went on between Paris and the provinces which had +nearly stopped now. Few Bretons came near it now, and the inn had +fallen into the hands of Madame Babette’s brother, as payment for a bad +wine debt of the last proprietor. He put his sister and her child in, +to keep it open, as it were, and sent all the people he could to occupy +the half-furnished rooms of the house. They paid Babette for their +lodging every morning as they went out to breakfast, and returned or +not as they chose, at night. Every three days, the wine merchant or his +son came to Madame Babette, and she accounted to them for the money she +had received. She and her child occupied the porter’s office (in which +the lad slept at nights) and a little miserable bed-room which opened +out of it, and received all the light and air that was admitted through +the door of communication, which was half glass. Madame Babette must +have had a kind of attachment for the De Crequys—her De Crequys, you +understand—Virginie’s father, the Count; for, at some risk to herself, +she had warned both him and his daughter of the danger impending over +them. But he, infatuated, would not believe that his dear Human Race +could ever do him harm; and, as long as he did not fear, Virginie was +not afraid. It was by some ruse, the nature of which I never heard, +that Madame Babette induced Virginie to come to her abode at the very +hour in which the Count had been recognized in the streets, and hurried +off to the Lanterne. It was after Babette had got her there, safe shut +up in the little back den, that she told her what had befallen her +father. From that day, Virginie had never stirred out of the gates, +or crossed the threshold of the porter’s lodge. I do not say that +Madame Babette was tired of her continual presence, or regretted the +impulse which made her rush to the De Crequy’s well-known house—after +being compelled to form one of the mad crowds that saw the Count de +Crequy seized and hung—and hurry his daughter out, through alleys and +backways, until at length she had the orphan safe in her own dark +sleeping-room, and could tell her tale of horror: but Madame Babette +was poorly paid for her porter’s work by her avaricious brother; and +it was hard enough to find food for herself and her growing boy; and, +though the poor girl ate little enough, I dare say, yet there seemed +no end to the burthen that Madame Babette had imposed upon herself: +the De Crequys were plundered, ruined, had become an extinct race, +all but a lonely friendless girl, in broken health and spirits; and, +though she lent no positive encouragement to his suit, yet, at the +time, when Clement reappeared in Paris, Madame Babette was beginning +to think that Virginie might do worse than encourage the attentions +of Monsieur Morin Fils, her nephew, and the wine merchant’s son. Of +course, he and his father had the entree into the conciergerie of the +hotel that belonged to them, in right of being both proprietors and +relations. The son, Morin, had seen Virginie in this manner. He was +fully aware that she was far above him in rank, and guessed from her +whole aspect that she had lost her natural protectors by the terrible +guillotine; but he did not know her exact name or station, nor could he +persuade his aunt to tell him. However, he fell head over ears in love +with her, whether she were princess or peasant; and though at first +there was something about her which made his passionate love conceal +itself with shy, awkward reserve, and then made it only appear in the +guise of deep, respectful devotion; yet, by-and-by,—by the same process +of reasoning, I suppose, that his aunt had gone through even before +him—Jean Morin began to let Hope oust Despair from his heart. Sometimes +he thought—perhaps years hence—that solitary, friendless lady, pent up +in squalor, might turn to him as to a friend and comforter—and then—and +then—. Meanwhile Jean Morin was most attentive to his aunt, whom he +had rather slighted before. He would linger over the accounts; would +bring her little presents; and, above all, he made a pet and favourite +of Pierre, the little cousin, who could tell him about all the ways +of going on of Mam’selle Cannes, as Virginie was called. Pierre was +thoroughly aware of the drift and cause of his cousin’s inquiries; and +was his ardent partisan, as I have heard, even before Jean Morin had +exactly acknowledged his wishes to himself. + +“It must have required some patience and much diplomacy, before Clement +de Crequy found out the exact place where his cousin was hidden. The old +gardener took the cause very much to heart; as, judging from my +recollections, I imagine he would have forwarded any fancy, however wild, +of Monsieur Clement’s. (I will tell you afterwards how I came to know +all these particulars so well.) + +“After Clement’s return, on two succeeding days, from his dangerous +search, without meeting with any good result, Jacques entreated Monsieur +de Crequy to let him take it in hand. He represented that he, as +gardener for the space of twenty years and more at the Hotel de Crequy, +had a right to be acquainted with all the successive concierges at the +Count’s house; that he should not go among them as a stranger, but as an +old friend, anxious to renew pleasant intercourse; and that if the +Intendant’s story, which he had told Monsieur de Crequy in England, was +true, that mademoiselle was in hiding at the house of a former concierge, +why, something relating to her would surely drop out in the course of +conversation. So he persuaded Clement to remain indoors, while he set +off on his round, with no apparent object but to gossip. + +“At night he came home,—having seen mademoiselle. He told Clement much +of the story relating to Madame Babette that I have told to you. Of +course, he had heard nothing of the ambitious hopes of Morin Fils,—hardly +of his existence, I should think. Madame Babette had received him +kindly; although, for some time, she had kept him standing in the +carriage gateway outside her door. But, on his complaining of the +draught and his rheumatism, she had asked him in: first looking round +with some anxiety, to see who was in the room behind her. No one was +there when he entered and sat down. But, in a minute or two, a tall, +thin young lady, with great, sad eyes, and pale cheeks, came from the +inner room, and, seeing him, retired. ‘It is Mademoiselle Cannes,’ said +Madame Babette, rather unnecessarily; for, if he had not been on the +watch for some sign of Mademoiselle de Crequy, he would hardly have +noticed the entrance and withdrawal. + +“Clement and the good old gardener were always rather perplexed by Madame +Babette’s evident avoidance of all mention of the De Crequy family. If +she were so much interested in one member as to be willing to undergo the +pains and penalties of a domiciliary visit, it was strange that she never +inquired after the existence of her charge’s friends and relations from +one who might very probably have heard something of them. They settled +that Madame Babette must believe that the Marquise and Clement were dead; +and admired her for her reticence in never speaking of Virginie. The +truth was, I suspect, that she was so desirous of her nephews success by +this time, that she did not like letting any one into the secret of +Virginie’s whereabouts who might interfere with their plan. However, it +was arranged between Clement and his humble friend, that the former, +dressed in the peasant’s clothes in which he had entered Paris, but +smartened up in one or two particulars, as if, although a countryman, he +had money to spare, should go and engage a sleeping-room in the old +Breton Inn; where, as I told you, accommodation for the night was to be +had. This was accordingly done, without exciting Madame Babette’s +suspicions, for she was unacquainted with the Normandy accent, and +consequently did not perceive the exaggeration of it which Monsieur de +Crequy adopted in order to disguise his pure Parisian. But after he had +for two nights slept in a queer dark closet, at the end of one of the +numerous short galleries in the Hotel Duguesclin, and paid his money for +such accommodation each morning at the little bureau under the window of +the conciergerie, he found himself no nearer to his object. He stood +outside in the gateway: Madame Babette opened a pane in her window, +counted out the change, gave polite thanks, and shut to the pane with a +clack, before he could ever find out what to say that might be the means +of opening a conversation. Once in the streets, he was in danger from +the bloodthirsty mob, who were ready in those days to hunt to death every +one who looked like a gentleman, as an aristocrat: and Clement, depend +upon it, looked a gentleman, whatever dress he wore. Yet it was unwise +to traverse Paris to his old friend the gardener’s grenier, so he had to +loiter about, where I hardly know. Only he did leave the Hotel +Duguesclin, and he did not go to old Jacques, and there was not another +house in Paris open to him. At the end of two days, he had made out +Pierre’s existence; and he began to try to make friends with the lad. +Pierre was too sharp and shrewd not to suspect something from the +confused attempts at friendliness. It was not for nothing that the +Norman farmer lounged in the court and doorway, and brought home presents +of galette. Pierre accepted the galette, reciprocated the civil +speeches, but kept his eyes open. Once, returning home pretty late at +night, he surprised the Norman studying the shadows on the blind, which +was drawn down when Madame Babette’s lamp was lighted. On going in, he +found Mademoiselle Cannes with his mother, sitting by the table, and +helping in the family mending. + +“Pierre was afraid that the Norman had some view upon the money which +his mother, as concierge, collected for her brother. But the money +was all safe next evening, when his cousin, Monsieur Morin Fils, +came to collect it. Madame Babette asked her nephew to sit down, and +skilfully barred the passage to the inner door, so that Virginie, had +she been ever so much disposed, could not have retreated. She sat +silently sewing. All at once the little party were startled by a very +sweet tenor voice, just close to the street window, singing one of the +airs out of Beaumarchais’ operas, which, a few years before, had been +popular all over Paris. But after a few moments of silence, and one or +two remarks, the talking went on again. Pierre, however, noticed an +increased air of abstraction in Virginie, who, I suppose, was recurring +to the last time that she had heard the song, and did not consider, as +her cousin had hoped she would have done, what were the words set to +the air, which he imagined she would remember, and which would have +told her so much. For, only a few years before, Adam’s opera of Richard +le Roi had made the story of the minstrel Blondel and our English Coeur +de Lion familiar to all the opera-going part of the Parisian public, +and Clement had bethought him of establishing a communication with +Virginie by some such means. + +“The next night, about the same hour, the same voice was singing outside +the window again. Pierre, who had been irritated by the proceeding the +evening before, as it had diverted Virginie’s attention from his cousin, +who had been doing his utmost to make himself agreeable, rushed out to +the door, just as the Norman was ringing the bell to be admitted for the +night. Pierre looked up and down the street; no one else was to be seen. +The next day, the Norman mollified him somewhat by knocking at the door +of the conciergerie, and begging Monsieur Pierre’s acceptance of some +knee-buckles, which had taken the country farmer’s fancy the day before, +as he had been gazing into the shops, but which, being too small for his +purpose, he took the liberty of offering to Monsieur Pierre. Pierre, a +French boy, inclined to foppery, was charmed, ravished by the beauty of +the present and with monsieur’s goodness, and he began to adjust them to +his breeches immediately, as well as he could, at least, in his mother’s +absence. The Norman, whom Pierre kept carefully on the outside of the +threshold, stood by, as if amused at the boy’s eagerness. + +“‘Take care,’ said he, clearly and distinctly; ‘take care, my little +friend, lest you become a fop; and, in that case, some day, years hence, +when your heart is devoted to some young lady, she may be inclined to say +to you’—here he raised his voice—‘No, thank you; when I marry, I marry +a man, not a petit-maitre; I marry a man, who, whatever his position may +be, will add dignity to the human race by his virtues.’ Farther than +that in his quotation Clement dared not go. His sentiments (so much +above the apparent occasion) met with applause from Pierre, who liked to +contemplate himself in the light of a lover, even though it should be a +rejected one, and who hailed the mention of the words ‘virtues’ and +‘dignity of the human race’ as belonging to the cant of a good citizen. + +“But Clement was more anxious to know how the invisible Lady took his +speech. There was no sign at the time. But when he returned at night, +he heard a voice, low singing, behind Madame Babette, as she handed him +his candle, the very air he had sung without effect for two nights past. +As if he had caught it up from her murmuring voice, he sang it loudly and +clearly as he crossed the court. + +“‘Here is our opera-singer!’ exclaimed Madame Babette. ‘Why, the Norman +grazier sings like Boupre,’ naming a favourite singer at the neighbouring +theatre. + +“Pierre was struck by the remark, and quietly resolved to look after the +Norman; but again, I believe, it was more because of his mother’s deposit +of money than with any thought of Virginie. + +“However, the next morning, to the wonder of both mother and son, +Mademoiselle Cannes proposed, with much hesitation, to go out and make +some little purchase for herself. A month or two ago, this was what +Madame Babette had been never weary of urging. But now she was as much +surprised as if she had expected Virginie to remain a prisoner in her +rooms all the rest of her life. I suppose she had hoped that her first +time of quitting it would be when she left it for Monsieur Morin’s house +as his wife. + +“A quick look from Madame Babette towards Pierre was all that was needed +to encourage the boy to follow her. He went out cautiously. She was at +the end of the street. She looked up and down, as if waiting for some +one. No one was there. Back she came, so swiftly that she nearly caught +Pierre before he could retreat through the porte-cochere. There he +looked out again. The neighbourhood was low and wild, and strange; and +some one spoke to Virginie,—nay, laid his hand upon her arm,—whose +dress and aspect (he had emerged out of a side-street) Pierre did not +know; but, after a start, and (Pierre could fancy) a little scream, +Virginie recognised the stranger, and the two turned up the side street +whence the man had come. Pierre stole swiftly to the corner of this +street; no one was there: they had disappeared up some of the alleys. +Pierre returned home to excite his mother’s infinite surprise. But they +had hardly done talking, when Virginie returned, with a colour and a +radiance in her face, which they had never seen there since her father’s +death.” + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +“I have told you that I heard much of this story from a friend of the +Intendant of the De Crequys, whom he met with in London. Some years +afterwards—the summer before my lord’s death—I was travelling with him +in Devonshire, and we went to see the French prisoners of war on +Dartmoor. We fell into conversation with one of them, whom I found out +to be the very Pierre of whom I had heard before, as having been involved +in the fatal story of Clement and Virginie, and by him I was told much of +their last days, and thus I learnt how to have some sympathy with all +those who were concerned in those terrible events; yes, even with the +younger Morin himself, on whose behalf Pierre spoke warmly, even after so +long a time had elapsed. + +“For when the younger Morin called at the porter’s lodge, on the evening +of the day when Virginie had gone out for the first time after so many +months’ confinement to the conciergerie, he was struck with the +improvement in her appearance. It seems to have hardly been that he +thought her beauty greater: for, in addition to the fact that she was not +beautiful, Morin had arrived at that point of being enamoured when it +does not signify whether the beloved one is plain or handsome—she has +enchanted one pair of eyes, which henceforward see her through their own +medium. But Morin noticed the faint increase of colour and light in her +countenance. It was as though she had broken through her thick cloud of +hopeless sorrow, and was dawning forth into a happier life. And so, +whereas during her grief, he had revered and respected it even to a point +of silent sympathy, now that she was gladdened, his heart rose on the +wings of strengthened hopes. Even in the dreary monotony of this +existence in his Aunt Babette’s conciergerie, Time had not failed in his +work, and now, perhaps, soon he might humbly strive to help Time. The +very next day he returned—on some pretence of business—to the Hotel +Duguesclin, and made his aunt’s room, rather than his aunt herself, a +present of roses and geraniums tied up in a bouquet with a tricolor +ribbon. Virginie was in the room, sitting at the coarse sewing she liked +to do for Madame Babette. He saw her eyes brighten at the sight of the +flowers: she asked his aunt to let her arrange them; he saw her untie the +ribbon, and with a gesture of dislike, throw it on the ground, and give +it a kick with her little foot, and even in this girlish manner of +insulting his dearest prejudices, he found something to admire. + +“As he was coming out, Pierre stopped him. The lad had been trying to +arrest his cousin’s attention by futile grimaces and signs played off +behind Virginie’s back: but Monsieur Morin saw nothing but Mademoiselle +Cannes. However, Pierre was not to be baffled, and Monsieur Morin found +him in waiting just outside the threshold. With his finger on his lips, +Pierre walked on tiptoe by his companion’s side till they would have been +long past sight or hearing of the conciergerie, even had the inhabitants +devoted themselves to the purposes of spying or listening. + +“‘Chut!’ said Pierre, at last. ‘She goes out walking.’ + +“‘Well?’ said Monsieur Morin, half curious, half annoyed at being +disturbed in the delicious reverie of the future into which he longed to +fall. + +“‘Well! It is not well. It is bad.’ + +“‘Why? I do not ask who she is, but I have my ideas. She is an +aristocrat. Do the people about here begin to suspect her?’ + +“‘No, no!’ said Pierre. ‘But she goes out walking. She has gone these +two mornings. I have watched her. She meets a man—she is friends with +him, for she talks to him as eagerly as he does to her—mamma cannot tell +who he is.’ + +“‘Has my aunt seen him?’ + +“‘No, not so much as a fly’s wing of him. I myself have only seen his +back. It strikes me like a familiar back, and yet I cannot think who it +is. But they separate with sudden darts, like two birds who have been +together to feed their young ones. One moment they are in close talk, +their heads together chuchotting; the next he has turned up some +bye-street, and Mademoiselle Cannes is close upon me—has almost caught +me.’ + +“‘But she did not see you?’ inquired Monsieur Morin, in so altered a +voice that Pierre gave him one of his quick penetrating looks. He was +struck by the way in which his cousin’s features—always coarse and +common-place—had become contracted and pinched; struck, too, by the +livid look on his sallow complexion. But as if Morin was conscious of +the manner in which his face belied his feelings, he made an effort, and +smiled, and patted Pierre’s head, and thanked him for his intelligence, +and gave him a five-franc piece, and bade him go on with his observations +of Mademoiselle Cannes’ movements, and report all to him. + +“Pierre returned home with a light heart, tossing up his five-franc piece +as he ran. Just as he was at the conciergerie door, a great tall man +bustled past him, and snatched his money away from him, looking back with +a laugh, which added insult to injury. Pierre had no redress; no one had +witnessed the impudent theft, and if they had, no one to be seen in the +street was strong enough to give him redress. Besides, Pierre had seen +enough of the state of the streets of Paris at that time to know that +friends, not enemies, were required, and the man had a bad air about him. +But all these considerations did not keep Pierre from bursting out into a +fit of crying when he was once more under his mother’s roof; and +Virginie, who was alone there (Madame Babette having gone out to make her +daily purchases), might have imagined him pommeled to death by the +loudness of his sobs. + +“‘What is the matter?’ asked she. ‘Speak, my child. What hast thou +done?’ + +“‘He has robbed me! he has robbed me!’ was all Pierre could gulp out. + +“‘Robbed thee! and of what, my poor boy?’ said Virginie, stroking his +hair gently. + +“‘Of my five-franc piece—of a five-franc piece,’ said Pierre, correcting +himself, and leaving out the word my, half fearful lest Virginie should +inquire how he became possessed of such a sum, and for what services it +had been given him. But, of course, no such idea came into her head, for +it would have been impertinent, and she was gentle-born. + +“‘Wait a moment, my lad,’ and going to the one small drawer in the inner +apartment, which held all her few possessions, she brought back a little +ring—a ring just with one ruby in it—which she had worn in the days +when she cared to wear jewels. ‘Take this,’ said she, ‘and run with it +to a jeweller’s. It is but a poor, valueless thing, but it will bring +you in your five francs, at any rate. Go! I desire you.’ + +“‘But I cannot,’ said the boy, hesitating; some dim sense of honour +flitting through his misty morals. + +“‘Yes, you must!’ she continued, urging him with her hand to the door. +‘Run! if it brings in more than five francs, you shall return the surplus +to me.’ + +“Thus tempted by her urgency, and, I suppose, reasoning with himself to +the effect that he might as well have the money, and then see whether he +thought it right to act as a spy upon her or not—the one action did not +pledge him to the other, nor yet did she make any conditions with her +gift—Pierre went off with her ring; and, after repaying himself his five +francs, he was enabled to bring Virginie back two more, so well had he +managed his affairs. But, although the whole transaction did not leave +him bound, in any way, to discover or forward Virginie’s wishes, it did +leave him pledged, according to his code, to act according to her +advantage, and he considered himself the judge of the best course to be +pursued to this end. And, moreover, this little kindness attached him to +her personally. He began to think how pleasant it would be to have so +kind and generous a person for a relation; how easily his troubles might +be borne if he had always such a ready helper at hand; how much he should +like to make her like him, and come to him for the protection of his +masculine power! First of all his duties, as her self-appointed squire, +came the necessity of finding out who her strange new acquaintance was. +Thus, you see, he arrived at the same end, via supposed duty, that he was +previously pledged to via interest. I fancy a good number of us, when +any line of action will promote our own interest, can make ourselves +believe that reasons exist which compel us to it as a duty. + +“In the course of a very few days, Pierre had so circumvented Virginie as +to have discovered that her new friend was no other than the Norman +farmer in a different dress. This was a great piece of knowledge to +impart to Morin. But Pierre was not prepared for the immediate physical +effect it had on his cousin. Morin sat suddenly down on one of the seats +in the Boulevards—it was there Pierre had met with him accidentally—when +he heard who it was that Virginie met. I do not suppose the man had the +faintest idea of any relationship or even previous acquaintanceship +between Clement and Virginie. If he thought of anything beyond the mere +fact presented to him, that his idol was in communication with another, +younger, handsomer man than himself, it must have been that the Norman +farmer had seen her at the conciergerie, and had been attracted by her, +and, as was but natural, had tried to make her acquaintance, and had +succeeded. But, from what Pierre told me, I should not think that even +this much thought passed through Morin’s mind. He seems to have been a +man of rare and concentrated attachments; violent, though restrained and +undemonstrative passions; and, above all, a capability of jealousy, of +which his dark oriental complexion must have been a type. I could fancy +that if he had married Virginie, he would have coined his life-blood for +luxuries to make her happy; would have watched over and petted her, at +every sacrifice to himself, as long as she would have been content to +live with him alone. But, as Pierre expressed it to me: ‘When I saw what +my cousin was, when I learned his nature too late, I perceived that he +would have strangled a bird if she whom he loved was attracted by it from +him.’ + +“When Pierre had told Morin of his discovery, Morin sat down, as I said, +quite suddenly, as if he had been shot. He found out that the first +meeting between the Norman and Virginie was no accidental, isolated +circumstance. Pierre was torturing him with his accounts of daily +rendezvous: if but for a moment, they were seeing each other every day, +sometimes twice a day. And Virginie could speak to this man, though to +himself she was coy and reserved as hardly to utter a sentence. Pierre +caught these broken words while his cousin’s complexion grew more and +more livid, and then purple, as if some great effect were produced on his +circulation by the news he had just heard. Pierre was so startled by his +cousin’s wandering, senseless eyes, and otherwise disordered looks, that +he rushed into a neighbouring cabaret for a glass of absinthe, which he +paid for, as he recollected afterwards, with a portion of Virginie’s five +francs. By-and-by Morin recovered his natural appearance; but he was +gloomy and silent; and all that Pierre could get out of him was, that the +Norman farmer should not sleep another night at the Hotel Duguesclin, +giving him such opportunities of passing and repassing by the +conciergerie door. He was too much absorbed in his own thoughts to repay +Pierre the half franc he had spent on the absinthe, which Pierre +perceived, and seems to have noted down in the ledger of his mind as on +Virginie’s balance of favour. + +“Altogether, he was much disappointed at his cousin’s mode of receiving +intelligence, which the lad thought worth another five-franc piece at +least; or, if not paid for in money, to be paid for in open-mouthed +confidence and expression of feeling, that he was, for a time, so far a +partisan of Virginie’s—unconscious Virginie—against his cousin, as to +feel regret when the Norman returned no more to his night’s lodging, and +when Virginie’s eager watch at the crevice of the closely-drawn blind +ended only with a sigh of disappointment. If it had not been for his +mother’s presence at the time, Pierre thought he should have told her +all. But how far was his mother in his cousin’s confidence as regarded +the dismissal of the Norman? + +“In a few days, however, Pierre felt almost sure that they had +established some new means of communication. Virginie went out for a +short time every day; but though Pierre followed her as closely as he +could without exciting her observation, he was unable to discover what +kind of intercourse she held with the Norman. She went, in general, the +same short round among the little shops in the neighbourhood; not +entering any, but stopping at two or three. Pierre afterwards remembered +that she had invariably paused at the nosegays displayed in a certain +window, and studied them long: but, then, she stopped and looked at caps, +hats, fashions, confectionery (all of the humble kind common in that +quarter), so how should he have known that any particular attraction +existed among the flowers? Morin came more regularly than ever to his +aunt’s; but Virginie was apparently unconscious that she was the +attraction. She looked healthier and more hopeful than she had done for +months, and her manners to all were gentler and not so reserved. Almost +as if she wished to manifest her gratitude to Madame Babette for her long +continuance of kindness, the necessity for which was nearly ended, +Virginie showed an unusual alacrity in rendering the old woman any little +service in her power, and evidently tried to respond to Monsieur Morin’s +civilities, he being Madame Babette’s nephew, with a soft graciousness +which must have made one of her principal charms; for all who knew her +speak of the fascination of her manners, so winning and attentive to +others, while yet her opinions, and often her actions, were of so decided +a character. For, as I have said, her beauty was by no means great; yet +every man who came near her seems to have fallen into the sphere of her +influence. Monsieur Morin was deeper than ever in love with her during +these last few days: he was worked up into a state capable of any +sacrifice, either of himself or others, so that he might obtain her at +last. He sat ‘devouring her with his eyes’ (to use Pierre’s expression) +whenever she could not see him; but, if she looked towards him, he looked +to the ground—anywhere—away from her and almost stammered in his +replies if she addressed any question to him. + +“He had been, I should think, ashamed of his extreme agitation on the +Boulevards, for Pierre thought that he absolutely shunned him for these +few succeeding days. He must have believed that he had driven the Norman +(my poor Clement!) off the field, by banishing him from his inn; and +thought that the intercourse between him and Virginie, which he had thus +interrupted, was of so slight and transient a character as to be quenched +by a little difficulty. + +“But he appears to have felt that he had made but little way, and he +awkwardly turned to Pierre for help—not yet confessing his love, though; +he only tried to make friends again with the lad after their silent +estrangement. And Pierre for some time did not choose to perceive his +cousin’s advances. He would reply to all the roundabout questions Morin +put to him respecting household conversations when he was not present, or +household occupations and tone of thought, without mentioning Virginie’s +name any more than his questioner did. The lad would seem to suppose, +that his cousin’s strong interest in their domestic ways of going on was +all on account of Madame Babette. At last he worked his cousin up to the +point of making him a confidant: and then the boy was half frightened at +the torrent of vehement words he had unloosed. The lava came down with a +greater rush for having been pent up so long. Morin cried out his words +in a hoarse, passionate voice, clenched his teeth, his fingers, and +seemed almost convulsed, as he spoke out his terrible love for Virginie, +which would lead him to kill her sooner than see her another’s; and if +another stepped in between him and her!—and then he smiled a fierce, +triumphant smile, but did not say any more. + +“Pierre was, as I said, half frightened; but also half-admiring. This +was really love—a ‘grande passion,’—a really fine dramatic thing,—like +the plays they acted at the little theatre yonder. He had a dozen times +the sympathy with his cousin now that he had had before, and readily +swore by the infernal gods, for they were far too enlightened to believe +in one God, or Christianity, or anything of the kind,—that he would +devote himself, body and soul, to forwarding his cousin’s views. Then +his cousin took him to a shop, and bought him a smart second-hand watch, +on which they scratched the word Fidelite, and thus was the compact +sealed. Pierre settled in his own mind, that if he were a woman, he +should like to be beloved as Virginie was, by his cousin, and that it +would be an extremely good thing for her to be the wife of so rich a +citizen as Morin Fils,—and for Pierre himself, too, for doubtless their +gratitude would lead them to give him rings and watches ad infinitum. + +“A day or two afterwards, Virginie was taken ill. Madame Babette said +it was because she had persevered in going out in all weathers, after +confining herself to two warm rooms for so long; and very probably this +was really the cause, for, from Pierre’s account, she must have been +suffering from a feverish cold, aggravated, no doubt, by her impatience +at Madame Babette’s familiar prohibitions of any more walks until she +was better. Every day, in spite of her trembling, aching limbs, she +would fain have arranged her dress for her walk at the usual time; but +Madame Babette was fully prepared to put physical obstacles in her +way, if she was not obedient in remaining tranquil on the little sofa +by the side of the fire. The third day, she called Pierre to her, when +his mother was not attending (having, in fact, locked up Mademoiselle +Cannes’ out-of-door things). + +“‘See, my child,’ said Virginie. ‘Thou must do me a great favour. Go to +the gardener’s shop in the Rue des Bons-Enfans, and look at the nosegays +in the window. I long for pinks; they are my favourite flower. Here are +two francs. If thou seest a nosegay of pinks displayed in the window, if +it be ever so faded—nay, if thou seest two or three nosegays of pinks, +remember, buy them all, and bring them to me, I have so great a desire +for the smell.’ She fell back weak and exhausted. Pierre hurried out. +Now was the time; here was the clue to the long inspection of the nosegay +in this very shop. + +“Sure enough, there was a drooping nosegay of pinks in the window. Pierre +went in, and, with all his impatience, he made as good a bargain as he +could, urging that the flowers were faded, and good for nothing. At last +he purchased them at a very moderate price. And now you will learn the +bad consequences of teaching the lower orders anything beyond what is +immediately necessary to enable them to earn their daily bread! The +silly Count de Crequy,—he who had been sent to his bloody rest, by the +very canaille of whom he thought so much,—he who had made Virginie +(indirectly, it is true) reject such a man as her cousin Clement, by +inflating her mind with his bubbles of theories,—this Count de Crequy +had long ago taken a fancy to Pierre, as he saw the bright sharp child +playing about his court—Monsieur de Crequy had even begun to educate the +boy himself to try work out certain opinions of his into practice,—but +the drudgery of the affair wearied him, and, beside, Babette had left his +employment. Still the Count took a kind of interest in his former pupil; +and made some sort of arrangement by which Pierre was to be taught +reading and writing, and accounts, and Heaven knows what besides,—Latin, +I dare say. So Pierre, instead of being an innocent messenger, as he +ought to have been—(as Mr. Horner’s little lad Gregson ought to have +been this morning)—could read writing as well as either you or I. So +what does he do, on obtaining the nosegay, but examine it well. The +stalks of the flowers were tied up with slips of matting in wet moss. +Pierre undid the strings, unwrapped the moss, and out fell a piece of wet +paper, with the writing all blurred with moisture. It was but a torn +piece of writing-paper, apparently, but Pierre’s wicked mischievous eyes +read what was written on it,—written so as to look like a +fragment,—‘Ready, every and any night at nine. All is prepared. Have +no fright. Trust one who, whatever hopes he might once have had, is +content now to serve you as a faithful cousin;’ and a place was named, +which I forget, but which Pierre did not, as it was evidently the +rendezvous. After the lad had studied every word, till he could say it +off by heart, he placed the paper where he had found it, enveloped it in +moss, and tied the whole up again carefully. Virginie’s face coloured +scarlet as she received it. She kept smelling at it, and trembling: but +she did not untie it, although Pierre suggested how much fresher it would +be if the stalks were immediately put into water. But once, after his +back had been turned for a minute, he saw it untied when he looked round +again, and Virginie was blushing, and hiding something in her bosom. + +“Pierre was now all impatience to set off and find his cousin, But his +mother seemed to want him for small domestic purposes even more than +usual; and he had chafed over a multitude of errands connected with the +Hotel before he could set off and search for his cousin at his usual +haunts. At last the two met and Pierre related all the events of the +morning to Morin. He said the note off word by word. (That lad this +morning had something of the magpie look of Pierre—it made me shudder to +see him, and hear him repeat the note by heart.) Then Morin asked him to +tell him all over again. Pierre was struck by Morin’s heavy sighs as he +repeated the story. When he came the second time to the note, Morin +tried to write the words down; but either he was not a good, ready +scholar, or his fingers trembled too much. Pierre hardly remembered, +but, at any rate, the lad had to do it, with his wicked reading and +writing. When this was done, Morin sat heavily silent. Pierre would +have preferred the expected outburst, for this impenetrable gloom +perplexed and baffled him. He had even to speak to his cousin to rouse +him; and when he replied, what he said had so little apparent connection +with the subject which Pierre had expected to find uppermost in his mind, +that he was half afraid that his cousin had lost his wits. + +“‘My Aunt Babette is out of coffee.’ + +“‘I am sure I do not know,’ said Pierre. + +“‘Yes, she is. I heard her say so. Tell her that a friend of mine has +just opened a shop in the Rue Saint Antoine, and that if she will join me +there in an hour, I will supply her with a good stock of coffee, just to +give my friend encouragement. His name is Antoine Meyer, Number One +hundred and Fifty at the sign of the Cap of Liberty.’ + +“‘I could go with you now. I can carry a few pounds of coffee better +than my mother,’ said Pierre, all in good faith. He told me he should +never forget the look on his cousin’s face, as he turned round, and bade +him begone, and give his mother the message without another word. It had +evidently sent him home promptly to obey his cousins command. Morin’s +message perplexed Madame Babette. + +“‘How could he know I was out of coffee?’ said she. ‘I am; but I only +used the last up this morning. How could Victor know about it?’ + +“‘I am sure I can’t tell,’ said Pierre, who by this time had recovered +his usual self-possession. ‘All I know is, that monsieur is in a pretty +temper, and that if you are not sharp to your time at this Antoine +Meyer’s you are likely to come in for some of his black looks.’ + +“‘Well, it is very kind of him to offer to give me some coffee, to be +sure! But how could he know I was out?’ + +“Pierre hurried his mother off impatiently, for he was certain that +the offer of the coffee was only a blind to some hidden purpose on +his cousin’s part; and he made no doubt that when his mother had been +informed of what his cousin’s real intention was, he, Pierre, could +extract it from her by coaxing or bullying. But he was mistaken. +Madame Babette returned home, grave, depressed, silent, and loaded +with the best coffee. Some time afterwards he learnt why his cousin +had sought for this interview. It was to extract from her, by promises +and threats, the real name of Mam’selle Cannes, which would give him +a clue to the true appellation of The Faithful Cousin. He concealed +the second purpose from his aunt, who had been quite unaware of his +jealousy of the Norman farmer, or of his identification of him with +any relation of Virginie’s. But Madame Babette instinctively shrank +from giving him any information: she must have felt that, in the +lowering mood in which she found him, his desire for greater knowledge +of Virginie’s antecedents boded her no good. And yet he made his aunt +his confidante—told her what she had only suspected before—that he +was deeply enamoured of Mam’selle Cannes, and would gladly marry her. +He spoke to Madame Babette of his father’s hoarded riches; and of the +share which he, as partner, had in them at the present time; and of +the prospect of the succession to the whole, which he had, as only +child. He told his aunt of the provision for her (Madame Babette’s) +life, which he would make on the day when he married Mam’selle Cannes. +And yet—and yet—Babette saw that in his eye and look which made her +more and more reluctant to confide in him. By-and-by he tried threats. +She should leave the conciergerie, and find employment where she +liked. Still silence. Then he grew angry, and swore that he would +inform against her at the bureau of the Directory, for harbouring an +aristocrat; an aristocrat he knew Mademoiselle was, whatever her real +name might be. His aunt should have a domiciliary visit, and see how +she liked that. The officers of the Government were the people for +finding out secrets. In vain she reminded him that, by so doing, he +would expose to imminent danger the lady whom he had professed to love. +He told her, with a sullen relapse into silence after his vehement +outpouring of passion, never to trouble herself about that. At last +he wearied out the old woman, and, frightened alike of herself and of +him, she told him all,—that Mam’selle Cannes was Mademoiselle Virginie +de Crequy, daughter of the Count of that name. Who was the Count? +Younger brother of the Marquis. Where was the Marquis? Dead long ago, +leaving a widow and child. A son? (eagerly). Yes, a son. Where was he? +Parbleu! how should she know?—for her courage returned a little as +the talk went away from the only person of the De Crequy family that +she cared about. But, by dint of some small glasses out of a bottle +of Antoine Meyer’s, she told him more about the De Crequys than she +liked afterwards to remember. For the exhilaration of the brandy lasted +but a very short time, and she came home, as I have said, depressed, +with a presentiment of coming evil. She would not answer Pierre, +but cuffed him about in a manner to which the spoilt boy was quite +unaccustomed. His cousin’s short, angry words, and sudden withdrawal +of confidence,—his mother’s unwonted crossness and fault-finding, all +made Virginie’s kind, gentle treatment, more than ever charming to the +lad. He half resolved to tell her how he had been acting as a spy upon +her actions, and at whose desire he had done it. But he was afraid of +Morin, and of the vengeance which he was sure would fall upon him for +any breach of confidence. Towards half-past eight that evening—Pierre, +watching, saw Virginie arrange several little things—she was in the +inner room, but he sat where he could see her through the glazed +partition. His mother sat—apparently sleeping—in the great easy-chair; +Virginie moved about softly, for fear of disturbing her. She made up +one or two little parcels of the few things she could call her own: +one packet she concealed about herself—the others she directed, and +left on the shelf. ‘She is going,’ thought Pierre, and (as he said +in giving me the account) his heart gave a spring, to think that he +should never see her again. If either his mother or his cousin had +been more kind to him, he might have endeavoured to intercept her; but +as it was, he held his breath, and when she came out he pretended to +read, scarcely knowing whether he wished her to succeed in the purpose +which he was almost sure she entertained, or not. She stopped by him, +and passed her hand over his hair. He told me that his eyes filled +with tears at this caress. Then she stood for a moment looking at the +sleeping Madame Babette, and stooped down and softly kissed her on the +forehead. Pierre dreaded lest his mother should awake (for by this time +the wayward, vacillating boy must have been quite on Virginie’s side), +but the brandy she had drunk made her slumber heavily. Virginie went. +Pierre’s heart beat fast. He was sure his cousin would try to intercept +her; but how, he could not imagine. He longed to run out and see the +catastrophe,—but he had let the moment slip; he was also afraid of +reawakening his mother to her unusual state of anger and violence.” + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +“Pierre went on pretending to read, but in reality listening with acute +tension of ear to every little sound. His perceptions became so +sensitive in this respect that he was incapable of measuring time, every +moment had seemed so full of noises, from the beating of his heart up to +the roll of the heavy carts in the distance. He wondered whether +Virginie would have reached the place of rendezvous, and yet he was +unable to compute the passage of minutes. His mother slept soundly: that +was well. By this time Virginie must have met the ‘faithful cousin:’ if, +indeed, Morin had not made his appearance. + +“At length, he felt as if he could no longer sit still, awaiting the +issue, but must run out and see what course events had taken. In vain +his mother, half-rousing herself, called after him to ask whither he was +going: he was already out of hearing before she had ended her sentence, +and he ran on until, stopped by the sight of Mademoiselle Cannes walking +along at so swift a pace that it was almost a run; while at her side, +resolutely keeping by her, Morin was striding abreast. Pierre had just +turned the corner of the street, when he came upon them. Virginie would +have passed him without recognizing him, she was in such passionate +agitation, but for Morin’s gesture, by which he would fain have kept +Pierre from interrupting them. Then, when Virginie saw the lad, she +caught at his arm, and thanked God, as if in that boy of twelve or +fourteen she held a protector. Pierre felt her tremble from head to +foot, and was afraid lest she would fall, there where she stood, in the +hard rough street. + +“‘Begone, Pierre!’ said Morin. + +“‘I cannot,’ replied Pierre, who indeed was held firmly by Virginie. +‘Besides, I won’t,’ he added. ‘Who has been frightening mademoiselle in +this way?’ asked he, very much inclined to brave his cousin at all +hazards. + +“‘Mademoiselle is not accustomed to walk in the streets alone,’ said +Morin, sulkily. ‘She came upon a crowd attracted by the arrest of an +aristocrat, and their cries alarmed her. I offered to take charge of her +home. Mademoiselle should not walk in these streets alone. We are not +like the cold-blooded people of the Faubourg Saint Germain.’ + +“Virginie did not speak. Pierre doubted if she heard a word of what they +were saying. She leant upon him more and more heavily. + +“‘Will mademoiselle condescend to take my arm?’ said Morin, with sulky, +and yet humble, uncouthness. I dare say he would have given worlds if he +might have had that little hand within his arm; but, though she still +kept silence, she shuddered up away from him, as you shrink from touching +a toad. He had said something to her during that walk, you may be sure, +which had made her loathe him. He marked and understood the gesture. He +held himself aloof while Pierre gave her all the assistance he could in +their slow progress homewards. But Morin accompanied her all the same. +He had played too desperate a game to be baulked now. He had given +information against the ci-devant Marquis de Crequy, as a returned +emigre, to be met with at such a time, in such a place. Morin had hoped +that all sign of the arrest would have been cleared away before Virginie +reached the spot—so swiftly were terrible deeds done in those days. But +Clement defended himself desperately: Virginie was punctual to a second; +and, though the wounded man was borne off to the Abbaye, amid a crowd of +the unsympathising jeerers who mingled with the armed officials of the +Directory, Morin feared lest Virginie had recognized him; and he would +have preferred that she should have thought that the ‘faithful cousin’ +was faithless, than that she should have seen him in bloody danger on her +account. I suppose he fancied that, if Virginie never saw or heard more +of him, her imagination would not dwell on his simple disappearance, as +it would do if she knew what he was suffering for her sake. + +“At any rate, Pierre saw that his cousin was deeply mortified by the +whole tenor of his behaviour during their walk home. When they arrived +at Madame Babette’s, Virginie fell fainting on the floor; her strength +had but just sufficed for this exertion of reaching the shelter of the +house. Her first sign of restoring consciousness consisted in avoidance +of Morin. He had been most assiduous in his efforts to bring her round; +quite tender in his way, Pierre said; and this marked, instinctive +repugnance to him evidently gave him extreme pain. I suppose Frenchmen +are more demonstrative than we are; for Pierre declared that he saw his +cousin’s eyes fill with tears, as she shrank away from his touch, if he +tried to arrange the shawl they had laid under her head like a pillow, or +as she shut her eyes when he passed before her. Madame Babette was +urgent with her to go and lie down on the bed in the inner room; but it +was some time before she was strong enough to rise and do this. + +“When Madame Babette returned from arranging the girl comfortably, the +three relations sat down in silence; a silence which Pierre thought would +never be broken. He wanted his mother to ask his cousin what had +happened. But Madame Babette was afraid of her nephew, and thought it +more discreet to wait for such crumbs of intelligence as he might think +fit to throw to her. But, after she had twice reported Virginie to be +asleep, without a word being uttered in reply to her whispers by either +of her companions, Morin’s powers of self-containment gave way. + +“‘It is hard!’ he said. + +“‘What is hard?’ asked Madame Babette, after she had paused for a time, +to enable him to add to, or to finish, his sentence, if he pleased. + +“‘It is hard for a man to love a woman as I do,’ he went on—‘I did not +seek to love her, it came upon me before I was aware—before I had ever +thought about it at all, I loved her better than all the world beside. +All my life, before I knew her, seems a dull blank. I neither know nor +care for what I did before then. And now there are just two lives before +me. Either I have her, or I have not. That is all: but that is +everything. And what can I do to make her have me? Tell me, aunt,’ and +he caught at Madame Babette’s arm, and gave it so sharp a shake, that she +half screamed out, Pierre said, and evidently grew alarmed at her +nephew’s excitement. + +“‘Hush, Victor!’ said she. ‘There are other women in the world, if this +one will not have you.’ + +“‘None other for me,’ he said, sinking back as if hopeless. ‘I am plain +and coarse, not one of the scented darlings of the aristocrats. Say that +I am ugly, brutish; I did not make myself so, any more than I made myself +love her. It is my fate. But am I to submit to the consequences of my +fate without a struggle? Not I. As strong as my love is, so strong is +my will. It can be no stronger,’ continued he, gloomily. ‘Aunt Babette, +you must help me—you must make her love me.’ He was so fierce here, +that Pierre said he did not wonder that his mother was frightened. + +“‘I, Victor!’ she exclaimed. ‘I make her love you? How can I? Ask me +to speak for you to Mademoiselle Didot, or to Mademoiselle Cauchois even, +or to such as they, and I’ll do it, and welcome. But to Mademoiselle de +Crequy, why you don’t know the difference! Those people—the old +nobility I mean—why they don’t know a man from a dog, out of their own +rank! And no wonder, for the young gentlemen of quality are treated +differently to us from their very birth. If she had you to-morrow, you +would be miserable. Let me alone for knowing the aristocracy. I have +not been a concierge to a duke and three counts for nothing. I tell you, +all your ways are different to her ways.’ + +“‘I would change my “ways,” as you call them.’ + +“‘Be reasonable, Victor.’ + +“‘No, I will not be reasonable, if by that you mean giving her up. I +tell you two lives are before me; one with her, one without her. But the +latter will be but a short career for both of us. You said, aunt, that +the talk went in the conciergerie of her father’s hotel, that she would +have nothing to do with this cousin whom I put out of the way to-day?’ + +“‘So the servants said. How could I know? All I know is, that he left +off coming to our hotel, and that at one time before then he had never +been two days absent.’ + +“‘So much the better for him. He suffers now for having come between me +and my object—in trying to snatch her away out of my sight. Take you +warning, Pierre! I did not like your meddling to-night.’ And so he went +off, leaving Madam Babette rocking herself backwards and forwards, in all +the depression of spirits consequent upon the reaction after the brandy, +and upon her knowledge of her nephew’s threatened purpose combined. + +“In telling you most of this, I have simply repeated Pierre’s account, +which I wrote down at the time. But here what he had to say came to a +sudden break; for, the next morning, when Madame Babette rose, Virginie +was missing, and it was some time before either she, or Pierre, or Morin, +could get the slightest clue to the missing girl. + +“And now I must take up the story as it was told to the Intendant +Flechier by the old gardener Jacques, with whom Clement had been +lodging on his first arrival in Paris. The old man could not, I dare +say, remember half as much of what had happened as Pierre did; the +former had the dulled memory of age, while Pierre had evidently thought +over the whole series of events as a story—as a play, if one may call +it so—during the solitary hours in his after-life, wherever they were +passed, whether in lonely camp watches, or in the foreign prison, +where he had to drag out many years. Clement had, as I said, returned +to the gardener’s garret after he had been dismissed from the Hotel +Duguesclin. There were several reasons for his thus doubling back. One +was, that he put nearly the whole breadth of Paris between him and an +enemy; though why Morin was an enemy, and to what extent he carried +his dislike or hatred, Clement could not tell, of course. The next +reason for returning to Jacques was, no doubt, the conviction that, +in multiplying his residences, he multiplied the chances against his +being suspected and recognized. And then, again, the old man was in his +secret, and his ally, although perhaps but a feeble kind of one. It was +through Jacques that the plan of communication, by means of a nosegay +of pinks, had been devised; and it was Jacques who procured him the +last disguise that Clement was to use in Paris—as he hoped and trusted. +It was that of a respectable shopkeeper of no particular class; a dress +that would have seemed perfectly suitable to the young man who would +naturally have worn it; and yet, as Clement put it on, and adjusted +it—giving it a sort of finish and elegance which I always noticed about +his appearance and which I believed was innate in the wearer—I have no +doubt it seemed like the usual apparel of a gentleman. No coarseness +of texture, nor clumsiness of cut could disguise the nobleman of +thirty descents, it appeared; for immediately on arriving at the place +of rendezvous, he was recognized by the men placed there on Morin’s +information to seize him. Jacques, following at a little distance, +with a bundle under his arm containing articles of feminine disguise +for Virginie, saw four men attempt Clement’s arrest—saw him, quick as +lightning, draw a sword hitherto concealed in a clumsy stick—saw his +agile figure spring to his guard,—and saw him defend himself with the +rapidity and art of a man skilled in arms. But what good did it do? +as Jacques piteously used to ask, Monsieur Flechier told me. A great +blow from a heavy club on the sword-arm of Monsieur de Crequy laid it +helpless and immovable by his side. Jacques always thought that that +blow came from one of the spectators, who by this time had collected +round the scene of the affray. The next instant, his master—his little +marquis—was down among the feet of the crowd, and though he was up +again before he had received much damage—so active and light was my +poor Clement—it was not before the old gardener had hobbled forwards, +and, with many an old-fashioned oath and curse, proclaimed himself a +partisan of the losing side—a follower of a ci-devant aristocrat. It +was quite enough. He received one or two good blows, which were, in +fact, aimed at his master; and then, almost before he was aware, he +found his arms pinioned behind him with a woman’s garter, which one of +the viragos in the crowd had made no scruple of pulling off in public, +as soon as she heard for what purpose it was wanted. Poor Jacques was +stunned and unhappy,—his master was out of sight, on before; and the +old gardener scarce knew whither they were taking him. His head ached +from the blows which had fallen upon it; it was growing dark—June day +though it was,—and when first he seems to have become exactly aware of +what had happened to him, it was when he was turned into one of the +larger rooms of the Abbaye, in which all were put who had no other +allotted place wherein to sleep. One or two iron lamps hung from the +ceiling by chains, giving a dim light for a little circle. Jacques +stumbled forwards over a sleeping body lying on the ground. The sleeper +wakened up enough to complain; and the apology of the old man in reply +caught the ear of his master, who, until this time, could hardly have +been aware of the straits and difficulties of his faithful Jacques. +And there they sat,—against a pillar, the live-long night, holding one +another’s hands, and each restraining expressions of pain, for fear of +adding to the other’s distress. That night made them intimate friends, +in spite of the difference of age and rank. The disappointed hopes, the +acute suffering of the present, the apprehensions of the future, made +them seek solace in talking of the past. Monsieur de Crequy and the +gardener found themselves disputing with interest in which chimney of +the stack the starling used to build,—the starling whose nest Clement +sent to Urian, you remember, and discussing the merits of different +espalier-pears which grew, and may grow still, in the old garden of +the Hotel de Crequy. Towards morning both fell asleep. The old man +wakened first. His frame was deadened to suffering, I suppose, for he +felt relieved of his pain; but Clement moaned and cried in feverish +slumber. His broken arm was beginning to inflame his blood. He was, +besides, much injured by some kicks from the crowd as he fell. As the +old man looked sadly on the white, baked lips, and the flushed cheeks, +contorted with suffering even in his sleep, Clement gave a sharp cry +which disturbed his miserable neighbours, all slumbering around in +uneasy attitudes. They bade him with curses be silent; and then turning +round, tried again to forget their own misery in sleep. For you see, +the bloodthirsty canaille had not been sated with guillotining and +hanging all the nobility they could find, but were now informing, +right and left, even against each other; and when Clement and Jacques +were in the prison, there were few of gentle blood in the place, +and fewer still of gentle manners. At the sound of the angry words +and threats, Jacques thought it best to awaken his master from his +feverish uncomfortable sleep, lest he should provoke more enmity; and, +tenderly lifting him up, he tried to adjust his own body, so that it +should serve as a rest and a pillow for the younger man. The motion +aroused Clement, and he began to talk in a strange, feverish way, of +Virginie, too,—whose name he would not have breathed in such a place +had he been quite himself. But Jacques had as much delicacy of feeling +as any lady in the land, although, mind you, he knew neither how to +read nor write,—and bent his head low down, so that his master might +tell him in a whisper what messages he was to take to Mademoiselle de +Crequy, in case—Poor Clement, he knew it must come to that! No escape +for him now, in Norman disguise or otherwise! Either by gathering fever +or guillotine, death was sure of his prey. Well! when that happened, +Jacques was to go and find Mademoiselle de Crequy, and tell her that +her cousin loved her at the last as he had loved her at the first; +but that she should never have heard another word of his attachment +from his living lips; that he knew he was not good enough for her, his +queen; and that no thought of earning her love by his devotion had +prompted his return to France, only that, if possible, he might have +the great privilege of serving her whom he loved. And then he went off +into rambling talk about petit-maitres, and such kind of expressions, +said Jacques to Flechier, the intendant, little knowing what a clue +that one word gave to much of the poor lad’s suffering. + +“The summer morning came slowly on in that dark prison, and when Jacques +could look round—his master was now sleeping on his shoulder, still the +uneasy, starting sleep of fever—he saw that there were many women among +the prisoners. (I have heard some of those who have escaped from the +prisons say, that the look of despair and agony that came into the faces +of the prisoners on first wakening, as the sense of their situation grew +upon them, was what lasted the longest in the memory of the survivors. +This look, they said, passed away from the women’s faces sooner than it +did from those of the men.) + +“Poor old Jacques kept falling asleep, and plucking himself up again for +fear lest, if he did not attend to his master, some harm might come to +the swollen, helpless arm. Yet his weariness grew upon him in spite of +all his efforts, and at last he felt as if he must give way to the +irresistible desire, if only for five minutes. But just then there was a +bustle at the door. Jacques opened his eyes wide to look. + +“‘The gaoler is early with breakfast,’ said some one, lazily. + +“‘It is the darkness of this accursed place that makes us think it +early,’ said another. + +“All this time a parley was going on at the door. Some one came in; not +the gaoler—a woman. The door was shut to and locked behind her. She +only advanced a step or two, for it was too sudden a change, out of the +light into that dark shadow, for any one to see clearly for the first few +minutes. Jacques had his eyes fairly open now, and was wide awake. It +was Mademoiselle de Crequy, looking bright, clear, and resolute. The +faithful heart of the old man read that look like an open page. Her +cousin should not die there on her behalf, without at least the comfort +of her sweet presence. + +“‘Here he is,’ he whispered as her gown would have touched him in +passing, without her perceiving him, in the heavy obscurity of the place. + +“‘The good God bless you, my friend!’ she murmured, as she saw the +attitude of the old man, propped against a pillar, and holding Clement in +his arms, as if the young man had been a helpless baby, while one of the +poor gardener’s hands supported the broken limb in the easiest position. +Virginie sat down by the old man, and held out her arms. Softly she +moved Clement’s head to her own shoulder; softly she transferred the task +of holding the arm to herself. Clement lay on the floor, but she +supported him, and Jacques was at liberty to arise and stretch and shake +his stiff, weary old body. He then sat down at a little distance, and +watched the pair until he fell asleep. Clement had muttered ‘Virginie,’ +as they half-roused him by their movements out of his stupor; but Jacques +thought he was only dreaming; nor did he seem fully awake when once his +eyes opened, and he looked full at Virginie’s face bending over him, and +growing crimson under his gaze, though she never stirred, for fear of +hurting him if she moved. Clement looked in silence, until his heavy +eyelids came slowly down, and he fell into his oppressive slumber again. +Either he did not recognize her, or she came in too completely as a part +of his sleeping visions for him to be disturbed by her appearance there. + +“When Jacques awoke it was full daylight—at least as full as it would +ever be in that place. His breakfast—the gaol-allowance of bread and +vin ordinaire—was by his side. He must have slept soundly. He looked +for his master. He and Virginie had recognized each other now,—hearts, +as well as appearance. They were smiling into each other’s faces, as if +that dull, vaulted room in the grim Abbaye were the sunny gardens of +Versailles, with music and festivity all abroad. Apparently they had +much to say to each other; for whispered questions and answers never +ceased. + +“Virginie had made a sling for the poor broken arm; nay, she had obtained +two splinters of wood in some way, and one of their fellow-prisoners—having, +it appeared, some knowledge of surgery—had set it. Jacques felt more +desponding by far than they did, for he was suffering from the night he had +passed, which told upon his aged frame; while they must have heard some +good news, as it seemed to him, so bright and happy did they look. Yet +Clement was still in bodily pain and suffering, and Virginie, by her own +act and deed, was a prisoner in that dreadful Abbaye, whence the only +issue was the guillotine. But they were together: they loved: they +understood each other at length. + +“When Virginie saw that Jacques was awake, and languidly munching his +breakfast, she rose from the wooden stool on which she was sitting, and +went to him, holding out both hands, and refusing to allow him to rise, +while she thanked him with pretty eagerness for all his kindness to +Monsieur. Monsieur himself came towards him, following Virginie, but +with tottering steps, as if his head was weak and dizzy, to thank the +poor old man, who now on his feet, stood between them, ready to cry while +they gave him credit for faithful actions which he felt to have been +almost involuntary on his part,—for loyalty was like an instinct in the +good old days, before your educational cant had come up. And so two days +went on. The only event was the morning call for the victims, a certain +number of whom were summoned to trial every day. And to be tried was to +be condemned. Every one of the prisoners became grave, as the hour for +their summons approached. Most of the victims went to their doom with +uncomplaining resignation, and for a while after their departure there +was comparative silence in the prison. But, by-and-by—so said +Jacques—the conversation or amusements began again. Human nature cannot +stand the perpetual pressure of such keen anxiety, without an effort to +relieve itself by thinking of something else. Jacques said that Monsieur +and Mademoiselle were for ever talking together of the past days,—it was +‘Do you remember this?’ or, ‘Do you remember that?’ perpetually. He +sometimes thought they forgot where they were, and what was before them. +But Jacques did not, and every day he trembled more and more as the list +was called over. + +“The third morning of their incarceration, the gaoler brought in a man +whom Jacques did not recognize, and therefore did not at once observe; +for he was waiting, as in duty bound, upon his master and his sweet young +lady (as he always called her in repeating the story). He thought that +the new introduction was some friend of the gaoler, as the two seemed +well acquainted, and the latter stayed a few minutes talking with his +visitor before leaving him in prison. So Jacques was surprised when, +after a short time had elapsed, he looked round, and saw the fierce stare +with which the stranger was regarding Monsieur and Mademoiselle de +Crequy, as the pair sat at breakfast,—the said breakfast being laid as +well as Jacques knew how, on a bench fastened into the prison +wall,—Virginie sitting on her low stool, and Clement half lying on the +ground by her side, and submitting gladly to be fed by her pretty white +fingers; for it was one of her fancies, Jacques said, to do all she could +for him, in consideration of his broken arm. And, indeed, Clement was +wasting away daily; for he had received other injuries, internal and more +serious than that to his arm, during the melee which had ended in his +capture. The stranger made Jacques conscious of his presence by a sigh, +which was almost a groan. All three prisoners looked round at the sound. +Clement’s face expressed little but scornful indifference; but Virginie’s +face froze into stony hate. Jacques said he never saw such a look, and +hoped that he never should again. Yet after that first revelation of +feeling, her look was steady and fixed in another direction to that in +which the stranger stood,—still motionless—still watching. He came a +step nearer at last. + +“‘Mademoiselle,’ he said. Not the quivering of an eyelash showed that +she heard him. ‘Mademoiselle!’ he said again, with an intensity of +beseeching that made Jacques—not knowing who he was—almost pity him, +when he saw his young lady’s obdurate face. + +“There was perfect silence for a space of time which Jacques could not +measure. Then again the voice, hesitatingly, saying, ‘Monsieur!’ Clement +could not hold the same icy countenance as Virginie; he turned his head +with an impatient gesture of disgust; but even that emboldened the man. + +“‘Monsieur, do ask mademoiselle to listen to me,—just two words.’ + +“‘Mademoiselle de Crequy only listens to whom she chooses.’ Very +haughtily my Clement would say that, I am sure. + +“‘But, mademoiselle,’—lowering his voice, and coming a step or two +nearer. Virginie must have felt his approach, though she did not see it; +for she drew herself a little on one side, so as to put as much space as +possible between him and her.—‘Mademoiselle, it is not too late. I can +save you: but to-morrow your name is down on the list. I can save you, +if you will listen.’ + +“Still no word or sign. Jacques did not understand the affair. Why was +she so obdurate to one who might be ready to include Clement in the +proposal, as far as Jacques knew? + +“The man withdrew a little, but did not offer to leave the prison. He +never took his eyes off Virginie; he seemed to be suffering from some +acute and terrible pain as he watched her. + +“Jacques cleared away the breakfast-things as well as he could. +Purposely, as I suspect, he passed near the man. + +“‘Hist!’ said the stranger. ‘You are Jacques, the gardener, arrested for +assisting an aristocrat. I know the gaoler. You shall escape, if you +will. Only take this message from me to mademoiselle. You heard. She +will not listen to me: I did not want her to come here. I never knew she +was here, and she will die to-morrow. They will put her beautiful round +throat under the guillotine. Tell her, good old man, tell her how sweet +life is; and how I can save her; and how I will not ask for more than +just to see her from time to time. She is so young; and death is +annihilation, you know. Why does she hate me so? I want to save her; I +have done her no harm. Good old man, tell her how terrible death is; and +that she will die to-morrow, unless she listens to me.’ + +“Jacques saw no harm in repeating this message. Clement listened in +silence, watching Virginie with an air of infinite tenderness. + +“‘Will you not try him, my cherished one?’ he said. ‘Towards you he may +mean well’ (which makes me think that Virginie had never repeated to +Clement the conversation which she had overheard that last night at +Madame Babette’s); ‘you would be in no worse a situation than you were +before!’ + +“‘No worse, Clement! and I should have known what you were, and have lost +you. My Clement!’ said she, reproachfully. + +“‘Ask him,’ said she, turning to Jacques, suddenly, ‘if he can save +Monsieur de Crequy as well,—if he can?—O Clement, we might escape to +England; we are but young.’ And she hid her face on his shoulder. + +“Jacques returned to the stranger, and asked him Virginie’s question. His +eyes were fixed on the cousins; he was very pale, and the twitchings or +contortions, which must have been involuntary whenever he was agitated, +convulsed his whole body. + +“He made a long pause. ‘I will save mademoiselle and monsieur, if she +will go straight from prison to the mairie, and be my wife.’ + +“‘Your wife!’ Jacques could not help exclaiming, ‘That she will never +be—never!’ + +“‘Ask her!’ said Morin, hoarsely. + +“But almost before Jacques thought he could have fairly uttered the +words, Clement caught their meaning. + +“‘Begone!’ said he; ‘not one word more.’ Virginie touched the old man as +he was moving away. ‘Tell him he does not know how he makes me welcome +death.’ And smiling, as if triumphant, she turned again to Clement. + +“The stranger did not speak as Jacques gave him the meaning, not the +words, of their replies. He was going away, but stopped. A minute or +two afterwards, he beckoned to Jacques. The old gardener seems to have +thought it undesirable to throw away even the chance of assistance from +such a man as this, for he went forward to speak to him. + +“‘Listen! I have influence with the gaoler. He shall let thee pass out +with the victims to-morrow. No one will notice it, or miss thee—. They +will be led to trial,—even at the last moment, I will save her, if she +sends me word she relents. Speak to her, as the time draws on. Life is +very sweet,—tell her how sweet. Speak to him; he will do more with her +than thou canst. Let him urge her to live. Even at the last, I will be +at the Palais de Justice,—at the Greve. I have followers,—I have +interest. Come among the crowd that follow the victims,—I shall see +thee. It will be no worse for him, if she escapes’— + +“‘Save my master, and I will do all,’ said Jacques. + +“‘Only on my one condition,’ said Morin, doggedly; and Jacques was +hopeless of that condition ever being fulfilled. But he did not see why +his own life might not be saved. By remaining in prison until the next +day, he should have rendered every service in his power to his master and +the young lady. He, poor fellow, shrank from death; and he agreed with +Morin to escape, if he could, by the means Morin had suggested, and to +bring him word if Mademoiselle de Crequy relented. (Jacques had no +expectation that she would; but I fancy he did not think it necessary to +tell Morin of this conviction of his.) This bargaining with so base a man +for so slight a thing as life, was the only flaw that I heard of in the +old gardener’s behaviour. Of course, the mere reopening of the subject +was enough to stir Virginie to displeasure. Clement urged her, it is +true; but the light he had gained upon Morin’s motions, made him rather +try to set the case before her in as fair a manner as possible than use +any persuasive arguments. And, even as it was, what he said on the +subject made Virginie shed tears—the first that had fallen from her +since she entered the prison. So, they were summoned and went together, +at the fatal call of the muster-roll of victims the next morning. He, +feeble from his wounds and his injured health; she, calm and serene, only +petitioning to be allowed to walk next to him, in order that she might +hold him up when he turned faint and giddy from his extreme suffering. + +“Together they stood at the bar; together they were condemned. As the +words of judgment were pronounced, Virginie tuned to Clement, and +embraced him with passionate fondness. Then, making him lean on her, +they marched out towards the Place de la Greve. + +“Jacques was free now. He had told Morin how fruitless his efforts at +persuasion had been; and scarcely caring to note the effect of his +information upon the man, he had devoted himself to watching Monsieur and +Mademoiselle de Crequy. And now he followed them to the Place de la +Greve. He saw them mount the platform; saw them kneel down together till +plucked up by the impatient officials; could see that she was urging some +request to the executioner; the end of which seemed to be, that Clement +advanced first to the guillotine, was executed (and just at this moment +there was a stir among the crowd, as of a man pressing forward towards +the scaffold). Then she, standing with her face to the guillotine, +slowly made the sign of the cross, and knelt down. + +“Jacques covered his eyes, blinded with tears. The report of a pistol +made him look up. She was gone—another victim in her place—and where +there had been a little stir in the crowd not five minutes before, some +men were carrying off a dead body. A man had shot himself, they said. +Pierre told me who that man was.” + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + +After a pause, I ventured to ask what became of Madame de Crequy, +Clement’s mother. + +“She never made any inquiry about him,” said my lady. “She must have +known that he was dead; though how, we never could tell. Medlicott +remembered afterwards that it was about, if not on—Medlicott to this day +declares that it was on the very Monday, June the nineteenth, when her +son was executed, that Madame de Crequy left off her rouge and took to +her bed, as one bereaved and hopeless. It certainly was about that time; +and Medlicott—who was deeply impressed by that dream of Madame de +Crequy’s (the relation of which I told you had had such an effect on my +lord), in which she had seen the figure of Virginie—as the only light +object amid much surrounding darkness as of night, smiling and beckoning +Clement on—on—till at length the bright phantom stopped, motionless, +and Madame de Crequy’s eyes began to penetrate the murky darkness, and to +see closing around her the gloomy dripping walls which she had once seen +and never forgotten—the walls of the vault of the chapel of the De +Crequys in Saint Germain l’Auxerrois; and there the two last of the +Crequys laid them down among their forefathers, and Madame de Crequy had +wakened to the sound of the great door, which led to the open air, being +locked upon her—I say Medlicott, who was predisposed by this dream to +look out for the supernatural, always declared that Madame de Crequy was +made conscious in some mysterious way, of her son’s death, on the very +day and hour when it occurred, and that after that she had no more +anxiety, but was only conscious of a kind of stupefying despair.” + +“And what became of her, my lady?” I again asked. + +“What could become of her?” replied Lady Ludlow. “She never could be +induced to rise again, though she lived more than a year after her son’s +departure. She kept her bed; her room darkened, her face turned towards +the wall, whenever any one besides Medlicott was in the room. She hardly +ever spoke, and would have died of starvation but for Medlicott’s tender +care, in putting a morsel to her lips every now and then, feeding her, in +fact, just as an old bird feeds her young ones. In the height of summer +my lord and I left London. We would fain have taken her with us into +Scotland, but the doctor (we had the old doctor from Leicester Square) +forbade her removal; and this time he gave such good reasons against it +that I acquiesced. Medlicott and a maid were left with her. Every care +was taken of her. She survived till our return. Indeed, I thought she +was in much the same state as I had left her in, when I came back to +London. But Medlicott spoke of her as much weaker; and one morning on +awakening, they told me she was dead. I sent for Medlicott, who was in +sad distress, she had become so fond of her charge. She said that, about +two o’clock, she had been awakened by unusual restlessness on Madame de +Crequy’s part; that she had gone to her bedside, and found the poor lady +feebly but perpetually moving her wasted arm up and down—and saying to +herself in a wailing voice: ‘I did not bless him when he left me—I did +not bless him when he left me!’ Medlicott gave her a spoonful or two of +jelly, and sat by her, stroking her hand, and soothing her till she +seemed to fall asleep. But in the morning she was dead.” + +“It is a sad story, your ladyship,” said I, after a while. + +“Yes it is. People seldom arrive at my age without having watched the +beginning, middle, and end of many lives and many fortunes. We do not +talk about them, perhaps; for they are often so sacred to us, from having +touched into the very quick of our own hearts, as it were, or into those +of others who are dead and gone, and veiled over from human sight, that +we cannot tell the tale as if it was a mere story. But young people +should remember that we have had this solemn experience of life, on which +to base our opinions and form our judgments, so that they are not mere +untried theories. I am not alluding to Mr. Horner just now, for he is +nearly as old as I am—within ten years, I dare say—but I am thinking of +Mr. Gray, with his endless plans for some new thing—schools, education, +Sabbaths, and what not. Now he has not seen what all this leads to.” + +“It is a pity he has not heard your ladyship tell the story of poor +Monsieur de Crequy.” + +“Not at all a pity, my dear. A young man like him, who, both by position +and age, must have had his experience confined to a very narrow circle, +ought not to set up his opinion against mine; he ought not to require +reasons from me, nor to need such explanation of my arguments (if I +condescend to argue), as going into relation of the circumstances on +which my arguments are based in my own mind, would be.” + +“But, my lady, it might convince him,” I said, with perhaps injudicious +perseverance. + +“And why should he be convinced?” she asked, with gentle inquiry in her +tone. “He has only to acquiesce. Though he is appointed by Mr. Croxton, +I am the lady of the manor, as he must know. But it is with Mr. Horner +that I must have to do about this unfortunate lad Gregson. I am afraid +there will be no method of making him forget his unlucky knowledge. His +poor brains will be intoxicated with the sense of his powers, without any +counterbalancing principles to guide him. Poor fellow! I am quite +afraid it will end in his being hanged!” + +The next day Mr. Horner came to apologize and explain. He was +evidently—as I could tell from his voice, as he spoke to my lady in the +next room—extremely annoyed at her ladyship’s discovery of the education +he had been giving to this boy. My lady spoke with great authority, and +with reasonable grounds of complaint. Mr. Horner was well acquainted +with her thoughts on the subject, and had acted in defiance of her +wishes. He acknowledged as much, and should on no account have done it, +in any other instance, without her leave. + +“Which I could never have granted you,” said my lady. + +But this boy had extraordinary capabilities; would, in fact, have taught +himself much that was bad, if he had not been rescued, and another +direction given to his powers. And in all Mr. Horner had done, he had +had her ladyship’s service in view. The business was getting almost +beyond his power, so many letters and so much account-keeping was +required by the complicated state in which things were. + +Lady Ludlow felt what was coming—a reference to the mortgage for the +benefit of my lord’s Scottish estates, which, she was perfectly aware, +Mr. Horner considered as having been a most unwise proceeding—and she +hastened to observe—“All this may be very true, Mr. Horner, and I am +sure I should be the last person to wish you to overwork or distress +yourself; but of that we will talk another time. What I am now anxious +to remedy is, if possible, the state of this poor little Gregson’s mind. +Would not hard work in the fields be a wholesome and excellent way of +enabling him to forget?” + +“I was in hopes, my lady, that you would have permitted me to bring him +up to act as a kind of clerk,” said Mr. Horner, jerking out his project +abruptly. + +“A what?” asked my lady, in infinite surprise. + +“A kind of—of assistant, in the way of copying letters and doing up +accounts. He is already an excellent penman and very quick at figures.” + +“Mr. Horner,” said my lady, with dignity, “the son of a poacher and +vagabond ought never to have been able to copy letters relating to the +Hanbury estates; and, at any rate, he shall not. I wonder how it is +that, knowing the use he has made of his power of reading a letter, you +should venture to propose such an employment for him as would require his +being in your confidence, and you the trusted agent of this family. Why, +every secret (and every ancient and honourable family has its secrets, as +you know, Mr. Horner) would be learnt off by heart, and repeated to the +first comer!” + +“I should have hoped to have trained him, my lady, to understand the +rules of discretion.” + +“Trained! Train a barn-door fowl to be a pheasant, Mr. Horner! That +would be the easier task. But you did right to speak of discretion +rather than honour. Discretion looks to the consequences of +actions—honour looks to the action itself, and is an instinct rather +than a virtue. After all, it is possible you might have trained him to +be discreet.” + +Mr. Horner was silent. My lady was softened by his not replying, and +began as she always did in such cases, to fear lest she had been too +harsh. I could tell that by her voice and by her next speech, as well as +if I had seen her face. + +“But I am sorry you are feeling the pressure of the affairs: I am quite +aware that I have entailed much additional trouble upon you by some of my +measures: I must try and provide you with some suitable assistance. +Copying letters and doing up accounts, I think you said?” + +Mr. Horner had certainly had a distant idea of turning the little boy, in +process of time, into a clerk; but he had rather urged this possibility +of future usefulness beyond what he had at first intended, in speaking of +it to my lady as a palliation of his offence, and he certainly was very +much inclined to retract his statement that the letter-writing, or any +other business, had increased, or that he was in the slightest want of +help of any kind, when my lady after a pause of consideration, suddenly +said— + +“I have it. Miss Galindo will, I am sure, be glad to assist you. I will +speak to her myself. The payment we should make to a clerk would be of +real service to her!” + +I could hardly help echoing Mr. Horner’s tone of surprise as he said— + +“Miss Galindo!” + +For, you must be told who Miss Galindo was; at least, told as much as I +know. Miss Galindo had lived in the village for many years, keeping +house on the smallest possible means, yet always managing to maintain a +servant. And this servant was invariably chosen because she had some +infirmity that made her undesirable to every one else. I believe Miss +Galindo had had lame and blind and hump-backed maids. She had even at +one time taken in a girl hopelessly gone in consumption, because if not +she would have had to go to the workhouse, and not have had enough to +eat. Of course the poor creature could not perform a single duty usually +required of a servant, and Miss Galindo herself was both servant and +nurse. + +Her present maid was scarcely four feet high, and bore a terrible +character for ill-temper. Nobody but Miss Galindo would have kept her; +but, as it was, mistress and servant squabbled perpetually, and were, at +heart, the best of friends. For it was one of Miss Galindo’s +peculiarities to do all manner of kind and self-denying actions, and to +say all manner of provoking things. Lame, blind, deformed, and dwarf, +all came in for scoldings without number: it was only the consumptive +girl that never had heard a sharp word. I don’t think any of her +servants liked her the worse for her peppery temper, and passionate odd +ways, for they knew her real and beautiful kindness of heart: and, +besides, she had so great a turn for humour that very often her speeches +amused as much or more than they irritated; and on the other side, a +piece of witty impudence from her servant would occasionally tickle her +so much and so suddenly, that she would burst out laughing in the middle +of her passion. + +But the talk about Miss Galindo’s choice and management of her servants +was confined to village gossip, and had never reached my Lady Ludlow’s +ears, though doubtless Mr. Horner was well acquainted with it. What my +lady knew of her amounted to this. It was the custom in those days for +the wealthy ladies of the county to set on foot a repository, as it was +called, in the assize-town. The ostensible manager of this repository +was generally a decayed gentlewoman, a clergyman’s widow, or so forth. +She was, however, controlled by a committee of ladies; and paid by them +in proportion to the amount of goods she sold; and these goods were the +small manufactures of ladies of little or no fortune, whose names, if +they chose it, were only signified by initials. + +Poor water-colour drawings, indigo and Indian ink; screens, ornamented +with moss and dried leaves; paintings on velvet, and such faintly +ornamental works were displayed on one side of the shop. It was always +reckoned a mark of characteristic gentility in the repository, to have +only common heavy-framed sash-windows, which admitted very little light, +so I never was quite certain of the merit of these Works of Art as they +were entitled. But, on the other side, where the Useful Work placard was +put up, there was a great variety of articles, of whose unusual +excellence every one might judge. Such fine sewing, and stitching, and +button-holing! Such bundles of soft delicate knitted stockings and +socks; and, above all, in Lady Ludlow’s eyes, such hanks of the finest +spun flaxen thread! + +And the most delicate dainty work of all was done by Miss Galindo, as +Lady Ludlow very well knew. Yet, for all their fine sewing, it sometimes +happened that Miss Galindo’s patterns were of an old-fashioned kind; and +the dozen nightcaps, maybe, on the materials for which she had expended +bona-fide money, and on the making-up, no little time and eyesight, +would lie for months in a yellow neglected heap; and at such times, it +was said, Miss Galindo was more amusing than usual, more full of dry +drollery and humour; just as at the times when an order came in to X. +(the initial she had chosen) for a stock of well-paying things, she sat +and stormed at her servant as she stitched away. She herself explained +her practice in this way:— + +“When everything goes wrong, one would give up breathing if one could not +lighten ones heart by a joke. But when I’ve to sit still from morning +till night, I must have something to stir my blood, or I should go off +into an apoplexy; so I set to, and quarrel with Sally.” + +Such were Miss Galindo’s means and manner of living in her own house. Out +of doors, and in the village, she was not popular, although she would +have been sorely missed had she left the place. But she asked too many +home questions (not to say impertinent) respecting the domestic economies +(for even the very poor liked to spend their bit of money their own way), +and would open cupboards to find out hidden extravagances, and question +closely respecting the weekly amount of butter, till one day she met with +what would have been a rebuff to any other person, but which she rather +enjoyed than otherwise. + +She was going into a cottage, and in the doorway met the good woman +chasing out a duck, and apparently unconscious of her visitor. + +“Get out, Miss Galindo!” she cried, addressing the duck. “Get out! O, I +ask your pardon,” she continued, as if seeing the lady for the first +time. “It’s only that weary duck will come in. Get out Miss Gal——” (to +the duck). + +“And so you call it after me, do you?” inquired her visitor. + +“O, yes, ma’am; my master would have it so, for he said, sure enough the +unlucky bird was always poking herself where she was not wanted.” + +“Ha, ha! very good! And so your master is a wit, is he? Well! tell him +to come up and speak to me to-night about my parlour chimney, for there +is no one like him for chimney doctoring.” + +And the master went up, and was so won over by Miss Galindo’s merry ways, +and sharp insight into the mysteries of his various kinds of business (he +was a mason, chimney-sweeper, and ratcatcher), that he came home and +abused his wife the next time she called the duck the name by which he +himself had christened her. + +But odd as Miss Galindo was in general, she could be as well-bred a lady +as any one when she chose. And choose she always did when my Lady Ludlow +was by. Indeed, I don’t know the man, woman, or child, that did not +instinctively turn out its best side to her ladyship. So she had no +notion of the qualities which, I am sure, made Mr. Horner think that Miss +Galindo would be most unmanageable as a clerk, and heartily wish that the +idea had never come into my lady’s head. But there it was; and he had +annoyed her ladyship already more than he liked to-day, so he could not +directly contradict her, but only urge difficulties which he hoped might +prove insuperable. But every one of them Lady Ludlow knocked down. +Letters to copy? Doubtless. Miss Galindo could come up to the Hall; she +should have a room to herself; she wrote a beautiful hand; and writing +would save her eyesight. “Capability with regard to accounts?” My lady +would answer for that too; and for more than Mr. Horner seemed to think +it necessary to inquire about. Miss Galindo was by birth and breeding a +lady of the strictest honour, and would, if possible, forget the +substance of any letters that passed through her hands; at any rate, no +one would ever hear of them again from her. “Remuneration?” Oh! as for +that, Lady Ludlow would herself take care that it was managed in the most +delicate manner possible. She would send to invite Miss Galindo to tea +at the Hall that very afternoon, if Mr. Horner would only give her +ladyship the slightest idea of the average length of time that my lady +was to request Miss Galindo to sacrifice to her daily. “Three hours! +Very well.” Mr. Horner looked very grave as he passed the windows of the +room where I lay. I don’t think he liked the idea of Miss Galindo as a +clerk. + +Lady Ludlow’s invitations were like royal commands. Indeed, the village +was too quiet to allow the inhabitants to have many evening engagements +of any kind. Now and then, Mr. and Mrs. Horner gave a tea and supper to +the principal tenants and their wives, to which the clergyman was +invited, and Miss Galindo, Mrs. Medlicott, and one or two other spinsters +and widows. The glory of the supper-table on these occasions was +invariably furnished by her ladyship: it was a cold roasted peacock, with +his tail stuck out as if in life. Mrs. Medlicott would take up the whole +morning arranging the feathers in the proper semicircle, and was always +pleased with the wonder and admiration it excited. It was considered a +due reward and fitting compliment to her exertions that Mr. Horner always +took her in to supper, and placed her opposite to the magnificent dish, +at which she sweetly smiled all the time they were at table. But since +Mrs. Horner had had the paralytic stroke these parties had been given up; +and Miss Galindo wrote a note to Lady Ludlow in reply to her invitation, +saying that she was entirely disengaged, and would have great pleasure in +doing herself the honour of waiting upon her ladyship. + +Whoever visited my lady took their meals with her, sitting on the dais, +in the presence of all my former companions. So I did not see Miss +Galindo until some time after tea; as the young gentlewomen had had to +bring her their sewing and spinning, to hear the remarks of so competent +a judge. At length her ladyship brought her visitor into the room where +I lay,—it was one of my bad days, I remember,—in order to have her +little bit of private conversation. Miss Galindo was dressed in her best +gown, I am sure, but I had never seen anything like it except in a +picture, it was so old-fashioned. She wore a white muslin apron, +delicately embroidered, and put on a little crookedly, in order, as she +told us, even Lady Ludlow, before the evening was over, to conceal a spot +whence the colour had been discharged by a lemon-stain. This crookedness +had an odd effect, especially when I saw that it was intentional; indeed, +she was so anxious about her apron’s right adjustment in the wrong place, +that she told us straight out why she wore it so, and asked her ladyship +if the spot was properly hidden, at the same time lifting up her apron +and showing her how large it was. + +“When my father was alive, I always took his right arm, so, and used to +remove any spotted or discoloured breadths to the left side, if it was a +walking-dress. That’s the convenience of a gentleman. But widows and +spinsters must do what they can. Ah, my dear (to me)! when you are +reckoning up the blessings in your lot,—though you may think it a hard +one in some respects,—don’t forget how little your stockings want +darning, as you are obliged to lie down so much! I would rather knit two +pairs of stockings than darn one, any day.” + +“Have you been doing any of your beautiful knitting lately?” asked my +lady, who had now arranged Miss Galindo in the pleasantest chair, and +taken her own little wicker-work one, and, having her work in her hands, +was ready to try and open the subject. + +“No, and alas! your ladyship. It is partly the hot weather’s fault, for +people seem to forget that winter must come; and partly, I suppose, that +every one is stocked who has the money to pay four-and-sixpence a pair +for stockings.” + +“Then may I ask if you have any time in your active days at liberty?” +said my lady, drawing a little nearer to her proposal, which I fancy she +found it a little awkward to make. + +“Why, the village keeps me busy, your ladyship, when I have neither +knitting or sewing to do. You know I took X. for my letter at the +repository, because it stands for Xantippe, who was a great scold in old +times, as I have learnt. But I’m sure I don’t know how the world would +get on without scolding, your ladyship. It would go to sleep, and the +sun would stand still.” + +“I don’t think I could bear to scold, Miss Galindo,” said her ladyship, +smiling. + +“No! because your ladyship has people to do it for you. Begging your +pardon, my lady, it seems to me the generality of people may be divided +into saints, scolds, and sinners. Now, your ladyship is a saint, because +you have a sweet and holy nature, in the first place; and have people to +do your anger and vexation for you, in the second place. And Jonathan +Walker is a sinner, because he is sent to prison. But here am I, half +way, having but a poor kind of disposition at best, and yet hating sin, +and all that leads to it, such as wasting, and extravagance, and +gossiping,—and yet all this lies right under my nose in the village, and +I am not saint enough to be vexed at it; and so I scold. And though I +had rather be a saint, yet I think I do good in my way.” + +“No doubt you do, dear Miss Galindo,” said Lady Ludlow. “But I am sorry +to hear that there is so much that is bad going on in the village,—very +sorry.” + +“O, your ladyship! then I am sorry I brought it out. It was only by way +of saying, that when I have no particular work to do at home, I take a +turn abroad, and set my neighbours to rights, just by way of steering +clear of Satan. + + For Satan finds some mischief still + For idle hands to do, + +you know, my lady.” + +There was no leading into the subject by delicate degrees, for Miss +Galindo was evidently so fond of talking, that, if asked a question, she +made her answer so long, that before she came to an end of it, she had +wandered far away from the original starting point. So Lady Ludlow +plunged at once into what she had to say. + +“Miss Galindo, I have a great favour to ask of you.” + +“My lady, I wish I could tell you what a pleasure it is to hear you say +so,” replied Miss Galindo, almost with tears in her eyes; so glad were we +all to do anything for her ladyship, which could be called a free service +and not merely a duty. + +“It is this. Mr. Horner tells me that the business-letters, relating to +the estate, are multiplying so much that he finds it impossible to copy +them all himself, and I therefore require the services of some +confidential and discreet person to copy these letters, and occasionally +to go through certain accounts. Now, there is a very pleasant little +sitting-room very near to Mr. Horner’s office (you know Mr. Horner’s +office—on the other side of the stone hall?), and if I could prevail +upon you to come here to breakfast and afterwards sit there for three +hours every morning, Mr. Horner should bring or send you the papers—” + +Lady Ludlow stopped. Miss Galindo’s countenance had fallen. There was +some great obstacle in her mind to her wish for obliging Lady Ludlow. + +“What would Sally do?” she asked at length. Lady Ludlow had not a notion +who Sally was. Nor if she had had a notion, would she have had a +conception of the perplexities that poured into Miss Galindo’s mind, at +the idea of leaving her rough forgetful dwarf without the perpetual +monitorship of her mistress. Lady Ludlow, accustomed to a household +where everything went on noiselessly, perfectly, and by clockwork, +conducted by a number of highly-paid, well-chosen, and accomplished +servants, had not a conception of the nature of the rough material from +which her servants came. Besides, in her establishment, so that the +result was good, no one inquired if the small economies had been observed +in the production. Whereas every penny—every halfpenny, was of +consequence to Miss Galindo; and visions of squandered drops of milk and +wasted crusts of bread filled her mind with dismay. But she swallowed +all her apprehensions down, out of her regard for Lady Ludlow, and desire +to be of service to her. No one knows how great a trial it was to her +when she thought of Sally, unchecked and unscolded for three hours every +morning. But all she said was— + +“‘Sally, go to the Deuce.’ I beg your pardon, my lady, if I was talking +to myself; it’s a habit I have got into of keeping my tongue in practice, +and I am not quite aware when I do it. Three hours every morning! I +shall be only too proud to do what I can for your ladyship; and I hope +Mr. Horner will not be too impatient with me at first. You know, +perhaps, that I was nearly being an authoress once, and that seems as if +I was destined to ‘employ my time in writing.’” + +“No, indeed; we must return to the subject of the clerkship afterwards, +if you please. An authoress, Miss Galindo! You surprise me!” + +“But, indeed, I was. All was quite ready. Doctor Burney used to teach +me music: not that I ever could learn, but it was a fancy of my poor +father’s. And his daughter wrote a book, and they said she was but a +very young lady, and nothing but a music-master’s daughter; so why should +not I try?” + +“Well?” + +“Well! I got paper and half-a-hundred good pens, a bottle of ink, all +ready—” + +“And then—” + +“O, it ended in my having nothing to say, when I sat down to write. But +sometimes, when I get hold of a book, I wonder why I let such a poor +reason stop me. It does not others.” + +“But I think it was very well it did, Miss Galindo,” said her ladyship. +“I am extremely against women usurping men’s employments, as they are +very apt to do. But perhaps, after all, the notion of writing a book +improved your hand. It is one of the most legible I ever saw.” + +“I despise z’s without tails,” said Miss Galindo, with a good deal of +gratified pride at my lady’s praise. Presently, my lady took her to look +at a curious old cabinet, which Lord Ludlow had picked up at the Hague; +and while they were out of the room on this errand, I suppose the +question of remuneration was settled, for I heard no more of it. + +When they came back, they were talking of Mr. Gray. Miss Galindo was +unsparing in her expressions of opinion about him: going much farther +than my lady—in her language, at least. + +“A little blushing man like him, who can’t say bo to a goose without +hesitating and colouring, to come to this village—which is as good a +village as ever lived—and cry us down for a set of sinners, as if we had +all committed murder and that other thing!—I have no patience with him, +my lady. And then, how is he to help us to heaven, by teaching us our, a +b, ab—b a, ba? And yet, by all accounts, that’s to save poor children’s +souls. O, I knew your ladyship would agree with me. I am sure my mother +was as good a creature as ever breathed the blessed air; and if she’s not +gone to heaven I don’t want to go there; and she could not spell a letter +decently. And does Mr. Gray think God took note of that?” + +“I was sure you would agree with me, Miss Galindo,” said my lady. “You +and I can remember how this talk about education—Rousseau, and his +writings—stirred up the French people to their Reign of Terror, and all +those bloody scenes.” + +“I’m afraid that Rousseau and Mr. Gray are birds of a feather,” replied +Miss Galindo, shaking her head. “And yet there is some good in the young +man too. He sat up all night with Billy Davis, when his wife was fairly +worn out with nursing him.” + +“Did he, indeed!” said my lady, her face lighting up, as it always did +when she heard of any kind or generous action, no matter who performed +it. “What a pity he is bitten with these new revolutionary ideas, and is +so much for disturbing the established order of society!” + +When Miss Galindo went, she left so favourable an impression of her visit +on my lady, that she said to me with a pleased smile— + +“I think I have provided Mr. Horner with a far better clerk than he would +have made of that lad Gregson in twenty years. And I will send the lad +to my lord’s grieve, in Scotland, that he may be kept out of harm’s way.” + +But something happened to the lad before this purpose could be +accomplished. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + + +The next morning, Miss Galindo made her appearance, and, by some mistake, +unusual to my lady’s well-trained servants, was shown into the room where +I was trying to walk; for a certain amount of exercise was prescribed for +me, painful although the exertion had become. + +She brought a little basket along with her and while the footman was gone +to inquire my lady’s wishes (for I don’t think that Lady Ludlow expected +Miss Galindo so soon to assume her clerkship; nor, indeed, had Mr. Horner +any work of any kind ready for his new assistant to do), she launched out +into conversation with me. + +“It was a sudden summons, my dear! However, as I have often said to +myself, ever since an occasion long ago, if Lady Ludlow ever honours me +by asking for my right hand, I’ll cut it off, and wrap the stump up so +tidily she shall never find out it bleeds. But, if I had had a little +more time, I could have mended my pens better. You see, I have had to +sit up pretty late to get these sleeves made”—and she took out of her +basket a pail of brown-holland over-sleeves, very much such as a grocer’s +apprentice wears—“and I had only time to make seven or eight pens, out +of some quills Farmer Thomson gave me last autumn. As for ink, I’m +thankful to say, that’s always ready; an ounce of steel filings, an ounce +of nut-gall, and a pint of water (tea, if you’re extravagant, which, +thank Heaven! I’m not), put all in a bottle, and hang it up behind the +house door, so that the whole gets a good shaking every time you slam it +to—and even if you are in a passion and bang it, as Sally and I often +do, it is all the better for it—and there’s my ink ready for use; ready +to write my lady’s will with, if need be.” + +“O, Miss Galindo!” said I, “don’t talk so my lady’s will! and she not +dead yet.” + +“And if she were, what would be the use of talking of making her will? +Now, if you were Sally, I should say, ‘Answer me that, you goose!’ But, +as you’re a relation of my lady’s, I must be civil, and only say, ‘I +can’t think how you can talk so like a fool!’ To be sure, poor thing, +you’re lame!” + +I do not know how long she would have gone on; but my lady came in, and +I, released from my duty of entertaining Miss Galindo, made my limping +way into the next room. To tell the truth, I was rather afraid of Miss +Galindo’s tongue, for I never knew what she would say next. + +After a while my lady came, and began to look in the bureau for +something: and as she looked she said—“I think Mr. Horner must have made +some mistake, when he said he had so much work that he almost required a +clerk, for this morning he cannot find anything for Miss Galindo to do; +and there she is, sitting with her pen behind her ear, waiting for +something to write. I am come to find her my mother’s letters, for I +should like to have a fair copy made of them. O, here they are: don’t +trouble yourself, my dear child.” + +When my lady returned again, she sat down and began to talk of Mr. Gray. + +“Miss Galindo says she saw him going to hold a prayer-meeting in a +cottage. Now that really makes me unhappy, it is so like what Mr. Wesley +used to do in my younger days; and since then we have had rebellion in +the American colonies and the French Revolution. You may depend upon it, +my dear, making religion and education common—vulgarising them, as it +were—is a bad thing for a nation. A man who hears prayers read in the +cottage where he has just supped on bread and bacon, forgets the respect +due to a church: he begins to think that one place is as good as another, +and, by-and-by, that one person is as good as another; and after that, I +always find that people begin to talk of their rights, instead of +thinking of their duties. I wish Mr. Gray had been more tractable, and +had left well alone. What do you think I heard this morning? Why that +the Home Hill estate, which niches into the Hanbury property, was bought +by a Baptist baker from Birmingham!” + +“A Baptist baker!” I exclaimed. I had never seen a Dissenter, to my +knowledge; but, having always heard them spoken of with horror, I looked +upon them almost as if they were rhinoceroses. I wanted to see a live +Dissenter, I believe, and yet I wished it were over. I was almost +surprised when I heard that any of them were engaged in such peaceful +occupations as baking. + +“Yes! so Mr. Horner tells me. A Mr. Lambe, I believe. But, at any rate, +he is a Baptist, and has been in trade. What with his schismatism and +Mr. Gray’s methodism, I am afraid all the primitive character of this +place will vanish.” + +From what I could hear, Mr. Gray seemed to be taking his own way; at +any rate, more than he had done when he first came to the village, +when his natural timidity had made him defer to my lady, and seek her +consent and sanction before embarking in any new plan. But newness +was a quality Lady Ludlow especially disliked. Even in the fashions +of dress and furniture, she clung to the old, to the modes which had +prevailed when she was young; and though she had a deep personal regard +for Queen Charlotte (to whom, as I have already said, she had been +maid-of-honour), yet there was a tinge of Jacobitism about her, such +as made her extremely dislike to hear Prince Charles Edward called the +young Pretender, as many loyal people did in those days, and made her +fond of telling of the thorn-tree in my lord’s park in Scotland, which +had been planted by bonny Queen Mary herself, and before which every +guest in the Castle of Monkshaven was expected to stand bare-headed, +out of respect to the memory and misfortunes of the royal planter. + +We might play at cards, if we so chose, on a Sunday; at least, I suppose +we might, for my lady and Mr. Mountford used to do so often when I first +went. But we must neither play cards, nor read, nor sew on the fifth of +November and on the thirtieth of January, but must go to church, and +meditate all the rest of the day—and very hard work meditating was. I +would far rather have scoured a room. That was the reason, I suppose, +why a passive life was seen to be better discipline for me than an active +one. + +But I am wandering away from my lady, and her dislike to all innovation. +Now, it seemed to me, as far as I heard, that Mr. Gray was full of +nothing but new things, and that what he first did was to attack all our +established institutions, both in the village and the parish, and also in +the nation. To be sure, I heard of his ways of going on principally from +Miss Galindo, who was apt to speak more strongly than accurately. + +“There he goes,” she said, “clucking up the children just like an old +hen, and trying to teach them about their salvation and their souls, and +I don’t know what—things that it is just blasphemy to speak about out of +church. And he potters old people about reading their Bibles. I am sure +I don’t want to speak disrespectfully about the Holy Scriptures, but I +found old Job Horton busy reading his Bible yesterday. Says I, ‘What are +you reading, and where did you get it, and who gave it you?’ So he made +answer, ‘That he was reading Susannah and the Elders, for that he had +read Bel and the Dragon till he could pretty near say it off by heart, +and they were two as pretty stories as ever he had read, and that it was +a caution to him what bad old chaps there were in the world.’ Now, as +Job is bedridden, I don’t think he is likely to meet with the Elders, +and I say that I think repeating his Creed, the Commandments, and the +Lord’s Prayer, and, maybe, throwing in a verse of the Psalms, if he +wanted a bit of a change, would have done him far more good than his +pretty stories, as he called them. And what’s the next thing our young +parson does? Why he tries to make us all feel pitiful for the black +slaves, and leaves little pictures of negroes about, with the question +printed below, ‘Am I not a man and a brother?’ just as if I was to be +hail-fellow-well-met with every negro footman. They do say he takes no +sugar in his tea, because he thinks he sees spots of blood in it. Now I +call that superstition.” + +The next day it was a still worse story. + +“Well, my dear! and how are you? My lady sent me in to sit a bit with +you, while Mr. Horner looks out some papers for me to copy. Between +ourselves, Mr. Steward Horner does not like having me for a clerk. It is +all very well he does not; for, if he were decently civil to me, I might +want a chaperone, you know, now poor Mrs. Horner is dead.” This was one +of Miss Galindo’s grim jokes. “As it is, I try to make him forget I’m a +woman, I do everything as ship-shape as a masculine man-clerk. I see he +can’t find a fault—writing good, spelling correct, sums all right. And +then he squints up at me with the tail of his eye, and looks glummer than +ever, just because I’m a woman—as if I could help that. I have gone +good lengths to set his mind at ease. I have stuck my pen behind my ear, +I have made him a bow instead of a curtsey, I have whistled—not a tune I +can’t pipe up that—nay, if you won’t tell my lady, I don’t mind telling +you that I have said ‘Confound it!’ and ‘Zounds!’ I can’t get any +farther. For all that, Mr. Horner won’t forget I am a lady, and so I am +not half the use I might be, and if it were not to please my Lady Ludlow, +Mr. Horner and his books might go hang (see how natural that came out!). +And there is an order for a dozen nightcaps for a bride, and I am so +afraid I shan’t have time to do them. Worst of all, there’s Mr. Gray +taking advantage of my absence to seduce Sally!” + +“To seduce Sally! Mr. Gray!” + +“Pooh, pooh, child! There’s many a kind of seduction. Mr. Gray is +seducing Sally to want to go to church. There has he been twice at my +house, while I have been away in the mornings, talking to Sally about the +state of her soul and that sort of thing. But when I found the meat all +roasted to a cinder, I said, ‘Come, Sally, let’s have no more praying +when beef is down at the fire. Pray at six o’clock in the morning and +nine at night, and I won’t hinder you.’ So she sauced me, and said +something about Martha and Mary, implying that, because she had let the +beef get so overdone that I declare I could hardly find a bit for Nancy +Pole’s sick grandchild, she had chosen the better part. I was very much +put about, I own, and perhaps you’ll be shocked at what I said—indeed, I +don’t know if it was right myself—but I told her I had a soul as well as +she, and if it was to be saved by my sitting still and thinking about +salvation and never doing my duty, I thought I had as good a right as she +had to be Mary, and save my soul. So, that afternoon I sat quite still, +and it was really a comfort, for I am often too busy, I know, to pray as +I ought. There is first one person wanting me, and then another, and the +house and the food and the neighbours to see after. So, when tea-time +comes, there enters my maid with her hump on her back, and her soul to be +saved. ‘Please, ma’am, did you order the pound of butter?’—‘No, Sally,’ +I said, shaking my head, ‘this morning I did not go round by Hale’s farm, +and this afternoon I have been employed in spiritual things.’ + +“Now, our Sally likes tea and bread and butter above everything, and dry +bread was not to her taste. + +“‘I’m thankful,’ said the impudent hussy, ‘that you have taken a turn +towards godliness. It will be my prayers, I trust, that’s given it you.’ + +“I was determined not to give her an opening towards the carnal subject +of butter, so she lingered still, longing to ask leave to run for it. But +I gave her none, and munched my dry bread myself, thinking what a famous +cake I could make for little Ben Pole with the bit of butter we were +saving; and when Sally had had her butterless tea, and was in none of the +best of tempers because Martha had not bethought herself of the butter, I +just quietly said— + +“‘Now, Sally, to-morrow we’ll try to hash that beef well, and to remember +the butter, and to work out our salvation all at the same time, for I +don’t see why it can’t all be done, as God has set us to do it all.’ But +I heard her at it again about Mary and Martha, and I have no doubt that +Mr. Gray will teach her to consider me a lost sheep.” + +I had heard so many little speeches about Mr. Gray from one person or +another, all speaking against him, as a mischief-maker, a setter-up of +new doctrines, and of a fanciful standard of life (and you may be sure +that, where Lady Ludlow led, Mrs. Medlicott and Adams were certain to +follow, each in their different ways showing the influence my lady had +over them), that I believe I had grown to consider him as a very +instrument of evil, and to expect to perceive in his face marks of his +presumption, and arrogance, and impertinent interference. It was now +many weeks since I had seen him, and when he was one morning shown into +the blue drawing-room (into which I had been removed for a change), I was +quite surprised to see how innocent and awkward a young man he appeared, +confused even more than I was at our unexpected tete-a-tete. He looked +thinner, his eyes more eager, his expression more anxious, and his colour +came and went more than it had done when I had seen him last. I tried to +make a little conversation, as I was, to my own surprise, more at my ease +than he was; but his thoughts were evidently too much preoccupied for him +to do more than answer me with monosyllables. + +Presently my lady came in. Mr. Gray twitched and coloured more than +ever; but plunged into the middle of his subject at once. + +“My lady, I cannot answer it to my conscience, if I allow the children of +this village to go on any longer the little heathens that they are. I +must do something to alter their condition. I am quite aware that your +ladyship disapproves of many of the plans which have suggested themselves +to me; but nevertheless I must do something, and I am come now to your +ladyship to ask respectfully, but firmly, what you would advise me to +do.” + +His eyes were dilated, and I could almost have said they were full of +tears with his eagerness. But I am sure it is a bad plan to remind +people of decided opinions which they have once expressed, if you wish +them to modify those opinions. Now, Mr. Gray had done this with my lady; +and though I do not mean to say she was obstinate, yet she was not one to +retract. + +She was silent for a moment or two before she replied. + +“You ask me to suggest a remedy for an evil of the existence of which I +am not conscious,” was her answer—very coldly, very gently given. “In +Mr. Mountford’s time I heard no such complaints: whenever I see the +village children (and they are not unfrequent visitors at this house, on +one pretext or another), they are well and decently behaved.” + +“Oh, madam, you cannot judge,” he broke in. “They are trained to respect +you in word and deed; you are the highest they ever look up to; they have +no notion of a higher.” + +“Nay, Mr. Gray,” said my lady, smiling, “they are as loyally disposed as +any children can be. They come up here every fourth of June, and drink +his Majesty’s health, and have buns, and (as Margaret Dawson can testify) +they take a great and respectful interest in all the pictures I can show +them of the royal family.” + +“But, madam, I think of something higher than any earthly dignities.” + +My lady coloured at the mistake she had made; for she herself was truly +pious. Yet when she resumed the subject, it seemed to me as if her tone +was a little sharper than before. + +“Such want of reverence is, I should say, the clergyman’s fault. You +must excuse me, Mr. Gray, if I speak plainly.” + +“My Lady, I want plain-speaking. I myself am not accustomed to those +ceremonies and forms which are, I suppose, the etiquette in your +ladyship’s rank of life, and which seem to hedge you in from any power of +mine to touch you. Among those with whom I have passed my life hitherto, +it has been the custom to speak plainly out what we have felt earnestly. +So, instead of needing any apology from your ladyship for straightforward +speaking, I will meet what you say at once, and admit that it is the +clergyman’s fault, in a great measure, when the children of his parish +swear, and curse, and are brutal, and ignorant of all saving grace; nay, +some of them of the very name of God. And because this guilt of mine, as +the clergyman of this parish, lies heavy on my soul, and every day leads +but from bad to worse, till I am utterly bewildered how to do good to +children who escape from me as if I were a monster, and who are growing +up to be men fit for and capable of any crime, but those requiring wit or +sense, I come to you, who seem to me all-powerful, as far as material +power goes—for your ladyship only knows the surface of things, and +barely that, that pass in your village—to help me with advice, and such +outward help as you can give.” + +Mr. Gray had stood up and sat down once or twice while he had been +speaking, in an agitated, nervous kind of way, and now he was interrupted +by a violent fit of coughing, after which he trembled all over. + +My lady rang for a glass of water, and looked much distressed. + +“Mr. Gray,” said she, “I am sure you are not well; and that makes you +exaggerate childish faults into positive evils. It is always the case +with us when we are not strong in health. I hear of your exerting +yourself in every direction: you overwork yourself, and the consequence +is, that you imagine us all worse people than we are.” + +And my lady smiled very kindly and pleasantly at him, as he sat, a little +panting, a little flushed, trying to recover his breath. I am sure that +now they were brought face to face, she had quite forgotten all the +offence she had taken at his doings when she heard of them from others; +and, indeed, it was enough to soften any one’s heart to see that young, +almost boyish face, looking in such anxiety and distress. + +“Oh, my lady, what shall I do?” he asked, as soon as he could recover +breath, and with such an air of humility, that I am sure no one who had +seen it could have ever thought him conceited again. “The evil of this +world is too strong for me. I can do so little. It is all in vain. It +was only to-day—” and again the cough and agitation returned. + +“My dear Mr. Gray,” said my lady (the day before I could never have +believed she could have called him My dear), “you must take the advice of +an old woman about yourself. You are not fit to do anything just now but +attend to your own health: rest, and see a doctor (but, indeed, I will +take care of that), and when you are pretty strong again, you will find +that you have been magnifying evils to yourself.” + +“But, my lady, I cannot rest. The evils do exist, and the burden of +their continuance lies on my shoulders. I have no place to gather the +children together in, that I may teach them the things necessary to +salvation. The rooms in my own house are too small; but I have tried +them. I have money of my own; and, as your ladyship knows, I tried to +get a piece of leasehold property, on which to build a school-house at my +own expense. Your ladyship’s lawyer comes forward, at your instructions, +to enforce some old feudal right, by which no building is allowed on +leasehold property without the sanction of the lady of the manor. It may +be all very true; but it was a cruel thing to do,—that is, if your +ladyship had known (which I am sure you do not) the real moral and +spiritual state of my poor parishioners. And now I come to you to know +what I am to do. Rest! I cannot rest, while children whom I could +possibly save are being left in their ignorance, their blasphemy, their +uncleanness, their cruelty. It is known through the village that your +ladyship disapproves of my efforts, and opposes all my plans. If you +think them wrong, foolish, ill-digested (I have been a student, living in +a college, and eschewing all society but that of pious men, until now: I +may not judge for the best, in my ignorance of this sinful human nature), +tell me of better plans and wiser projects for accomplishing my end; but +do not bid me rest, with Satan compassing me round, and stealing souls +away.” + +“Mr. Gray,” said my lady, “there may be some truth in what you have said. +I do not deny it, though I think, in your present state of indisposition +and excitement, you exaggerate it much. I believe—nay, the experience +of a pretty long life has convinced me—that education is a bad thing, if +given indiscriminately. It unfits the lower orders for their duties, the +duties to which they are called by God; of submission to those placed in +authority over them; of contentment with that state of life to which it +has pleased God to call them, and of ordering themselves lowly and +reverently to all their betters. I have made this conviction of mine +tolerably evident to you; and I have expressed distinctly my +disapprobation of some of your ideas. You may imagine, then, that I was +not well pleased when I found that you had taken a rood or more of Farmer +Hale’s land, and were laying the foundations of a school-house. You had +done this without asking for my permission, which, as Farmer Hale’s liege +lady, ought to have been obtained legally, as well as asked for out of +courtesy. I put a stop to what I believed to be calculated to do harm to +a village, to a population in which, to say the least of it, I may be +disposed to take as much interest as you can do. How can reading, and +writing, and the multiplication-table (if you choose to go so far) +prevent blasphemy, and uncleanness, and cruelty? Really, Mr. Gray, I +hardly like to express myself so strongly on the subject in your present +state of health, as I should do at any other time. It seems to me that +books do little; character much; and character is not formed from books.” + +“I do not think of character: I think of souls. I must get some hold +upon these children, or what will become of them in the next world? I +must be found to have some power beyond what they have, and which they +are rendered capable of appreciating, before they will listen to me. At +present physical force is all they look up to; and I have none.” + +“Nay, Mr. Gray, by your own admission, they look up to me.” + +“They would not do anything your ladyship disliked if it was likely to +come to your knowledge; but if they could conceal it from you, the +knowledge of your dislike to a particular line of conduct would never +make them cease from pursuing it.” + +“Mr. Gray”—surprise in her air, and some little indignation—“they and +their fathers have lived on the Hanbury lands for generations!” + +“I cannot help it, madam. I am telling you the truth, whether you +believe me or not.” There was a pause; my lady looked perplexed, and +somewhat ruffled; Mr. Gray as though hopeless and wearied out. “Then, my +lady,” said he, at last, rising as he spoke, “you can suggest nothing to +ameliorate the state of things which, I do assure you, does exist on your +lands, and among your tenants. Surely, you will not object to my using +Farmer Hale’s great barn every Sabbath? He will allow me the use of it, +if your ladyship will grant your permission.” + +“You are not fit for any extra work at present,” (and indeed he had been +coughing very much all through the conversation). “Give me time to +consider of it. Tell me what you wish to teach. You will be able to +take care of your health, and grow stronger while I consider. It shall +not be the worse for you, if you leave it in my hands for a time.” + +My lady spoke very kindly; but he was in too excited a state to recognize +the kindness, while the idea of delay was evidently a sore irritation. I +heard him say: “And I have so little time in which to do my work. Lord! +lay not this sin to my charge.” + +But my lady was speaking to the old butler, for whom, at her sign, I had +rung the bell some little time before. Now she turned round. + +“Mr. Gray, I find I have some bottles of Malmsey, of the vintage of +seventeen hundred and seventy-eight, yet left. Malmsey, as perhaps you +know, used to be considered a specific for coughs arising from weakness. +You must permit me to send you half a dozen bottles, and, depend upon it, +you will take a more cheerful view of life and its duties before you have +finished them, especially if you will be so kind as to see Dr. Trevor, +who is coming to see me in the course of the week. By the time you are +strong enough to work, I will try and find some means of preventing the +children from using such bad language, and otherwise annoying you.” + +“My lady, it is the sin, and not the annoyance. I wish I could make you +understand.” He spoke with some impatience; Poor fellow! he was too +weak, exhausted, and nervous. “I am perfectly well; I can set to work +to-morrow; I will do anything not to be oppressed with the thought of +how little I am doing. I do not want your wine. Liberty to act in the +manner I think right, will do me far more good. But it is of no use. It +is preordained that I am to be nothing but a cumberer of the ground. I +beg your ladyship’s pardon for this call.” + +He stood up, and then turned dizzy. My lady looked on, deeply hurt, and +not a little offended, he held out his hand to her, and I could see that +she had a little hesitation before she took it. He then saw me, I almost +think, for the first time; and put out his hand once more, drew it back, +as if undecided, put it out again, and finally took hold of mine for an +instant in his damp, listless hand, and was gone. + +Lady Ludlow was dissatisfied with both him and herself, I was sure. +Indeed, I was dissatisfied with the result of the interview myself. But +my lady was not one to speak out her feelings on the subject; nor was I +one to forget myself, and begin on a topic which she did not begin. She +came to me, and was very tender with me; so tender, that that, and the +thoughts of Mr. Gray’s sick, hopeless, disappointed look, nearly made me +cry. + +“You are tired, little one,” said my lady. “Go and lie down in my +room, and hear what Medlicott and I can decide upon in the way of +strengthening dainties for that poor young man, who is killing himself +with his over-sensitive conscientiousness.” + +“Oh, my lady!” said I, and then I stopped. + +“Well. What?” asked she. + +“If you would but let him have Farmer Hale’s barn at once, it would do +him more good than all.” + +“Pooh, pooh, child!” though I don’t think she was displeased, “he is not +fit for more work just now. I shall go and write for Dr. Trevor.” + +And for the next half-hour, we did nothing but arrange physical comforts +and cures for poor Mr. Gray. At the end of the time, Mrs. Medlicott +said— + +“Has your ladyship heard that Harry Gregson has fallen from a tree, and +broken his thigh-bone, and is like to be a cripple for life?” + +“Harry Gregson! That black-eyed lad who read my letter? It all comes +from over-education!” + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + +But I don’t see how my lady could think it was over-education that made +Harry Gregson break his thigh, for the manner in which he met with the +accident was this:— + +Mr. Horner, who had fallen sadly out of health since his wife’s death, +had attached himself greatly to Harry Gregson. Now, Mr. Horner had a +cold manner to every one, and never spoke more than was necessary, at the +best of times. And, latterly, it had not been the best of times with +him. I dare say, he had had some causes for anxiety (of which I knew +nothing) about my lady’s affairs; and he was evidently annoyed by my +lady’s whim (as he once inadvertently called it) of placing Miss Galindo +under him in the position of a clerk. Yet he had always been friends, in +his quiet way, with Miss Galindo, and she devoted herself to her new +occupation with diligence and punctuality, although more than once she +had moaned to me over the orders for needlework which had been sent to +her, and which, owing to her occupation in the service of Lady Ludlow, +she had been unable to fulfil. + +The only living creature to whom the staid Mr. Horner could be said to be +attached, was Harry Gregson. To my lady he was a faithful and devoted +servant, looking keenly after her interests, and anxious to forward them +at any cost of trouble to himself. But the more shrewd Mr. Horner was, +the more probability was there of his being annoyed at certain +peculiarities of opinion which my lady held with a quiet, gentle +pertinacity; against which no arguments, based on mere worldly and +business calculations, made any way. This frequent opposition to views +which Mr. Horner entertained, although it did not interfere with the +sincere respect which the lady and the steward felt for each other, yet +prevented any warmer feeling of affection from coming in. It seems +strange to say it, but I must repeat it—the only person for whom, since +his wife’s death, Mr. Horner seemed to feel any love, was the little imp +Harry Gregson, with his bright, watchful eyes, his tangled hair hanging +right down to his eyebrows, for all the world like a Skye terrier. This +lad, half gipsy and whole poacher, as many people esteemed him, hung +about the silent, respectable, staid Mr. Horner, and followed his steps +with something of the affectionate fidelity of the dog which he +resembled. I suspect, this demonstration of attachment to his person on +Harry Gregson’s part was what won Mr. Horner’s regard. In the first +instance, the steward had only chosen the lad out as the cleverest +instrument he could find for his purpose; and I don’t mean to say that, +if Harry had not been almost as shrewd as Mr. Horner himself was, both by +original disposition and subsequent experience, the steward would have +taken to him as he did, let the lad have shown ever so much affection for +him. + +But even to Harry Mr. Horner was silent. Still, it was pleasant to find +himself in many ways so readily understood; to perceive that the crumbs +of knowledge he let fall were picked up by his little follower, and +hoarded like gold that here was one to hate the persons and things whom +Mr. Horner coldly disliked, and to reverence and admire all those for +whom he had any regard. Mr. Horner had never had a child, and +unconsciously, I suppose, something of the paternal feeling had begun to +develop itself in him towards Harry Gregson. I heard one or two things +from different people, which have always made me fancy that Mr. Horner +secretly and almost unconsciously hoped that Harry Gregson might be +trained so as to be first his clerk, and next his assistant, and finally +his successor in his stewardship to the Hanbury estates. + +Harry’s disgrace with my lady, in consequence of his reading the letter, +was a deeper blow to Mr. Horner than his quiet manner would ever have led +any one to suppose, or than Lady Ludlow ever dreamed of inflicting, I am +sure. + +Probably Harry had a short, stern rebuke from Mr. Horner at the time, for +his manner was always hard even to those he cared for the most. But +Harry’s love was not to be daunted or quelled by a few sharp words. I +dare say, from what I heard of them afterwards, that Harry accompanied +Mr. Horner in his walk over the farm the very day of the rebuke; his +presence apparently unnoticed by the agent, by whom his absence would +have been painfully felt nevertheless. That was the way of it, as I have +been told. Mr. Horner never bade Harry go with him; never thanked him +for going, or being at his heels ready to run on any errands, straight as +the crow flies to his point, and back to heel in as short a time as +possible. Yet, if Harry were away, Mr. Horner never inquired the reason +from any of the men who might be supposed to know whether he was detained +by his father, or otherwise engaged; he never asked Harry himself where +he had been. But Miss Galindo said that those labourers who knew Mr. +Horner well, told her that he was always more quick-eyed to shortcomings, +more savage-like in fault-finding, on those days when the lad was absent. + +Miss Galindo, indeed, was my great authority for most of the village news +which I heard. She it was who gave me the particulars of poor Harry’s +accident. + +“You see, my dear,” she said, “the little poacher has taken some +unaccountable fancy to my master.” (This was the name by which Miss +Galindo always spoke of Mr. Horner to me, ever since she had been, as she +called it, appointed his clerk.) + +“Now if I had twenty hearts to lose, I never could spare a bit of one of +them for that good, gray, square, severe man. But different people have +different tastes, and here is that little imp of a gipsy-tinker ready to +turn slave for my master; and, odd enough, my master,—who, I should have +said beforehand, would have made short work of imp, and imp’s family, and +have sent Hall, the Bang-beggar, after them in no time—my master, as +they tell me, is in his way quite fond of the lad, and if he could, +without vexing my lady too much, he would have made him what the folks +here call a Latiner. However, last night, it seems that there was a +letter of some importance forgotten (I can’t tell you what it was about, +my dear, though I know perfectly well, but ‘_service oblige_,’ as well as +‘noblesse,’ and you must take my word for it that it was important, and +one that I am surprised my master could forget), till too late for the +post. (The poor, good, orderly man is not what he was before his wife’s +death.) Well, it seems that he was sore annoyed by his forgetfulness, +and well he might be. And it was all the more vexatious, as he had no +one to blame but himself. As for that matter, I always scold somebody +else when I’m in fault; but I suppose my master would never think of +doing that, else it’s a mighty relief. However, he could eat no tea, and +was altogether put out and gloomy. And the little faithful imp-lad, +perceiving all this, I suppose, got up like a page in an old ballad, and +said he would run for his life across country to Comberford, and see if +he could not get there before the bags were made up. So my master gave +him the letter, and nothing more was heard of the poor fellow till this +morning, for the father thought his son was sleeping in Mr. Horner’s +barn, as he does occasionally, it seems, and my master, as was very +natural, that he had gone to his father’s.” + +“And he had fallen down the old stone quarry, had he not?” + +“Yes, sure enough. Mr. Gray had been up here fretting my lady with some +of his new-fangled schemes, and because the young man could not have it +all his own way, from what I understand, he was put out, and thought he +would go home by the back lane, instead of through the village, where the +folks would notice if the parson looked glum. But, however, it was a +mercy, and I don’t mind saying so, ay, and meaning it too, though it may +be like methodism; for, as Mr. Gray walked by the quarry, he heard a +groan, and at first he thought it was a lamb fallen down; and he stood +still, and then he heard it again; and then I suppose, he looked down and +saw Harry. So he let himself down by the boughs of the trees to the +ledge where Harry lay half-dead, and with his poor thigh broken. There +he had lain ever since the night before: he had been returning to tell +the master that he had safely posted the letter, and the first words he +said, when they recovered him from the exhausted state he was in, were” +(Miss Galindo tried hard not to whimper, as she said it), “‘It was in +time, sir. I see’d it put in the bag with my own eyes.’” + +“But where is he?” asked I. “How did Mr. Gray get him out?” + +“Ay! there it is, you see. Why the old gentleman (I daren’t say Devil +in Lady Ludlow’s house) is not so black as he is painted; and Mr. Gray +must have a deal of good in him, as I say at times; and then at others, +when he has gone against me, I can’t bear him, and think hanging too +good for him. But he lifted the poor lad, as if he had been a baby, +I suppose, and carried him up the great ledges that were formerly +used for steps; and laid him soft and easy on the wayside grass, and +ran home and got help and a door, and had him carried to his house, +and laid on his bed; and then somehow, for the first time either he +or any one else perceived it, he himself was all over blood—his own +blood—he had broken a blood-vessel; and there he lies in the little +dressing-room, as white and as still as if he were dead; and the little +imp in Mr. Gray’s own bed, sound asleep, now his leg is set, just as if +linen sheets and a feather bed were his native element, as one may say. +Really, now he is doing so well, I’ve no patience with him, lying there +where Mr. Gray ought to be. It is just what my lady always prophesied +would come to pass, if there was any confusion of ranks.” + +“Poor Mr. Gray!” said I, thinking of his flushed face, and his feverish, +restless ways, when he had been calling on my lady not an hour before his +exertions on Harry’s behalf. And I told Miss Galindo how ill I had +thought him. + +“Yes,” said she. “And that was the reason my lady had sent for Doctor +Trevor. Well, it has fallen out admirably, for he looked well after that +old donkey of a Prince, and saw that he made no blunders.” + +Now “that old donkey of a Prince” meant the village surgeon, Mr. Prince, +between whom and Miss Galindo there was war to the knife, as they often +met in the cottages, when there was illness, and she had her queer, odd +recipes, which he, with his grand pharmacopoeia, held in infinite +contempt, and the consequence of their squabbling had been, not long +before this very time, that he had established a kind of rule, that into +whatever sick-room Miss Galindo was admitted, there he refused to visit. +But Miss Galindo’s prescriptions and visits cost nothing and were often +backed by kitchen-physic; so, though it was true that she never came but +she scolded about something or other, she was generally preferred as +medical attendant to Mr. Prince. + +“Yes, the old donkey is obliged to tolerate me, and be civil to me; +for, you see, I got there first, and had possession, as it were, and +yet my lord the donkey likes the credit of attending the parson, and +being in consultation with so grand a county-town doctor as Doctor +Trevor. And Doctor Trevor is an old friend of mine” (she sighed a +little, some time I may tell you why), “and treats me with infinite +bowing and respect; so the donkey, not to be out of medical fashion, +bows too, though it is sadly against the grain; and he pulled a face as +if he had heard a slate-pencil gritting against a slate, when I told +Doctor Trevor I meant to sit up with the two lads, for I call Mr. Gray +little more than a lad, and a pretty conceited one, too, at times.” + +“But why should you sit up, Miss Galindo? It will tire you sadly.” + +“Not it. You see, there is Gregson’s mother to keep quiet for she sits +by her lad, fretting and sobbing, so that I’m afraid of her disturbing +Mr. Gray; and there’s Mr. Gray to keep quiet, for Doctor Trevor says his +life depends on it; and there is medicine to be given to the one, and +bandages to be attended to for the other; and the wild horde of gipsy +brothers and sisters to be turned out, and the father to be held in from +showing too much gratitude to Mr. Gray, who can’t hear it,—and who is to +do it all but me? The only servant is old lame Betty, who once lived +with me, and _would_ leave me because she said I was always +bothering—(there was a good deal of truth in what she said, I grant, but +she need not have said it; a good deal of truth is best let alone at the +bottom of the well), and what can she do,—deaf as ever she can be, too?” + +So Miss Galindo went her ways; but not the less was she at her post in +the morning; a little crosser and more silent than usual; but the first +was not to be wondered at, and the last was rather a blessing. + +Lady Ludlow had been extremely anxious both about Mr. Gray and Harry +Gregson. Kind and thoughtful in any case of illness and accident, +she always was; but somehow, in this, the feeling that she was not +quite—what shall I call it?—“friends” seems hardly the right word to +use, as to the possible feeling between the Countess Ludlow and the +little vagabond messenger, who had only once been in her presence,—that +she had hardly parted from either as she could have wished to do, had +death been near, made her more than usually anxious. Doctor Trevor was +not to spare obtaining the best medical advice the county could afford: +whatever he ordered in the way of diet, was to be prepared under Mrs. +Medlicott’s own eye, and sent down from the Hall to the Parsonage. As +Mr. Horner had given somewhat similar directions, in the case of Harry +Gregson at least, there was rather a multiplicity of counsellors and +dainties, than any lack of them. And, the second night, Mr. Horner +insisted on taking the superintendence of the nursing himself, and sat +and snored by Harry’s bedside, while the poor, exhausted mother lay by +her child,—thinking that she watched him, but in reality fast asleep, +as Miss Galindo told us; for, distrusting any one’s powers of watching +and nursing but her own, she had stolen across the quiet village street +in cloak and dressing-gown, and found Mr. Gray in vain trying to reach +the cup of barley-water which Mr. Horner had placed just beyond his +reach. + +In consequence of Mr. Gray’s illness, we had to have a strange curate to +do duty; a man who dropped his h’s, and hurried through the service, and +yet had time enough to stand in my Lady’s way, bowing to her as she came +out of church, and so subservient in manner, that I believe that sooner +than remain unnoticed by a countess, he would have preferred being +scolded, or even cuffed. Now I found out, that great as was my lady’s +liking and approval of respect, nay, even reverence, being paid to her as +a person of quality,—a sort of tribute to her Order, which she had no +individual right to remit, or, indeed, not to exact,—yet she, being +personally simple, sincere, and holding herself in low esteem, could not +endure anything like the servility of Mr. Crosse, the temporary curate. +She grew absolutely to loathe his perpetual smiling and bowing; his +instant agreement with the slightest opinion she uttered; his veering +round as she blew the wind. I have often said that my lady did not talk +much, as she might have done had she lived among her equals. But we all +loved her so much, that we had learnt to interpret all her little ways +pretty truly; and I knew what particular turns of her head, and +contractions of her delicate fingers meant, as well as if she had +expressed herself in words. I began to suspect that my lady would be +very thankful to have Mr. Gray about again, and doing his duty even with +a conscientiousness that might amount to worrying himself, and fidgeting +others; and although Mr. Gray might hold her opinions in as little esteem +as those of any simple gentlewoman, she was too sensible not to feel how +much flavour there was in his conversation, compared to that of Mr. +Crosse, who was only her tasteless echo. + +As for Miss Galindo, she was utterly and entirely a partisan of Mr. +Gray’s, almost ever since she had begun to nurse him during his illness. + +“You know, I never set up for reasonableness, my lady. So I don’t +pretend to say, as I might do if I were a sensible woman and all +that,—that I am convinced by Mr. Gray’s arguments of this thing or +t’other. For one thing, you see, poor fellow! he has never been able to +argue, or hardly indeed to speak, for Doctor Trevor has been very +peremptory. So there’s been no scope for arguing! But what I mean is +this:—When I see a sick man thinking always of others, and never of +himself; patient, humble—a trifle too much at times, for I’ve caught him +praying to be forgiven for having neglected his work as a parish priest,” +(Miss Galindo was making horrible faces, to keep back tears, squeezing up +her eyes in a way which would have amused me at any other time, but when +she was speaking of Mr. Gray); “when I see a downright good, religious +man, I’m apt to think he’s got hold of the right clue, and that I can do +no better than hold on by the tails of his coat and shut my eyes, if +we’ve got to go over doubtful places on our road to Heaven. So, my lady, +you must excuse me if, when he gets about again, he is all agog about a +Sunday-school, for if he is, I shall be agog too, and perhaps twice as +bad as him, for, you see, I’ve a strong constitution compared to his, and +strong ways of speaking and acting. And I tell your ladyship this now, +because I think from your rank—and still more, if I may say so, for all +your kindness to me long ago, down to this very day—you’ve a right to be +first told of anything about me. Change of opinion I can’t exactly call +it, for I don’t see the good of schools and teaching A B C, any more than +I did before, only Mr. Gray does, so I’m to shut my eyes, and leap over +the ditch to the side of education. I’ve told Sally already, that if she +does not mind her work, but stands gossiping with Nelly Mather, I’ll +teach her her lessons; and I’ve never caught her with old Nelly since.” + +I think Miss Galindo’s desertion to Mr. Gray’s opinions in this matter +hurt my lady just a little bit; but she only said— + +“Of course, if the parishoners wish for it, Mr. Gray must have his +Sunday-school. I shall, in that case, withdraw my opposition. I am +sorry I cannot alter my opinions as easily as you.” + +My lady made herself smile as she said this. Miss Galindo saw it was an +effort to do so. She thought a minute before she spoke again. + +“Your ladyship has not seen Mr. Gray as intimately as I have done. That’s +one thing. But, as for the parishioners, they will follow your +ladyship’s lead in everything; so there is no chance of their wishing for +a Sunday-school.” + +“I have never done anything to make them follow my lead, as you call it, +Miss Galindo,” said my lady, gravely. + +“Yes, you have,” replied Miss Galindo, bluntly. And then, correcting +herself, she said, “Begging your ladyship’s pardon, you have. Your +ancestors have lived here time out of mind, and have owned the land on +which their forefathers have lived ever since there were forefathers. You +yourself were born amongst them, and have been like a little queen to +them ever since, I might say, and they’ve never known your ladyship do +anything but what was kind and gentle; but I’ll leave fine speeches about +your ladyship to Mr. Crosse. Only you, my lady, lead the thoughts of the +parish; and save some of them a world of trouble, for they could never +tell what was right if they had to think for themselves. It’s all quite +right that they should be guided by you, my lady,—if only you would +agree with Mr. Gray.” + +“Well,” said my lady, “I told him only the last day that he was here, +that I would think about it. I do believe I could make up my mind on +certain subjects better if I were left alone, than while being constantly +talked to about them.” + +My lady said this in her usual soft tones; but the words had a tinge of +impatience about them; indeed, she was more ruffled than I had often seen +her; but, checking herself in an instant she said— + +“You don’t know how Mr. Horner drags in this subject of education apropos +of everything. Not that he says much about it at any time: it is not his +way. But he cannot let the thing alone.” + +“I know why, my lady,” said Miss Galindo. “That poor lad, Harry Gregson, +will never be able to earn his livelihood in any active way, but will be +lame for life. Now, Mr. Horner thinks more of Harry than of any one else +in the world,—except, perhaps, your ladyship.” Was it not a pretty +companionship for my lady? “And he has schemes of his own for teaching +Harry; and if Mr. Gray could but have his school, Mr. Horner and he think +Harry might be schoolmaster, as your ladyship would not like to have him +coming to you as steward’s clerk. I wish your ladyship would fall into +this plan; Mr. Gray has it so at heart.” + +Miss Galindo looked wistfully at my lady, as she said this. But my lady +only said, drily, and rising at the same time, as if to end the +conversation— + +“So Mr. Horner and Mr. Gray seem to have gone a long way in advance of my +consent to their plans.” + +“There!” exclaimed Miss Galindo, as my lady left the room, with an +apology for going away; “I have gone and done mischief with my long, +stupid tongue. To be sure, people plan a long way ahead of to-day; more +especially when one is a sick man, lying all through the weary day on a +sofa.” + +“My lady will soon get over her annoyance,” said I, as it were +apologetically. I only stopped Miss Galindo’s self-reproaches to draw +down her wrath upon myself. + +“And has not she a right to be annoyed with me, if she likes, and to keep +annoyed as long as she likes? Am I complaining of her, that you need +tell me that? Let me tell you, I have known my lady these thirty years; +and if she were to take me by the shoulders, and turn me out of the +house, I should only love her the more. So don’t you think to come +between us with any little mincing, peace-making speeches. I have been a +mischief-making parrot, and I like her the better for being vexed with +me. So good-bye to you, Miss; and wait till you know Lady Ludlow as well +as I do, before you next think of telling me she will soon get over her +annoyance!” And off Miss Galindo went. + +I could not exactly tell what I had done wrong; but I took care never +again to come in between my lady and her by any remark about the one to +the other; for I saw that some most powerful bond of grateful affection +made Miss Galindo almost worship my lady. + +Meanwhile, Harry Gregson was limping a little about in the village, still +finding his home in Mr. Gray’s house; for there he could most +conveniently be kept under the doctor’s eye, and receive the requisite +care, and enjoy the requisite nourishment. As soon as he was a little +better, he was to go to Mr. Horner’s house; but, as the steward lived +some distance out of the way, and was much from home, he had agreed to +leave Harry at the house; to which he had first been taken, until he was +quite strong again; and the more willingly, I suspect, from what I heard +afterwards, because Mr. Gray gave up all the little strength of speaking +which he had, to teaching Harry in the very manner which Mr. Horner most +desired. + +As for Gregson the father—he—wild man of the woods, poacher, tinker, +jack-of-all trades—was getting tamed by this kindness to his child. +Hitherto his hand had been against every man, as every man’s had been +against him. That affair before the justice, which I told you about, +when Mr. Gray and even my lady had interested themselves to get him +released from unjust imprisonment, was the first bit of justice he +had ever met with; it attracted him to the people, and attached him +to the spot on which he had but squatted for a time. I am not sure +if any of the villagers were grateful to him for remaining in their +neighbourhood, instead of decamping as he had often done before, for +good reasons, doubtless, of personal safety. Harry was only one out +of a brood of ten or twelve children, some of whom had earned for +themselves no good character in service: one, indeed, had been actually +transported, for a robbery committed in a distant part of the county; +and the tale was yet told in the village of how Gregson the father +came back from the trial in a state of wild rage, striding through the +place, and uttering oaths of vengeance to himself, his great black +eyes gleaming out of his matted hair, and his arms working by his +side, and now and then tossed up in his impotent despair. As I heard +the account, his wife followed him, child-laden and weeping. After +this, they had vanished from the country for a time, leaving their +mud hovel locked up, and the door-key, as the neighbours said, buried +in a hedge bank. The Gregsons had reappeared much about the same time +that Mr. Gray came to Hanbury. He had either never heard of their evil +character, or considered that it gave them all the more claims upon +his Christian care; and the end of it was, that this rough, untamed, +strong giant of a heathen was loyal slave to the weak, hectic, nervous, +self-distrustful parson. Gregson had also a kind of grumbling respect +for Mr. Horner: he did not quite like the steward’s monopoly of his +Harry: the mother submitted to that with a better grace, swallowing +down her maternal jealousy in the prospect of her child’s advancement +to a better and more respectable position than that in which his +parents had struggled through life. But Mr. Horner, the steward, and +Gregson, the poacher and squatter, had come into disagreeable contact +too often in former days for them to be perfectly cordial at any +future time. Even now, when there was no immediate cause for anything +but gratitude for his child’s sake on Gregson’s part, he would skulk +out of Mr. Horner’s way, if he saw him coming; and it took all Mr. +Horner’s natural reserve and acquired self-restraint to keep him from +occasionally holding up his father’s life as a warning to Harry. Now +Gregson had nothing of this desire for avoidance with regard to Mr. +Gray. The poacher had a feeling of physical protection towards the +parson; while the latter had shown the moral courage, without which +Gregson would never have respected him, in coming right down upon him +more than once in the exercise of unlawful pursuits, and simply and +boldly telling him he was doing wrong, with such a quiet reliance upon +Gregson’s better feeling, at the same time, that the strong poacher +could not have lifted a finger against Mr. Gray, though it had been +to save himself from being apprehended and taken to the lock-ups the +very next hour. He had rather listened to the parson’s bold words +with an approving smile, much as Mr. Gulliver might have hearkened to +a lecture from a Lilliputian. But when brave words passed into kind +deeds, Gregson’s heart mutely acknowledged its master and keeper. And +the beauty of it all was, that Mr. Gray knew nothing of the good work +he had done, or recognized himself as the instrument which God had +employed. He thanked God, it is true, fervently and often, that the +work was done; and loved the wild man for his rough gratitude; but it +never occurred to the poor young clergyman, lying on his sick-bed, and +praying, as Miss Galindo had told us he did, to be forgiven for his +unprofitable life, to think of Gregson’s reclaimed soul as anything +with which he had had to do. It was now more than three months since +Mr. Gray had been at Hanbury Court. During all that time he had been +confined to his house, if not to his sick-bed, and he and my lady had +never met since their last discussion and difference about Farmer +Hale’s barn. + +This was not my dear lady’s fault; no one could have been more attentive +in every way to the slightest possible want of either of the invalids, +especially of Mr. Gray. And she would have gone to see him at his own +house, as she sent him word, but that her foot had slipped upon the +polished oak staircase, and her ankle had been sprained. + +So we had never seen Mr. Gray since his illness, when one November day he +was announced as wishing to speak to my lady. She was sitting in her +room—the room in which I lay now pretty constantly—and I remember she +looked startled, when word was brought to her of Mr. Gray’s being at the +Hall. + +She could not go to him, she was too lame for that, so she bade him be +shown into where she sat. + +“Such a day for him to go out!” she exclaimed, looking at the fog which +had crept up to the windows, and was sapping the little remaining life in +the brilliant Virginian creeper leaves that draperied the house on the +terrace side. + +He came in white, trembling, his large eyes wild and dilated. He +hastened up to Lady Ludlow’s chair, and, to my surprise, took one of her +hands and kissed it, without speaking, yet shaking all over. + +“Mr. Gray!” said she, quickly, with sharp, tremulous apprehension of some +unknown evil. “What is it? There is something unusual about you.” + +“Something unusual has occurred,” replied he, forcing his words to be +calm, as with a great effort. “A gentleman came to my house, not half an +hour ago—a Mr. Howard. He came straight from Vienna.” + +“My son!” said my dear lady, stretching out her arms in dumb questioning +attitude. + +“The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the +Lord.” + +But my poor lady could not echo the words. He was the last remaining +child. And once she had been the joyful mother of nine. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + +I am ashamed to say what feeling became strongest in my mind about this +time; next to the sympathy we all of us felt for my dear lady in her deep +sorrow, I mean; for that was greater and stronger than anything else, +however contradictory you may think it, when you hear all. + +It might arise from my being so far from well at the time, which produced +a diseased mind in a diseased body; but I was absolutely jealous for my +father’s memory, when I saw how many signs of grief there were for my +lord’s death, he having done next to nothing for the village and parish, +which now changed, as it were, its daily course of life, because his +lordship died in a far-off city. My father had spent the best years of +his manhood in labouring hard, body and soul, for the people amongst whom +he lived. His family, of course, claimed the first place in his heart; +he would have been good for little, even in the way of benevolence, if +they had not. But close after them he cared for his parishioners, and +neighbours. And yet, when he died, though the church bells tolled, and +smote upon our hearts with hard, fresh pain at every beat, the sounds of +every-day life still went on, close pressing around us,—carts and +carriages, street-cries, distant barrel-organs (the kindly neighbours +kept them out of our street): life, active, noisy life, pressed on our +acute consciousness of Death, and jarred upon it as on a quick nerve. + +And when we went to church,—my father’s own church,—though the pulpit +cushions were black, and many of the congregation had put on some humble +sign of mourning, yet it did not alter the whole material aspect of the +place. And yet what was Lord Ludlow’s relation to Hanbury, compared to +my father’s work and place in—? + +O! it was very wicked in me! I think if I had seen my lady,—if I had +dared to ask to go to her, I should not have felt so miserable, so +discontented. But she sat in her own room, hung with black, all, even +over the shutters. She saw no light but that which was +artificial—candles, lamps, and the like—for more than a month. Only +Adams went near her. Mr. Gray was not admitted, though he called daily. +Even Mrs. Medlicott did not see her for near a fortnight. The sight of +my lady’s griefs, or rather the recollection of it, made Mrs. Medlicott +talk far more than was her wont. She told us, with many tears, and much +gesticulation, even speaking German at times, when her English would not +flow, that my lady sat there, a white figure in the middle of the +darkened room; a shaded lamp near her, the light of which fell on an open +Bible,—the great family Bible. It was not open at any chapter or +consoling verse; but at the page whereon were registered the births of +her nine children. Five had died in infancy,—sacrificed to the cruel +system which forbade the mother to suckle her babies. Four had lived +longer; Urian had been the first to die, Ughtred-Mortimar, Earl Ludlow, +the last. + +My lady did not cry, Mrs. Medlicott said. She was quite composed; very +still, very silent. She put aside everything that savoured of mere +business: sent people to Mr. Horner for that. But she was proudly alive +to every possible form which might do honour to the last of her race. + +In those days, expresses were slow things, and forms still slower. Before +my lady’s directions could reach Vienna, my lord was buried. There was +some talk (so Mrs. Medlicott said) about taking the body up, and bringing +him to Hanbury. But his executors,—connections on the Ludlow +side,—demurred to this. If he were removed to England, he must be +carried on to Scotland, and interred with his Monkshaven forefathers. My +lady, deeply hurt, withdrew from the discussion, before it degenerated to +an unseemly contest. But all the more, for this understood mortification +of my lady’s, did the whole village and estate of Hanbury assume every +outward sign of mourning. The church bells tolled morning and evening. +The church itself was draped in black inside. Hatchments were placed +everywhere, where hatchments could be put. All the tenantry spoke in +hushed voices for more than a week, scarcely daring to observe that all +flesh, even that of an Earl Ludlow, and the last of the Hanburys, was but +grass after all. The very Fighting Lion closed its front door, front +shutters it had none, and those who needed drink stole in at the back, +and were silent and maudlin over their cups, instead of riotous and +noisy. Miss Galindo’s eyes were swollen up with crying, and she told me, +with a fresh burst of tears, that even hump-backed Sally had been found +sobbing over her Bible, and using a pocket-handkerchief for the first +time in her life; her aprons having hitherto stood her in the necessary +stead, but not being sufficiently in accordance with etiquette to be used +when mourning over an earl’s premature decease. + +If it was this way out of the Hall, “you might work it by the rule of +three,” as Miss Galindo used to say, and judge what it was in the Hall. +We none of us spoke but in a whisper: we tried not to eat; and indeed the +shock had been so really great, and we did really care so much for my +lady, that for some days we had but little appetite. But after that, I +fear our sympathy grew weaker, while our flesh grew stronger. But we +still spoke low, and our hearts ached whenever we thought of my lady +sitting there alone in the darkened room, with the light ever falling on +that one solemn page. + +We wished, O how I wished that she would see Mr. Gray! But Adams said, +she thought my lady ought to have a bishop come to see her. Still no one +had authority enough to send for one. + +Mr. Horner all this time was suffering as much as any one. He was too +faithful a servant of the great Hanbury family, though now the family had +dwindled down to a fragile old lady, not to mourn acutely over its +probable extinction. He had, besides, a deeper sympathy and reverence +with, and for, my lady, in all things, than probably he ever cared to +show, for his manners were always measured and cold. He suffered from +sorrow. He also suffered from wrong. My lord’s executors kept writing +to him continually. My lady refused to listen to mere business, saying +she intrusted all to him. But the “all” was more complicated than I ever +thoroughly understood. As far as I comprehended the case, it was +something of this kind:—There had been a mortgage raised on my lady’s +property of Hanbury, to enable my lord, her husband, to spend money in +cultivating his Scotch estates, after some new fashion that required +capital. As long as my lord, her son, lived, who was to succeed to both +the estates after her death, this did not signify; so she had said and +felt; and she had refused to take any steps to secure the repayment of +capital, or even the payment of the interest of the mortgage from the +possible representatives and possessors of the Scotch estates, to the +possible owner of the Hanbury property; saying it ill became her to +calculate on the contingency of her son’s death. + +But he had died childless, unmarried. The heir of the Monkshaven +property was an Edinburgh advocate, a far-away kinsman of my lord’s: the +Hanbury property, at my lady’s death, would go to the descendants of a +third son of the Squire Hanbury in the days of Queen Anne. + +This complication of affairs was most grievous to Mr. Horner. He had +always been opposed to the mortgage; had hated the payment of the +interest, as obliging my lady to practise certain economies which, though +she took care to make them as personal as possible, he disliked as +derogatory to the family. Poor Mr. Horner! He was so cold and hard in +his manner, so curt and decisive in his speech, that I don’t think we any +of us did him justice. Miss Galindo was almost the first, at this time, +to speak a kind word of him, or to take thought of him at all, any +farther than to get out of his way when we saw him approaching. + +“I don’t think Mr. Horner is well,” she said one day; about three weeks +after we had heard of my lord’s death. “He sits resting his head on his +hand, and hardly hears me when I speak to him.” + +But I thought no more of it, as Miss Galindo did not name it again. My +lady came amongst us once more. From elderly she had become old; a +little, frail, old lady, in heavy black drapery, never speaking about nor +alluding to her great sorrow; quieter, gentler, paler than ever before; +and her eyes dim with much weeping, never witnessed by mortal. + +She had seen Mr. Gray at the expiration of the month of deep retirement. +But I do not think that even to him she had said one word of her own +particular individual sorrow. All mention of it seemed buried deep for +evermore. One day, Mr. Horner sent word that he was too much indisposed +to attend to his usual business at the Hall; but he wrote down some +directions and requests to Miss Galindo, saying that he would be at his +office early the next morning. The next morning he was dead. + +Miss Galindo told my lady. Miss Galindo herself cried plentifully, but +my lady, although very much distressed, could not cry. It seemed a +physical impossibility, as if she had shed all the tears in her power. +Moreover, I almost think her wonder was far greater that she herself +lived than that Mr. Horner died. It was almost natural that so faithful +a servant should break his heart, when the family he belonged to lost +their stay, their heir, and their last hope. + +Yes! Mr. Horner was a faithful servant. I do not think there are many +so faithful now; but perhaps that is an old woman’s fancy of mine. When +his will came to be examined, it was discovered that, soon after Harry +Gregson’s accident, Mr. Horner had left the few thousands (three, I +think,) of which he was possessed, in trust for Harry’s benefit, desiring +his executors to see that the lad was well educated in certain things, +for which Mr. Horner had thought that he had shown especial aptitude; and +there was a kind of implied apology to my lady in one sentence where he +stated that Harry’s lameness would prevent his being ever able to gain +his living by the exercise of any mere bodily faculties, “as had been +wished by a lady whose wishes” he, the testator, “was bound to regard.” + +But there was a codicil in the will, dated since Lord Ludlow’s +death—feebly written by Mr. Horner himself, as if in preparation only +for some more formal manner of bequest: or, perhaps, only as a mere +temporary arrangement till he could see a lawyer, and have a fresh will +made. In this he revoked his previous bequest to Harry Gregson. He only +left two hundred pounds to Mr. Gray to be used, as that gentleman thought +best, for Henry Gregson’s benefit. With this one exception, he +bequeathed all the rest of his savings to my lady, with a hope that they +might form a nest-egg, as it were, towards the paying off of the mortgage +which had been such a grief to him during his life. I may not repeat all +this in lawyer’s phrase; I heard it through Miss Galindo, and she might +make mistakes. Though, indeed, she was very clear-headed, and soon +earned the respect of Mr. Smithson, my lady’s lawyer from Warwick. Mr. +Smithson knew Miss Galindo a little before, both personally and by +reputation; but I don’t think he was prepared to find her installed as +steward’s clerk, and, at first, he was inclined to treat her, in this +capacity, with polite contempt. But Miss Galindo was both a lady and a +spirited, sensible woman, and she could put aside her self-indulgence in +eccentricity of speech and manner whenever she chose. Nay more; she was +usually so talkative, that if she had not been amusing and warm-hearted, +one might have thought her wearisome occasionally. But to meet Mr. +Smithson she came out daily in her Sunday gown; she said no more than was +required in answer to his questions; her books and papers were in +thorough order, and methodically kept; her statements of matters-of-fact +accurate, and to be relied on. She was amusingly conscious of her +victory over his contempt of a woman-clerk and his preconceived opinion +of her unpractical eccentricity. + +“Let me alone,” said she, one day when she came in to sit awhile with me. +“That man is a good man—a sensible man—and I have no doubt he is a good +lawyer; but he can’t fathom women yet. I make no doubt he’ll go back to +Warwick, and never give credit again to those people who made him think +me half-cracked to begin with. O, my dear, he did! He showed it twenty +times worse than my poor dear master ever did. It was a form to be gone +through to please my lady, and, for her sake, he would hear my statements +and see my books. It was keeping a woman out of harm’s way, at any rate, +to let her fancy herself useful. I read the man. And, I am thankful to +say, he cannot read me. At least, only one side of me. When I see an +end to be gained, I can behave myself accordingly. Here was a man who +thought that a woman in a black silk gown was a respectable, orderly kind +of person; and I was a woman in a black silk gown. He believed that a +woman could not write straight lines, and required a man to tell her that +two and two made four. I was not above ruling my books, and had Cocker a +little more at my fingers’ ends than he had. But my greatest triumph has +been holding my tongue. He would have thought nothing of my books, or my +sums, or my black silk gown, if I had spoken unasked. So I have buried +more sense in my bosom these ten days than ever I have uttered in the +whole course of my life before. I have been so curt, so abrupt, so +abominably dull, that I’ll answer for it he thinks me worthy to be a man. +But I must go back to him, my dear, so good-bye to conversation and you.” + +But though Mr. Smithson might be satisfied with Miss Galindo, I am afraid +she was the only part of the affair with which he was content. Everything +else went wrong. I could not say who told me so—but the conviction of +this seemed to pervade the house. I never knew how much we had all +looked up to the silent, gruff Mr. Horner for decisions, until he was +gone. My lady herself was a pretty good woman of business, as women of +business go. Her father, seeing that she would be the heiress of the +Hanbury property, had given her a training which was thought unusual in +those days, and she liked to feel herself queen regnant, and to have to +decide in all cases between herself and her tenantry. But, perhaps, Mr. +Horner would have done it more wisely; not but what she always attended +to him at last. She would begin by saying, pretty clearly and promptly, +what she would have done, and what she would not have done. If Mr. +Horner approved of it, he bowed, and set about obeying her directly; if +he disapproved of it, he bowed, and lingered so long before he obeyed +her, that she forced his opinion out of him with her “Well, Mr. Horner! +and what have you to say against it?” For she always understood his +silence as well as if he had spoken. But the estate was pressed for +ready money, and Mr. Horner had grown gloomy and languid since the death +of his wife, and even his own personal affairs were not in the order in +which they had been a year or two before, for his old clerk had gradually +become superannuated, or, at any rate, unable by the superfluity of his +own energy and wit to supply the spirit that was wanting in Mr. Horner. + +Day after day Mr. Smithson seemed to grow more fidgety, more annoyed at +the state of affairs. Like every one else employed by Lady Ludlow, as +far as I could learn, he had an hereditary tie to the Hanbury family. As +long as the Smithsons had been lawyers, they had been lawyers to the +Hanburys; always coming in on all great family occasions, and better able +to understand the characters, and connect the links of what had once been +a large and scattered family, than any individual thereof had ever been. + +As long as a man was at the head of the Hanburys, the lawyers had simply +acted as servants, and had only given their advice when it was required. +But they had assumed a different position on the memorable occasion of +the mortgage: they had remonstrated against it. My lady had resented +this remonstrance, and a slight, unspoken coolness had existed between +her and the father of this Mr. Smithson ever since. + +I was very sorry for my lady. Mr. Smithson was inclined to blame Mr. +Horner for the disorderly state in which he found some of the outlying +farms, and for the deficiencies in the annual payment of rents. Mr. +Smithson had too much good feeling to put this blame into words; but my +lady’s quick instinct led her to reply to a thought, the existence of +which she perceived; and she quietly told the truth, and explained how +she had interfered repeatedly to prevent Mr. Horner from taking certain +desirable steps, which were discordant to her hereditary sense of right +and wrong between landlord and tenant. She also spoke of the want of +ready money as a misfortune that could be remedied, by more economical +personal expenditure on her own part; by which individual saving, it was +possible that a reduction of fifty pounds a year might have been +accomplished. But as soon as Mr. Smithson touched on larger economies, +such as either affected the welfare of others, or the honour and standing +of the great House of Hanbury, she was inflexible. Her establishment +consisted of somewhere about forty servants, of whom nearly as many as +twenty were unable to perform their work properly, and yet would have +been hurt if they had been dismissed; so they had the credit of +fulfilling duties, while my lady paid and kept their substitutes. Mr. +Smithson made a calculation, and would have saved some hundreds a year by +pensioning off these old servants. But my lady would not hear of it. +Then, again, I know privately that he urged her to allow some of us to +return to our homes. Bitterly we should have regretted the separation +from Lady Ludlow; but we would have gone back gladly, had we known at the +time that her circumstances required it: but she would not listen to the +proposal for a moment. + +“If I cannot act justly towards every one, I will give up a plan which +has been a source of much satisfaction; at least, I will not carry it out +to such an extent in future. But to these young ladies, who do me the +favour to live with me at present, I stand pledged. I cannot go back +from my word, Mr. Smithson. We had better talk no more of this.” + +As she spoke, she entered the room where I lay. She and Mr. Smithson +were coming for some papers contained in the bureau. They did not know I +was there, and Mr. Smithson started a little when he saw me, as he must +have been aware that I had overheard something. But my lady did not +change a muscle of her face. All the world might overhear her kind, +just, pure sayings, and she had no fear of their misconstruction. She +came up to me, and kissed me on the forehead, and then went to search for +the required papers. + +“I rode over the Connington farms yesterday, my lady. I must say I was +quite grieved to see the condition they are in; all the land that is not +waste is utterly exhausted with working successive white crops. Not a +pinch of manure laid on the ground for years. I must say that a greater +contrast could never have been presented than that between Harding’s farm +and the next fields—fences in perfect order, rotation crops, sheep +eating down the turnips on the waste lands—everything that could be +desired.” + +“Whose farm is that?” asked my lady. + +“Why, I am sorry to say, it was on none of your ladyship’s that I saw +such good methods adopted. I hoped it was, I stopped my horse to +inquire. A queer-looking man, sitting on his horse like a tailor, +watching his men with a couple of the sharpest eyes I ever saw, and +dropping his h’s at every word, answered my question, and told me it was +his. I could not go on asking him who he was; but I fell into +conversation with him, and I gathered that he had earned some money in +trade in Birmingham, and had bought the estate (five hundred acres, I +think he said,) on which he was born, and now was setting himself to +cultivate it in downright earnest, going to Holkham and Woburn, and half +the country over, to get himself up on the subject.” + +“It would be Brooke, that dissenting baker from Birmingham,” said my lady +in her most icy tone. “Mr. Smithson, I am sorry I have been detaining +you so long, but I think these are the letters you wished to see.” + +If her ladyship thought by this speech to quench Mr. Smithson she was +mistaken. Mr. Smithson just looked at the letters, and went on with the +old subject. + +“Now, my lady, it struck me that if you had such a man to take poor +Horner’s place, he would work the rents and the land round most +satisfactorily. I should not despair of inducing this very man to +undertake the work. I should not mind speaking to him myself on the +subject, for we got capital friends over a snack of luncheon that he +asked me to share with him.” + +Lady Ludlow fixed her eyes on Mr. Smithson as he spoke, and never took +them off his face until he had ended. She was silent a minute before she +answered. + +“You are very good, Mr. Smithson, but I need not trouble you with any +such arrangements. I am going to write this afternoon to Captain James, +a friend of one of my sons, who has, I hear, been severely wounded at +Trafalgar, to request him to honour me by accepting Mr. Horner’s +situation.” + +“A Captain James! A captain in the navy! going to manage your ladyship’s +estate!” + +“If he will be so kind. I shall esteem it a condescension on his part; +but I hear that he will have to resign his profession, his state of +health is so bad, and a country life is especially prescribed for him. I +am in some hopes of tempting him here, as I learn he has but little to +depend on if he gives up his profession.” + +“A Captain James! an invalid captain!” + +“You think I am asking too great a favour,” continued my lady. (I never +could tell how far it was simplicity, or how far a kind of innocent +malice, that made her misinterpret Mr. Smithson’s words and looks as she +did.) “But he is not a post-captain, only a commander, and his pension +will be but small. I may be able, by offering him country air and a +healthy occupation, to restore him to health.” + +“Occupation! My lady, may I ask how a sailor is to manage land? Why, +your tenants will laugh him to scorn.” + +“My tenants, I trust, will not behave so ill as to laugh at any one I +choose to set over them. Captain James has had experience in managing +men. He has remarkable practical talents, and great common-sense, as I +hear from every one. But, whatever he may be, the affair rests between +him and myself. I can only say I shall esteem myself fortunate if he +comes.” + +There was no more to be said, after my lady spoke in this manner. I had +heard her mention Captain James before, as a middy who had been very kind +to her son Urian. I thought I remembered then, that she had mentioned +that his family circumstances were not very prosperous. But, I confess, +that little as I knew of the management of land, I quite sided with Mr. +Smithson. He, silently prohibited from again speaking to my lady on the +subject, opened his mind to Miss Galindo, from whom I was pretty sure to +hear all the opinions and news of the household and village. She had +taken a great fancy to me, because she said I talked so agreeably. I +believe it was because I listened so well. + +“Well, have you heard the news,” she began, “about this Captain James? A +sailor,—with a wooden leg, I have no doubt. What would the poor, dear, +deceased master have said to it, if he had known who was to be his +successor! My dear, I have often thought of the postman’s bringing me a +letter as one of the pleasures I shall miss in heaven. But, really, I +think Mr. Horner may be thankful he has got out of the reach of news; or +else he would hear of Mr. Smithson’s having made up to the Birmingham +baker, and of his one-legged captain, coming to dot-and-go-one over the +estate. I suppose he will look after the labourers through a spy-glass. +I only hope he won’t stick in the mud with his wooden leg; for I, for +one, won’t help him out. Yes, I would,” said she, correcting herself; “I +would, for my lady’s sake.” + +“But are you sure he has a wooden leg?” asked I. “I heard Lady Ludlow +tell Mr. Smithson about him, and she only spoke of him as wounded.” + +“Well, sailors are almost always wounded in the leg. Look at Greenwich +Hospital! I should say there were twenty one-legged pensioners to one +without an arm there. But say he has got half a dozen legs: what has he +to do with managing land? I shall think him very impudent if he comes, +taking advantage of my lady’s kind heart.” + +However, come he did. In a month from that time, the carriage was sent +to meet Captain James; just as three years before it had been sent to +meet me. His coming had been so much talked about that we were all as +curious as possible to see him, and to know how so unusual an experiment, +as it seemed to us, would answer. But, before I tell you anything about +our new agent, I must speak of something quite as interesting, and I +really think quite as important. And this was my lady’s making friends +with Harry Gregson. I do believe she did it for Mr. Horner’s sake; but, +of course, I can only conjecture why my lady did anything. But I heard +one day, from Mary Legard, that my lady had sent for Harry to come and +see her, if he was well enough to walk so far; and the next day he was +shown into the room he had been in once before under such unlucky +circumstances. + +The lad looked pale enough, as he stood propping himself up on his +crutch, and the instant my lady saw him, she bade John Footman place a +stool for him to sit down upon while she spoke to him. It might be his +paleness that gave his whole face a more refined and gentle look; but I +suspect it was that the boy was apt to take impressions, and that Mr. +Horner’s grave, dignified ways, and Mr. Gray’s tender and quiet manners, +had altered him; and then the thoughts of illness and death seem to turn +many of us into gentlemen, and gentlewomen, as long as such thoughts are +in our minds. We cannot speak loudly or angrily at such times; we are +not apt to be eager about mere worldly things, for our very awe at our +quickened sense of the nearness of the invisible world, makes us calm and +serene about the petty trifles of to-day. At least, I know that was the +explanation Mr. Gray once gave me of what we all thought the great +improvement in Harry Gregson’s way of behaving. + +My lady hesitated so long about what she had best say, that Harry grew a +little frightened at her silence. A few months ago it would have +surprised me more than it did now; but since my lord her son’s death, she +had seemed altered in many ways,—more uncertain and distrustful of +herself, as it were. + +At last she said, and I think the tears were in her eyes: “My poor little +fellow, you have had a narrow escape with your life since I saw you +last.” + +To this there was nothing to be said but “Yes;” and again there was +silence. + +“And you have lost a good, kind friend, in Mr. Horner.” + +The boy’s lips worked, and I think he said, “Please, don’t.” But I can’t +be sure; at any rate, my lady went on: + +“And so have I,—a good, kind friend, he was to both of us; and to you he +wished to show his kindness in even a more generous way than he has done. +Mr. Gray has told you about his legacy to you, has he not?” + +There was no sign of eager joy on the lad’s face, as if he realised the +power and pleasure of having what to him must have seemed like a fortune. + +“Mr. Gray said as how he had left me a matter of money.” + +“Yes, he has left you two hundred pounds.” + +“But I would rather have had him alive, my lady,” he burst out, sobbing +as if his heart would break. + +“My lad, I believe you. We would rather have had our dead alive, would +we not? and there is nothing in money that can comfort us for their loss. +But you know—Mr. Gray has told you—who has appointed all our times to +die. Mr. Horner was a good, just man; and has done well and kindly, both +by me and you. You perhaps do not know” (and now I understood what my +lady had been making up her mind to say to Harry, all the time she was +hesitating how to begin) “that Mr. Horner, at one time, meant to leave +you a great deal more; probably all he had, with the exception of a +legacy to his old clerk, Morrison. But he knew that this estate—on +which my forefathers had lived for six hundred years—was in debt, and +that I had no immediate chance of paying off this debt; and yet he felt +that it was a very sad thing for an old property like this to belong in +part to those other men, who had lent the money. You understand me, I +think, my little man?” said she, questioning Harry’s face. + +He had left off crying, and was trying to understand, with all his might +and main; and I think he had got a pretty good general idea of the state +of affairs; though probably he was puzzled by the term “the estate being +in debt.” But he was sufficiently interested to want my lady to go on; +and he nodded his head at her, to signify this to her. + +“So Mr. Horner took the money which he once meant to be yours, and has +left the greater part of it to me, with the intention of helping me to +pay off this debt I have told you about. It will go a long way, and I +shall try hard to save the rest, and then I shall die happy in leaving +the land free from debt.” She paused. “But I shall not die happy in +thinking of you. I do not know if having money, or even having a great +estate and much honour, is a good thing for any of us. But God sees fit +that some of us should be called to this condition, and it is our duty +then to stand by our posts, like brave soldiers. Now, Mr. Horner +intended you to have this money first. I shall only call it borrowing +from you, Harry Gregson, if I take it and use it to pay off the debt. I +shall pay Mr. Gray interest on this money, because he is to stand as your +guardian, as it were, till you come of age; and he must fix what ought to +be done with it, so as to fit you for spending the principal rightly when +the estate can repay it you. I suppose, now, it will be right for you to +be educated. That will be another snare that will come with your money. +But have courage, Harry. Both education and money may be used rightly, +if we only pray against the temptations they bring with them.” + +Harry could make no answer, though I am sure he understood it all. My +lady wanted to get him to talk to her a little, by way of becoming +acquainted with what was passing in his mind; and she asked him what he +would like to have done with his money, if he could have part of it now? +To such a simple question, involving no talk about feelings, his answer +came readily enough. + +“Build a cottage for father, with stairs in it, and give Mr. Gray a +school-house. O, father does so want Mr. Gray for to have his wish! +Father saw all the stones lying quarried and hewn on Farmer Hale’s land; +Mr. Gray had paid for them all himself. And father said he would work +night and day, and little Tommy should carry mortar, if the parson would +let him, sooner than that he should be fretted and frabbed as he was, +with no one giving him a helping hand or a kind word.” + +Harry knew nothing of my lady’s part in the affair; that was very clear. +My lady kept silence. + +“If I might have a piece of my money, I would buy land from Mr. Brooks; +he has got a bit to sell just at the corner of Hendon Lane, and I would +give it to Mr. Gray; and, perhaps, if your ladyship thinks I may be +learned again, I might grow up into the schoolmaster.” + +“You are a good boy,” said my lady. “But there are more things to be +thought of, in carrying out such a plan, than you are aware of. However, +it shall be tried.” + +“The school, my lady?” I exclaimed, almost thinking she did not know what +she was saying. + +“Yes, the school. For Mr. Horner’s sake, for Mr. Gray’s sake, and last, +not least, for this lad’s sake, I will give the new plan a trial. Ask +Mr. Gray to come up to me this afternoon about the land he wants. He +need not go to a Dissenter for it. And tell your father he shall have a +good share in the building of it, and Tommy shall carry the mortar.” + +“And I may be schoolmaster?” asked Harry, eagerly. + +“We’ll see about that,” said my lady, amused. “It will be some time +before that plan comes to pass, my little fellow.” + +And now to return to Captain James. My first account of him was from +Miss Galindo. + +“He’s not above thirty; and I must just pack up my pens and my paper, and +be off; for it would be the height of impropriety for me to be staying +here as his clerk. It was all very well in the old master’s days. But +here am I, not fifty till next May, and this young, unmarried man, who is +not even a widower! O, there would be no end of gossip. Besides he +looks as askance at me as I do at him. My black silk gown had no effect. +He’s afraid I shall marry him. But I won’t; he may feel himself quite +safe from that. And Mr. Smithson has been recommending a clerk to my +lady. She would far rather keep me on; but I can’t stop. I really could +not think it proper.” + +“What sort of a looking man is he?” + +“O, nothing particular. Short, and brown, and sunburnt. I did not think +it became me to look at him. Well, now for the nightcaps. I should have +grudged any one else doing them, for I have got such a pretty pattern!” + +But when it came to Miss Galindo’s leaving, there was a great +misunderstanding between her and my lady. Miss Galindo had imagined that +my lady had asked her as a favour to copy the letters, and enter the +accounts, and had agreed to do the work without the notion of being paid +for so doing. She had, now and then, grieved over a very profitable +order for needlework passing out of her hands on account of her not +having time to do it, because of her occupation at the Hall; but she had +never hinted this to my lady, but gone on cheerfully at her writing as +long as her clerkship was required. My lady was annoyed that she had not +made her intention of paying Miss Galindo more clear, in the first +conversation she had had with her; but I suppose that she had been too +delicate to be very explicit with regard to money matters; and now Miss +Galindo was quite hurt at my lady’s wanting to pay her for what she had +done in such right-down good-will. + +“No,” Miss Galindo said; “my own dear lady, you may be as angry with me +as you like, but don’t offer me money. Think of six-and-twenty years +ago, and poor Arthur, and as you were to me then! Besides, I wanted +money—I don’t disguise it—for a particular purpose; and when I found +that (God bless you for asking me!) I could do you a service, I turned it +over in my mind, and I gave up one plan and took up another, and it’s all +settled now. Bessy is to leave school and come and live with me. Don’t, +please, offer me money again. You don’t know how glad I have been to do +anything for you. Have not I, Margaret Dawson? Did you not hear me say, +one day, I would cut off my hand for my lady; for am I a stick or a +stone, that I should forget kindness? O, I have been so glad to work for +you. And now Bessy is coming here; and no one knows anything about +her—as if she had done anything wrong, poor child!” + +“Dear Miss Galindo,” replied my lady, “I will never ask you to take money +again. Only I thought it was quite understood between us. And you know +you have taken money for a set of morning wrappers, before now.” + +“Yes, my lady; but that was not confidential. Now I was so proud to have +something to do for you confidentially.” + +“But who is Bessy?” asked my lady. “I do not understand who she is, or +why she is to come and live with you. Dear Miss Galindo, you must honour +me by being confidential with me in your turn!” + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + +I had always understood that Miss Galindo had once been in much better +circumstances, but I had never liked to ask any questions respecting her. +But about this time many things came out respecting her former life, +which I will try and arrange: not however, in the order in which I heard +them, but rather as they occurred. + +Miss Galindo was the daughter of a clergyman in Westmoreland. Her father +was the younger brother of a baronet, his ancestor having been one of +those of James the First’s creation. This baronet-uncle of Miss Galindo +was one of the queer, out-of-the-way people who were bred at that time, +and in that northern district of England. I never heard much of him from +any one, besides this one great fact: that he had early disappeared from +his family, which indeed only consisted of a brother and sister who died +unmarried, and lived no one knew where,—somewhere on the Continent, it +was supposed, for he had never returned from the grand tour which he had +been sent to make, according to the general fashion of the day, as soon +as he had left Oxford. He corresponded occasionally with his brother the +clergyman; but the letters passed through a banker’s hands; the banker +being pledged to secrecy, and, as he told Mr. Galindo, having the +penalty, if he broke his pledge, of losing the whole profitable business, +and of having the management of the baronet’s affairs taken out of his +hands, without any advantage accruing to the inquirer, for Sir Lawrence +had told Messrs. Graham that, in case his place of residence was revealed +by them, not only would he cease to bank with them, but instantly take +measures to baffle any future inquiries as to his whereabouts, by +removing to some distant country. + +Sir Lawrence paid a certain sum of money to his brother’s account every +year; but the time of this payment varied, and it was sometimes eighteen +or nineteen months between the deposits; then, again, it would not be +above a quarter of the time, showing that he intended it to be annual, +but, as this intention was never expressed in words, it was impossible to +rely upon it, and a great deal of this money was swallowed up by the +necessity Mr. Galindo felt himself under of living in the large, old, +rambling family mansion, which had been one of Sir Lawrence’s rarely +expressed desires. Mr. and Mrs. Galindo often planned to live upon their +own small fortune and the income derived from the living (a vicarage, of +which the great tithes went to Sir Lawrence as lay impropriator), so as +to put-by the payments made by the baronet, for the benefit of +Laurentia—our Miss Galindo. But I suppose they found it difficult to +live economically in a large house, even though they had it rent free. +They had to keep up with hereditary neighbours and friends, and could +hardly help doing it in the hereditary manner. + +One of these neighbours, a Mr. Gibson, had a son a few years older than +Laurentia. The families were sufficiently intimate for the young people +to see a good deal of each other: and I was told that this young Mr. Mark +Gibson was an unusually prepossessing man (he seemed to have impressed +every one who spoke of him to me as being a handsome, manly, kind-hearted +fellow), just what a girl would be sure to find most agreeable. The +parents either forgot that their children were growing up to man’s and +woman’s estate, or thought that the intimacy and probable attachment +would be no bad thing, even if it did lead to a marriage. Still, nothing +was ever said by young Gibson till later on, when it was too late, as it +turned out. He went to and from Oxford; he shot and fished with Mr. +Galindo, or came to the Mere to skate in winter-time; was asked to +accompany Mr. Galindo to the Hall, as the latter returned to the quiet +dinner with his wife and daughter; and so, and so, it went on, nobody +much knew how, until one day, when Mr. Galindo received a formal letter +from his brother’s bankers, announcing Sir Lawrence’s death, of malaria +fever, at Albano, and congratulating Sir Hubert on his accession to the +estates and the baronetcy. The king is dead—“Long live the king!” as I +have since heard that the French express it. + +Sir Hubert and his wife were greatly surprised. Sir Lawrence was but +two years older than his brother; and they had never heard of any +illness till they heard of his death. They were sorry; very much +shocked; but still a little elated at the succession to the baronetcy +and estates. The London bankers had managed everything well. There was +a large sum of ready money in their hands, at Sir Hubert’s service, +until he should touch his rents, the rent-roll being eight thousand +a-year. And only Laurentia to inherit it all! Her mother, a poor +clergyman’s daughter, began to plan all sorts of fine marriages for +her; nor was her father much behind his wife in his ambition. They took +her up to London, when they went to buy new carriages, and dresses, and +furniture. And it was then and there she made my lady’s acquaintance. +How it was that they came to take a fancy to each other, I cannot say. +My lady was of the old nobility,—grand, compose, gentle, and stately in +her ways. Miss Galindo must always have been hurried in her manner, and +her energy must have shown itself in inquisitiveness and oddness even +in her youth. But I don’t pretend to account for things: I only narrate +them. And the fact was this:—that the elegant, fastidious countess +was attracted to the country girl, who on her part almost worshipped +my lady. My lady’s notice of their daughter made her parents think, +I suppose, that there was no match that she might not command; she, +the heiress of eight thousand a-year, and visiting about among earls +and dukes. So when they came back to their old Westmoreland Hall, and +Mark Gibson rode over to offer his hand and his heart, and prospective +estate of nine hundred a-year, to his old companion and playfellow, +Laurentia, Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo made very short work of it. +They refused him plumply themselves; and when he begged to be allowed +to speak to Laurentia, they found some excuse for refusing him the +opportunity of so doing, until they had talked to her themselves, and +brought up every argument and fact in their power to convince her—a +plain girl, and conscious of her plainness—that Mr. Mark Gibson had +never thought of her in the way of marriage till after her father’s +accession to his fortune; and that it was the estate—not the young +lady—that he was in love with. I suppose it will never be known in +this world how far this supposition of theirs was true. My Lady Ludlow +had always spoken as if it was; but perhaps events, which came to her +knowledge about this time, altered her opinion. At any rate, the end +of it was, Laurentia refused Mark, and almost broke her heart in doing +so. He discovered the suspicions of Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo, and +that they had persuaded their daughter to share in them. So he flung +off with high words, saying that they did not know a true heart when +they met with one; and that although he had never offered till after +Sir Lawrence’s death, yet that his father knew all along that he had +been attached to Laurentia, only that he, being the eldest of five +children, and having as yet no profession, had had to conceal, rather +than to express, an attachment, which, in those days, he had believed +was reciprocated. He had always meant to study for the bar, and the +end of all he had hoped for had been to earn a moderate income, which +he might ask Laurentia to share. This, or something like it, was what +he said. But his reference to his father cut two ways. Old Mr. Gibson +was known to be very keen about money. It was just as likely that he +would urge Mark to make love to the heiress, now she was an heiress, as +that he would have restrained him previously, as Mark said he had done. +When this was repeated to Mark, he became proudly reserved, or sullen, +and said that Laurentia, at any rate, might have known him better. He +left the country, and went up to London to study law soon afterwards; +and Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo thought they were well rid of him. But +Laurentia never ceased reproaching herself, and never did to her dying +day, as I believe. The words, “She might have known me better,” told +to her by some kind friend or other, rankled in her mind, and were +never forgotten. Her father and mother took her up to London the next +year; but she did not care to visit—dreaded going out even for a drive, +lest she should see Mark Gibson’s reproachful eyes—pined and lost her +health. Lady Ludlow saw this change with regret, and was told the cause +by Lady Galindo, who of course, gave her own version of Mark’s conduct +and motives. My lady never spoke to Miss Galindo about it, but tried +constantly to interest and please her. It was at this time that my lady +told Miss Galindo so much about her own early life, and about Hanbury, +that Miss Galindo resolved, if ever she could, she would go and see the +old place which her friend loved so well. The end of it all was, that +she came to live there, as we know. + +But a great change was to come first. Before Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo +had left London on this, their second visit, they had a letter from the +lawyer, whom they employed, saying that Sir Lawrence had left an heir, +his legitimate child by an Italian woman of low rank; at least, legal +claims to the title and property had been sent into him on the boy’s +behalf. Sir Lawrence had always been a man of adventurous and artistic, +rather than of luxurious tastes; and it was supposed, when all came to be +proved at the trial, that he was captivated by the free, beautiful life +they lead in Italy, and had married this Neapolitan fisherman’s daughter, +who had people about her shrewd enough to see that the ceremony was +legally performed. She and her husband had wandered about the shores of +the Mediterranean for years, leading a happy, careless, irresponsible +life, unencumbered by any duties except those connected with a rather +numerous family. It was enough for her that they never wanted money, and +that her husband’s love was always continued to her. She hated the name +of England—wicked, cold, heretic England—and avoided the mention of any +subjects connected with her husband’s early life. So that, when he died +at Albano, she was almost roused out of her vehement grief to anger with +the Italian doctor, who declared that he must write to a certain address +to announce the death of Lawrence Galindo. For some time, she feared +lest English barbarians might come down upon her, making a claim to the +children. She hid herself and them in the Abruzzi, living upon the sale +of what furniture and jewels Sir Lawrence had died possessed of. When +these failed, she returned to Naples, which she had not visited since her +marriage. Her father was dead; but her brother inherited some of his +keenness. He interested the priests, who made inquiries and found that +the Galindo succession was worth securing to an heir of the true faith. +They stirred about it, obtained advice at the English Embassy; and hence +that letter to the lawyers, calling upon Sir Hubert to relinquish title +and property, and to refund what money he had expended. He was vehement +in his opposition to this claim. He could not bear to think of his +brother having married a foreigner—a papist, a fisherman’s daughter; +nay, of his having become a papist himself. He was in despair at the +thought of his ancestral property going to the issue of such a marriage. +He fought tooth and nail, making enemies of his relations, and losing +almost all his own private property; for he would go on against the +lawyer’s advice, long after every one was convinced except himself and +his wife. At last he was conquered. He gave up his living in gloomy +despair. He would have changed his name if he could, so desirous was he +to obliterate all tie between himself and the mongrel papist baronet and +his Italian mother, and all the succession of children and nurses who +came to take possession of the Hall soon after Mr. Hubert Galindo’s +departure, stayed there one winter, and then flitted back to Naples with +gladness and delight. Mr. and Mrs. Hubert Galindo lived in London. He +had obtained a curacy somewhere in the city. They would have been +thankful now if Mr. Mark Gibson had renewed his offer. No one could +accuse him of mercenary motives if he had done so. Because he did not +come forward, as they wished, they brought his silence up as a +justification of what they had previously attributed to him. I don’t +know what Miss Galindo thought herself; but Lady Ludlow has told me how +she shrank from hearing her parents abuse him. Lady Ludlow supposed that +he was aware that they were living in London. His father must have known +the fact, and it was curious if he had never named it to his son. +Besides, the name was very uncommon; and it was unlikely that it should +never come across him, in the advertisements of charity sermons which the +new and rather eloquent curate of Saint Mark’s East was asked to preach. +All this time Lady Ludlow never lost sight of them, for Miss Galindo’s +sake. And when the father and mother died, it was my lady who upheld +Miss Galindo in her determination not to apply for any provision to her +cousin, the Italian baronet, but rather to live upon the hundred a-year +which had been settled on her mother and the children of his son Hubert’s +marriage by the old grandfather, Sir Lawrence. + +Mr. Mark Gibson had risen to some eminence as a barrister on the Northern +Circuit, but had died unmarried in the lifetime of his father, a victim +(so people said) to intemperance. Doctor Trevor, the physician who had +been called in to Mr. Gray and Harry Gregson, had married a sister of +his. And that was all my lady knew about the Gibson family. But who was +Bessy? + +That mystery and secret came out, too, in process of time. Miss Galindo +had been to Warwick, some years before I arrived at Hanbury, on some kind +of business or shopping, which can only be transacted in a county town. +There was an old Westmoreland connection between her and Mrs. Trevor, +though I believe the latter was too young to have been made aware of her +brother’s offer to Miss Galindo at the time when it took place; and such +affairs, if they are unsuccessful, are seldom spoken about in the +gentleman’s family afterwards. But the Gibsons and Galindos had been +county neighbours too long for the connection not to be kept up between +two members settled far away from their early homes. Miss Galindo always +desired her parcels to be sent to Dr. Trevor’s, when she went to Warwick +for shopping purchases. If she were going any journey, and the coach did +not come through Warwick as soon as she arrived (in my lady’s coach or +otherwise) from Hanbury, she went to Doctor Trevor’s to wait. She was as +much expected to sit down to the household meals as if she had been one +of the family: and in after-years it was Mrs. Trevor who managed her +repository business for her. + +So, on the day I spoke of, she had gone to Doctor Trevor’s to rest, and +possibly to dine. The post in those times, came in at all hours of the +morning: and Doctor Trevor’s letters had not arrived until after his +departure on his morning round. Miss Galindo was sitting down to dinner +with Mrs. Trevor and her seven children, when the Doctor came in. He was +flurried and uncomfortable, and hurried the children away as soon as he +decently could. Then (rather feeling Miss Galindo’s presence an +advantage, both as a present restraint on the violence of his wife’s +grief, and as a consoler when he was absent on his afternoon round), he +told Mrs. Trevor of her brother’s death. He had been taken ill on +circuit, and had hurried back to his chambers in London only to die. She +cried terribly; but Doctor Trevor said afterwards, he never noticed that +Miss Galindo cared much about it one way or another. She helped him to +soothe his wife, promised to stay with her all the afternoon instead of +returning to Hanbury, and afterwards offered to remain with her while the +Doctor went to attend the funeral. When they heard of the old love-story +between the dead man and Miss Galindo,—brought up by mutual friends in +Westmoreland, in the review which we are all inclined to take of the +events of a man’s life when he comes to die,—they tried to remember Miss +Galindo’s speeches and ways of going on during this visit. She was a +little pale, a little silent; her eyes were sometimes swollen, and her +nose red; but she was at an age when such appearances are generally +attributed to a bad cold in the head, rather than to any more sentimental +reason. They felt towards her as towards an old friend, a kindly, +useful, eccentric old maid. She did not expect more, or wish them to +remember that she might once have had other hopes, and more youthful +feelings. Doctor Trevor thanked her very warmly for staying with his +wife, when he returned home from London (where the funeral had taken +place). He begged Miss Galindo to stay with them, when the children were +gone to bed, and she was preparing to leave the husband and wife by +themselves. He told her and his wife many particulars—then paused—then +went on—“And Mark has left a child—a little girl— + +“But he never was married!” exclaimed Mrs. Trevor. + +“A little girl,” continued her husband, “whose mother, I conclude, is +dead. At any rate, the child was in possession of his chambers; she and +an old nurse, who seemed to have the charge of everything, and has +cheated poor Mark, I should fancy, not a little.” + +“But the child!” asked Mrs. Trevor, still almost breathless with +astonishment. “How do you know it is his?” + +“The nurse told me it was, with great appearance of indignation at my +doubting it. I asked the little thing her name, and all I could get was +‘Bessy!’ and a cry of ‘Me wants papa!’ The nurse said the mother was +dead, and she knew no more about it than that Mr. Gibson had engaged her +to take care of the little girl, calling it his child. One or two of his +lawyer friends, whom I met with at the funeral, told me they were aware +of the existence of the child.” + +“What is to be done with her?” asked Mrs. Gibson. + +“Nay, I don’t know,” replied he. “Mark has hardly left assets enough to +pay his debts, and your father is not inclined to come forward.” + +That night, as Doctor Trevor sat in his study, after his wife had gone to +bed, Miss Galindo knocked at his door. She and he had a long +conversation. The result was that he accompanied Miss Galindo up to town +the next day; that they took possession of the little Bessy, and she was +brought down, and placed at nurse at a farm in the country near Warwick, +Miss Galindo undertaking to pay one-half of the expense, and to furnish +her with clothes, and Dr. Trevor undertaking that the remaining half +should be furnished by the Gibson family, or by himself in their default. + +Miss Galindo was not fond of children; and I dare say she dreaded taking +this child to live with her for more reasons than one. My Lady Ludlow +could not endure any mention of illegitimate children. It was a +principle of hers that society ought to ignore them. And I believe Miss +Galindo had always agreed with her until now, when the thing came home to +her womanly heart. Still she shrank from having this child of some +strange woman under her roof. She went over to see it from time to time; +she worked at its clothes long after every one thought she was in bed; +and, when the time came for Bessy to be sent to school, Miss Galindo +laboured away more diligently than ever, in order to pay the increased +expense. For the Gibson family had, at first, paid their part of the +compact, but with unwillingness and grudging hearts; then they had left +it off altogether, and it fell hard on Dr. Trevor with his twelve +children; and, latterly, Miss Galindo had taken upon herself almost all +the burden. One can hardly live and labour, and plan and make +sacrifices, for any human creature, without learning to love it. And +Bessy loved Miss Galindo, too, for all the poor girl’s scanty pleasures +came from her, and Miss Galindo had always a kind word, and, latterly, +many a kind caress, for Mark Gibson’s child; whereas, if she went to Dr. +Trevor’s for her holiday, she was overlooked and neglected in that +bustling family, who seemed to think that if she had comfortable board +and lodging under their roof, it was enough. + +I am sure, now, that Miss Galindo had often longed to have Bessy to live +with her; but, as long as she could pay for her being at school, she did +not like to take so bold a step as bringing her home, knowing what the +effect of the consequent explanation would be on my lady. And as the +girl was now more than seventeen, and past the age when young ladies are +usually kept at school, and as there was no great demand for governesses +in those days, and as Bessy had never been taught any trade by which to +earn her own living, why I don’t exactly see what could have been done +but for Miss Galindo to bring her to her own home in Hanbury. For, +although the child had grown up lately, in a kind of unexpected manner, +into a young woman, Miss Galindo might have kept her at school for a year +longer, if she could have afforded it; but this was impossible when she +became Mr. Horner’s clerk, and relinquished all the payment of her +repository work; and perhaps, after all, she was not sorry to be +compelled to take the step she was longing for. At any rate, Bessy came +to live with Miss Galindo, in a very few weeks from the time when Captain +James set Miss Galindo free to superintend her own domestic economy +again. + +For a long time, I knew nothing about this new inhabitant of Hanbury. My +lady never mentioned her in any way. This was in accordance with Lady +Ludlow’s well-known principles. She neither saw nor heard, nor was in +any way cognisant of the existence of those who had no legal right to +exist at all. If Miss Galindo had hoped to have an exception made in +Bessy’s favour, she was mistaken. My lady sent a note inviting Miss +Galindo herself to tea one evening, about a month after Bessy came; but +Miss Galindo “had a cold and could not come.” The next time she was +invited, she “had an engagement at home”—a step nearer to the absolute +truth. And the third time, she “had a young friend staying with her whom +she was unable to leave.” My lady accepted every excuse as bona fide, +and took no further notice. I missed Miss Galindo very much; we all did; +for, in the days when she was clerk, she was sure to come in and find the +opportunity of saying something amusing to some of us before she went +away. And I, as an invalid, or perhaps from natural tendency, was +particularly fond of little bits of village gossip. There was no Mr. +Horner—he even had come in, now and then, with formal, stately pieces of +intelligence—and there was no Miss Galindo in these days. I missed her +much. And so did my lady, I am sure. Behind all her quiet, sedate +manner, I am certain her heart ached sometimes for a few words from Miss +Galindo, who seemed to have absented herself altogether from the Hall now +Bessy was come. + +Captain James might be very sensible, and all that; but not even my lady +could call him a substitute for the old familiar friends. He was a +thorough sailor, as sailors were in those days—swore a good deal, drank +a good deal (without its ever affecting him in the least), and was very +prompt and kind-hearted in all his actions; but he was not accustomed to +women, as my lady once said, and would judge in all things for himself. +My lady had expected, I think, to find some one who would take his +notions on the management of her estate from her ladyship’s own self; but +he spoke as if he were responsible for the good management of the whole, +and must, consequently, be allowed full liberty of action. He had been +too long in command over men at sea to like to be directed by a woman in +anything he undertook, even though that woman was my lady. I suppose +this was the common-sense my lady spoke of; but when common-sense goes +against us, I don’t think we value it quite so much as we ought to do. + +Lady Ludlow was proud of her personal superintendence of her own +estate. She liked to tell us how her father used to take her with him +in his rides, and bid her observe this and that, and on no account +to allow such and such things to be done. But I have heard that the +first time she told all this to Captain James, he told her point-blank +that he had heard from Mr. Smithson that the farms were much neglected +and the rents sadly behindhand, and that he meant to set to in good +earnest and study agriculture, and see how he could remedy the state +of things. My lady would, I am sure, be greatly surprised, but what +could she do? Here was the very man she had chosen herself, setting to +with all his energy to conquer the defect of ignorance, which was all +that those who had presumed to offer her ladyship advice had ever had +to say against him. Captain James read Arthur Young’s “Tours” in all +his spare time, as long as he was an invalid; and shook his head at my +lady’s accounts as to how the land had been cropped or left fallow from +time immemorial. Then he set to, and tried too many new experiments at +once. My lady looked on in dignified silence; but all the farmers and +tenants were in an uproar, and prophesied a hundred failures. Perhaps +fifty did occur; they were only half as many as Lady Ludlow had feared; +but they were twice as many, four, eight times as many as the captain +had anticipated. His openly-expressed disappointment made him popular +again. The rough country people could not have understood silent and +dignified regret at the failure of his plans, but they sympathized +with a man who swore at his ill success—sympathized, even while they +chuckled over his discomfiture. Mr. Brooke, the retired tradesman, did +not cease blaming him for not succeeding, and for swearing. “But what +could you expect from a sailor?” Mr. Brooke asked, even in my lady’s +hearing; though he might have known Captain James was my lady’s own +personal choice, from the old friendship Mr. Urian had always shown for +him. I think it was this speech of the Birmingham baker’s that made +my lady determine to stand by Captain James, and encourage him to try +again. For she would not allow that her choice had been an unwise one, +at the bidding (as it were) of a dissenting tradesman; the only person +in the neighbourhood, too, who had flaunted about in coloured clothes, +when all the world was in mourning for my lady’s only son. + +Captain James would have thrown the agency up at once, if my lady had not +felt herself bound to justify the wisdom of her choice, by urging him to +stay. He was much touched by her confidence in him, and swore a great +oath, that the next year he would make the land such as it had never been +before for produce. It was not my lady’s way to repeat anything she had +heard, especially to another person’s disadvantage. So I don’t think she +ever told Captain James of Mr. Brooke’s speech about a sailor’s being +likely to mismanage the property; and the captain was too anxious to +succeed in this, the second year of his trial, to be above going to the +flourishing, shrewd Mr. Brooke, and asking for his advice as to the best +method of working the estate. I dare say, if Miss Galindo had been as +intimate as formerly at the Hall, we should all of us have heard of this +new acquaintance of the agent’s long before we did. As it was, I am sure +my lady never dreamed that the captain, who held opinions that were even +more Church and King than her own, could ever have made friends with a +Baptist baker from Birmingham, even to serve her ladyship’s own interests +in the most loyal manner. + +We heard of it first from Mr. Gray, who came now often to see my lady, +for neither he nor she could forget the solemn tie which the fact of +his being the person to acquaint her with my lord’s death had created +between them. For true and holy words spoken at that time, though +having no reference to aught below the solemn subjects of life and +death, had made her withdraw her opposition to Mr. Gray’s wish about +establishing a village school. She had sighed a little, it is true, +and was even yet more apprehensive than hopeful as to the result; but +almost as if as a memorial to my lord, she had allowed a kind of rough +school-house to be built on the green, just by the church; and had +gently used the power she undoubtedly had, in expressing her strong +wish that the boys might only be taught to read and write, and the +first four rules of arithmetic; while the girls were only to learn to +read, and to add up in their heads, and the rest of the time to work +at mending their own clothes, knitting stockings and spinning. My lady +presented the school with more spinning-wheels than there were girls, +and requested that there might be a rule that they should have spun so +many hanks of flax, and knitted so many pairs of stockings, before they +ever were taught to read at all. After all, it was but making the best +of a bad job with my poor lady—but life was not what it had been to +her. I remember well the day that Mr. Gray pulled some delicately fine +yarn (and I was a good judge of those things) out of his pocket, and +laid it and a capital pair of knitted stockings before my lady, as the +first-fruits, so to say, of his school. I recollect seeing her put on +her spectacles, and carefully examine both productions. Then she passed +them to me. + +“This is well, Mr. Gray. I am much pleased. You are fortunate in your +schoolmistress. She has had both proper knowledge of womanly things and +much patience. Who is she? One out of our village?” + +“My lady,” said Mr. Gray, stammering and colouring in his old fashion, +“Miss Bessy is so very kind as to teach all those sorts of things—Miss +Bessy, and Miss Galindo, sometimes.” + +My lady looked at him over her spectacles: but she only repeated the +words “Miss Bessy,” and paused, as if trying to remember who such a +person could be; and he, if he had then intended to say more, was quelled +by her manner, and dropped the subject. He went on to say, that he had +thought it his duty to decline the subscription to his school offered by +Mr. Brooke, because he was a Dissenter; that he (Mr. Gray) feared that +Captain James, through whom Mr. Brooke’s offer of money had been made, +was offended at his refusing to accept it from a man who held heterodox +opinions; nay, whom Mr. Gray suspected of being infected by Dodwell’s +heresy. + +“I think there must be some mistake,” said my lady, “or I have +misunderstood you. Captain James would never be sufficiently with a +schismatic to be employed by that man Brooke in distributing his +charities. I should have doubted, until now, if Captain James knew him.” + +“Indeed, my lady, he not only knows him, but is intimate with him, I +regret to say. I have repeatedly seen the captain and Mr. Brooke walking +together; going through the fields together; and people do say—” + +My lady looked up in interrogation at Mr. Gray’s pause. + +“I disapprove of gossip, and it may be untrue; but people do say that +Captain James is very attentive to Miss Brooke.” + +“Impossible!” said my lady, indignantly. “Captain James is a loyal and +religious man. I beg your pardon Mr. Gray, but it is impossible.” + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + + +Like many other things which have been declared to be impossible, this +report of Captain James being attentive to Miss Brooke turned out to be +very true. + +The mere idea of her agent being on the slightest possible terms of +acquaintance with the Dissenter, the tradesman, the Birmingham democrat, +who had come to settle in our good, orthodox, aristocratic, and +agricultural Hanbury, made my lady very uneasy. Miss Galindo’s +misdemeanour in having taken Miss Bessy to live with her, faded into a +mistake, a mere error of judgment, in comparison with Captain James’s +intimacy at Yeast House, as the Brookes called their ugly square-built +farm. My lady talked herself quite into complacency with Miss Galindo, +and even Miss Bessy was named by her, the first time I had ever been +aware that my lady recognized her existence; but—I recollect it was a +long rainy afternoon, and I sat with her ladyship, and we had time and +opportunity for a long uninterrupted talk—whenever we had been silent +for a little while she began again, with something like a wonder how it +was that Captain James could ever have commenced an acquaintance with +“that man Brooke.” My lady recapitulated all the times she could +remember, that anything had occurred, or been said by Captain James which +she could now understand as throwing light upon the subject. + +“He said once that he was anxious to bring in the Norfolk system of +cropping, and spoke a good deal about Mr. Coke of Holkham (who, by the +way, was no more a Coke than I am—collateral in the female line—which +counts for little or nothing among the great old commoners’ families of +pure blood), and his new ways of cultivation; of course new men bring in +new ways, but it does not follow that either are better than the old +ways. However, Captain James has been very anxious to try turnips and +bone manure, and he really is a man of such good sense and energy, and +was so sorry last year about the failure, that I consented; and now I +begin to see my error. I have always heard that town bakers adulterate +their flour with bone-dust; and, of course, Captain James would be aware +of this, and go to Brooke to inquire where the article was to be +purchased.” + +My lady always ignored the fact which had sometimes, I suspect, been +brought under her very eyes during her drives, that Mr. Brooke’s few +fields were in a state of far higher cultivation than her own; so she +could not, of course, perceive that there was any wisdom to be gained +from asking the advice of the tradesman turned farmer. + +But by-and-by this fact of her agent’s intimacy with the person whom +in the whole world she most disliked (with that sort of dislike in +which a large amount of uncomfortableness is combined—the dislike +which conscientious people sometimes feel to another without knowing +why, and yet which they cannot indulge in with comfort to themselves +without having a moral reason why), came before my lady in many shapes. +For, indeed I am sure that Captain James was not a man to conceal or +be ashamed of one of his actions. I cannot fancy his ever lowering his +strong loud clear voice, or having a confidental conversation with +any one. When his crops had failed, all the village had known it. He +complained, he regretted, he was angry, or owned himself a —— fool, all +down the village street; and the consequence was that, although he was +a far more passionate man than Mr. Horner, all the tenants liked him +far better. People, in general, take a kindlier interest in any one, +the workings of whose mind and heart they can watch and understand, +than in a man who only lets you know what he has been thinking about +and feeling, by what he does. But Harry Gregson was faithful to the +memory of Mr. Horner. Miss Galindo has told me that she used to +watch him hobble out of the way of Captain James, as if to accept +his notice, however good-naturedly given, would have been a kind of +treachery to his former benefactor. But Gregson (the father) and the +new agent rather took to each other; and one day, much to my surprise, +I heard that the “poaching, tinkering vagabond,” as the people used +to call Gregson when I first had come to live at Hanbury, had been +appointed gamekeeper; Mr. Gray standing godfather, as it were, to his +trustworthiness, if he were trusted with anything; which I thought at +the time was rather an experiment, only it answered, as many of Mr. +Gray’s deeds of daring did. It was curious how he was growing to be a +kind of autocrat in the village; and how unconscious he was of it. He +was as shy and awkward and nervous as ever in any affair that was not +of some moral consequence to him. But as soon as he was convinced that +a thing was right, he “shut his eyes and ran and butted at it like a +ram,” as Captain James once expressed it, in talking over something Mr. +Gray had done. People in the village said, “they never knew what the +parson would be at next;” or they might have said, “where his reverence +would next turn up.” For I have heard of his marching right into the +middle of a set of poachers, gathered together for some desperate +midnight enterprise, or walking into a public-house that lay just +beyond the bounds of my lady’s estate, and in that extra-parochial +piece of ground I named long ago, and which was considered the +rendezvous of all the ne’er-do-weel characters for miles round, and +where a parson and a constable were held in much the same kind of +esteem as unwelcome visitors. And yet Mr. Gray had his long fits of +depression, in which he felt as if he were doing nothing, making no +way in his work, useless and unprofitable, and better out of the world +than in it. In comparison with the work he had set himself to do, what +he did seemed to be nothing. I suppose it was constitutional, those +attacks of lowness of spirits which he had about this time; perhaps a +part of the nervousness which made him always so awkward when he came +to the Hall. Even Mrs. Medlicott, who almost worshipped the ground he +trod on, as the saying is, owned that Mr. Gray never entered one of my +lady’s rooms without knocking down something, and too often breaking +it. He would much sooner have faced a desperate poacher than a young +lady any day. At least so we thought. + +I do not know how it was that it came to pass that my lady became +reconciled to Miss Galindo about this time. Whether it was that her +ladyship was weary of the unspoken coolness with her old friend; or that +the specimens of delicate sewing and fine spinning at the school had +mollified her towards Miss Bessy; but I was surprised to learn one day +that Miss Galindo and her young friend were coming that very evening to +tea at the Hall. This information was given me by Mrs. Medlicott, as a +message from my lady, who further went on to desire that certain little +preparations should be made in her own private sitting-room, in which the +greater part of my days were spent. From the nature of these +preparations, I became quite aware that my lady intended to do honour to +her expected visitors. Indeed, Lady Ludlow never forgave by halves, as I +have known some people do. Whoever was coming as a visitor to my lady, +peeress, or poor nameless girl, there was a certain amount of preparation +required in order to do them fitting honour. I do not mean to say that +the preparation was of the same degree of importance in each case. I +dare say, if a peeress had come to visit us at the Hall, the covers would +have been taken off the furniture in the white drawing-room (they never +were uncovered all the time I stayed at the Hall), because my lady would +wish to offer her the ornaments and luxuries which this grand visitor +(who never came—I wish she had! I did so want to see that furniture +uncovered!) was accustomed to at home, and to present them to her in the +best order in which my lady could. The same rule, mollified, held good +with Miss Galindo. Certain things, in which my lady knew she took an +interest, were laid out ready for her to examine on this very day; and, +what was more, great books of prints were laid out, such as I remembered +my lady had had brought forth to beguile my own early days of +illness,—Mr. Hogarth’s works, and the like,—which I was sure were put +out for Miss Bessy. + +No one knows how curious I was to see this mysterious Miss Bessy—twenty +times more mysterious, of course, for want of her surname. And then +again (to try and account for my great curiosity, of which in +recollection I am more than half ashamed), I had been leading the quiet +monotonous life of a crippled invalid for many years,—shut up from any +sight of new faces; and this was to be the face of one whom I had thought +about so much and so long,—Oh! I think I might be excused. + +Of course they drank tea in the great hall, with the four young +gentlewomen, who, with myself, formed the small bevy now under her +ladyship’s charge. Of those who were at Hanbury when first I came, none +remained; all were married, or gone once more to live at some home which +could be called their own, whether the ostensible head were father or +brother. I myself was not without some hopes of a similar kind. My +brother Harry was now a curate in Westmoreland, and wanted me to go and +live with him, as eventually I did for a time. But that is neither here +nor there at present. What I am talking about is Miss Bessy. + +After a reasonable time had elapsed, occupied as I well knew by the meal +in the great hall,—the measured, yet agreeable conversation +afterwards,—and a certain promenade around the hall, and through the +drawing-rooms, with pauses before different pictures, the history or +subject of each of which was invariably told by my lady to every new +visitor,—a sort of giving them the freedom of the old family-seat, by +describing the kind and nature of the great progenitors who had lived +there before the narrator,—I heard the steps approaching my lady’s room, +where I lay. I think I was in such a state of nervous expectation, that +if I could have moved easily, I should have got up and run away. And yet +I need not have been, for Miss Galindo was not in the least altered (her +nose a little redder, to be sure, but then that might only have had a +temporary cause in the private crying I know she would have had before +coming to see her dear Lady Ludlow once again). But I could almost have +pushed Miss Galindo away, as she intercepted me in my view of the +mysterious Miss Bessy. + +Miss Bessy was, as I knew, only about eighteen, but she looked older. +Dark hair, dark eyes, a tall, firm figure, a good, sensible face, with a +serene expression, not in the least disturbed by what I had been thinking +must be such awful circumstances as a first introduction to my lady, who +had so disapproved of her very existence: those are the clearest +impressions I remember of my first interview with Miss Bessy. She seemed +to observe us all, in her quiet manner, quite as much as I did her; but +she spoke very little; occupied herself, indeed, as my lady had planned, +with looking over the great books of engravings. I think I must have +(foolishly) intended to make her feel at her ease, by my patronage; but +she was seated far away from my sofa, in order to command the light, and +really seemed so unconcerned at her unwonted circumstances, that she did +not need my countenance or kindness. One thing I did like—her watchful +look at Miss Galindo from time to time: it showed that her thoughts and +sympathy were ever at Miss Galindo’s service, as indeed they well might +be. When Miss Bessy spoke, her voice was full and clear, and what she +said, to the purpose, though there was a slight provincial accent in her +way of speaking. After a while, my lady set us two to play at chess, a +game which I had lately learnt at Mr. Gray’s suggestion. Still we did +not talk much together, though we were becoming attracted towards each +other, I fancy. + +“You will play well,” said she. “You have only learnt about six months, +have you? And yet you can nearly beat me, who have been at it as many +years.” + +“I began to learn last November. I remember Mr. Gray’s bringing me +‘Philidor on Chess,’ one very foggy, dismal day.” + +What made her look up so suddenly, with bright inquiry in her eyes? What +made her silent for a moment as if in thought, and then go on with +something, I know not what, in quite an altered tone? + +My lady and Miss Galindo went on talking, while I sat thinking. I heard +Captain James’s name mentioned pretty frequently; and at last my lady put +down her work, and said, almost with tears in her eyes: + +“I could not—I cannot believe it. He must be aware she is a schismatic; +a baker’s daughter; and he is a gentleman by virtue and feeling, as well +as by his profession, though his manners may be at times a little rough. +My dear Miss Galindo, what will this world come to?” + +Miss Galindo might possibly be aware of her own share in bringing the +world to the pass which now dismayed my lady,—for of course, though all +was now over and forgiven, yet Miss, Bessy’s being received into a +respectable maiden lady’s house, was one of the portents as to the +world’s future which alarmed her ladyship; and Miss Galindo knew +this,—but, at any rate, she had too lately been forgiven herself not to +plead for mercy for the next offender against my lady’s delicate sense of +fitness and propriety,—so she replied: + +“Indeed, my lady, I have long left off trying to conjecture what makes +Jack fancy Gill, or Gill Jack. It’s best to sit down quiet under the +belief that marriages are made for us, somewhere out of this world, and +out of the range of this world’s reason and laws. I’m not so sure that I +should settle it down that they were made in heaven; t’other place seems +to me as likely a workshop; but at any rate, I’ve given up troubling my +head as to why they take place. Captain James is a gentleman; I make no +doubt of that ever since I saw him stop to pick up old Goody Blake (when +she tumbled down on the slide last winter) and then swear at a little lad +who was laughing at her, and cuff him till he tumbled down crying; but we +must have bread somehow, and though I like it better baked at home in a +good sweet brick oven, yet, as some folks never can get it to rise, I +don’t see why a man may not be a baker. You see, my lady, I look upon +baking as a simple trade, and as such lawful. There is no machine comes +in to take away a man’s or woman’s power of earning their living, like +the spinning-jenny (the old busybody that she is), to knock up all our +good old women’s livelihood, and send them to their graves before their +time. There’s an invention of the enemy, if you will!” + +“That’s very true!” said my lady, shaking her head. + +“But baking bread is wholesome, straightforward elbow-work. They have +not got to inventing any contrivance for that yet, thank Heaven! It does +not seem to me natural, nor according to Scripture, that iron and steel +(whose brows can’t sweat) should be made to do man’s work. And so I say, +all those trades where iron and steel do the work ordained to man at the +Fall, are unlawful, and I never stand up for them. But say this baker +Brooke did knead his bread, and make it rise, and then that people, who +had, perhaps, no good ovens, came to him, and bought his good light +bread, and in this manner he turned an honest penny and got rich; why, +all I say, my lady, is this,—I dare say he would have been born a +Hanbury, or a lord if he could; and if he was not, it is no fault of his, +that I can see, that he made good bread (being a baker by trade), and got +money, and bought his land. It was his misfortune, not his fault, that +he was not a person of quality by birth.” + +“That’s very true,” said my lady, after a moment’s pause for +consideration. “But, although he was a baker, he might have been a +Churchman. Even your eloquence, Miss Galindo, shan’t convince me that +that is not his own fault.” + +“I don’t see even that, begging your pardon, my lady,” said Miss Galindo, +emboldened by the first success of her eloquence. “When a Baptist is a +baby, if I understand their creed aright, he is not baptized; and, +consequently, he can have no godfathers and godmothers to do anything for +him in his baptism; you agree to that, my lady?” + +My lady would rather have known what her acquiescence would lead to, +before acknowledging that she could not dissent from this first +proposition; still she gave her tacit agreement by bowing her head. + +“And, you know, our godfathers and godmothers are expected to promise and +vow three things in our name, when we are little babies, and can do +nothing but squall for ourselves. It is a great privilege, but don’t let +us be hard upon those who have not had the chance of godfathers and +godmothers. Some people, we know, are born with silver spoons,—that’s +to say, a godfather to give one things, and teach one’s catechism, and +see that we’re confirmed into good church-going Christians,—and others +with wooden ladles in their mouths. These poor last folks must just be +content to be godfatherless orphans, and Dissenters, all their lives; and +if they are tradespeople into the bargain, so much the worse for them; +but let us be humble Christians, my dear lady, and not hold our heads too +high because we were born orthodox quality.” + +“You go on too fast, Miss Galindo! I can’t follow you. Besides, I do +believe dissent to be an invention of the Devil’s. Why can’t they +believe as we do? It’s very wrong. Besides, its schism and heresy, and, +you know, the Bible says that’s as bad as witchcraft.” + +My lady was not convinced, as I could see. After Miss Galindo had gone, +she sent Mrs. Medlicott for certain books out of the great old library up +stairs, and had them made up into a parcel under her own eye. + +“If Captain James comes to-morrow, I will speak to him about these +Brookes. I have not hitherto liked to speak to him, because I did not +wish to hurt him, by supposing there could be any truth in the reports +about his intimacy with them. But now I will try and do my duty by him +and them. Surely this great body of divinity will bring them back to the +true church.” + +I could not tell, for though my lady read me over the titles, I was not +any the wiser as to their contents. Besides, I was much more anxious to +consult my lady as to my own change of place. I showed her the letter I +had that day received from Harry; and we once more talked over the +expediency of my going to live with him, and trying what entire change of +air would do to re-establish my failing health. I could say anything to +my lady, she was so sure to understand me rightly. For one thing, she +never thought of herself, so I had no fear of hurting her by stating the +truth. I told her how happy my years had been while passed under her +roof; but that now I had begun to wonder whether I had not duties +elsewhere, in making a home for Harry,—and whether the fulfilment of +these duties, quiet ones they must needs be in the case of such a cripple +as myself, would not prevent my sinking into the querulous habit of +thinking and talking, into which I found myself occasionally falling. Add +to which, there was the prospect of benefit from the more bracing air of +the north. + +It was then settled that my departure from Hanbury, my happy home for so +long, was to take place before many weeks had passed. And as, when one +period of life is about to be shut up for ever, we are sure to look back +upon it with fond regret, so I, happy enough in my future prospects, +could not avoid recurring to all the days of my life in the Hall, from +the time when I came to it, a shy awkward girl, scarcely past childhood, +to now, when a grown woman,—past childhood—almost, from the very +character of my illness, past youth,—I was looking forward to leaving my +lady’s house (as a residence) for ever. As it has turned out, I never +saw either her or it again. Like a piece of sea-wreck, I have drifted +away from those days: quiet, happy, eventless days,—very happy to +remember! + +I thought of good, jovial Mr. Mountford,—and his regrets that he might +not keep a pack, “a very small pack,” of harriers, and his merry ways, +and his love of good eating; of the first coming of Mr. Gray, and my +lady’s attempt to quench his sermons, when they tended to enforce any +duty connected with education. And now we had an absolute school-house +in the village; and since Miss Bessy’s drinking tea at the Hall, my lady +had been twice inside it, to give directions about some fine yarn she was +having spun for table-napery. And her ladyship had so outgrown her old +custom of dispensing with sermon or discourse, that even during the +temporary preaching of Mr. Crosse, she had never had recourse to it, +though I believe she would have had all the congregation on her side if +she had. + +And Mr. Horner was dead, and Captain James reigned in his stead. Good, +steady, severe, silent Mr. Horner! with his clock-like regularity, and +his snuff-coloured clothes, and silver buckles! I have often wondered +which one misses most when they are dead and gone,—the bright creatures +full of life, who are hither and thither and everywhere, so that no one +can reckon upon their coming and going, with whom stillness and the long +quiet of the grave, seems utterly irreconcilable, so full are they of +vivid motion and passion,—or the slow, serious people, whose +movements—nay, whose very words, seem to go by clockwork; who never +appear much to affect the course of our life while they are with us, but +whose methodical ways show themselves, when they are gone, to have been +intertwined with our very roots of daily existence. I think I miss these +last the most, although I may have loved the former best. Captain James +never was to me what Mr. Horner was, though the latter had hardly changed +a dozen words with me at the day of his death. Then Miss Galindo! I +remembered the time as if it had been only yesterday, when she was but a +name—and a very odd one—to me; then she was a queer, abrupt, +disagreeable, busy old maid. Now I loved her dearly, and I found out +that I was almost jealous of Miss Bessy. + +Mr. Gray I never thought of with love; the feeling was almost reverence +with which I looked upon him. I have not wished to speak much of myself, +or else I could have told you how much he had been to me during these +long, weary years of illness. But he was almost as much to every one, +rich and poor, from my lady down to Miss Galindo’s Sally. + +The village, too, had a different look about it. I am sure I could not +tell you what caused the change; but there were no more lounging young +men to form a group at the cross-road, at a time of day when young men +ought to be at work. I don’t say this was all Mr. Gray’s doing, for +there really was so much to do in the fields that there was but little +time for lounging now-a-days. And the children were hushed up in school, +and better behaved out of it, too, than in the days when I used to be +able to go my lady’s errands in the village. I went so little about now, +that I am sure I can’t tell who Miss Galindo found to scold; and yet she +looked so well and so happy that I think she must have had her accustomed +portion of that wholesome exercise. + +Before I left Hanbury, the rumour that Captain James was going to marry +Miss Brooke, Baker Brooke’s eldest daughter, who had only a sister to +share his property with her, was confirmed. He himself announced it to +my lady; nay, more, with a courage, gained, I suppose, in his former +profession, where, as I have heard, he had led his ship into many a post +of danger, he asked her ladyship, the Countess Ludlow, if he might bring +his bride elect, (the Baptist baker’s daughter!) and present her to my +lady! + +I am glad I was not present when he made this request; I should have felt +so much ashamed for him, and I could not have helped being anxious till I +heard my lady’s answer, if I had been there. Of course she acceded; but +I can fancy the grave surprise of her look. I wonder if Captain James +noticed it. + +I hardly dared ask my lady, after the interview had taken place, what she +thought of the bride elect; but I hinted my curiosity, and she told me, +that if the young person had applied to Mrs. Medlicott, for the situation +of cook, and Mrs. Medlicott had engaged her, she thought that it would +have been a very suitable arrangement. I understood from this how little +she thought a marriage with Captain James, R.N., suitable. + +About a year after I left Hanbury, I received a letter from Miss Galindo; +I think I can find it.—Yes, this is it. + + ‘Hanbury, May 4, 1811. + + DEAR MARGARET, + + ‘You ask for news of us all. Don’t you know there is no news in + Hanbury? Did you ever hear of an event here? Now, if you have + answered “Yes,” in your own mind to these questions, you have fallen + into my trap, and never were more mistaken in your life. Hanbury is + full of news; and we have more events on our hands than we know what + to do with. I will take them in the order of the newspapers—births, + deaths, and marriages. In the matter of births, Jenny Lucas has had + twins not a week ago. Sadly too much of a good thing, you’ll say. + Very true: but then they died; so their birth did not much signify. My + cat has kittened, too; she has had three kittens, which again you may + observe is too much of a good thing; and so it would be, if it were + not for the next item of intelligence I shall lay before you. Captain + and Mrs. James have taken the old house next Pearson’s; and the house + is overrun with mice, which is just as fortunate for me as the King of + Egypt’s rat-ridden kingdom was to Dick Whittington. For my cat’s + kittening decided me to go and call on the bride, in hopes she wanted + a cat; which she did like a sensible woman, as I do believe she is, in + spite of Baptism, Bakers, Bread, and Birmingham, and something worse + than all, which you shall hear about, if you’ll only be patient. As I + had got my best bonnet on, the one I bought when poor Lord Ludlow was + last at Hanbury in ’99—I thought it a great condescension in myself + (always remembering the date of the Galindo baronetcy) to go and call + on the bride; though I don’t think so much of myself in my every-day + clothes, as you know. But who should I find there but my Lady Ludlow! + She looks as frail and delicate as ever, but is, I think, in better + heart ever since that old city merchant of a Hanbury took it into his + head that he was a cadet of the Hanburys of Hanbury, and left her that + handsome legacy. I’ll warrant you that the mortgage was paid off + pretty fast; and Mr. Horner’s money—or my lady’s money, or Harry + Gregson’s money, call it which you will—is invested in his name, all + right and tight; and they do talk of his being captain of his school, + or Grecian, or something, and going to college, after all! Harry + Gregson the poacher’s son! Well! to be sure, we are living in strange + times! + + ‘But I have not done with the marriages yet. Captain James’s is all + very well, but no one cares for it now, we are so full of Mr. Gray’s. + Yes, indeed, Mr. Gray is going to be married, and to nobody else but + my little Bessy! I tell her she will have to nurse him half the days + of her life, he is such a frail little body. But she says she does + not care for that; so that his body holds his soul, it is enough for + her. She has a good spirit and a brave heart, has my Bessy! It is a + great advantage that she won’t have to mark her clothes over again: + for when she had knitted herself her last set of stockings, I told her + to put G for Galindo, if she did not choose to put it for Gibson, for + she should be my child if she was no one else’s. And now you see it + stands for Gray. So there are two marriages, and what more would you + have? And she promises to take another of my kittens. + + ‘Now, as to deaths, old Farmer Hale is dead—poor old man, I should + think his wife thought it a good riddance, for he beat her every day + that he was drunk, and he was never sober, in spite of Mr. Gray. I + don’t think (as I tell him) that Mr. Gray would ever have found + courage to speak to Bessy as long as Farmer Hale lived, he took the + old gentleman’s sins so much to heart, and seemed to think it was all + his fault for not being able to make a sinner into a saint. The + parish bull is dead too. I never was so glad in my life. But they + say we are to have a new one in his place. In the meantime I cross + the common in peace, which is very convenient just now, when I have so + often to go to Mr. Gray’s to see about furnishing. + + ‘Now you think I have told you all the Hanbury news, don’t you? Not + so. The very greatest thing of all is to come. I won’t tantalize + you, but just out with it, for you would never guess it. My Lady + Ludlow has given a party, just like any plebeian amongst us. We had + tea and toast in the blue drawing-room, old John Footman waiting with + Tom Diggles, the lad that used to frighten away crows in Farmer Hale’s + fields, following in my lady’s livery, hair powdered and everything. + Mrs. Medlicott made tea in my lady’s own room. My lady looked like a + splendid fairy queen of mature age, in black velvet, and the old lace, + which I have never seen her wear before since my lord’s death. But + the company? you’ll say. Why, we had the parson of Clover, and the + parson of Headleigh, and the parson of Merribank, and the three + parsonesses; and Farmer Donkin, and two Miss Donkins; and Mr. Gray (of + course), and myself and Bessy; and Captain and Mrs. James; yes, and + Mr. and Mrs. Brooke; think of that! I am not sure the parsons liked + it; but he was there. For he has been helping Captain James to get my + lady’s land into order; and then his daughter married the agent; and + Mr. Gray (who ought to know) says that, after all, Baptists are not + such bad people; and he was right against them at one time, as you may + remember. Mrs. Brooke is a rough diamond, to be sure. People have + said that of me, I know. But, being a Galindo, I learnt manners in my + youth and can take them up when I choose. But Mrs. Brooke never + learnt manners, I’ll be bound. When John Footman handed her the tray + with the tea-cups, she looked up at him as if she were sorely puzzled + by that way of going on. I was sitting next to her, so I pretended + not to see her perplexity, and put her cream and sugar in for her, and + was all ready to pop it into her hands,—when who should come up, but + that impudent lad Tom Diggles (I call him lad, for all his hair is + powdered, for you know that it is not natural gray hair), with his + tray full of cakes and what not, all as good as Mrs. Medlicott could + make them. By this time, I should tell you, all the parsonesses were + looking at Mrs. Brooke, for she had shown her want of breeding before; + and the parsonesses, who were just a step above her in manners, were + very much inclined to smile at her doings and sayings. Well! what + does she do, but pull out a clean Bandanna pocket-handkerchief all red + and yellow silk, spread it over her best silk gown; it was, like + enough, a new one, for I had it from Sally, who had it from her cousin + Molly, who is dairy-woman at the Brookes’, that the Brookes were + mighty set-up with an invitation to drink tea at the Hall. There we + were, Tom Diggles even on the grin (I wonder how long it is since he + was own brother to a scarecrow, only not so decently dressed) and Mrs. + Parsoness of Headleigh,—I forget her name, and it’s no matter, for + she’s an ill-bred creature, I hope Bessy will behave herself + better—was right-down bursting with laughter, and as near a hee-haw + as ever a donkey was, when what does my lady do? Ay! there’s my own + dear Lady Ludlow, God bless her! She takes out her own + pocket-handkerchief, all snowy cambric, and lays it softly down on her + velvet lap, for all the world as if she did it every day of her life, + just like Mrs. Brooke, the baker’s wife; and when the one got up to + shake the crumbs into the fire-place, the other did just the same. But + with such a grace! and such a look at us all! Tom Diggles went red + all over; and Mrs. Parsoness of Headleigh scarce spoke for the rest of + the evening; and the tears came into my old silly eyes; and Mr. Gray, + who was before silent and awkward in a way which I tell Bessy she must + cure him of, was made so happy by this pretty action of my lady’s, + that he talked away all the rest of the evening, and was the life of + the company. + + ‘Oh, Margaret Dawson! I sometimes wonder if you’re the better off for + leaving us. To be sure you’re with your brother, and blood is blood. + But when I look at my lady and Mr. Gray, for all they’re so different, + I would not change places with any in England.’ + +Alas! alas! I never saw my dear lady again. She died in eighteen +hundred and fourteen, and Mr. Gray did not long survive her. As I dare +say you know, the Reverend Henry Gregson is now vicar of Hanbury, and his +wife is the daughter of Mr. Gray and Miss Bessy. + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY LUDLOW *** + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law 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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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 <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: My Lady Ludlow</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Elizabeth Gaskell</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: May 17, 2005 [eBook #2524]<br /> +[Most recently updated: December 22, 2021]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: David Price and Richard Tonsing</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY LUDLOW ***</div> + +<h1>MY LADY LUDLOW</h1> + +<h2 class="no-break">by Elizabeth Gaskell</h2> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER I.</h2> + +<p> +I am an old woman now, and things are very different to what they were in my +youth. Then we, who travelled, travelled in coaches, carrying six inside, and +making a two days’ journey out of what people now go over in a couple of +hours with a whizz and a flash, and a screaming whistle, enough to deafen one. +Then letters came in but three times a week: indeed, in some places in Scotland +where I have stayed when I was a girl, the post came in but once a +month;—but letters were letters then; and we made great prizes of them, +and read them and studied them like books. Now the post comes rattling in twice +a day, bringing short jerky notes, some without beginning or end, but just a +little sharp sentence, which well-bred folks would think too abrupt to be +spoken. Well, well! they may all be improvements,—I dare say they are; +but you will never meet with a Lady Ludlow in these days. +</p> + +<p> +I will try and tell you about her. It is no story: it has, as I said, neither +beginning, middle, nor end. +</p> + +<p> +My father was a poor clergyman with a large family. My mother was always said +to have good blood in her veins; and when she wanted to maintain her position +with the people she was thrown among,—principally rich democratic +manufacturers, all for liberty and the French Revolution,—she would put +on a pair of ruffles, trimmed with real old English point, very much darned to +be sure,—but which could not be bought new for love or money, as the art +of making it was lost years before. These ruffles showed, as she said, that her +ancestors had been Somebodies, when the grandfathers of the rich folk, who now +looked down upon her, had been Nobodies,—if, indeed, they had any +grandfathers at all. I don’t know whether any one out of our own family +ever noticed these ruffles,—but we were all taught as children to feel +rather proud when my mother put them on, and to hold up our heads as became the +descendants of the lady who had first possessed the lace. Not but what my dear +father often told us that pride was a great sin; we were never allowed to be +proud of anything but my mother’s ruffles: and she was so innocently +happy when she put them on,—often, poor dear creature, to a very worn and +threadbare gown,—that I still think, even after all my experience of +life, they were a blessing to the family. You will think that I am wandering +away from my Lady Ludlow. Not at all. The Lady who had owned the lace, Ursula +Hanbury, was a common ancestress of both my mother and my Lady Ludlow. And so +it fell out, that when my poor father died, and my mother was sorely pressed to +know what to do with her nine children, and looked far and wide for signs of +willingness to help, Lady Ludlow sent her a letter, proffering aid and +assistance. I see that letter now: a large sheet of thick yellow paper, with a +straight broad margin left on the left-hand side of the delicate Italian +writing,—writing which contained far more in the same space of paper than +all the sloping, or masculine hand-writings of the present day. It was sealed +with a coat-of-arms,—a lozenge,—for Lady Ludlow was a widow. My +mother made us notice the motto, “Foy et Loy,” and told us where to +look for the quarterings of the Hanbury arms before she opened the letter. +Indeed, I think she was rather afraid of what the contents might be; for, as I +have said, in her anxious love for her fatherless children, she had written to +many people upon whom, to tell truly, she had but little claim; and their cold, +hard answers had many a time made her cry, when she thought none of us were +looking. I do not even know if she had ever seen Lady Ludlow: all I knew of her +was that she was a very grand lady, whose grandmother had been half-sister to +my mother’s great-grandmother; but of her character and circumstances I +had heard nothing, and I doubt if my mother was acquainted with them. +</p> + +<p> +I looked over my mother’s shoulder to read the letter; it began, +“Dear Cousin Margaret Dawson,” and I think I felt hopeful from the +moment I saw those words. She went on to say,—stay, I think I can +remember the very words: +</p> + +<p> +‘DEAR COUSIN MARGARET DAWSON,—I have been much grieved to hear of +the loss you have sustained in the death of so good a husband, and so excellent +a clergyman as I have always heard that my late cousin Richard was esteemed to +be.’ +</p> + +<p> +“There!” said my mother, laying her finger on the passage, +“read that aloud to the little ones. Let them hear how their +father’s good report travelled far and wide, and how well he is spoken of +by one whom he never saw. COUSIN Richard, how prettily her ladyship writes! Go +on, Margaret!” She wiped her eyes as she spoke: and laid her fingers on +her lips, to still my little sister, Cecily, who, not understanding anything +about the important letter, was beginning to talk and make a noise. +</p> + +<p> +‘You say you are left with nine children. I too should have had nine, if +mine had all lived. I have none left but Rudolph, the present Lord Ludlow. He +is married, and lives, for the most part, in London. But I entertain six young +gentlewomen at my house at Connington, who are to me as daughters—save +that, perhaps, I restrict them in certain indulgences in dress and diet that +might be befitting in young ladies of a higher rank, and of more probable +wealth. These young persons—all of condition, though out of +means—are my constant companions, and I strive to do my duty as a +Christian lady towards them. One of these young gentlewomen died (at her own +home, whither she had gone upon a visit) last May. Will you do me the favour to +allow your eldest daughter to supply her place in my household? She is, as I +make out, about sixteen years of age. She will find companions here who are but +a little older than herself. I dress my young friends myself, and make each of +them a small allowance for pocket-money. They have but few opportunities for +matrimony, as Connington is far removed from any town. The clergyman is a deaf +old widower; my agent is married; and as for the neighbouring farmers, they +are, of course, below the notice of the young gentlewomen under my protection. +Still, if any young woman wishes to marry, and has conducted herself to my +satisfaction, I give her a wedding dinner, her clothes, and her house-linen. +And such as remain with me to my death, will find a small competency provided +for them in my will. I reserve to myself the option of paying their travelling +expenses,—disliking gadding women, on the one hand; on the other, not +wishing by too long absence from the family home to weaken natural ties. +</p> + +<p> +‘If my proposal pleases you and your daughter—or rather, if it +pleases you, for I trust your daughter has been too well brought up to have a +will in opposition to yours—let me know, dear cousin Margaret Dawson, and +I will make arrangements for meeting the young gentlewoman at Cavistock, which +is the nearest point to which the coach will bring her.’ +</p> + +<p> +My mother dropped the letter, and sat silent. +</p> + +<p> +“I shall not know what to do without you, Margaret.” +</p> + +<p> +A moment before, like a young untried girl as I was, I had been pleased at the +notion of seeing a new place, and leading a new life. But now,—my +mother’s look of sorrow, and the children’s cry of remonstrance: +“Mother; I won’t go,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Nay! but you had better,” replied she, shaking her head. +“Lady Ludlow has much power. She can help your brothers. It will not do +to slight her offer.” +</p> + +<p> +So we accepted it, after much consultation. We were rewarded,—or so we +thought,—for, afterwards, when I came to know Lady Ludlow, I saw that she +would have done her duty by us, as helpless relations, however we might have +rejected her kindness,—by a presentation to Christ’s Hospital for +one of my brothers. +</p> + +<p> +And this was how I came to know my Lady Ludlow. +</p> + +<p> +I remember well the afternoon of my arrival at Hanbury Court. Her ladyship had +sent to meet me at the nearest post-town at which the mail-coach stopped. There +was an old groom inquiring for me, the ostler said, if my name was +Dawson—from Hanbury Court, he believed. I felt it rather formidable; and +first began to understand what was meant by going among strangers, when I lost +sight of the guard to whom my mother had intrusted me. I was perched up in a +high gig with a hood to it, such as in those days was called a chair, and my +companion was driving deliberately through the most pastoral country I had ever +yet seen. By-and-by we ascended a long hill, and the man got out and walked at +the horse’s head. I should have liked to walk, too, very much indeed; but +I did not know how far I might do it; and, in fact, I dared not speak to ask to +be helped down the deep steps of the gig. We were at last at the top,—on +a long, breezy, sweeping, unenclosed piece of ground, called, as I afterwards +learnt, a Chase. The groom stopped, breathed, patted his horse, and then +mounted again to my side. +</p> + +<p> +“Are we near Hanbury Court?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Near! Why, Miss! we’ve a matter of ten mile yet to go.” +</p> + +<p> +Once launched into conversation, we went on pretty glibly. I fancy he had been +afraid of beginning to speak to me, just as I was to him; but he got over his +shyness with me sooner than I did mine with him. I let him choose the subjects +of conversation, although very often I could not understand the points of +interest in them: for instance, he talked for more than a quarter of an hour of +a famous race which a certain dog-fox had given him, above thirty years before; +and spoke of all the covers and turns just as if I knew them as well as he did; +and all the time I was wondering what kind of an animal a dog-fox might be. +</p> + +<p> +After we left the Chase, the road grew worse. No one in these days, who has not +seen the byroads of fifty years ago, can imagine what they were. We had to +quarter, as Randal called it, nearly all the way along the deep-rutted, miry +lanes; and the tremendous jolts I occasionally met with made my seat in the gig +so unsteady that I could not look about me at all, I was so much occupied in +holding on. The road was too muddy for me to walk without dirtying myself more +than I liked to do, just before my first sight of my Lady Ludlow. But +by-and-by, when we came to the fields in which the lane ended, I begged Randal +to help me down, as I saw that I could pick my steps among the pasture grass +without making myself unfit to be seen; and Randal, out of pity for his +steaming horse, wearied with the hard struggle through the mud, thanked me +kindly, and helped me down with a springing jump. +</p> + +<p> +The pastures fell gradually down to the lower land, shut in on either side by +rows of high elms, as if there had been a wide grand avenue here in former +times. Down the grassy gorge we went, seeing the sunset sky at the end of the +shadowed descent. Suddenly we came to a long flight of steps. +</p> + +<p> +“If you’ll run down there, Miss, I’ll go round and meet you, +and then you’d better mount again, for my lady will like to see you drive +up to the house.” +</p> + +<p> +“Are we near the house?” said I, suddenly checked by the idea. +</p> + +<p> +“Down there, Miss,” replied he, pointing with his whip to certain +stacks of twisted chimneys rising out of a group of trees, in deep shadow +against the crimson light, and which lay just beyond a great square lawn at the +base of the steep slope of a hundred yards, on the edge of which we stood. +</p> + +<p> +I went down the steps quietly enough. I met Randal and the gig at the bottom; +and, falling into a side road to the left, we drove sedately round, through the +gateway, and into the great court in front of the house. +</p> + +<p> +The road by which we had come lay right at the back. +</p> + +<p> +Hanbury Court is a vast red-brick house—at least, it is cased in part +with red bricks; and the gate-house and walls about the place are of +brick,—with stone facings at every corner, and door, and window, such as +you see at Hampton Court. At the back are the gables, and arched doorways, and +stone mullions, which show (so Lady Ludlow used to tell us) that it was once a +priory. There was a prior’s parlour, I know—only we called it Mrs. +Medlicott’s room; and there was a tithe-barn as big as a church, and rows +of fish-ponds, all got ready for the monks’ fasting-days in old time. But +all this I did not see till afterwards. I hardly noticed, this first night, the +great Virginian Creeper (said to have been the first planted in England by one +of my lady’s ancestors) that half covered the front of the house. As I +had been unwilling to leave the guard of the coach, so did I now feel unwilling +to leave Randal, a known friend of three hours. But there was no help for it; +in I must go; past the grand-looking old gentleman holding the door open for +me, on into the great hall on the right hand, into which the sun’s last +rays were sending in glorious red light,—the gentleman was now walking +before me,—up a step on to the dais, as I afterwards learned that it was +called,—then again to the left, through a series of sitting-rooms, +opening one out of another, and all of them looking into a stately garden, +glowing, even in the twilight, with the bloom of flowers. We went up four steps +out of the last of these rooms, and then my guide lifted up a heavy silk +curtain and I was in the presence of my Lady Ludlow. +</p> + +<p> +She was very small of stature, and very upright. She wore a great lace cap, +nearly half her own height, I should think, that went round her head (caps +which tied under the chin, and which we called “mobs,” came in +later, and my lady held them in great contempt, saying people might as well +come down in their nightcaps). In front of my lady’s cap was a great bow +of white satin ribbon; and a broad band of the same ribbon was tied tight round +her head, and served to keep the cap straight. She had a fine Indian muslin +shawl folded over her shoulders and across her chest, and an apron of the same; +a black silk mode gown, made with short sleeves and ruffles, and with the tail +thereof pulled through the pocket-hole, so as to shorten it to a useful length: +beneath it she wore, as I could plainly see, a quilted lavender satin +petticoat. Her hair was snowy white, but I hardly saw it, it was so covered +with her cap: her skin, even at her age, was waxen in texture and tint; her +eyes were large and dark blue, and must have been her great beauty when she was +young, for there was nothing particular, as far as I can remember, either in +mouth or nose. She had a great gold-headed stick by her chair; but I think it +was more as a mark of state and dignity than for use; for she had as light and +brisk a step when she chose as any girl of fifteen, and, in her private early +walk of meditation in the mornings, would go as swiftly from garden alley to +garden alley as any one of us. +</p> + +<p> +She was standing up when I went in. I dropped my curtsey at the door, which my +mother had always taught me as a part of good manners, and went up +instinctively to my lady. She did not put out her hand, but raised herself a +little on tiptoe, and kissed me on both cheeks. +</p> + +<p> +“You are cold, my child. You shall have a dish of tea with me.” She +rang a little hand-bell on the table by her, and her waiting-maid came in from +a small anteroom; and, as if all had been prepared, and was awaiting my +arrival, brought with her a small china service with tea ready made, and a +plate of delicately-cut bread and butter, every morsel of which I could have +eaten, and been none the better for it, so hungry was I after my long ride. The +waiting-maid took off my cloak, and I sat down, sorely alarmed at the silence, +the hushed foot-falls of the subdued maiden over the thick carpet, and the soft +voice and clear pronunciation of my Lady Ludlow. My teaspoon fell against my +cup with a sharp noise, that seemed so out of place and season that I blushed +deeply. My lady caught my eye with hers,—both keen and sweet were those +dark-blue eyes of her ladyship’s:— +</p> + +<p> +“Your hands are very cold, my dear; take off those gloves” (I wore +thick serviceable doeskin, and had been too shy to take them off unbidden), +“and let me try and warm them—the evenings are very chilly.” +And she held my great red hands in hers,—soft, warm, white, ring-laden. +Looking at last a little wistfully into my face, she said—“Poor +child! And you’re the eldest of nine! I had a daughter who would have +been just your age; but I cannot fancy her the eldest of nine.” Then came +a pause of silence; and then she rang her bell, and desired her waiting-maid, +Adams, to show me to my room. +</p> + +<p> +It was so small that I think it must have been a cell. The walls were +whitewashed stone; the bed was of white dimity. There was a small piece of red +staircarpet on each side of the bed, and two chairs. In a closet adjoining were +my washstand and toilet-table. There was a text of Scripture painted on the +wall right opposite to my bed; and below hung a print, common enough in those +days, of King George and Queen Charlotte, with all their numerous children, +down to the little Princess Amelia in a go-cart. On each side hung a small +portrait, also engraved: on the left, it was Louis the Sixteenth; on the other, +Marie-Antoinette. On the chimney-piece there was a tinder-box and a +Prayer-book. I do not remember anything else in the room. Indeed, in those days +people did not dream of writing-tables, and inkstands, and portfolios, and easy +chairs, and what not. We were taught to go into our bed-rooms for the purposes +of dressing, and sleeping, and praying. +</p> + +<p> +Presently I was summoned to supper. I followed the young lady who had been sent +to call me, down the wide shallow stairs, into the great hall, through which I +had first passed on my way to my Lady Ludlow’s room. There were four +other young gentlewomen, all standing, and all silent, who curtsied to me when +I first came in. They were dressed in a kind of uniform: muslin caps bound +round their heads with blue ribbons, plain muslin handkerchiefs, lawn aprons, +and drab-coloured stuff gowns. They were all gathered together at a little +distance from the table, on which were placed a couple of cold chickens, a +salad, and a fruit tart. On the dais there was a smaller round table, on which +stood a silver jug filled with milk, and a small roll. Near that was set a +carved chair, with a countess’s coronet surmounting the back of it. I +thought that some one might have spoken to me; but they were shy, and I was +shy; or else there was some other reason; but, indeed, almost the minute after +I had come into the hall by the door at the lower hand, her ladyship entered by +the door opening upon the dais; whereupon we all curtsied very low; I because I +saw the others do it. She stood, and looked at us for a moment. +</p> + +<p> +“Young gentlewomen,” said she, “make Margaret Dawson welcome +among you;” and they treated me with the kind politeness due to a +stranger, but still without any talking beyond what was required for the +purposes of the meal. After it was over, and grace was said by one of our +party, my lady rang her hand-bell, and the servants came in and cleared away +the supper things: then they brought in a portable reading-desk, which was +placed on the dais, and, the whole household trooping in, my lady called to one +of my companions to come up and read the Psalms and Lessons for the day. I +remember thinking how afraid I should have been had I been in her place. There +were no prayers. My lady thought it schismatic to have any prayers excepting +those in the Prayer-book; and would as soon have preached a sermon herself in +the parish church, as have allowed any one not a deacon at the least to read +prayers in a private dwelling-house. I am not sure that even then she would +have approved of his reading them in an unconsecrated place. +</p> + +<p> +She had been maid-of-honour to Queen Charlotte: a Hanbury of that old stock +that flourished in the days of the Plantagenets, and heiress of all the land +that remained to the family, of the great estates which had once stretched into +four separate counties. Hanbury Court was hers by right. She had married Lord +Ludlow, and had lived for many years at his various seats, and away from her +ancestral home. She had lost all her children but one, and most of them had +died at these houses of Lord Ludlow’s; and, I dare say, that gave my lady +a distaste to the places, and a longing to come back to Hanbury Court, where +she had been so happy as a girl. I imagine her girlhood had been the happiest +time of her life; for, now I think of it, most of her opinions, when I knew her +in later life, were singular enough then, but had been universally prevalent +fifty years before. For instance, while I lived at Hanbury Court, the cry for +education was beginning to come up: Mr. Raikes had set up his Sunday Schools; +and some clergymen were all for teaching writing and arithmetic, as well as +reading. My lady would have none of this; it was levelling and revolutionary, +she said. When a young woman came to be hired, my lady would have her in, and +see if she liked her looks and her dress, and question her about her family. +Her ladyship laid great stress upon this latter point, saying that a girl who +did not warm up when any interest or curiosity was expressed about her mother, +or the “baby” (if there was one), was not likely to make a good +servant. Then she would make her put out her feet, to see if they were well and +neatly shod. Then she would bid her say the Lord’s Prayer and the Creed. +Then she inquired if she could write. If she could, and she had liked all that +had gone before, her face sank—it was a great disappointment, for it was +an all but inviolable rule with her never to engage a servant who could write. +But I have known her ladyship break through it, although in both cases in which +she did so she put the girl’s principles to a further and unusual test in +asking her to repeat the Ten Commandments. One pert young woman—and yet I +was sorry for her too, only she afterwards married a rich draper in +Shrewsbury—who had got through her trials pretty tolerably, considering +she could write, spoilt all, by saying glibly, at the end of the last +Commandment, “An’t please your ladyship, I can cast +accounts.” +</p> + +<p> +“Go away, wench,” said my lady in a hurry, “you’re only +fit for trade; you will not suit me for a servant.” The girl went away +crestfallen: in a minute, however, my lady sent me after her to see that she +had something to eat before leaving the house; and, indeed, she sent for her +once again, but it was only to give her a Bible, and to bid her beware of +French principles, which had led the French to cut off their king’s and +queen’s heads. +</p> + +<p> +The poor, blubbering girl said, “Indeed, my lady, I wouldn’t hurt a +fly, much less a king, and I cannot abide the French, nor frogs neither, for +that matter.” +</p> + +<p> +But my lady was inexorable, and took a girl who could neither read nor write, +to make up for her alarm about the progress of education towards addition and +subtraction; and afterwards, when the clergyman who was at Hanbury parish when +I came there, had died, and the bishop had appointed another, and a younger +man, in his stead, this was one of the points on which he and my lady did not +agree. While good old deaf Mr. Mountford lived, it was my lady’s custom, +when indisposed for a sermon, to stand up at the door of her large square +pew,—just opposite to the reading-desk,—and to say (at that part of +the morning service where it is decreed that, in quires and places where they +sing, here followeth the anthem): “Mr. Mountford, I will not trouble you +for a discourse this morning.” And we all knelt down to the Litany with +great satisfaction; for Mr. Mountford, though he could not hear, had always his +eyes open about this part of the service, for any of my lady’s movements. +But the new clergyman, Mr. Gray, was of a different stamp. He was very zealous +in all his parish work; and my lady, who was just as good as she could be to +the poor, was often crying him up as a godsend to the parish, and he never +could send amiss to the Court when he wanted broth, or wine, or jelly, or sago +for a sick person. But he needs must take up the new hobby of education; and I +could see that this put my lady sadly about one Sunday, when she suspected, I +know not how, that there was something to be said in his sermon about a +Sunday-school which he was planning. She stood up, as she had not done since +Mr. Mountford’s death, two years and better before this time, and +said— +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Gray, I will not trouble you for a discourse this morning.” +</p> + +<p> +But her voice was not well-assured and steady; and we knelt down with more of +curiosity than satisfaction in our minds. Mr. Gray preached a very rousing +sermon, on the necessity of establishing a Sabbath-school in the village. My +lady shut her eyes, and seemed to go to sleep; but I don’t believe she +lost a word of it, though she said nothing about it that I heard until the next +Saturday, when two of us, as was the custom, were riding out with her in her +carriage, and we went to see a poor bedridden woman, who lived some miles away +at the other end of the estate and of the parish: and as we came out of the +cottage we met Mr. Gray walking up to it, in a great heat, and looking very +tired. My lady beckoned him to her, and told him she should wait and take him +home with her, adding that she wondered to see him there, so far from his home, +for that it was beyond a Sabbath-day’s journey, and, from what she had +gathered from his sermon the last Sunday, he was all for Judaism against +Christianity. He looked as if he did not understand what she meant; but the +truth was that, besides the way in which he had spoken up for schools and +schooling, he had kept calling Sunday the Sabbath: and, as her ladyship said, +“The Sabbath is the Sabbath, and that’s one thing—it is +Saturday; and if I keep it, I’m a Jew, which I’m not. And Sunday is +Sunday; and that’s another thing; and if I keep it, I’m a +Christian, which I humbly trust I am.” +</p> + +<p> +But when Mr. Gray got an inkling of her meaning in talking about a +Sabbath-day’s journey, he only took notice of a part of it: he smiled and +bowed, and said no one knew better than her ladyship what were the duties that +abrogated all inferior laws regarding the Sabbath; and that he must go in and +read to old Betty Brown, so that he would not detain her ladyship. +</p> + +<p> +“But I shall wait for you, Mr. Gray,” said she. “Or I will +take a drive round by Oakfield, and be back in an hour’s time.” +For, you see, she would not have him feel hurried or troubled with a thought +that he was keeping her waiting, while he ought to be comforting and praying +with old Betty. +</p> + +<p> +“A very pretty young man, my dears,” said she, as we drove away. +“But I shall have my pew glazed all the same.” +</p> + +<p> +We did not know what she meant at the time; but the next Sunday but one we did. +She had the curtains all round the grand old Hanbury family seat taken down, +and, instead of them, there was glass up to the height of six or seven feet. We +entered by a door, with a window in it that drew up or down just like what you +see in carriages. This window was generally down, and then we could hear +perfectly; but if Mr. Gray used the word “Sabbath,” or spoke in +favour of schooling and education, my lady stepped out of her corner, and drew +up the window with a decided clang and clash. +</p> + +<p> +I must tell you something more about Mr. Gray. The presentation to the living +of Hanbury was vested in two trustees, of whom Lady Ludlow was one: Lord Ludlow +had exercised this right in the appointment of Mr. Mountford, who had won his +lordship’s favour by his excellent horsemanship. Nor was Mr. Mountford a +bad clergyman, as clergymen went in those days. He did not drink, though he +liked good eating as much as any one. And if any poor person was ill, and he +heard of it, he would send them plates from his own dinner of what he himself +liked best; sometimes of dishes which were almost as bad as poison to sick +people. He meant kindly to everybody except dissenters, whom Lady Ludlow and he +united in trying to drive out of the parish; and among dissenters he +particularly abhorred Methodists—some one said, because John Wesley had +objected to his hunting. But that must have been long ago for when I knew him +he was far too stout and too heavy to hunt; besides, the bishop of the diocese +disapproved of hunting, and had intimated his disapprobation to the clergy. For +my own part, I think a good run would not have come amiss, even in a moral +point of view, to Mr. Mountford. He ate so much, and took so little exercise, +that we young women often heard of his being in terrible passions with his +servants, and the sexton and clerk. But they none of them minded him much, for +he soon came to himself, and was sure to make them some present or +other—some said in proportion to his anger; so that the sexton, who was a +bit of a wag (as all sextons are, I think), said that the vicar’s saying, +“The Devil take you,” was worth a shilling any day, whereas +“The Deuce” was a shabby sixpenny speech, only fit for a curate. +</p> + +<p> +There was a great deal of good in Mr. Mountford, too. He could not bear to see +pain, or sorrow, or misery of any kind; and, if it came under his notice, he +was never easy till he had relieved it, for the time, at any rate. But he was +afraid of being made uncomfortable; so, if he possibly could, he would avoid +seeing any one who was ill or unhappy; and he did not thank any one for telling +him about them. +</p> + +<p> +“What would your ladyship have me to do?” he once said to my Lady +Ludlow, when she wished him to go and see a poor man who had broken his leg. +“I cannot piece the leg as the doctor can; I cannot nurse him as well as +his wife does; I may talk to him, but he no more understands me than I do the +language of the alchemists. My coming puts him out; he stiffens himself into an +uncomfortable posture, out of respect to the cloth, and dare not take the +comfort of kicking, and swearing, and scolding his wife, while I am there. I +hear him, with my figurative ears, my lady, heave a sigh of relief when my back +is turned, and the sermon that he thinks I ought to have kept for the pulpit, +and have delivered to his neighbours (whose case, as he fancies, it would just +have fitted, as it seemed to him to be addressed to the sinful), is all ended, +and done, for the day. I judge others as myself; I do to them as I would be +done to. That’s Christianity, at any rate. I should hate—saving +your ladyship’s presence—to have my Lord Ludlow coming and seeing +me, if I were ill. ’Twould be a great honour, no doubt; but I should have +to put on a clean nightcap for the occasion; and sham patience, in order to be +polite, and not weary his lordship with my complaints. I should be twice as +thankful to him if he would send me game, or a good fat haunch, to bring me up +to that pitch of health and strength one ought to be in, to appreciate the +honour of a visit from a nobleman. So I shall send Jerry Butler a good dinner +every day till he is strong again; and spare the poor old fellow my presence +and advice.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady would be puzzled by this, and by many other of Mr. Mountford’s +speeches. But he had been appointed by my lord, and she could not question her +dead husband’s wisdom; and she knew that the dinners were always sent, +and often a guinea or two to help to pay the doctor’s bills; and Mr. +Mountford was true blue, as we call it, to the back-bone; hated the dissenters +and the French; and could hardly drink a dish of tea without giving out the +toast of “Church and King, and down with the Rump.” Moreover, he +had once had the honour of preaching before the King and Queen, and two of the +Princesses, at Weymouth; and the King had applauded his sermon audibly +with,—“Very good; very good;” and that was a seal put upon +his merit in my lady’s eyes. +</p> + +<p> +Besides, in the long winter Sunday evenings, he would come up to the Court, and +read a sermon to us girls, and play a game of picquet with my lady afterwards; +which served to shorten the tedium of the time. My lady would, on those +occasions, invite him to sup with her on the dais; but as her meal was +invariably bread and milk only, Mr. Mountford preferred sitting down amongst +us, and made a joke about its being wicked and heterodox to eat meagre on +Sunday, a festival of the Church. We smiled at this joke just as much the +twentieth time we heard it as we did at the first; for we knew it was coming, +because he always coughed a little nervously before he made a joke, for fear my +lady should not approve: and neither she nor he seemed to remember that he had +ever hit upon the idea before. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Mountford died quite suddenly at last. We were all very sorry to lose him. +He left some of his property (for he had a private estate) to the poor of the +parish, to furnish them with an annual Christmas dinner of roast beef and plum +pudding, for which he wrote out a very good receipt in the codicil to his will. +</p> + +<p> +Moreover, he desired his executors to see that the vault, in which the vicars +of Hanbury were interred, was well aired, before his coffin was taken in; for, +all his life long, he had had a dread of damp, and latterly he kept his rooms +to such a pitch of warmth that some thought it hastened his end. +</p> + +<p> +Then the other trustee, as I have said, presented the living to Mr. Gray, +Fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford. It was quite natural for us all, as +belonging in some sort to the Hanbury family, to disapprove of the other +trustee’s choice. But when some ill-natured person circulated the report +that Mr. Gray was a Moravian Methodist, I remember my lady said, “She +could not believe anything so bad, without a great deal of evidence.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER II.</h2> + +<p> +Before I tell you about Mr. Gray, I think I ought to make you understand +something more of what we did all day long at Hanbury Court. There were five of +us at the time of which I am speaking, all young women of good descent, and +allied (however distantly) to people of rank. When we were not with my lady, +Mrs. Medlicott looked after us; a gentle little woman, who had been companion +to my lady for many years, and was indeed, I have been told, some kind of +relation to her. Mrs. Medlicott’s parents had lived in Germany, and the +consequence was, she spoke English with a very foreign accent. Another +consequence was, that she excelled in all manner of needlework, such as is not +known even by name in these days. She could darn either lace, table-linen, +India muslin, or stockings, so that no one could tell where the hole or rent +had been. Though a good Protestant, and never missing Guy Faux day at church, +she was as skilful at fine work as any nun in a Papist convent. She would take +a piece of French cambric, and by drawing out some threads, and working in +others, it became delicate lace in a very few hours. She did the same by +Hollands cloth, and made coarse strong lace, with which all my lady’s +napkins and table-linen were trimmed. We worked under her during a great part +of the day, either in the still-room, or at our sewing in a chamber that opened +out of the great hall. My lady despised every kind of work that would now be +called Fancy-work. She considered that the use of coloured threads or worsted +was only fit to amuse children; but that grown women ought not to be taken with +mere blues and reds, but to restrict their pleasure in sewing to making small +and delicate stitches. She would speak of the old tapestry in the hall as the +work of her ancestresses, who lived before the Reformation, and were +consequently unacquainted with pure and simple tastes in work, as well as in +religion. Nor would my lady sanction the fashion of the day, which, at the +beginning of this century, made all the fine ladies take to making shoes. She +said that such work was a consequence of the French Revolution, which had done +much to annihilate all distinctions of rank and class, and hence it was, that +she saw young ladies of birth and breeding handling lasts, and awls, and dirty +cobblers’-wax, like shoe’-makers’ daughters. +</p> + +<p> +Very frequently one of us would be summoned to my lady to read aloud to her, as +she sat in her small withdrawing-room, some improving book. It was generally +Mr. Addison’s “Spectator;” but one year, I remember, we had +to read “Sturm’s Reflections” translated from a German book +Mrs. Medlicott recommended. Mr. Sturm told us what to think about for every day +in the year; and very dull it was; but I believe Queen Charlotte had liked the +book very much, and the thought of her royal approbation kept my lady awake +during the reading. “Mrs. Chapone’s Letters” and “Dr. +Gregory’s Advice to Young Ladies” composed the rest of our library +for week-day reading. I, for one, was glad to leave my fine sewing, and even my +reading aloud (though this last did keep me with my dear lady) to go to the +still-room and potter about among the preserves and the medicated waters. There +was no doctor for many miles round, and with Mrs. Medlicott to direct us, and +Dr. Buchan to go by for recipes, we sent out many a bottle of physic, which, I +dare say, was as good as what comes out of the druggist’s shop. At any +rate, I do not think we did much harm; for if any of our physics tasted +stronger than usual, Mrs. Medlicott would bid us let it down with cochineal and +water, to make all safe, as she said. So our bottles of medicine had very +little real physic in them at last; but we were careful in putting labels on +them, which looked very mysterious to those who could not read, and helped the +medicine to do its work. I have sent off many a bottle of salt and water +coloured red; and whenever we had nothing else to do in the still-room, Mrs. +Medlicott would set us to making bread-pills, by way of practice; and, as far +as I can say, they were very efficacious, as before we gave out a box Mrs. +Medlicott always told the patient what symptoms to expect; and I hardly ever +inquired without hearing that they had produced their effect. There was one old +man, who took six pills a-night, of any kind we liked to give him, to make him +sleep; and if, by any chance, his daughter had forgotten to let us know that he +was out of his medicine, he was so restless and miserable that, as he said, he +thought he was like to die. I think ours was what would be called homoeopathic +practice now-a-days. Then we learnt to make all the cakes and dishes of the +season in the still-room. We had plum-porridge and mince-pies at Christmas, +fritters and pancakes on Shrove Tuesday, furmenty on Mothering Sunday, +violet-cakes in Passion Week, tansy-pudding on Easter Sunday, three-cornered +cakes on Trinity Sunday, and so on through the year: all made from good old +Church receipts, handed down from one of my lady’s earliest Protestant +ancestresses. Every one of us passed a portion of the day with Lady Ludlow; and +now and then we rode out with her in her coach and four. She did not like to go +out with a pair of horses, considering this rather beneath her rank; and, +indeed, four horses were very often needed to pull her heavy coach through the +stiff mud. But it was rather a cumbersome equipage through the narrow +Warwickshire lanes; and I used often to think it was well that countesses were +not plentiful, or else we might have met another lady of quality in another +coach and four, where there would have been no possibility of turning, or +passing each other, and very little chance of backing. Once when the idea of +this danger of meeting another countess in a narrow, deep-rutted lane was very +prominent in my mind I ventured to ask Mrs. Medlicott what would have to be +done on such an occasion; and she told me that “de latest creation must +back, for sure,” which puzzled me a good deal at the time, although I +understand it now. I began to find out the use of the “Peerage,” a +book which had seemed to me rather dull before; but, as I was always a coward +in a coach, I made myself well acquainted with the dates of creation of our +three Warwickshire earls, and was happy to find that Earl Ludlow ranked second, +the oldest earl being a hunting widower, and not likely to drive out in a +carriage. +</p> + +<p> +All this time I have wandered from Mr. Gray. Of course, we first saw him in +church when he read himself in. He was very red-faced, the kind of redness +which goes with light hair and a blushing complexion; he looked slight and +short, and his bright light frizzy hair had hardly a dash of powder in it. I +remember my lady making this observation, and sighing over it; for, though +since the famine in seventeen hundred and ninety-nine and eighteen hundred +there had been a tax on hair-powder, yet it was reckoned very revolutionary and +Jacobin not to wear a good deal of it. My lady hardly liked the opinions of any +man who wore his own hair; but this she would say was rather a prejudice: only +in her youth none but the mob had gone wigless, and she could not get over the +association of wigs with birth and breeding; a man’s own hair with that +class of people who had formed the rioters in seventeen hundred and eighty, +when Lord George Gordon had been one of the bugbears of my lady’s life. +Her husband and his brothers, she told us, had been put into breeches, and had +their heads shaved on their seventh birthday, each of them; a handsome little +wig of the newest fashion forming the old Lady Ludlow’s invariable +birthday present to her sons as they each arrived at that age; and afterwards, +to the day of their death, they never saw their own hair. To be without powder, +as some underbred people were talking of being now, was in fact to insult the +proprieties of life, by being undressed. It was English sans-culottism. But Mr. +Gray did wear a little powder, enough to save him in my lady’s good +opinion; but not enough to make her approve of him decidedly. +</p> + +<p> +The next time I saw him was in the great hall. Mary Mason and I were going to +drive out with my lady in her coach, and when we went down stairs with our best +hats and cloaks on, we found Mr. Gray awaiting my lady’s coming. I +believe he had paid his respects to her before, but we had never seen him; and +he had declined her invitation to spend Sunday evening at the Court (as Mr. +Mountford used to do pretty regularly—and play a game at picquet +too—), which, Mrs. Medlicott told us, had caused my lady to be not over +well pleased with him. +</p> + +<p> +He blushed redder than ever at the sight of us, as we entered the hall and +dropped him our curtsies. He coughed two or three times, as if he would have +liked to speak to us, if he could but have found something to say; and every +time he coughed he became hotter-looking than ever. I am ashamed to say, we +were nearly laughing at him; half because we, too, were so shy that we +understood what his awkwardness meant. +</p> + +<p> +My lady came in, with her quick active step—she always walked quickly +when she did not bethink herself of her cane—as if she was sorry to have +us kept waiting—and, as she entered, she gave us all round one of those +graceful sweeping curtsies, of which I think the art must have died out with +her,—it implied so much courtesy;—this time it said, as well as +words could do, “I am sorry to have kept you all waiting,—forgive +me.” +</p> + +<p> +She went up to the mantelpiece, near which Mr. Gray had been standing until her +entrance, and curtseying afresh to him, and pretty deeply this time, because of +his cloth, and her being hostess, and he, a new guest. She asked him if he +would not prefer speaking to her in her own private parlour, and looked as +though she would have conducted him there. But he burst out with his errand, of +which he was full even to choking, and which sent the glistening tears into his +large blue eyes, which stood farther and farther out with his excitement. +</p> + +<p> +“My lady, I want to speak to you, and to persuade you to exert your kind +interest with Mr. Lathom—Justice Lathom, of Hathaway Manor—” +</p> + +<p> +“Harry Lathom?” inquired my lady,—as Mr. Gray stopped to take +the breath he had lost in his hurry,—“I did not know he was in the +commission.” +</p> + +<p> +“He is only just appointed; he took the oaths not a month +ago,—more’s the pity!” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not understand why you should regret it. The Lathoms have held +Hathaway since Edward the First, and Mr. Lathom bears a good character, +although his temper is hasty—” +</p> + +<p> +“My lady! he has committed Job Gregson for stealing—a fault of +which he is as innocent as I—and all the evidence goes to prove it, now +that the case is brought before the Bench; only the Squires hang so together +that they can’t be brought to see justice, and are all for sending Job to +gaol, out of compliment to Mr. Lathom, saying it his first committal, and it +won’t be civil to tell him there is no evidence against his man. For +God’s sake, my lady, speak to the gentlemen; they will attend to you, +while they only tell me to mind my own business.” +</p> + +<p> +Now my lady was always inclined to stand by her order, and the Lathoms of +Hathaway Court were cousins to the Hanbury’s. Besides, it was rather a +point of honour in those days to encourage a young magistrate, by passing a +pretty sharp sentence on his first committals; and Job Gregson was the father +of a girl who had been lately turned away from her place as scullery-maid for +sauciness to Mrs. Adams, her ladyship’s own maid; and Mr. Gray had not +said a word of the reasons why he believed the man innocent,—for he was +in such a hurry, I believe he would have had my lady drive off to the Henley +Court-house then and there;—so there seemed a good deal against the man, +and nothing but Mr. Gray’s bare word for him; and my lady drew herself a +little up, and said— +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Gray! I do not see what reason either you or I have to interfere. +Mr. Harry Lathom is a sensible kind of young man, well capable of ascertaining +the truth without our help—” +</p> + +<p> +“But more evidence has come out since,” broke in Mr. Gray. My lady +went a little stiffer, and spoke a little more coldly:— +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose this additional evidence is before the justices: men of good +family, and of honour and credit, well known in the county. They naturally feel +that the opinion of one of themselves must have more weight than the words of a +man like Job Gregson, who bears a very indifferent character,—has been +strongly suspected of poaching, coming from no one knows where, squatting on +Hareman’s Common—which, by the way, is extra-parochial, I believe; +consequently you, as a clergyman, are not responsible for what goes on there; +and, although impolitic, there might be some truth in what the magistrates +said, in advising you to mind your own business,”—said her +ladyship, smiling,—“and they might be tempted to bid me mind mine, +if I interfered, Mr. Gray: might they not?” +</p> + +<p> +He looked extremely uncomfortable; half angry. Once or twice he began to speak, +but checked himself, as if his words would not have been wise or prudent. At +last he said—“It may seem presumptuous in me,—a stranger of +only a few weeks’ standing—to set up my judgment as to men’s +character against that of residents—” Lady Ludlow gave a little bow +of acquiescence, which was, I think, involuntary on her part, and which I +don’t think he perceived,—“but I am convinced that the man is +innocent of this offence,—and besides, the justices themselves allege +this ridiculous custom of paying a compliment to a newly-appointed magistrate +as their only reason.” +</p> + +<p> +That unlucky word “ridiculous!” It undid all the good his modest +beginning had done him with my lady. I knew as well as words could have told +me, that she was affronted at the expression being used by a man inferior in +rank to those whose actions he applied it to,—and truly, it was a great +want of tact, considering to whom he was speaking. +</p> + +<p> +Lady Ludlow spoke very gently and slowly; she always did so when she was +annoyed; it was a certain sign, the meaning of which we had all learnt. +</p> + +<p> +“I think, Mr. Gray, we will drop the subject. It is one on which we are +not likely to agree.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Gray’s ruddy colour grew purple and then faded away, and his face +became pale. I think both my lady and he had forgotten our presence; and we +were beginning to feel too awkward to wish to remind them of it. And yet we +could not help watching and listening with the greatest interest. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Gray drew himself up to his full height, with an unconscious feeling of +dignity. Little as was his stature, and awkward and embarrassed as he had been +only a few minutes before, I remember thinking he looked almost as grand as my +lady when he spoke. +</p> + +<p> +“Your ladyship must remember that it may be my duty to speak to my +parishioners on many subjects on which they do not agree with me. I am not at +liberty to be silent, because they differ in opinion from me.” +</p> + +<p> +Lady Ludlow’s great blue eyes dilated with surprise, and—I do +think—anger, at being thus spoken to. I am not sure whether it was very +wise in Mr. Gray. He himself looked afraid of the consequences but as if he was +determined to bear them without flinching. For a minute there was silence. Then +my lady replied—“Mr. Gray, I respect your plain-speaking, although +I may wonder whether a young man of your age and position has any right to +assume that he is a better judge than one with the experience which I have +naturally gained at my time of life, and in the station I hold.” +</p> + +<p> +“If I, madam, as the clergyman of this parish, am not to shrink from +telling what I believe to be the truth to the poor and lowly, no more am I to +hold my peace in the presence of the rich and titled.” Mr. Gray’s +face showed that he was in that state of excitement which in a child would have +ended in a good fit of crying. He looked as if he had nerved himself up to +doing and saying things, which he disliked above everything, and which nothing +short of serious duty could have compelled him to do and say. And at such times +every minute circumstance which could add to pain comes vividly before one. I +saw that he became aware of our presence, and that it added to his +discomfiture. +</p> + +<p> +My lady flushed up. “Are you aware, sir,” asked she, “that +you have gone far astray from the original subject of conversation? But as you +talk of your parish, allow me to remind you that Hareman’s Common is +beyond the bounds, and that you are really not responsible for the characters +and lives of the squatters on that unlucky piece of ground.” +</p> + +<p> +“Madam, I see I have only done harm in speaking to you about the affair +at all. I beg your pardon and take my leave.” +</p> + +<p> +He bowed, and looked very sad. Lady Ludlow caught the expression of his face. +</p> + +<p> +“Good morning!” she cried, in rather a louder and quicker way than +that in which she had been speaking. “Remember, Job Gregson is a +notorious poacher and evildoer, and you really are not responsible for what +goes on at Hareman’s Common.” +</p> + +<p> +He was near the hall door, and said something—half to himself, which we +heard (being nearer to him), but my lady did not; although she saw that he +spoke. “What did he say?” she asked in a somewhat hurried manner, +as soon as the door was closed—“I did not hear.” We looked at +each other, and then I spoke: +</p> + +<p> +“He said, my lady, that ‘God help him! he was responsible for all +the evil he did not strive to overcome.’” +</p> + +<p> +My lady turned sharp round away from us, and Mary Mason said afterwards she +thought her ladyship was much vexed with both of us, for having been present, +and with me for having repeated what Mr. Gray had said. But it was not our +fault that we were in the hall, and when my lady asked what Mr. Gray had said, +I thought it right to tell her. +</p> + +<p> +In a few minutes she bade us accompany her in her ride in the coach. +</p> + +<p> +Lady Ludlow always sat forwards by herself, and we girls backwards. Somehow +this was a rule, which we never thought of questioning. It was true that riding +backwards made some of us feel very uncomfortable and faint; and to remedy this +my lady always drove with both windows open, which occasionally gave her the +rheumatism; but we always went on in the old way. This day she did not pay any +great attention to the road by which we were going, and Coachman took his own +way. We were very silent, as my lady did not speak, and looked very serious. Or +else, in general, she made these rides very pleasant (to those who were not +qualmish with riding backwards), by talking to us in a very agreeable manner, +and telling us of the different things which had happened to her at various +places,—at Paris and Versailles, where she had been in her +youth,—at Windsor and Kew and Weymouth, where she had been with the +Queen, when maid-of-honour—and so on. But this day she did not talk at +all. All at once she put her head out of the window. +</p> + +<p> +“John Footman,” said she, “where are we? Surely this is +Hareman’s Common.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, an’t please my lady,” said John Footman, and waited for +further speech or orders. My lady thought a while, and then said she would have +the steps put down and get out. +</p> + +<p> +As soon as she was gone, we looked at each other, and then without a word began +to gaze after her. We saw her pick her dainty way in the little high-heeled +shoes she always wore (because they had been in fashion in her youth), among +the yellow pools of stagnant water that had gathered in the clayey soil. John +Footman followed, stately, after; afraid too, for all his stateliness, of +splashing his pure white stockings. Suddenly my lady turned round and said +something to him, and he returned to the carriage with a half-pleased, +half-puzzled air. +</p> + +<p> +My lady went on to a cluster of rude mud houses at the higher end of the +Common; cottages built, as they were occasionally at that day, of wattles and +clay, and thatched with sods. As far as we could make out from dumb show, Lady +Ludlow saw enough of the interiors of these places to make her hesitate before +entering, or even speaking to any of the children who were playing about in the +puddles. After a pause, she disappeared into one of the cottages. It seemed to +us a long time before she came out; but I dare say it was not more than eight +or ten minutes. She came back with her head hanging down, as if to choose her +way,—but we saw it was more in thought and bewilderment than for any such +purpose. +</p> + +<p> +She had not made up her mind where we should drive to when she got into the +carriage again. John Footman stood, bare-headed, waiting for orders. +</p> + +<p> +“To Hathaway. My dears, if you are tired, or if you have anything to do +for Mrs. Medlicott, I can drop you at Barford Corner, and it is but a quarter +of an hour’s brisk walk home.” +</p> + +<p> +But luckily we could safely say that Mrs. Medlicott did not want us; and as we +had whispered to each other, as we sat alone in the coach, that surely my lady +must have gone to Job Gregson’s, we were far too anxious to know the end +of it all to say that we were tired. So we all set off to Hathaway. Mr. Harry +Lathom was a bachelor squire, thirty or thirty-five years of age, more at home +in the field than in the drawing-room, and with sporting men than with ladies. +</p> + +<p> +My lady did not alight, of course; it was Mr. Lathom’s place to wait upon +her, and she bade the butler,—who had a smack of the gamekeeper in him, +very unlike our own powdered venerable fine gentleman at Hanbury,—tell +his master, with her compliments, that she wished to speak to him. You may +think how pleased we were to find that we should hear all that was said; +though, I think, afterwards we were half sorry when we saw how our presence +confused the squire, who would have found it bad enough to answer my +lady’s questions, even without two eager girls for audience. +</p> + +<p> +“Pray, Mr. Lathom,” began my lady, something abruptly for +her,—but she was very full of her subject,—“what is this I +hear about Job Gregson?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Lathom looked annoyed and vexed, but dared not show it in his words. +</p> + +<p> +“I gave out a warrant against him, my lady, for theft,—that is all. +You are doubtless aware of his character; a man who sets nets and springes in +long cover, and fishes wherever he takes a fancy. It is but a short step from +poaching to thieving.” +</p> + +<p> +“That is quite true,” replied Lady Ludlow (who had a horror of +poaching for this very reason): “but I imagine you do not send a man to +gaol on account of his bad character.” +</p> + +<p> +“Rogues and vagabonds,” said Mr. Lathom. “A man may be sent +to prison for being a vagabond; for no specific act, but for his general mode +of life.” +</p> + +<p> +He had the better of her ladyship for one moment; but then she answered— +</p> + +<p> +“But in this case, the charge on which you committed him is for theft; +now his wife tells me he can prove he was some miles distant from Holmwood, +where the robbery took place, all that afternoon; she says you had the evidence +before you.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Lathom here interrupted my lady, by saying, in a somewhat sulky +manner—“No such evidence was brought before me when I gave the +warrant. I am not answerable for the other magistrates’ decision, when +they had more evidence before them. It was they who committed him to gaol. I am +not responsible for that.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady did not often show signs of impatience; but we knew she was feeling +irritated, by the little perpetual tapping of her high-heeled shoe against the +bottom of the carriage. About the same time we, sitting backwards, caught a +glimpse of Mr. Gray through the open door, standing in the shadow of the hall. +Doubtless Lady Ludlow’s arrival had interrupted a conversation between +Mr. Lathom and Mr. Gray. The latter must have heard every word of what she was +saying; but of this she was not aware, and caught at Mr. Lathom’s +disclaimer of responsibility with pretty much the same argument which she had +heard (through our repetition) that Mr. Gray had used not two hours before. +</p> + +<p> +“And do you mean to say, Mr. Lathom, that you don’t consider +yourself responsible for all injustice or wrong-doing that you might have +prevented, and have not? Nay, in this case the first germ of injustice was your +own mistake. I wish you had been with me a little while ago, and seen the +misery in that poor fellow’s cottage.” She spoke lower, and Mr. +Gray drew near, in a sort of involuntary manner; as if to hear all she was +saying. We saw him, and doubtless Mr. Lathom heard his footstep, and knew who +it was that was listening behind him, and approving of every word that was +said. He grew yet more sullen in manner; but still my lady was my lady, and he +dared not speak out before her, as he would have done to Mr. Gray. Lady Ludlow, +however, caught the look of stubborness in his face, and it roused her as I had +never seen her roused. +</p> + +<p> +“I am sure you will not refuse, sir, to accept my bail. I offer to bail +the fellow out, and to be responsible for his appearance at the sessions. What +say you to that, Mr. Lathom?” +</p> + +<p> +“The offence of theft is not bailable, my lady.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not in ordinary cases, I dare say. But I imagine this is an +extraordinary case. The man is sent to prison out of compliment to you, and +against all evidence, as far as I can learn. He will have to rot in gaol for +two months, and his wife and children to starve. I, Lady Ludlow, offer to bail +him out, and pledge myself for his appearance at next quarter-sessions.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is against the law, my lady.” +</p> + +<p> +“Bah! Bah! Bah! Who makes laws? Such as I, in the House of +Lords—such as you, in the House of Commons. We, who make the laws in St. +Stephen’s, may break the mere forms of them, when we have right on our +sides, on our own land, and amongst our own people.” +</p> + +<p> +“The lord-lieutenant may take away my commission, if he heard of +it.” +</p> + +<p> +“And a very good thing for the county, Harry Lathom; and for you too, if +he did,—if you don’t go on more wisely than you have begun. A +pretty set you and your brother magistrates are to administer justice through +the land! I always said a good despotism was the best form of government; and I +am twice as much in favour of it now I see what a quorum is! My dears!” +suddenly turning round to us, “if it would not tire you to walk home, I +would beg Mr. Lathom to take a seat in my coach, and we would drive to Henley +Gaol, and have the poor man out at once.” +</p> + +<p> +“A walk over the fields at this time of day is hardly fitting for young +ladies to take alone,” said Mr. Lathom, anxious no doubt to escape from +his tête-à-tête drive with my lady, and possibly not quite +prepared to go to the illegal length of prompt measures, which she had in +contemplation. +</p> + +<p> +But Mr. Gray now stepped forward, too anxious for the release of the prisoner +to allow any obstacle to intervene which he could do away with. To see Lady +Ludlow’s face when she first perceived whom she had had for auditor and +spectator of her interview with Mr. Lathom, was as good as a play. She had been +doing and saying the very things she had been so much annoyed at Mr. +Gray’s saying and proposing only an hour or two ago. She had been setting +down Mr. Lathom pretty smartly, in the presence of the very man to whom she had +spoken of that gentleman as so sensible, and of such a standing in the county, +that it was presumption to question his doings. But before Mr. Gray had +finished his offer of escorting us back to Hanbury Court, my lady had recovered +herself. There was neither surprise nor displeasure in her manner, as she +answered—“I thank you, Mr. Gray. I was not aware that you were +here, but I think I can understand on what errand you came. And seeing you +here, recalls me to a duty I owe Mr. Lathom. Mr. Lathom, I have spoken to you +pretty plainly,—forgetting, until I saw Mr. Gray, that only this very +afternoon I differed from him on this very question; taking completely, at that +time, the same view of the whole subject which you have done; thinking that the +county would be well rid of such a man as Job Gregson, whether he had committed +this theft or not. Mr. Gray and I did not part quite friends,” she +continued, bowing towards him; “but it so happened that I saw Job +Gregson’s wife and home,—I felt that Mr. Gray had been right and I +had been wrong, so, with the famous inconsistency of my sex, I came hither to +scold you,” smiling towards Mr. Lathom, who looked half-sulky yet, and +did not relax a bit of his gravity at her smile, “for holding the same +opinions that I had done an hour before. Mr. Gray,” (again bowing towards +him) “these young ladies will be very much obliged to you for your +escort, and so shall I. Mr. Lathom, may I beg of you to accompany me to +Henley?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Gray bowed very low, and went very red; Mr. Lathom said something which we +none of us heard, but which was, I think, some remonstrance against the course +he was, as it were, compelled to take. Lady Ludlow, however, took no notice of +his murmur, but sat in an attitude of polite expectancy; and as we turned off +on our walk, I saw Mr. Lathom getting into the coach with the air of a whipped +hound. I must say, considering my lady’s feeling, I did not envy him his +ride—though, I believe, he was quite in the right as to the object of the +ride being illegal. +</p> + +<p> +Our walk home was very dull. We had no fears; and would far rather have been +without the awkward, blushing young man, into which Mr. Gray had sunk. At every +stile he hesitated,—sometimes he half got over it, thinking that he could +assist us better in that way; then he would turn back unwilling to go before +ladies. He had no ease of manner, as my lady once said of him, though on any +occasion of duty, he had an immense deal of dignity. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER III.</h2> + +<p> +As far as I can remember, it was very soon after this that I first began to +have the pain in my hip, which has ended in making me a cripple for life. I +hardly recollect more than one walk after our return under Mr. Gray’s +escort from Mr. Lathom’s. Indeed, at the time, I was not without +suspicions (which I never named) that the beginning of all the mischief was a +great jump I had taken from the top of one of the stiles on that very occasion. +</p> + +<p> +Well, it is a long while ago, and God disposes of us all, and I am not going to +tire you out with telling you how I thought and felt, and how, when I saw what +my life was to be, I could hardly bring myself to be patient, but rather wished +to die at once. You can every one of you think for yourselves what becoming all +at once useless and unable to move, and by-and-by growing hopeless of cure, and +feeling that one must be a burden to some one all one’s life long, would +be to an active, wilful, strong girl of seventeen, anxious to get on in the +world, so as, if possible, to help her brothers and sisters. So I shall only +say, that one among the blessings which arose out of what seemed at the time a +great, black sorrow was, that Lady Ludlow for many years took me, as it were, +into her own especial charge; and now, as I lie still and alone in my old age, +it is such a pleasure to think of her! +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Medlicott was great as a nurse, and I am sure I can never be grateful +enough to her memory for all her kindness. But she was puzzled to know how to +manage me in other ways. I used to have long, hard fits of crying; and, +thinking that I ought to go home—and yet what could they do with me +there?—and a hundred and fifty other anxious thoughts, some of which I +could tell to Mrs. Medlicott, and others I could not. Her way of comforting me +was hurrying away for some kind of tempting or strengthening food—a basin +of melted calves-foot jelly was, I am sure she thought, a cure for every woe. +</p> + +<p> +“There take it, dear, take it!” she would say; “and +don’t go on fretting for what can’t be helped.” +</p> + +<p> +But, I think, she got puzzled at length at the non-efficacy of good things to +eat; and one day, after I had limped down to see the doctor, in Mrs. +Medlicott’s sitting-room—a room lined with cupboards, containing +preserves and dainties of all kinds, which she perpetually made, and never +touched herself—when I was returning to my bed-room to cry away the +afternoon, under pretence of arranging my clothes, John Footman brought me a +message from my lady (with whom the doctor had been having a conversation) to +bid me go to her in that private sitting-room at the end of the suite of +apartments, about which I spoke in describing the day of my first arrival at +Hanbury. I had hardly been in it since; as, when we read to my lady, she +generally sat in the small withdrawing-room out of which this private room of +hers opened. I suppose great people do not require what we smaller people value +so much,—I mean privacy. I do not think that there was a room which my +lady occupied that had not two doors, and some of them had three or four. Then +my lady had always Adams waiting upon her in her bed-chamber; and it was Mrs. +Medlicott’s duty to sit within call, as it were, in a sort of anteroom +that led out of my lady’s own sitting-room, on the opposite side to the +drawing-room door. To fancy the house, you must take a great square and halve +it by a line: at one end of this line was the hall door, or public entrance; at +the opposite the private entrance from a terrace, which was terminated at one +end by a sort of postern door in an old gray stone wall, beyond which lay the +farm buildings and offices; so that people could come in this way to my lady on +business, while, if she were going into the garden from her own room, she had +nothing to do but to pass through Mrs. Medlicott’s apartment, out into +the lesser hall, and then turning to the right as she passed on to the terrace, +she could go down the flight of broad, shallow steps at the corner of the house +into the lovely garden, with stretching, sweeping lawns, and gay flower-beds, +and beautiful, bossy laurels, and other blooming or massy shrubs, with +full-grown beeches, or larches feathering down to the ground a little farther +off. The whole was set in a frame, as it were, by the more distant woodlands. +The house had been modernized in the days of Queen Anne, I think; but the money +had fallen short that was requisite to carry out all the improvements, so it +was only the suite of withdrawing-rooms and the terrace-rooms, as far as the +private entrance, that had the new, long, high windows put in, and these were +old enough by this time to be draped with roses, and honeysuckles, and +pyracanthus, winter and summer long. +</p> + +<p> +Well, to go back to that day when I limped into my lady’s sitting-room, +trying hard to look as if I had not been crying, and not to walk as if I was in +much pain. I do not know whether my lady saw how near my tears were to my eyes, +but she told me she had sent for me, because she wanted some help in arranging +the drawers of her bureau, and asked me—just as if it was a favour I was +to do her—if I could sit down in the easy-chair near the +window—(all quietly arranged before I came in, with a footstool, and a +table quite near)—and assist her. You will wonder, perhaps, why I was not +bidden to sit or lie on the sofa; but (although I found one there a morning or +two afterwards, when I came down) the fact was, that there was none in the room +at this time. I have even fancied that the easy-chair was brought in on purpose +for me; for it was not the chair in which I remembered my lady sitting the +first time I saw her. That chair was very much carved and gilded, with a +countess’ coronet at the top. I tried it one day, some time afterwards, +when my lady was out of the room, and I had a fancy for seeing how I could move +about, and very uncomfortable it was. Now my chair (as I learnt to call it, and +to think it) was soft and luxurious, and seemed somehow to give one’s +body rest just in that part where one most needed it. +</p> + +<p> +I was not at my ease that first day, nor indeed for many days afterwards, +notwithstanding my chair was so comfortable. Yet I forgot my sad pain in +silently wondering over the meaning of many of the things we turned out of +those curious old drawers. I was puzzled to know why some were kept at all; a +scrap of writing maybe, with only half a dozen common-place words written on +it, or a bit of broken riding-whip, and here and there a stone, of which I +thought I could have picked up twenty just as good in the first walk I took. +But it seems that was just my ignorance; for my lady told me they were pieces +of valuable marble, used to make the floors of the great Roman emperors palaces +long ago; and that when she had been a girl, and made the grand tour long ago, +her cousin Sir Horace Mann, the Ambassador or Envoy at Florence, had told her +to be sure to go into the fields inside the walls of ancient Rome, when the +farmers were preparing the ground for the onion-sowing, and had to make the +soil fine, and pick up what bits of marble she could find. She had done so, and +meant to have had them made into a table; but somehow that plan fell through, +and there they were with all the dirt out of the onion-field upon them; but +once when I thought of cleaning them with soap and water, at any rate, she bade +me not to do so, for it was Roman dirt—earth, I think, she called +it—but it was dirt all the same. +</p> + +<p> +Then, in this bureau, were many other things, the value of which I could +understand—locks of hair carefully ticketed, which my lady looked at very +sadly; and lockets and bracelets with miniatures in them,—very small +pictures to what they make now-a-days, and called miniatures: some of them had +even to be looked at through a microscope before you could see the individual +expression of the faces, or how beautifully they were painted. I don’t +think that looking at these made may lady seem so melancholy, as the seeing and +touching of the hair did. But, to be sure, the hair was, as it were, a part of +some beloved body which she might never touch and caress again, but which lay +beneath the turf, all faded and disfigured, except perhaps the very hair, from +which the lock she held had been dissevered; whereas the pictures were but +pictures after all—likenesses, but not the very things themselves. This +is only my own conjecture, mind. My lady rarely spoke out her feelings. For, to +begin with, she was of rank: and I have heard her say that people of rank do +not talk about their feelings except to their equals, and even to them they +conceal them, except upon rare occasions. Secondly,—and this is my own +reflection,—she was an only child and an heiress; and as such was more +apt to think than to talk, as all well-brought-up heiresses must be. I think. +Thirdly, she had long been a widow, without any companion of her own age with +whom it would have been natural for her to refer to old associations, past +pleasures, or mutual sorrows. Mrs. Medlicott came nearest to her as a companion +of this sort; and her ladyship talked more to Mrs. Medlicott, in a kind of +familiar way, than she did to all the rest of the household put together. But +Mrs. Medlicott was silent by nature, and did not reply at any great length. +Adams, indeed, was the only one who spoke much to Lady Ludlow. +</p> + +<p> +After we had worked away about an hour at the bureau, her ladyship said we had +done enough for one day; and as the time was come for her afternoon ride, she +left me, with a volume of engravings from Mr. Hogarth’s pictures on one +side of me (I don’t like to write down the names of them, though my lady +thought nothing of it, I am sure), and upon a stand her great prayer-book open +at the evening psalms for the day, on the other. But as soon as she was gone, I +troubled myself little with either, but amused myself with looking round the +room at my leisure. The side on which the fire-place stood was all +panelled,—part of the old ornaments of the house, for there was an Indian +paper with birds and beasts and insects on it, on all the other sides. There +were coats of arms, of the various families with whom the Hanburys had +intermarried, all over these panels, and up and down the ceiling as well. There +was very little looking-glass in the room, though one of the great +drawing-rooms was called the “Mirror Room,” because it was lined +with glass, which my lady’s great-grandfather had brought from Venice +when he was ambassador there. There were china jars of all shapes and sizes +round and about the room, and some china monsters, or idols, of which I could +never bear the sight, they were so ugly, though I think my lady valued them +more than all. There was a thick carpet on the middle of the floor, which was +made of small pieces of rare wood fitted into a pattern; the doors were +opposite to each other, and were composed of two heavy tall wings, and opened +in the middle, moving on brass grooves inserted into the floor—they would +not have opened over a carpet. There were two windows reaching up nearly to the +ceiling, but very narrow and with deep window-seats in the thickness of the +wall. The room was full of scent, partly from the flowers outside, and partly +from the great jars of pot-pourri inside. The choice of odours was what my lady +piqued herself upon, saying nothing showed birth like a keen susceptibility of +smell. We never named musk in her presence, her antipathy to it was so well +understood through the household: her opinion on the subject was believed to +be, that no scent derived from an animal could ever be of a sufficiently pure +nature to give pleasure to any person of good family, where, of course, the +delicate perception of the senses had been cultivated for generations. She +would instance the way in which sportsmen preserve the breed of dogs who have +shown keen scent; and how such gifts descend for generations amongst animals, +who cannot be supposed to have anything of ancestral pride, or hereditary +fancies about them. Musk, then, was never mentioned at Hanbury Court. No more +were bergamot or southern-wood, although vegetable in their nature. She +considered these two latter as betraying a vulgar taste in the person who chose +to gather or wear them. She was sorry to notice sprigs of them in the +button-hole of any young man in whom she took an interest, either because he +was engaged to a servant of hers or otherwise, as he came out of church on a +Sunday afternoon. She was afraid that he liked coarse pleasures; and I am not +sure if she did not think that his preference for these coarse sweetnesses did +not imply a probability that he would take to drinking. But she distinguished +between vulgar and common. Violets, pinks, and sweetbriar were common enough; +roses and mignionette, for those who had gardens, honeysuckle for those who +walked along the bowery lanes; but wearing them betrayed no vulgarity of taste: +the queen upon her throne might be glad to smell at a nosegay of the flowers. A +beau-pot (as we called it) of pinks and roses freshly gathered was placed every +morning that they were in bloom on my lady’s own particular table. For +lasting vegetable odours she preferred lavender and sweet woodroof to any +extract whatever. Lavender reminded her of old customs, she said, and of homely +cottage-gardens, and many a cottager made his offering to her of a bundle of +lavender. Sweet woodroof, again, grew in wild, woodland places where the soil +was fine and the air delicate: the poor children used to go and gather it for +her up in the woods on the higher lands; and for this service she always +rewarded them with bright new pennies, of which my lord, her son, used to send +her down a bagful fresh from the Mint in London every February. +</p> + +<p> +Attar of roses, again, she disliked. She said it reminded her of the city and +of merchants’ wives, over-rich, over-heavy in its perfume. And +lilies-of-the-valley somehow fell under the same condemnation. They were most +graceful and elegant to look at (my lady was quite candid about this), flower, +leaf, colour—everything was refined about them but the smell. That was +too strong. But the great hereditary faculty on which my lady piqued herself, +and with reason, for I never met with any person who possessed it, was the +power she had of perceiving the delicious odour arising from a bed of +strawberries in the late autumn, when the leaves were all fading and dying. +“Bacon’s Essays” was one of the few books that lay about in +my lady’s room; and if you took it up and opened it carelessly, it was +sure to fall apart at his “Essay on Gardens.” “Listen,” +her ladyship would say, “to what that great philosopher and statesman +says. ‘Next to that,’—he is speaking of violets, my +dear,—‘is the musk-rose,’—of which you remember the +great bush, at the corner of the south wall just by the Blue Drawing-room +windows; that is the old musk-rose, Shakespeare’s musk-rose, which is +dying out through the kingdom now. But to return to my Lord Bacon: ‘Then +the strawberry leaves, dying with a most excellent cordial smell.’ Now +the Hanburys can always smell this excellent cordial odour, and very delicious +and refreshing it is. You see, in Lord Bacon’s time, there had not been +so many intermarriages between the court and the city as there have been since +the needy days of his Majesty Charles the Second; and altogether in the time of +Queen Elizabeth, the great, old families of England were a distinct race, just +as a cart-horse is one creature, and very useful in its place, and Childers or +Eclipse is another creature, though both are of the same species. So the old +families have gifts and powers of a different and higher class to what the +other orders have. My dear, remember that you try if you can smell the scent of +dying strawberry-leaves in this next autumn. You have some of Ursula +Hanbury’s blood in you, and that gives you a chance.” +</p> + +<p> +But when October came, I sniffed and sniffed, and all to no purpose; and my +lady—who had watched the little experiment rather anxiously—had to +give me up as a hybrid. I was mortified, I confess, and thought that it was in +some ostentation of her own powers that she ordered the gardener to plant a +border of strawberries on that side of the terrace that lay under her windows. +</p> + +<p> +I have wandered away from time and place. I tell you all the remembrances I +have of those years just as they come up, and I hope that, in my old age, I am +not getting too like a certain Mrs. Nickleby, whose speeches were once read out +aloud to me. +</p> + +<p> +I came by degrees to be all day long in this room which I have been describing; +sometimes sitting in the easy-chair, doing some little piece of dainty work for +my lady, or sometimes arranging flowers, or sorting letters according to their +handwriting, so that she could arrange them afterwards, and destroy or keep, as +she planned, looking ever onward to her death. Then, after the sofa was brought +in, she would watch my face, and if she saw my colour change, she would bid me +lie down and rest. And I used to try to walk upon the terrace every day for a +short time: it hurt me very much, it is true, but the doctor had ordered it, +and I knew her ladyship wished me to obey. +</p> + +<p> +Before I had seen the background of a great lady’s life, I had thought it +all play and fine doings. But whatever other grand people are, my lady was +never idle. For one thing, she had to superintend the agent for the large +Hanbury estate. I believe it was mortgaged for a sum of money which had gone to +improve the late lord’s Scotch lands; but she was anxious to pay off this +before her death, and so to leave her own inheritance free of incumbrance to +her son, the present Earl; whom, I secretly think, she considered a greater +person, as being the heir of the Hanburys (though through a female line), than +as being my Lord Ludlow with half a dozen other minor titles. +</p> + +<p> +With this wish of releasing her property from the mortgage, skilful care was +much needed in the management of it; and as far as my lady could go, she took +every pains. She had a great book, in which every page was ruled into three +divisions; on the first column was written the date and the name of the tenant +who addressed any letter on business to her; on the second was briefly stated +the subject of the letter, which generally contained a request of some kind. +This request would be surrounded and enveloped in so many words, and often +inserted amidst so many odd reasons and excuses, that Mr. Horner (the steward) +would sometimes say it was like hunting through a bushel of chaff to find a +grain of wheat. Now, in the second column of this book, the grain of meaning +was placed, clean and dry, before her ladyship every morning. She sometimes +would ask to see the original letter; sometimes she simply answered the request +by a “Yes,” or a “No;” and often she would send for +lenses and papers, and examine them well, with Mr. Horner at her elbow, to see +if such petitions, as to be allowed to plough up pasture fields, were provided +for in the terms of the original agreement. On every Thursday she made herself +at liberty to see her tenants, from four to six in the afternoon. Mornings +would have suited my lady better, as far as convenience went, and I believe the +old custom had been to have these levées (as her ladyship used to call them) +held before twelve. But, as she said to Mr. Horner, when he urged returning to +the former hours, it spoilt a whole day for a farmer, if he had to dress +himself in his best and leave his work in the forenoon (and my lady liked to +see her tenants come in their Sunday clothes; she would not say a word, maybe, +but she would take her spectacles slowly out, and put them on with silent +gravity, and look at a dirty or raggedly-dressed man so solemnly and earnestly, +that his nerves must have been pretty strong if he did not wince, and resolve +that, however poor he might be, soap and water, and needle and thread, should +be used before he again appeared in her ladyship’s anteroom). The +outlying tenants had always a supper provided for them in the +servants’-hall on Thursdays, to which, indeed all comers were welcome to +sit down. For my lady said, though there were not many hours left of a working +man’s day when their business with her was ended, yet that they needed +food and rest, and that she should be ashamed if they sought either at the +Fighting Lion (called at this day the Hanbury Arms). They had as much beer as +they could drink while they were eating; and when the food was cleared away, +they had a cup a piece of good ale, in which the oldest tenant present, +standing up, gave Madam’s health; and after that was drunk, they were +expected to set off homewards; at any rate, no more liquor was given them. The +tenants one and all called her “Madam;” for they recognized in her +the married heiress of the Hanburys, not the widow of a Lord Ludlow, of whom +they and their forefathers knew nothing; and against whose memory, indeed, +there rankled a dim unspoken grudge, the cause of which was accurately known to +the very few who understood the nature of a mortgage, and were therefore aware +that Madam’s money had been taken to enrich my lord’s poor land in +Scotland. I am sure—for you can understand I was behind the scenes, as it +were, and had many an opportunity of seeing and hearing, as I lay or sat +motionless in my lady’s room with the double doors open between it and +the anteroom beyond, where Lady Ludlow saw her steward, and gave audience to +her tenants,—I am certain, I say, that Mr. Horner was silently as much +annoyed at the money that was swallowed up by this mortgage as any one; and, +some time or other, he had probably spoken his mind out to my lady; for there +was a sort of offended reference on her part, and respectful submission to +blame on his, while every now and then there was an implied +protest—whenever the payments of the interest became due, or whenever my +lady stinted herself of any personal expense, such as Mr. Horner thought was +only decorous and becoming in the heiress of the Hanburys. Her carriages were +old and cumbrous, wanting all the improvements which had been adopted by those +of her rank throughout the county. Mr. Horner would fain have had the ordering +of a new coach. The carriage-horses, too, were getting past their work; yet all +the promising colts bred on the estate were sold for ready money; and so on. My +lord, her son, was ambassador at some foreign place; and very proud we all were +of his glory and dignity; but I fancy it cost money, and my lady would have +lived on bread and water sooner than have called upon him to help her in paying +off the mortgage, although he was the one who was to benefit by it in the end. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Horner was a very faithful steward, and very respectful to my lady; +although sometimes, I thought she was sharper to him than to any one else; +perhaps because she knew that, although he never said anything, he disapproved +of the Hanburys being made to pay for the Earl Ludlow’s estates and +state. +</p> + +<p> +The late lord had been a sailor, and had been as extravagant in his habits as +most sailors are, I am told,—for I never saw the sea; and yet he had a +long sight to his own interests; but whatever he was, my lady loved him and his +memory, with about as fond and proud a love as ever wife gave husband, I should +think. +</p> + +<p> +For a part of his life Mr. Horner, who was born on the Hanbury property, had +been a clerk to an attorney in Birmingham; and these few years had given him a +kind of worldly wisdom, which, though always exerted for her benefit, was +antipathetic to her ladyship, who thought that some of her steward’s +maxims savoured of trade and commerce. I fancy that if it had been possible, +she would have preferred a return to the primitive system, of living on the +produce of the land, and exchanging the surplus for such articles as were +needed, without the intervention of money. +</p> + +<p> +But Mr. Horner was bitten with new-fangled notions, as she would say, though +his new-fangled notions were what folk at the present day would think sadly +behindhand; and some of Mr. Gray’s ideas fell on Mr. Horner’s mind +like sparks on tow, though they started from two different points. Mr. Horner +wanted to make every man useful and active in this world, and to direct as much +activity and usefulness as possible to the improvement of the Hanbury estates, +and the aggrandisement of the Hanbury family, and therefore he fell into the +new cry for education. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Gray did not care much,—Mr. Horner thought not enough,—for this +world, and where any man or family stood in their earthly position; but he +would have every one prepared for the world to come, and capable of +understanding and receiving certain doctrines, for which latter purpose, it +stands to reason, he must have heard of these doctrines; and therefore Mr. Gray +wanted education. The answer in the Catechism that Mr. Horner was most fond of +calling upon a child to repeat, was that to, “What is thy duty towards +thy neighbour?” The answer Mr. Gray liked best to hear repeated with +unction, was that to the question, “What is the inward and spiritual +grace?” The reply to which Lady Ludlow bent her head the lowest, as we +said our Catechism to her on Sundays, was to, “What is thy duty towards +God?” But neither Mr. Horner nor Mr. Gray had heard many answers to the +Catechism as yet. +</p> + +<p> +Up to this time there was no Sunday-school in Hanbury. Mr. Gray’s desires +were bounded by that object. Mr. Horner looked farther on: he hoped for a +day-school at some future time, to train up intelligent labourers for working +on the estate. My lady would hear of neither one nor the other: indeed, not the +boldest man whom she ever saw would have dared to name the project of a +day-school within her hearing. +</p> + +<p> +So Mr. Horner contented himself with quietly teaching a sharp, clever lad to +read and write, with a view to making use of him as a kind of foreman in +process of time. He had his pick of the farm-lads for this purpose; and, as the +brightest and sharpest, although by far the raggedest and dirtiest, singled out +Job Gregson’s son. But all this—as my lady never listened to +gossip, or indeed, was spoken to unless she spoke first—was quite unknown +to her, until the unlucky incident took place which I am going to relate. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER IV.</h2> + +<p> +I think my lady was not aware of Mr. Horner’s views on education (as +making men into more useful members of society), or the practice to which he +was putting his precepts in taking Harry Gregson as pupil and protégé; if, +indeed, she were aware of Harry’s distinct existence at all, until the +following unfortunate occasion. The anteroom, which was a kind of +business-place for my lady to receive her steward and tenants in, was +surrounded by shelves. I cannot call them book-shelves, though there were many +books on them; but the contents of the volumes were principally manuscript, and +relating to details connected with the Hanbury property. There were also one or +two dictionaries, gazetteers, works of reference on the management of property; +all of a very old date (the dictionary was Bailey’s, I remember; we had a +great Johnson in my lady’s room, but where lexicographers differed, she +generally preferred Bailey). +</p> + +<p> +In this antechamber a footman generally sat, awaiting orders from my lady; for +she clung to the grand old customs, and despised any bells, except her own +little hand-bell, as modern inventions; she would have her people always within +summons of this silvery bell, or her scarce less silvery voice. This man had +not the sinecure you might imagine. He had to reply to the private entrance; +what we should call the back door in a smaller house. As none came to the front +door but my lady, and those of the county whom she honoured by visiting, and +her nearest acquaintance of this kind lived eight miles (of bad road) off, the +majority of comers knocked at the nail-studded terrace-door; not to have it +opened (for open it stood, by my lady’s orders, winter and summer, so +that the snow often drifted into the back hall, and lay there in heaps when the +weather was severe), but to summon some one to receive their message, or carry +their request to be allowed to speak to my lady. I remember it was long before +Mr. Gray could be made to understand that the great door was only open on state +occasions, and even to the last he would as soon come in by that as the terrace +entrance. I had been received there on my first setting foot over my +lady’s threshold; every stranger was led in by that way the first time +they came; but after that (with the exceptions I have named) they went round by +the terrace, as it were by instinct. It was an assistance to this instinct to +be aware that from time immemorial, the magnificent and fierce Hanbury +wolf-hounds, which were extinct in every other part of the island, had been and +still were kept chained in the front quadrangle, where they bayed through a +great part of the day and night and were always ready with their deep, savage +growl at the sight of every person and thing, excepting the man who fed them, +my lady’s carriage and four, and my lady herself. It was pretty to see +her small figure go up to the great, crouching brutes thumping the flags with +their heavy, wagging tails, and slobbering in an ecstacy of delight, at her +light approach and soft caress. She had no fear of them; but she was a Hanbury +born, and the tale went, that they and their kind knew all Hanburys instantly, +and acknowledged their supremacy, ever since the ancestors of the breed had +been brought from the East by the great Sir Urian Hanbury, who lay with his +legs crossed on the altar-tomb in the church. Moreover, it was reported that, +not fifty years before, one of these dogs had eaten up a child, which had +inadvertently strayed within reach of its chain. So you may imagine how most +people preferred the terrace-door. Mr. Gray did not seem to care for the dogs. +It might be absence of mind, for I have heard of his starting away from their +sudden spring when he had unwittingly walked within reach of their chains: but +it could hardly have been absence of mind, when one day he went right up to one +of them, and patted him in the most friendly manner, the dog meanwhile looking +pleased, and affably wagging his tail, just as if Mr. Gray had been a Hanbury. +We were all very much puzzled by this, and to this day I have not been able to +account for it. +</p> + +<p> +But now let us go back to the terrace-door, and the footman sitting in the +antechamber. +</p> + +<p> +One morning we heard a parleying, which rose to such a vehemence, and lasted +for so long, that my lady had to ring her hand-bell twice before the footman +heard it. +</p> + +<p> +“What is the matter, John?” asked she, when he entered, +</p> + +<p> +“A little boy, my lady, who says he comes from Mr. Horner, and must see +your ladyship. Impudent little lad!” (This last to himself.) +</p> + +<p> +“What does he want?” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s just what I have asked him, my lady, but he won’t +tell me, please your ladyship.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is, probably, some message from Mr. Horner,” said Lady Ludlow, +with just a shade of annoyance in her manner; for it was against all etiquette +to send a message to her, and by such a messenger too! +</p> + +<p> +“No! please your ladyship, I asked him if he had any message, and he said +no, he had none; but he must see your ladyship for all that.” +</p> + +<p> +“You had better show him in then, without more words,” said her +ladyship, quietly, but still, as I have said, rather annoyed. +</p> + +<p> +As if in mockery of the humble visitor, the footman threw open both battants of +the door, and in the opening there stood a lithe, wiry lad, with a thick head +of hair, standing out in every direction, as if stirred by some electrical +current, a short, brown face, red now from affright and excitement, wide, +resolute mouth, and bright, deep-set eyes, which glanced keenly and rapidly +round the room, as if taking in everything (and all was new and strange), to be +thought and puzzled over at some future time. He knew enough of manners not to +speak first to one above him in rank, or else he was afraid. +</p> + +<p> +“What do you want with me?” asked my lady; in so gentle a tone that +it seemed to surprise and stun him. +</p> + +<p> +“An’t please your ladyship?” said he, as if he had been deaf. +</p> + +<p> +“You come from Mr. Horner’s: why do you want to see me?” +again asked she, a little more loudly. +</p> + +<p> +“An’t please your ladyship, Mr. Horner was sent for all on a sudden +to Warwick this morning.” +</p> + +<p> +His face began to work; but he felt it, and closed his lips into a resolute +form. +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” +</p> + +<p> +“And he went off all on a sudden like.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” +</p> + +<p> +“And he left a note for your ladyship with me, your ladyship.” +</p> + +<p> +“Is that all? You might have given it to the footman.” +</p> + +<p> +“Please your ladyship, I’ve clean gone and lost it.” +</p> + +<p> +He never took his eyes off her face. If he had not kept his look fixed, he +would have burst out crying. +</p> + +<p> +“That was very careless,” said my lady gently. “But I am sure +you are very sorry for it. You had better try and find it; it may have been of +consequence. +</p> + +<p> +“Please, mum—please your ladyship—I can say it off by +heart.” +</p> + +<p> +“You! What do you mean?” I was really afraid now. My lady’s +blue eyes absolutely gave out light, she was so much displeased, and, moreover, +perplexed. The more reason he had for affright, the more his courage rose. He +must have seen,—so sharp a lad must have perceived her displeasure; but +he went on quickly and steadily. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Horner, my lady, has taught me to read, write, and cast accounts, my +lady. And he was in a hurry, and he folded his paper up, but he did not seal +it; and I read it, my lady; and now, my lady, it seems like as if I had got it +off by heart;” and he went on with a high pitched voice, saying out very +loud what, I have no doubt, were the identical words of the letter, date, +signature and all: it was merely something about a deed, which required my +lady’s signature. +</p> + +<p> +When he had done, he stood almost as if he expected commendation for his +accurate memory. +</p> + +<p> +My lady’s eyes contracted till the pupils were as needle-points; it was a +way she had when much disturbed. She looked at me and said— +</p> + +<p> +“Margaret Dawson, what will this world come to?” And then she was +silent. +</p> + +<p> +The lad, beginning to perceive he had given deep offence, stood stock +still—as if his brave will had brought him into this presence, and +impelled him to confession, and the best amends he could make, but had now +deserted him, or was extinct, and left his body motionless, until some one else +with word or deed made him quit the room. My lady looked again at him, and saw +the frowning, dumb-foundering terror at his misdeed, and the manner in which +his confession had been received. +</p> + +<p> +“My poor lad!” said she, the angry look leaving her face, +“into whose hands have you fallen?” +</p> + +<p> +The boy’s lips began to quiver. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t you know what tree we read of in Genesis?—No! I hope +you have not got to read so easily as that.” A pause. “Who has +taught you to read and write?” +</p> + +<p> +“Please, my lady, I meant no harm, my lady.” He was fairly +blubbering, overcome by her evident feeling of dismay and regret, the soft +repression of which was more frightening to him than any strong or violent +words would have been. +</p> + +<p> +“Who taught you, I ask?” +</p> + +<p> +“It were Mr. Horner’s clerk who learned me, my lady.” +</p> + +<p> +“And did Mr. Horner know of it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, my lady. And I am sure I thought for to please him.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well! perhaps you were not to blame for that. But I wonder at Mr. +Horner. However, my boy, as you have got possession of edge-tools, you must +have some rules how to use them. Did you never hear that you were not to open +letters?” +</p> + +<p> +“Please, my lady, it were open. Mr. Horner forgot for to seal it, in his +hurry to be off.” +</p> + +<p> +“But you must not read letters that are not intended for you. You must +never try to read any letters that are not directed to you, even if they be +open before you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Please, may lady, I thought it were good for practice, all as one as a +book.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady looked bewildered as to what way she could farther explain to him the +laws of honour as regarded letters. +</p> + +<p> +“You would not listen, I am sure,” said she, “to anything you +were not intended to hear?” +</p> + +<p> +He hesitated for a moment, partly because he did not fully comprehend the +question. My lady repeated it. The light of intelligence came into his eager +eyes, and I could see that he was not certain if he could tell the truth. +</p> + +<p> +“Please, my lady, I always hearken when I hear folk talking secrets; but +I mean no harm.” +</p> + +<p> +My poor lady sighed: she was not prepared to begin a long way off in morals. +Honour was, to her, second nature, and she had never tried to find out on what +principle its laws were based. So, telling the lad that she wished to see Mr. +Horner when he returned from Warwick, she dismissed him with a despondent look; +he, meanwhile, right glad to be out of the awful gentleness of her presence. +</p> + +<p> +“What is to be done?” said she, half to herself and half to me. I +could not answer, for I was puzzled myself. +</p> + +<p> +“It was a right word,” she continued, “that I used, when I +called reading and writing ‘edge-tools.’ If our lower orders have +these edge-tools given to them, we shall have the terrible scenes of the French +Revolution acted over again in England. When I was a girl, one never heard of +the rights of men, one only heard of the duties. Now, here was Mr. Gray, only +last night, talking of the right every child had to instruction. I could hardly +keep my patience with him, and at length we fairly came to words; and I told +him I would have no such thing as a Sunday-school (or a Sabbath-school, as he +calls it, just like a Jew) in my village.” +</p> + +<p> +“And what did he say, my lady?” I asked; for the struggle that +seemed now to have come to a crisis, had been going on for some time in a quiet +way. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, he gave way to temper, and said he was bound to remember, he was +under the bishop’s authority, not under mine; and implied that he should +persevere in his designs, notwithstanding my expressed opinion.” +</p> + +<p> +“And your ladyship—” I half inquired. +</p> + +<p> +“I could only rise and curtsey, and civilly dismiss him. When two persons +have arrived at a certain point of expression on a subject, about which they +differ as materially as I do from Mr. Gray, the wisest course, if they wish to +remain friends, is to drop the conversation entirely and suddenly. It is one of +the few cases where abruptness is desirable.” +</p> + +<p> +I was sorry for Mr. Gray. He had been to see me several times, and had helped +me to bear my illness in a better spirit than I should have done without his +good advice and prayers. And I had gathered from little things he said, how +much his heart was set upon this new scheme. I liked him so much, and I loved +and respected my lady so well, that I could not bear them to be on the cool +terms to which they were constantly getting. Yet I could do nothing but keep +silence. +</p> + +<p> +I suppose my lady understood something of what was passing in my mind; for, +after a minute or two, she went on:— +</p> + +<p> +“If Mr. Gray knew all I know,—if he had my experience, he would not +be so ready to speak of setting up his new plans in opposition to my judgment. +Indeed,” she continued, lashing herself up with her own recollections, +“times are changed when the parson of a village comes to beard the liege +lady in her own house. Why, in my grandfather’s days, the parson was +family chaplain too, and dined at the Hall every Sunday. He was helped last, +and expected to have done first. I remember seeing him take up his plate and +knife and fork, and say with his mouth full all the time he was speaking: +‘If you please, Sir Urian, and my lady, I’ll follow the beef into +the housekeeper’s room;’ for you see, unless he did so, he stood no +chance of a second helping. A greedy man, that parson was, to be sure! I +recollect his once eating up the whole of some little bird at dinner, and by +way of diverting attention from his greediness, he told how he had heard that a +rook soaked in vinegar and then dressed in a particular way, could not be +distinguished from the bird he was then eating. I saw by the grim look of my +grandfather’s face that the parson’s doing and saying displeased +him; and, child as I was, I had some notion of what was coming, when, as I was +riding out on my little, white pony, by my grandfather’s side, the next +Friday, he stopped one of the gamekeepers, and bade him shoot one of the oldest +rooks he could find. I knew no more about it till Sunday, when a dish was set +right before the parson, and Sir Urian said: ‘Now, Parson Hemming, I have +had a rook shot, and soaked in vinegar, and dressed as you described last +Sunday. Fall to, man, and eat it with as good an appetite as you had last +Sunday. Pick the bones clean, or by—, no more Sunday dinners shall you +eat at my table!’ I gave one look at poor Mr. Hemming’s face, as he +tried to swallow the first morsel, and make believe as though he thought it +very good; but I could not look again, for shame, although my grandfather +laughed, and kept asking us all round if we knew what could have become of the +parson’s appetite.” +</p> + +<p> +“And did he finish it?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“O yes, my dear. What my grandfather said was to be done, was done +always. He was a terrible man in his anger! But to think of the difference +between Parson Hemming and Mr. Gray! or even of poor dear Mr. Mountford and Mr. +Gray. Mr. Mountford would never have withstood me as Mr. Gray did!” +</p> + +<p> +“And your ladyship really thinks that it would not be right to have a +Sunday-school?” I asked, feeling very timid as I put time question. +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly not. As I told Mr. Gray. I consider a knowledge of the Creed, +and of the Lord’s Prayer, as essential to salvation; and that any child +may have, whose parents bring it regularly to church. Then there are the Ten +Commandments, which teach simple duties in the plainest language. Of course, if +a lad is taught to read and write (as that unfortunate boy has been who was +here this morning) his duties become complicated, and his temptations much +greater, while, at the same time, he has no hereditary principles and +honourable training to serve as safeguards. I might take up my old simile of +the race-horse and cart-horse. I am distressed,” continued she, with a +break in her ideas, “about that boy. The whole thing reminds me so much +of a story of what happened to a friend of mine—Clément de Créquy. Did I +ever tell you about him?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, your ladyship,” I replied. +</p> + +<p> +“Poor Clément! More than twenty years ago, Lord Ludlow and I spent a +winter in Paris. He had many friends there; perhaps not very good or very wise +men, but he was so kind that he liked every one, and every one liked him. We +had an apartment, as they call it there, in the Rue de Lille; we had the +first-floor of a grand hôtel, with the basement for our servants. On the +floor above us the owner of the house lived, a Marquise de Créquy, a widow. +They tell me that the Créquy coat-of-arms is still emblazoned, after all these +terrible years, on a shield above the arched porte-cochère, just as it was +then, though the family is quite extinct. Madame de Créquy had only one son, +Clément, who was just the same age as my Urian—you may see his portrait +in the great hall—Urian’s, I mean.” I knew that Master Urian +had been drowned at sea; and often had I looked at the presentment of his bonny +hopeful face, in his sailor’s dress, with right hand outstretched to a +ship on the sea in the distance, as if he had just said, “Look at her! +all her sails are set, and I’m just off.” Poor Master Urian! he +went down in this very ship not a year after the picture was taken! But now I +will go back to my lady’s story. “I can see those two boys playing +now,” continued she, softly, shutting her eyes, as if the better to call +up the vision, “as they used to do five-and-twenty years ago in those +old-fashioned French gardens behind our hôtel. Many a time have I watched +them from my windows. It was, perhaps, a better play-place than an English +garden would have been, for there were but few flower-beds, and no lawn at all +to speak about; but, instead, terraces and balustrades and vases and flights of +stone steps more in the Italian style; and there were jets-d’eau, and +little fountains that could be set playing by turning water-cocks that were +hidden here and there. How Clément delighted in turning the water on to +surprise Urian, and how gracefully he did the honours, as it were, to my dear, +rough, sailor lad! Urian was as dark as a gipsy boy, and cared little for his +appearance, and resisted all my efforts at setting off his black eyes and +tangled curls; but Clément, without ever showing that he thought about himself +and his dress, was always dainty and elegant, even though his clothes were +sometimes but threadbare. He used to be dressed in a kind of hunter’s +green suit, open at the neck and half-way down the chest to beautiful old lace +frills; his long golden curls fell behind just like a girl’s, and his +hair in front was cut over his straight dark eyebrows in a line almost as +straight. Urian learnt more of a gentleman’s carefulness and propriety of +appearance from that lad in two months than he had done in years from all my +lectures. I recollect one day, when the two boys were in full romp—and, +my window being open, I could hear them perfectly—and Urian was daring +Clément to some scrambling or climbing, which Clément refused to undertake, but +in a hesitating way, as though he longed to do it if some reason had not stood +in the way; and at times, Urian, who was hasty and thoughtless, poor fellow, +told Clément that he was afraid. ‘Fear!’ said the French boy, +drawing himself up; ‘you do not know what you say. If you will be here at +six to-morrow morning, when it is only just light, I will take that +starling’s nest on the top of yonder chimney.’ ‘But why not +now, Clément?’ said Urian, putting his arm round Clément’s neck. +‘Why then, and not now, just when we are in the humour for it?’ +‘Because we De Créquys are poor, and my mother cannot afford me another +suit of clothes this year, and yonder stone carving is all jagged, and would +tear my coat and breeches. Now, to-morrow morning I could go up with nothing on +but an old shirt.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘But you would tear your legs.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘My race do not care for pain,’ said the boy, drawing +himself from Urian’s arm, and walking a few steps away, with a becoming +pride and reserve; for he was hurt at being spoken to as if he were afraid, and +annoyed at having to confess the true reason for declining the feat. But Urian +was not to be thus baffled. He went up to Clément, and put his arm once more +about his neck, and I could see the two lads as they walked down the terrace +away from the hotel windows: first Urian spoke eagerly, looking with imploring +fondness into Clément’s face, which sought the ground, till at last the +French boy spoke, and by-and-by his arm was round Urian too, and they paced +backwards and forwards in deep talk, but gravely, as became men, rather than +boys. +</p> + +<p> +“All at once, from the little chapel at the corner of the large garden +belonging to the Missions Etrangères, I heard the tinkle of the little bell, +announcing the elevation of the host. Down on his knees went Clément, hands +crossed, eyes bent down: while Urian stood looking on in respectful thought. +</p> + +<p> +“What a friendship that might have been! I never dream of Urian without +seeing Clément too—Urian speaks to me, or does something,—but +Clément only flits round Urian, and never seems to see any one else!” +</p> + +<p> +“But I must not forget to tell you, that the next morning, before he was +out of his room, a footman of Madame de Créquy’s brought Urian the +starling’s nest.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well! we came back to England, and the boys were to correspond; and +Madame de Créquy and I exchanged civilities; and Urian went to sea.” +</p> + +<p> +“After that, all seemed to drop away. I cannot tell you all. However, to +confine myself to the De Créquys. I had a letter from Clément; I knew he felt +his friend’s death deeply; but I should never have learnt it from the +letter he sent. It was formal, and seemed like chaff to my hungering heart. +Poor fellow! I dare say he had found it hard to write. What could he—or +any one—say to a mother who has lost her child? The world does not think +so, and, in general, one must conform to the customs of the world; but, judging +from my own experience, I should say that reverent silence at such times is the +tenderest balm. Madame de Créquy wrote too. But I knew she could not feel my +loss so much as Clément, and therefore her letter was not such a +disappointment. She and I went on being civil and polite in the way of +commissions, and occasionally introducing friends to each other, for a year or +two, and then we ceased to have any intercourse. Then the terrible Revolution +came. No one who did not live at those times can imagine the daily expectation +of news—the hourly terror of rumours affecting the fortunes and lives of +those whom most of us had known as pleasant hosts, receiving us with peaceful +welcome in their magnificent houses. Of course, there was sin enough and +suffering enough behind the scenes; but we English visitors to Paris had seen +little or nothing of that,—and I had sometimes thought, indeed, how even +death seemed loth to choose his victims out of that brilliant throng whom I had +known. Madame de Créquy’s one boy lived; while three out of my six were +gone since we had met! I do not think all lots are equal, even now that I know +the end of her hopes; but I do say that whatever our individual lot is, it is +our duty to accept it, without comparing it with that of others. +</p> + +<p> +“The times were thick with gloom and terror. ‘What next?’ was +the question we asked of every one who brought us news from Paris. Where were +these demons hidden when, so few years ago, we danced and feasted, and enjoyed +the brilliant salons and the charming friendships of Paris? +</p> + +<p> +“One evening, I was sitting alone in Saint James’s Square; my lord +off at the club with Mr. Fox and others: he had left me, thinking that I should +go to one of the many places to which I had been invited for that evening; but +I had no heart to go anywhere, for it was poor Urian’s birthday, and I +had not even rung for lights, though the day was fast closing in, but was +thinking over all his pretty ways, and on his warm affectionate nature, and how +often I had been too hasty in speaking to him, for all I loved him so dearly; +and how I seemed to have neglected and dropped his dear friend Clément, who +might even now be in need of help in that cruel, bloody Paris. I say I was +thinking reproachfully of all this, and particularly of Clément de Créquy in +connection with Urian, when Fenwick brought me a note, sealed with a +coat-of-arms I knew well, though I could not remember at the moment where I had +seen it. I puzzled over it, as one does sometimes, for a minute or more, before +I opened the letter. In a moment I saw it was from Clément de Créquy. ‘My +mother is here,’ he said: ‘she is very ill, and I am bewildered in +this strange country. May I entreat you to receive me for a few minutes?’ +The bearer of the note was the woman of the house where they lodged. I had her +brought up into the anteroom, and questioned her myself, while my carriage was +being brought round. They had arrived in London a fortnight or so before: she +had not known their quality, judging them (according to her kind) by their +dress and their luggage; poor enough, no doubt. The lady had never left her +bed-room since her arrival; the young man waited upon her, did everything for +her, never left her, in fact; only she (the messenger) had promised to stay +within call, as soon as she returned, while he went out somewhere. She could +hardly understand him, he spoke English so badly. He had never spoken it, I +dare say, since he had talked to my Urian.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER V.</h2> + +<p> +“In the hurry of the moment I scarce knew what I did. I bade the +housekeeper put up every delicacy she had, in order to tempt the invalid, whom +yet I hoped to bring back with me to our house. When the carriage was ready I +took the good woman with me to show us the exact way, which my coachman +professed not to know; for, indeed, they were staying at but a poor kind of +place at the back of Leicester Square, of which they had heard, as Clément told +me afterwards, from one of the fishermen who had carried them across from the +Dutch coast in their disguises as a Friesland peasant and his mother. They had +some jewels of value concealed round their persons; but their ready money was +all spent before I saw them, and Clément had been unwilling to leave his +mother, even for the time necessary to ascertain the best mode of disposing of +the diamonds. For, overcome with distress of mind and bodily fatigue, she had +reached London only to take to her bed in a sort of low, nervous fever, in +which her chief and only idea seemed to be that Clément was about to be taken +from her to some prison or other; and if he were out of her sight, though but +for a minute, she cried like a child, and could not be pacified or comforted. +The landlady was a kind, good woman, and though she but half understood the +case, she was truly sorry for them, as foreigners, and the mother sick in a +strange land. +</p> + +<p> +“I sent her forwards to request permission for my entrance. In a moment I +saw Clément—a tall, elegant young man, in a curious dress of coarse +cloth, standing at the open door of a room, and evidently—even before he +accosted me—striving to soothe the terrors of his mother inside. I went +towards him, and would have taken his hand, but he bent down and kissed mine. +</p> + +<p> +“‘May I come in, madame?’ I asked, looking at the poor sick +lady, lying in the dark, dingy bed, her head propped up on coarse and dirty +pillows, and gazing with affrighted eyes at all that was going on. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Clément! Clément! come to me!’ she cried; and when he went +to the bedside she turned on one side, and took his hand in both of hers, and +began stroking it, and looking up in his face. I could scarce keep back my +tears. +</p> + +<p> +“He stood there quite still, except that from time to time he spoke to +her in a low tone. At last I advanced into the room, so that I could talk to +him, without renewing her alarm. I asked for the doctor’s address; for I +had heard that they had called in some one, at their landlady’s +recommendation: but I could hardly understand Clément’s broken English, +and mispronunciation of our proper names, and was obliged to apply to the woman +herself. I could not say much to Clément, for his attention was perpetually +needed by his mother, who never seemed to perceive that I was there. But I told +him not to fear, however long I might be away, for that I would return before +night; and, bidding the woman take charge of all the heterogeneous things the +housekeeper had put up, and leaving one of my men in the house, who could +understand a few words of French, with directions that he was to hold himself +at Madame de Créquy’s orders until I sent or gave him fresh commands, I +drove off to the doctor’s. What I wanted was his permission to remove +Madame de Créquy to my own house, and to learn how it best could be done; for I +saw that every movement in the room, every sound except Clément’s voice, +brought on a fresh access of trembling and nervous agitation. +</p> + +<p> +“The doctor was, I should think, a clever man; but he had that kind of +abrupt manner which people get who have much to do with the lower orders. +</p> + +<p> +“I told him the story of his patient, the interest I had in her, and the +wish I entertained of removing her to my own house. +</p> + +<p> +“‘It can’t be done,’ said he. ‘Any change will +kill her.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘But it must be done,’ I replied. ‘And it shall not +kill her.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Then I have nothing more to say,’ said he, turning away +from the carriage door, and making as though he would go back into the house. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Stop a moment. You must help me; and, if you do, you shall have +reason to be glad, for I will give you fifty pounds down with pleasure. If you +won’t do it, another shall.’ +</p> + +<p> +“He looked at me, then (furtively) at the carriage, hesitated, and then +said: ‘You do not mind expense, apparently. I suppose you are a rich lady +of quality. Such folks will not stick at such trifles as the life or death of a +sick woman to get their own way. I suppose I must e’en help you, for if I +don’t, another will.’ +</p> + +<p> +“I did not mind what he said, so that he would assist me. I was pretty +sure that she was in a state to require opiates; and I had not forgotten +Christopher Sly, you may be sure, so I told him what I had in my head. That in +the dead of night—the quiet time in the streets,—she should be +carried in a hospital litter, softly and warmly covered over, from the +Leicester Square lodging-house to rooms that I would have in perfect readiness +for her. As I planned, so it was done. I let Clément know, by a note, of my +design. I had all prepared at home, and we walked about my house as though shod +with velvet, while the porter watched at the open door. At last, through the +darkness, I saw the lanterns carried by my men, who were leading the little +procession. The litter looked like a hearse; on one side walked the doctor, on +the other Clément; they came softly and swiftly along. I could not try any +farther experiment; we dared not change her clothes; she was laid in the bed in +the landlady’s coarse night-gear, and covered over warmly, and left in +the shaded, scented room, with a nurse and the doctor watching by her, while I +led Clément to the dressing-room adjoining, in which I had had a bed placed for +him. Farther than that he would not go; and there I had refreshments brought. +Meanwhile, he had shown his gratitude by every possible action (for we none of +us dared to speak): he had kneeled at my feet, and kissed my hand, and left it +wet with his tears. He had thrown up his arms to Heaven, and prayed earnestly, +as I could see by the movement of his lips. I allowed him to relieve himself by +these dumb expressions, if I may so call them,—and then I left him, and +went to my own rooms to sit up for my lord, and tell him what I had done. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course, it was all right; and neither my lord nor I could sleep for +wondering how Madame de Créquy would bear her awakening. I had engaged the +doctor, to whose face and voice she was accustomed, to remain with her all +night: the nurse was experienced, and Clément was within call. But it was with +the greatest relief that I heard from my own woman, when she brought me my +chocolate, that Madame de Créquy (Monsieur had said) had awakened more tranquil +than she had been for many days. To be sure, the whole aspect of the +bed-chamber must have been more familiar to her than the miserable place where +I had found her, and she must have intuitively felt herself among friends. +</p> + +<p> +“My lord was scandalized at Clément’s dress, which, after the first +moment of seeing him I had forgotten, in thinking of other things, and for +which I had not prepared Lord Ludlow. He sent for his own tailor, and bade him +bring patterns of stuffs, and engage his men to work night and day till Clément +could appear as became his rank. In short, in a few days so much of the traces +of their flight were removed, that we had almost forgotten the terrible causes +of it, and rather felt as if they had come on a visit to us than that they had +been compelled to fly their country. Their diamonds, too, were sold well by my +lord’s agents, though the London shops were stocked with jewellery, and +such portable valuables, some of rare and curious fashion, which were sold for +half their real value by emigrants who could not afford to wait. Madame de +Créquy was recovering her health, although her strength was sadly gone, and she +would never be equal to such another flight, as the perilous one which she had +gone through, and to which she could not bear the slightest reference. For some +time things continued in this state—the De Créquys still our honoured +visitors,—many houses besides our own, even among our own friends, open +to receive the poor flying nobility of France, driven from their country by the +brutal republicans, and every freshly-arrived emigrant bringing new tales of +horror, as if these revolutionists were drunk with blood, and mad to devise new +atrocities. One day Clément—I should tell you he had been presented to +our good King George and the sweet Queen, and they had accosted him most +graciously, and his beauty and elegance, and some of the circumstances +attendant on his flight, made him be received in the world quite like a hero of +romance; he might have been on intimate terms in many a distinguished house, +had he cared to visit much; but he accompanied my lord and me with an air of +indifference and languor, which I sometimes fancied made him be all the more +sought after: Monkshaven (that was the title my eldest son bore) tried in vain +to interest him in all young men’s sports. But no! it was the same +through all. His mother took far more interest in the on-dits of the London +world, into which she was far too great an invalid to venture, than he did in +the absolute events themselves, in which he might have been an actor. One day, +as I was saying, an old Frenchman of a humble class presented himself to our +servants, several of them, understood French; and through Medlicott, I learnt +that he was in some way connected with the De Créquys; not with their +Paris-life; but I fancy he had been intendant of their estates in the country; +estates which were more useful as hunting-grounds than as adding to their +income. However, there was the old man and with him, wrapped round his person, +he had brought the long parchment rolls, and deeds relating to their property. +These he would deliver up to none but Monsieur de Créquy, the rightful owner; +and Clément was out with Monkshaven, so the old man waited; and when Clément +came in, I told him of the steward’s arrival, and how he had been cared +for by my people. Clément went directly to see him. He was a long time away, +and I was waiting for him to drive out with me, for some purpose or another, I +scarce know what, but I remember I was tired of waiting, and was just in the +act of ringing the bell to desire that he might be reminded of his engagement +with me, when he came in, his face as white as the powder in his hair, his +beautiful eyes dilated with horror. I saw that he had heard something that +touched him even more closely than the usual tales which every fresh emigrant +brought. +</p> + +<p> +“‘What is it, Clément?’ I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“He clasped his hands, and looked as though he tried to speak, but could +not bring out the words. +</p> + +<p> +“‘They have guillotined my uncle!’ said he at last. Now, I +knew that there was a Count de Créquy; but I had always understood that the +elder branch held very little communication with him; in fact, that he was a +vaurien of some kind, and rather a disgrace than otherwise to the family. So, +perhaps, I was hard-hearted but I was a little surprised at this excess of +emotion, till I saw that peculiar look in his eyes that many people have when +there is more terror in their hearts than they dare put into words. He wanted +me to understand something without his saying it; but how could I? I had never +heard of a Mademoiselle de Créquy. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Virginie!’ at last he uttered. In an instant I understood +it all, and remembered that, if Urian had lived, he too might have been in +love. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Your uncle’s daughter?’ I inquired. +</p> + +<p> +“‘My cousin,’ he replied. +</p> + +<p> +“I did not say, ‘your betrothed,’ but I had no doubt of it. I +was mistaken, however. +</p> + +<p> +“‘O madame!’ he continued, ‘her mother died long +ago—her father now—and she is in daily fear,—alone, +deserted—’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Is she in the Abbaye?’ asked I. +</p> + +<p> +“‘No! she is in hiding with the widow of her father’s old +concierge. Any day they may search the house for aristocrats. They are seeking +them everywhere. Then, not her life alone, but that of the old woman, her +hostess, is sacrificed. The old woman knows this, and trembles with fear. Even +if she is brave enough to be faithful, her fears would betray her, should the +house be searched. Yet, there is no one to help Virginie to escape. She is +alone in Paris.’ +</p> + +<p> +“I saw what was in his mind. He was fretting and chafing to go to his +cousin’s assistance; but the thought of his mother restrained him. I +would not have kept back Urian from such on errand at such a time. How should I +restrain him? And yet, perhaps, I did wrong in not urging the chances of danger +more. Still, if it was danger to him, was it not the same or even greater +danger to her?—for the French spared neither age nor sex in those wicked +days of terror. So I rather fell in with his wish, and encouraged him to think +how best and most prudently it might be fulfilled; never doubting, as I have +said, that he and his cousin were troth-plighted. +</p> + +<p> +“But when I went to Madame de Créquy—after he had imparted his, or +rather our plan to her—I found out my mistake. She, who was in general +too feeble to walk across the room save slowly, and with a stick, was going +from end to end with quick, tottering steps; and, if now and then she sank upon +a chair, it seemed as if she could not rest, for she was up again in a moment, +pacing along, wringing her hands, and speaking rapidly to herself. When she saw +me, she stopped: ‘Madame,’ she said, ‘you have lost your own +boy. You might have left me mine.’ +</p> + +<p> +“I was so astonished—I hardly knew what to say. I had spoken to +Clément as if his mother’s consent were secure (as I had felt my own +would have been if Urian had been alive to ask it). Of coarse, both he and I +knew that his mother’s consent must be asked and obtained, before he +could leave her to go on such an undertaking; but, somehow, my blood always +rose at the sight or sound of danger; perhaps, because my life had been so +peaceful. Poor Madame de Créquy! it was otherwise with her; she despaired while +I hoped, and Clément trusted. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Dear Madame de Créquy,’ said I, ‘he will return +safely to us; every precaution shall be taken, that either he or you, or my +lord, or Monkshaven can think of; but he cannot leave a girl—his nearest +relation save you—his betrothed, is she not?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘His betrothed!’ cried she, now at the utmost pitch of her +excitement. ‘Virginie betrothed to Clément?—no! thank heaven, not +so bad as that! Yet it might have been. But mademoiselle scorned my son! She +would have nothing to do with him. Now is the time for him to have nothing to +do with her!” +</p> + +<p> +“Clément had entered at the door behind his mother as she thus spoke. His +face was set and pale, till it looked as gray and immovable as if it had been +carved in stone. He came forward and stood before his mother. She stopped her +walk, threw back her haughty head, and the two looked each other steadily in +the face. After a minute or two in this attitude, her proud and resolute gaze +never flinching or wavering, he went down upon one knee, and, taking her +hand—her hard, stony hand, which never closed on his, but remained +straight and stiff: +</p> + +<p> +“‘Mother,’ he pleaded, ‘withdraw your prohibition. Let +me go!’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘What were her words?’ Madame de Créquy replied, slowly, as +if forcing her memory to the extreme of accuracy. ‘My cousin,’ she +said, ‘when I marry, I marry a man, not a petit-maître. I marry a +man who, whatever his rank may be will add dignity to the human race by his +virtues, and not be content to live in an effeminate court on the traditions of +past grandeur.’ She borrowed her words from the infamous Jean-Jacques +Rousseau, the friend of her scarce less infamous father—nay! I will say +it,—if not her words, she borrowed her principles. And my son to request +her to marry him!’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘It was my father’s written wish,’ said Clément. +</p> + +<p> +“‘But did you not love her? You plead your father’s +words,—words written twelve years before,—and as if that were your +reason for being indifferent to my dislike to the alliance. But you requested +her to marry you,—and she refused you with insolent contempt; and now you +are ready to leave me,—leave me desolate in a foreign land—’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Desolate! my mother! and the Countess Ludlow stands there!’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Pardon, madame! But all the earth, though it were full of kind +hearts, is but a desolation and a desert place to a mother when her only child +is absent. And you, Clément, would leave me for this Virginie,—this +degenerate De Créquy, tainted with the atheism of the Encyclopédistes! She is +only reaping some of the fruit of the harvest whereof her friends have sown the +seed. Let her alone! Doubtless she has friends—it may be +lovers—among these demons, who, under the cry of liberty, commit every +licence. Let her alone, Clément! She refused you with scorn: be too proud to +notice her now.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Mother, I cannot think of myself; only of her.’ +</p> + +<p> +“’Think of me, then! I, your mother, forbid you to go.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Clément bowed low, and went out of the room instantly, as one blinded. +She saw his groping movement, and, for an instant, I think her heart was +touched. But she turned to me, and tried to exculpate her past violence by +dilating upon her wrongs, and they certainly were many. The Count, her +husband’s younger brother, had invariably tried to make mischief between +husband and wife. He had been the cleverer man of the two, and had possessed +extraordinary influence over her husband. She suspected him of having +instigated that clause in her husband’s will, by which the Marquis +expressed his wish for the marriage of the cousins. The Count had had some +interest in the management of the De Créquy property during her son’s +minority. Indeed, I remembered then, that it was through Count de Créquy that +Lord Ludlow had first heard of the apartment which we afterwards took in the +Hôtel de Créquy; and then the recollection of a past feeling came +distinctly out of the mist, as it were; and I called to mind how, when we first +took up our abode in the Hôtel de Créquy, both Lord Ludlow and I imagined +that the arrangement was displeasing to our hostess; and how it had taken us a +considerable time before we had been able to establish relations of friendship +with her. Years after our visit, she began to suspect that Clément (whom she +could not forbid to visit at his uncle’s house, considering the terms on +which his father had been with his brother; though she herself never set foot +over the Count de Créquy’s threshold) was attaching himself to +mademoiselle, his cousin; and she made cautious inquiries as to the appearance, +character, and disposition of the young lady. Mademoiselle was not handsome, +they said; but of a fine figure, and generally considered as having a very +noble and attractive presence. In character she was daring and wilful (said one +set); original and independent (said another). She was much indulged by her +father, who had given her something of a man’s education, and selected +for her intimate friend a young lady below her in rank, one of the +Bureaucracie, a Mademoiselle Necker, daughter of the Minister of Finance. +Mademoiselle de Créquy was thus introduced into all the free-thinking salons of +Paris; among people who were always full of plans for subverting society. +‘And did Clément affect such people?’ Madame de Créquy had asked +with some anxiety. No! Monsieur de Créquy had neither eyes nor ears, nor +thought for anything but his cousin, while she was by. And she? She hardly took +notice of his devotion, so evident to every one else. The proud creature! But +perhaps that was her haughty way of concealing what she felt. And so Madame de +Créquy listened, and questioned, and learnt nothing decided, until one day she +surprised Clément with the note in his hand, of which she remembered the +stinging words so well, in which Virginie had said, in reply to a proposal +Clément had sent her through her father, that ‘When she married she +married a man, not a petit-maître.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Clément was justly indignant at the insulting nature of the answer +Virginie had sent to a proposal, respectful in its tone, and which was, after +all, but the cool, hardened lava over a burning heart. He acquiesced in his +mother’s desire, that he should not again present himself in his +uncle’s salons; but he did not forget Virginie, though he never mentioned +her name. +</p> + +<p> +“Madame de Créquy and her son were among the earliest proscrits, as they +were of the strongest possible royalists, and aristocrats, as it was the custom +of the horrid Sansculottes to term those who adhered to the habits of +expression and action in which it was their pride to have been educated. They +had left Paris some weeks before they had arrived in England, and +Clément’s belief at the time of quitting the Hôtel de Créquy had +certainly been, that his uncle was not merely safe, but rather a popular man +with the party in power. And, as all communication having relation to private +individuals of a reliable kind was intercepted, Monsieur de Créquy had felt but +little anxiety for his uncle and cousin, in comparison with what he did for +many other friends of very different opinions in politics, until the day when +he was stunned by the fatal information that even his progressive uncle was +guillotined, and learnt that his cousin was imprisoned by the licence of the +mob, whose rights (as she called them) she was always advocating. +</p> + +<p> +“When I had heard all this story, I confess I lost in sympathy for +Clément what I gained for his mother. Virginie’s life did not seem to me +worth the risk that Clément’s would run. But when I saw him—sad, +depressed, nay, hopeless—going about like one oppressed by a heavy dream +which he cannot shake off; caring neither to eat, drink, nor sleep, yet bearing +all with silent dignity, and even trying to force a poor, faint smile when he +caught my anxious eyes; I turned round again, and wondered how Madame de Créquy +could resist this mute pleading of her son’s altered appearance. As for +my Lord Ludlow and Monkshaven, as soon as they understood the case, they were +indignant that any mother should attempt to keep a son out of honourable +danger; and it was honourable, and a clear duty (according to them) to try to +save the life of a helpless orphan girl, his next of kin. None but a Frenchman, +said my lord, would hold himself bound by an old woman’s whimsies and +fears, even though she were his mother. As it was, he was chafing himself to +death under the restraint. If he went, to be sure, the wretches might make an +end of him, as they had done of many a fine fellow: but my lord would take +heavy odds, that, instead of being guillotined, he would save the girl, and +bring her safe to England, just desperately in love with her preserver, and +then we would have a jolly wedding down at Monkshaven. My lord repeated his +opinion so often that it became a certain prophecy in his mind of what was to +take place; and, one day seeing Clément look even paler and thinner than he had +ever done before, he sent a message to Madame de Créquy, requesting permission +to speak to her in private. +</p> + +<p> +“‘For, by George!’ said he, ‘she shall hear my opinion, +and not let that lad of hers kill himself by fretting. He’s too good for +that, if he had been an English lad, he would have been off to his sweetheart +long before this, without saying with your leave or by your leave; but being a +Frenchman, he is all for Æneas and filial piety,—filial +fiddle-sticks!’ (My lord had run away to sea, when a boy, against his +father’s consent, I am sorry to say; and, as all had ended well, and he +had come back to find both his parents alive, I do not think he was ever as +much aware of his fault as he might have been under other circumstances.) +‘No, my lady,’ he went on, ‘don’t come with me. A woman +can manage a man best when he has a fit of obstinacy, and a man can persuade a +woman out of her tantrums, when all her own sex, the whole army of them, would +fail. Allow me to go alone to my tête-à-tête with +madame.” +</p> + +<p> +“What he said, what passed, he never could repeat; but he came back +graver than he went. However, the point was gained; Madame de Créquy withdrew +her prohibition, and had given him leave to tell Clément as much. +</p> + +<p> +“‘But she is an old Cassandra,’ said he. ‘Don’t +let the lad be much with her; her talk would destroy the courage of the bravest +man; she is so given over to superstition.’ Something that she had said +had touched a chord in my lord’s nature which he inherited from his +Scotch ancestors. Long afterwards, I heard what this was. Medlicott told me. +</p> + +<p> +“However, my lord shook off all fancies that told against the fulfilment +of Clément’s wishes. All that afternoon we three sat together, planning; +and Monkshaven passed in and out, executing our commissions, and preparing +everything. Towards nightfall all was ready for Clément’s start on his +journey towards the coast. +</p> + +<p> +“Madame had declined seeing any of us since my lord’s stormy +interview with her. She sent word that she was fatigued, and desired repose. +But, of course, before Clément set off, he was bound to wish her farewell, and +to ask for her blessing. In order to avoid an agitating conversation between +mother and son, my lord and I resolved to be present at the interview. Clément +was already in his travelling-dress, that of a Norman fisherman, which +Monkshaven had, with infinite trouble, discovered in the possession of one of +the emigrés who thronged London, and who had made his escape from the shores of +France in this disguise. Clément’s plan was, to go down to the coast of +Sussex, and get some of the fishing or smuggling boats to take him across to +the French coast near Dieppe. There again he would have to change his dress. +Oh, it was so well planned! His mother was startled by his disguise (of which +we had not thought to forewarn her) as he entered her apartment. And either +that, or the being suddenly roused from the heavy slumber into which she was +apt to fall when she was left alone, gave her manner an air of wildness that +was almost like insanity. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Go, go!’ she said to him, almost pushing him away as he +knelt to kiss her hand. ‘Virginie is beckoning to you, but you +don’t see what kind of a bed it is—’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Clément, make haste!’ said my lord, in a hurried manner, as +if to interrupt madame. ‘The time is later than I thought, and you must +not miss the morning’s tide. Bid your mother good-bye at once, and let us +be off.’ For my lord and Monkshaven were to ride with him to an inn near +the shore, from whence he was to walk to his destination. My lord almost took +him by the arm to pull him away; and they were gone, and I was left alone with +Madame de Créquy. When she heard the horses’ feet, she seemed to find out +the truth, as if for the first time. She set her teeth together. ‘He has +left me for her!’ she almost screamed. ‘Left me for her!’ she +kept muttering; and then, as the wild look came back into her eyes, she said, +almost with exultation, ‘But I did not give him my +blessing!’” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER VI.</h2> + +<p> +“All night Madame de Créquy raved in delirium. If I could I would have +sent for Clément back again. I did send off one man, but I suppose my +directions were confused, or they were wrong, for he came back after my +lord’s return, on the following afternoon. By this time Madame de Créquy +was quieter: she was, indeed, asleep from exhaustion when Lord Ludlow and +Monkshaven came in. They were in high spirits, and their hopefulness brought me +round to a less dispirited state. All had gone well: they had accompanied +Clément on foot along the shore, until they had met with a lugger, which my +lord had hailed in good nautical language. The captain had responded to these +freemason terms by sending a boat to pick up his passenger, and by an +invitation to breakfast sent through a speaking-trumpet. Monkshaven did not +approve of either the meal or the company, and had returned to the inn, but my +lord had gone with Clément and breakfasted on board, upon grog, biscuit, +fresh-caught fish—‘the best breakfast he ever ate,’ he said, +but that was probably owing to the appetite his night’s ride had given +him. However, his good fellowship had evidently won the captain’s heart, +and Clément had set sail under the best auspices. It was agreed that I should +tell all this to Madame de Créquy, if she inquired; otherwise, it would be +wiser not to renew her agitation by alluding to her son’s journey. +</p> + +<p> +“I sat with her constantly for many days; but she never spoke of Clément. +She forced herself to talk of the little occurrences of Parisian society in +former days: she tried to be conversational and agreeable, and to betray no +anxiety or even interest in the object of Clément’s journey; and, as far +as unremitting efforts could go, she succeeded. But the tones of her voice were +sharp and yet piteous, as if she were in constant pain; and the glance of her +eye hurried and fearful, as if she dared not let it rest on any object. +</p> + +<p> +“In a week we heard of Clément’s safe arrival on the French coast. +He sent a letter to this effect by the captain of the smuggler, when the latter +returned. We hoped to hear again; but week after week elapsed, and there was no +news of Clément. I had told Lord Ludlow, in Madame de Créquy’s presence, +as he and I had arranged, of the note I had received from her son, informing us +of his landing in France. She heard, but she took no notice, and evidently +began to wonder that we did not mention any further intelligence of him in the +same manner before her; and daily I began to fear that her pride would give +way, and that she would supplicate for news before I had any to give her. +</p> + +<p> +“One morning, on my awakening, my maid told me that Madame de Créquy had +passed a wretched night, and had bidden Medlicott (whom, as understanding +French, and speaking it pretty well, though with that horrid German accent, I +had put about her) request that I would go to madame’s room as soon as I +was dressed. +</p> + +<p> +“I knew what was coming, and I trembled all the time they were doing my +hair, and otherwise arranging me. I was not encouraged by my lord’s +speeches. He had heard the message, and kept declaring that he would rather be +shot than have to tell her that there was no news of her son; and yet he said, +every now and then, when I was at the lowest pitch of uneasiness, that he never +expected to hear again: that some day soon we should see him walking in and +introducing Mademoiselle de Créquy to us. +</p> + +<p> +“However at last I was ready, and go I must. +</p> + +<p> +“Her eyes were fixed on the door by which I entered. I went up to the +bedside. She was not rouged,—she had left it off now for several +days,—she no longer attempted to keep up the vain show of not feeling, +and loving, and fearing. +</p> + +<p> +“For a moment or two she did not speak, and I was glad of the respite. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Clément?’ she said at length, covering her mouth with a +handkerchief the minute she had spoken, that I might not see it quiver. +</p> + +<p> +“‘There has been no news since the first letter, saying how well +the voyage was performed, and how safely he had landed—near Dieppe, you +know,’ I replied as cheerfully as possible. ‘My lord does not +expect that we shall have another letter; he thinks that we shall see him +soon.’ +</p> + +<p> +“There was no answer. As I looked, uncertain whether to do or say more, +she slowly turned herself in bed, and lay with her face to the wall; and, as if +that did not shut out the light of day and the busy, happy world enough, she +put out her trembling hands, and covered her face with her handkerchief. There +was no violence: hardly any sound. +</p> + +<p> +“I told her what my lord had said about Clément’s coming in some +day, and taking us all by surprise. I did not believe it myself, but it was +just possible,—and I had nothing else to say. Pity, to one who was +striving so hard to conceal her feelings, would have been impertinent. She let +me talk; but she did not reply. She knew that my words were vain and idle, and +had no root in my belief; as well as I did myself. +</p> + +<p> +“I was very thankful when Medlicott came in with Madame’s +breakfast, and gave me an excuse for leaving. +</p> + +<p> +“But I think that conversation made me feel more anxious and impatient +than ever. I felt almost pledged to Madame de Créquy for the fulfilment of the +vision I had held out. She had taken entirely to her bed by this time: not from +illness, but because she had no hope within her to stir her up to the effort of +dressing. In the same way she hardly cared for food. She had no +appetite,—why eat to prolong a life of despair? But she let Medlicott +feed her, sooner than take the trouble of resisting. +</p> + +<p> +“And so it went on,—for weeks, months—I could hardly count +the time, it seemed so long. Medlicott told me she noticed a preternatural +sensitiveness of ear in Madame de Créquy, induced by the habit of listening +silently for the slightest unusual sound in the house. Medlicott was always a +minute watcher of any one whom she cared about; and, one day, she made me +notice by a sign madame’s acuteness of hearing, although the quick +expectation was but evinced for a moment in the turn of the eye, the hushed +breath—and then, when the unusual footstep turned into my lord’s +apartments, the soft quivering sigh, and the closed eyelids. +</p> + +<p> +“At length the intendant of the De Créquy estates—the old man, you +will remember, whose information respecting Virginie de Créquy first gave +Clément the desire to return to Paris,—came to St. James’s Square, +and begged to speak to me. I made haste to go down to him in the +housekeeper’s room, sooner than that he should be ushered into mine, for +fear of madame hearing any sound. +</p> + +<p> +“The old man stood—I see him now—with his hat held before him +in both his hands; he slowly bowed till his face touched it when I came in. +Such long excess of courtesy augured ill. He waited for me to speak. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Have you any intelligence?’ I inquired. He had been often +to the house before, to ask if we had received any news; and once or twice I +had seen him, but this was the first time he had begged to see me. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Yes, madame,’ he replied, still standing with his head bent +down, like a child in disgrace. +</p> + +<p> +“‘And it is bad!’ I exclaimed. +</p> + +<p> +“‘It is bad.’ For a moment I was angry at the cold tone in +which my words were echoed; but directly afterwards I saw the large, slow, +heavy tears of age falling down the old man’s cheeks, and on to the +sleeves of his poor, threadbare coat. +</p> + +<p> +“I asked him how he had heard it: it seemed as though I could not all at +once bear to hear what it was. He told me that the night before, in crossing +Long Acre, he had stumbled upon an old acquaintance of his; one who, like +himself had been a dependent upon the De Créquy family, but had managed their +Paris affairs, while Fléchier had taken charge of their estates in the country. +Both were now emigrants, and living on the proceeds of such small available +talents as they possessed. Fléchier, as I knew, earned a very fair livelihood +by going about to dress salads for dinner parties. His compatriot, Le Fèbvre, +had begun to give a few lessons as a dancing-master. One of them took the other +home to his lodgings; and there, when their most immediate personal adventures +had been hastily talked over, came the inquiry from Fléchier as to Monsieur de +Créquy +</p> + +<p> +“‘Clément was dead—guillotined. Virginie was +dead—guillotined.’ +</p> + +<p> +“When Fléchier had told me thus much, he could not speak for sobbing; and +I, myself, could hardly tell how to restrain my tears sufficiently, until I +could go to my own room and be at liberty to give way. He asked my leave to +bring in his friend Le Fèbvre, who was walking in the square, awaiting a +possible summons to tell his story. I heard afterwards a good many details, +which filled up the account, and made me feel—which brings me back to the +point I started from—how unfit the lower orders are for being trusted +indiscriminately with the dangerous powers of education. I have made a long +preamble, but now I am coming to the moral of my story.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady was trying to shake off the emotion which she evidently felt in +recurring to this sad history of Monsieur de Créquy’s death. She came +behind me, and arranged my pillows, and then, seeing I had been +crying—for, indeed, I was weak-spirited at the time, and a little served +to unloose my tears—she stooped down, and kissed my forehead, and said +“Poor child!” almost as if she thanked me for feeling that old +grief of hers. +</p> + +<p> +“Being once in France, it was no difficult thing for Clément to get into +Paris. The difficulty in those days was to leave, not to enter. He came in +dressed as a Norman peasant, in charge of a load of fruit and vegetables, with +which one of the Seine barges was freighted. He worked hard with his companions +in landing and arranging their produce on the quays; and then, when they +dispersed to get their breakfasts at some of the estaminets near the old Marché +aux Fleurs, he sauntered up a street which conducted him, by many an odd turn, +through the Quartier Latin to a horrid back alley, leading out of the Rue +l’Ecole de Médécine; some atrocious place, as I have heard, not far from +the shadow of that terrible Abbaye, where so many of the best blood of France +awaited their deaths. But here some old man lived, on whose fidelity Clément +thought that he might rely. I am not sure if he had not been gardener in those +very gardens behind the Hôtel Créquy where Clément and Urian used to play +together years before. But whatever the old man’s dwelling might be, +Clément was only too glad to reach it, you may be sure, he had been kept in +Normandy, in all sorts of disguises, for many days after landing in Dieppe, +through the difficulty of entering Paris unsuspected by the many ruffians who +were always on the look-out for aristocrats. +</p> + +<p> +“The old gardener was, I believe, both faithful and tried, and sheltered +Clément in his garret as well as might be. Before he could stir out, it was +necessary to procure a fresh disguise, and one more in character with an +inhabitant of Paris than that of a Norman carter was procured; and after +waiting indoors for one or two days, to see if any suspicion was excited, +Clément set off to discover Virginie. +</p> + +<p> +“He found her at the old concièrge’s dwelling. Madame Babette was +the name of this woman, who must have been a less faithful—or rather, +perhaps, I should say, a more interested—friend to her guest than the old +gardener Jaques was to Clément. +</p> + +<p> +“I have seen a miniature of Virginie, which a French lady of quality +happened to have in her possession at the time of her flight from Paris, and +which she brought with her to England unwittingly; for it belonged to the Count +de Créquy, with whom she was slightly acquainted. I should fancy from it, that +Virginie was taller and of a more powerful figure for a woman than her cousin +Clément was for a man. Her dark-brown hair was arranged in short +curls—the way of dressing the hair announced the politics of the +individual, in those days, just as patches did in my grandmother’s time; +and Virginie’s hair was not to my taste, or according to my principles: +it was too classical. Her large, black eyes looked out at you steadily. One +cannot judge of the shape of a nose from a full-face miniature, but the +nostrils were clearly cut and largely opened. I do not fancy her nose could +have been pretty; but her mouth had a character all its own, and which would, I +think, have redeemed a plainer face. It was wide, and deep set into the cheeks +at the corners; the upper lip was very much arched, and hardly closed over the +teeth; so that the whole face looked (from the serious, intent look in the +eyes, and the sweet intelligence of the mouth) as if she were listening eagerly +to something to which her answer was quite ready, and would come out of those +red, opening lips as soon as ever you had done speaking, and you longed to know +what she would say. +</p> + +<p> +“Well: this Virginie de Créquy was living with Madame Babette in the +concièrgerie of an old French inn, somewhere to the north of Paris, so, far +enough from Clément’s refuge. The inn had been frequented by farmers from +Brittany and such kind of people, in the days when that sort of intercourse +went on between Paris and the provinces which had nearly stopped now. Few +Bretons came near it now, and the inn had fallen into the hands of Madame +Babette’s brother, as payment for a bad wine debt of the last proprietor. +He put his sister and her child in, to keep it open, as it were, and sent all +the people he could to occupy the half-furnished rooms of the house. They paid +Babette for their lodging every morning as they went out to breakfast, and +returned or not as they chose, at night. Every three days, the wine-merchant or +his son came to Madame Babette, and she accounted to them for the money she had +received. She and her child occupied the porter’s office (in which the +lad slept at nights) and a little miserable bed-room which opened out of it, +and received all the light and air that was admitted through the door of +communication, which was half glass. Madame Babette must have had a kind of +attachment for the De Créquys—her De Créquys, you +understand—Virginie’s father, the Count; for, at some risk to +herself, she had warned both him and his daughter of the danger impending over +them. But he, infatuated, would not believe that his dear Human Race could ever +do him harm; and, as long as he did not fear, Virginie was not afraid. It was +by some ruse, the nature of which I never heard, that Madame Babette induced +Virginie to come to her abode at the very hour in which the Count had been +recognized in the streets, and hurried off to the Lanterne. It was after +Babette had got her there, safe shut up in the little back den, that she told +her what had befallen her father. From that day, Virginie had never stirred out +of the gates, or crossed the threshold of the porter’s lodge. I do not +say that Madame Babette was tired of her continual presence, or regretted the +impulse which made her rush to the De Créquy’s well-known +house—after being compelled to form one of the mad crowds that saw the +Count de Créquy seized and hung—and hurry his daughter out, through +alleys and backways, until at length she had the orphan safe in her own dark +sleeping-room, and could tell her tale of horror: but Madame Babette was poorly +paid for her porter’s work by her avaricious brother; and it was hard +enough to find food for herself and her growing boy; and, though the poor girl +ate little enough, I dare say, yet there seemed no end to the burthen that +Madame Babette had imposed upon herself: the De Créquys were plundered, ruined, +had become an extinct race, all but a lonely friendless girl, in broken health +and spirits; and, though she lent no positive encouragement to his suit, yet, +at the time, when Clément reappeared in Paris, Madame Babette was beginning to +think that Virginie might do worse than encourage the attentions of Monsieur +Morin Fils, her nephew, and the wine merchant’s son. Of course, he and +his father had the entrée into the concièrgerie of the hotel that belonged to +them, in right of being both proprietors and relations. The son, Morin, had +seen Virginie in this manner. He was fully aware that she was far above him in +rank, and guessed from her whole aspect that she had lost her natural +protectors by the terrible guillotine; but he did not know her exact name or +station, nor could he persuade his aunt to tell him. However, he fell head over +ears in love with her, whether she were princess or peasant; and though at +first there was something about her which made his passionate love conceal +itself with shy, awkward reserve, and then made it only appear in the guise of +deep, respectful devotion; yet, by-and-by,—by the same process of +reasoning, I suppose, that his aunt had gone through even before him—Jean +Morin began to let Hope oust Despair from his heart. Sometimes he +thought—perhaps years hence—that solitary, friendless lady, pent up +in squalor, might turn to him as to a friend and comforter—and +then—and then—. Meanwhile Jean Morin was most attentive to his +aunt, whom he had rather slighted before. He would linger over the accounts; +would bring her little presents; and, above all, he made a pet and favourite of +Pierre, the little cousin, who could tell him about all the ways of going on of +Mam’selle Cannes, as Virginie was called. Pierre was thoroughly aware of +the drift and cause of his cousin’s inquiries; and was his ardent +partisan, as I have heard, even before Jean Morin had exactly acknowledged his +wishes to himself. +</p> + +<p> +“It must have required some patience and much diplomacy, before Clément +de Créquy found out the exact place where his cousin was hidden. The old +gardener took the cause very much to heart; as, judging from my recollections, +I imagine he would have forwarded any fancy, however wild, of Monsieur +Clément’s. (I will tell you afterwards how I came to know all these +particulars so well.) +</p> + +<p> +“After Clément’s return, on two succeeding days, from his dangerous +search, without meeting with any good result, Jacques entreated Monsieur de +Créquy to let him take it in hand. He represented that he, as gardener for the +space of twenty years and more at the Hôtel de Créquy, had a right to be +acquainted with all the successive concièrges at the Count’s house; that +he should not go among them as a stranger, but as an old friend, anxious to +renew pleasant intercourse; and that if the Intendant’s story, which he +had told Monsieur de Créquy in England, was true, that mademoiselle was in +hiding at the house of a former concièrge, why, something relating to her would +surely drop out in the course of conversation. So he persuaded Clément to +remain indoors, while he set off on his round, with no apparent object but to +gossip. +</p> + +<p> +“At night he came home,—having seen mademoiselle. He told Clément +much of the story relating to Madame Babette that I have told to you. Of +course, he had heard nothing of the ambitious hopes of Morin Fils,—hardly +of his existence, I should think. Madame Babette had received him kindly; +although, for some time, she had kept him standing in the carriage gateway +outside her door. But, on his complaining of the draught and his rheumatism, +she had asked him in: first looking round with some anxiety, to see who was in +the room behind her. No one was there when he entered and sat down. But, in a +minute or two, a tall, thin young lady, with great, sad eyes, and pale cheeks, +came from the inner room, and, seeing him, retired. ‘It is Mademoiselle +Cannes,’ said Madame Babette, rather unnecessarily; for, if he had not +been on the watch for some sign of Mademoiselle de Créquy, he would hardly have +noticed the entrance and withdrawal. +</p> + +<p> +“Clément and the good old gardener were always rather perplexed by Madame +Babette’s evident avoidance of all mention of the De Créquy family. If +she were so much interested in one member as to be willing to undergo the pains +and penalties of a domiciliary visit, it was strange that she never inquired +after the existence of her charge’s friends and relations from one who +might very probably have heard something of them. They settled that Madame +Babette must believe that the Marquise and Clément were dead; and admired her +for her reticence in never speaking of Virginie. The truth was, I suspect, that +she was so desirous of her nephews success by this time, that she did not like +letting any one into the secret of Virginie’s whereabouts who might +interfere with their plan. However, it was arranged between Clément and his +humble friend, that the former, dressed in the peasant’s clothes in which +he had entered Paris, but smartened up in one or two particulars, as if, +although a countryman, he had money to spare, should go and engage a +sleeping-room in the old Bréton Inn; where, as I told you, accommodation for +the night was to be had. This was accordingly done, without exciting Madame +Babette’s suspicions, for she was unacquainted with the Normandy accent, +and consequently did not perceive the exaggeration of it which Monsieur de +Créquy adopted in order to disguise his pure Parisian. But after he had for two +nights slept in a queer dark closet, at the end of one of the numerous short +galleries in the Hôtel Duguesclin, and paid his money for such +accommodation each morning at the little bureau under the window of the +concièrgerie, he found himself no nearer to his object. He stood outside in the +gateway: Madame Babette opened a pane in her window, counted out the change, +gave polite thanks, and shut to the pane with a clack, before he could ever +find out what to say that might be the means of opening a conversation. Once in +the streets, he was in danger from the bloodthirsty mob, who were ready in +those days to hunt to death every one who looked like a gentleman, as an +aristocrat: and Clément, depend upon it, looked a gentleman, whatever dress he +wore. Yet it was unwise to traverse Paris to his old friend the +gardener’s grénier, so he had to loiter about, where I hardly know. Only +he did leave the Hôtel Duguesclin, and he did not go to old Jacques, and +there was not another house in Paris open to him. At the end of two days, he +had made out Pierre’s existence; and he began to try to make friends with +the lad. Pierre was too sharp and shrewd not to suspect something from the +confused attempts at friendliness. It was not for nothing that the Norman +farmer lounged in the court and doorway, and brought home presents of galette. +Pierre accepted the galette, reciprocated the civil speeches, but kept his eyes +open. Once, returning home pretty late at night, he surprised the Norman +studying the shadows on the blind, which was drawn down when Madame +Babette’s lamp was lighted. On going in, he found Mademoiselle Cannes +with his mother, sitting by the table, and helping in the family mending. +</p> + +<p> +“Pierre was afraid that the Norman had some view upon the money which his +mother, as concièrge, collected for her brother. But the money was all safe +next evening, when his cousin, Monsieur Morin Fils, came to collect it. Madame +Babette asked her nephew to sit down, and skilfully barred the passage to the +inner door, so that Virginie, had she been ever so much disposed, could not +have retreated. She sat silently sewing. All at once the little party were +startled by a very sweet tenor voice, just close to the street window, singing +one of the airs out of Beaumarchais’ operas, which, a few years before, +had been popular all over Paris. But after a few moments of silence, and one or +two remarks, the talking went on again. Pierre, however, noticed an increased +air of abstraction in Virginie, who, I suppose, was recurring to the last time +that she had heard the song, and did not consider, as her cousin had hoped she +would have done, what were the words set to the air, which he imagined she +would remember, and which would have told her so much. For, only a few years +before, Adam’s opera of Richard le Roi had made the story of the minstrel +Blondel and our English Coeur de Lion familiar to all the opera-going part of +the Parisian public, and Clément had bethought him of establishing a +communication with Virginie by some such means. +</p> + +<p> +“The next night, about the same hour, the same voice was singing outside +the window again. Pierre, who had been irritated by the proceeding the evening +before, as it had diverted Virginie’s attention from his cousin, who had +been doing his utmost to make himself agreeable, rushed out to the door, just +as the Norman was ringing the bell to be admitted for the night. Pierre looked +up and down the street; no one else was to be seen. The next day, the Norman +mollified him somewhat by knocking at the door of the concièrgerie, and begging +Monsieur Pierre’s acceptance of some knee-buckles, which had taken the +country farmer’s fancy the day before, as he had been gazing into the +shops, but which, being too small for his purpose, he took the liberty of +offering to Monsieur Pierre. Pierre, a French boy, inclined to foppery, was +charmed, ravished by the beauty of the present and with monsieur’s +goodness, and he began to adjust them to his breeches immediately, as well as +he could, at least, in his mother’s absence. The Norman, whom Pierre kept +carefully on the outside of the threshold, stood by, as if amused at the +boy’s eagerness. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Take care,’ said he, clearly and distinctly; ‘take +care, my little friend, lest you become a fop; and, in that case, some day, +years hence, when your heart is devoted to some young lady, she may be inclined +to say to you’—here he raised his voice—‘No, thank you; +when I marry, I marry a man, not a petit-maître; I marry a man, who, +whatever his position may be, will add dignity to the human race by his +virtues.’ Farther than that in his quotation Clément dared not go. His +sentiments (so much above the apparent occasion) met with applause from Pierre, +who liked to contemplate himself in the light of a lover, even though it should +be a rejected one, and who hailed the mention of the words +‘virtues’ and ‘dignity of the human race’ as belonging +to the cant of a good citizen. +</p> + +<p> +“But Clément was more anxious to know how the invisible Lady took his +speech. There was no sign at the time. But when he returned at night, he heard +a voice, low singing, behind Madame Babette, as she handed him his candle, the +very air he had sung without effect for two nights past. As if he had caught it +up from her murmuring voice, he sang it loudly and clearly as he crossed the +court. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Here is our opera-singer!’ exclaimed Madame Babette. +‘Why, the Norman grazier sings like Boupré,’ naming a favourite +singer at the neighbouring theatre. +</p> + +<p> +“Pierre was struck by the remark, and quietly resolved to look after the +Norman; but again, I believe, it was more because of his mother’s deposit +of money than with any thought of Virginie. +</p> + +<p> +“However, the next morning, to the wonder of both mother and son, +Mademoiselle Cannes proposed, with much hesitation, to go out and make some +little purchase for herself. A month or two ago, this was what Madame Babette +had been never weary of urging. But now she was as much surprised as if she had +expected Virginie to remain a prisoner in her rooms all the rest of her life. I +suppose she had hoped that her first time of quitting it would be when she left +it for Monsieur Morin’s house as his wife. +</p> + +<p> +“A quick look from Madame Babette towards Pierre was all that was needed +to encourage the boy to follow her. He went out cautiously. She was at the end +of the street. She looked up and down, as if waiting for some one. No one was +there. Back she came, so swiftly that she nearly caught Pierre before he could +retreat through the porte-cochère. There he looked out again. The neighbourhood +was low and wild, and strange; and some one spoke to Virginie,—nay, laid +his hand upon her arm,—whose dress and aspect (he had emerged out of a +side-street) Pierre did not know; but, after a start, and (Pierre could fancy) +a little scream, Virginie recognised the stranger, and the two turned up the +side street whence the man had come. Pierre stole swiftly to the corner of this +street; no one was there: they had disappeared up some of the alleys. Pierre +returned home to excite his mother’s infinite surprise. But they had +hardly done talking, when Virginie returned, with a colour and a radiance in +her face, which they had never seen there since her father’s +death.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER VII.</h2> + +<p> +“I have told you that I heard much of this story from a friend of the +Intendant of the De Créquys, whom he met with in London. Some years +afterwards—the summer before my lord’s death—I was travelling +with him in Devonshire, and we went to see the French prisoners of war on +Dartmoor. We fell into conversation with one of them, whom I found out to be +the very Pierre of whom I had heard before, as having been involved in the +fatal story of Clément and Virginie, and by him I was told much of their last +days, and thus I learnt how to have some sympathy with all those who were +concerned in those terrible events; yes, even with the younger Morin himself, +on whose behalf Pierre spoke warmly, even after so long a time had elapsed. +</p> + +<p> +“For when the younger Morin called at the porter’s lodge, on the +evening of the day when Virginie had gone out for the first time after so many +months’ confinement to the concièrgerie, he was struck with the +improvement in her appearance. It seems to have hardly been that he thought her +beauty greater: for, in addition to the fact that she was not beautiful, Morin +had arrived at that point of being enamoured when it does not signify whether +the beloved one is plain or handsome—she has enchanted one pair of eyes, +which henceforward see her through their own medium. But Morin noticed the +faint increase of colour and light in her countenance. It was as though she had +broken through her thick cloud of hopeless sorrow, and was dawning forth into a +happier life. And so, whereas during her grief, he had revered and respected it +even to a point of silent sympathy, now that she was gladdened, his heart rose +on the wings of strengthened hopes. Even in the dreary monotony of this +existence in his Aunt Babette’s concièrgerie, Time had not failed in his +work, and now, perhaps, soon he might humbly strive to help Time. The very next +day he returned—on some pretence of business—to the Hôtel +Duguesclin, and made his aunt’s room, rather than his aunt herself, a +present of roses and geraniums tied up in a bouquet with a tricolor ribbon. +Virginie was in the room, sitting at the coarse sewing she liked to do for +Madame Babette. He saw her eyes brighten at the sight of the flowers: she asked +his aunt to let her arrange them; he saw her untie the ribbon, and with a +gesture of dislike, throw it on the ground, and give it a kick with her little +foot, and even in this girlish manner of insulting his dearest prejudices, he +found something to admire. +</p> + +<p> +“As he was coming out, Pierre stopped him. The lad had been trying to +arrest his cousin’s attention by futile grimaces and signs played off +behind Virginie’s back: but Monsieur Morin saw nothing but Mademoiselle +Cannes. However, Pierre was not to be baffled, and Monsieur Morin found him in +waiting just outside the threshold. With his finger on his lips, Pierre walked +on tiptoe by his companion’s side till they would have been long past +sight or hearing of the concièrgerie, even had the inhabitants devoted +themselves to the purposes of spying or listening. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Chut!’ said Pierre, at last. ‘She goes out +walking.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Well?’ said Monsieur Morin, half curious, half annoyed at +being disturbed in the delicious reverie of the future into which he longed to +fall. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Well! It is not well. It is bad.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Why? I do not ask who she is, but I have my ideas. She is an +aristocrat. Do the people about here begin to suspect her?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘No, no!’ said Pierre. ‘But she goes out walking. She +has gone these two mornings. I have watched her. She meets a man—she is +friends with him, for she talks to him as eagerly as he does to her—mamma +cannot tell who he is.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Has my aunt seen him?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘No, not so much as a fly’s wing of him. I myself have only +seen his back. It strikes me like a familiar back, and yet I cannot think who +it is. But they separate with sudden darts, like two birds who have been +together to feed their young ones. One moment they are in close talk, their +heads together chuchotting; the next he has turned up some bye-street, and +Mademoiselle Cannes is close upon me—has almost caught me.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘But she did not see you?’ inquired Monsieur Morin, in so +altered a voice that Pierre gave him one of his quick penetrating looks. He was +struck by the way in which his cousin’s features—always coarse and +common-place—had become contracted and pinched; struck, too, by the livid +look on his sallow complexion. But as if Morin was conscious of the manner in +which his face belied his feelings, he made an effort, and smiled, and patted +Pierre’s head, and thanked him for his intelligence, and gave him a +five-franc piece, and bade him go on with his observations of Mademoiselle +Cannes’ movements, and report all to him. +</p> + +<p> +“Pierre returned home with a light heart, tossing up his five-franc piece +as he ran. Just as he was at the concièrgerie door, a great tall man bustled +past him, and snatched his money away from him, looking back with a laugh, +which added insult to injury. Pierre had no redress; no one had witnessed the +impudent theft, and if they had, no one to be seen in the street was strong +enough to give him redress. Besides, Pierre had seen enough of the state of the +streets of Paris at that time to know that friends, not enemies, were required, +and the man had a bad air about him. But all these considerations did not keep +Pierre from bursting out into a fit of crying when he was once more under his +mother’s roof; and Virginie, who was alone there (Madame Babette having +gone out to make her daily purchases), might have imagined him pommeled to +death by the loudness of his sobs. +</p> + +<p> +“‘What is the matter?’ asked she. ‘Speak, my child. +What hast thou done?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘He has robbed me! he has robbed me!’ was all Pierre could +gulp out. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Robbed thee! and of what, my poor boy?’ said Virginie, +stroking his hair gently. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Of my five-franc piece—of a five-franc piece,’ said +Pierre, correcting himself, and leaving out the word my, half fearful lest +Virginie should inquire how he became possessed of such a sum, and for what +services it had been given him. But, of course, no such idea came into her +head, for it would have been impertinent, and she was gentle-born. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Wait a moment, my lad,’ and going to the one small drawer +in the inner apartment, which held all her few possessions, she brought back a +little ring—a ring just with one ruby in it—which she had worn in +the days when she cared to wear jewels. ‘Take this,’ said she, +‘and run with it to a jeweller’s. It is but a poor, valueless +thing, but it will bring you in your five francs, at any rate. Go! I desire +you.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘But I cannot,’ said the boy, hesitating; some dim sense of +honour flitting through his misty morals. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Yes, you must!’ she continued, urging him with her hand to +the door. ‘Run! if it brings in more than five francs, you shall return +the surplus to me.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Thus tempted by her urgency, and, I suppose, reasoning with himself to +the effect that he might as well have the money, and then see whether he +thought it right to act as a spy upon her or not—the one action did not +pledge him to the other, nor yet did she make any conditions with her +gift—Pierre went off with her ring; and, after repaying himself his five +francs, he was enabled to bring Virginie back two more, so well had he managed +his affairs. But, although the whole transaction did not leave him bound, in +any way, to discover or forward Virginie’s wishes, it did leave him +pledged, according to his code, to act according to her advantage, and he +considered himself the judge of the best course to be pursued to this end. And, +moreover, this little kindness attached him to her personally. He began to +think how pleasant it would be to have so kind and generous a person for a +relation; how easily his troubles might be borne if he had always such a ready +helper at hand; how much he should like to make her like him, and come to him +for the protection of his masculine power! First of all his duties, as her +self-appointed squire, came the necessity of finding out who her strange new +acquaintance was. Thus, you see, he arrived at the same end, via supposed duty, +that he was previously pledged to via interest. I fancy a good number of us, +when any line of action will promote our own interest, can make ourselves +believe that reasons exist which compel us to it as a duty. +</p> + +<p> +“In the course of a very few days, Pierre had so circumvented Virginie as +to have discovered that her new friend was no other than the Norman farmer in a +different dress. This was a great piece of knowledge to impart to Morin. But +Pierre was not prepared for the immediate physical effect it had on his cousin. +Morin sat suddenly down on one of the seats in the Boulevards—it was +there Pierre had met with him accidentally—when he heard who it was that +Virginie met. I do not suppose the man had the faintest idea of any +relationship or even previous acquaintanceship between Clément and Virginie. If +he thought of anything beyond the mere fact presented to him, that his idol was +in communication with another, younger, handsomer man than himself, it must +have been that the Norman farmer had seen her at the concièrgerie, and had been +attracted by her, and, as was but natural, had tried to make her acquaintance, +and had succeeded. But, from what Pierre told me, I should not think that even +this much thought passed through Morin’s mind. He seems to have been a +man of rare and concentrated attachments; violent, though restrained and +undemonstrative passions; and, above all, a capability of jealousy, of which +his dark oriental complexion must have been a type. I could fancy that if he +had married Virginie, he would have coined his life-blood for luxuries to make +her happy; would have watched over and petted her, at every sacrifice to +himself, as long as she would have been content to live with him alone. But, as +Pierre expressed it to me: ‘When I saw what my cousin was, when I learned +his nature too late, I perceived that he would have strangled a bird if she +whom he loved was attracted by it from him.’ +</p> + +<p> +“When Pierre had told Morin of his discovery, Morin sat down, as I said, +quite suddenly, as if he had been shot. He found out that the first meeting +between the Norman and Virginie was no accidental, isolated circumstance. +Pierre was torturing him with his accounts of daily rendezvous: if but for a +moment, they were seeing each other every day, sometimes twice a day. And +Virginie could speak to this man, though to himself she was coy and reserved as +hardly to utter a sentence. Pierre caught these broken words while his +cousin’s complexion grew more and more livid, and then purple, as if some +great effect were produced on his circulation by the news he had just heard. +Pierre was so startled by his cousin’s wandering, senseless eyes, and +otherwise disordered looks, that he rushed into a neighbouring cabaret for a +glass of absinthe, which he paid for, as he recollected afterwards, with a +portion of Virginie’s five francs. By-and-by Morin recovered his natural +appearance; but he was gloomy and silent; and all that Pierre could get out of +him was, that the Norman farmer should not sleep another night at the +Hôtel Duguesclin, giving him such opportunities of passing and repassing +by the concièrgerie door. He was too much absorbed in his own thoughts to repay +Pierre the half franc he had spent on the absinthe, which Pierre perceived, and +seems to have noted down in the ledger of his mind as on Virginie’s +balance of favour. +</p> + +<p> +“Altogether, he was much disappointed at his cousin’s mode of +receiving intelligence, which the lad thought worth another five-franc piece at +least; or, if not paid for in money, to be paid for in open-mouthed confidence +and expression of feeling, that he was, for a time, so far a partisan of +Virginie’s—unconscious Virginie—against his cousin, as to +feel regret when the Norman returned no more to his night’s lodging, and +when Virginie’s eager watch at the crevice of the closely-drawn blind +ended only with a sigh of disappointment. If it had not been for his +mother’s presence at the time, Pierre thought he should have told her +all. But how far was his mother in his cousin’s confidence as regarded +the dismissal of the Norman? +</p> + +<p> +“In a few days, however, Pierre felt almost sure that they had +established some new means of communication. Virginie went out for a short time +every day; but though Pierre followed her as closely as he could without +exciting her observation, he was unable to discover what kind of intercourse +she held with the Norman. She went, in general, the same short round among the +little shops in the neighbourhood; not entering any, but stopping at two or +three. Pierre afterwards remembered that she had invariably paused at the +nosegays displayed in a certain window, and studied them long: but, then, she +stopped and looked at caps, hats, fashions, confectionery (all of the humble +kind common in that quarter), so how should he have known that any particular +attraction existed among the flowers? Morin came more regularly than ever to +his aunt’s; but Virginie was apparently unconscious that she was the +attraction. She looked healthier and more hopeful than she had done for months, +and her manners to all were gentler and not so reserved. Almost as if she +wished to manifest her gratitude to Madame Babette for her long continuance of +kindness, the necessity for which was nearly ended, Virginie showed an unusual +alacrity in rendering the old woman any little service in her power, and +evidently tried to respond to Monsieur Morin’s civilities, he being +Madame Babette’s nephew, with a soft graciousness which must have made +one of her principal charms; for all who knew her speak of the fascination of +her manners, so winning and attentive to others, while yet her opinions, and +often her actions, were of so decided a character. For, as I have said, her +beauty was by no means great; yet every man who came near her seems to have +fallen into the sphere of her influence. Monsieur Morin was deeper than ever in +love with her during these last few days: he was worked up into a state capable +of any sacrifice, either of himself or others, so that he might obtain her at +last. He sat ‘devouring her with his eyes’ (to use Pierre’s +expression) whenever she could not see him; but, if she looked towards him, he +looked to the ground—anywhere—away from her and almost stammered in +his replies if she addressed any question to him.’ +</p> + +<p> +“He had been, I should think, ashamed of his extreme agitation on the +Boulevards, for Pierre thought that he absolutely shunned him for these few +succeeding days. He must have believed that he had driven the Norman (my poor +Clément!) off the field, by banishing him from his inn; and thought that the +intercourse between him and Virginie, which he had thus interrupted, was of so +slight and transient a character as to be quenched by a little difficulty. +</p> + +<p> +“But he appears to have felt that he had made but little way, and he +awkwardly turned to Pierre for help—not yet confessing his love, though; +he only tried to make friends again with the lad after their silent +estrangement. And Pierre for some time did not choose to perceive his +cousin’s advances. He would reply to all the roundabout questions Morin +put to him respecting household conversations when he was not present, or +household occupations and tone of thought, without mentioning Virginie’s +name any more than his questioner did. The lad would seem to suppose, that his +cousin’s strong interest in their domestic ways of going on was all on +account of Madame Babette. At last he worked his cousin up to the point of +making him a confidant: and then the boy was half frightened at the torrent of +vehement words he had unloosed. The lava came down with a greater rush for +having been pent up so long. Morin cried out his words in a hoarse, passionate +voice, clenched his teeth, his fingers, and seemed almost convulsed, as he +spoke out his terrible love for Virginie, which would lead him to kill her +sooner than see her another’s; and if another stepped in between him and +her!—and then he smiled a fierce, triumphant smile, but did not say any +more. +</p> + +<p> +“Pierre was, as I said, half frightened; but also half-admiring. This was +really love—a ‘grande passion,’—a really fine dramatic +thing,—like the plays they acted at the little theatre yonder. He had a +dozen times the sympathy with his cousin now that he had had before, and +readily swore by the infernal gods, for they were far too enlightened to +believe in one God, or Christianity, or anything of the kind,—that he +would devote himself, body and soul, to forwarding his cousin’s views. +Then his cousin took him to a shop, and bought him a smart second-hand watch, +on which they scratched the word Fidélité, and thus was the compact sealed. +Pierre settled in his own mind, that if he were a woman, he should like to be +beloved as Virginie was, by his cousin, and that it would be an extremely good +thing for her to be the wife of so rich a citizen as Morin Fils,—and for +Pierre himself, too, for doubtless their gratitude would lead them to give him +rings and watches ad infinitum. +</p> + +<p> +“A day or two afterwards, Virginie was taken ill. Madame Babette said it +was because she had persevered in going out in all weathers, after confining +herself to two warm rooms for so long; and very probably this was really the +cause, for, from Pierre’s account, she must have been suffering from a +feverish cold, aggravated, no doubt, by her impatience at Madame +Babette’s familiar prohibitions of any more walks until she was better. +Every day, in spite of her trembling, aching limbs, she would fain have +arranged her dress for her walk at the usual time; but Madame Babette was fully +prepared to put physical obstacles in her way, if she was not obedient in +remaining tranquil on the little sofa by the side of the fire. The third day, +she called Pierre to her, when his mother was not attending (having, in fact, +locked up Mademoiselle Cannes’ out-of-door things). +</p> + +<p> +“‘See, my child,’ said Virginie. ‘Thou must do me a +great favour. Go to the gardener’s shop in the Rue des Bons-Enfans, and +look at the nosegays in the window. I long for pinks; they are my favourite +flower. Here are two francs. If thou seest a nosegay of pinks displayed in the +window, if it be ever so faded—nay, if thou seest two or three nosegays +of pinks, remember, buy them all, and bring them to me, I have so great a +desire for the smell.’ She fell back weak and exhausted. Pierre hurried +out. Now was the time; here was the clue to the long inspection of the nosegay +in this very shop. +</p> + +<p> +“Sure enough, there was a drooping nosegay of pinks in the window. Pierre +went in, and, with all his impatience, he made as good a bargain as he could, +urging that the flowers were faded, and good for nothing. At last he purchased +them at a very moderate price. And now you will learn the bad consequences of +teaching the lower orders anything beyond what is immediately necessary to +enable them to earn their daily bread! The silly Count de Créquy,—he who +had been sent to his bloody rest, by the very canaille of whom he thought so +much,—he who had made Virginie (indirectly, it is true) reject such a man +as her cousin Clément, by inflating her mind with his bubbles of +theories,—this Count de Créquy had long ago taken a fancy to Pierre, as +he saw the bright sharp child playing about his court—Monsieur de Créquy +had even begun to educate the boy himself to try work out certain opinions of +his into practice,—but the drudgery of the affair wearied him, and, +beside, Babette had left his employment. Still the Count took a kind of +interest in his former pupil; and made some sort of arrangement by which Pierre +was to be taught reading and writing, and accounts, and Heaven knows what +besides,—Latin, I dare say. So Pierre, instead of being an innocent +messenger, as he ought to have been—(as Mr. Horner’s little lad +Gregson ought to have been this morning)—could read writing as well as +either you or I. So what does he do, on obtaining the nosegay, but examine it +well. The stalks of the flowers were tied up with slips of matting in wet moss. +Pierre undid the strings, unwrapped the moss, and out fell a piece of wet +paper, with the writing all blurred with moisture. It was but a torn piece of +writing-paper, apparently, but Pierre’s wicked mischievous eyes read what +was written on it,—written so as to look like a +fragment,—‘Ready, every and any night at nine. All is prepared. +Have no fright. Trust one who, whatever hopes he might once have had, is +content now to serve you as a faithful cousin;’ and a place was named, +which I forget, but which Pierre did not, as it was evidently the rendezvous. +After the lad had studied every word, till he could say it off by heart, he +placed the paper where he had found it, enveloped it in moss, and tied the +whole up again carefully. Virginie’s face coloured scarlet as she +received it. She kept smelling at it, and trembling: but she did not untie it, +although Pierre suggested how much fresher it would be if the stalks were +immediately put into water. But once, after his back had been turned for a +minute, he saw it untied when he looked round again, and Virginie was blushing, +and hiding something in her bosom. +</p> + +<p> +“Pierre was now all impatience to set off and find his cousin, But his +mother seemed to want him for small domestic purposes even more than usual; and +he had chafed over a multitude of errands connected with the Hôtel before +he could set off and search for his cousin at his usual haunts. At last the two +met and Pierre related all the events of the morning to Morin. He said the note +off word by word. (That lad this morning had something of the magpie look of +Pierre—it made me shudder to see him, and hear him repeat the note by +heart.) Then Morin asked him to tell him all over again. Pierre was struck by +Morin’s heavy sighs as he repeated the story. When he came the second +time to the note, Morin tried to write the words down; but either he was not a +good, ready scholar, or his fingers trembled too much. Pierre hardly +remembered, but, at any rate, the lad had to do it, with his wicked reading and +writing. When this was done, Morin sat heavily silent. Pierre would have +preferred the expected outburst, for this impenetrable gloom perplexed and +baffled him. He had even to speak to his cousin to rouse him; and when he +replied, what he said had so little apparent connection with the subject which +Pierre had expected to find uppermost in his mind, that he was half afraid that +his cousin had lost his wits. +</p> + +<p> +“‘My Aunt Babette is out of coffee.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I am sure I do not know,’ said Pierre. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Yes, she is. I heard her say so. Tell her that a friend of mine +has just opened a shop in the Rue Saint Antoine, and that if she will join me +there in an hour, I will supply her with a good stock of coffee, just to give +my friend encouragement. His name is Antoine Meyer, Number One hundred and +Fifty at the sign of the Cap of Liberty.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I could go with you now. I can carry a few pounds of coffee +better than my mother,’ said Pierre, all in good faith. He told me he +should never forget the look on his cousin’s face, as he turned round, +and bade him begone, and give his mother the message without another word. It +had evidently sent him home promptly to obey his cousins command. Morin’s +message perplexed Madame Babette. +</p> + +<p> +“‘How could he know I was out of coffee?’ said she. ‘I +am; but I only used the last up this morning. How could Victor know about +it?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I am sure I can’t tell,’ said Pierre, who by this +time had recovered his usual self-possession. ‘All I know is, that +monsieur is in a pretty temper, and that if you are not sharp to your time at +this Antoine Meyer’s you are likely to come in for some of his black +looks.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Well, it is very kind of him to offer to give me some coffee, to +be sure! But how could he know I was out?’ +</p> + +<p> +“Pierre hurried his mother off impatiently, for he was certain that the +offer of the coffee was only a blind to some hidden purpose on his +cousin’s part; and he made no doubt that when his mother had been +informed of what his cousin’s real intention was, he, Pierre, could +extract it from her by coaxing or bullying. But he was mistaken. Madame Babette +returned home, grave, depressed, silent, and loaded with the best coffee. Some +time afterwards he learnt why his cousin had sought for this interview. It was +to extract from her, by promises and threats, the real name of Mam’selle +Cannes, which would give him a clue to the true appellation of The Faithful +Cousin. He concealed the second purpose from his aunt, who had been quite +unaware of his jealousy of the Norman farmer, or of his identification of him +with any relation of Virginie’s. But Madame Babette instinctively shrank +from giving him any information: she must have felt that, in the lowering mood +in which she found him, his desire for greater knowledge of Virginie’s +antecedents boded her no good. And yet he made his aunt his +confidante—told her what she had only suspected before—that he was +deeply enamoured of Mam’selle Cannes, and would gladly marry her. He +spoke to Madame Babette of his father’s hoarded riches; and of the share +which he, as partner, had in them at the present time; and of the prospect of +the succession to the whole, which he had, as only child. He told his aunt of +the provision for her (Madame Babette’s) life, which he would make on the +day when he married Mam’selle Cannes. And yet—and yet—Babette +saw that in his eye and look which made her more and more reluctant to confide +in him. By-and-by he tried threats. She should leave the concièrgerie, and find +employment where she liked. Still silence. Then he grew angry, and swore that +he would inform against her at the bureau of the Directory, for harbouring an +aristocrat; an aristocrat he knew Mademoiselle was, whatever her real name +might be. His aunt should have a domiciliary visit, and see how she liked that. +The officers of the Government were the people for finding out secrets. In vain +she reminded him that, by so doing, he would expose to imminent danger the lady +whom he had professed to love. He told her, with a sullen relapse into silence +after his vehement outpouring of passion, never to trouble herself about that. +At last he wearied out the old woman, and, frightened alike of herself and of +him, she told him all,—that Mam’selle Cannes was Mademoiselle +Virginie de Créquy, daughter of the Count of that name. Who was the Count? +Younger brother of the Marquis. Where was the Marquis? Dead long ago, leaving a +widow and child. A son? (eagerly). Yes, a son. Where was he? Parbleu! how +should she know?—for her courage returned a little as the talk went away +from the only person of the De Créquy family that she cared about. But, by dint +of some small glasses out of a bottle of Antoine Meyer’s, she told him +more about the De Créquys than she liked afterwards to remember. For the +exhilaration of the brandy lasted but a very short time, and she came home, as +I have said, depressed, with a presentiment of coming evil. She would not +answer Pierre, but cuffed him about in a manner to which the spoilt boy was +quite unaccustomed. His cousin’s short, angry words, and sudden +withdrawal of confidence,—his mother’s unwonted crossness and +fault-finding, all made Virginie’s kind, gentle treatment, more than ever +charming to the lad. He half resolved to tell her how he had been acting as a +spy upon her actions, and at whose desire he had done it. But he was afraid of +Morin, and of the vengeance which he was sure would fall upon him for any +breach of confidence. Towards half-past eight that evening—Pierre, +watching, saw Virginie arrange several little things—she was in the inner +room, but he sat where he could see her through the glazed partition. His +mother sat—apparently sleeping—in the great easy-chair; Virginie +moved about softly, for fear of disturbing her. She made up one or two little +parcels of the few things she could call her own: one packet she concealed +about herself—the others she directed, and left on the shelf. ‘She +is going,’ thought Pierre, and (as he said in giving me the account) his +heart gave a spring, to think that he should never see her again. If either his +mother or his cousin had been more kind to him, he might have endeavoured to +intercept her; but as it was, he held his breath, and when she came out he +pretended to read, scarcely knowing whether he wished her to succeed in the +purpose which he was almost sure she entertained, or not. She stopped by him, +and passed her hand over his hair. He told me that his eyes filled with tears +at this caress. Then she stood for a moment looking at the sleeping Madame +Babette, and stooped down and softly kissed her on the forehead. Pierre dreaded +lest his mother should awake (for by this time the wayward, vacillating boy +must have been quite on Virginie’s side), but the brandy she had drunk +made her slumber heavily. Virginie went. Pierre’s heart beat fast. He was +sure his cousin would try to intercept her; but how, he could not imagine. He +longed to run out and see the catastrophe,—but he had let the moment +slip; he was also afraid of reawakening his mother to her unusual state of +anger and violence.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> + +<p> +“Pierre went on pretending to read, but in reality listening with acute +tension of ear to every little sound. His perceptions became so sensitive in +this respect that he was incapable of measuring time, every moment had seemed +so full of noises, from the beating of his heart up to the roll of the heavy +carts in the distance. He wondered whether Virginie would have reached the +place of rendezvous, and yet he was unable to compute the passage of minutes. +His mother slept soundly: that was well. By this time Virginie must have met +the ‘faithful cousin:’ if, indeed, Morin had not made his +appearance. +</p> + +<p> +“At length, he felt as if he could no longer sit still, awaiting the +issue, but must run out and see what course events had taken. In vain his +mother, half-rousing herself, called after him to ask whither he was going: he +was already out of hearing before she had ended her sentence, and he ran on +until, stopped by the sight of Mademoiselle Cannes walking along at so swift a +pace that it was almost a run; while at her side, resolutely keeping by her, +Morin was striding abreast. Pierre had just turned the corner of the street, +when he came upon them. Virginie would have passed him without recognizing him, +she was in such passionate agitation, but for Morin’s gesture, by which +he would fain have kept Pierre from interrupting them. Then, when Virginie saw +the lad, she caught at his arm, and thanked God, as if in that boy of twelve or +fourteen she held a protector. Pierre felt her tremble from head to foot, and +was afraid lest she would fall, there where she stood, in the hard rough +street. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Begone, Pierre!’ said Morin. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I cannot,’ replied Pierre, who indeed was held firmly by +Virginie. ‘Besides, I won’t,’ he added. ‘Who has been +frightening mademoiselle in this way?’ asked he, very much inclined to +brave his cousin at all hazards. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Mademoiselle is not accustomed to walk in the streets +alone,’ said Morin, sulkily. ‘She came upon a crowd attracted by +the arrest of an aristocrat, and their cries alarmed her. I offered to take +charge of her home. Mademoiselle should not walk in these streets alone. We are +not like the cold-blooded people of the Faubourg Saint Germain.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Virginie did not speak. Pierre doubted if she heard a word of what they +were saying. She leant upon him more and more heavily. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Will mademoiselle condescend to take my arm?’ said Morin, +with sulky, and yet humble, uncouthness. I dare say he would have given worlds +if he might have had that little hand within his arm; but, though she still +kept silence, she shuddered up away from him, as you shrink from touching a +toad. He had said something to her during that walk, you may be sure, which had +made her loathe him. He marked and understood the gesture. He held himself +aloof while Pierre gave her all the assistance he could in their slow progress +homewards. But Morin accompanied her all the same. He had played too desperate +a game to be baulked now. He had given information against the ci-devant +Marquis de Créquy, as a returned emigré, to be met with at such a time, in such +a place. Morin had hoped that all sign of the arrest would have been cleared +away before Virginie reached the spot—so swiftly were terrible deeds done +in those days. But Clément defended himself desperately: Virginie was punctual +to a second; and, though the wounded man was borne off to the Abbaye, amid a +crowd of the unsympathising jeerers who mingled with the armed officials of the +Directory, Morin feared lest Virginie had recognized him; and he would have +preferred that she should have thought that the ‘faithful cousin’ +was faithless, than that she should have seen him in bloody danger on her +account. I suppose he fancied that, if Virginie never saw or heard more of him, +her imagination would not dwell on his simple disappearance, as it would do if +she knew what he was suffering for her sake. +</p> + +<p> +“At any rate, Pierre saw that his cousin was deeply mortified by the +whole tenor of his behaviour during their walk home. When they arrived at +Madame Babette’s, Virginie fell fainting on the floor; her strength had +but just sufficed for this exertion of reaching the shelter of the house. Her +first sign of restoring consciousness consisted in avoidance of Morin. He had +been most assiduous in his efforts to bring her round; quite tender in his way, +Pierre said; and this marked, instinctive repugnance to him evidently gave him +extreme pain. I suppose Frenchmen are more demonstrative than we are; for +Pierre declared that he saw his cousin’s eyes fill with tears, as she +shrank away from his touch, if he tried to arrange the shawl they had laid +under her head like a pillow, or as she shut her eyes when he passed before +her. Madame Babette was urgent with her to go and lie down on the bed in the +inner room; but it was some time before she was strong enough to rise and do +this. +</p> + +<p> +“When Madame Babette returned from arranging the girl comfortably, the +three relations sat down in silence; a silence which Pierre thought would never +be broken. He wanted his mother to ask his cousin what had happened. But Madame +Babette was afraid of her nephew, and thought it more discreet to wait for such +crumbs of intelligence as he might think fit to throw to her. But, after she +had twice reported Virginie to be asleep, without a word being uttered in reply +to her whispers by either of her companions, Morin’s powers of +self-containment gave way. +</p> + +<p> +“‘It is hard!’ he said. +</p> + +<p> +“‘What is hard?’ asked Madame Babette, after she had paused +for a time, to enable him to add to, or to finish, his sentence, if he pleased. +</p> + +<p> +“‘It is hard for a man to love a woman as I do,’ he went +on—‘I did not seek to love her, it came upon me before I was +aware—before I had ever thought about it at all, I loved her better than +all the world beside. All my life, before I knew her, seems a dull blank. I +neither know nor care for what I did before then. And now there are just two +lives before me. Either I have her, or I have not. That is all: but that is +everything. And what can I do to make her have me? Tell me, aunt,’ and he +caught at Madame Babette’s arm, and gave it so sharp a shake, that she +half screamed out, Pierre said, and evidently grew alarmed at her +nephew’s excitement. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Hush, Victor!’ said she. ‘There are other women in +the world, if this one will not have you.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘None other for me,’ he said, sinking back as if hopeless. +‘I am plain and coarse, not one of the scented darlings of the +aristocrats. Say that I am ugly, brutish; I did not make myself so, any more +than I made myself love her. It is my fate. But am I to submit to the +consequences of my fate without a struggle? Not I. As strong as my love is, so +strong is my will. It can be no stronger,’ continued he, gloomily. +‘Aunt Babette, you must help me—you must make her love me.’ +He was so fierce here, that Pierre said he did not wonder that his mother was +frightened. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I, Victor!’ she exclaimed. ‘I make her love you? How +can I? Ask me to speak for you to Mademoiselle Didot, or to Mademoiselle +Cauchois even, or to such as they, and I’ll do it, and welcome. But to +Mademoiselle de Créquy, why you don’t know the difference! Those +people—the old nobility I mean—why they don’t know a man from +a dog, out of their own rank! And no wonder, for the young gentlemen of quality +are treated differently to us from their very birth. If she had you to-morrow, +you would be miserable. Let me alone for knowing the aristocracy. I have not +been a concièrge to a duke and three counts for nothing. I tell you, all your +ways are different to her ways.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I would change my “ways,” as you call them.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Be reasonable, Victor.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘No, I will not be reasonable, if by that you mean giving her up. +I tell you two lives are before me; one with her, one without her. But the +latter will be but a short career for both of us. You said, aunt, that the talk +went in the concièrgerie of her father’s hotel, that she would have +nothing to do with this cousin whom I put out of the way to-day?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘So the servants said. How could I know? All I know is, that he +left off coming to our hotel, and that at one time before then he had never +been two days absent.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘So much the better for him. He suffers now for having come +between me and my object—in trying to snatch her away out of my sight. +Take you warning, Pierre! I did not like your meddling to-night.’ And so +he went off, leaving Madam Babette rocking herself backwards and forwards, in +all the depression of spirits consequent upon the reaction after the brandy, +and upon her knowledge of her nephew’s threatened purpose combined. +</p> + +<p> +“In telling you most of this, I have simply repeated Pierre’s +account, which I wrote down at the time. But here what he had to say came to a +sudden break; for, the next morning, when Madame Babette rose, Virginie was +missing, and it was some time before either she, or Pierre, or Morin, could get +the slightest clue to the missing girl. +</p> + +<p> +“And now I must take up the story as it was told to the Intendant +Fléchier by the old gardener Jacques, with whom Clément had been lodging on his +first arrival in Paris. The old man could not, I dare say, remember half as +much of what had happened as Pierre did; the former had the dulled memory of +age, while Pierre had evidently thought over the whole series of events as a +story—as a play, if one may call it so—during the solitary hours in +his after-life, wherever they were passed, whether in lonely camp watches, or +in the foreign prison, where he had to drag out many years. Clément had, as I +said, returned to the gardener’s garret after he had been dismissed from +the Hôtel Duguesclin. There were several reasons for his thus doubling +back. One was, that he put nearly the whole breadth of Paris between him and an +enemy; though why Morin was an enemy, and to what extent he carried his dislike +or hatred, Clément could not tell, of course. The next reason for returning to +Jacques was, no doubt, the conviction that, in multiplying his residences, he +multiplied the chances against his being suspected and recognized. And then, +again, the old man was in his secret, and his ally, although perhaps but a +feeble kind of one. It was through Jacques that the plan of communication, by +means of a nosegay of pinks, had been devised; and it was Jacques who procured +him the last disguise that Clément was to use in Paris—as he hoped and +trusted. It was that of a respectable shopkeeper of no particular class; a +dress that would have seemed perfectly suitable to the young man who would +naturally have worn it; and yet, as Clément put it on, and adjusted +it—giving it a sort of finish and elegance which I always noticed about +his appearance and which I believed was innate in the wearer—I have no +doubt it seemed like the usual apparel of a gentleman. No coarseness of +texture, nor clumsiness of cut could disguise the nobleman of thirty descents, +it appeared; for immediately on arriving at the place of rendezvous, he was +recognized by the men placed there on Morin’s information to seize him. +Jacques, following at a little distance, with a bundle under his arm containing +articles of feminine disguise for Virginie, saw four men attempt +Clément’s arrest—saw him, quick as lightning, draw a sword hitherto +concealed in a clumsy stick—saw his agile figure spring to his +guard,—and saw him defend himself with the rapidity and art of a man +skilled in arms. But what good did it do? as Jacques piteously used to ask, +Monsieur Fléchier told me. A great blow from a heavy club on the sword-arm of +Monsieur de Créquy laid it helpless and immovable by his side. Jacques always +thought that that blow came from one of the spectators, who by this time had +collected round the scene of the affray. The next instant, his master—his +little marquis—was down among the feet of the crowd, and though he was up +again before he had received much damage—so active and light was my poor +Clément—it was not before the old gardener had hobbled forwards, and, +with many an old-fashioned oath and curse, proclaimed himself a partisan of the +losing side—a follower of a ci-devant aristocrat. It was quite enough. He +received one or two good blows, which were, in fact, aimed at his master; and +then, almost before he was aware, he found his arms pinioned behind him with a +woman’s garter, which one of the viragos in the crowd had made no scruple +of pulling off in public, as soon as she heard for what purpose it was wanted. +Poor Jacques was stunned and unhappy,—his master was out of sight, on +before; and the old gardener scarce knew whither they were taking him. His head +ached from the blows which had fallen upon it; it was growing dark—June +day though it was,—and when first he seems to have become exactly aware +of what had happened to him, it was when he was turned into one of the larger +rooms of the Abbaye, in which all were put who had no other allotted place +wherein to sleep. One or two iron lamps hung from the ceiling by chains, giving +a dim light for a little circle. Jacques stumbled forwards over a sleeping body +lying on the ground. The sleeper wakened up enough to complain; and the apology +of the old man in reply caught the ear of his master, who, until this time, +could hardly have been aware of the straits and difficulties of his faithful +Jacques. And there they sat,—against a pillar, the live-long night, +holding one another’s hands, and each restraining expressions of pain, +for fear of adding to the other’s distress. That night made them intimate +friends, in spite of the difference of age and rank. The disappointed hopes, +the acute suffering of the present, the apprehensions of the future, made them +seek solace in talking of the past. Monsieur de Créquy and the gardener found +themselves disputing with interest in which chimney of the stack the starling +used to build,—the starling whose nest Clément sent to Urian, you +remember, and discussing the merits of different espalier-pears which grew, and +may grow still, in the old garden of the Hôtel de Créquy. Towards morning +both fell asleep. The old man wakened first. His frame was deadened to +suffering, I suppose, for he felt relieved of his pain; but Clément moaned and +cried in feverish slumber. His broken arm was beginning to inflame his blood. +He was, besides, much injured by some kicks from the crowd as he fell. As the +old man looked sadly on the white, baked lips, and the flushed cheeks, +contorted with suffering even in his sleep, Clément gave a sharp cry which +disturbed his miserable neighbours, all slumbering around in uneasy attitudes. +They bade him with curses be silent; and then turning round, tried again to +forget their own misery in sleep. For you see, the bloodthirsty canaille had +not been sated with guillotining and hanging all the nobility they could find, +but were now informing, right and left, even against each other; and when +Clément and Jacques were in the prison, there were few of gentle blood in the +place, and fewer still of gentle manners. At the sound of the angry words and +threats, Jacques thought it best to awaken his master from his feverish +uncomfortable sleep, lest he should provoke more enmity; and, tenderly lifting +him up, he tried to adjust his own body, so that it should serve as a rest and +a pillow for the younger man. The motion aroused Clément, and he began to talk +in a strange, feverish way, of Virginie, too,—whose name he would not +have breathed in such a place had he been quite himself. But Jacques had as +much delicacy of feeling as any lady in the land, although, mind you, he knew +neither how to read nor write,—and bent his head low down, so that his +master might tell him in a whisper what messages he was to take to Mademoiselle +de Créquy, in case—Poor Clément, he knew it must come to that! No escape +for him now, in Norman disguise or otherwise! Either by gathering fever or +guillotine, death was sure of his prey. Well! when that happened, Jacques was +to go and find Mademoiselle de Créquy, and tell her that her cousin loved her +at the last as he had loved her at the first; but that she should never have +heard another word of his attachment from his living lips; that he knew he was +not good enough for her, his queen; and that no thought of earning her love by +his devotion had prompted his return to France, only that, if possible, he +might have the great privilege of serving her whom he loved. And then he went +off into rambling talk about petit-maîtres, and such kind of expressions, +said Jacques to Fléchier, the intendant, little knowing what a clue that one +word gave to much of the poor lad’s suffering. +</p> + +<p> +“The summer morning came slowly on in that dark prison, and when Jacques +could look round—his master was now sleeping on his shoulder, still the +uneasy, starting sleep of fever—he saw that there were many women among +the prisoners. (I have heard some of those who have escaped from the prisons +say, that the look of despair and agony that came into the faces of the +prisoners on first wakening, as the sense of their situation grew upon them, +was what lasted the longest in the memory of the survivors. This look, they +said, passed away from the women’s faces sooner than it did from those of +the men.) +</p> + +<p> +“Poor old Jacques kept falling asleep, and plucking himself up again for +fear lest, if he did not attend to his master, some harm might come to the +swollen, helpless arm. Yet his weariness grew upon him in spite of all his +efforts, and at last he felt as if he must give way to the irresistible desire, +if only for five minutes. But just then there was a bustle at the door. Jacques +opened his eyes wide to look. +</p> + +<p> +“‘The gaoler is early with breakfast,’ said some one, lazily. +</p> + +<p> +“‘It is the darkness of this accursed place that makes us think it +early,’ said another. +</p> + +<p> +“All this time a parley was going on at the door. Some one came in; not +the gaoler—a woman. The door was shut to and locked behind her. She only +advanced a step or two, for it was too sudden a change, out of the light into +that dark shadow, for any one to see clearly for the first few minutes. Jacques +had his eyes fairly open now, and was wide awake. It was Mademoiselle de +Créquy, looking bright, clear, and resolute. The faithful heart of the old man +read that look like an open page. Her cousin should not die there on her +behalf, without at least the comfort of her sweet presence. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Here he is,’ he whispered as her gown would have touched +him in passing, without her perceiving him, in the heavy obscurity of the +place. +</p> + +<p> +“‘The good God bless you, my friend!’ she murmured, as she +saw the attitude of the old man, propped against a pillar, and holding Clément +in his arms, as if the young man had been a helpless baby, while one of the +poor gardener’s hands supported the broken limb in the easiest position. +Virginie sat down by the old man, and held out her arms. Softly she moved +Clément’s head to her own shoulder; softly she transferred the task of +holding the arm to herself. Clément lay on the floor, but she supported him, +and Jacques was at liberty to arise and stretch and shake his stiff, weary old +body. He then sat down at a little distance, and watched the pair until he fell +asleep. Clément had muttered ‘Virginie,’ as they half-roused him by +their movements out of his stupor; but Jacques thought he was only dreaming; +nor did he seem fully awake when once his eyes opened, and he looked full at +Virginie’s face bending over him, and growing crimson under his gaze, +though she never stirred, for fear of hurting him if she moved. Clément looked +in silence, until his heavy eyelids came slowly down, and he fell into his +oppressive slumber again. Either he did not recognize her, or she came in too +completely as a part of his sleeping visions for him to be disturbed by her +appearance there. +</p> + +<p> +“When Jacques awoke it was full daylight—at least as full as it +would ever be in that place. His breakfast—the gaol-allowance of bread +and vin ordinaire—was by his side. He must have slept soundly. He looked +for his master. He and Virginie had recognized each other now,—hearts, as +well as appearance. They were smiling into each other’s faces, as if that +dull, vaulted room in the grim Abbaye were the sunny gardens of Versailles, +with music and festivity all abroad. Apparently they had much to say to each +other; for whispered questions and answers never ceased. +</p> + +<p> +“Virginie had made a sling for the poor broken arm; nay, she had obtained +two splinters of wood in some way, and one of their +fellow-prisoners—having, it appeared, some knowledge of surgery—had +set it. Jacques felt more desponding by far than they did, for he was suffering +from the night he had passed, which told upon his aged frame; while they must +have heard some good news, as it seemed to him, so bright and happy did they +look. Yet Clément was still in bodily pain and suffering, and Virginie, by her +own act and deed, was a prisoner in that dreadful Abbaye, whence the only issue +was the guillotine. But they were together: they loved: they understood each +other at length. +</p> + +<p> +“When Virginie saw that Jacques was awake, and languidly munching his +breakfast, she rose from the wooden stool on which she was sitting, and went to +him, holding out both hands, and refusing to allow him to rise, while she +thanked him with pretty eagerness for all his kindness to Monsieur. Monsieur +himself came towards him, following Virginie, but with tottering steps, as if +his head was weak and dizzy, to thank the poor old man, who now on his feet, +stood between them, ready to cry while they gave him credit for faithful +actions which he felt to have been almost involuntary on his part,—for +loyalty was like an instinct in the good old days, before your educational cant +had come up. And so two days went on. The only event was the morning call for +the victims, a certain number of whom were summoned to trial every day. And to +be tried was to be condemned. Every one of the prisoners became grave, as the +hour for their summons approached. Most of the victims went to their doom with +uncomplaining resignation, and for a while after their departure there was +comparative silence in the prison. But, by-and-by—so said +Jacques—the conversation or amusements began again. Human nature cannot +stand the perpetual pressure of such keen anxiety, without an effort to relieve +itself by thinking of something else. Jacques said that Monsieur and +Mademoiselle were for ever talking together of the past days,—it was +‘Do you remember this?’ or, ‘Do you remember that?’ +perpetually. He sometimes thought they forgot where they were, and what was +before them. But Jacques did not, and every day he trembled more and more as +the list was called over. +</p> + +<p> +“The third morning of their incarceration, the gaoler brought in a man +whom Jacques did not recognize, and therefore did not at once observe; for he +was waiting, as in duty bound, upon his master and his sweet young lady (as he +always called her in repeating the story). He thought that the new introduction +was some friend of the gaoler, as the two seemed well acquainted, and the +latter stayed a few minutes talking with his visitor before leaving him in +prison. So Jacques was surprised when, after a short time had elapsed, he +looked round, and saw the fierce stare with which the stranger was regarding +Monsieur and Mademoiselle de Créquy, as the pair sat at breakfast,—the +said breakfast being laid as well as Jacques knew how, on a bench fastened into +the prison wall,—Virginie sitting on her low stool, and Clément half +lying on the ground by her side, and submitting gladly to be fed by her pretty +white fingers; for it was one of her fancies, Jacques said, to do all she could +for him, in consideration of his broken arm. And, indeed, Clément was wasting +away daily; for he had received other injuries, internal and more serious than +that to his arm, during the mêlée which had ended in his capture. The +stranger made Jacques conscious of his presence by a sigh, which was almost a +groan. All three prisoners looked round at the sound. Clément’s face +expressed little but scornful indifference; but Virginie’s face froze +into stony hate. Jacques said he never saw such a look, and hoped that he never +should again. Yet after that first revelation of feeling, her look was steady +and fixed in another direction to that in which the stranger stood,—still +motionless—still watching. He came a step nearer at last. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Mademoiselle,’ he said. Not the quivering of an eyelash +showed that she heard him. ‘Mademoiselle!’ he said again, with an +intensity of beseeching that made Jacques—not knowing who he +was—almost pity him, when he saw his young lady’s obdurate face. +</p> + +<p> +“There was perfect silence for a space of time which Jacques could not +measure. Then again the voice, hesitatingly, saying, ‘Monsieur!’ +Clément could not hold the same icy countenance as Virginie; he turned his head +with an impatient gesture of disgust; but even that emboldened the man. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Monsieur, do ask mademoiselle to listen to me,—just two +words.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Mademoiselle de Créquy only listens to whom she chooses.’ +Very haughtily my Clément would say that, I am sure. +</p> + +<p> +“‘But, mademoiselle,’—lowering his voice, and coming a +step or two nearer. Virginie must have felt his approach, though she did not +see it; for she drew herself a little on one side, so as to put as much space +as possible between him and her.—‘Mademoiselle, it is not too late. +I can save you: but to-morrow your name is down on the list. I can save you, if +you will listen.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Still no word or sign. Jacques did not understand the affair. Why was +she so obdurate to one who might be ready to include Clément in the proposal, +as far as Jacques knew? +</p> + +<p> +“The man withdrew a little, but did not offer to leave the prison. He +never took his eyes off Virginie; he seemed to be suffering from some acute and +terrible pain as he watched her. +</p> + +<p> +“Jacques cleared away the breakfast-things as well as he could. +Purposely, as I suspect, he passed near the man. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Hist!’ said the stranger. ‘You are Jacques, the +gardener, arrested for assisting an aristocrat. I know the gaoler. You shall +escape, if you will. Only take this message from me to mademoiselle. You heard. +She will not listen to me: I did not want her to come here. I never knew she +was here, and she will die to-morrow. They will put her beautiful round throat +under the guillotine. Tell her, good old man, tell her how sweet life is; and +how I can save her; and how I will not ask for more than just to see her from +time to time. She is so young; and death is annihilation, you know. Why does +she hate me so? I want to save her; I have done her no harm. Good old man, tell +her how terrible death is; and that she will die to-morrow, unless she listens +to me.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Jacques saw no harm in repeating this message. Clément listened in +silence, watching Virginie with an air of infinite tenderness. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Will you not try him, my cherished one?’ he said. +‘Towards you he may mean well’ (which makes me think that Virginie +had never repeated to Clément the conversation which she had overheard that +last night at Madame Babette’s); ‘you would be in no worse a +situation than you were before!’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘No worse, Clément! and I should have known what you were, and +have lost you. My Clément!’ said she, reproachfully. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Ask him,’ said she, turning to Jacques, suddenly, ‘if +he can save Monsieur de Créquy as well,—if he can?—O Clément, we +might escape to England; we are but young.’ And she hid her face on his +shoulder. +</p> + +<p> +“Jacques returned to the stranger, and asked him Virginie’s +question. His eyes were fixed on the cousins; he was very pale, and the +twitchings or contortions, which must have been involuntary whenever he was +agitated, convulsed his whole body. +</p> + +<p> +“He made a long pause. ‘I will save mademoiselle and monsieur, if +she will go straight from prison to the mairie, and be my wife.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Your wife!’ Jacques could not help exclaiming, ‘That +she will never be—never!’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Ask her!’ said Morin, hoarsely. +</p> + +<p> +“But almost before Jacques thought he could have fairly uttered the +words, Clément caught their meaning. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Begone!’ said he; ‘not one word more.’ Virginie +touched the old man as he was moving away. ‘Tell him he does not know how +he makes me welcome death.’ And smiling, as if triumphant, she turned +again to Clément. +</p> + +<p> +“The stranger did not speak as Jacques gave him the meaning, not the +words, of their replies. He was going away, but stopped. A minute or two +afterwards, he beckoned to Jacques. The old gardener seems to have thought it +undesirable to throw away even the chance of assistance from such a man as +this, for he went forward to speak to him. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Listen! I have influence with the gaoler. He shall let thee pass +out with the victims to-morrow. No one will notice it, or miss thee—. +They will be led to trial,—even at the last moment, I will save her, if +she sends me word she relents. Speak to her, as the time draws on. Life is very +sweet,—tell her how sweet. Speak to him; he will do more with her than +thou canst. Let him urge her to live. Even at the last, I will be at the Palais +de Justice,—at the Grève. I have followers,—I have interest. Come +among the crowd that follow the victims,—I shall see thee. It will be no +worse for him, if she escapes’— +</p> + +<p> +“‘Save my master, and I will do all,’ said Jacques. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Only on my one condition,’ said Morin, doggedly; and +Jacques was hopeless of that condition ever being fulfilled. But he did not see +why his own life might not be saved. By remaining in prison until the next day, +he should have rendered every service in his power to his master and the young +lady. He, poor fellow, shrank from death; and he agreed with Morin to escape, +if he could, by the means Morin had suggested, and to bring him word if +Mademoiselle de Créquy relented. (Jacques had no expectation that she would; +but I fancy he did not think it necessary to tell Morin of this conviction of +his.) This bargaining with so base a man for so slight a thing as life, was the +only flaw that I heard of in the old gardener’s behaviour. Of course, the +mere reopening of the subject was enough to stir Virginie to displeasure. +Clément urged her, it is true; but the light he had gained upon Morin’s +motions, made him rather try to set the case before her in as fair a manner as +possible than use any persuasive arguments. And, even as it was, what he said +on the subject made Virginie shed tears—the first that had fallen from +her since she entered the prison. So, they were summoned and went together, at +the fatal call of the muster-roll of victims the next morning. He, feeble from +his wounds and his injured health; she, calm and serene, only petitioning to be +allowed to walk next to him, in order that she might hold him up when he turned +faint and giddy from his extreme suffering. +</p> + +<p> +“Together they stood at the bar; together they were condemned. As the +words of judgment were pronounced, Virginie tuned to Clément, and embraced him +with passionate fondness. Then, making him lean on her, they marched out +towards the Place de la Grève. +</p> + +<p> +“Jacques was free now. He had told Morin how fruitless his efforts at +persuasion had been; and scarcely caring to note the effect of his information +upon the man, he had devoted himself to watching Monsieur and Mademoiselle de +Créquy. And now he followed them to the Place de la Grève. He saw them mount +the platform; saw them kneel down together till plucked up by the impatient +officials; could see that she was urging some request to the executioner; the +end of which seemed to be, that Clément advanced first to the guillotine, was +executed (and just at this moment there was a stir among the crowd, as of a man +pressing forward towards the scaffold). Then she, standing with her face to the +guillotine, slowly made the sign of the cross, and knelt down. +</p> + +<p> +“Jacques covered his eyes, blinded with tears. The report of a pistol +made him look up. She was gone—another victim in her place—and +where there had been a little stir in the crowd not five minutes before, some +men were carrying off a dead body. A man had shot himself, they said. Pierre +told me who that man was.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER IX.</h2> + +<p> +After a pause, I ventured to ask what became of Madame de Créquy, +Clément’s mother. +</p> + +<p> +“She never made any inquiry about him,” said my lady. “She +must have known that he was dead; though how, we never could tell. Medlicott +remembered afterwards that it was about, if not on—Medlicott to this day +declares that it was on the very Monday, June the nineteenth, when her son was +executed, that Madame de Créquy left off her rouge and took to her bed, as one +bereaved and hopeless. It certainly was about that time; and +Medlicott—who was deeply impressed by that dream of Madame de +Créquy’s (the relation of which I told you had had such an effect on my +lord), in which she had seen the figure of Virginie—as the only light +object amid much surrounding darkness as of night, smiling and beckoning +Clément on—on—till at length the bright phantom stopped, +motionless, and Madame de Créquy’s eyes began to penetrate the murky +darkness, and to see closing around her the gloomy dripping walls which she had +once seen and never forgotten—the walls of the vault of the chapel of the +De Créquys in Saint Germain l’Auxerrois; and there the two last of the +Créquys laid them down among their forefathers, and Madame de Créquy had +wakened to the sound of the great door, which led to the open air, being locked +upon her—I say Medlicott, who was predisposed by this dream to look out +for the supernatural, always declared that Madame de Créquy was made conscious +in some mysterious way, of her son’s death, on the very day and hour when +it occurred, and that after that she had no more anxiety, but was only +conscious of a kind of stupefying despair.” +</p> + +<p> +“And what became of her, my lady?” I again asked. +</p> + +<p> +“What could become of her?” replied Lady Ludlow. “She never +could be induced to rise again, though she lived more than a year after her +son’s departure. She kept her bed; her room darkened, her face turned +towards the wall, whenever any one besides Medlicott was in the room. She +hardly ever spoke, and would have died of starvation but for Medlicott’s +tender care, in putting a morsel to her lips every now and then, feeding her, +in fact, just as an old bird feeds her young ones. In the height of summer my +lord and I left London. We would fain have taken her with us into Scotland, but +the doctor (we had the old doctor from Leicester Square) forbade her removal; +and this time he gave such good reasons against it that I acquiesced. Medlicott +and a maid were left with her. Every care was taken of her. She survived till +our return. Indeed, I thought she was in much the same state as I had left her +in, when I came back to London. But Medlicott spoke of her as much weaker; and +one morning on awakening, they told me she was dead. I sent for Medlicott, who +was in sad distress, she had become so fond of her charge. She said that, about +two o’clock, she had been awakened by unusual restlessness on Madame de +Créquy’s part; that she had gone to her bedside, and found the poor lady +feebly but perpetually moving her wasted arm up and down—and saying to +herself in a wailing voice: ‘I did not bless him when he left me—I +did not bless him when he left me!’ Medlicott gave her a spoonful or two +of jelly, and sat by her, stroking her hand, and soothing her till she seemed +to fall asleep. But in the morning she was dead.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is a sad story, your ladyship,” said I, after a while. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes it is. People seldom arrive at my age without having watched the +beginning, middle, and end of many lives and many fortunes. We do not talk +about them, perhaps; for they are often so sacred to us, from having touched +into the very quick of our own hearts, as it were, or into those of others who +are dead and gone, and veiled over from human sight, that we cannot tell the +tale as if it was a mere story. But young people should remember that we have +had this solemn experience of life, on which to base our opinions and form our +judgments, so that they are not mere untried theories. I am not alluding to Mr. +Horner just now, for he is nearly as old as I am—within ten years, I dare +say—but I am thinking of Mr. Gray, with his endless plans for some new +thing—schools, education, Sabbaths, and what not. Now he has not seen +what all this leads to.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is a pity he has not heard your ladyship tell the story of poor +Monsieur de Créquy.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not at all a pity, my dear. A young man like him, who, both by position +and age, must have had his experience confined to a very narrow circle, ought +not to set up his opinion against mine; he ought not to require reasons from +me, nor to need such explanation of my arguments (if I condescend to argue), as +going into relation of the circumstances on which my arguments are based in my +own mind, would be.” +</p> + +<p> +“But, my lady, it might convince him,” I said, with perhaps +injudicious perseverance. +</p> + +<p> +“And why should he be convinced?” she asked, with gentle inquiry in +her tone. “He has only to acquiesce. Though he is appointed by Mr. +Croxton, I am the lady of the manor, as he must know. But it is with Mr. Horner +that I must have to do about this unfortunate lad Gregson. I am afraid there +will be no method of making him forget his unlucky knowledge. His poor brains +will be intoxicated with the sense of his powers, without any counterbalancing +principles to guide him. Poor fellow! I am quite afraid it will end in his +being hanged!” +</p> + +<p> +The next day Mr. Horner came to apologize and explain. He was +evidently—as I could tell from his voice, as he spoke to my lady in the +next room—extremely annoyed at her ladyship’s discovery of the +education he had been giving to this boy. My lady spoke with great authority, +and with reasonable grounds of complaint. Mr. Horner was well acquainted with +her thoughts on the subject, and had acted in defiance of her wishes. He +acknowledged as much, and should on no account have done it, in any other +instance, without her leave. +</p> + +<p> +“Which I could never have granted you,” said my lady. +</p> + +<p> +But this boy had extraordinary capabilities; would, in fact, have taught +himself much that was bad, if he had not been rescued, and another direction +given to his powers. And in all Mr. Horner had done, he had had her +ladyship’s service in view. The business was getting almost beyond his +power, so many letters and so much account-keeping was required by the +complicated state in which things were. +</p> + +<p> +Lady Ludlow felt what was coming—a reference to the mortgage for the +benefit of my lord’s Scottish estates, which, she was perfectly aware, +Mr. Horner considered as having been a most unwise proceeding—and she +hastened to observe—“All this may be very true, Mr. Horner, and I +am sure I should be the last person to wish you to overwork or distress +yourself; but of that we will talk another time. What I am now anxious to +remedy is, if possible, the state of this poor little Gregson’s mind. +Would not hard work in the fields be a wholesome and excellent way of enabling +him to forget?” +</p> + +<p> +“I was in hopes, my lady, that you would have permitted me to bring him +up to act as a kind of clerk,” said Mr. Horner, jerking out his project +abruptly. +</p> + +<p> +“A what?” asked my lady, in infinite surprise. +</p> + +<p> +“A kind of—of assistant, in the way of copying letters and doing up +accounts. He is already an excellent penman and very quick at figures.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Horner,” said my lady, with dignity, “the son of a +poacher and vagabond ought never to have been able to copy letters relating to +the Hanbury estates; and, at any rate, he shall not. I wonder how it is that, +knowing the use he has made of his power of reading a letter, you should +venture to propose such an employment for him as would require his being in +your confidence, and you the trusted agent of this family. Why, every secret +(and every ancient and honourable family has its secrets, as you know, Mr. +Horner) would be learnt off by heart, and repeated to the first comer!” +</p> + +<p> +“I should have hoped to have trained him, my lady, to understand the +rules of discretion.” +</p> + +<p> +“Trained! Train a barn-door fowl to be a pheasant, Mr. Horner! That would +be the easier task. But you did right to speak of discretion rather than +honour. Discretion looks to the consequences of actions—honour looks to +the action itself, and is an instinct rather than a virtue. After all, it is +possible you might have trained him to be discreet.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Horner was silent. My lady was softened by his not replying, and began as +she always did in such cases, to fear lest she had been too harsh. I could tell +that by her voice and by her next speech, as well as if I had seen her face. +</p> + +<p> +“But I am sorry you are feeling the pressure of the affairs: I am quite +aware that I have entailed much additional trouble upon you by some of my +measures: I must try and provide you with some suitable assistance. Copying +letters and doing up accounts, I think you said?” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Horner had certainly had a distant idea of turning the little boy, in +process of time, into a clerk; but he had rather urged this possibility of +future usefulness beyond what he had at first intended, in speaking of it to my +lady as a palliation of his offence, and he certainly was very much inclined to +retract his statement that the letter-writing, or any other business, had +increased, or that he was in the slightest want of help of any kind, when my +lady after a pause of consideration, suddenly said— +</p> + +<p> +“I have it. Miss Galindo will, I am sure, be glad to assist you. I will +speak to her myself. The payment we should make to a clerk would be of real +service to her!” +</p> + +<p> +I could hardly help echoing Mr. Horner’s tone of surprise as he +said— +</p> + +<p> +“Miss Galindo!” +</p> + +<p> +For, you must be told who Miss Galindo was; at least, told as much as I know. +Miss Galindo had lived in the village for many years, keeping house on the +smallest possible means, yet always managing to maintain a servant. And this +servant was invariably chosen because she had some infirmity that made her +undesirable to every one else. I believe Miss Galindo had had lame and blind +and hump-backed maids. She had even at one time taken in a girl hopelessly gone +in consumption, because if not she would have had to go to the workhouse, and +not have had enough to eat. Of course the poor creature could not perform a +single duty usually required of a servant, and Miss Galindo herself was both +servant and nurse. +</p> + +<p> +Her present maid was scarcely four feet high, and bore a terrible character for +ill-temper. Nobody but Miss Galindo would have kept her; but, as it was, +mistress and servant squabbled perpetually, and were, at heart, the best of +friends. For it was one of Miss Galindo’s peculiarities to do all manner +of kind and self-denying actions, and to say all manner of provoking things. +Lame, blind, deformed, and dwarf, all came in for scoldings without number: it +was only the consumptive girl that never had heard a sharp word. I don’t +think any of her servants liked her the worse for her peppery temper, and +passionate odd ways, for they knew her real and beautiful kindness of heart: +and, besides, she had so great a turn for humour that very often her speeches +amused as much or more than they irritated; and on the other side, a piece of +witty impudence from her servant would occasionally tickle her so much and so +suddenly, that she would burst out laughing in the middle of her passion. +</p> + +<p> +But the talk about Miss Galindo’s choice and management of her servants +was confined to village gossip, and had never reached my Lady Ludlow’s +ears, though doubtless Mr. Horner was well acquainted with it. What my lady +knew of her amounted to this. It was the custom in those days for the wealthy +ladies of the county to set on foot a repository, as it was called, in the +assize-town. The ostensible manager of this repository was generally a decayed +gentlewoman, a clergyman’s widow, or so forth. She was, however, +controlled by a committee of ladies; and paid by them in proportion to the +amount of goods she sold; and these goods were the small manufactures of ladies +of little or no fortune, whose names, if they chose it, were only signified by +initials. +</p> + +<p> +Poor water-colour drawings, indigo and Indian ink; screens, ornamented with +moss and dried leaves; paintings on velvet, and such faintly ornamental works +were displayed on one side of the shop. It was always reckoned a mark of +characteristic gentility in the repository, to have only common heavy-framed +sash-windows, which admitted very little light, so I never was quite certain of +the merit of these Works of Art as they were entitled. But, on the other side, +where the Useful Work placard was put up, there was a great variety of +articles, of whose unusual excellence every one might judge. Such fine sewing, +and stitching, and button-holing! Such bundles of soft delicate knitted +stockings and socks; and, above all, in Lady Ludlow’s eyes, such hanks of +the finest spun flaxen thread! +</p> + +<p> +And the most delicate dainty work of all was done by Miss Galindo, as Lady +Ludlow very well knew. Yet, for all their fine sewing, it sometimes happened +that Miss Galindo’s patterns were of an old-fashioned kind; and the dozen +nightcaps, maybe, on the materials for which she had expended bonâ-fide +money, and on the making-up, no little time and eyesight, would lie for months +in a yellow neglected heap; and at such times, it was said, Miss Galindo was +more amusing than usual, more full of dry drollery and humour; just as at the +times when an order came in to X. (the initial she had chosen) for a stock of +well-paying things, she sat and stormed at her servant as she stitched away. +She herself explained her practice in this way:— +</p> + +<p> +“When everything goes wrong, one would give up breathing if one could not +lighten ones heart by a joke. But when I’ve to sit still from morning +till night, I must have something to stir my blood, or I should go off into an +apoplexy; so I set to, and quarrel with Sally.” +</p> + +<p> +Such were Miss Galindo’s means and manner of living in her own house. Out +of doors, and in the village, she was not popular, although she would have been +sorely missed had she left the place. But she asked too many home questions +(not to say impertinent) respecting the domestic economies (for even the very +poor liked to spend their bit of money their own way), and would open cupboards +to find out hidden extravagances, and question closely respecting the weekly +amount of butter, till one day she met with what would have been a rebuff to +any other person, but which she rather enjoyed than otherwise. +</p> + +<p> +She was going into a cottage, and in the doorway met the good woman chasing out +a duck, and apparently unconscious of her visitor. +</p> + +<p> +“Get out, Miss Galindo!” she cried, addressing the duck. “Get +out! O, I ask your pardon,” she continued, as if seeing the lady for the +first time. “It’s only that weary duck will come in. Get out Miss +Gal—-” (to the duck). +</p> + +<p> +“And so you call it after me, do you?” inquired her visitor. +</p> + +<p> +“O, yes, ma’am; my master would have it so, for he said, sure +enough the unlucky bird was always poking herself where she was not +wanted.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ha, ha! very good! And so your master is a wit, is he? Well! tell him to +come up and speak to me to-night about my parlour chimney, for there is no one +like him for chimney doctoring.” +</p> + +<p> +And the master went up, and was so won over by Miss Galindo’s merry ways, +and sharp insight into the mysteries of his various kinds of business (he was a +mason, chimney-sweeper, and ratcatcher), that he came home and abused his wife +the next time she called the duck the name by which he himself had christened +her. +</p> + +<p> +But odd as Miss Galindo was in general, she could be as well-bred a lady as any +one when she chose. And choose she always did when my Lady Ludlow was by. +Indeed, I don’t know the man, woman, or child, that did not instinctively +turn out its best side to her ladyship. So she had no notion of the qualities +which, I am sure, made Mr. Horner think that Miss Galindo would be most +unmanageable as a clerk, and heartily wish that the idea had never come into my +lady’s head. But there it was; and he had annoyed her ladyship already +more than he liked to-day, so he could not directly contradict her, but only +urge difficulties which he hoped might prove insuperable. But every one of them +Lady Ludlow knocked down. Letters to copy? Doubtless. Miss Galindo could come +up to the Hall; she should have a room to herself; she wrote a beautiful hand; +and writing would save her eyesight. “Capability with regard to +accounts?” My lady would answer for that too; and for more than Mr. +Horner seemed to think it necessary to inquire about. Miss Galindo was by birth +and breeding a lady of the strictest honour, and would, if possible, forget the +substance of any letters that passed through her hands; at any rate, no one +would ever hear of them again from her. “Remuneration?” Oh! as for +that, Lady Ludlow would herself take care that it was managed in the most +delicate manner possible. She would send to invite Miss Galindo to tea at the +Hall that very afternoon, if Mr. Horner would only give her ladyship the +slightest idea of the average length of time that my lady was to request Miss +Galindo to sacrifice to her daily. “Three hours! Very well.” Mr. +Horner looked very grave as he passed the windows of the room where I lay. I +don’t think he liked the idea of Miss Galindo as a clerk. +</p> + +<p> +Lady Ludlow’s invitations were like royal commands. Indeed, the village +was too quiet to allow the inhabitants to have many evening engagements of any +kind. Now and then, Mr. and Mrs. Horner gave a tea and supper to the principal +tenants and their wives, to which the clergyman was invited, and Miss Galindo, +Mrs. Medlicott, and one or two other spinsters and widows. The glory of the +supper-table on these occasions was invariably furnished by her ladyship: it +was a cold roasted peacock, with his tail stuck out as if in life. Mrs. +Medlicott would take up the whole morning arranging the feathers in the proper +semicircle, and was always pleased with the wonder and admiration it excited. +It was considered a due reward and fitting compliment to her exertions that Mr. +Horner always took her in to supper, and placed her opposite to the magnificent +dish, at which she sweetly smiled all the time they were at table. But since +Mrs. Horner had had the paralytic stroke these parties had been given up; and +Miss Galindo wrote a note to Lady Ludlow in reply to her invitation, saying +that she was entirely disengaged, and would have great pleasure in doing +herself the honour of waiting upon her ladyship. +</p> + +<p> +Whoever visited my lady took their meals with her, sitting on the dais, in the +presence of all my former companions. So I did not see Miss Galindo until some +time after tea; as the young gentlewomen had had to bring her their sewing and +spinning, to hear the remarks of so competent a judge. At length her ladyship +brought her visitor into the room where I lay,—it was one of my bad days, +I remember,—in order to have her little bit of private conversation. Miss +Galindo was dressed in her best gown, I am sure, but I had never seen anything +like it except in a picture, it was so old-fashioned. She wore a white muslin +apron, delicately embroidered, and put on a little crookedly, in order, as she +told us, even Lady Ludlow, before the evening was over, to conceal a spot +whence the colour had been discharged by a lemon-stain. This crookedness had an +odd effect, especially when I saw that it was intentional; indeed, she was so +anxious about her apron’s right adjustment in the wrong place, that she +told us straight out why she wore it so, and asked her ladyship if the spot was +properly hidden, at the same time lifting up her apron and showing her how +large it was. +</p> + +<p> +“When my father was alive, I always took his right arm, so, and used to +remove any spotted or discoloured breadths to the left side, if it was a +walking-dress. That’s the convenience of a gentleman. But widows and +spinsters must do what they can. Ah, my dear (to me)! when you are reckoning up +the blessings in your lot,—though you may think it a hard one in some +respects,—don’t forget how little your stockings want darning, as +you are obliged to lie down so much! I would rather knit two pairs of stockings +than darn one, any day.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you been doing any of your beautiful knitting lately?” asked +my lady, who had now arranged Miss Galindo in the pleasantest chair, and taken +her own little wicker-work one, and, having her work in her hands, was ready to +try and open the subject. +</p> + +<p> +“No, and alas! your ladyship. It is partly the hot weather’s fault, +for people seem to forget that winter must come; and partly, I suppose, that +every one is stocked who has the money to pay four-and-sixpence a pair for +stockings.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then may I ask if you have any time in your active days at +liberty?” said my lady, drawing a little nearer to her proposal, which I +fancy she found it a little awkward to make. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, the village keeps me busy, your ladyship, when I have neither +knitting or sewing to do. You know I took X. for my letter at the repository, +because it stands for Xantippe, who was a great scold in old times, as I have +learnt. But I’m sure I don’t know how the world would get on +without scolding, your ladyship. It would go to sleep, and the sun would stand +still.” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t think I could bear to scold, Miss Galindo,” said her +ladyship, smiling. +</p> + +<p> +“No! because your ladyship has people to do it for you. Begging your +pardon, my lady, it seems to me the generality of people may be divided into +saints, scolds, and sinners. Now, your ladyship is a saint, because you have a +sweet and holy nature, in the first place; and have people to do your anger and +vexation for you, in the second place. And Jonathan Walker is a sinner, because +he is sent to prison. But here am I, half way, having but a poor kind of +disposition at best, and yet hating sin, and all that leads to it, such as +wasting, and extravagance, and gossiping,—and yet all this lies right +under my nose in the village, and I am not saint enough to be vexed at it; and +so I scold. And though I had rather be a saint, yet I think I do good in my +way.” +</p> + +<p> +“No doubt you do, dear Miss Galindo,” said Lady Ludlow. “But +I am sorry to hear that there is so much that is bad going on in the +village,—very sorry.” +</p> + +<p> +“O, your ladyship! then I am sorry I brought it out. It was only by way +of saying, that when I have no particular work to do at home, I take a turn +abroad, and set my neighbours to rights, just by way of steering clear of +Satan. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +For Satan finds some mischief still<br /> +For idle hands to do, +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +you know, my lady.” +</p> + +<p> +There was no leading into the subject by delicate degrees, for Miss Galindo was +evidently so fond of talking, that, if asked a question, she made her answer so +long, that before she came to an end of it, she had wandered far away from the +original starting point. So Lady Ludlow plunged at once into what she had to +say. +</p> + +<p> +“Miss Galindo, I have a great favour to ask of you.” +</p> + +<p> +“My lady, I wish I could tell you what a pleasure it is to hear you say +so,” replied Miss Galindo, almost with tears in her eyes; so glad were we +all to do anything for her ladyship, which could be called a free service and +not merely a duty. +</p> + +<p> +“It is this. Mr. Horner tells me that the business-letters, relating to +the estate, are multiplying so much that he finds it impossible to copy them +all himself, and I therefore require the services of some confidential and +discreet person to copy these letters, and occasionally to go through certain +accounts. Now, there is a very pleasant little sitting-room very near to Mr. +Horner’s office (you know Mr. Horner’s office—on the other +side of the stone hall?), and if I could prevail upon you to come here to +breakfast and afterwards sit there for three hours every morning, Mr. Horner +should bring or send you the papers—” +</p> + +<p> +Lady Ludlow stopped. Miss Galindo’s countenance had fallen. There was +some great obstacle in her mind to her wish for obliging Lady Ludlow. +</p> + +<p> +“What would Sally do?” she asked at length. Lady Ludlow had not a +notion who Sally was. Nor if she had had a notion, would she have had a +conception of the perplexities that poured into Miss Galindo’s mind, at +the idea of leaving her rough forgetful dwarf without the perpetual monitorship +of her mistress. Lady Ludlow, accustomed to a household where everything went +on noiselessly, perfectly, and by clockwork, conducted by a number of +highly-paid, well-chosen, and accomplished servants, had not a conception of +the nature of the rough material from which her servants came. Besides, in her +establishment, so that the result was good, no one inquired if the small +economies had been observed in the production. Whereas every penny—every +halfpenny, was of consequence to Miss Galindo; and visions of squandered drops +of milk and wasted crusts of bread filled her mind with dismay. But she +swallowed all her apprehensions down, out of her regard for Lady Ludlow, and +desire to be of service to her. No one knows how great a trial it was to her +when she thought of Sally, unchecked and unscolded for three hours every +morning. But all she said was— +</p> + +<p> +“‘Sally, go to the Deuce.’ I beg your pardon, my lady, if I +was talking to myself; it’s a habit I have got into of keeping my tongue +in practice, and I am not quite aware when I do it. Three hours every morning! +I shall be only too proud to do what I can for your ladyship; and I hope Mr. +Horner will not be too impatient with me at first. You know, perhaps, that I +was nearly being an authoress once, and that seems as if I was destined to +‘employ my time in writing.’” +</p> + +<p> +“No, indeed; we must return to the subject of the clerkship afterwards, +if you please. An authoress, Miss Galindo! You surprise me!” +</p> + +<p> +“But, indeed, I was. All was quite ready. Doctor Burney used to teach me +music: not that I ever could learn, but it was a fancy of my poor +father’s. And his daughter wrote a book, and they said she was but a very +young lady, and nothing but a music-master’s daughter; so why should not +I try?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well! I got paper and half-a-hundred good pens, a bottle of ink, all +ready—” +</p> + +<p> +“And then—” +</p> + +<p> +“O, it ended in my having nothing to say, when I sat down to write. But +sometimes, when I get hold of a book, I wonder why I let such a poor reason +stop me. It does not others.” +</p> + +<p> +“But I think it was very well it did, Miss Galindo,” said her +ladyship. “I am extremely against women usurping men’s employments, +as they are very apt to do. But perhaps, after all, the notion of writing a +book improved your hand. It is one of the most legible I ever saw.” +</p> + +<p> +“I despise z’s without tails,” said Miss Galindo, with a good +deal of gratified pride at my lady’s praise. Presently, my lady took her +to look at a curious old cabinet, which Lord Ludlow had picked up at the Hague; +and while they were out of the room on this errand, I suppose the question of +remuneration was settled, for I heard no more of it. +</p> + +<p> +When they came back, they were talking of Mr. Gray. Miss Galindo was unsparing +in her expressions of opinion about him: going much farther than my +lady—in her language, at least. +</p> + +<p> +“A little blushing man like him, who can’t say bo to a goose +without hesitating and colouring, to come to this village—which is as +good a village as ever lived—and cry us down for a set of sinners, as if +we had all committed murder and that other thing!—I have no patience with +him, my lady. And then, how is he to help us to heaven, by teaching us our, a +b, ab—b a, ba? And yet, by all accounts, that’s to save poor +children’s souls. O, I knew your ladyship would agree with me. I am sure +my mother was as good a creature as ever breathed the blessed air; and if +she’s not gone to heaven I don’t want to go there; and she could +not spell a letter decently. And does Mr. Gray think God took note of +that?” +</p> + +<p> +“I was sure you would agree with me, Miss Galindo,” said my lady. +“You and I can remember how this talk about education—Rousseau, and +his writings—stirred up the French people to their Reign of Terror, and +all those bloody scenes.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m afraid that Rousseau and Mr. Gray are birds of a +feather,” replied Miss Galindo, shaking her head. “And yet there is +some good in the young man too. He sat up all night with Billy Davis, when his +wife was fairly worn out with nursing him.” +</p> + +<p> +“Did he, indeed!” said my lady, her face lighting up, as it always +did when she heard of any kind or generous action, no matter who performed it. +“What a pity he is bitten with these new revolutionary ideas, and is so +much for disturbing the established order of society!” +</p> + +<p> +When Miss Galindo went, she left so favourable an impression of her visit on my +lady, that she said to me with a pleased smile— +</p> + +<p> +“I think I have provided Mr. Horner with a far better clerk than he would +have made of that lad Gregson in twenty years. And I will send the lad to my +lord’s grieve, in Scotland, that he may be kept out of harm’s +way.” +</p> + +<p> +But something happened to the lad before this purpose could be accomplished. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER X.</h2> + +<p> +The next morning, Miss Galindo made her appearance, and, by some mistake, +unusual to my lady’s well-trained servants, was shown into the room where +I was trying to walk; for a certain amount of exercise was prescribed for me, +painful although the exertion had become. +</p> + +<p> +She brought a little basket along with her and while the footman was gone to +inquire my lady’s wishes (for I don’t think that Lady Ludlow +expected Miss Galindo so soon to assume her clerkship; nor, indeed, had Mr. +Horner any work of any kind ready for his new assistant to do), she launched +out into conversation with me. +</p> + +<p> +“It was a sudden summons, my dear! However, as I have often said to +myself, ever since an occasion long ago, if Lady Ludlow ever honours me by +asking for my right hand, I’ll cut it off, and wrap the stump up so +tidily she shall never find out it bleeds. But, if I had had a little more +time, I could have mended my pens better. You see, I have had to sit up pretty +late to get these sleeves made”—and she took out of her basket a +pail of brown-holland over-sleeves, very much such as a grocer’s +apprentice wears—“and I had only time to make seven or eight pens, +out of some quills Farmer Thomson gave me last autumn. As for ink, I’m +thankful to say, that’s always ready; an ounce of steel filings, an ounce +of nut-gall, and a pint of water (tea, if you’re extravagant, which, +thank Heaven! I’m not), put all in a bottle, and hang it up behind the +house door, so that the whole gets a good shaking every time you slam it +to—and even if you are in a passion and bang it, as Sally and I often do, +it is all the better for it—and there’s my ink ready for use; ready +to write my lady’s will with, if need be.” +</p> + +<p> +“O, Miss Galindo!” said I, “don’t talk so my +lady’s will! and she not dead yet.” +</p> + +<p> +“And if she were, what would be the use of talking of making her will? +Now, if you were Sally, I should say, ‘Answer me that, you goose!’ +But, as you’re a relation of my lady’s, I must be civil, and only +say, ‘I can’t think how you can talk so like a fool!’ To be +sure, poor thing, you’re lame!” +</p> + +<p> +I do not know how long she would have gone on; but my lady came in, and I, +released from my duty of entertaining Miss Galindo, made my limping way into +the next room. To tell the truth, I was rather afraid of Miss Galindo’s +tongue, for I never knew what she would say next. +</p> + +<p> +After a while my lady came, and began to look in the bureau for something: and +as she looked she said—“I think Mr. Horner must have made some +mistake, when he said he had so much work that he almost required a clerk, for +this morning he cannot find anything for Miss Galindo to do; and there she is, +sitting with her pen behind her ear, waiting for something to write. I am come +to find her my mother’s letters, for I should like to have a fair copy +made of them. O, here they are: don’t trouble yourself, my dear +child.” +</p> + +<p> +When my lady returned again, she sat down and began to talk of Mr. Gray. +</p> + +<p> +“Miss Galindo says she saw him going to hold a prayer-meeting in a +cottage. Now that really makes me unhappy, it is so like what Mr. Wesley used +to do in my younger days; and since then we have had rebellion in the American +colonies and the French Revolution. You may depend upon it, my dear, making +religion and education common—vulgarising them, as it were—is a bad +thing for a nation. A man who hears prayers read in the cottage where he has +just supped on bread and bacon, forgets the respect due to a church: he begins +to think that one place is as good as another, and, by-and-by, that one person +is as good as another; and after that, I always find that people begin to talk +of their rights, instead of thinking of their duties. I wish Mr. Gray had been +more tractable, and had left well alone. What do you think I heard this +morning? Why that the Home Hill estate, which niches into the Hanbury property, +was bought by a Baptist baker from Birmingham!” +</p> + +<p> +“A Baptist baker!” I exclaimed. I had never seen a Dissenter, to my +knowledge; but, having always heard them spoken of with horror, I looked upon +them almost as if they were rhinoceroses. I wanted to see a live Dissenter, I +believe, and yet I wished it were over. I was almost surprised when I heard +that any of them were engaged in such peaceful occupations as baking. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes! so Mr. Horner tells me. A Mr. Lambe, I believe. But, at any rate, +he is a Baptist, and has been in trade. What with his schismatism and Mr. +Gray’s methodism, I am afraid all the primitive character of this place +will vanish.” +</p> + +<p> +From what I could hear, Mr. Gray seemed to be taking his own way; at any rate, +more than he had done when he first came to the village, when his natural +timidity had made him defer to my lady, and seek her consent and sanction +before embarking in any new plan. But newness was a quality Lady Ludlow +especially disliked. Even in the fashions of dress and furniture, she clung to +the old, to the modes which had prevailed when she was young; and though she +had a deep personal regard for Queen Charlotte (to whom, as I have already +said, she had been maid-of-honour), yet there was a tinge of Jacobitism about +her, such as made her extremely dislike to hear Prince Charles Edward called +the young Pretender, as many loyal people did in those days, and made her fond +of telling of the thorn-tree in my lord’s park in Scotland, which had +been planted by bonny Queen Mary herself, and before which every guest in the +Castle of Monkshaven was expected to stand bare-headed, out of respect to the +memory and misfortunes of the royal planter. +</p> + +<p> +We might play at cards, if we so chose, on a Sunday; at least, I suppose we +might, for my lady and Mr. Mountford used to do so often when I first went. But +we must neither play cards, nor read, nor sew on the fifth of November and on +the thirtieth of January, but must go to church, and meditate all the rest of +the day—and very hard work meditating was. I would far rather have +scoured a room. That was the reason, I suppose, why a passive life was seen to +be better discipline for me than an active one. +</p> + +<p> +But I am wandering away from my lady, and her dislike to all innovation. Now, +it seemed to me, as far as I heard, that Mr. Gray was full of nothing but new +things, and that what he first did was to attack all our established +institutions, both in the village and the parish, and also in the nation. To be +sure, I heard of his ways of going on principally from Miss Galindo, who was +apt to speak more strongly than accurately. +</p> + +<p> +“There he goes,” she said, “clucking up the children just +like an old hen, and trying to teach them about their salvation and their +souls, and I don’t know what—things that it is just blasphemy to +speak about out of church. And he potters old people about reading their +Bibles. I am sure I don’t want to speak disrespectfully about the Holy +Scriptures, but I found old Job Horton busy reading his Bible yesterday. Says +I, ‘What are you reading, and where did you get it, and who gave it +you?’ So he made answer, ‘That he was reading Susannah and the +Elders, for that he had read Bel and the Dragon till he could pretty near say +it off by heart, and they were two as pretty stories as ever he had read, and +that it was a caution to him what bad old chaps there were in the world.’ +Now, as Job is bedridden, I don’t think he is likely to meet with the +Elders, and I say that I think repeating his Creed, the Commandments, and the +Lord’s Prayer, and, maybe, throwing in a verse of the Psalms, if he +wanted a bit of a change, would have done him far more good than his pretty +stories, as he called them. And what’s the next thing our young parson +does? Why he tries to make us all feel pitiful for the black slaves, and leaves +little pictures of negroes about, with the question printed below, ‘Am I +not a man and a brother?’ just as if I was to be hail-fellow-well-met +with every negro footman. They do say he takes no sugar in his tea, because he +thinks he sees spots of blood in it. Now I call that superstition.” +</p> + +<p> +The next day it was a still worse story. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, my dear! and how are you? My lady sent me in to sit a bit with +you, while Mr. Horner looks out some papers for me to copy. Between ourselves, +Mr. Steward Horner does not like having me for a clerk. It is all very well he +does not; for, if he were decently civil to me, I might want a chaperone, you +know, now poor Mrs. Horner is dead.” This was one of Miss Galindo’s +grim jokes. “As it is, I try to make him forget I’m a woman, I do +everything as ship-shape as a masculine man-clerk. I see he can’t find a +fault—writing good, spelling correct, sums all right. And then he squints +up at me with the tail of his eye, and looks glummer than ever, just because +I’m a woman—as if I could help that. I have gone good lengths to +set his mind at ease. I have stuck my pen behind my ear, I have made him a bow +instead of a curtsey, I have whistled—not a tune I can’t pipe up +that—nay, if you won’t tell my lady, I don’t mind telling you +that I have said ‘Confound it!’ and ‘Zounds!’ I +can’t get any farther. For all that, Mr. Horner won’t forget I am a +lady, and so I am not half the use I might be, and if it were not to please my +Lady Ludlow, Mr. Horner and his books might go hang (see how natural that came +out!). And there is an order for a dozen nightcaps for a bride, and I am so +afraid I shan’t have time to do them. Worst of all, there’s Mr. +Gray taking advantage of my absence to seduce Sally!” +</p> + +<p> +“To seduce Sally! Mr. Gray!” +</p> + +<p> +“Pooh, pooh, child! There’s many a kind of seduction. Mr. Gray is +seducing Sally to want to go to church. There has he been twice at my house, +while I have been away in the mornings, talking to Sally about the state of her +soul and that sort of thing. But when I found the meat all roasted to a cinder, +I said, ‘Come, Sally, let’s have no more praying when beef is down +at the fire. Pray at six o’clock in the morning and nine at night, and I +won’t hinder you.’ So she sauced me, and said something about +Martha and Mary, implying that, because she had let the beef get so overdone +that I declare I could hardly find a bit for Nancy Pole’s sick +grandchild, she had chosen the better part. I was very much put about, I own, +and perhaps you’ll be shocked at what I said—indeed, I don’t +know if it was right myself—but I told her I had a soul as well as she, +and if it was to be saved by my sitting still and thinking about salvation and +never doing my duty, I thought I had as good a right as she had to be Mary, and +save my soul. So, that afternoon I sat quite still, and it was really a +comfort, for I am often too busy, I know, to pray as I ought. There is first +one person wanting me, and then another, and the house and the food and the +neighbours to see after. So, when tea-time comes, there enters my maid with her +hump on her back, and her soul to be saved. ‘Please, ma’am, did you +order the pound of butter?’—‘No, Sally,’ I said, +shaking my head, ‘this morning I did not go round by Hale’s farm, +and this afternoon I have been employed in spiritual things.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Now, our Sally likes tea and bread-and-butter above everything, and dry +bread was not to her taste. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I’m thankful,’ said the impudent hussy, ‘that +you have taken a turn towards godliness. It will be my prayers, I trust, +that’s given it you.’ +</p> + +<p> +“I was determined not to give her an opening towards the carnal subject +of butter, so she lingered still, longing to ask leave to run for it. But I +gave her none, and munched my dry bread myself, thinking what a famous cake I +could make for little Ben Pole with the bit of butter we were saving; and when +Sally had had her butterless tea, and was in none of the best of tempers +because Martha had not bethought herself of the butter, I just quietly +said— +</p> + +<p> +“‘Now, Sally, to-morrow we’ll try to hash that beef well, and +to remember the butter, and to work out our salvation all at the same time, for +I don’t see why it can’t all be done, as God has set us to do it +all.’ But I heard her at it again about Mary and Martha, and I have no +doubt that Mr. Gray will teach her to consider me a lost sheep.” +</p> + +<p> +I had heard so many little speeches about Mr. Gray from one person or another, +all speaking against him, as a mischief-maker, a setter-up of new doctrines, +and of a fanciful standard of life (and you may be sure that, where Lady Ludlow +led, Mrs. Medlicott and Adams were certain to follow, each in their different +ways showing the influence my lady had over them), that I believe I had grown +to consider him as a very instrument of evil, and to expect to perceive in his +face marks of his presumption, and arrogance, and impertinent interference. It +was now many weeks since I had seen him, and when he was one morning shown into +the blue drawing-room (into which I had been removed for a change), I was quite +surprised to see how innocent and awkward a young man he appeared, confused +even more than I was at our unexpected tête-à-tête. He +looked thinner, his eyes more eager, his expression more anxious, and his +colour came and went more than it had done when I had seen him last. I tried to +make a little conversation, as I was, to my own surprise, more at my ease than +he was; but his thoughts were evidently too much preoccupied for him to do more +than answer me with monosyllables. +</p> + +<p> +Presently my lady came in. Mr. Gray twitched and coloured more than ever; but +plunged into the middle of his subject at once. +</p> + +<p> +“My lady, I cannot answer it to my conscience, if I allow the children of +this village to go on any longer the little heathens that they are. I must do +something to alter their condition. I am quite aware that your ladyship +disapproves of many of the plans which have suggested themselves to me; but +nevertheless I must do something, and I am come now to your ladyship to ask +respectfully, but firmly, what you would advise me to do.” +</p> + +<p> +His eyes were dilated, and I could almost have said they were full of tears +with his eagerness. But I am sure it is a bad plan to remind people of decided +opinions which they have once expressed, if you wish them to modify those +opinions. Now, Mr. Gray had done this with my lady; and though I do not mean to +say she was obstinate, yet she was not one to retract. +</p> + +<p> +She was silent for a moment or two before she replied. +</p> + +<p> +“You ask me to suggest a remedy for an evil of the existence of which I +am not conscious,” was her answer—very coldly, very gently given. +“In Mr. Mountford’s time I heard no such complaints: whenever I see +the village children (and they are not unfrequent visitors at this house, on +one pretext or another), they are well and decently behaved.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, madam, you cannot judge,” he broke in. “They are trained +to respect you in word and deed; you are the highest they ever look up to; they +have no notion of a higher.” +</p> + +<p> +“Nay, Mr. Gray,” said my lady, smiling, “they are as loyally +disposed as any children can be. They come up here every fourth of June, and +drink his Majesty’s health, and have buns, and (as Margaret Dawson can +testify) they take a great and respectful interest in all the pictures I can +show them of the royal family.” +</p> + +<p> +“But, madam, I think of something higher than any earthly +dignities.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady coloured at the mistake she had made; for she herself was truly pious. +Yet when she resumed the subject, it seemed to me as if her tone was a little +sharper than before. +</p> + +<p> +“Such want of reverence is, I should say, the clergyman’s fault. +You must excuse me, Mr. Gray, if I speak plainly.” +</p> + +<p> +“My Lady, I want plain-speaking. I myself am not accustomed to those +ceremonies and forms which are, I suppose, the etiquette in your +ladyship’s rank of life, and which seem to hedge you in from any power of +mine to touch you. Among those with whom I have passed my life hitherto, it has +been the custom to speak plainly out what we have felt earnestly. So, instead +of needing any apology from your ladyship for straightforward speaking, I will +meet what you say at once, and admit that it is the clergyman’s fault, in +a great measure, when the children of his parish swear, and curse, and are +brutal, and ignorant of all saving grace; nay, some of them of the very name of +God. And because this guilt of mine, as the clergyman of this parish, lies +heavy on my soul, and every day leads but from bad to worse, till I am utterly +bewildered how to do good to children who escape from me as if I were a +monster, and who are growing up to be men fit for and capable of any crime, but +those requiring wit or sense, I come to you, who seem to me all-powerful, as +far as material power goes—for your ladyship only knows the surface of +things, and barely that, that pass in your village—to help me with +advice, and such outward help as you can give.” +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Gray had stood up and sat down once or twice while he had been speaking, in +an agitated, nervous kind of way, and now he was interrupted by a violent fit +of coughing, after which he trembled all over. +</p> + +<p> +My lady rang for a glass of water, and looked much distressed. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Gray,” said she, “I am sure you are not well; and that +makes you exaggerate childish faults into positive evils. It is always the case +with us when we are not strong in health. I hear of your exerting yourself in +every direction: you overwork yourself, and the consequence is, that you +imagine us all worse people than we are.” +</p> + +<p> +And my lady smiled very kindly and pleasantly at him, as he sat, a little +panting, a little flushed, trying to recover his breath. I am sure that now +they were brought face to face, she had quite forgotten all the offence she had +taken at his doings when she heard of them from others; and, indeed, it was +enough to soften any one’s heart to see that young, almost boyish face, +looking in such anxiety and distress. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, my lady, what shall I do?” he asked, as soon as he could +recover breath, and with such an air of humility, that I am sure no one who had +seen it could have ever thought him conceited again. “The evil of this +world is too strong for me. I can do so little. It is all in vain. It was only +to-day—” and again the cough and agitation returned. +</p> + +<p> +“My dear Mr. Gray,” said my lady (the day before I could never have +believed she could have called him My dear), “you must take the advice of +an old woman about yourself. You are not fit to do anything just now but attend +to your own health: rest, and see a doctor (but, indeed, I will take care of +that), and when you are pretty strong again, you will find that you have been +magnifying evils to yourself.” +</p> + +<p> +“But, my lady, I cannot rest. The evils do exist, and the burden of their +continuance lies on my shoulders. I have no place to gather the children +together in, that I may teach them the things necessary to salvation. The rooms +in my own house are too small; but I have tried them. I have money of my own; +and, as your ladyship knows, I tried to get a piece of leasehold property, on +which to build a school-house at my own expense. Your ladyship’s lawyer +comes forward, at your instructions, to enforce some old feudal right, by which +no building is allowed on leasehold property without the sanction of the lady +of the manor. It may be all very true; but it was a cruel thing to +do,—that is, if your ladyship had known (which I am sure you do not) the +real moral and spiritual state of my poor parishioners. And now I come to you +to know what I am to do. Rest! I cannot rest, while children whom I could +possibly save are being left in their ignorance, their blasphemy, their +uncleanness, their cruelty. It is known through the village that your ladyship +disapproves of my efforts, and opposes all my plans. If you think them wrong, +foolish, ill-digested (I have been a student, living in a college, and +eschewing all society but that of pious men, until now: I may not judge for the +best, in my ignorance of this sinful human nature), tell me of better plans and +wiser projects for accomplishing my end; but do not bid me rest, with Satan +compassing me round, and stealing souls away.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Gray,” said my lady, “there may be some truth in what +you have said. I do not deny it, though I think, in your present state of +indisposition and excitement, you exaggerate it much. I believe—nay, the +experience of a pretty long life has convinced me—that education is a bad +thing, if given indiscriminately. It unfits the lower orders for their duties, +the duties to which they are called by God; of submission to those placed in +authority over them; of contentment with that state of life to which it has +pleased God to call them, and of ordering themselves lowly and reverently to +all their betters. I have made this conviction of mine tolerably evident to +you; and I have expressed distinctly my disapprobation of some of your ideas. +You may imagine, then, that I was not well pleased when I found that you had +taken a rood or more of Farmer Hale’s land, and were laying the +foundations of a school-house. You had done this without asking for my +permission, which, as Farmer Hale’s liege lady, ought to have been +obtained legally, as well as asked for out of courtesy. I put a stop to what I +believed to be calculated to do harm to a village, to a population in which, to +say the least of it, I may be disposed to take as much interest as you can do. +How can reading, and writing, and the multiplication-table (if you choose to go +so far) prevent blasphemy, and uncleanness, and cruelty? Really, Mr. Gray, I +hardly like to express myself so strongly on the subject in your present state +of health, as I should do at any other time. It seems to me that books do +little; character much; and character is not formed from books.” +</p> + +<p> +“I do not think of character: I think of souls. I must get some hold upon +these children, or what will become of them in the next world? I must be found +to have some power beyond what they have, and which they are rendered capable +of appreciating, before they will listen to me. At present physical force is +all they look up to; and I have none.” +</p> + +<p> +“Nay, Mr. Gray, by your own admission, they look up to me.” +</p> + +<p> +“They would not do anything your ladyship disliked if it was likely to +come to your knowledge; but if they could conceal it from you, the knowledge of +your dislike to a particular line of conduct would never make them cease from +pursuing it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Gray”—surprise in her air, and some little +indignation—“they and their fathers have lived on the Hanbury lands +for generations!” +</p> + +<p> +“I cannot help it, madam. I am telling you the truth, whether you believe +me or not.” There was a pause; my lady looked perplexed, and somewhat +ruffled; Mr. Gray as though hopeless and wearied out. “Then, my +lady,” said he, at last, rising as he spoke, “you can suggest +nothing to ameliorate the state of things which, I do assure you, does exist on +your lands, and among your tenants. Surely, you will not object to my using +Farmer Hale’s great barn every Sabbath? He will allow me the use of it, +if your ladyship will grant your permission.” +</p> + +<p> +“You are not fit for any extra work at present,” (and indeed he had +been coughing very much all through the conversation). “Give me time to +consider of it. Tell me what you wish to teach. You will be able to take care +of your health, and grow stronger while I consider. It shall not be the worse +for you, if you leave it in my hands for a time.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady spoke very kindly; but he was in too excited a state to recognize the +kindness, while the idea of delay was evidently a sore irritation. I heard him +say: “And I have so little time in which to do my work. Lord! lay not +this sin to my charge.” +</p> + +<p> +But my lady was speaking to the old butler, for whom, at her sign, I had rung +the bell some little time before. Now she turned round. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Gray, I find I have some bottles of Malmsey, of the vintage of +seventeen hundred and seventy-eight, yet left. Malmsey, as perhaps you know, +used to be considered a specific for coughs arising from weakness. You must +permit me to send you half a dozen bottles, and, depend upon it, you will take +a more cheerful view of life and its duties before you have finished them, +especially if you will be so kind as to see Dr. Trevor, who is coming to see me +in the course of the week. By the time you are strong enough to work, I will +try and find some means of preventing the children from using such bad +language, and otherwise annoying you.” +</p> + +<p> +“My lady, it is the sin, and not the annoyance. I wish I could make you +understand.” He spoke with some impatience; Poor fellow! he was too weak, +exhausted, and nervous. “I am perfectly well; I can set to work +to-morrow; I will do anything not to be oppressed with the thought of how +little I am doing. I do not want your wine. Liberty to act in the manner I +think right, will do me far more good. But it is of no use. It is preordained +that I am to be nothing but a cumberer of the ground. I beg your +ladyship’s pardon for this call.” +</p> + +<p> +He stood up, and then turned dizzy. My lady looked on, deeply hurt, and not a +little offended, he held out his hand to her, and I could see that she had a +little hesitation before she took it. He then saw me, I almost think, for the +first time; and put out his hand once more, drew it back, as if undecided, put +it out again, and finally took hold of mine for an instant in his damp, +listless hand, and was gone. +</p> + +<p> +Lady Ludlow was dissatisfied with both him and herself, I was sure. Indeed, I +was dissatisfied with the result of the interview myself. But my lady was not +one to speak out her feelings on the subject; nor was I one to forget myself, +and begin on a topic which she did not begin. She came to me, and was very +tender with me; so tender, that that, and the thoughts of Mr. Gray’s +sick, hopeless, disappointed look, nearly made me cry. +</p> + +<p> +“You are tired, little one,” said my lady. “Go and lie down +in my room, and hear what Medlicott and I can decide upon in the way of +strengthening dainties for that poor young man, who is killing himself with his +over-sensitive conscientiousness.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, my lady!” said I, and then I stopped. +</p> + +<p> +“Well. What?” asked she. +</p> + +<p> +“If you would but let him have Farmer Hale’s barn at once, it would +do him more good than all.” +</p> + +<p> +“Pooh, pooh, child!” though I don’t think she was displeased, +“he is not fit for more work just now. I shall go and write for Dr. +Trevor.” +</p> + +<p> +And for the next half-hour, we did nothing but arrange physical comforts and +cures for poor Mr. Gray. At the end of the time, Mrs. Medlicott said— +</p> + +<p> +“Has your ladyship heard that Harry Gregson has fallen from a tree, and +broken his thigh-bone, and is like to be a cripple for life?” +</p> + +<p> +“Harry Gregson! That black-eyed lad who read my letter? It all comes from +over-education!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER XI.</h2> + +<p> +But I don’t see how my lady could think it was over-education that made +Harry Gregson break his thigh, for the manner in which he met with the accident +was this:— +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Horner, who had fallen sadly out of health since his wife’s death, +had attached himself greatly to Harry Gregson. Now, Mr. Horner had a cold +manner to every one, and never spoke more than was necessary, at the best of +times. And, latterly, it had not been the best of times with him. I dare say, +he had had some causes for anxiety (of which I knew nothing) about my +lady’s affairs; and he was evidently annoyed by my lady’s whim (as +he once inadvertently called it) of placing Miss Galindo under him in the +position of a clerk. Yet he had always been friends, in his quiet way, with +Miss Galindo, and she devoted herself to her new occupation with diligence and +punctuality, although more than once she had moaned to me over the orders for +needlework which had been sent to her, and which, owing to her occupation in +the service of Lady Ludlow, she had been unable to fulfil. +</p> + +<p> +The only living creature to whom the staid Mr. Horner could be said to be +attached, was Harry Gregson. To my lady he was a faithful and devoted servant, +looking keenly after her interests, and anxious to forward them at any cost of +trouble to himself. But the more shrewd Mr. Horner was, the more probability +was there of his being annoyed at certain peculiarities of opinion which my +lady held with a quiet, gentle pertinacity; against which no arguments, based +on mere worldly and business calculations, made any way. This frequent +opposition to views which Mr. Horner entertained, although it did not interfere +with the sincere respect which the lady and the steward felt for each other, +yet prevented any warmer feeling of affection from coming in. It seems strange +to say it, but I must repeat it—the only person for whom, since his +wife’s death, Mr. Horner seemed to feel any love, was the little imp +Harry Gregson, with his bright, watchful eyes, his tangled hair hanging right +down to his eyebrows, for all the world like a Skye terrier. This lad, half +gipsy and whole poacher, as many people esteemed him, hung about the silent, +respectable, staid Mr. Horner, and followed his steps with something of the +affectionate fidelity of the dog which he resembled. I suspect, this +demonstration of attachment to his person on Harry Gregson’s part was +what won Mr. Horner’s regard. In the first instance, the steward had only +chosen the lad out as the cleverest instrument he could find for his purpose; +and I don’t mean to say that, if Harry had not been almost as shrewd as +Mr. Horner himself was, both by original disposition and subsequent experience, +the steward would have taken to him as he did, let the lad have shown ever so +much affection for him. +</p> + +<p> +But even to Harry Mr. Horner was silent. Still, it was pleasant to find himself +in many ways so readily understood; to perceive that the crumbs of knowledge he +let fall were picked up by his little follower, and hoarded like gold that here +was one to hate the persons and things whom Mr. Horner coldly disliked, and to +reverence and admire all those for whom he had any regard. Mr. Horner had never +had a child, and unconsciously, I suppose, something of the paternal feeling +had begun to develop itself in him towards Harry Gregson. I heard one or two +things from different people, which have always made me fancy that Mr. Horner +secretly and almost unconsciously hoped that Harry Gregson might be trained so +as to be first his clerk, and next his assistant, and finally his successor in +his stewardship to the Hanbury estates. +</p> + +<p> +Harry’s disgrace with my lady, in consequence of his reading the letter, +was a deeper blow to Mr. Horner than his quiet manner would ever have led any +one to suppose, or than Lady Ludlow ever dreamed of inflicting, I am sure. +</p> + +<p> +Probably Harry had a short, stern rebuke from Mr. Horner at the time, for his +manner was always hard even to those he cared for the most. But Harry’s +love was not to be daunted or quelled by a few sharp words. I dare say, from +what I heard of them afterwards, that Harry accompanied Mr. Horner in his walk +over the farm the very day of the rebuke; his presence apparently unnoticed by +the agent, by whom his absence would have been painfully felt nevertheless. +That was the way of it, as I have been told. Mr. Horner never bade Harry go +with him; never thanked him for going, or being at his heels ready to run on +any errands, straight as the crow flies to his point, and back to heel in as +short a time as possible. Yet, if Harry were away, Mr. Horner never inquired +the reason from any of the men who might be supposed to know whether he was +detained by his father, or otherwise engaged; he never asked Harry himself +where he had been. But Miss Galindo said that those labourers who knew Mr. +Horner well, told her that he was always more quick-eyed to shortcomings, more +savage-like in fault-finding, on those days when the lad was absent. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Galindo, indeed, was my great authority for most of the village news which +I heard. She it was who gave me the particulars of poor Harry’s accident. +</p> + +<p> +“You see, my dear,” she said, “the little poacher has taken +some unaccountable fancy to my master.” (This was the name by which Miss +Galindo always spoke of Mr. Horner to me, ever since she had been, as she +called it, appointed his clerk.) +</p> + +<p> +“Now if I had twenty hearts to lose, I never could spare a bit of one of +them for that good, gray, square, severe man. But different people have +different tastes, and here is that little imp of a gipsy-tinker ready to turn +slave for my master; and, odd enough, my master,—who, I should have said +beforehand, would have made short work of imp, and imp’s family, and have +sent Hall, the Bang-beggar, after them in no time—my master, as they tell +me, is in his way quite fond of the lad, and if he could, without vexing my +lady too much, he would have made him what the folks here call a Latiner. +However, last night, it seems that there was a letter of some importance +forgotten (I can’t tell you what it was about, my dear, though I know +perfectly well, but ‘<i>service oblige</i>,’ as well as +‘noblesse,’ and you must take my word for it that it was important, +and one that I am surprised my master could forget), till too late for the +post. (The poor, good, orderly man is not what he was before his wife’s +death.) Well, it seems that he was sore annoyed by his forgetfulness, and well +he might be. And it was all the more vexatious, as he had no one to blame but +himself. As for that matter, I always scold somebody else when I’m in +fault; but I suppose my master would never think of doing that, else it’s +a mighty relief. However, he could eat no tea, and was altogether put out and +gloomy. And the little faithful imp-lad, perceiving all this, I suppose, got up +like a page in an old ballad, and said he would run for his life across country +to Comberford, and see if he could not get there before the bags were made up. +So my master gave him the letter, and nothing more was heard of the poor fellow +till this morning, for the father thought his son was sleeping in Mr. +Horner’s barn, as he does occasionally, it seems, and my master, as was +very natural, that he had gone to his father’s.” +</p> + +<p> +“And he had fallen down the old stone quarry, had he not?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, sure enough. Mr. Gray had been up here fretting my lady with some +of his new-fangled schemes, and because the young man could not have it all his +own way, from what I understand, he was put out, and thought he would go home +by the back lane, instead of through the village, where the folks would notice +if the parson looked glum. But, however, it was a mercy, and I don’t mind +saying so, ay, and meaning it too, though it may be like methodism; for, as Mr. +Gray walked by the quarry, he heard a groan, and at first he thought it was a +lamb fallen down; and he stood still, and then he heard it again; and then I +suppose, he looked down and saw Harry. So he let himself down by the boughs of +the trees to the ledge where Harry lay half-dead, and with his poor thigh +broken. There he had lain ever since the night before: he had been returning to +tell the master that he had safely posted the letter, and the first words he +said, when they recovered him from the exhausted state he was in, were” +(Miss Galindo tried hard not to whimper, as she said it), “‘It was +in time, sir. I see’d it put in the bag with my own eyes.’” +</p> + +<p> +“But where is he?” asked I. “How did Mr. Gray get him +out?” +</p> + +<p> +“Ay! there it is, you see. Why the old gentleman (I daren’t say +Devil in Lady Ludlow’s house) is not so black as he is painted; and Mr. +Gray must have a deal of good in him, as I say at times; and then at others, +when he has gone against me, I can’t bear him, and think hanging too good +for him. But he lifted the poor lad, as if he had been a baby, I suppose, and +carried him up the great ledges that were formerly used for steps; and laid him +soft and easy on the wayside grass, and ran home and got help and a door, and +had him carried to his house, and laid on his bed; and then somehow, for the +first time either he or any one else perceived it, he himself was all over +blood—his own blood—he had broken a blood-vessel; and there he lies +in the little dressing-room, as white and as still as if he were dead; and the +little imp in Mr. Gray’s own bed, sound asleep, now his leg is set, just +as if linen sheets and a feather bed were his native element, as one may say. +Really, now he is doing so well, I’ve no patience with him, lying there +where Mr. Gray ought to be. It is just what my lady always prophesied would +come to pass, if there was any confusion of ranks.” +</p> + +<p> +“Poor Mr. Gray!” said I, thinking of his flushed face, and his +feverish, restless ways, when he had been calling on my lady not an hour before +his exertions on Harry’s behalf. And I told Miss Galindo how ill I had +thought him. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said she. “And that was the reason my lady had sent +for Doctor Trevor. Well, it has fallen out admirably, for he looked well after +that old donkey of a Prince, and saw that he made no blunders.” +</p> + +<p> +Now “that old donkey of a Prince” meant the village surgeon, Mr. +Prince, between whom and Miss Galindo there was war to the knife, as they often +met in the cottages, when there was illness, and she had her queer, odd +recipes, which he, with his grand pharmacopoeia, held in infinite contempt, and +the consequence of their squabbling had been, not long before this very time, +that he had established a kind of rule, that into whatever sick-room Miss +Galindo was admitted, there he refused to visit. But Miss Galindo’s +prescriptions and visits cost nothing and were often backed by kitchen-physic; +so, though it was true that she never came but she scolded about something or +other, she was generally preferred as medical attendant to Mr. Prince. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, the old donkey is obliged to tolerate me, and be civil to me; for, +you see, I got there first, and had possession, as it were, and yet my lord the +donkey likes the credit of attending the parson, and being in consultation with +so grand a county-town doctor as Doctor Trevor. And Doctor Trevor is an old +friend of mine” (she sighed a little, some time I may tell you why), +“and treats me with infinite bowing and respect; so the donkey, not to be +out of medical fashion, bows too, though it is sadly against the grain; and he +pulled a face as if he had heard a slate-pencil gritting against a slate, when +I told Doctor Trevor I meant to sit up with the two lads, for I call Mr. Gray +little more than a lad, and a pretty conceited one, too, at times.” +</p> + +<p> +“But why should you sit up, Miss Galindo? It will tire you sadly.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not it. You see, there is Gregson’s mother to keep quiet for she +sits by her lad, fretting and sobbing, so that I’m afraid of her +disturbing Mr. Gray; and there’s Mr. Gray to keep quiet, for Doctor +Trevor says his life depends on it; and there is medicine to be given to the +one, and bandages to be attended to for the other; and the wild horde of gipsy +brothers and sisters to be turned out, and the father to be held in from +showing too much gratitude to Mr. Gray, who can’t hear it,—and who +is to do it all but me? The only servant is old lame Betty, who once lived with +me, and <i>would</i> leave me because she said I was always +bothering—(there was a good deal of truth in what she said, I grant, but +she need not have said it; a good deal of truth is best let alone at the bottom +of the well), and what can she do,—deaf as ever she can be, too?” +</p> + +<p> +So Miss Galindo went her ways; but not the less was she at her post in the +morning; a little crosser and more silent than usual; but the first was not to +be wondered at, and the last was rather a blessing. +</p> + +<p> +Lady Ludlow had been extremely anxious both about Mr. Gray and Harry Gregson. +Kind and thoughtful in any case of illness and accident, she always was; but +somehow, in this, the feeling that she was not quite—what shall I call +it?—“friends” seems hardly the right word to use, as to the +possible feeling between the Countess Ludlow and the little vagabond messenger, +who had only once been in her presence,—that she had hardly parted from +either as she could have wished to do, had death been near, made her more than +usually anxious. Doctor Trevor was not to spare obtaining the best medical +advice the county could afford: whatever he ordered in the way of diet, was to +be prepared under Mrs. Medlicott’s own eye, and sent down from the Hall +to the Parsonage. As Mr. Horner had given somewhat similar directions, in the +case of Harry Gregson at least, there was rather a multiplicity of counsellors +and dainties, than any lack of them. And, the second night, Mr. Horner insisted +on taking the superintendence of the nursing himself, and sat and snored by +Harry’s bedside, while the poor, exhausted mother lay by her +child,—thinking that she watched him, but in reality fast asleep, as Miss +Galindo told us; for, distrusting any one’s powers of watching and +nursing but her own, she had stolen across the quiet village street in cloak +and dressing-gown, and found Mr. Gray in vain trying to reach the cup of +barley-water which Mr. Horner had placed just beyond his reach. +</p> + +<p> +In consequence of Mr. Gray’s illness, we had to have a strange curate to +do duty; a man who dropped his h’s, and hurried through the service, and +yet had time enough to stand in my Lady’s way, bowing to her as she came +out of church, and so subservient in manner, that I believe that sooner than +remain unnoticed by a countess, he would have preferred being scolded, or even +cuffed. Now I found out, that great as was my lady’s liking and approval +of respect, nay, even reverence, being paid to her as a person of +quality,—a sort of tribute to her Order, which she had no individual +right to remit, or, indeed, not to exact,—yet she, being personally +simple, sincere, and holding herself in low esteem, could not endure anything +like the servility of Mr. Crosse, the temporary curate. She grew absolutely to +loathe his perpetual smiling and bowing; his instant agreement with the +slightest opinion she uttered; his veering round as she blew the wind. I have +often said that my lady did not talk much, as she might have done had she lived +among her equals. But we all loved her so much, that we had learnt to interpret +all her little ways pretty truly; and I knew what particular turns of her head, +and contractions of her delicate fingers meant, as well as if she had expressed +herself in words. I began to suspect that my lady would be very thankful to +have Mr. Gray about again, and doing his duty even with a conscientiousness +that might amount to worrying himself, and fidgeting others; and although Mr. +Gray might hold her opinions in as little esteem as those of any simple +gentlewoman, she was too sensible not to feel how much flavour there was in his +conversation, compared to that of Mr. Crosse, who was only her tasteless echo. +</p> + +<p> +As for Miss Galindo, she was utterly and entirely a partisan of Mr. +Gray’s, almost ever since she had begun to nurse him during his illness. +</p> + +<p> +“You know, I never set up for reasonableness, my lady. So I don’t +pretend to say, as I might do if I were a sensible woman and all +that,—that I am convinced by Mr. Gray’s arguments of this thing or +t’other. For one thing, you see, poor fellow! he has never been able to +argue, or hardly indeed to speak, for Doctor Trevor has been very peremptory. +So there’s been no scope for arguing! But what I mean is this:—When +I see a sick man thinking always of others, and never of himself; patient, +humble—a trifle too much at times, for I’ve caught him praying to +be forgiven for having neglected his work as a parish priest,” (Miss +Galindo was making horrible faces, to keep back tears, squeezing up her eyes in +a way which would have amused me at any other time, but when she was speaking +of Mr. Gray); “when I see a downright good, religious man, I’m apt +to think he’s got hold of the right clue, and that I can do no better +than hold on by the tails of his coat and shut my eyes, if we’ve got to +go over doubtful places on our road to Heaven. So, my lady, you must excuse me +if, when he gets about again, he is all agog about a Sunday-school, for if he +is, I shall be agog too, and perhaps twice as bad as him, for, you see, +I’ve a strong constitution compared to his, and strong ways of speaking +and acting. And I tell your ladyship this now, because I think from your +rank—and still more, if I may say so, for all your kindness to me long +ago, down to this very day—you’ve a right to be first told of +anything about me. Change of opinion I can’t exactly call it, for I +don’t see the good of schools and teaching A B C, any more than I did +before, only Mr. Gray does, so I’m to shut my eyes, and leap over the +ditch to the side of education. I’ve told Sally already, that if she does +not mind her work, but stands gossiping with Nelly Mather, I’ll teach her +her lessons; and I’ve never caught her with old Nelly since.” +</p> + +<p> +I think Miss Galindo’s desertion to Mr. Gray’s opinions in this +matter hurt my lady just a little bit; but she only said— +</p> + +<p> +“Of course, if the parishoners wish for it, Mr. Gray must have his +Sunday-school. I shall, in that case, withdraw my opposition. I am sorry I +cannot alter my opinions as easily as you.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady made herself smile as she said this. Miss Galindo saw it was an effort +to do so. She thought a minute before she spoke again. +</p> + +<p> +“Your ladyship has not seen Mr. Gray as intimately as I have done. +That’s one thing. But, as for the parishioners, they will follow your +ladyship’s lead in everything; so there is no chance of their wishing for +a Sunday-school.” +</p> + +<p> +“I have never done anything to make them follow my lead, as you call it, +Miss Galindo,” said my lady, gravely. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, you have,” replied Miss Galindo, bluntly. And then, +correcting herself, she said, “Begging your ladyship’s pardon, you +have. Your ancestors have lived here time out of mind, and have owned the land +on which their forefathers have lived ever since there were forefathers. You +yourself were born amongst them, and have been like a little queen to them ever +since, I might say, and they’ve never known your ladyship do anything but +what was kind and gentle; but I’ll leave fine speeches about your +ladyship to Mr. Crosse. Only you, my lady, lead the thoughts of the parish; and +save some of them a world of trouble, for they could never tell what was right +if they had to think for themselves. It’s all quite right that they +should be guided by you, my lady,—if only you would agree with Mr. +Gray.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said my lady, “I told him only the last day that he +was here, that I would think about it. I do believe I could make up my mind on +certain subjects better if I were left alone, than while being constantly +talked to about them.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady said this in her usual soft tones; but the words had a tinge of +impatience about them; indeed, she was more ruffled than I had often seen her; +but, checking herself in an instant she said— +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t know how Mr. Horner drags in this subject of education +apropos of everything. Not that he says much about it at any time: it is not +his way. But he cannot let the thing alone.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know why, my lady,” said Miss Galindo. “That poor lad, +Harry Gregson, will never be able to earn his livelihood in any active way, but +will be lame for life. Now, Mr. Horner thinks more of Harry than of any one +else in the world,—except, perhaps, your ladyship.” Was it not a +pretty companionship for my lady? “And he has schemes of his own for +teaching Harry; and if Mr. Gray could but have his school, Mr. Horner and he +think Harry might be schoolmaster, as your ladyship would not like to have him +coming to you as steward’s clerk. I wish your ladyship would fall into +this plan; Mr. Gray has it so at heart.” +</p> + +<p> +Miss Galindo looked wistfully at my lady, as she said this. But my lady only +said, drily, and rising at the same time, as if to end the conversation— +</p> + +<p> +“So Mr. Horner and Mr. Gray seem to have gone a long way in advance of my +consent to their plans.” +</p> + +<p> +“There!” exclaimed Miss Galindo, as my lady left the room, with an +apology for going away; “I have gone and done mischief with my long, +stupid tongue. To be sure, people plan a long way ahead of to-day; more +especially when one is a sick man, lying all through the weary day on a +sofa.” +</p> + +<p> +“My lady will soon get over her annoyance,” said I, as it were +apologetically. I only stopped Miss Galindo’s self-reproaches to draw +down her wrath upon myself. +</p> + +<p> +“And has not she a right to be annoyed with me, if she likes, and to keep +annoyed as long as she likes? Am I complaining of her, that you need tell me +that? Let me tell you, I have known my lady these thirty years; and if she were +to take me by the shoulders, and turn me out of the house, I should only love +her the more. So don’t you think to come between us with any little +mincing, peace-making speeches. I have been a mischief-making parrot, and I +like her the better for being vexed with me. So good-bye to you, Miss; and wait +till you know Lady Ludlow as well as I do, before you next think of telling me +she will soon get over her annoyance!” And off Miss Galindo went. +</p> + +<p> +I could not exactly tell what I had done wrong; but I took care never again to +come in between my lady and her by any remark about the one to the other; for I +saw that some most powerful bond of grateful affection made Miss Galindo almost +worship my lady. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile, Harry Gregson was limping a little about in the village, still +finding his home in Mr. Gray’s house; for there he could most +conveniently be kept under the doctor’s eye, and receive the requisite +care, and enjoy the requisite nourishment. As soon as he was a little better, +he was to go to Mr. Horner’s house; but, as the steward lived some +distance out of the way, and was much from home, he had agreed to leave Harry +at the house; to which he had first been taken, until he was quite strong +again; and the more willingly, I suspect, from what I heard afterwards, because +Mr. Gray gave up all the little strength of speaking which he had, to teaching +Harry in the very manner which Mr. Horner most desired. +</p> + +<p> +As for Gregson the father—he—wild man of the woods, poacher, +tinker, jack-of-all trades—was getting tamed by this kindness to his +child. Hitherto his hand had been against every man, as every man’s had +been against him. That affair before the justice, which I told you about, when +Mr. Gray and even my lady had interested themselves to get him released from +unjust imprisonment, was the first bit of justice he had ever met with; it +attracted him to the people, and attached him to the spot on which he had but +squatted for a time. I am not sure if any of the villagers were grateful to him +for remaining in their neighbourhood, instead of decamping as he had often done +before, for good reasons, doubtless, of personal safety. Harry was only one out +of a brood of ten or twelve children, some of whom had earned for themselves no +good character in service: one, indeed, had been actually transported, for a +robbery committed in a distant part of the county; and the tale was yet told in +the village of how Gregson the father came back from the trial in a state of +wild rage, striding through the place, and uttering oaths of vengeance to +himself, his great black eyes gleaming out of his matted hair, and his arms +working by his side, and now and then tossed up in his impotent despair. As I +heard the account, his wife followed him, child-laden and weeping. After this, +they had vanished from the country for a time, leaving their mud hovel locked +up, and the door-key, as the neighbours said, buried in a hedge bank. The +Gregsons had reappeared much about the same time that Mr. Gray came to Hanbury. +He had either never heard of their evil character, or considered that it gave +them all the more claims upon his Christian care; and the end of it was, that +this rough, untamed, strong giant of a heathen was loyal slave to the weak, +hectic, nervous, self-distrustful parson. Gregson had also a kind of grumbling +respect for Mr. Horner: he did not quite like the steward’s monopoly of +his Harry: the mother submitted to that with a better grace, swallowing down +her maternal jealousy in the prospect of her child’s advancement to a +better and more respectable position than that in which his parents had +struggled through life. But Mr. Horner, the steward, and Gregson, the poacher +and squatter, had come into disagreeable contact too often in former days for +them to be perfectly cordial at any future time. Even now, when there was no +immediate cause for anything but gratitude for his child’s sake on +Gregson’s part, he would skulk out of Mr. Horner’s way, if he saw +him coming; and it took all Mr. Horner’s natural reserve and acquired +self-restraint to keep him from occasionally holding up his father’s life +as a warning to Harry. Now Gregson had nothing of this desire for avoidance +with regard to Mr. Gray. The poacher had a feeling of physical protection +towards the parson; while the latter had shown the moral courage, without which +Gregson would never have respected him, in coming right down upon him more than +once in the exercise of unlawful pursuits, and simply and boldly telling him he +was doing wrong, with such a quiet reliance upon Gregson’s better +feeling, at the same time, that the strong poacher could not have lifted a +finger against Mr. Gray, though it had been to save himself from being +apprehended and taken to the lock-ups the very next hour. He had rather +listened to the parson’s bold words with an approving smile, much as Mr. +Gulliver might have hearkened to a lecture from a Lilliputian. But when brave +words passed into kind deeds, Gregson’s heart mutely acknowledged its +master and keeper. And the beauty of it all was, that Mr. Gray knew nothing of +the good work he had done, or recognized himself as the instrument which God +had employed. He thanked God, it is true, fervently and often, that the work +was done; and loved the wild man for his rough gratitude; but it never occurred +to the poor young clergyman, lying on his sick-bed, and praying, as Miss +Galindo had told us he did, to be forgiven for his unprofitable life, to think +of Gregson’s reclaimed soul as anything with which he had had to do. It +was now more than three months since Mr. Gray had been at Hanbury Court. During +all that time he had been confined to his house, if not to his sick-bed, and he +and my lady had never met since their last discussion and difference about +Farmer Hale’s barn. +</p> + +<p> +This was not my dear lady’s fault; no one could have been more attentive +in every way to the slightest possible want of either of the invalids, +especially of Mr. Gray. And she would have gone to see him at his own house, as +she sent him word, but that her foot had slipped upon the polished oak +staircase, and her ankle had been sprained. +</p> + +<p> +So we had never seen Mr. Gray since his illness, when one November day he was +announced as wishing to speak to my lady. She was sitting in her room—the +room in which I lay now pretty constantly—and I remember she looked +startled, when word was brought to her of Mr. Gray’s being at the Hall. +</p> + +<p> +She could not go to him, she was too lame for that, so she bade him be shown +into where she sat. +</p> + +<p> +“Such a day for him to go out!” she exclaimed, looking at the fog +which had crept up to the windows, and was sapping the little remaining life in +the brilliant Virginian creeper leaves that draperied the house on the terrace +side. +</p> + +<p> +He came in white, trembling, his large eyes wild and dilated. He hastened up to +Lady Ludlow’s chair, and, to my surprise, took one of her hands and +kissed it, without speaking, yet shaking all over. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Gray!” said she, quickly, with sharp, tremulous apprehension +of some unknown evil. “What is it? There is something unusual about +you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Something unusual has occurred,” replied he, forcing his words to +be calm, as with a great effort. “A gentleman came to my house, not half +an hour ago—a Mr. Howard. He came straight from Vienna.” +</p> + +<p> +“My son!” said my dear lady, stretching out her arms in dumb +questioning attitude. +</p> + +<p> +“The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the +Lord.” +</p> + +<p> +But my poor lady could not echo the words. He was the last remaining child. And +once she had been the joyful mother of nine. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER XII.</h2> + +<p> +I am ashamed to say what feeling became strongest in my mind about this time; +next to the sympathy we all of us felt for my dear lady in her deep sorrow, I +mean; for that was greater and stronger than anything else, however +contradictory you may think it, when you hear all. +</p> + +<p> +It might arise from my being so far from well at the time, which produced a +diseased mind in a diseased body; but I was absolutely jealous for my +father’s memory, when I saw how many signs of grief there were for my +lord’s death, he having done next to nothing for the village and parish, +which now changed, as it were, its daily course of life, because his lordship +died in a far-off city. My father had spent the best years of his manhood in +labouring hard, body and soul, for the people amongst whom he lived. His +family, of course, claimed the first place in his heart; he would have been +good for little, even in the way of benevolence, if they had not. But close +after them he cared for his parishioners, and neighbours. And yet, when he +died, though the church bells tolled, and smote upon our hearts with hard, +fresh pain at every beat, the sounds of every-day life still went on, close +pressing around us,—carts and carriages, street-cries, distant +barrel-organs (the kindly neighbours kept them out of our street): life, +active, noisy life, pressed on our acute consciousness of Death, and jarred +upon it as on a quick nerve. +</p> + +<p> +And when we went to church,—my father’s own church,—though +the pulpit cushions were black, and many of the congregation had put on some +humble sign of mourning, yet it did not alter the whole material aspect of the +place. And yet what was Lord Ludlow’s relation to Hanbury, compared to my +father’s work and place in—? +</p> + +<p> +O! it was very wicked in me! I think if I had seen my lady,—if I had +dared to ask to go to her, I should not have felt so miserable, so +discontented. But she sat in her own room, hung with black, all, even over the +shutters. She saw no light but that which was artificial—candles, lamps, +and the like—for more than a month. Only Adams went near her. Mr. Gray +was not admitted, though he called daily. Even Mrs. Medlicott did not see her +for near a fortnight. The sight of my lady’s griefs, or rather the +recollection of it, made Mrs. Medlicott talk far more than was her wont. She +told us, with many tears, and much gesticulation, even speaking German at +times, when her English would not flow, that my lady sat there, a white figure +in the middle of the darkened room; a shaded lamp near her, the light of which +fell on an open Bible,—the great family Bible. It was not open at any +chapter or consoling verse; but at the page whereon were registered the births +of her nine children. Five had died in infancy,—sacrificed to the cruel +system which forbade the mother to suckle her babies. Four had lived longer; +Urian had been the first to die, Ughtred-Mortimar, Earl Ludlow, the last. +</p> + +<p> +My lady did not cry, Mrs. Medlicott said. She was quite composed; very still, +very silent. She put aside everything that savoured of mere business: sent +people to Mr. Horner for that. But she was proudly alive to every possible form +which might do honour to the last of her race. +</p> + +<p> +In those days, expresses were slow things, and forms still slower. Before my +lady’s directions could reach Vienna, my lord was buried. There was some +talk (so Mrs. Medlicott said) about taking the body up, and bringing him to +Hanbury. But his executors,—connections on the Ludlow +side,—demurred to this. If he were removed to England, he must be carried +on to Scotland, and interred with his Monkshaven forefathers. My lady, deeply +hurt, withdrew from the discussion, before it degenerated to an unseemly +contest. But all the more, for this understood mortification of my +lady’s, did the whole village and estate of Hanbury assume every outward +sign of mourning. The church bells tolled morning and evening. The church +itself was draped in black inside. Hatchments were placed everywhere, where +hatchments could be put. All the tenantry spoke in hushed voices for more than +a week, scarcely daring to observe that all flesh, even that of an Earl Ludlow, +and the last of the Hanburys, was but grass after all. The very Fighting Lion +closed its front door, front shutters it had none, and those who needed drink +stole in at the back, and were silent and maudlin over their cups, instead of +riotous and noisy. Miss Galindo’s eyes were swollen up with crying, and +she told me, with a fresh burst of tears, that even hump-backed Sally had been +found sobbing over her Bible, and using a pocket-handkerchief for the first +time in her life; her aprons having hitherto stood her in the necessary stead, +but not being sufficiently in accordance with etiquette to be used when +mourning over an earl’s premature decease. +</p> + +<p> +If it was this way out of the Hall, “you might work it by the rule of +three,” as Miss Galindo used to say, and judge what it was in the Hall. +We none of us spoke but in a whisper: we tried not to eat; and indeed the shock +had been so really great, and we did really care so much for my lady, that for +some days we had but little appetite. But after that, I fear our sympathy grew +weaker, while our flesh grew stronger. But we still spoke low, and our hearts +ached whenever we thought of my lady sitting there alone in the darkened room, +with the light ever falling on that one solemn page. +</p> + +<p> +We wished, O how I wished that she would see Mr. Gray! But Adams said, she +thought my lady ought to have a bishop come to see her. Still no one had +authority enough to send for one. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Horner all this time was suffering as much as any one. He was too faithful +a servant of the great Hanbury family, though now the family had dwindled down +to a fragile old lady, not to mourn acutely over its probable extinction. He +had, besides, a deeper sympathy and reverence with, and for, my lady, in all +things, than probably he ever cared to show, for his manners were always +measured and cold. He suffered from sorrow. He also suffered from wrong. My +lord’s executors kept writing to him continually. My lady refused to +listen to mere business, saying she intrusted all to him. But the +“all” was more complicated than I ever thoroughly understood. As +far as I comprehended the case, it was something of this kind:—There had +been a mortgage raised on my lady’s property of Hanbury, to enable my +lord, her husband, to spend money in cultivating his Scotch estates, after some +new fashion that required capital. As long as my lord, her son, lived, who was +to succeed to both the estates after her death, this did not signify; so she +had said and felt; and she had refused to take any steps to secure the +repayment of capital, or even the payment of the interest of the mortgage from +the possible representatives and possessors of the Scotch estates, to the +possible owner of the Hanbury property; saying it ill became her to calculate +on the contingency of her son’s death. +</p> + +<p> +But he had died childless, unmarried. The heir of the Monkshaven property was +an Edinburgh advocate, a far-away kinsman of my lord’s: the Hanbury +property, at my lady’s death, would go to the descendants of a third son +of the Squire Hanbury in the days of Queen Anne. +</p> + +<p> +This complication of affairs was most grievous to Mr. Horner. He had always +been opposed to the mortgage; had hated the payment of the interest, as +obliging my lady to practise certain economies which, though she took care to +make them as personal as possible, he disliked as derogatory to the family. +Poor Mr. Horner! He was so cold and hard in his manner, so curt and decisive in +his speech, that I don’t think we any of us did him justice. Miss Galindo +was almost the first, at this time, to speak a kind word of him, or to take +thought of him at all, any farther than to get out of his way when we saw him +approaching. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t think Mr. Horner is well,” she said one day; about +three weeks after we had heard of my lord’s death. “He sits resting +his head on his hand, and hardly hears me when I speak to him.” +</p> + +<p> +But I thought no more of it, as Miss Galindo did not name it again. My lady +came amongst us once more. From elderly she had become old; a little, frail, +old lady, in heavy black drapery, never speaking about nor alluding to her +great sorrow; quieter, gentler, paler than ever before; and her eyes dim with +much weeping, never witnessed by mortal. +</p> + +<p> +She had seen Mr. Gray at the expiration of the month of deep retirement. But I +do not think that even to him she had said one word of her own particular +individual sorrow. All mention of it seemed buried deep for evermore. One day, +Mr. Horner sent word that he was too much indisposed to attend to his usual +business at the Hall; but he wrote down some directions and requests to Miss +Galindo, saying that he would be at his office early the next morning. The next +morning he was dead. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Galindo told my lady. Miss Galindo herself cried plentifully, but my lady, +although very much distressed, could not cry. It seemed a physical +impossibility, as if she had shed all the tears in her power. Moreover, I +almost think her wonder was far greater that she herself lived than that Mr. +Horner died. It was almost natural that so faithful a servant should break his +heart, when the family he belonged to lost their stay, their heir, and their +last hope. +</p> + +<p> +Yes! Mr. Horner was a faithful servant. I do not think there are many so +faithful now; but perhaps that is an old woman’s fancy of mine. When his +will came to be examined, it was discovered that, soon after Harry +Gregson’s accident, Mr. Horner had left the few thousands (three, I +think,) of which he was possessed, in trust for Harry’s benefit, desiring +his executors to see that the lad was well educated in certain things, for +which Mr. Horner had thought that he had shown especial aptitude; and there was +a kind of implied apology to my lady in one sentence where he stated that +Harry’s lameness would prevent his being ever able to gain his living by +the exercise of any mere bodily faculties, “as had been wished by a lady +whose wishes” he, the testator, “was bound to regard.” +</p> + +<p> +But there was a codicil in the will, dated since Lord Ludlow’s +death—feebly written by Mr. Horner himself, as if in preparation only for +some more formal manner of bequest: or, perhaps, only as a mere temporary +arrangement till he could see a lawyer, and have a fresh will made. In this he +revoked his previous bequest to Harry Gregson. He only left two hundred pounds +to Mr. Gray to be used, as that gentleman thought best, for Henry +Gregson’s benefit. With this one exception, he bequeathed all the rest of +his savings to my lady, with a hope that they might form a nest-egg, as it +were, towards the paying off of the mortgage which had been such a grief to him +during his life. I may not repeat all this in lawyer’s phrase; I heard it +through Miss Galindo, and she might make mistakes. Though, indeed, she was very +clear-headed, and soon earned the respect of Mr. Smithson, my lady’s +lawyer from Warwick. Mr. Smithson knew Miss Galindo a little before, both +personally and by reputation; but I don’t think he was prepared to find +her installed as steward’s clerk, and, at first, he was inclined to treat +her, in this capacity, with polite contempt. But Miss Galindo was both a lady +and a spirited, sensible woman, and she could put aside her self-indulgence in +eccentricity of speech and manner whenever she chose. Nay more; she was usually +so talkative, that if she had not been amusing and warm-hearted, one might have +thought her wearisome occasionally. But to meet Mr. Smithson she came out daily +in her Sunday gown; she said no more than was required in answer to his +questions; her books and papers were in thorough order, and methodically kept; +her statements of matters-of-fact accurate, and to be relied on. She was +amusingly conscious of her victory over his contempt of a woman-clerk and his +preconceived opinion of her unpractical eccentricity. +</p> + +<p> +“Let me alone,” said she, one day when she came in to sit awhile +with me. “That man is a good man—a sensible man—and I have no +doubt he is a good lawyer; but he can’t fathom women yet. I make no doubt +he’ll go back to Warwick, and never give credit again to those people who +made him think me half-cracked to begin with. O, my dear, he did! He showed it +twenty times worse than my poor dear master ever did. It was a form to be gone +through to please my lady, and, for her sake, he would hear my statements and +see my books. It was keeping a woman out of harm’s way, at any rate, to +let her fancy herself useful. I read the man. And, I am thankful to say, he +cannot read me. At least, only one side of me. When I see an end to be gained, +I can behave myself accordingly. Here was a man who thought that a woman in a +black silk gown was a respectable, orderly kind of person; and I was a woman in +a black silk gown. He believed that a woman could not write straight lines, and +required a man to tell her that two and two made four. I was not above ruling +my books, and had Cocker a little more at my fingers’ ends than he had. +But my greatest triumph has been holding my tongue. He would have thought +nothing of my books, or my sums, or my black silk gown, if I had spoken +unasked. So I have buried more sense in my bosom these ten days than ever I +have uttered in the whole course of my life before. I have been so curt, so +abrupt, so abominably dull, that I’ll answer for it he thinks me worthy +to be a man. But I must go back to him, my dear, so good-bye to conversation +and you.” +</p> + +<p> +But though Mr. Smithson might be satisfied with Miss Galindo, I am afraid she +was the only part of the affair with which he was content. Everything else went +wrong. I could not say who told me so—but the conviction of this seemed +to pervade the house. I never knew how much we had all looked up to the silent, +gruff Mr. Horner for decisions, until he was gone. My lady herself was a pretty +good woman of business, as women of business go. Her father, seeing that she +would be the heiress of the Hanbury property, had given her a training which +was thought unusual in those days, and she liked to feel herself queen regnant, +and to have to decide in all cases between herself and her tenantry. But, +perhaps, Mr. Horner would have done it more wisely; not but what she always +attended to him at last. She would begin by saying, pretty clearly and +promptly, what she would have done, and what she would not have done. If Mr. +Horner approved of it, he bowed, and set about obeying her directly; if he +disapproved of it, he bowed, and lingered so long before he obeyed her, that +she forced his opinion out of him with her “Well, Mr. Horner! and what +have you to say against it?” For she always understood his silence as +well as if he had spoken. But the estate was pressed for ready money, and Mr. +Horner had grown gloomy and languid since the death of his wife, and even his +own personal affairs were not in the order in which they had been a year or two +before, for his old clerk had gradually become superannuated, or, at any rate, +unable by the superfluity of his own energy and wit to supply the spirit that +was wanting in Mr. Horner. +</p> + +<p> +Day after day Mr. Smithson seemed to grow more fidgety, more annoyed at the +state of affairs. Like every one else employed by Lady Ludlow, as far as I +could learn, he had an hereditary tie to the Hanbury family. As long as the +Smithsons had been lawyers, they had been lawyers to the Hanburys; always +coming in on all great family occasions, and better able to understand the +characters, and connect the links of what had once been a large and scattered +family, than any individual thereof had ever been. +</p> + +<p> +As long as a man was at the head of the Hanburys, the lawyers had simply acted +as servants, and had only given their advice when it was required. But they had +assumed a different position on the memorable occasion of the mortgage: they +had remonstrated against it. My lady had resented this remonstrance, and a +slight, unspoken coolness had existed between her and the father of this Mr. +Smithson ever since. +</p> + +<p> +I was very sorry for my lady. Mr. Smithson was inclined to blame Mr. Horner for +the disorderly state in which he found some of the outlying farms, and for the +deficiencies in the annual payment of rents. Mr. Smithson had too much good +feeling to put this blame into words; but my lady’s quick instinct led +her to reply to a thought, the existence of which she perceived; and she +quietly told the truth, and explained how she had interfered repeatedly to +prevent Mr. Horner from taking certain desirable steps, which were discordant +to her hereditary sense of right and wrong between landlord and tenant. She +also spoke of the want of ready money as a misfortune that could be remedied, +by more economical personal expenditure on her own part; by which individual +saving, it was possible that a reduction of fifty pounds a year might have been +accomplished. But as soon as Mr. Smithson touched on larger economies, such as +either affected the welfare of others, or the honour and standing of the great +House of Hanbury, she was inflexible. Her establishment consisted of somewhere +about forty servants, of whom nearly as many as twenty were unable to perform +their work properly, and yet would have been hurt if they had been dismissed; +so they had the credit of fulfilling duties, while my lady paid and kept their +substitutes. Mr. Smithson made a calculation, and would have saved some +hundreds a year by pensioning off these old servants. But my lady would not +hear of it. Then, again, I know privately that he urged her to allow some of us +to return to our homes. Bitterly we should have regretted the separation from +Lady Ludlow; but we would have gone back gladly, had we known at the time that +her circumstances required it: but she would not listen to the proposal for a +moment. +</p> + +<p> +“If I cannot act justly towards every one, I will give up a plan which +has been a source of much satisfaction; at least, I will not carry it out to +such an extent in future. But to these young ladies, who do me the favour to +live with me at present, I stand pledged. I cannot go back from my word, Mr. +Smithson. We had better talk no more of this.” +</p> + +<p> +As she spoke, she entered the room where I lay. She and Mr. Smithson were +coming for some papers contained in the bureau. They did not know I was there, +and Mr. Smithson started a little when he saw me, as he must have been aware +that I had overheard something. But my lady did not change a muscle of her +face. All the world might overhear her kind, just, pure sayings, and she had no +fear of their misconstruction. She came up to me, and kissed me on the +forehead, and then went to search for the required papers. +</p> + +<p> +“I rode over the Connington farms yesterday, my lady. I must say I was +quite grieved to see the condition they are in; all the land that is not waste +is utterly exhausted with working successive white crops. Not a pinch of manure +laid on the ground for years. I must say that a greater contrast could never +have been presented than that between Harding’s farm and the next +fields—fences in perfect order, rotation crops, sheep eating down the +turnips on the waste lands—everything that could be desired.” +</p> + +<p> +“Whose farm is that?” asked my lady. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, I am sorry to say, it was on none of your ladyship’s that I +saw such good methods adopted. I hoped it was, I stopped my horse to inquire. A +queer-looking man, sitting on his horse like a tailor, watching his men with a +couple of the sharpest eyes I ever saw, and dropping his h’s at every +word, answered my question, and told me it was his. I could not go on asking +him who he was; but I fell into conversation with him, and I gathered that he +had earned some money in trade in Birmingham, and had bought the estate (five +hundred acres, I think he said,) on which he was born, and now was setting +himself to cultivate it in downright earnest, going to Holkham and Woburn, and +half the country over, to get himself up on the subject.” +</p> + +<p> +“It would be Brooke, that dissenting baker from Birmingham,” said +my lady in her most icy tone. “Mr. Smithson, I am sorry I have been +detaining you so long, but I think these are the letters you wished to +see.” +</p> + +<p> +If her ladyship thought by this speech to quench Mr. Smithson she was mistaken. +Mr. Smithson just looked at the letters, and went on with the old subject. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, my lady, it struck me that if you had such a man to take poor +Horner’s place, he would work the rents and the land round most +satisfactorily. I should not despair of inducing this very man to undertake the +work. I should not mind speaking to him myself on the subject, for we got +capital friends over a snack of luncheon that he asked me to share with +him.” +</p> + +<p> +Lady Ludlow fixed her eyes on Mr. Smithson as he spoke, and never took them off +his face until he had ended. She was silent a minute before she answered. +</p> + +<p> +“You are very good, Mr. Smithson, but I need not trouble you with any +such arrangements. I am going to write this afternoon to Captain James, a +friend of one of my sons, who has, I hear, been severely wounded at Trafalgar, +to request him to honour me by accepting Mr. Horner’s situation.” +</p> + +<p> +“A Captain James! A captain in the navy! going to manage your +ladyship’s estate!” +</p> + +<p> +“If he will be so kind. I shall esteem it a condescension on his part; +but I hear that he will have to resign his profession, his state of health is +so bad, and a country life is especially prescribed for him. I am in some hopes +of tempting him here, as I learn he has but little to depend on if he gives up +his profession.” +</p> + +<p> +“A Captain James! an invalid captain!” +</p> + +<p> +“You think I am asking too great a favour,” continued my lady. (I +never could tell how far it was simplicity, or how far a kind of innocent +malice, that made her misinterpret Mr. Smithson’s words and looks as she +did.) “But he is not a post-captain, only a commander, and his pension +will be but small. I may be able, by offering him country air and a healthy +occupation, to restore him to health.” +</p> + +<p> +“Occupation! My lady, may I ask how a sailor is to manage land? Why, your +tenants will laugh him to scorn.” +</p> + +<p> +“My tenants, I trust, will not behave so ill as to laugh at any one I +choose to set over them. Captain James has had experience in managing men. He +has remarkable practical talents, and great common-sense, as I hear from every +one. But, whatever he may be, the affair rests between him and myself. I can +only say I shall esteem myself fortunate if he comes.” +</p> + +<p> +There was no more to be said, after my lady spoke in this manner. I had heard +her mention Captain James before, as a middy who had been very kind to her son +Urian. I thought I remembered then, that she had mentioned that his family +circumstances were not very prosperous. But, I confess, that little as I knew +of the management of land, I quite sided with Mr. Smithson. He, silently +prohibited from again speaking to my lady on the subject, opened his mind to +Miss Galindo, from whom I was pretty sure to hear all the opinions and news of +the household and village. She had taken a great fancy to me, because she said +I talked so agreeably. I believe it was because I listened so well. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, have you heard the news,” she began, “about this +Captain James? A sailor,—with a wooden leg, I have no doubt. What would +the poor, dear, deceased master have said to it, if he had known who was to be +his successor! My dear, I have often thought of the postman’s bringing me +a letter as one of the pleasures I shall miss in heaven. But, really, I think +Mr. Horner may be thankful he has got out of the reach of news; or else he +would hear of Mr. Smithson’s having made up to the Birmingham baker, and +of his one-legged captain, coming to dot-and-go-one over the estate. I suppose +he will look after the labourers through a spy-glass. I only hope he +won’t stick in the mud with his wooden leg; for I, for one, won’t +help him out. Yes, I would,” said she, correcting herself; “I +would, for my lady’s sake.” +</p> + +<p> +“But are you sure he has a wooden leg?” asked I. “I heard +Lady Ludlow tell Mr. Smithson about him, and she only spoke of him as +wounded.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, sailors are almost always wounded in the leg. Look at Greenwich +Hospital! I should say there were twenty one-legged pensioners to one without +an arm there. But say he has got half a dozen legs: what has he to do with +managing land? I shall think him very impudent if he comes, taking advantage of +my lady’s kind heart.” +</p> + +<p> +However, come he did. In a month from that time, the carriage was sent to meet +Captain James; just as three years before it had been sent to meet me. His +coming had been so much talked about that we were all as curious as possible to +see him, and to know how so unusual an experiment, as it seemed to us, would +answer. But, before I tell you anything about our new agent, I must speak of +something quite as interesting, and I really think quite as important. And this +was my lady’s making friends with Harry Gregson. I do believe she did it +for Mr. Horner’s sake; but, of course, I can only conjecture why my lady +did anything. But I heard one day, from Mary Legard, that my lady had sent for +Harry to come and see her, if he was well enough to walk so far; and the next +day he was shown into the room he had been in once before under such unlucky +circumstances. +</p> + +<p> +The lad looked pale enough, as he stood propping himself up on his crutch, and +the instant my lady saw him, she bade John Footman place a stool for him to sit +down upon while she spoke to him. It might be his paleness that gave his whole +face a more refined and gentle look; but I suspect it was that the boy was apt +to take impressions, and that Mr. Horner’s grave, dignified ways, and Mr. +Gray’s tender and quiet manners, had altered him; and then the thoughts +of illness and death seem to turn many of us into gentlemen, and gentlewomen, +as long as such thoughts are in our minds. We cannot speak loudly or angrily at +such times; we are not apt to be eager about mere worldly things, for our very +awe at our quickened sense of the nearness of the invisible world, makes us +calm and serene about the petty trifles of to-day. At least, I know that was +the explanation Mr. Gray once gave me of what we all thought the great +improvement in Harry Gregson’s way of behaving. +</p> + +<p> +My lady hesitated so long about what she had best say, that Harry grew a little +frightened at her silence. A few months ago it would have surprised me more +than it did now; but since my lord her son’s death, she had seemed +altered in many ways,—more uncertain and distrustful of herself, as it +were. +</p> + +<p> +At last she said, and I think the tears were in her eyes: “My poor little +fellow, you have had a narrow escape with your life since I saw you +last.” +</p> + +<p> +To this there was nothing to be said but “Yes;” and again there was +silence. +</p> + +<p> +“And you have lost a good, kind friend, in Mr. Horner.” +</p> + +<p> +The boy’s lips worked, and I think he said, “Please, +don’t.” But I can’t be sure; at any rate, my lady went on: +</p> + +<p> +“And so have I,—a good, kind friend, he was to both of us; and to +you he wished to show his kindness in even a more generous way than he has +done. Mr. Gray has told you about his legacy to you, has he not?” +</p> + +<p> +There was no sign of eager joy on the lad’s face, as if he realised the +power and pleasure of having what to him must have seemed like a fortune. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Gray said as how he had left me a matter of money.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, he has left you two hundred pounds.” +</p> + +<p> +“But I would rather have had him alive, my lady,” he burst out, +sobbing as if his heart would break. +</p> + +<p> +“My lad, I believe you. We would rather have had our dead alive, would we +not? and there is nothing in money that can comfort us for their loss. But you +know—Mr. Gray has told you—who has appointed all our times to die. +Mr. Horner was a good, just man; and has done well and kindly, both by me and +you. You perhaps do not know” (and now I understood what my lady had been +making up her mind to say to Harry, all the time she was hesitating how to +begin) “that Mr. Horner, at one time, meant to leave you a great deal +more; probably all he had, with the exception of a legacy to his old clerk, +Morrison. But he knew that this estate—on which my forefathers had lived +for six hundred years—was in debt, and that I had no immediate chance of +paying off this debt; and yet he felt that it was a very sad thing for an old +property like this to belong in part to those other men, who had lent the +money. You understand me, I think, my little man?” said she, questioning +Harry’s face. +</p> + +<p> +He had left off crying, and was trying to understand, with all his might and +main; and I think he had got a pretty good general idea of the state of +affairs; though probably he was puzzled by the term “the estate being in +debt.” But he was sufficiently interested to want my lady to go on; and +he nodded his head at her, to signify this to her. +</p> + +<p> +“So Mr. Horner took the money which he once meant to be yours, and has +left the greater part of it to me, with the intention of helping me to pay off +this debt I have told you about. It will go a long way, and I shall try hard to +save the rest, and then I shall die happy in leaving the land free from +debt.” She paused. “But I shall not die happy in thinking of you. I +do not know if having money, or even having a great estate and much honour, is +a good thing for any of us. But God sees fit that some of us should be called +to this condition, and it is our duty then to stand by our posts, like brave +soldiers. Now, Mr. Horner intended you to have this money first. I shall only +call it borrowing from you, Harry Gregson, if I take it and use it to pay off +the debt. I shall pay Mr. Gray interest on this money, because he is to stand +as your guardian, as it were, till you come of age; and he must fix what ought +to be done with it, so as to fit you for spending the principal rightly when +the estate can repay it you. I suppose, now, it will be right for you to be +educated. That will be another snare that will come with your money. But have +courage, Harry. Both education and money may be used rightly, if we only pray +against the temptations they bring with them.” +</p> + +<p> +Harry could make no answer, though I am sure he understood it all. My lady +wanted to get him to talk to her a little, by way of becoming acquainted with +what was passing in his mind; and she asked him what he would like to have done +with his money, if he could have part of it now? To such a simple question, +involving no talk about feelings, his answer came readily enough. +</p> + +<p> +“Build a cottage for father, with stairs in it, and give Mr. Gray a +school-house. O, father does so want Mr. Gray for to have his wish! Father saw +all the stones lying quarried and hewn on Farmer Hale’s land; Mr. Gray +had paid for them all himself. And father said he would work night and day, and +little Tommy should carry mortar, if the parson would let him, sooner than that +he should be fretted and frabbed as he was, with no one giving him a helping +hand or a kind word.” +</p> + +<p> +Harry knew nothing of my lady’s part in the affair; that was very clear. +My lady kept silence. +</p> + +<p> +“If I might have a piece of my money, I would buy land from Mr. Brooks; +he has got a bit to sell just at the corner of Hendon Lane, and I would give it +to Mr. Gray; and, perhaps, if your ladyship thinks I may be learned again, I +might grow up into the schoolmaster.” +</p> + +<p> +“You are a good boy,” said my lady. “But there are more +things to be thought of, in carrying out such a plan, than you are aware of. +However, it shall be tried.” +</p> + +<p> +“The school, my lady?” I exclaimed, almost thinking she did not +know what she was saying. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, the school. For Mr. Horner’s sake, for Mr. Gray’s sake, +and last, not least, for this lad’s sake, I will give the new plan a +trial. Ask Mr. Gray to come up to me this afternoon about the land he wants. He +need not go to a Dissenter for it. And tell your father he shall have a good +share in the building of it, and Tommy shall carry the mortar.” +</p> + +<p> +“And I may be schoolmaster?” asked Harry, eagerly. +</p> + +<p> +“We’ll see about that,” said my lady, amused. “It will +be some time before that plan comes to pass, my little fellow.” +</p> + +<p> +And now to return to Captain James. My first account of him was from Miss +Galindo. +</p> + +<p> +“He’s not above thirty; and I must just pack up my pens and my +paper, and be off; for it would be the height of impropriety for me to be +staying here as his clerk. It was all very well in the old master’s days. +But here am I, not fifty till next May, and this young, unmarried man, who is +not even a widower! O, there would be no end of gossip. Besides he looks as +askance at me as I do at him. My black silk gown had no effect. He’s +afraid I shall marry him. But I won’t; he may feel himself quite safe +from that. And Mr. Smithson has been recommending a clerk to my lady. She would +far rather keep me on; but I can’t stop. I really could not think it +proper.” +</p> + +<p> +“What sort of a looking man is he?” +</p> + +<p> +“O, nothing particular. Short, and brown, and sunburnt. I did not think +it became me to look at him. Well, now for the nightcaps. I should have grudged +any one else doing them, for I have got such a pretty pattern!” +</p> + +<p> +But when it came to Miss Galindo’s leaving, there was a great +misunderstanding between her and my lady. Miss Galindo had imagined that my +lady had asked her as a favour to copy the letters, and enter the accounts, and +had agreed to do the work without the notion of being paid for so doing. She +had, now and then, grieved over a very profitable order for needlework passing +out of her hands on account of her not having time to do it, because of her +occupation at the Hall; but she had never hinted this to my lady, but gone on +cheerfully at her writing as long as her clerkship was required. My lady was +annoyed that she had not made her intention of paying Miss Galindo more clear, +in the first conversation she had had with her; but I suppose that she had been +too delicate to be very explicit with regard to money matters; and now Miss +Galindo was quite hurt at my lady’s wanting to pay her for what she had +done in such right-down good-will. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” Miss Galindo said; “my own dear lady, you may be as +angry with me as you like, but don’t offer me money. Think of +six-and-twenty years ago, and poor Arthur, and as you were to me then! Besides, +I wanted money—I don’t disguise it—for a particular purpose; +and when I found that (God bless you for asking me!) I could do you a service, +I turned it over in my mind, and I gave up one plan and took up another, and +it’s all settled now. Bessy is to leave school and come and live with me. +Don’t, please, offer me money again. You don’t know how glad I have +been to do anything for you. Have not I, Margaret Dawson? Did you not hear me +say, one day, I would cut off my hand for my lady; for am I a stick or a stone, +that I should forget kindness? O, I have been so glad to work for you. And now +Bessy is coming here; and no one knows anything about her—as if she had +done anything wrong, poor child!” +</p> + +<p> +“Dear Miss Galindo,” replied my lady, “I will never ask you +to take money again. Only I thought it was quite understood between us. And you +know you have taken money for a set of morning wrappers, before now.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, my lady; but that was not confidential. Now I was so proud to have +something to do for you confidentially.” +</p> + +<p> +“But who is Bessy?” asked my lady. “I do not understand who +she is, or why she is to come and live with you. Dear Miss Galindo, you must +honour me by being confidential with me in your turn!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER XIII.</h2> + +<p> +I had always understood that Miss Galindo had once been in much better +circumstances, but I had never liked to ask any questions respecting her. But +about this time many things came out respecting her former life, which I will +try and arrange: not however, in the order in which I heard them, but rather as +they occurred. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Galindo was the daughter of a clergyman in Westmoreland. Her father was +the younger brother of a baronet, his ancestor having been one of those of +James the First’s creation. This baronet-uncle of Miss Galindo was one of +the queer, out-of-the-way people who were bred at that time, and in that +northern district of England. I never heard much of him from any one, besides +this one great fact: that he had early disappeared from his family, which +indeed only consisted of a brother and sister who died unmarried, and lived no +one knew where,—somewhere on the Continent, it was supposed, for he had +never returned from the grand tour which he had been sent to make, according to +the general fashion of the day, as soon as he had left Oxford. He corresponded +occasionally with his brother the clergyman; but the letters passed through a +banker’s hands; the banker being pledged to secrecy, and, as he told Mr. +Galindo, having the penalty, if he broke his pledge, of losing the whole +profitable business, and of having the management of the baronet’s +affairs taken out of his hands, without any advantage accruing to the inquirer, +for Sir Lawrence had told Messrs. Graham that, in case his place of residence +was revealed by them, not only would he cease to bank with them, but instantly +take measures to baffle any future inquiries as to his whereabouts, by removing +to some distant country. +</p> + +<p> +Sir Lawrence paid a certain sum of money to his brother’s account every +year; but the time of this payment varied, and it was sometimes eighteen or +nineteen months between the deposits; then, again, it would not be above a +quarter of the time, showing that he intended it to be annual, but, as this +intention was never expressed in words, it was impossible to rely upon it, and +a great deal of this money was swallowed up by the necessity Mr. Galindo felt +himself under of living in the large, old, rambling family mansion, which had +been one of Sir Lawrence’s rarely expressed desires. Mr. and Mrs. Galindo +often planned to live upon their own small fortune and the income derived from +the living (a vicarage, of which the great tithes went to Sir Lawrence as lay +impropriator), so as to put-by the payments made by the baronet, for the +benefit of Laurentia—our Miss Galindo. But I suppose they found it +difficult to live economically in a large house, even though they had it rent +free. They had to keep up with hereditary neighbours and friends, and could +hardly help doing it in the hereditary manner. +</p> + +<p> +One of these neighbours, a Mr. Gibson, had a son a few years older than +Laurentia. The families were sufficiently intimate for the young people to see +a good deal of each other: and I was told that this young Mr. Mark Gibson was +an unusually prepossessing man (he seemed to have impressed every one who spoke +of him to me as being a handsome, manly, kind-hearted fellow), just what a girl +would be sure to find most agreeable. The parents either forgot that their +children were growing up to man’s and woman’s estate, or thought +that the intimacy and probable attachment would be no bad thing, even if it did +lead to a marriage. Still, nothing was ever said by young Gibson till later on, +when it was too late, as it turned out. He went to and from Oxford; he shot and +fished with Mr. Galindo, or came to the Mere to skate in winter-time; was asked +to accompany Mr. Galindo to the Hall, as the latter returned to the quiet +dinner with his wife and daughter; and so, and so, it went on, nobody much knew +how, until one day, when Mr. Galindo received a formal letter from his +brother’s bankers, announcing Sir Lawrence’s death, of malaria +fever, at Albano, and congratulating Sir Hubert on his accession to the estates +and the baronetcy. The king is dead—“Long live the king!” as +I have since heard that the French express it. +</p> + +<p> +Sir Hubert and his wife were greatly surprised. Sir Lawrence was but two years +older than his brother; and they had never heard of any illness till they heard +of his death. They were sorry; very much shocked; but still a little elated at +the succession to the baronetcy and estates. The London bankers had managed +everything well. There was a large sum of ready money in their hands, at Sir +Hubert’s service, until he should touch his rents, the rent-roll being +eight thousand a-year. And only Laurentia to inherit it all! Her mother, a poor +clergyman’s daughter, began to plan all sorts of fine marriages for her; +nor was her father much behind his wife in his ambition. They took her up to +London, when they went to buy new carriages, and dresses, and furniture. And it +was then and there she made my lady’s acquaintance. How it was that they +came to take a fancy to each other, I cannot say. My lady was of the old +nobility,—grand, compose, gentle, and stately in her ways. Miss Galindo +must always have been hurried in her manner, and her energy must have shown +itself in inquisitiveness and oddness even in her youth. But I don’t +pretend to account for things: I only narrate them. And the fact was +this:—that the elegant, fastidious countess was attracted to the country +girl, who on her part almost worshipped my lady. My lady’s notice of +their daughter made her parents think, I suppose, that there was no match that +she might not command; she, the heiress of eight thousand a-year, and visiting +about among earls and dukes. So when they came back to their old Westmoreland +Hall, and Mark Gibson rode over to offer his hand and his heart, and +prospective estate of nine hundred a-year, to his old companion and playfellow, +Laurentia, Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo made very short work of it. They refused +him plumply themselves; and when he begged to be allowed to speak to Laurentia, +they found some excuse for refusing him the opportunity of so doing, until they +had talked to her themselves, and brought up every argument and fact in their +power to convince her—a plain girl, and conscious of her +plainness—that Mr. Mark Gibson had never thought of her in the way of +marriage till after her father’s accession to his fortune; and that it +was the estate—not the young lady—that he was in love with. I +suppose it will never be known in this world how far this supposition of theirs +was true. My Lady Ludlow had always spoken as if it was; but perhaps events, +which came to her knowledge about this time, altered her opinion. At any rate, +the end of it was, Laurentia refused Mark, and almost broke her heart in doing +so. He discovered the suspicions of Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo, and that they +had persuaded their daughter to share in them. So he flung off with high words, +saying that they did not know a true heart when they met with one; and that +although he had never offered till after Sir Lawrence’s death, yet that +his father knew all along that he had been attached to Laurentia, only that he, +being the eldest of five children, and having as yet no profession, had had to +conceal, rather than to express, an attachment, which, in those days, he had +believed was reciprocated. He had always meant to study for the bar, and the +end of all he had hoped for had been to earn a moderate income, which he might +ask Laurentia to share. This, or something like it, was what he said. But his +reference to his father cut two ways. Old Mr. Gibson was known to be very keen +about money. It was just as likely that he would urge Mark to make love to the +heiress, now she was an heiress, as that he would have restrained him +previously, as Mark said he had done. When this was repeated to Mark, he became +proudly reserved, or sullen, and said that Laurentia, at any rate, might have +known him better. He left the country, and went up to London to study law soon +afterwards; and Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo thought they were well rid of him. +But Laurentia never ceased reproaching herself, and never did to her dying day, +as I believe. The words, “She might have known me better,” told to +her by some kind friend or other, rankled in her mind, and were never +forgotten. Her father and mother took her up to London the next year; but she +did not care to visit—dreaded going out even for a drive, lest she should +see Mark Gibson’s reproachful eyes—pined and lost her health. Lady +Ludlow saw this change with regret, and was told the cause by Lady Galindo, who +of course, gave her own version of Mark’s conduct and motives. My lady +never spoke to Miss Galindo about it, but tried constantly to interest and +please her. It was at this time that my lady told Miss Galindo so much about +her own early life, and about Hanbury, that Miss Galindo resolved, if ever she +could, she would go and see the old place which her friend loved so well. The +end of it all was, that she came to live there, as we know. +</p> + +<p> +But a great change was to come first. Before Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo had +left London on this, their second visit, they had a letter from the lawyer, +whom they employed, saying that Sir Lawrence had left an heir, his legitimate +child by an Italian woman of low rank; at least, legal claims to the title and +property had been sent into him on the boy’s behalf. Sir Lawrence had +always been a man of adventurous and artistic, rather than of luxurious tastes; +and it was supposed, when all came to be proved at the trial, that he was +captivated by the free, beautiful life they lead in Italy, and had married this +Neapolitan fisherman’s daughter, who had people about her shrewd enough +to see that the ceremony was legally performed. She and her husband had +wandered about the shores of the Mediterranean for years, leading a happy, +careless, irresponsible life, unencumbered by any duties except those connected +with a rather numerous family. It was enough for her that they never wanted +money, and that her husband’s love was always continued to her. She hated +the name of England—wicked, cold, heretic England—and avoided the +mention of any subjects connected with her husband’s early life. So that, +when he died at Albano, she was almost roused out of her vehement grief to +anger with the Italian doctor, who declared that he must write to a certain +address to announce the death of Lawrence Galindo. For some time, she feared +lest English barbarians might come down upon her, making a claim to the +children. She hid herself and them in the Abruzzi, living upon the sale of what +furniture and jewels Sir Lawrence had died possessed of. When these failed, she +returned to Naples, which she had not visited since her marriage. Her father +was dead; but her brother inherited some of his keenness. He interested the +priests, who made inquiries and found that the Galindo succession was worth +securing to an heir of the true faith. They stirred about it, obtained advice +at the English Embassy; and hence that letter to the lawyers, calling upon Sir +Hubert to relinquish title and property, and to refund what money he had +expended. He was vehement in his opposition to this claim. He could not bear to +think of his brother having married a foreigner—a papist, a +fisherman’s daughter; nay, of his having become a papist himself. He was +in despair at the thought of his ancestral property going to the issue of such +a marriage. He fought tooth and nail, making enemies of his relations, and +losing almost all his own private property; for he would go on against the +lawyer’s advice, long after every one was convinced except himself and +his wife. At last he was conquered. He gave up his living in gloomy despair. He +would have changed his name if he could, so desirous was he to obliterate all +tie between himself and the mongrel papist baronet and his Italian mother, and +all the succession of children and nurses who came to take possession of the +Hall soon after Mr. Hubert Galindo’s departure, stayed there one winter, +and then flitted back to Naples with gladness and delight. Mr. and Mrs. Hubert +Galindo lived in London. He had obtained a curacy somewhere in the city. They +would have been thankful now if Mr. Mark Gibson had renewed his offer. No one +could accuse him of mercenary motives if he had done so. Because he did not +come forward, as they wished, they brought his silence up as a justification of +what they had previously attributed to him. I don’t know what Miss +Galindo thought herself; but Lady Ludlow has told me how she shrank from +hearing her parents abuse him. Lady Ludlow supposed that he was aware that they +were living in London. His father must have known the fact, and it was curious +if he had never named it to his son. Besides, the name was very uncommon; and +it was unlikely that it should never come across him, in the advertisements of +charity sermons which the new and rather eloquent curate of Saint Mark’s +East was asked to preach. All this time Lady Ludlow never lost sight of them, +for Miss Galindo’s sake. And when the father and mother died, it was my +lady who upheld Miss Galindo in her determination not to apply for any +provision to her cousin, the Italian baronet, but rather to live upon the +hundred a-year which had been settled on her mother and the children of his son +Hubert’s marriage by the old grandfather, Sir Lawrence. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Mark Gibson had risen to some eminence as a barrister on the Northern +Circuit, but had died unmarried in the lifetime of his father, a victim (so +people said) to intemperance. Doctor Trevor, the physician who had been called +in to Mr. Gray and Harry Gregson, had married a sister of his. And that was all +my lady knew about the Gibson family. But who was Bessy? +</p> + +<p> +That mystery and secret came out, too, in process of time. Miss Galindo had +been to Warwick, some years before I arrived at Hanbury, on some kind of +business or shopping, which can only be transacted in a county town. There was +an old Westmoreland connection between her and Mrs. Trevor, though I believe +the latter was too young to have been made aware of her brother’s offer +to Miss Galindo at the time when it took place; and such affairs, if they are +unsuccessful, are seldom spoken about in the gentleman’s family +afterwards. But the Gibsons and Galindos had been county neighbours too long +for the connection not to be kept up between two members settled far away from +their early homes. Miss Galindo always desired her parcels to be sent to Dr. +Trevor’s, when she went to Warwick for shopping purchases. If she were +going any journey, and the coach did not come through Warwick as soon as she +arrived (in my lady’s coach or otherwise) from Hanbury, she went to +Doctor Trevor’s to wait. She was as much expected to sit down to the +household meals as if she had been one of the family: and in after-years it was +Mrs. Trevor who managed her repository business for her. +</p> + +<p> +So, on the day I spoke of, she had gone to Doctor Trevor’s to rest, and +possibly to dine. The post in those times, came in at all hours of the morning: +and Doctor Trevor’s letters had not arrived until after his departure on +his morning round. Miss Galindo was sitting down to dinner with Mrs. Trevor and +her seven children, when the Doctor came in. He was flurried and uncomfortable, +and hurried the children away as soon as he decently could. Then (rather +feeling Miss Galindo’s presence an advantage, both as a present restraint +on the violence of his wife’s grief, and as a consoler when he was absent +on his afternoon round), he told Mrs. Trevor of her brother’s death. He +had been taken ill on circuit, and had hurried back to his chambers in London +only to die. She cried terribly; but Doctor Trevor said afterwards, he never +noticed that Miss Galindo cared much about it one way or another. She helped +him to soothe his wife, promised to stay with her all the afternoon instead of +returning to Hanbury, and afterwards offered to remain with her while the +Doctor went to attend the funeral. When they heard of the old love-story +between the dead man and Miss Galindo,—brought up by mutual friends in +Westmoreland, in the review which we are all inclined to take of the events of +a man’s life when he comes to die,—they tried to remember Miss +Galindo’s speeches and ways of going on during this visit. She was a +little pale, a little silent; her eyes were sometimes swollen, and her nose +red; but she was at an age when such appearances are generally attributed to a +bad cold in the head, rather than to any more sentimental reason. They felt +towards her as towards an old friend, a kindly, useful, eccentric old maid. She +did not expect more, or wish them to remember that she might once have had +other hopes, and more youthful feelings. Doctor Trevor thanked her very warmly +for staying with his wife, when he returned home from London (where the funeral +had taken place). He begged Miss Galindo to stay with them, when the children +were gone to bed, and she was preparing to leave the husband and wife by +themselves. He told her and his wife many particulars—then +paused—then went on—“And Mark has left a child—a little +girl— +</p> + +<p> +“But he never was married!” exclaimed Mrs. Trevor. +</p> + +<p> +“A little girl,” continued her husband, “whose mother, I +conclude, is dead. At any rate, the child was in possession of his chambers; +she and an old nurse, who seemed to have the charge of everything, and has +cheated poor Mark, I should fancy, not a little.” +</p> + +<p> +“But the child!” asked Mrs. Trevor, still almost breathless with +astonishment. “How do you know it is his?” +</p> + +<p> +“The nurse told me it was, with great appearance of indignation at my +doubting it. I asked the little thing her name, and all I could get was +‘Bessy!’ and a cry of ‘Me wants papa!’ The nurse said +the mother was dead, and she knew no more about it than that Mr. Gibson had +engaged her to take care of the little girl, calling it his child. One or two +of his lawyer friends, whom I met with at the funeral, told me they were aware +of the existence of the child.” +</p> + +<p> +“What is to be done with her?” asked Mrs. Gibson. +</p> + +<p> +“Nay, I don’t know,” replied he. “Mark has hardly left +assets enough to pay his debts, and your father is not inclined to come +forward.” +</p> + +<p> +That night, as Doctor Trevor sat in his study, after his wife had gone to bed, +Miss Galindo knocked at his door. She and he had a long conversation. The +result was that he accompanied Miss Galindo up to town the next day; that they +took possession of the little Bessy, and she was brought down, and placed at +nurse at a farm in the country near Warwick, Miss Galindo undertaking to pay +one-half of the expense, and to furnish her with clothes, and Dr. Trevor +undertaking that the remaining half should be furnished by the Gibson family, +or by himself in their default. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Galindo was not fond of children; and I dare say she dreaded taking this +child to live with her for more reasons than one. My Lady Ludlow could not +endure any mention of illegitimate children. It was a principle of hers that +society ought to ignore them. And I believe Miss Galindo had always agreed with +her until now, when the thing came home to her womanly heart. Still she shrank +from having this child of some strange woman under her roof. She went over to +see it from time to time; she worked at its clothes long after every one +thought she was in bed; and, when the time came for Bessy to be sent to school, +Miss Galindo laboured away more diligently than ever, in order to pay the +increased expense. For the Gibson family had, at first, paid their part of the +compact, but with unwillingness and grudging hearts; then they had left it off +altogether, and it fell hard on Dr. Trevor with his twelve children; and, +latterly, Miss Galindo had taken upon herself almost all the burden. One can +hardly live and labour, and plan and make sacrifices, for any human creature, +without learning to love it. And Bessy loved Miss Galindo, too, for all the +poor girl’s scanty pleasures came from her, and Miss Galindo had always a +kind word, and, latterly, many a kind caress, for Mark Gibson’s child; +whereas, if she went to Dr. Trevor’s for her holiday, she was overlooked +and neglected in that bustling family, who seemed to think that if she had +comfortable board and lodging under their roof, it was enough. +</p> + +<p> +I am sure, now, that Miss Galindo had often longed to have Bessy to live with +her; but, as long as she could pay for her being at school, she did not like to +take so bold a step as bringing her home, knowing what the effect of the +consequent explanation would be on my lady. And as the girl was now more than +seventeen, and past the age when young ladies are usually kept at school, and +as there was no great demand for governesses in those days, and as Bessy had +never been taught any trade by which to earn her own living, why I don’t +exactly see what could have been done but for Miss Galindo to bring her to her +own home in Hanbury. For, although the child had grown up lately, in a kind of +unexpected manner, into a young woman, Miss Galindo might have kept her at +school for a year longer, if she could have afforded it; but this was +impossible when she became Mr. Horner’s clerk, and relinquished all the +payment of her repository work; and perhaps, after all, she was not sorry to be +compelled to take the step she was longing for. At any rate, Bessy came to live +with Miss Galindo, in a very few weeks from the time when Captain James set +Miss Galindo free to superintend her own domestic economy again. +</p> + +<p> +For a long time, I knew nothing about this new inhabitant of Hanbury. My lady +never mentioned her in any way. This was in accordance with Lady Ludlow’s +well-known principles. She neither saw nor heard, nor was in any way cognisant +of the existence of those who had no legal right to exist at all. If Miss +Galindo had hoped to have an exception made in Bessy’s favour, she was +mistaken. My lady sent a note inviting Miss Galindo herself to tea one evening, +about a month after Bessy came; but Miss Galindo “had a cold and could +not come.” The next time she was invited, she “had an engagement at +home”—a step nearer to the absolute truth. And the third time, she +“had a young friend staying with her whom she was unable to leave.” +My lady accepted every excuse as bonâ fide, and took no further notice. I +missed Miss Galindo very much; we all did; for, in the days when she was clerk, +she was sure to come in and find the opportunity of saying something amusing to +some of us before she went away. And I, as an invalid, or perhaps from natural +tendency, was particularly fond of little bits of village gossip. There was no +Mr. Horner—he even had come in, now and then, with formal, stately pieces +of intelligence—and there was no Miss Galindo in these days. I missed her +much. And so did my lady, I am sure. Behind all her quiet, sedate manner, I am +certain her heart ached sometimes for a few words from Miss Galindo, who seemed +to have absented herself altogether from the Hall now Bessy was come. +</p> + +<p> +Captain James might be very sensible, and all that; but not even my lady could +call him a substitute for the old familiar friends. He was a thorough sailor, +as sailors were in those days—swore a good deal, drank a good deal +(without its ever affecting him in the least), and was very prompt and +kind-hearted in all his actions; but he was not accustomed to women, as my lady +once said, and would judge in all things for himself. My lady had expected, I +think, to find some one who would take his notions on the management of her +estate from her ladyship’s own self; but he spoke as if he were +responsible for the good management of the whole, and must, consequently, be +allowed full liberty of action. He had been too long in command over men at sea +to like to be directed by a woman in anything he undertook, even though that +woman was my lady. I suppose this was the common-sense my lady spoke of; but +when common-sense goes against us, I don’t think we value it quite so +much as we ought to do. +</p> + +<p> +Lady Ludlow was proud of her personal superintendence of her own estate. She +liked to tell us how her father used to take her with him in his rides, and bid +her observe this and that, and on no account to allow such and such things to +be done. But I have heard that the first time she told all this to Captain +James, he told her point-blank that he had heard from Mr. Smithson that the +farms were much neglected and the rents sadly behindhand, and that he meant to +set to in good earnest and study agriculture, and see how he could remedy the +state of things. My lady would, I am sure, be greatly surprised, but what could +she do? Here was the very man she had chosen herself, setting to with all his +energy to conquer the defect of ignorance, which was all that those who had +presumed to offer her ladyship advice had ever had to say against him. Captain +James read Arthur Young’s “Tours” in all his spare time, as +long as he was an invalid; and shook his head at my lady’s accounts as to +how the land had been cropped or left fallow from time immemorial. Then he set +to, and tried too many new experiments at once. My lady looked on in dignified +silence; but all the farmers and tenants were in an uproar, and prophesied a +hundred failures. Perhaps fifty did occur; they were only half as many as Lady +Ludlow had feared; but they were twice as many, four, eight times as many as +the captain had anticipated. His openly-expressed disappointment made him +popular again. The rough country people could not have understood silent and +dignified regret at the failure of his plans, but they sympathized with a man +who swore at his ill success—sympathized, even while they chuckled over +his discomfiture. Mr. Brooke, the retired tradesman, did not cease blaming him +for not succeeding, and for swearing. “But what could you expect from a +sailor?” Mr. Brooke asked, even in my lady’s hearing; though he +might have known Captain James was my lady’s own personal choice, from +the old friendship Mr. Urian had always shown for him. I think it was this +speech of the Birmingham baker’s that made my lady determine to stand by +Captain James, and encourage him to try again. For she would not allow that her +choice had been an unwise one, at the bidding (as it were) of a dissenting +tradesman; the only person in the neighbourhood, too, who had flaunted about in +coloured clothes, when all the world was in mourning for my lady’s only +son. +</p> + +<p> +Captain James would have thrown the agency up at once, if my lady had not felt +herself bound to justify the wisdom of her choice, by urging him to stay. He +was much touched by her confidence in him, and swore a great oath, that the +next year he would make the land such as it had never been before for produce. +It was not my lady’s way to repeat anything she had heard, especially to +another person’s disadvantage. So I don’t think she ever told +Captain James of Mr. Brooke’s speech about a sailor’s being likely +to mismanage the property; and the captain was too anxious to succeed in this, +the second year of his trial, to be above going to the flourishing, shrewd Mr. +Brooke, and asking for his advice as to the best method of working the estate. +I dare say, if Miss Galindo had been as intimate as formerly at the Hall, we +should all of us have heard of this new acquaintance of the agent’s long +before we did. As it was, I am sure my lady never dreamed that the captain, who +held opinions that were even more Church and King than her own, could ever have +made friends with a Baptist baker from Birmingham, even to serve her +ladyship’s own interests in the most loyal manner. +</p> + +<p> +We heard of it first from Mr. Gray, who came now often to see my lady, for +neither he nor she could forget the solemn tie which the fact of his being the +person to acquaint her with my lord’s death had created between them. For +true and holy words spoken at that time, though having no reference to aught +below the solemn subjects of life and death, had made her withdraw her +opposition to Mr. Gray’s wish about establishing a village school. She +had sighed a little, it is true, and was even yet more apprehensive than +hopeful as to the result; but almost as if as a memorial to my lord, she had +allowed a kind of rough school-house to be built on the green, just by the +church; and had gently used the power she undoubtedly had, in expressing her +strong wish that the boys might only be taught to read and write, and the first +four rules of arithmetic; while the girls were only to learn to read, and to +add up in their heads, and the rest of the time to work at mending their own +clothes, knitting stockings and spinning. My lady presented the school with +more spinning-wheels than there were girls, and requested that there might be a +rule that they should have spun so many hanks of flax, and knitted so many +pairs of stockings, before they ever were taught to read at all. After all, it +was but making the best of a bad job with my poor lady—but life was not +what it had been to her. I remember well the day that Mr. Gray pulled some +delicately fine yarn (and I was a good judge of those things) out of his +pocket, and laid it and a capital pair of knitted stockings before my lady, as +the first-fruits, so to say, of his school. I recollect seeing her put on her +spectacles, and carefully examine both productions. Then she passed them to me. +</p> + +<p> +“This is well, Mr. Gray. I am much pleased. You are fortunate in your +schoolmistress. She has had both proper knowledge of womanly things and much +patience. Who is she? One out of our village?” +</p> + +<p> +“My lady,” said Mr. Gray, stammering and colouring in his old +fashion, “Miss Bessy is so very kind as to teach all those sorts of +things—Miss Bessy, and Miss Galindo, sometimes.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady looked at him over her spectacles: but she only repeated the words +“Miss Bessy,” and paused, as if trying to remember who such a +person could be; and he, if he had then intended to say more, was quelled by +her manner, and dropped the subject. He went on to say, that he had thought it +his duty to decline the subscription to his school offered by Mr. Brooke, +because he was a Dissenter; that he (Mr. Gray) feared that Captain James, +through whom Mr. Brooke’s offer of money had been made, was offended at +his refusing to accept it from a man who held heterodox opinions; nay, whom Mr. +Gray suspected of being infected by Dodwell’s heresy. +</p> + +<p> +“I think there must be some mistake,” said my lady, “or I +have misunderstood you. Captain James would never be sufficiently with a +schismatic to be employed by that man Brooke in distributing his charities. I +should have doubted, until now, if Captain James knew him.” +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed, my lady, he not only knows him, but is intimate with him, I +regret to say. I have repeatedly seen the captain and Mr. Brooke walking +together; going through the fields together; and people do say—” +</p> + +<p> +My lady looked up in interrogation at Mr. Gray’s pause. +</p> + +<p> +“I disapprove of gossip, and it may be untrue; but people do say that +Captain James is very attentive to Miss Brooke.” +</p> + +<p> +“Impossible!” said my lady, indignantly. “Captain James is a +loyal and religious man. I beg your pardon Mr. Gray, but it is +impossible.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>CHAPTER XIV.</h2> + +<p> +Like many other things which have been declared to be impossible, this report +of Captain James being attentive to Miss Brooke turned out to be very true. +</p> + +<p> +The mere idea of her agent being on the slightest possible terms of +acquaintance with the Dissenter, the tradesman, the Birmingham democrat, who +had come to settle in our good, orthodox, aristocratic, and agricultural +Hanbury, made my lady very uneasy. Miss Galindo’s misdemeanour in having +taken Miss Bessy to live with her, faded into a mistake, a mere error of +judgment, in comparison with Captain James’s intimacy at Yeast House, as +the Brookes called their ugly square-built farm. My lady talked herself quite +into complacency with Miss Galindo, and even Miss Bessy was named by her, the +first time I had ever been aware that my lady recognized her existence; +but—I recollect it was a long rainy afternoon, and I sat with her +ladyship, and we had time and opportunity for a long uninterrupted +talk—whenever we had been silent for a little while she began again, with +something like a wonder how it was that Captain James could ever have commenced +an acquaintance with “that man Brooke.” My lady recapitulated all +the times she could remember, that anything had occurred, or been said by +Captain James which she could now understand as throwing light upon the +subject. +</p> + +<p> +“He said once that he was anxious to bring in the Norfolk system of +cropping, and spoke a good deal about Mr. Coke of Holkham (who, by the way, was +no more a Coke than I am—collateral in the female line—which counts +for little or nothing among the great old commoners’ families of pure +blood), and his new ways of cultivation; of course new men bring in new ways, +but it does not follow that either are better than the old ways. However, +Captain James has been very anxious to try turnips and bone manure, and he +really is a man of such good sense and energy, and was so sorry last year about +the failure, that I consented; and now I begin to see my error. I have always +heard that town bakers adulterate their flour with bone-dust; and, of course, +Captain James would be aware of this, and go to Brooke to inquire where the +article was to be purchased.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady always ignored the fact which had sometimes, I suspect, been brought +under her very eyes during her drives, that Mr. Brooke’s few fields were +in a state of far higher cultivation than her own; so she could not, of course, +perceive that there was any wisdom to be gained from asking the advice of the +tradesman turned farmer. +</p> + +<p> +But by-and-by this fact of her agent’s intimacy with the person whom in +the whole world she most disliked (with that sort of dislike in which a large +amount of uncomfortableness is combined—the dislike which conscientious +people sometimes feel to another without knowing why, and yet which they cannot +indulge in with comfort to themselves without having a moral reason why), came +before my lady in many shapes. For, indeed I am sure that Captain James was not +a man to conceal or be ashamed of one of his actions. I cannot fancy his ever +lowering his strong loud clear voice, or having a confidental conversation with +any one. When his crops had failed, all the village had known it. He +complained, he regretted, he was angry, or owned himself a —- fool, all +down the village street; and the consequence was that, although he was a far +more passionate man than Mr. Horner, all the tenants liked him far better. +People, in general, take a kindlier interest in any one, the workings of whose +mind and heart they can watch and understand, than in a man who only lets you +know what he has been thinking about and feeling, by what he does. But Harry +Gregson was faithful to the memory of Mr. Horner. Miss Galindo has told me that +she used to watch him hobble out of the way of Captain James, as if to accept +his notice, however good-naturedly given, would have been a kind of treachery +to his former benefactor. But Gregson (the father) and the new agent rather +took to each other; and one day, much to my surprise, I heard that the +“poaching, tinkering vagabond,” as the people used to call Gregson +when I first had come to live at Hanbury, had been appointed gamekeeper; Mr. +Gray standing godfather, as it were, to his trustworthiness, if he were trusted +with anything; which I thought at the time was rather an experiment, only it +answered, as many of Mr. Gray’s deeds of daring did. It was curious how +he was growing to be a kind of autocrat in the village; and how unconscious he +was of it. He was as shy and awkward and nervous as ever in any affair that was +not of some moral consequence to him. But as soon as he was convinced that a +thing was right, he “shut his eyes and ran and butted at it like a +ram,” as Captain James once expressed it, in talking over something Mr. +Gray had done. People in the village said, “they never knew what the +parson would be at next;” or they might have said, “where his +reverence would next turn up.” For I have heard of his marching right +into the middle of a set of poachers, gathered together for some desperate +midnight enterprise, or walking into a public-house that lay just beyond the +bounds of my lady’s estate, and in that extra-parochial piece of ground I +named long ago, and which was considered the rendezvous of all the +ne’er-do-weel characters for miles round, and where a parson and a +constable were held in much the same kind of esteem as unwelcome visitors. And +yet Mr. Gray had his long fits of depression, in which he felt as if he were +doing nothing, making no way in his work, useless and unprofitable, and better +out of the world than in it. In comparison with the work he had set himself to +do, what he did seemed to be nothing. I suppose it was constitutional, those +attacks of lowness of spirits which he had about this time; perhaps a part of +the nervousness which made him always so awkward when he came to the Hall. Even +Mrs. Medlicott, who almost worshipped the ground he trod on, as the saying is, +owned that Mr. Gray never entered one of my lady’s rooms without knocking +down something, and too often breaking it. He would much sooner have faced a +desperate poacher than a young lady any day. At least so we thought. +</p> + +<p> +I do not know how it was that it came to pass that my lady became reconciled to +Miss Galindo about this time. Whether it was that her ladyship was weary of the +unspoken coolness with her old friend; or that the specimens of delicate sewing +and fine spinning at the school had mollified her towards Miss Bessy; but I was +surprised to learn one day that Miss Galindo and her young friend were coming +that very evening to tea at the Hall. This information was given me by Mrs. +Medlicott, as a message from my lady, who further went on to desire that +certain little preparations should be made in her own private sitting-room, in +which the greater part of my days were spent. From the nature of these +preparations, I became quite aware that my lady intended to do honour to her +expected visitors. Indeed, Lady Ludlow never forgave by halves, as I have known +some people do. Whoever was coming as a visitor to my lady, peeress, or poor +nameless girl, there was a certain amount of preparation required in order to +do them fitting honour. I do not mean to say that the preparation was of the +same degree of importance in each case. I dare say, if a peeress had come to +visit us at the Hall, the covers would have been taken off the furniture in the +white drawing-room (they never were uncovered all the time I stayed at the +Hall), because my lady would wish to offer her the ornaments and luxuries which +this grand visitor (who never came—I wish she had! I did so want to see +that furniture uncovered!) was accustomed to at home, and to present them to +her in the best order in which my lady could. The same rule, mollified, held +good with Miss Galindo. Certain things, in which my lady knew she took an +interest, were laid out ready for her to examine on this very day; and, what +was more, great books of prints were laid out, such as I remembered my lady had +had brought forth to beguile my own early days of illness,—Mr. +Hogarth’s works, and the like,—which I was sure were put out for +Miss Bessy. +</p> + +<p> +No one knows how curious I was to see this mysterious Miss Bessy—twenty +times more mysterious, of course, for want of her surname. And then again (to +try and account for my great curiosity, of which in recollection I am more than +half ashamed), I had been leading the quiet monotonous life of a crippled +invalid for many years,—shut up from any sight of new faces; and this was +to be the face of one whom I had thought about so much and so long,—Oh! I +think I might be excused. +</p> + +<p> +Of course they drank tea in the great hall, with the four young gentlewomen, +who, with myself, formed the small bevy now under her ladyship’s charge. +Of those who were at Hanbury when first I came, none remained; all were +married, or gone once more to live at some home which could be called their +own, whether the ostensible head were father or brother. I myself was not +without some hopes of a similar kind. My brother Harry was now a curate in +Westmoreland, and wanted me to go and live with him, as eventually I did for a +time. But that is neither here nor there at present. What I am talking about is +Miss Bessy. +</p> + +<p> +After a reasonable time had elapsed, occupied as I well knew by the meal in the +great hall,—the measured, yet agreeable conversation +afterwards,—and a certain promenade around the hall, and through the +drawing-rooms, with pauses before different pictures, the history or subject of +each of which was invariably told by my lady to every new visitor,—a sort +of giving them the freedom of the old family-seat, by describing the kind and +nature of the great progenitors who had lived there before the +narrator,—I heard the steps approaching my lady’s room, where I +lay. I think I was in such a state of nervous expectation, that if I could have +moved easily, I should have got up and run away. And yet I need not have been, +for Miss Galindo was not in the least altered (her nose a little redder, to be +sure, but then that might only have had a temporary cause in the private crying +I know she would have had before coming to see her dear Lady Ludlow once +again). But I could almost have pushed Miss Galindo away, as she intercepted me +in my view of the mysterious Miss Bessy. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Bessy was, as I knew, only about eighteen, but she looked older. Dark +hair, dark eyes, a tall, firm figure, a good, sensible face, with a serene +expression, not in the least disturbed by what I had been thinking must be such +awful circumstances as a first introduction to my lady, who had so disapproved +of her very existence: those are the clearest impressions I remember of my +first interview with Miss Bessy. She seemed to observe us all, in her quiet +manner, quite as much as I did her; but she spoke very little; occupied +herself, indeed, as my lady had planned, with looking over the great books of +engravings. I think I must have (foolishly) intended to make her feel at her +ease, by my patronage; but she was seated far away from my sofa, in order to +command the light, and really seemed so unconcerned at her unwonted +circumstances, that she did not need my countenance or kindness. One thing I +did like—her watchful look at Miss Galindo from time to time: it showed +that her thoughts and sympathy were ever at Miss Galindo’s service, as +indeed they well might be. When Miss Bessy spoke, her voice was full and clear, +and what she said, to the purpose, though there was a slight provincial accent +in her way of speaking. After a while, my lady set us two to play at chess, a +game which I had lately learnt at Mr. Gray’s suggestion. Still we did not +talk much together, though we were becoming attracted towards each other, I +fancy. +</p> + +<p> +“You will play well,” said she. “You have only learnt about +six months, have you? And yet you can nearly beat me, who have been at it as +many years.” +</p> + +<p> +“I began to learn last November. I remember Mr. Gray’s bringing me +‘Philidor on Chess,’ one very foggy, dismal day.” +</p> + +<p> +What made her look up so suddenly, with bright inquiry in her eyes? What made +her silent for a moment as if in thought, and then go on with something, I know +not what, in quite an altered tone? +</p> + +<p> +My lady and Miss Galindo went on talking, while I sat thinking. I heard Captain +James’s name mentioned pretty frequently; and at last my lady put down +her work, and said, almost with tears in her eyes: +</p> + +<p> +“I could not—I cannot believe it. He must be aware she is a +schismatic; a baker’s daughter; and he is a gentleman by virtue and +feeling, as well as by his profession, though his manners may be at times a +little rough. My dear Miss Galindo, what will this world come to?” +</p> + +<p> +Miss Galindo might possibly be aware of her own share in bringing the world to +the pass which now dismayed my lady,—for of course, though all was now +over and forgiven, yet Miss, Bessy’s being received into a respectable +maiden lady’s house, was one of the portents as to the world’s +future which alarmed her ladyship; and Miss Galindo knew this,—but, at +any rate, she had too lately been forgiven herself not to plead for mercy for +the next offender against my lady’s delicate sense of fitness and +propriety,—so she replied: +</p> + +<p> +“Indeed, my lady, I have long left off trying to conjecture what makes +Jack fancy Gill, or Gill Jack. It’s best to sit down quiet under the +belief that marriages are made for us, somewhere out of this world, and out of +the range of this world’s reason and laws. I’m not so sure that I +should settle it down that they were made in heaven; t’other place seems +to me as likely a workshop; but at any rate, I’ve given up troubling my +head as to why they take place. Captain James is a gentleman; I make no doubt +of that ever since I saw him stop to pick up old Goody Blake (when she tumbled +down on the slide last winter) and then swear at a little lad who was laughing +at her, and cuff him till he tumbled down crying; but we must have bread +somehow, and though I like it better baked at home in a good sweet brick oven, +yet, as some folks never can get it to rise, I don’t see why a man may +not be a baker. You see, my lady, I look upon baking as a simple trade, and as +such lawful. There is no machine comes in to take away a man’s or +woman’s power of earning their living, like the spinning-jenny (the old +busybody that she is), to knock up all our good old women’s livelihood, +and send them to their graves before their time. There’s an invention of +the enemy, if you will!” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s very true!” said my lady, shaking her head. +</p> + +<p> +“But baking bread is wholesome, straightforward elbow-work. They have not +got to inventing any contrivance for that yet, thank Heaven! It does not seem +to me natural, nor according to Scripture, that iron and steel (whose brows +can’t sweat) should be made to do man’s work. And so I say, all +those trades where iron and steel do the work ordained to man at the Fall, are +unlawful, and I never stand up for them. But say this baker Brooke did knead +his bread, and make it rise, and then that people, who had, perhaps, no good +ovens, came to him, and bought his good light bread, and in this manner he +turned an honest penny and got rich; why, all I say, my lady, is this,—I +dare say he would have been born a Hanbury, or a lord if he could; and if he +was not, it is no fault of his, that I can see, that he made good bread (being +a baker by trade), and got money, and bought his land. It was his misfortune, +not his fault, that he was not a person of quality by birth.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s very true,” said my lady, after a moment’s +pause for consideration. “But, although he was a baker, he might have +been a Churchman. Even your eloquence, Miss Galindo, shan’t convince me +that that is not his own fault.” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t see even that, begging your pardon, my lady,” said +Miss Galindo, emboldened by the first success of her eloquence. “When a +Baptist is a baby, if I understand their creed aright, he is not baptized; and, +consequently, he can have no godfathers and godmothers to do anything for him +in his baptism; you agree to that, my lady?” +</p> + +<p> +My lady would rather have known what her acquiescence would lead to, before +acknowledging that she could not dissent from this first proposition; still she +gave her tacit agreement by bowing her head. +</p> + +<p> +“And, you know, our godfathers and godmothers are expected to promise and +vow three things in our name, when we are little babies, and can do nothing but +squall for ourselves. It is a great privilege, but don’t let us be hard +upon those who have not had the chance of godfathers and godmothers. Some +people, we know, are born with silver spoons,—that’s to say, a +godfather to give one things, and teach one’s catechism, and see that +we’re confirmed into good church-going Christians,—and others with +wooden ladles in their mouths. These poor last folks must just be content to be +godfatherless orphans, and Dissenters, all their lives; and if they are +tradespeople into the bargain, so much the worse for them; but let us be humble +Christians, my dear lady, and not hold our heads too high because we were born +orthodox quality.” +</p> + +<p> +“You go on too fast, Miss Galindo! I can’t follow you. Besides, I +do believe dissent to be an invention of the Devil’s. Why can’t +they believe as we do? It’s very wrong. Besides, its schism and heresy, +and, you know, the Bible says that’s as bad as witchcraft.” +</p> + +<p> +My lady was not convinced, as I could see. After Miss Galindo had gone, she +sent Mrs. Medlicott for certain books out of the great old library up stairs, +and had them made up into a parcel under her own eye. +</p> + +<p> +“If Captain James comes to-morrow, I will speak to him about these +Brookes. I have not hitherto liked to speak to him, because I did not wish to +hurt him, by supposing there could be any truth in the reports about his +intimacy with them. But now I will try and do my duty by him and them. Surely +this great body of divinity will bring them back to the true church.” +</p> + +<p> +I could not tell, for though my lady read me over the titles, I was not any the +wiser as to their contents. Besides, I was much more anxious to consult my lady +as to my own change of place. I showed her the letter I had that day received +from Harry; and we once more talked over the expediency of my going to live +with him, and trying what entire change of air would do to re-establish my +failing health. I could say anything to my lady, she was so sure to understand +me rightly. For one thing, she never thought of herself, so I had no fear of +hurting her by stating the truth. I told her how happy my years had been while +passed under her roof; but that now I had begun to wonder whether I had not +duties elsewhere, in making a home for Harry,—and whether the fulfilment +of these duties, quiet ones they must needs be in the case of such a cripple as +myself, would not prevent my sinking into the querulous habit of thinking and +talking, into which I found myself occasionally falling. Add to which, there +was the prospect of benefit from the more bracing air of the north. +</p> + +<p> +It was then settled that my departure from Hanbury, my happy home for so long, +was to take place before many weeks had passed. And as, when one period of life +is about to be shut up for ever, we are sure to look back upon it with fond +regret, so I, happy enough in my future prospects, could not avoid recurring to +all the days of my life in the Hall, from the time when I came to it, a shy +awkward girl, scarcely past childhood, to now, when a grown woman,—past +childhood—almost, from the very character of my illness, past +youth,—I was looking forward to leaving my lady’s house (as a +residence) for ever. As it has turned out, I never saw either her or it again. +Like a piece of sea-wreck, I have drifted away from those days: quiet, happy, +eventless days,—very happy to remember! +</p> + +<p> +I thought of good, jovial Mr. Mountford,—and his regrets that he might +not keep a pack, “a very small pack,” of harriers, and his merry +ways, and his love of good eating; of the first coming of Mr. Gray, and my +lady’s attempt to quench his sermons, when they tended to enforce any +duty connected with education. And now we had an absolute school-house in the +village; and since Miss Bessy’s drinking tea at the Hall, my lady had +been twice inside it, to give directions about some fine yarn she was having +spun for table-napery. And her ladyship had so outgrown her old custom of +dispensing with sermon or discourse, that even during the temporary preaching +of Mr. Crosse, she had never had recourse to it, though I believe she would +have had all the congregation on her side if she had. +</p> + +<p> +And Mr. Horner was dead, and Captain James reigned in his stead. Good, steady, +severe, silent Mr. Horner! with his clock-like regularity, and his +snuff-coloured clothes, and silver buckles! I have often wondered which one +misses most when they are dead and gone,—the bright creatures full of +life, who are hither and thither and everywhere, so that no one can reckon upon +their coming and going, with whom stillness and the long quiet of the grave, +seems utterly irreconcilable, so full are they of vivid motion and +passion,—or the slow, serious people, whose movements—nay, whose +very words, seem to go by clockwork; who never appear much to affect the course +of our life while they are with us, but whose methodical ways show themselves, +when they are gone, to have been intertwined with our very roots of daily +existence. I think I miss these last the most, although I may have loved the +former best. Captain James never was to me what Mr. Horner was, though the +latter had hardly changed a dozen words with me at the day of his death. Then +Miss Galindo! I remembered the time as if it had been only yesterday, when she +was but a name—and a very odd one—to me; then she was a queer, +abrupt, disagreeable, busy old maid. Now I loved her dearly, and I found out +that I was almost jealous of Miss Bessy. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Gray I never thought of with love; the feeling was almost reverence with +which I looked upon him. I have not wished to speak much of myself, or else I +could have told you how much he had been to me during these long, weary years +of illness. But he was almost as much to every one, rich and poor, from my lady +down to Miss Galindo’s Sally. +</p> + +<p> +The village, too, had a different look about it. I am sure I could not tell you +what caused the change; but there were no more lounging young men to form a +group at the cross-road, at a time of day when young men ought to be at work. I +don’t say this was all Mr. Gray’s doing, for there really was so +much to do in the fields that there was but little time for lounging +now-a-days. And the children were hushed up in school, and better behaved out +of it, too, than in the days when I used to be able to go my lady’s +errands in the village. I went so little about now, that I am sure I +can’t tell who Miss Galindo found to scold; and yet she looked so well +and so happy that I think she must have had her accustomed portion of that +wholesome exercise. +</p> + +<p> +Before I left Hanbury, the rumour that Captain James was going to marry Miss +Brooke, Baker Brooke’s eldest daughter, who had only a sister to share +his property with her, was confirmed. He himself announced it to my lady; nay, +more, with a courage, gained, I suppose, in his former profession, where, as I +have heard, he had led his ship into many a post of danger, he asked her +ladyship, the Countess Ludlow, if he might bring his bride elect, (the Baptist +baker’s daughter!) and present her to my lady! +</p> + +<p> +I am glad I was not present when he made this request; I should have felt so +much ashamed for him, and I could not have helped being anxious till I heard my +lady’s answer, if I had been there. Of course she acceded; but I can +fancy the grave surprise of her look. I wonder if Captain James noticed it. +</p> + +<p> +I hardly dared ask my lady, after the interview had taken place, what she +thought of the bride elect; but I hinted my curiosity, and she told me, that if +the young person had applied to Mrs. Medlicott, for the situation of cook, and +Mrs. Medlicott had engaged her, she thought that it would have been a very +suitable arrangement. I understood from this how little she thought a marriage +with Captain James, R.N., suitable. +</p> + +<p> +About a year after I left Hanbury, I received a letter from Miss Galindo; I +think I can find it.—Yes, this is it. +</p> + +<p class="right"> +‘Hanbury, May 4, 1811. +</p> + +<blockquote> + +<p> +D<small>EAR</small> M<small>ARGARET</small>, +</p> + +<p> +‘You ask for news of us all. Don’t you know there is no news in +Hanbury? Did you ever hear of an event here? Now, if you have answered +“Yes,” in your own mind to these questions, you have fallen into my +trap, and never were more mistaken in your life. Hanbury is full of news; and +we have more events on our hands than we know what to do with. I will take them +in the order of the newspapers—births, deaths, and marriages. In the +matter of births, Jenny Lucas has had twins not a week ago. Sadly too much of a +good thing, you’ll say. Very true: but then they died; so their birth did +not much signify. My cat has kittened, too; she has had three kittens, which +again you may observe is too much of a good thing; and so it would be, if it +were not for the next item of intelligence I shall lay before you. Captain and +Mrs. James have taken the old house next Pearson’s; and the house is +overrun with mice, which is just as fortunate for me as the King of +Egypt’s rat-ridden kingdom was to Dick Whittington. For my cat’s +kittening decided me to go and call on the bride, in hopes she wanted a cat; +which she did like a sensible woman, as I do believe she is, in spite of +Baptism, Bakers, Bread, and Birmingham, and something worse than all, which you +shall hear about, if you’ll only be patient. As I had got my best bonnet +on, the one I bought when poor Lord Ludlow was last at Hanbury in +’99—I thought it a great condescension in myself (always +remembering the date of the Galindo baronetcy) to go and call on the bride; +though I don’t think so much of myself in my every-day clothes, as you +know. But who should I find there but my Lady Ludlow! She looks as frail and +delicate as ever, but is, I think, in better heart ever since that old city +merchant of a Hanbury took it into his head that he was a cadet of the Hanburys +of Hanbury, and left her that handsome legacy. I’ll warrant you that the +mortgage was paid off pretty fast; and Mr. Horner’s money—or my +lady’s money, or Harry Gregson’s money, call it which you +will—is invested in his name, all right and tight; and they do talk of +his being captain of his school, or Grecian, or something, and going to +college, after all! Harry Gregson the poacher’s son! Well! to be sure, we +are living in strange times! +</p> + +<p> +‘But I have not done with the marriages yet. Captain James’s is all +very well, but no one cares for it now, we are so full of Mr. Gray’s. +Yes, indeed, Mr. Gray is going to be married, and to nobody else but my little +Bessy! I tell her she will have to nurse him half the days of her life, he is +such a frail little body. But she says she does not care for that; so that his +body holds his soul, it is enough for her. She has a good spirit and a brave +heart, has my Bessy! It is a great advantage that she won’t have to mark +her clothes over again: for when she had knitted herself her last set of +stockings, I told her to put G for Galindo, if she did not choose to put it for +Gibson, for she should be my child if she was no one else’s. And now you +see it stands for Gray. So there are two marriages, and what more would you +have? And she promises to take another of my kittens. +</p> + +<p> +‘Now, as to deaths, old Farmer Hale is dead—poor old man, I should +think his wife thought it a good riddance, for he beat her every day that he +was drunk, and he was never sober, in spite of Mr. Gray. I don’t think +(as I tell him) that Mr. Gray would ever have found courage to speak to Bessy +as long as Farmer Hale lived, he took the old gentleman’s sins so much to +heart, and seemed to think it was all his fault for not being able to make a +sinner into a saint. The parish bull is dead too. I never was so glad in my +life. But they say we are to have a new one in his place. In the meantime I +cross the common in peace, which is very convenient just now, when I have so +often to go to Mr. Gray’s to see about furnishing. +</p> + +<p> +‘Now you think I have told you all the Hanbury news, don’t you? Not +so. The very greatest thing of all is to come. I won’t tantalize you, but +just out with it, for you would never guess it. My Lady Ludlow has given a +party, just like any plebeian amongst us. We had tea and toast in the blue +drawing-room, old John Footman waiting with Tom Diggles, the lad that used to +frighten away crows in Farmer Hale’s fields, following in my lady’s +livery, hair powdered and everything. Mrs. Medlicott made tea in my +lady’s own room. My lady looked like a splendid fairy queen of mature +age, in black velvet, and the old lace, which I have never seen her wear before +since my lord’s death. But the company? you’ll say. Why, we had the +parson of Clover, and the parson of Headleigh, and the parson of Merribank, and +the three parsonesses; and Farmer Donkin, and two Miss Donkins; and Mr. Gray +(of course), and myself and Bessy; and Captain and Mrs. James; yes, and Mr. and +Mrs. Brooke; think of that! I am not sure the parsons liked it; but he was +there. For he has been helping Captain James to get my lady’s land into +order; and then his daughter married the agent; and Mr. Gray (who ought to +know) says that, after all, Baptists are not such bad people; and he was right +against them at one time, as you may remember. Mrs. Brooke is a rough diamond, +to be sure. People have said that of me, I know. But, being a Galindo, I learnt +manners in my youth and can take them up when I choose. But Mrs. Brooke never +learnt manners, I’ll be bound. When John Footman handed her the tray with +the tea-cups, she looked up at him as if she were sorely puzzled by that way of +going on. I was sitting next to her, so I pretended not to see her perplexity, +and put her cream and sugar in for her, and was all ready to pop it into her +hands,—when who should come up, but that impudent lad Tom Diggles (I call +him lad, for all his hair is powdered, for you know that it is not natural gray +hair), with his tray full of cakes and what not, all as good as Mrs. Medlicott +could make them. By this time, I should tell you, all the parsonesses were +looking at Mrs. Brooke, for she had shown her want of breeding before; and the +parsonesses, who were just a step above her in manners, were very much inclined +to smile at her doings and sayings. Well! what does she do, but pull out a +clean Bandanna pocket-handkerchief all red and yellow silk, spread it over her +best silk gown; it was, like enough, a new one, for I had it from Sally, who +had it from her cousin Molly, who is dairy-woman at the Brookes’, that +the Brookes were mighty set-up with an invitation to drink tea at the Hall. +There we were, Tom Diggles even on the grin (I wonder how long it is since he +was own brother to a scarecrow, only not so decently dressed) and Mrs. +Parsoness of Headleigh,—I forget her name, and it’s no matter, for +she’s an ill-bred creature, I hope Bessy will behave herself +better—was right-down bursting with laughter, and as near a hee-haw as +ever a donkey was, when what does my lady do? Ay! there’s my own dear +Lady Ludlow, God bless her! She takes out her own pocket-handkerchief, all +snowy cambric, and lays it softly down on her velvet lap, for all the world as +if she did it every day of her life, just like Mrs. Brooke, the baker’s +wife; and when the one got up to shake the crumbs into the fire-place, the +other did just the same. But with such a grace! and such a look at us all! Tom +Diggles went red all over; and Mrs. Parsoness of Headleigh scarce spoke for the +rest of the evening; and the tears came into my old silly eyes; and Mr. Gray, +who was before silent and awkward in a way which I tell Bessy she must cure him +of, was made so happy by this pretty action of my lady’s, that he talked +away all the rest of the evening, and was the life of the company. +</p> + +<p> +‘Oh, Margaret Dawson! I sometimes wonder if you’re the better off +for leaving us. To be sure you’re with your brother, and blood is blood. +But when I look at my lady and Mr. Gray, for all they’re so different, I +would not change places with any in England.’ +</p> + +</blockquote> + +<p> +Alas! alas! I never saw my dear lady again. She died in eighteen hundred and +fourteen, and Mr. Gray did not long survive her. As I dare say you know, the +Reverend Henry Gregson is now vicar of Hanbury, and his wife is the daughter of +Mr. Gray and Miss Bessy. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY LUDLOW ***</div> +<div style='text-align:left'> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law 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. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™ +concept and trademark. 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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: My Lady Ludlow + + +Author: Elizabeth Gaskell + +Release Date: May 17, 2005 [eBook #2524] +[Last updated: March 30, 2011] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY LUDLOW*** +</pre> +<p><a name="startoftext"></a></p> +<p>Transcribed from the 1896 Smith Elder and Co. “Lizzie Leigh +and Other Tales” edition by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk</p> +<h1>MY LADY LUDLOW<br /> +by Elizabeth Gaskell</h1> +<h2>CHAPTER I.</h2> +<p>I am an old woman now, and things are very different to what they +were in my youth. Then we, who travelled, travelled in coaches, +carrying six inside, and making a two days’ journey out of what +people now go over in a couple of hours with a whizz and a flash, and +a screaming whistle, enough to deafen one. Then letters came in +but three times a week: indeed, in some places in Scotland where I have +stayed when I was a girl, the post came in but once a month;—but +letters were letters then; and we made great prizes of them, and read +them and studied them like books. Now the post comes rattling +in twice a day, bringing short jerky notes, some without beginning or +end, but just a little sharp sentence, which well-bred folks would think +too abrupt to be spoken. Well, well! they may all be improvements,—I +dare say they are; but you will never meet with a Lady Ludlow in these +days.</p> +<p>I will try and tell you about her. It is no story: it has, +as I said, neither beginning, middle, nor end.</p> +<p>My father was a poor clergyman with a large family. My mother +was always said to have good blood in her veins; and when she wanted +to maintain her position with the people she was thrown among,—principally +rich democratic manufacturers, all for liberty and the French Revolution,—she +would put on a pair of ruffles, trimmed with real old English point, +very much darned to be sure,—but which could not be bought new +for love or money, as the art of making it was lost years before. +These ruffles showed, as she said, that her ancestors had been Somebodies, +when the grandfathers of the rich folk, who now looked down upon her, +had been Nobodies,—if, indeed, they had any grandfathers at all. +I don’t know whether any one out of our own family ever noticed +these ruffles,—but we were all taught as children to feel rather +proud when my mother put them on, and to hold up our heads as became +the descendants of the lady who had first possessed the lace. +Not but what my dear father often told us that pride was a great sin; +we were never allowed to be proud of anything but my mother’s +ruffles: and she was so innocently happy when she put them on,—often, +poor dear creature, to a very worn and threadbare gown,—that I +still think, even after all my experience of life, they were a blessing +to the family. You will think that I am wandering away from my +Lady Ludlow. Not at all. The Lady who had owned the lace, +Ursula Hanbury, was a common ancestress of both my mother and my Lady +Ludlow. And so it fell out, that when my poor father died, and +my mother was sorely pressed to know what to do with her nine children, +and looked far and wide for signs of willingness to help, Lady Ludlow +sent her a letter, proffering aid and assistance. I see that letter +now: a large sheet of thick yellow paper, with a straight broad margin +left on the left-hand side of the delicate Italian writing,—writing +which contained far more in the same space of paper than all the sloping, +or masculine hand-writings of the present day. It was sealed with +a coat of arms,—a lozenge,—for Lady Ludlow was a widow. +My mother made us notice the motto, “Foy et Loy,” and told +us where to look for the quarterings of the Hanbury arms before she +opened the letter. Indeed, I think she was rather afraid of what +the contents might be; for, as I have said, in her anxious love for +her fatherless children, she had written to many people upon whom, to +tell truly, she had but little claim; and their cold, hard answers had +many a time made her cry, when she thought none of us were looking. +I do not even know if she had ever seen Lady Ludlow: all I knew of her +was that she was a very grand lady, whose grandmother had been half-sister +to my mother’s great-grandmother; but of her character and circumstances +I had heard nothing, and I doubt if my mother was acquainted with them.</p> +<p>I looked over my mother’s shoulder to read the letter; it began, +“Dear Cousin Margaret Dawson,” and I think I felt hopeful +from the moment I saw those words. She went on to say,—stay, +I think I can remember the very words:</p> +<p>‘DEAR COUSIN MARGARET DAWSON,—I have been much grieved +to hear of the loss you have sustained in the death of so good a husband, +and so excellent a clergyman as I have always heard that my late cousin +Richard was esteemed to be.’</p> +<p>“There!” said my mother, laying her finger on the passage, +“read that aloud to the little ones. Let them hear how their +father’s good report travelled far and wide, and how well he is +spoken of by one whom he never saw. COUSIN Richard, how prettily +her ladyship writes! Go on, Margaret!” She wiped her +eyes as she spoke: and laid her fingers on her lips, to still my little +sister, Cecily, who, not understanding anything about the important +letter, was beginning to talk and make a noise.</p> +<p>‘You say you are left with nine children. I too should +have had nine, if mine had all lived. I have none left but Rudolph, +the present Lord Ludlow. He is married, and lives, for the most +part, in London. But I entertain six young gentlewomen at my house +at Connington, who are to me as daughters—save that, perhaps, +I restrict them in certain indulgences in dress and diet that might +be befitting in young ladies of a higher rank, and of more probable +wealth. These young persons—all of condition, though out +of means—are my constant companions, and I strive to do my duty +as a Christian lady towards them. One of these young gentlewomen +died (at her own home, whither she had gone upon a visit) last May. +Will you do me the favour to allow your eldest daughter to supply her +place in my household? She is, as I make out, about sixteen years +of age. She will find companions here who are but a little older +than herself. I dress my young friends myself, and make each of +them a small allowance for pocket-money. They have but few opportunities +for matrimony, as Connington is far removed from any town. The +clergyman is a deaf old widower; my agent is married; and as for the +neighbouring farmers, they are, of course, below the notice of the young +gentlewomen under my protection. Still, if any young woman wishes +to marry, and has conducted herself to my satisfaction, I give her a +wedding dinner, her clothes, and her house-linen. And such as +remain with me to my death, will find a small competency provided for +them in my will. I reserve to myself the option of paying their +travelling expenses,—disliking gadding women, on the one hand; +on the other, not wishing by too long absence from the family home to +weaken natural ties.</p> +<p>‘If my proposal pleases you and your daughter—or rather, +if it pleases you, for I trust your daughter has been too well brought +up to have a will in opposition to yours—let me know, dear cousin +Margaret Dawson, and I will make arrangements for meeting the young +gentlewoman at Cavistock, which is the nearest point to which the coach +will bring her.’</p> +<p>My mother dropped the letter, and sat silent.</p> +<p>“I shall not know what to do without you, Margaret.”</p> +<p>A moment before, like a young untried girl as I was, I had been pleased +at the notion of seeing a new place, and leading a new life. But +now,—my mother’s look of sorrow, and the children’s +cry of remonstrance: “Mother; I won’t go,” I said.</p> +<p>“Nay! but you had better,” replied she, shaking her head. +“Lady Ludlow has much power. She can help your brothers. +It will not do to slight her offer.”</p> +<p>So we accepted it, after much consultation. We were rewarded,—or +so we thought,—for, afterwards, when I came to know Lady Ludlow, +I saw that she would have done her duty by us, as helpless relations, +however we might have rejected her kindness,—by a presentation +to Christ’s Hospital for one of my brothers.</p> +<p>And this was how I came to know my Lady Ludlow.</p> +<p>I remember well the afternoon of my arrival at Hanbury Court. +Her ladyship had sent to meet me at the nearest post-town at which the +mail-coach stopped. There was an old groom inquiring for me, the +ostler said, if my name was Dawson—from Hanbury Court, he believed. +I felt it rather formidable; and first began to understand what was +meant by going among strangers, when I lost sight of the guard to whom +my mother had intrusted me. I was perched up in a high gig with +a hood to it, such as in those days was called a chair, and my companion +was driving deliberately through the most pastoral country I had ever +yet seen. By-and-by we ascended a long hill, and the man got out +and walked at the horse’s head. I should have liked to walk, +too, very much indeed; but I did not know how far I might do it; and, +in fact, I dared not speak to ask to be helped down the deep steps of +the gig. We were at last at the top,—on a long, breezy, +sweeping, unenclosed piece of ground, called, as I afterwards learnt, +a Chase. The groom stopped, breathed, patted his horse, and then +mounted again to my side.</p> +<p>“Are we near Hanbury Court?” I asked.</p> +<p>“Near! Why, Miss! we’ve a matter of ten mile yet +to go.”</p> +<p>Once launched into conversation, we went on pretty glibly. +I fancy he had been afraid of beginning to speak to me, just as I was +to him; but he got over his shyness with me sooner than I did mine with +him. I let him choose the subjects of conversation, although very +often I could not understand the points of interest in them: for instance, +he talked for more than a quarter of an hour of a famous race which +a certain dog-fox had given him, above thirty years before; and spoke +of all the covers and turns just as if I knew them as well as he did; +and all the time I was wondering what kind of an animal a dog-fox might +be.</p> +<p>After we lost the Chase, the road grew worse. No one in these +days, who has not seen the byroads of fifty years ago, can imagine what +they were. We had to quarter, as Randal called it, nearly all +the way along the deep-rutted, miry lanes; and the tremendous jolts +I occasionally met with made my seat in the gig so unsteady that I could +not look about me at all, I was so much occupied in holding on. +The road was too muddy for me to walk without dirtying myself more than +I liked to do, just before my first sight of my Lady Ludlow. But +by-and-by, when we came to the fields in which the lane ended, I begged +Randal to help me down, as I saw that I could pick my steps among the +pasture grass without making myself unfit to be seen; and Randal, out +of pity for his steaming horse, wearied with the hard struggle through +the mud, thanked me kindly, and helped me down with a springing jump.</p> +<p>The pastures fell gradually down to the lower land, shut in on either +side by rows of high elms, as if there had been a wide grand avenue +here in former times. Down the grassy gorge we went, seeing the +sunset sky at the end of the shadowed descent. Suddenly we came +to a long flight of steps.</p> +<p>“If you’ll run down there, Miss, I’ll go round +and meet you, and then you’d better mount again, for my lady will +like to see you drive up to the house.”</p> +<p>“Are we near the house?” said I, suddenly checked by +the idea.</p> +<p>“Down there, Miss,” replied he, pointing with his whip +to certain stacks of twisted chimneys rising out of a group of trees, +in deep shadow against the crimson light, and which lay just beyond +a great square lawn at the base of the steep slope of a hundred yards, +on the edge of which we stood.</p> +<p>I went down the steps quietly enough. I met Randal and the +gig at the bottom; and, falling into a side road to the left, we drove +sedately round, through the gateway, and into the great court in front +of the house.</p> +<p>The road by which we had come lay right at the back.</p> +<p>Hanbury Court is a vast red-brick house—at least, it is cased +in part with red bricks; and the gate-house and walls about the place +are of brick,—with stone facings at every corner, and door, and +window, such as you see at Hampton Court. At the back are the +gables, and arched doorways, and stone mullions, which show (so Lady +Ludlow used to tell us) that it was once a priory. There was a +prior’s parlour, I know—only we called it Mrs. Medlicott’s +room; and there was a tithe-barn as big as a church, and rows of fish-ponds, +all got ready for the monks’ fasting-days in old time. But +all this I did not see till afterwards. I hardly noticed, this +first night, the great Virginian Creeper (said to have been the first +planted in England by one of my lady’s ancestors) that half covered +the front of the house. As I had been unwilling to leave the guard +of the coach, so did I now feel unwilling to leave Randal, a known friend +of three hours. But there was no help for it; in I must go; past +the grand-looking old gentleman holding the door open for me, on into +the great hall on the right hand, into which the sun’s last rays +were sending in glorious red light,—the gentleman was now walking +before me,—up a step on to the dais, as I afterwards learned that +it was called,—then again to the left, through a series of sitting-rooms, +opening one out of another, and all of them looking into a stately garden, +glowing, even in the twilight, with the bloom of flowers. We went +up four steps out of the last of these rooms, and then my guide lifted +up a heavy silk curtain and I was in the presence of my Lady Ludlow.</p> +<p>She was very small of stature, and very upright. She wore a +great lace cap, nearly half her own height, I should think, that went +round her head (caps which tied under the chin, and which we called +“mobs,” came in later, and my lady held them in great contempt, +saying people might as well come down in their nightcaps). In +front of my lady’s cap was a great bow of white satin ribbon; +and a broad band of the same ribbon was tied tight round her head, and +served to keep the cap straight. She had a fine Indian muslin +shawl folded over her shoulders and across her chest, and an apron of +the same; a black silk mode gown, made with short sleeves and ruffles, +and with the tail thereof pulled through the pocket-hole, so as to shorten +it to a useful length: beneath it she wore, as I could plainly see, +a quilted lavender satin petticoat. Her hair was snowy white, +but I hardly saw it, it was so covered with her cap: her skin, even +at her age, was waxen in texture and tint; her eyes were large and dark +blue, and must have been her great beauty when she was young, for there +was nothing particular, as far as I can remember, either in mouth or +nose. She had a great gold-headed stick by her chair; but I think +it was more as a mark of state and dignity than for use; for she had +as light and brisk a step when she chose as any girl of fifteen, and, +in her private early walk of meditation in the mornings, would go as +swiftly from garden alley to garden alley as any one of us.</p> +<p>She was standing up when I went in. I dropped my curtsey at +the door, which my mother had always taught me as a part of good manners, +and went up instinctively to my lady. She did not put out her +hand, but raised herself a little on tiptoe, and kissed me on both cheeks.</p> +<p>“You are cold, my child. You shall have a dish of tea +with me.” She rang a little hand-bell on the table by her, +and her waiting-maid came in from a small anteroom; and, as if all had +been prepared, and was awaiting my arrival, brought with her a small +china service with tea ready made, and a plate of delicately-cut bread +and butter, every morsel of which I could have eaten, and been none +the better for it, so hungry was I after my long ride. The waiting-maid +took off my cloak, and I sat down, sorely alarmed at the silence, the +hushed foot-falls of the subdued maiden over the thick carpet, and the +soft voice and clear pronunciation of my Lady Ludlow. My teaspoon +fell against my cup with a sharp noise, that seemed so out of place +and season that I blushed deeply. My lady caught my eye with hers,—both +keen and sweet were those dark-blue eyes of her ladyship’s:—</p> +<p>“Your hands are very cold, my dear; take off those gloves” +(I wore thick serviceable doeskin, and had been too shy to take them +off unbidden), “and let me try and warm them—the evenings +are very chilly.” And she held my great red hands in hers,—soft, +warm, white, ring-laden. Looking at last a little wistfully into +my face, she said—“Poor child! And you’re the +eldest of nine! I had a daughter who would have been just your +age; but I cannot fancy her the eldest of nine.” Then came +a pause of silence; and then she rang her bell, and desired her waiting-maid, +Adams, to show me to my room.</p> +<p>It was so small that I think it must have been a cell. The +walls were whitewashed stone; the bed was of white dimity. There +was a small piece of red staircarpet on each side of the bed, and two +chairs. In a closet adjoining were my washstand and toilet-table. +There was a text of Scripture painted on the wall right opposite to +my bed; and below hung a print, common enough in those days, of King +George and Queen Charlotte, with all their numerous children, down to +the little Princess Amelia in a go-cart. On each side hung a small +portrait, also engraved: on the left, it was Louis the Sixteenth; on +the other, Marie-Antoinette. On the chimney-piece there was a +tinder-box and a Prayer-book. I do not remember anything else +in the room. Indeed, in those days people did not dream of writing-tables, +and inkstands, and portfolios, and easy chairs, and what not. +We were taught to go into our bedrooms for the purposes of dressing, +and sleeping, and praying.</p> +<p>Presently I was summoned to supper. I followed the young lady +who had been sent to call me, down the wide shallow stairs, into the +great hall, through which I had first passed on my way to my Lady Ludlow’s +room. There were four other young gentlewomen, all standing, and +all silent, who curtsied to me when I first came in. They were +dressed in a kind of uniform: muslin caps bound round their heads with +blue ribbons, plain muslin handkerchiefs, lawn aprons, and drab-coloured +stuff gowns. They were all gathered together at a little distance +from the table, on which were placed a couple of cold chickens, a salad, +and a fruit tart. On the dais there was a smaller round table, +on which stood a silver jug filled with milk, and a small roll. +Near that was set a carved chair, with a countess’s coronet surmounting +the back of it. I thought that some one might have spoken to me; +but they were shy, and I was shy; or else there was some other reason; +but, indeed, almost the minute after I had come into the hall by the +door at the lower hand, her ladyship entered by the door opening upon +the dais; whereupon we all curtsied very low; I because I saw the others +do it. She stood, and looked at us for a moment.</p> +<p>“Young gentlewomen,” said she, “make Margaret Dawson +welcome among you;” and they treated me with the kind politeness +due to a stranger, but still without any talking beyond what was required +for the purposes of the meal. After it was over, and grace was +said by one of our party, my lady rang her hand-bell, and the servants +came in and cleared away the supper things: then they brought in a portable +reading-desk, which was placed on the dais, and, the whole household +trooping in, my lady called to one of my companions to come up and read +the Psalms and Lessons for the day. I remember thinking how afraid +I should have been had I been in her place. There were no prayers. +My lady thought it schismatic to have any prayers excepting those in +the Prayer-book; and would as soon have preached a sermon herself in +the parish church, as have allowed any one not a deacon at the least +to read prayers in a private dwelling-house. I am not sure that +even then she would have approved of his reading them in an unconsecrated +place.</p> +<p>She had been maid of honour to Queen Charlotte: a Hanbury of that +old stock that flourished in the days of the Plantagenets, and heiress +of all the land that remained to the family, of the great estates which +had once stretched into four separate counties. Hanbury Court +was hers by right. She had married Lord Ludlow, and had lived +for many years at his various seats, and away from her ancestral home. +She had lost all her children but one, and most of them had died at +these houses of Lord Ludlow’s; and, I dare say, that gave my lady +a distaste to the places, and a longing to come back to Hanbury Court, +where she had been so happy as a girl. I imagine her girlhood +had been the happiest time of her life; for, now I think of it, most +of her opinions, when I knew her in later life, were singular enough +then, but had been universally prevalent fifty years before. For +instance, while I lived at Hanbury Court, the cry for education was +beginning to come up: Mr. Raikes had set up his Sunday Schools; and +some clergymen were all for teaching writing and arithmetic, as well +as reading. My lady would have none of this; it was levelling +and revolutionary, she said. When a young woman came to be hired, +my lady would have her in, and see if she liked her looks and her dress, +and question her about her family. Her ladyship laid great stress +upon this latter point, saying that a girl who did not warm up when +any interest or curiosity was expressed about her mother, or the “baby” +(if there was one), was not likely to make a good servant. Then +she would make her put out her feet, to see if they were well and neatly +shod. Then she would bid her say the Lord’s Prayer and the +Creed. Then she inquired if she could write. If she could, +and she had liked all that had gone before, her face sank—it was +a great disappointment, for it was an all but inviolable rule with her +never to engage a servant who could write. But I have known her +ladyship break through it, although in both cases in which she did so +she put the girl’s principles to a further and unusual test in +asking her to repeat the Ten Commandments. One pert young woman—and +yet I was sorry for her too, only she afterwards married a rich draper +in Shrewsbury—who had got through her trials pretty tolerably, +considering she could write, spoilt all, by saying glibly, at the end +of the last Commandment, “An’t please your ladyship, I can +cast accounts.”</p> +<p>“Go away, wench,” said my lady in a hurry, “you’re +only fit for trade; you will not suit me for a servant.” +The girl went away crestfallen: in a minute, however, my lady sent me +after her to see that she had something to eat before leaving the house; +and, indeed, she sent for her once again, but it was only to give her +a Bible, and to bid her beware of French principles, which had led the +French to cut off their king’s and queen’s heads.</p> +<p>The poor, blubbering girl said, “Indeed, my lady, I wouldn’t +hurt a fly, much less a king, and I cannot abide the French, nor frogs +neither, for that matter.”</p> +<p>But my lady was inexorable, and took a girl who could neither read +nor write, to make up for her alarm about the progress of education +towards addition and subtraction; and afterwards, when the clergyman +who was at Hanbury parish when I came there, had died, and the bishop +had appointed another, and a younger man, in his stead, this was one +of the points on which he and my lady did not agree. While good +old deaf Mr. Mountford lived, it was my lady’s custom, when indisposed +for a sermon, to stand up at the door of her large square pew,—just +opposite to the reading-desk,—and to say (at that part of the +morning service where it is decreed that, in quires and places where +they sing, here followeth the anthem): “Mr. Mountford, I will +not trouble you for a discourse this morning.” And we all +knelt down to the Litany with great satisfaction; for Mr. Mountford, +though he could not hear, had always his eyes open about this part of +the service, for any of my lady’s movements. But the new +clergyman, Mr. Gray, was of a different stamp. He was very zealous +in all his parish work; and my lady, who was just as good as she could +be to the poor, was often crying him up as a godsend to the parish, +and he never could send amiss to the Court when he wanted broth, or +wine, or jelly, or sago for a sick person. But he needs must take +up the new hobby of education; and I could see that this put my lady +sadly about one Sunday, when she suspected, I know not how, that there +was something to be said in his sermon about a Sunday-school which he +was planning. She stood up, as she had not done since Mr. Mountford’s +death, two years and better before this time, and said—</p> +<p>“Mr. Gray, I will not trouble you for a discourse this morning.”</p> +<p>But her voice was not well-assured and steady; and we knelt down +with more of curiosity than satisfaction in our minds. Mr. Gray +preached a very rousing sermon, on the necessity of establishing a Sabbath-school +in the village. My lady shut her eyes, and seemed to go to sleep; +but I don’t believe she lost a word of it, though she said nothing +about it that I heard until the next Saturday, when two of us, as was +the custom, were riding out with her in her carriage, and we went to +see a poor bedridden woman, who lived some miles away at the other end +of the estate and of the parish: and as we came out of the cottage we +met Mr. Gray walking up to it, in a great heat, and looking very tired. +My lady beckoned him to her, and told him she should wait and take him +home with her, adding that she wondered to see him there, so far from +his home, for that it was beyond a Sabbath-day’s journey, and, +from what she had gathered from his sermon the last Sunday, he was all +for Judaism against Christianity. He looked as if he did not understand +what she meant; but the truth was that, besides the way in which he +had spoken up for schools and schooling, he had kept calling Sunday +the Sabbath: and, as her ladyship said, “The Sabbath is the Sabbath, +and that’s one thing—it is Saturday; and if I keep it, I’m +a Jew, which I’m not. And Sunday is Sunday; and that’s +another thing; and if I keep it, I’m a Christian, which I humbly +trust I am.”</p> +<p>But when Mr. Gray got an inkling of her meaning in talking about +a Sabbath-day’s journey, he only took notice of a part of it: +he smiled and bowed, and said no one knew better than her ladyship what +were the duties that abrogated all inferior laws regarding the Sabbath; +and that he must go in and read to old Betty Brown, so that he would +not detain her ladyship.</p> +<p>“But I shall wait for you, Mr. Gray,” said she. +“Or I will take a drive round by Oakfield, and be back in an hour’s +time.” For, you see, she would not have him feel hurried +or troubled with a thought that he was keeping her waiting, while he +ought to be comforting and praying with old Betty.</p> +<p>“A very pretty young man, my dears,” said she, as we +drove away. “But I shall have my pew glazed all the same.”</p> +<p>We did not know what she meant at the time; but the next Sunday but +one we did. She had the curtains all round the grand old Hanbury +family seat taken down, and, instead of them, there was glass up to +the height of six or seven feet. We entered by a door, with a +window in it that drew up or down just like what you see in carriages. +This window was generally down, and then we could hear perfectly; but +if Mr. Gray used the word “Sabbath,” or spoke in favour +of schooling and education, my lady stepped out of her corner, and drew +up the window with a decided clang and clash.</p> +<p>I must tell you something more about Mr. Gray. The presentation +to the living of Hanbury was vested in two trustees, of whom Lady Ludlow +was one: Lord Ludlow had exercised this right in the appointment of +Mr. Mountford, who had won his lordship’s favour by his excellent +horsemanship. Nor was Mr. Mountford a bad clergyman, as clergymen +went in those days. He did not drink, though he liked good eating +as much as any one. And if any poor person was ill, and he heard +of it, he would send them plates from his own dinner of what he himself +liked best; sometimes of dishes which were almost as bad as poison to +sick people. He meant kindly to everybody except dissenters, whom +Lady Ludlow and he united in trying to drive out of the parish; and +among dissenters he particularly abhorred Methodists—some one +said, because John Wesley had objected to his hunting. But that +must have been long ago for when I knew him he was far too stout and +too heavy to hunt; besides, the bishop of the diocese disapproved of +hunting, and had intimated his disapprobation to the clergy. For +my own part, I think a good run would not have come amiss, even in a +moral point of view, to Mr. Mountford. He ate so much, and took +so little exercise, that we young women often heard of his being in +terrible passions with his servants, and the sexton and clerk. +But they none of them minded him much, for he soon came to himself, +and was sure to make them some present or other—some said in proportion +to his anger; so that the sexton, who was a bit of a wag (as all sextons +are, I think), said that the vicar’s saying, “The Devil +take you,” was worth a shilling any day, whereas “The Deuce” +was a shabby sixpenny speech, only fit for a curate.</p> +<p>There was a great deal of good in Mr. Mountford, too. He could +not bear to see pain, or sorrow, or misery of any kind; and, if it came +under his notice, he was never easy till he had relieved it, for the +time, at any rate. But he was afraid of being made uncomfortable; +so, if he possibly could, he would avoid seeing any one who was ill +or unhappy; and he did not thank any one for telling him about them.</p> +<p>“What would your ladyship have me to do?” he once said +to my Lady Ludlow, when she wished him to go and see a poor man who +had broken his leg. “I cannot piece the leg as the doctor +can; I cannot nurse him as well as his wife does; I may talk to him, +but he no more understands me than I do the language of the alchemists. +My coming puts him out; he stiffens himself into an uncomfortable posture, +out of respect to the cloth, and dare not take the comfort of kicking, +and swearing, and scolding his wife, while I am there. I hear +him, with my figurative ears, my lady, heave a sigh of relief when my +back is turned, and the sermon that he thinks I ought to have kept for +the pulpit, and have delivered to his neighbours (whose case, as he +fancies, it would just have fitted, as it seemed to him to be addressed +to the sinful), is all ended, and done, for the day. I judge others +as myself; I do to them as I would be done to. That’s Christianity, +at any rate. I should hate—saving your ladyship’s +presence—to have my Lord Ludlow coming and seeing me, if I were +ill. ’Twould be a great honour, no doubt; but I should have +to put on a clean nightcap for the occasion; and sham patience, in order +to be polite, and not weary his lordship with my complaints. I +should be twice as thankful to him if he would send me game, or a good +fat haunch, to bring me up to that pitch of health and strength one +ought to be in, to appreciate the honour of a visit from a nobleman. +So I shall send Jerry Butler a good dinner every day till he is strong +again; and spare the poor old fellow my presence and advice.”</p> +<p>My lady would be puzzled by this, and by many other of Mr. Mountford’s +speeches. But he had been appointed by my lord, and she could +not question her dead husband’s wisdom; and she knew that the +dinners were always sent, and often a guinea or two to help to pay the +doctor’s bills; and Mr. Mountford was true blue, as we call it, +to the back-bone; hated the dissenters and the French; and could hardly +drink a dish of tea without giving out the toast of “Church and +King, and down with the Rump.” Moreover, he had once had +the honour of preaching before the King and Queen, and two of the Princesses, +at Weymouth; and the King had applauded his sermon audibly with,—“Very +good; very good;” and that was a seal put upon his merit in my +lady’s eyes.</p> +<p>Besides, in the long winter Sunday evenings, he would come up to +the Court, and read a sermon to us girls, and play a game of picquet +with my lady afterwards; which served to shorten the tedium of the time. +My lady would, on those occasions, invite him to sup with her on the +dais; but as her meal was invariably bread and milk only, Mr. Mountford +preferred sitting down amongst us, and made a joke about its being wicked +and heterodox to eat meagre on Sunday, a festival of the Church. +We smiled at this joke just as much the twentieth time we heard it as +we did at the first; for we knew it was coming, because he always coughed +a little nervously before he made a joke, for fear my lady should not +approve: and neither she nor he seemed to remember that he had ever +hit upon the idea before.</p> +<p>Mr. Mountford died quite suddenly at last. We were all very +sorry to lose him. He left some of his property (for he had a +private estate) to the poor of the parish, to furnish them with an annual +Christmas dinner of roast beef and plum pudding, for which he wrote +out a very good receipt in the codicil to his will.</p> +<p>Moreover, he desired his executors to see that the vault, in which +the vicars of Hanbury were interred, was well aired, before his coffin +was taken in; for, all his life long, he had had a dread of damp, and +latterly he kept his rooms to such a pitch of warmth that some thought +it hastened his end.</p> +<p>Then the other trustee, as I have said, presented the living to Mr. +Gray, Fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford. It was quite natural +for us all, as belonging in some sort to the Hanbury family, to disapprove +of the other trustee’s choice. But when some ill-natured +person circulated the report that Mr. Gray was a Moravian Methodist, +I remember my lady said, “She could not believe anything so bad, +without a great deal of evidence.”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER II.</h2> +<p>Before I tell you about Mr. Gray, I think I ought to make you understand +something more of what we did all day long at Hanbury Court. There +were five of us at the time of which I am speaking, all young women +of good descent, and allied (however distantly) to people of rank. +When we were not with my lady, Mrs. Medlicott looked after us; a gentle +little woman, who had been companion to my lady for many years, and +was indeed, I have been told, some kind of relation to her. Mrs. +Medlicott’s parents had lived in Germany, and the consequence +was, she spoke English with a very foreign accent. Another consequence +was, that she excelled in all manner of needlework, such as is not known +even by name in these days. She could darn either lace, table-linen, +India muslin, or stockings, so that no one could tell where the hole +or rent had been. Though a good Protestant, and never missing +Guy Faux day at church, she was as skilful at fine work as any nun in +a Papist convent. She would take a piece of French cambric, and +by drawing out some threads, and working in others, it became delicate +lace in a very few hours. She did the same by Hollands cloth, +and made coarse strong lace, with which all my lady’s napkins +and table-linen were trimmed. We worked under her during a great +part of the day, either in the still-room, or at our sewing in a chamber +that opened out of the great hall. My lady despised every kind +of work that would now be called Fancy-work. She considered that +the use of coloured threads or worsted was only fit to amuse children; +but that grown women ought not to be taken with mere blues and reds, +but to restrict their pleasure in sewing to making small and delicate +stitches. She would speak of the old tapestry in the hall as the +work of her ancestresses, who lived before the Reformation, and were +consequently unacquainted with pure and simple tastes in work, as well +as in religion. Nor would my lady sanction the fashion of the +day, which, at the beginning of this century, made all the fine ladies +take to making shoes. She said that such work was a consequence +of the French Revolution, which had done much to annihilate all distinctions +of rank and class, and hence it was, that she saw young ladies of birth +and breeding handling lasts, and awls, and dirty cobblers’-wax, +like shoe’-makers’ daughters.</p> +<p>Very frequently one of us would be summoned to my lady to read aloud +to her, as she sat in her small withdrawing-room, some improving book. +It was generally Mr. Addison’s “Spectator;” but one +year, I remember, we had to read “Sturm’s Reflections” +translated from a German book Mrs. Medlicott recommended. Mr. +Sturm told us what to think about for every day in the year; and very +dull it was; but I believe Queen Charlotte had liked the book very much, +and the thought of her royal approbation kept my lady awake during the +reading. “Mrs. Chapone’s Letters” and “Dr. +Gregory’s Advice to Young Ladies” composed the rest of our +library for week-day reading. I, for one, was glad to leave my +fine sewing, and even my reading aloud (though this last did keep me +with my dear lady) to go to the still-room and potter about among the +preserves and the medicated waters. There was no doctor for many +miles round, and with Mrs. Medlicott to direct us, and Dr. Buchan to +go by for recipes, we sent out many a bottle of physic, which, I dare +say, was as good as what comes out of the druggist’s shop. +At any rate, I do not think we did much harm; for if any of our physics +tasted stronger than usual, Mrs. Medlicott would bid us let it down +with cochineal and water, to make all safe, as she said. So our +bottles of medicine had very little real physic in them at last; but +we were careful in putting labels on them, which looked very mysterious +to those who could not read, and helped the medicine to do its work. +I have sent off many a bottle of salt and water coloured red; and whenever +we had nothing else to do in the still-room, Mrs. Medlicott would set +us to making bread-pills, by way of practice; and, as far as I can say, +they were very efficacious, as before we gave out a box Mrs. Medlicott +always told the patient what symptoms to expect; and I hardly ever inquired +without hearing that they had produced their effect. There was +one old man, who took six pills a-night, of any kind we liked to give +him, to make him sleep; and if, by any chance, his daughter had forgotten +to let us know that he was out of his medicine, he was so restless and +miserable that, as he said, he thought he was like to die. I think +ours was what would be called homoeopathic practice now-a-days. +Then we learnt to make all the cakes and dishes of the season in the +still-room. We had plum-porridge and mince-pies at Christmas, +fritters and pancakes on Shrove Tuesday, furmenty on Mothering Sunday, +violet-cakes in Passion Week, tansy-pudding on Easter Sunday, three-cornered +cakes on Trinity Sunday, and so on through the year: all made from good +old Church receipts, handed down from one of my lady’s earliest +Protestant ancestresses. Every one of us passed a portion of the +day with Lady Ludlow; and now and then we rode out with her in her coach +and four. She did not like to go out with a pair of horses, considering +this rather beneath her rank; and, indeed, four horses were very often +needed to pull her heavy coach through the stiff mud. But it was +rather a cumbersome equipage through the narrow Warwickshire lanes; +and I used often to think it was well that countesses were not plentiful, +or else we might have met another lady of quality in another coach and +four, where there would have been no possibility of turning, or passing +each other, and very little chance of backing. Once when the idea +of this danger of meeting another countess in a narrow, deep-rutted +lane was very prominent in my mind I ventured to ask Mrs. Medlicott +what would have to be done on such an occasion; and she told me that +“de latest creation must back, for sure,” which puzzled +me a good deal at the time, although I understand it now. I began +to find out the use of the “Peerage,” a book which had seemed +to me rather dull before; but, as I was always a coward in a coach, +I made myself well acquainted with the dates of creation of our three +Warwickshire earls, and was happy to find that Earl Ludlow ranked second, +the oldest earl being a hunting widower, and not likely to drive out +in a carriage.</p> +<p>All this time I have wandered from Mr. Gray. Of course, we +first saw him in church when he read himself in. He was very red-faced, +the kind of redness which goes with light hair and a blushing complexion; +he looked slight and short, and his bright light frizzy hair had hardly +a dash of powder in it. I remember my lady making this observation, +and sighing over it; for, though since the famine in seventeen hundred +and ninety-nine and eighteen hundred there had been a tax on hair-powder, +yet it was reckoned very revolutionary and Jacobin not to wear a good +deal of it. My lady hardly liked the opinions of any man who wore +his own hair; but this she would say was rather a prejudice: only in +her youth none but the mob had gone wigless, and she could not get over +the association of wigs with birth and breeding; a man’s own hair +with that class of people who had formed the rioters in seventeen hundred +and eighty, when Lord George Gordon had been one of the bugbears of +my lady’s life. Her husband and his brothers, she told us, +had been put into breeches, and had their heads shaved on their seventh +birthday, each of them; a handsome little wig of the newest fashion +forming the old Lady Ludlow’s invariable birthday present to her +sons as they each arrived at that age; and afterwards, to the day of +their death, they never saw their own hair. To be without powder, +as some underbred people were talking of being now, was in fact to insult +the proprieties of life, by being undressed. It was English sans-culottism. +But Mr. Gray did wear a little powder, enough to save him in my lady’s +good opinion; but not enough to make her approve of him decidedly.</p> +<p>The next time I saw him was in the great hall. Mary Mason and +I were going to drive out with my lady in her coach, and when we went +down stairs with our best hats and cloaks on, we found Mr. Gray awaiting +my lady’s coming. I believe he had paid his respects to +her before, but we had never seen him; and he had declined her invitation +to spend Sunday evening at the Court (as Mr. Mountford used to do pretty +regularly—and play a game at picquet too—), which, Mrs. +Medlicott told us, had caused my lady to be not over well pleased with +him.</p> +<p>He blushed redder than ever at the sight of us, as we entered the +hall and dropped him our curtsies. He coughed two or three times, +as if he would have liked to speak to us, if he could but have found +something to say; and every time he coughed he became hotter-looking +than ever. I am ashamed to say, we were nearly laughing at him; +half because we, too, were so shy that we understood what his awkwardness +meant.</p> +<p>My lady came in, with her quick active step—she always walked +quickly when she did not bethink herself of her cane—as if she +was sorry to have us kept waiting—and, as she entered, she gave +us all round one of those graceful sweeping curtsies, of which I think +the art must have died out with her,—it implied so much courtesy;—this +time it said, as well as words could do, “I am sorry to have kept +you all waiting,—forgive me.”</p> +<p>She went up to the mantelpiece, near which Mr. Gray had been standing +until her entrance, and curtseying afresh to him, and pretty deeply +this time, because of his cloth, and her being hostess, and he, a new +guest. She asked him if he would not prefer speaking to her in +her own private parlour, and looked as though she would have conducted +him there. But he burst out with his errand, of which he was full +even to choking, and which sent the glistening tears into his large +blue eyes, which stood farther and farther out with his excitement.</p> +<p>“My lady, I want to speak to you, and to persuade you to exert +your kind interest with Mr. Lathom—Justice Lathom, of Hathaway +Manor—”</p> +<p>“Harry Lathom?” inquired my lady,—as Mr. Gray stopped +to take the breath he had lost in his hurry,—“I did not +know he was in the commission.”</p> +<p>“He is only just appointed; he took the oaths not a month ago,—more’s +the pity!”</p> +<p>“I do not understand why you should regret it. The Lathoms +have held Hathaway since Edward the First, and Mr. Lathom bears a good +character, although his temper is hasty—”</p> +<p>“My lady! he has committed Job Gregson for stealing—a +fault of which he is as innocent as I—and all the evidence goes +to prove it, now that the case is brought before the Bench; only the +Squires hang so together that they can’t be brought to see justice, +and are all for sending Job to gaol, out of compliment to Mr. Lathom, +saying it his first committal, and it won’t be civil to tell him +there is no evidence against his man. For God’s sake, my +lady, speak to the gentlemen; they will attend to you, while they only +tell me to mind my own business.”</p> +<p>Now my lady was always inclined to stand by her order, and the Lathoms +of Hathaway Court were cousins to the Hanbury’s. Besides, +it was rather a point of honour in those days to encourage a young magistrate, +by passing a pretty sharp sentence on his first committals; and Job +Gregson was the father of a girl who had been lately turned away from +her place as scullery-maid for sauciness to Mrs. Adams, her ladyship’s +own maid; and Mr. Gray had not said a word of the reasons why he believed +the man innocent,—for he was in such a hurry, I believe he would +have had my lady drive off to the Henley Court-house then and there;—so +there seemed a good deal against the man, and nothing but Mr. Gray’s +bare word for him; and my lady drew herself a little up, and said—</p> +<p>“Mr. Gray! I do not see what reason either you or I have +to interfere. Mr. Harry Lathom is a sensible kind of young man, +well capable of ascertaining the truth without our help—”</p> +<p>“But more evidence has come out since,” broke in Mr. +Gray. My lady went a little stiffer, and spoke a little more coldly:—</p> +<p>“I suppose this additional evidence is before the justices: +men of good family, and of honour and credit, well known in the county. +They naturally feel that the opinion of one of themselves must have +more weight than the words of a man like Job Gregson, who bears a very +indifferent character,—has been strongly suspected of poaching, +coming from no one knows where, squatting on Hareman’s Common—which, +by the way, is extra-parochial, I believe; consequently you, as a clergyman, +are not responsible for what goes on there; and, although impolitic, +there might be some truth in what the magistrates said, in advising +you to mind your own business,”—said her ladyship, smiling,—“and +they might be tempted to bid me mind mine, if I interfered, Mr. Gray: +might they not?”</p> +<p>He looked extremely uncomfortable; half angry. Once or twice +he began to speak, but checked himself, as if his words would not have +been wise or prudent. At last he said—“It may seem +presumptuous in me,—a stranger of only a few weeks’ standing—to +set up my judgment as to men’s character against that of residents—” +Lady Ludlow gave a little bow of acquiescence, which was, I think, involuntary +on her part, and which I don’t think he perceived,—“but +I am convinced that the man is innocent of this offence,—and besides, +the justices themselves allege this ridiculous custom of paying a compliment +to a newly-appointed magistrate as their only reason.”</p> +<p>That unlucky word “ridiculous!” It undid all the +good his modest beginning had done him with my lady. I knew as +well as words could have told me, that she was affronted at the expression +being used by a man inferior in rank to those whose actions he applied +it to,—and truly, it was a great want of tact, considering to +whom he was speaking.</p> +<p>Lady Ludlow spoke very gently and slowly; she always did so when +she was annoyed; it was a certain sign, the meaning of which we had +all learnt.</p> +<p>“I think, Mr. Gray, we will drop the subject. It is one +on which we are not likely to agree.”</p> +<p>Mr. Gray’s ruddy colour grew purple and then faded away, and +his face became pale. I think both my lady and he had forgotten +our presence; and we were beginning to feel too awkward to wish to remind +them of it. And yet we could not help watching and listening with +the greatest interest.</p> +<p>Mr. Gray drew himself up to his full height, with an unconscious +feeling of dignity. Little as was his stature, and awkward and +embarrassed as he had been only a few minutes before, I remember thinking +he looked almost as grand as my lady when he spoke.</p> +<p>“Your ladyship must remember that it may be my duty to speak +to my parishioners on many subjects on which they do not agree with +me. I am not at liberty to be silent, because they differ in opinion +from me.”</p> +<p>Lady Ludlow’s great blue eyes dilated with surprise, and—I +do think—anger, at being thus spoken to. I am not sure whether +it was very wise in Mr. Gray. He himself looked afraid of the +consequences but as if he was determined to bear them without flinching. +For a minute there was silence. Then my lady replied—“Mr. +Gray, I respect your plain speaking, although I may wonder whether a +young man of your age and position has any right to assume that he is +a better judge than one with the experience which I have naturally gained +at my time of life, and in the station I hold.”</p> +<p>“If I, madam, as the clergyman of this parish, am not to shrink +from telling what I believe to be the truth to the poor and lowly, no +more am I to hold my peace in the presence of the rich and titled.” +Mr. Gray’s face showed that he was in that state of excitement +which in a child would have ended in a good fit of crying. He +looked as if he had nerved himself up to doing and saying things, which +he disliked above everything, and which nothing short of serious duty +could have compelled him to do and say. And at such times every +minute circumstance which could add to pain comes vividly before one. +I saw that he became aware of our presence, and that it added to his +discomfiture.</p> +<p>My lady flushed up. “Are you aware, sir,” asked +she, “that you have gone far astray from the original subject +of conversation? But as you talk of your parish, allow me to remind +you that Hareman’s Common is beyond the bounds, and that you are +really not responsible for the characters and lives of the squatters +on that unlucky piece of ground.”</p> +<p>“Madam, I see I have only done harm in speaking to you about +the affair at all. I beg your pardon and take my leave.”</p> +<p>He bowed, and looked very sad. Lady Ludlow caught the expression +of his face.</p> +<p>“Good morning!” she cried, in rather a louder and quicker +way than that in which she had been speaking. “Remember, +Job Gregson is a notorious poacher and evildoer, and you really are +not responsible for what goes on at Hareman’s Common.”</p> +<p>He was near the hall door, and said something—half to himself, +which we heard (being nearer to him), but my lady did not; although +she saw that he spoke. “What did he say?” she asked +in a somewhat hurried manner, as soon as the door was closed—“I +did not hear.” We looked at each other, and then I spoke:</p> +<p>“He said, my lady, that ‘God help him! he was responsible +for all the evil he did not strive to overcome.’”</p> +<p>My lady turned sharp round away from us, and Mary Mason said afterwards +she thought her ladyship was much vexed with both of us, for having +been present, and with me for having repeated what Mr. Gray had said. +But it was not our fault that we were in the hall, and when my lady +asked what Mr. Gray had said, I thought it right to tell her.</p> +<p>In a few minutes she bade us accompany her in her ride in the coach.</p> +<p>Lady Ludlow always sat forwards by herself, and we girls backwards. +Somehow this was a rule, which we never thought of questioning. +It was true that riding backwards made some of us feel very uncomfortable +and faint; and to remedy this my lady always drove with both windows +open, which occasionally gave her the rheumatism; but we always went +on in the old way. This day she did not pay any great attention +to the road by which we were going, and Coachman took his own way. +We were very silent, as my lady did not speak, and looked very serious. +Or else, in general, she made these rides very pleasant (to those who +were not qualmish with riding backwards), by talking to us in a very +agreeable manner, and telling us of the different things which had happened +to her at various places,—at Paris and Versailles, where she had +been in her youth,—at Windsor and Kew and Weymouth, where she +had been with the Queen, when maid-of-honour—and so on. +But this day she did not talk at all. All at once she put her +head out of the window.</p> +<p>“John Footman,” said she, “where are we? +Surely this is Hareman’s Common.”</p> +<p>“Yes, an’t please my lady,” said John Footman, +and waited for further speech or orders. My lady thought a while, +and then said she would have the steps put down and get out.</p> +<p>As soon as she was gone, we looked at each other, and then without +a word began to gaze after her. We saw her pick her dainty way +in the little high-heeled shoes she always wore (because they had been +in fashion in her youth), among the yellow pools of stagnant water that +had gathered in the clayey soil. John Footman followed, stately, +after; afraid too, for all his stateliness, of splashing his pure white +stockings. Suddenly my lady turned round and said something to +him, and he returned to the carriage with a half-pleased, half-puzzled +air.</p> +<p>My lady went on to a cluster of rude mud houses at the higher end +of the Common; cottages built, as they were occasionally at that day, +of wattles and clay, and thatched with sods. As far as we could +make out from dumb show, Lady Ludlow saw enough of the interiors of +these places to make her hesitate before entering, or even speaking +to any of the children who were playing about in the puddles. +After a pause, she disappeared into one of the cottages. It seemed +to us a long time before she came out; but I dare say it was not more +than eight or ten minutes. She came back with her head hanging +down, as if to choose her way,—but we saw it was more in thought +and bewilderment than for any such purpose.</p> +<p>She had not made up her mind where we should drive to when she got +into the carriage again. John Footman stood, bare-headed, waiting +for orders.</p> +<p>“To Hathaway. My dears, if you are tired, or if you have +anything to do for Mrs. Medlicott, I can drop you at Barford Corner, +and it is but a quarter of an hour’s brisk walk home.”</p> +<p>But luckily we could safely say that Mrs. Medlicott did not want +us; and as we had whispered to each other, as we sat alone in the coach, +that surely my lady must have gone to Job Gregson’s, we were far +too anxious to know the end of it all to say that we were tired. +So we all set off to Hathaway. Mr. Harry Lathom was a bachelor +squire, thirty or thirty-five years of age, more at home in the field +than in the drawing-room, and with sporting men than with ladies.</p> +<p>My lady did not alight, of course; it was Mr. Lathom’s place +to wait upon her, and she bade the butler,—who had a smack of +the gamekeeper in him, very unlike our own powdered venerable fine gentleman +at Hanbury,—tell his master, with her compliments, that she wished +to speak to him. You may think how pleased we were to find that +we should hear all that was said; though, I think, afterwards we were +half sorry when we saw how our presence confused the squire, who would +have found it bad enough to answer my lady’s questions, even without +two eager girls for audience.</p> +<p>“Pray, Mr. Lathom,” began my lady, something abruptly +for her,—but she was very full of her subject,—“what +is this I hear about Job Gregson?”</p> +<p>Mr. Lathom looked annoyed and vexed, but dared not show it in his +words.</p> +<p>“I gave out a warrant against him, my lady, for theft,—that +is all. You are doubtless aware of his character; a man who sets +nets and springes in long cover, and fishes wherever he takes a fancy. +It is but a short step from poaching to thieving.”</p> +<p>“That is quite true,” replied Lady Ludlow (who had a +horror of poaching for this very reason): “but I imagine you do +not send a man to gaol on account of his bad character.”</p> +<p>“Rogues and vagabonds,” said Mr. Lathom. “A +man may be sent to prison for being a vagabond; for no specific act, +but for his general mode of life.”</p> +<p>He had the better of her ladyship for one moment; but then she answered—</p> +<p>“But in this case, the charge on which you committed him is +for theft; now his wife tells me he can prove he was some miles distant +from Holmwood, where the robbery took place, all that afternoon; she +says you had the evidence before you.”</p> +<p>Mr. Lathom here interrupted my lady, by saying, in a somewhat sulky +manner—“No such evidence was brought before me when I gave +the warrant. I am not answerable for the other magistrates’ +decision, when they had more evidence before them. It was they +who committed him to gaol. I am not responsible for that.”</p> +<p>My lady did not often show signs of impatience; but we knew she was +feeling irritated, by the little perpetual tapping of her high-heeled +shoe against the bottom of the carriage. About the same time we, +sitting backwards, caught a glimpse of Mr. Gray through the open door, +standing in the shadow of the hall. Doubtless Lady Ludlow’s +arrival had interrupted a conversation between Mr. Lathom and Mr. Gray. +The latter must have heard every word of what she was saying; but of +this she was not aware, and caught at Mr. Lathom’s disclaimer +of responsibility with pretty much the same argument which she had heard +(through our repetition) that Mr. Gray had used not two hours before.</p> +<p>“And do you mean to say, Mr. Lathom, that you don’t consider +yourself responsible for all injustice or wrong-doing that you might +have prevented, and have not? Nay, in this case the first germ +of injustice was your own mistake. I wish you had been with me +a little while ago, and seen the misery in that poor fellow’s +cottage.” She spoke lower, and Mr. Gray drew near, in a +sort of involuntary manner; as if to hear all she was saying. +We saw him, and doubtless Mr. Lathom heard his footstep, and knew who +it was that was listening behind him, and approving of every word that +was said. He grew yet more sullen in manner; but still my lady +was my lady, and he dared not speak out before her, as he would have +done to Mr. Gray. Lady Ludlow, however, caught the look of stubborness +in his face, and it roused her as I had never seen her roused.</p> +<p>“I am sure you will not refuse, sir, to accept my bail. +I offer to bail the fellow out, and to be responsible for his appearance +at the sessions. What say you to that, Mr. Lathom?”</p> +<p>“The offence of theft is not bailable, my lady.”</p> +<p>“Not in ordinary cases, I dare say. But I imagine this +is an extraordinary case. The man is sent to prison out of compliment +to you, and against all evidence, as far as I can learn. He will +have to rot in gaol for two months, and his wife and children to starve. +I, Lady Ludlow, offer to bail him out, and pledge myself for his appearance +at next quarter-sessions.”</p> +<p>“It is against the law, my lady.”</p> +<p>“Bah! Bah! Bah! Who makes laws? Such as I, in the +House of Lords—such as you, in the House of Commons. We, +who make the laws in St. Stephen’s, may break the mere forms of +them, when we have right on our sides, on our own land, and amongst +our own people.”</p> +<p>“The lord-lieutenant may take away my commission, if he heard +of it.”</p> +<p>“And a very good thing for the county, Harry Lathom; and for +you too, if he did,—if you don’t go on more wisely than +you have begun. A pretty set you and your brother magistrates +are to administer justice through the land! I always said a good +despotism was the best form of government; and I am twice as much in +favour of it now I see what a quorum is! My dears!” suddenly +turning round to us, “if it would not tire you to walk home, I +would beg Mr. Lathom to take a seat in my coach, and we would drive +to Henley Gaol, and have the poor man out at once.”</p> +<p>“A walk over the fields at this time of day is hardly fitting +for young ladies to take alone,” said Mr. Lathom, anxious no doubt +to escape from his tête-à-tête drive with my lady, +and possibly not quite prepared to go to the illegal length of prompt +measures, which she had in contemplation.</p> +<p>But Mr. Gray now stepped forward, too anxious for the release of +the prisoner to allow any obstacle to intervene which he could do away +with. To see Lady Ludlow’s face when she first perceived +whom she had had for auditor and spectator of her interview with Mr. +Lathom, was as good as a play. She had been doing and saying the +very things she had been so much annoyed at Mr. Gray’s saying +and proposing only an hour or two ago. She had been setting down +Mr. Lathom pretty smartly, in the presence of the very man to whom she +had spoken of that gentleman as so sensible, and of such a standing +in the county, that it was presumption to question his doings. +But before Mr. Gray had finished his offer of escorting us back to Hanbury +Court, my lady had recovered herself. There was neither surprise +nor displeasure in her manner, as she answered—“I thank +you, Mr. Gray. I was not aware that you were here, but I think +I can understand on what errand you came. And seeing you here, +recalls me to a duty I owe Mr. Lathom. Mr. Lathom, I have spoken +to you pretty plainly,—forgetting, until I saw Mr. Gray, that +only this very afternoon I differed from him on this very question; +taking completely, at that time, the same view of the whole subject +which you have done; thinking that the county would be well rid of such +a man as Job Gregson, whether he had committed this theft or not. +Mr. Gray and I did not part quite friends,” she continued, bowing +towards him; “but it so happened that I saw Job Gregson’s +wife and home,—I felt that Mr. Gray had been right and I had been +wrong, so, with the famous inconsistency of my sex, I came hither to +scold you,” smiling towards Mr. Lathom, who looked half-sulky +yet, and did not relax a bit of his gravity at her smile, “for +holding the same opinions that I had done an hour before. Mr. +Gray,” (again bowing towards him) “these young ladies will +be very much obliged to you for your escort, and so shall I. Mr. +Lathom, may I beg of you to accompany me to Henley?”</p> +<p>Mr. Gray bowed very low, and went very red; Mr. Lathom said something +which we none of us heard, but which was, I think, some remonstrance +against the course he was, as it were, compelled to take. Lady +Ludlow, however, took no notice of his murmur, but sat in an attitude +of polite expectancy; and as we turned off on our walk, I saw Mr. Lathom +getting into the coach with the air of a whipped hound. I must +say, considering my lady’s feeling, I did not envy him his ride—though, +I believe, he was quite in the right as to the object of the ride being +illegal.</p> +<p>Our walk home was very dull. We had no fears; and would far +rather have been without the awkward, blushing young man, into which +Mr. Gray had sunk. At every stile he hesitated,—sometimes +he half got over it, thinking that he could assist us better in that +way; then he would turn back unwilling to go before ladies. He +had no ease of manner, as my lady once said of him, though on any occasion +of duty, he had an immense deal of dignity.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER III.</h2> +<p>As far as I can remember, it was very soon after this that I first +began to have the pain in my hip, which has ended in making me a cripple +for life. I hardly recollect more than one walk after our return +under Mr. Gray’s escort from Mr. Lathom’s. Indeed, +at the time, I was not without suspicions (which I never named) that +the beginning of all the mischief was a great jump I had taken from +the top of one of the stiles on that very occasion.</p> +<p>Well, it is a long while ago, and God disposes of us all, and I am +not going to tire you out with telling you how I thought and felt, and +how, when I saw what my life was to be, I could hardly bring myself +to be patient, but rather wished to die at once. You can every +one of you think for yourselves what becoming all at once useless and +unable to move, and by-and-by growing hopeless of cure, and feeling +that one must be a burden to some one all one’s life long, would +be to an active, wilful, strong girl of seventeen, anxious to get on +in the world, so as, if possible, to help her brothers and sisters. +So I shall only say, that one among the blessings which arose out of +what seemed at the time a great, black sorrow was, that Lady Ludlow +for many years took me, as it were, into her own especial charge; and +now, as I lie still and alone in my old age, it is such a pleasure to +think of her!</p> +<p>Mrs. Medlicott was great as a nurse, and I am sure I can never be +grateful enough to her memory for all her kindness. But she was +puzzled to know how to manage me in other ways. I used to have +long, hard fits of crying; and, thinking that I ought to go home—and +yet what could they do with me there?—and a hundred and fifty +other anxious thoughts, some of which I could tell to Mrs. Medlicott, +and others I could not. Her way of comforting me was hurrying +away for some kind of tempting or strengthening food—a basin of +melted calves-foot jelly was, I am sure she thought, a cure for every +woe.</p> +<p>“There take it, dear, take it!” she would say; “and +don’t go on fretting for what can’t be helped.”</p> +<p>But, I think, she got puzzled at length at the non-efficacy of good +things to eat; and one day, after I had limped down to see the doctor, +in Mrs. Medlicott’s sitting-room—a room lined with cupboards, +containing preserves and dainties of all kinds, which she perpetually +made, and never touched herself—when I was returning to my bed-room +to cry away the afternoon, under pretence of arranging my clothes, John +Footman brought me a message from my lady (with whom the doctor had +been having a conversation) to bid me go to her in that private sitting-room +at the end of the suite of apartments, about which I spoke in describing +the day of my first arrival at Hanbury. I had hardly been in it +since; as, when we read to my lady, she generally sat in the small withdrawing-room +out of which this private room of hers opened. I suppose great +people do not require what we smaller people value so much,—I +mean privacy. I do not think that there was a room which my lady +occupied that had not two doors, and some of them had three or four. +Then my lady had always Adams waiting upon her in her bed-chamber; and +it was Mrs. Medlicott’s duty to sit within call, as it were, in +a sort of anteroom that led out of my lady’s own sitting-room, +on the opposite side to the drawing-room door. To fancy the house, +you must take a great square and halve it by a line: at one end of this +line was the hall-door, or public entrance; at the opposite the private +entrance from a terrace, which was terminated at one end by a sort of +postern door in an old gray stone wall, beyond which lay the farm buildings +and offices; so that people could come in this way to my lady on business, +while, if she were going into the garden from her own room, she had +nothing to do but to pass through Mrs. Medlicott’s apartment, +out into the lesser hall, and then turning to the right as she passed +on to the terrace, she could go down the flight of broad, shallow steps +at the corner of the house into the lovely garden, with stretching, +sweeping lawns, and gay flower-beds, and beautiful, bossy laurels, and +other blooming or massy shrubs, with full-grown beeches, or larches +feathering down to the ground a little farther off. The whole +was set in a frame, as it were, by the more distant woodlands. +The house had been modernized in the days of Queen Anne, I think; but +the money had fallen short that was requisite to carry out all the improvements, +so it was only the suite of withdrawing-rooms and the terrace-rooms, +as far as the private entrance, that had the new, long, high windows +put in, and these were old enough by this time to be draped with roses, +and honeysuckles, and pyracanthus, winter and summer long.</p> +<p>Well, to go back to that day when I limped into my lady’s sitting-room, +trying hard to look as if I had not been crying, and not to walk as +if I was in much pain. I do not know whether my lady saw how near +my tears were to my eyes, but she told me she had sent for me, because +she wanted some help in arranging the drawers of her bureau, and asked +me—just as if it was a favour I was to do her—if I could +sit down in the easy-chair near the window—(all quietly arranged +before I came in, with a footstool, and a table quite near)—and +assist her. You will wonder, perhaps, why I was not bidden to +sit or lie on the sofa; but (although I found one there a morning or +two afterwards, when I came down) the fact was, that there was none +in the room at this time. I have even fancied that the easy-chair +was brought in on purpose for me; for it was not the chair in which +I remembered my lady sitting the first time I saw her. That chair +was very much carved and gilded, with a countess’ coronet at the +top. I tried it one day, some time afterwards, when my lady was +out of the room, and I had a fancy for seeing how I could move about, +and very uncomfortable it was. Now my chair (as I learnt to call +it, and to think it) was soft and luxurious, and seemed somehow to give +one’s body rest just in that part where one most needed it.</p> +<p>I was not at my ease that first day, nor indeed for many days afterwards, +notwithstanding my chair was so comfortable. Yet I forgot my sad +pain in silently wondering over the meaning of many of the things we +turned out of those curious old drawers. I was puzzled to know +why some were kept at all; a scrap of writing maybe, with only half +a dozen common-place words written on it, or a bit of broken riding-whip, +and here and there a stone, of which I thought I could have picked up +twenty just as good in the first walk I took. But it seems that +was just my ignorance; for my lady told me they were pieces of valuable +marble, used to make the floors of the great Roman emperors palaces +long ago; and that when she had been a girl, and made the grand tour +long ago, her cousin Sir Horace Mann, the Ambassador or Envoy at Florence, +had told her to be sure to go into the fields inside the walls of ancient +Rome, when the farmers were preparing the ground for the onion-sowing, +and had to make the soil fine, and pick up what bits of marble she could +find. She had done so, and meant to have had them made into a +table; but somehow that plan fell through, and there they were with +all the dirt out of the onion-field upon them; but once when I thought +of cleaning them with soap and water, at any rate, she bade me not to +do so, for it was Roman dirt—earth, I think, she called it—but +it was dirt all the same.</p> +<p>Then, in this bureau, were many other things, the value of which +I could understand—locks of hair carefully ticketed, which my +lady looked at very sadly; and lockets and bracelets with miniatures +in them,—very small pictures to what they make now-a-days, and +called miniatures: some of them had even to be looked at through a microscope +before you could see the individual expression of the faces, or how +beautifully they were painted. I don’t think that looking +at these made may lady seem so melancholy, as the seeing and touching +of the hair did. But, to be sure, the hair was, as it were, a +part of some beloved body which she might never touch and caress again, +but which lay beneath the turf, all faded and disfigured, except perhaps +the very hair, from which the lock she held had been dissevered; whereas +the pictures were but pictures after all—likenesses, but not the +very things themselves. This is only my own conjecture, mind. +My lady rarely spoke out her feelings. For, to begin with, she +was of rank: and I have heard her say that people of rank do not talk +about their feelings except to their equals, and even to them they conceal +them, except upon rare occasions. Secondly,—and this is +my own reflection,—she was an only child and an heiress; and as +such was more apt to think than to talk, as all well-brought-up heiresses +must be. I think. Thirdly, she had long been a widow, without +any companion of her own age with whom it would have been natural for +her to refer to old associations, past pleasures, or mutual sorrows. +Mrs. Medlicott came nearest to her as a companion of this sort; and +her ladyship talked more to Mrs. Medlicott, in a kind of familiar way, +than she did to all the rest of the household put together. But +Mrs. Medlicott was silent by nature, and did not reply at any great +length. Adams, indeed, was the only one who spoke much to Lady +Ludlow.</p> +<p>After we had worked away about an hour at the bureau, her ladyship +said we had done enough for one day; and as the time was come for her +afternoon ride, she left me, with a volume of engravings from Mr. Hogarth’s +pictures on one side of me (I don’t like to write down the names +of them, though my lady thought nothing of it, I am sure), and upon +a stand her great prayer-book open at the evening psalms for the day, +on the other. But as soon as she was gone, I troubled myself little +with either, but amused myself with looking round the room at my leisure. +The side on which the fire-place stood was all panelled,—part +of the old ornaments of the house, for there was an Indian paper with +birds and beasts and insects on it, on all the other sides. There +were coats of arms, of the various families with whom the Hanburys had +intermarried, all over these panels, and up and down the ceiling as +well. There was very little looking-glass in the room, though +one of the great drawing-rooms was called the “Mirror Room,” +because it was lined with glass, which my lady’s great-grandfather +had brought from Venice when he was ambassador there. There were +china jars of all shapes and sizes round and about the room, and some +china monsters, or idols, of which I could never bear the sight, they +were so ugly, though I think my lady valued them more than all. +There was a thick carpet on the middle of the floor, which was made +of small pieces of rare wood fitted into a pattern; the doors were opposite +to each other, and were composed of two heavy tall wings, and opened +in the middle, moving on brass grooves inserted into the floor—they +would not have opened over a carpet. There were two windows reaching +up nearly to the ceiling, but very narrow and with deep window-seats +in the thickness of the wall. The room was full of scent, partly +from the flowers outside, and partly from the great jars of pot-pourri +inside. The choice of odours was what my lady piqued herself upon, +saying nothing showed birth like a keen susceptibility of smell. +We never named musk in her presence, her antipathy to it was so well +understood through the household: her opinion on the subject was believed +to be, that no scent derived from an animal could ever be of a sufficiently +pure nature to give pleasure to any person of good family, where, of +course, the delicate perception of the senses had been cultivated for +generations. She would instance the way in which sportsmen preserve +the breed of dogs who have shown keen scent; and how such gifts descend +for generations amongst animals, who cannot be supposed to have anything +of ancestral pride, or hereditary fancies about them. Musk, then, +was never mentioned at Hanbury Court. No more were bergamot or +southern-wood, although vegetable in their nature. She considered +these two latter as betraying a vulgar taste in the person who chose +to gather or wear them. She was sorry to notice sprigs of them +in the button-hole of any young man in whom she took an interest, either +because he was engaged to a servant of hers or otherwise, as he came +out of church on a Sunday afternoon. She was afraid that he liked +coarse pleasures; and I am not sure if she did not think that his preference +for these coarse sweetnesses did not imply a probability that he would +take to drinking. But she distinguished between vulgar and common. +Violets, pinks, and sweetbriar were common enough; roses and mignionette, +for those who had gardens, honeysuckle for those who walked along the +bowery lanes; but wearing them betrayed no vulgarity of taste: the queen +upon her throne might be glad to smell at a nosegay of the flowers. +A beau-pot (as we called it) of pinks and roses freshly gathered was +placed every morning that they were in bloom on my lady’s own +particular table. For lasting vegetable odours she preferred lavender +and sweet-woodroof to any extract whatever. Lavender reminded +her of old customs, she said, and of homely cottage-gardens, and many +a cottager made his offering to her of a bundle of lavender. Sweet +woodroof, again, grew in wild, woodland places where the soil was fine +and the air delicate: the poor children used to go and gather it for +her up in the woods on the higher lands; and for this service she always +rewarded them with bright new pennies, of which my lord, her son, used +to send her down a bagful fresh from the Mint in London every February.</p> +<p>Attar of roses, again, she disliked. She said it reminded her +of the city and of merchants’ wives, over-rich, over-heavy in +its perfume. And lilies-of-the-valley somehow fell under the same +condemnation. They were most graceful and elegant to look at (my +lady was quite candid about this), flower, leaf, colour—everything +was refined about them but the smell. That was too strong. +But the great hereditary faculty on which my lady piqued herself, and +with reason, for I never met with any person who possessed it, was the +power she had of perceiving the delicious odour arising from a bed of +strawberries in the late autumn, when the leaves were all fading and +dying. “Bacon’s Essays” was one of the few books +that lay about in my lady’s room; and if you took it up and opened +it carelessly, it was sure to fall apart at his “Essay on Gardens.” +“Listen,” her ladyship would say, “to what that great +philosopher and statesman says. ‘Next to that,’—he +is speaking of violets, my dear,—‘is the musk-rose,’—of +which you remember the great bush, at the corner of the south wall just +by the Blue Drawing-room windows; that is the old musk-rose, Shakespeare’s +musk-rose, which is dying out through the kingdom now. But to +return to my Lord Bacon: ‘Then the strawberry leaves, dying with +a most excellent cordial smell.’ Now the Hanburys can always +smell this excellent cordial odour, and very delicious and refreshing +it is. You see, in Lord Bacon’s time, there had not been +so many intermarriages between the court and the city as there have +been since the needy days of his Majesty Charles the Second; and altogether +in the time of Queen Elizabeth, the great, old families of England were +a distinct race, just as a cart-horse is one creature, and very useful +in its place, and Childers or Eclipse is another creature, though both +are of the same species. So the old families have gifts and powers +of a different and higher class to what the other orders have. +My dear, remember that you try if you can smell the scent of dying strawberry-leaves +in this next autumn. You have some of Ursula Hanbury’s blood +in you, and that gives you a chance.”</p> +<p>But when October came, I sniffed and sniffed, and all to no purpose; +and my lady—who had watched the little experiment rather anxiously—had +to give me up as a hybrid. I was mortified, I confess, and thought +that it was in some ostentation of her own powers that she ordered the +gardener to plant a border of strawberries on that side of the terrace +that lay under her windows.</p> +<p>I have wandered away from time and place. I tell you all the +remembrances I have of those years just as they come up, and I hope +that, in my old age, I am not getting too like a certain Mrs. Nickleby, +whose speeches were once read out aloud to me.</p> +<p>I came by degrees to be all day long in this room which I have been +describing; sometimes sitting in the easy-chair, doing some little piece +of dainty work for my lady, or sometimes arranging flowers, or sorting +letters according to their handwriting, so that she could arrange them +afterwards, and destroy or keep, as she planned, looking ever onward +to her death. Then, after the sofa was brought in, she would watch +my face, and if she saw my colour change, she would bid me lie down +and rest. And I used to try to walk upon the terrace every day +for a short time: it hurt me very much, it is true, but the doctor had +ordered it, and I knew her ladyship wished me to obey.</p> +<p>Before I had seen the background of a great lady’s life, I +had thought it all play and fine doings. But whatever other grand +people are, my lady was never idle. For one thing, she had to +superintend the agent for the large Hanbury estate. I believe +it was mortgaged for a sum of money which had gone to improve the late +lord’s Scotch lands; but she was anxious to pay off this before +her death, and so to leave her own inheritance free of incumbrance to +her son, the present Earl; whom, I secretly think, she considered a +greater person, as being the heir of the Hanburys (though through a +female line), than as being my Lord Ludlow with half a dozen other minor +titles.</p> +<p>With this wish of releasing her property from the mortgage, skilful +care was much needed in the management of it; and as far as my lady +could go, she took every pains. She had a great book, in which +every page was ruled into three divisions; on the first column was written +the date and the name of the tenant who addressed any letter on business +to her; on the second was briefly stated the subject of the letter, +which generally contained a request of some kind. This request +would be surrounded and enveloped in so many words, and often inserted +amidst so many odd reasons and excuses, that Mr. Horner (the steward) +would sometimes say it was like hunting through a bushel of chaff to +find a grain of wheat. Now, in the second column of this book, +the grain of meaning was placed, clean and dry, before her ladyship +every morning. She sometimes would ask to see the original letter; +sometimes she simply answered the request by a “Yes,” or +a “No;” and often she would send for lenses and papers, +and examine them well, with Mr. Horner at her elbow, to see if such +petitions, as to be allowed to plough up pasture fields, were provided +for in the terms of the original agreement. On every Thursday +she made herself at liberty to see her tenants, from four to six in +the afternoon. Mornings would have suited my lady better, as far +as convenience went, and I believe the old custom had been to have these +levées (as her ladyship used to call them) held before twelve. +But, as she said to Mr. Horner, when he urged returning to the former +hours, it spoilt a whole day for a farmer, if he had to dress himself +in his best and leave his work in the forenoon (and my lady liked to +see her tenants come in their Sunday clothes; she would not say a word, +maybe, but she would take her spectacles slowly out, and put them on +with silent gravity, and look at a dirty or raggedly-dressed man so +solemnly and earnestly, that his nerves must have been pretty strong +if he did not wince, and resolve that, however poor he might be, soap +and water, and needle and thread, should be used before he again appeared +in her ladyship’s anteroom). The out-lying tenants had always +a supper provided for them in the servants’-hall on Thursdays, +to which, indeed all comers were welcome to sit down. For my lady +said, though there were not many hours left of a working man’s +day when their business with her was ended, yet that they needed food +and rest, and that she should be ashamed if they sought either at the +Fighting Lion (called at this day the Hanbury Arms). They had +as much beer as they could drink while they were eating; and when the +food was cleared away, they had a cup a-piece of good ale, in which +the oldest tenant present, standing up, gave Madam’s health; and +after that was drunk, they were expected to set off homewards; at any +rate, no more liquor was given them. The tenants one and all called +her “Madam;” for they recognized in her the married heiress +of the Hanburys, not the widow of a Lord Ludlow, of whom they and their +forefathers knew nothing; and against whose memory, indeed, there rankled +a dim unspoken grudge, the cause of which was accurately known to the +very few who understood the nature of a mortgage, and were therefore +aware that Madam’s money had been taken to enrich my lord’s +poor land in Scotland. I am sure—for you can understand +I was behind the scenes, as it were, and had many an opportunity of +seeing and hearing, as I lay or sat motionless in my lady’s room +with the double doors open between it and the anteroom beyond, where +Lady Ludlow saw her steward, and gave audience to her tenants,—I +am certain, I say, that Mr. Horner was silently as much annoyed at the +money that was swallowed up by this mortgage as any one; and, some time +or other, he had probably spoken his mind out to my lady; for there +was a sort of offended reference on her part, and respectful submission +to blame on his, while every now and then there was an implied protest—whenever +the payments of the interest became due, or whenever my lady stinted +herself of any personal expense, such as Mr. Horner thought was only +decorous and becoming in the heiress of the Hanburys. Her carriages +were old and cumbrous, wanting all the improvements which had been adopted +by those of her rank throughout the county. Mr. Horner would fain +have had the ordering of a new coach. The carriage-horses, too, +were getting past their work; yet all the promising colts bred on the +estate were sold for ready money; and so on. My lord, her son, +was ambassador at some foreign place; and very proud we all were of +his glory and dignity; but I fancy it cost money, and my lady would +have lived on bread and water sooner than have called upon him to help +her in paying off the mortgage, although he was the one who was to benefit +by it in the end.</p> +<p>Mr. Horner was a very faithful steward, and very respectful to my +lady; although sometimes, I thought she was sharper to him than to any +one else; perhaps because she knew that, although he never said anything, +he disapproved of the Hanburys being made to pay for the Earl Ludlow’s +estates and state.</p> +<p>The late lord had been a sailor, and had been as extravagant in his +habits as most sailors are, I am told,—for I never saw the sea; +and yet he had a long sight to his own interests; but whatever he was, +my lady loved him and his memory, with about as fond and proud a love +as ever wife gave husband, I should think.</p> +<p>For a part of his life Mr. Horner, who was born on the Hanbury property, +had been a clerk to an attorney in Birmingham; and these few years had +given him a kind of worldly wisdom, which, though always exerted for +her benefit, was antipathetic to her ladyship, who thought that some +of her steward’s maxims savoured of trade and commerce. +I fancy that if it had been possible, she would have preferred a return +to the primitive system, of living on the produce of the land, and exchanging +the surplus for such articles as were needed, without the intervention +of money.</p> +<p>But Mr. Horner was bitten with new-fangled notions, as she would +say, though his new-fangled notions were what folk at the present day +would think sadly behindhand; and some of Mr. Gray’s ideas fell +on Mr. Horner’s mind like sparks on tow, though they started from +two different points. Mr. Horner wanted to make every man useful +and active in this world, and to direct as much activity and usefulness +as possible to the improvement of the Hanbury estates, and the aggrandisement +of the Hanbury family, and therefore he fell into the new cry for education.</p> +<p>Mr. Gray did not care much,—Mr. Horner thought not enough,—for +this world, and where any man or family stood in their earthly position; +but he would have every one prepared for the world to come, and capable +of understanding and receiving certain doctrines, for which latter purpose, +it stands to reason, he must have heard of these doctrines; and therefore +Mr. Gray wanted education. The answer in the Catechism that Mr. +Horner was most fond of calling upon a child to repeat, was that to, +“What is thy duty towards thy neighbour?” The answer +Mr. Gray liked best to hear repeated with unction, was that to the question, +“What is the inward and spiritual grace?” The reply +to which Lady Ludlow bent her head the lowest, as we said our Catechism +to her on Sundays, was to, “What is thy duty towards God?” +But neither Mr. Horner nor Mr. Gray had heard many answers to the Catechism +as yet.</p> +<p>Up to this time there was no Sunday-school in Hanbury. Mr. +Gray’s desires were bounded by that object. Mr. Horner looked +farther on: he hoped for a day-school at some future time, to train +up intelligent labourers for working on the estate. My lady would +hear of neither one nor the other: indeed, not the boldest man whom +she ever saw would have dared to name the project of a day-school within +her hearing.</p> +<p>So Mr. Horner contented himself with quietly teaching a sharp, clever +lad to read and write, with a view to making use of him as a kind of +foreman in process of time. He had his pick of the farm-lads for +this purpose; and, as the brightest and sharpest, although by far the +raggedest and dirtiest, singled out Job Gregson’s son. But +all this—as my lady never listened to gossip, or indeed, was spoken +to unless she spoke first—was quite unknown to her, until the +unlucky incident took place which I am going to relate.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER IV.</h2> +<p>I think my lady was not aware of Mr. Horner’s views on education +(as making men into more useful members of society), or the practice +to which he was putting his precepts in taking Harry Gregson as pupil +and protégé; if, indeed, she were aware of Harry’s +distinct existence at all, until the following unfortunate occasion. +The anteroom, which was a kind of business-place for my lady to receive +her steward and tenants in, was surrounded by shelves. I cannot +call them book-shelves, though there were many books on them; but the +contents of the volumes were principally manuscript, and relating to +details connected with the Hanbury property. There were also one +or two dictionaries, gazetteers, works of reference on the management +of property; all of a very old date (the dictionary was Bailey’s, +I remember; we had a great Johnson in my lady’s room, but where +lexicographers differed, she generally preferred Bailey).</p> +<p>In this antechamber a footman generally sat, awaiting orders from +my lady; for she clung to the grand old customs, and despised any bells, +except her own little hand-bell, as modern inventions; she would have +her people always within summons of this silvery bell, or her scarce +less silvery voice. This man had not the sinecure you might imagine. +He had to reply to the private entrance; what we should call the back +door in a smaller house. As none came to the front door but my +lady, and those of the county whom she honoured by visiting, and her +nearest acquaintance of this kind lived eight miles (of bad road) off, +the majority of comers knocked at the nail-studded terrace-door; not +to have it opened (for open it stood, by my lady’s orders, winter +and summer, so that the snow often drifted into the back hall, and lay +there in heaps when the weather was severe), but to summon some one +to receive their message, or carry their request to be allowed to speak +to my lady. I remember it was long before Mr. Gray could be made +to understand that the great door was only open on state occasions, +and even to the last he would as soon come in by that as the terrace +entrance. I had been received there on my first setting foot over +my lady’s threshold; every stranger was led in by that way the +first time they came; but after that (with the exceptions I have named) +they went round by the terrace, as it were by instinct. It was +an assistance to this instinct to be aware that from time immemorial, +the magnificent and fierce Hanbury wolf-hounds, which were extinct in +every other part of the island, had been and still were kept chained +in the front quadrangle, where they bayed through a great part of the +day and night and were always ready with their deep, savage growl at +the sight of every person and thing, excepting the man who fed them, +my lady’s carriage and four, and my lady herself. It was +pretty to see her small figure go up to the great, crouching brutes +thumping the flags with their heavy, wagging tails, and slobbering in +an ecstacy of delight, at her light approach and soft caress. +She had no fear of them; but she was a Hanbury born, and the tale went, +that they and their kind knew all Hanburys instantly, and acknowledged +their supremacy, ever since the ancestors of the breed had been brought +from the East by the great Sir Urian Hanbury, who lay with his legs +crossed on the altar-tomb in the church. Moreover, it was reported +that, not fifty years before, one of these dogs had eaten up a child, +which had inadvertently strayed within reach of its chain. So +you may imagine how most people preferred the terrace-door. Mr. +Gray did not seem to care for the dogs. It might be absence of +mind, for I have heard of his starting away from their sudden spring +when he had unwittingly walked within reach of their chains: but it +could hardly have been absence of mind, when one day he went right up +to one of them, and patted him in the most friendly manner, the dog +meanwhile looking pleased, and affably wagging his tail, just as if +Mr. Gray had been a Hanbury. We were all very much puzzled by +this, and to this day I have not been able to account for it.</p> +<p>But now let us go back to the terrace-door, and the footman sitting +in the antechamber.</p> +<p>One morning we heard a parleying, which rose to such a vehemence, +and lasted for so long, that my lady had to ring her hand-bell twice +before the footman heard it.</p> +<p>“What is the matter, John?” asked she, when he entered,</p> +<p>“A little boy, my lady, who says he comes from Mr. Horner, +and must see your ladyship. Impudent little lad!” +(This last to himself.)</p> +<p>“What does he want?”</p> +<p>“That’s just what I have asked him, my lady, but he won’t +tell me, please your ladyship.”</p> +<p>“It is, probably, some message from Mr. Horner,” said +Lady Ludlow, with just a shade of annoyance in her manner; for it was +against all etiquette to send a message to her, and by such a messenger +too!</p> +<p>“No! please your ladyship, I asked him if he had any message, +and he said no, he had none; but he must see your ladyship for all that.”</p> +<p>“You had better show him in then, without more words,” +said her ladyship, quietly, but still, as I have said, rather annoyed.</p> +<p>As if in mockery of the humble visitor, the footman threw open both +battants of the door, and in the opening there stood a lithe, wiry lad, +with a thick head of hair, standing out in every direction, as if stirred +by some electrical current, a short, brown face, red now from affright +and excitement, wide, resolute mouth, and bright, deep-set eyes, which +glanced keenly and rapidly round the room, as if taking in everything +(and all was new and strange), to be thought and puzzled over at some +future time. He knew enough of manners not to speak first to one +above him in rank, or else he was afraid.</p> +<p>“What do you want with me?” asked my lady; in so gentle +a tone that it seemed to surprise and stun him.</p> +<p>“An’t please your ladyship?” said he, as if he +had been deaf.</p> +<p>“You come from Mr. Horner’s: why do you want to see me?” +again asked she, a little more loudly.</p> +<p>“An’t please your ladyship, Mr. Horner was sent for all +on a sudden to Warwick this morning.”</p> +<p>His face began to work; but he felt it, and closed his lips into +a resolute form.</p> +<p>“Well?”</p> +<p>“And he went off all on a sudden like.”</p> +<p>“Well?”</p> +<p>“And he left a note for your ladyship with me, your ladyship.”</p> +<p>“Is that all? You might have given it to the footman.”</p> +<p>“Please your ladyship, I’ve clean gone and lost it.”</p> +<p>He never took his eyes off her face. If he had not kept his +look fixed, he would have burst out crying.</p> +<p>“That was very careless,” said my lady gently. +“But I am sure you are very sorry for it. You had better +try and find it; it may have been of consequence.</p> +<p>“Please, mum—please your ladyship—I can say it +off by heart.”</p> +<p>“You! What do you mean?” I was really afraid +now. My lady’s blue eyes absolutely gave out light, she +was so much displeased, and, moreover, perplexed. The more reason +he had for affright, the more his courage rose. He must have seen,—so +sharp a lad must have perceived her displeasure; but he went on quickly +and steadily.</p> +<p>“Mr. Horner, my lady, has taught me to read, write, and cast +accounts, my lady. And he was in a hurry, and he folded his paper +up, but he did not seal it; and I read it, my lady; and now, my lady, +it seems like as if I had got it off by heart;” and he went on +with a high pitched voice, saying out very loud what, I have no doubt, +were the identical words of the letter, date, signature and all: it +was merely something about a deed, which required my lady’s signature.</p> +<p>When he had done, he stood almost as if he expected commendation +for his accurate memory.</p> +<p>My lady’s eyes contracted till the pupils were as needle-points; +it was a way she had when much disturbed. She looked at me and +said—</p> +<p>“Margaret Dawson, what will this world come to?” +And then she was silent.</p> +<p>The lad, beginning to perceive he had given deep offence, stood stock +still—as if his brave will had brought him into this presence, +and impelled him to confession, and the best amends he could make, but +had now deserted him, or was extinct, and left his body motionless, +until some one else with word or deed made him quit the room. +My lady looked again at him, and saw the frowning, dumb-foundering terror +at his misdeed, and the manner in which his confession had been received.</p> +<p>“My poor lad!” said she, the angry look leaving her face, +“into whose hands have you fallen?”</p> +<p>The boy’s lips began to quiver.</p> +<p>“Don’t you know what tree we read of in Genesis?—No! +I hope you have not got to read so easily as that.” A pause. +“Who has taught you to read and write?”</p> +<p>“Please, my lady, I meant no harm, my lady.” He +was fairly blubbering, overcome by her evident feeling of dismay and +regret, the soft repression of which was more frightening to him than +any strong or violent words would have been.</p> +<p>“Who taught you, I ask?”</p> +<p>“It were Mr. Horner’s clerk who learned me, my lady.”</p> +<p>“And did Mr. Horner know of it?”</p> +<p>“Yes, my lady. And I am sure I thought for to please +him.”</p> +<p>“Well! perhaps you were not to blame for that. But I +wonder at Mr. Horner. However, my boy, as you have got possession +of edge-tools, you must have some rules how to use them. Did you +never hear that you were not to open letters?”</p> +<p>“Please, my lady, it were open. Mr. Horner forgot for +to seal it, in his hurry to be off.”</p> +<p>“But you must not read letters that are not intended for you. +You must never try to read any letters that are not directed to you, +even if they be open before you.”</p> +<p>“Please, may lady, I thought it were good for practice, all +as one as a book.”</p> +<p>My lady looked bewildered as to what way she could farther explain +to him the laws of honour as regarded letters.</p> +<p>“You would not listen, I am sure,” said she, “to +anything you were not intended to hear?”</p> +<p>He hesitated for a moment, partly because he did not fully comprehend +the question. My lady repeated it. The light of intelligence +came into his eager eyes, and I could see that he was not certain if +he could tell the truth.</p> +<p>“Please, my lady, I always hearken when I hear folk talking +secrets; but I mean no harm.”</p> +<p>My poor lady sighed: she was not prepared to begin a long way off +in morals. Honour was, to her, second nature, and she had never +tried to find out on what principle its laws were based. So, telling +the lad that she wished to see Mr. Horner when he returned from Warwick, +she dismissed him with a despondent look; he, meanwhile, right glad +to be out of the awful gentleness of her presence.</p> +<p>“What is to be done?” said she, half to herself and half +to me. I could not answer, for I was puzzled myself.</p> +<p>“It was a right word,” she continued, “that I used, +when I called reading and writing ‘edge-tools.’ If +our lower orders have these edge-tools given to them, we shall have +the terrible scenes of the French Revolution acted over again in England. +When I was a girl, one never heard of the rights of men, one only heard +of the duties. Now, here was Mr. Gray, only last night, talking +of the right every child had to instruction. I could hardly keep +my patience with him, and at length we fairly came to words; and I told +him I would have no such thing as a Sunday-school (or a Sabbath-school, +as he calls it, just like a Jew) in my village.”</p> +<p>“And what did he say, my lady?” I asked; for the struggle +that seemed now to have come to a crisis, had been going on for some +time in a quiet way.</p> +<p>“Why, he gave way to temper, and said he was bound to remember, +he was under the bishop’s authority, not under mine; and implied +that he should persevere in his designs, notwithstanding my expressed +opinion.”</p> +<p>“And your ladyship—” I half inquired.</p> +<p>“I could only rise and curtsey, and civilly dismiss him. +When two persons have arrived at a certain point of expression on a +subject, about which they differ as materially as I do from Mr. Gray, +the wisest course, if they wish to remain friends, is to drop the conversation +entirely and suddenly. It is one of the few cases where abruptness +is desirable.”</p> +<p>I was sorry for Mr. Gray. He had been to see me several times, +and had helped me to bear my illness in a better spirit than I should +have done without his good advice and prayers. And I had gathered +from little things he said, how much his heart was set upon this new +scheme. I liked him so much, and I loved and respected my lady +so well, that I could not bear them to be on the cool terms to which +they were constantly getting. Yet I could do nothing but keep +silence.</p> +<p>I suppose my lady understood something of what was passing in my +mind; for, after a minute or two, she went on:—</p> +<p>“If Mr. Gray knew all I know,—if he had my experience, +he would not be so ready to speak of setting up his new plans in opposition +to my judgment. Indeed,” she continued, lashing herself +up with her own recollections, “times are changed when the parson +of a village comes to beard the liege lady in her own house. Why, +in my grandfather’s days, the parson was family chaplain too, +and dined at the Hall every Sunday. He was helped last, and expected +to have done first. I remember seeing him take up his plate and +knife and fork, and say with his mouth full all the time he was speaking: +‘If you please, Sir Urian, and my lady, I’ll follow the +beef into the housekeeper’s room;’ for you see, unless he +did so, he stood no chance of a second helping. A greedy man, +that parson was, to be sure! I recollect his once eating up the +whole of some little bird at dinner, and by way of diverting attention +from his greediness, he told how he had heard that a rook soaked in +vinegar and then dressed in a particular way, could not be distinguished +from the bird he was then eating. I saw by the grim look of my +grandfather’s face that the parson’s doing and saying displeased +him; and, child as I was, I had some notion of what was coming, when, +as I was riding out on my little, white pony, by my grandfather’s +side, the next Friday, he stopped one of the gamekeepers, and bade him +shoot one of the oldest rooks he could find. I knew no more about +it till Sunday, when a dish was set right before the parson, and Sir +Urian said: ‘Now, Parson Hemming, I have had a rook shot, and +soaked in vinegar, and dressed as you described last Sunday. Fall +to, man, and eat it with as good an appetite as you had last Sunday. +Pick the bones clean, or by—, no more Sunday dinners shall you +eat at my table!’ I gave one look at poor Mr. Hemming’s +face, as he tried to swallow the first morsel, and make believe as though +he thought it very good; but I could not look again, for shame, although +my grandfather laughed, and kept asking us all round if we knew what +could have become of the parson’s appetite.”</p> +<p>“And did he finish it?” I asked.</p> +<p>“O yes, my dear. What my grandfather said was to be done, +was done always. He was a terrible man in his anger! But +to think of the difference between Parson Hemming and Mr. Gray! or even +of poor dear Mr. Mountford and Mr. Gray. Mr. Mountford would never +have withstood me as Mr. Gray did!”</p> +<p>“And your ladyship really thinks that it would not be right +to have a Sunday-school?” I asked, feeling very timid as I put +time question.</p> +<p>“Certainly not. As I told Mr. Gray. I consider +a knowledge of the Creed, and of the Lord’s Prayer, as essential +to salvation; and that any child may have, whose parents bring it regularly +to church. Then there are the Ten Commandments, which teach simple +duties in the plainest language. Of course, if a lad is taught +to read and write (as that unfortunate boy has been who was here this +morning) his duties become complicated, and his temptations much greater, +while, at the same time, he has no hereditary principles and honourable +training to serve as safeguards. I might take up my old simile +of the race-horse and cart-horse. I am distressed,” continued +she, with a break in her ideas, “about that boy. The whole +thing reminds me so much of a story of what happened to a friend of +mine—Clément de Créquy. Did I ever tell you +about him?”</p> +<p>“No, your ladyship,” I replied.</p> +<p>“Poor Clément! More than twenty years ago, Lord +Ludlow and I spent a winter in Paris. He had many friends there; +perhaps not very good or very wise men, but he was so kind that he liked +every one, and every one liked him. We had an apartment, as they +call it there, in the Rue de Lille; we had the first-floor of a grand +hôtel, with the basement for our servants. On the floor +above us the owner of the house lived, a Marquise de Créquy, +a widow. They tell me that the Créquy coat-of-arms is still +emblazoned, after all these terrible years, on a shield above the arched +porte-cochère, just as it was then, though the family is quite +extinct. Madame de Créquy had only one son, Clément, +who was just the same age as my Urian—you may see his portrait +in the great hall—Urian’s, I mean.” I knew that +Master Urian had been drowned at sea; and often had I looked at the +presentment of his bonny hopeful face, in his sailor’s dress, +with right hand outstretched to a ship on the sea in the distance, as +if he had just said, “Look at her! all her sails are set, and +I’m just off.” Poor Master Urian! he went down in +this very ship not a year after the picture was taken! But now +I will go back to my lady’s story. “I can see those +two boys playing now,” continued she, softly, shutting her eyes, +as if the better to call up the vision, “as they used to do five-and-twenty +years ago in those old-fashioned French gardens behind our hôtel. +Many a time have I watched them from my windows. It was, perhaps, +a better play-place than an English garden would have been, for there +were but few flower-beds, and no lawn at all to speak about; but, instead, +terraces and balustrades and vases and flights of stone steps more in +the Italian style; and there were jets-d’eau, and little fountains +that could be set playing by turning water-cocks that were hidden here +and there. How Clément delighted in turning the water on +to surprise Urian, and how gracefully he did the honours, as it were, +to my dear, rough, sailor lad! Urian was as dark as a gipsy boy, +and cared little for his appearance, and resisted all my efforts at +setting off his black eyes and tangled curls; but Clément, without +ever showing that he thought about himself and his dress, was always +dainty and elegant, even though his clothes were sometimes but threadbare. +He used to be dressed in a kind of hunter’s green suit, open at +the neck and half-way down the chest to beautiful old lace frills; his +long golden curls fell behind just like a girl’s, and his hair +in front was cut over his straight dark eyebrows in a line almost as +straight. Urian learnt more of a gentleman’s carefulness +and propriety of appearance from that lad in two months than he had +done in years from all my lectures. I recollect one day, when +the two boys were in full romp—and, my window being open, I could +hear them perfectly—and Urian was daring Clément to some +scrambling or climbing, which Clément refused to undertake, but +in a hesitating way, as though he longed to do it if some reason had +not stood in the way; and at times, Urian, who was hasty and thoughtless, +poor fellow, told Clément that he was afraid. ‘Fear!’ +said the French boy, drawing himself up; ‘you do not know what +you say. If you will be here at six to-morrow morning, when it +is only just light, I will take that starling’s nest on the top +of yonder chimney.’ ‘But why not now, Clément?’ +said Urian, putting his arm round Clément’s neck. +‘Why then, and not now, just when we are in the humour for it?’ +‘Because we De Créquys are poor, and my mother cannot afford +me another suit of clothes this year, and yonder stone carving is all +jagged, and would tear my coat and breeches. Now, to-morrow morning +I could go up with nothing on but an old shirt.’</p> +<p>“‘But you would tear your legs.’</p> +<p>“‘My race do not care for pain,’ said the boy, +drawing himself from Urian’s arm, and walking a few steps away, +with a becoming pride and reserve; for he was hurt at being spoken to +as if he were afraid, and annoyed at having to confess the true reason +for declining the feat. But Urian was not to be thus baffled. +He went up to Clément, and put his arm once more about his neck, +and I could see the two lads as they walked down the terrace away from +the hotel windows: first Urian spoke eagerly, looking with imploring +fondness into Clément’s face, which sought the ground, +till at last the French boy spoke, and by-and-by his arm was round Urian +too, and they paced backwards and forwards in deep talk, but gravely, +as became men, rather than boys.</p> +<p>“All at once, from the little chapel at the corner of the large +garden belonging to the Missions Etrangères, I heard the tinkle +of the little bell, announcing the elevation of the host. Down +on his knees went Clément, hands crossed, eyes bent down: while +Urian stood looking on in respectful thought.</p> +<p>“What a friendship that might have been! I never dream +of Urian without seeing Clément too—Urian speaks to me, +or does something,—but Clément only flits round Urian, +and never seems to see any one else!”</p> +<p>“But I must not forget to tell you, that the next morning, +before he was out of his room, a footman of Madame de Créquy’s +brought Urian the starling’s nest.”</p> +<p>“Well! we came back to England, and the boys were to correspond; +and Madame de Créquy and I exchanged civilities; and Urian went +to sea.”</p> +<p>“After that, all seemed to drop away. I cannot tell you +all. However, to confine myself to the De Créquys. +I had a letter from Clément; I knew he felt his friend’s +death deeply; but I should never have learnt it from the letter he sent. +It was formal, and seemed like chaff to my hungering heart. Poor +fellow! I dare say he had found it hard to write. What could he—or +any one—say to a mother who has lost her child? The world +does not think so, and, in general, one must conform to the customs +of the world; but, judging from my own experience, I should say that +reverent silence at such times is the tenderest balm. Madame de +Créquy wrote too. But I knew she could not feel my loss +so much as Clément, and therefore her letter was not such a disappointment. +She and I went on being civil and polite in the way of commissions, +and occasionally introducing friends to each other, for a year or two, +and then we ceased to have any intercourse. Then the terrible +Revolution came. No one who did not live at those times can imagine +the daily expectation of news—the hourly terror of rumours affecting +the fortunes and lives of those whom most of us had known as pleasant +hosts, receiving us with peaceful welcome in their magnificent houses. +Of course, there was sin enough and suffering enough behind the scenes; +but we English visitors to Paris had seen little or nothing of that,—and +I had sometimes thought, indeed, how even death seemed loth to choose +his victims out of that brilliant throng whom I had known. Madame +de Créquy’s one boy lived; while three out of my six were +gone since we had met! I do not think all lots are equal, even +now that I know the end of her hopes; but I do say that whatever our +individual lot is, it is our duty to accept it, without comparing it +with that of others.</p> +<p>“The times were thick with gloom and terror. ‘What +next?’ was the question we asked of every one who brought us news +from Paris. Where were these demons hidden when, so few years +ago, we danced and feasted, and enjoyed the brilliant salons and the +charming friendships of Paris?</p> +<p>“One evening, I was sitting alone in Saint James’s Square; +my lord off at the club with Mr. Fox and others: he had left me, thinking +that I should go to one of the many places to which I had been invited +for that evening; but I had no heart to go anywhere, for it was poor +Urian’s birthday, and I had not even rung for lights, though the +day was fast closing in, but was thinking over all his pretty ways, +and on his warm affectionate nature, and how often I had been too hasty +in speaking to him, for all I loved him so dearly; and how I seemed +to have neglected and dropped his dear friend Clément, who might +even now be in need of help in that cruel, bloody Paris. I say +I was thinking reproachfully of all this, and particularly of Clément +de Créquy in connection with Urian, when Fenwick brought me a +note, sealed with a coat-of-arms I knew well, though I could not remember +at the moment where I had seen it. I puzzled over it, as one does +sometimes, for a minute or more, before I opened the letter. In +a moment I saw it was from Clément de Créquy. ‘My +mother is here,’ he said: ‘she is very ill, and I am bewildered +in this strange country. May I entreat you to receive me for a +few minutes?’ The bearer of the note was the woman of the +house where they lodged. I had her brought up into the anteroom, +and questioned her myself, while my carriage was being brought round. +They had arrived in London a fortnight or so before: she had not known +their quality, judging them (according to her kind) by their dress and +their luggage; poor enough, no doubt. The lady had never left +her bedroom since her arrival; the young man waited upon her, did everything +for her, never left her, in fact; only she (the messenger) had promised +to stay within call, as soon as she returned, while he went out somewhere. +She could hardly understand him, he spoke English so badly. He +had never spoken it, I dare say, since he had talked to my Urian.”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER V.</h2> +<p>“In the hurry of the moment I scarce knew what I did. +I bade the housekeeper put up every delicacy she had, in order to tempt +the invalid, whom yet I hoped to bring back with me to our house. +When the carriage was ready I took the good woman with me to show us +the exact way, which my coachman professed not to know; for, indeed, +they were staying at but a poor kind of place at the back of Leicester +Square, of which they had heard, as Clément told me afterwards, +from one of the fishermen who had carried them across from the Dutch +coast in their disguises as a Friesland peasant and his mother. +They had some jewels of value concealed round their persons; but their +ready money was all spent before I saw them, and Clément had +been unwilling to leave his mother, even for the time necessary to ascertain +the best mode of disposing of the diamonds. For, overcome with +distress of mind and bodily fatigue, she had reached London only to +take to her bed in a sort of low, nervous fever, in which her chief +and only idea seemed to be that Clément was about to be taken +from her to some prison or other; and if he were out of her sight, though +but for a minute, she cried like a child, and could not be pacified +or comforted. The landlady was a kind, good woman, and though +she but half understood the case, she was truly sorry for them, as foreigners, +and the mother sick in a strange land.</p> +<p>“I sent her forwards to request permission for my entrance. +In a moment I saw Clément—a tall, elegant young man, in +a curious dress of coarse cloth, standing at the open door of a room, +and evidently—even before he accosted me—striving to soothe +the terrors of his mother inside. I went towards him, and would +have taken his hand, but he bent down and kissed mine.</p> +<p>“‘May I come in, madame?’ I asked, looking at the +poor sick lady, lying in the dark, dingy bed, her head propped up on +coarse and dirty pillows, and gazing with affrighted eyes at all that +was going on.</p> +<p>“‘Clément! Clément! come to me!’ +she cried; and when he went to the bedside she turned on one side, and +took his hand in both of hers, and began stroking it, and looking up +in his face. I could scarce keep back my tears.</p> +<p>“He stood there quite still, except that from time to time +he spoke to her in a low tone. At last I advanced into the room, +so that I could talk to him, without renewing her alarm. I asked +for the doctor’s address; for I had heard that they had called +in some one, at their landlady’s recommendation: but I could hardly +understand Clément’s broken English, and mispronunciation +of our proper names, and was obliged to apply to the woman herself. +I could not say much to Clément, for his attention was perpetually +needed by his mother, who never seemed to perceive that I was there. +But I told him not to fear, however long I might be away, for that I +would return before night; and, bidding the woman take charge of all +the heterogeneous things the housekeeper had put up, and leaving one +of my men in the house, who could understand a few words of French, +with directions that he was to hold himself at Madame de Créquy’s +orders until I sent or gave him fresh commands, I drove off to the doctor’s. +What I wanted was his permission to remove Madame de Créquy to +my own house, and to learn how it best could be done; for I saw that +every movement in the room, every sound except Clément’s +voice, brought on a fresh access of trembling and nervous agitation.</p> +<p>“The doctor was, I should think, a clever man; but he had that +kind of abrupt manner which people get who have much to do with the +lower orders.</p> +<p>“I told him the story of his patient, the interest I had in +her, and the wish I entertained of removing her to my own house.</p> +<p>“‘It can’t be done,’ said he. ‘Any +change will kill her.’</p> +<p>“‘But it must be done,’ I replied. ‘And +it shall not kill her.’</p> +<p>“‘Then I have nothing more to say,’ said he, turning +away from the carriage door, and making as though he would go back into +the house.</p> +<p>“‘Stop a moment. You must help me; and, if you +do, you shall have reason to be glad, for I will give you fifty pounds +down with pleasure. If you won’t do it, another shall.’</p> +<p>“He looked at me, then (furtively) at the carriage, hesitated, +and then said: ‘You do not mind expense, apparently. I suppose +you are a rich lady of quality. Such folks will not stick at such +trifles as the life or death of a sick woman to get their own way. +I suppose I must e’en help you, for if I don’t, another +will.’</p> +<p>“I did not mind what he said, so that he would assist me. +I was pretty sure that she was in a state to require opiates; and I +had not forgotten Christopher Sly, you may be sure, so I told him what +I had in my head. That in the dead of night—the quiet time +in the streets,—she should be carried in a hospital litter, softly +and warmly covered over, from the Leicester Square lodging-house to +rooms that I would have in perfect readiness for her. As I planned, +so it was done. I let Clément know, by a note, of my design. +I had all prepared at home, and we walked about my house as though shod +with velvet, while the porter watched at the open door. At last, +through the darkness, I saw the lanterns carried by my men, who were +leading the little procession. The litter looked like a hearse; +on one side walked the doctor, on the other Clément; they came +softly and swiftly along. I could not try any farther experiment; +we dared not change her clothes; she was laid in the bed in the landlady’s +coarse night-gear, and covered over warmly, and left in the shaded, +scented room, with a nurse and the doctor watching by her, while I led +Clément to the dressing-room adjoining, in which I had had a +bed placed for him. Farther than that he would not go; and there +I had refreshments brought. Meanwhile, he had shown his gratitude +by every possible action (for we none of us dared to speak): he had +kneeled at my feet, and kissed my hand, and left it wet with his tears. +He had thrown up his arms to Heaven, and prayed earnestly, as I could +see by the movement of his lips. I allowed him to relieve himself +by these dumb expressions, if I may so call them,—and then I left +him, and went to my own rooms to sit up for my lord, and tell him what +I had done.</p> +<p>“Of course, it was all right; and neither my lord nor I could +sleep for wondering how Madame de Créquy would bear her awakening. +I had engaged the doctor, to whose face and voice she was accustomed, +to remain with her all night: the nurse was experienced, and Clément +was within call. But it was with the greatest relief that I heard +from my own woman, when she brought me my chocolate, that Madame de +Créquy (Monsieur had said) had awakened more tranquil than she +had been for many days. To be sure, the whole aspect of the bed-chamber +must have been more familiar to her than the miserable place where I +had found her, and she must have intuitively felt herself among friends.</p> +<p>“My lord was scandalized at Clément’s dress, which, +after the first moment of seeing him I had forgotten, in thinking of +other things, and for which I had not prepared Lord Ludlow. He +sent for his own tailor, and bade him bring patterns of stuffs, and +engage his men to work night and day till Clément could appear +as became his rank. In short, in a few days so much of the traces +of their flight were removed, that we had almost forgotten the terrible +causes of it, and rather felt as if they had come on a visit to us than +that they had been compelled to fly their country. Their diamonds, +too, were sold well by my lord’s agents, though the London shops +were stocked with jewellery, and such portable valuables, some of rare +and curious fashion, which were sold for half their real value by emigrants +who could not afford to wait. Madame de Créquy was recovering +her health, although her strength was sadly gone, and she would never +be equal to such another flight, as the perilous one which she had gone +through, and to which she could not bear the slightest reference. +For some time things continued in this state—the De Créquys +still our honoured visitors,—many houses besides our own, even +among our own friends, open to receive the poor flying nobility of France, +driven from their country by the brutal republicans, and every freshly-arrived +emigrant bringing new tales of horror, as if these revolutionists were +drunk with blood, and mad to devise new atrocities. One day Clément—I +should tell you he had been presented to our good King George and the +sweet Queen, and they had accosted him most graciously, and his beauty +and elegance, and some of the circumstances attendant on his flight, +made him be received in the world quite like a hero of romance; he might +have been on intimate terms in many a distinguished house, had he cared +to visit much; but he accompanied my lord and me with an air of indifference +and languor, which I sometimes fancied made him be all the more sought +after: Monkshaven (that was the title my eldest son bore) tried in vain +to interest him in all young men’s sports. But no! it was +the same through all. His mother took far more interest in the +on-dits of the London world, into which she was far too great an invalid +to venture, than he did in the absolute events themselves, in which +he might have been an actor. One day, as I was saying, an old +Frenchman of a humble class presented himself to our servants, several +of them, understood French; and through Medlicott, I learnt that he +was in some way connected with the De Créquys; not with their +Paris-life; but I fancy he had been intendant of their estates in the +country; estates which were more useful as hunting-grounds than as adding +to their income. However, there was the old man and with him, +wrapped round his person, he had brought the long parchment rolls, and +deeds relating to their property. These he would deliver up to +none but Monsieur de Créquy, the rightful owner; and Clément +was out with Monkshaven, so the old man waited; and when Clément +came in, I told him of the steward’s arrival, and how he had been +cared for by my people. Clément went directly to see him. +He was a long time away, and I was waiting for him to drive out with +me, for some purpose or another, I scarce know what, but I remember +I was tired of waiting, and was just in the act of ringing the bell +to desire that he might be reminded of his engagement with me, when +he came in, his face as white as the powder in his hair, his beautiful +eyes dilated with horror. I saw that he had heard something that +touched him even more closely than the usual tales which every fresh +emigrant brought.</p> +<p>“‘What is it, Clément?’ I asked.</p> +<p>“He clasped his hands, and looked as though he tried to speak, +but could not bring out the words.</p> +<p>“‘They have guillotined my uncle!’ said he at last. +Now, I knew that there was a Count de Créquy; but I had always +understood that the elder branch held very little communication with +him; in fact, that he was a vaurien of some kind, and rather a disgrace +than otherwise to the family. So, perhaps, I was hard-hearted +but I was a little surprised at this excess of emotion, till I saw that +peculiar look in his eyes that many people have when there is more terror +in their hearts than they dare put into words. He wanted me to +understand something without his saying it; but how could I? I +had never heard of a Mademoiselle de Créquy.</p> +<p>“‘Virginie!’ at last he uttered. In an instant +I understood it all, and remembered that, if Urian had lived, he too +might have been in love.</p> +<p>“‘Your uncle’s daughter?’ I inquired.</p> +<p>“‘My cousin,’ he replied.</p> +<p>“I did not say, ‘your betrothed,’ but I had no +doubt of it. I was mistaken, however.</p> +<p>“‘O madame!’ he continued, ‘her mother died +long ago—her father now—and she is in daily fear,—alone, +deserted—’</p> +<p>“‘Is she in the Abbaye?’ asked I.</p> +<p>“‘No! she is in hiding with the widow of her father’s +old concierge. Any day they may search the house for aristocrats. +They are seeking them everywhere. Then, not her life alone, but +that of the old woman, her hostess, is sacrificed. The old woman +knows this, and trembles with fear. Even if she is brave enough +to be faithful, her fears would betray her, should the house be searched. +Yet, there is no one to help Virginie to escape. She is alone +in Paris.’</p> +<p>“I saw what was in his mind. He was fretting and chafing +to go to his cousin’s assistance; but the thought of his mother +restrained him. I would not have kept back Urian from such on +errand at such a time. How should I restrain him? And yet, +perhaps, I did wrong in not urging the chances of danger more. +Still, if it was danger to him, was it not the same or even greater +danger to her?—for the French spared neither age nor sex in those +wicked days of terror. So I rather fell in with his wish, and +encouraged him to think how best and most prudently it might be fulfilled; +never doubting, as I have said, that he and his cousin were troth-plighted.</p> +<p>“But when I went to Madame de Créquy—after he +had imparted his, or rather our plan to her—I found out my mistake. +She, who was in general too feeble to walk across the room save slowly, +and with a stick, was going from end to end with quick, tottering steps; +and, if now and then she sank upon a chair, it seemed as if she could +not rest, for she was up again in a moment, pacing along, wringing her +hands, and speaking rapidly to herself. When she saw me, she stopped: +‘Madame,’ she said, ‘you have lost your own boy. +You might have left me mine.’</p> +<p>“I was so astonished—I hardly knew what to say. +I had spoken to Clément as if his mother’s consent were +secure (as I had felt my own would have been if Urian had been alive +to ask it). Of coarse, both he and I knew that his mother’s +consent must be asked and obtained, before he could leave her to go +on such an undertaking; but, somehow, my blood always rose at the sight +or sound of danger; perhaps, because my life had been so peaceful. +Poor Madame de Créquy! it was otherwise with her; she despaired +while I hoped, and Clément trusted.</p> +<p>“‘Dear Madame de Créquy,’ said I, ‘he +will return safely to us; every precaution shall be taken, that either +he or you, or my lord, or Monkshaven can think of; but he cannot leave +a girl—his nearest relation save you—his betrothed, is she +not?’</p> +<p>“‘His betrothed!’ cried she, now at the utmost +pitch of her excitement. ‘Virginie betrothed to Clément?—no! +thank heaven, not so bad as that! Yet it might have been. +But mademoiselle scorned my son! She would have nothing to do +with him. Now is the time for him to have nothing to do with her!”</p> +<p>“Clément had entered at the door behind his mother as +she thus spoke. His face was set and pale, till it looked as gray +and immovable as if it had been carved in stone. He came forward +and stood before his mother. She stopped her walk, threw back +her haughty head, and the two looked each other steadily in the face. +After a minute or two in this attitude, her proud and resolute gaze +never flinching or wavering, he went down upon one knee, and, taking +her hand—her hard, stony hand, which never closed on his, but +remained straight and stiff:</p> +<p>“‘Mother,’ he pleaded, ‘withdraw your prohibition. +Let me go!’</p> +<p>“‘What were her words?’ Madame de Créquy +replied, slowly, as if forcing her memory to the extreme of accuracy. +‘My cousin,’ she said, ‘when I marry, I marry a man, +not a petit-maître. I marry a man who, whatever his rank +may be will add dignity to the human race by his virtues, and not be +content to live in an effeminate court on the traditions of past grandeur.’ +She borrowed her words from the infamous Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the +friend of her scarce less infamous father—nay! I will say +it,—if not her words, she borrowed her principles. And my +son to request her to marry him!’</p> +<p>“‘It was my father’s written wish,’ said +Clément.</p> +<p>“‘But did you not love her? You plead your father’s +words,—words written twelve years before,—and as if that +were your reason for being indifferent to my dislike to the alliance. +But you requested her to marry you,—and she refused you with insolent +contempt; and now you are ready to leave me,—leave me desolate +in a foreign land—’</p> +<p>“‘Desolate! my mother! and the Countess Ludlow stands +there!’</p> +<p>“‘Pardon, madame! But all the earth, though it +were full of kind hearts, is but a desolation and a desert place to +a mother when her only child is absent. And you, Clément, +would leave me for this Virginie,—this degenerate De Créquy, +tainted with the atheism of the Encyclopédistes! She is +only reaping some of the fruit of the harvest whereof her friends have +sown the seed. Let her alone! Doubtless she has friends—it +may be lovers—among these demons, who, under the cry of liberty, +commit every licence. Let her alone, Clément! She +refused you with scorn: be too proud to notice her now.’</p> +<p>“‘Mother, I cannot think of myself; only of her.’</p> +<p>“’Think of me, then! I, your mother, forbid you +to go.’</p> +<p>“Clément bowed low, and went out of the room instantly, +as one blinded. She saw his groping movement, and, for an instant, +I think her heart was touched. But she turned to me, and tried +to exculpate her past violence by dilating upon her wrongs, and they +certainly were many. The Count, her husband’s younger brother, +had invariably tried to make mischief between husband and wife. +He had been the cleverer man of the two, and had possessed extraordinary +influence over her husband. She suspected him of having instigated +that clause in her husband’s will, by which the Marquis expressed +his wish for the marriage of the cousins. The Count had had some +interest in the management of the De Créquy property during her +son’s minority. Indeed, I remembered then, that it was through +Count de Créquy that Lord Ludlow had first heard of the apartment +which we afterwards took in the Hôtel de Créquy; and then +the recollection of a past feeling came distinctly out of the mist, +as it were; and I called to mind how, when we first took up our abode +in the Hôtel de Créquy, both Lord Ludlow and I imagined +that the arrangement was displeasing to our hostess; and how it had +taken us a considerable time before we had been able to establish relations +of friendship with her. Years after our visit, she began to suspect +that Clément (whom she could not forbid to visit at his uncle’s +house, considering the terms on which his father had been with his brother; +though she herself never set foot over the Count de Créquy’s +threshold) was attaching himself to mademoiselle, his cousin; and she +made cautious inquiries as to the appearance, character, and disposition +of the young lady. Mademoiselle was not handsome, they said; but +of a fine figure, and generally considered as having a very noble and +attractive presence. In character she was daring and wilful (said +one set); original and independent (said another). She was much +indulged by her father, who had given her something of a man’s +education, and selected for her intimate friend a young lady below her +in rank, one of the Bureaucracie, a Mademoiselle Necker, daughter of +the Minister of Finance. Mademoiselle de Créquy was thus +introduced into all the free-thinking salons of Paris; among people +who were always full of plans for subverting society. ‘And +did Clément affect such people?’ Madame de Créquy +had asked with some anxiety. No! Monsieur de Créquy +had neither eyes nor ears, nor thought for anything but his cousin, +while she was by. And she? She hardly took notice of his +devotion, so evident to every one else. The proud creature! +But perhaps that was her haughty way of concealing what she felt. +And so Madame de Créquy listened, and questioned, and learnt +nothing decided, until one day she surprised Clément with the +note in his hand, of which she remembered the stinging words so well, +in which Virginie had said, in reply to a proposal Clément had +sent her through her father, that ‘When she married she married +a man, not a petit-maître.’</p> +<p>“Clément was justly indignant at the insulting nature +of the answer Virginie had sent to a proposal, respectful in its tone, +and which was, after all, but the cool, hardened lava over a burning +heart. He acquiesced in his mother’s desire, that he should +not again present himself in his uncle’s salons; but he did not +forget Virginie, though he never mentioned her name.</p> +<p>“Madame de Créquy and her son were among the earliest +proscrits, as they were of the strongest possible royalists, and aristocrats, +as it was the custom of the horrid Sansculottes to term those who adhered +to the habits of expression and action in which it was their pride to +have been educated. They had left Paris some weeks before they +had arrived in England, and Clément’s belief at the time +of quitting the Hôtel de Créquy had certainly been, that +his uncle was not merely safe, but rather a popular man with the party +in power. And, as all communication having relation to private +individuals of a reliable kind was intercepted, Monsieur de Créquy +had felt but little anxiety for his uncle and cousin, in comparison +with what he did for many other friends of very different opinions in +politics, until the day when he was stunned by the fatal information +that even his progressive uncle was guillotined, and learnt that his +cousin was imprisoned by the licence of the mob, whose rights (as she +called them) she was always advocating.</p> +<p>“When I had heard all this story, I confess I lost in sympathy +for Clément what I gained for his mother. Virginie’s +life did not seem to me worth the risk that Clément’s would +run. But when I saw him—sad, depressed, nay, hopeless—going +about like one oppressed by a heavy dream which he cannot shake off; +caring neither to eat, drink, nor sleep, yet bearing all with silent +dignity, and even trying to force a poor, faint smile when he caught +my anxious eyes; I turned round again, and wondered how Madame de Créquy +could resist this mute pleading of her son’s altered appearance. +As for my Lord Ludlow and Monkshaven, as soon as they understood the +case, they were indignant that any mother should attempt to keep a son +out of honourable danger; and it was honourable, and a clear duty (according +to them) to try to save the life of a helpless orphan girl, his next +of kin. None but a Frenchman, said my lord, would hold himself +bound by an old woman’s whimsies and fears, even though she were +his mother. As it was, he was chafing himself to death under the +restraint. If he went, to be sure, the wretches might make an +end of him, as they had done of many a fine fellow: but my lord would +take heavy odds, that, instead of being guillotined, he would save the +girl, and bring her safe to England, just desperately in love with her +preserver, and then we would have a jolly wedding down at Monkshaven. +My lord repeated his opinion so often that it became a certain prophecy +in his mind of what was to take place; and, one day seeing Clément +look even paler and thinner than he had ever done before, he sent a +message to Madame de Créquy, requesting permission to speak to +her in private.</p> +<p>“‘For, by George!’ said he, ‘she shall hear +my opinion, and not let that lad of hers kill himself by fretting. +He’s too good for that, if he had been an English lad, he would +have been off to his sweetheart long before this, without saying with +your leave or by your leave; but being a Frenchman, he is all for Æneas +and filial piety,—filial fiddle-sticks!’ (My lord +had run away to sea, when a boy, against his father’s consent, +I am sorry to say; and, as all had ended well, and he had come back +to find both his parents alive, I do not think he was ever as much aware +of his fault as he might have been under other circumstances.) +‘No, my lady,’ he went on, ‘don’t come with +me. A woman can manage a man best when he has a fit of obstinacy, +and a man can persuade a woman out of her tantrums, when all her own +sex, the whole army of them, would fail. Allow me to go alone +to my tête-à-tête with madame.”</p> +<p>“What he said, what passed, he never could repeat; but he came +back graver than he went. However, the point was gained; Madame +de Créquy withdrew her prohibition, and had given him leave to +tell Clément as much.</p> +<p>“‘But she is an old Cassandra,’ said he. +‘Don’t let the lad be much with her; her talk would destroy +the courage of the bravest man; she is so given over to superstition.’ +Something that she had said had touched a chord in my lord’s nature +which he inherited from his Scotch ancestors. Long afterwards, +I heard what this was. Medlicott told me.</p> +<p>“However, my lord shook off all fancies that told against the +fulfilment of Clément’s wishes. All that afternoon +we three sat together, planning; and Monkshaven passed in and out, executing +our commissions, and preparing everything. Towards nightfall all +was ready for Clément’s start on his journey towards the +coast.</p> +<p>“Madame had declined seeing any of us since my lord’s +stormy interview with her. She sent word that she was fatigued, +and desired repose. But, of course, before Clément set +off, he was bound to wish her farewell, and to ask for her blessing. +In order to avoid an agitating conversation between mother and son, +my lord and I resolved to be present at the interview. Clément +was already in his travelling-dress, that of a Norman fisherman, which +Monkshaven had, with infinite trouble, discovered in the possession +of one of the emigrés who thronged London, and who had made his +escape from the shores of France in this disguise. Clément’s +plan was, to go down to the coast of Sussex, and get some of the fishing +or smuggling boats to take him across to the French coast near Dieppe. +There again he would have to change his dress. Oh, it was so well +planned! His mother was startled by his disguise (of which we +had not thought to forewarn her) as he entered her apartment. +And either that, or the being suddenly roused from the heavy slumber +into which she was apt to fall when she was left alone, gave her manner +an air of wildness that was almost like insanity.</p> +<p>“‘Go, go!’ she said to him, almost pushing him +away as he knelt to kiss her hand. ‘Virginie is beckoning +to you, but you don’t see what kind of a bed it is—’</p> +<p>“‘Clément, make haste!’ said my lord, in +a hurried manner, as if to interrupt madame. ‘The time is +later than I thought, and you must not miss the morning’s tide. +Bid your mother good-bye at once, and let us be off.’ For +my lord and Monkshaven were to ride with him to an inn near the shore, +from whence he was to walk to his destination. My lord almost +took him by the arm to pull him away; and they were gone, and I was +left alone with Madame de Créquy. When she heard the horses’ +feet, she seemed to find out the truth, as if for the first time. +She set her teeth together. ‘He has left me for her!’ +she almost screamed. ‘Left me for her!’ she kept muttering; +and then, as the wild look came back into her eyes, she said, almost +with exultation, ‘But I did not give him my blessing!’”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER VI.</h2> +<p>“All night Madame de Créquy raved in delirium. +If I could I would have sent for Clément back again. I +did send off one man, but I suppose my directions were confused, or +they were wrong, for he came back after my lord’s return, on the +following afternoon. By this time Madame de Créquy was +quieter: she was, indeed, asleep from exhaustion when Lord Ludlow and +Monkshaven came in. They were in high spirits, and their hopefulness +brought me round to a less dispirited state. All had gone well: +they had accompanied Clément on foot along the shore, until they +had met with a lugger, which my lord had hailed in good nautical language. +The captain had responded to these freemason terms by sending a boat +to pick up his passenger, and by an invitation to breakfast sent through +a speaking-trumpet. Monkshaven did not approve of either the meal +or the company, and had returned to the inn, but my lord had gone with +Clément and breakfasted on board, upon grog, biscuit, fresh-caught +fish—‘the best breakfast he ever ate,’ he said, but +that was probably owing to the appetite his night’s ride had given +him. However, his good fellowship had evidently won the captain’s +heart, and Clément had set sail under the best auspices. +It was agreed that I should tell all this to Madame de Créquy, +if she inquired; otherwise, it would be wiser not to renew her agitation +by alluding to her son’s journey.</p> +<p>“I sat with her constantly for many days; but she never spoke +of Clément. She forced herself to talk of the little occurrences +of Parisian society in former days: she tried to be conversational and +agreeable, and to betray no anxiety or even interest in the object of +Clément’s journey; and, as far as unremitting efforts could +go, she succeeded. But the tones of her voice were sharp and yet +piteous, as if she were in constant pain; and the glance of her eye +hurried and fearful, as if she dared not let it rest on any object.</p> +<p>“In a week we heard of Clément’s safe arrival +on the French coast. He sent a letter to this effect by the captain +of the smuggler, when the latter returned. We hoped to hear again; +but week after week elapsed, and there was no news of Clément. +I had told Lord Ludlow, in Madame de Créquy’s presence, +as he and I had arranged, of the note I had received from her son, informing +us of his landing in France. She heard, but she took no notice, +and evidently began to wonder that we did not mention any further intelligence +of him in the same manner before her; and daily I began to fear that +her pride would give way, and that she would supplicate for news before +I had any to give her.</p> +<p>“One morning, on my awakening, my maid told me that Madame +de Créquy had passed a wretched night, and had bidden Medlicott +(whom, as understanding French, and speaking it pretty well, though +with that horrid German accent, I had put about her) request that I +would go to madame’s room as soon as I was dressed.</p> +<p>“I knew what was coming, and I trembled all the time they were +doing my hair, and otherwise arranging me. I was not encouraged +by my lord’s speeches. He had heard the message, and kept +declaring that he would rather be shot than have to tell her that there +was no news of her son; and yet he said, every now and then, when I +was at the lowest pitch of uneasiness, that he never expected to hear +again: that some day soon we should see him walking in and introducing +Mademoiselle de Créquy to us.</p> +<p>“However at last I was ready, and go I must.</p> +<p>“Her eyes were fixed on the door by which I entered. +I went up to the bedside. She was not rouged,—she had left +it off now for several days,—she no longer attempted to keep up +the vain show of not feeling, and loving, and fearing.</p> +<p>“For a moment or two she did not speak, and I was glad of the +respite.</p> +<p>“‘Clément?’ she said at length, covering +her mouth with a handkerchief the minute she had spoken, that I might +not see it quiver.</p> +<p>“‘There has been no news since the first letter, saying +how well the voyage was performed, and how safely he had landed—near +Dieppe, you know,’ I replied as cheerfully as possible. +‘My lord does not expect that we shall have another letter; he +thinks that we shall see him soon.’</p> +<p>“There was no answer. As I looked, uncertain whether +to do or say more, she slowly turned herself in bed, and lay with her +face to the wall; and, as if that did not shut out the light of day +and the busy, happy world enough, she put out her trembling hands, and +covered her face with her handkerchief. There was no violence: +hardly any sound.</p> +<p>“I told her what my lord had said about Clément’s +coming in some day, and taking us all by surprise. I did not believe +it myself, but it was just possible,—and I had nothing else to +say. Pity, to one who was striving so hard to conceal her feelings, +would have been impertinent. She let me talk; but she did not +reply. She knew that my words were vain and idle, and had no root +in my belief; as well as I did myself.</p> +<p>“I was very thankful when Medlicott came in with Madame’s +breakfast, and gave me an excuse for leaving.</p> +<p>“But I think that conversation made me feel more anxious and +impatient than ever. I felt almost pledged to Madame de Créquy +for the fulfilment of the vision I had held out. She had taken +entirely to her bed by this time: not from illness, but because she +had no hope within her to stir her up to the effort of dressing. +In the same way she hardly cared for food. She had no appetite,—why +eat to prolong a life of despair? But she let Medlicott feed her, +sooner than take the trouble of resisting.</p> +<p>“And so it went on,—for weeks, months—I could hardly +count the time, it seemed so long. Medlicott told me she noticed +a preternatural sensitiveness of ear in Madame de Créquy, induced +by the habit of listening silently for the slightest unusual sound in +the house. Medlicott was always a minute watcher of any one whom +she cared about; and, one day, she made me notice by a sign madame’s +acuteness of hearing, although the quick expectation was but evinced +for a moment in the turn of the eye, the hushed breath—and then, +when the unusual footstep turned into my lord’s apartments, the +soft quivering sigh, and the closed eyelids.</p> +<p>“At length the intendant of the De Créquy estates—the +old man, you will remember, whose information respecting Virginie de +Créquy first gave Clément the desire to return to Paris,—came +to St. James’s Square, and begged to speak to me. I made +haste to go down to him in the housekeeper’s room, sooner than +that he should be ushered into mine, for fear of madame hearing any +sound.</p> +<p>“The old man stood—I see him now—with his hat held +before him in both his hands; he slowly bowed till his face touched +it when I came in. Such long excess of courtesy augured ill. +He waited for me to speak.</p> +<p>“‘Have you any intelligence?’ I inquired. +He had been often to the house before, to ask if we had received any +news; and once or twice I had seen him, but this was the first time +he had begged to see me.</p> +<p>“‘Yes, madame,’ he replied, still standing with +his head bent down, like a child in disgrace.</p> +<p>“‘And it is bad!’ I exclaimed.</p> +<p>“‘It is bad.’ For a moment I was angry at +the cold tone in which my words were echoed; but directly afterwards +I saw the large, slow, heavy tears of age falling down the old man’s +cheeks, and on to the sleeves of his poor, threadbare coat.</p> +<p>“I asked him how he had heard it: it seemed as though I could +not all at once bear to hear what it was. He told me that the +night before, in crossing Long Acre, he had stumbled upon an old acquaintance +of his; one who, like himself had been a dependent upon the De Créquy +family, but had managed their Paris affairs, while Fléchier had +taken charge of their estates in the country. Both were now emigrants, +and living on the proceeds of such small available talents as they possessed. +Fléchier, as I knew, earned a very fair livelihood by going about +to dress salads for dinner parties. His compatriot, Le Fèbvre, +had begun to give a few lessons as a dancing-master. One of them +took the other home to his lodgings; and there, when their most immediate +personal adventures had been hastily talked over, came the inquiry from +Fléchier as to Monsieur de Créquy</p> +<p>“‘Clément was dead—guillotined. Virginie +was dead—guillotined.’</p> +<p>“When Fléchier had told me thus much, he could not speak +for sobbing; and I, myself, could hardly tell how to restrain my tears +sufficiently, until I could go to my own room and be at liberty to give +way. He asked my leave to bring in his friend Le Fèbvre, +who was walking in the square, awaiting a possible summons to tell his +story. I heard afterwards a good many details, which filled up +the account, and made me feel—which brings me back to the point +I started from—how unfit the lower orders are for being trusted +indiscriminately with the dangerous powers of education. I have +made a long preamble, but now I am coming to the moral of my story.”</p> +<p>My lady was trying to shake off the emotion which she evidently felt +in recurring to this sad history of Monsieur de Créquy’s +death. She came behind me, and arranged my pillows, and then, +seeing I had been crying—for, indeed, I was weak-spirited at the +time, and a little served to unloose my tears—she stooped down, +and kissed my forehead, and said “Poor child!” almost as +if she thanked me for feeling that old grief of hers.</p> +<p>“Being once in France, it was no difficult thing for Clément +to get into Paris. The difficulty in those days was to leave, +not to enter. He came in dressed as a Norman peasant, in charge +of a load of fruit and vegetables, with which one of the Seine barges +was freighted. He worked hard with his companions in landing and +arranging their produce on the quays; and then, when they dispersed +to get their breakfasts at some of the estaminets near the old Marché +aux Fleurs, he sauntered up a street which conducted him, by many an +odd turn, through the Quartier Latin to a horrid back alley, leading +out of the Rue l’Ecole de Médécine; some atrocious +place, as I have heard, not far from the shadow of that terrible Abbaye, +where so many of the best blood of France awaited their deaths. +But here some old man lived, on whose fidelity Clément thought +that he might rely. I am not sure if he had not been gardener +in those very gardens behind the Hôtel Créquy where Clément +and Urian used to play together years before. But whatever the +old man’s dwelling might be, Clément was only too glad +to reach it, you may be sure, he had been kept in Normandy, in all sorts +of disguises, for many days after landing in Dieppe, through the difficulty +of entering Paris unsuspected by the many ruffians who were always on +the look-out for aristocrats.</p> +<p>“The old gardener was, I believe, both faithful and tried, +and sheltered Clément in his garret as well as might be. +Before he could stir out, it was necessary to procure a fresh disguise, +and one more in character with an inhabitant of Paris than that of a +Norman carter was procured; and after waiting in-doors for one or two +days, to see if any suspicion was excited, Clément set off to +discover Virginie.</p> +<p>“He found her at the old concièrge’s dwelling. +Madame Babette was the name of this woman, who must have been a less +faithful—or rather, perhaps, I should say, a more interested—friend +to her guest than the old gardener Jaques was to Clément.</p> +<p>“I have seen a miniature of Virginie, which a French lady of +quality happened to have in her possession at the time of her flight +from Paris, and which she brought with her to England unwittingly; for +it belonged to the Count de Créquy, with whom she was slightly +acquainted. I should fancy from it, that Virginie was taller and +of a more powerful figure for a woman than her cousin Clément +was for a man. Her dark-brown hair was arranged in short curls—the +way of dressing the hair announced the politics of the individual, in +those days, just as patches did in my grandmother’s time; and +Virginie’s hair was not to my taste, or according to my principles: +it was too classical. Her large, black eyes looked out at you +steadily. One cannot judge of the shape of a nose from a full-face +miniature, but the nostrils were clearly cut and largely opened. +I do not fancy her nose could have been pretty; but her mouth had a +character all its own, and which would, I think, have redeemed a plainer +face. It was wide, and deep set into the cheeks at the corners; +the upper lip was very much arched, and hardly closed over the teeth; +so that the whole face looked (from the serious, intent look in the +eyes, and the sweet intelligence of the mouth) as if she were listening +eagerly to something to which her answer was quite ready, and would +come out of those red, opening lips as soon as ever you had done speaking, +and you longed to know what she would say.</p> +<p>“Well: this Virginie de Créquy was living with Madame +Babette in the concièrgerie of an old French inn, somewhere to +the north of Paris, so, far enough from Clément’s refuge. +The inn had been frequented by farmers from Brittany and such kind of +people, in the days when that sort of intercourse went on between Paris +and the provinces which had nearly stopped now. Few Bretons came +near it now, and the inn had fallen into the hands of Madame Babette’s +brother, as payment for a bad wine debt of the last proprietor. +He put his sister and her child in, to keep it open, as it were, and +sent all the people he could to occupy the half-furnished rooms of the +house. They paid Babette for their lodging every morning as they +went out to breakfast, and returned or not as they chose, at night. +Every three days, the wine-merchant or his son came to Madame Babette, +and she accounted to them for the money she had received. She +and her child occupied the porter’s office (in which the lad slept +at nights) and a little miserable bed-room which opened out of it, and +received all the light and air that was admitted through the door of +communication, which was half glass. Madame Babette must have +had a kind of attachment for the De Créquys—her De Créquys, +you understand—Virginie’s father, the Count; for, at some +risk to herself, she had warned both him and his daughter of the danger +impending over them. But he, infatuated, would not believe that +his dear Human Race could ever do him harm; and, as long as he did not +fear, Virginie was not afraid. It was by some ruse, the nature +of which I never heard, that Madame Babette induced Virginie to come +to her abode at the very hour in which the Count had been recognized +in the streets, and hurried off to the Lanterne. It was after +Babette had got her there, safe shut up in the little back den, that +she told her what had befallen her father. From that day, Virginie +had never stirred out of the gates, or crossed the threshold of the +porter’s lodge. I do not say that Madame Babette was tired +of her continual presence, or regretted the impulse which made her rush +to the De Créquy’s well-known house—after being compelled +to form one of the mad crowds that saw the Count de Créquy seized +and hung—and hurry his daughter out, through alleys and backways, +until at length she had the orphan safe in her own dark sleeping-room, +and could tell her tale of horror: but Madame Babette was poorly paid +for her porter’s work by her avaricious brother; and it was hard +enough to find food for herself and her growing boy; and, though the +poor girl ate little enough, I dare say, yet there seemed no end to +the burthen that Madame Babette had imposed upon herself: the De Créquys +were plundered, ruined, had become an extinct race, all but a lonely +friendless girl, in broken health and spirits; and, though she lent +no positive encouragement to his suit, yet, at the time, when Clément +reappeared in Paris, Madame Babette was beginning to think that Virginie +might do worse than encourage the attentions of Monsieur Morin Fils, +her nephew, and the wine merchant’s son. Of course, he and +his father had the entrée into the concièrgerie of the +hotel that belonged to them, in right of being both proprietors and +relations. The son, Morin, had seen Virginie in this manner. +He was fully aware that she was far above him in rank, and guessed from +her whole aspect that she had lost her natural protectors by the terrible +guillotine; but he did not know her exact name or station, nor could +he persuade his aunt to tell him. However, he fell head over ears +in love with her, whether she were princess or peasant; and though at +first there was something about her which made his passionate love conceal +itself with shy, awkward reserve, and then made it only appear in the +guise of deep, respectful devotion; yet, by-and-by,—by the same +process of reasoning, I suppose, that his aunt had gone through even +before him—Jean Morin began to let Hope oust Despair from his +heart. Sometimes he thought—perhaps years hence—that +solitary, friendless lady, pent up in squalor, might turn to him as +to a friend and comforter—and then—and then—. +Meanwhile Jean Morin was most attentive to his aunt, whom he had rather +slighted before. He would linger over the accounts; would bring +her little presents; and, above all, he made a pet and favourite of +Pierre, the little cousin, who could tell him about all the ways of +going on of Mam’selle Cannes, as Virginie was called. Pierre +was thoroughly aware of the drift and cause of his cousin’s inquiries; +and was his ardent partisan, as I have heard, even before Jean Morin +had exactly acknowledged his wishes to himself.</p> +<p>“It must have required some patience and much diplomacy, before +Clément de Créquy found out the exact place where his +cousin was hidden. The old gardener took the cause very much to +heart; as, judging from my recollections, I imagine he would have forwarded +any fancy, however wild, of Monsieur Clément’s. (I +will tell you afterwards how I came to know all these particulars so +well.)</p> +<p>“After Clément’s return, on two succeeding days, +from his dangerous search, without meeting with any good result, Jacques +entreated Monsieur de Créquy to let him take it in hand. +He represented that he, as gardener for the space of twenty years and +more at the Hôtel de Créquy, had a right to be acquainted +with all the successive concièrges at the Count’s house; +that he should not go among them as a stranger, but as an old friend, +anxious to renew pleasant intercourse; and that if the Intendant’s +story, which he had told Monsieur de Créquy in England, was true, +that mademoiselle was in hiding at the house of a former concièrge, +why, something relating to her would surely drop out in the course of +conversation. So he persuaded Clément to remain indoors, +while he set off on his round, with no apparent object but to gossip.</p> +<p>“At night he came home,—having seen mademoiselle. +He told Clément much of the story relating to Madame Babette +that I have told to you. Of course, he had heard nothing of the +ambitious hopes of Morin Fils,—hardly of his existence, I should +think. Madame Babette had received him kindly; although, for some +time, she had kept him standing in the carriage gateway outside her +door. But, on his complaining of the draught and his rheumatism, +she had asked him in: first looking round with some anxiety, to see +who was in the room behind her. No one was there when he entered +and sat down. But, in a minute or two, a tall, thin young lady, +with great, sad eyes, and pale cheeks, came from the inner room, and, +seeing him, retired. ‘It is Mademoiselle Cannes,’ +said Madame Babette, rather unnecessarily; for, if he had not been on +the watch for some sign of Mademoiselle de Créquy, he would hardly +have noticed the entrance and withdrawal.</p> +<p>“Clément and the good old gardener were always rather +perplexed by Madame Babette’s evident avoidance of all mention +of the De Créquy family. If she were so much interested +in one member as to be willing to undergo the pains and penalties of +a domiciliary visit, it was strange that she never inquired after the +existence of her charge’s friends and relations from one who might +very probably have heard something of them. They settled that +Madame Babette must believe that the Marquise and Clément were +dead; and admired her for her reticence in never speaking of Virginie. +The truth was, I suspect, that she was so desirous of her nephews success +by this time, that she did not like letting any one into the secret +of Virginie’s whereabouts who might interfere with their plan. +However, it was arranged between Clément and his humble friend, +that the former, dressed in the peasant’s clothes in which he +had entered Paris, but smartened up in one or two particulars, as if, +although a countryman, he had money to spare, should go and engage a +sleeping-room in the old Bréton Inn; where, as I told you, accommodation +for the night was to be had. This was accordingly done, without +exciting Madame Babette’s suspicions, for she was unacquainted +with the Normandy accent, and consequently did not perceive the exaggeration +of it which Monsieur de Créquy adopted in order to disguise his +pure Parisian. But after he had for two nights slept in a queer +dark closet, at the end of one of the numerous short galleries in the +Hôtel Duguesclin, and paid his money for such accommodation each +morning at the little bureau under the window of the concièrgerie, +he found himself no nearer to his object. He stood outside in +the gateway: Madame Babette opened a pane in her window, counted out +the change, gave polite thanks, and shut to the pane with a clack, before +he could ever find out what to say that might be the means of opening +a conversation. Once in the streets, he was in danger from the +bloodthirsty mob, who were ready in those days to hunt to death every +one who looked like a gentleman, as an aristocrat: and Clément, +depend upon it, looked a gentleman, whatever dress he wore. Yet +it was unwise to traverse Paris to his old friend the gardener’s +grénier, so he had to loiter about, where I hardly know. +Only he did leave the Hôtel Duguesclin, and he did not go to old +Jacques, and there was not another house in Paris open to him. +At the end of two days, he had made out Pierre’s existence; and +he began to try to make friends with the lad. Pierre was too sharp +and shrewd not to suspect something from the confused attempts at friendliness. +It was not for nothing that the Norman farmer lounged in the court and +doorway, and brought home presents of galette. Pierre accepted +the galette, reciprocated the civil speeches, but kept his eyes open. +Once, returning home pretty late at night, he surprised the Norman studying +the shadows on the blind, which was drawn down when Madame Babette’s +lamp was lighted. On going in, he found Mademoiselle Cannes with +his mother, sitting by the table, and helping in the family mending.</p> +<p>“Pierre was afraid that the Norman had some view upon the money +which his mother, as concièrge, collected for her brother. +But the money was all safe next evening, when his cousin, Monsieur Morin +Fils, came to collect it. Madame Babette asked her nephew to sit +down, and skilfully barred the passage to the inner door, so that Virginie, +had she been ever so much disposed, could not have retreated. +She sat silently sewing. All at once the little party were startled +by a very sweet tenor voice, just close to the street window, singing +one of the airs out of Beaumarchais’ operas, which, a few years +before, had been popular all over Paris. But after a few moments +of silence, and one or two remarks, the talking went on again. +Pierre, however, noticed an increased air of abstraction in Virginie, +who, I suppose, was recurring to the last time that she had heard the +song, and did not consider, as her cousin had hoped she would have done, +what were the words set to the air, which he imagined she would remember, +and which would have told her so much. For, only a few years before, +Adam’s opera of Richard le Roi had made the story of the minstrel +Blondel and our English Coeur de Lion familiar to all the opera-going +part of the Parisian public, and Clément had bethought him of +establishing a communication with Virginie by some such means.</p> +<p>“The next night, about the same hour, the same voice was singing +outside the window again. Pierre, who had been irritated by the +proceeding the evening before, as it had diverted Virginie’s attention +from his cousin, who had been doing his utmost to make himself agreeable, +rushed out to the door, just as the Norman was ringing the bell to be +admitted for the night. Pierre looked up and down the street; +no one else was to be seen. The next day, the Norman mollified +him somewhat by knocking at the door of the concièrgerie, and +begging Monsieur Pierre’s acceptance of some knee-buckles, which +had taken the country farmer’s fancy the day before, as he had +been gazing into the shops, but which, being too small for his purpose, +he took the liberty of offering to Monsieur Pierre. Pierre, a +French boy, inclined to foppery, was charmed, ravished by the beauty +of the present and with monsieur’s goodness, and he began to adjust +them to his breeches immediately, as well as he could, at least, in +his mother’s absence. The Norman, whom Pierre kept carefully +on the outside of the threshold, stood by, as if amused at the boy’s +eagerness.</p> +<p>“‘Take care,’ said he, clearly and distinctly; +‘take care, my little friend, lest you become a fop; and, in that +case, some day, years hence, when your heart is devoted to some young +lady, she may be inclined to say to you’—here he raised +his voice—‘No, thank you; when I marry, I marry a man, not +a petit-maître; I marry a man, who, whatever his position may +be, will add dignity to the human race by his virtues.’ +Farther than that in his quotation Clément dared not go. +His sentiments (so much above the apparent occasion) met with applause +from Pierre, who liked to contemplate himself in the light of a lover, +even though it should be a rejected one, and who hailed the mention +of the words ‘virtues’ and ‘dignity of the human race’ +as belonging to the cant of a good citizen.</p> +<p>“But Clément was more anxious to know how the invisible +Lady took his speech. There was no sign at the time. But +when he returned at night, he heard a voice, low singing, behind Madame +Babette, as she handed him his candle, the very air he had sung without +effect for two nights past. As if he had caught it up from her +murmuring voice, he sang it loudly and clearly as he crossed the court.</p> +<p>“‘Here is our opera-singer!’ exclaimed Madame Babette. +‘Why, the Norman grazier sings like Boupré,’ naming +a favourite singer at the neighbouring theatre.</p> +<p>“Pierre was struck by the remark, and quietly resolved to look +after the Norman; but again, I believe, it was more because of his mother’s +deposit of money than with any thought of Virginie.</p> +<p>“However, the next morning, to the wonder of both mother and +son, Mademoiselle Cannes proposed, with much hesitation, to go out and +make some little purchase for herself. A month or two ago, this +was what Madame Babette had been never weary of urging. But now +she was as much surprised as if she had expected Virginie to remain +a prisoner in her rooms all the rest of her life. I suppose she +had hoped that her first time of quitting it would be when she left +it for Monsieur Morin’s house as his wife.</p> +<p>“A quick look from Madame Babette towards Pierre was all that +was needed to encourage the boy to follow her. He went out cautiously. +She was at the end of the street. She looked up and down, as if +waiting for some one. No one was there. Back she came, so +swiftly that she nearly caught Pierre before he could retreat through +the porte-cochère. There he looked out again. The +neighbourhood was low and wild, and strange; and some one spoke to Virginie,—nay, +laid his hand upon her arm,—whose dress and aspect (he had emerged +out of a side-street) Pierre did not know; but, after a start, and (Pierre +could fancy) a little scream, Virginie recognised the stranger, and +the two turned up the side street whence the man had come. Pierre +stole swiftly to the corner of this street; no one was there: they had +disappeared up some of the alleys. Pierre returned home to excite +his mother’s infinite surprise. But they had hardly done +talking, when Virginie returned, with a colour and a radiance in her +face, which they had never seen there since her father’s death.”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER VII.</h2> +<p>“I have told you that I heard much of this story from a friend +of the Intendant of the De Créquys, whom he met with in London. +Some years afterwards—the summer before my lord’s death—I +was travelling with him in Devonshire, and we went to see the French +prisoners of war on Dartmoor. We fell into conversation with one +of them, whom I found out to be the very Pierre of whom I had heard +before, as having been involved in the fatal story of Clément +and Virginie, and by him I was told much of their last days, and thus +I learnt how to have some sympathy with all those who were concerned +in those terrible events; yes, even with the younger Morin himself, +on whose behalf Pierre spoke warmly, even after so long a time had elapsed.</p> +<p>“For when the younger Morin called at the porter’s lodge, +on the evening of the day when Virginie had gone out for the first time +after so many months’ confinement to the concièrgerie, +he was struck with the improvement in her appearance. It seems +to have hardly been that he thought her beauty greater: for, in addition +to the fact that she was not beautiful, Morin had arrived at that point +of being enamoured when it does not signify whether the beloved one +is plain or handsome—she has enchanted one pair of eyes, which +henceforward see her through their own medium. But Morin noticed +the faint increase of colour and light in her countenance. It +was as though she had broken through her thick cloud of hopeless sorrow, +and was dawning forth into a happier life. And so, whereas during +her grief, he had revered and respected it even to a point of silent +sympathy, now that she was gladdened, his heart rose on the wings of +strengthened hopes. Even in the dreary monotony of this existence +in his Aunt Babette’s concièrgerie, Time had not failed +in his work, and now, perhaps, soon he might humbly strive to help Time. +The very next day he returned—on some pretence of business—to +the Hôtel Duguesclin, and made his aunt’s room, rather than +his aunt herself, a present of roses and geraniums tied up in a bouquet +with a tricolor ribbon. Virginie was in the room, sitting at the +coarse sewing she liked to do for Madame Babette. He saw her eyes +brighten at the sight of the flowers: she asked his aunt to let her +arrange them; he saw her untie the ribbon, and with a gesture of dislike, +throw it on the ground, and give it a kick with her little foot, and +even in this girlish manner of insulting his dearest prejudices, he +found something to admire.</p> +<p>“As he was coming out, Pierre stopped him. The lad had +been trying to arrest his cousin’s attention by futile grimaces +and signs played off behind Virginie’s back: but Monsieur Morin +saw nothing but Mademoiselle Cannes. However, Pierre was not to +be baffled, and Monsieur Morin found him in waiting just outside the +threshold. With his finger on his lips, Pierre walked on tiptoe +by his companion’s side till they would have been long past sight +or hearing of the concièrgerie, even had the inhabitants devoted +themselves to the purposes of spying or listening.</p> +<p>“‘Chut!’ said Pierre, at last. ‘She +goes out walking.’</p> +<p>“‘Well?’ said Monsieur Morin, half curious, half +annoyed at being disturbed in the delicious reverie of the future into +which he longed to fall.</p> +<p>“‘Well! It is not well. It is bad.’</p> +<p>“‘Why? I do not ask who she is, but I have my ideas. +She is an aristocrat. Do the people about here begin to suspect +her?’</p> +<p>“‘No, no!’ said Pierre. ‘But she goes +out walking. She has gone these two mornings. I have watched +her. She meets a man—she is friends with him, for she talks +to him as eagerly as he does to her—mamma cannot tell who he is.’</p> +<p>“‘Has my aunt seen him?’</p> +<p>“‘No, not so much as a fly’s wing of him. +I myself have only seen his back. It strikes me like a familiar +back, and yet I cannot think who it is. But they separate with +sudden darts, like two birds who have been together to feed their young +ones. One moment they are in close talk, their heads together +chuckotting; the next he has turned up some bye-street, and Mademoiselle +Cannes is close upon me—has almost caught me.’</p> +<p>“‘But she did not see you?’ inquired Monsieur Morin, +in so altered a voice that Pierre gave him one of his quick penetrating +looks. He was struck by the way in which his cousin’s features—always +coarse and common-place—had become contracted and pinched; struck, +too, by the livid look on his sallow complexion. But as if Morin +was conscious of the manner in which his face belied his feelings, he +made an effort, and smiled, and patted Pierre’s head, and thanked +him for his intelligence, and gave him a five-franc piece, and bade +him go on with his observations of Mademoiselle Cannes’ movements, +and report all to him.</p> +<p>“Pierre returned home with a light heart, tossing up his five-franc +piece as he ran. Just as he was at the concièrgerie door, +a great tall man bustled past him, and snatched his money away from +him, looking back with a laugh, which added insult to injury. +Pierre had no redress; no one had witnessed the impudent theft, and +if they had, no one to be seen in the street was strong enough to give +him redress. Besides, Pierre had seen enough of the state of the +streets of Paris at that time to know that friends, not enemies, were +required, and the man had a bad air about him. But all these considerations +did not keep Pierre from bursting out into a fit of crying when he was +once more under his mother’s roof; and Virginie, who was alone +there (Madame Babette having gone out to make her daily purchases), +might have imagined him pommeled to death by the loudness of his sobs.</p> +<p>“‘What is the matter?’ asked she. ‘Speak, +my child. What hast thou done?’</p> +<p>“‘He has robbed me! he has robbed me!’ was all +Pierre could gulp out.</p> +<p>“‘Robbed thee! and of what, my poor boy?’ said +Virginie, stroking his hair gently.</p> +<p>“‘Of my five-franc piece—of a five-franc piece,’ +said Pierre, correcting himself, and leaving out the word my, half fearful +lest Virginie should inquire how he became possessed of such a sum, +and for what services it had been given him. But, of course, no +such idea came into her head, for it would have been impertinent, and +she was gentle-born.</p> +<p>“‘Wait a moment, my lad,’ and going to the one +small drawer in the inner apartment, which held all her few possessions, +she brought back a little ring—a ring just with one ruby in it—which +she had worn in the days when she cared to wear jewels. ‘Take +this,’ said she, ‘and run with it to a jeweller’s. +It is but a poor, valueless thing, but it will bring you in your five +francs, at any rate. Go! I desire you.’</p> +<p>“‘But I cannot,’ said the boy, hesitating; some +dim sense of honour flitting through his misty morals.</p> +<p>“‘Yes, you must!’ she continued, urging him with +her hand to the door. ‘Run! if it brings in more than five +francs, you shall return the surplus to me.’</p> +<p>“Thus tempted by her urgency, and, I suppose, reasoning with +himself to the effect that he might as well have the money, and then +see whether he thought it right to act as a spy upon her or not—the +one action did not pledge him to the other, nor yet did she make any +conditions with her gift—Pierre went off with her ring; and, after +repaying himself his five francs, he was enabled to bring Virginie back +two more, so well had he managed his affairs. But, although the +whole transaction did not leave him bound, in any way, to discover or +forward Virginie’s wishes, it did leave him pledged, according +to his code, to act according to her advantage, and he considered himself +the judge of the best course to be pursued to this end. And, moreover, +this little kindness attached him to her personally. He began +to think how pleasant it would be to have so kind and generous a person +for a relation; how easily his troubles might be borne if he had always +such a ready helper at hand; how much he should like to make her like +him, and come to him for the protection of his masculine power! +First of all his duties, as her self-appointed squire, came the necessity +of finding out who her strange new acquaintance was. Thus, you +see, he arrived at the same end, via supposed duty, that he was previously +pledged to via interest. I fancy a good number of us, when any +line of action will promote our own interest, can make ourselves believe +that reasons exist which compel us to it as a duty.</p> +<p>“In the course of a very few days, Pierre had so circumvented +Virginie as to have discovered that her new friend was no other than +the Norman farmer in a different dress. This was a great piece +of knowledge to impart to Morin. But Pierre was not prepared for +the immediate physical effect it had on his cousin. Morin sat +suddenly down on one of the seats in the Boulevards—it was there +Pierre had met with him accidentally—when he heard who it was +that Virginie met. I do not suppose the man had the faintest idea +of any relationship or even previous acquaintanceship between Clément +and Virginie. If he thought of anything beyond the mere fact presented +to him, that his idol was in communication with another, younger, handsomer +man than himself, it must have been that the Norman farmer had seen +her at the concièrgerie, and had been attracted by her, and, +as was but natural, had tried to make her acquaintance, and had succeeded. +But, from what Pierre told me, I should not think that even this much +thought passed through Morin’s mind. He seems to have been +a man of rare and concentrated attachments; violent, though restrained +and undemonstrative passions; and, above all, a capability of jealousy, +of which his dark oriental complexion must have been a type. I +could fancy that if he had married Virginie, he would have coined his +life-blood for luxuries to make her happy; would have watched over and +petted her, at every sacrifice to himself, as long as she would have +been content to live with him alone. But, as Pierre expressed +it to me: ‘When I saw what my cousin was, when I learned his nature +too late, I perceived that he would have strangled a bird if she whom +he loved was attracted by it from him.’</p> +<p>“When Pierre had told Morin of his discovery, Morin sat down, +as I said, quite suddenly, as if he had been shot. He found out +that the first meeting between the Norman and Virginie was no accidental, +isolated circumstance. Pierre was torturing him with his accounts +of daily rendezvous: if but for a moment, they were seeing each other +every day, sometimes twice a day. And Virginie could speak to +this man, though to himself she was coy and reserved as hardly to utter +a sentence. Pierre caught these broken words while his cousin’s +complexion grew more and more livid, and then purple, as if some great +effect were produced on his circulation by the news he had just heard. +Pierre was so startled by his cousin’s wandering, senseless eyes, +and otherwise disordered looks, that he rushed into a neighbouring cabaret +for a glass of absinthe, which he paid for, as he recollected afterwards, +with a portion of Virginie’s five francs. By-and-by Morin +recovered his natural appearance; but he was gloomy and silent; and +all that Pierre could get out of him was, that the Norman farmer should +not sleep another night at the Hôtel Duguesclin, giving him such +opportunities of passing and repassing by the concièrgerie door. +He was too much absorbed in his own thoughts to repay Pierre the half +franc he had spent on the absinthe, which Pierre perceived, and seems +to have noted down in the ledger of his mind as on Virginie’s +balance of favour.</p> +<p>“Altogether, he was much disappointed at his cousin’s +mode of receiving intelligence, which the lad thought worth another +five-franc piece at least; or, if not paid for in money, to be paid +for in open-mouthed confidence and expression of feeling, that he was, +for a time, so far a partisan of Virginie’s—unconscious +Virginie—against his cousin, as to feel regret when the Norman +returned no more to his night’s lodging, and when Virginie’s +eager watch at the crevice of the closely-drawn blind ended only with +a sigh of disappointment. If it had not been for his mother’s +presence at the time, Pierre thought he should have told her all. +But how far was his mother in his cousin’s confidence as regarded +the dismissal of the Norman?</p> +<p>“In a few days, however, Pierre felt almost sure that they +had established some new means of communication. Virginie went +out for a short time every day; but though Pierre followed her as closely +as he could without exciting her observation, he was unable to discover +what kind of intercourse she held with the Norman. She went, in +general, the same short round among the little shops in the neighbourhood; +not entering any, but stopping at two or three. Pierre afterwards +remembered that she had invariably paused at the nosegays displayed +in a certain window, and studied them long: but, then, she stopped and +looked at caps, hats, fashions, confectionery (all of the humble kind +common in that quarter), so how should he have known that any particular +attraction existed among the flowers? Morin came more regularly +than ever to his aunt’s; but Virginie was apparently unconscious +that she was the attraction. She looked healthier and more hopeful +than she had done for months, and her manners to all were gentler and +not so reserved. Almost as if she wished to manifest her gratitude +to Madame Babette for her long continuance of kindness, the necessity +for which was nearly ended, Virginie showed an unusual alacrity in rendering +the old woman any little service in her power, and evidently tried to +respond to Monsieur Morin’s civilities, he being Madame Babette’s +nephew, with a soft graciousness which must have made one of her principal +charms; for all who knew her speak of the fascination of her manners, +so winning and attentive to others, while yet her opinions, and often +her actions, were of so decided a character. For, as I have said, +her beauty was by no means great; yet every man who came near her seems +to have fallen into the sphere of her influence. Monsieur Morin +was deeper than ever in love with her during these last few days: he +was worked up into a state capable of any sacrifice, either of himself +or others, so that he might obtain her at last. He sat ‘devouring +her with his eyes’ (to use Pierre’s expression) whenever +she could not see him; but, if she looked towards him, he looked to +the ground—anywhere—away from her and almost stammered in +his replies if she addressed any question to him.’</p> +<p>“He had been, I should think, ashamed of his extreme agitation +on the Boulevards, for Pierre thought that he absolutely shunned him +for these few succeeding days. He must have believed that he had +driven the Norman (my poor Clément!) off the field, by banishing +him from his inn; and thought that the intercourse between him and Virginie, +which he had thus interrupted, was of so slight and transient a character +as to be quenched by a little difficulty.</p> +<p>“But he appears to have felt that he had made but little way, +and he awkwardly turned to Pierre for help—not yet confessing +his love, though; he only tried to make friends again with the lad after +their silent estrangement. And Pierre for some time did not choose +to perceive his cousin’s advances. He would reply to all +the roundabout questions Morin put to him respecting household conversations +when he was not present, or household occupations and tone of thought, +without mentioning Virginie’s name any more than his questioner +did. The lad would seem to suppose, that his cousin’s strong +interest in their domestic ways of going on was all on account of Madame +Babette. At last he worked his cousin up to the point of making +him a confidant: and then the boy was half frightened at the torrent +of vehement words he had unloosed. The lava came down with a greater +rush for having been pent up so long. Morin cried out his words +in a hoarse, passionate voice, clenched his teeth, his fingers, and +seemed almost convulsed, as he spoke out his terrible love for Virginie, +which would lead him to kill her sooner than see her another’s; +and if another stepped in between him and her!—and then he smiled +a fierce, triumphant smile, but did not say any more.</p> +<p>“Pierre was, as I said, half-frightened; but also half-admiring. +This was really love—a ‘grande passion,’—a really +fine dramatic thing,—like the plays they acted at the little theatre +yonder. He had a dozen times the sympathy with his cousin now +that he had had before, and readily swore by the infernal gods, for +they were far too enlightened to believe in one God, or Christianity, +or anything of the kind,—that he would devote himself, body and +soul, to forwarding his cousin’s views. Then his cousin +took him to a shop, and bought him a smart second-hand watch, on which +they scratched the word Fidélité, and thus was the compact +sealed. Pierre settled in his own mind, that if he were a woman, +he should like to be beloved as Virginie was, by his cousin, and that +it would be an extremely good thing for her to be the wife of so rich +a citizen as Morin Fils,—and for Pierre himself, too, for doubtless +their gratitude would lead them to give him rings and watches ad infinitum.</p> +<p>“A day or two afterwards, Virginie was taken ill. Madame +Babette said it was because she had persevered in going out in all weathers, +after confining herself to two warm rooms for so long; and very probably +this was really the cause, for, from Pierre’s account, she must +have been suffering from a feverish cold, aggravated, no doubt, by her +impatience at Madame Babette’s familiar prohibitions of any more +walks until she was better. Every day, in spite of her trembling, +aching limbs, she would fain have arranged her dress for her walk at +the usual time; but Madame Babette was fully prepared to put physical +obstacles in her way, if she was not obedient in remaining tranquil +on the little sofa by the side of the fire. The third day, she +called Pierre to her, when his mother was not attending (having, in +fact, locked up Mademoiselle Cannes’ out-of-door things).</p> +<p>“‘See, my child,’ said Virginie. ‘Thou +must do me a great favour. Go to the gardener’s shop in +the Rue des Bons-Enfans, and look at the nosegays in the window. +I long for pinks; they are my favourite flower. Here are two francs. +If thou seest a nosegay of pinks displayed in the window, if it be ever +so faded—nay, if thou seest two or three nosegays of pinks, remember, +buy them all, and bring them to me, I have so great a desire for the +smell.’ She fell back weak and exhausted. Pierre hurried +out. Now was the time; here was the clue to the long inspection +of the nosegay in this very shop.</p> +<p>“Sure enough, there was a drooping nosegay of pinks in the +window. Pierre went in, and, with all his impatience, he made +as good a bargain as he could, urging that the flowers were faded, and +good for nothing. At last he purchased them at a very moderate +price. And now you will learn the bad consequences of teaching +the lower orders anything beyond what is immediately necessary to enable +them to earn their daily bread! The silly Count de Créquy,—he +who had been sent to his bloody rest, by the very canaille of whom he +thought so much,—he who had made Virginie (indirectly, it is true) +reject such a man as her cousin Clément, by inflating her mind +with his bubbles of theories,—this Count de Créquy had +long ago taken a fancy to Pierre, as he saw the bright sharp child playing +about his court—Monsieur de Créquy had even begun to educate +the boy himself to try work out certain opinions of his into practice,—but +the drudgery of the affair wearied him, and, beside, Babette had left +his employment. Still the Count took a kind of interest in his +former pupil; and made some sort of arrangement by which Pierre was +to be taught reading and writing, and accounts, and Heaven knows what +besides,—Latin, I dare say. So Pierre, instead of being +an innocent messenger, as he ought to have been—(as Mr. Horner’s +little lad Gregson ought to have been this morning)—could read +writing as well as either you or I. So what does he do, on obtaining +the nosegay, but examine it well. The stalks of the flowers were +tied up with slips of matting in wet moss. Pierre undid the strings, +unwrapped the moss, and out fell a piece of wet paper, with the writing +all blurred with moisture. It was but a torn piece of writing-paper, +apparently, but Pierre’s wicked mischievous eyes read what was +written on it,—written so as to look like a fragment,—‘Ready, +every and any night at nine. All is prepared. Have no fright. +Trust one who, whatever hopes he might once have had, is content now +to serve you as a faithful cousin;’ and a place was named, which +I forget, but which Pierre did not, as it was evidently the rendezvous. +After the lad had studied every word, till he could say it off by heart, +he placed the paper where he had found it, enveloped it in moss, and +tied the whole up again carefully. Virginie’s face coloured +scarlet as she received it. She kept smelling at it, and trembling: +but she did not untie it, although Pierre suggested how much fresher +it would be if the stalks were immediately put into water. But +once, after his back had been turned for a minute, he saw it untied +when he looked round again, and Virginie was blushing, and hiding something +in her bosom.</p> +<p>“Pierre was now all impatience to set off and find his cousin, +But his mother seemed to want him for small domestic purposes even more +than usual; and he had chafed over a multitude of errands connected +with the Hôtel before he could set off and search for his cousin +at his usual haunts. At last the two met and Pierre related all +the events of the morning to Morin. He said the note off word +by word. (That lad this morning had something of the magpie look +of Pierre—it made me shudder to see him, and hear him repeat the +note by heart.) Then Morin asked him to tell him all over again. +Pierre was struck by Morin’s heavy sighs as he repeated the story. +When he came the second time to the note, Morin tried to write the words +down; but either he was not a good, ready scholar, or his fingers trembled +too much. Pierre hardly remembered, but, at any rate, the lad +had to do it, with his wicked reading and writing. When this was +done, Morin sat heavily silent. Pierre would have preferred the +expected outburst, for this impenetrable gloom perplexed and baffled +him. He had even to speak to his cousin to rouse him; and when +he replied, what he said had so little apparent connection with the +subject which Pierre had expected to find uppermost in his mind, that +he was half afraid that his cousin had lost his wits.</p> +<p>“‘My Aunt Babette is out of coffee.’</p> +<p>“‘I am sure I do not know,’ said Pierre.</p> +<p>“‘Yes, she is. I heard her say so. Tell her +that a friend of mine has just opened a shop in the Rue Saint Antoine, +and that if she will join me there in an hour, I will supply her with +a good stock of coffee, just to give my friend encouragement. +His name is Antoine Meyer, Number One hundred and Fifty at the sign +of the Cap of Liberty.’</p> +<p>“‘I could go with you now. I can carry a few pounds +of coffee better than my mother,’ said Pierre, all in good faith. +He told me he should never forget the look on his cousin’s face, +as he turned round, and bade him begone, and give his mother the message +without another word. It had evidently sent him home promptly +to obey his cousins command. Morin’s message perplexed Madame +Babette.</p> +<p>“‘How could he know I was out of coffee?’ said +she. ‘I am; but I only used the last up this morning. +How could Victor know about it?’</p> +<p>“‘I am sure I can’t tell,’ said Pierre, who +by this time had recovered his usual self-possession. ‘All +I know is, that monsieur is in a pretty temper, and that if you are +not sharp to your time at this Antoine Meyer’s you are likely +to come in for some of his black looks.’</p> +<p>“‘Well, it is very kind of him to offer to give me some +coffee, to be sure! But how could he know I was out?’</p> +<p>“Pierre hurried his mother off impatiently, for he was certain +that the offer of the coffee was only a blind to some hidden purpose +on his cousin’s part; and he made no doubt that when his mother +had been informed of what his cousin’s real intention was, he, +Pierre, could extract it from her by coaxing or bullying. But +he was mistaken. Madame Babette returned home, grave, depressed, +silent, and loaded with the best coffee. Some time afterwards +he learnt why his cousin had sought for this interview. It was +to extract from her, by promises and threats, the real name of Mam’selle +Cannes, which would give him a clue to the true appellation of The Faithful +Cousin. He concealed the second purpose from his aunt, who had +been quite unaware of his jealousy of the Norman farmer, or of his identification +of him with any relation of Virginie’s. But Madame Babette +instinctively shrank from giving him any information: she must have +felt that, in the lowering mood in which she found him, his desire for +greater knowledge of Virginie’s antecedents boded her no good. +And yet he made his aunt his confidante—told her what she had +only suspected before—that he was deeply enamoured of Mam’selle +Cannes, and would gladly marry her. He spoke to Madame Babette +of his father’s hoarded riches; and of the share which he, as +partner, had in them at the present time; and of the prospect of the +succession to the whole, which he had, as only child. He told +his aunt of the provision for her (Madame Babette’s) life, which +he would make on the day when he married Mam’selle Cannes. +And yet—and yet—Babette saw that in his eye and look which +made her more and more reluctant to confide in him. By-and-by +he tried threats. She should leave the concièrgerie, and +find employment where she liked. Still silence. Then he +grew angry, and swore that he would inform against her at the bureau +of the Directory, for harbouring an aristocrat; an aristocrat he knew +Mademoiselle was, whatever her real name might be. His aunt should +have a domiciliary visit, and see how she liked that. The officers +of the Government were the people for finding out secrets. In +vain she reminded him that, by so doing, he would expose to imminent +danger the lady whom he had professed to love. He told her, with +a sullen relapse into silence after his vehement outpouring of passion, +never to trouble herself about that. At last he wearied out the +old woman, and, frightened alike of herself and of him, she told him +all,—that Mam’selle Cannes was Mademoiselle Virginie de +Créquy, daughter of the Count of that name. Who was the +Count? Younger brother of the Marquis. Where was the Marquis? +Dead long ago, leaving a widow and child. A son? (eagerly). +Yes, a son. Where was he? Parbleu! how should she know?—for +her courage returned a little as the talk went away from the only person +of the De Créquy family that she cared about. But, by dint +of some small glasses out of a bottle of Antoine Meyer’s, she +told him more about the De Créquys than she liked afterwards +to remember. For the exhilaration of the brandy lasted but a very +short time, and she came home, as I have said, depressed, with a presentiment +of coming evil. She would not answer Pierre, but cuffed him about +in a manner to which the spoilt boy was quite unaccustomed. His +cousin’s short, angry words, and sudden withdrawal of confidence,—his +mother’s unwonted crossness and fault-finding, all made Virginie’s +kind, gentle treatment, more than ever charming to the lad. He +half resolved to tell her how he had been acting as a spy upon her actions, +and at whose desire he had done it. But he was afraid of Morin, +and of the vengeance which he was sure would fall upon him for any breach +of confidence. Towards half-past eight that evening—Pierre, +watching, saw Virginie arrange several little things—she was in +the inner room, but he sat where he could see her through the glazed +partition. His mother sat—apparently sleeping—in the +great easy-chair; Virginie moved about softly, for fear of disturbing +her. She made up one or two little parcels of the few things she +could call her own: one packet she concealed about herself—the +others she directed, and left on the shelf. ‘She is going,’ +thought Pierre, and (as he said in giving me the account) his heart +gave a spring, to think that he should never see her again. If +either his mother or his cousin had been more kind to him, he might +have endeavoured to intercept her; but as it was, he held his breath, +and when she came out he pretended to read, scarcely knowing whether +he wished her to succeed in the purpose which he was almost sure she +entertained, or not. She stopped by him, and passed her hand over +his hair. He told me that his eyes filled with tears at this caress. +Then she stood for a moment looking at the sleeping Madame Babette, +and stooped down and softly kissed her on the forehead. Pierre +dreaded lest his mother should awake (for by this time the wayward, +vacillating boy must have been quite on Virginie’s side), but +the brandy she had drunk made her slumber heavily. Virginie went. +Pierre’s heart beat fast. He was sure his cousin would try +to intercept her; but how, he could not imagine. He longed to +run out and see the catastrophe,—but he had let the moment slip; +he was also afraid of reawakening his mother to her unusual state of +anger and violence.”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> +<p>“Pierre went on pretending to read, but in reality listening +with acute tension of ear to every little sound. His perceptions +became so sensitive in this respect that he was incapable of measuring +time, every moment had seemed so full of noises, from the beating of +his heart up to the roll of the heavy carts in the distance. He +wondered whether Virginie would have reached the place of rendezvous, +and yet he was unable to compute the passage of minutes. His mother +slept soundly: that was well. By this time Virginie must have +met the ‘faithful cousin:’ if, indeed, Morin had not made +his appearance.</p> +<p>“At length, he felt as if he could no longer sit still, awaiting +the issue, but must run out and see what course events had taken. +In vain his mother, half-rousing herself, called after him to ask whither +he was going: he was already out of hearing before she had ended her +sentence, and he ran on until, stopped by the sight of Mademoiselle +Cannes walking along at so swift a pace that it was almost a run; while +at her side, resolutely keeping by her, Morin was striding abreast. +Pierre had just turned the corner of the street, when he came upon them. +Virginie would have passed him without recognizing him, she was in such +passionate agitation, but for Morin’s gesture, by which he would +fain have kept Pierre from interrupting them. Then, when Virginie +saw the lad, she caught at his arm, and thanked God, as if in that boy +of twelve or fourteen she held a protector. Pierre felt her tremble +from head to foot, and was afraid lest she would fall, there where she +stood, in the hard rough street.</p> +<p>“‘Begone, Pierre!’ said Morin.</p> +<p>“‘I cannot,’ replied Pierre, who indeed was held +firmly by Virginie. ‘Besides, I won’t,’ he added. +‘Who has been frightening mademoiselle in this way?’ asked +he, very much inclined to brave his cousin at all hazards.</p> +<p>“‘Mademoiselle is not accustomed to walk in the streets +alone,’ said Morin, sulkily. ‘She came upon a crowd +attracted by the arrest of an aristocrat, and their cries alarmed her. +I offered to take charge of her home. Mademoiselle should not +walk in these streets alone. We are not like the cold-blooded +people of the Faubourg Saint Germain.’</p> +<p>“Virginie did not speak. Pierre doubted if she heard +a word of what they were saying. She leant upon him more and more +heavily.</p> +<p>“‘Will mademoiselle condescend to take my arm?’ +said Morin, with sulky, and yet humble, uncouthness. I dare say +he would have given worlds if he might have had that little hand within +his arm; but, though she still kept silence, she shuddered up away from +him, as you shrink from touching a toad. He had said something +to her during that walk, you may be sure, which had made her loathe +him. He marked and understood the gesture. He held himself +aloof while Pierre gave her all the assistance he could in their slow +progress homewards. But Morin accompanied her all the same. +He had played too desperate a game to be baulked now. He had given +information against the ci-devant Marquis de Créquy, as a returned +emigré, to be met with at such a time, in such a place. +Morin had hoped that all sign of the arrest would have been cleared +away before Virginie reached the spot—so swiftly were terrible +deeds done in those days. But Clément defended himself +desperately: Virginie was punctual to a second; and, though the wounded +man was borne off to the Abbaye, amid a crowd of the unsympathising +jeerers who mingled with the armed officials of the Directory, Morin +feared lest Virginie had recognized him; and he would have preferred +that she should have thought that the ‘faithful cousin’ +was faithless, than that she should have seen him in bloody danger on +her account. I suppose he fancied that, if Virginie never saw +or heard more of him, her imagination would not dwell on his simple +disappearance, as it would do if she knew what he was suffering for +her sake.</p> +<p>“At any rate, Pierre saw that his cousin was deeply mortified +by the whole tenor of his behaviour during their walk home. When +they arrived at Madame Babette’s, Virginie fell fainting on the +floor; her strength had but just sufficed for this exertion of reaching +the shelter of the house. Her first sign of restoring consciousness +consisted in avoidance of Morin. He had been most assiduous in +his efforts to bring her round; quite tender in his way, Pierre said; +and this marked, instinctive repugnance to him evidently gave him extreme +pain. I suppose Frenchmen are more demonstrative than we are; +for Pierre declared that he saw his cousin’s eyes fill with tears, +as she shrank away from his touch, if he tried to arrange the shawl +they had laid under her head like a pillow, or as she shut her eyes +when he passed before her. Madame Babette was urgent with her +to go and lie down on the bed in the inner room; but it was some time +before she was strong enough to rise and do this.</p> +<p>“When Madame Babette returned from arranging the girl comfortably, +the three relations sat down in silence; a silence which Pierre thought +would never be broken. He wanted his mother to ask his cousin +what had happened. But Madame Babette was afraid of her nephew, +and thought it more discreet to wait for such crumbs of intelligence +as he might think fit to throw to her. But, after she had twice +reported Virginie to be asleep, without a word being uttered in reply +to her whispers by either of her companions, Morin’s powers of +self-containment gave way.</p> +<p>“‘It is hard!’ he said.</p> +<p>“‘What is hard?’ asked Madame Babette, after she +had paused for a time, to enable him to add to, or to finish, his sentence, +if he pleased.</p> +<p>“‘It is hard for a man to love a woman as I do,’ +he went on—‘I did not seek to love her, it came upon me +before I was aware—before I had ever thought about it at all, +I loved her better than all the world beside. All my life, before +I knew her, seems a dull blank. I neither know nor care for what +I did before then. And now there are just two lives before me. +Either I have her, or I have not. That is all: but that is everything. +And what can I do to make her have me? Tell me, aunt,’ and +he caught at Madame Babette’s arm, and gave it so sharp a shake, +that she half screamed out, Pierre said, and evidently grew alarmed +at her nephew’s excitement.</p> +<p>“‘Hush, Victor!’ said she. ‘There are +other women in the world, if this one will not have you.’</p> +<p>“‘None other for me,’ he said, sinking back as +if hopeless. ‘I am plain and coarse, not one of the scented +darlings of the aristocrats. Say that I am ugly, brutish; I did +not make myself so, any more than I made myself love her. It is +my fate. But am I to submit to the consequences of my fate without +a struggle? Not I. As strong as my love is, so strong is +my will. It can be no stronger,’ continued he, gloomily. +‘Aunt Babette, you must help me—you must make her love me.’ +He was so fierce here, that Pierre said he did not wonder that his mother +was frightened.</p> +<p>“‘I, Victor!’ she exclaimed. ‘I make +her love you? How can I? Ask me to speak for you to Mademoiselle +Didot, or to Mademoiselle Cauchois even, or to such as they, and I’ll +do it, and welcome. But to Mademoiselle de Créquy, why +you don’t know the difference! Those people—the old +nobility I mean—why they don’t know a man from a dog, out +of their own rank! And no wonder, for the young gentlemen of quality +are treated differently to us from their very birth. If she had +you to-morrow, you would be miserable. Let me alone for knowing +the aristocracy. I have not been a concièrge to a duke +and three counts for nothing. I tell you, all your ways are different +to her ways.’</p> +<p>“‘I would change my “ways,” as you call them.’</p> +<p>“‘Be reasonable, Victor.’</p> +<p>“‘No, I will not be reasonable, if by that you mean giving +her up. I tell you two lives are before me; one with her, one +without her. But the latter will be but a short career for both +of us. You said, aunt, that the talk went in the concièrgerie +of her father’s hotel, that she would have nothing to do with +this cousin whom I put out of the way to-day?’</p> +<p>“‘So the servants said. How could I know? +All I know is, that he left off coming to our hotel, and that at one +time before then he had never been two days absent.’</p> +<p>“‘So much the better for him. He suffers now for +having come between me and my object—in trying to snatch her away +out of my sight. Take you warning, Pierre! I did not like +your meddling to-night.’ And so he went off, leaving Madam +Babette rocking herself backwards and forwards, in all the depression +of spirits consequent upon the reaction after the brandy, and upon her +knowledge of her nephew’s threatened purpose combined.</p> +<p>“In telling you most of this, I have simply repeated Pierre’s +account, which I wrote down at the time. But here what he had +to say came to a sudden break; for, the next morning, when Madame Babette +rose, Virginie was missing, and it was some time before either she, +or Pierre, or Morin, could get the slightest clue to the missing girl.</p> +<p>“And now I must take up the story as it was told to the Intendant +Fléchier by the old gardener Jacques, with whom Clément +had been lodging on his first arrival in Paris. The old man could +not, I dare say, remember half as much of what had happened as Pierre +did; the former had the dulled memory of age, while Pierre had evidently +thought over the whole series of events as a story—as a play, +if one may call it so—during the solitary hours in his after-life, +wherever they were passed, whether in lonely camp watches, or in the +foreign prison, where he had to drag out many years. Clément +had, as I said, returned to the gardener’s garret after he had +been dismissed from the Hôtel Duguesclin. There were several +reasons for his thus doubling back. One was, that he put nearly +the whole breadth of Paris between him and an enemy; though why Morin +was an enemy, and to what extent he carried his dislike or hatred, Clément +could not tell, of course. The next reason for returning to Jacques +was, no doubt, the conviction that, in multiplying his residences, he +multiplied the chances against his being suspected and recognized. +And then, again, the old man was in his secret, and his ally, although +perhaps but a feeble kind of one. It was through Jacques that +the plan of communication, by means of a nosegay of pinks, had been +devised; and it was Jacques who procured him the last disguise that +Clément was to use in Paris—as he hoped and trusted. +It was that of a respectable shopkeeper of no particular class; a dress +that would have seemed perfectly suitable to the young man who would +naturally have worn it; and yet, as Clément put it on, and adjusted +it—giving it a sort of finish and elegance which I always noticed +about his appearance and which I believed was innate in the wearer—I +have no doubt it seemed like the usual apparel of a gentleman. +No coarseness of texture, nor clumsiness of cut could disguise the nobleman +of thirty descents, it appeared; for immediately on arriving at the +place of rendezvous, he was recognized by the men placed there on Morin’s +information to seize him. Jacques, following at a little distance, +with a bundle under his arm containing articles of feminine disguise +for Virginie, saw four men attempt Clément’s arrest—saw +him, quick as lightning, draw a sword hitherto concealed in a clumsy +stick—saw his agile figure spring to his guard,—and saw +him defend himself with the rapidity and art of a man skilled in arms. +But what good did it do? as Jacques piteously used to ask, Monsieur +Fléchier told me. A great blow from a heavy club on the +sword-arm of Monsieur de Créquy laid it helpless and immovable +by his side. Jacques always thought that that blow came from one +of the spectators, who by this time had collected round the scene of +the affray. The next instant, his master—his little marquis—was +down among the feet of the crowd, and though he was up again before +he had received much damage—so active and light was my poor Clément—it +was not before the old gardener had hobbled forwards, and, with many +an old-fashioned oath and curse, proclaimed himself a partisan of the +losing side—a follower of a ci-devant aristocrat. It was +quite enough. He received one or two good blows, which were, in +fact, aimed at his master; and then, almost before he was aware, he +found his arms pinioned behind him with a woman’s garter, which +one of the viragos in the crowd had made no scruple of pulling off in +public, as soon as she heard for what purpose it was wanted. Poor +Jacques was stunned and unhappy,—his master was out of sight, +on before; and the old gardener scarce knew whither they were taking +him. His head ached from the blows which had fallen upon it; it +was growing dark—June day though it was,—and when first +he seems to have become exactly aware of what had happened to him, it +was when he was turned into one of the larger rooms of the Abbaye, in +which all were put who had no other allotted place wherein to sleep. +One or two iron lamps hung from the ceiling by chains, giving a dim +light for a little circle. Jacques stumbled forwards over a sleeping +body lying on the ground. The sleeper wakened up enough to complain; +and the apology of the old man in reply caught the ear of his master, +who, until this time, could hardly have been aware of the straits and +difficulties of his faithful Jacques. And there they sat,—against +a pillar, the live-long night, holding one another’s hands, and +each restraining expressions of pain, for fear of adding to the other’s +distress. That night made them intimate friends, in spite of the +difference of age and rank. The disappointed hopes, the acute +suffering of the present, the apprehensions of the future, made them +seek solace in talking of the past. Monsieur de Créquy +and the gardener found themselves disputing with interest in which chimney +of the stack the starling used to build,—the starling whose nest +Clément sent to Urian, you remember, and discussing the merits +of different espalier-pears which grew, and may grow still, in the old +garden of the Hôtel de Créquy. Towards morning both +fell asleep. The old man wakened first. His frame was deadened +to suffering, I suppose, for he felt relieved of his pain; but Clément +moaned and cried in feverish slumber. His broken arm was beginning +to inflame his blood. He was, besides, much injured by some kicks +from the crowd as he fell. As the old man looked sadly on the +white, baked lips, and the flushed cheeks, contorted with suffering +even in his sleep, Clément gave a sharp cry which disturbed his +miserable neighbours, all slumbering around in uneasy attitudes. +They bade him with curses be silent; and then turning round, tried again +to forget their own misery in sleep. For you see, the bloodthirsty +canaille had not been sated with guillotining and hanging all the nobility +they could find, but were now informing, right and left, even against +each other; and when Clément and Jacques were in the prison, +there were few of gentle blood in the place, and fewer still of gentle +manners. At the sound of the angry words and threats, Jacques +thought it best to awaken his master from his feverish uncomfortable +sleep, lest he should provoke more enmity; and, tenderly lifting him +up, he tried to adjust his own body, so that it should serve as a rest +and a pillow for the younger man. The motion aroused Clément, +and he began to talk in a strange, feverish way, of Virginie, too,—whose +name he would not have breathed in such a place had he been quite himself. +But Jacques had as much delicacy of feeling as any lady in the land, +although, mind you, he knew neither how to read nor write,—and +bent his head low down, so that his master might tell him in a whisper +what messages he was to take to Mademoiselle de Créquy, in case—Poor +Clément, he knew it must come to that! No escape for him +now, in Norman disguise or otherwise! Either by gathering fever +or guillotine, death was sure of his prey. Well! when that happened, +Jacques was to go and find Mademoiselle de Créquy, and tell her +that her cousin loved her at the last as he had loved her at the first; +but that she should never have heard another word of his attachment +from his living lips; that he knew he was not good enough for her, his +queen; and that no thought of earning her love by his devotion had prompted +his return to France, only that, if possible, he might have the great +privilege of serving her whom he loved. And then he went off into +rambling talk about petit-maîtres, and such kind of expressions, +said Jacques to Fléchier, the intendant, little knowing what +a clue that one word gave to much of the poor lad’s suffering.</p> +<p>“The summer morning came slowly on in that dark prison, and +when Jacques could look round—his master was now sleeping on his +shoulder, still the uneasy, starting sleep of fever—he saw that +there were many women among the prisoners. (I have heard some +of those who have escaped from the prisons say, that the look of despair +and agony that came into the faces of the prisoners on first wakening, +as the sense of their situation grew upon them, was what lasted the +longest in the memory of the survivors. This look, they said, +passed away from the women’s faces sooner than it did from those +of the men.)</p> +<p>“Poor old Jacques kept falling asleep, and plucking himself +up again for fear lest, if he did not attend to his master, some harm +might come to the swollen, helpless arm. Yet his weariness grew +upon him in spite of all his efforts, and at last he felt as if he must +give way to the irresistible desire, if only for five minutes. +But just then there was a bustle at the door. Jacques opened his +eyes wide to look.</p> +<p>“‘The gaoler is early with breakfast,’ said some +one, lazily.</p> +<p>“‘It is the darkness of this accursed place that makes +us think it early,’ said another.</p> +<p>“All this time a parley was going on at the door. Some +one came in; not the gaoler—a woman. The door was shut to +and locked behind her. She only advanced a step or two, for it +was too sudden a change, out of the light into that dark shadow, for +any one to see clearly for the first few minutes. Jacques had +his eyes fairly open now, and was wide awake. It was Mademoiselle +de Créquy, looking bright, clear, and resolute. The faithful +heart of the old man read that look like an open page. Her cousin +should not die there on her behalf, without at least the comfort of +her sweet presence.</p> +<p>“‘Here he is,’ he whispered as her gown would have +touched him in passing, without her perceiving him, in the heavy obscurity +of the place.</p> +<p>“‘The good God bless you, my friend!’ she murmured, +as she saw the attitude of the old man, propped against a pillar, and +holding Clément in his arms, as if the young man had been a helpless +baby, while one of the poor gardener’s hands supported the broken +limb in the easiest position. Virginie sat down by the old man, +and held out her arms. Softly she moved Clément’s +head to her own shoulder; softly she transferred the task of holding +the arm to herself. Clément lay on the floor, but she supported +him, and Jacques was at liberty to arise and stretch and shake his stiff, +weary old body. He then sat down at a little distance, and watched +the pair until he fell asleep. Clément had muttered ‘Virginie,’ +as they half-roused him by their movements out of his stupor; but Jacques +thought he was only dreaming; nor did he seem fully awake when once +his eyes opened, and he looked full at Virginie’s face bending +over him, and growing crimson under his gaze, though she never stirred, +for fear of hurting him if she moved. Clément looked in +silence, until his heavy eyelids came slowly down, and he fell into +his oppressive slumber again. Either he did not recognize her, +or she came in too completely as a part of his sleeping visions for +him to be disturbed by her appearance there.</p> +<p>“When Jacques awoke it was full daylight—at least as +full as it would ever be in that place. His breakfast—the +gaol-allowance of bread and vin ordinaire—was by his side. +He must have slept soundly. He looked for his master. He +and Virginie had recognized each other now,—hearts, as well as +appearance. They were smiling into each other’s faces, as +if that dull, vaulted room in the grim Abbaye were the sunny gardens +of Versailles, with music and festivity all abroad. Apparently +they had much to say to each other; for whispered questions and answers +never ceased.</p> +<p>“Virginie had made a sling for the poor broken arm; nay, she +had obtained two splinters of wood in some way, and one of their fellow-prisoners—having, +it appeared, some knowledge of surgery—had set it. Jacques +felt more desponding by far than they did, for he was suffering from +the night he had passed, which told upon his aged frame; while they +must have heard some good news, as it seemed to him, so bright and happy +did they look. Yet Clément was still in bodily pain and +suffering, and Virginie, by her own act and deed, was a prisoner in +that dreadful Abbaye, whence the only issue was the guillotine. +But they were together: they loved: they understood each other at length.</p> +<p>“When Virginie saw that Jacques was awake, and languidly munching +his breakfast, she rose from the wooden stool on which she was sitting, +and went to him, holding out both hands, and refusing to allow him to +rise, while she thanked him with pretty eagerness for all his kindness +to Monsieur. Monsieur himself came towards him, following Virginie, +but with tottering steps, as if his head was weak and dizzy, to thank +the poor old man, who now on his feet, stood between them, ready to +cry while they gave him credit for faithful actions which he felt to +have been almost involuntary on his part,—for loyalty was like +an instinct in the good old days, before your educational cant had come +up. And so two days went on. The only event was the morning +call for the victims, a certain number of whom were summoned to trial +every day. And to be tried was to be condemned. Every one +of the prisoners became grave, as the hour for their summons approached. +Most of the victims went to their doom with uncomplaining resignation, +and for a while after their departure there was comparative silence +in the prison. But, by-and-by—so said Jacques—the +conversation or amusements began again. Human nature cannot stand +the perpetual pressure of such keen anxiety, without an effort to relieve +itself by thinking of something else. Jacques said that Monsieur +and Mademoiselle were for ever talking together of the past days,—it +was ‘Do you remember this?’ or, ‘Do you remember that?’ +perpetually. He sometimes thought they forgot where they were, +and what was before them. But Jacques did not, and every day he +trembled more and more as the list was called over.</p> +<p>“The third morning of their incarceration, the gaoler brought +in a man whom Jacques did not recognize, and therefore did not at once +observe; for he was waiting, as in duty bound, upon his master and his +sweet young lady (as he always called her in repeating the story). +He thought that the new introduction was some friend of the gaoler, +as the two seemed well acquainted, and the latter stayed a few minutes +talking with his visitor before leaving him in prison. So Jacques +was surprised when, after a short time had elapsed, he looked round, +and saw the fierce stare with which the stranger was regarding Monsieur +and Mademoiselle de Créquy, as the pair sat at breakfast,—the +said breakfast being laid as well as Jacques knew how, on a bench fastened +into the prison wall,—Virginie sitting on her low stool, and Clément +half lying on the ground by her side, and submitting gladly to be fed +by her pretty white fingers; for it was one of her fancies, Jacques +said, to do all she could for him, in consideration of his broken arm. +And, indeed, Clément was wasting away daily; for he had received +other injuries, internal and more serious than that to his arm, during +the mêlée which had ended in his capture. The stranger +made Jacques conscious of his presence by a sigh, which was almost a +groan. All three prisoners looked round at the sound. Clément’s +face expressed little but scornful indifference; but Virginie’s +face froze into stony hate. Jacques said he never saw such a look, +and hoped that he never should again. Yet after that first revelation +of feeling, her look was steady and fixed in another direction to that +in which the stranger stood,—still motionless—still watching. +He came a step nearer at last.</p> +<p>“‘Mademoiselle,’ he said. Not the quivering +of an eyelash showed that she heard him. ‘Mademoiselle!’ +he said again, with an intensity of beseeching that made Jacques—not +knowing who he was—almost pity him, when he saw his young lady’s +obdurate face.</p> +<p>“There was perfect silence for a space of time which Jacques +could not measure. Then again the voice, hesitatingly, saying, +‘Monsieur!’ Clément could not hold the same +icy countenance as Virginie; he turned his head with an impatient gesture +of disgust; but even that emboldened the man.</p> +<p>“‘Monsieur, do ask mademoiselle to listen to me,—just +two words.’</p> +<p>“‘Mademoiselle de Créquy only listens to whom +she chooses.’ Very haughtily my Clément would say +that, I am sure.</p> +<p>“‘But, mademoiselle,’—lowering his voice, +and coming a step or two nearer. Virginie must have felt his approach, +though she did not see it; for she drew herself a little on one side, +so as to put as much space as possible between him and her.—‘Mademoiselle, +it is not too late. I can save you: but to-morrow your name is +down on the list. I can save you, if you will listen.’</p> +<p>“Still no word or sign. Jacques did not understand the +affair. Why was she so obdurate to one who might be ready to include +Clément in the proposal, as far as Jacques knew?</p> +<p>“The man withdrew a little, but did not offer to leave the +prison. He never took his eyes off Virginie; he seemed to be suffering +from some acute and terrible pain as he watched her.</p> +<p>“Jacques cleared away the breakfast-things as well as he could. +Purposely, as I suspect, he passed near the man.</p> +<p>“‘Hist!’ said the stranger. ‘You are +Jacques, the gardener, arrested for assisting an aristocrat. I +know the gaoler. You shall escape, if you will. Only take +this message from me to mademoiselle. You heard. She will +not listen to me: I did not want her to come here. I never knew +she was here, and she will die to-morrow. They will put her beautiful +round throat under the guillotine. Tell her, good old man, tell +her how sweet life is; and how I can save her; and how I will not ask +for more than just to see her from time to time. She is so young; +and death is annihilation, you know. Why does she hate me so? +I want to save her; I have done her no harm. Good old man, tell +her how terrible death is; and that she will die to-morrow, unless she +listens to me.’</p> +<p>“Jacques saw no harm in repeating this message. Clément +listened in silence, watching Virginie with an air of infinite tenderness.</p> +<p>“‘Will you not try him, my cherished one?’ he said. +‘Towards you he may mean well’ (which makes me think that +Virginie had never repeated to Clément the conversation which +she had overheard that last night at Madame Babette’s); ‘you +would be in no worse a situation than you were before!’</p> +<p>“‘No worse, Clément! and I should have known what +you were, and have lost you. My Clément!’ said she, +reproachfully.</p> +<p>“‘Ask him,’ said she, turning to Jacques, suddenly, +‘if he can save Monsieur de Créquy as well,—if he +can?—O Clément, we might escape to England; we are but +young.’ And she hid her face on his shoulder.</p> +<p>“Jacques returned to the stranger, and asked him Virginie’s +question. His eyes were fixed on the cousins; he was very pale, +and the twitchings or contortions, which must have been involuntary +whenever he was agitated, convulsed his whole body.</p> +<p>“He made a long pause. ‘I will save mademoiselle +and monsieur, if she will go straight from prison to the mairie, and +be my wife.’</p> +<p>“‘Your wife!’ Jacques could not help exclaiming, +‘That she will never be—never!’</p> +<p>“‘Ask her!’ said Morin, hoarsely.</p> +<p>“But almost before Jacques thought he could have fairly uttered +the words, Clément caught their meaning.</p> +<p>“‘Begone!’ said he; ‘not one word more.’ +Virginie touched the old man as he was moving away. ‘Tell +him he does not know how he makes me welcome death.’ And +smiling, as if triumphant, she turned again to Clément.</p> +<p>“The stranger did not speak as Jacques gave him the meaning, +not the words, of their replies. He was going away, but stopped. +A minute or two afterwards, he beckoned to Jacques. The old gardener +seems to have thought it undesirable to throw away even the chance of +assistance from such a man as this, for he went forward to speak to +him.</p> +<p>“‘Listen! I have influence with the gaoler. +He shall let thee pass out with the victims to-morrow. No one +will notice it, or miss thee—. They will be led to trial,—even +at the last moment, I will save her, if she sends me word she relents. +Speak to her, as the time draws on. Life is very sweet,—tell +her how sweet. Speak to him; he will do more with her than thou +canst. Let him urge her to live. Even at the last, I will +be at the Palais de Justice,—at the Grève. I have +followers,—I have interest. Come among the crowd that follow +the victims,—I shall see thee. It will be no worse for him, +if she escapes’—</p> +<p>“‘Save my master, and I will do all,’ said Jacques.</p> +<p>“‘Only on my one condition,’ said Morin, doggedly; +and Jacques was hopeless of that condition ever being fulfilled. +But he did not see why his own life might not be saved. By remaining +in prison until the next day, he should have rendered every service +in his power to his master and the young lady. He, poor fellow, +shrank from death; and he agreed with Morin to escape, if he could, +by the means Morin had suggested, and to bring him word if Mademoiselle +de Créquy relented. (Jacques had no expectation that she +would; but I fancy he did not think it necessary to tell Morin of this +conviction of his.) This bargaining with so base a man for so +slight a thing as life, was the only flaw that I heard of in the old +gardener’s behaviour. Of course, the mere reopening of the +subject was enough to stir Virginie to displeasure. Clément +urged her, it is true; but the light he had gained upon Morin’s +motions, made him rather try to set the case before her in as fair a +manner as possible than use any persuasive arguments. And, even +as it was, what he said on the subject made Virginie shed tears—the +first that had fallen from her since she entered the prison. So, +they were summoned and went together, at the fatal call of the muster-roll +of victims the next morning. He, feeble from his wounds and his +injured health; she, calm and serene, only petitioning to be allowed +to walk next to him, in order that she might hold him up when he turned +faint and giddy from his extreme suffering.</p> +<p>“Together they stood at the bar; together they were condemned. +As the words of judgment were pronounced, Virginie tuned to Clément, +and embraced him with passionate fondness. Then, making him lean +on her, they marched out towards the Place de la Grève.</p> +<p>“Jacques was free now. He had told Morin how fruitless +his efforts at persuasion had been; and scarcely caring to note the +effect of his information upon the man, he had devoted himself to watching +Monsieur and Mademoiselle de Créquy. And now he followed +them to the Place de la Grève. He saw them mount the platform; +saw them kneel down together till plucked up by the impatient officials; +could see that she was urging some request to the executioner; the end +of which seemed to be, that Clément advanced first to the guillotine, +was executed (and just at this moment there was a stir among the crowd, +as of a man pressing forward towards the scaffold). Then she, +standing with her face to the guillotine, slowly made the sign of the +cross, and knelt down.</p> +<p>“Jacques covered his eyes, blinded with tears. The report +of a pistol made him look up. She was gone—another victim +in her place—and where there had been a little stir in the crowd +not five minutes before, some men were carrying off a dead body. +A man had shot himself, they said. Pierre told me who that man +was.”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER IX.</h2> +<p>After a pause, I ventured to ask what became of Madame de Créquy, +Clément’s mother.</p> +<p>“She never made any inquiry about him,” said my lady. +“She must have known that he was dead; though how, we never could +tell. Medlicott remembered afterwards that it was about, if not +on—Medlicott to this day declares that it was on the very Monday, +June the nineteenth, when her son was executed, that Madame de Créquy +left off her rouge and took to her bed, as one bereaved and hopeless. +It certainly was about that time; and Medlicott—who was deeply +impressed by that dream of Madame de Créquy’s (the relation +of which I told you had had such an effect on my lord), in which she +had seen the figure of Virginie—as the only light object amid +much surrounding darkness as of night, smiling and beckoning Clément +on—on—till at length the bright phantom stopped, motionless, +and Madame de Créquy’s eyes began to penetrate the murky +darkness, and to see closing around her the gloomy dripping walls which +she had once seen and never forgotten—the walls of the vault of +the chapel of the De Créquys in Saint Germain l’Auxerrois; +and there the two last of the Créquys laid them down among their +forefathers, and Madame de Créquy had wakened to the sound of +the great door, which led to the open air, being locked upon her—I +say Medlicott, who was predisposed by this dream to look out for the +supernatural, always declared that Madame de Créquy was made +conscious in some mysterious way, of her son’s death, on the very +day and hour when it occurred, and that after that she had no more anxiety, +but was only conscious of a kind of stupefying despair.”</p> +<p>“And what became of her, my lady?” I again asked.</p> +<p>“What could become of her?” replied Lady Ludlow. +“She never could be induced to rise again, though she lived more +than a year after her son’s departure. She kept her bed; +her room darkened, her face turned towards the wall, whenever any one +besides Medlicott was in the room. She hardly ever spoke, and +would have died of starvation but for Medlicott’s tender care, +in putting a morsel to her lips every now and then, feeding her, in +fact, just as an old bird feeds her young ones. In the height +of summer my lord and I left London. We would fain have taken +her with us into Scotland, but the doctor (we had the old doctor from +Leicester Square) forbade her removal; and this time he gave such good +reasons against it that I acquiesced. Medlicott and a maid were +left with her. Every care was taken of her. She survived +till our return. Indeed, I thought she was in much the same state +as I had left her in, when I came back to London. But Medlicott +spoke of her as much weaker; and one morning on awakening, they told +me she was dead. I sent for Medlicott, who was in sad distress, +she had become so fond of her charge. She said that, about two +o’clock, she had been awakened by unusual restlessness on Madame +de Créquy’s part; that she had gone to her bedside, and +found the poor lady feebly but perpetually moving her wasted arm up +and down—and saying to herself in a wailing voice: ‘I did +not bless him when he left me—I did not bless him when he left +me!’ Medlicott gave her a spoonful or two of jelly, and +sat by her, stroking her hand, and soothing her till she seemed to fall +asleep. But in the morning she was dead.”</p> +<p>“It is a sad story, your ladyship,” said I, after a while.</p> +<p>“Yes it is. People seldom arrive at my age without having +watched the beginning, middle, and end of many lives and many fortunes. +We do not talk about them, perhaps; for they are often so sacred to +us, from having touched into the very quick of our own hearts, as it +were, or into those of others who are dead and gone, and veiled over +from human sight, that we cannot tell the tale as if it was a mere story. +But young people should remember that we have had this solemn experience +of life, on which to base our opinions and form our judgments, so that +they are not mere untried theories. I am not alluding to Mr. Horner +just now, for he is nearly as old as I am—within ten years, I +dare say—but I am thinking of Mr. Gray, with his endless plans +for some new thing—schools, education, Sabbaths, and what not. +Now he has not seen what all this leads to.”</p> +<p>“It is a pity he has not heard your ladyship tell the story +of poor Monsieur de Créquy.”</p> +<p>“Not at all a pity, my dear. A young man like him, who, +both by position and age, must have had his experience confined to a +very narrow circle, ought not to set up his opinion against mine; he +ought not to require reasons from me, nor to need such explanation of +my arguments (if I condescend to argue), as going into relation of the +circumstances on which my arguments are based in my own mind, would +be.”</p> +<p>“But, my lady, it might convince him,” I said, with perhaps +injudicious perseverance.</p> +<p>“And why should he be convinced?” she asked, with gentle +inquiry in her tone. “He has only to acquiesce. Though +he is appointed by Mr. Croxton, I am the lady of the manor, as he must +know. But it is with Mr. Horner that I must have to do about this +unfortunate lad Gregson. I am afraid there will be no method of +making him forget his unlucky knowledge. His poor brains will +be intoxicated with the sense of his powers, without any counterbalancing +principles to guide him. Poor fellow! I am quite afraid +it will end in his being hanged!”</p> +<p>The next day Mr. Horner came to apologize and explain. He was +evidently—as I could tell from his voice, as he spoke to my lady +in the next room—extremely annoyed at her ladyship’s discovery +of the education he had been giving to this boy. My lady spoke +with great authority, and with reasonable grounds of complaint. +Mr. Horner was well acquainted with her thoughts on the subject, and +had acted in defiance of her wishes. He acknowledged as much, +and should on no account have done it, in any other instance, without +her leave.</p> +<p>“Which I could never have granted you,” said my lady.</p> +<p>But this boy had extraordinary capabilities; would, in fact, have +taught himself much that was bad, if he had not been rescued, and another +direction given to his powers. And in all Mr. Horner had done, +he had had her ladyship’s service in view. The business +was getting almost beyond his power, so many letters and so much account-keeping +was required by the complicated state in which things were.</p> +<p>Lady Ludlow felt what was coming—a reference to the mortgage +for the benefit of my lord’s Scottish estates, which, she was +perfectly aware, Mr. Horner considered as having been a most unwise +proceeding—and she hastened to observe—“All this may +be very true, Mr. Horner, and I am sure I should be the last person +to wish you to overwork or distress yourself; but of that we will talk +another time. What I am now anxious to remedy is, if possible, +the state of this poor little Gregson’s mind. Would not +hard work in the fields be a wholesome and excellent way of enabling +him to forget?”</p> +<p>“I was in hopes, my lady, that you would have permitted me +to bring him up to act as a kind of clerk,” said Mr. Horner, jerking +out his project abruptly.</p> +<p>“A what?” asked my lady, in infinite surprise.</p> +<p>“A kind of—of assistant, in the way of copying letters +and doing up accounts. He is already an excellent penman and very +quick at figures.”</p> +<p>“Mr. Horner,” said my lady, with dignity, “the +son of a poacher and vagabond ought never to have been able to copy +letters relating to the Hanbury estates; and, at any rate, he shall +not. I wonder how it is that, knowing the use he has made of his +power of reading a letter, you should venture to propose such an employment +for him as would require his being in your confidence, and you the trusted +agent of this family. Why, every secret (and every ancient and +honourable family has its secrets, as you know, Mr. Horner) would be +learnt off by heart, and repeated to the first comer!”</p> +<p>“I should have hoped to have trained him, my lady, to understand +the rules of discretion.”</p> +<p>“Trained! Train a barn-door fowl to be a pheasant, Mr. +Horner! That would be the easier task. But you did right +to speak of discretion rather than honour. Discretion looks to +the consequences of actions—honour looks to the action itself, +and is an instinct rather than a virtue. After all, it is possible +you might have trained him to be discreet.”</p> +<p>Mr. Horner was silent. My lady was softened by his not replying, +and began as she always did in such cases, to fear lest she had been +too harsh. I could tell that by her voice and by her next speech, +as well as if I had seen her face.</p> +<p>“But I am sorry you are feeling the pressure of the affairs: +I am quite aware that I have entailed much additional trouble upon you +by some of my measures: I must try and provide you with some suitable +assistance. Copying letters and doing up accounts, I think you +said?”</p> +<p>Mr. Horner had certainly had a distant idea of turning the little +boy, in process of time, into a clerk; but he had rather urged this +possibility of future usefulness beyond what he had at first intended, +in speaking of it to my lady as a palliation of his offence, and he +certainly was very much inclined to retract his statement that the letter-writing, +or any other business, had increased, or that he was in the slightest +want of help of any kind, when my lady after a pause of consideration, +suddenly said—</p> +<p>“I have it. Miss Galindo will, I am sure, be glad to +assist you. I will speak to her myself. The payment we should +make to a clerk would be of real service to her!”</p> +<p>I could hardly help echoing Mr. Horner’s tone of surprise as +he said—</p> +<p>“Miss Galindo!”</p> +<p>For, you must be told who Miss Galindo was; at least, told as much +as I know. Miss Galindo had lived in the village for many years, +keeping house on the smallest possible means, yet always managing to +maintain a servant. And this servant was invariably chosen because +she had some infirmity that made her undesirable to every one else. +I believe Miss Galindo had had lame and blind and hump-backed maids. +She had even at one time taken in a girl hopelessly gone in consumption, +because if not she would have had to go to the workhouse, and not have +had enough to eat. Of course the poor creature could not perform +a single duty usually required of a servant, and Miss Galindo herself +was both servant and nurse.</p> +<p>Her present maid was scarcely four feet high, and bore a terrible +character for ill-temper. Nobody but Miss Galindo would have kept +her; but, as it was, mistress and servant squabbled perpetually, and +were, at heart, the best of friends. For it was one of Miss Galindo’s +peculiarities to do all manner of kind and self-denying actions, and +to say all manner of provoking things. Lame, blind, deformed, +and dwarf, all came in for scoldings without number: it was only the +consumptive girl that never had heard a sharp word. I don’t +think any of her servants liked her the worse for her peppery temper, +and passionate odd ways, for they knew her real and beautiful kindness +of heart: and, besides, she had so great a turn for humour that very +often her speeches amused as much or more than they irritated; and on +the other side, a piece of witty impudence from her servant would occasionally +tickle her so much and so suddenly, that she would burst out laughing +in the middle of her passion.</p> +<p>But the talk about Miss Galindo’s choice and management of +her servants was confined to village gossip, and had never reached my +Lady Ludlow’s ears, though doubtless Mr. Horner was well acquainted +with it. What my lady knew of her amounted to this. It was +the custom in those days for the wealthy ladies of the county to set +on foot a repository, as it was called, in the assize-town. The +ostensible manager of this repository was generally a decayed gentlewoman, +a clergyman’s widow, or so forth. She was, however, controlled +by a committee of ladies; and paid by them in proportion to the amount +of goods she sold; and these goods were the small manufactures of ladies +of little or no fortune, whose names, if they chose it, were only signified +by initials.</p> +<p>Poor water-colour drawings, indigo and Indian ink; screens, ornamented +with moss and dried leaves; paintings on velvet, and such faintly ornamental +works were displayed on one side of the shop. It was always reckoned +a mark of characteristic gentility in the repository, to have only common +heavy-framed sash-windows, which admitted very little light, so I never +was quite certain of the merit of these Works of Art as they were entitled. +But, on the other side, where the Useful Work placard was put up, there +was a great variety of articles, of whose unusual excellence every one +might judge. Such fine sewing, and stitching, and button-holing! +Such bundles of soft delicate knitted stockings and socks; and, above +all, in Lady Ludlow’s eyes, such hanks of the finest spun flaxen +thread!</p> +<p>And the most delicate dainty work of all was done by Miss Galindo, +as Lady Ludlow very well knew. Yet, for all their fine sewing, +it sometimes happened that Miss Galindo’s patterns were of an +old-fashioned kind; and the dozen nightcaps, maybe, on the materials +for which she had expended bonâ-fide money, and on the making-up, +no little time and eye-sight, would lie for months in a yellow neglected +heap; and at such times, it was said, Miss Galindo was more amusing +than usual, more full of dry drollery and humour; just as at the times +when an order came in to X. (the initial she had chosen) for a stock +of well-paying things, she sat and stormed at her servant as she stitched +away. She herself explained her practice in this way:—</p> +<p>“When everything goes wrong, one would give up breathing if +one could not lighten ones heart by a joke. But when I’ve +to sit still from morning till night, I must have something to stir +my blood, or I should go off into an apoplexy; so I set to, and quarrel +with Sally.”</p> +<p>Such were Miss Galindo’s means and manner of living in her +own house. Out of doors, and in the village, she was not popular, +although she would have been sorely missed had she left the place. +But she asked too many home questions (not to say impertinent) respecting +the domestic economies (for even the very poor liked to spend their +bit of money their own way), and would open cupboards to find out hidden +extravagances, and question closely respecting the weekly amount of +butter, till one day she met with what would have been a rebuff to any +other person, but which she rather enjoyed than otherwise.</p> +<p>She was going into a cottage, and in the doorway met the good woman +chasing out a duck, and apparently unconscious of her visitor.</p> +<p>“Get out, Miss Galindo!” she cried, addressing the duck. +“Get out! O, I ask your pardon,” she continued, as +if seeing the lady for the first time. “It’s only +that weary duck will come in. Get out Miss Gal---” (to the +duck).</p> +<p>“And so you call it after me, do you?” inquired her +visitor.</p> +<p>“O, yes, ma’am; my master would have it so, for he said, +sure enough the unlucky bird was always poking herself where she was +not wanted.”</p> +<p>“Ha, ha! very good! And so your master is a wit, is he? +Well! tell him to come up and speak to me to-night about my parlour +chimney, for there is no one like him for chimney doctoring.”</p> +<p>And the master went up, and was so won over by Miss Galindo’s +merry ways, and sharp insight into the mysteries of his various kinds +of business (he was a mason, chimney-sweeper, and ratcatcher), that +he came home and abused his wife the next time she called the duck the +name by which he himself had christened her.</p> +<p>But odd as Miss Galindo was in general, she could be as well-bred +a lady as any one when she chose. And choose she always did when +my Lady Ludlow was by. Indeed, I don’t know the man, woman, +or child, that did not instinctively turn out its best side to her ladyship. +So she had no notion of the qualities which, I am sure, made Mr. Horner +think that Miss Galindo would be most unmanageable as a clerk, and heartily +wish that the idea had never come into my lady’s head. But +there it was; and he had annoyed her ladyship already more than he liked +to-day, so he could not directly contradict her, but only urge difficulties +which he hoped might prove insuperable. But every one of them +Lady Ludlow knocked down. Letters to copy? Doubtless. +Miss Galindo could come up to the Hall; she should have a room to herself; +she wrote a beautiful hand; and writing would save her eyesight. +“Capability with regard to accounts?” My lady would +answer for that too; and for more than Mr. Horner seemed to think it +necessary to inquire about. Miss Galindo was by birth and breeding +a lady of the strictest honour, and would, if possible, forget the substance +of any letters that passed through her hands; at any rate, no one would +ever hear of them again from her. “Remuneration?” +Oh! as for that, Lady Ludlow would herself take care that it was managed +in the most delicate manner possible. She would send to invite +Miss Galindo to tea at the Hall that very afternoon, if Mr. Horner would +only give her ladyship the slightest idea of the average length of time +that my lady was to request Miss Galindo to sacrifice to her daily. +“Three hours! Very well.” Mr. Horner looked +very grave as he passed the windows of the room where I lay. I +don’t think he liked the idea of Miss Galindo as a clerk.</p> +<p>Lady Ludlow’s invitations were like royal commands. Indeed, +the village was too quiet to allow the inhabitants to have many evening +engagements of any kind. Now and then, Mr. and Mrs. Horner gave +a tea and supper to the principal tenants and their wives, to which +the clergyman was invited, and Miss Galindo, Mrs. Medlicott, and one +or two other spinsters and widows. The glory of the supper-table +on these occasions was invariably furnished by her ladyship: it was +a cold roasted peacock, with his tail stuck out as if in life. +Mrs. Medlicott would take up the whole morning arranging the feathers +in the proper semicircle, and was always pleased with the wonder and +admiration it excited. It was considered a due reward and fitting +compliment to her exertions that Mr. Horner always took her in to supper, +and placed her opposite to the magnificent dish, at which she sweetly +smiled all the time they were at table. But since Mrs. Horner +had had the paralytic stroke these parties had been given up; and Miss +Galindo wrote a note to Lady Ludlow in reply to her invitation, saying +that she was entirely disengaged, and would have great pleasure in doing +herself the honour of waiting upon her ladyship.</p> +<p>Whoever visited my lady took their meals with her, sitting on the +dais, in the presence of all my former companions. So I did not +see Miss Galindo until some time after tea; as the young gentlewomen +had had to bring her their sewing and spinning, to hear the remarks +of so competent a judge. At length her ladyship brought her visitor +into the room where I lay,—it was one of my bad days, I remember,—in +order to have her little bit of private conversation. Miss Galindo +was dressed in her best gown, I am sure, but I had never seen anything +like it except in a picture, it was so old-fashioned. She wore +a white muslin apron, delicately embroidered, and put on a little crookedly, +in order, as she told us, even Lady Ludlow, before the evening was over, +to conceal a spot whence the colour had been discharged by a lemon-stain. +This crookedness had an odd effect, especially when I saw that it was +intentional; indeed, she was so anxious about her apron’s right +adjustment in the wrong place, that she told us straight out why she +wore it so, and asked her ladyship if the spot was properly hidden, +at the same time lifting up her apron and showing her how large it was.</p> +<p>“When my father was alive, I always took his right arm, so, +and used to remove any spotted or discoloured breadths to the left side, +if it was a walking-dress. That’s the convenience of a gentleman. +But widows and spinsters must do what they can. Ah, my dear (to +me)! when you are reckoning up the blessings in your lot,—though +you may think it a hard one in some respects,—don’t forget +how little your stockings want darning, as you are obliged to lie down +so much! I would rather knit two pairs of stockings than darn +one, any day.”</p> +<p>“Have you been doing any of your beautiful knitting lately?” +asked my lady, who had now arranged Miss Galindo in the pleasantest +chair, and taken her own little wicker-work one, and, having her work +in her hands, was ready to try and open the subject.</p> +<p>“No, and alas! your ladyship. It is partly the hot weather’s +fault, for people seem to forget that winter must come; and partly, +I suppose, that every one is stocked who has the money to pay four-and-sixpence +a pair for stockings.”</p> +<p>“Then may I ask if you have any time in your active days at +liberty?” said my lady, drawing a little nearer to her proposal, +which I fancy she found it a little awkward to make.</p> +<p>“Why, the village keeps me busy, your ladyship, when I have +neither knitting or sewing to do. You know I took X. for my letter +at the repository, because it stands for Xantippe, who was a great scold +in old times, as I have learnt. But I’m sure I don’t +know how the world would get on without scolding, your ladyship. +It would go to sleep, and the sun would stand still.”</p> +<p>“I don’t think I could bear to scold, Miss Galindo,” +said her ladyship, smiling.</p> +<p>“No! because your ladyship has people to do it for you. +Begging your pardon, my lady, it seems to me the generality of people +may be divided into saints, scolds, and sinners. Now, your ladyship +is a saint, because you have a sweet and holy nature, in the first place; +and have people to do your anger and vexation for you, in the second +place. And Jonathan Walker is a sinner, because he is sent to +prison. But here am I, half way, having but a poor kind of disposition +at best, and yet hating sin, and all that leads to it, such as wasting, +and extravagance, and gossiping,—and yet all this lies right under +my nose in the village, and I am not saint enough to be vexed at it; +and so I scold. And though I had rather be a saint, yet I think +I do good in my way.”</p> +<p>“No doubt you do, dear Miss Galindo,” said Lady Ludlow. +“But I am sorry to hear that there is so much that is bad going +on in the village,—very sorry.”</p> +<p>“O, your ladyship! then I am sorry I brought it out. +It was only by way of saying, that when I have no particular work to +do at home, I take a turn abroad, and set my neighbours to rights, just +by way of steering clear of Satan.</p> +<blockquote><p>For Satan finds some mischief still<br /> +For idle hands to do,</p> +</blockquote> +<p>you know, my lady.”</p> +<p>There was no leading into the subject by delicate degrees, for Miss +Galindo was evidently so fond of talking, that, if asked a question, +she made her answer so long, that before she came to an end of it, she +had wandered far away from the original starting point. So Lady +Ludlow plunged at once into what she had to say.</p> +<p>“Miss Galindo, I have a great favour to ask of you.”</p> +<p>“My lady, I wish I could tell you what a pleasure it is to +hear you say so,” replied Miss Galindo, almost with tears in her +eyes; so glad were we all to do anything for her ladyship, which could +be called a free service and not merely a duty.</p> +<p>“It is this. Mr. Horner tells me that the business-letters, +relating to the estate, are multiplying so much that he finds it impossible +to copy them all himself, and I therefore require the services of some +confidential and discreet person to copy these letters, and occasionally +to go through certain accounts. Now, there is a very pleasant +little sitting-room very near to Mr. Horner’s office (you know +Mr. Horner’s office—on the other side of the stone hall?), +and if I could prevail upon you to come here to breakfast and afterwards +sit there for three hours every morning, Mr. Horner should bring or +send you the papers—”</p> +<p>Lady Ludlow stopped. Miss Galindo’s countenance had fallen. +There was some great obstacle in her mind to her wish for obliging Lady +Ludlow.</p> +<p>“What would Sally do?” she asked at length. Lady +Ludlow had not a notion who Sally was. Nor if she had had a notion, +would she have had a conception of the perplexities that poured into +Miss Galindo’s mind, at the idea of leaving her rough forgetful +dwarf without the perpetual monitorship of her mistress. Lady +Ludlow, accustomed to a household where everything went on noiselessly, +perfectly, and by clock-work, conducted by a number of highly-paid, +well-chosen, and accomplished servants, had not a conception of the +nature of the rough material from which her servants came. Besides, +in her establishment, so that the result was good, no one inquired if +the small economies had been observed in the production. Whereas +every penny—every halfpenny, was of consequence to Miss Galindo; +and visions of squandered drops of milk and wasted crusts of bread filled +her mind with dismay. But she swallowed all her apprehensions +down, out of her regard for Lady Ludlow, and desire to be of service +to her. No one knows how great a trial it was to her when she +thought of Sally, unchecked and unscolded for three hours every morning. +But all she said was—</p> +<p>“‘Sally, go to the Deuce.’ I beg your pardon, +my lady, if I was talking to myself; it’s a habit I have got into +of keeping my tongue in practice, and I am not quite aware when I do +it. Three hours every morning! I shall be only too proud +to do what I can for your ladyship; and I hope Mr. Horner will not be +too impatient with me at first. You know, perhaps, that I was +nearly being an authoress once, and that seems as if I was destined +to ‘employ my time in writing.’”</p> +<p>“No, indeed; we must return to the subject of the clerkship +afterwards, if you please. An authoress, Miss Galindo! You +surprise me!”</p> +<p>“But, indeed, I was. All was quite ready. Doctor +Burney used to teach me music: not that I ever could learn, but it was +a fancy of my poor father’s. And his daughter wrote a book, +and they said she was but a very young lady, and nothing but a music-master’s +daughter; so why should not I try?”</p> +<p>“Well?”</p> +<p>“Well! I got paper and half-a-hundred good pens, a bottle +of ink, all ready—”</p> +<p>“And then—”</p> +<p>“O, it ended in my having nothing to say, when I sat down to +write. But sometimes, when I get hold of a book, I wonder why +I let such a poor reason stop me. It does not others.”</p> +<p>“But I think it was very well it did, Miss Galindo,” +said her ladyship. “I am extremely against women usurping +men’s employments, as they are very apt to do. But perhaps, +after all, the notion of writing a book improved your hand. It +is one of the most legible I ever saw.”</p> +<p>“I despise z’s without tails,” said Miss Galindo, +with a good deal of gratified pride at my lady’s praise. +Presently, my lady took her to look at a curious old cabinet, which +Lord Ludlow had picked up at the Hague; and while they were out of the +room on this errand, I suppose the question of remuneration was settled, +for I heard no more of it.</p> +<p>When they came back, they were talking of Mr. Gray. Miss Galindo +was unsparing in her expressions of opinion about him: going much farther +than my lady—in her language, at least.</p> +<p>“A little blushing man like him, who can’t say bo to +a goose without hesitating and colouring, to come to this village—which +is as good a village as ever lived—and cry us down for a set of +sinners, as if we had all committed murder and that other thing!—I +have no patience with him, my lady. And then, how is he to help +us to heaven, by teaching us our, a b, ab—b a, ba? And yet, +by all accounts, that’s to save poor children’s souls. +O, I knew your ladyship would agree with me. I am sure my mother +was as good a creature as ever breathed the blessed air; and if she’s +not gone to heaven I don’t want to go there; and she could not +spell a letter decently. And does Mr. Gray think God took note +of that?”</p> +<p>“I was sure you would agree with me, Miss Galindo,” said +my lady. “You and I can remember how this talk about education—Rousseau, +and his writings—stirred up the French people to their Reign of +Terror, and all those bloody scenes.”</p> +<p>“I’m afraid that Rousseau and Mr. Gray are birds of a +feather,” replied Miss Galindo, shaking her head. “And +yet there is some good in the young man too. He sat up all night +with Billy Davis, when his wife was fairly worn out with nursing him.”</p> +<p>“Did he, indeed!” said my lady, her face lighting up, +as it always did when she heard of any kind or generous action, no matter +who performed it. “What a pity he is bitten with these new +revolutionary ideas, and is so much for disturbing the established order +of society!”</p> +<p>When Miss Galindo went, she left so favourable an impression of her +visit on my lady, that she said to me with a pleased smile—</p> +<p>“I think I have provided Mr. Horner with a far better clerk +than he would have made of that lad Gregson in twenty years. And +I will send the lad to my lord’s grieve, in Scotland, that he +may be kept out of harm’s way.”</p> +<p>But something happened to the lad before this purpose could be accomplished.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER X.</h2> +<p>The next morning, Miss Galindo made her appearance, and, by some +mistake, unusual to my lady’s well-trained servants, was shown +into the room where I was trying to walk; for a certain amount of exercise +was prescribed for me, painful although the exertion had become.</p> +<p>She brought a little basket along with her and while the footman +was gone to inquire my lady’s wishes (for I don’t think +that Lady Ludlow expected Miss Galindo so soon to assume her clerkship; +nor, indeed, had Mr. Horner any work of any kind ready for his new assistant +to do), she launched out into conversation with me.</p> +<p>“It was a sudden summons, my dear! However, as I have +often said to myself, ever since an occasion long ago, if Lady Ludlow +ever honours me by asking for my right hand, I’ll cut it off, +and wrap the stump up so tidily she shall never find out it bleeds. +But, if I had had a little more time, I could have mended my pens better. +You see, I have had to sit up pretty late to get these sleeves made”—and +she took out of her basket a pail of brown-holland over-sleeves, very +much such as a grocer’s apprentice wears—“and I had +only time to make seven or eight pens, out of some quills Farmer Thomson +gave me last autumn. As for ink, I’m thankful to say, that’s +always ready; an ounce of steel filings, an ounce of nut-gall, and a +pint of water (tea, if you’re extravagant, which, thank Heaven! +I’m not), put all in a bottle, and hang it up behind the house +door, so that the whole gets a good shaking every time you slam it to—and +even if you are in a passion and bang it, as Sally and I often do, it +is all the better for it—and there’s my ink ready for use; +ready to write my lady’s will with, if need be.”</p> +<p>“O, Miss Galindo!” said I, “don’t talk so +my lady’s will! and she not dead yet.”</p> +<p>“And if she were, what would be the use of talking of making +her will? Now, if you were Sally, I should say, ‘Answer +me that, you goose!’ But, as you’re a relation of +my lady’s, I must be civil, and only say, ‘I can’t +think how you can talk so like a fool!’ To be sure, poor +thing, you’re lame!”</p> +<p>I do not know how long she would have gone on; but my lady came in, +and I, released from my duty of entertaining Miss Galindo, made my limping +way into the next room. To tell the truth, I was rather afraid +of Miss Galindo’s tongue, for I never knew what she would say +next.</p> +<p>After a while my lady came, and began to look in the bureau for something: +and as she looked she said—“I think Mr. Horner must have +made some mistake, when he said he had so much work that he almost required +a clerk, for this morning he cannot find anything for Miss Galindo to +do; and there she is, sitting with her pen behind her ear, waiting for +something to write. I am come to find her my mother’s letters, +for I should like to have a fair copy made of them. O, here they +are: don’t trouble yourself, my dear child.”</p> +<p>When my lady returned again, she sat down and began to talk of Mr. +Gray.</p> +<p>“Miss Galindo says she saw him going to hold a prayer-meeting +in a cottage. Now that really makes me unhappy, it is so like +what Mr. Wesley used to do in my younger days; and since then we have +had rebellion in the American colonies and the French Revolution. +You may depend upon it, my dear, making religion and education common—vulgarising +them, as it were—is a bad thing for a nation. A man who +hears prayers read in the cottage where he has just supped on bread +and bacon, forgets the respect due to a church: he begins to think that +one place is as good as another, and, by-and-by, that one person is +as good as another; and after that, I always find that people begin +to talk of their rights, instead of thinking of their duties. +I wish Mr. Gray had been more tractable, and had left well alone. +What do you think I heard this morning? Why that the Home Hill +estate, which niches into the Hanbury property, was bought by a Baptist +baker from Birmingham!”</p> +<p>“A Baptist baker!” I exclaimed. I had never seen +a Dissenter, to my knowledge; but, having always heard them spoken of +with horror, I looked upon them almost as if they were rhinoceroses. +I wanted to see a live Dissenter, I believe, and yet I wished it were +over. I was almost surprised when I heard that any of them were +engaged in such peaceful occupations as baking.</p> +<p>“Yes! so Mr. Horner tells me. A Mr. Lambe, I believe. +But, at any rate, he is a Baptist, and has been in trade. What +with his schismatism and Mr. Gray’s methodism, I am afraid all +the primitive character of this place will vanish.”</p> +<p>From what I could hear, Mr. Gray seemed to be taking his own way; +at any rate, more than he had done when he first came to the village, +when his natural timidity had made him defer to my lady, and seek her +consent and sanction before embarking in any new plan. But newness +was a quality Lady Ludlow especially disliked. Even in the fashions +of dress and furniture, she clung to the old, to the modes which had +prevailed when she was young; and though she had a deep personal regard +for Queen Charlotte (to whom, as I have already said, she had been maid-of-honour), +yet there was a tinge of Jacobitism about her, such as made her extremely +dislike to hear Prince Charles Edward called the young Pretender, as +many loyal people did in those days, and made her fond of telling of +the thorn-tree in my lord’s park in Scotland, which had been planted +by bonny Queen Mary herself, and before which every guest in the Castle +of Monkshaven was expected to stand bare-headed, out of respect to the +memory and misfortunes of the royal planter.</p> +<p>We might play at cards, if we so chose, on a Sunday; at least, I +suppose we might, for my lady and Mr. Mountford used to do so often +when I first went. But we must neither play cards, nor read, nor +sew on the fifth of November and on the thirtieth of January, but must +go to church, and meditate all the rest of the day—and very hard +work meditating was. I would far rather have scoured a room. +That was the reason, I suppose, why a passive life was seen to be better +discipline for me than an active one.</p> +<p>But I am wandering away from my lady, and her dislike to all innovation. +Now, it seemed to me, as far as I heard, that Mr. Gray was full of nothing +but new things, and that what he first did was to attack all our established +institutions, both in the village and the parish, and also in the nation. +To be sure, I heard of his ways of going on principally from Miss Galindo, +who was apt to speak more strongly than accurately.</p> +<p>“There he goes,” she said, “clucking up the children +just like an old hen, and trying to teach them about their salvation +and their souls, and I don’t know what—things that it is +just blasphemy to speak about out of church. And he potters old +people about reading their Bibles. I am sure I don’t want +to speak disrespectfully about the Holy Scriptures, but I found old +Job Horton busy reading his Bible yesterday. Says I, ‘What +are you reading, and where did you get it, and who gave it you?’ +So he made answer, ‘That he was reading Susannah and the Elders, +for that he had read Bel and the Dragon till he could pretty near say +it off by heart, and they were two as pretty stories as ever he had +read, and that it was a caution to him what bad old chaps there were +in the world.’ Now, as Job is bed-ridden, I don’t +think he is likely to meet with the Elders, and I say that I think repeating +his Creed, the Commandments, and the Lord’s Prayer, and, maybe, +throwing in a verse of the Psalms, if he wanted a bit of a change, would +have done him far more good than his pretty stories, as he called them. +And what’s the next thing our young parson does? Why he +tries to make us all feel pitiful for the black slaves, and leaves little +pictures of negroes about, with the question printed below, ‘Am +I not a man and a brother?’ just as if I was to be hail-fellow-well-met +with every negro footman. They do say he takes no sugar in his +tea, because he thinks he sees spots of blood in it. Now I call +that superstition.”</p> +<p>The next day it was a still worse story.</p> +<p>“Well, my dear! and how are you? My lady sent me in to +sit a bit with you, while Mr. Horner looks out some papers for me to +copy. Between ourselves, Mr. Steward Horner does not like having +me for a clerk. It is all very well he does not; for, if he were +decently civil to me, I might want a chaperone, you know, now poor Mrs. +Horner is dead.” This was one of Miss Galindo’s grim +jokes. “As it is, I try to make him forget I’m a woman, +I do everything as ship-shape as a masculine man-clerk. I see +he can’t find a fault—writing good, spelling correct, sums +all right. And then he squints up at me with the tail of his eye, +and looks glummer than ever, just because I’m a woman—as +if I could help that. I have gone good lengths to set his mind +at ease. I have stuck my pen behind my ear, I have made him a +bow instead of a curtsey, I have whistled—not a tune I can’t +pipe up that—nay, if you won’t tell my lady, I don’t +mind telling you that I have said ‘Confound it!’ and ‘Zounds!’ +I can’t get any farther. For all that, Mr. Horner won’t +forget I am a lady, and so I am not half the use I might be, and if +it were not to please my Lady Ludlow, Mr. Horner and his books might +go hang (see how natural that came out!). And there is an order +for a dozen nightcaps for a bride, and I am so afraid I shan’t +have time to do them. Worst of all, there’s Mr. Gray taking +advantage of my absence to seduce Sally!”</p> +<p>“To seduce Sally! Mr. Gray!”</p> +<p>“Pooh, pooh, child! There’s many a kind of seduction. +Mr. Gray is seducing Sally to want to go to church. There has +he been twice at my house, while I have been away in the mornings, talking +to Sally about the state of her soul and that sort of thing. But +when I found the meat all roasted to a cinder, I said, ‘Come, +Sally, let’s have no more praying when beef is down at the fire. +Pray at six o’clock in the morning and nine at night, and I won’t +hinder you.’ So she sauced me, and said something about +Martha and Mary, implying that, because she had let the beef get so +overdone that I declare I could hardly find a bit for Nancy Pole’s +sick grandchild, she had chosen the better part. I was very much +put about, I own, and perhaps you’ll be shocked at what I said—indeed, +I don’t know if it was right myself—but I told her I had +a soul as well as she, and if it was to be saved by my sitting still +and thinking about salvation and never doing my duty, I thought I had +as good a right as she had to be Mary, and save my soul. So, that +afternoon I sat quite still, and it was really a comfort, for I am often +too busy, I know, to pray as I ought. There is first one person +wanting me, and then another, and the house and the food and the neighbours +to see after. So, when tea-time comes, there enters my maid with +her hump on her back, and her soul to be saved. ‘Please, +ma’am, did you order the pound of butter?’—‘No, +Sally,’ I said, shaking my head, ‘this morning I did not +go round by Hale’s farm, and this afternoon I have been employed +in spiritual things.’</p> +<p>“Now, our Sally likes tea and bread-and-butter above everything, +and dry bread was not to her taste.</p> +<p>“‘I’m thankful,’ said the impudent hussy, +‘that you have taken a turn towards godliness. It will be +my prayers, I trust, that’s given it you.’</p> +<p>“I was determined not to give her an opening towards the carnal +subject of butter, so she lingered still, longing to ask leave to run +for it. But I gave her none, and munched my dry bread myself, +thinking what a famous cake I could make for little Ben Pole with the +bit of butter we were saving; and when Sally had had her butterless +tea, and was in none of the best of tempers because Martha had not bethought +herself of the butter, I just quietly said—</p> +<p>“‘Now, Sally, to-morrow we’ll try to hash that +beef well, and to remember the butter, and to work out our salvation +all at the same time, for I don’t see why it can’t all be +done, as God has set us to do it all.’ But I heard her at +it again about Mary and Martha, and I have no doubt that Mr. Gray will +teach her to consider me a lost sheep.”</p> +<p>I had heard so many little speeches about Mr. Gray from one person +or another, all speaking against him, as a mischief-maker, a setter-up +of new doctrines, and of a fanciful standard of life (and you may be +sure that, where Lady Ludlow led, Mrs. Medlicott and Adams were certain +to follow, each in their different ways showing the influence my lady +had over them), that I believe I had grown to consider him as a very +instrument of evil, and to expect to perceive in his face marks of his +presumption, and arrogance, and impertinent interference. It was +now many weeks since I had seen him, and when he was one morning shown +into the blue drawing-room (into which I had been removed for a change), +I was quite surprised to see how innocent and awkward a young man he +appeared, confused even more than I was at our unexpected tête-à-tête. +He looked thinner, his eyes more eager, his expression more anxious, +and his colour came and went more than it had done when I had seen him +last. I tried to make a little conversation, as I was, to my own +surprise, more at my ease than he was; but his thoughts were evidently +too much preoccupied for him to do more than answer me with monosyllables.</p> +<p>Presently my lady came in. Mr. Gray twitched and coloured more +than ever; but plunged into the middle of his subject at once.</p> +<p>“My lady, I cannot answer it to my conscience, if I allow the +children of this village to go on any longer the little heathens that +they are. I must do something to alter their condition. +I am quite aware that your ladyship disapproves of many of the plans +which have suggested themselves to me; but nevertheless I must do something, +and I am come now to your ladyship to ask respectfully, but firmly, +what you would advise me to do.”</p> +<p>His eyes were dilated, and I could almost have said they were full +of tears with his eagerness. But I am sure it is a bad plan to +remind people of decided opinions which they have once expressed, if +you wish them to modify those opinions. Now, Mr. Gray had done +this with my lady; and though I do not mean to say she was obstinate, +yet she was not one to retract.</p> +<p>She was silent for a moment or two before she replied.</p> +<p>“You ask me to suggest a remedy for an evil of the existence +of which I am not conscious,” was her answer—very coldly, +very gently given. “In Mr. Mountford’s time I heard +no such complaints: whenever I see the village children (and they are +not unfrequent visitors at this house, on one pretext or another), they +are well and decently behaved.”</p> +<p>“Oh, madam, you cannot judge,” he broke in. “They +are trained to respect you in word and deed; you are the highest they +ever look up to; they have no notion of a higher.”</p> +<p>“Nay, Mr. Gray,” said my lady, smiling, “they are +as loyally disposed as any children can be. They come up here +every fourth of June, and drink his Majesty’s health, and have +buns, and (as Margaret Dawson can testify) they take a great and respectful +interest in all the pictures I can show them of the royal family.”</p> +<p>“But, madam, I think of something higher than any earthly dignities.”</p> +<p>My lady coloured at the mistake she had made; for she herself was +truly pious. Yet when she resumed the subject, it seemed to me +as if her tone was a little sharper than before.</p> +<p>“Such want of reverence is, I should say, the clergyman’s +fault. You must excuse me, Mr. Gray, if I speak plainly.”</p> +<p>“My Lady, I want plain-speaking. I myself am not accustomed +to those ceremonies and forms which are, I suppose, the etiquette in +your ladyship’s rank of life, and which seem to hedge you in from +any power of mine to touch you. Among those with whom I have passed +my life hitherto, it has been the custom to speak plainly out what we +have felt earnestly. So, instead of needing any apology from your +ladyship for straightforward speaking, I will meet what you say at once, +and admit that it is the clergyman’s fault, in a great measure, +when the children of his parish swear, and curse, and are brutal, and +ignorant of all saving grace; nay, some of them of the very name of +God. And because this guilt of mine, as the clergyman of this +parish, lies heavy on my soul, and every day leads but from bad to worse, +till I am utterly bewildered how to do good to children who escape from +me as if I were a monster, and who are growing up to be men fit for +and capable of any crime, but those requiring wit or sense, I come to +you, who seem to me all-powerful, as far as material power goes—for +your ladyship only knows the surface of things, and barely that, that +pass in your village—to help me with advice, and such outward +help as you can give.”</p> +<p>Mr. Gray had stood up and sat down once or twice while he had been +speaking, in an agitated, nervous kind of way, and now he was interrupted +by a violent fit of coughing, after which he trembled all over.</p> +<p>My lady rang for a glass of water, and looked much distressed.</p> +<p>“Mr. Gray,” said she, “I am sure you are not well; +and that makes you exaggerate childish faults into positive evils. +It is always the case with us when we are not strong in health. +I hear of your exerting yourself in every direction: you overwork yourself, +and the consequence is, that you imagine us all worse people than we +are.”</p> +<p>And my lady smiled very kindly and pleasantly at him, as he sat, +a little panting, a little flushed, trying to recover his breath. +I am sure that now they were brought face to face, she had quite forgotten +all the offence she had taken at his doings when she heard of them from +others; and, indeed, it was enough to soften any one’s heart to +see that young, almost boyish face, looking in such anxiety and distress.</p> +<p>“Oh, my lady, what shall I do?” he asked, as soon as +he could recover breath, and with such an air of humility, that I am +sure no one who had seen it could have ever thought him conceited again. +“The evil of this world is too strong for me. I can do so +little. It is all in vain. It was only to-day—” +and again the cough and agitation returned.</p> +<p>“My dear Mr. Gray,” said my lady (the day before I could +never have believed she could have called him My dear), “you must +take the advice of an old woman about yourself. You are not fit +to do anything just now but attend to your own health: rest, and see +a doctor (but, indeed, I will take care of that), and when you are pretty +strong again, you will find that you have been magnifying evils to yourself.”</p> +<p>“But, my lady, I cannot rest. The evils do exist, and +the burden of their continuance lies on my shoulders. I have no +place to gather the children together in, that I may teach them the +things necessary to salvation. The rooms in my own house are too +small; but I have tried them. I have money of my own; and, as +your ladyship knows, I tried to get a piece of leasehold property, on +which to build a school-house at my own expense. Your ladyship’s +lawyer comes forward, at your instructions, to enforce some old feudal +right, by which no building is allowed on leasehold property without +the sanction of the lady of the manor. It may be all very true; +but it was a cruel thing to do,—that is, if your ladyship had +known (which I am sure you do not) the real moral and spiritual state +of my poor parishioners. And now I come to you to know what I +am to do. Rest! I cannot rest, while children whom I could +possibly save are being left in their ignorance, their blasphemy, their +uncleanness, their cruelty. It is known through the village that +your ladyship disapproves of my efforts, and opposes all my plans. +If you think them wrong, foolish, ill-digested (I have been a student, +living in a college, and eschewing all society but that of pious men, +until now: I may not judge for the best, in my ignorance of this sinful +human nature), tell me of better plans and wiser projects for accomplishing +my end; but do not bid me rest, with Satan compassing me round, and +stealing souls away.”</p> +<p>“Mr. Gray,” said my lady, “there may be some truth +in what you have said. I do not deny it, though I think, in your +present state of indisposition and excitement, you exaggerate it much. +I believe—nay, the experience of a pretty long life has convinced +me—that education is a bad thing, if given indiscriminately. +It unfits the lower orders for their duties, the duties to which they +are called by God; of submission to those placed in authority over them; +of contentment with that state of life to which it has pleased God to +call them, and of ordering themselves lowly and reverently to all their +betters. I have made this conviction of mine tolerably evident +to you; and I have expressed distinctly my disapprobation of some of +your ideas. You may imagine, then, that I was not well pleased +when I found that you had taken a rood or more of Farmer Hale’s +land, and were laying the foundations of a school-house. You had +done this without asking for my permission, which, as Farmer Hale’s +liege lady, ought to have been obtained legally, as well as asked for +out of courtesy. I put a stop to what I believed to be calculated +to do harm to a village, to a population in which, to say the least +of it, I may be disposed to take as much interest as you can do. +How can reading, and writing, and the multiplication-table (if you choose +to go so far) prevent blasphemy, and uncleanness, and cruelty? +Really, Mr. Gray, I hardly like to express myself so strongly on the +subject in your present state of health, as I should do at any other +time. It seems to me that books do little; character much; and +character is not formed from books.”</p> +<p>“I do not think of character: I think of souls. I must +get some hold upon these children, or what will become of them in the +next world? I must be found to have some power beyond what they +have, and which they are rendered capable of appreciating, before they +will listen to me. At present physical force is all they look +up to; and I have none.”</p> +<p>“Nay, Mr. Gray, by your own admission, they look up to me.”</p> +<p>“They would not do anything your ladyship disliked if it was +likely to come to your knowledge; but if they could conceal it from +you, the knowledge of your dislike to a particular line of conduct would +never make them cease from pursuing it.”</p> +<p>“Mr. Gray”—surprise in her air, and some little +indignation—“they and their fathers have lived on the Hanbury +lands for generations!”</p> +<p>“I cannot help it, madam. I am telling you the truth, +whether you believe me or not.” There was a pause; my lady +looked perplexed, and somewhat ruffled; Mr. Gray as though hopeless +and wearied out. “Then, my lady,” said he, at last, +rising as he spoke, “you can suggest nothing to ameliorate the +state of things which, I do assure you, does exist on your lands, and +among your tenants. Surely, you will not object to my using Farmer +Hale’s great barn every Sabbath? He will allow me the use +of it, if your ladyship will grant your permission.”</p> +<p>“You are not fit for any extra work at present,” (and +indeed he had been coughing very much all through the conversation). +“Give me time to consider of it. Tell me what you wish to +teach. You will be able to take care of your health, and grow +stronger while I consider. It shall not be the worse for you, +if you leave it in my hands for a time.”</p> +<p>My lady spoke very kindly; but he was in too excited a state to recognize +the kindness, while the idea of delay was evidently a sore irritation. +I heard him say: “And I have so little time in which to do my +work. Lord! lay not this sin to my charge.”</p> +<p>But my lady was speaking to the old butler, for whom, at her sign, +I had rung the bell some little time before. Now she turned round.</p> +<p>“Mr. Gray, I find I have some bottles of Malmsey, of the vintage +of seventeen hundred and seventy-eight, yet left. Malmsey, as +perhaps you know, used to be considered a specific for coughs arising +from weakness. You must permit me to send you half-a-dozen bottles, +and, depend upon it, you will take a more cheerful view of life and +its duties before you have finished them, especially if you will be +so kind as to see Dr. Trevor, who is coming to see me in the course +of the week. By the time you are strong enough to work, I will +try and find some means of preventing the children from using such bad +language, and otherwise annoying you.”</p> +<p>“My lady, it is the sin, and not the annoyance. I wish +I could make you understand.” He spoke with some impatience; +Poor fellow! he was too weak, exhausted, and nervous. “I +am perfectly well; I can set to work to-morrow; I will do anything not +to be oppressed with the thought of how little I am doing. I do +not want your wine. Liberty to act in the manner I think right, +will do me far more good. But it is of no use. It is preordained +that I am to be nothing but a cumberer of the ground. I beg your +ladyship’s pardon for this call.”</p> +<p>He stood up, and then turned dizzy. My lady looked on, deeply +hurt, and not a little offended, he held out his hand to her, and I +could see that she had a little hesitation before she took it. +He then saw me, I almost think, for the first time; and put out his +hand once more, drew it back, as if undecided, put it out again, and +finally took hold of mine for an instant in his damp, listless hand, +and was gone.</p> +<p>Lady Ludlow was dissatisfied with both him and herself, I was sure. +Indeed, I was dissatisfied with the result of the interview myself. +But my lady was not one to speak out her feelings on the subject; nor +was I one to forget myself, and begin on a topic which she did not begin. +She came to me, and was very tender with me; so tender, that that, and +the thoughts of Mr. Gray’s sick, hopeless, disappointed look, +nearly made me cry.</p> +<p>“You are tired, little one,” said my lady. “Go +and lie down in my room, and hear what Medlicott and I can decide upon +in the way of strengthening dainties for that poor young man, who is +killing himself with his over-sensitive conscientiousness.”</p> +<p>“Oh, my lady!” said I, and then I stopped.</p> +<p>“Well. What?” asked she.</p> +<p>“If you would but let him have Farmer Hale’s barn at +once, it would do him more good than all.”</p> +<p>“Pooh, pooh, child!” though I don’t think she was +displeased, “he is not fit for more work just now. I shall +go and write for Dr. Trevor.”</p> +<p>And for the next half-hour, we did nothing but arrange physical comforts +and cures for poor Mr. Gray. At the end of the time, Mrs. Medlicott +said—</p> +<p>“Has your ladyship heard that Harry Gregson has fallen from +a tree, and broken his thigh-bone, and is like to be a cripple for life?”</p> +<p>“Harry Gregson! That black-eyed lad who read my letter? +It all comes from over-education!”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XI.</h2> +<p>But I don’t see how my lady could think it was over-education +that made Harry Gregson break his thigh, for the manner in which he +met with the accident was this:—</p> +<p>Mr. Horner, who had fallen sadly out of health since his wife’s +death, had attached himself greatly to Harry Gregson. Now, Mr. +Horner had a cold manner to every one, and never spoke more than was +necessary, at the best of times. And, latterly, it had not been +the best of times with him. I dare say, he had had some causes +for anxiety (of which I knew nothing) about my lady’s affairs; +and he was evidently annoyed by my lady’s whim (as he once inadvertently +called it) of placing Miss Galindo under him in the position of a clerk. +Yet he had always been friends, in his quiet way, with Miss Galindo, +and she devoted herself to her new occupation with diligence and punctuality, +although more than once she had moaned to me over the orders for needlework +which had been sent to her, and which, owing to her occupation in the +service of Lady Ludlow, she had been unable to fulfil.</p> +<p>The only living creature to whom the staid Mr. Horner could be said +to be attached, was Harry Gregson. To my lady he was a faithful +and devoted servant, looking keenly after her interests, and anxious +to forward them at any cost of trouble to himself. But the more +shrewd Mr. Horner was, the more probability was there of his being annoyed +at certain peculiarities of opinion which my lady held with a quiet, +gentle pertinacity; against which no arguments, based on mere worldly +and business calculations, made any way. This frequent opposition +to views which Mr. Horner entertained, although it did not interfere +with the sincere respect which the lady and the steward felt for each +other, yet prevented any warmer feeling of affection from coming in. +It seems strange to say it, but I must repeat it—the only person +for whom, since his wife’s death, Mr. Horner seemed to feel any +love, was the little imp Harry Gregson, with his bright, watchful eyes, +his tangled hair hanging right down to his eyebrows, for all the world +like a Skye terrier. This lad, half gipsy and whole poacher, as +many people esteemed him, hung about the silent, respectable, staid +Mr. Horner, and followed his steps with something of the affectionate +fidelity of the dog which he resembled. I suspect, this demonstration +of attachment to his person on Harry Gregson’s part was what won +Mr. Horner’s regard. In the first instance, the steward +had only chosen the lad out as the cleverest instrument he could find +for his purpose; and I don’t mean to say that, if Harry had not +been almost as shrewd as Mr. Horner himself was, both by original disposition +and subsequent experience, the steward would have taken to him as he +did, let the lad have shown ever so much affection for him.</p> +<p>But even to Harry Mr. Horner was silent. Still, it was pleasant +to find himself in many ways so readily understood; to perceive that +the crumbs of knowledge he let fall were picked up by his little follower, +and hoarded like gold that here was one to hate the persons and things +whom Mr. Horner coldly disliked, and to reverence and admire all those +for whom he had any regard. Mr. Horner had never had a child, +and unconsciously, I suppose, something of the paternal feeling had +begun to develop itself in him towards Harry Gregson. I heard +one or two things from different people, which have always made me fancy +that Mr. Horner secretly and almost unconsciously hoped that Harry Gregson +might be trained so as to be first his clerk, and next his assistant, +and finally his successor in his stewardship to the Hanbury estates.</p> +<p>Harry’s disgrace with my lady, in consequence of his reading +the letter, was a deeper blow to Mr. Horner than his quiet manner would +ever have led any one to suppose, or than Lady Ludlow ever dreamed of +inflicting, I am sure.</p> +<p>Probably Harry had a short, stern rebuke from Mr. Horner at the time, +for his manner was always hard even to those he cared for the most. +But Harry’s love was not to be daunted or quelled by a few sharp +words. I dare say, from what I heard of them afterwards, that +Harry accompanied Mr. Horner in his walk over the farm the very day +of the rebuke; his presence apparently unnoticed by the agent, by whom +his absence would have been painfully felt nevertheless. That +was the way of it, as I have been told. Mr. Horner never bade +Harry go with him; never thanked him for going, or being at his heels +ready to run on any errands, straight as the crow flies to his point, +and back to heel in as short a time as possible. Yet, if Harry +were away, Mr. Horner never inquired the reason from any of the men +who might be supposed to know whether he was detained by his father, +or otherwise engaged; he never asked Harry himself where he had been. +But Miss Galindo said that those labourers who knew Mr. Horner well, +told her that he was always more quick-eyed to shortcomings, more savage-like +in fault-finding, on those days when the lad was absent.</p> +<p>Miss Galindo, indeed, was my great authority for most of the village +news which I heard. She it was who gave me the particulars of +poor Harry’s accident.</p> +<p>“You see, my dear,” she said, “the little poacher +has taken some unaccountable fancy to my master.” (This +was the name by which Miss Galindo always spoke of Mr. Horner to me, +ever since she had been, as she called it, appointed his clerk.)</p> +<p>“Now if I had twenty hearts to lose, I never could spare a +bit of one of them for that good, gray, square, severe man. But +different people have different tastes, and here is that little imp +of a gipsy-tinker ready to turn slave for my master; and, odd enough, +my master,—who, I should have said beforehand, would have made +short work of imp, and imp’s family, and have sent Hall, the Bang-beggar, +after them in no time—my master, as they tell me, is in his way +quite fond of the lad, and if he could, without vexing my lady too much, +he would have made him what the folks here call a Latiner. However, +last night, it seems that there was a letter of some importance forgotten +(I can’t tell you what it was about, my dear, though I know perfectly +well, but ‘<i>service oblige</i>,’ as well as ‘noblesse,’ +and you must take my word for it that it was important, and one that +I am surprised my master could forget), till too late for the post. +(The poor, good, orderly man is not what he was before his wife’s +death.) Well, it seems that he was sore annoyed by his forgetfulness, +and well he might be. And it was all the more vexatious, as he +had no one to blame but himself. As for that matter, I always +scold somebody else when I’m in fault; but I suppose my master +would never think of doing that, else it’s a mighty relief. +However, he could eat no tea, and was altogether put out and gloomy. +And the little faithful imp-lad, perceiving all this, I suppose, got +up like a page in an old ballad, and said he would run for his life +across country to Comberford, and see if he could not get there before +the bags were made up. So my master gave him the letter, and nothing +more was heard of the poor fellow till this morning, for the father +thought his son was sleeping in Mr. Horner’s barn, as he does +occasionally, it seems, and my master, as was very natural, that he +had gone to his father’s.”</p> +<p>“And he had fallen down the old stone quarry, had he not?”</p> +<p>“Yes, sure enough. Mr. Gray had been up here fretting +my lady with some of his new-fangled schemes, and because the young +man could not have it all his own way, from what I understand, he was +put out, and thought he would go home by the back lane, instead of through +the village, where the folks would notice if the parson looked glum. +But, however, it was a mercy, and I don’t mind saying so, ay, +and meaning it too, though it may be like methodism; for, as Mr. Gray +walked by the quarry, he heard a groan, and at first he thought it was +a lamb fallen down; and he stood still, and then he heard it again; +and then I suppose, he looked down and saw Harry. So he let himself +down by the boughs of the trees to the ledge where Harry lay half-dead, +and with his poor thigh broken. There he had lain ever since the +night before: he had been returning to tell the master that he had safely +posted the letter, and the first words he said, when they recovered +him from the exhausted state he was in, were” (Miss Galindo tried +hard not to whimper, as she said it), “‘It was in time, +sir. I see’d it put in the bag with my own eyes.’”</p> +<p>“But where is he?” asked I. “How did Mr. +Gray get him out?”</p> +<p>“Ay! there it is, you see. Why the old gentleman (I daren’t +say Devil in Lady Ludlow’s house) is not so black as he is painted; +and Mr. Gray must have a deal of good in him, as I say at times; and +then at others, when he has gone against me, I can’t bear him, +and think hanging too good for him. But he lifted the poor lad, +as if he had been a baby, I suppose, and carried him up the great ledges +that were formerly used for steps; and laid him soft and easy on the +wayside grass, and ran home and got help and a door, and had him carried +to his house, and laid on his bed; and then somehow, for the first time +either he or any one else perceived it, he himself was all over blood—his +own blood—he had broken a blood-vessel; and there he lies in the +little dressing-room, as white and as still as if he were dead; and +the little imp in Mr. Gray’s own bed, sound asleep, now his leg +is set, just as if linen sheets and a feather bed were his native element, +as one may say. Really, now he is doing so well, I’ve no +patience with him, lying there where Mr. Gray ought to be. It +is just what my lady always prophesied would come to pass, if there +was any confusion of ranks.”</p> +<p>“Poor Mr. Gray!” said I, thinking of his flushed face, +and his feverish, restless ways, when he had been calling on my lady +not an hour before his exertions on Harry’s behalf. And +I told Miss Galindo how ill I had thought him.</p> +<p>“Yes,” said she. “And that was the reason +my lady had sent for Doctor Trevor. Well, it has fallen out admirably, +for he looked well after that old donkey of a Prince, and saw that he +made no blunders.”</p> +<p>Now “that old donkey of a Prince” meant the village surgeon, +Mr. Prince, between whom and Miss Galindo there was war to the knife, +as they often met in the cottages, when there was illness, and she had +her queer, odd recipes, which he, with his grand pharmacopoeia, held +in infinite contempt, and the consequence of their squabbling had been, +not long before this very time, that he had established a kind of rule, +that into whatever sick-room Miss Galindo was admitted, there he refused +to visit. But Miss Galindo’s prescriptions and visits cost +nothing and were often backed by kitchen-physic; so, though it was true +that she never came but she scolded about something or other, she was +generally preferred as medical attendant to Mr. Prince.</p> +<p>“Yes, the old donkey is obliged to tolerate me, and be civil +to me; for, you see, I got there first, and had possession, as it were, +and yet my lord the donkey likes the credit of attending the parson, +and being in consultation with so grand a county-town doctor as Doctor +Trevor. And Doctor Trevor is an old friend of mine” (she +sighed a little, some time I may tell you why), “and treats me +with infinite bowing and respect; so the donkey, not to be out of medical +fashion, bows too, though it is sadly against the grain; and he pulled +a face as if he had heard a slate-pencil gritting against a slate, when +I told Doctor Trevor I meant to sit up with the two lads, for I call +Mr. Gray little more than a lad, and a pretty conceited one, too, at +times.”</p> +<p>“But why should you sit up, Miss Galindo? It will tire +you sadly.”</p> +<p>“Not it. You see, there is Gregson’s mother to +keep quiet for she sits by her lad, fretting and sobbing, so that I’m +afraid of her disturbing Mr. Gray; and there’s Mr. Gray to keep +quiet, for Doctor Trevor says his life depends on it; and there is medicine +to be given to the one, and bandages to be attended to for the other; +and the wild horde of gipsy brothers and sisters to be turned out, and +the father to be held in from showing too much gratitude to Mr. Gray, +who can’t hear it,—and who is to do it all but me? +The only servant is old lame Betty, who once lived with me, and <i>would</i> +leave me because she said I was always bothering—(there was a +good deal of truth in what she said, I grant, but she need not have +said it; a good deal of truth is best let alone at the bottom of the +well), and what can she do,—deaf as ever she can be, too?”</p> +<p>So Miss Galindo went her ways; but not the less was she at her post +in the morning; a little crosser and more silent than usual; but the +first was not to be wondered at, and the last was rather a blessing.</p> +<p>Lady Ludlow had been extremely anxious both about Mr. Gray and Harry +Gregson. Kind and thoughtful in any case of illness and accident, +she always was; but somehow, in this, the feeling that she was not quite—what +shall I call it?—“friends” seems hardly the right +word to use, as to the possible feeling between the Countess Ludlow +and the little vagabond messenger, who had only once been in her presence,—that +she had hardly parted from either as she could have wished to do, had +death been near, made her more than usually anxious. Doctor Trevor +was not to spare obtaining the best medical advice the county could +afford: whatever he ordered in the way of diet, was to be prepared under +Mrs. Medlicott’s own eye, and sent down from the Hall to the Parsonage. +As Mr. Horner had given somewhat similar directions, in the case of +Harry Gregson at least, there was rather a multiplicity of counsellors +and dainties, than any lack of them. And, the second night, Mr. +Horner insisted on taking the superintendence of the nursing himself, +and sat and snored by Harry’s bedside, while the poor, exhausted +mother lay by her child,—thinking that she watched him, but in +reality fast asleep, as Miss Galindo told us; for, distrusting any one’s +powers of watching and nursing but her own, she had stolen across the +quiet village street in cloak and dressing-gown, and found Mr. Gray +in vain trying to reach the cup of barley-water which Mr. Horner had +placed just beyond his reach.</p> +<p>In consequence of Mr. Gray’s illness, we had to have a strange +curate to do duty; a man who dropped his h’s, and hurried through +the service, and yet had time enough to stand in my Lady’s way, +bowing to her as she came out of church, and so subservient in manner, +that I believe that sooner than remain unnoticed by a countess, he would +have preferred being scolded, or even cuffed. Now I found out, +that great as was my lady’s liking and approval of respect, nay, +even reverence, being paid to her as a person of quality,—a sort +of tribute to her Order, which she had no individual right to remit, +or, indeed, not to exact,—yet she, being personally simple, sincere, +and holding herself in low esteem, could not endure anything like the +servility of Mr. Crosse, the temporary curate. She grew absolutely +to loathe his perpetual smiling and bowing; his instant agreement with +the slightest opinion she uttered; his veering round as she blew the +wind. I have often said that my lady did not talk much, as she +might have done had she lived among her equals. But we all loved +her so much, that we had learnt to interpret all her little ways pretty +truly; and I knew what particular turns of her head, and contractions +of her delicate fingers meant, as well as if she had expressed herself +in words. I began to suspect that my lady would be very thankful +to have Mr. Gray about again, and doing his duty even with a conscientiousness +that might amount to worrying himself, and fidgeting others; and although +Mr. Gray might hold her opinions in as little esteem as those of any +simple gentlewoman, she was too sensible not to feel how much flavour +there was in his conversation, compared to that of Mr. Crosse, who was +only her tasteless echo.</p> +<p>As for Miss Galindo, she was utterly and entirely a partisan of Mr. +Gray’s, almost ever since she had begun to nurse him during his +illness.</p> +<p>“You know, I never set up for reasonableness, my lady. +So I don’t pretend to say, as I might do if I were a sensible +woman and all that,—that I am convinced by Mr. Gray’s arguments +of this thing or t’other. For one thing, you see, poor fellow! +he has never been able to argue, or hardly indeed to speak, for Doctor +Trevor has been very peremptory. So there’s been no scope +for arguing! But what I mean is this:—When I see a sick +man thinking always of others, and never of himself; patient, humble—a +trifle too much at times, for I’ve caught him praying to be forgiven +for having neglected his work as a parish priest,” (Miss Galindo +was making horrible faces, to keep back tears, squeezing up her eyes +in a way which would have amused me at any other time, but when she +was speaking of Mr. Gray); “when I see a downright good, religious +man, I’m apt to think he’s got hold of the right clue, and +that I can do no better than hold on by the tails of his coat and shut +my eyes, if we’ve got to go over doubtful places on our road to +Heaven. So, my lady, you must excuse me if, when he gets about +again, he is all agog about a Sunday-school, for if he is, I shall be +agog too, and perhaps twice as bad as him, for, you see, I’ve +a strong constitution compared to his, and strong ways of speaking and +acting. And I tell your ladyship this now, because I think from +your rank—and still more, if I may say so, for all your kindness +to me long ago, down to this very day—you’ve a right to +be first told of anything about me. Change of opinion I can’t +exactly call it, for I don’t see the good of schools and teaching +A B C, any more than I did before, only Mr. Gray does, so I’m +to shut my eyes, and leap over the ditch to the side of education. +I’ve told Sally already, that if she does not mind her work, but +stands gossiping with Nelly Mather, I’ll teach her her lessons; +and I’ve never caught her with old Nelly since.”</p> +<p>I think Miss Galindo’s desertion to Mr. Gray’s opinions +in this matter hurt my lady just a little bit; but she only said—</p> +<p>“Of course, if the parishoners wish for it, Mr. Gray must have +his Sunday-school. I shall, in that case, withdraw my opposition. +I am sorry I cannot alter my opinions as easily as you.”</p> +<p>My lady made herself smile as she said this. Miss Galindo saw +it was an effort to do so. She thought a minute before she spoke +again.</p> +<p>“Your ladyship has not seen Mr. Gray as intimately as I have +done. That’s one thing. But, as for the parishioners, +they will follow your ladyship’s lead in everything; so there +is no chance of their wishing for a Sunday-school.”</p> +<p>“I have never done anything to make them follow my lead, as +you call it, Miss Galindo,” said my lady, gravely.</p> +<p>“Yes, you have,” replied Miss Galindo, bluntly. +And then, correcting herself, she said, “Begging your ladyship’s +pardon, you have. Your ancestors have lived here time out of mind, +and have owned the land on which their forefathers have lived ever since +there were forefathers. You yourself were born amongst them, and +have been like a little queen to them ever since, I might say, and they’ve +never known your ladyship do anything but what was kind and gentle; +but I’ll leave fine speeches about your ladyship to Mr. Crosse. +Only you, my lady, lead the thoughts of the parish; and save some of +them a world of trouble, for they could never tell what was right if +they had to think for themselves. It’s all quite right that +they should be guided by you, my lady,—if only you would agree +with Mr. Gray.”</p> +<p>“Well,” said my lady, “I told him only the last +day that he was here, that I would think about it. I do believe +I could make up my mind on certain subjects better if I were left alone, +than while being constantly talked to about them.”</p> +<p>My lady said this in her usual soft tones; but the words had a tinge +of impatience about them; indeed, she was more ruffled than I had often +seen her; but, checking herself in an instant she said—</p> +<p>“You don’t know how Mr. Horner drags in this subject +of education apropos of everything. Not that he says much about +it at any time: it is not his way. But he cannot let the thing +alone.”</p> +<p>“I know why, my lady,” said Miss Galindo. “That +poor lad, Harry Gregson, will never be able to earn his livelihood in +any active way, but will be lame for life. Now, Mr. Horner thinks +more of Harry than of any one else in the world,—except, perhaps, +your ladyship.” Was it not a pretty companionship for my +lady? “And he has schemes of his own for teaching Harry; +and if Mr. Gray could but have his school, Mr. Horner and he think Harry +might be schoolmaster, as your ladyship would not like to have him coming +to you as steward’s clerk. I wish your ladyship would fall +into this plan; Mr. Gray has it so at heart.”</p> +<p>Miss Galindo looked wistfully at my lady, as she said this. +But my lady only said, drily, and rising at the same time, as if to +end the conversation—</p> +<p>“So Mr. Horner and Mr. Gray seem to have gone a long way in +advance of my consent to their plans.”</p> +<p>“There!” exclaimed Miss Galindo, as my lady left the +room, with an apology for going away; “I have gone and done mischief +with my long, stupid tongue. To be sure, people plan a long way +ahead of to-day; more especially when one is a sick man, lying all through +the weary day on a sofa.”</p> +<p>“My lady will soon get over her annoyance,” said I, as +it were apologetically. I only stopped Miss Galindo’s self-reproaches +to draw down her wrath upon myself.</p> +<p>“And has not she a right to be annoyed with me, if she likes, +and to keep annoyed as long as she likes? Am I complaining of +her, that you need tell me that? Let me tell you, I have known +my lady these thirty years; and if she were to take me by the shoulders, +and turn me out of the house, I should only love her the more. +So don’t you think to come between us with any little mincing, +peace-making speeches. I have been a mischief-making parrot, and +I like her the better for being vexed with me. So good-bye to +you, Miss; and wait till you know Lady Ludlow as well as I do, before +you next think of telling me she will soon get over her annoyance!” +And off Miss Galindo went.</p> +<p>I could not exactly tell what I had done wrong; but I took care never +again to come in between my lady and her by any remark about the one +to the other; for I saw that some most powerful bond of grateful affection +made Miss Galindo almost worship my lady.</p> +<p>Meanwhile, Harry Gregson was limping a little about in the village, +still finding his home in Mr. Gray’s house; for there he could +most conveniently be kept under the doctor’s eye, and receive +the requisite care, and enjoy the requisite nourishment. As soon +as he was a little better, he was to go to Mr. Horner’s house; +but, as the steward lived some distance out of the way, and was much +from home, he had agreed to leave Harry at the house; to which he had +first been taken, until he was quite strong again; and the more willingly, +I suspect, from what I heard afterwards, because Mr. Gray gave up all +the little strength of speaking which he had, to teaching Harry in the +very manner which Mr. Horner most desired.</p> +<p>As for Gregson the father—he—wild man of the woods, poacher, +tinker, jack-of-all trades—was getting tamed by this kindness +to his child. Hitherto his hand had been against every man, as +every man’s had been against him. That affair before the +justice, which I told you about, when Mr. Gray and even my lady had +interested themselves to get him released from unjust imprisonment, +was the first bit of justice he had ever met with; it attracted him +to the people, and attached him to the spot on which he had but squatted +for a time. I am not sure if any of the villagers were grateful +to him for remaining in their neighbourhood, instead of decamping as +he had often done before, for good reasons, doubtless, of personal safety. +Harry was only one out of a brood of ten or twelve children, some of +whom had earned for themselves no good character in service: one, indeed, +had been actually transported, for a robbery committed in a distant +part of the county; and the tale was yet told in the village of how +Gregson the father came back from the trial in a state of wild rage, +striding through the place, and uttering oaths of vengeance to himself, +his great black eyes gleaming out of his matted hair, and his arms working +by his side, and now and then tossed up in his impotent despair. +As I heard the account, his wife followed him, child-laden and weeping. +After this, they had vanished from the country for a time, leaving their +mud hovel locked up, and the door-key, as the neighbours said, buried +in a hedge bank. The Gregsons had reappeared much about the same +time that Mr. Gray came to Hanbury. He had either never heard +of their evil character, or considered that it gave them all the more +claims upon his Christian care; and the end of it was, that this rough, +untamed, strong giant of a heathen was loyal slave to the weak, hectic, +nervous, self-distrustful parson. Gregson had also a kind of grumbling +respect for Mr. Horner: he did not quite like the steward’s monopoly +of his Harry: the mother submitted to that with a better grace, swallowing +down her maternal jealousy in the prospect of her child’s advancement +to a better and more respectable position than that in which his parents +had struggled through life. But Mr. Horner, the steward, and Gregson, +the poacher and squatter, had come into disagreeable contact too often +in former days for them to be perfectly cordial at any future time. +Even now, when there was no immediate cause for anything but gratitude +for his child’s sake on Gregson’s part, he would skulk out +of Mr. Horner’s way, if he saw him coming; and it took all Mr. +Horner’s natural reserve and acquired self-restraint to keep him +from occasionally holding up his father’s life as a warning to +Harry. Now Gregson had nothing of this desire for avoidance with +regard to Mr. Gray. The poacher had a feeling of physical protection +towards the parson; while the latter had shown the moral courage, without +which Gregson would never have respected him, in coming right down upon +him more than once in the exercise of unlawful pursuits, and simply +and boldly telling him he was doing wrong, with such a quiet reliance +upon Gregson’s better feeling, at the same time, that the strong +poacher could not have lifted a finger against Mr. Gray, though it had +been to save himself from being apprehended and taken to the lock-ups +the very next hour. He had rather listened to the parson’s +bold words with an approving smile, much as Mr. Gulliver might have +hearkened to a lecture from a Lilliputian. But when brave words +passed into kind deeds, Gregson’s heart mutely acknowledged its +master and keeper. And the beauty of it all was, that Mr. Gray +knew nothing of the good work he had done, or recognized himself as +the instrument which God had employed. He thanked God, it is true, +fervently and often, that the work was done; and loved the wild man +for his rough gratitude; but it never occurred to the poor young clergyman, +lying on his sick-bed, and praying, as Miss Galindo had told us he did, +to be forgiven for his unprofitable life, to think of Gregson’s +reclaimed soul as anything with which he had had to do. It was +now more than three months since Mr. Gray had been at Hanbury Court. +During all that time he had been confined to his house, if not to his +sick-bed, and he and my lady had never met since their last discussion +and difference about Farmer Hale’s barn.</p> +<p>This was not my dear lady’s fault; no one could have been more +attentive in every way to the slightest possible want of either of the +invalids, especially of Mr. Gray. And she would have gone to see +him at his own house, as she sent him word, but that her foot had slipped +upon the polished oak staircase, and her ancle had been sprained.</p> +<p>So we had never seen Mr. Gray since his illness, when one November +day he was announced as wishing to speak to my lady. She was sitting +in her room—the room in which I lay now pretty constantly—and +I remember she looked startled, when word was brought to her of Mr. +Gray’s being at the Hall.</p> +<p>She could not go to him, she was too lame for that, so she bade him +be shown into where she sat.</p> +<p>“Such a day for him to go out!” she exclaimed, looking +at the fog which had crept up to the windows, and was sapping the little +remaining life in the brilliant Virginian creeper leaves that draperied +the house on the terrace side.</p> +<p>He came in white, trembling, his large eyes wild and dilated. +He hastened up to Lady Ludlow’s chair, and, to my surprise, took +one of her hands and kissed it, without speaking, yet shaking all over.</p> +<p>“Mr. Gray!” said she, quickly, with sharp, tremulous +apprehension of some unknown evil. “What is it? There +is something unusual about you.”</p> +<p>“Something unusual has occurred,” replied he, forcing +his words to be calm, as with a great effort. “A gentleman +came to my house, not half an hour ago—a Mr. Howard. He +came straight from Vienna.”</p> +<p>“My son!” said my dear lady, stretching out her arms +in dumb questioning attitude.</p> +<p>“The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the +name of the Lord.”</p> +<p>But my poor lady could not echo the words. He was the last +remaining child. And once she had been the joyful mother of nine.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XII.</h2> +<p>I am ashamed to say what feeling became strongest in my mind about +this time; next to the sympathy we all of us felt for my dear lady in +her deep sorrow, I mean; for that was greater and stronger than anything +else, however contradictory you may think it, when you hear all.</p> +<p>It might arise from my being so far from well at the time, which +produced a diseased mind in a diseased body; but I was absolutely jealous +for my father’s memory, when I saw how many signs of grief there +were for my lord’s death, he having done next to nothing for the +village and parish, which now changed, as it were, its daily course +of life, because his lordship died in a far-off city. My father +had spent the best years of his manhood in labouring hard, body and +soul, for the people amongst whom he lived. His family, of course, +claimed the first place in his heart; he would have been good for little, +even in the way of benevolence, if they had not. But close after +them he cared for his parishioners, and neighbours. And yet, when +he died, though the church-bells tolled, and smote upon our hearts with +hard, fresh pain at every beat, the sounds of every-day life still went +on, close pressing around us,—carts and carriages, street-cries, +distant barrel-organs (the kindly neighbours kept them out of our street): +life, active, noisy life, pressed on our acute consciousness of Death, +and jarred upon it as on a quick nerve.</p> +<p>And when we went to church,—my father’s own church,—though +the pulpit cushions were black, and many of the congregation had put +on some humble sign of mourning, yet it did not alter the whole material +aspect of the place. And yet what was Lord Ludlow’s relation +to Hanbury, compared to my father’s work and place in—?</p> +<p>O! it was very wicked in me! I think if I had seen my lady,—if +I had dared to ask to go to her, I should not have felt so miserable, +so discontented. But she sat in her own room, hung with black, +all, even over the shutters. She saw no light but that which was +artificial—candles, lamps, and the like—for more than a +month. Only Adams went near her. Mr. Gray was not admitted, +though he called daily. Even Mrs. Medlicott did not see her for +near a fortnight. The sight of my lady’s griefs, or rather +the recollection of it, made Mrs. Medlicott talk far more than was her +wont. She told us, with many tears, and much gesticulation, even +speaking German at times, when her English would not flow, that my lady +sat there, a white figure in the middle of the darkened room; a shaded +lamp near her, the light of which fell on an open Bible,—the great +family Bible. It was not open at any chapter or consoling verse; +but at the page whereon were registered the births of her nine children. +Five had died in infancy,—sacrificed to the cruel system which +forbade the mother to suckle her babies. Four had lived longer; +Urian had been the first to die, Ughtred-Mortimar, Earl Ludlow, the +last.</p> +<p>My lady did not cry, Mrs. Medlicott said. She was quite composed; +very still, very silent. She put aside everything that savoured +of mere business: sent people to Mr. Horner for that. But she +was proudly alive to every possible form which might do honour to the +last of her race.</p> +<p>In those days, expresses were slow things, and forms still slower. +Before my lady’s directions could reach Vienna, my lord was buried. +There was some talk (so Mrs. Medlicott said) about taking the body up, +and bringing him to Hanbury. But his executors,—connections +on the Ludlow side,—demurred to this. If he were removed +to England, he must be carried on to Scotland, and interred with his +Monkshaven forefathers. My lady, deeply hurt, withdrew from the +discussion, before it degenerated to an unseemly contest. But +all the more, for this understood mortification of my lady’s, +did the whole village and estate of Hanbury assume every outward sign +of mourning. The church bells tolled morning and evening. +The church itself was draped in black inside. Hatchments were +placed everywhere, where hatchments could be put. All the tenantry +spoke in hushed voices for more than a week, scarcely daring to observe +that all flesh, even that of an Earl Ludlow, and the last of the Hanburys, +was but grass after all. The very Fighting Lion closed its front +door, front shutters it had none, and those who needed drink stole in +at the back, and were silent and maudlin over their cups, instead of +riotous and noisy. Miss Galindo’s eyes were swollen up with +crying, and she told me, with a fresh burst of tears, that even hump-backed +Sally had been found sobbing over her Bible, and using a pocket-handkerchief +for the first time in her life; her aprons having hitherto stood her +in the necessary stead, but not being sufficiently in accordance with +etiquette to be used when mourning over an earl’s premature decease.</p> +<p>If it was this way out of the Hall, “you might work it by the +rule of three,” as Miss Galindo used to say, and judge what it +was in the Hall. We none of us spoke but in a whisper: we tried +not to eat; and indeed the shock had been so really great, and we did +really care so much for my lady, that for some days we had but little +appetite. But after that, I fear our sympathy grew weaker, while +our flesh grew stronger. But we still spoke low, and our hearts +ached whenever we thought of my lady sitting there alone in the darkened +room, with the light ever falling on that one solemn page.</p> +<p>We wished, O how I wished that she would see Mr. Gray! But +Adams said, she thought my lady ought to have a bishop come to see her. +Still no one had authority enough to send for one.</p> +<p>Mr. Horner all this time was suffering as much as any one. +He was too faithful a servant of the great Hanbury family, though now +the family had dwindled down to a fragile old lady, not to mourn acutely +over its probable extinction. He had, besides, a deeper sympathy +and reverence with, and for, my lady, in all things, than probably he +ever cared to show, for his manners were always measured and cold. +He suffered from sorrow. He also suffered from wrong. My +lord’s executors kept writing to him continually. My lady +refused to listen to mere business, saying she intrusted all to him. +But the “all” was more complicated than I ever thoroughly +understood. As far as I comprehended the case, it was something +of this kind:—There had been a mortgage raised on my lady’s +property of Hanbury, to enable my lord, her husband, to spend money +in cultivating his Scotch estates, after some new fashion that required +capital. As long as my lord, her son, lived, who was to succeed +to both the estates after her death, this did not signify; so she had +said and felt; and she had refused to take any steps to secure the repayment +of capital, or even the payment of the interest of the mortgage from +the possible representatives and possessors of the Scotch estates, to +the possible owner of the Hanbury property; saying it ill became her +to calculate on the contingency of her son’s death.</p> +<p>But he had died childless, unmarried. The heir of the Monkshaven +property was an Edinburgh advocate, a far-away kinsman of my lord’s: +the Hanbury property, at my lady’s death, would go to the descendants +of a third son of the Squire Hanbury in the days of Queen Anne.</p> +<p>This complication of affairs was most grievous to Mr. Horner. +He had always been opposed to the mortgage; had hated the payment of +the interest, as obliging my lady to practise certain economies which, +though she took care to make them as personal as possible, he disliked +as derogatory to the family. Poor Mr. Horner! He was so +cold and hard in his manner, so curt and decisive in his speech, that +I don’t think we any of us did him justice. Miss Galindo +was almost the first, at this time, to speak a kind word of him, or +to take thought of him at all, any farther than to get out of his way +when we saw him approaching.</p> +<p>“I don’t think Mr. Horner is well,” she said one +day; about three weeks after we had heard of my lord’s death. +“He sits resting his head on his hand, and hardly hears me when +I speak to him.”</p> +<p>But I thought no more of it, as Miss Galindo did not name it again. +My lady came amongst us once more. From elderly she had become +old; a little, frail, old lady, in heavy black drapery, never speaking +about nor alluding to her great sorrow; quieter, gentler, paler than +ever before; and her eyes dim with much weeping, never witnessed by +mortal.</p> +<p>She had seen Mr. Gray at the expiration of the month of deep retirement. +But I do not think that even to him she had said one word of her own +particular individual sorrow. All mention of it seemed buried +deep for evermore. One day, Mr. Horner sent word that he was too +much indisposed to attend to his usual business at the Hall; but he +wrote down some directions and requests to Miss Galindo, saying that +he would be at his office early the next morning. The next morning +he was dead.</p> +<p>Miss Galindo told my lady. Miss Galindo herself cried plentifully, +but my lady, although very much distressed, could not cry. It +seemed a physical impossibility, as if she had shed all the tears in +her power. Moreover, I almost think her wonder was far greater +that she herself lived than that Mr. Horner died. It was almost +natural that so faithful a servant should break his heart, when the +family he belonged to lost their stay, their heir, and their last hope.</p> +<p>Yes! Mr. Horner was a faithful servant. I do not think +there are many so faithful now; but perhaps that is an old woman’s +fancy of mine. When his will came to be examined, it was discovered +that, soon after Harry Gregson’s accident, Mr. Horner had left +the few thousands (three, I think,) of which he was possessed, in trust +for Harry’s benefit, desiring his executors to see that the lad +was well educated in certain things, for which Mr. Horner had thought +that he had shown especial aptitude; and there was a kind of implied +apology to my lady in one sentence where he stated that Harry’s +lameness would prevent his being ever able to gain his living by the +exercise of any mere bodily faculties, “as had been wished by +a lady whose wishes” he, the testator, “was bound to regard.”</p> +<p>But there was a codicil in the will, dated since Lord Ludlow’s +death—feebly written by Mr. Horner himself, as if in preparation +only for some more formal manner of bequest: or, perhaps, only as a +mere temporary arrangement till he could see a lawyer, and have a fresh +will made. In this he revoked his previous bequest to Harry Gregson. +He only left two hundred pounds to Mr Gray to be used, as that gentleman +thought best, for Henry Gregson’s benefit. With this one +exception, he bequeathed all the rest of his savings to my lady, with +a hope that they might form a nest-egg, as it were, towards the paying +off of the mortgage which had been such a grief to him during his life. +I may not repeat all this in lawyer’s phrase; I heard it through +Miss Galindo, and she might make mistakes. Though, indeed, she +was very clear-headed, and soon earned the respect of Mr. Smithson, +my lady’s lawyer from Warwick. Mr. Smithson knew Miss Galindo +a little before, both personally and by reputation; but I don’t +think he was prepared to find her installed as steward’s clerk, +and, at first, he was inclined to treat her, in this capacity, with +polite contempt. But Miss Galindo was both a lady and a spirited, +sensible woman, and she could put aside her self-indulgence in eccentricity +of speech and manner whenever she chose. Nay more; she was usually +so talkative, that if she had not been amusing and warm-hearted, one +might have thought her wearisome occasionally. But to meet Mr. +Smithson she came out daily in her Sunday gown; she said no more than +was required in answer to his questions; her books and papers were in +thorough order, and methodically kept; her statements of matters-of-fact +accurate, and to be relied on. She was amusingly conscious of +her victory over his contempt of a woman-clerk and his preconceived +opinion of her unpractical eccentricity.</p> +<p>“Let me alone,” said she, one day when she came in to +sit awhile with me. “That man is a good man—a sensible +man—and I have no doubt he is a good lawyer; but he can’t +fathom women yet. I make no doubt he’ll go back to Warwick, +and never give credit again to those people who made him think me half-cracked +to begin with. O, my dear, he did! He showed it twenty times +worse than my poor dear master ever did. It was a form to be gone +through to please my lady, and, for her sake, he would hear my statements +and see my books. It was keeping a woman out of harm’s way, +at any rate, to let her fancy herself useful. I read the man. +And, I am thankful to say, he cannot read me. At least, only one +side of me. When I see an end to be gained, I can behave myself +accordingly. Here was a man who thought that a woman in a black +silk gown was a respectable, orderly kind of person; and I was a woman +in a black silk gown. He believed that a woman could not write +straight lines, and required a man to tell her that two and two made +four. I was not above ruling my books, and had Cocker a little +more at my fingers’ ends than he had. But my greatest triumph +has been holding my tongue. He would have thought nothing of my +books, or my sums, or my black silk gown, if I had spoken unasked. +So I have buried more sense in my bosom these ten days than ever I have +uttered in the whole course of my life before. I have been so +curt, so abrupt, so abominably dull, that I’ll answer for it he +thinks me worthy to be a man. But I must go back to him, my dear, +so good-bye to conversation and you.”</p> +<p>But though Mr. Smithson might be satisfied with Miss Galindo, I am +afraid she was the only part of the affair with which he was content. +Everything else went wrong. I could not say who told me so—but +the conviction of this seemed to pervade the house. I never knew +how much we had all looked up to the silent, gruff Mr. Horner for decisions, +until he was gone. My lady herself was a pretty good woman of +business, as women of business go. Her father, seeing that she +would be the heiress of the Hanbury property, had given her a training +which was thought unusual in those days, and she liked to feel herself +queen regnant, and to have to decide in all cases between herself and +her tenantry. But, perhaps, Mr. Horner would have done it more +wisely; not but what she always attended to him at last. She would +begin by saying, pretty clearly and promptly, what she would have done, +and what she would not have done. If Mr. Horner approved of it, +he bowed, and set about obeying her directly; if he disapproved of it, +he bowed, and lingered so long before he obeyed her, that she forced +his opinion out of him with her “Well, Mr. Horner! and what have +you to say against it?” For she always understood his silence +as well as if he had spoken. But the estate was pressed for ready +money, and Mr. Horner had grown gloomy and languid since the death of +his wife, and even his own personal affairs were not in the order in +which they had been a year or two before, for his old clerk had gradually +become superannuated, or, at any rate, unable by the superfluity of +his own energy and wit to supply the spirit that was wanting in Mr. +Horner.</p> +<p>Day after day Mr. Smithson seemed to grow more fidgety, more annoyed +at the state of affairs. Like every one else employed by Lady +Ludlow, as far as I could learn, he had an hereditary tie to the Hanbury +family. As long as the Smithsons had been lawyers, they had been +lawyers to the Hanburys; always coming in on all great family occasions, +and better able to understand the characters, and connect the links +of what had once been a large and scattered family, than any individual +thereof had ever been.</p> +<p>As long as a man was at the head of the Hanburys, the lawyers had +simply acted as servants, and had only given their advice when it was +required. But they had assumed a different position on the memorable +occasion of the mortgage: they had remonstrated against it. My +lady had resented this remonstrance, and a slight, unspoken coolness +had existed between her and the father of this Mr. Smithson ever since.</p> +<p>I was very sorry for my lady. Mr. Smithson was inclined to +blame Mr. Horner for the disorderly state in which he found some of +the outlying farms, and for the deficiencies in the annual payment of +rents. Mr. Smithson had too much good feeling to put this blame +into words; but my lady’s quick instinct led her to reply to a +thought, the existence of which she perceived; and she quietly told +the truth, and explained how she had interfered repeatedly to prevent +Mr. Horner from taking certain desirable steps, which were discordant +to her hereditary sense of right and wrong between landlord and tenant. +She also spoke of the want of ready money as a misfortune that could +be remedied, by more economical personal expenditure on her own part; +by which individual saving, it was possible that a reduction of fifty +pounds a year might have been accomplished. But as soon as Mr. +Smithson touched on larger economies, such as either affected the welfare +of others, or the honour and standing of the great House of Hanbury, +she was inflexible. Her establishment consisted of somewhere about +forty servants, of whom nearly as many as twenty were unable to perform +their work properly, and yet would have been hurt if they had been dismissed; +so they had the credit of fulfilling duties, while my lady paid and +kept their substitutes. Mr. Smithson made a calculation, and would +have saved some hundreds a year by pensioning off these old servants. +But my lady would not hear of it. Then, again, I know privately +that he urged her to allow some of us to return to our homes. +Bitterly we should have regretted the separation from Lady Ludlow; but +we would have gone back gladly, had we known at the time that her circumstances +required it: but she would not listen to the proposal for a moment.</p> +<p>“If I cannot act justly towards every one, I will give up a +plan which has been a source of much satisfaction; at least, I will +not carry it out to such an extent in future. But to these young +ladies, who do me the favour to live with me at present, I stand pledged. +I cannot go back from my word, Mr. Smithson. We had better talk +no more of this.”</p> +<p>As she spoke, she entered the room where I lay. She and Mr. +Smithson were coming for some papers contained in the bureau. +They did not know I was there, and Mr. Smithson started a little when +he saw me, as he must have been aware that I had overheard something. +But my lady did not change a muscle of her face. All the world +might overhear her kind, just, pure sayings, and she had no fear of +their misconstruction. She came up to me, and kissed me on the +forehead, and then went to search for the required papers.</p> +<p>“I rode over the Connington farms yesterday, my lady. +I must say I was quite grieved to see the condition they are in; all +the land that is not waste is utterly exhausted with working successive +white crops. Not a pinch of manure laid on the ground for years. +I must say that a greater contrast could never have been presented than +that between Harding’s farm and the next fields—fences in +perfect order, rotation crops, sheep eating down the turnips on the +waste lands—everything that could be desired.”</p> +<p>“Whose farm is that?” asked my lady.</p> +<p>“Why, I am sorry to say, it was on none of your ladyship’s +that I saw such good methods adopted. I hoped it was, I stopped +my horse to inquire. A queer-looking man, sitting on his horse +like a tailor, watching his men with a couple of the sharpest eyes I +ever saw, and dropping his h’s at every word, answered my question, +and told me it was his. I could not go on asking him who he was; +but I fell into conversation with him, and I gathered that he had earned +some money in trade in Birmingham, and had bought the estate (five hundred +acres, I think he said,) on which he was born, and now was setting himself +to cultivate it in downright earnest, going to Holkham and Woburn, and +half the country over, to get himself up on the subject.”</p> +<p>“It would be Brooke, that dissenting baker from Birmingham,” +said my lady in her most icy tone. “Mr. Smithson, I am sorry +I have been detaining you so long, but I think these are the letters +you wished to see.”</p> +<p>If her ladyship thought by this speech to quench Mr. Smithson she +was mistaken. Mr. Smithson just looked at the letters, and went +on with the old subject.</p> +<p>“Now, my lady, it struck me that if you had such a man to take +poor Horner’s place, he would work the rents and the land round +most satisfactorily. I should not despair of inducing this very +man to undertake the work. I should not mind speaking to him myself +on the subject, for we got capital friends over a snack of luncheon +that he asked me to share with him.”</p> +<p>Lady Ludlow fixed her eyes on Mr. Smithson as he spoke, and never +took them off his face until he had ended. She was silent a minute +before she answered.</p> +<p>“You are very good, Mr. Smithson, but I need not trouble you +with any such arrangements. I am going to write this afternoon +to Captain James, a friend of one of my sons, who has, I hear, been +severely wounded at Trafalgar, to request him to honour me by accepting +Mr. Horner’s situation.”</p> +<p>“A Captain James! A captain in the navy! going to manage +your ladyship’s estate!”</p> +<p>“If he will be so kind. I shall esteem it a condescension +on his part; but I hear that he will have to resign his profession, +his state of health is so bad, and a country life is especially prescribed +for him. I am in some hopes of tempting him here, as I learn he +has but little to depend on if he gives up his profession.”</p> +<p>“A Captain James! an invalid captain!”</p> +<p>“You think I am asking too great a favour,” continued +my lady. (I never could tell how far it was simplicity, or how +far a kind of innocent malice, that made her misinterpret Mr. Smithson’s +words and looks as she did.) “But he is not a post-captain, +only a commander, and his pension will be but small. I may be +able, by offering him country air and a healthy occupation, to restore +him to health.”</p> +<p>“Occupation! My lady, may I ask how a sailor is to manage +land? Why, your tenants will laugh him to scorn.”</p> +<p>“My tenants, I trust, will not behave so ill as to laugh at +any one I choose to set over them. Captain James has had experience +in managing men. He has remarkable practical talents, and great +common sense, as I hear from every one. But, whatever he may be, +the affair rests between him and myself. I can only say I shall +esteem myself fortunate if he comes.”</p> +<p>There was no more to be said, after my lady spoke in this manner. +I had heard her mention Captain James before, as a middy who had been +very kind to her son Urian. I thought I remembered then, that +she had mentioned that his family circumstances were not very prosperous. +But, I confess, that little as I knew of the management of land, I quite +sided with Mr. Smithson. He, silently prohibited from again speaking +to my lady on the subject, opened his mind to Miss Galindo, from whom +I was pretty sure to hear all the opinions and news of the household +and village. She had taken a great fancy to me, because she said +I talked so agreeably. I believe it was because I listened so +well.</p> +<p>“Well, have you heard the news,” she began, “about +this Captain James? A sailor,—with a wooden leg, I have +no doubt. What would the poor, dear, deceased master have said +to it, if he had known who was to be his successor! My dear, I +have often thought of the postman’s bringing me a letter as one +of the pleasures I shall miss in heaven. But, really, I think +Mr. Horner may be thankful he has got out of the reach of news; or else +he would hear of Mr. Smithson’s having made up to the Birmingham +baker, and of his one-legged captain, coming to dot-and-go-one over +the estate. I suppose he will look after the labourers through +a spy-glass. I only hope he won’t stick in the mud with +his wooden leg; for I, for one, won’t help him out. Yes, +I would,” said she, correcting herself; “I would, for my +lady’s sake.”</p> +<p>“But are you sure he has a wooden leg?” asked I. +“I heard Lady Ludlow tell Mr. Smithson about him, and she only +spoke of him as wounded.”</p> +<p>“Well, sailors are almost always wounded in the leg. +Look at Greenwich Hospital! I should say there were twenty one-legged +pensioners to one without an arm there. But say he has got half-a-dozen +legs: what has he to do with managing land? I shall think him +very impudent if he comes, taking advantage of my lady’s kind +heart.”</p> +<p>However, come he did. In a month from that time, the carriage +was sent to meet Captain James; just as three years before it had been +sent to meet me. His coming had been so much talked about that +we were all as curious as possible to see him, and to know how so unusual +an experiment, as it seemed to us, would answer. But, before I +tell you anything about our new agent, I must speak of something quite +as interesting, and I really think quite as important. And this +was my lady’s making friends with Harry Gregson. I do believe +she did it for Mr. Horner’s sake; but, of course, I can only conjecture +why my lady did anything. But I heard one day, from Mary Legard, +that my lady had sent for Harry to come and see her, if he was well +enough to walk so far; and the next day he was shown into the room he +had been in once before under such unlucky circumstances.</p> +<p>The lad looked pale enough, as he stood propping himself up on his +crutch, and the instant my lady saw him, she bade John Footman place +a stool for him to sit down upon while she spoke to him. It might +be his paleness that gave his whole face a more refined and gentle look; +but I suspect it was that the boy was apt to take impressions, and that +Mr. Horner’s grave, dignified ways, and Mr. Gray’s tender +and quiet manners, had altered him; and then the thoughts of illness +and death seem to turn many of us into gentlemen, and gentlewomen, as +long as such thoughts are in our minds. We cannot speak loudly +or angrily at such times; we are not apt to be eager about mere worldly +things, for our very awe at our quickened sense of the nearness of the +invisible world, makes us calm and serene about the petty trifles of +to-day. At least, I know that was the explanation Mr. Gray once +gave me of what we all thought the great improvement in Harry Gregson’s +way of behaving.</p> +<p>My lady hesitated so long about what she had best say, that Harry +grew a little frightened at her silence. A few months ago it would +have surprised me more than it did now; but since my lord her son’s +death, she had seemed altered in many ways,—more uncertain and +distrustful of herself, as it were.</p> +<p>At last she said, and I think the tears were in her eyes: “My +poor little fellow, you have had a narrow escape with your life since +I saw you last.”</p> +<p>To this there was nothing to be said but “Yes;” and again +there was silence.</p> +<p>“And you have lost a good, kind friend, in Mr. Horner.”</p> +<p>The boy’s lips worked, and I think he said, “Please, +don’t.” But I can’t be sure; at any rate, my +lady went on:</p> +<p>“And so have I,—a good, kind friend, he was to both of +us; and to you he wished to show his kindness in even a more generous +way than he has done. Mr. Gray has told you about his legacy to +you, has he not?”</p> +<p>There was no sign of eager joy on the lad’s face, as if he +realised the power and pleasure of having what to him must have seemed +like a fortune.</p> +<p>“Mr. Gray said as how he had left me a matter of money.”</p> +<p>“Yes, he has left you two hundred pounds.”</p> +<p>“But I would rather have had him alive, my lady,” he +burst out, sobbing as if his heart would break.</p> +<p>“My lad, I believe you. We would rather have had our +dead alive, would we not? and there is nothing in money that can comfort +us for their loss. But you know—Mr. Gray has told you—who +has appointed all our times to die. Mr. Horner was a good, just +man; and has done well and kindly, both by me and you. You perhaps +do not know” (and now I understood what my lady had been making +up her mind to say to Harry, all the time she was hesitating how to +begin) “that Mr. Horner, at one time, meant to leave you a great +deal more; probably all he had, with the exception of a legacy to his +old clerk, Morrison. But he knew that this estate—on which +my forefathers had lived for six hundred years—was in debt, and +that I had no immediate chance of paying off this debt; and yet he felt +that it was a very sad thing for an old property like this to belong +in part to those other men, who had lent the money. You understand +me, I think, my little man?” said she, questioning Harry’s +face.</p> +<p>He had left off crying, and was trying to understand, with all his +might and main; and I think he had got a pretty good general idea of +the state of affairs; though probably he was puzzled by the term “the +estate being in debt.” But he was sufficiently interested +to want my lady to go on; and he nodded his head at her, to signify +this to her.</p> +<p>“So Mr. Horner took the money which he once meant to be yours, +and has left the greater part of it to me, with the intention of helping +me to pay off this debt I have told you about. It will go a long +way, and I shall try hard to save the rest, and then I shall die happy +in leaving the land free from debt.” She paused. “But +I shall not die happy in thinking of you. I do not know if having +money, or even having a great estate and much honour, is a good thing +for any of us. But God sees fit that some of us should be called +to this condition, and it is our duty then to stand by our posts, like +brave soldiers. Now, Mr. Horner intended you to have this money +first. I shall only call it borrowing from you, Harry Gregson, +if I take it and use it to pay off the debt. I shall pay Mr. Gray +interest on this money, because he is to stand as your guardian, as +it were, till you come of age; and he must fix what ought to be done +with it, so as to fit you for spending the principal rightly when the +estate can repay it you. I suppose, now, it will be right for +you to be educated. That will be another snare that will come +with your money. But have courage, Harry. Both education +and money may be used rightly, if we only pray against the temptations +they bring with them.”</p> +<p>Harry could make no answer, though I am sure he understood it all. +My lady wanted to get him to talk to her a little, by way of becoming +acquainted with what was passing in his mind; and she asked him what +he would like to have done with his money, if he could have part of +it now? To such a simple question, involving no talk about feelings, +his answer came readily enough.</p> +<p>“Build a cottage for father, with stairs in it, and give Mr. +Gray a school-house. O, father does so want Mr. Gray for to have +his wish! Father saw all the stones lying quarried and hewn on +Farmer Hale’s land; Mr. Gray had paid for them all himself. +And father said he would work night and day, and little Tommy should +carry mortar, if the parson would let him, sooner than that he should +be fretted and frabbed as he was, with no one giving him a helping hand +or a kind word.”</p> +<p>Harry knew nothing of my lady’s part in the affair; that was +very clear. My lady kept silence.</p> +<p>“If I might have a piece of my money, I would buy land from +Mr. Brooks; he has got a bit to sell just at the corner of Hendon Lane, +and I would give it to Mr. Gray; and, perhaps, if your ladyship thinks +I may be learned again, I might grow up into the schoolmaster.”</p> +<p>“You are a good boy,” said my lady. “But +there are more things to be thought of, in carrying out such a plan, +than you are aware of. However, it shall be tried.”</p> +<p>“The school, my lady?” I exclaimed, almost thinking she +did not know what she was saying.</p> +<p>“Yes, the school. For Mr. Horner’s sake, for Mr. +Gray’s sake, and last, not least, for this lad’s sake, I +will give the new plan a trial. Ask Mr. Gray to come up to me +this afternoon about the land he wants. He need not go to a Dissenter +for it. And tell your father he shall have a good share in the +building of it, and Tommy shall carry the mortar.”</p> +<p>“And I may be schoolmaster?” asked Harry, eagerly.</p> +<p>“We’ll see about that,” said my lady, amused. +“It will be some time before that plan comes to pass, my little +fellow.”</p> +<p>And now to return to Captain James. My first account of him +was from Miss Galindo.</p> +<p>“He’s not above thirty; and I must just pack up my pens +and my paper, and be off; for it would be the height of impropriety +for me to be staying here as his clerk. It was all very well in +the old master’s days. But here am I, not fifty till next +May, and this young, unmarried man, who is not even a widower! +O, there would be no end of gossip. Besides he looks as askance +at me as I do at him. My black silk gown had no effect. +He’s afraid I shall marry him. But I won’t; he may +feel himself quite safe from that. And Mr. Smithson has been recommending +a clerk to my lady. She would far rather keep me on; but I can’t +stop. I really could not think it proper.”</p> +<p>“What sort of a looking man is he?”</p> +<p>“O, nothing particular. Short, and brown, and sunburnt. +I did not think it became me to look at him. Well, now for the +nightcaps. I should have grudged any one else doing them, for +I have got such a pretty pattern!”</p> +<p>But when it came to Miss Galindo’s leaving, there was a great +misunderstanding between her and my lady. Miss Galindo had imagined +that my lady had asked her as a favour to copy the letters, and enter +the accounts, and had agreed to do the work without the notion of being +paid for so doing. She had, now and then, grieved over a very +profitable order for needlework passing out of her hands on account +of her not having time to do it, because of her occupation at the Hall; +but she had never hinted this to my lady, but gone on cheerfully at +her writing as long as her clerkship was required. My lady was +annoyed that she had not made her intention of paying Miss Galindo more +clear, in the first conversation she had had with her; but I suppose +that she had been too delicate to be very explicit with regard to money +matters; and now Miss Galindo was quite hurt at my lady’s wanting +to pay her for what she had done in such right-down good-will.</p> +<p>“No,” Miss Galindo said; “my own dear lady, you +may be as angry with me as you like, but don’t offer me money. +Think of six-and-twenty years ago, and poor Arthur, and as you were +to me then! Besides, I wanted money—I don’t disguise +it—for a particular purpose; and when I found that (God bless +you for asking me!) I could do you a service, I turned it over in my +mind, and I gave up one plan and took up another, and it’s all +settled now. Bessy is to leave school and come and live with me. +Don’t, please, offer me money again. You don’t know +how glad I have been to do anything for you. Have not I, Margaret +Dawson? Did you not hear me say, one day, I would cut off my hand +for my lady; for am I a stick or a stone, that I should forget kindness? +O, I have been so glad to work for you. And now Bessy is coming +here; and no one knows anything about her—as if she had done anything +wrong, poor child!”</p> +<p>“Dear Miss Galindo,” replied my lady, “I will never +ask you to take money again. Only I thought it was quite understood +between us. And you know you have taken money for a set of morning +wrappers, before now.”</p> +<p>“Yes, my lady; but that was not confidential. Now I was +so proud to have something to do for you confidentially.”</p> +<p>“But who is Bessy?” asked my lady. “I do +not understand who she is, or why she is to come and live with you. +Dear Miss Galindo, you must honour me by being confidential with me +in your turn!”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XIII.</h2> +<p>I had always understood that Miss Galindo had once been in much better +circumstances, but I had never liked to ask any questions respecting +her. But about this time many things came out respecting her former +life, which I will try and arrange: not however, in the order in which +I heard them, but rather as they occurred.</p> +<p>Miss Galindo was the daughter of a clergyman in Westmoreland. +Her father was the younger brother of a baronet, his ancestor having +been one of those of James the First’s creation. This baronet-uncle +of Miss Galindo was one of the queer, out-of-the-way people who were +bred at that time, and in that northern district of England. I +never heard much of him from any one, besides this one great fact: that +he had early disappeared from his family, which indeed only consisted +of a brother and sister who died unmarried, and lived no one knew where,—somewhere +on the Continent, it was supposed, for he had never returned from the +grand tour which he had been sent to make, according to the general +fashion of the day, as soon as he had left Oxford. He corresponded +occasionally with his brother the clergyman; but the letters passed +through a banker’s hands; the banker being pledged to secrecy, +and, as he told Mr. Galindo, having the penalty, if he broke his pledge, +of losing the whole profitable business, and of having the management +of the baronet’s affairs taken out of his hands, without any advantage +accruing to the inquirer, for Sir Lawrence had told Messrs. Graham that, +in case his place of residence was revealed by them, not only would +he cease to bank with them, but instantly take measures to baffle any +future inquiries as to his whereabouts, by removing to some distant +country.</p> +<p>Sir Lawrence paid a certain sum of money to his brother’s account +every year; but the time of this payment varied, and it was sometimes +eighteen or nineteen months between the deposits; then, again, it would +not be above a quarter of the time, showing that he intended it to be +annual, but, as this intention was never expressed in words, it was +impossible to rely upon it, and a great deal of this money was swallowed +up by the necessity Mr. Galindo felt himself under of living in the +large, old, rambling family mansion, which had been one of Sir Lawrence’s +rarely expressed desires. Mr. and Mrs. Galindo often planned to +live upon their own small fortune and the income derived from the living +(a vicarage, of which the great tithes went to Sir Lawrence as lay impropriator), +so as to put-by the payments made by the baronet, for the benefit of +Laurentia—our Miss Galindo. But I suppose they found it +difficult to live economically in a large house, even though they had +it rent free. They had to keep up with hereditary neighbours and +friends, and could hardly help doing it in the hereditary manner.</p> +<p>One of these neighbours, a Mr. Gibson, had a son a few years older +than Laurentia. The families were sufficiently intimate for the +young people to see a good deal of each other: and I was told that this +young Mr. Mark Gibson was an unusually prepossessing man (he seemed +to have impressed every one who spoke of him to me as being a handsome, +manly, kind-hearted fellow), just what a girl would be sure to find +most agreeable. The parents either forgot that their children +were growing up to man’s and woman’s estate, or thought +that the intimacy and probable attachment would be no bad thing, even +if it did lead to a marriage. Still, nothing was ever said by +young Gibson till later on, when it was too late, as it turned out. +He went to and from Oxford; he shot and fished with Mr. Galindo, or +came to the Mere to skate in winter-time; was asked to accompany Mr. +Galindo to the Hall, as the latter returned to the quiet dinner with +his wife and daughter; and so, and so, it went on, nobody much knew +how, until one day, when Mr. Galindo received a formal letter from his +brother’s bankers, announcing Sir Lawrence’s death, of malaria +fever, at Albano, and congratulating Sir Hubert on his accession to +the estates and the baronetcy. The king is dead—“Long +live the king!” as I have since heard that the French express +it.</p> +<p>Sir Hubert and his wife were greatly surprised. Sir Lawrence +was but two years older than his brother; and they had never heard of +any illness till they heard of his death. They were sorry; very +much shocked; but still a little elated at the succession to the baronetcy +and estates. The London bankers had managed everything well. +There was a large sum of ready money in their hands, at Sir Hubert’s +service, until he should touch his rents, the rent-roll being eight +thousand a-year. And only Laurentia to inherit it all! Her +mother, a poor clergyman’s daughter, began to plan all sorts of +fine marriages for her; nor was her father much behind his wife in his +ambition. They took her up to London, when they went to buy new +carriages, and dresses, and furniture. And it was then and there +she made my lady’s acquaintance. How it was that they came +to take a fancy to each other, I cannot say. My lady was of the +old nobility,—grand, compose, gentle, and stately in her ways. +Miss Galindo must always have been hurried in her manner, and her energy +must have shown itself in inquisitiveness and oddness even in her youth. +But I don’t pretend to account for things: I only narrate them. +And the fact was this:—that the elegant, fastidious countess was +attracted to the country girl, who on her part almost worshipped my +lady. My lady’s notice of their daughter made her parents +think, I suppose, that there was no match that she might not command; +she, the heiress of eight thousand a-year, and visiting about among +earls and dukes. So when they came back to their old Westmoreland +Hall, and Mark Gibson rode over to offer his hand and his heart, and +prospective estate of nine hundred a-year, to his old companion and +playfellow, Laurentia, Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo made very short work +of it. They refused him plumply themselves; and when he begged +to be allowed to speak to Laurentia, they found some excuse for refusing +him the opportunity of so doing, until they had talked to her themselves, +and brought up every argument and fact in their power to convince her—a +plain girl, and conscious of her plainness—that Mr. Mark Gibson +had never thought of her in the way of marriage till after her father’s +accession to his fortune; and that it was the estate—not the young +lady—that he was in love with. I suppose it will never be +known in this world how far this supposition of theirs was true. +My Lady Ludlow had always spoken as if it was; but perhaps events, which +came to her knowledge about this time, altered her opinion. At +any rate, the end of it was, Laurentia refused Mark, and almost broke +her heart in doing so. He discovered the suspicions of Sir Hubert +and Lady Galindo, and that they had persuaded their daughter to share +in them. So he flung off with high words, saying that they did +not know a true heart when they met with one; and that although he had +never offered till after Sir Lawrence’s death, yet that his father +knew all along that he had been attached to Laurentia, only that he, +being the eldest of five children, and having as yet no profession, +had had to conceal, rather than to express, an attachment, which, in +those days, he had believed was reciprocated. He had always meant +to study for the bar, and the end of all he had hoped for had been to +earn a moderate income, which he might ask Laurentia to share. +This, or something like it, was what he said. But his reference +to his father cut two ways. Old Mr. Gibson was known to be very +keen about money. It was just as likely that he would urge Mark +to make love to the heiress, now she was an heiress, as that he would +have restrained him previously, as Mark said he had done. When +this was repeated to Mark, he became proudly reserved, or sullen, and +said that Laurentia, at any rate, might have known him better. +He left the country, and went up to London to study law soon afterwards; +and Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo thought they were well rid of him. +But Laurentia never ceased reproaching herself, and never did to her +dying day, as I believe. The words, “She might have known +me better,” told to her by some kind friend or other, rankled +in her mind, and were never forgotten. Her father and mother took +her up to London the next year; but she did not care to visit—dreaded +going out even for a drive, lest she should see Mark Gibson’s +reproachful eyes—pined and lost her health. Lady Ludlow +saw this change with regret, and was told the cause by Lady Galindo, +who of course, gave her own version of Mark’s conduct and motives. +My lady never spoke to Miss Galindo about it, but tried constantly to +interest and please her. It was at this time that my lady told +Miss Galindo so much about her own early life, and about Hanbury, that +Miss Galindo resolved, if ever she could, she would go and see the old +place which her friend loved so well. The end of it all was, that +she came to live there, as we know.</p> +<p>But a great change was to come first. Before Sir Hubert and +Lady Galindo had left London on this, their second visit, they had a +letter from the lawyer, whom they employed, saying that Sir Lawrence +had left an heir, his legitimate child by an Italian woman of low rank; +at least, legal claims to the title and property had been sent into +him on the boy’s behalf. Sir Lawrence had always been a +man of adventurous and artistic, rather than of luxurious tastes; and +it was supposed, when all came to be proved at the trial, that he was +captivated by the free, beautiful life they lead in Italy, and had married +this Neapolitan fisherman’s daughter, who had people about her +shrewd enough to see that the ceremony was legally performed. +She and her husband had wandered about the shores of the Mediterranean +for years, leading a happy, careless, irresponsible life, unencumbered +by any duties except those connected with a rather numerous family. +It was enough for her that they never wanted money, and that her husband’s +love was always continued to her. She hated the name of England—wicked, +cold, heretic England—and avoided the mention of any subjects +connected with her husband’s early life. So that, when he +died at Albano, she was almost roused out of her vehement grief to anger +with the Italian doctor, who declared that he must write to a certain +address to announce the death of Lawrence Galindo. For some time, +she feared lest English barbarians might come down upon her, making +a claim to the children. She hid herself and them in the Abruzzi, +living upon the sale of what furniture and jewels Sir Lawrence had died +possessed of. When these failed, she returned to Naples, which +she had not visited since her marriage. Her father was dead; but +her brother inherited some of his keenness. He interested the +priests, who made inquiries and found that the Galindo succession was +worth securing to an heir of the true faith. They stirred about +it, obtained advice at the English Embassy; and hence that letter to +the lawyers, calling upon Sir Hubert to relinquish title and property, +and to refund what money he had expended. He was vehement in his +opposition to this claim. He could not bear to think of his brother +having married a foreigner—a papist, a fisherman’s daughter; +nay, of his having become a papist himself. He was in despair +at the thought of his ancestral property going to the issue of such +a marriage. He fought tooth and nail, making enemies of his relations, +and losing almost all his own private property; for he would go on against +the lawyer’s advice, long after every one was convinced except +himself and his wife. At last he was conquered. He gave +up his living in gloomy despair. He would have changed his name +if he could, so desirous was he to obliterate all tie between himself +and the mongrel papist baronet and his Italian mother, and all the succession +of children and nurses who came to take possession of the Hall soon +after Mr. Hubert Galindo’s departure, stayed there one winter, +and then flitted back to Naples with gladness and delight. Mr. +and Mrs. Hubert Galindo lived in London. He had obtained a curacy +somewhere in the city. They would have been thankful now if Mr. +Mark Gibson had renewed his offer. No one could accuse him of +mercenary motives if he had done so. Because he did not come forward, +as they wished, they brought his silence up as a justification of what +they had previously attributed to him. I don’t know what +Miss Galindo thought herself; but Lady Ludlow has told me how she shrank +from hearing her parents abuse him. Lady Ludlow supposed that +he was aware that they were living in London. His father must +have known the fact, and it was curious if he had never named it to +his son. Besides, the name was very uncommon; and it was unlikely +that it should never come across him, in the advertisements of charity +sermons which the new and rather eloquent curate of Saint Mark’s +East was asked to preach. All this time Lady Ludlow never lost +sight of them, for Miss Galindo’s sake. And when the father +and mother died, it was my lady who upheld Miss Galindo in her determination +not to apply for any provision to her cousin, the Italian baronet, but +rather to live upon the hundred a-year which had been settled on her +mother and the children of his son Hubert’s marriage by the old +grandfather, Sir Lawrence.</p> +<p>Mr. Mark Gibson had risen to some eminence as a barrister on the +Northern Circuit, but had died unmarried in the lifetime of his father, +a victim (so people said) to intemperance. Doctor Trevor, the +physician who had been called in to Mr. Gray and Harry Gregson, had +married a sister of his. And that was all my lady knew about the +Gibson family. But who was Bessy?</p> +<p>That mystery and secret came out, too, in process of time. +Miss Galindo had been to Warwick, some years before I arrived at Hanbury, +on some kind of business or shopping, which can only be transacted in +a county town. There was an old Westmoreland connection between +her and Mrs. Trevor, though I believe the latter was too young to have +been made aware of her brother’s offer to Miss Galindo at the +time when it took place; and such affairs, if they are unsuccessful, +are seldom spoken about in the gentleman’s family afterwards. +But the Gibsons and Galindos had been county neighbours too long for +the connection not to be kept up between two members settled far away +from their early homes. Miss Galindo always desired her parcels +to be sent to Dr. Trevor’s, when she went to Warwick for shopping +purchases. If she were going any journey, and the coach did not +come through Warwick as soon as she arrived (in my lady’s coach +or otherwise) from Hanbury, she went to Doctor Trevor’s to wait. +She was as much expected to sit down to the household meals as if she +had been one of the family: and in after-years it was Mrs. Trevor who +managed her repository business for her.</p> +<p>So, on the day I spoke of, she had gone to Doctor Trevor’s +to rest, and possibly to dine. The post in those times, came in +at all hours of the morning: and Doctor Trevor’s letters had not +arrived until after his departure on his morning round. Miss Galindo +was sitting down to dinner with Mrs. Trevor and her seven children, +when the Doctor came in. He was flurried and uncomfortable, and +hurried the children away as soon as he decently could. Then (rather +feeling Miss Galindo’s presence an advantage, both as a present +restraint on the violence of his wife’s grief, and as a consoler +when he was absent on his afternoon round), he told Mrs. Trevor of her +brother’s death. He had been taken ill on circuit, and had +hurried back to his chambers in London only to die. She cried +terribly; but Doctor Trevor said afterwards, he never noticed that Miss +Galindo cared much about it one way or another. She helped him +to soothe his wife, promised to stay with her all the afternoon instead +of returning to Hanbury, and afterwards offered to remain with her while +the Doctor went to attend the funeral. When they heard of the +old love-story between the dead man and Miss Galindo,—brought +up by mutual friends in Westmoreland, in the review which we are all +inclined to take of the events of a man’s life when he comes to +die,—they tried to remember Miss Galindo’s speeches and +ways of going on during this visit. She was a little pale, a little +silent; her eyes were sometimes swollen, and her nose red; but she was +at an age when such appearances are generally attributed to a bad cold +in the head, rather than to any more sentimental reason. They +felt towards her as towards an old friend, a kindly, useful, eccentric +old maid. She did not expect more, or wish them to remember that +she might once have had other hopes, and more youthful feelings. +Doctor Trevor thanked her very warmly for staying with his wife, when +he returned home from London (where the funeral had taken place). +He begged Miss Galindo to stay with them, when the children were gone +to bed, and she was preparing to leave the husband and wife by themselves. +He told her and his wife many particulars—then paused—then +went on—“And Mark has left a child—a little girl—</p> +<p>“But he never was married!” exclaimed Mrs. Trevor.</p> +<p>“A little girl,” continued her husband, “whose +mother, I conclude, is dead. At any rate, the child was in possession +of his chambers; she and an old nurse, who seemed to have the charge +of everything, and has cheated poor Mark, I should fancy, not a little.”</p> +<p>“But the child!” asked Mrs. Trevor, still almost breathless +with astonishment. “How do you know it is his?”</p> +<p>“The nurse told me it was, with great appearance of indignation +at my doubting it. I asked the little thing her name, and all +I could get was ‘Bessy!’ and a cry of ‘Me wants papa!’ +The nurse said the mother was dead, and she knew no more about it than +that Mr. Gibson had engaged her to take care of the little girl, calling +it his child. One or two of his lawyer friends, whom I met with +at the funeral, told me they were aware of the existence of the child.”</p> +<p>“What is to be done with her?” asked Mrs. Gibson.</p> +<p>“Nay, I don’t know,” replied he. “Mark +has hardly left assets enough to pay his debts, and your father is not +inclined to come forward.”</p> +<p>That night, as Doctor Trevor sat in his study, after his wife had +gone to bed, Miss Galindo knocked at his door. She and he had +a long conversation. The result was that he accompanied Miss Galindo +up to town the next day; that they took possession of the little Bessy, +and she was brought down, and placed at nurse at a farm in the country +near Warwick, Miss Galindo undertaking to pay one-half of the expense, +and to furnish her with clothes, and Dr. Trevor undertaking that the +remaining half should be furnished by the Gibson family, or by himself +in their default.</p> +<p>Miss Galindo was not fond of children; and I dare say she dreaded +taking this child to live with her for more reasons than one. +My Lady Ludlow could not endure any mention of illegitimate children. +It was a principle of hers that society ought to ignore them. +And I believe Miss Galindo had always agreed with her until now, when +the thing came home to her womanly heart. Still she shrank from +having this child of some strange woman under her roof. She went +over to see it from time to time; she worked at its clothes long after +every one thought she was in bed; and, when the time came for Bessy +to be sent to school, Miss Galindo laboured away more diligently than +ever, in order to pay the increased expense. For the Gibson family +had, at first, paid their part of the compact, but with unwillingness +and grudging hearts; then they had left it off altogether, and it fell +hard on Dr. Trevor with his twelve children; and, latterly, Miss Galindo +had taken upon herself almost all the burden. One can hardly live +and labour, and plan and make sacrifices, for any human creature, without +learning to love it. And Bessy loved Miss Galindo, too, for all +the poor girl’s scanty pleasures came from her, and Miss Galindo +had always a kind word, and, latterly, many a kind caress, for Mark +Gibson’s child; whereas, if she went to Dr. Trevor’s for +her holiday, she was overlooked and neglected in that bustling family, +who seemed to think that if she had comfortable board and lodging under +their roof, it was enough.</p> +<p>I am sure, now, that Miss Galindo had often longed to have Bessy +to live with her; but, as long as she could pay for her being at school, +she did not like to take so bold a step as bringing her home, knowing +what the effect of the consequent explanation would be on my lady. +And as the girl was now more than seventeen, and past the age when young +ladies are usually kept at school, and as there was no great demand +for governesses in those days, and as Bessy had never been taught any +trade by which to earn her own living, why I don’t exactly see +what could have been done but for Miss Galindo to bring her to her own +home in Hanbury. For, although the child had grown up lately, +in a kind of unexpected manner, into a young woman, Miss Galindo might +have kept her at school for a year longer, if she could have afforded +it; but this was impossible when she became Mr. Horner’s clerk, +and relinquished all the payment of her repository work; and perhaps, +after all, she was not sorry to be compelled to take the step she was +longing for. At any rate, Bessy came to live with Miss Galindo, +in a very few weeks from the time when Captain James set Miss Galindo +free to superintend her own domestic economy again.</p> +<p>For a long time, I knew nothing about this new inhabitant of Hanbury. +My lady never mentioned her in any way. This was in accordance +with Lady Ludlow’s well-known principles. She neither saw +nor heard, nor was in any way cognisant of the existence of those who +had no legal right to exist at all. If Miss Galindo had hoped +to have an exception made in Bessy’s favour, she was mistaken. +My lady sent a note inviting Miss Galindo herself to tea one evening, +about a month after Bessy came; but Miss Galindo “had a cold and +could not come.” The next time she was invited, she “had +an engagement at home”—a step nearer to the absolute truth. +And the third time, she “had a young friend staying with her whom +she was unable to leave.” My lady accepted every excuse +as bonâ fide, and took no further notice. I missed Miss +Galindo very much; we all did; for, in the days when she was clerk, +she was sure to come in and find the opportunity of saying something +amusing to some of us before she went away. And I, as an invalid, +or perhaps from natural tendency, was particularly fond of little bits +of village gossip. There was no Mr. Horner—he even had come +in, now and then, with formal, stately pieces of intelligence—and +there was no Miss Galindo in these days. I missed her much. +And so did my lady, I am sure. Behind all her quiet, sedate manner, +I am certain her heart ached sometimes for a few words from Miss Galindo, +who seemed to have absented herself altogether from the Hall now Bessy +was come.</p> +<p>Captain James might be very sensible, and all that; but not even +my lady could call him a substitute for the old familiar friends. +He was a thorough sailor, as sailors were in those days—swore +a good deal, drank a good deal (without its ever affecting him in the +least), and was very prompt and kind-hearted in all his actions; but +he was not accustomed to women, as my lady once said, and would judge +in all things for himself. My lady had expected, I think, to find +some one who would take his notions on the management of her estate +from her ladyship’s own self; but he spoke as if he were responsible +for the good management of the whole, and must, consequently, be allowed +full liberty of action. He had been too long in command over men +at sea to like to be directed by a woman in anything he undertook, even +though that woman was my lady. I suppose this was the common-sense +my lady spoke of; but when common-sense goes against us, I don’t +think we value it quite so much as we ought to do.</p> +<p>Lady Ludlow was proud of her personal superintendence of her own +estate. She liked to tell us how her father used to take her with +him in his rides, and bid her observe this and that, and on no account +to allow such and such things to be done. But I have heard that +the first time she told all this to Captain James, he told her point-blank +that he had heard from Mr. Smithson that the farms were much neglected +and the rents sadly behind-hand, and that he meant to set to in good +earnest and study agriculture, and see how he could remedy the state +of things. My lady would, I am sure, be greatly surprised, but +what could she do? Here was the very man she had chosen herself, +setting to with all his energy to conquer the defect of ignorance, which +was all that those who had presumed to offer her ladyship advice had +ever had to say against him. Captain James read Arthur Young’s +“Tours” in all his spare time, as long as he was an invalid; +and shook his head at my lady’s accounts as to how the land had +been cropped or left fallow from time immemorial. Then he set +to, and tried too many new experiments at once. My lady looked +on in dignified silence; but all the farmers and tenants were in an +uproar, and prophesied a hundred failures. Perhaps fifty did occur; +they were only half as many as Lady Ludlow had feared; but they were +twice as many, four, eight times as many as the captain had anticipated. +His openly-expressed disappointment made him popular again. The +rough country people could not have understood silent and dignified +regret at the failure of his plans, but they sympathized with a man +who swore at his ill success—sympathized, even while they chuckled +over his discomfiture. Mr. Brooke, the retired tradesman, did +not cease blaming him for not succeeding, and for swearing. “But +what could you expect from a sailor?” Mr. Brooke asked, even in +my lady’s hearing; though he might have known Captain James was +my lady’s own personal choice, from the old friendship Mr. Urian +had always shown for him. I think it was this speech of the Birmingham +baker’s that made my lady determine to stand by Captain James, +and encourage him to try again. For she would not allow that her +choice had been an unwise one, at the bidding (as it were) of a dissenting +tradesman; the only person in the neighbourhood, too, who had flaunted +about in coloured clothes, when all the world was in mourning for my +lady’s only son.</p> +<p>Captain James would have thrown the agency up at once, if my lady +had not felt herself bound to justify the wisdom of her choice, by urging +him to stay. He was much touched by her confidence in him, and +swore a great oath, that the next year he would make the land such as +it had never been before for produce. It was not my lady’s +way to repeat anything she had heard, especially to another person’s +disadvantage. So I don’t think she ever told Captain James +of Mr. Brooke’s speech about a sailor’s being likely to +mismanage the property; and the captain was too anxious to succeed in +this, the second year of his trial, to be above going to the flourishing, +shrewd Mr. Brooke, and asking for his advice as to the best method of +working the estate. I dare say, if Miss Galindo had been as intimate +as formerly at the Hall, we should all of us have heard of this new +acquaintance of the agent’s long before we did. As it was, +I am sure my lady never dreamed that the captain, who held opinions +that were even more Church and King than her own, could ever have made +friends with a Baptist baker from Birmingham, even to serve her ladyship’s +own interests in the most loyal manner.</p> +<p>We heard of it first from Mr. Gray, who came now often to see my +lady, for neither he nor she could forget the solemn tie which the fact +of his being the person to acquaint her with my lord’s death had +created between them. For true and holy words spoken at that time, +though having no reference to aught below the solemn subjects of life +and death, had made her withdraw her opposition to Mr. Gray’s +wish about establishing a village school. She had sighed a little, +it is true, and was even yet more apprehensive than hopeful as to the +result; but almost as if as a memorial to my lord, she had allowed a +kind of rough school-house to be built on the green, just by the church; +and had gently used the power she undoubtedly had, in expressing her +strong wish that the boys might only be taught to read and write, and +the first four rules of arithmetic; while the girls were only to learn +to read, and to add up in their heads, and the rest of the time to work +at mending their own clothes, knitting stockings and spinning. +My lady presented the school with more spinning-wheels than there were +girls, and requested that there might be a rule that they should have +spun so many hanks of flax, and knitted so many pairs of stockings, +before they ever were taught to read at all. After all, it was +but making the best of a bad job with my poor lady—but life was +not what it had been to her. I remember well the day that Mr. +Gray pulled some delicately fine yarn (and I was a good judge of those +things) out of his pocket, and laid it and a capital pair of knitted +stockings before my lady, as the first-fruits, so to say, of his school. +I recollect seeing her put on her spectacles, and carefully examine +both productions. Then she passed them to me.</p> +<p>“This is well, Mr. Gray. I am much pleased. You +are fortunate in your schoolmistress. She has had both proper +knowledge of womanly things and much patience. Who is she? +One out of our village?”</p> +<p>“My lady,” said Mr. Gray, stammering and colouring in +his old fashion, “Miss Bessy is so very kind as to teach all those +sorts of things—Miss Bessy, and Miss Galindo, sometimes.”</p> +<p>My lady looked at him over her spectacles: but she only repeated +the words “Miss Bessy,” and paused, as if trying to remember +who such a person could be; and he, if he had then intended to say more, +was quelled by her manner, and dropped the subject. He went on +to say, that he had thought it his duty to decline the subscription to +his school offered by Mr. Brooke, because he was a Dissenter; that he +(Mr. Gray) feared that Captain James, through whom Mr. Brooke’s +offer of money had been made, was offended at his refusing to accept +it from a man who held heterodox opinions; nay, whom Mr. Gray suspected +of being infected by Dodwell’s heresy.</p> +<p>“I think there must be some mistake,” said my lady, “or +I have misunderstood you. Captain James would never be sufficiently +with a schismatic to be employed by that man Brooke in distributing +his charities. I should have doubted, until now, if Captain James +knew him.”</p> +<p>“Indeed, my lady, he not only knows him, but is intimate with +him, I regret to say. I have repeatedly seen the captain and Mr. +Brooke walking together; going through the fields together; and people +do say—”</p> +<p>My lady looked up in interrogation at Mr. Gray’s pause.</p> +<p>“I disapprove of gossip, and it may be untrue; but people do +say that Captain James is very attentive to Miss Brooke.”</p> +<p>“Impossible!” said my lady, indignantly. “Captain +James is a loyal and religious man. I beg your pardon Mr. Gray, +but it is impossible.”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XIV.</h2> +<p>Like many other things which have been declared to be impossible, +this report of Captain James being attentive to Miss Brooke turned out +to be very true.</p> +<p>The mere idea of her agent being on the slightest possible terms +of acquaintance with the Dissenter, the tradesman, the Birmingham democrat, +who had come to settle in our good, orthodox, aristocratic, and agricultural +Hanbury, made my lady very uneasy. Miss Galindo’s misdemeanour +in having taken Miss Bessy to live with her, faded into a mistake, a +mere error of judgment, in comparison with Captain James’s intimacy +at Yeast House, as the Brookes called their ugly square-built farm. +My lady talked herself quite into complacency with Miss Galindo, and +even Miss Bessy was named by her, the first time I had ever been aware +that my lady recognized her existence; but—I recollect it was +a long rainy afternoon, and I sat with her ladyship, and we had time +and opportunity for a long uninterrupted talk—whenever we had +been silent for a little while she began again, with something like +a wonder how it was that Captain James could ever have commenced an +acquaintance with “that man Brooke.” My lady recapitulated +all the times she could remember, that anything had occurred, or been +said by Captain James which she could now understand as throwing light +upon the subject.</p> +<p>“He said once that he was anxious to bring in the Norfolk system +of cropping, and spoke a good deal about Mr. Coke of Holkham (who, by +the way, was no more a Coke than I am—collateral in the female +line—which counts for little or nothing among the great old commoners’ +families of pure blood), and his new ways of cultivation; of course +new men bring in new ways, but it does not follow that either are better +than the old ways. However, Captain James has been very anxious +to try turnips and bone manure, and he really is a man of such good +sense and energy, and was so sorry last year about the failure, that +I consented; and now I begin to see my error. I have always heard +that town bakers adulterate their flour with bone-dust; and, of course, +Captain James would be aware of this, and go to Brooke to inquire where +the article was to be purchased.”</p> +<p>My lady always ignored the fact which had sometimes, I suspect, been +brought under her very eyes during her drives, that Mr. Brooke’s +few fields were in a state of far higher cultivation than her own; so +she could not, of course, perceive that there was any wisdom to be gained +from asking the advice of the tradesman turned farmer.</p> +<p>But by-and-by this fact of her agent’s intimacy with the person +whom in the whole world she most disliked (with that sort of dislike +in which a large amount of uncomfortableness is combined—the dislike +which conscientious people sometimes feel to another without knowing +why, and yet which they cannot indulge in with comfort to themselves +without having a moral reason why), came before my lady in many shapes. +For, indeed I am sure that Captain James was not a man to conceal or +be ashamed of one of his actions. I cannot fancy his ever lowering +his strong loud clear voice, or having a confidental conversation with +any one. When his crops had failed, all the village had known +it. He complained, he regretted, he was angry, or owned himself +a --- fool, all down the village street; and the consequence was that, +although he was a far more passionate man than Mr. Horner, all the tenants +liked him far better. People, in general, take a kindlier interest +in any one, the workings of whose mind and heart they can watch and +understand, than in a man who only lets you know what he has been thinking +about and feeling, by what he does. But Harry Gregson was faithful +to the memory of Mr. Horner. Miss Galindo has told me that she +used to watch him hobble out of the way of Captain James, as if to accept +his notice, however good-naturedly given, would have been a kind of +treachery to his former benefactor. But Gregson (the father) and +the new agent rather took to each other; and one day, much to my surprise, +I heard that the “poaching, tinkering vagabond,” as the +people used to call Gregson when I first had come to live at Hanbury, +had been appointed gamekeeper; Mr. Gray standing godfather, as it were, +to his trustworthiness, if he were trusted with anything; which I thought +at the time was rather an experiment, only it answered, as many of Mr. +Gray’s deeds of daring did. It was curious how he was growing +to be a kind of autocrat in the village; and how unconscious he was +of it. He was as shy and awkward and nervous as ever in any affair +that was not of some moral consequence to him. But as soon as +he was convinced that a thing was right, he “shut his eyes and +ran and butted at it like a ram,” as Captain James once expressed +it, in talking over something Mr. Gray had done. People in the +village said, “they never knew what the parson would be at next;” +or they might have said, “where his reverence would next turn +up.” For I have heard of his marching right into the middle +of a set of poachers, gathered together for some desperate midnight +enterprise, or walking into a public-house that lay just beyond the +bounds of my lady’s estate, and in that extra-parochial piece +of ground I named long ago, and which was considered the rendezvous +of all the ne’er-do-weel characters for miles round, and where +a parson and a constable were held in much the same kind of esteem as +unwelcome visitors. And yet Mr. Gray had his long fits of depression, +in which he felt as if he were doing nothing, making no way in his work, +useless and unprofitable, and better out of the world than in it. +In comparison with the work he had set himself to do, what he did seemed +to be nothing. I suppose it was constitutional, those attacks +of lowness of spirits which he had about this time; perhaps a part of +the nervousness which made him always so awkward when he came to the +Hall. Even Mrs. Medlicott, who almost worshipped the ground he +trod on, as the saying is, owned that Mr. Gray never entered one of +my lady’s rooms without knocking down something, and too often +breaking it. He would much sooner have faced a desperate poacher +than a young lady any day. At least so we thought.</p> +<p>I do not know how it was that it came to pass that my lady became +reconciled to Miss Galindo about this time. Whether it was that +her ladyship was weary of the unspoken coolness with her old friend; +or that the specimens of delicate sewing and fine spinning at the school +had mollified her towards Miss Bessy; but I was surprised to learn one +day that Miss Galindo and her young friend were coming that very evening +to tea at the Hall. This information was given me by Mrs. Medlicott, +as a message from my lady, who further went on to desire that certain +little preparations should be made in her own private sitting-room, +in which the greater part of my days were spent. From the nature +of these preparations, I became quite aware that my lady intended to +do honour to her expected visitors. Indeed, Lady Ludlow never +forgave by halves, as I have known some people do. Whoever was +coming as a visitor to my lady, peeress, or poor nameless girl, there +was a certain amount of preparation required in order to do them fitting +honour. I do not mean to say that the preparation was of the same +degree of importance in each case. I dare say, if a peeress had +come to visit us at the Hall, the covers would have been taken off the +furniture in the white drawing-room (they never were uncovered all the +time I stayed at the Hall), because my lady would wish to offer her +the ornaments and luxuries which this grand visitor (who never came—I +wish she had! I did so want to see that furniture uncovered!) +was accustomed to at home, and to present them to her in the best order +in which my lady could. The same rule, mollified, held good with +Miss Galindo. Certain things, in which my lady knew she took an +interest, were laid out ready for her to examine on this very day; and, +what was more, great books of prints were laid out, such as I remembered +my lady had had brought forth to beguile my own early days of illness,—Mr. +Hogarth’s works, and the like,—which I was sure were put +out for Miss Bessy.</p> +<p>No one knows how curious I was to see this mysterious Miss Bessy—twenty +times more mysterious, of course, for want of her surname. And +then again (to try and account for my great curiosity, of which in recollection +I am more than half ashamed), I had been leading the quiet monotonous +life of a crippled invalid for many years,—shut up from any sight +of new faces; and this was to be the face of one whom I had thought +about so much and so long,—Oh! I think I might be excused.</p> +<p>Of course they drank tea in the great hall, with the four young gentlewomen, +who, with myself, formed the small bevy now under her ladyship’s +charge. Of those who were at Hanbury when first I came, none remained; +all were married, or gone once more to live at some home which could +be called their own, whether the ostensible head were father or brother. +I myself was not without some hopes of a similar kind. My brother +Harry was now a curate in Westmoreland, and wanted me to go and live +with him, as eventually I did for a time. But that is neither +here nor there at present. What I am talking about is Miss Bessy.</p> +<p>After a reasonable time had elapsed, occupied as I well knew by the +meal in the great hall,—the measured, yet agreeable conversation +afterwards,—and a certain promenade around the hall, and through +the drawing-rooms, with pauses before different pictures, the history +or subject of each of which was invariably told by my lady to every +new visitor,—a sort of giving them the freedom of the old family-seat, +by describing the kind and nature of the great progenitors who had lived +there before the narrator,—I heard the steps approaching my lady’s +room, where I lay. I think I was in such a state of nervous expectation, +that if I could have moved easily, I should have got up and run away. +And yet I need not have been, for Miss Galindo was not in the least +altered (her nose a little redder, to be sure, but then that might only +have had a temporary cause in the private crying I know she would have +had before coming to see her dear Lady Ludlow once again). But +I could almost have pushed Miss Galindo away, as she intercepted me +in my view of the mysterious Miss Bessy.</p> +<p>Miss Bessy was, as I knew, only about eighteen, but she looked older. +Dark hair, dark eyes, a tall, firm figure, a good, sensible face, with +a serene expression, not in the least disturbed by what I had been thinking +must be such awful circumstances as a first introduction to my lady, +who had so disapproved of her very existence: those are the clearest +impressions I remember of my first interview with Miss Bessy. +She seemed to observe us all, in her quiet manner, quite as much as +I did her; but she spoke very little; occupied herself, indeed, as my +lady had planned, with looking over the great books of engravings. +I think I must have (foolishly) intended to make her feel at her ease, +by my patronage; but she was seated far away from my sofa, in order +to command the light, and really seemed so unconcerned at her unwonted +circumstances, that she did not need my countenance or kindness. +One thing I did like—her watchful look at Miss Galindo from time +to time: it showed that her thoughts and sympathy were ever at Miss +Galindo’s service, as indeed they well might be. When Miss +Bessy spoke, her voice was full and clear, and what she said, to the +purpose, though there was a slight provincial accent in her way of speaking. +After a while, my lady set us two to play at chess, a game which I had +lately learnt at Mr. Gray’s suggestion. Still we did not +talk much together, though we were becoming attracted towards each other, +I fancy.</p> +<p>“You will play well,” said she. “You have +only learnt about six months, have you? And yet you can nearly +beat me, who have been at it as many years.”</p> +<p>“I began to learn last November. I remember Mr. Gray’s +bringing me ‘Philidor on Chess,’ one very foggy, dismal +day.”</p> +<p>What made her look up so suddenly, with bright inquiry in her eyes? +What made her silent for a moment as if in thought, and then go on with +something, I know not what, in quite an altered tone?</p> +<p>My lady and Miss Galindo went on talking, while I sat thinking. +I heard Captain James’s name mentioned pretty frequently; and +at last my lady put down her work, and said, almost with tears in her +eyes:</p> +<p>“I could not—I cannot believe it. He must be aware +she is a schismatic; a baker’s daughter; and he is a gentleman +by virtue and feeling, as well as by his profession, though his manners +may be at times a little rough. My dear Miss Galindo, what will +this world come to?”</p> +<p>Miss Galindo might possibly be aware of her own share in bringing +the world to the pass which now dismayed my lady,—for of course, +though all was now over and forgiven, yet Miss, Bessy’s being +received into a respectable maiden lady’s house, was one of the +portents as to the world’s future which alarmed her ladyship; +and Miss Galindo knew this,—but, at any rate, she had too lately +been forgiven herself not to plead for mercy for the next offender against +my lady’s delicate sense of fitness and propriety,—so she +replied:</p> +<p>“Indeed, my lady, I have long left off trying to conjecture +what makes Jack fancy Gill, or Gill Jack. It’s best to sit +down quiet under the belief that marriages are made for us, somewhere +out of this world, and out of the range of this world’s reason +and laws. I’m not so sure that I should settle it down that +they were made in heaven; t’other place seems to me as likely +a workshop; but at any rate, I’ve given up troubling my head as +to why they take place. Captain James is a gentleman; I make no +doubt of that ever since I saw him stop to pick up old Goody Blake (when +she tumbled down on the slide last winter) and then swear at a little +lad who was laughing at her, and cuff him till he tumbled down crying; +but we must have bread somehow, and though I like it better baked at +home in a good sweet brick oven, yet, as some folks never can get it +to rise, I don’t see why a man may not be a baker. You see, +my lady, I look upon baking as a simple trade, and as such lawful. +There is no machine comes in to take away a man’s or woman’s +power of earning their living, like the spinning-jenny (the old busybody +that she is), to knock up all our good old women’s livelihood, +and send them to their graves before their time. There’s +an invention of the enemy, if you will!”</p> +<p>“That’s very true!” said my lady, shaking her head.</p> +<p>“But baking bread is wholesome, straight-forward elbow-work. +They have not got to inventing any contrivance for that yet, thank Heaven! +It does not seem to me natural, nor according to Scripture, that iron +and steel (whose brows can’t sweat) should be made to do man’s +work. And so I say, all those trades where iron and steel do the +work ordained to man at the Fall, are unlawful, and I never stand up +for them. But say this baker Brooke did knead his bread, and make +it rise, and then that people, who had, perhaps, no good ovens, came +to him, and bought his good light bread, and in this manner he turned +an honest penny and got rich; why, all I say, my lady, is this,—I +dare say he would have been born a Hanbury, or a lord if he could; and +if he was not, it is no fault of his, that I can see, that he made good +bread (being a baker by trade), and got money, and bought his land. +It was his misfortune, not his fault, that he was not a person of quality +by birth.”</p> +<p>“That’s very true,” said my lady, after a moment’s +pause for consideration. “But, although he was a baker, +he might have been a Churchman. Even your eloquence, Miss Galindo, +shan’t convince me that that is not his own fault.”</p> +<p>“I don’t see even that, begging your pardon, my lady,” +said Miss Galindo, emboldened by the first success of her eloquence. +“When a Baptist is a baby, if I understand their creed aright, +he is not baptized; and, consequently, he can have no godfathers and +godmothers to do anything for him in his baptism; you agree to that, +my lady?”</p> +<p>My lady would rather have known what her acquiescence would lead +to, before acknowledging that she could not dissent from this first +proposition; still she gave her tacit agreement by bowing her head.</p> +<p>“And, you know, our godfathers and godmothers are expected +to promise and vow three things in our name, when we are little babies, +and can do nothing but squall for ourselves. It is a great privilege, +but don’t let us be hard upon those who have not had the chance +of godfathers and godmothers. Some people, we know, are born with +silver spoons,—that’s to say, a godfather to give one things, +and teach one’s catechism, and see that we’re confirmed +into good church-going Christians,—and others with wooden ladles +in their mouths. These poor last folks must just be content to +be godfatherless orphans, and Dissenters, all their lives; and if they +are tradespeople into the bargain, so much the worse for them; but let +us be humble Christians, my dear lady, and not hold our heads too high +because we were born orthodox quality.”</p> +<p>“You go on too fast, Miss Galindo! I can’t follow +you. Besides, I do believe dissent to be an invention of the Devil’s. +Why can’t they believe as we do? It’s very wrong. +Besides, its schism and heresy, and, you know, the Bible says that’s +as bad as witchcraft.”</p> +<p>My lady was not convinced, as I could see. After Miss Galindo +had gone, she sent Mrs. Medlicott for certain books out of the great +old library up stairs, and had them made up into a parcel under her +own eye.</p> +<p>“If Captain James comes to-morrow, I will speak to him about +these Brookes. I have not hitherto liked to speak to him, because +I did not wish to hurt him, by supposing there could be any truth in +the reports about his intimacy with them. But now I will try and +do my duty by him and them. Surely this great body of divinity +will bring them back to the true church.”</p> +<p>I could not tell, for though my lady read me over the titles, I was +not any the wiser as to their contents. Besides, I was much more +anxious to consult my lady as to my own change of place. I showed +her the letter I had that day received from Harry; and we once more +talked over the expediency of my going to live with him, and trying +what entire change of air would do to re-establish my failing health. +I could say anything to my lady, she was so sure to understand me rightly. +For one thing, she never thought of herself, so I had no fear of hurting +her by stating the truth. I told her how happy my years had been +while passed under her roof; but that now I had begun to wonder whether +I had not duties elsewhere, in making a home for Harry,—and whether +the fulfilment of these duties, quiet ones they must needs be in the +case of such a cripple as myself, would not prevent my sinking into +the querulous habit of thinking and talking, into which I found myself +occasionally falling. Add to which, there was the prospect of +benefit from the more bracing air of the north.</p> +<p>It was then settled that my departure from Hanbury, my happy home +for so long, was to take place before many weeks had passed. And +as, when one period of life is about to be shut up for ever, we are +sure to look back upon it with fond regret, so I, happy enough in my +future prospects, could not avoid recurring to all the days of my life +in the Hall, from the time when I came to it, a shy awkward girl, scarcely +past childhood, to now, when a grown woman,—past childhood—almost, +from the very character of my illness, past youth,—I was looking +forward to leaving my lady’s house (as a residence) for ever. +As it has turned out, I never saw either her or it again. Like +a piece of sea-wreck, I have drifted away from those days: quiet, happy, +eventless days,—very happy to remember!</p> +<p>I thought of good, jovial Mr. Mountford,—and his regrets that +he might not keep a pack, “a very small pack,” of harriers, +and his merry ways, and his love of good eating; of the first coming +of Mr. Gray, and my lady’s attempt to quench his sermons, when +they tended to enforce any duty connected with education. And +now we had an absolute school-house in the village; and since Miss Bessy’s +drinking tea at the Hall, my lady had been twice inside it, to give +directions about some fine yarn she was having spun for table-napery. +And her ladyship had so outgrown her old custom of dispensing with sermon +or discourse, that even during the temporary preaching of Mr. Crosse, +she had never had recourse to it, though I believe she would have had +all the congregation on her side if she had.</p> +<p>And Mr. Horner was dead, and Captain James reigned in his stead. +Good, steady, severe, silent Mr. Horner! with his clock-like regularity, +and his snuff-coloured clothes, and silver buckles! I have often +wondered which one misses most when they are dead and gone,—the +bright creatures full of life, who are hither and thither and everywhere, +so that no one can reckon upon their coming and going, with whom stillness +and the long quiet of the grave, seems utterly irreconcilable, so full +are they of vivid motion and passion,—or the slow, serious people, +whose movements—nay, whose very words, seem to go by clockwork; +who never appear much to affect the course of our life while they are +with us, but whose methodical ways show themselves, when they are gone, +to have been intertwined with our very roots of daily existence. +I think I miss these last the most, although I may have loved the former +best. Captain James never was to me what Mr. Horner was, though +the latter had hardly changed a dozen words with me at the day of his +death. Then Miss Galindo! I remembered the time as if it +had been only yesterday, when she was but a name—and a very odd +one—to me; then she was a queer, abrupt, disagreeable, busy old +maid. Now I loved her dearly, and I found out that I was almost +jealous of Miss Bessy.</p> +<p>Mr. Gray I never thought of with love; the feeling was almost reverence +with which I looked upon him. I have not wished to speak much +of myself, or else I could have told you how much he had been to me +during these long, weary years of illness. But he was almost as +much to every one, rich and poor, from my lady down to Miss Galindo’s +Sally.</p> +<p>The village, too, had a different look about it. I am sure +I could not tell you what caused the change; but there were no more +lounging young men to form a group at the cross-road, at a time of day +when young men ought to be at work. I don’t say this was +all Mr. Gray’s doing, for there really was so much to do in the +fields that there was but little time for lounging now-a-days. +And the children were hushed up in school, and better behaved out of +it, too, than in the days when I used to be able to go my lady’s +errands in the village. I went so little about now, that I am +sure I can’t tell who Miss Galindo found to scold; and yet she +looked so well and so happy that I think she must have had her accustomed +portion of that wholesome exercise.</p> +<p>Before I left Hanbury, the rumour that Captain James was going to +marry Miss Brooke, Baker Brooke’s eldest daughter, who had only +a sister to share his property with her, was confirmed. He himself +announced it to my lady; nay, more, with a courage, gained, I suppose, +in his former profession, where, as I have heard, he had led his ship +into many a post of danger, he asked her ladyship, the Countess Ludlow, +if he might bring his bride elect, (the Baptist baker’s daughter!) +and present her to my lady!</p> +<p>I am glad I was not present when he made this request; I should have +felt so much ashamed for him, and I could not have helped being anxious +till I heard my lady’s answer, if I had been there. Of course +she acceded; but I can fancy the grave surprise of her look. I +wonder if Captain James noticed it.</p> +<p>I hardly dared ask my lady, after the interview had taken place, +what she thought of the bride elect; but I hinted my curiosity, and +she told me, that if the young person had applied to Mrs. Medlicott, +for the situation of cook, and Mrs. Medlicott had engaged her, she thought +that it would have been a very suitable arrangement. I understood +from this how little she thought a marriage with Captain James, R.N., +suitable.</p> +<p>About a year after I left Hanbury, I received a letter from Miss +Galindo; I think I can find it.—Yes, this is it.</p> +<blockquote><p>‘Hanbury, May 4, 1811.</p> +<p>DEAR MARGARET,</p> +<p>‘You ask for news of us all. Don’t you know there +is no news in Hanbury? Did you ever hear of an event here? +Now, if you have answered “Yes,” in your own mind to these +questions, you have fallen into my trap, and never were more mistaken +in your life. Hanbury is full of news; and we have more events +on our hands than we know what to do with. I will take them in +the order of the newspapers—births, deaths, and marriages. +In the matter of births, Jenny Lucas has had twins not a week ago. +Sadly too much of a good thing, you’ll say. Very true: but +then they died; so their birth did not much signify. My cat has +kittened, too; she has had three kittens, which again you may observe +is too much of a good thing; and so it would be, if it were not for +the next item of intelligence I shall lay before you. Captain +and Mrs. James have taken the old house next Pearson’s; and the +house is overrun with mice, which is just as fortunate for me as the +King of Egypt’s rat-ridden kingdom was to Dick Whittington. +For my cat’s kittening decided me to go and call on the bride, +in hopes she wanted a cat; which she did like a sensible woman, as I +do believe she is, in spite of Baptism, Bakers, Bread, and Birmingham, +and something worse than all, which you shall hear about, if you’ll +only be patient. As I had got my best bonnet on, the one I bought +when poor Lord Ludlow was last at Hanbury in ’99—I thought +it a great condescension in myself (always remembering the date of the +Galindo baronetcy) to go and call on the bride; though I don’t +think so much of myself in my every-day clothes, as you know. +But who should I find there but my Lady Ludlow! She looks as frail +and delicate as ever, but is, I think, in better heart ever since that +old city merchant of a Hanbury took it into his head that he was a cadet +of the Hanburys of Hanbury, and left her that handsome legacy. +I’ll warrant you that the mortgage was paid off pretty fast; and +Mr. Horner’s money—or my lady’s money, or Harry Gregson’s +money, call it which you will—is invested in his name, all right +and tight; and they do talk of his being captain of his school, or Grecian, +or something, and going to college, after all! Harry Gregson the +poacher’s son! Well! to be sure, we are living in strange +times!</p> +<p>‘But I have not done with the marriages yet. Captain +James’s is all very well, but no one cares for it now, we are +so full of Mr. Gray’s. Yes, indeed, Mr. Gray is going to +be married, and to nobody else but my little Bessy! I tell her +she will have to nurse him half the days of her life, he is such a frail +little body. But she says she does not care for that; so that +his body holds his soul, it is enough for her. She has a good +spirit and a brave heart, has my Bessy! It is a great advantage +that she won’t have to mark her clothes over again: for when she +had knitted herself her last set of stockings, I told her to put G for +Galindo, if she did not choose to put it for Gibson, for she should +be my child if she was no one else’s. And now you see it +stands for Gray. So there are two marriages, and what more would +you have? And she promises to take another of my kittens.</p> +<p>‘Now, as to deaths, old Farmer Hale is dead—poor old +man, I should think his wife thought it a good riddance, for he beat +her every day that he was drunk, and he was never sober, in spite of +Mr. Gray. I don’t think (as I tell him) that Mr. Gray would +ever have found courage to speak to Bessy as long as Farmer Hale lived, +he took the old gentleman’s sins so much to heart, and seemed +to think it was all his fault for not being able to make a sinner into +a saint. The parish bull is dead too. I never was so glad +in my life. But they say we are to have a new one in his place. +In the meantime I cross the common in peace, which is very convenient +just now, when I have so often to go to Mr. Gray’s to see about +furnishing.</p> +<p>‘Now you think I have told you all the Hanbury news, don’t +you? Not so. The very greatest thing of all is to come. +I won’t tantalize you, but just out with it, for you would never +guess it. My Lady Ludlow has given a party, just like any plebeian +amongst us. We had tea and toast in the blue drawing-room, old +John Footman waiting with Tom Diggles, the lad that used to frighten +away crows in Farmer Hale’s fields, following in my lady’s +livery, hair powdered and everything. Mrs. Medlicott made tea +in my lady’s own room. My lady looked like a splendid fairy +queen of mature age, in black velvet, and the old lace, which I have +never seen her wear before since my lord’s death. But the +company? you’ll say. Why, we had the parson of Clover, and +the parson of Headleigh, and the parson of Merribank, and the three +parsonesses; and Farmer Donkin, and two Miss Donkins; and Mr. Gray (of +course), and myself and Bessy; and Captain and Mrs. James; yes, and +Mr. and Mrs. Brooke; think of that! I am not sure the parsons +liked it; but he was there. For he has been helping Captain James +to get my lady’s land into order; and then his daughter married +the agent; and Mr. Gray (who ought to know) says that, after all, Baptists +are not such bad people; and he was right against them at one time, +as you may remember. Mrs. Brooke is a rough diamond, to be sure. +People have said that of me, I know. But, being a Galindo, I learnt +manners in my youth and can take them up when I choose. But Mrs. +Brooke never learnt manners, I’ll be bound. When John Footman +handed her the tray with the tea-cups, she looked up at him as if she +were sorely puzzled by that way of going on. I was sitting next +to her, so I pretended not to see her perplexity, and put her cream +and sugar in for her, and was all ready to pop it into her hands,—when +who should come up, but that impudent lad Tom Diggles (I call him lad, +for all his hair is powdered, for you know that it is not natural gray +hair), with his tray full of cakes and what not, all as good as Mrs. +Medlicott could make them. By this time, I should tell you, all +the parsonesses were looking at Mrs. Brooke, for she had shown her want +of breeding before; and the parsonesses, who were just a step above +her in manners, were very much inclined to smile at her doings and sayings. +Well! what does she do, but pull out a clean Bandanna pocket-handkerchief +all red and yellow silk, spread it over her best silk gown; it was, +like enough, a new one, for I had it from Sally, who had it from her +cousin Molly, who is dairy-woman at the Brookes’, that the Brookes +were mighty set-up with an invitation to drink tea at the Hall. +There we were, Tom Diggles even on the grin (I wonder how long it is +since he was own brother to a scarecrow, only not so decently dressed) +and Mrs. Parsoness of Headleigh,—I forget her name, and it’s +no matter, for she’s an ill-bred creature, I hope Bessy will behave +herself better—was right-down bursting with laughter, and as near +a hee-haw as ever a donkey was, when what does my lady do? Ay! +there’s my own dear Lady Ludlow, God bless her! She takes +out her own pocket-handkerchief, all snowy cambric, and lays it softly +down on her velvet lap, for all the world as if she did it every day +of her life, just like Mrs. Brooke, the baker’s wife; and when +the one got up to shake the crumbs into the fire-place, the other did +just the same. But with such a grace! and such a look at us all! +Tom Diggles went red all over; and Mrs. Parsoness of Headleigh scarce +spoke for the rest of the evening; and the tears came into my old silly +eyes; and Mr. Gray, who was before silent and awkward in a way which +I tell Bessy she must cure him of, was made so happy by this pretty +action of my lady’s, that he talked away all the rest of the evening, +and was the life of the company.</p> +<p>‘Oh, Margaret Dawson! I sometimes wonder if you’re +the better off for leaving us. To be sure you’re with your +brother, and blood is blood. But when I look at my lady and Mr. +Gray, for all they’re so different, I would not change places +with any in England.’</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Alas! alas! I never saw my dear lady again. She died +in eighteen hundred and fourteen, and Mr. Gray did not long survive +her. As I dare say you know, the Reverend Henry Gregson is now +vicar of Hanbury, and his wife is the daughter of Mr. Gray and Miss +Bessy.</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY LUDLOW***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 2524-h.htm or 2524-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/5/2/2524 + + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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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: My Lady Ludlow + + +Author: Elizabeth Gaskell + +Release Date: May 17, 2005 [eBook #2524] +[Last updated: March 30, 2011] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY LUDLOW*** + + + + + + +Transcribed from the 1896 Smith Elder and Co. "Lizzie Leigh and Other +Tales" edition by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + + +MY LADY LUDLOW +by Elizabeth Gaskell + + +CHAPTER I. + + +I am an old woman now, and things are very different to what they were in +my youth. Then we, who travelled, travelled in coaches, carrying six +inside, and making a two days' journey out of what people now go over in +a couple of hours with a whizz and a flash, and a screaming whistle, +enough to deafen one. Then letters came in but three times a week: +indeed, in some places in Scotland where I have stayed when I was a girl, +the post came in but once a month;--but letters were letters then; and we +made great prizes of them, and read them and studied them like books. Now +the post comes rattling in twice a day, bringing short jerky notes, some +without beginning or end, but just a little sharp sentence, which well- +bred folks would think too abrupt to be spoken. Well, well! they may all +be improvements,--I dare say they are; but you will never meet with a +Lady Ludlow in these days. + +I will try and tell you about her. It is no story: it has, as I said, +neither beginning, middle, nor end. + +My father was a poor clergyman with a large family. My mother was always +said to have good blood in her veins; and when she wanted to maintain her +position with the people she was thrown among,--principally rich +democratic manufacturers, all for liberty and the French Revolution,--she +would put on a pair of ruffles, trimmed with real old English point, very +much darned to be sure,--but which could not be bought new for love or +money, as the art of making it was lost years before. These ruffles +showed, as she said, that her ancestors had been Somebodies, when the +grandfathers of the rich folk, who now looked down upon her, had been +Nobodies,--if, indeed, they had any grandfathers at all. I don't know +whether any one out of our own family ever noticed these ruffles,--but we +were all taught as children to feel rather proud when my mother put them +on, and to hold up our heads as became the descendants of the lady who +had first possessed the lace. Not but what my dear father often told us +that pride was a great sin; we were never allowed to be proud of anything +but my mother's ruffles: and she was so innocently happy when she put +them on,--often, poor dear creature, to a very worn and threadbare +gown,--that I still think, even after all my experience of life, they +were a blessing to the family. You will think that I am wandering away +from my Lady Ludlow. Not at all. The Lady who had owned the lace, +Ursula Hanbury, was a common ancestress of both my mother and my Lady +Ludlow. And so it fell out, that when my poor father died, and my mother +was sorely pressed to know what to do with her nine children, and looked +far and wide for signs of willingness to help, Lady Ludlow sent her a +letter, proffering aid and assistance. I see that letter now: a large +sheet of thick yellow paper, with a straight broad margin left on the +left-hand side of the delicate Italian writing,--writing which contained +far more in the same space of paper than all the sloping, or masculine +hand-writings of the present day. It was sealed with a coat of arms,--a +lozenge,--for Lady Ludlow was a widow. My mother made us notice the +motto, "Foy et Loy," and told us where to look for the quarterings of the +Hanbury arms before she opened the letter. Indeed, I think she was +rather afraid of what the contents might be; for, as I have said, in her +anxious love for her fatherless children, she had written to many people +upon whom, to tell truly, she had but little claim; and their cold, hard +answers had many a time made her cry, when she thought none of us were +looking. I do not even know if she had ever seen Lady Ludlow: all I knew +of her was that she was a very grand lady, whose grandmother had been +half-sister to my mother's great-grandmother; but of her character and +circumstances I had heard nothing, and I doubt if my mother was +acquainted with them. + +I looked over my mother's shoulder to read the letter; it began, "Dear +Cousin Margaret Dawson," and I think I felt hopeful from the moment I saw +those words. She went on to say,--stay, I think I can remember the very +words: + +'DEAR COUSIN MARGARET DAWSON,--I have been much grieved to hear of the +loss you have sustained in the death of so good a husband, and so +excellent a clergyman as I have always heard that my late cousin Richard +was esteemed to be.' + +"There!" said my mother, laying her finger on the passage, "read that +aloud to the little ones. Let them hear how their father's good report +travelled far and wide, and how well he is spoken of by one whom he never +saw. COUSIN Richard, how prettily her ladyship writes! Go on, +Margaret!" She wiped her eyes as she spoke: and laid her fingers on her +lips, to still my little sister, Cecily, who, not understanding anything +about the important letter, was beginning to talk and make a noise. + +'You say you are left with nine children. I too should have had nine, if +mine had all lived. I have none left but Rudolph, the present Lord +Ludlow. He is married, and lives, for the most part, in London. But I +entertain six young gentlewomen at my house at Connington, who are to me +as daughters--save that, perhaps, I restrict them in certain indulgences +in dress and diet that might be befitting in young ladies of a higher +rank, and of more probable wealth. These young persons--all of +condition, though out of means--are my constant companions, and I strive +to do my duty as a Christian lady towards them. One of these young +gentlewomen died (at her own home, whither she had gone upon a visit) +last May. Will you do me the favour to allow your eldest daughter to +supply her place in my household? She is, as I make out, about sixteen +years of age. She will find companions here who are but a little older +than herself. I dress my young friends myself, and make each of them a +small allowance for pocket-money. They have but few opportunities for +matrimony, as Connington is far removed from any town. The clergyman is +a deaf old widower; my agent is married; and as for the neighbouring +farmers, they are, of course, below the notice of the young gentlewomen +under my protection. Still, if any young woman wishes to marry, and has +conducted herself to my satisfaction, I give her a wedding dinner, her +clothes, and her house-linen. And such as remain with me to my death, +will find a small competency provided for them in my will. I reserve to +myself the option of paying their travelling expenses,--disliking gadding +women, on the one hand; on the other, not wishing by too long absence +from the family home to weaken natural ties. + +'If my proposal pleases you and your daughter--or rather, if it pleases +you, for I trust your daughter has been too well brought up to have a +will in opposition to yours--let me know, dear cousin Margaret Dawson, +and I will make arrangements for meeting the young gentlewoman at +Cavistock, which is the nearest point to which the coach will bring her.' + +My mother dropped the letter, and sat silent. + +"I shall not know what to do without you, Margaret." + +A moment before, like a young untried girl as I was, I had been pleased +at the notion of seeing a new place, and leading a new life. But now,--my +mother's look of sorrow, and the children's cry of remonstrance: "Mother; +I won't go," I said. + +"Nay! but you had better," replied she, shaking her head. "Lady Ludlow +has much power. She can help your brothers. It will not do to slight +her offer." + +So we accepted it, after much consultation. We were rewarded,--or so we +thought,--for, afterwards, when I came to know Lady Ludlow, I saw that +she would have done her duty by us, as helpless relations, however we +might have rejected her kindness,--by a presentation to Christ's Hospital +for one of my brothers. + +And this was how I came to know my Lady Ludlow. + +I remember well the afternoon of my arrival at Hanbury Court. Her +ladyship had sent to meet me at the nearest post-town at which the mail- +coach stopped. There was an old groom inquiring for me, the ostler said, +if my name was Dawson--from Hanbury Court, he believed. I felt it rather +formidable; and first began to understand what was meant by going among +strangers, when I lost sight of the guard to whom my mother had intrusted +me. I was perched up in a high gig with a hood to it, such as in those +days was called a chair, and my companion was driving deliberately +through the most pastoral country I had ever yet seen. By-and-by we +ascended a long hill, and the man got out and walked at the horse's head. +I should have liked to walk, too, very much indeed; but I did not know +how far I might do it; and, in fact, I dared not speak to ask to be +helped down the deep steps of the gig. We were at last at the top,--on a +long, breezy, sweeping, unenclosed piece of ground, called, as I +afterwards learnt, a Chase. The groom stopped, breathed, patted his +horse, and then mounted again to my side. + +"Are we near Hanbury Court?" I asked. + +"Near! Why, Miss! we've a matter of ten mile yet to go." + +Once launched into conversation, we went on pretty glibly. I fancy he +had been afraid of beginning to speak to me, just as I was to him; but he +got over his shyness with me sooner than I did mine with him. I let him +choose the subjects of conversation, although very often I could not +understand the points of interest in them: for instance, he talked for +more than a quarter of an hour of a famous race which a certain dog-fox +had given him, above thirty years before; and spoke of all the covers and +turns just as if I knew them as well as he did; and all the time I was +wondering what kind of an animal a dog-fox might be. + +After we left the Chase, the road grew worse. No one in these days, who +has not seen the byroads of fifty years ago, can imagine what they were. +We had to quarter, as Randal called it, nearly all the way along the deep- +rutted, miry lanes; and the tremendous jolts I occasionally met with made +my seat in the gig so unsteady that I could not look about me at all, I +was so much occupied in holding on. The road was too muddy for me to +walk without dirtying myself more than I liked to do, just before my +first sight of my Lady Ludlow. But by-and-by, when we came to the fields +in which the lane ended, I begged Randal to help me down, as I saw that I +could pick my steps among the pasture grass without making myself unfit +to be seen; and Randal, out of pity for his steaming horse, wearied with +the hard struggle through the mud, thanked me kindly, and helped me down +with a springing jump. + +The pastures fell gradually down to the lower land, shut in on either +side by rows of high elms, as if there had been a wide grand avenue here +in former times. Down the grassy gorge we went, seeing the sunset sky at +the end of the shadowed descent. Suddenly we came to a long flight of +steps. + +"If you'll run down there, Miss, I'll go round and meet you, and then +you'd better mount again, for my lady will like to see you drive up to +the house." + +"Are we near the house?" said I, suddenly checked by the idea. + +"Down there, Miss," replied he, pointing with his whip to certain stacks +of twisted chimneys rising out of a group of trees, in deep shadow +against the crimson light, and which lay just beyond a great square lawn +at the base of the steep slope of a hundred yards, on the edge of which +we stood. + +I went down the steps quietly enough. I met Randal and the gig at the +bottom; and, falling into a side road to the left, we drove sedately +round, through the gateway, and into the great court in front of the +house. + +The road by which we had come lay right at the back. + +Hanbury Court is a vast red-brick house--at least, it is cased in part +with red bricks; and the gate-house and walls about the place are of +brick,--with stone facings at every corner, and door, and window, such as +you see at Hampton Court. At the back are the gables, and arched +doorways, and stone mullions, which show (so Lady Ludlow used to tell us) +that it was once a priory. There was a prior's parlour, I know--only we +called it Mrs. Medlicott's room; and there was a tithe-barn as big as a +church, and rows of fish-ponds, all got ready for the monks' fasting-days +in old time. But all this I did not see till afterwards. I hardly +noticed, this first night, the great Virginian Creeper (said to have been +the first planted in England by one of my lady's ancestors) that half +covered the front of the house. As I had been unwilling to leave the +guard of the coach, so did I now feel unwilling to leave Randal, a known +friend of three hours. But there was no help for it; in I must go; past +the grand-looking old gentleman holding the door open for me, on into the +great hall on the right hand, into which the sun's last rays were sending +in glorious red light,--the gentleman was now walking before me,--up a +step on to the dais, as I afterwards learned that it was called,--then +again to the left, through a series of sitting-rooms, opening one out of +another, and all of them looking into a stately garden, glowing, even in +the twilight, with the bloom of flowers. We went up four steps out of +the last of these rooms, and then my guide lifted up a heavy silk curtain +and I was in the presence of my Lady Ludlow. + +She was very small of stature, and very upright. She wore a great lace +cap, nearly half her own height, I should think, that went round her head +(caps which tied under the chin, and which we called "mobs," came in +later, and my lady held them in great contempt, saying people might as +well come down in their nightcaps). In front of my lady's cap was a +great bow of white satin ribbon; and a broad band of the same ribbon was +tied tight round her head, and served to keep the cap straight. She had +a fine Indian muslin shawl folded over her shoulders and across her +chest, and an apron of the same; a black silk mode gown, made with short +sleeves and ruffles, and with the tail thereof pulled through the pocket- +hole, so as to shorten it to a useful length: beneath it she wore, as I +could plainly see, a quilted lavender satin petticoat. Her hair was +snowy white, but I hardly saw it, it was so covered with her cap: her +skin, even at her age, was waxen in texture and tint; her eyes were large +and dark blue, and must have been her great beauty when she was young, +for there was nothing particular, as far as I can remember, either in +mouth or nose. She had a great gold-headed stick by her chair; but I +think it was more as a mark of state and dignity than for use; for she +had as light and brisk a step when she chose as any girl of fifteen, and, +in her private early walk of meditation in the mornings, would go as +swiftly from garden alley to garden alley as any one of us. + +She was standing up when I went in. I dropped my curtsey at the door, +which my mother had always taught me as a part of good manners, and went +up instinctively to my lady. She did not put out her hand, but raised +herself a little on tiptoe, and kissed me on both cheeks. + +"You are cold, my child. You shall have a dish of tea with me." She +rang a little hand-bell on the table by her, and her waiting-maid came in +from a small anteroom; and, as if all had been prepared, and was awaiting +my arrival, brought with her a small china service with tea ready made, +and a plate of delicately-cut bread and butter, every morsel of which I +could have eaten, and been none the better for it, so hungry was I after +my long ride. The waiting-maid took off my cloak, and I sat down, sorely +alarmed at the silence, the hushed foot-falls of the subdued maiden over +the thick carpet, and the soft voice and clear pronunciation of my Lady +Ludlow. My teaspoon fell against my cup with a sharp noise, that seemed +so out of place and season that I blushed deeply. My lady caught my eye +with hers,--both keen and sweet were those dark-blue eyes of her +ladyship's:-- + +"Your hands are very cold, my dear; take off those gloves" (I wore thick +serviceable doeskin, and had been too shy to take them off unbidden), +"and let me try and warm them--the evenings are very chilly." And she +held my great red hands in hers,--soft, warm, white, ring-laden. Looking +at last a little wistfully into my face, she said--"Poor child! And +you're the eldest of nine! I had a daughter who would have been just +your age; but I cannot fancy her the eldest of nine." Then came a pause +of silence; and then she rang her bell, and desired her waiting-maid, +Adams, to show me to my room. + +It was so small that I think it must have been a cell. The walls were +whitewashed stone; the bed was of white dimity. There was a small piece +of red staircarpet on each side of the bed, and two chairs. In a closet +adjoining were my washstand and toilet-table. There was a text of +Scripture painted on the wall right opposite to my bed; and below hung a +print, common enough in those days, of King George and Queen Charlotte, +with all their numerous children, down to the little Princess Amelia in a +go-cart. On each side hung a small portrait, also engraved: on the left, +it was Louis the Sixteenth; on the other, Marie-Antoinette. On the +chimney-piece there was a tinder-box and a Prayer-book. I do not +remember anything else in the room. Indeed, in those days people did not +dream of writing-tables, and inkstands, and portfolios, and easy chairs, +and what not. We were taught to go into our bedrooms for the purposes of +dressing, and sleeping, and praying. + +Presently I was summoned to supper. I followed the young lady who had +been sent to call me, down the wide shallow stairs, into the great hall, +through which I had first passed on my way to my Lady Ludlow's room. +There were four other young gentlewomen, all standing, and all silent, +who curtsied to me when I first came in. They were dressed in a kind of +uniform: muslin caps bound round their heads with blue ribbons, plain +muslin handkerchiefs, lawn aprons, and drab-coloured stuff gowns. They +were all gathered together at a little distance from the table, on which +were placed a couple of cold chickens, a salad, and a fruit tart. On the +dais there was a smaller round table, on which stood a silver jug filled +with milk, and a small roll. Near that was set a carved chair, with a +countess's coronet surmounting the back of it. I thought that some one +might have spoken to me; but they were shy, and I was shy; or else there +was some other reason; but, indeed, almost the minute after I had come +into the hall by the door at the lower hand, her ladyship entered by the +door opening upon the dais; whereupon we all curtsied very low; I because +I saw the others do it. She stood, and looked at us for a moment. + +"Young gentlewomen," said she, "make Margaret Dawson welcome among you;" +and they treated me with the kind politeness due to a stranger, but still +without any talking beyond what was required for the purposes of the +meal. After it was over, and grace was said by one of our party, my lady +rang her hand-bell, and the servants came in and cleared away the supper +things: then they brought in a portable reading-desk, which was placed on +the dais, and, the whole household trooping in, my lady called to one of +my companions to come up and read the Psalms and Lessons for the day. I +remember thinking how afraid I should have been had I been in her place. +There were no prayers. My lady thought it schismatic to have any prayers +excepting those in the Prayer-book; and would as soon have preached a +sermon herself in the parish church, as have allowed any one not a deacon +at the least to read prayers in a private dwelling-house. I am not sure +that even then she would have approved of his reading them in an +unconsecrated place. + +She had been maid of honour to Queen Charlotte: a Hanbury of that old +stock that flourished in the days of the Plantagenets, and heiress of all +the land that remained to the family, of the great estates which had once +stretched into four separate counties. Hanbury Court was hers by right. +She had married Lord Ludlow, and had lived for many years at his various +seats, and away from her ancestral home. She had lost all her children +but one, and most of them had died at these houses of Lord Ludlow's; and, +I dare say, that gave my lady a distaste to the places, and a longing to +come back to Hanbury Court, where she had been so happy as a girl. I +imagine her girlhood had been the happiest time of her life; for, now I +think of it, most of her opinions, when I knew her in later life, were +singular enough then, but had been universally prevalent fifty years +before. For instance, while I lived at Hanbury Court, the cry for +education was beginning to come up: Mr. Raikes had set up his Sunday +Schools; and some clergymen were all for teaching writing and arithmetic, +as well as reading. My lady would have none of this; it was levelling +and revolutionary, she said. When a young woman came to be hired, my +lady would have her in, and see if she liked her looks and her dress, and +question her about her family. Her ladyship laid great stress upon this +latter point, saying that a girl who did not warm up when any interest or +curiosity was expressed about her mother, or the "baby" (if there was +one), was not likely to make a good servant. Then she would make her put +out her feet, to see if they were well and neatly shod. Then she would +bid her say the Lord's Prayer and the Creed. Then she inquired if she +could write. If she could, and she had liked all that had gone before, +her face sank--it was a great disappointment, for it was an all but +inviolable rule with her never to engage a servant who could write. But +I have known her ladyship break through it, although in both cases in +which she did so she put the girl's principles to a further and unusual +test in asking her to repeat the Ten Commandments. One pert young +woman--and yet I was sorry for her too, only she afterwards married a +rich draper in Shrewsbury--who had got through her trials pretty +tolerably, considering she could write, spoilt all, by saying glibly, at +the end of the last Commandment, "An't please your ladyship, I can cast +accounts." + +"Go away, wench," said my lady in a hurry, "you're only fit for trade; +you will not suit me for a servant." The girl went away crestfallen: in +a minute, however, my lady sent me after her to see that she had +something to eat before leaving the house; and, indeed, she sent for her +once again, but it was only to give her a Bible, and to bid her beware of +French principles, which had led the French to cut off their king's and +queen's heads. + +The poor, blubbering girl said, "Indeed, my lady, I wouldn't hurt a fly, +much less a king, and I cannot abide the French, nor frogs neither, for +that matter." + +But my lady was inexorable, and took a girl who could neither read nor +write, to make up for her alarm about the progress of education towards +addition and subtraction; and afterwards, when the clergyman who was at +Hanbury parish when I came there, had died, and the bishop had appointed +another, and a younger man, in his stead, this was one of the points on +which he and my lady did not agree. While good old deaf Mr. Mountford +lived, it was my lady's custom, when indisposed for a sermon, to stand up +at the door of her large square pew,--just opposite to the +reading-desk,--and to say (at that part of the morning service where it +is decreed that, in quires and places where they sing, here followeth the +anthem): "Mr. Mountford, I will not trouble you for a discourse this +morning." And we all knelt down to the Litany with great satisfaction; +for Mr. Mountford, though he could not hear, had always his eyes open +about this part of the service, for any of my lady's movements. But the +new clergyman, Mr. Gray, was of a different stamp. He was very zealous +in all his parish work; and my lady, who was just as good as she could be +to the poor, was often crying him up as a godsend to the parish, and he +never could send amiss to the Court when he wanted broth, or wine, or +jelly, or sago for a sick person. But he needs must take up the new +hobby of education; and I could see that this put my lady sadly about one +Sunday, when she suspected, I know not how, that there was something to +be said in his sermon about a Sunday-school which he was planning. She +stood up, as she had not done since Mr. Mountford's death, two years and +better before this time, and said-- + +"Mr. Gray, I will not trouble you for a discourse this morning." + +But her voice was not well-assured and steady; and we knelt down with +more of curiosity than satisfaction in our minds. Mr. Gray preached a +very rousing sermon, on the necessity of establishing a Sabbath-school in +the village. My lady shut her eyes, and seemed to go to sleep; but I +don't believe she lost a word of it, though she said nothing about it +that I heard until the next Saturday, when two of us, as was the custom, +were riding out with her in her carriage, and we went to see a poor +bedridden woman, who lived some miles away at the other end of the estate +and of the parish: and as we came out of the cottage we met Mr. Gray +walking up to it, in a great heat, and looking very tired. My lady +beckoned him to her, and told him she should wait and take him home with +her, adding that she wondered to see him there, so far from his home, for +that it was beyond a Sabbath-day's journey, and, from what she had +gathered from his sermon the last Sunday, he was all for Judaism against +Christianity. He looked as if he did not understand what she meant; but +the truth was that, besides the way in which he had spoken up for schools +and schooling, he had kept calling Sunday the Sabbath: and, as her +ladyship said, "The Sabbath is the Sabbath, and that's one thing--it is +Saturday; and if I keep it, I'm a Jew, which I'm not. And Sunday is +Sunday; and that's another thing; and if I keep it, I'm a Christian, +which I humbly trust I am." + +But when Mr. Gray got an inkling of her meaning in talking about a +Sabbath-day's journey, he only took notice of a part of it: he smiled and +bowed, and said no one knew better than her ladyship what were the duties +that abrogated all inferior laws regarding the Sabbath; and that he must +go in and read to old Betty Brown, so that he would not detain her +ladyship. + +"But I shall wait for you, Mr. Gray," said she. "Or I will take a drive +round by Oakfield, and be back in an hour's time." For, you see, she +would not have him feel hurried or troubled with a thought that he was +keeping her waiting, while he ought to be comforting and praying with old +Betty. + +"A very pretty young man, my dears," said she, as we drove away. "But I +shall have my pew glazed all the same." + +We did not know what she meant at the time; but the next Sunday but one +we did. She had the curtains all round the grand old Hanbury family seat +taken down, and, instead of them, there was glass up to the height of six +or seven feet. We entered by a door, with a window in it that drew up or +down just like what you see in carriages. This window was generally +down, and then we could hear perfectly; but if Mr. Gray used the word +"Sabbath," or spoke in favour of schooling and education, my lady stepped +out of her corner, and drew up the window with a decided clang and clash. + +I must tell you something more about Mr. Gray. The presentation to the +living of Hanbury was vested in two trustees, of whom Lady Ludlow was +one: Lord Ludlow had exercised this right in the appointment of Mr. +Mountford, who had won his lordship's favour by his excellent +horsemanship. Nor was Mr. Mountford a bad clergyman, as clergymen went +in those days. He did not drink, though he liked good eating as much as +any one. And if any poor person was ill, and he heard of it, he would +send them plates from his own dinner of what he himself liked best; +sometimes of dishes which were almost as bad as poison to sick people. He +meant kindly to everybody except dissenters, whom Lady Ludlow and he +united in trying to drive out of the parish; and among dissenters he +particularly abhorred Methodists--some one said, because John Wesley had +objected to his hunting. But that must have been long ago for when I +knew him he was far too stout and too heavy to hunt; besides, the bishop +of the diocese disapproved of hunting, and had intimated his +disapprobation to the clergy. For my own part, I think a good run would +not have come amiss, even in a moral point of view, to Mr. Mountford. He +ate so much, and took so little exercise, that we young women often heard +of his being in terrible passions with his servants, and the sexton and +clerk. But they none of them minded him much, for he soon came to +himself, and was sure to make them some present or other--some said in +proportion to his anger; so that the sexton, who was a bit of a wag (as +all sextons are, I think), said that the vicar's saying, "The Devil take +you," was worth a shilling any day, whereas "The Deuce" was a shabby +sixpenny speech, only fit for a curate. + +There was a great deal of good in Mr. Mountford, too. He could not bear +to see pain, or sorrow, or misery of any kind; and, if it came under his +notice, he was never easy till he had relieved it, for the time, at any +rate. But he was afraid of being made uncomfortable; so, if he possibly +could, he would avoid seeing any one who was ill or unhappy; and he did +not thank any one for telling him about them. + +"What would your ladyship have me to do?" he once said to my Lady Ludlow, +when she wished him to go and see a poor man who had broken his leg. "I +cannot piece the leg as the doctor can; I cannot nurse him as well as his +wife does; I may talk to him, but he no more understands me than I do the +language of the alchemists. My coming puts him out; he stiffens himself +into an uncomfortable posture, out of respect to the cloth, and dare not +take the comfort of kicking, and swearing, and scolding his wife, while I +am there. I hear him, with my figurative ears, my lady, heave a sigh of +relief when my back is turned, and the sermon that he thinks I ought to +have kept for the pulpit, and have delivered to his neighbours (whose +case, as he fancies, it would just have fitted, as it seemed to him to be +addressed to the sinful), is all ended, and done, for the day. I judge +others as myself; I do to them as I would be done to. That's +Christianity, at any rate. I should hate--saving your ladyship's +presence--to have my Lord Ludlow coming and seeing me, if I were ill. +'Twould be a great honour, no doubt; but I should have to put on a clean +nightcap for the occasion; and sham patience, in order to be polite, and +not weary his lordship with my complaints. I should be twice as thankful +to him if he would send me game, or a good fat haunch, to bring me up to +that pitch of health and strength one ought to be in, to appreciate the +honour of a visit from a nobleman. So I shall send Jerry Butler a good +dinner every day till he is strong again; and spare the poor old fellow +my presence and advice." + +My lady would be puzzled by this, and by many other of Mr. Mountford's +speeches. But he had been appointed by my lord, and she could not +question her dead husband's wisdom; and she knew that the dinners were +always sent, and often a guinea or two to help to pay the doctor's bills; +and Mr. Mountford was true blue, as we call it, to the back-bone; hated +the dissenters and the French; and could hardly drink a dish of tea +without giving out the toast of "Church and King, and down with the +Rump." Moreover, he had once had the honour of preaching before the King +and Queen, and two of the Princesses, at Weymouth; and the King had +applauded his sermon audibly with,--"Very good; very good;" and that was +a seal put upon his merit in my lady's eyes. + +Besides, in the long winter Sunday evenings, he would come up to the +Court, and read a sermon to us girls, and play a game of picquet with my +lady afterwards; which served to shorten the tedium of the time. My lady +would, on those occasions, invite him to sup with her on the dais; but as +her meal was invariably bread and milk only, Mr. Mountford preferred +sitting down amongst us, and made a joke about its being wicked and +heterodox to eat meagre on Sunday, a festival of the Church. We smiled +at this joke just as much the twentieth time we heard it as we did at the +first; for we knew it was coming, because he always coughed a little +nervously before he made a joke, for fear my lady should not approve: and +neither she nor he seemed to remember that he had ever hit upon the idea +before. + +Mr. Mountford died quite suddenly at last. We were all very sorry to +lose him. He left some of his property (for he had a private estate) to +the poor of the parish, to furnish them with an annual Christmas dinner +of roast beef and plum pudding, for which he wrote out a very good +receipt in the codicil to his will. + +Moreover, he desired his executors to see that the vault, in which the +vicars of Hanbury were interred, was well aired, before his coffin was +taken in; for, all his life long, he had had a dread of damp, and +latterly he kept his rooms to such a pitch of warmth that some thought it +hastened his end. + +Then the other trustee, as I have said, presented the living to Mr. Gray, +Fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford. It was quite natural for us all, as +belonging in some sort to the Hanbury family, to disapprove of the other +trustee's choice. But when some ill-natured person circulated the report +that Mr. Gray was a Moravian Methodist, I remember my lady said, "She +could not believe anything so bad, without a great deal of evidence." + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +Before I tell you about Mr. Gray, I think I ought to make you understand +something more of what we did all day long at Hanbury Court. There were +five of us at the time of which I am speaking, all young women of good +descent, and allied (however distantly) to people of rank. When we were +not with my lady, Mrs. Medlicott looked after us; a gentle little woman, +who had been companion to my lady for many years, and was indeed, I have +been told, some kind of relation to her. Mrs. Medlicott's parents had +lived in Germany, and the consequence was, she spoke English with a very +foreign accent. Another consequence was, that she excelled in all manner +of needlework, such as is not known even by name in these days. She +could darn either lace, table-linen, India muslin, or stockings, so that +no one could tell where the hole or rent had been. Though a good +Protestant, and never missing Guy Faux day at church, she was as skilful +at fine work as any nun in a Papist convent. She would take a piece of +French cambric, and by drawing out some threads, and working in others, +it became delicate lace in a very few hours. She did the same by +Hollands cloth, and made coarse strong lace, with which all my lady's +napkins and table-linen were trimmed. We worked under her during a great +part of the day, either in the still-room, or at our sewing in a chamber +that opened out of the great hall. My lady despised every kind of work +that would now be called Fancy-work. She considered that the use of +coloured threads or worsted was only fit to amuse children; but that +grown women ought not to be taken with mere blues and reds, but to +restrict their pleasure in sewing to making small and delicate stitches. +She would speak of the old tapestry in the hall as the work of her +ancestresses, who lived before the Reformation, and were consequently +unacquainted with pure and simple tastes in work, as well as in religion. +Nor would my lady sanction the fashion of the day, which, at the +beginning of this century, made all the fine ladies take to making shoes. +She said that such work was a consequence of the French Revolution, which +had done much to annihilate all distinctions of rank and class, and hence +it was, that she saw young ladies of birth and breeding handling lasts, +and awls, and dirty cobblers'-wax, like shoe'-makers' daughters. + +Very frequently one of us would be summoned to my lady to read aloud to +her, as she sat in her small withdrawing-room, some improving book. It +was generally Mr. Addison's "Spectator;" but one year, I remember, we had +to read "Sturm's Reflections" translated from a German book Mrs. +Medlicott recommended. Mr. Sturm told us what to think about for every +day in the year; and very dull it was; but I believe Queen Charlotte had +liked the book very much, and the thought of her royal approbation kept +my lady awake during the reading. "Mrs. Chapone's Letters" and "Dr. +Gregory's Advice to Young Ladies" composed the rest of our library for +week-day reading. I, for one, was glad to leave my fine sewing, and even +my reading aloud (though this last did keep me with my dear lady) to go +to the still-room and potter about among the preserves and the medicated +waters. There was no doctor for many miles round, and with Mrs. +Medlicott to direct us, and Dr. Buchan to go by for recipes, we sent out +many a bottle of physic, which, I dare say, was as good as what comes out +of the druggist's shop. At any rate, I do not think we did much harm; +for if any of our physics tasted stronger than usual, Mrs. Medlicott +would bid us let it down with cochineal and water, to make all safe, as +she said. So our bottles of medicine had very little real physic in them +at last; but we were careful in putting labels on them, which looked very +mysterious to those who could not read, and helped the medicine to do its +work. I have sent off many a bottle of salt and water coloured red; and +whenever we had nothing else to do in the still-room, Mrs. Medlicott +would set us to making bread-pills, by way of practice; and, as far as I +can say, they were very efficacious, as before we gave out a box Mrs. +Medlicott always told the patient what symptoms to expect; and I hardly +ever inquired without hearing that they had produced their effect. There +was one old man, who took six pills a-night, of any kind we liked to give +him, to make him sleep; and if, by any chance, his daughter had forgotten +to let us know that he was out of his medicine, he was so restless and +miserable that, as he said, he thought he was like to die. I think ours +was what would be called homoeopathic practice now-a-days. Then we +learnt to make all the cakes and dishes of the season in the still-room. +We had plum-porridge and mince-pies at Christmas, fritters and pancakes +on Shrove Tuesday, furmenty on Mothering Sunday, violet-cakes in Passion +Week, tansy-pudding on Easter Sunday, three-cornered cakes on Trinity +Sunday, and so on through the year: all made from good old Church +receipts, handed down from one of my lady's earliest Protestant +ancestresses. Every one of us passed a portion of the day with Lady +Ludlow; and now and then we rode out with her in her coach and four. She +did not like to go out with a pair of horses, considering this rather +beneath her rank; and, indeed, four horses were very often needed to pull +her heavy coach through the stiff mud. But it was rather a cumbersome +equipage through the narrow Warwickshire lanes; and I used often to think +it was well that countesses were not plentiful, or else we might have met +another lady of quality in another coach and four, where there would have +been no possibility of turning, or passing each other, and very little +chance of backing. Once when the idea of this danger of meeting another +countess in a narrow, deep-rutted lane was very prominent in my mind I +ventured to ask Mrs. Medlicott what would have to be done on such an +occasion; and she told me that "de latest creation must back, for sure," +which puzzled me a good deal at the time, although I understand it now. I +began to find out the use of the "Peerage," a book which had seemed to me +rather dull before; but, as I was always a coward in a coach, I made +myself well acquainted with the dates of creation of our three +Warwickshire earls, and was happy to find that Earl Ludlow ranked second, +the oldest earl being a hunting widower, and not likely to drive out in a +carriage. + +All this time I have wandered from Mr. Gray. Of course, we first saw him +in church when he read himself in. He was very red-faced, the kind of +redness which goes with light hair and a blushing complexion; he looked +slight and short, and his bright light frizzy hair had hardly a dash of +powder in it. I remember my lady making this observation, and sighing +over it; for, though since the famine in seventeen hundred and ninety- +nine and eighteen hundred there had been a tax on hair-powder, yet it was +reckoned very revolutionary and Jacobin not to wear a good deal of it. My +lady hardly liked the opinions of any man who wore his own hair; but this +she would say was rather a prejudice: only in her youth none but the mob +had gone wigless, and she could not get over the association of wigs with +birth and breeding; a man's own hair with that class of people who had +formed the rioters in seventeen hundred and eighty, when Lord George +Gordon had been one of the bugbears of my lady's life. Her husband and +his brothers, she told us, had been put into breeches, and had their +heads shaved on their seventh birthday, each of them; a handsome little +wig of the newest fashion forming the old Lady Ludlow's invariable +birthday present to her sons as they each arrived at that age; and +afterwards, to the day of their death, they never saw their own hair. To +be without powder, as some underbred people were talking of being now, +was in fact to insult the proprieties of life, by being undressed. It +was English sans-culottism. But Mr. Gray did wear a little powder, +enough to save him in my lady's good opinion; but not enough to make her +approve of him decidedly. + +The next time I saw him was in the great hall. Mary Mason and I were +going to drive out with my lady in her coach, and when we went down +stairs with our best hats and cloaks on, we found Mr. Gray awaiting my +lady's coming. I believe he had paid his respects to her before, but we +had never seen him; and he had declined her invitation to spend Sunday +evening at the Court (as Mr. Mountford used to do pretty regularly--and +play a game at picquet too--), which, Mrs. Medlicott told us, had caused +my lady to be not over well pleased with him. + +He blushed redder than ever at the sight of us, as we entered the hall +and dropped him our curtsies. He coughed two or three times, as if he +would have liked to speak to us, if he could but have found something to +say; and every time he coughed he became hotter-looking than ever. I am +ashamed to say, we were nearly laughing at him; half because we, too, +were so shy that we understood what his awkwardness meant. + +My lady came in, with her quick active step--she always walked quickly +when she did not bethink herself of her cane--as if she was sorry to have +us kept waiting--and, as she entered, she gave us all round one of those +graceful sweeping curtsies, of which I think the art must have died out +with her,--it implied so much courtesy;--this time it said, as well as +words could do, "I am sorry to have kept you all waiting,--forgive me." + +She went up to the mantelpiece, near which Mr. Gray had been standing +until her entrance, and curtseying afresh to him, and pretty deeply this +time, because of his cloth, and her being hostess, and he, a new guest. +She asked him if he would not prefer speaking to her in her own private +parlour, and looked as though she would have conducted him there. But he +burst out with his errand, of which he was full even to choking, and +which sent the glistening tears into his large blue eyes, which stood +farther and farther out with his excitement. + +"My lady, I want to speak to you, and to persuade you to exert your kind +interest with Mr. Lathom--Justice Lathom, of Hathaway Manor--" + +"Harry Lathom?" inquired my lady,--as Mr. Gray stopped to take the breath +he had lost in his hurry,--"I did not know he was in the commission." + +"He is only just appointed; he took the oaths not a month ago,--more's +the pity!" + +"I do not understand why you should regret it. The Lathoms have held +Hathaway since Edward the First, and Mr. Lathom bears a good character, +although his temper is hasty--" + +"My lady! he has committed Job Gregson for stealing--a fault of which he +is as innocent as I--and all the evidence goes to prove it, now that the +case is brought before the Bench; only the Squires hang so together that +they can't be brought to see justice, and are all for sending Job to +gaol, out of compliment to Mr. Lathom, saying it his first committal, and +it won't be civil to tell him there is no evidence against his man. For +God's sake, my lady, speak to the gentlemen; they will attend to you, +while they only tell me to mind my own business." + +Now my lady was always inclined to stand by her order, and the Lathoms of +Hathaway Court were cousins to the Hanbury's. Besides, it was rather a +point of honour in those days to encourage a young magistrate, by passing +a pretty sharp sentence on his first committals; and Job Gregson was the +father of a girl who had been lately turned away from her place as +scullery-maid for sauciness to Mrs. Adams, her ladyship's own maid; and +Mr. Gray had not said a word of the reasons why he believed the man +innocent,--for he was in such a hurry, I believe he would have had my +lady drive off to the Henley Court-house then and there;--so there seemed +a good deal against the man, and nothing but Mr. Gray's bare word for +him; and my lady drew herself a little up, and said-- + +"Mr. Gray! I do not see what reason either you or I have to interfere. +Mr. Harry Lathom is a sensible kind of young man, well capable of +ascertaining the truth without our help--" + +"But more evidence has come out since," broke in Mr. Gray. My lady went +a little stiffer, and spoke a little more coldly:-- + +"I suppose this additional evidence is before the justices: men of good +family, and of honour and credit, well known in the county. They +naturally feel that the opinion of one of themselves must have more +weight than the words of a man like Job Gregson, who bears a very +indifferent character,--has been strongly suspected of poaching, coming +from no one knows where, squatting on Hareman's Common--which, by the +way, is extra-parochial, I believe; consequently you, as a clergyman, are +not responsible for what goes on there; and, although impolitic, there +might be some truth in what the magistrates said, in advising you to mind +your own business,"--said her ladyship, smiling,--"and they might be +tempted to bid me mind mine, if I interfered, Mr. Gray: might they not?" + +He looked extremely uncomfortable; half angry. Once or twice he began to +speak, but checked himself, as if his words would not have been wise or +prudent. At last he said--"It may seem presumptuous in me,--a stranger +of only a few weeks' standing--to set up my judgment as to men's +character against that of residents--" Lady Ludlow gave a little bow of +acquiescence, which was, I think, involuntary on her part, and which I +don't think he perceived,--"but I am convinced that the man is innocent +of this offence,--and besides, the justices themselves allege this +ridiculous custom of paying a compliment to a newly-appointed magistrate +as their only reason." + +That unlucky word "ridiculous!" It undid all the good his modest +beginning had done him with my lady. I knew as well as words could have +told me, that she was affronted at the expression being used by a man +inferior in rank to those whose actions he applied it to,--and truly, it +was a great want of tact, considering to whom he was speaking. + +Lady Ludlow spoke very gently and slowly; she always did so when she was +annoyed; it was a certain sign, the meaning of which we had all learnt. + +"I think, Mr. Gray, we will drop the subject. It is one on which we are +not likely to agree." + +Mr. Gray's ruddy colour grew purple and then faded away, and his face +became pale. I think both my lady and he had forgotten our presence; and +we were beginning to feel too awkward to wish to remind them of it. And +yet we could not help watching and listening with the greatest interest. + +Mr. Gray drew himself up to his full height, with an unconscious feeling +of dignity. Little as was his stature, and awkward and embarrassed as he +had been only a few minutes before, I remember thinking he looked almost +as grand as my lady when he spoke. + +"Your ladyship must remember that it may be my duty to speak to my +parishioners on many subjects on which they do not agree with me. I am +not at liberty to be silent, because they differ in opinion from me." + +Lady Ludlow's great blue eyes dilated with surprise, and--I do +think--anger, at being thus spoken to. I am not sure whether it was very +wise in Mr. Gray. He himself looked afraid of the consequences but as if +he was determined to bear them without flinching. For a minute there was +silence. Then my lady replied--"Mr. Gray, I respect your plain speaking, +although I may wonder whether a young man of your age and position has +any right to assume that he is a better judge than one with the +experience which I have naturally gained at my time of life, and in the +station I hold." + +"If I, madam, as the clergyman of this parish, am not to shrink from +telling what I believe to be the truth to the poor and lowly, no more am +I to hold my peace in the presence of the rich and titled." Mr. Gray's +face showed that he was in that state of excitement which in a child +would have ended in a good fit of crying. He looked as if he had nerved +himself up to doing and saying things, which he disliked above +everything, and which nothing short of serious duty could have compelled +him to do and say. And at such times every minute circumstance which +could add to pain comes vividly before one. I saw that he became aware +of our presence, and that it added to his discomfiture. + +My lady flushed up. "Are you aware, sir," asked she, "that you have gone +far astray from the original subject of conversation? But as you talk of +your parish, allow me to remind you that Hareman's Common is beyond the +bounds, and that you are really not responsible for the characters and +lives of the squatters on that unlucky piece of ground." + +"Madam, I see I have only done harm in speaking to you about the affair +at all. I beg your pardon and take my leave." + +He bowed, and looked very sad. Lady Ludlow caught the expression of his +face. + +"Good morning!" she cried, in rather a louder and quicker way than that +in which she had been speaking. "Remember, Job Gregson is a notorious +poacher and evildoer, and you really are not responsible for what goes on +at Hareman's Common." + +He was near the hall door, and said something--half to himself, which we +heard (being nearer to him), but my lady did not; although she saw that +he spoke. "What did he say?" she asked in a somewhat hurried manner, as +soon as the door was closed--"I did not hear." We looked at each other, +and then I spoke: + +"He said, my lady, that 'God help him! he was responsible for all the +evil he did not strive to overcome.'" + +My lady turned sharp round away from us, and Mary Mason said afterwards +she thought her ladyship was much vexed with both of us, for having been +present, and with me for having repeated what Mr. Gray had said. But it +was not our fault that we were in the hall, and when my lady asked what +Mr. Gray had said, I thought it right to tell her. + +In a few minutes she bade us accompany her in her ride in the coach. + +Lady Ludlow always sat forwards by herself, and we girls backwards. +Somehow this was a rule, which we never thought of questioning. It was +true that riding backwards made some of us feel very uncomfortable and +faint; and to remedy this my lady always drove with both windows open, +which occasionally gave her the rheumatism; but we always went on in the +old way. This day she did not pay any great attention to the road by +which we were going, and Coachman took his own way. We were very silent, +as my lady did not speak, and looked very serious. Or else, in general, +she made these rides very pleasant (to those who were not qualmish with +riding backwards), by talking to us in a very agreeable manner, and +telling us of the different things which had happened to her at various +places,--at Paris and Versailles, where she had been in her youth,--at +Windsor and Kew and Weymouth, where she had been with the Queen, when +maid-of-honour--and so on. But this day she did not talk at all. All at +once she put her head out of the window. + +"John Footman," said she, "where are we? Surely this is Hareman's +Common." + +"Yes, an't please my lady," said John Footman, and waited for further +speech or orders. My lady thought a while, and then said she would have +the steps put down and get out. + +As soon as she was gone, we looked at each other, and then without a word +began to gaze after her. We saw her pick her dainty way in the little +high-heeled shoes she always wore (because they had been in fashion in +her youth), among the yellow pools of stagnant water that had gathered in +the clayey soil. John Footman followed, stately, after; afraid too, for +all his stateliness, of splashing his pure white stockings. Suddenly my +lady turned round and said something to him, and he returned to the +carriage with a half-pleased, half-puzzled air. + +My lady went on to a cluster of rude mud houses at the higher end of the +Common; cottages built, as they were occasionally at that day, of wattles +and clay, and thatched with sods. As far as we could make out from dumb +show, Lady Ludlow saw enough of the interiors of these places to make her +hesitate before entering, or even speaking to any of the children who +were playing about in the puddles. After a pause, she disappeared into +one of the cottages. It seemed to us a long time before she came out; +but I dare say it was not more than eight or ten minutes. She came back +with her head hanging down, as if to choose her way,--but we saw it was +more in thought and bewilderment than for any such purpose. + +She had not made up her mind where we should drive to when she got into +the carriage again. John Footman stood, bare-headed, waiting for orders. + +"To Hathaway. My dears, if you are tired, or if you have anything to do +for Mrs. Medlicott, I can drop you at Barford Corner, and it is but a +quarter of an hour's brisk walk home." + +But luckily we could safely say that Mrs. Medlicott did not want us; and +as we had whispered to each other, as we sat alone in the coach, that +surely my lady must have gone to Job Gregson's, we were far too anxious +to know the end of it all to say that we were tired. So we all set off +to Hathaway. Mr. Harry Lathom was a bachelor squire, thirty or thirty- +five years of age, more at home in the field than in the drawing-room, +and with sporting men than with ladies. + +My lady did not alight, of course; it was Mr. Lathom's place to wait upon +her, and she bade the butler,--who had a smack of the gamekeeper in him, +very unlike our own powdered venerable fine gentleman at Hanbury,--tell +his master, with her compliments, that she wished to speak to him. You +may think how pleased we were to find that we should hear all that was +said; though, I think, afterwards we were half sorry when we saw how our +presence confused the squire, who would have found it bad enough to +answer my lady's questions, even without two eager girls for audience. + +"Pray, Mr. Lathom," began my lady, something abruptly for her,--but she +was very full of her subject,--"what is this I hear about Job Gregson?" + +Mr. Lathom looked annoyed and vexed, but dared not show it in his words. + +"I gave out a warrant against him, my lady, for theft,--that is all. You +are doubtless aware of his character; a man who sets nets and springes in +long cover, and fishes wherever he takes a fancy. It is but a short step +from poaching to thieving." + +"That is quite true," replied Lady Ludlow (who had a horror of poaching +for this very reason): "but I imagine you do not send a man to gaol on +account of his bad character." + +"Rogues and vagabonds," said Mr. Lathom. "A man may be sent to prison +for being a vagabond; for no specific act, but for his general mode of +life." + +He had the better of her ladyship for one moment; but then she answered-- + +"But in this case, the charge on which you committed him is for theft; +now his wife tells me he can prove he was some miles distant from +Holmwood, where the robbery took place, all that afternoon; she says you +had the evidence before you." + +Mr. Lathom here interrupted my lady, by saying, in a somewhat sulky +manner--"No such evidence was brought before me when I gave the warrant. +I am not answerable for the other magistrates' decision, when they had +more evidence before them. It was they who committed him to gaol. I am +not responsible for that." + +My lady did not often show signs of impatience; but we knew she was +feeling irritated, by the little perpetual tapping of her high-heeled +shoe against the bottom of the carriage. About the same time we, sitting +backwards, caught a glimpse of Mr. Gray through the open door, standing +in the shadow of the hall. Doubtless Lady Ludlow's arrival had +interrupted a conversation between Mr. Lathom and Mr. Gray. The latter +must have heard every word of what she was saying; but of this she was +not aware, and caught at Mr. Lathom's disclaimer of responsibility with +pretty much the same argument which she had heard (through our +repetition) that Mr. Gray had used not two hours before. + +"And do you mean to say, Mr. Lathom, that you don't consider yourself +responsible for all injustice or wrong-doing that you might have +prevented, and have not? Nay, in this case the first germ of injustice +was your own mistake. I wish you had been with me a little while ago, +and seen the misery in that poor fellow's cottage." She spoke lower, and +Mr. Gray drew near, in a sort of involuntary manner; as if to hear all +she was saying. We saw him, and doubtless Mr. Lathom heard his footstep, +and knew who it was that was listening behind him, and approving of every +word that was said. He grew yet more sullen in manner; but still my lady +was my lady, and he dared not speak out before her, as he would have done +to Mr. Gray. Lady Ludlow, however, caught the look of stubborness in his +face, and it roused her as I had never seen her roused. + +"I am sure you will not refuse, sir, to accept my bail. I offer to bail +the fellow out, and to be responsible for his appearance at the sessions. +What say you to that, Mr. Lathom?" + +"The offence of theft is not bailable, my lady." + +"Not in ordinary cases, I dare say. But I imagine this is an +extraordinary case. The man is sent to prison out of compliment to you, +and against all evidence, as far as I can learn. He will have to rot in +gaol for two months, and his wife and children to starve. I, Lady +Ludlow, offer to bail him out, and pledge myself for his appearance at +next quarter-sessions." + +"It is against the law, my lady." + +"Bah! Bah! Bah! Who makes laws? Such as I, in the House of Lords--such +as you, in the House of Commons. We, who make the laws in St. Stephen's, +may break the mere forms of them, when we have right on our sides, on our +own land, and amongst our own people." + +"The lord-lieutenant may take away my commission, if he heard of it." + +"And a very good thing for the county, Harry Lathom; and for you too, if +he did,--if you don't go on more wisely than you have begun. A pretty +set you and your brother magistrates are to administer justice through +the land! I always said a good despotism was the best form of +government; and I am twice as much in favour of it now I see what a +quorum is! My dears!" suddenly turning round to us, "if it would not +tire you to walk home, I would beg Mr. Lathom to take a seat in my coach, +and we would drive to Henley Gaol, and have the poor man out at once." + +"A walk over the fields at this time of day is hardly fitting for young +ladies to take alone," said Mr. Lathom, anxious no doubt to escape from +his tete-a-tete drive with my lady, and possibly not quite prepared to go +to the illegal length of prompt measures, which she had in contemplation. + +But Mr. Gray now stepped forward, too anxious for the release of the +prisoner to allow any obstacle to intervene which he could do away with. +To see Lady Ludlow's face when she first perceived whom she had had for +auditor and spectator of her interview with Mr. Lathom, was as good as a +play. She had been doing and saying the very things she had been so much +annoyed at Mr. Gray's saying and proposing only an hour or two ago. She +had been setting down Mr. Lathom pretty smartly, in the presence of the +very man to whom she had spoken of that gentleman as so sensible, and of +such a standing in the county, that it was presumption to question his +doings. But before Mr. Gray had finished his offer of escorting us back +to Hanbury Court, my lady had recovered herself. There was neither +surprise nor displeasure in her manner, as she answered--"I thank you, +Mr. Gray. I was not aware that you were here, but I think I can +understand on what errand you came. And seeing you here, recalls me to a +duty I owe Mr. Lathom. Mr. Lathom, I have spoken to you pretty +plainly,--forgetting, until I saw Mr. Gray, that only this very afternoon +I differed from him on this very question; taking completely, at that +time, the same view of the whole subject which you have done; thinking +that the county would be well rid of such a man as Job Gregson, whether +he had committed this theft or not. Mr. Gray and I did not part quite +friends," she continued, bowing towards him; "but it so happened that I +saw Job Gregson's wife and home,--I felt that Mr. Gray had been right and +I had been wrong, so, with the famous inconsistency of my sex, I came +hither to scold you," smiling towards Mr. Lathom, who looked half-sulky +yet, and did not relax a bit of his gravity at her smile, "for holding +the same opinions that I had done an hour before. Mr. Gray," (again +bowing towards him) "these young ladies will be very much obliged to you +for your escort, and so shall I. Mr. Lathom, may I beg of you to +accompany me to Henley?" + +Mr. Gray bowed very low, and went very red; Mr. Lathom said something +which we none of us heard, but which was, I think, some remonstrance +against the course he was, as it were, compelled to take. Lady Ludlow, +however, took no notice of his murmur, but sat in an attitude of polite +expectancy; and as we turned off on our walk, I saw Mr. Lathom getting +into the coach with the air of a whipped hound. I must say, considering +my lady's feeling, I did not envy him his ride--though, I believe, he was +quite in the right as to the object of the ride being illegal. + +Our walk home was very dull. We had no fears; and would far rather have +been without the awkward, blushing young man, into which Mr. Gray had +sunk. At every stile he hesitated,--sometimes he half got over it, +thinking that he could assist us better in that way; then he would turn +back unwilling to go before ladies. He had no ease of manner, as my lady +once said of him, though on any occasion of duty, he had an immense deal +of dignity. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +As far as I can remember, it was very soon after this that I first began +to have the pain in my hip, which has ended in making me a cripple for +life. I hardly recollect more than one walk after our return under Mr. +Gray's escort from Mr. Lathom's. Indeed, at the time, I was not without +suspicions (which I never named) that the beginning of all the mischief +was a great jump I had taken from the top of one of the stiles on that +very occasion. + +Well, it is a long while ago, and God disposes of us all, and I am not +going to tire you out with telling you how I thought and felt, and how, +when I saw what my life was to be, I could hardly bring myself to be +patient, but rather wished to die at once. You can every one of you +think for yourselves what becoming all at once useless and unable to +move, and by-and-by growing hopeless of cure, and feeling that one must +be a burden to some one all one's life long, would be to an active, +wilful, strong girl of seventeen, anxious to get on in the world, so as, +if possible, to help her brothers and sisters. So I shall only say, that +one among the blessings which arose out of what seemed at the time a +great, black sorrow was, that Lady Ludlow for many years took me, as it +were, into her own especial charge; and now, as I lie still and alone in +my old age, it is such a pleasure to think of her! + +Mrs. Medlicott was great as a nurse, and I am sure I can never be +grateful enough to her memory for all her kindness. But she was puzzled +to know how to manage me in other ways. I used to have long, hard fits +of crying; and, thinking that I ought to go home--and yet what could they +do with me there?--and a hundred and fifty other anxious thoughts, some +of which I could tell to Mrs. Medlicott, and others I could not. Her way +of comforting me was hurrying away for some kind of tempting or +strengthening food--a basin of melted calves-foot jelly was, I am sure +she thought, a cure for every woe. + +"There take it, dear, take it!" she would say; "and don't go on fretting +for what can't be helped." + +But, I think, she got puzzled at length at the non-efficacy of good +things to eat; and one day, after I had limped down to see the doctor, in +Mrs. Medlicott's sitting-room--a room lined with cupboards, containing +preserves and dainties of all kinds, which she perpetually made, and +never touched herself--when I was returning to my bed-room to cry away +the afternoon, under pretence of arranging my clothes, John Footman +brought me a message from my lady (with whom the doctor had been having a +conversation) to bid me go to her in that private sitting-room at the end +of the suite of apartments, about which I spoke in describing the day of +my first arrival at Hanbury. I had hardly been in it since; as, when we +read to my lady, she generally sat in the small withdrawing-room out of +which this private room of hers opened. I suppose great people do not +require what we smaller people value so much,--I mean privacy. I do not +think that there was a room which my lady occupied that had not two +doors, and some of them had three or four. Then my lady had always Adams +waiting upon her in her bed-chamber; and it was Mrs. Medlicott's duty to +sit within call, as it were, in a sort of anteroom that led out of my +lady's own sitting-room, on the opposite side to the drawing-room door. +To fancy the house, you must take a great square and halve it by a line: +at one end of this line was the hall-door, or public entrance; at the +opposite the private entrance from a terrace, which was terminated at one +end by a sort of postern door in an old gray stone wall, beyond which lay +the farm buildings and offices; so that people could come in this way to +my lady on business, while, if she were going into the garden from her +own room, she had nothing to do but to pass through Mrs. Medlicott's +apartment, out into the lesser hall, and then turning to the right as she +passed on to the terrace, she could go down the flight of broad, shallow +steps at the corner of the house into the lovely garden, with stretching, +sweeping lawns, and gay flower-beds, and beautiful, bossy laurels, and +other blooming or massy shrubs, with full-grown beeches, or larches +feathering down to the ground a little farther off. The whole was set in +a frame, as it were, by the more distant woodlands. The house had been +modernized in the days of Queen Anne, I think; but the money had fallen +short that was requisite to carry out all the improvements, so it was +only the suite of withdrawing-rooms and the terrace-rooms, as far as the +private entrance, that had the new, long, high windows put in, and these +were old enough by this time to be draped with roses, and honeysuckles, +and pyracanthus, winter and summer long. + +Well, to go back to that day when I limped into my lady's sitting-room, +trying hard to look as if I had not been crying, and not to walk as if I +was in much pain. I do not know whether my lady saw how near my tears +were to my eyes, but she told me she had sent for me, because she wanted +some help in arranging the drawers of her bureau, and asked me--just as +if it was a favour I was to do her--if I could sit down in the easy-chair +near the window--(all quietly arranged before I came in, with a +footstool, and a table quite near)--and assist her. You will wonder, +perhaps, why I was not bidden to sit or lie on the sofa; but (although I +found one there a morning or two afterwards, when I came down) the fact +was, that there was none in the room at this time. I have even fancied +that the easy-chair was brought in on purpose for me; for it was not the +chair in which I remembered my lady sitting the first time I saw her. +That chair was very much carved and gilded, with a countess' coronet at +the top. I tried it one day, some time afterwards, when my lady was out +of the room, and I had a fancy for seeing how I could move about, and +very uncomfortable it was. Now my chair (as I learnt to call it, and to +think it) was soft and luxurious, and seemed somehow to give one's body +rest just in that part where one most needed it. + +I was not at my ease that first day, nor indeed for many days afterwards, +notwithstanding my chair was so comfortable. Yet I forgot my sad pain in +silently wondering over the meaning of many of the things we turned out +of those curious old drawers. I was puzzled to know why some were kept +at all; a scrap of writing maybe, with only half a dozen common-place +words written on it, or a bit of broken riding-whip, and here and there a +stone, of which I thought I could have picked up twenty just as good in +the first walk I took. But it seems that was just my ignorance; for my +lady told me they were pieces of valuable marble, used to make the floors +of the great Roman emperors palaces long ago; and that when she had been +a girl, and made the grand tour long ago, her cousin Sir Horace Mann, the +Ambassador or Envoy at Florence, had told her to be sure to go into the +fields inside the walls of ancient Rome, when the farmers were preparing +the ground for the onion-sowing, and had to make the soil fine, and pick +up what bits of marble she could find. She had done so, and meant to +have had them made into a table; but somehow that plan fell through, and +there they were with all the dirt out of the onion-field upon them; but +once when I thought of cleaning them with soap and water, at any rate, +she bade me not to do so, for it was Roman dirt--earth, I think, she +called it--but it was dirt all the same. + +Then, in this bureau, were many other things, the value of which I could +understand--locks of hair carefully ticketed, which my lady looked at +very sadly; and lockets and bracelets with miniatures in them,--very +small pictures to what they make now-a-days, and called miniatures: some +of them had even to be looked at through a microscope before you could +see the individual expression of the faces, or how beautifully they were +painted. I don't think that looking at these made may lady seem so +melancholy, as the seeing and touching of the hair did. But, to be sure, +the hair was, as it were, a part of some beloved body which she might +never touch and caress again, but which lay beneath the turf, all faded +and disfigured, except perhaps the very hair, from which the lock she +held had been dissevered; whereas the pictures were but pictures after +all--likenesses, but not the very things themselves. This is only my own +conjecture, mind. My lady rarely spoke out her feelings. For, to begin +with, she was of rank: and I have heard her say that people of rank do +not talk about their feelings except to their equals, and even to them +they conceal them, except upon rare occasions. Secondly,--and this is my +own reflection,--she was an only child and an heiress; and as such was +more apt to think than to talk, as all well-brought-up heiresses must be. +I think. Thirdly, she had long been a widow, without any companion of +her own age with whom it would have been natural for her to refer to old +associations, past pleasures, or mutual sorrows. Mrs. Medlicott came +nearest to her as a companion of this sort; and her ladyship talked more +to Mrs. Medlicott, in a kind of familiar way, than she did to all the +rest of the household put together. But Mrs. Medlicott was silent by +nature, and did not reply at any great length. Adams, indeed, was the +only one who spoke much to Lady Ludlow. + +After we had worked away about an hour at the bureau, her ladyship said +we had done enough for one day; and as the time was come for her +afternoon ride, she left me, with a volume of engravings from Mr. +Hogarth's pictures on one side of me (I don't like to write down the +names of them, though my lady thought nothing of it, I am sure), and upon +a stand her great prayer-book open at the evening psalms for the day, on +the other. But as soon as she was gone, I troubled myself little with +either, but amused myself with looking round the room at my leisure. The +side on which the fire-place stood was all panelled,--part of the old +ornaments of the house, for there was an Indian paper with birds and +beasts and insects on it, on all the other sides. There were coats of +arms, of the various families with whom the Hanburys had intermarried, +all over these panels, and up and down the ceiling as well. There was +very little looking-glass in the room, though one of the great drawing- +rooms was called the "Mirror Room," because it was lined with glass, +which my lady's great-grandfather had brought from Venice when he was +ambassador there. There were china jars of all shapes and sizes round +and about the room, and some china monsters, or idols, of which I could +never bear the sight, they were so ugly, though I think my lady valued +them more than all. There was a thick carpet on the middle of the floor, +which was made of small pieces of rare wood fitted into a pattern; the +doors were opposite to each other, and were composed of two heavy tall +wings, and opened in the middle, moving on brass grooves inserted into +the floor--they would not have opened over a carpet. There were two +windows reaching up nearly to the ceiling, but very narrow and with deep +window-seats in the thickness of the wall. The room was full of scent, +partly from the flowers outside, and partly from the great jars of pot- +pourri inside. The choice of odours was what my lady piqued herself +upon, saying nothing showed birth like a keen susceptibility of smell. We +never named musk in her presence, her antipathy to it was so well +understood through the household: her opinion on the subject was believed +to be, that no scent derived from an animal could ever be of a +sufficiently pure nature to give pleasure to any person of good family, +where, of course, the delicate perception of the senses had been +cultivated for generations. She would instance the way in which +sportsmen preserve the breed of dogs who have shown keen scent; and how +such gifts descend for generations amongst animals, who cannot be +supposed to have anything of ancestral pride, or hereditary fancies about +them. Musk, then, was never mentioned at Hanbury Court. No more were +bergamot or southern-wood, although vegetable in their nature. She +considered these two latter as betraying a vulgar taste in the person who +chose to gather or wear them. She was sorry to notice sprigs of them in +the button-hole of any young man in whom she took an interest, either +because he was engaged to a servant of hers or otherwise, as he came out +of church on a Sunday afternoon. She was afraid that he liked coarse +pleasures; and I am not sure if she did not think that his preference for +these coarse sweetnesses did not imply a probability that he would take +to drinking. But she distinguished between vulgar and common. Violets, +pinks, and sweetbriar were common enough; roses and mignionette, for +those who had gardens, honeysuckle for those who walked along the bowery +lanes; but wearing them betrayed no vulgarity of taste: the queen upon +her throne might be glad to smell at a nosegay of the flowers. A beau- +pot (as we called it) of pinks and roses freshly gathered was placed +every morning that they were in bloom on my lady's own particular table. +For lasting vegetable odours she preferred lavender and sweet-woodroof to +any extract whatever. Lavender reminded her of old customs, she said, +and of homely cottage-gardens, and many a cottager made his offering to +her of a bundle of lavender. Sweet woodroof, again, grew in wild, +woodland places where the soil was fine and the air delicate: the poor +children used to go and gather it for her up in the woods on the higher +lands; and for this service she always rewarded them with bright new +pennies, of which my lord, her son, used to send her down a bagful fresh +from the Mint in London every February. + +Attar of roses, again, she disliked. She said it reminded her of the +city and of merchants' wives, over-rich, over-heavy in its perfume. And +lilies-of-the-valley somehow fell under the same condemnation. They were +most graceful and elegant to look at (my lady was quite candid about +this), flower, leaf, colour--everything was refined about them but the +smell. That was too strong. But the great hereditary faculty on which +my lady piqued herself, and with reason, for I never met with any person +who possessed it, was the power she had of perceiving the delicious odour +arising from a bed of strawberries in the late autumn, when the leaves +were all fading and dying. "Bacon's Essays" was one of the few books +that lay about in my lady's room; and if you took it up and opened it +carelessly, it was sure to fall apart at his "Essay on Gardens." +"Listen," her ladyship would say, "to what that great philosopher and +statesman says. 'Next to that,'--he is speaking of violets, my dear,--'is +the musk-rose,'--of which you remember the great bush, at the corner of +the south wall just by the Blue Drawing-room windows; that is the old +musk-rose, Shakespeare's musk-rose, which is dying out through the +kingdom now. But to return to my Lord Bacon: 'Then the strawberry +leaves, dying with a most excellent cordial smell.' Now the Hanburys can +always smell this excellent cordial odour, and very delicious and +refreshing it is. You see, in Lord Bacon's time, there had not been so +many intermarriages between the court and the city as there have been +since the needy days of his Majesty Charles the Second; and altogether in +the time of Queen Elizabeth, the great, old families of England were a +distinct race, just as a cart-horse is one creature, and very useful in +its place, and Childers or Eclipse is another creature, though both are +of the same species. So the old families have gifts and powers of a +different and higher class to what the other orders have. My dear, +remember that you try if you can smell the scent of dying +strawberry-leaves in this next autumn. You have some of Ursula Hanbury's +blood in you, and that gives you a chance." + +But when October came, I sniffed and sniffed, and all to no purpose; and +my lady--who had watched the little experiment rather anxiously--had to +give me up as a hybrid. I was mortified, I confess, and thought that it +was in some ostentation of her own powers that she ordered the gardener +to plant a border of strawberries on that side of the terrace that lay +under her windows. + +I have wandered away from time and place. I tell you all the +remembrances I have of those years just as they come up, and I hope that, +in my old age, I am not getting too like a certain Mrs. Nickleby, whose +speeches were once read out aloud to me. + +I came by degrees to be all day long in this room which I have been +describing; sometimes sitting in the easy-chair, doing some little piece +of dainty work for my lady, or sometimes arranging flowers, or sorting +letters according to their handwriting, so that she could arrange them +afterwards, and destroy or keep, as she planned, looking ever onward to +her death. Then, after the sofa was brought in, she would watch my face, +and if she saw my colour change, she would bid me lie down and rest. And +I used to try to walk upon the terrace every day for a short time: it +hurt me very much, it is true, but the doctor had ordered it, and I knew +her ladyship wished me to obey. + +Before I had seen the background of a great lady's life, I had thought it +all play and fine doings. But whatever other grand people are, my lady +was never idle. For one thing, she had to superintend the agent for the +large Hanbury estate. I believe it was mortgaged for a sum of money +which had gone to improve the late lord's Scotch lands; but she was +anxious to pay off this before her death, and so to leave her own +inheritance free of incumbrance to her son, the present Earl; whom, I +secretly think, she considered a greater person, as being the heir of the +Hanburys (though through a female line), than as being my Lord Ludlow +with half a dozen other minor titles. + +With this wish of releasing her property from the mortgage, skilful care +was much needed in the management of it; and as far as my lady could go, +she took every pains. She had a great book, in which every page was +ruled into three divisions; on the first column was written the date and +the name of the tenant who addressed any letter on business to her; on +the second was briefly stated the subject of the letter, which generally +contained a request of some kind. This request would be surrounded and +enveloped in so many words, and often inserted amidst so many odd reasons +and excuses, that Mr. Horner (the steward) would sometimes say it was +like hunting through a bushel of chaff to find a grain of wheat. Now, in +the second column of this book, the grain of meaning was placed, clean +and dry, before her ladyship every morning. She sometimes would ask to +see the original letter; sometimes she simply answered the request by a +"Yes," or a "No;" and often she would send for lenses and papers, and +examine them well, with Mr. Horner at her elbow, to see if such +petitions, as to be allowed to plough up pasture fields, were provided +for in the terms of the original agreement. On every Thursday she made +herself at liberty to see her tenants, from four to six in the afternoon. +Mornings would have suited my lady better, as far as convenience went, +and I believe the old custom had been to have these levees (as her +ladyship used to call them) held before twelve. But, as she said to Mr. +Horner, when he urged returning to the former hours, it spoilt a whole +day for a farmer, if he had to dress himself in his best and leave his +work in the forenoon (and my lady liked to see her tenants come in their +Sunday clothes; she would not say a word, maybe, but she would take her +spectacles slowly out, and put them on with silent gravity, and look at a +dirty or raggedly-dressed man so solemnly and earnestly, that his nerves +must have been pretty strong if he did not wince, and resolve that, +however poor he might be, soap and water, and needle and thread, should +be used before he again appeared in her ladyship's anteroom). The out- +lying tenants had always a supper provided for them in the servants'-hall +on Thursdays, to which, indeed all comers were welcome to sit down. For +my lady said, though there were not many hours left of a working man's +day when their business with her was ended, yet that they needed food and +rest, and that she should be ashamed if they sought either at the +Fighting Lion (called at this day the Hanbury Arms). They had as much +beer as they could drink while they were eating; and when the food was +cleared away, they had a cup a-piece of good ale, in which the oldest +tenant present, standing up, gave Madam's health; and after that was +drunk, they were expected to set off homewards; at any rate, no more +liquor was given them. The tenants one and all called her "Madam;" for +they recognized in her the married heiress of the Hanburys, not the widow +of a Lord Ludlow, of whom they and their forefathers knew nothing; and +against whose memory, indeed, there rankled a dim unspoken grudge, the +cause of which was accurately known to the very few who understood the +nature of a mortgage, and were therefore aware that Madam's money had +been taken to enrich my lord's poor land in Scotland. I am sure--for you +can understand I was behind the scenes, as it were, and had many an +opportunity of seeing and hearing, as I lay or sat motionless in my +lady's room with the double doors open between it and the anteroom +beyond, where Lady Ludlow saw her steward, and gave audience to her +tenants,--I am certain, I say, that Mr. Horner was silently as much +annoyed at the money that was swallowed up by this mortgage as any one; +and, some time or other, he had probably spoken his mind out to my lady; +for there was a sort of offended reference on her part, and respectful +submission to blame on his, while every now and then there was an implied +protest--whenever the payments of the interest became due, or whenever my +lady stinted herself of any personal expense, such as Mr. Horner thought +was only decorous and becoming in the heiress of the Hanburys. Her +carriages were old and cumbrous, wanting all the improvements which had +been adopted by those of her rank throughout the county. Mr. Horner +would fain have had the ordering of a new coach. The carriage-horses, +too, were getting past their work; yet all the promising colts bred on +the estate were sold for ready money; and so on. My lord, her son, was +ambassador at some foreign place; and very proud we all were of his glory +and dignity; but I fancy it cost money, and my lady would have lived on +bread and water sooner than have called upon him to help her in paying +off the mortgage, although he was the one who was to benefit by it in the +end. + +Mr. Horner was a very faithful steward, and very respectful to my lady; +although sometimes, I thought she was sharper to him than to any one +else; perhaps because she knew that, although he never said anything, he +disapproved of the Hanburys being made to pay for the Earl Ludlow's +estates and state. + +The late lord had been a sailor, and had been as extravagant in his +habits as most sailors are, I am told,--for I never saw the sea; and yet +he had a long sight to his own interests; but whatever he was, my lady +loved him and his memory, with about as fond and proud a love as ever +wife gave husband, I should think. + +For a part of his life Mr. Horner, who was born on the Hanbury property, +had been a clerk to an attorney in Birmingham; and these few years had +given him a kind of worldly wisdom, which, though always exerted for her +benefit, was antipathetic to her ladyship, who thought that some of her +steward's maxims savoured of trade and commerce. I fancy that if it had +been possible, she would have preferred a return to the primitive system, +of living on the produce of the land, and exchanging the surplus for such +articles as were needed, without the intervention of money. + +But Mr. Horner was bitten with new-fangled notions, as she would say, +though his new-fangled notions were what folk at the present day would +think sadly behindhand; and some of Mr. Gray's ideas fell on Mr. Horner's +mind like sparks on tow, though they started from two different points. +Mr. Horner wanted to make every man useful and active in this world, and +to direct as much activity and usefulness as possible to the improvement +of the Hanbury estates, and the aggrandisement of the Hanbury family, and +therefore he fell into the new cry for education. + +Mr. Gray did not care much,--Mr. Horner thought not enough,--for this +world, and where any man or family stood in their earthly position; but +he would have every one prepared for the world to come, and capable of +understanding and receiving certain doctrines, for which latter purpose, +it stands to reason, he must have heard of these doctrines; and therefore +Mr. Gray wanted education. The answer in the Catechism that Mr. Horner +was most fond of calling upon a child to repeat, was that to, "What is +thy duty towards thy neighbour?" The answer Mr. Gray liked best to hear +repeated with unction, was that to the question, "What is the inward and +spiritual grace?" The reply to which Lady Ludlow bent her head the +lowest, as we said our Catechism to her on Sundays, was to, "What is thy +duty towards God?" But neither Mr. Horner nor Mr. Gray had heard many +answers to the Catechism as yet. + +Up to this time there was no Sunday-school in Hanbury. Mr. Gray's +desires were bounded by that object. Mr. Horner looked farther on: he +hoped for a day-school at some future time, to train up intelligent +labourers for working on the estate. My lady would hear of neither one +nor the other: indeed, not the boldest man whom she ever saw would have +dared to name the project of a day-school within her hearing. + +So Mr. Horner contented himself with quietly teaching a sharp, clever lad +to read and write, with a view to making use of him as a kind of foreman +in process of time. He had his pick of the farm-lads for this purpose; +and, as the brightest and sharpest, although by far the raggedest and +dirtiest, singled out Job Gregson's son. But all this--as my lady never +listened to gossip, or indeed, was spoken to unless she spoke first--was +quite unknown to her, until the unlucky incident took place which I am +going to relate. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +I think my lady was not aware of Mr. Horner's views on education (as +making men into more useful members of society), or the practice to which +he was putting his precepts in taking Harry Gregson as pupil and protege; +if, indeed, she were aware of Harry's distinct existence at all, until +the following unfortunate occasion. The anteroom, which was a kind of +business-place for my lady to receive her steward and tenants in, was +surrounded by shelves. I cannot call them book-shelves, though there +were many books on them; but the contents of the volumes were principally +manuscript, and relating to details connected with the Hanbury property. +There were also one or two dictionaries, gazetteers, works of reference +on the management of property; all of a very old date (the dictionary was +Bailey's, I remember; we had a great Johnson in my lady's room, but where +lexicographers differed, she generally preferred Bailey). + +In this antechamber a footman generally sat, awaiting orders from my +lady; for she clung to the grand old customs, and despised any bells, +except her own little hand-bell, as modern inventions; she would have her +people always within summons of this silvery bell, or her scarce less +silvery voice. This man had not the sinecure you might imagine. He had +to reply to the private entrance; what we should call the back door in a +smaller house. As none came to the front door but my lady, and those of +the county whom she honoured by visiting, and her nearest acquaintance of +this kind lived eight miles (of bad road) off, the majority of comers +knocked at the nail-studded terrace-door; not to have it opened (for open +it stood, by my lady's orders, winter and summer, so that the snow often +drifted into the back hall, and lay there in heaps when the weather was +severe), but to summon some one to receive their message, or carry their +request to be allowed to speak to my lady. I remember it was long before +Mr. Gray could be made to understand that the great door was only open on +state occasions, and even to the last he would as soon come in by that as +the terrace entrance. I had been received there on my first setting foot +over my lady's threshold; every stranger was led in by that way the first +time they came; but after that (with the exceptions I have named) they +went round by the terrace, as it were by instinct. It was an assistance +to this instinct to be aware that from time immemorial, the magnificent +and fierce Hanbury wolf-hounds, which were extinct in every other part of +the island, had been and still were kept chained in the front quadrangle, +where they bayed through a great part of the day and night and were +always ready with their deep, savage growl at the sight of every person +and thing, excepting the man who fed them, my lady's carriage and four, +and my lady herself. It was pretty to see her small figure go up to the +great, crouching brutes thumping the flags with their heavy, wagging +tails, and slobbering in an ecstacy of delight, at her light approach and +soft caress. She had no fear of them; but she was a Hanbury born, and +the tale went, that they and their kind knew all Hanburys instantly, and +acknowledged their supremacy, ever since the ancestors of the breed had +been brought from the East by the great Sir Urian Hanbury, who lay with +his legs crossed on the altar-tomb in the church. Moreover, it was +reported that, not fifty years before, one of these dogs had eaten up a +child, which had inadvertently strayed within reach of its chain. So you +may imagine how most people preferred the terrace-door. Mr. Gray did not +seem to care for the dogs. It might be absence of mind, for I have heard +of his starting away from their sudden spring when he had unwittingly +walked within reach of their chains: but it could hardly have been +absence of mind, when one day he went right up to one of them, and patted +him in the most friendly manner, the dog meanwhile looking pleased, and +affably wagging his tail, just as if Mr. Gray had been a Hanbury. We +were all very much puzzled by this, and to this day I have not been able +to account for it. + +But now let us go back to the terrace-door, and the footman sitting in +the antechamber. + +One morning we heard a parleying, which rose to such a vehemence, and +lasted for so long, that my lady had to ring her hand-bell twice before +the footman heard it. + +"What is the matter, John?" asked she, when he entered, + +"A little boy, my lady, who says he comes from Mr. Horner, and must see +your ladyship. Impudent little lad!" (This last to himself.) + +"What does he want?" + +"That's just what I have asked him, my lady, but he won't tell me, please +your ladyship." + +"It is, probably, some message from Mr. Horner," said Lady Ludlow, with +just a shade of annoyance in her manner; for it was against all etiquette +to send a message to her, and by such a messenger too! + +"No! please your ladyship, I asked him if he had any message, and he said +no, he had none; but he must see your ladyship for all that." + +"You had better show him in then, without more words," said her ladyship, +quietly, but still, as I have said, rather annoyed. + +As if in mockery of the humble visitor, the footman threw open both +battants of the door, and in the opening there stood a lithe, wiry lad, +with a thick head of hair, standing out in every direction, as if stirred +by some electrical current, a short, brown face, red now from affright +and excitement, wide, resolute mouth, and bright, deep-set eyes, which +glanced keenly and rapidly round the room, as if taking in everything +(and all was new and strange), to be thought and puzzled over at some +future time. He knew enough of manners not to speak first to one above +him in rank, or else he was afraid. + +"What do you want with me?" asked my lady; in so gentle a tone that it +seemed to surprise and stun him. + +"An't please your ladyship?" said he, as if he had been deaf. + +"You come from Mr. Horner's: why do you want to see me?" again asked she, +a little more loudly. + +"An't please your ladyship, Mr. Horner was sent for all on a sudden to +Warwick this morning." + +His face began to work; but he felt it, and closed his lips into a +resolute form. + +"Well?" + +"And he went off all on a sudden like." + +"Well?" + +"And he left a note for your ladyship with me, your ladyship." + +"Is that all? You might have given it to the footman." + +"Please your ladyship, I've clean gone and lost it." + +He never took his eyes off her face. If he had not kept his look fixed, +he would have burst out crying. + +"That was very careless," said my lady gently. "But I am sure you are +very sorry for it. You had better try and find it; it may have been of +consequence. + +"Please, mum--please your ladyship--I can say it off by heart." + +"You! What do you mean?" I was really afraid now. My lady's blue eyes +absolutely gave out light, she was so much displeased, and, moreover, +perplexed. The more reason he had for affright, the more his courage +rose. He must have seen,--so sharp a lad must have perceived her +displeasure; but he went on quickly and steadily. + +"Mr. Horner, my lady, has taught me to read, write, and cast accounts, my +lady. And he was in a hurry, and he folded his paper up, but he did not +seal it; and I read it, my lady; and now, my lady, it seems like as if I +had got it off by heart;" and he went on with a high pitched voice, +saying out very loud what, I have no doubt, were the identical words of +the letter, date, signature and all: it was merely something about a +deed, which required my lady's signature. + +When he had done, he stood almost as if he expected commendation for his +accurate memory. + +My lady's eyes contracted till the pupils were as needle-points; it was a +way she had when much disturbed. She looked at me and said-- + +"Margaret Dawson, what will this world come to?" And then she was +silent. + +The lad, beginning to perceive he had given deep offence, stood stock +still--as if his brave will had brought him into this presence, and +impelled him to confession, and the best amends he could make, but had +now deserted him, or was extinct, and left his body motionless, until +some one else with word or deed made him quit the room. My lady looked +again at him, and saw the frowning, dumb-foundering terror at his +misdeed, and the manner in which his confession had been received. + +"My poor lad!" said she, the angry look leaving her face, "into whose +hands have you fallen?" + +The boy's lips began to quiver. + +"Don't you know what tree we read of in Genesis?--No! I hope you have +not got to read so easily as that." A pause. "Who has taught you to +read and write?" + +"Please, my lady, I meant no harm, my lady." He was fairly blubbering, +overcome by her evident feeling of dismay and regret, the soft repression +of which was more frightening to him than any strong or violent words +would have been. + +"Who taught you, I ask?" + +"It were Mr. Horner's clerk who learned me, my lady." + +"And did Mr. Horner know of it?" + +"Yes, my lady. And I am sure I thought for to please him." + +"Well! perhaps you were not to blame for that. But I wonder at Mr. +Horner. However, my boy, as you have got possession of edge-tools, you +must have some rules how to use them. Did you never hear that you were +not to open letters?" + +"Please, my lady, it were open. Mr. Horner forgot for to seal it, in his +hurry to be off." + +"But you must not read letters that are not intended for you. You must +never try to read any letters that are not directed to you, even if they +be open before you." + +"Please, may lady, I thought it were good for practice, all as one as a +book." + +My lady looked bewildered as to what way she could farther explain to him +the laws of honour as regarded letters. + +"You would not listen, I am sure," said she, "to anything you were not +intended to hear?" + +He hesitated for a moment, partly because he did not fully comprehend the +question. My lady repeated it. The light of intelligence came into his +eager eyes, and I could see that he was not certain if he could tell the +truth. + +"Please, my lady, I always hearken when I hear folk talking secrets; but +I mean no harm." + +My poor lady sighed: she was not prepared to begin a long way off in +morals. Honour was, to her, second nature, and she had never tried to +find out on what principle its laws were based. So, telling the lad that +she wished to see Mr. Horner when he returned from Warwick, she dismissed +him with a despondent look; he, meanwhile, right glad to be out of the +awful gentleness of her presence. + +"What is to be done?" said she, half to herself and half to me. I could +not answer, for I was puzzled myself. + +"It was a right word," she continued, "that I used, when I called reading +and writing 'edge-tools.' If our lower orders have these edge-tools +given to them, we shall have the terrible scenes of the French Revolution +acted over again in England. When I was a girl, one never heard of the +rights of men, one only heard of the duties. Now, here was Mr. Gray, +only last night, talking of the right every child had to instruction. I +could hardly keep my patience with him, and at length we fairly came to +words; and I told him I would have no such thing as a Sunday-school (or a +Sabbath-school, as he calls it, just like a Jew) in my village." + +"And what did he say, my lady?" I asked; for the struggle that seemed now +to have come to a crisis, had been going on for some time in a quiet way. + +"Why, he gave way to temper, and said he was bound to remember, he was +under the bishop's authority, not under mine; and implied that he should +persevere in his designs, notwithstanding my expressed opinion." + +"And your ladyship--" I half inquired. + +"I could only rise and curtsey, and civilly dismiss him. When two +persons have arrived at a certain point of expression on a subject, about +which they differ as materially as I do from Mr. Gray, the wisest course, +if they wish to remain friends, is to drop the conversation entirely and +suddenly. It is one of the few cases where abruptness is desirable." + +I was sorry for Mr. Gray. He had been to see me several times, and had +helped me to bear my illness in a better spirit than I should have done +without his good advice and prayers. And I had gathered from little +things he said, how much his heart was set upon this new scheme. I liked +him so much, and I loved and respected my lady so well, that I could not +bear them to be on the cool terms to which they were constantly getting. +Yet I could do nothing but keep silence. + +I suppose my lady understood something of what was passing in my mind; +for, after a minute or two, she went on:-- + +"If Mr. Gray knew all I know,--if he had my experience, he would not be +so ready to speak of setting up his new plans in opposition to my +judgment. Indeed," she continued, lashing herself up with her own +recollections, "times are changed when the parson of a village comes to +beard the liege lady in her own house. Why, in my grandfather's days, +the parson was family chaplain too, and dined at the Hall every Sunday. +He was helped last, and expected to have done first. I remember seeing +him take up his plate and knife and fork, and say with his mouth full all +the time he was speaking: 'If you please, Sir Urian, and my lady, I'll +follow the beef into the housekeeper's room;' for you see, unless he did +so, he stood no chance of a second helping. A greedy man, that parson +was, to be sure! I recollect his once eating up the whole of some little +bird at dinner, and by way of diverting attention from his greediness, he +told how he had heard that a rook soaked in vinegar and then dressed in a +particular way, could not be distinguished from the bird he was then +eating. I saw by the grim look of my grandfather's face that the +parson's doing and saying displeased him; and, child as I was, I had some +notion of what was coming, when, as I was riding out on my little, white +pony, by my grandfather's side, the next Friday, he stopped one of the +gamekeepers, and bade him shoot one of the oldest rooks he could find. I +knew no more about it till Sunday, when a dish was set right before the +parson, and Sir Urian said: 'Now, Parson Hemming, I have had a rook shot, +and soaked in vinegar, and dressed as you described last Sunday. Fall +to, man, and eat it with as good an appetite as you had last Sunday. Pick +the bones clean, or by--, no more Sunday dinners shall you eat at my +table!' I gave one look at poor Mr. Hemming's face, as he tried to +swallow the first morsel, and make believe as though he thought it very +good; but I could not look again, for shame, although my grandfather +laughed, and kept asking us all round if we knew what could have become +of the parson's appetite." + +"And did he finish it?" I asked. + +"O yes, my dear. What my grandfather said was to be done, was done +always. He was a terrible man in his anger! But to think of the +difference between Parson Hemming and Mr. Gray! or even of poor dear Mr. +Mountford and Mr. Gray. Mr. Mountford would never have withstood me as +Mr. Gray did!" + +"And your ladyship really thinks that it would not be right to have a +Sunday-school?" I asked, feeling very timid as I put time question. + +"Certainly not. As I told Mr. Gray. I consider a knowledge of the +Creed, and of the Lord's Prayer, as essential to salvation; and that any +child may have, whose parents bring it regularly to church. Then there +are the Ten Commandments, which teach simple duties in the plainest +language. Of course, if a lad is taught to read and write (as that +unfortunate boy has been who was here this morning) his duties become +complicated, and his temptations much greater, while, at the same time, +he has no hereditary principles and honourable training to serve as +safeguards. I might take up my old simile of the race-horse and cart- +horse. I am distressed," continued she, with a break in her ideas, +"about that boy. The whole thing reminds me so much of a story of what +happened to a friend of mine--Clement de Crequy. Did I ever tell you +about him?" + +"No, your ladyship," I replied. + +"Poor Clement! More than twenty years ago, Lord Ludlow and I spent a +winter in Paris. He had many friends there; perhaps not very good or +very wise men, but he was so kind that he liked every one, and every one +liked him. We had an apartment, as they call it there, in the Rue de +Lille; we had the first-floor of a grand hotel, with the basement for our +servants. On the floor above us the owner of the house lived, a Marquise +de Crequy, a widow. They tell me that the Crequy coat-of-arms is still +emblazoned, after all these terrible years, on a shield above the arched +porte-cochere, just as it was then, though the family is quite extinct. +Madame de Crequy had only one son, Clement, who was just the same age as +my Urian--you may see his portrait in the great hall--Urian's, I mean." I +knew that Master Urian had been drowned at sea; and often had I looked at +the presentment of his bonny hopeful face, in his sailor's dress, with +right hand outstretched to a ship on the sea in the distance, as if he +had just said, "Look at her! all her sails are set, and I'm just off." +Poor Master Urian! he went down in this very ship not a year after the +picture was taken! But now I will go back to my lady's story. "I can +see those two boys playing now," continued she, softly, shutting her +eyes, as if the better to call up the vision, "as they used to do five- +and-twenty years ago in those old-fashioned French gardens behind our +hotel. Many a time have I watched them from my windows. It was, +perhaps, a better play-place than an English garden would have been, for +there were but few flower-beds, and no lawn at all to speak about; but, +instead, terraces and balustrades and vases and flights of stone steps +more in the Italian style; and there were jets-d'eau, and little +fountains that could be set playing by turning water-cocks that were +hidden here and there. How Clement delighted in turning the water on to +surprise Urian, and how gracefully he did the honours, as it were, to my +dear, rough, sailor lad! Urian was as dark as a gipsy boy, and cared +little for his appearance, and resisted all my efforts at setting off his +black eyes and tangled curls; but Clement, without ever showing that he +thought about himself and his dress, was always dainty and elegant, even +though his clothes were sometimes but threadbare. He used to be dressed +in a kind of hunter's green suit, open at the neck and half-way down the +chest to beautiful old lace frills; his long golden curls fell behind +just like a girl's, and his hair in front was cut over his straight dark +eyebrows in a line almost as straight. Urian learnt more of a +gentleman's carefulness and propriety of appearance from that lad in two +months than he had done in years from all my lectures. I recollect one +day, when the two boys were in full romp--and, my window being open, I +could hear them perfectly--and Urian was daring Clement to some +scrambling or climbing, which Clement refused to undertake, but in a +hesitating way, as though he longed to do it if some reason had not stood +in the way; and at times, Urian, who was hasty and thoughtless, poor +fellow, told Clement that he was afraid. 'Fear!' said the French boy, +drawing himself up; 'you do not know what you say. If you will be here +at six to-morrow morning, when it is only just light, I will take that +starling's nest on the top of yonder chimney.' 'But why not now, +Clement?' said Urian, putting his arm round Clement's neck. 'Why then, +and not now, just when we are in the humour for it?' 'Because we De +Crequys are poor, and my mother cannot afford me another suit of clothes +this year, and yonder stone carving is all jagged, and would tear my coat +and breeches. Now, to-morrow morning I could go up with nothing on but +an old shirt.' + +"'But you would tear your legs.' + +"'My race do not care for pain,' said the boy, drawing himself from +Urian's arm, and walking a few steps away, with a becoming pride and +reserve; for he was hurt at being spoken to as if he were afraid, and +annoyed at having to confess the true reason for declining the feat. But +Urian was not to be thus baffled. He went up to Clement, and put his arm +once more about his neck, and I could see the two lads as they walked +down the terrace away from the hotel windows: first Urian spoke eagerly, +looking with imploring fondness into Clement's face, which sought the +ground, till at last the French boy spoke, and by-and-by his arm was +round Urian too, and they paced backwards and forwards in deep talk, but +gravely, as became men, rather than boys. + +"All at once, from the little chapel at the corner of the large garden +belonging to the Missions Etrangeres, I heard the tinkle of the little +bell, announcing the elevation of the host. Down on his knees went +Clement, hands crossed, eyes bent down: while Urian stood looking on in +respectful thought. + +"What a friendship that might have been! I never dream of Urian without +seeing Clement too--Urian speaks to me, or does something,--but Clement +only flits round Urian, and never seems to see any one else!" + +"But I must not forget to tell you, that the next morning, before he was +out of his room, a footman of Madame de Crequy's brought Urian the +starling's nest." + +"Well! we came back to England, and the boys were to correspond; and +Madame de Crequy and I exchanged civilities; and Urian went to sea." + +"After that, all seemed to drop away. I cannot tell you all. However, +to confine myself to the De Crequys. I had a letter from Clement; I knew +he felt his friend's death deeply; but I should never have learnt it from +the letter he sent. It was formal, and seemed like chaff to my hungering +heart. Poor fellow! I dare say he had found it hard to write. What +could he--or any one--say to a mother who has lost her child? The world +does not think so, and, in general, one must conform to the customs of +the world; but, judging from my own experience, I should say that +reverent silence at such times is the tenderest balm. Madame de Crequy +wrote too. But I knew she could not feel my loss so much as Clement, and +therefore her letter was not such a disappointment. She and I went on +being civil and polite in the way of commissions, and occasionally +introducing friends to each other, for a year or two, and then we ceased +to have any intercourse. Then the terrible Revolution came. No one who +did not live at those times can imagine the daily expectation of news--the +hourly terror of rumours affecting the fortunes and lives of those whom +most of us had known as pleasant hosts, receiving us with peaceful +welcome in their magnificent houses. Of course, there was sin enough and +suffering enough behind the scenes; but we English visitors to Paris had +seen little or nothing of that,--and I had sometimes thought, indeed, how +even death seemed loth to choose his victims out of that brilliant throng +whom I had known. Madame de Crequy's one boy lived; while three out of +my six were gone since we had met! I do not think all lots are equal, +even now that I know the end of her hopes; but I do say that whatever our +individual lot is, it is our duty to accept it, without comparing it with +that of others. + +"The times were thick with gloom and terror. 'What next?' was the +question we asked of every one who brought us news from Paris. Where +were these demons hidden when, so few years ago, we danced and feasted, +and enjoyed the brilliant salons and the charming friendships of Paris? + +"One evening, I was sitting alone in Saint James's Square; my lord off at +the club with Mr. Fox and others: he had left me, thinking that I should +go to one of the many places to which I had been invited for that +evening; but I had no heart to go anywhere, for it was poor Urian's +birthday, and I had not even rung for lights, though the day was fast +closing in, but was thinking over all his pretty ways, and on his warm +affectionate nature, and how often I had been too hasty in speaking to +him, for all I loved him so dearly; and how I seemed to have neglected +and dropped his dear friend Clement, who might even now be in need of +help in that cruel, bloody Paris. I say I was thinking reproachfully of +all this, and particularly of Clement de Crequy in connection with Urian, +when Fenwick brought me a note, sealed with a coat-of-arms I knew well, +though I could not remember at the moment where I had seen it. I puzzled +over it, as one does sometimes, for a minute or more, before I opened the +letter. In a moment I saw it was from Clement de Crequy. 'My mother is +here,' he said: 'she is very ill, and I am bewildered in this strange +country. May I entreat you to receive me for a few minutes?' The bearer +of the note was the woman of the house where they lodged. I had her +brought up into the anteroom, and questioned her myself, while my +carriage was being brought round. They had arrived in London a fortnight +or so before: she had not known their quality, judging them (according to +her kind) by their dress and their luggage; poor enough, no doubt. The +lady had never left her bedroom since her arrival; the young man waited +upon her, did everything for her, never left her, in fact; only she (the +messenger) had promised to stay within call, as soon as she returned, +while he went out somewhere. She could hardly understand him, he spoke +English so badly. He had never spoken it, I dare say, since he had +talked to my Urian." + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + +"In the hurry of the moment I scarce knew what I did. I bade the +housekeeper put up every delicacy she had, in order to tempt the invalid, +whom yet I hoped to bring back with me to our house. When the carriage +was ready I took the good woman with me to show us the exact way, which +my coachman professed not to know; for, indeed, they were staying at but +a poor kind of place at the back of Leicester Square, of which they had +heard, as Clement told me afterwards, from one of the fishermen who had +carried them across from the Dutch coast in their disguises as a +Friesland peasant and his mother. They had some jewels of value +concealed round their persons; but their ready money was all spent before +I saw them, and Clement had been unwilling to leave his mother, even for +the time necessary to ascertain the best mode of disposing of the +diamonds. For, overcome with distress of mind and bodily fatigue, she +had reached London only to take to her bed in a sort of low, nervous +fever, in which her chief and only idea seemed to be that Clement was +about to be taken from her to some prison or other; and if he were out of +her sight, though but for a minute, she cried like a child, and could not +be pacified or comforted. The landlady was a kind, good woman, and +though she but half understood the case, she was truly sorry for them, as +foreigners, and the mother sick in a strange land. + +"I sent her forwards to request permission for my entrance. In a moment +I saw Clement--a tall, elegant young man, in a curious dress of coarse +cloth, standing at the open door of a room, and evidently--even before he +accosted me--striving to soothe the terrors of his mother inside. I went +towards him, and would have taken his hand, but he bent down and kissed +mine. + +"'May I come in, madame?' I asked, looking at the poor sick lady, lying +in the dark, dingy bed, her head propped up on coarse and dirty pillows, +and gazing with affrighted eyes at all that was going on. + +"'Clement! Clement! come to me!' she cried; and when he went to the +bedside she turned on one side, and took his hand in both of hers, and +began stroking it, and looking up in his face. I could scarce keep back +my tears. + +"He stood there quite still, except that from time to time he spoke to +her in a low tone. At last I advanced into the room, so that I could +talk to him, without renewing her alarm. I asked for the doctor's +address; for I had heard that they had called in some one, at their +landlady's recommendation: but I could hardly understand Clement's broken +English, and mispronunciation of our proper names, and was obliged to +apply to the woman herself. I could not say much to Clement, for his +attention was perpetually needed by his mother, who never seemed to +perceive that I was there. But I told him not to fear, however long I +might be away, for that I would return before night; and, bidding the +woman take charge of all the heterogeneous things the housekeeper had put +up, and leaving one of my men in the house, who could understand a few +words of French, with directions that he was to hold himself at Madame de +Crequy's orders until I sent or gave him fresh commands, I drove off to +the doctor's. What I wanted was his permission to remove Madame de +Crequy to my own house, and to learn how it best could be done; for I saw +that every movement in the room, every sound except Clement's voice, +brought on a fresh access of trembling and nervous agitation. + +"The doctor was, I should think, a clever man; but he had that kind of +abrupt manner which people get who have much to do with the lower orders. + +"I told him the story of his patient, the interest I had in her, and the +wish I entertained of removing her to my own house. + +"'It can't be done,' said he. 'Any change will kill her.' + +"'But it must be done,' I replied. 'And it shall not kill her.' + +"'Then I have nothing more to say,' said he, turning away from the +carriage door, and making as though he would go back into the house. + +"'Stop a moment. You must help me; and, if you do, you shall have reason +to be glad, for I will give you fifty pounds down with pleasure. If you +won't do it, another shall.' + +"He looked at me, then (furtively) at the carriage, hesitated, and then +said: 'You do not mind expense, apparently. I suppose you are a rich +lady of quality. Such folks will not stick at such trifles as the life +or death of a sick woman to get their own way. I suppose I must e'en +help you, for if I don't, another will.' + +"I did not mind what he said, so that he would assist me. I was pretty +sure that she was in a state to require opiates; and I had not forgotten +Christopher Sly, you may be sure, so I told him what I had in my head. +That in the dead of night--the quiet time in the streets,--she should be +carried in a hospital litter, softly and warmly covered over, from the +Leicester Square lodging-house to rooms that I would have in perfect +readiness for her. As I planned, so it was done. I let Clement know, by +a note, of my design. I had all prepared at home, and we walked about my +house as though shod with velvet, while the porter watched at the open +door. At last, through the darkness, I saw the lanterns carried by my +men, who were leading the little procession. The litter looked like a +hearse; on one side walked the doctor, on the other Clement; they came +softly and swiftly along. I could not try any farther experiment; we +dared not change her clothes; she was laid in the bed in the landlady's +coarse night-gear, and covered over warmly, and left in the shaded, +scented room, with a nurse and the doctor watching by her, while I led +Clement to the dressing-room adjoining, in which I had had a bed placed +for him. Farther than that he would not go; and there I had refreshments +brought. Meanwhile, he had shown his gratitude by every possible action +(for we none of us dared to speak): he had kneeled at my feet, and kissed +my hand, and left it wet with his tears. He had thrown up his arms to +Heaven, and prayed earnestly, as I could see by the movement of his lips. +I allowed him to relieve himself by these dumb expressions, if I may so +call them,--and then I left him, and went to my own rooms to sit up for +my lord, and tell him what I had done. + +"Of course, it was all right; and neither my lord nor I could sleep for +wondering how Madame de Crequy would bear her awakening. I had engaged +the doctor, to whose face and voice she was accustomed, to remain with +her all night: the nurse was experienced, and Clement was within call. +But it was with the greatest relief that I heard from my own woman, when +she brought me my chocolate, that Madame de Crequy (Monsieur had said) +had awakened more tranquil than she had been for many days. To be sure, +the whole aspect of the bed-chamber must have been more familiar to her +than the miserable place where I had found her, and she must have +intuitively felt herself among friends. + +"My lord was scandalized at Clement's dress, which, after the first +moment of seeing him I had forgotten, in thinking of other things, and +for which I had not prepared Lord Ludlow. He sent for his own tailor, +and bade him bring patterns of stuffs, and engage his men to work night +and day till Clement could appear as became his rank. In short, in a few +days so much of the traces of their flight were removed, that we had +almost forgotten the terrible causes of it, and rather felt as if they +had come on a visit to us than that they had been compelled to fly their +country. Their diamonds, too, were sold well by my lord's agents, though +the London shops were stocked with jewellery, and such portable +valuables, some of rare and curious fashion, which were sold for half +their real value by emigrants who could not afford to wait. Madame de +Crequy was recovering her health, although her strength was sadly gone, +and she would never be equal to such another flight, as the perilous one +which she had gone through, and to which she could not bear the slightest +reference. For some time things continued in this state--the De Crequys +still our honoured visitors,--many houses besides our own, even among our +own friends, open to receive the poor flying nobility of France, driven +from their country by the brutal republicans, and every freshly-arrived +emigrant bringing new tales of horror, as if these revolutionists were +drunk with blood, and mad to devise new atrocities. One day Clement--I +should tell you he had been presented to our good King George and the +sweet Queen, and they had accosted him most graciously, and his beauty +and elegance, and some of the circumstances attendant on his flight, made +him be received in the world quite like a hero of romance; he might have +been on intimate terms in many a distinguished house, had he cared to +visit much; but he accompanied my lord and me with an air of indifference +and languor, which I sometimes fancied made him be all the more sought +after: Monkshaven (that was the title my eldest son bore) tried in vain +to interest him in all young men's sports. But no! it was the same +through all. His mother took far more interest in the on-dits of the +London world, into which she was far too great an invalid to venture, +than he did in the absolute events themselves, in which he might have +been an actor. One day, as I was saying, an old Frenchman of a humble +class presented himself to our servants, several of them, understood +French; and through Medlicott, I learnt that he was in some way connected +with the De Crequys; not with their Paris-life; but I fancy he had been +intendant of their estates in the country; estates which were more useful +as hunting-grounds than as adding to their income. However, there was +the old man and with him, wrapped round his person, he had brought the +long parchment rolls, and deeds relating to their property. These he +would deliver up to none but Monsieur de Crequy, the rightful owner; and +Clement was out with Monkshaven, so the old man waited; and when Clement +came in, I told him of the steward's arrival, and how he had been cared +for by my people. Clement went directly to see him. He was a long time +away, and I was waiting for him to drive out with me, for some purpose or +another, I scarce know what, but I remember I was tired of waiting, and +was just in the act of ringing the bell to desire that he might be +reminded of his engagement with me, when he came in, his face as white as +the powder in his hair, his beautiful eyes dilated with horror. I saw +that he had heard something that touched him even more closely than the +usual tales which every fresh emigrant brought. + +"'What is it, Clement?' I asked. + +"He clasped his hands, and looked as though he tried to speak, but could +not bring out the words. + +"'They have guillotined my uncle!' said he at last. Now, I knew that +there was a Count de Crequy; but I had always understood that the elder +branch held very little communication with him; in fact, that he was a +vaurien of some kind, and rather a disgrace than otherwise to the family. +So, perhaps, I was hard-hearted but I was a little surprised at this +excess of emotion, till I saw that peculiar look in his eyes that many +people have when there is more terror in their hearts than they dare put +into words. He wanted me to understand something without his saying it; +but how could I? I had never heard of a Mademoiselle de Crequy. + +"'Virginie!' at last he uttered. In an instant I understood it all, and +remembered that, if Urian had lived, he too might have been in love. + +"'Your uncle's daughter?' I inquired. + +"'My cousin,' he replied. + +"I did not say, 'your betrothed,' but I had no doubt of it. I was +mistaken, however. + +"'O madame!' he continued, 'her mother died long ago--her father now--and +she is in daily fear,--alone, deserted--' + +"'Is she in the Abbaye?' asked I. + +"'No! she is in hiding with the widow of her father's old concierge. Any +day they may search the house for aristocrats. They are seeking them +everywhere. Then, not her life alone, but that of the old woman, her +hostess, is sacrificed. The old woman knows this, and trembles with +fear. Even if she is brave enough to be faithful, her fears would betray +her, should the house be searched. Yet, there is no one to help Virginie +to escape. She is alone in Paris.' + +"I saw what was in his mind. He was fretting and chafing to go to his +cousin's assistance; but the thought of his mother restrained him. I +would not have kept back Urian from such on errand at such a time. How +should I restrain him? And yet, perhaps, I did wrong in not urging the +chances of danger more. Still, if it was danger to him, was it not the +same or even greater danger to her?--for the French spared neither age +nor sex in those wicked days of terror. So I rather fell in with his +wish, and encouraged him to think how best and most prudently it might be +fulfilled; never doubting, as I have said, that he and his cousin were +troth-plighted. + +"But when I went to Madame de Crequy--after he had imparted his, or +rather our plan to her--I found out my mistake. She, who was in general +too feeble to walk across the room save slowly, and with a stick, was +going from end to end with quick, tottering steps; and, if now and then +she sank upon a chair, it seemed as if she could not rest, for she was up +again in a moment, pacing along, wringing her hands, and speaking rapidly +to herself. When she saw me, she stopped: 'Madame,' she said, 'you have +lost your own boy. You might have left me mine.' + +"I was so astonished--I hardly knew what to say. I had spoken to Clement +as if his mother's consent were secure (as I had felt my own would have +been if Urian had been alive to ask it). Of coarse, both he and I knew +that his mother's consent must be asked and obtained, before he could +leave her to go on such an undertaking; but, somehow, my blood always +rose at the sight or sound of danger; perhaps, because my life had been +so peaceful. Poor Madame de Crequy! it was otherwise with her; she +despaired while I hoped, and Clement trusted. + +"'Dear Madame de Crequy,' said I, 'he will return safely to us; every +precaution shall be taken, that either he or you, or my lord, or +Monkshaven can think of; but he cannot leave a girl--his nearest relation +save you--his betrothed, is she not?' + +"'His betrothed!' cried she, now at the utmost pitch of her excitement. +'Virginie betrothed to Clement?--no! thank heaven, not so bad as that! +Yet it might have been. But mademoiselle scorned my son! She would have +nothing to do with him. Now is the time for him to have nothing to do +with her!" + +"Clement had entered at the door behind his mother as she thus spoke. His +face was set and pale, till it looked as gray and immovable as if it had +been carved in stone. He came forward and stood before his mother. She +stopped her walk, threw back her haughty head, and the two looked each +other steadily in the face. After a minute or two in this attitude, her +proud and resolute gaze never flinching or wavering, he went down upon +one knee, and, taking her hand--her hard, stony hand, which never closed +on his, but remained straight and stiff: + +"'Mother,' he pleaded, 'withdraw your prohibition. Let me go!' + +"'What were her words?' Madame de Crequy replied, slowly, as if forcing +her memory to the extreme of accuracy. 'My cousin,' she said, 'when I +marry, I marry a man, not a petit-maitre. I marry a man who, whatever +his rank may be will add dignity to the human race by his virtues, and +not be content to live in an effeminate court on the traditions of past +grandeur.' She borrowed her words from the infamous Jean-Jacques +Rousseau, the friend of her scarce less infamous father--nay! I will say +it,--if not her words, she borrowed her principles. And my son to +request her to marry him!' + +"'It was my father's written wish,' said Clement. + +"'But did you not love her? You plead your father's words,--words +written twelve years before,--and as if that were your reason for being +indifferent to my dislike to the alliance. But you requested her to +marry you,--and she refused you with insolent contempt; and now you are +ready to leave me,--leave me desolate in a foreign land--' + +"'Desolate! my mother! and the Countess Ludlow stands there!' + +"'Pardon, madame! But all the earth, though it were full of kind hearts, +is but a desolation and a desert place to a mother when her only child is +absent. And you, Clement, would leave me for this Virginie,--this +degenerate De Crequy, tainted with the atheism of the Encyclopedistes! +She is only reaping some of the fruit of the harvest whereof her friends +have sown the seed. Let her alone! Doubtless she has friends--it may be +lovers--among these demons, who, under the cry of liberty, commit every +licence. Let her alone, Clement! She refused you with scorn: be too +proud to notice her now.' + +"'Mother, I cannot think of myself; only of her.' + +"'Think of me, then! I, your mother, forbid you to go.' + +"Clement bowed low, and went out of the room instantly, as one blinded. +She saw his groping movement, and, for an instant, I think her heart was +touched. But she turned to me, and tried to exculpate her past violence +by dilating upon her wrongs, and they certainly were many. The Count, +her husband's younger brother, had invariably tried to make mischief +between husband and wife. He had been the cleverer man of the two, and +had possessed extraordinary influence over her husband. She suspected +him of having instigated that clause in her husband's will, by which the +Marquis expressed his wish for the marriage of the cousins. The Count +had had some interest in the management of the De Crequy property during +her son's minority. Indeed, I remembered then, that it was through Count +de Crequy that Lord Ludlow had first heard of the apartment which we +afterwards took in the Hotel de Crequy; and then the recollection of a +past feeling came distinctly out of the mist, as it were; and I called to +mind how, when we first took up our abode in the Hotel de Crequy, both +Lord Ludlow and I imagined that the arrangement was displeasing to our +hostess; and how it had taken us a considerable time before we had been +able to establish relations of friendship with her. Years after our +visit, she began to suspect that Clement (whom she could not forbid to +visit at his uncle's house, considering the terms on which his father had +been with his brother; though she herself never set foot over the Count +de Crequy's threshold) was attaching himself to mademoiselle, his cousin; +and she made cautious inquiries as to the appearance, character, and +disposition of the young lady. Mademoiselle was not handsome, they said; +but of a fine figure, and generally considered as having a very noble and +attractive presence. In character she was daring and wilful (said one +set); original and independent (said another). She was much indulged by +her father, who had given her something of a man's education, and +selected for her intimate friend a young lady below her in rank, one of +the Bureaucracie, a Mademoiselle Necker, daughter of the Minister of +Finance. Mademoiselle de Crequy was thus introduced into all the free- +thinking salons of Paris; among people who were always full of plans for +subverting society. 'And did Clement affect such people?' Madame de +Crequy had asked with some anxiety. No! Monsieur de Crequy had neither +eyes nor ears, nor thought for anything but his cousin, while she was by. +And she? She hardly took notice of his devotion, so evident to every one +else. The proud creature! But perhaps that was her haughty way of +concealing what she felt. And so Madame de Crequy listened, and +questioned, and learnt nothing decided, until one day she surprised +Clement with the note in his hand, of which she remembered the stinging +words so well, in which Virginie had said, in reply to a proposal Clement +had sent her through her father, that 'When she married she married a +man, not a petit-maitre.' + +"Clement was justly indignant at the insulting nature of the answer +Virginie had sent to a proposal, respectful in its tone, and which was, +after all, but the cool, hardened lava over a burning heart. He +acquiesced in his mother's desire, that he should not again present +himself in his uncle's salons; but he did not forget Virginie, though he +never mentioned her name. + +"Madame de Crequy and her son were among the earliest proscrits, as they +were of the strongest possible royalists, and aristocrats, as it was the +custom of the horrid Sansculottes to term those who adhered to the habits +of expression and action in which it was their pride to have been +educated. They had left Paris some weeks before they had arrived in +England, and Clement's belief at the time of quitting the Hotel de Crequy +had certainly been, that his uncle was not merely safe, but rather a +popular man with the party in power. And, as all communication having +relation to private individuals of a reliable kind was intercepted, +Monsieur de Crequy had felt but little anxiety for his uncle and cousin, +in comparison with what he did for many other friends of very different +opinions in politics, until the day when he was stunned by the fatal +information that even his progressive uncle was guillotined, and learnt +that his cousin was imprisoned by the licence of the mob, whose rights +(as she called them) she was always advocating. + +"When I had heard all this story, I confess I lost in sympathy for +Clement what I gained for his mother. Virginie's life did not seem to me +worth the risk that Clement's would run. But when I saw him--sad, +depressed, nay, hopeless--going about like one oppressed by a heavy dream +which he cannot shake off; caring neither to eat, drink, nor sleep, yet +bearing all with silent dignity, and even trying to force a poor, faint +smile when he caught my anxious eyes; I turned round again, and wondered +how Madame de Crequy could resist this mute pleading of her son's altered +appearance. As for my Lord Ludlow and Monkshaven, as soon as they +understood the case, they were indignant that any mother should attempt +to keep a son out of honourable danger; and it was honourable, and a +clear duty (according to them) to try to save the life of a helpless +orphan girl, his next of kin. None but a Frenchman, said my lord, would +hold himself bound by an old woman's whimsies and fears, even though she +were his mother. As it was, he was chafing himself to death under the +restraint. If he went, to be sure, the wretches might make an end of +him, as they had done of many a fine fellow: but my lord would take heavy +odds, that, instead of being guillotined, he would save the girl, and +bring her safe to England, just desperately in love with her preserver, +and then we would have a jolly wedding down at Monkshaven. My lord +repeated his opinion so often that it became a certain prophecy in his +mind of what was to take place; and, one day seeing Clement look even +paler and thinner than he had ever done before, he sent a message to +Madame de Crequy, requesting permission to speak to her in private. + +"'For, by George!' said he, 'she shall hear my opinion, and not let that +lad of hers kill himself by fretting. He's too good for that, if he had +been an English lad, he would have been off to his sweetheart long before +this, without saying with your leave or by your leave; but being a +Frenchman, he is all for AEneas and filial piety,--filial fiddle-sticks!' +(My lord had run away to sea, when a boy, against his father's consent, I +am sorry to say; and, as all had ended well, and he had come back to find +both his parents alive, I do not think he was ever as much aware of his +fault as he might have been under other circumstances.) 'No, my lady,' +he went on, 'don't come with me. A woman can manage a man best when he +has a fit of obstinacy, and a man can persuade a woman out of her +tantrums, when all her own sex, the whole army of them, would fail. Allow +me to go alone to my tete-a-tete with madame." + +"What he said, what passed, he never could repeat; but he came back +graver than he went. However, the point was gained; Madame de Crequy +withdrew her prohibition, and had given him leave to tell Clement as +much. + +"'But she is an old Cassandra,' said he. 'Don't let the lad be much with +her; her talk would destroy the courage of the bravest man; she is so +given over to superstition.' Something that she had said had touched a +chord in my lord's nature which he inherited from his Scotch ancestors. +Long afterwards, I heard what this was. Medlicott told me. + +"However, my lord shook off all fancies that told against the fulfilment +of Clement's wishes. All that afternoon we three sat together, planning; +and Monkshaven passed in and out, executing our commissions, and +preparing everything. Towards nightfall all was ready for Clement's +start on his journey towards the coast. + +"Madame had declined seeing any of us since my lord's stormy interview +with her. She sent word that she was fatigued, and desired repose. But, +of course, before Clement set off, he was bound to wish her farewell, and +to ask for her blessing. In order to avoid an agitating conversation +between mother and son, my lord and I resolved to be present at the +interview. Clement was already in his travelling-dress, that of a Norman +fisherman, which Monkshaven had, with infinite trouble, discovered in the +possession of one of the emigres who thronged London, and who had made +his escape from the shores of France in this disguise. Clement's plan +was, to go down to the coast of Sussex, and get some of the fishing or +smuggling boats to take him across to the French coast near Dieppe. There +again he would have to change his dress. Oh, it was so well planned! His +mother was startled by his disguise (of which we had not thought to +forewarn her) as he entered her apartment. And either that, or the being +suddenly roused from the heavy slumber into which she was apt to fall +when she was left alone, gave her manner an air of wildness that was +almost like insanity. + +"'Go, go!' she said to him, almost pushing him away as he knelt to kiss +her hand. 'Virginie is beckoning to you, but you don't see what kind of +a bed it is--' + +"'Clement, make haste!' said my lord, in a hurried manner, as if to +interrupt madame. 'The time is later than I thought, and you must not +miss the morning's tide. Bid your mother good-bye at once, and let us be +off.' For my lord and Monkshaven were to ride with him to an inn near +the shore, from whence he was to walk to his destination. My lord almost +took him by the arm to pull him away; and they were gone, and I was left +alone with Madame de Crequy. When she heard the horses' feet, she seemed +to find out the truth, as if for the first time. She set her teeth +together. 'He has left me for her!' she almost screamed. 'Left me for +her!' she kept muttering; and then, as the wild look came back into her +eyes, she said, almost with exultation, 'But I did not give him my +blessing!'" + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +"All night Madame de Crequy raved in delirium. If I could I would have +sent for Clement back again. I did send off one man, but I suppose my +directions were confused, or they were wrong, for he came back after my +lord's return, on the following afternoon. By this time Madame de Crequy +was quieter: she was, indeed, asleep from exhaustion when Lord Ludlow and +Monkshaven came in. They were in high spirits, and their hopefulness +brought me round to a less dispirited state. All had gone well: they had +accompanied Clement on foot along the shore, until they had met with a +lugger, which my lord had hailed in good nautical language. The captain +had responded to these freemason terms by sending a boat to pick up his +passenger, and by an invitation to breakfast sent through a +speaking-trumpet. Monkshaven did not approve of either the meal or the +company, and had returned to the inn, but my lord had gone with Clement +and breakfasted on board, upon grog, biscuit, fresh-caught fish--'the +best breakfast he ever ate,' he said, but that was probably owing to the +appetite his night's ride had given him. However, his good fellowship +had evidently won the captain's heart, and Clement had set sail under the +best auspices. It was agreed that I should tell all this to Madame de +Crequy, if she inquired; otherwise, it would be wiser not to renew her +agitation by alluding to her son's journey. + +"I sat with her constantly for many days; but she never spoke of Clement. +She forced herself to talk of the little occurrences of Parisian society +in former days: she tried to be conversational and agreeable, and to +betray no anxiety or even interest in the object of Clement's journey; +and, as far as unremitting efforts could go, she succeeded. But the +tones of her voice were sharp and yet piteous, as if she were in constant +pain; and the glance of her eye hurried and fearful, as if she dared not +let it rest on any object. + +"In a week we heard of Clement's safe arrival on the French coast. He +sent a letter to this effect by the captain of the smuggler, when the +latter returned. We hoped to hear again; but week after week elapsed, +and there was no news of Clement. I had told Lord Ludlow, in Madame de +Crequy's presence, as he and I had arranged, of the note I had received +from her son, informing us of his landing in France. She heard, but she +took no notice, and evidently began to wonder that we did not mention any +further intelligence of him in the same manner before her; and daily I +began to fear that her pride would give way, and that she would +supplicate for news before I had any to give her. + +"One morning, on my awakening, my maid told me that Madame de Crequy had +passed a wretched night, and had bidden Medlicott (whom, as understanding +French, and speaking it pretty well, though with that horrid German +accent, I had put about her) request that I would go to madame's room as +soon as I was dressed. + +"I knew what was coming, and I trembled all the time they were doing my +hair, and otherwise arranging me. I was not encouraged by my lord's +speeches. He had heard the message, and kept declaring that he would +rather be shot than have to tell her that there was no news of her son; +and yet he said, every now and then, when I was at the lowest pitch of +uneasiness, that he never expected to hear again: that some day soon we +should see him walking in and introducing Mademoiselle de Crequy to us. + +"However at last I was ready, and go I must. + +"Her eyes were fixed on the door by which I entered. I went up to the +bedside. She was not rouged,--she had left it off now for several +days,--she no longer attempted to keep up the vain show of not feeling, +and loving, and fearing. + +"For a moment or two she did not speak, and I was glad of the respite. + +"'Clement?' she said at length, covering her mouth with a handkerchief +the minute she had spoken, that I might not see it quiver. + +"'There has been no news since the first letter, saying how well the +voyage was performed, and how safely he had landed--near Dieppe, you +know,' I replied as cheerfully as possible. 'My lord does not expect +that we shall have another letter; he thinks that we shall see him soon.' + +"There was no answer. As I looked, uncertain whether to do or say more, +she slowly turned herself in bed, and lay with her face to the wall; and, +as if that did not shut out the light of day and the busy, happy world +enough, she put out her trembling hands, and covered her face with her +handkerchief. There was no violence: hardly any sound. + +"I told her what my lord had said about Clement's coming in some day, and +taking us all by surprise. I did not believe it myself, but it was just +possible,--and I had nothing else to say. Pity, to one who was striving +so hard to conceal her feelings, would have been impertinent. She let me +talk; but she did not reply. She knew that my words were vain and idle, +and had no root in my belief; as well as I did myself. + +"I was very thankful when Medlicott came in with Madame's breakfast, and +gave me an excuse for leaving. + +"But I think that conversation made me feel more anxious and impatient +than ever. I felt almost pledged to Madame de Crequy for the fulfilment +of the vision I had held out. She had taken entirely to her bed by this +time: not from illness, but because she had no hope within her to stir +her up to the effort of dressing. In the same way she hardly cared for +food. She had no appetite,--why eat to prolong a life of despair? But +she let Medlicott feed her, sooner than take the trouble of resisting. + +"And so it went on,--for weeks, months--I could hardly count the time, it +seemed so long. Medlicott told me she noticed a preternatural +sensitiveness of ear in Madame de Crequy, induced by the habit of +listening silently for the slightest unusual sound in the house. +Medlicott was always a minute watcher of any one whom she cared about; +and, one day, she made me notice by a sign madame's acuteness of hearing, +although the quick expectation was but evinced for a moment in the turn +of the eye, the hushed breath--and then, when the unusual footstep turned +into my lord's apartments, the soft quivering sigh, and the closed +eyelids. + +"At length the intendant of the De Crequy estates--the old man, you will +remember, whose information respecting Virginie de Crequy first gave +Clement the desire to return to Paris,--came to St. James's Square, and +begged to speak to me. I made haste to go down to him in the +housekeeper's room, sooner than that he should be ushered into mine, for +fear of madame hearing any sound. + +"The old man stood--I see him now--with his hat held before him in both +his hands; he slowly bowed till his face touched it when I came in. Such +long excess of courtesy augured ill. He waited for me to speak. + +"'Have you any intelligence?' I inquired. He had been often to the house +before, to ask if we had received any news; and once or twice I had seen +him, but this was the first time he had begged to see me. + +"'Yes, madame,' he replied, still standing with his head bent down, like +a child in disgrace. + +"'And it is bad!' I exclaimed. + +"'It is bad.' For a moment I was angry at the cold tone in which my +words were echoed; but directly afterwards I saw the large, slow, heavy +tears of age falling down the old man's cheeks, and on to the sleeves of +his poor, threadbare coat. + +"I asked him how he had heard it: it seemed as though I could not all at +once bear to hear what it was. He told me that the night before, in +crossing Long Acre, he had stumbled upon an old acquaintance of his; one +who, like himself had been a dependent upon the De Crequy family, but had +managed their Paris affairs, while Flechier had taken charge of their +estates in the country. Both were now emigrants, and living on the +proceeds of such small available talents as they possessed. Flechier, as +I knew, earned a very fair livelihood by going about to dress salads for +dinner parties. His compatriot, Le Febvre, had begun to give a few +lessons as a dancing-master. One of them took the other home to his +lodgings; and there, when their most immediate personal adventures had +been hastily talked over, came the inquiry from Flechier as to Monsieur +de Crequy + +"'Clement was dead--guillotined. Virginie was dead--guillotined.' + +"When Flechier had told me thus much, he could not speak for sobbing; and +I, myself, could hardly tell how to restrain my tears sufficiently, until +I could go to my own room and be at liberty to give way. He asked my +leave to bring in his friend Le Febvre, who was walking in the square, +awaiting a possible summons to tell his story. I heard afterwards a good +many details, which filled up the account, and made me feel--which brings +me back to the point I started from--how unfit the lower orders are for +being trusted indiscriminately with the dangerous powers of education. I +have made a long preamble, but now I am coming to the moral of my story." + +My lady was trying to shake off the emotion which she evidently felt in +recurring to this sad history of Monsieur de Crequy's death. She came +behind me, and arranged my pillows, and then, seeing I had been +crying--for, indeed, I was weak-spirited at the time, and a little served +to unloose my tears--she stooped down, and kissed my forehead, and said +"Poor child!" almost as if she thanked me for feeling that old grief of +hers. + +"Being once in France, it was no difficult thing for Clement to get into +Paris. The difficulty in those days was to leave, not to enter. He came +in dressed as a Norman peasant, in charge of a load of fruit and +vegetables, with which one of the Seine barges was freighted. He worked +hard with his companions in landing and arranging their produce on the +quays; and then, when they dispersed to get their breakfasts at some of +the estaminets near the old Marche aux Fleurs, he sauntered up a street +which conducted him, by many an odd turn, through the Quartier Latin to a +horrid back alley, leading out of the Rue l'Ecole de Medecine; some +atrocious place, as I have heard, not far from the shadow of that +terrible Abbaye, where so many of the best blood of France awaited their +deaths. But here some old man lived, on whose fidelity Clement thought +that he might rely. I am not sure if he had not been gardener in those +very gardens behind the Hotel Crequy where Clement and Urian used to play +together years before. But whatever the old man's dwelling might be, +Clement was only too glad to reach it, you may be sure, he had been kept +in Normandy, in all sorts of disguises, for many days after landing in +Dieppe, through the difficulty of entering Paris unsuspected by the many +ruffians who were always on the look-out for aristocrats. + +"The old gardener was, I believe, both faithful and tried, and sheltered +Clement in his garret as well as might be. Before he could stir out, it +was necessary to procure a fresh disguise, and one more in character with +an inhabitant of Paris than that of a Norman carter was procured; and +after waiting in-doors for one or two days, to see if any suspicion was +excited, Clement set off to discover Virginie. + +"He found her at the old concierge's dwelling. Madame Babette was the +name of this woman, who must have been a less faithful--or rather, +perhaps, I should say, a more interested--friend to her guest than the +old gardener Jaques was to Clement. + +"I have seen a miniature of Virginie, which a French lady of quality +happened to have in her possession at the time of her flight from Paris, +and which she brought with her to England unwittingly; for it belonged to +the Count de Crequy, with whom she was slightly acquainted. I should +fancy from it, that Virginie was taller and of a more powerful figure for +a woman than her cousin Clement was for a man. Her dark-brown hair was +arranged in short curls--the way of dressing the hair announced the +politics of the individual, in those days, just as patches did in my +grandmother's time; and Virginie's hair was not to my taste, or according +to my principles: it was too classical. Her large, black eyes looked out +at you steadily. One cannot judge of the shape of a nose from a full- +face miniature, but the nostrils were clearly cut and largely opened. I +do not fancy her nose could have been pretty; but her mouth had a +character all its own, and which would, I think, have redeemed a plainer +face. It was wide, and deep set into the cheeks at the corners; the +upper lip was very much arched, and hardly closed over the teeth; so that +the whole face looked (from the serious, intent look in the eyes, and the +sweet intelligence of the mouth) as if she were listening eagerly to +something to which her answer was quite ready, and would come out of +those red, opening lips as soon as ever you had done speaking, and you +longed to know what she would say. + +"Well: this Virginie de Crequy was living with Madame Babette in the +conciergerie of an old French inn, somewhere to the north of Paris, so, +far enough from Clement's refuge. The inn had been frequented by farmers +from Brittany and such kind of people, in the days when that sort of +intercourse went on between Paris and the provinces which had nearly +stopped now. Few Bretons came near it now, and the inn had fallen into +the hands of Madame Babette's brother, as payment for a bad wine debt of +the last proprietor. He put his sister and her child in, to keep it +open, as it were, and sent all the people he could to occupy the half- +furnished rooms of the house. They paid Babette for their lodging every +morning as they went out to breakfast, and returned or not as they chose, +at night. Every three days, the wine-merchant or his son came to Madame +Babette, and she accounted to them for the money she had received. She +and her child occupied the porter's office (in which the lad slept at +nights) and a little miserable bed-room which opened out of it, and +received all the light and air that was admitted through the door of +communication, which was half glass. Madame Babette must have had a kind +of attachment for the De Crequys--her De Crequys, you +understand--Virginie's father, the Count; for, at some risk to herself, +she had warned both him and his daughter of the danger impending over +them. But he, infatuated, would not believe that his dear Human Race +could ever do him harm; and, as long as he did not fear, Virginie was not +afraid. It was by some ruse, the nature of which I never heard, that +Madame Babette induced Virginie to come to her abode at the very hour in +which the Count had been recognized in the streets, and hurried off to +the Lanterne. It was after Babette had got her there, safe shut up in +the little back den, that she told her what had befallen her father. From +that day, Virginie had never stirred out of the gates, or crossed the +threshold of the porter's lodge. I do not say that Madame Babette was +tired of her continual presence, or regretted the impulse which made her +rush to the De Crequy's well-known house--after being compelled to form +one of the mad crowds that saw the Count de Crequy seized and hung--and +hurry his daughter out, through alleys and backways, until at length she +had the orphan safe in her own dark sleeping-room, and could tell her +tale of horror: but Madame Babette was poorly paid for her porter's work +by her avaricious brother; and it was hard enough to find food for +herself and her growing boy; and, though the poor girl ate little enough, +I dare say, yet there seemed no end to the burthen that Madame Babette +had imposed upon herself: the De Crequys were plundered, ruined, had +become an extinct race, all but a lonely friendless girl, in broken +health and spirits; and, though she lent no positive encouragement to his +suit, yet, at the time, when Clement reappeared in Paris, Madame Babette +was beginning to think that Virginie might do worse than encourage the +attentions of Monsieur Morin Fils, her nephew, and the wine merchant's +son. Of course, he and his father had the entree into the conciergerie +of the hotel that belonged to them, in right of being both proprietors +and relations. The son, Morin, had seen Virginie in this manner. He was +fully aware that she was far above him in rank, and guessed from her +whole aspect that she had lost her natural protectors by the terrible +guillotine; but he did not know her exact name or station, nor could he +persuade his aunt to tell him. However, he fell head over ears in love +with her, whether she were princess or peasant; and though at first there +was something about her which made his passionate love conceal itself +with shy, awkward reserve, and then made it only appear in the guise of +deep, respectful devotion; yet, by-and-by,--by the same process of +reasoning, I suppose, that his aunt had gone through even before him--Jean +Morin began to let Hope oust Despair from his heart. Sometimes he +thought--perhaps years hence--that solitary, friendless lady, pent up in +squalor, might turn to him as to a friend and comforter--and then--and +then--. Meanwhile Jean Morin was most attentive to his aunt, whom he had +rather slighted before. He would linger over the accounts; would bring +her little presents; and, above all, he made a pet and favourite of +Pierre, the little cousin, who could tell him about all the ways of going +on of Mam'selle Cannes, as Virginie was called. Pierre was thoroughly +aware of the drift and cause of his cousin's inquiries; and was his +ardent partisan, as I have heard, even before Jean Morin had exactly +acknowledged his wishes to himself. + +"It must have required some patience and much diplomacy, before Clement +de Crequy found out the exact place where his cousin was hidden. The old +gardener took the cause very much to heart; as, judging from my +recollections, I imagine he would have forwarded any fancy, however wild, +of Monsieur Clement's. (I will tell you afterwards how I came to know +all these particulars so well.) + +"After Clement's return, on two succeeding days, from his dangerous +search, without meeting with any good result, Jacques entreated Monsieur +de Crequy to let him take it in hand. He represented that he, as +gardener for the space of twenty years and more at the Hotel de Crequy, +had a right to be acquainted with all the successive concierges at the +Count's house; that he should not go among them as a stranger, but as an +old friend, anxious to renew pleasant intercourse; and that if the +Intendant's story, which he had told Monsieur de Crequy in England, was +true, that mademoiselle was in hiding at the house of a former concierge, +why, something relating to her would surely drop out in the course of +conversation. So he persuaded Clement to remain indoors, while he set +off on his round, with no apparent object but to gossip. + +"At night he came home,--having seen mademoiselle. He told Clement much +of the story relating to Madame Babette that I have told to you. Of +course, he had heard nothing of the ambitious hopes of Morin Fils,--hardly +of his existence, I should think. Madame Babette had received him +kindly; although, for some time, she had kept him standing in the +carriage gateway outside her door. But, on his complaining of the +draught and his rheumatism, she had asked him in: first looking round +with some anxiety, to see who was in the room behind her. No one was +there when he entered and sat down. But, in a minute or two, a tall, +thin young lady, with great, sad eyes, and pale cheeks, came from the +inner room, and, seeing him, retired. 'It is Mademoiselle Cannes,' said +Madame Babette, rather unnecessarily; for, if he had not been on the +watch for some sign of Mademoiselle de Crequy, he would hardly have +noticed the entrance and withdrawal. + +"Clement and the good old gardener were always rather perplexed by Madame +Babette's evident avoidance of all mention of the De Crequy family. If +she were so much interested in one member as to be willing to undergo the +pains and penalties of a domiciliary visit, it was strange that she never +inquired after the existence of her charge's friends and relations from +one who might very probably have heard something of them. They settled +that Madame Babette must believe that the Marquise and Clement were dead; +and admired her for her reticence in never speaking of Virginie. The +truth was, I suspect, that she was so desirous of her nephews success by +this time, that she did not like letting any one into the secret of +Virginie's whereabouts who might interfere with their plan. However, it +was arranged between Clement and his humble friend, that the former, +dressed in the peasant's clothes in which he had entered Paris, but +smartened up in one or two particulars, as if, although a countryman, he +had money to spare, should go and engage a sleeping-room in the old +Breton Inn; where, as I told you, accommodation for the night was to be +had. This was accordingly done, without exciting Madame Babette's +suspicions, for she was unacquainted with the Normandy accent, and +consequently did not perceive the exaggeration of it which Monsieur de +Crequy adopted in order to disguise his pure Parisian. But after he had +for two nights slept in a queer dark closet, at the end of one of the +numerous short galleries in the Hotel Duguesclin, and paid his money for +such accommodation each morning at the little bureau under the window of +the conciergerie, he found himself no nearer to his object. He stood +outside in the gateway: Madame Babette opened a pane in her window, +counted out the change, gave polite thanks, and shut to the pane with a +clack, before he could ever find out what to say that might be the means +of opening a conversation. Once in the streets, he was in danger from +the bloodthirsty mob, who were ready in those days to hunt to death every +one who looked like a gentleman, as an aristocrat: and Clement, depend +upon it, looked a gentleman, whatever dress he wore. Yet it was unwise +to traverse Paris to his old friend the gardener's grenier, so he had to +loiter about, where I hardly know. Only he did leave the Hotel +Duguesclin, and he did not go to old Jacques, and there was not another +house in Paris open to him. At the end of two days, he had made out +Pierre's existence; and he began to try to make friends with the lad. +Pierre was too sharp and shrewd not to suspect something from the +confused attempts at friendliness. It was not for nothing that the +Norman farmer lounged in the court and doorway, and brought home presents +of galette. Pierre accepted the galette, reciprocated the civil +speeches, but kept his eyes open. Once, returning home pretty late at +night, he surprised the Norman studying the shadows on the blind, which +was drawn down when Madame Babette's lamp was lighted. On going in, he +found Mademoiselle Cannes with his mother, sitting by the table, and +helping in the family mending. + +"Pierre was afraid that the Norman had some view upon the money which his +mother, as concierge, collected for her brother. But the money was all +safe next evening, when his cousin, Monsieur Morin Fils, came to collect +it. Madame Babette asked her nephew to sit down, and skilfully barred +the passage to the inner door, so that Virginie, had she been ever so +much disposed, could not have retreated. She sat silently sewing. All +at once the little party were startled by a very sweet tenor voice, just +close to the street window, singing one of the airs out of Beaumarchais' +operas, which, a few years before, had been popular all over Paris. But +after a few moments of silence, and one or two remarks, the talking went +on again. Pierre, however, noticed an increased air of abstraction in +Virginie, who, I suppose, was recurring to the last time that she had +heard the song, and did not consider, as her cousin had hoped she would +have done, what were the words set to the air, which he imagined she +would remember, and which would have told her so much. For, only a few +years before, Adam's opera of Richard le Roi had made the story of the +minstrel Blondel and our English Coeur de Lion familiar to all the opera- +going part of the Parisian public, and Clement had bethought him of +establishing a communication with Virginie by some such means. + +"The next night, about the same hour, the same voice was singing outside +the window again. Pierre, who had been irritated by the proceeding the +evening before, as it had diverted Virginie's attention from his cousin, +who had been doing his utmost to make himself agreeable, rushed out to +the door, just as the Norman was ringing the bell to be admitted for the +night. Pierre looked up and down the street; no one else was to be seen. +The next day, the Norman mollified him somewhat by knocking at the door +of the conciergerie, and begging Monsieur Pierre's acceptance of some +knee-buckles, which had taken the country farmer's fancy the day before, +as he had been gazing into the shops, but which, being too small for his +purpose, he took the liberty of offering to Monsieur Pierre. Pierre, a +French boy, inclined to foppery, was charmed, ravished by the beauty of +the present and with monsieur's goodness, and he began to adjust them to +his breeches immediately, as well as he could, at least, in his mother's +absence. The Norman, whom Pierre kept carefully on the outside of the +threshold, stood by, as if amused at the boy's eagerness. + +"'Take care,' said he, clearly and distinctly; 'take care, my little +friend, lest you become a fop; and, in that case, some day, years hence, +when your heart is devoted to some young lady, she may be inclined to say +to you'--here he raised his voice--'No, thank you; when I marry, I marry +a man, not a petit-maitre; I marry a man, who, whatever his position may +be, will add dignity to the human race by his virtues.' Farther than +that in his quotation Clement dared not go. His sentiments (so much +above the apparent occasion) met with applause from Pierre, who liked to +contemplate himself in the light of a lover, even though it should be a +rejected one, and who hailed the mention of the words 'virtues' and +'dignity of the human race' as belonging to the cant of a good citizen. + +"But Clement was more anxious to know how the invisible Lady took his +speech. There was no sign at the time. But when he returned at night, +he heard a voice, low singing, behind Madame Babette, as she handed him +his candle, the very air he had sung without effect for two nights past. +As if he had caught it up from her murmuring voice, he sang it loudly and +clearly as he crossed the court. + +"'Here is our opera-singer!' exclaimed Madame Babette. 'Why, the Norman +grazier sings like Boupre,' naming a favourite singer at the neighbouring +theatre. + +"Pierre was struck by the remark, and quietly resolved to look after the +Norman; but again, I believe, it was more because of his mother's deposit +of money than with any thought of Virginie. + +"However, the next morning, to the wonder of both mother and son, +Mademoiselle Cannes proposed, with much hesitation, to go out and make +some little purchase for herself. A month or two ago, this was what +Madame Babette had been never weary of urging. But now she was as much +surprised as if she had expected Virginie to remain a prisoner in her +rooms all the rest of her life. I suppose she had hoped that her first +time of quitting it would be when she left it for Monsieur Morin's house +as his wife. + +"A quick look from Madame Babette towards Pierre was all that was needed +to encourage the boy to follow her. He went out cautiously. She was at +the end of the street. She looked up and down, as if waiting for some +one. No one was there. Back she came, so swiftly that she nearly caught +Pierre before he could retreat through the porte-cochere. There he +looked out again. The neighbourhood was low and wild, and strange; and +some one spoke to Virginie,--nay, laid his hand upon her arm,--whose +dress and aspect (he had emerged out of a side-street) Pierre did not +know; but, after a start, and (Pierre could fancy) a little scream, +Virginie recognised the stranger, and the two turned up the side street +whence the man had come. Pierre stole swiftly to the corner of this +street; no one was there: they had disappeared up some of the alleys. +Pierre returned home to excite his mother's infinite surprise. But they +had hardly done talking, when Virginie returned, with a colour and a +radiance in her face, which they had never seen there since her father's +death." + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +"I have told you that I heard much of this story from a friend of the +Intendant of the De Crequys, whom he met with in London. Some years +afterwards--the summer before my lord's death--I was travelling with him +in Devonshire, and we went to see the French prisoners of war on +Dartmoor. We fell into conversation with one of them, whom I found out +to be the very Pierre of whom I had heard before, as having been involved +in the fatal story of Clement and Virginie, and by him I was told much of +their last days, and thus I learnt how to have some sympathy with all +those who were concerned in those terrible events; yes, even with the +younger Morin himself, on whose behalf Pierre spoke warmly, even after so +long a time had elapsed. + +"For when the younger Morin called at the porter's lodge, on the evening +of the day when Virginie had gone out for the first time after so many +months' confinement to the conciergerie, he was struck with the +improvement in her appearance. It seems to have hardly been that he +thought her beauty greater: for, in addition to the fact that she was not +beautiful, Morin had arrived at that point of being enamoured when it +does not signify whether the beloved one is plain or handsome--she has +enchanted one pair of eyes, which henceforward see her through their own +medium. But Morin noticed the faint increase of colour and light in her +countenance. It was as though she had broken through her thick cloud of +hopeless sorrow, and was dawning forth into a happier life. And so, +whereas during her grief, he had revered and respected it even to a point +of silent sympathy, now that she was gladdened, his heart rose on the +wings of strengthened hopes. Even in the dreary monotony of this +existence in his Aunt Babette's conciergerie, Time had not failed in his +work, and now, perhaps, soon he might humbly strive to help Time. The +very next day he returned--on some pretence of business--to the Hotel +Duguesclin, and made his aunt's room, rather than his aunt herself, a +present of roses and geraniums tied up in a bouquet with a tricolor +ribbon. Virginie was in the room, sitting at the coarse sewing she liked +to do for Madame Babette. He saw her eyes brighten at the sight of the +flowers: she asked his aunt to let her arrange them; he saw her untie the +ribbon, and with a gesture of dislike, throw it on the ground, and give +it a kick with her little foot, and even in this girlish manner of +insulting his dearest prejudices, he found something to admire. + +"As he was coming out, Pierre stopped him. The lad had been trying to +arrest his cousin's attention by futile grimaces and signs played off +behind Virginie's back: but Monsieur Morin saw nothing but Mademoiselle +Cannes. However, Pierre was not to be baffled, and Monsieur Morin found +him in waiting just outside the threshold. With his finger on his lips, +Pierre walked on tiptoe by his companion's side till they would have been +long past sight or hearing of the conciergerie, even had the inhabitants +devoted themselves to the purposes of spying or listening. + +"'Chut!' said Pierre, at last. 'She goes out walking.' + +"'Well?' said Monsieur Morin, half curious, half annoyed at being +disturbed in the delicious reverie of the future into which he longed to +fall. + +"'Well! It is not well. It is bad.' + +"'Why? I do not ask who she is, but I have my ideas. She is an +aristocrat. Do the people about here begin to suspect her?' + +"'No, no!' said Pierre. 'But she goes out walking. She has gone these +two mornings. I have watched her. She meets a man--she is friends with +him, for she talks to him as eagerly as he does to her--mamma cannot tell +who he is.' + +"'Has my aunt seen him?' + +"'No, not so much as a fly's wing of him. I myself have only seen his +back. It strikes me like a familiar back, and yet I cannot think who it +is. But they separate with sudden darts, like two birds who have been +together to feed their young ones. One moment they are in close talk, +their heads together chuckotting; the next he has turned up some +bye-street, and Mademoiselle Cannes is close upon me--has almost caught +me.' + +"'But she did not see you?' inquired Monsieur Morin, in so altered a +voice that Pierre gave him one of his quick penetrating looks. He was +struck by the way in which his cousin's features--always coarse and +common-place--had become contracted and pinched; struck, too, by the +livid look on his sallow complexion. But as if Morin was conscious of +the manner in which his face belied his feelings, he made an effort, and +smiled, and patted Pierre's head, and thanked him for his intelligence, +and gave him a five-franc piece, and bade him go on with his observations +of Mademoiselle Cannes' movements, and report all to him. + +"Pierre returned home with a light heart, tossing up his five-franc piece +as he ran. Just as he was at the conciergerie door, a great tall man +bustled past him, and snatched his money away from him, looking back with +a laugh, which added insult to injury. Pierre had no redress; no one had +witnessed the impudent theft, and if they had, no one to be seen in the +street was strong enough to give him redress. Besides, Pierre had seen +enough of the state of the streets of Paris at that time to know that +friends, not enemies, were required, and the man had a bad air about him. +But all these considerations did not keep Pierre from bursting out into a +fit of crying when he was once more under his mother's roof; and +Virginie, who was alone there (Madame Babette having gone out to make her +daily purchases), might have imagined him pommeled to death by the +loudness of his sobs. + +"'What is the matter?' asked she. 'Speak, my child. What hast thou +done?' + +"'He has robbed me! he has robbed me!' was all Pierre could gulp out. + +"'Robbed thee! and of what, my poor boy?' said Virginie, stroking his +hair gently. + +"'Of my five-franc piece--of a five-franc piece,' said Pierre, correcting +himself, and leaving out the word my, half fearful lest Virginie should +inquire how he became possessed of such a sum, and for what services it +had been given him. But, of course, no such idea came into her head, for +it would have been impertinent, and she was gentle-born. + +"'Wait a moment, my lad,' and going to the one small drawer in the inner +apartment, which held all her few possessions, she brought back a little +ring--a ring just with one ruby in it--which she had worn in the days +when she cared to wear jewels. 'Take this,' said she, 'and run with it +to a jeweller's. It is but a poor, valueless thing, but it will bring +you in your five francs, at any rate. Go! I desire you.' + +"'But I cannot,' said the boy, hesitating; some dim sense of honour +flitting through his misty morals. + +"'Yes, you must!' she continued, urging him with her hand to the door. +'Run! if it brings in more than five francs, you shall return the surplus +to me.' + +"Thus tempted by her urgency, and, I suppose, reasoning with himself to +the effect that he might as well have the money, and then see whether he +thought it right to act as a spy upon her or not--the one action did not +pledge him to the other, nor yet did she make any conditions with her +gift--Pierre went off with her ring; and, after repaying himself his five +francs, he was enabled to bring Virginie back two more, so well had he +managed his affairs. But, although the whole transaction did not leave +him bound, in any way, to discover or forward Virginie's wishes, it did +leave him pledged, according to his code, to act according to her +advantage, and he considered himself the judge of the best course to be +pursued to this end. And, moreover, this little kindness attached him to +her personally. He began to think how pleasant it would be to have so +kind and generous a person for a relation; how easily his troubles might +be borne if he had always such a ready helper at hand; how much he should +like to make her like him, and come to him for the protection of his +masculine power! First of all his duties, as her self-appointed squire, +came the necessity of finding out who her strange new acquaintance was. +Thus, you see, he arrived at the same end, via supposed duty, that he was +previously pledged to via interest. I fancy a good number of us, when +any line of action will promote our own interest, can make ourselves +believe that reasons exist which compel us to it as a duty. + +"In the course of a very few days, Pierre had so circumvented Virginie as +to have discovered that her new friend was no other than the Norman +farmer in a different dress. This was a great piece of knowledge to +impart to Morin. But Pierre was not prepared for the immediate physical +effect it had on his cousin. Morin sat suddenly down on one of the seats +in the Boulevards--it was there Pierre had met with him accidentally--when +he heard who it was that Virginie met. I do not suppose the man had the +faintest idea of any relationship or even previous acquaintanceship +between Clement and Virginie. If he thought of anything beyond the mere +fact presented to him, that his idol was in communication with another, +younger, handsomer man than himself, it must have been that the Norman +farmer had seen her at the conciergerie, and had been attracted by her, +and, as was but natural, had tried to make her acquaintance, and had +succeeded. But, from what Pierre told me, I should not think that even +this much thought passed through Morin's mind. He seems to have been a +man of rare and concentrated attachments; violent, though restrained and +undemonstrative passions; and, above all, a capability of jealousy, of +which his dark oriental complexion must have been a type. I could fancy +that if he had married Virginie, he would have coined his life-blood for +luxuries to make her happy; would have watched over and petted her, at +every sacrifice to himself, as long as she would have been content to +live with him alone. But, as Pierre expressed it to me: 'When I saw what +my cousin was, when I learned his nature too late, I perceived that he +would have strangled a bird if she whom he loved was attracted by it from +him.' + +"When Pierre had told Morin of his discovery, Morin sat down, as I said, +quite suddenly, as if he had been shot. He found out that the first +meeting between the Norman and Virginie was no accidental, isolated +circumstance. Pierre was torturing him with his accounts of daily +rendezvous: if but for a moment, they were seeing each other every day, +sometimes twice a day. And Virginie could speak to this man, though to +himself she was coy and reserved as hardly to utter a sentence. Pierre +caught these broken words while his cousin's complexion grew more and +more livid, and then purple, as if some great effect were produced on his +circulation by the news he had just heard. Pierre was so startled by his +cousin's wandering, senseless eyes, and otherwise disordered looks, that +he rushed into a neighbouring cabaret for a glass of absinthe, which he +paid for, as he recollected afterwards, with a portion of Virginie's five +francs. By-and-by Morin recovered his natural appearance; but he was +gloomy and silent; and all that Pierre could get out of him was, that the +Norman farmer should not sleep another night at the Hotel Duguesclin, +giving him such opportunities of passing and repassing by the +conciergerie door. He was too much absorbed in his own thoughts to repay +Pierre the half franc he had spent on the absinthe, which Pierre +perceived, and seems to have noted down in the ledger of his mind as on +Virginie's balance of favour. + +"Altogether, he was much disappointed at his cousin's mode of receiving +intelligence, which the lad thought worth another five-franc piece at +least; or, if not paid for in money, to be paid for in open-mouthed +confidence and expression of feeling, that he was, for a time, so far a +partisan of Virginie's--unconscious Virginie--against his cousin, as to +feel regret when the Norman returned no more to his night's lodging, and +when Virginie's eager watch at the crevice of the closely-drawn blind +ended only with a sigh of disappointment. If it had not been for his +mother's presence at the time, Pierre thought he should have told her +all. But how far was his mother in his cousin's confidence as regarded +the dismissal of the Norman? + +"In a few days, however, Pierre felt almost sure that they had +established some new means of communication. Virginie went out for a +short time every day; but though Pierre followed her as closely as he +could without exciting her observation, he was unable to discover what +kind of intercourse she held with the Norman. She went, in general, the +same short round among the little shops in the neighbourhood; not +entering any, but stopping at two or three. Pierre afterwards remembered +that she had invariably paused at the nosegays displayed in a certain +window, and studied them long: but, then, she stopped and looked at caps, +hats, fashions, confectionery (all of the humble kind common in that +quarter), so how should he have known that any particular attraction +existed among the flowers? Morin came more regularly than ever to his +aunt's; but Virginie was apparently unconscious that she was the +attraction. She looked healthier and more hopeful than she had done for +months, and her manners to all were gentler and not so reserved. Almost +as if she wished to manifest her gratitude to Madame Babette for her long +continuance of kindness, the necessity for which was nearly ended, +Virginie showed an unusual alacrity in rendering the old woman any little +service in her power, and evidently tried to respond to Monsieur Morin's +civilities, he being Madame Babette's nephew, with a soft graciousness +which must have made one of her principal charms; for all who knew her +speak of the fascination of her manners, so winning and attentive to +others, while yet her opinions, and often her actions, were of so decided +a character. For, as I have said, her beauty was by no means great; yet +every man who came near her seems to have fallen into the sphere of her +influence. Monsieur Morin was deeper than ever in love with her during +these last few days: he was worked up into a state capable of any +sacrifice, either of himself or others, so that he might obtain her at +last. He sat 'devouring her with his eyes' (to use Pierre's expression) +whenever she could not see him; but, if she looked towards him, he looked +to the ground--anywhere--away from her and almost stammered in his +replies if she addressed any question to him.' + +"He had been, I should think, ashamed of his extreme agitation on the +Boulevards, for Pierre thought that he absolutely shunned him for these +few succeeding days. He must have believed that he had driven the Norman +(my poor Clement!) off the field, by banishing him from his inn; and +thought that the intercourse between him and Virginie, which he had thus +interrupted, was of so slight and transient a character as to be quenched +by a little difficulty. + +"But he appears to have felt that he had made but little way, and he +awkwardly turned to Pierre for help--not yet confessing his love, though; +he only tried to make friends again with the lad after their silent +estrangement. And Pierre for some time did not choose to perceive his +cousin's advances. He would reply to all the roundabout questions Morin +put to him respecting household conversations when he was not present, or +household occupations and tone of thought, without mentioning Virginie's +name any more than his questioner did. The lad would seem to suppose, +that his cousin's strong interest in their domestic ways of going on was +all on account of Madame Babette. At last he worked his cousin up to the +point of making him a confidant: and then the boy was half frightened at +the torrent of vehement words he had unloosed. The lava came down with a +greater rush for having been pent up so long. Morin cried out his words +in a hoarse, passionate voice, clenched his teeth, his fingers, and +seemed almost convulsed, as he spoke out his terrible love for Virginie, +which would lead him to kill her sooner than see her another's; and if +another stepped in between him and her!--and then he smiled a fierce, +triumphant smile, but did not say any more. + +"Pierre was, as I said, half-frightened; but also half-admiring. This +was really love--a 'grande passion,'--a really fine dramatic thing,--like +the plays they acted at the little theatre yonder. He had a dozen times +the sympathy with his cousin now that he had had before, and readily +swore by the infernal gods, for they were far too enlightened to believe +in one God, or Christianity, or anything of the kind,--that he would +devote himself, body and soul, to forwarding his cousin's views. Then +his cousin took him to a shop, and bought him a smart second-hand watch, +on which they scratched the word Fidelite, and thus was the compact +sealed. Pierre settled in his own mind, that if he were a woman, he +should like to be beloved as Virginie was, by his cousin, and that it +would be an extremely good thing for her to be the wife of so rich a +citizen as Morin Fils,--and for Pierre himself, too, for doubtless their +gratitude would lead them to give him rings and watches ad infinitum. + +"A day or two afterwards, Virginie was taken ill. Madame Babette said it +was because she had persevered in going out in all weathers, after +confining herself to two warm rooms for so long; and very probably this +was really the cause, for, from Pierre's account, she must have been +suffering from a feverish cold, aggravated, no doubt, by her impatience +at Madame Babette's familiar prohibitions of any more walks until she was +better. Every day, in spite of her trembling, aching limbs, she would +fain have arranged her dress for her walk at the usual time; but Madame +Babette was fully prepared to put physical obstacles in her way, if she +was not obedient in remaining tranquil on the little sofa by the side of +the fire. The third day, she called Pierre to her, when his mother was +not attending (having, in fact, locked up Mademoiselle Cannes' out-of- +door things). + +"'See, my child,' said Virginie. 'Thou must do me a great favour. Go to +the gardener's shop in the Rue des Bons-Enfans, and look at the nosegays +in the window. I long for pinks; they are my favourite flower. Here are +two francs. If thou seest a nosegay of pinks displayed in the window, if +it be ever so faded--nay, if thou seest two or three nosegays of pinks, +remember, buy them all, and bring them to me, I have so great a desire +for the smell.' She fell back weak and exhausted. Pierre hurried out. +Now was the time; here was the clue to the long inspection of the nosegay +in this very shop. + +"Sure enough, there was a drooping nosegay of pinks in the window. Pierre +went in, and, with all his impatience, he made as good a bargain as he +could, urging that the flowers were faded, and good for nothing. At last +he purchased them at a very moderate price. And now you will learn the +bad consequences of teaching the lower orders anything beyond what is +immediately necessary to enable them to earn their daily bread! The +silly Count de Crequy,--he who had been sent to his bloody rest, by the +very canaille of whom he thought so much,--he who had made Virginie +(indirectly, it is true) reject such a man as her cousin Clement, by +inflating her mind with his bubbles of theories,--this Count de Crequy +had long ago taken a fancy to Pierre, as he saw the bright sharp child +playing about his court--Monsieur de Crequy had even begun to educate the +boy himself to try work out certain opinions of his into practice,--but +the drudgery of the affair wearied him, and, beside, Babette had left his +employment. Still the Count took a kind of interest in his former pupil; +and made some sort of arrangement by which Pierre was to be taught +reading and writing, and accounts, and Heaven knows what besides,--Latin, +I dare say. So Pierre, instead of being an innocent messenger, as he +ought to have been--(as Mr. Horner's little lad Gregson ought to have +been this morning)--could read writing as well as either you or I. So +what does he do, on obtaining the nosegay, but examine it well. The +stalks of the flowers were tied up with slips of matting in wet moss. +Pierre undid the strings, unwrapped the moss, and out fell a piece of wet +paper, with the writing all blurred with moisture. It was but a torn +piece of writing-paper, apparently, but Pierre's wicked mischievous eyes +read what was written on it,--written so as to look like a +fragment,--'Ready, every and any night at nine. All is prepared. Have +no fright. Trust one who, whatever hopes he might once have had, is +content now to serve you as a faithful cousin;' and a place was named, +which I forget, but which Pierre did not, as it was evidently the +rendezvous. After the lad had studied every word, till he could say it +off by heart, he placed the paper where he had found it, enveloped it in +moss, and tied the whole up again carefully. Virginie's face coloured +scarlet as she received it. She kept smelling at it, and trembling: but +she did not untie it, although Pierre suggested how much fresher it would +be if the stalks were immediately put into water. But once, after his +back had been turned for a minute, he saw it untied when he looked round +again, and Virginie was blushing, and hiding something in her bosom. + +"Pierre was now all impatience to set off and find his cousin, But his +mother seemed to want him for small domestic purposes even more than +usual; and he had chafed over a multitude of errands connected with the +Hotel before he could set off and search for his cousin at his usual +haunts. At last the two met and Pierre related all the events of the +morning to Morin. He said the note off word by word. (That lad this +morning had something of the magpie look of Pierre--it made me shudder to +see him, and hear him repeat the note by heart.) Then Morin asked him to +tell him all over again. Pierre was struck by Morin's heavy sighs as he +repeated the story. When he came the second time to the note, Morin +tried to write the words down; but either he was not a good, ready +scholar, or his fingers trembled too much. Pierre hardly remembered, +but, at any rate, the lad had to do it, with his wicked reading and +writing. When this was done, Morin sat heavily silent. Pierre would +have preferred the expected outburst, for this impenetrable gloom +perplexed and baffled him. He had even to speak to his cousin to rouse +him; and when he replied, what he said had so little apparent connection +with the subject which Pierre had expected to find uppermost in his mind, +that he was half afraid that his cousin had lost his wits. + +"'My Aunt Babette is out of coffee.' + +"'I am sure I do not know,' said Pierre. + +"'Yes, she is. I heard her say so. Tell her that a friend of mine has +just opened a shop in the Rue Saint Antoine, and that if she will join me +there in an hour, I will supply her with a good stock of coffee, just to +give my friend encouragement. His name is Antoine Meyer, Number One +hundred and Fifty at the sign of the Cap of Liberty.' + +"'I could go with you now. I can carry a few pounds of coffee better +than my mother,' said Pierre, all in good faith. He told me he should +never forget the look on his cousin's face, as he turned round, and bade +him begone, and give his mother the message without another word. It had +evidently sent him home promptly to obey his cousins command. Morin's +message perplexed Madame Babette. + +"'How could he know I was out of coffee?' said she. 'I am; but I only +used the last up this morning. How could Victor know about it?' + +"'I am sure I can't tell,' said Pierre, who by this time had recovered +his usual self-possession. 'All I know is, that monsieur is in a pretty +temper, and that if you are not sharp to your time at this Antoine +Meyer's you are likely to come in for some of his black looks.' + +"'Well, it is very kind of him to offer to give me some coffee, to be +sure! But how could he know I was out?' + +"Pierre hurried his mother off impatiently, for he was certain that the +offer of the coffee was only a blind to some hidden purpose on his +cousin's part; and he made no doubt that when his mother had been +informed of what his cousin's real intention was, he, Pierre, could +extract it from her by coaxing or bullying. But he was mistaken. Madame +Babette returned home, grave, depressed, silent, and loaded with the best +coffee. Some time afterwards he learnt why his cousin had sought for +this interview. It was to extract from her, by promises and threats, the +real name of Mam'selle Cannes, which would give him a clue to the true +appellation of The Faithful Cousin. He concealed the second purpose from +his aunt, who had been quite unaware of his jealousy of the Norman +farmer, or of his identification of him with any relation of Virginie's. +But Madame Babette instinctively shrank from giving him any information: +she must have felt that, in the lowering mood in which she found him, his +desire for greater knowledge of Virginie's antecedents boded her no good. +And yet he made his aunt his confidante--told her what she had only +suspected before--that he was deeply enamoured of Mam'selle Cannes, and +would gladly marry her. He spoke to Madame Babette of his father's +hoarded riches; and of the share which he, as partner, had in them at the +present time; and of the prospect of the succession to the whole, which +he had, as only child. He told his aunt of the provision for her (Madame +Babette's) life, which he would make on the day when he married Mam'selle +Cannes. And yet--and yet--Babette saw that in his eye and look which +made her more and more reluctant to confide in him. By-and-by he tried +threats. She should leave the conciergerie, and find employment where +she liked. Still silence. Then he grew angry, and swore that he would +inform against her at the bureau of the Directory, for harbouring an +aristocrat; an aristocrat he knew Mademoiselle was, whatever her real +name might be. His aunt should have a domiciliary visit, and see how she +liked that. The officers of the Government were the people for finding +out secrets. In vain she reminded him that, by so doing, he would expose +to imminent danger the lady whom he had professed to love. He told her, +with a sullen relapse into silence after his vehement outpouring of +passion, never to trouble herself about that. At last he wearied out the +old woman, and, frightened alike of herself and of him, she told him +all,--that Mam'selle Cannes was Mademoiselle Virginie de Crequy, daughter +of the Count of that name. Who was the Count? Younger brother of the +Marquis. Where was the Marquis? Dead long ago, leaving a widow and +child. A son? (eagerly). Yes, a son. Where was he? Parbleu! how +should she know?--for her courage returned a little as the talk went away +from the only person of the De Crequy family that she cared about. But, +by dint of some small glasses out of a bottle of Antoine Meyer's, she +told him more about the De Crequys than she liked afterwards to remember. +For the exhilaration of the brandy lasted but a very short time, and she +came home, as I have said, depressed, with a presentiment of coming evil. +She would not answer Pierre, but cuffed him about in a manner to which +the spoilt boy was quite unaccustomed. His cousin's short, angry words, +and sudden withdrawal of confidence,--his mother's unwonted crossness and +fault-finding, all made Virginie's kind, gentle treatment, more than ever +charming to the lad. He half resolved to tell her how he had been acting +as a spy upon her actions, and at whose desire he had done it. But he +was afraid of Morin, and of the vengeance which he was sure would fall +upon him for any breach of confidence. Towards half-past eight that +evening--Pierre, watching, saw Virginie arrange several little things--she +was in the inner room, but he sat where he could see her through the +glazed partition. His mother sat--apparently sleeping--in the great easy- +chair; Virginie moved about softly, for fear of disturbing her. She made +up one or two little parcels of the few things she could call her own: +one packet she concealed about herself--the others she directed, and left +on the shelf. 'She is going,' thought Pierre, and (as he said in giving +me the account) his heart gave a spring, to think that he should never +see her again. If either his mother or his cousin had been more kind to +him, he might have endeavoured to intercept her; but as it was, he held +his breath, and when she came out he pretended to read, scarcely knowing +whether he wished her to succeed in the purpose which he was almost sure +she entertained, or not. She stopped by him, and passed her hand over +his hair. He told me that his eyes filled with tears at this caress. +Then she stood for a moment looking at the sleeping Madame Babette, and +stooped down and softly kissed her on the forehead. Pierre dreaded lest +his mother should awake (for by this time the wayward, vacillating boy +must have been quite on Virginie's side), but the brandy she had drunk +made her slumber heavily. Virginie went. Pierre's heart beat fast. He +was sure his cousin would try to intercept her; but how, he could not +imagine. He longed to run out and see the catastrophe,--but he had let +the moment slip; he was also afraid of reawakening his mother to her +unusual state of anger and violence." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +"Pierre went on pretending to read, but in reality listening with acute +tension of ear to every little sound. His perceptions became so +sensitive in this respect that he was incapable of measuring time, every +moment had seemed so full of noises, from the beating of his heart up to +the roll of the heavy carts in the distance. He wondered whether +Virginie would have reached the place of rendezvous, and yet he was +unable to compute the passage of minutes. His mother slept soundly: that +was well. By this time Virginie must have met the 'faithful cousin:' if, +indeed, Morin had not made his appearance. + +"At length, he felt as if he could no longer sit still, awaiting the +issue, but must run out and see what course events had taken. In vain +his mother, half-rousing herself, called after him to ask whither he was +going: he was already out of hearing before she had ended her sentence, +and he ran on until, stopped by the sight of Mademoiselle Cannes walking +along at so swift a pace that it was almost a run; while at her side, +resolutely keeping by her, Morin was striding abreast. Pierre had just +turned the corner of the street, when he came upon them. Virginie would +have passed him without recognizing him, she was in such passionate +agitation, but for Morin's gesture, by which he would fain have kept +Pierre from interrupting them. Then, when Virginie saw the lad, she +caught at his arm, and thanked God, as if in that boy of twelve or +fourteen she held a protector. Pierre felt her tremble from head to +foot, and was afraid lest she would fall, there where she stood, in the +hard rough street. + +"'Begone, Pierre!' said Morin. + +"'I cannot,' replied Pierre, who indeed was held firmly by Virginie. +'Besides, I won't,' he added. 'Who has been frightening mademoiselle in +this way?' asked he, very much inclined to brave his cousin at all +hazards. + +"'Mademoiselle is not accustomed to walk in the streets alone,' said +Morin, sulkily. 'She came upon a crowd attracted by the arrest of an +aristocrat, and their cries alarmed her. I offered to take charge of her +home. Mademoiselle should not walk in these streets alone. We are not +like the cold-blooded people of the Faubourg Saint Germain.' + +"Virginie did not speak. Pierre doubted if she heard a word of what they +were saying. She leant upon him more and more heavily. + +"'Will mademoiselle condescend to take my arm?' said Morin, with sulky, +and yet humble, uncouthness. I dare say he would have given worlds if he +might have had that little hand within his arm; but, though she still +kept silence, she shuddered up away from him, as you shrink from touching +a toad. He had said something to her during that walk, you may be sure, +which had made her loathe him. He marked and understood the gesture. He +held himself aloof while Pierre gave her all the assistance he could in +their slow progress homewards. But Morin accompanied her all the same. +He had played too desperate a game to be baulked now. He had given +information against the ci-devant Marquis de Crequy, as a returned +emigre, to be met with at such a time, in such a place. Morin had hoped +that all sign of the arrest would have been cleared away before Virginie +reached the spot--so swiftly were terrible deeds done in those days. But +Clement defended himself desperately: Virginie was punctual to a second; +and, though the wounded man was borne off to the Abbaye, amid a crowd of +the unsympathising jeerers who mingled with the armed officials of the +Directory, Morin feared lest Virginie had recognized him; and he would +have preferred that she should have thought that the 'faithful cousin' +was faithless, than that she should have seen him in bloody danger on her +account. I suppose he fancied that, if Virginie never saw or heard more +of him, her imagination would not dwell on his simple disappearance, as +it would do if she knew what he was suffering for her sake. + +"At any rate, Pierre saw that his cousin was deeply mortified by the +whole tenor of his behaviour during their walk home. When they arrived +at Madame Babette's, Virginie fell fainting on the floor; her strength +had but just sufficed for this exertion of reaching the shelter of the +house. Her first sign of restoring consciousness consisted in avoidance +of Morin. He had been most assiduous in his efforts to bring her round; +quite tender in his way, Pierre said; and this marked, instinctive +repugnance to him evidently gave him extreme pain. I suppose Frenchmen +are more demonstrative than we are; for Pierre declared that he saw his +cousin's eyes fill with tears, as she shrank away from his touch, if he +tried to arrange the shawl they had laid under her head like a pillow, or +as she shut her eyes when he passed before her. Madame Babette was +urgent with her to go and lie down on the bed in the inner room; but it +was some time before she was strong enough to rise and do this. + +"When Madame Babette returned from arranging the girl comfortably, the +three relations sat down in silence; a silence which Pierre thought would +never be broken. He wanted his mother to ask his cousin what had +happened. But Madame Babette was afraid of her nephew, and thought it +more discreet to wait for such crumbs of intelligence as he might think +fit to throw to her. But, after she had twice reported Virginie to be +asleep, without a word being uttered in reply to her whispers by either +of her companions, Morin's powers of self-containment gave way. + +"'It is hard!' he said. + +"'What is hard?' asked Madame Babette, after she had paused for a time, +to enable him to add to, or to finish, his sentence, if he pleased. + +"'It is hard for a man to love a woman as I do,' he went on--'I did not +seek to love her, it came upon me before I was aware--before I had ever +thought about it at all, I loved her better than all the world beside. +All my life, before I knew her, seems a dull blank. I neither know nor +care for what I did before then. And now there are just two lives before +me. Either I have her, or I have not. That is all: but that is +everything. And what can I do to make her have me? Tell me, aunt,' and +he caught at Madame Babette's arm, and gave it so sharp a shake, that she +half screamed out, Pierre said, and evidently grew alarmed at her +nephew's excitement. + +"'Hush, Victor!' said she. 'There are other women in the world, if this +one will not have you.' + +"'None other for me,' he said, sinking back as if hopeless. 'I am plain +and coarse, not one of the scented darlings of the aristocrats. Say that +I am ugly, brutish; I did not make myself so, any more than I made myself +love her. It is my fate. But am I to submit to the consequences of my +fate without a struggle? Not I. As strong as my love is, so strong is +my will. It can be no stronger,' continued he, gloomily. 'Aunt Babette, +you must help me--you must make her love me.' He was so fierce here, +that Pierre said he did not wonder that his mother was frightened. + +"'I, Victor!' she exclaimed. 'I make her love you? How can I? Ask me +to speak for you to Mademoiselle Didot, or to Mademoiselle Cauchois even, +or to such as they, and I'll do it, and welcome. But to Mademoiselle de +Crequy, why you don't know the difference! Those people--the old +nobility I mean--why they don't know a man from a dog, out of their own +rank! And no wonder, for the young gentlemen of quality are treated +differently to us from their very birth. If she had you to-morrow, you +would be miserable. Let me alone for knowing the aristocracy. I have +not been a concierge to a duke and three counts for nothing. I tell you, +all your ways are different to her ways.' + +"'I would change my "ways," as you call them.' + +"'Be reasonable, Victor.' + +"'No, I will not be reasonable, if by that you mean giving her up. I +tell you two lives are before me; one with her, one without her. But the +latter will be but a short career for both of us. You said, aunt, that +the talk went in the conciergerie of her father's hotel, that she would +have nothing to do with this cousin whom I put out of the way to-day?' + +"'So the servants said. How could I know? All I know is, that he left +off coming to our hotel, and that at one time before then he had never +been two days absent.' + +"'So much the better for him. He suffers now for having come between me +and my object--in trying to snatch her away out of my sight. Take you +warning, Pierre! I did not like your meddling to-night.' And so he went +off, leaving Madam Babette rocking herself backwards and forwards, in all +the depression of spirits consequent upon the reaction after the brandy, +and upon her knowledge of her nephew's threatened purpose combined. + +"In telling you most of this, I have simply repeated Pierre's account, +which I wrote down at the time. But here what he had to say came to a +sudden break; for, the next morning, when Madame Babette rose, Virginie +was missing, and it was some time before either she, or Pierre, or Morin, +could get the slightest clue to the missing girl. + +"And now I must take up the story as it was told to the Intendant +Flechier by the old gardener Jacques, with whom Clement had been lodging +on his first arrival in Paris. The old man could not, I dare say, +remember half as much of what had happened as Pierre did; the former had +the dulled memory of age, while Pierre had evidently thought over the +whole series of events as a story--as a play, if one may call it +so--during the solitary hours in his after-life, wherever they were +passed, whether in lonely camp watches, or in the foreign prison, where +he had to drag out many years. Clement had, as I said, returned to the +gardener's garret after he had been dismissed from the Hotel Duguesclin. +There were several reasons for his thus doubling back. One was, that he +put nearly the whole breadth of Paris between him and an enemy; though +why Morin was an enemy, and to what extent he carried his dislike or +hatred, Clement could not tell, of course. The next reason for returning +to Jacques was, no doubt, the conviction that, in multiplying his +residences, he multiplied the chances against his being suspected and +recognized. And then, again, the old man was in his secret, and his +ally, although perhaps but a feeble kind of one. It was through Jacques +that the plan of communication, by means of a nosegay of pinks, had been +devised; and it was Jacques who procured him the last disguise that +Clement was to use in Paris--as he hoped and trusted. It was that of a +respectable shopkeeper of no particular class; a dress that would have +seemed perfectly suitable to the young man who would naturally have worn +it; and yet, as Clement put it on, and adjusted it--giving it a sort of +finish and elegance which I always noticed about his appearance and which +I believed was innate in the wearer--I have no doubt it seemed like the +usual apparel of a gentleman. No coarseness of texture, nor clumsiness +of cut could disguise the nobleman of thirty descents, it appeared; for +immediately on arriving at the place of rendezvous, he was recognized by +the men placed there on Morin's information to seize him. Jacques, +following at a little distance, with a bundle under his arm containing +articles of feminine disguise for Virginie, saw four men attempt +Clement's arrest--saw him, quick as lightning, draw a sword hitherto +concealed in a clumsy stick--saw his agile figure spring to his +guard,--and saw him defend himself with the rapidity and art of a man +skilled in arms. But what good did it do? as Jacques piteously used to +ask, Monsieur Flechier told me. A great blow from a heavy club on the +sword-arm of Monsieur de Crequy laid it helpless and immovable by his +side. Jacques always thought that that blow came from one of the +spectators, who by this time had collected round the scene of the affray. +The next instant, his master--his little marquis--was down among the feet +of the crowd, and though he was up again before he had received much +damage--so active and light was my poor Clement--it was not before the +old gardener had hobbled forwards, and, with many an old-fashioned oath +and curse, proclaimed himself a partisan of the losing side--a follower +of a ci-devant aristocrat. It was quite enough. He received one or two +good blows, which were, in fact, aimed at his master; and then, almost +before he was aware, he found his arms pinioned behind him with a woman's +garter, which one of the viragos in the crowd had made no scruple of +pulling off in public, as soon as she heard for what purpose it was +wanted. Poor Jacques was stunned and unhappy,--his master was out of +sight, on before; and the old gardener scarce knew whither they were +taking him. His head ached from the blows which had fallen upon it; it +was growing dark--June day though it was,--and when first he seems to +have become exactly aware of what had happened to him, it was when he was +turned into one of the larger rooms of the Abbaye, in which all were put +who had no other allotted place wherein to sleep. One or two iron lamps +hung from the ceiling by chains, giving a dim light for a little circle. +Jacques stumbled forwards over a sleeping body lying on the ground. The +sleeper wakened up enough to complain; and the apology of the old man in +reply caught the ear of his master, who, until this time, could hardly +have been aware of the straits and difficulties of his faithful Jacques. +And there they sat,--against a pillar, the live-long night, holding one +another's hands, and each restraining expressions of pain, for fear of +adding to the other's distress. That night made them intimate friends, +in spite of the difference of age and rank. The disappointed hopes, the +acute suffering of the present, the apprehensions of the future, made +them seek solace in talking of the past. Monsieur de Crequy and the +gardener found themselves disputing with interest in which chimney of the +stack the starling used to build,--the starling whose nest Clement sent +to Urian, you remember, and discussing the merits of different espalier- +pears which grew, and may grow still, in the old garden of the Hotel de +Crequy. Towards morning both fell asleep. The old man wakened first. +His frame was deadened to suffering, I suppose, for he felt relieved of +his pain; but Clement moaned and cried in feverish slumber. His broken +arm was beginning to inflame his blood. He was, besides, much injured by +some kicks from the crowd as he fell. As the old man looked sadly on the +white, baked lips, and the flushed cheeks, contorted with suffering even +in his sleep, Clement gave a sharp cry which disturbed his miserable +neighbours, all slumbering around in uneasy attitudes. They bade him +with curses be silent; and then turning round, tried again to forget +their own misery in sleep. For you see, the bloodthirsty canaille had +not been sated with guillotining and hanging all the nobility they could +find, but were now informing, right and left, even against each other; +and when Clement and Jacques were in the prison, there were few of gentle +blood in the place, and fewer still of gentle manners. At the sound of +the angry words and threats, Jacques thought it best to awaken his master +from his feverish uncomfortable sleep, lest he should provoke more +enmity; and, tenderly lifting him up, he tried to adjust his own body, so +that it should serve as a rest and a pillow for the younger man. The +motion aroused Clement, and he began to talk in a strange, feverish way, +of Virginie, too,--whose name he would not have breathed in such a place +had he been quite himself. But Jacques had as much delicacy of feeling +as any lady in the land, although, mind you, he knew neither how to read +nor write,--and bent his head low down, so that his master might tell him +in a whisper what messages he was to take to Mademoiselle de Crequy, in +case--Poor Clement, he knew it must come to that! No escape for him now, +in Norman disguise or otherwise! Either by gathering fever or +guillotine, death was sure of his prey. Well! when that happened, +Jacques was to go and find Mademoiselle de Crequy, and tell her that her +cousin loved her at the last as he had loved her at the first; but that +she should never have heard another word of his attachment from his +living lips; that he knew he was not good enough for her, his queen; and +that no thought of earning her love by his devotion had prompted his +return to France, only that, if possible, he might have the great +privilege of serving her whom he loved. And then he went off into +rambling talk about petit-maitres, and such kind of expressions, said +Jacques to Flechier, the intendant, little knowing what a clue that one +word gave to much of the poor lad's suffering. + +"The summer morning came slowly on in that dark prison, and when Jacques +could look round--his master was now sleeping on his shoulder, still the +uneasy, starting sleep of fever--he saw that there were many women among +the prisoners. (I have heard some of those who have escaped from the +prisons say, that the look of despair and agony that came into the faces +of the prisoners on first wakening, as the sense of their situation grew +upon them, was what lasted the longest in the memory of the survivors. +This look, they said, passed away from the women's faces sooner than it +did from those of the men.) + +"Poor old Jacques kept falling asleep, and plucking himself up again for +fear lest, if he did not attend to his master, some harm might come to +the swollen, helpless arm. Yet his weariness grew upon him in spite of +all his efforts, and at last he felt as if he must give way to the +irresistible desire, if only for five minutes. But just then there was a +bustle at the door. Jacques opened his eyes wide to look. + +"'The gaoler is early with breakfast,' said some one, lazily. + +"'It is the darkness of this accursed place that makes us think it +early,' said another. + +"All this time a parley was going on at the door. Some one came in; not +the gaoler--a woman. The door was shut to and locked behind her. She +only advanced a step or two, for it was too sudden a change, out of the +light into that dark shadow, for any one to see clearly for the first few +minutes. Jacques had his eyes fairly open now, and was wide awake. It +was Mademoiselle de Crequy, looking bright, clear, and resolute. The +faithful heart of the old man read that look like an open page. Her +cousin should not die there on her behalf, without at least the comfort +of her sweet presence. + +"'Here he is,' he whispered as her gown would have touched him in +passing, without her perceiving him, in the heavy obscurity of the place. + +"'The good God bless you, my friend!' she murmured, as she saw the +attitude of the old man, propped against a pillar, and holding Clement in +his arms, as if the young man had been a helpless baby, while one of the +poor gardener's hands supported the broken limb in the easiest position. +Virginie sat down by the old man, and held out her arms. Softly she +moved Clement's head to her own shoulder; softly she transferred the task +of holding the arm to herself. Clement lay on the floor, but she +supported him, and Jacques was at liberty to arise and stretch and shake +his stiff, weary old body. He then sat down at a little distance, and +watched the pair until he fell asleep. Clement had muttered 'Virginie,' +as they half-roused him by their movements out of his stupor; but Jacques +thought he was only dreaming; nor did he seem fully awake when once his +eyes opened, and he looked full at Virginie's face bending over him, and +growing crimson under his gaze, though she never stirred, for fear of +hurting him if she moved. Clement looked in silence, until his heavy +eyelids came slowly down, and he fell into his oppressive slumber again. +Either he did not recognize her, or she came in too completely as a part +of his sleeping visions for him to be disturbed by her appearance there. + +"When Jacques awoke it was full daylight--at least as full as it would +ever be in that place. His breakfast--the gaol-allowance of bread and +vin ordinaire--was by his side. He must have slept soundly. He looked +for his master. He and Virginie had recognized each other now,--hearts, +as well as appearance. They were smiling into each other's faces, as if +that dull, vaulted room in the grim Abbaye were the sunny gardens of +Versailles, with music and festivity all abroad. Apparently they had +much to say to each other; for whispered questions and answers never +ceased. + +"Virginie had made a sling for the poor broken arm; nay, she had obtained +two splinters of wood in some way, and one of their fellow-prisoners--having, +it appeared, some knowledge of surgery--had set it. Jacques felt more +desponding by far than they did, for he was suffering from the night he had +passed, which told upon his aged frame; while they must have heard some +good news, as it seemed to him, so bright and happy did they look. Yet +Clement was still in bodily pain and suffering, and Virginie, by her own +act and deed, was a prisoner in that dreadful Abbaye, whence the only +issue was the guillotine. But they were together: they loved: they +understood each other at length. + +"When Virginie saw that Jacques was awake, and languidly munching his +breakfast, she rose from the wooden stool on which she was sitting, and +went to him, holding out both hands, and refusing to allow him to rise, +while she thanked him with pretty eagerness for all his kindness to +Monsieur. Monsieur himself came towards him, following Virginie, but +with tottering steps, as if his head was weak and dizzy, to thank the +poor old man, who now on his feet, stood between them, ready to cry while +they gave him credit for faithful actions which he felt to have been +almost involuntary on his part,--for loyalty was like an instinct in the +good old days, before your educational cant had come up. And so two days +went on. The only event was the morning call for the victims, a certain +number of whom were summoned to trial every day. And to be tried was to +be condemned. Every one of the prisoners became grave, as the hour for +their summons approached. Most of the victims went to their doom with +uncomplaining resignation, and for a while after their departure there +was comparative silence in the prison. But, by-and-by--so said +Jacques--the conversation or amusements began again. Human nature cannot +stand the perpetual pressure of such keen anxiety, without an effort to +relieve itself by thinking of something else. Jacques said that Monsieur +and Mademoiselle were for ever talking together of the past days,--it was +'Do you remember this?' or, 'Do you remember that?' perpetually. He +sometimes thought they forgot where they were, and what was before them. +But Jacques did not, and every day he trembled more and more as the list +was called over. + +"The third morning of their incarceration, the gaoler brought in a man +whom Jacques did not recognize, and therefore did not at once observe; +for he was waiting, as in duty bound, upon his master and his sweet young +lady (as he always called her in repeating the story). He thought that +the new introduction was some friend of the gaoler, as the two seemed +well acquainted, and the latter stayed a few minutes talking with his +visitor before leaving him in prison. So Jacques was surprised when, +after a short time had elapsed, he looked round, and saw the fierce stare +with which the stranger was regarding Monsieur and Mademoiselle de +Crequy, as the pair sat at breakfast,--the said breakfast being laid as +well as Jacques knew how, on a bench fastened into the prison +wall,--Virginie sitting on her low stool, and Clement half lying on the +ground by her side, and submitting gladly to be fed by her pretty white +fingers; for it was one of her fancies, Jacques said, to do all she could +for him, in consideration of his broken arm. And, indeed, Clement was +wasting away daily; for he had received other injuries, internal and more +serious than that to his arm, during the melee which had ended in his +capture. The stranger made Jacques conscious of his presence by a sigh, +which was almost a groan. All three prisoners looked round at the sound. +Clement's face expressed little but scornful indifference; but Virginie's +face froze into stony hate. Jacques said he never saw such a look, and +hoped that he never should again. Yet after that first revelation of +feeling, her look was steady and fixed in another direction to that in +which the stranger stood,--still motionless--still watching. He came a +step nearer at last. + +"'Mademoiselle,' he said. Not the quivering of an eyelash showed that +she heard him. 'Mademoiselle!' he said again, with an intensity of +beseeching that made Jacques--not knowing who he was--almost pity him, +when he saw his young lady's obdurate face. + +"There was perfect silence for a space of time which Jacques could not +measure. Then again the voice, hesitatingly, saying, 'Monsieur!' Clement +could not hold the same icy countenance as Virginie; he turned his head +with an impatient gesture of disgust; but even that emboldened the man. + +"'Monsieur, do ask mademoiselle to listen to me,--just two words.' + +"'Mademoiselle de Crequy only listens to whom she chooses.' Very +haughtily my Clement would say that, I am sure. + +"'But, mademoiselle,'--lowering his voice, and coming a step or two +nearer. Virginie must have felt his approach, though she did not see it; +for she drew herself a little on one side, so as to put as much space as +possible between him and her.--'Mademoiselle, it is not too late. I can +save you: but to-morrow your name is down on the list. I can save you, +if you will listen.' + +"Still no word or sign. Jacques did not understand the affair. Why was +she so obdurate to one who might be ready to include Clement in the +proposal, as far as Jacques knew? + +"The man withdrew a little, but did not offer to leave the prison. He +never took his eyes off Virginie; he seemed to be suffering from some +acute and terrible pain as he watched her. + +"Jacques cleared away the breakfast-things as well as he could. +Purposely, as I suspect, he passed near the man. + +"'Hist!' said the stranger. 'You are Jacques, the gardener, arrested for +assisting an aristocrat. I know the gaoler. You shall escape, if you +will. Only take this message from me to mademoiselle. You heard. She +will not listen to me: I did not want her to come here. I never knew she +was here, and she will die to-morrow. They will put her beautiful round +throat under the guillotine. Tell her, good old man, tell her how sweet +life is; and how I can save her; and how I will not ask for more than +just to see her from time to time. She is so young; and death is +annihilation, you know. Why does she hate me so? I want to save her; I +have done her no harm. Good old man, tell her how terrible death is; and +that she will die to-morrow, unless she listens to me.' + +"Jacques saw no harm in repeating this message. Clement listened in +silence, watching Virginie with an air of infinite tenderness. + +"'Will you not try him, my cherished one?' he said. 'Towards you he may +mean well' (which makes me think that Virginie had never repeated to +Clement the conversation which she had overheard that last night at +Madame Babette's); 'you would be in no worse a situation than you were +before!' + +"'No worse, Clement! and I should have known what you were, and have lost +you. My Clement!' said she, reproachfully. + +"'Ask him,' said she, turning to Jacques, suddenly, 'if he can save +Monsieur de Crequy as well,--if he can?--O Clement, we might escape to +England; we are but young.' And she hid her face on his shoulder. + +"Jacques returned to the stranger, and asked him Virginie's question. His +eyes were fixed on the cousins; he was very pale, and the twitchings or +contortions, which must have been involuntary whenever he was agitated, +convulsed his whole body. + +"He made a long pause. 'I will save mademoiselle and monsieur, if she +will go straight from prison to the mairie, and be my wife.' + +"'Your wife!' Jacques could not help exclaiming, 'That she will never +be--never!' + +"'Ask her!' said Morin, hoarsely. + +"But almost before Jacques thought he could have fairly uttered the +words, Clement caught their meaning. + +"'Begone!' said he; 'not one word more.' Virginie touched the old man as +he was moving away. 'Tell him he does not know how he makes me welcome +death.' And smiling, as if triumphant, she turned again to Clement. + +"The stranger did not speak as Jacques gave him the meaning, not the +words, of their replies. He was going away, but stopped. A minute or +two afterwards, he beckoned to Jacques. The old gardener seems to have +thought it undesirable to throw away even the chance of assistance from +such a man as this, for he went forward to speak to him. + +"'Listen! I have influence with the gaoler. He shall let thee pass out +with the victims to-morrow. No one will notice it, or miss thee--. They +will be led to trial,--even at the last moment, I will save her, if she +sends me word she relents. Speak to her, as the time draws on. Life is +very sweet,--tell her how sweet. Speak to him; he will do more with her +than thou canst. Let him urge her to live. Even at the last, I will be +at the Palais de Justice,--at the Greve. I have followers,--I have +interest. Come among the crowd that follow the victims,--I shall see +thee. It will be no worse for him, if she escapes'-- + +"'Save my master, and I will do all,' said Jacques. + +"'Only on my one condition,' said Morin, doggedly; and Jacques was +hopeless of that condition ever being fulfilled. But he did not see why +his own life might not be saved. By remaining in prison until the next +day, he should have rendered every service in his power to his master and +the young lady. He, poor fellow, shrank from death; and he agreed with +Morin to escape, if he could, by the means Morin had suggested, and to +bring him word if Mademoiselle de Crequy relented. (Jacques had no +expectation that she would; but I fancy he did not think it necessary to +tell Morin of this conviction of his.) This bargaining with so base a man +for so slight a thing as life, was the only flaw that I heard of in the +old gardener's behaviour. Of course, the mere reopening of the subject +was enough to stir Virginie to displeasure. Clement urged her, it is +true; but the light he had gained upon Morin's motions, made him rather +try to set the case before her in as fair a manner as possible than use +any persuasive arguments. And, even as it was, what he said on the +subject made Virginie shed tears--the first that had fallen from her +since she entered the prison. So, they were summoned and went together, +at the fatal call of the muster-roll of victims the next morning. He, +feeble from his wounds and his injured health; she, calm and serene, only +petitioning to be allowed to walk next to him, in order that she might +hold him up when he turned faint and giddy from his extreme suffering. + +"Together they stood at the bar; together they were condemned. As the +words of judgment were pronounced, Virginie tuned to Clement, and +embraced him with passionate fondness. Then, making him lean on her, +they marched out towards the Place de la Greve. + +"Jacques was free now. He had told Morin how fruitless his efforts at +persuasion had been; and scarcely caring to note the effect of his +information upon the man, he had devoted himself to watching Monsieur and +Mademoiselle de Crequy. And now he followed them to the Place de la +Greve. He saw them mount the platform; saw them kneel down together till +plucked up by the impatient officials; could see that she was urging some +request to the executioner; the end of which seemed to be, that Clement +advanced first to the guillotine, was executed (and just at this moment +there was a stir among the crowd, as of a man pressing forward towards +the scaffold). Then she, standing with her face to the guillotine, +slowly made the sign of the cross, and knelt down. + +"Jacques covered his eyes, blinded with tears. The report of a pistol +made him look up. She was gone--another victim in her place--and where +there had been a little stir in the crowd not five minutes before, some +men were carrying off a dead body. A man had shot himself, they said. +Pierre told me who that man was." + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + +After a pause, I ventured to ask what became of Madame de Crequy, +Clement's mother. + +"She never made any inquiry about him," said my lady. "She must have +known that he was dead; though how, we never could tell. Medlicott +remembered afterwards that it was about, if not on--Medlicott to this day +declares that it was on the very Monday, June the nineteenth, when her +son was executed, that Madame de Crequy left off her rouge and took to +her bed, as one bereaved and hopeless. It certainly was about that time; +and Medlicott--who was deeply impressed by that dream of Madame de +Crequy's (the relation of which I told you had had such an effect on my +lord), in which she had seen the figure of Virginie--as the only light +object amid much surrounding darkness as of night, smiling and beckoning +Clement on--on--till at length the bright phantom stopped, motionless, +and Madame de Crequy's eyes began to penetrate the murky darkness, and to +see closing around her the gloomy dripping walls which she had once seen +and never forgotten--the walls of the vault of the chapel of the De +Crequys in Saint Germain l'Auxerrois; and there the two last of the +Crequys laid them down among their forefathers, and Madame de Crequy had +wakened to the sound of the great door, which led to the open air, being +locked upon her--I say Medlicott, who was predisposed by this dream to +look out for the supernatural, always declared that Madame de Crequy was +made conscious in some mysterious way, of her son's death, on the very +day and hour when it occurred, and that after that she had no more +anxiety, but was only conscious of a kind of stupefying despair." + +"And what became of her, my lady?" I again asked. + +"What could become of her?" replied Lady Ludlow. "She never could be +induced to rise again, though she lived more than a year after her son's +departure. She kept her bed; her room darkened, her face turned towards +the wall, whenever any one besides Medlicott was in the room. She hardly +ever spoke, and would have died of starvation but for Medlicott's tender +care, in putting a morsel to her lips every now and then, feeding her, in +fact, just as an old bird feeds her young ones. In the height of summer +my lord and I left London. We would fain have taken her with us into +Scotland, but the doctor (we had the old doctor from Leicester Square) +forbade her removal; and this time he gave such good reasons against it +that I acquiesced. Medlicott and a maid were left with her. Every care +was taken of her. She survived till our return. Indeed, I thought she +was in much the same state as I had left her in, when I came back to +London. But Medlicott spoke of her as much weaker; and one morning on +awakening, they told me she was dead. I sent for Medlicott, who was in +sad distress, she had become so fond of her charge. She said that, about +two o'clock, she had been awakened by unusual restlessness on Madame de +Crequy's part; that she had gone to her bedside, and found the poor lady +feebly but perpetually moving her wasted arm up and down--and saying to +herself in a wailing voice: 'I did not bless him when he left me--I did +not bless him when he left me!' Medlicott gave her a spoonful or two of +jelly, and sat by her, stroking her hand, and soothing her till she +seemed to fall asleep. But in the morning she was dead." + +"It is a sad story, your ladyship," said I, after a while. + +"Yes it is. People seldom arrive at my age without having watched the +beginning, middle, and end of many lives and many fortunes. We do not +talk about them, perhaps; for they are often so sacred to us, from having +touched into the very quick of our own hearts, as it were, or into those +of others who are dead and gone, and veiled over from human sight, that +we cannot tell the tale as if it was a mere story. But young people +should remember that we have had this solemn experience of life, on which +to base our opinions and form our judgments, so that they are not mere +untried theories. I am not alluding to Mr. Horner just now, for he is +nearly as old as I am--within ten years, I dare say--but I am thinking of +Mr. Gray, with his endless plans for some new thing--schools, education, +Sabbaths, and what not. Now he has not seen what all this leads to." + +"It is a pity he has not heard your ladyship tell the story of poor +Monsieur de Crequy." + +"Not at all a pity, my dear. A young man like him, who, both by position +and age, must have had his experience confined to a very narrow circle, +ought not to set up his opinion against mine; he ought not to require +reasons from me, nor to need such explanation of my arguments (if I +condescend to argue), as going into relation of the circumstances on +which my arguments are based in my own mind, would be." + +"But, my lady, it might convince him," I said, with perhaps injudicious +perseverance. + +"And why should he be convinced?" she asked, with gentle inquiry in her +tone. "He has only to acquiesce. Though he is appointed by Mr. Croxton, +I am the lady of the manor, as he must know. But it is with Mr. Horner +that I must have to do about this unfortunate lad Gregson. I am afraid +there will be no method of making him forget his unlucky knowledge. His +poor brains will be intoxicated with the sense of his powers, without any +counterbalancing principles to guide him. Poor fellow! I am quite +afraid it will end in his being hanged!" + +The next day Mr. Horner came to apologize and explain. He was +evidently--as I could tell from his voice, as he spoke to my lady in the +next room--extremely annoyed at her ladyship's discovery of the education +he had been giving to this boy. My lady spoke with great authority, and +with reasonable grounds of complaint. Mr. Horner was well acquainted +with her thoughts on the subject, and had acted in defiance of her +wishes. He acknowledged as much, and should on no account have done it, +in any other instance, without her leave. + +"Which I could never have granted you," said my lady. + +But this boy had extraordinary capabilities; would, in fact, have taught +himself much that was bad, if he had not been rescued, and another +direction given to his powers. And in all Mr. Horner had done, he had +had her ladyship's service in view. The business was getting almost +beyond his power, so many letters and so much account-keeping was +required by the complicated state in which things were. + +Lady Ludlow felt what was coming--a reference to the mortgage for the +benefit of my lord's Scottish estates, which, she was perfectly aware, +Mr. Horner considered as having been a most unwise proceeding--and she +hastened to observe--"All this may be very true, Mr. Horner, and I am +sure I should be the last person to wish you to overwork or distress +yourself; but of that we will talk another time. What I am now anxious +to remedy is, if possible, the state of this poor little Gregson's mind. +Would not hard work in the fields be a wholesome and excellent way of +enabling him to forget?" + +"I was in hopes, my lady, that you would have permitted me to bring him +up to act as a kind of clerk," said Mr. Horner, jerking out his project +abruptly. + +"A what?" asked my lady, in infinite surprise. + +"A kind of--of assistant, in the way of copying letters and doing up +accounts. He is already an excellent penman and very quick at figures." + +"Mr. Horner," said my lady, with dignity, "the son of a poacher and +vagabond ought never to have been able to copy letters relating to the +Hanbury estates; and, at any rate, he shall not. I wonder how it is +that, knowing the use he has made of his power of reading a letter, you +should venture to propose such an employment for him as would require his +being in your confidence, and you the trusted agent of this family. Why, +every secret (and every ancient and honourable family has its secrets, as +you know, Mr. Horner) would be learnt off by heart, and repeated to the +first comer!" + +"I should have hoped to have trained him, my lady, to understand the +rules of discretion." + +"Trained! Train a barn-door fowl to be a pheasant, Mr. Horner! That +would be the easier task. But you did right to speak of discretion +rather than honour. Discretion looks to the consequences of +actions--honour looks to the action itself, and is an instinct rather +than a virtue. After all, it is possible you might have trained him to +be discreet." + +Mr. Horner was silent. My lady was softened by his not replying, and +began as she always did in such cases, to fear lest she had been too +harsh. I could tell that by her voice and by her next speech, as well as +if I had seen her face. + +"But I am sorry you are feeling the pressure of the affairs: I am quite +aware that I have entailed much additional trouble upon you by some of my +measures: I must try and provide you with some suitable assistance. +Copying letters and doing up accounts, I think you said?" + +Mr. Horner had certainly had a distant idea of turning the little boy, in +process of time, into a clerk; but he had rather urged this possibility +of future usefulness beyond what he had at first intended, in speaking of +it to my lady as a palliation of his offence, and he certainly was very +much inclined to retract his statement that the letter-writing, or any +other business, had increased, or that he was in the slightest want of +help of any kind, when my lady after a pause of consideration, suddenly +said-- + +"I have it. Miss Galindo will, I am sure, be glad to assist you. I will +speak to her myself. The payment we should make to a clerk would be of +real service to her!" + +I could hardly help echoing Mr. Horner's tone of surprise as he said-- + +"Miss Galindo!" + +For, you must be told who Miss Galindo was; at least, told as much as I +know. Miss Galindo had lived in the village for many years, keeping +house on the smallest possible means, yet always managing to maintain a +servant. And this servant was invariably chosen because she had some +infirmity that made her undesirable to every one else. I believe Miss +Galindo had had lame and blind and hump-backed maids. She had even at +one time taken in a girl hopelessly gone in consumption, because if not +she would have had to go to the workhouse, and not have had enough to +eat. Of course the poor creature could not perform a single duty usually +required of a servant, and Miss Galindo herself was both servant and +nurse. + +Her present maid was scarcely four feet high, and bore a terrible +character for ill-temper. Nobody but Miss Galindo would have kept her; +but, as it was, mistress and servant squabbled perpetually, and were, at +heart, the best of friends. For it was one of Miss Galindo's +peculiarities to do all manner of kind and self-denying actions, and to +say all manner of provoking things. Lame, blind, deformed, and dwarf, +all came in for scoldings without number: it was only the consumptive +girl that never had heard a sharp word. I don't think any of her +servants liked her the worse for her peppery temper, and passionate odd +ways, for they knew her real and beautiful kindness of heart: and, +besides, she had so great a turn for humour that very often her speeches +amused as much or more than they irritated; and on the other side, a +piece of witty impudence from her servant would occasionally tickle her +so much and so suddenly, that she would burst out laughing in the middle +of her passion. + +But the talk about Miss Galindo's choice and management of her servants +was confined to village gossip, and had never reached my Lady Ludlow's +ears, though doubtless Mr. Horner was well acquainted with it. What my +lady knew of her amounted to this. It was the custom in those days for +the wealthy ladies of the county to set on foot a repository, as it was +called, in the assize-town. The ostensible manager of this repository +was generally a decayed gentlewoman, a clergyman's widow, or so forth. +She was, however, controlled by a committee of ladies; and paid by them +in proportion to the amount of goods she sold; and these goods were the +small manufactures of ladies of little or no fortune, whose names, if +they chose it, were only signified by initials. + +Poor water-colour drawings, indigo and Indian ink; screens, ornamented +with moss and dried leaves; paintings on velvet, and such faintly +ornamental works were displayed on one side of the shop. It was always +reckoned a mark of characteristic gentility in the repository, to have +only common heavy-framed sash-windows, which admitted very little light, +so I never was quite certain of the merit of these Works of Art as they +were entitled. But, on the other side, where the Useful Work placard was +put up, there was a great variety of articles, of whose unusual +excellence every one might judge. Such fine sewing, and stitching, and +button-holing! Such bundles of soft delicate knitted stockings and +socks; and, above all, in Lady Ludlow's eyes, such hanks of the finest +spun flaxen thread! + +And the most delicate dainty work of all was done by Miss Galindo, as +Lady Ludlow very well knew. Yet, for all their fine sewing, it sometimes +happened that Miss Galindo's patterns were of an old-fashioned kind; and +the dozen nightcaps, maybe, on the materials for which she had expended +bona-fide money, and on the making-up, no little time and eye-sight, +would lie for months in a yellow neglected heap; and at such times, it +was said, Miss Galindo was more amusing than usual, more full of dry +drollery and humour; just as at the times when an order came in to X. +(the initial she had chosen) for a stock of well-paying things, she sat +and stormed at her servant as she stitched away. She herself explained +her practice in this way:-- + +"When everything goes wrong, one would give up breathing if one could not +lighten ones heart by a joke. But when I've to sit still from morning +till night, I must have something to stir my blood, or I should go off +into an apoplexy; so I set to, and quarrel with Sally." + +Such were Miss Galindo's means and manner of living in her own house. Out +of doors, and in the village, she was not popular, although she would +have been sorely missed had she left the place. But she asked too many +home questions (not to say impertinent) respecting the domestic economies +(for even the very poor liked to spend their bit of money their own way), +and would open cupboards to find out hidden extravagances, and question +closely respecting the weekly amount of butter, till one day she met with +what would have been a rebuff to any other person, but which she rather +enjoyed than otherwise. + +She was going into a cottage, and in the doorway met the good woman +chasing out a duck, and apparently unconscious of her visitor. + +"Get out, Miss Galindo!" she cried, addressing the duck. "Get out! O, I +ask your pardon," she continued, as if seeing the lady for the first +time. "It's only that weary duck will come in. Get out Miss Gal---" (to +the duck). + +"And so you call it after me, do you?" inquired her visitor. + +"O, yes, ma'am; my master would have it so, for he said, sure enough the +unlucky bird was always poking herself where she was not wanted." + +"Ha, ha! very good! And so your master is a wit, is he? Well! tell him +to come up and speak to me to-night about my parlour chimney, for there +is no one like him for chimney doctoring." + +And the master went up, and was so won over by Miss Galindo's merry ways, +and sharp insight into the mysteries of his various kinds of business (he +was a mason, chimney-sweeper, and ratcatcher), that he came home and +abused his wife the next time she called the duck the name by which he +himself had christened her. + +But odd as Miss Galindo was in general, she could be as well-bred a lady +as any one when she chose. And choose she always did when my Lady Ludlow +was by. Indeed, I don't know the man, woman, or child, that did not +instinctively turn out its best side to her ladyship. So she had no +notion of the qualities which, I am sure, made Mr. Horner think that Miss +Galindo would be most unmanageable as a clerk, and heartily wish that the +idea had never come into my lady's head. But there it was; and he had +annoyed her ladyship already more than he liked to-day, so he could not +directly contradict her, but only urge difficulties which he hoped might +prove insuperable. But every one of them Lady Ludlow knocked down. +Letters to copy? Doubtless. Miss Galindo could come up to the Hall; she +should have a room to herself; she wrote a beautiful hand; and writing +would save her eyesight. "Capability with regard to accounts?" My lady +would answer for that too; and for more than Mr. Horner seemed to think +it necessary to inquire about. Miss Galindo was by birth and breeding a +lady of the strictest honour, and would, if possible, forget the +substance of any letters that passed through her hands; at any rate, no +one would ever hear of them again from her. "Remuneration?" Oh! as for +that, Lady Ludlow would herself take care that it was managed in the most +delicate manner possible. She would send to invite Miss Galindo to tea +at the Hall that very afternoon, if Mr. Horner would only give her +ladyship the slightest idea of the average length of time that my lady +was to request Miss Galindo to sacrifice to her daily. "Three hours! +Very well." Mr. Horner looked very grave as he passed the windows of the +room where I lay. I don't think he liked the idea of Miss Galindo as a +clerk. + +Lady Ludlow's invitations were like royal commands. Indeed, the village +was too quiet to allow the inhabitants to have many evening engagements +of any kind. Now and then, Mr. and Mrs. Horner gave a tea and supper to +the principal tenants and their wives, to which the clergyman was +invited, and Miss Galindo, Mrs. Medlicott, and one or two other spinsters +and widows. The glory of the supper-table on these occasions was +invariably furnished by her ladyship: it was a cold roasted peacock, with +his tail stuck out as if in life. Mrs. Medlicott would take up the whole +morning arranging the feathers in the proper semicircle, and was always +pleased with the wonder and admiration it excited. It was considered a +due reward and fitting compliment to her exertions that Mr. Horner always +took her in to supper, and placed her opposite to the magnificent dish, +at which she sweetly smiled all the time they were at table. But since +Mrs. Horner had had the paralytic stroke these parties had been given up; +and Miss Galindo wrote a note to Lady Ludlow in reply to her invitation, +saying that she was entirely disengaged, and would have great pleasure in +doing herself the honour of waiting upon her ladyship. + +Whoever visited my lady took their meals with her, sitting on the dais, +in the presence of all my former companions. So I did not see Miss +Galindo until some time after tea; as the young gentlewomen had had to +bring her their sewing and spinning, to hear the remarks of so competent +a judge. At length her ladyship brought her visitor into the room where +I lay,--it was one of my bad days, I remember,--in order to have her +little bit of private conversation. Miss Galindo was dressed in her best +gown, I am sure, but I had never seen anything like it except in a +picture, it was so old-fashioned. She wore a white muslin apron, +delicately embroidered, and put on a little crookedly, in order, as she +told us, even Lady Ludlow, before the evening was over, to conceal a spot +whence the colour had been discharged by a lemon-stain. This crookedness +had an odd effect, especially when I saw that it was intentional; indeed, +she was so anxious about her apron's right adjustment in the wrong place, +that she told us straight out why she wore it so, and asked her ladyship +if the spot was properly hidden, at the same time lifting up her apron +and showing her how large it was. + +"When my father was alive, I always took his right arm, so, and used to +remove any spotted or discoloured breadths to the left side, if it was a +walking-dress. That's the convenience of a gentleman. But widows and +spinsters must do what they can. Ah, my dear (to me)! when you are +reckoning up the blessings in your lot,--though you may think it a hard +one in some respects,--don't forget how little your stockings want +darning, as you are obliged to lie down so much! I would rather knit two +pairs of stockings than darn one, any day." + +"Have you been doing any of your beautiful knitting lately?" asked my +lady, who had now arranged Miss Galindo in the pleasantest chair, and +taken her own little wicker-work one, and, having her work in her hands, +was ready to try and open the subject. + +"No, and alas! your ladyship. It is partly the hot weather's fault, for +people seem to forget that winter must come; and partly, I suppose, that +every one is stocked who has the money to pay four-and-sixpence a pair +for stockings." + +"Then may I ask if you have any time in your active days at liberty?" +said my lady, drawing a little nearer to her proposal, which I fancy she +found it a little awkward to make. + +"Why, the village keeps me busy, your ladyship, when I have neither +knitting or sewing to do. You know I took X. for my letter at the +repository, because it stands for Xantippe, who was a great scold in old +times, as I have learnt. But I'm sure I don't know how the world would +get on without scolding, your ladyship. It would go to sleep, and the +sun would stand still." + +"I don't think I could bear to scold, Miss Galindo," said her ladyship, +smiling. + +"No! because your ladyship has people to do it for you. Begging your +pardon, my lady, it seems to me the generality of people may be divided +into saints, scolds, and sinners. Now, your ladyship is a saint, because +you have a sweet and holy nature, in the first place; and have people to +do your anger and vexation for you, in the second place. And Jonathan +Walker is a sinner, because he is sent to prison. But here am I, half +way, having but a poor kind of disposition at best, and yet hating sin, +and all that leads to it, such as wasting, and extravagance, and +gossiping,--and yet all this lies right under my nose in the village, and +I am not saint enough to be vexed at it; and so I scold. And though I +had rather be a saint, yet I think I do good in my way." + +"No doubt you do, dear Miss Galindo," said Lady Ludlow. "But I am sorry +to hear that there is so much that is bad going on in the village,--very +sorry." + +"O, your ladyship! then I am sorry I brought it out. It was only by way +of saying, that when I have no particular work to do at home, I take a +turn abroad, and set my neighbours to rights, just by way of steering +clear of Satan. + + For Satan finds some mischief still + For idle hands to do, + +you know, my lady." + +There was no leading into the subject by delicate degrees, for Miss +Galindo was evidently so fond of talking, that, if asked a question, she +made her answer so long, that before she came to an end of it, she had +wandered far away from the original starting point. So Lady Ludlow +plunged at once into what she had to say. + +"Miss Galindo, I have a great favour to ask of you." + +"My lady, I wish I could tell you what a pleasure it is to hear you say +so," replied Miss Galindo, almost with tears in her eyes; so glad were we +all to do anything for her ladyship, which could be called a free service +and not merely a duty. + +"It is this. Mr. Horner tells me that the business-letters, relating to +the estate, are multiplying so much that he finds it impossible to copy +them all himself, and I therefore require the services of some +confidential and discreet person to copy these letters, and occasionally +to go through certain accounts. Now, there is a very pleasant little +sitting-room very near to Mr. Horner's office (you know Mr. Horner's +office--on the other side of the stone hall?), and if I could prevail +upon you to come here to breakfast and afterwards sit there for three +hours every morning, Mr. Horner should bring or send you the papers--" + +Lady Ludlow stopped. Miss Galindo's countenance had fallen. There was +some great obstacle in her mind to her wish for obliging Lady Ludlow. + +"What would Sally do?" she asked at length. Lady Ludlow had not a notion +who Sally was. Nor if she had had a notion, would she have had a +conception of the perplexities that poured into Miss Galindo's mind, at +the idea of leaving her rough forgetful dwarf without the perpetual +monitorship of her mistress. Lady Ludlow, accustomed to a household +where everything went on noiselessly, perfectly, and by clock-work, +conducted by a number of highly-paid, well-chosen, and accomplished +servants, had not a conception of the nature of the rough material from +which her servants came. Besides, in her establishment, so that the +result was good, no one inquired if the small economies had been observed +in the production. Whereas every penny--every halfpenny, was of +consequence to Miss Galindo; and visions of squandered drops of milk and +wasted crusts of bread filled her mind with dismay. But she swallowed +all her apprehensions down, out of her regard for Lady Ludlow, and desire +to be of service to her. No one knows how great a trial it was to her +when she thought of Sally, unchecked and unscolded for three hours every +morning. But all she said was-- + +"'Sally, go to the Deuce.' I beg your pardon, my lady, if I was talking +to myself; it's a habit I have got into of keeping my tongue in practice, +and I am not quite aware when I do it. Three hours every morning! I +shall be only too proud to do what I can for your ladyship; and I hope +Mr. Horner will not be too impatient with me at first. You know, +perhaps, that I was nearly being an authoress once, and that seems as if +I was destined to 'employ my time in writing.'" + +"No, indeed; we must return to the subject of the clerkship afterwards, +if you please. An authoress, Miss Galindo! You surprise me!" + +"But, indeed, I was. All was quite ready. Doctor Burney used to teach +me music: not that I ever could learn, but it was a fancy of my poor +father's. And his daughter wrote a book, and they said she was but a +very young lady, and nothing but a music-master's daughter; so why should +not I try?" + +"Well?" + +"Well! I got paper and half-a-hundred good pens, a bottle of ink, all +ready--" + +"And then--" + +"O, it ended in my having nothing to say, when I sat down to write. But +sometimes, when I get hold of a book, I wonder why I let such a poor +reason stop me. It does not others." + +"But I think it was very well it did, Miss Galindo," said her ladyship. +"I am extremely against women usurping men's employments, as they are +very apt to do. But perhaps, after all, the notion of writing a book +improved your hand. It is one of the most legible I ever saw." + +"I despise z's without tails," said Miss Galindo, with a good deal of +gratified pride at my lady's praise. Presently, my lady took her to look +at a curious old cabinet, which Lord Ludlow had picked up at the Hague; +and while they were out of the room on this errand, I suppose the +question of remuneration was settled, for I heard no more of it. + +When they came back, they were talking of Mr. Gray. Miss Galindo was +unsparing in her expressions of opinion about him: going much farther +than my lady--in her language, at least. + +"A little blushing man like him, who can't say bo to a goose without +hesitating and colouring, to come to this village--which is as good a +village as ever lived--and cry us down for a set of sinners, as if we had +all committed murder and that other thing!--I have no patience with him, +my lady. And then, how is he to help us to heaven, by teaching us our, a +b, ab--b a, ba? And yet, by all accounts, that's to save poor children's +souls. O, I knew your ladyship would agree with me. I am sure my mother +was as good a creature as ever breathed the blessed air; and if she's not +gone to heaven I don't want to go there; and she could not spell a letter +decently. And does Mr. Gray think God took note of that?" + +"I was sure you would agree with me, Miss Galindo," said my lady. "You +and I can remember how this talk about education--Rousseau, and his +writings--stirred up the French people to their Reign of Terror, and all +those bloody scenes." + +"I'm afraid that Rousseau and Mr. Gray are birds of a feather," replied +Miss Galindo, shaking her head. "And yet there is some good in the young +man too. He sat up all night with Billy Davis, when his wife was fairly +worn out with nursing him." + +"Did he, indeed!" said my lady, her face lighting up, as it always did +when she heard of any kind or generous action, no matter who performed +it. "What a pity he is bitten with these new revolutionary ideas, and is +so much for disturbing the established order of society!" + +When Miss Galindo went, she left so favourable an impression of her visit +on my lady, that she said to me with a pleased smile-- + +"I think I have provided Mr. Horner with a far better clerk than he would +have made of that lad Gregson in twenty years. And I will send the lad +to my lord's grieve, in Scotland, that he may be kept out of harm's way." + +But something happened to the lad before this purpose could be +accomplished. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + + +The next morning, Miss Galindo made her appearance, and, by some mistake, +unusual to my lady's well-trained servants, was shown into the room where +I was trying to walk; for a certain amount of exercise was prescribed for +me, painful although the exertion had become. + +She brought a little basket along with her and while the footman was gone +to inquire my lady's wishes (for I don't think that Lady Ludlow expected +Miss Galindo so soon to assume her clerkship; nor, indeed, had Mr. Horner +any work of any kind ready for his new assistant to do), she launched out +into conversation with me. + +"It was a sudden summons, my dear! However, as I have often said to +myself, ever since an occasion long ago, if Lady Ludlow ever honours me +by asking for my right hand, I'll cut it off, and wrap the stump up so +tidily she shall never find out it bleeds. But, if I had had a little +more time, I could have mended my pens better. You see, I have had to +sit up pretty late to get these sleeves made"--and she took out of her +basket a pail of brown-holland over-sleeves, very much such as a grocer's +apprentice wears--"and I had only time to make seven or eight pens, out +of some quills Farmer Thomson gave me last autumn. As for ink, I'm +thankful to say, that's always ready; an ounce of steel filings, an ounce +of nut-gall, and a pint of water (tea, if you're extravagant, which, +thank Heaven! I'm not), put all in a bottle, and hang it up behind the +house door, so that the whole gets a good shaking every time you slam it +to--and even if you are in a passion and bang it, as Sally and I often +do, it is all the better for it--and there's my ink ready for use; ready +to write my lady's will with, if need be." + +"O, Miss Galindo!" said I, "don't talk so my lady's will! and she not +dead yet." + +"And if she were, what would be the use of talking of making her will? +Now, if you were Sally, I should say, 'Answer me that, you goose!' But, +as you're a relation of my lady's, I must be civil, and only say, 'I +can't think how you can talk so like a fool!' To be sure, poor thing, +you're lame!" + +I do not know how long she would have gone on; but my lady came in, and +I, released from my duty of entertaining Miss Galindo, made my limping +way into the next room. To tell the truth, I was rather afraid of Miss +Galindo's tongue, for I never knew what she would say next. + +After a while my lady came, and began to look in the bureau for +something: and as she looked she said--"I think Mr. Horner must have made +some mistake, when he said he had so much work that he almost required a +clerk, for this morning he cannot find anything for Miss Galindo to do; +and there she is, sitting with her pen behind her ear, waiting for +something to write. I am come to find her my mother's letters, for I +should like to have a fair copy made of them. O, here they are: don't +trouble yourself, my dear child." + +When my lady returned again, she sat down and began to talk of Mr. Gray. + +"Miss Galindo says she saw him going to hold a prayer-meeting in a +cottage. Now that really makes me unhappy, it is so like what Mr. Wesley +used to do in my younger days; and since then we have had rebellion in +the American colonies and the French Revolution. You may depend upon it, +my dear, making religion and education common--vulgarising them, as it +were--is a bad thing for a nation. A man who hears prayers read in the +cottage where he has just supped on bread and bacon, forgets the respect +due to a church: he begins to think that one place is as good as another, +and, by-and-by, that one person is as good as another; and after that, I +always find that people begin to talk of their rights, instead of +thinking of their duties. I wish Mr. Gray had been more tractable, and +had left well alone. What do you think I heard this morning? Why that +the Home Hill estate, which niches into the Hanbury property, was bought +by a Baptist baker from Birmingham!" + +"A Baptist baker!" I exclaimed. I had never seen a Dissenter, to my +knowledge; but, having always heard them spoken of with horror, I looked +upon them almost as if they were rhinoceroses. I wanted to see a live +Dissenter, I believe, and yet I wished it were over. I was almost +surprised when I heard that any of them were engaged in such peaceful +occupations as baking. + +"Yes! so Mr. Horner tells me. A Mr. Lambe, I believe. But, at any rate, +he is a Baptist, and has been in trade. What with his schismatism and +Mr. Gray's methodism, I am afraid all the primitive character of this +place will vanish." + +From what I could hear, Mr. Gray seemed to be taking his own way; at any +rate, more than he had done when he first came to the village, when his +natural timidity had made him defer to my lady, and seek her consent and +sanction before embarking in any new plan. But newness was a quality +Lady Ludlow especially disliked. Even in the fashions of dress and +furniture, she clung to the old, to the modes which had prevailed when +she was young; and though she had a deep personal regard for Queen +Charlotte (to whom, as I have already said, she had been maid-of-honour), +yet there was a tinge of Jacobitism about her, such as made her extremely +dislike to hear Prince Charles Edward called the young Pretender, as many +loyal people did in those days, and made her fond of telling of the thorn- +tree in my lord's park in Scotland, which had been planted by bonny Queen +Mary herself, and before which every guest in the Castle of Monkshaven +was expected to stand bare-headed, out of respect to the memory and +misfortunes of the royal planter. + +We might play at cards, if we so chose, on a Sunday; at least, I suppose +we might, for my lady and Mr. Mountford used to do so often when I first +went. But we must neither play cards, nor read, nor sew on the fifth of +November and on the thirtieth of January, but must go to church, and +meditate all the rest of the day--and very hard work meditating was. I +would far rather have scoured a room. That was the reason, I suppose, +why a passive life was seen to be better discipline for me than an active +one. + +But I am wandering away from my lady, and her dislike to all innovation. +Now, it seemed to me, as far as I heard, that Mr. Gray was full of +nothing but new things, and that what he first did was to attack all our +established institutions, both in the village and the parish, and also in +the nation. To be sure, I heard of his ways of going on principally from +Miss Galindo, who was apt to speak more strongly than accurately. + +"There he goes," she said, "clucking up the children just like an old +hen, and trying to teach them about their salvation and their souls, and +I don't know what--things that it is just blasphemy to speak about out of +church. And he potters old people about reading their Bibles. I am sure +I don't want to speak disrespectfully about the Holy Scriptures, but I +found old Job Horton busy reading his Bible yesterday. Says I, 'What are +you reading, and where did you get it, and who gave it you?' So he made +answer, 'That he was reading Susannah and the Elders, for that he had +read Bel and the Dragon till he could pretty near say it off by heart, +and they were two as pretty stories as ever he had read, and that it was +a caution to him what bad old chaps there were in the world.' Now, as +Job is bed-ridden, I don't think he is likely to meet with the Elders, +and I say that I think repeating his Creed, the Commandments, and the +Lord's Prayer, and, maybe, throwing in a verse of the Psalms, if he +wanted a bit of a change, would have done him far more good than his +pretty stories, as he called them. And what's the next thing our young +parson does? Why he tries to make us all feel pitiful for the black +slaves, and leaves little pictures of negroes about, with the question +printed below, 'Am I not a man and a brother?' just as if I was to be +hail-fellow-well-met with every negro footman. They do say he takes no +sugar in his tea, because he thinks he sees spots of blood in it. Now I +call that superstition." + +The next day it was a still worse story. + +"Well, my dear! and how are you? My lady sent me in to sit a bit with +you, while Mr. Horner looks out some papers for me to copy. Between +ourselves, Mr. Steward Horner does not like having me for a clerk. It is +all very well he does not; for, if he were decently civil to me, I might +want a chaperone, you know, now poor Mrs. Horner is dead." This was one +of Miss Galindo's grim jokes. "As it is, I try to make him forget I'm a +woman, I do everything as ship-shape as a masculine man-clerk. I see he +can't find a fault--writing good, spelling correct, sums all right. And +then he squints up at me with the tail of his eye, and looks glummer than +ever, just because I'm a woman--as if I could help that. I have gone +good lengths to set his mind at ease. I have stuck my pen behind my ear, +I have made him a bow instead of a curtsey, I have whistled--not a tune I +can't pipe up that--nay, if you won't tell my lady, I don't mind telling +you that I have said 'Confound it!' and 'Zounds!' I can't get any +farther. For all that, Mr. Horner won't forget I am a lady, and so I am +not half the use I might be, and if it were not to please my Lady Ludlow, +Mr. Horner and his books might go hang (see how natural that came out!). +And there is an order for a dozen nightcaps for a bride, and I am so +afraid I shan't have time to do them. Worst of all, there's Mr. Gray +taking advantage of my absence to seduce Sally!" + +"To seduce Sally! Mr. Gray!" + +"Pooh, pooh, child! There's many a kind of seduction. Mr. Gray is +seducing Sally to want to go to church. There has he been twice at my +house, while I have been away in the mornings, talking to Sally about the +state of her soul and that sort of thing. But when I found the meat all +roasted to a cinder, I said, 'Come, Sally, let's have no more praying +when beef is down at the fire. Pray at six o'clock in the morning and +nine at night, and I won't hinder you.' So she sauced me, and said +something about Martha and Mary, implying that, because she had let the +beef get so overdone that I declare I could hardly find a bit for Nancy +Pole's sick grandchild, she had chosen the better part. I was very much +put about, I own, and perhaps you'll be shocked at what I said--indeed, I +don't know if it was right myself--but I told her I had a soul as well as +she, and if it was to be saved by my sitting still and thinking about +salvation and never doing my duty, I thought I had as good a right as she +had to be Mary, and save my soul. So, that afternoon I sat quite still, +and it was really a comfort, for I am often too busy, I know, to pray as +I ought. There is first one person wanting me, and then another, and the +house and the food and the neighbours to see after. So, when tea-time +comes, there enters my maid with her hump on her back, and her soul to be +saved. 'Please, ma'am, did you order the pound of butter?'--'No, Sally,' +I said, shaking my head, 'this morning I did not go round by Hale's farm, +and this afternoon I have been employed in spiritual things.' + +"Now, our Sally likes tea and bread-and-butter above everything, and dry +bread was not to her taste. + +"'I'm thankful,' said the impudent hussy, 'that you have taken a turn +towards godliness. It will be my prayers, I trust, that's given it you.' + +"I was determined not to give her an opening towards the carnal subject +of butter, so she lingered still, longing to ask leave to run for it. But +I gave her none, and munched my dry bread myself, thinking what a famous +cake I could make for little Ben Pole with the bit of butter we were +saving; and when Sally had had her butterless tea, and was in none of the +best of tempers because Martha had not bethought herself of the butter, I +just quietly said-- + +"'Now, Sally, to-morrow we'll try to hash that beef well, and to remember +the butter, and to work out our salvation all at the same time, for I +don't see why it can't all be done, as God has set us to do it all.' But +I heard her at it again about Mary and Martha, and I have no doubt that +Mr. Gray will teach her to consider me a lost sheep." + +I had heard so many little speeches about Mr. Gray from one person or +another, all speaking against him, as a mischief-maker, a setter-up of +new doctrines, and of a fanciful standard of life (and you may be sure +that, where Lady Ludlow led, Mrs. Medlicott and Adams were certain to +follow, each in their different ways showing the influence my lady had +over them), that I believe I had grown to consider him as a very +instrument of evil, and to expect to perceive in his face marks of his +presumption, and arrogance, and impertinent interference. It was now +many weeks since I had seen him, and when he was one morning shown into +the blue drawing-room (into which I had been removed for a change), I was +quite surprised to see how innocent and awkward a young man he appeared, +confused even more than I was at our unexpected tete-a-tete. He looked +thinner, his eyes more eager, his expression more anxious, and his colour +came and went more than it had done when I had seen him last. I tried to +make a little conversation, as I was, to my own surprise, more at my ease +than he was; but his thoughts were evidently too much preoccupied for him +to do more than answer me with monosyllables. + +Presently my lady came in. Mr. Gray twitched and coloured more than +ever; but plunged into the middle of his subject at once. + +"My lady, I cannot answer it to my conscience, if I allow the children of +this village to go on any longer the little heathens that they are. I +must do something to alter their condition. I am quite aware that your +ladyship disapproves of many of the plans which have suggested themselves +to me; but nevertheless I must do something, and I am come now to your +ladyship to ask respectfully, but firmly, what you would advise me to +do." + +His eyes were dilated, and I could almost have said they were full of +tears with his eagerness. But I am sure it is a bad plan to remind +people of decided opinions which they have once expressed, if you wish +them to modify those opinions. Now, Mr. Gray had done this with my lady; +and though I do not mean to say she was obstinate, yet she was not one to +retract. + +She was silent for a moment or two before she replied. + +"You ask me to suggest a remedy for an evil of the existence of which I +am not conscious," was her answer--very coldly, very gently given. "In +Mr. Mountford's time I heard no such complaints: whenever I see the +village children (and they are not unfrequent visitors at this house, on +one pretext or another), they are well and decently behaved." + +"Oh, madam, you cannot judge," he broke in. "They are trained to respect +you in word and deed; you are the highest they ever look up to; they have +no notion of a higher." + +"Nay, Mr. Gray," said my lady, smiling, "they are as loyally disposed as +any children can be. They come up here every fourth of June, and drink +his Majesty's health, and have buns, and (as Margaret Dawson can testify) +they take a great and respectful interest in all the pictures I can show +them of the royal family." + +"But, madam, I think of something higher than any earthly dignities." + +My lady coloured at the mistake she had made; for she herself was truly +pious. Yet when she resumed the subject, it seemed to me as if her tone +was a little sharper than before. + +"Such want of reverence is, I should say, the clergyman's fault. You +must excuse me, Mr. Gray, if I speak plainly." + +"My Lady, I want plain-speaking. I myself am not accustomed to those +ceremonies and forms which are, I suppose, the etiquette in your +ladyship's rank of life, and which seem to hedge you in from any power of +mine to touch you. Among those with whom I have passed my life hitherto, +it has been the custom to speak plainly out what we have felt earnestly. +So, instead of needing any apology from your ladyship for straightforward +speaking, I will meet what you say at once, and admit that it is the +clergyman's fault, in a great measure, when the children of his parish +swear, and curse, and are brutal, and ignorant of all saving grace; nay, +some of them of the very name of God. And because this guilt of mine, as +the clergyman of this parish, lies heavy on my soul, and every day leads +but from bad to worse, till I am utterly bewildered how to do good to +children who escape from me as if I were a monster, and who are growing +up to be men fit for and capable of any crime, but those requiring wit or +sense, I come to you, who seem to me all-powerful, as far as material +power goes--for your ladyship only knows the surface of things, and +barely that, that pass in your village--to help me with advice, and such +outward help as you can give." + +Mr. Gray had stood up and sat down once or twice while he had been +speaking, in an agitated, nervous kind of way, and now he was interrupted +by a violent fit of coughing, after which he trembled all over. + +My lady rang for a glass of water, and looked much distressed. + +"Mr. Gray," said she, "I am sure you are not well; and that makes you +exaggerate childish faults into positive evils. It is always the case +with us when we are not strong in health. I hear of your exerting +yourself in every direction: you overwork yourself, and the consequence +is, that you imagine us all worse people than we are." + +And my lady smiled very kindly and pleasantly at him, as he sat, a little +panting, a little flushed, trying to recover his breath. I am sure that +now they were brought face to face, she had quite forgotten all the +offence she had taken at his doings when she heard of them from others; +and, indeed, it was enough to soften any one's heart to see that young, +almost boyish face, looking in such anxiety and distress. + +"Oh, my lady, what shall I do?" he asked, as soon as he could recover +breath, and with such an air of humility, that I am sure no one who had +seen it could have ever thought him conceited again. "The evil of this +world is too strong for me. I can do so little. It is all in vain. It +was only to-day--" and again the cough and agitation returned. + +"My dear Mr. Gray," said my lady (the day before I could never have +believed she could have called him My dear), "you must take the advice of +an old woman about yourself. You are not fit to do anything just now but +attend to your own health: rest, and see a doctor (but, indeed, I will +take care of that), and when you are pretty strong again, you will find +that you have been magnifying evils to yourself." + +"But, my lady, I cannot rest. The evils do exist, and the burden of +their continuance lies on my shoulders. I have no place to gather the +children together in, that I may teach them the things necessary to +salvation. The rooms in my own house are too small; but I have tried +them. I have money of my own; and, as your ladyship knows, I tried to +get a piece of leasehold property, on which to build a school-house at my +own expense. Your ladyship's lawyer comes forward, at your instructions, +to enforce some old feudal right, by which no building is allowed on +leasehold property without the sanction of the lady of the manor. It may +be all very true; but it was a cruel thing to do,--that is, if your +ladyship had known (which I am sure you do not) the real moral and +spiritual state of my poor parishioners. And now I come to you to know +what I am to do. Rest! I cannot rest, while children whom I could +possibly save are being left in their ignorance, their blasphemy, their +uncleanness, their cruelty. It is known through the village that your +ladyship disapproves of my efforts, and opposes all my plans. If you +think them wrong, foolish, ill-digested (I have been a student, living in +a college, and eschewing all society but that of pious men, until now: I +may not judge for the best, in my ignorance of this sinful human nature), +tell me of better plans and wiser projects for accomplishing my end; but +do not bid me rest, with Satan compassing me round, and stealing souls +away." + +"Mr. Gray," said my lady, "there may be some truth in what you have said. +I do not deny it, though I think, in your present state of indisposition +and excitement, you exaggerate it much. I believe--nay, the experience +of a pretty long life has convinced me--that education is a bad thing, if +given indiscriminately. It unfits the lower orders for their duties, the +duties to which they are called by God; of submission to those placed in +authority over them; of contentment with that state of life to which it +has pleased God to call them, and of ordering themselves lowly and +reverently to all their betters. I have made this conviction of mine +tolerably evident to you; and I have expressed distinctly my +disapprobation of some of your ideas. You may imagine, then, that I was +not well pleased when I found that you had taken a rood or more of Farmer +Hale's land, and were laying the foundations of a school-house. You had +done this without asking for my permission, which, as Farmer Hale's liege +lady, ought to have been obtained legally, as well as asked for out of +courtesy. I put a stop to what I believed to be calculated to do harm to +a village, to a population in which, to say the least of it, I may be +disposed to take as much interest as you can do. How can reading, and +writing, and the multiplication-table (if you choose to go so far) +prevent blasphemy, and uncleanness, and cruelty? Really, Mr. Gray, I +hardly like to express myself so strongly on the subject in your present +state of health, as I should do at any other time. It seems to me that +books do little; character much; and character is not formed from books." + +"I do not think of character: I think of souls. I must get some hold +upon these children, or what will become of them in the next world? I +must be found to have some power beyond what they have, and which they +are rendered capable of appreciating, before they will listen to me. At +present physical force is all they look up to; and I have none." + +"Nay, Mr. Gray, by your own admission, they look up to me." + +"They would not do anything your ladyship disliked if it was likely to +come to your knowledge; but if they could conceal it from you, the +knowledge of your dislike to a particular line of conduct would never +make them cease from pursuing it." + +"Mr. Gray"--surprise in her air, and some little indignation--"they and +their fathers have lived on the Hanbury lands for generations!" + +"I cannot help it, madam. I am telling you the truth, whether you +believe me or not." There was a pause; my lady looked perplexed, and +somewhat ruffled; Mr. Gray as though hopeless and wearied out. "Then, my +lady," said he, at last, rising as he spoke, "you can suggest nothing to +ameliorate the state of things which, I do assure you, does exist on your +lands, and among your tenants. Surely, you will not object to my using +Farmer Hale's great barn every Sabbath? He will allow me the use of it, +if your ladyship will grant your permission." + +"You are not fit for any extra work at present," (and indeed he had been +coughing very much all through the conversation). "Give me time to +consider of it. Tell me what you wish to teach. You will be able to +take care of your health, and grow stronger while I consider. It shall +not be the worse for you, if you leave it in my hands for a time." + +My lady spoke very kindly; but he was in too excited a state to recognize +the kindness, while the idea of delay was evidently a sore irritation. I +heard him say: "And I have so little time in which to do my work. Lord! +lay not this sin to my charge." + +But my lady was speaking to the old butler, for whom, at her sign, I had +rung the bell some little time before. Now she turned round. + +"Mr. Gray, I find I have some bottles of Malmsey, of the vintage of +seventeen hundred and seventy-eight, yet left. Malmsey, as perhaps you +know, used to be considered a specific for coughs arising from weakness. +You must permit me to send you half-a-dozen bottles, and, depend upon it, +you will take a more cheerful view of life and its duties before you have +finished them, especially if you will be so kind as to see Dr. Trevor, +who is coming to see me in the course of the week. By the time you are +strong enough to work, I will try and find some means of preventing the +children from using such bad language, and otherwise annoying you." + +"My lady, it is the sin, and not the annoyance. I wish I could make you +understand." He spoke with some impatience; Poor fellow! he was too +weak, exhausted, and nervous. "I am perfectly well; I can set to work to- +morrow; I will do anything not to be oppressed with the thought of how +little I am doing. I do not want your wine. Liberty to act in the +manner I think right, will do me far more good. But it is of no use. It +is preordained that I am to be nothing but a cumberer of the ground. I +beg your ladyship's pardon for this call." + +He stood up, and then turned dizzy. My lady looked on, deeply hurt, and +not a little offended, he held out his hand to her, and I could see that +she had a little hesitation before she took it. He then saw me, I almost +think, for the first time; and put out his hand once more, drew it back, +as if undecided, put it out again, and finally took hold of mine for an +instant in his damp, listless hand, and was gone. + +Lady Ludlow was dissatisfied with both him and herself, I was sure. +Indeed, I was dissatisfied with the result of the interview myself. But +my lady was not one to speak out her feelings on the subject; nor was I +one to forget myself, and begin on a topic which she did not begin. She +came to me, and was very tender with me; so tender, that that, and the +thoughts of Mr. Gray's sick, hopeless, disappointed look, nearly made me +cry. + +"You are tired, little one," said my lady. "Go and lie down in my room, +and hear what Medlicott and I can decide upon in the way of strengthening +dainties for that poor young man, who is killing himself with his over- +sensitive conscientiousness." + +"Oh, my lady!" said I, and then I stopped. + +"Well. What?" asked she. + +"If you would but let him have Farmer Hale's barn at once, it would do +him more good than all." + +"Pooh, pooh, child!" though I don't think she was displeased, "he is not +fit for more work just now. I shall go and write for Dr. Trevor." + +And for the next half-hour, we did nothing but arrange physical comforts +and cures for poor Mr. Gray. At the end of the time, Mrs. Medlicott +said-- + +"Has your ladyship heard that Harry Gregson has fallen from a tree, and +broken his thigh-bone, and is like to be a cripple for life?" + +"Harry Gregson! That black-eyed lad who read my letter? It all comes +from over-education!" + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + +But I don't see how my lady could think it was over-education that made +Harry Gregson break his thigh, for the manner in which he met with the +accident was this:-- + +Mr. Horner, who had fallen sadly out of health since his wife's death, +had attached himself greatly to Harry Gregson. Now, Mr. Horner had a +cold manner to every one, and never spoke more than was necessary, at the +best of times. And, latterly, it had not been the best of times with +him. I dare say, he had had some causes for anxiety (of which I knew +nothing) about my lady's affairs; and he was evidently annoyed by my +lady's whim (as he once inadvertently called it) of placing Miss Galindo +under him in the position of a clerk. Yet he had always been friends, in +his quiet way, with Miss Galindo, and she devoted herself to her new +occupation with diligence and punctuality, although more than once she +had moaned to me over the orders for needlework which had been sent to +her, and which, owing to her occupation in the service of Lady Ludlow, +she had been unable to fulfil. + +The only living creature to whom the staid Mr. Horner could be said to be +attached, was Harry Gregson. To my lady he was a faithful and devoted +servant, looking keenly after her interests, and anxious to forward them +at any cost of trouble to himself. But the more shrewd Mr. Horner was, +the more probability was there of his being annoyed at certain +peculiarities of opinion which my lady held with a quiet, gentle +pertinacity; against which no arguments, based on mere worldly and +business calculations, made any way. This frequent opposition to views +which Mr. Horner entertained, although it did not interfere with the +sincere respect which the lady and the steward felt for each other, yet +prevented any warmer feeling of affection from coming in. It seems +strange to say it, but I must repeat it--the only person for whom, since +his wife's death, Mr. Horner seemed to feel any love, was the little imp +Harry Gregson, with his bright, watchful eyes, his tangled hair hanging +right down to his eyebrows, for all the world like a Skye terrier. This +lad, half gipsy and whole poacher, as many people esteemed him, hung +about the silent, respectable, staid Mr. Horner, and followed his steps +with something of the affectionate fidelity of the dog which he +resembled. I suspect, this demonstration of attachment to his person on +Harry Gregson's part was what won Mr. Horner's regard. In the first +instance, the steward had only chosen the lad out as the cleverest +instrument he could find for his purpose; and I don't mean to say that, +if Harry had not been almost as shrewd as Mr. Horner himself was, both by +original disposition and subsequent experience, the steward would have +taken to him as he did, let the lad have shown ever so much affection for +him. + +But even to Harry Mr. Horner was silent. Still, it was pleasant to find +himself in many ways so readily understood; to perceive that the crumbs +of knowledge he let fall were picked up by his little follower, and +hoarded like gold that here was one to hate the persons and things whom +Mr. Horner coldly disliked, and to reverence and admire all those for +whom he had any regard. Mr. Horner had never had a child, and +unconsciously, I suppose, something of the paternal feeling had begun to +develop itself in him towards Harry Gregson. I heard one or two things +from different people, which have always made me fancy that Mr. Horner +secretly and almost unconsciously hoped that Harry Gregson might be +trained so as to be first his clerk, and next his assistant, and finally +his successor in his stewardship to the Hanbury estates. + +Harry's disgrace with my lady, in consequence of his reading the letter, +was a deeper blow to Mr. Horner than his quiet manner would ever have led +any one to suppose, or than Lady Ludlow ever dreamed of inflicting, I am +sure. + +Probably Harry had a short, stern rebuke from Mr. Horner at the time, for +his manner was always hard even to those he cared for the most. But +Harry's love was not to be daunted or quelled by a few sharp words. I +dare say, from what I heard of them afterwards, that Harry accompanied +Mr. Horner in his walk over the farm the very day of the rebuke; his +presence apparently unnoticed by the agent, by whom his absence would +have been painfully felt nevertheless. That was the way of it, as I have +been told. Mr. Horner never bade Harry go with him; never thanked him +for going, or being at his heels ready to run on any errands, straight as +the crow flies to his point, and back to heel in as short a time as +possible. Yet, if Harry were away, Mr. Horner never inquired the reason +from any of the men who might be supposed to know whether he was detained +by his father, or otherwise engaged; he never asked Harry himself where +he had been. But Miss Galindo said that those labourers who knew Mr. +Horner well, told her that he was always more quick-eyed to shortcomings, +more savage-like in fault-finding, on those days when the lad was absent. + +Miss Galindo, indeed, was my great authority for most of the village news +which I heard. She it was who gave me the particulars of poor Harry's +accident. + +"You see, my dear," she said, "the little poacher has taken some +unaccountable fancy to my master." (This was the name by which Miss +Galindo always spoke of Mr. Horner to me, ever since she had been, as she +called it, appointed his clerk.) + +"Now if I had twenty hearts to lose, I never could spare a bit of one of +them for that good, gray, square, severe man. But different people have +different tastes, and here is that little imp of a gipsy-tinker ready to +turn slave for my master; and, odd enough, my master,--who, I should have +said beforehand, would have made short work of imp, and imp's family, and +have sent Hall, the Bang-beggar, after them in no time--my master, as +they tell me, is in his way quite fond of the lad, and if he could, +without vexing my lady too much, he would have made him what the folks +here call a Latiner. However, last night, it seems that there was a +letter of some importance forgotten (I can't tell you what it was about, +my dear, though I know perfectly well, but '_service oblige_,' as well as +'noblesse,' and you must take my word for it that it was important, and +one that I am surprised my master could forget), till too late for the +post. (The poor, good, orderly man is not what he was before his wife's +death.) Well, it seems that he was sore annoyed by his forgetfulness, +and well he might be. And it was all the more vexatious, as he had no +one to blame but himself. As for that matter, I always scold somebody +else when I'm in fault; but I suppose my master would never think of +doing that, else it's a mighty relief. However, he could eat no tea, and +was altogether put out and gloomy. And the little faithful imp-lad, +perceiving all this, I suppose, got up like a page in an old ballad, and +said he would run for his life across country to Comberford, and see if +he could not get there before the bags were made up. So my master gave +him the letter, and nothing more was heard of the poor fellow till this +morning, for the father thought his son was sleeping in Mr. Horner's +barn, as he does occasionally, it seems, and my master, as was very +natural, that he had gone to his father's." + +"And he had fallen down the old stone quarry, had he not?" + +"Yes, sure enough. Mr. Gray had been up here fretting my lady with some +of his new-fangled schemes, and because the young man could not have it +all his own way, from what I understand, he was put out, and thought he +would go home by the back lane, instead of through the village, where the +folks would notice if the parson looked glum. But, however, it was a +mercy, and I don't mind saying so, ay, and meaning it too, though it may +be like methodism; for, as Mr. Gray walked by the quarry, he heard a +groan, and at first he thought it was a lamb fallen down; and he stood +still, and then he heard it again; and then I suppose, he looked down and +saw Harry. So he let himself down by the boughs of the trees to the +ledge where Harry lay half-dead, and with his poor thigh broken. There +he had lain ever since the night before: he had been returning to tell +the master that he had safely posted the letter, and the first words he +said, when they recovered him from the exhausted state he was in, were" +(Miss Galindo tried hard not to whimper, as she said it), "'It was in +time, sir. I see'd it put in the bag with my own eyes.'" + +"But where is he?" asked I. "How did Mr. Gray get him out?" + +"Ay! there it is, you see. Why the old gentleman (I daren't say Devil in +Lady Ludlow's house) is not so black as he is painted; and Mr. Gray must +have a deal of good in him, as I say at times; and then at others, when +he has gone against me, I can't bear him, and think hanging too good for +him. But he lifted the poor lad, as if he had been a baby, I suppose, +and carried him up the great ledges that were formerly used for steps; +and laid him soft and easy on the wayside grass, and ran home and got +help and a door, and had him carried to his house, and laid on his bed; +and then somehow, for the first time either he or any one else perceived +it, he himself was all over blood--his own blood--he had broken a blood- +vessel; and there he lies in the little dressing-room, as white and as +still as if he were dead; and the little imp in Mr. Gray's own bed, sound +asleep, now his leg is set, just as if linen sheets and a feather bed +were his native element, as one may say. Really, now he is doing so +well, I've no patience with him, lying there where Mr. Gray ought to be. +It is just what my lady always prophesied would come to pass, if there +was any confusion of ranks." + +"Poor Mr. Gray!" said I, thinking of his flushed face, and his feverish, +restless ways, when he had been calling on my lady not an hour before his +exertions on Harry's behalf. And I told Miss Galindo how ill I had +thought him. + +"Yes," said she. "And that was the reason my lady had sent for Doctor +Trevor. Well, it has fallen out admirably, for he looked well after that +old donkey of a Prince, and saw that he made no blunders." + +Now "that old donkey of a Prince" meant the village surgeon, Mr. Prince, +between whom and Miss Galindo there was war to the knife, as they often +met in the cottages, when there was illness, and she had her queer, odd +recipes, which he, with his grand pharmacopoeia, held in infinite +contempt, and the consequence of their squabbling had been, not long +before this very time, that he had established a kind of rule, that into +whatever sick-room Miss Galindo was admitted, there he refused to visit. +But Miss Galindo's prescriptions and visits cost nothing and were often +backed by kitchen-physic; so, though it was true that she never came but +she scolded about something or other, she was generally preferred as +medical attendant to Mr. Prince. + +"Yes, the old donkey is obliged to tolerate me, and be civil to me; for, +you see, I got there first, and had possession, as it were, and yet my +lord the donkey likes the credit of attending the parson, and being in +consultation with so grand a county-town doctor as Doctor Trevor. And +Doctor Trevor is an old friend of mine" (she sighed a little, some time I +may tell you why), "and treats me with infinite bowing and respect; so +the donkey, not to be out of medical fashion, bows too, though it is +sadly against the grain; and he pulled a face as if he had heard a slate- +pencil gritting against a slate, when I told Doctor Trevor I meant to sit +up with the two lads, for I call Mr. Gray little more than a lad, and a +pretty conceited one, too, at times." + +"But why should you sit up, Miss Galindo? It will tire you sadly." + +"Not it. You see, there is Gregson's mother to keep quiet for she sits +by her lad, fretting and sobbing, so that I'm afraid of her disturbing +Mr. Gray; and there's Mr. Gray to keep quiet, for Doctor Trevor says his +life depends on it; and there is medicine to be given to the one, and +bandages to be attended to for the other; and the wild horde of gipsy +brothers and sisters to be turned out, and the father to be held in from +showing too much gratitude to Mr. Gray, who can't hear it,--and who is to +do it all but me? The only servant is old lame Betty, who once lived +with me, and _would_ leave me because she said I was always +bothering--(there was a good deal of truth in what she said, I grant, but +she need not have said it; a good deal of truth is best let alone at the +bottom of the well), and what can she do,--deaf as ever she can be, too?" + +So Miss Galindo went her ways; but not the less was she at her post in +the morning; a little crosser and more silent than usual; but the first +was not to be wondered at, and the last was rather a blessing. + +Lady Ludlow had been extremely anxious both about Mr. Gray and Harry +Gregson. Kind and thoughtful in any case of illness and accident, she +always was; but somehow, in this, the feeling that she was not quite--what +shall I call it?--"friends" seems hardly the right word to use, as to the +possible feeling between the Countess Ludlow and the little vagabond +messenger, who had only once been in her presence,--that she had hardly +parted from either as she could have wished to do, had death been near, +made her more than usually anxious. Doctor Trevor was not to spare +obtaining the best medical advice the county could afford: whatever he +ordered in the way of diet, was to be prepared under Mrs. Medlicott's own +eye, and sent down from the Hall to the Parsonage. As Mr. Horner had +given somewhat similar directions, in the case of Harry Gregson at least, +there was rather a multiplicity of counsellors and dainties, than any +lack of them. And, the second night, Mr. Horner insisted on taking the +superintendence of the nursing himself, and sat and snored by Harry's +bedside, while the poor, exhausted mother lay by her child,--thinking +that she watched him, but in reality fast asleep, as Miss Galindo told +us; for, distrusting any one's powers of watching and nursing but her +own, she had stolen across the quiet village street in cloak and dressing- +gown, and found Mr. Gray in vain trying to reach the cup of barley-water +which Mr. Horner had placed just beyond his reach. + +In consequence of Mr. Gray's illness, we had to have a strange curate to +do duty; a man who dropped his h's, and hurried through the service, and +yet had time enough to stand in my Lady's way, bowing to her as she came +out of church, and so subservient in manner, that I believe that sooner +than remain unnoticed by a countess, he would have preferred being +scolded, or even cuffed. Now I found out, that great as was my lady's +liking and approval of respect, nay, even reverence, being paid to her as +a person of quality,--a sort of tribute to her Order, which she had no +individual right to remit, or, indeed, not to exact,--yet she, being +personally simple, sincere, and holding herself in low esteem, could not +endure anything like the servility of Mr. Crosse, the temporary curate. +She grew absolutely to loathe his perpetual smiling and bowing; his +instant agreement with the slightest opinion she uttered; his veering +round as she blew the wind. I have often said that my lady did not talk +much, as she might have done had she lived among her equals. But we all +loved her so much, that we had learnt to interpret all her little ways +pretty truly; and I knew what particular turns of her head, and +contractions of her delicate fingers meant, as well as if she had +expressed herself in words. I began to suspect that my lady would be +very thankful to have Mr. Gray about again, and doing his duty even with +a conscientiousness that might amount to worrying himself, and fidgeting +others; and although Mr. Gray might hold her opinions in as little esteem +as those of any simple gentlewoman, she was too sensible not to feel how +much flavour there was in his conversation, compared to that of Mr. +Crosse, who was only her tasteless echo. + +As for Miss Galindo, she was utterly and entirely a partisan of Mr. +Gray's, almost ever since she had begun to nurse him during his illness. + +"You know, I never set up for reasonableness, my lady. So I don't +pretend to say, as I might do if I were a sensible woman and all +that,--that I am convinced by Mr. Gray's arguments of this thing or +t'other. For one thing, you see, poor fellow! he has never been able to +argue, or hardly indeed to speak, for Doctor Trevor has been very +peremptory. So there's been no scope for arguing! But what I mean is +this:--When I see a sick man thinking always of others, and never of +himself; patient, humble--a trifle too much at times, for I've caught him +praying to be forgiven for having neglected his work as a parish priest," +(Miss Galindo was making horrible faces, to keep back tears, squeezing up +her eyes in a way which would have amused me at any other time, but when +she was speaking of Mr. Gray); "when I see a downright good, religious +man, I'm apt to think he's got hold of the right clue, and that I can do +no better than hold on by the tails of his coat and shut my eyes, if +we've got to go over doubtful places on our road to Heaven. So, my lady, +you must excuse me if, when he gets about again, he is all agog about a +Sunday-school, for if he is, I shall be agog too, and perhaps twice as +bad as him, for, you see, I've a strong constitution compared to his, and +strong ways of speaking and acting. And I tell your ladyship this now, +because I think from your rank--and still more, if I may say so, for all +your kindness to me long ago, down to this very day--you've a right to be +first told of anything about me. Change of opinion I can't exactly call +it, for I don't see the good of schools and teaching A B C, any more than +I did before, only Mr. Gray does, so I'm to shut my eyes, and leap over +the ditch to the side of education. I've told Sally already, that if she +does not mind her work, but stands gossiping with Nelly Mather, I'll +teach her her lessons; and I've never caught her with old Nelly since." + +I think Miss Galindo's desertion to Mr. Gray's opinions in this matter +hurt my lady just a little bit; but she only said-- + +"Of course, if the parishoners wish for it, Mr. Gray must have his Sunday- +school. I shall, in that case, withdraw my opposition. I am sorry I +cannot alter my opinions as easily as you." + +My lady made herself smile as she said this. Miss Galindo saw it was an +effort to do so. She thought a minute before she spoke again. + +"Your ladyship has not seen Mr. Gray as intimately as I have done. That's +one thing. But, as for the parishioners, they will follow your +ladyship's lead in everything; so there is no chance of their wishing for +a Sunday-school." + +"I have never done anything to make them follow my lead, as you call it, +Miss Galindo," said my lady, gravely. + +"Yes, you have," replied Miss Galindo, bluntly. And then, correcting +herself, she said, "Begging your ladyship's pardon, you have. Your +ancestors have lived here time out of mind, and have owned the land on +which their forefathers have lived ever since there were forefathers. You +yourself were born amongst them, and have been like a little queen to +them ever since, I might say, and they've never known your ladyship do +anything but what was kind and gentle; but I'll leave fine speeches about +your ladyship to Mr. Crosse. Only you, my lady, lead the thoughts of the +parish; and save some of them a world of trouble, for they could never +tell what was right if they had to think for themselves. It's all quite +right that they should be guided by you, my lady,--if only you would +agree with Mr. Gray." + +"Well," said my lady, "I told him only the last day that he was here, +that I would think about it. I do believe I could make up my mind on +certain subjects better if I were left alone, than while being constantly +talked to about them." + +My lady said this in her usual soft tones; but the words had a tinge of +impatience about them; indeed, she was more ruffled than I had often seen +her; but, checking herself in an instant she said-- + +"You don't know how Mr. Horner drags in this subject of education apropos +of everything. Not that he says much about it at any time: it is not his +way. But he cannot let the thing alone." + +"I know why, my lady," said Miss Galindo. "That poor lad, Harry Gregson, +will never be able to earn his livelihood in any active way, but will be +lame for life. Now, Mr. Horner thinks more of Harry than of any one else +in the world,--except, perhaps, your ladyship." Was it not a pretty +companionship for my lady? "And he has schemes of his own for teaching +Harry; and if Mr. Gray could but have his school, Mr. Horner and he think +Harry might be schoolmaster, as your ladyship would not like to have him +coming to you as steward's clerk. I wish your ladyship would fall into +this plan; Mr. Gray has it so at heart." + +Miss Galindo looked wistfully at my lady, as she said this. But my lady +only said, drily, and rising at the same time, as if to end the +conversation-- + +"So Mr. Horner and Mr. Gray seem to have gone a long way in advance of my +consent to their plans." + +"There!" exclaimed Miss Galindo, as my lady left the room, with an +apology for going away; "I have gone and done mischief with my long, +stupid tongue. To be sure, people plan a long way ahead of to-day; more +especially when one is a sick man, lying all through the weary day on a +sofa." + +"My lady will soon get over her annoyance," said I, as it were +apologetically. I only stopped Miss Galindo's self-reproaches to draw +down her wrath upon myself. + +"And has not she a right to be annoyed with me, if she likes, and to keep +annoyed as long as she likes? Am I complaining of her, that you need +tell me that? Let me tell you, I have known my lady these thirty years; +and if she were to take me by the shoulders, and turn me out of the +house, I should only love her the more. So don't you think to come +between us with any little mincing, peace-making speeches. I have been a +mischief-making parrot, and I like her the better for being vexed with +me. So good-bye to you, Miss; and wait till you know Lady Ludlow as well +as I do, before you next think of telling me she will soon get over her +annoyance!" And off Miss Galindo went. + +I could not exactly tell what I had done wrong; but I took care never +again to come in between my lady and her by any remark about the one to +the other; for I saw that some most powerful bond of grateful affection +made Miss Galindo almost worship my lady. + +Meanwhile, Harry Gregson was limping a little about in the village, still +finding his home in Mr. Gray's house; for there he could most +conveniently be kept under the doctor's eye, and receive the requisite +care, and enjoy the requisite nourishment. As soon as he was a little +better, he was to go to Mr. Horner's house; but, as the steward lived +some distance out of the way, and was much from home, he had agreed to +leave Harry at the house; to which he had first been taken, until he was +quite strong again; and the more willingly, I suspect, from what I heard +afterwards, because Mr. Gray gave up all the little strength of speaking +which he had, to teaching Harry in the very manner which Mr. Horner most +desired. + +As for Gregson the father--he--wild man of the woods, poacher, tinker, +jack-of-all trades--was getting tamed by this kindness to his child. +Hitherto his hand had been against every man, as every man's had been +against him. That affair before the justice, which I told you about, +when Mr. Gray and even my lady had interested themselves to get him +released from unjust imprisonment, was the first bit of justice he had +ever met with; it attracted him to the people, and attached him to the +spot on which he had but squatted for a time. I am not sure if any of +the villagers were grateful to him for remaining in their neighbourhood, +instead of decamping as he had often done before, for good reasons, +doubtless, of personal safety. Harry was only one out of a brood of ten +or twelve children, some of whom had earned for themselves no good +character in service: one, indeed, had been actually transported, for a +robbery committed in a distant part of the county; and the tale was yet +told in the village of how Gregson the father came back from the trial in +a state of wild rage, striding through the place, and uttering oaths of +vengeance to himself, his great black eyes gleaming out of his matted +hair, and his arms working by his side, and now and then tossed up in his +impotent despair. As I heard the account, his wife followed him, child- +laden and weeping. After this, they had vanished from the country for a +time, leaving their mud hovel locked up, and the door-key, as the +neighbours said, buried in a hedge bank. The Gregsons had reappeared +much about the same time that Mr. Gray came to Hanbury. He had either +never heard of their evil character, or considered that it gave them all +the more claims upon his Christian care; and the end of it was, that this +rough, untamed, strong giant of a heathen was loyal slave to the weak, +hectic, nervous, self-distrustful parson. Gregson had also a kind of +grumbling respect for Mr. Horner: he did not quite like the steward's +monopoly of his Harry: the mother submitted to that with a better grace, +swallowing down her maternal jealousy in the prospect of her child's +advancement to a better and more respectable position than that in which +his parents had struggled through life. But Mr. Horner, the steward, and +Gregson, the poacher and squatter, had come into disagreeable contact too +often in former days for them to be perfectly cordial at any future time. +Even now, when there was no immediate cause for anything but gratitude +for his child's sake on Gregson's part, he would skulk out of Mr. +Horner's way, if he saw him coming; and it took all Mr. Horner's natural +reserve and acquired self-restraint to keep him from occasionally holding +up his father's life as a warning to Harry. Now Gregson had nothing of +this desire for avoidance with regard to Mr. Gray. The poacher had a +feeling of physical protection towards the parson; while the latter had +shown the moral courage, without which Gregson would never have respected +him, in coming right down upon him more than once in the exercise of +unlawful pursuits, and simply and boldly telling him he was doing wrong, +with such a quiet reliance upon Gregson's better feeling, at the same +time, that the strong poacher could not have lifted a finger against Mr. +Gray, though it had been to save himself from being apprehended and taken +to the lock-ups the very next hour. He had rather listened to the +parson's bold words with an approving smile, much as Mr. Gulliver might +have hearkened to a lecture from a Lilliputian. But when brave words +passed into kind deeds, Gregson's heart mutely acknowledged its master +and keeper. And the beauty of it all was, that Mr. Gray knew nothing of +the good work he had done, or recognized himself as the instrument which +God had employed. He thanked God, it is true, fervently and often, that +the work was done; and loved the wild man for his rough gratitude; but it +never occurred to the poor young clergyman, lying on his sick-bed, and +praying, as Miss Galindo had told us he did, to be forgiven for his +unprofitable life, to think of Gregson's reclaimed soul as anything with +which he had had to do. It was now more than three months since Mr. Gray +had been at Hanbury Court. During all that time he had been confined to +his house, if not to his sick-bed, and he and my lady had never met since +their last discussion and difference about Farmer Hale's barn. + +This was not my dear lady's fault; no one could have been more attentive +in every way to the slightest possible want of either of the invalids, +especially of Mr. Gray. And she would have gone to see him at his own +house, as she sent him word, but that her foot had slipped upon the +polished oak staircase, and her ancle had been sprained. + +So we had never seen Mr. Gray since his illness, when one November day he +was announced as wishing to speak to my lady. She was sitting in her +room--the room in which I lay now pretty constantly--and I remember she +looked startled, when word was brought to her of Mr. Gray's being at the +Hall. + +She could not go to him, she was too lame for that, so she bade him be +shown into where she sat. + +"Such a day for him to go out!" she exclaimed, looking at the fog which +had crept up to the windows, and was sapping the little remaining life in +the brilliant Virginian creeper leaves that draperied the house on the +terrace side. + +He came in white, trembling, his large eyes wild and dilated. He +hastened up to Lady Ludlow's chair, and, to my surprise, took one of her +hands and kissed it, without speaking, yet shaking all over. + +"Mr. Gray!" said she, quickly, with sharp, tremulous apprehension of some +unknown evil. "What is it? There is something unusual about you." + +"Something unusual has occurred," replied he, forcing his words to be +calm, as with a great effort. "A gentleman came to my house, not half an +hour ago--a Mr. Howard. He came straight from Vienna." + +"My son!" said my dear lady, stretching out her arms in dumb questioning +attitude. + +"The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the +Lord." + +But my poor lady could not echo the words. He was the last remaining +child. And once she had been the joyful mother of nine. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + +I am ashamed to say what feeling became strongest in my mind about this +time; next to the sympathy we all of us felt for my dear lady in her deep +sorrow, I mean; for that was greater and stronger than anything else, +however contradictory you may think it, when you hear all. + +It might arise from my being so far from well at the time, which produced +a diseased mind in a diseased body; but I was absolutely jealous for my +father's memory, when I saw how many signs of grief there were for my +lord's death, he having done next to nothing for the village and parish, +which now changed, as it were, its daily course of life, because his +lordship died in a far-off city. My father had spent the best years of +his manhood in labouring hard, body and soul, for the people amongst whom +he lived. His family, of course, claimed the first place in his heart; +he would have been good for little, even in the way of benevolence, if +they had not. But close after them he cared for his parishioners, and +neighbours. And yet, when he died, though the church-bells tolled, and +smote upon our hearts with hard, fresh pain at every beat, the sounds of +every-day life still went on, close pressing around us,--carts and +carriages, street-cries, distant barrel-organs (the kindly neighbours +kept them out of our street): life, active, noisy life, pressed on our +acute consciousness of Death, and jarred upon it as on a quick nerve. + +And when we went to church,--my father's own church,--though the pulpit +cushions were black, and many of the congregation had put on some humble +sign of mourning, yet it did not alter the whole material aspect of the +place. And yet what was Lord Ludlow's relation to Hanbury, compared to +my father's work and place in--? + +O! it was very wicked in me! I think if I had seen my lady,--if I had +dared to ask to go to her, I should not have felt so miserable, so +discontented. But she sat in her own room, hung with black, all, even +over the shutters. She saw no light but that which was +artificial--candles, lamps, and the like--for more than a month. Only +Adams went near her. Mr. Gray was not admitted, though he called daily. +Even Mrs. Medlicott did not see her for near a fortnight. The sight of +my lady's griefs, or rather the recollection of it, made Mrs. Medlicott +talk far more than was her wont. She told us, with many tears, and much +gesticulation, even speaking German at times, when her English would not +flow, that my lady sat there, a white figure in the middle of the +darkened room; a shaded lamp near her, the light of which fell on an open +Bible,--the great family Bible. It was not open at any chapter or +consoling verse; but at the page whereon were registered the births of +her nine children. Five had died in infancy,--sacrificed to the cruel +system which forbade the mother to suckle her babies. Four had lived +longer; Urian had been the first to die, Ughtred-Mortimar, Earl Ludlow, +the last. + +My lady did not cry, Mrs. Medlicott said. She was quite composed; very +still, very silent. She put aside everything that savoured of mere +business: sent people to Mr. Horner for that. But she was proudly alive +to every possible form which might do honour to the last of her race. + +In those days, expresses were slow things, and forms still slower. Before +my lady's directions could reach Vienna, my lord was buried. There was +some talk (so Mrs. Medlicott said) about taking the body up, and bringing +him to Hanbury. But his executors,--connections on the Ludlow +side,--demurred to this. If he were removed to England, he must be +carried on to Scotland, and interred with his Monkshaven forefathers. My +lady, deeply hurt, withdrew from the discussion, before it degenerated to +an unseemly contest. But all the more, for this understood mortification +of my lady's, did the whole village and estate of Hanbury assume every +outward sign of mourning. The church bells tolled morning and evening. +The church itself was draped in black inside. Hatchments were placed +everywhere, where hatchments could be put. All the tenantry spoke in +hushed voices for more than a week, scarcely daring to observe that all +flesh, even that of an Earl Ludlow, and the last of the Hanburys, was but +grass after all. The very Fighting Lion closed its front door, front +shutters it had none, and those who needed drink stole in at the back, +and were silent and maudlin over their cups, instead of riotous and +noisy. Miss Galindo's eyes were swollen up with crying, and she told me, +with a fresh burst of tears, that even hump-backed Sally had been found +sobbing over her Bible, and using a pocket-handkerchief for the first +time in her life; her aprons having hitherto stood her in the necessary +stead, but not being sufficiently in accordance with etiquette to be used +when mourning over an earl's premature decease. + +If it was this way out of the Hall, "you might work it by the rule of +three," as Miss Galindo used to say, and judge what it was in the Hall. +We none of us spoke but in a whisper: we tried not to eat; and indeed the +shock had been so really great, and we did really care so much for my +lady, that for some days we had but little appetite. But after that, I +fear our sympathy grew weaker, while our flesh grew stronger. But we +still spoke low, and our hearts ached whenever we thought of my lady +sitting there alone in the darkened room, with the light ever falling on +that one solemn page. + +We wished, O how I wished that she would see Mr. Gray! But Adams said, +she thought my lady ought to have a bishop come to see her. Still no one +had authority enough to send for one. + +Mr. Horner all this time was suffering as much as any one. He was too +faithful a servant of the great Hanbury family, though now the family had +dwindled down to a fragile old lady, not to mourn acutely over its +probable extinction. He had, besides, a deeper sympathy and reverence +with, and for, my lady, in all things, than probably he ever cared to +show, for his manners were always measured and cold. He suffered from +sorrow. He also suffered from wrong. My lord's executors kept writing +to him continually. My lady refused to listen to mere business, saying +she intrusted all to him. But the "all" was more complicated than I ever +thoroughly understood. As far as I comprehended the case, it was +something of this kind:--There had been a mortgage raised on my lady's +property of Hanbury, to enable my lord, her husband, to spend money in +cultivating his Scotch estates, after some new fashion that required +capital. As long as my lord, her son, lived, who was to succeed to both +the estates after her death, this did not signify; so she had said and +felt; and she had refused to take any steps to secure the repayment of +capital, or even the payment of the interest of the mortgage from the +possible representatives and possessors of the Scotch estates, to the +possible owner of the Hanbury property; saying it ill became her to +calculate on the contingency of her son's death. + +But he had died childless, unmarried. The heir of the Monkshaven +property was an Edinburgh advocate, a far-away kinsman of my lord's: the +Hanbury property, at my lady's death, would go to the descendants of a +third son of the Squire Hanbury in the days of Queen Anne. + +This complication of affairs was most grievous to Mr. Horner. He had +always been opposed to the mortgage; had hated the payment of the +interest, as obliging my lady to practise certain economies which, though +she took care to make them as personal as possible, he disliked as +derogatory to the family. Poor Mr. Horner! He was so cold and hard in +his manner, so curt and decisive in his speech, that I don't think we any +of us did him justice. Miss Galindo was almost the first, at this time, +to speak a kind word of him, or to take thought of him at all, any +farther than to get out of his way when we saw him approaching. + +"I don't think Mr. Horner is well," she said one day; about three weeks +after we had heard of my lord's death. "He sits resting his head on his +hand, and hardly hears me when I speak to him." + +But I thought no more of it, as Miss Galindo did not name it again. My +lady came amongst us once more. From elderly she had become old; a +little, frail, old lady, in heavy black drapery, never speaking about nor +alluding to her great sorrow; quieter, gentler, paler than ever before; +and her eyes dim with much weeping, never witnessed by mortal. + +She had seen Mr. Gray at the expiration of the month of deep retirement. +But I do not think that even to him she had said one word of her own +particular individual sorrow. All mention of it seemed buried deep for +evermore. One day, Mr. Horner sent word that he was too much indisposed +to attend to his usual business at the Hall; but he wrote down some +directions and requests to Miss Galindo, saying that he would be at his +office early the next morning. The next morning he was dead. + +Miss Galindo told my lady. Miss Galindo herself cried plentifully, but +my lady, although very much distressed, could not cry. It seemed a +physical impossibility, as if she had shed all the tears in her power. +Moreover, I almost think her wonder was far greater that she herself +lived than that Mr. Horner died. It was almost natural that so faithful +a servant should break his heart, when the family he belonged to lost +their stay, their heir, and their last hope. + +Yes! Mr. Horner was a faithful servant. I do not think there are many +so faithful now; but perhaps that is an old woman's fancy of mine. When +his will came to be examined, it was discovered that, soon after Harry +Gregson's accident, Mr. Horner had left the few thousands (three, I +think,) of which he was possessed, in trust for Harry's benefit, desiring +his executors to see that the lad was well educated in certain things, +for which Mr. Horner had thought that he had shown especial aptitude; and +there was a kind of implied apology to my lady in one sentence where he +stated that Harry's lameness would prevent his being ever able to gain +his living by the exercise of any mere bodily faculties, "as had been +wished by a lady whose wishes" he, the testator, "was bound to regard." + +But there was a codicil in the will, dated since Lord Ludlow's +death--feebly written by Mr. Horner himself, as if in preparation only +for some more formal manner of bequest: or, perhaps, only as a mere +temporary arrangement till he could see a lawyer, and have a fresh will +made. In this he revoked his previous bequest to Harry Gregson. He only +left two hundred pounds to Mr Gray to be used, as that gentleman thought +best, for Henry Gregson's benefit. With this one exception, he +bequeathed all the rest of his savings to my lady, with a hope that they +might form a nest-egg, as it were, towards the paying off of the mortgage +which had been such a grief to him during his life. I may not repeat all +this in lawyer's phrase; I heard it through Miss Galindo, and she might +make mistakes. Though, indeed, she was very clear-headed, and soon +earned the respect of Mr. Smithson, my lady's lawyer from Warwick. Mr. +Smithson knew Miss Galindo a little before, both personally and by +reputation; but I don't think he was prepared to find her installed as +steward's clerk, and, at first, he was inclined to treat her, in this +capacity, with polite contempt. But Miss Galindo was both a lady and a +spirited, sensible woman, and she could put aside her self-indulgence in +eccentricity of speech and manner whenever she chose. Nay more; she was +usually so talkative, that if she had not been amusing and warm-hearted, +one might have thought her wearisome occasionally. But to meet Mr. +Smithson she came out daily in her Sunday gown; she said no more than was +required in answer to his questions; her books and papers were in +thorough order, and methodically kept; her statements of matters-of-fact +accurate, and to be relied on. She was amusingly conscious of her +victory over his contempt of a woman-clerk and his preconceived opinion +of her unpractical eccentricity. + +"Let me alone," said she, one day when she came in to sit awhile with me. +"That man is a good man--a sensible man--and I have no doubt he is a good +lawyer; but he can't fathom women yet. I make no doubt he'll go back to +Warwick, and never give credit again to those people who made him think +me half-cracked to begin with. O, my dear, he did! He showed it twenty +times worse than my poor dear master ever did. It was a form to be gone +through to please my lady, and, for her sake, he would hear my statements +and see my books. It was keeping a woman out of harm's way, at any rate, +to let her fancy herself useful. I read the man. And, I am thankful to +say, he cannot read me. At least, only one side of me. When I see an +end to be gained, I can behave myself accordingly. Here was a man who +thought that a woman in a black silk gown was a respectable, orderly kind +of person; and I was a woman in a black silk gown. He believed that a +woman could not write straight lines, and required a man to tell her that +two and two made four. I was not above ruling my books, and had Cocker a +little more at my fingers' ends than he had. But my greatest triumph has +been holding my tongue. He would have thought nothing of my books, or my +sums, or my black silk gown, if I had spoken unasked. So I have buried +more sense in my bosom these ten days than ever I have uttered in the +whole course of my life before. I have been so curt, so abrupt, so +abominably dull, that I'll answer for it he thinks me worthy to be a man. +But I must go back to him, my dear, so good-bye to conversation and you." + +But though Mr. Smithson might be satisfied with Miss Galindo, I am afraid +she was the only part of the affair with which he was content. Everything +else went wrong. I could not say who told me so--but the conviction of +this seemed to pervade the house. I never knew how much we had all +looked up to the silent, gruff Mr. Horner for decisions, until he was +gone. My lady herself was a pretty good woman of business, as women of +business go. Her father, seeing that she would be the heiress of the +Hanbury property, had given her a training which was thought unusual in +those days, and she liked to feel herself queen regnant, and to have to +decide in all cases between herself and her tenantry. But, perhaps, Mr. +Horner would have done it more wisely; not but what she always attended +to him at last. She would begin by saying, pretty clearly and promptly, +what she would have done, and what she would not have done. If Mr. +Horner approved of it, he bowed, and set about obeying her directly; if +he disapproved of it, he bowed, and lingered so long before he obeyed +her, that she forced his opinion out of him with her "Well, Mr. Horner! +and what have you to say against it?" For she always understood his +silence as well as if he had spoken. But the estate was pressed for +ready money, and Mr. Horner had grown gloomy and languid since the death +of his wife, and even his own personal affairs were not in the order in +which they had been a year or two before, for his old clerk had gradually +become superannuated, or, at any rate, unable by the superfluity of his +own energy and wit to supply the spirit that was wanting in Mr. Horner. + +Day after day Mr. Smithson seemed to grow more fidgety, more annoyed at +the state of affairs. Like every one else employed by Lady Ludlow, as +far as I could learn, he had an hereditary tie to the Hanbury family. As +long as the Smithsons had been lawyers, they had been lawyers to the +Hanburys; always coming in on all great family occasions, and better able +to understand the characters, and connect the links of what had once been +a large and scattered family, than any individual thereof had ever been. + +As long as a man was at the head of the Hanburys, the lawyers had simply +acted as servants, and had only given their advice when it was required. +But they had assumed a different position on the memorable occasion of +the mortgage: they had remonstrated against it. My lady had resented +this remonstrance, and a slight, unspoken coolness had existed between +her and the father of this Mr. Smithson ever since. + +I was very sorry for my lady. Mr. Smithson was inclined to blame Mr. +Horner for the disorderly state in which he found some of the outlying +farms, and for the deficiencies in the annual payment of rents. Mr. +Smithson had too much good feeling to put this blame into words; but my +lady's quick instinct led her to reply to a thought, the existence of +which she perceived; and she quietly told the truth, and explained how +she had interfered repeatedly to prevent Mr. Horner from taking certain +desirable steps, which were discordant to her hereditary sense of right +and wrong between landlord and tenant. She also spoke of the want of +ready money as a misfortune that could be remedied, by more economical +personal expenditure on her own part; by which individual saving, it was +possible that a reduction of fifty pounds a year might have been +accomplished. But as soon as Mr. Smithson touched on larger economies, +such as either affected the welfare of others, or the honour and standing +of the great House of Hanbury, she was inflexible. Her establishment +consisted of somewhere about forty servants, of whom nearly as many as +twenty were unable to perform their work properly, and yet would have +been hurt if they had been dismissed; so they had the credit of +fulfilling duties, while my lady paid and kept their substitutes. Mr. +Smithson made a calculation, and would have saved some hundreds a year by +pensioning off these old servants. But my lady would not hear of it. +Then, again, I know privately that he urged her to allow some of us to +return to our homes. Bitterly we should have regretted the separation +from Lady Ludlow; but we would have gone back gladly, had we known at the +time that her circumstances required it: but she would not listen to the +proposal for a moment. + +"If I cannot act justly towards every one, I will give up a plan which +has been a source of much satisfaction; at least, I will not carry it out +to such an extent in future. But to these young ladies, who do me the +favour to live with me at present, I stand pledged. I cannot go back +from my word, Mr. Smithson. We had better talk no more of this." + +As she spoke, she entered the room where I lay. She and Mr. Smithson +were coming for some papers contained in the bureau. They did not know I +was there, and Mr. Smithson started a little when he saw me, as he must +have been aware that I had overheard something. But my lady did not +change a muscle of her face. All the world might overhear her kind, +just, pure sayings, and she had no fear of their misconstruction. She +came up to me, and kissed me on the forehead, and then went to search for +the required papers. + +"I rode over the Connington farms yesterday, my lady. I must say I was +quite grieved to see the condition they are in; all the land that is not +waste is utterly exhausted with working successive white crops. Not a +pinch of manure laid on the ground for years. I must say that a greater +contrast could never have been presented than that between Harding's farm +and the next fields--fences in perfect order, rotation crops, sheep +eating down the turnips on the waste lands--everything that could be +desired." + +"Whose farm is that?" asked my lady. + +"Why, I am sorry to say, it was on none of your ladyship's that I saw +such good methods adopted. I hoped it was, I stopped my horse to +inquire. A queer-looking man, sitting on his horse like a tailor, +watching his men with a couple of the sharpest eyes I ever saw, and +dropping his h's at every word, answered my question, and told me it was +his. I could not go on asking him who he was; but I fell into +conversation with him, and I gathered that he had earned some money in +trade in Birmingham, and had bought the estate (five hundred acres, I +think he said,) on which he was born, and now was setting himself to +cultivate it in downright earnest, going to Holkham and Woburn, and half +the country over, to get himself up on the subject." + +"It would be Brooke, that dissenting baker from Birmingham," said my lady +in her most icy tone. "Mr. Smithson, I am sorry I have been detaining +you so long, but I think these are the letters you wished to see." + +If her ladyship thought by this speech to quench Mr. Smithson she was +mistaken. Mr. Smithson just looked at the letters, and went on with the +old subject. + +"Now, my lady, it struck me that if you had such a man to take poor +Horner's place, he would work the rents and the land round most +satisfactorily. I should not despair of inducing this very man to +undertake the work. I should not mind speaking to him myself on the +subject, for we got capital friends over a snack of luncheon that he +asked me to share with him." + +Lady Ludlow fixed her eyes on Mr. Smithson as he spoke, and never took +them off his face until he had ended. She was silent a minute before she +answered. + +"You are very good, Mr. Smithson, but I need not trouble you with any +such arrangements. I am going to write this afternoon to Captain James, +a friend of one of my sons, who has, I hear, been severely wounded at +Trafalgar, to request him to honour me by accepting Mr. Horner's +situation." + +"A Captain James! A captain in the navy! going to manage your ladyship's +estate!" + +"If he will be so kind. I shall esteem it a condescension on his part; +but I hear that he will have to resign his profession, his state of +health is so bad, and a country life is especially prescribed for him. I +am in some hopes of tempting him here, as I learn he has but little to +depend on if he gives up his profession." + +"A Captain James! an invalid captain!" + +"You think I am asking too great a favour," continued my lady. (I never +could tell how far it was simplicity, or how far a kind of innocent +malice, that made her misinterpret Mr. Smithson's words and looks as she +did.) "But he is not a post-captain, only a commander, and his pension +will be but small. I may be able, by offering him country air and a +healthy occupation, to restore him to health." + +"Occupation! My lady, may I ask how a sailor is to manage land? Why, +your tenants will laugh him to scorn." + +"My tenants, I trust, will not behave so ill as to laugh at any one I +choose to set over them. Captain James has had experience in managing +men. He has remarkable practical talents, and great common sense, as I +hear from every one. But, whatever he may be, the affair rests between +him and myself. I can only say I shall esteem myself fortunate if he +comes." + +There was no more to be said, after my lady spoke in this manner. I had +heard her mention Captain James before, as a middy who had been very kind +to her son Urian. I thought I remembered then, that she had mentioned +that his family circumstances were not very prosperous. But, I confess, +that little as I knew of the management of land, I quite sided with Mr. +Smithson. He, silently prohibited from again speaking to my lady on the +subject, opened his mind to Miss Galindo, from whom I was pretty sure to +hear all the opinions and news of the household and village. She had +taken a great fancy to me, because she said I talked so agreeably. I +believe it was because I listened so well. + +"Well, have you heard the news," she began, "about this Captain James? A +sailor,--with a wooden leg, I have no doubt. What would the poor, dear, +deceased master have said to it, if he had known who was to be his +successor! My dear, I have often thought of the postman's bringing me a +letter as one of the pleasures I shall miss in heaven. But, really, I +think Mr. Horner may be thankful he has got out of the reach of news; or +else he would hear of Mr. Smithson's having made up to the Birmingham +baker, and of his one-legged captain, coming to dot-and-go-one over the +estate. I suppose he will look after the labourers through a spy-glass. +I only hope he won't stick in the mud with his wooden leg; for I, for +one, won't help him out. Yes, I would," said she, correcting herself; "I +would, for my lady's sake." + +"But are you sure he has a wooden leg?" asked I. "I heard Lady Ludlow +tell Mr. Smithson about him, and she only spoke of him as wounded." + +"Well, sailors are almost always wounded in the leg. Look at Greenwich +Hospital! I should say there were twenty one-legged pensioners to one +without an arm there. But say he has got half-a-dozen legs: what has he +to do with managing land? I shall think him very impudent if he comes, +taking advantage of my lady's kind heart." + +However, come he did. In a month from that time, the carriage was sent +to meet Captain James; just as three years before it had been sent to +meet me. His coming had been so much talked about that we were all as +curious as possible to see him, and to know how so unusual an experiment, +as it seemed to us, would answer. But, before I tell you anything about +our new agent, I must speak of something quite as interesting, and I +really think quite as important. And this was my lady's making friends +with Harry Gregson. I do believe she did it for Mr. Horner's sake; but, +of course, I can only conjecture why my lady did anything. But I heard +one day, from Mary Legard, that my lady had sent for Harry to come and +see her, if he was well enough to walk so far; and the next day he was +shown into the room he had been in once before under such unlucky +circumstances. + +The lad looked pale enough, as he stood propping himself up on his +crutch, and the instant my lady saw him, she bade John Footman place a +stool for him to sit down upon while she spoke to him. It might be his +paleness that gave his whole face a more refined and gentle look; but I +suspect it was that the boy was apt to take impressions, and that Mr. +Horner's grave, dignified ways, and Mr. Gray's tender and quiet manners, +had altered him; and then the thoughts of illness and death seem to turn +many of us into gentlemen, and gentlewomen, as long as such thoughts are +in our minds. We cannot speak loudly or angrily at such times; we are +not apt to be eager about mere worldly things, for our very awe at our +quickened sense of the nearness of the invisible world, makes us calm and +serene about the petty trifles of to-day. At least, I know that was the +explanation Mr. Gray once gave me of what we all thought the great +improvement in Harry Gregson's way of behaving. + +My lady hesitated so long about what she had best say, that Harry grew a +little frightened at her silence. A few months ago it would have +surprised me more than it did now; but since my lord her son's death, she +had seemed altered in many ways,--more uncertain and distrustful of +herself, as it were. + +At last she said, and I think the tears were in her eyes: "My poor little +fellow, you have had a narrow escape with your life since I saw you +last." + +To this there was nothing to be said but "Yes;" and again there was +silence. + +"And you have lost a good, kind friend, in Mr. Horner." + +The boy's lips worked, and I think he said, "Please, don't." But I can't +be sure; at any rate, my lady went on: + +"And so have I,--a good, kind friend, he was to both of us; and to you he +wished to show his kindness in even a more generous way than he has done. +Mr. Gray has told you about his legacy to you, has he not?" + +There was no sign of eager joy on the lad's face, as if he realised the +power and pleasure of having what to him must have seemed like a fortune. + +"Mr. Gray said as how he had left me a matter of money." + +"Yes, he has left you two hundred pounds." + +"But I would rather have had him alive, my lady," he burst out, sobbing +as if his heart would break. + +"My lad, I believe you. We would rather have had our dead alive, would +we not? and there is nothing in money that can comfort us for their loss. +But you know--Mr. Gray has told you--who has appointed all our times to +die. Mr. Horner was a good, just man; and has done well and kindly, both +by me and you. You perhaps do not know" (and now I understood what my +lady had been making up her mind to say to Harry, all the time she was +hesitating how to begin) "that Mr. Horner, at one time, meant to leave +you a great deal more; probably all he had, with the exception of a +legacy to his old clerk, Morrison. But he knew that this estate--on +which my forefathers had lived for six hundred years--was in debt, and +that I had no immediate chance of paying off this debt; and yet he felt +that it was a very sad thing for an old property like this to belong in +part to those other men, who had lent the money. You understand me, I +think, my little man?" said she, questioning Harry's face. + +He had left off crying, and was trying to understand, with all his might +and main; and I think he had got a pretty good general idea of the state +of affairs; though probably he was puzzled by the term "the estate being +in debt." But he was sufficiently interested to want my lady to go on; +and he nodded his head at her, to signify this to her. + +"So Mr. Horner took the money which he once meant to be yours, and has +left the greater part of it to me, with the intention of helping me to +pay off this debt I have told you about. It will go a long way, and I +shall try hard to save the rest, and then I shall die happy in leaving +the land free from debt." She paused. "But I shall not die happy in +thinking of you. I do not know if having money, or even having a great +estate and much honour, is a good thing for any of us. But God sees fit +that some of us should be called to this condition, and it is our duty +then to stand by our posts, like brave soldiers. Now, Mr. Horner +intended you to have this money first. I shall only call it borrowing +from you, Harry Gregson, if I take it and use it to pay off the debt. I +shall pay Mr. Gray interest on this money, because he is to stand as your +guardian, as it were, till you come of age; and he must fix what ought to +be done with it, so as to fit you for spending the principal rightly when +the estate can repay it you. I suppose, now, it will be right for you to +be educated. That will be another snare that will come with your money. +But have courage, Harry. Both education and money may be used rightly, +if we only pray against the temptations they bring with them." + +Harry could make no answer, though I am sure he understood it all. My +lady wanted to get him to talk to her a little, by way of becoming +acquainted with what was passing in his mind; and she asked him what he +would like to have done with his money, if he could have part of it now? +To such a simple question, involving no talk about feelings, his answer +came readily enough. + +"Build a cottage for father, with stairs in it, and give Mr. Gray a +school-house. O, father does so want Mr. Gray for to have his wish! +Father saw all the stones lying quarried and hewn on Farmer Hale's land; +Mr. Gray had paid for them all himself. And father said he would work +night and day, and little Tommy should carry mortar, if the parson would +let him, sooner than that he should be fretted and frabbed as he was, +with no one giving him a helping hand or a kind word." + +Harry knew nothing of my lady's part in the affair; that was very clear. +My lady kept silence. + +"If I might have a piece of my money, I would buy land from Mr. Brooks; +he has got a bit to sell just at the corner of Hendon Lane, and I would +give it to Mr. Gray; and, perhaps, if your ladyship thinks I may be +learned again, I might grow up into the schoolmaster." + +"You are a good boy," said my lady. "But there are more things to be +thought of, in carrying out such a plan, than you are aware of. However, +it shall be tried." + +"The school, my lady?" I exclaimed, almost thinking she did not know what +she was saying. + +"Yes, the school. For Mr. Horner's sake, for Mr. Gray's sake, and last, +not least, for this lad's sake, I will give the new plan a trial. Ask +Mr. Gray to come up to me this afternoon about the land he wants. He +need not go to a Dissenter for it. And tell your father he shall have a +good share in the building of it, and Tommy shall carry the mortar." + +"And I may be schoolmaster?" asked Harry, eagerly. + +"We'll see about that," said my lady, amused. "It will be some time +before that plan comes to pass, my little fellow." + +And now to return to Captain James. My first account of him was from +Miss Galindo. + +"He's not above thirty; and I must just pack up my pens and my paper, and +be off; for it would be the height of impropriety for me to be staying +here as his clerk. It was all very well in the old master's days. But +here am I, not fifty till next May, and this young, unmarried man, who is +not even a widower! O, there would be no end of gossip. Besides he +looks as askance at me as I do at him. My black silk gown had no effect. +He's afraid I shall marry him. But I won't; he may feel himself quite +safe from that. And Mr. Smithson has been recommending a clerk to my +lady. She would far rather keep me on; but I can't stop. I really could +not think it proper." + +"What sort of a looking man is he?" + +"O, nothing particular. Short, and brown, and sunburnt. I did not think +it became me to look at him. Well, now for the nightcaps. I should have +grudged any one else doing them, for I have got such a pretty pattern!" + +But when it came to Miss Galindo's leaving, there was a great +misunderstanding between her and my lady. Miss Galindo had imagined that +my lady had asked her as a favour to copy the letters, and enter the +accounts, and had agreed to do the work without the notion of being paid +for so doing. She had, now and then, grieved over a very profitable +order for needlework passing out of her hands on account of her not +having time to do it, because of her occupation at the Hall; but she had +never hinted this to my lady, but gone on cheerfully at her writing as +long as her clerkship was required. My lady was annoyed that she had not +made her intention of paying Miss Galindo more clear, in the first +conversation she had had with her; but I suppose that she had been too +delicate to be very explicit with regard to money matters; and now Miss +Galindo was quite hurt at my lady's wanting to pay her for what she had +done in such right-down good-will. + +"No," Miss Galindo said; "my own dear lady, you may be as angry with me +as you like, but don't offer me money. Think of six-and-twenty years +ago, and poor Arthur, and as you were to me then! Besides, I wanted +money--I don't disguise it--for a particular purpose; and when I found +that (God bless you for asking me!) I could do you a service, I turned it +over in my mind, and I gave up one plan and took up another, and it's all +settled now. Bessy is to leave school and come and live with me. Don't, +please, offer me money again. You don't know how glad I have been to do +anything for you. Have not I, Margaret Dawson? Did you not hear me say, +one day, I would cut off my hand for my lady; for am I a stick or a +stone, that I should forget kindness? O, I have been so glad to work for +you. And now Bessy is coming here; and no one knows anything about +her--as if she had done anything wrong, poor child!" + +"Dear Miss Galindo," replied my lady, "I will never ask you to take money +again. Only I thought it was quite understood between us. And you know +you have taken money for a set of morning wrappers, before now." + +"Yes, my lady; but that was not confidential. Now I was so proud to have +something to do for you confidentially." + +"But who is Bessy?" asked my lady. "I do not understand who she is, or +why she is to come and live with you. Dear Miss Galindo, you must honour +me by being confidential with me in your turn!" + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + +I had always understood that Miss Galindo had once been in much better +circumstances, but I had never liked to ask any questions respecting her. +But about this time many things came out respecting her former life, +which I will try and arrange: not however, in the order in which I heard +them, but rather as they occurred. + +Miss Galindo was the daughter of a clergyman in Westmoreland. Her father +was the younger brother of a baronet, his ancestor having been one of +those of James the First's creation. This baronet-uncle of Miss Galindo +was one of the queer, out-of-the-way people who were bred at that time, +and in that northern district of England. I never heard much of him from +any one, besides this one great fact: that he had early disappeared from +his family, which indeed only consisted of a brother and sister who died +unmarried, and lived no one knew where,--somewhere on the Continent, it +was supposed, for he had never returned from the grand tour which he had +been sent to make, according to the general fashion of the day, as soon +as he had left Oxford. He corresponded occasionally with his brother the +clergyman; but the letters passed through a banker's hands; the banker +being pledged to secrecy, and, as he told Mr. Galindo, having the +penalty, if he broke his pledge, of losing the whole profitable business, +and of having the management of the baronet's affairs taken out of his +hands, without any advantage accruing to the inquirer, for Sir Lawrence +had told Messrs. Graham that, in case his place of residence was revealed +by them, not only would he cease to bank with them, but instantly take +measures to baffle any future inquiries as to his whereabouts, by +removing to some distant country. + +Sir Lawrence paid a certain sum of money to his brother's account every +year; but the time of this payment varied, and it was sometimes eighteen +or nineteen months between the deposits; then, again, it would not be +above a quarter of the time, showing that he intended it to be annual, +but, as this intention was never expressed in words, it was impossible to +rely upon it, and a great deal of this money was swallowed up by the +necessity Mr. Galindo felt himself under of living in the large, old, +rambling family mansion, which had been one of Sir Lawrence's rarely +expressed desires. Mr. and Mrs. Galindo often planned to live upon their +own small fortune and the income derived from the living (a vicarage, of +which the great tithes went to Sir Lawrence as lay impropriator), so as +to put-by the payments made by the baronet, for the benefit of +Laurentia--our Miss Galindo. But I suppose they found it difficult to +live economically in a large house, even though they had it rent free. +They had to keep up with hereditary neighbours and friends, and could +hardly help doing it in the hereditary manner. + +One of these neighbours, a Mr. Gibson, had a son a few years older than +Laurentia. The families were sufficiently intimate for the young people +to see a good deal of each other: and I was told that this young Mr. Mark +Gibson was an unusually prepossessing man (he seemed to have impressed +every one who spoke of him to me as being a handsome, manly, kind-hearted +fellow), just what a girl would be sure to find most agreeable. The +parents either forgot that their children were growing up to man's and +woman's estate, or thought that the intimacy and probable attachment +would be no bad thing, even if it did lead to a marriage. Still, nothing +was ever said by young Gibson till later on, when it was too late, as it +turned out. He went to and from Oxford; he shot and fished with Mr. +Galindo, or came to the Mere to skate in winter-time; was asked to +accompany Mr. Galindo to the Hall, as the latter returned to the quiet +dinner with his wife and daughter; and so, and so, it went on, nobody +much knew how, until one day, when Mr. Galindo received a formal letter +from his brother's bankers, announcing Sir Lawrence's death, of malaria +fever, at Albano, and congratulating Sir Hubert on his accession to the +estates and the baronetcy. The king is dead--"Long live the king!" as I +have since heard that the French express it. + +Sir Hubert and his wife were greatly surprised. Sir Lawrence was but two +years older than his brother; and they had never heard of any illness +till they heard of his death. They were sorry; very much shocked; but +still a little elated at the succession to the baronetcy and estates. The +London bankers had managed everything well. There was a large sum of +ready money in their hands, at Sir Hubert's service, until he should +touch his rents, the rent-roll being eight thousand a-year. And only +Laurentia to inherit it all! Her mother, a poor clergyman's daughter, +began to plan all sorts of fine marriages for her; nor was her father +much behind his wife in his ambition. They took her up to London, when +they went to buy new carriages, and dresses, and furniture. And it was +then and there she made my lady's acquaintance. How it was that they +came to take a fancy to each other, I cannot say. My lady was of the old +nobility,--grand, compose, gentle, and stately in her ways. Miss Galindo +must always have been hurried in her manner, and her energy must have +shown itself in inquisitiveness and oddness even in her youth. But I +don't pretend to account for things: I only narrate them. And the fact +was this:--that the elegant, fastidious countess was attracted to the +country girl, who on her part almost worshipped my lady. My lady's +notice of their daughter made her parents think, I suppose, that there +was no match that she might not command; she, the heiress of eight +thousand a-year, and visiting about among earls and dukes. So when they +came back to their old Westmoreland Hall, and Mark Gibson rode over to +offer his hand and his heart, and prospective estate of nine hundred a- +year, to his old companion and playfellow, Laurentia, Sir Hubert and Lady +Galindo made very short work of it. They refused him plumply themselves; +and when he begged to be allowed to speak to Laurentia, they found some +excuse for refusing him the opportunity of so doing, until they had +talked to her themselves, and brought up every argument and fact in their +power to convince her--a plain girl, and conscious of her plainness--that +Mr. Mark Gibson had never thought of her in the way of marriage till +after her father's accession to his fortune; and that it was the +estate--not the young lady--that he was in love with. I suppose it will +never be known in this world how far this supposition of theirs was true. +My Lady Ludlow had always spoken as if it was; but perhaps events, which +came to her knowledge about this time, altered her opinion. At any rate, +the end of it was, Laurentia refused Mark, and almost broke her heart in +doing so. He discovered the suspicions of Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo, +and that they had persuaded their daughter to share in them. So he flung +off with high words, saying that they did not know a true heart when they +met with one; and that although he had never offered till after Sir +Lawrence's death, yet that his father knew all along that he had been +attached to Laurentia, only that he, being the eldest of five children, +and having as yet no profession, had had to conceal, rather than to +express, an attachment, which, in those days, he had believed was +reciprocated. He had always meant to study for the bar, and the end of +all he had hoped for had been to earn a moderate income, which he might +ask Laurentia to share. This, or something like it, was what he said. +But his reference to his father cut two ways. Old Mr. Gibson was known +to be very keen about money. It was just as likely that he would urge +Mark to make love to the heiress, now she was an heiress, as that he +would have restrained him previously, as Mark said he had done. When +this was repeated to Mark, he became proudly reserved, or sullen, and +said that Laurentia, at any rate, might have known him better. He left +the country, and went up to London to study law soon afterwards; and Sir +Hubert and Lady Galindo thought they were well rid of him. But Laurentia +never ceased reproaching herself, and never did to her dying day, as I +believe. The words, "She might have known me better," told to her by +some kind friend or other, rankled in her mind, and were never forgotten. +Her father and mother took her up to London the next year; but she did +not care to visit--dreaded going out even for a drive, lest she should +see Mark Gibson's reproachful eyes--pined and lost her health. Lady +Ludlow saw this change with regret, and was told the cause by Lady +Galindo, who of course, gave her own version of Mark's conduct and +motives. My lady never spoke to Miss Galindo about it, but tried +constantly to interest and please her. It was at this time that my lady +told Miss Galindo so much about her own early life, and about Hanbury, +that Miss Galindo resolved, if ever she could, she would go and see the +old place which her friend loved so well. The end of it all was, that +she came to live there, as we know. + +But a great change was to come first. Before Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo +had left London on this, their second visit, they had a letter from the +lawyer, whom they employed, saying that Sir Lawrence had left an heir, +his legitimate child by an Italian woman of low rank; at least, legal +claims to the title and property had been sent into him on the boy's +behalf. Sir Lawrence had always been a man of adventurous and artistic, +rather than of luxurious tastes; and it was supposed, when all came to be +proved at the trial, that he was captivated by the free, beautiful life +they lead in Italy, and had married this Neapolitan fisherman's daughter, +who had people about her shrewd enough to see that the ceremony was +legally performed. She and her husband had wandered about the shores of +the Mediterranean for years, leading a happy, careless, irresponsible +life, unencumbered by any duties except those connected with a rather +numerous family. It was enough for her that they never wanted money, and +that her husband's love was always continued to her. She hated the name +of England--wicked, cold, heretic England--and avoided the mention of any +subjects connected with her husband's early life. So that, when he died +at Albano, she was almost roused out of her vehement grief to anger with +the Italian doctor, who declared that he must write to a certain address +to announce the death of Lawrence Galindo. For some time, she feared +lest English barbarians might come down upon her, making a claim to the +children. She hid herself and them in the Abruzzi, living upon the sale +of what furniture and jewels Sir Lawrence had died possessed of. When +these failed, she returned to Naples, which she had not visited since her +marriage. Her father was dead; but her brother inherited some of his +keenness. He interested the priests, who made inquiries and found that +the Galindo succession was worth securing to an heir of the true faith. +They stirred about it, obtained advice at the English Embassy; and hence +that letter to the lawyers, calling upon Sir Hubert to relinquish title +and property, and to refund what money he had expended. He was vehement +in his opposition to this claim. He could not bear to think of his +brother having married a foreigner--a papist, a fisherman's daughter; +nay, of his having become a papist himself. He was in despair at the +thought of his ancestral property going to the issue of such a marriage. +He fought tooth and nail, making enemies of his relations, and losing +almost all his own private property; for he would go on against the +lawyer's advice, long after every one was convinced except himself and +his wife. At last he was conquered. He gave up his living in gloomy +despair. He would have changed his name if he could, so desirous was he +to obliterate all tie between himself and the mongrel papist baronet and +his Italian mother, and all the succession of children and nurses who +came to take possession of the Hall soon after Mr. Hubert Galindo's +departure, stayed there one winter, and then flitted back to Naples with +gladness and delight. Mr. and Mrs. Hubert Galindo lived in London. He +had obtained a curacy somewhere in the city. They would have been +thankful now if Mr. Mark Gibson had renewed his offer. No one could +accuse him of mercenary motives if he had done so. Because he did not +come forward, as they wished, they brought his silence up as a +justification of what they had previously attributed to him. I don't +know what Miss Galindo thought herself; but Lady Ludlow has told me how +she shrank from hearing her parents abuse him. Lady Ludlow supposed that +he was aware that they were living in London. His father must have known +the fact, and it was curious if he had never named it to his son. +Besides, the name was very uncommon; and it was unlikely that it should +never come across him, in the advertisements of charity sermons which the +new and rather eloquent curate of Saint Mark's East was asked to preach. +All this time Lady Ludlow never lost sight of them, for Miss Galindo's +sake. And when the father and mother died, it was my lady who upheld +Miss Galindo in her determination not to apply for any provision to her +cousin, the Italian baronet, but rather to live upon the hundred a-year +which had been settled on her mother and the children of his son Hubert's +marriage by the old grandfather, Sir Lawrence. + +Mr. Mark Gibson had risen to some eminence as a barrister on the Northern +Circuit, but had died unmarried in the lifetime of his father, a victim +(so people said) to intemperance. Doctor Trevor, the physician who had +been called in to Mr. Gray and Harry Gregson, had married a sister of +his. And that was all my lady knew about the Gibson family. But who was +Bessy? + +That mystery and secret came out, too, in process of time. Miss Galindo +had been to Warwick, some years before I arrived at Hanbury, on some kind +of business or shopping, which can only be transacted in a county town. +There was an old Westmoreland connection between her and Mrs. Trevor, +though I believe the latter was too young to have been made aware of her +brother's offer to Miss Galindo at the time when it took place; and such +affairs, if they are unsuccessful, are seldom spoken about in the +gentleman's family afterwards. But the Gibsons and Galindos had been +county neighbours too long for the connection not to be kept up between +two members settled far away from their early homes. Miss Galindo always +desired her parcels to be sent to Dr. Trevor's, when she went to Warwick +for shopping purchases. If she were going any journey, and the coach did +not come through Warwick as soon as she arrived (in my lady's coach or +otherwise) from Hanbury, she went to Doctor Trevor's to wait. She was as +much expected to sit down to the household meals as if she had been one +of the family: and in after-years it was Mrs. Trevor who managed her +repository business for her. + +So, on the day I spoke of, she had gone to Doctor Trevor's to rest, and +possibly to dine. The post in those times, came in at all hours of the +morning: and Doctor Trevor's letters had not arrived until after his +departure on his morning round. Miss Galindo was sitting down to dinner +with Mrs. Trevor and her seven children, when the Doctor came in. He was +flurried and uncomfortable, and hurried the children away as soon as he +decently could. Then (rather feeling Miss Galindo's presence an +advantage, both as a present restraint on the violence of his wife's +grief, and as a consoler when he was absent on his afternoon round), he +told Mrs. Trevor of her brother's death. He had been taken ill on +circuit, and had hurried back to his chambers in London only to die. She +cried terribly; but Doctor Trevor said afterwards, he never noticed that +Miss Galindo cared much about it one way or another. She helped him to +soothe his wife, promised to stay with her all the afternoon instead of +returning to Hanbury, and afterwards offered to remain with her while the +Doctor went to attend the funeral. When they heard of the old love-story +between the dead man and Miss Galindo,--brought up by mutual friends in +Westmoreland, in the review which we are all inclined to take of the +events of a man's life when he comes to die,--they tried to remember Miss +Galindo's speeches and ways of going on during this visit. She was a +little pale, a little silent; her eyes were sometimes swollen, and her +nose red; but she was at an age when such appearances are generally +attributed to a bad cold in the head, rather than to any more sentimental +reason. They felt towards her as towards an old friend, a kindly, +useful, eccentric old maid. She did not expect more, or wish them to +remember that she might once have had other hopes, and more youthful +feelings. Doctor Trevor thanked her very warmly for staying with his +wife, when he returned home from London (where the funeral had taken +place). He begged Miss Galindo to stay with them, when the children were +gone to bed, and she was preparing to leave the husband and wife by +themselves. He told her and his wife many particulars--then paused--then +went on--"And Mark has left a child--a little girl-- + +"But he never was married!" exclaimed Mrs. Trevor. + +"A little girl," continued her husband, "whose mother, I conclude, is +dead. At any rate, the child was in possession of his chambers; she and +an old nurse, who seemed to have the charge of everything, and has +cheated poor Mark, I should fancy, not a little." + +"But the child!" asked Mrs. Trevor, still almost breathless with +astonishment. "How do you know it is his?" + +"The nurse told me it was, with great appearance of indignation at my +doubting it. I asked the little thing her name, and all I could get was +'Bessy!' and a cry of 'Me wants papa!' The nurse said the mother was +dead, and she knew no more about it than that Mr. Gibson had engaged her +to take care of the little girl, calling it his child. One or two of his +lawyer friends, whom I met with at the funeral, told me they were aware +of the existence of the child." + +"What is to be done with her?" asked Mrs. Gibson. + +"Nay, I don't know," replied he. "Mark has hardly left assets enough to +pay his debts, and your father is not inclined to come forward." + +That night, as Doctor Trevor sat in his study, after his wife had gone to +bed, Miss Galindo knocked at his door. She and he had a long +conversation. The result was that he accompanied Miss Galindo up to town +the next day; that they took possession of the little Bessy, and she was +brought down, and placed at nurse at a farm in the country near Warwick, +Miss Galindo undertaking to pay one-half of the expense, and to furnish +her with clothes, and Dr. Trevor undertaking that the remaining half +should be furnished by the Gibson family, or by himself in their default. + +Miss Galindo was not fond of children; and I dare say she dreaded taking +this child to live with her for more reasons than one. My Lady Ludlow +could not endure any mention of illegitimate children. It was a +principle of hers that society ought to ignore them. And I believe Miss +Galindo had always agreed with her until now, when the thing came home to +her womanly heart. Still she shrank from having this child of some +strange woman under her roof. She went over to see it from time to time; +she worked at its clothes long after every one thought she was in bed; +and, when the time came for Bessy to be sent to school, Miss Galindo +laboured away more diligently than ever, in order to pay the increased +expense. For the Gibson family had, at first, paid their part of the +compact, but with unwillingness and grudging hearts; then they had left +it off altogether, and it fell hard on Dr. Trevor with his twelve +children; and, latterly, Miss Galindo had taken upon herself almost all +the burden. One can hardly live and labour, and plan and make +sacrifices, for any human creature, without learning to love it. And +Bessy loved Miss Galindo, too, for all the poor girl's scanty pleasures +came from her, and Miss Galindo had always a kind word, and, latterly, +many a kind caress, for Mark Gibson's child; whereas, if she went to Dr. +Trevor's for her holiday, she was overlooked and neglected in that +bustling family, who seemed to think that if she had comfortable board +and lodging under their roof, it was enough. + +I am sure, now, that Miss Galindo had often longed to have Bessy to live +with her; but, as long as she could pay for her being at school, she did +not like to take so bold a step as bringing her home, knowing what the +effect of the consequent explanation would be on my lady. And as the +girl was now more than seventeen, and past the age when young ladies are +usually kept at school, and as there was no great demand for governesses +in those days, and as Bessy had never been taught any trade by which to +earn her own living, why I don't exactly see what could have been done +but for Miss Galindo to bring her to her own home in Hanbury. For, +although the child had grown up lately, in a kind of unexpected manner, +into a young woman, Miss Galindo might have kept her at school for a year +longer, if she could have afforded it; but this was impossible when she +became Mr. Horner's clerk, and relinquished all the payment of her +repository work; and perhaps, after all, she was not sorry to be +compelled to take the step she was longing for. At any rate, Bessy came +to live with Miss Galindo, in a very few weeks from the time when Captain +James set Miss Galindo free to superintend her own domestic economy +again. + +For a long time, I knew nothing about this new inhabitant of Hanbury. My +lady never mentioned her in any way. This was in accordance with Lady +Ludlow's well-known principles. She neither saw nor heard, nor was in +any way cognisant of the existence of those who had no legal right to +exist at all. If Miss Galindo had hoped to have an exception made in +Bessy's favour, she was mistaken. My lady sent a note inviting Miss +Galindo herself to tea one evening, about a month after Bessy came; but +Miss Galindo "had a cold and could not come." The next time she was +invited, she "had an engagement at home"--a step nearer to the absolute +truth. And the third time, she "had a young friend staying with her whom +she was unable to leave." My lady accepted every excuse as bona fide, +and took no further notice. I missed Miss Galindo very much; we all did; +for, in the days when she was clerk, she was sure to come in and find the +opportunity of saying something amusing to some of us before she went +away. And I, as an invalid, or perhaps from natural tendency, was +particularly fond of little bits of village gossip. There was no Mr. +Horner--he even had come in, now and then, with formal, stately pieces of +intelligence--and there was no Miss Galindo in these days. I missed her +much. And so did my lady, I am sure. Behind all her quiet, sedate +manner, I am certain her heart ached sometimes for a few words from Miss +Galindo, who seemed to have absented herself altogether from the Hall now +Bessy was come. + +Captain James might be very sensible, and all that; but not even my lady +could call him a substitute for the old familiar friends. He was a +thorough sailor, as sailors were in those days--swore a good deal, drank +a good deal (without its ever affecting him in the least), and was very +prompt and kind-hearted in all his actions; but he was not accustomed to +women, as my lady once said, and would judge in all things for himself. +My lady had expected, I think, to find some one who would take his +notions on the management of her estate from her ladyship's own self; but +he spoke as if he were responsible for the good management of the whole, +and must, consequently, be allowed full liberty of action. He had been +too long in command over men at sea to like to be directed by a woman in +anything he undertook, even though that woman was my lady. I suppose +this was the common-sense my lady spoke of; but when common-sense goes +against us, I don't think we value it quite so much as we ought to do. + +Lady Ludlow was proud of her personal superintendence of her own estate. +She liked to tell us how her father used to take her with him in his +rides, and bid her observe this and that, and on no account to allow such +and such things to be done. But I have heard that the first time she +told all this to Captain James, he told her point-blank that he had heard +from Mr. Smithson that the farms were much neglected and the rents sadly +behind-hand, and that he meant to set to in good earnest and study +agriculture, and see how he could remedy the state of things. My lady +would, I am sure, be greatly surprised, but what could she do? Here was +the very man she had chosen herself, setting to with all his energy to +conquer the defect of ignorance, which was all that those who had +presumed to offer her ladyship advice had ever had to say against him. +Captain James read Arthur Young's "Tours" in all his spare time, as long +as he was an invalid; and shook his head at my lady's accounts as to how +the land had been cropped or left fallow from time immemorial. Then he +set to, and tried too many new experiments at once. My lady looked on in +dignified silence; but all the farmers and tenants were in an uproar, and +prophesied a hundred failures. Perhaps fifty did occur; they were only +half as many as Lady Ludlow had feared; but they were twice as many, +four, eight times as many as the captain had anticipated. His openly- +expressed disappointment made him popular again. The rough country +people could not have understood silent and dignified regret at the +failure of his plans, but they sympathized with a man who swore at his +ill success--sympathized, even while they chuckled over his discomfiture. +Mr. Brooke, the retired tradesman, did not cease blaming him for not +succeeding, and for swearing. "But what could you expect from a sailor?" +Mr. Brooke asked, even in my lady's hearing; though he might have known +Captain James was my lady's own personal choice, from the old friendship +Mr. Urian had always shown for him. I think it was this speech of the +Birmingham baker's that made my lady determine to stand by Captain James, +and encourage him to try again. For she would not allow that her choice +had been an unwise one, at the bidding (as it were) of a dissenting +tradesman; the only person in the neighbourhood, too, who had flaunted +about in coloured clothes, when all the world was in mourning for my +lady's only son. + +Captain James would have thrown the agency up at once, if my lady had not +felt herself bound to justify the wisdom of her choice, by urging him to +stay. He was much touched by her confidence in him, and swore a great +oath, that the next year he would make the land such as it had never been +before for produce. It was not my lady's way to repeat anything she had +heard, especially to another person's disadvantage. So I don't think she +ever told Captain James of Mr. Brooke's speech about a sailor's being +likely to mismanage the property; and the captain was too anxious to +succeed in this, the second year of his trial, to be above going to the +flourishing, shrewd Mr. Brooke, and asking for his advice as to the best +method of working the estate. I dare say, if Miss Galindo had been as +intimate as formerly at the Hall, we should all of us have heard of this +new acquaintance of the agent's long before we did. As it was, I am sure +my lady never dreamed that the captain, who held opinions that were even +more Church and King than her own, could ever have made friends with a +Baptist baker from Birmingham, even to serve her ladyship's own interests +in the most loyal manner. + +We heard of it first from Mr. Gray, who came now often to see my lady, +for neither he nor she could forget the solemn tie which the fact of his +being the person to acquaint her with my lord's death had created between +them. For true and holy words spoken at that time, though having no +reference to aught below the solemn subjects of life and death, had made +her withdraw her opposition to Mr. Gray's wish about establishing a +village school. She had sighed a little, it is true, and was even yet +more apprehensive than hopeful as to the result; but almost as if as a +memorial to my lord, she had allowed a kind of rough school-house to be +built on the green, just by the church; and had gently used the power she +undoubtedly had, in expressing her strong wish that the boys might only +be taught to read and write, and the first four rules of arithmetic; +while the girls were only to learn to read, and to add up in their heads, +and the rest of the time to work at mending their own clothes, knitting +stockings and spinning. My lady presented the school with more spinning- +wheels than there were girls, and requested that there might be a rule +that they should have spun so many hanks of flax, and knitted so many +pairs of stockings, before they ever were taught to read at all. After +all, it was but making the best of a bad job with my poor lady--but life +was not what it had been to her. I remember well the day that Mr. Gray +pulled some delicately fine yarn (and I was a good judge of those things) +out of his pocket, and laid it and a capital pair of knitted stockings +before my lady, as the first-fruits, so to say, of his school. I +recollect seeing her put on her spectacles, and carefully examine both +productions. Then she passed them to me. + +"This is well, Mr. Gray. I am much pleased. You are fortunate in your +schoolmistress. She has had both proper knowledge of womanly things and +much patience. Who is she? One out of our village?" + +"My lady," said Mr. Gray, stammering and colouring in his old fashion, +"Miss Bessy is so very kind as to teach all those sorts of things--Miss +Bessy, and Miss Galindo, sometimes." + +My lady looked at him over her spectacles: but she only repeated the +words "Miss Bessy," and paused, as if trying to remember who such a +person could be; and he, if he had then intended to say more, was quelled +by her manner, and dropped the subject. He went on to say, that he had +thought it his duty to decline the subscription to his school offered by +Mr. Brooke, because he was a Dissenter; that he (Mr. Gray) feared that +Captain James, through whom Mr. Brooke's offer of money had been made, +was offended at his refusing to accept it from a man who held heterodox +opinions; nay, whom Mr. Gray suspected of being infected by Dodwell's +heresy. + +"I think there must be some mistake," said my lady, "or I have +misunderstood you. Captain James would never be sufficiently with a +schismatic to be employed by that man Brooke in distributing his +charities. I should have doubted, until now, if Captain James knew him." + +"Indeed, my lady, he not only knows him, but is intimate with him, I +regret to say. I have repeatedly seen the captain and Mr. Brooke walking +together; going through the fields together; and people do say--" + +My lady looked up in interrogation at Mr. Gray's pause. + +"I disapprove of gossip, and it may be untrue; but people do say that +Captain James is very attentive to Miss Brooke." + +"Impossible!" said my lady, indignantly. "Captain James is a loyal and +religious man. I beg your pardon Mr. Gray, but it is impossible." + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + + +Like many other things which have been declared to be impossible, this +report of Captain James being attentive to Miss Brooke turned out to be +very true. + +The mere idea of her agent being on the slightest possible terms of +acquaintance with the Dissenter, the tradesman, the Birmingham democrat, +who had come to settle in our good, orthodox, aristocratic, and +agricultural Hanbury, made my lady very uneasy. Miss Galindo's +misdemeanour in having taken Miss Bessy to live with her, faded into a +mistake, a mere error of judgment, in comparison with Captain James's +intimacy at Yeast House, as the Brookes called their ugly square-built +farm. My lady talked herself quite into complacency with Miss Galindo, +and even Miss Bessy was named by her, the first time I had ever been +aware that my lady recognized her existence; but--I recollect it was a +long rainy afternoon, and I sat with her ladyship, and we had time and +opportunity for a long uninterrupted talk--whenever we had been silent +for a little while she began again, with something like a wonder how it +was that Captain James could ever have commenced an acquaintance with +"that man Brooke." My lady recapitulated all the times she could +remember, that anything had occurred, or been said by Captain James which +she could now understand as throwing light upon the subject. + +"He said once that he was anxious to bring in the Norfolk system of +cropping, and spoke a good deal about Mr. Coke of Holkham (who, by the +way, was no more a Coke than I am--collateral in the female line--which +counts for little or nothing among the great old commoners' families of +pure blood), and his new ways of cultivation; of course new men bring in +new ways, but it does not follow that either are better than the old +ways. However, Captain James has been very anxious to try turnips and +bone manure, and he really is a man of such good sense and energy, and +was so sorry last year about the failure, that I consented; and now I +begin to see my error. I have always heard that town bakers adulterate +their flour with bone-dust; and, of course, Captain James would be aware +of this, and go to Brooke to inquire where the article was to be +purchased." + +My lady always ignored the fact which had sometimes, I suspect, been +brought under her very eyes during her drives, that Mr. Brooke's few +fields were in a state of far higher cultivation than her own; so she +could not, of course, perceive that there was any wisdom to be gained +from asking the advice of the tradesman turned farmer. + +But by-and-by this fact of her agent's intimacy with the person whom in +the whole world she most disliked (with that sort of dislike in which a +large amount of uncomfortableness is combined--the dislike which +conscientious people sometimes feel to another without knowing why, and +yet which they cannot indulge in with comfort to themselves without +having a moral reason why), came before my lady in many shapes. For, +indeed I am sure that Captain James was not a man to conceal or be +ashamed of one of his actions. I cannot fancy his ever lowering his +strong loud clear voice, or having a confidental conversation with any +one. When his crops had failed, all the village had known it. He +complained, he regretted, he was angry, or owned himself a --- fool, all +down the village street; and the consequence was that, although he was a +far more passionate man than Mr. Horner, all the tenants liked him far +better. People, in general, take a kindlier interest in any one, the +workings of whose mind and heart they can watch and understand, than in a +man who only lets you know what he has been thinking about and feeling, +by what he does. But Harry Gregson was faithful to the memory of Mr. +Horner. Miss Galindo has told me that she used to watch him hobble out +of the way of Captain James, as if to accept his notice, however good- +naturedly given, would have been a kind of treachery to his former +benefactor. But Gregson (the father) and the new agent rather took to +each other; and one day, much to my surprise, I heard that the "poaching, +tinkering vagabond," as the people used to call Gregson when I first had +come to live at Hanbury, had been appointed gamekeeper; Mr. Gray standing +godfather, as it were, to his trustworthiness, if he were trusted with +anything; which I thought at the time was rather an experiment, only it +answered, as many of Mr. Gray's deeds of daring did. It was curious how +he was growing to be a kind of autocrat in the village; and how +unconscious he was of it. He was as shy and awkward and nervous as ever +in any affair that was not of some moral consequence to him. But as soon +as he was convinced that a thing was right, he "shut his eyes and ran and +butted at it like a ram," as Captain James once expressed it, in talking +over something Mr. Gray had done. People in the village said, "they +never knew what the parson would be at next;" or they might have said, +"where his reverence would next turn up." For I have heard of his +marching right into the middle of a set of poachers, gathered together +for some desperate midnight enterprise, or walking into a public-house +that lay just beyond the bounds of my lady's estate, and in that extra- +parochial piece of ground I named long ago, and which was considered the +rendezvous of all the ne'er-do-weel characters for miles round, and where +a parson and a constable were held in much the same kind of esteem as +unwelcome visitors. And yet Mr. Gray had his long fits of depression, in +which he felt as if he were doing nothing, making no way in his work, +useless and unprofitable, and better out of the world than in it. In +comparison with the work he had set himself to do, what he did seemed to +be nothing. I suppose it was constitutional, those attacks of lowness of +spirits which he had about this time; perhaps a part of the nervousness +which made him always so awkward when he came to the Hall. Even Mrs. +Medlicott, who almost worshipped the ground he trod on, as the saying is, +owned that Mr. Gray never entered one of my lady's rooms without knocking +down something, and too often breaking it. He would much sooner have +faced a desperate poacher than a young lady any day. At least so we +thought. + +I do not know how it was that it came to pass that my lady became +reconciled to Miss Galindo about this time. Whether it was that her +ladyship was weary of the unspoken coolness with her old friend; or that +the specimens of delicate sewing and fine spinning at the school had +mollified her towards Miss Bessy; but I was surprised to learn one day +that Miss Galindo and her young friend were coming that very evening to +tea at the Hall. This information was given me by Mrs. Medlicott, as a +message from my lady, who further went on to desire that certain little +preparations should be made in her own private sitting-room, in which the +greater part of my days were spent. From the nature of these +preparations, I became quite aware that my lady intended to do honour to +her expected visitors. Indeed, Lady Ludlow never forgave by halves, as I +have known some people do. Whoever was coming as a visitor to my lady, +peeress, or poor nameless girl, there was a certain amount of preparation +required in order to do them fitting honour. I do not mean to say that +the preparation was of the same degree of importance in each case. I +dare say, if a peeress had come to visit us at the Hall, the covers would +have been taken off the furniture in the white drawing-room (they never +were uncovered all the time I stayed at the Hall), because my lady would +wish to offer her the ornaments and luxuries which this grand visitor +(who never came--I wish she had! I did so want to see that furniture +uncovered!) was accustomed to at home, and to present them to her in the +best order in which my lady could. The same rule, mollified, held good +with Miss Galindo. Certain things, in which my lady knew she took an +interest, were laid out ready for her to examine on this very day; and, +what was more, great books of prints were laid out, such as I remembered +my lady had had brought forth to beguile my own early days of +illness,--Mr. Hogarth's works, and the like,--which I was sure were put +out for Miss Bessy. + +No one knows how curious I was to see this mysterious Miss Bessy--twenty +times more mysterious, of course, for want of her surname. And then +again (to try and account for my great curiosity, of which in +recollection I am more than half ashamed), I had been leading the quiet +monotonous life of a crippled invalid for many years,--shut up from any +sight of new faces; and this was to be the face of one whom I had thought +about so much and so long,--Oh! I think I might be excused. + +Of course they drank tea in the great hall, with the four young +gentlewomen, who, with myself, formed the small bevy now under her +ladyship's charge. Of those who were at Hanbury when first I came, none +remained; all were married, or gone once more to live at some home which +could be called their own, whether the ostensible head were father or +brother. I myself was not without some hopes of a similar kind. My +brother Harry was now a curate in Westmoreland, and wanted me to go and +live with him, as eventually I did for a time. But that is neither here +nor there at present. What I am talking about is Miss Bessy. + +After a reasonable time had elapsed, occupied as I well knew by the meal +in the great hall,--the measured, yet agreeable conversation +afterwards,--and a certain promenade around the hall, and through the +drawing-rooms, with pauses before different pictures, the history or +subject of each of which was invariably told by my lady to every new +visitor,--a sort of giving them the freedom of the old family-seat, by +describing the kind and nature of the great progenitors who had lived +there before the narrator,--I heard the steps approaching my lady's room, +where I lay. I think I was in such a state of nervous expectation, that +if I could have moved easily, I should have got up and run away. And yet +I need not have been, for Miss Galindo was not in the least altered (her +nose a little redder, to be sure, but then that might only have had a +temporary cause in the private crying I know she would have had before +coming to see her dear Lady Ludlow once again). But I could almost have +pushed Miss Galindo away, as she intercepted me in my view of the +mysterious Miss Bessy. + +Miss Bessy was, as I knew, only about eighteen, but she looked older. +Dark hair, dark eyes, a tall, firm figure, a good, sensible face, with a +serene expression, not in the least disturbed by what I had been thinking +must be such awful circumstances as a first introduction to my lady, who +had so disapproved of her very existence: those are the clearest +impressions I remember of my first interview with Miss Bessy. She seemed +to observe us all, in her quiet manner, quite as much as I did her; but +she spoke very little; occupied herself, indeed, as my lady had planned, +with looking over the great books of engravings. I think I must have +(foolishly) intended to make her feel at her ease, by my patronage; but +she was seated far away from my sofa, in order to command the light, and +really seemed so unconcerned at her unwonted circumstances, that she did +not need my countenance or kindness. One thing I did like--her watchful +look at Miss Galindo from time to time: it showed that her thoughts and +sympathy were ever at Miss Galindo's service, as indeed they well might +be. When Miss Bessy spoke, her voice was full and clear, and what she +said, to the purpose, though there was a slight provincial accent in her +way of speaking. After a while, my lady set us two to play at chess, a +game which I had lately learnt at Mr. Gray's suggestion. Still we did +not talk much together, though we were becoming attracted towards each +other, I fancy. + +"You will play well," said she. "You have only learnt about six months, +have you? And yet you can nearly beat me, who have been at it as many +years." + +"I began to learn last November. I remember Mr. Gray's bringing me +'Philidor on Chess,' one very foggy, dismal day." + +What made her look up so suddenly, with bright inquiry in her eyes? What +made her silent for a moment as if in thought, and then go on with +something, I know not what, in quite an altered tone? + +My lady and Miss Galindo went on talking, while I sat thinking. I heard +Captain James's name mentioned pretty frequently; and at last my lady put +down her work, and said, almost with tears in her eyes: + +"I could not--I cannot believe it. He must be aware she is a schismatic; +a baker's daughter; and he is a gentleman by virtue and feeling, as well +as by his profession, though his manners may be at times a little rough. +My dear Miss Galindo, what will this world come to?" + +Miss Galindo might possibly be aware of her own share in bringing the +world to the pass which now dismayed my lady,--for of course, though all +was now over and forgiven, yet Miss, Bessy's being received into a +respectable maiden lady's house, was one of the portents as to the +world's future which alarmed her ladyship; and Miss Galindo knew +this,--but, at any rate, she had too lately been forgiven herself not to +plead for mercy for the next offender against my lady's delicate sense of +fitness and propriety,--so she replied: + +"Indeed, my lady, I have long left off trying to conjecture what makes +Jack fancy Gill, or Gill Jack. It's best to sit down quiet under the +belief that marriages are made for us, somewhere out of this world, and +out of the range of this world's reason and laws. I'm not so sure that I +should settle it down that they were made in heaven; t'other place seems +to me as likely a workshop; but at any rate, I've given up troubling my +head as to why they take place. Captain James is a gentleman; I make no +doubt of that ever since I saw him stop to pick up old Goody Blake (when +she tumbled down on the slide last winter) and then swear at a little lad +who was laughing at her, and cuff him till he tumbled down crying; but we +must have bread somehow, and though I like it better baked at home in a +good sweet brick oven, yet, as some folks never can get it to rise, I +don't see why a man may not be a baker. You see, my lady, I look upon +baking as a simple trade, and as such lawful. There is no machine comes +in to take away a man's or woman's power of earning their living, like +the spinning-jenny (the old busybody that she is), to knock up all our +good old women's livelihood, and send them to their graves before their +time. There's an invention of the enemy, if you will!" + +"That's very true!" said my lady, shaking her head. + +"But baking bread is wholesome, straight-forward elbow-work. They have +not got to inventing any contrivance for that yet, thank Heaven! It does +not seem to me natural, nor according to Scripture, that iron and steel +(whose brows can't sweat) should be made to do man's work. And so I say, +all those trades where iron and steel do the work ordained to man at the +Fall, are unlawful, and I never stand up for them. But say this baker +Brooke did knead his bread, and make it rise, and then that people, who +had, perhaps, no good ovens, came to him, and bought his good light +bread, and in this manner he turned an honest penny and got rich; why, +all I say, my lady, is this,--I dare say he would have been born a +Hanbury, or a lord if he could; and if he was not, it is no fault of his, +that I can see, that he made good bread (being a baker by trade), and got +money, and bought his land. It was his misfortune, not his fault, that +he was not a person of quality by birth." + +"That's very true," said my lady, after a moment's pause for +consideration. "But, although he was a baker, he might have been a +Churchman. Even your eloquence, Miss Galindo, shan't convince me that +that is not his own fault." + +"I don't see even that, begging your pardon, my lady," said Miss Galindo, +emboldened by the first success of her eloquence. "When a Baptist is a +baby, if I understand their creed aright, he is not baptized; and, +consequently, he can have no godfathers and godmothers to do anything for +him in his baptism; you agree to that, my lady?" + +My lady would rather have known what her acquiescence would lead to, +before acknowledging that she could not dissent from this first +proposition; still she gave her tacit agreement by bowing her head. + +"And, you know, our godfathers and godmothers are expected to promise and +vow three things in our name, when we are little babies, and can do +nothing but squall for ourselves. It is a great privilege, but don't let +us be hard upon those who have not had the chance of godfathers and +godmothers. Some people, we know, are born with silver spoons,--that's +to say, a godfather to give one things, and teach one's catechism, and +see that we're confirmed into good church-going Christians,--and others +with wooden ladles in their mouths. These poor last folks must just be +content to be godfatherless orphans, and Dissenters, all their lives; and +if they are tradespeople into the bargain, so much the worse for them; +but let us be humble Christians, my dear lady, and not hold our heads too +high because we were born orthodox quality." + +"You go on too fast, Miss Galindo! I can't follow you. Besides, I do +believe dissent to be an invention of the Devil's. Why can't they +believe as we do? It's very wrong. Besides, its schism and heresy, and, +you know, the Bible says that's as bad as witchcraft." + +My lady was not convinced, as I could see. After Miss Galindo had gone, +she sent Mrs. Medlicott for certain books out of the great old library up +stairs, and had them made up into a parcel under her own eye. + +"If Captain James comes to-morrow, I will speak to him about these +Brookes. I have not hitherto liked to speak to him, because I did not +wish to hurt him, by supposing there could be any truth in the reports +about his intimacy with them. But now I will try and do my duty by him +and them. Surely this great body of divinity will bring them back to the +true church." + +I could not tell, for though my lady read me over the titles, I was not +any the wiser as to their contents. Besides, I was much more anxious to +consult my lady as to my own change of place. I showed her the letter I +had that day received from Harry; and we once more talked over the +expediency of my going to live with him, and trying what entire change of +air would do to re-establish my failing health. I could say anything to +my lady, she was so sure to understand me rightly. For one thing, she +never thought of herself, so I had no fear of hurting her by stating the +truth. I told her how happy my years had been while passed under her +roof; but that now I had begun to wonder whether I had not duties +elsewhere, in making a home for Harry,--and whether the fulfilment of +these duties, quiet ones they must needs be in the case of such a cripple +as myself, would not prevent my sinking into the querulous habit of +thinking and talking, into which I found myself occasionally falling. Add +to which, there was the prospect of benefit from the more bracing air of +the north. + +It was then settled that my departure from Hanbury, my happy home for so +long, was to take place before many weeks had passed. And as, when one +period of life is about to be shut up for ever, we are sure to look back +upon it with fond regret, so I, happy enough in my future prospects, +could not avoid recurring to all the days of my life in the Hall, from +the time when I came to it, a shy awkward girl, scarcely past childhood, +to now, when a grown woman,--past childhood--almost, from the very +character of my illness, past youth,--I was looking forward to leaving my +lady's house (as a residence) for ever. As it has turned out, I never +saw either her or it again. Like a piece of sea-wreck, I have drifted +away from those days: quiet, happy, eventless days,--very happy to +remember! + +I thought of good, jovial Mr. Mountford,--and his regrets that he might +not keep a pack, "a very small pack," of harriers, and his merry ways, +and his love of good eating; of the first coming of Mr. Gray, and my +lady's attempt to quench his sermons, when they tended to enforce any +duty connected with education. And now we had an absolute school-house +in the village; and since Miss Bessy's drinking tea at the Hall, my lady +had been twice inside it, to give directions about some fine yarn she was +having spun for table-napery. And her ladyship had so outgrown her old +custom of dispensing with sermon or discourse, that even during the +temporary preaching of Mr. Crosse, she had never had recourse to it, +though I believe she would have had all the congregation on her side if +she had. + +And Mr. Horner was dead, and Captain James reigned in his stead. Good, +steady, severe, silent Mr. Horner! with his clock-like regularity, and +his snuff-coloured clothes, and silver buckles! I have often wondered +which one misses most when they are dead and gone,--the bright creatures +full of life, who are hither and thither and everywhere, so that no one +can reckon upon their coming and going, with whom stillness and the long +quiet of the grave, seems utterly irreconcilable, so full are they of +vivid motion and passion,--or the slow, serious people, whose +movements--nay, whose very words, seem to go by clockwork; who never +appear much to affect the course of our life while they are with us, but +whose methodical ways show themselves, when they are gone, to have been +intertwined with our very roots of daily existence. I think I miss these +last the most, although I may have loved the former best. Captain James +never was to me what Mr. Horner was, though the latter had hardly changed +a dozen words with me at the day of his death. Then Miss Galindo! I +remembered the time as if it had been only yesterday, when she was but a +name--and a very odd one--to me; then she was a queer, abrupt, +disagreeable, busy old maid. Now I loved her dearly, and I found out +that I was almost jealous of Miss Bessy. + +Mr. Gray I never thought of with love; the feeling was almost reverence +with which I looked upon him. I have not wished to speak much of myself, +or else I could have told you how much he had been to me during these +long, weary years of illness. But he was almost as much to every one, +rich and poor, from my lady down to Miss Galindo's Sally. + +The village, too, had a different look about it. I am sure I could not +tell you what caused the change; but there were no more lounging young +men to form a group at the cross-road, at a time of day when young men +ought to be at work. I don't say this was all Mr. Gray's doing, for +there really was so much to do in the fields that there was but little +time for lounging now-a-days. And the children were hushed up in school, +and better behaved out of it, too, than in the days when I used to be +able to go my lady's errands in the village. I went so little about now, +that I am sure I can't tell who Miss Galindo found to scold; and yet she +looked so well and so happy that I think she must have had her accustomed +portion of that wholesome exercise. + +Before I left Hanbury, the rumour that Captain James was going to marry +Miss Brooke, Baker Brooke's eldest daughter, who had only a sister to +share his property with her, was confirmed. He himself announced it to +my lady; nay, more, with a courage, gained, I suppose, in his former +profession, where, as I have heard, he had led his ship into many a post +of danger, he asked her ladyship, the Countess Ludlow, if he might bring +his bride elect, (the Baptist baker's daughter!) and present her to my +lady! + +I am glad I was not present when he made this request; I should have felt +so much ashamed for him, and I could not have helped being anxious till I +heard my lady's answer, if I had been there. Of course she acceded; but +I can fancy the grave surprise of her look. I wonder if Captain James +noticed it. + +I hardly dared ask my lady, after the interview had taken place, what she +thought of the bride elect; but I hinted my curiosity, and she told me, +that if the young person had applied to Mrs. Medlicott, for the situation +of cook, and Mrs. Medlicott had engaged her, she thought that it would +have been a very suitable arrangement. I understood from this how little +she thought a marriage with Captain James, R.N., suitable. + +About a year after I left Hanbury, I received a letter from Miss Galindo; +I think I can find it.--Yes, this is it. + + 'Hanbury, May 4, 1811. + + DEAR MARGARET, + + 'You ask for news of us all. Don't you know there is no news in + Hanbury? Did you ever hear of an event here? Now, if you have + answered "Yes," in your own mind to these questions, you have fallen + into my trap, and never were more mistaken in your life. Hanbury is + full of news; and we have more events on our hands than we know what + to do with. I will take them in the order of the newspapers--births, + deaths, and marriages. In the matter of births, Jenny Lucas has had + twins not a week ago. Sadly too much of a good thing, you'll say. + Very true: but then they died; so their birth did not much signify. My + cat has kittened, too; she has had three kittens, which again you may + observe is too much of a good thing; and so it would be, if it were + not for the next item of intelligence I shall lay before you. Captain + and Mrs. James have taken the old house next Pearson's; and the house + is overrun with mice, which is just as fortunate for me as the King of + Egypt's rat-ridden kingdom was to Dick Whittington. For my cat's + kittening decided me to go and call on the bride, in hopes she wanted + a cat; which she did like a sensible woman, as I do believe she is, in + spite of Baptism, Bakers, Bread, and Birmingham, and something worse + than all, which you shall hear about, if you'll only be patient. As I + had got my best bonnet on, the one I bought when poor Lord Ludlow was + last at Hanbury in '99--I thought it a great condescension in myself + (always remembering the date of the Galindo baronetcy) to go and call + on the bride; though I don't think so much of myself in my every-day + clothes, as you know. But who should I find there but my Lady Ludlow! + She looks as frail and delicate as ever, but is, I think, in better + heart ever since that old city merchant of a Hanbury took it into his + head that he was a cadet of the Hanburys of Hanbury, and left her that + handsome legacy. I'll warrant you that the mortgage was paid off + pretty fast; and Mr. Horner's money--or my lady's money, or Harry + Gregson's money, call it which you will--is invested in his name, all + right and tight; and they do talk of his being captain of his school, + or Grecian, or something, and going to college, after all! Harry + Gregson the poacher's son! Well! to be sure, we are living in strange + times! + + 'But I have not done with the marriages yet. Captain James's is all + very well, but no one cares for it now, we are so full of Mr. Gray's. + Yes, indeed, Mr. Gray is going to be married, and to nobody else but + my little Bessy! I tell her she will have to nurse him half the days + of her life, he is such a frail little body. But she says she does + not care for that; so that his body holds his soul, it is enough for + her. She has a good spirit and a brave heart, has my Bessy! It is a + great advantage that she won't have to mark her clothes over again: + for when she had knitted herself her last set of stockings, I told her + to put G for Galindo, if she did not choose to put it for Gibson, for + she should be my child if she was no one else's. And now you see it + stands for Gray. So there are two marriages, and what more would you + have? And she promises to take another of my kittens. + + 'Now, as to deaths, old Farmer Hale is dead--poor old man, I should + think his wife thought it a good riddance, for he beat her every day + that he was drunk, and he was never sober, in spite of Mr. Gray. I + don't think (as I tell him) that Mr. Gray would ever have found + courage to speak to Bessy as long as Farmer Hale lived, he took the + old gentleman's sins so much to heart, and seemed to think it was all + his fault for not being able to make a sinner into a saint. The + parish bull is dead too. I never was so glad in my life. But they + say we are to have a new one in his place. In the meantime I cross + the common in peace, which is very convenient just now, when I have so + often to go to Mr. Gray's to see about furnishing. + + 'Now you think I have told you all the Hanbury news, don't you? Not + so. The very greatest thing of all is to come. I won't tantalize + you, but just out with it, for you would never guess it. My Lady + Ludlow has given a party, just like any plebeian amongst us. We had + tea and toast in the blue drawing-room, old John Footman waiting with + Tom Diggles, the lad that used to frighten away crows in Farmer Hale's + fields, following in my lady's livery, hair powdered and everything. + Mrs. Medlicott made tea in my lady's own room. My lady looked like a + splendid fairy queen of mature age, in black velvet, and the old lace, + which I have never seen her wear before since my lord's death. But + the company? you'll say. Why, we had the parson of Clover, and the + parson of Headleigh, and the parson of Merribank, and the three + parsonesses; and Farmer Donkin, and two Miss Donkins; and Mr. Gray (of + course), and myself and Bessy; and Captain and Mrs. James; yes, and + Mr. and Mrs. Brooke; think of that! I am not sure the parsons liked + it; but he was there. For he has been helping Captain James to get my + lady's land into order; and then his daughter married the agent; and + Mr. Gray (who ought to know) says that, after all, Baptists are not + such bad people; and he was right against them at one time, as you may + remember. Mrs. Brooke is a rough diamond, to be sure. People have + said that of me, I know. But, being a Galindo, I learnt manners in my + youth and can take them up when I choose. But Mrs. Brooke never + learnt manners, I'll be bound. When John Footman handed her the tray + with the tea-cups, she looked up at him as if she were sorely puzzled + by that way of going on. I was sitting next to her, so I pretended + not to see her perplexity, and put her cream and sugar in for her, and + was all ready to pop it into her hands,--when who should come up, but + that impudent lad Tom Diggles (I call him lad, for all his hair is + powdered, for you know that it is not natural gray hair), with his + tray full of cakes and what not, all as good as Mrs. Medlicott could + make them. By this time, I should tell you, all the parsonesses were + looking at Mrs. Brooke, for she had shown her want of breeding before; + and the parsonesses, who were just a step above her in manners, were + very much inclined to smile at her doings and sayings. Well! what + does she do, but pull out a clean Bandanna pocket-handkerchief all red + and yellow silk, spread it over her best silk gown; it was, like + enough, a new one, for I had it from Sally, who had it from her cousin + Molly, who is dairy-woman at the Brookes', that the Brookes were + mighty set-up with an invitation to drink tea at the Hall. There we + were, Tom Diggles even on the grin (I wonder how long it is since he + was own brother to a scarecrow, only not so decently dressed) and Mrs. + Parsoness of Headleigh,--I forget her name, and it's no matter, for + she's an ill-bred creature, I hope Bessy will behave herself + better--was right-down bursting with laughter, and as near a hee-haw + as ever a donkey was, when what does my lady do? Ay! there's my own + dear Lady Ludlow, God bless her! She takes out her own + pocket-handkerchief, all snowy cambric, and lays it softly down on her + velvet lap, for all the world as if she did it every day of her life, + just like Mrs. Brooke, the baker's wife; and when the one got up to + shake the crumbs into the fire-place, the other did just the same. But + with such a grace! and such a look at us all! Tom Diggles went red + all over; and Mrs. Parsoness of Headleigh scarce spoke for the rest of + the evening; and the tears came into my old silly eyes; and Mr. Gray, + who was before silent and awkward in a way which I tell Bessy she must + cure him of, was made so happy by this pretty action of my lady's, + that he talked away all the rest of the evening, and was the life of + the company. + + 'Oh, Margaret Dawson! I sometimes wonder if you're the better off for + leaving us. To be sure you're with your brother, and blood is blood. + But when I look at my lady and Mr. Gray, for all they're so different, + I would not change places with any in England.' + +Alas! alas! I never saw my dear lady again. She died in eighteen +hundred and fourteen, and Mr. Gray did not long survive her. As I dare +say you know, the Reverend Henry Gregson is now vicar of Hanbury, and his +wife is the daughter of Mr. Gray and Miss Bessy. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY LUDLOW*** + + +******* This file should be named 2524.txt or 2524.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/5/2/2524 + + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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Then we, who travelled, travelled in coaches, +carrying six inside, and making a two days' journey out of what +people now go over in a couple of hours with a whizz and a flash, and +a screaming whistle, enough to deafen one. Then letters came in but +three times a week: indeed, in some places in Scotland where I have +stayed when I was a girl, the post came in but once a month;--but +letters were letters then; and we made great prizes of them, and read +them and studied them like books. Now the post comes rattling in +twice a day, bringing short jerky notes, some without beginning or +end, but just a little sharp sentence, which well-bred folks would +think too abrupt to be spoken. Well, well! they may all be +improvements,--I dare say they are; but you will never meet with a +Lady Ludlow in these days. + +I will try and tell you about her. It is no story: it has, as I +said, neither beginning, middle, nor end. + +My father was a poor clergyman with a large family. My mother was +always said to have good blood in her veins; and when she wanted to +maintain her position with the people she was thrown among,-- +principally rich democratic manufacturers, all for liberty and the +French Revolution,--she would put on a pair of ruffles, trimmed with +real old English point, very much darned to be sure,--but which could +not be bought new for love or money, as the art of making it was lost +years before. These ruffles showed, as she said, that her ancestors +had been Somebodies, when the grandfathers of the rich folk, who now +looked down upon her, had been Nobodies,--if, indeed, they had any +grandfathers at all. I don't know whether any one out of our own +family ever noticed these ruffles,--but we were all taught as +children to feel rather proud when my mother put them on, and to hold +up our heads as became the descendants of the lady who had first +possessed the lace. Not but what my dear father often told us that +pride was a great sin; we were never allowed to be proud of anything +but my mother's ruffles: and she was so innocently happy when she +put them on,--often, poor dear creature, to a very worn and +threadbare gown,--that I still think, even after all my experience of +life, they were a blessing to the family. You will think that I am +wandering away from my Lady Ludlow. Not at all. The Lady who had +owned the lace, Ursula Hanbury, was a common ancestress of both my +mother and my Lady Ludlow. And so it fell out, that when my poor +father died, and my mother was sorely pressed to know what to do with +her nine children, and looked far and wide for signs of willingness +to help, Lady Ludlow sent her a letter, proffering aid and +assistance. I see that letter now: a large sheet of thick yellow +paper, with a straight broad margin left on the left-hand side of the +delicate Italian writing,--writing which contained far more in the +same space of paper than all the sloping, or masculine hand-writings +of the present day. It was sealed with a coat of arms,--a lozenge,-- +for Lady Ludlow was a widow. My mother made us notice the motto, +"Foy et Loy," and told us where to look for the quarterings of the +Hanbury arms before she opened the letter. Indeed, I think she was +rather afraid of what the contents might be; for, as I have said, in +her anxious love for her fatherless children, she had written to many +people upon whom, to tell truly, she had but little claim; and their +cold, hard answers had many a time made her cry, when she thought +none of us were looking. I do not even know if she had ever seen +Lady Ludlow: all I knew of her was that she was a very grand lady, +whose grandmother had been half-sister to my mother's great- +grandmother; but of her character and circumstances I had heard +nothing, and I doubt if my mother was acquainted with them. + +I looked over my mother's shoulder to read the letter; it began, +"Dear Cousin Margaret Dawson," and I think I felt hopeful from the +moment I saw those words. She went on to say,--stay, I think I can +remember the very words: + +'DEAR COUSIN MARGARET DAWSON,--I have been much grieved to hear of +the loss you have sustained in the death of so good a husband, and so +excellent a clergyman as I have always heard that my late cousin +Richard was esteemed to be.' + +"There!" said my mother, laying her finger on the passage, "read that +aloud to the little ones. Let them hear how their father's good +report travelled far and wide, and how well he is spoken of by one +whom he never saw. COUSIN Richard, how prettily her ladyship writes! +Go on, Margaret!" She wiped her eyes as she spoke: and laid her +fingers on her lips, to still my little sister, Cecily, who, not +understanding anything about the important letter, was beginning to +talk and make a noise. + +'You say you are left with nine children. I too should have had +nine, if mine had all lived. I have none left but Rudolph, the +present Lord Ludlow. He is married, and lives, for the most part, in +London. But I entertain six young gentlewomen at my house at +Connington, who are to me as daughters--save that, perhaps, I +restrict them in certain indulgences in dress and diet that might be +befitting in young ladies of a higher rank, and of more probable +wealth. These young persons--all of condition, though out of means-- +are my constant companions, and I strive to do my duty as a Christian +lady towards them. One of these young gentlewomen died (at her own +home, whither she had gone upon a visit) last May. Will you do me +the favour to allow your eldest daughter to supply her place in my +household? She is, as I make out, about sixteen years of age. She +will find companions here who are but a little older than herself. I +dress my young friends myself, and make each of them a small +allowance for pocket-money. They have but few opportunities for +matrimony, as Connington is far removed from any town. The clergyman +is a deaf old widower; my agent is married; and as for the +neighbouring farmers, they are, of course, below the notice of the +young gentlewomen under my protection. Still, if any young woman +wishes to marry, and has conducted herself to my satisfaction, I give +her a wedding dinner, her clothes, and her house-linen. And such as +remain with me to my death, will find a small competency provided for +them in my will. I reserve to myself the option of paying their +travelling expenses,--disliking gadding women, on the one hand; on +the other, not wishing by too long absence from the family home to +weaken natural ties. + +'If my proposal pleases you and your daughter--or rather, if it +pleases you, for I trust your daughter has been too well brought up +to have a will in opposition to yours--let me know, dear cousin +Margaret Dawson, and I will make arrangements for meeting the young +gentlewoman at Cavistock, which is the nearest point to which the +coach will bring her.' + +My mother dropped the letter, and sat silent. + +"I shall not know what to do without you, Margaret." + +A moment before, like a young untried girl as I was, I had been +pleased at the notion of seeing a new place, and leading a new life. +But now,--my mother's look of sorrow, and the children's cry of +remonstrance: "Mother; I won't go," I said. + +"Nay! but you had better," replied she, shaking her head. "Lady +Ludlow has much power. She can help your brothers. It will not do +to slight her offer." + +So we accepted it, after much consultation. We were rewarded,--or so +we thought,--for, afterwards, when I came to know Lady Ludlow, I saw +that she would have done her duty by us, as helpless relations, +however we might have rejected her kindness,--by a presentation to +Christ's Hospital for one of my brothers. + +And this was how I came to know my Lady Ludlow. + +I remember well the afternoon of my arrival at Hanbury Court. Her +ladyship had sent to meet me at the nearest post-town at which the +mail-coach stopped. There was an old groom inquiring for me, the +ostler said, if my name was Dawson--from Hanbury Court, he believed. +I felt it rather formidable; and first began to understand what was +meant by going among strangers, when I lost sight of the guard to +whom my mother had intrusted me. I was perched up in a high gig with +a hood to it, such as in those days was called a chair, and my +companion was driving deliberately through the most pastoral country +I had ever yet seen. By-and-by we ascended a long hill, and the man +got out and walked at the horse's head. I should have liked to walk, +too, very much indeed; but I did pot know how far I might do it; and, +in fact, I dared not speak to ask to be helped down the deep steps of +the gig. We were at last at the top,--on a long, breezy, sweeping, +unenclosed piece of ground, called, as I afterwards learnt, a Chase. +The groom stopped, breathed, patted his horse, and then mounted again +to my side. + +"Are we near Hanbury Court?" I asked. + +"Near! Why, Miss! we've a matter of ten mile yet to go." + +Once launched into conversation, we went on pretty glibly. I fancy +he had been afraid of beginning to speak to me, just as I was to him; +but he got over his shyness with me sooner than I did mine with him. +I let him choose the subjects of conversation, although very often I +could not understand the points of interest in them: for instance, +he talked for more than a quarter of an hour of a famous race which a +certain dog-fox had given him, above thirty years before; and spoke +of all the covers and turns just as if I knew them as well as he did; +and all the time I was wondering what kind of an animal a dog-fox +might be. + +After we loft the Chase, the road grew worse. No one in these days, +who has not seen the byroads of fifty years ago, can imagine what +they were. We had to quarter, as Randal called it, nearly all the +way along the deep-rutted, miry lanes; and the tremendous jolts I +occasionally met with made my seat in the gig so unsteady that I +could not look about me at all, I was so much occupied in holding on. +The road was too muddy for me to walk without dirtying myself more +than I liked to do, just before my first sight of my Lady Ludlow. +But by-and-by, when we came to the fields in which the lane ended, I +begged Randal to help me down, as I saw that I could pick my steps +among the pasture grass without making myself unfit to be seen; and +Randal, out of pity for his steaming horse, wearied with the hard +struggle through the mud, thanked me kindly, and helped me down with +a springing jump. + +The pastures fell gradually down to the lower land, shut in on either +side by rows of high elms, as if there had been a wide grand avenue +here in former times. Down the grassy gorge we went, seeing the +sunset sky at the end of the shadowed descent. Suddenly we came to a +long flight of steps. + +"If you'll run down there, Miss, I'll go round and meet you, and then +you'd better mount again, for my lady will like to see you drive up +to the house." + +"Are we near the house?" said I, suddenly checked by the idea. + +"Down there, Miss," replied he, pointing with his whip to certain +stacks of twisted chimneys rising out of a group of trees, in deep +shadow against the crimson light, and which lay just beyond a great +square lawn at the base of the steep slope of a hundred yards, on the +edge of which we stood. + +I went down the steps quietly enough. I met Randal and the gig at +the bottom; and, falling into a side road to the left, we drove +sedately round, through the gateway, and into the great court in +front of the house. + +The road by which we had come lay right at the back. + +Hanbury Court is a vast red-trick house--at least, it is cased in +part with red bricks; and the gate-house and walls about the place +are of brick,--with stone facings at every corner, and door, and +window, such as you see at Hampton Court. At the back are the +gables, and arched doorways, and stone mullions, which show (so Lady +Ludlow used to tell us) that it was once a priory. There was a +prior's parlour, I know--only we called it Mrs. Medlicott's room; and +there was a tithe-barn as big as a church, and rows of fish-ponds, +all got ready for the monks' fasting-days in old time. But all this +I did not see till afterwards. I hardly noticed, this first night, +the great Virginian Creeper (said to have been the first planted in +England by one of my lady's ancestors) that half covered the front of +the house. As I had been unwilling to leave the guard of the coach, +so did I now feel unwilling to leave Randal, a known friend of three +hours. But there was no help for it; in I must go; past the grand- +looking old gentleman holding the door open for me, on into the great +hall on the right hand, into which the sun's last rays were sending +in glorious red light,--the gentleman was now walking before me,--up +a step on to the dais, as I afterwards learned that it was called,-- +then again to the left, through a series of sitting-rooms, opening +one out of another, and all of them looking into a stately garden, +glowing, even in the twilight, with the bloom of flowers. We went up +four steps out of the last of these rooms, and then my guide lifted +up a heavy silk curtain and I was in the presence of my Lady Ludlow. + +She was very small of stature, and very upright. She wore a great +lace cap, nearly half her own height, I should think, that went round +her head (caps which tied under the chin, and which we called "mobs," +came in later, and my lady held them in great contempt, saying people +might as well come down in their nightcaps). In front of my lady's +cap was a great bow of white satin ribbon; and a broad band of the +same ribbon was tied tight round her head, and served to keep the cap +straight. She had a fine Indian muslin shawl folded over her +shoulders and across her chest, and an apron of the same; a black +silk mode gown, made with short sleeves and ruffles, and with the +tail thereof pulled through the pocket-hole, so as to shorten it to a +useful length: beneath it she wore, as I could plainly see, a +quilted lavender satin petticoat. Her hair was snowy white, but I +hardly saw it, it was so covered with her cap: her skin, even at her +age, was waxen in texture and tint; her eyes were large and dark +blue, and must have been her great beauty when she was young, for +there was nothing particular, as far as I can remember, either in +mouth or nose. She had a great gold-headed stick by her chair; but I +think it was more as a mark of state and dignity than for use; for +she had as light and brisk a step when she chose as any girl of +fifteen, and, in her private early walk of meditation in the +mornings, would go as swiftly from garden alley to garden alley as +any one of us. + +She was standing up when I went in. I dropped my curtsey at the +door, which my mother had always taught me as a part of good manners, +and went up instinctively to my lady. She did not put out her hand, +but raised herself a little on tiptoe, and kissed me on both cheeks. + +"You are cold, my child. You shall have a dish of tea with me." She +rang a little hand-bell on the table by her, and her waiting-maid +came in from a small anteroom; and, as if all had been prepared, and +was awaiting my arrival, brought with her a small china service with +tea ready made, and a plate of delicately-cut bread and butter, every +morsel of which I could have eaten, and been none the better for it, +so hungry was I after my long ride. The waiting-maid took off my +cloak, and I sat down, sorely alarmed at the silence, the hushed +foot-falls of the subdued maiden over the thick carpet, and the soft +voice and clear pronunciation of my Lady Ludlow. My teaspoon fell +against my cup with a sharp noise, that seemed so out of place and +season that I blushed deeply. My lady caught my eye with hers,--both +keen and sweet were those dark-blue eyes of her ladyship's:- + +"Your hands are very cold, my dear; take off those gloves" (I wore +thick serviceable doeskin, and had been too shy to take them off +unbidden), "and let me try and warm them--the evenings are very +chilly." And she held my great red hands in hers,--soft, warm, +white, ring-laden. Looking at last a little wistfully into my face, +she said--"Poor child! And you're the eldest of nine! I had a +daughter who would have been just your age; but I cannot fancy her +the eldest of nine." Then came a pause of silence; and then she rang +her bell, and desired her waiting-maid, Adams, to show me to my room. + +It was so small that I think it must have been a cell. The walls +were whitewashed stone; the bed was of white dimity. There was a +small piece of red staircarpet on each side of the bed, and two +chairs. In a closet adjoining were my washstand and toilet-table. +There was a text of Scripture painted on the wall right opposite to +my bed; and below hung a print, common enough in those days, of King +George and Queen Charlotte, with all their numerous children, down to +the little Princess Amelia in a go-cart. On each side hung a small +portrait, also engraved: on the left, it was Louis the Sixteenth; on +the other, Marie-Antoinette. On the chimney-piece there was a +tinder-box and a Prayer-book. I do not remember anything else in the +room. Indeed, in those days people did not dream of writing-tables, +and inkstands, and portfolios, and easy chairs, and what not. We +were taught to go into our bedrooms for the purposes of dressing, and +sleeping, and praying. + +Presently I was summoned to supper. I followed the young lady who +had been sent to call me, down the wide shallow stairs, into the +great hall, through which I had first passed on my way to my Lady +Ludlow's room. There were four other young gentlewomen, all +standing, and all silent, who curtsied to me when I first came in. +They were dressed in a kind of uniform: muslin caps bound round +their heads with blue ribbons, plain muslin handkerchiefs, lawn +aprons, and drab-coloured stuff gowns. They were all gathered +together at a little distance from the table, on which were placed a +couple of cold chickens, a salad, and a fruit tart. On the dais +there was a smaller round table, on which stood a silver jug filled +with milk, and a small roll. Near that was set a carved chair, with +a countess's coronet surmounting the back of it. I thought that some +one might have spoken to me; but they were shy, and I was shy; or +else there was some other reason; but, indeed, almost the minute +after I had come into the hall by the door at the lower hand, her +ladyship entered by the door opening upon the dais; whereupon we all +curtsied very low; I because I saw the others do it. She stood, and +looked at us for a moment. + +"Young gentlewomen," said she, "make Margaret Dawson welcome among +you;" and they treated me with the kind politeness due to a stranger, +but still without any talking beyond what was required for the +purposes of the meal. After it was over, and grace was said by one +of our party, my lady rang her hand-bell, and the servants came in +and cleared away the supper things: then they brought in a portable +reading-desk, which was placed on the dais, and, the whole household +trooping in, my lady called to one of my companions to come up and +read the Psalms and Lessons for the day. I remember thinking how +afraid I should have been had I been in her place. There were no +prayers. My lady thought it schismatic to have any prayers excepting +those in the Prayer-book; and would as soon have preached a sermon +herself in the parish church, as have allowed any one not a deacon at +the least to read prayers in a private dwelling-house. I am not sure +that even then she would have approved of his reading them in an +unconsecrated place. + +She had been maid of honour to Queen Charlotte: a Hanbury of that +old stock that flourished in the days of the Plantagenets, and +heiress of all the land that remained to the family, of the great +estates which had once stretched into four separate counties. +Hanbury Court was hers by right. She had married Lord Ludlow, and +had lived for many years at his various seats, and away from her +ancestral home. She had lost all her children but one, and most of +them had died at these houses of Lord Ludlow's; and, I dare say, that +gave my lady a distaste to the places, and a longing to come back to +Hanbury Court, where she had been so happy as a girl. I imagine her +girlhood had been the happiest time of her life; for, now I think of +it, most of her opinions, when I knew her in later life, were +singular enough then, but had been universally prevalent fifty years +before. For instance, while I lived at Hanbury Court, the cry for +education was beginning to come up: Mr. Raikes had set up his Sunday +Schools; and some clergymen were all for teaching writing and +arithmetic, as well as reading. My lady would have none of this; it +was levelling and revolutionary, she said. When a young woman came +to be hired, my lady would have her in, and see if she liked her +looks and her dress, and question her about her family. Her ladyship +laid great stress upon this latter point, saying that a girl who did +not warm up when any interest or curiosity was expressed about her +mother, or the "baby" (if there was one), was not likely to make a +good servant. Then she would make her put out her feet, to see if +they were well and neatly shod. Then she would bid her say the +Lord's Prayer and the Creed. Then she inquired if she could write. +If she could, and she had liked all that had gone before, her face +sank--it was a great disappointment, for it was an all but inviolable +rule with her never to engage a servant who could write. But I have +known her ladyship break through it, although in both cases in which +she did so she put the girl's principles to a further and unusual +test in asking her to repeat the Ten Commandments. One pert young +woman--and yet I was sorry for her too, only she afterwards married a +rich draper in Shrewsbury--who had got through her trials pretty +tolerably, considering she could write, spoilt all, by saying glibly, +at the end of the last Commandment, "An't please your ladyship, I can +cast accounts." + +"Go away, wench," said my lady in a hurry, "you're only fit for +trade; you will not suit me for a servant." The girl went away +crestfallen: in a minute, however, my lady sent me after her to see +that she had something to eat before leaving the house; and, indeed, +she sent for her once again, but it was only to give her a Bible, and +to bid her beware of French principles, which had led the French to +cut off their king's and queen's heads. + +The poor, blubbering girl said, "Indeed, my lady, I wouldn't hurt a +fly, much less a king, and I cannot abide the French, nor frogs +neither, for that matter." + +But my lady was inexorable, and took a girl who could neither read +nor write, to make up for her alarm about the progress of education +towards addition and subtraction; and afterwards, when the clergyman +who was at Hanbury parish when I came there, had died, and the bishop +had appointed another, and a younger man, in his stead, this was one +of the points on which he and my lady did not agree. While good old +deaf Mr. Mountford lived, it was my lady's custom, when indisposed +for a sermon, to stand up at the door of her large square pew,--just +opposite to the reading-desk,--and to say (at that part of the +morning service where it is decreed that, in quires and places where +they sing, here followeth the anthem): "Mr. Mountford, I will not +trouble you for a discourse this morning." And we all knelt down to +the Litany with great satisfaction; for Mr. Mountford, though he +could not hear, had always his eyes open about this part of the +service, for any of my lady's movements. But the new clergyman, Mr. +Gray, was of a different stamp. He was very zealous in all his +parish work; and my lady, who was just as good as she could be to the +poor, was often crying him up as a godsend to the parish, and he +never could send amiss to the Court when he wanted broth, or wine, or +jelly, or sago for a sick person. But he needs must take up the new +hobby of education; and I could see that this put my lady sadly about +one Sunday, when she suspected, I know not how, that there was +something to be said in his sermon about a Sunday-school which he was +planning. She stood up, as she had not done since Mr. Mountford's +death, two years and better before this time, and said - + +"Mr. Gray, I will not trouble you for a discourse this morning." + +But her voice was not well-assured and steady; and we knelt down with +more of curiosity than satisfaction in our minds. Mr. Gray preached +a very rousing sermon, on the necessity of establishing a Sabbath- +school in the village. My lady shut her eyes, and seemed to go to +sleep; but I don't believe she lost a word of it, though she said +nothing about it that I heard until the next Saturday, when two of +us, as was the custom, were riding out with her in her carriage, and +we went to see a poor bedridden woman, who lived some miles away at +the other end of the estate and of the parish: and as we came out of +the cottage we met Mr. Gray walking up to it, in a great heat, and +looking very tired. My lady beckoned him to her, and told him she +should wait and take him home with her, adding that she wondered to +see him there, so far from his home, for that it was beyond a +Sabbath-day's journey, and, from what she had gathered from his +sermon the last Sunday, he was all for Judaism against Christianity. +He looked as if he did not understand what she meant; but the truth +was that, besides the way in which he had spoken up for schools and +schooling, he had kept calling Sunday the Sabbath: and, as her +ladyship said, "The Sabbath is the Sabbath, and that's one thing--it +is Saturday; and if I keep it, I'm a Jew, which I'm not. And Sunday +is Sunday; and that's another thing; and if I keep it, I'm a +Christian, which I humbly trust I am." + +But when Mr. Gray got an inkling of her meaning in talking about a +Sabbath-day's journey, he only took notice of a part of it: he +smiled and bowed, and said no one knew better than her ladyship what +were the duties that abrogated all inferior laws regarding the +Sabbath; and that he must go in and read to old Betty Brown, so that +he would not detain her ladyship. + +"But I shall wait for you, Mr. Gray," said she. "Or I will take a +drive round by Oakfield, and be back in an hour's time." For, you +see, she would not have him feel hurried or troubled with a thought +that he was keeping her waiting, while he ought to be comforting and +praying with old Betty. + +"A very pretty young man, my dears," said she, as we drove away. +"But I shall have my pew glazed all the same." + +We did not know what she meant at the time; but the next Sunday but +one we did. She had the curtains all round the grand old Hanbury +family seat taken down, and, instead of them, there was glass up to +the height of six or seven feet. We entered by a door, with a window +in it that drew up or down just like what you see in carriages. This +window was generally down, and then we could hear perfectly; but if +Mr. Gray used the word "Sabbath," or spoke in favour of schooling and +education, my lady stepped out of her corner, and drew up the window +with a decided clang and clash. + +I must tell you something more about Mr. Gray. The presentation to +the living of Hanbury was vested in two trustees, of whom Lady Ludlow +was one: Lord Ludlow had exercised this right in the appointment of +Mr. Mountford, who had won his lordship's favour by his excellent +horsemanship. Nor was Mr. Mountford a bad clergyman, as clergymen +went in those days. He did not drink, though he liked good eating as +much as any one. And if any poor person was ill, and he heard of it, +he would send them plates from his own dinner of what he himself +liked best; sometimes of dishes which were almost as bad as poison to +sick people. He meant kindly to everybody except dissenters, whom +Lady Ludlow and he united in trying to drive out of the parish; and +among dissenters he particularly abhorred Methodists--some one said, +because John Wesley had objected to his hunting. But that must have +been long ago for when I knew him he was far too stout and too heavy +to hunt; besides, the bishop of the diocese disapproved of hunting, +and had intimated his disapprobation to the clergy. For my own part, +I think a good run would not have come amiss, even in a moral point +of view, to Mr. Mountford. He ate so much, and took so little +exercise, that we young women often heard of his being in terrible +passions with his servants, and the sexton and clerk. But they none +of them minded him much, for he soon came to himself, and was sure to +make them some present or other--some said in proportion to his +anger; so that the sexton, who was a bit of a wag (as all sextons +are, I think), said that the vicar's saying, "The Devil take you," +was worth a shilling any day, whereas "The Deuce" was a shabby +sixpenny speech, only fit for a curate. + +There was a great deal of good in Mr. Mountford, too. He could not +bear to see pain, or sorrow, or misery of any kind; and, if it came +under his notice, he was never easy till he had relieved it, for the +time, at any rate. But he was afraid of being made uncomfortable; +so, if he possibly could, he would avoid seeing any one who was ill +or unhappy; and he did not thank any one for telling him about them. + +"What would your ladyship have me to do?" he once said to my Lady +Ludlow, when she wished him to go and see a poor man who had broken +his leg. "I cannot piece the leg as the doctor can; I cannot nurse +him as well as his wife does; I may talk to him, but he no more +understands me than I do the language of the alchemists. My coming +puts him out; he stiffens himself into an uncomfortable posture, out +of respect to the cloth, and dare not take the comfort of kicking, +and swearing, and scolding his wife, while I am there. I hear him, +with my figurative ears, my lady, heave a sigh of relief when my back +is turned, and the sermon that he thinks I ought to have kept for the +pulpit, and have delivered to his neighbours (whose case, as he +fancies, it would just have fitted, as it seemed to him to be +addressed to the sinful), is all ended, and done, for the day. I +judge others as myself; I do to them as I would be done to. That's +Christianity, at any rate. I should hate--saving your ladyship's +presence--to have my Lord Ludlow coming and seeing me, if I were ill. +'Twould be a great honour, no doubt; but I should have to put on a +clean nightcap for the occasion; and sham patience, in order to be +polite, and not weary his lordship with my complaints. I should be +twice as thankful to him if he would send me game, or a good fat +haunch, to bring me up to that pitch of health and strength one ought +to be in, to appreciate the honour of a visit from a nobleman. So I +shall send Jerry Butler a good dinner every day till he is strong +again; and spare the poor old fellow my presence and advice." + +My lady would be puzzled by this, and by many other of Mr. +Mountford's speeches. But he had been appointed by my lord, and she +could not question her dead husband's wisdom; and she knew that the +dinners were always sent, and often a guinea or two to help to pay +the doctor's bills; and Mr. Mountford was true blue, as we call it, +to the back-bone; hated the dissenters and the French; and could +hardly drink a dish of tea without giving out the toast of "Church +and King, and down with the Rump." Moreover, he had once had the +honour of preaching before the King and Queen, and two of the +Princesses, at Weymouth; and the King had applauded his sermon +audibly with,--"Very good; very good;" and that was a seal put upon +his merit in my lady's eyes. + +Besides, in the long winter Sunday evenings, he would come up to the +Court, and read a sermon to us girls, and play a game of picquet with +my lady afterwards; which served to shorten the tedium of the time. +My lady would, on those occasions, invite him to sup with her on the +dais; but as her meal was invariably bread and milk only, Mr. +Mountford preferred sitting down amongst us, and made a joke about +its being wicked and heterodox to eat meagre on Sunday, a festival of +the Church. We smiled at this joke just as much the twentieth time +we heard it as we did at the first; for we knew it was coming, +because he always coughed a little nervously before he made a joke, +for fear my lady should not approve: and neither she nor he seemed +to remember that he had ever hit upon the idea before. + +Mr. Mountford died quite suddenly at last. We were all very sorry to +lose him. He left some of his property (for he had a private estate) +to the poor of the parish, to furnish them with an annual Christmas +dinner of roast beef and plum pudding, for which he wrote out a very +good receipt in the codicil to his will. + +Moreover, he desired his executors to see that the vault, in which +the vicars of Hanbury were interred, was well aired, before his +coffin was taken in; for, all his life long, he had had a dread of +damp, and latterly he kept his rooms to such a pitch of warmth that +some thought it hastened his end. + +Then the other trustee, as I have said, presented the living to Mr. +Gray, Fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford. It was quite natural for us +all, as belonging in some sort to the Hanbury family, to disapprove +of the other trustee's choice. But when some ill-natured person +circulated the report that Mr. Gray was a Moravian Methodist, I +remember my lady said, "She could not believe anything so bad, +without a great deal of evidence." + + + +CHAPTER II. + + + +Before I tell you about Mr. Gray, I think I ought to make you +understand something more of what we did all day long at Hanbury +Court. There were five of us at the time of which I am speaking, all +young women of good descent, and allied (however distantly) to people +of rank. When we were not with my lady, Mrs. Medlicott looked after +us; a gentle little woman, who had been companion to my lady for many +years, and was indeed, I have been told, some kind of relation to +her. Mrs. Medlicott's parents had lived in Germany, and the +consequence was, she spoke English with a very foreign accent. +Another consequence was, that she excelled in all manner of +needlework, such as is not known even by name in these days. She +could darn either lace, table-linen, India muslin, or stockings, so +that no one could tell where the hole or rent had been. Though a +good Protestant, and never missing Guy Faux day at church, she was as +skilful at fine work as any nun in a Papist convent. She would take +a piece of French cambric, and by drawing out some threads, and +working in others, it became delicate lace in a very few hours. She +did the same by Hollands cloth, and made coarse strong lace, with +which all my lady's napkins and table-linen were trimmed. We worked +under her during a great part of the day, either in the still-room, +or at our sewing in a chamber that opened out of the great hall. My +lady despised every kind of work that would now be called Fancy-work. +She considered that the use of coloured threads or worsted was only +fit to amuse children; but that grown women ought not to be taken +with mere blues and reds, but to restrict their pleasure in sewing to +making small and delicate stitches. She would speak of the old +tapestry in the hall as the work of her ancestresses, who lived +before the Reformation, and were consequently unacquainted with pure +and simple tastes in work, as well as in religion. Nor would my lady +sanction the fashion of the day, which, at the beginning of this +century, made all the fine ladies take to making shoes. She said +that such work was a consequence of the French Revolution, which had +done much to annihilate all distinctions of rank and class, and hence +it was, that she saw young ladies of birth and breeding handling +lasts, and awls, and dirty cobblers'-wax, like shoe'-makers' +daughters. + +Very frequently one of us would be summoned to my lady to read aloud +to her, as she sat in her small withdrawing-room, some improving +book. It was generally Mr. Addison's "Spectator;" but one year, I +remember, we had to read "Sturm's Reflections" translated from a +German book Mrs. Medlicott recommended. Mr. Sturm told us what to +think about for every day in the year; and very dull it was; but I +believe Queen Charlotte had liked the book very much, and the thought +of her royal approbation kept my lady awake during the reading. +"Mrs. Chapone's Letters" and "Dr. Gregory's Advice to Young Ladies" +composed the rest of our library for week-day reading. I, for one, +was glad to leave my fine sewing, and even my reading aloud (though +this last did keep me with my dear lady) to go to the still-room and +potter about among the preserves and the medicated waters. There was +no doctor for many miles round, and with Mrs. Medlicott to direct us, +and Dr. Buchan to go by for recipes, we sent out many a bottle of +physic, which, I dare say, was as good as what comes out of the +druggist's shop. At any rate, I do not think we did much harm; for +if any of our physics tasted stronger than usual, Mrs. Medlicott +would bid us let it down with cochineal and water, to make all safe, +as she said. So our bottles of medicine had very little real physic +in them at last; but we were careful in putting labels on them, which +looked very mysterious to those who could not read, and helped the +medicine to do its work. I have sent off many a bottle of salt and +water coloured red; and whenever we had nothing else to do in the +still-room, Mrs. Medlicott would set us to making bread-pills, by way +of practice; and, as far as I can say, they were very efficacious, as +before we gave out a box Mrs. Medlicott always told the patient what +symptoms to expect; and I hardly ever inquired without hearing that +they had produced their effect. There was one old man, who took six +pills a-night, of any kind we liked to give him, to make him sleep; +and if, by any chance, his daughter had forgotten to let us know that +he was out of his medicine, he was so restless and miserable that, as +he said, he thought he was like to die. I think ours was what would +be called homoeopathic practice now-a-days. Then we learnt to make +all the cakes and dishes of the season in the still-room. We had +plum-porridge and mince-pies at Christmas, fritters and pancakes on +Shrove Tuesday, furmenty on Mothering Sunday, violet-cakes in Passion +Week, tansy-pudding on Easter Sunday, three-cornered cakes on Trinity +Sunday, and so on through the year: all made from good old Church +receipts, handed down from one of my lady's earliest Protestant +ancestresses. Every one of us passed a portion of the day with Lady +Ludlow; and now and then we rode out with her in her coach and four. +She did not like to go out with a pair of horses, considering this +rather beneath her rank; and, indeed, four horses were very often +needed to pull her heavy coach through the stiff mud. But it was +rather a cumbersome equipage through the narrow Warwickshire lanes; +and I used often to think it was well that countesses were not +plentiful, or else we might have met another lady of quality in +another coach and four, where there would have been no possibility of +turning, or passing each other, and very little chance of backing. +Once when the idea of this danger of meeting another countess in a +narrow, deep-rutted lane was very prominent in my mind I ventured to +ask Mrs. Medlicott what would have to be done on such an occasion; +and she told me that "de latest creation must back, for sure," which +puzzled me a good deal at the time, although I understand it now. I +began to find out the use of the "Peerage," a book which had seemed +to me rather dull before; but, as I was always a coward in a coach, I +made myself well acquainted with the dates of creation of our three +Warwickshire earls, and was happy to find that Earl Ludlow ranked +second, the oldest earl being a hunting widower, and not likely to +drive out in a carriage. + +All this time I have wandered from Mr. Gray. Of course, we first saw +him in church when he read himself in. He was very red-faced, the +kind of redness which goes with light hair and a blushing complexion; +he looked slight and short, and his bright light frizzy hair had +hardly a dash of powder in it. I remember my lady making this +observation, and sighing over it; for, though since the famine in +seventeen hundred and ninety-nine and eighteen hundred there had been +a tax on hair-powder, yet it was reckoned very revolutionary and +Jacobin not to wear a good deal of it. My lady hardly liked the +opinions of any man who wore his own hair; but this she would say was +rather a prejudice: only in her youth none but the mob had gone +wigless, and she could not get over the association of wigs with +birth and breeding; a man's own hair with that class of people who +had formed the rioters in seventeen hundred and eighty, when Lord +George Gordon had been one of the bugbears of my lady's life. Her +husband and his brothers, she told us, had been put into breeches, +and had their heads shaved on their seventh birthday, each of them; a +handsome little wig of the newest fashion forming the old Lady +Ludlow's invariable birthday present to her sons as they each arrived +at that age; and afterwards, to the day of their death, they never +saw their own hair. To be without powder, as some underbred people +were talking of being now, was in fact to insult the proprieties of +life, by being undressed. It was English sans-culottism. But Mr. +Gray did wear a little powder, enough to save him in my lady's good +opinion; but not enough to make her approve of him decidedly. + +The next time I saw him was in the great hall. Mary Mason and I were +going to drive out with my lady in her coach, and when we went down +stairs with our best hats and cloaks on, we found Mr. Gray awaiting +my lady's coming. I believe he had paid his respects to her before, +but we had never seen him; and he had declined her invitation to +spend Sunday evening at the Court (as Mr. Mountford used to do pretty +regularly--and play a game at picquet too--), which, Mrs. Medlicott +told us, had caused my lady to be not over well pleased with him. + +He blushed redder than ever at the sight of us, as we entered the +hall and dropped him our curtsies. He coughed two or three times, as +if he would have liked to speak to us, if he could but have found +something to say; and every time he coughed he became hotter-looking +than ever. I am ashamed to say, we were nearly laughing at him; half +because we, too, were so shy that we understood what his awkwardness +meant. + +My lady came in, with her quick active step--she always walked +quickly when she did not bethink herself of her cane--as if she was +sorry to have us kept waiting--and, as she entered, she gave us all +round one of those graceful sweeping curtsies, of which I think the +art must have died out with her,--it implied so much courtesy;--this +time it said, as well as words could do, "I am sorry to have kept you +all waiting,--forgive me." + +She went up to the mantelpiece, near which Mr. Gray had been standing +until her entrance, and curtseying afresh to him, and pretty deeply +this time, because of his cloth, and her being hostess, and he, a new +guest. She asked him if he would not prefer speaking to her in her +own private parlour, and looked as though she would have conducted +him there. But he burst out with his errand, of which he was full +even to choking, and which sent the glistening tears into his large +blue eyes, which stood farther and farther out with his excitement. + +"My lady, I want to speak to you, and to persuade you to exert your +kind interest with Mr. Lathom--Justice Lathom, of Hathaway Manor--" + +"Harry Lathom?" inquired my lady,--as Mr. Gray stopped to take the +breath he had lost in his hurry,--"I did not know he was in the +commission." + +"He is only just appointed; he took the oaths not a month ago,-- +more's the pity!" + +"I do not understand why you should regret it. The Lathoms have held +Hathaway since Edward the First, and Mr. Lathom bears a good +character, although his temper is hasty--" + +"My lady! he has committed Job Gregson for stealing--a fault of which +he is as innocent as I--and all the evidence goes to prove it, now +that the case is brought before the Bench; only the Squires hang so +together that they can't be brought to see justice, and are all for +sending Job to gaol, out of compliment to Mr. Lathom, saying it his +first committal, and it won't be civil to tell him there is no +evidence against his man. For God's sake, my lady, speak to the +gentlemen; they will attend to you, while they only tell me to mind +my own business." + +Now my lady was always inclined to stand by her order, and the +Lathoms of Hathaway Court were cousins to the Hanbury's. Besides, it +was rather a point of honour in those days to encourage a young +magistrate, by passing a pretty sharp sentence on his first +committals; and Job Gregson was the father of a girl who had been +lately turned away from her place as scullery-maid for sauciness to +Mrs. Adams, her ladyship's own maid; and Mr. Gray had not said a word +of the reasons why he believed the man innocent,--for he was in such +a hurry, I believe he would have had my lady drive off to the Henley +Court-house then and there;--so there seemed a good deal against the +man, and nothing but Mr. Gray's bare word for him; and my lady drew +herself a little up, and said - + +"Mr. Gray! I do not see what reason either you or I have to +interfere. Mr. Harry Lathom is a sensible kind of young man, well +capable of ascertaining the truth without our help--" + +"But more evidence has come out since," broke in Mr. Gray. My lady +went a little stiffer, and spoke a little more coldly:- + +"I suppose this additional evidence is before the justices: men of +good family, and of honour and credit, well known in the county. +They naturally feel that the opinion of one of themselves must have +more weight than the words of a man like Job Gregson, who bears a +very indifferent character,--has been strongly suspected of poaching, +coming from no one knows where, squatting on Hareman's Common--which, +by the way, is extra-parochial, I believe; consequently you, as a +clergyman, are not responsible for what goes on there; and, although +impolitic, there might be some truth in what the magistrates said, in +advising you to mind your own business,"--said her ladyship, +smiling,--"and they might be tempted to bid me mind mine, if I +interfered, Mr. Gray: might they not?" + +He looked extremely uncomfortable; half angry. Once or twice he +began to speak, but checked himself, as if his words would not have +been wise or prudent. At last he said--"It may seem presumptuous in +me,--a stranger of only a few weeks' standing--to set up my judgment +as to men's character against that of residents--" Lady Ludlow gave +a little bow of acquiescence, which was, I think, involuntary on her +part, and which I don't think he perceived,--"but I am convinced that +the man is innocent of this offence,--and besides, the justices +themselves allege this ridiculous custom of paying a compliment to a +newly-appointed magistrate as their only reason." + +That unlucky word "ridiculous!" It undid all the good his modest +beginning had done him with my lady. I knew as well as words could +have told me, that she was affronted at the expression being used by +a man inferior in rank to those whose actions he applied it to,--and +truly, it was a great want of tact, considering to whom he was +speaking. + +Lady Ludlow spoke very gently and slowly; she always did so when she +was annoyed; it was a certain sign, the meaning of which we had all +learnt. + +"I think, Mr. Gray, we will drop the subject. It is one on which we +are not likely to agree." + +Mr. Gray's ruddy colour grew purple and then faded away, and his face +became pale. I think both my lady and he had forgotten our presence; +and we were beginning to feel too awkward to wish to remind them of +it. And yet we could not help watching and listening with the +greatest interest. + +Mr. Gray drew himself up to his full height, with an unconscious +feeling of dignity. Little as was his stature, and awkward and +embarrassed as he had been only a few minutes before, I remember +thinking he looked almost as grand as my lady when he spoke. + +"Your ladyship must remember that it may be my duty to speak to my +parishioners on many subjects on which they do not agree with me. I +am not at liberty to be silent, because they differ in opinion from +me." + +Lady Ludlow's great blue eyes dilated with surprise, and--I do think- +-anger, at being thus spoken to. I am not sure whether it was very +wise in Mr. Gray. He himself looked afraid of the consequences but +as if he was determined to bear them without flinching. For a minute +there was silence. Then my lady replied--"Mr. Gray, I respect your +plain speaking, although I may wonder whether a young man of your age +and position has any right to assume that he is a better judge than +one with the experience which I have naturally gained at my time of +life, and in the station I hold." + +"If I, madam, as the clergyman of this parish, am not to shrink from +telling what I believe to be the truth to the poor and lowly, no more +am I to hold my peace in the presence of the rich and titled." Mr. +Gray's face showed that he was in that state of excitement which in a +child would have ended in a good fit of crying. He looked as if he +had nerved himself up to doing and saying things, which he disliked +above everything, and which nothing short of serious duty could have +compelled him to do and say. And at such times every minute +circumstance which could add to pain comes vividly before one. I saw +that he became aware of our presence, and that it added to his +discomfiture. + +My lady flushed up. "Are you aware, sir," asked she, "that you have +gone far astray from the original subject of conversation? But as +you talk of your parish, allow me to remind you that Hareman's Common +is beyond the bounds, and that you are really not responsible for the +characters and lives of the squatters on that unlucky piece of +ground." + +"Madam, I see I have only done harm in speaking to you about the +affair at all. I beg your pardon and take my leave." + +He bowed, and looked very sad. Lady Ludlow caught the expression of +his face. + +"Good morning!" she cried, in rather a louder and quicker way than +that in which she had been speaking. "Remember, Job Gregson is a +notorious poacher and evildoer, and you really are not responsible +for what goes on at Hareman's Common." + +He was near the hall door, and said something--half to himself, which +we heard (being nearer to him), but my lady did not; although she saw +that he spoke. "What did he say?" she asked in a somewhat hurried +manner, as soon as the door was closed--"I did not hear." We looked +at each other, and then I spoke: + +"He said, my lady, that 'God help him! he was responsible for all the +evil he did not strive to overcome.'" + +My lady turned sharp round away from us, and Mary Mason said +afterwards she thought her ladyship was much vexed with both of us, +for having been present, and with me for having repeated what Mr. +Gray had said. But it was not our fault that we were in the hall, +and when my lady asked what Mr. Gray had said, I thought it right to +tell her. + +In a few minutes she bade us accompany her in her ride in the coach. + +Lady Ludlow always sat forwards by herself, and we girls backwards. +Somehow this was a rule, which we never thought of questioning. It +was true that riding backwards made some of us feel very +uncomfortable and faint; and to remedy this my lady always drove with +both windows open, which occasionally gave her the rheumatism; but we +always went on in the old way. This day she did not pay any great +attention to the road by which we were going, and Coachman took his +own way. We were very silent, as my lady did not speak, and looked +very serious. Or else, in general, she made these rides very +pleasant (to those who were not qualmish with riding backwards), by +talking to us in a very agreeable manner, and telling us of the +different things which had happened to her at various places,--at +Paris and Versailles, where she had been in her youth,--at Windsor +and Kew and Weymouth, where she had been with the Queen, when maid- +of-honour--and so on. But this day she did not talk at all. All at +once she put her head out of the window. + +"John Footman," said she, "where are we? Surely this is Hareman's +Common." + +"Yes, an't please my lady," said John Footman, and waited for further +speech or orders. My lady thought a while, and then said she would +have the steps put down and get out. + +As soon as she was gone, we looked at each other, and then without a +word began to gaze after her. We saw her pick her dainty way in the +little high-heeled shoes she always wore (because they had been in +fashion in her youth), among the yellow pools of stagnant water that +had gathered in the clayey soil. John Footman followed, stately, +after; afraid too, for all his stateliness, of splashing his pure +white stockings. Suddenly my lady turned round and said something to +him, and he returned to the carriage with a half-pleased, half- +puzzled air. + +My lady went on to a cluster of rude mud houses at the higher end of +the Common; cottages built, as they were occasionally at that day, of +wattles and clay, and thatched with sods. As far as we could make +out from dumb show, Lady Ludlow saw enough of the interiors of these +places to make her hesitate before entering, or even speaking to any +of the children who were playing about in the puddles. After a +pause, she disappeared into one of the cottages. It seemed to us a +long time before she came out; but I dare say it was not more than +eight or ten minutes. She came back with her head hanging down, as +if to choose her way,--but we saw it was more in thought and +bewilderment than for any such purpose. + +She had not made up her mind where we should drive to when she got +into the carriage again. John Footman stood, bare-headed, waiting +for orders. + +"To Hathaway. My dears, if you are tired, or if you have anything to +do for Mrs. Medlicott, I can drop you at Barford Corner, and it is +but a quarter of an hour's brisk walk home." + +But luckily we could safely say that Mrs. Medlicott did not want us; +and as we had whispered to each other, as we sat alone in the coach, +that surely my lady must have gone to Job Gregson's, we were far too +anxious to know the end of it all to say that we were tired. So we +all set off to Hathaway. Mr. Harry Lathom was a bachelor squire, +thirty or thirty-five years of age, more at home in the field than in +the drawing-room, and with sporting men than with ladies. + +My lady did not alight, of course; it was Mr. Lathom's place to wait +upon her, and she bade the butler,--who had a smack of the gamekeeper +in him, very unlike our own powdered venerable fine gentleman at +Hanbury,--tell his master, with her compliments, that she wished to +speak to him. You may think how pleased we were to find that we +should hear all that was said; though, I think, afterwards we were +half sorry when we saw how our presence confused the squire, who +would have found it bad enough to answer my lady's questions, even +without two eager girls for audience. + +"Pray, Mr. Lathom," began my lady, something abruptly for her,--but +she was very full of her subject,--"what is this I hear about Job +Gregson?" + +Mr. Lathom looked annoyed and vexed, but dared not show it in his +words. + +"I gave out a warrant against him, my lady, for theft,--that is all. +You are doubtless aware of his character; a man who sets nets and +springes in long cover, and fishes wherever he takes a fancy. It is +but a short step from poaching to thieving." + +"That is quite true," replied Lady Ludlow (who had a horror of +poaching for this very reason): "but I imagine you do not send a man +to gaol on account of his bad character." + +"Rogues and vagabonds," said Mr. Lathom. "A man may be sent to +prison for being a vagabond; for no specific act, but for his general +mode of life." + +He had the better of her ladyship for one moment; but then she +answered - + +"But in this case, the charge on which you committed him is for +theft; now his wife tells me he can prove he was some miles distant +from Holmwood, where the robbery took place, all that afternoon; she +says you had the evidence before you." + +Mr. Lathom here interrupted my lady, by saying, in a somewhat sulky +manner--"No such evidence was brought before me when I gave the +warrant. I am not answerable for the other magistrates' decision, +when they had more evidence before them. It was they who committed +him to gaol. I am not responsible for that." + +My lady did not often show signs of impatience; but we knew she was +feeling irritated, by the little perpetual tapping of her high-heeled +shoe against the bottom of the carriage. About the same time we, +sitting backwards, caught a glimpse of Mr. Gray through the open +door, standing in the shadow of the hall. Doubtless Lady Ludlow's +arrival had interrupted a conversation between Mr. Lathom and Mr. +Gray. The latter must have heard every word of what she was saying; +but of this she was not aware, and caught at Mr. Lathom's disclaimer +of responsibility with pretty much the same argument which she had +heard (through our repetition) that Mr. Gray had used not two hours +before. + +"And do you mean to say, Mr. Lathom, that you don't consider yourself +responsible for all injustice or wrong-doing that you might have +prevented, and have not? Nay, in this case the first germ of +injustice was your own mistake. I wish you had been with me a little +while ago, and seen the misery in that poor fellow's cottage." She +spoke lower, and Mr. Gray drew near, in a sort of involuntary manner; +as if to hear all she was saying. We saw him, and doubtless Mr. +Lathom heard his footstep, and knew who it was that was listening +behind him, and approving of every word that was said. He grew yet +more sullen in manner; but still my lady was my lady, and he dared +not speak out before her, as he would have done to Mr. Gray. Lady +Ludlow, however, caught the look of stubborness in his face, and it +roused her as I had never seen her roused. + +"I am sure you will not refuse, sir, to accept my bail. I offer to +bail the fellow out, and to be responsible for his appearance at the +sessions. What say you to that, Mr. Lathom?" + +"The offence of theft is not bailable, my lady." + +"Not in ordinary cases, I dare say. But I imagine this is an +extraordinary case. The man is sent to prison out of compliment to +you, and against all evidence, as far as I can learn. He will have +to rot in gaol for two months, and his wife and children to starve. +I, Lady Ludlow, offer to bail him out, and pledge myself for his +appearance at next quarter-sessions." + +"It is against the law, my lady." + +"Bah! Bah! Bah! Who makes laws? Such as I, in the House of Lords-- +such as you, in the House of Commons. We, who make the laws in St. +Stephen's, may break the mere forms of them, when we have right on +our sides, on our own land, and amongst our own people." + +"The lord-lieutenant may take away my commission, if he heard of it." + +"And a very good thing for the county, Harry Lathom; and for you too, +if he did,--if you don't go on more wisely than you have begun. A +pretty set you and your brother magistrates are to administer justice +through the land! I always said a good despotism was the best form +of government; and I am twice as much in favour of it now I see what +a quorum is! My dears!" suddenly turning round to us, "if it would +not tire you to walk home, I would beg Mr. Lathom to take a seat in +my coach, and we would drive to Henley Gaol, and have the poor man +out at once." + +"A walk over the fields at this time of day is hardly fitting for +young ladies to take alone," said Mr. Lathom, anxious no doubt to +escape from his tete-a-tete drive with my lady, and possibly not +quite prepared to go to the illegal length of prompt measures, which +she had in contemplation. + +But Mr. Gray now stepped forward, too anxious for the release of the +prisoner to allow any obstacle to intervene which he could do away +with. To see Lady Ludlow's face when she first perceived whom she +had had for auditor and spectator of her interview with Mr. Lathom, +was as good as a play. She had been doing and saying the very things +she had been so much annoyed at Mr. Gray's saying and proposing only +an hour or two ago. She had been setting down Mr. Lathom pretty +smartly, in the presence of the very man to whom she had spoken of +that gentleman as so sensible, and of such a standing in the county, +that it was presumption to question his doings. But before Mr. Gray +had finished his offer of escorting us back to Hanbury Court, my lady +had recovered herself. There was neither surprise nor displeasure in +her manner, as she answered--"I thank you, Mr. Gray. I was not aware +that you were here, but I think I can understand on what errand you +came. And seeing you here, recalls me to a duty I owe Mr. Lathom. +Mr. Lathom, I have spoken to you pretty plainly,--forgetting, until I +saw Mr. Gray, that only this very afternoon I differed from him on +this very question; taking completely, at that time, the same view of +the whole subject which you have done; thinking that the county would +be well rid of such a man as Job Gregson, whether he had committed +this theft or not. Mr. Gray and I did not part quite friends," she +continued, bowing towards him; "but it so happened that I saw Job +Gregson's wife and home,--I felt that Mr. Gray had been right and I +had been wrong, so, with the famous inconsistency of my sex, I came +hither to scold you," smiling towards Mr. Lathom, who looked half- +sulky yet, and did not relax a bit of his gravity at her smile, "for +holding the same opinions that I had done an hour before. Mr. Gray," +(again bowing towards him) "these young ladies will be very much +obliged to you for your escort, and so shall I. Mr. Lathom, may I +beg of you to accompany me to Henley?" + +Mr. Gray bowed very low, and went very red; Mr. Lathom said something +which we none of us heard, but which was, I think, some remonstrance +against the course he was, as it were, compelled to take. Lady +Ludlow, however, took no notice of his murmur, but sat in an attitude +of polite expectancy; and as we turned off on our walk, I saw Mr. +Lathom getting into the coach with the air of a whipped hound. I +must say, considering my lady's feeling, I did not envy him his ride- +-though, I believe, he was quite in the right as to the object of the +ride being illegal. + +Our walk home was very dull. We had no fears; and would far rather +have been without the awkward, blushing young man, into which Mr. +Gray had sunk. At every stile he hesitated,--sometimes he half got +over it, thinking that he could assist us better in that way; then he +would turn back unwilling to go before ladies. He had no ease of +manner, as my lady once said of him, though on any occasion of duty, +he had an immense deal of dignity. + + + +CHAPTER III. + + + +As far as I can remember, it was very soon after this that I first +began to have the pain in my hip, which has ended in making me a +cripple for life. I hardly recollect more than one walk after our +return under Mr. Gray's escort from Mr. Lathom's. Indeed, at the +time, I was not without suspicions (which I never named) that the +beginning of all the mischief was a great jump I had taken from the +top of one of the stiles on that very occasion. + +Well, it is a long while ago, and God disposes of us all, and I am +not going to tire you out with telling you how I thought and felt, +and how, when I saw what my life was to be, I could hardly bring +myself to be patient, but rather wished to die at once. You can +every one of you think for yourselves what becoming all at once +useless and unable to move, and by-and-by growing hopeless of cure, +and feeling that one must be a burden to some one all one's life +long, would be to an active, wilful, strong girl of seventeen, +anxious to get on in the world, so as, if possible, to help her +brothers and sisters. So I shall only say, that one among the +blessings which arose out of what seemed at the time a great, black +sorrow was, that Lady Ludlow for many years took me, as it were, into +her own especial charge; and now, as I lie still and alone in my old +age, it is such a pleasure to think of her! + +Mrs. Medlicott was great as a nurse, and I am sure I can never be +grateful enough to her memory for all her kindness. But she was +puzzled to know how to manage me in other ways. I used to have long, +hard fits of crying; and, thinking that I ought to go home--and yet +what could they do with me there?--and a hundred and fifty other +anxious thoughts, some of which I could tell to Mrs. Medlicott, and +others I could not. Her way of comforting me was hurrying away for +some kind of tempting or strengthening food--a basin of melted +calves-foot jelly was, I am sure she thought, a cure for every woe. + +"There take it, dear, take it!" she would say; "and don't go on +fretting for what can't be helped." + +But, I think, she got puzzled at length at the non-efficacy of good +things to eat; and one day, after I had limped down to see the +doctor, in Mrs. Medlicott's sitting-room--a room lined with +cupboards, containing preserves and dainties of all kinds, which she +perpetually made, and never touched herself--when I was returning to +my bed-room to cry away the afternoon, under pretence of arranging my +clothes, John Footman brought me a message from my lady (with whom +the doctor had been having a conversation) to bid me go to her in +that private sitting-room at the end of the suite of apartments, +about which I spoke in describing the day of my first arrival at +Hanbury. I had hardly been in it since; as, when we read to my lady, +she generally sat in the small withdrawing-room out of which this +private room of hers opened. I suppose great people do not require +what we smaller people value so much,--I mean privacy. I do not +think that there was a room which my lady occupied that had not two +doors, and some of them had three or four. Then my lady had always +Adams waiting upon her in her bed-chamber; and it was Mrs. +Medlicott's duty to sit within call, as it were, in a sort of +anteroom that led out of my lady's own sitting-room, on the opposite +side to the drawing-room door. To fancy the house, you must take a +great square and halve it by a line: at one end of this line was the +hall-door, or public entrance; at the opposite the private entrance +from a terrace, which was terminated at one end by a sort of postern +door in an old gray stone wall, beyond which lay the farm buildings +and offices; so that people could come in this way to my lady on +business, while, if she were going into the garden from her own room, +she had nothing to do but to pass through Mrs. Medlicott's apartment, +out into the lesser hall, and then turning to the right as she passed +on to the terrace, she could go down the flight of broad, shallow +steps at the corner of the house into the lovely garden, with +stretching, sweeping lawns, and gay flower-beds, and beautiful, bossy +laurels, and other blooming or massy shrubs, with full-grown beeches, +or larches feathering down to the ground a little farther off. The +whole was set in a frame, as it were, by the more distant woodlands. +The house had been modernized in the days of Queen Anne, I think; but +the money had fallen short that was requisite to carry out all the +improvements, so it was only the suite of withdrawing-rooms and the +terrace-rooms, as far as the private entrance, that had the new, +long, high windows put in, and these were old enough by this time to +be draped with roses, and honeysuckles, and pyracanthus, winter and +summer long. + +Well, to go back to that day when I limped into my lady's sitting- +room, trying hard to look as if I had not been crying, and not to +walk as if I was in much pain. I do not know whether my lady saw how +near my tears were to my eyes, but she told me she had sent for me, +because she wanted some help in arranging the drawers of her bureau, +and asked me--just as if it was a favour I was to do her--if I could +sit down in the easy-chair near the window--(all quietly arranged +before I came in, with a footstool, and a table quite near)--and +assist her. You will wonder, perhaps, why I was not bidden to sit or +lie on the sofa; but (although I found one there a morning or two +afterwards, when I came down) the fact was, that there was none in +the room at this time. I have even fancied that the easy-chair was +brought in on purpose for me; for it was not the chair in which I +remembered my lady sitting the first time I saw her. That chair was +very much carved and gilded, with a countess' coronet at the top. I +tried it one day, some time afterwards, when my lady was out of the +room, and I had a fancy for seeing how I could move about, and very +uncomfortable it was. Now my chair (as I learnt to call it, and to +think it) was soft and luxurious, and seemed somehow to give one's +body rest just in that part where one most needed it. + +I was not at my ease that first day, nor indeed for many days +afterwards, notwithstanding my chair was so comfortable. Yet I +forgot my sad pain in silently wondering over the meaning of many of +the things we turned out of those curious old drawers. I was puzzled +to know why some were kept at all; a scrap of writing maybe, with +only half a dozen common-place words written on it, or a bit of +broken riding-whip, and here and there a stone, of which I thought I +could have picked up twenty just as good in the first walk I took. +But it seems that was just my ignorance; for my lady told me they +were pieces of valuable marble, used to make the floors of the great +Roman emperors palaces long ago; and that when she had been a girl, +and made the grand tour long ago, her cousin Sir Horace Mann, the +Ambassador or Envoy at Florence, had told her to be sure to go into +the fields inside the walls of ancient Rome, when the farmers were +preparing the ground for the onion-sowing, and had to make the soil +fine, and pick up what bits of marble she could find. She had done +so, and meant to have had them made into a table; but somehow that +plan fell through, and there they were with all the dirt out of the +onion-field upon them; but once when I thought of cleaning them with +soap and water, at any rate, she bade me not to do so, for it was +Roman dirt--earth, I think, she called it--but it was dirt all the +same. + +Then, in this bureau, were many other things, the value of which I +could understand--locks of hair carefully ticketed, which my lady +looked at very sadly; and lockets and bracelets with miniatures in +them,--very small pictures to what they make now-a-days, and called +miniatures: some of them had even to be looked at through a +microscope before you could see the individual expression of the +faces, or how beautifully they were painted. I don't think that +looking at these made may lady seem so melancholy, as the seeing and +touching of the hair did. But, to be sure, the hair was, as it were, +a part of some beloved body which she might never touch and caress +again, but which lay beneath the turf, all faded and disfigured, +except perhaps the very hair, from which the lock she held had been +dissevered; whereas the pictures were but pictures after all-- +likenesses, but not the very things themselves. This is only my own +conjecture, mind. My lady rarely spoke out her feelings. For, to +begin with, she was of rank: and I have heard her say that people of +rank do not talk about their feelings except to their equals, and +even to them they conceal them, except upon rare occasions. +Secondly,--and this is my own reflection,--she was an only child and +an heiress; and as such was more apt to think than to talk, as all +well-brought-up heiresses must be. I think. Thirdly, she had long +been a widow, without any companion of her own age with whom it would +have been natural for her to refer to old associations, past +pleasures, or mutual sorrows. Mrs. Medlicott came nearest to her as +a companion of this sort; and her ladyship talked more to Mrs. +Medlicott, in a kind of familiar way, than she did to all the rest of +the household put together. But Mrs. Medlicott was silent by nature, +and did not reply at any great length. Adams, indeed, was the only +one who spoke much to Lady Ludlow. + +After we had worked away about an hour at the bureau, her ladyship +said we had done enough for one day; and as the time was come for her +afternoon ride, she left me, with a volume of engravings from Mr. +Hogarth's pictures on one side of me (I don't like to write down the +names of them, though my lady thought nothing of it, I am sure), and +upon a stand her great prayer-book open at the evening psalms for the +day, on the other. But as soon as she was gone, I troubled myself +little with either, but amused myself with looking round the room at +my leisure. The side on which the fire-place stood was all +panelled,--part of the old ornaments of the house, for there was an +Indian paper with birds and beasts and insects on it, on all the +other sides. There were coats of arms, of the various families with +whom the Hanburys had intermarried, all over these panels, and up and +down the ceiling as well. There was very little looking-glass in the +room, though one of the great drawing-rooms was called the "Mirror +Room," because it was lined with glass, which my lady's great- +grandfather had brought from Venice when he was ambassador there. +There were china jars of all shapes and sizes round and about the +room, and some china monsters, or idols, of which I could never bear +the sight, they were so ugly, though I think my lady valued them more +than all. There was a thick carpet on the middle of the floor, which +was made of small pieces of rare wood fitted into a pattern; the +doors were opposite to each other, and were composed of two heavy +tall wings, and opened in the middle, moving on brass grooves +inserted into the floor--they would not have opened over a carpet. +There were two windows reaching up nearly to the ceiling, but very +narrow and with deep window-seats in the thickness of the wall. The +room was full of scent, partly from the flowers outside, and partly +from the great jars of pot-pourri inside. The choice of odours was +what my lady piqued herself upon, saying nothing showed birth like a +keen susceptibility of smell. We never named musk in her presence, +her antipathy to it was so well understood through the household: +her opinion on the subject was believed to be, that no scent derived +from an animal could ever be of a sufficiently pure nature to give +pleasure to any person of good family, where, of course, the delicate +perception of the senses had been cultivated for generations. She +would instance the way in which sportsmen preserve the breed of dogs +who have shown keen scent; and how such gifts descend for generations +amongst animals, who cannot be supposed to have anything of ancestral +pride, or hereditary fancies about them. Musk, then, was never +mentioned at Hanbury Court. No more were bergamot or southern-wood, +although vegetable in their nature. She considered these two latter +as betraying a vulgar taste in the person who chose to gather or wear +them. She was sorry to notice sprigs of them in the button-hole of +any young man in whom she took an interest, either because he was +engaged to a servant of hers or otherwise, as he came out of church +on a Sunday afternoon. She was afraid that he liked coarse +pleasures; and I am not sure if she did not think that his preference +for these coarse sweetnesses did not imply a probability that he +would take to drinking. But she distinguished between vulgar and +common. Violets, pinks, and sweetbriar were common enough; roses and +mignionette, for those who had gardens, honeysuckle for those who +walked along the bowery lanes; but wearing them betrayed no vulgarity +of taste: the queen upon her throne might be glad to smell at a +nosegay of the flowers. A beau-pot (as we called it) of pinks and +roses freshly gathered was placed every morning that they were in +bloom on my lady's own particular table. For lasting vegetable +odours she preferred lavender and sweet-woodroof to any extract +whatever. Lavender reminded her of old customs, she said, and of +homely cottage-gardens, and many a cottager made his offering to her +of a bundle of lavender. Sweet woodroof, again, grew in wild, +woodland places where the soil was fine and the air delicate: the +poor children used to go and gather it for her up in the woods on the +higher lands; and for this service she always rewarded them with +bright new pennies, of which my lord, her son, used to send her down +a bagful fresh from the Mint in London every February. + +Attar of roses, again, she disliked. She said it reminded her of the +city and of merchants' wives, over-rich, over-heavy in its perfume. +And lilies-of-the-valley somehow fell under the same condemnation. +They were most graceful and elegant to look at (my lady was quite +candid about this), flower, leaf, colour--everything was refined +about them but the smell. That was too strong. But the great +hereditary faculty on which my lady piqued herself, and with reason, +for I never met with any person who possessed it, was the power she +had of perceiving the delicious odour arising from a bed of +strawberries in the late autumn, when the leaves were all fading and +dying. "Bacon's Essays" was one of the few books that lay about in +my lady's room; and if you took it up and opened it carelessly, it +was sure to fall apart at his "Essay on Gardens." "Listen," her +ladyship would say, "to what that great philosopher and statesman +says. 'Next to that,'--he is speaking of violets, my dear,--'is the +musk-rose,'--of which you remember the great bush, at the corner of +the south wall just by the Blue Drawing-room windows; that is the old +musk-rose, Shakespeare's musk-rose, which is dying out through the +kingdom now. But to return to my Lord Bacon: 'Then the strawberry +leaves, dying with a most excellent cordial smell.' Now the Hanburys +can always smell this excellent cordial odour, and very delicious and +refreshing it is. You see, in Lord Bacon's time, there had not been +so many intermarriages between the court and the city as there have +been since the needy days of his Majesty Charles the Second; and +altogether in the time of Queen Elizabeth, the great, old families of +England were a distinct race, just as a cart-horse is one creature, +and very useful in its place, and Childers or Eclipse is another +creature, though both are of the same species. So the old families +have gifts and powers of a different and higher class to what the +other orders have. My dear, remember that you try if you can smell +the scent of dying strawberry-leaves in this next autumn. You have +some of Ursula Hanbury's blood in you, and that gives you a chance." + +But when October came, I sniffed and sniffed, and all to no purpose; +and my lady--who had watched the little experiment rather anxiously-- +had to give me up as a hybrid. I was mortified, I confess, and +thought that it was in some ostentation of her own powers that she +ordered the gardener to plant a border of strawberries on that side +of the terrace that lay under her windows. + +I have wandered away from time and place. I tell you all the +remembrances I have of those years just as they come up, and I hope +that, in my old age, I am not getting too like a certain Mrs. +Nickleby, whose speeches were once read out aloud to me. + +I came by degrees to be all day long in this room which I have been +describing; sometimes sitting in the easy-chair, doing some little +piece of dainty work for my lady, or sometimes arranging flowers, or +sorting letters according to their handwriting, so that she could +arrange them afterwards, and destroy or keep, as she planned, looking +ever onward to her death. Then, after the sofa was brought in, she +would watch my face, and if she saw my colour change, she would bid +me lie down and rest. And I used to try to walk upon the terrace +every day for a short time: it hurt me very much, it is true, but +the doctor had ordered it, and I knew her ladyship wished me to obey. + +Before I had seen the background of a great lady's life, I had +thought it all play and fine doings. But whatever other grand people +are, my lady was never idle. For one thing, she had to superintend +the agent for the large Hanbury estate. I believe it was mortgaged +for a sum of money which had gone to improve the late lord's Scotch +lands; but she was anxious to pay off this before her death, and so +to leave her own inheritance free of incumbrance to her son, the +present Earl; whom, I secretly think, she considered a greater +person, as being the heir of the Hanburys (though through a female +line), than as being my Lord Ludlow with half a dozen other minor +titles. + +With this wish of releasing her property from the mortgage, skilful +care was much needed in the management of it; and as far as my lady +could go, she took every pains. She had a great book, in which every +page was ruled into three divisions; on the first column was written +the date and the name of the tenant who addressed any letter on +business to her; on the second was briefly stated the subject of the +letter, which generally contained a request of some kind. This +request would be surrounded and enveloped in so many words, and often +inserted amidst so many odd reasons and excuses, that Mr. Horner (the +steward) would sometimes say it was like hunting through a bushel of +chaff to find a grain of wheat. Now, in the second column of this +book, the grain of meaning was placed, clean and dry, before her +ladyship every morning. She sometimes would ask to see the original +letter; sometimes she simply answered the request by a "Yes," or a +"No;" and often she would send for lenses and papers, and examine +them well, with Mr. Horner at her elbow, to see if such petitions, as +to be allowed to plough up pasture fields, were provided for in the +terms of the original agreement. On every Thursday she made herself +at liberty to see her tenants, from four to six in the afternoon. +Mornings would have suited my lady better, as far as convenience +went, and I believe the old custom had been to have these levees (as +her ladyship used to call them) held before twelve. But, as she said +to Mr. Horner, when he urged returning to the former hours, it spoilt +a whole day for a farmer, if he had to dress himself in his best and +leave his work in the forenoon (and my lady liked to see her tenants +come in their Sunday clothes; she would not say a word, maybe, but +she would take her spectacles slowly out, and put them on with silent +gravity, and look at a dirty or raggedly-dressed man so solemnly and +earnestly, that his nerves must have been pretty strong if he did not +wince, and resolve that, however poor he might be, soap and water, +and needle and thread, should be used before he again appeared in her +ladyship's anteroom). The out-lying tenants had always a supper +provided for them in the servants'-hall on Thursdays, to which, +indeed all comers were welcome to sit down. For my lady said, though +there were not many hours left of a working man's day when their +business with her was ended, yet that they needed food and rest, and +that she should be ashamed if they sought either at the Fighting Lion +(called at this day the Hanbury Arms). They had as much beer as they +could drink while they were eating; and when the food was cleared +away, they had a cup a-piece of good ale, in which the oldest tenant +present, standing up, gave Madam's health; and after that was drunk, +they were expected to set off homewards; at any rate, no more liquor +was given them. The tenants one and all called her "Madam;" for they +recognized in her the married heiress of the Hanburys, not the widow +of a Lord Ludlow, of whom they and their forefathers knew nothing; +and against whose memory, indeed, there rankled a dim unspoken +grudge, the cause of which was accurately known to the very few who +understood the nature of a mortgage, and were therefore aware that +Madam's money had been taken to enrich my lord's poor land in +Scotland. I am sure--for you can understand I was behind the scenes, +as it were, and had many an opportunity of seeing and hearing, as I +lay or sat motionless in my lady's room with the double doors open +between it and the anteroom beyond, where Lady Ludlow saw her +steward, and gave audience to her tenants,--I am certain, I say, that +Mr. Horner was silently as much annoyed at the money that was +swallowed up by this mortgage as any one; and, some time or other, he +had probably spoken his mind out to my lady; for there was a sort of +offended reference on her part, and respectful submission to blame on +his, while every now and then there was an implied protest--whenever +the payments of the interest became due, or whenever my lady stinted +herself of any personal expense, such as Mr. Horner thought was only +decorous and becoming in the heiress of the Hanburys. Her carriages +were old and cumbrous, wanting all the improvements which had been +adopted by those of her rank throughout the county. Mr. Horner would +fain have had the ordering of a new coach. The carriage-horses, too, +were getting past their work; yet all the promising colts bred on the +estate were sold for ready money; and so on. My lord, her son, was +ambassador at some foreign place; and very proud we all were of his +glory and dignity; but I fancy it cost money, and my lady would have +lived on bread and water sooner than have called upon him to help her +in paying off the mortgage, although he was the one who was to +benefit by it in the end. + +Mr. Horner was a very faithful steward, and very respectful to my +lady; although sometimes, I thought she was sharper to him than to +any one else; perhaps because she knew that, although he never said +anything, he disapproved of the Hanburys being made to pay for the +Earl Ludlow's estates and state. + +The late lord had been a sailor, and had been as extravagant in his +habits as most sailors are, I am told,--for I never saw the sea; and +yet he had a long sight to his own interests; but whatever he was, my +lady loved him and his memory, with about as fond and proud a love as +ever wife gave husband, I should think. + +For a part of his life Mr. Horner, who was born on the Hanbury +property, had been a clerk to an attorney in Birmingham; and these +few years had given him a kind of worldly wisdom, which, though +always exerted for her benefit, was antipathetic to her ladyship, who +thought that some of her steward's maxims savoured of trade and +commerce. I fancy that if it had been possible, she would have +preferred a return to the primitive system, of living on the produce +of the land, and exchanging the surplus for such articles as were +needed, without the intervention of money. + +But Mr. Horner was bitten with new-fangled notions, as she would say, +though his new-fangled notions were what folk at the present day +would think sadly behindhand; and some of Mr. Gray's ideas fell on +Mr. Horner's mind like sparks on tow, though they started from two +different points. Mr. Horner wanted to make every man useful and +active in this world, and to direct as much activity and usefulness +as possible to the improvement of the Hanbury estates, and the +aggrandisement of the Hanbury family, and therefore he fell into the +new cry for education. + +Mr. Gray did not care much,--Mr. Horner thought not enough,--for this +world, and where any man or family stood in their earthly position; +but he would have every one prepared for the world to come, and +capable of understanding and receiving certain doctrines, for which +latter purpose, it stands to reason, he must have heard of these +doctrines; and therefore Mr. Gray wanted education. The answer in +the Catechism that Mr. Horner was most fond of calling upon a child +to repeat, was that to, "What is thy duty towards thy neighbour?" +The answer Mr. Gray liked best to hear repeated with unction, was +that to the question, "What is the inward and spiritual grace?" The +reply to which Lady Ludlow bent her head the lowest, as we said our +Catechism to her on Sundays, was to, "What is thy duty towards God?" +But neither Mr. Horner nor Mr. Gray had heard many answers to the +Catechism as yet. + +Up to this time there was no Sunday-school in Hanbury. Mr. Gray's +desires were bounded by that object. Mr. Horner looked farther on: +he hoped for a day-school at some future time, to train up +intelligent labourers for working on the estate. My lady would hear +of neither one nor the other: indeed, not the boldest man whom she +ever saw would have dared to name the project of a day-school within +her hearing. + +So Mr. Horner contented himself with quietly teaching a sharp, clever +lad to read and write, with a view to making use of him as a kind of +foreman in process of time. He had his pick of the farm-lads for +this purpose; and, as the brightest and sharpest, although by far the +raggedest and dirtiest, singled out Job Gregson's son. But all this- +-as my lady never listened to gossip, or indeed, was spoken to unless +she spoke first--was quite unknown to her, until the unlucky incident +took place which I am going to relate. + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + + +I think my lady was not aware of Mr. Horner's views on education (as +making men into more useful members of society), or the practice to +which he was putting his precepts in taking Harry Gregson as pupil +and protege; if, indeed, she were aware of Harry's distinct existence +at all, until the following unfortunate occasion. The ante-room, +which was a kind of business-place for my lady to receive her steward +and tenants in, was surrounded by shelves. I cannot call them book- +shelves, though there were many books on them; but the contents of +the volumes were principally manuscript, and relating to details +connected with the Hanbury property. There were also one or two +dictionaries, gazetteers, works of reference on the management of +property; all of a very old date (the dictionary was Bailey's, I +remember; we had a great Johnson in my lady's room, but where +lexicographers differed, she generally preferred Bailey). + +In this antechamber a footman generally sat, awaiting orders from my +lady; for she clung to the grand old customs, and despised any bells, +except her own little hand-bell, as modern inventions; she would have +her people always within summons of this silvery bell, or her scarce +less silvery voice. This man had not the sinecure you might imagine. +He had to reply to the private entrance; what we should call the back +door in a smaller house. As none came to the front door but my lady, +and those of the county whom she honoured by visiting, and her +nearest acquaintance of this kind lived eight miles (of bad road) +off, the majority of comers knocked at the nail-studded terrace-door; +not to have it opened (for open it stood, by my lady's orders, winter +and summer, so that the snow often drifted into the back hall, and +lay there in heaps when the weather was severe), but to summon some +one to receive their message, or carry their request to be allowed to +speak to my lady. I remember it was long before Mr. Gray could be +made to understand that the great door was only open on state +occasions, and even to the last he would as soon come in by that as +the terrace entrance. I had been received there on my first setting +foot over my lady's threshold; every stranger was led in by that way +the first time they came; but after that (with the exceptions I have +named) they went round by the terrace, as it were by instinct. It +was an assistance to this instinct to be aware that from time +immemorial, the magnificent and fierce Hanbury wolf-hounds, which +were extinct in every other part of the island, had been and still +were kept chained in the front quadrangle, where they bayed through a +great part of the day and night and were always ready with their +deep, savage growl at the sight of every person and thing, excepting +the man who fed them, my lady's carriage and four, and my lady +herself. It was pretty to see her small figure go up to the great, +crouching brutes thumping the flags with their heavy, wagging tails, +and slobbering in an ecstacy of delight, at her light approach and +soft caress. She had no fear of them; but she was a Hanbury born, +and the tale went, that they and their kind knew all Hanburys +instantly, and acknowledged their supremacy, ever since the ancestors +of the breed had been brought from the East by the great Sir Urian +Hanbury, who lay with his legs crossed on the altar-tomb in the +church. Moreover, it was reported that, not fifty years before, one +of these dogs had eaten up a child, which had inadvertently strayed +within reach of its chain. So you may imagine how most people +preferred the terrace-door. Mr. Gray did not seem to care for the +dogs. It might be absence of mind, for I have heard of his starting +away from their sudden spring when he had unwittingly walked within +reach of their chains: but it could hardly have been absence of +mind, when one day he went right up to one of them, and patted him in +the most friendly manner, the dog meanwhile looking pleased, and +affably wagging his tail, just as if Mr. Gray had been a Hanbury. We +were all very much puzzled by this, and to this day I have not been +able to account for it. + +But now let us go back to the terrace-door, and the footman sitting +in the antechamber. + +One morning we heard a parleying, which rose to such a vehemence, and +lasted for so long, that my lady had to ring her hand-bell twice +before the footman heard it. + +"What is the matter, John?" asked she, when he entered, + +"A little boy, my lady, who says he comes from Mr. Horner, and must +see your ladyship. Impudent little lad!" (This last to himself.) + +"What does he want?" + +"That's just what I have asked him, my lady, but he won't tell me, +please your ladyship." + +"It is, probably, some message from Mr. Horner," said Lady Ludlow, +with just a shade of annoyance in her manner; for it was against all +etiquette to send a message to her, and by such a messenger too! + +"No! please your ladyship, I asked him if he had any message, and he +said no, he had none; but he must see your ladyship for all that." + +"You had better show him in then, without more words," said her +ladyship, quietly, but still, as I have said, rather annoyed. + +As if in mockery of the humble visitor, the footman threw open both +battants of the door, and in the opening there stood a lithe, wiry +lad, with a thick head of hair, standing out in every direction, as +if stirred by some electrical current, a short, brown face, red now +from affright and excitement, wide, resolute mouth, and bright, deep- +set eyes, which glanced keenly and rapidly round the room, as if +taking in everything (and all was new and strange), to be thought and +puzzled over at some future time. He knew enough of manners not to +speak first to one above him in rank, or else he was afraid. + +"What do you want with me?" asked my lady; in so gentle a tone that +it seemed to surprise and stun him. + +"An't please your ladyship?" said he, as if he had been deaf. + +"You come from Mr. Horner's: why do you want to see me?" again asked +she, a little more loudly. + +"An't please your ladyship, Mr. Horner was sent for all on a sudden +to Warwick this morning." + +His face began to work; but he felt it, and closed his lips into a +resolute form. + +"Well?" + +"And he went off all on a sudden like." + +"Well?" + +"And he left a note for your ladyship with me, your ladyship." + +"Is that all? You might have given it to the footman." + +"Please your ladyship, I've clean gone and lost it." + +He never took his eyes off her face. If he had not kept his look +fixed, he would have burst out crying. + +"That was very careless," said my lady gently. "But I am sure you +are very sorry for it. You had better try and find it; it may have +been of consequence. + +"Please, mum--please your ladyship--I can say it off by heart." + +"You! What do you mean?" I was really afraid now. My lady's blue +eyes absolutely gave out light, she was so much displeased, and, +moreover, perplexed. The more reason he had for affright, the more +his courage rose. He must have seen,--so sharp a lad must have +perceived her displeasure; but he went on quickly and steadily. + +"Mr. Horner, my lady, has taught me to read, write, and cast +accounts, my lady. And he was in a hurry, and he folded his paper +up, but he did not seal it; and I read it, my lady; and now, my lady, +it seems like as if I had got it off by heart;" and he went on with a +high pitched voice, saying out very loud what, I have no doubt, were +the identical words of the letter, date, signature and all: it was +merely something about a deed, which required my lady's signature. + +When he had done, he stood almost as if he expected commendation for +his accurate memory. + +My lady's eyes contracted till the pupils were as needle-points; it +was a way she had when much disturbed. She looked at me and said - + +"Margaret Dawson, what will this world come to?" And then she was +silent. + +The lad, beginning to perceive he had given deep offence, stood stock +still--as if his brave will had brought him into this presence, and +impelled him to confession, and the best amends he could make, but +had now deserted him, or was extinct, and left his body motionless, +until some one else with word or deed made him quit the room. My +lady looked again at him, and saw the frowning, dumb-foundering +terror at his misdeed, and the manner in which his confession had +been received. + +"My poor lad!" said she, the angry look leaving her face, "into whose +hands have you fallen?" + +The boy's lips began to quiver. + +"Don't you know what tree we read of in Genesis?--No! I hope you +have not got to read so easily as that." A pause. "Who has taught +you to read and write?" + +"Please, my lady, I meant no harm, my lady." He was fairly +blubbering, overcome by her evident feeling of dismay and regret, the +soft repression of which was more frightening to him than any strong +or violent words would have been. + +"Who taught you, I ask?" + +"It were Mr. Horner's clerk who learned me, my lady." + +"And did Mr. Horner know of it?" + +"Yes, my lady. And I am sure I thought for to please him." + +"Well! perhaps you were not to blame for that. But I wonder at Mr. +Horner. However, my boy, as you have got possession of edge-tools, +you must have some rules how to use them. Did you never hear that +you were not to open letters?" + +"Please, my lady, it were open. Mr. Horner forgot for to seal it, in +his hurry to be off." + +"But you must not read letters that are not intended for you. You +must never try to read any letters that are not directed to you, even +if they be open before you." + +"Please, may lady, I thought it were good for practice, all as one as +a book." + +My lady looked bewildered as to what way she could farther explain to +him the laws of honour as regarded letters. + +"You would not listen, I am sure," said she, "to anything you were +not intended to hear?" + +He hesitated for a moment, partly because he did not fully comprehend +the question. My lady repeated it. The light of intelligence came +into his eager eyes, and I could see that he was not certain if he +could tell the truth. + +"Please, my lady, I always hearken when I hear folk talking secrets; +but I mean no harm." + +My poor lady sighed: she was not prepared to begin a long way off in +morals. Honour was, to her, second nature, and she had never tried +to find out on what principle its laws were based. So, telling the +lad that she wished to see Mr. Horner when he returned from Warwick, +she dismissed him with a despondent look; he, meanwhile, right glad +to be out of the awful gentleness of her presence. + +"What is to be done?" said she, half to herself and half to me. I +could not answer, for I was puzzled myself. + +"It was a right word," she continued, "that I used, when I called +reading and writing 'edge-tools.' If our lower orders have these +edge-tools given to them, we shall have the terrible scenes of the +French Revolution acted over again in England. When I was a girl, +one never heard of the rights of men, one only heard of the duties. +Now, here was Mr. Gray, only last night, talking of the right every +child had to instruction. I could hardly keep my patience with him, +and at length we fairly came to words; and I told him I would have no +such thing as a Sunday-school (or a Sabbath-school, as he calls it, +just like a Jew) in my village." + +"And what did he say, my lady?" I asked; for the struggle that seemed +now to have come to a crisis, had been going on for some time in a +quiet way. + +"Why, he gave way to temper, and said he was bound to remember, he +was under the bishop's authority, not under mine; and implied that he +should persevere in his designs, notwithstanding my expressed +opinion." + +"And your ladyship--" I half inquired. + +"I could only rise and curtsey, and civilly dismiss him. When two +persons have arrived at a certain point of expression on a subject, +about which they differ as materially as I do from Mr. Gray, the +wisest course, if they wish to remain friends, is to drop the +conversation entirely and suddenly. It is one of the few cases where +abruptness is desirable." + +I was sorry for Mr. Gray. He had been to see me several times, and +had helped me to bear my illness in a better spirit than I should +have done without his good advice and prayers. And I had gathered +from little things he said, how much his heart was set upon this new +scheme. I liked him so much, and I loved and respected my lady so +well, that I could not bear them to be on the cool terms to which +they were constantly getting. Yet I could do nothing but keep +silence. + +I suppose my lady understood something of what was passing in my +mind; for, after a minute or two, she went on:- + +"If Mr. Gray knew all I know,--if he had my experience, he would not +be so ready to speak of setting up his new plans in opposition to my +judgment. Indeed," she continued, lashing herself up with her own +recollections, "times are changed when the parson of a village comes +to beard the liege lady in her own house. Why, in my grandfather's +days, the parson was family chaplain too, and dined at the Hall every +Sunday. He was helped last, and expected to have done first. I +remember seeing him take up his plate and knife and fork, and say +with his mouth full all the time he was speaking: 'If you please, +Sir Urian, and my lady, I'll follow the beef into the housekeeper's +room;' for you see, unless he did so, he stood no chance of a second +helping. A greedy man, that parson was, to be sure! I recollect his +once eating up the whole of some little bird at dinner, and by way of +diverting attention from his greediness, he told how he had heard +that a rook soaked in vinegar and then dressed in a particular way, +could not be distinguished from the bird he was then eating. I saw +by the grim look of my grandfather's face that the parson's doing and +saying displeased him; and, child as I was, I had some notion of what +was coming, when, as I was riding out on my little, white pony, by my +grandfather's side, the next Friday, he stopped one of the +gamekeepers, and bade him shoot one of the oldest rooks he could +find. I knew no more about it till Sunday, when a dish was set right +before the parson, and Sir Urian said: 'Now, Parson Hemming, I have +had a rook shot, and soaked in vinegar, and dressed as you described +last Sunday. Fall to, man, and eat it with as good an appetite as +you had last Sunday. Pick the bones clean, or by--, no more Sunday +dinners shall you eat at my table!' I gave one look at poor Mr. +Hemming's face, as he tried to swallow the first morsel, and make +believe as though he thought it very good; but I could not look +again, for shame, although my grandfather laughed, and kept asking us +all round if we knew what could have become of the parson's +appetite." + +"And did he finish it?" I asked. + +"O yes, my dear. What my grandfather said was to be done, was done +always. He was a terrible man in his anger! But to think of the +difference between Parson Hemming and Mr. Gray! or even of poor dear +Mr. Mountford and Mr. Gray. Mr. Mountford would never have withstood +me as Mr. Gray did!" + +"And your ladyship really thinks that it would not be right to have a +Sunday-school?" I asked, feeling very timid as I put time question. + +"Certainly not. As I told Mr. Gray. I consider a knowledge of the +Creed, and of the Lord's Prayer, as essential to salvation; and that +any child may have, whose parents bring it regularly to church. Then +there are the Ten Commandments, which teach simple duties in the +plainest language. Of course, if a lad is taught to read and write +(as that unfortunate boy has been who was here this morning) his +duties become complicated, and his temptations much greater, while, +at the same time, he has no hereditary principles and honourable +training to serve as safeguards. I might take up my old simile of +the race-horse and cart-horse. I am distressed," continued she, with +a break in her ideas, "about that boy. The whole thing reminds me so +much of a story of what happened to a friend of mine--Clement de +Crequy. Did I ever tell you about him?" + +"No, your ladyship," I replied. + +"Poor Clement! More than twenty years ago, Lord Ludlow and I spent a +winter in Paris. He had many friends there; perhaps not very good or +very wise men, but he was so kind that he liked every one, and every +one liked him. We had an apartment, as they call it there, in the +Rue de Lille; we had the first-floor of a grand hotel, with the +basement for our servants. On the floor above us the owner of the +house lived, a Marquise de Crequy, a widow. They tell me that the +Crequy coat-of-arms is still emblazoned, after all these terrible +years, on a shield above the arched porte-cochere, just as it was +then, though the family is quite extinct. Madame de Crequy had only +one son, Clement, who was just the same age as my Urian--you may see +his portrait in the great hall--Urian's, I mean." I knew that Master +Urian had been drowned at sea; and often had I looked at the +presentment of his bonny hopeful face, in his sailor's dress, with +right hand outstretched to a ship on the sea in the distance, as if +he had just said, "Look at her! all her sails are set, and I'm just +off." Poor Master Urian! he went down in this very ship not a year +after the picture was taken! But now I will go back to my lady's +story. "I can see those two boys playing now," continued she, +softly, shutting her eyes, as if the better to call up the vision, +"as they used to do five-and-twenty years ago in those old-fashioned +French gardens behind our hotel. Many a time have I watched them +from my windows. It was, perhaps, a better play-place than an +English garden would have been, for there were but few flower-beds, +and no lawn at all to speak about; but, instead, terraces and +balustrades and vases and flights of stone steps more in the Italian +style; and there were jets-d'eau, and little fountains that could be +set playing by turning water-cocks that were hidden here and there. +How Clement delighted in turning the water on to surprise Urian, and +how gracefully he did the honours, as it were, to my dear, rough, +sailor lad! Urian was as dark as a gipsy boy, and cared little for +his appearance, and resisted all my efforts at setting off his black +eyes and tangled curls; but Clement, without ever showing that he +thought about himself and his dress, was always dainty and elegant, +even though his clothes were sometimes but threadbare. He used to be +dressed in a kind of hunter's green suit, open at the neck and half- +way down the chest to beautiful old lace frills; his long golden +curls fell behind just like a girl's, and his hair in front was cut +over his straight dark eyebrows in a line almost as straight. Urian +learnt more of a gentleman's carefulness and propriety of appearance +from that lad in two months than he had done in years from all my +lectures. I recollect one day, when the two boys were in full romp-- +and, my window being open, I could hear them perfectly--and Urian was +daring Clement to some scrambling or climbing, which Clement refused +to undertake, but in a hesitating way, as though he longed to do it +if some reason had not stood in the way; and at times, Urian, who was +hasty and thoughtless, poor fellow, told Clement that he was afraid. +'Fear!' said the French boy, drawing himself up; 'you do not know +what you say. If you will be here at six to-morrow morning, when it +is only just light, I will take that starling's nest on the top of +yonder chimney.' 'But why not now, Clement?' said Urian, putting his +arm round Clement's neck. 'Why then, and not now, just when we are +in the humour for it?' 'Because we De Crequys are poor, and my +mother cannot afford me another suit of clothes this year, and yonder +stone carving is all jagged, and would tear my coat and breeches. +Now, to-morrow morning I could go up with nothing on but an old +shirt.' + +"'But you would tear your legs.' + +"'My race do not care for pain,' said the boy, drawing himself from +Urian's arm, and walking a few steps away, with a becoming pride and +reserve; for he was hurt at being spoken to as if he were afraid, and +annoyed at having to confess the true reason for declining the feat. +But Urian was not to be thus baffled. He went up to Clement, and put +his arm once more about his neck, and I could see the two lads as +they walked down the terrace away from the hotel windows: first +Urian spoke eagerly, looking with imploring fondness into Clement's +face, which sought the ground, till at last the French boy spoke, and +by-and-by his arm was round Urian too, and they paced backwards and +forwards in deep talk, but gravely, as became men, rather than boys. + +"All at once, from the little chapel at the corner of the large +garden belonging to the Missions Etrangeres, I heard the tinkle of +the little bell, announcing the elevation of the host. Down on his +knees went Clement, hands crossed, eyes bent down: while Urian stood +looking on in respectful thought. + +"What a friendship that might have been! I never dream of Urian +without seeing Clement too--Urian speaks to me, or does something,-- +but Clement only flits round Urian, and never seems to see any one +else!" + +"But I must not forget to tell you, that the next morning, before he +was out of his room, a footman of Madame de Crequy's brought Urian +the starling's nest." + +"Well! we came back to England, and the boys were to correspond; and +Madame de Crequy and I exchanged civilities; and Urian went to sea." + +"After that, all seemed to drop away. I cannot tell you all. +However, to confine myself to the De Crequys. I had a letter from +Clement; I knew he felt his friend's death deeply; but I should never +have learnt it from the letter he sent. It was formal, and seemed +like chaff to my hungering heart. Poor fellow! I dare say he had +found it hard to write. What could he--or any one--say to a mother +who has lost her child? The world does not think so, and, in +general, one must conform to the customs of the world; but, judging +from my own experience, I should say that reverent silence at such +times is the tenderest balm. Madame de Crequy wrote too. But I knew +she could not feel my loss so much as Clement, and therefore her +letter was not such a disappointment. She and I went on being civil +and polite in the way of commissions, and occasionally introducing +friends to each other, for a year or two, and then we ceased to have +any intercourse. Then the terrible Revolution came. No one who did +not live at those times can imagine the daily expectation of news-- +the hourly terror of rumours affecting the fortunes and lives of +those whom most of us had known as pleasant hosts, receiving us with +peaceful welcome in their magnificent houses. Of course, there was +sin enough and suffering enough behind the scenes; but we English +visitors to Paris had seen little or nothing of that,--and I had +sometimes thought, indeed, how even death seemed loth to choose his +victims out of that brilliant throng whom I had known. Madame de +Crequy's one boy lived; while three out of my six were gone since we +had met! I do not think all lots are equal, even now that I know the +end of her hopes; but I do say that whatever our individual lot is, +it is our duty to accept it, without comparing it with that of +others. + +"The times were thick with gloom and terror. 'What next?' was the +question we asked of every one who brought us news from Paris. Where +were these demons hidden when, so few years ago, we danced and +feasted, and enjoyed the brilliant salons and the charming +friendships of Paris? + +"One evening, I was sitting alone in Saint James's Square; my lord +off at the club with Mr. Fox and others: he had left me, thinking +that I should go to one of the many places to which I had been +invited for that evening; but I had no heart to go anywhere, for it +was poor Urian's birthday, and I had not even rung for lights, though +the day was fast closing in, but was thinking over all his pretty +ways, and on his warm affectionate nature, and how often I had been +too hasty in speaking to him, for all I loved him so dearly; and how +I seemed to have neglected and dropped his dear friend Clement, who +might even now be in need of help in that cruel, bloody Paris. I say +I was thinking reproachfully of all this, and particularly of Clement +de Crequy in connection with Urian, when Fenwick brought me a note, +sealed with a coat-of-arms I knew well, though I could not remember +at the moment where I had seen it. I puzzled over it, as one does +sometimes, for a minute or more, before I opened the letter. In a +moment I saw it was from Clement de Crequy. 'My mother is here,' he +said: 'she is very ill, and I am bewildered in this strange country. +May I entreat you to receive me for a few minutes?' The bearer of +the note was the woman of the house where they lodged. I had her +brought up into the anteroom, and questioned her myself, while my +carriage was being brought round. They had arrived in London a +fortnight or so before: she had not known their quality, judging +them (according to her kind) by their dress and their luggage; poor +enough, no doubt. The lady had never left her bedroom since her +arrival; the young man waited upon her, did everything for her, never +left her, in fact; only she (the messenger) had promised to stay +within call, as soon as she returned, while he went out somewhere. +She could hardly understand him, he spoke English so badly. He had +never spoken it, I dare say, since he had talked to my Urian." + + + +CHAPTER V. + + + +"In the hurry of the moment I scarce knew what I did. I bade the +housekeeper put up every delicacy she had, in order to tempt the +invalid, whom yet I hoped to bring back with me to our house. When +the carriage was ready I took the good woman with me to show us the +exact way, which my coachman professed not to know; for, indeed, they +were staying at but a poor kind of place at the back of Leicester +Square, of which they had heard, as Clement told me afterwards, from +one of the fishermen who had carried them across from the Dutch coast +in their disguises as a Friesland peasant and his mother. They had +some jewels of value concealed round their persons; but their ready +money was all spent before I saw them, and Clement had been unwilling +to leave his mother, even for the time necessary to ascertain the +best mode of disposing of the diamonds. For, overcome with distress +of mind and bodily fatigue, she had reached London only to take to +her bed in a sort of low, nervous fever, in which her chief and only +idea seemed to be that Clement was about to be taken from her to some +prison or other; and if he were out of her sight, though but for a +minute, she cried like a child, and could not be pacified or +comforted. The landlady was a kind, good woman, and though she but +half understood the case, she was truly sorry for them, as +foreigners, and the mother sick in a strange land. + +"I sent her forwards to request permission for my entrance. In a +moment I saw Clement--a tall, elegant young man, in a curious dress +of coarse cloth, standing at the open door of a room, and evidently-- +even before he accosted me--striving to soothe the terrors of his +mother inside. I went towards him, and would have taken his hand, +but he bent down and kissed mine. + +"'May I come in, madame?' I asked, looking at the poor sick lady, +lying in the dark, dingy bed, her head propped up on coarse and dirty +pillows, and gazing with affrighted eyes at all that was going on. + +"'Clement! Clement! come to me!' she cried; and when he went to the +bedside she turned on one side, and took his hand in both of hers, +and began stroking it, and looking up in his face. I could scarce +keep back my tears. + +"He stood there quite still, except that from time to time he spoke +to her in a low tone. At last I advanced into the room, so that I +could talk to him, without renewing her alarm. I asked for the +doctor's address; for I had heard that they had called in some one, +at their landlady's recommendation: but I could hardly understand +Clement's broken English, and mispronunciation of our proper names, +and was obliged to apply to the woman herself. I could not say much +to Clement, for his attention was perpetually needed by his mother, +who never seemed to perceive that I was there. But I told him not to +fear, however long I might be away, for that I would return before +night; and, bidding the woman take charge of all the heterogeneous +things the housekeeper had put up, and leaving one of my men in the +house, who could understand a few words of French, with directions +that he was to hold himself at Madame de Crequy's orders until I sent +or gave him fresh commands, I drove off to the doctor's. What I +wanted was his permission to remove Madame de Crequy to my own house, +and to learn how it best could be done; for I saw that every movement +in the room, every sound except Clement's voice, brought on a fresh +access of trembling and nervous agitation. + +"The doctor was, I should think, a clever man; but he had that kind +of abrupt manner which people get who have much to do with the lower +orders. + +"I told him the story of his patient, the interest I had in her, and +the wish I entertained of removing her to my own house. + +"'It can't be done,' said he. 'Any change will kill her.' + +"'But it must be done,' I replied. 'And it shall not kill her.' + +"'Then I have nothing more to say,' said he, turning away from the +carriage door, and making as though he would go back into the house. + +"'Stop a moment. You must help me; and, if you do, you shall have +reason to be glad, for I will give you fifty pounds down with +pleasure. If you won't do it, another shall.' + +"He looked at me, then (furtively) at the carriage, hesitated, and +then said: 'You do not mind expense, apparently. I suppose you are +a rich lady of quality. Such folks will not stick at such trifles as +the life or death of a sick woman to get their own way. I suppose I +must e'en help you, for if I don't, another will.' + +"I did not mind what he said, so that he would assist me. I was +pretty sure that she was in a state to require opiates; and I had not +forgotten Christopher Sly, you may be sure, so I told him what I had +in my head. That in the dead of night--the quiet time in the +streets,--she should be carried in a hospital litter, softly and +warmly covered over, from the Leicester Square lodging-house to rooms +that I would have in perfect readiness for her. As I planned, so it +was done. I let Clement know, by a note, of my design. I had all +prepared at home, and we walked about my house as though shod with +velvet, while the porter watched at the open door. At last, through +the darkness, I saw the lanterns carried by my men, who were leading +the little procession. The litter looked like a hearse; on one side +walked the doctor, on the other Clement; they came softly and swiftly +along. I could not try any farther experiment; we dared not change +her clothes; she was laid in the bed in the landlady's coarse night- +gear, and covered over warmly, and left in the shaded, scented room, +with a nurse and the doctor watching by her, while I led Clement to +the dressing-room adjoining, in which I had had a bed placed for him. +Farther than that he would not go; and there I had refreshments +brought. Meanwhile, he had shown his gratitude by every possible +action (for we none of us dared to speak): he had kneeled at my +feet, and kissed my hand, and left it wet with his tears. He had +thrown up his arms to Heaven, and prayed earnestly, as I could see by +the movement of his lips. I allowed him to relieve himself by these +dumb expressions, if I may so call them,--and then I left him, and +went to my own rooms to sit up for my lord, and tell him what I had +done. + +"Of course, it was all right; and neither my lord nor I could sleep +for wondering how Madame de Crequy would bear her awakening. I had +engaged the doctor, to whose face and voice she was accustomed, to +remain with her all night: the nurse was experienced, and Clement +was within call. But it was with the greatest relief that I heard +from my own woman, when she brought me my chocolate, that Madame de +Crequy (Monsieur had said) had awakened more tranquil than she had +been for many days. To be sure, the whole aspect of the bed-chamber +must have been more familiar to her than the miserable place where I +had found her, and she must have intuitively felt herself among +friends. + +"My lord was scandalized at Clement's dress, which, after the first +moment of seeing him I had forgotten, in thinking of other things, +and for which I had not prepared Lord Ludlow. He sent for his own +tailor, and bade him bring patterns of stuffs, and engage his men to +work night and day till Clement could appear as became his rank. In +short, in a few days so much of the traces of their flight were +removed, that we had almost forgotten the terrible causes of it, and +rather felt as if they had come on a visit to us than that they had +been compelled to fly their country. Their diamonds, too, were sold +well by my lord's agents, though the London shops were stocked with +jewellery, and such portable valuables, some of rare and curious +fashion, which were sold for half their real value by emigrants who +could not afford to wait. Madame de Crequy was recovering her +health, although her strength was sadly gone, and she would never be +equal to such another flight, as the perilous one which she had gone +through, and to which she could not bear the slightest reference. +For some time things continued in this state--the De Crequys still +our honoured visitors,--many houses besides our own, even among our +own friends, open to receive the poor flying nobility of France, +driven from their country by the brutal republicans, and every +freshly-arrived emigrant bringing new tales of horror, as if these +revolutionists were drunk with blood, and mad to devise new +atrocities. One day Clement--I should tell you he had been presented +to our good King George and the sweet Queen, and they had accosted +him most graciously, and his beauty and elegance, and some of the +circumstances attendant on his flight, made him be received in the +world quite like a hero of romance; he might have been on intimate +terms in many a distinguished house, had he cared to visit much; but +he accompanied my lord and me with an air of indifference and +languor, which I sometimes fancied made him be all the more sought +after: Monkshaven (that was the title my eldest son bore) tried in +vain to interest him in all young men's sports. But no! it was the +same through all. His mother took far more interest in the on-dits +of the London world, into which she was far too great an invalid to +venture, than he did in the absolute events themselves, in which he +might have been an actor. One day, as I was saying, an old Frenchman +of a humble class presented himself to our servants, several of them, +understood French; and through Medlicott, I learnt that he was in +some way connected with the De Crequys; not with their Paris-life; +but I fancy he had been intendant of their estates in the country; +estates which were more useful as hunting-grounds than as adding to +their income. However, there was the old man and with him, wrapped +round his person, he had brought the long parchment rolls, and deeds +relating to their property. These he would deliver up to none but +Monsieur de Crequy, the rightful owner; and Clement was out with +Monkshaven, so the old man waited; and when Clement came in, I told +him of the steward's arrival, and how he had been cared for by my +people. Clement went directly to see him. He was a long time away, +and I was waiting for him to drive out with me, for some purpose or +another, I scarce know what, but I remember I was tired of waiting, +and was just in the act of ringing the bell to desire that he might +be reminded of his engagement with me, when he came in, his face as +white as the powder in his hair, his beautiful eyes dilated with +horror. I saw that he had heard something that touched him even more +closely than the usual tales which every fresh emigrant brought. + +"'What is it, Clement?' I asked. + +"He clasped his hands, and looked as though he tried to speak, but +could not bring out the words. + +"'They have guillotined my uncle!' said he at last. Now, I knew that +there was a Count de Crequy; but I had always understood that the +elder branch held very little communication with him; in fact, that +he was a vaurien of some kind, and rather a disgrace than otherwise +to the family. So, perhaps, I was hard-hearted but I was a little +surprised at this excess of emotion, till I saw that peculiar look in +his eyes that many people have when there is more terror in their +hearts than they dare put into words. He wanted me to understand +something without his saying it; but how could I? I had never heard +of a Mademoiselle de Crequy. + +"'Virginie!' at last he uttered. In an instant I understood it all, +and remembered that, if Urian had lived, he too might have been in +love. + +"'Your uncle's daughter?' I inquired. + +"'My cousin,' he replied. + +"I did not say, 'your betrothed,' but I had no doubt of it. I was +mistaken, however. + +"'O madame!' he continued, 'her mother died long ago--her father now- +-and she is in daily fear,--alone, deserted--' + +"'Is she in the Abbaye?' asked I. + +"'No! she is in hiding with the widow of her father's old concierge. +Any day they may search the house for aristocrats. They are seeking +them everywhere. Then, not her life alone, but that of the old +woman, her hostess, is sacrificed. The old woman knows this, and +trembles with fear. Even if she is brave enough to be faithful, her +fears would betray her, should the house be searched. Yet, there is +no one to help Virginie to escape. She is alone in Paris.' + +"I saw what was in his mind. He was fretting and chafing to go to +his cousin's assistance; but the thought of his mother restrained +him. I would not have kept back Urian from such on errand at such a +time. How should I restrain him? And yet, perhaps, I did wrong in +not urging the chances of danger more. Still, if it was danger to +him, was it not the same or even greater danger to her?--for the +French spared neither age nor sex in those wicked days of terror. So +I rather fell in with his wish, and encouraged him to think how best +and most prudently it might be fulfilled; never doubting, as I have +said, that he and his cousin were troth-plighted. + +"But when I went to Madame de Crequy--after he had imparted his, or +rather our plan to her--I found out my mistake. She, who was in +general too feeble to walk across the room save slowly, and with a +stick, was going from end to end with quick, tottering steps; and, if +now and then she sank upon a chair, it seemed as if she could not +rest, for she was up again in a moment, pacing along, wringing her +hands, and speaking rapidly to herself. When she saw me, she +stopped: 'Madame,' she said, 'you have lost your own boy. You might +have left me mine.' + +"I was so astonished--I hardly knew what to say. I had spoken to +Clement as if his mother's consent were secure (as I had felt my own +would have been if Urian had been alive to ask it). Of coarse, both +he and I knew that his mother's consent must be asked and obtained, +before he could leave her to go on such an undertaking; but, somehow, +my blood always rose at the sight or sound of danger; perhaps, +because my life had been so peaceful. Poor Madame de Crequy! it was +otherwise with her; she despaired while I hoped, and Clement trusted. + +"'Dear Madame de Crequy,' said I, 'he will return safely to us; every +precaution shall be taken, that either he or you, or my lord, or +Monkshaven can think of; but he cannot leave a girl--his nearest +relation save you--his betrothed, is she not?' + +"'His betrothed!' cried she, now at the utmost pitch of her +excitement. 'Virginie betrothed to Clement?--no! thank heaven, not +so bad as that! Yet it might have been. But mademoiselle scorned my +son! She would have nothing to do with him. Now is the time for him +to have nothing to do with her!" + +"Clement had entered at the door behind his mother as she thus spoke. +His face was set and pale, till it looked as gray and immovable as if +it had been carved in stone. He came forward and stood before his +mother. She stopped her walk, threw back her haughty head, and the +two looked each other steadily in the face. After a minute or two in +this attitude, her proud and resolute gaze never flinching or +wavering, he went down upon one knee, and, taking her hand--her hard, +stony hand, which never closed on his, but remained straight and +stiff: + +"'Mother,' he pleaded, 'withdraw your prohibition. Let me go!' + +"'What were her words?' Madame de Crequy replied, slowly, as if +forcing her memory to the extreme of accuracy. 'My cousin,' she +said, 'when I marry, I marry a man, not a petit-maitre. I marry a +man who, whatever his rank may be will add dignity to the human race +by his virtues, and not be content to live in an effeminate court on +the traditions of past grandeur.' She borrowed her words from the +infamous Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the friend of her scarce less +infamous father--nay! I will say it,--if not her words, she borrowed +her principles. And my son to request her to marry him!' + +"'It was my father's written wish,' said Clement. + +"'But did you not love her? You plead your father's words,--words +written twelve years before,--and as if that were your reason for +being indifferent to my dislike to the alliance. But you requested +her to marry you,--and she refused you with insolent contempt; and +now you are ready to leave me,--leave me desolate in a foreign land-- +' + +"'Desolate! my mother! and the Countess Ludlow stands there!' + +"'Pardon, madame! But all the earth, though it were full of kind +hearts, is but a desolation and a desert place to a mother when her +only child is absent. And you, Clement, would leave me for this +Virginie,--this degenerate De Crequy, tainted with the atheism of the +Encyclopedistes! She is only reaping some of the fruit of the +harvest whereof her friends have sown the seed. Let her alone! +Doubtless she has friends--it may be lovers--among these demons, who, +under the cry of liberty, commit every licence. Let her alone, +Clement! She refused you with scorn: be too proud to notice her +new.' + +"'Mother, I cannot think of myself; only of her.' + +"'Think of me, then! I, your mother, forbid you to go.' + +"Clement bowed low, and went out of the room instantly, as one +blinded. She saw his groping movement, and, for an instant, I think +her heart was touched. But she turned to me, and tried to exculpate +her past violence by dilating upon her wrongs, and they certainly +were many. The Count, her husband's younger brother, had invariably +tried to make mischief between husband and wife. He had been the +cleverer man of the two, and had possessed extraordinary influence +over her husband. She suspected him of having instigated that clause +in her husband's will, by which the Marquis expressed his wish for +the marriage of the cousins. The Count had had some interest in the +management of the De Crequy property during her son's minority. +Indeed, I remembered then, that it was through Count de Crequy that +Lord Ludlow had first heard of the apartment which we afterwards took +in the Hotel de Crequy; and then the recollection of a past feeling +came distinctly out of the mist, as it were; and I called to mind +how, when we first took up our abode in the Hotel de Crequy, both +Lord Ludlow and I imagined that the arrangement was displeasing to +our hostess; and how it had taken us a considerable time before we +had been able to establish relations of friendship with her. Years +after our visit, she began to suspect that Clement (whom she could +not forbid to visit at his uncle's house, considering the terms on +which his father had been with his brother; though she herself never +set foot over the Count de Crequy's threshold) was attaching himself +to mademoiselle, his cousin; and she made cautious inquiries as to +the appearance, character, and disposition of the young lady. +Mademoiselle was not handsome, they said; but of a fine figure, and +generally considered as having a very noble and attractive presence. +In character she was daring and wilful (said one set); original and +independent (said another). She was much indulged by her father, who +had given her something of a man's education, and selected for her +intimate friend a young lady below her in rank, one of the +Bureaucracie, a Mademoiselle Necker, daughter of the Minister of +Finance. Mademoiselle de Crequy was thus introduced into all the +free-thinking salons of Paris; among people who were always full of +plans for subverting society. 'And did Clement affect such people?' +Madame de Crequy had asked with some anxiety. No! Monsieur de +Crequy had neither eyes nor ears, nor thought for anything but his +cousin, while she was by. And she? She hardly took notice of his +devotion, so evident to every one else. The proud creature! But +perhaps that was her haughty way of concealing what she felt. And so +Madame de Crequy listened, and questioned, and learnt nothing +decided, until one day she surprised Clement with the note in his +hand, of which she remembered the stinging words so well, in which +Virginie had said, in reply to a proposal Clement had sent her +through her father, that 'When she married she married a man, not a +petit-maitre.' + +"Clement was justly indignant at the insulting nature of the answer +Virginie had sent to a proposal, respectful in its tone, and which +was, after all, but the cool, hardened lava over a burning heart. He +acquiesced in his mother's desire, that he should not again present +himself in his uncle's salons; but he did not forget Virginie, though +he never mentioned her name. + +"Madame de Crequy and her son were among the earliest proscrits, as +they were of the strongest possible royalists, and aristocrats, as it +was the custom of the horrid Sansculottes to term those who adhered +to the habits of expression and action in which it was their pride to +have been educated. They had left Paris some weeks before they had +arrived in England, and Clement's belief at the time of quitting the +Hotel de Crequy had certainly been, that his uncle was not merely +safe, but rather a popular man with the party in power. And, as all +communication having relation to private individuals of a reliable +kind was intercepted, Monsieur de Crequy had felt but little anxiety +for his uncle and cousin, in comparison with what he did for many +other friends of very different opinions in politics, until the day +when he was stunned by the fatal information that even his +progressive uncle was guillotined, and learnt that his cousin was +imprisoned by the licence of the mob, whose rights (as she called +them) she was always advocating. + +"When I had heard all this story, I confess I lost in sympathy for +Clement what I gained for his mother. Virginie's life did not seem +to me worth the risk that Clement's would run. But when I saw him-- +sad, depressed, nay, hopeless--going about like one oppressed by a +heavy dream which he cannot shake off; caring neither to eat, drink, +nor sleep, yet bearing all with silent dignity, and even trying to +force a poor, faint smile when he caught my anxious eyes; I turned +round again, and wondered how Madame de Crequy could resist this mute +pleading of her son's altered appearance. As for my Lord Ludlow and +Monkshaven, as soon as they understood the case, they were indignant +that any mother should attempt to keep a son out of honourable +danger; and it was honourable, and a clear duty (according to them) +to try to save the life of a helpless orphan girl, his next of kin. +None but a Frenchman, said my lord, would hold himself bound by an +old woman's whimsies and fears, even though she were his mother. As +it was, he was chafing himself to death under the restraint. If he +went, to be sure, the wretches might make an end of him, as they had +done of many a fine fellow: but my lord would take heavy odds, that, +instead of being guillotined, he would save the girl, and bring her +safe to England, just desperately in love with her preserver, and +then we would have a jolly wedding down at Monkshaven. My lord +repeated his opinion so often that it became a certain prophecy in +his mind of what was to take place; and, one day seeing Clement look +even paler and thinner than he had ever done before, he sent a +message to Madame de Crequy, requesting permission to speak to her in +private. + +"'For, by George!' said he, 'she shall hear my opinion, and not let +that lad of hers kill himself by fretting. He's too good for that, +if he had been an English lad, he would have been off to his +sweetheart long before this, without saying with your leave or by +your leave; but being a Frenchman, he is all for AEneas and filial +piety,--filial fiddle-sticks!' (My lord had run away to sea, when a +boy, against his father's consent, I am sorry to say; and, as all had +ended well, and he had come back to find both his parents alive, I do +not think he was ever as much aware of his fault as he might have +been under other circumstances.) 'No, my lady,' he went on, 'don't +come with me. A woman can manage a man best when he has a fit of +obstinacy, and a man can persuade a woman out of her tantrums, when +all her own sex, the whole army of them, would fail. Allow me to go +alone to my tete-a-tete with madame." + +"What he said, what passed, he never could repeat; but he came back +graver than he went. However, the point was gained; Madame de Crequy +withdrew her prohibition, and had given him leave to tell Clement as +much. + +"'But she is an old Cassandra,' said he. 'Don't let the lad be much +with her; her talk would destroy the courage of the bravest man; she +is so given over to superstition.' Something that she had said had +touched a chord in my lord's nature which he inherited from his +Scotch ancestors. Long afterwards, I heard what this was. Medlicott +told me. + +"However, my lord shook off all fancies that told against the +fulfilment of Clement's wishes. All that afternoon we three sat +together, planning; and Monkshaven passed in and out, executing our +commissions, and preparing everything. Towards nightfall all was +ready for Clement's start on his journey towards the coast. + +"Madame had declined seeing any of us since my lord's stormy +interview with her. She sent word that she was fatigued, and desired +repose. But, of course, before Clement set off, he was bound to wish +her farewell, and to ask for her blessing. In order to avoid an +agitating conversation between mother and son, my lord and I resolved +to be present at the interview. Clement was already in his +travelling-dress, that of a Norman fisherman, which Monkshaven had, +with infinite trouble, discovered in the possession of one of the +emigres who thronged London, and who had made his escape from the +shores of France in this disguise. Clement's plan was, to go down to +the coast of Sussex, and get some of the fishing or smuggling boats +to take him across to the French coast near Dieppe. There again he +would have to change his dress. Oh, it was so well planned! His +mother was startled by his disguise (of which we had not thought to +forewarn her) as he entered her apartment. And either that, or the +being suddenly roused from the heavy slumber into which she was apt +to fall when she was left alone, gave her manner an air of wildness +that was almost like insanity. + +"'Go, go!' she said to him, almost pushing him away as he knelt to +kiss her hand. 'Virginie is beckoning to you, but you don't see what +kind of a bed it is--' + +"'Clement, make haste!' said my lord, in a hurried manner, as if to +interrupt madame. 'The time is later than I thought, and you must +not miss the morning's tide. Bid your mother good-bye at once, and +let us be off.' For my lord and Monkshaven were to ride with him to +an inn near the shore, from whence he was to walk to his destination. +My lord almost took him by the arm to pull him away; and they were +gone, and I was left alone with Madame de Crequy. When she heard the +horses' feet, she seemed to find out the truth, as if for the first +time. She set her teeth together. 'He has left me for her!' she +almost screamed. 'Left me for her!' she kept muttering; and then, as +the wild look came back into her eyes, she said, almost with +exultation, 'But I did not give him my blessing!'" + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + + +"All night Madame de Crequy raved in delirium. If I could I would +have sent for Clement back again. I did send off one man, but I +suppose my directions were confused, or they were wrong, for he came +back after my lord's return, on the following afternoon. By this +time Madame de Crequy was quieter: she was, indeed, asleep from +exhaustion when Lord Ludlow and Monkshaven came in. They were in +high spirits, and their hopefulness brought me round to a less +dispirited state. All had gone well: they had accompanied Clement +on foot along the shore, until they had met with a lugger, which my +lord had hailed in good nautical language. The captain had responded +to these freemason terms by sending a boat to pick up his passenger, +and by an invitation to breakfast sent through a speaking-trumpet. +Monkshaven did not approve of either the meal or the company, and had +returned to the inn, but my lord had gone with Clement and +breakfasted on board, upon grog, biscuit, fresh-caught fish--'the +best breakfast he ever ate,' he said, but that was probably owing to +the appetite his night's ride had given him. However, his good +fellowship had evidently won the captain's heart, and Clement had set +sail under the best auspices. It was agreed that I should tell all +this to Madame de Crequy, if she inquired; otherwise, it would be +wiser not to renew her agitation by alluding to her son's journey. + +"I sat with her constantly for many days; but she never spoke of +Clement. She forced herself to talk of the little occurrences of +Parisian society in former days: she tried to be conversational and +agreeable, and to betray no anxiety or even interest in the object of +Clement's journey; and, as far as unremitting efforts could go, she +succeeded. But the tones of her voice were sharp and yet piteous, as +if she were in constant pain; and the glance of her eye hurried and +fearful, as if she dared not let it rest on any object. + +"In a week we heard of Clement's safe arrival on the French coast. +He sent a letter to this effect by the captain of the smuggler, when +the latter returned. We hoped to hear again; but week after week +elapsed, and there was no news of Clement. I had told Lord Ludlow, +in Madame de Crequy's presence, as he and I had arranged, of the note +I had received from her son, informing us of his landing in France. +She heard, but she took no notice, and evidently began to wonder that +we did not mention any further intelligence of him in the same manner +before her; and daily I began to fear that her pride would give way, +and that she would supplicate for news before I had any to give her. + +"One morning, on my awakening, my maid told me that Madame de Crequy +had passed a wretched night, and had bidden Medlicott (whom, as +understanding French, and speaking it pretty well, though with that +horrid German accent, I had put about her) request that I would go to +madame's room as soon as I was dressed. + +"I knew what was coming, and I trembled all the time they were doing +my hair, and otherwise arranging me. I was not encouraged by my +lord's speeches. He had heard the message, and kept declaring that +he would rather be shot than have to tell her that there was no news +of her son; and yet he said, every now and then, when I was at the +lowest pitch of uneasiness, that he never expected to hear again: +that some day soon we should see him walking in and introducing +Mademoiselle de Crequy to us. + +"However at last I was ready, and go I must. + +"Her eyes were fixed on the door by which I entered. I went up to +the bedside. She was not rouged,--she had left it off now for +several days,--she no longer attempted to keep up the vain show of +not feeling, and loving, and fearing. + +"For a moment or two she did not speak, and I was glad of the +respite. + +"'Clement?' she said at length, covering her mouth with a +handkerchief the minute she had spoken, that I might not see it +quiver. + +"'There has been no news since the first letter, saying how well the +voyage was performed, and how safely he had landed--near Dieppe, you +know,' I replied as cheerfully as possible. 'My lord does not expect +that we shall have another letter; he thinks that we shall see him +soon.' + +"There was no answer. As I looked, uncertain whether to do or say +more, she slowly turned herself in bed, and lay with her face to the +wall; and, as if that did not shut out the light of day and the busy, +happy world enough, she put out her trembling hands, and covered her +face with her handkerchief. There was no violence: hardly any +sound. + +I told her what my lord had said about Clement's coming in some day, +and taking us all by surprise. I did not believe it myself, but it +was just possible,--and I had nothing else to say. Pity, to one who +was striving so hard to conceal her feelings, would have been +impertinent. She let me talk; but she did not reply. She knew that +my words were vain and idle, and had no root in my belief; as well as +I did myself. + +"I was very thankful when Medlicott came in with Madame's breakfast, +and gave me an excuse for leaving. + +"But I think that conversation made me feel more anxious and +impatient than ever. I felt almost pledged to Madame de Crequy for +the fulfilment of the vision I had held out. She had taken entirely +to her bed by this time: not from illness, but because she had no +hope within her to stir her up to the effort of dressing. In the +same way she hardly cared for food. She had no appetite,--why eat to +prolong a life of despair? But she let Medlicott feed her, sooner +than take the trouble of resisting. + +"And so it went on,--for weeks, months--I could hardly count the +time, it seemed so long. Medlicott told me she noticed a +preternatural sensitiveness of ear in Madame de Crequy, induced by +the habit of listening silently for the slightest unusual sound in +the house. Medlicott was always a minute watcher of any one whom she +cared about; and, one day, she made me notice by a sign madame's +acuteness of hearing, although the quick expectation was but evinced +for a moment in the turn of the eye, the hushed breath--and then, +when the unusual footstep turned into my lord's apartments, the soft +quivering sigh, and the closed eyelids. + +"At length the intendant of the De Crequy estates--the old man, you +will remember, whose information respecting Virginie de Crequy first +gave Clement the desire to return to Paris,--came to St. James's +Square, and begged to speak to me. I made haste to go down to him in +the housekeeper's room, sooner than that he should be ushered into +mine, for fear of madame hearing any sound. + +"The old man stood--I see him now--with his hat held before him in +both his hands; he slowly bowed till his face touched it when I came +in. Such long excess of courtesy augured ill. He waited for me to +speak. + +"'Have you any intelligence?' I inquired. He had been often to the +house before, to ask if we had received any news; and once or twice I +had seen him, but this was the first time he had begged to see me. + +"'Yes, madame,' he replied, still standing with his head bent down, +like a child in disgrace. + +"'And it is bad!' I exclaimed. + +"'It is bad.' For a moment I was angry at the cold tone in which my +words were echoed; but directly afterwards I saw the large, slow, +heavy tears of age falling down the old man's cheeks, and on to the +sleeves of his poor, threadbare coat. + +"I asked him how he had heard it: it seemed as though I could not +all at once bear to hear what it was. He told me that the night +before, in crossing Long Acre, he had stumbled upon an old +acquaintance of his; one who, like himself had been a dependent upon +the De Crequy family, but had managed their Paris affairs, while +Flechier had taken charge of their estates in the country. Both were +now emigrants, and living on the proceeds of such small available +talents as they possessed. Flechier, as I knew, earned a very fair +livelihood by going about to dress salads for dinner parties. His +compatriot, Le Febvre, had begun to give a few lessons as a dancing- +master. One of them took the other home to his lodgings; and there, +when their most immediate personal adventures had been hastily talked +over, came the inquiry from Flechier as to Monsieur de Crequy + +"'Clement was dead--guillotined. Virginie was dead--guillotined.' + +"When Flechier had told me thus much, he could not speak for sobbing; +and I, myself, could hardly tell how to restrain my tears +sufficiently, until I could go to my own room and be at liberty to +give way. He asked my leave to bring in his friend Le Febvre, who +was walking in the square, awaiting a possible summons to tell his +story. I heard afterwards a good many details, which filled up the +account, and made me feel--which brings me back to the point I +started from--how unfit the lower orders are for being trusted +indiscriminately with the dangerous powers of education. I have made +a long preamble, but now I am coming to the moral of my story." + +My lady was trying to shake off the emotion which she evidently felt +in recurring to this sad history of Monsieur de Crequy's death. She +came behind me, and arranged my pillows, and then, seeing I had been +crying--for, indeed, I was weak-spirited at the time, and a little +served to unloose my tears--she stooped down, and kissed my forehead, +and said "Poor child!" almost as if she thanked me for feeling that +old grief of hers. + +"Being once in France, it was no difficult thing for Clement to get +into Paris. The difficulty in those days was to leave, not to enter. +He came in dressed as a Norman peasant, in charge of a load of fruit +and vegetables, with which one of the Seine barges was freighted. He +worked hard with his companions in landing and arranging their +produce on the quays; and then, when they dispersed to get their +breakfasts at some of the estaminets near the old Marche aux Fleurs, +he sauntered up a street which conducted him, by many an odd turn, +through the Quartier Latin to a horrid back alley, leading out of the +Rue l'Ecole de Medecine; some atrocious place, as I have heard, not +far from the shadow of that terrible Abbaye, where so many of the +best blood of France awaited their deaths. But here some old man +lived, on whose fidelity Clement thought that he might rely. I am +not sure if he had not been gardener in those very gardens behind the +Hotel Crequy where Clement and Urian used to play together years +before. But whatever the old man's dwelling might be, Clement was +only too glad to reach it, you may be sure, he had been kept in +Normandy, in all sorts of disguises, for many days after landing in +Dieppe, through the difficulty of entering Paris unsuspected by the +many ruffians who were always on the look-out for aristocrats. + +"The old gardener was, I believe, both faithful and tried, and +sheltered Clement in his garret as well as might be. Before he could +stir out, it was necessary to procure a fresh disguise, and one more +in character with an inhabitant of Paris than that of a Norman carter +was procured; and after waiting in-doors for one or two days, to see +if any suspicion was excited, Clement set off to discover Virginie. + +"He found her at the old concierge's dwelling. Madame Babette was +the name of this woman, who must have been a less faithful--or +rather, perhaps, I should say, a more interested--friend to her guest +than the old gardener Jaques was to Clement. + +"I have seen a miniature of Virginie, which a French lady of quality +happened to have in her possession at the time of her flight from +Paris, and which she brought with her to England unwittingly; for it +belonged to the Count de Crequy, with whom she was slightly +acquainted. I should fancy from it, that Virginie was taller and of +a more powerful figure for a woman than her cousin Clement was for a +man. Her dark-brown hair was arranged in short curls--the way of +dressing the hair announced the politics of the individual, in those +days, just as patches did in my grandmother's time; and Virginie's +hair was not to my taste, or according to my principles: it was too +classical. Her large, black eyes looked out at you steadily. One +cannot judge of the shape of a nose from a full-face miniature, but +the nostrils were clearly cut and largely opened. I do not fancy her +nose could have been pretty; but her mouth had a character all its +own, and which would, I think, have redeemed a plainer face. It was +wide, and deep set into the cheeks at the corners; the upper lip was +very much arched, and hardly closed over the teeth; so that the whole +face looked (from the serious, intent look in the eyes, and the sweet +intelligence of the mouth) as if she were listening eagerly to +something to which her answer was quite ready, and would come out of +those red, opening lips as soon as ever you had done speaking, and +you longed to know what she would say. + +"Well: this Virginie de Crequy was living with Madame Babette in the +conciergerie of an old French inn, somewhere to the north of Paris, +so, far enough from Clement's refuge. The inn had been frequented by +farmers from Brittany and such kind of people, in the days when that +sort of intercourse went on between Paris and the provinces which had +nearly stopped now. Few Bretons came near it now, and the inn had +fallen into the hands of Madame Babette's brother, as payment for a +bad wine debt of the last proprietor. He put his sister and her +child in, to keep it open, as it were, and sent all the people he +could to occupy the half-furnished rooms of the house. They paid +Babette for their lodging every morning as they went out to +breakfast, and returned or not as they chose, at night. Every three +days, the wine-merchant or his son came to Madame Babette, and she +accounted to them for the money she had received. She and her child +occupied the porter's office (in which the lad slept at nights) and a +little miserable bed-room which opened out of it, and received all +the light and air that was admitted through the door of +communication, which was half glass. Madame Babette must have had a +kind of attachment for the De Crequys--her De Crequys, you +understand--Virginie's father, the Count; for, at some risk to +herself, she had warned both him and his daughter of the danger +impending over them. But he, infatuated, would not believe that his +dear Human Race could ever do him harm; and, as long as he did not +fear, Virginie was not afraid. It was by some ruse, the nature of +which I never heard, that Madame Babette induced Virginie to come to +her abode at the very hour in which the Count had been recognized in +the streets, and hurried off to the Lanterne. It was after Babette +had got her there, safe shut up in the little back den, that she told +her what had befallen her father. From that day, Virginie had never +stirred out of the gates, or crossed the threshold of the porter's +lodge. I do not say that Madame Babette was tired of her continual +presence, or regretted the impulse which made her rush to the De +Crequy's well-known house--after being compelled to form one of the +mad crowds that saw the Count de Crequy seized and hung--and hurry +his daughter out, through alleys and backways, until at length she +had the orphan safe in her own dark sleeping-room, and could tell her +tale of horror: but Madame Babette was poorly paid for her porter's +work by her avaricious brother; and it was hard enough to find food +for herself and her growing boy; and, though the poor girl ate little +enough, I dare say, yet there seemed no end to the burthen that +Madame Babette had imposed upon herself: the De Crequys were +plundered, ruined, had become an extinct race, all but a lonely +friendless girl, in broken health and spirits; and, though she lent +no positive encouragement to his suit, yet, at the time, when Clement +reappeared in Paris, Madame Babette was beginning to think that +Virginie might do worse than encourage the attentions of Monsieur +Morin Fils, her nephew, and the wine merchant's son. Of course, he +and his father had the entree into the conciergerie of the hotel that +belonged to them, in right of being both proprietors and relations. +The son, Morin, had seen Virginie in this manner. He was fully aware +that she was far above him in rank, and guessed from her whole aspect +that she had lost her natural protectors by the terrible guillotine; +but he did not know her exact name or station, nor could he persuade +his aunt to tell him. However, he fell head over ears in love with +her, whether she were princess or peasant; and though at first there +was something about her which made his passionate love conceal itself +with shy, awkward reserve, and then made it only appear in the guise +of deep, respectful devotion; yet, by-and-by,--by the same process of +reasoning, I suppose, that his aunt had gone through even before him- +-Jean Morin began to let Hope oust Despair from his heart. Sometimes +he thought--perhaps years hence--that solitary, friendless lady, pent +up in squalor, might turn to him as to a friend and comforter--and +then--and then--. Meanwhile Jean Morin was most attentive to his +aunt, whom he had rather slighted before. He would linger over the +accounts; would bring her little presents; and, above all, he made a +pet and favourite of Pierre, the little cousin, who could tell him +about all the ways of going on of Mam'selle Cannes, as Virginie was +called. Pierre was thoroughly aware of the drift and cause of his +cousin's inquiries; and was his ardent partisan, as I have heard, +even before Jean Morin had exactly acknowledged his wishes to +himself. + +"It must have required some patience and much diplomacy, before +Clement de Crequy found out the exact place where his cousin was +hidden. The old gardener took the cause very much to heart; as, +judging from my recollections, I imagine he would have forwarded any +fancy, however wild, of Monsieur Clement's. (I will tell you +afterwards how I came to know all these particulars so well.) + +"After Clement's return, on two succeeding days, from his dangerous +search, without meeting with any good result, Jacques entreated +Monsieur de Crequy to let him take it in hand. He represented that +he, as gardener for the space of twenty years and more at the Hotel +de Crequy, had a right to be acquainted with all the successive +concierges at the Count's house; that he should not go among them as +a stranger, but as an old friend, anxious to renew pleasant +intercourse; and that if the Intendant's story, which he had told +Monsieur de Crequy in England, was true, that mademoiselle was in +hiding at the house of a former concierge, why, something relating to +her would surely drop out in the course of conversation. So he +persuaded Clement to remain indoors, while he set off on his round, +with no apparent object but to gossip. + +"At night he came home,--having seen mademoiselle. He told Clement +much of the story relating to Madame Babette that I have told to you. +Of course, he had heard nothing of the ambitious hopes of Morin +Fils,--hardly of his existence, I should think. Madame Babette had +received him kindly; although, for some time, she had kept him +standing in the carriage gateway outside her door. But, on his +complaining of the draught and his rheumatism, she had asked him in: +first looking round with some anxiety, to see who was in the room +behind her. No one was there when he entered and sat down. But, in +a minute or two, a tall, thin young lady, with great, sad eyes, and +pale cheeks, came from the inner room, and, seeing him, retired. 'It +is Mademoiselle Cannes,' said Madame Babette, rather unnecessarily; +for, if he had not been on the watch for some sign of Mademoiselle de +Crequy, he would hardly have noticed the entrance and withdrawal. + +"Clement and the good old gardener were always rather perplexed by +Madame Babette's evident avoidance of all mention of the De Crequy +family. If she were so much interested in one member as to be +willing to undergo the pains and penalties of a domiciliary visit, it +was strange that she never inquired after the existence of her +charge's friends and relations from one who might very probably have +heard something of them. They settled that Madame Babette must +believe that the Marquise and Clement were dead; and admired her for +her reticence in never speaking of Virginie. The truth was, I +suspect, that she was so desirous of her nephews success by this +time, that she did not like letting any one into the secret of +Virginie's whereabouts who might interfere with their plan. However, +it was arranged between Clement and his humble friend, that the +former, dressed in the peasant's clothes in which he had entered +Paris, but smartened up in one or two particulars, as if, although a +countryman, he had money to spare, should go and engage a sleeping- +room in the old Breton Inn; where, as I told you, accommodation for +the night was to be had. This was accordingly done, without exciting +Madame Babette's suspicions, for she was unacquainted with the +Normandy accent, and consequently did not perceive the exaggeration +of it which Monsieur de Crequy adopted in order to disguise his pure +Parisian. But after he had for two nights slept in a queer dark +closet, at the end of one of the numerous short galleries in the +Hotel Duguesclin, and paid his money for such accommodation each +morning at the little bureau under the window of the conciergerie, he +found himself no nearer to his object. He stood outside in the +gateway: Madame Babette opened a pane in her window, counted out the +change, gave polite thanks, and shut to the pane with a clack, before +he could ever find out what to say that might be the means of opening +a conversation. Once in the streets, he was in danger from the +bloodthirsty mob, who were ready in those days to hunt to death every +one who looked like a gentleman, as an aristocrat: and Clement, +depend upon it, looked a gentleman, whatever dress he wore. Yet it +was unwise to traverse Paris to his old friend the gardener's +grenier, so he had to loiter about, where I hardly know. Only he did +leave the Hotel Duguesclin, and he did not go to old Jacques, and +there was not another house in Paris open to him. At the end of two +days, he had made out Pierre's existence; and he began to try to make +friends with the lad. Pierre was too sharp and shrewd not to suspect +something from the confused attempts at friendliness. It was not for +nothing that the Norman farmer lounged in the court and doorway, and +brought home presents of galette. Pierre accepted the galette, +reciprocated the civil speeches, but kept his eyes open. Once, +returning home pretty late at night, he surprised the Norman studying +the shadows on the blind, which was drawn down when Madame Babette's +lamp was lighted. On going in, he found Mademoiselle Cannes with his +mother, sitting by the table, and helping in the family mending. + +"Pierre was afraid that the Norman had some view upon the money which +his mother, as concierge, collected for her brother. But the money +was all safe next evening, when his cousin, Monsieur Morin Fils, came +to collect it. Madame Babette asked her nephew to sit down, and +skilfully barred the passage to the inner door, so that Virginie, had +she been ever so much disposed, could not have retreated. She sat +silently sewing. All at once the little party were startled by a +very sweet tenor voice, just close to the street window, singing one +of the airs out of Beaumarchais' operas, which, a few years before, +had been popular all over Paris. But after a few moments of silence, +and one or two remarks, the talking went on again. Pierre, however, +noticed an increased air of abstraction in Virginie, who, I suppose, +was recurring to the last time that she had heard the song, and did +not consider, as her cousin had hoped she would have done, what were +the words set to the air, which he imagined she would remember, and +which would have told her so much. For, only a few years before, +Adam's opera of Richard le Roi had made the story of the minstrel +Blondel and our English Coeur de Lion familiar to all the opera-going +part of the Parisian public, and Clement had bethought him of +establishing a communication with Virginie by some such means. + +"The next night, about the same hour, the same voice was singing +outside the window again. Pierre, who had been irritated by the +proceeding the evening before, as it had diverted Virginie's +attention from his cousin, who had been doing his utmost to make +himself agreeable, rushed out to the door, just as the Norman was +ringing the bell to be admitted for the night. Pierre looked up and +down the street; no one else was to be seen. The next day, the +Norman mollified him somewhat by knocking at the door of the +conciergerie, and begging Monsieur Pierre's acceptance of some knee- +buckles, which had taken the country farmer's fancy the day before, +as he had been gazing into the shops, but which, being too small for +his purpose, he took the liberty of offering to Monsieur Pierre. +Pierre, a French boy, inclined to foppery, was charmed, ravished by +the beauty of the present and with monsieur's goodness, and he began +to adjust them to his breeches immediately, as well as he could, at +least, in his mother's absence. The Norman, whom Pierre kept +carefully on the outside of the threshold, stood by, as if amused at +the boy's eagerness. + +"'Take care,' said he, clearly and distinctly; 'take care, my little +friend, lest you become a fop; and, in that case, some day, years +hence, when your heart is devoted to some young lady, she may be +inclined to say to you'--here he raised his voice--'No, thank you; +when I marry, I marry a man, not a petit-maitre; I marry a man, who, +whatever his position may be, will add dignity to the human race by +his virtues.' Farther than that in his quotation Clement dared not +go. His sentiments (so much above the apparent occasion) met with +applause from Pierre, who liked to contemplate himself in the light +of a lover, even though it should be a rejected one, and who hailed +the mention of the words 'virtues' and 'dignity of the human race' as +belonging to the cant of a good citizen. + +"But Clement was more anxious to know how the invisible Lady took his +speech. There was no sign at the time. But when he returned at +night, he heard a voice, low singing, behind Madame Babette, as she +handed him his candle, the very air he had sung without effect for +two nights past. As if he had caught it up from her murmuring voice, +he sang it loudly and clearly as he crossed the court. + +"'Here is our opera-singer!' exclaimed Madame Babette. 'Why, the +Norman grazier sings like Boupre,' naming a favourite singer at the +neighbouring theatre. + +"Pierre was struck by the remark, and quietly resolved to look after +the Norman; but again, I believe, it was more because of his mother's +deposit of money than with any thought of Virginie. + +"However, the next morning, to the wonder of both mother and son, +Mademoiselle Cannes proposed, with much hesitation, to go out and +make some little purchase for herself. A month or two ago, this was +what Madame Babette had been never weary of urging. But now she was +as much surprised as if she had expected Virginie to remain a +prisoner in her rooms all the rest of her life. I suppose she had +hoped that her first time of quitting it would be when she left it +for Monsieur Morin's house as his wife. + +"A quick look from Madame Babette towards Pierre was all that was +needed to encourage the boy to follow her. He went out cautiously. +She was at the end of the street. She looked up and down, as if +waiting for some one. No one was there. Back she came, so swiftly +that she nearly caught Pierre before he could retreat through the +porte-cochere. There he looked out again. The neighbourhood was low +and wild, and strange; and some one spoke to Virginie,--nay, laid his +hand upon her arm,--whose dress and aspect (he had emerged out of a +side-street) Pierre did not know; but, after a start, and (Pierre +could fancy) a little scream, Virginie recognised the stranger, and +the two turned up the side street whence the man had come. Pierre +stole swiftly to the corner of this street; no one was there: they +had disappeared up some of the alleys. Pierre returned home to +excite his mother's infinite surprise. But they had hardly done +talking, when Virginie returned, with a colour and a radiance in her +face, which they had never seen there since her father's death." + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + + +"I have told you that I heard much of this story from a friend of the +Intendant of the De Crequys, whom he met with in London. Some years +afterwards--the summer before my lord's death--I was travelling with +him in Devonshire, and we went to see the French prisoners of war on +Dartmoor. We fell into conversation with one of them, whom I found +out to be the very Pierre of whom I had heard before, as having been +involved in the fatal story of Clement and Virginie, and by him I was +told much of their last days, and thus I learnt how to have some +sympathy with all those who were concerned in those terrible events; +yes, even with the younger Morin himself, on whose behalf Pierre +spoke warmly, even after so long a time had elapsed. + +"For when the younger Morin called at the porter's lodge, on the +evening of the day when Virginie had gone out for the first time +after so many months' confinement to the conciergerie, he was struck +with the improvement in her appearance. It seems to have hardly been +that he thought her beauty greater: for, in addition to the fact +that she was not beautiful, Morin had arrived at that point of being +enamoured when it does not signify whether the beloved one is plain +or handsome--she has enchanted one pair of eyes, which henceforward +see her through their own medium. But Morin noticed the faint +increase of colour and light in her countenance. It was as though +she had broken through her thick cloud of hopeless sorrow, and was +dawning forth into a happier life. And so, whereas during her grief, +he had revered and respected it even to a point of silent sympathy, +now that she was gladdened, his heart rose on the wings of +strengthened hopes. Even in the dreary monotony of this existence in +his Aunt Babette's conciergerie, Time had not failed in his work, and +now, perhaps, soon he might humbly strive to help Time. The very +next day he returned--on some pretence of business--to the Hotel +Duguesclin, and made his aunt's room, rather than his aunt herself, a +present of roses and geraniums tied up in a bouquet with a tricolor +ribbon. Virginie was in the room, sitting at the coarse sewing she +liked to do for Madame Babette. He saw her eyes brighten at the +sight of the flowers: she asked his aunt to let her arrange them; he +saw her untie the ribbon, and with a gesture of dislike, throw it on +the ground, and give it a kick with her little foot, and even in this +girlish manner of insulting his dearest prejudices, he found +something to admire. + +"As he was coming out, Pierre stopped him. The lad had been trying +to arrest his cousin's attention by futile grimaces and signs played +off behind Virginie's back: but Monsieur Morin saw nothing but +Mademoiselle Cannes. However, Pierre was not to be baffled, and +Monsieur Morin found him in waiting just outside the threshold. With +his finger on his lips, Pierre walked on tiptoe by his companion's +side till they would have been long past sight or hearing of the +conciergerie, even had the inhabitants devoted themselves to the +purposes of spying or listening. + +"'Chut!' said Pierre, at last. 'She goes out walking.' + +"'Well?' said Monsieur Morin, half curious, half annoyed at being +disturbed in the delicious reverie of the future into which he longed +to fall. + +"'Well! It is not well. It is bad.' + +"'Why? I do not ask who she is, but I have my ideas. She is an +aristocrat. Do the people about here begin to suspect her?' + +"'No, no!' said Pierre. 'But she goes out walking. She has gone +these two mornings. I have watched her. She meets a man--she is +friends with him, for she talks to him as eagerly as he does to her-- +mamma cannot tell who he is.' + +"'Has my aunt seen him?' + +"'No, not so much as a fly's wing of him. I myself have only seen +his back. It strikes me like a familiar back, and yet I cannot think +who it is. But they separate with sudden darts, like two birds who +have been together to feed their young ones. One moment they are in +close talk, their heads together chuckotting; the next he has turned +up some bye-street, and Mademoiselle Cannes is close upon me--has +almost caught me.' + +"'But she did not see you?' inquired Monsieur Morin, in so altered a +voice that Pierre gave him one of his quick penetrating looks. He +was struck by the way in which his cousin's features--always coarse +and common-place--had become contracted and pinched; struck, too, by +the livid look on his sallow complexion. But as if Morin was +conscious of the manner in which his face belied his feelings, he +made an effort, and smiled, and patted Pierre's head, and thanked him +for his intelligence, and gave him a five-franc piece, and bade him +go on with his observations of Mademoiselle Cannes' movements, and +report all to him. + +"Pierre returned home with a light heart, tossing up his five-franc +piece as he ran. Just as he was at the conciergerie door, a great +tall man bustled past him, and snatched his money away from him, +looking back with a laugh, which added insult to injury. Pierre had +no redress; no one had witnessed the impudent theft, and if they had, +no one to be seen in the street was strong enough to give him +redress. Besides, Pierre had seen enough of the state of the streets +of Paris at that time to know that friends, not enemies, were +required, and the man had a bad air about him. But all these +considerations did not keep Pierre from bursting out into a fit of +crying when he was once more under his mother's roof; and Virginie, +who was alone there (Madame Babette having gone out to make her daily +purchases), might have imagined him pommeled to death by the loudness +of his sobs. + +"'What is the matter?' asked she. 'Speak, my child. What hast thou +done?' + +"'He has robbed me! he has robbed me!' was all Pierre could gulp out. + +"'Robbed thee! and of what, my poor boy?' said Virginie, stroking his +hair gently. + +"'Of my five-franc piece--of a five-franc piece,' said Pierre, +correcting himself, and leaving out the word my, half fearful lest +Virginie should inquire how he became possessed of such a sum, and +for what services it had been given him. But, of course, no such +idea came into her head, for it would have been impertinent, and she +was gentle-born. + +"'Wait a moment, my lad,' and going to the one small drawer in the +inner apartment, which held all her few possessions, she brought back +a little ring--a ring just with one ruby in it--which she had worn in +the days when she cared to wear jewels. 'Take this,' said she, 'and +run with it to a jeweller's. It is but a poor, valueless thing, but +it will bring you in your five francs, at any rate. Go! I desire +you.' + +"'But I cannot,' said the boy, hesitating; some dim sense of honour +flitting through his misty morals. + +"'Yes, you must!' she continued, urging him with her hand to the +door. 'Run! if it brings in more than five francs, you shall return +the surplus to me.' + +"Thus tempted by her urgency, and, I suppose, reasoning with himself +to the effect that he might as well have the money, and then see +whether he thought it right to act as a spy upon her or not--the one +action did not pledge him to the other, nor yet did she make any +conditions with her gift--Pierre went off with her ring; and, after +repaying himself his five francs, he was enabled to bring Virginie +back two more, so well had he managed his affairs. But, although the +whole transaction did not leave him bound, in any way, to discover or +forward Virginie's wishes, it did leave him pledged, according to his +code, to act according to her advantage, and he considered himself +the judge of the best course to be pursued to this end. And, +moreover, this little kindness attached him to her personally. He +began to think how pleasant it would be to have so kind and generous +a person for a relation; how easily his troubles might be borne if he +had always such a ready helper at hand; how much he should like to +make her like him, and come to him for the protection of his +masculine power! First of all his duties, as her self-appointed +squire, came the necessity of finding out who her strange new +acquaintance was. Thus, you see, he arrived at the same end, via +supposed duty, that he was previously pledged to via interest. I +fancy a good number of us, when any line of action will promote our +own interest, can make ourselves believe that reasons exist which +compel us to it as a duty. + +"In the course of a very few days, Pierre had so circumvented +Virginie as to have discovered that her new friend was no other than +the Norman farmer in a different dress. This was a great piece of +knowledge to impart to Morin. But Pierre was not prepared for the +immediate physical effect it had on his cousin. Morin sat suddenly +down on one of the seats in the Boulevards--it was there Pierre had +met with him accidentally--when he heard who it was that Virginie +met. I do not suppose the man had the faintest idea of any +relationship or even previous acquaintanceship between Clement and +Virginie. If he thought of anything beyond the mere fact presented +to him, that his idol was in communication with another, younger, +handsomer man than himself, it must have been that the Norman farmer +had seen her at the conciergerie, and had been attracted by her, and, +as was but natural, had tried to make her acquaintance, and had +succeeded. But, from what Pierre told me, I should not think that +even this much thought passed through Morin's mind. He seems to have +been a man of rare and concentrated attachments; violent, though +restrained and undemonstrative passions; and, above all, a capability +of jealousy, of which his dark oriental complexion must have been a +type. I could fancy that if he had married Virginie, he would have +coined his life-blood for luxuries to make her happy; would have +watched over and petted her, at every sacrifice to himself, as long +as she would have been content to live with him alone. But, as +Pierre expressed it to me: 'When I saw what my cousin was, when I +learned his nature too late, I perceived that he would have strangled +a bird if she whom he loved was attracted by it from him.' + +"When Pierre had told Morin of his discovery, Morin sat down, as I +said, quite suddenly, as if he had been shot. He found out that the +first meeting between the Norman and Virginie was no accidental, +isolated circumstance. Pierre was torturing him with his accounts of +daily rendezvous: if but for a moment, they were seeing each other +every day, sometimes twice a day. And Virginie could speak to this +man, though to himself she was coy and reserved as hardly to utter a +sentence. Pierre caught these broken words while his cousin's +complexion grew more and more livid, and then purple, as if some +great effect were produced on his circulation by the news he had just +heard. Pierre was so startled by his cousin's wandering, senseless +eyes, and otherwise disordered looks, that he rushed into a +neighbouring cabaret for a glass of absinthe, which he paid for, as +he recollected afterwards, with a portion of Virginie's five francs. +By-and-by Morin recovered his natural appearance; but he was gloomy +and silent; and all that Pierre could get out of him was, that the +Norman farmer should not sleep another night at the Hotel Duguesclin, +giving him such opportunities of passing and repassing by the +conciergerie door. He was too much absorbed in his own thoughts to +repay Pierre the half franc he had spent on the absinthe, which +Pierre perceived, and seems to have noted down in the ledger of his +mind as on Virginie's balance of favour. + +"Altogether, he was much disappointed at his cousin's mode of +receiving intelligence, which the lad thought worth another five- +franc piece at least; or, if not paid for in money, to be paid for in +open-mouthed confidence and expression of feeling, that he was, for a +time, so far a partisan of Virginie's--unconscious Virginie--against +his cousin, as to feel regret when the Norman returned no more to his +night's lodging, and when Virginie's eager watch at the crevice of +the closely-drawn blind ended only with a sigh of disappointment. If +it had not been for his mother's presence at the time, Pierre thought +he should have told her all. But how far was his mother in his +cousin's confidence as regarded the dismissal of the Norman? + +"In a few days, however, Pierre felt almost sure that they had +established some new means of communication. Virginie went out for a +short time every day; but though Pierre followed her as closely as he +could without exciting her observation, he was unable to discover +what kind of intercourse she held with the Norman. She went, in +general, the same short round among the little shops in the +neighbourhood; not entering any, but stopping at two or three. +Pierre afterwards remembered that she had invariably paused at the +nosegays displayed in a certain window, and studied them long: but, +then, she stopped and looked at caps, hats, fashions, confectionery +(all of the humble kind common in that quarter), so how should he +have known that any particular attraction existed among the flowers? +Morin came more regularly than ever to his aunt's; but Virginie was +apparently unconscious that she was the attraction. She looked +healthier and more hopeful than she had done for months, and her +manners to all were gentler and not so reserved. Almost as if she +wished to manifest her gratitude to Madame Babette for her long +continuance of kindness, the necessity for which was nearly ended, +Virginie showed an unusual alacrity in rendering the old woman any +little service in her power, and evidently tried to respond to +Monsieur Morin's civilities, he being Madame Babette's nephew, with a +soft graciousness which must have made one of her principal charms; +for all who knew her speak of the fascination of her manners, so +winning and attentive to others, while yet her opinions, and often +her actions, were of so decided a character. For, as I have said, +her beauty was by no means great; yet every man who came near her +seems to have fallen into the sphere of her influence. Monsieur +Morin was deeper than ever in love with her during these last few +days: he was worked up into a state capable of any sacrifice, either +of himself or others, so that he might obtain her at last. He sat +'devouring her with his eyes' (to use Pierre's expression) whenever +she could not see him; but, if she looked towards him, he looked to +the ground--anywhere--away from her and almost stammered in his +replies if she addressed any question to him.' + +"He had been, I should think, ashamed of his extreme agitation on the +Boulevards, for Pierre thought that he absolutely shunned him for +these few succeeding days. He must have believed that he had driven +the Norman (my poor Clement!) off the field, by banishing him from +his inn; and thought that the intercourse between him and Virginie, +which he had thus interrupted, was of so slight and transient a +character as to be quenched by a little difficulty. + +"But he appears to have felt that he had made but little way, and he +awkwardly turned to Pierre for help--not yet confessing his love, +though; he only tried to make friends again with the lad after their +silent estrangement. And Pierre for some time did not choose to +perceive his cousin's advances. He would reply to all the roundabout +questions Morin put to him respecting household conversations when he +was not present, or household occupations and tone of thought, +without mentioning Virginie's name any more than his questioner did. +The lad would seem to suppose, that his cousin's strong interest in +their domestic ways of going on was all on account of Madame Babette. +At last he worked his cousin up to the point of making him a +confidant: and then the boy was half frightened at the torrent of +vehement words he had unloosed. The lava came down with a greater +rush for having been pent up so long. Morin cried out his words in a +hoarse, passionate voice, clenched his teeth, his fingers, and seemed +almost convulsed, as he spoke out his terrible love for Virginie, +which would lead him to kill her sooner than see her another's; and +if another stepped in between him and her!--and then he smiled a +fierce, triumphant smile, but did not say any more. + +"Pierre was, as I said, half-frightened; but also half-admiring. +This was really love--a 'grande passion,'--a really fine dramatic +thing,--like the plays they acted at the little theatre yonder. He +had a dozen times the sympathy with his cousin now that he had had +before, and readily swore by the infernal gods, for they were far too +enlightened to believe in one God, or Christianity, or anything of +the kind,--that he would devote himself, body and soul, to forwarding +his cousin's views. Then his cousin took him to a shop, and bought +him a smart second-hand watch, on which they scratched the word +Fidelite, and thus was the compact sealed. Pierre settled in his own +mind, that if he were a woman, he should like to be beloved as +Virginie was, by his cousin, and that it would be an extremely good +thing for her to be the wife of so rich a citizen as Morin Fils,--and +for Pierre himself, too, for doubtless their gratitude would lead +them to give him rings and watches ad infinitum. + +"A day or two afterwards, Virginie was taken ill. Madame Babette +said it was because she had persevered in going out in all weathers, +after confining herself to two warm rooms for so long; and very +probably this was really the cause, for, from Pierre's account, she +must have been suffering from a feverish cold, aggravated, no doubt, +by her impatience at Madame Babette's familiar prohibitions of any +more walks until she was better. Every day, in spite of her +trembling, aching limbs, she would fain have arranged her dress for +her walk at the usual time; but Madame Babette was fully prepared to +put physical obstacles in her way, if she was not obedient in +remaining tranquil on the little sofa by the side of the fire. The +third day, she called Pierre to her, when his mother was not +attending (having, in fact, locked up Mademoiselle Cannes' out-of- +door things). + +"'See, my child,' said Virginie. 'Thou must do me a great favour. +Go to the gardener's shop in the Rue des Bons-Enfans, and look at the +nosegays in the window. I long for pinks; they are my favourite +flower. Here are two francs. If thou seest a nosegay of pinks +displayed in the window, if it be ever so faded--nay, if thou seest +two or three nosegays of pinks, remember, buy them all, and bring +them to me, I have so great a desire for the smell.' She fell back +weak and exhausted. Pierre hurried out. Now was the time; here was +the clue to the long inspection of the nosegay in this very shop. + +"Sure enough, there was a drooping nosegay of pinks in the window. +Pierre went in, and, with all his impatience, he made as good a +bargain as he could, urging that the flowers were faded, and good for +nothing. At last he purchased them at a very moderate price. And +now you will learn the bad consequences of teaching the lower orders +anything beyond what is immediately necessary to enable them to earn +their daily bread! The silly Count de Crequy,--he who had been sent +to his bloody rest, by the very canaille of whom he thought so much,- +-he who had made Virginie (indirectly, it is true) reject such a man +as her cousin Clement, by inflating her mind with his bubbles of +theories,--this Count de Crequy had long ago taken a fancy to Pierre, +as he saw the bright sharp child playing about his court--Monsieur de +Crequy had even begun to educate the boy himself to try work out +certain opinions of his into practice,--but the drudgery of the +affair wearied him, and, beside, Babette had left his employment. +Still the Count took a kind of interest in his former pupil; and made +some sort of arrangement by which Pierre was to be taught reading and +writing, and accounts, and Heaven knows what besides,--Latin, I dare +say. So Pierre, instead of being an innocent messenger, as he ought +to have been--(as Mr. Horner's little lad Gregson ought to have been +this morning)--could read writing as well as either you or I. So +what does he do, on obtaining the nosegay, but examine it well. The +stalks of the flowers were tied up with slips of matting in wet moss. +Pierre undid the strings, unwrapped the moss, and out fell a piece of +wet paper, with the writing all blurred with moisture. It was but a +torn piece of writing-paper, apparently, but Pierre's wicked +mischievous eyes read what was written on it,--written so as to look +like a fragment,--'Ready, every and any night at nine. All is +prepared. Have no fright. Trust one who, whatever hopes he might +once have had, is content now to serve you as a faithful cousin;' and +a place was named, which I forget, but which Pierre did not, as it +was evidently the rendezvous. After the lad had studied every word, +till he could say it off by heart, he placed the paper where he had +found it, enveloped it in moss, and tied the whole up again +carefully. Virginie's face coloured scarlet as she received it. She +kept smelling at it, and trembling: but she did not untie it, +although Pierre suggested how much fresher it would be if the stalks +were immediately put into water. But once, after his back had been +turned for a minute, he saw it untied when he looked round again, and +Virginie was blushing, and hiding something in her bosom. + +"Pierre was now all impatience to set off and find his cousin, But +his mother seemed to want him for small domestic purposes even more +than usual; and he had chafed over a multitude of errands connected +with the Hotel before he could set off and search for his cousin at +his usual haunts. At last the two met and Pierre related all the +events of the morning to Morin. He said the note off word by word. +(That lad this morning had something of the magpie look of Pierre--it +made me shudder to see him, and hear him repeat the note by heart.) +Then Morin asked him to tell him all over again. Pierre was struck +by Morin's heavy sighs as he repeated the story. When he came the +second time to the note, Morin tried to write the words down; but +either he was not a good, ready scholar, or his fingers trembled too +much. Pierre hardly remembered, but, at any rate, the lad had to do +it, with his wicked reading and writing. When this was done, Morin +sat heavily silent. Pierre would have preferred the expected +outburst, for this impenetrable gloom perplexed and baffled him. He +had even to speak to his cousin to rouse him; and when he replied, +what he said had so little apparent connection with the subject which +Pierre had expected to find uppermost in his mind, that he was half +afraid that his cousin had lost his wits. + +"'My Aunt Babette is out of coffee.' + +"'I am sure I do not know,' said Pierre. + +"'Yes, she is. I heard her say so. Tell her that a friend of mine +has just opened a shop in the Rue Saint Antoine, and that if she will +join me there in an hour, I will supply her with a good stock of +coffee, just to give my friend encouragement. His name is Antoine +Meyer, Number One hundred and Fifty at the sign of the Cap of +Liberty.' + +"'I could go with you now. I can carry a few pounds of coffee better +than my mother,' said Pierre, all in good faith. He told me he +should never forget the look on his cousin's face, as he turned +round, and bade him begone, and give his mother the message without +another word. It had evidently sent him home promptly to obey his +cousins command. Morin's message perplexed Madame Babette. + +"'How could he know I was out of coffee?' said she. 'I am; but I +only used the last up this morning. How could Victor know about it?' + +"'I am sure I can't tell,' said Pierre, who by this time had +recovered his usual self-possession. 'All I know is, that monsieur +is in a pretty temper, and that if you are not sharp to your time at +this Antoine Meyer's you are likely to come in for some of his black +looks.' + +"'Well, it is very kind of him to offer to give me some coffee, to be +sure! But how could he know I was out?' + +"Pierre hurried his mother off impatiently, for he was certain that +the offer of the coffee was only a blind to some hidden purpose on +his cousin's part; and he made no doubt that when his mother had been +informed of what his cousin's real intention was, he, Pierre, could +extract it from her by coaxing or bullying. But he was mistaken. +Madame Babette returned home, grave, depressed, silent, and loaded +with the best coffee. Some time afterwards he learnt why his cousin +had sought for this interview. It was to extract from her, by +promises and threats, the real name of Mam'selle Cannes, which would +give him a clue to the true appellation of The Faithful Cousin. He +concealed the second purpose from his aunt, who had been quite +unaware of his jealousy of the Norman farmer, or of his +identification of him with any relation of Virginie's. But Madame +Babette instinctively shrank from giving him any information: she +must have felt that, in the lowering mood in which she found him, his +desire for greater knowledge of Virginie's antecedents boded her no +good. And yet he made his aunt his confidante--told her what she had +only suspected before--that he was deeply enamoured of Mam'selle +Cannes, and would gladly marry her. He spoke to Madame Babette of +his father's hoarded riches; and of the share which he, as partner, +had in them at the present time; and of the prospect of the +succession to the whole, which he had, as only child. He told his +aunt of the provision for her (Madame Babette's) life, which he would +make on the day when he married Mam'selle Cannes. And yet--and yet-- +Babette saw that in his eye and look which made her more and more +reluctant to confide in him. By-and-by he tried threats. She should +leave the conciergerie, and find employment where she liked. Still +silence. Then he grew angry, and swore that he would inform against +her at the bureau of the Directory, for harbouring an aristocrat; an +aristocrat he knew Mademoiselle was, whatever her real name might be. +His aunt should have a domiciliary visit, and see how she liked that. +The officers of the Government were the people for finding out +secrets. In vain she reminded him that, by so doing, he would expose +to imminent danger the lady whom he had professed to love. He told +her, with a sullen relapse into silence after his vehement outpouring +of passion, never to trouble herself about that. At last he wearied +out the old woman, and, frightened alike of herself and of him, she +told him all,--that Mam'selle Cannes was Mademoiselle Virginie de +Crequy, daughter of the Count of that name. Who was the Count? +Younger brother of the Marquis. Where was the Marquis? Dead long +ago, leaving a widow and child. A son? (eagerly). Yes, a son. +Where was he? Parbleu! how should she know?--for her courage +returned a little as the talk went away from the only person of the +De Crequy family that she cared about. But, by dint of some small +glasses out of a bottle of Antoine Meyer's, she told him more about +the De Crequys than she liked afterwards to remember. For the +exhilaration of the brandy lasted but a very short time, and she came +home, as I have said, depressed, with a presentiment of coming evil. +She would not answer Pierre, but cuffed him about in a manner to +which the spoilt boy was quite unaccustomed. His cousin's short, +angry words, and sudden withdrawal of confidence,--his mother's +unwonted crossness and fault-finding, all made Virginie's kind, +gentle treatment, more than ever charming to the lad. He half +resolved to tell her how he had been acting as a spy upon her +actions, and at whose desire he had done it. But he was afraid of +Morin, and of the vengeance which he was sure would fall upon him for +any breach of confidence. Towards half-past eight that evening-- +Pierre, watching, saw Virginie arrange several little things--she was +in the inner room, but he sat where he could see her through the +glazed partition. His mother sat--apparently sleeping--in the great +easy-chair; Virginie moved about softly, for fear of disturbing her. +She made up one or two little parcels of the few things she could +call her own: one packet she concealed about herself--the others she +directed, and left on the shelf. 'She is going,' thought Pierre, and +(as he said in giving me the account) his heart gave a spring, to +think that he should never see her again. If either his mother or +his cousin had been more kind to him, he might have endeavoured to +intercept her; but as it was, he held his breath, and when she came +out he pretended to read, scarcely knowing whether he wished her to +succeed in the purpose which he was almost sure she entertained, or +not. She stopped by him, and passed her hand over his hair. He told +me that his eyes filled with tears at this caress. Then she stood +for a moment looking at the sleeping Madame Babette, and stooped down +and softly kissed her on the forehead. Pierre dreaded lest his +mother should awake (for by this time the wayward, vacillating boy +must have been quite on Virginie's side), but the brandy she had +drunk made her slumber heavily. Virginie went. Pierre's heart beat +fast. He was sure his cousin would try to intercept her; but how, he +could not imagine. He longed to run out and see the catastrophe,-- +but he had let the moment slip; he was also afraid of reawakening his +mother to her unusual state of anger and violence." + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + + +"Pierre went on pretending to read, but in reality listening with +acute tension of ear to every little sound. His perceptions became +so sensitive in this respect that he was incapable of measuring time, +every moment had seemed so full of noises, from the beating of his +heart up to the roll of the heavy carts in the distance. He wondered +whether Virginie would have reached the place of rendezvous, and yet +he was unable to compute the passage of minutes. His mother slept +soundly: that was well. By this time Virginie must have met the +'faithful cousin:' if, indeed, Morin had not made his appearance. + +"At length, he felt as if he could no longer sit still, awaiting the +issue, but must run out and see what course events had taken. In +vain his mother, half-rousing herself, called after him to ask +whither he was going: he was already out of hearing before she had +ended her sentence, and he ran on until, stopped by the sight of +Mademoiselle Cannes walking along at so swift a pace that it was +almost a run; while at her side, resolutely keeping by her, Morin was +striding abreast. Pierre had just turned the corner of the street, +when he came upon them. Virginie would have passed him without +recognizing him, she was in such passionate agitation, but for +Morin's gesture, by which he would fain have kept Pierre from +interrupting them. Then, when Virginie saw the lad, she caught at +his arm, and thanked God, as if in that boy of twelve or fourteen she +held a protector. Pierre felt her tremble from head to foot, and was +afraid lest she would fall, there where she stood, in the hard rough +street. + +"'Begone, Pierre!' said Morin. + +"'I cannot,' replied Pierre, who indeed was held firmly by Virginie. +'Besides, I won't,' he added. 'Who has been frightening mademoiselle +in this way?' asked he, very much inclined to brave his cousin at all +hazards. + +"'Mademoiselle is not accustomed to walk in the streets alone,' said +Morin, sulkily. 'She came upon a crowd attracted by the arrest of an +aristocrat, and their cries alarmed her. I offered to take charge of +her home. Mademoiselle should not walk in these streets alone. We +are not like the cold-blooded people of the Faubourg Saint Germain.' + +"Virginie did not speak. Pierre doubted if she heard a word of what +they were saying. She leant upon him more and more heavily. + +"'Will mademoiselle condescend to take my arm?' said Morin, with +sulky, and yet humble, uncouthness. I dare say he would have given +worlds if he might have had that little hand within his arm; but, +though she still kept silence, she shuddered up away from him, as you +shrink from touching a toad. He had said something to her during +that walk, you may be sure, which had made her loathe him. He marked +and understood the gesture. He held himself aloof while Pierre gave +her all the assistance he could in their slow progress homewards. +But Morin accompanied her all the same. He had played too desperate +a game to be baulked now. He had given information against the ci- +devant Marquis de Crequy, as a returned emigre, to be met with at +such a time, in such a place. Morin had hoped that all sign of the +arrest would have been cleared away before Virginie reached the spot- +-so swiftly were terrible deeds done in those days. But Clement +defended himself desperately: Virginie was punctual to a second; +and, though the wounded man was borne off to the Abbaye, amid a crowd +of the unsympathising jeerers who mingled with the armed officials of +the Directory, Morin feared lest Virginie had recognized him; and he +would have preferred that she should have thought that the 'faithful +cousin' was faithless, than that she should have seen him in bloody +danger on her account. I suppose he fancied that, if Virginie never +saw or heard more of him, her imagination would not dwell on his +simple disappearance, as it would do if she knew what he was +suffering for her sake. + +"At any rate, Pierre saw that his cousin was deeply mortified by the +whole tenor of his behaviour during their walk home. When they +arrived at Madame Babette's, Virginie fell fainting on the floor; her +strength had but just sufficed for this exertion of reaching the +shelter of the house. Her first sign of restoring consciousness +consisted in avoidance of Morin. He had been most assiduous in his +efforts to bring her round; quite tender in his way, Pierre said; and +this marked, instinctive repugnance to him evidently gave him extreme +pain. I suppose Frenchmen are more demonstrative than we are; for +Pierre declared that he saw his cousin's eyes fill with tears, as she +shrank away from his touch, if he tried to arrange the shawl they had +laid under her head like a pillow, or as she shut her eyes when he +passed before her. Madame Babette was urgent with her to go and lie +down on the bed in the inner room; but it was some time before she +was strong enough to rise and do this. + +"When Madame Babette returned from arranging the girl comfortably, +the three relations sat down in silence; a silence which Pierre +thought would never be broken. He wanted his mother to ask his +cousin what had happened. But Madame Babette was afraid of her +nephew, and thought it more discreet to wait for such crumbs of +intelligence as he might think fit to throw to her. But, after she +had twice reported Virginie to be asleep, without a word being +uttered in reply to her whispers by either of her companions, Morin's +powers of self-containment gave way. + +"'It is hard!' he said. + +"'What is hard?' asked Madame Babette, after she had paused for a +time, to enable him to add to, or to finish, his sentence, if he +pleased. + +"'It is hard for a man to love a woman as I do,' he went on--'I did +not seek to love her, it came upon me before I was aware--before I +had ever thought about it at all, I loved her better than all the +world beside. All my life, before I knew her, seems a dull blank. I +neither know nor care for what I did before then. And now there are +just two lives before me. Either I have her, or I have not. That is +all: but that is everything. And what can I do to make her have me? +Tell me, aunt,' and he caught at Madame Babette's arm, and gave it so +sharp a shake, that she half screamed out, Pierre said, and evidently +grew alarmed at her nephew's excitement. + +"'Hush, Victor!' said she. 'There are other women in the world, if +this one will not have you.' + +"'None other for me,' he said, sinking back as if hopeless. 'I am +plain and coarse, not one of the scented darlings of the aristocrats. +Say that I am ugly, brutish; I did not make myself so, any more than +I made myself love her. It is my fate. But am I to submit to the +consequences of my fate without a struggle? Not I. As strong as my +love is, so strong is my will. It can be no stronger,' continued he, +gloomily. 'Aunt Babette, you must help me--you must make her love +me.' He was so fierce here, that Pierre said he did not wonder that +his mother was frightened. + +"'I, Victor!' she exclaimed. 'I make her love you? How can I? Ask +me to speak for you to Mademoiselle Didot, or to Mademoiselle +Cauchois even, or to such as they, and I'll do it, and welcome. But +to Mademoiselle de Crequy, why you don't know the difference! Those +people--the old nobility I mean--why they don't know a man from a +dog, out of their own rank! And no wonder, for the young gentlemen +of quality are treated differently to us from their very birth. If +she had you to-morrow, you would be miserable. Let me alone for +knowing the aristocracy. I have not been a concierge to a duke and +three counts for nothing. I tell you, all your ways are different to +her ways.' + +"'I would change my "ways," as you call them.' + +"'Be reasonable, Victor.' + +"'No, I will not be reasonable, if by that you mean giving her up. I +tell you two lives are before me; one with her, one without her. But +the latter will be but a short career for both of us. You said, +aunt, that the talk went in the conciergerie of her father's hotel, +that she would have nothing to do with this cousin whom I put out of +the way to-day?' + +"'So the servants said. How could I know? All I know is, that he +left off coming to our hotel, and that at one time before then he had +never been two days absent.' + +"'So much the better for him. He suffers now for having come between +me and my object--in trying to snatch her away out of my sight. Take +you warning, Pierre! I did not like your meddling to-night.' And so +he went off, leaving Madam Babette rocking herself backwards and +forwards, in all the depression of spirits consequent upon the +reaction after the brandy, and upon her knowledge of her nephew's +threatened purpose combined. + +"In telling you most of this, I have simply repeated Pierre's +account, which I wrote down at the time. But here what he had to say +came to a sudden break; for, the next morning, when Madame Babette +rose, Virginie was missing, and it was some time before either she, +or Pierre, or Morin, could get the slightest clue to the missing +girl. + +"And now I must take up the story as it was told to the Intendant +Flechier by the old gardener Jacques, with whom Clement had been +lodging on his first arrival in Paris. The old man could not, I dare +say, remember half as much of what had happened as Pierre did; the +former had the dulled memory of age, while Pierre had evidently +thought over the whole series of events as a story--as a play, if one +may call it so--during the solitary hours in his after-life, wherever +they were passed, whether in lonely camp watches, or in the foreign +prison, where he had to drag out many years. Clement had, as I said, +returned to the gardener's garret after he had been dismissed from +the Hotel Duguesclin. There were several reasons for his thus +doubling back. One was, that he put nearly the whole breadth of +Paris between him and an enemy; though why Morin was an enemy, and to +what extent he carried his dislike or hatred, Clement could not tell, +of course. The next reason for returning to Jacques was, no doubt, +the conviction that, in multiplying his residences, he multiplied the +chances against his being suspected and recognized. And then, again, +the old man was in his secret, and his ally, although perhaps but a +feeble kind of one. It was through Jacques that the plan of +communication, by means of a nosegay of pinks, had been devised; and +it was Jacques who procured him the last disguise that Clement was to +use in Paris--as he hoped and trusted. It was that of a respectable +shopkeeper of no particular class; a dress that would have seemed +perfectly suitable to the young man who would naturally have worn it; +and yet, as Clement put it on, and adjusted it--giving it a sort of +finish and elegance which I always noticed about his appearance and +which I believed was innate in the wearer--I have no doubt it seemed +like the usual apparel of a gentleman. No coarseness of texture, nor +clumsiness of cut could disguise the nobleman of thirty descents, it +appeared; for immediately on arriving at the place of rendezvous, he +was recognized by the men placed there on Morin's information to +seize him. Jacques, following at a little distance, with a bundle +under his arm containing articles of feminine disguise for Virginie, +saw four men attempt Clement's arrest--saw him, quick as lightning, +draw a sword hitherto concealed in a clumsy stick--saw his agile +figure spring to his guard,--and saw him defend himself with the +rapidity and art of a man skilled in arms. But what good did it do? +as Jacques piteously used to ask, Monsieur Flechier told me. A great +blow from a heavy club on the sword-arm of Monsieur de Crequy laid it +helpless and immovable by his side. Jacques always thought that that +blow came from one of the spectators, who by this time had collected +round the scene of the affray. The next instant, his master--his +little marquis--was down among the feet of the crowd, and though he +was up again before he had received much damage--so active and light +was my poor Clement--it was not before the old gardener had hobbled +forwards, and, with many an old-fashioned oath and curse, proclaimed +himself a partisan of the losing side--a follower of a ci-devant +aristocrat. It was quite enough. He received one or two good blows, +which were, in fact, aimed at his master; and then, almost before he +was aware, he found his arms pinioned behind him with a woman's +garter, which one of the viragos in the crowd had made no scruple of +pulling off in public, as soon as she heard for what purpose it was +wanted. Poor Jacques was stunned and unhappy,--his master was out of +sight, on before; and the old gardener scarce knew whither they were +taking him. His head ached from the blows which had fallen upon it; +it was growing dark--June day though it was,--and when first he seems +to have become exactly aware of what had happened to him, it was when +he was turned into one of the larger rooms of the Abbaye, in which +all were put who had no other allotted place wherein to sleep. One +or two iron lamps hung from the ceiling by chains, giving a dim light +for a little circle. Jacques stumbled forwards over a sleeping body +lying on the ground. The sleeper wakened up enough to complain; and +the apology of the old man in reply caught the ear of his master, +who, until this time, could hardly have been aware of the straits and +difficulties of his faithful Jacques. And there they sat,--against a +pillar, the live-long night, holding one another's hands, and each +restraining expressions of pain, for fear of adding to the other's +distress. That night made them intimate friends, in spite of the +difference of age and rank. The disappointed hopes, the acute +suffering of the present, the apprehensions of the future, made them +seek solace in talking of the past. Monsieur de Crequy and the +gardener found themselves disputing with interest in which chimney of +the stack the starling used to build,--the starling whose nest +Clement sent to Urian, you remember, and discussing the merits of +different espalier-pears which grew, and may grow still, in the old +garden of the Hotel de Crequy. Towards morning both fell asleep. +The old man wakened first. His frame was deadened to suffering, I +suppose, for he felt relieved of his pain; but Clement moaned and +cried in feverish slumber. His broken arm was beginning to inflame +his blood. He was, besides, much injured by some kicks from the +crowd as he fell. As the old man looked sadly on the white, baked +lips, and the flushed cheeks, contorted with suffering even in his +sleep, Clement gave a sharp cry which disturbed his miserable +neighbours, all slumbering around in uneasy attitudes. They bade him +with curses be silent; and then turning round, tried again to forget +their own misery in sleep. For you see, the bloodthirsty canaille +had not been sated with guillotining and hanging all the nobility +they could find, but were now informing, right and left, even against +each other; and when Clement and Jacques were in the prison, there +were few of gentle blood in the place, and fewer still of gentle +manners. At the sound of the angry words and threats, Jacques +thought it best to awaken his master from his feverish uncomfortable +sleep, lest he should provoke more enmity; and, tenderly lifting him +up, he tried to adjust his own body, so that it should serve as a +rest and a pillow for the younger man. The motion aroused Clement, +and he began to talk in a strange, feverish way, of Virginie, too,-- +whose name he would not have breathed in such a place had he been +quite himself. But Jacques had as much delicacy of feeling as any +lady in the land, although, mind you, he knew neither how to read nor +write,--and bent his head low down, so that his master might tell him +in a whisper what messages he was to take to Mademoiselle de Crequy, +in case--Poor Clement, he knew it must come to that! No escape for +him now, in Norman disguise or otherwise! Either by gathering fever +or guillotine, death was sure of his prey. Well! when that happened, +Jacques was to go and find Mademoiselle de Crequy, and tell her that +her cousin loved her at the last as he had loved her at the first; +but that she should never have heard another word of his attachment +from his living lips; that he knew he was not good enough for her, +his queen; and that no thought of earning her love by his devotion +had prompted his return to France, only that, if possible, he might +have the great privilege of serving her whom he loved. And then he +went off into rambling talk about petit-maitres, and such kind of +expressions, said Jacques to Flechier, the intendant, little knowing +what a clue that one word gave to much of the poor lad's suffering. + +"The summer morning came slowly on in that dark prison, and when +Jacques could look round--his master was now sleeping on his +shoulder, still the uneasy, starting sleep of fever--he saw that +there were many women among the prisoners. (I have heard some of +those who have escaped from the prisons say, that the look of despair +and agony that came into the faces of the prisoners on first +wakening, as the sense of their situation grew upon them, was what +lasted the longest in the memory of the survivors. This look, they +said, passed away from the women's faces sooner than it did from +those of the men.) + +"Poor old Jacques kept falling asleep, and plucking himself up again +for fear lest, if he did not attend to his master, some harm might +come to the swollen, helpless arm. Yet his weariness grew upon him +in spite of all his efforts, and at last he felt as if he must give +way to the irresistible desire, if only for five minutes. But just +then there was a bustle at the door. Jacques opened his eyes wide to +look. + +"'The gaoler is early with breakfast,' said some one, lazily. + +"'It is the darkness of this accursed place that makes us think it +early,' said another. + +"All this time a parley was going on at the door. Some one came in; +not the gaoler--a woman. The door was shut to and locked behind her. +She only advanced a step or two, for it was too sudden a change, out +of the light into that dark shadow, for any one to see clearly for +the first few minutes. Jacques had his eyes fairly open now, and was +wide awake. It was Mademoiselle de Crequy, looking bright, clear, +and resolute. The faithful heart of the old man read that look like +an open page. Her cousin should not die there on her behalf, without +at least the comfort of her sweet presence. + +"'Here he is,' he whispered as her gown would have touched him in +passing, without her perceiving him, in the heavy obscurity of the +place. + +"'The good God bless you, my friend!' she murmured, as she saw the +attitude of the old man, propped against a pillar, and holding +Clement in his arms, as if the young man had been a helpless baby, +while one of the poor gardener's hands supported the broken limb in +the easiest position. Virginie sat down by the old man, and held out +her arms. Softly she moved Clement's head to her own shoulder; +softly she transferred the task of holding the arm to herself. +Clement lay on the floor, but she supported him, and Jacques was at +liberty to arise and stretch and shake his stiff, weary old body. He +then sat down at a little distance, and watched the pair until he +fell asleep. Clement had muttered 'Virginie,' as they half-roused +him by their movements out of his stupor; but Jacques thought he was +only dreaming; nor did he seem fully awake when once his eyes opened, +and he looked full at Virginie's face bending over him, and growing +crimson under his gaze, though she never stirred, for fear of hurting +him if she moved. Clement looked in silence, until his heavy eyelids +came slowly down, and he fell into his oppressive slumber again. +Either he did not recognize her, or she came in too completely as a +part of his sleeping visions for him to be disturbed by her +appearance there. + +"When Jacques awoke it was full daylight--at least as full as it +would ever be in that place. His breakfast--the gaol-allowance of +bread and vin ordinaire--was by his side. He must have slept +soundly. He looked for his master. He and Virginie had recognized +each other now,--hearts, as well as appearance. They were smiling +into each other's faces, as if that dull, vaulted room in the grim +Abbaye were the sunny gardens of Versailles, with music and festivity +all abroad. Apparently they had much to say to each other; for +whispered questions and answers never ceased. + +"Virginie had made a sling for the poor broken arm; nay, she had +obtained two splinters of wood in some way, and one of their fellow- +prisoners--having, it appeared, some knowledge of surgery--had set +it. Jacques felt more desponding by far than they did, for he was +suffering from the night he had passed, which told upon his aged +frame; while they must have heard some good news, as it seemed to +him, so bright and happy did they look. Yet Clement was still in +bodily pain and suffering, and Virginie, by her own act and deed, was +a prisoner in that dreadful Abbaye, whence the only issue was the +guillotine. But they were together: they loved: they understood +each other at length. + +"When Virginie saw that Jacques was awake, and languidly munching his +breakfast, she rose from the wooden stool on which she was sitting, +and went to him, holding out both hands, and refusing to allow him to +rise, while she thanked him with pretty eagerness for all his +kindness to Monsieur. Monsieur himself came towards him, following +Virginie, but with tottering steps, as if his head was weak and +dizzy, to thank the poor old man, who now on his feet, stood between +them, ready to cry while they gave him credit for faithful actions +which he felt to have been almost involuntary on his part,--for +loyalty was like an instinct in the good old days, before your +educational cant had come up. And so two days went on. The only +event was the morning call for the victims, a certain number of whom +were summoned to trial every day. And to be tried was to be +condemned. Every one of the prisoners became grave, as the hour for +their summons approached. Most of the victims went to their doom +with uncomplaining resignation, and for a while after their departure +there was comparative silence in the prison. But, by-and-by--so said +Jacques--the conversation or amusements began again. Human nature +cannot stand the perpetual pressure of such keen anxiety, without an +effort to relieve itself by thinking of something else. Jacques said +that Monsieur and Mademoiselle were for ever talking together of the +past days,--it was 'Do you remember this?' or, 'Do you remember +that?' perpetually. He sometimes thought they forgot where they +were, and what was before them. But Jacques did not, and every day +he trembled more and more as the list was called over. + +"The third morning of their incarceration, the gaoler brought in a +man whom Jacques did not recognize, and therefore did not at once +observe; for he was waiting, as in duty bound, upon his master and +his sweet young lady (as he always called her in repeating the +story). He thought that the new introduction was some friend of the +gaoler, as the two seemed well acquainted, and the latter stayed a +few minutes talking with his visitor before leaving him in prison. +So Jacques was surprised when, after a short time had elapsed, he +looked round, and saw the fierce stare with which the stranger was +regarding Monsieur and Mademoiselle de Crequy, as the pair sat at +breakfast,--the said breakfast being laid as well as Jacques knew +how, on a bench fastened into the prison wall,--Virginie sitting on +her low stool, and Clement half lying on the ground by her side, and +submitting gladly to be fed by her pretty white fingers; for it was +one of her fancies, Jacques said, to do all she could for him, in +consideration of his broken arm. And, indeed, Clement was wasting +away daily; for he had received other injuries, internal and more +serious than that to his arm, during the melee which had ended in his +capture. The stranger made Jacques conscious of his presence by a +sigh, which was almost a groan. All three prisoners looked round at +the sound. Clement's face expressed little but scornful +indifference; but Virginie's face froze into stony hate. Jacques +said he never saw such a look, and hoped that he never should again. +Yet after that first revelation of feeling, her look was steady and +fixed in another direction to that in which the stranger stood,-- +still motionless--still watching. He came a step nearer at last. + +"'Mademoiselle,' he said. Not the quivering of an eyelash showed +that she heard him. 'Mademoiselle!' he said again, with an intensity +of beseeching that made Jacques--not knowing who he was--almost pity +him, when he saw his young lady's obdurate face. + +"There was perfect silence for a space of time which Jacques could +not measure. Then again the voice, hesitatingly, saying, 'Monsieur!' +Clement could not hold the same icy countenance as Virginie; he +turned his head with an impatient gesture of disgust; but even that +emboldened the man. + +"'Monsieur, do ask mademoiselle to listen to me,--just two words.' + +"'Mademoiselle de Crequy only listens to whom she chooses.' Very +haughtily my Clement would say that, I am sure. + +"'But, mademoiselle,'--lowering his voice, and coming a step or two +nearer. Virginie must have felt his approach, though she did not see +it; for she drew herself a little on one side, so as to put as much +space as possible between him and her.--'Mademoiselle, it is not too +late. I can save you: but to-morrow your name is down on the list. +I can save you, if you will listen.' + +"Still no word or sign. Jacques did not understand the affair. Why +was she so obdurate to one who might be ready to include Clement in +the proposal, as far as Jacques knew? + +"The man withdrew a little, but did not offer to leave the prison. +He never took his eyes off Virginie; he seemed to be suffering from +some acute and terrible pain as he watched her. + +"Jacques cleared away the breakfast-things as well as he could. +Purposely, as I suspect, he passed near the man. + +"'Hist!' said the stranger. 'You are Jacques, the gardener, arrested +for assisting an aristocrat. I know the gaoler. You shall escape, +if you will. Only take this message from me to mademoiselle. You +heard. She will not listen to me: I did not want her to come here. +I never knew she was here, and she will die to-morrow. They will put +her beautiful round throat under the guillotine. Tell her, good old +man, tell her how sweet life is; and how I can save her; and how I +will not ask for more than just to see her from time to time. She is +so young; and death is annihilation, you know. Why does she hate me +so? I want to save her; I have done her no harm. Good old man, tell +her how terrible death is; and that she will die to-morrow, unless +she listens to me.' + +"Jacques saw no harm in repeating this message. Clement listened in +silence, watching Virginie with an air of infinite tenderness. + +"'Will you not try him, my cherished one?' he said. 'Towards you he +may mean well' (which makes me think that Virginie had never repeated +to Clement the conversation which she had overheard that last night +at Madame Babette's); 'you would be in no worse a situation than you +were before!' + +"'No worse, Clement! and I should have known what you were, and have +lost you. My Clement!' said she, reproachfully. + +"'Ask him,' said she, turning to Jacques, suddenly, 'if he can save +Monsieur de Crequy as well,--if he can?--O Clement, we might escape +to England; we are but young.' And she hid her face on his shoulder. + +"Jacques returned to the stranger, and asked him Virginie's question. +His eyes were fixed on the cousins; he was very pale, and the +twitchings or contortions, which must have been involuntary whenever +he was agitated, convulsed his whole body. + +"He made a long pause. 'I will save mademoiselle and monsieur, if +she will go straight from prison to the mairie, and be my wife.' + +"'Your wife!' Jacques could not help exclaiming, 'That she will never +be--never!' + +"'Ask her!' said Morin, hoarsely. + +"But almost before Jacques thought he could have fairly uttered the +words, Clement caught their meaning. + +"'Begone!' said he; 'not one word more.' Virginie touched the old +man as he was moving away. 'Tell him he does not know how he makes +me welcome death.' And smiling, as if triumphant, she turned again +to Clement. + +"The stranger did not speak as Jacques gave him the meaning, not the +words, of their replies. He was going away, but stopped. A minute +or two afterwards, he beckoned to Jacques. The old gardener seems to +have thought it undesirable to throw away even the chance of +assistance from such a man as this, for he went forward to speak to +him. + +"'Listen! I have influence with the gaoler. He shall let thee pass +out with the victims to-morrow. No one will notice it, or miss thee- +-. They will be led to trial,--even at the last moment, I will save +her, if she sends me word she relents. Speak to her, as the time +draws on. Life is very sweet,--tell her how sweet. Speak to him; he +will do more with her than thou canst. Let him urge her to live. +Even at the last, I will be at the Palais de Justice,--at the Greve. +I have followers,--I have interest. Come among the crowd that follow +the victims,--I shall see thee. It will be no worse for him, if she +escapes' - + +"'Save my master, and I will do all,' said Jacques. + +"'Only on my one condition,' said Morin, doggedly; and Jacques was +hopeless of that condition ever being fulfilled. But he did not see +why his own life might not be saved. By remaining in prison until +the next day, he should have rendered every service in his power to +his master and the young lady. He, poor fellow, shrank from death; +and he agreed with Morin to escape, if he could, by the means Morin +had suggested, and to bring him word if Mademoiselle de Crequy +relented. (Jacques had no expectation that she would; but I fancy he +did not think it necessary to tell Morn of this conviction of his.) +This bargaining with so base a man for so slight a thing as life, was +the only flaw that I heard of in the old gardener's behaviour. Of +course, the mere reopening of the subject was enough to stir Virginie +to displeasure. Clement urged her, it is true; but the light he had +gained upon Morin's motions, made him rather try to set the case +before her in as fair a manner as possible than use any persuasive +arguments. And, even as it was, what he said on the subject made +Virginie shed tears--the first that had fallen from her since she +entered the prison. So, they were summoned and went together, at the +fatal call of the muster-roll of victims the next morning. He, +feeble from his wounds and his injured health; she, calm and serene, +only petitioning to be allowed to walk next to him, in order that she +might hold him up when he turned faint and giddy from his extreme +suffering. + +"Together they stood at the bar; together they were condemned. As +the words of judgment were pronounced, Virginie tuned to Clement, and +embraced him with passionate fondness. Then, making him lean on her, +they marched out towards the Place de la Greve. + +"Jacques was free now. He had told Morin how fruitless his efforts +at persuasion had been; and scarcely caring to note the effect of his +information upon the man, he had devoted himself to watching Monsieur +and Mademoiselle de Crequy. And now he followed them to the Place de +la Greve. He saw them mount the platform; saw them kneel down +together till plucked up by the impatient officials; could see that +she was urging some request to the executioner; the end of which +seemed to be, that Clement advanced first to the guillotine, was +executed (and just at this moment there was a stir among the crowd, +as of a man pressing forward towards the scaffold). Then she, +standing with her face to the guillotine, slowly made the sign of the +cross, and knelt down. + +"Jacques covered his eyes, blinded with tears. The report of a +pistol made him look up. She was gone--another victim in her place-- +and where there had been a little stir in the crowd not five minutes +before, some men were carrying off a dead body. A man had shot +himself, they said. Pierre told me who that man was." + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + + +After a pause, I ventured to ask what became of Madame de Crequy, +Clement's mother. + +"She never made any inquiry about him," said my lady. "She must have +known that he was dead; though how, we never could tell. Medlicott +remembered afterwards that it was about, if not on--Medlicott to this +day declares that it was on the very Monday, June the nineteenth, +when her son was executed, that Madame de Crequy left off her rouge +and took to her bed, as one bereaved and hopeless. It certainly was +about that time; and Medlicott--who was deeply impressed by that +dream of Madame de Crequy's (the relation of which I told you had had +such an effect on my lord), in which she had seen the figure of +Virginie--as the only light object amid much surrounding darkness as +of night, smiling and beckoning Clement on--on--till at length the +bright phantom stopped, motionless, and Madame de Crequy's eyes began +to penetrate the murky darkness, and to see closing around her the +gloomy dripping walls which she had once seen and never forgotten-- +the walls of the vault of the chapel of the De Crequys in Saint +Germain l'Auxerrois; and there the two last of the Crequys laid them +down among their forefathers, and Madame de Crequy had wakened to the +sound of the great door, which led to the open air, being locked upon +her--I say Medlicott, who was predisposed by this dream to look out +for the supernatural, always declared that Madame de Crequy was made +conscious in some mysterious way, of her son's death, on the very day +and hour when it occurred, and that after that she had no more +anxiety, but was only conscious of a kind of stupefying despair." + +"And what became of her, my lady?" I again asked. + +"What could become of her?" replied Lady Ludlow. "She never could be +induced to rise again, though she lived more than a year after her +son's departure. She kept her bed; her room darkened, her face +turned towards the wall, whenever any one besides Medlicott was in +the room. She hardly ever spoke, and would have died of starvation +but for Medlicott's tender care, in putting a morsel to her lips +every now and then, feeding her, in fact, just as an old bird feeds +her young ones. In the height of summer my lord and I left London. +We would fain have taken her with us into Scotland, but the doctor +(we had the old doctor from Leicester Square) forbade her removal; +and this time he gave such good reasons against it that I acquiesced. +Medlicott and a maid were left with her. Every care was taken of +her. She survived till our return. Indeed, I thought she was in +much the same state as I had left her in, when I came back to London. +But Medlicott spoke of her as much weaker; and one morning on +awakening, they told me she was dead. I sent for Medlicott, who was +in sad distress, she had become so fond of her charge. She said +that, about two o'clock, she had been awakened by unusual +restlessness on Madame de Crequy's part; that she had gone to her +bedside, and found the poor lady feebly but perpetually moving her +wasted arm up and down--and saying to herself in a wailing voice: 'I +did not bless him when he left me--I did not bless him when he left +me!' Medlicott gave her a spoonful or two of jelly, and sat by her, +stroking her hand, and soothing her till she seemed to fall asleep. +But in the morning she was dead." + +"It is a sad story, your ladyship," said I, after a while. + +"Yes it is. People seldom arrive at my age without having watched +the beginning, middle, and end of many lives and many fortunes. We +do not talk about them, perhaps; for they are often so sacred to us, +from having touched into the very quick of our own hearts, as it +were, or into those of others who are dead and gone, and veiled over +from human sight, that we cannot tell the tale as if it was a mere +story. But young people should remember that we have had this solemn +experience of life, on which to base our opinions and form our +judgments, so that they are not mere untried theories. I am not +alluding to Mr. Horner just now, for he is nearly as old as I am-- +within ten years, I dare say--but I am thinking of Mr. Gray, with his +endless plans for some new thing--schools, education, Sabbaths, and +what not. Now he has not seen what all this leads to." + +"It is a pity he has not heard your ladyship tell the story of poor +Monsieur de Crequy." + +"Not at all a pity, my dear. A young man like him, who, both by +position and age, must have had his experience confined to a very +narrow circle, ought not to set up his opinion against mine; he ought +not to require reasons from me, nor to need such explanation of my +arguments (if I condescend to argue), as going into relation of the +circumstances on which my arguments are based in my own mind, would +be." + +"But, my lady, it might convince him," I said, with perhaps +injudicious perseverance. + +"And why should he be convinced?" she asked, with gentle inquiry in +her tone. "He has only to acquiesce. Though he is appointed by Mr. +Croxton, I am the lady of the manor, as he must know. But it is with +Mr. Horner that I must have to do about this unfortunate lad Gregson. +I am afraid there will be no method of making him forget his unlucky +knowledge. His poor brains will be intoxicated with the sense of his +powers, without any counterbalancing principles to guide him. Poor +fellow! I am quite afraid it will end in his being hanged!" + +The next day Mr. Horner came to apologize and explain. He was +evidently--as I could tell from his voice, as he spoke to my lady in +the next room--extremely annoyed at her ladyship's discovery of the +education he had been giving to this boy. My lady spoke with great +authority, and with reasonable grounds of complaint. Mr. Horner was +well acquainted with her thoughts on the subject, and had acted in +defiance of her wishes. He acknowledged as much, and should on no +account have done it, in any other instance, without her leave. + +"Which I could never have granted you," said my lady. + +But this boy had extraordinary capabilities; would, in fact, have +taught himself much that was bad, if he had not been rescued, and +another direction given to his powers. And in all Mr. Horner had +done, he had had her ladyship's service in view. The business was +getting almost beyond his power, so many letters and so much account- +keeping was required by the complicated state in which things were. + +Lady Ludlow felt what was coming--a reference to the mortgage for the +benefit of my lord's Scottish estates, which, she was perfectly +aware, Mr. Horner considered as having been a most unwise proceeding- +-and she hastened to observe--"All this may be very true, Mr. Horner, +and I am sure I should be the last person to wish you to overwork or +distress yourself; but of that we will talk another time. What I am +now anxious to remedy is, if possible, the state of this poor little +Gregson's mind. Would not hard work in the fields be a wholesome and +excellent way of enabling him to forget?" + +"I was in hopes, my lady, that you would have permitted me to bring +him up to act as a kind of clerk," said Mr. Horner, jerking out his +project abruptly. + +"A what?" asked my lady, in infinite surprise. + +"A kind of--of assistant, in the way of copying letters and doing up +accounts. He is already an excellent penman and very quick at +figures." + +"Mr. Horner," said my lady, with dignity, "the son of a poacher and +vagabond ought never to have been able to copy letters relating to +the Hanbury estates; and, at any rate, he shall not. I wonder how it +is that, knowing the use he has made of his power of reading a +letter, you should venture to propose such an employment for him as +would require his being in your confidence, and you the trusted agent +of this family. Why, every secret (and every ancient and honourable +family has its secrets, as you know, Mr. Horner) would be learnt off +by heart, and repeated to the first comer!" + +"I should have hoped to have trained him, my lady, to understand the +rules of discretion." + +"Trained! Train a barn-door fowl to be a pheasant, Mr. Horner! That +would be the easier task. But you did right to speak of discretion +rather than honour. Discretion looks to the consequences of actions- +-honour looks to the action itself, and is an instinct rather than a +virtue. After all, it is possible you might have trained him to be +discreet." + +Mr. Horner was silent. My lady was softened by his not replying, and +began as she always did in such cases, to fear lest she had been too +harsh. I could tell that by her voice and by her next speech, as +well as if I had seen her face. + +"But I am sorry you are feeling the pressure of the affairs: I am +quite aware that I have entailed much additional trouble upon you by +some of my measures: I must try and provide you with some suitable +assistance. Copying letters and doing up accounts, I think you +said?" + +Mr. Horner had certainly had a distant idea of turning the little +boy, in process of time, into a clerk; but he had rather urged this +possibility of future usefulness beyond what he had at first +intended, in speaking of it to my lady as a palliation of his +offence, and he certainly was very much inclined to retract his +statement that the letter-writing, or any other business, had +increased, or that he was in the slightest want of help of any kind, +when my lady after a pause of consideration, suddenly said - + +"I have it. Miss Galindo will, I am sure, be glad to assist you. I +will speak to her myself. The payment we should make to a clerk +would be of real service to her!" + +I could hardly help echoing Mr. Horner's tone of surprise as he said +- + +"Miss Galindo!" + +For, you must be told who Miss Galindo was; at least, told as much as +I know. Miss Galindo had lived in the village for many years, +keeping house on the smallest possible means, yet always managing to +maintain a servant. And this servant was invariably chosen because +she had some infirmity that made her undesirable to every one else. +I believe Miss Galindo had had lame and blind and hump-backed maids. +She had even at one time taken in a girl hopelessly gone in +consumption, because if not she would have had to go to the +workhouse, and not have had enough to eat. Of course the poor +creature could not perform a single duty usually required of a +servant, and Miss Galindo herself was both servant and nurse. + +Her present maid was scarcely four feet high, and bore a terrible +character for ill-temper. Nobody but Miss Galindo would have kept +her; but, as it was, mistress and servant squabbled perpetually, and +were, at heart, the best of friends. For it was one of Miss +Galindo's peculiarities to do all manner of kind and self-denying +actions, and to say all manner of provoking things. Lame, blind, +deformed, and dwarf, all came in for scoldings without number: it +was only the consumptive girl that never had heard a sharp word. I +don't think any of her servants liked her the worse for her peppery +temper, and passionate odd ways, for they knew her real and beautiful +kindness of heart: and, besides, she had so great a turn for humour +that very often her speeches amused as much or more than they +irritated; and on the other side, a piece of witty impudence from her +servant would occasionally tickle her so much and so suddenly, that +she would burst out laughing in the middle of her passion. + +But the talk about Miss Galindo's choice and management of her +servants was confined to village gossip, and had never reached my +Lady Ludlow's ears, though doubtless Mr. Horner was well acquainted +with it. What my lady knew of her amounted to this. It was the +custom in those days for the wealthy ladies of the county to set on +foot a repository, as it was called, in the assize-town. The +ostensible manager of this repository was generally a decayed +gentlewoman, a clergyman's widow, or so forth. She was, however, +controlled by a committee of ladies; and paid by them in proportion +to the amount of goods she sold; and these goods were the small +manufactures of ladies of little or no fortune, whose names, if they +chose it, were only signified by initials. + +Poor water-colour drawings, indigo and Indian ink; screens, +ornamented with moss and dried leaves; paintings on velvet, and such +faintly ornamental works were displayed on one side of the shop. It +was always reckoned a mark of characteristic gentility in the +repository, to have only common heavy-framed sash-windows, which +admitted very little light, so I never was quite certain of the merit +of these Works of Art as they were entitled. But, on the other side, +where the Useful Work placard was put up, there was a great variety +of articles, of whose unusual excellence every one might judge. Such +fine sewing, and stitching, and button-holing! Such bundles of soft +delicate knitted stockings and socks; and, above all, in Lady +Ludlow's eyes, such hanks of the finest spun flaxen thread! + +And the most delicate dainty work of all was done by Miss Galindo, as +Lady Ludlow very well knew. Yet, for all their fine sewing, it +sometimes happened that Miss Galindo's patterns were of an old- +fashioned kind; and the dozen night-caps, maybe, on the materials for +which she had expended bona-fide money, and on the making-up, no +little time and eye-sight, would lie for months in a yellow neglected +heap; and at such times, it was said, Miss Galindo was more amusing +than usual, more full of dry drollery and humour; just as at the +times when an order came in to X. (the initial she had chosen) for a +stock of well-paying things, she sat and stormed at her servant as +she stitched away. She herself explained her practice in this way:- + +"When everything goes wrong, one would give up breathing if one could +not lighten ones heart by a joke. But when I've to sit still from +morning till night, I must have something to stir my blood, or I +should go off into an apoplexy; so I set to, and quarrel with Sally." + +Such were Miss Galindo's means and manner of living in her own house. +Out of doors, and in the village, she was not popular, although she +would have been sorely missed had she left the place. But she asked +too many home questions (not to say impertinent) respecting the +domestic economies (for even the very poor liked to spend their bit +of money their own way), and would open cupboards to find out hidden +extravagances, and question closely respecting the weekly amount of +butter, till one day she met with what would have been a rebuff to +any other person, but which she rather enjoyed than otherwise. + +She was going into a cottage, and in the doorway met the good woman +chasing out a duck, and apparently unconscious of her visitor. + +"Get out, Miss Galindo!" she cried, addressing the duck. "Get out! +O, I ask your pardon," she continued, as if seeing the lady for the +first time. "It's only that weary duck will come in. Get out Miss +Gal- " (to the duck). + +"And so you call it after, me, do you?" inquired her visitor. + +"O, yes, ma'am; my master would have it so, for he said, sure enough +the unlucky bird was always poking herself where she was not wanted." + +"Ha, ha! very good! And so your master is a wit, is he? Well! tell +him to come up and speak to me to-night about my parlour chimney, for +there is no one like him for chimney doctoring." + +And the master went up, and was so won over by Miss Galindo's merry +ways, and sharp insight into the mysteries of his various kinds of +business (he was a mason, chimney-sweeper, and ratcatcher), that he +came home and abused his wife the next time she called the duck the +name by which he himself had christened her. + +But odd as Miss Galindo was in general, she could be as well-bred a +lady as any one when she chose. And choose she always did when my +Lady Ludlow was by. Indeed, I don't know the man, woman, or child, +that did not instinctively turn out its best side to her ladyship. +So she had no notion of the qualities which, I am sure, made Mr. +Horner think that Miss Galindo would be most unmanageable as a clerk, +and heartily wish that the idea had never come into my lady's head. +But there it was; and he had annoyed her ladyship already more than +he liked to-day, so he could not directly contradict her, but only +urge difficulties which he hoped might prove insuperable. But every +one of them Lady Ludlow knocked down. Letters to copy? Doubtless. +Miss Galindo could come up to the Hall; she should have a room to +herself; she wrote a beautiful hand; and writing would save her +eyesight. "Capability with regard to accounts?" My lady would +answer for that too; and for more than Mr. Horner seemed to think it +necessary to inquire about. Miss Galindo was by birth and breeding a +lady of the strictest honour, and would, if possible, forget the +substance of any letters that passed through her hands; at any rate, +no one would ever hear of them again from her. "Remuneration?" Oh! +as for that, Lady Ludlow would herself take care that it was managed +in the most delicate manner possible. She would send to invite Miss +Galindo to tea at the Hall that very afternoon, if Mr. Horner would +only give her ladyship the slightest idea of the average length of +time that my lady was to request Miss Galindo to sacrifice to her +daily. "Three hours! Very well." Mr. Horner looked very grave as +he passed the windows of the room where I lay. I don't think he +liked the idea of Miss Galindo as a clerk. + +Lady Ludlow's invitations were like royal commands. Indeed, the +village was too quiet to allow the inhabitants to have many evening +engagements of any kind. Now and then, Mr. and Mrs. Horner gave a +tea and supper to the principal tenants and their wives, to which the +clergyman was invited, and Miss Galindo, Mrs. Medlicott, and one or +two other spinsters and widows. The glory of the supper-table on +these occasions was invariably furnished by her ladyship: it was a +cold roasted peacock, with his tail stuck out as if in life. Mrs. +Medlicott would take up the whole morning arranging the feathers in +the proper semicircle, and was always pleased with the wonder and +admiration it excited. It was considered a due reward and fitting +compliment to her exertions that Mr. Horner always took her in to +supper, and placed her opposite to the magnificent dish, at which she +sweetly smiled all the time they were at table. But since Mrs. +Horner had had the paralytic stroke these parties had been given up; +and Miss Galindo wrote a note to Lady Ludlow in reply to her +invitation, saying that she was entirely disengaged, and would have +great pleasure in doing herself the honour of waiting upon her +ladyship. + +Whoever visited my lady took their meals with her, sitting on the +dais, in the presence of all my former companions. So I did not see +Miss Galindo until some time after tea; as the young gentlewomen had +had to bring her their sewing and spinning, to hear the remarks of so +competent a judge. At length her ladyship brought her visitor into +the room where I lay,--it was one of my bad days, I remember,--in +order to have her little bit of private conversation. Miss Galindo +was dressed in her best gown, I am sure, but I had never seen +anything like it except in a picture, it was so old-fashioned. She +wore a white muslin apron, delicately embroidered, and put on a +little crookedly, in order, as she told us, even Lady Ludlow, before +the evening was over, to conceal a spot whence the colour had been +discharged by a lemon-stain. This crookedness had an odd effect, +especially when I saw that it was intentional; indeed, she was so +anxious about her apron's right adjustment in the wrong place, that +she told us straight out why she wore it so, and asked her ladyship +if the spot was properly hidden, at the same time lifting up her +apron and showing her how large it was. + +"When my father was alive, I always took his right arm, so, and used +to remove any spotted or discoloured breadths to the left side, if it +was a walking-dress. That's the convenience of a gentleman. But +widows and spinsters must do what they can. Ah, my dear (to me)! +when you are reckoning up the blessings in your lot,--though you may +think it a hard one in some respects,--don't forget how little your +stockings want darning, as you are obliged to lie down so much! I +would rather knit two pairs of stockings than darn one, any day." + +"Have you been doing any of your beautiful knitting lately?" asked my +lady, who had now arranged Miss Galindo in the pleasantest chair, and +taken her own little wicker-work one, and, having her work in her +hands, was ready to try and open the subject. + +"No, and alas! your ladyship. It is partly the hot weather's fault, +for people seem to forget that winter must come; and partly, I +suppose, that every one is stocked who has the money to pay four-and- +sixpence a pair for stockings." + +"Then may I ask if you have any time in your active days at liberty?" +said my lady, drawing a little nearer to her proposal, which I fancy +she found it a little awkward to make. + +"Why, the village keeps me busy, your ladyship, when I have neither +knitting or sewing to do. You know I took X. for my letter at the +repository, because it stands for Xantippe, who was a great scold in +old times, as I have learnt. But I'm sure I don't know how the world +would get on without scolding, your ladyship. It would go to sleep, +and the sun would stand still." + +"I don't think I could bear to scold, Miss Galindo," said her +ladyship, smiling. + +"No! because your ladyship has people to do it for you. Begging your +pardon, my lady, it seems to me the generality of people may be +divided into saints, scolds, and sinners. Now, your ladyship is a +saint, because you have a sweet and holy nature, in the first place; +and have people to do your anger and vexation for you, in the second +place. And Jonathan Walker is a sinner, because he is sent to +prison. But here am I, half way, having but a poor kind of +disposition at best, and yet hating sin, and all that leads to it, +such as wasting, and extravagance, and gossiping,--and yet all this +lies right under my nose in the village, and I am not saint enough to +be vexed at it; and so I scold. And though I had rather be a saint, +yet I think I do good in my way." + +"No doubt you do, dear Miss Galindo," said Lady Ludlow. "But I am +sorry to hear that there is so much that is bad going on in the +village,--very sorry." + +"O, your ladyship! then I am sorry I brought it out. It was only by +way of saying, that when I have no particular work to do at home, I +take a turn abroad, and set my neighbours to rights, just by way of +steering clear of Satan. + + +For Satan finds some mischief still +For idle hands to do, + + +you know, my lady." + +There was no leading into the subject by delicate degrees, for Miss +Galindo was evidently so fond of talking, that, if asked a question, +she made her answer so long, that before she came to an end of it, +she had wandered far away from the original starting point. So Lady +Ludlow plunged at once into what she had to say. + +"Miss Galindo, I have a great favour to ask of you." + +"My lady, I wish I could tell you what a pleasure it is to hear you +say so," replied Miss Galindo, almost with tears in her eyes; so glad +were we all to do anything for her ladyship, which could be called a +free service and not merely a duty. + +"It is this. Mr. Horner tells me that the business-letters, relating +to the estate, are multiplying so much that he finds it impossible to +copy them all himself, and I therefore require the services of some +confidential and discreet person to copy these letters, and +occasionally to go through certain accounts. Now, there is a very +pleasant little sitting-room very near to Mr. Horner's office (you +know Mr. Horner's office--on the other side of the stone hall?), and +if I could prevail upon you to come here to breakfast and afterwards +sit there for three hours every morning, Mr. Horner should bring or +send you the papers--" + +Lady Ludlow stopped. Miss Galindo's countenance had fallen. There +was some great obstacle in her mind to her wish for obliging Lady +Ludlow. + +"What would Sally do?" she asked at length. Lady Ludlow had not a +notion who Sally was. Nor if she had had a notion, would she have +had a conception of the perplexities that poured into Miss Galindo's +mind, at the idea of leaving her rough forgetful dwarf without the +perpetual monitorship of her mistress. Lady Ludlow, accustomed to a +household where everything went on noiselessly, perfectly, and by +clock-work, conducted by a number of highly-paid, well-chosen, and +accomplished servants, had not a conception of the nature of the +rough material from which her servants came. Besides, in her +establishment, so that the result was good, no one inquired if the +small economies had been observed in the production. Whereas every +penny--every halfpenny, was of consequence to Miss Galindo; and +visions of squandered drops of milk and wasted crusts of bread filled +her mind with dismay. But she swallowed all her apprehensions down, +out of her regard for Lady Ludlow, and desire to be of service to +her. No one knows how great a trial it was to her when she thought +of Sally, unchecked and unscolded for three hours every morning. But +all she said was - + +"'Sally, go to the Deuce.' I beg your pardon, my lady, if I was +talking to myself; it's a habit I have got into of keeping my tongue +in practice, and I am not quite aware when I do it. Three hours +every morning! I shall be only too proud to do what I can for your +ladyship; and I hope Mr. Horner will not be too impatient with me at +first. You know, perhaps, that I was nearly being an authoress once, +and that seems as if I was destined to 'employ my time in writing.'" + +"No, indeed; we must return to the subject of the clerkship +afterwards, if you please. An authoress, Miss Galindo! You surprise +me!" + +"But, indeed, I was. All was quite ready. Doctor Burney used to +teach me music: not that I ever could learn, but it was a fancy of +my poor father's. And his daughter wrote a book, and they said she +was but a very young lady, and nothing but a music-master's daughter; +so why should not I try?" + +"Well?" + +"Well! I got paper and half-a-hundred good pens, a bottle of ink, +all ready--" + +"And then--" + +"O, it ended in my having nothing to say, when I sat down to write. +But sometimes, when I get hold of a book, I wonder why I let such a +poor reason stop me. It does not others." + +"But I think it was very well it did, Miss Galindo," said her +ladyship. "I am extremely against women usurping men's employments, +as they are very apt to do. But perhaps, after all, the notion of +writing a book improved your hand. It is one of the most legible I +ever saw." + +"I despise z's without tails," said Miss Galindo, with a good deal of +gratified pride at my lady's praise. Presently, my lady took her to +look at a curious old cabinet, which Lord Ludlow had picked up at the +Hague; and while they were out of the room on this errand, I suppose +the question of remuneration was settled, for I heard no more of it. + +When they came back, they were talking of Mr. Gray. Miss Galindo was +unsparing in her expressions of opinion about him: going much +farther than my lady--in her language, at least. + +"A little blushing man like him, who can't say bo to a goose without +hesitating and colouring, to come to this village--which is as good a +village as ever lived--and cry us down for a set of sinners, as if we +had all committed murder and that other thing!--I have no patience +with him, my lady. And then, how is he to help us to heaven, by +teaching us our, a b, ab--b a, ba? And yet, by all accounts, that's +to save poor children's souls. O, I knew your ladyship would agree +with me. I am sure my mother was as good a creature as ever breathed +the blessed air; and if she's not gone to heaven I don't want to go +there; and she could not spell a letter decently. And does Mr. Gray +think God took note of that?" + +"I was sure you would agree with me, Miss Galindo," said my lady. +"You and I can remember how this talk about education--Rousseau, and +his writings--stirred up the French people to their Reign of Terror, +and all those bloody scenes." + +"I'm afraid that Rousseau and Mr. Gray are birds of a feather," +replied Miss Galindo, shaking her head. "And yet there is some good +in the young man too. He sat up all night with Billy Davis, when his +wife was fairly worn out with nursing him." + +"Did he, indeed!" said my lady, her face lighting up, as it always +did when she heard of any kind or generous action, no matter who +performed it. "What a pity he is bitten with these new revolutionary +ideas, and is so much for disturbing the established order of +society!" + +When Miss Galindo went, she left so favourable an impression of her +visit on my lady, that she said to me with a pleased smile - + +"I think I have provided Mr. Horner with a far better clerk than he +would have made of that lad Gregson in twenty years. And I will send +the lad to my lord's grieve, in Scotland, that he may be kept out of +harm's way." + +But something happened to the lad before this purpose could be +accomplished. + + + +CHAPTER X. + + + +The next morning, Miss Galindo made her appearance, and, by some +mistake, unusual to my lady's well-trained servants, was shown into +the room where I was trying to walk; for a certain amount of exercise +was prescribed for me, painful although the exertion had become. + +She brought a little basket along with her and while the footman was +gone to inquire my lady's wishes (for I don't think that Lady Ludlow +expected Miss Galindo so soon to assume her clerkship; nor, indeed, +had Mr. Horner any work of any kind ready for his new assistant to +do), she launched out into conversation with me. + +"It was a sudden summons, my dear! However, as I have often said to +myself, ever since an occasion long ago, if Lady Ludlow ever honours +me by asking for my right hand, I'll cut it off, and wrap the stump +up so tidily she shall never find out it bleeds. But, if I had had a +little more time, I could have mended my pens better. You see, I +have had to sit up pretty late to get these sleeves made"--and she +took out of her basket a pail of brown-holland over-sleeves, very +much such as a grocer's apprentice wears--"and I had only time to +make seven or eight pens, out of some quills Farmer Thomson gave me +last autumn. As for ink, I'm thankful to say, that's always ready; +an ounce of steel filings, an ounce of nut-gall, and a pint of water +(tea, if you're extravagant, which, thank Heaven! I'm not), put all +in a bottle, and hang it up behind the house door, so that the whole +gets a good shaking every time you slam it to--and even if you are in +a passion and bang it, as Sally and I often do, it is all the better +for it--and there's my ink ready for use; ready to write my lady's +will with, if need be." + +"O, Miss Galindo!" said I, "don't talk so my lady's will! and she not +dead yet." + +"And if she were, what would be the use of talking of making her +will? Now, if you were Sally, I should say, 'Answer me that, you +goose!' But, as you're a relation of my lady's, I must be civil, and +only say, 'I can't think how you can talk so like a fool!' To be +sure, poor thing, you're lame!" + +I do not know how long she would have gone on; but my lady came in, +and I, released from my duty of entertaining Miss Galindo, made my +limping way into the next room. To tell the truth, I was rather +afraid of Miss Galindo's tongue, for I never knew what she would say +next. + +After a while my lady came, and began to look in the bureau for +something: and as she looked she said--"I think Mr. Horner must have +made some mistake, when he said he had so much work that he almost +required a clerk, for this morning he cannot find anything for Miss +Galindo to do; and there she is, sitting with her pen behind her ear, +waiting for something to write. I am come to find her my mother's +letters, for I should like to have a fair copy made of them. O, here +they are: don't trouble yourself, my dear child." + +When my lady returned again, she sat down and began to talk of Mr. +Gray. + +"Miss Galindo says she saw him going to hold a prayer-meeting in a +cottage. Now that really makes me unhappy, it is so like what Mr. +Wesley used to do in my younger days; and since then we have had +rebellion in the American colonies and the French Revolution. You +may depend upon it, my dear, making religion and education common-- +vulgarising them, as it were--is a bad thing for a nation. A man who +hears prayers read in the cottage where he has just supped on bread +and bacon, forgets the respect due to a church: he begins to think +that one place is as good as another, and, by-and-by, that one person +is as good as another; and after that, I always find that people +begin to talk of their rights, instead of thinking of their duties. +I wish Mr. Gray had been more tractable, and had left well alone. +What do you think I heard this morning? Why that the Home Hill +estate, which niches into the Hanbury property, was bought by a +Baptist baker from Birmingham!" + +"A Baptist baker!" I exclaimed. I had never seen a Dissenter, to my +knowledge; but, having always heard them spoken of with horror, I +looked upon them almost as if they were rhinoceroses. I wanted to +see a live Dissenter, I believe, and yet I wished it were over. I +was almost surprised when I heard that any of them were engaged in +such peaceful occupations as baking. + +"Yes! so Mr. Horner tells me. A Mr. Lambe, I believe. But, at any +rate, he is a Baptist, and has been in trade. What with his +schismatism and Mr. Gray's methodism, I am afraid all the primitive +character of this place will vanish." + +From what I could hear, Mr. Gray seemed to be taking his own way; at +any rate, more than he had done when he first came to the village, +when his natural timidity had made him defer to my lady, and seek her +consent and sanction before embarking in any new plan. But newness +was a quality Lady Ludlow especially disliked. Even in the fashions +of dress and furniture, she clung to the old, to the modes which had +prevailed when she was young; and though she had a deep personal +regard for Queen Charlotte (to whom, as I have already said, she had +been maid-of-honour), yet there was a tinge of Jacobitism about her, +such as made her extremely dislike to hear Prince Charles Edward +called the young Pretender, as many loyal people did in those days, +and made her fond of telling of the thorn-tree in my lord's park in +Scotland, which had been planted by bonny Queen Mary herself, and +before which every guest in the Castle of Monkshaven was expected to +stand bare-headed, out of respect to the memory and misfortunes of +the royal planter. + +We might play at cards, if we so chose, on a Sunday; at least, I +suppose we might, for my lady and Mr. Mountford used to do so often +when I first went. But we must neither play cards, nor read, nor sew +on the fifth of November and on the thirtieth of January, but must go +to church, and meditate all the rest of the day--and very hard work +meditating was. I would far rather have scoured a room. That was +the reason, I suppose, why a passive life was seen to be better +discipline for me than an active one. + +But I am wandering away from my lady, and her dislike to all +innovation. Now, it seemed to me, as far as I heard, that Mr. Gray +was full of nothing but new things, and that what he first did was to +attack all our established institutions, both in the village and the +parish, and also in the nation. To be sure, I heard of his ways of +going on principally from Miss Galindo, who was apt to speak more +strongly than accurately. + +"There he goes," she said, "clucking up the children just like an old +hen, and trying to teach them about their salvation and their souls, +and I don't know what--things that it is just blasphemy to speak +about out of church. And he potters old people about reading their +Bibles. I am sure I don't want to speak disrespectfully about the +Holy Scriptures, but I found old Job Horton busy reading his Bible +yesterday. Says I, 'What are you reading, and where did you get it, +and who gave it you?' So he made answer, 'That he was reading +Susannah and the Elders, for that he had read Bel and the Dragon till +he could pretty near say it off by heart, and they were two as pretty +stories as ever he had read, and that it was a caution to him what +bad old chaps there were in the world.' Now, as Job is bed-ridden, I +don't think he is likely to meet with the Elders, and I say that I +think repeating his Creed, the Commandments, and the Lord's Prayer, +and, maybe, throwing in a verse of the Psalms, if he wanted a bit of +a change, would have done him far more good than his pretty stories, +as he called them. And what's the next thing our young parson does? +Why he tries to make us all feel pitiful for the black slaves, and +leaves little pictures of negroes about, with the question printed +below, 'Am I not a man and a brother?' just as if I was to be hail- +fellow-well-met with every negro footman. They do say he takes no +sugar in his tea, because he thinks he sees spots of blood in it. +Now I call that superstition. + +The next day it was a still worse story. + +"Well, my dear! and how are you? My lady sent me in to sit a bit +with you, while Mr. Horner looks out some papers for me to copy. +Between ourselves, Mr. Steward Horner does not like having me for a +clerk. It is all very well he does not; for, if he were decently +civil to me, I might want a chaperone, you know, now poor Mrs. Horner +is dead." This was one of Miss Galindo's grim jokes. "As it is, I +try to make him forget I'm a woman, I do everything as ship-shape as +a masculine man-clerk. I see he can't find a fault--writing good, +spelling correct, sums all right. And then he squints up at me with +the tail of his eye, and looks glummer than ever, just because I'm a +woman--as if I could help that. I have gone good lengths to set his +mind at ease. I have stuck my pen behind my ear, I have made him a +bow instead of a curtsey, I have whistled--not a tune I can't pipe up +that--nay, if you won't tell my lady, I don't mind telling you that I +have said 'Confound it!' and 'Zounds!' I can't get any farther. For +all that, Mr. Horner won't forget I am a lady, and so I am not half +the use I might be, and if it were not to please my Lady Ludlow, Mr. +Horner and his books might go hang (see how natural that came out!). +And there is an order for a dozen nightcaps for a bride, and I am so +afraid I shan't have time to do them. Worst of all, there's Mr. Gray +taking advantage of my absence to seduce Sally!" + +"To seduce Sally! Mr. Gray!" + +"Pooh, pooh, child! There's many a kind of seduction. Mr. Gray is +seducing Sally to want to go to church. There has he been twice at +my house, while I have been away in the mornings, talking to Sally +about the state of her soul and that sort of thing. But when I found +the meat all roasted to a cinder, I said, 'Come, Sally, let's have no +more praying when beef is down at the fire. Pray at six o'clock in +the morning and nine at night, and I won't hinder you.' So she +sauced me, and said something about Martha and Mary, implying that, +because she had let the beef get so overdone that I declare I could +hardly find a bit for Nancy Pole's sick grandchild, she had chosen +the better part. I was very much put about, I own, and perhaps +you'll be shocked at what I said--indeed, I don't know if it was +right myself--but I told her I had a soul as well as she, and if it +was to be saved by my sitting still and thinking about salvation and +never doing my duty, I thought I had as good a right as she had to be +Mary, and save my soul. So, that afternoon I sat quite still, and it +was really a comfort, for I am often too busy, I know, to pray as I +ought. There is first one person wanting me, and then another, and +the house and the food and the neighbours to see after. So, when +tea-time comes, there enters my maid with her hump on her back, and +her soul to be saved. 'Please, ma'am, did you order the pound of +butter?'--'No, Sally,' I said, shaking my head, 'this morning I did +not go round by Hale's farm, and this afternoon I have been employed +in spiritual things.' + +"Now, our Sally likes tea and bread-and-butter above everything, and +dry bread was not to her taste. + +"'I'm thankful,' said the impudent hussy, 'that you have taken a turn +towards godliness. It will be my prayers, I trust, that's given it +you.' + +"I was determined not to give her an opening towards the carnal +subject of butter, so she lingered still, longing to ask leave to run +for it. But I gave her none, and munched my dry bread myself, +thinking what a famous cake I could make for little Ben Pole with the +bit of butter we were saving; and when Sally had had her butterless +tea, and was in none of the best of tempers because Martha had not +bethought herself of the butter, I just quietly said - + +"'Now, Sally, to-morrow we'll try to hash that beef well, and to +remember the butter, and to work out our salvation all at the same +time, for I don't see why it can't all be done, as God has set us to +do it all.' But I heard her at it again about Mary and Martha, and I +have no doubt that Mr. Gray will teach her to consider me a lost +sheep." + +I had heard so many little speeches about Mr. Gray from one person or +another, all speaking against him, as a mischief-maker, a setter-up +of new doctrines, and of a fanciful standard of life (and you may be +sure that, where Lady Ludlow led, Mrs. Medlicott and Adams were +certain to follow, each in their different ways showing the influence +my lady had over them), that I believe I had grown to consider him as +a very instrument of evil, and to expect to perceive in his face +marks of his presumption, and arrogance, and impertinent +interference. It was now many weeks since I had seen him, and when +he was one morning shown into the blue drawing-room (into which I had +been removed for a change), I was quite surprised to see how innocent +and awkward a young man he appeared, confused even more than I was at +our unexpected tete-a-tete. He looked thinner, his eyes more eager, +his expression more anxious, and his colour came and went more than +it had done when I had seen him last. I tried to make a little +conversation, as I was, to my own surprise, more at my ease than he +was; but his thoughts were evidently too much preoccupied for him to +do more than answer me with monosyllables. + +Presently my lady came in. Mr. Gray twitched and coloured more than +ever; but plunged into the middle of his subject at once. + +"My lady, I cannot answer it to my conscience, if I allow the +children of this village to go on any longer the little heathens that +they are. I must do something to alter their condition. I am quite +aware that your ladyship disapproves of many of the plans which have +suggested themselves to me; but nevertheless I must do something, and +I am come now to your ladyship to ask respectfully, but firmly, what +you would advise me to do." + +His eyes were dilated, and I could almost have said they were full of +tears with his eagerness. But I am sure it is a bad plan to remind +people of decided opinions which they have once expressed, if you +wish them to modify those opinions. Now, Mr. Gray had done this with +my lady; and though I do not mean to say she was obstinate, yet she +was not one to retract. + +She was silent for a moment or two before she replied. + +"You ask me to suggest a remedy for an evil of the existence of which +I am not conscious," was her answer--very coldly, very gently given. +"In Mr. Mountford's time I heard no such complaints: whenever I see +the village children (and they are not unfrequent visitors at this +house, on one pretext or another), they are well and decently +behaved." + +"Oh, madam, you cannot judge," he broke in. "They are trained to +respect you in word and deed; you are the highest they ever look up +to; they have no notion of a higher." + +"Nay, Mr. Gray," said my lady, smiling, "they are as loyally disposed +as any children can be. They come up here every fourth of June, and +drink his Majesty's health, and have buns, and (as Margaret Dawson +can testify) they take a great and respectful interest in all the +pictures I can show them of the royal family." + +"But, madam, I think of something higher than any earthly dignities." + +My lady coloured at the mistake she had made; for she herself was +truly pious. Yet when she resumed the subject, it seemed to me as if +her tone was a little sharper than before. + +"Such want of reverence is, I should say, the clergyman's fault. You +must excuse me, Mr. Gray, if I speak plainly." + +"My Lady, I want plain-speaking. I myself am not accustomed to those +ceremonies and forms which are, I suppose, the etiquette in your +ladyship's rank of life, and which seem to hedge you in from any +power of mine to touch you. Among those with whom I have passed my +life hitherto, it has been the custom to speak plainly out what we +have felt earnestly. So, instead of needing any apology from your +ladyship for straightforward speaking, I will meet what you say at +once, and admit that it is the clergyman's fault, in a great measure, +when the children of his parish swear, and curse, and are brutal, and +ignorant of all saving grace; nay, some of them of the very name of +God. And because this guilt of mine, as the clergyman of this +parish, lies heavy on my soul, and every day leads but from bad to +worse, till I am utterly bewildered how to do good to children who +escape from me as it I were a monster, and who are growing up to be +men fit for and capable of any crime, but those requiring wit or +sense, I come to you, who seem to me all-powerful, as far as material +power goes--for your ladyship only knows the surface of things, and +barely that, that pass in your village--to help me with advice, and +such outward help as you can give." + +Mr. Gray had stood up and sat down once or twice while he had been +speaking, in an agitated, nervous kind of way, and now he was +interrupted by a violent fit of coughing, after which he trembled all +over. + +My lady rang for a glass of water, and looked much distressed. + +"Mr. Gray," said she, "I am sure you are not well; and that makes you +exaggerate childish faults into positive evils. It is always the +case with us when we are not strong in health. I hear of your +exerting yourself in every direction: you overwork yourself, and the +consequence is, that you imagine us all worse people than we are." + +And my lady smiled very kindly and pleasantly at him, as he sat, a +little panting, a little flushed, trying to recover his breath. I am +sure that now they were brought face to face, she had quite forgotten +all the offence she had taken at his doings when she heard of them +from others; and, indeed, it was enough to soften any one's heart to +see that young, almost boyish face, looking in such anxiety and +distress. + +"Oh, my lady, what shall I do?" he asked, as soon as he could recover +breath, and with such an air of humility, that I am sure no one who +had seen it could have ever thought him conceited again. "The evil +of this world is too strong for me. I can do so little. It is all +in vain. It was only to-day--" and again the cough and agitation +returned. + +"My dear Mr. Gray," said my lady (the day before I could never have +believed she could have called him My dear), "you must take the +advice of an old woman about yourself. You are not fit to do +anything just now but attend to your own health: rest, and see a +doctor (but, indeed, I will take care of that), and when you are +pretty strong again, you will find that you have been magnifying +evils to yourself." + +"But, my lady, I cannot rest. The evils do exist, and the burden of +their continuance lies on my shoulders. I have no place to gather +the children together in, that I may teach them the things necessary +to salvation. The rooms in my own house are too small; but I have +tried them. I have money of my own; and, as your ladyship knows, I +tried to get a piece of leasehold property, on which to build a +school-house at my own expense. Your ladyship's lawyer comes +forward, at your instructions, to enforce some old feudal right, by +which no building is allowed on leasehold property without the +sanction of the lady of the manor. It may be all very true; but it +was a cruel thing to do,--that is, if your ladyship had known (which +I am sure you do not) the real moral and spiritual state of my poor +parishioners. And now I come to you to know what I am to do. Rest! +I cannot rest, while children whom I could possibly save are being +left in their ignorance, their blasphemy, their uncleanness, their +cruelty. It is known through the village that your ladyship +disapproves of my efforts, and opposes all my plans. If you think +them wrong, foolish, ill-digested (I have been a student, living in a +college, and eschewing all society but that of pious men, until now: +I may not judge for the best, in my ignorance of this sinful human +nature), tell me of better plans and wiser projects for accomplishing +my end; but do not bid me rest, with Satan compassing me round, and +stealing souls away." + +"Mr. Gray," said my lady, "there may be some truth in what you have +said. I do not deny it, though I think, in your present state of +indisposition and excitement, you exaggerate it much. I believe-- +nay, the experience of a pretty long life has convinced me--that +education is a bad thing, if given indiscriminately. It unfits the +lower orders for their duties, the duties to which they are called by +God; of submission to those placed in authority over them; of +contentment with that state of life to which it has pleased God to +call them, and of ordering themselves lowly and reverently to all +their betters. I have made this conviction of mine tolerably evident +to you; and I have expressed distinctly my disapprobation of some of +your ideas. You may imagine, then, that I was not well pleased when +I found that you had taken a rood or more of Farmer Hale's land, and +were laying the foundations of a school-house. You had done this +without asking for my permission, which, as Farmer Hale's liege lady, +ought to have been obtained legally, as well as asked for out of +courtesy. I put a stop to what I believed to be calculated to do +harm to a village, to a population in which, to say the least of it, +I may be disposed to take as much interest as you can do. How can +reading, and writing, and the multiplication-table (if you choose to +go so far) prevent blasphemy, and uncleanness, and cruelty? Really, +Mr. Gray, I hardly like to express myself so strongly on the subject +in your present state of health, as I should do at any other time. +It seems to me that books do little; character much; and character is +not formed from books." + +"I do not think of character: I think of souls. I must get some +hold upon these children, or what will become of them in the next +world? I must be found to have some power beyond what they have, and +which they are rendered capable of appreciating, before they will +listen to me. At present physical force is all they look up to; and +I have none." + +"Nay, Mr. Gray, by your own admission, they look up to me." + +"They would not do anything your ladyship disliked if it was likely +to come to your knowledge; but if they could conceal it from you, the +knowledge of your dislike to a particular line of conduct would never +make them cease from pursuing it." + +"Mr. Gray"--surprise in her air, and some little indignation--"they +and their fathers have lived on the Hanbury lands for generations!" + +"I cannot help it, madam. I am telling you the truth, whether you +believe me or not." There was a pause; my lady looked perplexed, and +somewhat ruffled; Mr. Gray as though hopeless and wearied out. +"Then, my lady," said he, at last, rising as he spoke, "you can +suggest nothing to ameliorate the state of things which, I do assure +you, does exist on your lands, and among your tenants. Surely, you +will not object to my using Farmer Hale's great barn every Sabbath? +He will allow me the use of it, if your ladyship will grant your +permission." + +"You are not fit for any extra work at present," (and indeed he had +been coughing very much all through the conversation). "Give me time +to consider of it. Tell me what you wish to teach. You will be able +to take care of your health, and grow stronger while I consider. It +shall not be the worse for you, if you leave it in my hands for a +time." + +My lady spoke very kindly; but he was in too excited a state to +recognize the kindness, while the idea of delay was evidently a sore +irritation. I heard him say: "And I have so little time in which to +do my work. Lord! lay not this sin to my charge." + +But my lady was speaking to the old butler, for whom, at her sign, I +had rung the bell some little time before. Now she turned round. + +"Mr. Gray, I find I have some bottles of Malmsey, of the vintage of +seventeen hundred and seventy-eight, yet left. Malmsey, as perhaps +you know, used to be considered a specific for coughs arising from +weakness. You must permit me to send you half-a-dozen bottles, and, +depend upon it, you will take a more cheerful view of life and its +duties before you have finished them, especially if you will be so +kind as to see Dr. Trevor, who is coming to see me in the course of +the week. By the time you are strong enough to work, I will try and +find some means of preventing the children from using such bad +language, and otherwise annoying you." + +"My lady, it is the sin, and not the annoyance. I wish I could make +you understand." He spoke with some impatience; Poor fellow! he was +too weak, exhausted, and nervous. "I am perfectly well; I can set to +work to-morrow; I will do anything not to be oppressed with the +thought of how little I am doing. I do not want your wine. Liberty +to act in the manner I think right, will do me far more good. But it +is of no use. It is preordained that I am to be nothing but a +cumberer of the ground. I beg your ladyship's pardon for this call." + +He stood up, and then turned dizzy. My lady looked on, deeply hurt, +and not a little offended, he held out his hand to her, and I could +see that she had a little hesitation before she took it. He then saw +me, I almost think, for the first time; and put out his hand once +more, drew it back, as if undecided, put it out again, and finally +took hold of mine for an instant in his damp, listless hand, and was +gone. + +Lady Ludlow was dissatisfied with both him and herself, I was sure. +Indeed, I was dissatisfied with the result of the interview myself. +But my lady was not one to speak out her feelings on the subject; nor +was I one to forget myself, and begin on a topic which she did not +begin. She came to me, and was very tender with me; so tender, that +that, and the thoughts of Mr. Gray's sick, hopeless, disappointed +look, nearly made me cry. + +"You are tired, little one," said my lady. "Go and lie down in my +room, and hear what Medlicott and I can decide upon in the way of +strengthening dainties for that poor young man, who is killing +himself with his over-sensitive conscientiousness." + +"Oh, my lady!" said I, and then I stopped. + +"Well. What?" asked she. + +"If you would but let him have Farmer Hale's barn at once, it would +do him more good than all." + +"Pooh, pooh, child!" though I don't think she was displeased, "he is +not fit for more work just now. I shall go and write for Dr. +Trevor." + +And for the next half-hour, we did nothing but arrange physical +comforts and cures for poor Mr. Gray. At the end of the time, Mrs. +Medlicott said - + +"Has your ladyship heard that Harry Gregson has fallen from a tree, +and broken his thigh-bone, and is like to be a cripple for life?" + +"Harry Gregson! That black-eyed lad who read my letter? It all +comes from over-education!" + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + + +But I don't see how my lady could think it was over-education that +made Harry Gregson break his thigh, for the manner in which he met +with the accident was this:- + +Mr. Horner, who had fallen sadly out of health since his wife's +death, had attached himself greatly to Harry Gregson. Now, Mr. +Horner had a cold manner to every one, and never spoke more than was +necessary, at the best of times. And, latterly, it had not been the +best of times with him. I dare say, he had had some causes for +anxiety (of which I knew nothing) about my lady's affairs; and he was +evidently annoyed by my lady's whim (as he once inadvertently called +it) of placing Miss Galindo under him in the position of a clerk. +Yet he had always been friends, in his quiet way, with Miss Galindo, +and she devoted herself to her new occupation with diligence and +punctuality, although more than once she had moaned to me over the +orders for needlework which had been sent to her, and which, owing to +her occupation in the service of Lady Ludlow, she had been unable to +fulfil. + +The only living creature to whom the staid Mr. Horner could be said +to be attached, was Harry Gregson. To my lady he was a faithful and +devoted servant, looking keenly after her interests, and anxious to +forward them at any cost of trouble to himself. But the more shrewd +Mr. Horner was, the more probability was there of his being annoyed +at certain peculiarities of opinion which my lady held with a quiet, +gentle pertinacity; against which no arguments, based on mere worldly +and business calculations, made any way. This frequent opposition to +views which Mr. Horner entertained, although it did not interfere +with the sincere respect which the lady and the steward felt for each +other, yet prevented any warmer feeling of affection from coming in. +It seems strange to say it, but I must repeat it--the only person for +whom, since his wife's death, Mr. Horner seemed to feel any love, was +the little imp Harry Gregson, with his bright, watchful eyes, his +tangled hair hanging right down to his eyebrows, for all the world +like a Skye terrier. This lad, half gipsy and whole poacher, as many +people esteemed him, hung about the silent, respectable, staid Mr. +Horner, and followed his steps with something of the affectionate +fidelity of the dog which he resembled. I suspect, this +demonstration of attachment to his person on Harry Gregson's part was +what won Mr. Horner's regard. In the first instance, the steward had +only chosen the lad out as the cleverest instrument he could find for +his purpose; and I don't mean to say that, if Harry had not been +almost as shrewd as Mr. Horner himself was, both by original +disposition and subsequent experience, the steward would have taken +to him as he did, let the lad have shown ever so much affection for +him. + +But even to Harry Mr. Horner was silent. Still, it was pleasant to +find himself in many ways so readily understood; to perceive that the +crumbs of knowledge he let fall were picked up by his little +follower, and hoarded like gold that here was one to hate the persons +and things whom Mr. Horner coldly disliked, and to reverence and +admire all those for whom he had any regard. Mr. Horner had never +had a child, and unconsciously, I suppose, something of the paternal +feeling had begun to develop itself in him towards Harry Gregson. I +heard one or two things from different people, which have always made +me fancy that Mr. Horner secretly and almost unconsciously hoped that +Harry Gregson might be trained so as to be first his clerk, and next +his assistant, and finally his successor in his stewardship to the +Hanbury estates. + +Harry's disgrace with my lady, in consequence of his reading the +letter, was a deeper blow to Mr. Horner than his quiet manner would +ever have led any one to suppose, or than Lady Ludlow ever dreamed of +inflicting, I am sure. + +Probably Harry had a short, stern rebuke from Mr. Horner at the time, +for his manner was always hard even to those he cared for the most. +But Harry's love was not to be daunted or quelled by a few sharp +words. I dare say, from what I heard of them afterwards, that Harry +accompanied Mr. Horner in his walk over the farm the very day of the +rebuke; his presence apparently unnoticed by the agent, by whom his +absence would have been painfully felt nevertheless. That was the +way of it, as I have been told. Mr. Horner never bade Harry go with +him; never thanked him for going, or being at his heels ready to run +on any errands, straight as the crow flies to his point, and back to +heel in as short a time as possible. Yet, if Harry were away, Mr. +Horner never inquired the reason from any of the men who might be +supposed to know whether he was detained by his father, or otherwise +engaged; he never asked Harry himself where he had been. But Miss +Galindo said that those labourers who knew Mr. Horner well, told her +that he was always more quick-eyed to shortcomings, more savage-like +in fault-finding, on those days when the lad was absent. + +Miss Galindo, indeed, was my great authority for most of the village +news which I heard. She it was who gave me the particulars of poor +Harry's accident. + +"You see, my dear," she said, "the little poacher has taken some +unaccountable fancy to my master." (This was the name by which Miss +Galindo always spoke of Mr. Horner to me, ever since she had been, as +she called it, appointed his clerk.) + +"Now if I had twenty hearts to lose, I never could spare a bit of one +of them for that good, gray, square, severe man. But different +people have different tastes, and here is that little imp of a gipsy- +tinker ready to turn slave for my master; and, odd enough, my +master,--who, I should have said beforehand, would have made short +work of imp, and imp's family, and have sent Hall, the Bang-beggar, +after them in no time--my master, as they tell me, is in his way +quite fond of the lad, and if he could, without vexing my lady too +much, he would have made him what the folks here call a Latiner. +However, last night, it seems that there was a letter of some +importance forgotten (I can't tell you what it was about, my dear, +though I know perfectly well, but 'service oblige,' as well as +'noblesse,' and you must take my word for it that it was important, +and one that I am surprised my master could forget), till too late +for the post. (The poor, good, orderly man is not what he was before +his wife's death.) Well, it seems that he was sore annoyed by his +forgetfulness, and well he might be. And it was all the more +vexatious, as he had no one to blame but himself. As for that +matter, I always scold somebody else when I'm in fault; but I suppose +my master would never think of doing that, else it's a mighty relief. +However, he could eat no tea, and was altogether put out and gloomy. +And the little faithful imp-lad, perceiving all this, I suppose, got +up like a page in an old ballad, and said he would run for his life +across country to Comberford, and see if he could not get there +before the bags were made up. So my master gave him the letter, and +nothing more was heard of the poor fellow till this morning, for the +father thought his son was sleeping in Mr. Horner's barn, as he does +occasionally, it seems, and my master, as was very natural, that he +had gone to his father's." + +"And he had fallen down the old stone quarry, had he not?" + +"Yes, sure enough. Mr. Gray had been up here fretting my lady with +some of his new-fangled schemes, and because the young man could not +have it all his own way, from what I understand, he was put out, and +thought he would go home by the back lane, instead of through the +village, where the folks would notice if the parson looked glum. +But, however, it was a mercy, and I don't mind saying so, ay, and +meaning it too, though it may be like methodism; for, as Mr. Gray +walked by the quarry, he heard a groan, and at first he thought it +was a lamb fallen down; and he stood still, and then he heard it +again; and then I suppose, he looked down and saw Harry. So he let +himself down by the boughs of the trees to the ledge where Harry lay +half-dead, and with his poor thigh broken. There he had lain ever +since the night before: he had been returning to tell the master +that he had safely posted the letter, and the first words he said, +when they recovered him from the exhausted state he was in, were" +(Miss Galindo tried hard not to whimper, as she said it), "'It was in +time, sir. I see'd it put in the bag with my own eyes.'" + +"But where is he?" asked I. "How did Mr. Gray get him out?" + +"Ay! there it is, you see. Why the old gentleman (I daren't say +Devil in Lady Ludlow's house) is not so black as he is painted; and +Mr. Gray must have a deal of good in him, as I say at times; and then +at others, when he has gone against me, I can't bear him, and think +hanging too good for him. But he lifted the poor lad, as if he had +been a baby, I suppose, and carried him up the great ledges that were +formerly used for steps; and laid him soft and easy on the wayside +grass, and ran home and got help and a door, and had him carried to +his house, and laid on his bed; and then somehow, for the first time +either he or any one else perceived it, he himself was all over +blood--his own blood--he had broken a blood-vessel; and there he lies +in the little dressing-room, as white and as still as if he were +dead; and the little imp in Mr. Gray's own bed, sound asleep, now his +leg is set, just as if linen sheets and a feather bed were his native +element, as one may say. Really, now he is doing so well, I've no +patience with him, lying there where Mr. Gray ought to be. It is +just what my lady always prophesied would come to pass, if there was +any confusion of ranks." + +"Poor Mr. Gray!" said I, thinking of his flushed face, and his +feverish, restless ways, when he had been calling on my lady not an +hour before his exertions on Harry's behalf. And I told Miss Galindo +how ill I had thought him. + +"Yes," said she. "And that was the reason my lady had sent for +Doctor Trevor. Well, it has fallen out admirably, for he looked well +after that old donkey of a Prince, and saw that he made no blunders." + +Now "that old donkey of a Prince" meant the village surgeon, Mr. +Prince, between whom and Miss Galindo there was war to the knife, as +they often met in the cottages, when there was illness, and she had +her queer, odd recipes, which he, with his grand pharmacopoeia, held +in infinite contempt, and the consequence of their squabbling had +been, not long before this very time, that he had established a kind +of rule, that into whatever sick-room Miss Galindo was admitted, +there he refused to visit. But Miss Galindo's prescriptions and +visits cost nothing and were often backed by kitchen-physic; so, +though it was true that she never came but she scolded about +something or other, she was generally preferred as medical attendant +to Mr. Prince. + +"Yes, the old donkey is obliged to tolerate me, and be civil to me; +for, you see, I got there first, and had possession, as it were, and +yet my lord the donkey likes the credit of attending the parson, and +being in consultation with so grand a county-town doctor as Doctor +Trevor. And Doctor Trevor is an old friend of mine" (she sighed a +little, some time I may tell you why), "and treats me with infinite +bowing and respect; so the donkey, not to be out of medical fashion, +bows too, though it is sadly against the grain; and he pulled a face +as if he had heard a slate-pencil gritting against a slate, when I +told Doctor Trevor I meant to sit up with the two lads, for I call +Mr. Gray little more than a lad, and a pretty conceited one, too, at +times." + +"But why should you sit up, Miss Galindo? It will tire you sadly." + +"Not it. You see, there is Gregson's mother to keep quiet for she +sits by her lad, fretting and sobbing, so that I'm afraid of her +disturbing Mr. Gray; and there's Mr. Gray to keep quiet, for Doctor +Trevor says his life depends on it; and there is medicine to be given +to the one, and bandages to be attended to for the other; and the +wild horde of gipsy brothers and sisters to be turned out, and the +father to be held in from showing too much gratitude to Mr. Gray, who +can't hear it,--and who is to do it all but me? The only servant is +old lame Betty, who once lived with me, and WOULD leave me because +she said I was always bothering--(there was a good deal of truth in +what she said, I grant, but she need not have said it; a good deal of +truth is best let alone at the bottom of the well), and what can she +do,--deaf as ever she can be, too?" + +So Miss Galindo went her ways; but not the less was she at her post +in the morning; a little crosser and more silent than usual; but the +first was not to he wondered at, and the last was rather a blessing. + +Lady Ludlow had been extremely anxious both about Mr. Gray and Harry +Gregson. Kind and thoughtful in any case of illness and accident, +she always was; but somehow, in this, the feeling that she was not +quite--what shall I call it?--"friends" seems hardly the right word +to use, as to the possible feeling between the Countess Ludlow and +the little vagabond messenger, who had only once been in her +presence,--that she had hardly parted from either as she could have +wished to do, had death been near, made her more than usually +anxious. Doctor Trevor was not to spare obtaining the best medical +advice the county could afford: whatever he ordered in the way of +diet, was to be prepared under Mrs. Medlicott's own eye, and sent +down from the Hall to the Parsonage. As Mr. Horner had given +somewhat similar directions, in the case of Harry Gregson at least, +there was rather a multiplicity of counsellors and dainties, than any +lack of them. And, the second night, Mr. Horner insisted on taking +the superintendence of the nursing himself, and sat and snored by +Harry's bedside, while the poor, exhausted mother lay by her child,-- +thinking that she watched him, but in reality fast asleep, as Miss +Galindo told us; for, distrusting any one's powers of watching and +nursing but her own, she had stolen across the quiet village street +in cloak and dressing-gown, and found Mr. Gray in vain trying to +reach the cup of barley-water which Mr. Horner had placed just beyond +his reach. + +In consequence of Mr. Gray's illness, we had to have a strange curate +to do duty; a man who dropped his h's, and hurried through the +service, and yet had time enough to stand in my Lady's way, bowing to +her as she came out of church, and so subservient in manner, that I +believe that sooner than remain unnoticed by a countess, he would +have preferred being scolded, or even cuffed. Now I found out, that +great as was my lady's liking and approval of respect, nay, even +reverence, being paid to her as a person of quality,--a sort of +tribute to her Order, which she had no individual right to remit, or, +indeed, not to exact,--yet she, being personally simple, sincere, and +holding herself in low esteem, could not endure anything like the +servility of Mr. Crosse, the temporary curate. She grew absolutely +to loathe his perpetual smiling and bowing; his instant agreement +with the slightest opinion she uttered; his veering round as she blew +the wind. I have often said that my lady did not talk much, as she +might have done had she lived among her equals. But we all loved her +so much, that we had learnt to interpret all her little ways pretty +truly; and I knew what particular turns of her head, and contractions +of her delicate fingers meant, as well as if she had expressed +herself in words. I began to suspect that my lady would be very +thankful to have Mr. Gray about again, and doing his duty even with a +conscientiousness that might amount to worrying himself, and +fidgeting others; and although Mr. Gray might hold her opinions in as +little esteem as those of any simple gentlewoman, she was too +sensible not to feel how much flavour there was in his conversation, +compared to that of Mr. Crosse, who was only her tasteless echo. + +As for Miss Galindo, she was utterly and entirely a partisan of Mr. +Gray's, almost ever since she had begun to nurse him during his +illness. + +"You know, I never set up for reasonableness, my lady. So I don't +pretend to say, as I might do if I were a sensible woman and all +that,--that I am convinced by Mr. Gray's arguments of this thing or +t'other. For one thing, you see, poor fellow! he has never been able +to argue, or hardly indeed to speak, for Doctor Trevor has been very +peremptory. So there's been no scope for arguing! But what I mean +is this:- When I see a sick man thinking always of others, and never +of himself; patient, humble--a trifle too much at times, for I've +caught him praying to be forgiven for having neglected his work as a +parish priest," (Miss Galindo was making horrible faces, to keep back +tears, squeezing up her eyes in a way which would have amused me at +any other time, but when she was speaking of Mr. Gray); "when I see a +downright good, religious man, I'm apt to think he's got hold of the +right clue, and that I can do no better than hold on by the tails of +his coat and shut my eyes, if we've got to go over doubtful places on +our road to Heaven. So, my lady, you must excuse me if, when he gets +about again, he is all agog about a Sunday-school, for if he is, I +shall be agog too, and perhaps twice as bad as him, for, you see, +I've a strong constitution compared to his, and strong ways of +speaking and acting. And I tell your ladyship this now, because I +think from your rank--and still more, if I may say so, for all your +kindness to me long ago, down to this very day--you've a right to be +first told of anything about me. Change of opinion I can't exactly +call it, for I don't see the good of schools and teaching A B C, any +more than I did before, only Mr. Gray does, so I'm to shut my eyes, +and leap over the ditch to the side of education. I've told Sally +already, that if she does not mind her work, but stands gossiping +with Nelly Mather, I'll teach her her lessons; and I've never caught +her with old Nelly since." + +I think Miss Galindo's desertion to Mr. Gray's opinions in this +matter hurt my lady just a little bit; but she only said - + +"Of course, if the parishoners wish for it, Mr. Gray must have his +Sunday-school. I shall, in that case, withdraw my opposition. I am +sorry I cannot alter my opinions as easily as you." + +My lady made herself smile as she said this. Miss Galindo saw it was +an effort to do so. She thought a minute before she spoke again. + +"Your ladyship has not seen Mr. Gray as intimately as I have done. +That's one thing. But, as for the parishioners, they will follow +your ladyship's lead in everything; so there is no chance of their +wishing for a Sunday-school." + +"I have never done anything to make them follow my lead, as you call +it, Miss Galindo," said my lady, gravely. + +"Yes, you have," replied Miss Galindo, bluntly. And then, correcting +herself, she said, "Begging your ladyship's pardon, you have. Your +ancestors have lived here time out of mind, and have owned the land +on which their forefathers have lived ever since there were +forefathers. You yourself were born amongst them, and have been like +a little queen to them ever since, I might say, and they've never +known your ladyship do anything but what was kind and gentle; but +I'll leave fine speeches about your ladyship to Mr. Crosse. Only +you, my lady, lead the thoughts of the parish; and save some of them +a world of trouble, for they could never tell what was right if they +had to think for themselves. It's all quite right that they should +be guided by you, my lady,--if only you would agree with Mr. Gray." + +"Well," said my lady, "I told him only the last day that he was here, +that I would think about it. I do believe I could make up my mind on +certain subjects better if I were left alone, than while being +constantly talked to about them." + +My lady said this in her usual soft tones; but the words had a tinge +of impatience about them; indeed, she was more ruffled than I had +often seen her; but, checking herself in an instant she said - + +"You don't know how Mr. Horner drags in this subject of education +apropos of everything. Not that he says much about it at any time: +it is not his way. But he cannot let the thing alone." + +"I know why, my lady," said Miss Galindo. "That poor lad, Harry +Gregson, will never be able to earn his livelihood in any active way, +but will be lame for life. Now, Mr. Horner thinks more of Harry than +of any one else in the world,--except, perhaps, your ladyship." Was +it not a pretty companionship for my lady? "And he has schemes of +his own for teaching Harry; and if Mr. Gray could but have his +school, Mr. Horner and he think Harry might be schoolmaster, as your +ladyship would not like to have him coming to you as steward's clerk. +I wish your ladyship would fall into this plan; Mr. Gray has it so at +heart." + +Miss Galindo looked wistfully at my lady, as she said this. But my +lady only said, drily, and rising at the same time, as if to end the +conversation - + +"So Mr. Horner and Mr. Gray seem to have gone a long way in advance +of my consent to their plans." + +"There!" exclaimed Miss Galindo, as my lady left the room, with an +apology for going away; "I have gone and done mischief with my long, +stupid tongue. To be sure, people plan a long way ahead of to-day; +more especially when one is a sick man, lying all through the weary +day on a sofa." + +"My lady will soon get over her annoyance," said I, as it were +apologetically. I only stopped Miss Galindo's self-reproaches to +draw down her wrath upon myself. + +"And has not she a right to be annoyed with me, if she likes, and to +keep annoyed as long as she likes? Am I complaining of her, that you +need tell me that? Let me tell you, I have known my lady these +thirty years; and if she were to take me by the shoulders, and turn +me out of the house, I should only love her the more. So don't you +think to come between us with any little mincing, peace-making +speeches. I have been a mischief-making parrot, and I like her the +better for being vexed with me. So good-bye to you, Miss; and wait +till you know Lady Ludlow as well as I do, before you next think of +telling me she will soon get over her annoyance!" And off Miss +Galindo went. + +I could not exactly tell what I had done wrong; but I took care never +again to come in between my lady and her by any remark about the one +to the other; for I saw that some most powerful bond of grateful +affection made Miss Galindo almost worship my lady. + +Meanwhile, Harry Gregson was limping a little about in the village, +still finding his home in Mr. Gray's house; for there he could most +conveniently be kept under the doctor's eye, and receive the +requisite care, and enjoy the requisite nourishment. As soon as he +was a little better, he was to go to Mr. Horner's house; but, as the +steward lived some distance out of the way, and was much from home, +he had agreed to leave Harry at the house; to which he had first been +taken, until he was quite strong again; and the more willingly, I +suspect, from what I heard afterwards, because Mr. Gray gave up all +the little strength of speaking which he had, to teaching Harry in +the very manner which Mr. Horner most desired. + +As for Gregson the father--he--wild man of the woods, poacher, +tinker, jack-of-all trades--was getting tamed by this kindness to his +child. Hitherto his hand had been against every man, as every man's +had been against him. That affair before the justice, which I told +you about, when Mr. Gray and even my lady had interested themselves +to get him released from unjust imprisonment, was the first bit of +justice he had ever met with; it attracted him to the people, and +attached him to the spot on which he had but squatted for a time. I +am not sure if any of the villagers were grateful to him for +remaining in their neighbourhood, instead of decamping as he had +often done before, for good reasons, doubtless, of personal safety. +Harry was only one out of a brood of ten or twelve children, some of +whom had earned for themselves no good character in service: one, +indeed, had been actually transported, for a robbery committed in a +distant part of the county; and the tale was yet told in the village +of how Gregson the father came back from the trial in a state of wild +rage, striding through the place, and uttering oaths of vengeance to +himself, his great black eyes gleaming out of his matted hair, and +his arms working by his side, and now and then tossed up in his +impotent despair. As I heard the account, his wife followed him, +child-laden and weeping. After this, they had vanished from the +country for a time, leaving their mud hovel locked up, and the door- +key, as the neighbours said, buried in a hedge bank. The Gregsons +had reappeared much about the same time that Mr. Gray came to +Hanbury. He had either never heard of their evil character, or +considered that it gave them all the more claims upon his Christian +care; and the end of it was, that this rough, untamed, strong giant +of a heathen was loyal slave to the weak, hectic, nervous, self- +distrustful parson. Gregson had also a kind of grumbling respect for +Mr. Horner: he did not quite like the steward's monopoly of his +Harry: the mother submitted to that with a better grace, swallowing +down her maternal jealousy in the prospect of her child's advancement +to a better and more respectable position than that in which his +parents had struggled through life. But Mr. Horner, the steward, and +Gregson, the poacher and squatter, had come into disagreeable contact +too often in former days for them to be perfectly cordial at any +future time. Even now, when there was no immediate cause for +anything but gratitude for his child's sake on Gregson's part, he +would skulk out of Mr. Horner's way, if he saw him coming; and it +took all Mr. Horner's natural reserve and acquired self-restraint to +keep him from occasionally holding up his father's life as a warning +to Harry. Now Gregson had nothing of this desire for avoidance with +regard to Mr. Gray. The poacher had a feeling of physical protection +towards the parson; while the latter had shown the moral courage, +without which Gregson would never have respected him, in coming right +down upon him more than once in the exercise of unlawful pursuits, +and simply and boldly telling him he was doing wrong, with such a +quiet reliance upon Gregson's better feeling, at the same time, that +the strong poacher could not have lifted a finger against Mr. Gray, +though it had been to save himself from being apprehended and taken +to the lock-ups the very next hour. He had rather listened to the +parson's bold words with an approving smile, much as Mr. Gulliver +might have hearkened to a lecture from a Lilliputian. But when brave +words passed into kind deeds, Gregson's heart mutely acknowledged its +master and keeper. And the beauty of it all was, that Mr. Gray knew +nothing of the good work he had done, or recognized himself as the +instrument which God had employed. He thanked God, it is true, +fervently and often, that the work was done; and loved the wild man +for his rough gratitude; but it never occurred to the poor young +clergyman, lying on his sick-bed, and praying, as Miss Galindo had +told us he did, to be forgiven for his unprofitable life, to think of +Gregson's reclaimed soul as anything with which he had had to do. It +was now more than three months since Mr. Gray had been at Hanbury +Court. During all that time he had been confined to his house, if +not to his sick-bed, and he and my lady had never met since their +last discussion and difference about Farmer Hale's barn. + +This was not my dear lady's fault; no one could have been more +attentive in every way to the slightest possible want of either of +the invalids, especially of Mr. Gray. And she would have gone to see +him at his own house, as she sent him word, but that her foot had +slipped upon the polished oak staircase, and her ancle had been +sprained. + +So we had never seen Mr. Gray since his illness, when one November +day he was announced as wishing to speak to my lady. She was sitting +in her room--the room in which I lay now pretty constantly--and I +remember she looked startled, when word was brought to her of Mr. +Gray's being at the Hall. + +She could not go to him, she was too lame for that, so she bade him +be shown into where she sat. + +"Such a day for him to go out!" she exclaimed, looking at the fog +which had crept up to the windows, and was sapping the little +remaining life in the brilliant Virginian creeper leaves that +draperied the house on the terrace side. + +He came in white, trembling, his large eyes wild and dilated. He +hastened up to Lady Ludlow's chair, and, to my surprise, took one of +her hands and kissed it, without speaking, yet shaking all over. + +"Mr. Gray!" said she, quickly, with sharp, tremulous apprehension of +some unknown evil. "What is it? There is something unusual about +you." + +"Something unusual has occurred," replied he, forcing his words to be +calm, as with a great effort. "A gentleman came to my house, not +half an hour ago--a Mr. Howard. He came straight from Vienna." + +"My son!" said my dear lady, stretching out her arms in dumb +questioning attitude. + +"The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the +Lord." + +But my poor lady could not echo the words. He was the last remaining +child. And once she had been the joyful mother of nine. + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + + +I am ashamed to say what feeling became strongest in my mind about +this time; next to the sympathy we all of us felt for my dear lady in +her deep sorrow, I mean; for that was greater and stronger than +anything else, however contradictory you may think it, when you hear +all. + +It might arise from my being so far from well at the time, which +produced a diseased mind in a diseased body; but I was absolutely +jealous for my father's memory, when I saw how many signs of grief +there were for my lord's death, he having done next to nothing for +the village and parish, which now changed, as it were, its daily +course of life, because his lordship died in a far-off city. My +father had spent the best years of his manhood in labouring hard, +body and soul, for the people amongst whom he lived. His family, of +course, claimed the first place in his heart; he would have been good +for little, even in the way of benevolence, if they had not. But +close after them he cared for his parishioners, and neighbours. And +yet, when he died, though the church-bells tolled, and smote upon our +hearts with hard, fresh pain at every beat, the sounds of every-day +life still went on, close pressing around us,--carts and carriages, +street-cries, distant barrel-organs (the kindly neighbours kept them +out of our street): life, active, noisy life, pressed on our acute +consciousness of Death, and jarred upon it as on a quick nerve. + +And when we went to church,--my father's own church,--though the +pulpit cushions were black, and many of the congregation had put on +some humble sign of mourning, yet it did not alter the whole material +aspect of the place. And yet what was Lord Ludlow's relation to +Hanbury, compared to my father's work and place in--? + +O! it was very wicked in me! I think if I had seen my lady,--if I +had dared to ask to go to her, I should not have felt so miserable, +so discontented. But she sat in her own room, hung with black, all, +even over the shutters. She saw no light but that which was +artificial--candles, lamps, and the like--for more than a month. +Only Adams went near her. Mr. Gray was not admitted, though he +called daily. Even Mrs. Medlicott did not see her for near a +fortnight. The sight of my lady's griefs, or rather the recollection +of it, made Mrs. Medlicott talk far more than was her wont. She told +us, with many tears, and much gesticulation, even speaking German at +times, when her English would not flow, that my lady sat there, a +white figure in the middle of the darkened room; a shaded lamp near +her, the light of which fell on an open Bible,--the great family +Bible. It was not open at any chapter or consoling verse; but at the +page whereon were registered the births of her nine children. Five +had died in infancy,--sacrificed to the cruel system which forbade +the mother to suckle her babies. Four had lived longer; Urian had +been the first to die, Ughtred-Mortimar, Earl Ludlow, the last. + +My lady did not cry, Mrs. Medlicott said. She was quite composed; +very still, very silent. She put aside everything that savoured of +mere business: sent people to Mr. Horner for that. But she was +proudly alive to every possible form which might do honour to the +last of her race. + +In those days, expresses were slow things, and forms still slower. +Before my lady's directions could reach Vienna, my lord was buried. +There was some talk (so Mrs. Medlicott said) about taking the body +up, and bringing him to Hanbury. But his executors,--connections on +the Ludlow side,--demurred to this. If he were removed to England, +he must be carried on to Scotland, and interred with his Monkshaven +forefathers. My lady, deeply hurt, withdrew from the discussion, +before it degenerated to an unseemly contest. But all the more, for +this understood mortification of my lady's, did the whole village and +estate of Hanbury assume every outward sign of mourning. The church +bells tolled morning and evening. The church itself was draped in +black inside. Hatchments were placed everywhere, where hatchments +could be put. All the tenantry spoke in hushed voices for more than +a week, scarcely daring to observe that all flesh, even that of an +Earl Ludlow, and the last of the Hanburys, was but grass after all. +The very Fighting Lion closed its front door, front shutters it had +none, and those who needed drink stole in at the back, and were +silent and maudlin over their cups, instead of riotous and noisy. +Miss Galindo's eyes were swollen up with crying, and she told me, +with a fresh burst of tears, that even hump-backed Sally had been +found sobbing over her Bible, and using a pocket-handkerchief for the +first time in her life; her aprons having hitherto stood her in the +necessary stead, but not being sufficiently in accordance with +etiquette to be used when mourning over an earl's premature decease. + +If it was this way out of the Hall, "you might work it by the rule of +three," as Miss Galindo used to say, and judge what it was in the +Hall. We none of us spoke but in a whisper: we tried not to eat; +and indeed the shock had been so really great, and we did really care +so much for my lady, that for some days we had but little appetite. +But after that, I fear our sympathy grew weaker, while our flesh grew +stronger. But we still spoke low, and our hearts ached whenever we +thought of my lady sitting there alone in the darkened room, with the +light ever falling on that one solemn page. + +We wished, O how I wished that she would see Mr. Gray! But Adams +said, she thought my lady ought to have a bishop come to see her. +Still no one had authority enough to send for one. + +Mr. Horner all this time was suffering as much as any one. He was +too faithful a servant of the great Hanbury family, though now the +family had dwindled down to a fragile old lady, not to mourn acutely +over its probable extinction. He had, besides, a deeper sympathy and +reverence with, and for, my lady, in all things, than probably he +ever cared to show, for his manners were always measured and cold. +He suffered from sorrow. He also suffered from wrong. My lord's +executors kept writing to him continually. My lady refused to listen +to mere business, saying she intrusted all to him. But the "all" was +more complicated than I ever thoroughly understood. As far as I +comprehended the case, it was something of this kind:- There had been +a mortgage raised on my lady's property of Hanbury, to enable my +lord, her husband, to spend money in cultivating his Scotch estates, +after some new fashion that required capital. As long as my lord, +her son, lived, who was to succeed to both the estates after her +death, this did not signify; so she had said and felt; and she had +refused to take any steps to secure the repayment of capital, or even +the payment of the interest of the mortgage from the possible +representatives and possessors of the Scotch estates, to the possible +owner of the Hanbury property; saying it ill became her to calculate +on the contingency of her son's death. + +But he had died childless, unmarried. The heir of the Monkshaven +property was an Edinburgh advocate, a far-away kinsman of my lord's: +the Hanbury property, at my lady's death, would go to the descendants +of a third son of the Squire Hanbury in the days of Queen Anne. + +This complication of affairs was most grievous to Mr. Horner. He had +always been opposed to the mortgage; had hated the payment of the +interest, as obliging my lady to practise certain economies which, +though she took care to make them as personal as possible, he +disliked as derogatory to the family. Poor Mr. Horner! He was so +cold and hard in his manner, so curt and decisive in his speech, that +I don't think we any of us did him justice. Miss Galindo was almost +the first, at this time, to speak a kind word of him, or to take +thought of him at all, any farther than to get out of his way when we +saw him approaching. + +"I don't think Mr. Horner is well," she said one day; about three +weeks after we had heard of my lord's death. "He sits resting his +head on his hand, and hardly hears me when I speak to him." + +But I thought no more of it, as Miss Galindo did not name it again. +My lady came amongst us once more. From elderly she had become old; +a little, frail, old lady, in heavy black drapery, never speaking +about nor alluding to her great sorrow; quieter, gentler, paler than +ever before; and her eyes dim with much weeping, never witnessed by +mortal. + +She had seen Mr. Gray at the expiration of the month of deep +retirement. But I do not think that even to him she had said one +word of her own particular individual sorrow. All mention of it +seemed buried deep for evermore. One day, Mr. Horner sent word that +he was too much indisposed to attend to his usual business at the +Hall; but he wrote down some directions and requests to Miss Galindo, +saying that he would be at his office early the next morning. The +next morning he was dead. + +Miss Galindo told my lady. Miss Galindo herself cried plentifully, +but my lady, although very much distressed, could not cry. It seemed +a physical impossibility, as if she had shed all the tears in her +power. Moreover, I almost think her wonder was far greater that she +herself lived than that Mr. Horner died. It was almost natural that +so faithful a servant should break his heart, when the family he +belonged to lost their stay, their heir, and their last hope. + +Yes! Mr. Horner was a faithful servant. I do not think there are +many so faithful now; but perhaps that is an old woman's fancy of +mine. When his will came to be examined, it was discovered that, +soon after Harry Gregson's accident, Mr. Horner had left the few +thousands (three, I think,) of which he was possessed, in trust for +Harry's benefit, desiring his executors to see that the lad was well +educated in certain things, for which Mr. Horner had thought that he +had shown especial aptitude; and there was a kind of implied apology +to my lady in one sentence where he stated that Harry's lameness +would prevent his being ever able to gain his living by the exercise +of any mere bodily faculties, "as had been wished by a lady whose +wishes" he, the testator, "was bound to regard." + +But there was a codicil in the will, dated since Lord Ludlow's death- +-feebly written by Mr. Horner himself, as if in preparation only for +some more formal manner of bequest: or, perhaps, only as a mere +temporary arrangement till he could see a lawyer, and have a fresh +will made. In this he revoked his previous bequest to Harry Gregson. +He only left two hundred pounds to Mr Gray to be used, as that +gentleman thought best, for Henry Gregson's benefit. With this one +exception, he bequeathed all the rest of his savings to my lady, with +a hope that they might form a nest-egg, as it were, towards the +paying off of the mortgage which had been such a grief to him during +his life. I may not repeat all this in lawyer's phrase; I heard it +through Miss Galindo, and she might make mistakes. Though, indeed, +she was very clear-headed, and soon earned the respect of Mr. +Smithson, my lady's lawyer from Warwick. Mr. Smithson knew Miss +Galindo a little before, both personally and by reputation; but I +don't think he was prepared to find her installed as steward's clerk, +and, at first, he was inclined to treat her, in this capacity, with +polite contempt. But Miss Galindo was both a lady and a spirited, +sensible woman, and she could put aside her self-indulgence in +eccentricity of speech and manner whenever she chose. Nay more; she +was usually so talkative, that if she had not been amusing and warm- +hearted, one might have thought her wearisome occasionally. But to +meet Mr. Smithson she came out daily in her Sunday gown; she said no +more than was required in answer to his questions; her books and +papers were in thorough order, and methodically kept; her statements +of matters-of-fact accurate, and to be relied on. She was amusingly +conscious of her victory over his contempt of a woman-clerk and his +preconceived opinion of her unpractical eccentricity. + +"Let me alone," said she, one day when she came in to sit awhile with +me. "That man is a good man--a sensible man--and I have no doubt he +is a good lawyer; but he can't fathom women yet. I make no doubt +he'll go back to Warwick, and never give credit again to those people +who made him think me half-cracked to begin with. O, my dear, he +did! He showed it twenty times worse than my poor dear master ever +did. It was a form to be gone through to please my lady, and, for +her sake, he would hear my statements and see my books. It was +keeping a woman out of harm's way, at any rate, to let her fancy +herself useful. I read the man. And, I am thankful to say, he +cannot read me. At least, only one side of me. When I see an end to +be gained, I can behave myself accordingly. Here was a man who +thought that a woman in a black silk gown was a respectable, orderly +kind of person; and I was a woman in a black silk gown. He believed +that a woman could not write straight lines, and required a man to +tell her that two and two made four. I was not above ruling my +books, and had Cocker a little more at my fingers' ends than he had. +But my greatest triumph has been holding my tongue. He would have +thought nothing of my books, or my sums, or my black silk gown, if I +had spoken unasked. So I have buried more sense in my bosom these +ten days than ever I have uttered in the whole course of my life +before. I have been so curt, so abrupt, so abominably dull, that +I'll answer for it he thinks me worthy to be a man. But I must go +back to him, my dear, so good-bye to conversation and you." + +But though Mr. Smithson might be satisfied with Miss Galindo, I am +afraid she was the only part of the affair with which he was content. +Everything else went wrong. I could not say who told me so--but the +conviction of this seemed to pervade the house. I never knew how +much we had all looked up to the silent, gruff Mr. Horner for +decisions, until he was gone. My lady herself was a pretty good +woman of business, as women of business go. Her father, seeing that +she would be the heiress of the Hanbury property, had given her a +training which was thought unusual in those days, and she liked to +feel herself queen regnant, and to have to decide in all cases +between herself and her tenantry. But, perhaps, Mr. Horner would +have done it more wisely; not but what she always attended to him at +last. She would begin by saying, pretty clearly and promptly, what +she would have done, and what she would not have done. If Mr. Horner +approved of it, he bowed, and set about obeying her directly; if he +disapproved of it, he bowed, and lingered so long before he obeyed +her, that she forced his opinion out of him with her "Well, Mr. +Horner! and what have you to say against it?" For she always +understood his silence as well as if he had spoken. But the estate +was pressed for ready money, and Mr. Horner had grown gloomy and +languid since the death of his wife, and even his own personal +affairs were not in the order in which they had been a year or two +before, for his old clerk had gradually become superannuated, or, at +any rate, unable by the superfluity of his own energy and wit to +supply the spirit that was wanting in Mr. Horner. + +Day after day Mr. Smithson seemed to grow more fidgety, more annoyed +at the state of affairs. Like every one else employed by Lady +Ludlow, as far as I could learn, he had an hereditary tie to the +Hanbury family. As long as the Smithsons had been lawyers, they had +been lawyers to the Hanburys; always coming in on all great family +occasions, and better able to understand the characters, and connect +the links of what had once been a large and scattered family, than +any individual thereof had ever been. + +As long as a man was at the head of the Hanburys, the lawyers had +simply acted as servants, and had only given their advice when it was +required. But they had assumed a different position on the memorable +occasion of the mortgage: they had remonstrated against it. My lady +had resented this remonstrance, and a slight, unspoken coolness had +existed between her and the father of this Mr. Smithson ever since. + +I was very sorry for my lady. Mr. Smithson was inclined to blame Mr. +Horner for the disorderly state in which he found some of the +outlying farms, and for the deficiencies in the annual payment of +rents. Mr. Smithson had too much good feeling to put this blame into +words; but my lady's quick instinct led her to reply to a thought, +the existence of which she perceived; and she quietly told the truth, +and explained how she had interfered repeatedly to prevent Mr. Horner +from taking certain desirable steps, which were discordant to her +hereditary sense of right and wrong between landlord and tenant. She +also spoke of the want of ready money as a misfortune that could be +remedied, by more economical personal expenditure on her own part; by +which individual saving, it was possible that a reduction of fifty +pounds a year might have been accomplished. But as soon as Mr. +Smithson touched on larger economies, such as either affected the +welfare of others, or the honour and standing of the great House of +Hanbury, she was inflexible. Her establishment consisted of +somewhere about forty servants, of whom nearly as many as twenty were +unable to perform their work properly, and yet would have been hurt +if they had been dismissed; so they had the credit of fulfilling +duties, while my lady paid and kept their substitutes. Mr. Smithson +made a calculation, and would have saved some hundreds a year by +pensioning off these old servants. But my lady would not hear of it. +Then, again, I know privately that he urged her to allow some of us +to return to our homes. Bitterly we should have regretted the +separation from Lady Ludlow; but we would have gone back gladly, had +we known at the time that her circumstances required it: but she +would not listen to the proposal for a moment. + +"If I cannot act justly towards every one, I will give up a plan +which has been a source of much satisfaction; at least, I will not +carry it out to such an extent in future. But to these young ladies, +who do me the favour to live with me at present, I stand pledged. I +cannot go back from my word, Mr. Smithson. We had better talk no +more of this." + +As she spoke, she entered the room where I lay. She and Mr. Smithson +were coming for some papers contained in the bureau. They did not +know I was there, and Mr. Smithson started a little when he saw me, +as he must have been aware that I had overheard something. But my +lady did not change a muscle of her face. All the world might +overhear her kind, just, pure sayings, and she had no fear of their +misconstruction. She came up to me, and kissed me on the forehead, +and then went to search for the required papers. + +"I rode over the Connington farms yesterday, my lady. I must say I +was quite grieved to see the condition they are in; all the land that +is not waste is utterly exhausted with working successive white +crops. Not a pinch of manure laid on the ground for years. I must +say that a greater contrast could never have been presented than that +between Harding's farm and the next fields--fences in perfect order, +rotation crops, sheep eating down the turnips on the waste lands-- +everything that could be desired." + +"Whose farm is that?" asked my lady. + +"Why, I am sorry to say, it was on none of your ladyship's that I saw +such good methods adopted. I hoped it was, I stopped my horse to +inquire. A queer-looking man, sitting on his horse like a tailor, +watching his men with a couple of the sharpest eyes I ever saw, and +dropping his h's at every word, answered my question, and told me it +was his. I could not go on asking him who he was; but I fell into +conversation with him, and I gathered that he had earned some money +in trade in Birmingham, and had bought the estate (five hundred +acres, I think he said,) on which he was born, and now was setting +himself to cultivate it in downright earnest, going to Holkham and +Woburn, and half the country over, to get himself up on the subject." + +"It would be Brooke, that dissenting baker from Birmingham," said my +lady in her most icy tone. "Mr. Smithson, I am sorry I have been +detaining you so long, but I think these are the letters you wished +to see." + +If her ladyship thought by this speech to quench Mr. Smithson she was +mistaken. Mr. Smithson just looked at the letters, and went on with +the old subject. + +"Now, my lady, it struck me that if you had such a man to take poor +Horner's place, he would work the rents and the land round most +satisfactorily. I should not despair of inducing this very man to +undertake the work. I should not mind speaking to him myself on the +subject, for we got capital friends over a snack of luncheon that he +asked me to share with him." + +Lady Ludlow fixed her eyes on Mr. Smithson as he spoke, and never +took them off his face until he had ended. She was silent a minute +before she answered. + +"You are very good, Mr. Smithson, but I need not trouble you with any +such arrangements. I am going to write this afternoon to Captain +James, a friend of one of my sons, who has, I hear, been severely +wounded at Trafalgar, to request him to honour me by accepting Mr. +Horner's situation." + +"A Captain James! A captain in the navy! going to manage your +ladyship's estate!" + +"If he will be so kind. I shall esteem it a condescension on his +part; but I hear that he will have to resign his profession, his +state of health is so bad, and a country life is especially +prescribed for him. I am in some hopes of tempting him here, as I +learn he has but little to depend on if he gives up his profession." + +"A Captain James! an invalid captain!" + +"You think I am asking too great a favour," continued my lady. (I +never could tell how far it was simplicity, or how far a kind of +innocent malice, that made her misinterpret Mr. Smithson's words and +looks as she did.) "But he is not a post-captain, only a commander, +and his pension will be but small. I may be able, by offering him +country air and a healthy occupation, to restore him to health." + +"Occupation! My lady, may I ask how a sailor is to manage land? +Why, your tenants will laugh him to scorn." + +"My tenants, I trust, will not behave so ill as to laugh at any one I +choose to set over them. Captain James has had experience in +managing men. He has remarkable practical talents, and great common +sense, as I hear from every one. But, whatever he may be, the affair +rests between him and myself. I can only say I shall esteem myself +fortunate if he comes." + +There was no more to be said, after my lady spoke in this manner. I +had heard her mention Captain James before, as a middy who had been +very kind to her son Urian. I thought I remembered then, that she +had mentioned that his family circumstances were not very prosperous. +But, I confess, that little as I knew of the management of land, I +quite sided with Mr. Smithson. He, silently prohibited from again +speaking to my lady on the subject, opened his mind to Miss Galindo, +from whom I was pretty sure to hear all the opinions and news of the +household and village. She had taken a great fancy to me, because +she said I talked so agreeably. I believe it was because I listened +so well. + +"Well, have you heard the news," she began, "about this Captain +James? A sailor,--with a wooden leg, I have no doubt. What would +the poor, dear, deceased master have said to it, if he had known who +was to be his successor! My dear, I have often thought of the +postman's bringing me a letter as one of the pleasures I shall miss +in heaven. But, really, I think Mr. Horner may be thankful he has +got out of the reach of news; or else he would hear of Mr. Smithson's +having made up to the Birmingham baker, and of his one-legged +captain, coming to dot-and-go-one over the estate. I suppose he will +look after the labourers through a spy-glass. I only hope he won't +stick in the mud with his wooden leg; for I, for one, won't help him +out. Yes, I would," said she, correcting herself; "I would, for my +lady's sake." + +"But are you sure he has a wooden leg?" asked I. "I heard Lady +Ludlow tell Mr. Smithson about him, and she only spoke of him as +wounded." + +"Well, sailors are almost always wounded in the leg. Look at +Greenwich Hospital! I should say there were twenty one-legged +pensioners to one without an arm there. But say he has got half-a- +dozen legs: what has he to do with managing land? I shall think him +very impudent if he comes, taking advantage of my lady's kind heart." + +However, come he did. In a month from that time, the carriage was +sent to meet Captain James; just as three years before it had been +sent to meet me. His coming had been so much talked about that we +were all as curious as possible to see him, and to know how so +unusual an experiment, as it seemed to us, would answer. But, before +I tell you anything about our new agent, I must speak of something +quite as interesting, and I really think quite as important. And +this was my lady's making friends with Harry Gregson. I do believe +she did it for Mr. Horner's sake; but, of course, I can only +conjecture why my lady did anything. But I heard one day, from Mary +Legard, that my lady had sent for Harry to come and see her, if he +was well enough to walk so far; and the next day he was shown into +the room he had been in once before under such unlucky circumstances. + +The lad looked pale enough, as he stood propping himself up on his +crutch, and the instant my lady saw him, she bade John Footman place +a stool for him to sit down upon while she spoke to him. It might be +his paleness that gave his whole face a more refined and gentle look; +but I suspect it was that the boy was apt to take impressions, and +that Mr. Horner's grave, dignified ways, and Mr. Gray's tender and +quiet manners, had altered him; and then the thoughts of illness and +death seem to turn many of us into gentlemen, and gentlewomen, as +long as such thoughts are in our minds. We cannot speak loudly or +angrily at such times; we are not apt to be eager about mere worldly +things, for our very awe at our quickened sense of the nearness of +the invisible world, makes us calm and serene about the petty trifles +of to-day. At least, I know that was the explanation Mr. Gray once +gave me of what we all thought the great improvement in Harry +Gregson's way of behaving. + +My lady hesitated so long about what she had best say, that Harry +grew a little frightened at her silence. A few months ago it would +have surprised me more than it did now; but since my lord her son's +death, she had seemed altered in many ways,--more uncertain and +distrustful of herself, as it were. + +At last she said, and I think the tears were in her eyes: "My poor +little fellow, you have had a narrow escape with your life since I +saw you last." + +To this there was nothing to be said but "Yes;" and again there was +silence. + +"And you have lost a good, kind friend, in Mr. Horner." + +The boy's lips worked, and I think he said, "Please, don't." But I +can't be sure; at any rate, my lady went on: + +"And so have I,--a good, kind friend, he was to both of us; and to +you he wished to show his kindness in even a more generous way than +he has done. Mr. Gray has told you about his legacy to you, has he +not?" + +There was no sign of eager joy on the lad's face, as if he realised +the power and pleasure of having what to him must have seemed like a +fortune. + +"Mr. Gray said as how he had left me a matter of money." + +"Yes, he has left you two hundred pounds." + +"But I would rather have had him alive, my lady," he burst out, +sobbing as if his heart would break. + +"My lad, I believe you. We would rather have had our dead alive, +would we not? and there is nothing in money that can comfort us for +their loss. But you know--Mr. Gray has told you--who has appointed +all our times to die. Mr. Horner was a good, just man; and has done +well and kindly, both by me and you. You perhaps do not know" (and +now I understood what my lady had been making up her mind to say to +Harry, all the time she was hesitating how to begin) "that Mr. +Horner, at one time, meant to leave you a great deal more; probably +all he had, with the exception of a legacy to his old clerk, +Morrison. But he knew that this estate--on which my forefathers had +lived for six hundred years--was in debt, and that I had no immediate +chance of paying off this debt; and yet he felt that it was a very +sad thing for an old property like this to belong in part to those +other men, who had lent the money. You understand me, I think, my +little man?" said she, questioning Harry's face. + +He had left off crying, and was trying to understand, with all his +might and main; and I think he had got a pretty good general idea of +the state of affairs; though probably he was puzzled by the term "the +estate being in debt." But he was sufficiently interested to want my +lady to go on; and he nodded his head at her, to signify this to her. + +"So Mr. Horner took the money which he once meant to be yours, and +has left the greater part of it to me, with the intention of helping +me to pay off this debt I have told you about. It will go a long +way, and I shall try hard to save the rest, and then I shall die +happy in leaving the land free from debt." She paused. "But I shall +not die happy in thinking of you. I do not know if having money, or +even having a great estate and much honour, is a good thing for any +of us. But God sees fit that some of us should be called to this +condition, and it is our duty then to stand by our posts, like brave +soldiers. Now, Mr. Horner intended you to have this money first. I +shall only call it borrowing from you, Harry Gregson, if I take it +and use it to pay off the debt. I shall pay Mr. Gray interest on +this money, because he is to stand as your guardian, as it were, till +you come of age; and he must fix what ought to be done with it, so as +to fit you for spending the principal rightly when the estate can +repay it you. I suppose, now, it will be right for you to be +educated. That will be another snare that will come with your money. +But have courage, Harry. Both education and money may be used +rightly, if we only pray against the temptations they bring with +them." + +Harry could make no answer, though I am sure he understood it all. +My lady wanted to get him to talk to her a little, by way of becoming +acquainted with what was passing in his mind; and she asked him what +he would like to have done with his money, if he could have part of +it now? To such a simple question, involving no talk about feelings, +his answer came readily enough. + +"Build a cottage for father, with stairs in it, and give Mr. Gray a +school-house. O, father does so want Mr. Gray for to have his wish! +Father saw all the stones lying quarried and hewn on Farmer Hale's +land; Mr. Gray had paid for them all himself. And father said he +would work night and day, and little Tommy should carry mortar, if +the parson would let him, sooner than that he should be fretted and +frabbed as he was, with no one giving him a helping hand or a kind +word." + +Harry knew nothing of my lady's part in the affair; that was very +clear. My lady kept silence. + +"If I might have a piece of my money, I would buy land from Mr. +Brooks; he has got a bit to sell just at the corner of Hendon Lane, +and I would give it to Mr. Gray; and, perhaps, if your ladyship +thinks I may be learned again, I might grow up into the +schoolmaster." + +"You are a good boy," said my lady. "But there are more things to be +thought of, in carrying out such a plan, than you are aware of. +However, it shall be tried." + +"The school, my lady?" I exclaimed, almost thinking she did not know +what she was saying. + +"Yes, the school. For Mr. Horner's sake, for Mr. Gray's sake, and +last, not least, for this lad's sake, I will give the new plan a +trial. Ask Mr. Gray to come up to me this afternoon about the land +he wants. He need not go to a Dissenter for it. And tell your +father he shall have a good share in the building of it, and Tommy +shall carry the mortar." + +"And I may be schoolmaster?" asked Harry, eagerly. + +"We'll see about that," said my lady, amused. "It will be some time +before that plan comes to pass, my little fellow." + +And now to return to Captain James. My first account of him was from +Miss Galindo. + +"He's not above thirty; and I must just pack up my pens and my paper, +and be off; for it would be the height of impropriety for me to be +staying here as his clerk. It was all very well in the old master's +days. But here am I, not fifty till next May, and this young, +unmarried man, who is not even a widower! O, there would be no end +of gossip. Besides he looks as askance at me as I do at him. My +black silk gown had no effect. He's afraid I shall marry him. But I +won't; he may feel himself quite safe from that. And Mr. Smithson +has been recommending a clerk to my lady. She would far rather keep +me on; but I can't stop. I really could not think it proper." + +"What sort of a looking man is he?" + +"O, nothing particular. Short, and brown, and sunburnt. I did not +think it became me to look at him. Well, now for the nightcaps. I +should have grudged any one else doing them, for I have got such a +pretty pattern!" + +But when it came to Miss Galindo's leaving, there was a great +misunderstanding between her and my lady. Miss Galindo had imagined +that my lady had asked her as a favour to copy the letters, and enter +the accounts, and had agreed to do the work without the notion of +being paid for so doing. She had, now and then, grieved over a very +profitable order for needlework passing out of her hands on account +of her not having time to do it, because of her occupation at the +Hall; but she had never hinted this to my lady, but gone on +cheerfully at her writing as long as her clerkship was required. My +lady was annoyed that she had not made her intention of paying Miss +Galindo more clear, in the first conversation she had had with her; +but I suppose that she had been too delicate to be very explicit with +regard to money matters; and now Miss Galindo was quite hurt at my +lady's wanting to pay her for what she had done in such right-down +good-will. + +"No," Miss Galindo said; "my own dear lady, you may be as angry with +me as you like, but don't offer me money. Think of six-and-twenty +years ago, and poor Arthur, and as you were to me then! Besides, I +wanted money--I don't disguise it--for a particular purpose; and when +I found that (God bless you for asking me!) I could do you a service, +I turned it over in my mind, and I gave up one plan and took up +another, and it's all settled now. Bessy is to leave school and come +and live with me. Don't, please, offer me money again. You don't +know how glad I have been to do anything for you. Have not I, +Margaret Dawson? Did you not hear me say, one day, I would cut off +my hand for my lady; for am I a stock or a stone, that I should +forget kindness? O, I have been so glad to work for you. And now +Bessy is coming here; and no one knows anything about her--as if she +had done anything wrong, poor child!" + +"Dear Miss Galindo," replied my lady, "I will never ask you to take +money again. Only I thought it was quite understood between us. And +you know you have taken money for a set of morning wrappers, before +now." + +"Yes, my lady; but that was not confidential. Now I was so proud to +have something to do for you confidentially." + +"But who is Bessy?" asked my lady. "I do not understand who she is, +or why she is to come and live with you. Dear Miss Galindo, you must +honour me by being confidential with me in your turn!" + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + + +I had always understood that Miss Galindo had once been in much +better circumstances, but I had never liked to ask any questions +respecting her. But about this time many things came out respecting +her former life, which I will try and arrange: not however, in the +order in which I heard them, but rather as they occurred. + +Miss Galindo was the daughter of a clergyman in Westmoreland. Her +father was the younger brother of a baronet, his ancestor having been +one of those of James the First's creation. This baronet-uncle of +Miss Galindo was one of the queer, out-of-the-way people who were +bred at that time, and in that northern district of England. I never +heard much of him from any one, besides this one great fact: that he +had early disappeared from his family, which indeed only consisted of +a brother and sister who died unmarried, and lived no one knew +where,--somewhere on the Continent, it was supposed, for he had never +returned from the grand tour which he had been sent to make, +according to the general fashion of the day, as soon as he had left +Oxford. He corresponded occasionally with his brother the clergyman; +but the letters passed through a banker's hands; the banker being +pledged to secrecy, and, as he told Mr. Galindo, having the penalty, +if he broke his pledge, of losing the whole profitable business, and +of having the management of the baronet's affairs taken out of his +hands, without any advantage accruing to the inquirer, for Sir +Lawrence had told Messrs. Graham that, in case his place of residence +was revealed by them, not only would he cease to bank with them, but +instantly take measures to baffle any future inquiries as to his +whereabouts, by removing to some distant country. + +Sir Lawrence paid a certain sum of money to his brother's account +every year; but the time of this payment varied, and it was sometimes +eighteen or nineteen months between the deposits; then, again, it +would not be above a quarter of the time, showing that he intended it +to be annual, but, as this intention was never expressed in words, it +was impossible to rely upon it, and a great deal of this money was +swallowed up by the necessity Mr. Galindo felt himself under of +living in the large, old, rambling family mansion, which had been one +of Sir Lawrence's rarely expressed desires. Mr. and Mrs. Galindo +often planned to live upon their own small fortune and the income +derived from the living (a vicarage, of which the great tithes went +to Sir Lawrence as lay impropriator), so as to put-by the payments +made by the baronet, for the benefit of Laurentia--our Miss Galindo. +But I suppose they found it difficult to live economically in a large +house, even though they had it rent free. They had to keep up with +hereditary neighbours and friends, and could hardly help doing it in +the hereditary manner. + +One of these neighbours, a Mr. Gibson, had a son a few years older +than Laurentia. The families were sufficiently intimate for the +young people to see a good deal of each other: and I was told that +this young Mr. Mark Gibson was an unusually prepossessing man (he +seemed to have impressed every one who spoke of him to me as being a +handsome, manly, kind-hearted fellow), just what a girl would be sure +to find most agreeable. The parents either forgot that their +children were growing up to man's and woman's estate, or thought that +the intimacy and probable attachment would be no bad thing, even if +it did lead to a marriage. Still, nothing was ever said by young +Gibson till later on, when it was too late, as it turned out. He +went to and from Oxford; he shot and fished with Mr. Galindo, or came +to the Mere to skate in winter-time; was asked to accompany Mr. +Galindo to the Hall, as the latter returned to the quiet dinner with +his wife and daughter; and so, and so, it went on, nobody much knew +how, until one day, when Mr. Galindo received a formal letter from +his brother's bankers, announcing Sir Lawrence's death, of malaria +fever, at Albano, and congratulating Sir Hubert on his accession to +the estates and the baronetcy. The king is dead--"Long live the +king!" as I have since heard that the French express it. + +Sir Hubert and his wife were greatly surprised. Sir Lawrence was but +two years older than his brother; and they had never heard of any +illness till they heard of his death. They were sorry; very much +shocked; but still a little elated at the succession to the baronetcy +and estates. The London bankers had managed everything well. There +was a large sum of ready money in their hands, at Sir Hubert's +service, until he should touch his rents, the rent-roll being eight +thousand a-year. And only Laurentia to inherit it all! Her mother, +a poor clergyman's daughter, began to plan all sorts of fine +marriages for her; nor was her father much behind his wife in his +ambition. They took her up to London, when they went to buy new +carriages, and dresses, and furniture. And it was then and there she +made my lady's acquaintance. How it was that they came to take a +fancy to each other, I cannot say. My lady was of the old nobility,- +-grand, compose, gentle, and stately in her ways. Miss Galindo must +always have been hurried in her manner, and her energy must have +shown itself in inquisitiveness and oddness even in her youth. But I +don't pretend to account for things: I only narrate them. And the +fact was this:- that the elegant, fastidious countess was attracted +to the country girl, who on her part almost worshipped my lady. My +lady's notice of their daughter made her parents think, I suppose, +that there was no match that she might not command; she, the heiress +of eight thousand a-year, and visiting about among earls and dukes. +So when they came back to their old Westmoreland Hall, and Mark +Gibson rode over to offer his hand and his heart, and prospective +estate of nine hundred a-year, to his old companion and playfellow, +Laurentia, Sir Hubert and Lady Galindo made very short work of it. +They refused him plumply themselves; and when he begged to be allowed +to speak to Laurentia, they found some excuse for refusing him the +opportunity of so doing, until they had talked to her themselves, and +brought up every argument and fact in their power to convince her--a +plain girl, and conscious of her plainness--that Mr. Mark Gibson had +never thought of her in the way of marriage till after her father's +accession to his fortune; and that it was the estate--not the young +lady--that he was in love with. I suppose it will never be known in +this world how far this supposition of theirs was true. My Lady +Ludlow had always spoken as if it was; but perhaps events, which came +to her knowledge about this time, altered her opinion. At any rate, +the end of it was, Laurentia refused Mark, and almost broke her heart +in doing so. He discovered the suspicions of Sir Hubert and Lady +Galindo, and that they had persuaded their daughter to share in them. +So he flung off with high words, saying that they did not know a true +heart when they met with one; and that although he had never offered +till after Sir Lawrence's death, yet that his father knew all along +that he had been attached to Laurentia, only that he, being the +eldest of five children, and having as yet no profession, had had to +conceal, rather than to express, an attachment, which, in those days, +he had believed was reciprocated. He had always meant to study for +the bar, and the end of all he had hoped for had been to earn a +moderate income, which he might ask Laurentia to share. This, or +something like it, was what he said. But his reference to his father +cut two ways. Old Mr. Gibson was known to be very keen about money. +It was just as likely that he would urge Mark to make love to the +heiress, now she was an heiress, as that he would have restrained him +previously, as Mark said he had done. When this was repeated to +Mark, he became proudly reserved, or sullen, and said that Laurentia, +at any rate, might have known him better. He left the country, and +went up to London to study law soon afterwards; and Sir Hubert and +Lady Galindo thought they were well rid of him. But Laurentia never +ceased reproaching herself, and never did to her dying day, as I +believe. The words, "She might have known me better," told to her by +some kind friend or other, rankled in her mind, and were never +forgotten. Her father and mother took her up to London the next +year; but she did not care to visit--dreaded going out even for a +drive, lest she should see Mark Gibson's reproachful eyes--pined and +lost her health. Lady Ludlow saw this change with regret, and was +told the cause by Lady Galindo, who of course, gave her own version +of Mark's conduct and motives. My lady never spoke to Miss Galindo +about it, but tried constantly to interest and please her. It was at +this time that my lady told Miss Galindo so much about her own early +life, and about Hanbury, that Miss Galindo resolved, if ever she +could, she would go and see the old place which her friend loved so +well. The end of it all was, that she came to live there, as we +know. + +But a great change was to come first. Before Sir Hubert and Lady +Galindo had left London on this, their second visit, they had a +letter from the lawyer, whom they employed, saying that Sir Lawrence +had left an heir, his legitimate child by an Italian woman of low +rank; at least, legal claims to the title and property had been sent +into him on the boy's behalf. Sir Lawrence had always been a man of +adventurous and artistic, rather than of luxurious tastes; and it was +supposed, when all came to be proved at the trial, that he was +captivated by the free, beautiful life they lead in Italy, and had +married this Neapolitan fisherman's daughter, who had people about +her shrewd enough to see that the ceremony was legally performed. +She and her husband had wandered about the shores of the +Mediterranean for years, leading a happy, careless, irresponsible +life, unencumbered by any duties except those connected with a rather +numerous family. It was enough for her that they never wanted money, +and that her husband's love was always continued to her. She hated +the name of England--wicked, cold, heretic England--and avoided the +mention of any subjects connected with her husband's early life. So +that, when he died at Albano, she was almost roused out of her +vehement grief to anger with the Italian doctor, who declared that he +must write to a certain address to announce the death of Lawrence +Galindo. For some time, she feared lest English barbarians might +come down upon her, making a claim to the children. She hid herself +and them in the Abruzzi, living upon the sale of what furniture and +jewels Sir Lawrence had died possessed of. When these failed, she +returned to Naples, which she had not visited since her marriage. +Her father was dead; but her brother inherited some of his keenness. +He interested the priests, who made inquiries and found that the +Galindo succession was worth securing to an heir of the true faith. +They stirred about it, obtained advice at the English Embassy; and +hence that letter to the lawyers, calling upon Sir Hubert to +relinquish title and property, and to refund what money he had +expended. He was vehement in his opposition to this claim. He could +not bear to think of his brother having married a foreigner--a +papist, a fisherman's daughter; nay, of his having become a papist +himself. He was in despair at the thought of his ancestral property +going to the issue of such a marriage. He fought tooth and nail, +making enemies of his relations, and losing almost all his own +private property; for he would go on against the lawyer's advice, +long after every one was convinced except himself and his wife. At +last he was conquered. He gave up his living in gloomy despair. He +would have changed his name if he could, so desirous was he to +obliterate all tie between himself and the mongrel papist baronet and +his Italian mother, and all the succession of children and nurses who +came to take possession of the Hall soon after Mr. Hubert Galindo's +departure, stayed there one winter, and then flitted back to Naples +with gladness and delight. Mr. and Mrs. Hubert Galindo lived in +London. He had obtained a curacy somewhere in the city. They would +have been thankful now if Mr. Mark Gibson had renewed his offer. No +one could accuse him of mercenary motives if he had done so. Because +he did not come forward, as they wished, they brought his silence up +as a justification of what they had previously attributed to him. I +don't know what Miss Galindo thought herself; but Lady Ludlow has +told me how she shrank from hearing her parents abuse him. Lady +Ludlow supposed that he was aware that they were living in London. +His father must have known the fact, and it was curious if he had +never named it to his son. Besides, the name was very uncommon; and +it was unlikely that it should never come across him, in the +advertisements of charity sermons which the new and rather eloquent +curate of Saint Mark's East was asked to preach. All this time Lady +Ludlow never lost sight of them, for Miss Galindo's sake. And when +the father and mother died, it was my lady who upheld Miss Galindo in +her determination not to apply for any provision to her cousin, the +Italian baronet, but rather to live upon the hundred a-year which had +been settled on her mother and the children of his son Hubert's +marriage by the old grandfather, Sir Lawrence. + +Mr. Mark Gibson had risen to some eminence as a barrister on the +Northern Circuit, but had died unmarried in the lifetime of his +father, a victim (so people said) to intemperance. Doctor Trevor, +the physician who had been called in to Mr. Gray and Harry Gregson, +had married a sister of his. And that was all my lady knew about the +Gibson family. But who was Bessy? + +That mystery and secret came out, too, in process of time. Miss +Galindo had been to Warwick, some years before I arrived at Hanbury, +on some kind of business or shopping, which can only be transacted in +a county town. There was an old Westmoreland connection between her +and Mrs. Trevor, though I believe the latter was too young to have +been made aware of her brother's offer to Miss Galindo at the time +when it took place; and such affairs, if they are unsuccessful, are +seldom spoken about in the gentleman's family afterwards. But the +Gibsons and Galindos had been county neighbours too long for the +connection not to be kept up between two members settled far away +from their early homes. Miss Galindo always desired her parcels to +be sent to Dr. Trevor's, when she went to Warwick for shopping +purchases. If she were going any journey, and the coach did not come +through Warwick as soon as she arrived (in my lady's coach or +otherwise) from Hanbury, she went to Doctor Trevor's to wait. She +was as much expected to sit down to the household meals as if she had +been one of the family: and in after-years it was Mrs. Trevor who +managed her repository business for her. + +So, on the day I spoke of, she had gone to Doctor Trevor's to rest, +and possibly to dine. The post in those times, came in at all hours +of the morning: and Doctor Trevor's letters had not arrived until +after his departure on his morning round. Miss Galindo was sitting +down to dinner with Mrs. Trevor and her seven children, when the +Doctor came in. He was flurried and uncomfortable, and hurried the +children away as soon as he decently could. Then (rather feeling +Miss Galindo's presence an advantage, both as a present restraint on +the violence of his wife's grief, and as a consoler when he was +absent on his afternoon round), he told Mrs. Trevor of her brother's +death. He had been taken ill on circuit, and had hurried back to his +chambers in London only to die. She cried terribly; but Doctor +Trevor said afterwards, he never noticed that Miss Galindo cared much +about it one way or another. She helped him to soothe his wife, +promised to stay with her all the afternoon instead of returning to +Hanbury, and afterwards offered to remain with her while the Doctor +went to attend the funeral. When they heard of the old love-story +between the dead man and Miss Galindo,--brought up by mutual friends +in Westmoreland, in the review which we are all inclined to take of +the events of a man's life when he comes to die,--they tried to +remember Miss Galindo's speeches and ways of going on during this +visit. She was a little pale, a little silent; her eyes were +sometimes swollen, and her nose red; but she was at an age when such +appearances are generally attributed to a bad cold in the head, +rather than to any more sentimental reason. They felt towards her as +towards an old friend, a kindly, useful, eccentric old maid. She did +not expect more, or wish them to remember that she might once have +had other hopes, and more youthful feelings. Doctor Trevor thanked +her very warmly for staying with his wife, when he returned home from +London (where the funeral had taken place). He begged Miss Galindo +to stay with them, when the children were gone to bed, and she was +preparing to leave the husband and wife by themselves. He told her +and his wife many particulars--then paused--then went on--"And Mark +has left a child--a little girl - + +"But he never was married!" exclaimed Mrs. Trevor. + +"A little girl," continued her husband, "whose mother, I conclude, is +dead. At any rate, the child was in possession of his chambers; she +and an old nurse, who seemed to have the charge of everything, and +has cheated poor Mark, I should fancy, not a little." + +"But the child!" asked Mrs. Trevor, still almost breathless with +astonishment. "How do you know it is his?" + +"The nurse told me it was, with great appearance of indignation at my +doubting it. I asked the little thing her name, and all I could get +was 'Bessy!' and a cry of 'Me wants papa!' The nurse said the mother +was dead, and she knew no more about it than that Mr. Gibson had +engaged her to take care of the little girl, calling it his child. +One or two of his lawyer friends, whom I met with at the funeral, +told me they were aware of the existence of the child." + +"What is to be done with her?" asked Mrs. Gibson. + +"Nay, I don't know," replied he. "Mark has hardly left assets enough +to pay his debts, and your father is not inclined to come forward." + +That night, as Doctor Trevor sat in his study, after his wife had +gone to bed, Miss Galindo knocked at his door. She and he had a long +conversation. The result was that he accompanied Miss Galindo up to +town the next day; that they took possession of the little Bessy, and +she was brought down, and placed at nurse at a farm in the country +near Warwick, Miss Galindo undertaking to pay one-half of the +expense, and to furnish her with clothes, and Dr. Trevor undertaking +that the remaining half should be furnished by the Gibson family, or +by himself in their default. + +Miss Galindo was not fond of children; and I dare say she dreaded +taking this child to live with her for more reasons than one. My +Lady Ludlow could not endure any mention of illegitimate children. +It was a principle of hers that society ought to ignore them. And I +believe Miss Galindo had always agreed with her until now, when the +thing came home to her womanly heart. Still she shrank from having +this child of some strange woman under her roof. She went over to +see it from time to time; she worked at its clothes long after every +one thought she was in bed; and, when the time came for Bessy to be +sent to school, Miss Galindo laboured away more diligently than ever, +in order to pay the increased expense. For the Gibson family had, at +first, paid their part of the compact, but with unwillingness and +grudging hearts; then they had left it off altogether, and it fell +hard on Dr. Trevor with his twelve children; and, latterly, Miss +Galindo had taken upon herself almost all the burden. One can hardly +live and labour, and plan and make sacrifices, for any human +creature, without learning to love it. And Bessy loved Miss Galindo, +too, for all the poor girl's scanty pleasures came from her, and Miss +Galindo had always a kind word, and, latterly, many a kind caress, +for Mark Gibson's child; whereas, if she went to Dr. Trevor's for her +holiday, she was overlooked and neglected in that bustling family, +who seemed to think that if she had comfortable board and lodging +under their roof, it was enough. + +I am sure, now, that Miss Galindo had often longed to have Bessy to +live with her; but, as long as she could pay for her being at school, +she did not like to take so bold a step as bringing her home, knowing +what the effect of the consequent explanation would be on my lady. +And as the girl was now more than seventeen, and past the age when +young ladies are usually kept at school, and as there was no great +demand for governesses in those days, and as Bessy had never been +taught any trade by which to earn her own living, why I don't exactly +see what could have been done but for Miss Galindo to bring her to +her own home in Hanbury. For, although the child had grown up +lately, in a kind of unexpected manner, into a young woman, Miss +Galindo might have kept her at school for a year longer, if she could +have afforded it; but this was impossible when she became Mr. +Horner's clerk, and relinquished all the payment of her repository +work; and perhaps, after all, she was not sorry to be compelled to +take the step she was longing for. At any rate, Bessy came to live +with Miss Galindo, in a very few weeks from the time when Captain +James set Miss Galindo free to superintend her own domestic economy +again. + +For a long time, I knew nothing about this new inhabitant of Hanbury. +My lady never mentioned her in any way. This was in accordance with +Lady Ludlow's well-known principles. She neither saw nor heard, nor +was in any way cognisant of the existence of those who had no legal +right to exist at all. If Miss Galindo had hoped to have an +exception made in Bessy's favour, she was mistaken. My lady sent a +note inviting Miss Galindo herself to tea one evening, about a month +after Bessy came; but Miss Galindo "had a cold and could not come." +The next time she was invited, she "had an engagement at home"--a +step nearer to the absolute truth. And the third time, she "had a +young friend staying with her whom she was unable to leave." My lady +accepted every excuse as bona fide, and took no further notice. I +missed Miss Galindo very much; we all did; for, in the days when she +was clerk, she was sure to come in and find the opportunity of saying +something amusing to some of us before she went away. And I, as an +invalid, or perhaps from natural tendency, was particularly fond of +little bits of village gossip. There was no Mr. Horner--he even had +come in, now and then, with formal, stately pieces of intelligence-- +and there was no Miss Galindo in these days. I missed her much. And +so did my lady, I am sure. Behind all her quiet, sedate manner, I am +certain her heart ached sometimes for a few words from Miss Galindo, +who seemed to have absented herself altogether from the Hall now +Bessy was come. + +Captain James might be very sensible, and all that; but not even my +lady could call him a substitute for the old familiar friends. He +was a thorough sailor, as sailors were in those days--swore a good +deal, drank a good deal (without its ever affecting him in the +least), and was very prompt and kind-hearted in all his actions; but +he was not accustomed to women, as my lady once said, and would judge +in all things for himself. My lady had expected, I think, to find +some one who would take his notions on the management of her estate +from her ladyship's own self; but he spoke as if he were responsible +for the good management of the whole, and must, consequently, be +allowed full liberty of action. He had been too long in command over +men at sea to like to be directed by a woman in anything he +undertook, even though that woman was my lady. I suppose this was +the common-sense my lady spoke of; but when common-sense goes against +us, I don't think we value it quite so much as we ought to do. + +Lady Ludlow was proud of her personal superintendence of her own +estate. She liked to tell us how her father used to take her with +him in his rides, and bid her observe this and that, and on no +account to allow such and such things to be done. But I have heard +that the first time she told all this to Captain James, he told her +point-blank that he had heard from Mr. Smithson that the farms were +much neglected and the rents sadly behind-hand, and that he meant to +set to in good earnest and study agriculture, and see how he could +remedy the state of things. My lady would, I am sure, be greatly +surprised, but what could she do? Here was the very man she had +chosen herself, setting to with all his energy to conquer the defect +of ignorance, which was all that those who had presumed to offer her +ladyship advice had ever had to say against him. Captain James read +Arthur Young's "Tours" in all his spare time, as long as he was an +invalid; and shook his head at my lady's accounts as to how the land +had been cropped or left fallow from time immemorial. Then he set +to, and tried too many new experiments at once. My lady looked on in +dignified silence; but all the farmers and tenants were in an uproar, +and prophesied a hundred failures. Perhaps fifty did occur; they +were only half as many as Lady Ludlow had feared; but they were twice +as many, four, eight times as many as the captain had anticipated. +His openly-expressed disappointment made him popular again. The +rough country people could not have understood silent and dignified +regret at the failure of his plans, but they sympathized with a man +who swore at his ill success--sympathized, even while they chuckled +over his discomfiture. Mr. Brooke, the retired tradesman, did not +cease blaming him for not succeeding, and for swearing. "But what +could you expect from a sailor?" Mr. Brooke asked, even in my lady's +hearing; though he might have known Captain James was my lady's own +personal choice, from the old friendship Mr. Urian had always shown +for him. I think it was this speech of the Birmingham baker's that +made my lady determine to stand by Captain James, and encourage him +to try again. For she would not allow that her choice had been an +unwise one, at the bidding (as it were) of a dissenting tradesman; +the only person in the neighbourhood, too, who had flaunted about in +coloured clothes, when all the world was in mourning for my lady's +only son. + +Captain James would have thrown the agency up at once, if my lady had +not felt herself bound to justify the wisdom of her choice, by urging +him to stay. He was much touched by her confidence in him, and swore +a great oath, that the next year he would make the land such as it +had never been before for produce. It was not my lady's way to +repeat anything she had heard, especially to another person's +disadvantage. So I don't think she ever told Captain James of Mr. +Brooke's speech about a sailor's being likely to mismanage the +property; and the captain was too anxious to succeed in this, the +second year of his trial, to be above going to the flourishing, +shrewd Mr. Brooke, and asking for his advice as to the best method of +working the estate. I dare say, if Miss Galindo had been as intimate +as formerly at the Hall, we should all of us have heard of this new +acquaintance of the agent's long before we did. As it was, I am sure +my lady never dreamed that the captain, who held opinions that were +even more Church and King than her own, could ever have made friends +with a Baptist baker from Birmingham, even to serve her ladyship's +own interests in the most loyal manner. + +We heard of it first from Mr. Gray, who came now often to see my +lady, for neither he nor she could forget the solemn tie which the +fact of his being the person to acquaint her with my lord's death had +created between them. For true and holy words spoken at that time, +though having no reference to aught below the solemn subjects of life +and death, had made her withdraw her opposition to Mr. Gray's wish +about establishing a village school. She had sighed a little, it is +true, and was even yet more apprehensive than hopeful as to the +result; but almost as if as a memorial to my lord, she had allowed a +kind of rough school-house to be built on the green, just by the +church; and had gently used the power she undoubtedly had, in +expressing her strong wish that the boys might only be taught to read +and write, and the first four rules of arithmetic; while the girls +were only to learn to read, and to add up in their heads, and the +rest of the time to work at mending their own clothes, knitting +stockings and spinning. My lady presented the school with more +spinning-wheels than there were girls, and requested that there might +be a rule that they should have spun so many hanks of flax, and +knitted so many pairs of stockings, before they ever were taught to +read at all. After all, it was but making the best of a bad job with +my poor lady--but life was not what it had been to her. I remember +well the day that Mr. Gray pulled some delicately fine yarn (and I +was a good judge of those things) out of his pocket, and laid it and +a capital pair of knitted stockings before my lady, as the first- +fruits, so to say, of his school. I recollect seeing her put on her +spectacles, and carefully examine both productions. Then she passed +them to me. + +"This is well, Mr. Gray. I am much pleased. You are fortunate in +your schoolmistress. She has had both proper knowledge of womanly +things and much patience. Who is she? One out of our village?" + +"My lady," said Mr. Gray, stammering and colouring in his old +fashion, "Miss Bessy is so very kind as to teach all those sorts of +things--Miss Bessy, and Miss Galindo, sometimes." + +My lady looked at him over her spectacles: but she only repeated the +words "Miss Bessy," and paused, as if trying to remember who such a +person could be; and he, if he had then intended to say more, was +quelled by her manner, and dropped the subject. He went on to say, +that he had thought it is duty to decline the subscription to his +school offered by Mr. Brooke, because he was a Dissenter; that he +(Mr. Gray) feared that Captain James, through whom Mr. Brooke's offer +of money had been made, was offended at his refusing to accept it +from a man who held heterodox opinions; nay, whom Mr. Gray suspected +of being infected by Dodwell's heresy. + +"I think there must be some mistake," said my lady, "or I have +misunderstood you. Captain James would never be sufficiently with a +schismatic to be employed by that man Brooke in distributing his +charities. I should have doubted, until now, if Captain James knew +him." + +"Indeed, my lady, he not only knows him, but is intimate with him, I +regret to say. I have repeatedly seen the captain and Mr. Brooke +walking together; going through the fields together; and people do +say--" + +My lady looked up in interrogation at Mr. Gray's pause. + +"I disapprove of gossip, and it may be untrue; but people do say that +Captain James is very attentive to Miss Brooke." + +"Impossible!" said my lady, indignantly. "Captain James is a loyal +and religious man. I beg your pardon Mr. Gray, but it is +impossible." + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + + + +Like many other things which have been declared to be impossible, +this report of Captain James being attentive to Miss Brooke turned +out to be very true. + +The mere idea of her agent being on the slightest possible terms of +acquaintance with the Dissenter, the tradesman, the Birmingham +democrat, who had come to settle in our good, orthodox, aristocratic, +and agricultural Hanbury, made my lady very uneasy. Miss Galindo's +misdemeanour in having taken Miss Bessy to live with her, faded into +a mistake, a mere error of judgment, in comparison with Captain +James's intimacy at Yeast House, as the Brookes called their ugly +square-built farm. My lady talked herself quite into complacency +with Miss Galindo, and even Miss Bessy was named by her, the first +time I had ever been aware that my lady recognized her existence; +but--I recollect it was a long rainy afternoon, and I sat with her +ladyship, and we had time and opportunity for a long uninterrupted +talk--whenever we had been silent for a little while she began again, +with something like a wonder how it was that Captain James could ever +have commenced an acquaintance with "that man Brooke." My lady +recapitulated all the times she could remember, that anything had +occurred, or been said by Captain James which she could now +understand as throwing light upon the subject. + +"He said once that he was anxious to bring in the Norfolk system of +cropping, and spoke a good deal about Mr. Coke of Holkham (who, by +the way, was no more a Coke than I am--collateral in the female line- +-which counts for little or nothing among the great old commoners' +families of pure blood), and his new ways of cultivation; of course +new men bring in new ways, but it does not follow that either are +better than the old ways. However, Captain James has been very +anxious to try turnips and bone manure, and he really is a man of +such good sense and energy, and was so sorry last year about the +failure, that I consented; and now I begin to see my error. I have +always heard that town bakers adulterate their flour with bone-dust; +and, of course, Captain James would be aware of this, and go to +Brooke to inquire where the article was to be purchased." + +My lady always ignored the fact which had sometimes, I suspect, been +brought under her very eyes during her drives, that Mr. Brooke's few +fields were in a state of far higher cultivation than her own; so she +could not, of course, perceive that there was any wisdom to be gained +from asking the advice of the tradesman turned farmer. + +But by-and-by this fact of her agent's intimacy with the person whom +in the whole world she most disliked (with that sort of dislike in +which a large amount of uncomfortableness is combined--the dislike +which conscientious people sometimes feel to another without knowing +why, and yet which they cannot indulge in with comfort to themselves +without having a moral reason why), came before my lady in many +shapes. For, indeed I am sure that Captain James was not a man to +conceal or be ashamed of one of his actions. I cannot fancy his ever +lowering his strong loud clear voice, or having a confidental +conversation with any one. When his crops had failed, all the +village had known it. He complained, he regretted, he was angry, or +owned himself a -- fool, all down the village street; and the +consequence was that, although he was a far more passionate man than +Mr. Horner, all the tenants liked him far better. People, in +general, take a kindlier interest in any one, the workings of whose +mind and heart they can watch and understand, than in a man who only +lets you know what he has been thinking about and feeling, by what he +does. But Harry Gregson was faithful to the memory of Mr. Horner. +Miss Galindo has told me that she used to watch him hobble out of the +way of Captain James, as if to accept his notice, however good- +naturedly given, would have been a kind of treachery to his former +benefactor. But Gregson (the father) and the new agent rather took +to each other; and one day, much to my surprise, I heard that the +"poaching, tinkering vagabond," as the people used to call Gregson +when I first had come to live at Hanbury, had been appointed +gamekeeper; Mr. Gray standing godfather, as it were, to his +trustworthiness, if he were trusted with anything; which I thought at +the time was rather an experiment, only it answered, as many of Mr. +Gray's deeds of daring did. It was curious how he was growing to be +a kind of autocrat in the village; and how unconscious he was of it. +He was as shy and awkward and nervous as ever in any affair that was +not of some moral consequence to him. But as soon as he was +convinced that a thing was right, he "shut his eyes and ran and +butted at it like a ram," as Captain James once expressed it, in +talking over something Mr. Gray had done. People in the village +said, "they never knew what the parson would be at next;" or they +might have said, "where his reverence would next turn up." For I +have heard of his marching right into the middle of a set of +poachers, gathered together for some desperate midnight enterprise, +or walking into a public-house that lay just beyond the bounds of my +lady's estate, and in that extra-parochial piece of ground I named +long ago, and which was considered the rendezvous of all the ne'er- +do-weel characters for miles round, and where a parson and a +constable were held in much the same kind of esteem as unwelcome +visitors. And yet Mr. Gray had his long fits of depression, in which +he felt as if he were doing nothing, making no way in his work, +useless and unprofitable, and better out of the world than in it. In +comparison with the work he had set himself to do, what he did seemed +to be nothing. I suppose it was constitutional, those attacks of +lowness of spirits which he had about this time; perhaps a part of +the nervousness which made him always so awkward when he came to the +Hall. Even Mrs. Medlicott, who almost worshipped the ground he trod +on, as the saying is, owned that Mr. Gray never entered one of my +lady's rooms without knocking down something, and too often breaking +it. He would much sooner have faced a desperate poacher than a young +lady any day. At least so we thought. + +I do not know how it was that it came to pass that my lady became +reconciled to Miss Galindo about this time. Whether it was that her +ladyship was weary of the unspoken coolness with her old friend; or +that the specimens of delicate sewing and fine spinning at the school +had mollified her towards Miss Bessy; but I was surprised to learn +one day that Miss Galindo and her young friend were coming that very +evening to tea at the Hall. This information was given me by Mrs. +Medlicott, as a message from my lady, who further went on to desire +that certain little preparations should be made in her own private +sitting-room, in which the greater part of my days were spent. From +the nature of these preparations, I became quite aware that my lady +intended to do honour to her expected visitors. Indeed, Lady Ludlow +never forgave by halves, as I have known some people do. Whoever was +coming as a visitor to my lady, peeress, or poor nameless girl, there +was a certain amount of preparation required in order to do them +fitting honour. I do not mean to say that the preparation was of the +same degree of importance in each case. I dare say, if a peeress had +come to visit us at the Hall, the covers would have been taken off +the furniture in the white drawing-room (they never were uncovered +all the time I stayed at the Hall), because my lady would wish to +offer her the ornaments and luxuries which this grand visitor (who +never came--I wish she had! I did so want to see that furniture +uncovered!) was accustomed to at home, and to present them to her in +the best order in which my lady could. The same rule, mollified, +held good with Miss Galindo. Certain things, in which my lady knew +she took an interest, were laid out ready for her to examine on this +very day; and, what was more, great books of prints were laid out, +such as I remembered my lady had had brought forth to beguile my own +early days of illness,--Mr. Hogarth's works, and the like,--which I +was sure were put out for Miss Bessy. + +No one knows how curious I was to see this mysterious Miss Bessy-- +twenty times more mysterious, of course, for want of her surname. +And then again (to try and account for my great curiosity, of which +in recollection I am more than half ashamed), I had been leading the +quiet monotonous life of a crippled invalid for many years,--shut up +from any sight of new faces; and this was to be the face of one whom +I had thought about so much and so long,--Oh! I think I might be +excused. + +Of course they drank tea in the great hall, with the four young +gentlewomen, who, with myself, formed the small bevy now under her +ladyship's charge. Of those who were at Hanbury when first I came, +none remained; all were married, or gone once more to live at some +home which could be called their own, whether the ostensible head +were father or brother. I myself was not without some hopes of a +similar kind. My brother Harry was now a curate in Westmoreland, and +wanted me to go and live with him, as eventually I did for a time. +But that is neither here nor there at present. What I am talking +about is Miss Bessy. + +After a reasonable time had elapsed, occupied as I well knew by the +meal in the great hall,--the measured, yet agreeable conversation +afterwards,--and a certain promenade around the hall, and through the +drawing-rooms, with pauses before different pictures, the history or +subject of each of which was invariably told by my lady to every new +visitor,--a sort of giving them the freedom of the old family-seat, +by describing the kind and nature of the great progenitors who had +lived there before the narrator,--I heard the steps approaching my +lady's room, where I lay. I think I was in such a state of nervous +expectation, that if I could have moved easily, I should have got up +and run away. And yet I need not have been, for Miss Galindo was not +in the least altered (her nose a little redder, to be sure, but then +that might only have had a temporary cause in the private crying I +know she would have had before coming to see her dear Lady Ludlow +once again). But I could almost have pushed Miss Galindo away, as +she intercepted me in my view of the mysterious Miss Bessy. + +Miss Bessy was, as I knew, only about eighteen, but she looked older. +Dark hair, dark eyes, a tall, firm figure, a good, sensible face, +with a serene expression, not in the least disturbed by what I had +been thinking must be such awful circumstances as a first +introduction to my lady, who had so disapproved of her very +existence: those are the clearest impressions I remember of my first +interview with Miss Bessy. She seemed to observe us all, in her +quiet manner, quite as much as I did her; but she spoke very little; +occupied herself, indeed, as my lady had planned, with looking over +the great books of engravings. I think I must have (foolishly) +intended to make her feel at her ease, by my patronage; but she was +seated far away from my sofa, in order to command the light, and +really seemed so unconcerned at her unwonted circumstances, that she +did not need my countenance or kindness. One thing I did like--her +watchful look at Miss Galindo from time to time: it showed that her +thoughts and sympathy were ever at Miss Galindo's service, as indeed +they well might be. When Miss Bessy spoke, her voice was full and +clear, and what she said, to the purpose, though there was a slight +provincial accent in her way of speaking. After a while, my lady set +us two to play at chess, a game which I had lately learnt at Mr. +Gray's suggestion. Still we did not talk much together, though we +were becoming attracted towards each other, I fancy. + +"You will play well," said she. "You have only learnt about six +months, have you? And yet you can nearly beat me, who have been at +it as many years." + +"I began to learn last November. I remember Mr. Gray's bringing me +'Philidor on Chess,' one very foggy, dismal day." + +What made her look up so suddenly, with bright inquiry in her eyes? +What made her silent for a moment as if in thought, and then go on +with something, I know not what, in quite an altered tone? + +My lady and Miss Galindo went on talking, while I sat thinking. I +heard Captain James's name mentioned pretty frequently; and at last +my lady put down her work, and said, almost with tears in her eyes: + +"I could not--I cannot believe it. He must be aware she is a +schismatic; a baker's daughter; and he is a gentleman by virtue and +feeling, as well as by his profession, though his manners may be at +times a little rough. My dear Miss Galindo, what will this world +come to?" + +Miss Galindo might possibly be aware of her own share in bringing the +world to the pass which now dismayed my lady,--for of course, though +all was now over and forgiven, yet Miss, Bessy's being received into +a respectable maiden lady's house, was one of the portents as to the +world's future which alarmed her ladyship; and Miss Galindo knew +this,--but, at any rate, she had too lately been forgiven herself not +to plead for mercy for the next offender against my lady's delicate +sense of fitness and propriety,--so she replied: + +"Indeed, my lady, I have long left off trying to conjecture what +makes Jack fancy Gill, or Gill Jack. It's best to sit down quiet +under the belief that marriages are made for us, somewhere out of +this world, and out of the range of this world's reason and laws. +I'm not so sure that I should settle it down that they were made in +heaven; t'other place seems to me as likely a workshop; but at any +rate, I've given up troubling my head as to why they take place. +Captain James is a gentleman; I make no doubt of that ever since I +saw him stop to pick up old Goody Blake (when she tumbled down on the +slide last winter) and then swear at a little lad who was laughing at +her, and cuff him till he tumbled down crying; but we must have bread +somehow, and though I like it better baked at home in a good sweet +brick oven, yet, as some folks never can get it to rise, I don't see +why a man may not be a baker. You see, my lady, I look upon baking +as a simple trade, and as such lawful. There is no machine comes in +to take away a man's or woman's power of earning their living, like +the spinning-jenny (the old busybody that she is), to knock up all +our good old women's livelihood, and send them to their graves before +their time. There's an invention of the enemy, if you will!" + +"That's very true!" said my lady, shaking her head. + +"But baking bread is wholesome, straight-forward elbow-work. They +have not got to inventing any contrivance for that yet, thank Heaven! +It does not seem to me natural, nor according to Scripture, that iron +and steel (whose brows can't sweat) should be made to do man's work. +And so I say, all those trades where iron and steel do the work +ordained to man at the Fall, are unlawful, and I never stand up for +them. But say this baker Brooke did knead his bread, and make it +rise, and then that people, who had, perhaps, no good ovens, came to +him, and bought his good light bread, and in this manner he turned an +honest penny and got rich; why, all I say, my lady, is this,--I dare +say he would have been born a Hanbury, or a lord if he could; and if +he was not, it is no fault of his, that I can see, that he made good +bread (being a baker by trade), and got money, and bought his land. +It was his misfortune, not his fault, that he was not a person of +quality by birth." + +"That's very true," said my lady, after a moment's pause for +consideration. "But, although he was a baker, he might have been a +Churchman. Even your eloquence, Miss Galindo, shan't convince me +that that is not his own fault." + +"I don't see even that, begging your pardon, my lady," said Miss +Galindo, emboldened by the first success of her eloquence. "When a +Baptist is a baby, if I understand their creed aright, he is not +baptized; and, consequently, he can have no godfathers and godmothers +to do anything for him in his baptism; you agree to that, my lady?" + +My lady would rather have known what her acquiescence would lead to, +before acknowledging that she could not dissent from this first +proposition; still she gave her tacit agreement by bowing her head. + +"And, you know, our godfathers and godmothers are expected to promise +and vow three things in our name, when we are little babies, and can +do nothing but squall for ourselves. It is a great privilege, but +don't let us be hard upon those who have not had the chance of +godfathers and godmothers. Some people, we know, are born with +silver spoons,--that's to say, a godfather to give one things, and +teach one's catechism, and see that we're confirmed into good church- +going Christians,--and others with wooden ladles in their mouths. +These poor last folks must just be content to be godfatherless +orphans, and Dissenters, all their lives; and if they are +tradespeople into the bargain, so much the worse for them; but let us +be humble Christians, my dear lady, and not hold our heads too high +because we were born orthodox quality." + +"You go on too fast, Miss Galindo! I can't follow you. Besides, I +do believe dissent to be an invention of the Devil's. Why can't they +believe as we do? It's very wrong. Besides, its schism and heresy, +and, you know, the Bible says that's as bad as witchcraft." + +My lady was not convinced, as I could see. After Miss Galindo had +gone, she sent Mrs. Medlicott for certain books out of the great old +library up stairs, and had them made up into a parcel under her own +eye. + +"If Captain James comes to-morrow, I will speak to him about these +Brookes. I have not hitherto liked to speak to him, because I did +not wish to hurt him, by supposing there could be any truth in the +reports about his intimacy with them. But now I will try and do my +duty by him and them. Surely this great body of divinity will bring +them back to the true church." + +"I could not tell, for though my lady read me over the titles, I was +not any the wiser as to their contents. Besides, I was much more +anxious to consult my lady as to my own change of place. I showed +her the letter I had that day received from Harry; and we once more +talked over the expediency of my going to live with him, and trying +what entire change of air would do to re-establish my failing health. +I could say anything to my lady, she was so sure to understand me +rightly. For one thing, she never thought of herself, so I had no +fear of hurting her by stating the truth. I told her how happy my +years had been while passed under her roof; but that now I had begun +to wonder whether I had not duties elsewhere, in making a home for +Harry,--and whether the fulfilment of these duties, quiet ones they +must needs be in the case of such a cripple as myself, would not +prevent my sinking into the querulous habit of thinking and talking, +into which I found myself occasionally falling. Add to which, there +was the prospect of benefit from the more bracing air of the north. + +It was then settled that my departure from Hanbury, my happy home for +so long, was to take place before many weeks had passed. And as, +when one period of life is about to be shut up for ever, we are sure +to look back upon it with fond regret, so I, happy enough in my +future prospects, could not avoid recurring to all the days of my +life in the Hall, from the time when I came to it, a shy awkward +girl, scarcely past childhood, to now, when a grown woman,--past +childhood--almost, from the very character of my illness, past +youth,--I was looking forward to leaving my lady's house (as a +residence) for ever. As it has turned out, I never saw either her or +it again. Like a piece of sea-wreck, I have drifted away from those +days: quiet, happy, eventless days,--very happy to remember! + +I thought of good, jovial Mr. Mountford,--and his regrets that he +might not keep a pack, "a very small pack," of harriers, and his +merry ways, and his love of good eating; of the first coming of Mr. +Gray, and my lady's attempt to quench his sermons, when they tended +to enforce any duty connected with education. And now we had an +absolute school-house in the village; and since Miss Bessy's drinking +tea at the Hall, my lady had been twice inside it, to give directions +about some fine yarn she was having spun for table-napery. And her +ladyship had so outgrown her old custom of dispensing with sermon or +discourse, that even during the temporary preaching of Mr. Crosse, +she had never had recourse to it, though I believe she would have had +all the congregation on her side if she had. + +And Mr. Horner was dead, and Captain James reigned in his stead. +Good, steady, severe, silent Mr. Horner! with his clock-like +regularity, and his snuff-coloured clothes, and silver buckles! I +have often wondered which one misses most when they are dead and +gone,--the bright creatures full of life, who are hither and thither +and everywhere, so that no one can reckon upon their coming and +going, with whom stillness and the long quiet of the grave, seems +utterly irreconcilable, so full are they of vivid motion and +passion,--or the slow, serious people, whose movements--nay, whose +very words, seem to go by clockwork; who never appear much to affect +the course of our life while they are with us, but whose methodical +ways show themselves, when they are gone, to have been intertwined +with our very roots of daily existence. I think I miss these last +the most, although I may have loved the former best. Captain James +never was to me what Mr. Horner was, though the latter had hardly +changed a dozen words with me at the day of his death. Then Miss +Galindo! I remembered the time as if it had been only yesterday, +when she was but a name--and a very odd one--to me; then she was a +queer, abrupt, disagreeable, busy old maid. Now I loved her dearly, +and I found out that I was almost jealous of Miss Bessy. + +Mr. Gray I never thought of with love; the feeling was almost +reverence with which I looked upon him. I have not wished to speak +much of myself, or else I could have told you how much he had been to +me during these long, weary years of illness. But he was almost as +much to every one, rich and poor, from my lady down to Miss Galindo's +Sally. + +The village, too, had a different look about it. I am sure I could +not tell you what caused the change; but there were no more lounging +young men to form a group at the cross-road, at a time of day when +young men ought to be at work. I don't say this was all Mr. Gray's +doing, for there really was so much to do in the fields that there +was but little time for lounging now-a-days. And the children were +hushed up in school, and better behaved out of it, too, than in the +days when I used to be able to go my lady's errands in the village. +I went so little about now, that I am sure I can't tell who Miss +Galindo found to scold; and yet she looked so well and so happy that +I think she must have had her accustomed portion of that wholesome +exercise. + +Before I left Hanbury, the rumour that Captain James was going to +marry Miss Brooke, Baker Brooke's eldest daughter, who had only a +sister to share his property with her, was confirmed. He himself +announced it to my lady; nay, more, with a courage, gained, I +suppose, in his former profession, where, as I have heard, he had led +his ship into many a post of danger, he asked her ladyship, the +Countess Ludlow, if he might bring his bride elect, (the Baptist +baker's daughter!) and present her to my lady! + +I am glad I was not present when he made this request; I should have +felt so much ashamed for him, and I could not have helped being +anxious till I heard my lady's answer, if I had been there. Of +course she acceded; but I can fancy the grave surprise of her look. +I wonder if Captain James noticed it. + +I hardly dared ask my lady, after the interview had taken place, what +she thought of the bride elect; but I hinted my curiosity, and she +told me, that if the young person had applied to Mrs. Medlicott, for +the situation of cook, and Mrs. Medlicott had engaged her, she +thought that it would have been a very suitable arrangement. I +understood from this how little she thought a marriage with Captain +James, R.N., suitable. + +About a year after I left Hanbury, I received a letter from Miss +Galindo; I think I can find it.--Yes, this is it. + + +'Hanbury, May 4, 1811. + +DEAR MARGARET, + +'You ask for news of us all. Don't you know there is no news in +Hanbury? Did you ever hear of an event here? Now, if you have +answered "Yes," in your own mind to these questions, you have fallen +into my trap, and never were more mistaken in your life. Hanbury is +full of news; and we have more events on our hands than we know what +to do with. I will take them in the order of the newspapers--births, +deaths, and marriages. In the matter of births, Jenny Lucas has had +twins not a week ago. Sadly too much of a good thing, you'll say. +Very true: but then they died; so their birth did not much signify. +My cat has kittened, too; she has had three kittens, which again you +may observe is too much of a good thing; and so it would be, if it +were not for the next item of intelligence I shall lay before you. +Captain and Mrs. James have taken the old house next Pearson's; and +the house is overrun with mice, which is just as fortunate for me as +the King of Egypt's rat-ridden kingdom was to Dick Whittington. For +my cat's kittening decided me to go and call on the bride, in hopes +she wanted a cat; which she did like a sensible woman, as I do +believe she is, in spite of Baptism, Bakers, Bread, and Birmingham, +and something worse than all, which you shall hear about, if you'll +only be patient. As I had got my best bonnet on, the one I bought +when poor Lord Ludlow was last at Hanbury in '99--I thought it a +great condescension in myself (always remembering the date of the +Galindo baronetcy) to go and call on the bride; though I don't think +so much of myself in my every-day clothes, as you know. But who +should I find there but my Lady Ludlow! She looks as frail and +delicate as ever, but is, I think, in better heart ever since that +old city merchant of a Hanbury took it into his head that he was a +cadet of the Hanburys of Hanbury, and left her that handsome legacy. +I'll warrant you that the mortgage was paid off pretty fast; and Mr. +Horner's money--or my lady's money, or Harry Gregson's money, call it +which you will--is invested in his name, all right and tight; and +they do talk of his being captain of his school, or Grecian, or +something, and going to college, after all! Harry Gregson the +poacher's son! Well! to be sure, we are living in strange times! + +'But I have not done with the marriages yet. Captain James's is all +very well, but no one cares for it now, we are so full of Mr. Gray's. +Yes, indeed, Mr. Gray is going to be married, and to nobody else but +my little Bessy! I tell her she will have to nurse him half the days +of her life, he is such a frail little body. But she says she does +not care for that; so that his body holds his soul, it is enough for +her. She has a good spirit and a brave heart, has my Bessy! It is a +great advantage that she won't have to mark her clothes over again: +for when she had knitted herself her last set of stockings, I told +her to put G for Galindo, if she did not choose to put it for Gibson, +for she should be my child if she was no one else's. And now you see +it stands for Gray. So there are two marriages, and what more would +you have? And she promises to take another of my kittens. + +'Now, as to deaths, old Farmer Hale is dead--poor old man, I should +think his wife thought it a good riddance, for he beat her every day +that he was drunk, and he was never sober, in spite of Mr. Gray. I +don't think (as I tell him) that Mr. Gray would ever have found +courage to speak to Bessy as long as Farmer Hale lived, he took the +old gentleman's sins so much to heart, and seemed to think it was all +his fault for not being able to make a sinner into a saint. The +parish bull is dead too. I never was so glad in my life. But they +say we are to have a new one in his place. In the meantime I cross +the common in peace, which is very convenient just now, when I have +so often to go to Mr. Gray's to see about furnishing. + +'Now you think I have told you all the Hanbury news, don't you? Not +so. The very greatest thing of all is to come. I won't tantalize +you, but just out with it, for you would never guess it. My Lady +Ludlow has given a party, just like any plebeian amongst us. We had +tea and toast in the blue drawing-room, old John Footman waiting with +Tom Diggles, the lad that used to frighten away crows in Farmer +Hale's fields, following in my lady's livery, hair powdered and +everything. Mrs. Medlicott made tea in my lady's own room. My lady +looked like a splendid fairy queen of mature age, in black velvet, +and the old lace, which I have never seen her wear before since my +lord's death. But the company? you'll say. Why, we had the parson +of Clover, and the parson of Headleigh, and the parson of Merribank, +and the three parsonesses; and Farmer Donkin, and two Miss Donkins; +and Mr. Gray (of course), and myself and Bessy; and Captain and Mrs. +James; yes, and Mr. and Mrs. Brooke; think of that! I am not sure +the parsons liked it; but he was there. For he has been helping +Captain James to get my lady's land into order; and then his daughter +married the agent; and Mr. Gray (who ought to know) says that, after +all, Baptists are not such bad people; and he was right against them +at one time, as you may remember. Mrs. Brooke is a rough diamond, to +be sure. People have said that of me, I know. But, being a Galindo, +I learnt manners in my youth and can take them up when I choose. But +Mrs. Brooke never learnt manners, I'll be bound. When John Footman +handed her the tray with the tea-cups, she looked up at him as if she +were sorely puzzled by that way of going on. I was sitting next to +her, so I pretended not to see her perplexity, and put her cream and +sugar in for her, and was all ready to pop it into her hands,--when +who should come up, but that impudent lad Tom Diggles (I call him +lad, for all his hair is powdered, for you know that it is not +natural gray hair), with his tray full of cakes and what not, all as +good as Mrs. Medlicott could make them. By this time, I should tell +you, all the parsonesses were looking at Mrs. Brooke, for she had +shown her want of breeding before; and the parsonesses, who were just +a step above her in manners, were very much inclined to smile at her +doings and sayings. Well! what does she do, but pull out a clean +Bandanna pocket-handkerchief all red and yellow silk, spread it over +her best silk gown; it was, like enough, a new one, for I had it from +Sally, who had it from her cousin Molly, who is dairy-woman at the +Brookes', that the Brookes were mighty set-up with an invitation to +drink tea at the Hall. There we were, Tom Diggles even on the grin +(I wonder how long it is since he was own brother to a scarecrow, +only not so decently dressed) and Mrs. Parsoness of Headleigh,--I +forget her name, and it's no matter, for she's an ill-bred creature, +I hope Bessy will behave herself better--was right-down bursting with +laughter, and as near a hee-haw as ever a donkey was, when what does +my lady do? Ay! there's my own dear Lady Ludlow, God bless her! She +takes out her own pocket-handkerchief, all snowy cambric, and lays it +softly down on her velvet lap, for all the world as if she did it +every day of her life, just like Mrs. Brooke, the baker's wife; and +when the one got up to shake the crumbs into the fire-place, the +other did just the same. But with such a grace! and such a look at +us all! Tom Diggles went red all over; and Mrs. Parsoness of +Headleigh scarce spoke for the rest of the evening; and the tears +came into my old silly eyes; and Mr. Gray, who was before silent and +awkward in a way which I tell Bessy she must cure him of, was made so +happy by this pretty action of my lady's, that he talked away all the +rest of the evening, and was the life of the company. + +'Oh, Margaret Dawson! I sometimes wonder if you're the better off +for leaving us. To be sure you're with your brother, and blood is +blood. But when I look at my lady and Mr. Gray, for all they're so +different, I would not change places with any in England.' + + +Alas! alas! I never saw my dear lady again. She died in eighteen +hundred and fourteen, and Mr. Gray did not long survive her. As I +dare say you know, the Reverend Henry Gregson is now vicar of +Hanbury, and his wife is the daughter of Mr. Gray and Miss Bessy. + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg eText My Lady Ludlow diff --git a/old/ldyld10.zip b/old/ldyld10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..e5bf110 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/ldyld10.zip |
