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diff --git a/33942.txt b/33942.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3022535 --- /dev/null +++ b/33942.txt @@ -0,0 +1,13319 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Beatrice Boville and Other Stories, by Ouida + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Beatrice Boville and Other Stories + +Author: Ouida + +Release Date: October 6, 2010 [EBook #33942] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BEATRICE BOVILLE AND OTHER STORIES *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material +from the Google Print project.) + + + + + + + + + + TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: Punctuation has been normalized. All other + printer's errors have been retained. + + + + + BEATRICE BOVILLE + AND + OTHER STORIES. + + BY + + "OUIDA." + + AUTHOR OF + "STRATHMORE," "GRANVILLE DE VIGNE," "CHANDOS," + "IDALIA," "RANDOLPH GORDON," ETC., ETC. + + + Third Series. + + + PHILADELPHIA: + J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY. + 1905 + + + + +CONTENTS. + + +BEATRICE BOVILLE. + + I.--OF EARLSCOURT'S FIANCEE. 9 + II.--THE FIRST SHADOW. 13 + III.--HOW PRIDE SOWED AND REAPED. 23 + IV.--WHERE I SAW BEATRICE BOVILLE AGAIN. 33 + V.--HOW IN PERFECT INNOCENCE I PLAYED THE PART OF A RIVAL. 44 + VI.--HOW PRIDE BOWED AND FELL. 51 + + +A LINE IN THE "DAILY." + + WHO DID IT, AND WHO WAS DONE BY IT. 65 + + +HOLLY WREATHS AND ROSE CHAINS. + + I.--THE COLONEL OF THE "WHITE FAVORS" AND CECIL ST. AUBYN. 109 + II.--THE CANADIAN'S COLD BATH WARMS UP THE COLONEL. 119 + III.--SHOWING THAT LOVE-MAKING ON HOLY GROUND DOESN'T PROSPER. 132 + IV.--THE COLONEL KILLS HIS FOX, BUT LOSES HIS HEAD AFTER + OTHER GAME. 146 + + +SILVER CHIMES AND GOLDEN FETTERS. + + I.--WALDEMAR FALKENSTEIN AND VALERIE L'ESTRANGE. 161 + II.--FALKENSTEIN BREAKS LANCES WITH "LONGS YEUX BLEUS." 174 + III.--"SCARLET AND WHITE" MAKES A HIT, AND FALKENSTEIN FEELS + THE WEIGHT OF THE GOLDEN FETTERS. 188 + IV.--THE GOLDEN FETTERS ARE SHAKEN OFF AND OTHERS ARE PUT ON. 202 + V.--THE SILVER CHIMES RING IN A HAPPY NEW YEAR. 215 + + +SLANDER AND SILLERY. + + I.--THE LION OF THE CHAUSSEE D'ANTIN. 225 + II.--NINA GORDON. 233 + III.--LE LION AMOUREUX. 242 + IV.--MISCHIEF. 252 + V.--MORE MISCHIEF, AND AN END. 263 + + +SIR GALAHAD'S RAID. + + AN ADVENTURE ON THE SWEET WATERS. 285 + + +"REDEEMED." + + AN EPISODE WITH THE CONFEDERATE HORSE. 307 + + +OUR WAGER; OR, HOW THE MAJOR LOST AND WON. + + I.--INTRODUCES MAJOR TELFER OF THE 50TH DASHAWAY HUSSARS. 333 + II.--VIOLET TRESSILLIAN. 339 + III.--FROM WHICH IT WOULD APPEAR, THAT IT IS SOMETIMES WELL + TO BEGIN WITH A LITTLE AVERSION. 346 + IV.--IN WHICH THE MAJOR PROVOKES A QUARREL IN BEHALF OF + THE FAIR TRESSILLIAN. 353 + V.--THE DUEL, AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. 367 + + +OUR COUNTRY QUARTERS. 379 + + + + +BEATRICE BOVILLE. + + + + +I + +OF EARLSCOURT'S FIANCEE. + + "To compass her with sweet observances, + To dress her beautifully and keep her true." + + +That, according to Mr. Tennyson's lately-published opinion, is the +devoir of that deeply-to-be-pitied individual, l'homme marie. Possibly +in the times of which the Idyls treat, Launcelot and Gunevere _might_ +have been the sole, exceptional mauvais sujets in the land, and woad, +being the chief ingredient in the toilet-dress, mightn't come quite so +expensive. But nowadays "sweet observances," rendered, I presume, by +gifts from Hunt and Roskell's and boxes in the grand tier, tell on a +cheque-book so severely; "keeping her true" is such an exceedingly +problematical performance, to judge by Sir C. C.'s breathless work, and +"dressing her beautifully" comes so awfully expensive, with crinoline +and cashmeres, pink pearls, and Mechlin, and the beau sexe's scornful +repudiation, not alone of a faded silk, like poor Enid's, but of the +handsomest dress going, if it's damned by being "seen twice," that I +have ever vowed that, plaise a Dieu, I will never marry, and with +heaven's help will keep the vow better than I might most probably keep +the matrimonial ones if I took them. Yet if ever I saw a woman for whom +I could have fancied a man's committing that semisuicidal act, that +woman was Beatrice Boville. Not for her beauty, for, except one of the +loveliest figures and a pair of the most glorious eyes, she did not +claim much; not for her money, for she had none; not for her birth, for +on one side that was somewhat obscure; but for _herself_; and had I ever +tried the herculean task of dressing anybody beautifully and keeping +anybody true, it should have been she, but for the fact that when I knew +her first she was engaged to my cousin Earlscourt. We had none of us +ever dreamt he would marry, for he had been sworn to political life so +long, given over so utterly to the battle-ground of St. Stephen's and +the intrigues of Downing Street, that the ladies of our house were +sorely wrathful when they heard that he had at last fallen in love and +proposed to Beatrice Boville, who, though she was Lady Mechlin's niece, +was the daughter of a West Indian who had married her mother, broken her +heart, spent her money, deserted her, and never been heard of since; the +more wrathful as they had no help for themselves, and were obliged to be +contented with distinguishing her with refreshing appellations of a +"very clever schemer," evidently a "perfect intrigante," and similar +epithets with which their sex is driven for consolation under such +trying circumstances. It's a certain amount of relief to us to call a +man who has cut us down in a race "a stupid owl; very little in him!" +but it is mild gratification to that enjoyed by ladies when they +retaliate for injury done them by that delightful bonbon of a sentence, +"No doubt a most artful person!" You see it conveys so much and proves +three things in one--their own artlessness, their enemy's worthlessness, +and their victim's folly. Being with Earlscourt at the time of his +"singularly unwise, step," as they phrased it, I knew that he wasn't +trapped in any way, and that he was loved irrespectively of his social +rank; but where was the good of telling that to deeply-injured and +perforce silenced ladies? "They knew better;" and when a woman says +that, always bow to her superior judgment, my good fellow, even when +she knows better than you what you did with yourself last evening, and +informs you positively you were at that odious Mrs. Vanille's opera +supper, though, to the best of your belief, you never stirred from the +U. S. card-room; or you will be voted a Goth, and make an enemy for the +rest of your natural life. + +In opposition to the rest of the family, _I_ thought (and you must know +by this time, amis lecteurs, that I hardly think marriage so enjoyable +an institution as some writers do, but perhaps a little like a pipe of +opium, of which the dreams are better than the awakening)--I thought +that he could hardly have done better, as far as his own happiness went, +as I saw her standing by him one evening in the window of Lady Mechlin's +rooms at Lemongenseidlitz, where we all were that August, a brilliant, +fascinating woman already, though then but nineteen, noble-hearted, +frank, impetuous, with something in the turn of her head and the proud +glance of her eyes, that told you, you might trust her; that she was of +the stuff to keep her word even to her own hinderance; that neither +would she tell a lie, nor brook one imputed to her; that she might err +on the side of pride, on the side of meanness never; that she might have +plenty of failings, but not anything petty, low, or ungenerous among +them. The evening sun fell on them as they stood, on her high, white +forehead, with its chestnut hair turned off it as you see it in old +pictures, which Earlscourt was touching caressingly with his hand as he +talked to her. They seemed well suited, and yet--his fault was pride, +an unassailable, unyielding pride; hers was pride, too, pride in her own +truth and honor, which would send you to the deuce if you ever presumed +to doubt either; and I wondered idly as I looked at them, whether those +two prides would ever come in conflict, and if so, whether either of +them would give in in such a case--whether there would be submission on +one side or on both, or on neither? Such metaphysical and romantic +calculations are not often my line; but as they stood together, the sun +faded off, and a cold, stormy wind blew up in its stead, which, perhaps, +metaphorically suggested the problem to me. As one goes through life one +gets up to so many sunny, balmy, cloudless days, and so often before the +night is down gets wetted to the skin by a drenching shower, that one +contracts an uncomfortable habit when the sun _does_ shine, of looking +out for squalls, a fear that, sans doute, considerably damps the +pleasures of the noon. But the fear is natural, isn't it, more's the +pity, when one has been often caught? + +I chanced to ask her that night what made her so fond of Earlscourt. She +turned her fearless, flashing eyes half laughingly, half haughtily on +me, the color brighter in her face: + +"I should have thought you would rather have asked how could I, or any +other woman whom he stooped to notice, fail to love him? There are few +hearts and intellects so noble: he is as superior to you ball-room +loungers, you butterfly flutterers, as the stars to that chandelier." + +"Bien oblige!" laughed I. "But that is just what I meant. Most young +ladies are afraid of him; you never were?" + +She laughed contemptuously. + +"Afraid! You do not know much of me. It is precisely his giant +intellect that first drew me to him, when I heard his speech on the +Austrian question. Do you remember how the Lords listened to him so +quietly that you could have heard a feather fall? I like that silence of +theirs when they hear what they admire, better than I do the cheers of +the other house. Afraid of him! What a ludicrous idea! Do you suppose I +should be afraid of any one? It is only those who are conceited or +cowardly, who are timid. If you have nothing to assume, or to conceal, +what cause have you to fear? I love, honor, reverence Lord Earlscourt, +God knows; but fear him--never!" + +"Not even his anger, if you ever incurred it?" I asked her, amused with +her haughty indignation. + +"Certainly not. Did I merit it, I would come to him frankly, and ask his +pardon, and he would give it; if I did not deserve it, _he_ would be the +one to repent." + +She looked far more attractive than many a handsomer woman, and +infinitely more noble than a more tractable one. She was admirably +fitted for Earlscourt, if he trusted her; but it was just possible he +might some day _mis_trust and _mis_understand her, and then there might +be the devil to pay! + + + + +II. + +THE FIRST SHADOW. + + +Lemongenseidlitz was a charming little Bad. Beatrice Boville +and her aunt Lady Mechlin, Earlscourt and I, had been there +six weeks. His brother peers--of whom there were scores at +Lemongenseidlitz--complimented Earlscourt on his fiancee. + +"So you're caught at last?" said an octogenarian minister, who was as +sprightly as a schoolboy. "Well, my dear fellow, you might have gone +higher, sans doute, but on my honor I don't think you could have done +better." + +It was the universal opinion. Beatrice was not the belle of the Bad, +because there were dozens of beautiful women, and beautiful she was not; +but she was more admired than any of them, and had Earlscourt wanted +voices to justify his choice he would have had them, but he didn't; he +was entirely independent of the opinions of others, and had he chosen to +set his coronet on the brows of a peasant girl, would have cared little +what any one thought or said. We all of us enjoyed that six weeks. Lady +Mechlin lost to her heart's content at roulette, and was as complacent +over her losses as any old dowager could be. Beatrice Boville shone +best, as nice natures ever do, in a sunny atmosphere; and if she had any +faults of impatient temper or pride, there was nothing to call them +forth. Earlscourt, cold politician though he'd been, gave himself up +entirely to the warmer, brighter existence, which he found in his new +passion; and I, not being in love with anybody, made the pleasantest +love possible wherever I liked. We all of us found a couleur de rose +tint in the air of little Lemongenseidlitz, and I'd quite forgotten my +presentiment, when, one night at the Kursaal, a cloud no bigger than a +man's hand came up on the sunny horizon, and put me in mind of it. + +Earlscourt came into the ball room rather late; he had been talking with +some French ministers on some international project which he was anxious +to effect, and asked Lady Mechlin where Beatrice was. + +"She was with me a moment ago; she is waltzing, I dare say," said the +old lady, whose soul was hankering after the ivory ball. + +"Very likely," he answered, as he looked among the dancers for her; he +was restless without her, though he would have liked none to see the +weakness, for he was a man who felt more than he told. He could not see +her, and went through the rooms till he found her, which was in a small +anteroom alone. She started as he spoke to her, and a start being a +timorous and nervous thing of which Beatrice Boville was never guilty, +he drew her to him anxiously. + +"My darling, has anything annoyed you?" + +She answered him with her habitual candor: + +"Yes; but I cannot tell you what, just now." + +"Cannot tell me! and why?" + +"Because I cannot. I can give no other reason. It is nothing of import +to you, or you are sure I should not keep it from you." + +"Yes; but I am equally sure that anything that concerns you _is_ of +import to me. To whom should you tell anything, if not to me? I do not +like concealment, Beatrice." + +His tone was grave; indeed, too much like reproof to a fractious child +to suit Beatrice's pride. She drew away from him. + +"Nor I. You must think but meanly of me if you can impute anything like +concealment to me." + +"How can I do otherwise? You tell me you have been annoyed, and refuse +to say how, and by whom. Is that anything but concealment? If any one +has offended or insulted you, I ought to be the first you came to. A +woman, Beatrice, should have nothing hidden from the man who is, or will +be, her husband." + +She threw her arms around him. Her moods were variable as a child's. +Perhaps this very variability Earlscourt hardly understood, for it was +utterly opposed to his own character: you always found him the same; +_she_ would be all storm one moment, all sunshine the next. + +"Do you suppose I would hide anything from you? Do you think for a +moment I would hold back anything you had a right to know? You might +look into my heart; there would be no thought or feeling there I should +wish to keep from you. But if you exact confidence, so do I. Would you +think of taking as your wife one you could not trust?" + +He answered her a little sternly: + +"No; if I once ceased to believe in your truth or honor, as I believe in +my own, I should part from you forever, though God knows what it would +cost me!" + +"God knows what it would cost _me!_ But I give you free leave. The +instant you find a flaw in either, I am no longer worthy of your love; +withdraw it, and I will never complain. But trust me you must and will; +I merit your confidence, and I exact it. Look at me, Ernest. Do you +believe I could ever deceive you?" + +He looked into her eyes long and earnestly. + +"No. When you do, your eyes will droop before mine. I trust you, +Beatrice, fully, and I know you will never wrong it." + +She clung to him with caressant softness, softer in her than in a +meeker-spirited woman, as she whispered, 'Never!' and a man would need +have been obtuse and skeptical, indeed, who could then have doubted her. +And so that cloud blew over, for a time, at the least--trusted, Beatrice +Boville was soft and gentle as a lamb; mistrusted or misjudged, she was +fiery as a young lioness, and Earlscourt, I thought, though originally +won by her intellect, held her too much as a child to fully understand +her character, and to see that, though she was his darling and +plaything, she was also a passionate, ardent, proud-spirited woman, +stung by injustice and impatient of doubt. No two people could be more +fitted to make each other's happiness, yet it struck me that it was just +possible they might make each other's misery very completely, through +want of comprehension on the one side, through want of explanation on +the other. + +"Your marriage is fixed, isn't it, Earlscourt?" asked his sister, Lady +Clive Edghill, who had come to Lemongenseidlitz, and, though compelled +by him, as he compelled all the rest of the family, to show Beatrice +strict courtesy, disliked her, because she was not an advantageous +match, was much too young in their opinion, and had no money--the +gravest crimes a woman can have in the eyes of any man's relatives. +"The 14th! Indeed! yours is a very short engagement!" + +"Is there any reason why it should be longer?" + +"O, dear, no! none that I am aware of. I wish, earnestly, my dear +Earlscourt, I could congratulate you more warmly; but I can never say +what I do not feel, and I had so much hoped--" + +"My dear Helena, as long as I have so much reason to congratulate +myself, it matters very little whether you do or do not," smiled +Earlscourt. He was too much of a lion to be stung by gnats. + +"I dare say. I sincerely trust you may ever have reason. But I heard +some very disagreeable things about that Mr. Boville, Beatrice's father. +Do you know that he was in a West India regiment, but was deprived of +his commission even there?--a perfect blackleg and sharper, I +understand. I suppose she has never mentioned him to you?" + +"You are very much mistaken; all that Beatrice knows of him, I know; +that is but little, for Lady Mechlin took her long ago, when her mother +died, from such unfit guardianship. Beatrice is as open as the day--" + +"Indeed! A little too frank, perhaps?" + +"Too frank? That is a paradox. No one can have too much candor. It is +not a virtue of your sex, but it is one, thank God! which she possesses +in a rare degree, though possibly it gains her enemies where it should +gain her friends." + +"Still frankness _may_ merge into indiscretion," said Helena, musingly. + +"I doubt it. An indiscreet woman is never frank, for she has always the +memory of silly things said and done which require concealment." + +"I was merely thinking," Helena went on, regardless of a speech which +she did not perhaps relish, pour cause, "merely from my deep interest in +you, and my knowledge of all you will wish your wife to be, that perhaps +Beatrice might be, in pure insouciance, a little too careless, a little +too candid for so prominent a position as she will occupy. Last night, +in passing a little anteroom in the Redoute, I saw her in such extremely +earnest conversation with a man, a handsome man, about your height and +age, and--" + +The anteroom! Earlscourt thought, with a pang, of the start she had +given when he entered it the previous night. But he was not of a jealous +temperament, nor a curious one; his mind was too constantly occupied +with great projects and ambitions to be capable of joining petty things +together into an elaborate mosaic; he had no petitesses himself, and +trifles passed unheeded. He interrupted her decidedly: + +"What is there in that to build a pyramid of censure from? Doubtless it +was one of her acquaintances--probably one of mine also. I should have +thought you knew me better, Helena, than to attempt this gossiping +nonsense with me." + +"O, I say no more. I only thought you, of all men, would wish Caesar's +wife to be above--" + +The gnat-strings had been too insignificant to rouse him before, but at +this one his eyebrows contracted, and he rose. + +"Silence! Never venture to make such a speech as that to me again. In +insulting Beatrice you insult me. Unless you can mention her in terms of +proper respect and reverence, never presume to speak her name to me +again. Her enemies are my enemies, and, whoever they may be, I will +treat them as such." + +Helena was sorely frightened; if she held anybody in veneration it was +Earlscourt, and she would never have ventured so far with him but for +the causeless hate she had taken to Beatrice, simply because Lady Clive +had decided long ago that her brother was too voue to public life ever +to marry, and that her son would succeed to his title. She was sorely +frightened, but she comforted herself--the little thorn she had thrust +in might rankle after a while; as pleasant a consolation under failure +as any lady could desire. + +Beatrice was coming along the corridor as Earlscourt left Helena's +rooms, which were in the same hotel as Lady Mechlin's. She was stopping +to look out of one of the windows at the sunset; she did not see him at +first, and he watched her unobserved, and smiled at the idea of +associating anything deceitful with her--smiled still more at the idea +when she came up to him, with her frank, bright, regard, lifting her +face for a caress, and patting both her hands through his arm. +Accustomed to chill and reserved women in his own family, her abandon +had a great charm for him; but perhaps it led him into his error in +holding her still as half a child. + +"You have been seeing my enemy?" she said, laughingly. "Your sister does +not like me, does she?" + +"Not like you! Why should you think so? She may not like my marrying, +perhaps, because she had decided for me that I should never do so; and +no woman can bear any prophecies she makes to prove wrong." + +"Very possibly that may be one reason; but she does not think me good +enough for you." + +Her tips curved disdainfully, and Earlscourt caught a glimpse of her in +her fiery mood. He laughed at her where, with her, he had better have +admitted the truth. Beatrice had too much pride to be wounded by it, and +far too much good sense to measure herself by money and station. + +"Nonsense, Beatrice; I should have thought you too proud to suppose such +a thing," he said, carelessly. + +"It is the truth, nevertheless." + +"More foolish she, then; but if you and I do not, what can it signify?" + +"Nothing. As long as I am worthy of you in your eyes, what others think +or say is nothing to me. I honor you too much to make the gauge between +us a third person's opinion; or measure you or myself by a few stops +higher or lower in the social ladder. Your sister thinks me below you in +rank, soit! She is right; I am quite ready to admit it; but that I am +your equal in all that makes men and women equal in the sight of Heaven, +I know. When she finds me unworthy of you in thought or deed, then she +may call me beneath you--not till then." + +Her cheeks were flushed; he could hear her quick breathings, and in her +vehemence and haughty indignation she picked the petals of her bouquet +de corsage to pieces and flung them away. Another time he would have +thought how well her pride became her, and given her some fond reply. +Just now the thorn rankled as Lady Clive had hoped, and he answered her +gravely, in the tone which it was as unwise to use to her as to prick a +thorough-bred colt with both spurs. + +"You are quite right. Were I a king, you would be my equal as long as +your heart was mine, your mind as noble, and your character as unsullied +as I hope them to be now." + +She turned on him rapidly with the first indignant look she had ever +given to him. + +"_Hope!_ You might say _know_, I think!" + +"I would have said 'know,' and meant it too, yesterday." + +"Yesterday? What do you mean? Why am I less worthy your confidence +to-day than yesterday?" + +She looked wonderingly at him, her eyes full of inquiry and +bewilderment. It was marvellous acting, if it was acting; yet he thought +she could scarcely have so soon forgotten their scene in the anteroom +the previous night. They had now come into the salon; he left her side +and walked to the mantel-piece, leaning his arm on it, and speaking +coldly, as he had never done to her since they first met. + +"Beatrice, do not attempt to act with me. You cannot have forgotten what +we said in the anteroom last night. Nothing assumed ever deceives me, +and you only lower yourself in my estimation." + +She clinched her hands till the rings he had given her crushed together. + +"Act! assume! Great Heaven, how dare you speak such words to me?" + +"Dare? You speak like an angry child, Beatrice. When you are reasonable +I will answer you." + +The tears welled into her eyes, but she would not let them fall. + +"Reasonable? Is there anything unreasonable in resenting words utterly +undeserved? Would you be calm under them yourself, Lord Earlscourt? I +remember now what you mean by yesterday; I did not remember when I asked +you. Had I done so I should never have simulated ignorance and surprise. +Only last night you promised to trust me. Is this your trust, to accuse +me of artifice, of acting, of falsehood? I would bear no such imputation +from any one, still less from you, who ought to know me so well. What +happiness can we have if you--" + +She stopped, the tears choking her voice, but he did not see them; he +only saw her indignant attitude, her flushed cheeks, her flashing eyes, +and put them down to her girlish passion. + +"Calm yourself, Beatrice, I beg. This sort of scene is very distasteful +to me; to figure in a lover's quarrel hardly suits me. I am not young +enough to find amusement in disputation and reconciliation, sparring one +moment and caresses the next. My life is one of grave pursuits and +feverish ambitions; I am often harassed, annoyed, worn out in body and +mind. What I hoped for from you was, to borrow the gayety and brightness +of your own youth, to find rest, and happiness, and distraction. A life +of disputes, reproaches, and misconstruction, would be what I never +would endure." + +Beatrice was silent; she leaned her forehead on her arms and did not +answer him. His tone stung her pride, but his words touched her heart. +Her passion was always short-lived, and no evil spirit possessed her +long. She rebelled against the first part of his speech with all her +might, but she softened to the last. She came up to him with her hands +out. + +"I had no right to speak so impatiently to you. God knows, to make your +life happy will be my only thought, and care, and wish. If I spoke +angrily, forgive me!" + +Earlscourt knew that the nature so quick to acknowledge error was worth +fifty unerring and unruffled ones; still he sighed as he answered her,-- + +"My dear child, I forgive you. But, Beatrice, there is no foe to love so +sure and deadly as dissension!" And as he drew her to him and felt her +soft warm lips on his, he thought, half uneasily yet, "She has never +told me who annoyed her--never mentioned her companion in the anteroom +last night." + +Lady Clive had her wish; the thorn festered as promisingly as she could +have desired. Ce n'est que le premier pas qui coute in quarrels as in +all else. Dispute once, you are very sure to dispute again, whether with +the man you hate or the woman you love. + + + + +III. + +HOW PRIDE SOWED AND REAPED. + + +It only wanted three weeks to Beatrice Boville's marriage. We were all +to leave Lemongenseidlitz together in a fortnight's time for old Lady +Mechlin's house in Berks, where the ceremony was to take place. + +"Earlscourt is quite infatuated," said Lady Clive to me one evening. +"Beatrice is very charming, of course, but she is not at all suited to +him, she is so fiery, so impetuous, so self-reliant." + +"I think you are mistaken," said I. I admired Beatrice Boville--comme je +vous ai dit--and I didn't like our family's snaps and snarls at her. +"She may be impetuous, but, as her impulses are always generous, that +doesn't matter much. She is only fiery at injustice, and, for myself, I +prefer a woman who can stand up for her own rights and her friends' to +one who'll sit by in--you'll call it meekness, I suppose? I call it +cowardice and hypocrisy--to hear herself or them abused." + +"Thank you, mon ami," said Beatrice's voice at my elbow, as Lady Clive +rose and crossed the room. "I am much obliged for your defence; I +couldn't help hearing it as I stood in the balcony, and I wish very much +I deserved it. I am afraid, though, I cannot dispute Helena's verdict of +'fiery,' 'impetuous,'--" + +"And self-reliant?" I asked her. She laughed softly, and her eyes +unconsciously sought Earlscourt, who was talking to Lady Mechlin. + +"Well? Not quite, now! But, by the way, why should people charge +self-reliance on to one as something reprehensible and undesirable? A +proper self-reliance is an indispensable ground-work to any success. If +you cannot rely upon yourself, upon your power to judge and to act, you +must rely upon some other person, possibly upon many people, and you +become, perforce, vacillating and unstable. + + 'To thine own self be true, + And it shall follow, as the day the night, + Thou canst not then be false to any man.'" + +As she spoke a servant brought a note to her, and I noticed her cheeks +grow pale as she saw the handwriting upon it. She broke it open, and +read it hastily, an oddly troubled, worried look coming over her face, a +look that Earlscourt could not help but notice as he stood beside her. + +"Is there anything in that letter to annoy you, Beatrice?" he asked, +very naturally. + +She started--rather guiltily, I thought--and crushed the note in her +hand. + +"Whom is it from? It troubles you, I think. Tell me, my darling, is it +anything that vexes or offends you?" he whispered, bending down to her. + +She laughed, a little nervously for her, and tore the note into tiny +pieces. + +"Why do you not tell me, Beatrice?" he said again, with a shade of +annoyance on his face. + +"Because I would rather not," she said, frankly enough, letting the +pieces float out of the window into the street below. The shadow grew +darker in his face; he bent his head in acquiescence, and said no more, +but I don't think he forgot either the note or her destroyal of it. + +"I thought there was implicit confidence _before_ marriage whatever +there is after," sneered his sister, as she passed him. He answered her +calmly:-- + +"I should say, Helena, that neither before nor after marriage would any +man who respected his wife suffer curiosity or suspicion to enter into +him. If he do, he has no right to expect happiness, and he will +certainly not go the way to get it." + +That was the only reply he gave Lady Clive, but her thorn No. 2 festered +in him, and when he bade Beatrice good night, standing alone with her in +the little drawing room, he took both her hands in his, and looked +straight into her eyes. + +"Beatrice, why would you not let me see that note this evening?" + +She looked up at him as fearlessly and clearly. + +"If I tell you why, I must tell you whom the note was from, and what it +was about, and I would much rather do neither as yet." + +"That is very strange. I dislike concealment of all kinds, especially +from you, who so soon will be my wife. It is inconceivable to me why you +should need or desire any. I thought your life was a fair open book, +every line of which I might read if I desired." + +Beatrice looked at him in amazement. + +"So you may. Do you suppose, if I had any secret from you that I feared +you should know, I could have a moment's peace in your society, or look +at you for an instant as I do now? I give you my word of honor that +there was nothing either in the note that concerns you, or that you +would wish me to tell you. In a few days you shall know all that was in +it, but I ask you as a kindness not to press me now. Surely you do not +think me such a child but that you can trust me in so small a trifle. If +you say I am not worthy of your confidence, you imply that I am not +worthy of your love. You spoke nobly to your sister just now, Ernest; do +not act less nobly to me." + +He could not but admire her as she looked at him, with her fearless, +unshadowed regard, her head thrown a little back, and her attitude +half-commanding, half-entreating. He smiled in spite of himself. + +"You are a wayward, spoiled child, Beatrice. You must have your own +way?" + +She gave a little stamp of her foot. She hated being called a spoiled +child, specially by him, and in a serious moment. + +"If I have my own way, have I your full confidence too?" + +"Yes; but, my dear Beatrice, the only way to gain confidence is never to +excite suspicion." And Lady Clive's thorn rankled a ravir; for even as +he pressed his goodnight kisses on her lips, he thought, restlessly, +"Shall we make each other happy?--am I too grave for her?--and is she +too wilful for me? I want rest, not contention." + +The night after that there was a bal-masque at the Redoute. I was just +coming out of my room as Beatrice came down the corridor; She had her +mask in her hand, her dress was something white starred with gold, and +round her hair she had a little band of pearls of Earlscourt's gift. I +never saw her look better, specially when her cheeks flushed and her +eyes brightened as Earlscourt opened his door next mine, and met her. He +did not see me, the corridor was empty, and he bent down to her with +fond words and caresses. + +"Do I look well?" she said, with child-like delight. + +"I am so glad, Ernest, I want to do you honor." + +In that mood he understood her well enough, and he pressed her against +his heart with the passion that was in him, whose strength he so rarely +let her see. Then he drew her hand through his arm, and led her down the +stairs; and, as I laughed to find to what lengths our cold statesman +could come at last, I thought Lady Clive's thorns would be innocuous, +however well planted. + +Earlscourt never danced; nothing but what was calm and stately could +possibly have suited him; but Beatrice did, and waltzed like a Willis, +(though she liked even better than that standing on his arm and talking +with his friends--diplomatic, military, and ministerial--on all sorts of +questions, most of which she could handle nearly as well as they;) and +about the middle of the evening, while she was waltzing with some man or +other who had begged to be introduced to her, Earlscourt left the +ball-room for ten minutes in earnest conversation with one of the French +ministers, who was leaving the next morning. As he came back again, I +asked him where Beatrice was, because Powell, of the Bays, was bothering +my life out to introduce him to her. + +"In the ball room, isn't she? She is with Lady Mechlin, of course, if, +the waltz is over." + +A familiar voice stopped him. + +"She is not in the ball room. Go where you found her the other night, +and see if Caesar's promised wife be above suspicion!" + +I could have sworn the voice was Lady Clive's; a pink domino passed us +too fast for detention, but Earlscourt's lips turned white at the subtle +whisper, and he muttered a fierce oath--fiercer from him, because he's +never stirred into fiery expletives. "There is some vile plot against +her. I must sift it to the bottom;" and, pushing past me, he entered the +ball room. Beatrice was not there; and wending his way through the +crowd, he went in through several other apartments leading off to the +right, and involuntarily I followed him, to see what the malicious +whisper of the pink domino had meant. Earlscourt lifted the curtain that +parted the anteroom from the other chamber--lifted it to see Beatrice +Boville, as the pink domino had prophesied, and not alone! With her was +a man, masked, but about Earlscourt's height, and seemingly about his +age, who, as he saw us, let go her hand with a laugh, turned on to a +balcony, which was but a yard or so from the street, and dropped on to +the pave below. Beatrice started and colored, but I thought she must be +the most desperate actress going, for she came up to Earlscourt with a +smile, and was about to put her hand through his arm, but he signed her +away from him. + +"Your acting is quite useless with me. I am not to be blinded by it +again. I have believed in your truth as in my own--" + +"So you may still. Listen to me, Ernest!" + +"Hush! Do not add falsehood to falsehood." + +He spoke sternly and coldly; his pride, which was as strong as his love +for her, would not gratify her by a sign of the torture within him, and +even in his bitterest anger Earlscourt would never have been ungentle to +a woman. That word acted like an incantation on her, the blood crimsoned +her temples, her eyes literally flashed fire, and she threw back her +head with the haughty, impatient gesture habitual to her. + +"Falsehood? Three times of late you have used that word to me." + +"And why? Because you merited it." + +She stood before him, the indignant flush hotter still upon her cheeks, +her lips curved into scornful anger. If she was an actress, she knew her +role to perfection. + +"Do you speak that seriously, Lord Earlscourt? Do you believe that I +have lied to you?" + +"God help me! What else can I believe?" he muttered, too low for her to +hear it. + +She asked him the question again, fiercely, and he answered her briefly +and sternly,-- + +"I believe that all your life with me has been a lie. I trusted you +implicitly, and how do you return it? By carrying on clandestine +intercourse with another man, giving him interviews that you conceal +from me, having letters that you destroy, doubtless receiving caresses +that you take care are unwitnessed; while you dare to smile in my face, +and to dupe me with child-like tenderness, and to bid me 'trust' you and +believe in you! Love shared to me is worthless, and on my wife, +Beatrice, no stain must rest!" + +As he spoke, a dark shadow spread over her countenance, her evil spirit +rose up in her, and her bright, frank, fearless face grew almost as +hard and cold as his, while her teeth were set together, till her lips, +usually soft and laughing, were pressed into one straight haughty line. + +"Since you give me up so easily, far be it from me to dispute your will. +We part from this hour, if you desire it. My honor is as dear to me as +yours to you, and to those who dare to suspect it I never stoop to +defend it!" + +"But, my God! Beatrice, what _am_ I to believe?" + +"Whatever you please!" + +"What I please! Child, you must be mad. What _can_ I believe, but that +you are the most perfect of all actresses, that your art is the greatest +of all sins, the art that clothes itself in innocence, and carries +would-be truth upon its lips. Prove to me that I wrong you!" + +She shook her head; the devil in her had still the victory; her eyes +glittered, and her little teeth were clinched together. + +"What I exact is trust without proof. I am not your prisoner, Lord +Earlscourt, to be tried coldly, and acquitted if you find legal evidence +of innocence; convicted, if there be a link wanting. If you choose to +trust me, I have told you often your trust will never be wronged; if you +choose to condemn me, do. I shall not stoop to show you your injustice." + +Earlscourt's face grew dark and hard as hers, but it was wonderful how +well his pride chained down all evidence of suffering; the only sign was +in the hoarseness of, and quiver in, his voice. + +"Say nothing more--prevarication is guilt! God forgive you, Beatrice +Boville! If you loved me, and knelt at my feet, I would not make you my +wife after the art and the lies with which you have repaid my trust. +Thank God, you do not already bear my name and my honor in your hands!" + +With those words he left her. Beatrice stood still in the same place, +her lips set in one scornful line, her eyes glittering, her brow +crimson, her whole attitude defiant, wronged, and unyielding. Earlscourt +passed me, his face white as death, and was out of sight in a second. I +waited a moment, then I followed my impulse, and went up to her. + +"Beatrice, for Heaven's sake, what is all this?" + +She turned her large eyes on me haughtily. + +"Do _you_ believe what your cousin does?" + +I answered her as briefly:-- + +"No, I do not. There is some mistake here." + +She seized my arm, impetuously:-- + +"Promise me, on your honor, never to tell what I tell to you while I +live. Promise me, on your faith as a gentleman." + +"On my honor, I promise. Well?" + +"The man whom you saw with me to-night is my father. Lord Earlscourt +chose to condemn me without inquiry; so let him! But I tell you, that +you may tell him if I die before him, that he wronged me. You know Mr. +Boville's--my father's--character. I had not seen him since I was a +child, but when he heard of my engagement to Lord Earlscourt he found me +out, and wanted to force himself on him, and borrow money of him, and--" +She stopped, her face was crimson, but she went on, passionately. "All +my efforts, of course, were to keep them apart, to spare my father such +degradation, and your cousin such an application. I could not tell Lord +Earlscourt, for he is generous as the winds, and I knew what he would +have done. My note was from my father; he wanted to frighten me into +introducing him to Lord Earlscourt, but he did not succeed. I would not +have your cousin disgraced or pained by--Arthur, that is all my crime! +No very great one, is it?" And she laughed a loud, bitter laugh, as +unlike her own as the stormy shadow on her face was like the usual +sunshine. + +"But, great Heaven! why not have told this to Earlscourt?" + +She signed me to silence with a passionate gesture. + +"No! He dishonored me with suspicion; let him go. I forbid you ever to +breathe a word of what I have told you to him. If he has pride, so have +I. He would hold no dishonor greater than for another man to charge him +with a lie. My truth is as untainted as his, and my honor as dear to me. +He accused me wrongly; let him repent. I would have loved and reverenced +him as never any woman yet could do; but once suspected, I could find no +happiness with him. His bitter words are stamped into my heart. I shall +never forget--I doubt if I shall ever forgive--them. I can bear anything +but injustice or misconception. If any doubt me, they are free to do so; +theirs is the sin, not mine. As he has sown so must he reap, and so must +I!" A low, gasping sob choked her voice, but she stood like a little +Pythoness, the pearl gleaming above her brow, her eyes unnaturally +bright, the color burning in her face, her attitude what it was when he +left her, defiant, wronged, unyielding. She swept away from me to a man +who was coming through the other room, and he stared at her set lips and +her gleaming eyes as she asked him, carelessly, "Count Avonyl, will you +have the kindness to take me to Lady Mechlin?" + +That was the last I saw of her. She left the Bad with her aunt as soon +as the day dawned, and when I went to our hotel, I found that Earlscourt +had ordered post-horses immediately he quitted the ball room, and +gone--where he did not leave word. So my presentiment was verified; the +pride of both had come in conflict, and the pride of neither had +succumbed. How long it would sustain and satisfy them, I could not +guess; but Lady Clive smiled again, as sweetly as ladies ever do when +their thorns have thriven and brought forth abundant fruit. Some other +time I will tell you how I saw Beatrice Boville again; but I often +thought of + + "Pauline, by pride + Angels have fallen ere thy time!" + +when I recalled her with the pearls above her brow, and her passionate, +gleaming eyes, and her fearless, scornful, haughty anguish, as she had +stood before me that night when Pride _v_. Pride caused the wreck of +both their lives. + + + + +IV. + +WHERE I SAW BEATRICE BOVILLE AGAIN + + +I don't belong to St. Stephen's myself, thank Heaven. Very likely they +would have returned me for the county when the governor departed this +life had I tried them; but as I generally cut the county, from not being +one of the grass countries, and as I couldn't put forward any patriotic +claims like Mr. Harper Twelvetrees, (who, as he's such a slayer of +vermin, thought, I suppose, that he'd try his hand at the dry-rot and +the red tapeworms, which, according to cotton grumblers, are sapping the +nation,) I haven't solicited its suffrages. The odds at Tattersall's +interest me more than the figures of the ways and means; and +Diophantus's and Kettledrum's legerdemain at Newmarket and Epsom is more +to my taste than our brilliant rhetorician's with the surplus. I don't +care a button about Lord Raynham and Sir C. Burrell's maids-of-all-work; +they are not an attractive class, I should say, and, if they like to +amuse their time tumbling out of windows, I can't see for the life of me +why peers and gentlemen should rush to the rescue like Don Quixote to +Dulcinea's. And as for that great question, Tea _v_. Paper, bohea +delights the souls of old ladies and washerwomen--who destroy crumpets +and character over its inebriating cups, and who will rush to crown Lord +Derby's and Mr. Disraeli's brows with laurels if they ever go to the +country with a teapot blazoned on their patriotic banners--more than it +does mine, which prefers Bass and Burgundy, seltzer and Sillery; and, +though I dare say Brown, Jones, and Robinson find the Divorce News +exciting, and paper collars very showy and economical, as I myself am +content with the _Times_ and its compeers, and think, with poor Brummel, +that life without daily clean linen were worthless, _that_ subject +doesn't absorb me as it does those gentlemen who find "the last tax of +knowledge" so grandiloquent and useful a finishing period. So I have +never stood for the county, nor essayed to stand for it, seeing that to +one Bernal Osborne there are fifty prosers in St. Stephen's, and to be +bored is, to a butterfly flutterer, as the young lady whose name heads +this paper once obligingly called me, torture unparalleled by anything +short of acid wine or the Chinese atrocities, though truly he who heads +our Lower House with his vernal heart and his matchless brain were +enough to make any man, coxcomb or hero, oppositionist or +ministerialist, proud to sit in the same chamber with him. But there are +nights now and then, of course, when I like to go to both Houses, to +hear Lord Derby's rich, intricate oratory, or Gladstone's rhetoric, +(which has so potent a spell even for his foes, and is yet charged so +strangely against him as half a crime; possibly by the same spirit with +which plain women reproach a pretty one for her beauty: what business +has he to be more attractive than his compeers? of course it's a peche +mortel in their eyes!) and when Mrs. Breloques, who is a charming little +woman, to whom no man short of a Goth could possibly say "No" to any +petition, gave me a little blow with her fan, and told me, as I valued +her friendship, to get an order and take her and Gwen to hear the Lords' +debate on Tuesday, when my cousin Viscount Earlscourt, one of the best +orators in the Upper House, was certain to speak, of course I obliged +her. Her sister Gwen, who was a girl of seventeen, barely out, and whom +I wished at Jerico, (three is so odious a number, one of the triad must +ever be _de trop_,) was wrathful with the Upper House; it in no wise +realized her expectations; the peers should have worn their robes, she +thought, (as if the horrors of a chamber filled with Thames odors in +June wasn't enough without being bored with velvet and ermine) she would +have been further impressed by coronets also; they had no business to +lounge on their benches as if they were in a smoking-room; they should +have declaimed like Kean, not spoken colloquially; and--in fact, they +shouldn't have been ordinary men at all. I think a fine collection from +Madame Tussaud's, with a touch of the Roman antique, would have been +much more to Gwen's ideal, and she wasn't at all content till Earlscourt +rose; _he_ reconciled her a little, for he had a grand-seigneur air, she +said, that made up for the incongruities of his dress. It was a measure +that he had much at heart; he had exerted for it all his influence in +the cabinet, and he was determined that the bill should pass the Lords, +though the majority inclined to throw it out. As he stood now against +the table, with his calm dignity of gesture, his unstrained flow of +words, and his rich and ringing voice, which could give majesty to +commonplace subjects, and sway even an apathetic audience as completely +as Sheridan's Begum speech, every one in the House listened attentively, +and each of his words fell with its due weight. I heard him with pride, +often as I had done so before, though I noticed with pain that the lines +in his forehead and his mouth were visibly deepened; that he seemed to +speak with effort, for him, and looked altogether, as somebody had said +to me at White's in the morning, as if he were wearing out, and would go +down in his prime, like Canning and Pitt. + +"Lord Earlscourt looks very ill--don't you think so?" said Lelia +Breloques. + +As I answered her, I heard a sharp-wrung sigh, and I looked for the +first time at the lady next me. I saw a delicate profile, lips +compressed and colorless, chestnut hair that I had last seen with his +pearls gleaming above it: I saw, en deux mots, Beatrice Boville for the +first time since that night eight months before, when she had stood +before me in her passion and her pride. She never took her eyes off +Earlscourt while he spoke, and I wondered if she regretted having lost +him for a point of honor. Had she grown indifferent to him, that she had +come to his own legislative chamber, or was her love so much stronger +than her pride that she had sought to see him thus rather than not see +him at all? When his speech was closed, and he had resumed his place on +the benches, she leaned back, covering her eyes with her hand for a +moment: and, as I said aloud (more for her benefit than Mrs. +Breloques's) my regret that Earlscourt would wear himself out, I was +afraid, in his devotion to public life, Beatrice started at the sound +of my voice, turned her head hastily, and her face was colorless enough +to tell me she had not gratified her pride without some cost. Of course +I spoke to her; she had been a favorite of mine always, and I had often +wished to come across her again; but beyond learning that she was with +Lady Mechlin in Lowndes Square, and had been spending the winter at Pau +for her aunt's health, I had no time to hear more, for Lelia, having +only come for Earlscourt's speech, bade me take her to her carriage, +while Beatrice and her party remained for the rest of the debate; but +the rencontre struck me as so odd, that I believe it occupied my +thoughts more than Mrs. Breloques liked, who got into her carriage in +not the best of humors, and asked me if _I_ was going in for public life +that I'd grown so particularly unamusing. We're always unamusing to one +woman if we're thinking at all about another. + +"Do you know who was at the House to-night, Earlscourt, to hear your +speech?" I asked him, as I met him, a couple of hours afterwards, in one +of the passages, as he was leaving the House. He had altered much in +eight months; he stooped a little from his waist; he looked worn, and +his lips were pale. Men said his stamina was not equal to his brain; +physicians, that he gave himself too much work and too little sleep. I +knew he was more wrapped in public life than ever; that in his place in +the government he worked unwearyingly, and that he found time in spare +moments for intellectual recreation that would have sufficed for their +life's study for most men. Still, I thought possibly there might be a +weakness still clinging round his heart, though he never alluded to it; +a passion which, though he appeared to have crushed it out, might be +sapping his health more than all his work for the nation. + +"Do you mean any one in particular? Persigny said he should attend, but +I did not see him." + +"No, I meant among the ladies. Beatrice Boville was in the seat next +me." I had no earthly business to speak of her so abruptly, for when I +had seen him for the first time after he left the Bad when Parliament +met that February, he had forbidden me ever to mention her name to him, +and no allusion to her had ever passed his lips. The worn, stern +gravity, that had become his habitual expression, changed for a moment; +bullet-proof he might be, but my arrow had shot in through the chain +links of his armor; a look of unutterable pain, eagerness, anxiety, +passion, passed over his face; but, whatever he felt, he subdued it, +though his voice was broken as he answered me:-- + +"Once for all, I bade you never speak that name to me. Without being +forbidden, I should have thought your own feeling, your own delicacy, +might--" + +"Have checked me? O, hang it, Earlscourt, listen one second without +shutting a fellow up. I never broached the subject before, by your +desire; but, now I have once broken the ice, I must ask you one +question: Are you sure you judged the girl justly? are you sure you were +not too quick to slan--" + +He pressed his hand on his chest and breathed heavily as I spoke, but he +wouldn't let me finish. + +"That is enough. Would any man sacrifice what he held dearest wantonly +and without proof? She is dear to me _now_. You are the only living +being so thoughtless or so merciless as to force her name upon me, and +rake up the one folly, the one madness, the one crowning sorrow of my +life. See that you never dare bring forward her name again." + +He went out before me into the soft night air. His carriage was +waiting; he entered it, threw himself back on its cushions, and was +driven off before I had time to break my word of honor to Beatrice +Boville, which I felt sorely tempted to do just then. Who among the +thousands that heard his briliant speech that night, or read it the next +morning, who saw him pass in his carriage, and had him pointed out to +them as the finest orator of his day, or dined with him at his +ministerial dinners at his house in Park Lane, would have believed that, +with all his ambition, fame, honors, and attainments, the one cross, the +one shadow, the one dark thread, in the successful stateman's life, was +due to a woman's hand, and that underneath all his strength lay that +single weakness, sapping and undermining it? + +"_Did you_ see that girl Boville at the House last night?" Lady Clive +(who had smiled most sweetly ever since her thorns had brought forth +their fruit--her son _would_ be his heir--Earlscourt would never marry +now!) said to me, the next day, at one of the Musical Society concerts. +"Incredible effrontery, wasn't it, in her, to come and hear Earlscourt's +speech? One would have imagined that conscience and delicacy might have +made her reluctant to see him, instead of letting her voluntarily seek +his own legislative chamber, and listen coolly for an hour and a half to +the man whom she misled and deceived so disgracefully." + +I laughed to think how long a time a woman's malice _will_ flourish, +n'importe how victorious it may have been in crushing its object, or how +harmless that object may have become. + +"You are very bitter about her still, Lady Clive. Is that quite fair? +You know you were so much obliged to her for throwing Earlscourt away. +You want Horace to come in for the title, don't you?" Which truism +being unpalatable, Lady Clive averred that she had no wish on earth but +for Earlscourt's happiness; that of course she naturally grieved for his +betrayal by that little intrigante, but that had his marriage been a +well-advised one, nobody would have rejoiced more, etc., etc., and bade +me be silent and listen to Vieuxtemps, both of which commands I obeyed, +pondering in my own mind whether I should go and call in Lowndes Square +or not: if anybody heard of it, they would think it odd for me alone, of +all the family, to continue acquainted with a girl whom report +(circulated through Lady Clive) said had used Earlscourt so ill, and +wrong constructions might get put upon it; but, thank God! I never have +considered the qu'en dira-t-on. If constructions are wrong, to the deuce +with them! they matter nothing to sensible people; and the man who lives +in dread of "reports" will have to shift his conduct as the old man of +immortal fable shifted his donkey, and won't ever journey in any peace +at all. If anybody remarked my visiting Lowndes Square, I couldn't help +it: I wanted to see Beatrice Boville again, and to Lowndes Square, after +the concert, I drove my tilbury accordingly, which, as that turn-out is +known pretty tolerably in those parts, I should be wisest to leave +behind me when I don't want my calls noticed. By good fortune, I saw +Beatrice alone. They were going to drive in the Park, and she was in the +drawing room, dressed and waiting for her aunt. She was not altered: at +her age sorrow doesn't tell physically as it does at Earlscourt's. In +youth we have Hope; later on we know that of all the gifts of Pandora's +box none are so treacherous and delusive as the one that Pandora left at +the bottom. True, Beatrice had none of that insouciant, shadowless +brightness that had been her chief charm at Lemongenseidlitz, but she +was one of those women whose attractions, dependent on fascination, not +on beauty, grow more instead of less as time goes on. She met me with a +trace of embarrassment; but she was always self-possessed under any +amount of difficulties, and stood chatting, a trifle hurriedly, of all +the subjects of the year, of anything, I dare say, rather than of that +speech the night before, or of the secret of which I was her sole +confidant. But I was not going to let her off so easily. I had come +there for a definite purpose, and was not going away without +accomplishing it. I was afraid every second that Lady Mechlin might come +down, or some visitor enter, and as she sat in a low chair among the +flowers in the window, leant towards her, and plunged into it _in medias +res_. + +"Miss Boville, I want you to release me from my promise." + +She looked up, her face flushing slightly, but her lips and eyes +shadowed already with that determined pride and hauteur that they had +worn the last time I had seen her. She did not speak, but played with +the boughs of a coronella near her. + +"You remember" (I went on speaking as briefly as possible, lest the old +lady's toilet should be finished, and our tete-a-tete cut short) "I gave +you my word of honor never to speak again of what you told me in the +Kursaal last autumn until you gave me leave; that leave I ask you for +now. Silence lies in the way of your own happiness, I feel sure, and not +alone of yours. If you give me carte blanche, you may be certain I shall +use it discreetly and cautiously. You made the prohibition in a moment +of heat and passion; withdraw it now--believe me, you will never +repent." + +The flush died out of her cheeks as I spoke; but her little, white +teeth were set together as they had been that night, and she answered me +bitterly,-- + +"You ask what is impossible; I cannot, in justice to myself, withdraw +it. I would never have told you, but that I deemed you a man of honor, +whom I could trust." + +"I do not think I have proved myself otherwise, Beatrice. I have kept my +word to you, when I have been greatly tempted to break it, when I have +doubted whether it were either right or wise to stand on such punctilio, +when greater stakes were involved by my silence. Surely, if you once had +elevated mind enough to comprehend and admire such a man as Earlscourt, +and be won by the greatness of his intellect to prefer him to younger +rivals, it is impossible you can have lowered your taste and found any +one to replace him. No woman who once loved Earlscourt could stoop to an +inferior man, and almost all men _are_ his inferiors; it is impossible +you can have grown cold towards him." + +She turned her eyes upon me luminous with her old passion--the color hot +in her cheeks, and her attitude full of that fiery pride which became +her so infinitely well. + +"_I_ changed!--_I_ grown cold to him! I love him more than all the +world, and shall do to my grave. Do you think that any who heard him +last night could glory in him as I did? Did you think any physical +torture would not have been easier to bear than what I felt when I saw +his face once more, and thought of what we _should have been_ to one +another, and of what we _are_? We women have to act, and smile, and wear +a calm semblance, while our hearts are bursting; and so you fancy that +we never feel." + +"But, great Heavens! Beatrice, if you love Earlscourt like this, why not +give me leave to tell him? Why not write to him yourself? A word would +clear you, a word restore you to him. Your anger, your pride, he would +forgive in a moment." + +I'm a military man, not a diplomatist, or I shouldn't have added that +last sentence. + +She rose, and looked at me haughtily and amazedly. + +"It is I who have to forgive, not he. I wronged him in no way; he +wronged me bitterly. He dared to misjudge, to suspect, to insult me. I +shall never stoop to undeceive him. He gave me up without a trial. I +never will force myself upon him. He thanked God I was not his +wife--could I seek to be his wife after that? Love him passionately I +do, but forgive him I do _not_! I forbid you, on your faith as a +gentleman, ever to tell him what I told you that night. I trusted to +your honor; I shall hold you _dis_honored if you betray me." + +Just as she paused an open carriage rolled past. I looked down +mechanically; in it was Earlscourt lying back on his cushions, +returning, I believe, from a Cabinet Council. There, in the street, +stood my tilbury, with the piebald Cognac that everybody in Belgravia +knew. There, in the open window, stood Beatrice and I; and Earlscourt, +as he happened to glance upwards, saw us both! His carriage rolled on; +Beatrice grew as white as death, and her lips quivered as she looked +after him; but Lady Mechlin entered, and I took them down to their +barouche. + +"You are determined not to release me from my promise?" I asked +Beatrice, as I pulled up the tiger-skin over her flounces. + +She shook her head. + +"Certainly not; and I should think you are too much of a gentleman not +to hold a promise sacred." + +Pride and determination were written in every line of her face, in the +very arch of her eyebrows, the very form of her brow, the very curve of +her lips--a soft, delicate face enough otherwise, but as expressive of +indomitable pride as any face could be. And yet, though I swore at her +as I drove Cognac out of the square, I couldn't help liking her all the +better for it, the little Pythoness! for, after all, it was natural and +very intelligible to me--she had been misjudged and wrongly suspected, +and the noblest spirits are always the quickest to rebel against +injustice and resent false accusation. + + + + +V. + +HOW IN PERFECT INNOCENCE I PLAYED THE PART OF A RIVAL. + + +The season whirled and spun along as usual. They were having stormy +debates in the Lower House, and throwing out bills in the Upper; stifled +by Thames odors one evening, and running down to Epsom the next morning; +blackguarding each other in parliamentary language--which, on my honor, +will soon want duels revived to keep it within decent breeding, if Lord +Robert Cecil and others don't learn better manners, and remember the +golden rule that "He alone resorts to vituperation whose argument is +illogical and weak." We, luckier dogs, who weren't slaves to St. +Stephen's, nor to anything at all except as parsons and moralists, with +whom the grapes sont verts et bons pour des goujats, said to our own +worldly vitiated tastes and evil leanings, spent our hours in the Ring +and the coulisses, White's and the United, crush balls and opera +suppers, and swore we were immeasurably bored, though we wouldn't have +led any other life for half a million. The season whirled along. +Earlscourt devoted himself more entirely than ever to public life; he +filled one of the most onerous and important posts in the ministry, and +appeared to occupy himself solely with home politics and foreign +politics. Lady Mechlin, only a baronet's widow, though she had very +tolerable society of her own, was not in _his_ monde; and Beatrice +Boville and he, with only Hyde Park Corner between them, might as well, +for any chance of rapprochement, have been severally at Spitzbergen and +Cape Horn. Two or three times they passed each other in Pall-Mall and +the Ride; but Earlscourt only lifted his hat to Lady Mechlin, and +Beatrice set her little teeth together, and wouldn't have solicited a +glance from him to save her life. Earlscourt was excessively distant to +me after seeing my tilbury at her door; no doubt he thought it strange +for me to have continued my intimacy with a woman who had wronged him so +bitterly. He said nothing, but I could see he was exceedingly +displeased; and the more I tried to smooth it with him, the more +completely I seemed to set my foot in it. It was exceedingly difficult +to touch on any obnoxious subject with him; he was never harsh or +discourteous, but he could freeze the atmosphere about him gently, but +so completely, that no mortal could pierce through it; and, fettered by +my promise to her and his prohibition to me, I hardly knew how to bring +up her name. As the Fates would have it, I often met Beatrice myself, at +the Regent Park fetes, at concerts, at a Handel Festival at Sydenham, at +one or two dinner parties; and, as she generally made way for me beside +her, and was one of those women who are invariably, though without +effort, admired and surrounded in any society, possibly people remarked +it--possibly our continued intimacy might have come round to Earlscourt, +specially as Lady Clive and Mrs Breloques abused me roundly, each a sa +mode, for countenancing that "abominable intrigante." I couldn't help +it, even if Earlscourt took exception at me for it. I knew the girl was +not to blame, and I took her part, and tried my best to tame the little +Pythoness into releasing me from my promise. But Beatrice was firm; had +she erred, no one would have acknowledged and atoned for it quicker, but +innocent and wrongly accused, she kept silent, coute que coute, and in +my heart I sympathized with her. Nothing stings so sharply, nothing is +harder to forgive, than injustice; and, knowing herself to be frank, +honorable, and open as the day, his charge of falsehood and deception +rankled in her only more keenly as time went on. Men ran after her like +mad; she had more of them about her than many beauties or belles. There +was a style, a charm, a something in her that sent beauties into the +shade, and by which, had she chosen, she could soon have replaced +Earlscourt. Still, it needed to be no Lavater to see, by the passionate +gleam of her eyes and the haughty pride on her brow, that Beatrice +Boville was not happy. + +"Why _will_ you let pride and punctilio wreck your own life, Beatrice?" +I asked her, in a low tone, as we stood before one of Ed. Warren's +delicious bits of woodland in the Water-Color Exhibition, where we had +chanced to meet one day. "That he should have judged you as he did was +not unnatural. Think! how was it possible for him to guess your father +was your companion? Remember how very much circumstances were against +you." + +"Had they been ten times more against me, a man who cared for me would +have believed in me, and stood by me, not condemned me on the first +suspicion. It was unchivalrous, ungenerous, unjust. I tell you, his +words are stamped into my memory forever. I shall never forgive them." + +"Not even if you knew that he suffered as much and more than you do?" + +She clinched her hands on the rolled-up catalogue with a passionate +gesture. + +"No; because he _misjudged_ me. Anything else I would have pardoned, +though I am no patient Griselda, to put up tamely with any wrong; but +_that_ I never could--I never would!" + +"I regret it, then. I thought you too warm and noble-hearted a woman to +retain resentment so long. I never blamed you in the first instance, but +I must say I blame you now." + +She laughed, a little contemptuously, and glanced at me with her +haughtiest air; and on my life, much as it provoked one, nothing became +her better. + +"Blame me or not, as you please--your verdict will be quite bearable, +either way. I am the one sinned against. I can have nothing explained to +Lord Earlscourt. Had he cared for me, as he once vowed, he would have +been less quick then to suspect me, and quicker now to give me a chance +of clearing myself. But you remember he thanked God I had not his name +and his honor in my hands. I dare say he rejoices at his escape." + +She laughed again, turning over the catalogue feverishly and +unconsciously. _Those_ were the words that rankled in her; and it was +not much wonder if, to a proud spirit like Beatrice Boville's, they +seemed unpardonable. As I handed her and Lady Mechlin into their +carriage when they left the exhibition, Earlscourt, as ill luck would +have it, passed us, walking on to White's, the fringe of Beatrice's +parasol brushed his arm, and a hot color flushed into her cheeks at the +sudden rencontre. By the instinct of courtesy he bowed to her and Lady +Mechlin, but passed up Pall-Mall without looking at Beatrice. How well +society drills us, that we meet with such calm impassiveness in its +routine those with whom we have sorrowed and joyed, loved and hated, in +such far different scenes! + +Their carriage drove on, and I overtook him as he went up Pall-Mall. He +was walking slowly, with his hand pressed on his chest, and his lips set +together, as if in bodily pain. He looked at me, as I joined him, with +an annoyed glance of unusual irritation for him, for he was always calm +and untroubled, punctiliously just, and though of a proud temper, never +quick to anger. + +"You passed that girl wonderfully coldly, Earlscourt," I began, plunging +recklessly into the thick of the subject. + +"Coldly!" he repeated, bitterly. "It is very strange that you will +pursue me with her name. I forbade you to intrude it upon me; was not +that sufficient?" + +"No; because I think you judged her too harshly." + +"Think so, if you please, but never renew the topic to me. If she gives +you her confidence, enjoy it. If you choose, knowing what you do, to be +misled by her, be so; but I beg of you to spare me your opinions and +intentions." + +"But why? I say you _do_ misjudge her. She might err in impatience and +pride; but I would bet you any money you like that you would prove her +guilty of no indelicacy, no treachery, no underhand conduct, though +appearances might be against her." + +"_Might_ be! You select your words strangely; you must have some deeper +motive for your unusual blindness. I desire, for the last time, that you +cease either the subject to me, or your acquaintance with me, whichever +you prefer." + +With which, he went up the steps of White's, and I strolled on, amazed +at the fierce acrimony of his tone, utterly unlike anything I had ever +heard from him, wished their pride to the devil, called myself a fool +for meddling in the matter at all, and went to have a quiet weed in the +smoking-room of the U. S. to cool myself. I was heartily sick of the +whole affair. If they wanted it cleared, they must clear it +themselves--I should trouble myself no more about it. Yet I couldn't +altogether dismiss Beatrice's cause from my mind. I thought her, to say +the truth, rather harshly used. I liked her for her fearless, truthful, +impassioned character. I liked her for the very courage and pride with +which she preferred to relinquish any chance of regaining her forfeited +happiness, rather than stoop to solicit exculpation from charges of +which she knew she was innocent. Perhaps, at first, she did not consider +sufficiently Earlscourt's provocation, and perhaps, now, she was too +persisting in her resentment of it; still I liked her, and I was sorry +to see her, at an age when life should have been couleur de rose, to one +of her gay and insouciant nature, with a weary, passionate look on her +face that she should not have had for ten years to come--a look that was +rapidly hardening into stern and contemptuous sadness. + +"You tell me I am too bitter," she said to me one day, "how should I be +otherwise? I, who have wronged no one, and have never in my life done +anything of which I am ashamed, am called an intrigante by Lady Clive +Edghill, and get ill-will from strangers, and misconstructions from my +friends, merely because, thinking no harm myself, it never occurs to me +that circumstances may look against me; and, hating falsehood, I cannot +lie, and smile, and give soft words where I feel contempt and +indignation. Mrs. Breloques yonder, with whom les presens ont toujours +raison, and les absens ont toujours tort, who has honeyed speeches for +her bitterest foes, and poisoned arrows (behind their back) for her most +trusting friends, who goes to early matins every morning, and pries out +for a second all over the top of her prayer-book, who kisses 'darling +Helena,' and says she 'never looked so sweetly,' whispering en petit +comite what a pity it is, when Helena is so passee, she _will_ dress +like a girl just out--she is called the sweetest woman possible--so +amiable! and is praised for her high knowledge of religion. You tell me +I am too bitter. I think not. Honesty does _not_ prosper, and truth is +at a miserable discount; straightforward frankness makes a myriad of +foes, and adroit diplomacy as many friends. If you make a +prettily-turned compliment, who cares if it is sincere? if you hold your +tongue where you cannot praise, because you will not tell a conventional +falsehood, the world thinks you very ill-natured, or odiously satirical. +Society is entirely built upon insincerity and conventionality, from the +wording of an acceptance of a dinner invitation, where we write 'with +much pleasure,' thinking to ourselves 'what a bore!' to the giant +hypocrisies daily spoken without a blush from pulpit and lecturn, and +legitimatized both as permissible and praiseworthy. To truth and +unconventionality society of course is adverse; and whoever dares to +uphold them must expect to be hissed, as Paul by the Ephesians, because +he shivered their silver shrines and destroyed the craft by which they +got their wealth." + +Beatrice was right; her truth and fearlessness were her enemies with +most people, even with the man who had loved her best. Had she been +ready with an adroit falsehood and a quick excuse, Earlscourt's +suspicions would never have been raised as they were by her frank +admission that there was something she would rather not tell him, and +her innocent request to be trusted. That must have been some very +innocent and unworldly village schoolmaster, I should say, who first set +going that venerable proverb, "Honesty is the best policy." He must have +known comically little of life. A diplomatist who took it as his motto +would soon come to grief, and ladies would soon stone out of their +circles any woman bete enough to try its truth among them. There is no +policy at greater discount in the world, and straightforward and candid +people stand at very unequal odds with the rest of humanity; they are +the one morsel of bread to a hogshead of sack, the handful of Spartans +against a swarm of Persians, and they get the brunt of the battle and +the worst of the fight. + + + + +VI. + +HOW PRIDE BOWED AND FELL. + + +Beyond meeting Earlscourt at White's, or, for an hour, at the reunion of +some fair leader of ton, I scarcely saw him that season, for he was more +and more devoted to public life. He looked wretchedly ill, and his +physicians said if he wished to live he must go to the south of France +in July, and winter at Corfu; but he paid them no heed; he occupied +himself constantly with political and literary work, and grudged the +three or four hours he gave to sleep that did him little good. + +"Will you get me admittance to the Lords to-morrow night?" Beatrice +asked me, one morning, when I met her in the Ride. I looked at her +surprised. + +"To the Lords? Of course, if you wish." + +"I do wish it." Her hands clinched on her bridle, and the color flushed +into her face, for Earlscourt just then passed us, riding with one of +his brother ministers. He looked at us both, and his face changed +strangely, though he rode on, continuing his conversation with the other +man, while I went round the turn with Beatrice and the other fellows who +were about her; le fruit defendu is always most attractive, and +Beatrice's profound negligence of them all made them more mad about her +than all the traps and witcheries, beguilements and attractions, that +coquettes and beauties set out for them. She rode beautifully; and a +woman who _does_ sit well down on her saddle, and knows how to handle +her horse, never looks better than en Amazone. Earlscourt met her three +times at the turn of the Ride; and though you would not have told that +he was passing any other than an utter stranger, I think it must have +struck him that he had lost much in losing Beatrice Boville. I was +riding on her off-side each time when we passed him. As I say, I never, +thank God! have cared a straw for the qu'en dira-t-on? and if people +remarked on my intimacy with my cousin's cast off fiancee, so they +might, but to Earlscourt I wished to explain it more for Beatrice's sake +than my own; and as I rode out by Apsley House afterwards, I overtook +him, and went up to Piccadilly with him, though his manner was decidedly +distant and chill, so pointedly so that it would have been rude, had he +not been too entirely a disciple of Chesterfield to be ever otherwise +than courteous to his deadliest foe; but, disregarding his coldness, I +said what I intended to say, and began an explanation that I considered +only due to him. + +"I beg your pardon, Earlscourt, for intruding on you a topic you have +forbidden, but I shall be obliged to you to listen to me a moment. I +wish to tell you my reasons for what, I dare say, seems strange to you, +my continued intimacy with--" + +But I was not permitted to end my sentence; he divined what I was about +to say, and stopped me, with a cold, wearied air. + +"I understand; but I prefer not to hear them. I have no desire to +interfere with your actions, and less to be troubled with your motives. +Of course, you choose your friendships as you please. All I beg is, that +you obey the wish I expressed the other day, and intrude the subject no +more upon me." + +And he bade me good morning, urged his mare into a sharp canter, and +turned down St. James's Street. How little those in the crowd, who +looked at him as he rode by, pointing him out to the women with them as +Viscount Earlscourt, the most eloquent debater in the Lords, the +celebrated foreign minister, author, and diplomatist, guessed that a +woman's name could touch and sting him as nothing else could do, and +that under the calm and glittering upper-current of his life ran a dark, +slender, unnoticed thread that had power to poison all the rest! Those +women, mon ami!--if we _do_ satirize them a little bit now and then, are +we doing any more than taking a very mild revenge? Don't they make fools +of the very best and wisest of us, play the deuce with Caesar as with +Catullus, and make Achilles soft as Amphimachus? + +The next morning I met Beatrice at a concert at the Marchioness of +Pursang's. Lady Pursang would not have been, vous concevez, on the +visiting list of Lady Mechlin, as she was one of the creme de la creme, +but she had met Beatrice the winter before at Pau, had been very +delighted with her, and now continued the acquaintance in town. I +happened to sit next our little Pythoness, who looked better, I think, +that morning, than ever I saw her, though her face was set into that +disdainful sadness which had become its habitual expression. She liked +my society, and sought it, no doubt, because I was the only link between +her and her lost past; and she was talking with me more animatedly than +usual, thanking me for having got her admittance to the Lords that +night, during a pause in the concert, when Earlscourt entered the room, +and took the seat reserved for him, which was not far from ours. Music +was one of his passions, the only delassement, indeed, he ever gave +himself now; but to-day, though ostensibly he listened to Alboni and +Arabella Goddard, Halle and Vieuxtemps, and talked to the marchioness +and other women of her set, in reality he was watching Beatrice, who, +her pride roused by his presence, laughed and chatted with me and other +men with her old gay abandon, and, impervious to dereglement though he +was, I fancy even _he_ felt it a severe trial of his composure when Lady +Pursang, who had been the last five years in India with her husband, and +who was ignorant of or had forgotten the name of the girl Earlscourt was +to have married the year before, asked him, when the concert was over, +to let her introduce him to her, yet Beatrice Boville, bringing him in +innocent cruelty up to that little Pythoness, with whom he had parted so +passionately and bitterly ten months before! Happy for them that they +had that armor which the Spartans called heroism, the stoics philosophy, +and we--simply style good breeding, or they would hardly have gone +through that ordeal as well as they did when she introduced them to each +other as strangers!--those two who had whispered such passionate love +words, given and received such fond caresses, vowed barely twelve +months before to pass their lifetime together! Happy for them they were +used to society, or they would hardly have bowed to each other as calmly +and admirably as they did, with the recollection of that night in which +they had parted so bitterly, so full as it was in the minds of both. +Beatrice was standing in one of the open windows of the little cabinet +de peinture almost empty, and when the marchioness moved away, satisfied +that she had introduced two people admirably fitted to entertain one +another, Earlscourt, with people flirting and talking within a few yards +of him, was virtually alone with Beatrice--for there is, after all, no +solitude like the solitude of a crowd--and _then_, for the first time in +his life, his self-possession forsook him. Beatrice was silent and very +pale, looking out of the window on to the Green Park, which the house +overlooked, and Earlscourt's pride had a hard struggle, but his passion +got the better of him, malgre lui, and he leaned towards her. + +"Do you remember the last night we were together?" + +She answered him bitterly. She had not forgiven him. She had sometimes, +I am half afraid, sworn to revenge herself. + +"I am hardly likely to forget it, Lord Earlscourt." + +He looked at her longingly and wistfully; his pride was softened, that +granite pride, hitherto so unassailable! and he bent nearer to her. + +"Beatrice! I would give much to be able to wash out the memories of that +night--to be proved mistaken--to be convicted of haste, of sternness--" + +The tears rushed into her eyes. + +"You need only have given one little thing--all I asked of you--trust!" + +"Would to God I dare believe you now! Tell me, answer me, did I judge +you too harshly? Love at my age never changes, however wronged; it is +the latest, and it only expires with life itself. I confess to you, you +are dearer to me still than anything ever was, than anything ever will +be. Prove to me, for God's sake, that I misjudged you! Only prove it to +me; explain away what appeared against you, and we may yet--" + +He stopped; his voice trembled, his hand touched hers, he breathed short +and fast. The Pythoness was very nearly tamed; her eyes grew soft and +melting, her lips trembled; but pride was still strong in her. At the +touch of his hand it very nearly gave way, but not wholly; it was there +still, tenacious of its reign. She set her little teeth obstinately +together, and looked up at him with her old hauteur. + +"No, as I told you then, you must believe in me _without_ proof. I have +not forgotten your bitter words, nor yet forgiven them. I doubt if I +ever shall. You roused an evil spirit in me that night, Lord Earlscourt, +which you cannot exorcise at a moment's notice. Remember what was your +own motto, 'An indiscreet woman is never frank,'--yet from my very +frankness you accused me of indiscretion, and of far worse than +indiscretion--" + +"My God! if I accused you falsely, Beatrice, forgive me!" + +He must have loved her very much to bow his pride so far as that. _He_ +was at _her_ feet--at _her_ mercy now; he, whom she had vainly sued, +sued her; but a perverse, fiery devil in her urged her to take her own +revenge, compelled her to throw away her own peace. + +"You should have asked me that ten months ago; it is too late now." + +His face dyed white, his eyes filled with passionate anguish. He crushed +her hand in his. + +"Too late! Great Heavens! Answer me, child, I entreat you--I beseech +you--is it 'too late' because report is true that you have replaced me +with your cousin--that you are engaged to Hervey? Tell me truth now, for +pity's sake. I will be trifled with no longer." + +Beatrice threw back her haughty little head contemptuously, though +ladies _don't_ sneer at the idea of being liees with me generally, I can +assure you. Her heart throbbed triumphantly and joyously. She had +conquered him at last. The man of giant intellect and haughty will had +bowed to her. She held him by a thread, he who ruled the fate of +nations!--and she loved him so dearly! But the Pythoness was not wholly +tamed, and she could not even yet forget her wrongs. + +"You told me before I spoke falsehoods to you, Lord Earlscourt; my word +would find no more credence now." + +He looked at her, dropped her hand, and turned away, before Beatrice +could detain him. Five minutes after he left the house. Little as I +guessed it, he was jealous of me--I! who never in my own life rivalled +any man who wished to _marry_! Beatrice had fully revenged herself. I +wonder if she enjoyed it quite as much as she had anticipated, as she +stood where he had left her looking out on the Green Park? + +I went with Beatrice and her party to the Lords that night; it was the +tug of war for the bill which Earlscourt was so determined should pass, +and a great speech was expected from him. We were not disappointed. When +he rose he spoke with effort, and his oratory suffered from the slight +hoarseness of his voice, for half the beauty of his rhetoric lay in the +flexibility and music of his tones; still, it was emphatically a great +speech, and Beatrice Boville listened to it breathlessly, with her eyes +fixed on the face--weary, worn, but grandly intellectual--of the man +whom Europe reverenced, and she--a girl of twenty!--ruled. Perhaps her +heart smote her for the lines she had added there; perhaps she felt her +pride misplaced to him, great as he was, with his stainless honor and +unequalled genius; perhaps she thought of how, with all his strength, +his hand had trembled as it touched hers; and how, with all her love, +she had been wilful and naughty to him a second time. His voice grew +weaker as he ended, and he spoke with visible effort; still it was one +of his greatest political triumphs: his bill passed by a large majority, +and the papers, the morning after, filled their leading articles with +admiration of Viscount Earlscourt's speech. But before those journals +were out, Earlscourt was too ill almost to notice the success of his +measures: as he left the House, the presiding devil of beloved Albion, +that plays the deuce with English statesmen as with Italian +cantatrices,--the confounded east wind,--had caught him, finished what +over-exertion had begun, and knocked him over, prostrated with severe +bronchitis. What pity it is that the body _will_ levy such cruel black +mail upon the mind; that a gust of wind, a horse's plunge, the effluvia +of a sewer, the carelessness of a pointsman, can destroy the grandest +intellect, sweep off the men whose genius lights the world, as +ruthlessly as a storm of rain a cloud of gnats, and strike Peel and +Canning, Macaulay and Donaldson, in the prime of their power, as +heedlessly as peasants little higher than the brutes, dull as the clods +of their own valley, who stake their ambitions on a surfeit of fat +bacon, and can barely scrawl their names upon a slate! + +Unconscious that Earlscourt's jealousy had fastened so wrongly upon me, +I was calling upon Beatrice late the next morning, ignorant myself of +his illness, when his physician, who was Lady Mechlin's too, while +paying her a complimentary visit, regretted to me my cousin's sudden +attack. + +"Lord Earlscourt would speak last night," he began. "I entreated him +not; but those public men are so obstinate; to-day he is very ill--very +ill indeed, though prompt measures stopped the worst. He has risen to +dictate something of importance to his secretary; he would work his +brain if he were dying; but it has taken a severe hold on him, I fear. I +shall send him somewhere south as soon as he can leave the house, which +will not be for some weeks. He would be a great loss to the country. We +have not such another foreign minister. But I admit to you, Major +Hervey--though of course I do not wish it to go further--that I _do_ +think very seriously of Lord Earlscourt's state of health." + +Beatrice heard him as she sat at her Davenport; her face grew white, and +her eyes filled with great anguish. She thought of his words to her only +the day before, and of how her pride had repelled him a second time. I +saw her hand clinch on the pen she was playing with, and her teeth set +tight together, her habitual action under any strong emotion, thinking +to herself, no doubt, "And my last words to him were bitter ones!" + +When the physician had left, I went up to her.-- + +"Beatrice, you must let me tell him _now_!" + +She did not answer, but her hand clinched tighter on the pen-handle. + +"His life is in your hands; for God's sake relinquish your pride." + +But her pride was strong in her, and dear to her still, strong and dear +as her love; and the two struggled together. Earlscourt had bowed _his_ +pride to her; but she had not yielded up her own, and it cost her much +to yield it even now. All the Pythoness in her was not tamed yet. She +was silent--she wavered--then her great love for him vanquished all +else. She rose, white as death, her passionate eyes full of unshed +tears, the bitterest, yet the softest, Beatrice Boville had ever known. + +"Take me to him. No one shall tell him but myself." + +Earlscourt was lying on a couch in his library; he had been unable to +dictate or to write himself, for severe remedies had prostrated him +utterly, and he could not speak above his breath, though he was loath to +give up, and acknowledge himself as ill as he was. His eyes were closed, +his forehead knitted together in pain, and his labored breathing told +plainly enough how fiercely his foe had attacked him, and that it was by +no means conquered yet. He had not slept all night, and had fallen into +a short slumber now, desiring his attendants to leave him. I bade the +groom of the chambers let us enter unannounced, and, opening the door +myself, signed to Beatrice to go in, while her aunt and I waited in the +anteroom. She stopped a moment at the entrance; her pride had its last +struggle; but he turned restlessly, with a weary sigh, and by that sigh +the Pythoness was conquered. Beatrice went forward and fell on her knees +beside his sofa, bending down till her lips touched his brow, and her +hot tears fell on his hands. + +"I was too proud last night to tell you you misjudged me. I have no +pride now. I am your own--wholly your own. I never loved, I never should +love, any but you. I forgive you now. O, how could you ever doubt me? +Lord Earlscourt--Ernest--may we not yet be all we once were to one +another?" + +Awakened by her kisses on his brow, bewildered by her sudden appearance, +he tried to rise, but sank back exhausted. He did not disbelieve her +now. He had no voice to speak to her, no strength to answer her; but he +drew her down closer and closer to him, as she knelt by him, and, as her +heart beat once more against his, the little Pythoness, tamed at last, +threw her arms round him and sobbed like a child on his breast. And +so--Beatrice Boville took her best REVENGE!--while I shut the library +door, invited Lady Mechlin to inspect Earlscourt's collection of French +pictures, and asked what she thought of _Punch_ this week. + +I don't know what his physicians would have said of the treatment, as +they'd recommended him "perfect quiet;" all I do know is, that though +Earlscourt went to the south of Europe as soon as he could leave the +house, Beatrice Boville went with him; and he took his place on the +benches and in the cabinet this season, without any trace of bronchia, +or any sign of wearing out. + +Lady Clive, I regret to say, "does not know" Lady Earlscourt: anything +for her beloved brother she _would_ do, were it possible; but she hopes +we understand that, for her daughters' sakes, she feels it quite +impossible to countenance that "shocking little intrigante." + + + + +A LINE IN THE "DAILY." + + + + +A LINE IN THE "DAILY." + +WHO DID IT, AND WHO WAS DONE BY IT. + + +"Lieutenant-Colonel Fairlie's troop of Horse Artillery is ordered to +Norwich to replace the 12th Lancers, en route to Bombay."--Those three +lines in the papers spread dismay into the souls of Norfolk young +ladies, and no less horror into ours, for we were very jolly at +Woolwich, could run up to the Clubs and down to Epsom, and were far too +material not to prefer ball-room belles to bluebells, strawberry-ice to +fresh hautboys, the sparkle of champagne-cups to all the murmurs of the +brooks, and the flutter of ballet-girls' wings to all the rustle of +forest-leaves. But, unhappily, the Ordnance Office is no more given to +considering the feelings of their Royal Gunners than the Horse Guards +the individual desires of the two other Arms; and off we went to +Norwich, repining bitterly, or, in modern English, swearing hard at our +destinies, creating an immense sensation with our 6-pounders, as we +flatter ourselves the Royals always contrive to do, whether on fair +friends or fierce foes, and were looked upon spitefully by the one or +two young ladies whose hearts were gone eastwards with the Twelfth, +smilingly by the one or two hundred who, having fruitlessly laid out a +great deal of tackle on the Twelfth, proceeded to manufacture fresh +flies to catch us. + +We soon made up, I think, to the Norwich girls for the loss of the +Twelfth. They set dead upon Fairlie, our captain, a Brevet +Lieutenant-Colonel, and a C. B. for "services in India," where he had +rivalled Norman Ramsay at Fuentes d'Onor, had had a ball put in his hip, +and had come home again to be worshipped by the women for his romantic +reputation. They made an immense deal, too, of Levison Courtenay, the +beauty of the troop, and called Belle in consequence; who did not want +any flummery or flirtation to increase his opinion of himself, being as +vain of his almond eyes as any girl just entered as the favorite for the +season. There were Tom Gower, too, a capital fellow, with no nonsense +about him, who made no end of chaff of Belle Courtenay; and Little Nell, +otherwise Harcourt Poulteney Nelson, who had by some miracle escaped +expulsion both from Carshalton and the College; and _votre humble +serviteur_ Phil Hardinge, first lieutenant; and one or two other +fellows, who having cut dashing figures at our Woolwich reviews, +cantering across Blackheath Common, or waltzing with dainty beauties +down our mess-room, made the Artillery welcome in that city of shawls +and oratorios, where according to the Gazetteer, no virtuous person +ought to dwell, that volume, with characteristic lucidity, pronouncing +its streets "ill-disposed." + +The Clergy asked us to their rectories--a temptation we were often proof +against, there being three noticeable facts in rectories, that the talk +is always slow, "the Church" being present, and having much the same +chilling effect as the presence of a chaperone at a tete-a-tete; the +daughters generally ugly, and, from leading the choir at morning +services, perfectly convinced that they sing like Clara Novello, and +that the harmonium is a most delightful instrument; and, last and worst, +the wines are almost always poor, except the port which the reverend +host drinks himself, but which, Dieu merci! we rarely or never touch. + +The County asked us, too; and there we went for good hock, +tolerable-looking women, and first-rate billiard-tables. For the first +month we were in Norfolk we voted it unanimously the most infernally +slow and hideous county going; and I dare say we made ourselves +uncommonly disagreeable, as people, if they are not pleased, be they +ever so well bred, have a knack of doing. + +Things were thus quiescent and stagnant, when Fairlie one night at mess +told us a bit of news. + +"Old fellows, whom do you think I met to-day?" + +"How should we know? Cut along." + +"The Swan and her Cygnets." + +"The Vanes? Oh, bravo!" was shouted at a chorus, for the dame and +demoiselles in question we had known in town that winter, and a nicer, +pleasanter, faster set of women I never came across. "What's bringing +them down here, and how's Geraldine?" + +"Vane's come into his baronetcy, and his place is close by Norwich," +said Fairlie; "his wife's health has been bad, and so they left town +early; and Geraldine is quite well, and counting on haymaking, she +informed me." + +"Come, that is good news," said Belle, yawning. "There'll be one pretty +woman in the county, thank Heaven! Poor little Geraldine! I must go and +call on her to-morrow." + +"She has existed without your calls, Belle," said Fairlie, dryly, "and +don't look as if she'd pined after you." + +"My dear fellow, how should you know?" said Belle, in no wise +disconcerted. "A little rogue soon makes 'em look well, and as for +smiles, they'll smile while they're dying for you. Little Vane and I +were always good friends, and shall be again--if I care." + +"Conceited owl!" said Fairlie, under his moustaches. "I'm sorry to hurt +your feelings, then, but your pretty 'friend' never asked after you." + +"I dare say not," said Belle, complacently. "Where a woman's most +interested she's always quietest, and Geraldine----" + +"Lady Vane begged me to tell you you will always be welcome over there, +old fellows," said Fairlie, remorselessly cutting him short. "Perhaps we +shall find something to amuse us better than these stiltified Chapter +dinners." + +The Vanes of whom we talked were an uncommonly pleasant set of people +whom we had known at Lee, where Vane, a Q. C., then resided, his +prospective baronetcy being at that time held by a third or fourth +cousin. Fairlie had known the family since his boyhood; there were four +daughters, tall graceful women, who had gained themselves the nickname +of The Swan and her Cygnets; and then there were twins, a boy of +eighteen, who'd just left Eton; and the girl Geraldine, a charming young +lady, whom Belle admired more warmly than that dandy often admired +anybody besides himself, and whom Fairlie liked cordially, having had +many a familiar bit of fun with her, as he had known her ever since he +was a dashing cadet, and she made her _debut_ in life in the first +column of the _Times_. Her sisters were handsome women; but Geraldine +was bewitching. A very pleasant family they were, and a vast acquisition +to us. Miss Geraldine flirted to a certain extent with us all, but +chiefly with the Colonel, whenever he was to be had, those two having a +very free-and-easy, familiar, pleasant style of intercourse, owing to +old acquaintance; and Belle spent two hours every evening on his +toilette when we were going to dine there, and vowed she was a "deuced +pretty little puss. Perhaps she might--he wasn't sure, but perhaps (it +would be a horrid sacrifice), if he were with her much longer, he wasn't +sure she mightn't persuade him to take compassion upon her, he _was_ so +weak where women were concerned!" + +"What a conceit!" said Fairlie thereat, with a contemptuous twist of his +moustaches and a shrug of his shoulders to me. "I must say, if I were a +woman, I shouldn't feel over-flattered by a lover who admired his own +beauty first, and mine afterwards. Not that I pretend to understand +women." + +By which speech I argued that his old playmate Geraldine hadn't thrown +hay over the Colonel, and been taught billiards by him, and ridden his +bay mare over the park in her evening dress, without interesting him +slightly; and that--though I don't think he knew it--he was deigning to +be a trifle jealous of his Second Captain, the all-mighty conqueror +Belle. + +"What fools they must be that put in these things!" yawned Belle one +morning, reading over his breakfast coffee in the _Daily Pryer_ one of +those "advertisements for a wife" that one comes across sometimes in the +papers, and that make us, like a good many other things, agree with +Goldsmith: + + Reason, they say, belongs to man, + But let them prove it if they can; + Wise Aristotle and Smiglicious, + By ratiocinations specious, + Have strove to prove with great precision, + With definition and division, + Homo est ratione praeditum, + But for my soul I cannot credit 'em. + +"What fools they must be!" yawned Belle, wrapping his dressing-gown +round him, and coaxing his perfumy whiskers under his velvet +smoking-cap. Belle was always inundated by smoking-caps in cloth and +velvet, silk and beads, with blue tassels, and red tassels, and gold +tassels, embroidered and filigreed, rounded and pointed; he had them +sent to him by the dozen, and pretty good chaff he made of the donors. +"Awful fools! The idea of advertising for a wife, when the only +difficulty a man has is to keep from being tricked into taking one. I +bet you, if I did like this owl here, I should have a hundred answers; +and if it was known it was I----" + +"Little Geraldine's self for a candidate, eh?" asked Tom Gower. + +"Very possibly," said Belle, with a self-complacent smile. "She's a fast +little thing, don't check at much, and she's deucedly in love with me, +poor little dear--almost as much trouble to me as Julia Sedley was last +season. That girl all but proposed to me; she did, indeed. Never was +nearer coming to grief in my life. What will you bet me that, if I +advertise for a wife, I don't hoax lots of women?" + +"I'll bet you ten pounds," said I, "that you don't hoax one!" + +"Done!" said Belle, stretching out his hand for a dainty +memorandum-book, gift of the identical Julia Sedley aforesaid, and +entering the bet in it--"done! If I'm not asked to walk in the Close at +noon and look out for a pink bonnet and a black lace cloak, and to +loiter up the market-place till I come across a black hat and blue +muslin dress; if I'm not requested to call at No. 20, and to grant an +interview at No. 84; if I'm not written to by Agatha A. with hazel, and +Belinda B. with black, eyes--all coming after me like flies after a +sugar-cask, why you shall have your ten guineas, my boy, and my colt +into the bargain. Come, write out the advertisement, Tom--I can't, it's +too much trouble; draw it mild, that's all, or the letters we shall get +will necessitate an additional Norwich postman. By George, what fun it +will be to do the girls! Cut along, Tom, can't you?" + +"All right," said Gower, pushing away his coffee-cup, and drawing the +ink to him. "Head it 'MARRIAGE,' of course?" + +"Of course. That word's as attractive to a woman as the belt to a +prize-fighter, or a pipe of port to a college fellow." + +"'MARRIAGE.--A Bachelor----'" + +"Tell 'em a military man; all girls have the scarlet fever." + +"Very well--'an Officer in the Queen's, of considerable personal +attractions----'" + +"My dear fellow, pray don't!" expostulated Belle, in extreme alarm; "we +shall have such swarms of 'em!" + +"No, no! we must say that," persisted Gower--"'personal attractions, +aged eight-and-twenty----'" + +"Can't you put it, 'in the flower of his age,' or his 'sixth lustre'? +It's so much more poetic." + +"'--the flower of his age,' then (that'll leave 'em a wide range from +twenty to fifty, according to their taste), 'is desirous of meeting a +young lady of beauty, talent, and good family,'--eh?" + +"Yes. All women think themselves beauties, if they're as ugly as sin. +Milliners and confectioner girls talk Anglo-French, and rattle a +tin-kettle piano after a fashion, and anybody buys a 'family' for +half-a-crown at the Heralds' Office--so fire away." + +"'--who, feeling as he does the want of a kindred heart and sympathetic +soul, will accord him the favor of a letter or an interview, as a +preliminary to the greatest step in life.'" + +"A step--like one on thin ice--very sure to bring a man to grief," +interpolated Belle. "Say something about property; those soul-and-spirit +young ladies generally keep a look-out for tin, and only feel an +elective affinity for a lot of debentures and consols." + +"'The advertiser being a man of some present and still more prospective +wealth, requires no fortune, the sole objects of his search being love +and domestic felicity.' Domestic felicity--how horrible! Don't it sound +exactly like the end of a lady's novel, where the unlucky hero is always +brought to an untimely end in a 'sweet cottage on the banks of the +lovely Severn.'" + +"'Domestic felicity'--bah! What are you writing about?" yawned +Belle. "I'd as soon take to teetotalism: however, it'll tell in the +advertisement. Bravo, Tom, that will do. Address it to 'L. C., care of +Mrs. Greene, confectioner, St. Giles Street, Norwich.' Miss Patty'll +take the letters in for me, though not if she knew their errand. Tip +seven-and-sixpence with it, and send it to the _Daily Pryer_." + +We did send it to the _Daily_, and in that broadsheet we all of us read +it two mornings after. + + MARRIAGE.--A Bachelor, an Officer of the Queen's, of + considerable personal attractions, and in the flower of + his age, is desirous of meeting a young lady of beauty, + accomplishments, and good family, who, feeling as he does the + want of a kindred heart and sympathetic soul, will accord him + the favor either of a letter or an interview, as a preliminary + to the greatest step in life. The advertiser being a man of + some present and still more prospective wealth, requires no + fortune, the sole objects of his search being love and domestic + felicity. Address, L. C., care of Mrs. Greene, confectioner, + St. Giles Street, Norwich. + +"Whose advertisement do you imagine that is?" said Fairlie, showing the +_Daily_ to Geraldine, as he sat with her and her sisters under some +lilac and larch trees in one of the meadows of Fern Chase, which had had +the civility, Geraldine said, to yield a second crop of hay expressly +for her to have the pleasure of making it. She leaned down towards him +as he lay on the grass, and read the advertisement, looking uncommonly +pretty in her dainty muslin dress, with its fluttering mauve ribbons, +and a wreath she had just twisted up, of bluebells and pinks and white +heaths which Fairlie had gathered as he lay, put on her bright hair. We +called her a little flirt, but I think she was an unintentional one; at +least, her agaceries were, all as unconscious as they were--her worst +enemies (_i. e._ plain young ladies) had to allow--unaffected. + +"How exquisitely sentimental! Is it yours?" she asked, with demure +mischief. + +"Mine!" echoed Fairlie, with supreme scorn. + +"It's some one's here, because the address is at Mrs. Greene's. Come, +tell me at once, monsieur." + +"The only fool in the Artillery," said Fairlie, curtly: "Belle +Courtenay." + +"Captain Courtenay!" echoed Geraldine, with a little flush on her +cheeks, caused, perhaps, by the quick glance the Colonel shot at her as +he spoke. + +"Captain Courtenay!" said Katherine Vane. "Why, what can he want with a +wife? I thought he had _l'embarras de choix_ offered him in that line; +at least, so he makes out himself." + +"I dare say," said Fairlie, dryly, "it's for a bet he's made, to see how +many women he can hoax, I believe." + +"How can you tell it is a hoax?" said Geraldine, throwing cowslips at +her greyhound. "It may be some medium of intercourse with some one he +really cares for, and who may understand his meaning." + +"Perhaps you are in his confidence, Geraldine, or perhaps you are +thinking of answering it yourself?" + +"Perhaps," said the young lady, waywardly, making the cowslips into a +ball, "there might be worse investments. Your _bete noire_ is strikingly +handsome; he is the perfection of style; he is going to be Equerry to +the Prince; his mother is just married again to Lord Chevenix; he did +not name half his attractions in that line in the _Daily_." + +With which Geraldine rushed across the meadow after the greyhound and +the cowslip ball, and Fairlie lay quiet plucking up the heaths by the +roots. He lay there still, when the cowslip ball struck him a soft +fragrant blow against his lips, and knocked the Cuba from between his +teeth. + +"Why don't you speak?" asked Geraldine, plaintively. "You are not half +so pleasant to play with as you were before you went to India and I was +seven or eight, and you had La Grace, and battledoor and shuttlecock, +and cricket, and all sorts of games with me in the old garden at +Charlton." + +He might have told her she was much less dangerous then than now; he was +not disposed to flatter her, however. So he answered her quietly, + +"I preferred you as you were then." + +"Indeed!" said Geraldine, with a hot color in her cheeks "I do not think +there are many who would indorse your complimentary opinion." + +"Possibly," said Fairlie, coldly. + +She took up her cowslips, and hit him hard with them several times. + +"Don't speak in that tone. If you dislike me, you can say so in warmer +words, surely." + +Fairlie smiled _malgre lui_. + +"What a child you are, Geraldine! but a child that is a very mischievous +coquette, and has learned a hundred tricks and _agaceries_ of which my +little friend of seven or eight knew nothing. I grant you were not a +quarter so charming, but you were, I am afraid--more true." + +Geraldine was ready to cry, but she was in a passion, nevertheless; such +a hot and short-lived passion as all women of any spirit can go into on +occasion, when they are unjustly suspected. + +"If you choose to think so of me you may," she said, with immeasurable +hauteur, sweeping away from him, her mauve ribbons fluttering +disdainfully. "I, for one, shall not try to undeceive you." + +The next night we all went up to a ball at the Vanes', to drink Rhenish, +eat ices, quiz the women, flirt with the pretty ones in corners, lounge +against doorways, criticise the feet in the waltzing as they passed us, +and do, in fact, anything but what we went to do--dance,--according to +our custom in such scenes. + +The Swan and her Cygnets looked very stunning; they "made up well," as +ladies say when they cannot deny that another is good-looking, but +qualify your admiration by an assurance that she is shockingly plain in +the morning, and owes all to her milliner and maids. Geraldine, who, by +the greatest stretch of scepticism, could not be supposed "made up," was +bewitching, with her sunshiny enjoyment of everything, and her untiring +waltzing, going for all the world like a spinning-top, only a top tires, +and she did not. Belle, who made a principle of never dancing except +under extreme coercion by a very pretty hostess, could not resist her, +and Tom Gower, and Little Nell, and all the rest, not to mention half +Norfolk, crowded round her; all except Fairlie, who leaned against the +doorway, seeming to talk to her father or the members, or anybody near, +but watching the young lady for all that, who flirted not a little, +having in her mind the scene in the paddock of yesterday, and wishing, +perhaps, to show him that if he did not admire her more than when she +was eight, other men had better taste. + +She managed to come near him towards the end of the evening, sending +Belle to get her an ice. + +"Well," she said, with a comical _pitie d'elle-meme_, "do you dislike me +so much that you don't mean to dance with me at all? Not a single waltz +all night?" + +"What time have you had to give me?" said Fairlie, coldly. "You have +been surrounded all the evening." + +"Of course I have. I am not so disagreeable to other gentlemen as I am +to you. But I could have made time for you if you had only asked for it. +At your own ball last week you engaged me beforehand for six waltzes." + +Fairlie relented towards her. Despite her flirting, he thought she did +not care for Belle after all. + +"Well," he said, smiling, "will you give me one after supper?" + +"You told me you shouldn't dance, Colonel Fairlie," said Katherine Vane, +smiling. + +"One can't tell what one mayn't do under temptation," said Fairlie, +smiling too. "A man may change his mind, you know." + +"Oh yes," cried Geraldine; "a man may change his mind, and we are +expected to be eminently grateful to him for his condescension; but if +_we_ change our minds, how severely we are condemned for vacillation: +'So weak!' 'Just like women!' 'Never like the same thing two minutes, +poor things!'" + +"You don't like the same thing two minutes, Geraldine," laughed Fairlie; +"so I dare say you speak feelingly." + +"I changeable! I am constancy itself!" + +"Are you? You know what the Italians say of 'ocche azzure'?" + +"But I don't believe it, monsieur!" cried Geraldine: + + "Blue eyes beat black fifty to seven, + For black's of hell, but blue's of heaven!" + +"I beg your pardon, mademoiselle," laughed Fairlie: + + "Done, by the odds, it is not true! + One devil's black, but scores are blue!" + +He whirled her off into the circle in the midst of our laughter at their +ready wit. Soon after he bid her good night, but he found time to +whisper as he did so. + +"You are more like _my_ little Geraldine to-night!" + +The look he got made him determine to make her his little Geraldine +before much more time had passed. At least he drove us back to Norwich +in what seemed very contented silence, for he smoked tranquilly, and let +the horses go their own pace--two certain indications that a man has +pleasant thoughts to accompany him. + +I do not think he listened to Belle's, and Gower's, and my conversation, +not even when Belle took his weed out of his mouth and announced the +important fact: "Hardinge! my ten guineas, if you please. I've had a +letter!" + +"What! an answer? By Jove!" + +"Of course, an answer. I tell you all the pretty women in the city will +know my initials, and send after me. I only hope they _will_ be pretty, +and then one may have a good deal of fun. I was in at Greene's this +morning having mock-turtle, and talking to Patty (she's not bad-looking, +that little girl, only she drops her 'h's' so. I'm like that +fellow--what's his name?--in the 'Peau de Chagrin:' I don't admire my +loves in cotton prints), when she gave me the letter. I left it on my +dressing-table, but you can see it to-morrow. It's a horrid red +daubed-looking seal, and no crest; but that she mightn't use for fear of +being found out, and the writing is disguised, but that it would be. She +_says_ she has the three requisites; but where's the woman that don't +think herself Sappho and Galatea combined? And she was nineteen last +March. Poor little devil! she little thinks how she'll be done. I'm to +meet her on the Yarmouth road at two, and to look out for a lady +standing by the first milestone. Shall we go, Tom? It may lead to +something amusing, you know, though certainly it won't lead to +marriage." + +"Oh! we'll go, old fellow," said I. "Deuce take you, Belle! what a lucky +fellow you are with the women." + +"Luckier than I want to be," yawned Belle. "It's a horrid bore to be so +set upon. One may have too much of a good thing, you know." + +At two the day after, having refreshed ourselves with a light luncheon +at Mrs. Greene's of lobster-salad and pale ale, Belle, Gower, and I +buttoned our gloves and rode leisurely up the road. + +"How my heart palpitates!" said Belle, stroking his moustaches with a +bored air. "How can I tell, you know, but what I may be going to see the +arbiter of my destiny? Men have been tricked into all sorts of +tomfoolery by their compassionate feelings. And then--if she should +squint or have a turn-up nose! Good Heavens, what a fearful idea! I've +often wondered when I've seen men with ugly wives how they could have +been cheated into taking 'em; they couldn't have done it in their +senses, you know, nor yet with their eyes open. You may depend they took +'em to church in a state of coma from chloroform. 'Pon my word, I feel +quite nervous. You don't think the girl will have a parson and a +register hid behind the milestone, do you?" + +"If she should, it won't be legal without a license, thanks to the fools +who turn Hymen into a tax-gatherer, and won't let a fellow make love +without he asks leave of the Archbishop of Canterbury," said Gower. +"Hallo, Belle, here's the milestone, but where's the lady?" + +"Virgin modesty makes her unpunctual," said Belle, putting up his +eye-glass. + +"Hang modesty!" swore Tom. "It's past two, and we left a good quarter of +that salad uneaten. Confound her!" + +"There are no signs of her," said I. "Did she tell you her dress, +Belle?" + +"Not a syllable about it; only mentioned a milestone, and one might have +found a market-woman sitting on that." + +"Hallo! here's something feminine. Oh, good gracious! this can't be it, +it's got a brown stuff dress on, and a poke straw bonnet and a green +veil. No, no, Belle. If you married her, that _would_ be a case of +chloroform." + +But the horrible brown stuff came sidling along the road with that +peculiar step belonging to ladies of a certain age, characterized by +Patty Greene as "tipputting," sweeping up the dust with its horrible +folds, making straight _en route_ for Belle, who was standing a little +in advance of us. Nineteen! Good Heavens! she must have been fifty if +she was a day, and under her green veil was a chestnut front--yes, +decidedly a front--and a face yellow as a Canadian's, and wrinkled as +Madame Pipelet's, made infinitely worse by that sweet maiden simper and +assumed juvenility common to _vieilles filles_. Up she came towards poor +Belle, who involuntarily retreated step by step till he had backed +against the milestone, and could get no farther, while she smiled up in +his handsome face, and he stared down in her withered one, with the most +comical expression of surprise, dismay, and horror that had ever +appeared on our "beauty's" impassive features. + +"Are you--the--the--L. C.?" demanded the maiden of ten lustres, casting +her eyes to the ground with virgin modesty. + +"L. C. ar----My dear madam, I don't quite understand you," faltered +Belle, taken aback for once in his life. + +"Was it not you," faltered the fair one, shaking out a +pocket-handkerchief that sent a horrible odor of musk to the olfactory +nerves of poor Belle, most fastidious connoisseur in perfume, "who +advertised for a kindred heart and sympathetic soul?" + +"Really, my good lady," began Belle, still too aghast by the chestnut +front to recover his self-possession. + +"Because," simpered his inamorata, too agitated by her own feelings to +hear his horrible appellative, keeping him at bay there with the fatal +milestone behind him and the awful brown stuff in front of him--"because +I, too, have desired to meet with some elective affinity, some +spirit-tie that might give me all those more subtle sympathies which can +never be found in the din and bustle of the heartless world; I, too, +have pined for the objects of your search--love and domestic happiness. +Oh, blessed words, surely we might--might we not?----" + +She paused, overcome with maidenly confusion, and buried her face in the +musk-scented handkerchief. Tom and I, where we stood _perdus_, burst +into uncontrollable shouts of laughter. Poor Belle gave one blank look +of utter terror at the _tout ensemble_ of brown stuff, straw poke, and +chestnut front. He forgot courtesy, manners, and everything else; his +lips were parted, with his small white teeth glancing under his silky +moustaches, his sleepy eyes were open wide, and as the maiden lady +dropped her handkerchief, and gave him what she meant to be the softest +and most tender glance, he turned straight round, sprang on his bay, and +rushed down the Yarmouth road as if the whole of the dignitaries of the +church and law were tearing after him to force him _nolens volens_ into +carrying out the horrible promise in his cursed line in the _Daily_. +What was Tom's and my amazement to see the maiden lady seat herself +astride on the milestone, and join her cachinnatory shouts to ours, +fling her green veil into a hawthorn tree, jerk her bonnet into our +faces, kick off her brown stuff into the middle of the road, tear off +her chestnut front and yellow mask, and perform a frantic war-dance on +the roadside turf. No less a person than that mischievous monkey and +inimitable mimic Little Nell! + +"You young demon!" shouted Gower, shrieking with laughter till he cried. +"A pretty fellow you are to go tricking your senior officer like this. +You little imp, how can you tell but what I shall court-martial you +to-morrow?" + +"No, no, you won't!" cried Little Nell, pursuing his frantic dance. +"Wasn't it prime? wasn't it glorious? wasn't it worth the Kohinoor to +see? You won't go and peach, when I've just given you a better farce +than all old Buckstone's? By Jove! Belle's face at my chestnut front! +This'll be one of his prime conquests, eh? I say, old fellows, when +Charles Mathews goes to glory, don't you think I might take his place, +and beat him hollow, too?" + +When we got back to barracks, we found Belle prostrate on his sofa, +heated, injured, crestfallen, solacing himself with Seltzer-and-water, +and swearing away anything but mildly at that "wretched old woman." He +bound us over to secrecy, which, with Little Nell's confidence in our +minds, we naturally promised. Poor Belle! to have been made a fool of +before two was humiliation more than sufficient for our all-conquering +_blondin_. For one who had so often refused to stir across a ball-room +to look at a Court beauty, to have ridden out three miles to see an old +maid of fifty with a chestnut front! The insult sank deep into his soul, +and threw him into an abject melancholy, which hung over him all through +mess, and was not dissipated till a letter came to him from Mrs. +Greene's, when we were playing loo in Fairlie's room. That night Fairlie +was in gay spirits. He had called at Fern Chase that morning, and though +he had not been able to see Geraldine alone, he had passed a pleasant +couple of hours there, playing pool with her and her sisters, and had +been as good friends as ever with his old playmate. + +"Well, Belle," said he, feeling good-natured even with him that night, +"did you get any good out of your advertisement? Did your lady turn out +a very pretty one?" + +"No: deuced ugly, like the generality," yawned poor Belle, giving me a +kick to remind me of my promise. Little Nell was happily about the city +somewhere with Pretty Face, or the boy would scarcely have kept his +countenance. + +"What amusement you can find in hoaxing silly women," said Fairlie, "is +incomprehensible to me. However, men's tastes differ, happily. Here +comes another epistle for you, Belle; perhaps there's better luck for +you there." + +"Oh! I shall have no end of letters. I sha'n't answer any more. I think +it's such a deuced trouble. Diamonds trumps, eh?" said Belle, laying the +note down till he should have leisure to attend to it. Poor old fellow! +I dare say he was afraid of another onslaught from maiden ladies. + +"Come, Belle," said Glenville; "come, Belle, open your letter; we're all +impatience. If you won't go, I will in your place." + +"Do, my dear fellow. Take care you're not pounced down upon by a +respectable papa for intentions, or called to account by a fierce +brother with a stubby beard," said Belle, lazily taking up the letter. +As he did so, the melancholy indolence on his face changed to eagerness. + +"The deuce! the Vane crest!" + +"A note of invitation, probably?" suggested Gower. + +"Would they send an invitation to Patty Greene's? I tell you it's +addressed to L. C.," said Belle, disdainfully, opening the letter, +leaving its giant deer couchant intact. "I thought it very likely; I +expected it, indeed--poor little dear! I oughtn't to have let it out. +Ain't you jealous, old fellows? Little darling! Perhaps I may be tricked +into matrimony after all. I'd rather a presentiment that advertisement +would come to something. There, you may all look at it, if you like." + +It was a dainty sheet of scented cream-laid, stamped with the deer +couchant, such as had brought us many an invitation down from Fern +Chase, and on it was written, in delicate caligraphy: + +"G. V. understands the meaning of the advertisement, and will meet L. C. +at the entrance of Fern Wood, at eleven o'clock to-morrow morning." + +There was a dead silence as we read it; then a tremendous buzz. Cheaply +as we held women, I don't think there was one of us who wasn't surprised +at Geraldine's doing any clandestine thing like this. He sat with a look +of indolent triumph, curling his perfumed moustaches, and looking at the +little autograph, which gave us evidence of what he often +boasted--Geraldine Vane's regard. + +"Let me look at your note," said Fairlie, stretching out his hand. + +He soon returned it, with a brief, "Very complimentary indeed!" + +When the men left, I chanced to be last, having mislaid my cigar-case. +As I looked about for it, Fairlie addressed me in the same brief, stern +tone between his teeth with which he spoke to Belle. + +"Hardinge, you made this absurd bet with Courtenay, did you not? Is this +note a hoax upon him?" + +"Not that I know of--it doesn't look like it. You see there is the Vane +crest, and the girl's own initials." + +"Very true." He turned round to the window again, and leaned against it, +looking out into the dawn, with a look upon his face that I was very +sorry to see. + +"But it is not like Geraldine," I began. "It may be a trick. Somebody +may have stolen their paper and crest--it's possible. I tell you what +I'll do to find out; I'll follow Belle to-morrow, and see who does meet +him in Fern Wood." + +"Do," said Fairlie, eagerly. Then he checked himself, and went on +tapping an impatient tattoo on the shutter. "You see, I have known the +family for years--known her when she was a little child. I should be +sorry to think that one of them could be capable of such----" + +Despite his self-command he could not finish his sentence. Geraldine was +a great deal too dear to him to be treated in seeming carelessness, or +spoken lightly of, however unwisely she might act. I found my +cigar-case. His laconic "Good night!" told me he would rather be alone, +so I closed the door and left him. + +The morning was as sultry and as clear as a July day could be when Belle +lounged down the street, looking the perfection of a gentleman, a trifle +less bored and _blase_ than ordinary, _en route_ to his appointment at +Fern Wood (a sequestered part of the Vane estate), where trees and +lilies of the valley grew wild, and where the girls were accustomed to +go for picnics or sketching. As soon as he had turned a corner, Gower +and I turned it too, and with perseverance worthy a better cause, Tom +and I followed Belle in and out and down the road which led to Fern +Wood--a flat, dusty, stony two miles--on which, in the blazing noon of a +hot midsummer day, nothing short of Satanic coercion, or love of +Geraldine Vane, would have induced our beauty to immolate himself, and +expose his delicate complexion. + +"I bet you anything, Tom," said I, confidently, "that this is a hoax, +like yesterday's. Geraldine will no more meet Belle there than all the +Ordnance Office." + +"Well, we shall see," responded Gower. "Somebody might get the +note-paper from the bookseller, and the crest seal through the servants, +but they'll hardly get Geraldine there bodily against her will." + +We waited at the entrance of the wood, shrouded ourselves in the wild +hawthorn hedges, while we could still see Belle--of course we did not +mean to be near enough to overhear him--who paced up and down the green +alleys under the firs and larches, rendered doubly dark by the +evergreens, brambles, and honeysuckles, + + which, ripened by the sun, + Forbade the sun to enter. + +He paced up and down there a good ten minutes, prying about with his +eye-glass, but unable to see very far in the tangled boughs, and heavy +dusky light of the untrimmed wood. Then there was the flutter of +something azure among the branches, and Gower gave vent to a low whistle +of surprise. + +"By George, Hardinge! there's Geraldine! Well! I didn't think she'd have +done it. You see they're all alike if they get the opportunity." + +It _was_ Geraldine herself--it was her fluttering muslin, her abundant +folds, her waving ribbons, her tiny sailor hat, and her little veil, and +under the veil her face, with its delicate tinting, its pencilled +eyebrows, and its undulating bright-colored hair. There was no doubt +about it: it was Geraldine. I vow I was as sorry to have to tell it to +Fairlie as if I'd had to tell him she was dead, for I knew how it would +cut him to the heart to know not only that she had given herself to his +rival, but that his little playmate, whom he had thought truth, and +honesty, and daylight itself, should have stooped to a clandestine +interview arranged through an advertisement! Their retreating figures +were soon lost in the dim woodland, and Tom and I turned to retrace our +steps. + +"No doubt about it now, old fellow?" quoth Gower. + +"No, confound her!" swore I. + +"Confound her? _Et pourquoi!_ Hasn't she a right to do what she likes?" + +"Of course she has, the cursed little flirt; but she'd no earthly +business to go making such love to Fairlie. It's a rascally shame, and I +don't care if I tell her so myself." + +"She'll only say you're in love with her too," was Gower's sensible +response. "I'm not surprised myself. I always said she was an +out-and-out coquette." + +I met Fairlie coming out of his room as I went up to mine. He looked as +men will look when they have not been in bed all night, and have watched +the sun up with painful thoughts for their companions. + +"You have been----" he began; then stopped short, unwilling or unable to +put the question into words. + +"After Belle? Yes. It is no hoax, Geraldine met him herself." + +I did not relish telling him, and therefore told it, in all probability, +bluntly and blunderingly--tact, like talk, having, they say, been given +to women. A spasm passed over his face. "_Herself!_" he echoed. Until +then I do not think he had realized it as even possible. + +"Yes, there was no doubt about it. What a wretched little coquette she +must have been; she always seemed to make such game of Belle----" + +But Fairlie, saying something about his gloves that he had left behind, +had gone back into his room again before I had half done my sentence. +When Belle came back, about half an hour afterwards, with an affected +air of triumph, and for once in his life of languid sensations really +well contented, Gower and I poured questions upon him, as, done up with +the toil of his dusty walk, and horrified to find himself so low-bred as +to be hot, he kicked off his varnished boots, imbibed Seltzer, and +fanned himself with a periodical before he could find breath to answer +us. + +"Was it Geraldine?" + +"Of course it was Geraldine," he said, yawning. + +"And will she marry you, Belle?" + +"To be sure she will. I should like to see the woman that wouldn't," +responded Belle, shutting his eyes and nestling down among the cushions. +"And what's more, I've been fool enough to let her make me ask her. Give +me some more sherry, Phil; a man wants support under such circumstances. +The deuce if I'm not as hot as a ploughboy! It was very cruel of her to +call a fellow out with the sun at the meridian; she might as well have +chosen twilight. But, I say, you fellows, keep the secret, will you? she +don't want her family to get wind of it, because they're bothering her +to marry that old cove, Mount Trefoil, with his sixty years and his +broad acres, and wouldn't let her take anybody else if they knew it; +she's under age, you see." + +"But how did she know you were L. C.?" + +"Fairlie told her, and the dear little vain thing immediately thought it +was an indirect proposal to herself, and answered it; of course I didn't +undeceive her. She _raffoles_ of me--it'll be almost too much of a good +thing, I'm afraid. She's deuced prudish, too, much more than I should +have thought _she_'d have been; but I vow she'd only let me kiss her +hand, and that was gloved." + +"I hate prudes," said Gower; "they've always much more devilry than the +open-hearted ones. Videlicet--here's your young lady stiff enough only +to give you her hand to kiss, and yet she'll lower herself to a +clandestine correspondence and stolen interviews--a condescension I +don't think I should admire in _my_ wife." + +"Love, my dear fellow, oversteps all--what d'ye call 'em?--boundaries," +said Belle, languidly. "What a bore! I shall never be able to wear this +coat again, it's so ingrained with dust; little puss, why didn't she +wait till it was cooler?" + +"Did you fix your marriage-day?" asked Tom, rather contemptuously. + +"Yes, I was very weak!" sighed Belle; "but you see she's uncommonly +pretty, and there's Mount Trefoil and lots of men, and, I fancy, that +dangerous fellow Fairlie, after her; so we hurried matters. We've been +making love to one another all these three months, you know, and fixed +it so soon as Thursday week. Of course she blushed, and sighed, and put +her handkerchief to her eyes, and all the rest of it, _en regle_; but +she consented, and I'm to be sacrificed. But not a word about it, my +dear fellows! The Vanes are to be kept in profoundest darkness, and, to +lull suspicion, I'm not to go there scarcely at all until then, and when +I do, she'll let me know when she will be out, and I'm to call on her +mother then. She'll write to me, and put the letters in a hollow tree in +the wood, where I'm to leave my answers, or, rather, send 'em; catch me +going over that road again! Don't give me joy, old boys. I know I'm +making a holocaust of myself, but deuce take me if I can help it--she is +so deuced pretty!" + +Fairlie was not at mess that night. Nobody knew where he was. I learnt, +long months afterwards, that as soon as I had told him of Geraldine's +identity, he, still thirsting to disbelieve, reluctant to condemn, +catching at straws to save his idol from being shattered as men in love +will do, had thrown himself across his horse and torn off to Fern Dell +to see whether or no Geraldine was at home. + +His heart beat faster and thicker as he entered the drawing-room than it +had done before the lines at Ferozeshah, or in the giant semicircle at +Sobraon; it stood still as in the far end of the room, lying back on a +low chair, sat Geraldine, her gloves and sailor hat lying on her lap. +She sprang up to welcome him with her old gay smile. + +"Good God! that a child like that can be such an accomplished actress!" +thought Fairlie, as he just touched her hand. + +"Have you been out to-day?" he asked suddenly. + +"You see I have." + +"Prevarication is conviction," thought Fairlie, with a deadly chill over +him. + +"Where did you go, love?" asked mamma. + +"To see Adela Ferrers; she is not well, you know, and I came home +through part of the wood to gather some of the anemones; I don't mean +anemones, they are over--lilies of the valley." + +She spoke hurriedly, glancing at Fairlie all the time, who never took +his iron gaze off her, though all the beauty and glory was draining away +from his life with every succeeding proof that stared him in the face +with its cruel evidence. + +At that minute Lady Vane was called from the room to give some +directions to her head gardener about some flowers, over which she was +particularly choice, and Fairlie and Geraldine were left in dead +silence, with only the ticking of the timepiece and the chirrup of the +birds outside the open windows to break its heavy monotony. + +Fairlie bent over a spaniel, rolling the dog backwards and forwards on +the rug. + +Geraldine stood on the rug, her head on one side in her old pretty +attitude of plaintiveness and defiance, the bright sunshine falling +round her and playing on her gay dress and fair hair--a tableau lost +upon the Colonel, who though he had risen too, was playing sedulously +with the dog. + +"Colonel Fairlie, what is the matter with you? How unkind you are +to-day!" + +Fairlie was roused at last, disgusted that so young a girl could be so +accomplished a liar and actress, sick at heart that he had been so +deceived, mad with jealousy, and that devil in him sent courtesy flying +to the winds. + +"Pardon me, Miss Vane, you waste your coquetteries on me. Unhappily, I +know their value, and am not likely to be duped by them." + +Geraldine's face flushed as deep a rose hue as the geraniums nodding +their heads in at the windows. + +"Coquetteries?--duped? What do you mean?" + +"You know well enough what. All I warn you is, never try them again on +me--never come near me any more with your innocent smiles and your lying +lips, or, by Heaven, Geraldine Vane, I may say what I think of you in +plainer words than suit the delicacy of a lady's ears!" + +Geraldine's eyes flashed fire; from rose-hued as the geraniums she +changed to the dead white of the Guelder roses beside them. + +"Colonel Fairlie, you are mad, I think! If you only came here to insult +me----" + +"I had better leave? I agree with you. Good morning." + +Wherewith Fairlie took his hat and whip, bowed himself out, and, +throwing himself across his horse, tore away many miles beyond Norwich, +I should say, and rode into the stable-yard at twelve o'clock that +night, his horse with every hair wringing and limb trembling at the +headlong pace he had been ridden; such a midnight gallop as only +Mazeppa, or a Border rider, or Turpin racing for his life, or a man +vainly seeking to leave behind him some pursuing ghost of memory or +passion, ever took before. + +We saw little of him for the next few days. Luckily for him, he was +employed to purchase several strings of Suffolk horses for the corps, +and he rode about the country a good deal, and went over to Newmarket, +and to the Bury horse fair, inspecting the cattle, glad, I dare say, of +an excuse to get away. + +"I feel nervous, terribly nervous; do give me the Seltzer and hock, Tom. +They wonder at the fellows asking for beer before their execution. I +don't; and if a fellow wants it to keep his spirits up before he's +hanged, he may surely want it before he's married, for one's a swing and +a crash, and it's all over and done most likely before you've time to +know anything about it; but the other you walk into so deliberately, +superintend the sacrifice of yourself, as it were, like that old cove +Seneca; feel yourself rolling down-hill like Regulus, with all the +horrid nails of the 'domesticities' pricking you in every corner; see +life ebbing away from you; all the sunshine of life, as poets have it, +fading, sweetly but surely, from your grasp, and Death, _alias_ the +Matrimonial Black Cap, coming down ruthlessly on your devoted heads. I +feel low--shockingly low. Pass me the Seltzer, Tom, do!" + +So spake Geraldine's _sposo_ that was to be, on the evening before his +marriage-day, lying on his sofa in his Cashmere dressing-gown, his gold +embroidered slippers, and his velvet smoking-cap, puffing largely at his +meerschaum, and unbosoming his private sentiments and emotions to the +(on this score) sufficiently sympathetic listeners, Gower and I. + +"I don't pity you!" said Tom, contemptuously, who had as much disdain +for a man who married as for one who bought gooseberry for champagne, or +Cape for comet hock, and did not know the difference--"I don't pity you +one bit. You've put the curb on yourself; you can't complain if you get +driven where you don't like." + +"But, my dear fellow, _can_ one help it?" expostulated Belle, +pathetically. "When a little winning, bewitching, attractive little +animal like that takes you in hand, and traps you as you catch a pony, +holding out a sieve of oats, and coaxing you, and so-ho-ing you till +she's fairly got the bridle over your head, and the bit between your +teeth, what is a man to do?" + +"Remember that as soon as the bit is in your mouth, she'll never trouble +herself to give you any oats, or so-ho you softly any more, but will +take the whip hand of you, and not let you have the faintest phantom of +a will of your own ever again," growled the misogamistic Tom. + +"Catch a man's remembering while it's any use," was Belle's very true +rejoinder. "After he's put his hand to a little bill, he'll remember +it's a very green thing to do, but he don't often remember it before, I +fancy. No, in things like this, one can't help one's self; one's time is +come, and one goes down before fate. If anybody had told me that I +should go as spooney about any woman as I have about that little girl +Geraldine, I'd have given 'em the lie direct; I would, indeed! But then +she made such desperate love to me, took such a deuced fancy to me, you +see: else, after all, the women _I_ might have chosen----By George! I +wonder what Lady Con, and the little Bosanquet, and poor Honoria, and +all the rest of 'em will say?" + +"What?" said Gower; "say 'Poor dear fellow!' to you, and 'Poor girl, I +pity her!' to your wife. So you're going to elope with Miss Geraldine? A +man's generally too ready to marry his daughters, to force a fellow to +carry them off by stealth. Besides, as Bulwer says somewhere, +'_Gentlemen_ don't run away with the daughters of gentlemen.'" + +"Pooh, nonsense! all's fair in love or war," returned Belle, going into +the hock and Seltzer to keep up his spirits. "You see, she's afraid, her +governor's mind being so set on old Mount Trefoil and his baron's +coronet; they might offer some opposition, put it off till she was +one-and-twenty, you know--and she's so distractedly fond of me, poor +little thing, that she'd die under the probation, probably--and I'm sure +I couldn't keep faithful to her for two mortal years. Besides, there's +something amusing in eloping; the excitement of it keeps up one's +spirits; whereas, if I were marched to church with so many mourners--I +mean groomsmen--I should feel I was rehearsing my own obsequies like +Charles V., and should funk it, ten to one I should. No! I like eloping: +it gives the certain flavor of forbidden fruit, which many things, +besides pure water, want to 'give them a relish.'" + +"Let's see how's the thing to be managed?" asked Gower. "Beyond telling +me I was to go with you, consigned ignominiously to the rumble, to +witness the ceremony, I'm not very clear as to the programme." + +"Why, as soon as it's dawn," responded Belle, with leisurely whiffs of +his meerschaum, "I'm to take the carriage up to the gate at Fern +Wood--this is what she tells me in her last note; she was coming to meet +me, but just as she was dressed her mother took her to call on some +people, and she had to resort to the old hollow tree. The deuce is in +it, I think, to prevent our meeting; if it weren't for the letters and +her maid, we should have been horribly put to it for communication;--I'm +to take the carriage, as I say, and drive up there, where she and her +maid will be waiting. We drive away, of course, catch the 8.15 train, +and cut off to town, and get married at the Regeneration, Piccadilly, +where a fellow I know very well will act the priestly Calcraft. The +thing that bothers me most of all is getting up so early. I used to hate +it so awfully when I was a young one at the college. I like to have my +bath, and my coffee, and my paper leisurely, and saunter through my +dressing, and get up when the day's _warmed_ for me. Early parade's one +of the crying cruelties of the service; I always turn in again after it, +and regard it as a hideous nightmare. I vow I couldn't give a greater +test of my devotion than by getting up at six o'clock to go after +her--deuced horrible exertion! I'm quite certain that my linen won't be +aired, nor my coffee fit to drink, nor Perkins with his eyes half open, +nor a quarter of his wits about him. Six o'clock! By George! nothing +should get me up at that unearthly hour except my dear, divine, +delicious little demon Geraldine! But she's so deuced fond of me, one +must make sacrifices for such a little darling." + +With which sublimely unselfish and heroic sentiment the bridegroom-elect +drank the last of his hock and Seltzer, took his pipe out of his lips, +flung his smoking-cap lazily on to his Skye's head, who did not relish +the attention, and rose languidly to get into his undress in time for +mess. + +As Belle had to get up so frightfully early in the morning, he did not +think it worth while to go to bed at all, but asked us all to +vingt-et-un in his room, where, with the rattle of half-sovereigns and +the flow of rum-punch, kept up his courage before the impending doom of +matrimony. Belle was really in love with Geraldine, but in love in his +own particular way, and consoled himself for his destiny and her absence +by what I dare say seems to mademoiselle, fresh from her perusal of +"Aurora Leigh" or "Lucille," very material comforters indeed. But, if +truth were told, I am afraid mademoiselle would find, save that from one +or two fellows here and there, who go in for love as they go in for +pig-sticking or tiger-hunting, with all their might and main, wagering +even their lives in the sport, the Auroras and Lucilles are very apt to +have their charms supplanted by the points of a favorite, their absence +made endurable by the aroma of Turkish tobacco, and their last fond +admonishing words, spoken with such persuasive caresses under the +moonlight and the limes, against those "horrid cards, love," forgotten +that very night under the glare of gas, while the hands that lately held +their own so tenderly, clasp wellnigh with as much affection the +unprecedented luck "two honors and five trumps!" + + Man's love is of man's life a thing apart. + +Byron was right; and if we go no deeper, how can it well be otherwise, +when we have our stud, our pipe, our Pytchley, our Newmarket, our club, +our coulisses, our Mabille, and our Epsom, and they--oh, Heaven help +them!--have no distraction but a needle or a novel! The Fates forbid +that our _agremens_ should be _less_, but I dare say, if they had a vote +in it, they'd try to get a trifle _more_. So Belle put his "love apart," +to keep (or to rust, whichever you please) till six A. M. that morning, +when, having by dint of extreme physical exertion got himself dressed, +saw his valet pack his things with the keenest anxiety relative to the +immaculate folding of his coats and the safe repose of his shirts, and +at last was ready to go and fetch the bride his line in the _Daily_ had +procured him. + +As Belle went down the stairs with Gower, who should come too, with his +gun in his hand, his cap over his eyes, and a pointer following close at +his heels, but Fairlie, going out to shoot over a friend's manor. + +Of course he knew that Belle had asked for and obtained leave for a +couple of months, but he had never heard for what purpose; and possibly, +as he saw him at such an unusual hour, going out, not in his usual +travelling guise of a wide-awake and a Maude, but with a delicate +lavender tie and a toilet of the most unexceptionable art, the purport +of his journey flashed fully on his mind, for his face grew as fixed and +unreadable as if he had had on the iron mask. Belle, guessing as he did +that Fairlie would not have disliked to have been in his place that +morning, was too kind-hearted and infinitely too much of a gentleman to +hint at his own triumph. He laughed, and nodded a good morning. + +"Off early, you see, Fairlie; going to make the most of my leave. +'Tisn't very often we can get one; our corps is deuced stiff and strict +compared to the Guards and the Cavalry." + +"At least our strictness keeps us from such disgraceful scenes as some +of the other regiments have shown up of late," answered Fairlie between +his teeth. + +"Ah! well, perhaps so; still, strictness ain't pleasant, you know, when +one's the victim." + +"Certainly not." + +"And, therefore, we should never be hard upon others." + +"I perfectly agree with you." + +"There's a good fellow. Well, I must be off; I've no time for +philosophizing. Good-bye, Colonel." + +"Good-bye--a safe journey." + +But I noticed that he held the dog's collar in one hand and the gun in +the other, so as to have an excuse for not offering that _poignee de +main_ which ought to be as sure a type of friendship, and as safe a +guarantee for good faith, as the Bedouin Arab's salt. + +Belle nodded him a farewell, and lounged down the steps and into the +carriage, just as Fairlie's man brought his mare round. + +Fairlie turned on to me with unusual fierceness, for generally he was +very calm, and gentle, and impassive in manner. + +"Where is he gone?" + +I could not help but tell him, reluctant though I was, for I guessed +pretty well what it would cost him to hear it. He did not say one word +while I told him, but bent over Marquis, drawing the dog's leash +tighter, so that I might not see his face, and without a sign or a reply +he was out of the barracks, across his mare's back, and rushing away at +a mad gallop, as if he would leave thought, and memory, and the curse of +love for a worthless woman behind him for ever. + +His man stood looking at the gun Fairlie had thrown to him with a +puzzled expression. + +"Is the Colonel gone mad?" I heard him say to himself. "The devil's in +it, I think. He used to treat his things a little carefuller than this. +As I live, he's been and gone and broke the trigger?" + +The devil wasn't in it, but a woman _was_, an individual that causes as +much mischief as any Asmodeus, Belphegor, or Mephistopheles. Some fair +unknown correspondents assured me the other day, in a letter, that my +satire on women was "a monstrous libel." All I can say is, that if it +_be_ a libel, it is like many a one for which one pays the highest, and +which sounds the blackest--a libel that is _true_! + +While his rival rode away as recklessly as though he was riding for his +life, the gallant bridegroom--as the _Court Circular_ would have +it--rolled on his way to Fern Wood, while Gower, very amiably occupying +the rumble, smoked, and bore his position philosophically, comforted by +the recollection that Geraldine's French maid was an uncommonly +good-looking, coquettish little person. + +They rolled on, and speedily the postilion pulled up, according to +order, before the white five-bar gate, its paint blistering in the hot +summer dawn, and the great fern-leaves and long grass clinging up round +its posts, still damp with the six o'clock dew. Five minutes passed--ten +minutes--a quarter of an hour. Poor Belle got impatient. Twenty +minutes--five-and-twenty--thirty. Belle couldn't stand it. He began to +pace up and down the turf, soiling his boots frightfully with the long +wet grass, and rejecting all Tom's offers of consolation and a +cigar-case. + +"Confound it!" cried poor Belle, piteously, "I thought women were always +ready to marry. I know, when I went to turn off Lacquers of the Rifles +at St. George's, his bride had been waiting for him half an hour, and +was in an awful state of mind, and all the other brides as well, for you +know they always marry first the girl that gets there first, and all the +other poor wretches were kept on tenter-hooks too. Lacquers had lost the +ring, and found it in his waistcoat after all! I say, Tom, devil take +it, where can she be? It's forty minutes, as I live. We shall lose the +train, you know. She's never prevented coming, surely. I think she'd let +me hear, don't you? She could send Justine to me if she couldn't come by +any wretched chance. Good Heavens, Tom, what shall I do?" + +"Wait, and don't worry," was Tom's laconic and common-sense advice; +about the most irritating probably to a lover's feelings that could +pretty well be imagined. Belle swore at him in stronger terms than he +generally exerted himself to use, but was pulled up in the middle of +them by the sight of Geraldine and Justine, followed by a boy bearing +his bride's dainty trunks. + +On came Geraldine in a travelling-dress; Justine following after her, +with a brilliant smile, that showed all her white teeth, at "Monsieur +Torm," for whom she had a very tender friendship, consolidated by +certain half-sovereigns and French phrases whispered by Gower after his +dinners at Fern Chase. + +Belle met Geraldine with all that tender _empressement_ which he knew +well how to put into his slightest actions; but the young lady seemed +already almost to have begun repenting her hasty step. She hung her head +down, she held a handkerchief to her bright eyes, and to Belle's +tenderest and most ecstatic whispers she only answered by a convulsive +pressure of the arm, into which he had drawn her left hand, and a +half-smothered sob from her heart's depths. + +Belle thought it all natural enough under the circumstances. He knew +women always made a point of impressing upon you that they are making a +frightful sacrifice for your good when they condescend to accept you, +and he whispered what tender consolation occurred to him as best fitted +for the occasion, thanked her, of course, for all the rapture, &c. &c., +assured her of his life-long devotion--you know the style--and lifted +her into the carriage, Geraldine only responding with broken sighs and +stifled sobs. + +The boxes were soon beside Belle's valises, Justine soon beside Gower, +the postilion cracked his whip over his outsider, Perkins refolded his +arms, and the carriage rolled down the lane. + +Gower was very well contented with his seat in the rumble. Justine was a +very dainty little Frenchwoman, with the smoothest hair and the whitest +teeth in the world, and she and "Monsieur Torm" were eminently good +friends, as I have told you, though to-day she was very coquettish and +wilful, and laughed _a propos de bottes_ at Gower, say what Chaumiere +compliments he might. + +"Ma chere et charmante petite," expostulated Tom, "tes moues mutines +sont ravissantes, mais je t'avoue que je prefere tes----" + +"Tais-toi, becasse!" cried Justine, giving him a blow with her parasol, +and going off into what she would have called _eclats de rire_. + +"Mais ecoute-moi, Justine," whispered Tom, piqued by her perversity; "je +raffole de toi! je t'adore, sur ma parole! je----Hallo! what the devil's +the matter? Good gracious! Deuce take it!" + +Well might Tom call on his Satanic Majesty to explain what met his eyes +as he gave vent to all three ejaculations and maledictions. No less a +sight than the carriage-door flying violently open, Belle descending +with a violent impetus, his face crimson, and his hat in his hand, +clearing the hedge at a bound, plunging up to his ankles in mud on the +other side of it, and starting across country at the top of his speed, +rushing frantically straight over the heavy grass-land as if he had just +escaped from Hanwell, and the whole hue and cry of keepers and policemen +was let loose at his heels. + +"Good Heavens! By Jove! Belle, Belle, I say, stop! Are you mad? What's +happened? What's the row? I say--the devil!" + +But to his coherent but very natural exclamations poor Tom received no +answer. Justine was screaming with laughter, the postilion was staring, +Perkins swearing, Belle, flying across the country at express speed, +rapidly diminishing into a small black dot in the green landscape, while +from inside the carriage, from Geraldine, from the deserted bride, peals +of laughter, loud, long, and uproarious, rang out in the summer +stillness of the early morning. + +"By Jupiter! but this is most extraordinary. The deuce is in it. Are +they both gone stark staring mad?" asked Tom of his Cuba, or the +blackbirds, or the hedge-cutter afar off, or anything or anybody that +might turn out so amiable as to solve his problem for him. + +No reply being given him, however, Tom could stand it no longer. Down he +sprang, jerked the door open again, and put his head into the carriage. + +"Hallo, old boy, done green, eh? Pity 'tisn't the 1st of April!" cried +Geraldine, with renewed screams of mirth from the interior. + +"Eh? What? What did you say, Miss Vane?" ejaculated Gower, fairly +staggered by this extraordinary answer of a young girl, a lady, and a +forsaken bride. + +"What did I say, my dear fellow? Why, that you're done most preciously, +and that I fancy it'll be a deuced long time before your delectable +friend tries his hand at matrimony again, that's all. Done! oh, by +George, he is done, and no mistake. Look at me, sir, ain't I a charming +bride?" + +With which elegant language Geraldine took off her hat, pulled down some +false braids, pushed her hair off her forehead, shook her head like a +water-dog after a bath, and grinned in Gower's astonished eyes--_not_ +Geraldine, but her twin-brother, Pretty Face! + +"Do you know me now, old boy?" asked the Etonian, with demoniacal +delight,--"do you know me now? Haven't I chiselled him--haven't I +tricked him--haven't I done him as green as young gooseberries, and as +brown as that bag? Do you fancy he'll boast of his conquests again, or +advertise for another wife? So you didn't know how I got Gary Clements, +of the Ten Bells, to write the letters for me? and Justine to dress me +in Geraldine's things? You know they always did say they couldn't tell +her from me; I've proved it now, eh?--rather! Oh, by George, I never had +a better luck! and not a creature guesses it, not a soul, save Justine, +Nell, and I! By Jupiter, Gower, if you'd heard that unlucky Belle go on +swearing devotion interminable, and enough love to stock all Mudie's +novels! But I never dare let him kiss me, though my beard is down, +confound it! Oh! what jolly fun it's been, Gower, no words can tell. I +always said he shouldn't marry her; he'll hardly try to do it now, I +fancy! What a lark it's been! I couldn't have done it, you know, without +that spicy little French girl;--she did my hair, and got up my +crinoline, and stole Geraldine's dress, and tricked me up altogether, +and carried my notes to the hollow oak, and took all my messages to +Belle. Oh, Jupiter! what fun it's been! If Belle isn't gone clean out of +his senses, it's very odd to me. When he was going to kiss me, and +whispered, 'My dearest, my darling, my wife!' I just took off my hat and +grinned in his face, and said, 'Ain't this a glorious go? Oh! by +George, Gower, I think the fun will kill me!'" + +And the wicked little dog of an Etonian sank back among the carriage +cushions stifled with his laughter. Gower staggered backwards against a +roadside tree, and stood there with his lips parted and his eyes wide +open, bewildered, more than that cool hand had ever been in all his +days, by the extraordinary finish of poor Belle's luckless wooing; the +postilion rolled off his saddle in cachinnatory fits at the little +monkey's narrative! Perkins, like a soldier as he was, utterly impassive +to all surrounding circumstances, shouldered a valise and dashed at +quick march after his luckless master; Justine clapped her plump +French-gloved fingers with a million ma Fois! and mon Dieus! and O +Ciels! and far away in the gray distance sped the retreating figure of +poor Belle, with the license in one pocket and the wedding-ring in the +other, flying, as if his life depended on it, from the shame, and the +misery, and the horror of that awful sell, drawn on his luckless head by +that ill-fated line in the _Daily_. + +While Belle drove to his hapless wooing, Fairlie galloped on and on. +Where he went he neither knew nor cared. He had ridden heedlessly along, +and the Grey, left to her own devices, had taken the road to which her +head for the last four months had been so often turned--the road leading +to Fern Chase,--and about a mile from the Vane estate lost her left +hind-shoe, and came to a dead stop of her own accord, after having been +ridden for a couple of hours as hard as if she had been at the Grand +Military. Fairlie threw himself off the saddle, and, leaving the bridle +loose on the mare's neck, who he knew would not stray a foot away from +him, he flung himself on the grass, under the cool morning shadows of +the roadside trees, no sound in the quiet country round him breaking in +on his weary thoughts, till the musical ring of a pony's hoofs came +pattering down the lane. He never heard it, however, nor looked up, +till the quick trot slackened and then stopped beside him. + +"Colonel Fairlie!" + +"Good Heavens! Geraldine!" + +"Well," she said, with tears in her eyes and petulant anger in her +voice, "so you have never had the grace to come and apologize for +insulting me as you did last week?" + +"For mercy's sake do not trifle with me." + +"Trifle! No, indeed!" interrupted the young lady. "Your behavior was no +trifle, and it will be a very long time before I forgive it, if ever I +do." + +"Stay--wait a moment." + +"How can you ask me, when, five days ago, you bid me never come near you +with my cursed coquetries again?" asked Geraldine, trying, and vainly, +to get the bridle out of his grasp. + +"God forgive me! I did not know what I said. What I had heard was enough +to madden a colder man than I. Is it untrue?" + +"Is what untrue?" + +"You know well enough. Answer me, is it true or not?" + +"How can I tell what you mean? You talk in enigmas. Let me go." + +"I will never let you go till you have answered me." + +"How can I answer you if I don't know what you mean?" retorted +Geraldine, half laughing. + +"Do not jest. Tell me, yes or no, are you going to marry that cursed +fool?" + +"What 'cursed fool'? Your language is not elegant, Colonel Fairlie!" +said Geraldine, with demure mischief. + +"Belle! Would you have met him? Did you intend to elope with him?" + +Geraldine's eyes, always large enough, grew larger and a darker blue +still, in extremest astonishment. + +"Belle!--elope with him? What are you dreaming? Are you mad?" + +"Almost," said Fairlie, recklessly. "Have you misled him, then--tricked +him? Do you care nothing for him? Answer me, for Heaven's sake, +Geraldine!" + +"I know nothing of what you are talking!" said Geraldine, with her +surprised eyes wide open still. "Oblige me by leaving my pony's head. I +shall be too late home." + +"You never answered his advertisement, then?" + +"The very question insults me! Let my pony go." + +"You never met him in Fern Wood--never engaged yourself to him--never +corresponded with him?" + +"Colonel Fairlie, you have no earthly right to put such questions to +me," interrupted Geraldine, with her hot geranium color in her cheeks +and her eyes flashing fire. "I honor the report, whoever circulated it, +far more than it deserves, by condescending to contradict it. Have the +kindness to unhand my pony, and allow me to continue my ride." + +"You shall _not_ go," said Fairlie, as passionately as she, "till you +have answered me one more question: Can you, will you ever forgive me?" + +"No," said Geraldine, with an impatient shake of her head, but a smile +nevertheless under the shadow of her hat. + +"Not if you know it was jealousy of him which maddened me, love for you +which made me speak such unpardonable words to you?--not if I tell you +how perfect was the tale I was told, so that there was no link wanting, +no room for doubt or hope?--not if I tell you what tortures I had +endured in losing you--what bitter punishment I have already borne in +crediting the report that you were secretly engaged to my rival--would +you not forgive me then?" + +"No," whispered the young lady perversely, but smiling still, the +geraniums brighter in her cheeks, and her eyes fixed on the bridle. + +Fairlie dropped the reins, let go her hand, and left her free to ride, +if she would, away from him. + +"Will you leave me, Geraldine? Not for this morning only, remember, nor +for to-day, nor for this year, but--for ever?" + +"No!" It was a very different "No" this time. + +"Will you forgive me, then, my darling?" + +Her fingers clasped his hand closely, and Geraldine looked at him from +under her hat; her eyes, so like an April day, with their tears, and +their tender and mischievous smile, were so irresistibly provocative +that Fairlie took his pardon for granted, and thanked her in the way +that seemed to him at once most eloquent and most satisfactory. + +If you wish to know what became of Belle, he fled across the country to +the railway station, and spent his leave Heaven knows where--in +sackcloth and ashes, I suppose--meditating on his frightful sell. _We_ +saw nothing more of him; he could hardly show in Norwich again with all +his laurels tumbled in the dust, and his trophies of conquest +laughing-stocks for all the troop. He exchanged into the Z Battery going +out to India, and I never saw or heard of him till a year or two ago, +when he landed at Portsmouth, a much wiser and pleasanter man. The +lesson, joined to the late campaign under Sir Colin, had done him a vast +amount of good; he had lost his conceit, his vanity, his affectation, +and was what Nature meant him to be--a sensible, good-hearted fellow. As +luck would have it, Pretty Face, who had joined the Eleventh, was there +too, and Fairlie and his wife as well, and Belle had the good sense to +laugh it over with them, assuring Geraldine, however, that no one had +eclipsed the G. V. whom he had once hoped had answered his memorable +advertisement. He has grown wiser, and makes a jest of it now; it may be +a sore point still, I cannot say--nobody sees it; but, whether or no, in +the old city of Norwich, and in our corps, from Cadets to Colonels, +nobody forgets THE LINE IN THE "DAILY:" WHO DID IT, AND WHO WAS DONE BY +IT. + + + + +HOLLY WREATHS AND ROSE CHAINS. + + + + +HOLLY WREATHS AND ROSE CHAINS. + + +I. + +THE COLONEL OF THE "WHITE FAVORS" AND CECIL ST. AUBYN. + +"What are you going to do with yourself this Christmas, old fellow?" +said Vivian, of the 60th Hussars: the White Favors we call them, +because, after Edgehill, Henriette Maria gave their Colonel a white +rosette off her own dress to hang to his sword-knot, and all the 60th +have like ribbons to this day. "If you've nothing better to do," +continued their present Lieutenant-Colonel, "Come down with me to +Deerhurst. The governor'll be charmed to see you; my mother has always +some nice-looking girls there; and, as we keep the hounds, I can promise +you some good hunting with the Harkaway." + +"I shall be delighted," said I, who, being in the ---- Lancers, had been +chained by the leg at Kensington the whole year, and, of all the woes +the most pitiable, had not been able to get leave for either the 12th or +the 1st; but while my chums were shooting among the turnips, or stalking +royals in Blackmount Forest, I had been tied to town, a solitary unit in +Pall-Mall, standing on the forsaken steps of the U. S., or pacing my +hack through the dreary desert of Hyde Park--like Macaulay's New +Zealander gazing on the ruins of London Bridge. + +"Very well," continued Vivian, "come down with me next week, and you can +send your horses with Steevens and my stud. The governor could mount you +well enough, but I never hunt with so much pleasure as when I'm on Qui +Vive; so I dare say you, like me, prefer your own horses. I only hope we +shan't have a confounded 'black frost;' but we must take our chance of +the weather. I think you'll like my sisters; they're just about half my +age. Lots of children came in between, but were providentially nipped in +the bud." + +"Are they pretty?" + +"Can't say, really; I'm too used to them to judge. I can't make love to +them, so I never took the trouble to criticise them; but we've always +been a good-looking race, I believe. I tell you who's staying +there--that girl we met in Toronto. Do you remember her--Cecil St. +Aubyn?" + +"I should say I did. How did she get here?" + +"She's come to live with her aunt, Mrs. Coverdale. You know that +over-dressed widow who lives in Hyde Park gardens, and, when she can't +afford Brighton, shuts the front shutters, lives in the back +drawing-room, and says, 'Not at home to callers?' St. Aubyn is as poor +as a rat, so I suppose he was glad to send Cecil here; and the Coverdale +likes to have somebody who'll draw men to her parties, which I'm sure +her champagne will never do. It's the most unblushing gooseberry ever +ticketed 'Veuve Clicquot.'" + +"'Pon my life, I'm delighted to hear it," said I. "The St. Aubyn's +superb eyes will make the gooseberry go down. Men in Canada would have +swallowed cask-washings to get a single waltz with her. All Toronto +went mad on that score. You admired her, too, old fellow, only you +weren't with her long enough for such a stoic as you are to boil up into +anything warmer." + +"Oh yes, I thought her extremely pretty, but I thought her a little +flirt, nevertheless." + +"Stuff! An attractive girl can't make herself ugly or disagreeable, or +erect a brick wall round herself, with iron spikes on the top, for fear, +through looking at her, any fellow might come to grief. The men followed +her, and she couldn't help that." + +"And she encouraged them, and she _could_ help that. However, I don't +wish to speak against her; it's nothing to me how she kills and slays, +provided I'm not among the bag. Take care you don't get shot yourself, +Ned." + +"Keep your counsel for your own use, Syd. You put me in mind of the +philanthropist, who ran to warn his neighbor of the dangers of soot +while his own chimney was on fire." + +"As how? I don't quite see the point of your parable," said Vivian, with +an expression of such innocent impassiveness that one would have thought +he had never seen her fair face out of her furs in her sledge, or +admired her small ankles when she was skating on the Ontario. + +The winter before, a brother of mine, who was out there in the Rifles, +wrote and asked me to go and have some buffalo-hunting, and Vivian went +out with me for a couple of months. We had some very good sport in the +western woods and plains, and his elk and bison horns are still stuck up +in Vivian's rooms at Uxbridge, with many another trophy of both +hemispheres. We had sport of another kind, too, to the merry music of +the silvery sledge-bells, over the crisp snow and the gleaming ice, +while bright eyes shone on us under delicate lace veils, and little feet +peeped from under heaps of sable and bearskin, and gay voices rang out +in would-be fear when the horses shied at the shadow of themselves, or +at the moon shining on the ice. Who thinks of Canada without in fancy +hearing the ringing chimes of the gay sledge bells swinging joyous +measure into the clear sunshine or the white moonlight, in tune with +light laughter, and soft whispers, and careless hearts? + +There we saw Cecil St. Aubyn, one of the prettiest girls in Toronto, +then about nineteen. My brother Harry was mad about her, so were almost +all the men in the Canada Rifles, and Engineers, and, 61st that were +quartered there; and Vivian admired her too, though in a calmer sort of +way. Perhaps if he had been with her more than a fortnight he might have +gone further. As it was, he left Toronto liking her long Canadian eyes +no more than was pleasant. It was as well so, perhaps, for it would not +have been a good match for him, St. Aubyn being a broken-down gambler, +who, having lost a princely fortune at Crocky's, and the Bads, married +at fifty a widow with a little money, and migrated to Toronto, where he +was a torment to himself and to everybody else. Vivian, meanwhile, was a +great matrimonial _coup_. Coming of a high county family, and being the +only son, of course there was priceless value set on his life, which, +equally, of course, he imperilled, after the manner of us all, in every +way he could--in charges and skirmishes, yachting, hunting, and +steeple-chasing--ever since some two-and-twenty years ago he joined as a +cornet of fifteen--a man already in muscle and ideas, pleasures and +pursuits. + +At the present time he had been tranquilly engaged in the House, as he +represented the borough of Cacklebury. + +He spoke seldom, but always well, and was thought a very promising +member, his speeches being in Bernal Osborne's style; but he himself +cared little about his senatorial laurels, and was fervently hoping +that there would be a row with Russia, and that we should be allowed to +go and stick Croats and make love to Bayaderes, to freshen us up and +make us boys again. + +Next week, the first in December, he and I drove to Paddington, put +ourselves in the express, and whisked through the snow-covered +embankments, whitened fields, and holly hedges on the line down to +Deerhurst. If the frost broke up we should have magnificent runs, and we +looked at the country with a longing eye. Ever since he was six years +old, he told me, he had gone out with the Harkaway Hack on +Christmas-eve. When the drag met us, with the four bays steaming in the +night air, and the groom warming into a smile at the sight of the +Colonel, the sleet was coming down heavily, and the wind blew as keen as +a sabre's edge. The bays dashed along at a furious gallop under Vivian's +hand, the frosty road cracked under the wheel, the leaders' breath was +white in the misty night; we soon flew through the park gate--though he +didn't forget to throw down a sovereign on the snow for the old +porteress--and up the leafless avenue, and bright and cheery the old +manor-house, with its score of windows, like so many bright eyes, looked +out upon the winter's night. + +"By George! we did that four miles quick enough," said Vivian, jumping +down, and shaking the snow off his hair and mustaches. "The old place +looks cheery, doesn't it? Ah! there are the girls; they're sure to +pounce on me." + +The two girls in question having warm hearts, not spoilt by the +fashionable world they live in, darted across the hall, and, regardless +of the snow, welcomed him ardently. They were proud of him, for he is a +handsome dog, with haughty, aristocratic features, and a grand air as +stately as a noble about Versailles in the polished "Age dore." + +He shook himself free, and went forward to meet his mother, whom he is +very fond of; while the governor, a fine-looking, genial old fellow, +bade me welcome to Deerhurst. In the library door I caught sight of a +figure in white that I recognised as our belle of the sledge drives; she +was looking at Vivian as he bent down to his mother. As soon as she saw +me though, she disappeared, and he and I went up to our rooms to thaw, +and dress for dinner. + +By the fire, talking to Blanche Vivian, stood Cecil, when we went down +to the drawing-room. She always makes me think of a Sevres or Dresden +figure, her coloring is so delicate, and yet brilliant; and if you were +to see her Canadian eyes, her waving chestnut hair, and her +instantaneous, radiant, coquettish smiles, you would not wonder at the +Toronto men losing their heads about her. + +"Why, Cecil, you never told me you knew Sydney!" cried Blanche, as +Vivian shook hands with the St. Aubyn. "Where did you meet him? how long +have you been acquainted? why did you never tell me?" + +"How could I tell Colonel Vivian was your brother?" said Cecil, playing +with a little silver Cupid driving a barrowful of matches on the +mantelpiece till she tumbled all his matches into the fender. + +"You might have asked. Never mind the wax-lights," said Blanche, who, +not having been long out, had a habit of saying anything that came into +her head. "When did you see him? Tell me, Sydney, if she won't." + +"Oh, in Canada, dear!" interrupted Cecil, quickly. "But it was for so +short a time I should have thought Colonel Vivian would have forgotten +my face, and name, and existence." + +"Nay, Miss St. Aubyn," said Vivian, smiling. "Pardon me, but I think +you must know your own power too well to think that any man who has seen +you once could hope for his own peace to forget you." + +The words of course were flattering, but his quizzical smile made them +doubtful. Cecil evidently took them as satire. "At least, you've +forgotten anything we talked about at Toronto," she said, rather +impatiently, "for I remember telling you I detested compliments." + +"I shouldn't have guessed it," murmured Vivian, stroking his mustaches. + +"And you," Cecil went on, regardless of the interruption, "told me you +never complimented any woman you respected; so that speech just now +doesn't say much for your opinion of me." + +"How dare I begin to like you?" laughed Vivian. + +"Don't you know Levinge and Castlereagh were great friends of mine? Poor +fellows! the sole object of their desires now is six feet of Crimean +sod, if we're lucky enough to get out there." Cecil colored. Levinge's +and Castlereagh's hard drinking and gloomy aspect at mess were popularly +attributed to the witchery of the St. Aubyn. Canada, while she was in +it, was as fatal to the Service as the Cape or the cholera. + +"If I talked so romantically, Colonel Vivian, with what superb mockery +you would curl your mustaches. Surely the Iron Hand (wasn't that your +sobriquet in Caffreland?) does not believe in broken hearts?" + +"Perhaps not; but I _do_ believe in some people's liking to try and +break them." + +"So do I. It is a favorite pastime with your sex," said Cecil, beating +the hearth-rug impatiently with her little satin shoe. + +"I don't think we often attack," laughed Vivian. "We sometimes yield out +of amiability, and we sometimes take out the foils in self-defence, +though we are no match for those delicate hands that use their Damascus +blades so skilfully. We soon learn to cry quarter!" + +"To a dozen different conquerors in as many months, then!" cried Cecil, +with a defiant toss of her head. + +Vivian looked down on her as a Newfoundland might look down on a small +and impetuous-minded King Charles, who is hoping to irritate him. Just +then three other people staying there came in. A fat old dowager and a +thin daughter, who had turquoise eyes, and from whom, being a great +pianist, we all fled in mortal terror of a hailstorm of Thalberg and +Hertz, and a cousin of Syd's, Cossetting, a young chap, a blondin, with +fair curls parted down the centre, whose brains were small, hands like a +girl's, and thoughts centred on dew _bouquets_ and his own beauty, but +who, having a baronetcy, with much tin, was strongly set upon by the +turquoise eyes, but appeared himself to lean more towards the Canadian, +as a greater contrast to himself, I suppose. + +"How do you do, Cos?" said Vivian, carelessly. The Iron Hand very +naturally scorned this effeminate _patte de velours_. + +"You here!" lisped the baronet. "Delighted to see you! thought you'd +killed yourself over a fence, or something, before this----" + +"Why, Horace," burst in energetic little Blanche, "I have told you for +the last month that he was coming down for Christmas." + +"Did you, my dear child?" said Cos. "'Pon my life I forgot it. Miss St. +Aubyn, my man Cleante (he's the handiest dog--he once belonged to the +Duc d'Aumale) has just discovered something quite new--there's no +perfume like it; he calls it 'Fleurs des Tilleuls,' and the best of it +is, nobody can have it. If you'll allow me----" + +"Everybody seems to make it their duty to forget Sydney," muttered +Blanche, as the Baronet murmured the rest of his speech inaudibly. + +"Never mind, petite; I can bear it," laughed Vivian, leaning against the +mantelpiece with that look of quiet strength characteristic of both his +mind and body. + +Cecil overheard the whisper, and flushed a quick look at him; then +turning to Cossetting, talked over the "Fleurs des Tilleuls" as if her +whole mind was absorbed in _bouquet_. + +When dinner was announced, Vivian troubled himself, however, to give his +arm to Cecil, and, tossing his head back in the direction of the +turquoise eyes, said to the discomfited Horace, "You sing, don't you, +Cosset? Miss Screechington will bore you less than she would me." + +"Is it, then, because I 'bore you less' that you do me the honor?" asked +Cecil, quickly. + +"Yes," said Syd, calmly; "or, rather, to put it more courteously, you +amuse me more." + +"Monseigneur! je vous remercie," said Cecil, her long almond eyes +sparkling dangerously. "You promote me to the same rank with an opera, a +hookah, a rat-hunt, and a French novel?" + +"And," Vivian went on tranquilly, "I dare say I shall amuse _you_ better +than that poor little fool with his lisp and his talk of the toilet, and +his hands that never pulled in a thorough-bred or aided a rowing match." + +"Oh, we're not in the Iliad and Odyssey days to deify physical +strength," said Cecil, who secretly adored it, as all women do; "nor yet +among the Pawnees to reverence a man according to his scalps. Though Sir +Horace may not have followed your example and jeopardised his life on +every possible occasion, he is very handsome, and can be very +agreeable." + +"Is it possible you can endure that fop?" said Vivian, quickly. + +"Certainly. Why not?" + +The Colonel stroked his moustache contemptuously. "I should have fancied +you more difficile, that is all; but Cos is, as you say, good-looking, +and very well off. I wish----" + +"What? That you were 'less bored?'" + +"That I always wish; but I was thinking of Cos, there--milk-posset, as +little Eardley in the troop says they called him at Eton--I was wishing +he could see Levinge and Castlereagh, just as _epouvantails_, to make +him turn and flee as the French noblesse did when they saw their cousins +and brothers strung up a la lanterne." + +"Wasn't it very strange," Blanche was saying to me at the same time, +"that Cecil never mentioned Sydney? I've so often spoken of him, told +her his troop, and all about him. (He has always been so kind to me, +though he is eighteen years older--just twice my age.) Besides, I found +her one day looking at his picture in the gallery, so she must have +known it was the same Colonel Vivian, mustn't she Captain Thornton?" + +"I should say so. Have you known her long?" + +"No. We met her at Brighton this August with that silly woman, Mrs. +Coverdale. All her artifices and falsehoods annoy Cecil so; Cecil +doesn't mind saying she's not rich, she knows it's no crime." + +"C'est pire qu'un crime, c'est une faute," said I. + +"Don't talk in that way," laughed Blanche. "That's bitter and sarcastic, +like Sydney in his grand moods, when I'm half afraid of him. I am sure +Cecil couldn't be nicer, if she were ever such an heiress. Mamma asked +her for Christmas because she once knew Mr. St. Aubyn well, and Cecil is +not happy with Mrs. Coverdale. False and true don't suit each other. I +hope Sydney will like her--do you think he does?" + +That was a question I could not answer. He admired her, of course, +because he could not well have helped it, and had done so in Canada; and +he was talking to her now, I dare say, to force her to acknowledge that +he _was_ more amusing than Horace Cos. But he seemed to me to weigh her +in a criticising balance, as if he expected to find her wanting--as if +it pleased him to provoke and correct her, as one pricks and curbs a +beautiful two-year old, just to see its graceful impatience at the check +and the glance of its wild eye. + + + + +II. + +THE CANADIAN'S COLD BATH WARMS UP THE COLONEL. + + +Deerhurst was a capital house to spend a Christmas in. It was the house +of an English gentleman, with even the dens called bachelors' rooms +comfortable and luxurious to the last extent: a first-rate stud, a +capital billiard table, a good sporting country, pretty girls to amuse +one with when tired of the pink, the best Chablis and Chateau Margaux to +be had anywhere, and a host who would have liked a hundred people at his +dinner-table the whole year round. The snow, confound it! prevented our +taking the hounds out for the first few days; but we were not bored as +one might have expected, and our misery was the girls' delight, who were +fervently hoping that the ice might come thick enough for them to skate. +Cecil was invaluable in a country-house; her resources were as unlimited +as Houdin's inexhaustible bottle. She played in French vaudevilles and +Sheridan Knowles's comedies, acted charades, planned tableaux vivants, +sang gay wild chansons peculiar to herself, that made the Screechington +bravuras and themes more insupportable than ever; and, what was more, +managed to infuse into everybody else some of her own energy and spirit. +She made every one do as she liked; but she tyrannised over us so +charmingly that we never chafed at the bit; and to the other girls she +was so good-natured in giving them the roles they liked, in praising, +and in aiding them, that it was difficult for feminine malice, though +its limits are boundless, to find fault with her. Vivian, though he did +not relax his criticism of her, was agreeable to her, as he had been in +Canada, and as he is always to women when he is not too lazy. He +consented to stand for Rienzi in a tableau, though he hates doing all +those things, and played in the Proverbs with such a flashing fire of +wit in answer to Cecil that we told him he beat Mathews. + +"I'm inspired," he said, with a laughing bend of his head to Cecil, when +somebody complimented him. + +She gave an impatient movement--she was accustomed to have such things +whispered in earnest, not in jest. She laughed, however. "Are you +inspired, then, to take _Huon's_ part? All the characters are cast but +that." + +"I'm afraid I can't play well enough." + +"Nonsense. You cannot think that. Say you would rather not at once." + +Vivian stroked his mustaches thoughtfully. "Well, you see, it bores me +rather; and I'm not Christian enough to suffer ennui cheerfully to +please other people." + +"Very well, then, I will give the part to Sir Horace," said Cecil, +looking through the window at the church spire, covered with the +confounded snow. + +Vivian stroked away at his mustaches rather fiercely this time. "Cos! +he'll ruin the play. Dress him up as a lord in waiting, he'll be a +dainty lay figure, but for anything more he's not as fit as this setter! +Fancy that essenced, fair-haired young idiot taking _Huon_--his lisp +would be so effective!" + +She looked up in his face with one of her mischievous, dangerous smiles, +and put up her hands in an attitude of petition. "He must have the part +if you won't. Be good, and don't spoil the play. I have set my mind on +its being perfect, and--I will have _such_ a dress as the _Countess_ if +you will only do as I tell you." + +Cecil, in her soft, childlike moods, could finish any man. Of course +Vivian rehearsed "Love" with her that afternoon, a play that was to come +off on the 23rd. Cos sulked slightly at being commanded by her to dress +himself beautifully and play the _Prince of Milan_. + +"To be refused by you," lisped Horace. "Oh, I dare say! No! 'pon my +life----" + +"My dear Cos, you'll have plenty of fellow-sufferers," whispered Syd, +mischievously. + +"Do you dare to disobey me, Sir Horace?" cried Cecil. "For shame! I +should have thought you more of a preux chevalier. If you don't order +over from Boxwood that suit of Milan armor you say one of your ancestors +wore at Flodden, and wear it on Tuesday, you shall never waltz with me +again. Now what do you say?" + +"Nobody can rethitht you," murmured Cos. "You do anything with a fellow +that you chooth." + +Vivian glanced down at him with superb scorn, and turned to me. "What a +confounded frost this is. The weathercock sticks at the north, and old +Ben says there's not a chance of a change till the new moon. Qui Vive +might as well have kept at Hounslow. To waste all the season like this +would make a parson swear! If I'd foreseen it I would have gone to +Paris with Lovell, as he wanted me to do." + +I suppose the Colonel was piqued to find he was not the only one +persuaded into his role. He bent over Laura Caldecott's chair, a pretty +girl, but with nothing to say for herself, admired her embroidery, and +talked with great empressement about it, till Laura, much flattered at +such unusual attention, after lisping a good deal of nonsense, finally +promised to embroider a note-case for him, "if you'll be good and use +it, and not throw it away, as you naughty men always do the pretty +things we give you," simpered Miss Laura. + +"Hearts included," said Syd, smiling. "I assure you if you give me +yours, I will prize it with Turkish jealousy." + +The fair brodeuse gave a silly laugh; and Vivian, whose especial +detestation is this sort of love-making nonsense, went on flirting with +her, talking the persiflage that one whispers leaning over the back of a +phaeton after a dinner at the Castle or a day at Ascot, but never +expects to be called to remember the next morning, when one bows to the +object thereof in the Ring, and the flavor of the claret-cup and the +scent of the cigar are both fled with the moonbeams and forgotten. + +Cecil gave the Colonel and his flirtation a glance, and let Cossetting +lean over the back of her chair and deliver himself of some +lackadaisical sentiment (taken second-hand out of "Isidora" or the +"Amant de la Lune," and diluted to be suitable for presentation to her), +looking up at him with her large velvet eyes, or flashing on him her +radiant smile, till Horace pulled up his little stiff collar, coaxed his +flaxen whiskers, looked at her with his half-closed light eyes--and +thought himself irresistible--and Miss Screechington broke the string of +the purse she was making, and scattered all the steel beads about the +floor in the futile hope of gaining his attention. Blanche went down on +her knees and spent twenty minutes hunting them all up; but as I helped +her I saw the turquoise eyes looked anything but grateful for our +efforts, though if Blanche had done anything for me with that ready +kindness and those soft little white hands, I should have repaid her +very warmly. But oh, these women! these women! Do they ever love one +another in their hearts? Does not Chloris always swear that Lelia's +gazelle eyes have a squint in them and Delia hint that Daphne, who is +innocent as a dove, is bad style, and horridly bold? + +At last Cecil got tired of Cos's drawling platitudes, and walked up to +one of the windows. "How is the ice, will anybody tell me? I am wild to +try it, ain't you, Blanche? If we are kept waiting much longer, we will +have the carpets up and skate on the oak floors." + +I told her I thought they might try it safely. "Then let us go after +luncheon, shall we?" said Cecil. "It is quite sunny now. You skate, of +course, Sir Horace?" + +"Oh! to be sure--certainly," murmured Cos. "We'd a quadrille on the +Serpentine last February, Talbot, and I, and some other men--lots of +people said they never saw it better done. But it's rather cold--don't +you think so?" + +"Do you expect to find ice in warm weather?" said Vivian, curtly, from +the fire, where he was standing watching the commencement of the +note-case. + +"No. But I hate cold," said Horace, looking at his snowy fingers. "One +looks such a figure--blue, and wet, and shivering; the house is much the +best place in a frost." + +"Poor fellow!" said Vivian, with a contemptuous twist of his mustaches. +"I fear, however fete you may be in every other quarter, the seasons +won't change to accommodate you." + +"Oh! you are a dreadful man," drawled Cos. "You don't a bit mind tanning +yourself, nor getting drenched through, nor soiling your hands----" + +"Thank Heaven, no!" responded Syd. "I'm neither a school-girl, nor--a +fop." + +"Would you believe it, Miss St. Aubyn?" said the baronet, appealingly. +"That man'll get up before daylight and let himself be drenched to the +skin for the chance of playing a pike; and will turn out of a +comfortable arm-chair on a winter's night just to go after poachers and +knock a couple of men over, and think it the primest fun in life. I +don't understand it myself, do you?" + +"Yes," said Cecil, fervently. "I delight in a man's love for sport, for +I idolise horses, and there is nothing that can beat a canter on a fine +fresh morning over a grass country; and I believe that a man who has the +strength, and nerve, and energy to go thoroughly into fishing, or +shooting, or whatever it be, will carry the same will and warmth into +the rest of his life; and the hand that is strong in the field and firm +in righteous wrath, will be the truer in friendship and the gentler in +pity." + +Cecil spoke with energetic enthusiasm. Horace stared, the Screechington +sneered, Laura gave an affected little laugh. The Colonel swung round +from his study of the fire, his face lighting up. I've seen Syd on +occasion look as soft as a woman. However, he said nothing; he only took +her in to luncheon, and was exceedingly kind to her and oblivious of +Laura Caldecott's existence throughout that meal, which, at Deerhurst, +was of unusual splendor and duration. And afterwards, when she had +arrayed herself in a hat with soft curling feathers, and looped up her +dress in some inexplicable manner that showed her dainty high heels +artistically, he took her little skates in his hand and walked down by +her side to the pond. It was some way to the pond--a good sized piece of +water, that snobs would have called the Lake, by way of dignifying their +possessions, with willows on its banks (where in summer the sentimental +Screechington would have reclined, Tennyson _a la main_), and boats and +punts beside it, among which was a tub, in which Blanche confessed to me +she had paddled herself across to the saturation of a darling blue +muslin, and the agonised feelings of her governess, only twelve months +before. + +"A dreadful stiff old thing that governess was," said Blanche, looking +affectionately at the tub. "Do you know, Captain Thornton, when she went +away, and I saw her boxes actually on the carriage-top, I waltzed round +the schoolroom seven times, and burnt 'Noel et Chapsal' in the fire--I +did, indeed!" + +The way, as I say, was long to the pond; and as Cecil's dainty high +heels and Syd's swinging cavalry strides kept pace over the snow +together, they had plenty of time for conversation. + +"Miss Caldecott is looking for you," said Cecil, with a contemptuous +glance at the fair Laura, who, between two young dandies, was picking +her route over the snow holding her things very high indeed, and casting +back looks at the Colonel. + +"Is she? It is very kind of her." + +"If you feel the kindness so deeply, you had better repay it by joining +her." + +Vivian laughed. "Not just now, thank you. We are close to the +kennels--hark at their bay! Would you like to come and see them? +By-the-by, how is your wolf-dog--Leatherstockings, didn't you call him?" + +"Do you remember him?" said Cecil, her eyes beaming and her lips +quivering. "Dear old dog, I loved him so much, and he loved me. He was +bitten by an asp just before I left, and papa would have him shot. Good +gracious! what is the matter?--she is actually frightened at that +setter!" + +The "she" of whom Cecil so disdainfully spoke was Miss Caldecott, who, +on seeing a large setter leap upon her with muddy paws and much sudden +affection, began to scream, and rushed to Vivian with a beseeching cry +of "Save me, save me!" Cecil stood and laughed, and called the setter to +her. + +"Here, Don--Dash--what is your name? Come here, good dog. That poor +young lady has nerves, and you must not try them, or you will cause her +endless expenses in sal volatile and ether; But I have no such +interesting weaknesses, and you may lavish any demonstrations you please +on me!" + +We all laughed as she thus talked confidentially to the setter, holding +his feathered paws against her waist; while Vivian stood by her with +admiration in his glance. Poor Laura looked foolish, and began to caress +a great bull-dog, who snapped at her. She hadn't Cecil's ways either +with dogs or men. + +"What a delightful scene," whispered Cecil to the Colonel, as we left +the kennels. "You were not half so touched by it as you were expected to +be!" + +Vivian laughed. "Didn't you effectually destroy all romantic effect? You +can be very mischievous to your enemies." + +Cecil colored. "She is no enemy of mine; I know nothing of her, but I do +detest that mock sentimentality, that would-be fine ladyism that thinks +it looks interesting when it pleads guilty to sal volatile, and screams +at an honest dog's bark. Did you see how shocked she and Miss +Screechington looked because I let the hounds leap about me?" + +"Of course; but though you have not lived very long, you must have +learned that you are too dangerous to the peace of our sex to expect +much mercy from your own." + +A flush came into Cecil's cheeks _not_ brought by the wind. Her feathers +gave a little dance as she shook her head with her customary action of +annoyance. + +"Ah, never compliment me, I am so tired of it." + +"I wish I could believe that," said Syd, in a low tone. "Your feelings +are warm, your impulses frank and true; it were a pity to mar them by an +undue love for the flattering voices of empty-headed fools." + +Tears of pleasure started into her eyes, but she would not let him see +it. She had not forgotten the Caldecott flirtation of the morning enough +to resist revenging it. She looked up with a merry laugh. + +"Je m'amuse--voila tout. There is no great harm in it." + +A shadow of disappointment passed over Syd's haughty face. + +"No, if you do not do it once too often. I _have_ known men--and women +too--who all their lives through have been haunted by the memory of a +slight word, a careless look, with which, unwittingly or in obstinacy, +they shut the door of their own happiness. Have you ever heard of the +Deerhurst ghost?" + +"No," said Cecil, softly. "Tell it me." + +"It is a short story. Do you know that picture of Muriel Vivian, the +girl with the hawk on her wrist and long hair of your color? She lived +in Charles's time, and was a great beauty at the court. There were many +who would have lived and died for her, but the one who loved her best +was her cousin Guy. The story says that she had plighted herself to him +in these very woods; at any rate, he followed her when she went to join +the court, and she kept him on, luring him with vague promises, and +flirting with Goring, and Francis Egerton, and all the other gay +gentlemen. One night his endurance broke down: he asked her whether or +no she cared for him? He begged, as a sign, for the rosebud she had in +her dress. She laughed at him, and--gave the flower to Harry Carrew, a +young fellow in Lunsford's 'Babe-eaters.' Guy said no more, and left +her. Before dawn he shot Carrew through the heart, took the rosebud from +the boy's doublet, put it in his own breast, and fell upon his sword. +They say Muriel lost her senses. I don't believe it: no coquette ever +had so much feeling; but if you ask the old servants they will tell you, +and firmly credit the story too, that hers and Guy Vivian's ghosts still +are to be seen every midnight at Christmas-eve, the day that he fought +and killed little Harry Carrew." + +He laughed, but Cecil shuddered. + +"What a horrible story! But do you believe that any woman ever possessed +such power over a man?" + +"I believe it since I have seen it. One of my best friends is now +hopelessly insane because a woman as worthless as this dead branch +forsook him. Poor fellow! they set it down to a coup de soleil, but it +was the falsehood of Emily Rushbrooke that did it. But, for myself, I +never should lose my head for any woman. I did once when I was a boy, +but I know better now." + +A wild, desperate idea came into Cecil's mind. She contrasted the +passionless calm of his face with the tender gentleness of his tone a +few moments ago, and she would have given her life to see him "lose his +head for her" as he had done for that other. How she hated her, whoever +she had been! Cecil had seen too many men not to know that Syd's cool +exterior covered a stormy heart, and in the longing to rouse up the +storm at her incantation she resolved to play a dangerous game. The +ghost story did not warn her. As Mephistopheles to Faust came Horace Cos +to aid the impulse, and Cecil turned to him with one of her radiant +smiles. She never looked prettier than in her black hat; the wind had +only blown a bright flush into her cheeks--though it had turned Laura +blue and the Screechington red--and the Colonel looked up at her as he +put her skates on with something of the look Guy might have given Muriel +Vivian flirting gaily with the roistering cavaliers. + +"Now, Sir Horace, show us some of those wonderful Serpentine figures," +cried Cecil, balancing herself with the grace of a curlew, and whirling +here, there, and everywhere at her will as easily as if she were on a +chalked ball-room floor. She hadn't skated and sledged on the Ontario +for nothing. More than one man had lost his own balance looking after +her. Cos wasn't started yet; one pair of skates were too large, another +pair too small; if he'd thought of it he'd have had his own sent over. +He stood on the brink much as Winkle, of Pickwickian memory, trembled in +Weller's grasp. Cecil looked at him with laughing eyes, a shrewd +suspicion that he had planted her adorer, and that the quadrille on the +Serpentine was an offspring of the Cossetting poetic fancy. Thrice did +the luckless baronet essay the ice, and thrice did he come to grief with +heels in the air, and his dainty apparel disordered. At last, his +Canadian sorceress took compassion upon him, and declaring she was +tired, asked him to drive her across the pond. Cos, with an air of +languid martyrdom and a heavy sigh as he glanced at his Houbigants, torn +and soiled, grasped the back of the chair, and actually contrived to +start it. Once started, away went the chair and its Phaeton after it, +whether he would or no, its occupant looking up and laughing in the +dandy's heated, disconcerted, and anxious face. All at once there was a +crash, a plunge, and a shout from Vivian, who was on the opposite bank. +The chair had broken the ice, flung Cecil out into the water with the +shock, while her charioteer, by a lucky jump backwards, had saved +himself, and stood on the brink of the chasm unharmed. Cecil's crinoline +kept her from sinking; she stretched out her little hand with a cry--it +sounded like Vivian's name as it came to my ears on the keen north +wind--but before Vivian, who came across the ice like a whirlwind, could +get to her, Cos, valorously determining to wet his wristbands, stooped +down, and, holding by the chair, which was firmly wedged in, put his arm +round her and dragged her out. Vivian came up two seconds too late. + +"Are you hurt?" he said, bending towards her. + +"No," said Cecil, faintly, as her head drooped unconsciously on Cos's +shoulder. She had struck her forehead on the ice, which had stunned her +slightly. The Colonel saw the chestnut hair resting against Cos's arm; +he dropped the hand he had taken, and turned to the shore. + +"Bring her to the bank," he said, briefly. "I will go home and send a +carriage. Good Heavens! that that fool should have saved her!" I heard +him mutter, as he brushed past me. + +He drove the carriage down himself, and under pretext of holding on the +horses, did not descend from the box while Horace wrapped rugs and +cloaks round Cecil, who, having more pluck than strength, declared she +was quite well now, but nearly fainted when Horace lifted her out, and +she was consigned by Mrs. Vivian to her bedroom for the rest of the day. + +"It is astonishing how we miss Cecil," remarked Blanche, at dinner. +"Isn't it dull without her, Sydney?" + +"I didn't perceive it," said the Colonel, calmly; "but I am very sorry +for the cause of her absence." + +"Well, by Jove! it sounds unfeeling; but I can't say I am," murmured +Horace. "It's something to have saved such a deuced pretty girl as +that." + +"Curse that puppy," muttered Syd to his champagne glass. "A fool that +isn't fit for her to look at----" + +Syd's and my room, in the bachelors' wing, adjoin each other; and as our +windows both possess the convenience of balconies, we generally smoke in +them, and hold a little chat before turning in. When I stepped out into +my balcony that night, Syd was already puffing away at his pipe. Perhaps +his Cavendish was unusually good, for he did not seem greatly inclined +to talk, but leant over the balcony, looking out into the clear frosty +night, with the winter stars shining on the wide white uplands and the +leafless glittering trees. + +"What's that?" said he sharply, as the notes of a cornet playing, and +playing badly, Halevy's air, "Quand de la Nuit," struck on the night +air. + +"A serenade, I suppose." + +"A serenade in the snow. Who is romantic idiot enough for that?" said +Vivian contemptuously, nearly pitching himself over to see where the +cornet came from. It came from under Cecil's windows, where a light was +still burning. The player looked uncommonly like Cossetting wrapped up +in a cloak with a wide-awake on, under which the moonlight showed us +some fair hair peeping. + +Vivian drew back with an oath he did not mean me to hear. He laughed +scornfully. "Milk-posset, of course! There is no other fool in the +house. His passion must be miraculously deep to drag him out of his bed +into the snow to play some false notes to his lady-love. It's rather +windy, don't you think, Ned. Good night, old fellow--and, I say, don't +turn little Blanche's head with your pretty speeches. You and I are +bound not to flirt, since we're sworn never to marry; and I don't want +the child played with, though possibly (being a woman) she'd very soon +recover it." + +With which sarcasm on his sister and her sex, the Colonel shut down the +window with a clang; and I remained, smoking four pipes and a half, +meditating on his last words, for I _had_ been playing with the child, +and felt (inhuman brute! the ladies will say) that I should be sorry if +she _did_ recover it. + + + + +III. + +SHOWING THAT LOVE-MAKING ON HOLY GROUND DOESN'T PROSPER. + + +Cecil came down the next morning looking very pretty after her ducking. +Vivian asked her how she was with his general air of calm courtesy, +helped her to some cold pheasant, and applied himself to his breakfast +and some talk with a sporting man about the chances of the frost +breaking up. + +Horace, who looked upon himself as a preux chevalier, had had his left +arm put in a sling on the strength of a bruise as big as a +fourpenny-piece, and appeared to consider himself entitled to Cecil's +eternal gratitude and admiration for having gone the length of wetting +his coat sleeves for her. + +"Do you like music by starlight?" he whispered, with a self-conscious +smile, after a course of delicate attentions throughout breakfast. + +Syd fixed his eyes on Cecil's, steadily but impassively. The color rose +into her face, and she turned to Cos with a mischievous laugh. + +"Very much, if--I am not too sleepy to hear it; and it isn't a cornet +out of tune." + +"How cruel!" murmured Horace, as he passed her coffee. "You shouldn't +criticise so severely when a fellow tries to please you." + +"That poor dear girl really thinks I turned out into the snow last night +to give her that serenade," observed Cos, with a languid laugh, when we +were alone in the billiard-room. "Good, isn't it, the idea of _my_ +troubling myself?" + +"Whose cracked cornet was it, then, that made that confounded row last +night?" I asked. + +Horace laughed again; it was rarely he was so highly amused at anything: +"It was Cleante's, to be sure. He don't play badly when his hands are +not numbed, poor devil! Of course he made no end of a row about going +out into the snow, but I made him do it. I knew Cecil would think it was +I. Women are so vain, poor things!" + +It was lucky I alone was the repository of his confidence, for if Vivian +had chanced to have been in the billiard-room, it is highly probable he +would then and there have brained his cousin with one of the cues. + +Happily he was out of the reach of temptation, in the stables, looking +after Qui Vive, who had to "bide in stall," as much to that gallant +bay's disquiet as to her owner's; for I don't know which of the two +best loves a burst over a stiff country, or a fast twenty minutes up +wind alone with the hounds when they throw up their heads. + +To the stables, by an odd coincidence, Cecil, putting the irresistible +black hat on the top of her chestnut braids, prevailed on Blanche to +escort her, vowing (which was nearly, but not quite, the truth) that she +loved the sweet pets of horses better than anything on earth. Where +Cecil went, Laura made a point of going too, to keep her enemy in sight, +I suppose; though Cecil, liking a fast walk on the frosty roads, a game +of battledore and shuttlecock with Blanche (when we were out of the +house), or anything, in short, better than working with her feet on the +fender, and the Caldecott inanities or Screechington scandals in her +ear, often led Laura many an unwelcome dance, and brought that luckless +young lady to try at things which did not sit well upon her as they did +upon the St. Aubyn, who had a knack of doing, and doing charmingly, a +thousand things no other woman could have attempted. So, as Vivian and +I, and some of the other men, stood in the stable-doors, smoking, and +talking over the studs accommodated in the spacious stalls, a strong +party of four young ladies came across the yard. + +"I'm come to look at Qui Vive; will you show him to me?" said Cecil, +softly. Her gentle, childlike way was the most telling of all her +changing moods, but I must do her the justice to say that it was +perfectly natural, she was no actress. + +"With great pleasure," said Syd, very courteously, if not +over-cordially; and to Qui Vive's stall Cecil went, alone in her glory, +for Laura was infinitely too terrified at the sight of the bay's strong +black hind legs to risk a kick from them, even to follow Syd. Helena +Vivian stayed with her, and Blanche came with me to visit my hunters. + +Cecil is a tolerable judge of a horse; she praised Qui Vive's lean head, +full eye, and silky coat with discrimination, and Qui Vive, though not +the best-tempered of thorough-breds, let her pat his smooth sides and +kiss his strong neck without any hostile demonstration. + +Vivian watched her as if she were a spoilt child who bewitched him, but +whom he knew to be naughty; he could not resist the fascination of her +ways, but he never altered his calm, courteous tone to her--the tone +Cecil longed to hear change, were it even into invectives against her, +to testify some deeper interest. + +"Now show me the mount you will give me when the frost breaks up and we +take out the hounds," said Cecil, with a farewell caress of Qui Vive. + +"You shall have the grey four-year-old; Billiard-ball, and he will suit +you exactly, for he is as light as a bird, checks at nothing, and will +take you safe over the stiffest bullfinch. I know you may trust him, for +he has carried Blanche." + +Cecil threw back her head. "Oh, I would ride anything, Qui Vive himself, +if he would bear a habit. I am not like Miss Caldecott, who, catching +sight of his dear brown legs, vanished as rapidly as if she had seen +Muriel's ghost on Christmas-eve." + +The Colonel smiled. "You are very unmerciful to poor Miss Caldecott. +What has she done to offend you?" + +"Offend me! Nothing in the world. Though I heard her lament with Miss +Screechington in the music-room, that I was 'so fast,' and 'such slang +style;' I consider that rather a compliment, for I never knew any lady +pull to pieces my bonnet, or my bouquet, or my hat, unless it was a +prettier one than their own. That sounds a vain speech, but I don't mean +it so." + + +The Colonel looked down into her velvet eyes; she was most dangerous to +him in this mood. "No," he said, briefly, "no one would accuse you of +vanity, though they might, pardon me, of love of admiration." + +Cecil laughed merrily. "Yes, perhaps so; it is pleasant, you know. Yet +sometimes I am tired of it all, and I want----" + +"A more difficult conquest? To find a diamond, merely, like Cleopatra, +to show your estimate of its value by throwing it away." + +A flush of vexation came into her cheeks. "Do you think me utterly +heartless?" she said impetuously. "No. I mean that I often tire of the +fulsome compliments, the flattery, the attention, the whirl of society! +I do like admiration. I tell you candidly what every other woman +acknowledges to herself but denies to the world; but often it is nothing +to me--mere Dead Sea fruit. I care nothing for the voices that whisper +it; the eyes that express it wake no response in mine, and I would give +it all for one word of true interest, one glance of real----" + +Vivian looked down on her steadily with his searching eagle eyes, out of +which, when he chose, nothing could be read. "If I dare believe you----" +he said, half aloud. + +Gentle as his tone was, the mere doubt stung Cecil to the quick. +Something of the wild, desperate feeling of the day previous rose in her +heart. The same feeling that makes men brave heaven and hell to win +their desires worked up in her. If she had been one of us, just at that +moment, she would have flinched at nothing; being a young lady, her +hands were tied. She could only go to Cos's stalls with him (Cos knows +as much about horseflesh as I do about the profound female mystery they +call "shopping"), and flirt with him to desperation, while Horace got +the steam up faster than he, with his very languid motor powers, often +did, being accustomed to be spared the trouble and have all the love +made to him--an indolence in which the St. Aubyn, who knows how to keep +a man well up to hand, never indulged him. + +"Do have some pity on me," I heard Cos murmuring, as she stroked a great +brute of his, with a head like a fiddle-case, and no action at all. "I +assure you, Miss St. Aubyn, you make me wretched. I'd die for you +to-morrow if I only saw how, and yet you take no more notice of me +sometimes than if I were that colt." + +Cecil glanced at him with a smile that would have driven Cos distracted +if he'd been in for it as deep as he pretended. + +"I don't see that you are much out of condition, Sir Horace, but if you +have any particular fancy to suicide, the horse-pond will accommodate +you at a moment's notice; only don't do it till after our play, because +I have set my heart on that suit of Milan armor. Pray don't look so +plaintive. If it will make you any happier, I am going for a walk, and +you may come too. Blanche, dear, which way is it to the plantations?" + +Now poor Horace hated a walk on a frosty morning as cordially as +anything, being altogether averse to any natural exercise: but he was +sworn to the St. Aubyn, and Blanche and I, dropping behind them, he had +a good hour of her fascinations to himself. I do not know whether he +improved the occasion, but Cecil at luncheon looked tired and teased. I +should think, after Syd's graphic epigrammatic talk, the baronet's +lisped nonsense must have been rather trying, especially as Cecil has a +strong leaning to intellect. + +Vivian didn't appear at luncheon; he was gone rabbit-shooting with the +other fellows, and I should have been with them if I had not thought +lounging in the drawing-room, reading "Clytemnestra" to Blanche, with +many pauses, the greater fun of the two. I am keen about sport, too; but +ever since, at the age of ten, I conceived a romantic passion for my +mother's lady's-maid--a tall and stately young lady, who eventually +married a retail tea-dealer--I have thought the beaux yeux the best of +all games. + +"Mrs. Vivian, Blanche and Helena and I want to be very useful, if you +will let us," said Cecil, one morning. She was always soft and playful +with that gentlest of all women, Syd's mother. "What do you smile in +that incredulous way for? We _can_ be extraordinarily industrious: the +steam sewing-machine is nothing to us when we choose! What do you think +we are going to do? We are going to decorate the church for Christmas. +To leave it to that poor little old clerk, who would only stick two +holly twigs in the pulpit candlesticks, and fancy he had done a work of +high art, would be madness. And, besides, it will be such fun." + +"If you think it so, pray do it, dear," laughed Mrs. Vivian. "I can't +say I should, but your tastes and mine are probably rather different. +The servants will do as you direct them." + +"Oh no," said Cecil; "we mean to do it all ourselves. The gentlemen may +help us if they like--those, at least, who prefer our society to that of +smaller animals, with lop-ears and little bushy tails, who have a +fascination superior sometimes to any of our attractions." She flashed a +glance at the Colonel, who was watching her over the top of _Punch_, as, +when I was a boy, I have watched the sun, though it pained my eyes to do +it. "You're the grand seigneur of Deerhurst," said Cecil, turning to +him; "will you be good, and order cart-loads of holly and evergreens +(and plenty of the Portugal laurel, please, because it's so pretty) down +to the church; and will you come and do all the hard work for me? The +rabbits would _so_ enjoy a little peace to-day, poor things!" + +He smiled in spite of himself, and did her bidding, with a flush of +pleasure on his face. I believe at that moment, to please her, he would +have cut down the best timber on the estates--even the old oaks, in +whose shadow in the midsummer of centuries before Guy Vivian and Muriel +had plighted their troth. + +The way to the church was through a winding walk, between high walls of +yew, and the sanctuary itself was a find old Norman place, whose _tout +ensemble_ I admired, though I could not pick it to pieces +architecturally. + +To the church we all went, of course, with more readiness than we +probably ever did in our lives, regardless of the rose chains with which +we were very likely to become entangled, while white hands weaved the +holly wreaths. + +Vivian had ordered evergreens enough to decorate fifty churches, and had +sent over to the neighboring town for no end of ribbon emblazonments and +illuminated scrolls, on which Cecil looked with delight. She seemed to +know by instinct it was done for _her_, and not for his sisters. + +"How kind that is of you," she said, softly. "That is like what you were +in Toronto. Why are you not always the same?" + +For a moment she saw passion enough in his eye to satisfy her, but he +soon mastered it, and answered her courteously: + +"I am very glad they please you. Shall we go to work at once, for fear +it grow dusk before we get through with it?" + +"Can I do anything to help you?" murmured Cos in her ear. + +She did not want him, and laughed mischievously. "You can cut some holly +if you like. Begin on those large boughs." + +"Better not, Cos," said the Colonel. "You will certainly soil your +hands, and you might chance to scratch them." + +"And if you did you would never forgive me, so I will let you off duty. +You may go back to the dormeuse and the 'Lys de la Vallee' if you wish," +laughed Cecil. + +Horace looked sulky, and curled his blond whiskers in dudgeon, while +Cecil, with half a dozen satellites about her, proceeded to work with +vigorous energy, keeping Syd, however, as her head workman; and the +Colonel twisted pillars, nailed up crosses, hung wreaths, and put up +illuminated texts, as if he had been a carpenter all his life, and his +future subsistence entirely depended on his adorning Deerhurst church in +good taste. It was amusing to me to see him, whom the highest London +society, the gayest Paris life bored--who pronounced the most dashing +opera supper and the most vigorous debates alike slow--taking the +deepest interest in decorating a little village church! I question if +Eros did not lurk under the shiny leaves and the scarlet berries of +those holly boughs quite as dangerously as ever he did under the rose +petals consecrated to him. + +I had my own affairs to attend to, sitting on the pulpit stairs at +Blanche's feet, twisting the refractory evergreens at her direction; but +I kept an occasional look-out at the Colonel and his dangerous Canadian +for all that. They found time (as we did) for plenty of conversation +over the Christmas decorations, and Cecil talked softly and earnestly +for once without any "mischief." She talked of her father's +embarrassments, her mother's trials, of Mrs. Coverdale, with honest +detestation of that widow's arts and artifices, and of her own tastes, +and ideas, and feelings, showing the Colonel (what she did not show +generally to her numerous worshippers) her heart as well as her mind. As +she knelt on the altar steps, twisting green leaves round the communion +rails, Syd standing beside her, his pale bronze cheek flushed, and his +eyes never left their study of her face as she bent over her work, +looking up every minute to ask him for another branch, or another strip +of blue ribbon. + +When it had grown dusk, and the church was finished, looking certainly +very pretty, with the dark leaves against its white pillars, and the +scarlet berries kissing the stained windows, Cecil went noiselessly up +into the organ-loft, and played the Christmas anthem. Vivian followed +her, and, leaning against the organ, watched her, shading his eyes with +his hand. She went on playing--first a Miserere, then Mozart's Symphony +in E, and then improvisations of her own--the sort of music that, when +one stands calmly to listen to it, makes one feel it whether one likes +or not. As she played, tears rose to her lashes, and she looked up at +Vivian's face, bending over her in the gloaming. Love was in her eyes, +and Syd knew it, but feared to trust to it. His pulses beat fast, he +leaned towards her, till his mustaches touched her soft perfumy hair. +Words hung on his lips. But the door of the organ-loft opened. + +"'Pon my life, Miss St. Aubyn, that's divine, delicious!" cried Cos. "We +always thought that you were divine, but we never knew till now that you +brought the angels' harmony with you to earth. For Heaven's sake, play +that last thing again!" + +"I never play what I compose twice," said Cecil, hurriedly, stooping +down for her hat. + +Vivian cursed him inwardly for his untimely interruption, but cooler +thought made him doubt if he were not well saved some words, dictates of +hasty passion, that he might have lived to repent. For Guy Vivian's fate +warned him, and he mistrusted the love of a flirt, if flirt, as he +feared--from her sudden caprices to him, her alternate impatience with, +and encouragement of, his cousin--Cecil St. Aubyn would prove. He gave +her his arm down the yew-tree walk. Neither of them spoke all the way, +but he sent a servant on for another shawl, and wrapped it round her +very tenderly when it came; and when he stood in the lighted hall, I saw +by the stern, worn look of his face--the look I have seen him wear after +a hard fight--that the fiery passions in him had been having a fierce +battle. + +That evening the St. Aubyn was off her fun, said she was tired, and, +disregarding the misery she caused to Cos and four other men, who, +figuratively speaking, _not_ literally, for they went into the "dry" and +comestibles fast enough, had lived on her smiles for the last month, +excused herself to Mrs. Vivian, and departed to her dormitory. Syd gave +her her candle, and held her little hand two seconds in his as he bid +her softly good night at the foot of the staircase. + +I did not get much out of him in the balcony that night, and long after +I had turned in, I scented his Cavendish as he smoked, Heaven knows how +many pipes, in the chill December air. The next day, the 23rd, was the +night of our theatricals, which went off as dashingly as if Mr. Kean, +with his eternal "R-r-r-richard," had been there to superintend them. + +All the country came; dowagers and beauties, with the odor of Belgravia +still strong about them: people not quite so high, who were not the +rose, but living near it, toadied that flower with much amusing and +undue worship; a detachment of Dragoons from the next town, whom the +girls wanted to draw, and the mammas to warn off--Dragoons being +ordinarily better waltzers than speculations; all the magnates, custos +rotulorum, sheriff, members, and magistrates--the two latter portions of +the constitution being chiefly remarkable for keenness about hunting and +turnips, and an unchristian and deadly enmity against all poachers and +vagrants; rectors, who tossed down the still Ai with Falstaff's keen +relish; other rectors, who came against their principles, but preferred +fashion to salvation, having daughters to marry and sons to start; +hunting men; girls who could waltz in a nutshell; dandies of St. +James's, and veterans of Pall-Mall, down for the Christmas; belles +renewing their London acquaintance, and recalling that "pleasant day at +Richmond." But, by Jove! if I describe all the different species +presented to view in that ball-room, I might use as many words as an old +whip giving you the genealogy of a killing pack in a flying county. + +Suffice it, there they all were to criticise us, and pretty sharply I +dare say they did it, when they were out of our hearing, in their +respective clarences, broughams, dog-carts, drags, tilburies, and +hansoms. Before our faces, of course, they only clapped their snowy kid +gloves, and murmured "Bravissimo!" with an occasional "Go it, Jack!" and +"Get up the steam, old fellow!" from the young bloods in the background; +and a shower of bouquets at Cecil and Blanche from their especial +worshippers. + +Blanche made the dearest little _Catherine_ that ever dressed herself up +in blue and silver, and when she drew her toy-rapier in the green-room, +asked me if I could not get her a cornetcy in ours. As for Cecil, she +played _a ravir_ as Cos, in his Milan armor, whispered with some +difficulty, as the steel gorget pressed his throat uncomfortably. +Vestris herself never made a more brilliant or impassioned _Countess_. +She and Syd really acquitted themselves in a style to qualify them for +London boards, and as she threw herself at his feet-- + + Huon--my husband--lord--canst thou forgive + The scornful maid? for the devoted wife + Had cleaved to thee, though ne'er she owned thee lord, + +I thought the St. Aubyn must be as great an actress as Rachel, if some +of that fervor was not real. + +Cecil played in the afterpiece, "The wonderful Woman;" the Colonel +didn't; and Cos being _De Frontignac_, Syd leaned against one of the +scenes, and looked on the whole thing with calm indifference externally, +but much disquietude and annoyance within him. He was not jealous of the +puppy; he would as soon have thought of putting himself on a par with +Blanche's little white terrier, but he'd come to set a price on Cecil's +winning smiles, and to see them given pretty equally to him, and to a +young fool, her inferior in everything save position, whom he knew in +her inmost soul she must ridicule and despise, galled his pride, and +steeled his heart against her. His experience in women made him know +that it was highly probable that Cecil was playing both at once, and +that though, as he guessed, she loved him, she would, if Cos offered +first, accept the title, and wealth, and position his cousin, equally +with himself, could give her; and such love as that was far from the +Colonel's ideal. + +"By George! Vivian, that Canadian of yours is a perfect angel," said a +man in the Dragoons, who had played _Ulric_. "She's such a deuced lot +ove pluck, such eyes, such hair, such a voice! 'Pon my life, I quite +envy you. I suppose you mean to act out the play in reality, don't you?" + +Vivian lying back in an arm-chair in the green-room crushed up one of +the satin playbills in his hand, and answered simply, "You do me too +much honor, Calvert. Miss St. Aubyn and I have no thought of each +other." + +If any man had given Vivian the lie, he would have had him out and shot +him instanter; nevertheless, he told this one with the most unhesitating +defiance of truth. He did not see Cecil, who had just come off the +stage, standing behind him. But she heard his words, went as white as +Muriel's phantom, and brushed past us into her dressing room, whence she +emerged, when her name was called, her cheeks bright with their first +rouge, and her eyes unnaturally brilliant. _How_ she flirted with Horace +that night, when the theatricals were over! Young ladies who wanted to +hook the pet baronet, whispered over their bouquets, "How bold!" and +dowagers, seeing one of their best matrimonial speculations endangered +by the brilliant Canadian, murmured behind their fans to each other +their wonder that Mrs. Vivian should allow any one so fast and so +unblushing a coquette to associate with her young daughters. + +Vivian watched her with intense earnestness. He had given her a bouquet +that day, and she had thanked him for it with her soft, fond eyes, and +told him she should use it. Now, as she came into the ball-room, he +looked at the one in her hand; it was not his, but his cousin's. + +He set his teeth hard; and swore a bitter oath to himself. As _Huon_, he +was obliged to dance the first dance with the _Countess_, but he spoke +little to her, and indeed, Cecil did not give him much opportunity, for +she talked fast, and at random, on all sorts of indifferent subjects, +with more than even her usual vivacity, and quite unlike the ordinary +soft and winning way she had used of late when with him. He danced no +more with her, but, daring the waltzes with which he was obliged to +favor certain county beauties, and all the time he was doing the honors +of Deerhurst, with his calm, stately, Bayard-like courtesy, his eyes +would fasten on the St. Aubyn, driving the Dragoons to desperation, +waltzing while Horace whispered tender speeches in her ear, or sitting +jesting and laughing, half the men in the room gathered round her--with +a look of passion and hopelessness, tenderness and determination, +strangely combined. + + + + +IV. + +THE COLONEL KILLS HIS FOX, BUT LOSES HIS HEAD AFTER OTHER GAME. + + +The next day was Christmas-eve; and on the 24th of December the hounds, +from time immemorial, had been taken out by a Vivian. For the last few +days the frost had been gradually breaking up, thank Heaven, and we +looked forward to a good day's sport The meet was at Deerhurst, and it +proved a strong muster for the Harkaway; though not exactly up to the +Northamptonshire Leicestershire mark, are a clever, steady pack. Cecil +and Blanche were the only two women with us, for the country is cramped +and covered with blind fences, and the fair sex seldom hunt with the +Harkaway. But the St. Aubyn is a first-rate seat, and Blanche has, she +tells me, ridden anything from the day she first stuck on to her +Shetland, when she was three years old. They were both down in time. +Indeed, I question if they went to bed at all, or did any more than +change their ball dresses for their habits. As I lifted Blanche on to +her pet chestnut, I heard Syd telling Cecil that Billiard-ball was +saddled. + +"Thank you," said the St. Aubyn, hurriedly. "I need not trouble you. +Sir Horace has promised to mount me." + +Vivian bent his head with a strange smile, and sprang on Qui Vive, while +Cecil mounted a showy roan, thorough-bred, the only good horse Cos had +in his stud, despite the thousands he had paid into trainers' and +breeders' pockets. + +"Stole away--forward, forward!" screamed Vivian's fellow-member for +Cacklebury; and, holding Qui Vive hard by the head, away went Syd after +the couple or two of hounds that were leading the way over some pasture +land, with an ox-rail at the bottom of it, all the field after him. +Cecil's roan flew over the grass land, and rose at the ox-rail as +steadily as Qui Vive. Blanche's chestnut let himself be kicked along at +no end of a pace, his mistress sitting down in her stirrups as well as +the gallant M. F. H., her father. I never _do_ think of anything but the +hounds flying along in front of me, but I could not help turning my head +over my shoulder to see if she was all right; and I never admired her so +much as when she passed me with a merry laugh: "Five to one I beat you, +monsieur!" Away we went over the dark ploughed lands, and the naked +thorn hedges, the wide straggling briar fences, and the fields covered +with stones and belted with black-looking plantations. Down went Cos +with his horse wallowing helplessly in a ditch, after considerately +throwing him unhurt on the bank. Syd set his teeth as he lifted Qui Vive +over the prostrate baronet, to the imminent danger of that dandy +field-sportsman's life. "Take hold of his head, Miss St. Aubyn," shouted +the M. F. H.; but before the words had passed his lips, Cecil had landed +gallantly a little farther down. Another ten minutes with the hounds +streaming over the country--a ten minutes of wild delight, worth all the +monotonous hours of every-day life--and Qui Vive was alone with the +hounds. We could see him speeding along a quarter of a mile ahead of us, +and Cecil's roan was but half a field behind him. She was "riding +jealous" of one of the best riders in the Queen's; the M. F. H. just in +front of her turned his head once, in admiration of her pluck, to see +her lift her horse at a staken-bound fence; but the Colonel never looked +round. Away they went--they disappeared over the brow of a hill. Blanche +shook her reins and struck her chestnut, and I sawed my hunter's mouth +mercilessly with the snaffle. No use--we were too late by three minutes. +Confound it! they had just killed their fox after twenty minutes' burst +over a stiff country, one of the fastest things I ever saw. + +Cecil was pale with over-excitement, and upon my word she looked more +ready to cry than anything when the M. F. H. complimented her with his +genial smile, and his cordial "Well done, my dear. I never saw anybody +ride better. I used to think my little Blanche the best seat in the +country, but she must give place to you--eh, Syd?" + +"Miss St. Aubyn does everything well that she attempts," answered the +Colonel, in his calm, courteous tone, looking, nevertheless, as stern as +if he had just slain his deadliest enemy, instead of having seen a fox +killed. + +Cecil flushed scarlet, and Cos coming up at that moment, a sadly +bespattered object for such an Adonis to present, his coat possessing +more the appearance of a bricklayer's than any one else's, after its +bath of white mud, she turned to him, and began to laugh and talk with +rather wild gaiety. It so chanced that the fox was killed on Horace's +land, and we, being not more than a mile and a half off his house, the +gallant Cos immediately seized upon the idea of having the object of his +idolatry up there to luncheon; and his uncle, and Cecil, and Blanche +acquiescing in the arrangement, to his house we went, with such of the +field as had ridden up after the finish. Cos trotted forward with the +St. Aubyn to show us the way by a short cut through the park, and the +echoes of Cecil's laughter rang to Vivian in the rear discussing the run +with his father. + +A very slap-up place was Cos's baronial hall, for the Cossettings had +combined blood and money far many generations; its style and +appointments were calculated to back him powerfully in the matrimonial +market, and that Cecil might have it all was fully apparent, as he +devoted himself to her at the luncheon, which made its appearance at a +minute's notice, as if Aladdin had called it up. Cecil seemed disposed +to have it too. A deep flush had come up in her cheeks; she smiled her +brightest smiles on Cos; she drank his Moet's, bending her graceful head +with a laughing pledge to her host; she talked so fast, so gaily, such +repartee, such sarcasms, such jeux de mots, that it was well no women +were at table to sit in judgment on her afterwards. A deadly paleness +came over Vivian's face as he listened to her--but he sat at the bottom +of the board where Cecil could not see him. His father, the gayest and +best-tempered of mortals, laughed and applauded her; the other men were +charmed with a style and a wit so new to them; and Cos, of course, was +in the seventh heaven. + +The horses were dead beat, and Cos's drag, with its four bays very +fresh, for they were so little worked, was ordered to take us back to +Deerhurst. + +"Who'll drive," said Horace. "Will you, Syd?" + +"No," said his cousin, more laconically than politely. + +"Let _me_," cried Cecil. "I can drive four in hand. Nothing I like +better." + +"Give me the ribbons," interposed the Colonel, changing his mind, "if +you can't drive them yourself, Cos, as you ought to do." + +"No, no," murmured Cos. "Mith St. Aubyn shall do everything she wishes +in _my_ house." + +"Let her drive them," laughed Vivian, senior. "Blanche has tooled my +drag often enough before now." + +Before he had finished, Cecil had sprung up on to the box as lightly as +a bird; her cheeks were flushed deeper still, and her gazelle eyes +flashed darker than ever. Cos mounted beside her. Blanche and I in the +back seat. The M. F. H., Syd, and the two other men behind. The bays +shook their harness and started off at a rattling pace, Cecil tooling +them down the avenue with her little gauntleted hands as well as if she +had been Four-in-hand Forester of the Queen's Bays, or any other crack +whip. How she flirted, and jested, and laughed, and shook the ribbons +till the bays tore along the stony road in the dusky winter's +afternoon--even Blanche, though a game little lady herself, looked +anxious. + +Cecil asked Horace for a cigar, and struck a fusee, and puffed away into +the frosty air like the wildest young Cantab at Trinity. It didn't make +her sick, for she and Blanche had had two Queens out of Vivian's case, +and smoked them to the last ash for fun only the day before; and she +drove us at a mad gallop into Deerhurst Park, past the dark trees and +the gleaming water and the trooping deer, and pulled up before the hall +door just as the moon came out on Christmas-eve. + +We were all rather fast at Deerhurst, so Blanche got no scolding from +her mamma (who, like a sensible woman, never put into their heads that +things done in the glad innocency of the heart were "wrong"); and Cecil, +as soon as she had sprung down, snatched her hand from Cos, and went up +to her own room. + +The Colonel's lips were pressed close together, and his forehead had the +dark frown that Guy wears in his portrait. + +It had been done with another, so it was all wrong; but oh! Syd, my +friend, if the "dry" that was drunk, and the drag that was tooled, and +the weed that was smoked, had been _yours_, wouldn't it have been the +most charming caprice of the most charming woman! + +That night, at dinner, a letter by the afternoon's post came to the +Colonel. It was "On her Majesty's Service," and his mother asked him +anxiously what it was. + +"Only to tell me to join soon," said he, carelessly, giving me a sign to +keep the contents of a similar letter I had just received to myself; +which I should have done anyhow, as I had reason to hope that the +disclosure of them would have quenched the light in some bright eyes +beside me. + +"Ordered off at last, thank God!" said Syd, handing his father the +letter as soon as the ladies were gone. "There's a train starts at +12.40, isn't there, for town? You and I, Ned, had better go to-night. +You don't look so charmed, old fellow, as you did when you went out to +Scinde. I say, don't tell my sisters; there is no need to make a row in +the house. Governor, you'll prepare my mother; I must bid _her_ +good-by." + +I _did not_ view the Crimea with the unmingled, devil-me-care delight +with which I had gone out under "fighting Napier" nine years before, +for Blanche's sunshiny face had made life fairer to me; and to obey Syd, +and go without a farewell of her, was really too great a sacrifice to +friendship. But he and I went to the drawing-rooms, chatted, and took +coffee as if nothing had chanced, till he could no longer stand seeing +Cecil, still excited, singing chansons to Cos, who was leaning +enraptured over the instrument, and he went off to his own room. The +other girls and men were busy playing the Race game; Blanche and I were +sitting in the back drawing-room beside the fire, and the words that +decided my destiny were so few, that I cite them as a useful lesson to +those novelists who are in the habit of making their heroes, while +waiting breathless to hear their fate, recite off at a cool canter four +pages of the neatest-turned sentences without a single break-down or a +single pull-up, to see how the lady takes it. + +"Blanche, I must bid you good-by to-night." Blanche turned to me in +bewildered anxiety. "I must join my troop: perhaps I may be sent to the +Crimea. I could go happily if I thought you would regret me?" + +Brutally selfish that was to be sure, but she did not take it so. She +looked as if she was going to faint, and for fear she should, trusting +to the engrossing nature of the Race game in the further apartment, I +drew nearer to her. "Will you promise to give yourself to nobody else +while I am away, my darling?" Blanche's eyes did promise me through +their tears, and this brief scene, occupying the space of two minutes, +twisted our fates into one on that eventful Christmas-eve. + +While I was parting with my poor little Blanche in the library, Vivian +was bidding his mother farewell in her dressing-room. His mother had the +one soft place in his heart, steeled and made skeptical to all others by +that fatal first love of which he had spoken to Cecil. Possibly some of +her son's bitter grief was shown to her on that sad Christmas-eve; at +all events, when he left her dressing-room, he had the tired, haggard +look left by any conflict of passion. As he came down the stairs to come +to the dog-cart that was to take us to the station, the door of +Blanche's boudoir stood open, and in it he saw Cecil. The fierce tide of +his love surged up, subduing all his pride, and he paused to take his +last sight of the face that would haunt him in the long night watches +and the rapid rush of many a charge. She looked up and saw him; that +look overpowered all his calmness and resolve. He turned, and bent +towards her, every feature quivering with the passion she had once +longed to rouse. His hot breath scorched her cheek, and he caught her +fiercely against his heart in an iron embrace, pressing his burning lips +on hers. "God forgive you! I have loved you too well. Women have ever +been fatal to my race!" + +He almost threw her from him in the violence of feelings roused after a +long sleep. In another moment he was driving the dog-cart at a mad +gallop past the old church in which we had spent such pleasant hours. +Its clock tolled out twelve strokes as we passed it, and on the quiet +village, and the weird-like trees, and the tall turrets of Deerhurst, +the Christmas morning dawned. + +Vivian continued so utterly enfeebled and prostrate that there was but +one chance for him--return homewards. I was going to England with +despatches, and Syd, at his mother's entreaty, let himself be carried +down to a transport, and shipped for England. He was utterly listless +and strengthless, although the voyage did him a little good. He did not +care where he went, so he stayed in town with me while I presented +myself at the Horse Guards and war Office, and then we travelled down +together to Deerhurst. + +Oddly enough it was Christmas-eve again when we drove up the old avenue. +The snow was falling heavily, and lay deep on the road and thick on the +hedges and trees. The meadows and woods were white against the dark, +hushed sky, and the old church, and its churchyard cedars, were loaded +too with the clouds' Christmas gift. To me, at least, the English scene +was very pleasant, after the heat, and dirt, and minor worries of +Gallipoli and Constantinople. The wide stretching country, with its +pollards, and holly hedges, and homesteads, the cattle safe housed, the +yule fire burning cheerily on the hearths, the cottages and farms +nestling down among their orchards and pasture-lands, all was so +heartily and thoroughly English. They seemed to bring back days when I +was a boy skating and sliding on the mere at home, or riding out with +the harriers light-hearted and devil-me-care as a boy might be, coming +back to hear the poor governor's cheery voice tell me I was one of the +old stock, and to toss down a bumper of Rhenish with a time-honored +Christmas toast. The crackle of the crisp snow, the snort of the horses +as they plunged on into the darkening night, and the red fire-light +flickering on the lattice windows of the cottages we passed, were so +many welcomes home, and I double-thonged the off-wheeler with a +vengeance as I thought of soft lips that would soon touch mine, and a +soft voice that would soon whisper my best "Io triumphe!" + +The lodge-gates flew open. We passed the old oaks and beeches, the deer +trooping away over the snow as we startled them out of their rest. We +were not expected that night, and my man rang such a peal at the bell as +might have been heard all over the quiet park. Another minute, and +Blanche and I were together again, and alone in the library where we had +parted just twelve months before. Of course, for the time being, we +neither knew nor cared what was going on in the other rooms of the +house. The Colonel had gone to rest himself on the sofa in the +dining-room. Half an hour had elapsed, perhaps, when a wild cry rang +through the house, startling even us, absorbed though we were in our +tete-a-tete. Blanche's first thought was of her brother. She ran out +through the hall, and up the staircase, and I followed her. At the top +of the stairs, leaning against the wall, breathing fast, and his face +ashy white, stood Syd, and at his feet, in a dead faint, lay Cecil St. +Aubyn. I caught hold of Blanche's arm and held her back as she was about +to spring forward. I thought their meeting had much best be +uninterrupted; for, if Cecil's had been mere flirtation I fancied the +Colonel's return could scarcely have moved her like this. + +Vivian stood looking down on her, all the passion in him breaking +bounds. He could not stand calmly by the woman he loved. He did not wait +to know whether she was his or another's--whether she was worthy or +unworthy of him--but he lifted her up and pressed her unconscious form +against his heart, covering her lips with wild caresses. Waking from her +trance, she opened her eyes with a terrified stare, and gazed up in his +face; then tears came to her relief, and she sank down at his feet again +with a pitiful cry, "Forgive me--forgive me!" Weak as Syd was, he found +strength to raise her in his arms, and whisper, as he bent over her, "If +you love me, I have nothing to forgive." + + * * * * * + +The snow fell softly without over the woods and fields and the winds +roared through the old oaks and whistled among the frozen ferns, but +Christmas-eve passed brightly enough to us at home within the strong +walls of Deerhurst. + +I am sure that all Moore's pictures of Paradise seemed to me tame +compared to that drawing-room, with its warmth, and coziness, and +luxuries; with the waxlights shining on the silver of the English tea +equipage (pleasant to eye and taste, let one love campaigning ever so +well, after the roast beans of the Commissariat), and the fire-gleams +dancing on the soft brow and shining hair of the face beside me. I doubt +if Vivian either ever spent a happier Christmas-eve as he lay on the +sofa in the back drawing-room, with Cecil sitting on a low seat by him, +her hand in his, and the Canadian eyes telling him eloquently of love +and reconciliation. They had such volumes to say! As soon as she knew +that wild farewell of his preceded his departure to the Crimea, Cecil, +always impulsive, had written to him on the instant, telling him how she +loved him, detailing what she had heard in the green-room, confessing +that, in desperation, she had done everything she could to rouse his +jealousy, assuring him that that same evening she had refused Cos's +proposals, and beseeching him to forgive her and come back to her. That +letter Vivian had never had (six months from that time, by the way, it +turned up, after a journey to India and Melbourne, following a cousin of +his, colonel of a line regiment, she in her haste having omitted to put +his troop on the address), and Cecil, whose feeling was too deep to let +her mention the subject to Blanche or Helena, made up her mind that he +would never forgive her, and being an impressionable young lady, had, on +the anniversary of Christmas-eve, been comparing her fate with that of +Muriel in the ghost legend, and, on seeing the Colonel's unexpected +apparition, had fainted straight away in the over-excitement and sudden +joy of the moment. + +Such was Cecil's story, and Vivian was content with it and gladly took +occasion to practise the Christmas duties of peace, and love, and +pardon. He had the best anodyne for his wounds now, and there was no +danger for him, since Cecil had taken the place of the Scutari nurses. +No "Crimean heroes," as they call us in the papers, were ever more feted +and petted than were the Colonel and I. + +Christmas morning dawned, the sun shining bright on the snow-covered +trees, and the Christmas bells chiming merrily; and as we stood on the +terrace to see the whole village trooping up through the avenue to +receive the gifts left to them by some old Vivian long gone to his rest +with his forefathers under the churchyard cedars, Syd looked down with a +smile into Cecil's eyes as she hung on his arm, and whispered, + +"I will double those alms, love, in memory of the priceless gift this +Christmas has given me. Ah! Thornton and I little knew, when we came +down for the hunting, how fast you and Blanche would capture us with +your--HOLLY WREATHS AND ROSE CHAINS." + + + + +SILVER CHIMES AND GOLDEN FETTERS. + + + + +SILVER CHIMES AND GOLDEN FETTERS. + + + + +I. + +WALDEMAR FALKENSTEIN AND VALERIE L'ESTRANGE. + + +"A quarter to twelve! By Heaven if my luck don't change before the year +is out, I vow I'll never touch a card in the next!" exclaimed one of +several men playing lansquenet in Harry Godolphin's rooms at +Knightsbridge. + +There were seven or eight of them, some with long rent-rolls, others +within an ace of the Queen's Bench; the poor devils losing in the long +run much oftener and more recklessly than the rich fellows; all of them +playing high, as that _beau joueur_ of the Guards, Godolphin, always +did. + +Luck had been dead against the man who spoke ever since they had +deserted the mess-room for the _cartes_ in the privacy of Harry's rooms. +If Fortune is a woman, he ought to have found favor in her eyes. His age +was between thirty and thirty-five, his figure with grace and strength +combined, his features nobly and delicately cut, his head, like +Canning's, one of great intellectual beauty, and by the flash of his +large dark eyes, and the additional paleness of his cheek, it was easy +to see he was playing high once too often. + +Five minutes passed--he lost still; ten minutes' luck was yet against +him. A little French clock began the Silver Chimes that rang out the Old +Year; the twelfth stroke sounded, the New Year was come, and Waldemar +Falkenstein rose and drank down some cognac--a ruined man. + +"A happy New Year to you, and better luck, Falkenstein," cried +Godolphin, drinking his toast with a ringing laugh and a foaming bumper +of Chambertin. "What shall I wish you? The richest wife in the kingdom, +a cabal that will break all the banks, for Mistletoe to win the Oaks, or +for your eyes to be opened to your sinful state, as the parson phrases +it--which, eh?" + +"Thank you, Harry," laughed Falkenstein. (Like the old Spartans, we can +laugh while the wolf gnaws our vitals.) "You remind me of what my +holy-minded brother wrote to me when I broke my shoulder-bone down at +Melton last season: 'My dear Waldemar, I am sorry to hear of your sad +accident; but all things are ordered for the best, and I trust that in +your present hours of solitude your thoughts may be mercifully turned to +higher and better things.' Queer style of sympathy, wasn't it? I +preferred yours, when you sent me 'Adelaide Meran,' and that splendid +hock I wasn't allowed to touch." + +"I should say so; but catch the Pharisees giving anybody anything warmer +than texts and counsels, that cost them nothing," said Tom Bevan of the +Blues. "Apropos of Pharisees, have you heard that old Cash is going to +build a chapel-of-ease in Belgravia, to endow that young owl Gus with as +soon as he can pull himself through his 'greats?' It is thought that the +dear Bella will be painted as St. Catherine for the altar-piece." + +"She'll strychnine herself if we're all so hard-hearted as to leave her +to St. Catharine's nightcap," laughed Falkenstein. + +"Why don't _you_ take up with her, old fellow?" said a man in +Godolphin's troop. "Not the sangue puro, you'd say; rather sallied with +XXX. But what does that signify? you've quarterings enough for two." + +"Much good the quarterings do me. No, thank you," said Falkenstein +bitterly. "I'm not going to sell myself, though my dear friends would +insinuate that I was sold already to a gentleman who never quits hold of +his bargains. I've fetters enough now too heavy by half to add +matrimonial handcuffs to them." + +"Right, old boy," said Harry. "The Cashranger hops and vats, even done +in the brightest parvenu _or_, would scarcely look well blazoned on the +royal _gules_. Come, sit down. Where are you going?" + +"He's going to Eulalie Brown's, I bet," said Bevan. "Nonsense, Waldemar; +throw her over, and stay and take your revenge--it's so early." + +"No, thank you," said Falkenstein briefly. "By the way, I suppose you +all go to Cashranger's to-morrow?" + +"Make a point of it, answered Godolphin. I feel I'm sinning against my +Order to visit him, but really his Lafitte's so good----I'm sorry you +_will_ leave us, Waldemar, but I know I might as well try to move the +Marble Arch as try to turn you." + +"Indeed I never set up for a Roman, Harry. The deuce take this pipe, it +won't light. Good night to you all." And leaving them drinking hard, +laughing loud, and telling _grivois_ tales before they sat down to play +in all its delirious delight, he sprang into a hanson, and drove, not to +Eulalie Brown's _petit souper_, but to his own rooms in Duke Street, St. +James's. + +Falkenstein's governor, some two-score years before, had got in +mauvaise odeur in Vienna for some youthful escapade at court; powerful +as his princely family was, had been obliged to fly the country; and, +coming over here, entered himself at the Bar, and, setting himself to +work with characteristic energy, had, wonderful to relate, made a +fortune at it. A fine, gallant, courtly _ancien noble_ was the Count, +haughty and passionate at times, after the manner of the house; fond of +his younger son Waldemar, who at school had tanned boys twice his size; +rode his pony in at the finish; smoked, swam, and otherwise conducted +himself, till all the rest of the boys worshipped him, though I believe +the masters generally attributed to him more _diablerie_ than divinity. +But of late, unluckily, his father had been much dominated over by +Waldemar's three sisters, ladies of a chill and High Church turn of +mind, and by his brother, who in early life had been a prize boy and a +sap, and received severe buffetings from his junior at football; and +now, being much the more conventional and unimpeachable of the two, took +his revenge by carrying many tales to the old Count of his wilder +son--tales to which Falkenstein gave strong foundation. For he was +restless and reckless, strikingly original, and, above the common herd, +too impatient to take any meddling with his affairs, and too proud to +explain where he was misjudged; and, though he held a crack government +place, good pay, and all but a sinecure, he often spent more than he +had, for economy was a dead-letter to him, and if any man asked him a +loan, he was too generous to say "No." Life in all its phases he had +seen from the time he left school, and you know, mon ami, we cannot see +life on a groat--at least, through the bouquet of the wines at Vefours, +and the brilliance of the gas-light in Casinos and Redoutes. The +fascinations of play were over him--the iron hand of debt pressed upon +him; altogether, as he sat through the first hours of the New Year, +smoking, and gazing on the flickering fire gleams, there was not much +light either in his past or future! + +Keenly imaginative and susceptible, blase and skeptical though he was, +the weight of the Old Year and of many gone before it, weighed heavily +on his thoughts. Scenes and deeds of his life, that he would willingly +have blotted out, rose before him; vague regrets, unformed desires, +floated to him on the midnight chimes. + +The Old Year was drifting away on the dark clouds floating on to the +sea, the New Year was dawning on the vast human life swarming in the +costly palaces and crowded dens around him. The past was past, +ineffaceable, and relentless; the future lay hid in the unborn days, and +Falkenstein, his pipe out, his fire cold and black, took a sedative, and +threw himself on his bed, to sleep heavily and restlessly through the +struggling morning light of the New Year. + +James Cashranger, Esq., of 133, Lowndes Square, was a millionnaire, and +the million owed its being to the sale of his entire, which was of high +celebrity, being patronised by all the messes and clubs, shipped to all +the colonies, blessed by all the H. E. I. C.s, shouted by all the potmen +as "Beer-r-r-how," and consumed by all England generally. But +Cashranger's soul soared above the snobisms of malt and jack, and a la +Jourdain, of bourgeois celebrity, he would have let any Dorante of the +beau monde fleece him through thick and thin, and, _en effet_, gave +dinners and drums unnumbered to men and women, who, like Godolphin, went +there for the sake of his Lafitte, and quizzed him mercilessly behind +his back. The first day Harry dined there with nine other spirits worse +than himself--Cashranger having begged him to bring some of his +particular chums--he looked at the eleventh seat, and asked, with +consummate impudence, who it was for? + +"Why, really, my dear Colonel, it is for--for myself," faltered the +luckless brewer. + +"Oh?--ah?--I see," drawled Harry; "you mistook me; I said I'd dine +_here_--I didn't say I'd dine with _you_." + +That, however, was four or five years before; now, Godolphin having +proclaimed his cook and cellar worth countenancing, and his wife, the +relict of a lieutenant in the navy, being an admirable adept in the +snob's art of "pushing," plenty of exclusive dandies and extensive fine +ladies crushed up the stairs on New Year's-night to one of Cashranger's +numerous "At homes." Among them, late enough, came Falkenstein. These +sort of crushes bored him beyond measure, but he wanted to see Godolphin +about some intelligence he had had of an intended illegitimate use of +the twitch to Mistletoe, that sweet little chestnut who stood favorite +for the Oaks. He soon paid his devoir to madame, who wasn't quite +accustomed even yet to all this grandeur after her early struggles on +half-pay, and to her eldest daughter, the Bella aforesaid, a showy, +flaunting girl with a peony color, and went on through the rooms seeking +Harry, stopping, however, for a word to every pretty woman he knew; for +though he began to find his game grow stale, he and the beau sexe have a +mutual attraction. Little those women guessed, as they smiled in his +handsome eyes, and laughed at his witty talk, and blushed at his soft +voice, how heartily sick he was of their frivolities, and how often +disappointment and sarcasm lurked in his mocking words. To be blase was +no affectation with Falkenstein; it was a very earnest reality, as with +most of us who have knocked about in the world, not only from the +variety of his manifold experiences, but from the trickery, and censure, +and cold water with which the world had treated him. + +"You here, old fellow?" said Bevan of the Blues, meeting him in the +music-room, where some artistes were singing Traviata airs. "You don't +care for this row, do you? Come along with me, and I'll show you +something that will amuse you better." + +"Show me Godolphin, and I'll thank you. I didn't come to stay--did you?" + +"No. Horrid bore, ain't it? But since you are here, you may as well take +a look at the dearest little actress I ever saw since I was a boy, and +bewitched by Leontine Fay. Sit down." Bevan went on, as they entered a +room fitted up like a theatre, "There, it's that one with blue eyes, got +up like a Watteau's huntress; isn't she a brilliant little thing?" + +"Very. She plays as well as Dejazet. Who is she?" + +"Don't know. Can you tell us, Forester?" + +"She's old Cash's niece," said Forester, not taking his eyes off the +stage. "Come as a sort of companion to the beloved Bella; dangerous +companion, I should say, for there's no comparing the two." + +"What's her name?" + +"Viola--Violet--no, Valerie L'Estrange. L'Estrange, of the 10th, ran +away with Cash's sister. God knows why. Horrid low connexion, and no +money. She went speedily to glory, and he drank himself to death two +years ago in Lahore. I remember him, a big fellow, fourteen stone, +pounded Bully Batson once at Moseley, and there wasn't such another hard +hitter among the fancy as Bully. When he departed this life, of course +his daughter was left to her own devices, with scarcely a rap to buy her +bonnets. Clever little animal she is, too; she wrote those proverbs +they're now playing; full of dash, and spice, ain't they? especially +when you think a girl wrote 'em." + +"Introduce me as soon as they're over," said Falkenstein, leaning back +to study the young actress and author, who was an engaging study enough, +being full of grace and vivacity, with animated features, mobile +eyebrows, dark-blue eyes, and chestnut hair. "Anything original would be +as great a wonder as to buy Cavendish in Regent-Street that wasn't +bird's-eye." + +"Valerie's original enough for anybody's money. Hark how she's firing +away at Egerton. Pretty little soft voice she has. I do like a pretty +voice for a woman," said Forester, clapping softly, with many a murmured +bravisima. + +"You're quite enthusiastic," smiled Falkenstein. "Pity you haven't a +bouquet to throw at her." + +"Don't you poke fun at me, you cynic," growled Forester. "I've seen you +throw bouquets at much plainer women." + +"And the bouquets and the women were much alike in morning light--faded +and colorless on their artificial stalks as soon as the gas glare was +off them." + +"Hold your tongue, Juvenal," laughed Forester, "or I vow I won't +introduce you. You'll begin satirising poor little Val as soon as you've +spoken to her." + +"Oh, I can be merciful to the weak; don't I let _you_ alone, Forester?" +laughed Waldemar, as the curtain fell. + +The proverbs were over, and having put herself in ball-room style, the +author came among the audience. He amused himself with watching how she +took her numerous compliments, and was astonished to detect neither +vanity nor shyness, and to hear her turn most of them aside with a +laugh. She was quite as attractive off as on the stage, especially with +the aroma of her sparkling proverbs hanging about her; and Falkenstein +got his introduction, and consigning Godolphin and Mistletoe to +futurity, waltzed with her, and found her dancing as full of grace and +lightness as an Andalusian's or Arlesienne's. Falkenstein cared little +enough for the saltatory art, but this waltz did not bore him, and when +it was over, regardless of some dozen names written on her tablets, he +gave her his arm, and they strolled out of the ball-room into a cooler +atmosphere. He found plenty of fun in her, as he had expected from her +proverbs, and sat down beside her in the conservatory to let himself be +amused for half an hour. + +"Do you know many of the people here?" she asked him. "Is there anybody +worth pointing out? There ought to be, in four or five hundred dwellers +in the aristocratic west." + +"I know most of them personally or by report, but they are all of the +same stamp, like the petals of that camellia, some larger and some +smaller, but all cut in the same pattern. Most of them apostles of +fashion, martyrs to debt, worshippers of the rising sun. All of them +created by art, from the young ladies who owe their roses and lilies to +Breidenbach, to the ci-devant jeunes hommes, who buy their figures in +Bond Street and their faces from Isidore. All of them actors--and pretty +good actors, too--from that pretty woman yonder, who knows her milliner +may imprison her any day for the lace she is now drawing round her with +a laugh, to that sleek old philanthropist playing whist through the +doors there, whose guinea points are paid by the swindle of half +England." + +She laughed. + +"Lend me your lorgnon. I should like to see around me as you do." + +"Wait twenty years, you will have it; there are two glasses to +it--experience and observation." + +"But your glasses are smoked, are they not?" said Valerie, with a quick +glance at him; "for you seem to me to see everything en noir." + +He smiled. + +"When I was a boy I had a Claude glass, but they break very soon; or +rather, as you say, grow dark and dim with the smoke of society. But you +ask me about these people. You know them, do you not, as they are your +uncle's guests?" + +She shook her head. + +"I have been here but a week or two. For the last two years I have been +vegetating among the fens, with a maiden aunt of poor papa's." + +"And did you like the country?" + +"Like it!" cried Valerie, "I was buried alive. Everything was so +dreadfully punctual and severe in that house, that I believe the very +cat had forgotten how to purr. Breakfast at eight, drive at two, dinner +at five, prayers at ten. Can't you fancy the dreary diurnal round, with +a pursy old rector or two, and three or four high-dried county +princesses as callers once a quarter? Luckily, I can amuse myself, but +oh, you cannot think how I sickened of the monotony, how I longed to +_live!_ At last, I grew so naughty, I was expelled." + +"May I inquire your sins?" asked Falkenstein, really amused for once. + +She laughed at the remembrance. + +"I read 'Notre-Dame' against orders, and I rode the fat old mare round +the paddock without a saddle. I saw no harm in it; as a child, I read +and rode everything I came near, but the rough-riding was condemned as +unfeminine, and any French book, were it even the 'Genie du +Christianisme,' or the 'Petit Careme,' would be regarded by Aunt Agatha, +who doesn't know a word of the language, as a powder magazine of +immorality and infidelity." + +"C'est la profonde ignorance qui inspire le ton dogmatique," laughed +Falkenstein. "But surely you have been accustomed to society." + +"No, never; but I am made for it, I fancy," said Valerie, with an +unconscious compliment to herself. "When I was with the dear old Tenth, +I used to enjoy myself, but I was a child then. The officers were very +kind to me--gentlemen always are much more so than ladies"--("Pour +cause," thought Waldemar, as she went on)--"but ever since then I have +vegetated as I tell you, in much the same still life as the anemones in +my vase." + +"Yet you could write those proverbs," said he, involuntarily. + +She laughed, and colored. + +"Oh, I have written ever since I could make A B C, and I have not +forgotten all I saw with the old Tenth. But come, tell me more of these +people; I like to hear your satire." + +"I am glad you do," said Falkenstein, with a smile; "for only those who +have no foibles to hit have a relish for sarcasm. Do you think Messaline +and Lelie had much admiration for La Bruyere's periods, however well +turned or justly pointed? but those whom the caps did not fit probably +enjoyed them as you and I do. All satirists, from Martial downwards, +most likely gain an enemy for each truth they utter, for in this bal +masque of life it is not permitted to tear the masks off our +companions." + +"Do you wear one?" asked Valerie, quickly. "I fancy, like Monte Cristo, +your pleasure is to 'usurper les vices que vous n'avez pas, et de cacher +les vertus que vous avez.'" + +"Virtues? If you knew me better, you would know that I never pretend to +any. If you compare me to Monte Cristo, say rather that I 'preche +loyalement l'egoisme,'" laughed Falkenstein. "Upon my word, we are +talking very seriously for a ball-room. I ought to be admiring your +bouquet, Miss L'Estrange, or petitioning for another waltz." + +"Don't trouble yourself. I like this best," said Valerie, playing with +the flowers round her. "And I ought to have my own way, for this is my +birthday." + +"New Year's-day? Indeed! Then I am sure I wish you most sincerely the +realisation of all your ideals and desires, which, to the imaginative +author of the proverbs, will be as good as wishing her Aladdin's lamp," +smiled Falkenstein. + +She smiled too, and sighed. + +"And about as improbable as Aladdin's lamp. Did you see the Old Year out +last night?" + +"Yes," he answered, briefly; for the remembrance of what he had lost +watching it out was not agreeable to him. + +"There was a musical party here," continued Valerie, "but I got away +from it, for I like to be alone when the past and the future meet--do +not you?" + +"No; your past is pure, your future is bright. Mine are not so; I don't +want to be stopped to contemplate them." + +"Nor are mine, indeed; but the death of an Old Year is sad and solemn to +me as the death of a friend, and I like to be alone in its last hour. I +wonder," she continued, suddenly, "what this year will bring. I wonder +where you and I shall be next New Year's-night?" + +Falkenstein laughed, not merrily. + +"_I_ shall be in Kensal Green or the Queen's Bench, very likely. Why do +you look astonished Miss L'Estrange; one is the destination of everybody +in these rooms, and the other probably of one-half of them." + +"Don't speak so bitterly--don't give me sad thoughts on my birthday. Oh, +how tiresome!" cried Valerie, interrupting herself, "there comes Major +D'Orwood." + +"To claim you?" + +"Yes; I'd forgotten him entirely. I promised to waltz with him an hour +ago." + +"What the devil brought you here to interrupt us?" thought Falkenstein, +as the Guardsman lisped a reproof at Valerie's cruelty, and gave her his +arm back to the ball-room. Waldemar stopped her, however, engaged her +for the next, and sauntered through the room on her other side. He +waltzed a good deal with her, paying her that sort of attention which +Falkenstein knew how to make the softest and subtlest homage a woman +could have. Amused himself, he amused her with his brilliant and pointed +wit, so well, that Valerie L'Estrange told him, when he bid her good +night, that she had never enjoyed any birthday so much. + +"Well," said Bevan, as they drove away from 133, Lowndes Square, "did +you find that wonderful little L'Estrange as charming a companion as +actress? You ought to know, for you've been after her all night, like a +ferret after a rabbit." + +"Yes," said Falkenstein, taking out a little pet briarwood pipe, "I was +very pleased with her: she's worth no more than the others, probably, au +fond, but she's very entertaining and frank: she'll tell you anything. +Poor child! she can't be over-comfortable in Cash's house. She's a lady +by instinct; that odious ostentation and snobbish toadying must disgust +her. Besides, Bella is not very likely to lead a girl a very nice life +who is partially dependent on her father, and infinitely better style +than herself." + +"The devil, no! That flaunting, flirting, over-dressed Cashranger girl +is my detestation. She'll soon find means to worry littil Valerie. Women +have a great spice of the mosquito in 'em, and enjoy nothing more than +stinging each other to death." + +"Well, she must get Forester or D'Orwood--some man who can afford it--to +take compassion upon her. All of them finish so when they can; the rich +ones marry for a title, and the poor ones for a home," said the Count, +stirring up his pipe. "Here's my number; thank you for dropping me; and +good night, old fellow." + +"Good night. Pleasant dreams of your author and actress, _aux longs yeux +bleus_." + +Waldemar laughed as he took out his latch-key. "I'm afraid I couldn't +get up so much romance. You and I have done with all that, Tom. Confound +it, I never saw Godolphin, after all. Well, I must go and breakfast with +him to-morrow." + + + + +II. + +FALKENSTEIN BREAKS LANCES WITH THE "LONGS YEUX BLEUS." + + +He did breakfast with Godolphin, not, however, before he had held a +small but disagreeable levee to one or two rather impatient callers whom +he couldn't satisfy, and a certain Amadeus Levi, who, having helped him +to the payment of those debts of honor incurred in Harry's rooms, held +him by Golden Fetters as hard to unclasp as the chains that bound +Prometheus. He shook himself free of them at last, drove to +Knightsbridge, and had a chat with Godolphin, over coffee and +chibouques, went to his two or three hours' diplomatic work in the Deeds +and Chronicles Office, and when he came out, instead of going to his +club as usual, thought he might as well call on the Cashrangers, and +turned his steps to Lowndes Square. Valerie L'Estrange was sitting at a +Davenport, done out of her Watteau costume into very becoming English +morning dress; he had only time to shake hands with her before Bella and +her mamma set upon him. Miss Cashranger had a great admiration for him, +and, though his want of money was a drawback, the royal gules of his +blazonments, joined to his manifold attractions, fairly dazzled her, and +she held him tight, talking over the palace concerts, till a dowager and +her daughter, and a couple of men from Hounslow, being ushered in, he +was at liberty, and sitting down by Valerie, gave her a book she had +said the night before she wished to read. + +"'Goethe's Autobiography!' Oh, thank you--how kind you are!" + +"Not at all," laughed Falkenstein. "To merit such things I ought to have +saved your life at least. What are you doing here; writing some more +proverbs, I hope, to give me a part in one?" + +She shook her head. "Nothing half so agreeable. I am writing dinner +invitations, and answering Belle's letters." + +"Why, can't she answer them herself?" + +"My motto here is 'Ich Dien,'" she answered, with a flush on her cheeks. + +Bella turned languidly round, and verified her words: "Val, Puppet's +scratching at the door; let him in, will you?" + +Waldemar rose and opened the door for a little slate-colored greyhound, +and while Bella lisped out her regrets for his trouble, smiled a smile +that made Miss Cashranger color, and looked searchingly at Valerie to +see how she took it. She turned a grateful, radiant look on him, and +whispered, "Je m'affranchirai un jour." + +"Et comment?" + +She raised her mobile eyebrows: "Dieu sait! Comme actrice, comme +feuilletonniste--j'ai mes reves, monsieur--mais pas comme institutrice: +cela me tuerait bientot." + +"Je le crois," said Falkenstein, briefly, as he took up the +autobiography, and began to talk on it. + +"I don't like Goethe for one thing," said Valerie; "he loved a dozen +women one after the other. That I would pardon him; most men do so; but +I don't believe he really loved any one of them." + +"Oh yes he did; quite enough, at least, to please himself. He wasn't so +silly as to go in for a never-ending, heart-burning, heart-breaking, +absorbing passion. We don't do those things." + +"Go in for it!" repeated Valerie, contemptuously, "I suppose if he had +been of the nature to feel such, he couldn't have helped it." + +"I can help going near the fire, can't I, if I don't wish to be burnt?" + +"Yes; but a coal may fly out of the fire, and set you in flames, when +you are sitting far away from it." + +"Then I ought to wear asbestos," said Waldemar, with a merry quizzical +smile. "You authors, and poets, and artists think 'the world well lost, +and all for love!' but we rational people, who know the world, find it +quite the contrary. Those are very pretty ideas for your proverbs, but +they don't suit real life. _We_, when we're boys, worship some parterre +divinity, till we see her some luckless day inebriate with +eau-de-Cologne, or more unpoetic porter, are cured and disenchanted, +wait ten years with Christines and Minna Herzliebs in the interim, and +wind up with a rich widow, who keeps us straight and heads our table. +_You_, fresh from the school-room, fasten on some lachrymose curate, or +flirting dragoon, as the object of your early romances, walk with him +under the limes, work him a smoking-cap, and write him tender little +notes, till mamma whispers her hope that Mr. A. or B. is serious, and +you, balancing, like a sensible girl, A. or B.'s tangible settlements +with the others' intangible love-speeches, forsake the limes, forswear +the notes, and announce yourself as 'sold.' That's the love of our day, +Miss L'Estrange, and very wise and----" + +"Love!" cried Valerie, with supreme scorn. "You don't know the common A +B C of love. You might as well call gilt leather-work pure gold." + +Falkenstein laughed heartily. "Well, there's a good deal more +leather-work than gold about in the world, isn't there?" + +"A good deal more, granted; but there is some gold to be found, I should +hope." + +"Not without alloy; it can't be worked, you know." + +"It can't be worked for the base purposes of earth; but it may be found +still undefiled before men's touch has soiled it. So I believe in some +hearts, undefiled by the breath of conventionality and cant, may lie the +true love of the poets, 'lasting, and knowing not change.'" + +"Ah! you're too ideal for me," cried Waldemar, smiling at her impetuous +earnestness. "You are all enthusiasm, imagination, effervescence----" + +"I am not," she answered, impatiently. "I can be very practical when I +like; I made myself the loveliest wreath yesterday; quite as pretty as +Bella buys at Mitchell's for five times the sum mine cost me. That was +very realistic, wasn't it?" + +"No. That exercised your fancy. You wouldn't do--what do you call +it?--plain work, with half the gusto; now, would you?" + +Valerie made a _moue mutine_, expressive of entire repudiation of such +employment. + +"I thought so," laughed Falkenstein. "You idealists are like the fire in +the grate yonder; you flame up very hot and bright for a moment, but +'the sparks fly upward and expire,' and if they're not fed with some +fresh fuel they soon die out into lifeless cinders." + +"On the contrary," said Valerie, quickly, "we are like wood fires, and +burn red down to the last ash." + +"Mr. Falkenstein, come and look at this little 'Ghirlandaio,'" said +Bella, turning round, with an angry light in her eyes; "it is such a +gem. Papa bought it the other day." + +Waldemar rose reluctantly enough to inspect the "Ghirlandaio," +manufactured in a back slum, and smoked into proper antiquity to pigeon, +under the attractive title of an "Old Master," the brewer and his +species, and found Miss Cashranger's ignorant dilettantism very tame +after Valerie's animated arguments and gesticulation. But he was too old +a hand at such game not to know how to take advantage of even an enemy's +back-handed stroke, and he turned the discussion on art to an inspection +of Valerie's portfolio, over whose croquis and pastels, and +water-colors, he lingered as long as he could, till the clock reminded +him that it was time to walk on into Eaton Square, where he was going to +dine at his father's. The governor excepted, Falkenstein had little +rapport with his family. His brother was as chilly disagreeable in +private life as he was popularly considered irreproachable in public, +and as pragmatical and uncharitable as your immaculate individuals +ordinarily are. His sisters were cold, conventional women, as utterly +incapable of appreciating him as of allowing the odor of his Latakia in +their drawing-room, and so it chanced that Waldemar, a favorite in every +other house he entered, received but a chill welcome at home. A prophet +has no honor in his own country, and the hearth where a man's own kin +are seated is too often the one to nurture the cockatrice's eggs of +ill-nature and injustice against him. Thank Heaven there are others +where the fire burns brighter, and the smiles are fonder for him. It +were hard for some of us if we were dependent on the mercies of our "own +family." + +The old Count gave him this night but a distant welcome, for Maximilian +was there to "damn" his brother with "faint praise," and had been +pouring into his father's ear tales of "poor Waldemar's losses at play." +All that Falkenstein said, his sisters took up, contradicted, and jarred +upon, till he, fairly out of patience, lapsed into silence, only broken +by a sarcasm deftly flung at Maximillian to floor him completely in his +orthodoxy or ethics. He was glad to bid the governor good night; and +leaving them to hold a congress over his skepticism, radicalism, and +other dangerous opinions, he walked through the streets, and swore +slightly, with his pipe between his teeth, as he opened his own door. + +"Since my father prefers Max to me, let him have him," thought Waldemar, +smoking, and undressing himself. "If people choose to dictate to me or +misjudge me, let them go; and if they have not penetration enough to +judge what I am, I shall not take the trouble to show them." + +But, nevertheless, as he thus resolved, Falkenstein smoked hard and +fast, for he was fond of the old Count, and felt keenly his desertion; +for, steel himself as he might, egotist as he might call himself, +Waldemar was quick in his susceptibilities and tenacious in his +attachments. + +Since Falkenstein had got intimate with Valerie L'Estrange in one ball +you are pretty sure that week after week did not lessen their +friendship. He was amused, and past memories of women he had wooed, and +won, and left, certain passages in his life where such had reproached +him, not always deservedly, never presented themselves to check him in +his new pursuit. It is pleasant to a naturalist to study a butterfly +pinned to the wall; the rememberance that the butterfly may die of the +sport does not occur to him, or, at least, never troubles him. + +So Falkenstein called to Lowndes Square, and lent her books, and gave +her a little Skye of his, and met her occasionally by accident on +purpose in Kensington Gardens, where Valerie, according to Mrs. +Cashranger's request, sometimes took one of her cousins, a headstrong +young demon of six or seven, for an early walk, to which early walks +Valerie made no objection, preferring them to the drawing-rooms of No. +133, and liking them, you may guess, none the less after seeing somebody +she knew standing by the pond throwing in sticks for his retriever, and +Falkenstein had sat down with her under the bushes by the water, and +talked of all the things in heaven and earth; while Julius Adolphus ran +about and gobbled at the China geese, and wetted his silk stockings +unreproved. He made no love to her, not a bit; he talked of it +theoretically, but never practically. But he liked to talk to her, to +argue with her, to see her demonstrative pleasure in his society, to +watch her coming through the trees, and find the _longs yeux bleus_ +gleam and darken at his approach. All this amused him, pleased him as +something original and out of the beaten track. She told him all she +thought and felt; she pleased him, and beguiled him from his darker +thoughts, and she began to reconcile him to human nature, which, with +Faria, he had learnt to class into "les tigres et les crocodiles a deux +pieds." + +It was well he had this amusement, for it was his only one. He was going +to the bad, as we say; debts and entanglements imperceptibly gathered +round him, held him tight, and only in Valerie's lively society (lively, +for when with him she was as happy as a bird) could exercise his dark +spirit. + +You remember the vow he made when the Silver Chimes rang in the New +Year? So did not he. We cannot be always Medes and Persians, madam, to +resist every temptation and keep unbroken every law, though you, sitting +in your cushioned chair, in unattacked tranquillity, can tell us easily +enough we should be. One night, when he was dining with Bevan, Tom +produced those two little ivory fiends, whose rattle is in the ear of +watchful deans and proctors as the singing of the rattlesnake, and whose +witchery is more wily and irresistible than the witchery of woman. No +beaux yeux, whether of the cassette or of one's first love, ever +subjugate a man so completely as the fascinations of play. Once yielded +to the charm, the Circe that clasps us will not let us go. Falkenstein, +though in much he had the strong will of his race, had no power to +resist the beguilements of his Omphale; he played again and again, and +five times out of seven lost. + +"Well, Falkenstein," cried Godolphin, after five games of ecarte at a +pony a side, three of which Falkenstein had lost, "I heard Max lamenting +to old Straitlace in the lobby, the other night, that you were going to +the devil, only the irreproachable member phrased it in more delicate +periods." + +"Quite true," said Falkenstein, with a short laugh, "if for devil you +substitute Queen's Bench." + +"Well, we're en route together, old fellow," interrupted Tom Bevan; +"and, with all your sins, you're a fat lot better than that brother of +yours, who, I believe, don't know Latakia from Maryland. Jesse Egerton +told me the other day that his wife has an awful life of it; but who'd +credit it of a man who patronises Exeter Hall, and gave the shoeblacks +only yesterday such unlimited supply of weak tea, buns, and strong +texts?" + +"Who indeed! Max is such a moral man," sneered Falkenstein; "though he +has done one or two things in his life that I wouldn't have stooped to +do. But you may sin as much as you like as long as you sin under the +rose. John Bull takes his vices as a ten pound voter takes a bribe; he +stretches his hand out eagerly enough, but he turns his eyes away and +looks innocent, and is the first to point at his neighbor and cry out +against moral corruption. Melville's quite right that there is an +eleventh commandment--'Thou shalt not be found out'--whose transgression +is the only one society visits with impunity." + +"True enough," laughed Jimmy Fitzroy. "Thank Heaven, nobody can accuse +us of studying the law and the prophets overmuch. By the way, old +fellow, who's that stunning little girl you were walking with by the +Serpentine yesterday morning, when I was waiting for the Metcalfe, who +promised to meet me at twelve, and never came till half-past one--the +most unpunctual woman going. Any new game? She's a governess, ain't she? +She'd some sort of brat with her; but she's deuced good style, anyhow." + +"That's little L'Estrange," laughed Godolphin: "the beloved Bella's +cousin. He's met her there every day for the last three months. I don't +know how much further the affair may have gone, or if----" + +"My dear Harry, your imagination is running away with you," said +Falkenstein, impatiently. "I never made an appointment with her in my +life; she's not the same style as Mrs. Metcalfe." + +Oh the jesuitism of the most candid men on occasion! He never made an +appointment with her, because it was utterly unnecessary, he knowing +perfectly that he should find her feeding the ducks with Julius Adolphus +any morning he chose to look for her. + +"All friendship is it, then?" laughed Godolphin. "Stick to it, my boy, +if you can. Take care what you do, though, for to carry her off to Duke +Street would give Max such a handle as he would not let go in a hurry; +And to marry (though that of course, will never enter your wildest +dreams) with anybody of the Cashranger's race, were it the heiress +instead of the companion, would be such a come-down to the princely +house, as would infallibly strike you out of Count Ferdinand's will." + +Waldemar threw back his head like a thorough-bred impatient of the +punishing. "The 'princely house,' as you call it, is not so +extraordinarily stainless; but leave Valerie alone, she and I have +nothing to do with other, and never shall have. I have enough on my +hands, in all conscience, without plunging into another love affair." + +"I did hear," continued Godolphin, "that Forester proposed to her, but I +don't suppose it's true; he'd scarcely be such a fool." + +Falkenstein looked up quickly, but did not speak. + +"I think it is true," said Bevan; "and, moreover, I fancy she refused +him, for he used to cry her up to the skies, and now he's always +snapping and sneering at her, which is beastly ungenerous, but after the +manner of many fellows." + +"One would think you were an old woman, Tom, believing all the tales you +hear," said Godolphin. "She'd better know you disclaim her, Falkenstein, +that she mayn't waste her chances waiting for you." + +Waldemar cast a quick, annoyed, contemptuous glance upon him. "You are +wonderfully careful over her interests," he said, sharply, "but I never +heard that having her on your lips, Harry, ever did a woman much good. +Pass me that whisky, Conrad, will you?" + +The next morning, however, though he "disclaimed" her, Waldemar, about +ten, took his stick, whistled his dog, and walked down to Kensington +Gardens. Under the beeches just budding their first leaves, he saw what +he expected to see--Valerie L'Estrange. She turned--even at that +distance he thought he saw the _longs yeux bleus_ flash and +sparkle--dropped the biscuits she was giving the ducks to the tender +mercies of Julius Adolphus, and came to meet him. Spit, the little Skye +he had given her, welcoming him noisily. + +"Spit is as pleased to see you as I am," said Valerie, laughing. "We +have both been wondering whether you would come this morning. I am so +glad you have, for I have been reading your 'Pollnitz Memoirs,' and want +to talk to you about them. You know I can talk to no one as I can to +you." + +"You do me much honor," said Falkenstein, rather formally. He was +wondering in his mind whether she _had_ refused Forester or not. + +"What a cold, distant speech! It is very unkind of you to answer me so. +What is the matter with you, Count Waldemar?" + +She always called him by the title he had dropped in English society; +she had a fervent reverence for his historic _antecedens_; and besides, +as she told him one day, "she liked to call him something no one else +did." + +"Matter with me? Nothing at all, I assure you," he answered, still +distantly. + +"You are not like yourself, at all events," persisted Valerie. "You +should be kind to me. I have so few who are." + +The tone touched him; he smiled, but did not speak, as he sat down by +her poking up the turf with his stick. + +"Count Waldemar," said Valerie, suddenly, brushing Spit's hair off his +bright little eyes, "do tell me; hasn't something vexed you?" + +"Nothing new," answered Falkenstein, with a short laugh. "The same +entanglements and annoyances that have been netting their toils round me +for many years--that is all. I am young enough, as time counts, yet I +give you my word I have as little hope in my future, and I know as well +what my life will be as if I were fourscore." + +"Hush, don't say so," said Valerie, with a gesture of pain. "You are so +worthy of happiness; your nature was made to be happy; and if you are +not, fate has misused you cruelly." + +"Fate? there is no such thing. I have been a fool, and my folly is now +working itself out. I have made my own life, and I have nobody but +myself to thank for it." + +"I don't know that. Circumstances, temptation, education, opportunity, +association, often take the place of the Parcae, and gild or cut the +threads of our destiny." + +"No. I don't accept that doctrine," said Falkenstein, always much +sterner judge to himself than anybody would have been to him. "What I +have done has been with my eyes open. I have known the price I should +pay for my pleasures, but I never paused to count it. I never stopped +for any obstacle, and for what I desired, I would, like the men in the +old legends, have sold myself to the devil. Now, of course, I am +hampered with ten thousand embarrassments. You are young; you are a +woman; you cannot understand the reckless madness which will drink the +wine to-day, though one's life paid for it to-morrow. Screened from +opportunity, fenced in by education, position, and society, you cannot +know how impossible it is to a man, whose very energies and strength +become his tempters, to put a check upon himself in the vortex of +pleasure round him----" + +"Yes," interrupted Valerie, "I can. Feeling for you, I can sympathise in +all things with you. Had I been a man, I should have done as you have +done, drunk the ambrosia without heeding its cost. Go on--I love to hear +you speak of yourself; and I know your real nature, Count Waldemar, into +whatever errors or hasty acts repented of in cooler moments the hot +spirit of your race may have led you." + +Falkenstein was pleased, despite himself, half amused, half saddened. He +turned it off with a laugh. "By Heaven, I wish they had made a brewer of +me--I might now be as rich and free from care as your uncle." + +"You a brewer!" cried Valerie. Her father, a poor gentleman, had left +her his aristocratic leanings. "What an absurd idea! All the old +Falkensteins would come out of their crypts, and chanceries, and +cloisters, to see the coronet surmounting the beer vats!" + +He smiled at her vehemence. "The coronet! I had better have full pockets +than empty titles." + +"For shame!" cried Valerie. "Yes, bark at him, Spit dear; he is telling +stories. You do not mean it; you know you are proud of your glorious +name. Who would not rather be a Falkenstein on a hundred a year, than a +Cashranger on a thousand?" + +"I wouldn't," said Waldemar, wilfully. "If I had money, I could find +oblivion for my past, and hope for my future. If I had money, what loads +of friends would open their purses for me to borrow the money they'd +know I did not need. As it is, if I except poor Tom Bevan, who's as hard +up as I am, and who's a good-hearted, single-minded fellow, and likes +me, I believe I haven't a friend. Godolphin welcomes me as a companion, +a bon vivant, a good card player; but if he heard I was in the Queen's +Bench, or had shot myself, he'd say, 'Poor devil! I am not surprised,' +as he lighted his pipe and forgot me a second after. So they would all. +I don't blame them." + +"But I do," cried Valerie, her cheeks burning; "they are wicked and +heartless, and I hate them all. Oh! Count Waldemar, I would not do so. I +would not desert you if all the world did!" + +He smiled: he was accustomed to her passionate ebullitions. "Poor child, +I believe you would be truer than the rest," he muttered, half aloud, as +he rose hastily and took out his watch. "I must be in Downing Street by +eleven, and it only wants ten minutes. If you will walk with me to the +gates, I have something to tell you about your MS." + + + + +III. + +"SCARLET AND WHITE" MAKES A HIT, AND FALKENSTEIN FEELS THE WEIGHT OF THE +GOLDEN FETTERS. + + +"Tom, will you come to the theatre with me to-night?" said Falkenstein +as they lounged by the rails one afternoon in May. + +"The theatre! What for? Who's that girl with a scarlet tie, on that roan +there? I don't know her face. The ballet is the only thing worth +stirring a step for in town. Which theatre is it?" + +"I am going to see the new piece Pomps and Vanities is bringing out, and +I want you as a sort of claqueur." + +"Very well. I'll come," said Tom, who regarded Falkenstein, who had been +his school and formfellow, still rather as a Highlandman his chief; +"but, certainly, the first night of a play is the very last I should +select. But if you wish it---- There's that roan coming round again! +Good action, hasn't it?" + +Obedient to his chiefs orders, Bevan brushed his whiskers, settled his +tie, or rather let his valet do it for him, and accompanied Waldemar to +one of the crack-up theatres, where Pomps and Vanities, as the manager +was irreverently styled by the habitues of his green-room, reigned in a +state of scenic magnificence, very different to the days when Garrick +played Macbeth in wig and gaiters. + +Bevan asked no questions; he was rather a silent man, and probably knew +by experience that he would most likely get no answers, unless the +information was volunteered. So settling in his own mind that it was the +debut of some protegee of Falkenstein's, he followed him to the door of +a private box. Waldemar opened it, and entered. In it sat two women: +one, a middle-aged lady-like-looking person; the other a young one, in +whom, as she turned round with a radiant smile, and gave Falkenstein her +hand, Bevan recognised Valerie L'Estrange. "Keep up your courage," +whispered Waldemar, as he took the seat behind her, and leaned forward +with a smile. Tom stared at them both. It was high Dutch to him; but +being endowed with very little curiosity, and a lion's share of British +immovability, he waited without any impatience for the elucidation of +the mystery, and seeing the Count and Valerie absorbed in earnest and +low-toned conversation, he first studied the house, and finding not a +single decent-looking woman, he dropped his glass and studied the +play-bill. The bill announced the new piece as "Scarlet and White." +"Queer title," thought Bevan, a little consoled for his self-immolation +by seeing that Rosalie Rivers, a very pretty little brunette, was to +fill the soubrette role. The curtain drew up. Tom, looking at Valerie +instead of the stage, fancied she looked very pale, and her eyes were +fixed, not on the actors, but on Falkenstein. The first act passed off +in ominous silence. An audience is often afraid to compromise itself by +applauding a new piece too quickly. Then the story began to develop +itself--wit and passion, badinage and pathos, were well intermingled. It +turned on the love of a Catholic girl, a fille d'honneur to Catherine de +Medicis, for a Huguenot, Vicomte de Valere, a friend of Conde and +Coligny. The despairing love of the woman, the fierce struggle of her +lover between his passion and his faith, the intrigues of the court, the +cruelty and weakness of Charles Neuf, were all strikingly and forcibly +written. The actors, being warmly applauded as the plot thickened and +the audience became interested, played with energy and spirit; and when +the curtain fell the success of "Scarlet and White" was proclaimed +through the house. + +"Very good play--very good indeed," said Tom, approvingly. "I hope +you've been pleased, Miss L'Estrange." Valerie did not hear him; she was +trembling and breathless, her blue eyes almost black with excitement, +while Falkenstein bent over her, his face more full of animation and +pleasure than Bevan had seen it for many a day. "Well," thought Tom, +"Forester _did_ say little Val was original. I should think that was a +polite term for insane. I suppose Falkenstein's keeper." + +At that minute the applause redoubled. Pomps and Vanities had announced +"Scarlet and White" for repetition, and from the pit to the gods there +was a cry for the author. Falkenstein bent his head till his lips +touched her hair, and whispered a few words. She looked up in his face. +"Do you wish me?" + +"Certainly." + +His word was law. She rose and went to the front of the box, a burning +color in her cheeks, smiles on her lips, and tears lying under her +lashes. + +"The devil, Waldemar! Do you mean that--that little thing?" began Bevan. + +Falkenstein nodded, and Tom, for once in his life astonished, forgot to +finish his sentence in staring at the author! Probably the audience also +shared his surprise, in seeing her young face and girlish form, in lieu +of the anticipated member of the Garrick or new Bourcicault, with +inspiration drawn from Cavendish and Cognac; for there was a moment's +silence, and then they received her with such a welcome as had not +sounded through the house for years. + +She bowed two or three times to thank them; then Falkenstein, knowing +that though she had no shyness, she was extremely excitable, drew her +gently back to her seat behind the curtain. "Your success is too much +for you," he said, softly. + +"No, no," said Valerie, passionately, utterly forgetful that any one +else was near her; "but I am so glad that I owe it all to you. It would +be nothing to me, as you know, unless it pleased you; and it came to me +through your hands." + +Falkenstein gave a short, quick sigh, and moved restlessly. + +"You would like to go home now, wouldn't you?" he said after a pause. + +She assented, and he led her out of the box, poor victimised Tom +following with her duenna, who was the daily governess at No. 133. + +As their cab drove away, Valerie leaned out of the window, and watched +Falkenstein as long as she could see him. He waved his hand to her, and +walked on into Regent Street in silence. + +"Hallo, Waldemar!" began Bevan, at length, "so your protegee's turning +out a star. Do you mean that she really wrote that play?" + +Falkenstein nodded. + +"Well, it's more than I could do. But what the deuce have you got to do +with it? For a man who says he won't entangle himself with another love +affair, you seem pretty tolerably _au mieux_ with her. How did it all +come about?" + +"Simply enough," answered Falkenstein. "Of course I haven't known her +all these months without finding out her talents. She has a passion for +writing, and writes well, as I saw at once by those New Year's Night's +Proverbs. She has no money, as you know; she wants to turn her talents +to account, and didn't know how to set about it. She'd several +conversations with me on the subject, so I took her play, looked it +over, and gave it to Pomps and Vanities. He read it to oblige me, and +put it on the stage to oblige himself, as he wanted something new for +the season, and was pretty sure it would make a hit." + +"Do the Cashrangers know of it?" + +"No; that is why she asked the governess to come with her to-night. That +stingy old Pomps wouldn't pay her much, but she thinks it an El Dorado, +and I shall take care she commands her own price next time. I count on a +treat on enlightening Miss Bella." + +"Yes, she'll cut up rough. By George! I quite envy you your young +genius." + +"She isn't _mine_," said Falkenstein, bitterly. + +"She might be if you chose." + +"Poor little thing!--yes. But love is too expensive a luxury for a +ruined man, even if---- The devil take this key, why won't it unlock? +You're off to half a dozen parties I suppose, Tom?" + +"And where are you going?" + +"Nowhere." + +"What! going to bed at half-past ten?" + +"There is no particular sin in going to bed at half-past ten, is there?" +said Waldemar, impatiently. "I haven't the stuff in me for balls and +such things. I'm sick of them. Good-night, old fellow." + +He went up-stairs to his room, threw himself on his bed, and, lighting +his pipe, lay smoking and thinking while the Abbey clock tolled the +hours one after another. The _longs yeux bleus_ haunted him, for +Waldemar had already too many chains upon him not to shrink from adding +to them the Golden Fetters of a fresh passion, and marriage, unless a +rich one, was certain to bring about him all his entanglements. He +resolved to seek her no more, to check the demonstrative affection +which, like Esmeralda, "a la fois naive et passionnee," she had no +thought of concealing from him, and which, as Falkenstein's conscience +told him, he had done everything to foster. "What is a man worth if he +hasn't strength of will?" he muttered, as he tossed on his bed. "And +yet, poor little Valerie---- Pshaw! all women learn quickly enough to +forget!" + +Some ten days after he was calling in Lowndes Square. True as yet to his +resolution, he had avoided the tete-a-tete walks in the Gardens; and +Valerie keenly felt the change in his manner, though in what he did for +her he was as kind as ever. The successful run of "Scarlet and White," +the praises of its talents, its promises of future triumphs--all the +admiration which, despite Bella's efforts to keep her back, the _yeux +bleus_ excited--all were valueless, if, as she vaguely feared, she had +lost "Count Waldemar." The play had made a great sensation, and the +Cashrangers had taken a box the night before, as they made a point of +following the lead and seeing everything, though they generally forswore +theatres as not quite _ton_. Pah! these people, "qui se couchent +roturiers et se levent nobles," they paint their lilies with such +superabundant coloring, that we see, at a glance, the flowers come not +out of a conservatory but out of an atelier. + +They were out, as it chanced, and Valerie was alone. She received him +joyously, for unhappy as she was in his absence, the mere sight of his +face recalled her old spirits, and Falkenstein, in all probability, +never guessed a tithe she suffered, because she had always a smile for +him. + +"Oh! Count Waldemar," she cried, "why have you never been to the +Gardens this week? If you only knew how I miss you----" + +"I have had no time," he answered, coldly. + +"You could make time if you wished," said Valerie, passionately. "You +are so cold, so unkind to me lately. Have I vexed you at all?" + +"Vexed me, Miss L'Estrange? Certainly not." + +She was silent, chilled, despite herself. + +"Why do you call me Miss L'Estrange?" she said, suddenly. "You know I +cannot bear it from _you_." + +"What should I call you?" + +"Valerie," she answered, softly. + +He got up and walked to the hearth-rug, playing with Spit and Puppet +with his foot, and for once hailed, as a relief, the entrance of Bella, +in an extensive morning toilet, fresh from "shopping." She looked +rapidly and angrily from him to Valerie, and attacked him at once. +Seeing her cousin's vivacity told, she went in for the same stakes, with +but slight success, being a young lady of the heavy artillery stamp, +with no light action about her. + +"Oh! Mr. Falkenstein," she began, "that exquisite play--you've seen it, +of course? Captain Boville told me I should be delighted with it, and so +I was. Don't you think it enchanting?" + +"It is very clever," answered Falkenstein, gravely. + +"Val missed a great treat," continued Bella; "nothing would make her go +last night; however, she never likes anything I like. I should love to +know who wrote it; some people say a woman, but I would never believe +it." + +"The witty raillery and unselfish devotion of the heroine might be +dictated by a woman's head and heart, but the passion, and vigor, and +knowledge of human nature indicate a masculine genius," replied +Waldemar. + +Valerie gave him such a grateful, rapturous glance, that, had Bella been +looking, might have disclosed the secret; but she was studying her +dainty gloves, and went on: + +"Could it be Westland Marston--Sterling Coyne?" + +Falkenstein shook his head. "If it were, they would put their name on +the play-bills." + +"You naughty man! I do believe you could tell me if you chose. _Are_ you +not, now, in the author's confidence?" + +The corner of Falkenstein's mouth went up in an irresistible smile as he +telegraphed a glance at "the author." "Well, perhaps I am." + +Bella clapped her hands with enchanting gaiety. "Then, tell me this +moment; I am in agonies to know!" + +"It is no great mystery," smiled Falkenstein. "I fancy you are +acquainted with the unknown." + +"You don't mean it!" cried Bella, in a state of ecstasy. "Have you +written it, then?" + +"I'm afraid I can't lay claim to the honor." + +"Who can it be? Oh, do tell me! How enchanting!" cried Miss Cashranger; +"I am wild to hear. Somebody I know, you say? Is it--is it Captain +Tweed?" + +"No, it isn't," laughed Falkenstein. Elliot Tweed--Idiot Tweed, as they +all call him--who was hanging after Bella, abhorred all caligraphy, and +wrote his own name with one _e_. + +"Mr. Dashaway, then?" + +"Dash never scrawled anything but I. O. U.s." + +"Lord Flippertygibbett, perhaps?" + +"Wrong again. Flip took up a pen once too often, when he signed his +marriage register, to have any leanings to goose quills." + +"Charlie Montmorency, then?" + +"Reads nothing but his betting-book and _Bell's Life_." + +"Dear me! how tiresome. Who can it be? Wait a moment. Let me see. Is it +Major Powell?" + +"Guess again. He wouldn't write, save in Indian fashion, with his +tomahawk on his enemies' scalps." + +"How provoking!" cried Bella, exasperated. "Stop: is it Mr. Beauchamp?" + +"No; he scribbles for six-and-eightpences too perseveringly to have time +for anything, except ruining his clients." + +"Dr. Montressor, then?" + +"Try once more. His prescriptions bring him too many guineas for him to +waste ink on any other purpose." + +"How stupid I am! Perhaps--perhaps---- Yet no, it can't be, because he's +at the Cape, and most likely killed, poor fellow. Could it be Cecil +Green?" + +Falkenstein laughed. "You needn't go so far as Kaffirland; try a little +nearer home. Think over the _ladies_ you know." + +"The ladies! Then it _is_ a woman!" cried Bella. "Well, I should never +have believed it. Who can she be? How I shall admire her, and envy her! +A lady! Can it be darling Flora?" + +"No. If your pet friend can get through an invitation-note of four +lines, the exertion costs her at least a dram of sal volatile." + +"How wicked you are," murmured Miss Cashranger, delighted, after the +custom of women, to hear her friend pulled to pieces. "Is it Mrs. +Lushington, then?" + +"Wrong again. The Lushington has so much business on hand, inditing +rose-hued notes to twenty men at once, and wording them differently, for +fear they may ever be compared, that she's no time for other +composition." + +"Lady Mechlin, perhaps--she is a charming creature?" + +Falkenstein shook his head. "Never could learn the simplest rule of +grammar. When she was engaged to Mechlin, she wrote her love-letters out +of 'Henrietta Temple,' and flattered him immensely by their pathos." + +"Was there ever such a sarcastic creature!" cried Bella, reprovingly; +her interest rather flagged, since no man was the incognito author. +"Well, let me see: there is Rosa Temple--she is immensely intellectual." + +"But immensely orthodox. Every minute of her life is spent in working +slippers and Bible markers for interesting curates. It is to be hoped +one of them may reward her some day, though, I believe, till they _do_ +propose, she is in the habit of advocating priestly celibacy, by way of +assertion of her disinterestedness. No! Miss Cashranger, the talented +writer of 'Scarlet and White,' is not only of your acquaintance, but +your family." + +"My family!" almost screamed Bella. "Good gracious, Mr. Falkenstein, is +it dear papa, or--or Augustus?" + +The idea of the brewer, fat, and round, and innocent of literature as +one of his own teams, or of his son just plucked for his "smalls" at +Cambridge, for spelling Caesar, Sesar, sitting down to indite the pathos +and poetry of "Scarlet and White," was so exquisitely absurd that +Waldemar, forgetting courtesy, lay back in his arm-chair and laughed +aloud. The contagion of his ringing laugh was irresistible; Valerie +followed his example, and their united merriment rang in the astonished +ears of Miss Cashranger, who looked from one to the other in wrathful +surprise. As soon as he could control himself, Falkenstein turned +towards her with his most courteous smile. + +"You will forgive our laughter, I am sure, when I tell you what I am +certain _must_ give you great pleasure, that the play you so warmly and +justly admire was written by your cousin." + +Bella stared at him, her face scarlet, all the envy and reasonless spite +within her flaming up at the idea of her cousin's success. + +"Valerie--Valerie," she stammered, "is it true? I had no idea she ever +thought of----" + +"No," said Falkenstein, roused in his protegee's defence; "I dare say +you are astonished, as every one else would be, that any one so young, +and, comparatively speaking, so inexperienced as your cousin, should +have developed such extraordinary talent and power." + +"Oh, of course--to be sure--yes," said Bella, her lips twitching +nervously, "mamma will be astonished to hear of these new laurels for +the family. I congratulate you, Valerie; I never knew you dreamt of +writing, much less of making so public a debut." + +"Nor should I ever have been able to do so unless my way had been +pioneered for me," said Valerie, resting her eyes fondly on Waldemar. + +He stayed ten minutes longer, chatting on indifferent subjects, then +left, making poor little Val happy with a touch of his hand, and a smile +as "kind" as of old. + +"You horrid, deceitful little thing!" began Bella, bursting with fury, +as the door closed on him, "never to mention what you were doing. I +can't bear such sly people I hate----" + +"My dear Bella, don't disturb yourself," said Valerie, quietly; "if you +had testified any interest in my doings, you might have known them; as +it was, I was glad to find warmer and kinder friends." + +"In Waldemar Falkenstein, I suppose," sneered Bella, white with rage. "A +nice friend you have, certainly; a man whom everybody knows may go to +prison for debt any day." + +"Leave him alone," said Valerie haughtily; "unless you speak well of +him, in my presence, you shall not speak at all." + +"Oh, indeed," laughed Bella, nervously; "how very much interested you +are in him! more than he is in you, I'm afraid, dear. He's famed for +loving and leaving. Pray how long has this romantic affair been on the +tapis?" + +"He's met her every day in the Gardens," cried Julius Adolphus, just +come in with that fatal apropos of "enfans terribles," much oftener the +result of mechancete than of innocence; "he's met her every day, Bella, +while I fed the ducks." + +Bella rose, inflated with fury, and summoning all her dignity: + +"I suppose, Valerie, you know the sort of reputation you will get +through these morning assignations." + +Valerie bent over Spit with a smile. + +"Of course, it is nothing to _me_," continued Bella, spitefully; "but I +shall consider it my duty to inform mamma." + +Valerie fairly laughed out. + +"Do your duty, by all means." + +"And," continued Bella, a third time, "I dare say she will find some +means to put a stop to this absurd friendship with an unmarried and +unprincipled man." + +Valerie was roused; she lifted her head like a little Pythoness, and her +blue eyes flashed angry scorn. + +"Tell your mamma what you please, but--listen to me, Bella--if you +venture to harm him in any way with your pitiful venom, I, girl as I am, +will never let you go till I have revenged myself and him." + +Bella, like most bullies, was a terrible coward. There was an +earnestness in Valerie's words, and a dangerous light in her eyes, that +frightened her, and she left the room in silence, while Valerie leaned +her forehead on Spit's silky back, and cried bitterly, tears that for +her life she wouldn't have shed while her cousin was there. + +The next time Falkenstein called at Lowndes Square, the footman told +him, "Not at home," and Waldemar swore, mentally, as he turned from the +door, for though he could keep himself from seeking her, it was +something new not to find her when he wished. + +"She's like all the rest," he thought bitterly; "She's used me, and now +she's gone to newer friends. I was a fool to suppose any woman would do +otherwise. They'll tell her I can't marry; of course she'll go over to +D'Orwood, or some of those confounded fools that are dangling after +her." + +So in his skeptical haste judged Falkenstein, on the strength of a +single "Not at home," due to Cashranger malice, and the fierce throbs +the mere suspicion gave him showed him that he loved Valerie too much to +be able to deceive himself any longer with the assurance that his +feelings towards his protegee was simple "friendship." He knew it, but +he was loth to give way to it. He had long held as a doctrine that a man +could forget if he chose. He had been wearied of so many, been +disappointed in so much, he had had idols of the hour, in which, their +first gloss off, he had found no beauty, he could not tell; it might not +be the same with Valerie. Warm and passionate as a Southern, haughty and +reserved as a Northern, he held many a bitter conflict in his solitary +vigils at night over his pipe, after evenings spent in society which no +longer amused him, or excitement with which he vainly sought to drown +his cares. When he did meet Valerie out, which was rarely, as he +refused most invitations now, his struggle against his ill-timed passion +made his manner so cold and capricious, that Valerie, who could not +divine the workings of his heart, began, despite her vehement faith in +him, and conviction that he was not wholly indifferent to her, to dread +that Bella might be right, and that as he had left others so would he +leave her. He gave her no opportunity of questioning him as to his +sudden change, for when he did call in Lowndes Square, Bella and her +aunt always stationed themselves as a sort of detective police, and +Falkenstein now never sought a tete-a-tete. + +One evening she met him at a dinner-party. With undisguised delight she +watched his entrance, and Waldemar, seeing her radiant face, thought in +his haste, "She is happy enough, what does she care for me?" If he had +looked at her after he had shaken hands carelessly with her, and turned +away to talk to another woman, he would have discovered his mistake. But +when do we ever discover half our errors before it is too late? She +signed to him to come to her under pretext of looking at some croquis, +and whispered hurriedly, + +"Count Waldemar, what have I done--why do you never come to see me? You +are so changed, so altered----" + +"I was not aware of it." + +"But I never see you in the Gardens now. You never talk to me, you never +call on me." + +"I have other engagements." + +Valerie breathed hard between her set teeth. + +"That are more agreeable to you, I suppose. You should not have +accustomed me to what you intended to withdraw when it ceased to amuse +you. _I_ am not so capricious. Your kindness about my play----" + +"It was no kindness; I would have done the same for any one." + +She looked at him fixedly. + +"General kindness is no kindness," said Valerie, passionately. "If you +would do for a mere acquaintance what you would do for your friend, what +value attaches to your friendship?" + +"I attach none to it," said the Count, coldly. + +Valerie's little hands clenched hard. She did not speak, lest her +self-possession should give way, and just then D'Orwood came to give her +his arm in to dinner; and at dinner Valerie, demonstrative and candid as +she was, was gay and animated, for she could wear a mask in the bal +d'Opera of life as well as he; and though she could not believe the +coldness he testified was really meant, she felt bitterly the neglect of +his manner before others, at sight of which Bella's small eyes sparkled +with malicious satisfaction. + + + + +IV. + +SOME GOLDEN FETTERS ARE SHAKEN OFF AND OTHERS ARE PUT ON. + + +"Mrs. Boville told me last night that Waldemar Falkenstein is so +dreadfully in debt, that she thinks he'll have to go into court--don't +they call it?" lisped Bella, the next morning; "be arrested, or +bankrupt, or something dreadful. Should you think it is true?" + +"I know it's true," said Idiot Tweed, who was there, having a little +music before luncheon. "He's confoundedly hard up, poor devil." + +"But I thought he was in such a good position--so well off?" said Bella, +observing with secret delight that her cousin's head was raised, and +that the pen with which she was writing had stopped in its rapid gallop. + +"Ah! so one thinks of a good many fellows," answered the Guardsman; +"or, at least, you ladies do, who don't look at a man's ins and outs, +and the fifty hundred things there are to bother him. Lots of +people--householders, and all that sort of thing--that one would fancy +worth no end, go smash when nobody's expecting it." + +"And Mr. Falkenstein really is embarrassed?" + +The Guardsman laughed outright. "That is a mild term, Miss Cashranger. I +heard down at Windsor yesterday, from a man that knows his family very +well, that if he don't pay his debts this week, Amadeus Levi will arrest +him. I dare say he will. Jews do when they can't bleed you any longer, +and think your family will come down handsomely. But they say the old +Count won't give Falkenstein a rap, so most likely he'll cut the +country." + +That afternoon, on his return from the Deeds and Chronicles Office, +whose slow red-tapeism ill suited his impatient and vigorous intellect, +Waldemar sat down deliberately to investigate his affairs. It was true +that Amadeus Levi's patience was waning fast; his debts of honor had put +him deep in that worthy's books, and Falkenstein, as he sat in his +lodgings, with the August sun streaming full on the relentless figures +that showed him, with cruel mathematical ruthlessness, that he was fast +chained in the Golden Fetters of debt, leaned his head upon his arms +with the bitter despair of a man whose own hand has blotted his past and +ruined his future. + +The turning of the handle of his door roused him from his reverie. He +looked up quickly. + +"A lady wants to speak to you, sir," said the servant who waited on him. + +"What name?" + +"She'd rather not give it, sir." + +"Very well," said Falkenstein, consigning all women to the devil; "show +her up." + +Resigning himself to his fate, he rose, leaning his hand on the arm of +the chair. He started involuntarily as the door opened again. + +"Valerie!" + +She looked up at him half hesitatingly. "Count Waldemar, don't be angry +with me----" + +"Angry! no, Heaven knows; but----" + +Her face and her voice were fast thawing his chill reserve, and he +stopped abruptly. + +"You wonder why I have come here," Valerie went on singularly shyly for +her, "but--but I heard that you--you have much to trouble you just now. +Is it true?" + +"True enough, Heaven knows." + +"Then--then," said Valerie, with all her old impetuosity, "let me do +something for you--let me help you in some way--you who have done +everything for me, who have been the only person kind to me on earth. Do +let me--do not refuse me. I would die to serve you." + +He breathed fast as he gazed on her expressive eyes. It was a hard +struggle to him to preserve his self-control. + +"No one can help me," he answered, hurriedly. "I have made my own +fate--leave me to it." + +"I will not!" cried Valerie, passionately. "Do not send me away--do not +refuse me. What happiness would there be for me so great as serving +you--you to whom I owe all the pleasure I have known! Take them. Count +Waldemar--pray take them; they have often told me they are worth a good +deal, and I will thank Heaven every hour for having enabled me to aid +you ever so little." She pressed into his hands a jewel-case. + +Falkenstein could not answer her. He stood looking down at her, his lips +white as death. She mistook his silence for displeasure, and laid her +hands on his arm. + +"Do not be offended--do not be annoyed with me. They are my own--an old +heirloom of the L'Estranges that only came to me the other day. Take +them, Count Waldemar. Do, for Heaven's sake. I spoke passionately to you +last night; I have been unhappy ever since. If you will not take them, I +shall think you have not yet forgiven me?" + +He seized her hands and drew her close to him: "Good Heavens! do you +love me like this?" + +She did not answer, but she looked up at him. That look shivered to +atoms Falkenstein's resolves, and cast his pride and prudence to the +winds. He pressed her fiercely against his heart, he kissed her again +and again, bitter tears rushing to his burning eyes. + +"Valerie! Valerie!" he whispered, wildly, "my fate is at its darkest. +Will you share it?" + +She leaned her brow on his shoulder, trembling with hysterical joy. + +"You do care for me, then?" she murmured, at last. + +"Oh! thank Heaven." + +In the delirium of his happiness, in the vehemence of feelings touched +to the core by sight of the intense love he had awakened, Falkenstein +poured out on her all the passion of his impetuous and reserved nature, +and in the paradise of the moment forgot every cloud that hung on his +horizon. + +"Valerie!" he whispered, at length, "I have now nothing to offer you. I +can give you none of the riches, and power, and position that other men +can----" + +She stopped him, putting her hands on his lips. "Hush! I shall have +everything that life can give me in having your love." + +"My darling, Heaven bless you!" cried Falkenstein, passionately; "but +think twice, Valerie--pause before you decide. I am a ruined +man--embarrassments fetter me on every side. To-morrow, for aught I +know, I may be arrested for debt. I would not lead you into what, in +older years, you may regret." + +"Regret!" cried Valerie, clinging to him. "How can I ever regret that I +have won the one heaven I crave. If you love me, life will always be +beautiful in my eyes; and, Count Waldemar, I can work for you--I can +help you, be it ever so little. I cannot make much money now, but you +have said that I shall gain more year after year. Only let me be with +you; let me know your sorrows and lighten them if I can, and I could ask +no greater happiness----" + +Falkenstein bent over her, and covered with caresses the lips that to +him seemed so eloquent; he had no words to thank her for a love that, to +his warm and solitary heart, came like water in the wilderness. The +sound of voices gay and laughing, on the stairs, startled him. + +"That is Bevan and Godolphin; I forgot they were coming for me to go +down to the Castle. Good Heavens! they mustn't see you here, love, to +jest about you over their mess-tables. Stay," said Falkenstein, hastily, +as the men entered the front room, "wait here a moment; they cannot see +you in this window, and I will come to you again. Hallo! old fellows!" +said he, passing through the folding-doors. "You're wonderfully +punctual, Tom. I always give you half an hour's grace; but I suppose +Harry's such an awful martinet, that he kept you up to time for once." + +"All the credit's due to my mare," laughed Godolphin. "She did the +distance from Knightsbridge in four minutes, and I don't think Musjid +himself could beat that. Are you ready, I say? because we're to be at +the Castle by six, and Fitz don't like waiting for his turbot." + +"Give me a brace of seconds, and I shall be with you," said Waldemar. + +"Make haste, there's a good fellow. By George!" said Harry, catching +sight of the jewel-case, "for a fellow who's so deucedly hard up, you've +been pretty extravagant in getting those diamonds, Waldemar. Who are +they for--Rosalie Rivers, or the Deloraine; or that last love of yours, +that wonderful little L'Estrange?" + +Falkenstein's brow grew dark; he snatched the case from the table, with +a suppressed oath, and went back to the inner room, slamming the +folding-doors after him. Godolphin lounged to the window looking on the +street, where he stood for five minutes, whistling A te, o cara. "The +devil! what's that fellow about?" he said, yawning. "How impatient +Bonbon's growing! Why don't that fool Roberts drive her up and down? By +Jove! come here, Tom. Who's that girl Falkenstein's now putting into a +cab? That's what he wanted his brace of seconds for! Confound that +portico! I can't see her face, and women dress so much alike now, +there's no telling one from another. What an infernal while he is +bidding her good-by. I shall know another time what his two seconds +mean. There, the cab's off at last, thank Heaven!--Very pretty, +Falkenstein," he began, as the Count entered. "That's your game, is it? +I think you might have confided in your bosom friend. Who is the fair +one? Come, make a clean breast of it." + +Falkenstein shook his head. "My dear Harry, spare your words. Don't you +know of old that you never get anything out of me unless I choose?" + +"Oh yes, confound you, I know that pretty well. One question, +though--was she pretty?" + +"Do you suppose I entertain plain women?" + +"No; never was such a man for the beaux yeux. It looked uncommonly like +little L'Estrange; but I don't suppose she could get out of the durance +vile of Lowndes Square, to come and pay you a tete-a-tete call. Well, +are you ready now? because Bonbon's tired of waiting, and so are we. A +man in love makes an abominable friend." + +"A man in love with himself makes a worse one," said Waldemar; which hit +Harry in a vulnerable spot, Godolphin being generally chaffed about the +affection he bore his own person. + +"That _was_ the little L'Estrange, wasn't it?" asked Godolphin, as they +leaned out of the window after dinner, apart from the others. + +"Yes," said Waldemar, curtly; "but I beg you to keep silence on it to +every one." + +"To be sure; I've kept plenty of your confidences. I had no idea you'd +push it so far. Of course you won't be fool enough to marry her?" + +Falkenstein's dark eyes flashed fire. "I shall not be fool enough to +consult or confide in any man upon my private affairs." + +Godolphin shrugged his shoulders with commiseration, and left Waldemar +alone in his window. + +Falkenstein called in Lowndes Square the morning after and had an +interview with old Cash in the library of gaudy books that were never +opened, and told him concisely that he loved his niece, and--that ever I +should live to record it!--that little snob, with not two ideas in his +head, who couldn't, if put to it, tell you who his own grandfather was, +and who owed his tolerance in society to his banking account, refused an +alliance with the refined intellect and the blue blood of one of the +proud, courtly, historic Falkensteins! He'd been tutored by his wife, +and said his lesson properly, refusing to sanction "any such connexion;" +of course his niece must act for herself. + +Waldemar bowed himself out with all his haughtiest high-breeding; he +knew Valerie _would_ act for herself, but the insult cut him to the +quick. He threw himself into the train, and went down to Fairlie, his +governor's place in Devonshire, determining to sacrifice his pride, and +ask his father to aid him in his effort for freedom. In the drawing-room +he found his sister Virginia, a cold, proud woman of the world. She +scarcely let him sit down and inquire for the governor, before she +pounced on him. + +"Waldemar, I have heard the most absurd report about you." + +"Most reports are absurd." + +"Yes, of course; but this is too ridiculous. What do you think it is?" + +"I am sure I can't say." + +"That you are going to marry." + +"Well?" + +"Well! You take it very quietly. If you were going to make a good match +I should be the first to rejoice; but they say that you are engaged to +some niece of that odious, vulgar parvenu, Cashranger, the brewer; that +little bold thing who wrote that play that made a noise a little while +ago. Pray set me at rest at once, and say it is not true." + +"I should be very sorry if it were not." + +His sister looked at him in haughty horror. "Waldemar! you must be mad. +If you were rich, it would be intolerable to stoop to such a connexion; +but, laden with debts as you are, to disgrace the family with such----" + +"Disgrace?" repeated Falkenstein, scornfully. "She would honor any +family she entered." + +"You talk like a boy of twenty," said Virginia, impatiently. "To load +yourself with a penniless wife when you are on the brink of ruin--to +introduce to _us_ the niece of a low-bred, pushing plebeian--to give +your name to a bold manoeuvring girl, who has the impudence to take her +stand before a crowded theatre----" + +"Hold!" broke out Waldemar, fiercely: "you might thank Heaven, Virginia, +if you were as frank-hearted and as free from guile as she is. She +thinks no ill, and therefore she is not, like you fine ladies, on the +constant qui vive lest it should be attributed to her. I have found at +last a woman too generous to be mistrustful, too fond to wait for the +world's advantages, and, moreover, untainted by the breath of your +conventionalities, and pride, and cant." + +Virginia threw back her head with a curl on her lip. "You are mad, as I +said before. I suppose you do not expect me to countenance your +infatuation?" + +He shrugged his shoulder. "Really, whether you do or not is perfectly +immaterial to me." + +Virginia was silent, pale with anger, for they were all (pardonably +enough) proud. She turned with a sneer to Josephine, a younger and less +decided woman, just entering. "Josephine, you are come in time to be +congratulated on your sister-in-law." + +"Is it true?" murmured Josephine, aghast. "Oh! my dear Waldemar, pause; +consider how dreadful for us--a person who is so horribly connected; +the man's beer wagon is now standing at the door. Oh, do reflect--a +girl, whose name is before the public----" + +"By talent that would grace a queen!" interrupted Waldemar, rising +impatiently. "You waste your words; you might know that I am not so weak +as to give up my sole chance of happiness to please your pitiful +prejudices." + +"Very well. _I_ shall never speak to her," said Virginia, between her +teeth. + +"That you will do as you please; you will be the loser." + +"But, Waldemar, do consider," began Josephine. + +"Your women's tongues would drive a man mad," muttered Falkenstein. +"Tell me where my father is." + +"In his study," answered Virginia briefly. And in his study Falkenstein +found him. He saw at once that something was wrong by his reception; but +he plunged at once into his affairs, showing him plainly his position, +and asking him frankly for help to discharge his debts. + +Count Ferdinand heard him in silence. "Waldemar," he answered, after a +long pause, "you shall have all you wish. I will sign you a check for +the amount this instant if you give me your word to break off this +miserable affair." + +Falkenstein's cheek flushed with annoyance; he had expected sympathy +from his father, or at least toleration. "That is impossible. You ask me +to give up the one thing that binds me to life--the one love I have +given me--the one chance of redeeming the future, that lies in my grasp. +I am not a boy led away by a passing caprice. I have known and tried +everything, and I can judge what will make my happiness. What +unfortunate prejudice have you all formed against my poor little +Valerie----" + +"Enough" said his father, sternly. "I address you as a man of the world, +and a man of sense; you answer me with infatuated folly. I give you your +choice: my aid and esteem, in everything you can desire, or the madman's +gratification of the ill-placed caprice of the hour." + +Falkenstein rose as haughtily as the Count. + +"Virtually, then, you give me no choice. I am sorry I troubled you with +my concerns. I know whose interference I have to thank for it, and am +only astonished you are so easily influenced," said Falkenstein, setting +his teeth hard as he closed the door; for his father's easy desertion of +him hit him hard, and he attributed it, rightly enough, to Maximilian, +who, industriously gathering every grain of evil report against his +brother, had taken such a character of Valerie--whom, unluckily, he had +seen coming out of Duke street--down to Fairlee, that his father vowed +to disinherit him, and his sisters never to speak to him. The doors both +of his own home and Lowndes Square were closed to him; and in his +adversity the only one that clung to him was Valerie. + +If he had been willing to ask them, none of his friends could have +helped him. Godolphin, with 20,000_l_. a year, spent every shilling on +himself; Tom Bevan, but that he stood for a pocket borough of his +governor's, would have been in quod long ago; and for the others, men +very willing to take your money at ecarte are not very willing to lend +you theirs when you can play ecarte no longer. Amadeus Levi grew more +and more importunate; down on him at once, as Falkenstein knew, would +come the Jew's _griffes_ if he took any such unprofitable step as a +marriage for love; and with all the passion in the world, +mesdemoiselles, a man thinks twice before he throws himself into the +Insolvent Court. + +One night, _nolens volens_, decision was forced on him. He had seen +Valerie that morning in the Pantheon, and they had parted to meet again +at a ball, one of the lingering stragglers of the past season. About +twelve he dressed and walked down Duke Street, looking for a cab to take +him to Park Lane. Under a lamp at the corner, standing reading, he saw a +man whom he knew by sight, and whose errand he guessed without +hesitation. He paused unnoticed close beside him; he stood a moment and +glanced over his shoulder; he saw a warrant for his own apprehension at +Levi's suit. The man looking, to make sure of the dress, never raised +his eyes. Falkenstein walked on, hailed a hansom in Regent street, and +in a quarter of an hour was chatting with his hostess. + +"Where is Miss L'Estrange?" he asked, carelessly. + +"She was waltzing with Tom a moment ago," answered Mrs. Eden. "If you +run after her so, I shall believe report. But is anything the matter, +Falkenstein? How ill you look!" + +"Too much champagne," laughed Waldemar. "I've been dining with Gourmet, +and all the Falkensteins inherit the desire of obtaining that +gentlemanlike curse, the gout." + +"It's not the gout, mon ami," smiled Mrs. Eden. + +"Break your engagement and waltz with me," he whispered, ten minutes +after, to Valerie. + +"I have none. I kept them all free for you!" + +He put his arm round her and whirled her into the circle. + +"Count Waldemar, you are not well. Has anything fresh occurred?" she +asked anxiously, as she felt the quick throbs of his heart, and saw the +dark circles of his eyes and the deepened lines round his haughty mouth. + +"Not much, dearest. I will tell you in a moment." + +She was silent, and he led her through the different rooms into Mrs. +Eden's boudoir, which he knew was generally deserted; and there, holding +her close to him, but not looking into her eyes lest his strength should +fail him, he told her that he must leave England, and asked her if he +should go alone. + +She caught both his hands and kissed them passionately. "No, no; do not +leave me--take me with you, wherever it be. Oh, that I were rich for +your sake! I, who would die for you, can do nothing to help you--" + +He pressed her fiercely to him. "Oh, Valerie! Heaven bless you for your +love, that renders the darkest hour of my life the brightest. But weigh +well what you do, my darling. I am utterly ruined. I cannot insure you +from privation in the future, perhaps not from absolute want; if I make +money, much must go in honor year by year to the payment of my debts, by +instalments. I shall take you from all the luxuries and the society that +you are formed for; do not sacrifice yourself blindly----" + +"Sacrifice myself!" interrupted Valerie. "Oh! Waldemar, if it is no +sacrifice to _you_, let me be with you wherever it be; and if you have +cares, and toil, and sorrow, let me share them. I will write for you, +work for you, do anything for you, only let me be with you----" + +He pressed his lips to hers, silent with the tumult of passion, +happiness, delirious joy, regret, remorse, that arose in him at her +words. + +"My guardian angel, be it as you will!" he said, at length. "I must be +out of England to-morrow, Valerie. Will you come with me as my wife?" + +Early on Sunday morning Falkenstein was married, and out of his host of +friends, and relatives, and acquaintance, honest Tom Bevan was the only +man who turned him off, as Tom phrased it, and bid him good bye, with +few words but much regret, concealed, after the manner of Britons, for +the loss of his old chum. Tom's congratulations were the only ones that +fell on Valerie's ear in the empty church that morning; but I question +if Valerie ever noticed the absence of the marriage paraphernalia, so +entirely were her heart, and eyes, and mind, fixed on the one whom she +followed into exile. They were out of London before their part of it had +begun to lounge down to their late breakfasts; and as they crossed the +Channel, and the noon sun streamed on the white line of cliffs, +Falkenstein, holding her hands in his and looking down into her eyes, +forgot the follies of his past, the insecurity of his future, the tale +of his ruin and his flight, that would be on the tongues of his friends +on the morrow, and only remembered the love that came to him when all +others forsook him. + + + + +V. + +THE SILVER CHIMES RING IN A HAPPY NEW YEAR. + + +One December evening Falkenstein sat in his lodgings in Vienna; the wood +fire burnt brightly, and if its flames lighted up a room whose +_appanages_ were rather different to the palace his grandfather had +owned in the imperial city, they at least shone on waving hair and +violet eyes that were very dear to him, and helped to teach him to +forget much that he had forfeited. From England he had come to Vienna, +where, as he had projected, his uncle, one of the cabinet, had been able +to help him to a diplomatic situation, for which his keen judgment and +varied information fitted him; and in Austria his name gave him at once +a brevet of the highest nobility. Of course the knowledge that he was +virtually outlawed, and that he was deep in the debt of such sharps as +Amadeus Levi, often galled his proud and sensitive nature; but Valerie +knew how to soften and to soothe him, and, under her caressing affection +or her ready vivacity, the dark hours passed away. + +He was smoking his favorite briar-wood pipe, with Valerie sitting at his +feet, reading him some copy just going to her publishers in England, and +little Spit, not forgotten in their flight, lying on the hearth, when a +deep English voice startled them, singing out, "Here you are at last! I +give you my word, I've been driving over this blessed city two hours to +find you!" + +"Tom!" cried Falkenstein. + +"Captain Bevan!" echoed Valerie, springing to her feet, while Spit began +barking furiously. + +Bevan shook hands with them; heartily glad to see his friend again, +though, of course he grumbled more about the snow and the stupidity of +the Viennese than anything else. "Very jolly rooms you've got," said he +at last; "and, 'pon my life, you look better than I've seen you do a +long time, Waldemar. Madame has done wonders for you." + +"Madame" laughed, and glanced up at Falkenstein, who smiled half sadly. + +"She has taught me how to find happiness, Tom. I wish you may get such a +teacher." + +"Thank you, so do I, if my time ever comes; but geniuses _aux longs yeux +bleus_ are rare in the world. But you're wondering why I'm here, ain't +you?" + +"I was flattering myself you were here to see us." + +"Well, of course and very glad to see you, too; but I'm come in part as +your governor's messenger." + +Valerie saw him look up quickly, a flush on his face. "My father?" + +"Yes, that rascal--(you know I always said he was good for nothing, a +fool that couldn't smoke a Queen without being sick)--I mean, your +brother Maximillian--was at the bottom of the Count's row with you. Last +week I was dining at old Fitz's, and your father and sisters were there, +and when the women were gone I asked him when he'd last heard of you; of +course he looked tempestuous, and said, 'Never.' Happily, I'm not easily +shut up, so I told him it was a pity, then, for if he did he'd hear you +were jollier than ever, and I said your wife was---- Well, I won't say +what, for fear we spoil this young lady, and make her vain of herself. +The old boy turned pale, and said nothing; but two days after I got a +line from him, saying he wasn't quite well; would I go down and speak to +him. I found him chained with the gout, and he began to talk about you. +I like that old man, Waldemar, I do, uncommonly. He said he'd been too +hasty, but that it was a family failing, and that Max had brought him +such--well, such confounded lies--about Valerie, that he would have shot +you rather than see you give her your name; now he wants to have you +back. I'd nothing to do, so I said I'd come and ask you to forgive the +poor old boy, and come and see him, for he isn't well. I know you will, +Falkenstein, because you never _did_ bear malice." + +"Oh yes, he will," murmured Valerie, tears in her eyes. "I separated +you, Waldemar; you will let me see you reconciled?" + +"My darling, yes! Poor old governor!" And Falkenstein stopped and +smoked vigorously, for kindness always touched him to the heart. + +Bevan looked at him and was silent. "I say," he whispered, when he was a +moment alone with Valerie. "I didn't tell Waldemar, because I thought +you'd break it to him less blunderingly than I should, but the old +Count's breaking fast. I doubt if he'll live another week." + +Bevan was right. In another week Falkenstein stood by the death-bed of +his father. He had a long interview with him alone, in which the old +Count detailed to him the fabricated slanders with which his brother had +blackened Valerie's name. With all his old passion he disowned the son +capable of such baseness, and constituted Waldemar his sole heir, save +the legacies left his daughters. He died in Waldemar's arms the night +they arrived in England, with his last word to him and Valerie, whom, +despite Virginia's opposition, he insisted on seeing. Falkenstein's +sorrow for his father was deep and unfeigned, like his character; but +his guardian angel, as he used to call her, was there to console him, +and, under the light of her smile, sorrow could not long pursue him. + +On his brother, always his own enemy, and now the traducer of the woman +he loved, Waldemar's wrath fell heavily, and would, to a certainty, have +found some means of wreaking itself, but for the last wishes of his +father. As it was, he took a nobler, yet a more complete revenge. The +day of the funeral, when they were assembled for the reading of the +will, Maximilian, unconscious of his doom, came with his gentle face, +and tender melancholy air, to inherit, as he believed, Fairlie, and all +the personal property. + +Stunned as by a spent ball, horror-struck, disbelieving his senses, he +heard his younger brother proclaimed the heir. It was a serious thing +to him, moreover, for--for a man of large expenses and great +ostentation--his own means were small. To secure every shilling he had +schemed, and planned, and lied; and now every shilling was taken from +him. Like the dog of AEsopian memory, trying to catch two pieces of meat, +he had lost his own! + +After the last words were read, Waldemar stood a moment irresolute; then +he lifted his head, his dark eyes bright and clear, his mouth fixed and +firm, a proud calm displacing his old look of passion and of care. + +He went up to his brother with a generous impulse, and held out his +hand. + +"Maximilian, from our boyhood you never liked me, and of late you have +done me a great wrong; but I am willing to believe that you did it from +a mistaken motive, and by me, at least, it shall never be recalled. My +father, in his wish to make amends for the one harsh act of his life to +me, has made a will which I know you consider unjust. I cannot dispute +his last desire that I should inherit Fairlie, but I can do what I know +he would sanction--divide with you the wealth his energy collected. Take +the half of the property, as if he had left it to you, and over his +grave let us forget the past!" + + * * * * * + +On the last day of the year, so eventful to them both, Falkenstein and +Valerie drove through the park at Fairlie. The role of a country +gentleman would have been the last into which Waldemar, with his +independent opinions and fastidious intellect, would have sunk; but he +was fond of the place from early associations, and he came down to take +possession. The tenantry and servants welcomed him heartily, for they +had often used to wish that the wild high-spirited child, who rode his +Shetland over the country at a headlong pace, and if he sometimes +teased their lives out, always gave them a kind word and merry laugh, +had been the heir instead of the one to whom they applied the old +proverb "still and ill." + +The tenantry had been dismissed, the dinner finished, even the briarwood +pipe smoked out, and in the wide Elizabethan window of the library +Falkenstein stood, looking on the clear bright night, and watching the +Old Year out. + +"You sent the deed of gift to-day to Maximilian?" said Valerie, clasping +both her hands on his arm. + +"Yes. He does not take it very graciously; but perhaps we can hardly +expect that from a man who has been disinherited. I question if I should +accept it at all." + +"But you could never have wronged another as he wronged you," cried +Valerie. "Oh, Waldemar! I think I never realised fully, till the day you +took your generous revenge, how noble, how good, how above all others +you are." + +He smiled, and put his hand on her lips. + +"Good, noble, silly child! those words may do for some spotless Gahlahad +or Folko, not for me, who, a month ago, was in debt to some of the +greatest blackguards in town, who have yielded to every temptation, +given way to every weakness; not with the excuse of a boy new to life, +but willfully and recklessly, knowing both the pleasures and their +price--I, who but for your love and my father's, should now be a +solitary exile, paying for my past follies with----" + +"Be quiet," interrupted Valerie, with her passionate vivacity. "As +different as was 'Mirabeau juge par sa famille et Mirabeau juge par le +peuple,' are you judged by your enemies, and judged by those who love +you. Granted you have had temptations, follies, errors; so has every +man of high spirit and generous temper, and I value you far more coming +out of a fiery furnace with so much of pure gold that the flames could +not destroy, than if you were some ascetic Pharisee, who has never +succumbed because he has never been tempted, and, born with no +weaknesses, is born with no warmer virtues either!" + +Falkenstein laughed, as he looked down at her. + +"You little goose! Well, at least you have eloquence, Valerie, if not +truth, on your side; and your sophistry is dear to me, as it springs out +of your love." + +"But it is not sophistry," she cried, with an energetic stamp of her +foot. "If you will not listen to philosophy, concede, at least, to fact. +Which is most worthy of my epithets--'noble and good'--Waldemar +Falkenstein, or Maximillian? And yet Maximillian has been quiet and +virtuous from his youth upwards, and always wins white balls from the +ballot of society." + +"Well, you shall have the privilege of your sex--the last word," smiled +Waldemar, "more especially as the last word is on my side." + +"Hark!" interrupted Valerie, quiet and subdued in a second, "the clock +is striking twelve." + +Silently, with her arms round his neck, they listened to the parting +knell of the Old Year, stealing quietly away from its place among men. +From the church towers through England tolled the twelve strokes, with a +melancholy echo, telling a world that its dead past was laid in a sealed +grave, and the stone of Never More was rolled to the door of the +sepulchre. The Old Year was gone, with all its sins and errors, its +golden gleams and midnight storms, its midsummer days of sunshine for +some, its winter nights of starless gloom for others. Its last knell +echoed; and then, from the old grey belfries in villages and towns, over +the stirring cities and the sleeping hamlets, over the quiet meadows and +stretching woodlands and grand old forest trees, rang the Silver Chimes +of the New Year. + +"It shall be a happy New Year to you, my darling, if my love can make it +so," whispered Waldemar, as the musical bells clashed out in wild +harmony under the winter stars. + +She looked up into his eyes. "I _must_ be happy, since it will be passed +with you. Do you remember, Waldemar, the night I saw you first, my +telling you New Year's-day was my birthday, and wondering where you and +I should spend the next? I liked you strangely from the first, but how +little I foresaw that my whole life was to hang on yours!" + +"As little as I foresaw when, after heavy losses at Godolphin's, I +watched the Old Year out in my chambers, a tired, ruined, hopeless, +aimless man, with not one on whom I could rely for help or sympathy in +my need, that I should stand here now, free, clear from debt, with all +my old entanglements shaken off, my old scores wiped out, my darker +errors forgotten, my worst enemy humbled, and my own future bright. Oh! +Valerie! Heaven bless you for the love that followed me into exile!" + +He drew her closer to him as he spoke, and as he felt the beating of the +heart that was always true to him, and the soft caress of the lips that +had always a smile for him, Falkenstein looked out over the wide +woodland that called him master, glistening in the clear starlight, and +as he listened to the SILVER CHIMES--joyous herald of the New-born +Year--he blessed in his inmost heart the GOLDEN FETTERS OF LOVE. + + + + +SLANDER AND SILLERY. + + + + +SLANDER AND SILLERY. + + + + +I. + +THE LION OF THE CHAUSSEE D'ANTIN. + + Ma mere est a Paris, + Mon pere est a Versailles. + Et moi je suis ici. + Pour chanter sur la paille, + L'amour! L'amour! + La nuit comme le jour. + + +Humming this popular if not over-recherche ditty, a man sat sketching in +pastels, one morning, in his rooms at Numero 10, Rue des Mauvais Sujets, +Chaussee d' Antin, Paris. + +The band of the national guard, the marchands crying "Coco!" the +charlatans puffing everything from elixirs to lead-pencils, the Empress +and Mme. d'Alve passing in their carriage, the tramp of some Zouaves +just returned from Algeria--nothing in the street below disturbed him; +he went sketching on as if his life depended on the completion of the +picture. He was a man about thirty-three, middle height, and eminently +graceful. He was half Bohemian, half English, and the animation of the +one nation and the hauteur of the other were by turns expressed on his +chiselled features as his thoughts moved with his pencil. The stamp of +his good blood was on him; his face would have attracted and interested +in ever so large a crowd. He was very pale, and there was a tired look +on his wide, powerful forehead and in his long dark eyes, and a weary +line or two about his handsome mouth, as if he had exhausted his youth +very quickly; and, indeed, to see life as he had seen it _is_ somewhat a +fatiguing process, and apt to make one blase before one's time. + +The rooms in which he sat were intensely comfortable, and very +provocative to a quiet pipe and idleness. To be sure, if one judged his +tastes by them, they were not probably, to use the popular jargon, +"healthy," for they had nothing very domestic or John Halifaxish about +them, and were certainly not calculated to gratify the eyes of maiden +aunts and spinster sisters. + +There were fencing-foils, pistols, tobacco-boxes of every style and +order, from ballet-girls to terriers' heads. There were three or four +cockatoos and parrots on stands chattering bits of Quartier Latin songs, +or imitating the cries in the street below. There were cards, +dice-boxes, albums a rire, meerschaums, lorgnons, pink notes, no end of +De Kock's and Lebrun's books, and all the etcaeteras of chambres de +garcon strewed about: and there were things, too--pictures, statuettes, +fauteuils, and a breakfast-service of Sevres and silver--that Du Barry +need not have scrupled to put in her "petite bon-bonniere" at Luciennes. + +So busy was he sketching and singing + + "Messieurs les etudiens + Montez a la Chaumiere!" + +that he never heard a knock at his door, and he looked up with an +impatient frown on his white, broad forehead as a man entered _sans +ceremonie_. + +"Mon Dieu! Ernest," cried his friend, "what the devil are you doing here +with your pipe and your pastels, when I've been waiting at Tortoni's a +good half-hour, and at last, out of patience, drove here to see what on +earth had become of you?" + +"My dear fellow, I beg you a thousand pardons," said Vaughan, lazily. "I +was sketching this, and you and your horses went clean out of my head, I +honestly confess." + +"And your breakfast too, it seems," said De Concressault, glancing at +the table. "Is it Madame de Melusine or the little Bluette whose +portrait absorbs you so much? No, by Jove! it's a prettier woman than +either of 'em. If she's like that, take me to see her this instant. What +glorious gold hair! I adore your countrywomen when they've hair that +color. Where did you get that face? Is she a duchess, or a danseuse, a +little actress you're going to patronise, or a millionnaire you're going +to marry?" + +"I can't tell you," laughed Vaughan. "I've not an idea who she may be. I +saw her last evening coming out of the Francais, and picked up her +bouquet for her as she was getting into her carriage. The face was +young, the smile very pretty and bright, and, as they daguerreotyped +themselves in my mind, I thought I might as well transfer them to paper +before newer beauties chased them out of it." + +"Diable! and you don't know who she is? However, we'll soon find out. +That gold hair mustn't be lost. But get your breakfast, pray, Ernest, +and let us be off to poor Armand's sale." + +"That's the way we mourn our dead friends," said Vaughan, with a sneer, +pouring out his coffee. "Armand is jesting, laughing, and smoking with +us one day, the next he's pitched out of his carriage going down to +Asnieres, and all we think of is--that his horses are for sale. If I +were found in the Morgue to-morrow, your first emotion, Emile, would be, +'Vaughan's De l'Orme will be sold. I must go and bid for it directly.'" + +De Concressault laughed as he looked up at a miniature of Marion de +l'Orme, once taken for the Marquis of Gordon. "I fancy, mon garcon, +there'll be too many sharks after all your possessions for me to stand +any chance." + +"True enough," said Vaughan; "and I question if they'll wait till my +death before they come down on 'em. But I don't look forward. I take +life as it comes. Vogue la galere! At least, I've _lived_, not +vegetated." And humming his refrain, + + "L'amour! l'amour! + La nuit comme le jour!" + +he lounged down the stairs and drove to a sale in the Faubourg St. +Germain, where one of his Paris chums, a virtuoso and connoisseur, had +left endless _meubles_ to be sold by his duns and knocked down to his +friends. + +Vaughan was quite right; he _had_ lived, and at a pretty good pace, too. +When he came of age a tolerably good fortune awaited him, but it had not +been long in his hands before he contrived to let it slip through them. +He'd been brought up at Sainte Barbe, after being expelled from Rugby, +knew all the best of the "jeunesse doree," and could not endure any +place after Paris, where his life was as sparkling and brilliant as the +foam off a glass of champagne. Wild and careless, high spirited, and +lavish in his Opera suppers, his _cabaret_ dinners, his Trois Freres +banquets, his lansquenet parties, his bouquets for baronnes, and his +bracelets for ballerinas, Ernest gained his reputation as a _Lion_, +and--ruined himself, too, poor old fellow! + +His place down in Surrey had mortgages thick on every inch of its lands, +and the money that kept him going was borrowed from those modern Satans, +money lenders, at the usually ruinous interest. "But still," Ernest was +wont to say, with great philosophy, "I've had ten years' swing of +pleasure. Does every man get as much as that? And should I have been any +happier if I'd been a good boy, and a country squire, sat on the bench, +amused my mind with turnips, and married some bishop's daughter, who'd +have marched me to church, forbidden cigars, and buried me in family +boots?" + +Certainly that would _not_ have been his line, and so, in natural horror +at it, he dashed into a diametrically opposite one, and after the favor +he had shown him from every handsome woman that drove through Longchamp, +wore diamonds at the Tuileries, and supped with dominos noirs at bals +d'Opera, and the favor he showed to cards, the _courses_, and the +_coulisses_, few bishops would have imperilled their daughters' souls by +setting them to hunt down this wicked _Lion_, especially as the poor +_Lion_ now wasn't worth the trapping. If he had been, there would have +been hue and cry enough after him I don't doubt; but the Gordon Cummings +of the beau sexe rarely hunt unless it's worth their while, and they can +bring home splendid spoils to make their bosom friends mad with envy; +and Ernest, despite his handsome face, his fashionable reputation, and +the aroma of conquest that hung about him (they used to say he never +wooed ever so negligently but he won), was assuredly neither an +"eligible speculation" nor a "marrying man," and was an object rather +of terror to English mammas steering budding young ladies through the +dangerous vortex of French society with a fierce chevaux de frise of +British prejudices and a keen British eye to business. If Ernest was of +no other use, however, he was invaluable to his uncles, aunts, and male +cousins, as a sort of scapegoat and _epouvantail_, to be held up on high +to show the unwary what they would come to if they followed his steps. +It was so pleasant to them to exult over his backslidings, and, cutting +him mercilessly up into little bits, hold condemnatory sermons over +every one of the pieces. "Dans l'adversite de nos meilleurs amis, nous +trouvons toujours quelque chose qui ne nous deplait pas;" and Vaughan's +friends, like the rest of us pharisees, dearly loved to glance at the +publican (especially if he was handsomer, cleverer, or any way better +than themselves), and thank God loudly that they were not such men as +he. Ernest was a hardened sinner, however; he laughed, put the Channel +between him and them, and went on his ways without thinking or caring +for their animadversions. + +"By Jove! Emile," said he as they sat dining together at Leiter's, "I +should like to find out my golden-haired sylphide. She was English, by +her fair skin, and though I'm not very fond of my compatriotes, +especially when they're abroad (I think touring John Bull detestable +wrapped up in his treble plaid of reserve), still I should like to find +her out just for simple curiosity. I assure you she'd the prettiest foot +and ankle I ever saw, not excepting even Bluette's." + +"Ma foi! that's a good deal from _you_. She must be found, then. Voyons! +shall we advertise in the _Moniteur_, employ the secret police, or call +at all the hotels in person to say that you're quite ready to act out +Soulie's 'Lion Amoureux,' if you can only discover the petite +bourgeoise to play it with you?" + +Vaughan laughed as he drank his demi-tasse. + +"Lion amoureux! that's an anomaly; we're only in love just enough pour +nous amuser; and of us Albin says, very rightly, + + Si vous connaissiez quelques meilleurs, + Vous porteriez bientot cette ame ailleurs." + +"Very well, then: if you don't know of anything better, let's hunt up +this incognita. If she went to the Francais, she's most likely at the +Odeon to-night," said De Concressault. "Shall we try?" + +"Allons!" said Vaughan, rising indolently, as he did most things. "But +it's rather silly, I think; there are bright smiles and pretty feet +enough in Paris without one's setting off on a wild-goose chase after +them." + +They were playing the last act of "La Calomnie," as Vaughan and De +Concressault took their places, put up their lorgnons, and looked round +the house. He swore a few mental "Diables!" and "Sacres!" as his gaze +fell on faces old or ugly, or too brunes or too blondes, or anything but +what he wanted. At last, without moving his glass, he touched De +Concressault's arm. + +"There she is, Emile, in the fourth from the centre, in a white opera +cloak, with pink flowers in her hair." + +"I see her, mon ami," said Emile. "I found her out two seconds ago (see +how well you sketch!) but I wouldn't spoil your pleasure in discovering +her. Mon Dieu! Ernest, she's looking at you, and smiles as if she +recognised you. Was there ever so lucky a Lauzun?" + +Vaughan could have laughed outright to see by the brightness of the +girl's expression that she knew the saviour of her bouquet again, for +though he was accustomed to easy conquests, such naive interest in him +at such short notice was something new to him. + +He didn't take his lorgnon off her again, and she was certainly worth +the honor, with her soft, lustrous gold hair, the eyes that defy +definition--black in some lights, violet in others--a wide-arched +forehead, promising plenty of brains, and a rayonnante, animated, joyous +expression, quite refreshing to anybody as bored and blase as Vaughan +and De Concressault. As soon as the last piece was over Vaughan slipped +out of his loge, and took up his station at the entrance. + +He didn't wait in vain: the golden hair soon came, on the arm of a +gentleman--middle aged, as Vaughan noticed with a sensation of +satisfaction. She glanced up at him as she passed: he looked very +handsome in the gas glare. Vaughan perhaps was too sensible a fellow to +think of his pose, but even _we_ have our weaknesses under certain +circumstances, as well as the crinolines. Luckily for him, he chanced to +have in his pocket a gold serpent bracelet he had bought that morning +for some fair dame or demoiselle. He stopped her, and held it out to +her. + +"I beg your pardon, mademoiselle," he said in French, "but I think you +dropped this?" + +She looked up at him with the sunniest of smiles as she answered, in a +pure accent, "No monsieur, thank you, it does not belong to me." + +The middle-aged man glanced sideways at him with true British +suspicion--I dare say a pickpocket, a Rouge, and Fieschi, were all mixed +up in his mind as embodied in the graceful figure and bold glance of the +_Lion_. He drew the girl on, looking much like a heavy cloud with a +bright sun ray after it; but she half turned her head over her shoulder +to give him a farewell smile, which Ernest returned with ten per cent. +interest. + +"Anglais," said Emile, concisely. + +"Malheureusement," said Ernest as briefly, as he pushed his way into the +air, and saw the gold hair vanish into her carriage. He went quickly up +to the cocher. + +"Ou demeurent-ils, mon ami?" he whispered, slipping a five-franc piece +into his hand. + +The man smiled. "A l'Hotel de Londres, monsieur; No. 6, au premier." + +"The devil! pourquoir ne allez pas?" said an unmistakably English voice +from the interior of the voiture. The man set off at a trot; Ernest +sprang into his own trap. + +"Au Chateau Rouge! May as well go there, eh, Emile? What a deuced pity +la chevelure doree is English!" + +"I wish she were a danseuse, an actress, a fleuriste--anything one could +make his own introduction to. Confound it there's the 'heavy father,' +I'm afraid, in the case, and some rigorous mamma, or vigilant _beguine_ +of a governess: but, to judge by the young lady's smiles, she'll be easy +game unless she's tremendously fenced in." + +With which consolatory reflection Vaughan leaned back and lighted a +cheroot, _en route_ to spend the night as he had spent most of them for +the last ten years, till the fan had begun to be more bore than +pleasure. + + + + +II. + +NINA GORDON. + + +"Have you been to the Hotel de Londres, Ernest?" said De Concressault, +as Vaughan lounged into Tortoni's next day, where Emile and three or +four other men were drinking Seltzer and talking of how Cerisette had +beaten Vivandiere by a neck at Chantilly, or (the sport to which a +Frenchman takes much more naturally) of how well Riviere played in the +"Prix d'un Bouquet;" what a _belle taille_ la De Servans had; and what a +fool Senecterre had made of himself in the duel about Madame Viardot. + +"Of course I have," said Vaughan. "The name is Gordon--general name +enough in England. They were gone to the Expiatoire, the portiere told +me. There _is_ the heavy father, as I feared, and a quasi-governess +acting duenna; they're travelling with another family, whose name I +could not hear: the woman said 'C'etait beaucoup trop dur pour les +levres.' I dare say they're some Brummagem people--some Fudge family or +other--on their travels. Confound it!" + +"Poor Ernest," laughed De Concressault. "Some gold hair has bewitched +him, and instead of finding it belongs to a danseuse, or a married +woman, or a fleuriste of the Palais Royal, or something attainable, he +finds it turn into an unapproachable English girl, with no end of +outlying sentries round her, who'll fire at the first familiar +approach." + +"It is a hard case," said De Kerroualle, a dashing fellow in one of the +"Regiments de famille." "Never mind, mon ami; 'contre fortune bon +coeur,' you know: it'll be more fun to devastate one of our countrymen's +inviolate strongholds than to conquer where the white flag's already +held out. Halloa! here's a compatriot of yours, I'd bet; look at his +sanctified visage and stiff choker--a Church of England man, eh?" + +"The devil!" muttered Vaughan, turning round; "deuce take him, it's my +cousin Ruskinstone! What in the world does _he_ do in Paris?" + +The man he spoke of was the Rev. Eusebius Ruskinstone, the Dean's +Warden of the cathedral of Faithandgrace, a tall, thin young clerical of +eight or nine-and-twenty, with goodness enough (it was generally +supposed) in his little finger to make up for all Ernest's sins, scarlet +though they were. He had just sat down and taken up the carte to blunder +through "Potage au Duc de Malakoff," "Fricassee de volaille a la +Princesse Mathilde," and all the rest of it, when his eye lit on his +graceless cousin, and a vinegar asperity spread over his bland visage. +Vaughan rose with a lazy grace, immensely bored within him: "My dear +Ruskinstone, what an unanticipated pleasure. I never hoped Vanity Fair +would have had power to lure _you_ into its naughty peep-shows and +roundabouts." + +The Rev. Eusebius reddened slightly; he had once stated strongly his +opinion that poor Paris was Pandemonium. "How do you do?" he said, +giving his cousin two fingers; "it is a long time since we saw you in +England." + +"England doesn't want me," said Ernest, dryly. "I don't fancy I should +be very welcome at Faithandgrace, should I? The dear Chapter would +probably consign me to starvation for my skeptical notions, as Calvin +did Castellio. But what _has_ brought you to Paris? Are you come to +fight the Jesuits in a conference, or to abjure the Wardenship and turn +over to them?" + +Eusebius was shocked at the irreverent tone, but there was a satirical +smile on his cousin's lips that he didn't care to provoke. "I am come," +he said, stiffly, "partly for health, partly to collect materials for a +work on the 'Gurgoyles and Rose Mouldings of Mediaeval Architecture,' and +partly to oblige some friends of mine. Pardon me, here they come." + +Vaughan lifted his eyes, expecting nothing very delectable in +Ruskinstone's friends; to his astonishment they fell on his beauty of +the Francais! with the outlying sentries of father, governess, and two +other women, the Warden's maiden sisters, stiff, manierees, and prudish, +like too many Englishwomen. The young lady of the Francais was a curious +contrast to them: she started a little as she saw Vaughan, and smiled +brilliantly. On the spur of that smile Ernest greeted his cousins with a +degree of _empressement_ that they certainly wouldn't have been honored +by without it. They were rather frightened at coming in actual contact +with such a monster of iniquity as a Paris _Lion_, who, they'd heard, +had out-Juan'd Don Juan, and gave him but a frigid welcome. Mr. Gordon +had doubtless heard, too, of Vaughan's misdemeanors, for he looked +stoical and acidulated as he bowed. But the young girl's eyes reconciled +Ernest to all the rest, as she frankly returned a look with which he was +wont to win his way through women's hearts, 'midst the hum of ball +rooms, in the soft tete-a-tete in boudoirs, and over the sparkling +Sillery of _petits soupers_. So, for the sake of his new quarry, he +disregarded the cold looks of the others, and made himself so charming, +that nobody could withstand the fascination of his manner till their +dinner was served, and then, telling his cousins he would do himself the +pleasure of calling on them the next day, he left the cafe to drive over +to Gentilly, to inspect a grey colt of De Kerroualle's. + +"La chevelure doree is quite as pretty by daylight, Ernest," said De +Concressault. "Bon dieu! it is such a relief to see eyes that are not +tinted, and a skin whose pink and white is not born from the mysterious +rites of the toilet." + +Vaughan nodded, with his Manilla between his teeth. + +"That cousin of yours is queer style, mon garcon," said Kerroualle. +"How some of those islanders contrive to iron themselves into the +stiffness and flatness they do, is to me the profoundest enigma. But +what Church of England meaning lies hid in his coat-tails? They are, for +all the world, like our reverends peres! What is it for?" + +"High Church. Next door shop to yours, you know. Our ecclesiastics are +given to balancing themselves on a tight rope between their 'mother' and +their 'sister,' till they tumble over into their sister's open arms--the +Catholics say into salvation, the Protestants into damnation; into +neither, I myself opine, poor simpletons. Ruskinstone is fearfully +architectural. The sole things he'll see here will be facades, +gurgoyles, and clerestories, and his soul knows no warmer loves than +'stone dolls,' as Newton calls them. I say, Gaston, what do you think of +_my_ love of the Francais; isn't she _chic_, isn't she mignonne, isn't +she spirituelle?" + +"Yes," assented De Kerroualle, "prettier than either Bluette or Madame +de Melusine would allow, or--relish." + +Ernest frowned. "I've done with Bluette; she's a pretty face, but--ah, +bah! one can't amuse oneself always with a little paysanne, for she's +nothing better, after all; and I'm half afraid the Melusine begins to +bore me." + +"Better not tell her so, mon ami," said De Kerroualle; "she'd be a nasty +enemy." + +"Pooh! a woman like that loves and forgets." + +"Sans doute; but they also sometimes revenge. Poor little Bluette you +may safely turn over; but Madame la Baronne won't so easily be jilted." + +Vaughan laughed. "Oh, I'm not going to break her heart. Don't you know, +Gaston, 'on a bien de la peine a rompre, meme quand on ne s'aime plus." + +"I shouldn't have said you found it so," smiled De Concressault, "for +you change your loves as you change your gloves. La chevelure doree will +be the next, eh?" + +"Poor little thing!" said Ernest, bitterly. "I wish her a better fate." + +He went to call on la chevelure doree, nevertheless, the morning after, +and found her in the salon alone, greatly to his surprise and pleasure. +Nina Gordon _was_ pretty _even_ in the morning--as Byron says--and she +was much more, she was fascinating, and as perfectly demonstrative and +natural as any peasant girl out of the meadows of Arles, ignorant of the +magic words toilette, cosmetique, and crinoline. + +She received him with evident pleasure and perfect unreserve, which even +this daring and skeptical _Lion_ could not twist or contort into +boldness, and began to talk fast and gaily. + +"Do I like Paris?" she said, in answer to his question. "Oh yes; or at +least I should, if I could see it differently. I detest sight-seeing, +crowding one's brains with pictures, statues, palaces, Holy Families +jostling Polinchinelle, races, mixing up with grand masses, Versailles, +clouding St. Cloud--the Trianon rattled through in five minutes--all in +inextricable muddle. _I_ should like to see Paris at leisure, with some +one with whom I had a 'rapport,' my thoughts undisturbed, and my +historical associations fresh and fervent." + +"I wish I were honored with the office of your guide," said Ernest, +smiling. "Do you think you would have a 'rapport' with me?" + +She smiled in return. "Yes, I think I should. I cannot tell why. But as +it is, my warmest souvenir of Conde is chilled by the offer of an ice, +and my tenderest thought of Louise de la Valliere is shivered with the +suggestion of dinner." + +Vaughan laughed. "Bravo!" thought he. "Thank God this is no tame English +icicle. I would give much," he said, "to be able to take my cousin's +place, and show you Paris. We would have no such vulgar gastronomical +interruptions; we would go through it all perfectly. I would make you +hear the very whispers with which La Valliere, under the old oaks of St. +Germain, unknowingly, told her love to Louis. In the forest glades of +St. Cloud you should see Cinq-Mars and the Royal Hunt riding out in the +_chasse de nuit_; in the gloomy walls of the prisons you should hear +Andre Chenier reciting his last verses, and see Egalite completing his +last toilet. The glittering 'Cotillons' on the terraces of Versailles, +the fierce canaille surging through the salons of the Tuileries, the +Templars dying in the green meadows at the back of St. Antoine--they +should all rise up for you under my incantations." + +Positively Ernest, bored and blase, accustomed to look at Paris through +the gas-lights of his _Lion's_ life, warmed into romance to please the +eyes that now beamed upon him. + +"Ah! that would be delightful," said the girl, her eyes sparkling. "Mr. +Ruskinstone, you know, is terrible to me, for he goes about with +'Ruskin' in one hand, 'Murray' in the other, and a Phrase-book or two in +his pocket (of course he wants it, as he's a 'classical scholar'), and +no matter whatever associations cling around a place, only looks at it +in regard to its architectural points. I beg your pardon," she said, +interrupting herself with a blush, "I forgot he was your cousin; but +really that constant cold stone does tease me so." + +At that moment the heavy father, as Ernest irreverently styled the tall, +pompous head of one of the first banks in London, who was worth a +million if he was worth a sou, entered, and the Rev. Eusebius after +him, who had been spending a lively morning taking notes among the +catacombs. He was prepared to be as cold as a refrigerator, and the +banker to follow his example, at finding this _bete noire_ of the +Chaussee d'Antin tete-a-tete with Nina. But Ernest had a sort of haughty +high breeding and careless dignity which warned people off from any +liberties with him; and Gordon remembered that he knew Paris and its +_haute volee_ so well that he might be a useful acquaintance if kept at +arm's length from Nina, and afterwards dropped. Unlucky man! he actually +thought his weak muscles were strong enough to cope with a _Lion's_! + +Vaughan took his leave, after offering his box at the Opera-Comique to +Mr. Gordon, and drove to the Jockey Club, pondering much on this new +species of the _beau sexe_. He was too used to women not to know at a +glance that she had nothing bold about her, and yet he was too skeptical +to credit that a girl could possibly exist who was neither a coquette +nor a prude. As soon as the door closed on him his friends began to open +their batteries of scandal. + +"How sad it is to see life wasted as my cousin wastes his," said the +Warden, balancing a paper-knife thoughtfully, with a depressed air; +"frittered away on mere trifles, as valuless and empty as soap-bubbles, +but not, alas! so innocent." + +"What do you mean?" Nina asked, quickly. + +"What do I mean, Miss Gordon?" repeated Eusebius, reproachfully; "what +can I mean but the idle whirl of gaiety, the vitiating pleasures, the +debts and the vices which are to be laid at poor Ernest's door. Ever +since we were boys together, and he was expelled from Rugby for going +to Coventry fair and staying there all night, he has been going rapidly +down the road to ruin." + +"He looks very comfortable in his descent," smiled the young lady. "Pray +why, after all, shouldn't horses, operas, and Manillas, be as legitimate +objects to set one's affections upon as Norman arches and Gregorian +chants? He has his dissipations, you have yours. Chacun a son gout!" + +The Warden had his reasons for conciliating the young heiress, so he +made a feeble effort to smile. "You know as well as I that you do not +think what you say, Miss Gordon. Were it merely Vaughan's tastes that +were in fault it would not be of such fearful consequence, but +unfortunately it is his principles." + +"He is utterly without any," said Miss Selina Ruskinstone, who, ten +years before, had been deeply and hopelessly in love with Ernest, and +never forgave him for not reciprocating the passion. + +"He is a skeptic, a gambler, a spendthrift; and a more heartlessless +flirt never lived," averred Miss Augusta, who hated the whole of +Ernest's sex--even the Chapter--_pour cause_. + +"Gentlemen can't help seeming flirts sometimes, some women pay such +attention to them," said Nina, with a mischievous laugh. "Poor Mr. +Vaughn! I hope he's not as black as he is painted. His physiognomy tells +a different tale; he is just my ideal of 'Ernest Maltravers.' How kind +his eyes are; have you ever looked into them, Selina?" + +Miss Ruskinstone gave an angry sneer, vouchsafing no other response. + +"My dear Nina, how foolishly you talk, about looking into a young man's +eyes," frowned her father. "I am surprised to hear you." + +Her own eyes opened in astonishment. "Why mayn't I look at them? It is +by the eyes that, like a dog, I know whom to like and whom to avoid." + +"And pray does your prescience guide you to see a saint in a ruined +_Lion_ of the Chaussee d'Antin?" sneered Selina, with another +contemptuous sniff. + +"Not a saint. I'm not good enough to appreciate the race," laughed Nina. +"But I do not believe your cousin to be all you paint him; or, at least, +if circumstances have led him into extravagance, I have a conviction +that he has a warm heart and a noble character au fond." + +"We will hope so," said the Warden, meekly, with an expression which +plainly said how vain a hope it was. + +"I think we have wasted a great deal too much conversation on a +thankless subject," said Selina, with asperity. "Don't you think it +time, Mr. Gordon, for us to go to the Louvre?" + +That day, as they were driving along the Boulevards, they passed Ernest +with Bluette in his carriage going to the Pre Catalan: they all knew +her, from having seen her play at the Odeon. Selina and Augusta turned +down their mouths, and turned up their eyes. Gordon pulled up his +collar, and looked a Brutus in spectacles. Nina colored, and looked +vexed. Triumph glittered in Eusebius's meek eyes, but he sighed a +pastor's sigh over a lost soul. + + + + +III. + +"LE LION AMOUREUX." + + +The morning after, as they were going into the Exposition des Beaux +Arts, they met Vaughan; and no ghost would have been more unwelcome to +the Warden than the distingue figure of his fashionable cousin. Nina was +the only one who looked pleased to recognise him, and she, as she +returned his smile, forgot that the evening before it had been given to +Bluette. + +"Are you coming in too?" she asked. + +"I was not, but I will with pleasure," said Ernest. And into the +Exhibition with them he went, to Ruskinstone's wrath and Gordon's +annoyance. + +Vaughan was a connoisseur in art. The Warden knew no more than what he +took verbatim from the god of his idolatry, Mr. John Ruskin. It was very +natural that Nina should listen to the friend of Ingres and Vernet +instead of to the second-hand worshipper of Turner. Vaughan, by +instinct, dropped his customary tone of compliment--compliment he never +used to women he delighted to honor--and talked so charmingly, that Nina +utterly forgot the luckless Eusebius, and started when a low, sweet +voice said, close beside her, "What, Ernest, you here?" + +She turned, and saw a woman about eight-and-twenty, dressed in +perfection of taste, with an exquisite figure, and a face of brunette +beauty; the rouge most undiscoverable, and the eyes artistically tinted +to make them look larger, which, Heaven knows, was needless. She darted +a quick look at Vaughan's companion, which Nina gave back with a dash of +hauteur. A shade came over his face as he answered her greeting. + +"Will you not introduce me to your friend?" said the new comer. "She is +of your nation, I fancy, and you know I am entetee of everything +English." + +Ernest looked rather gloomy at the compliment, but turning to Nina, +begged to introduce her to Madame de Melusine. The gay, handsome +baronne, taking in all the English girl's points as rapidly as a groom +at Tattersall's does a two-year-old's, was chatting volubly to Nina, +when the others came up. Gordon, though wont to boast that he belonged +to the aristocracy of money, was always ready to fall in the dust before +the noblesse of blood, and was gratified at the introduction, +remembering to have read in the _Moniteur_ the name of De Melusine at +the ball at the Tuileries. And the widow was very charming even to the +professedly stoical eyes of a Brutus of sixty-two. She soon floated off, +however, with her party, giving Vaughan a gay "A ce soir!" and +requesting to be allowed the honor of calling on the Gordons. + +"Is she a great friend of yours?" asked Nina, when she and he were a +little in advance of the others. + +"I have known her some time." + +"And you are very intimate, I suppose, as she called you by your +Christian name?" + +He smiled a smile that puzzled Nina. "Oh! we soon get familiar here!" + +"Where are you going to see her again this evening?" she persevered, +playing with her parasol fringe. + +"At her own house--a house that will charm you. By the way, it once +belonged to Bussy Rabutin, and it has all Louis Quatorze furniture." + +"Is it a dinner?--a ball?" + +"No, an Opera supper--she is famed for her Sillery and her mots. Ten to +one I shall not go; what amuses one once palls with repetition." + +"I don't understand that," said Nina, quickly; "what I like, I like pour +toujours." + +"Pauvre enfant! you little know life," muttered Ernest. "Ah! Miss +Gordon, you are at the happy age when one can believe in the feelings +and friendships, and all the charming little romances of existence. But +I have passed it, and so that I am amused for a moment, so that +something takes time off my hands, I look no further, and expect no +more. I know well enough the champagne will cease to sparkle, but I +drink it while it foams, and don't trouble myself to lament over it. +Qu'importe? when one bottle's empty, there is another!" + +"Ah! it is such women as Madame de Melusine who have taught you that +doctrine," cried Nina, with an energy that rather startled Ernest, +though his nerves were as strong as any man's in Paris. "My romances, as +you term them, still I believe sleep in your heart, but the world you +live in has stifled them. Do you think amusement will always be enough +for you?--do you think you will never want something better than your +empty champagne foam?" + +"I hope I shall not, mademoiselle," said Vaughan, bitterly, "for I am +certain I do not believe in it, and am quite sure I should never get it. +Leave me to the roses of my Tritericae; they are all I shall ever enjoy, +and they, at the best, are withered." + +"Nina, love," interrupted Selina, coming up with much amiability, "I was +_obliged_ to come and tell you not to be _quite_ so energetic. All the +people in the room are looking at you." + +"I dare say they are," said Vaughan, calmly. "It is not often the +Parisians have the pleasure of seeing beauty unaffected, and +fascinations careless of their own charms. Nature, Selina, is unhappily +as rare one side the Channel as the other, and we men appreciate it when +we do see it." + +When Vaughan parted from them soon after, he swore at himself for three +things. First, for having driven Bluette, en plein jour, through the +Boulevards, though he had driven Bluette, and such as Bluette, a +thousand times before; secondly, for having been so weak as to +introduce Madame de Melusine to the Gordons; and, thirdly, for +having--he the thorough-paced _Lion_, whose manual was Rochefoucauld, +and tutor in love, De Kock--actually talked romance as if he were Werter +or Paul Flemming, or some other sentimental simpleton. + +Vaughan, to his great disgust, felt a fit of blue devils stealing on +him, hurled one or two rose notes waiting for him into the fire with an +oath, smoked half a dozen Manillas fiercely, and then, to get +excitement, went to a dinner at the Rocher de Cancale, played ecarte +with a beau joueur, went to an Opera supper--_not_ to the De +Melusine's--then to Mabille and came home at seven in the morning after +a night such as would have raised every hair off Brutus's head, given a +triumphant glitter to the Warden's small blue eyes, and possibly even +staggered the hot faith of his young champion. Pauline de Melusine was +as good as her word--she did call on the Gordons--and Brutus, stoic +though he was, was well pleased; for the baronne, though her nobility +only dated from the Restoration, and was not received by the exclusive +Legitimists of the old Faubourg St. Germain, had a very pleasant set of +her own, and figured among the nouvelle noblesse and bourgeois decores +who fill the vacant places of the De Rochefoucauld, the De Rohan, and +the Montmorency, in the "imperial" salons of the Tuileries, where once +the noblest blood in Europe was gathered. + +"It is painful to me to frequent Ernest's society," the Warden was wont +to say, "for every word he utters impresses me but more sadly with the +conviction of his lost state. But we are commanded to be in the world +though not of it, and, if I shun him, how can I hope to benefit him?" + +"True; and, as your cousin, it would scarcely be charitable to avoid +him entirely, terrible as we know his habits to be. But there is no +necessity to be too intimate, and I do not wish Nina to be too much with +him," the banker was accustomed to answer. + +"_Anglice_, Vaughan gets us good introductions, and makes Paris pleasant +to us; we'll use him while we want him: when we don't, we will give him +his conge." + +That's the reading of most of our dear friends' compliments and +caresses, isn't it? + +Vaughan knew perfectly well that they would like to make a cat's-paw of +him, and was the last man likely to play that simple and certainly not +agreeable role unless it suited him. But he had reasons of his own for +forcing Gordon to be civil and obliged to him, despite the prejudices of +that English, and therefore, of course, opinionated gentleman. It amused +him to mortify Eusebius, whom he saw at a glance was bewitched with the +prospect of Nina's _dot_, and it amused him very much to see Nina's +joyous laughter as he leaned over her chair at the Opera Comique, to +hear her animated satire on Madame de Melusine, for whom, knowing +nothing of her, the young lady had conceived hot aversion, and to listen +to her enthusiasm when she poured out to him her vivid imaginings. + +Gradually the cafes, and the Boulevards, and the boudoirs missed Ernest +while he accompanied Nina through the glades of St. Cloud, or down the +Seine to Asnieres, or up the slopes of Pere la Chaise, in his new +pursuit; and often at night he would leave the coulisses, or a +lansquenet, or the gas-lights of the Maison Doree, and the Closerie des +Lilas, to watch her thorough enjoyment of a vaudeville, her fervent +feeling in an opera, or to waltz with her at a ball, and note her glad +recognition of him. + +To this girl, Ernest opened his heart and mind as he--being a reserved, +proud, and skeptical man--had never done to any one; there was a +sympathy and confidence between them, and she learned much of his inner +nature as she talked to him soft and low under the forest trees of +Fontainebleau, such talk as could not be heard in Bluette's boudoir, +under the wax-lights of the Quartier Breda, or in the flow of the +Sillery at la Melusine's soupers. All this was new to the tired _Lion_, +and amused him immensely. La chevelure doree was twisting the golden +meshes of its net round him, as De Concressault told him one day. + +"Nonsense," said Ernest; "have I not two loves already on my hands more +than I want?" + +"Dethrone them, and promote la petite." + +Vaughan turned on his friend with his eyes flashing. + +"Bon Dieu! do you take her for a ballet-girl or a grisette?" + +"Well, if you don't like that, marry her then, mon cher. You will +satisfy your fancy, and get cinquante mille francs de rente--at a +sacrifice, of course; but, que veux-tu? There is no medal without its +reverse, though a 'lion marie' is certainly an anomaly, an absurdity, +and an intense pity." + +"Tais-toi," said Ernest, impatiently; "tu es fou! Caught in the toils of +a wretched intrigante, in the power of any tailor in the Rue Vivienne, +any jeweller in the Palais Royal, my money spent on follies, my life +wasted in play, the turf, and worthless women, I have much indeed to +offer to a young girl who has wealth, beauty, genius, and heart!" + +"All the more reason why you should make a good coup," said Emile, +calmly, after listening with pitying surprise to his friend in his new +mood. "You have a handsome face, a fashionable reputation, and a good +name. Bah! you can do anything. As for your life, all women like a +mauvais sujet, and unless the De Melusine turn out a Brinvilliers, I +don't see what you have to fear." + +"When I want your counsel, Emile, I will ask it," said Vaughan, shortly; +"but, as I have no intention of going in for the prize, there is no need +for you to bet on the chance of the throw." + +"Comme tu veux!" said the Parisian, shrugging his shoulders. "That homme +de paille, your priestly cousin, will take her back to the English fogs, +and make her a much better husband than you'd ever be, mon garcon." + +Vaughan moved restlessly. + +"The idiot! if I thought so---- The devil take you, Emile! why do you +talk of such things?" + +At that minute Nina was sitting by one of the windows of their hotel, +watching for Ernest, with a bouquet he had sent her on a table by her +side; and the Rev. Eusebius was talking in a very low tone to her +father. She caught a few words. "Last night--Vaughan at the Freres +Provencaux--a souper au cabinet--Mademoiselle Celine, premiere +danseuse--quite terrible," &c., &c. + +Nina flushed scarlet, and turned round. "If you blame your cousin, Mr. +Ruskinstone, why were you there yourself?" + +The Warden colored too. With him, as with a good many, foreign air +relaxed the severity of the Decalogue, and what was sin at home, where +everybody knew it, was none at all abroad--under the rose. Some dear +pharisees will not endanger their souls by a carpet-dance in England, +but if a little bird followed them in their holiday across the Channel, +it might chance to see them disporting under a domino noir. + +"I had been," he stammered, "to see, as you know, a beautiful specimen +of the arcboutant in a ruined chapel of the Carmelites, some miles down +the Seine. It was very late, and I was very tired, so turned into the +Freres Provencaux to take some little refreshment, and I there saw my +unhappy cousin in society which _ought_, Miss Gordon, to disqualify him +for yours. It is very painful to me to mention such things to you. I +never thought you overheard----" + +"Then, if it is very painful to you," Nina burst in, impetuously, her +_bouche de rose_, as De Kerroualle called it, curving haughtily, "why +are you ceaselessly raking up every possible bit of scandal that you can +against your cousin? His life does not clash with yours, his acts do not +matter to you, his extravagance does not rob you. I used to fancy +charity should cover a multitude of sins, but it seems to me that, +now-a-days, clergymen, like Dr. Watt's naughty dogs, only delight to +bark and bite." + +"You are cruelly unjust," answered the Warden, in those smooth tones +that irritate one much more than "hard swearing." "I have no other wish +than Christian kindness to poor Ernest. If, in my place as pastor, I +justly condemn his errors and vices, it is only through a loving desire +to wean him from his downward course." + +"Your love is singularly vindictive," said his vehement young opponent, +her cheeks hot and her eyes bright. "No good was ever yet done to a man +by proclaiming his faults right and left. _I_ should like you much +better, Mr. Ruskinstone, if you said, candidly, I don't like my cousin, +and I have never forgiven him for thrashing me at Rugby, and playing +football better than I did." + +Eusebius winced at this little touch up of his bygone years, but he +smiled a benign, superior, pitying smile. "Such petitesses, I thank +Heaven, are utterly beneath me, and I should have fancied Miss Gordon +was too generous to suppose them. God forbid that I should envy poor +Vaughan his dazzling qualities. I sorrow over him as a relative and a +precious human soul, but as a minister of our holy Church I neither can, +nor will, countenance his gross violations of all her divinest laws." +With which peroration the Warden, with a sigh, took up a work on "The +Early English Piscini and Aspersoria," and became immersed therein. + +"Poor Mr. Vaughan!" cried Nina, impatiently. "Probably he is too wise to +concern himself about what people buzz in his absence, or else he need +be cased in mail to avoid being stung to death with the musquito bites +of scandal." + +Gordon came down on her with his heavy artillery. "Silence, Nina! you do +not know what you are defending. I fear that no slander can darken Mr. +Vaughan's character more than he merits." + +"A gambler--a roue--a lover of married woman, of dancing-girls," +murmured Eusebius, in an aside, meant, like those on the stage, to tell +killingly with the audience. + +Nina flushed as scarlet as the camellias in her bouquet, and put up her +head with a haughty gesture. "Here comes the subject of your +vituperation, Mr. Ruskinstone, so you can repeat your denunciations, and +favor him with a sermon in person--unless, indeed, the secular +recollections of Rugby intimidate the religious arm." + +I fear something as irreverent as "Little devil!" rose to the Warden's +pious lips as he flashed a fierce glance at her from his pale-blue eyes, +for he loved not her, but the splendid _dot_ which the banker was sure +to pay down if his son-in-law were to his taste. He caught his cousin's +glance as he came into the salons, and in the superb scorn gleaming in +Ernest's dark eyes, Eusebius saw that they were not merely enemies, +but--rivals: a Warden with Church principles, all the cardinal virtues, +strict morality, and money; and a _Lion_ with Paris principles (if any), +great fascinations, debts, entanglements, and an empty purse. Which will +win, with Nina for the cup and Gordon for the umpire? + + + + +IV. + +MISCHIEF. + + +"Qui cherchez-vous, petite?" + +The speaker was la Melusine, and the hearer was Nina who considerably +resented the half-patronising, half mocking, yet intensely amiable +manner the widow chose to assume towards her. Gordon was stricken with +warm admiration of madame, and never inquired into _her_ morality, only +too pleased when she condescended to talk to or invite him. They had met +at a soiree at some intimate friends of Vaughan's in the Champs Elysees. +(Ernest was a favorite wherever he went, and the good-natured French +people at once took up his relatives to please him.) He was not there +himself, but the baronne's quick eyes soon caught and construed her +restless glances through the crowded rooms. + +"Je ne cherche personne, madame," said Nina, haughtily. Dressed simply +in white tulle, with the most exquisite flowers to be had out of the +Palais Royal in the famous golden hair, which gleamed in the gaslight +like sunshine, she aroused the serpent which lay hid in the roses of +madame's smiles. + +Pauline laughed softly, and flirted her fan. "Nay, nay, mignonne, those +soft eyes are seeking some one. Who is it? Ah! it is that mechant +Monsieur Vaughan n'est-ce pas? He is very handsome, certainly, but + + On dit an village + Qu'Argire est volage." + +"Madame's own thoughts possibly suggest the supposition of mine," said +Nina, coldly. + +"Comme ces Anglaises sont impolies," thought the baronne. "No, indeed," +she said, laughing carelessly, "I know Ernest too well to let my +thoughts dwell on him. He is charming to talk to, to waltz with, to +flirt with, but from anything further Dieu nous garde! Lauzun himself +were not more dangerous or more unstable." + +"You speak as bitterly, madame, as if you had suffered from the +fickleness," said Nina, with a contemptuous curl of her soft lips. Sweet +temper as she was, she could thrust a spear in her enemy's side when she +liked. + +Madame's eyes glittered like a rattlesnake's. Nina's chance ball shot +home. But madame was a woman of the world, and could mask her batteries +with a skill of which Nina, with her impetuous _abandon_, was incapable. +She smiled very sweetly, as she answered, "No, petite I have unhappily +seen too much of the world not to know that we must never put our trust +in those charming mauvais sujets. At your age, I dare say I should not +have been proof against your countryman's fascinations, but now, I know +just how much his fondest vows are worth, and I have been deaf to them +all, for I would not let my heart mislead me against my reason and my +conscience. Ah, petite! you little guess what the traitor word 'love' +means here, in Paris. We women grow accustomed to our fate, but the +lesson is hard sometimes." + +"You have been reading 'Mes Confidences,' lately?" asked Nina, with a +sarcastic flash of her brilliant eyes. + +"How cruel! Do you suppose I can have no _emotions_ except I learn them +second-hand through Lamartine or Delphine Gay? You are very satirical, +Miss Gordon----How strange!" said the baronne, interrupting herself; +"your bouquet is the fac-simile of mine! Look! De Kerroualle sent you +that I fancy? You know he raffoles of you. I was very silly to use mine, +but Mr. Vaughan sent me such a pretty note with it, that I had not the +resolution to disappoint him. Poor Ernest!" And Madame sighed softly, as +if bewailing in her tender heart the woes her obduracy caused. The blood +flamed up in Nina's cheeks, and her hand clenched hard on Ernest's +flowers: they _were_ the fac-similes of the widow's; delicate pink +blossoms, mixed with white azalias. "Is he here to-night, do you know?" +madame continued. "I dare say not; he is behind the coulisses, most +likely. Celine, the new danseuse from the Fenice, makes her debut +to-night. Here comes poor Gaston to petition for a valse. Be kind to +him, pray." + +She herself went off to the ball-room, and the effect of her exordium +was to make Nina very disagreeable to poor De Kerroualle, whom she +really liked, and who was _entete_ about her. Not long afterwards, Nina +saw in the distance Vaughan's haughty head and powerful brow, and her +silly little heart beat as quick as a pigeon's just caught in the trap: +he was talking to the widow. + +"Look at our young English friend," Pauline was saying, "how she is +flirting with Gaston, and De Lafitolle, and De Concressault. Certainly, +when your Englishwomen do coquet, they go further than any of us." + +"Est-ce possible?" said Ernest, raising his eyebrows. + +"Mechant!" cried madame, with a chastising blow of her fan. "But, do you +know, I admire the petite very much. I believe all really beautiful +women had that rare golden hair of hers--Lucrezia Borgia (I could never +bear Grisi as _Lucrezia_, for that very reason). La Cenci, the Duchess +of Portsmouth, AEnone--and Helen, I am sure, netted Paris with those gold +threads. Don't you think it is very lovely?" + +"I do, indeed," said Vaughan, with unconscious warmth. + +Madame laughed gaily, but there was a disagreeable glitter in her eye. +"What, fickle already? Ah well, I give you full leave." + +"And example, madame," said Ernest, as he bowed and left her side, glad +to have struck the first blow of his freedom from this handsome tyrant, +who was as capricious and exacting as she was clever and captivating. +But fetters made of fairer roses were over Ernest now, and he never +bethought himself of the probable vengeance of that bitterest foe, a +woman who is piqued. + +"Tout beau!" thought Pauline, as she saw him waltzing with Nina. "Mais +je vous donnerai encore l'echec et mat, mon brave joueur." + +"Did you give Madame de Melusine the bouquet she carries this evening?" +asked Nina, as he whirled her round. + +"No," said Ernest, astonished. "Why do you ask?" + +"Because she said you did," answered Nina, never accustomed to conceal +anything; "and, besides, it is exactly like mine." + +"Infernal woman!" muttered Ernest. "How could you for a moment believe +that I would have so insulted you?" + +"I didn't believe it," said Nina, lifting her frank eyes to his. "But +how very late you are; have you been at the ballet?" + +His face grew stern. "Did she tell you that?" + +"Yes. But why did you go there, instead of coming to dance with me? Do +you like those danseuses better than you do me? What was Celine's or +anybody's debut, to you?" + +Ernest smiled at the native indignation of the question. "Never think +that I do not wish to be with you; but--I wanted oblivion, and one +cannot shake off old habits. Did you miss me among all those other men +that you have always round you?" + +"How unkind that is!" whispered Nina, indignantly. "You know I always +do." + +He held her closer to him in the waltz, and she felt his heart beat +quicker, but she got no other answer. + +That night Nina stood before her toilette-table, putting her flowers in +water, and some hot tears fell on the azalias. + +"I will have faith in him," she cried, passionately; "though all the +world be witness against him, I will believe in him. Whatever his life +may have been, his heart is warm and true; they shall never make me +doubt it." + +Her last thoughts were of him, and when she slept his face was in her +dreams, while Ernest, with some of the wildest men of his set, smoked +hard and drank deep in his chambers to drive away, if he could, the +fiends of Regret and Passion and the memory of a young, radiant, +impassioned face, which lured him to an unattainable future. + +"Nina dearest," said Selina Ruskinstone, affectionately, the morning +after, "I hope you will not think me unkind--you know I have no wish +but for your good--but _don't_ you think it would be better to be a +little more--more reserved, a little less free, with Mr. Vaughan?" + +"Explain yourself more clearly," said Nina, tranquilly. "Do you wish me +to send to Turkey for a veil and a guard of Bashi-Bazouks, or do you +mean that Mr. Vaughan is so attractive that he is better avoided, like a +mantrap or a Maelstrom?" + +"Don't be ridiculous," retorted Augusta; "you know well enough what we +mean, and certainly you do run after him a great deal too much." + +"You are so _very_ demonstrative," sighed Selina, "and it is so easily +misconstrued. It is not feminine to court any man so unblushingly." + +Nina's eyes flashed, and the blood colored her brow. "I am not afraid of +being misconstrued by Mr. Vaughan," she said, haughtily; "gentlemen are +kinder and wiser judges in those things than our sex." + +"I wouldn't advise you to trust to Ernest's tender mercies," sneered +Augusta. + +"My dear child, remember his principles," sighed Selina; "his life--his +reputation----" + +"Leave both him and me alone," retorted Nina, passionately. "I will not +stand calmly by to hear him slandered with your vague calumnies. You +preach religion often enough; practice it now, and show more common +kindness to your cousin: I do not say charity, for I am sick of the cant +word, and he is above your pity. You think me utterly lost because I +dance, and laugh, and enjoy my life, but, bad as _my_ principles are, I +should be shocked--yes, Selina, and I should think I merited little +mercy myself, were I as harsh and bitter upon any one as you are upon +him. How can _you_ judge him?--how can you say what nobility, and truth, +and affection--that will shame your own cold pharisaism--may lie in his +heart unrevealed?--how can you dare to censure _him_?" + +In the door of the salon, listening to the lecture his young champion +was giving these two blue, opinionated, and strongly pious ladies, stood +Ernest, his face even paler than usual, and his eyes with a strange +mixture of joy and pain in them. Nina colored scarlet, but went forward +to meet him with undisguised pleasure, utterly regardless of the +sneering lips and averted eyes of the Miss Ruskinstones. He had come to +go with them to St. Germain, and, with a dexterous manoeuvre, took the +very seat in the carriage opposite Nina that Eusebius had planned for +himself. But the Warden was no match for the _Lion_ in such affairs, +and, being exiled to the barouche with Gordon and Augusta, took from +under the seat a folio of the "Stones of Venice," and read sulkily all +the way. + +"My dear fellow," said Vaughan, when they reached St. Germain, "don't +you think you would prefer to sit in the carriage, and finish that +delightful work, to coming to see some simple woods and terraces? If you +would, pray don't hesitate to say so; I am sure Miss Gordon will excuse +your absence." + +The solicitous courtesy of Ernest's manner was boiling oil to the fire +raging in the Warden's gentle breast, and Eusebius, besides, was not +quick at retorts. "I am not guilty of any such bad taste," he said, +stiffly, "though I do discover a charm in severe studies, which I +believe you never did." + +"No, never," said Ernest, laughing; "my genius does not lie that way; +and I've no vacant bishopric in my mind's eye to make such studies +profitable. Even you, you know, light of the Church as you are, want +recreation sometimes. Confess now, the chansons a boire last night +sounded pleasant after long months of Faithandgrace services!" + +Eusebius looked much as I have seen a sleek tom-cat, who bears a +respectable character generally, surprised in surreptitiously licking +out of the cream-jug. He had the night before (when he was popularly +supposed to be sitting under Adolphe Monod) tasted rather too many +petits verres up at the Pre Catalan, utterly unconscious of his cousin's +proximity. The pure-minded soul thus cruelly caught looked prayers of +piteous entreaty to Vaughan not to damage his milk-white reputation by +further revelation of this unlucky detour into the Broad Road; and +Ernest, who, always kind-hearted, never hit a man when he was down, +contented himself with saying: + +"Ah! well, we are none of us pure alabaster, though some of the +sepulchres _do_ contrive to whiten themselves up astonishingly. My +father, poor man, once wished to put me in the Church. Do you think I +should have graced it, Selina?" + +"I can't say I do," sneered Selina. + +"You think I should _disgrace_ it? Very probably. I am not good at +'canting.'" And giving Nina his arm, the Warden being much too confused +to forestall him, he whispered: "when is that atrocious saint going to +take himself over the water? Couldn't we bribe his diocesan to call him +before the Arches Court? Surely those long coats, so like the little +wooden men in Noah's Ark, and that straightened hair, so mathematically +parted down the centre, look 'perverted' enough to warrant it." + +Nina shook her head. "Unhappily, he is here for six months for ill +health!--the sick-leave of clergymen who wish for a holiday, and are too +holy to leave their flock without an excuse to society." + +Vaughan laughed, then sighed. "Six months--and you have been here four +already! Eusebius hates me cordially--all my English relatives do, I +believe; we do not get on together. They are too cold and conventional +for me. I have some of the warm Bohemian blood, though God knows I've +seen enough to chill it to ice by this time; but it is _not_ chilled--so +much the worse for me," muttered Ernest "Tell me," he said, +abruptly--"tell me why you took the trouble to defend me so generously +this morning?" + +She looked up at him with her frank, beaming regard. "Because they dare +to misjudge you, and they know nothing, and are not worthy to know +anything of your real self." + +He pressed his lips together as if in bodily pain. "And what do you +know?" + +"Have you not yourself said that you talk to me as you talk to no one +else?" answered Nina, impetuously; "besides--I cannot tell why, but the +first day I met you I seemed to find some friend that I had lost before. +I was certain that you would never misconstrue anything I said, and I +felt that I saw further into your heart and mind than any one else could +do. Was it not very strange?" She stopped, and looked up at him. Ernest +bent his eyes on the ground, and breathed fast. + +"No, no," he said at last; "yours is only an ideal of me. If you knew me +as I really am, you would cease to feel the--the interest that you +say----" + +He stopped abruptly; facile as he was at pretty compliments, and versed +in tender scenes as he had been from his school-days, the longing to +make this girl love him, and his struggle not to breathe love to her, +deprived him of his customary strength and nonchalance. + +"I do not fear to know you as you are," said Nina, gently. "I do not +think you yourself allow all the better things that there are in you. +People have not judged you rightly, and you have been too proud to prove +their error to them. You have found pleasure in running counter to the +prudish and illiberal bigots who presumed to judge you; and to a world +you have found heartless and false you have not cared to lift the domino +and mask you wore." + +Vaughan sighed from the bottom of his heart, and walked on in silence +for a good five minutes. "Promise me, Nina," he said at length with an +effort, "that no matter what you hear against me, you will not condemn +me unheard." + +"I promise," she answered, raising her eyes to his, brighter still for +the color in her checks. It was the first time he had called her Nina. + +"Miss Gordon," said Eusebius, hurriedly overtaking them, "pray come with +me a moment: there is the most exquisite specimen of the Flamboyant +style in an archway----" + +"Thank you for your good intentions," said Nina, pettishly, "but really, +as you might know by this time, I never can see any attractions in your +prosaic and matter-of-fact-fact study." + +"It might be more profitable than----" + +"Than thinking of La Valliere and poor Bragelonne, and all the gay +glories of the exiled Bourbons?" laughed Nina. "Very likely; but romance +is more to my taste than granite. You would never have killed yourself, +like Bragelonne, for the beaux yeux of Louise de la Beaume-sur-Blanc, +would you?" + +"I trust," said Eusebius, stiffly, "that I should have had a deeper +sense of the important responsibilities of the gift of life than to +throw it away because a silly girl preferred another." + +"You are very impolitic," said Ernest, with a satirical smile. "No lady +could feel remorse at forsaking you, if you could get over it so +easily." + +"He _would_ get over it easily," laughed Nina. "You would call her +Delilah, and all the Scripture bad names, order Mr. Ruskin's new work, +turn your desires to a deanship, marry some bishop's daughter with high +ecclesiastical interest, and console yourself in the bosom of your +Mother Church--eh, Mr. Ruskinstone?" + +"You are cruelly unjust," sighed Eusebius. "You little know----" + +"The charms of architecture? No; and I never shall," answered his +tormentor, humming the "Queen of the Roses," and waltzing down the +forest glade, where they were walking. "How severe you look!" she said +as she waltzed back. "Is _that_ wrong, too? Miriam danced before the ark +and Jephtha's daughter." + +The Warden appeared not to hear. Certainly his mode of courtship was +singular. + +"Ernest," he said, turning to his cousin as the rest of the party came +up, "I had no idea your sister was in Paris. I have not seen her since +she was fourteen. I should not have known her in the least." + +"Margaret is in India with her husband," answered Vaughan. "What are you +dreaming of? Where have you seen her?" + +"I saw her in your chambers," answered the Warden, slowly. "I passed +three times yesterday, and she was sitting in the centre window each +time." + +"Pshaw! You dreamt it in your sleep last night. Margaret's in Vellore, I +assure you." + +"I saw her," said the Warden, softly; "or, at least, I saw some lady, +whom I naturally presumed to be your sister." + +Ernest, who had not colored for fifteen years, and would have defied man +or woman to confuse him, flushed to his very temples. + +"You are mistaken," he said, decidedly. "There is no woman in my rooms." + +Eusebius raised his eyebrows, bent his head, smiled and sighed. More +polite disbelief was never expressed. The Miss Ruskinstones would have +blushed if they could; as they could not, they drew themselves bolt +upright, and put their parasols between them and the reprobate. Nina, +whose hand was still in Vaughan's arm, turned white, and flashed a +quick, upward look at him; then, with a glance at Eusebius, as fiery as +the eternal wrath that that dear divine was accustomed to deal out so +largely to other people, she led Ernest up to her father, who being +providentially somewhat deaf, had not heard this by-play, and said, to +her cousin's horror, "Papa, dear, Mr. Vaughan wants you to dine with him +at Tortoni's to-night, to meet M. de Vendanges. You will be very happy, +won't you?" + +Ernest pressed her little hand against his side, and thanked her with +his eyes. + +Gordon was propitiated for that day; he was not likely to quarrel with a +man who could introduce him to "Son Altesse Monseigneur le Duc de +Vendanges." + + + + +V. + +MORE MISCHIEF--AND AN END. + + +In a little cabinet de peinture, in a house in the Place Vendome, apart +from all the other people, who having come to a dejeuner were now +dispersed in the music rooms, boudoirs, and conservatories, sat Madame +de Melusine, talking to Gordon, flatteringly, beguilingly, +bewitchingly, as that accomplished widow could. The banker found her +charming, and really, under her blandishments, began to believe, poor +old fellow, that she was in love with him! + +"Ah! by-the-by, cher monsieur," began madame, when she had soft-soaped +him into a proper frame of mind, "I want to speak to you about that +mignonne Nina. You cannot tell, you cannot imagine, what interest I take +in her." + +"You do her much honor, madame," replied her bourgeois gentilhomme, +always stiff, however enraptured he might feel internally. + +"The honor is mine," smiled Pauline. "Yes, I do feel much interest in +her; there is a sympathy in our natures, I am certain, and--and, +Monsieur Gordon, I cannot see that darling girl on the brink of a +precipice without stretching out a hand to snatch her from the abyss." + +"Precipice--abyss--Nina! Good Heavens! my dear madame, what do you +mean?" cried Gordon--a fire, an elopement, and the small-pox, all +presenting themselves to his mind. + +"No, no," repeated madame, with increasing vehemence, "I will not permit +any private feelings, I will not allow my own weakness to prevent me +from saving her. It would be a crime, a cruelty, to let your innocent +child be deceived, and rendered miserable for all time, because I lack +the moral courage to preserve her. Monsieur, I speak to you, as I am +sure I may, as one friend to another, and I am perfectly certain that +you will not misjudge me. Answer me one thing; no impertinent curiosity +dictates the question. Do you wish your daughter married to Mr. +Vaughan?" + +"Married to Vaughan!" exclaimed the startled banker; "I'd sooner see her +married to a crossing sweeper. She never thought of such a thing. +Impossible! absurd! she'll marry my friend Ruskinstone as soon as she +comes of age. Marry Vaughan! a fellow without a penny----" + +Pauline laid her soft, jewelled hand on his arm: + +"My dear friend, _he_ thinks of it if you do not, and I am much mistaken +if dear Nina is not already dazzled by his brilliant qualities. Your +countryman is a charming companion, no one can gainsay that; but, alas! +he is a roue, a gambler, an adventurer, who, while winning her young +girl's affections, has only in view the wealth which he hopes he will +gain with her. It is painful to me to say this" (and tears stood in +madame's long, velvet eyes). "We were good friends before he wanted more +than friendship, while poor De Melusine was still living, and his true +character was revealed to me. It would be false delicacy to allow your +darling Nina to become his victim for want of a few words from me, +though I know, if he were aware of my interference, the inference he +would basely insinuate from it. But you," whispered madame, brushing the +tears from her eyes, and giving him an angelic smile, "I need not fear +that you would ever misjudge me?" + +"Never, I swear, most generous of women!" said the banker, kissing the +snow-white hand, very clumsily, too. "I'll tell the fellow my mind +directly--an unprincipled, gambling----" + +"Non, non, je vous en prie, monsieur!" cried the widow, really +frightened, for this would not have suited her plans at all. "You would +put me in the power of that unscrupulous man. He would destroy my +reputation at once in his revenge." + +"But what am I to do?" said the poor gulled banker. "Nina's a will of +her own, and if she take a fancy to this confounded----" + +"Leave that to me," said la baronne, softly. "I have proofs which will +stagger her most obstinate faith in her lover. Meanwhile give him no +suspicion, go to his supper on Tuesday, and--you are asked to Vauvenay, +accept the invitation--and conclude the fiancailles with Monsieur le +Ministre as soon as you can." + +"But--but, madame," stammered this new Jourdain to his enchanting +Dorimene, "Vauvenay is an exile. I shall not see you there?" + +"Ah, silly man," laughed the widow, "I shall be only two miles off. I am +going to stay with the Salvador; they leave Paris in three weeks. +Listen--your daughter is singing 'The Swallows.' Her voice is quite as +good as Ristori's." + +Three hours after, madame held another tete-a-tete in that boudoir. This +time the favored mortal was Vaughan. They had had a pathetic interview, +of which the pathos hardly moved Ernest as much as the widow desired. + +"You love me no longer, Ernest," she murmured, the tears falling down +her cheeks--her rouge was the product of high art, and never washed +off--"I see it, I feel it; your heart is given to that English girl. I +have tried to jest about it; I have tried to affect indifference, but I +cannot. The love you once won will be yours to the grave." + +Ernest listened, a satirical smile on his lips. + +"I should feel more grateful," he said, calmly, "if the gift had not +been given to so many; it will be a great deal of trouble to you to +love us all to our graves. And your new friend Gordon, do you intend +cherishing his grey hairs, too, till the gout puts them under the sod?" + +She fell back sobbing with exquisite _abandon_. No deserted Calypso's +_pose_ was ever more effective. + +"Ernest, Ernest! that I should live to be so insulted, and by you!" + +"Nay, madame, end this vaudeville," said he bitterly. "I know well +enough that you hate me, or why have you troubled yourself to coin the +untruths about me that you whispered to Miss Gordon?" + +"Ah! have you no pity for the first mad vengeance dictated by jealousy +and despair?" murmured Pauline. "Once there was attraction in this face +for you, Ernest; have some compassion, some sympathy----" + +Well as he knew the worth of madame's tears, Ernest, chivalric and +generous at heart, was touched. + +"Forgive me," he said, gently, "and let us part. You know now, Pauline, +that she has my deepest, my latest love. It were disloyalty to both did +we meet again save in society." + +"Farewell, then," murmured Pauline. "Think gently of me, Ernest, for I +_have_ loved you more than you will ever know now." + +She rose, and, as he bent towards her, kissed his forehead. Then, +floating from the room, passed the Reverend Eusebius, standing in the +doorway, looking in on this parting scene. The widow looked at herself +in her mirror that night with a smile of satisfaction. + +"C'est bien en train," she said, half aloud. "Le fou! de penser qu'il +puisse me braver. Je ne l'aime plus, c'est vrai, mais je ne veux pas +qu'elle reussisse." + +Nina went to bed very happy. Ernest had sat next her at the dejeuner; +and afterwards at a ball had waltzed often with her and with nobody +else; and his eyes had talked love in the waltzes though his tongue +never had. + +Ernest went to his chambers, smoked hard, half mad with the battle +within him, and took three grains of opium, which gave him forgetfulness +and sleep. He woke, tired and depressed, to hear the gay hum of life in +the street below, and to remember he had promised Nina to meet them at +Versailles. + +It was Sunday morning. In England, of course, Gordon would have gone up +to the sanctuary, listened to Mr. Bellew, frowned severely on the cheap +trains, and, after his claret, read edifying sermons to his household; +but in Paris there would be nobody to admire the piety, and the "grandes +eaux" only play once a week, you know--on Sundays. So his Sabbath +severity was relaxed, and down to Versailles he journied. There must be +something peculiar in continental air, for it certainly stretches our +countrymen's morality and religion uncommonly: it is only up at +Jerusalem that our pharisees worship. Eusebius dare not go--he'd be sure +to meet a brother-clerical, who might have reported the dereliction at +home--so that Vaughan, despite Gordon's cold looks, kept by Nina's side +though he wasn't alone with her, and when they came back in the _wagon_ +the banker slept and the duenna dozed, and he talked softly and low to +her--not quite love, but something very like it--and as they neared +Paris he took the little hand with its delicate Jouvin glove in his, and +whispered, + +"Remember your promise: I can brave, and have braved most things, but I +could not bear your scorn. _That_ would make me a worse man than I have +been, if, as some folks would tell you, such a thing be possible." + +It was dark, but I dare say the moonbeams shining on the chevelure doree +showed him a pair of truthful, trusting eyes that promised never to +desert him. + +The day after he had, by dint of tact and strategy, planned to spend +entirely with Nina. He was going with them to the races at Chantilly, +then to the Gaite to see the first representation of a vaudeville of a +friend of his, and afterwards he had persuaded Gordon to enter the +Lion's den, and let Nina grace a petit souper at No. 10, Rue des Mauvais +Sujets, Chaussee d'Antin. + +The weather was delicious, the race-ground full, if not quite so +crowded as the Downs on Derby Day. Ernest cast away his depression, he +gave himself up to the joy of being loved, his wit had never rung finer +nor his laugh clearer than as he drove back to Paris opposite Nina. He +had never felt in higher spirits than, after having given carte blanche +to a cordon bleu for the entertainment, he looked round his salons, +luxurious as Eugene Sue's, and perfumed with exotics from the Palais +Royal, and thought of one rather different in style to the women that +had been wont to drink his Sillery and grace his symposia. + +He knew well enough she loved him, and his heart beat high as he put a +bouquet of white flowers into a gold bouquetiere to take to her. + +On his lover-like thoughts the voice of one of his parrots--Ernest had +almost as many pets as there are in the Jardin des Plantes--broke in, +screaming "Bluette! Bluette! Sacre bleu, elle est jolie! Bluette! +Bluette!" + +The recollection was unwelcome. Vaughan swore a "sacre bleu!" too. +"Diable! she mustn't hear that Francois, put that bird out of the way. +He makes a such a confounded row." + +The parrot, fond of him, as all things were that knew him, sidled up, +arching its neck, and repeating what De Concressault had taught it: "Fi +donc, Ernest! Tu es volage! Tu ne m'aimes plus! Tu aimes Pauline!" + +"Devil take the bird!" thought its master; "even he'll be witness +against me." And as he went down stairs to his cab, a chorus of birds +shouting "Tu aimes Pauline!" followed him, and while he laughed, he +sighed to think that even these unconscious things could tell her how +little his love was worth. He forgot all but his love, however, when he +leaned over her chair in the Gaites and saw that, strenuously as De +Concressault and De Kerroualle sought to distract her attention, and +many as were the lorgnons levelled at the chevelure doree, all her +thoughts and smiles were given to him. + +Ernest had never, even in his careless boyhood, felt so happy as he did +that night as he handed her into Gordon's carriage, and drove to the +Chaussee d'Antin; and though Gordon sat there heavy and solemn, looming +like an iceberg on Ernest's golden future, Vaughan forgot him utterly, +and only looked at the sunshine beaming on him from radiant eyes that, +skeptic in her sex as he was from experience, he felt would always be +true to him. The carriage stopped at No. 10, Rue des Mauvais Sujets. He +had given her one or two dinners with the Senecterre, the De Salvador, +and other fine ladies--grand affairs at the Freres Provencaux that would +have satisfied Brillat-Savarin--but she had never been to his rooms +before, and she smiled joyously in his face as he lifted her out--the +smile that had first charmed him at the Francais. He gave her his arm, +and led her across the salle, bending his head down to whisper a +welcome. Gordon and Selina and several men followed. Selina felt that it +was perdition to enter the _Lion's_ den, but a fat old vicomte, on whom +she'd fixed her eye, was going, and the "femmes de trente ans" that +Balzac champions risk their souls rather than risk their chances when +the day is far spent, and good offers grow rare. + +Ernest's Abyssinian, mute, subordinate to that grand gentleman, M. +Francois, ushered them up the stairs, making furtive signs to his +master, which Vaughan was too much absorbed to notice. Francois, in all +his glory, flung open the door of the salon. In the salon a sight met +Ernest's eyes which froze his blood more than if all the dead had arisen +out of their graves on the slopes of Pere la Chaise. + +The myriad of wax-lights shone on the rooms, fragrant with the perfume +of exotics, gleamed on the supper-table, gorgeous with its gold plate +and its flowers, lighted up the aviary with its brilliant hues of +plumage, and showed to full perfection the snowy shoulders, raven hair, +and rose-hued dress of a woman lying back in a fauteuil, laughing, as De +Cheffontaine, a man but slightly known to Ernest, leaned over her, +fanning her. On a sofa in an alcove reclined another girl, young, fair, +and pretty, the amber mouthpiece of a hookah between her lips, and a +couple of young fellows at her feet. + +The brunette was Bluette, who played the soubrette roles at the Odeon; +the blonde was Celine Gamelle, the new premiere danseuse. Bluette rose +from the depths of her amber satin fauteuil, with her little _petillant_ +eyes laughing, and her small plump hands stretched out in gesticulation. +"Mechant! Comme tu es tard, Ernest. Nous avons ete ici si longtemps--dix +minutes au moins! And dis is you leetler new Ingleesh friend. How do you +do, my dear?" + +Nina, white as death, shrank from her, clinging with both hands to +Ernest's arms. As pale as she, Vaughan stood staring at the actress, his +lips pressed convulsively together, the veins standing out on his broad, +high forehead. The bold _Lion_ hunted into his lair, for once lost all +power, all strength. + +Gordon looked over Nina's shoulder into the room. He recognized the +women at a glance, and, with his heavy brow dark as night, he glared on +Ernest in a silence more ominous than words or oaths, and snatching +Nina's arm from his, he drew her hand within his own, and dragged her +from the room. + +Ernest sprang after him. "Good God! you do not suppose me capable of +this. Stay one instant. Hear me----" + +"Let us pass, sir," thundered Gordon, "or by Heaven this insult shall +not go unavenged." + +"Nina, Nina!" cried Ernest, passionately, "do you at least listen!--you +at least will not condemn----" + +Nina wrenched her hands from her father, and turned to him, a passion of +tears falling down her face. "No, no! have I not promised you?" + +With a violent oath Gordon carried her to her carriage. It drove away, +and Ernest, his lips set, his face white, and a fierce glare in his dark +eyes that made Bluette and Celine tremble, entered his salons a second +time, so bitter an anguish, so deadly a wrath marked in his expressive +countenance, that even the Frenchmen hushed their jests, and the women +shrunk away, awed at a depth of feeling they could not fathom or brave. + +The fierce anathemas of Gordon, the "Christian" lamentations of +Eusebius, the sneers of Selina, the triumphs of Augusta, all these vials +of wrath were poured forth on Ernest, in poor little Nina's ears, the +whole of the next day. She had but one voice among many to raise in his +defence, and she had no armor but her faith in him. Gordon vowed with +the same breath that she should never see Vaughan again, and that she +should engage herself to Ruskinstone forthwith. Eusebius poured in at +one ear his mild milk-and-water attachment, and, in the other, details +of Ernest's scene in the boudoir with Madame de Melusine, or, at least, +what he had seen of it, _i. e._ her parting caress. Selina rang the +changes on her immodesty in loving a man who had never proposed to her; +and Augusta drew lively pictures of the eternal fires which were already +being kept up below, ready for the _Lion's_ reception. Against all these +furious batteries Nina stood firm. All their sneers and arguments could +not shake her belief, all her father's commands--and, when he was +roused, the old banker was very fierce--could not move her to promise +not to see Ernest again, or alter her firm repudiation of the warden's +proposals. The thunder rolled, the lightning flamed, the winds screamed +all to no purpose, the little reed that one might have fancied would +break, stood steady. + +The day passed, and the next passed, and there were no tidings of +Ernest. Nina's little loyal heart, despite its unhesitating faith, began +to tremble lest it should have wrecked itself: but then, she thought of +his eyes, and she felt that all the world would never make her mistrust +him. + +On the _surlendemain_ the De Melusine called. Gordon and Eusebius were +out, and Nina wished her to be shown up. Ill as the girl felt, she rose +haughtily and self-possessed to greet madame, as, announced by her tall +chasseur, with his green plume, the widow glided into the room. + +Pauline kissed her lightly (there are no end of Judases among the dear +sex), and, though something in Nina's eye startled her, she sat down +beside her, and began to talk most kindly, most sympathisingly. She was +_chagrinee, desolee_ that her _chere_ Nina should have been so insulted; +every one knew M. Vaughan was quite _entete_ with that little, horrid, +coarse thing, Bluette; but it was certainly very shocking; men were such +_demons_. The affair was already _repandue_ in Paris; everybody was +talking of it. Ernest was unfortunately so well known; he could not be +in his senses; she almost wished he _was_ mad, it would be the only +excuse for him; wild as he was, she should scarcely have thought, &c., +&c., &c. "Ah! chere enfant," madame went on at the finish, "you do not +know these men--I do. I fear you have been dazzled by this naughty +fellow; he _is_ very attractive, certainly: if so, though it will be a +sharp pang, it will be better to know his real character at once. Voyez +donc! he has been persuading you that you were all the world to him, +while at the same time, he has been trying to make me believe the same. +See, only two days ago he sent me this." + +She held out a miniature. Nina, who hitherto had listened in haughty +silence, gave a sharp cry of pain as she saw Vaughan's graceful figure, +stately head, and statue-like features. But, before the widow could +pursue her advantage, Nina rallied, threw back her head, and said, her +soft lips set sternly: + +"If you repulsed his love, why was he obliged to repulse yours? Why did +you tell him on Saturday night that 'you had loved him more than he +would ever know now?'" + +The shot Eusebius had unconsciously provided, struck home. Madame was +baffled. Her eyes sank under Nina's, and she colored through her rouge. + +"You have played two roles, madame," said Nina, rising, "and not played +them with you usual skill. Excuse my English ill-breeding, if I ask you +to do me the favor of ending this comedy." + +"Certainly, mademoiselle, if it is your wish," answered the widow, now +smiling blandly. "If it please you to be blind, I have no desire to +remove the bandage from your eyes. Seulement, je vous prie de me +pardonner mon indiscretion, et j'ai l'honneur, mademoiselle, de vous +dire adieu!" + +With the lowest of _reverences_ madame glided from the room, and, as the +door closed, Nina bowed her head on the miniature left behind in the +_deroute_, and burst into tears. + +Scarcely had la Melusine's barouche rolled away, when another visitor +was shown in, and Nina, brushing the tears from her cheeks, looked up +hurriedly, and saw a small woman, finely dressed, with a Shetland veil +on, through which her small black eyes roved listlessly. + +"Mademoiselle," she said, in very quick but very bad English, "I is +come to warn you against dat ver wrong man, Mr. Vaughan. I have like +him, helas! I have like him too vell, but I do not vish you to suffer +too." + +Nina knew the voice in a moment, and rose like a little empress, though +she was flushed and trembling. "I wish to hear nothing of Mr. Vaughan. +If this is the sole purport of your visit, I shall be obliged by your +leaving me." + +"But mademoiselle----" + +"I have told you I wish to hear nothing," interposed Nina, quietly. + +"Ver vell, ma'amselle; den read dat. It is a copy, and I got de +original." + +She laid a letter on the sofa beside Nina. Two minutes after, Bluette +joined her friend Celine Gamelle in a fiacre, and laughed heartily, +clapping her little plump hands. "Ah, mon Dieu! Celine, comme elle est +fiere, la petite! Je ne lui ai pas dit un seul mot--elle m'a arretee si +vite, si vite! Mais la lettre fera notre affaire n'est pas? Oui, oui!" + +The letter unfolded in Nina's hand. It was a promise of marriage from +Ernest Vaughan to Bluette Lemaire. Voiceless and tearless, Nina sat +gazing on the paper: first she rose, gasping for breath; then she threw +herself down, sobbing convulsively, till she heard a step, caught up the +miniature and letter, dreading to see her father, and, instead, saw +Ernest, pale, worn, deep lines round his mouth and eyes, standing in the +doorway. Involuntarily she sprang towards him. Ernest pressed her to +heart, and his hot tears fell on the chevelure doree, as he bent over +her, murmuring, "_You_ have not deserted me. God bless you for your +noble faith." At last he put her gently from him, and, leaning against +the mantelpiece, said, with an effort, between his teeth, "Nina, I came +to bid you farewell, and to ask your forgiveness for the wrong I have +done you." + +Nina caught hold of him, much as Malibran seized hold of _Elvino_: +"Leave me! leave me! No, no; you cannot mean it!" + +"I have no strength for it now I see you," said Ernest, looking down +into her eyes; and the bold, reckless _Lion_ shivered under the clinging +clasp of her little hands. "I need not say I was not the cause of the +insult you received the other night. Pauline de Melusine was the agent, +women willing to injure me the actors in it. But there is still much for +you to forgive. Tell me, at once, what have you heard of me?" + +She silently put the miniature and letter in his hand. The blood rushed +to his very temples, and, sinking his head on his arms, his chest rose +and fell with uncontrollable sobs. All the pent-up feelings of his +vehement and affectionate nature poured out at last. + +"And you have not condemned me even on these?" he said at length, in a +hoarse whisper. + +"Did I not promise?" she murmured. + +"But if I told you they were true?" + +She looked at him through her tears, and put her hand in his. "Tell me +nothing of your past; it can make no difference to my love. Let the +world judge you as it may, it cannot alter me." + +Ernest strained her to him, kissing her wildly. "God bless you for your +trust! would to God I were more worthy of it! I have nothing to give you +but a love such as I have never before known; but most would tell you +all _my_ love is worthless, and my life has been one of reckless +dissipation and of darker errors still, until you awoke me to a deeper +love--to thoughts and aspirations that I thought had died out for ever. +Painful as it is to confess----" + +"Hush!" interrupted Nina, gently. "Confess nothing; with your past life +I can have nothing to do, and I wish never to hear anything that it +gives you pain to tell. You say that you love me now, and will never +love another--that is enough for me." + +Ernest kissed the flushed cheeks and eloquent lips, and thanked her with +all the fiery passion that was in him; and his heart throbbed fiercely +as he put her promise to the test. + +"No, my darling! Priceless as your love is to me I will not buy it by +concealment. I will not sully your ears with the details of my life. God +forbid I should! but it is only due to you to know that I did give both +these women the love-tokens they brought you. Love! It is desecration of +the name, but I knew none better then! Three years ago, Bluette Lemaire +first appeared at the Odeon. She is illiterate, coarse, heartless, but +she was handsome, and she drew me to the coulisses. I was infatuated +with her, though her ignorance and vulgarity constantly grated against +all my tastes. One night at her petit souper I drank more Sillery than +was wise. I have a stronger head than most men: perhaps there was some +other stimulant in it; at any rate, she who was then poor, and is always +avaricious, got from me a promise to marry her, or to pay twenty +thousand francs. Three months after I gave it I cared no more for her +than for my old glove. France is too wise to have Breach of Promise +cases, and give money to coarse and vengeful women for their pretended +broken hearts; but I had no incentive to create a scene by breaking with +her, and so she kept the promise in her hands. What Pauline de Melusine +is, you can judge. Twelve months ago I met her at Vichy; the love she +gave me, and the love I vowed her, were of equal value--the love of +Paris boudoirs. That I sent her that picture only two days ago, is, of +course, false. On my word, as a man of honor, since the moment I felt +your influence upon me I have shunned her. Now, my own love, you know +the truth. Will you send me from you, or will you still love and still +forgive?" + +In an agony of suspense he bent his head to listen for her answer. Tears +rained down her cheeks as she put her arms round his neck, and +whispered: + +"Why ask? Are you not all the world to me? I should love you little if I +condemned you for any errors of your past. I know your warm and noble +heart, and I trust to it without a fear. There is no doubt between us +now!" + +Oh, my prudent and conventional young ladies, standing ready to accuse +my poor little Nina, are you any wiser in your generation? You who have +had all nature taken out of you by "finishing," whose heads are crammed +with "society's" laws, and whose affections are measured out by rule, +who would have been cold, and dignified, and read Ernest a severe +lesson, and sent him back hopeless and hardened to go ten times worse +than he had gone before--believe me, that impulse points truer than "the +world," and that the dictates of the heart are better than the +regulations of society. Take my word for it, that love will do more for +a man than lectures; and faith in him be more likely to keep him +straight than all your moralising; and before you judge him severely for +having drunk a little too deep of the Sillery of life, remember that his +temptations are not your temptations, nor his ways your ways, and be +gentle to dangers which society and custom keep out of your own path. +The stern thorn crows you offer to us when we are inclined to ask your +absolution, are not the right means to win us from the rose wreaths of +our bacchanalia. + +Nina, as you see, loved her _Lion_ too well to remember dignity, or +take her stand on principle; and gallantly did the young lady stand the +bombardment from all sides that sought to break her resolutions and +crush her "misplaced affections." Gordon chanced to come in that day and +light upon Ernest, and the fury into which he worked himself ill +beseemed so respectable a pharisee. Vaughan kept tranquilly haughty, and +told the banker, calmly, that he "thanked God he had his daughter's +love, and his money he would never have stooped to accept." Gordon +forbade him the house, and carried Nina back to England; but before she +went they had a parting interview, in which Ernest offered to leave her +free. But such freedom would have been worse than death to Nina, and, +before they separated, she told him that in three months more she should +be of age, and then, come what might, she would be his if he would take +her without wealth. Take her he would have done from the arms of Satanus +himself, but to disentangle himself from all his difficulties was a task +that beat the Augean stables hollow. The three months of his probation +he worked hard; he sold off all his pictures, his stud, and his +_meubles_; he sold, what cost him a more bitter pang, his encumbered +estates in Surrey; he paid off all his debts, Bluette's twenty thousand +francs included; and shaking himself free of the accumulated +embarrassments of fifteen years, he crossed the water to claim his last +love. No poor little Huguenot was ever persecuted for her faith more +than poor little Nina for her engagement. Every relative she had thought +it his duty to write admonitory letters, plentifully interspersed with +texts. Eusebius and his 4000_l._ a year, and his perspective bishopric, +were held up before her from morning to night; the banker, whose +deception in the Melusine had turned him into sharper vinegar than +before, told her with chill stoicism that she must of course choose her +own path in life, but that if that path led her into the Chaussee +d'Antin, she need never expect a sou from him, for all his property +would be divided between her two brothers. But Nina was neither to be +frightened nor bribed. She kept true to her lover, and disinherited +herself. + +They were married a week or two after Nina's majority; and Gordon knew +it, though he could not prevent it. They did not miss the absence of +bridesmaids, bishop, dejeuner, and the usual fashionable crowd. It was a +marriage of the heart, you see, and did not want the trappings with +which they gild that bitter pill so often swallowed now-a-days--a +"mariage de convenance." Nina, as she saw further still into the wealth +of deep feeling and strong affection which, at her touch, she had awoke +in his heart, felt that money, and friends, and the world's smile were +well lost since she had won him. And Ernest--Ernest's sacrifice was +greater; for it is not a little thing, young ladies, for a man to give +up his accustomed freedom, and luxuries, and careless vie de garcon, and +to have to think and work for another, even though dearer than himself. +But he had long since seen so much of life, had exhausted all its +pleasures so rapidly, that they palled upon him, and for some time he +had vaguely wanted something of deeper interest, of warmer sympathy. +Unknown to himself, he had felt the "besoin d'etre aime"--a want the +trash offered him by the women of his acquaintance could never +satisfy--and his warm, passionate nature found rest in a love which, +though the strongest of his life, was still returned to him fourfold. + +After some months of delicious _far niente_ in the south of France, they +came back to Paris. Though anything but rich, he was not absolutely +poor, after he had paid his debts, and the necessity to exertion rousing +his dormant talents, the _Lion_ turned _litterateur_. He was too +popular with men to be dropped because he had sold his stud or given up +his petits soupers. The romance of their story charmed the Parisians, +and, though (behind his back) they sometimes jested about the "Lion +amoureux," there were not a few who envied him his young love, and the +sunshine that shone round them in his inexpensive appartement garni. + +Ernest _was_ singularly happy--and suddenly he became the star of the +literary, as he had been of the fashionable world. His mots were +repeated, his vaudevilles applauded, his feuilletons adored. The world +smiled on Nina and her _Lion_; it made little difference to them--they +had been as contented when it frowned. + +But it made a good deal of difference across the Channel. Gordon began +to repent. Ernest's family was high, his Austrian connexions very +aristocratic: there would be something after all in belonging to a man +so well known. (Be successful, ami lecteur, and all your relatives will +love you.) Besides, he had found out that it is no use to put your faith +in princes, or clergymen. Eusebius had treated him very badly when he +found he could not get Nina and her money, and spoke against the poor +banker everywhere, calling him, with tender pastoral regret, a "worldly +Egyptian," a "Dives," a "whitened sepulchre," and all the rest of it. + +Probably, too, stoic though he was, he missed the chevelure doree; at +any rate, he wrote to her stiffly, but kindly, and settled two thousand +a year upon her. Vaughan was very willing she should be friends with her +father, but nothing would make him draw a sou of the money. So Nina--the +only sly thing she ever did in her life--after a while contrived to buy +back the Surrey estate, and gave it to him, with no end of prayers and +caresses, on the Jour de l'An. + +"And you do not regret, my darling," smiled Ernest, after wishing her +the new year's wishes, "having forgiven me for once drinking too much +Sillery, and all the other naughty things of my vie de garcon?" + +"Regret!" interrupted Nina, vehemently--"regret that I have won your +love, live your life, share your cares and joys, regret that my +existence is one long day of sunshine? Oh, why ask! you know I can never +repay you for the happiness of my life." + +"Rather can I never repay you," said Vaughan, looking down into her +eyes, "for the faith that made you brave calumny and opposition, and +cling to my side despite all. I was heart-sick of the world, and you +called me back to life. I was weary of the fools who misjudged me, and I +let them think me what they might." + +"Ah, how happy you make me!" cried Nina. "I should have been little +worthy of your love if I had suffered slander to warp me against you, or +if any revelations you cared enough for me to make of your past life, +had parted us: + + Love is not love + That alters where it alteration finds, + Or bends with the remover to remove. + +There, monsieur!" she said, throwing her arms round him with a laugh, +while happy tears stood in her eyes--"there is a grand quotation for +you. Mind and take care, Ernest, that you never realise the Ruskinstone +predictions, and make me repent having caught and caged such a terrible +thing as a hunted PARIS LION!" + + + + +SIR GALAHAD'S RAID. + + + + +SIR GALAHAD'S RAID. + +AN ADVENTURE ON THE SWEET WATERS. + + +For the punishment of my sins may the gods never again send me to Pera! +That I might have plenty on my shoulders I am frankly willing to +concede; all I protest is, that when one submissively acknowledges the +justice of ones future terminating in Tophet, it comes a little hard to +get purgatory in this world into the bargain. Purgatory lies _perdu_ for +one all over the earth. I have had fifty times more than my share +already, and the gout still remains an untried experience, a Gehenna +grimly waiting to avenge every morsel of white truffle and every glass +of comet claret with which I innocently solace my frail mortality. +Purgatory!--I have been chained in it fifty times; _et vous_? + +When you rush to a Chancellerie, with the English Arms gorgeous above +its doorway, on the spur of a frightfully mysterious and autocratic +telegram, that makes it life or death to catch the train for England in +ten minutes, and have time enough to smoke about two dozen very big +cheroots, cooling your heels in the bureau, and then hear (when properly +tortured into the due amount of frantic agony for the intelligence to be +fully appreciated) that his Excellency is gone snipe-shooting to ----, +and that the First Secretary is in his bath, and has given orders not to +be disturbed; your informant languidly pricking his cigar with his +toothpick, and politely intimating, by his eyebrows, that you and your +necessities may go to the deuce--what's _that_? When you are doing the +sanitary at Weedon, by some hideous conjunction of evil destinies, in +the very Ducal week itself, and thinking of the rush with which Tom +Alcroft will land the filly, or the close finish with which Fordham will +get the cup, while you are not there to see, are sorely tempted to +realize the Parisian vision of Anglo suicide, and load the apple-trees +with suspended human fruit;--what's _that_? When, having got leave, and +established yourself in cosy hunting-quarters, with some cattle not to +be beat in stay, blood, and pace, close to a killing pack that never +score a blank day, there falls a bitter, black frost, locking the +country up in iron bonds, and making every bit of ridge and furrow like +a sheet of glass--what's _that_? + +Bah! I could go on ad infinitum, and cite "circles of purgatory" in +which mortal man is doomed to pass his time, beside which Dante's Caina, +Antenora, and Ptolomea sink into insignificance. But of all Purgatories, +chiefest in my memory, is----Pera. Pera in the old Crimean time--Pera +the "beautiful suburb" of fond "fiction"--Pera, with the dirt, the +fleas, the murders, the mosquitoes, the crooked streets, the lying +Greeks, the stench, the hubbub, the dulness, and the everlasting "Bono +Johnny." + +"Call a dog Hervey, and I shall love him," said Johnson, so dear was his +friend to him:--"call a dog Johnny, and I shall kick him," so abominable +grew that word in the eternal Turkish jabber! Tell me, O prettiest, +softest-voiced, most beguiling, feminine AEothen, in as romantic periods +as you will, of bird-like feluccas darting over the Bosphorus, of curled +caiques gliding through fragrant water-weeds; of Arabian Nights +reproduced, when up through the darkness peals the roll of the drums +calling the Faithful to prayers; of the nights of Ramadan, with the +starry clusters of light gleaming all down Stamboul, and flashing, +firefly-like, through the dark citron groves;--tell me of it as you +will, I don't care; you may think me a Goth, _ce m'est bien egal_, and +_you_ were not in cavalry quarters at Pera. I wasn't exacting; I did not +mind having ants in my jam, nor centipedes in my boots, nor a shirt in +six months, nor bacon for a luxury that strongly resembled an old file +rusted by sea-water, nor any little trifle of that sort up in the front; +all that is in the fortune of war: but I confess that Pera put me fairly +out of patience, specially when a certain trusty friend of mine, who has +no earthly fault, that I wot of, except that of perpetually looking at +life through a Claude glass (which is the most aggravating opticism to a +dispassionate and unblinded mind that the world holds), _would_ poetize +upon it, or at least on the East in general, which came pretty much to +the same thing. + +The sun poured down on me till (conscience, probably) I remembered the +scriptural threat to the wicked, "their brains shall boil in their +skulls like pots;"--Sir Galahad, as I will call him, would murmur to +himself, with his cheroot in his teeth, Manfred's _salut_ to the sun, +looking as lovingly at it as any eagle. Mosquitoes reduced me to the +very borders of madness,--Sir Galahad would placidly remark, how +Buckland would revel here in all those gorgeous beetles. A Greek told +crackers till I had to double-thong him like a puppy,--Sir Galahad would +shout to me to let the fellow alone, he looked so deuced picturesque, he +must have him for a study. I made myself wretched in a ticklish caique, +the size of a cockle-shell, where, when one was going full harness to +the Great Effendi's, it was a moral impossibility to be doubled without +one's sash swinging into the water, one's sword sticking over the side, +and the liveliest sensation of cramp pervading one's body,--Sir Galahad, +blandly indifferent, would discourse, with superb Ruskin obscurity, of +"tone," and "coloring," and "harmonized light," while he looked down the +Golden Horn, for he was a little Art-mad, and painted so well that if +he had been a professional, the hanging committee would have shut him +out to a certainty. + +Now he was a good fellow, a _beau sabreur_, who had fetched some superb +back strokes in the battery at Balaclava, who could send a line +spinning, and land his horse in a gentleman riders' race, and pot the +big game, and lead the first flight over Northamptonshire doubles at +home, as well as a man wants to do; but I put it to any dispassionate +person, whether this persistent poetism of his, flying in the face of +facts and of fleas, was not enough to make anybody swear in that +mosquito-purgatorio of Pera? + +Sir Galahad was a capital fellow, and the men would have gone after him +to the death; the fair, frank, handsome face, a little womanish perhaps, +was very pleasant to look at, and he got the Victoria not long ago for a +deed that would suit Arthur's Table; but in Pera, I avow, he made me +swear hard, and if he would just have set his heel on his Claude glass, +cursed the Turks, and growled refreshingly, I should have loved him +better. He was philosophic and he was poetic; and the combination of +temperaments lifted him in a mortifying altitude above ordinary +humanity, that was baked, broiled, grumbling, savage, bitten, fleeced, +and holding its own against miserable rats, Greeks, and Bono Johnnies, +with an Aristides thieving its last shirt, and a Pisistratus getting +drunk at its case-bottle! That sublime serenity of his in Pera ended in +making me unholy and ungenerous; if he would but have sworn once at the +confounded country, I should have borne it, but he never did, and I +longed to see him out of temper, I pined and thirsted to get him +disenchanted. "_Tout vient a point, a qui sait attendre_," they say; a +motto, by the way, that might be written over the Horse Guards for the +comfort of gloomy souls, when, in the words of the Psalmist, "Promotion +cometh neither from the south, nor from the east, nor from the +west"--by which lament one might conclude David of Israel to have been a +sufferer by the Purchase-system! + +"Delicious!" said Sir Galahad, sending a whiff of Turkish tobacco into +the air one morning after exercise, when he and I, having ridden out a +good many miles along the Sweet Waters, turned the horses loose, bought +some grapes and figs of an old Turk, dispossessed him of his bit of +cocoa-matting, and flung ourselves under a plane-tree. And the fellow +looked round him through his race-glass at the cypress woods, the +mosques and minarets, the almond thickets, the "soft creamy distance," +as he called it in his _argot d'atelier_, and the Greek fishermen near, +drawing up a net full of silvery prismatic fishes, with a relish +absolutely exasperating. Exasperating--when the sun was broiling one's +brain through the linen, and there wasn't a drop of Bass or soda and B +to be got for love or money, and one thought thirstily of days at home +in England, with the birds whirring up from the stubble in the cool +morning, and the cold punch uncorked for luncheon, under the home woods +fringing the open. + +"One wants Hunt to catch that bit of color," murmured Sir Galahad, +luxuriously eying a mutilated Janissary's tomb covered with scarlet +creepers. + +"Hunt be hanged!" said I (meaning no disrespect to that eminent +Pre-Raphaelite, whose "Light of the World" I took at first sight to be a +policeman going his night rounds, and come out in his shirt by mistake; +by the way, it is a droll idea to symbolize the "light of the world" by +a watchman with a dark lantern, _lux in tenebras_ with a vengeance!). +"Give me the sweet shady side of Pall Mall, and the devil may take the +Sweet Waters. What's the Feast of Bairam beside the Derby-day, or your +confounded coloring beside a well-done cutlet? What's lemonade by +Brighton Tipper, and a veiled bundle by a pretty blonde, and an eternity +of Stamboul by an hour of Piccadilly?" + +Sir Galahad smiled superior, and shied a date at me. + +"Goth! can't you be content to feed like the Patriarchs and live an +idyl?" + +"No! I'd rather feed like a Parisian and live an idler! Eat grapes if +you choose; I agree with Brillat-Savarin, and don't like my wine in +pills." + +"My good fellow, you're all prose." + +"And you're all poetry. You're as bad as that pretty little commissariat +girl who lisped me to death last night at the Embassy with platitudes of +bosh about the 'poetry of marriage.'" + +"The deuce!" said Sir Galahad, with a whistle, "that must be like most +other poetry nowadays--uncommon dull prose, sliced up in uneven lengths! +Didn't you tell her so?" + +"Couldn't; I should have pulled the string for a shower-bath of +sentiment! When a woman's bolted on romance you only make the pace worse +if you gall her with the curb of common sense. When romance is in, +reason's out,--excuse the personality!" + +He didn't hear me; he was up like a retriever who scents a wild duck or +a water-rat among the sedges, for sweeping near us with soft gliding +motion, as pretty as a toy and as graceful as a swan, came a caique, +with the wife of a Pacha of at least a hundred tails in it, to judge by +the costliness of her exquisite attire. Now, women were not rare, but +then they were always veiled, which is like giving a man a nugget he +mustn't take out of the quartz, a case of champagne he mustn't undo, a +cover-side he is never to beat, a trout stream in which he must never +fling a fly; and Sir Galahad, whose loves were not, I admit, quite so +saintly as Arthur's code exacted, lost his head in a second as the +caique drifted past us, and, raising herself on her cushions, the Leilah +Duda, or Salya within it, glanced toward the myrtle screen that half hid +us, with the divinest antelope eyes in the world, and letting the +silver gauze folds of her veil float half aside, showed us the beautiful +warm bloom, the proud lips, and the chestnut tresses braided with pearls +and threaded with gold, of your genuine Circassian beauty. Shade of Don +Juan! what a face it was! + +A yataghan might have been at his throat, a bowstring at his neck, +eunuchs might have slaughtered, and pachas have impaled him, Galahad +would have seen more of that loveliness: headlong he plunged down the +slope, crushing through the almond thickets and scattering the green +tree-frogs right and left; the caique was just rounding past as he +reached the water's edge, and the beauty's veil was drawn in terror of +her guard. But as the little cockle-shell, pretty and ticklish as a +nautilus, was moored to a broad flight of marble stairs, the Circassian +turned her head towards the place where the Unbeliever stood in the +sunlight--her eyes were left her, and with them women speak in a +universal tongue. Then the green lattice gate shut, the white +impenetrable walls hid her from sight, and Sir Galahad stood looking +down the Sweet Waters in a sort of beatific vision, in love for the +1360th time in his life. And certainly he had never been in love with +better reason; for is there anything on earth so divine as your +antelope-eyed and gold-haired Circassian? + +"I shall be inside those walls or know the reason why," said he, whom +two gazelle eyes had fired and captured, there by the side of the sunny +Sweet Waters, where the lazy air was full of syringa and rose odors, and +there was no sound but the indolent beating of the tired oars on the +ripples. + +"Which reason you will rapidly find," I suggested, "in a knock on the +head from the Faithful!" + +"Well! a very picturesque way of coming to grief; to go off the scene in +the sick-wards, from raki and fruit, would be commonplace and +humiliating, but to die in a serail, stabbed through and through by +green-eyed jealousy, would be piquant and refreshing to the last degree; +do you really think there's a chance of it?" said Galahad, rather +anxiously--the eager wistful anxiety of a man who, athirst for the +forest, hears of the rumored slot of an outlying deer--while he shouted +the Greek fishermen to him, and learned after sore travail through a +slough of mixed Italian, Turkish, and Albanian, that the white palace, +with its green lattice and its hanging gardens, belonged to a rich +merchant of Constantinople, and that this veiled angel was the favorite +of his harem, Leilah Derran, a recent purchase in Circassia, and the +queen of the Anderun. + +"The old rascal!" swore Galahad, in his wrath, which was not, however, I +think, caused by any particular Christian disgust at polygamy. "A fat +old sinner, I'll be bound, who sits on his divan puffing his chibouque +and stuffing his sweetmeats, as yellow as Beppo, and as round as a ball. +Bah! what pearls before swine! It's enough to make a saint swear. Those +heavenly eyes!..." And Galahad went into a somewhat earthly reverie, +colored with a thirsty jealousy of the purchaser and the possessor of +this Circassian gazelle, as he rode reluctantly back towards Pera. + +The Circassian was in his head, and did not get out again. He let +himself be bewitched by that lovely face which had flashed on him for a +second, and began to feel himself as aggrieved by that innocent and +unoffending Turkish lord of hers, as if the unlucky gentleman had stolen +his own property! The antelope eyes had looked softly and hauntingly +sad, moreover: I demonstrated to him that it was nothing more than the +way that the eyelashes drooped, but nobody in love (very few people out +of it) have any taste for logic; he was simply disgusted with my +realism, and saw an instant vision for himself of this loveliest of +slaves, captive in a bazaar and sold into the splendid bondage of the +harem as into an inevitable fate, mournful in her royalty as a +nightingale in a cage stifled with roses, and as little able to escape +as the bird. A vision which intoxicated and enraptured Sir Galahad, who, +in the teeth of every abomination of Pera, had been content to see only +what he wished to see, and had maintained that the execrable East, to +make it the East of Hafiz and all the poets, only wanted--available +Haidees! + +"Hang it! I think it's nothing _but_ Hades," said an Aide, overhearing +that statement one night, as we stumbled out of a half-cafe, +half-gambling-booth pandemonium into the crooked, narrow, pitch-dark +street, where dogs were snarling over offal, jackals screaming, Turkish +bands shrieking, cannon booming out the hour of prayer, women yelling +alarms of fire, a Zouave was spitting a Greek by way of practice, and an +Irishman had just potted a Dalmatian, in as brawling, rowing, +pestiferous, unodorous an earthly Gehenna as men ever succeeded in +making. + +Sir Galahad was the least vain of mortals; nevertheless, being as +well-beloved by the "maidens and young widows," for his fair handsome +face, as Harold the Gold-haired, he would have been more than mortal if +he had not been tolerably confident of "killing," and luxuriously +practised in that pleasant pastime. That if he could once get the +antelope eyes to look at him, they would look lovingly before long, he +was in comfortable security; but how to get into a presence, which it +was death for an unbeliever and a male creature to approach, was a +knottier question, and the difficulty absorbed him. There were several +rather telling Englishwomen out there, with whom he had flirted _faute +de mieux_, at the cavalry balls we managed to get up in Pera, at the +Embassy costume-ball, on board yacht-decks in the harbor, and in picnics +to Therapia or the Monastery. But they became as flavorless as +twice-told tales, and twice-warmed entremets, beside the new piquance, +the delicious loveliness, the divine difficulty of this captive +Circassian. That he had no more earthly business to covet her than he +had to covet the unlucky Turkish trader's lumps of lapis-lazuli and +agate, never occurred to him; the stones didn't tempt him, you see, but +the beauty did. That those rich, soft, unrivalled Eastern charms, +"merely born to bloom and drop," should be caged from the world and only +rejoice the eyes of a fat old opium-soddened Stamboul merchant, seemed a +downright reversal of all the laws of nature, a tampering with the +balance of just apportionment that clamored for redress; but, like most +other crying injustice, the remedy was hard to compass. + +Day after day he rode down to the same place on the Sweet Waters on the +chance of the caique's passing; and, sure enough, the caique did pass +nine times out of ten, and, when opportunity served for such a hideous +Oriental crime not to be too perilous, the silver gauze floated aside +unveiling a face as fair as the morning, or, when that was impossible, +the eyes turned on him shyly and sadly in their lustrous appeal, as +though mutely bewailing such cruel captivity. Those eyes said as plainly +as language could speak that the lovely Favorite plaintively resisted +her bondage, and thought the Frank with his long fair beard, and his six +feet of height, little short of an angel of light, though he might be an +infidel. + +Given--hot languid days, nothing to do, sultry air heavy with orange and +rose odors, and those "silent passages," repeating themselves every time +that Leilah Derran's caique glided past the myrtle screen, where her +Giaour lay _perdu_, the result is conjectural: though they had never +spoken a word, they had both fallen in love. Voiceless _amourettes_ have +their advantages:--when a woman speaks, how often she snaps her spell! +For instance, when the lips are divine but the utterance is slangy, when +the mouth is adorably rosebud but what it says is most horrible horsy! + +A tender pity, too, gave its spur to his passion; he saw that, all Queen +of the Serail though she might be, this fettered gazelle was not happy +in her rose-chains, and to Galahad, who had a wonderful twist of the +knight-errant and lived decidedly some eight centuries too late, no +wiliest temptation would have been so fatal as this. + +He swore to get inside those white inexorable walls, and he kept his +oath: one morning the latticed door stood ajar, with the pomegranates +and the citrons nodding through the opening; he flung prudence to the +winds and peril to the devil, and entered the forbidden ground where it +was death for any man, save the fat Omar himself, to be found. The +fountains were falling into marble basins, the sun was tempered by the +screen of leaves, the lories and humming-birds were flying among the +trumpet-flowers, altogether a most poetic and pleasant place for an +erratic adventure; more so still when, as he went farther, he saw +reclining alone by the mosaic edge of a fountain his lovely Circassian +unveiled. With a cry of terror she sprang to her feet, graceful as a +startled antelope, and casting the silver shroud about her head, would +have fled; but the scream was not loud enough to give the alarm--perhaps +she attuned it so--and flight he prevented. Such Turkish as he had he +poured out in passionate eloquence, his love declaration only made the +more piquant by the knowledge that in a trice the gardens might swarm +with the Mussulman's guards and a scimitar smite his head into the +fountain. But the danger he disdained, _la belle_ Leilah remembered; +rebuke him she did not, nor yet call her eunuchs to rid her of this +terrible Giaour, but the antelope eyes filled with piteous tears and she +prayed him begone--if he were seen here, in the gardens of the women, it +were his death, it were hers! Her terror at the infidel was outweighed +by her fear for his peril; how handsome he was with his blue eyes and +fair locks, after the bald, black-browed, yellow, obese little Omar! + +"Let me see again the face that is the light of my soul and I will obey +thee; thou shalt do with thy slave as thou wilt!" whispered Galahad in +the most impassioned and poetical Turkish he could muster, thinking the +style of Hafiz understood better here than the style of Belgravia, while +the almond-eyed Leilah trembled like a netted bird under his look and +his touch, conscious, pretty creature, that were it once known that a +Giaour had looked on her, poison in her coffee, or a sullen plunge by +night into the Bosphorus, would expiate the insult to the honor of Omar, +a master whom she piteously hated. She let her veil float aside, +nevertheless, blushing like a sea-shell under the shame of an +unbeliever's gaze--a genuine blush that is banished from Europe--his +eyes rested on the lovely youth of her face, his cheek brushed the + + Loose train of her amber dropping hair, + +his lips met her own; then, with a startled stifled cry, his coy gazelle +sprang away, lost in the aisles of the roses, and Galahad quitted the +dangerous precincts, in safety so far, not quite clear whether he had +been drinking or dreaming, and of conviction that Pera had changed into +Paradise. For he was in love with two things at once, a romance and a +woman; and an anchorite would fairly have lost his head after the divine +dawn of beauty in Leilah Derran. + +The morrow, of course, found him at the same place, at the same hour, +hoping for a similar fortune, but the lattice door was shut, and defied +all force; he was just about to try scaling the high slippery walls by +the fibres of a clinging fig-tree, when a negress, the sole living thing +in sight, beckoned him, a hideous Abyssinian enough for a messenger of +Eros; a grinning good-natured black, who had been bought in the same +bazaar and of the same owner as the lovely Circassian, to whose service +she was sworn. She told him by scraps of Turkish, and signs, that Leilah +had bidden her watch for and warn him, that it were as much as both +their lives were worth for him to be seen again in the women's gardens, +or anywhere near her presence; that the merchant Omar was a monster of +jealousy, and that the rest of the harem, jealous of her supremacy and +of the unusual liberty her ascendancy procured her, would love nothing +so well as to compass her destruction. Further meeting with her infidel +lover she pronounced impossible, unless he would see her consigned to +the Bosphorus; an ice avalanche of intelligence, which, falling on the +tropical Eden of his passion, had the effect, as it was probably meant +that it should have, of drowning the lingering remnant of prudence and +sanity that had remained to him after his lips had once touched the +exquisite Eastern's. + +Under the circumstances the negress was his sole hope and chance; he +pressed her into his service and made her Mercury and mediatrix in one. +She took his messages, sent in the only alphabet the pretty gazelle +could read, i. e. flowers, plotted against her owner with true Eastern +finesse, wrought on the Circassian's tenderness for the Giaour, and her +terrified hatred of her grim lord Omar, and threw herself into the +intrigue with the avidity of all womanhood, be it black or be it white, +for anything on the face of the earth that has the charm of being +forbidden. The affair was admirably _en train_, and Galahad was +profoundly happy; he was deliciously in love,--a pleasant spice as +difficult to find in its full flavor as it is to bag a sand grouse;--and +had an adventure to amuse him that might very likely cost him his head, +and might fairly claim to rise into the poetic. The only reward he +received (or ever got, for that matter) for the Balaclava brush, where +he cut down three gunners, and had a ball put in his hip, had been a +cavil raised by a critic, not there, of doubt whether he had ever +ridden inside the lines at all; but his Circassian would have +recompensed him at once for a score of years of Chersonnesus +campaigning, and unprofessional chroniclers: he was perfectly happy, and +his soft, careless, _couleur de rose_ enjoyment of the paradise was +aggravating to behold,--when one was in Pera, and the heat broiled alive +every mortal thing that wasn't a negro, and Bass was limited, and there +were no Dailies, and one thought even lovingly and regretfully of the +old "beastly shells," that had at least this merit, that they scattered +bores when they burst! + +"Old fellow!--want something to do?" he asked me one day. I nodded, +being silent and savage from having had to dance attendance on the +Sultan at an Embassy reception. Peace to his _manes_ now! but I know I +wished him heartily in Eblis at that time. + +"Come with me to-night then, if you don't mind a probability of being +potted by a True Believer," went on Leilah Derran's lover, going into +some golden water Soyer had sent me. + +"For the big game? Like it of all things; but you know I'm tied by the +leg here." + +Galahad laughed. "Oh, I only want you an hour or two. I've got six days' +leave for the pigs and the deer: but the hills won't see much of me, I'm +going to make a raid in the rose-gardens. It may be hot work, so I +thought you would like it." + +Of course I did, and asked the programme which Sir Galahad, as lucidly +as a man utterly in love can tell anything, unfolded to me. Fortune +favored him; it was the night of the Feast of Bairam, when all the world +of Turkey lights its lamps and turns out; he had got leave under pretext +of a shooting trip into Roumelia, but the game he was intent on was the +captive Circassian, who in the confusion and _tintamarre_ attendant on +Bairam, was to escape to him by the rose-gardens, and being carried off +as swiftly as Syrian stallions could take them, would be borne away by +her infidel lover on board a yacht, belonging to a man whom he knew who +was cruising in the Bosphorus, which would steam them away down the +Dardanelles before the Turk had a chance of getting in chase. Nothing +could be better planned for everybody but the luckless Mussulman who was +to be robbed,--and the whole thing had a fine flavor about it of dash +and difficulty, of piquance and poetry, of Mediaeval errantry and +Oriental coloring, that put Leilah's Giaour most deliciously in his +element, setting apart the treasure that he would carry off in that +rich, soft, antelope-eyed, bright-haired Circassian loveliness which +made all the dreams in Lalla Rookh and Don Juan look pale. + +So his raid was planned, and I agreed to go with him to cover the rear +in case of pursuit, which was likely enough to be hot and sharp, for the +Moslems, for all their apathy, lack the philosophic gratitude which your +British husband usually exhibits towards his despoiler--but then, to be +sure, an Englishman can't make a fresh purchase unless he's first robbed +of the old! Night came; and the nights, I am forced to admit, have a +witching charm of their own in the East, that the West never knows. The +Commander of the Faithful went to prayer, with the roar of cannon and +the roll of drums pealing down the Golden Horn, and along the +cypress-clad valleys. The mosques and minarets, starred and circled with +a myriad of lamps, gleamed through the dark foliage, and were mirrored +in the silvery sheet of the waves. The caiques, as they swept along, +left tracks of light in the phosphor-lit waves, and while the chant of +the Muezzin rang through the air, the children of Allah, from one end of +the Bosphorus to the other, held festival on the most holy eve of +Bairam. A splendid night for a lyric of Swinburne's!--a superb scene for +an amorous adventure! And as we mingled amongst the crowds of the +Faithful, swarming with their painted lanterns, their wild music, their +gorgeous colors, their booming guns, in street and caique, on land and +sea, Sir Galahad, though an infidel, had certainly entered the Seventh +Heaven. He had never been more intensely in love in his life; and, if +the fates should decree that the dogs of Islam should slay him at her +feet, in the sanctuary of her rose-paradise, he was ready to say in his +pet poet's words, with the last breath of his lips, + + It was ordained to be so, sweet and best + Comes now beneath thine eyes and on thy breast. + Still kiss me! Care not for the cowards! Care + Only to put aside thy beauteous hair + My blood will hurt! + +In the night of the feast all the world was astir, Franks and Moslems, +believers and unbelievers, and we made our way through the press +unwatched to where Omar's house was illumined, the cressets, and +wreaths, and stars of light sparkling through the black foliage. Under +the walls, hidden by a group of planes, we fastened the stallions in +readiness, and Galahad, at the latticed door, gave the signal word, +"Kef," low whispered. The door unclosed, and, true to her tryst, in the +silvery Bosphorus moonlight, crouching in terror and shame, was the +veiled and trembling Circassian. + +But not in peace was her capture decreed to be made; scarce had the door +flown open, when the shrill yell of "Allah hu! Allah hu!" rung through +the air; and from the dark aisles of the gardens poured Mussulmans, +slaves, and eunuchs, the Turk with a shoal at his back, giving the alarm +with hideous bellowings, while their drawn scimitars flashed in the +white starlight, and their cries filled the air with their din. "Make +off, while I hold the gate!" I shouted to Galahad, who, catching Leilah +Derran in his arms before the Moslems could be nigh us, held her close +with one hand, while with his right he levelled his revolver, as I did, +and backed--facing the Turks. At sight of the lean shining barrels, the +Moslems paused in their rush for a second--only a second; the next, +shouting to Allah till the minarets gave back the echo, they sprang at +us, their curled naked yataghans whirling above their heads, their jetty +eyeballs flaming like tigers' on the spring. Our days looked +numbered;--I gave them the contents of one barrel, and in the moment's +check we gained the outside of the gardens; the swarm rushed after us, +their shots flying wide, and whistling with a shrill hiss harmlessly +past; we reserved further fire, not wishing to kill, if we could manage +to cut our way through without bloodshed, and backed to the plane-trees, +where the horses were waiting. There was a moment's blind but breathless +struggle, swift and indistinct to remembrance, as a flash of lightning; +the Turks swarmed around us, while we beat them off, and hurled them +asunder somehow. Omar sprang like a rattlesnake on to his spoiler, his +yataghan circling viciously in the air, to crash down upon Galahad's +skull, who was encumbered by the clinging embrace of his stolen +Circassian. I straightened my left arm with a remnant of "science" that +savored more of old Cambridge than of Crimean custom; the Moslem went +down like an ox, and keeping the yelling pack at bay with the levelled +death-dealer, I threw myself into saddle just as Galahad flung himself +on his stallion, and the Syrians, fleet as Arab breeding could make +them, tore down the beach in the rich Eastern night, while the balls +shrieked through the air past our ears, and the shouts of our laughter, +with the salute of a ringing English cheer in victorious farewell, +answered the howls of our distant and baffled pursuers. + +Sir Galahad's Raid was a triumph! + +On we went through the hot fragrant air, through the silvery moonlight, +through the deep shade of cypress and pine woods; on we went through +gorge, and ravine, and defile, through stretches of sweet wild +lavender, of shining sands, of trampled rose-fields, with the +phosphor-lit sea gleaming beside us, and the Islam Feast of Bairam left +far distant behind. On and on--while the glorious night itself was +elixir, and one shouted to the starry silence Robert Browning's grand +challenge-- + + How good is man's life, the mere living! how fit to employ + All the heart, and the soul, and the senses, for ever in joy! + +That ride was superb! + +We never drew rein till some ten miles farther on, where we saw against +the clear skies the dark outline of the yacht with a blue light burning +at her mast-head, the signal selected; then Galahad checked the good +Syrian, who had proved pace as fleet as the "wild pigeon blue" is ever +vouched in the desert, and bent over his prize who, through that long +ride, had been held close to his breast, with her arms wound about him, +and the beautiful veiled face bowed on his heart. The moon was bright as +day, and he stooped his head to uplift the envious veil, and see the +radiant beauty that never again would be shrouded, and to meet once more +the lips which his own had touched before but in one single caress; he +bowed his head, and I thought that my disinterested ungrudging +friendship made the friendships of antiquity look small; when----an oath +that chilled my blood rang through the night and over the seas, +startling the echoes from rock and hill; the veiled captive reeled from +the saddle with a wailing scream, hurled to earth by the impetus with +which his arms loosed her from him; and away into the night, without +word or sign, plunging headlong down the dark defile, riding as men may +ride from a field that reeks with death, far out of sight into the heart +of the black dank woods, his Syrian bore Sir Galahad. And lo! in the +white moonlight, against the luminous sea, slowly there rose before me, +unveiled and confessed--THE NEGRESS! + + * * * * * + +The history of that night we never learnt. Whether Leilah Derran herself +played the cruel trick on her Giaour lover (but this _he_ always +scouted), whether Omar himself was a man of grim humor, whether the +Abyssinian, having betrayed her mistress, was used as a decoy-bird, +dressed like the Circassian, to lure the infidels into the rose-gardens +where the Faithful intended to dispatch them hastily to Eblis--no one +knows. We could never find out. The negress escaped me before my +surprise let me stay her, and the fray made the place too hot for close +investigation. Nor do I know where Galahad tore in that wild night-ride, +whose spur was the first maddened pain and rage of shame that his life +had tasted. I never heard where he spent the six days of his absence; +but when he joined us again, six weeks in the sick-wards would not have +altered him more; all he said to me was one piteous phrase--"For God's +sake don't tell the fellows!"--and I never did; I liked him well enough +not to make chaff of him. Unholily had I thirsted to see him +disenchanted, ungenerously had I pined to see him goaded out of temper: +I had my wish, and I don't think I enjoyed it. I saw him at last in +passion that I had much to do to tame down from a deadly vengeance that +would have rung through the Allied Armies; and I saw him loathe the +East, curse romance, burn all the poets with Hafiz at their head, and +shun a woman's beauty like the pestilence. To this day I believe that +the image of Leilah Derran haunts his memory, and that a certain remorse +consumes him for his lost gazelle, whom _he_ always thought paid penalty +for their love under the silent waves of the Bosphorus, with those lost +ones whose souls, according to the faith of Stamboul, flit ceaselessly +above its waters, in the guise of its white-winged unrestful sea-gulls. +He is far enough away just now--in which of the death-pots where we are +simmering and fritting away in little wretched driblets men and money +that would have sufficed Caesar or Scipio to conquer an Empire, matters +not to his story. When he reads this, he will remember the bitterest +night of his life, and the fiasco that ended SIR GALAHAD'S RAID! + + + + +'REDEEMED.' + + + + +"REDEEMED." + +AN EPISODE WITH THE CONFEDERATE HORSE. + + + +Bertie Winton had got the Gold Vase. + +The Sovereign, one of the best horses that ever had a dash of the +Godolphin blood in him, had led the first flight over the +ridge-and-furrow, cleared the fences, trying as the shire-thorn could +make them, been lifted over the stiffest doubles and croppers, passed +the turning-flags, and been landed at the straight run-in with the stay +and pace for which his breed was famous, enrapturing the fancy, who had +piled capfuls of money on him, and getting the Soldiers' Blue Riband +from the Guards, who had stood crackers on little Benyon's mount--Ben, +who is as pretty as a girl, with his _petites mains blanches_, riding +like any professional. + +Now, I take it--and I suppose there are none who will disagree with +me--that there are few things pleasanter in this life than to stand, in +the crisp winter's morning, winner of the Grand Military, having got the +Gold Vase for the old corps against the best mounts in the Service. + +Life must look worth having to you, when you have come over those black, +barren pastures and rugged ploughed lands, where the field floundered +helplessly in grief, with Brixworth brook yawning gaunt and wide beneath +you, and the fresh cold north wind blowing full in your teeth, and have +ridden in at the distance alone, while the air is rent by the echoing +shouts of the surging crowd, and the best riding-men are left "nowhere" +behind. Life must look pleasant to you, if it had been black as thunder +the night before. Nevertheless, where Bertie Winton sat, having brought +the Sovereign in, winner of the G. M., with that superb bay's head a +little drooped, and his flanks steaming, but scarce a hair turned, while +the men who had won pots of money on him crowded round in hot +congratulation, and he drank down some Curacoa punch out of a +pocket-pistol, with his habitual soft, low, languid laugh, he had that +in his thoughts which took the flavor out of the Curacoa, and made the +sunny, cheery winter's day look very dull and gray to him. For Bertie, +sitting there while the cheers reeled round him like mad, with a +singularly handsome, reckless face, long tawny moustaches, tired blue +eyes, and a splendid length and strength of limb, knew that this was the +last day of the old times for him, and that he had sailed terribly near +the wind of--dishonor. + +He had been brought to _envisager_ his position a little of late, and +had seen that it was very bad indeed--as bad as it could be. He had run +through all his own fortune from his mother, a good one enough, and owed +almost as much again in bills and one way and another. He had lost +heavily on the turf, gamed deeply, travelled with the most expensive +adventuresses of their day, startled town with all its worst crim. +cons.; had every vice under heaven, save that he drank not at all; and +now, having shot a Russian prince at Baden the August before, about +Lillah Lis, had received on the night just passed, from the Horse +Guards, a hint, which was a command, that his absence was requested from +her Majesty's Service--a mandate which, politely though inexorably +couched, would have taken a more forcible and public form but for the +respect in which his father, old Lion Winton, as he was called, was held +by the Army and the authorities. And Bertie, who for five-and-thirty +years had never thought at all, except on things that pleasured him, +and such bagatelles as _barriere_ duels abroad, delicately-spiced +intrigues, bills easily renewed, the _cru_ of wines, and the siege of +women, found himself pulled up with a rush, and face to face with +nothing less than ruin. + +"I'm up a tree, Melcombe," he said to a man of his own corps that day as +he finished a great cheroot before mounting. + +"Badly?" + +"Well, yes. It'll be smash this time, I suppose." + +"Bother! That's hard lines." + +"It's rather a bore," he answered, with a little yawn, as he got into +the saddle; and that was all he ever said then or afterwards on the +matter; but he rode the Sovereign superbly over the barren wintry +grass-land, and landed him winner of the Blue Riband for all that, +though Black Care, for the first time in his life, rode behind him and +weighted the race. + +Poor Bertie! nobody would have believed him if he had said so, but he +had been honestly and truly thinking, for some brief time past, whether +it would not be possible and worth while for him to shake himself free +of this life, of which he was growing heartily tired, and make a name +for himself in the world in some other fashion than by winging Russians, +importing new dancers, taking French women to the Bads, scandalizing +society, and beggaring himself. He had begun to wonder whether it was +not yet, after all, too late, and whether if----when down had come the +request from the Horse Guards for him to sell out, and the rush of all +his creditors upon him, and away forever went all his stray shapeless +fancies of a possible better future. And--consolation or aggravation, +whichever it be--he knew that he had no one, save himself, to thank for +it; for no man ever had a more brilliant start in the race of life than +he, and none need have made better running over the course, had he only +kept straight or put on the curb as he went down-hill. Poor Bertie! you +must have known many such lives, or I can't tell where your own has been +spent; lives which began so brilliantly that none could rival them, and +which ended--God help them!--so miserably and so pitifully that you do +not think of them without a shudder still? + +Poor Bertie!--a man of a sweeter temper, a more generous nature, a more +lavish kindliness, never lived. He had the most versatile talents and +the gentlest manners in the world; and yet here he was, having fairly +come to ruin, and very nearly to disgrace. + +It was little wonder that his father, looking at him and thinking of all +he might have been, and all he might have done, was lashed into a +terrible bitterness of passionate grief, and hurled words at him of a +deadly wrath, in the morning that followed on the Grand Military. Fiery +as his comrades the Napiers, of a stern code as a soldier, and a lofty +honor as a man, haughty in pride and swift to passion, old Sir Lionel +was stung to the quick by his son's fall, and would have sooner, by a +thousand-fold, have followed him to his grave, than have seen him live +to endure that tacit dismissal from the service of the country--the +deepest shame, in his sight, that could have touched his race. + +"I knew you were lost to morality, but I did not know till now that you +were lost to honor!" said the old Lion, with such a storm of passion in +him that his words swept out, acrid and unchosen, in a very whirlwind. +"I knew you had vices, I knew you had follies, I knew you wasted your +substance with debtors and gamblers like yourself, on courtesans and +gaming-tables, in Parisian enormities, and vaunted libertinage, but I +did not think that you were so utterly a traitor to your blood as to +bring disgrace to a name that never was approached by shame until _you_ +bore it!" + +Bertie's face flushed darkly, then he grew very pale. The indolence +with which he lay back in an ecarte-chair did not alter, however, and he +stroked his long moustaches a little with his habitual gentle +indifferentism. + +"It is all over. Pray do not give it that tremendous earnestness," he +said, quietly. "Nothing is ever worth that; and I should prefer it if we +kept to the language of gentlemen!" + +"The language of gentlemen is _for_ gentlemen," retorted the old man, +with fiery vehemence. His heart was cut to the core, and all his soul +was in revolt against the degradation to his name that came in the train +of his heir's ruin. "When a man has forgot that he has been a gentleman, +one may be pardoned for forgetting it also! You may have no honor left +for your career to shame; _I_ have--and, by God, sir, from this hour you +are no son of mine. I disown you--I know you no longer! Go and drag out +all the rest of a disgraced life in any idleness that you choose. If you +were to lie dying at my feet, I would not give you a crust!" + +Bertie raised his eyebrows slightly. + +"_Soit!_ But would it not be possible to intimate this quietly? A scene +is such very bad style--always exhausting, too!" + +The languid calmness, the soft nonchalance of the tone, were like oil +upon flame to the old Lion's heart, lashed to fury and embittered with +pain as it was. A heavier oath than print will bear broke from him, with +a deadly imprecation, as he paced the library with swift, uneven steps. + +"It had been better if your 'style' had been less and your decency and +your honor greater! One word more is all you will ever hear from my +lips. The title must come to you; that, unhappily, is not in my hands to +prevent. It must be yours when I die, if you have not been shot in some +gambling brawl or some bagnio abroad before then; but you will remember, +not a shilling of money, not a rood of the land are entailed; and, by +the heaven above us, every farthing, every acre shall be willed to the +young children. _You_ are disinherited, sir--disowned for ever--if you +died at my feet! Now go, and never let me see your face again." + +As he spoke, Bertie rose. + +The two men stood opposite to each other--singularly alike in form and +feature, in magnificence of stature, and distinction of personal beauty, +save that the tawny gold of the old Lion's hair was flaked with white, +and that his blue eyes were bright as steel and flashing fire, while the +younger man's were very worn. His face, too, was deeply flushed and his +lips quivered, while his son's were perfectly serene and impassive as he +listened, without a muscle twitching, or even a gleam of anxiety coming +into his eyes. + +They were of different schools. + +Bertie heard to the end; then bowed with a languid grace. "It will be +fortunate for Lady Winton's children! Make her my compliments and +congratulations. Good-day to you." + +Their eyes met steadily once--that was all; then the door of the library +closed on him; Bertie knew the worst; he was face to face with beggary. +As he crossed the hall, the entrance to the conservatories stood open; +he looked through, paused a moment, and then went in. On a low chair, +buried among the pyramids of blossom, sat a woman reading, aristocrat to +the core, and in the earliest bloom of her youth, for she was scarcely +eighteen, beautiful as the morning, with a delicate thorough-bred +beauty, dark lustrous eyes, arched pencilled brows, a smile like +sunshine, and lips sweet as they were proud. She was Ida Deloraine, a +ward of Sir Lionel, and a cousin of his young second wife's. + +Bertie went up to her and held out his hand. + +"Lady Ida, I am come to wish you good-bye." + +She started a little and looked up. + +"Good-bye! Are you going to town?" + +"Yes--a little farther. Will you give me that camellia by way of _bon +voyage_?" + +A soft warmth flushed her face for a moment; she hesitated slightly, +toying with the snowy blossom; then she gave it him. He had not asked it +like a love gage. + +He took it, and bowed silently over her hand. + +"You will find it very cold," said Lady Ida, with a trifle of +embarrassment, nestling herself in her dormeuse in her warm bright nest +among the exotics. + +He smiled--a very gentle smile. + +"Yes, I am frozen out. Adieu!" + +He paused a moment, looking at her--that brilliant picture framed in +flowers; then, without another word, he bowed again and left her, the +woman he had learned too late to love, and had lost by his own folly for +ever. + +"Frozen out? What could he mean?--there is no frost," thought Lady Ida, +left alone in her hot-house warmth among the white and scarlet blossoms, +a little startled, a little disappointed, a little excited with some +vague apprehension, she could not have told why; while Bertie Winton +went on out into the cold gray winter's morning from the old +Northamptonshire Hall that would know him no more, with no end so likely +for him as that which had just been prophesied--a shot in a gambling +hell. + +_Facilis descensus Averni_--and he was at the bottom of the pit. Well, +the descent had been very pleasant. Bertie set his teeth tight, and let +the waters close over his head and shut him out of sight. He knew that a +man who is down has nothing more to do with the world, save to quietly +accept--oblivion. + + * * * * * + +It was a hot summer night in Secessia. + +The air was very heavy, no wind stirring the dense woods crowning the +sides of the hills or the great fields of trodden maize trampled by the +hoofs of cavalry and the tramp of divisions. The yellow corn waved above +the earth where the dead had fallen like wheat in harvest-time, and the +rice grew but the richer and the faster because it was sown in soil +where slaughtered thousands rotted, unsepulchred and unrecorded. The +shadows were black from the reared mountain range that rose frowning in +the moonlight, and the stars were out in southern brilliancy, shining as +calmly and as luminously as though their rays did not fall on graves +crammed full with dead, on flaming homesteads, crowded sick-wards, +poisonous waters that killed their thousands in deadly rivalry with shot +and shell, and vast battalions sleeping on their arms in wheat-fields +and by river-swamps, in opposing camps, and before beleaguered cities, +where brethren warred with brethren, and Virginia was drenched with +blood. There was no sound, save now and then the challenge of some +distant picket or the faint note of a trumpet-call, the roar of a +torrent among the hills, or the monotonous rise and fall from miles away +in the interior, of the negroes' funeral song, "Old Joe,"--more +pathetic, somehow, when you catch it at night from the far distance +echoing on the silence as you sit over a watch-fire, or ride alone +through a ravine, than many a grander requiem. + +It was close upon midnight, and all was very still; for they were in the +heart of the South, and on the eve of a perilous enterprise, coined by a +bold brain and to be carried out by a bold hand. + +It was in the narrow neck of a valley, pent up between rocky shelving +ridges, anywhere you will between Maryland and Georgia--for he who did +this thing would not care to have it too particularly drawn out from the +million other deeds of "derring-do" that the mighty story of the Great +War has known and buried. Eight hundred Confederate Horse, some of +Stuart's Cavalry, had got driven and trapped and caged up in this +miserable defile, misled and intercepted; with the dense mass of a +Federal army marching on their rear, within them by bare fifteen miles, +and the forward route through the crammed defile between the hills, by +which alone they could regain Lee's forces, dammed up by a deep, rapid, +though not broad river; by a bridge strongly fortified and barricaded; +and, on the opposite bank, by some Federal corps a couple of thousand +strong, well under cover in rifle-pits and earthworks, thrown up by keen +woodsmen and untiring trench-diggers. It was close peril, deadly as any +that Secessia had seen, here in the hot still midnight, with the columns +of the Federal divisions within them by eight hours' march, stretching +out and taking in all the land to the rear in the sweep of their +semicircular wings; while in front rose, black and shapeless in the deep +gloom of the rocks above, the barricades upon the bridge, behind which +two thousand rifles were ready to open fire at the first alarm from the +Federal guard. And alone, without the possibility of aid, caged in among +the trampled corn and maize that filled the valley, imprisoned between +the two Federal forces as in the iron jaws of a trap, the handful of +Southern troopers stood, resolute to sell their lives singly one by one, +and at a costly price, and perish to a man, rather than fall alive into +the hands of their foes. + +When the morning broke they would be cut to pieces, as the chaff is cut +by the whirl of the steam-wheels. They knew that. Well, they looked at +it steadily; it had no terrors for them, the Cavaliers of Old Virginia, +so that they died with their face to the front. There was but one chance +left for escape; aid there could be none; and that chance was so +desperate, that even to them--reckless in daring, living habitually +between life and death, and ever careless of the issue--it looked like +madness to attempt it. But one among them had urged it on their +consideration--urged it with passionate entreaty, pledging his own life +for its success; and they had given their adhesion to it, for his name +was famous through the Confederacy. + +He had won his spurs at Manasses, at Antietam, at Chancellorsville; he +had been in every headlong charge with Stuart; he had been renowned for +the most dashing Border raids and conspicuous staff service of any +soldier in Secessia; he had galloped through a tempest of the enemy's +balls, and swept along their lines to reconnoitre, riding back through +the storm of shot to Lee, as coolly as though he rode through a summer +shower at a review; and his words had weight with men who would have +gone after him to the death. He stood now, the only man dismounted, in +true Virginia uniform; a rough riding-coat, crossed by an undressed +chamois belt, into which his sabre and a brace of revolvers were thrust, +a broad Spanish sombrero shading his face, great Hessians reaching above +his knee, and a long silken golden-colored beard sweeping to his +waist,--a keen reconnoitrer, a daring raider, a superb horseman, and a +soldier heart and soul. + +When he had laid before them the solitary chance of the perilous +enterprise that he had planned, each man of the eight hundred had sought +the post of danger for himself; but there he was, inexorable--what he +had proposed he alone would execute. The Federals were ignorant of their +close vicinity, for their near approach had been unheard, the trodden +maize and rice, and the angry foaming of the torrent above, deadening +the sound of their horses' hoofs; and the Union-men, satisfied that the +"rebels" were entrapped beyond escape, were sleeping securely behind +their earth-works, the passage of the river blockaded by their +barricade, while the Southerners were drawn up close to the head of the +bridge in sections of threes, screened by the intense shadow of the +overhanging rocks; shadow darker from the brilliance of the full summer +moon that, shining on the enemy's encampment, and on the black boiling +waters thundering through the ravine, was shut out from the defile by +the leaning pine-covered walls of granite. It was terribly still, that +awful silence, only filled with the splashing of the water and the +audible beat of the Federal sentinel's measured tramp, as they were +drawn up there by the bridge-head; and though they had cast themselves +into the desperate effort with the recklessness of men for whom death +waited surely on the morrow, it looked a madman's thought, a madman's +exploit, to them, as their leader laid aside his sword and pistols, and +took up a small barrel of powder, part of some ammunition carried off +from some sappers and miners' stores in the raid of the past day, the +sight of which had brought to remembrance a stray, half-forgotten story +told him in boyhood of one of Soult's Army--the story on which he was +about to act now. + +"For God's sake, take care!" whispered the man nearest him; and though +he was a veteran who had gone through the hottest of the campaign since +Bull's Run, his voice shook, and was husky as he spoke. + +The other laughed a little--a slight, soft, languid laugh. + +"All right, my dear fellow," he whispered back. "There's nothing in it +to be alarmed at; a Frenchman did it in the Peninsula, you know. Only if +I get shot, or blown up, and the alarm be given, do you take care to +bolt over and cut your way through in the first of the rush, that's +all." + +Then, without more words, he laid himself down at full length with a +cord tied round his ankle, that they might know his progress, and the +cask of gunpowder, swathed in green cloth, that it should roll without +noise along the ground; and, creeping slowly on his way, propelling the +barrel with his head, and guiding it by his hands, was lost to their +sight in the darkness. By the string, as it uncoiled through their +hands, they could tell he was advancing; that was all. + +The chances were as a million to one that his life would pay the forfeit +for that perilous and daring venture; a single shot and he would be +blown into the air a charred and shapeless corpse; one spark on that +rolling mass that he pushed before him, and the explosion would hurl him +upward in the silent night, mangled, dismembered, blackened, lifeless. +But his nerve was not the less cool, nor did his heart beat one throb +the quicker, as he crept noiselessly along in the black shade cast by +the parapet of the bridge, with the tramp of the guard close above on +his ear, and rifles ready to be levelled on him from the covered +earthworks if the faintest sound of his approach or the dimmest streak +of moonlight on his moving body told the Federals of his presence. He +had looked death in the teeth most days through the last five years; it +had no power to quicken or slacken a single beat of his pulse as he +propelled himself slowly forward along the black, rugged, uneven ground, +and on to the passage of the bridge, as coolly, as fearlessly, as he +would have crept through the heather and bracken after the slot of a +deer on the moor-side at home. + +He heard the challenge and the tramp of the sentinel on the opposite +bank; he saw the white starlight shine on the barrels of their +breech-loaders as they paced to and fro in the stillness, filled with +the surge and rush of the rapid waters beneath him. Shrouded in the +gloom, he dragged himself onward with slow and painful movement, +stretched out on the ground, urging himself forward by the action of his +limbs so cautiously that, even had the light been on him, he could +scarcely have been seen to move, or been distinguished from the earth on +which he lay. Eight hundred lives hung on the coolness of his own; if he +were discovered, they were lost. And, without haste, without excitation, +he drew himself along under the parapet until he came to the centre of +the bridge, placed the barrel close against the barricades, uncovered +the head of the cask, and took his way back by the same laborious, +tedious way, until he reached the Virginian Troopers gathered together +under the shelving rocks. + +A deep hoarse murmur rolling down the ranks, the repressed cheer they +dared not give aloud, welcomed him and the dauntless daring of his act; +man after man pressed forward entreating to take his place, to share his +peril; he gave it up to none, and three times more went back again on +that deadly journey, until sufficient powder for his purpose was lodged +under the Federal fortifications on the bridge. Two hours went by in +that slow and terrible passage; then, for the last time, he wound a +saucisson round his body serpent-wise, and, with that coil of powder +curled around him, took his way once more in the same manner through the +hot, dark, heavy night. + +And those left behind in the impenetrable gloom, ignorant of his fate, +knowing that with every instant the crack of the rifles might roll out +on the stillness, and the ball pierce that death-snake twisted round his +limbs, and the rocks echo with the roar of the exploding powder, +blasting him in the rush of its sheet of fire and stones, sat mute and +motionless in their saddles, with a colder chill in their bold blood, +and a tighter fear at their proud hearts, than the Cavaliers of the +South would have known for their own peril, or than he knew for his. + +Another half-hour went by--an eternity in its long drawn-out +suspense--then in the darkness under the rocks his form rose up amongst +them. + +"Ready?"--"Ready." + +The low whisper passed all but inaudible from man to man. He took back +his sabre and pistols and thrust them into his belt, then stooped, +struck a slow match, and laid it to the end of the saucisson, whose +mouth he had fastened to the barrels on the bridge, and rapidly as the +lightning, flung himself across the horse held for him, and fell into +line at the head of the troop. + +There was a moment of intense silence while the fire crept up the long +stick of the match; then the shrill, hissing, snake-like sound, that +none who have once heard ever forget, rushed through the quiet of the +night, and with a roar that startled all the sleeping echoes of the +hills, the explosion followed; the columns of flame shooting upward to +the starlit sky, and casting their crimson lurid light on the black +brawling waters, on the rugged towering rocks, on the gnarled trunks of +the lofty pines, and on the wild, picturesque forms and the bold, +swarthy, Spanish-like faces of the Confederate raiders. With a shock +that shook the earth till it rocked and trembled under them, the pillar +of smoke and fire towered aloft in the hush of the midnight, blasting +and hurling upward, in thunder that pealed back from rock to rock, +lifeless bodies, mangled limbs, smouldering timbers, loosened stones, +dead men flung heavenward like leaves whirled by the wind, and iron torn +up and bent like saplings in a storm, as the mass of the barricades +quivered, oscillated, and fell with a mighty crash, while the night was +red with the hot glare of the flame, and filled with the deafening din. + +The Federals, sleeping under cover of their intrenchments, woke by that +concussion as though heaven and earth were meeting, poured out from pit +and trench, from salient and parallel, to see their fortifications and +their guard blown up, while the skies were lurid with the glow of the +burning barricades, and the ravine was filled with the yellow mist of +the dense and rolling smoke. Confused, startled, demoralized, they ran +together like sheep, vainly rallied by their officers, some few hundred +opening an aimless desultory fire from behind their works, the rest +rushing hither and thither, in that inextricable intricacy, and nameless +panic, which doom the best regiments that were ever under arms, when +once they seize them. + +"Charge!" shouted the Confederate leader, his voice ringing out clear +and sonorous above the infernal tempest of hissing, roaring, shrieking, +booming sound. + +With that resistless impetus with which they had, over and over again, +broken through the granite mass of packed squares and bristling +bayonets, the Southerners, raising their wild war-whoop, thundered on to +the bridge, which, strongly framed of stone and iron, had withstood the +shock, as they had foreseen; and while the fiery glare shone, and the +seething flame hissed, on the boiling waters below, swept, full gallop, +over the torn limbs, the blackened bodies, the charred wood, the falling +timbers, the exploding powder, with which the passage of the bridge was +strewn, and charged through the hellish din, the lurid fire, the heavy +smoke, at a headlong pace, down into the Federal camp. + +A thousand shots fell like hail amongst them, but not a saddle was +emptied, not even a trooper was touched; and with their line unbroken, +and the challenge of their war-shout pealing out upon the uproar, they +rode through the confusion worse confounded, and cutting their way +through shot and sabre, through levelled rifles, and through piled +earthworks, with their horses breathing fire, and the roar of the +opening musketry pealing out upon their rear, dashed on, never drawing +rein, down into the darkness of the front defile, and into the freshness +of the starry summer night, saved by the leader that they loved, +and--FREE! + + * * * * * + +"Tarnation cheeky thing to do. Guess they ain't wise to rile us that +way," said a Federal general from Vermont, as they discussed this +exploit of the Eight Hundred at the Federal head-quarters. + +"A splendid thing!" said an English visitor to the Northern camp, who +had come for a six months' tour to see the war for himself, having been +in his own time the friend of Paget and Vivian and Londonderry, the +comrade of Picton, of Mackinnon, and of Arthur Wellesley. "A magnificent +thing! I remember Bouchard did something the same sort of thing at +Amarante, but not half so pluckily, nor against any such odds. Who's the +fellow that led the charge? I'd give anything to see him and tell him +what I think of it. How Will Napier would have loved him, by George!" + +"Who's the d----d rebel, Jed?" said the General, taking his gin-sling. + +"Think he's an Englishman. We'd give ten thousand dollars for him, alive +or dead: he's fifty devils in one, that _I_ know," responded the Colonel +of Artillery, thus appealed to, a gentlemanlike, quiet man, educated at +West Point. + +"God bless the fellow! I'm glad he's English!" said the English visitor, +heartily, forgetting his Federal situation and companions. "Who is he? +Perhaps I know the name." + +"Should say you would. It's the same as your own--Winton. Bertie Winton, +they call him. Maybe he's a relative of yours!" + +The blood flushed the Englishman's face hotly for a second; then a stern +dark shadow came on it, and his lips set tight. + +"I have no knowledge of him," he said, curtly. + +"Haven't you now? That's curious. Some said he was a son of yours," +pursued the Colonel. + +The old Lion flung back his silvery mane with his haughtiest +imperiousness. + +"No, sir; he's no son of mine." + +Lion Winton sat silent, the dark shadow still upon his face. For five +years no rumor even had reached him of the man he had disowned and +disinherited; he had believed him dead--shot, as he had predicted, after +some fray in a gaming-room abroad; and now he heard of him thus in the +war-news of the American camp! His denial of him was not less stern, +nor his refusal to acknowledge even his name less peremptory, because, +with all his wrath, his bitterness, his inexorable passion, and his +fierce repudiation of him as his son, a thrill of pleasure stirred in +him that the man still lived--a proud triumph swept over him, through +all his darker thoughts, at the magnificent dash and daring of a deed +wholly akin to him. + +Bertie, a listless man about town, a dilettante in pictures, wines, and +women, spending every moment that he could in Paris, gentle as any young +beauty, always bored, and never roused out of that habitual languid +indolent indifferentism which the old man, fiery and impassioned himself +as the Napiers, held the most damnable effeminacy with which the present +generation emasculates itself, had been incomprehensible, antagonistic, +abhorrent to him. Bertie, the Leader of the Eight Hundred, the reckless +trooper of the Virginian Horse, the head of a hundred wild night raids, +the hero of a score of brilliant charges, the chief in the most daring +secret expeditions and the most intrepid cavalry skirmishes of the +South, was far nearer to the old Lion, who had in him all the hot fire +of Crawford's school, with the severe simplicity of Wellington's stern +creeds. "He is true to his blood at last," he muttered, as he tossed +back his silky white hair, while his blue flashing eyes ranged over the +far distance where the Southern lines lay, with something of eager +restlessness; "he is true to his blood at last!" + +There was fighting some days later in the Shenandoah Valley. + +Longstreet's corps, with two regiments of cavalry, had attacked +Sheridan's divisions, and the struggle was hot and fierce. The day was +warm, and a brilliant sun poured down into the green cornland and +woodland wealth of the valley as the Southern divisions came up to the +attack in beautiful precision, and hurled themselves with tremendous +_elan_ on the right front of the Federals, who, covered by their +hastily thrown-up breastworks, opened a deadly fire that raked the whole +Confederate line as they advanced. Men fell by the score under the +murderous mitraille, but the ranks closed up shoulder to shoulder, +without pause or wavering, only maddened by the furious storm of shot, +as the engagement became general and the white rolling clouds of smoke +poured down the valley, and hid conflict and combatants from sight, the +thunder of the musketry pealing from height to height; while in many +places men were fighting literally face to face and hand to hand in a +death-struggle--rare in these days, when the duello of artillery and the +rivalry of breech-loaders begins, decides, and ends most battles. + +On Longstreet's left, two squadrons of Virginian Cavalry were drawn up, +waiting the order to advance, and passionately impatient of delay as +regiment after regiment were sent up to the attack and were lost in the +whirling cloud of dust and smoke, and they were kept motionless, in +reserve. At their head was Bertie Winton, unconscious that, on a hill to +the right, with a group of Federal commanders, his father was looking +down on that struggle in the Shenandoah. Bertie was little altered, save +that on his face there was a sterner look, and in his eyes a keener and +less listless glance; but the old languid grace, the old lazy +gentleness, were there still. They were part of his nature, and nothing +could kill them in him. In the five years that had gone by, none whom he +had known in Europe had ever heard a word of him or from him; he had cut +away all the moorings that bound him to his old life, and had sought to +build up his ruined fortunes, like the penniless soldier that he was, by +his sword alone. So far he had succeeded: he had made his name famous +throughout the States as a bold and unerring cavalry leader, and had won +the personal friendship and esteem of the Chiefs of the Southern +Confederacy. The five years had been filled with incessant adventures, +with ever present peril, with the din of falling citadels, with the +rush of headlong charges, with daring raids in starless autumn nights, +with bivouacs in trackless Western forests, with desert-thirst in +parching summer heats, with winters of such frozen roofless misery as he +had never even dreamed--five years of ceaseless danger, of frequent +suffering, of habitual renunciation; but five years of _life_--real, +vivid, unselfish--and Bertie was a better man for them. What he had done +at the head of Eight Hundred was but a sample of whatever he did +whenever duty called, or opportunity offered, in the service of the +South; and no man was better known or better trusted in all Lee's +divisions than Bertie Winton, who sat now at the head of his regiment, +waiting Longstreet's orders. An aide galloped up before long. + +"The General desires you to charge and break the enemy's square to the +left, Colonel." + +Bertie bowed with the old Pall Mall grace, turned, and gave the word to +advance. Like greyhounds loosed from leash, the squadrons thundered down +the slope, and swept across the plain in magnificent order, charging +full gallop, riding straight down on the bristling steel and levelled +rifles of the enemy's kneeling square. They advanced in superb +condition, in matchless order, coming on with the force of a whirlwind +across the plain; midway they were met by a tremendous volley poured +direct upon them; half their saddles were emptied; the riderless +chargers tore, snorting, bleeding, terrified, out of the ranks; the line +was broken; the Virginians wavered, halted, all but recoiled; it was one +of those critical moments when hesitation is destruction. Bertie saw the +danger, and, with a shout to the men to come on, he spurred his horse +through the raking volley of shot, while a shot struck his sombrero, +leaving his head bare, and urging the animal straight at the Federal +front, lifted him in the air as he would have done before a fence, and +landed him in the midst of the square, down on the points of the +levelled bayonets. With their fierce war-cheer ringing out above the +sullen uproar of the firing, his troopers followed him to a man, charged +the enemy's line, broke through the packed mass opposed to them, cut +their way through into the centre, and hewed their enemies down as +mowers hew the grass. Longstreet's work was done for him; the Federal +square was broken, never again to rally. + +But the victory was bought with a price; as his horse fell, pierced and +transfixed by the crossed steel of the bayonets, a dozen rifles covered +the Confederate leader; their shots rang out, and Bertie Winton reeled +from his saddle and sank down beneath the press as his own Southerners +charged above him in the rush of the onward attack. On an eminence to +the right, through his race-glass, his father watched the engagement, +his eyes seldom withdrawn from the Virginian cavalry, where, for aught +he knew, one of his own blood and name might be--memories of Salamanca +and Quatre Bras, of Moodkee and Ferozeshah, stirring in him, while the +fire of his dead youth thrilled through his veins with the tramp of the +opposing divisions, and he roused like a war-horse at the scent of the +battle as the white shroud of the smoke rolled up to his feet, and the +thunder of the musketry echoed through the valley. Through his glass, he +saw the order given to the troopers held in reserve; he saw the +magnificent advance of that charge in the morning light; he saw the +volley poured in upon them; and he saw them under that shock reel, +stagger, waver, and recoil. The old soldier knew well the critical +danger of that ominous moment of panic and of confusion; then, as the +Confederate Colonel rode out alone and put his horse at that leap on to +the line of steel, into the bristling square, a cry loud as the +Virginian battle-shout broke from him. For when the charger rose in the +air, and the sun shone full on the uncovered head of the Southern +leader, he knew the fair English features that no skies could bronze, +and the fair English hair that blew in the hot wind. He looked once more +upon the man he had denied and had disowned; and, as Bertie Winton +reeled and fell, his father, all unarmed and non-combatant as he was, +drove the spurs into his horse's flanks, and dashing down the steep +hill-side, rode over the heaps of slain, and through the pools of gore, +into the thick of the strife. + +With his charger dead under him, beaten down upon one knee, his +sword-arm shivered by a bullet, while the blood poured from his side +where another shot had lodged, Bertie knew that his last hour had come, +as the impetus of the charge broke above him--as a great wave may sweep +over the head of a drowning man--and left him in the centre of the foe. +Kneeling there, while the air was red before his sight that was fast +growing blind from the loss of blood, and the earth seemed to reel and +rock under him, he still fought to desperation, his sabre in his left +hand; he knew he could not hold out more than a second longer, but while +he had strength he kept at bay. + +His life was not worth a moment's purchase,--when, with a shout that +rang over the field, the old Lion rode down through the carnage to his +rescue, his white hair floating in the wind, his azure eyes flashing +with war-fire, his holster-pistol levelled; spurred his horse through +the struggle, trampled aside all that opposed him, dashed untouched +through the cross-fire of the bullets, shot through the brain the man +whose rifle covered his son who had reeled down insensible, and +stooping, raised the senseless body, lifted him up by sheer manual +strength to the level of his saddle-bow, laid him across his holsters, +holding him up with his right hand, and, while the Federals fell asunder +in sheer amazement at the sudden onslaught, and admiration of the old +man's daring, plunged the rowels into his horse, and, breaking through +the reeking slaughter of the battle-field, rode back, thus laden with +his prisoner, through the incessant fire of the cannonade up the heights +to the Federal lines. + +"If you were to lie dying at my feet!"--his father remembered those +words, that had been spoken five years before in the fury of a deadly +passion, as Bertie lay stretched before him in his tent, the blood +flowing from the deep shot-wound in his side, his eyes closed, his face +livid, and about his lips a faint and ghastly foam. + +Had he saved him too late? had he too late repented? + +His heart had yearned to him when, in the morning light, he had looked +once more upon the face of his son, as the Virginian Horse had swept on +to the shock of the charge; and all of wrath, of bitterness, of hatred, +of dark, implacable, unforgiving vengeance, were quenched and gone for +ever from his soul as he stooped over him where he lay at his feet, +stricken and senseless in all the glory of his manhood. He only knew +that he loved the man--he only knew that he would have died for him, or +died with him. + +Bertie stirred faintly, with a heavy sigh, and his left hand moved +towards his breast. Old Sir Lion bent over him, while his voice shook +terribly, like a woman's. + +"Bertie! My God! don't you know _me_?" + +He opened his eyes and looked wearily and dreamily around; he did not +know what had passed, nor where he was; but a faint light of wonder, of +pleasure, of recognition, came into his eyes, and he smiled--a smile +that was very gentle and very wistful. + +"I am glad of that--before I die! Let us part friends--_now_. They will +tell you I have--redeemed--the name." + +The words died slowly and with difficulty on his lips, and as his +father's hand closed upon his in a strong grasp of tenderness and +reconciliation, his lids closed, his head fell back, and a deep-drawn, +labored sigh quivered through all his frame; and Lion Winton, bowing +down his grand white crest, wept with the passion of a woman. For he +knew not whether the son he loved was living or dead--he knew not +whether he was not at the last too late. + + * * * * * + +Three months further on, Lady Ida Deloraine sat in her warm bright nest +among the exotics, gazing out upon the sunny lawns and the green +woodlands of Northamptonshire. Highest names and proudest titles had +been pressed on her through the five years that had gone, but her +loveliness had been unwon, and was but something more thoughtful, more +brilliant, more exquisite still than of old. The beautiful warmth that +had never come there through all these years was in her cheeks now, and +the nameless lustre was in her eyes, which all those who had wooed her +had never wakened in their antelope brilliancy, as she sat looking +outward at the sunlight; for in her hands lay a camellia, withered, +colorless, and yellow, and eyes gazed down upon the marvellous beauty of +her face which had remembered it in the hush of Virginian forests, in +the rush of headlong charges, in the glare of bivouac fires, in the +silence of night-pickets, and in the din of falling cities. + +And Bertie's voice, as he bent over her, was on her ear. + +"That flower has been on my heart night and day; and since we parted I +have never done that which would have been insult to your memory. I have +tried to lead a better and a purer life; I have striven to redeem my +name and my honor; I have done all I could to wash out the vice and the +vileness of my past. Through all the years we have been severed I have +had no thought, no hope, except to die more worthy of you; but now--oh, +my God!--if you knew how I love you, if you knew how my love alone saved +me----" + +His words broke down in the great passion that had been his redemption; +and as she lifted her eyes upward to his own, soft with tears that had +gathered but did not fall, and lustrous with the light that had never +come there save for him, he bowed his head over her, and, as his lips +met hers, he knew that the redeemed life he laid at her feet was dearer +to her than lives, more stainless, but less nobly won. + + + + +OUR WAGER. + + + + +OUR WAGER; + +OR, + +HOW THE MAJOR LOST AND WON. + + + + +I + +INTRODUCES MAJOR TELFER OF THE 50TH DASHAWAY HUSSARS. + + +The softest of lounging-chairs, an unexceptionable hubble-bubble bought +at Benares, the last _Bell's Life_, the morning papers, chocolate milled +to a T, and a breakfast worthy of Francatelli,--what sensible man can +ask more to make him comfortable? All these was my chum, Hamilton +Telfer, Major (50th Dashaway Hussars), enjoying, and yet he was in a +frame of mind anything but mild and genial. + +"The deuce take the whole sex!" said he, stroking his moustache +savagely. "They're at the bottom of all the mischief going. The idea of +my father at seventy-five, with hair as white as that poodle's, making +such a fool of himself, when here am I, at six-and-thirty, unmarried; +it's abominable, it's disgusting. A girl of twenty, taking in an old man +of his age, for the sake of his money----" + +"But are you sure, Telfer," said I, "that the affair's really on the +tapis?" + +"Sure! Yes," said the Major, with immeasurable disgust. "I never saw her +till last night, but the governor wrote no end of rhapsodies about her, +and as I came upon them he was taking leave of her, holding her hand in +his, and saying, 'I may write to you, may I not?' and the young +hypocrite lifted her eyes so bewitchingly, 'Oh yes, I shall long so much +to hear from you!' She colored when she saw me--well she might! If she +thinks she'll make a fool of my father, and reign paramount at Torwood, +give me a mother-in-law sixteen years younger than myself, and fill the +house and cumber the estates with a lot of wretched little brats, she'll +find herself mistaken, for I'll prevent it, if I live." + +"Don't be too sure of that," said I. "From what I know of Violet +Tressillian, she's not the sort of girl to lure her quarry in vain." + +"Of course she'll try hard," answered Telfer. "She comes of a race that +always were poor and proud; she's an orphan, and hasn't a sou, and to +catch a man like my father worth 15,000_l._ a year, with the surety of a +good dower and jointure house whenever he die, is one of the best things +that could chance to her; but I'll be shot if she ever shall manage it." + +"_Nous verrons._ I bet you my roan filly Calceolaria against your colt +Jockeyclub that before Christmas is out Violet Tressillian will be +Violet Telfer." + +"Done!" cried the Major, stirring his chocolate fiercely. "You'll lose, +Vane; Calceolaria will come to my stables as sure as this mouthpiece is +made of amber. Whenever this scheming little actress changes her name, +it sha'n't be to the same cognomen as mine. I say, it's getting deuced +warm--one must begin to go somewhere. What do you say to going abroad +till the 12th? I've got three months' leave--that will give me one away, +and two on the moor. Will you go?" + +"Yes, if you like; town's emptying gradually, and it is confoundedly +hot. Where shall it be?--Naples--Paris----" + +"Paris in July! Heaven forbid! Why, it would be worse than London in +November. By Jove! I'll tell you where: let's go to Essellau." + +"And where may that be? Somewhere in the Arctic regions, I hope, for +I've spent half my worldly possessions already in sherry and seltzer and +iced punch, and if I go where it's warmer still, I shall be utterly +beggared." + +"Essellau is in Swabia, as you ought to know by this, you Goth. It's +Marc von Edenburgh's place, and a very jolly place, too, I can tell you; +the sport's first-rate there, and the pig-sticking really splendid. He's +just written to ask me to go, and take any fellows I like, as he's got +some English people--some friends of his mother's. (A drawback that--I +wonder who they are.) Will you come, Vane? I can promise you some fun, +if only at the trente-et-quarante tables in Pipesandbeersbad." + +"Oh yes, I'll come," said I. "I hope the English won't be some horrid +snobs he's picked up at some of the balls, who'll be scraping +acquaintance with us when we come back." + +"No fear," said Telfer; "Marc's as English as you or I, and knows the +good breed when he sees them. He'd keep as clear of the Smith, Brown, +and Robinson style as we should. It's settled, then, you'll come. All +right! I wish I could settle that confounded Violet, too, first. I hope +nothing will happen while I'm in Essellau. I don't think it can. The +Tressillian leaves town to-day with the Carterets, and the governor must +stick here till parliament closes, and it's sure to be late this year." + +With which consolatory reflection the Major rose, stretched himself, +yawned, sighed, stroked his moustache, fitted on his lavender gloves, +and rang to order his tilbury round. + +Telfer was an only son, and when he heard it reported that his father +intended to give him a _belle-mere_ in a young lady as attractive as she +was poor, who, if she caught him, would probably make a fool of the old +gentleman in the widest sense of the word, he naturally swore very +heartily, and anything but relished the idea. Hamilton Telfer, senior, +had certainly been a good deal with Violet that season, and Violet, a +girl poor as a rat and beautiful as Semele, talked to him, and sang to +him, and rode with him more than she did with any of us; so people +talked and talked, and said the old member would get caught, and the +Major, when he heard it, waxed fiercely wroth at the folly his parent +had fallen into while he'd been off the scene down at Dover with his +troop, but, like a wise man, said nothing, knowing, both by experience +and observation, that opposition in such affairs is like a patent Vesta +among hayricks. Telfer was a particular chum of mine: we'd lounged about +town, and shot on the moors, and campaigned in India together, and I +don't believe there was a better soldier, a cooler head, a quicker eye, +or a steadier hand in the service than he was. He was six-and-thirty +now, and had seen life pretty well, I can tell you, for there was not a +get-at-able corner of the globe that he hadn't looked at through his +eye-glass. Tall and muscular, with a stern, handsome face, with the +prospect of Torwood (where there's some of the best shooting in England, +I give you my word), and 15,000_l._ a year, Telfer was a great card in +the matrimonial line, but hadn't let himself be played as yet, for the +petty trickery the women used in trying to get him dealt to them +disgusted him, and small wonder. Men liked him cordially, women thought +him cold and sarcastic; and he was much more genial, I admit, at mess, +or at lansquenet, or in the smoking-room of the U. S., than he was in +boudoirs and ball-rooms, as the mere knowledge that mammas and their +darlings were trying to hook him made him get on his stilts at once. + +"I don't feel easy in my mind about the governor," said he, as we drove +along to the South-Eastern Station a few days after on our way to +Essellau. "As I was bidding him good-bye this morning, Soames brought +him a letter in a woman's hand. Heaven knows he may have a score of fair +correspondents for anything I care, but if I thought it was the +Tressillian, devil take her----" + +"And the devil won't have had a prettier prize since Proserpine was +stolen," said I. + +"No, confound it, I saw she was handsome enough," swore the Major, +disgusted; "and a pretty face always did make a fool of my father, +according to his own telling. Well, thank God, I don't take that +weakness after him. I never went mad about any woman. You've just as +much control over love, if you like, as over a quiet shooting pony; and +if it don't suit you to gallop, you can rein up and give over the sport. +Any man who's anything of a philosopher needn't fall in love unless he +likes." + +"Were you never in love, then, old boy?" I asked. + +"Of course I have been. I've made love to no end of women in my time; +but when one love was died out I took another, as I take a cigar, and +never wept over the quenched ashes. You need never fall in love unless +it's convenient, and as to caring for a girl who don't care for you, +that's a contemptible weakness, and one I don't sympathize with at all. +Come along, or the train will be off." + +He went up to the carriages, opened a door, shut it hastily, and turned +away, with the frigid bow with which Telfer, in common with every other +Briton, can say, "Go to the devil," as plainly as if he spoke. + +"By Jove!" said I, "what's that eccentric move? Did you see the Medusa +in that carriage, or a baby?" + +"Something quite as bad," said he, curtly. "I saw the Tressillian and +her aunt. For Heaven's sake, let's get away from them. I'd rather have a +special train, if it cost me a fortune, than travel with that girl, +boxed up for four hours in the same compartment with such a little +intrigante." + +"Calm your mind, old fellow; if she's aiming at your governor she won't +hit you. She can't be your wife and your mother-in-law both," laughed +Fred Walsham, a good-natured little chap in the Carabiniers, a friend of +Von Edenburgh, who was coming with us. + +"I'll see her shot before she's either," said Telfer, fiercely stroking +his moustache. + +"Hush! the deuce! hold your tongue," said Walsham, giving him a push. +For past us, so close that the curling plumes in her hat touched the +Major's shoulder, floated the "little intrigante" in question, who'd +come out of her carriage to see where a pug of hers was put. She'd heard +all we said, confound it, for her head was up, her color bright, and she +looked at Telfer proudly and disdainfully, with her dark eyes flashing. +Telfer returned it to the full as haughtily, for he never shirked the +consequences of his own actions ('pon my life, they looked like a great +stag and a little greyhound challenging each other), and Violet swept +away across the platform. + +"You've made an enemy for life, Telfer," said Walsham, as we whisked +along. + +"So much the better, if I'm a rock ahead to warn her off a marriage with +the governor," rejoined the Major, smoking, as he always did, under the +officials' very noses. "I hope I sha'n't come across her again. If the +Tressillian and I meet, we shall be about as amicable as a rat and a +beagle. Take a weed, Fred. I do it on principle to resist unjust +regulations. Why shouldn't we take a pipe if we like? A man whose +olfactory nerves are so badly organized as to dislike Cavendish is too +great a muff to be considered." + +As ill luck would have it, when we crossed to Dover, who should cross, +too, but the Tressillian and her party--aunt, cousins, maid, courier, +and pug. Telfer wouldn't see them, but got on the poop, as far away as +ever he could from the spot where Violet sat nursing her dog and +reading a novel, provokingly calm and comfortable to the envious eyes of +all the _malades_ around her. + +"Good Heavens!" said he, "was anything ever so provoking? Just because +that girl's my particular aversion, she must haunt me like this. If +she'd been anybody I wanted to meet, I should never have caught a +glimpse of her. For mercy's sake, Vane, if you see a black hat and white +feather anywhere again, tell me, and we'll change the route +immediately." + +Change the route we did, for, going on board the steamer at Duesseldorf, +there, on the deck, stood the Tressillian. Telfer turned sharp on his +heel, and went back as he came. "I'll be shot if I go down the Rhine +with her. Let's cut across into France." Cut across we did, but we +stopped at Brussels on our way; and when at last we caught sight of the +tops of the fir-trees around Essellau, Telfer took a long whiff at his +pipe with an air of contentment. "I should say we're safe now. She'll +hardly come pig-sticking into the middle of Swabia." + + + + +II. + +VIOLET TRESSILLIAN. + + +Essellau was a very jolly place, with thick woods round it, and the +river Beersbad running in sight; and his pretty sister, the Comtesse +Virginie, his good wines, and good sport, made Von Edenburgh's a +pleasant house to visit at. Marc himself, who is in the Austrian service +(he was winged at Montebello the other day by a rascally Zouave, but he +paid him off for it, as I hope his countrymen will eventually pay off +all the Bonapartists for their _galimatias_)--Marc himself was a jolly +fellow, a good host, a keen shot, and a capital ecarte player, and made +us enjoy ourselves at Essellau as he had done before, hunting and +shooting with Telfer down at Torwood. + +"I've some countrywomen of yours here, Telfer," said Marc, after we'd +talked over his English loves, given him tiding of duchesses and +danseuses, and messages from no end of pretty women that he'd flirted +with the Christmas before. "They're some friends of my mother's, and +when they were at Baden-Baden last year, Virginie struck up a desperate +young lady attachment with one of them----" + +"Are they good-looking?--because, if they are, they may be drysalters' +daughters, and I shan't care," interrupted Fred. + +Telfer stroked his moustache with a contemptuous smile--_he_ wouldn't +have looked at a drysalter's daughter if she'd had all the beauty of +Amphitrite. + +"Come and see," said Marc. "Virginie will think you're neglecting her +atrociously." + +Horribly bored to be going to meet some Englishwomen who might turn out +to be Smiths or Joneses, and would, to a dead certainty, spoil all his +pleasure in pig-sticking, shooting, and ecarte, by flirting with him +whether he would or no, the Major strode along corridors and galleries +after Von Edenburgh. When at length we reached the salon where Virginie +and her mother and friends were, Telfer lifted his eyes from the ground +as the door opened, started as if he'd been shot, and stepped back a +pace or two, with an audible, "If that isn't the very devil!" + +There, in a low chair, sat the Tressillian, graceful as a Sphakiote +girl, with a toilet as perfect as her profile, dark hair like waves of +silk, and dark eyes full of liquid light, that, when they looked +irresistible, could do anything with any man that they liked. Violet +certainly looked as unlike that unlucky ogre and scapegoat, the devil, +as a young lady ever could. But worse than a score of demons was she in +poor Telfer's eyes: to have come out to Essellau only to be shut up in a +country-house for a whole month with his pet aversion!--certainly it +_was_ a hard case, and the fierce lightning glance he flashed on her was +pardonable under the circumstances. But nobody's more impassive than the +Major: I've seen him charge down into the Sikhs with just the same calm, +quiet expression as he'd wear smoking and reading a novel at home; so he +soon rallied, bowed to the Tressillian, who gave him an inclination as +cold as the North Pole, shook hands with her aunt and cousins (three +women I hate: the mamma's the most dexterous of manoeuvrers, and the +girls the arrantest of flirts), and then sat down to a little quiet chat +with Virginie von Edenburgh, who's pretty, intelligent, and unaffected, +though she's a belle at the Viennese court. Telfer was pleasant with the +little comtesse; he'd known her from childhood, and she was engaged to +the colonel of Marc's troop, so that Telfer felt quite sure she'd no +designs upon him, and talked to her _sans gene_, though to have wholly +abstained from bitterness and satire would have been an impossibility to +him, with the obnoxious Tressillian seated within sight. Once he fixed +her with his calm gray eyes, she met them with a proud flashing glance; +Telfer gave back the defiance, and _guerre a outrance_ was declared +between them. It was plain to see that they hated one another by +instinct, and I began to think Calceolaria wasn't so safe in my stables +after all, for if the Major set his face against anything, his father, +who pretty well worshipped him, would never venture to do it in +opposition; he'd as soon think of leaving Torwood to the country, to be +turned into an infirmary or a museum. + +That whole day Telfer was agreeable to the Von Edenburgh, distantly +courteous to the Carterets, and utterly oblivious of the very existence +of the Tressillian. When we were smoking together, after dinner, he +began to unburden himself of his mighty wrath. + +"Where the deuce did you pick up that girl, Marc?" asked he, as we stood +looking at the sun setting over the woods of Essellau, and crimsoning +the western clouds. + +"What girl?" asked Marc. + +"That confounded Tressillian," answered the Major, gloomily. + +"I told you the Carterets were friends of my mother's, and last year, +when the Tressillian came with them to Baden, Virginie met her, and they +were struck with a great and sudden love for one another, after the +insane custom of women. But why on earth, Telfer, do you call her such +names? I think her divine; her eyes are something----" + +"I wish her eyes had been at the devil before she'd bewitched my poor +father with them," said Telfer, pulling a rose to pieces fiercely. "I +give you my word, Marc, that if I didn't like you so well, I'd go +straight off home to-morrow. Here have I been turning out of my route +twenty times, on purpose to avoid her, and then she must turn up at the +very place I thought I was sure to be safe from her. It's enough to make +a man swear, I should say, and not over-mildly either." + +"But what's she done?" cried Von Edenburgh, thinking, I dare say, that +Telfer had gone clean mad. "Refused you--jilted you--what is it?" + +"Refused me! I should like to see myself giving her the chance," said +the Major, with intense scorn. "No but she's done what I'd never +forgive--tried to cozen the poor old governor into marrying her. She's +no money, you know, and no home of her own; but, for all that, for a +girl of twenty to try and hook an old man of seventy-five, to cheat him +into the idea that he's made a conquest, and chisel him into the belief +that she's in love with him--faugh! the very idea disgusts one. What +sort of a wife would a woman make who could act such a lie?" + +As he spoke, a form swept past him, and a beautiful face full of scorn +and passion gleamed on him through the _demi-lumiere_. + +"By Jove! you've done it now, Telfer," said Walsham. "She was behind us, +I bet you, gathering those roses; her hands are full of them, and she +took that means of showing us she was within earshot. You _have_ set +your foot in it nicely, certainly." + +"_Ce m'est bien egal_," said Telfer, haughtily. "If she hear what I say +of her, so much the better. It's the truth, that a young girl who'd sell +herself for money, as soon as she's got what she wanted will desert the +man who's given it to her; and I like my father too well to stand by and +see him made a fool of. The Tressillian and I are open foes now--we'll +see which wins." + +"And a very fair foe you have, too," thought I, as I looked at Violet +that night as she stood in the window, a wreath of lilies on her +splendid hair, and her impassioned eyes lighting into joyous laughter as +she talked nonsense with Von Edenburgh. + +"Isn't she first-rate style, in spite of your prejudice?" I said to +Telfer, who'd just finished a game at ecarte with De Tintiniac, one of +the best players in Europe. If the Major has any weakness, ecarte is one +of them. He just glanced across with a sarcastic smile. + +"Well got up, of course; so are all actresses--on the stage." + +Then he dropped his glass and went back to his cards, and seemed to +notice the splendid Tressillian not one whit more than he did her pup. + +Whether his discourteous speeches had piqued Violet into showing off her +best paces, or whether it's a natural weakness of her sex to shine in +all times and places that they can, certain it was that I never saw the +Tressillian more brilliant and bewitching than she was that night. +Waltzing with Von Edenburgh, singing with me, talking fun with Fred, or +merely lying back in her chair, playing lazily with her bouquet, she was +eminently dangerous in whatever she did, and there wasn't a man in the +castle who didn't gather round her, except her sworn foe the Major. Even +De Tintiniac, that old campaigner at the green tables, who has long ago +given over any mistress save hazard, glanced once or twice at the superb +eyes beaming with the _droit de conquete_, but Telfer never looked up +from his cards. + +Telfer and she parted with the chilliest of "good nights," and met again +in the morning with the most frigid of "good mornings," and to that +simple exchange of words was their colloquy limited for an entire +fortnight. Unless I'd been witness of it, I wouldn't have credited that +any two people could live for that space of time in the same +country-house and keep so distant. Nobody noticed it, for there were no +end of guests at Essellau, and the Tressillian had so many liege +subjects ready to her slightest bidding, that the Major's _lese-majeste_ +wasn't of such consequence. But when day after day came, and he spent +them all boar-hunting, shooting, fishing, or playing rouge-et-noir and +roulette at the gaming-tables in Pipesandbeersbad, and when he was in +the drawing-rooms at Essellau she saw him amusing and agreeable, and +unbending to every one but herself, I don't know anything of woman's +nature if I didn't see Violet's delicate cheek flush, and her eyes +flash, whenever she caught the Major's cool, contemptuous, depreciating +glance, much harder to her sex to bear than spoken ridicule or open war. +Occasionally he cast a sarcasm, quick, sharp, and relentless as a Minie +ball, at her, which she fired back with such rifle-powder as she had in +her flask; but the return shot fell as harmlessly as it might have done +on Achilles's breast. + +"A man is very silly to marry," he was saying one evening to Marc, +"since, as Emerson says, from the beginning of the world such as are in +the institution want to get out, and such as are out want to get in." + +Violet, sitting near at the piano, turned half round. "If all others are +of my opinion, Major Telfer, you will never be tempted, for no one will +be willing to enter it with you." + +The shot fell short. Telfer neither smiled nor looked annoyed, but +answered, tranquilly,-- + +"Possibly; but my time is to come. When I own Torwood, ladies will be as +kind to me as they are now to my father; for it is wonderful what a +charm to renew youth, reform rakes, buy love, and make the Beast the +Beauty, is '_un peu de poudre d'or_,' in the eyes of the _beau sexe_." + +The Tressillian flushed scarlet, but soon recovered herself. + +"I have heard," she said, pulling her bouquet to pieces with impatience, +"that when people look through smoked glass the very sun looks dusky, +and so I suppose, through your own moral perceptions, you view those of +others. You know what De la Fayette wrote to Madame de Sable: '_Quelle +corruption il faut avoir dans l'esprit pour etre capable d'imaginer tout +cela!_'" + +"It does not follow," answered Telfer, impassively. "De la Fayette was +quite wrong. Suard was nearer the truth when he said that Rochefoucauld, +'_a peint les hommes comme il les a vus. Il n'appartenait qu'a un homme +d'une reputation bien pure et bien distinguee d'oser fletrir ainsi le +principe de toutes les actions humaines._'" + +"And Major Telfer is so unassailable himself that he can mount his +pedestal and censure all weaker mortals," said Violet, sarcastically. +"Your judgments are, perhaps, not always as infallible as the gods'." + +"You are gone very wide of the original subject, Miss Tressillian," +answered Telfer, coldly. "I was merely speaking of that common social +fraud and falsehood, a _mariage de convenance_, which, as I shall never +sin in that manner myself, I am at liberty to censure with the scorn I +feel for it." + +He looked hard at her as he spoke. The Tressillian's eyes answered the +stare as haughtily. + +"Some may not be all _mariages de convenance_ that you choose to call +such. It does not necessarily follow, because a girl marries a rich man, +that she marries him for his money. There _may_ be love in the case, but +the world never gives her the grace of the doubt." + +"What hardy hypocrisy," thought Telfer. "She'd actually try to persuade +me to my face that she was in love with the poor old governor and his +gout!" + +"Pardon me," he said, with his most cynical smile. "In attributing +disinterested affection to ladies, I think '_quelque disposition qu'ait +le monde a mal juger, il fait plus souvent grace au faux merite qu'il ne +fait injustice au veritable_.'" + +The Tressillian's soft lips curved angrily; she turned away, and began +to sing again, at Walsham's entreaty. Telfer got up and lounged over to +Virginie, with whom he laughed, talked, waltzed, and played chess for +the rest of the evening. + + + + +III. + +FROM WHICH IT WOULD APPEAR, THAT IT IS SOMETIMES WELL TO BEGIN WITH A +LITTLE AVERSION. + + +After this split, Telfer and the Tressillian were rather further off +each other than before; and whenever riding, and driving, at dinner, or +in lionizing, they came by chance together, he avoided her silently as +much as ever he could, without making a parade of it. Violet could see +very well how cordially he hated her, and, woman-like, I dare say mine, +and Edenburgh's, and Walsham's, and all her devoted friends' admiration +was valueless, as long as her vowed enemy treated her with such careless +contempt. + +One morning the two foes met by chance. Telfer and I, after a late night +over at Pipesandbeersbad, with lansquenet, cheroots, and cognac, had +betaken ourselves out to whip the Beersbad, whose fish, for all their +boiling by the hot springs, are first-rate, I can assure you. Telfer +tells you he likes fishing, but I never see that he does much more than +lie full length under the shadiest tree he can find, with his cap over +his eyes and his cigar in his mouth, doing the _dolce_ lazily enough. A +three-pound trout had no power to rouse him; and he's lost a salmon +before now in the Tweed because it bored him to play it! Shade of old +Izaak! is _that_ liking fishing? But few things ever did excite him, +except it was a charge, or a Kaffir scrimmage; and then he looked more +like a concentrated tempest than anything else, and woe to the turban +that his sabre came down upon. + +That part of the stream we'd tried first had been whipped before us, or +the fish wouldn't bite; and I, who haven't as much patience as I might +have, went up higher to try my luck. Telfer declined to come; he was +comfortable, he said, and out of the sun; he preferred "Indiana" and his +cheroot to catching all the fish in the Beersbad, so I bid him good-bye, +and left him smoking and reading at his leisure under the linden-trees. +I went further on than I had meant, up round a bend of the river, and +was too absorbed in filling my basket to notice a storm coming up from +the west, till I began to find myself getting wet to the skin, and the +lightning flying up and down the hills round Essellau. I looked for the +Major as I passed the lime-trees, but he wasn't there, and I made the +best of my way back to the castle, supposing he'd got there before me; +but I was mistaken. + +"I've seen nothing of him," said Marc. "He's stalking about the woods, I +dare say, admiring the lightning. That's more than the poor Tressillian +does, I bet. She went out by herself, I believe, just before the storm, +to get a water-lily she wanted to paint, and hasn't appeared since. By +Jove! if Telfer should have to play knight-errant to his 'pet aversion,' +what fun it would be." + +Marc had his fun, for an hour afterwards, when the storm had blown over, +up the terrace steps came Violet and the Major. They weren't talking to +each other, but they were actually walking together; and the courtesy +with which he put a dripping rose-branch out of her path with his stick, +was something quite new. + +It seems that Telfer, disliking disagreeable sensations, and classing +getting wet among such, had arisen when the thunder began to growl, and +slowly wended his way homewards. But before he was halfway to Essellau +the rain began to drip off his moustache, and seeing a little marble +temple (the Parthenon turned into a summer-house!) close by, he thought +he might as well go in and have another weed till it grew finer. Go in +he did; and he'd just smoked half a cigar, and read the last chapter of +"Indiana," when he looked up, and saw the Tressillian's pug, looking a +bedraggled and miserable object, at his feet, and the Tressillian +herself standing within a few yards of him. If Telfer had abstained from +a few fierce mental oaths, he would have been of a much more pacific +nature than he ever pretended to be; and I don't doubt that he looked +hauteur concentrated as he rose at his enemy's entrance. Violet made a +movement of retreat, but then thought better of it. It would have seemed +too much like flying from the foe. So with a careless bow she sank on +one of the seats, took off her hat, shook the rain-drops off her hair, +and busied herself in sedulous attentions to the pug. The Major thought +it incumbent on him to speak a few sentences about the thunder that was +cracking over their heads; Violet answered him as briefly; and Telfer +putting down his cigar with a sigh, sat watching the storm in silence, +not troubling himself to talk any more. + +As she bent down to pat the pug she caught his eyes on her with a cold, +critical glance. He was thinking how pure her profile was and how +exquisite her eyes, and--of how cordially he should hate her if his +father married her. Her color rose, but she met his look steadily, which +is a difficult thing to do if you've anything to conceal, for the +Major's eyes are very keen and clear. Her lips curved with a smile half +amused, half disdainful. "What a pity, Major Telfer," she said, with a +silvery laugh, "that you should be condemned to imprisonment with one +who is unfortunately such a _bete noire_ to you as I am! I assure you, I +feel for you; if I were not coward enough to be a little afraid of that +lightning, I would really go away to relieve you from your sufferings. I +should feel quite honored by the distinction of your hatred if I didn't +know, you, on principle, dislike every woman living. Is your judgment +always infallible?" + +Beyond a little surprise in his eyes, Telfer's features were as +impassive as ever. "Far from it," he answered, quietly "I merely judge +people by their actions." + +The Tressillian's luminous eyes flashed proudly. "An unsafe guide, Major +Telfer; you cannot judge of actions until you know their motives. I know +perfectly well why you dislike and avoid me: you listened to a foolish +report, and you heard me giving your father permission to write to me. +Those are your grounds, are they not?" + +Telfer, for once in his life, _was_ astonished, but he looked at her +fixedly. "And were they not just ones?" + +"No," said Violet, vehemently,--"no, they were most rankly unjust; and +it is hard, indeed, if a girl, who has no friends or advisers that she +can trust, may not accept the kindness and ask the counsels of a man +fifty-five years older than herself without his being given to her as a +lover, and the world's whispering that she is trying to entrap him. You +pique yourself on your clear-sightedness, Major Telfer, but for once +your judgment failed you when you attributed such mean and mercenary +motives to me, and supposed, because, as you so generously stated, I had +'no money and no home,' I must necessarily have no heart or conscience, +but be ready to give myself at any moment to the highest bidder, and +take advantage of the kindness of your noble-minded, generous-hearted +father to trick him into marriage." She stopped, fairly out of breath +with excitement. Telfer was going to speak, but she silenced him with a +haughty gesture. "No; now we are started on the subject, hear me to the +end. You have done me gross injustice--an offence the Tressillians never +forgive--but, for my own sake, I wish to show you how mistaken you were +in your hasty condemnation. At the beginning of the season I was +introduced to your father. He knew my mother well in her girlhood, and +he said I reminded him of her. He was very kind to me, and I, who have +no real friend on earth, of course was grateful to him, for I was +thankful to have any one on whom I could rely. You know, probably as +well as I do, that there is little love lost between the Carterets and +myself, though, by my father's will, I must stay with them till I am of +age. I have one brother, a boy of eighteen; he is with his regiment +serving out in India, and the climate is killing him by inches, though +he is too brave to try and get sick leave. Your father has been doing +all he can to have him exchanged; the letters I have had from him have +been to tell me of his success, and to say that Arthur is gazetted to +the Buffs, and coming home overland. There is the head and front of my +offending, Major Telfer; a very simple explanation, is it not? Perhaps +another time you will be more cautious in your censure." + +A faint flush came over the Major's bronzed cheek; he looked out of the +portico, and was silent for a minute. The knowledge that he has wronged +another is a keen pang to a proud man of an honor almost fastidious in +his punctilio of right. He swung quickly round, and held out his hand to +her. + +"I beg your pardon; I have misjudged you, and I am thoroughly ashamed of +myself for it," he said, in a low voice. + +When the Major does come down from his hauteur, and let some of his +winning cordial nature come out, no woman living, unless she were some +animated Medusa, could find it in her heart to say him nay. His frank +self-condemnation touched Violet, despite herself, and, without +thinking, she laid her small fingers in his proffered hand. Then the +Tressillian pride flashed up again; she drew it hastily away, and walked +out into the air. + +"Pray do not distress yourself," she said, with an effort (not +successful) to seem perfectly calm and nonchalant. "It is not of the +slightest consequence; we understand each other's sentiments now, and +shall in future be courteous in our hate like two of the French +_noblesse_, complimenting one another before they draw their swords to +slay or to be slain. It has cleared now, so I will leave you to the +solitude I disturbed. Come, Floss." And calling the pug after her, +Violet very gracefully swept down the steps, but with a stride the Major +was at her side. + +"Nay, Miss Tressillian," he said, gently, "it is true I've given you +cause to think me as rude as Orson or Caliban, but I am not quite such a +bear as to let you walk home through these woods alone." + +Violet made an impatient movement. "Pray don't trouble yourself. We are +close to the castle, and--pardon me, but truth-telling seems the order +for the day--I much prefer you in your open enmity to your simulated +courtesy. We have been rude to each other for three weeks; in another +one you will be gone, so it is scarcely worth while to begin politeness +now." + +"As you please," said Telfer, coldly. + +He'd made great advances and concessions for him, and was far too +English when repulsed to go on making any more. But he was +astonished--extremely so--for he'd been courted and sought since he was +in jackets, and couldn't make out a young girl like the Tressillian +treating him so lightly. He walked along beside her in profound silence, +but though neither of them spoke a word, he didn't leave her side till +she was safe on the terrace at Essellau. The Major was very grave that +night at dinner, and occasionally he looked at Violet with a strange, +inquiring glance, as the young lady, in the most brilliant of spirits, +fired away French repartees with Von Edenburgh and De Tintiniac, her +face absolutely _rayonnant_ in the gleam of the wax lights. I thought +the spirits were a little too high to be real. Late at night, as he and +I and Marc were smoking on the terrace, before turning in, Telfer +constrained himself to tell us of the scene in the summer-house. He'd +abused her to us. Common honor, he said, obliged him to tell us the +truth about her. + +"I am sorry," said he, slowly, between the whiffs of his meerschaum. "If +there is one thing I hate, it is injustice. I was never guilty of +misjudging anybody before in my life, that I know of; and, I give you my +word, I experienced a new sensation--I absolutely felt humbled before +that girl's great, flashing, truthful eyes, to think that I'd been +listening to report and judging from prejudice like any silly, gossiping +woman." + +"It seems to have made a great impression on you, Telfer," laughed Marc. +"Has your detestation of Violet changed to something as warm, but more +gentle? Shall we have to say the love wherewith he loves her is greater +than the hate wherewith he hated her?" + +"Not exactly," answered the Major, calmly, with a supercilious twist of +his moustaches. "But I like pluck wherever I see it, and she's a true +Tressillian." + + + + +IV. + +IN WHICH THE MAJOR PROVOKES A QUARREL IN BEHALF OF THE FAIR TRESSILLIAN. + + +"Well, Telfer," said I, two mornings after, "if you want to be at the +moor by the 12th, we must start soon; this is the 6th. It will be sharp +work to get there as it is." + +"What, do you think of not going at all?" said Telfer, laying down the +_Revue des deux Mondes_ with a yawn. "We are very well here. Marc +bothers me tremendously to stay on another month, and the shooting's as +good as we shall get at Glenattock. What do you say, Vane?" + +"Just as you like," I answered. "The pigs are as good as the grouse, for +anything I know. They put me in mind of getting my first spear at +Burampootra. I only thought you wanted to be off out of sight of the +Tressillian." + +He laughed slightly. "Oh! the young lady's no particular eyesore to me +now I don't regard her in the light of a _belle-mere_. Well, shall we +stop here, then?" + +"_Comme vous voulez._ I don't care." + +"No philosopher ever moves when he's comfortable," said the Major, +laughing. "I'll write and tell Montague he can shoot over Glenattock if +he likes. I dare say he can find some men who'll keep him company and +fill the box. I say, old fellow, I've won Calceolaria, but I sha'n't +have her, because I consider the bet drawn. Our wager was laid on the +supposition that the Tressillian wished to marry the governor, but as +she never has had the desire, I've neither lost nor won." + +"Well, we'll wait and see," said I. "Christmas isn't come yet. Here +comes Violet. She looks well, don't she? Confess now, prejudice apart, +that you admire her, _nolens volens_." + +Telfer looked at her steadily as she came into the billiard-room in her +hat and habit, as she'd been riding with Lucy Carteret, Marc, and De +Tintiniac. "Yes," he said, slowly, under his breath, "she is very good +style, I admit." + +Lucy Carteret challenged Telfer to a game; she has a tall, _svelte_ +figure, and knows she looks well at billiards. He played lazily, and let +her win easily enough, paying as little attention to the _agaceries_ and +glances she lavished upon him as if he'd been an automaton. When they'd +played it out, he went up to the Tressillian, who was talking to Marc in +the window, and, to my supreme astonishment, asked her to have a game. + +"Thank you, no," answered Violet, coldly; "it is too warm for +billiards." + +This was certainly the first time the Major had ever been refused in any +of his overtures to her sex, and I believe it surprised him exceedingly. +He bent his head, and soon after he went for a walk in the rosery with +Lucy Carteret, whom he hates. We always hate those manoeuvring, +_maniere_ girls, who are everlastingly flinging bait after us, whether +or no we want to nibble; and just in proportion as they fixatrice, and +crinoline, and cosmetique to hook us, will leave us to die in the sun +when they've once trapped us into the basket. + +That night, when Telfer sat down to ecarte, Violet was singing in +another room, out of which her voice came distinctly to us. I noticed he +didn't play quite as well as usual. I don't suppose he could be +listening, though, for he doesn't care for music, and still less for +the Tressillian. + +"Mademoiselle," said De Tintiniac, going up to her afterwards, "you can +boast of greater conquests than Orpheus. He only charmed rocks, but you +have distracted the two most inveterate _joueurs_ in Europe." + +Telfer looked annoyed. Violet laughed. "Pardon me if I doubt your +compliment. If you were so kind as to listen to me, I have not enough +vanity to think that your opponent would yield to what _he_ would think +such immeasurable weakness." + +"You are not magnanimous, Miss Tressillian," said Telfer, in a low tone, +leaning down over the piano. "You are ceaselessly reminding me of a +hasty prejudice, unjustly formed, of which I have told you I am heartily +ashamed." + +"A hasty prejudice!" repeated Violet. "I beg your pardon, Major Telfer; +I think ours is a very strong and lasting enmity, as mutual as it is +well founded. Don't contradict me; you know you could have shot me with +as little remorse as a partridge." + +"But can you never forget," continued Telfer, impatiently, "that my +enmity, as you please to term it, was grafted on erroneous opinions and +false reports, and will you never credit that when I see myself in the +wrong, I am too just to others to continue in it?" + +The Tressillian laughed--a mischievous, _provoquant_ laugh. "No, I +believe neither in sudden conversions nor sudden friendships. Pray do +not trouble yourself to be 'just' to me; you see I did not droop and die +under the shadow of your wrath." + +"Oh no," said Telfer, with a sardonic twist of his moustaches, "one +would not accuse you of too much softness, Miss Tressillian." + +She colored, and the pride of her family flashed out of her eyes. The +Tressillians are all deucedly proud, and would die sooner than yield an +inch. "If by softness you mean weakness, you are right," she said, +haughtily. "As I have told you, we never forgive injustice." + +Telfer frowned. If there was one thing he hated more than another, it +was a woman who had anything hard about her. He smiled his chilliest +smile. "Those are harsh words from a lady's lips--not so becoming to +them as something gentler. You remind me, Miss Tressillian, of a young +panther I once had, beautiful to look at, but eminently dangerous to +approach, much less to caress. Everybody admired my panther, but no one +dared to choose it for a pet." + +With this uncourteous allegory the Major turned away, leaving Violet to +make it out as best she might. It was good fun to watch the +Tressillian's face: I only, standing near, had caught what he said, for +he had spoken very low. First she looked haughty and annoyed, then a +little troubled and perplexed: she sat quiet a minute, playing +thoughtfully with her bracelets; then shook her head with a movement of +defiance, and began to sing a Venetian barcarole with more _elan_ and +spirit than ever. + +"By Jove! Telfer," said I, as we sat in the smoking-room that night, +"your would-have-been mother-in-law has plenty of pluck. She'd have kept +you in good training, and made a better boy of you; it's quite a loss to +your morals that your father didn't marry her." + +Telfer didn't look best pleased. He stretched himself full length on one +of the divans, and answered not. + +"I shouldn't be surprised if, with all her beauty, she hangs on hand," +said Walsham, "for she hasn't a rap, you know; her governor gamed it all +away, and she's certainly a bit of a flirt." + +"I don't think so," said Telfer, shortly. + +"Oh, by George! don't you? but I do," cried Fred. "Why, she takes a turn +at us all, from old De Tintiniac, with his padded figure and coulisses +compliments, to Marc, young and beautiful, as the novels say,--but we'll +spare his blushes--from Vane, there, with his long rent-roll, to poor +me, who she knows goes on tick for my weeds and gloves. She flirts with +us all, one after the other, except you, whom she don't dare to touch. +Tell me where you get your _noli me tangere_ armor, Telfer, and I'll +adopt it to-morrow, for the girls make such desperate love to me I know +some of them will propose before long." + +Telfer smoked vigorously during Fred's peroration, and his brow +darkened. "I do not consider Miss Tressillian a flirt," he said, slowly. +"She's too careless in showing you her weak points to be trying to trap +you. What _I_ call a coquette is a woman who is all things to all men, +whose every languishing glance is a bait, and whose every thought is a +conquest." + +"And pray how can you tell but what the Tressillian's naturalness and +carelessness may be only a superior bit of acting? The highest art, you +know, is to imitate nature so close that you can't tell which is which," +laughed Walsham. + +Telfer didn't seem to relish the suggestion, but went on smoking +fiercely. + +"Not that I want to speak against the girl," Fred went on; "she's very +amusing, and well enough, I dare say, if she weren't so devilish proud." + +"You seem rather inconsistent," said Telfer, impatiently. "First, you +accuse her of being too free, and then blame her for being too +reserved." + +Walsham laughed. + +"If I'm inconsistent, you're a perfect weathercock. A month ago you were +calling Violet every name you could think of, and now you snap us all +off short if we say a word against her." + +Telfer looked haughty enough to extinguish Fred upon the spot; Fred +being a small, lively little chap, with not the slightest dignity about +him. + +"I know little or nothing of Miss Tressillian, but as I was the first +to prejudice you all against her, it is only common honor to take her +part when I think her unjustly attacked." + +Fred gave me a wink of intense significance, but remonstrated no +further, for Telfer had something of the dark look upon him that our men +knew so well when he led them down to the slaughter at Alma and +Balaklava. + +"I tell you," continued the Major, after a little silence, "that I am +disgusted with myself for having listened to whispers and reports, and +believed in them just because they suited the bias of my prejudice. It +didn't matter to me whom my father married, as far as money went, for +beyond 10,000_l._ or so, it must all come in the entail; but I couldn't +endure the idea of his being chiselled by some Becky Sharp or Blanche +Armory, and I made up my mind that the Tressillian was of that genre. +I've changed my opinion now. I don't think she either is an actress or +an intrigante; and I should be a coward indeed if I hesitated to say so, +out of common justice to a young girl who has no one to defend her." + +"Bravo, my boy!" said Walsham; "I thought the Tressillian's bright eyes +wouldn't let you hate her long. You're quite right, though 'pon my life +it is really horrid how women contrive to damage each other. If there's +an unlucky girl who has made the best match of the season--she might be +an angel from heaven--her bosom-friends would manage gently to spread +abroad the interesting facts that she's a 'dreadful flirt,' 'has a snub +nose,' is an awful temper, had a ballet-girl for her mamma, or something +detrimental. An attractive woman is the target for all her sex to shoot +their sneers at, and if the poor thing isn't so riddled with arrows that +she's no beauty left, it isn't her sisters' fault." + +"I believe you," said Telfer. "My gauge of a woman's fascinations is the +amount of hatred all the others bear her. It often amuses me to hear the +tone that ladies take in talking of some girl whom we admire. She's a +charming creature--a darling--their particular friend but ... there's +always a 'but' to neutralize the praise, and with their honeyed hatred +they contrive to damn the luckless object irretrievably. If another +man's a good shot, or whip, or billiard-player, we're not spiteful to +him for it. We think him a good fellow, and like him the better; but the +dear _beau sexe_ cannot bear a rival, and never rest while one of their +acquaintance has diamonds a carat larger, dresses a trifle more costly, +has finer horses, or more conquests. The only style of friend I ever +heard women speak well of is some plain and timorous individual, +good-natured to foolery, and weak as water, who never comes in their +orbit, and whom we never look at; and then what a darling she is, and +how eloquently they will laud her to the skies, despising her miserably +all the while for not having been born pretty!" + +"True enough," Marc began. "Why do the Carterets treat the Tressillian +so disagreeably?--only because, though without their fortune, she makes +ten times their coups; and get themselves up how they may, they know +none of us care to waltz with them if she's in the room. Let's drink her +health in Marcobrunnen--she's magnificent eyes." + +"And first-rate style," said I. + +"And a deuced pretty foot," cried Fred. + +"_Et une taille superbe_," added de Tintiniac, just come in. "_En +verite, elle est chouette cette Violette Anglaise._" + +So we chanted the Tressillian's praises. Telfer drank the toast in +silence--_I_ thought with a frown on his brow at the freedom with which +we discussed his fair foe. + +Little Countess Virginie's wedding was to come off in another month, and +Marc begged us so hard to stay on till then, that, Telfer seeming very +willing, I consented, though it would be the first September I had ever +spent out of the English open since I was old enough to know partridges +from pheasants. The Tressillian being Virginie's pet friend, after young +ladies' custom of contracting eternal alliances (which ordinarily +terminate in a quarrel about the shade of a ponceau ribbon, or a mauve +flower, or a cornet's eyes, some three months after the signing and +sealing thereof), was of course to be one of the _filles d'honneur_. So, +as I said to Telfer, he'd have time for a few more battles before the +two enemies parted to meet again--nobody could tell when. + +I began to think that the Major had really been wounded, and that his +opponent's bright eyes wouldn't let him come out of the fight wholly +scathless, as I saw him leaning against the wall at a ball in the +Redoute at Pipesandbeersbad, watching Violet with great earnestness as +she whirled round in a _deux temps_, bewitching as was her wont all the +frequenters of the Bad. Rich English dyspeptics, poverty-stricken +princes, Austrian diplomats, come to cure their hypochondria; French +_decores_, to try their new cabals and martingales; British snobs, to +indulge the luxury of grumbling,--all of them found some strange +attraction in the "Violette Anglaise." + +Violet sank on a seat after her valse. Telfer quietly displaced a young +dragoon from Lucca, and sat down by her. + +"I am going to stay on another month, Miss Tressillian; are you not +sorry to hear it?" he said, with a smile, but I thought a little anxiety +in his eyes. + +The color flushed over her face, and she answered, with a laugh, not +quite a real one: "Of course I am very sorry. I would go away myself to +let you enjoy your last week in peace if I were not engaged to Virginie. +Cannot you get me leave of absence from her? I know you would throw your +whole heart into the petition." + +Telfer curled his moustaches impatiently. + +"Truth has come out of her well at last," he said, with a dash of +bitterness, "and has disguised herself in Miss Tressillian's tulle +illusion." + +Violet colored brighter still. + +"Well," she said, quickly, "was it not your decision that we should +never waste courtesy on one another? Was not your own desire _guerre a +outrance_?" + +"No," answered Telfer, his brow darkening; "that I certainly must deny. +I did you injustice, and I offered you an apology. No man could do more +than acknowledge he was in the wrong. I offered you the palm-branch +once; you were pleased to refuse it. I am not a man, Miss Tressillian, +to run the chance of another repulse. My friendship is not so cheap that +I shall intrude it where it is undesired." He spoke with a laugh, but +his eyes had a grave anger in them that Violet didn't quite relish. + +She looked a little bit frightened up at him. The proud, brilliant +Tressillian was as pale and quiet as a little child after a good +scolding. But she soon rallied, and flashed up haughtier than ever. + +"Major Telfer, you make one great error--one very common to your sex. +You drop us one day, and take us up the next, and then think that we +must be grateful to you for the supreme honor you do us. You are cold to +us, absolutely rude, as long as it pleases your lordly will, and then, +at the first word of courtesy and kindness, you expect us to rise and +make you a _reverence_ in the utmost humiliation and thanksgiving. You +men"--and Violet began destroying her bouquet with immense +energy--"treat us exactly as a cat will treat a mouse. You yourself, for +instance, in a moment's hasty judgment, construed all my actions by the +light of your own unjust suspicions, and believing everything, no matter +how unfounded, spoke against me to all your acquaintance, and treated me +with, as you must admit, but scanty courtesy, for one whom I have heard +piques himself on his high breeding. And now, when you discover that +your suspicions had no foundation, and your hatred no grounds, you +wonder that I find it difficult to be as grateful as you seem to think I +should be for your having so kindly misjudged me." + +As the young lady gave all this forth with much vehemence and spirit, +Telfer's lips set, and the blood forced itself through the bronze of his +cheeks. He bent towards her till his moustache touched her hair. + +"You have no mercy, Violet Tressillian," he said, between his teeth. +"Take care that no one is as pitiless to you in return." + +She started, and her bouquet fell to the ground. Telfer gave it her back +without looking at her, and turned round to an Austrian with his usual +impassive air. + +"Do you know where De Tintiniac is, Staumgaurn? In the roulette room? +All right. I am going there now." + +He did go there, and I've a notion that the croupier of Pipesandbeersbad +made something that night out of the Major's preoccupation. + +Violet, meanwhile, was waltzing with Staumgaurn and a dozen others, but +looked rather white--not using any rouge but what nature had given +her--and by the end of the evening her bouquet had utterly come to +grief. Days went on till a fortnight of our last month had gone, and +Telfer, to my sorrow (not surprise, for I always thought the Tressillian +was a dangerous foe, and that, like Ringwood, he'd find himself unhorsed +by a woman), grew grave and stern, haunted with ten times more +recklessness than usual, and threw away his guineas at the Redoute in a +wild way, quite new with him, for though he liked play _pour s'amuser_, +he had too much control over his passions ever to let play get +ascendancy over him. I used to think he had the strongest passions and +the strongest will over them of any man I knew; but now a passion least +undesired and most hopeless of any that ever entered his soul, seemed to +have mastered him. Not that he showed it; with the Tressillian he was +simply distantly courteous; but I, who was on the _qui vive_ for his +first sign of being conquered, saw his eyebrows contract when somebody +was paying her desperate court, and his glance lighten and flash when +she passed near him. They had never been alone since the night of the +ball, and Violet was too proud to try for a reconciliation, even if +she'd cared for one. + +One night we were at a ball at the Prince Humbugandschwerinn's. The +Tressillian had been waltzing with all her might, and had all the men in +the room, Humbugandschwerinn himself included, round her. Telfer leaned +against a console ten minutes, watching her, and then abruptly left the +ball-room, and did not return again. He came instead into the card-room, +and sat down to _ecarte_ with De Tintiniac, and lost two games at ten +Napoleons a side. Generally, he played very steadily, never giving his +attention to anything but the game; but now he was listening to what a +knot of men were saying, who were laughing, chatting, and sipping +coffee, while they talked about--the Tressillian. + +"I mark the king and play," said Telfer, his eyes fixed fiercely on a +young fellow who was discussing Violet much as he'd have discussed his +new Danish dog or English hunter. He was Jack Snobley, Lord +Featherweight's son, who was doing the grand, a confounded young +parvenu, vulgar as his cotton-spinning ancestry could make him, who +could appreciate the Tressillian about as much as he could Dannecker's +Ariadne, which work of art he pronounced, in my hearing, "a pretty girl, +but the dawg very badly done--too much like a cat." "I take your three +to two," continued Telfer, his brow lowering as he heard the young fool +praising and criticising Violet with small ceremony. The Major had the +haughtiest patrician principles, and to hear a snob like this +sandy-haired honorable, speaking of the woman _he_ chose to champion as +he might have done of some ballerina or Chaumiere belle, was rather too +much for Telfer's self-control. + +When the game was done, he rose, and walked quietly over to where +Snobley stood. He looked him down with that cold, haughty glance that +has cowed men bolder than Lord Featherweight's hopeful offspring, and +said a word or two to him in a low tone, which caused that gentleman to +flush up red and look fierce with all his might. + +"What's the girl to you, that I mayn't speak as I choose of her?" he +retorted; the Sillery, of which he'd taken a good deal too much, working +up in his weak brain. "I've heard that she jilted you, and that was why +you've been setting them all against her, and saying she wanted to hook +your old governor." + +The Sillery must have indeed obscured Jack's reason with a vengeance to +make him venture this very elegant and refined speech with the Major, +most fastidious in his ideas of good breeding, and most direful in his +wrath, of any man I ever knew. Telfer's cheek turned as white with +passion as the bronze would let it; his gray eyes grew almost black as +they stared at the young snob. He was so supremely astonished that this +ill-bred boy had actually dared thus to address him! + +"Mr. Snobley," he said, with his chilled and most ironical smile, and +his quietest, most courteous voice, "you must learn good manners before +you venture to parley with gentlemen. Allow me to give you your first +lesson." And stooping, as if to a very little boy--young Snobley was a +good foot shorter than he--the Major struck him on the lips with his +left-hand French kid glove. It was a very gentle blow--it would scarcely +have reddened the Tressillian's delicate skin--but on the Hon. Jack it +had electric effect. He was beginning to swear, to look big, to talk of +satisfaction, insult, and all the rest of it; but Telfer laughed, bent +his head, told him he was quite ready to satisfy him to any extent he +required; and, turning away, sat down to _ecarte_ calm and impassive as +ever, and pleased greatly with himself for having silenced this silly +youth. The affair was much less exciting to him than it was to any other +man in the room. "It's too great an honor for him, the young brute, for +me to be called out by him, as if he were one of us. I hate snobs; Lord +Featherweight's grandfather was butler to mine, and he himself was a +cotton-spinner in Lancashire, and then this little contemptible puppy +dares to----" + +Telfer finished his sentence with a puff of smoke from his meerschaum, +as he sat in his bedroom after the ball, into which sanctuary I had +followed him to talk a little before turning in. + +"To discuss the Tressillian," said I. "But that surprises me less, old +fellow, than that you should champion her. What's it for? Has hate +turned to the other thing? Have you come to think that, though she'd +make a very bad mother-in-law, she'd make a charming wife? 'Pon my life, +if you have----" + +"Hush! Don't jest!" + +I knew by the tone of those three little monosyllables that the Major +was done for--caught, conquered, and fettered by his dangerous foe. + +Telfer sat silent for some minutes, looking out of the window where the +dawn was rising over the hills, with a settled gloom upon his face. Then +he rose, and began swinging about the room with his firm cavalry tread, +his arms crossed on his chest, and his head bent down. + +"By Heaven! Vane," he said at length, in a tone low, but passionate and +bitter, "I have gone on like a baby or a fool, playing with tools till +they have cut me. Against my will, against my judgment, against reason, +hope, everything, I have lingered in that girl's fascinations till I am +bound by them hand and foot. I cannot deceive myself, I cannot shut the +truth out; it was not honor, nor chivalry, nor friendship that made me +to-night insult the man who spoke jestingly of her; it was love--love as +mad, as reckless, as misplaced, as ever cursed a man and drove him to +his ruin." He paused, breathing hard, with his teeth set, then broke out +again: "I, who held love in such disdain, who have so long kept my +passions in such strong control, who thought no woman had the power to +move me against my will--I love at last, despite myself, though I know +that she is pitiless, that nothing I have said has been able to touch +her into softer feeling, and that, mad as my passion is for her, if her +nature be as hard and haughty as I fear, I dare not, if I could, make +her my wife. No, Vane, no," he went on, hastily, as I interrupted. "She +does not love me, she has no gentler feeling in her; I thought she had, +but I was mistaken. I tried her several times, but she will never +forgive my first injustice to her; and to one with so little softness in +her nature I dare not trust my peace. It were a worse hell even than +that I now endure, to have her with me, loving her as I do, and feel +that her cold heart gave no response to mine; to possess her glorious +beauty, and yet know that her love and her soul were dead in their chill +pride to me----" + +He paused again, and leaned against the window, his chest heaving, and +hot tears standing in his haughty eyes, wrung from the very anguish of +his soul. The pride that had never before bent to any human thing, was +now cast in the dust before a woman who never did, and probably never +would, love him in return. + + + + +V. + +THE DUEL, AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. + + +The contemptible young puppy, for whom Telfer considered the honor of a +ball from his pistol a great deal too good in the morning, sent +Heavysides, of the 40th, a chum of his found up at the Bad, to claim +"satisfaction," the valor produced in him by Sillery over night having +been kept up since by copious draughts of cognac and Seltzer. Having +signified to Heavysides that the Major would do Mr. Snobley the favor of +shooting him in the retired valley of Koenigshoehle at sunrise the next +day, I went to tell Telfer, who had a hearty laugh at the young fellow's +challenge. + +"I'd give him something to shoot me through the heart," said he, +bitterly, "but I don't suppose he will. He's practised at pigeons, not +at men, probably. I won't hurt him much, but a little lesson will do him +good. Mind nobody in the house gets wind of the affair. Though I make a +fool of myself in her defence, there is no need that she or others +should know it. But if the boy should do for me, tell her, Vane--tell +her," said the Major, shading his eyes with his hand, "that I have +learnt to love her as I never dreamt I should love any woman, and that I +do not blame her for the just lesson she has read me for the rudeness +and the unjust prejudice I indulged in so long towards her. She +retaliated fairly upon me, and God forbid that she should have one hour +of her life embittered through remorse for me." + +His voice sank into a whisper as he spoke; then, with an effort, he +forced himself into calmness, and went to play billiards with Marc. This +was the man who, three months before, had told me with such contemptuous +decision that "we need never fall in love unless it's convenient; and +as to caring for a girl who doesn't care for us, that was a weakness +with which he couldn't sympathize at all!" + +Late that night, Telfer and I, coming down the stairs, met the +Tressillian going up them to her room. The Major stopped her, and held +out his hand, with a softened light in his eyes. "Will you not bid me +good-bye? I may not see you again." + +There was a sadness in his smile bitterly significant to me, but very +likely she didn't see it, not having any key to it, as I had. + +Violet turned pale, and I fancied her lips twitched, but it might be the +flickering of the light of the staircase lamps on her face. At any rate, +being a young lady born and bred in good society, she put her hand in +his, with a simple "What! are you going away?" + +"Perhaps. At any rate, let us part in peace." + +The proud man laughed as he said it, though he was enduring tortures. +Violet heard the laugh, and didn't see the straining anxiety in his +gaze. + +She drew her hand rapidly away. "Certainly. _Bon voyage_, Major Telfer, +and good night," she answered, carelessly; and, with a graceful bend, +the Tressillian floated on up the stairs with the dignity of a young +empress. + +Telfer looked after the white gossamer dress and the beautiful head, +with its wreath of scarlet flowers, and an iron sternness settled on his +face. All hope was gone now. She could not have parted with him like +this if she had cared for him one straw more than for the flowers in her +hair. Yet, in the morning, he was going to risk his life for her. Ah, +well! I've always seen that in love there's one of the two who gives all +and gets nothing. + +In the morning, by five o'clock, in the valley of Koenigshoehle, a snug +bit of pasture land between two rocks, where no gendarme could pounce +upon us, young Snobley made his appearance to enjoy the honor of being +a target for one of the best shots in Europe. Snobley had a good deal of +swagger and would-be dash, and made a great show of pluck, which your +man of true pluck never does. Telfer stood talking to me up to the last +minute, took his pistol carelessly in his hand, and, without taking any +apparent aim, fired. + +If Telfer made up his mind to shoot off your fifth waistcoat-button, +your fifth waistcoat-button would be irrevocably doomed; and therefore, +having determined to himself to lodge a bullet in this young puppy's +left wrist, in the left wrist did the ball lodge. Snobley was +"satisfied," very amply satisfied, I fancy, by his looks. He'd fired, +and sent his shot right into the trunk of a chestnut growing some seven +yards off his opponent, to Heavyside's supreme scorn. + +"That'll teach him not to talk of young ladies in his Mabille slang," +said Telfer, lighting his cigar. "I hope the little snob may be the +better for my lesson. Now I am _en route_, I'll go over to +Pipesandbeersbad, breakfast at the Hotel de France, and go and see +Humbugandschwerinn: he wants me to look at some English racers Brookes +has just sent him over. Make my excuses at Essellau; and I say, Vane, +see if you can't get us away in a day or two; have some call home, or +something, for I shall never stand this long." + +With which not over-clear speech the Major mounted his horse and +cantered off towards the Bad. + +I rode back; went to my own room, had some chocolate, read Pigault le +Brun, and about noon, seeing Virginie, the Tressillian, and several +others out on the terrace, went to join them. Marc slipped his arm +through mine and drew me aside. + +"I say, Vane, what's all this about Telfer striking some fellow for +talking about the Tressillian? Staurmgaurn was over here just now, and +told me there was a row in the card-room at Humbugandschwerinn's +between Telfer and another Englishman. I knew nothing about it. Is it +true?" + +"So far true," I answered, "that Telfer put a ball in the youth's wrist +at seven o'clock this morning; and serve him right too--he's an impudent +young snob." + +"By Jove!" cried Marc, "what in the world made him take the +Tressillian's part? Have the _beaux yeux_ really made an impression on +the most unimpressionable of men?" + +"The devil they have," said I, crossly; "but I wish she'd been at the +deuce first, for he's too good a fellow to waste his best years pining +after a pair of dark eyes." + +Marc shrugged his shoulders. "_C'est vrai_; but we're all fools some +time or other. The idea of Telfer's chivalry! I declare it's quite like +the old days of Froissart and Commines--fighting for my lady's favor." +And away he went, singing those two famous lines from Alcyonee: + + Pour meriter son coeur, pour plaire a ses beaux yeux, + J'ai fait la guerre aux rois: je l'aurais faite aux dieux; + +and I thought to myself that if the Tressillian proved a De Longueville, +I could find it in my soul to shoot her without remorse. + +But as I turned away from Marc, I came upon her, looking pale and ill +enough to satisfy anybody. The color flushed into her cheeks as she saw +me; we spoke of the weather, the chances of storm, Floss's new collar, +and other trifles; then she asked me, bending over her little dog,-- + +"Is Captain Staurmgaurn's news true, that your friend has--has been +quarrelling with a young Englishman?" + +"Yes," I answered. "I wonder Staurmgaurn told you; it is scarcely a +topic to interest ladies. Telfer has given the young gentleman a +well-merited lesson." + +"Have they fought?" she asked, breathlessly, laying her hand on my arm, +and looking as white as a ghost. + +"Yes, they have," said I; "and he fought, Miss Tressillian, for one who +gave him a very cold adieu last night." + +Her head drooped, she trembled perceptibly, and the color rushed back to +her cheeks. + +"Is he safe?" she asked, in the lowest of whispers. + +"Quite," I answered, quickly, as De Tintiniac lounged up to us; and I +left my words, like a prudent diplomatist, to bear fruit as best they +might. + +I wondered if she cared for him, or if it was merely a girl's natural +feeling for a man who had let himself be shot at, rather than hear a +light word spoken of her. But they were both so deuced proud, Heaven's +special intervention alone seemed likely to bring them together. + +The Major didn't come home from Pipesandbeersbad till between two and +three that night, and he's told me since that being _un peu fou_ with +his self-willed and vehement passion, never went to bed at all, but sat +and walked about his room smoking, unable to sleep, in a frame of mind +that, when sane, a few months before, he would have pronounced spoony +and contemptible in the lowest degree. At eight he strode forth into the +park, brushing off the dew with his impatient steps, glad of the fresh +morning air upon his brow, which was as burning as our first headache +from "that cursed punch of Jones's," the day after our "first wine," +which acute suffering any gentleman who ever tasted that delicious +_melange_ of rum and milk and lemons, will keenly recall among other +passed-away passages of his green youth. + +Telfer strode on and on, over the molehills and through the ferns, down +this slope and up that, under the oaks, and lindens, and fir-trees +gleaming red beneath the October sun, with very little notion of where +he was going or what he was doing, a great stag-hound of Marc's +following at his heels. The path he took, without thinking, led him to +the top of a rock overhanging the Beersbad, where that historic stream +was but a few yards in width; and here Telfer, lying down with his head +against a plane-tree, struck a fusee and lighted a cigar--for a weed's a +pleasant companion in any stage of existence: if we're happy we smoke in +the fulness of our hearts, and build airy castles on each fragrant +cloud; and if we're unhappy, we smoke to console ourselves, and draw in +with each whiff philosophy and peace. So the Major smoked and thought, +till a bark from the staghound made him look up. On the top of the +cliffs on the other side of the stream, looking down into the valleys +below, with her head turned away from him, stood Violet Tressillian; and +at the sight of that graceful figure, with its indescribable high-bred +air, I don't doubt the Major's once unimpressive heart beat faster than +it had ever done in a charge or a skirmish. She was full twenty feet +above him, and the rocks on which she stood sloped precipitately down to +a ledge exactly opposite that on which he lay smoking--a ledge in +reality but a few inches wide, but to which the treacherous boughs and +ferns waving over it gave a semblance of a firm broad footing--a +semblance which (like a good many other things one meets with) it +utterly failed to carry out when you came to try it. + +Violet, not seeing Telfer lying _perdu_ among the grass at the foot of +his plane-tree, walked along to the edge of the cliff, her eyes on the +ground, so deep in thought that she never noticed the river beneath, but +began to descend the slope, little Floss coming with exceeding +trepidation after her. Telfer sprang up to warn her. "Violet! Violet! go +back! go back! Oh! my God, do you not hear?" + +His passionate tones startled her. Never dreaming he was there, she +looked hurriedly up; her foot slipped; unable to stay her descent, she +came down the steep cliff with an impetus which, to a certainty, would +send her over the narrow ledge into the river below--a fall of full +thirty feet. To see her perish thus before his eyes--die thus while he +stood calmly by! A whole age of torture was crowded into the misery of +that one brief moment. There was but one way to save her. He sprang +across the gulf that parted them, while the river in its straitened bed +hissed and foamed beneath him, and, standing on the narrow ledge, where +there seemed scarce footing for a dog, he caught her as she fell in his +iron grasp, as little swayed by the shock as the rock on which he stood. +Holding her tight to him with one arm, he swung himself down by the +other to a less dangerous position, on a flat plateau of cliff, and +leaning against one of the linden-trees on its summit, he bent over her; +his eyes dim, and his pulses beating with the emotions he had controlled +while he wanted cool thought and firm nerve to save her, but over which +he had no more power now. He pressed her to his heart, forgetting pride, +and doubt, and fear; and Violet, by way of answer, only burst into a +passion of tears. Who would have recognized the proud, brilliant +Tressillian, in the pale, trembling woman who sobbed on his breast with +the _abandon_ of a child, and who, at his passionate kisses, only +blushed like a wild rose? + +Telfer evidently thought the transformation complete, for he forgot all +his reserve resolutions and hauteur, and poured out the tenderest love +for a girl who, three months before, he had wished at the devil! And the +Tressillian was conquered at last; she was pitiless no longer, and, +having vanquished him, was, woman-like, ready to be a slave to her +captive; and her eyes were never more dangerous than now, when, shy and +softened, they looked up through their tears into Telfer's. + +What old De Tintiniac said of her was true, that all her beauty wanted +to make it perfect was for her to be in love! + +So at least I thought, when, several hours afterwards, I met them coming +across the park, and I knew by the gleam of the Major's eyes that he +had lost Calceolaria and won Violet. + +"How strange it is," laughed Telfer that evening, when they were alone +in the conservatory, "that you and I, who so hated each other, should +now be so dear to one another. Oh, Violet! how ashamed I have been since +of my unjustifiable prejudices, my abominable discourtesy----" + +"You _were_ dreadfully rude," said the Tressillian, smiling; "and judged +me very cruelly by all the false reports that women chose to gossip of +me. But you are wrong. I never hated you. Your father had spoken of you +as so generous, so noble, so chivalrous a soldier, so kind a son, that I +was prepared to admire you immensely, and when you looked so sternly on +me at our first introduction, and I overheard your bitter words about me +at the station, I really was never more vexed and disappointed in my +life. And then a demon entered into me, and I thought--forgive me, +Hamilton--that I would try to make you repent your hasty judgment and +recant your prejudices. But I could not always fight you with the +coolness I wished; your indifference began to pique me more and more. +Wounds from you ranked as they did from no one else, and something +besides pride made me feel your neglect so keenly. I had meant--yes, I +must tell you all," and the Tressillian, in her soft repentance, looked, +Telfer thought, more bewitching than in her most brilliant moments--"I +had wished," she went on in a whisper, with her color bright, "to make +you regret your injustice, to conquer your stubborn pride, and to +revenge myself on you for all the wrong you had done me in thoughts and +words. But, you see, I wasn't so strong as I fancied; I thought I could +fence with the buttons on, but I was mistaken, and--and--when I heard +that you had fought for me, I knew then that----" And Violet stopped +with a smile and a sigh; the sigh for the past, I suppose, and the smile +for the present. + +"Well, _nous sommes quittes_, dearest," smiled Telfer. "Thank Heaven! we +no longer need reproach each other. Too many elevate the one they love +into an ideal of such superhuman excellence, that at the first shadow of +mortality they see their poor idol is shivered from its pedestal. But we +have seen the worst side of each other's character, Violet, and +henceforth love shall cover all faults, and subdue all pride between +us." + +Telfer kept his word. They had had their last quarrel, and buried their +last suspicion before their marriage, and were not, like the generality, +doves first and tigers after. The governor, of course, was charmed that +a match on which he had secretly set his heart had brought itself about +so neatly without his interference. He had begun to despair of his son's +ever giving Torwood a mistress, and the diamonds he gave Violet, in the +excess of his pleasure, brought her no end of female enemies, for they +were some of the finest water in the kingdom. Seldom, indeed, has +slander been productive of such good fruits, for rarely, _very_ rarely, +does that Upas-tree put forth any but Dead Sea apples. + +Violet Tressillian _was_ Violet Telfer before the Christmas recess, but +I considered the bet drawn. So Telfer and I exchanged the roan filly and +the colt, and Calceolaria in the Torwood stables, and Jockey Club in my +stalls, stand witnesses to this day of OUR WAGER, AND HOW THE MAJOR LOST +AND WON. + + + + +OUR COUNTRY QUARTERS. + + + + +OUR COUNTRY QUARTERS. + + +I remember well the day that we (that is the 110th Lancers) were ordered +down to Layton Rise. Savage enough we all were to quit P---- for that +detestable country place. Many and miserable were the tales we raked up +of the _ennui_ we had experienced at other provincial quarters; sadly we +dressed for Lady Dashwood's ball, the last _soiree_ before our +departure. And then the bills and the _billets-doux_ that rained down +upon our devoted heads! + +However, by some miracle we escaped them all; and on a bright April +morning, 184-, we were _en route_ for this Layton Rise, this _terra +incognita_, as grumpy and as seedy as ever any poor demons were. But +there was no help for it; so leaving, we flattered ourselves, a great +many hearts the heavier for this order from the Horse Guards, we, as I +said, set out for Layton Rise. + +The only bit of good news that provoking morning had brought was that my +particular chum, Drummond Fane, a captain of ours, who had been cutting +about on leave from Constantinople to Kamtchatka for the last six +months, would join us at Layton. Fane was really a good fellow, a +perfect gentleman (_ca va sans dire_, as he was one of _ours_), +intensely plucky, knew, I believe, every language under the sun, and, as +he had been tumbling about in the world ever since he went to Eton at +eight years old, had done everything, seen everything, and could talk on +every possible subject. He was a great favorite with ladies: I always +wonder they did not quite spoil him. I have seen a young lady actually +neglect a most eligible heir to a dukedom, that her mamma had been at +great pains to procure for her, if this "fascinating younger son" were +by. For Fane _was_ the younger son of the Earl of Avanley, and would, of +course, every one said, one day retrieve his fortunes by marriage with +some heiress in want of rank. + +He has been my great friend ever since I, a small youth, spoiled by +having come into my property while in the nursery, became his fag at +Eton: and when I bought my commission in the 110th, of which he was a +captain, our intimacy increased. + +But _revenons a nos moutons_. On the road we naturally talked of Layton, +wondering if there was any one fit to visit, anybody that gave good +dinners, if there was a pack of hounds, a billiard-room, or any pretty +girls. Suddenly the Honorable Ennuye L'Estrange threw a little light on +the matter, by recollecting, "now he thought of it, he believed that was +where an uncle of his lived; his name was Aspi--Aspinall--no! Aspeden." +"Had he any cousins?" was the inquiry. He "y'ally could not remember!" +So we were left to conjure up imaginary Miss Aspedens, more handsome +than their honorable cousin, who might relieve for us the monotony of +country quarters. The sun was very bright as we entered Layton Rise; the +clattering and clashing that we made soon brought out the inhabitants, +and, lying in the light of a spring day, it did not seem such a very +miserable little town after all. Our mess was established at the one +good inn of the one good street of the place, and I and two other young +subs fixed our residence at a grocer's, where a card of "Lodgings to let +furnished" was embordered in vine-leaves and roses. + +As I was leaning out of the window smoking my last cigar before mess, +with Sydney and Mounteagle stretched in equally elegant attitudes on +equally hard sofas, I heard our grocer, a sleek little Methodist, +addressing some party in the street with--"I fear me I have done evil in +admitting these young servants of Satan into mine habitation!" "Well, +Nathan," replied a Quaker, "thou didst it for the best, and verily these +officers seem quiet and gentlemanly youths." "Gentlemanlike," I should +say we were, _rather_--but "quiet!"--how we shouted over the innocent +"Friend's" mistake. Here the voices again resumed. "Doubtless, when the +Aspedens return, there will be dances and devices of the Evil One, and +Quelps will make a good time of it; however, the custom of ungodly men I +would not take were it offered!" So these Aspedens were out--confound +it! But the clock struck six; so, flinging the remains of my cigar on +the Quaker's broad-brimmed hat, adorned with which ornament he walked +unconsciously away, we strolled down to the mess-room. + +A few hours later some of them met in my room, and having sent out for +some cards, which the grocer kindly wrapped in a tract against gambling, +we had just sat down to loo, when the door was thrown open, and Captain +Fane announced. A welcome addition! + +"Fane, by all that's glorious!"--"Well, young one, how are you?" were +the only salutations that passed between two men who were as true +friends as any in England. Fane was soon seated among us, and telling us +many a joke and tale. "And so," said he, "we're sent down to ruralize? +(Mounteagle, you are 'loo'd.') Any one you know here?" + +"Not a creature! I am awfully afraid we shall be found dead of _ennui_ +one fine morning. I'll thank you for a little more punch, Fitzspur," +said Sydney. "I suppose, as usual, Fane," he continued, "you left at the +very least twelve dozen German princesses, Italian marchesas, and French +countesses dying for you?" + +"My dear fellow," replied Fane, "you are considerably under the mark +(I'll take 'miss,' Paget!); but really, if women _will_ fall in love +with you, how _can_ you help it? And if you _will_ flirt with them, how +can they help it?" + +"I see, Fane, _your_ heart is as strong as ever," I added, laughing. + +"Of course," answered the gallant captain; "disinterested love is +reserved for men who are too rich or too poor to mind its attendant +evils. (The first, I must say, very rarely profit by the privilege!) No! +I steel myself against all bright eyes and dancing curls not backed by a +good dowry. Heiresses, though, somehow, are always plain; I never could +do my duty and propose to one, though, of course, whenever I _do_ +surrender my liberty, which I have not the smallest intention of at +present, it will be to somebody with at least fifty thousand a year. +Hearts trumps, Mount?" + +"Yes--hurrah! Paget's loo'd at last.--Here, my dear, let us have lots +more punch!" said Mounteagle, addressing the female domestic, who was +standing open-mouthed at the glittering pool of half-sovereigns. + +I will spare the gentle reader--if I _may_ flatter myself that I +entertain a _few_ such--a recital of the conversation which followed, +and which was kept up until the very, very "small hours;" also I will +leave it to her imagination to picture how we spent the next few days, +how we found out a few families worth visiting, how we inspired the +Layton youths with a vehement passion for smoking, billiards, and the +cavalry branch of the service, and how we and our gay uniforms and our +prancing horses were the admiration of all the young damsels in the +place. + +One morning after parade, Fane and I, having nothing better to do, +lighted our cigars and strolled down one of those shady lanes which +almost reconcile one to the country--_out_ of the London season. Seeing +the gate of a park standing invitingly open, we walked in and threw +ourselves down under the trees. "Now we are in for it," said Fane, "if +we are trespassing, and any adventurous-minded gamekeeper appears. Whose +park is this?" + +"Mr. Aspeden's, Ennuye told me. It's rather a nice place," I replied. + +"And that castle, of which mine eyes behold the turrets afar off?" he +asked. + +"Lord Linton's, I believe; the father of Jack Vernon, of the Rifles, you +know," I answered. + +"Indeed! I never saw the old gentleman, but I remember his daughter +Beatrice,--we had rather a desperate flirtation at Baden-Baden. She's a +showy-looking girl," said the captain, stretching himself on the grass. + +"Why did you not allow her the sublime felicity of becoming Lady +Beatrice Fane?" I asked, laughing. + +"My dear fellow, she had not a _sou_! That old marquis is as poor as a +church-mouse. You forget that I am only a younger son, with not much +besides my pay, and cannot afford to marry anywhere I like. I am not in +your happy position, able to espouse any pretty face I may chance to +take a fancy to. It would be utter madness in me. Do you think _I_ was +made for a little house, one maid-servant, dinner at noon, and six small +children? _Very_ much obliged to you, but love in a cottage is not _my_ +style, Fred; besides _j'aime a vivre garcon_!" added Fane. + +"_Et moi aussi!_" said I. "Really the girls one meets seem all tarlatan +and coquetry. I have never seen one worth committing matrimony for." + +"Hear him!" cried Fane. "Here is the happy owner of Wilmot Park, at the +advanced age of twenty, despairing of ever finding anything more worthy +of his affection than his moustaches! Oh, what will the boys come to +next? But, eureka! here comes a pretty girl if you like. Who on earth is +she?" he exclaimed, raising his eye-glass to a party advancing up the +avenue who really seemed worthy the attention. + +Pulling at the bridle of a donkey, "what wouldn't go," with all her +might, was indeed a pretty girl. Her hat had fallen off and showed a +quantity of bright hair and a lovely face, with the largest and darkest +of eyes, and a mouth now wreathing with smiles. Unconscious of our +vicinity, on she came, laughing, and beseeching a little boy, seated on +the aforesaid donkey, and thumping thereupon with, a large stick, "not +to be so cruel and hurt poor Dapple." At this juncture the restive steed +gave a vigorous stride, and toppling its rider on the grass, trotted off +with a self-satisfied air; but Fane, intending to make the rebellious +charger a means of introduction, caught his bridle and led him back to +his discomfited master. The young lady, who was endeavoring to pacify +the child, looked prettier than ever as she smiled and thanked him. But +the gallant captain was not going to let the matter drop _here_, so, +turning to the youthful rider, he asked him to let him put him on "the +naughty donkey again." Master Tommy acquiesced, and, armed with his +terrible stick, allowed himself to be mounted. Certainly Fane was a most +unnecessary length of time settling that child, but then he was talking +to the young lady, whom he begged to allow him to lead the donkey home. + +"Oh! no, she was quite used to Dapple; she could manage him very well, +and they were going farther." So poor Fane had nothing for it but to +raise his hat and gaze at her through his eye-glass until some trees hid +her from sight. + +"'Pon my word, that's a pretty girl!" said he, at length. "I wonder who +she can be! However, I shall soon find out. Have another weed, Fred?" + +There was to be a ball that night at the Assembly Rooms, which we were +assured only the "_best_ families" would attend for Layton was a very +exclusive little town in its way. Some of us who were going were +standing about the mess-room, recalling the many good balls and pretty +girls of our late quarters, when Fane, who had declined to go, as he +said he had a horror of "bad dancing, bad perfumes, bad ventilation, and +bad champagne, and really could not stand the concentration of all of +them, which he foresaw that night," to our surprise declared his +intention of accompanying us. + +"I suppose, Fane, you hope to see your heroine of the donkey again?" +asked Sydney. + +"Precisely," was Fane's reply; "or if not, to find out who she is. But +here comes Ennuye, got up no end to fascinate the belles of Layton!" + +"The Aspedens are home; I saw 'em to-day," were the words of the +honorable cornet, as he lounged into the room. "My uncle seems rather a +brick, and hopes to make the acquaintance of all of you. He will mess +with us to-morrow." + +"Have you any _belles cousines_?"--"Are they going to-night?" we +inquired. + +"Yaas, I saw one; she's rather pretty," said L'Estrange. + +"Dark eyes--golden hair--about eighteen?" demanded Fane, eagerly. + +"Not a bit of it," replied the cornet, curling his moustache, and +contemplating himself in the glass with very great satisfaction; "hair's +as dark as mine, and eyes--y'ally I forget. But, let's have loo or +whist, or something; we need not go for ages!" So down we sat, and soon +nothing was heard but "Two by honors and the trick!" "Game and game!" +&c., until about twelve, when we rose and adjourned to the ball-room. + +No sooner had we entered the room than Fane exclaimed, "There's my +houri, by all that's glorious! and looking lovelier than ever. By Jove! +that girl's too good for a country ball-room!" And there, in truth, +waltzing like a sylph, was, as Sydney called her, the "heroine of the +donkey." The dance over, we saw her join a party at the top of the room, +consisting of a handsome but _passee_ woman, a lovely Hebe-like girl +with dancing eyes, and a number of gentlemen, with whom they seemed to +be keeping up an animated conversation. + +"Ennuye is with them--he will introduce me," said Fane, as he swept up +the room. + +I watched him bow, and, after talking a few minutes, lead off his +"houri" for a _valse_; and disengaging myself from a Cambridge friend +whom I had met with, I professed my intention of following his example. + +"What? Who did you say? That girl at the top there? Why, man, that's my +cousin Mary, and the other lady is my most revered aunt, Mrs. Aspeden. +Did you not know I and Ennuye were related? Y'ally I forget how, +exactly," he continued, mimicking the cornet. "But do you want to be +introduced to her? Come along then." + +So, following my friend, who was a Trinity-man, of the name of +Cleaveland, I soon made acquaintance with Mrs. Aspeden and her daughter +Mary. + +"_Who_ is he?" I heard Mrs. Aspeden ask, in a low tone, of Tom +Cleaveland, as I led off Mary to the _valse_. + +"A very good fellow," was the good-natured Cantab's reply, "with lots of +tin and a glorious place. The shooting at Wilmot is really----" + +"_Bien!_" said his aunt, as she took Lord Linton's arm to the +refreshment-room, satisfied, I suppose, on the strength of my "lots of +tin," that I was a safe companion for her child. + +I found Mary Aspeden a most agreeable partner for a _dance_; she was +lively, agreeable, and a coquette, I felt sure (women with those dancing +eyes always are), and I thought I could not do better than amuse myself +by getting up a flirtation with her. What an intensely good opinion I +had of myself then! So I condescended to dance, though it was not +Almack's, and actually permitted myself to be amused. Strolling through +the rooms with Mary Aspeden on my arm, we entered one in which was an +alcove fitted up with a _vis-a-vis_ sofa (whoever planned that Layton +ball-room had a sympathy in the bottom of his heart for _tete-a-tete_), +and here Fane was seated, talking to his "houri" with the soft voice and +winning smiles which had gained the heart, or at least what portion of +that member they possessed, of so many London belles, and which would do +their work _here_ most assuredly. + +"There is my cousin Florence--ah! she does not observe us. Who is the +gentleman with her?" said Miss Aspeden. + +"My friend, Captain Fane," I replied. "You have heard of their rencontre +this morning?" + +"Indeed! is he Tommy's champion, of whom he has done nothing but talk +all day, and of whom I could not make Florence say one word?" asked +Mary. "You must know our donkey is the most determined and resolute of +animals: if she 'will, she will,' you may depend upon it!" she +continued. + +"Do you honor those most untrue lines upon ladies by a quotation?" I +asked. + +"I do not think they _are_ so very untrue," laughed Mary, "except in +confining obstinacy to us poor women and exempting the 'lords of the +creation.' The Scotch adage knows better. 'A wilful _man_----' You know +the rest." + +"Quite well," I replied; "but another poet's lines on _you_ are far more +true. 'Ye are stars of the----'" I commenced. + +"Mary, my love, let me introduce you to Lord Craigarven," said Mrs. +Aspeden, coming up with Lord Linton's heir-apparent. + +At the same time I was introduced to Mr. Aspeden, a hearty Englishman, +loving his horses, his dogs, and his daughter; and as much the inferior +of his aristocratic-looking wife in _intellect_ as he was her superior +in _heart_. When we parted that night he gave Fane and me a most +hospitable general invitation, and, what was more, an especial one for +the next night. As we walked home "i' the grey o' the morning," I asked +Fane who his "houri" was. + +"A niece of Mr. Aspeden's, and cousin to your friend Cleaveland," was +the reply. "Those Aspedens really seem to be uncle and aunt to every +one. She is staying there now." + +"So is Tom Cleaveland," said I. "But, pray, are your expectations quite +realized? Is she as charming as she looks, this Miss Florence----" + +"Aspeden?" added Fane. "Yes, quite. But here are my quarters; so good +night, old fellow." + +We had soon established ourselves as _amis de la maison_ at Woodlands, +the Aspedens' place, and found him, as his nephew had stated, "rather a +brick," and her daughter and niece something more. All of us, especially +Fane and I, spent the best part of our time there, lounging away the +days between the shady lanes, the little lake, and the music or +billiard-rooms. Fane seemed entirely to appropriate Florence, and to +fascinate her as he had fascinated so many others. I really felt angry +with him; for, as Tom Cleaveland had candidly told me that poor Florie +had not a rap--her father had run through all his property and left her +an orphan, and a very poor one too--of course Fane could not marry her, +but would, I feared, "ride away" some day, like the "gay dragoon," +heartwhole _himself_--but would _she_ come out as scatheless? Poor +Mounteagle, too, was getting quite spooney about Florence, and, owing to +Fane, she paid him no more heed than if he had been an old dried-up +Indianized major. _He_, poor fellow! followed her about everywhere, +asked her to dance in quite an insane manner, and made the most +horrible revokes in whist and mistakes in pool that can be imagined. + +"By George! she is pretty, and no mistake!" said Sydney, as Florence +rode past us one day as we were sauntering down Layton, looking +charmingly _en amazone_. + +"Pretty! I should rather think so. She is more beautiful than any other +woman upon earth!" cried Mounteagle. + +"Y'ally! well, I can't see _that_," replied Ennuye. "She has tolerably +good eyes, but she is too _petite_ to please me." + +"Ah! the adjutant's girls have rendered L'Estrange _difficile_. He +cannot expect to meet _their_ equals in a hurry!" said Fane, in a very +audible aside. + +Poor Ennuye was silenced--nay, he even blushed. The adjutant's girls +recalled an episode in which the gallant cornet had shone in a rather +verdant light. Fane had effectually quieted him. + +"I wonder if Florence Aspeden will marry Mount?" I remarked to Fane, +when the others had left us. "She does not seem to pay him much heed +_yet_; but still----" + +"The devil, no!" cried Fane, in an unusually energetic manner. "I would +stake my life she would not have such a muff as that, if he owned half +the titles in the peerage!" + +"You seem rather excited about the matter," I observed. "It would not be +such a bad match for her, for you know she has no tin; but I am sure, +with your opinion on love-matches, you would not counsel Mount to such a +step." + +"Of course not!" replied Fane, in his ordinary cool tones. "A man has no +right to marry for love, except he is one of those fortunate individuals +who own half a county, or some country doctor or parson of whom the +world takes no notice. There may be a few exceptions. But yet," he +continued, with the air of a person trying to convince himself against +his will, "did you ever see a love match turn out happily? It is all +very well for the first week, but the roses won't bloom in winter, and +then the cottage walls look ugly. Then a fellow cannot live as he did +_en garcon_, and all his friends drop him, and altogether it is an act +no wise man would perpetrate. But I shall forget to give you a message I +was intrusted with. They are going to get up some theatricals at +Woodlands. I have promised to take _Sir Thomas Clifford_ (the piece is +the 'Hunchback'). and they want you to play _Modus_ to Mary Aspeden's +_Helen_. Do, old fellow. Acting is very good fun with a pretty girl----" + +"Like the _Julia_ you will have, I suppose," I said. "Very well, I will +be amiable and take it. Mary will make a first-rate _Helen_. Come and +have a game of billiards, will you?" + +"Can't," replied the gallant captain. "I promised to go in half an hour +with--with the Aspedens to see some waterfall or ruin, or something, and +the time is up. So, _au revoir, monsieur_." + +Many of ours were pressed into the service for the coming theatricals, +and right willingly did we rehearse a most unnecessary number of times. +Many merry hours did we spend at Woodlands, and I sentimentalized away +desperately to Mary Aspeden; but, somehow or other, always had an +uncomfortable suspicion that she was laughing at me. She never seemed +the least impressed by all my gallantries and pretty speeches, which was +peculiarly mortifying to a moustached cornet of twenty, who thought +himself irresistible. I began, too, to get terribly jealous of Tom +Cleaveland, who, by right of his cousinship, arrived at a degree of +intimacy _I_ could not attain. + +One morning Fane and I (who were going to dine there that evening), the +Miss Aspedens, and, of course, that Tom Cleaveland, were sitting in the +drawing-room at Woodlands. Fane and Florence were going it at some +opera airs (what passionate emphasis that wicked fellow gave the loving +Italian words as his rich voice rolled them out to her accompaniment!), +the detestable Trinity-man had been discoursing away to Mary on +boat-racing, outriggers, bumping, and Heaven knows what, and I was just +taking the shine out of him with the description of a shipwreck I had +had in the Mediterranean, when Mary, who sat working at her _broderie_, +and provokingly giving just as sweet smiles to the one as to the other, +interrupted me with-- + +"Goodness, Florie, there is Mr. Mills coming up the avenue. He is my +cousin's admirer and admiration!" she added, mischievously, as the door +opened, and a little man about forty entered. + +There was all over him the essence of the country. You saw at once he +had never passed a season in London. His very boots proclaimed he had +never been presented; and we felt almost convulsed with laughter as he +shook hands with us all round, and attempted a most _empresse_ manner +with Florence. + +"Beautiful weather we have now," remarked Mrs. Aspeden. + +"She is indeed!" answered the little squire, with a gaze of admiration +at Florence. + +Fane, who was leaning against the mantelpiece, looking most superbly +haughty and unapproachable, shot an annihilating glance at the small +man, which would have quite extinguished him had he seen it. + +"The country is very pretty in June," said Mrs. Aspeden, hazarding +another original remark. + +"Lovely--too lovely!" echoed Mr. Mills, with a profound sigh, at which +the country must have felt exceedingly flattered. + +"Glorious creature your new mare is, Mr. Mills," cried the Cantab; +"splendid style she took the fences in yesterday." + +"Wilkins may well say she is the _belle_ of the county!" continued Mr. +Mills, dreamily. "I beg your pardon, what did you say? my mother took +the fences well? No, she never hunts." + +"Pray tell Mrs. Mills I am very much obliged for the beautiful azalias +she sent me," interposed Florence, with her sweet smile. + +"I--I am sure anything we have _you_ are welcome to. I--I--allow me----" +And the poor squire, stooping for Florence's thimble, upset a tiny +table, on which stood a vase with the azalias in question, on the back +of a little bull of a spaniel, who yelled, and barked, and flew at the +squire's legs, who, for his part, became speechless from fright, +reddened all over, and at last, stammering out that he wanted to see Mr. +Aspeden, and would go to him in the grounds, rushed from the room. + +We all burst out laughing at this climax of the poor little man's +misery. + +"I will not have you laugh at him so," said Florence, at length. "I know +him to be truly good and charitable, for all his peculiarities of +manner." + +"It is but right Miss Aspeden should defend a _soupirant_ so charming in +every way," said the captain, his moustache curling contemptuously. + +"Oh! Florie's made an out-and-out conquest, and no mistake!" cried Tom +Cleaveland. + +Florence did not heed her cousin, but looked up in Fane's face, utterly +astonished at his sarcastic tones. No man could have withstood that look +of those large, beautiful eyes, and Fane bent down and asked her to sing +"_Roberto, oh tu che adoro!_" + +"Yes, that will just do. Robert is his name; pity he is not here to hear +it. 'Robert Mills, _oh tu che adoro!_'" sang the inexorable Cantab, as +he walked across the room and asked Mary to have a game of billiards. +For once I had the pleasure of forestalling him, but he, nevertheless, +came and marked for us in a very amiable manner. "How well you play, +Mary," said he. "Really, stunningly for a woman. Do you know Beauchamp +of Kings won three whole pools the other day without losing a life!" + +"Indeed!" said Mary. "What good fun it is to see Mr. Mills play; he +holds his queue as if he were afraid of it." + +"I say, Mary," said Cleaveland, "you don't think that Florence will +marry that contemptible little wretch, do you? Hang it, I should be +savage if she had not better taste. There's a cannon." + +"She has better taste," replied Mary, in a low tone, as Mrs. Aspeden and +Fane entered the room. + +I never could like Mrs. Aspeden--peace be with her now, poor woman--but +there was such a want of delicacy and tact, and such open manoeuvring +in all she did, which surprised me, clever woman as she was. + +No sooner had she approached the billiard-table that day, than she +began: + +"Florence was called away from her singing to a conference with her +uncle, and--with somebody else, I fancy." (Fane darted a keen look of +inquiry at her.) "Poor dear girl! being left so young an orphan, I have +always felt such a great interest and affection for her, and I shall +rejoice to see her happily settled as--as I trust there is a prospect of +now," she continued. + +Could she mean Florence Aspeden had engaged herself to Mr. Mills? A +roguish smile on Mary's face reassured me, but Fane walked hastily to +the window, and stood with folded arms looking out upon the sunny +landscape. + +Inveterate flirt that he was, his pride was hurt at the idea of a rival, +and _such_ a rival, winning in a game in which _he_ deigned to have +_ever_ so small a stake, _ever_ such a passing interest! + +The dinner passed off heavily--_very_ heavily--for gay Woodlands, for +the gallant captain and Florence were both of them _distraits_ and +_genes_, and he hardly spoke to the poor girl. Oh, wicked Fane! + +We sat but little time after the ladies had retired, and Tom and Mr. +Aspeden going after some horse or other, Fane and I ascended to the +drawing-room alone. It was unoccupied, and we sat down to await them, I +amusing myself with teaching Master Tommy, the young heir of Woodlands, +some comic songs, wherewith to astonish his nurse pretty considerably, +and Fane leaning back in an arm-chair, with Florence's dog upon his knee +in _that_, for _him_, most extraordinary thing, a "brown study." + +Suddenly some voices were heard in the next room. + +"Florence, it is your duty, recollect." + +"Aunt, I can recollect nothing, save that it would be far, far worse +than death to me to marry Mr. Mills. I hold it dread sin to marry a man +for whom one can have nothing but contempt. Once for all, I cannot,--I +will not." + +Here the voice was broken with sobs. Fane had raised his head eagerly at +the commencement of the dialogue, but now, recollecting that we were +listeners, rose, and closed the door. I did not say a word on the +conversation we had just heard, for I felt out of patience with him for +his heartless flirtation; so, taking up a book on Italy, I looked over +the engravings for a little time, and then, Tommy having been conveyed +to the nursery in a state of rebellion, I reminded Fane of a promise he +had once made to accompany me to Rome the next winter, and asked him if +he intended to fulfil it. + +"Really, my dear fellow, I cannot tell what I may possibly do next +winter; I hate making plans for the future. We may none of us be alive +then," said he, in an unusually dull strain for him: "I half fancy I may +exchange into some regiment going on foreign service. But _l'homme +propose_, you know. By the by, poor Castleton" (his elder brother) "is +very ill at Brussels." + +"Yes. I was extremely sorry to hear it, in a letter I had from Vivian +this morning," I replied. "He is at Brussels also, and mentions a +_belle_ there, Lady Adeliza Fitzhowden, with whom, he says, the world is +associating _your_ name. Is it true, Fane?" + +"_Les on dit font la gazette des fous!_" cried the captain, impatiently, +stroking Florence's little King Charles. "I saw Lady Adeliza at Paris +last January, but I would not marry her--no! not if there were no other +woman upon earth! I thought, Fred, really you were too sensible to +believe all the scandal raked up by that gossiping Vivian. I do hope you +have not been propagating his most unfounded report?" asked my gallant +friend, in quite an excited tone. + +At this moment the ladies entered. Florence with her dark eyes looking +very sad under their long lashes, but they soon brightened when Fane +seated himself by her side, and began talking in a lower tone, and with +even more _tendresse_ than ever. + +I had the pleasure of quite eclipsing Tom Cleaveland, I thought, as I +turned over the leaves of Mary's music, and looked unutterable things, +which, however, I fear were all lost, as Mary _would_ look only at the +notes of the piano, and I firmly believe never heard a word I said. + +How Florence blushed as Fane whispered his soft good night; she looked +so happy, poor girl, and he, heartless demon, talked of going into +foreign service! By the by, what put that into his head, I wonder? + +The night of our grand theatricals at length arrived, and we were all +assembled in the library, converted for the time into a green-room. +Mounteagle was repeating to himself, for the hundredth time, his part of +_Lord Tinsel_; I, in my _Modus_ dress, which I had a disagreeable idea +was not becoming, was endeavoring to make an impression on the +not-to-be impressed Mary, and Florence was looking lovelier than ever in +her rich old-fashioned dress, when Fane entered, and bending, offered +her a bouquet of rare flowers. She blushed deeply as she took it. Oh! +Fane, Fane, what will you have to answer for? + +We were waiting the summons for the first scene, when, to Mary's horror, +I suddenly exclaimed that I could not play! + +"Good Heavens! why not?" was the general inquiry. + +"Why!" I said. "I never thought of it until now, but certainly _Modus_ +ought to appear without moustaches, and, hang it, I cannot cut mine +off." + +"Take my life, but spare my moustaches!" cried Mary, in tragic tones. +"Certainly though, Mr. Wilmot, you are right; _Modus_ ought not to be +seen with the characteristic 'musk-toshes,' as nurse calls them; of an +English officer. What is to be done?" + +"Please, sir, will you come? Major Vaughan says the group is agoing to +be set for the first scene, and you are wanted, sir," was a flunkey's +admonition to Fane, who went off accordingly, after advising me to add a +dishevelled beard to my tenderly cared-for moustaches, which would seem +as if _Modus_ had entirely neglected his toilette. + +There was a general rush for part books, a general cry for things that +were not forthcoming, and a general despair on the parts of the youngest +amateurs at forgetting their cues just when they were most wanted. + +Fane, when he came off the stage after the first scene, leant against a +pillar to watch the pretty one between _Julia_ and _Helen_, so near that +he must have been seen by the audience, and presented a most handsome +and interesting spectacle, I dare say, for young ladies to gaze at. +Fixing his eyes on Florence, whose rendering of the part was really +perfect as she uttered these words, "Helen, I'm constancy!" he +unconsciously muttered aloud, "I believe it!" + +"So do I!" I could not help saying, "and therefore more shame to whoever +wins such a heart to throw it away. 'Beneath her feet, a duke--a duke +might lay his coronet!'" I quoted. + +"Are you in love yourself, Fred?" laughed the captain; then, stroking +his moustaches thoughtfully for some minutes, he said at last, as if +with an effort, "You are right, young one, and yet----" + +If I was right, what need was there for him to throw such passion into +his part--what need was there for him to say with such _empressement_ +those words: + + A willing pupil kneels to thee, + And lays his title and his fortune at thy feet? + +If he intended to go into foreign service, why did he not go at once? +Though I confess it seemed strange to me why Fane--the courted, the +flattered, the admired Fane--should wish to leave England. + +Reader, mind, the gallant captain is a desperate flirt, and I do not +believe he will go into foreign service any more than I shall, but I +_am_ afraid he will win that poor girl's heart with far less thought +than you buy your last "little darling French bonnet," and when he is +tired of it will throw it away with quite as little heed. But I was not +so much interested in his flirtation as to forget my own, still I was +obliged to confess that Mary Aspeden did not pay me as much attention as +I should have wished. + +I danced the first dance with her, after the play was over--(I forgot to +tell you we were very much applauded)--and Tom Cleaveland engaging her +for the next, I proposed a walk through the conservatories to a +sentimental young lady who was my peculiar aversion, but to whom I +became extremely _devoue_, for I thought I would try and pique Mary if I +could. + +The light strains of dance music floated in from the distance, and the +air was laden with the scent of flowers, and many a _tete-a-tete_ and +_partie carree_ was arranged in that commodious conservatory. + +Half hidden by an orange-tree, Florence Aspeden was leaning back in a +garden-chair, close to where we stood looking out upon the beautiful +night. Her fair face was flushed, and she was nervously picking some of +the blossoms to pieces; before her stood Mounteagle, speaking eagerly. I +was moving away to avoid being a hearer of his love-speech, as I doubted +not it was, but my companion, with many young-ladyish expressions of +adoration of the "sublime moonlight," begged me to stay "one moment, +that she might see the dear moon emerge like a swan from that dark, +beautiful cloud!" and in the pauses of her ecstatics I heard poor +Mount's voice in a tone of intense entreaty. + +At that moment Fane passed. He glanced at the group behind the +orange-trees, and his face grew stern and cold, and his lips closed with +that iron compression they always have when he is irritated. His eyes +met Florences, and he bowed haughtily and stiffly as he moved on, and +his upright figure, with its stately head, was seen in the room beyond, +high above any of those around him. A heavy sigh came through the orange +boughs, and her voice whispered, "I--I am very sorry, but----" + +"Oh! _do_ look at the moonbeams falling on that darling little piece of +water, Mr. Wilmot!" exclaimed my decidedly _moonstruck_ companion. + +"Is there no hope?" cried poor Mount. + +"None!" And the low-whispered knell of hope came sighing over the +flowers. I thought how little she guessed there was none for her. Poor +Florence! + +"Oh, this night! I could gaze on it forever, though it is saddening in +its sweetness, do not you think?" asked my romantic demoiselle. "Ah! +what a pretty _valse_ they are playing!" + +"May I have the pleasure of dancing it with you?" I felt myself obliged +to ask, although intensely victimized thereby, as I hate dancing, and +wonder whatever idiot invented it. + +Miss Chesney, considering her devotion to the moon, consented very +joyfully to leave it for the pleasures (?) of a _valse a deux temps_. + +As we moved away, I saw that Florence was alone, and apparently occupied +with sad thoughts. She, I dare say, was grieving over Fane's cold bow, +and poor Mount had rushed away somewhere with his great sorrow. Fane +came into my room next morning while I was at breakfast, having been +obliged to get up at the unconscionable hour of ten, to be in time for a +review we were to have that day on Layton Common for the glorification +of the country around. + +The gallant captain flung himself on my sofa, and, after puffing away at +his cigar for some minutes, came out with, "Any commands for London? I +am going to apply for leave, and I think I shall start by the express +to-morrow." + +"What's in the wind now?" I asked. "Is Lord Avanley unwell?" + +"No; the governor's all right, thank you. I am tired of rural felicity, +that is all," replied Fane. "I must stay for this review to-day, or the +colonel would make no end of a row. He is a testy old boy. I rather +think I shall set out, or exchange into the Heavies." + +"What in the world have you got into your head, Fane?" I asked, utterly +astonished to see him diligently smoking an extinguished cigar. "I am +sorry you are going to leave us. The 110th will miss you, old fellow; +and what _will_ the Aspedens say to losing their _preux chevalier_? By +the way, speaking of them, poor Mount received his _conge_ last night, I +expect." + +"What! are you sure? What did you say?" demanded Fane, stooping to +relight his cigar. + +I told him what I had overheard in the conservatory. + +"Oh! well--ah! indeed--poor fellow!" ejaculated the captain. "But +there's the bugle-call! I must go and get into harness." + +And I followed his example, turning over in my mind, as I donned my +uniform, what might possibly have induced Fane to leave Layton Rise so +suddenly. Was it, at last, pity for Florence? And if it were, would not +the pity come too late? + +Layton Rise looked very pretty and bright under the combined influence +of beauty and valor (that is the correct style, is it not?). The +Aspedens came early, and drew up their carriages close to the +flag-staff. Fane's eye-glass soon spied them from our distant corner of +the field, and, as we passed before the flagstaff, he bent low to his +saddle with one of those fascinating smiles which have gone deep to so +many unfortunate young ladies' hearts. Again I felt angry with him, as I +rode along thinking of that girl, her whole future most likely clouded +for ever, and he going away to-morrow to enjoy himself about in the +world, quite reckless of the heart he had broken, and---- But in the +midst of my sentimentalism I was startled by hearing the sharp voice of +old Townsend, our colonel, who was a bit of a martinet, asking poor +Ennuye "what he lifted his hand for?" + +"There was a bee upon my nose, colonel." + +"Well, sir, and if there were a whole hive of bees upon your nose, what +right have you to raise your hand on parade?" stormed the colonel. + +There was a universal titter, and poor Ennuye was glad to hide his +confusion in the "charge" which was sounded. + +On we dashed our horses at a stretching gallop, our spurs jingling, our +plumes waving in the wind, and our lances gleaming in the sunlight. +Hurrah! there is no charge in the world like the resistless English +dragoons'! On we went, till suddenly there was a piercing cry, and one +of the carriages, in which the ponies had been most negligently left, +broke from the circle and tore headlong down the common, at the bottom +of which was a lake. One young lady alone was in it. It was impossible +for her to pull in the excited little grays, and, unless they _were_ +stopped, down they would all go into it. But as soon as it was +perceived, Fane had rushed from the ranks, and, digging his spurs into +his horse, galloped after the carriage. Breathless we watched him. We +would not follow, for we knew that he would do it, if any man could, and +the sound of many in pursuit would only further exasperate the ponies. +Ha! he is nearing them now. Another moment and they will be down the +sloping bank into the lake. The girl gives a wild cry; Fane is straining +every nerve. Bravo! well done---he has saved her! I rushed up, and +arrived to find Fane supporting a half-fainting young lady, in whose +soft face, as it rested on his shoulder, I recognized Florence Aspeden. +Her eyes unclosed as I drew near, and, blushing, she disengaged herself +from his arms. Fane bent his head over her, and murmured, "Thank God, I +have saved you!" But perhaps I did not hear distinctly. + +By this time all her friends had gathered round them, and Fane had +consigned her to her cousin's care, and she was endeavoring to thank +him, which her looks, and blushes, and smiles did most eloquently; Mr. +Aspeden was shaking Fane by the hand, and what further might have +happened I know not, if the colonel (very wrathful at such an unseemly +interruption to his cherished manoeuvres) had not shouted out, "Fall +in, gentlemen--fall in! Captain Fane, fall in with your troop, sir!" We +did accordingly fall in, and the review proceeded; but my friend +actually made some mistakes in his evolutions, and kept his eye-glass +immovably fixed on the point in the circle, and behaved altogether in a +_distrait_ manner--Fane, whom I used to accuse of having too much _sang +froid_--whom nothing could possibly disturb--whom I never saw agitated +before in the whole course of my acquaintance! + +What an inexplicable fellow he is! + +The review over, we joined the Aspedens, and many were the +congratulations Florence had heaped upon her; but she looked +_distraite_, too, until Fane came up, and leaning his hand on the +carriage, bent down and talked to her. Their conversation went on in a +low tone, and as I was busy laughing with Mary, I cannot report it, save +that from the bright blushes on the one hand, and the soft whispered +tones on the other, Fane was clearly at his old and favorite work of +winning hearts. + +"You seem quite _occupe_ this morning, Mr. Wilmot," said Mary, in her +winning tones. "I trust you have had no bad news--no order from the +Horse Guards for the Lancers to leave off moustaches." + +"No, Miss Aspeden," said Sydney; "if such a calamity as that had +occurred, you would not see Wilmot here, he would never survive the loss +of his moustaches--they are his first and only love." + +"And a first affection is never forgotten," added that provoking Mary, +in a most melancholy voice. + +"It would be a pity if it were, as it seems such a fertile source of +amusement to you and Miss Aspeden," I said, angrily, to Sydney, too much +of a boy then to take a joke. + +"Captain Fane has an invitation for you and Mr. Sydney," said Mary, I +suppose by way of _amende_. "We are going on the river, to a picnic at +the old castle;--you will come?" + +The tones were irresistible, so I smoothed down my indignation and my +poor moustache, and replied that I would have that pleasure, as did +Sydney. + +"_Bien!_ good-bye, then, for we must hasten home," said Mary, whipping +her ponies. And off bowled the carriage with its fair occupants. + +"You won't be here for this picnic, old fellow," I remarked to Fane, as +we rode off the ground. + +"Well! I don't know. I hardly think I shall go just yet. You see I had +six months' leave when I was in Germany, before I came down here, and I +hardly like to ask for another so soon, and----" + +"It is so easy to find a reason for what one _wishes_," I added, +smiling. + +"Come and look at my new chestnut, will you?" said Fane, not deigning to +reply to my insinuation. "I am going to run her against Stuckup of the +Guards' bay colt!" + +That beautiful morning in June! How well I remember it, as we dropped +down the sunlit river, under the shade of the branching trees, the +gentle plash of the oars mingling with the high tones and ringing +laughter of our merry party, on our way to the castle picnic. + +"How beautiful this is," I said to Mary Aspeden; "would that life could +glide on calmly and peacefully as we do this morning!" + +"How romantic you are becoming!" laughed Mary. "What a pity that I feel +much more in mood to fish than to sentimentalize!" + +"Ah!" I replied, "with the present companionship I could be content to +float on forever." + +"Hush! I beg your pardon, but _do_ listen to that dear thrush," +interrupted Mary, not the least disturbed, or even interested, by my +pretty speeches. + +I was old enough to know I was not the least in love with Mary Aspeden, +but I was quite too much of a boy not to feel provoked I did not make +more impression. I was a desperate puppy at that time, and she served +me perfectly right. However, feeling very injured, I turned my attention +to Fane, who sat talking of course to Florence, and left Mary to the +attentions of her Cantab cousin. + +"Miss Aspeden does not agree with you, Fred," said Fane. "She says life +was not intended to glide on like a peaceful river; she likes the waves +and storms," he added, looking down at her with very visible admiration. + +"No, not for myself," replied Florence, with a sweet, sad smile. "I did +not mean _that_. One storm will wreck a _woman's_ happiness; but were I +a man I should glory in battling with the tempest-tossed waves of life. +If there be no combat there can be no fame, and the fiercer, the more +terrible it is, the more renown to be the victor in the struggle!" + +"You are right," answered Fane, with unusual earnestness. "That used to +be _my_ dream once, and I think even now I have the stuff in me for it; +but then," he continued, sinking his voice, "I must have an end, an aim, +and, above all, some one who will sorrow in my sorrow, and glory in my +glory; who will be----" + +"Quite ready for luncheon, I should think; hope you've enjoyed your +boating!" cried Mr. Aspeden's hearty voice from the shore, where, having +come by land, he now stood to welcome us, surrounded by a crowd of +anxious mammas, wondering if the boating had achieved the desirable end +of a proposal from Captain A----; hoping Mr. B----, who had nothing but +his pay, had not been paying too much attention to Adelina; and that +Honoria had given sufficient encouragement to Mr. C----, who, on the +strength of 1000_l._ a year, and a coronet in prospect, was considered +an eligible _parti_ (his being a consummate scamp and inveterate gambler +is nothing); and that D---- has too much "consideration for his family" +to have any "serious intentions" to Miss E----, whom he is assisting to +land. However, whatever proposals have been accepted or rejected, here +we all were ready for luncheon, which was laid out on the grass, and +Fane will be obliged to finish his speech another time, for little now +is heard but _bons mots_, laughter, and champagne corks. The captain is +more brilliant than ever, and I make Mary laugh if I cannot make her +sigh. Luncheon over, what was to be done? See the castle, of course, as +we were in duty bound, since it was what we came to do; and the +_tete-a-tete_ of the boats are resumed, as ladies and gentlemen ascended +the grassy slopes on which the fine old ruins stood. I looked for Mary +Aspeden, feeling sure that I should conquer her in time (though I did +not _want_ to in the least!), but she had gone off somewhere, I dare say +with Tom Cleaveland; so I offered my arm to that same sentimental Miss +Chesney who had bored me into a _valse a deux temps_ the night of the +theatricals, and I have no doubt her mamma contemplated her as Mrs. +Wilmot, of Wilmot Park, with very great gratification and security. +Becoming rather tired of the young lady's hackneyed style of +conversation, which consisted, as usual, of large notes of exclamation +about "the _sweet_ nightingales!" "the _dear_ ruins!" "the _darling_ +flowers!" &c. &c., I managed to exchange with another sub, and strolled +off by myself. + +As I was leaning against an old wall in no very amiable frame of mind, +consigning all young ladies to no very delightful place, and returning +to my old conclusion that they were all tarlatan and coquetry, soft +musical voices on the other side of the wall fell almost unconsciously +on my ear. + +"Oh! Florence, I am so unhappy!" + +"Are you, darling? I wish I could help you. Is it about Cyril Graham?" + +"Yes!" with a tremendous sigh. "I am afraid papa, and I am sure mamma, +will never consent. I know poor dear Cyril is not rich, but then he is +so clever, he will soon make himself known. But if that tiresome Fred +Wilmot should propose, I know they will want me to accept him." (There +is one thing, I never, _never will_!) "I do snub him as much as ever I +can, but he is such a puppy, I believe he thinks I am in love with +him--as if Cyril, were not worth twenty such as he, for all he is the +owner of Wilmot Park!" + +Very pleasant this was! What a fool I must have made of myself to Mary +Aspeden, and how nice it was to hear one's self called "a puppy!" + +"Of course, dear," resumed Florence, "as you love Cyril, it is +impossible for you to love any one ever again; but I do not think Mr. +Wilmot a puppy. He is conceited, to be sure, but I do not believe he +would be so much liked by--by those who are his friends, if he were not +rather nice. Come, dear, cheer up. I am sure uncle Aspeden is too kind +not to let you marry Cyril when he knows how much you love one another. +_I_ will talk to him, Mary dear, and bring him round, see if I do not! +But--but--will you think me _very_ selfish if I tell you"--(a long +pause)--"he has asked me--I mean--he wishes--he told me--he says he does +love me!" + +"Who, darling? Let me think--Lord Athum?--Mr. Grant?" + +"No, Mary--Drummond--that is, Captain Fane--he said----Oh, Mary, I am so +happy!" + +At this juncture it occurred suddenly to me that I was playing the part +of a listener. (But may not much be forgiven a man who has heard himself +called "a puppy"?) So I moved away, leaving the fair Florence to her +blushes and her happiness, unshared by any but her friend. Between my +astonishment at Fane and my indignation at Mary, I was fairly +bewildered. Fane actually had proposed! _He_, the Honorable Drummond +Fane, who had always declaimed against matrimony--who had been +proof-hardened against half the best matches in the country--that +desperate flirt who we thought would never fall in love, to have tumbled +in headlong like this! + +Well, there was some satisfaction, I would chaff him delightfully about +it; and I was really glad, for if Florence had given her heart to Fane, +she was not the sort of girl to forget, nor he the sort of man to be +forgotten, in a hurry. But in what an awfully foolish light I must have +appeared to Mary Aspeden! There was one thing, she would never know I +had overheard her. I would get leave, and go off somewhere--I would +marry the first pretty girl I met with--she should _not_ think I cared +for _her_. No, I would go on flirting as if nothing had happened, and +then announce, in a natural manner, that I was going into the Highlands, +and then _she_ would be the one to feel small, as she had made so _very_ +sure of my proposal. And yet, if I went away, that was the thing to +please her. _Hang_ it! I did not know _what_ to do! My vanity was most +considerably touched, though my heart was not; but after cooling down a +little, I saw how foolishly I should look if I behaved otherwise than +quietly and naturally, and that after all _that_ would be the best way +to make Mary reverse her judgment. + +So, when I met her again, which was not until we were going to return, I +offered her my arm to the boat where Fane and his _belle fiancee_ were +sitting, looking most absurdly happy; and the idea of my adamantine +friend being actually caught seemed so ridiculous, that it almost +restored me to my good humor, which, sooth to say, the appellation of +"puppy" had somewhat disturbed. + +And so the moon rose and shed her silver light over the young lady who +had sentimentalized upon her, and a romantic cornet produced a +concertina, and sent forth dulcet strains into the evening air, and +Florence and her captain talked away in whispers, and Mary Aspeden sat +with tears in her eyes, thinking, I suppose, of "Cyril" and I mused on +my "puppyism;" and thus, wrapped each in our own little sphere, we +floated down the river to Woodlands, and, it being late, with many a +soft good night, and many a gentle "_Au revoir_," we parted, and Mr. +Aspeden's castle picnic was over! + +I did not see Fane the next day, except at parade, until I was dressing +for mess, when he stalked into my room, and stretching himself on a +sofa, said, after a pause, + +"Well, old boy, I've been and gone and done it." + +"Been and gone and done what?" I asked, for, by the laws of retaliation, +I was bound to tease him a little. + +"Confound you, what an idiot you are!" was the complimentary rejoinder. +"Why, my dear fellow, the truth is, that, like most of my unfortunate +sex, I have at last turned into that most tortuous path called love, and +surrendered myself to the machinations of beautiful woman. The long and +the short of it is--I am engaged to be married!" + +"Good Heavens! Fane!" I exclaimed, "what next? _You_ married! Who on +earth is she? I know of no heiress down here!" + +"She is no heiress," said the captain; "but she is what is much +better--the sweetest, dearest, most lovable----" + +"Of _course_!" I said, "but no heiress! My dear Fane, you cannot mean +what you say?" + +"I should be sorry if I did not," was the cool reply; "and you must be +more of a fool, Fred, than I took you for, if you cannot see that +Florence Aspeden is worth all the heiresses upon earth, and is the +embodiment of all that is lovely and winning in woman----" + +"No doubt of it, _tout cela saute aux yeux_," I answered. "But reflect, +Fane; it would be utter madness in _you_ to marry anything but an +heiress. Love in a cottage is not _your_ style. _You_ were not made for +a small house, one maid-servant, and dinner----" + +"Ah!" laughed Fane, "you are bringing my former nonsense against me. +Some would say I was committing worse folly now, but believe me, Fred, +the folly even of the heart is better than the calculating wisdom of the +world. I do not hesitate to say that if Florence had fortune I should +prefer it, for such a _vaurien_ as I was made to spend money; but as she +has not, I love her too dearly to think about it, and my father, I have +no doubt, will soon get me my majority, and we shall get on stunningly. +So marry for _love_, Fred, if you take my advice." + +"A _rather_ different opinion to that which you inculcated so +strenuously a month ago," I observed, smiling; "but let me congratulate +you, old fellow, with all my heart. 'Pon my word, I am very glad, for I +always felt afraid you would, like Morvillier's _garcon_, resist all the +attractions of a woman until the '_cent mille ecus_,' and then, without +hesitation, declare, '_J'epouse_.' But you were too good to be spoiled." + +"As for my goodness, there's not much of _that_," replied Fane; "I am +afraid I am much better off than I deserve. I wrote to the governor last +night: dear old boy! he will do anything _I_ ask him. By the by, Mary +will be married soon too. I hope you are not _epris_ in that quarter, +Fred?--pray do not faint if you are. _My_ Florence, who can do anything +she likes with anybody (do you think any one _could_ be angry with +_her_?) coaxed old Aspeden into consenting to Mary's marriage with a +fellow she really is in love with--Graham, a barrister. I think she +would have had more difficulty with the lady-mother, if a letter had not +most opportunely come from Graham this morning, announcing the agreeable +fact that he had lots of tin left him unexpectedly. I wish somebody +would do the same by me. And so this Graham will fly down on the wings +of love--represented in these days by the express train--to-morrow +evening." + +"And how about the foreign service, Fane?" I could not help asking. +"And do you intend going to London to-morrow?" + +"I made those two resolutions under very different circumstances to the +_present_, my dear fellow," laughed Fane: "the first, when I determined +to cut away from Florence altogether, as the only chance of forgetting +her; sad the second, when I thought poor Mount was an accepted lover, +and I confess that I did not feel to have stoicism enough to witness his +happiness. But how absurd it seems that _I_ should have fallen in love," +continued he; "_I_, that defied the charms of all the Venuses upon +earth--the last person any one would have taken for a marrying man. I am +considerably astonished myself! But I suppose love is like the +whooping-cough, one must have it some time or other." And with these +words the gallant captain raised himself from the sofa, lighted a cigar, +and, strolling out of the room, mounted his horse for Woodlands, where +he was engaged of course to dinner that evening. + +And now, gentle reader, what more is there to tell? I fear as it is I +have written too "much about nothing," and as thou hast, I doubt not, a +fine imagination, what need to tell how Lord Avanley and Mr. Aspeden +arranged matters, not like the cross papas in books and dramas, but +amicably, as gentlemen should; how merrily the bells pealed for the +double wedding; how I, as _garcon d'honneur_, flirted with the +bridesmaids to my heart's content; how Fane is my friend, _par +excellence_, still, and how his love is all the stronger for having +"come late," he says. How all the young ladies hated Florence, and all +the mammas and chaperones blessed her for having carried off the +"fascinating younger son," until his brother Lord Castleton dying at the +baths, Fane succeeded of course to the title; how she is, if possible, +even more charming as Lady Castleton than as Florence Aspeden, and how +they were _really_ heart-happy until the Crimean campaign separated +them; and how she turns her beautiful eyes ever to the East and heeds +not, save to repulse, the crowd of admirers who seek to render her +forgetful of her soldier-husband. + +True wife as she is, may he live to come back with laurels hardly won, +still to hold her his dearest treasure. + +_May 1, 1856._--Fane _has_ come back all safe. I hope, dear reader, you +are as glad as I am. He has distinguished himself stunningly, and is now +lieutenant-colonel of the dear old 110th. You have gloried in the charge +of ours at Balaklava, but as I have not whispered to you my name, you +cannot possibly divine that a rascally Russian gave me a cut on the +sword-arm that very day in question, which laid me _hors de combat_, but +got me my majority. + +Well may I, as well as Fane, bless the remembrance of Layton Rise, for +if I had never made the acquaintance of Mary Aspeden--I mean Graham--I +might never have known her _belle-soeur_ (who is now shaking her head +at me for writing about her), and whom, either through my interesting +appearance when I returned home on the sick-list, and my manifold +Crimean adventures, or through the usual perversity of women, who will +fall always in love with scamps who do not deserve half their +goodness--(Edith, you shall _not_ look over my shoulder)--I prevailed on +to accept my noble self and Lancer uniform, with the "_puppyism_" shaken +pretty well out of it! And so here we are _very happy of course_.--"As +yet," suggests Edith. + +Ah! Fane and I little knew--poor unhappy wretches that we were--what our +fate was preparing for us when it led us discontented _blases_ and +_ennuyes_ down to our Country Quarters! + + + + +THE CHALLONERS + + BY E. F. BENSON + + _12mo. Cloth, $1.50._ + + The theme is a father's concern lest his children become + contaminated by what he considers an unwholesome social + atmosphere. The book is filled with Mr. Benson's clever + observations on the English smart set, and the love-story + shows him at his best. + + +MORGANATIC + + BY MAX NORDAU + + _12mo. Decorated cloth, $1.50._ + + This new book by the author of "Degeneration," has many of the + qualities which gave its predecessor such a phenomenal sale. It + is a study of morganatic marriage, and full of strong + situations. + + +OLIVE LATHAM + + By E. L. VOYNICH + Author of "Jack Raymond" and "The Gadfly." Cloth, $1.50 + +"The author's knowledge of this matter has been painfully personal. Her +husband, a Polish political refugee, at the age of twenty-two, was +arrested and thrown into a vile Russian prison without trial, and spent +five years of his life thereafter in Siberian exile, escaping in 1890 +and fleeing to England. Throughout 'Olive Latham' you get the impression +that it is a veritable record of what one woman went through for +love.... This painful, poignant, powerfully-written story permits one +full insight into the cruel workings of Russian justice and its effects +upon the nature of a well-poised Englishwoman. Olive comes out of the +Russian hell alive, and lives to know what happiness is again, but the +horror of those days in St. Petersburg, the remembrance of the +inhumanity which killed her lover never leaves her.... It rings true. It +is a grewsome study of Russian treatment of political offenders. Its +theme is not objectionable--a criticism which has been brought against +other books of Mrs. Voynich's."--_Chicago Record-Herald._ + +"So vividly are the coming events made to cast their shadows before, +that long before the half-way point is reached the reader knows that +Volodya's doom is near at hand, and that the chief interest of the story +lies not with him, but with the girl, and more specifically with the +curious mental disorders which her long ordeal brings upon her. It is +seldom that an author has succeeded in depicting with such grim horror +the sufferings of a mind that feels itself slipping over the brink of +sanity, and clutches desperately at shadows in the effort to drag itself +back."--_New York Globe._ + + +BACCARAT + + BY FRANK DANBY + AUTHOR OF "PIGS IN CLOVER" + + _12 mo. Six illustrations in color. Cloth, $1.50._ + + The story of a young wife left by her husband at a Continental + watering place for a brief summer stay, who, before she is + aware, has drifted into the feverish current of a French Monte + Carlo. + + A dramatic and intense book that stirs the pity. One cannot read + "Baccarat" unmoved. + +"The finished style and unforgettable story, the living characters, and +compact tale of the new book show it to be a work on which care and time +have been expended. + +"Much more dramatic than her first novel, it possesses in common with it +a story of deep and terrible human interest."--_Chicago Tribune._ + + +THE ISSUE + + By GEORGE MORGAN + + Illustrated. Cloth, $1.50 + +"Will stand prominently forth as the strongest book that the season has +given us. The novel is a brilliant one, and will command wide +attention."--_Philadelphia Public Ledger._ + +"The love story running through the book is very tender and +sweet."--_St. Paul Despatch._ + +"Po, a sweet, lovable heroine."--_The Milwaukee Sentinel._ + +"Such novels as 'The Issue' are rare upon any theme. It is a work that +must have cost tremendous toil, a masterpiece. It is superior to 'The +Crisis.'"--_Pittsburg Gazette._ + +"The best novel of the Civil War that we have had."--_Baltimore Sun._ + + + J. B. 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