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diff --git a/78292-0.txt b/78292-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cba7c47 --- /dev/null +++ b/78292-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3830 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 78292 *** + + + + + A BROKEN BLOSSOM. + =A Novel.= + + + BY + + FLORENCE MARRYAT, + + AUTHOR OF “LOVE’S CONFLICT,” ETC., ETC., ETC. + + + IN THREE VOLUMES. + + VOL. I. + +[Illustration: MIND IS STRONGER THAN MATTER] + + =London:= + + SAMUEL TINSLEY & CO., + 10, SOUTHAMPTON STREET, STRAND. + 1879. + + [_All Rights Reserved._] + + + =Dedicated to= + + MY DEAREST CHILDREN AND MOST FAITHFUL FRIENDS, + + EVA FLORENCE + + AND + + FRANCIS FREDERICK MARRYAT + + WITH THEIR MOTHER’S PROUD AND GRATEFUL LOVE. + + LONDON, + _April, 1879_. + + + + +[Illustration] + + CONTENTS OF VOL. I. + + + CHAPTER PAGE + I. ALONE 1 + II. REFUSED 24 + III. LAUNCHED 47 + IV. ST. PUCELLE 69 + V. ANGE 92 + VI. TURKEY AND TRUFFLES 111 + VII. THE FAIR SOPHIA 137 + VIII. MADAME FROMARD 155 + IX. SUNDAY 187 + X. CHATEAU DES ROSES 213 + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + + A BROKEN BLOSSOM. + + + + + CHAPTER I. + ALONE. + + +I was alone—I felt it for the first time in my life—horribly and +fearfully _alone_. Everything around me was unchanged, and yet nothing +looked the same. The August sun streamed in mercilessly through the +white window blind, lighting up every nook and corner of the +commonly-furnished room. I had known those ornaments upon the +chimney-piece for years past—that Parian figure of Innocence, pretending +to be modest behind a rag of drapery about the size of a housemaid’s +duster—and that fine Court gentleman in imitation Dresden, who never +left off beckoning to the lady who stood opposite to him, hiding her +face coquettishly behind a fan. I had heard the tick of the carriage +clock, which was one of the very few remnants left of our former luxury, +ever since I could remember anything, without having noticed that it was +particularly loud; and I had trodden and retrodden the green and red +Brussels carpet beneath my feet without having observed that it was +woven in the colours of a macaw. But now, as I sat in the armchair, with +my hands folded listlessly upon my lap and my blistered eyes staring +vacuously at all around me, the rag with which Innocence defended her +modesty appeared so ludicrously small, and the smirk of the lady and +gentleman courtiers such a veritable leer, that I burst into a nervous +hysterical giggle as I caught sight of them. The tick of the clock upon +the mantelpiece, too, seemed to strike like a hammer on my empty, +bewildered brain; and I perceived, to my horror, that a blue and yellow +worsted, that made me shudder each time I looked at it, was twisted +amongst the red and green pattern of the carpet. It appeared strange to +me that I should never have observed that glaring blue and yellow line +before, when it seemed to stand out now from the rest of the design as +if the carpet were all yellow and blue, and nothing else. What a fool I +must have been all these years to imagine it was red and green! The idea +of my folly was so ludicrous that I began to giggle again, and ended in +a burst of tears that left me no better than before. I had shed so many +tears during the last week, they seemed to have lost their effect upon +me. They only inflamed my eyes anew, and caused their lids to smart +more. I felt cold, too, although the day was unusually warm, and my head +was like a ball of fire. After a while I rose, and, leaning my elbows on +the mantelpiece, stared at myself in the glass. People had called me +pretty sometimes, and I believed that they spoke the truth, but few +would have said so now. + +My eyes were dull and fishy; my complexion sodden; my hair rough and in +disorder. I looked to myself like an old woman; older than _she_ had +done when I had seen her last with her own living face upon her. + +It was a week now since she had left me—eight whole days; and I was +still alive. It seemed marvellous to me! + +I was not a young girl—I had completed my twenty-fourth year; and I +knew, of course, that the majority of daughters were called upon to see +their mothers leave this world before them. But then my mother had not +been like other women’s mothers. She was my friend and companion—my +second self—the only confidante I had ever made. We had almost grown up +together, for there were but eighteen years between us, and I felt +utterly stunned and lost to think that she could go and leave me behind +her—_alone_. How often we had talked together of leaving the rooms we +had occupied so long at Norwood, and travelling, in the modest style our +limited means would admit of, through Switzerland and Germany and +France! Unless I married, meanwhile, she said with a smile (knowing well +there was not a man on earth who had the power to separate me from her), +we really must think of breaking up our English establishment this +autumn, and making a move southward—that is, if Mr. Lovett approved of +the plan. + +Mr. Lovett was a personage of whom I had often heard, but never seen. He +was a clergyman, and had been an intimate friend and schoolfellow of my +late father, and my mother held his name in infinite respect. He was the +trustee also, of our small capital, and the quarterly interest of it +always came to us through his hands. He lived abroad, which was the +reason I had never met him, but his name was as familiar to me as a +household word. If Mr. Lovett approved, then, my dear mother had said, +we should travel together that autumn, and I had been looking forward to +the novel pleasure with unmixed delight. And now, the autumn had not yet +come, and she was—_where?_ As these thoughts recurred to me, I pressed +both my hands to my head to prevent my screaming aloud. It was too +horrible—too dreadful—I could not realise it! + +She had been so well, and we had been so happy, until two short weeks +before. She was only forty-two years of age, and very youthful-looking; +our friends had often said, in jest, that I was the older and the graver +of the two. She was a tall woman, with an unusually fine figure, and a +bright speaking face that would have looked young to the last; a soft, +fair complexion, sunny blue eyes, and a mouth that was always ready for +a kiss. She had a happy temperament, too, that ever looked on the +brighter side, and was capable of taking the keenest enjoyment and +interest in everything that was beautiful in Art or Nature. + +If I had ever thought of death coming between us two, it was of dying +myself, with my head on that dear bosom, and those kind eyes fixed on me +to the last. But if _she_ would have suffered in that instance as _I_ +had suffered during the past fortnight, I thanked God for singling me +out as His victim. + +At that phase of my existence I felt there was nothing else to thank Him +for. + +Eight days before, she had been with me, struggling, it is true, in the +last throes of the fearful malady that separated us, but still there, +with her dear blue eyes, grown meek with suffering, turned lovingly to +me, and her hot, fevered hand able to acknowledge the clasp of mine. And +then arrived that awful moment when the light faded and the grasp +relaxed, and they half pulled, half pushed me out of the room; and +something seemed to burst in my head, and make a thousand wheels, like +the burring of machinery, go round and round in my brain, until they +expended themselves like fireworks, and went out one after another, and +my spirit escaped somewhere into a land of darkness and forgetfulness. +As soon as I came to myself again, and they would let me leave my room, +I rushed to _her_. + +I could not believe but that she was still living: that she yet could +open her eyes and look at me, or clasp my hand. I rushed into the room +and ran straight up to the bed; but I had been absent for an hour, and +the officious attendants had already what they termed ‘laid her out.’ I +pulled off the sheet impetuously, intending to cast myself upon her +breast, but drew back in horror. + +That straightened flattened figure, like a bad model made in discoloured +wax—those dark, closed, sunken eyes—that pinched and drawn-down +nose—those livid, half-parted lips—they never belonged to the mother who +bore me. As well assure me that the house I see fallen to decay, with +clouded panes and shuttered windows and stained walls, is the same that +I have passed when the sunlight played on every square of glass, and +dainty lace curtains shaded, and many-coloured blossoms ornamented every +sill. It was the casket that had once enshrined her soul, I knew; but +that it was my mother, I never realised. It was my first view of the +common change—so common and yet always so strangely new—and it was my +first and last view of the shape that had held what was so dear to me. I +clasped both my hands before my eyes, and fled from it in loathing. They +called me unnatural and hard, and begged of me to look at it again; but +no persuasions could induce me to re-enter the chamber. On the contrary, +I sat in my own room, trying hard to forget I had ever seen it. I wanted +to remember my mother at her best and brightest. I wanted to think of +her as she had appeared to me as a little child—when I had thought her +the cleverest and most beautiful and most wonderful of created +beings—who knew everything and could do everything, and read my mind +before I had expressed it. And I wanted to think of her as she had been +to the last—my friend and companion, who sympathised in all my troubles +and took pleasure in all my joy. And I felt as if the happier +remembrance could never come back to me while _that_ remained in the +room that had been hers, lying stark and stiff upon the bed, or cased +within its narrow coffin, with a sheet drawn over it to keep off the +flies, and a few July roses lying prone upon its sunken surface. Ah! how +I suffered during those days of waiting, heaven and my own heart only +knew. I longed for two things only: that the dreaded funeral might be +over and done with, and I might be able to go away somewhere—no matter +where, so long as the place was very distant from that in which I had +been so miserable—and that I might never see any of the things again by +which I was then surrounded. + +And now one of my wishes had been realised, and I had followed the dark +coffin to Norwood Cemetery, and seen it lowered into a grave dug in the +grass. And I had come back to the house again, to find it still more +empty than before. + +That was yesterday. The people of the house had drawn up the blinds +again, and the chamber in which she had died was having ‘a regular turn +out.’ I could hear the maidservants from where I sat, throwing the +casements wide, and laughing with one another as they shook the bed and +pillows, and smartly swept the carpet which had been innocent of broom +so long. I heard them rattling the glass and china, and moving the +furniture about the room, and my heart sickened afresh at the unusual +sound of bustle. Pshaw! what did it matter, after all? They could not +disturb her, lying six feet under ground in Norwood Cemetery; and as for +me, I must get used to such things. Yet, for all that, my lip was +quivering terribly as a knock at the door caused me to turn from the +looking-glass to confront my landlady, Mrs. Medlicott. + +‘Mr. Warrington wishes to speak to you, if you please, miss.’ + +Mrs. Medlicott’s voice was unusually low and subdued. You would have +thought, to hear her, that butter would not melt in her mouth; and to +me, who knew how spiteful and shrill her tones could be on occasions, +the change was irritating. What had happened to me more than to others, +that a common lodging-house keeper should presume to show me compassion! + +‘Show him in,’ I answered, almost sharply. + +Mr. Warrington was my mother’s solicitor. I had seen him at the funeral +yesterday, as I had seen the rest of the mourners, through a sort of +misty haze, but we had not spoken to each other. I knew he came to talk +to me now about money, and my future mode of living, and my soul +sickened at the mere idea; but nothing could make me worse than I was, +so I said: ‘Show him in.’ + +Mr. Warrington was not at all like the conventional family lawyer. He +was a fashionable man in appearance, not more than forty, and always +looked distinguished, in well-cut clothes, trimly-arranged hair, and a +fresh bouquet in his button-hole. To-day it was composed of lilies of +the valley and gardenias; and the faint smell of the latter blossom +recalled to my mind, I could not tell why, the painful scene of +yesterday, with so much acuteness, that I felt as though I must tear it +from his breast and trample it under foot. But I schooled myself to +raise my heavy eyes in his direction, and greet him with composure. Then +we shook hands in complete silence. + +‘I trust I have not called upon you too early, Miss Marsh,’ commenced +Mr. Warrington; ‘but I was anxious to see if I could be of any use, and +also to have a little conversation with you about your money-matters.’ + +‘Yes?’ I said, interrogatively. + +‘I received a letter this morning, also, from your trustee, Mr. Lovett, +the contents of which he is desirous I should communicate to you. You +have no personal knowledge of Mr. Lovett, I believe, Miss Marsh?’ + +‘None whatever!’ + +‘But you are aware, I suppose, that your—your late mother’s income was +derivable from a pension granted her on your father’s death, in +recognition of his scientific discoveries, and a sum of money vested in +East India property which realised about one hundred and fifty pounds a +year?’ + +‘Yes; I have heard so.’ + +‘The Rev. Horace Lovett, who was your father’s most intimate friend, was +left trustee for this small property during your mother’s lifetime. At +her death it was to revert, unconditionally, to you; but Mr. Lovett is +still willing to continue his trust, if you wish it, and will re-appoint +him to the charge.’ + +‘I have no choice in the matter. You had better arrange it all, Mr. +Warrington.’ + +‘But shall I seem impertinent if I ask you what you intend to do?’ + +‘I have no intentions of any sort.’ + +‘You will not continue to live here?’ + +‘Oh no! I suppose things will settle themselves in due time, and I shall +drift on somewhere. It will be all “drifting” henceforward. I cannot +look forward to “living” again.’ + +‘No, no; of course not—not for the present; no one could expect it,’ +replied Mr. Warrington, soothingly. ‘But you are too young to live +alone, Miss Hilda.’ + +‘Am I? Numbers live alone who are as young as I am. And I see no +alternative.’ + +‘There are several! Young ladies situated as you are, generally try to +board with some pleasant family; or they have an older lady to live with +them, and chaperon them into the world.’ + +‘I shall want no chaperonage,’ I said sadly, recalling the arm on which +I had leant for so many years; ‘neither shall I go out into the world. I +am only sure of one thing, that I must leave this place; but whether to +go into a convent or on the stage is perfectly indifferent to me. I have +no present, Mr. Warrington, and no future! All I desire to do is to +forget.’ + +‘Come, come! you mustn’t talk to me in that strain,’ he answered. ‘I +know it is quite natural, but it is not like the sensible, philosophical +reasoning I have heard you exercise on the behalf of others. You have +doubtless experienced a very heavy loss——’ + +‘Mr. Warrington, will you be good enough not to speak to me about it? +You may say what you like about myself, but nothing, please, that refers +to the past.’ + +I dreaded breaking down before this hard, cynical man of the world, who +looked upon death as the end of all things, and had frequently +challenged me to prove to him, by even the feeblest argument, that the +soul lived again after it had quitted the body. + +‘Very well, Miss Hilda,’ he replied, nonchalantly; ‘your wishes shall be +respected in all things. But since you have formed no plans for +yourself, may I be permitted to suggest one for you? Mr. Lovett writes +me most feelingly on the subject this morning, and proposes that you +should go, as soon as ever you please, to St. Pucelle, and form one of +his family circle, as long as it suits your convenience to do so.’ + +‘I go to St. Pucelle!’ I exclaimed. + +‘Why not? It is a charming old-fashioned town, on the very frontiers of +the Belgian territory, and Mr. Lovett’s family consists of two +motherless daughters, who would form pleasant companions for you. Mr. +Lovett is not rich, as you may suppose. The salary of a Protestant +clergyman abroad is barely sufficient to enable him to live in decent +gentility; but he offers, should you go there, to hand you over fifty +pounds annually for your own expenses, and I do not think that you will +easily find a pleasanter or cheaper home in which to establish yourself. +And so eminently respectable, too; living in a clergyman’s family, and +under the guardianship of your trustee. I hope you will think of the +proposal favourably.’ + +‘To go to St. Pucelle!’ I repeated vaguely. Thoughts of the foreign trip +that _we_ had planned together rushed rebelliously into my mind, and for +a few minutes I could not trust myself to speak. But as the mental mist +cleared off, I found the plan that Mr. Warrington had proposed a very +feasible one. + +‘You _cannot_ live alone,’ continued the solicitor, earnestly. ‘It is of +no use discussing the question. You are too young, and, if you will +forgive me for saying so, Miss Hilda, you are much too handsome, to set +up housekeeping on your own account. You have your name, and the name of +those who are gone, to consider, and I am sure you will never dream of +doing anything that would have displeased them.’ + +‘No, no,’ I answered, hastily; ‘but I must have time to think about it.’ + +I had no friends to consult upon the subject. I suppose there never was +a girl who found herself more completely thrown upon the world than I +did. My father had been an only child, and my mother had come from +Australia. Brothers and sisters, uncles, aunts, and cousins, were names +unknown to me, except as they related to other people. I was literally +my own mistress, and I felt terribly alone in remembering it—I, who had +never felt alone in my life before. For the last few years I had +believed myself to be so much of a woman, for my experience in some +things had been greater than that of other girls, and _she_ had made me +her intimate companion, and unfolded all her mind to me as I had done +mine to her. Now I felt like a little child that wanted advice and +guidance, and had no one to depend on but herself. But Mr. Lovett’s +offer had opened new ideas to me, and I felt it was not to be rejected +hastily. + +‘I suppose, if I go to St. Pucelle,’ I continued, after a pause, ‘that +my stay there will be perfectly optional, and I shall be able to leave +it whenever I choose?’ + +‘Certainly. I can have no idea that Mr. Lovett wishes to keep you a +prisoner there. The proposal is evidently made only with a view to your +benefit, and I will make it a proviso in my answer that your actions are +to be perfectly uncontrolled. But, at the same time, let me ask what you +could possibly do, at your age, in the world by yourself?’ + +‘Oh, don’t worry me!’ I said, impatiently; ‘there are a thousand things +I could do if I chose, and I will never stay in any family whose habits +are uncongenial to me. I have been used to have my own way too much for +that!’ + +Mr. Warrington rose, and commenced smoothing down the nap of his hat, +which the crape band of yesterday still encircled. + +‘Very good, Miss Marsh! Then I will leave you to consider the matter at +your leisure, and I hope you will give me the first intimation of your +decision. I presume you have sufficient money in hand for current +expenses?’ + +‘Yes, yes; I have everything I want,’ I answered. I was longing for him +to be gone, and leave me to myself. Every moment he stayed recalled the +past so vividly to me. After a few more words of courtesy, he bowed +himself deferentially out of the room, and I was once more alone. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + + CHAPTER II. + REFUSED. + + +As soon as he had disappeared, I sat down in my chair and began to +think. I might just as well do it then as at any other time. There was +nothing for me to do. All my occupation seemed gone for ever. It would +have been better if I had been one of the housemaids who were beating up +the bed on which she died, with so much cheerful energy; or if I had had +a little brother or sister, any one dependent on me, for whom I should +have been obliged to order meals and bestir myself to amuse or to attend +to. But my time was too much my own. Mrs. Medlicott, in deference to my +loss, sent up my dinner even without the least reference to me. I had +not the poor distraction of annoyance or trouble to divert my thoughts +from the great void that had been suddenly made in my life. So I sat +with my head buried in my hands, and pondered upon St. Pucelle. The idea +of going there, although not positively agreeable, attracted me more +than any that had passed through my brain yet. Naturally, I had thought +a little of my future. In the pauses when grief had spent itself, and I +had wept till I was in a state of insensibility to everything, I had +more than once wondered, in a dull sort of way, what was to become of +me; but, as I had told Mr. Warrington, whether I went into a convent or +on the stage was a matter of perfect indifference. All I wanted was to +change my outward surroundings: not to be obliged every morning to pass +the closed bedroom door which I had been accustomed to enter with an +affectionate greeting; not to have to sit down at the same table where a +chair had always been placed opposite to mine, and eat my meals in +solitude; not, in fact, to have my heart torn every minute by those +seeming ‘nothings’ which make up the happiness or the misery of every +human life. + +St. Pucelle could have no power to remind me of all this, although I +knew that in my inmost heart I should never forget it. But there I +should be in a totally new country—amongst a set of strangers—far from +everything connected with the bitter suffering I was undergoing now. + +The thought, instead of intimidating me, gave me courage. I seemed to +breathe freer when I had decided to accept Mr. Lovett’s offer of a home +at all events, for the next few months; and I rose, with the first +semblance of interest I had experienced in anything since _she_ left me, +to find an old atlas which was stowed away amongst our small collection +of books, and see if St. Pucelle was of sufficient importance to be +marked anywhere upon the frontiers of Belgium. I found it, very much +screwed up in a corner, it is true, but still distinct enough to be +read, close to the Valley of Artois, and on the borders of the +celebrated Forest of Piron. The afternoon was merging, by this time, +into the dusk of evening, and I was just about to ring the bell and +desire the servant to light the lamp, when my attention was attracted by +an altercation going on in the hall. Mrs. Medlicott was apparently, if +one might judge by sounds, fighting with some one who wished to effect +an entrance to her domains. + +‘You can’t come in, sir,’ I heard her say, after a long consultation, ‘I +couldn’t think of allowing it. She ain’t fit to see no one—and won’t be +for days—that’s my opinion; and if she was, I’m quite sure as she would +never dream of admitting a gentleman at this hour. Why, it’s as near +dark as can be—and Miss Marsh quite alone, as she is too.’ + +‘Only for a minute!’ pleaded a young fresh voice. + +Why! it was Charlie—dear old Charlie Sandilands, and she was actually +sending him away! Something rushed up to my throat and my eyes, and I +felt as if I _must_ see him; as if it would do me all the good in the +world to look in his honest eyes and feel the warm grasp of his hand. +What Mrs. Medlicott thought of my propriety I do not know, but I flew to +the drawing-room door, and opening it just wide enough to allow of my +voice being heard, exclaimed: + +‘Yes, Charlie, come in; I should like to see you;’ which caused him +quickly to pass the irate landlady on the doormat, and enter my +apartment. + +I had met Mr. Warrington with dry eyes and a composed voice, and I had +intended to do the same by Charlie Sandilands. But we had had so many +happy evenings together, when _she_ had been present, to laugh at the +absurd devotion which this foolish young man persisted in paying me, +that the contrast between them and the position in which I now stood +struck me too forcibly, and instead of taking the hand he extended to +me, I retreated to my armchair again, and burst into a storm of tears. + +I had not set eyes on Charlie since she had been attacked with her fatal +illness, although his dear good mother had come to me as soon as she had +heard of my trouble, and remained with me to the end. All that had +happened since we met last, and all the sad details of which we must +speak together, overwhelmed me, and for a few minutes I could do nothing +but cry. But then I held out my hand to him, without raising my head, +and said: + +‘Oh, Charlie! you must not think I am not glad to see you; but you know +how much I loved her, and how very miserable I must be.’ + +‘Yes, of course, I know all about it,’ he answered, in an awkward manner +(men do feel so strangely awkward in the presence of a weeping woman +whom they have no right to console); ‘but please don’t mind me, Hilda. I +will go away at once, if you wish it; but I thought I would like to see +you, if I could, and tell you how sorry we all are about it.’ + +‘Don’t go away just yet,’ I murmured. ‘I shall be all right presently. +We will have a cup of tea together, and that will do me good. I am not +often so silly as this, Charlie; for, after all, what is the good of +crying? It cannot bring her back again.’ + +The poor boy looked very uncomfortable at my sad words, of which there +was no refutation, and tried to cover their effect by ringing the bell +for me. I call him a boy, because we had always looked upon and spoken +of him as such, but in reality he was only two years younger than +myself. He was the eldest of a large family of children belonging to a +widowed friend, and we had been such near neighbours for several years, +that we were very intimate. Scarcely a day had passed without our seeing +or hearing something of the Sandilands; and Charlie, who was a clerk in +Somerset House, and spent all his days in London, had been used to walk +in and out of our little room in the evenings like a tame cat. We made +nobody of Charlie Sandilands; and though his mother and mine had had +many a laugh over his flirtation with me, I looked upon him quite in the +light of a brother or a cousin, and took what liberties with him I +chose. + +When the tea made its appearance, we drank it so silently, that I +observed at last that I thought we were holding a Quakers meeting. + +‘I saw you and your brothers in the cemetery yesterday, Charlie,’ I +continued, with an effort, believing that if I did not break the ice I +should never be able to speak to him at all; ‘and I thought it so kind +of you to come.’ + +‘There was no kindness in it, Hilda. I would not have been absent for +worlds.’ + +‘Well, I thought it kind. I suppose one feels small attentions at such +times more than at others. And _she_ was very fond of you, Charlie. She +used to call you “the blue-eyed baby.”’ + +‘She was always too good to me, I know that. Though I am not much of a +baby, Hilda. I shall be twenty-three next birthday.’ + +‘What of that? It is experience, not years, that makes our age. You will +always be a baby, I think. Your mother has spoiled you so.’ + +‘Oh, come, that’s not fair! She spoils Willy and Herbert twice as much +as she does me! Not that I’m jealous of it, for I hate being coddled.’ + +‘Ah, don’t hate it, dear. You may live to miss it, as I am doing now.’ + +‘Mother sent her best love,’ Charlie went on rapidly, feeling he had +made a blunder; ‘and said, if it would be any comfort to you, she would +be so glad if you would come to us for a few days—or for as long as you +like.’ + +‘I couldn’t, Charlie, thank you. It is very kind of your mother, and you +must tell her so; but I would rather be alone. Besides, I have work to +do at home.’ + +‘You could be as much alone as you liked with us. I’d be sorry for the +one who would dare to disturb you. And until your affairs are settled, +and all that sort of thing, wouldn’t it be better for you, Hilda, to +stay with friends, than in these lodgings by yourself?’ + +‘My affairs are already settled, Charlie. I am going to live with my +father’s old friend, Mr. Lovett, at St. Pucelle.’ + +‘_What?_’ cried poor Charlie, thunderstruck at my announcement. + +‘I am going abroad,’ I said, with the selfish indifference that a great +trouble gives us to other people’s pain. ‘I could not stay in Norwood, +you know. I should go mad before a month was over my head; and my +greatest desire now is to lose sight of it at once and for ever. It’s +very name is hateful to me.’ + +‘Oh, Hilda! is it possible you are going to leave us?’ he said, in a +voice of despair. + +‘Why, you could never have imagined I should remain here. I have +suffered too much for that. I have no home now, and no friends; and I +must try and begin a new existence for myself, if that is possible, +where I can wipe out the memory of the past as soon as may be.’ + +‘What will Norwood be without you?’ he exclaimed. + +‘Oh, Charlie, don’t be so ungrateful, when your good mother will still +be here, and all your brothers and sisters! Do you think if I had a +mother and a home circle left to me, as you have, that I should give +more than an ordinary regret to the departure or arrival of mere +friends, however pleasant their company might be!’ + +‘It is quite different, Hilda. You are not a mere friend to me, and you +have known it for a long time past.’ + +This was one of the speeches which a month ago I should have laughed at +merrily, and called him a saucy boy for making. But there was a mournful +earnestness in his voice to-day, that, added to the solemnity of my own +feelings, forbid my even smiling at him. + +‘Please don’t talk like that,’ I said quietly; ‘the time is past with us +for jesting.’ + +‘But it is no jest, Hilda; it is truth—reality! I have loved you for +years. Oh, don’t leave Norwood! Stay with us, and let my mother be your +mother, and make me happy. I should be so very, very happy if you were +my wife.’ + +‘_Your wife!_’ + +The idea seemed sacrilege to me. But the poor boy took my vehement +surprise for anger. + +‘Oh, I ought not to have said anything about it now. It is unseemly, +indecent. I have given you pain. But do forgive me, Hilda. I had not the +least intention of offending you. It slipped out of my mouth before I +was aware of it. The news of your departure was such a dreadful blow!’ + +‘I am not angry,’ I replied. ‘I do not see why the presence of a great +grief should make it indecent to speak of love. It is at such times we +want love most. But it can never be spoken of between you and me, +Charlie—not seriously; and so I am very sorry you ever spoke of it at +all.’ + +‘Is it impossible, then, that you could ever marry me, Hilda? I have two +hundred a year already from Somerset House, and the salary increases +annually. I know it is very little, but I could contrive to keep you in +the same style in which you have been living, and my mother would take +you to her heart as another daughter.’ + +I was so troubled for the poor young fellow. I looked up into his blue +eyes, and they were actually swimming in tears. I felt I had been a +heartless brute to let him go on loving me all this time, and think that +it was play. But I could no more have got up a semblance of passion for +him, than I could for the table which divided us. + +‘Charlie!’ I said, ‘if you had two thousand a year it would make no +difference to me. I shall never marry any one. My heart was all hers, +and it will lie in her grave till we meet again.’ + +‘You think so now, but you will alter your mind by-and-by, perhaps.’ + +‘Nothing can alter it. And I feel very angry with myself to think that I +should have let you grow fond of me, and never found out you were in +earnest.’ + +‘_In earnest!_ It is the hope of my life. And I will never give it up +until one of us is dead and buried.’ + +‘What am I to do to convince you it will be of no use?’ I said +despondingly. ‘If you will give me your solemn promise of secrecy, +Charlie, I will tell you something that I have never told to a single +soul, except to _her_; and that I would cut my tongue out sooner than +tell you, unless it were to try and repair the wrong which, it seems, I +have done you.’ + +‘You have never done me any wrong,’ replied the poor boy, with the +generosity of a true affection. ‘You didn’t mean it, Hilda. It is all my +own fault.’ + +‘But I won’t allow that, Charlie. I have not laid myself out to attract +you, it is true; but I am older than you are, and I should have +remembered what our intimacy might lead to.’ + +‘You seem to harp a great deal on the fact of there being a couple of +years’ difference in our ages; but if a man is not a man at +two-and-twenty, he never will be.’ + +‘Well, I am going to show you now that I consider you to be a man, and +to treat you as such. I have told you that there is a reason why I shall +never marry you nor any one; and that reason is, because—because——’ + +It was much harder to tell than I had imagined it would be. I felt so +much for poor Charlie’s disappointment, that I thought I could make any +sacrifice in order to salve his wounded feelings; but nothing is so +mortifying to a woman as to have to confess that she has loved in vain. + +‘Don’t go on if you don’t wish to,’ said Charlie, with ungrammatical +consideration, as I paused to gain a little courage. + +‘Oh yes; I mean to tell you, that you may be sure that my refusal has +nothing to do with yourself.’ + +‘You care for somebody else!’ he exclaimed intuitively. + +‘No, I don’t,’ I said, reddening up under the consciousness of telling a +lie; ‘but I did—that is, I used to—I mean that years and years ago I met +some one in whom I was very much interested, as you are in me, and I +thought things would have been all right between us; but they never +were, and so I shall be Hilda Marsh to the end of my days.’ + +‘Is that _all_?’ said Charlie, evidently disappointed at so tame a +love-story. ‘I shouldn’t lose heart over that, Hilda; you’ll meet the +fellow again some day, and come to an understanding with him; or perhaps +you’ll forget him, and learn to think of me instead.’ + +‘How utterly I must have failed to make you comprehend my meaning,’ I +replied. ‘Do be convinced, once and for ever, Charlie, there can be no +question of love for me, in this world, again.’ + +‘Is he dead, then?’ + +‘Yes, he is dead—at least to me.’ + +My face burned as I uttered the words. Charlie received them with a look +of blank dismay. Then he said: + +‘All this has made me feel very miserable, Hilda. I think, perhaps, that +I had better go home.’ + +‘Yes, Charlie, I wish you would. It can do you no good to stay here, and +the sight of your home may make you feel there are other people less +lucky than you are.’ + +We shook hands in silence, and he crept quietly out of the house. I was +very sorry for him, for I knew I possessed influence over him, and I was +afraid that he might find some difficulty in shaking it off again. It +was as well for him as for myself that I had determined to leave +Norwood. The conversation I had just held had recalled Cave Charteris +powerfully to my mind; and for some time after Charlie had left me, I +sat pondering over that epoch in my life, which was so entirely closed +and done with, but which yet had left such ineffaceable marks behind it. + +It had happened five years before; but the remembrance was as fresh as +yesterday. I had always believed myself most to blame in the matter, +whilst my dear mother had unhesitatingly attributed all the wrong to +him. But then I had loved the man, and she had only viewed him through +the misery he had caused me. I had told Charlie Sandilands but half the +story; it would have blistered my lips to let him know the whole truth. + +But from my heart I could have no secrets. As I sat by myself that +evening, I recalled every expression of Cave’s handsome features, every +tone of his thrilling voice, as he lingered, day after day, in our +little drawing-room, or accompanied us in our walks, or on our journeys +to town. + +I had believed so fully then, and so had _she_, that the most momentous +period of my existence had arrived, and that all those walks and talks +could end but in one way—the declaration of Cave Charteris’s love for +me. + +For why else had he, over a period of months, attached himself to our +side as though he had a right to accompany us everywhere? I had no doubt +on the subject, and permitted myself to love him without limit; and my +mother looked upon him as her future son, and hailed every good trait in +his character as a fresh guarantee for my happiness. And so we had gone +on, in our blind belief, until one day, after he had been absent for +about a week, I received an affectionate letter from him, claiming my +congratulations on the score of his father having, at last, withdrawn +his refusal to consent to his travelling on the Continent for a couple +of years, preparatory to his entering the profession of the law. And +from that hour I had never heard from him again. His philandering after +me proved only to have been the expression of an impatient spirit +waiting restlessly to hear its doom, and anxious, meanwhile, to make the +weary hours pass away by any means that came easiest to hand. + +I know that heaps of women must have deceived themselves after this +fashion, and felt it as keenly, perhaps, as I did; but it seemed to me, +in my inexperience of pain, as if nobody had ever suffered so much in +this world before. + +My dear mother might rave against the dishonour of Mr. Charteris’s +behaviour to me, as freely as she chose, but we two poor unprotected +women had no remedy against it. We could only fly into each other’s +arms, and weep over it until we could weep no more. I poured out all my +soul to my one true friend and companion, and then we made a compact +never to speak of his name to one another again, unless the burden +should become too heavy to bear alone. + +It was out of this grief that the complete love and reverence I +maintained for my lost parent had been finally cemented. Her tenderness +and sympathy for me in the great trial of health and spirits that +followed, had made her appear more like an angel than a woman in my +eyes; and at the time of her death, it is true that I would not have +exchanged her love for that of any man. She had been my one great good +in this world, and the Creator of the universe had seen fit to take it +away. What wonder was it that both my heart and my soul were in a state +of rebellion against Him? + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + + CHAPTER III. + LAUNCHED. + + +Before I went to bed that night I wrote to Mr. Warrington, telling him I +had decided to accept Mr. Lovett’s offer; and before another fortnight +was over my head, I was on my way to St. Pucelle. There was no reason +for delay, and the few things I had to do, I hurried over as quickly as +possible. We had always lived in furnished rooms; one week’s notice was +sufficient to set me free from them. The books and articles that had +belonged especially to my mother found house-room with my kind friend +Mrs. Sandilands. The only possessions I carried away with me were her +Bible and her portrait and my own limited wardrobe. I wanted to begin +life anew, cumbered with as few reminders of the past as possible. + +I did not think, though, that I should find parting with the grave in +Norwood Cemetery so hard. I had believed myself to be too philosophical +to care about leaving that, any more than the old books that Mrs. +Sandilands had taken charge of. But when the time came to say good-bye +to it, and that which lay in it, I found I was as stupid, commonplace +and non-reasoning an animal as ever wept above an inanimate object that +could neither see, hear, nor respond. + +Mr. Warrington’s cruel arguments came back to my mind, and I found +myself wondering if the end of it all had really come, and I was tearing +myself away from the only link that could ever bind me to her again. It +was late in the evening, at the close of the last day I was to spend in +Norwood, that I stole into the cemetery and found my way, less by sight +than by instinct, to the heap of earth, as yet unsoftened by any grass, +that covered her. It must be allowed to sink—so the sexton had informed +me—before it could be decorated like the other graves. + +To sink right down upon _her_—pressing, pressing, with its awful +unyielding weight, upon the lid of the coffin which covered that dear +dead face—dear, even in spite of its ghastly want of resemblance to that +which she had borne in life. I had said good-bye to the Sandilands and +all my friends in Norwood; this was to be the last farewell my lips +should utter there. + +I sank down upon the mound of clay, and wrestled with my agony alone. +Where was she, this beloved mother of mine? Who could tell me, _without +any doubt_, of her habitation, her occupation, or her final destiny? Was +she really gone for ever, as Mr. Warrington would have assured me, +resolved, body and spirit, into the dust out of which she had been made, +and as effectually lost as the burnt-out candle, the particles of which +have mingled with the air? Was there no place of meeting beyond this +world where I should see and clasp her again? The parson would, of +course, have answered ‘yes;’ but the attainment of his conventional +paradise was saddled with so many conditions that I was hopeless of ever +reaching it. _She_ might have got there, with her angelic love and +tenderness for all things, whether in heaven or on earth, but I knew +myself to be unequal to following her footsteps. I sat on her grave +stunned and hopeless. We had often talked of a future world together, +and it had seemed easy to believe anything when her lips uttered it; but +now that she had left me, I wanted _proof_, certain and unanswerable +proof, of the truth of what I had been taught; and the foundation on +which I had built my apparent trust had all crumbled under my touchstone +like sand. I felt there was no proof, no certainty, only a vague hope +for ourselves, which became a broken reed when we tried to find comfort +in it under the loss of those we had loved. Every one had conjured me to +look forward to meeting her again. No one had given me one convincing +argument that I should do so. I was surrounded by the dark, impenetrable +mystery of death, and I got up from the grave and walked back to my +lodgings in a condition of dull, sodden despair. + +I was to meet Mr. Warrington the next morning, at twelve o’clock, at one +of the large London wharves. He had been very anxious to accompany me to +St. Pucelle, and deliver me safely into Mr. Lovett’s charge, but I had +refused his kind offices. In the first place, I was quite able to travel +alone; in the second, I longed to find myself so. I had merely to cross +to Antwerp, and take the train on from there to St. Pucelle—or rather to +Artois, which was the nearest railway-station to it. I was sufficiently +acquainted with the French language not to have the slightest doubt of +being able to make my wants understood, and something struck me as very +ludicrous in the idea of a little dandy like Mr. Warrington conducting a +great, tall woman like myself across the water, and delivering me over +to Mr. Lovett’s care, as if I had been a child. So, after he had met me +at the wharf, looking as fresh and trim, with an exquisite button-hole +of white rosebuds and forget-me-nots, as if he were just about to take a +stroll in the Park, and secured a berth for me, and paid my fare, and +seen that my luggage was safely on board, I dismissed him with +ungrateful alacrity, and felt a sensation of relief as the steamboat +quietly glided down the river, and I saw him take off his hat to me for +at least the sixth time, before he quitted the landing-stage. + +‘At last,’ I said to myself, with a long-drawn sigh, ‘I am free to +forget. Everything about me—even to the dress I wear—is a novelty. I +have positively nothing, except a piece of pasteboard and a book, that +belongs to the past. Thank God for it!’ + +I forgot the heart I carried in my bosom. For a while I diverted myself +by watching my fellow-passengers and trying to guess their histories. +There were only about a dozen of them, and they were all collected upon +deck. There was the conventional newly-married couple; I found them out +at once, principally because everything the bride had on was new, even +to the soles of her boots, which were almost as fresh as when they had +left the workman’s hands, and had evidently never trod the vulgar earth +before that morning. + +There were a mother and father with a couple of odious children, whom +they permitted to run against the other passengers just as they chose, +smearing their dresses with their sticky fingers and staring rudely in +their faces for five minutes together. They kept leaping up on the seats +also, and leaning over the sides of the vessel, till I began to hope +that one or both might disappear for ever under the water. No such good +luck, however, was in store for us. To the end of the voyage the +children were ubiquitous. They scrambled for food at the dinner-table, +and long after they had been put to bed, reappeared in their +night-dresses to demand more fruit and biscuits. + +If parents only would realise what an abominable nuisance their +offspring are to everybody but themselves, they would not, perhaps, +entail so many unnecessary invectives on their heads as they do. If +there is one character in history with whom I have more sympathy than +another, it certainly is Herod. My attention was diverted for a time +from these horrid imps by a young girl dressed, as I was, in deep +mourning, who sat by herself in a very subdued attitude at one end of +the vessel. I found she was going, for the first time, to a foreign +school at Ghent. She had lost her father, and was anxious to perfect +herself in French and German, before attempting to earn her own +livelihood as a governess. It was a melancholy prospect, I thought. I +imagined myself the governess of two such children as were annoying the +company now, whilst their mother complacently read a cheap novel, and +felt sure that in such a case I should have ended my career upon the +gallows. Had it been necessary for me to work for my bread, I would have +been a housemaid, a cook, shop-girl—anything rather than a governess or +a nurse! + +Two or three foreigners, seedy and dirty in appearance, were standing +near me, and looking rather impertinently in my face, which gave me a +desire to change my seat. I rose, with the intention of crossing the +deck, when my hand-bag, which had been lying on my lap, fell to the +ground. + +Some one quickly picked it up and restored it to me. Not one of my seedy +foreigners, but a bright-haired English lad of not more, I thought, than +sixteen or seventeen years old. + +‘Do you wish to go downstairs?’ he inquired politely; ‘and may I help +you?’ + +It was such a nice, frank, boyish voice and face, that I quite took to +him. + +‘No, thank you,’ I said; ‘I only wish to sit on the other side of the +boat.’ + +‘I will find you a seat. It is much cooler there,’ he answered, with +alacrity. + +My boy-gallant then accompanied me across the deck, and having arranged +my plaid for me to sit down upon, ensconced himself by my side. + +‘We shall have a charming passage across this time,’ he remarked, +confidentially. + +‘Shall we? I know nothing of the tides. I have never crossed before.’ + +‘Do you go by Calais, then?’ + +‘No! This is the first time I have ever left England!’ + +He opened his round eyes to their utmost. + +‘Oh! I say! Why, I cross six times every year, and sometimes oftener.’ + +‘Do you live abroad, then?’ + +‘No! I live in London—at least, my dad does—but I’m coaching for the +Civil Service, with old Felton, at Rille, and run home at Christmas and +Easter and Midsummer. I’m just going back after the summer vacation. +Isn’t it a bore?’ + +‘Dreadful!’ I acquiesced. ‘But is not Rille near Artois?’ + +‘About twenty miles distant. Why?’ + +‘Only that I am going to Artois, or near it.’ + +‘That’s jolly! I’ll look after you and see you get there all right, as +you’ve not been used to travelling—that is, if you’d like me to.’ + +‘Thank you, very much.’ + +I could not help inwardly smiling to think that I, who had so scornfully +rejected the escort of the polite and experienced Mr. Warrington, should +be thanking a raw schoolboy for the offer of his valuable protection to +Rille. But the cordial unconventionality of the lad pleased me, and I +thought I should like to have him for a travelling companion. + +‘It is not much of a journey from Antwerp to Rille,’ I said. + +‘Only a couple of hours. We shall get in about eight o’clock to-morrow +morning, and there’s a train at half-past which will land me at my shop +by half-past ten, and you at Artois at eleven. I pity you staying at +Artois; it’s a horrid dull place.’ + +‘Oh! I am not going to remain at Artois. My friends live a little +farther on.’ + +As he saw I did not volunteer the information, his intuitive delicacy +forbid his asking me the name of my friends, or of myself. But he +frankly disclosed his own. + +‘My dad’s name is Sir John Stephenson. Dare say you’ve heard of him. +He’s a bigwig in the doctor way. He wanted me to be one. He said, “Fred, +my boy, there’s nothing like the medical profession.” But I didn’t see +it—I don’t fancy cutting off arms and legs—should you?’ + +‘No, indeed! And so your name is Frederick Stephenson?’ + +‘Yes! And I’ve got two brothers, Bob and Ernest; but they’re quite +little chaps.’ + +‘I suppose I must tell you my name in return, especially as we shall +travel to Rille together. I am called Hilda Marsh.’ + +‘That’s an awfully jolly name—Hilda, I mean. I’ve got three sisters, and +they have rather nice names, I think: Jessie and Amy and Blanche, but +“Hilda” beats them all to smash.’ + +‘I am glad you think so! Do you like living at Rille?’ + +‘Pretty well, but I shall be very glad when I’ve done with it. We have +larks now and then, but old Felton’s the clergyman there, and awfully +stiff with us. He hardly ever lets us go into the town.’ + +At this juncture the dinner-bell rang, and my young friend was all alert +to obey it. + +‘Won’t you come down?’ he urged. ‘They give very good spreads on board +this boat, and if you’re likely to be ill when we get out to sea, you’ll +be all the worse for not having eaten anything.’ + +But I could not join them at the dinnertable. I had not sat down to a +regular meal for weeks, and the idea of roast and boiled joints sickened +me. I persuaded Master Fred Stephenson to leave me where I was, whilst +he satisfied the cravings of nature, to look at the charming sights +which presented themselves on either side the river, which we were now +fast leaving for the open sea. + +By six o’clock we were well out in the ocean, which was calm as a lake +at that time of year; and I shrank with dismay at the idea of quitting +the cool sweet-smelling deck for the stuffy cabin, to which I had been +introduced in the former part of the day. + +‘Why should you?’ exclaimed Master Fred, to whom I had confided my +grievance; ‘we’ll have a mattress and pillow sent up on deck for you, +and you’ll sleep twice as well here as you would below. I’ll go and +speak to the captain at once about it.’ + +He strode off with the air of a man, before I had time to dissuade him +from asking for what appeared to me an impossible indulgence. However, +his application was speedily followed by the appearance of a seaman +bearing the mattress, pillows, and blankets; and when I saw several +others of the passengers making themselves comfortable for the night in +the same manner, I grew less shy of using my improvised couch, and was +thankful to rest upon it. + +As I lay there through the dark night, gazing up into the faces of the +moon and the stars, I could hardly believe that every throb of the +machinery was carrying me farther and farther away from the scenes with +which I had been associated so long. It was a lonely, peaceful +sensation, that of being borne along upon the lapping waves and through +the cool night air without any exertion, and only the burr of the +steamer’s wheels, and an occasional order from the captain to intimate +that some one was watching over my safety whether I slept or not. I lay +thus for some hours, thinking the one great thought that never left my +brain then, by night or day, until at last fatigue overcame me, and I +fell asleep. I woke with a sensation of being stifled. There was no +light, no air, nothing. What had happened to me? I struggled violently +for a moment, when some one, with a gay laugh, suddenly twitched a +blanket off my face, and I was free to breathe again. + +‘Holloa! Miss Marsh,’ exclaimed Fred Stephenson, ‘did you think you were +buried alive?’ + +‘Something very like it,’ I replied; ‘what happened to me?’ + +‘Only this, that when the dew began to fall this morning, I drew the +blanket over your face. It isn’t safe to sleep in it, you know, and +every one is covered up in the same way.’ + +‘Well, it was very kind of you to think of it,’ I said, ‘but I certainly +thought we were all going to the bottom. How still the sea is!’ + +‘We’ve been out of the sea for the last four hours. We are going up the +Scheldt now, and shall be in Antwerp before you’ve had time to have your +breakfast and make a comfortable toilet.’ + +I scrambled to my feet at this intelligence, and sought the shelter of +my cabin, which felt closer and more stuffy even than it had done the +day before. A cup of coffee woke me completely up again, and by the time +the boat steamed alongside the quay at Antwerp, I was on deck, ready to +admire or be surprised at every fresh thing I saw. Master Fred +Stephenson proved an admirable cicerone, and never ceased to call my +attention to everything that he thought would interest or amuse me. + +‘Aren’t those rum houses and trees?’ he said in his schoolboy language, +as he pointed out some quaint buildings on the quay; ‘they look for all +the world like the contents of one of those German boxes of toys the +children get at home, set up on end. And that’s a milk-cart drawn by +that dog, with all those brass cans in it. Did you ever see such caps +and bonnets as the women wear. I tried to squash one of their bonnets +once by sitting on it, but it was no use. They’re as hard as wood. +Holloa! here come the Custom-house people to look at the boxes. If you +will let me have your keys, Miss Marsh, I’ll see your luggage passed. I +suppose you’ve got nothing to declare.’ + +I assured him I had not. + +‘Well, I’ve got lots, but I’m blessed if they shall find them. I smuggle +more things, every time I cross, than the rest of the English pupils put +together; but I’m an awfully lucky fellow, and have never been caught +yet.’ + +I stood on the bridge to watch the Custom-house officers at their duty, +and found it a very amusing sight. The distinction they made between +searching the luggage of their own countrymen and that of mine, inspired +me with a feeling of pride that, notwithstanding Master Fred’s +peccadilloes, the word of an Englishman should be so readily taken. + +I observed that when the bridegroom and the father of the obnoxious +children had simply said they had nothing in their boxes liable to duty, +the keys were returned to them after the merest feint had been made of +raising the lids. But no such declarations availed the seedy foreigners, +though they accompanied them with oaths. Their scanty apparel, very +yellow and shabby in appearance, was religiously displayed on deck for +the admiration of the rest of the passengers, and every crevice of their +trunks carefully searched; and I felt sincere pity for one poor wretch +who was compelled to turn out the whole contents of an enormous hamper, +which was found, after all, to contain nothing but apples and pears. + +When it came to the turn for Master Fred’s boxes, he threw his keys to +the Custom-house officers in the most nonchalant manner, desiring him to +search for himself. + +The consequence of which was that, the trouble promising to prove too +great, the keys were merely turned in the locks and delivered again to +their owner. + +‘That’s the way I do them, Miss Marsh,’ said Master Fred, with the +greatest glee, as we drove together to the station. ‘There’s nothing +goes down in this world like a perfect absence of fear. If you try to +prevent those fellows from rumpling your collars, they turn everything +over in order to find your contraband goods; but if you tell them to +look for themselves and not bother you, they feel sure directly that +innocence alone can make you so brave.’ + +‘You are a very naughty boy,’ I said, smiling in spite of myself at his +self-assurance and British cheek. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + + CHAPTER IV. + ST. PUCELLE. + + +But notwithstanding his youth, I found Master Fred Stephenson not only +entertaining, but useful, for he took all trouble off my hands, and +before long I found myself sitting by his side in a _coupé_, and +travelling fast towards Rille and Artois. He rattled on, in his boyish +manner, of his school-life and pursuits, mingling his discourse with +more than one tale of scandal concerning the English abroad. + +‘You should not repeat such stories young man,’ I said reprovingly, +‘whether they are true or not.’ + +‘Oh! they deserve everything one can say of them, Miss Marsh. You never +saw such a lot—greedy, grasping, ill-natured, and tale-bearing. They +seem to live only to cheat each other and pick holes in their +neighbours’ characters. I am generally ashamed to meet any of my +countrymen on the Continent. And the way they dress, too! I wonder, for +my part, that any of the tradesmen trust them. Now there’s an old card +who’s a great chum of Felton’s—to see him and hear him talk, you’d think +he was a perfect saint; but just listen to the tales that are told of +his being in debt all over the place, and fleecing young men out of +their money! Oh! criminy!’ + +‘Perhaps they are not all true,’ I suggested mildly, for as we neared my +destination I began to feel rather nervous at the prospect of meeting my +unknown friends, and less well disposed to listen to the social scandal +Master Stephenson amused himself by retailing to me. ‘Were we not rather +late in starting? It is nearly half-past ten now, and we are several +stations yet from Rille. I wonder if Mr. Lovett has received my letter +to say I should start yesterday.’ + +‘Mr.—_who_?’ exclaimed Fred Stephenson. + +‘Mr. Lovett, the Protestant minister of St. Pucelle. He is my trustee, +and a sort of guardian. It is at his house that I am going to stay.’ + +‘Well, I _am_ blowed!’ ejaculated my elegant young friend. + +‘Do you know him, then?’ + +‘_Know him!_ Of course I do! Everybody knows him within fifty miles of +Artois. He was tutor, or guardian, or something of the kind, to the +young German Prince Francius von Rudelstein de Ritzburg, and spends half +his time at court. He is considered quite a swell in his way, and is +often over at Rille. And so you’re going to St. Pucelle! What a lark!’ + +I could not exactly see in what the ‘lark’ consisted; but I thought it a +singular coincidence that my young travelling companion should be +acquainted with Mr. Lovett. + +‘Perhaps you will be surprised to hear that I have never seen him yet. +What is he like?’ + +‘Oh, a very fine-looking old fellow, with snow-white hair and the most +benevolent of countenances. He’s got two jolly daughters, too.’ + +‘I am glad to hear that, because I am likely to see much more of them +than of their father. What are their ages?’ + +‘I can’t tell you that, because I’m not sure; but I should think the +eldest must be about your age, and her sister a few years younger. +They’re both pretty; Tessie has fair hair and a nice tall figure, but +the little one’s darker.’ + +‘Have you seen much of them?’ + +‘No; very little; only when they came to Rille with their father, to be +confirmed. But, by Jove! here’s the old shop itself. I’m so awfully +sorry I can’t see you safe to Artois, Miss Marsh, but it’s only three +stations farther on, and the diligence will be in waiting to take you on +to St. Pucelle. Good-bye! I’m so glad I met you! Hope we shall soon meet +again! Shouldn’t wonder if old Felton lets me run over to Piron for a +day’s shooting this autumn. No; no thanks. I’m so glad I was able to do +anything for you!’ And, with a wave of his hat and many smiles, the +nice, frank-hearted boy ran away to greet a group of his schoolfellows, +who were assembled on the platform. The last I saw of his happy face, as +the train moved slowly out of the station, was a succession of nods; the +last I heard of his joyous voice, a hearty ‘_Au revoir._’ + +Well, he had been much comfort to me on my first essay at traversing the +world alone, and I was thankful I had encountered him. Now he was gone, +and I turned my thoughts entirely to the meeting which lay so short a +way ahead of me. + +When I arrived at Artois, I found, as he had told me, a diligence in +waiting to take all passengers and luggage on to St. Pucelle. This +conveyance, so fast becoming extinct upon the Continent, excited much of +my interest. It is true that it had no springs, and jolted along the +rough country-road to such an extent as nearly to jolt me into pieces; +true, that the four little mules that drew it, decorated with scarlet +woollen tassels and jingling with bells, required a constant succession +of oaths and cracks of the whip to make them move out of a walk, and +often stopped dead of their own accord, notwithstanding their driver’s +energy. I was wedged in tightly, also, on a broiling August morning, +between some fat market-women, who regarded my foreign appearance with +curious wonder, and, opposite, a set of men who puffed smoke in my face +with the utmost nonchalance. But the diligence was making its slow, +uneven way on a road cut in the side of a hill. On one hand lay the +lovely fertile valley of Artois, through the green bosom of which a +river was winding its way like a silver snake, glistening in the +sunlight. On the other was a high hill, which looked almost like a +mountain in my inexperienced eyes, and was covered to the top with +purple heather, precisely similar to that we find in England and +Scotland, intermingled with wild flowers of every form and colour. I was +wrapt in admiration of the view. I gazed from right to left in silent +wonder, thinking I had never seen anything in my life before so +beautiful and bright, and forgetful alike of the uncomfortable pressure +I was enduring from my stout neighbours, and the vile tobacco-smoke +which came puffing in my face from over the way. Subsequent experience +made me aware that the journey from Artois to St. Pucelle, when +performed in the diligence, occupied an hour and a quarter; but it did +not seem to have been half that time to me when the vehicle suddenly +came to a standstill, and I heard a voice in parley with the driver. + +The fat women looked at each other and murmured something about the +‘_Curé Anglais_;’ and my curiosity was just being awakened by a few +words of French which I had caught from outside, when an old gentleman +came round to the diligence-door and looked in upon us. + +‘_Bonjour, monsieur!_’ cried all its occupants, save one, +simultaneously; and the new-comer raised his hat in reply to the general +salutation. I thought I had never seen such a perfect picture of an old +man before. His snow-white hair covered his finely-formed head in loose, +wavy curls; his high forehead bore the impress of intellect and +benevolence; and his bright blue eyes beamed forth from a face the +complexion of which was soft and fair as that of a child. He had a tall, +upright figure, rather stout than otherwise, and must have been, in his +youth, an unusually handsome man. His long cloth coat and broad-brimmed +hat told me his profession before he spoke, and I was delighted when I +heard him demand, in English, if I were Miss Marsh. + +‘Am I speaking to Mr. Lovett?’ I exclaimed. + +‘Yes, my dear, yes; no other. Your letter reached us safely this +morning, so I thought I would walk a little way down the road to meet +the diligence. I hope you have travelled here comfortably?’ + +‘Very comfortably, thank you. But are we so short a distance, then, from +St. Pucelle?’ + +‘We are within a stone’s throw of the town. There it stands, on the brow +of the hill.’ + +‘I should very much like then, if I may, Mr. Lovett, to walk back with +you instead of driving.’ + +‘By all means, my dear,’ he replied, as he opened the door and helped me +out of the vehicle. + +A few words in French explained matters to the driver, and in another +minute the diligence was lost to view in a cloud of white dust, and the +Rev. Horace Lovett and I were left standing alone on the road to St. +Pucelle. The first thing he did was to take my hand, and regard me +steadfastly in the face. + +‘You are _very_ like your poor father,’ he said, ‘both in feature and +expression, and you will be all the dearer to me for the resemblance. +Perhaps you have heard—you may have been told—what firm, fast friends we +were in the olden days.’ + +‘Oh yes, Mr. Lovett; my mother has often told me so.’ + +‘I did not know your poor mother,’ he replied; ‘I was settled here +before your father’s marriage. But report has told me how good and +amiable a wife he had gained in her.’ + +‘She was indeed good,’ I said falteringly. ‘I seem to have lost +everything I possessed in losing her.’ + +‘Come, come, my child,’ he said soothingly, ‘I should not have mentioned +the subject to you so soon. Do not let us speak of it today. You have +come to the house of your father’s earliest and closest friend. You must +try and think that it is a second father himself who welcomes you +there.’ + +‘Indeed you are very good to me,’ I replied; ‘and I felt the kindness of +your offer from the first, though I have scarcely thanked you for it.’ + +‘You have thanked me in the best way possible, my dear, by accepting it. +I have had two daughters hitherto; now I shall have three. My little +girls are all impatience to form your acquaintance; but you must make +allowances for them. You will find them rough little Wallons, who know +nothing of England or English customs.’ + +‘What is a Wallon, Mr. Lovett? I am afraid you will find me as ignorant +of Continental ways and fashions as your girls are of English.’ + +‘Then you must teach each other. We are in what they call here the +Wallon country, my dear, which they would term in Scotland, I think, +“neither fish, flesh, nor good red herrin’.” The people hereabout speak +a _patois_ of French and German, rather difficult of comprehension at +first, and which has considerably spoilt my little girls’ accent. + +We were now approaching the entrance of the town, which consisted +principally of one long street built on a steep hill, so that to mount +it almost seemed like climbing up stairs, especially as it was paved +irregularly with grey rough stone. At the very summit of it stood an +imposing-looking edifice built of granite, with a spire and cross lifted +to the skies, which I concluded to be the church of which Mr. Lovett had +charge. But he soon undeceived me. + +‘Oh no, my dear; you must not expect to see our faith honoured after +that fashion in this country. That is the Catholic church, under the +superintendence of my very good friend, the Abbé Morteville. I have +offered to exchange with him more than once, but he has not taken the +hint.’ + +‘I should hardly have thought there had been sufficient Protestants in a +town like this to render it worth while to keep up a church and minister +for them.’ + +‘No more there are. But my excellent friend and patron, the Grand Duke +Francius von Rudelstein, interested himself on my behalf, and placed me +here in order to attend to the spiritual wants of the summer visitors. +We have a great many visitors to St. Pucelle in the summer season.’ + +‘I don’t wonder at it. It seems to me the loveliest place I have ever +seen.’ + +At this juncture, a man dressed in a blue blouse, buckled round his +waist, and a cap with a peak to it, ran out of a shop and button-holed +Mr. Lovett, whilst he apparently pleaded for something, very volubly and +earnestly, in his own language. + +‘Some parochial confidence,’ I thought, as I saw my old friend move +farther from my side, so as to take the man out of earshot. They spoke +together for some minutes; the tradesman still pleading, and Mr. Lovett +seeming to try and soothe him down to a quieter frame of mind. At last +he prevailed. The man in the blouse smiled and raised his peaked cap, +and Mr. Lovett, calling out cheerily, ‘_À demain_,’ returned his smile +in the most benevolent manner, and hastened to my side again. + +‘You will excuse me, my dear,’ he said, ‘but a minister is at the beck +and call of all his parishioners.’ + +‘Is that man a Protestant, then?’ I asked with surprise. + +I do not know why I should have been surprised, but he had looked so +thoroughly unlike it. + +‘We have a regular mixture here,’ replied Mr. Lovett, without answering +my question. ‘Do you see that house on the right hand, my dear child, +with steps leading up either side to the porch? that is my humble abode, +and that is where I hope you will make yourself very happy for a long +time to come.’ + +I followed the direction of his silver-headed cane with a quick +curiosity that the appearance of the house was well calculated to +increase. It was built of wood, and looked to me more like the +representations I had seen of Swiss châlets than any other sort of +private dwelling. The principal door was reached, as Mr. Lovett had +pointed out to me, by a double flight of wooden steps, with rails on the +outer side of them. The windows were lattices, with diamond-shaped panes +of glass. The house looked large and commodious, but it was so much +built on a slope that the garden to one side of it was level with the +windows of the first story; so that the lower rooms must consequently +have been, in part at least, under ground. The front was covered with a +luxuriant union of vine, fig and pear tree, and the little garden to the +side, which was visible above the top of the wall, was a mass of +fragrant bloom. But what attracted me most was the figure of a girl, +leaning over the rails which guarded the porch. + +Her features did not strike me at first sight as being pretty, but there +was a grace about her figure, and a sweet, fair womanliness in her face, +that made me feel at once we should be friends. + +‘Papa!’ she called out, with a decidedly French pronunciation, as we +drew near the porch. + +Mr. Lovett looked up and shook his stick gaily at her. + +‘There is my Tessie,’ he said proudly, ‘the elder of the two; and as +good a child as ever walked alone! And where is my little maid?’ he +continued to his daughter; ‘has she run away to hide herself, in fear of +this formidable stranger?’ + +‘No, no, papa!’ replied Tessie, laughing. ‘Ange has gone up the hill to +fetch some eggs from Mère Fromard. For we did not expect Miss Marsh +would arrive so soon.’ + +I thought she was a daughter for any man to be proud of, as she came +gracefully down the steps to meet me, and extended her hand in greeting. +She was tall and slight, and clothed in a black stuff dress, with a +broad white muslin apron on, fashioned with a bib that was pinned on +either shoulder. Her fair, soft hair was taken loosely off her face and +coiled in a knot behind her head, and her grey eyes—too small and too +grey to be like her father’s—beamed forth mildly from a complexion that +was unusually delicate for a country-bred girl. But what struck me most +in Teresa Lovett’s face was the unmistakable look which betrayed that +she had suffered—and seen others suffer—as I had. It was a bond of union +between us that was cemented the first day we met, and will last until +time is no more. + +‘Come, girls! kiss each other!’ cried Mr. Lovett, as he watched the +commonplace greeting with which we timidly touched each other’s hand. +‘That’s right,’ he continued, as we obeyed his directions; ‘you must +never forget that your fathers were more like brothers than friends in +the olden time. God bless my soul! it’s many a scrape I got in with Dick +Marsh in our college days; and many a time we’ve hoped we should live to +meet again, and have a crack over the past. But that wish has been +overruled, so we must make the best of what remains to us. But if you +girls don’t get on together, I shall never forgive you. You are both +motherless, and you’ve only got one father left between the lot of you; +so it will be very hard if you can’t cling together and make the rest of +your lives as pleasant as may be.’ + +‘We mean to try to do so, dear papa,’ said Tessie in her soft voice, as +she gave me a second embrace, preparatory to leading me into the house. +‘I am sure you must be tired,’ she continued; ‘do come in and rest.’ + +All this had taken place in front of the house, and in the very centre +of the street; but then the street of St. Pucelle must not be judged by +the rules of any other. It was just past noon. The inhabitants of the +town were unanimously partaking of their mid-day meal. + +Not a passenger was to be seen from one end of the long thoroughfare to +the other, and doubtless my new friends and I might have embraced for +the next half-hour without observation. But I was beginning to feel very +weary, and was glad to accept Tessie’s invitation to enter and rest +myself. My slumbers on board the boat had been but broken ones, and the +fatigue of the excitement consequent on my journey was beginning to make +itself apparent. So that I felt thankful when I had mounted the wooden +steps which led to the hall-door, and realised that, for the time being, +I had reached the end of my travels. + +The door opened immediately upon a large room, the floor of which was +but half covered by a threadbare carpet, in which it was impossible to +trace even the remains of colour; in the centre stood a deal table with +a faded green cloth, round which were placed some half-dozen or more +rush-bottomed chairs. A large oil painting of the Crucifixion hung over +the narrow, wooden mantelpiece, and was the only visible ornament. And a +buffet covered with wine-glasses and tumblers stood to one side of the +apartment, which I concluded to be the dining-room. I confess, though, +that I was hardly prepared for the meagre appearance of its furniture, +and I suppose Tessie guessed my surprise from the expression of my face. + +‘You must not expect to find all the customs of this country similar to +those of England,’ she said, with a touch of pride. ‘Papa tells me you +think a great deal of your furniture and rooms there, but no one does so +in St. Pucelle. In the first place, there are so few people here to see +and admire it; and in the second, the servants would not know how to +keep it in order. Not that we have always been so shabby as we are now,’ +she added, in a lower voice; ‘but Ange and I were only babies when poor +mamma died, and there has been no one to look after such things since. +We don’t care for ourselves—Ange and I—we would as soon sit on +rush-bottomed chairs as on velvet; but it is sad for poor papa, who has +been used to such a different life from this.’ + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + + CHAPTER V. + ANGE. + + +‘Ange is your sister’s name, is it not?’ I asked her. + +‘Yes. And you will like her so much. She is such a darling! She was +baptised ‘Angela,’ but we have always called her Ange for short. The +country people gave it to her first. She was so pretty, like a little +angel, running amongst them with her golden curls, and they named her +‘_Petite Ange!_’ And then we took it up, and she has been called so ever +since.’ + +‘It is a very pretty abbreviation! Is there much difference in your +ages?’ + +‘Five years. I am three-and-twenty, and she is but just eighteen. Am I +younger than you?’ + +‘By a twelvemonth only. I hope we shall be very good friends, Tessie—if +I may call you so.’ + +‘Yes, indeed you must; and I must call you by your name—Hilda—since papa +says we are to be sisters. But if you should find the life here too dull +and stupid after England! That would be very sad for all of us, would it +not?’ + +‘Why should you anticipate it? I have not been accustomed to a gay life, +Tessie. I lived all alone with my dear mother until—until——’ + +‘Yes, yes, I know!’ cried the girl, with ready sympathy. + +‘And, as you may imagine, I am hardly likely to wish to mix in scenes of +gaiety now. All I want is rest and peace.’ + +‘Shall we ever get it in this life?’ inquired Tessie, in a low voice. + +I looked up at her in astonishment. + +‘I mean—I mean—’ she went on confusedly, ‘that I am not going to let you +stand here any longer. Come and see the bedroom I have prepared for +you.’ + +For we were still lingering in the barely-furnished dining-room by which +we had entered the house. She led me through a second apartment, smaller +than the first, but bearing more signs of occupation, having an old +piano in one corner, a case of books in another, and a cage of canary +birds singing loudly in the window. Then, to my astonishment, we entered +a large stone kitchen, from which a flight of stairs led up to the +bedroom floor. At the table in the centre sat an old Frenchwoman, +shredding potatoes into a wooden bowl; but whether she was a servant or +not I felt puzzled to decide. She wore a stuff gown, as good as +Tessie’s, with a scarlet worsted shawl, notwithstanding the heat, pinned +tightly across her bosom, and a net-cap much ornamented with artificial +flowers and ribbons, such as is never assumed by the lower classes in +Belgium except on Sundays and fête days. + +She did not look up, either, as we entered the kitchen, nor show any +sign of noticing our presence until Tessie addressed her, as I thought, +with some timidity. + +‘This is Miss Marsh, Madame; she has just arrived by the diligence, and +I am about to take her up to her bedroom that she may refresh herself +before luncheon.’ + +‘Very good! You know your way there,’ muttered the woman in French, +going on with her occupation. + +‘We generally have our luncheon about this time,’ said Tessie to me, +‘but if you would like to take any refreshment beforehand——’ + +‘What refreshment would you offer her, unless it be an apple and a glass +of sour beer?’ interrupted the potato-shredder, who appeared to +understand English perfectly, although she spoke in French. + +‘Oh, Madame! we can surely find Miss Marsh a roll and a little butter,’ +replied Tessie, with a nervous laugh; but I assured her that I should +need nothing until the family meal was announced. + +I heard the Frenchwoman grumbling to herself as we ascended the stairs, +and trusted that a close association with her would not form a necessary +part of my new life. + +‘Madame Marmoret is not very genial with strangers,’ remarked Tessie, as +we entered a long bare corridor upon which the doors of the bedchambers +opened. + +‘Is she your housekeeper?’ I inquired + +‘She is our everything. She nursed me and Ange when we were babies, and +has reared us ever since. She is the cook and the housemaid and the +footman and the butler all in one. But she is a shocking tyrant, and +Ange and I hardly dare call our souls our own when she says that we +shall not.’ + +‘Why don’t you get rid of her, then?’ + +Tessie’s eyes opened to their fullest extent. + +‘Get rid of Madame Marmoret! We should almost as soon think of getting +rid of papa. Oh, no! we shall never get rid of her, as long as we live. +She is an “institution.” She wouldn’t go even if we asked her. She would +turn us all out of the house first.’ + +To me, who possessed a strongly conservative spirit, and had no idea of +permitting my inferiors to take a liberty with me, Tessie’s mode of +talking about Madame Marmoret appeared only as excellent satire. I was +yet to learn that it was sad and sober truth. But we had arrived at my +bedchamber, and though I was a little disappointed at its want of size, +all the bulk of the house seeming to be monopolised by passages and +staircases, I could not help observing with gratitude the evident care +that had been bestowed on the arrangement of the little white bed, and +the muslin curtain that draped the window, and was touched beyond +measure at the discovery of a small blue silk pincushion on the +toilet-table, ready filled with pins, with ‘Hilda’ worked across the +front of it in white beads. + +‘Ange did that,’ said Tessie, delighted with my pleasure at the sight; +‘she was making that all last week, especially for your table. She +wanted to work a little cross beneath your name, but I would not allow +her. I thought you might not like it.’ + +‘Why not?’ + +‘Because the English, as a rule, are so superstitious. They are afraid +of a cross. One would think it portended evil. But Ange is so good—so +pious! She would live in the church, if it were possible.’ + +‘Is your church far from here?’ + +‘Ah! I did not mean our church—I meant that of our good friend, Monsieur +Morteville. No, it is not far off—it is just over the way. But it is not +a church at all. It is only a room.’ + +My face fell. I had always greatly enjoyed the services of religion, +especially where well conducted, and I felt I should need the comfort of +them more than ever now. + +There had been something in Mr. Lovett’s manner and appearance—I know +not why—that had led me to hope that I should derive much solace from +being under his care. I suppose it was the look of extra refinement that +had misled me. But Tessie’s description of their place of worship was +very discouraging. + +‘Only a room!’ I echoed, in a tone of disappointment. + +‘Yes, and such an ugly one! It is a schoolroom on week-days, and we have +to sit on the dirty benches that the children use. I play the harmonium, +and Ange leads the hymns, but it is sorry work. It will be better now +you have come. I hope you will sing with us. Papa is grand, of course. +He is grand whatever he does, or wherever you put him; but it makes me +sad to see him thrown away in such a horrid place. I always feel he +ought to be preaching in a splendid cathedral like St. Gudule, at +Brussels. He looks altogether out of place with whitewashed walls.’ + +‘St. Paul, in the upper room at Athens,’ I said, smiling. + +‘Ah! St. Paul was never half such a man as our father. He ought to be +Archbishop of Canterbury at the very least, or, as Ange says, Pope of +Rome!’ + +‘He is certainly a very fine-looking old gentleman,’ I acquiesced. + +‘Do you think he looks _old_?’ said Tessie. ‘He never seems to grow old, +to Ange and me. It would be a dreadful thing to wake up some day and +find that papa had really changed into an old gentleman.’ + +I could not say he looked young, and so I discreetly held my tongue. I +had not quite completed my toilette when a bell was heard to tinkle. + +‘I must go!’ cried Tessie. ‘That is Madame ringing the bell for me to +lay the table for _goûter_. You see, Ange and I are obliged to help her +in these little matters, or she could not get through her work. Do you +think you can find your way downstairs again, Hilda, without me?’ + +‘I am sure I can,’ I answered; and in a few minutes more I proved my +words by following her through the kitchen to the apartment which held +the piano. There I found her busily employed in laying the +luncheon-table, and singing a little French song as she worked. + +The repast was a very simple one, but it looked inviting. There was a +loaf of rye bread, a country cheese, a large basket of rosy apples, a +bowl of custard, and a plate of _gaufres_, which Tessie told me she had +made herself. Everything was beautifully clean, but there was evidence +of strict economy, if not of poverty, in the arrangements, which, +remembering what I had been told of the Reverend Horace Lovett’s grand +patrons and connection with court, rather surprised me. However, I was +no gourmand, and did not give a second thought to the matter. As soon as +the _goûter_ was prepared, Madame Marmoret went out at the front door +and rang a handbell violently on the balcony, which was shortly followed +by the sound of her master’s voice and footsteps as he obeyed the signal +to return home. + +‘There is papa!’ exclaimed Tessie, ‘and there—yes! there comes Ange with +him! I thought she could not be much longer. They must have met in the +street.’ + +At this moment Mr. Lovett, his face beaming with kindly benevolence, +appeared on the threshold of the room we sat in, dragging a girl after +him by both her hands held in one of his. + +‘Here she is,’ he said; ‘here’s my little maid, Hilda. I found her +hiding somewhere away in the cow-house, afraid to show her face indoors +for fear you would bite her nose off; and I believe she would have +stayed there till to-morrow morning if I had not chanced to come across +her.’ + +‘No, no, papa! indeed,’ remonstrated Ange, with the same foreign accent +I had observed in her sister, ‘you are not just to me. I am not afraid: +I was only going round to give the eggs to Madame, and take off my hat +before presenting myself to Mademoiselle Marsh.’ + +He swung the girl in front of him, and nearly pushed her into my arms. + +‘Go and present yourself to Mademoiselle Marsh, then,’ he said, +mimicking her pronunciation. + +As she stood before me, with her heightened colour and a deprecating +look upon her face, I thought I had never seen such a pretty creature +before as Mr. Lovett’s ‘little maid.’ She was dressed in black serge, +like her sister, and had a white muslin pelerine crossed quaintly over +her bosom; a straw hat, with a black ribbon tied round it, and a wide +flapping brim that almost hid her features, formed her head-dress, and a +plain silver cross, depending from her throat, was her only ornament. +But how shall I ever describe her face! that mobile face, the expression +of which changed every second, like a restless sea that never can keep +still; and that delicate variable bloom, that rose and fell in crimson +waves with every emotion that passed through her sensitive little brain! +In actual appearance she was very like the old man, which accounted for +his evident pride in her. She had his rich blue eyes, with long dark +lashes and well-marked eyebrows: the chestnut hair—which I afterwards +learned he had also possessed when young—with a natural wave in it like +his, that kept it rippling low on her brow and the nape of her neck and +round about her ears in little sunny curls. The tip of her pretty nose +was just sufficiently tilted to redeem it from being aquiline, and her +laughing mouth, displaying a row of firm white teeth, was childlike in +its dewy roseleaf bloom. + +I am not given to falling into raptures over the perfections of my own +sex: few women are, in this century of pearl powder, belladonna, rouge +and auricomus. But it was just because I had detected and been disgusted +at such falsehoods, that I gazed at Angela Lovett as at something that I +had never seen before. She looked as if she had but just stepped down, +fresh made, from the hand of her Creator. + +‘Oh, Ange!’ I exclaimed involuntarily, my admiration made patent by my +voice, ‘I hope that you will like me!’ + +‘Like you—why, of course she will! what should she do else?’ replied her +father, answering for her. ‘We must hear no more of likes and dislikes +after to-day, Hilda! Here are my three daughters, all ready to attend me +at my _goûter_, and I mean to make no distinction between them +henceforward. So now, my little maid, kiss your sister Hilda, and let us +see if Madame has given us anything that my poor old teeth can manage to +crack for luncheon.’ + +The old gentleman’s kindness made me feel so completely at home, that +when Ange blushingly advanced to salute me, I opened my arms and pressed +the girl to my heart as if she had indeed been my younger sister. I was +not surprised, as we gathered round the table, to see that Tessie had +slipped out of the room and returned with a basin of hot soup, which she +placed before her father, whilst Ange silently rose and produced a small +tin of rusks for him to eat with it. It was but right that the old man, +whose digestion was probably impaired, should fare more daintily than +his young daughters, who could eat anything. + +I resolved that, before the morrow came, I would ask Tessie to let me +share in the labour of waiting on him and attending to his wants. + +He was good enough to call me his daughter, and I would not take the +name unless I were allowed to fulfil the service. So we girls ate rye +bread and cheese and munched apples, whilst Mr. Lovett sipped his soup +and sherry, and talked to us of the days before we were born, when he +had been hand-in-glove with some of the highest and most celebrated +names in England, until I wondered why he should have left a country +which was reeking with patronage and interest for him, to bury himself +abroad, even though it were as the tutor of a German prince. I could not +venture, however, to put the question, although I did ask him if he had +not greatly missed the associates of whom he spoke on first leaving +them. + +‘Yes, my dear Hilda, you are right. I certainly did so, but my motto +through life has been, _Fais ce que dois, advienne que pourra_. It was +duty that called me to this country; a hard and difficult duty it is +true, but one which I could not have neglected without sacrificing what +was dearer to me than pleasure—my sense of right!’ + +And Mr. Lovett struck his broad chest with an energy that raised him +very considerably in my estimation. There is something so ennobling in +the sight of a man who is strong enough to conquer inclination in the +cause of his religion. His girls regarded the sentiment he had expressed +with the same admiration that I did. I could see Ange’s blue eyes +beaming upon him from the opposite side of the table, whilst Tessie’s +looked tenderer than before. It was beautiful to see their devotion to +their father. How glad I was to find myself in a family who respected +and loved each other, and were, moreover, so perfectly united. + +On rising from the table, the girls asked me if I would accompany them +in a walk, but the fatigue I had encountered since the day before was +beginning to make itself palpably felt, and I decided to spend the +afternoon in my own room, putting my wardrobe in order. Tessie offered +to assist me, but I declined her services. After so much novelty and +excitement, the idea of a few hours’ rest and solitude was grateful to +me. But when I got alone I found I was too tired even to think. I turned +out the contents of my boxes into the wooden press that waited for them, +and then I flung myself down upon the inviting-looking little bed and +fell fast asleep. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + + CHAPTER VI. + TURKEY AND TRUFFLES. + + +I must have slept for several hours, when I was awakened by the sound of +a shrill voice that reached me from the courtyard below. For my room was +at the back of the house, and looked out on a little paved court that +lay on the other side of the narrow garden, and led through a cow-shed +into the main street again. So primitive was the mode of architecture +and the idea of comfort in the town of St. Pucelle. + +‘_Tiens!_’ the shrill voice was exclaiming when my ears were suddenly +made cognisant of its existence; ‘you are a fool—a pig, a _maladroit_, +to fancy any such thing! She will cost twice the money to keep that one +of our girls do. Can we feed her on nettle soup and dandelion salad? +Will she eat rye bread every day, and be content with crust _potage_ for +her dinner? And her presence here will make the town furious. We shall +be beset by them; they will say you have no right to increase your +family; and if you tell them the reason why, they will answer, “Then +give us justice,” and you will look like a fool—as you are!’ + +‘But, my dear good Marmoret,’ replied a soft voice, which sounded +wonderfully like that of my guardian, though I could not believe that it +was he, ‘you are mistaken; I shall tell them nothing.’ + +‘And you think I have four hands to work with, perhaps, and four feet on +which to run up and down these stairs from morning till night, that you +bring me another person to cook for and clean after. Bah! but it is you +that will find yourself mistaken! If justice is to be done to any one it +begins with me, Marie Marmoret, who has slaved and toiled for the last +twenty-two years without so much as a “thank you” for it.’ + +‘Is that quite true?’ demanded the same soft voice. ‘But you are not +yourself to-day, my good Marmoret; let us leave the discussion of these +domestic matters until tomorrow.’ + +‘_Not myself!_’ echoed Madame, sharply; ‘it is false. I am not myself +when I cringe and smile and speak softly, and pretend to believe that +which I know to be a lie; but I am telling you my true mind now, and you +can make what you please of it. I am getting tired—that is the +truth—tired and sick of it all; and I know not why I should hold my +tongue more than others.’ + +‘Well, well! I am about to see Dumont and Chrétien to-morrow, and they +will believe what I say to them, if you do not.’ + +‘And much good your seeing them will do them—poor fools! They’d better +by far come to me. I could give them a piece of advice worth two of +yours.’ + +‘Now, my dear good Marmoret,’ said the other voice, ‘I must entreat you +to be reasonable. I can manage my own affairs perfectly well, and need +no assistance. You must oblige me by not interfering.’ + +‘Bah! I have been “reasonable,” as you call it, too long. If Dumont and +Chrétien are to see you, I do so first. Have I not the prior claim? +Answer me that!’ + +‘Certainly you have, and I always acknowledge it. But be patient, and +your reward will come.’ + +‘I should like to see it,’ grumbled Madame Marmoret, as she bustled into +the house again. + +Now the whole of this conversation, being carried on in voluble French, +was not patent to my understanding; but I could catch a word here and +there, and it made me uneasy. + +Madame Marmoret was evidently very angry, and her anger was chiefly +directed against me. I was sure that the first part of her conversation +alluded to my arrival at St. Pucelle, and her disgust at the prospect of +having more work to do in consequence. It was annoying to think I had +been the cause of a disturbance so soon; but Madame Marmoret had judged +me too hastily, and I had no doubt that when she knew more of me she +would alter her opinion. I should never dream of entering a household +with only one servant, without taking my share of its duties. She +thought, doubtless, that I was a fine English lady, accustomed to be +waited on for everything, and unwilling to raise a hand to help myself. +She would soon find out her mistake. I could dust and sweep and make +beds perhaps as well as she could, and I had fully intended to join +Tessie and Ange in their domestic avocations the very next morning. + +But what puzzled me was to guess to whom Madame could possibly have been +confiding her grievances. At first I had thought the voice was like that +of Mr. Lovett, but when I heard the familiar way in which she addressed +her companion, I knew at once that it could not be her master with whom +she had been talking. And I was further convinced of the justice of my +conclusion when a tap at my door was followed by the entrance of Ange to +tell me that dinner would be ready in a few minutes. + +‘We have been for such a long walk, Tessie and I,’ she said, as she took +off her broad-brimmed hat and fanned her heated face with it; ‘right up +the hill and as far as the forest. It was delightful when we got there! +You would have enjoyed it, Hilda! The trees are so big and beautiful, +and under them it is as cool and as shady as a church. And you and papa +have been sleeping all the afternoon away. Lazy people!’ + +‘Has your papa been asleep also?’ + +‘Yes. We found him fast asleep in the big straw chair. I hid behind it, +and tickled his nose with a branch of flowering lime until he woke. It +was such fun to see his dear old head bobbing round to find out who it +was. Most people would have been cross, you know, but papa is never +cross about anything.’ + +‘Not with _you_, I expect,’ I said, smiling. + +‘Nor with anybody, unless they have done something very bad indeed. Papa +is an angel; you will know that when you have stayed here a little +while. He is a great deal too good for this world.’ + +‘They say the best praise a man can have is that of his own household.’ + +‘Then papa deserves the very best, for every one loves him—in the house +and out of it—they couldn’t help it. He is so good and holy. I should +have no fear at all about getting into heaven if I were only sure I +might keep hold of his skirts.’ + +‘My dear, you shouldn’t say that of any man.’ + +‘I must say it of papa. I often think he is only half a man. He is so +much more like some of those dear old saints whose lives Monsieur +Morteville has lent me to read, and who were too holy to live with +sinners upon earth. You will say the same in a few days, Hilda. But now +it is dinnertime, and we must go down, or we shall get a scolding.’ + +‘Few gentlemen like being kept waiting for their dinner,’ I observed. + +‘Oh, I didn’t mean from papa; he never scolds. It is Madame who will be +so angry if we are late. And as likely as not she will carry off the +dishes again, and leave us without any dinner at all,’ cried Ange, +laughing, as she disappeared. + +I did not consider it a laughing matter, and so I quickly arranged my +toilet and hurried after her. + +The meal was laid in the front room, I found, this time—the _salle_, as +they familiarly termed it—and the family were already assembled there. + +Mr. Lovett sat at the head of the table, looking like a veritable +patriarch, with his table-napkin pinned to his breast, after the foreign +fashion; the girls were on either side of him, and I found I was +expected to fill the seat of honour at the bottom. + +‘As the eldest, my dear—as the eldest,’ he averred. ‘It is your proper +place.’ + +Madame now appeared with a large covered dish, which she put before her +master, and the contents of which, on being disclosed, proved to be a +turkey stuffed with truffles. I felt quite hungry at the sight. My +_goûter_ had been sparse, and the roast turkey smelt delicious. I had no +hesitation in answering in the affirmative when I was asked if I would +take some of it. + +I thought Madame Marmoret seemed to be muttering very much to herself +when she held my plate to her master, and as she returned it to me, her +words were audible enough. + +‘Extravagance—ruin!’ she let off close to my ears, like so many +pistol-shots of anger. + +I saw Ange and Tessie colour and look at me and then at their father, +and Mr. Lovett himself seemed to think it was time to put an end to such +exhibitions of folly. + +‘_Tais-toi!_’ he said quite sharply to the woman, and then, appearing to +regret his harshness, he added: ‘We know what we are about, my friend. +Suppose you help me to some potatoes.’ + +Tessie and Ange made a simultaneous grab at the potato-dish, and, under +cover of their alacrity to help their father, Madame grumbled herself +out of the room. + +When the confusion which followed this episode had somewhat subsided, I +looked round the table and saw that neither of the girls had taken any +turkey. I suppose their father had offered it to them, but they had not +accepted it. Tessie was eating some slices of spiced sausage and bread, +and Ange had cut up an entire cucumber as her share of dinner. + +‘Do you not eat meat?’ I inquired, without thinking. + +To the thoroughbred Briton, there appears something so extraordinary in +any one dining on vegetables and bread. + +‘No,’ replied Ange, with a pretty blush, ‘we do not care for it. In this +country you see few people eat it, and, for my part, I could live upon +cucumbers all the year round.’ + +Mr. Lovett was evidently not one of the ‘few.’ He consumed his turkey +and truffles with the air of a real connoisseur, returning to it until +he had nearly caused the whole of the breast to disappear, and washing +it down with copious draughts of champagne, a bottle of which stood at +his elbow. He asked me to take a glass, but I declined. I had never been +used to wine, and preferred drinking water, as I saw the girls do. If +Mr. Lovett’s daughters did not care for meat, it was not because they +meant to make up the deficiency by pudding, for no second course +followed the turkey. Some Gruyère cheese and biscuits were put upon the +table for their father, but the flavour was too strong to suit anybody +but himself. Tessie picked some ripe figs and grapes from the walls of +the house and offered them to me in her sweet shy way, and we sat +together on the sill of the window that looked out upon the street, +eating our fruit and watching Ange perched upon her father’s knee, tying +up the silver curls that hung over his brow with little bits of blue +ribbon, as she was accustomed to do with her poodle’s top-knot. + +It was a charming sight to see them together—the handsome old man with +his look of proud contentment, and the beautiful girl who was playing +with him; both so like and yet so unlike each other; she in her extreme +youth and innocence, and he with the weight perhaps of five-and-sixty +winters on his brow. Yet, when at last her gentle touch had sent him off +to sleep in his chair, he almost seemed the younger of the two, as he +lay back, peacefully slumbering, with scarcely a wrinkle on his fair +smooth skin, and the little witch’s blue ribbons fluttering in his +silver hair. + +Meanwhile Ange joined Tessie and myself in the window-sill, and there we +sat whispering to each other of all the thousand and one foolish things +that enter young women’s brains. + +‘And are you the only English in St. Pucelle?’ I asked, after we had +finished discussing the place. + +‘Oh, Tessie! only hear what Hilda is saying!’ exclaimed Ange. ‘What +would Miss Sophia Markham do if she were to hear her? She would have a +fit of hysterics, at the very least.’ + +‘Sophia Markham! That sounds dreadfully English,’ I observed. + +‘And Miss Markham considers herself essentially French,’ replied Tessie, +laughing. ‘She is constantly putting us right on subjects with which we +have been familiar from our birth, and on more than one occasion she has +been kind enough to correct our accent for us.’ + +‘What an unpleasant person! Does she live here?’ + +‘No; it is difficult to say where she lives——’ + +‘I can tell you,’ interrupted Ange, ‘with whoever will take her in.’ + +‘Or let themselves be taken in,’ continued her sister. ‘Miss Markham is +ubiquitous. She has no settled home, but we seem to meet her everywhere. +This summer she is staying here with a family of the name of Carolus, +from Brussels.’ + +‘And, poor things, how sick they are of her! I am sure I pity them, +having to listen to her silly chatter all day.’ + +‘Well, Ange, it strikes me that Mrs. Carolus and Miss Markham get on +very well together. They are inseparable companions, and have always +some mutual acquaintance to abuse. This Miss Markham is really clever, +Hilda; she can do anything in needle-work, and is very talkative and +pleasant——’ + +‘When there are gentlemen present,’ interposed Ange. + +‘Oh, Ange! that is spiteful of you, though I must allow she is more +pleasant with them than with her own sex.’ + +‘Is she a young woman?’ I asked. + +‘Oh no! I should think she must be forty or more, but she always talks +as if she were very young indeed, and she calls me and Ange “mere +children.”’ + +‘I know the sort of woman you mean, exactly. We had one of them at +Norwood, who made herself pre-eminently ridiculous. They can never +believe they are too old for love or admiration, and they generally +dress so as to make themselves the laughing-stocks of society.’ + +‘Oh! that is true, Hilda. Miss Markham borrowed a pelerine from Ange +last week, and has come out in one exactly like it.’ + +‘Is it not strange,’ said Ange, musingly, ‘that Madame, who in general +dislikes strangers so much, should have taken such a fancy to Sophia +Markham? She says she is “_une dame très amiable_,” that she has “_l’air +noble_,” and would well adorn a throne! What can Madame see in her to +say all that?’ + +‘I am sure I cannot tell, Ange. Hilda will see her for herself, and then +she can judge. But Miss Markham does not comprise the whole English +population of St. Pucelle. There are, I should think, at present about a +dozen families of visitors here, beside several single men for +shooting.’ + +‘Is there shooting about here, then?’ + +‘Oh yes, in the forest of Piron—wild boars and rabbits, and hares and +wolves——’ + +‘_Wolves!_ Tessie! Are you in earnest? You make me shiver.’ + +‘Indeed there are! And M. Condé keeps one in a cage, which we will show +you. And there is excellent trout-fishing here also, Hilda.’ + +The mention of sport had recalled my young travelling companion to my +mind, and I suddenly exclaimed: + +‘By the way, I met some one on my journey from England, who told me that +he knew you both: some one who met you at Rille, when you went to be +confirmed there.’ + +Notwithstanding the fast-falling dusk, I saw the crimson mount to the +cheek of Ange. + +‘Who can it be?’ said Tessie. ‘Was it Mr. Henderson, a very old +gentleman?’ + +‘No; this gentleman was quite young.’ + +‘Not Mr.——’ began Ange, and there she stopped short, and would say no +more. + +‘Well, I won’t keep you in suspense any longer. It was a Master +Frederick Stephenson who is at school at Mr. Felton’s, and was greatly +interested at hearing I was coming to live at St. Pucelle. He seems a +very nice boy. He was so kind and polite to me about my luggage and +train-ticket.’ + +‘Oh! is that all?’ said Ange, disappointedly. + +‘Ange thought it was a duke at the very least, coming back again to +propose for her,’ said her sister. + +‘I didn’t,’ pouted the little maid; ‘but we know such heaps of +school-boys. It is nothing new to hear they come backwards and forwards. +I do not remember Master Stephenson, but Mr. Felton is a great friend of +papa’s, and we stayed at his house whilst we were in Rille.’ + +‘_Bonjour, mesdemoiselles_,’ said a courteous voice at the open door, +and we started to see a gentleman enter the _salle_. + +‘Monsieur le Baron!’ exclaimed Tessie and Ange in a breath, as they rose +to their feet, and having saluted the new-comer, introduced him to me as +the Baron de Nesselrode. + +‘Papa! papa! here is Monsieur le Baron!’ cried Ange, as she pulled the +blue top-knots out of her father’s curls and wakened him with a kiss on +either cheek. + +Mr. Lovett appeared delighted to welcome his friend, and they were soon +engaged in active conversation. + +‘Such an unfortunate young man,’ whispered Tessie to me, under cover of +the gentlemen’s voices. ‘He belongs to one of the highest families in +France, but he got so dreadfully into debt that his creditors have +confiscated all his fortune, and only leave him a wretched little estate +in St. Pucelle to live upon. Is it not melancholy? The poor Baron always +looks so sad and dull to me. He has nothing to do but to shoot and visit +his neighbours, and during the winter season we are almost the only +people left here. Papa is very fond of him. He pities him so much, and +thinks he has been so hardly used for a little wildness.’ + +‘And papa’s daughter seems to follow his example,’ I said, smiling. + +‘Oh! no, _indeed_!’ remonstrated Tessie, earnestly; ‘but it _is_ sad to +be left to live alone so young—don’t you think so? He is not thirty +yet.’ + +Ange, entering at that moment with a lamp, showed me that Armand de +Nesselrode was not only young, but very good-looking, which made me +still further inclined to doubt whether fair-haired Tessie had not +mistaken her feelings of compassion for him. He had an air of melancholy +also that, combined with his dark languid eyes and the story I had +heard, made him doubtless a very interesting object. He did not appear, +however, to have paid his visit for the sake of seeing the Miss Lovetts, +for, after the first ordinary greetings that had passed between them, he +confined his attention entirely to their father, with whom he seemed to +be on terms of the greatest intimacy. Cigars were produced and lighted, +which was apparently the signal for the weaker sex to retire, as Tessie +immediately asked me if I would go into the next room with them and have +some music. Music I had little inclination for, but the wisdom of +withdrawal I saw at once. + +‘Papa always likes to be left alone with the Baron,’ said Tessie, as we +entered the smaller apartment, ‘they have so much to talk about +together.’ + +The girls asked me to sing, but I begged them to excuse me. I possessed +a good voice, and the use of it had formed one of my favourite +occupations. I had been accustomed to sing at all sorts of places: in +church choirs, for charitable concerts, at evening parties; and _she_ +had always been so proud to accompany me to the scenes of my small +triumphs, and to double the praises I earned. Now I felt as if I should +never sing again. + +My voice, except for the common purposes of speech, would be as silent +as hers from whom I had inherited it. I have learned since that this is +the commonest feeling attendant upon sorrow. But grief was new to me +then, and I believed myself to be thoroughly in earnest. Presently Ange +sat down to the tinkling old instrument, whose notes were a misery to +listen to, and began to sing—in low tones at first, but louder as she +gained confidence—a French _chansonnette_. The little maid had not much +volume of voice, I could have extinguished it with mine in a couple of +bars; but what she possessed was so sweetly fresh and true, that it was +a real pleasure to hear her. I sat at the window gazing up into the dark +blue sky, now besprinkled with stars, and could have fancied I was +listening to a child-angel singing—that is, if they ever sing +_chansonnettes_. By-and-by she passed into a Latin hymn—one of those +half-solemn, half-joyous chants that are so much in use in the Catholic +churches, and then indeed I could look up to heaven through my tears and +wonder if _she_ were listening too. Did she know of the sudden change +that had taken place in my life, or were all my doings, my thoughts, my +joys and my sorrows, to be matters of indifference to her thenceforward; +to her who had ever been so ready to sympathise with me, even if I had a +finger-ache? Under the influence of this thought and the music, my tears +fell faster, and, unwilling that the girls should perceive my emotion, I +rose, with the intention of going to my own room for a few minutes until +I should have recovered myself. But the geography of the house was as +yet unfamiliar to me, and in the dusk I made a mistake, and turned the +handle of the door that led into the _salle_ instead of that which would +have taken me to the kitchen. + +I closed it again at once, but not before I had seen what was going on +inside. The Baron and Mr. Lovett were seated close together at the +table, playing cards by the light of a shaded lamp. There was not much +harm in the circumstance, perhaps, but I had been brought up with rather +strict ideas with regard to the clergy, and it offended my ideas of +propriety. Yet, after all, what was there in a game of cards? I asked +myself, as soon as I was alone. It was not likely that Mr. Lovett would +play for anything but the pleasure of defeating his antagonist. And in a +place like St. Pucelle, where there was no amusement to be had but such +as one might devise for one’s self, it seemed hard that even a clergyman +should be deprived of any innocent diversion. So I put the game of cards +to one side, under the general decision that I must not judge the +customs of one country by those of another. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + + CHAPTER VII. + THE FAIR SOPHIA. + + +Had I waited a day or two, I should have had no occasion to ask Teresa +Lovett if her family formed the English population of St. Pucelle. The +news of my arrival spread like wild-fire, and before a week was over my +head, I had been introduced to every individual, English or Belgian, in +the place. The very first whom I had the pleasure of meeting was Miss +Sophia Markham, who ran in—Miss Markham never walked—on the morning +following my arrival. As soon as I entered the room I recognised her, +from the description given me the night before. She was so wonderfully +infantile in dress, manner, and conversation. She was a woman of +forty—of forty-five—perhaps even fifty years of age, but she was very +well preserved and looked much younger. And this preservation had been +accomplished, not by means of cosmetics, but by the lack of them. Miss +Markham was wise in her generation. She knew that powder and paint never +yet hid wrinkles effectually, and that to dye the hair a different +colour from that which nature has bestowed upon it, is to violate one of +the first principles of art. + +But this fact must not lead one to suppose that she was not intensely +vain of her personal appearance, and took any amount of trouble to +maintain it. For years past she had never gone to bed without plastering +her face with cold cream, in order to keep her skin soft and unwrinkled. +Each grey hair, as it made its unwelcome appearance, had been sedulously +rooted out, and she spent hours before the looking-glass, brushing and +oiling the remainder. She had bestowed equal attention on her teeth and +her complexion and her figure, and the result was, that in middle life, +though she could not look a girl (as she fondly persisted in thinking +that she did), Miss Sophia Markham had certainly contrived to drop at +least ten years of her existence. She was a short woman, with a large +head, and very small hands and feet, of which she was inordinately vain. +She had fine eyes and good teeth; a large nose and a small brain. But, +after the fashion of most mortals, she was so shortsighted as to be +quite unable to distinguish in what she excelled and in what she did +not, and persisted in imagining that her fleshy nose was a pert +_retroussé_, and her mind of a ponderous and weighty order, equal in +value to that of any of her peers. + +As a child, she had given promise of a prettiness that had never been +fulfilled. This was unfortunate, as her parents’ undue admiration had +taught her to believe her pretensions would be realised, and after their +death she had refused to be convinced that their judgment had proved +false. She had been left alone in the world with a small income barely +sufficient to procure the necessaries of life, and from an early period +it had been borne in upon her mind that she must be dependent for its +luxuries upon her friends. Miss Sophia knew which side her bread was +buttered well enough. She found that, in order to be welcome in other +people’s houses and allowed to stay there as long as she chose, she must +give them a _quid pro quo_ for their hospitality over and above the +charms of her mind and person, and the questionable merit of her +talents. Some she had to fawn upon and flatter till they were full to +surfeiting with praises of themselves: for others she was compelled to +exercise her skill in needlework, and slave at making caps and dresses +wherewith to adorn their persons and recoup them for the food she was +consuming: to others, again, she acted as a foil or a blind, or in any +other useful capacity that a woman past her _première jeunesse_ can +fill, although she would have been quite faithless and unbelieving had +she been told so. + +At St. Pucelle she was staying, as Tessie had told me, with a couple of +the name of Carolus, who were spending a few months on the Continent. It +was easy to guess why _they_ had come together. Mrs. Carolus, although +older than Miss Markham, was newly-married, and possessed scarcely any +knowledge of French. Mr. Carolus also, who was again many years senior +to his wife, was fussy, taciturn, and given, about every other day, to +making sudden resolutions to return to England and his merchant’s +office, which Mrs. Carolus was anxious to prevent. She found, therefore, +in Miss Markham at once a companion, an interpreter, and an advocate to +plead against and turn the rash intentions of her husband. + +At the same time, the two ladies appeared to be of very congenial +temperaments, if abusing each other behind their backs and everybody +else in common might be taken in evidence of the fact. + +On the first occasion of my meeting Miss Sophia Markham, she was attired +in a white muslin dress striped with a tiny line of blue, that might +have been put on a child of ten: a pelerine edged with lace, the pattern +of which she had borrowed from Angela; and a broad-brimmed hat, trimmed +with the same material and ornamented with a bunch of red cherries and +leaves, that bobbed about in the most tempting manner each time she +moved. In her arms she carried a little beast of a terrier, that snapped +at every one who approached within a few yards of it, and which she +spoke of and addressed as if it had been a human being. + +In attempting to sketch a biography of Miss Markham as it came to my +knowledge, little by little, I have made one grand omission, which is to +state that, throughout her varied career, she had never lost, and +evidently never would lose, the hope of being married. When she was +young, nothing but a duke or a marquis could have satisfied her sense of +what befitted her merits; in riper years, a baronet or a general would +not have been rejected without consideration: now, she would have sworn +to love, honour and obey anything, so long as it was in the shape of a +man. From the youth of eighteen or twenty to the octogenarian, she could +not be made to believe but that the whole race of man had been formed +but for one purpose: to admire, follow, and fall in love with her. Yet +she was by no means a specimen, at least outwardly, of what is termed ‘a +spiteful old maid.’ All Miss Markham’s speeches were placid, and her +words oil and honey. Even when she intended to sting most sharply, it +was done under cover of the greatest amiability and the very best +intentions, and she never lost an opportunity of wounding the self-love +of others by encouraging and patronising them for that which they +believed they did better than anything else. But I have spent too much +time on a description of Miss Markham’s failings. She must come forward +now and speak for herself. + +When I first entered the room where she was sitting, I found her engaged +in an animated conversation with the ‘little maid,’ on the component +parts of a certain ball-dress which she had worn the month before at +Paris. + +‘Yes! it was so pretty, dear, the prettiest dress in the room, everybody +said so—all pink and white silk—the very palest pink, you know—and +little rosebuds peeping out every here and there from the trimming, and +one gentleman said I looked just like a little rosebud myself in the +midst of my pink and white drapery! He! he! he!’ + +At this juncture my entrance was perceived, and an introduction gone +through. + +‘_Marsh!_’ exclaimed Miss Markham, as if she had not heard my name +before; ‘are you any relation to the Marshes of Northampton?’ + +‘No! I have never heard of them.’ + +‘They were great friends of mine—indeed, Walter Marsh wanted to marry +me—he! he! he!—only I wouldn’t have him. He always used to call me “the +pocket Venus;” and when I refused him, his family thought he would have +gone out of his mind.’ + +‘You are so hard-hearted, Sophia! you have refused so many people,’ +cried Tessie, laughing; but Miss Markham did not perceive that the laugh +was against herself. + +‘Well, one cannot marry every one, you see, and perhaps my early +experience has made me rather particular. I was engaged to Lord +Vauxhall, you know, before I was sixteen. Such a handsome man, and with +an income of ten thousand a year. Ah! I was very foolish in those days.’ + +‘Why didn’t you marry him?’ asked Ange. + +‘Well, dear, I broke off the engagement myself. I had been taught to +look higher by my dear father, who did not think any man in the world +good enough for me. Mrs. Carolus cannot understand such a thing. She +evidently married the first man who asked her—and such a man, too! If +you could only see the way he mumbles his food, it is enough to make one +leave the dinnertable. And they go on in the most absurd manner for +people of their age. She calls him “Willy,” and if he does anything she +disapproves of, she says he’s “a naughty boy.” Did you ever hear +anything like it? I have found out, from some things Mrs. Carolus has +told me, that she must be past sixty herself. Why, she was at a +finishing school when King William died. And as for Mr. Carolus, he must +be ten or fifteen years older. He has had a wife before, and twelve +children. I think he ought to have been ashamed of himself for marrying +again. But as for her, poor thing! I expect it was her only chance, so +you can scarcely wonder at her taking it. And I _have_ heard—but mind +you don’t mention my name—that she was not _too_ particular in her +younger days, and so I dare say it was rather unexpected her receiving +an offer of marriage at all. My friends the Willoughbys met some people +in Norfolk this spring, who lived in the same place as Mrs. Carolus’s +family, and I hear they had some very queer stories to tell about her +sisters and herself.’ + +‘Isn’t it a great pity,’ said Tessie, quietly, ‘that people should +trouble themselves to take away the character of a woman who is a +perfect stranger to them?’ + +‘Oh! but she was not a perfect stranger, my dear! They knew her well—by +repute, that is to say. And, indeed, from all one hears, she must have +been quite notorious some twenty or thirty years ago.’ + +‘Is it wise of you to stay with her, then?’ asked Ange, innocently. + +I found afterwards that the little maid was very much in the habit of +putting awkward questions in the most aggravatingly innocent manner. The +present one caused Miss Markham to redden up like a peony. + +‘As for that matter, Ange,’ she retorted, ‘I might go far enough, I +expect, before I found any one to stay with against whose advantage +there is not to be heard some story or other. I dare say Mrs. Carolus is +no worse than many of your own friends; Lucy Edgecombe for instance, who +ran away with and married a man against her parents’ wishes, and found +out afterwards that he had a wife already in America. That was a nice +little scandal, wasn’t it?’ + +‘Ah! poor Lucy!’ said Ange, her bright eyes filling with tears; ‘it has +been a most terrible grief and misfortune for her—you know that, Miss +Markham. I am sure I can never think of her without crying. She used to +be such a bright merry girl when we knew her in Rille, two years ago. +And it broke her poor old father’s heart.’ + +‘Oh yes! I dare say. These scandals always do break the heart of +somebody or other, and generally the one who is least to blame in the +matter. But that doesn’t alter the fact. Why do you let Ange wear her +hair so much over her eyes, Tessie? It is not _bong tong_ at all. The +Paris ladies all wear their hair taken off the forehead, as I do. But +then you must have a high, intellectual forehead for that style to suit +you.’ + +‘Papa likes her to wear it so,’ said Tessie. + +‘And I am not a Paris lady, and I have not a high intellectual +forehead,’ interposed Ange. ‘So I’m much better as I am.’ + +‘Perhaps so, my dear. Indeed your forehead is not high. Arthur Thrale +was remarking only the other day that you had more of the _paysanne_ +than the _ancienne noblesse_ air about you.’ + +‘Yet I should like to see papa’s pedigree placed by that of Arthur +Thrale,’ cried Tessie, indignantly. ‘We have some of the best blood in +England in our veins, though we are so poor. Papa has often said so, and +Mrs. Carolus told us the other day that Mr. Thrale’s father is a large +linendraper in one of the suburbs of London.’ + +‘Of course Mrs. Carolus will run the poor boy down, because he is so +absurdly devoted to me. She has tried all she can to get him for +herself, without success.’ + +‘Oh! Sophia! what can you be thinking of?’ exclaimed Tessie. ‘Why, +Arthur Thrale is young enough to be——’ + +‘What?’ demanded Miss Markham, sharply. + +‘Mrs. Carolus’s grandson,’ replied Tessie, saving herself by a grand +_coup d’état_. + +‘So he may be,’ said Miss Markham, drawing a long breath of relief, ‘but +that makes no difference to her. Her jealousy of me is proverbial. She +has even said—he! he! he!—that I have tried to turn “Willy’s” affections +from her.’ + +‘There goes papa,’ remarked Ange, more with the intention of diverting +attention from the folly of their visitor than anything else, as she +pointed out Mr. Lovett walking past the window on his way to the town. + +‘Well, good-bye then, dears, I can’t stay any longer,’ exclaimed Miss +Markham with sudden energy, as she jumped up and kissed the two girls. +‘Adieu! Miss Marsh; I hope we shall soon meet again. Come! my sweet +little Toodles,’ to the terrier, who was leaping and yapping round her; +‘did it want to go for a walk? Then its mammy shall take it for one, the +dear little angel’; and off she tripped, with the dog at her heels, in +the same direction as that taken by Mr. Lovett. + +‘I wonder,’ said Ange thoughtfully, as she watched her from the open +window, ‘why Sophia Markham always pretends to like papa so much. She is +generally so bitter against old men and women. But just look at her now, +Hilda. She is actually taking his arm. And oh! do see the cherries +bobbing up and down in his face, I should catch one in my mouth if I +were he. But do you think she is in earnest, Hilda, or is it humbug?’ + +‘How can I tell, Ange? I have only seen the woman for an hour. But even +from that short experience, I should feel very much disposed to call it +“humbug.” Miss Markham has not the face of a true woman, neither would I +like to have her for my friend.’ + +‘I observed that you were very silent during her visit.’ + +‘I was listening to what she said, and judging her out of her own mouth; +and I do not think your father would have cared for the style of +conversation she kept up with you this morning. It was worse than idle.’ + +‘I think papa rather likes Miss Markham than otherwise,’ remarked Ange. +‘He is always pleased when she spends the evening here.’ + +‘Because she is such an abominable flatterer,’ said Tessie. ‘She praises +up his appearance, and his preaching, and his daughters to him, till he +does not know whether he is on his head or his heels. Any one would like +it.’ + +‘Oh! Tessie! you do not suppose that papa could be influenced by a woman +like that, just because she flattered him,’ cried Ange, with holy +horror. + +‘Well, no, perhaps not,’ replied Tessie, dubiously, whilst I thought +myself that Mr. Lovett must be the saint his little daughter made him +out, and not a man, if he were proof against flattery, even from Miss +Markham. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + + CHAPTER VIII. + MADAME FROMARD. + + +Tessie had prophesied that Mrs. Carolus and Miss Markham would not call +in each other’s company, and so it happened. The married lady did not +pay her visit till some days after her friend, and then it was performed +with much greater ceremony. The two girls had gone out for a walk +together towards Artois, and I had promised to follow them as soon as I +had finished a long epistle which I was writing to dear Mrs. Sandilands, +descriptive of my new life and the thoughts it had brought to me. I had +sealed my letter and put on my black hat and cloak, when Madame Marmoret +shouted at me from the kitchen staircase that Mrs. Carolus had arrived, +and was waiting to see me in the _salon_. I would willingly have avoided +her, but found, on inquiry, that she had asked for me by name, and +Madame had confessed I was at home. So there was no alternative but to +receive her, and I descended to the sitting-room with my letter in my +hand. I found Mrs. Carolus robed in state, with a Parisian bonnet on and +a Parisian mantle, and new lavender-coloured gloves. Her grandeur quite +overcame me, and I felt very meek in my straw hat bound with crape, and +my untrimmed, every-day costume. + +‘Miss Marsh, I believe,’ she said, as she shook hands with me, and I was +fain to acknowledge that she believed aright. + +‘I have delayed my visit to you for a few days, Miss Marsh,’ Mrs. +Carolus continued, ‘not from any want of desire to make your +acquaintance, I can assure you; but because I consider it the height of +ill-breeding to rush upon a stranger the very minute of her arrival, +without giving her time to turn round, as if a lady had nothing else to +do, at the end of a fatiguing journey, than to make the acquaintance of +a pack of people she has never seen before.’ + +‘It is very considerate of you,’ I said. + +‘I think it is only polite, and I have hinted the same to others; but my +advice is not often taken, I find, especially by those who are most +indebted to me. My husband, Mr. Carolus,’ said the bride, with an +attempt at a blush, ‘would have had the pleasure of accompanying me +to-day; but he is suffering from a little indigestion, and I forbid him +to move.’ + +‘I am sorry Mr. Carolus is ill.’ + +‘It is not serious; but gentlemen are difficult creatures to keep in +order, as perhaps you will discover for yourself some day. You know my +friend Miss Markham, I think?’ + +‘Yes; she called here the day after my arrival.’ + +‘I guessed as much! Mr. Lovett is the great attraction here, I believe; +but I cannot say I have ever seen much good result from single ladies +running after gentlemen in that way—widowers or not. But this is a +terrible place for flirtation, Miss Marsh! and you will have as many +opportunities of pursuing it as anybody.’ + +‘Indeed! I do not quite understand you.’ + +‘Why, all the young men in St. Pucelle collect about Mr. Lovett. He is a +general favourite with them. Have you not seen the Baron de Nesselrode +here?’ + +‘Yes; he comes almost every evening.’ + +‘Just so. Some people think it is a pity that Mr. Lovett should +encourage his young friends so much. It is not as if they came to speak +of the things that a clergyman is usually supposed to talk about, you +know.’ + +‘But surely young men could never derive anything but benefit from +association with such a good man as Mr. Lovett,’ I replied. ‘You should +hear his daughters speak of him, Mrs. Carolus. They cannot find terms +high enough in which to sing their father’s praises.’ + +‘Oh yes, my dear; I have heard them speak of him. And, of course, no one +could dare to say that he would do his friends any harm. But still, +there’s the Baron, you see. Poor fellow! he’s gambled away more than +two-thirds of his fortune already, and has to live on a pittance until +his debts are discharged. It is a pity, is it not, that he should not +have given up cards even yet? I wish dear good Mr. Lovett would +remonstrate with him on the subject, and advise him better. But he is +too easy with young men. I understand he was very wild himself in his +early days—at least, so my Willy tells me—and that makes him disposed to +be lenient, perhaps, with others.’ + +I felt that to this speech I had no answer to make, so I evaded it with +a remark: + +‘With two such pretty girls in the house,’ I said, ‘I should have +thought people would have had no difficulty in deciding the motive which +made young men congregate about their father.’ + +‘Oh no, my dear, it’s not that,’ replied Mrs. Carolus, hastily. ‘He has +not got either of them off his hands yet, you see, though the eldest +must be seven-and-twenty.’ + +‘Three-and-twenty,’ I murmured in correction. + +‘Only three-and-twenty! Dear me! She looks very old for her age. There +was a talk, some few months ago, of the little one being very much +admired by a young fellow of the name of—let me see, what was his name? +I declare I have quite forgotten it. But Sophia can tell you—Sophia can +always remember a gentleman’s name, whatever she forgets. However, the +Lovetts met him at Rille, where their father takes them every now and +then; and I suppose he paid Miss Angela some attention (for that little +one really, is very nice-looking), but it came to nothing after all; and +it’s my opinion they’ll neither of them ever be married.’ + +‘What a terrible fate!’ I said, laughing. + +‘Ah, well, my dear Miss Marsh, you may be able to afford to laugh at the +idea; but a single life _is_ a terrible fate for a woman after all! And +how it sours them! Just look at Sophia Markham! That girl—I call her a +girl, you know, but in reality she is many years older than myself; and +I might have been married fifty times over before I made up my mind to +take Willy—well, to hear her speak of her own sex is shocking! She has +never a good word to say for any one of them. Now, I am sure I may trust +you, Miss Marsh, and you won’t mention my name again, if I tell you that +the way Sophia Markham has gone on under my roof has distressed me to +that degree, that I can never invite her to stay with me again—never! No +gentleman is safe from her attacks—young or old, rich or poor, it is all +the same. She would carry my Willy off from under my very eyes if I +would let her! But I drew the line there. Of course I cannot interfere +with her goings-on in other directions; still, it annoys me greatly. For +I am quite convinced she will never be married. Not on account of her +age; though I think few people would credit she is only ten years my +senior,’ added Mrs. Carolus with a smirk, ‘but because of her manners, +which are bold and forward to a degree. But you were going out, Miss +Marsh! I am afraid I am detaining you.’ + +‘I was going to post this letter, and then to join the Miss Lovetts, who +have gone for a walk on the Artois road.’ + +‘Do not let me keep you any longer, then; indeed, I will walk a little +way with you if you will permit me,’ said Mrs. Carolus. + +I did not particularly wish for the company of this lady, who appeared +to me only a degree less objectionable than her friend, but as it was +drawing near the post-time, and I was anxious that Mrs. Sandilands +should get my letter without delay, I consented to the proposal made me. + +‘Do you consider that Mr. Lovett is likely to marry again, Miss Marsh?’ +inquired Mrs. Carolus, as we left the house together. + +The question took me so completely by surprise, that I did not know what +to answer. + +‘Indeed,’ I said, ‘I have been here far too short a time to be able to +form any opinion on the matter.’ + +‘I should think it very improbable myself, with those girls dependent on +him, and in the state of his affairs too; but doubtless you know quite +as much about _them_ as I do. Everybody in St. Pucelle is admiring you +so much for coming to live with them, Miss Marsh, and says that it is an +act of pure benevolence on your part.’ + +‘I am afraid you are giving me more credit than I deserve, Mrs. Carolus. +I came here on the invitation of Mr. Lovett, simply because I needed +change of scene, and I considered myself more than any one else in +making the decision.’ + +‘Ah! and so did he, my dear—so did he. There is little doubt of that. +But what is to become of those poor girls when he is gone? He can’t last +for ever, you know. He must be past seventy now!’ + +‘I have never thought of it. It does not come within my province to do +so.’ + +‘To be sure not, and I trust it never may. Death is a sad thing! I +suppose you know pretty nearly every one in St. Pucelle by this time, +Miss Marsh.’ + +‘I think I have made acquaintance with all the ladies. A very pretty +girl, a Mrs. Arthur Johnstone called upon me yesterday. She does not +look much older than Ange.’ + +‘Poor child! yes, she has very tolerable features. For my part, I like +her, but one cannot quite shut one’s ears to all one hears. Did the +husband come with her?’ + +‘No!’ + +‘I thought as much! He never goes anywhere. Only too glad to keep out of +sight, I should think. The Ormerods tell me he has been cashiered from +the army!’ + +‘How dreadful for his poor little wife! And she seems so cheerful too. +She laughed the whole time she was with us yesterday.’ + +‘Perhaps she doesn’t know it, or doesn’t care. You will meet strange +characters abroad, my dear. The Continent is the general refuge for all +those who are unable to live in England.’ + +‘So I have heard,’ I answered listlessly. + +I was thinking of Frederick Stephenson’s stories on the same subject, +and it vexed me. It was not pleasant to believe one’s self surrounded by +a set of dishonourable vagabonds. And if it were so, I would rather have +been left to find it out for myself than have been told of it by Mrs. +Carolus. We had reached the high ground by this time which led to the +Artois road, and I was looking about me with the admiration with which I +never ceased to view the country that surrounded St. Pucelle. The grass +we trod upon sent up a grateful fragrance of crushed herbs, and little +tufts of flowers grew between each cleft of the rocky hill as if they +had been planted there on purpose for effect. + +As we strolled along, we gazed down upon the town which we had quitted, +lying in the steep hollow beneath us, with its long narrow street of +wooden houses and grey granite walls, peopled by women in short +petticoats, bare feet, and snowy caps, with men in blue blouses and +leathern aprons, with rough carts drawn by oxen, and a heterogeneous +mass of children tumbling about in the stream of dirty water which the +gutter conveyed rapidly to its level in the valley. On the summit of the +green hill which we had to gain before descending, like the dirty water, +to Artois, there stood a large wooden Calvary, which might be seen for +many miles round. Rough as this representation of the most important +event that ever occurred in the world’s history was upon a closer +inspection, its size and colouring, with the green mound on which it was +erected, gave it a very solemn appearance when viewed from a distance, +particularly when, as was the case on this occasion, a group of +worshippers knelt at the foot of the Cross. + +We instinctively dropped our voices and walked slower as we approached +the Calvary, but before we had passed it, a woman and a little girl rose +hastily and confronted us. They were peasants, and carried covered +baskets, filled probably with butter and eggs. The woman was wiping her +eyes on the corner of her rough apron, when she perceived Mrs. Carolus, +and gave her a ‘_Bon jour, madame._’ + +My companion returned the greeting, and we were continuing our walk when +the woman suddenly ran after us and touched Mrs. Carolus on the sleeve. + +‘Is that the demoiselle that has come to live with Monsieur le Curé +Anglais?’ she demanded in her own language, as she intimated me with her +forefinger. + +‘_Je ne comprenez pas_,’ replied Mrs. Carolus. + +Notwithstanding my inexperience of speaking French, I thought I could do +a little better in the way of verbs than this, and ventured to answer +the woman myself. + +‘Yes! I am the demoiselle. What do you want?’ + +But on hearing these few faltering words, the poor woman gave vent to +such a mingled torrent of tears and explanations, that I was out of my +depth again directly. She was _désolée_; she was _distraite_; she would +pray that the good Lord would take her life, only that Monsieur l’Abbé +would refuse her absolution if she did so. + +‘But would mademoiselle conceive of her position. Monsieur le Curé +Anglais was so beloved and so respected, ‘_c’est un homme si bon, si +amiable, si dévoué_.’ How could one go to him again for the fourteenth +time in a month, and ask for his pity, his benevolence, his compassion? +But then mademoiselle must consider her family. She had five children to +provide for, and here was the eldest, not old enough to do more than +carry the baskets to and from the Artois market. It was but little they +wanted; they had been very patient, and she had been praying the _bon +Dieu_ for more patience, but mademoiselle must know that people cannot +live without eating, though ’twas but little enough they had had inside +them for the last month.’ + +‘But what has all this got to do with me?’ I said in despair. + +I had tried to translate the question three times into French, but +failing to do so, was obliged to have recourse to Mrs. Carolus and the +English language. + +‘Oh! I think I can guess fast enough,’ she replied, with a sarcastic +laugh. + +The woman, with the quickness of her race, had caught the meaning of my +words and answered them. + +‘If mademoiselle would only speak for me,’ she pleaded, ‘we are so poor, +and _mon mari_ has been in his bed for the last twelvemonth. A few +francs, mademoiselle. We do not ask for a large sum, but if we could +have half, or even a quarter of it.’ + +‘Does she want me to give her money?’ I inquired in my bewilderment of +Mrs. Carolus. + +‘I should hardly think so. There are no beggars here. What does she +say?’ + +‘She says she is so poor—they have not enough to eat, and her husband is +ill.’ + +‘Give her half a franc, then; but I should hardly think it is true. The +Catholics are too well looked after to want.’ + +I tendered the coin to the woman, but she pushed it away impatiently. + +‘No! no! mademoiselle,’ she said, shaking her head, ‘I am not a beggar. +I do not want your charity.’ + +‘Then what _do_ you want?’ I asked, defying grammar and accent in my +desire to make her understand. + +‘_Mon droit_,’ she answered proudly. + +‘What is your name?’ I said. + +‘I am Madame Fromard.’ + +‘_Fromard!_’ echoed Mrs. Carolus suddenly; ‘you sell eggs, don’t you? +_vous vendez urfs—urfs et boor?_’ she repeated for Madame Fromard’s +benefit. + +‘_Oui, madame! oui! des œufs et du beurre._’ + +‘Oh! I know her well. You’d better come on, Miss Marsh. It is of no use +stopping to talk to this woman. She will keep you till midnight if you +let her.’ + +‘What is her cause of complaint?’ I said, as, having bidden Madame +Fromard farewell, and left her snivelling and wiping her eyes upon her +apron, we strolled on together. + +Mrs. Carolus regarded me with a very curious expression. + +‘Haven’t you found out?’ she said; ‘I thought you understood French.’ + +‘So I do, after the English fashion, but when these natives begin to +chatter, they run on so fast, there is no keeping pace with them. I +could make out that she was very poor and wanted francs, but I suppose +they would all say that, if they found any one to listen to them.’ + +‘You’ll understand them a great deal better after you have been here a +little while,’ replied Mrs. Carolus, mysteriously, so mysteriously and +unpleasantly, indeed, that I did not like her manner at all, and was +quite glad when I perceived the figures of Tessie and Ange advancing to +meet us. + +‘What a time you have been!’ exclaimed the little maid. ‘We have walked +half way to Artois and back. Monsieur Condé met us, and wanted us to go +into the park and see him shoot a young bear he keeps there that has +become dangerous—horrid man! as if we would; and he is coming to see you +very soon, Hilda. He is anxious to take you over the grottoes. He thinks +they are the only things worth seeing in the world.’ + +‘What grottoes?’ + +‘Why, the grottoes of St. Jean! Have you never heard of them? They are +very wonderful, full of beautiful crystals and stalactites. We must make +a party and go over them some day. It is no fun going alone. Have you +seen them, Mrs. Carolus?’ + +‘Oh yes! We visited them on our first arrival here, and thought them +very interesting.’ + +It was more, however, than Mrs. Carolus appeared to think our +conversation, for she declined to turn back with us again. + +‘Tell them all about Mère Fromard,’ she called out to me before she +finally disappeared. + +‘What about Mère Fromard?’ asked Tessie. + +So I told them of the peasants we had encountered kneeling at the +Calvary, and the broken conversation that had subsequently ensued +between us. I saw Tessie and Ange exchange glances as I proceeded with +my story, and I fancied they were not pleased with it. + +‘I could barely catch her meaning,’ I concluded, ‘but I fancy she +mentioned your names. I suppose you know her.’ + +‘Oh yes! we know her well,’ said Tessie. + +‘Is she amongst the poor that you visit?’ + +‘There are no families here whom we visit in the way you mean. Monsieur +l’Abbé looks after them too well for that. But we go if they are sick or +in trouble, as we should offer our sympathy to any other friends.’ + +‘This poor woman seemed in trouble.’ + +‘Ange will go and see her as soon as she has time,’ said Tessie. ‘For +the present, we cannot do her any good, so let us take this little path +into the town, or we may meet her again. She is very troublesome to +shake off if she once gets a hearing.’ + +I thought both the girls seemed graver and less sympathetic than they +usually were when talking of their poorer neighbours, and I concluded +that the Fromards were not amongst the most deserving in St. Pucelle. + +Mr. Lovett appeared at dinner-time looking as handsome and benignant as +usual, and quite full of the pleasant stroll he had had with Miss +Markham, and the successful manner in which she had beguiled the time. + +‘She is a most amusing companion,’ he said. ‘Her fund of anecdotes seems +inexhaustible, and she tells her stories in an irresistibly funny +manner. I do not know when I have laughed so much as I did this +afternoon.’ + +‘I am glad you enjoyed yourself, papa,’ remarked Tessie, quietly. + +‘I did indeed! Miss Markham reminds me in a powerful degree of the late +Duchess of Rochester, who was one of the wittiest women in society in +Lord Amor’s time. And she is well-looking for her age too—very +well-looking!’ + +‘She is better than well-looking, is Mademoiselle Markham,’ said the +shrill voice of Marmoret, as she placed a roast hare before her master; +‘she has got money, and that’s worth all the beauty in the world, in my +opinion.’ + +‘It’s not a bad thing, Madame, is it,’ replied Mr. Lovett; ‘but how do +you know the lady in question possesses any?’ + +‘Why, by using my eyes, to be sure! Do you think I’m blind, or a fool, +like some I could mention? Look at that demoiselle’s dresses. Why! she +wears a fresh muslin every morning, and the silk she went to church in +last Sunday would have stood of itself. Of course she’s got money. How +do you suppose she could pay for such things else?’ + +‘Perhaps she doesn’t pay for them,’ remarked my guardian facetiously, +but he had to answer for doubting the truth of Madame Marmoret’s +expressed opinion. + +‘_Doesn’t pay for them!_’ she echoed in a tone steeped in vinegar. ‘Why +should you imagine such a scandal? It is not everybody, remember, who +would stoop to defraud honest people of their money, when they’ve worked +hard to earn it.’ + +The woman was in such an evident rage that the two girls looked quite +frightened. + +‘Dear Madame, do be reasonable,’ pleaded Tessie. + +But Mr. Lovett put it down with a higher hand. + +‘Come—come! let us have no nonsense of this kind,’ he said. ‘I like to +have my dinner in peace, or I shall digest nothing that I eat; and as +for you, Madame, the kitchen is your arena for display, and not the +_salle à manger_.’ + +‘And much you would get to eat or to digest either, if I stayed there,’ +she exclaimed, as she flounced off to her own domains. + +The girls looked annoyed, as they always did when Madame Marmoret +displayed any temper, but their father laughed as if it were a very good +joke. + +‘She will go out in the court and cool herself upon the flagstones,’ he +said, ‘meanwhile we will discuss our dinner. Hilda, my dear, may I help +you to a little of this hare?’ + +I had found, since the first day of my dining with them, that his +daughters never partook of the same dish as he did, and I had learnt to +follow their example. It is true that, considering the amount that was +to be deducted from my income for my keep, I might reasonably have +considered myself entitled to the best that was put upon the table; but +there was a strong feeling in me against sharing in the luxuries which +they were forbidden. I liked them both too well. The meals greatly +varied too, both in quality and quantity. I had found that out already. +Sometimes there was barely sufficient to go round the family, and that +of food of the commonest or most distasteful quality; at others, we +rejoiced in an influx of fish, flesh, and fowl—a regular _embarras des +richesses_, and accompanied by bottles of champagne and burgundy. On +such occasions the old father would be in the very best of spirits, +laughing and jesting with us all, and brilliant with repartee and +anecdote. At others, he would seem low and despondent, remaining silent +during the dinner hour, or alluding only to his poverty and altered +circumstances. + +Then his girls would vie with each other to pet and caress him, +reminding him of his past successes, and of what a favourite he was at +the Belgian Court, until he would leave them with the determination to +write to some of his friends in office and seek redress for the hardness +of his position. + +Yet the very next day, perhaps, we would have trout for breakfast and +beef for dinner, and all would go merry as a marriage bell. + +To-day the secret springs that moved the machinery of the kitchen and +larder had evidently gone right, for the roast hare was crowned with red +currant jelly and flanked by sauterne; but I refused all the dainties +Mr. Lovett pressed upon me, and preferred to eat stewed veal, the +commonest dish of the country, with Tessie and Ange instead. + +‘I heard an unpleasant thing to-day about some acquaintances of ours,’ +remarked Mr. Lovett, as he finished his second plate of hare—‘a very +unpleasant thing, indeed.’ + +‘From Miss Markham, papa?’ inquired Tessie, timidly. + +‘Yes; but not repeated with the slightest ill-nature, I can assure you. +In fact, I was quite charmed with the candid and liberal manner in which +the story was told me. The truth is, Miss Markham, who is quite a woman +of the world and shows a wonderful interest in you two girls, considered +it quite her duty to inform me of it, and I assured her she was right.’ + +‘Oh, papa! what is it?’ cried Ange, anxiously. + +‘Nothing to alarm you, my little maid. It is only about the Johnstones. +Miss Markham does not think Mrs. Johnstone a very desirable acquaintance +for you, and neither do I.’ + +‘What has she done, sir?’ I inquired. + +‘Nothing herself, my dear Hilda, at least that I have heard of, but the +husband appears to be a very loose character. It seems that he was +cashiered from the army for gambling, and left England only to prevent +himself from being arrested for debt.’ + +‘Oh, how dishonourable that is!’ I exclaimed. ‘I think there is no +meanness equal to that of defrauding tradesmen of their due.’ + +‘And neither do I,’ said Angela, stoutly. Tessie sat by and heard us, +but she said nothing. + +‘Yet it is hard that her husband’s dishonesty should inculpate poor Mrs. +Johnstone,’ I observed; ‘perhaps she knows nothing of it all.’ + +‘Perhaps not,’ replied Mr. Lovett, ‘but she shares his disgrace. It is +the penalty of having married a man without principle. And I would not +have my children’s names associated with hers, after what I have heard +to-day. So mind, girls, what I say. Be civil to her when you meet, but +don’t go to her house any more, nor invite her to come here.’ + +‘I am _so_ sorry for the Johnstones,’ remarked Tessie, softly, as we sat +in our own room together afterwards. + +‘_I_ am not,’ said Ange; ‘I think there is nothing so horrible in this +world as swindling tradesmen. Fancy, going to a lot of poor people who +trust your honour, and getting clothes and provisions out of them, and +then running away and leaving them to pay for you. It is so pitifully +mean and ungenerous.’ + +‘I quite agree with you, Ange,’ I said; ‘still, people do sometimes get +into debt before they are aware of it.’ + +‘I can’t believe that,’ returned the little maid; ‘no one but a child or +an idiot could do that. Why, if papa were to swindle or cheat people, I +don’t think I could ever speak to him again. It would break my heart +with shame and agony. I should never be able to look anybody in the +face. Would you, Tessie?’ + +‘What did you say, dear? I was not listening.’ + +‘Wouldn’t you rather that papa were dead than a cheat and a swindler +like Mr. Johnstone?’ + +‘Oh, Ange! don’t say such hard things of people.’ + +‘Are they too hard? I didn’t think they could be. Well! there’s one +comfort in hearing of such villany. It makes one feel so thankful that +papa is not as other men are! The dear, dear, good old pappy! If he had +ever done such things, I should die at once.’ + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + + CHAPTER IX. + SUNDAY. + + +Sunday at St. Pucelle was not such an uninteresting day as I had +anticipated. On the first Saturday I spent there, I passed through the +kitchen and detected Tessie, with a large holland apron and bib pinned +over her serge dress, busily employed in making tartlets. How fair and +gentle she looked—somehow after I had seen Ange I never could call +Tessie pretty, although her sweet womanly face gained by the contrast +with that of her lovely sister. There she stood with her sleeves rolled +off her arms, and a smile dimpling every feature as I confronted her. + +‘Making good things for to-morrow’s dinner?’ I asked. + +‘Oh no! though I’ll keep some for you, Hilda, if you particularly wish +it. These are for papa during the service.’ + +‘_For papa during the service!_’ I could not help re-echoing her words. +There seemed something so intensely ludicrous in the idea of a minister +of the Church consuming jam tarts between the Litany and the Communion. + +‘Yes; he requires something to keep him up, you know. It is very +fatiguing for an old man to read and preach for two hours at a time, so +we always prepare him a little _goûter_ in the vestry.’ + +‘Has Mr. Lovett no help, then?’ + +‘A layman occasionally reads the lessons for him. Young Mr. Thrale has +promised to do so to-morrow, but otherwise he has all the work on his +own hands.’ + +‘And three services a day, I suppose?’ + +‘Oh no! only one in the morning. There are not enough Protestants to +make it worth while. No one would come a second time. But I hope you +will like our service, Hilda. It is nothing very grand, of course, but +Ange and I try to make the singing as nice as we can, and nothing could +exceed papa’s preaching. It is beautiful!’ + +When I had become acquainted with the Protestant service held in the +schoolroom vacated by the little Romanists of St. Pucelle, I agreed with +Tessie, that, considering all the disadvantages it laboured under, it +was very nice, and it owed much of its success to the labours of herself +and Ange. From the moment that Sunday dawned, these two girls were very +important people indeed. They appeared to me to combine the offices of +sacristan, clerk, organist and choir all in one. As soon as their +breakfast was completed they ran over to the schoolroom to make sure +that it was properly aired, dusted and swept: to arrange the Communion +table, which was stowed away in a cupboard during the week: to see that +the benches were properly placed; the tiny harmonium pulled into +position, and the lessons and hymns for the day looked out ready for +their father and themselves. They had the arrangements for all the music +and chanting in their own hands, and merely placed a list of the hymns +to be sung on the Communion table; which always bore a vase of flowers +set there by Ange. + +Of course they had secured me to take part in the singing, which I was +willing enough to do. To sing praise to God and to sing songs to the +piano were two different things. I felt I came nearer _her_ whilst +engaged in the former practice, and that if my dull ears could only be +opened, I might be able to distinguish her own sweet voice mingling with +mine. + +So at a few minutes before eleven, we three girls were established +behind the harmonium; Tessie in front of it as accompanist, and Ange and +I on either side, to take soprano and alto as lustily as we could, and +induce the congregation to chime in. + +It was difficult to divest one’s mind of the idea that we were only in a +schoolroom, nor to help being amused by the remarks Ange made on the +people as they filed in, one after another. There were the poor +condemned Johnstones, looking handsomer and more stylish than anybody +there: there were, of necessity, the giddy Sophia Markham, with young +Thrale in close attendance: Mr. and Mrs. Carolus, dressed in their +newest and best. Colonel Berwick, with his interminable family of girls +and boys—a gentleman of such ultra-Protestant views that he would not +permit his children to pass the Catholic church in their daily walks, +for fear the Abbé Morteville should rush out and baptise them all in the +middle of the road: Mrs. Dart, a handsome widow, of whose antecedents no +one could find out anything; and a dozen or more stray men and women +whose names I had been told, but who were not particularly intimate with +the Lovetts. These naturally did not constitute the resident part of the +population of St. Pucelle, who were all Catholics. + +They were the English visitors only, who filled the two little primitive +hotels of the town—the Hôtel de la Cloche and the Hôtel de l’Étoile—for +three to six months in the year. They had scarcely settled down in their +seats—Miss Markham having turned round first and nodded to us all in a +manner which I thought most irreverent in a place of worship—when Mr. +Lovett entered and ascended the temporary pulpit that was dragged out of +the cupboard with the Communion-table every Sunday morning. As I saw the +old man in his surplice and bands, I was ready to agree with all the +admiration his daughters bestowed upon him; he looked so handsome, so +venerable and so much like a saint, that he was what the nurses term ‘a +perfect picture.’ + +As he knelt in prayer, with his finely-shaped hands clasped together, +his beautiful blue eyes upraised to heaven, and his silver curls +crowning a brow which must have befitted an Antinous in earlier days, he +should have been painted for a prophet or an apostle, pleading with the +Almighty for mercy on sins which he knew only through the weakness of +others. And if I thought my guardian’s personal appearance striking on +that occasion, I was still more delighted with his delivery. His +elocution was remarkable. Each word fell from his lips with musical +distinctness, and it was evident that the art had formed an important +part of his studies. He read the lessons—young Thrale being too nervous +to do so when it came to the point—as I had never heard them read +before. Without any theatrical display, he gave the New Testament +history for the day, as a history, not divided into so many monotonous +verses badly punctuated, but strongly and energetically delivered, with +an expression that must have riveted the attention of every one who was +listening to him. + +I felt at once that there stood before me a man of no common parts or +learning, a man who should have been (as his daughter had fondly said) +set in a high place to give light to the world. Nor was I disappointed +by the sermon that followed the prayers. It was stirring—terse—to the +point, and delivered with energy. The blue eyes flashed with anger or +glowed with feeling as he denounced sin or invited to pardon, and when +in a few words he described the horrors that awaited the impenitent, a +thrill of terror ran through his congregation. + +I felt it keenly, and glanced towards my companions to see what effect +it had upon them. Tessie was looking like an ordinary mortal, quietly +interested; but Ange had her whole attention riveted on her father’s +words and face. Her eyes were filled with tears, her cheeks were +glowing, her whole expression was one of adoring admiration. When Mr. +Lovett had finished his sermon, which was so superabundantly superior to +anything I had ever heard from a pulpit before, that I was quite +surprised the congregation did not applaud him, she waked up from her +reverie with a start and a long-drawn sigh, and had only time to whisper +hurriedly to me, ‘Isn’t he perfect?’ before the harmonium struck up +again, and we rose to sing the parting hymn. + +The service, simply as it was conducted, had had such a solemn effect +upon me that I was disgusted to see Miss Sophia Markham, before she left +the schoolroom, approach the place where we were sitting, and to hear +her ask Ange in a loud whisper if we would all go over to their hotel in +the afternoon and have tea with them. + +‘Arthur Thrale’s friend—the sporting man—my great admirer (you know who +I mean), has promised to come over from Rille, if possible, and we can +all go for a walk over the hills together. _You_ can come, can’t you, if +the others won’t?’ + +I saw the crimson colour rush like a flood over Ange’s lovely face, but +she shook her head determinately in answer to the invitation. + +‘We make a rule of never going out on Sundays, Miss Markham.’ + +‘Oh, well! just as you like, you know; but I thought it would give you +pleasure. What are you going to do to-morrow?’ + +‘Papa will be waiting for us in the vestry, Ange,’ whispered Tessie, who +had put away the chant-books and did not appear to like this sort of +conversation going on in church any more than I did. + +Ange took the hint, and, rising without further ceremony, we walked up +to the little room where Mr. Lovett robed and disrobed. But here I was +rather startled by coming upon the reverend gentleman seated in his +surplice before a small table on which, spread on an old newspaper, were +some sandwiches, a flask of sherry, and the tartlets Tessie had made the +day before. Yet she did not seem to see anything in the sight +incongruous with the words we had just heard fall from those lips, now +besmeared with _compôte de fraises_. + +‘Are they good, papa?’ she inquired affectionately. + +‘Very good, my dear!’ he replied, with his mouth full; ‘but your second +hymn was so short, I had no time to eat them before. You must look out a +longer one for next Sunday! You forget the work I have to do whilst you +are singing a couple of verses. Four is the very least I can accomplish +it under.’ + +‘He _shall_ have four—the dear old dad!’ exclaimed Ange, as she kissed +the top of his head; ‘or six if he likes it better. Oh, papa! you were +divine to-day. You made me cry so! How I wish we were all dead and safe +in heaven together!’ + +‘Tut! tut! you silly little mouse!’ said her father, as he patted her +rose-leaf cheek; ‘you mustn’t talk about being dead and buried just yet! +You’ll have to put me under ground first, you know.’ + +‘Oh, papa! papa! _don’t!_’ she cried, in a voice of real pain. + +‘Well, then, trot home and see after the dinner being got ready in time. +We are obliged to dine early to-day, my dear Hilda, in consideration of +the proceedings of our domestic tyrant Madame Marmoret, who insists upon +attending three services at her own church every Sunday, and +disregarding everything she hears there on the remaining six days of the +week.’ + +‘A very common practice, Mr. Lovett, with people much better instructed +than Madame Marmoret.’ + +‘Very true, my dear! I wonder how many of my congregation of to-day will +even remember, let alone practise, the precepts I have just preached to +them. But come, little people, clear out of my vestry, for I want to +resume my usual garb.’ + +I thought Ange was uncommonly thoughtful that afternoon, and I could not +help associating her mood with the information Mrs. Carolus had given me +about the young man at Rille who had paid her so much attention, which +had come to nothing. + +Was it possible, I thought, as I watched her sitting on the ground with +her hands folded idly on her lap, and her sunny head laid against her +father’s knee, that her young heart could have suffered a +disappointment, anything akin, in magnitude or bitterness, to that which +had been experienced by my own? I could not believe it. The infidelity +of Cave Charteris, whether it had been brought on by my credulous folly +or his thoughtlessness, had left a mark upon me which I knew that +nothing in this world could ever obliterate. I was not so young nor so +blind as to imagine that I should never be happy again. I knew that men +and women had sustained and conquered greater griefs and more crushing +shames than mine. But I no more believed that I should ever forget the +awful pain my first disappointment had caused me, than that I should +replace the dear friend and mother whose death had left a vacancy in my +bruised heart that no mortal could fill again. + +Ange seemed to me too young to have suffered in proportion with myself; +not too young in years, but in spirit. How I envied the youthful gaiety +with which she enjoyed her walks and talks, and simple occupations, the +fresh laughter that burst from her, with her will or against it, at +anything that touched her sense of ridicule; and the innocent mischief +which made her love to tease her father or her sister, or even Madame, +until she was compelled to win their pardon by her kisses. + +No! Ange could never have passed through the same valley of suffering as +I had! Its shadows would have frightened her lightheartedness to death. +Yet she was certainly very grave that afternoon, and very silent; but, +when I taxed her with it, she replied that she was always tired on +Sundays, and wanted rest after the exertion of singing, or, as she +expressed it, of ‘bawling at the top of her voice, for two hours, +without stopping.’ After which I was surprised, when tea was over, to +see her come down into the sitting-room, robed for walking. + +‘Are you going out again, Ange?’ + +‘Yes, to evening church.’ + +‘I thought there was only one service here.’ + +‘Papa has only one; but Monsieur l’Abbé has the regular number at his +church. I always go there in the evening, the service is so beautiful. +Will you come with me?’ + +‘I shall be delighted.’ + +It was nothing extraordinary in _me_ to consent to attend a Catholic +service, because I was a very broad and muscular Christian indeed, +bound, by my own conscience, to no creed nor church whatever, but ready +to join in any prayers that satisfied my ideas of what religious worship +should be, and to believe that the path that took him readiest to God +was the right path for each man to walk in, irrespective of the pilot +who led the way. But then I was not a minister of the Established Church +of England, who had taken a very solemn oath to uphold her doctrines and +protect her interests in every possible manner, and it seemed very +strange to me that Mr. Lovett should like it to be known, in a little +town like St. Pucelle, that his daughters attended the services of a +Church whose doctrines were so diametrically opposed to those of his +own. + +‘Does your papa approve of your going to vespers at St. Marie?’ I said +to Ange, as we walked there together. + +‘Oh, Hilda! Do you suppose I should do so without his approval? Why, of +course he does. And the Abbé Morteville is one of papa’s very best and +most intimate friends.’ + +‘That may be. I see no reason whatever why a difference of religious +opinion should have any effect upon the friendship of men. Still, I +should have thought, as Mr. Lovett is a Protestant minister, that he +would have been almost afraid to let you and Tessie attend the Catholic +services.’ + +‘Why?’ she asked quickly. + +‘For various reasons; the chief being, that you might be converted to +Catholicism yourselves.’ + +‘I don’t think papa would object to it if we were! You don’t half know +yet how good and generous and liberal-minded he is, Hilda. If he thought +Tessie and I were fully persuaded that we should not be happy unless we +became Catholics, he would never oppose our wishes. But he need have no +fear; at all events on my account. I shall never leave the English +Church so long as he is in it.’ + +I admired the beautiful childlike faith which she had in her father, and +in everything which he believed to be right, but I could not join in it. +To me it seemed the most culpable negligence to allow a girl with so +unformed a mind as that of Ange to attend regularly the offices of a +church to which she did not belong. However, it was no concern of mine, +and I was silent. + +As we approached the porch of St. Marie, we met the Baron de Nesselrode. + +‘How do you do, M. le Baron?’ exclaimed Ange. ‘We are going to attend +vespers this evening. Will you come with us?’ + +Armand de Nesselrode laughed uneasily. + +‘I am afraid you must excuse me,’ he replied; ‘it is a very long time +since I have seen the inside of a church, Mademoiselle Ange.’ + +‘Is that so? What a sad confession! What would Monsieur l’Abbé say were +he to hear it?’ + +‘The truth, probably—that I am a lost sheep not worth the looking +after.’ + +‘Indeed he would not. I can answer for that. Monsieur l’Abbé is far too +good to say such a thing of any one.’ + +‘But he has given me up all the same, and he is wise to do so. He has +too much occupation for his time to waste it upon a _vaurien_ like +myself. No one remembers me, Mademoiselle Ange. I am an outcast, and +alone.’ + +_Alone!_ The word struck painfully upon my ear. I had so often used it +in reference to my own condition. And although Armand de Nesselrode +laughed with apparent carelessness as he said it, I felt sure that he +was suffering bitterly the while. I wished, at that moment, that I could +speak French as fluently as Ange did—that I might assure him that I +could sympathise in his sense of solitude. But a foolish timidity bound +my tongue. The young Baron spoke with a pure Parisian accent, and I was +ashamed to air my boarding-school French before him. Yet, as he raised +his hat to me in parting, I ventured to say, in a very low voice: + +‘Monsieur, when we pray to-night, we will not forget you.’ + +A gleam of pleasure and sudden interest lit up the dark eyes which he +fixed upon me. + +‘I thank you—I thank you much, mademoiselle,’ he replied fervently, as +we passed into the church. + +When we returned home that evening, we went at once into the little +sitting-room where Tessie was sitting by herself, reading. + +‘Where is papa, Tessie?’ + +‘He has gone over to the Hôtel de la Cloche to see Miss Markham. She +sent up a note by Arthur Thrale to ask him to do so. I suppose the +visitor they expected from Rille has arrived, and requires a little more +amusement than can be extracted from poor old Mr. Carolus.’ + +Again that vivid burning blush on Ange’s cheek, but she did not make any +remark upon her sister’s news. She only threw her hat and cape upon a +chair, and, going up to the piano, sat down and commenced to play a +hymn. It was a familiar one to all of us. + +Tessie left her book and took a seat beside me, and put her arm round my +waist, and we sang the words together. Amidst the noise which we made +with our own voices, I could not distinguish if the little maid joined +us or no. We had not finished the hymn, however, when the door from the +_salle_ softly opened, and the tall figure of the Baron de Nesselrode +stood upon the threshold. We would have stopped at once, but he motioned +us to proceed, and stood there, with the door in his hand, until the +hymn was concluded. Then he closed it behind him, and advanced into our +midst. + +‘Monsieur Lovett, I find, is not at home, so I ventured to come a little +farther than the _salle_,’ he said to Tessie. ‘Will you continue your +singing, Mademoiselle Ange? It is such a treat to me to listen to music. +I never hear any now.’ + +‘You are fond of it, then, Monsieur le Baron?’ + +‘Passionately, mademoiselle. At one time I thought I could never live +without it. But one is forced to learn hard lessons in this world. There +is a fine organ up at my old château, but it has not been opened for +years; and I conclude that, like its owner, it is ruined.’ + +‘What a pity! You should have it examined. Why not get the opinion of +the organist of St. Marie upon it?’ + +‘I would rather have the opinion of you, demoiselles, if you would +graciously accord it to me. Do you think Monsieur votre père would so +far honour me as to bring you all up to the château some day, that you +may see and pronounce on the merits of my poor old organ for +yourselves?’ + +‘We will ask papa, Monsieur le Baron, but I do not think he will have +any objection.’ + +‘Objection!’ cried Ange, wheeling round on her music-stool, ‘I should +think not. I won’t let him have an objection. Tessie and I have so often +longed to see your château, Monsieur le Baron—the dear old romantic +tumbled-down place. I have peeped over the wall dozens of times, and +picked all the roses within my reach, but of course I dared not venture +within the gates, it would not have been _comme-il-faut_!’ + +‘A dear old romantic tumbled-down place,’ repeated the Baron, bitterly. +‘Yes! that is the fittest name for the only rest my folly has left for +the sole of my foot. Bah! do not let us talk of it any more. Monsieur +will bring you to visit me there, I trust, and old Denise shall receive +you with all the reverence befitting your own position, if not with the +luxury a De Nesselrode should be able to lavish upon his guests. Sing to +me again, mesdemoiselles. Let me forget the memories this little +conversation has provoked, in listening to your voices.’ + +So Ange struck up the plaintive air of ‘Sun of my soul,’ and we all +joined in the evening hymn together. Its last chords were dying away, +when Mr. Lovett’s footstep was heard entering the _salle_. The Baron +rose at once to join him, but before he had time to leave the room, +Tessie and Ange had flown past him to welcome their father home. +Consequently, he and I were left for one brief moment together. + +‘Did you forget your promise, mademoiselle?’ he asked me, in a low +earnest voice. + +‘I did not, monsieur.’ + +He made no answer, but he threw one long searching glance upon me before +he left the room, and I sat there thinking what a pity it was that he +was so careless and dissipated, and what a desirable husband he would +make for Tessie, if he could only be converted to see the errors of his +ways. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + + CHAPTER X. + CHÂTEAU DES ROSES. + + +I thought of this long after I went to bed that night, and for several +succeeding days. I felt sure that Tessie liked the Baron, and indeed few +girls with hearts that were disengaged could have helped doing so. He +was very handsome, with that dark Southern beauty which bespeaks fire +and energy, and all that makes a man attractive to a woman. And he was +interesting—a more dangerous circumstance still. A halo of romance hung +around his ill-fortune and his solitude, even though both had been +induced by his own misdeeds. And I doubt, moreover, whether a man’s +errors, unless directed towards herself, ever closed a woman’s heart +against him. Although we are but too often the tempters and destroyers +of the other sex, we like to flatter ourselves with the idea that we +were sent into this world to be their guardian angels. The instinct of +maternity, too, is rampant in the breasts of most of us, and a sick man +or a naughty man is for the time being very like a child, something that +is to be petted and tended and caressed, or coaxed and reprimanded and +forgiven. I never heard the girls mention the young Baron de Nesselrode +without a word of pity or excuse, and I too had much the same feeling +for him. + +But I had heard that his present state of poverty was not to last for +ever. The interest of his large fortune alone was being annually +swallowed by his greedy creditors; and if the Baron could only be +persuaded to lose no more money in the interim, a few years’ probation +would certainly set him free again. Meanwhile his family had utterly +refused to assist him, over which piece of cruelty I had heard Tessie +properly indignant. But privately I argued that in all probability his +family had not the means of doing so. The Baron de Nesselrode was the +representative of his race, and his relations were naturally incensed to +find that his extravagance had led him to represent it in a ruinous old +château at St. Pucelle. + +The great thing to be done now, I said to myself, was to persuade him to +give up that fatal habit of gambling, which we heard that he still +continued to practise at more than one private house in the town. + +If he would only learn to be wise in time, and to see the beauties of +Tessie’s character as I saw them, what a charming couple they would +make! She was so thoroughly good and amiable. Each day I seemed to +discover some fresh trait in her disposition which rendered her more +worthy of my affection; and I pictured her to myself as the future +Baronne de Nesselrode, and thought how well she would look the part, and +how faithfully she would discharge the duties of her position as wife +and mother and mistress of the household. + +I wonder now why I never thought of the probability of the Baron +preferring Ange to her sister—Ange, with her lovely, ever-changing +countenance, her childlike gaiety of disposition, her ardent faith in +religion and her father—but it never struck me that it might be so. + +Tessie, with her quiet, somewhat pensive air, and her softly-braided +flaxen locks, was always the ideal Baronne that figured in my airy +castles; whilst bright-haired, blushing Ange was nowhere. + +But the first thing, of course, to be done was to convert Armand de +Nesselrode; and with that idea seething in my brain, I was very pleased, +a few days afterwards, to hear that Mr. Lovett had arranged to take us +all over to the château that very afternoon. + +‘Hilda, it will be delightful!’ cried Ange, dancing about me in her +glee. ‘You don’t know how often Tessie and I have longed to see inside +the old château.’ + +‘And Monsieur le Baron has never asked you all these years?’ + +‘Never once—until last Sunday; indeed, I believe we shall be the first +people in St. Pucelle who have set foot inside it. The poor Baron is +ashamed of his poverty, so Madame says. I know he has only one servant +to wait on him: I have seen her at market. She looks like a veritable +old _châtelaine_. I should never dare to ask her to clean my boots. But +I must go, Hilda, or I shall not be back again by twelve o’clock. I have +five people to call upon within an hour.’ + +And off she ran, with a little basket on her arm, to see her poor. + +I have forgotten to mention what a charitable heart Ange Lovett had. Not +the charity that enters poor people’s homes without knocking, and sows +good advice and platitudes broadcast, to bring up a crop of curses and +complaints; but a large-hearted love, that saw no distinction between +herself and them except that made by poverty, and greater need of +friendship. When I saw her stop and salute her humbler friends, I was +not surprised to hear they called her ‘_Petite Ange_’ even to that day. + +Yet she carried them neither food nor money: she had none to spare. The +basket on her arm held some trifling remembrance, perhaps: a rag doll, +manufactured by herself, for a sick child; the Sunday cap of some old +woman which she had turned and made to look as good as new; or a bottle +of physic for cough or ague, concocted by Madame Marmoret, and which was +about the only thing in which that unpleasant domestic seemed willing to +accommodate herself to the wishes of her young mistresses. So, although +Ange possessed nothing wherewith to win the affections of her poor +neighbours, beyond her ready sympathy and beaming smile, she was the +cherished friend of every one of them; and even the Abbé Morteville used +to say that he always knew, when called upon to visit the sick, if the +little Angel of St. Pucelle had been there before him or no. Sweet Ange! +She used to laugh at Tessie and me, and call us lazy, because we did not +join her in her work of love; but the fact was that she left us nothing +to do. There was scarcely a day that she had not flitted in and out of +half the cottages in St. Pucelle. She lived amongst the poor as though +she had been one of themselves. + +We were an expectant party as we walked up together to the Château des +Roses, as the Baron’s domicile was romantically called, for the girls +had talked to me so much on the subject, that I had become almost as +curious to find myself within its walls as they were. I found that the +château was situated quite a mile away from St. Pucelle. Two massive +pillars that had once supported the gates, and were surmounted by +wolves’ heads carved in stone, the armorial bearing of the family of De +Nesselrode, became visible some time before we reached the entrance. +When we had gained it, we discovered that the way was open: the gate +being off its hinges and thrown carelessly amongst the bushes within. To +the top of either pillar had climbed a rose-tree, the fragrant blossoms +of which were hanging halfway to the ground; whilst various costly +shrubs, which had once been planted about the entrance with a due regard +to effect, had obtruded their luxuriant growth until it encroached upon +the highway. + +‘Is not this a regular wilderness of sweets?’ said Angela. ‘These are +the roses, papa, that I told the Baron I had so often picked in passing. +I wonder if he has more of them within; for if so, I must steal a +bouquet before we return again.’ + +We had little time to wonder, for as we took our way to the château by a +pathway cut through the pinewood, which sheltered it on three sides from +the mountain air, we discovered that it well deserved its name. We +seemed to be surrounded by roses of every size and colour. They ran +along the ground at our feet, they hung in clusters from the trees at +our side, they entangled themselves in the skirts of our dresses and +caught the flimsy trimmings of our hats. For myself, I thought I had +never traversed such a labyrinth of beauty; though the rose-trees, in +common with everything else, bore the appearance of a long-sustained and +utter neglect. + +As we came in sight of the fine old château, which had originally been +built of grey granite, but was much disfigured by having been restored +in various places by common red brick, we saw our host approaching to +greet us. He looked so picturesque in a black velveteen coat, with a +little handkerchief of grey silk carelessly knotted about his throat, +that I could not resist glancing at Tessie to see how his appearance +struck her. To my disappointment, she was not looking at the Baron at +all, but busily engaged in fastening a bunch of yellow rosebuds in her +bosom. + +Well, Tessie cared for something higher than mere outward seeming +perhaps. So much the better! Her happiness, when it came, would be all +the more lasting and to be depended on. Still, Monsieur le Baron did +look very graceful and aristocratic in his artistic suit—there was no +manner of doubt about that! + +We all rushed at him, open-mouthed, with praises of his lovely roses. + +‘_Ah, les roses_,’ he said, indifferently. ‘Yes, they are very abundant; +and I am only too flattered that mesdemoiselles should deign to honour +my poor flowers with their regard! But my little _goûter_ is waiting for +you, and I trust that your walk has given you an appetite. Mademoiselle, +will you permit me to conduct you into the Château des Roses?’ + +He offered his arm to me as he spoke, and I was surprised that he should +not have chosen Tessie instead, until I remembered that Mr. Lovett had +told several of his friends that he regarded me as his eldest daughter. + +The entrance-hall to the château was very imposing; only, had I not +known it was inhabited by a gentleman of the nineteenth century, I +should certainly have imagined I was being introduced to the residence +of some feudal chief of the tenth instead. Suits of armour, coated with +rust, covered the walls; on the stone floor were laid numerous rough +skins of animals which the Baron had killed in the chase. A stand, +filled with all sorts of murderous weapons, ornamented one end of the +hall; whilst on the other hung an arras of tapestry, faded into +indistinctness and moth-eaten, until it would hardly hold together. Here +we encountered Denise, the old _châtelaine_, as Ange had designated +her—an ancient dame who had once been the Baron’s nurse, and had +followed him into his exile with a fidelity as rare as it is beautiful. +As I saw this old servant, whose appearance was the very picture of +modest decorum, receiving her young master’s guests with as much state +as though she had had a band of domestics behind her to execute her +orders, I could not help thinking that there must be something good left +in the man who, in the midst of misfortune brought on his own head, +could yet command the service and fidelity of so thoroughly respectable +a woman. + +‘Denise,’ said the Baron, ‘these young ladies have condescended to +honour the château with their presence for a few hours. I commend them, +during their visit, to your care.’ + +‘Will mesdemoiselles follow me upstairs and remove their walking attire +before partaking of _goûter_?’ inquired the old servant, and we were +very thankful, after a hot and dusty walk, to bathe our hands and faces +in the cool spring water she had provided for us. + +‘I never saw anything like this in my life before,’ exclaimed Tessie, as +we followed Denise up a wide staircase into a long corridor lined with +flapping tapestry, and ornamented with grim oil-paintings of the +martyred saints. ‘Could you not fancy, Hilda, this corridor at dead of +night peopled with the ghosts of these poor martyrs and ringing with +their groans?’ + +Old Denise crossed herself. + +‘Do not speak of it, mademoiselle,’ she said. ‘The blessed martyrs are +in heaven, and would not return to this earth if they could; and as for +the spirits of others, surely _Le bon Dieu_ would never permit them to +terrify a poor old woman like me. Though, for the matter of that, there +has always been a legend in our family that one of my dear master’s +noble ancestors, Le Sieur Armand de Valois, still walks the Château des +Roses, which was his favourite summer residence when alive; and that is +the reason, mesdemoiselles, that the old house is in so sad a condition +of ruin and decay, for no one has cared to keep it up or live in it.’ + +‘I wonder you were not afraid to come here, then, madame,’ I remarked. + +‘I should not have been afraid to go anywhere with my dear master, +mademoiselle; and since those thieves who stripped him of his rightful +property left him no shelter but this, why I had no choice but to follow +and take care of him.’ + +‘It does you honour!’ said Tessie, as we entered the bed-chamber. + +Such a chamber! uncarpeted and uncurtained, with a huge bedstead of +carved oak, a Venetian mirror which distorted our features until we did +not recognise ourselves—and for the purposes of washing, a brass ewer +and basin shining like burnished gold, but placed upon a table of ebony. +The towels offered us were of the finest fringed damask, but Denise was +profuse in her apologies for the humbleness of the accommodation she had +prepared. + +‘This is not as it should be,’ she said sorrowfully, ‘but mesdemoiselles +must be gracious and overlook our poverty. When Monsieur le Baron told +me that ladies were coming to the château, you might have knocked me +down with a feather. “Ladies,” I said, “and not a room to show them +into.” + +‘But my dear master assured me you would excuse it. Ah, mesdemoiselles! +until those thieves and robbers restore his rights to him, what can you +expect? We have no money to replace these things. But when that day +comes,’ exclaimed the old woman, brightening up, ‘then his friends and +his enemies alike shall see what the Baron de Nesselrode can do. They +shall be fine times, mesdemoiselles, when we go back to our château at +Versailles, and our châlet in beautiful Switzerland, and above all, our +hôtel in Paris. The Château des Roses may fall to the ground then—we +shall need it no longer. But, meanwhile, we have sore need of +patience—Heaven knows!’ + +‘But this is all very beautiful,’ I said. ‘What could be better? I would +not have it changed for worlds, if it were mine.’ + +Denise shook her head despondently. + +‘Mademoiselle is too good to say so,’ she replied, ‘but if she and these +young ladies will excuse me, I will descend again and see that the +_salle_ is prepared for their reception.’ + + + END OF VOL. I. + + + BILLING AND SONS, PRINTERS, GUILDFORD, SURREY. + +------------------------------------------------------------------------ + + + + + TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES + + + ● Fixed typos; non-standard spelling and dialect retained. + ● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_. + ● Enclosed blackletter font in =equals=. + ● Images without captions use HTML alt text. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 78292 *** |