EVAN HARRINGTON

By George Meredith


CONTENTS

 CHAPTER I. ABOVE BUTTONS
 CHAPTER II. THE HERITAGE OF THE SON
 CHAPTER III. THE DAUGHTERS OF THE SHEARS
 CHAPTER IV. ON BOARD THE JOCASTA
 CHAPTER V. THE FAMILY AND THE FUNERAL
 CHAPTER VI. MY GENTLEMAN ON THE ROAD
 CHAPTER VII. MOTHER AND SON
 CHAPTER VIII. INTRODUCES AN ECCENTRIC
 CHAPTER IX. THE COUNTESS IN LOW SOCIETY
 CHAPTER X. MY GENTLEMAN ON THE ROAD AGAIN
 CHAPTER XI. DOINGS AT AN INN
 CHAPTER XII. IN WHICH ALE IS SHOWN TO HAVE ONE QUALITY OF WINE
 CHAPTER XIII. THE MATCH OF FALLOW FIELD AGAINST BECKLEY
 CHAPTER XIV. THE COUNTESS DESCRIBES THE FIELD OF ACTION
 CHAPTER XV. A CAPTURE
 CHAPTER XVI. LEADS TO A SMALL SKIRMISH BETWEEN ROSE AND EVAN
 CHAPTER XVII. IN WHICH EVAN WRITES HIMSELF TAILOR
 CHAPTER XVIII. IN WHICH EVAN CALLS HIMSELF GENTLEMAN
 CHAPTER XIX. SECOND DESPATCH OF THE COUNTESS
 CHAPTER XX. BREAK-NECK LEAP
 CHAPTER XXI. TRIBULATIONS AND TACTICS OF THE COUNTESS
 CHAPTER XXII. IN WHICH THE DAUGHTERS OF THE GREAT MEL HAVE TO DIGEST HIM AT DINNER
 CHAPTER XXIII. TREATS OF A HANDKERCHIEF
 CHAPTER XXIV. THE COUNTESS MAKES HERSELF FELT
 CHAPTER XXV. IN WHICH THE STREAM FLOWS MUDDY AND CLEAR
 CHAPTER XXVI. MRS. MEL MAKES A BED FOR HERSELF AND FAMILY
 CHAPTER XXVII. EXHIBITS ROSE’S GENERALSHIP; EVAN’S PERFORMANCE ON THE SECOND FIDDLE; AND THE WRETCHEDNESS OF THE COUNTESS
 CHAPTER XXVIII. TOM COGGLESEY’S PROPOSITION
 CHAPTER XXIX. PRELUDE TO AN ENGAGEMENT
 CHAPTER XXX. THE BATTLE OF THE BULL-DOGS. PART I.
 CHAPTER XXXI. THE BATTLE OF THE BULL-DOGS. PART II.
 CHAPTER XXXII. IN WHICH EVAN’S LIGHT BEGINS TO TWINKLE AGAIN
 CHAPTER XXXIII. THE HERO TAKES HIS RANK IN THE ORCHESTRA
 CHAPTER XXXIV. A PAGAN SACRIFICE
 CHAPTER XXXV. ROSE WOUNDED
 CHAPTER XXXVI. BEFORE BREAKFAST
 CHAPTER XXXVII. THE RETREAT FROM BECKLEY
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. IN WHICH WE HAVE TO SEE IN THE DARK
 CHAPTER XXXIX. IN THE DOMAIN OF TAILORDOM
 CHAPTER XL. IN WHICH THE COUNTESS STILL SCENTS GAME
 CHAPTER XLI. REVEALS AN ABOMINABLE PLOT OF THE BROTHERS COGGLESBY
 CHAPTER XLII. JULIANA
 CHAPTER XLIII. ROSE
 CHAPTER XLIV. CONTAINS A WARNING TO ALL CONSPIRATORS
 CHAPTER XLV. IN WHICH THE SHOP BECOMES THE CENTRE OF ATTRACTION
 CHAPTER XLVI. A LOVERS’ PARTING
 CHAPTER XLVII. A YEAR LATER, THE COUNTESS DE SALDAR DE SANCORVO TO HER SISTER CAROLINE




CHAPTER I.
ABOVE BUTTONS


Long after the hours when tradesmen are in the habit of commencing
business, the shutters of a certain shop in the town of
Lymport-on-the-Sea remained significantly closed, and it became known
that death had taken Mr. Melchisedec Harrington, and struck one off the
list of living tailors. The demise of a respectable member of this
class does not ordinarily create a profound sensation. He dies, and his
equals debate who is to be his successor: while the rest of them who
have come in contact with him, very probably hear nothing of his great
launch and final adieu till the winding up of cash-accounts; on which
occasions we may augur that he is not often blessed by one or other of
the two great parties who subdivide this universe. In the case of Mr.
Melchisedec it was otherwise. This had been a grand man, despite his
calling, and in the teeth of opprobrious epithets against his craft. To
be both generally blamed, and generally liked, evinces a peculiar
construction of mortal. Mr. Melchisedec, whom people in private called
the great Mel, had been at once the sad dog of Lymport, and the pride
of the town. He was a tailor, and he kept horses; he was a tailor, and
he had gallant adventures; he was a tailor, and he shook hands with his
customers. Finally, he was a tradesman, and he never was known to have
sent in a bill. Such a personage comes but once in a generation, and,
when he goes, men miss the man as well as their money.

That he was dead, there could be no doubt. Kilne, the publican
opposite, had seen Sally, one of the domestic servants, come out of the
house in the early morning and rush up the street to the doctor’s,
tossing her hands; and she, not disinclined to dilute her grief, had,
on her return, related that her master was then at his last gasp, and
had refused, in so many words, to swallow the doctor.

“‘I won’t swallow the doctor!’ he says, ‘I won’t swallow the doctor!’”
Sally moaned. “‘I never touched him,’ he says, ‘and I never will.’”

Kilne angrily declared, that in his opinion, a man who rejected
medicine in extremity, ought to have it forced down his throat: and
considering that the invalid was pretty deeply in Kilne’s debt, it
naturally assumed the form of a dishonest act on his part; but Sally
scornfully dared any one to lay hand on her master, even for his own
good. “For,” said she, “he’s got his eyes awake, though he do lie so
helpless. He marks ye!”

“Ah! ah!” Kilne sniffed the air. Sally then rushed back to her duties.

“Now, there’s a man!” Kilne stuck his hands in his pockets and began
his meditation: which, however, was cut short by the approach of his
neighbour Barnes, the butcher, to whom he confided what he had heard,
and who ejaculated professionally, “Obstinate as a pig!” As they stood
together they beheld Sally, a figure of telegraph, at one of the
windows, implying that all was just over.

“Amen!” said Barnes, as to a matter-of-fact affair.

Some minutes after, the two were joined by Grossby, the confectioner,
who listened to the news, and observed:

“Just like him! I’d have sworn he’d never take doctor’s stuff”; and,
nodding at Kilne, “liked his medicine best, eh?”

“Had a-hem!—good lot of it,” muttered Kilne, with a suddenly serious
brow.

“How does he stand on your books?” asked Barnes.

Kilne shouldered round, crying: “Who the deuce is to know?”

“I don’t,” Grossby sighed. “In he comes with his ‘Good morning,
Grossby, fine day for the hunt, Grossby,’ and a ten-pound note. ‘Have
the kindness to put that down in my favour, Grossby.’ And just as I am
going to say, ‘Look here,—this won’t do,’ he has me by the collar, and
there’s one of the regiments going to give a supper party, which he’s
to order; or the Admiral’s wife wants the receipt for that pie; or in
comes my wife, and there’s no talking of business then, though she may
have been bothering about his account all the night beforehand.
Something or other! and so we run on.”

“What I want to know,” said Barnes, the butcher, “is where he got his
tenners from?”

Kilne shook a sagacious head: “No knowing!”

“I suppose we shall get something out of the fire?” Barnes suggested.

“That depends!” answered the emphatic Kilne.

“But, you know, if the widow carries on the business,” said Grossby,
“there’s no reason why we shouldn’t get it all, eh?”

“There ain’t two that can make clothes for nothing, and make a profit
out of it,” said Kilne.

“That young chap in Portugal,” added Barnes, “he won’t take to
tailoring when he comes home. D’ye think he will?”

Kilne muttered: “Can’t say!” and Grossby, a kindly creature in his way,
albeit a creditor, reverting to the first subject of their discourse,
ejaculated, “But what a one he was!—eh?”

“Fine!—to look on,” Kilne assented.

“Well, he was like a Marquis,” said Barnes.

Here the three regarded each other, and laughed, though not loudly.
They instantly checked that unseemliness, and Kilne, as one who rises
from the depths of a calculation with the sum in his head, spoke quite
in a different voice:

“Well, what do you say, gentlemen? shall we adjourn? No use standing
here.”

By the invitation to adjourn, it was well understood by the committee
Kilne addressed, that they were invited to pass his threshold, and
partake of a morning draught. Barnes, the butcher, had no objection
whatever, and if Grossby, a man of milder make, entertained any, the
occasion and common interests to be discussed, advised him to waive
them. In single file these mourners entered the publican’s house, where
Kilne, after summoning them from behind the bar, on the important
question, what it should be? and receiving, first, perfect acquiescence
in his views as to what it should be, and then feeble suggestions of
the drink best befitting that early hour and the speaker’s particular
constitution, poured out a toothful to each, and one to himself.

“Here’s to him, poor fellow!” said Kilne; and was deliberately echoed
twice.

“Now, it wasn’t that,” Kilne pursued, pointing to the bottle in the
midst of a smacking of lips, “that wasn’t what got him into
difficulties. It was expensive luckshries. It was being above his
condition. Horses! What’s a tradesman got to do with horses? Unless
he’s retired! Then he’s a gentleman, and can do as he likes. It’s no
use trying to be a gentleman if you can’t pay for it. It always ends
bad. Why, there was he, consorting with gentlefolks—gay as a lark! Who
has to pay for it?”

Kilne’s fellow-victims maintained a rather doleful tributary silence.

“I’m not saying anything against him now,” the publican further
observed. “It’s too late. And there! I’m sorry he’s gone, for one. He
was as kind a hearted a man as ever breathed. And there! perhaps it was
just as much my fault; I couldn’t say ‘No’ to him,—dash me, if I
could!”

Lymport was a prosperous town, and in prosperity the much-despised
British tradesman is not a harsh, he is really a well-disposed, easy
soul, and requires but management, manner, occasional instalments—just
to freshen the account—and a surety that he who debits is on the spot,
to be a right royal king of credit. Only the account must never drivel.
“Stare aut crescere” appears to be his feeling on that point, and the
departed Mr. Melchisedec undoubtedly understood him there; for the
running on of the account looked deplorable and extraordinary now that
Mr. Melchisedec was no longer in a position to run on with it, and it
was precisely his doing so which had prevented it from being brought to
a summary close long before.

Both Barnes, the butcher, and Grossby, the confectioner, confessed that
they, too, found it hard ever to say “No” to him, and, speaking
broadly, never could.

“Except once,” said Barnes, “when he wanted me to let him have a ox to
roast whole out on the common, for the Battle of Waterloo. I stood out
against him on that. ‘No, no,’ says I, ‘I’ll joint him for ye, Mr.
Harrington. You shall have him in joints, and eat him at home’;—ha!
ha!”

“Just like him!” said Grossby, with true enjoyment of the princely
disposition that had dictated the patriotic order.

“Oh!—there!” Kilne emphasized, pushing out his arm across the bar, as
much as to say, that in anything of such a kind, the great Mel never
had a rival.

“That ‘Marquis’ affair changed him a bit,” said Barnes.

“Perhaps it did, for a time,” said Kilne. “What’s in the grain, you
know. He couldn’t change. He would be a gentleman, and nothing’d stop
him.”

“And I shouldn’t wonder but what that young chap out in Portugal’ll
want to be one, too; though he didn’t bid fair to be so fine a man as
his father.”

“More of a scholar,” remarked Kilne. “That I call his worst
fault—shilly-shallying about that young chap. I mean his.” Kilne
stretched a finger toward the dead man’s house. “First, the young
chap’s to be sent into the Navy; then it’s the Army; then he’s to be a
judge, and sit on criminals; then he goes out to his sister in
Portugal; and now there’s nothing but a tailor open to him, as I see,
if we’re to get our money.”

“Ah! and he hasn’t got too much spirit to work to pay his father’s
debts,” added Barnes. “There’s a business there to make any man’s
fortune—properly _di_rected, _I_ say. But, I suppose, like father like
son, he’ll becoming the Marquis, too. He went to a gentleman’s school,
and he’s had foreign training. I don’t know what to think about it. His
sisters over there—they were fine women.”

“Oh! a fine family, every one of ’em! and married well!” exclaimed the
publican.

“I never had the exact rights of that ‘Marquis’ affair,” said Grossby;
and, remembering that he had previously laughed knowingly when it was
alluded to, pursued: “Of course I heard of it at the time, but how did
he behave when he was blown upon?”

Barnes undertook to explain; but Kilne, who relished the narrative
quite as well, and was readier, said: “Look here! I’ll tell you. I had
it from his own mouth one night when he wasn’t—not quite himself. He
was coming down King William Street, where he stabled his horse, you
know, and I met him. He’d been dining out-somewhere out over
Fallowfield, I think it was; and he sings out to me, ‘Ah! Kilne, my
good fellow!’ and I, wishing to be equal with him, says, ‘A fine night,
my lord!’ and he draws himself up—he smelt of good company—says he,
‘Kilne! I’m not a lord, as you know, and you have no excuse for
mistaking me for one, sir!’ So I pretended I had mistaken him, and then
he tucked his arm under mine, and said, ‘You’re no worse than your
betters, Kilne. They took me for one at Squire Uplift’s to-night, but a
man who wishes to pass off for more than he is, Kilne, and impose upon
people, he says, ‘he’s contemptible, Kilne! contemptible!’ So that, you
know, set me thinking about ‘Bath’ and the ‘Marquis,’ and I couldn’t
help smiling to myself, and just let slip a question whether he had
enlightened them a bit. ‘Kilne,’ said he, ‘you’re an honest man, and a
neighbour, and I’ll tell you what happened. The Squire,’ he says,
‘likes my company, and I like his table. Now the Squire’d never do a
dirty action, but the Squire’s nephew, Mr. George Uplift, he can’t
forget that I earn my money, and once or twice I have had to correct
him.’ And I’ll wager Mel did it, too! Well, he goes on: ‘There was
Admiral Sir Jackson Racial and his lady, at dinner, Squire Falco of
Bursted, Lady Barrington, Admiral Combleman—our admiral, that was; “Mr.
This and That”, I forget their names—and other ladies and gentlemen
whose acquaintance I was not honoured with.’ You know his way of
talking. ‘And there was a goose on the table,’ he says; and, looking
stern at me, ‘Don’t laugh yet!’ says he, like thunder. ‘Well, he goes
on: Mr. George caught my eye across the table, and said, so as not to
be heard by his uncle, “If that bird was rampant, you would see your
own arms, Marquis.”’ And Mel replied, quietly for him to hear, “And as
that bird is couchant, Mr. George, you had better look to your sauce.”
Couchant means squatting, you know. That’s heraldry! Well, that wasn’t
bad sparring of Mel’s. But, bless you! he was never taken aback, and
the gentlefolks was glad enough to get him to sit down amongst ’em. So,
says Mr. George, ‘I know you’re a fire-eater, Marquis,’ and his dander
was up, for he began marquising Mel, and doing the mock polite at such
a rate, that, by-and-by, one of the ladies who didn’t know Mel called
him ‘my lord’ and ‘his lordship.’ ‘And,’ says Mel, ‘I merely bowed to
her, and took no notice.’ So that passed off: and there sits Mel
telling his anecdotes, as grand as a king. And, by-and-by, young Mr.
George, who hadn’t forgiven Mel, and had been pulling at the bottle
pretty well, he sings out, ‘It’s Michaelmas! the death of the goose!
and I should like to drink the Marquis’s health!’ and he drank it
solemn. But, as far as I can make out, the women part of the company
was a little in the dark. So Mel waited till there was a sort of a
pause, and then speaks rather loud to the Admiral, ‘By the way, Sir
Jackson, may I ask you, has the title of Marquis anything to do with
tailoring?’ Now Mel was a great favourite with the Admiral, and with
his lady, too, they say—and the Admiral played into his hands, you see,
and, says he, ‘I’m not aware that it has, Mr. Harrington.’ And he
begged for to know why he asked the question—called him, ‘Mister,’ you
understand. So Mel said, and I can see him now, right out from his
chest he spoke, with his head up—‘When I was a younger man, I had the
good taste to be fond of good society, and the bad taste to wish to
appear different from what I was in it’: that’s Mel speaking; everybody
was listening; so he goes on: ‘I was in the habit of going to Bath in
the season, and consorting with the gentlemen I met there on terms of
equality; and for some reason that I am quite guiltless of,’ says Mel,
‘the hotel people gave out that I was a Marquis in disguise; and, upon
my honour, ladies and gentlemen—I was young then, and a fool—I could
not help imagining I looked the thing. At all events, I took upon
myself to act the part, and with some success, and considerable
gratification; for, in my opinion,’ says Mel, ‘no real Marquis ever
enjoyed his title so much as I did. One day I was in my shop—No. 193,
Main Street, Lymport—and a gentleman came in to order his outfit. I
received his directions, when suddenly he started back, stared at me,
and exclaimed:

“My dear Marquis! I trust you will pardon me for having addressed you
with so much familiarity.” I recognized in him one of my Bath
acquaintances. That circumstance, ladies and gentlemen, has been a
lesson to me. Since that time I have never allowed a false impression
with regard to my position to exist. I desire,’ says Mel, smiling, ‘to
have my exact measure taken everywhere; and if the Michaelmas bird is
to be associated with me, I am sure I have no objection; all I can say
is, that I cannot justify it by letters patent of nobility.’ That’s how
Mel put it. Do you think they thought worse of him? I warrant you he
came out of it in flying colours. Gentlefolks like straight-forwardness
in their inferiors—that’s what they do. Ah!” said Kilne, meditatively,
“I see him now, walking across the street in the moonlight, after he’d
told me that. A fine figure of a man! and there ain’t many Marquises to
match him.”

To this Barnes and Grossby, not insensible to the merits of the recital
they had just given ear to, agreed. And with a common voice of praise
in the mouths of his creditors, the dead man’s requiem was sounded.




CHAPTER II.
THE HERITAGE OF THE SON


Toward evening, a carriage drove up to the door of the muted house, and
the card of Lady Racial, bearing a hurried line in pencil, was handed
to the widow.

It was when you looked upon her that you began to comprehend how great
was the personal splendour of the husband who could eclipse such a
woman. Mrs. Harrington was a tall and a stately dame. Dressed in the
high waists of the matrons of that period, with a light shawl drawn
close over her shoulders and bosom, she carried her head well; and her
pale firm features, with the cast of immediate affliction on them, had
much dignity: dignity of an unrelenting physical order, which need not
express any remarkable pride of spirit. The family gossips who, on both
sides, were vain of this rare couple, and would always descant on their
beauty, even when they had occasion to slander their characters, said,
to distinguish them, that Henrietta Maria had a Port, and Melchisedec a
Presence: and that the union of a Port and a Presence, and such a Port
and such a Presence, was so uncommon, that you might search England
through and you would not find another, not even in the highest ranks
of society. There lies some subtle distinction here; due to the minute
perceptions which compel the gossips of a family to coin phrases that
shall express the nicest shades of a domestic difference. By a Port,
one may understand them to indicate something unsympathetically
impressive; whereas a Presence would seem to be a thing that directs
the most affable appeal to our poor human weaknesses. His Majesty King
George IV., for instance, possessed a Port: Beau Brummel wielded a
Presence. Many, it is true, take a Presence to mean no more than a
shirt-frill, and interpret a Port as the art of walking erect. But this
is to look upon language too narrowly.

On a more intimate acquaintance with the couple, you acknowledge the
aptness of the fine distinction. By birth Mrs. Harrington had claims to
rank as a gentlewoman. That is, her father was a lawyer of Lymport. The
lawyer, however, since we must descend the genealogical tree, was known
to have married his cook, who was the lady’s mother. Now Mr.
Melchisedec was mysterious concerning his origin; and, in his cups,
talked largely and wisely of a great Welsh family, issuing from a line
of princes; and it is certain that he knew enough of their history to
have instructed them on particular points of it. He never could think
that his wife had done him any honour in espousing him; nor was she the
woman to tell him so. She had married him for love, rejecting various
suitors, Squire Uplift among them, in his favour. Subsequently she had
committed the profound connubial error of transferring her affections,
or her thoughts, from him to his business, which, indeed, was much in
want of a mate; and while he squandered the guineas, she patiently
picked up the pence. They had not lived unhappily. He was constantly
courteous to her. But to see the Port at that sordid work considerably
ruffled the Presence—put, as it were, the peculiar division between
them; and to behave toward her as the same woman who had attracted his
youthful ardours was a task for his magnificent mind, and may have
ranked with him as an indemnity for his general conduct, if his
reflections ever stretched so far. The townspeople of Lymport were
correct in saying that his wife, and his wife alone, had, as they
termed it, kept him together. Nevertheless, now that he was dead, and
could no longer be kept together, they entirely forgot their respect
for her, in the outburst of their secret admiration for the popular
man. Such is the constitution of the inhabitants of this dear Island of
Britain, so falsely accused by the Great Napoleon of being a nation of
shopkeepers. Here let any one proclaim himself Above Buttons, and act
on the assumption, his fellows with one accord hoist him on their
heads, and bear him aloft, sweating, and groaning, and cursing, but
proud of him! And if he can contrive, or has any good wife at home to
help him, to die without going to the dogs, they are, one may say,
unanimous in crying out the same eulogistic funeral oration as that
commenced by Kilne, the publican, when he was interrupted by Barnes,
the butcher, “Now, there’s a man!—”

Mrs. Harrington was sitting in her parlour with one of her married
nieces, Mrs. Fiske, and on reading Lady Racial’s card she gave word for
her to be shown up into the drawing-room. It was customary among Mrs.
Harrington’s female relatives, who one and all abused and adored the
great Mel, to attribute his shortcomings pointedly to the ladies; which
was as much as if their jealous generous hearts had said that he was
sinful, but that it was not his fault. Mrs. Fiske caught the card from
her aunt, read the superscription, and exclaimed: “The idea! At least
she might have had the decency! She never set her foot in the house
before—and right enough too! What can she want now? I decidedly would
refuse to see her, aunt!”

The widow’s reply was simply, “Don’t be a fool, Ann!”

Rising, she said: “Here, take poor Jacko, and comfort him till I come
back.”

Jacko was a middle-sized South American monkey, and had been a pet of
her husband’s. He was supposed to be mourning now with the rest of the
family. Mrs. Fiske received him on a shrinking lap, and had found time
to correct one of his indiscretions before she could sigh and say, in
the rear of her aunt’s retreating figure, “I certainly never would let
myself down so”; but Mrs. Harrington took her own counsel, and Jacko
was of her persuasion, for he quickly released himself from Mrs.
Fiske’s dispassionate embrace, and was slinging his body up the
balusters after his mistress.

“Mrs. Harrington,” said Lady Racial, very sweetly swimming to meet her
as she entered the room, “I have intruded upon you, I fear, in
venturing to call upon you at such a time?”

The widow bowed to her, and begged her to be seated.

Lady Racial was an exquisitely silken dame, in whose face a winning
smile was cut, and she was still sufficiently youthful not to be
accused of wearing a flower too artificial.

“It was so sudden! so sad!” she continued. “We esteemed him so much. I
thought you might be in need of sympathy, and hoped I might—Dear Mrs.
Harrington! can you bear to speak of it?”

“I can tell you anything you wish to hear, my lady,” the widow replied.
Lady Racial had expected to meet a woman much more like what she
conceived a tradesman’s wife would be: and the grave reception of her
proffer of sympathy slightly confused her. She said:

“I should not have come, at least not so early, but Sir Jackson, my
husband, thought, and indeed I imagined—You have a son, Mrs.
Harrington? I think his name is—”

“Evan, my lady.”

“Evan. It was of him we have been speaking. I imagined that is, we
thought, Sir Jackson might—you will be writing to him, and will let him
know we will use our best efforts to assist him in obtaining some
position worthy of his—superior to—something that will secure him from
the harassing embarrassments of an uncongenial employment.”

The widow listened to this tender allusion to the shears without a
smile of gratitude. She replied: “I hope my son will return in time to
bury his father, and he will thank you himself, my lady.”

“He has no taste for—a—for anything in the shape of trade, has he, Mrs.
Harrington?”

“I am afraid not, my lady.”

“Any position—a situation—that of a clerk even—would be so much better
for him!”

The widow remained impassive.

“And many young gentlemen I know, who are clerks, and are enabled to
live comfortably, and make a modest appearance in society; and your
son, Mrs. Harrington, he would find it surely an improvement upon—many
would think it a step for him.”

“I am bound to thank you for the interest you take in my son, my lady.”

“Does it not quite suit your views, Mrs. Harrington?” Lady Racial was
surprised at the widow’s manner.

“If my son had only to think of himself, my lady.”

“Oh! but of course,”—the lady understood her now—“of course! You cannot
suppose, Mrs. Harrington, but that I should anticipate he would have
you to live with him, and behave to you in every way as a dutiful son,
surely?

“A clerk’s income is not very large, my lady.”

“No; but enough, as I have said, and with the management you would
bring, Mrs. Harrington, to produce a modest, respectable maintenance.
My respect for your husband, Mrs. Harrington, makes me anxious to press
my services upon you.” Lady Racial could not avoid feeling hurt at the
widow’s want of common gratitude.

“A clerk’s income would not be more than £100 a year, my lady.”

“To begin with—no; certainly not more.” The lady was growing brief.

“If my son puts by the half of that yearly, he can hardly support
himself and his mother, my lady.”

“Half of that yearly, Mrs. Harrington?”

“He would have to do so, and be saddled till he dies, my lady.”

“I really cannot see why.”

Lady Racial had a notion of some excessive niggardly thrift in the
widow, which was arousing symptoms of disgust.

Mrs. Harrington quietly said: “There are his father’s debts to pay, my
lady.”

“His father’s debts!”

“Under £5000, but above £4000, my lady.”

“Five thousand pounds! Mrs. Harrington!” The lady’s delicately gloved
hand gently rose and fell. “And this poor young man”—she pursued.

“My son will have to pay it, my lady.”

For a moment the lady had not a word to instance. Presently she
remarked: “But, Mrs. Harrington, he is surely under no legal
obligation?”

“He is only under the obligation not to cast disrespect on his father’s
memory, my lady; and to be honest, while he can.”

“But, Mrs. Harrington! surely! what can the poor young man do?”

“He will pay it, my lady.”

“But how, Mrs. Harrington?”

“There is his father’s business, my lady.”

His father’s business! Then must the young man become a tradesman in
order to show respect for his father? Preposterous! That was the lady’s
natural inward exclamation. She said, rather shrewdly, for one who knew
nothing of such things: “But a business which produces debts so
enormous, Mrs. Harrington!”

The widow replied: “My son will have to conduct it in a different way.
It would be a very good business, conducted properly, my lady.”

“But if he has no taste for it, Mrs. Harrington? If he is altogether
superior to it?”

For the first time during the interview, the widow’s inflexible
countenance was mildly moved, though not to any mild expression.

“My son will have not to consult his tastes,” she observed: and seeing
the lady, after a short silence, quit her seat, she rose likewise, and
touched the fingers of the hand held forth to her, bowing.

“You will pardon the interest I take in your son,” said Lady Racial. “I
hope, indeed, that his relatives and friends will procure him the means
of satisfying the demands made upon him.”

“He would still have to pay them, my lady,” was the widow’s answer.

“Poor young man! indeed I pity him!” sighed her visitor. “You have
hitherto used no efforts to persuade him to take such a step,—Mrs.
Harrington?”

“I have written to Mr. Goren, who was my husband’s fellow-apprentice in
London, my lady; and he is willing to instruct him in cutting, and
measuring, and keeping accounts.”

Certain words in this speech were obnoxious to the fine ear of Lady
Racial, and she relinquished the subject.

“Your husband, Mrs. Harrington—I should so much have wished!—he did not
pass away in—in pain!”

“He died very calmly, my lady.”

“It is so terrible, so disfiguring, sometimes. One dreads to see!—one
can hardly distinguish! I have known cases where death was dreadful!
But a peaceful death is very beautiful! There is nothing shocking to
the mind. It suggests heaven! It seems a fulfilment of our prayers!”

“Would your ladyship like to look upon him?” said the widow.

Lady Racial betrayed a sudden gleam at having her desire thus
intuitively fathomed.

“For one moment, Mrs. Harrington! We esteemed him so much! May I?”

The widow responded by opening the door, and leading her into the
chamber where the dead man lay.

At that period, when threats of invasion had formerly stirred up the
military fire of us Islanders, the great Mel, as if to show the great
Napoleon what character of being a British shopkeeper really was, had,
by remarkable favour, obtained a lieutenancy of militia dragoons: in
the uniform of which he had revelled, and perhaps, for the only time in
his life, felt that circumstances had suited him with a perfect fit.
However that may be, his solemn final commands to his wife, Henrietta
Maria, on whom he could count for absolute obedience in such matters,
had been, that as soon as the breath had left his body, he should be
taken from his bed, washed, perfumed, powdered, and in that uniform
dressed and laid out; with directions that he should be so buried at
the expiration of three days, that havoc in his features might be
hidden from men. In this array Lady Racial beheld him. The curtains of
the bed were drawn aside. The beams of evening fell soft through the
blinds of the room, and cast a subdued light on the figure of the
vanquished warrior. The Presence, dumb now for evermore, was sadly
illumined for its last exhibition. But one who looked closely might
have seen that Time had somewhat spoiled that perfect fit which had
aforetime been his pride; and now that the lofty spirit had departed,
there had been extreme difficulty in persuading the sullen excess of
clay to conform to the dimensions of those garments. The upper part of
the chest alone would bear its buttons, and across one portion of the
lower limbs an ancient seam had started; recalling an incident to them
who had known him in his brief hour of glory. For one night, as he was
riding home from Fallowfield, and just entering the gates of the town,
a mounted trooper spurred furiously past, and slashing out at him,
gashed his thigh. Mrs. Melchisedec found him lying at his door in a not
unwonted way; carried him up-stairs in her arms, as she had done many a
time before, and did not perceive his condition till she saw the blood
on her gown. The cowardly assailant was never discovered; but Mel was
both gallant and had, in his military career, the reputation of being a
martinet. Hence, divers causes were suspected. The wound failed not to
mend, the trousers were repaired: Peace about the same time was made,
and the affair passed over.

Looking on the fine head and face, Lady Racial saw nothing of this. She
had not looked long before she found covert employment for her
handkerchief. The widow standing beside her did not weep, or reply to
her whispered excuses at emotion; gazing down on his mortal length with
a sort of benignant friendliness; aloof, as one whose duties to that
form of flesh were well-nigh done. At the feet of his master, Jacko,
the monkey, had jumped up, and was there squatted, with his legs
crossed, very like a tailor! The imitative wretch had got a towel, and
as often as Lady Racial’s handkerchief travelled to her eyes, Jacko’s
peery face was hidden, and you saw his lithe skinny body doing grief’s
convulsions till, tired of this amusement, he obtained possession of
the warrior’s helmet, from a small round table on one side of the bed;
a calque of the barbarous military-Georgian form, with a huge knob of
horse-hair projecting over the peak; and under this, trying to adapt it
to his rogue’s head, the tricksy image of Death extinguished himself.

All was very silent in the room. Then the widow quietly disengaged
Jacko, and taking him up, went to the door, and deposited him outside.
During her momentary absence, Lady Racial had time to touch the dead
man’s forehead with her lips, unseen.




CHAPTER III.
THE DAUGHTERS OF THE SHEARS


Three daughters and a son were left to the world by Mr. Melchisedec.
Love, well endowed, had already claimed to provide for the daughters:
first in the shape of a lean Marine subaltern, whose days of
obscuration had now passed, and who had come to be a major of that
corps: secondly, presenting his addresses as a brewer of distinction:
thirdly, and for a climax, as a Portuguese Count: no other than the
Senor Silva Diaz, Conde de Saldar: and this match did seem a far more
resplendent one than that of the two elder sisters with Major Strike
and Mr. Andrew Cogglesby. But the rays of neither fell visibly on
Lymport. These escaped Eurydices never reappeared, after being once
fairly caught away from the gloomy realms of Dis, otherwise Trade. All
three persons of singular beauty, a certain refinement, some Port, and
some Presence, hereditarily combined, they feared the clutch of that
fell king, and performed the widest possible circles around him. Not
one of them ever approached the house of her parents. They were dutiful
and loving children, and wrote frequently; but of course they had to
consider their new position, and their husbands, and their husbands’
families, and the world, and what it would say, if to it the dreaded
rumour should penetrate! Lymport gossips, as numerous as in other
parts, declared that the foreign nobleman would rave in an
extraordinary manner, and do things after the outlandish fashion of his
country: for from him, there was no doubt, the shop had been most
successfully veiled, and he knew not of Pluto’s close relationship to
his lovely spouse.

The marriages had happened in this way. Balls are given in country
towns, where the graces of tradesmen’s daughters may be witnessed and
admired at leisure by other than tradesmen: by occasional country
gentlemen of the neighbourhood, with light minds: and also by small
officers: subalterns wishing to do tender execution upon man’s fair
enemy, and to find a distraction for their legs. The classes of our
social fabric have, here and there, slight connecting links, and
provincial public balls are one of these. They are dangerous, for Cupid
is no respecter of class-prejudice; and if you are the son of a retired
tea-merchant, or of a village doctor, or of a half-pay captain, or of
anything superior, and visit one of them, you are as likely to receive
his shot as any shopboy. Even masquerading lords at such places, have
been known to be slain outright; and although Society allows to its
highest and dearest to save the honour of their families, and heal
their anguish, by indecorous compromise, you, if you are a trifle below
that mark, must not expect it. You must absolutely give yourself for
what you hope to get. Dreadful as it sounds to philosophic ears, you
must marry. This, having danced with Caroline Harrington, the gallant
Lieutenant Strike determined to do. Nor, when he became aware of her
father’s occupation, did he shrink from his resolve. After a month’s
hard courtship, he married her straight out of her father’s house. That
he may have all the credit due to him, it must be admitted that he did
not once compare, or possibly permit himself to reflect on, the
dissimilarity in their respective ranks, and the step he had taken
downward, till they were man and wife: and then not in any great
degree, before Fortune had given him his majority; an advance the good
soldier frankly told his wife he did not owe to her. If we may be
permitted to suppose the colonel of a regiment on friendly terms with
one of his corporals, we have an estimate of the domestic life of Major
and Mrs. Strike. Among the garrison males, his comrades, he passed for
a disgustingly jealous brute.

The ladies, in their pretty language, signalized him as a “finick.”

Now, having achieved so capital a marriage, Caroline, worthy creature,
was anxious that her sisters should not be less happy, and would have
them to visit her, in spite of her husband’s protests.

“There can be no danger,” she said, for she was in fresh quarters, far
from the nest of contagion. The lieutenant himself ungrudgingly
declared that, looking on the ladies, no one for an instant could
suspect; and he saw many young fellows ready to be as great fools as he
had been: another voluntary confession he made to his wife; for the
candour of which she thanked him, and pointed out that it seemed to run
in the family; inasmuch as Mr. Andrew Cogglesby, his rich relative, had
seen and had proposed for Harriet. The lieutenant flatly said he would
never allow it. In fact he had hitherto concealed the non-presentable
portion of his folly very satisfactorily from all save the mess-room,
and Mr. Andrew’s passion was a severe dilemma to him. It need scarcely
be told that his wife, fortified by the fervid brewer, defeated him
utterly. What was more, she induced him to be an accomplice in
deception. For though the lieutenant protested that he washed his hands
of it, and that it was a fraud and a snare, he certainly did not avow
the condition of his wife’s parents to Mr. Andrew, but alluded to them
in passing as “the country people.” He supposed “the country people”
must be asked, he said. The brewer offered to go down to them. But the
lieutenant drew an unpleasant picture of the country people, and his
wife became so grave at the proposal, that Mr. Andrew said he wanted to
marry the lady and not the “country people,” and if she would have him,
there he was. There he was, behaving with a particular and sagacious
kindness to the raw lieutenant since Harriet’s arrival. If the
lieutenant sent her away, Mr. Andrew would infallibly pursue her, and
light on a discovery. Twice cursed by Love, twice the victim of
tailordom, our excellent Marine gave away Harriet Harrington in
marriage to Mr. Andrew Cogglesby.

Thus Joy clapped hands a second time, and Horror deepened its shadows.

From higher ground it was natural that the remaining sister should take
a bolder flight. Of the loves of the fair Louisa Harrington and the
foreign Count, and how she first encountered him in the brewer’s
saloons, and how she, being a humorous person, laughed at his “loaf”
for her, and wore the colours that pleased him, and kindled and soothed
his jealousy, little is known beyond the fact that she espoused the
Count, under the auspices of the affluent brewer, and engaged that her
children should be brought up in the faith of the Catholic Church:
which Lymport gossips called, paying the Devil for her pride.

The three sisters, gloriously rescued by their own charms, had now to
think of their one young brother. How to make him a gentleman! That was
their problem.

Preserve him from tailordom—from all contact with trade—they must;
otherwise they would be perpetually linked to the horrid thing they
hoped to outlive and bury. A cousin of Mr. Melchisedec’s had risen to
be an Admiral and a knight for valiant action in the old war, when men
could rise. Him they besought to take charge of the youth, and make a
distinguished seaman of him. He courteously declined. They then
attacked the married Marine—Navy or Army being quite indifferent to
them as long as they could win for their brother the badge of one
Service, “When he is a gentleman at once!” they said, like those who
see the end of their labours. Strike basely pretended to second them.
It would have been delightful to him, of course, to have the tailor’s
son messing at the same table, and claiming him when he pleased with a
familiar “Ah, brother!” and prating of their relationship everywhere.
Strike had been a fool: in revenge for it he laid out for himself a
masterly career of consequent wisdom. The brewer—uxorious Andrew
Cogglesby—might and would have bought the commission. Strike laughed at
the idea of giving money for what could be got for nothing. He told
them to wait.

In the meantime Evan, a lad of seventeen, spent the hours not devoted
to his positive profession—that of gentleman—in the offices of the
brewery, toying with big books and balances, which he despised with the
combined zeal of the sucking soldier and emancipated tailor.

Two years passed in attendance on the astute brother-in-law, to whom
Fortune now beckoned to come to her and gather his laurels from the
pig-tails. About the same time the Countess sailed over from Lisbon on
a visit to her sister Harriet (in reality, it was whispered in the
Cogglesby saloons, on a diplomatic mission from the Court of Lisbon;
but that could not be made ostensible). The Countess narrowly examined
Evan, whose steady advance in his profession both her sisters praised.

“Yes,” said the Countess, in a languid alien accent. “He has something
of his father’s carriage—something. Something of his delivery—his
readiness.”

It was a remarkable thing that these ladies thought no man on earth
like their father, and always cited him as the example of a perfect
gentleman, and yet they buried him with one mind, and each mounted
guard over his sepulchre, to secure his ghost from an airing.

“He can walk, my dears, certainly, and talk—a little. Tête-à-tête, I do
not say. I should think there he would be—a stick! All you English are.
But what sort of a bow has he got, I ask you? How does he enter a room?
And, then his smile! his laugh! He laughs like a horse—absolutely!
There’s no music in his smile. Oh! you should see a Portuguese nobleman
smile. Oh! Dios! honeyed, my dears! But Evan has it not. None of you
English have. You go so.”

The Countess pressed a thumb and finger to the sides of her mouth, and
set her sisters laughing.

“I assure you, no better! not a bit! I faint in your society. I ask
myself—Where am I? Among what boors have I fallen? But Evan is no worse
than the rest of you; I acknowledge that. If he knew how to dress his
shoulders properly, and to direct his eyes—Oh! the eyes! you should see
how a Portuguese nobleman can use his eyes! Soul! my dears, soul! Can
any of you look the unutterable without being absurd! You look so.”

And the Countess hung her jaw under heavily vacuous orbits, something
as a sheep might yawn.

“But I acknowledge that Evan is no worse than the rest of you,” she
repeated. “If he understood at all the management of his eyes and
mouth! But that’s what he cannot possibly learn in England—not
possibly! As for your poor husband, Harriet! one really has to remember
his excellent qualities to forgive him, poor man! And that stiff
bandbox of a man of yours, Caroline!” addressing the wife of the
Marine, “he looks as if he were all angles and sections, and were taken
to pieces every night and put together in the morning. He may be a good
soldier—good anything you will—but, Dios! to be married to that! He is
not civilized. None of you English are. You have no place in the
drawing-room. You are like so many intrusive oxen—absolutely! One of
your men trod on my toe the other night, and what do you think the
creature did? Jerks back, then the half of him forward—I thought he was
going to break in two—then grins, and grunts, ‘Oh! ’m sure, beg pardon,
’m sure!’ I don’t know whether he didn’t say, MA’AM!”

The Countess lifted her hands, and fell away in laughing horror. When
her humour, or her feelings generally, were a little excited, she spoke
her vernacular as her sisters did, but immediately subsided into the
deliberate delicately-syllabled drawl.

“Now that happened to me once at one of our great Balls,” she pursued.
“I had on one side of me the Duchesse Eugenia de Formosa de
Fontandigua; on the other sat the Countess de Pel, a widow. And we were
talking of the ices that evening. Eugenia, you must know, my dears, was
in love with the Count Belmaraña. I was her sole confidante. The
Countess de Pel—a horrible creature! Oh! she was the Duchess’s
determined enemy—would have stabbed her for Belmaraña, one of the most
beautiful men! Adored by every woman! So we talked ices, Eugenic and
myself, quite comfortably, and that horrible De Pel had no idea in
life! Eugenia had just said, ‘This ice sickens me! I do not taste the
flavour of the vanille.’ I answered, ‘It is here! It must—it cannot but
be here! You love the flavour of the vanille?’ With her exquisite
smile, I see her now saying, ‘Too well! it is necessary to me! I live
on it!’—when up he came. In his eagerness, his foot just effleured my
robe. Oh! I never shall forget! In an instant he was down on one knee
it was so momentary that none saw it but we three, and done with
ineffable grace. ‘Pardon!’ he said, in his sweet Portuguese; ‘Pardon!’
looking up—the handsomest man I ever beheld; and when I think of that
odious wretch the other night, with his ‘Oh! ’m sure, beg pardon, ’m
sure! ’pon my honour!’ I could have kicked him—I could, indeed!”

Here the Countess laughed out, but relapsed into:

“Alas! that Belmaraña should have betrayed that beautiful trusting
creature to De Pel. Such scandal! a duel!—the Duke was wounded. For a
whole year Eugenia did not dare to appear at Court, but had to remain
immured in her country-house, where she heard that Belmaraña had
married De Pel! It was for her money, of course. Rich as Croesus, and
as wicked as the black man below! as dear papa used to say. By the way,
weren’t we talking of Evan? Ah,—yes!”

And so forth. The Countess was immensely admired, and though her
sisters said that she was “foreignized” overmuch, they clung to her
desperately. She seemed so entirely to have eclipsed tailordom, or
“Demogorgon,” as the Countess was pleased to call it. Who could suppose
this grand-mannered lady, with her coroneted anecdotes and delicious
breeding, the daughter of that thing? It was not possible to suppose
it. It seemed to defy the fact itself.

They congratulated her on her complete escape from Demogorgon. The
Countess smiled on them with a lovely sorrow.

“Safe from the whisper, my dears; the ceaseless dread? If you knew what
I have to endure! I sometimes envy you. ’Pon my honour, I sometimes
wish I had married a fishmonger! Silva, indeed, is a most excellent
husband. Polished! such polish as you know not of in England. He has a
way—a wriggle with his shoulders in company—I cannot describe it to
you; so slight! so elegant! and he is all that a woman could desire.
But who could be safe in any part of the earth, my dears, while papa
will go about so, and behave so extraordinarily? I was at dinner at
your English embassy a month ago, and there was Admiral Combleman, then
on the station off Lisbon, Sir Jackson Racial’s friend, who was the
Admiral at Lymport formerly. I knew him at once, and thought, oh! what
shall I do! My heart was like a lump of lead. I would have given worlds
that we might one of us have smothered the other! I had to sit beside
him—it always happens! Thank heaven! he did not identify me. And then
he told an anecdote of Papa. It was the dreadful old ‘Bath’ story. I
thought I should have died. I could not but fancy the Admiral
suspected. Was it not natural? And what do you think I had the audacity
to do? I asked him coolly, whether the Mr. Harrington he mentioned was
not the son of Sir Abraham Harrington, of Torquay,—the gentleman who
lost his yacht in the Lisbon waters last year? I brought it on myself.
“Gentleman, ma’am,—MA’AM!” says the horrid old creature, laughing,
“gentleman! he’s a —— I cannot speak it: I choke!” And then he began
praising Papa. Dios! what I suffered. But, you know, I can keep my
countenance, if I perish. I am a Harrington as much as any of us!”

And the Countess looked superb in the pride with which she said she was
what she would have given her hand not to be. But few feelings are
single on this globe, and junction of sentiments need not imply unity
in our yeasty compositions.

“After it was over—my supplice,” continued the Countess, “I was
questioned by all the ladies—I mean our ladies—not your English. They
wanted to know how I could be so civil to that intolerable man. I
gained a deal of credit, my dears. I laid it all on—Diplomacy.” The
Countess laughed bitterly. “Diplomacy bears the burden of it all. I
pretended that Combleman could be useful to Silva! Oh! what hypocrites
we all are!”

The ladies listening could not gainsay this favourite claim of
universal brotherhood among the select who wear masks instead of faces.

With regard to Evan, the Countess had far outstripped her sisters in
her views. A gentleman she had discovered must have one of two things—a
title or money. He might have all the breeding in the world; he might
be as good as an angel; but without a title or money he was under
eclipse almost total. On a gentleman the sun must shine. Now, Evan had
no title, no money. The clouds were thick above the youth. To gain a
title he would have to scale aged mountains. There was one break in his
firmament through which the radiant luminary might be assisted to cast
its beams on him still young. That divine portal was matrimony. If he
could but make a rich marriage he would blaze transfigured; all would
be well! And why should not Evan marry an heiress, as well as another?

“I know a young creature who would exactly suit him,” said the
Countess. “She is related to the embassy, and is in Lisbon now. A
charming child—just sixteen! Dios! how the men rave about her! and she
isn’t a beauty,—there’s the wonder; and she is a little too gauche—too
English in her habits and ways of thinking; likes to be admired, of
course, but doesn’t know yet how to set about getting it. She rather
scandalizes our ladies, but when you know her!—She will have, they say,
a hundred thousand pounds in her own right! Rose Jocelyn, the daughter
of Sir Franks, and that eccentric Lady Jocelyn. She is with her uncle,
Melville, the celebrated diplomate though, to tell you the truth, we
turn him round our fingers, and spin him as the boys used to do the
cockchafers. I cannot forget our old Fallowfield school-life, you see,
my dears. Well, Rose Jocelyn would just suit Evan. She is just of an
age to receive an impression. And I would take care she did. Instance
me a case where I have failed?

“Or there is the Portuguese widow, the Rostral. She’s thirty,
certainly; but she possesses millions! Estates all over the kingdom,
and the sweetest creature. But, no. Evan would be out of the way there,
certainly. But—our women are very nice: they have the dearest, sweetest
ways: but I would rather Evan did not marry one of them. And then
there’s the religion!”

This was a sore of the Countess’s own, and she dropped a tear in coming
across it.

“No, my dears, it shall be Rose Jocelyn!” she concluded: “I will take
Evan over with me, and see that he has opportunities. It shall be Rose,
and then I can call her mine; for in verity I love the child.”

It is not my part to dispute the Countess’s love for Miss Jocelyn; and
I have only to add that Evan, unaware of the soft training he was to
undergo, and the brilliant chance in store for him, offered no
impediment to the proposition that he should journey to Portugal with
his sister (whose subtlest flattery was to tell him that she should not
be ashamed to own him there); and ultimately, furnished with cash for
the trip by the remonstrating brewer, went.

So these Parcae, daughters of the shears, arranged and settled the
young man’s fate. His task was to learn the management of his mouth,
how to dress his shoulders properly, and to direct his eyes—rare
qualities in man or woman, I assure you; the management of the mouth
being especially admirable, and correspondingly difficult. These
achieved, he was to place his battery in position, and win the heart
and hand of an heiress.

Our comedy opens with his return from Portugal, in company with Miss
Rose, the heiress; the Honourable Melville Jocelyn, the diplomate; and
the Count and Countess de Saldar, refugees out of that explosive little
kingdom.




CHAPTER IV.
ON BOARD THE JOCASTA


From the Tagus to the Thames the Government sloop-of-war, Jocasta, had
made a prosperous voyage, bearing that precious freight, a removed
diplomatist and his family; for whose uses let a sufficient vindication
be found in the exercise he affords our crews in the science of
seamanship. She entered our noble river somewhat early on a fine July
morning. Early as it was, two young people, who had nothing to do with
the trimming or guiding of the vessel, stood on deck, and watched the
double-shore, beginning to embrace them more and more closely as they
sailed onward. One, a young lady, very young in manner, wore a black
felt hat with a floating scarlet feather, and was clad about the
shoulders in a mantle of foreign style and pattern. The other you might
have taken for a wandering Don, were such an object ever known; so
simply he assumed the dusky sombrero and dangling cloak, of which one
fold was flung across his breast and drooped behind him. The line of an
adolescent dark moustache ran along his lip, and only at intervals
could you see that his eyes were blue and of the land he was nearing.
For the youth was meditative, and held his head much down. The young
lady, on the contrary, permitted an open inspection of her countenance,
and seemed, for the moment at least, to be neither caring nor thinking
of what kind of judgement would be passed on her. Her pretty nose was
up, sniffing the still salt breeze with vivacious delight.

“Oh!” she cried, clapping her hands, “there goes a dear old English
gull! How I have wished to see him! I haven’t seen one for two years
and seven months. When I’m at home, I’ll leave my window open all
night, just to hear the rooks, when they wake in the morning. There
goes another!”

She tossed up her nose again, exclaiming:

“I’m sure I smell England nearer and nearer! I smell the fields, and
the cows in them. I’d have given anything to be a dairy-maid for half
an hour! I used to lie and pant in that stifling air among those stupid
people, and wonder why anybody ever left England. Aren’t you glad to
come back?”

This time the fair speaker lent her eyes to the question, and shut her
lips; sweet, cold, chaste lips she had: a mouth that had not yet
dreamed of kisses, and most honest eyes.

The young man felt that they were not to be satisfied by his own, and
after seeking to fill them with a doleful look, which was immediately
succeeded by one of superhuman indifference, he answered:

“Yes! We shall soon have to part!” and commenced tapping with his foot
the cheerful martyr’s march.

Speech that has to be hauled from the depths usually betrays the
effort. Listening an instant to catch the import of this cavernous gasp
upon the brink of sound, the girl said:

“Part? what do you mean?”

Apparently it required a yet vaster effort to pronounce an explanation.
The doleful look, the superhuman indifference, were repeated in due
order: sound, a little more distinct, uttered the words:

“We cannot be as we have been, in England!” and then the cheerful
martyr took a few steps farther.

“Why, you don’t mean to say you’re going to give me up, and not be
friends with me, because we’ve come back to England?” cried the girl in
a rapid breath, eyeing him seriously.

Most conscientiously he did not mean it! but he replied with the
quietest negative.

“No?” she mimicked him. “Why do you say ‘No’ like that? Why are you so
mysterious, Evan? Won’t you promise me to come and stop with us for
weeks? Haven’t you said we would ride, and hunt, and fish together, and
read books, and do all sorts of things?”

He replied with the quietest affirmative.

“Yes? What does ‘Yes!’ mean?” She lifted her chest to shake out the
dead-alive monosyllable, as he had done. “Why are you so singular this
morning, Evan? Have I offended you? You are so touchy!”

The slur on his reputation for sensitiveness induced the young man to
attempt being more explicit.

“I mean,” he said, hesitating; “why, we must part. We shall not see
each other every day. Nothing more than that.” And away went the
cheerful martyr in sublimest mood.

“Oh! and that makes you, sorry?” A shade of archness was in her voice.

The girl waited as if to collect something in her mind, and was now a
patronizing woman.

“Why, you dear sentimental boy! You don’t suppose we could see each
other every day for ever?”

It was perhaps the cruelest question that could have been addressed to
the sentimental boy from her mouth. But he was a cheerful martyr!

“You dear Don Doloroso!” she resumed. “I declare if you are not just
like those young Portugals this morning; and over there you were such a
dear English fellow; and that’s why I liked you so much! Do change! Do,
please, be lively, and yourself again. Or mind; I’ll call you Don
Doloroso, and that shall be your name in England. See
there!—that’s—that’s? what’s the name of that place? Hoy! Mr. Skerne!”
She hailed the boatswain, passing, “Do tell me the name of that place.”

Mr. Skerne righted about to satisfy her minutely, and then coming up to
Evan, he touched his hat, and said:

“I mayn’t have another opportunity—we shall be busy up there—of
thankin’ you again, sir, for what you did for my poor drunken brother
Bill, and you may take my word I won’t forget it, sir, if he does; and
I suppose he’ll be drowning his memory just as he was near drowning
himself.”

Evan muttered something, grimaced civilly, and turned away. The girl’s
observant brows were moved to a faintly critical frown, and nodding
intelligently to the boatswain’s remark, that the young gentleman did
not seem quite himself, now that he was nearing home, she went up to
Evan, and said:

“I’m going to give you a lesson in manners, to be quits with you.
Listen, sir. Why did you turn away so ungraciously from Mr. Skerne,
while he was thanking you for having saved his brother’s life? Now
there’s where you’re too English. Can’t you bear to be thanked?”

“I don’t want to be thanked because I can swim,” said Evan.

“But it is not that. Oh, how you trifle!” she cried. “There’s nothing
vexes me so much as that way you have. Wouldn’t my eyes have sparkled
if anybody had come up to me to thank me for such a thing? I would let
them know how glad I was to have done such a thing! Doesn’t it make
them happier, dear Evan?”

“My dear Miss Jocelyn!”

“What?”

The honest grey eyes fixed on him, narrowed their enlarged lids. She
gazed before her on the deck, saying:

“I’m sure I can’t understand you. I suppose it’s because I’m a girl,
and I never shall till I’m a woman. Heigho!”

A youth who is engaged in the occupation of eating his heart, cannot
shine to advantage, and is as much a burden to himself as he is an
enigma to others. Evan felt this; but he could do nothing and say
nothing; so he retired deeper into the folds of the Don, and remained
picturesque and scarcely pleasant.

They were relieved by a summons to breakfast from below.

She brightened and laughed. “Now, what will you wager me, Evan, that
the Countess doesn’t begin:

‘Sweet child! how does she this morning? blooming?’ when she kisses
me?”

Her capital imitation of his sister’s manner constrained him to join in
her laugh, and he said:

“I’ll back against that, I get three fingers from your uncle, and
‘Morrow, young sir!’”

Down they ran together, laughing; and, sure enough, the identical words
of the respective greetings were employed, which they had to enjoy with
all the discretion they could muster.

Rose went round the table to her little cousin Alec, aged seven, kissed
his reluctant cheek, and sat beside him, announcing a sea appetite and
great capabilities, while Evan silently broke bread. The Count de
Saldar, a diminutive tawny man, just a head and neck above the
tablecloth, sat sipping chocolate and fingering dry toast, which he
would now and then dip in jelly, and suck with placidity, in the
intervals of a curt exchange of French with the wife of the Hon.
Melville, a ringleted English lady, or of Portuguese with the Countess;
who likewise sipped chocolate and fingered dry toast, and was
mournfully melodious. The Hon. Melville, as became a tall islander,
carved beef, and ate of it, like a ruler of men. Beautiful to see was
the compassionate sympathy of the Countess’s face when Rose offered her
plate for a portion of the world-subjugating viand, as who should say:
“Sweet child! thou knowest not yet of sorrows, thou canst ballast thy
stomach with beef!” In any other than an heiress, she would probably
have thought: “This is indeed a disgusting little animal, and most
unfeminine conduct!”

Rose, unconscious of praise or blame, rivalled her uncle in enjoyment
of the fare, and talked of her delight in seeing England again, and
anything that belonged to her native land. Mrs. Melville perceived that
it pained the refugee Countess, and gave her the glance intelligible;
but the Countess never missed glances, or failed to interpret them. She
said:

“Let her. I love to hear the sweet child’s prattle.”

“It was fortunate” (she addressed the diplomatist) “that we touched at
Southampton and procured fresh provision!”

“Very lucky for US!” said he, glaring shrewdly between a mouthful.

The Count heard the word “Southampton,” and wished to know how it was
comprised. A passage of Portuguese ensued, and then the Countess said:

“Silva, you know, desired to relinquish the vessel at Southampton. He
does not comprehend the word ‘expense,’ but” (she shook a dumb Alas!)
“I must think of that for him now!”

“Oh! always avoid expense,” said the Hon. Melville, accustomed to be
paid for by his country.

“At what time shall we arrive, may I ask, do you think?” the Countess
gently inquired.

The watch of a man who had his eye on Time was pulled out, and she was
told it might be two hours before dark. Another reckoning, keenly
balanced, informed the company that the day’s papers could be expected
on board somewhere about three o’clock in the afternoon.

“And then,” said the Hon. Melville, nodding general gratulation, “we
shall know how the world wags.”

How it had been wagging the Countess’s straining eyes under closed
eyelids were eloquent of.

“Too late, I fear me, to wait upon Lord Livelyston to-night?” she
suggested.

“To-night?” The Hon. Melville gazed blank astonishment at the notion.
“Oh! certainly, too late tonight. A-hum! I think, madam, you had better
not be in too great a hurry to see him. Repose a little. Recover your
fatigue.”

“Oh!” exclaimed the Countess, with a beam of utter confidence in him,
“I shall be too happy to place myself in your hands—believe me.”

This was scarcely more to the taste of the diplomatist. He put up his
mouth, and said, blandly:

“I fear—you know, madam, I must warn you beforehand—I, personally, am
but an insignificant unit over here, you know; I, personally, can’t
guarantee much assistance to you—not positive. What I can do—of course,
very happy!” And he fell to again upon the beef.

“Not so very insignificant!” said the Countess, smiling, as at a softly
radiant conception of him.

“Have to bob and bow like the rest of them over here,” he added, proof
against the flattery.

“But that you will not forsake Silva, I am convinced,” said the
Countess; and, paying little heed to his brief “Oh! what I can do,”
continued: “For over here, in England, we are almost friendless. My
relations—such as are left of them—are not in high place.” She turned
to Mrs. Melville, and renewed the confession with a proud humility.
“Truly, I have not a distant cousin in the Cabinet!”

Mrs. Melville met her sad smile, and returned it, as one who understood
its entire import.

“My brother-in-law—my sister, I think, you know—married a—a brewer! He
is rich; but, well! such was her taste! My brother-in-law is indeed in
Parliament, and he—”

“Very little use, seeing he votes with the opposite party,” the
diplomatist interrupted her.

“Ah! but he will not,” said the Countess, serenely. “I can trust with
confidence that, if it is for Silva’s interest, he will assuredly so
dispose of his influence as to suit the desiderations of his family,
and not in any way oppose his opinions to the powers that would
willingly stoop to serve us!”

It was impossible for the Hon. Melville to withhold a slight grimace at
his beef, when he heard this extremely alienized idea of the nature of
a member of the Parliament of Great Britain. He allowed her to enjoy
her delusion, as she pursued:

“No. So much we could offer in repayment. It is little! But this, in
verity, is a case. Silva’s wrongs have only to be known in England, and
I am most assured that the English people will not permit it. In the
days of his prosperity, Silva was a friend to England, and England
should not—should not—forget it now. Had we money! But of that arm our
enemies have deprived us: and, I fear, without it we cannot hope to
have the justice of our cause pleaded in the English papers. Mr.
Redner, you know, the correspondent in Lisbon, is a sworn foe to Silva.
And why but because I would not procure him an invitation to Court! The
man was so horridly vulgar; his gloves were never clean; I had to hold
a bouquet to my nose when I talked to him. That, you say, was my fault!
Truly so. But what woman can be civil to a low-bred, pretentious,
offensive man?”

Mrs. Melville, again appealed to, smiled perfect sympathy, and said, to
account for his character:

“Yes. He is the son of a small shopkeeper of some kind, in Southampton,
I hear.”

“A very good fellow in his way,” said her husband.

“Oh! I can’t bear that class of people,” Rose exclaimed. “I always keep
out of their way. You can always tell them.”

The Countess smiled considerate approbation of her exclusiveness and
discernment. So sweet a smile!

“You were on deck early, my dear?” she asked Evan, rather abruptly.

Master Alec answered for him: “Yes, he was, and so was Rose. They made
an appointment, just as they used to do under the oranges.”

“Children!” the Countess smiled to Mrs. Melville.

“They always whisper when I’m by,” Alec appended.

“Children!” the Countess’s sweetened visage entreated Mrs. Melville to
re-echo; but that lady thought it best for the moment to direct Rose to
look to her packing, now that she had done breakfast.

“And I will take a walk with my brother on deck,” said the Countess.
“Silva is too harassed for converse.”

The parties were thus divided. The silent Count was left to meditate on
his wrongs in the saloon; and the diplomatist, alone with his lady,
thought fit to say to her, shortly: “Perhaps it would be as well to
draw away from these people a little. We’ve done as much as we could
for them, in bringing them over here. They may be trying to compromise
us. That woman’s absurd. She’s ashamed of the brewer, and yet she wants
to sell him—or wants us to buy him. Ha! I think she wants us to send a
couple of frigates, and threaten bombardment of the capital, if they
don’t take her husband back, and receive him with honours.”

“Perhaps it would be as well,” said Mrs. Melville. “Rose’s invitation
to him goes for nothing.”

“Rose? inviting the Count? down to Hampshire?” The diplomatist’s brows
were lifted.

“No, I mean the other,” said the diplomatist’s wife.

“Oh! the young fellow! very good young fellow. Gentlemanly. No harm in
him.”

“Perhaps not,” said the diplomatist’s wife.

“You don’t suppose he expects us to keep him on, or provide for him
over here—eh?”

The diplomatist’s wife informed him that such was not her thought, that
he did not understand, and that it did not matter; and as soon as the
Hon. Melville saw that she was brooding something essentially feminine,
and which had no relationship to the great game of public life,
curiosity was extinguished in him.

On deck the Countess paced with Evan, and was for a time pleasantly
diverted by the admiration she could, without looking, perceive that
her sorrow-subdued graces had aroused in the breast of a susceptible
naval lieutenant. At last she spoke:

“My dear! remember this. Your last word to Mr. Jocelyn will be: ‘I will
do myself the honour to call upon my benefactor early.’ To Rose you
will say: ‘Be assured, Miss Jocelyn “Miss Jocelyn—” I shall not fail in
hastening to pay my respects to your family in Hampshire.’ You will
remember to do it, in the exact form I speak it.”

Evan laughed: “What! call him benefactor to his face? I couldn’t do
it.”

“Ah! my child!”

“Besides, he isn’t a benefactor at all. His private secretary died, and
I stepped in to fill the post, because nobody else was handy.”

“And tell me of her who pushed you forward, Evan?”

“My dear sister, I’m sure I’m not ungrateful.”

“No; but headstrong: opinionated. Now these people will endeavour—Oh! I
have seen it in a thousand little things—they wish to shake us off.
Now, if you will but do as I indicate! Put your faith in an older head,
Evan. It is your only chance of society in England. For your
brother-in-law—I ask you, what sort of people will you meet at the
Cogglesbys? Now and then a nobleman, very much out of his element. In
short, you have fed upon a diet which will make you to distinguish, and
painfully to know the difference! Indeed! Yes, you are looking about
for Rose. It depends upon your behaviour now, whether you are to see
her at all in England. Do you forget? You wished once to inform her of
your origin. Think of her words at the breakfast this morning!”

The Countess imagined she had produced an impression. Evan said: “Yes,
and I should have liked to have told her this morning that I’m myself
nothing more than the son of a—”

“Stop! cried his sister, glancing about in horror. The admiring
lieutenant met her eye. Blandishingly she smiled on him: “Most
beautiful weather for a welcome to dear England?” and passed with
majesty.

“Boy!” she resumed, “are you mad?”

“I hate being such a hypocrite, madam.”

“Then you do not love her, Evan?”

This may have been dubious logic, but it resulted from a clear sequence
of ideas in the lady’s head. Evan did not contest it.

“And assuredly you will lose her, Evan. Think of my troubles! I have to
intrigue for Silva; I look to your future; I smile, Oh heaven! how do I
not smile when things are spoken that pierce my heart! This morning at
the breakfast!”

Evan took her hand, and patted it.

“What is your pity?” she sighed.

“If it had not been for you, my dear sister, I should never have held
my tongue.”

“You are not a Harrington! You are a Dawley!” she exclaimed,
indignantly.

Evan received the accusation of possessing more of his mother’s spirit
than his father’s in silence.

“You would not have held your tongue,” she said, with fervid severity:
“and you would have betrayed yourself! and you would have said you were
that! and you in that costume! Why, goodness gracious! could you bear
to appear so ridiculous?”

The poor young man involuntarily surveyed his person. The pains of an
impostor seized him. The deplorable image of the Don making confession
became present to his mind. It was a clever stroke of this female
intriguer. She saw him redden grievously, and blink his eyes; and not
wishing to probe him so that he would feel intolerable disgust at his
imprisonment in the Don, she continued:

“But you have the sense to see your duties, Evan. You have an excellent
sense, in the main. No one would dream—to see you. You did not, I must
say, you did not make enough of your gallantry. A Portuguese who had
saved a man’s life, Evan, would he have been so boorish? You behaved as
if it was a matter of course that you should go overboard after
anybody, in your clothes, on a dark night. So, then, the Jocelyns took
it. I barely heard one compliment to you. And Rose—what an effect it
should have had on her! But, owing to your manner, I do believe the
girl thinks it nothing but your ordinary business to go overboard after
anybody, in your clothes, on a dark night. ’Pon my honour, I believe
she expects to see you always dripping!” The Countess uttered a burst
of hysterical humour. “So you miss your credit. That inebriated sailor
should really have been gold to you. Be not so young and thoughtless.”

The Countess then proceeded to tell him how foolishly he had let slip
his great opportunity. A Portuguese would have fixed the young lady
long before. By tender moonlight, in captivating language, beneath the
umbrageous orange-groves, a Portuguese would have accurately calculated
the effect of the perfume of the blossom on her sensitive nostrils, and
know the exact moment when to kneel, and declare his passion
sonorously.

“Yes,” said Evan, “one of them did. She told me.”

“She told you? And you—what did you do?”

“Laughed at him with her, to be sure.”

“Laughed at him! She told you, and you helped her to laugh at love!
Have you no perceptions? Why did she tell you?”

“Because she thought him such a fool, I suppose.”

“You never will know a woman,” said the Countess, with contempt.

Much of his worldly sister at a time was more than Evan could bear.
Accustomed to the symptoms of restiveness, she finished her discourse,
enjoyed a quiet parade up and down under the gaze of the lieutenant,
and could find leisure to note whether she at all struck the inferior
seamen, even while her mind was absorbed by the multiform troubles and
anxieties for which she took such innocent indemnification.

The appearance of the Hon. Melville Jocelyn on deck, and without his
wife, recalled her to business. It is a peculiarity of female
diplomatists that they fear none save their own sex. Men they regard as
their natural prey: in women they see rival hunters using their own
weapons. The Countess smiled a slowly-kindling smile up to him, set her
brother adrift, and delicately linked herself to Evan’s benefactor.

“I have been thinking,” she said, “knowing your kind and most
considerate attentions, that we may compromise you in England.”

He at once assured her he hoped not, he thought not at all.

“The idea is due to my brother,” she went on; “for I—women know so
little!—and most guiltlessly should we have done so. My brother perhaps
does not think of us foremost; but his argument I can distinguish. I
can see, that were you openly to plead Silva’s cause, you might bring
yourself into odium, Mr. Jocelyn; and heaven knows I would not that!
May I then ask, that in England we may be simply upon the same footing
of private friendship?”

The diplomatist looked into her uplifted visage, that had all the
sugary sparkles of a crystallized preserved fruit of the Portugal
clime, and observed, confidentially, that, with every willingness in
the world to serve her, he did think it would possibly be better, for a
time, to be upon that footing, apart from political considerations.

“I was very sure my brother would apprehend your views,” said the
Countess. “He, poor boy! his career is closed. He must sink into a
different sphere. He will greatly miss the intercourse with you and
your sweet family.”

Further relieved, the diplomatist delivered a high opinion of the young
gentleman, his abilities, and his conduct, and trusted he should see
him frequently.

By an apparent sacrifice, the lady thus obtained what she wanted.

Near the hour speculated on by the diplomatist, the papers came on
board, and he, unaware how he had been manoeuvred for lack of a wife at
his elbow, was quickly engaged in appeasing the great British hunger
for news; second only to that for beef, it seems, and equally
acceptable salted when it cannot be had fresh.

Leaving the devotee of statecraft with his legs crossed, and his face
wearing the cognizant air of one whose head is above the waters of
events, to enjoy the mighty meal of fresh and salted at discretion, the
Countess dived below.

Meantime the Jocasta, as smoothly as before she was ignorant of how the
world wagged, slipped up the river with the tide; and the sun hung red
behind the forest of masts, burnishing a broad length of the serpentine
haven of the nations of the earth. A young Englishman returning home
can hardly look on this scene without some pride of kinship. Evan stood
at the fore part of the vessel. Rose, in quiet English attire, had
escaped from her aunt to join him, singing in his ears, to spur his
senses: “Isn’t it beautiful? Isn’t it beautiful? Dear old England!”

“What do you find so beautiful?” he asked.

“Oh, you dull fellow! Why the ships, and the houses, and the smoke, to
be sure.”

“The ships? Why, I thought you despised trade, mademoiselle?”

“And so I do. That is, not trade, but tradesmen. Of course, I mean
shopkeepers.”

“It’s they who send the ships to and fro, and make the picture that
pleases you, nevertheless.”

“Do they?” said she, indifferently, and then with a sort of fervour,
“Why do you always grow so cold to me whenever we get on this subject?”

“I cold?” Evan responded. The incessant fears of his diplomatic sister
had succeeded in making him painfully jealous of this subject. He
turned it off. “Why, our feelings are just the same. Do you know what I
was thinking when you came up? I was thinking that I hoped I might
never disgrace the name of an Englishman.”

“Now, that’s noble!” cried the girl. “And I’m sure you never will. Of
an English gentleman, Evan. I like that better.”

“Would you rather be called a true English lady than a true English
woman, Rose?”

“Don’t think I would, my dear,” she answered, pertly; “but ‘gentleman’
always means more than ‘man’ to me.”

“And what’s a gentleman, mademoiselle?”

“Can’t tell you, Don Doloroso. Something you are, sir,” she added,
surveying him.

Evan sucked the bitter and the sweet of her explanation. His sister in
her anxiety to put him on his guard, had not beguiled him to forget his
real state.

His sister, the diplomatist and his lady, the refugee Count, with
ladies’ maids, servants, and luggage, were now on the main-deck, and
Master Alec, who was as good as a newspaper correspondent for private
conversations, put an end to the colloquy of the young people. They
were all assembled in a circle when the vessel came to her moorings.
The diplomatist glutted with news, and thirsting for confirmations; the
Count dumb, courteous, and quick-eyed; the honourable lady complacent
in the consciousness of boxes well packed; the Countess breathing
mellifluous long-drawn adieux that should provoke invitations. Evan and
Rose regarded each other.

The boat to convey them on shore was being lowered, and they were
preparing to move forward. Just then the vessel was boarded by a
stranger.

“Is that one of the creatures of your Customs? I did imagine we were
safe from them,” exclaimed the Countess.

The diplomatist laughingly requested her to save herself anxiety on
that score, while under his wing. But she had drawn attention to the
intruder, who was seen addressing one of the midshipmen. He was a man
in a long brown coat and loose white neckcloth, spectacles on nose,
which he wore considerably below the bridge and peered over, as if
their main use were to sight his eye; a beaver hat, with broadish brim,
on his head. A man of no station, it was evident to the ladies at once,
and they would have taken no further notice of him had he not been seen
stepping toward them in the rear of the young midshipman.

The latter came to Evan, and said: “A fellow of the name of Goren wants
you. Says there’s something the matter at home.”

Evan advanced, and bowed stiffly.

Mr. Goren held out his hand. “You don’t remember me, young man? I cut
out your first suit for you when you were breeched, though! Yes-ah!
Your poor father wouldn’t put his hand to it. Goren!”

Embarrassed, and not quite alive to the chapter of facts this name
should have opened to him, Evan bowed again.

“Goren!” continued the possessor of the name. He had a cracked voice,
that when he spoke a word of two syllables, commenced with a lugubrious
crow, and ended in what one might have taken for a curious question.

“It is a bad business brings me, young man. I’m not the best messenger
for such tidings. It’s a black suit, young man! It’s your father!”

The diplomatist and his lady gradually edged back but Rose remained
beside the Countess, who breathed quick, and seemed to have lost her
self-command.

Thinking he was apprehended, Mr. Goren said: “I’m going down to-night
to take care of the shop. He’s to be buried in his old uniform. You had
better come with me by the night-coach, if you would see the last of
him, young man.”

Breaking an odd pause that had fallen, the Countess cried aloud,
suddenly:

“In his uniform!”

Mr. Goren felt his arm seized and his legs hurrying him some paces into
isolation. “Thanks! thanks!” was murmured in his ear. “Not a word more.
Evan cannot bear it. Oh! you are good to have come, and we are
grateful. My father! my father!”

She had to tighten her hand and wrist against her bosom to keep herself
up. She had to reckon in a glance how much Rose had heard, or divined.
She had to mark whether the Count had understood a syllable. She had to
whisper to Evan to hasten away with the horrible man.

She had to enliven his stunned senses, and calm her own. And with
mournful images of her father in her brain, the female Spartan had to
turn to Rose, and speculate on the girl’s reflective brows, while she
said, as over a distant relative, sadly, but without distraction: “A
death in the family!” and preserved herself from weeping her heart out,
that none might guess the thing who did not positively know it. Evan
touched the hand of Rose without meeting her eyes. He was soon cast off
in Mr. Goren’s boat. Then the Countess murmured final adieux; twilight
under her lids, but yet a smile, stately, affectionate, almost genial.
Rose, her sweet Rose, she must kiss. She could have slapped Rose for
appearing so reserved and cold. She hugged Rose, as to hug oblivion of
the last few minutes into her. The girl leant her cheek, and bore the
embrace, looking on her with a kind of wonder.

Only when alone with the Count, in the brewer’s carriage awaiting her
on shore, did the lady give a natural course to her grief; well knowing
that her Silva would attribute it to the darkness of their common
exile. She wept: but in the excess of her misery, two words of
strangely opposite signification, pronounced by Mr. Goren; two words
that were at once poison and antidote, sang in her brain; two words
that painted her dead father from head to foot, his nature and his
fortune: these were the Shop, and the Uniform.

Oh! what would she not have given to have seen and bestowed on her
beloved father one last kiss! Oh! how she hoped that her inspired echo
of Uniform, on board the Jocasta, had drowned the memory, eclipsed the
meaning, of that fatal utterance of Shop!




CHAPTER V.
THE FAMILY AND THE FUNERAL


It was the evening of the second day since the arrival of the black
letter in London from Lymport, and the wife of the brewer and the wife
of the Major sat dropping tears into one another’s laps, in expectation
of their sister the Countess. Mr. Andrew Cogglesby had not yet returned
from his office. The gallant Major had gone forth to dine with General
Sir George Frebuter, the head of the Marines of his time. It would have
been difficult for the Major, he informed his wife, to send in an
excuse to the General for non-attendance, without entering into
particulars; and that he should tell the General he could not dine with
him, because of the sudden decease of a tailor, was, as he let his wife
understand, and requested her to perceive, quite out of the question.
So he dressed himself carefully, and though peremptory with his wife
concerning his linen, and requiring natural services from her in the
button department, and a casual expression of contentment as to his
ultimate make-up, he left her that day without any final injunctions to
occupy her mind, and she was at liberty to weep if she pleased, a
privilege she did not enjoy undisturbed when he was present; for the
warrior hated that weakness, and did not care to hide his contempt for
it.

Of the three sisters, the wife of the Major was, oddly enough, the one
who was least inveterately solicitous of concealing the fact of her
parentage. Reticence, of course, she had to study with the rest; the
Major was a walking book of reticence and the observances; he
professed, also, in company with herself alone, to have had much
trouble in drilling her to mark and properly preserve them. She had no
desire to speak of her birthplace. But, for some reason or other, she
did not share her hero’s rather petulant anxiety to keep the curtain
nailed down on that part of her life which preceded her entry into the
ranks of the Royal Marines. Some might have thought that those fair
large blue eyes of hers wandered now and then in pleasant unambitious
walks behind the curtain, and toyed with little flowers of palest
memory. Utterly tasteless, totally wanting in discernment, not to say
gratitude, the Major could not presume her to be; and yet his wits
perceived that her answers and the conduct she shaped in accordance
with his repeated protests and long-reaching apprehensions of what he
called danger, betrayed acquiescent obedience more than the connubial
sympathy due to him. Danger on the field the Major knew not of; he did
not scruple to name the word in relation to his wife. For, as he told
her, should he, some day, as in the chapter of accidents might occur,
sally into the street a Knight Companion of the Bath and become known
to men as Sir Maxwell Strike, it would be decidedly disagreeable for
him to be blown upon by a wind from Lymport. Moreover she was the
mother of a son. The Major pointed out to her the duty she owed her
offspring. Certainly the protecting aegis of his rank and title would
be over the lad, but she might depend upon it any indiscretion of hers
would damage him in his future career, the Major assured her. Young
Maxwell must be considered.

For all this, the mother and wife, when the black letter found them in
the morning at breakfast, had burst into a fit of grief, and faltered
that she wept for a father. Mrs. Andrew, to whom the letter was
addressed, had simply held the letter to her in a trembling hand. The
Major compared their behaviour, with marked encomiums of Mrs. Andrew.
Now this lady and her husband were in obverse relative positions. The
brewer had no will but his Harriet’s. His esteem for her combined the
constitutional feelings of an insignificantly-built little man for a
majestic woman, and those of a worthy soul for the wife of his bosom.
Possessing, or possessed by her, the good brewer was perfectly happy.
She, it might be thought, under these circumstances, would not have
minded much his hearing what he might hear. It happened, however, that
she was as jealous of the winds of Lymport as the Major himself; as
vigilant in debarring them from access to the brewery as now the
Countess could have been. We are not dissecting human nature suffice
it, therefore, from a mere glance at the surface, to say, that just as
moneyed men are careful of their coin, women who have all the
advantages in a conjunction, are miserly in keeping them, and shudder
to think that one thing remains hidden, which the world they move in
might put down pityingly in favour of their spouse, even though to the
little man ’twere naught. She assumed that a revelation would diminish
her moral stature; and certainly it would not increase that of her
husband. So no good could come of it. Besides, Andrew knew, his whole
conduct was a tacit admission, that she had condescended in giving him
her hand. The features of their union might not be changed altogether
by a revelation, but it would be a shock to her.

Consequently, Harriet tenderly rebuked Caroline, for her outcry at the
breakfast-table; and Caroline, the elder sister, who had not since
marriage grown in so free an air, excused herself humbly, and the two
were weeping when the Countess joined them and related what she had
just undergone.

Hearing of Caroline’s misdemeanour, however, Louisa’s eyes rolled aloft
in a paroxysm of tribulation. It was nothing to Caroline; it was
comparatively nothing to Harriet; but the Count knew not Louisa had a
father: believed that her parents had long ago been wiped out. And the
Count was by nature inquisitive: and if he once cherished a suspicion
he was restless; he was pointed in his inquiries: he was pertinacious
in following out a clue: there never would be peace with him! And then,
as they were secure in their privacy, Louisa cried aloud for her
father, her beloved father! Harriet wept silently. Caroline alone
expressed regret that she had not set eyes on him from the day she
became a wife.

“How could we, dear?” the Countess pathetically asked, under drowning
lids.

“Papa did not wish it,” sobbed Mrs. Andrew.

“I never shall forgive myself!” said the wife of the Major, drying her
cheeks. Perhaps it was not herself whom she felt she never could
forgive.

Ah! the man their father was! Incomparable Melchisedec! he might well
be called. So generous! so lordly! When the rain of tears would subside
for a moment, one would relate an anecdote or childish reminiscence of
him, and provoke a more violent outburst.

“Never, among the nobles of any land, never have I seen one like him!”
exclaimed the Countess, and immediately requested Harriet to tell her
how it would be possible to stop Andrew’s tongue in Silva’s presence.

“At present, you know, my dear, they may talk as much as they like—they
can’t understand one another one bit.”

Mrs. Cogglesby comforted her by the assurance that Andrew had received
an intimation of her wish for silence everywhere and toward everybody;
and that he might be reckoned upon to respect it, without demanding a
reason for the restriction. In other days Caroline and Louisa had a
little looked down on Harriet’s alliance with a dumpy man—a brewer—and
had always kind Christian compassion for him if his name were
mentioned. They seemed now, by their silence, to have a happier
estimate of Andrew’s qualities.

While the three sisters sat mingling their sorrows and alarms, their
young brother was making his way to the house. As he knocked at the
door he heard his name pronounced behind him, and had no difficulty in
recognizing the worthy brewer.

“What, Van, my boy! how are you? Quite a foreigner! By George, what a
hat!”

Mr. Andrew bounced back two or three steps to regard the dusky
sombrero.

“How do you do, sir?” said Evan.

“Sir to you!” Mr. Andrew briskly replied. “Don’t they teach you to give
your fist in Portugal, eh? I’ll ‘sir’ you. Wait till I’m Sir Andrew,
and then ‘sir’ away. You do speak English still, Van, eh? Quite jolly,
my boy?”

Mr. Andrew rubbed his hands to express that state in himself. Suddenly
he stopped, blinked queerly at Evan, grew pensive, and said, “Bless my
soul! I forgot.”

The door opened, Mr. Andrew took Evan’s arm, murmured a “hush!” and
trod gently along the passage to his library.

“We’re safe here,” he said. “There—there’s something the matter
up-stairs. The women are upset about something. Harriet—” Mr. Andrew
hesitated, and branched off: “You’ve heard we’ve got a new baby?”

Evan congratulated him; but another inquiry was in Mr. Andrew’s aspect,
and Evan’s calm, sad manner answered it.

“Yes,”—Mr. Andrew shook his head dolefully—“a splendid little chap! a
rare little chap! a we can’t help these things, Van! They will happen.
Sit down, my boy.”

Mr. Andrew again interrogated Evan with his eyes.

“My father is dead,” said Evan.

“Yes!” Mr. Andrew nodded, and glanced quickly at the ceiling, as if to
make sure that none listened overhead. “My parliamentary duties will
soon be over for the season,” he added, aloud; pursuing, in an
under-breath:

“Going down to-night, Van?”

“He is to be buried to-morrow,” said Evan.

“Then, of course, you go. Yes: quite right. Love your father and
mother! always love your father and mother! Old Tom and I never knew
ours. Tom’s quite well-same as ever. I’ll,” he rang the bell, “have my
chop in here with you. You must try and eat a bit, Van. Here we are,
and there we go. Old Tom’s wandering for one of his weeks. You’ll see
him some day. He ain’t like me. No dinner to-day, I suppose, Charles?”

This was addressed to the footman. He announced:

“Dinner to-day at half-past six, as usual, sir,” bowed, and retired.

Mr. Andrew pored on the floor, and rubbed his hair back on his head.
“An odd world!” was his remark.

Evan lifted up his face to sigh: “I’m almost sick of it!”

“Damn appearances!” cried Mr. Andrew, jumping on his legs.

The action cooled him.

“I’m sorry I swore,” he said. “Bad habit! The Major’s here—you know
that?” and he assumed the Major’s voice, and strutted in imitation of
the stalwart marine. “Major—a—Strike! of the Royal Marines! returned
from China! covered with glory!—a hero, Van! We can’t expect him to be
much of a mourner. And we shan’t have him to dine with us to-day—that’s
something.” He sank his voice: “I hope the widow’ll bear it.”

“I hope to God my mother is well!” Evan groaned.

“That’ll do,” said Mr. Andrew. “Don’t say any more.”

As he spoke, he clapped Evan kindly on the back.

A message was brought from the ladies, requiring Evan to wait on them.
He returned after some minutes.

“How do you think Harriet’s looking?” asked Mr. Andrew. And, not
waiting for an answer, whispered,

“Are they going down to the funeral, my boy?”

Evan’s brow was dark, as he replied: “They are not decided.”

“Won’t Harriet go?”

“She is not going—she thinks not.”

“And the Countess—Louisa’s upstairs, eh?—will she go?”

“She cannot leave the Count—she thinks not.”

“Won’t Caroline go? Caroline can go. She—he—I mean—Caroline can go?”

“The Major objects. She wishes to.”

Mr. Andrew struck out his arm, and uttered, “the Major!”—a compromise
for a loud anathema. But the compromise was vain, for he sinned again
in an explosion against appearances.

“I’m a brewer, Van. Do you think I’m ashamed of it? Not while I brew
good beer, my boy!—not while I brew good beer! They don’t think worse
of me in the House for it. It isn’t ungentlemanly to brew good beer,
Van. But what’s the use of talking?”

Mr. Andrew sat down, and murmured, “Poor girl! poor girl!”

The allusion was to his wife; for presently he said: “I can’t see why
Harriet can’t go. What’s to prevent her?”

Evan gazed at him steadily. Death’s levelling influence was in Evan’s
mind. He was ready to say why, and fully.

Mr. Andrew arrested him with a sharp “Never mind! Harriet does as she
likes. I’m accustomed to—hem! what she does is best, after all. She
doesn’t interfere with my business, nor I with hers. Man and wife.”

Pausing a moment or so, Mr. Andrew intimated that they had better be
dressing for dinner. With his hand on the door, which he kept closed,
he said, in a businesslike way, “You know, Van, as for me, I should be
very willing—only too happy—to go down and pay all the respect I
could.” He became confused, and shot his head from side to side,
looking anywhere but at Evan. “Happy now and to-morrow, to do anything
in my power, if Harriet—follow the funeral—one of the family—anything I
could do: but—a—we’d better be dressing for dinner.” And out the
enigmatic little man went.

Evan partly divined him then. But at dinner his behaviour was
perplexing. He was too cheerful. He pledged the Count. He would have
the Portuguese for this and that, and make Anglican efforts to repeat
it, and laugh at his failures. He would not see that there was a father
dead. At a table of actors, Mr. Andrew overdid his part, and was the
worst. His wife could not help thinking him a heartless little man.

The poor show had its term. The ladies fled to the boudoir sacred to
grief. Evan was whispered that he was to join them when he might,
without seeming mysterious to the Count. Before he reached them, they
had talked tearfully over the clothes he should wear at Lymport,
agreeing that his present foreign apparel, being black, would be
suitable, and would serve almost as disguise, to the inhabitants at
large; and as Evan had no English wear, and there was no time to
procure any for him, that was well. They arranged exactly how long he
should stay at Lymport, whom he should visit, the manner he should
adopt toward the different inhabitants. By all means he was to avoid
the approach of the gentry. For hours Evan, in a trance, half
stupefied, had to listen to the Countess’s directions how he was to
comport himself in Lymport.

“Show that you have descended among them, dear Van, but are not of
them. Our beautiful noble English poet expresses it so. You have come
to pay the last mortal duties, which they will respect, if they are not
brutes, and attempt no familiarities. Allow none: gently, but firmly.
Imitate Silva. You remember, at Dona Risbonda’s ball? When he met the
Comte de Dartigues, and knew he was to be in disgrace with his Court on
the morrow? Oh! the exquisite shade of difference in Silva’s behaviour
towards the Comte. So finely, delicately perceptible to the Comte, and
not a soul saw it but that wretched Frenchman! He came to me: ‘Madame,’
he said, ‘is a question permitted?’ I replied, ‘As many as you please,
M. le Comte, but no answers promised.’ He said: ‘May I ask if the
Courier has yet come in?’—‘Nay, M. le Comte,’ I replied, ‘this is
diplomacy. Inquire of me, or better, give me an opinion on the new
glacé silk from Paris.’—‘Madame,’ said he, bowing, ‘I hope Paris may
send me aught so good, or that I shall grace half so well.’ I smiled,
‘You shall not be single in your hopes, M. le Comte. The gift would be
base that you did not embellish.’ He lifted his hands, French-fashion:
‘Madame, it is that I have received the gift.’—‘Indeed! M. le
Comte.’—‘Even now from the Count de Saldar, your husband.’ I looked
most innocently, ‘From my husband, M. le Comte?’—‘From him, Madame. A
portrait. An Ambassador without his coat! The portrait was a finished
performance.’ I said: ‘And may one beg the permission to inspect
it?’—‘Mais,’ said he, laughing: ‘were it you alone, it would be a
privilege to me.’ I had to check him. ‘Believe me, M. le Comte, that
when I look upon it, my praise of the artist will be extinguished by my
pity for the subject.’ He should have stopped there; but you cannot
have the last word with a Frenchman—not even a woman. Fortunately the
Queen just then made her entry into the saloon, and his mot on the
charity of our sex was lost. We bowed mutually, and were separated.”
(The Countess employed her handkerchief.) “Yes, dear Van! that is how
you should behave. Imply things. With dearest Mama, of course, you are
the dutiful son. Alas! you must stand for son and daughters. Mama has
so much sense! She will understand how sadly we are placed. But in a
week I will come to her for a day, and bring you back.”

So much his sister Louisa. His sister Harriet offered him her house for
a home in London, thence to project his new career. His sister Caroline
sought a word with him in private, but only to weep bitterly in his
arms, and utter a faint moan of regret at marriages in general. He
loved this beautiful creature the best of his three sisters (partly, it
may be, because he despised her superior officer), and tried with a few
smothered words to induce her to accompany him: but she only shook her
fair locks and moaned afresh. Mr. Andrew, in the farewell squeeze of
the hand at the street-door, asked him if he wanted anything. He
negatived the requirement of anything whatever, with an air of careless
decision, though he was aware that his purse barely contained more than
would take him the distance, but the instincts of this amateur
gentleman were very fine and sensitive on questions of money. His
family had never known him beg for a shilling, or admit his necessity
for a penny: nor could he be made to accept money unless it was thrust
into his pocket. Somehow his sisters had forgotten this peculiarity of
his. Harriet only remembered it when too late.

“But I dare say Andrew has supplied him,” she said.

Andrew being interrogated, informed her what had passed between them.

“And you think a Harrington would confess he wanted money!” was her
scornful exclamation. “Evan would walk—he would die rather. It was
treating him like a mendicant.”

Andrew had to shrink in his brewer’s skin.

By some fatality all who were doomed to sit and listen to the Countess
de Saldar, were sure to be behindhand in an appointment.

When the young man arrived at the coach-office, he was politely
informed that the vehicle, in which a seat had been secured for him,
was in close alliance with time and tide, and being under the same
rigid laws, could not possibly have waited for him, albeit it had
stretched a point to the extent of a pair of minutes, at the urgent
solicitation of a passenger.

“A gentleman who speaks so, sir,” said a volunteer mimic of the office,
crowing and questioning from his throat in Goren’s manner. “Yok! yok!
That was how he spoke, sir.”

Evan reddened, for it brought the scene on board the Jocasta vividly to
his mind. The heavier business obliterated it. He took counsel with the
clerks of the office, and eventually the volunteer mimic conducted him
to certain livery stables, where Evan, like one accustomed to command,
ordered a chariot to pursue the coach, received a touch of the hat for
a lordly fee, and was soon rolling out of London.




CHAPTER VI.
MY GENTLEMAN ON THE ROAD


The postillion had every reason to believe that he carried a real
gentleman behind him; in other words, a purse long and liberal. He
judged by all the points he knew of: a firm voice, a brief commanding
style, an apparent indifference to expense, and the inexplicable minor
characteristics, such as polished boots, and a striking wristband, and
so forth, which will show a creature accustomed to step over the heads
of men. He had, therefore, no particular anxiety to part company, and
jogged easily on the white highway, beneath a moon that walked high and
small over marble clouds.

Evan reclined in the chariot, revolving his sensations. In another mood
he would have called, them thoughts, perhaps, and marvelled at their
immensity. The theme was Love and Death. One might have supposed, from
his occasional mutterings at the pace regulated by the postillion, that
he was burning with anxiety to catch the flying coach. He had forgotten
it: forgotten that he was giving chase to anything. A pair of wondering
feminine eyes pursued him, and made him fret for the miles to throw a
thicker veil between him and them. The serious level brows of Rose
haunted the poor youth; and reflecting whither he was tending, and to
what sight, he had shadowy touches of the holiness there is in death,
from which came a conflict between the imaged phantoms of his father
and of Rose, and he sided against his love with some bitterness. His
sisters, weeping for their father and holding aloof from his ashes,
Evan swept from his mind. He called up the man his father was: the
kindliness, the readiness, the gallant gaiety of the great Mel. Youths
are fascinated by the barbarian virtues; and to Evan, under present
influences, his father was a pattern of manhood. He asked himself: Was
it infamous to earn one’s bread? and answered it very strongly in his
father’s favour. The great Mel’s creditors were not by to show him
another feature of the case.

Hitherto, in passive obedience to the indoctrination of the Countess,
Evan had looked on tailors as the proscribed race of modern society. He
had pitied his father as a man superior to his fate; but despite the
fitfully honest promptings with Rose (tempting to him because of the
wondrous chivalry they argued, and at bottom false probably as the
hypocrisy they affected to combat), he had been by no means sorry that
the world saw not the spot on himself. Other sensations beset him now.
Since such a man was banned by the world, which was to be despised?

The clear result of Evan’s solitary musing was to cast a sort of halo
over Tailordom. Death stood over the pale dead man, his father, and
dared the world to sneer at him. By a singular caprice of fancy, Evan
had no sooner grasped this image, than it was suggested that he might
as well inspect his purse, and see how much money he was master of.

Are you impatient with this young man? He has little character for the
moment. Most youths are like Pope’s women; they have no character at
all. And indeed a character that does not wait for circumstances to
shape it, is of small worth in the race that must be run. To be set too
early, is to take the work out of the hands of the Sculptor who
fashions men. Happily a youth is always at school, and if he was shut
up and without mark two or three hours ago, he will have something to
show you now: as I have seen blooming seaflowers and other graduated
organisms, when left undisturbed to their own action. Where the Fates
have designed that he shall present his figure in a story, this is sure
to happen.

To the postillion Evan was indebted for one of his first lessons.

About an hour after midnight pastoral stillness and the moon begat in
the postillion desire for a pipe. Daylight prohibits the dream of it to
mounted postillions. At night the question is more human, and allows
appeal. The moon smiles assentingly, and smokers know that she really
lends herself to the enjoyment of tobacco.

The postillion could remember gentlemen who did not object: who had
even given him cigars. Turning round to see if haply the present inmate
of the chariot might be smoking, he observed a head extended from the
window.

“How far are we?” was inquired.

The postillion numbered the milestones passed.

“Do you see anything of the coach?”

“Can’t say as I do, sir.”

He was commanded to stop. Evan jumped out.

“I don’t think I’ll take you any farther,” he said.

The postillion laughed to scorn the notion of his caring how far he
went. With a pipe in his mouth, he insinuatingly remarked, he could jog
on all night, and throw sleep to the dogs. Fresh horses at Hillford;
fresh at Fallowfield: and the gentleman himself would reach Lymport
fresh in the morning.

“No, no; I won’t take you any farther,” Evan repeated.

“But what do it matter, sir?” urged the postillion.

“I’d rather go on as I am. I—a—made no arrangement to take you the
whole way.”

“Oh!” cried the postillion, “don’t you go troublin’ yourself about
that, sir. Master knows it’s touch-and-go about catchin’ the coach. I’m
all right.”

So infatuated was the fellow in the belief that he was dealing with a
perfect gentleman—an easy pocket!

Now you would not suppose that one who presumes he has sufficient,
would find a difficulty in asking how much he has to pay. With an
effort, indifferently masked, Evan blurted:

“By the way, tell me—how much—what is the charge for the distance we’ve
come?”

There are gentlemen-screws: there are conscientious gentlemen. They
calculate, and remonstrating or not, they pay. The postillion would
rather have had to do with the gentleman royal, who is above base
computation; but he knew the humanity in the class he served, and with
his conception of Evan only partially dimmed, he remarked:

“Oh-h-h! that won’t hurt you, sir. Jump along in,—settle that
by-and-by.”

But when my gentleman stood fast, and renewed the demand to know the
exact charge for the distance already traversed, the postillion
dismounted, glanced him over, and speculated with his fingers tipping
up his hat. Meantime Evan drew out his purse, a long one, certainly,
but limp. Out of this drowned-looking wretch the last spark of life was
taken by the sum the postillion ventured to name; and if paying your
utmost farthing without examination of the charge, and cheerfully
stepping out to walk fifty miles, penniless, constituted a postillion’s
gentleman, Evan would have passed the test. The sight of poverty,
however, provokes familiar feelings in poor men, if you have not had
occasion to show them you possess particular qualities. The
postillion’s eye was more on the purse than on the sum it surrendered.

“There,” said Evan, “I shall walk. Good night.” And he flung his cloak
to step forward.

“Stop a bit, sir!” arrested him.

The postillion rallied up sideways, with an assumption of genial
respect. “I didn’t calc’late myself in that there amount.”

Were these words, think you, of a character to strike a young man hard
on the breast, send the blood to his head, and set up in his heart a
derisive chorus? My gentleman could pay his money, and keep his footing
gallantly; but to be asked for a penny beyond what he possessed; to be
seen beggared, and to be claimed a debtor-aleck! Pride was the one
developed faculty of Evan’s nature. The Fates who mould us, always work
from the main-spring. I will not say that the postillion stripped off
the mask for him, at that instant completely; but he gave him the first
true glimpse of his condition. From the vague sense of being an
impostor, Evan awoke to the clear fact that he was likewise a fool.

It was impossible for him to deny the man’s claim, and he would not
have done it, if he could. Acceding tacitly, he squeezed the ends of
his purse in his pocket, and with a “Let me see,” tried his waistcoat.
Not too impetuously; for he was careful of betraying the horrid
emptiness till he was certain that the powers who wait on gentlemen had
utterly forsaken him. They had not. He discovered a small coin, under
ordinary circumstances not contemptible; but he did not stay to
reflect, and was guilty of the error of offering it to the postillion.

The latter peered at it in the centre of his palm; gazed queerly in the
gentleman’s face, and then lifting the spit of silver for the disdain
of his mistress, the moon, he drew a long breath of regret at the
original mistake he had committed, and said:

“That’s what you’re goin’ to give me for my night’s work?”

The powers who wait on gentlemen had only helped the pretending youth
to try him. A rejection of the demand would have been infinitely wiser
and better than this paltry compromise. The postillion would have
fought it: he would not have despised his fare.

How much it cost the poor pretender to reply, “It’s the last farthing I
have, my man,” the postillion could not know.

“A scabby sixpence?” The postillion continued his question.

“You heard what I said,” Evan remarked.

The postillion drew another deep breath, and holding out the coin at
arm’s length:

“Well, sir!” he observed, as one whom mental conflict has brought to
the philosophy of the case, “now, was we to change places, I couldn’t
a’ done it! I couldn’t a’ done it!” he reiterated, pausing
emphatically.

“Take it, sir!” he magnanimously resumed; “take it! You rides when you
can, and you walks when you must. Lord forbid I should rob such a
gentleman as you!”

One who feels a death, is for the hour lifted above the satire of
postillions. A good genius prompted Evan to avoid the silly squabble
that might have ensued and made him ridiculous. He took the money,
quietly saying, “Thank you.”

Not to lose his vantage, the postillion, though a little staggered by
the move, rejoined: “Don’t mention it.”

Evan then said: “Good night, my man. I won’t wish, for your sake, that
we changed places. You would have to walk fifty miles to be in time for
your father’s funeral. Good night.”

“You are it to look at!” was the postillion’s comment, seeing my
gentleman depart with great strides. He did not speak offensively;
rather, it seemed, to appease his conscience for the original mistake
he had committed, for subsequently came, “My oath on it, I don’t get
took in again by a squash hat in a hurry!”

Unaware of the ban he had, by a sixpenny stamp, put upon an unoffending
class, Evan went ahead, hearing the wheels of the chariot still
dragging the road in his rear. The postillion was in a dissatisfied
state of mind. He had asked and received more than his due. But in the
matter of his sweet self, he had been choused, as he termed it. And my
gentleman had baffled him, he could not quite tell how; but he had been
got the better of; his sarcasms had not stuck, and returned to rankle
in the bosom of their author. As a Jew, therefore, may eye an erewhile
bondsman who has paid the bill, but stands out against excess of
interest on legal grounds, the postillion regarded Evan, of whom he was
now abreast, eager for a controversy.

“Fine night,” said the postillion, to begin, and was answered by a
short assent. “Lateish for a poor man to be out—don’t you think sir,
eh?”

“I ought to think so,” said Evan, mastering the shrewd unpleasantness
he felt in the colloquy forced on him.

“Oh, you! you’re a gentleman!” the postillion ejaculated.

“You see I have no money.”

“Feel it, too, sir.”

“I am sorry you should be the victim.”

“Victim!” the postillion seized on an objectionable word. “I ain’t no
victim, unless you was up to a joke with me, sir, just now. Was that
the game?”

Evan informed him that he never played jokes with money, or on men.

“Cause it looks like it, sir, to go to offer a poor chap sixpence.” The
postillion laughed hollow from the end of his lungs. “Sixpence for a
night’s work! It is a joke, if you don’t mean it for one. Why, do you
know, sir, I could go—there, I don’t care where it is!—I could go
before any magistrate livin’, and he’d make ye pay. It’s a charge, as
custom is, and he’d make ye pay. Or p’rhaps you’re a goin’ on my
generosity, and’ll say, he gev back that sixpence! Well! I shouldn’t a’
thought a gentleman’d make that his defence before a magistrate. But
there, my man! if it makes ye happy, keep it. But you take my advice,
sir. When you hires a chariot, see you’ve got the shiners. And don’t
you go never again offerin’ a sixpence to a poor man for a night’s
work. They don’t like it. It hurts their feelin’s. Don’t you forget
that, sir. Lay that up in your mind.”

Now the postillion having thus relieved himself, jeeringly asked
permission to smoke a pipe. To which Evan said, “Pray, smoke, if it
pleases you.” And the postillion, hardly mollified, added, “The baccy’s
paid for,” and smoked.

As will sometimes happen, the feelings of the man who had spoken out
and behaved doubtfully, grew gentle and Christian, whereas those of the
man whose bearing under the trial had been irreproachable were much the
reverse. The postillion smoked—he was a lord on his horse; he beheld my
gentleman trudging in the dust. Awhile he enjoyed the contrast,
dividing his attention between the footfarer and moon. To have had the
last word is always a great thing; and to have given my gentleman a
lecture, because he shunned a dispute, also counts. And then there was
the poor young fellow trudging to his father’s funeral! The postillion
chose to remember that now. In reality, he allowed, he had not very
much to complain of, and my gentleman’s courteous avoidance of
provocation (the apparent fact that he, the postillion, had humbled him
and got the better of him, equally, it may be), acted on his fine
English spirit. I should not like to leave out the tobacco in this good
change that was wrought in him. However, he presently astonished Evan
by pulling up his horses, and crying that he was on his way to Hillford
to bait, and saw no reason why he should not take a lift that part of
the road, at all events. Evan thanked him briefly, but declined, and
paced on with his head bent.

“It won’t cost you nothing—not a sixpence!” the postillion sang out,
pursuing him. “Come, sir! be a man! I ain’t a hintin’ at anything—jump
in.”

Evan again declined, and looked out for a side path to escape the
fellow, whose bounty was worse to him than his abuse, and whose mention
of the sixpence was unlucky.

“Dash it!” cried the postillion, “you’re going down to a funeral—I
think you said your father’s, sir—you may as well try and get there
respectable—as far as I go. It’s one to me whether you’re in or out;
the horses won’t feel it, and I do wish you’d take a lift and welcome.
It’s because you’re too much of a gentleman to be beholden to a poor
man, I suppose!”

Evan’s young pride may have had a little of that base mixture in it,
and certainly he would have preferred that the invitation had not been
made to him; but he was capable of appreciating what the rejection of a
piece of friendliness involved, and as he saw that the man was sincere,
he did violence to himself, and said: “Very well; then I’ll jump in.”

The postillion was off his horse in a twinkling, and trotted his bandy
legs to undo the door, as to a gentleman who paid. This act of service
Evan valued.

“Suppose I were to ask you to take the sixpence now?” he said, turning
round, with one foot on the step.

“Well, sir,” the postillion sent his hat aside to answer. “I don’t want
it—I’d rather not have it; but there! I’ll take it—dash the sixpence!
and we’ll cry quits.”

Evan, surprised and pleased with him, dropped the bit of money in his
hand, saying: “It will fill a pipe for you. While you’re smoking it,
think of me as in your debt. You’re the only man I ever owed a penny
to.”

The postillion put it in a side pocket apart, and observed: “A sixpence
kindly meant is worth any crown-piece that’s grudged—that it is! In you
jump, sir. It’s a jolly night!”

Thus may one, not a conscious sage, play the right tune on this human
nature of ours: by forbearance, put it in the wrong; and then, by not
refusing the burden of an obligation, confer something better. The
instrument is simpler than we are taught to fancy. But it was doubtless
owing to a strong emotion in his soul, as well as to the stuff he was
made of, that the youth behaved as he did. We are now and then above
our own actions; seldom on a level with them. Evan, I dare say, was
long in learning to draw any gratification from the fact that he had
achieved without money the unparalleled conquest of a man. Perhaps he
never knew what immediate influence on his fortune this episode
effected.

At Hillford they went their different ways. The postillion wished him
good speed, and Evan shook his hand. He did so rather abruptly, for the
postillion was fumbling at his pocket, and evidently rounding about a
proposal in his mind.

My gentleman has now the road to himself. Money is the clothing of a
gentleman: he may wear it well or ill. Some, you will mark, carry great
quantities of it gracefully: some, with a stinted supply, present a
decent appearance: very few, I imagine, will bear inspection, who are
absolutely stripped of it. All, save the shameless, are toiling to
escape that trial. My gentleman, treading the white highway across the
solitary heaths, that swell far and wide to the moon, is, by the
postillion, who has seen him, pronounced no sham. Nor do I think the
opinion of any man worthless, who has had the postillion’s authority
for speaking. But it is, I am told, a finer test to embellish much
gentleman-apparel, than to walk with dignity totally unadorned. This
simply tries the soundness of our faculties: that tempts them in
erratic directions. It is the difference between active and passive
excellence. As there is hardly any situation, however, so interesting
to reflect upon as that of a man without a penny in his pocket, and a
gizzard full of pride, we will leave Mr. Evan Harrington to what fresh
adventures may befall him, walking toward the funeral plumes of the
firs, under the soft midsummer flush, westward, where his father lies.




CHAPTER VII.
MOTHER AND SON


Rare as epic song is the man who is thorough in what he does. And
happily so; for in life he subjugates us, and he makes us bondsmen to
his ashes. It was in the order of things that the great Mel should be
borne to his final resting-place by a troop of creditors. You have seen
(since the occasion demands a pompous simile) clouds that all day cling
about the sun, and, in seeking to obscure him, are compelled to blaze
in his livery at fall of night they break from him illumined, hang
mournfully above him, and wear his natural glories long after he is
gone. Thus, then, these worthy fellows, faithful to him to the dust,
fulfilled Mel’s triumphant passage amongst them, and closed his career.

To regale them when they returned, Mrs. Mel, whose mind was not intent
on greatness, was occupied in spreading meat and wine. Mrs. Fiske
assisted her, as well as she could, seeing that one hand was entirely
engaged by her handkerchief. She had already stumbled, and dropped a
glass, which had brought on her sharp condemnation from her aunt, who
bade her sit down, or go upstairs to have her cry out, and then return
to be serviceable.

“Oh! I can’t help it!” sobbed Mrs. Fiske. “That he should be carried
away, and none of his children to see him the last time! I can
understand Louisa—and Harriet, too, perhaps? But why could not
Caroline? And that they should be too fine ladies to let their brother
come and bury his father. Oh! it does seem——”

Mrs. Fiske fell into a chair, and surrendered to grief.

“Where is the cold tongue?” said Mrs. Mel to Sally, the maid, in a
brief under-voice.

“Please mum, Jacko——!”

“He must be whipped. You are a careless slut.”

“Please, I can’t think of everybody and everything, and poor master——”

Sally plumped on a seat, and took sanctuary under her apron. Mrs. Mel
glanced at the pair, continuing her labour.

“Oh, aunt, aunt!” cried Mrs. Fiske, “why didn’t you put it off for
another day, to give Evan a chance?”

“Master’d have kept another two days, he would!” whimpered Sally.

“Oh, aunt! to think!” cried Mrs. Fiske.

“And his coffin not bearin’ of his spurs!” whimpered Sally.

Mrs. Mel interrupted them by commanding Sally to go to the
drawing-room, and ask a lady there, of the name of Mrs. Wishaw, whether
she would like to have some lunch sent up to her. Mrs. Fiske was
requested to put towels in Evan’s bedroom.

“Yes, aunt, if you’re not infatuated!” said Mrs. Fiske, as she prepared
to obey; while Sally, seeing that her public exhibition of sorrow and
sympathy could be indulged but an instant longer, unwound herself for a
violent paroxysm, blurting between stops:

“If he’d ony’ve gone to his last bed comfortable!... If he’d ony’ve
been that decent as not for to go to his last bed with his clothes on!
... If he’d ony’ve had a comfortable sheet!... It makes a woman feel
cold to think of him full dressed there, as if he was goin’ to be a
soldier on the Day o’ Judgement!”

To let people speak was a maxim of Mrs. Mel’s, and a wise one for any
form of society when emotions are very much on the surface. She
continued her arrangements quietly, and, having counted the number of
plates and glasses, and told off the guests on her fingers, she, sat
down to await them.

The first one who entered the room was her son.

“You have come,” said Mrs. Mel, flushing slightly, but otherwise
outwardly calm.

“You didn’t suppose I should stay away from you, mother?”

Evan kissed her cheek.

“I knew you would not.”

Mrs. Mel examined him with those eyes of hers that compassed objects in
a single glance. She drew her finger on each side of her upper lip, and
half smiled, saying:

“That won’t do here.”

“What?” asked Evan, and proceeded immediately to make inquiries about
her health, which she satisfied with a nod.

“You saw him lowered, Van?”

“Yes, mother.”

“Then go and wash yourself, for you are dirty, and then come and take
your place at the head of the table.”

“Must I sit here, mother?”

“Without a doubt—you must. You know your room. Quick!”

In this manner their first interview passed.

Mrs. Fiske rushed in to exclaim:

“So, you were right, aunt—he has come. I met him on the stairs. Oh! how
like dear uncle Mel he looks, in the militia, with that moustache. I
just remember him as a child; and, oh, what a gentleman he is!”

At the end of the sentence Mrs. Mel’s face suddenly darkened: she said,
in a deep voice:

“Don’t dare to talk that nonsense before him, Ann.”

Mrs. Fiske looked astonished.

“What have I done, aunt?”

“He shan’t be ruined by a parcel of fools,” said Mrs. Mel. “There, go!
Women have no place here.”

“How the wretches can force themselves to touch a morsel, after this
morning!” Mrs. Fiske exclaimed, glancing at the table.

“Men must eat,” said Mrs. Mel.

The mourners were heard gathering outside the door. Mrs. Fiske escaped
into the kitchen. Mrs. Mel admitted them into the parlour, bowing much
above the level of many of the heads that passed her.

Assembled were Messrs. Barnes, Kilne, and Grossby, whom we know; Mr.
Doubleday, the ironmonger; Mr. Joyce, the grocer; Mr. Perkins, commonly
called Lawyer Perkins; Mr. Welbeck, the pier-master of Lymport;
Bartholomew Fiske; Mr. Coxwell, a Fallowfield maltster, brewer, and
farmer; creditors of various dimensions, all of them. Mr. Goren coming
last, behind his spectacles.

“My son will be with you directly, to preside,” said Mrs. Mel. “Accept
my thanks for the respect you have shown my husband. I wish you good
morning.”

“Morning, ma’am,” answered several voices, and Mrs. Mel retired.

The mourners then set to work to relieve their hats of the appendages
of crape. An undertaker’s man took possession of the long black cloaks.
The gloves were generally pocketed.

“That’s my second black pair this year,” said Joyce.

“They’ll last a time to come. I don’t need to buy gloves while
neighbours pop off.”

“Undertakers’ gloves seem to me as if they’re made for mutton fists,”
remarked Welbeck; upon which Kilne nudged Barnes, the butcher, with a
sharp “Aha!” and Barnes observed:

“Oh! I never wear ’em—they does for my boys on Sundays. I smoke a pipe
at home.”

The Fallowfield farmer held his length of crape aloft and inquired:
“What shall do with this?”

“Oh, you keep it,” said one or two.

Coxwell rubbed his chin. “Don’t like to rob the widder.”

“What’s left goes to the undertaker?” asked Grossby.

“To be sure,” said Barnes; and Kilne added: “It’s a job”: Lawyer
Perkins ejaculating confidently, “Perquisites of office, gentlemen;
perquisites of office!” which settled the dispute and appeased every
conscience.

A survey of the table ensued. The mourners felt hunger, or else thirst;
but had not, it appeared, amalgamated the two appetites as yet. Thirst
was the predominant declaration; and Grossby, after an examination of
the decanters, unctuously deduced the fact, which he announced, that
port and sherry were present.

“Try the port,” said Kilne.

“Good?” Barnes inquired.

A very intelligent “I ought to know,” with a reserve of regret at the
extension of his intimacy with the particular vintage under that roof,
was winked by Kilne.

Lawyer Perkins touched the arm of a mourner about to be experimental on
Kilne’s port—

“I think we had better wait till young Mr. Harrington takes the table,
don’t you see?”

“Yes,-ah!” croaked Goren. “The head of the family, as the saying goes!”

“I suppose we shan’t go into business to-day?” Joyce carelessly
observed.

Lawyer Perkins answered:

“No. You can’t expect it. Mr. Harrington has led me to anticipate that
he will appoint a day. Don’t you see?”

“Oh! I see,” returned Joyce. “I ain’t in such a hurry. What’s he
doing?”

Doubleday, whose propensities were waggish, suggested “shaving,” but
half ashamed of it, since the joke missed, fell to as if he were
soaping his face, and had some trouble to contract his jaw.

The delay in Evan’s attendance on the guests of the house was caused by
the fact that Mrs. Mel had lain in wait for him descending, to warn him
that he must treat them with no supercilious civility, and to tell him
partly the reason why. On hearing the potential relations in which they
stood toward the estate of his father, Evan hastily and with the
assurance of a son of fortune, said they should be paid.

“That’s what they would like to hear,” said Mrs. Mel. “You may just
mention it when they’re going to leave. Say you will fix a day to meet
them.”

“Every farthing!” pursued Evan, on whom the tidings were beginning to
operate. “What! debts? my poor father!”

“And a thumping sum, Van. You will open your eyes wider.”

“But it shall be paid, mother,—it shall be paid. Debts? I hate them.
I’d slave night and day to pay them.”

Mrs. Mel spoke in a more positive tense: “And so will I, Van. Now, go.”

It mattered little to her what sort of effect on his demeanour her
revelation produced, so long as the resolve she sought to bring him to
was nailed in his mind; and she was a woman to knock and knock again,
till it was firmly fixed there. With a strong purpose, and no plans,
there were few who could resist what, in her circle, she willed; not
even a youth who would gaily have marched to the scaffold rather than
stand behind a counter. A purpose wedded to plans may easily suffer
shipwreck; but an unfettered purpose that moulds circumstances as they
arise, masters us, and is terrible. Character melts to it, like metal
in the steady furnace. The projector of plots is but a miserable
gambler and votary of chances. Of a far higher quality is the will that
can subdue itself to wait, and lay no petty traps for opportunity.
Poets may fable of such a will, that it makes the very heavens conform
to it; or, I may add, what is almost equal thereto, one who would be a
gentleman, to consent to be a tailor. The only person who ever held in
his course against Mrs. Mel, was Mel,—her husband; but, with him, she
was under the physical fascination of her youth, and it never left her.
In her heart she barely blamed him. What he did, she took among other
inevitable matters.

The door closed upon Evan, and waiting at the foot, of the stairs a
minute to hear how he was received, Mrs. Mel went to the kitchen and
called the name of Dandy, which brought out an ill-built, low-browed,
small man, in a baggy suit of black, who hopped up to her with a surly
salute. Dandy was a bird Mrs. Mel had herself brought down, and she had
for him something of a sportsman’s regard for his victim. Dandy was the
cleaner of boots and runner of errands in the household of Melchisedec,
having originally entered it on a dark night by the cellar. Mrs. Mel,
on that occasion, was sleeping in her dressing-gown, to be ready to
give the gallant night-hawk, her husband, the service he might require
on his return to the nest. Hearing a suspicious noise below, she rose,
and deliberately loaded a pair of horse-pistols, weapons Mel had worn
in his holsters in the heroic days gone; and with these she stepped
downstairs straight to the cellar, carrying a lantern at her girdle.
She could not only load, but present and fire. Dandy was foremost in
stating that she called him forth steadily, three times, before the
pistol was discharged. He admitted that he was frightened, and
incapable of speech, at the apparition of the tall, terrific woman.
After the third time of asking he had the ball lodged in his leg and
fell. Mrs. Mel was in the habit of bearing heavier weights than Dandy.
She made no ado about lugging him to a chamber, where, with her own
hands (for this woman had some slight knowledge of surgery, and was
great in herbs and drugs) she dressed his wound, and put him to bed;
crying contempt (ever present in Dandy’s memory) at such a poor
creature undertaking the work of housebreaker. Taught that he really
was a poor creature for the work, Dandy, his nursing over, begged to be
allowed to stop and wait on Mrs. Mel; and she who had, like many strong
natures, a share of pity for the objects she despised, did not cast him
out. A jerk in his gait, owing to the bit of lead Mrs. Mel had dropped
into him, and a little, perhaps, to her self-satisfied essay in
surgical science on his person, earned him the name he went by.

When her neighbours remonstrated with her for housing a reprobate, Mrs.
Mel would say: “Dandy is well-fed and well-physicked: there’s no harm
in Dandy”; by which she may have meant that the food won his gratitude,
and the physic reduced his humours. She had observed human nature. At
any rate, Dandy was her creature; and the great Mel himself rallied her
about her squire.

“When were you drunk last?” was Mrs. Mel’s address to Dandy, as he
stood waiting for orders.

He replied to it in an altogether injured way:

“There, now; you’ve been and called me away from my dinner to ask me
that. Why, when I had the last chance, to be sure.”

“And you were at dinner in your new black suit?”

“Well,” growled Dandy, “I borrowed Sally’s apron. Seems I can’t please
ye.”

Mrs. Mel neither enjoined nor cared for outward forms of respect, where
she was sure of complete subserviency. If Dandy went beyond the limits,
she gave him an extra dose. Up to the limits he might talk as he
pleased, in accordance with Mrs. Mel’s maxim, that it was a necessary
relief to all talking creatures.

“Now, take off your apron,” she said, “and wash your hands, dirty pig,
and go and wait at table in there”; she pointed to the parlour-door:
“Come straight to me when everybody has left.”

“Well, there I am with the bottles again,” returned Dandy. “It’s your
fault this time, mind! I’ll come as straight as I can.”

Dandy turned away to perform her bidding, and Mrs. Mel ascended to the
drawing-room to sit with Mrs. Wishaw, who was, as she told all who
chose to hear, an old flame of Mel’s, and was besides, what Mrs. Mel
thought more of, the wife of Mel’s principal creditor, a wholesale
dealer in cloth, resident in London.

The conviviality of the mourners did not disturb the house. Still, men
who are not accustomed to see the colour of wine every day, will sit
and enjoy it, even upon solemn occasions, and the longer they sit the
more they forget the matter that has brought them together. Pleading
their wives and shops, however, they released Evan from his miserable
office late in the afternoon.

His mother came down to him,—and saying, “I see how you did the
journey—you walked it,” told him to follow her.

“Yes, mother,” Evan yawned, “I walked part of the way. I met a fellow
in a gig about ten miles out of Fallowfield, and he gave me a lift to
Flatsham. I just reached Lymport in time, thank Heaven! I wouldn’t have
missed that! By the way, I’ve satisfied these men.”

“Oh!” said Mrs. Mel.

“They wanted—one or two of them—what a penance it is to have to sit
among those people an hour!—they wanted to ask me about the business,
but I silenced them. I told them to meet me here this day week.”

Mrs. Mel again said “Oh!” and, pushing into one of the upper rooms,
“Here’s your bedroom, Van, just as you left it.”

“Ah, so it is,” muttered Evan, eyeing a print. “The Douglas and the
Percy: ‘he took the dead man by the hand.’ What an age it seems since I
last saw that. There’s Sir Hugh Montgomery on horseback—he hasn’t
moved. Don’t you remember my father calling it the Battle of
Tit-for-Tat? Gallant Percy! I know he wished he had lived in those days
of knights and battles.”

“It does not much signify whom one has to make clothes for,” observed
Mrs. Mel. Her son happily did not mark her.

“I think we neither of us were made for the days of pence and pounds,”
he continued. “Now, mother, sit down, and talk to me about him. Did he
mention me? Did he give me his blessing? I hope he did not suffer. I’d
have given anything to press his hand,” and looking wistfully at the
Percy lifting the hand of Douglas dead, Evan’s eyes filled with big
tears.

“He suffered very little,” returned Mrs. Mel, “and his last words were
about you.”

“What were they?” Evan burst out.

“I will tell you another time. Now undress, and go to bed. When I talk
to you, Van, I want a cool head to listen. You do nothing but yawn
yard-measures.”

The mouth of the weary youth instinctively snapped short the abhorred
emblem.

“Here, I will help you, Van.”

In spite of his remonstrances and petitions for talk, she took off his
coat and waistcoat, contemptuously criticizing the cloth of foreign
tailors and their absurd cut.

“Have you heard from Louisa?” asked Evan.

“Yes, yes—about your sisters by-and-by. Now, be good, and go to bed.”

She still treated him like a boy, whom she was going to force to the
resolution of a man.

Dandy’s sleeping-room was on the same floor as Evan’s. Thither, when
she had quitted her son, she directed her steps. She had heard Dandy
tumble up-stairs the moment his duties were over, and knew what to
expect when the bottles had been in his way; for drink made Dandy
savage, and a terror to himself. It was her command to him that, when
he happened to come across liquor, he should immediately seek his
bedroom and bolt the door, and Dandy had got the habit of obeying her.
On this occasion he was vindictive against her, seeing that she had
delivered him over to his enemy with malice prepense. A good deal of
knocking, and summoning of Dandy by name, was required before she was
admitted, and the sight of her did not delight him, as he testified.

“I’m drunk!” he bawled. “Will that do for ye?”

Mrs. Mel stood with her two hands crossed above her apron-string,
noting his sullen lurking eye with the calm of a tamer of beasts.

“You go out of the room; I’m drunk!” Dandy repeated, and pitched
forward on the bed-post, in the middle of an oath.

She understood that it was pure kindness on Dandy’s part to bid her go
and be out of his reach; and therefore, on his becoming so abusive as
to be menacing, she, without a shade of anger, and in the most
unruffled manner, administered to him the remedy she had reserved, in
the shape of a smart box on the ear, which sent him flat to the floor.
He rose, after two or three efforts, quite subdued.

“Now, Dandy, sit on the edge of the bed.”

Dandy sat on the extreme edge, and Mrs. Mel pursued:

“Now, Dandy, tell me what your master said at the table.”

“Talked at ’em like a lord, he did,” said Dandy, stupidly consoling the
boxed ear.

“What were his words?”

Dandy’s peculiarity was, that he never remembered anything save when
drunk, and Mrs. Mel’s dose had rather sobered him. By degrees,
scratching at his head haltingly, he gave the context.

“‘Gentlemen, I hear for the first time, you’ve claims against my poor
father. Nobody shall ever say he died, and any man was the worse for
it. I’ll meet you next week, and I’ll bind myself by law. Here’s Lawyer
Perkins. No; Mr. Perkins. I’ll pay off every penny. Gentlemen, look
upon me as your debtor, and not my father.’”

Delivering this with tolerable steadiness, Dandy asked, “Will that do?”

“That will do,” said Mrs. Mel. “I’ll send you up some tea presently.
Lie down, Dandy.”

The house was dark and silent when Evan, refreshed by his rest,
descended to seek his mother. She was sitting alone in the parlour.
With a tenderness which Mrs. Mel permitted rather than encouraged, Evan
put his arm round her neck, and kissed her many times. One of the
symptoms of heavy sorrow, a longing for the signs of love, made Evan
fondle his mother, and bend over her yearningly. Mrs. Mel said once:
“Dear Van; good boy!” and quietly sat through his caresses.

“Sitting up for me, mother?” he whispered.

“Yes, Van; we may as well have our talk out.”

“Ah!” he took a chair close by her side, “tell me my father’s last
words.”

“He said he hoped you would never be a tailor.”

Evan’s forehead wrinkled up. “There’s not much fear of that, then!”

His mother turned her face on him, and examined him with a rigorous
placidity; all her features seeming to bear down on him. Evan did not
like the look.

“You object to trade, Van?”

“Yes, decidedly, mother—hate it; but that’s not what I want to talk to
you about. Didn’t my father speak of me much?”

“He desired that you should wear his militia sword, if you got a
commission.”

“I have rather given up hope of the Army,” said Evan.

Mrs. Mel requested him to tell her what a colonel’s full pay amounted
to; and again, the number of years it required, on a rough calculation,
to attain that grade. In reply to his statement she observed: “A tailor
might realize twice the sum in a quarter of the time.”

“What if he does—double, or treble?” cried Evan, impetuously; and to
avoid the theme, and cast off the bad impression it produced on him, he
rubbed his hands, and said: “I want to talk to you about my prospects,
mother.”

“What are they?” Mrs. Mel inquired.

The severity of her mien and sceptical coldness of her speech caused
him to inspect them suddenly, as if she had lent him her eyes. He put
them by, till the gold should recover its natural shine, saying: “By
the way, mother, I’ve written the half of a History of Portugal.”

“Have you?” said Mrs. Mel. “For Louisa?”

“No, mother, of course not: to sell it. Albuquerque! what a splendid
fellow he was!”

Informing him that he knew she abominated foreign names, she said: “And
your prospects are, writing Histories of Portugal?”

“No, mother. I was going to tell you, I expect a Government
appointment. Mr. Jocelyn likes my work—I think he likes me. You know, I
was his private secretary for ten months.”

“You write a good hand,” his mother interposed.

“And I’m certain I was born for diplomacy.”

“For an easy chair, and an ink-dish before you, and lacqueys behind.
What’s to be your income, Van?”

Evan carelessly remarked that he must wait and see.

“A very proper thing to do,” said Mrs. Mel; for now that she had fixed
him to some explanation of his prospects, she could condescend in her
stiff way to banter.

Slightly touched by it, Evan pursued, half laughing, as men do who wish
to propitiate common sense on behalf of what seems tolerably absurd:
“It’s not the immediate income, you know, mother: one thinks of one’s
future. In the diplomatic service, as Louisa says, you come to be known
to Ministers gradually, I mean. That is, they hear of you; and if you
show you have some capacity—Louisa wants me to throw it up in time, and
stand for Parliament. Andrew, she thinks, would be glad to help me to
his seat. Once in Parliament, and known to Ministers, you—your career
is open to you.”

In justice to Mr. Evan Harrington, it must be said, he built up this
extraordinary card-castle to dazzle his mother’s mind: he had lost his
right grasp of her character for the moment, because of an undefined
suspicion of something she intended, and which sent him himself to take
refuge in those flimsy structures; while the very altitude he reached
beguiled his imagination, and made him hope to impress hers.

Mrs. Mel dealt it one fillip. “And in the meantime how are you to live,
and pay the creditors?”

Though Evan answered cheerfully, “Oh, they will wait, and I can live on
anything,” he was nevertheless floundering on the ground amid the ruins
of the superb edifice; and his mother, upright and rigid, continuing,
“You can live on anything, and they will wait, and call your father a
rogue,” he started, grievously bitten by one of the serpents of earth.

“Good heaven, mother! what are you saying?”

“That they will call your father a rogue, and will have a right to,”
said the relentless woman.

“Not while I live!” Evan exclaimed.

“You may stop one mouth with your fist, but you won’t stop a dozen,
Van.”

Evan jumped up and walked the room.

“What am I to do?” he cried. “I will pay everything. I will bind myself
to pay every farthing. What more can I possibly do?”

“Make the money,” said Mrs. Mel’s deep voice.

Evan faced her: “My dear mother, you are very unjust and inconsiderate.
I have been working and doing my best. I promise—what do the debts
amount to?”

“Something like £5000 in all, Van.”

“Very well.” Youth is not alarmed by the sound of big sums. “Very
well—I will pay it.”

Evan looked as proud as if he had just clapped down the full amount on
the table.

“Out of the History of Portugal, half written, and the prospect of a
Government appointment?”

Mrs. Mel raised her eyelids to him.

“In time—in time, mother!”

“Mention your proposal to the creditors when you meet them this day
week,” she said.

Neither of them spoke for several minutes. Then Evan came close to her,
saying:

“What is it you want of me, mother?”

“I want nothing, Van—I can support myself.”

“But what would you have me do, mother?”

“Be honest; do your duty, and don’t be a fool about it.”

“I will try,” he rejoined. “You tell me to make the money. Where and
how can I make it? I am perfectly willing to work.”

“In this house,” said Mrs. Mel; and, as this was pretty clear speaking,
she stood up to lend her figure to it.

“Here?” faltered Evan. “What! be a ——”

“Tailor!” The word did not sting her tongue.

“I? Oh, that’s quite impossible!” said Evan. And visions of leprosy,
and Rose shrinking her skirts from contact with him, shadowed out and
away in his mind.

“Understand your choice!” Mrs. Mel imperiously spoke. “What are brains
given you for? To be played the fool with by idiots and women? You have
£5000 to pay to save your father from being called a rogue. You can
only make the money in one way, which is open to you. This business
might produce a thousand pounds a-year and more. In seven or eight
years you may clear your father’s name, and live better all the time
than many of your bankrupt gentlemen. You have told the creditors you
will pay them. Do you think they’re gaping fools, to be satisfied by a
History of Portugal? If you refuse to take the business at once, they
will sell me up, and quite right too. Understand your choice. There’s
Mr. Goren has promised to have you in London a couple of months, and
teach you what he can. He is a kind friend. Would any of your gentlemen
acquaintance do the like for you? Understand your choice. You will be a
beggar—the son of a rogue—or an honest man who has cleared his father’s
name!”

During this strenuously uttered allocution, Mrs. Mel, though her chest
heaved but faintly against her crossed hands, showed by the dilatation
of her eyes, and the light in them, that she felt her words. There is
that in the aspect of a fine frame breathing hard facts, which, to a
youth who has been tumbled headlong from his card-castles and airy
fabrics, is masterful, and like the pressure of a Fate. Evan drooped
his head.

“Now,” said Mrs. Mel, “you shall have some supper.”

Evan told her he could not eat.

“I insist upon your eating,” said Mrs. Mel; “empty stomachs are foul
counsellors.”

“Mother! do you want to drive me mad?” cried Evan.

She looked at him to see whether the string she held him by would bear
the slight additional strain: decided not to press a small point.

“Then go to bed and sleep on it,” she said—sure of him—and gave her
cheek for his kiss, for she never performed the operation, but kept her
mouth, as she remarked, for food and speech, and not for slobbering
mummeries.

Evan returned to his solitary room. He sat on the bed and tried to
think, oppressed by horrible sensations of self-contempt, that caused
whatever he touched to sicken him.

There were the Douglas and the Percy on the wall. It was a happy and a
glorious time, was it not, when men lent each other blows that killed
outright; when to be brave and cherish noble feelings brought honour;
when strength of arm and steadiness of heart won fortune; when the fair
stars of earth—sweet women—wakened and warmed the love of squires of
low degree. This legacy of the dead man’s hand! Evan would have paid it
with his blood; but to be in bondage all his days to it; through it to
lose all that was dear to him; to wear the length of a loathed
existence!—we should pardon a young man’s wretchedness at the prospect,
for it was in a time before our joyful era of universal equality. Yet
he never cast a shade of blame upon his father.

The hours moved on, and he found himself staring at his small candle,
which struggled more and more faintly with the morning light, like his
own flickering ambition against the facts of life.




CHAPTER VIII.
INTRODUCES AN ECCENTRIC


At the Aurora—one of those rare antiquated taverns, smelling of
comfortable time and solid English fare, that had sprung up in the
great coffee days, when taverns were clubs, and had since subsisted on
the attachment of steady bachelor Templars there had been dismay, and
even sorrow, for a month. The most constant patron of the
establishment—an old gentleman who had dined there for seven-and-twenty
years, four days in the week, off dishes dedicated to the particular
days, and had grown grey with the landlady, the cook, and the
head-waiter—this old gentleman had abruptly withheld his presence.
Though his name, his residence, his occupation, were things only to be
speculated on at the Aurora, he was very well known there, and as men
are best to be known: that is to say, by their habits. Some affection
for him also was felt. The landlady looked on him as a part of the
house. The cook and the waiter were accustomed to receive acceptable
compliments from him monthly. His precise words, his regular ancient
jokes, his pint of Madeira and after-pint of Port, his antique bow to
the landlady, passing out and in, his method of spreading his
table-napkin on his lap and looking up at the ceiling ere he fell to,
and how he talked to himself during the repast, and indulged in short
chuckles, and the one look of perfect felicity that played over his
features when he had taken his first sip of Port—these were matters it
pained them at the Aurora to have to remember.

For three weeks the resolution not to regard him as of the past was
general. The Aurora was the old gentleman’s home. Men do not play
truant from home at sixty years of age. He must, therefore, be
seriously indisposed. The kind heart of the landlady fretted to think
he might have no soul to nurse and care for him; but she kept his
corner near the fire-place vacant, and took care that his pint of
Madeira was there. The belief was gaining ground that he had gone, and
that nothing but his ghost would ever sit there again. Still the
melancholy ceremony continued: for the landlady was not without a
secret hope, that in spite of his reserve and the mystery surrounding
him, he would have sent her a last word. The cook and head-waiter,
interrogated as to their dealings with the old gentleman, testified
solemnly to the fact of their having performed their duty by him. They
would not go against their interests so much as to forget one of his
ways, they said—taking oath, as it were, by their lower nature, in
order to be credited: an instinct men have of one another. The landlady
could not contradict them, for the old gentleman had made no complaint;
but then she called to memory that fifteen years back, in such and such
a year, Wednesday’s dish had been, by shameful oversight, furnished him
for Tuesday’s, and he had eaten it quietly, but refused his Port; which
pathetic event had caused alarm and inquiry, when the error was
discovered, and apologized for, the old gentleman merely saying, “Don’t
let it happen again.” Next day he drank his Port, as usual, and the
wheels of the Aurora went smoothly. The landlady was thus justified in
averring that something had been done by somebody, albeit unable to
point to anything specific. Women, who are almost as deeply bound to
habit as old gentlemen, possess more of its spiritual element, and are
warned by dreams, omens, creepings of the flesh, unwonted chills,
suicide of china, and other shadowing signs, when a break is to be
anticipated, or, has occurred. The landlady of the Aurora tavern was
visited by none of these, and with that beautiful trust which habit
gives, and which boastful love or vainer earthly qualities would fail
in effecting, she ordered that the pint of Madeira should stand from
six o’clock in the evening till seven—a small monument of confidence in
him who was at one instant the “poor old dear”; at another, the
“naughty old gad-about”; further, the “faithless old-good-for-nothing”;
and again, the “blessed pet” of the landlady’s parlour, alternately and
indiscriminately apostrophized by herself, her sister, and daughter.

On the last day of the month a step was heard coming up the long alley
which led from the riotous scrambling street to the plentiful cheerful
heart of the Aurora. The landlady knew the step. She checked the
natural flutterings of her ribbons, toned down the strong simper that
was on her lips, rose, pushed aside her daughter, and, as the step
approached, curtsied composedly. Old Habit lifted his hat, and passed.
With the same touching confidence in the Aurora that the Aurora had in
him, he went straight to his corner, expressed no surprise at his
welcome by the Madeira, and thereby apparently indicated that his
appearance should enjoy a similar immunity.

As of old, he called “Jonathan!” and was not to be disturbed till he
did so. Seeing that Jonathan smirked and twiddled his napkin, the old
gentleman added, “Thursday!”

But Jonathan, a man, had not his mistress’s keen intuition of the
deportment necessitated by the case, or was incapable of putting the
screw upon weak excited nature, for he continued to smirk, and was
remarking how glad he was, he was sure, and something he had dared to
think and almost to fear, when the old gentleman called to him, as if
he were at the other end of the room, “Will you order Thursday, or not,
sir?” Whereat Jonathan flew, and two or three cosy diners glanced up
from their plates, or the paper, smiled, and pursued their capital
occupation.

“Glad to see me!” the old gentleman muttered, querulously. “Of course,
glad to see a customer! Why do you tell me that? Talk! tattle! might as
well have a woman to wait—just!”

He wiped his forehead largely with his handkerchief; as one whom
Calamity hunted a little too hard in summer weather.

“No tumbling-room for the wine, too!”

That was his next grievance. He changed the pint of Madeira from his
left side to his right, and went under his handkerchief again,
feverishly. The world was severe with this old gentleman.

“Ah! clock wrong now!”

He leaned back like a man who can no longer carry his burdens,
informing Jonathan, on his coming up to place the roll of bread and
firm butter, that he was forty seconds too fast, as if it were a
capital offence, and he deserved to step into Eternity for outstripping
Time.

“But, I daresay, you don’t understand the importance of a minute,” said
the old gentleman, bitterly. “Not you, or any of you. Better if we had
run a little ahead of your minute, perhaps—and the rest of you! Do you
think you can cancel the mischief that’s done in the world in that
minute, sir, by hurrying ahead like that? Tell me!”

Rather at a loss, Jonathan scanned the clock seriously, and observed
that it was not quite a minute too fast.

The old gentleman pulled out his watch. He grunted that a lying clock
was hateful to him; subsequently sinking into contemplation of his
thumbs,—a sign known to Jonathan as indicative of the old gentleman’s
system having resolved, in spite of external outrages, to be fortified
with calm to meet the repast.

It is not fair to go behind an eccentric; but the fact was, this old
gentleman was slightly ashamed of his month’s vagrancy and cruel
conduct, and cloaked his behaviour toward the Aurora, in all the
charges he could muster against it. He was very human, albeit an odd
form of the race.

Happily for his digestion of Thursday, the cook, warned by Jonathan,
kept the old gentleman’s time, not the Aurora’s: and the dinner was
correct; the dinner was eaten in peace; he began to address his plate
vigorously, poured out his Madeira, and chuckled, as the familiar ideas
engendered by good wine were revived in him. Jonathan reported at the
bar that the old gentleman was all right again.

One would like here to pause, while our worthy ancient feeds, and
indulge in a short essay on Habit, to show what a sacred and admirable
thing it is that makes flimsy Time substantial, and consolidates his
triple life. It is proof that we have come to the end of dreams and
Time’s delusions, and are determined to sit down at Life’s feast and
carve for ourselves. Its day is the child of yesterday, and has a claim
on to-morrow. Whereas those who have no such plan of existence and sum
of their wisdom to show, the winds blow them as they list. Consider,
then, mercifully the wrath of him on whom carelessness or forgetfulness
has brought a snap in the links of Habit. You incline to scorn him
because, his slippers misplaced, or asparagus not on his table the
first day of a particular Spring month, he gazes blankly and sighs as
one who saw the End. To you it may appear small. You call to him to be
a man. He is: but he is also an immortal, and his confidence in
unceasing orderly progression is rudely dashed.

But the old gentleman has finished his dinner and his Madeira, and
says: “Now, Jonathan, ‘thock’ the Port!”—his joke when matters have
gone well: meant to express the sound of the uncorking, probably. The
habit of making good jokes is rare, as you know: old gentlemen have not
yet attained to it: nevertheless Jonathan enjoys this one, which has
seen a generation in and out, for he knows its purport to be, “My heart
is open.”

And now is a great time with this old gentleman. He sips, and in his
eyes the world grows rosy, and he exchanges mute or monosyllable
salutes here and there. His habit is to avoid converse; but he will let
a light remark season meditation.

He says to Jonathan: “The bill for the month.”

“Yes, sir,” Jonathan replies. “Would you not prefer, sir, to have the
items added on to the month ensuing?”

“I asked you for the bill of the month,” said the old gentleman, with
an irritated voice and a twinkle in his eye.

Jonathan bowed; but his aspect betrayed perplexity, and that perplexity
was soon shared by the landlady for Jonathan said, he was convinced the
old gentleman intended to pay for sixteen days, and the landlady could
not bring her hand to charge him for more than two. Here was the
dilemma foreseen by the old gentleman, and it added vastly to the
flavour of the Port.

Pleasantly tickled, he sat gazing at his glass, and let the minutes
fly. He knew the part he would act in his little farce. If charged for
the whole month, he would peruse the bill deliberately, and perhaps cry
out “Hulloa?” and then snap at Jonathan for the interposition of a
remark. But if charged for two days, he would wish to be told whether
they were demented, those people outside, and scornfully return the
bill to Jonathan.

A slap on the shoulder, and a voice: “Found you at last, Tom!”
violently shattered the excellent plot, and made the old gentleman
start. He beheld Mr. Andrew Cogglesby.

“Drinking Port, Tom?” said Mr. Andrew. “I’ll join you”: and he sat down
opposite to him, rubbing his hands and pushing back his hair.

Jonathan entering briskly with the bill, fell back a step, in alarm.
The old gentleman, whose inviolacy was thus rudely assailed, sat
staring at the intruder, his mouth compressed, and three fingers round
his glass, which it was doubtful whether he was not going to hurl at
him.

“Waiter!” Mr. Andrew carelessly hailed, “a pint of this Port, if you
please.”

Jonathan sought the countenance of the old gentleman.

“Do you hear, sir?” cried the latter, turning his wrath on him.
“Another pint!” He added: “Take back the bill”; and away went Jonathan
to relate fresh marvels to his mistress.

Mr. Andrew then addressed the old gentleman in the most audacious
manner.

“Astonished to see me here, Tom? Dare say you are. I knew you came
somewhere in this neighbourhood, and, as I wanted to speak to you very
particularly, and you wouldn’t be visible till Monday, why, I spied
into two or three places, and here I am.”

You might see they were brothers. They had the same bushy eyebrows, the
same healthy colour in their cheeks, the same thick shoulders, and
brisk way of speaking, and clear, sharp, though kindly, eyes; only Tom
was cast in larger proportions than Andrew, and had gotten the grey
furniture of Time for his natural wear. Perhaps, too, a cross in early
life had a little twisted him, and set his mouth in a rueful bunch, out
of which occasionally came biting things. Mr. Andrew carried his head
up, and eyed every man living with the benevolence of a patriarch,
dashed with the impudence of a London sparrow. Tom had a nagging air,
and a trifle of acridity on his broad features. Still, any one at a
glance could have sworn they were brothers, and Jonathan unhesitatingly
proclaimed it at the Aurora bar.

Mr. Andrew’s hands were working together, and at them, and at his face,
the old gentleman continued to look with a firmly interrogating air.

“Want to know what brings me, Tom? I’ll tell you presently. Hot,—isn’t
it?”

“What the deuce are you taking exercise for?” the old gentleman burst
out, and having unlocked his mouth, he began to puff and alter his
posture.

“There you are, thawed in a minute!” said Mr. Andrew. “What’s an
eccentric? a child grown grey. It isn’t mine; I read it somewhere. Ah,
here’s the Port! good, I’ll warrant.”

Jonathan deferentially uncorked, excessive composure on his visage. He
arranged the table-cloth to a nicety, fixed the bottle with exactness,
and was only sent scudding by the old gentleman’s muttering of:
“Eavesdropping pie!” followed by a short, “Go!” and even then he must
delay to sweep off a particular crumb.

“Good it is!” said Mr. Andrew, rolling the flavour on his lips, as he
put down his glass. “I follow you in Port, Tom. Elder brother!”

The old gentleman also drank, and was mollified enough to reply:
“Shan’t follow you in Parliament.”

“Haven’t forgiven that yet, Tom?”

“No great harm done when you’re silent.”

“Capital Port!” said Mr. Andrew, replenishing the glasses. “I ought to
have inquired where they kept the best Port. I might have known you’d
stick by it. By the way, talking of Parliament, there’s talk of a new
election for Fallowfield. You have a vote there. Will you give it to
Jocelyn? There’s talk of his standing.

“If he’ll wear petticoats, I’ll give him my vote.”

“There you go, Tom!”

“I hate masquerades. You’re penny trumpets of the women. That tattle
comes from the bed-curtains. When a petticoat steps forward I give it
my vote, or else I button it up in my pocket.”

This was probably one of the longest speeches he had ever delivered at
the Aurora. There was extra Port in it. Jonathan, who from his place of
observation noted the length of time it occupied, though he was unable
to gather the context, glanced at Mr. Andrew with a sly satisfaction.
Mr. Andrew, laughing, signalled for another pint.

“So you’ve come here for my vote, have you?” said Mr. Tom.

“Why, no; not exactly that,” Mr. Andrew answered, blinking and passing
it by.

Jonathan brought the fresh pint, and Tom filled for himself, drank, and
said emphatically, and with a confounding voice:

“Your women have been setting you on me, sir!”

Andrew protested that he was entirely mistaken.

“You’re the puppet of your women!”

“Well, Tom, not in this instance. Here’s to the bachelors, and brother
Tom at their head!”

It seemed to be Andrew’s object to help his companion to carry a
certain quantity of Port, as if he knew a virtue it had to subdue him,
and to have fixed on a particular measure that he should hold before he
addressed him specially. Arrived at this, he said:

“Look here, Tom. I know your ways. I shouldn’t have bothered you here;
I never have before; but we couldn’t very well talk it over in business
hours; and besides you’re never at the Brewery till Monday, and the
matter’s rather urgent.”

“Why don’t you speak like that in Parliament?” the old man interposed.

“Because Parliament isn’t my brother,” replied Mr. Andrew. “You know,
Tom, you never quite took to my wife’s family.”

“I’m not a match for fine ladies, Nan.”

“Well, Harriet would have taken to you, Tom, and will now, if you’ll
let her. Of course, it’s a pity if she’s ashamed of—hem! You found it
out about the Lymport people, Tom, and, you’ve kept the secret and
respected her feelings, and I thank you for it. Women are odd in those
things, you know. She mustn’t imagine I’ve heard a whisper. I believe
it would kill her.”

The old gentleman shook silently.

“Do you want me to travel over the kingdom, hawking her for the
daughter of a marquis?”

“Now, don’t joke, Tom. I’m serious. Are you not a Radical at heart? Why
do you make such a set against the poor women? What do we spring from?”

“I take off my hat, Nan, when I see a cobbler’s stall.”

“And I, Tom, don’t care a rush who knows it. Homo—something; but we
never had much schooling. We’ve thriven, and should help those we can.
We’ve got on in the world...”

“Wife come back from Lymport?” sneered Tom.

Andrew hurriedly, and with some confusion, explained that she had not
been able to go, on account of the child.

“Account of the child!” his brother repeated, working his chin
contemptuously. “Sisters gone?”

“They’re stopping with us,” said Andrew, reddening.

“So the tailor was left to the kites and the crows. Ah! hum!” and Tom
chuckled.

“You’re angry with me, Tom, for coming here,” said Andrew. “I see what
it is. Thought how it would be! You’re offended, old Tom.”

“Come where you like,” returned Tom, “the place is open. It’s a fool
that hopes for peace anywhere. They sent a woman here to wait on me,
this day month.”

“That’s a shame!” said Mr. Andrew, propitiatingly. “Well, never mind,
Tom: the women are sometimes in the way.—Evan went down to bury his
father. He’s there now. You wouldn’t see him when he was at the
Brewery, Tom. He’s—upon my honour! he’s a good young fellow.”

“A fine young gentleman, I’ve no doubt, Nan.”

“A really good lad, Tom. No nonsense. I’ve come here to speak to you
about him.”

Mr. Andrew drew a letter from his pocket, pursuing: “Just throw aside
your prejudices, and read this. It’s a letter I had from him this
morning. But first I must tell you how the case stands.”

“Know more than you can tell me, Nan,” said Tom, turning over the
flavour of a gulp of his wine.

“Well, then, just let me repeat it. He has been capitally educated; he
has always been used to good society: well, we mustn’t sneer at it:
good society’s better than bad, you’ll allow. He has refined tastes:
well, you wouldn’t like to live among crossing-sweepers, Tom. He’s
clever and accomplished, can speak and write in three languages: I wish
I had his abilities. He has good manners: well, Tom, you know you like
them as well as anybody. And now—but read for yourself.”

“Yah!” went old Tom. “The women have been playing the fool with him
since he was a baby. I read his rigmarole? No.”

Mr. Andrew shrugged his shoulders, and opened the letter, saying:
“Well, listen”; and then he coughed, and rapidly skimmed the
introductory part. “Excuses himself for addressing me formally—poor
boy! Circumstances have altered his position towards the world: found
his father’s affairs in a bad state: only chance of paying off father’s
debts to undertake management of business, and bind himself to so much
a year. But there, Tom, if you won’t read it, you miss the poor young
fellow’s character. He says that he has forgotten his station: fancied
he was superior to trade, but hates debt; and will not allow anybody to
throw dirt at his father’s name, while he can work to clear it; and
will sacrifice his pride. Come, Tom, that’s manly, isn’t it? I call it
touching, poor lad!”

Manly it may have been, but the touching part of it was a feature
missed in Mr. Andrew’s hands. At any rate, it did not appear favourably
to impress Tom, whose chin had gathered its ominous puckers, as he
inquired:

“What’s the trade? he don’t say.”

Andrew added, with a wave of the hand: “Out of a sort of feeling for
his sisters—I like him for it. Now what I want to ask you, Tom, is,
whether we can’t assist him in some way! Why couldn’t we take him into
our office, and fix him there, eh? If he works well—we’re both getting
old, and my brats are chicks—we might, by-and-by, give him a share.”

“Make a brewer of him? Ha! there’d be another mighty sacrifice for his
pride!”

“Come, come, Tom,” said Andrew, “he’s my wife’s brother, and I’m yours;
and—there, you know what women are. They like to preserve appearances:
we ought to consider them.”

“Preserve appearances!” echoed Tom: “ha! who’ll do that for them better
than a tailor?”

Andrew was an impatient little man, fitter for a kind action than to
plead a cause. Jeering jarred on him; and from the moment his brother
began it, he was of small service to Evan. He flung back against the
partition of the compound, rattling it to the disturbance of many a
quiet digestion.

“Tom,” he cried, “I believe you’re a screw!”

“Never said I wasn’t,” rejoined Tom, as he finished his glass. “I’m a
bachelor, and a person—you’re married, and an object. I won’t have the
tailor’s family at my coat-tails.”

Do you mean to say, Tom, you don’t like the young fellow? The Countess
says he’s half engaged to an heiress; and he has a chance of
appointments—of course, nothing may come of them. But do you mean to
say, you don’t like him for what he has done?”

Tom made his jaw disagreeably prominent. “’Fraid I’m guilty of that
crime.”

“And you that swear at people pretending to be above their station!”
exclaimed Andrew. “I shall get in a passion. I can’t stand this. Here,
waiter! what have I to pay?”

“Go,” cried the time-honoured guest of the Aurora to Jonathan
advancing.

Andrew pressed the very roots of his hair back from his red forehead,
and sat upright and resolute, glancing at Tom. And now ensued a curious
scene of family blood. For no sooner did elderly Tom observe this
bantam-like demeanour of his brother, than he ruffled his feathers
likewise, and looked down on him, agitating his wig over a prodigious
frown. Whereof came the following sharp colloquy; Andrew beginning:

“I’ll pay off the debts out of my own pocket.”

“You can make a greater fool of yourself, then?”

“He shan’t be a tailor!”

“He shan’t be a brewer!”

“I say he shall live like a gentleman!”

“I say he shall squat like a Turk!”

Bang went Andrew’s hand on the table: “I’ve pledged my word, mind!”

Tom made a counter demonstration: “And I’ll have my way!”

“Hang it! I can be as eccentric as you,” said Andrew.

“And I as much a donkey as you, if I try hard,” said Tom.

Something of the cobbler’s stall followed this; till waxing furious,
Tom sung out to Jonathan, hovering around them in watchful timidity,
“More Port!” and the words immediately fell oily on the wrath of the
brothers; both commenced wiping their heads with their handkerchiefs
the faces of both emerged and met, with a half-laugh: and, severally
determined to keep to what they had spoken, there was a tacit accord
between them to drop the subject.

Like sunshine after smart rain, the Port shone on these brothers. Like
a voice from the pastures after the bellowing of the thunder, Andrew’s
voice asked: “Got rid of that twinge of the gout, Tom? Did you rub in
that ointment?” while Tom replied: “Ay. How about that rheumatism of
yours? Have you tried that Indy oil?” receiving a like assurance.

The remainder of the Port ebbed in meditation and chance remarks. The
bit of storm had done them both good; and Tom especially—the cynical,
carping, grim old gentleman—was much improved by the nearer resemblance
of his manner to Andrew’s.

Behind this unaffected fraternal concord, however, the fact that they
were pledged to a race in eccentricity, was present. They had been
rivals before; and anterior to the date of his marriage, Andrew had
done odd eclipsing things. But Andrew required prompting to it; he
required to be put upon his mettle. Whereas, it was more nature with
Tom: nature and the absence of a wife, gave him advantages over Andrew.
Besides, he had his character to maintain. He had said the word: and
the first vanity of your born eccentric is, that he shall be taken for
infallible.

Presently Andrew ducked his head to mark the evening clouds flushing
over the court-yard of the Aurora.

“Time to be off, Tom,” he said: “wife at home.”

“Ah!” Tom answered. “Well, I haven’t got to go to bed so early.”

“What an old rogue you are, Tom!” Andrew pushed his elbows forward on
the table amiably. “’Gad, we haven’t drunk wine together since—by
George! we’ll have another pint.”

“Many as you like,” said Tom.

Over the succeeding pint, Andrew, in whose veins the Port was merry,
favoured his brother with an imitation of Major Strike, and indicated
his dislike to that officer. Tom informed him that Major Strike was
speculating.

“The ass eats at my table, and treats me with contempt.”

“Just tell him that you’re putting by the bones for him. He’ll want
’em.”

Then Andrew with another glance at the clouds, now violet on a grey
sky, said he must really be off. Upon which Tom observed: “Don’t come
here again.”

“You old rascal, Tom!” cried Andrew, swinging over the table: “it’s
quite jolly for us to be hob-a-nobbing together once more. ’Gad!—no, we
won’t though! I promised—Harriet. Eh? What say, Tom?”

“Nother pint, Nan?”

Tom shook his head in a roguishly-cosy, irresistible way. Andrew, from
a shake of denial and resolve, fell into the same; and there sat the
two brothers—a jolly picture.

The hour was ten, when Andrew Cogglesby, comforted by Tom’s remark,
that he, Tom, had a wig, and that he, Andrew, would have a wigging,
left the Aurora; and he left it singing a song. Tom Cogglesby still sat
at his table, holding before him Evan’s letter, of which he had got
possession; and knocking it round and round with a stroke of the
forefinger, to the tune of, “Tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor,
’pothecary, ploughboy, thief”; each profession being sounded as a
corner presented itself to the point of his nail. After indulging in
this species of incantation for some length of time, Tom Cogglesby read
the letter from beginning to end, and called peremptorily for pen, ink,
and paper.




CHAPTER IX.
THE COUNTESS IN LOW SOCIETY


By dint of stratagems worthy of a Court intrigue, the Countess de
Saldar contrived to traverse the streets of Lymport, and enter the
house where she was born, unsuspected and unseen, under cover of a
profusion of lace and veil and mantilla, which only her heroic resolve
to keep her beauties hidden from the profane townspeople could have
rendered endurable beneath the fervid summer sun. Dress in a foreign
style she must, as without it she lost that sense of superiority, which
was the only comfort to her in her tribulations. The period of her
arrival was ten days subsequent to the burial of her father. She had
come in the coach, like any common mortal, and the coachman, upon her
request, had put her down at the Governor’s house, and the guard had
knocked at the door, and the servant had informed her that General
Hucklebridge was not the governor of Lymport, nor did Admiral Combleman
then reside in the town; which tidings, the coach then being out of
sight, it did not disconcert the Countess to hear; and she reached her
mother, having, at least, cut off communication with the object of
conveyance.

The Countess kissed her mother, kissed Mrs. Fiske, and asked sharply
for Evan. Mrs. Fiske let her know that Evan was in the house.

“Where?” inquired the Countess. “I have news of the utmost importance
for him. I must see him.”

“Where is he, aunt?” said Mrs. Fiske. “In the shop, I think; I wonder
he did not see you passing, Louisa.”

The Countess went bolt down into a chair.

“Go to him, Jane,” said Mrs. Mel. “Tell him Louisa is here, and don’t
return.”

Mrs. Fiske departed, and the Countess smiled.

“Thank you, Mama! you know I never could bear that odious, vulgar
little woman. Oh, the heat! You talk of Portugal! And, oh! poor dear
Papa! what I have suffered!”

Flapping her laces for air, and wiping her eyes for sorrow, the
Countess poured a flood of sympathy into her mother’s ears and then
said:

“But you have made a great mistake, Mama, in allowing Evan to put his
foot into that place. He—beloved of an heiress! Why, if an enemy should
hear of it, it would ruin him—positively blast him—for ever. And that
she loves him I have proof positive. Yes; with all her frankness, the
little thing cannot conceal that from me now. She loves him! And I
desire you to guess, Mama, whether rivals will not abound? And what
enemy so much to be dreaded as a rival? And what revelation so awful as
that he has stood in a—in a—boutique?”

Mrs. Mel maintained her usual attitude for listening. It had occurred
to her that it might do no good to tell the grand lady, her daughter,
of Evan’s resolution, so she simply said, “It is discipline for him,”
and left her to speak a private word with the youth.

Timidly the Countess inspected the furniture of the apartment, taking
chills at the dingy articles she saw, in the midst of her heat. That
she should have sprung from this! The thought was painful; still she
could forgive Providence so much. But should it ever be known she had
sprung from this! Alas! she felt she never could pardon such a dire
betrayal. She had come in good spirits, but the mention of Evan’s
backsliding had troubled her extremely, and though she did not say to
herself, What was the benefit resulting from her father’s dying, if
Evan would be so base-minded? she thought the thing indefinitely, and
was forming the words on her mouth, One Harrington in a shop is equal
to all! when Evan appeared alone.

“Why, goodness gracious! where’s your moustache?” cried the Countess.

“Gone the way of hair!” said Evan, coldly stooping to her forehead.

“Such a distinction!” the Countess continued, reproachfully. “Why, mon
Dieu! one could hardly tell you; as you look now, from the very
commonest tradesman—if you were not rather handsome and something of a
figure. It’s a disguise, Evan—do you know that?”

“And I’ve parted with it—that’s all,” said Evan. “No more disguises for
me!”

The Countess immediately took his arm, and walked with him to a window.
His face was certainly changed. Murmuring that the air of Lymport was
bad for him, and that he must leave it instantly, she bade him sit and
attend to what she was about to say.

“While you have been here, degenerating, Evan, day by day—as you always
do out of my sight—degenerating! no less a word!—I have been slaving in
your interests. Yes; I have forced the Jocelyns socially to acknowledge
us. I have not slept; I have eaten bare morsels. Do abstinence and
vigils clear the wits? I know not! but indeed they have enabled me to
do more in a week than would suffice for a lifetime. Hark to me. I have
discovered Rose’s secret. Si! It is so! Rose loves you. You blush; you
blush like a girl. She loves you, and you have let yourself be seen in
a shop! Contrast me the two things. Oh! in verity, dreadful as it is,
one could almost laugh. But the moment I lose sight of you, my
instructions vanish as quickly as that hair on your superior lip, which
took such time to perfect. Alas! you must grow it again immediately.
Use any perfumer’s contrivance. Rowland! I have great faith in Rowland.
Without him, I believe, there would have been many bald women
committing suicide! You remember the bottle I gave to the Count de
Villa Flor? ‘Countess,’ he said to me, ‘you have saved this egg-shell
from a crack by helping to cover it’—for so he called his head—the top,
you know, was beginning to shine like an egg. And I do fear me he would
have done it. Ah! you do not conceive what the dread of baldness is! To
a woman death—death is preferable to baldness! Baldness is death! And a
wig—a wig! Oh, horror! total extinction is better than to rise again in
a wig! But you are young, and play with hair. But I was saying, I went
to see the Jocelyns. I was introduced to Sir Franks and his lady and
the wealthy grandmother. And I have an invitation for you, Evan—you
unmannered boy, that you do not bow! A gentle incline forward of the
shoulders, and the eyes fixed softly, your upper lids drooping
triflingly, as if you thanked with gentle sincerity, but were
indifferent. Well, well, if you will not! An invitation for you to
spend part of the autumn at Beckley Court, the ancestral domain, where
there will be company the nobles of the land! Consider that. You say it
was bold in me to face them after that horrible man committed us on
board the vessel? A Harrington is anything but a coward. I did go and
because I am devoted to your interests. That very morning, I saw
announced in the paper, just beneath poor Andrew’s hand, as he held it
up at the breakfast-table, reading it, I saw among the deaths, Sir
Abraham Harrington, of Torquay, Baronet, of quinsy! Twice that good man
has come to my rescue! Oh! I welcomed him as a piece of Providence! I
turned and said to Harriet, ‘I see they have put poor Papa in the
paper.’ Harriet was staggered. I took the paper from Andrew, and
pointed it to her. She has no readiness. She has had no foreign
training. She could not comprehend, and Andrew stood on tiptoe, and
peeped. He has a bad cough, and coughed himself black in the face. I
attribute it to excessive bad manners and his cold feelings. He left
the room. I reproached Harriet. But, oh! the singularity of the
excellent fortune of such an event at such a time! It showed that our
Harrington-luck had not forsaken us. I hurried to the Jocelyns
instantly. Of course, it cleared away any suspicions aroused in them by
that horrible man on board the vessel. And the tears I wept for Sir
Abraham, Evan, in verity they were tears of deep and sincere gratitude!
What is your mouth knitting the corners at? Are you laughing?”

Evan hastily composed his visage to the melancholy that was no
counterfeit in him just then.

“Yes,” continued the Countess, easily reassured, “I shall ever feel a
debt to Sir Abraham Harrington, of Torquay. I dare say we are related
to him. At least he has done us more service than many a rich and
titled relative. No one supposes he would acknowledge poor Papa. I can
forgive him that, Evan!” The Countess pointed out her finger with
mournful and impressive majesty, “As we look down on that monkey,
people of rank and consideration in society look on what poor dear Papa
was.”

This was partly true, for Jacko sat on a chair, in his favourite
attitude, copied accurately from the workmen of the establishment at
their labour with needle and thread. Growing cognizant of the infamy of
his posture, the Countess begged Evan to drive him out of her sight,
and took a sniff at her smelling-bottle.

She went on: “Now, dear Van, you would hear of your sweet Rose?”

“Not a word!” Evan hastily answered.

“Why, what does this indicate? Whims! Then you do love?”

“I tell you, Louisa, I don’t want to hear a word of any of them,” said
Evan, with an angry gleam in his eyes. “They are nothing to me, nor I
to them. I—my walk in life is not theirs.”

“Faint heart! faint heart!” the Countess lifted a proverbial
forefinger.

“Thank heaven, I shall have the consolation of not going about, and
bowing and smirking like an impostor!” Evan exclaimed.

There was a wider intelligence in the Countess’s arrested gaze than she
chose to fashion into speech.

“I knew,” she said, “I knew how the air of this horrible Lymport would
act on you. But while I live, Evan, you shall not sink in the sludge.
You, with all the pains I have lavished on you! and with your
presence!—for you have a presence, so rare among young men in this
England! You, who have been to a Court, and interchanged bows with
duchesses, and I know not what besides—nay, I do not accuse you; but if
you had not been a mere boy, and an English boy—poor Eugenia herself
confessed to me that you had a look—a tender cleaving of the
underlids—that made her catch her hand to her heart sometimes: it
reminded her so acutely of false Belmaraña. Could you have had a
greater compliment than that? You shall not stop here another day!”

“True,” said Evan, “for I’m going to London to-night.”

“Not to London,” the Countess returned, with a conquering glance, “but
to Beckley Court—and with me.”

“To London, Louisa, with Mr. Goren.”

Again the Countess eyed him largely; but took, as it were, a side-path
from her broad thought, saying: “Yes, fortunes are made in London, if
you would they should be rapid.”

She meditated. At that moment Dandy knocked at the door, and called
outside: “Please, master, Mr. Goren says there’s a gentleman in the
shop—wants to see you.”

“Very well,” replied Evan, moving. He was swung violently round.

The Countess had clutched him by the arm. A fearful expression was on
her face.

“Whither do you go?” she said.

“To the shop, Louisa.”

Too late to arrest the villanous word, she pulled at him. “Are you
quite insane? Consent to be seen by a gentleman there? What has come to
you? You must be lunatic! Are we all to be utterly ruined—disgraced?”

“Is my mother to starve?” said Evan.

“Absurd rejoinder! No! You should have sold everything here before
this. She can live with Harriet—she—once out of this horrible
element—she would not show it. But, Evan, you are getting away from me:
you are not going?—speak!”

“I am going,” said Evan.

The Countess clung to him, exclaiming: “Never, while I have the power
to detain you!” but as he was firm and strong, she had recourse to her
woman’s aids, and burst into a storm of sobs on his shoulder—a scene of
which Mrs. Mel was, for some seconds, a composed spectator.

“What’s the matter now?” said Mrs. Mel.

Evan impatiently explained the case. Mrs. Mel desired her daughter to
avoid being ridiculous, and making two fools in her family; and at the
same time that she told Evan there was no occasion for him to go,
contrived, with a look, to make the advice a command. He, in that state
of mind when one takes bitter delight in doing an abhorred duty, was
hardly willing to be submissive; but the despair of the Countess
reduced him, and for her sake he consented to forego the sacrifice of
his pride which was now his sad, sole pleasure. Feeling him linger, the
Countess relaxed her grasp. Hers were tears that dried as soon as they
had served their end; and, to give him the full benefit of his conduct,
she said: “I knew Evan would be persuaded by me.”

Evan pitifully pressed her hand, and sighed.

“Tea is on the table down-stairs,” said Mrs. Mel. “I have cooked
something for you, Louisa. Do you sleep here to-night?”

“Can I tell you, Mama?” murmured the Countess. “I am dependent on our
Evan.”

“Oh! well, we will eat first,” said Mrs. Mel, and they went to the
table below, the Countess begging her mother to drop titles in
designating her to the servants, which caused Mrs. Mel to say:

“There is but one. I do the cooking”; and the Countess, ever disposed
to flatter and be suave, even when stung by a fact or a phrase, added:

“And a beautiful cook you used to be, dear Mama!”

At the table, awaiting them, sat Mrs. Wishaw, Mrs. Fiske, and Mr.
Goren, who soon found themselves enveloped in the Countess’s
graciousness. Mr. Goren would talk of trade, and compare Lymport
business with London, and the Countess, loftily interested in his
remarks, drew him out to disgust her brother. Mrs. Wishaw, in whom the
Countess at once discovered a frivolous pretentious woman of the
moneyed trading class, she treated as one who was alive to society, and
surveyed matters from a station in the world, leading her to think that
she tolerated Mr. Goren, as a lady-Christian of the highest rank should
tolerate the insects that toil for us. Mrs. Fiske was not so tractable,
for Mrs. Fiske was hostile and armed. Mrs. Fiske adored the great Mel,
and she had never loved Louisa. Hence, she scorned Louisa on account of
her late behaviour toward her dead parent. The Countess saw through
her, and laboured to be friendly with her, while she rendered her
disagreeable in the eyes of Mrs. Wishaw, and let Mrs. Wishaw perceive
that sympathy was possible between them; manoeuvring a trifle too
delicate, perhaps, for the people present, but sufficient to blind its
keen-witted author to the something that was being concealed from
herself, of which something, nevertheless, her senses apprehensively
warned her: and they might have spoken to her wits, but that mortals
cannot, unaided, guess, or will not, unless struck in the face by the
fact, credit, what is to their minds the last horror.

“I came down in the coach, quite accidental, with this gentleman,” said
Mrs. Wishaw, fanning a cheek and nodding at Mr. Goren. “I’m an old
flame of dear Mel’s. I knew him when he was an apprentice in London.
Now, wasn’t it odd? Your mother—I suppose I must call you ‘my lady’?”

The Countess breathed a tender “Spare me,” with a smile that added,
“among friends!”

Mrs. Wishaw resumed: “Your mother was an old flame of this gentleman’s,
I found out. So there were two old flames, and I couldn’t help
thinking! But I was so glad to have seen dear Mel once more.”

“Ah!” sighed the Countess.

“He was always a martial-looking man, and laid out, he was quite
imposing. I declare, I cried so, as it reminded me of when I couldn’t
have him, for he had nothing but his legs and arms—and I married
Wishaw. But it’s a comfort to think I have been of some service to
dear, dear Mel! for Wishaw’s a man of accounts and payments; and I knew
Mel had cloth from him, and,” the lady suggested bills delayed, with
two or three nods, “you know! and I’ll do my best for his son.”

“You are kind,” said the Countess, smiling internally at the vulgar
creature’s misconception of Evan’s requirements.

“Did he ever talk much about Mary Fence?” asked Mrs. Wishaw. “‘Polly
Fence,’ he used to say, ‘sweet Polly Fence!’”

“Oh! I think so. Frequently,” observed the Countess.

Mrs. Fiske primmed her mouth. She had never heard the great Mel allude
to the name of Fence.

The Goren-croak was heard:

“Painters have painted out ‘Melchisedec’ this afternoon. Yes,—ah! In
and out—as the saying goes.”

Here was an opportunity to mortify the Countess.

Mrs. Fiske placidly remarked: “Have we the other put up in its stead?
It’s shorter.”

A twinge of weakness had made Evan request that the name of Evan
Harrington should not decorate the shopfront till he had turned his
back on it, for a time. Mrs. Mel crushed her venomous niece.

“What have you to do with such things? Shine in your own affairs first,
Ann, before you meddle with others.”

Relieved at hearing that “Melchisedec” was painted out, and
unsuspicious of the announcement that should replace it, the Countess
asked Mrs. Wishaw if she thought Evan like her dear Papa.

“So like,” returned the lady, “that I would not be alone with him yet,
for worlds. I should expect him to be making love to me: for, you know,
my dear—I must be familiar—Mel never could be alone with you, without!
It was his nature. I speak of him before marriage. But, if I can trust
myself with him, I shall take charge of Mr. Evan, and show him some
London society.”

“That is indeed kind,” said the Countess, glad of a thick veil for the
utterance of her contempt. “Evan, though—I fear—will be rather engaged.
His friends, the Jocelyns of Beckley Court, will—I fear—hardly dispense
with him and Lady Splenders—you know her? the Marchioness of Splenders?
No?—by repute, at least: a most beautiful and most fascinating woman;
report of him alone has induced her to say that Evan must and shall
form a part of her autumnal gathering at Splenders Castle. And how he
is to get out of it, I cannot tell. But I am sure his multitudinous
engagements will not prevent his paying due court to Mistress Wishaw.”

As the Countess intended, Mistress Wishaw’s vanity was reproved, and
her ambition excited: a pretty doublestroke, only possible to dexterous
players.

The lady rejoined that she hoped so, she was sure; and forthwith
(because she suddenly seemed to possess him more than his son),
launched upon Mel’s incomparable personal attractions. This caused the
Countess to enlarge upon Evan’s vast personal prospects. They talked
across each other a little, till the Countess remembered her breeding,
allowed Mrs. Wishaw to run to an end in hollow exclamations, and put a
finish to the undeclared controversy, by a traverse of speech, as if
she were taking up the most important subject of their late colloquy.
“But Evan is not in his own hands—he is in the hands of a lovely young
woman, I must tell you. He belongs to her, and not to us. You have
heard of Rose Jocelyn, the celebrated heiress?”

“Engaged?” Mrs. Wishaw whispered aloud.

The Countess, an adept in the lie implied—practised by her, that she
might not subject herself to future punishment (in which she was so
devout a believer, that she condemned whole hosts to it)—deeply smiled.

“Really!” said Mrs. Wishaw, and was about to inquire why Evan, with
these brilliant expectations, could think of trade and tailoring, when
the young man, whose forehead had been growing black, jumped up, and
quitted them; thus breaking the harmony of the table; and as the
Countess had said enough, she turned the conversation to the always
welcome theme of low society. She broached death and corpses; and
became extremely interesting, and very sympathetic: the only difference
between the ghostly anecdotes she related, and those of the other
ladies, being that her ghosts were all of them titled, and walked
mostly under the burden of a coronet. For instance, there was the
Portuguese Marquis de Col. He had married a Spanish wife, whose end was
mysterious. Undressing, on the night of the anniversary of her death,
and on the point of getting into bed, he beheld the dead woman lying on
her back before him. All night long he had to sleep with this freezing
phantom! Regularly, every fresh anniversary, he had to endure the same
penance, no matter where he might be, or in what strange bed. On one
occasion, when he took the live for the dead, a curious thing occurred,
which the Countess scrupled less to relate than would men to hint at.
Ghosts were the one childish enjoyment Mrs. Mel allowed herself, and
she listened to her daughter intently, ready to cap any narrative; but
Mrs. Fiske stopped the flood.

“You have improved on Peter Smithers, Louisa,” she said.

The Countess turned to her mildly.

“You are certainly thinking of Peter Smithers,” Mrs. Fiske continued,
bracing her shoulders. “Surely, you remember poor Peter, Louisa? An old
flame of your own! He was going to kill himself, but married a
Devonshire woman, and they had disagreeables, and SHE died, and he was
undressing, and saw her there in the bed, and wouldn’t get into it, and
had the mattress, and the curtains, and the counterpanes, and
everything burnt. He told us it himself. You must remember it, Louisa?”

The Countess remembered nothing of the sort. No doubt could exist of
its having been the Portuguese Marquis de Col, because he had confided
to her the whole affair, and indeed come to her, as his habit was, to
ask her what he could possibly do, under the circumstances. If Mrs.
Fiske’s friend, who married the Devonshire person, had seen the same
thing, the coincidence was yet more extraordinary than the case. Mrs.
Fiske said it assuredly was, and glanced at her aunt, who, as the
Countess now rose, declaring she must speak to Evan, chid Mrs. Fiske,
and wished her and Peter Smithers at the bottom of the sea.

“No, no, Mama,” said the Countess, laughing, “that would hardly be
proper,” and before Mrs. Fiske could reply, escaped to complain to Evan
of the vulgarity of those women.

She was not prepared for the burst of wrath with which Evan met her.
“Louisa,” said he, taking her wrist sternly, “you have done a thing I
can’t forgive. I find it hard to bear disgrace myself: I will not
consent to bring it upon others. Why did you dare to couple Miss
Jocelyn’s name with mine?”

The Countess gave him out her arm’s length. “Speak on, Van,” she said,
admiring him with a bright gaze.

“Answer me, Louisa; and don’t take me for a fool any more,” he pursued.
“You have coupled Miss Jocelyn’s name with mine, in company, and I
insist now upon your giving me your promise to abstain from doing it
anywhere, before anybody.”

“If she saw you at this instant, Van,” returned the incorrigible
Countess, “would she desire it, think you? Oh! I must make you angry
before her, I see that! You have your father’s frown. You surpass him,
for your delivery is more correct, and equally fluent. And if a woman
is momentarily melted by softness in a man, she is for ever subdued by
boldness and bravery of mien.”

Evan dropped her hand. “Miss Jocelyn has done me the honour to call me
her friend. That was in other days.” His lip quivered. “I shall not see
Miss Jocelyn again. Yes; I would lay down my life for her; but that’s
idle talk. No such chance will ever come to me. But I can save her from
being spoken of in alliance with me, and what I am, and I tell you,
Louisa, I will not have it.” Saying which, and while he looked harshly
at her, wounded pride bled through his eyes.

She was touched. “Sit down, dear; I must explain to you, and make you
happy against your will,” she said, in another voice, and an English
accent. “The mischief is done, Van. If you do not want Rose Jocelyn to
love you, you must undo it in your own way. I am not easily deceived.
On the morning I went to her house in town, she took me aside, and
spoke to me. Not a confession in words. The blood in her cheeks, when I
mentioned you, did that for her. Everything about you she must know—how
you bore your grief, and all. And not in her usual free manner, but
timidly, as if she feared a surprise, or feared to be wakened to the
secret in her bosom she half suspects—‘Tell him!’ she said, ‘I hope he
will not forget me.’”

The Countess was interrupted by a great sob; for the picture of frank
Rose Jocelyn changed, and soft, and, as it were, shadowed under a veil
of bashful regard for him, so filled the young man with sorrowful
tenderness, that he trembled, and was as a child.

Marking the impression she had produced on him, and having worn off
that which he had produced on her, the Countess resumed the art in her
style of speech, easier to her than nature.

“So the sweetest of Roses may be yours, dear Van; and you have her in a
gold setting, to wear on your heart. Are you not enviable? I will
not—no, I will not tell you she is perfect. I must fashion the sweet
young creature. Though I am very ready to admit that she is much
improved by this—shall I call it, desired consummation?”

Evan could listen no more. Such a struggle was rising in his breast:
the effort to quench what the Countess had so shrewdly kindled;
passionate desire to look on Rose but for one lightning flash: desire
to look on her, and muffled sense of shame twin-born with it: wild love
and leaden misery mixed: dead hopelessness and vivid hope. Up to the
neck in Purgatory, but his soul saturated with visions of Bliss! The
fair orb of Love was all that was wanted to complete his planetary
state, and aloft it sprang, showing many faint, fair tracts to him, and
piling huge darknesses.

As if in search of something, he suddenly went from the room.

“I have intoxicated the poor boy,” said the Countess, and consulted an
attitude by the evening light in a mirror. Approving the result, she
rang for her mother, and sat with her till dark; telling her she could
not and would not leave her dear Mama that night. At the supper-table
Evan did not appear, and Mr. Goren, after taking counsel of Mrs. Mel,
dispersed the news that Evan was off to London. On the road again, with
a purse just as ill-furnished, and in his breast the light that
sometimes leads gentlemen, as well as ladies, astray.




CHAPTER X.
MY GENTLEMAN ON THE ROAD AGAIN


Near a milestone, under the moonlight, crouched the figure of a woman,
huddled with her head against her knees, and careless hair falling to
the summer’s dust. Evan came upon this sight within a few miles of
Fallowfield. At first he was rather startled, for he had inherited
superstitious emotions from his mother, and the road was lone, the moon
full. He went up to her and spoke a gentle word, which provoked no
reply. He ventured to put his hand on her shoulder, continuing softly
to address her. She was flesh and blood. Evan stooped his head to catch
a whisper from her mouth, but nothing save a heavier fall of the breath
she took, as of one painfully waking, was heard.

A misery beyond our own is a wholesome picture for youth, and though we
may not for the moment compare the deep with the lower deep, we, if we
have a heart for outer sorrows, can forget ourselves in it. Evan had
just been accusing the heavens of conspiracy to disgrace him. Those
patient heavens had listened, as is their wont. They had viewed and had
not been disordered by his mental frenzies. It is certainly hard that
they do not come down to us, and condescend to tell us what they mean,
and be dumb-foundered by the perspicuity of our arguments—the argument,
for instance, that they have not fashioned us for the science of the
shears, and do yet impel us to wield them. Nevertheless, they to whom
mortal life has ceased to be a long matter perceive that our appeals
for conviction are answered, now and then very closely upon the call.
When we have cast off the scales of hope and fancy, and surrender our
claims on mad chance, it is given us to see that some plan is working
out: that the heavens, icy as they are to the pangs of our blood, have
been throughout speaking to our souls; and, according to the strength
there existing, we learn to comprehend them. But their language is an
element of Time, whom primarily we have to know.

Evan Harrington was young. He wished not to clothe the generation. What
was to the remainder of the exiled sons of Adam simply the brand of
expulsion from Paradise, was to him hell. In his agony, anything less
than an angel, soft-voiced in his path, would not have satisfied the
poor boy, and here was this wretched outcast, and instead of being
relieved, he was to act the reliever!

Striving to rouse the desolate creature, he shook her slightly. She now
raised her head with a slow, gradual motion, like that of a wax-work,
showing a white young face, tearless,—dreadfully drawn at the lips.
After gazing at him, she turned her head mechanically to her shoulder,
as to ask him why he touched her. He withdrew his hand, saying:

“Why are you here? Pardon me; I want, if possible, to help you.”

A light sprang in her eyes. She jumped from the stone, and ran forward
a step or two, with a gasp:

“Oh, my God! I want to go and drown myself.”

Evan lingered behind her till he saw her body sway, and in a fit of
trembling she half fell on his outstretched arm. He led her to the
stone, not knowing what on earth to do with her. There was no sign of a
house near; they were quite solitary; to all his questions she gave an
unintelligible moan. He had not the heart to leave her, so, taking a
sharp seat on a heap of flints, thus possibly furnishing future
occupation for one of his craftsmen, he waited, and amused himself by
marking out diagrams with his stick in the thick dust.

His thoughts were far away, when he heard, faintly uttered:

“Why do you stop here?”

“To help you.”

“Please don’t. Let me be. I can’t be helped.”

“My good creature,” said Evan, “it’s quite impossible that I should
leave you in this state. Tell me where you were going when your illness
seized you?”

“I was going,” she commenced vacantly, “to the sea—the water,” she
added, with a shivering lip.

The foolish youth asked her if she could be cold on such a night.

“No, I’m not cold,” she replied, drawing closer over her lap the ends
of a shawl which would in that period have been thought rather gaudy
for her station.

“You were going to Lymport?”

“Yes,—Lymport’s nearest, I think.”

“And why were you out travelling at this hour?”

She dropped her head, and began rocking to right and left.

While they talked the noise of waggon-wheels was heard approaching.
Evan went into the middle of the road, and beheld a covered waggon, and
a fellow whom he advanced to meet, plodding a little to the rear of the
horses. He proved kindly. He was a farmer’s man, he said, and was at
that moment employed in removing the furniture of the farmer’s son, who
had failed as a corn-chandler in Lymport, to Hillford, which he
expected to reach about morn. He answered Evan’s request that he would
afford the young woman conveyance as far as Fallowfield:

“Tak’ her in? That I will.

“She won’t hurt the harses,” he pursued, pointing his whip at the
vehicle: “there’s my mate, Garge Stoakes, he’s in there, snorin’ his
turn. Can’t you hear ’n asnorin’ thraugh the wheels? I can; I’ve been
laughin’! He do snore that loud—Garge do!”

Proceeding to inform Evan how George Stokes had snored in that
characteristic manner from boyhood, ever since he and George had slept
in a hayloft together; and how he, kept wakeful and driven to
distraction by George Stokes’ nose, had been occasionally compelled, in
sheer self-defence, madly to start up and hold that pertinacious alarum
in tight compression between thumb and forefinger; and how George
Stokes, thus severely handled, had burst his hold with a tremendous
snort, as big as a bull, and had invariably uttered the exclamation,
“Hulloa!—same to you, my lad!” and rolled over to snore as fresh as
ever;—all this with singular rustic comparisons, racy of the soil, and
in raw Hampshire dialect, the waggoner came to a halt opposite the
stone, and, while Evan strode to assist the girl, addressed himself to
the great task of arousing the sturdy sleeper and quieting his trumpet,
heard by all ears now that the accompaniment of the wheels was at an
end.

George, violently awakened, complained that it was before his time, to
which he was true; and was for going off again with exalted
contentment, though his heels had been tugged, and were dangling some
length out of the machine; but his comrade, with a determined blow of
the lungs, gave another valiant pull, and George Stokes was on his
legs, marvelling at the world and man. Evan had less difficulty with
the girl. She rose to meet him, put up her arms for him to clasp her
waist, whispering sharply in an inward breath: “What are you going to
do with me?” and indifferent to his verbal response, trustingly yielded
her limbs to his guidance. He could see blood on her bitten underlip;
as, with the help of the waggoner, he lifted her on the mattress,
backed by a portly bundle, which the sagacity of Mr. Stokes had
selected for his couch.

The waggoner cracked his whip, laughing at George Stokes, who yawned
and settled into a composed ploughswing, without asking questions;
apparently resolved to finish his nap on his legs.

“Warn’t he like that Myzepper chap, I see at the circus, bound athert
gray mare!” chuckled the waggoner. “So he’d ’a gone on, had ye ’a let
’n. No wulves waddn’t wake Garge till he’d slept it out. Then he’d say,
‘marnin’!’ to ’m. Are ye ’wake now, Garge?”

The admirable sleeper preferred to be a quiet butt, and the waggoner
leisurely exhausted the fun that was to be had out of him; returning to
it with a persistency that evinced more concentration than variety in
his mind. At last Evan said: “Your pace is rather slow. They’ll be shut
up in Fallowfield. I’ll go on ahead. You’ll find me at one of the
inns—the Green Dragon.”

In return for this speech, the waggoner favoured him with a stare,
followed by the exclamation:

“Oh, no! dang that!”

“Why, what’s the matter?” quoth Evan.

“You en’t goin’ to be off, for to leave me and Garge in the lurch
there, with that ther’ young woman, in that ther’ pickle!” returned the
waggoner.

Evan made an appeal to his reason, but finding that impregnable, he
pulled out his scanty purse to guarantee his sincerity with an offer of
pledgemoney. The waggoner waved it aside. He wanted no money, he said.

“Look heer,” he went on; “if you’re for a start, I tells ye plain, I
chucks that ther’ young woman int’ the road.”

Evan bade him not to be a brute.

“Nark and crop!” the waggoner doggedly ejaculated.

Very much surprised that a fellow who appeared sound at heart, should
threaten to behave so basely, Evan asked an explanation: upon which the
waggoner demanded to know what he had eyes for: and as this query
failed to enlighten the youth, he let him understand that he was a man
of family experience, and that it was easy to tell at a glance that the
complaint the young woman laboured under was one common to the
daughters of Eve. He added that, should an emergency arise, he, though
a family man, would be useless: that he always vacated the premises
while those incidental scenes were being enacted at home; and that for
him and George Stokes to be left alone with the young woman, why they
would be of no more service to her than a couple of babies newborn
themselves. He, for his part, he assured Evan, should take to his
heels, and relinquish waggon, and horses, and all; while George
probably would stand and gape; and the end of it would be, they would
all be had up for murder. He diverged from the alarming prospect, by a
renewal of the foregoing alternative to the gentleman who had
constituted himself the young woman’s protector. If he parted company
with them, they would immediately part company with the young woman,
whose condition was evident.

“Why, couldn’t you tall that?” said the waggoner, as Evan, tingling at
the ears, remained silent.

“I know nothing of such things,” he answered, hastily, like one hurt.

I have to repeat the statement, that he was a youth, and a modest one.
He felt unaccountably, unreasonably, but horridly, ashamed. The thought
of his actual position swamped the sickening disgust at tailordom.
Worse, then, might happen to us in this extraordinary world! There was
something more abhorrent than sitting with one’s legs crossed, publicly
stitching, and scoffed at! He called vehemently to the waggoner to whip
the horses, and hurry ahead into Fallowfield; but that worthy, whatever
might be his dire alarms, had a regular pace, that was conscious of no
spur: the reply of “All right!” satisfied him at least; and Evan’s
chaste sighs for the appearance of an assistant petticoat round a turn
of the road, were offered up duly, to the measure of the waggoner’s
steps.

Suddenly the waggoner came to a halt, and said “Blest if that Garge
bain’t a snorin’ on his pins!”

Evan lingered by him with some curiosity, while the waggoner thumped
his thigh to, “Yes he be! no he bain’t!” several times, in eager
hesitation.

“It’s a fellow calling from the downs,” said Evan.

“Ay, so!” responded the waggoner. “Dang’d if I didn’t think ’twere that
Garge of our’n. Hark awhile.”

At a repetition of the call, the waggoner stopped his team. After a few
minutes, a man appeared panting on the bank above them, down which he
ran precipitately, knocked against Evan, apologized with the little
breath that remained to him, and then held his hand as to entreat a
hearing. Evan thought him half-mad; the waggoner was about to imagine
him the victim of a midnight assault. He undeceived them by requesting,
in rather flowery terms, conveyance on the road and rest for his limbs.
It being explained to him that the waggon was already occupied, he
comforted himself aloud with the reflection that it was something to be
on the road again for one who had been belated, lost, and wandering
over the downs for the last six hours.

“Walcome to git in, when young woman gits out,” said the waggoner.
“I’ll gi’ ye my sleep on t’ Hillford.”

“Thanks, worthy friend,” returned the new comer. “The state of the case
is this—I’m happy to take from humankind whatsoever I can get. If this
gentleman will accept of my company, and my legs hold out, all will yet
be well.”

Though he did not wear a petticoat, Evan was not sorry to have him.
Next to the interposition of the Gods, we pray for human fellowship
when we are in a mess. So he mumbled politely, dropped with him a
little to the rear, and they all stepped out to the crack of the
waggoner’s whip.

“Rather a slow pace,” said Evan, feeling bound to converse.

“Six hours on the downs makes it extremely suitable to me,” rejoined
the stranger.

“You lost your way?”

“I did, sir. Yes; one does not court those desolate regions wittingly.
I am for life and society. The embraces of Diana do not agree with my
constitution. If classics there be who differ from me, I beg them to
take six hours on the downs alone with the moon, and the last prospect
of bread and cheese, and a chaste bed, seemingly utterly extinguished.
I am cured of my romance. Of course, when I say bread and cheese, I
speak figuratively. Food is implied.”

Evan stole a glance at his companion.

“Besides,” the other continued, with an inflexion of grandeur, “for a
man accustomed to his hunters, it is, you will confess, unpleasant—I
speak hypothetically—to be reduced to his legs to that extent that it
strikes him shrewdly he will run them into stumps.”

The stranger laughed.

The fair lady of the night illumined his face, like one who recognized
a subject. Evan thought he knew the voice. A curious struggle therein
between native facetiousness and an attempt at dignity, appeared to
Evan not unfamiliar; and the egregious failure of ambition and triumph
of the instinct, helped him to join the stranger in his mirth.

“Jack Raikes?” he said: “surely?”

“The man!” it was answered to him. “But you? and near our old
school—Viscount Harrington? These marvels occur, you see—we meet again
by night.”

Evan, with little gratification at the meeting, fell into their former
comradeship; tickled by a recollection of his old schoolfellow’s
India-rubber mind.

Mr. Raikes stood about a head under him. He had extremely mobile
features; thick, flexible eyebrows; a loose, voluble mouth; a
ridiculous figure on a dandified foot. He represented to you one who
was rehearsing a part he wished to act before the world, and was not
aware that he took the world into his confidence.

How he had come there his elastic tongue explained in tropes and puns
and lines of dramatic verse. His patrimony spent, he at once believed
himself an actor, and he was hissed off the stage of a provincial
theatre.

“Ruined, the last ignominy endured, I fled from the gay vistas of the
Bench—for they live who would thither lead me! and determined, the day
before the yesterday—what think’st thou? why to go boldly, and offer
myself as Adlatus to blessed old Cudford! Yes! a little Latin is all
that remains to me, and I resolved, like the man I am, to turn, hic,
hac, hoc, into bread and cheese, and beer: Impute nought foreign to me,
in the matter of pride.”

“Usher in our old school—poor old Jack!” exclaimed Evan.

“Lieutenant in the Cudford Academy!” the latter rejoined. “I walked the
distance from London. I had my interview with the respected principal.
He gave me of mutton nearest the bone, which, they say, is sweetest;
and on sweet things you should not regale in excess. Endymion watched
the sheep that bred that mutton! He gave me the thin beer of our
boyhood, that I might the more soberly state my mission. That beer, my
friend, was brewed by one who wished to form a study for pantomimic
masks. He listened with the gravity which is all his own to the recital
of my career; he pleasantly compared me to Phaethon, congratulated the
river Thames at my not setting it on fire in my rapid descent, and
extended to me the three fingers of affectionate farewell. ‘You an
usher, a rearer of youth, Mr. Raikes? Oh, no! Oh, no!’ That was all I
could get out of him. ’Gad! he might have seen that I didn’t joke with
the mutton-bone. If I winced at the beer it was imperceptible. Now a
man who can do that is what I call a man in earnest.”

“You’ve just come from Cudford?” said Evan.

“Short is the tale, though long the way, friend Harrington. From Bodley
is ten miles to Beckley. I walked them. From Beckley is fifteen miles
to Fallowfield. Them I was traversing, when, lo! near sweet eventide a
fair horsewoman riding with her groom at her horse’s heels. ‘Lady,’
says I, addressing her, as much out of the style of the needy as
possible, ‘will you condescend to direct me to Fallowfield?’—‘Are you
going to the match?’ says she. I answered boldly that I was. ‘Beckley’s
in,’ says she, ‘and you’ll be in time to see them out, if you cut
across the downs there.’ I lifted my hat—a desperate measure, for the
brim won’t bear much—but honour to women though we perish. She bowed: I
cut across the downs. In fine, Harrington, old boy, I’ve been wandering
among those downs for the last seven or eight hours. I was on the point
of turning my back on the road for the twentieth time, I believe when I
heard your welcome vehicular music, and hailed you; and I ask you,
isn’t it luck for a fellow who hasn’t got a penny in his pocket, and is
as hungry as five hundred hunters, to drop on an old friend like this?”

Evan answered with the question:

“Where was it you said you met the young lady?”

“In the first place, O Amadis! I never said she was young. You’re on
the scent, I see.”

Nursing the fresh image of his darling in his heart’s recesses, Evan,
as they entered Fallowfield, laid the state of his purse before Jack,
and earned anew the epithet of Amadis, when it came to be told that the
occupant of the waggon was likewise one of its pensioners.

Sleep had long held its reign in Fallowfield. Nevertheless, Mr. Raikes,
though blind windows alone looked on him, and nought foreign was to be
imputed to him in the matter of pride, had become exceedingly
solicitous concerning his presentation to the inhabitants of that quiet
little country town; and while Evan and the waggoner consulted—the
former with regard to the chances of procuring beds and supper, the
latter as to his prospect of beer and a comfortable riddance of the
feminine burden weighing on them all—Mr. Raikes was engaged in
persuading his hat to assume something of the gentlemanly polish of its
youth, and might have been observed now and then furtively catching up
a leg to be dusted. Ere the wheels of the waggon stopped he had gained
that ease of mind which the knowledge that you have done all a man may
do and circumstances warrant, establishes. Capacities conscious of
their limits may repose even proudly when they reach them; and, if Mr.
Raikes had not quite the air of one come out of a bandbox, he at least
proved to the discerning intelligence that he knew what sort of manner
befitted that happy occasion, and was enabled by the pains he had taken
to glance with a challenge at the sign of the hostelry, under which
they were now ranked, and from which, though the hour was late, and
Fallowfield a singularly somnolent little town, there issued signs of
life approaching to festivity.




CHAPTER XI.
DOINGS AT AN INN


What every traveller sighs to find, was palatably furnished by the
Green Dragon of Fallowfield—a famous inn, and a constellation for
wandering coachmen. There pleasant smiles seasoned plenty, and the bill
was gilded in a manner unknown to our days. Whoso drank of the ale of
the Green Dragon kept in his memory a place apart for it. The secret,
that to give a warm welcome is the breath of life to an inn, was one
the Green Dragon boasted, even then, not to share with many Red Lions,
or Cocks of the Morning, or Kings’ Heads, or other fabulous monsters;
and as if to show that when you are in the right track you are sure to
be seconded, there was a friend of the Green Dragon, who, on a
particular night of the year, caused its renown to enlarge to the
dimensions of a miracle. But that, for the moment, is my secret.

Evan and Jack were met in the passage by a chambermaid. Before either
of them could speak, she had turned and fled, with the words:

“More coming!” which, with the addition of “My goodness me!” were
echoed by the hostess in her recess. Hurried directions seemed to be
consequent, and then the hostess sallied out, and said, with a curtsey:

“Please to step in, gentlemen. This is the room, tonight.”

Evan lifted his hat; and bowing, requested to know whether they could
have a supper and beds.

“Beds, Sir!” cried the hostess. “What am I to do for beds! Yes, beds
indeed you may have, but bed-rooms—if you ask for them, it really is
more than I can supply you with. I have given up my own. I sleep with
my maid Jane to-night.”

“Anything will do for us, madam,” replied Evan, renewing his foreign
courtesy. “But there is a poor young woman outside.”

“Another!” The hostess instantly smiled down her inhospitable outcry.

“She,” said Evan, “must have a room to herself. She is ill.”

“Must is must, sir,” returned the gracious hostess. “But I really
haven’t the means.”

“You have bed-rooms, madam?”

“Every one of them engaged, sir.”

“By ladies, madam?”

“Lord forbid, Sir!” she exclaimed with the honest energy of a woman who
knew her sex.

Evan bade Jack go and assist the waggoner to bring in the girl. Jack,
who had been all the time pulling at his wristbands, and settling his
coat-collar by the dim reflection of a window of the bar, departed,
after, on his own authority, assuring the hostess that fever was not
the young woman’s malady, as she protested against admitting fever into
her house, seeing that she had to consider her guests.

“We’re open to all the world to-night, except fever,” said the hostess.
“Yes,” she rejoined to Evan’s order that the waggoner and his mate
should be supplied with ale, “they shall have as much as they can
drink,” which is not a speech usual at inns, when one man gives an
order for others, but Evan passed it by, and politely begged to be
shown in to one of the gentlemen who had engaged bedrooms.

“Oh! if you can persuade any of them, sir, I’m sure I’ve nothing to
say,” observed the hostess. “Pray, don’t ask me to stand by and back
it, that’s all.”

Had Evan been familiar with the Green Dragon, he would have noticed
that the landlady, its presiding genius, was stiffer than usual; the
rosy smile was more constrained, as if a great host had to be embraced,
and were trying it to the utmost stretch. There was, however, no
asperity about her, and when she had led him to the door he was to
enter to prefer his suit, and she had asked whether the young woman was
quite common, and he had replied that he had picked her up on the road,
and that she was certainly poor, the hostess said:

“I’m sure you’re a very good gentleman, sir, and if I could spare your
asking at all, I would.”

With that she went back to encounter Mr. Raikes and his charge, and
prime the waggoner and his mate.

A noise of laughter and talk was stilled gradually, as Evan made his
bow into a spacious room, wherein, as the tops of pines are seen
swimming on the morning mist, about a couple of dozen guests of divers
conditions sat partially revealed through wavy clouds of tobacco-smoke.
By their postures, which Evan’s appearance by no means disconcerted,
you read in a glance men who had been at ease for so many hours that
they had no troubles in the world save the two ultimate perplexities of
the British Sybarite, whose bed of roses is harassed by the pair of
problems: first, what to do with his legs; secondly, how to imbibe
liquor with the slightest possible derangement of those members
subordinate to his upper structure. Of old the Sybarite complained. Not
so our self-helpful islanders. Since they could not, now that work was
done and jollity the game, take off their legs, they got away from them
as far as they might, in fashions original or imitative: some by
thrusting them out at full length; some by cramping them under their
chairs: while some, taking refuge in a mental effort, forgot them, a
process to be recommended if it did not involve occasional pangs of
consciousness to the legs of their neighbours. We see in our cousins
West of the great water, who are said to exaggerate our peculiarities,
beings labouring under the same difficulty, and intent on its solution.
As to the second problem: that of drinking without discomposure to the
subservient limbs: the company present worked out this republican
principle ingeniously, but in a manner beneath the attention of the
Muse. Let Clio record that mugs and glasses, tobacco and pipes, were
strewn upon the table. But if the guests had arrived at that stage when
to reach the arm, or arrange the person, for a sip of good stuff,
causes moral debates, and presents to the mind impediments equal to
what would be raised in active men by the prospect of a great
excursion, it is not to be wondered at that the presence of a stranger
produced no immediate commotion. Two or three heads were half turned;
such as faced him imperceptibly lifted their eyelids.

“Good evening, sir,” said one who sat as chairman, with a decisive nod.

“Good night, ain’t it?” a jolly-looking old fellow queried of the
speaker, in an under-voice.

“’Gad, you don’t expect me to be wishing the gentleman good-bye, do
you?” retorted the former.

“Ha! ha! No, to be sure,” answered the old boy; and the remark was
variously uttered, that “Good night,” by a caprice of our language, did
sound like it.

“Good evening’s ‘How d’ ye do?’—‘How are ye?’ Good night’s ‘Be off, and
be blowed to you,’” observed an interpreter with a positive mind; and
another, whose intelligence was not so clear, but whose perceptions had
seized the point, exclaimed: “I never says it when I hails a chap; but,
dash my buttons, if I mightn’t ’a done, one day or another! Queer!”

The chairman, warmed by his joke, added, with a sharp wink: “Ay; it
would be queer, if you hailed ‘Good night’ in the middle of the day!”
and this among a company soaked in ripe ale, could not fail to run the
electric circle, and persuaded several to change their positions; in
the rumble of which, Evan’s reply, if he had made any, was lost. Few,
however, were there who could think of him, and ponder on that glimpse
of fun, at the same time; and he would have been passed over, had not
the chairman said: “Take a seat, sir; make yourself comfortable.”

“Before I have that pleasure,” replied Evan, “I—”

“I see where ’tis,” burst out the old boy who had previously
superinduced a diversion: “he’s going to ax if he can’t have a bed!”

A roar of laughter, and “Don’t you remember this day last year?”
followed the cunning guess. For awhile explication was impossible; and
Evan coloured, and smiled, and waited for them.

“I was going to ask—”

“Said so!” shouted the old boy, gleefully.

“—one of the gentlemen who has engaged a bed-room to do me the extreme
favour to step aside with me, and allow me a moment’s speech with him.”

Long faces were drawn, and odd stares were directed toward him, in
reply.

“I see where ’tis”; the old boy thumped his knee. “Ain’t it now? Speak
up, sir! There’s a lady in the case?”

“I may tell you thus much,” answered Evan, “that it is an unfortunate
young woman, very ill, who needs rest and quiet.”

“Didn’t I say so?” shouted the old boy.

But this time, though his jolly red jowl turned all round to demand a
confirmation, it was not generally considered that he had divined so
correctly. Between a lady and an unfortunate young woman, there seemed
to be a strong distinction, in the minds of the company.

The chairman was the most affected by the communication. His bushy
eyebrows frowned at Evan, and he began tugging at the brass buttons of
his coat, like one preparing to arm for a conflict.

“Speak out, sir, if you please,” he said. “Above board—no asides—no
taking advantages. You want me to give up my bed-room for the use of
your young woman, sir?”

Evan replied quietly: “She is a stranger to me; and if you could see
her, sir, and know her situation, I think she would move your pity.”

“I don’t doubt it, sir—I don’t doubt it,” returned the chairman. “They
all move our pity. That’s how they get over us. She has diddled you,
and she would diddle me, and diddle us all—diddle the devil, I dare
say, when her time comes. I don’t doubt it, sir.”

To confront a vehement old gentleman, sitting as president in an
assembly of satellites, requires command of countenance, and Evan was
not browbeaten: he held him, and the whole room, from where he stood,
under a serene and serious eye, for his feelings were too deeply
stirred on behalf of the girl to let him think of himself. That
question of hers, “What are you going to do with me?” implying such
helplessness and trust, was still sharp on his nerves.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “I humbly beg your pardon for disturbing you as I
do.”

But with a sudden idea that a general address on behalf of a particular
demand must necessarily fail, he let his eyes rest on one there, whose
face was neither stupid nor repellent, and who, though he did not look
up, had an attentive, thoughtful cast about the mouth.

“May I entreat a word apart with you, sir?”

Evan was not mistaken in the index he had perused. The gentleman seemed
to feel that he was selected from the company, and slightly raising his
head, carelessly replied: “My bed is entirely at your disposal,”
resuming his contemplative pose.

On the point of thanking him, Evan advanced a step, when up started the
irascible chairman.

“I don’t permit it! I won’t allow it!” And before Evan could ask his
reasons, he had rung the bell, muttering: “They follow us to our inns,
now, the baggages! They must harry us at our inns! We can’t have peace
and quiet at our inns!—”

In a state of combustion, he cried out to the waiter:

“Here, Mark, this gentleman has brought in a dirty wench: pack her up
to my bed-room, and lock her in lock her in, and bring down the key.”

Agreeably deceived in the old gentleman’s intentions, Evan could not
refrain from joining the murmured hilarity created by the conclusion of
his order. The latter glared at him, and added: “Now, sir, you’ve done
your worst. Sit down, and be merry.”

Replying that he had a friend outside, and would not fail to accept the
invitation, Evan retired. He was met by the hostess with the
reproachful declaration on her lips, that she was a widow woman, wise
in appearances, and that he had brought into her house that night work
she did not expect, or bargain for. Rather (since I must speak truth of
my gentleman) to silence her on the subject, and save his ears, than to
propitiate her favour towards the girl, Evan drew out his
constitutionally lean purse, and dropped it in her hand, praying her to
put every expense incurred to his charge. She exclaimed:

“If Dr. Pillie has his full sleep this night, I shall be astonished”;
and Evan hastily led Jack into the passage to impart to him, that the
extent of his resources was reduced to the smallest of sums in
shillings.

“I can beat my friend at that reckoning,” said Mr. Raikes; and they
entered the room.

Eyes were on him. This had ever the effect of causing him to swell to
monstrous proportions in the histrionic line. Asking the waiter
carelessly for some light supper dish, he suggested the various French,
with “not that?” and the affable naming of another. “Nor that? Dear me,
we shall have to sup on chops, I believe!”

Evan saw the chairman scrutinizing Raikes, much as he himself might
have done, and he said: “Bread and cheese for me.”

Raikes exclaimed: “Really? Well, my lord, you lead, and your taste is
mine!”

A second waiter scudded past, and stopped before the chairman to say:
“If you please, sir, the gentlemen upstairs send their compliments, and
will be happy to accept.”

“Ha!” was the answer. “Thought better of it, have they! Lay for three
more, then. Five more, I guess.” He glanced at the pair of intruders.

Among a portion of the guests there had been a return to common talk,
and one had observed that he could not get that “Good Evening,” and
“Good Night,” out of his head which had caused a friend to explain the
meaning of these terms of salutation to him: while another, of a
philosophic turn, pursued the theme: “You see, when we meets, we makes
a night of it. So, when we parts, it’s Good Night—natural! ain’t it?” A
proposition assented to, and considerably dilated on; but whether he
was laughing at that, or what had aroused the fit, the chairman did not
say.

Gentle chuckles had succeeded his laughter by the time the bread and
cheese appeared.

In the rear of the provision came three young gentlemen, of whom the
foremost lumped in, singing to one behind him, “And you shall have
little Rosey!”

They were clad in cricketing costume, and exhibited the health and
manners of youthful Englishmen of station. Frolicsome young bulls
bursting on an assemblage of sheep, they might be compared to. The
chairman welcomed them a trifle snubbingly. The colour mounted to the
cheeks of Mr. Raikes as he made incision in the cheese, under their
eyes, knitting his brows fearfully, as if at hard work.

The chairman entreated Evan to desist from the cheese; and, pulling out
his watch, thundered: “Time!”

The company generally jumped on their legs; and, in the midst of a hum
of talk and laughter, he informed Evan and Jack, that he invited them
cordially to a supper up-stairs, and would be pleased if they would
partake of it, and in a great rage if they would not.

Raikes was for condescending to accept.

Evan sprang up and cried: “Gladly, sir,” and gladly would he have cast
his cockney schoolmate to the winds, in the presence of these young
cricketers; for he had a prognostication.

The door was open, and the company of jolly yeomen, tradesmen, farmers,
and the like, had become intent on observing all the ceremonies of
precedence: not one would broaden his back on the other; and there was
bowing, and scraping, and grimacing, till Farmer Broadmead was hailed
aloud, and the old boy stepped forth, and was summarily pushed through:
the chairman calling from the rear, “Hulloa! no names to-night!” to
which was answered lustily: “All right, Mr. Tom!” and the speaker was
reproved with, “There you go! at it again!” and out and up they
hustled.

The chairman said quietly to Evan, as they were ascending the stairs:
“We don’t have names to-night; may as well drop titles.” Which
presented no peculiar meaning to Evan’s mind, and he smiled the usual
smile.

To Raikes, at the door of the supper-room, the chairman repeated the
same; and with extreme affability and alacrity of abnegation, the other
rejoined, “Oh, certainly!”

No wonder that he rubbed his hands with more delight than aristocrats
and people with gentlemanly connections are in the habit of betraying
at the prospect of refection, for the release from bread and cheese was
rendered overpoweringly glorious, in his eyes, by the bountiful
contrast exhibited on the board before him.




CHAPTER XII.
IN WHICH ALE IS SHOWN TO HAVE ONE QUALITY OF WINE


To proclaim that yon ribs of beef and yonder ruddy Britons have met, is
to furnish matter for an hour’s comfortable meditation.

Digest the fact. Here the Fates have put their seal to something Nature
clearly devised. It was intended; and it has come to pass. A thing has
come to pass which we feel to be right! The machinery of the world,
then, is not entirely dislocated: there is harmony, on one point, among
the mysterious powers who have to do with us.

Apart from its eloquent and consoling philosophy, the picture is
pleasant. You see two rows of shoulders resolutely set for action:
heads in divers degrees of proximity to their plates: eyes variously
twinkling, or hypocritically composed: chaps in vigorous exercise. Now
leans a fellow right back with his whole face to the firmament: Ale is
his adoration. He sighs not till he sees the end of the mug. Now from
one a laugh is sprung; but, as if too early tapped, he turns off the
cock, and primes himself anew. Occupied by their own requirements,
these Britons allow that their neighbours have rights: no cursing at
waste of time is heard when plates have to be passed: disagreeable, it
is still duty. Field-Marshal Duty, the Briton’s chief star, shines
here. If one usurps more than his allowance of elbow-room, bring your
charge against them that fashioned him: work away to arrive at some
compass yourself.

Now the mustard ceases to travel, and the salt: the guests have leisure
to contemplate their achievements. Laughs are more prolonged, and come
from the depths.

Now Ale, which is to Beef what Eve was to Adam, threatens to take
possession of the field. Happy they who, following Nature’s direction,
admitted not bright ale into their Paradise till their manhood was
strengthened with beef. Some, impatient, had thirsted; had satisfied
their thirst; and the ale, the light though lovely spirit, with nothing
to hold it down, had mounted to their heads; just as Eve will do when
Adam is not mature: just as she did—Alas!

Now, the ruins of the feast being removed, and a clear course left for
the flow of ale, Farmer Broadmead, facing the chairman, rises. He
stands in an attitude of midway. He speaks:

“Gentlemen! ’Taint fust time you and I be met here, to salbrate this
here occasion. I say, not fust time, not by many a time, ’taint. Well,
gentlemen, I ain’t much of a speaker, gentlemen, as you know. Howsever,
here I be. No denyin’ that. I’m on my legs. This here’s a strange
enough world, and a man’s a gentleman, I say, we ought for to be glad
when we got ’m. You know: I’m coming to it shortly. I ain’t much of a
speaker, and if you wants somethin’ new, you must ax elsewhere: but
what I say is—Bang it! here’s good health and long life to Mr. Tom, up
there!”

“No names!” shouts the chairman, in the midst of a tremendous clatter.

Farmer Broadmead moderately disengages his breadth from the seat. He
humbly axes pardon, which is accorded him with a blunt nod.

Ale (to Beef what Eve was to Adam) circulates beneath a dazzling foam,
fair as the first woman.

Mr. Tom (for the breach of the rules in mentioning whose name on a
night when identities are merged, we offer sincere apologies every
other minute), Mr. Tom is toasted. His parents, who selected that day
sixty years ago, for his bow to be made to the world, are alluded to
with encomiums, and float down to posterity on floods of liquid amber.

But to see all the subtle merits that now begin to bud out from Mr.
Tom, the chairman and giver of the feast; and also rightly to
appreciate the speeches, we require to be enormously charged with Ale.
Mr. Raikes did his best to keep his head above the surface of the rapid
flood. He conceived the chairman in brilliant colours, and probably
owing to the energy called for by his brain, the legs of the young man
failed him twice, as he tried them. Attention was demanded. Mr. Raikes
addressed the meeting.

The three young gentlemen-cricketers had hitherto behaved with a
certain propriety. It did not offend Mr. Raikes to see them conduct
themselves as if they were at a play, and the rest of the company paid
actors. He had likewise taken a position, and had been the first to
laugh aloud at a particular slip of grammar; while his shrugs at the
aspirates transposed and the pronunciation prevalent, had almost
established a free-masonry between him and one of the three young
gentlemen-cricketers—a fair-haired youth, with a handsome, reckless
face, who leaned on the table, humorously eyeing the several speakers,
and exchanging by-words and laughs with his friends on each side of
him.

But Mr. Raikes had the disadvantage of having come to the table empty
in stomach—thirsty exceedingly; and, I repeat, that as, without
experience, you are the victim of divinely given Eve, so, with no
foundation to receive it upon, are you the victim of good sound Ale. He
very soon lost his head. He would otherwise have seen that he must
produce a wonderfully-telling speech if he was to keep the position he
had taken, and had better not attempt one. The three young cricketers
were hostile from the beginning. All of them leant forward, calling
attention loudly laughing for the fun to come.

“Gentlemen!” he said: and said it twice. The gap was wide, and he said,
“Gentlemen!” again.

This commencement of a speech proves that you have made the plunge, but
not that you can swim. At a repetition of “Gentlemen!” expectancy
resolved into cynicism.

“Gie’n a help,” sang out a son of the plough to a neighbour of the
orator.

“Hang it!” murmured another, “we ain’t such gentlemen as that comes
to.”

Mr. Raikes was politely requested to “tune his pipe.”

With a gloomy curiosity as to the results of Jack’s adventurous
undertaking, and a touch of anger at the three whose bearing throughout
had displeased him, Evan regarded his friend. He, too, had drunk, and
upon emptiness. Bright ale had mounted to his brain. A hero should be
held as sacred as the Grand Llama: so let no more be said than that he
drank still, nor marked the replenishing of his glass.

Raikes cleared his throat for a final assault: he had got an image, and
was dashing off; but, unhappily, as if to make the start seem fair, he
was guilty of his reiteration, “Gentlemen.”

Everybody knew that it was a real start this time, and indeed he had
made an advance, and had run straight through half a sentence. It was
therefore manifestly unfair, inimical, contemptuous, overbearing, and
base, for one of the three young cricketers at this period to fling
back weariedly and exclaim: “By the Lord; too many gentlemen here!”

Evan heard him across the table. Lacking the key of the speaker’s
previous conduct, the words might have passed. As it was, they, to the
ale-invaded head of a young hero, feeling himself the world’s equal,
and condemned nevertheless to bear through life the insignia of
Tailordom, not unnaturally struck with peculiar offence. There was
arrogance, too, in the young man who had interposed. He was long in the
body, and, when he was not refreshing his sight by a careless
contemplation of his finger-nails, looked down on his company at table,
as one may do who comes from loftier studies. He had what is popularly
known as the nose of our aristocracy: a nose that much culture of the
external graces, and affectation of suavity, are required to soften.
Thereto were joined thin lips and arched brows. Birth it was possible
he could boast, hardly brains. He sat to the right of the fair-haired
youth, who, with his remaining comrade, a quiet smiling fellow,
appeared to be better liked by the guests, and had been hailed once or
twice, under correction of the chairman, as Mr. Harry. The three had
distinguished one there by a few friendly passages; and this was he who
had offered his bed to Evan for the service of the girl. The
recognition they extended to him did not affect him deeply. He was
called Drummond, and had his place near the chairmen, whose humours he
seemed to relish.

The ears of Mr. Raikes were less keen at the moment than Evan’s, but
his openness to ridicule was that of a man on his legs solus, amid a
company sitting, and his sense of the same—when he saw himself the
victim of it—acute. His face was rather comic, and, under the shadow of
embarrassment, twitching and working for ideas—might excuse a want of
steadiness and absolute gravity in the countenances of others.

The chairman’s neighbour, Drummond, whispered him “Laxley will get up a
row with that fellow.”

“It’s young Jocelyn egging him on,” said the chairman.

“Um!” added Drummond: “it’s the friend of that talkative rascal that’s
dangerous, if it comes to anything.”

Mr. Raikes perceived that his host desired him to conclude. So, lifting
his voice and swinging his arm, he ended: “Allow me to propose to you
the Fly in Amber. In other words, our excellent host embalmed in
brilliant ale! Drink him! and so let him live in our memories for
ever!”

He sat down very well contented with himself, very little comprehended,
and applauded loudly.

“The Flyin’ Number!” echoed Farmer Broadmead, confidently and with
clamour; adding to a friend, when both had drunk the toast to the
dregs, “But what number that be, or how many ’tis of ’em, dishes me!
But that’s ne’ther here nor there.”

The chairman and host of the evening stood up to reply, welcomed by
thunders—“There ye be, Mr. Tom! glad I lives to see ye!” and “No
names!” and “Long life to him!”

This having subsided, the chairman spoke, first nodding. “You don’t
want many words, and if you do, you won’t get ’em from me.”

Cries of “Got something better!” took up the blunt address.

“You’ve been true to it, most of you. I like men not to forget a
custom.”

“Good reason so to be,” and “A jolly good custom,” replied to both
sentences.

“As to the beef, I hope you didn’t find it tough: as to the ale—I know
all about THAT!”

“Aha! good!” rang the verdict.

“All I can say is, that this day next year it will be on the table, and
I hope that every one of you will meet Tom—will meet me here
punctually. I’m not a Parliament man, so that’ll do.”

The chairman’s breach of his own rules drowned the termination of his
speech in an uproar.

Re-seating himself, he lifted his glass, and proposed: “The
Antediluvians!”

Farmer Broadmead echoed: “The Antediloovians!” appending, as a private
sentiment, “And dam rum chaps they were!”

The Antediluvians, undoubtedly the toast of the evening, were
enthusiastically drunk, and in an ale of treble brew.

When they had quite gone down, Mr. Raikes ventured to ask for the
reason of their receiving such honour from a posterity they had so
little to do with. He put the question mildly, but was impetuously
snapped at by the chairman.

“You respect men for their luck, sir, don’t you? Don’t be a hypocrite,
and say you don’t—you do. Very well: so do I. That’s why I drink ‘The
Antediluvians’!”

“Our worthy host here” (Drummond, gravely smiling, undertook to
elucidate the case) “has a theory that the constitutions of the
Postdiluvians have been deranged, and their lives shortened, by the
miasmas of the Deluge. I believe he carries it so far as to say that
Noah, in the light of a progenitor, is inferior to Adam, owing to the
shaking he had to endure in the ark, and which he conceives to have
damaged the patriarch and the nervous systems of his sons. It’s a
theory, you know.”

“They lived close on a thousand years, hale, hearty—and no water!” said
the chairman.

“Well!” exclaimed one, some way down the table, a young farmer, red as
a cock’s comb: “no fools they, eh, master? Where there’s ale, would you
drink water, my hearty?” and back he leaned to enjoy the tribute to his
wit; a wit not remarkable, but nevertheless sufficient in the noise it
created to excite the envy of Mr. Raikes, who, inveterately silly when
not engaged in a contest, now began to play on the names of the sons of
Noah.

The chairman lanced a keen light at him from beneath his bushy
eyebrows.

Before long he had again to call two parties to order. To Raikes,
Laxley was a puppy: to Laxley, Mr. Raikes was a snob. The antagonism
was natural: ale did but put the match to the magazine. But previous to
an explosion, Laxley, who had observed Evan’s disgust at Jack’s
exhibition of himself, and had been led to think, by his conduct and
clothes in conjunction, that Evan was his own equal; a gentleman
condescending to the society of a low-born acquaintance;—had sought
with sundry propitiations, intelligent glances, light shrugs, and such
like, to divide Evan from Jack. He did this, doubtless, because he
partly sympathized with Evan, and to assure him that he took a separate
view of him. Probably Evan was already offended, or he held to Jack, as
a comrade should, or else it was that Tailordom and the pride of his
accepted humiliation bellowed in his ears, every fresh minute: “Nothing
assume!” I incline to think that the more ale he drank the fiercer
rebel he grew against conventional ideas of rank, and those
class-barriers which we scorn so vehemently when we find ourselves
kicking at them. Whatsoever the reason that prompted him, he did not
respond to Laxley’s advances; and Laxley, disregarding him, dealt with
Raikes alone.

In a tone plainly directed at him, he said: “Well, Harry, tired of
this? The agriculturals are good fun, but I can’t stand much of the
small cockney. A blackguard who tries to make jokes out of the
Scriptures ought to be kicked!”

Harry rejoined, with wet lips: “Wopping stuff, this ale! Who’s that you
want to kick?”

“Somebody who objects to his bray, I suppose,” Mr. Raikes struck in,
across the table, negligently thrusting out his elbow to support his
head.

“Did you allude to me, sir?” Laxley inquired.

“I alluded to a donkey, sir.” Raikes lifted his eyelids to the same
level as Laxley’s: “a passing remark on that interesting animal.”

His friend Harry now came into the ring to try a fall.

“Are you an usher in a school?” he asked, meaning by his looks what men
of science in fisticuffs call business.

Mr. Raikes started in amazement. He recovered as quickly.

“No, sir, not quite; but I have no doubt I should be able to instruct
you upon a point or two.”

“Good manners, for instance?” remarked the third young cricketer,
without disturbing his habitual smile.

“Or what comes from not observing them,” said Evan, unwilling to have
Jack over-matched.

“Perhaps you’ll give me a lesson now?” Harry indicated a readiness to
rise for either of them.

At this juncture the chairman interposed.

“Harmony, my lads!—harmony to-night.”

Farmer Broadmead, imagining it to be the signal for a song, returned:

“All right, Mr.—- Mr. Chair! but we an’t got pipes in yet. Pipes before
harmony, you know, to-night.”

The pipes were summoned forthwith. System appeared to regulate the
proceedings of this particular night at the Green Dragon. The pipes
charged, and those of the guests who smoked, well fixed behind them,
celestial Harmony was invoked through the slowly curling clouds. In
Britain the Goddess is coy. She demands pressure to appear, and great
gulps of ale. Vastly does she swell the chests of her island children,
but with the modesty of a maid at the commencement. Precedence again
disturbed the minds of the company. At last the red-faced young farmer
led off with “The Rose and the Thorn.” In that day Chloe still lived;
nor were the amorous transports of Strephon quenched. Mountainous
inflation—mouse-like issue characterized the young farmer’s first
verse. Encouraged by manifest approbation he now told Chloe that he “by
Heaven! never would plant in that bosom a thorn,” with such a volume of
sound as did indeed show how a lover’s oath should be uttered in the
ear of a British damsel to subdue her.

“Good!” cried Mr. Raikes, anxious to be convivial.

Subsiding into impertinence, he asked Laxley, “Could you tip us a
Strephonade, sir? Rejoiced to listen to you, I’m sure! Promise you my
applause beforehand.”

Harry replied hotly: “Will you step out of the room with me a minute?”

“Have you a confession to make?” quoth Jack, unmoved. “Have you planted
a thorn in the feminine flower-garden? Make a clean breast of it at the
table. Confess openly and be absolved.”

While Evan spoke a word of angry reproof to Raikes, Harry had to be
restrained by his two friends. The rest of the company looked on with
curiosity; the mouth of the chairman was bunched. Drummond had his eyes
on Evan, who was gazing steadily at the three. Suddenly “The fellow
isn’t a gentleman!” struck the attention of Mr. Raikes with alarming
force.

Raikes—and it may be because he knew he could do more than Evan in this
respect—vociferated: “I’m the son of a gentleman!”

Drummond, from the head of the table, saw that a diversion was
imperative. He leaned forward, and with a look of great interest said:

“Are you? Pray, never disgrace your origin, then.”

“If the choice were offered me, I think I would rather have known his
father,” said the smiling fellow, yawning, and rocking on his chair.

“You would, possibly, have been exceedingly intimate—with his right
foot,” said Raikes.

The other merely remarked: “Oh! that is the language of the son of a
gentleman.”

The tumult of irony, abuse, and retort, went on despite the efforts of
Drummond and the chairman. It was odd; for at Farmer Broadmead’s end of
the table, friendship had grown maudlin: two were seen in a drowsy
embrace, with crossed pipes; and others were vowing deep amity, and
offering to fight the man that might desire it.

“Are ye a friend? or are ye a foe?” was heard repeatedly, and
consequences to the career of the respondent, on his choice of
affirmatives to either of these two interrogations, emphatically
detailed.

It was likewise asked, in reference to the row at the gentlemen’s end:
“Why doan’ they stand up and have ’t out?”

“They talks, they speechifies—why doan’ they fight for ’t, and then be
friendly?”

“Where’s the yarmony, Mr. Chair, I axes—so please ye?” sang out Farmer
Broadmead.

“Ay, ay! Silence!” the chairman called.

Mr. Raikes begged permission to pronounce his excuses, but lapsed into
a lamentation for the squandering of property bequeathed to him by his
respected uncle, and for which—as far as he was intelligible—he
persisted in calling the three offensive young cricketers opposite to
account.

Before he could desist, Harmony, no longer coy, burst on the assembly
from three different sources. “A Man who is given to Liquor,” soared
aloft with “The Maid of sweet Seventeen,” who participated in the
adventures of “Young Molly and the Kicking Cow”; while the guests
selected the chorus of the song that first demanded it.

Evan probably thought that Harmony was herself only when she came
single, or he was wearied of his fellows, and wished to gaze a moment
on the skies whose arms were over and around his young beloved. He went
to the window and threw it up, and feasted his sight on the moon
standing on the downs. He could have wept at the bitter ignominy that
severed him from Rose. And again he gathered his pride as a cloak, and
defied the world, and gloried in the sacrifice that degraded him. The
beauty of the night touched him, and mixed these feelings with
mournfulness. He quite forgot the bellow and clatter behind. The beauty
of the night, and heaven knows what treacherous hope in the depths of
his soul, coloured existence warmly.

He was roused from his reverie by an altercation unmistakeably fierce.

Raikes had been touched on a tender point. In reply to a bantering
remark of his, Laxley had hummed over bits of his oration, amid the
chuckles of his comrades. Unfortunately at a loss for a biting retort,
Raikes was reduced to that plain confession of a lack of wit; he
offered combat.

“I’ll tell you what,” said Laxley, “I never soil my hands with a
blackguard; and a fellow who tries to make fun of Scripture, in my
opinion is one. A blackguard—do you hear? But, if you’ll give me
satisfactory proofs that you really are what I have some difficulty in
believing—the son of a gentleman—I’ll meet you when and where you
please.”

“Fight him, anyhow,” said Harry. “I’ll take him myself after we finish
the match to-morrow.”

Laxley rejoined that Mr. Raikes must be left to him.

“Then I’ll take the other,” said Harry. “Where is he?”

Evan walked round to his place.

“I am here,” he answered, “and at your service.”

“Will you fight?” cried Harry.

There was a disdainful smile on Evan’s mouth, as he replied: “I must
first enlighten you. I have no pretensions to your blue blood, or
yellow. If, sir, you will deign to challenge a man who is not the son
of a gentleman, and consider the expression of his thorough contempt
for your conduct sufficient to enable you to overlook that fact, you
may dispose of me. My friend here has, it seems, reason to be proud of
his connections. That you may not subsequently bring the charge against
me of having led you to ‘soil your hands’—as your friend there terms
it—I, with all the willingness in the world to chastise you or him for
your impertinence, must first give you a fair chance of escape, by
telling you that my father was a tailor.”

The countenance of Mr. Raikes at the conclusion of this speech was a
painful picture. He knocked the table passionately, exclaiming:

“Who’d have thought it?”

Yet he had known it. But he could not have thought it possible for a
man to own it publicly.

Indeed, Evan could not have mentioned it, but for hot fury and the ale.
It was the ale in him expelling truth; and certainly, to look at him,
none would have thought it.

“That will do,” said Laxley, lacking the magnanimity to despise the
advantage given him, “you have chosen the very best means of saving
your skins.”

“We’ll come to you when our supply of clothes runs short,” added Harry.
“A snip!”

“Pardon me!” said Evan, with his eyes slightly widening, “but if you
come to me, I shall no longer give you a choice of behaviour. I wish
you good-night, gentlemen. I shall be in this house, and am to be found
here, till ten o’clock to-morrow morning. Sir,” he addressed the
chairman, “I must apologize to you for this interruption to your
kindness, for which I thank you very sincerely. It’s ‘good-night,’ now,
sir,” he pursued, bowing, and holding out his hand, with a smile.

The chairman grasped it: “You’re a hot-headed young fool, sir: you’re
an ill-tempered ferocious young ass. Can’t you see another young donkey
without joining company in kicks-eh? Sit down, and don’t dare to spoil
the fun any more. You a tailor! Who’ll believe it? You’re a nobleman in
disguise. Didn’t your friend say so?—ha! ha! Sit down.” He pulled out
his watch, and proclaiming that he was born into this world at the hour
about to strike, called for a bumper all round.

While such of the company as had yet legs and eyes unvanquished by the
potency of the ale, stood up to drink and cheer, Mark, the waiter,
scurried into the room, and, to the immense stupefaction of the
chairman, and amusement of his guests, spread the news of the immediate
birth of a little stranger on the premises, who was declared by Dr.
Pillie to be a lusty boy, and for whom the kindly landlady solicited
good luck to be drunk.




CHAPTER XIII.
THE MATCH OF FALLOW FIELD AGAINST BECKLEY


The dramatic proportions to which ale will exalt the sentiments within
us, and our delivery of them, are apt to dwindle and shrink even below
the natural elevation when we look back on them from the hither shore
of the river of sleep—in other words, wake in the morning: and it was
with no very self-satisfied emotions that Evan, dressing by the full
light of day, reviewed his share in the events of the preceding night.
Why, since he had accepted his fate, should he pretend to judge the
conduct of people his superiors in rank? And where was the necessity
for him to thrust the fact of his being that abhorred social pariah
down the throats of an assembly of worthy good fellows? The answer was,
that he had not accepted his fate: that he considered himself as good a
gentleman as any man living, and was in absolute hostility with the
prejudices of society. That was the state of the case: but the
evaporation of ale in his brain caused him to view his actions from the
humble extreme of that delightful liquor, of which the spirit had flown
and the corpse remained.

Having revived his system with soda-water, and finding no sign of his
antagonist below, Mr. Raikes, to disperse the sceptical dimples on his
friend’s face, alluded during breakfast to a determination he had
formed to go forth and show on the cricket-field.

“For, you know,” he observed, “they can’t have any objection to fight
one.”

Evan, slightly colouring, answered: “Why, you said up-stairs, you
thought fighting duels disgraceful folly.”

“So it is, so it is; everybody knows that,” returned Jack; “but what
can a gentleman do?”

“Be a disgraceful fool, I suppose,” said Evan: and Raikes went on with
his breakfast, as if to be such occasionally was the distinguished fate
of a gentleman, of which others, not so happy in their birth, might
well be envious.

He could not help betraying that he bore in mind the main incidents of
the festival over-night; for when he had inquired who it might be that
had reduced his friend to wear mourning, and heard that it was his
father (spoken by Evan with a quiet sigh), Mr. Raikes tapped an egg,
and his flexible brows exhibited a whole Bar of contending arguments
within. More than for the love of pleasure, he had spent his money to
be taken for a gentleman. He naturally thought highly of the position,
having bought it. But Raikes appreciated a capital fellow, and felt
warmly to Evan, who, moreover, was feeding him.

If not born a gentleman, this Harrington had the look of one, and was
pleasing in female eyes, as the landlady, now present, bore witness,
wishing them good morning, and hoping they had slept well. She handed
to Evan his purse, telling him she had taken it last night, thinking it
safer for the time being in her pocket; and that the chairman of the
feast paid for all in the Green Dragon up to twelve that day, he having
been born between the hours, and liking to make certain: and that every
year he did the same; and was a seemingly rough old gentleman, but as
soft-hearted as a chicken. His name must positively not be inquired,
she said; to be thankful to him was to depart, asking no questions.

“And with a dart in the bosom from those eyes—those eyes!” cried Jack,
shaking his head at the landlady’s resistless charms.

“I hope you was not one of the gentlemen who came and disturbed us last
night, Sir?” she turned on him sharply.

Jack dallied with the imputation, but denied his guilt.

“No; it wasn’t your voice,” continued the landlady. “A parcel of young
puppies calling themselves gentlemen! I know him. It’s that young Mr.
Laxley: and he the nephew of a Bishop, and one of the Honourables! and
then the poor gals get the blame. I call it a shame, I do. There’s that
poor young creature up-stairs—somebody’s victim she is: and nobody’s to
suffer but herself, the little fool!”

“Yes,” said Raikes. “Ah! we regret these things in after life!” and he
looked as if he had many gentlemanly burdens of the kind on his
conscience.

“It’s a wonder, to my mind,” remarked the landlady, when she had
placidly surveyed Mr. Raikes, “how young gals can let some of you
men-folk mislead ’em.”

She turned from him huffily, and addressed Evan:

“The old gentleman is gone, sir. He slept on a chair, breakfasted, and
was off before eight. He left word, as the child was born on his
birthright, he’d provide for it, and pay the mother’s bill, unless you
claimed the right. I’m afraid he suspected—what I never, never-no! but
by what I’ve seen of you—never will believe. For you, I’d say, must be
a gentleman, whatever your company. She asks one favour of you,
sir:—for you to go and let her speak to you once before you go away for
good. She’s asleep now, and mustn’t be disturbed. Will you do it,
by-and-by? Please to comfort the poor creature, sir.”

Evan consented. I am afraid also it was the landlady’s flattering
speech made him, without reckoning his means, add that the young mother
and her child must be considered under his care, and their expenses
charged to him. The landlady was obliged to think him a wealthy as well
as a noble youth, and admiringly curtsied.

Mr. John Raikes and Mr. Evan Harrington then strolled into the air, and
through a long courtyard, with brewhouse and dairy on each side, and a
pleasant smell of baking bread, and dogs winking in the sun, cats at
the corners of doors, satisfied with life, and turkeys parading, and
fowls, strutting cocks, that overset the dignity of Mr. Raikes by
awakening his imitative propensities. Certain white-capped women, who
were washing in a tub, laughed, and one observed: “He’s for all the
world like the little bantam cock stickin’ ’self up in a crow against
the Spaniar’.” And this, and the landlady’s marked deference to Evan,
induced Mr. Raikes contemptuously to glance at our national blindness
to the true diamond, and worship of the mere plumes in which a person
is dressed.

They passed a pretty flower-garden, and entering a smooth-shorn meadow,
beheld the downs beautifully clear under sunlight and slowly-sailing
images of cloud. At the foot of the downs, on a plain of grass, stood a
white booth topped by a flag, which signalled that on that spot
Fallowfield and Beckley were contending.

“A singular old gentleman! A very singular old gentleman, that!” Raikes
observed, following an idea that had been occupying him. “We did wrong
to miss him. We ought to have waylaid him in the morning. Never miss a
chance, Harrington.”

“What chance?” Evan inquired.

“Those old gentlemen are very odd,” Jack pursued, “very strange. He
wouldn’t have judged me by my attire. Admetus’ flocks I guard, yet am a
God! Dress is nothing to those old cocks. He’s an eccentric. I know it;
I can see it. He’s a corrective of Cudford, who is abhorrent to my
soul. To give you an instance, now, of what those old boys will do—I
remember my father taking me, when I was quite a youngster, to a tavern
he frequented, and we met one night just such an old fellow as this;
and the waiter told us afterwards that he noticed me particularly. He
thought me a very remarkable boy—predicted great things. For some
reason or other my father never took me there again. I remember our
having a Welsh rarebit there for supper, and when the waiter last night
mentioned a rarebit, ’gad he started up before me. I gave chase into my
early youth. However, my father never took me to meet the old fellow
again. I believe it lost me a fortune.”

Evan’s thoughts were leaping to the cricket-field, or he would have
condoled with Mr. Raikes for a loss that evidently afflicted him still.

Now, it must be told that the lady’s-maid of Mrs. Andrew Cogglesby,
borrowed temporarily by the Countess de Saldar for service at Beckley
Court, had slept in charge of the Countess’s boxes at the Green Dragon:
the Countess having told her, with the candour of high-born dames to
their attendants, that it would save expense; and that, besides,
Admiral Combleman, whom she was going to see, or Sir Perkins Ripley
(her father’s old friend), whom she should visit if Admiral Combleman
was not at his mansion—both were likely to have full houses, and she
could not take them by storm. An arrangement which left her upwards of
twelve hours’ liberty, seemed highly proper to Maria Conning, this
lady’s-maid, a very demure young person. She was at her bed-room
window, as Evan passed up the courtyard of the inn, and recognized him
immediately. “Can it be him they mean that’s the low tradesman?” was
Maria’s mysterious exclamation. She examined the pair, and added: “Oh,
no. It must be the tall one they mistook for the small one. But Mr.
Harrington ought not to demean himself by keeping company with such,
and my lady should know of it.”

My lady, alighting from the Lymport coach, did know of it, within a few
minutes after Evan had quitted the Green Dragon, and turned pale, as
high-born dames naturally do when they hear of a relative’s disregard
of the company he keeps.

“A tailor, my lady!” said scornful Maria; and the Countess jumped and
complained of a pin.

“How did you hear of this, Conning?” she presently asked with
composure.

“Oh, my lady, he was tipsy last night, and kept swearing out loud he
was a gentleman.”

“Tipsy!” the Countess murmured in terror. She had heard of inaccessible
truths brought to light by the magic wand of alcohol. Was Evan
intoxicated, and his dreadful secret unlocked last night?

“And who may have told you of this, Conning?” she asked.

Maria plunged into one of the boxes, and was understood to say that
nobody in particular had told her, but that among other flying matters
it had come to her ears.

“My brother is Charity itself,” sighed the Countess. “He welcomes high
or low.”

“Yes, but, my lady, a tailor!” Maria repeated, and the Countess,
agreeing with her scorn as she did, could have killed her. At least she
would have liked to run a bodkin into her, and make her scream. In her
position she could not always be Charity itself: nor is this the
required character for a high-born dame: so she rarely affected it.

“Order a fly: discover the direction Mr. Harrington has taken; spare me
further remarks,” she said; and Maria humbly flitted from her presence.

When she was gone, the Countess covered her face with her hands. “Even
this creature would despise us!” she exclaimed.

The young lady encountered by Mr. Raikes on the road to Fallowfield,
was wrong in saying that Beckley would be seen out before the shades of
evening caught up the ball. Not one, but two men of Beckley—the last
two—carried out their bats, cheered handsomely by both parties. The
wickets pitched in the morning, they carried them in again, and
plaudits renewed proved that their fame had not slumbered. To stand
before a field, thoroughly aware that every successful stroke you make
is adding to the hoards of applause in store for you is a joy to your
friends, an exasperation to your foes; I call this an exciting
situation, and one as proud as a man may desire. Then, again, the two
last men of an eleven are twins: they hold one life between them; so
that he who dies extinguishes the other. Your faculties are stirred to
their depths. You become engaged in the noblest of rivalries: in
defending your own, you fight for your comrade’s existence. You are
assured that the dread of shame, if not emulation, is making him
equally wary and alert.

Behold, then, the two bold men of Beckley fighting to preserve one
life. Under the shadow of the downs they stand, beneath a glorious day,
and before a gallant company. For there are ladies in carriages here,
there are cavaliers; good county names may be pointed out. The sons of
first-rate families are in the two elevens, mingled with the yeomen and
whoever can best do the business. Fallowfield and Beckley, without
regard to rank, have drawn upon their muscle and science. One of the
bold men of Beckley at the wickets is Nick Frim, son of the gamekeeper
at Beckley Court; the other is young Tom Copping, son of Squire
Copping, of Dox Hall, in the parish of Beckley. Last year, you must
know, Fallowfield beat. That is why Nick Frim, a renowned out-hitter,
good to finish a score brilliantly with a pair of threes, has taken to
blocking, and Mr. Tom cuts with caution, though he loves to steal his
runs, and is usually dismissed by his remarkable cunning.

The field was ringing at a stroke of Nick Frim’s, who had lashed out in
his old familiar style at last, and the heavens heard of it, when Evan
came into the circle of spectators. Nick and Tom were stretching from
post to post, might and main. A splendid four was scored. The field
took breath with the heroes; and presume not to doubt that heroes they
are. It is good to win glory for your country; it is also good to win
glory for your village. A Member of Parliament, Sir George Lowton,
notes this emphatically, from the statesman’s eminence, to a group of
gentlemen on horseback round a carriage wherein a couple of fair ladies
reclined.

“They didn’t shout more at the news of the Battle of Waterloo. Now this
is our peculiarity, this absence of extreme centralization. It must be
encouraged. Local jealousies, local rivalries, local triumphs—these are
the strength of the kingdom.”

“If you mean to say that cricket’s a ——” the old squire speaking
(Squire Uplift of Fallowfield) remembered the saving presences, and
coughed—“good thing, I’m one with ye, Sir George. Encouraged, egad!
They don’t want much of that here. Give some of your lean London straws
a strip o’ clean grass and a bit o’ liberty, and you’ll do ’em a
service.”

“What a beautiful hit!” exclaimed one of the ladies, languidly watching
the ascent of the ball.

“Beautiful, d’ ye call it?” muttered the squire.

The ball, indeed, was dropping straight into the hands of the
long-hit-off. Instantly a thunder rolled. But it was Beckley that took
the joyful treble—Fallowfield the deeply-cursing bass. The
long-hit-off, he who never was known to miss a catch—butter-fingered
beast!—he has let the ball slip through his fingers.

Are there Gods in the air? Fred Linnington, the unfortunate of
Fallowfield, with a whole year of unhappy recollection haunting him in
prospect, ere he can retrieve his character—Fred, if he does not accuse
the powers of the sky, protests that he cannot understand it, which
means the same.

Fallowfield’s defeat—should such be the result of the contest—he knows
now will be laid at his door. Five men who have bowled at the
indomitable Beckleyans think the same. Albeit they are Britons, it
abashes them. They are not the men they were. Their bowling is as the
bowling of babies; and see! Nick, who gave the catch, and pretends he
did it out of commiseration for Fallowfield, the ball has flown from
his bat sheer over the booth. If they don’t add six to the score, it
will be the fault of their legs. But no: they rest content with a fiver
and cherish their wind.

Yet more they mean to do, Success does not turn the heads of these
Britons, as it would of your frivolous foreigners.

And now small boys (who represent the Press here) spread out from the
marking-booth, announcing foremost, and in larger type, as it were,
quite in Press style, their opinion—which is, that Fallowfield will get
a jolly good hiding; and vociferating that Beckley is seventy-nine
ahead, and that Nick Frim, the favourite of the field, has scored
fifty-one to his own cheek. The boys are boys of both villages: but
they are British boys—they adore prowess. The Fallowfield boys wish
that Nick Frim would come and live on their side; the boys of Beckley
rejoice in possessing him. Nick is the wicketkeeper of the Beckley
eleven; long-limbed, wiry, keen of eye. His fault as a batsman is, that
he will be a slashing hitter. He is too sensible of the joys of a grand
spanking hit. A short life and a merry one, has hitherto been his
motto.

But there were reasons for Nick’s rare display of skill. That woman may
have the credit due to her (and, as there never was a contest of which
she did not sit at the springs, so is she the source of all superhuman
efforts exhibited by men), be it told that Polly Wheedle is on the
field; Polly, one of the upper housemaids of Beckley Court; Polly,
eagerly courted by Fred Linnington, humbly desired by Nick Frim—a pert
and blooming maiden—who, while her suitors combat hotly for an
undivided smile, improves her holiday by instilling similar unselfish
aspirations into the breasts of others.

Between his enjoyment of society and the melancholy it engendered in
his mind by reflecting on him the age and decrepitude of his hat, Mr.
John Raikes was doubtful of his happiness for some time. But as his
taste for happiness was sharp, he, with a great instinct amounting
almost to genius in its pursuit, resolved to extinguish his suspicion
by acting the perfectly happy man. To do this, it was necessary that he
should have listeners: Evan was not enough, and was besides
unsympathetic; he had not responded to Jack’s cordial assurances of his
friendship “in spite of anything,” uttered before they came into the
field.

Heat and lustre were now poured from the sky, on whose soft blue a
fleet of clouds sailed heavily. Nick Frim was very wonderful, no doubt.
He deserved that the Gods should recline on those gold-edged cushions
above, and lean over to observe him. Nevertheless, the ladies were
beginning to ask when Nick Frim would be out. The small boys alone
preserved their enthusiasm for Nick. As usual, the men took a middle
position. Theirs was the pleasure of critics, which, being founded on
the judgement, lasts long, and is without disappointment at the close.
It was sufficient that the ladies should lend the inspiration of their
bonnets to this fine match. Their presence on the field is another
beautiful instance of the generous yielding of the sex simply to grace
our amusement, and their acute perception of the part they have to
play.

Mr. Raikes was rather shy of them at first. But his acting rarely
failing to deceive himself, he began to feel himself the perfectly
happy man he impersonated, and where there were ladies he went, and
talked of days when he had creditably handled a bat, and of a renown in
the annals of Cricket cut short by mysterious calamity. The foolish
fellow did not know that they care not a straw for cricketing fame. His
gaiety presently forsook him as quickly as it had come. Instead of
remonstrating at Evan’s restlessness, it was he who now dragged Evan
from spot to spot. He spoke low and nervously.

“We’re watched!”

There was indeed a man lurking near and moving as they moved, with a
speculative air. Writs were out against Raikes. He slipped from his
friend, saying:

“Never mind me. That old amphitryon’s birthday hangs on till the
meridian; you understand. His table invites. He is not unlikely to
enjoy my conversation. What mayn’t that lead to? Seek me there.”

Evan strolled on, relieved by the voluntary departure of the weariful
funny friend he would not shake off, but could not well link with.

A long success is better when seen at a distance of time, and Nick Frim
was beginning to suffer from the monotony of his luck. Fallowfield
could do nothing with him. He no longer blocked. He lashed out at every
ball, and far flew every ball that was bowled. The critics saw, in this
return to his old practices, promise of Nick’s approaching extinction.
The ladies were growing hot and weary. The little boys gasped on the
grass, but like cunning circulators of excitement, spread a report to
keep it up, that Nick, on going to his wickets the previous day, had
sworn an oath that he would not lay down his bat till he had scored a
hundred.

So they had still matter to agitate their youthful breasts, and Nick’s
gradual building up of tens, and prophecies and speculations as to his
chances of completing the hundred, were still vehemently confided to
the field, amid a general mopping of faces.

Evan did become aware that a man was following him. The man had not the
look of a dreaded official. His countenance was sun-burnt and open, and
he was dressed in a countryman’s holiday suit. When Evan met his eyes,
they showed perplexity. Evan felt he was being examined from head to
heel, but by one unaccustomed to his part, and without the courage to
decide what he ought consequently to do while a doubt remained, though
his inspection was verging towards a certainty in his mind.

At last, somewhat annoyed that the man should continue to dog him
wherever he moved, he turned on him and asked him what he wanted?

“Be you a Muster Eav’n Harrington, Esquire?” the man drawled out in the
rustic music of inquiry.

“That is my name,” said Evan.

“Ay,” returned the man, “it’s somebody lookin’ like a lord, and has a
small friend wi’ shockin’ old hat, and I see ye come out o’ the Green
Drag’n this mornin’—I don’t reck’n there’s e’er a mistaak, but I likes
to make cock sure. Be you been to Poortigal, sir?”

“Yes,” answered Evan, “I have been to Poortigal.”

“What’s the name o’ the capital o’ Portugal, sir?” The man looked
immensely shrewd, and nodding his consent at the laughing reply, added:

“And there you was born, sir? You’ll excuse my boldness, but I only
does what’s necessary.”

Evan said he was not born there.

“No, not born there. That’s good. Now, sir, did you happen to be born
anywheres within smell o’ salt water?”

“Yes,” answered Evan, “I was born by the sea.”

“Not far beyond fifty mile from Fall’field here, sir?”

“Something less.”

“All right. Now I’m cock sure,” said the man. “Now, if you’ll have the
kindness just to oblige me by—” he sped the words and the instrument
jointly at Evan, “—takin’ that there letter, I’ll say good-bye, sir,
and my work’s done for the day.”

Saying which, he left Evan with the letter in his hands. Evan turned it
over curiously. It was addressed to “Evan Harrington, Esquire, T—— of
Lymport.”

A voice paralyzed his fingers: the clear ringing voice of a young
horsewoman, accompanied by a little maid on a pony, who galloped up to
the carriage upon which Squire Uplift, Sir George Lowton, Hamilton
Jocelyn, and other cavaliers, were in attendance.

“Here I am at last, and Beckley’s in still! How d’ ye do, Lady Racial?
How d’ ye do, Sir George. How d’ ye do, everybody. Your servant,
Squire! We shall beat you. Harry says we shall soon be a hundred a-head
of you. Fancy those boys! they would sleep at Fallowfield last night.
How I wish you had made a bet with me, Squire.”

“Well, my lass, it’s not too late,” said the Squire, detaining her
hand.

“Oh, but it wouldn’t be fair now. And I’m not going to be kissed on the
field, if you please, Squire. Here, Dorry will do instead. Dorry! come
and be kissed by the Squire.”

It was Rose, living and glowing; Rose, who was the brilliant young
Amazon, smoothing the neck of a mettlesome gray cob. Evan’s heart
bounded up to her, but his limbs were motionless.

The Squire caught her smaller companion in his arms, and sounded a kiss
upon both her cheeks; then settled her in the saddle, and she went to
answer some questions of the ladies. She had the same lively eyes as
Rose; quick saucy lips, red, and open for prattle. Rolls of auburn hair
fell down her back, for being a child she was allowed privileges. To
talk as her thoughts came, as well as to wear her hair as it grew, was
a special privilege of this young person, on horseback or elsewhere.

“Now, I know what you want to ask me, Aunt Shorne. Isn’t it about my
Papa? He’s not come, and he won’t be able to come for a week.—Glad to
be with Cousin Rosey? I should think I am! She’s the nicest girl I ever
could suppose. She isn’t a bit spoiled by Portugal; only browned; and
she doesn’t care for that; no more do I. I rather like the sun when it
doesn’t freckle you. I can’t bear freckles, and I don’t believe in milk
for them. People who have them are such a figure. Drummond Forth has
them, but he’s a man, and it doesn’t matter for a man to have freckles.
How’s my uncle Mel? Oh, he’s quite well. I mean he has the gout in one
of his fingers, and it’s swollen so, it’s just like a great fat fir
cone! He can’t write a bit, and rests his hand on a table. He wants to
have me made to write with my left hand as well as my right. As if I
was ever going to have the gout in one of my fingers!”

Sir George Lowton observed to Hamilton Jocelyn, that Melville must take
to his tongue now.

“I fancy he will,” said Hamilton. “My father won’t give up his nominee;
so I fancy he’ll try Fallowfield. Of course, we go in for the
agricultural interest; but there’s a cantankerous old ruffian down
here—a brewer, or something—he’s got half the votes at his bidding. We
shall see.”

“Dorothy, my dear child, are you not tired?” said Lady Racial. “You are
very hot.”

“Yes, that’s because Rose would tear along the road to get here in
time, after we had left those tiresome Copping people, where she had to
make a call. ‘What a slow little beast your pony is, Dorry!’—she said
that at least twenty times.”

“Oh, you naughty puss!” cried Rose. “Wasn’t it, ‘Rosey, Rosey, I’m sure
we shall be too late, and shan’t see a thing: do come along as hard as
you can’?”

“I’m sure it was not,” Miss Dorothy retorted, with the large eyes of
innocence. “You said you wanted to see Nick Frim keeping the wicket,
and Ferdinand Laxley bowl. And, oh! you know something you said about
Drummond Forth.”

“Now, shall I tell upon you?” said Rose.

“No, don’t!” hastily replied the little woman, blushing. And the
cavaliers laughed out, and the ladies smiled, and Dorothy added: “It
isn’t much, after all.”

“Then, come; let’s have it, or I shall be jealous,” said the Squire.

“Shall I tell?” Rose asked slily.

“It’s unfair to betray one of your sex, Rose,” remarked the
sweetly-smiling lady.

“Yes, Lady Racial—mayn’t a woman have secrets?” Dorothy put it with
great natural earnestness, and they all laughed aloud. “But I know a
secret of Rosey’s,” continued Miss Dorothy, “and if she tells upon me,
I shall tell upon her.”

“They’re out!” cried Rose, pointing her whip at the wickets. “Good
night to Beckley! Tom Copping’s run out.”

Questions as to how it was done passed from mouth to mouth. Questions
as to whether it was fair sprang from Tom’s friends, and that a doubt
existed was certain: the whole field was seen converging toward the two
umpires.

Farmer Broadmead for Fallowfield, Master Nat Hodges for Beckley.

It really is a mercy there’s some change in the game,” said Mrs.
Shorne, waving her parasol. “It’s a charming game, but it wants variety
a little. When do you return, Rose?”

“Not for some time,” said Rose, primly. “I like variety very well, but
I don’t seek it by running away the moment I’ve come.”

“No, but, my dear,” Mrs. Shorne negligently fanned her face, “you will
have to come with us, I fear, when we go. Your uncle accompanies us. I
really think the Squire will, too; and Mr. Forth is no chaperon. Even
you understand that.”

“Oh, I can get an old man—don’t be afraid, said Rose. “Or must I have
an old woman, aunt?”

The lady raised her eyelids slowly on Rose, and thought: “If you were
soundly whipped, my little madam, what a good thing it would be for
you.” And that good thing Mrs. Shorne was willing to do for Rose. She
turned aside, and received the salute of an unmistakable curate on
foot.

“Ah, Mr. Parsley, you lend your countenance to the game, then?”

The curate observed that sound Churchmen unanimously supported the
game.

“Bravo!” cried Rose. “How I like to hear you talk like that, Mr.
Parsley. I didn’t think you had so much sense. You and I will have a
game together—single wicket. We must play for something—what shall it
be?”

“Oh—for nothing,” the curate vacuously remarked.

“That’s for love, you rogue!” exclaimed the Squire. “Come, come, none
o’ that, sir—ha! ha!”

“Oh, very well; we’ll play for love,” said Rose.

“And I’ll hold the stakes, my dear—eh?”

“You dear old naughty Squire!—what do you mean?”

Rose laughed. But she had all the men surrounding her, and Mrs. Shorne
talked of departing.

Why did not Evan bravely march away? Why, he asked himself, had he come
on this cricket-field to be made thus miserable? What right had such as
he to look on Rose? Consider, however, the young man’s excuses. He
could not possibly imagine that a damsel who rode one day to a match,
would return on the following day to see it finished: or absolutely
know that unseen damsel to be Rose Jocelyn. And if he waited, it was
only to hear her sweet voice once again, and go for ever. As far as he
could fathom his hopes, they were that Rose would not see him: but the
hopes of youth are deep.

Just then a toddling small rustic stopped in front of Evan, and set up
a howl for his “fayther.” Evan lifted him high to look over people’s
heads, and discover his wandering parent. The urchin, when he had
settled to his novel position, surveyed the field, and shouting,
“Fayther, fayther! here I bes on top of a gentleman!” made lusty signs,
which attracted not his father alone. Rose sang out, “Who can lend me a
penny?” Instantly the curate and the squire had a race in their
pockets. The curate was first, but Rose favoured the squire, took his
money with a nod and a smile, and rode at the little lad, to whom she
was saying: “Here, bonny boy, this will buy you—”

She stopped and coloured.

“Evan!”

The child descended rapidly to the ground.

A bow and a few murmured words replied to her.

“Isn’t this just like you, my dear Evan? Shouldn’t I know that whenever
I met you, you would be doing something kind? How did you come here?
You were on your way to Beckley!”

“To London,” said Evan.

“To London! and not coming over to see me—us?”

Here the little fellow’s father intervened to claim his offspring, and
thank the lady and the gentleman: and, with his penny firmly grasped,
he who had brought the lady and the gentleman together, was borne off a
wealthy human creature.

Before much further could be said between them, the Countess de Saldar
drove up.

“My dearest Rose!” and “My dear Countess!” and “Not Louisa, then?” and,
“I am very glad to see you!” without attempting the endearing
“Louisa”—passed.

The Countess de Saldar then admitted the presence of her brother.

“Think!” said Rose. “He talks of going on straight from here to
London.”

“That pretty pout will alone suffice to make him deviate, then,” said
the Countess, with her sweetest open slyness. “I am now on the point of
accepting your most kind invitation. Our foreign habits allow us to
visit thus early! He will come with me.”

Evan tried to look firm, and speak as he was trying to look. Rose fell
to entreaty, and from entreaty rose to command; and in both was utterly
fascinating to the poor youth. Luxuriously—while he hesitated and dwelt
on this and that faint objection—his spirit drank the delicious changes
of her face. To have her face before him but one day seemed so rich a
boon to deny himself, that he was beginning to wonder at his constancy
in refusal; and now that she spoke to him so pressingly, devoting her
guileless eyes to him alone, he forgot a certain envious feeling that
had possessed him while she was rattling among the other males—a doubt
whether she ever cast a thought on Mr. Evan Harrington.

“Yes; he will come,” cried Rose; “and he shall ride home with me and my
friend Drummond; and he shall have my groom’s horse, if he doesn’t
mind. Bob can ride home in the cart with Polly, my maid; and he’ll like
that, because Polly’s always good fun—when they’re not in love with
her. Then, of course, she torments them.”

“Naturally,” said the Countess.

Mr. Evan Harrington’s final objection, based on his not having clothes,
and so forth, was met by his foreseeing sister.

“I have your portmanteau packed, in with me, my dear brother; Conning
has her feet on it. I divined that I should overtake you.”

Evan felt he was in the toils. After a struggle or two he yielded; and,
having yielded, did it with grace. In a moment, and with a power of
self-compression equal to that of the adept Countess, he threw off his
moodiness as easily as if it had been his Spanish mantle, and assumed a
gaiety that made the Countess’s eyes beam rapturously upon him, and was
pleasing to Rose, apart from the lead in admiration the Countess had
given her—not for the first time. We mortals, the best of us, may be
silly sheep in our likes and dislikes: where there is no premeditated
or instinctive antagonism, we can be led into warm acknowledgement of
merits we have not sounded. This the Countess de Saldar knew right
well.

Rose now intimated her wish to perform the ceremony of introduction
between her aunt and uncle present, and the visitors to Beckley Court.
The Countess smiled, and in the few paces that separated the two
groups, whispered to her brother: “Miss Jocelyn, my dear.”

The eye-glasses of the Beckley group were dropped with one accord. The
ceremony was gone through. The softly-shadowed differences of a grand
manner addressed to ladies, and to males, were exquisitely accomplished
by the Countess de Saldar.

“Harrington? Harrington?” her quick ear caught on the mouth of Squire
Uplift, scanning Evan.

Her accent was very foreign, as she said aloud: “We are entirely
strangers to your game—your creecket. My brother and myself are
scarcely English. Nothing save diplomacy are we adepts in!”

“You must be excessively dangerous, madam,” said Sir George, hat in
air.

“Even in that, I fear, we are babes and sucklings, and might take many
a lesson from you. Will you instruct me in your creecket? What are they
doing now? It seems very unintelligible—indistinct—is it not?”

Inasmuch as Farmer Broadmead and Master Nat Hodges were surrounded by a
clamorous mob, shouting both sides of the case, as if the loudest and
longest-winded were sure to wrest a favourable judgement from those two
infallible authorities on the laws of cricket, the noble game was
certainly in a state of indistinctness.

The squire came forward to explain, piteously entreated not to expect
too much from a woman’s inapprehensive wits, which he plainly promised
(under eyes that had melted harder men) he would not. His forbearance
and bucolic gallantry were needed, for he had the Countess’s radiant
full visage alone. Her senses were dancing in her right ear, which had
heard the name of Lady Racial pronounced, and a voice respond to it
from the carriage.

Into what a pit had she suddenly plunged! You ask why she did not drive
away as fast as the horses would carry her, and fly the veiled head of
Demogorgon obscuring valley and hill and the shining firmament, and
threatening to glare destruction on her? You do not know an intriguer.
She relinquishes the joys of life for the joys of intrigue. This is her
element. The Countess did feel that the heavens were hard on her. She
resolved none the less to fight her way to her object; for where so
much had conspired to favour her—the decease of the generous Sir
Abraham Harrington, of Torquay, and the invitation to Beckley
Court—could she believe the heavens in league against her? Did she not
nightly pray to them, in all humbleness of body, for the safe issue of
her cherished schemes? And in this, how unlike she was to the rest of
mankind! She thought so; she relied on her devout observances; they
gave her sweet confidence, and the sense of being specially shielded
even when specially menaced. Moreover, tell a woman to put back, when
she is once clearly launched! Timid as she may be, her light bark
bounds to meet the tempest. I speak of women who do launch: they are
not numerous, but, to the wise, the minorities are the representatives.

“Indeed, it is an intricate game!” said the Countess, at the conclusion
of the squire’s explanation, and leaned over to Mrs. Shorne to ask her
if she thoroughly understood it.

“Yes, I suppose I do,” was the reply; “it—rather than the amusement
they find in it.” This lady had recovered Mr. Parsley from Rose, but
had only succeeded in making the curate unhappy, without satisfying
herself.

The Countess gave her the shrug of secret sympathy.

“We must not say so,” she observed aloud—most artlessly, and fixed the
squire with a bewitching smile, under which her heart beat thickly. As
her eyes travelled from Mrs. Shorne to the squire, she had marked Lady
Racial looking singularly at Evan, who was mounting the horse of Bob
the groom.

“Fine young fellow, that,” said the squire to Lady Racial, as Evan rode
off with Rose.

“An extremely handsome, well-bred young man,” she answered. Her eyes
met the Countess’s, and the Countess, after resting on their surface
with an ephemeral pause, murmured: “I must not praise my brother,” and
smiled a smile which was meant to mean: “I think with you, and thank
you, and love you for admiring him.”

Had Lady Racial joined the smile and spoken with animation afterwards,
the Countess would have shuddered and had chills of dread. As it was,
she was passably content. Lady Racial slightly dimpled her cheek, for
courtesy’s sake, and then looked gravely on the ground. This was no
promise; it was even an indication (as the Countess read her), of
something beyond suspicion in the lady’s mind; but it was a sign of
delicacy, and a sign that her feelings had been touched, from which a
truce might be reckoned on, and no betrayal feared.

She heard it said that the match was for honour and glory. A match of
two days’ duration under a broiling sun, all for honour and glory! Was
it not enough to make her despise the games of men? For something
better she played. Her game was for one hundred thousand pounds, the
happiness of her brother, and the concealment of a horror. To win a
game like that was worth the trouble. Whether she would have continued
her efforts, had she known that the name of Evan Harrington was then
blazing on a shop-front in Lymport, I cannot tell. The possessor of the
name was in love, and did not reflect.

Smiling adieu to the ladies, bowing to the gentlemen, and apprehending
all the homage they would pour out to her condescending beauty when she
had left them, the Countess’s graceful hand gave the signal for
Beckley.

She stopped the coachman ere the wheels had rolled off the muffling
turf, to enjoy one glimpse of Evan and Rose riding together, with the
little maid on her pony in the rear. How suitable they seemed! how
happy! She had brought them together after many difficulties—might it
not be? It was surely a thing to be hoped for!

Rose, galloping freshly, was saying to Evan: “Why did you cut off your
moustache?”

He, neck and neck with her, replied: “You complained of it in
Portugal.”

And she: “Portugal’s old times now to me—and I always love old times.
I’m sorry! And, oh, Evan! did you really do it for me?”

And really, just then, flying through the air, close to the darling of
his heart, he had not the courage to spoil that delicious question, but
dallying with the lie, he looked in her eyes lingeringly.

This picture the Countess contemplated. Close to her carriage two young
gentlemen-cricketers were strolling, while Fallowfield gained breath to
decide which men to send in first to the wickets.

One of these stood suddenly on tiptoe, and pointing to the pair on
horseback, cried, with the vivacity of astonishment:

“Look there! do you see that? What the deuce is little Rosey doing with
the tailor-fellow?”

The Countess, though her cheeks were blanched, gazed calmly in
Demogorgon’s face, took a mental impression of the speaker, and again
signalled for Beckley.




CHAPTER XIV.
THE COUNTESS DESCRIBES THE FIELD OF ACTION


Now, to clear up a point or two: You may think the Comic Muse is
straining human nature rather toughly in making the Countess de Saldar
rush open-eyed into the jaws of Demogorgon, dreadful to her. She has
seen her brother pointed out unmistakeably as the tailor-fellow. There
is yet time to cast him off or fly with him. Is it her extraordinary
heroism impelling her onward, or infatuated rashness? or is it her mere
animal love of conflict?

The Countess de Saldar, like other adventurers, has her star. They who
possess nothing on earth, have a right to claim a portion of the
heavens. In resolute hands, much may be done with a star. As it has
empires in its gift, so may it have heiresses. The Countess’s star had
not blinked balefully at her. That was one reason why she went straight
on to Beckley.

Again: the Countess was a born general. With her star above, with
certain advantages secured, with battalions of lies disciplined and
zealous, and with one clear prize in view, besides other undeveloped
benefits dimly shadowing forth, the Countess threw herself headlong
into the enemy’s country.

But, that you may not think too highly of this lady, I must add that
the trivial reason was the exciting cause—as in many great enterprises.
This was nothing more than the simple desire to be located, if but for
a day or two, on the footing of her present rank, in the English
country-house of an offshoot of our aristocracy. She who had moved in
the first society of a foreign capital—who had married a Count, a
minister of his sovereign, had enjoyed delicious high-bred badinage
with refulgent ambassadors, could boast the friendship of duchesses,
and had been the amiable receptacle of their pardonable follies; she
who, moreover, heartily despised things English:—this lady experienced
thrills of proud pleasure at the prospect of being welcomed at a
third-rate English mansion. But then, that mansion was Beckley Court.
We return to our first ambitions, as to our first loves not that they
are dearer to us,—quit that delusion: our ripened loves and mature
ambitions are probably closest to our hearts, as they deserve to be—but
we return to them because our youth has a hold on us which it asserts
whenever a disappointment knocks us down. Our old loves (with the bad
natures I know in them) are always lurking to avenge themselves on the
new by tempting us to a little retrograde infidelity. A schoolgirl in
Fallowfield, the tailor’s daughter, had sighed for the bliss of Beckley
Court. Beckley Court was her Elysium ere the ardent feminine brain
conceived a loftier summit. Fallen from that attained eminence, she
sighed anew for Beckley Court. Nor was this mere spiritual longing; it
had its material side. At Beckley Court she could feel her foreign
rank. Moving with our nobility as an equal, she could feel that the
short dazzling glitter of her career was not illusory, and had left her
something solid; not coin of the realm exactly, but yet gold. She could
not feel this in the Cogglesby saloons, among pitiable
bourgeoises—middle-class people daily soiled by the touch of tradesmen.
They dragged her down. Their very homage was a mockery.

Let the Countess have due credit for still allowing Evan to visit
Beckley Court to follow up his chance. If Demogorgon betrayed her
there, the Count was her protector: a woman rises to her husband. But a
man is what he is, and must stand upon that. She was positive Evan had
committed himself in some manner. As it did not suit her to think so,
she at once encouraged an imaginary conversation, in which she took the
argument that it was quite impossible Evan could have been so mad, and
others instanced his youth, his wrongheaded perversity, his ungenerous
disregard for his devoted sister, and his known weakness: she replying,
that undoubtedly they were right so far: but that he could not have
said he himself was that horrible thing, because he was nothing of the
sort: which faith in Evan’s stedfast adherence to facts, ultimately
silenced the phantom opposition, and gained the day.

With admiration let us behold the Countess de Saldar alighting on the
gravel sweep of Beckley Court, the footman and butler of the enemy
bowing obsequious welcome to the most potent visitor Beckley Court has
ever yet embraced.

The despatches of a general being usually acknowledged to be the safest
sources from which the historian of a campaign can draw, I proceed to
set forth a letter of the Countess de Saldar, forwarded to her sister,
Harriet Cogglesby, three mornings after her arrival at Beckley Court;
and which, if it should prove false in a few particulars, does
nevertheless let us into the state of the Countess’s mind, and gives
the result of that general’s first inspection of the field of action.
The Countess’s epistolary English does small credit to her Fallowfield
education; but it is feminine, and flows more than her ordinary speech.
Besides, leaders of men have always notoriously been above the honours
of grammar. “MY DEAREST HARRIET,

“Your note awaited me. No sooner my name announced, than servitors in
yellow livery, with powder and buckles started before me, and bowing
one presented it on a salver. A venerable butler—most impressive! led
the way. In future, my dear, let it be de Saldar de Sancorvo. That is
our title by rights, and it may as well be so in England. English
Countess is certainly best. Always put the de. But let us be
systematic, as my poor Silva says. He would be in the way here, and had
better not come till I see something he can do. Silva has great
reliance upon me. The farther he is from Lymport, my dear!—and imagine
me, Harriet, driving through Fallowfield to Beckley Court! I gave one
peep at Dubbins’s, as I passed. The school still goes on. I saw three
little girls skipping, and the old swing-pole. SEMINARY FOR YOUNG
LADIES as bright as ever! I should have liked to have kissed the
children and given them bonbons and a holiday.

“How sparing you English are of your crests and arms! I fully expected
to see the Jocelyns’ over my bed; but no—four posts totally without
ornament! Sleep, indeed, must be the result of dire fatigue in such a
bed. The Jocelyn crest is a hawk in jesses. The Elburne arms are, Or,
three falcons on a field, vert. How heraldry reminds me of poor Papa!
the evenings we used to spend with him, when he stayed at home,
studying it so diligently under his directions! We never shall again!
Sir Franks Jocelyn is the third son of Lord Elburne, made a Baronet for
his patriotic support of the Ministry in a time of great trouble. The
people are sometimes grateful, my dear. Lord Elburne is the fourteenth
of his line—originally simple country squires. They talk of the Roses,
but we need not go so very far back as that. I do not quite understand
why a Lord’s son should condescend to a Baronetcy. Precedence of some
sort for his lady, I suppose. I have yet to learn whether she ranks by
his birth, or his present title. If so, a young Baronetcy cannot
possibly be a gain. One thing is certain. She cares very little about
it. She is most eccentric. But remember what I have told you. It will
be serviceable when you are speaking of the family.

“The dinner-hour, six. It would no doubt be full seven in Town. I am
convinced you are half-an-hour too early. I had the post of honour to
the right of Sir Franks. Evan to the right of Lady Jocelyn. Most
fortunately he was in the best of spirits—quite brilliant. I saw the
eyes of that sweet Rose glisten. On the other side of me sat my pet
diplomatist, and I gave him one or two political secrets which
astonished him. Of course, my dear, I was wheedled out of them. His
contempt for our weak intellects is ineffable. But a woman must now and
then ingratiate herself at the expense of her sex. This is perfectly
legitimate. Tory policy at the table. The Opposition, as Andrew says,
not represented. So to show that we were human beings, we differed
among ourselves, and it soon became clear to me that Lady Jocelyn is
the rankest of Radicals. My secret suspicion is, that she is a person
of no birth whatever, wherever her money came from. A fine woman—yes;
still to be admired, I suppose, by some kind of men; but totally
wanting in the essentially feminine attractions.

“There was no party, so to say. I will describe the people present,
beginning with the insignifacants.

“First, Mr. Parsley, the curate of Beckley. He eats everything at
table, and agrees with everything. A most excellent orthodox young
clergyman. Except that he was nearly choked by a fish-bone, and could
not quite conceal his distress—and really Rose should have repressed
her desire to laugh till the time for our retirement—he made no
sensation. I saw her eyes watering, and she is not clever in turning it
off. In that nobody ever equalled dear Papa. I attribute the attack
almost entirely to the tightness of the white neck-cloths the young
clergymen of the Established Church wear. But, my dear, I have lived
too long away from them to wish for an instant the slightest change in
anything they think, say, or do. The mere sight of this young man was
most refreshing to my spirit. He may be the shepherd of a flock, this
poor Mr. Parsley, but he is a sheep to one young person.

“Mr. Drummond Forth. A great favourite of Lady Jocelyn’s; an old
friend. He went with them to the East. Nothing improper. She is too
cold for that. He is fair, with regular features, very self-possessed,
and ready—your English notions of gentlemanly. But none of your men
treat a woman as a woman. We are either angels, or good fellows, or
heaven knows what that is bad. No exquisite delicacy, no insinuating
softness, mixed with respect, none of that hovering over the border, as
Papa used to say, none of that happy indefiniteness of manner which
seems to declare ‘I would love you if I might,’ or ‘I do, but I dare
not tell,’ even when engaged in the most trivial attentions—handing a
footstool, remarking on the soup, etc. You none of you know how to meet
a woman’s smile, or to engage her eyes without boldness—to slide off
them, as it were, gracefully. Evan alone can look between the eyelids
of a woman. I have had to correct him, for to me he quite exposes the
state of his heart towards dearest Rose. She listens to Mr. Forth with
evident esteem. In Portugal we do not understand young ladies having
male friends.

“Hamilton Jocelyn—all politics. The stiff Englishman. Not a shade of
manners. He invited me to drink wine. Before I had finished my bow his
glass was empty—the man was telling an anecdote of Lord Livelyston! You
may be sure, my dear, I did not say I had seen his lordship.

“Seymour Jocelyn, Colonel of Hussars. He did nothing but sigh for the
cold weather, and hunting. All I envied him was his moustache for Evan.
Will you believe that the ridiculous boy has shaved!

“Then there is Melville, my dear diplomatist; and here is another
instance of our Harrington luck. He has the gout in his right hand; he
can only just hold knife and fork, and is interdicted Port-wine and
penmanship. The dinner was not concluded before I had arranged that
Evan should resume (gratuitously, you know) his post of secretary to
him. So here is Evan fixed at Beckley Court as long as Melville stays.
Talking of him, I am horrified suddenly. They call him the great Mel!

“Sir Franks is most estimable, I am sure, as a man, and redolent of
excellent qualities—a beautiful disposition, very handsome. He has just
as much and no more of the English polish one ordinarily meets. When he
has given me soup or fish, bowed to me over wine, and asked a
conventional question, he has done with me. I should imagine his
opinions to be extremely good, for they are not a multitude.

“Then his lady—but I have not grappled with her yet. Now for the women,
for I quite class her with the opposite sex.

“You must know that before I retired for the night, I induced Conning
to think she had a bad head-ache, and Rose lent me her lady’s-maid—they
call the creature Polly. A terrible talker. She would tell all about
the family. Rose has been speaking of Evan. It would have looked better
had she been quiet—but then she is so English!”

Here the Countess breaks off to say, that from where she is writing,
she can see Rose and Evan walking out to the cypress avenue, and that
no eyes are on them; great praise being given to the absence of
suspicion in the Jocelyn nature.

The communication is resumed the night of the same day.

“Two days at Beckley Court are over, and that strange sensation I had
of being an intruder escaped from Dubbins’s, and expecting every
instant the old schoolmistress to call for me, and expose me, and take
me to the dark room, is quite vanished, and I feel quite at home, quite
happy. Evan is behaving well. Quite the young nobleman. With the women
I had no fear of him; he is really admirable with the men—easy, and
talks of sport and politics, and makes the proper use of Portugal. He
has quite won the heart of his sister. Heaven smiles on us, dearest
Harriet!

“We must be favoured, my dear, for Evan is very
troublesome—distressingly inconsiderate! I left him for a day—remaining
to comfort poor Mama—and on the road he picked up an object he had
known at school, and this creature, in shameful garments, is seen in
the field where Rose and Evan are riding—in a dreadful hat—Rose might
well laugh at it!—he is seen running away from an old apple woman,
whose fruit he had consumed without means to liquidate; but, of course,
he rushes bolt up to Evan before all his grand company, and claims
acquaintance, and Evan was base enough to acknowledge him! He
disengaged himself so far well by tossing his purse to the wretch, but
if he knows not how to _cut_, I assure him it will be his ruin.
Resolutely he must cast the dust off his shoes, or he will be dragged
down to their level. By the way, as to hands and feet, comparing him
with the Jocelyn men, he has every mark of better blood. Not a question
about it. As Papa would say—We have Nature’s proof.

“Looking out on a beautiful lawn, and the moon, and all sorts of trees,
I must now tell you about the ladies here.

“Conning undid me to-night. While Conning remains unattached, Conning
is likely to be serviceable. If Evan, would only give her a crumb, she
would be his most faithful dog. I fear he cannot be induced, and
Conning will be snapped up by somebody else. You know how susceptible
she is behind her primness—she will be of no use on earth, and I shall
find excuse to send her back immediately. After all, her appearance
here was all that was wanted.

“Mrs. Melville and her dreadful juvenile are here, as you may
imagine—the complete Englishwoman. I smile on her, but I could laugh.
To see the crow’s-feet under her eyes on her white skin, and those
ringlets, is really too ridiculous. Then there is a Miss Carrington,
Lady Jocelyn’s cousin, aged thirty-two—if she has not tampered with the
register of her birth. I should think her equal to it. Between dark and
fair. Always in love with some man, Conning tells me she hears. Rose’s
maid, Polly, hinted the same. She has a little money.

“But my sympathies have been excited by a little cripple—a niece of
Lady Jocelyn’s and the favourite grand-daughter of the rich old Mrs.
Bonner—also here—Juliana Bonner. Her age must be twenty. You would take
her for ten. In spite of her immense expectations, the Jocelyns hate
her. They can hardly be civil to her. It is the poor child’s temper.
She has already begun to watch dear Evan—certainly the handsomest of
the men here as yet, though I grant you, they are well-grown men, these
Jocelyns, for an untravelled Englishwoman. I fear, dear Harriet, we
have been dreadfully deceived about Rose. The poor child has not, in
her own right, much more than a tenth part of what we supposed, I fear.
It was that Mrs. Melville. I have had occasion to notice her quiet
boasts here. She said this morning, ‘when Mel is in the Ministry’—he is
not yet in Parliament! I feel quite angry with the woman, and she is
not so cordial as she might be. I have her profile very frequently
while I am conversing with her.

“With Grandmama Bonner I am excellent good friends,—venerable silver
hair, high caps, etc. More of this most interesting Juliana Bonner
by-and-by. It is clear to me that Rose’s fortune is calculated upon the
dear invalid’s death! Is not that harrowing? It shocks me to think of
it.

“Then there is Mrs. Shorne. She is a Jocelyn—and such a history! She
married a wealthy manufacturer—bartered her blood for his money, and he
failed, and here she resides, a bankrupt widow, petitioning any man
that may be willing for his love _and_ a decent home. _And_—I say in
charity.

“Mrs. Shorne comes here to-morrow. She is at present with—guess, my
dear!—with Lady Racial. Do not be alarmed. I have met Lady Racial. She
heard Evan’s name, and by that and the likeness I saw she knew at once,
and I saw a truce in her eyes. She gave me a tacit assurance of it—she
was engaged to dine here yesterday, and put it off—probably to grant us
time for composure. If she comes I do not fear her. Besides, has she
not reasons? Providence may have designed her for a staunch ally—I will
not say, confederate.

“Would that Providence had fixed this beautiful mansion five hundred
miles from L——, though it were in a desolate region! And that reminds
me of the Madre. She is in health. She always will be overbearingly
robust till the day we are bereft of her. There was some secret in the
house when I was there, which I did not trouble to penetrate. That
little Jane F—— was there—not improved.

“Pray, be firm about Torquay. Estates mortgaged, but hopes of saving a
remnant of the property. Third son! Don’t commit yourself there. We
dare not baronetize him. You need not speak it—imply. More can be done
that way.

“And remember, dear Harriet, that you must manage Andrew so that we may
positively promise his vote to the Ministry on all questions when
Parliament next assembles. I understood from Lord Livelyston, that
Andrew’s vote would be thought much of. A most amusing nobleman! He
pledged himself to nothing! But we are above such a thing as a
commercial transaction. He must countenance Silva. Women, my dear, have
sent out armies—why not fleets? Do not spare me your utmost aid in my
extremity, my dearest sister.

“As for Strike, I refuse to speak of him. He is insufferable and next
to useless. How can one talk with any confidence of relationship with a
Major of Marines? When I reflect on what he is, and his conduct to
Caroline, I have inscrutable longings to slap his face. Tell dear Carry
her husband’s friend—the chairman or something of that wonderful
company of Strike’s—you know—the Duke of Belfield is coming here. He is
a blood-relation of the Elburnes, therefore of the Jocelyns. It will
not matter at all. Breweries, I find, are quite in esteem in your
England. It was highly commendable in his Grace to visit you. Did he
come to see the Major of Marines? Caroline is certainly the loveliest
woman I ever beheld, and I forgive her now the pangs of jealousy she
used to make me feel.

“Andrew, I hope, has received the most kind invitations of the
Jocelyns. He must come. Melville must talk with him about the votes of
his abominable brother in Fallowfield. We must elect Melville and have
the family indebted to us. But pray be careful that Andrew speaks not a
word to his odious brother about our location here. It would set him
dead against these hospitable Jocelyns. It will perhaps be as well,
dear Harriet, if you do not accompany Andrew. You would not be able to
account for him quite thoroughly. Do as you like—I do but advise, and
you know I may be trusted—for our sakes, dear one! I am working for
Carry to come with Andrew. Beautiful women always welcome. A
prodigy!—if they wish to astonish the Duke. Adieu! Heaven bless your
babes!”

The night passes, and the Countess pursues:

“Awakened by your fresh note from a dream of Evan on horseback, and a
multitude hailing him Count Jocelyn for Fallowfield! A morning dream.
They might desire that he should change his name; but ‘Count’ is
preposterous, though it may conceal something.

“You say Andrew will come, and talk of his bringing Caroline. Anything
to give our poor darling a respite from her brute. You deserve great
credit for your managing of that dear little good-natured piece of
obstinate man. I will at once see to prepare dear Caroline’s welcome,
and trust her stay may be prolonged in the interest of common humanity.
They have her story here already.

“Conning has come in, and says that young Mr. Harry Jocelyn will be
here this morning from Fallowfield, where he has been cricketing. The
family have not spoken of him in my hearing. He is not, I think, in
good odour at home—a scapegrace. Rose’s maid, Polly, quite flew out
when I happened to mention him, and broke one of my laces. These
English maids are domesticated savage animals.

“My chocolate is sent up, exquisitely concocted, in plate of the purest
quality—lovely little silver cups! I have already quite set the fashion
for the ladies to have chocolate in bed. The men, I hear, complain that
there is no lady at the breakfast-table. They have Miss Carrington to
superintend. I read, in the subdued satisfaction of her eyes
(completely without colour), how much she thanks me and the institution
of chocolate in bed. Poor Miss Carrington is no match for her
opportunities. One may give them to her without dread.

“It is ten on the Sabbath morn. The sweet churchbells are ringing. It
seems like a dream. There is nothing but the religion attaches me to
England; but that—is not that everything? How I used to sigh on Sundays
to hear them in Portugal!

“I have an idea of instituting toilette-receptions. They will not
please Miss Carrington so well.

“Now to the peaceful village church, and divine worship. Adieu, my
dear. I kiss my fingers to Silva. Make no effort to amuse him. He is
always occupied. Bread!—he asks no more. Adieu! Carry will be invited
with your little man.... You unhappily unable.... She, the sister I
pine to see, to show her worthy of my praises. Expectation and
excitement! Adieu!”

Filled with pleasing emotions at the thought of the service in the
quiet village church, and worshipping in the principal pew, under the
blazonry of the Jocelyn arms, the Countess sealed her letter and
addressed it, and then examined the name of Cogglesby; which plebeian
name, it struck her, would not sound well to the menials of Beckley
Court. While she was deliberating what to do to conceal it, she heard,
through her open window, the voices of some young men laughing. She
beheld her brother pass these young men, and bow to them. She beheld
them stare at him without at all returning his salute, and then one of
them—the same who had filled her ears with venom at Fallowfield—turned
to the others and laughed outrageously, crying—

“By Jove! this comes it strong. Fancy the snipocracy here—eh?”

What the others said the Countess did not wait to hear. She put on her
bonnet hastily, tried the effect of a peculiar smile in the mirror, and
lightly ran down-stairs.




CHAPTER XV.
A CAPTURE


The three youths were standing in the portico when the Countess
appeared among them. She singled out him who was specially obnoxious to
her, and sweetly inquired the direction to the village post. With the
renowned gallantry of his nation, he offered to accompany her, but
presently, with a different exhibition of the same, proposed that they
should spare themselves the trouble by dropping the letter she held
prominently, in the bag.

“Thanks,” murmured the Countess, “I will go.” Upon which his eager air
subsided, and he fell into an awkward silent march at her side, looking
so like the victim he was to be, that the Countess could have emulated
his power of laughter.

“And you are Mr. Harry Jocelyn, the very famous cricketer?”

He answered, glancing back at his friends, that he was, but did not
know about the “famous.”

“Oh! but I saw you—I saw you hit the ball most beautifully, and dearly
wished my brother had an equal ability. Brought up in the Court of
Portugal, he is barely English. There they have no manly sports. You
saw him pass you?”

“Him! Who?” asked Harry.

“My brother, on the lawn, this moment. Your sweet sister’s friend. Your
uncle Melville’s secretary.”

“What’s his name?” said Harry, in blunt perplexity.

The Countess repeated his name, which in her pronunciation was
“Hawington,” adding, “That was my brother. I am his sister. Have you
heard of the Countess de Saldar?”

“Countess!” muttered Harry. “Dash it! here’s a mistake.”

She continued, with elegant fan-like motion of her gloved fingers:
“They say there is a likeness between us. The dear Queen of Portugal
often remarked it, and in her it was a compliment to me, for she
thought my brother a model! You I should have known from your extreme
resemblance to your lovely young sister.”

Coarse food, but then Harry was a youthful Englishman; and the Countess
dieted the vanity according to the nationality. With good wine to wash
it down, one can swallow anything. The Countess lent him her eyes for
that purpose; eyes that had a liquid glow under the dove—like drooping
lids. It was a principle of hers, pampering our poor sex with swinish
solids or the lightest ambrosia, never to let the accompanying cordial
be other than of the finest quality. She knew that clowns, even more
than aristocrats, are flattered by the inebriation of delicate
celestial liquors.

“Now,” she said, after Harry had gulped as much of the dose as she
chose to administer direct from the founts, “you must accord me the
favour to tell me all about yourself, for I have heard much of you, Mr.
Harry Jocelyn, and you have excited my woman’s interest. Of me you know
nothing.”

“Haven’t I?” cried Harry, speaking to the pitch of his new warmth. “My
uncle Melville goes on about you tremendously—makes his wife as jealous
as fire. How could I tell that was your brother?”

“Your uncle has deigned to allude to me?” said the Countess,
meditatively. “But not of him—of you, Mr. Harry! What does he say?”

“Says you’re so clever you ought to be a man.”

“Ah! generous!” exclaimed the Countess. “The idea, I think, is novel to
him. Is it not?”

“Well, I believe, from what I hear, he didn’t back you for much over in
Lisbon,” said veracious Harry.

“I fear he is deceived in me now. I fear I am but a woman—I am not to
be ‘backed.’ But you are not talking of yourself.”

“Oh! never mind me,” was Harry’s modest answer.

“But I do. Try to imagine me as clever as a man, and talk to me of your
doings. Indeed I will endeavour to comprehend you.”

Thus humble, the Countess bade him give her his arm. He stuck it out
with abrupt eagerness.

“Not against my cheek.” She laughed forgivingly. “And you need not
start back half-a-mile,” she pursued with plain humour: “and please do
not look irresolute and awkward—It is not necessary,” she added.
“There!”; and she settled her fingers on him, “I am glad I can find one
or two things to instruct you in. Begin. You are a great cricketer.
What else?”

Ay! what else? Harry might well say he had no wish to talk of himself.
He did not know even how to give his arm to a lady! The first flattery
and the subsequent chiding clashed in his elated soul, and caused him
to deem himself one of the blest suddenly overhauled by an inspecting
angel and found wanting: or, in his own more accurate style of
reflection, “What a rattling fine woman this is, and what a deuce of a
fool she must think me!”

The Countess leaned on his arm with dainty languor.

“You walk well,” she said.

Harry’s backbone straightened immediately.

“No, no; I do not want you to be a drill-sergeant. Can you not be told
you are perfect without seeking to improve, vain boy? You can cricket,
and you can walk, and will very soon learn how to give your arm to a
lady. I have hopes of you. Of your friends, from whom I have ruthlessly
dragged you, I have not much. Am I personally offensive to them, Mr.
Harry? I saw them let my brother pass without returning his bow, and
they in no way acknowledged my presence as I passed. Are they
gentlemen?”

“Yes,” said Harry, stupefied by the question. “One’s Ferdinand Laxley,
Lord Laxley’s son, heir to the title; the other’s William Harvey, son
of the Chief Justice—both friends of mine.”

“But not of your manners,” interposed the Countess. “I have not so much
compunction as I ought to have in divorcing you from your associates
for a few minutes. I think I shall make a scholar of you in one or two
essentials. You do want polish. Have I not a right to take you in hand?
I have defended you already.”

“Me?” cried Harry.

“None other than Mr. Harry Jocelyn. Will he vouchsafe to me his pardon?
It has been whispered in my ears that his ambition is to be the Don
Juan of a country district, and I have said for him, that however
grovelling his undirected tastes, he is too truly noble to plume
himself upon the reputation they have procured him. Why did I defend
you? Women, you know, do not shrink from Don Juans—even provincial Don
Juans—as they should, perhaps, for their own sakes! You are all of you
dangerous, if a woman is not strictly on her guard. But you will
respect your champion, will you not?”

Harry was about to reply with wonderful briskness. He stopped, and
murmured boorishly that he was sure he was very much obliged.

Command of countenance the Countess possessed in common with her sex.
Those faces on which we make them depend entirely, women can entirely
control. Keenly sensible to humour as the Countess was, her face sidled
up to his immovably sweet. Harry looked, and looked away, and looked
again. The poor fellow was so profoundly aware of his foolishness that
he even doubted whether he was admired.

The Countess trifled with his English nature; quietly watched him bob
between tugging humility and airy conceit, and went on:

“Yes! I will trust you, and that is saying very much, for what
protection is a brother? I am alone here—defenceless!”

Men, of course, grow virtuously zealous in an instant on behalf of the
lovely dame who tells them bewitchingly, she is alone and defenceless,
with pitiful dimples round the dewy mouth that entreats their
guardianship and mercy!

The provincial Don Juan found words—a sign of clearer sensations
within. He said:

“Upon my honour, I’d look after you better than fifty brothers!”

The Countess eyed him softly, and then allowed herself the luxury of a
laugh.

“No, no! it is not the sheep, it is the wolf I fear.”

And she went through a bit of the concluding portion of the drama of
Little Red Riding Hood very prettily, and tickled him so that he became
somewhat less afraid of her.

“Are you truly so bad as report would have you to be, Mr. Harry?” she
asked, not at all in the voice of a censor.

“Pray don’t think me—a—anything you wouldn’t have me,” the youth
stumbled into an apt response.

“We shall see,” said the Countess, and varied her admiration for the
noble creature beside her with gentle ejaculations on the beauty of the
deer that ranged the park of Beckley Court, the grand old oaks and
beeches, the clumps of flowering laurel, and the rich air swarming
Summer.

She swept out her arm. “And this most magnificent estate will be yours?
How happy will she be who is led hither to reside by you, Mr. Harry!”

“Mine? No; there’s the bother,” he answered, with unfeigned chagrin.
“Beckley isn’t Elburne property, you know. It belongs to old Mrs.
Bonner, Rose’s grandmama.”

“Oh!” interjected the Countess, indifferently.

“I shall never get it—no chance,” Harry pursued. “Lost my luck with the
old lady long ago.” He waxed excited on a subject that drew him from
his shamefacedness. “It goes to Juley Bonner, or to Rosey; it’s a
toss-up which. If I’d stuck up to Juley, I might have had a pretty fair
chance. They wanted me to, that’s why I scout the premises. But fancy
Juley Bonner!”

“You couldn’t, upon your honour!” rhymed the Countess. (And Harry let
loose a delighted “Ha! ha!” as at a fine stroke of wit.) “Are we
enamoured of a beautiful maiden, Senor Harry?”

“Not a bit,” he assured her eagerly. “I don’t know any girl. I don’t
care for ’em. I don’t, really.”

The Countess impressively declared to him that he must be guided by
her; and that she might the better act his monitress, she desired to
hear the pedigree of the estate, and the exact relations in which it at
present stood toward the Elburne family.

Glad of any theme he could speak on, Harry informed her that Beckley
Court was bought by his grandfather Bonner from the proceeds of a
successful oil speculation.

“So we ain’t much on that side,” he said.

“Oil!” was the Countess’s weary exclamation. “I imagined Beckley Court
to be your ancestral mansion. Oil!”

Harry deprecatingly remarked that oil was money.

“Yes,” she replied; “but you are not one to mix oil with your Elburne
blood. Let me see—oil! That, I conceive, is grocery. So, you are
grocers on one side!”

“Oh, come! hang it!” cried Harry, turning red.

“Am I leaning on the grocer’s side, or on the lord’s?”

Harry felt dreadfully taken down. “One ranks with one’s father,” he
said.

“Yes,” observed the Countess; “but you should ever be careful not to
expose the grocer. When I beheld my brother bow to you, and that your
only return was to stare at him in that singular way, I was not aware
of this, and could not account for it.”

I declare I’m very sorry,” said Harry, with a nettled air. “Do just let
me tell you how it happened. We were at an inn, where there was an odd
old fellow gave a supper; and there was your brother, and another
fellow—as thorough an upstart as I ever met, and infernally impudent.
He got drinking, and wanted to fight us. Now I see it! Your brother, to
save his friend’s bones, said he was a tailor! Of course no gentleman
could fight a tailor; and it blew over with my saying we’d order our
clothes of him.”

“Said he was a—!” exclaimed the Countess, gazing blankly.

“I don’t wonder at your feeling annoyed,” returned Harry. “I saw him
with Rosey next day, and began to smell a rat then, but Laxley won’t
give up the tailor. He’s as proud as Lucifer. He wanted to order a suit
of your brother to-day; but I said—not while he’s in the house, however
he came here.”

The Countess had partially recovered. They were now in the village
street, and Harry pointed out the post-office.

“Your divination with regard to my brother’s most eccentric behaviour
was doubtless correct,” she said. “He wished to succour his wretched
companion. Anywhere—it matters not to him what!—he allies himself with
miserable mortals. He is the modern Samaritan. You should thank him for
saving you an encounter with some low creature.”

Swaying the letter to and fro, she pursued archly: “I can read your
thoughts. You are dying to know to whom this dear letter is addressed!”

Instantly Harry, whose eyes had previously been quite empty of
expression, glanced at the letter wistfully.

Shall I tell you?”

“Yes, do.”

“It’s to somebody I love.”

“Are you in love then?” was his disconcerted rejoinder.

“Am I not married?”

“Yes; but every woman that’s married isn’t in love with her husband,
you know.”

“Oh! Don Juan of the provinces!” she cried, holding the seal of the
letter before him in playful reproof. “Fie!”

“Come! who is it?” Harry burst out.

“I am not, surely, obliged to confess my correspondence to you?
Remember!” she laughed lightly. “He already assumes the airs of a lord
and master! You are rapid, Mr. Harry.”

“Won’t you really tell me?” he pleaded.

She put a corner of the letter in the box. “Must I?”

All was done with the archest elegance: the bewildering condescension
of a Goddess to a boor.

“I don’t say you must, you know: but I should like to see it,” returned
Harry.

“There!” She showed him a glimpse of “Mrs.,” cleverly concealing
plebeian “Cogglesby,” and the letter slid into darkness. “Are you
satisfied?”

“Yes,” said Harry, wondering why he felt a relief at the sight of
“Mrs.” written on a letter by a lady he had only known half an hour.

“And now,” said she, “I shall demand a boon of you, Mr. Harry. Will it
be accorded?”

She was hurriedly told that she might count upon him for whatever she
chose to ask; and after much trifling and many exaggerations of the
boon in question, he heard that she had selected him as her cavalier
for the day, and that he was to consent to accompany her to the village
church.

“Is it so great a request, the desire that you should sit beside a
solitary lady for so short a space?” she asked, noting his rueful
visage.

Harry assured her he would be very happy, but hinted at the bother of
having to sit and listen to that fool of a Parsley: again assuring her,
and with real earnestness, which the lady now affected to doubt, that
he would be extremely happy.

“You know, I haven’t been there for ages,” he explained.

“I hear it!” she sighed, aware of the credit his escort would bring her
in Beckley, and especially with Harry’s grandmama Bonner.

They went together to the village church. The Countess took care to be
late, so that all eyes beheld her stately march up the aisle, with her
captive beside her.

Nor was her captive less happy than he professed he would be. Charming
comic side-play, at the expense of Mr. Parsley, she mingled with
exceeding devoutness, and a serious attention to Mr. Parsley’s
discourse. In her heart this lady really thought her confessed daily
sins forgiven her by the recovery of the lost sheep to Mr. Parsley’s
fold. The results of this small passage of arms were, that Evan’s
disclosure at Fallowfield was annulled in the mind of Harry Jocelyn,
and the latter gentleman became the happy slave of the Countess de
Saldar.




CHAPTER XVI.
LEADS TO A SMALL SKIRMISH BETWEEN ROSE AND EVAN


Lady Jocelyn belonged properly to that order which the Sultans and the
Roxalanas of earth combine to exclude from their little games, under
the designation of blues, or strong-minded women: a kind, if genuine,
the least dangerous and staunchest of the sex, as poor fellows learn
when the flippant and the frail fair have made mummies of them. She had
the frankness of her daughter, the same direct eyes and firm step: a
face without shadows, though no longer bright with youth. It may be
charged to her as one of the errors of her strong mind, that she
believed friendship practicable between men and women, young or old.
She knew the world pretty well, and was not amazed by extraordinary
accidents; but as she herself continued to be an example of her faith:
we must presume it natural that her delusion should cling to her. She
welcomed Evan as her daughter’s friend, walked half-way across the room
to meet him on his introduction to her, and with the simple words, “I
have heard of you,” let him see that he stood upon his merits in her
house. The young man’s spirit caught something of hers even in their
first interview, and at once mounted to that level. Unconsciously he
felt that she took, and would take him, for what he was, and he rose to
his worth in the society she presided over. A youth like Evan could not
perceive, that in loving this lady’s daughter, and accepting the place
she offered him, he was guilty of a breach of confidence; or reflect,
that her entire absence of suspicion imposed upon him a corresponding
honesty toward her. He fell into a blindness. Without dreaming for a
moment that she designed to encourage his passion for Rose, he yet
beheld himself in the light she had cast on him; and, received as her
daughter’s friend, it seemed to him not so utterly monstrous that he
might be her daughter’s lover. A haughty, a grand, or a too familiar
manner, would have kept his eyes clearer on his true condition. Lady
Jocelyn spoke to his secret nature, and eclipsed in his mind the
outward aspects with which it was warring. To her he was a gallant
young man, a fit companion for Rose, and when she and Sir Franks said,
and showed him, that they were glad to know him, his heart swam in a
flood of happiness they little suspected.

This was another of the many forms of intoxication to which
circumstances subjected the poor lover. In Fallowfield, among
impertinent young men, Evan’s pride proclaimed him a tailor. At Beckley
Court, acted on by one genuine soul, he forgot it, and felt elate in
his manhood. The shades of Tailordom dispersed like fog before the full
South-west breeze. When I say he forgot it, the fact was present enough
to him, but it became an outward fact: he had ceased to feel it within
him. It was not a portion of his being, hard as Mrs. Mel had struck to
fix it. Consequently, though he was in a far worse plight than when he
parted with Rose on board the Jocasta, he felt much less of an impostor
now. This may have been partly because he had endured his struggle with
the Demogorgon the Countess painted to him in such frightful colours,
and found him human after all; but it was mainly owing to the hearty
welcome Lady Jocelyn had extended to him as the friend of Rose.

Loving Rose, he nevertheless allowed his love no tender liberties. The
eyes of a lover are not his own; but his hands and lips are, till such
time as they are claimed. The sun must smile on us with peculiar warmth
to woo us forth utterly—pluck our hearts out. Rose smiled on many. She
smiled on Drummond Forth, Ferdinand Laxley, William Harvey, and her
brother Harry; and she had the same eyes for all ages. Once, previous
to the arrival of the latter three, there was a change in her look, or
Evan fancied it. They were going to ride out together, and Evan, coming
to his horse on the gravel walk, saw her talking with Drummond Forth.
He mounted, awaiting her, and either from a slight twinge of jealousy,
or to mark her dainty tread with her riding-habit drawn above her
heels, he could not help turning his head occasionally. She listened to
Drummond with attention, but presently broke from him, crying: “It’s an
absurdity. Speak to them yourself—I shall not.”

On the ride that day, she began prattling of this and that with the
careless glee that became her well, and then sank into a reverie.
Between-whiles her eyes had raised tumults in Evan’s breast by dropping
on him in a sort of questioning way, as if she wished him to speak, or
wished to fathom something she would rather have unspoken. Ere they had
finished their ride, she tossed off what burden may have been on her
mind as lightly as a stray lock from her shoulders. He thought that the
singular look recurred. It charmed him too much for him to speculate on
it.

The Countess’s opportune ally, the gout, which had reduced the Hon.
Melville Jocelyn’s right hand to a state of uselessness, served her
with her brother equally: for, having volunteered his services to the
invalided diplomatist, it excused his stay at Beckley Court to himself,
and was a mask to his intimacy with Rose, besides earning him the
thanks of the family. Harry Jocelyn, released from the wing of the
Countess, came straight to him, and in a rough kind of way begged Evan
to overlook his rudeness.

“You took us all in at Fallowfield, except Drummond,” he said.
“Drummond would have it you were joking. I see it now. And you’re a
confoundedly clever fellow into the bargain, or you wouldn’t be
quill-driving for Uncle Mel. Don’t be uppish about it—will you?”

“You have nothing to fear on that point,” said Evan. With which promise
the peace was signed between them. Drummond and William Harvey were
cordial, and just laughed over the incident. Laxley, however, held
aloof. His retention of ideas once formed befitted his rank and
station. Some trifling qualms attended Evan’s labours with the
diplomatist; but these were merely occasioned by the iteration of a
particular phrase. Mr. Goren, an enthusiastic tailor, had now and then
thrown out to Evan stirring hints of an invention he claimed: the
discovery of a Balance in Breeches: apparently the philosopher’s stone
of the tailor craft, a secret that should ensure harmony of outline to
the person and an indubitable accommodation to the most difficult legs.

Since Adam’s expulsion, it seemed, the tailors of this wilderness had
been in search of it. But like the doctors of this wilderness, their
science knew no specific: like the Babylonian workmen smitten with
confusion of tongues, they had but one word in common, and that word
was “cut.” Mr. Goren contended that to cut was not the key of the
science: but to find a Balance was. An artistic admirer of the frame of
man, Mr. Goren was not wanting in veneration for the individual who had
arisen to do it justice. He spoke of his Balance with supreme
self-appreciation. Nor less so the Honourable Melville, who professed
to have discovered the Balance of Power, at home and abroad. It was a
capital Balance, but inferior to Mr. Goren’s. The latter gentleman
guaranteed a Balance with motion: whereas one step not only upset the
Honourable Melville’s, but shattered the limbs of Europe. Let us admit,
that it is easier to fit a man’s legs than to compress expansive
empires.

Evan enjoyed the doctoring of kingdoms quite as well as the
diplomatist. It suited the latent grandeur of soul inherited by him
from the great Mel. He liked to prop Austria and arrest the Czar, and
keep a watchful eye on France; but the Honourable Melville’s
deep-mouthed phrase conjured up to him a pair of colossal legs
imperiously demanding their Balance likewise. At first the image scared
him. In time he was enabled to smile it into phantom vagueness. The
diplomatist diplomatically informed him, it might happen that the
labours he had undertaken might be neither more nor less than education
for a profession he might have to follow. Out of this, an ardent
imagination, with the Countess de Saldar for an interpreter, might
construe a promise of some sort. Evan soon had high hopes. What though
his name blazed on a shop-front? The sun might yet illumine him to
honour!

Where a young man is getting into delicate relations with a young
woman, the more of his sex the better—they serve as a blind; and the
Countess hailed fresh arrivals warmly. There was Sir John Loring,
Dorothy’s father, who had married the eldest of the daughters of Lord
Elburne. A widower, handsome, and a flirt, he capitulated to the
Countess instantly, and was played off against the provincial Don Juan,
who had reached that point with her when youths of his description make
bashful confidences of their successes, and receive delicious chidings
for their naughtiness—rebukes which give immeasurable rebounds. Then
came Mr. Gordon Graine, with his daughter, Miss Jenny Graine, an early
friend of Rose’s, and numerous others. For the present, Miss Isabella
Current need only be chronicled among the visitors—a sprightly maid
fifty years old, without a wrinkle to show for it—the Aunt Bel of fifty
houses where there were young women and little boys. Aunt Bel had quick
wit and capital anecdotes, and tripped them out aptly on a sparkling
tongue with exquisite instinct for climax and when to strike for a
laugh. No sooner had she entered the hall than she announced the
proximate arrival of the Duke of Belfield at her heels, and it was
known that his Grace was as sure to follow as her little dog, who was
far better paid for his devotion.

The dinners at Beckley Court had hitherto been rather languid to those
who were not intriguing or mixing young love with the repast. Miss
Current was an admirable neutral, sent, as the Countess fervently
believed, by Providence. Till now the Countess had drawn upon her own
resources to amuse the company, and she had been obliged to restrain
herself from doing it with that unctuous feeling for rank which warmed
her Portuguese sketches in low society and among her sisters. She
retired before Miss Current and formed audience, glad of a relief to
her inventive labour. While Miss Current and her ephemerals lightly
skimmed the surface of human life, the Countess worked in the depths.
Vanities, passions, prejudices beneath the surface, gave her full
employment. How naturally poor Juliana Bonner was moved to mistake
Evan’s compassion for a stronger sentiment! The Countess eagerly
assisted Providence to shuffle the company into their proper places.
Harry Jocelyn was moodily happy, but good; greatly improved in the eyes
of his grandmama Bonner, who attributed the change to the Countess, and
partly forgave her the sinful consent to the conditions of her
love-match with the foreign Count, which his penitent wife had
privately confessed to that strict Churchwoman.

“Thank Heaven that you have no children,” Mrs. Bonner had said; and the
Countess humbly replied:

“It is indeed my remorseful consolation!”

“Who knows that it is not your punishment?” added Mrs. Bonner; the
Countess weeping.

She went and attended morning prayers in Mrs. Bonner’s apartments,
alone with the old lady. “To make up for lost time in Catholic
Portugal!” she explained it to the household.

On the morning after Miss Current had come to shape the party, most of
the inmates of Beckley Court being at breakfast, Rose gave a lead to
the conversation.

“Aunt Bel! I want to ask you something. We’ve been making bets about
you. Now, answer honestly, we’re all friends. Why did you refuse all
your offers?”

“Quite simple, child,” replied the unabashed ex-beauty. “A matter of
taste. I liked twenty shillings better than a sovereign.”

Rose looked puzzled, but the men laughed, and Rose exclaimed:

“Now I see! How stupid I am! You mean, you may have friends when you
are not married. Well, I think that’s the wisest, after all. You don’t
lose them, do you? Pray, Mr. Evan, are you thinking Aunt Bel might
still alter her mind for somebody, if she knew his value?”

“I was presuming to hope there might be a place vacant among the
twenty,” said Evan, slightly bowing to both. “Am I pardoned?”

“I like you!” returned Aunt Bel, nodding at him. “Where do you come
from? A young man who’ll let himself go for small coin’s a jewel worth
knowing.”

“Where do I come from?” drawled Laxley, who had been tapping an egg
with a dreary expression.

“Aunt Bel spoke to Mr. Harrington,” said Rose, pettishly.

“Asked him where he came from,” Laxley continued his drawl. “He didn’t
answer, so I thought it polite for another of the twenty to strike in.”

“I must thank you expressly,” said Evan, and achieved a cordial bow.

Rose gave Evan one of her bright looks, and then called the attention
of Ferdinand Laxley to the fact that he had lost a particular bet made
among them.

“What bet?” asked Laxley. “About the profession?”

A stream of colour shot over Rose’s face. Her eyes flew nervously from
Laxley to Evan, and then to Drummond. Laxley appeared pleased as a man
who has made a witty sally: Evan was outwardly calm, while Drummond
replied to the mute appeal of Rose, by saying:

“Yes; we’ve all lost. But who could hit it? The lady admits no
sovereign in our sex.”

“So you’ve been betting about me?” said Aunt Bel. “I’ll settle the
dispute. Let him who guessed ‘Latin’ pocket the stakes, and, if I guess
him, let him hand them over to me.”

“Excellent!” cried Rose. “One did guess ‘Latin,’ Aunt Bel! Now, tell us
which one it was.”

“Not you, my dear. You guessed ‘temper.’”

“No! you dreadful Aunt Bel!”

“Let me see,” said Aunt Bel, seriously. “A young man would not marry a
woman with Latin, but would not guess it the impediment. Gentlemen
moderately aged are mad enough to slip their heads under any yoke, but
see the obstruction. It was a man of forty guessed ‘Latin.’ I request
the Hon. Hamilton Everard Jocelyn to confirm it.”

Amid laughter and exclamations Hamilton confessed himself the man who
had guessed Latin to be the cause of Miss Current’s remaining an old
maid; Rose, crying:

“You really are too clever, Aunt Bel!”

A divergence to other themes ensued, and then Miss Jenny Graine said:
“Isn’t Juley learning Latin? I should like to join her while I’m here.”

“And so should I,” responded Rose. “My friend Evan is teaching her
during the intervals of his arduous diplomatic labours. Will you take
us into your class, Evan?”

“Don’t be silly, girls,” interposed Aunt Bel. “Do you want to graduate
for my state with your eyes open?”

Evan objected his poor qualifications as a tutor, and Aunt Bel
remarked, that if Juley learnt Latin at all, she should have regular
instruction.

“I am quite satisfied,” said Juley, quietly.

“Of course you are,” Rose snubbed her cousin. “So would anybody be. But
Mama really was talking of a tutor for Juley, if she could find one.
There’s a school at Bodley; but that’s too far for one of the men to
come over.”

A school at Bodley! thought Evan, and his probationary years at the
Cudford Establishment rose before him; and therewith, for the first
time since his residence at Beckley, the figure of John Raikes.

“There’s a friend of mine,” he said, aloud, “I think if Lady Jocelyn
does wish Miss Bonner to learn Latin thoroughly, he would do very well
for the groundwork and would be glad of the employment. He is very
poor.”

“If he’s poor, and a friend of yours, Evan, we’ll have him,” said Rose:
“we’ll ride and fetch him.”

“Yes,” added Miss Carrington, “that must be quite sufficient
qualification.”

Juliana was not gazing gratefully at Evan for his proposal.

Rose asked the name of Evan’s friend. “His name is Raikes,” answered
Evan. “I don’t know where he is now. He may be at Fallowfield. If Lady
Jocelyn pleases, I will ride over to-day and see.”

“My dear Evan!” cried Rose, “you don’t mean that absurd figure we saw
on the cricket-field?” She burst out laughing. “Oh! what fun it will
be! Let us have him here by all means.”

“I shall not bring him to be laughed at,” said Evan.

“I will remember he is your friend,” Rose returned demurely; and again
laughed, as she related to Jenny Graine the comic appearance Mr. Raikes
had presented.

Laxley waited for a pause, and then said: “I have met this Mr. Raikes.
As a friend of the family, I should protest against his admission here
in any office whatever into the upper part of the house, at least. He
is not a gentleman.”

We don’t want teachers to be gentlemen,” observed Rose.

“This fellow is the reverse,” Laxley pronounced, and desired Harry to
confirm it; but Harry took a gulp of coffee.

“Oblige me by recollecting that I have called him a friend of mine,”
said Evan.

Rose murmured to him: “Pray forgive me! I forgot.” Laxley hummed
something about “taste.” Aunt Bel led from the theme by a lively
anecdote.

After breakfast the party broke into knots, and canvassed Laxley’s
behaviour to Evan, which was generally condemned. Rose met the young
men strolling on the lawn; and, with her usual bluntness, accused
Laxley of wishing to insult her friend.

“I speak to him—do I not?” said Laxley. “What would you have more? I
admit the obligation of speaking to him when I meet him in your house.
Out of it—that’s another matter.”

“But what is the cause for your conduct to him, Ferdinand?”

“By Jove!” cried Harry, “I wonder he puts up with it: I wouldn’t. I’d
have a shot with you, my boy.”

“Extremely honoured,” said Laxley. “But neither you nor I care to fight
tailors.”

“Tailors!” exclaimed Rose. There was a sharp twitch in her body, as if
she had been stung or struck.

“Look here, Rose,” said Laxley; “I meet him, he insults me, and to get
out of the consequences tells me he’s the son of a tailor, and a tailor
himself; knowing that it ties my hands. Very well, he puts himself hors
de combat to save his bones. Let him unsay it, and choose whether he’ll
apologize or not, and I’ll treat him accordingly. At present I’m not
bound to do more than respect the house I find he has somehow got
admission to.”

“It’s clear it was that other fellow,” said Harry, casting a
side-glance up at the Countess’s window.

Rose looked straight at Laxley, and abruptly turned on her heel.

In the afternoon, Lady Jocelyn sent a message to Evan that she wished
to see him. Rose was with her mother. Lady Jocelyn had only to say,
that if he thought his friend a suitable tutor for Miss Bonner, they
would be happy to give him the office at Beckley Court. Glad to
befriend poor Jack, Evan gave the needful assurances, and was requested
to go and fetch him forthwith. When he left the room, Rose marched out
silently beside him.

“Will you ride over with me, Rose?” he said, though scarcely anxious
that she should see Mr. Raikes immediately.

The singular sharpness of her refusal astonished him none the less.

“Thank you, no; I would rather not.”

A lover is ever ready to suspect that water has been thrown on the fire
that burns for him in the bosom of his darling. Sudden as the change
was, it was very decided. His sensitive ears were pained by the absence
of his Christian name, which her lips had lavishly made sweet to him.
He stopped in his walk.

“You spoke of riding to Fallowfield. Is it possible you don’t want me
to bring my friend here? There’s time to prevent it.”

Judged by the Countess de Saldar, the behaviour of this well-born
English maid was anything but well-bred. She absolutely shrugged her
shoulders and marched a-head of him into the conservatory, where she
began smelling at flowers and plucking off sere leaves.

In such cases a young man always follows; as her womanly instinct must
have told her, for she expressed no surprise when she heard his voice
two minutes after.

“Rose! what have I done?”

“Nothing at all,” she said, sweeping her eyes over his a moment, and
resting them on the plants.

“I must have uttered something that has displeased you.”

“No.”

Brief negatives are not re-assuring to a lover’s uneasy mind.

“I beg you—Be frank with me, Rose!”

A flame of the vanished fire shone in her face, but subsided, and she
shook her head darkly.

“Have you any objection to my friend?”

Her fingers grew petulant with an orange leaf. Eyeing a spot on it, she
said, hesitatingly:

“Any friend of yours I am sure I should like to help. But—but I wish
you wouldn’t associate with that—that kind of friend. It gives people
all sorts of suspicions.”

Evan drew a sharp breath.

The voices of Master Alec and Miss Dorothy were heard shouting on the
lawn. Alec gave Dorothy the slip and approached the conservatory on
tip-toe, holding his hand out behind him to enjoin silence and secrecy.
The pair could witness the scene through the glass before Evan spoke.

“What suspicions?” he asked.

Rose looked up, as if the harshness of his tone pleased her.

“Do you like red roses best, or white?” was her answer, moving to a
couple of trees in pots.

“Can’t make up your mind?” she continued, and plucked both a white and
red rose, saying: “There! choose your colour by-and-by,” and ask Juley
to sew the one you choose in your button-hole.”

She laid the roses in his hand, and walked away. She must have known
that there was a burden of speech on his tongue. She saw him move to
follow her, but this time she did not linger, and it may be inferred
that she wished to hear no more.




CHAPTER XVII.
IN WHICH EVAN WRITES HIMSELF TAILOR


The only philosophic method of discovering what a young woman means,
and what is in her mind, is that zigzag process of inquiry conducted by
following her actions, for she can tell you nothing, and if she does
not want to know a particular matter, it must be a strong beam from the
central system of facts that shall penetrate her. Clearly there was a
disturbance in the bosom of Rose Jocelyn, and one might fancy that
amiable mirror as being wilfully ruffled to confuse a thing it was
asked by the heavens to reflect: a good fight fought by all young
people at a certain period, and now and then by an old fool or two. The
young it seasons and strengthens; the old it happily kills off; and
thus, what is, is made to work harmoniously with what we would have be.

After quitting Evan, Rose hied to her friend Jenny Graine, and in the
midst of sweet millinery talk, darted the odd question, whether
baronets or knights ever were tradesmen: to which Scottish Jenny,
entirely putting aside the shades of beatified aldermen and the
illustrious list of mayors that have welcomed royalty, replied that it
was a thing quite impossible. Rose then wished to know if tailors were
thought worse of than other tradesmen. Jenny, premising that she was no
authority, stated she imagined she had heard that they were.

“Why?” said Rose, no doubt because she was desirous of seeing justice
dealt to that class. But Jenny’s bosom was a smooth reflector of facts
alone.

Rose pondered, and said with compressed eagerness, “Jenny, do you think
you could ever bring yourself to consent to care at all for anybody
ever talked of as belonging to them? Tell me.”

Now Jenny had come to Beckley Court to meet William Harvey: she was
therefore sufficiently soft to think she could care for him whatever
his origin were, and composed in the knowledge that no natal stigma was
upon him to try the strength of her affection. Designing to generalize,
as women do (and seem tempted to do most when they are secretly
speaking from their own emotions), she said, shyly moving her
shoulders, with a forefinger laying down the principle:

“You know, my dear, if one esteemed such a person very very much, and
were quite sure, without any doubt, that he liked you in return—that
is, completely liked you, and was quite devoted, and made no
concealment—I mean, if he was very superior, and like other men—you
know what I mean—and had none of the cringing ways some of them have—I
mean; supposing him gay and handsome, taking—”

“Just like William,” Rose cut her short; and we may guess her to have
had some one in her head for her to conceive that Jenny must be
speaking of any one in particular.

A young lady who can have male friends, as well as friends of her own
sex, is not usually pressing and secret in her confidences, possibly
because such a young lady is not always nursing baby-passions, and does
not require her sex’s coddling and posseting to keep them alive. With
Rose love will be full grown when it is once avowed, and will know
where to go to be nourished.

“Merely an idea I had,” she said to Jenny, who betrayed her mental
pre-occupation by putting the question for the questions last.

Her Uncle Melville next received a visit from the restless young woman.
To him she spoke not a word of the inferior classes, but as a special
favourite of the diplomatist’s, begged a gift of him for her proximate
birthday. Pushed to explain what it was, she said, “It’s something I
want you to do for a friend of mine, Uncle Mel.”

The diplomatist instanced a few of the modest requests little maids
prefer to people they presume to have power to grant.

“No, it’s nothing nonsensical,” said Rose; “I want you to get my friend
Evan an appointment. You can if you like, you know, Uncle Mel, and it’s
a shame to make him lose his time when he’s young and does his work so
well—that you can’t deny! Now, please, be positive, Uncle Mel. You know
I hate—I have no faith in your ‘nous verrons’. Say you will, and at
once.”

The diplomatist pretended to have his weather-eye awakened.

“You seem very anxious about feathering the young fellow’s nest,
Rosey?”

“There,” cried Rose, with the maiden’s mature experience of us, “isn’t
that just like men? They never can believe you can be entirely
disinterested!”

“Hulloa!” the diplomatist sung out, “I didn’t say anything, Rosey.”

She reddened at her hastiness, but retrieved it by saying:

“No, but you listen to your wife; you know you do, Uncle Mel; and now
there’s Aunt Shorne and the other women, who make you think just what
they like about me, because they hate Mama.”

“Don’t use strong words, my dear.”

“But it’s abominable!” cried Rose. “They asked Mama yesterday what
Evan’s being here meant? Why, of course, he’s your secretary, and my
friend, and Mama very properly stopped them, and so will I! As for me,
I intend to stay at Beckley, I can tell you, dear old boy.” Uncle Mel
had a soft arm round his neck, and was being fondled. “And I’m not
going to be bred up to go into a harem, you may be sure.”

The diplomatist whistled, “You talk your mother with a vengeance,
Rosey.”

“And she’s the only sensible woman I know,” said Rose. “Now promise
me—in earnest. Don’t let them mislead you, for you know you’re quite a
child, out of your politics, and I shall take you in hand myself. Why,
now, think, Uncle Mel! wouldn’t any girl, as silly as they make me out,
hold her tongue—not talk of him, as I do; and because I really do feel
for him as a friend. See the difference between me and Juley!”

It was a sad sign if Rose was growing a bit of a hypocrite, but this
instance of Juliana’s different manner of showing her feelings toward
Evan would have quieted suspicion in shrewder men, for Juliana watched
Evan’s shadow, and it was thought by two or three at Beckley Court,
that Evan would be conferring a benefit on all by carrying off the
romantically-inclined but little presentable young lady.

The diplomatist, with a placid “Well, well!” ultimately promised to do
his best for Rose’s friend, and then Rose said, “Now I leave you to the
Countess,” and went and sat with her mother and Drummond Forth. The
latter was strange in his conduct to Evan. While blaming Laxley’s
unmannered behaviour, he seemed to think Laxley had grounds for it, and
treated Evan with a sort of cynical deference that had, for the last
couple of days, exasperated Rose.

“Mama, you must speak to Ferdinand,” she burst upon the conversation,
“Drummond is afraid to—he can stand by and see my friend insulted.
Ferdinand is insufferable with his pride—he’s jealous of everybody who
has manners, and Drummond approves him, and I will not bear it.”

Lady Jocelyn hated household worries, and quietly remarked that the
young men must fight it out together.

“No, but it’s your duty to interfere, Mama,” said Rose; “and I know you
will when I tell you that Ferdinand declares my friend Evan is a
tradesman—beneath his notice. Why, it insults me!”

Lady Jocelyn looked out from a lofty window on such veritable squabbles
of boys and girls as Rose revealed.

“Can’t you help them to run on smoothly while they’re here?” she said
to Drummond, and he related the scene at the Green Dragon.

“I think I heard he was the son of Sir Something Harrington, Devonshire
people,” said Lady Jocelyn.

“Yes, he is,” cried Rose, “or closely related. I’m sure I understood
the Countess that it was so. She brought the paper with the death in it
to us in London, and shed tears over it.”

“She showed it in the paper, and shed tears over it?” said Drummond,
repressing an inclination to laugh. “Was her father’s title given in
full?”

“Sir Abraham Harrington, replied Rose. “I think she said father, if the
word wasn’t too common-place for her.”

“You can ask old Tom when he comes, if you are anxious to know,” said
Drummond to her ladyship. “His brother married one of the sisters. By
the way, he’s coming, too. He ought to clear up the mystery.”

“Now you’re sneering, Drummond,” said Rose: “for you know there’s no
mystery to clear up.”

Drummond and Lady Jocelyn began talking of old Tom Cogglesby, whom, it
appeared, the former knew intimately, and the latter had known.

“The Cogglesbys are sons of a cobbler, Rose,” said Lady Jocelyn. “You
must try and be civil to them.”

“Of course I shall, Mama,” Rose answered seriously.

“And help the poor Countess to bear their presence as well as
possible,” said Drummond. “The Harringtons have had to mourn a dreadful
mesalliance. Pity the Countess!”

“Oh! the Countess! the Countess!” exclaimed Rose to Drummond’s pathetic
shake of the head. She and Drummond were fully agreed about the
Countess; Drummond mimicking the lady: “In verity, she is most
mellifluous!” while Rose sugared her lips and leaned gracefully forward
with “De Saldar, let me petition you—since we must endure our
title—since it is not to be your Louisa?” and her eyes sought the
ceiling, and her hand slowly melted into her drapery, as the Countess
was wont to effect it.

Lady Jocelyn laughed, but said: “You’re too hard upon the Countess. The
female euphuist is not to be met with every day. It’s a different kind
from the Precieuse. She is not a Precieuse. She has made a capital
selection of her vocabulary from Johnson, and does not work it badly,
if we may judge by Harry and Melville. Euphuism—[affectation D.W.]—in
‘woman’ is the popular ideal of a Duchess. She has it by nature, or she
has studied it: and if so, you must respect her abilities.”

“Yes—Harry!” said Rose, who was angry at a loss of influence over her
rough brother, “any one could manage Harry! and Uncle Mel’s a goose.
You should see what a ‘female euphuist’ Dorry is getting. She says in
the Countess’s hearing: ‘Rose! I should in verity wish to play, if it
were pleasing to my sweet cousin?’ I’m ready to die with laughing. I
don’t do it, Mama.”

The Countess, thus being discussed, was closeted with old Mrs. Bonner:
not idle. Like Hannibal in Italy, she had crossed her Alps in attaining
Beckley Court, and here in the enemy’s country the wary general found
herself under the necessity of throwing up entrenchments to fly to in
case of defeat. Sir Abraham Harrington of Torquay, who had helped her
to cross the Alps, became a formidable barrier against her return.

Meantime Evan was riding over to Fallowfield, and as he rode under
black visions between the hedgeways crowned with their hop-garlands, a
fragrance of roses saluted his nostril, and he called to mind the red
and the white the peerless representative of the two had given him, and
which he had thrust sullenly in his breast-pocket and he drew them out
to look at them reproachfully and sigh farewell to all the roses of
life, when in company with them he found in his hand the forgotten
letter delivered to him on the cricket-field the day of the memorable
match. He smelt at the roses, and turned the letter this way and that.
His name was correctly worded on the outside. With an odd reluctance to
open it, he kept trifling over the flowers, and then broke the broad
seal, and these are the words that met his eyes:

“Mr. EVAN HARRINGTON.

“You have made up your mind to be a tailor, instead of a Tomnoddy.
You’re right. Not too many men in the world—plenty of nincompoops.

“Don’t be made a weathercock of by a parcel of women. I want to find a
man worth something. If you go on with it, you shall end by riding in
your carriage, and cutting it as fine as any of them. I’ll take care
your belly is not punished while you’re about it.

“From the time your name is over your shop, I give you £300 per annum.

“Or stop. There’s nine of you. They shall have £40. per annum apiece, 9
times 40, eh? That’s better than £300., if you know how to reckon.
Don’t you wish it was ninety-nine tailors to a man! I could do that
too, and it would not break me; so don’t be a proud young ass, or I’ll
throw my money to the geese. Lots of them in the world. How many geese
to a tailor?

“Go on for five years, and I double it.

“Give it up, and I give you up.

“No question about me. The first tailor can be paid his £40 in advance,
by applying at the offices of Messrs. Grist, Gray’s Inn Square, Gray’s
Inn. Let him say he is tailor No. 1, and show this letter, signed
Agreed, with your name in full at bottom. This will do—money will be
paid—no questions one side or other. So on—the whole nine. The end of
the year they can give a dinner to their acquaintance. Send in bill to
Messrs. Grist.

“The advice to you to take the cash according to terms mentioned is
advice of

“A FRIEND.

“P.S. You shall have your wine. Consult among yourselves, and carry it
by majority what wine it’s to be. Five carries it. Dozen and half per
tailor, per annum—that’s the limit.”

It was certainly a very hot day. The pores of his skin were prickling,
and his face was fiery; and yet he increased his pace, and broke into a
wild gallop for a mile or so; then suddenly turned his horse’s head
back for Beckley. The secret of which evolution was, that he had caught
the idea of a plotted insult of Laxley’s in the letter, for when the
blood is up we are drawn the way the tide sets strongest, and Evan was
prepared to swear that Laxley had written the letter, because he was
burning to chastise the man who had injured him with Rose.

Sure that he was about to confirm his suspicion, he read it again,
gazed upon Beckley Court in the sultry light, and turned for
Fallowfield once more, devising to consult Mr. John Raikes on the
subject.

The letter had a smack of crabbed age hardly counterfeit. The savour of
an old eccentric’s sour generosity was there. Evan fell into bitter
laughter at the idea of Rose glancing over his shoulder and asking him
what nine of him to a man meant. He heard her clear voice pursuing him.
He could not get away from the mocking sound of Rose beseeching him to
instruct her on that point. How if the letter were genuine? He began to
abhor the sight and touch of the paper, for it struck division cold as
death between him and his darling. He saw now the immeasurable hopes
his residence at Beckley had lured him to. Rose had slightly awakened
him: this letter was blank day to his soul. He saw the squalid shop,
the good, stern, barren-spirited mother, the changeless drudgery, the
existence which seemed indeed no better than what the ninth of a man
was fit for. The influence of his mother came on him once more. Dared
he reject the gift if true? No spark of gratitude could he feel, but
chained, dragged at the heels of his fate, he submitted to think it
true; resolving the next moment that it was a fabrication and a trap:
but he flung away the roses.

As idle as a painted cavalier upon a painted drop-scene, the figure of
Mr. John Raikes was to be observed leaning with crossed legs against a
shady pillar of the Green Dragon; eyeing alternately, with an
indifference he did not care to conceal, the assiduous pecking in the
dust of some cocks and hens that had strayed from the yard of the inn,
and the sleepy blinking in the sun of an old dog at his feet: nor did
Evan’s appearance discompose the sad sedateness of his demeanour.

“Yes; I am here still,” he answered Evan’s greeting, with a flaccid
gesture. “Don’t excite me too much. A little at a time. I can’t bear
it!”

“How now? What is it now, Jack?” said Evan.

Mr. Raikes pointed at the dog. “I’ve made a bet with myself he won’t
wag his tail within the next ten minutes. I beg of you, Harrington, to
remain silent for both our sakes.”

Evan was induced to look at the dog, and the dog looked at him, and
gently moved his tail.

“I’ve lost!” cried Raikes, in languid anguish. “He’s getting excited.
He’ll go mad. We’re not accustomed to this in Fallowfield.”

Evan dismounted, and was going to tell him the news he had for him,
when his attention was distracted by the sight of Rose’s maid, Polly
Wheedle, splendidly bonneted, who slipped past them into the inn, after
repulsing Jack’s careless attempt to caress her chin; which caused him
to tell Evan that he could not get on without the society of
intellectual women.

Evan called a boy to hold the horse.

“Have you seen her before, Jack?”

Jack replied: “Once. Your pensioner up-stairs she comes to visit. I do
suspect there kinship is betwixt them. Ay! one might swear them
sisters. She’s a relief to the monotony of the petrified street—the old
man with the brown-gaitered legs and the doubled-up old woman with the
crutch. I heard the London horn this morning.”

Evan thrust the letter in his hands, telling him to read and form an
opinion on it, and went in the track of Miss Wheedle.

Mr. Raikes resumed his station against the pillar, and held the letter
out on a level with his thigh. Acting (as it was his nature to do off
the stage), he had not exaggerated his profound melancholy. Of a light
soil and with a tropical temperament, he had exhausted all lively
recollection of his brilliant career, and, in the short time since Evan
had parted with him, sunk abjectly down into the belief that he was
fixed in Fallowfield for life. His spirit pitied for agitation and
events. The horn of the London coach had sounded distant metropolitan
glories in the ears of the exile in rustic parts.

Sighing heavily, Raikes opened the letter, in simple obedience to the
wishes of his friend; for he would have preferred to stand
contemplating his own state of hopeless stagnation. The sceptical
expression he put on when he had read the letter through must not
deceive us. John Raikes had dreamed of a beneficent eccentric old
gentleman for many years: one against whom, haply, he had bumped in a
crowded thoroughfare, and had with cordial politeness begged pardon of;
had then picked up his walking-stick; restored it, venturing a witty
remark; retired, accidentally dropping his card-case; subsequently, to
his astonishment and gratification, receiving a pregnant missive from
that old gentleman’s lawyer. Or it so happened that Mr. Raikes met the
old gentleman at a tavern, and, by the exercise of a signal dexterity,
relieved him from a bone in his throat, and reluctantly imparted his
address on issuing from the said tavern. Or perhaps it was a lonely
highway where the old gentleman walked, and John Raikes had his name in
the papers for a deed of heroism, nor was man ungrateful. Since he had
eaten up his uncle, this old gentleman of his dreams walked in town and
country—only, and alas! Mr. Raikes could never encounter him in the
flesh. The muscles of his face, therefore, are no index to the real
feelings of the youth when he had thoroughly mastered the contents of
the letter, and reflected that the dream of his luck—his angelic old
gentleman—had gone and wantonly bestowed himself upon Evan Harrington,
instead of the expectant and far worthier John Raikes. Worthier
inasmuch as he gave him credence for existing long ere he knew of him
and beheld him manifest.

Raikes retreated to the vacant parlour of the Green Dragon, and there
Evan found him staring at the unfolded letter, his head between his
cramped fists, with a contraction of his mouth. Evan was troubled by
what he had seen up-stairs, and did not speak till Jack looked up and
said, “Oh, there you are.”

“Well, what do you think, Jack?”

“Yes—it’s all right,” Raikes rejoined in most matter-of-course tone,
and then he stepped to the window, and puffed a very deep breath
indeed, and glanced from the straight line of the street to the
heavens, with whom, injured as he was, he felt more at home now that he
knew them capable of miracles.

“Is it a bad joke played upon me?” said Evan.

Raikes upset a chair. “It’s quite childish. You’re made a gentleman for
life, and you ask if it’s a joke played upon you! It’s maddening!
There—there goes my hat!”

With a vehement kick, Mr. Raikes despatched his ancient head-gear to
the other end of the room, saying that he must have some wine, and
would; and disdainful was his look at Evan, when the latter attempted
to reason him into economy. He ordered the wine; drank a glass, which
coloured a new mood in him; and affecting a practical manner, said:

“I confess I have been a little hurt with you, Harrington. You left me
stranded on the desert isle. I thought myself abandoned. I thought I
should never see anything but the lengthening of an endless bill on my
landlady’s face—my sole planet. I was resigned till I heard my friend
‘to-lool!’ this morning. He kindled recollection. But, this is a tidy
Port, and that was a delectable sort of young lady that you were riding
with when we parted last! She laughs like the true metal. I suppose you
know it’s the identical damsel I met the day before, and owe it to for
my run on the downs—I’ve a compliment ready made for her.”

“You think that letter written in good faith?” said Evan.

“Look here.” Mr. Raikes put on a calmness. “You got up the other night,
and said you were a tailor—a devotee of the cabbage and the goose. Why
the notion didn’t strike me is extraordinary—I ought to have known my
man. However, the old gentleman who gave the supper—he’s evidently one
of your beastly rich old ruffianly republicans—spent part of his time
in America, I dare say. Put two and two together.”

But as Harrington desired plain prose, Mr. Raikes tamed his imagination
to deliver it. He pointed distinctly at the old gentleman who gave the
supper as the writer of the letter. Evan, in return, confided to him
his history and present position, and Mr. Raikes, without cooling to
his fortunate friend, became a trifle patronizing.

“You said your father—I think I remember at old Cudford’s—was a cavalry
officer, a bold dragoon?”

“I did,” replied Evan. “I told a lie.”

“We knew it; but we feared your prowess, Harrington.”

Then they talked over the singular letter uninterruptedly, and Evan,
weak among his perplexities of position and sentiment: wanting money
for the girl up-stairs, for this distasteful comrade’s bill at the
Green Dragon, and for his own immediate requirements, and with the bee
buzzing of Rose in his ears: “She despises you,” consented in a
desperation ultimately to sign his name to it, and despatch Jack
forthwith to Messrs. Grist.

“You’ll find it’s an imposition,” he said, beginning less to think it
so, now that his name was put to the hated monstrous thing; which also
now fell to pricking at curiosity. For he was in the early steps of his
career, and if his lady, holding to pride, despised him—as, he was
tortured into the hypocrisy of confessing, she justly might, why, then,
unless he was the sport of a farceur, here seemed a gilding of the path
of duty: he could be serviceable to friends. His claim on fair young
Rose’s love had grown in the short while so prodigiously asinine that
it was a minor matter to constitute himself an old eccentric’s puppet.

“No more an imposition than it’s 50 of Virgil,” quoth the rejected
usher.

“It smells of a plot,” said Evan.

“It’s the best joke that will be made in my time,” said Mr. Raikes,
rubbing his hands.

“And now listen to your luck,” said Evan; “I wish mine were like it!”
and Jack heard of Lady Jocelyn’s offer. He heard also that the young
lady he was to instruct was an heiress, and immediately inspected his
garments, and showed the sacred necessity there was for him to refit in
London, under the hands of scientific tailors. Evan wrote him an
introduction to Mr. Goren, counted out the contents of his purse (which
Jack had reduced in his study of the pastoral game of skittles, he
confessed), and calculated in a niggardly way, how far it would go to
supply the fellow’s wants; sighing, as he did it, to think of Jack
installed at Beckley Court, while Jack, comparing his luck with Evan’s,
had discovered it to be dismally inferior.

“Oh, confound those bellows you keep blowing!” he exclaimed. “I wish to
be decently polite, Harrington, but you annoy me. Excuse me, pray, but
the most unexampled case of a lucky beggar that ever was known—and to
hear him panting and ready to whimper!—it’s outrageous. You’ve only to
put up your name, and there you are—an independent gentleman! By Jove!
this isn’t such a dull world. John Raikes! thou livest in times. I feel
warm in the sun of your prosperity, Harrington. Now listen to me.
Propound thou no inquiries anywhere about the old fellow who gave the
supper. Humour his whim—he won’t have it. All Fallowfield is paid to
keep him secret; I know it for a fact. I plied my rustic friends every
night. ‘Eat you yer victuals, and drink yer beer, and none o’ yer
pryin’s and peerin’s among we!’ That’s my rebuff from Farmer Broadmead.
And that old boy knows more than he will tell. I saw his cunning old
eye on-cock. Be silent, Harrington. Let discretion be the seal of thy
luck.”

“You can reckon on my silence,” said Evan. “I believe in no such folly.
Men don’t do these things.”

“Ha!” went Mr. Raikes contemptuously.

Of the two he was the foolisher fellow; but quacks have cured
incomprehensible maladies, and foolish fellows have an instinct for
eccentric actions.

Telling Jack to finish the wine, Evan rose to go.

“Did you order the horse to be fed?”

“Did I order the feeding of the horse?” said Jack, rising and yawning.
“No, I forgot him. Who can think of horses now?”

“Poor brute!” muttered Evan, and went out to see to him.

The ostler had required no instructions to give the horse a feed of
corn. Evan mounted, and rode out of the yard to where Jack was
standing, bare-headed, in his old posture against the pillar, of which
the shade had rounded, and the evening sun shone full on him over a
black cloud. He now looked calmly gay.

“I’m laughing at the agricultural Broadmead!” he said: “‘None o’ yer
pryin’s and peerin’s!’ He thought my powers of amusing prodigious.
‘Dang ’un, he do maak a chap laugh!’ Well, Harrington, that sort of
homage isn’t much, I admit.”

Raikes pursued: “There’s something in a pastoral life, after all.”

“Pastoral!” muttered Evan. “I was speaking of you at Beckley, and hope
when you’re there you won’t make me regret my introduction of you. Keep
your mind on old Cudford’s mutton-bone.”

“I perfectly understood you,” said Jack. “I’m Presumed to be in luck.
Ingratitude is not my fault—I’m afraid ambition is!”

“Console yourself with it or what you can get till we meet—here or in
London. But the Dragon shall be the address for both of us,” Evan said,
and nodded, trotting off.




CHAPTER XVIII.
IN WHICH EVAN CALLS HIMSELF GENTLEMAN


The young cavalier perused that letter again in memory. Genuine, or a
joke of the enemy, it spoke wakening facts to him. He leapt from the
spell Rose had encircled him with. Strange that he should have rushed
into his dream with eyes open! But he was fully awake now. He would
speak his last farewell to her, and so end the earthly happiness he
paid for in deep humiliation, and depart into that gray cold mist where
his duty lay. It is thus that young men occasionally design to burst
from the circle of the passions, and think that they have done it, when
indeed they are but making the circle more swiftly. Here was Evan
mouthing his farewell to Rose, using phrases so profoundly humble, that
a listener would have taken them for bitter irony. He said adieu to
her,—pronouncing it with a pathos to melt scornful princesses. He tried
to be honest, and was as much so as his disease permitted.

The black cloud had swallowed the sun; and turning off to the short cut
across the downs, Evan soon rode between the wind and the storm. He
could see the heavy burden breasting the beacon-point, round which
curled leaden arms, and a low internal growl saluted him advancing. The
horse laid back his ears. A last gust from the opposing quarter shook
the furzes and the clumps of long pale grass, and straight fell columns
of rattling white rain, and in a minute he was closed in by a hissing
ring. Men thus pelted abandon without protest the hope of retaining a
dry particle of clothing on their persons. Completely drenched, the
track lost, everything in dense gloom beyond the white enclosure that
moved with him, Evan flung the reins to the horse, and curiously
watched him footing on; for physical discomfort balanced his mental
perturbation, and he who had just been chafing was now quite calm.

Was that a shepherd crouched under the thorn? The place betokened a
shepherd, but it really looked like a bundle of the opposite sex; and
it proved to be a woman gathered up with her gown over her head.
Apparently, Mr. Evan Harrington was destined for these encounters. The
thunder rolled as he stopped by her side and called out to her. She
heard him, for she made a movement, but without sufficiently
disengaging her head of its covering to show him a part of her face.

Bellowing against the thunder, Evan bade her throw back her garment,
and stand and give him up her arms, that he might lift her on the horse
behind him.

There came a muffled answer, on a big sob, as it seemed. And as if
heaven paused to hear, the storm was mute.

Could he have heard correctly? The words he fancied he had heard sobbed
were:

“Best bonnet.”

The elements hereupon crashed deep and long from end to end, like a
table of Titans passing a jest.

Rain-drops, hard as hail, were spattering a pool on her head. Evan
stooped his shoulder, seized the soaked garment, and pulled it back,
revealing the features of Polly Wheedle, and the splendid bonnet in
ruins—all limp and stained.

Polly blinked at him penitentially.

“Oh, Mr. Harrington; oh, ain’t I punished!” she whimpered.

In truth, the maid resembled a well-watered poppy.

Evan told her to stand up close to the horse, and Polly stood up close,
looking like a creature that expected a whipping. She was suffering,
poor thing, from that abject sense of the lack of a circumference,
which takes the pride out of women more than anything. Note, that in
all material fashions, as in all moral observances, women demand a
circumference, and enlarge it more and more as civilization advances.
Respect the mighty instinct, however mysterious it seem.

“Oh, Mr. Harrington, don’t laugh at me,” said Polly.

Evan assured her that he was seriously examining her bonnet.

“It’s the bonnet of a draggletail,” said Polly, giving up her arms, and
biting her under-lip for the lift.

With some display of strength, Evan got the lean creature up behind
him, and Polly settled there, and squeezed him tightly with her arms,
excusing the liberty she took.

They mounted the beacon, and rode along the ridge whence the West
became visible, and a washed edge of red over Beckley Church spire and
the woods of Beckley Court.

“And what have you been doing to be punished? What brought you here?”
said Evan.

“Somebody drove me to Fallowfield to see my poor sister Susan,”
returned Polly, half crying.

“Well, did he bring you here and leave you?

“No: he wasn’t true to his appointment the moment I wanted to go back;
and I, to pay him out, I determined I’d walk it where he shouldn’t
overtake me, and on came the storm... And my gown spoilt, and such a
bonnet!”

“Who was the somebody?”

“He’s a Mr. Nicholas Frim, sir.”

“Mr. Nicholas Frim will be very unhappy, I should think.”

“Yes, that’s one comfort,” said Polly ruefully, drying her eyes.

Closely surrounding a young man as a young woman must be when both are
on the same horse, they, as a rule, talk confidentially together in a
very short time. His “Are you cold?” when Polly shivered, and her “Oh,
no; not very,” and a slight screwing of her body up to him, as she
spoke, to assure him and herself of it, soon made them intimate.

“I think Mr. Nicholas Frim mustn’t see us riding into Beckley,” said
Evan.

“Oh, my gracious! Ought I to get down, sir?” Polly made no move,
however.

“Is he jealous?”

“Only when I make him, he is.”

“That’s very naughty of you.”

“Yes, I know it is—all the Wheedles are. Mother says, we never go right
till we’ve once got in a pickle.”

“You ought to go right from this hour,” said Evan.

“It’s ’dizenzy—does it,” said Polly. “And then we’re ashamed to show
it. My poor Susan went to stay with her aunt at Bodley, and then at our
cousin’s at Hillford, and then she was off to Lymport to drown her poor
self, I do believe, when you met her. And all because we can’t bear to
be seen when we’re in any of our pickles. I wish you wouldn’t look at
me, Mr. Harrington.”

“You look very pretty.”

“It’s quite impossible I can now,” said Polly, with a wretched effort
to spread open her collar. “I can see myself a fright, like my Miss
Rose did, making a face in the looking-glass when I was undressing her
last night. But, do you know, I would much rather Nicholas saw us than
somebody!

“Who’s that?”

“Miss Bonner. She’d never forgive me.”

“Is she so strict?”

“She only uses servants for spies,” said Polly. “And since my Miss Rose
come—though I’m up a step—I’m still a servant, and Miss Bonner’d be in
a fury to see my—though I’m sure we’re quite respectable, Mr.
Harrington—my having hold of you as I’m obliged to, and can’t help
myself. But she’d say I ought to tumble off rather than touch her
engaged with a little finger.”

“Her engaged?” cried Evan.

“Ain’t you, sir?” quoth Polly. “I understand you were going to be, from
my lady, the Countess. We all think so at Beckley. Why, look how Miss
Bonner looks at you, and she’s sure to have plenty of money.”

This was Polly’s innocent way of bringing out a word about her own
young mistress.

Evan controlled any denial of his pretensions to the hand of Miss
Bonner. He said: “Is it your mistress’s habit to make faces in the
looking-glass?”

“I’ll tell you how it happened,” said Polly. “But I’m afraid I’m in
your way, sir. Shall I get off now?”

“Not by any means,” said Evan. “Make your arm tighter.”

“Will that do?” asked Polly.

Evan looked round and met her appealing face, over which the damp locks
of hair straggled. The maid was fair: it was fortunate that he was
thinking of the mistress.

“Speak on,” said Evan, but Polly put the question whether her face did
not want washing, and so earnestly that he had to regard it again, and
compromised the case by saying that it wanted kissing by Nicholas Frim,
which set Polly’s lips in a pout.

“I’m sure it wants kissing by nobody,” she said, adding with a spasm of
passion: “Oh! I know the colours of my bonnet are all smeared over it,
and I’m a dreadful fright.”

Evan failed to adopt the proper measures to make Miss Wheedle’s mind
easy with regard to her appearance, and she commenced her story rather
languidly.

“My Miss Rose—what was it I was going to tell? Oh!—my Miss Rose. You
must know, Mr. Harrington, she’s very fond of managing; I can see that,
though I haven’t known her long before she gave up short frocks; and
she said to Mr. Laxley, who’s going to marry her some day, ‘She didn’t
like my lady, the Countess, taking Mr. Harry to herself like that.’ I
can’t a-bear to speak his name, but I suppose he’s not a bit more
selfish than the rest of men. So Mr. Laxley said—just like the jealousy
of men—they needn’t talk of women! I’m sure nobody can tell what we
have to put up with. We mustn’t look out of this eye, or out of the
other, but they’re up and—oh, dear me! there’s such a to-do as never
was known—all for nothing!”

“My good girl!” said Evan, recalling her to the subject-matter with all
the patience he could command.

“Where was I?” Polly travelled meditatively back. “I do feel a little
cold.”

“Come closer,” said Evan. “Take this handkerchief—it’s the only dry
thing I have—cover your chest with it.”

“The shoulders feel wettest,” Polly replied, “and they can’t be helped.
I’ll tie it round my neck, if you’ll stop, sir. There, now I’m warmer.”

To show how concisely women can narrate when they feel warmer, Polly
started off:

“So, you know, Mr. Harrington, Mr. Laxley said—he said to Miss Rose,
‘You have taken her brother, and she has taken yours.’ And Miss Rose
said, ‘That was her own business, and nobody else’s.’ And Mr. Laxley
said, ‘He was glad she thought it a fair exchange.’ I heard it all! And
then Miss Rose said—for she can be in a passion about some things—‘What
do you mean, Ferdinand,’ was her words, ‘I insist upon your speaking
out.’ Miss Rose always will call gentlemen by their Christian names
when she likes them; that’s always a sign with her. And he wouldn’t
tell her. And Miss Rose got awful angry, and she’s clever, is my Miss
Rose, for what does she do, Mr. Harrington, but begins praising you up
so that she knew it must make him mad, only because men can’t abide
praise of another man when it’s a woman that says it—meaning, young
lady; for my Miss Rose has my respect, however familiar she lets
herself be to us that she likes. The others may go and drown
themselves. Are you took ill, sir?”

“No,” said Evan, “I was only breathing.”

“The doctors say it’s bad to take such long breaths,” remarked artless
Polly. “Perhaps my arms are pressing you?”

It’s the best thing they can do,” murmured Evan, dejectedly.

“What, sir?”

“Go and drown themselves.”

Polly screwed her lips, as if she had a pin between them, and
continued: “Miss Rose was quite sensible when she praised you as her
friend; she meant it—every word; and then sudden what does Mr. Laxley
do, but say you was something else besides friend—worse or better; and
she was silent, which made him savage, I could hear by his voice. And
he said, Mr. Harrington, ‘You meant it if she did not.’ ‘No,’ says she,
‘I know better; he’s as honest as the day.’ Out he flew and said such
things: he said, Mr. Harrington, you wasn’t fit to be Miss Rose’s
friend, even. Then she said, she heard he had told lies about you to
her Mama, and her aunts; but her Mama, my lady, laughed at him, and she
at her aunts. Then he said you—oh, abominable of him!”

“What did he say?” asked Evan, waking up.

“Why, if I were to tell my Miss Rose some things of him,” Polly went
on, “she’d never so much as speak to him another instant.”

“What did he say?” Evan repeated.

“I hate him!” cried Polly. “It’s Mr. Laxley that misleads Mr. Harry,
who has got his good nature, and means no more harm than he can help.
Oh, I didn’t hear what he said of you, sir. Only I know it was
abominable, because Miss Rose was so vexed, and you were her dearest
friend.”

“Well, and about the looking-glass?”

“That was at night, Mr. Harrington, when I was undressing of her. Miss
Rose has a beautiful figure, and no need of lacing. But I’d better get
down now.”

“For heaven’s sake, stay where you are.”

“I tell her she stands as if she’d been drilled for a soldier,” Polly
quietly continued. “You’re squeezing my arm with your elbow, Mr.
Harrington. It didn’t hurt me. So when I had her nearly undressed, we
were talking about this and that, and you amongst ’em—and I, you know,
rather like you, sir, if you’ll not think me too bold—she started off
by asking me what was the nickname people gave to tailors. It was one
of her whims. I told her they were called snips—I’m off!”

Polly gave a shriek. The horse had reared as if violently stung.

“Go on,” said Evan. “Hold hard, and go on.”

“Snips—Oh! and I told her they were called snips. It is a word that
seems to make you hate the idea. I shouldn’t like to hear my intended
called snip. Oh, he’s going to gallop!”

And off in a gallop Polly was borne.

“Well,” said Evan, “well?”

“I can’t, Mr. Harrington; I have to press you so,” cried Polly; “and
I’m bounced so—I shall bite my tongue.”

After a sharp stretch, the horse fell to a canter, and then trotted
slowly, and allowed Polly to finish.

“So Miss Rose was standing sideways to the glass, and she turned her
neck, and just as I’d said ‘snip,’ I saw her saying it in the glass;
and you never saw anything so funny. It was enough to make anybody
laugh; but Miss Rose, she seemed as if she couldn’t forget how ugly it
had made her look. She covered her face with her hands, and she
shuddered! It is a word—snip! that makes you seem to despise yourself.”

Beckley was now in sight from the edge of the downs, lying in its
foliage dark under the grey sky backed by motionless mounds of vapour.
Miss Wheedle to her great surprise was suddenly though safely dropped;
and on her return to the ground the damsel instantly “knew her place,”
and curtseyed becoming gratitude for his kindness; but he was off in a
fiery gallop, the gall of Demogorgon in his soul.

What’s that the leaves of the proud old trees of Beckley Court hiss as
he sweeps beneath them? What has suddenly cut him short? Is he
diminished in stature? Are the lackeys sneering? The storm that has
passed has marvellously chilled the air.

His sister, the Countess, once explained to him what Demogorgon was, in
the sensation it entailed. “You are skinned alive!” said the Countess.
Evan was skinned alive. Fly, wretched young man! Summon your pride, and
fly! Fly, noble youth, for whom storms specially travel to tell you
that your mistress makes faces in the looking-glass! Fly where human
lips and noses are not scornfully distorted, and get thee a new skin,
and grow and attain to thy natural height in a more genial sphere! You,
ladies and gentlemen, who may have had a matter to conceal, and find
that it is oozing out: you, whose skeleton is seen stalking beside you,
you know what it is to be breathed upon: you, too, are skinned alive:
but this miserable youth is not only flayed, he is doomed calmly to
contemplate the hideous image of himself burning on the face of her he
loves; making beauty ghastly. In vain—for he is two hours behind the
dinner-bell—Mr. Burley, the butler, bows and offers him viands and
wine. How can he eat, with the phantom of Rose there, covering her
head, shuddering, loathing him? But he must appear in company: he has a
coat, if he has not a skin. Let him button it, and march boldly. Our
comedies are frequently youth’s tragedies. We will smile reservedly as
we mark Mr. Evan Harrington step into the midst of the fair society of
the drawing-room. Rose is at the piano. Near her reclines the Countess
de Saldar, fanning the languors from her cheeks, with a word for the
diplomatist on one side, a whisper for Sir John Loring on the other,
and a very quiet pair of eyes for everybody. Providence, she is sure,
is keeping watch to shield her sensitive cuticle; and she is besides
exquisitely happy, albeit outwardly composed: for, in the room sits his
Grace the Duke of Belfield, newly arrived. He is talking to her sister,
Mrs. Strike, masked by Miss Current. The wife of the Major has come
this afternoon, and Andrew Cogglesby, who brought her, chats with Lady
Jocelyn like an old acquaintance.

Evan shakes the hands of his relatives. Who shall turn over the leaves
of the fair singer’s music-book? The young men are in the
billiard-room: Drummond is engaged in converse with a lovely person
with Giorgione hair, which the Countess intensely admires, and asks the
diplomatist whether he can see a soupçon of red in it. The
diplomatist’s taste is for dark beauties: the Countess is dark.

Evan must do duty by Rose. And now occurred a phenomenon in him.
Instead of shunning her, as he had rejoiced in doing after the Jocasta
scene, ere she had wounded him, he had a curious desire to compare her
with the phantom that had dispossessed her in his fancy. Unconsciously
when he saw her, he transferred the shame that devoured him, from him
to her, and gazed coldly at the face that could twist to that
despicable contortion.

He was in love, and subtle love will not be shamed and smothered. Love
sits, we must remember, mostly in two hearts at the same time, and the
one that is first stirred by any of the passions to wakefulness, may
know more of the other than its owner. Why had Rose covered her head
and shuddered? Would the girl feel that for a friend? If his pride
suffered, love was not so downcast; but to avenge him for the cold she
had cast on him, it could be critical, and Evan made his bearing to her
a blank.

This somehow favoured him with Rose. Sheep’s eyes are a dainty dish for
little maids, and we know how largely they indulge in it; but when they
are just a bit doubtful of the quality of the sheep, let the good
animal shut his lids forthwith, for a time. Had she not been a little
unkind to him in the morning? She had since tried to help him, and that
had appeased her conscience, for in truth he was a good young man.
Those very words she mentally pronounced, while he was thinking, “Would
she feel it for a friend?” We dare but guess at the puzzle young women
present now and then, but I should say that Evan was nearer the mark,
and that the “good young man” was a sop she threw to that within her
which wanted quieting, and was thereby passably quieted. Perhaps the
good young man is offended? Let us assure him of our disinterested
graciousness.

“Is your friend coming?” she asked, and to his reply said, “I’m glad”;
and pitched upon a new song—one that, by hazard, did not demand his
attentions, and he surveyed the company to find a vacant seat with a
neighbour. Juley Bonner was curled up on the sofa, looking like a
damsel who has lost the third volume of an exciting novel, and is
divining the climax. He chose to avoid Miss Bonner. Drummond was
leaving the side of the Giorgione lady. Evan passed leisurely, and
Drummond said “You know Mrs. Evremonde? Let me introduce you.”

He was soon in conversation with the glorious-haired dame.

“Excellently done, my brother!” thinks the Countess de Saldar.

Rose sees the matter coolly. What is it to her? But she had finished
with song. Jenny takes her place at the piano; and, as Rose does not
care for instrumental music, she naturally talks and laughs with
Drummond, and Jenny does not altogether like it, even though she is not
playing to the ear of William Harvey, for whom billiards have such
attractions; but, at the close of the performance, Rose is quiet
enough, and the Countess observes her sitting, alone, pulling the
petals of a flower in her lap, on which her eyes are fixed. Is the doe
wounded? The damsel of the disinterested graciousness is assuredly
restless. She starts up and goes out upon the balcony to breathe the
night-air, mayhap regard the moon, and no one follows her.

Had Rose been guiltless of offence, Evan might have left Beckley Court
the next day, to cherish his outraged self-love. Love of woman is
strongly distinguished from pure egoism when it has got a wound: for it
will not go into a corner complaining, it will fight its duel on the
field or die. Did the young lady know his origin, and scorn him? He
resolved to stay and teach her that the presumption she had imputed to
him was her own mistake. And from this Evan graduated naturally enough
the finer stages of self-deception downward.

A lover must have his delusions, just as a man must have a skin. But
here was another singular change in Evan. After his ale-prompted speech
in Fallowfield, he was nerved to face the truth in the eyes of all save
Rose. Now that the truth had enmeshed his beloved, he turned to battle
with it; he was prepared to deny it at any moment; his burnt flesh was
as sensitive as the Countess’s.

Let Rose accuse him, and he would say, “This is true, Miss Jocelyn—what
then?” and behold Rose confused and dumb! Let not another dare suspect
it. For the fire that had scorched him was in some sort healing, though
horribly painful; but contact with the general air was not to be
endured—was death! This, I believe, is common in cases of injury by
fire. So it befell that Evan, meeting Rose the next morning was
playfully asked by her what choice he had made between the white and
the red; and he, dropping on her the shallow eyes of a conventional
smile, replied, that unable to decide and form a choice, he had thrown
both away; at which Miss Jocelyn gave him a look in the centre of his
brows, let her head slightly droop, and walked off.

“She can look serious as well as grimace,” was all that Evan allowed
himself to think, and he strolled out on the lawn with the careless
serenity of lovers when they fancy themselves heart-free.

Rose, whipping the piano in the drawing-room, could see him go to sit
by Mrs. Evremonde, till they were joined by Drummond, when he left her
and walked with Harry, and apparently shadowed the young gentleman’s
unreflective face; after which Harry was drawn away by the appearance
of that dark star, the Countess de Saldar, whom Rose was beginning to
detest. Jenny glided by William Harvey’s side, far off. Rose, the young
Queen of Friendship, was left deserted on her music-stool for a throne,
and when she ceased to hammer the notes she was insulted by a voice
that cried from below:

“Go on, Rose, it’s nice in the sun to hear you,” causing her to close
her performances and the instrument vigorously.

Rose was much behind her age: she could not tell what was the matter
with her. In these little torments young people have to pass through
they gain a rapid maturity. Let a girl talk with her own heart an hour,
and she is almost a woman. Rose came down-stairs dressed for riding.
Laxley was doing her the service of smoking one of her rose-trees. Evan
stood disengaged, prepared for her summons. She did not notice him, but
beckoned to Laxley drooping over a bud, while the curled smoke floated
from his lips.

“The very gracefullest of chimney-pots—is he not?” says the Countess to
Harry, whose immense guffaw fails not to apprise Laxley that something
has been said of him, for in his dim state of consciousness absence of
the power of retort is the prominent feature, and when he has the
suspicion of malicious tongues at their work, all he can do is silently
to resent it. Probably this explains his conduct to Evan. Some youths
have an acute memory for things that have shut their mouths.

The Countess observed to Harry that his dear friend Mr. Laxley
appeared, by the cast of his face, to be biting a sour apple.

“Grapes, you mean?” laughed Harry. “Never mind! she’ll bite at him when
he comes in for the title.”

“Anything crude will do,” rejoined the Countess. “Why are you not
courting Mrs. Evremonde, naughty Don?”

“Oh! she’s occupied—castle’s in possession. Besides—!” and Harry tried
hard to look sly.

“Come and tell me about her,” said the Countess.

Rose, Laxley, and Evan were standing close together.

“You really are going alone, Rose?” said Laxley.

“Didn’t I say so?—unless you wish to join us?” She turned upon Evan.

“I am at your disposal,” said Evan.

Rose nodded briefly.

“I think I’ll smoke the trees,” said Laxley, perceptibly huffing.

“You won’t come, Ferdinand?”

“I only offered to fill up the gap. One does as well as another.”

Rose flicked her whip, and then declared she would not ride at all,
and, gathering up her skirts, hurried back to the house.

As Laxley turned away, Evan stood before him.

The unhappy fellow was precipitated by the devil of his false position.

“I think one of us two must quit the field; if I go I will wait for
you,” he said.

“Oh; I understand,” said Laxley. “But if it’s what I suppose you to
mean, I must decline.”

“I beg to know your grounds.”

“You have tied my hands.”

“You would escape under cover of superior station?”

“Escape! You have only to unsay—tell me you have a right to demand it.”

The battle of the sophist victorious within him was done in a flash, as
Evan measured his qualities beside this young man’s, and without a
sense of lying, said: “I have.”

He spoke firmly. He looked the thing he called himself now. The
Countess, too, was a dazzling shield to her brother. The beautiful Mrs.
Strike was a completer vindicator of him; though he had queer
associates, and talked oddly of his family that night in Fallowfield.

“Very well, sir: I admit you manage to annoy me,” said Laxley. “I can
give you a lesson as well as another, if you want it.”

Presently the two youths were seen bowing in the stiff curt style of
those cavaliers who defer a passage of temper for an appointed
settlement. Harry rushed off to them with a shout, and they separated;
Laxley speaking a word to Drummond, Evan—most judiciously, the Countess
thought—joining his fair sister Caroline, whom the Duke held in
converse.

Drummond returned laughing to the side of Mrs. Evremonde, nearing whom,
the Countess, while one ear was being filled by Harry’s eulogy of her
brother’s recent handling of Laxley, and while her intense
gratification at the success of her patient management of her most
difficult subject made her smiles no mask, heard, “Is it not impossible
to suppose such a thing?” A hush ensued—the Countess passed.

In the afternoon, the Jocelyns, William Harvey, and Drummond met
together to consult about arranging the dispute; and deputations went
to Laxley and to Evan. The former demanded an apology for certain
expressions that day; and an equivalent to an admission that Mr.
Harrington had said, in Fallowfield, that he was not a gentleman, in
order to escape the consequences. All the Jocelyns laughed at his
tenacity, and “gentleman” began to be bandied about in ridicule of the
arrogant lean-headed adolescent. Evan was placable enough, but dogged;
he declined to make any admission, though within himself he admitted
that his antagonist was not in the position of an impostor; which he
for one honest word among them would be exposed as being, and which a
simple exercise of resolution to fly the place would save him from
being further.

Lady Jocelyn enjoyed the fun, and still more the serious way in which
her relatives regarded it.

“This comes of Rose having friends, Emily,” said Mrs. Shorne.

There would have been a dispute to arrange between Lady Jocelyn and
Mrs. Shorne, had not her ladyship been so firmly established in her
phlegmatic philosophy. She said: “Quelle enfantillage! I dare say Rose
was at the bottom of it: she can settle it best. Defer the encounter
between the boys until they see they are in the form of donkeys. They
will; and then they’ll run on together, as long as their goddess
permits.”

“Indeed, Emily,” said Mrs. Shorne, “I desire you, by all possible
means, to keep the occurrence secret from Rose. She ought not to hear
of it.”

“No; I dare say she ought not,” returned Lady Jocelyn; “but I wager you
she does. You can teach her to pretend not to, if you like. Ecce
signum.”

Her ladyship pointed through the library window at Rose, who was
walking with Laxley, and showing him her pearly teeth in return for one
of his jokes: an exchange so manifestly unfair, that Lady Jocelyn’s
womanhood, indifferent as she was, could not but feel that Rose had an
object in view; which was true, for she was flattering Laxley into a
consent to meet Evan half way.

The ladies murmured and hummed of these proceedings, and of Rose’s
familiarity with Mr. Harrington; and the Countess in trepidation took
Evan to herself, and spoke to him seriously; a thing she had not done
since her residence in Beckley. She let him see that he must be on a
friendly footing with everybody in the house, or go which latter
alternative Evan told her he had decided on. “Yes,” said the Countess,
“and then you give people full warrant to say it was jealousy drove you
hence; and you do but extinguish yourself to implicate dear Rose. In
love, Evan, when you run away, you don’t live to fight another day.”

She was commanded not to speak of love.

“Whatever it may be, my dear,” said the Countess, “Mr. Laxley has used
you ill. It may be that you put yourself at his feet”; and his sister
looked at him, sighing a great sigh. She had, with violence, stayed her
mouth concerning what she knew of the Fallowfield business, dreading to
alarm his sensitiveness; but she could not avoid giving him a little
slap. It was only to make him remember by the smart that he must always
suffer when he would not be guided by her.

Evan professed to the Jocelyns that he was willing to apologize to
Laxley for certain expressions; determining to leave the house when he
had done it. The Countess heard and nodded. The young men, sounded on
both sides, were accordingly lured to the billiard-room, and pushed
together: and when he had succeeded in thrusting the idea of Rose from
the dispute, it did seem such folly to Evan’s common sense, that he
spoke with pleasant bonhommie about it. That done, he entered into his
acted part, and towered in his conceit considerably above these
aristocratic boors, who were speechless and graceless, but tigers for
their privileges and advantages.

It will not be thought that the Countess intended to permit her
brother’s departure. To have toiled, and yet more, to have lied and
fretted her conscience, for nothing, was as little her principle, as to
quit the field of action till she is forcibly driven from it is that of
any woman.

“Going, my dear,” she said coolly. “To-morrow? Oh! very well. You are
the judge. And this creature—the insolvent to the apple-woman, who is
coming, whom you would push here—will expose us, without a soul to
guide his conduct, for I shall not remain. And Carry will not remain.
Carry—-!” The Countess gave a semisob. “Carry must return to her
brute—” meaning the gallant Marine, her possessor.

And the Countess, knowing that Evan loved his sister Caroline,
incidentally related to him an episode in the domestic life of Major
and Mrs. Strike.

“Greatly redounding to the credit of the noble martinet for the
discipline he upholds,” the Countess said, smiling at the stunned
youth.

“I would advise you to give her time to recover from one bruise,” she
added. “You will do as it pleases you.”

Evan was sent rushing from the Countess to Caroline, with whom the
Countess was content to leave him.

The young man was daintily managed. Caroline asked him to stay, as she
did not see him often, and (she brought it in at the close) her home
was not very happy. She did not entreat him, but looking resigned, her
lovely face conjured up the Major to Evan, and he thought, “Can I drive
her back to her tyrant?” For so he juggled with himself to have but
another day in the sunshine of Rose.

Andrew, too, threw out genial hints about the Brewery. Old Tom intended
to retire, he said, and then they would see what they would see! He
silenced every word about Lymport; called him a brewer already, and
made absurd jokes, that were serviceable stuff nevertheless to the
Countess, who deplored to this one and to that the chance existing that
Evan might, by the urgent solicitations of his brother-in-law, give up
diplomacy and its honours for a brewery and lucre!

Of course Evan knew that he was managed. The memoirs of a managed man
have yet to be written; but if he be sincere he will tell you that he
knew it all the time. He longed for the sugar-plum; he knew it was
naughty to take it: he dared not for fear of the devil, and he shut his
eyes while somebody else popped it into his mouth, and assumed his
responsibility. Being man-driven or chicaned, is different from being
managed. Being managed implies being led the way this other person
thinks you should go: altogether for your own benefit, mind: you are to
see with her eyes, that you may not disappoint your own appetites:
which does not hurt the flesh, certainly; but does damage the
conscience; and from the moment you have once succumbed, that function
ceases to perform its office of moral strainer so well.

After all, was he not happier when he wrote himself tailor, than when
he declared himself gentleman?

So he now imagined, till Rose, wishing him “Good night” on the balcony,
and abandoning her hand with a steady sweet voice and gaze, said: “How
generous of you to forgive my friend, dear Evan!” And the ravishing
little glimpse of womanly softness in her, set his heart beating. If he
thought at all, it was that he would have sacrificed body and soul for
her.




CHAPTER XIX.
SECOND DESPATCH OF THE COUNTESS


We do not advance very far in this second despatch, and it will be
found chiefly serviceable for the indications it affords of our
General’s skill in mining, and addiction to that branch of military
science. For the moment I must beg that a little indulgence be granted
to her.

“Purely business. Great haste. Something has happened. An event? I know
not; but events may flow from it.

“A lady is here who has run away from the conjugal abode, and Lady
Jocelyn shelters her, and is hospitable to another, who is more
concerned in this lady’s sad fate than he should be. This may be
morals, my dear: but please do not talk of Portugal now. A fineish
woman with a great deal of hair worn as if her maid had given it one
comb straight down and then rolled it up in a hurry round one finger.
Malice would say carrots. It is called gold. Mr. Forth is in a glass
house, and is wrong to cast his sneers at perfectly inoffensive people.

“Perfectly impossible we can remain at Beckley Court together—if not
dangerous. Any means that Providence may designate, I would employ. It
will be like exorcising a demon. Always excuseable. I only ask a little
more time for stupid Evan. He might have little Bonner now. I should
not object; but her family is not so good.

“Now, do attend. At once obtain a copy of Strike’s Company people. You
understand—prospectuses. Tell me instantly if the Captain Evremonde in
it is Captain Lawson Evremonde. Pump Strike. Excuse vulgar words.
Whether he is not Lord Laxley’s half-brother. Strike shall be of use to
us. Whether he is not mad. Captain E——’s address. Oh! when I think of
Strike—brute! and poor beautiful uncomplaining Carry and her shoulder!
But let us indeed most fervently hope that his Grace may be balm to it.
We must not pray for vengeance. It is sinful. Providence will inflict
that. Always know that Providence is quite sure to. It comforts
exceedingly.

“Oh, that Strike were altogether in the past tense! No knowing what the
Duke might do—a widower and completely subjugated. It makes my bosom
bound. The man tempts me to the wickedest Frenchy ideas. There!

We progress with dear venerable Mrs. Bonner. Truly pious—interested in
your Louisa. She dreads that my husband will try to convert me to his
creed. I can but weep and say—never!

“I need not say I have my circle. To hear this ridiculous boy Harry
Jocelyn grunt under my nose when he has led me unsuspectingly away from
company—Harriet! dearest! He thinks it a sigh! But there is no time for
laughing.

“My maxim in any house is—never to despise the good opinion of the
nonentities. They are the majority. I think they all look up to me. But
then of course you must fix that by seducing the stars. My diplomatist
praises my abilities—Sir John Loring my style—the rest follow and I do
not withhold my smiles, and they are happy, and I should be but that
for ungrateful Evan’s sake I sacrificed my peace by binding myself to a
dreadful sort of half-story. I know I did not quite say it. It seems as
if Sir A.’s ghost were going to haunt me. And then I have the most
dreadful fears that what I have done has disturbed him in the other
world. Can it be so? It is not money or estates we took at all,
dearest! And these excellent young curates—I almost wish it was
Protestant to speak a word behind a board to them and imbibe comfort.
For after all it is nothing: and a word even from this poor thin mopy
Mr. Parsley might be relief to a poor soul in trouble. Catholics tell
you that what you do in a good cause is redeemable if not exactly
right. And you know the Catholic is the oldest Religion of the two. I
would listen to the Pope, staunch Protestant as I am, in preference to
King Henry the Eighth. Though, as a woman, I bear him no rancour, for
his wives were—fools, point blank. No man was ever so manageable. My
diplomatist is getting liker and liker to him every day. Leaner, of
course, and does not habitually straddle. Whiskers and morals, I mean.
We must be silent before our prudish sister. Not a prude? We talk
diplomacy, dearest. He complains of the exclusiveness of the port of
Oporto, and would have strict alliance between Portugal and England,
with mutual privileges. I wish the alliance, and think it better to
maintain the exclusiveness. Very trifling; but what is life!

“Adieu. One word to leave you laughing. Imagine her situation! This
stupid Miss Carrington has offended me. She has tried to pump Conning,
who, I do not doubt, gave her as much truth as I chose she should have
in her well. But the quandary of the wretched creature! She takes
Conning into her confidence—a horrible malady just covered by high-neck
dress! Skin! and impossible that she can tell her engaged—who
is—guess—Mr. George Up———! Her name is Louisa Carrington. There was a
Louisa Harrington once. Similarity of names perhaps. Of course I could
not let her come to the house; and of course Miss C. is in a state of
wonderment and bad passions, I fear. I went straight to Lady Racial, my
dear. There was nothing else for it but to go and speak. She is truly a
noble woman—serves us in every way. As she should!—much affected by
sight of Evan, and keeps aloof from Beckley Court. The finger of
Providence is in all. Adieu! but do pray think of Miss Carrington! It
was foolish of her to offend me. Drives and walks—the Duke attentive.
Description of him when I embrace you. I give amiable Sir Franks
Portuguese dishes. Ah, my dear, if we had none but men to contend
against, and only women for our tools! But this is asking for the
world, and nothing less.

“Open again,” she pursues. “Dear Carry just come in. There are fairies,
I think, where there are dukes! Where could it have come from? Could
any human being have sent messengers post to London, ordered, and had
it despatched here within this short time? You shall not be mystified!
I do not think I even hinted; but the afternoon walk I had with his
Grace, on the first day of his arrival, I did shadow it very delicately
how much it was to be feared our poor Carry could not, that she dared
not, betray her liege lord in an evening dress. Nothing more, upon my
veracity! And Carry has this moment received the most beautiful green
box, containing two of the most heavenly old lace shawls that you ever
beheld. We divine it is to hide poor Carry’s matrimonial blue mark! We
know nothing. Will you imagine Carry is for not accepting it! Priority
of birth does not imply superior wits, dear—no allusion to you. I have
undertaken all. Arch looks, but nothing pointed. His Grace will
understand the exquisite expression of feminine gratitude. It is so
sweet to deal with true nobility. Carry has only to look as she always
does. One sees Strike sitting on her. Her very pliability has rescued
her from being utterly squashed long ere this! The man makes one
vulgar. It would have been not the slightest use asking me to be a
Christian had I wedded Strike. But think of the fairy presents! It has
determined me not to be expelled by Mr. Forth—quite. Tell Silva he is
not forgotten. But, my dear, between us alone, men are so selfish, that
it is too evident they do not care for private conversations to turn
upon a lady’s husband: not to be risked, only now and then.

“I hear that the young ladies and the young gentlemen have been out
riding a race. The poor little Bonner girl cannot ride, and she says to
Carry that Rose wishes to break our brother’s neck. The child hardly
wishes that, but she is feelingless. If Evan could care for Miss
Bonner, he might have B. C.! Oh, it is not so very long a shot, my
dear. I am on the spot, remember. Old Mrs. Bonner is a most just-minded
spirit. Juliana is a cripple, and her grandmother wishes to be sure
that when she departs to her Lord the poor cripple may not be chased
from this home of hers. Rose cannot calculate—Harry is in
disgrace—there is really no knowing. This is how I have reckoned;
£10,000 extra to Rose; perhaps £1000 or nothing to H.; all the rest of
ready-money—a large sum—no use guessing—to Lady Jocelyn; and B. C. to
little Bonner—it is worth £40,000. Then she sells, or stops—permanent
resident. It might be so soon, for I can see worthy Mrs. Bonner to be
breaking visibly. But young men will not see with wiser eyes than their
own. Here is Evan risking his neck for an indifferent—there’s some word
for ‘not soft.’ In short, Rose is the cold-blooded novice, as I have
always said, the most selfish of the creatures on two legs.

“Adieu! Would you have dreamed that Major Nightmare’s gallantry to his
wife would have called forth a gallantry so truly touching and
delicate? Can you not see Providence there? Out of Evil—the Catholics
again!

“Address. If Lord Lax—’s half-brother. If wrong in noddle. This I know
you will attend to scrupulously. Ridiculous words are sometimes the
most expressive. Once more, may Heaven bless you all! I thought of you
in church last Sunday.

“I may tell you this: young Mr. Laxley is here. He—but it was Evan’s
utter madness was the cause, and I have not ventured a word to him. He
compelled Evan to assert his rank, and Mr. Forth’s face has been one
concentrated sneer since THEN. He must know the origin of the
Cogglesbys, or something. Now you will understand the importance. I
cannot be more explicit. Only—the man must go.

“P.S. I have just ascertained that Lady Jocelyn is quite familiar with
Andrew’s origin!! She must think my poor Harriet an eccentric woman. Of
course I have not pretended to rank here, merely gentry. It is gentry
in reality, for had poor Papa been legitimized, he would have been a
nobleman. You know that; and between the two we may certainly claim
gentry. I twiddle your little good Andrew to assert it for us twenty
times a day. Of all the dear little manageable men! It does you
infinite credit that you respect him as you do. What would have become
of me I do not know.

“P.S. I said two shawls—a black and a white. The black not so
costly—very well. And so delicate of him to think of the mourning! But
the white, my dear, must be family—must! Old English point. Exquisitely
chaste. So different from that Brussels poor Andrew surprised you with.
I know it cost money, but this is a question of taste. The Duke
reconciles me to England and all my troubles! He is more like poor Papa
than any one of the men I have yet seen. The perfect gentleman! I do
praise myself for managing an invitation to our Carry. She has been a
triumph.”

Admire the concluding stroke. The Countess calls this letter a purely
business communication. Commercial men might hardly think so; but
perhaps ladies will perceive it. She rambles concentrically, if I may
so expound her. Full of luxurious enjoyment of her position, her mind
is active, and you see her at one moment marking a plot, the next, with
a light exclamation, appeasing her conscience, proud that she has one;
again she calls up rival forms of faith, that she may show the
Protestant its little shortcomings, and that it is slightly in debt to
her (like Providence) for her constancy, notwithstanding. The
Protestant you see, does not confess, and she has to absolve herself,
and must be doing it internally while she is directing outer matters.
Hence her slap at King Henry VIII. In fact, there is much more business
in this letter than I dare to indicate; but as it is both impertinent
and unpopular to dive for any length of time beneath the surface
(especially when there are few pearls to show for it), we will
discontinue our examination.

The Countess, when she had dropped the letter in the bag, returned to
her chamber, and deputed Dorothy Loring, whom she met on the stairs, to
run and request Rose to lend her her album to beguile the afternoon
with; and Dorothy dances to Rose, saying, “The Countess de Lispy-Lispy
would be delighted to look at your album all the afternoon.”

“Oh what a woman that is!” says Rose. “Countess de Lazy-Lazy, I think.”

The Countess, had she been listening, would have cared little for
accusations on that head. Idlesse was fashionable: exquisite languors
were a sign of breeding; and she always had an idea that she looked
more interesting at dinner after reclining on a couch the whole of the
afternoon. The great Mel and his mate had given her robust health, and
she was able to play the high-born invalid without damage to her
constitution. Anything amused her; Rose’s album even, and the
compositions of W. H., E. H., D. F., and F. L. The initials F. L. were
diminutive, and not unlike her own hand, she thought. They were
appended to a piece of facetiousness that would not have disgraced the
abilities of Mr. John Raikes; but we know that very stiff young
gentlemen betray monkey-minds when sweet young ladies compel them to
disport. On the whole, it was not a lazy afternoon that the Countess
passed, and it was not against her wish that others should think it
was.




CHAPTER XX.
BREAK-NECK LEAP


The August sun was in mid-sky, when a troop of ladies and cavaliers
issued from the gates of Beckley Court, and winding through the
hopgardens, emerged on the cultivated slopes bordering the downs.
Foremost, on her grey cob, was Rose, having on her right her uncle
Seymour, and on her left Ferdinand Laxley. Behind came Mrs. Evremonde,
flanked by Drummond and Evan. Then followed Jenny Graine, supported by
Harry and William Harvey. In the rear came an open carriage, in which
Miss Carrington and the Countess de Saldar were borne, attended by Lady
Jocelyn and Andrew Cogglesby on horseback. The expedition had for its
object the selection of a run of ground for an amateur steeple-chase:
the idea of which had sprung from Laxley’s boasts of his horsemanship:
and Rose, quick as fire, had backed herself, and Drummond and Evan, to
beat him. The mention of the latter was quite enough for Laxley.

“If he follows me, let him take care of his neck,” said that youth.

“Why, Ferdinand, he can beat you in anything!” exclaimed Rose,
imprudently.

But the truth was, she was now more restless than ever. She was not
distant with Evan, but she had a feverish manner, and seemed to thirst
to make him show his qualities, and excel, and shine. Billiards, or
jumping, or classical acquirements, it mattered not—Evan must come
first. He had crossed the foils with Laxley, and disarmed him; for Mel
his father had seen him trained for a military career. Rose made a
noise about the encounter, and Laxley was eager for his opportunity,
which he saw in the proposed mad gallop.

Now Mr. George Uplift, who usually rode in buckskins whether he was
after the fox or fresh air, was out on this particular morning; and it
happened that, as the cavalcade wound beneath the down, Mr. George
trotted along the ridge. He was a fat-faced, rotund young squire—a
bully where he might be, and an obedient creature enough where he must
be—good-humoured when not interfered with; fond of the table, and
brimful of all the jokes of the county, the accent of which just
seasoned his speech. He had somehow plunged into a sort of
half-engagement with Miss Carrington. At his age, and to ladies of Miss
Carrington’s age, men unhappily do not plunge head-foremost, or Miss
Carrington would have had him long before. But he was at least in for
it half a leg; and a desperate maiden, on the criminal side of thirty,
may make much of that. Previous to the visit of the Countess de Saldar,
Mr. George had been in the habit of trotting over to Beckley three or
four times a week. Miss Carrington had a little money: Mr. George was
heir to his uncle. Miss Carrington was lean and blue-eyed.

Mr. George was black-eyed and obese. By everybody, except Mr. George,
the match was made: but that exception goes for little in the country,
where half the population are talked into marriage, and gossips
entirely devote themselves to continuing the species. Mr. George was
certain that he had not been fighting shy of the fair Carrington of
late, nor had he been unfaithful. He had only been in an extraordinary
state of occupation. Messages for Lady Racial had to be delivered, and
he had become her cavalier and escort suddenly. The young squire was
bewildered; but as he was only one leg in love—if the sentiment may be
thus spoken of figuratively—his vanity in his present office kept him
from remorse or uneasiness.

He rode at an easy pace within sight of the home of his treasure, and
his back turned to it. Presently there rose a cry from below. Mr.
George looked about. The party of horsemen hallooed: Mr. George
yoicked. Rose set her horse to gallop up; Seymour Jocelyn cried “fox,”
and gave the view; hearing which Mr. George shouted, and seemed
inclined to surrender; but the fun seized him, and, standing up in his
stirrups, he gathered his coat-tails in a bunch, and waggled them with
a jolly laugh, which was taken up below, and the clamp of hoofs
resounded on the turf as Mr. George led off, after once more, with a
jocose twist in his seat, showing them the brush mockingly. Away went
fox, and a mad chase began. Seymour acted as master of the hunt. Rose,
Evan, Drummond, and Mrs. Evremonde and Dorothy, skirted to the right,
all laughing, and full of excitement. Harry bellowed the direction from
above. The ladies in the carriage, with Lady Jocelyn and Andrew,
watched them till they flowed one and all over the shoulder of the
down.

“And who may the poor hunted animal be?” inquired the Countess.

“George Uplift,” said Lady Jocelyn, pulling out her watch. “I give him
twenty minutes.”

“Providence speed him!” breathed the Countess, with secret fervour.

“Oh, he hasn’t a chance,” said Lady Jocelyn. “The squire keeps wretched
beasts.”

“Is there not an attraction that will account for his hasty capture?”
said the Countess, looking tenderly at Miss Carrington, who sat a
little straighter, and the Countess, hating manifestations of
stiff-backedness, could not forbear adding: “I am at war with my
sympathies, which should be with the poor brute flying from his
persecutors.”

She was in a bitter state of trepidation, or she would have thought
twice before she touched a nerve of the enamoured lady, as she knew she
did in calling her swain a poor brute, and did again by pertinaciously
pursuing:

“Does he then shun his captivity?”

“Touching a nerve” is one of those unforgivable small offences which,
in our civilized state, produce the social vendettas and dramas that,
with savage nations, spring from the spilling of blood. Instead of an
eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, we demand a nerve for a nerve.
“Thou hast touched me where I am tender thee, too, will I touch.”

Miss Carrington had been alarmed and hurt at the strange evasion of Mr.
George; nor could she see the fun of his mimicry of the fox and his
flight away from instead of into her neighbourhood. She had also, or
she now thought it, remarked that when Mr. George had been spoken of
casually, the Countess had not looked a natural look. Perhaps it was
her present inflamed fancy. At any rate the Countess was offensive now.
She was positively vulgar, in consequence, to the mind of Miss
Carrington, and Miss Carrington was drawn to think of a certain thing
Ferdinand Laxley had said he had heard from the mouth of this lady’s
brother when ale was in him. Alas! how one seed of a piece of folly
will lurk and sprout to confound us; though, like the cock in the
eastern tale, we peck up zealously all but that one!

The carriage rolled over the turf, attended by Andrew, and Lady
Jocelyn, and the hunt was seen; Mr. George some forty paces a-head;
Seymour gaining on him, Rose next.

“Who’s that breasting Rose?” said Lady Jocelyn, lifting her glass.

“My brother-in-law, Harrington,” returned Andrew.

“He doesn’t ride badly,” said Lady Jocelyn. “A little too military. He
must have been set up in England.”

“Oh, Evan can do anything,” said Andrew enthusiastically. “His father
was a capital horseman, and taught him fencing, riding, and every
accomplishment. You won’t find such a young fellow, my lady—”

“The brother like him at all?” asked Lady Jocelyn, still eyeing the
chase.

“Brother? He hasn’t got a brother,” said Andrew.

Lady Jocelyn continued: “I mean the present baronet.”

She was occupied with her glass, and did not observe the flush that
took hold of Andrew’s ingenuous cheeks, and his hurried glance at and
off the quiet eye of the Countess. Miss Carrington did observe it.

Mr. Andrew dashed his face under the palm of his hand, and murmured:

“Oh—yes! His brother-in-law isn’t much like him—ha! ha!”

And then the poor little man rubbed his hands, unconscious of the
indignant pity for his wretched abilities in the gaze of the Countess;
and he must have been exposed—there was a fear that the ghost of Sir
Abraham would have darkened this day, for Miss Carrington was about to
speak, when Lady Jocelyn cried: “There’s a purl! Somebody’s down.”

The Countess was unaware of the nature of a purl, but she could have
sworn it to be a piece of Providence.

“Just by old Nat Hodges’ farm, on Squire Copping’s ground,” cried
Andrew, much relieved by the particular individual’s misfortune. “Dear
me, my lady! how old Tom and I used to jump the brook there, to be
sure! and when you were no bigger than little Miss Loring—do you
remember old Tom? We’re all fools one time in our lives!”

“Who can it be?” said Lady Jocelyn, spying at the discomfited horseman.
“I’m afraid it’s poor Ferdinand.”

They drove on to an eminence from which the plain was entirely laid
open.

“I hope my brother will enjoy his ride this day,” sighed the Countess.
“It will be his limit of enjoyment for a lengthened period!”

She perceived that Mr. George’s capture was inevitable, and her heart
sank; for she was sure he would recognize her, and at the moment she
misdoubted her powers. She dreamed of flight.

“You’re not going to leave us?” said Lady Jocelyn. “My dear Countess,
what will the future member do without you? We have your promise to
stay till the election is over.”

“Thanks for your extreme kind courtesy, Lady Jocelyn,” murmured the
Countess: “but my husband—the Count.”

“The favour is yours,” returned her ladyship. “And if the Count cannot
come, you at least are at liberty?”

“You are most kind,” said the Countess.

“Andrew and his wife I should not dare to separate for more than a
week,” said Lady Jocelyn. “He is the great British husband. The
proprietor! ‘My wife’ is his unanswerable excuse.”

“Yes,” Andrew replied cheerily. “I don’t like division between man and
wife, I must say.”

The Countess dared no longer instance the Count, her husband. She was
heard to murmur that citizen feelings were not hers:

“You suggested Fallowfield to Melville, did you not?” asked Lady
Jocelyn.

“It was the merest suggestion,” said the Countess, smiling.

“Then you must really stay to see us through it,” said her ladyship.
“Where are they now? They must be making straight for break-neck fence.
They’ll have him there. George hasn’t pluck for that.”

“Hasn’t what?”

It was the Countess who requested to know the name of this other piece
of Providence Mr. George Uplift was deficient in.

“Pluck—go,” said her ladyship hastily, and telling the coachman to
drive to a certain spot, trotted on with Andrew, saying to him: “I’m
afraid we are thought vulgar by the Countess.”

Andrew considered it best to reassure her gravely.

“The young man, her brother, is well-bred,” said Lady Jocelyn, and
Andrew was very ready to praise Evan.

Lady Jocelyn, herself in slimmer days a spirited horsewoman, had
correctly estimated Mr. George’s pluck. He was captured by Harry and
Evan close on the leap, in the act of shaking his head at it; and many
who inspected the leap would have deemed it a sign that wisdom weighted
the head that would shake long at it; for it consisted of a post and
rails, with a double ditch.

Seymour Jocelyn, Mrs. Evremonde, Drummond, Jenny Graine, and William
Harvey, rode with Mr. George in quest of the carriage, and the captive
was duly delivered over.

“But where’s the brush?” said Lady Jocelyn, laughing, and introducing
him to the Countess, who dropped her head, and with it her veil.

“Oh! they leave that on for my next run,” said Mr. George, bowing
civilly.

“You are going to run again?”

Miss Carrington severely asked this question; and Mr. George protested.

“Secure him, Louisa,” said Lady Jocelyn. “See here: what’s the matter
with poor Dorothy?”

Dorothy came slowly trotting up to them along the green lane, and thus
expressed her grief, between sobs:

“Isn’t it a shame? Rose is such a tyrant. They’re going to ride a race
and a jump down in the field, and it’s break-neck leap, and Rose won’t
allow me to stop and see it, though she knows I’m just as fond of Evan
as she is; and if he’s killed I declare it will be her fault; and it’s
all for her stupid, dirty old pocket handkerchief!”

“Break-neck fence!” said Lady Jocelyn; “that’s rather mad.”

“Do let’s go and see it, darling Aunty Joey,” pleaded the little maid.
Lady Jocelyn rode on, saying to herself: “That girl has a great deal of
devil in her.” The lady’s thoughts were of Rose.

“Black Lymport’d take the leap,” said Mr. George, following her with
the rest of the troop. “Who’s that fellow on him?”

“His name’s Harrington,” quoth Drummond.

“Oh, Harrington!” Mr. George responded; but immediately
laughed—“Harrington? ’Gad, if he takes the leap it’ll be odd—another of
the name. That’s where old Mel had his spill.”

“Who?” Drummond inquired.

“Old Mel Harrington—the Lymport wonder. Old Marquis Mel,” said Mr.
George. “Haven’t ye heard of him?”

“What! the gorgeous tailor!” exclaimed Lady Jocelyn. “How I regret
never meeting that magnificent snob! that efflorescence of sublime
imposture! I’ve seen the Regent; but one’s life doesn’t seem complete
without having seen his twin-brother. You must give us warning when you
have him down at Croftlands again, Mr. George.”

“’Gad, he’ll have to come a long distance—poor old Mel!” said Mr.
George; and was going on, when Seymour Jocelyn stroked his moustache to
cry, “Look! Rosey’s starting ’em, by Jove!”

The leap, which did not appear formidable from where they stood, was
four fields distant from the point where Rose, with a handkerchief in
her hand, was at that moment giving the signal to Laxley and Evan.

Miss Carrington and the Countess begged Lady Jocelyn to order a shout
to be raised to arrest them, but her ladyship marked her good sense by
saying: “Let them go, now they’re about it”; for she saw that to make a
fuss now matters had proceeded so far, was to be uncivil to the
inevitable.

The start was given, and off they flew. Harry Jocelyn, behind them, was
evidently caught by the demon, and clapped spurs to his horse to have
his fling as well, for the fun of the thing; but Rose, farther down the
field, rode from her post straight across him, to the imminent peril of
a mutual overset; and the party on the height could see Harry fuming,
and Rose coolly looking him down, and letting him understand what her
will was; and her mother, and Drummond, and Seymour who beheld this,
had a common sentiment of admiration for the gallant girl. But away
went the rivals. Black Lymport was the favourite, though none of the
men thought he would be put at the fence. The excitement became
contagious. The Countess threw up her veil. Lady Jocelyn, and Seymour,
and Drummond, galloped down the lane, and Mr. George was for
accompanying them, till the line of Miss Carrington’s back gave him her
unmistakeable opinion of such a course of conduct, and he had to dally
and fret by her side. Andrew’s arm was tightly grasped by the Countess.
The rivals were crossing the second field, Laxley a little a-head.

“He’s holding in the black mare—that fellow!” said Mr. George. “’Gad,
it looks like going at the fence. Fancy Harrington!”

They were now in the fourth field, a smooth shorn meadow. Laxley was
two clear lengths in advance, but seemed riding, as Mr. George
remarked, more for pace than to take the jump. The ladies kept plying
random queries and suggestions: the Countess wishing to know whether
they could not be stopped by a countryman before they encountered any
danger. In the midst of their chatter, Mr. George rose in his stirrups,
crying:

“Bravo, the black mare!”

“Has he done it?” said Andrew, wiping his poll.

“He? No, the mare!” shouted Mr. George, and bolted off, no longer to be
restrained.

The Countess, doubly relieved, threw herself back in the carriage, and
Andrew drew a breath, saying: “Evan has beat him—I saw that! The
other’s horse swerved right round.”

“I fear,” said Mrs. Evremonde, “Mr. Harrington has had a fall. Don’t be
alarmed—it may not be much.”

“A fall!” exclaimed the Countess, equally divided between alarms of
sisterly affection and a keen sense of the romance of the thing.

Miss Carrington ordered the carriage to be driven round. They had not
gone far when they were met by Harry Jocelyn riding in hot haste, and
he bellowed to the coachman to drive as hard as he could, and stop
opposite Brook’s farm.

The scene on the other side of the fence would have been a sweet one to
the central figure in it had his eyes then been open. Surrounded by
Lady Jocelyn, Drummond, Seymour, and the rest, Evan’s dust-stained body
was stretched along the road, and his head was lying in the lap of
Rose, who, pale, heedless of anything spoken by those around her, and
with her lips set and her eyes turning wildly from one to the other,
held a gory handkerchief to his temple with one hand, and with the
other felt for the motion of his heart.

But heroes don’t die, you know.




CHAPTER XXI.
TRIBULATIONS AND TACTICS OF THE COUNTESS


“You have murdered my brother, Rose Jocelyn!”

“Don’t say so now.”

Such was the interchange between the two that loved the senseless
youth, as he was being lifted into the carriage.

Lady Jocelyn sat upright in her saddle, giving directions about what
was to be done with Evan and the mare, impartially.

“Stunned, and a good deal shaken, I suppose; Lymport’s knees are
terribly cut,” she said to Drummond, who merely nodded. And Seymour
remarked, “Fifty guineas knocked off her value!” One added, “Nothing
worse, I should think”; and another, “A little damage inside, perhaps.”
Difficult to say whether they spoke of Evan or the brute.

No violent outcries; no reproaches cast on the cold-blooded coquette;
no exclamations on the heroism of her brother! They could absolutely
spare a thought for the animal! And Evan had risked his life for this,
and might die unpitied. The Countess diversified her grief with a
deadly bitterness against the heartless Jocelyns.

Oh, if Evan dies! will it punish Rose sufficiently?

Andrew expressed emotion, but not of a kind the Countess liked a
relative to be seen exhibiting; for in emotion worthy Andrew betrayed
to her his origin offensively.

“Go away and puke, if you must,” she said, clipping poor Andrew’s word
about his “dear boy.” She could not help speaking in that way—he was so
vulgar. A word of sympathy from Lady Jocelyn might have saved her from
the sourness into which her many conflicting passions were resolving;
and might also have saved her ladyship from the rancour she had sown in
the daughter of the great Mel by her selection of epithets to
characterize him.

Will it punish Rose at all, if Evan dies?

Rose saw that she was looked at. How could the Countess tell that Rose
envied her the joy of holding Evan in the carriage there? Rose, to
judge by her face, was as calm as glass. Not so well seen through,
however. Mrs. Evremonde rode beside her, whose fingers she caught, and
twined her own with them tightly once for a fleeting instant. Mrs.
Evremonde wanted no further confession of her state.

Then Rose said to her mother, “Mama, may I ride to have the doctor
ready?”

Ordinarily, Rose would have clapped heel to horse the moment the
thought came. She waited for the permission, and flew off at a gallop,
waving back Laxley, who was for joining her.

“Franks will be a little rusty about the mare,” the Countess heard Lady
Jocelyn say; and Harry just then stooped his head to the carriage, and
said, in his blunt fashion, “After all, it won’t show much.”

“We are not cattle!” exclaimed the frenzied Countess, within her bosom.
Alas! it was almost a democratic outcry they made her guilty of; but
she was driven past patience. And as a further provocation, Evan would
open his eyes. She laid her handkerchief over them with loving
delicacy, remembering in a flash that her own face had been all the
while exposed to Mr. George Uplift; and then the terrors of his
presence at Beckley Court came upon her, and the fact that she had not
for the last ten minutes been the serene Countess de Saldar; and she
quite hated Andrew, for vulgarity in others evoked vulgarity in her,
which was the reason why she ranked vulgarity as the chief of the
deadly sins. Her countenance for Harry and all the others save poor
Andrew was soon the placid heaven-confiding sister’s again; not before
Lady Jocelyn had found cause to observe to Drummond:

“Your Countess doesn’t ruffle well.”

But a lady who is at war with two or three of the facts of Providence,
and yet will have Providence for her ally, can hardly ruffle well. Do
not imagine that the Countess’s love for her brother was hollow. She
was assured when she came up to the spot where he fell, that there was
no danger; he had but dislocated his shoulder, and bruised his head a
little. Hearing this, she rose out of her clamorous heart, and seized
the opportunity for a small burst of melodrama. Unhappily, Lady
Jocelyn, who gave the tone to the rest, was a Spartan in matters of
this sort; and as she would have seen those dearest to her bear the
luck of the field, she could see others. When the call for active help
reached her, you beheld a different woman.

The demonstrativeness the Countess thirsted for was afforded her by
Juley Bonner, and in a measure by her sister Caroline, who loved Evan
passionately. The latter was in riding attire, about to mount to ride
and meet them, accompanied by the Duke. Caroline had hastily tied up
her hair; a rich golden brown lump of it hung round her cheek; her
limpid eyes and anxiously-nerved brows impressed the Countess
wonderfully as she ran down the steps and bent her fine well-filled
bust forward to ask the first hurried question.

The Countess patted her shoulder. “Safe, dear,” she said aloud, as one
who would not make much of it. And in a whisper, “You look superb.”

I must charge it to Caroline’s beauty under the ducal radiance, that a
stream of sweet feelings entering into the Countess made her forget to
tell her sister that George Uplift was by. Caroline had not been
abroad, and her skin was not olive-hued; she was a beauty, and a
majestic figure, little altered since the day when the wooden marine
marched her out of Lymport.

The Countess stepped from the carriage to go and cherish Juliana’s
petulant distress; for that unhealthy little body was stamping with
impatience to have the story told to her, to burst into fits of pathos;
and while Seymour and Harry assisted Evan to descend, trying to laugh
off the pain he endured, Caroline stood by, soothing him with words and
tender looks.

Lady Jocelyn passed him, and took his hand, saying, “Not killed this
time!”

“At your ladyship’s service to-morrow,” he replied, and his hand was
kindly squeezed.

“My darling Evan, you will not ride again?” Caroline cried, kissing him
on the steps; and the Duke watched the operation, and the Countess
observed the Duke.

That Providence should select her sweetest moments to deal her wounds,
was cruel; but the Countess just then distinctly heard Mr. George
Uplift ask Miss Carrington.

“Is that lady a Harrington?”

“You perceive a likeness?” was the answer.

Mr. George went “Whew!—tit-tit-tit!” with the profound expression of a
very slow mind.

The scene was quickly over. There was barely an hour for the ladies to
dress for dinner. Leaving Evan in the doctor’s hand, and telling
Caroline to dress in her room, the Countess met Rose, and gratified her
vindictiveness, while she furthered her projects, by saying:

“Not till my brother is quite convalescent will it be adviseable that
you should visit him. I am compelled to think of him entirely now. In
his present state he is not fit to be, played with.”

Rose, stedfastly eyeing her, seemed to swallow down something in her
throat, and said:

“I will obey you, Countess. I hoped you would allow me to nurse him.”

“Quiet above all things, Rose Jocelyn!” returned the Countess, with the
suavity of a governess, who must be civil in her sourness. “If you
would not complete this morning’s achievement—stay away.”

The Countess declined to see that Rose’s lip quivered. She saw an
unpleasantness in the bottom of her eyes; and now that her brother’s
decease was not even remotely to be apprehended, she herself determined
to punish the cold, unimpressionable coquette of a girl. Before
returning to Caroline, she had five minutes’ conversation with Juliana,
which fully determined her to continue the campaign at Beckley Court,
commence decisive movements, and not to retreat, though fifty George
Uplofts menaced her. Consequently, having dismissed Conning on a
message to Harry Jocelyn, to ask him for a list of the names of the new
people they were to meet that day at dinner, she said to Caroline:

“My dear, I think it will be incumbent on us to depart very quickly.”

Much to the Countess’s chagrin and astonishment, Caroline replied:

“I shall hardly be sorry.”

“Not sorry? Why, what now, dear one? Is it true, then, that a
flagellated female kisses the rod? Are you so eager for a repetition of
Strike?”

Caroline, with some hesitation, related to her more than the Countess
had ventured to petition for in her prayers.

“Oh! how exceedingly generous!” the latter exclaimed. How very
refreshing to think that there are nobles in your England as romantic,
as courteous, as delicate as our own foreign ones! But his Grace is
quite an exceptional nobleman. Are you not touched, dearest Carry?”

Caroline pensively glanced at the reflection of her beautiful arm in
the glass, and sighed, pushing back the hair from her temples.

“But, for mercy’s sake!” resumed the Countess, in alarm at the sigh,
“do not be too—too touched. Do, pray, preserve your wits. You weep!
Caroline, Caroline! O my goodness; it is just five-and-twenty minutes
to the first dinner-bell, and you are crying! For God’s sake, think of
your face! Are you going to be a Gorgon? And you show the marks twice
as long as any other, you fair women. Squinnying like this! Caroline,
for your Louisa’s sake, do not!”

Hissing which, half angrily and half with entreaty, the Countess
dropped on her knees. Caroline’s fit of tears subsided. The eldest of
the sisters, she was the kindest, the fairest, the weakest.

“Not,” said the blandishing Countess, when Caroline’s face was clearer,
“not that my best of Carrys does not look delicious in her shower. Cry,
with your hair down, and you would subdue any male creature on two
legs. And that reminds me of that most audacious Marquis de Remilla. He
saw a dirty drab of a fruit-girl crying in Lisbon streets one day, as
he was riding in the carriage of the Duchesse de Col da Rosta, and her
husband and duena, and he had a letter for her—the Duchesse. They
loved! How deliver the letter? ‘Save me!’ he cried to the Duchesse,
catching her hand, and pressing his heart, as if very sick. The
Duchesse felt the paper—turned her hand over on her knee, and he
withdrew his. What does my Carry think was the excuse he tendered the
Duke? This—and this gives you some idea of the wonderful audacity of
those dear Portuguese—that he—he must precipitate himself and marry any
woman he saw weep, and be her slave for the term of his natural life,
unless another woman’s hand at the same moment restrained him! There!”
and the Countess’s eyes shone brightly.

“How excessively imbecile!” Caroline remarked, hitherto a passive
listener to these Lusitanian _contes_.

It was the first sign she had yet given of her late intercourse with a
positive Duke, and the Countess felt it, and drew back. No more
anecdotes for Caroline, to whom she quietly said:

“You are very English, dear!”

“But now, the Duke—his Grace,” she went on, “how did he inaugurate?”

“I spoke to him of Evan’s position. God forgive me!—I said that was the
cause of my looks being sad.”

“You could have thought of nothing better,” interposed the Countess.
“Yes?”

“He said, if he might clear them he should be happy.”

“In exquisite language, Carry, of course.”

“No; just as others talk.”

“Hum!” went the Countess, and issued again brightly from a cloud of
reflection, with the remark: “It was to seem business-like—the
commerciality of the English mind. To the point—I know. Well, you
perceive, my sweetest, that Evan’s interests are in your hands. You
dare not quit the field. In one week, I fondly trust, he will be
secure. What more did his Grace say? May we not be the repository of
such delicious secresies?”

Caroline gave tremulous indications about the lips, and the Countess
jumped to the bell and rang it, for they were too near dinner for the
trace of a single tear to be permitted. The bell and the appearance of
Conning effectually checked the flood.

While speaking to her sister, the Countess had hesitated to mention
George Uplift’s name, hoping that, as he had no dinner-suit, he would
not stop to dinner that day, and would fall to the charge of Lady
Racial once more. Conning, however, brought in a sheet of paper on
which the names of the guests were written out by Harry, a daily piece
of service he performed for the captivating dame, and George Uplift’s
name was in the list.

“We will do the rest, Conning—retire,” she said, and then folding
Caroline in her arms, murmured, the moment they were alone, “Will my
Carry dress her hair plain to-day, for the love of her Louisa?”

“Goodness! what a request!” exclaimed Caroline, throwing back her head
to see if her Louisa could be serious.

“Most inexplicable—is it not? Will she do it?”

“Flat, dear? It makes a fright of me.”

“Possibly. May I beg it?”

“But why, dearest, why? If I only knew why!”

“For the love of your Louy.”

“Plain along the temples?”

“And a knot behind.”

“And a band along the forehead?”

“Gems, if they meet your favour.”

“But my cheek-bones, Louisa?”

“They are not too prominent, Carry.”

“Curls relieve them.”

“The change will relieve the curls, dear one.”

Caroline looked in the glass, at the Countess, as polished a reflector,
and fell into a chair. Her hair was accustomed to roll across her
shoulders in heavy curls. The Duke would find a change of the sort
singular. She should not at all know herself with her hair done
differently: and for a lovely woman to be transformed to a fright is
hard to bear in solitude, or in imagination.

“Really!” she petitioned.

“Really—yes, or no?” added the Countess.

“So unaccountable a whim!” Caroline looked in the glass dolefully, and
pulled up her thick locks from one cheek, letting them fall on the
instant.

“She will?” breathed the Countess.

“I really cannot,” said Caroline, with vehemence.

The Countess burst into laughter, replying: “My poor child! it is not
my whim—it is your obligation. George Uplift dines here to-day. Now do
you divine it? Disguise is imperative for you.”

Mrs. Strike, gazing in her sister’s face, answered slowly, “George? But
how will you meet him?” she hurriedly asked.

“I have met him,” rejoined the Countess, boldly. “I defy him to know
me. I brazen him! You with your hair in my style are equally safe. You
see there is no choice. Pooh! contemptible puppy!”

“But I never,”—Caroline was going to say she never could face him. “I
will not dine. I will nurse Evan.”

“You have faced him, my dear,” said the Countess, “and you are to
change your head-dress simply to throw him off his scent.”

As she spoke the Countess tripped about, nodding her head like a girl.
Triumph in the sense of her power over all she came in contact with,
rather elated the lady.

Do you see why she worked her sister in this roundabout fashion? She
would not tell her George Uplift was in the house till she was sure he
intended to stay, for fear of frightening her. When the necessity
became apparent, she put it under the pretext of a whim in order to see
how far Caroline, whose weak compliance she could count on, and whose
reticence concerning the Duke annoyed her, would submit to it to please
her sister; and if she rebelled positively, why to be sure it was the
Duke she dreaded to shock: and, therefore, the Duke had a peculiar hold
on her: and, therefore, the Countess might reckon that she would do
more than she pleased to confess to remain with the Duke, and was
manageable in that quarter. All this she learnt without asking. I need
not add, that Caroline sighingly did her bidding.

“We must all be victims in our turn, Carry,” said the Countess. “Evan’s
prospects—it may be, Silva’s restoration—depend upon your hair being
dressed plain to-day. Reflect on that!”

Poor Caroline obeyed; but she was capable of reflecting only that her
face was unnaturally lean and strange to her.

The sisters tended and arranged one another, taking care to push their
mourning a month or two ahead and the Countess animadverted on the
vulgar mind of Lady Jocelyn, who would allow a “gentleman to sit down
at a gentlewoman’s table, in full company, in pronounced undress: and
Caroline, utterly miserable, would pretend that she wore a mask and
kept grimacing as they do who are not accustomed to paint on the
cheeks, till the Countess checked her by telling her she should ask her
for that before the Duke.

After a visit to Evan, the sisters sailed together into the
drawing-room.

“Uniformity is sometimes a gain,” murmured the Countess, as they were
parting in the middle of the room. She saw that their fine figures, and
profiles, and resemblance in contrast, produced an effect. The Duke
wore one of those calmly intent looks by which men show they are aware
of change in the heavens they study, and are too devout worshippers to
presume to disapprove. Mr. George was standing by Miss Carrington, and
he also watched Mrs. Strike. To bewilder him yet more the Countess
persisted in fixing her eyes upon his heterodox apparel, and Mr. George
became conscious and uneasy. Miss Carrington had to address her
question to him twice before he heard. Melville Jocelyn, Sir John
Loring, Sir Franks, and Hamilton surrounded the Countess, and told her
what they had decided on with regard to the election during the day;
for Melville was warm in his assertion that they would not talk to the
Countess five minutes without getting a hint worth having.

“Call to us that man who is habited like a groom,” said the Countess,
indicating Mr. George. “I presume he is in his right place up here?”

“Whew—take care, Countess—our best man. He’s good for a dozen,” said
Hamilton.

Mr. George was brought over and introduced to the Countess de Saldar.

“So the oldest Tory in the county is a fox?” she said, in allusion to
the hunt. Never did Caroline Strike admire her sister’s fearful genius
more than at that moment.

Mr. George ducked and rolled his hand over his chin, with “ah-um!” and
the like, ended by a dry laugh.

“Are you our supporter, Mr. Uplift?”

“Tory interest, ma—um—my lady.”

“And are you staunch and may be trusted?”

“’Pon my honour, I think I have that reputation.”

“And you would not betray us if we give you any secrets? Say ‘’Pon my
honour,’ again. You launch it out so courageously.”

The men laughed, though they could not see what the Countess was
driving at. She had for two minutes spoken as she spoke when a girl,
and George—entirely off his guard and unsuspicious—looked
unenlightened. If he knew, there were hints enough for him in her
words.

If he remained blind, they might pass as air. The appearance of the
butler cut short his protestation as to his powers of secresy.

The Countess dismissed him.

“You will be taken into our confidence when we require you.” And she
resumed her foreign air in a most elaborate and overwhelming bow.

She was now perfectly satisfied that she was safe from Mr. George, and,
as she thoroughly detested the youthful squire, she chose to propagate
a laugh at him by saying with the utmost languor and clearness of
voice, as they descended the stairs:

“After all, a very clever fox may be a very dull dog—don’t you think?”

Gentlemen in front of her, and behind, heard it, and at Mr. George’s
expense her reputation rose.

Thus the genius of this born general prompted her to adopt the
principle in tactics—boldly to strike when you are in the dark as to
your enemy’s movements.




CHAPTER XXII.
IN WHICH THE DAUGHTERS OF THE GREAT MEL HAVE TO DIGEST HIM AT DINNER


You must know, if you would form an estimate of the Countess’s heroic
impudence, that a rumour was current in Lymport that the fair and
well-developed Louisa Harrington, in her sixteenth year, did advisedly,
and with the intention of rendering the term indefinite, entrust her
guileless person to Mr. George Uplift’s honourable charge. The rumour,
unflavoured by absolute malignity, was such; and it went on to say,
that the sublime Mel, alive to the honour of his family, followed the
fugitives with a pistol, and with a horsewhip, that he might chastise
the offender according to the degree of his offence. It was certain
that he had not used the pistol: it was said that he had used the whip.
The details of the interview between Mel and Mr. George were numerous,
but at the same time various. Some declared that he put a pistol to Mr.
George’s ear, and under pressure of that persuader got him into the
presence of a clergyman, when he turned sulky; and when the pistol was
again produced, the ceremony would have been performed, had not the
outraged Church cried out for help. Some vowed that Mr. George had
referred all questions implying a difference between himself and Mel to
their mutual fists for decision. At any rate, Mr. George turned up in
Fallowfield subsequently; the fair Louisa, unhurt and with a quiet
mind, in Lymport; and this amount of truth the rumours can be reduced
to—that Louisa and Mr. George had been acquainted. Rumour and gossip
know how to build: they always have some solid foundation, however
small. Upwards of twelve years had run since Louisa went to the wife of
the brewer—a period quite long enough for Mr. George to forget any one
in; and she was altogether a different creature; and, as it was true
that Mr. George was a dull one, she was, after the test she had put him
to, justified in hoping that Mel’s progeny might pass unchallenged
anywhere out of Lymport. So, with Mr. George facing her at table, the
Countess sat down, determined to eat and be happy.

A man with the education and tastes of a young country squire is not
likely to know much of the character of women; and of the marvellous
power they have of throwing a veil of oblivion between themselves and
what they don’t want to remember, few men know much. Mr. George had
thought, when he saw Mrs. Strike leaning to Evan, and heard she was a
Harrington, that she was rather like the Lymport family; but the
reappearance of Mrs. Strike, the attention of the Duke of Belfield to
her, and the splendid tactics of the Countess, which had extinguished
every thought in the thought of himself, drove Lymport out of his mind.

There were some dinner guests at the table—people of Fallowfield,
Beckley, and Bodley. The Countess had the diplomatist on one side, the
Duke on the other. Caroline was under the charge of Sir Franks. The
Countess, almost revelling in her position opposite Mr. George, was
ambitious to lead the conversation, and commenced, smiling at Melville:

“We are to be spared politics to-day? I think politics and cookery do
not assimilate.”

“I’m afraid you won’t teach the true Briton to agree with you,” said
Melville, shaking his head over the sums involved by this British
propensity.

“No,” said Seymour. “Election dinners are a part of the Constitution”:
and Andrew laughed: “They make Radicals pay as well as Tories, so it’s
pretty square.”

The topic was taken up, flagged, fell, and was taken up again. And then
Harry Jocelyn said:

“I say, have you worked the flags yet? The great Mel must have his
flags.”

The flags were in the hands of ladies, and ladies would look to the
rosettes, he was told.

Then a lady of the name of Barrington laughed lightly, and said:

“Only, pray, my dear Harry, don’t call your uncle the ‘Great Mel’ at
the election.”

“Oh! very well,” quoth Harry: “why not?”

“You’ll get him laughed at—that’s all.”

“Oh! well, then, I won’t,” said Harry, whose wits were attracted by the
Countess’s visage.

Mrs. Barrington turned to Seymour, her neighbour, and resumed:

“He really would be laughed at. There was a tailor—he was called the
Great Mel—and he tried to stand for Fallowfield once. I believe he had
the support of Squire Uplift—George’s uncle—and others. They must have
done it for fun! Of course he did not get so far as the hustings; but I
believe he had flags, and principles, and all sorts of things worked
ready. He certainly canvassed.”

“A tailor—canvassed—for Parliament?” remarked an old Dowager, the
mother of Squire Copping. “My what are we coming to next?”

“He deserved to get in,” quoth Aunt Bel: “After having his principles
worked ready, to eject the man was infamous.”

Amazed at the mine she had sprung, the Countess sat through it,
lamenting the misery of owning a notorious father. Happily Evan was
absent, on his peaceful blessed bed!

Bowing over wine with the Duke, she tried another theme, while still,
like a pertinacious cracker, the Great Mel kept banging up and down the
table.

“We are to have a feast in the open air, I hear. What you call
pic-nic.”

The Duke believed there was a project of the sort.

“How exquisitely they do those things in Portugal! I suppose there
would be no scandal in my telling something now. At least we are out of
Court-jurisdiction.”

“Scandal of the Court!” exclaimed his Grace, in mock horror.

“The option is yours to listen. The Queen, when young, was sweetly
pretty; a divine complexion; and a habit of smiling on everybody. I
presume that the young Habral, son of the first magistrate of Lisbon,
was also smiled on. Most innocently, I would swear! But it operated on
the wretched youth! He spent all his fortune in the purchase and
decoration of a fairy villa, bordering on the Val das Rosas, where the
Court enjoyed its rustic festivities, and one day a storm! all the
ladies hurried their young mistress to the house where the young Habral
had been awaiting her for ages. None so polished as he! Musicians
started up, the floors were ready, and torches beneath them!—there was
a feast of exquisite wines and viands sparkling. Quite enchantment. The
girl-Queen was in ecstasies. She deigned a dance with the young Habral,
and then all sat down to supper; and in the middle of it came the cry
of Fire! The Queen shrieked; the flames were seen all around; and if
the arms of the young Habral were opened to save her, or perish, could
she cast a thought on Royalty, and refuse? The Queen was saved the
villa was burnt; the young Habral was ruined, but, if I know a
Portuguese, he was happy till he died, and well remunerated! For he had
held a Queen to his heart! So that was a pic-nic!”

The Duke slightly inclined his head.

“Vrai Portughez derrendo,” he said. “They tell a similar story in
Spain, of one of the Queens—I forget her name. The difference between
us and your Peninsular cavaliers is, that we would do as much for
uncrowned ladies.”

“Ah! your Grace!” The Countess swam in the pleasure of a nobleman’s
compliment.

“What’s the story?” interposed Aunt Bel.

An outline of it was given her. Thank heaven, the table was now rid of
the Great Mel. For how could he have any, the remotest relation with
Queens and Peninsular pic-nics? You shall hear.

Lady Jocelyn happened to catch a word or two of the story.

“Why,” said she, “that’s English! Franks, you remember the ballet
divertissement they improvised at the Bodley race-ball, when the
magnificent footman fired a curtain and caught up Lady Racial, and
carried her—”

“Heaven knows where!” cried Sir Franks. “I remember it perfectly. It
was said that the magnificent footman did it on purpose to have that
pleasure.”

“Ay, of course,” Hamilton took him up. “They talked of prosecuting the
magnificent footman.”

“Ay,” followed Seymour, “and nobody could tell where the magnificent
footman bolted. He vanished into thin air.”

“Ay, of course,” Melville struck in; “and the magic enveloped the lady
for some time.”

At this point Mr. George Uplift gave a horse-laugh. He jerked in his
seat excitedly.

“Bodley race-ball!” he cried; and looking at Lady Jocelyn: “Was your
ladyship there, then? Why—ha! ha! why, you have seen the Great Mel,
then! That tremendous footman was old Mel himself!”

Lady Jocelyn struck both her hands on the table, and rested her large
grey eyes, full of humorous surprise, on Mr. George.

There was a pause, and then the ladies and gentlemen laughed.

“Yes,” Mr. George went on, “that was old Mel. I’ll swear to him.”

“And that’s how it began?” murmured Lady Jocelyn.

Mr. George nodded at his plate discreetly.

“Well,” said Lady Jocelyn, leaning back, and lifting her face upward in
the discursive fulness of her fancy, “I feel I am not robbed. ‘Il y a
des miracles, et j’en ai vu’. One’s life seems more perfect when one
has seen what nature can do. The fellow was stupendous! I conceive him
present. Who’ll fire a house for me? Is it my deficiency of attraction,
or a total dearth of gallant snobs?”

The Countess was drowned. The muscles of her smiles were horribly stiff
and painful. Caroline was getting pale. Could it be accident that thus
resuscitated Mel, their father, and would not let the dead man die? Was
not malice at the bottom of it? The Countess, though she hated Mr.
George infinitely, was clear-headed enough to see that Providence alone
was trying her. No glances were exchanged between him and Laxley, or
Drummond.

Again Mel returned to his peace, and again he had to come forth.

“Who was this singular man you were speaking about just now?” Mrs.
Evremonde asked.

Lady Jocelyn answered her: “The light of his age. The embodied protest
against our social prejudice. Combine—say, Mirabeau and Alcibiades, and
the result is the Lymport Tailor:—he measures your husband in the
morning: in the evening he makes love to you, through a series of
pantomimic transformations. He was a colossal Adonis, and I’m sorry
he’s dead!”

“But did the man get into society?” said Mrs. Evremonde. “How did he
manage that?”

“Yes, indeed! and what sort of a society!” the dowager Copping
interjected. “None but bachelor-tables, I can assure you. Oh! I
remember him. They talked of fetching him to Dox Hall. I said, No,
thank you, Tom; this isn’t your Vauxhall.”

“A sharp retort,” said Lady Jocelyn, “a most conclusive rhyme; but
you’re mistaken. Many families were glad to see him, I hear. And he
only consented to be treated like a footman when he dressed like one.
The fellow had some capital points. He fought two or three duels, and
behaved like a man. Franks wouldn’t have him here, or I would have
received him. I hear that, as a conteur, he was inimitable. In short,
he was a robust Brummel, and the Regent of low life.”

This should have been Mel’s final epitaph.

Unhappily, Mrs. Melville would remark, in her mincing manner, that the
idea of the admission of a tailor into society seemed very unnatural;
and Aunt Bel confessed that her experience did not comprehend it.

“As to that,” said Lady Jocelyn, “phenomena are unnatural. The rules of
society are lightened by the exceptions. What I like in this Mel is,
that though he was a snob, and an impostor, he could still make himself
respected by his betters. He was honest, so far; he acknowledged his
tastes, which were those of Franks, Melville, Seymour, and George—the
tastes of a gentleman. I prefer him infinitely to your cowardly
democrat, who barks for what he can’t get, and is generally beastly. In
fact, I’m not sure that I haven’t a secret passion for the great
tailor.”

“After all, old Mel wasn’t so bad,” Mr. George Uplift chimed in.

“Granted a tailor—you didn’t see a bit of it at table. I’ve known him
taken for a lord. And when he once got hold of you, you couldn’t give
him up. The squire met him first in the coach, one winter. He took him
for a Russian nobleman—didn’t find out what he was for a month or so.
Says Mel, ‘Yes, I make clothes. You find the notion unpleasant; guess
how disagreeable it is to me.’ The old squire laughed, and was glad to
have him at Croftlands as often as he chose to come. Old Mel and I used
to spar sometimes; but he’s gone, and I should like to shake his fist
again.”

Then Mr. George told the “Bath” story, and episodes in Mel’s career as
Marquis; and while he held the ear of the table, Rose, who had not
spoken a word, and had scarcely eaten a morsel during dinner, studied
the sisters with serious eyes. Only when she turned them from the
Countess to Mrs. Strike, they were softened by a shadowy drooping of
the eyelids, as if for some reason she deeply pitied that lady.

Next to Rose sat Drummond, with a face expressive of cynical enjoyment.
He devoted uncommon attention to the Countess, whom he usually shunned
and overlooked. He invited her to exchange bows over wine, in the
fashion of that day, and the Countess went through the performance with
finished grace and ease. Poor Andrew had all the time been brushing
back his hair, and making strange deprecatory sounds in his throat,
like a man who felt bound to assure everybody at table he was perfectly
happy and comfortable.

“Material enough for a Sartoriad,” said Drummond to Lady Jocelyn.

“Excellent. Pray write it forthwith, Drummond”, replied her ladyship;
and as they exchanged talk unintelligible to the Countess, this lady
observed to the Duke:

“It is a relief to have buried that subject.”

The Duke smiled, raising an eyebrow; but the persecuted Countess
perceived she had been much too hasty when Drummond added,

“I’ll make a journey to Lymport in a day or two, and master his
history.”

“Do,” said her ladyship; and flourishing her hand, “‘I sing the Prince
of Snobs!’”

“Oh, if it’s about old Mel, I’ll sing you material enough,” said Mr.
George. “There! you talk of it’s being unnatural, his dining out at
respectable tables. Why, I believe—upon my honour, I believe it’s a
fact—he’s supped and thrown dice with the Regent.”

Lady Jocelyn clapped her hands. “A noble culmination, Drummond! The
man’s an Epic!”

“Well, I think old Mel was equal to it,” Mr. George pursued. “He gave
me pretty broad hints; and this is how it was, if it really happened,
you know. Old Mel had a friend; some say he was more. Well, that was a
fellow, a great gambler. I dare say you’ve heard of him—Burley
Bennet—him that won Ryelands Park of one of the royal dukes—died worth
upwards of £100,000; and old Mel swore he ought to have had it, and
would if he hadn’t somehow offended him. He left the money to Admiral
Harrington, and he was a relation of Mel’s.”

“But are we then utterly mixed up with tailors?” exclaimed Mrs.
Barrington.

“Well, those are the facts,” said Mr. George.

The wine made the young squire talkative. It is my belief that his
suspicions were not awake at that moment, and that, like any other
young country squire, having got a subject he could talk on, he did not
care to discontinue it. The Countess was past the effort to attempt to
stop him. She had work enough to keep her smile in the right place.

Every dinner may be said to have its special topic, just as every age
has its marked reputation. They are put up twice or thrice, and have to
contend with minor lights, and to swallow them, and then they command
the tongues of men and flow uninterruptedly. So it was with the great
Mel upon this occasion. Curiosity was aroused about him. Aunt Bel
agreed with Lady Jocelyn that she would have liked to know the mighty
tailor. Mrs. Shorne but very imperceptibly protested against the
notion, and from one to another it ran. His Grace of Belfield expressed
positive approval of Mel as one of the old school.

“Si ce n’est pas le gentilhomme, au moins, c’est le gentilhomme
manqué,” said Lady Jocelyn. “He is to be regretted, Duke. You are
right. The stuff was in him, but the Fates were unkind. I stretch out
my hand to the pauvre diable.”

“I think one learns more from the mock magnifico than from anything
else,” observed his Grace.

“When the lion saw the donkey in his own royal skin,” said Aunt Bel,
“add the rhyme at your discretion—he was a wiser lion, that’s all.”

“And the ape that strives to copy one—he’s an animal of judgement,”
said Lady Jocelyn. “We will be tolerant to the tailor, and the Countess
must not set us down as a nation of shopkeepers: philosophically
tolerant.”

The Countess started, and ran a little broken “Oh!” affably out of her
throat, dipped her lips to her tablenapkin, and resumed her smile.

“Yes,” pursued her ladyship; “old Mel stamps the age gone by. The
gallant adventurer tied to his shop! Alternate footman and marquis, out
of intermediate tailor! Isn’t there something fine in his buffoon
imitation of the real thing? I feel already that old Mel belongs to me.
Where is the great man buried? Where have they set the funeral brass
that holds his mighty ashes?”

Lady Jocelyn’s humour was fully entered into by the men. The women
smiled vacantly, and had a common thought that it was ill-bred of her
to hold forth in that way at table, and unfeminine of any woman to
speak continuously anywhere.

“Oh, come!” cried Mr. George, who saw his own subject snapped away from
him by sheer cleverness; “old Mel wasn’t only a buffoon, my lady, you
know. Old Mel had his qualities. He was as much a ‘no-nonsense’ fellow,
in his way, as a magistrate, or a minister.”

“Or a king, or a constable,” Aunt Bel helped his illustration.

“Or a prince, a poll-parrot, a Perigord-pie,” added Drummond, whose
gravity did not prevent Mr. George from seeing that he was laughed at.

“Well, then, now, listen to this,” said Mr. George, leaning his two
hands on the table resolutely. Dessert was laid, and, with a full glass
beside him, and a pear to peel, he determined to be heard.

The Countess’s eyes went mentally up to the vindictive heavens. She
stole a glance at Caroline, and was alarmed at her excessive pallor.
Providence had rescued Evan from this!

“Now, I know this to be true,” Mr. George began. “When old Mel was
alive, he and I had plenty of sparring, and that—but he’s dead, and
I’ll do him justice. I spoke of Burley Bennet just now. Now, my lady,
old Burley was, I think, Mel’s half-brother, and he came, I know,
somewhere out of Drury Lane—one of the courts near the theatre—I don’t
know much of London. However, old Mel wouldn’t have that. Nothing less
than being born in St. James’s Square would content old Mel, and he
must have a Marquis for his father. I needn’t be more particular.
Before ladies—ahem! But Burley was the shrewd hand of the two. Oh-h-h!
such a card! He knew the way to get into company without false
pretences. Well, I told you, he had lots more than £100,000—some said
two—and he gave up Ryelands; never asked for it, though he won it.
Consequence was, he commanded the services of somebody pretty high. And
it was he got Admiral Harrington made a captain, posted, commodore,
admiral, and K.C.B., all in seven years! In the Army it’d have been
half the time, for the H.R.H. was stronger in that department. Now, I
know old Burley promised Mel to leave him his money, and called the
Admiral an ungrateful dog. He didn’t give Mel much at a time—now and
then a twenty-pounder or so—I saw the cheques. And old Mel expected the
money, and looked over his daughters like a turkey-cock. Nobody good
enough for them. Whacking handsome gals—three! used to be called the
Three Graces of Lymport. And one day Burley comes and visits Mel, and
sees the girls. And he puts his finger on the eldest, I can tell you.
She was a spanker! She was the handsomest gal, I think, ever I saw. For
the mother’s a fine woman, and what with the mother, and what with old
Mel—”

“We won’t enter into the mysteries of origin,” quoth Lady Jocelyn.

“Exactly, my lady. Oh, your servant, of course. Before ladies. A Burley
Bennet, I said. Long and short was, he wanted to take her up to London.
Says old Mel: ‘London’s a sad place.’—‘Place to make money,’ says
Burley. ‘That’s not work for a young gal,’ says Mel. Long and short
was, Burley wanted to take her, and Mel wouldn’t let her go.” Mr.
George lowered his tone, and mumbled, “Don’t know how to explain it
very well before ladies. What Burley wanted was—it wasn’t quite
honourable, you know, though there was a good deal of spangles on it,
and whether a real H.R.H., or a Marquis, or a Viscount, I can’t say,
but—the offer was tempting to a tradesman. ‘No,’ says Mel; like a chap
planting his flagstaff and sticking to it. I believe that to get her to
go with him, Burley offered to make a will on the spot, and to leave
every farthing of his money and property—upon my soul, I believe it to
be true—to Mel and his family, if he’d let the gal go. ‘No,’ says Mel.
I like the old bird! And Burley got in a rage, and said he’d leave
every farthing to the sailor. Says Mel: ‘I’m a poor tradesman; but I
have and I always will have the feelings of a gentleman, and they’re
more to me than hard cash, and the honour of my daughter, sir, is
dearer to me than my blood. Out of the house!’ cries Mel. And away old
Burley went, and left every penny to the sailor, Admiral Harrington,
who never noticed ’em an inch. Now, there!”

All had listened to Mr. George attentively, and he had slurred the
apologetic passages, and emphasized the propitiatory “before ladies” in
a way to make himself well understood a generation back.

“Bravo, old Mel!” rang the voice of Lady Jocelyn, and a murmur ensued,
in the midst of which Rose stood up and hurried round the table to Mrs.
Strike, who was seen to rise from her chair; and as she did so, the
ill-arranged locks fell from their unnatural restraint down over her
shoulders; one great curl half forward to the bosom, and one behind her
right ear. Her eyes were wide, her whole face, neck, and fingers, white
as marble. The faintest tremor of a frown on her brows, and her shut
lips, marked the continuation of some internal struggle, as if with her
last conscious force she kept down a flood of tears and a wild outcry
which it was death to hold. Sir Franks felt his arm touched, and looked
up, and caught her, as Rose approached. The Duke and other gentlemen
went to his aid, and as the beautiful woman was borne out white and
still as a corpse, the Countess had this dagger plunged in her heart
from the mouth of Mr. George, addressing Miss Carrington:

“I swear I didn’t do it on purpose. She’s Carry Harrington, old Mel’s
daughter, as sure as she’s flesh and blood!”




CHAPTER XXIII.
TREATS OF A HANDKERCHIEF


Running through Beckley Park, clear from the chalk, a little stream
gave light and freshness to its pasturage. Near where it entered, a
bathing-house of white marble had been built, under which the water
flowed, and the dive could be taken to a paved depth, and you swam out
over a pebbly bottom into sun-light, screened by the thick-weeded
banks, loose-strife and willow-herb, and mint, nodding over you, and in
the later season long-plumed yellow grasses. Here at sunrise the young
men washed their limbs, and here since her return home English Rose
loved to walk by night. She had often spoken of the little happy stream
to Evan in Portugal, and when he came to Beckley Court, she arranged
that he should sleep in a bed-room overlooking it. The view was sweet
and pleasant to him, for all the babbling of the water was of Rose, and
winding in and out, to East, to North, it wound to embowered hopes in
the lover’s mind, to tender dreams; and often at dawn, when dressing,
his restless heart embarked on it, and sailed into havens, the phantom
joys of which coloured his life for him all the day. But most he loved
to look across it when the light fell. The palest solitary gleam along
its course spoke to him rich promise. The faint blue beam of a star
chained all his longings, charmed his sorrows to sleep. Rose like a
fairy had breathed her spirit here, and it was a delight to the silly
luxurious youth to lie down, and fix some image of a flower bending to
the stream on his brain, and in the cradle of fancies that grew round
it, slide down the tide of sleep.

From the image of a flower bending to the stream, like his own soul to
the bosom of Rose, Evan built sweet fables. It was she that exalted
him, that led him through glittering chapters of adventure. In his
dream of deeds achieved for her sake, you may be sure the young man
behaved worthily, though he was modest when she praised him, and his
limbs trembled when the land whispered of his great reward to come. The
longer he stayed at Beckley the more he lived in this world within
world, and if now and then the harsh outer life smote him, a look or a
word from Rose encompassed him again, and he became sensible only of a
distant pain.

At first his hope sprang wildly to possess her, to believe, that after
he had done deeds that would have sent ordinary men in the condition of
shattered hulks to the hospital, she might be his. Then blow upon blow
was struck, and he prayed to be near her till he died: no more. Then
she, herself, struck him to the ground, and sitting in his chamber,
sick and weary, on the evening of his mishap, Evan’s sole desire was to
obtain the handkerchief he had risked his neck for. To have that, and
hold it to his heart, and feel it as a part of her, seemed much.

Over a length of the stream the red round harvest-moon was rising, and
the weakened youth was this evening at the mercy of the charm that
encircled him. The water curved, and dimpled, and flowed flat, and the
whole body of it rushed into the spaces of sad splendour. The clustered
trees stood like temples of darkness; their shadows lengthened
supernaturally; and a pale gloom crept between them on the sward. He
had been thinking for some time that Rose would knock at his door, and
give him her voice, at least; but she did not come; and when he had
gazed out on the stream till his eyes ached, he felt that he must go
and walk by it. Those little flashes of the hurrying tide spoke to him
of a secret rapture and of a joy-seeking impulse; the pouring onward of
all the blood of life to one illumined heart, mournful from excess of
love.

Pardon me, I beg. Enamoured young men have these notions. Ordinarily
Evan had sufficient common sense and was as prosaic as mankind could
wish him; but he has had a terrible fall in the morning, and a young
woman rages in his brain. Better, indeed, and “more manly,” were he to
strike and raise huge bosses on his forehead, groan, and so have done
with it. We must let him go his own way.

At the door he was met by the Countess. She came into the room without
a word or a kiss, and when she did speak, the total absence of any
euphuism gave token of repressed excitement yet more than her angry
eyes and eager step. Evan had grown accustomed to her moods, and if one
moment she was the halcyon, and another the petrel, it no longer
disturbed him, seeing that he was a stranger to the influences by which
she was affected. The Countess rated him severely for not seeking
repose and inviting sympathy. She told him that the Jocelyns had one
and all combined in an infamous plot to destroy the race of Harrington,
and that Caroline had already succumbed to their assaults; that the
Jocelyns would repent it, and sooner than they thought for; and that
the only friend the Harringtons had in the house was Miss Bonner, whom
Providence would liberally reward.

Then the Countess changed to a dramatic posture, and whispered aloud,
“Hush: she is here. She is so anxious. Be generous, my brother, and let
her see you!”

“She?” said Evan, faintly. “May she come, Louisa?” He hoped for Rose.

“I have consented to mask it,” returned the Countess. “Oh, what do I
not sacrifice for you!”

She turned from him, and to Evan’s chagrin introduced Juliana Bonner.

“Five minutes, remember!” said the Countess. “I must not hear of more.”
And then Evan found himself alone with Miss Bonner, and very uneasy.
This young lady had restless brilliant eyes, and a contraction about
the forehead which gave one the idea of a creature suffering perpetual
headache. She said nothing, and when their eyes met she dropped hers in
a manner that made silence too expressive. Feeling which, Evan began:

“May I tell you that I think it is I who ought to be nursing you, not
you me?”

Miss Bonner replied by lifting her eyes and dropping them as before,
murmuring subsequently, “Would you do so?”

“Most certainly, if you did me the honour to select me.”

The fingers of the young lady commenced twisting and intertwining on
her lap. Suddenly she laughed:

“It would not do at all. You won’t be dismissed from your present
service till you’re unfit for any other.”

“What do you mean?” said Evan, thinking more of the unmusical laugh
than of the words.

He received no explanation, and the irksome silence caused him to look
through the window, as an escape for his mind, at least. The waters
streamed on endlessly into the golden arms awaiting them. The low moon
burnt through the foliage. In the distance, over a reach of the flood,
one tall aspen shook against the lighted sky.

“Are you in pain?” Miss Bonner asked, and broke his reverie.

“No; I am going away, and perhaps I sigh involuntarily.”

“You like these grounds?”

“I have never been so happy in any place.”

“With those cruel young men about you?”

Evan now laughed. “We don’t call young men cruel, Miss Bonner.”

“But were they not? To take advantage of what Rose told them—it was
base!”

She had said more than she intended, possibly, for she coloured under
his inquiring look, and added: “I wish I could say the same as you of
Beckley. Do you know, I am called Rose’s thorn?”

“Not by Miss Jocelyn herself, certainly!”

“How eager you are to defend her. But am I not—tell me—do I not look
like a thorn in company with her?”

“There is but the difference that ill health would make.”

“Ill health? Oh, yes! And Rose is so much better born.”

“To that, I am sure, she does not give a thought.”

“Not Rose? Oh!”

An exclamation, properly lengthened, convinces the feelings more
satisfactorily than much logic. Though Evan claimed only the
hand-kerchief he had won, his heart sank at the sound. Miss Bonner
watched him, and springing forward, said sharply:

“May I tell you something?”

“You may tell me what you please.”

“Then, whether I offend you or not, you had better leave this.”

“I am going,” said Evan. “I am only waiting to introduce your tutor to
you.”

She kept her eyes on him, and in her voice as well there was a depth,
as she returned:

“Mr. Laxley, Mr. Forth, and Harry, are going to Lymport to-morrow.”

Evan was looking at a figure, whose shadow was thrown towards the house
from the margin of the stream.

He stood up, and taking the hand of Miss Bonner, said:

“I thank you. I may, perhaps, start with them. At any rate, you have
done me a great service, which I shall not forget.”

The figure by the stream he knew to be that of Rose. He released Miss
Bonner’s trembling moist hand, and as he continued standing, she moved
to the door, after once following the line of his eyes into the
moonlight.

Outside the door a noise was audible. Andrew had come to sit with his
dear boy, and the Countess had met and engaged and driven him to the
other end of the passage, where he hung remonstrating with her.

“Why, Van,” he said, as Evan came up to him, “I thought you were in a
profound sleep. Louisa said—”

“Silly Andrew!” interposed the Countess, “do you not observe he is
sleep-walking now?” and she left them with a light laugh to go to
Juliana, whom she found in tears. The Countess was quite aware of the
efficacy of a little bit of burlesque lying to cover her retreat from
any petty exposure.

Evan soon got free from Andrew. He was under the dim stars, walking to
the great fire in the East. The cool air refreshed him. He was simply
going to ask for his own, before he went, and had no cause to fear what
would be thought by any one. A handkerchief! A man might fairly win
that, and carry it out of a very noble family, without having to blush
for himself.

I cannot say whether he inherited his feeling for rank from Mel, his
father, or that the Countess had succeeded in instilling it, but Evan
never took Republican ground in opposition to those who insulted him,
and never lashed his “manhood” to assert itself, nor compared the
fineness of his instincts with the behaviour of titled gentlemen.
Rather he seemed to admit the distinction between his birth and that of
a gentleman, admitting it to his own soul, as it were, and struggled
simply as men struggle against a destiny. The news Miss Bonner had
given him sufficed to break a spell which could not have endured
another week; and Andrew, besides, had told him of Caroline’s illness.
He walked to meet Rose, honestly intending to ask for his own, and wish
her good-bye.

Rose saw him approach, and knew him in the distance. She was sitting on
a lower branch of the aspen, that shot out almost from the root, and
stretched over the intervolving rays of light on the tremulous water.
She could not move to meet him. She was not the Rose whom we have
hitherto known. Love may spring in the bosom of a young girl, like
Hesper in the evening sky, a grey speck in a field of grey, and not be
seen or known, till surely as the circle advances the faint planet
gathers fire, and, coming nearer earth, dilates, and will and must be
seen and known. When Evan lay like a dead man on the ground, Rose
turned upon herself as the author of his death, and then she felt this
presence within her, and her heart all day had talked to her of it, and
was throbbing now, and would not be quieted. She could only lift her
eyes and give him her hand; she could not speak. She thought him cold,
and he was; cold enough to think that she and her cousin were not
unlike in their manner, though not deep enough to reflect that it was
from the same cause.

She was the first to find her wits: but not before she spoke did she
feel, and start to feel, how long had been the silence, and that her
hand was still in his.

“Why did you come out, Evan? It was not right.”

“I came to speak to you. I shall leave early to-morrow, and may not see
you alone.”

“You are going——?”

She checked her voice, and left the thrill of it wavering in him.

“Yes, Rose, I am going; I should have gone before.”

“Evan!” she grasped his hand, and then timidly retained it. “You have
not forgiven me? I see now. I did not think of any risk to you. I only
wanted you to beat. I wanted you to be first and best. If you knew how
I thank God for saving you! What my punishment would have been!”

Till her eyes were full she kept them on him, too deep in emotion to be
conscious of it.

He could gaze on her tears coldly.

“I should be happy to take the leap any day for the prize you offered.
I have come for that.”

“For what, Evan?” But while she was speaking the colour mounted in her
cheeks, and she went on rapidly:

“Did you think it unkind of me not to come to nurse you. I must tell
you, to defend myself. It was the Countess, Evan. She is offended with
me—very justly, I dare say. She would not let me come. What could I do?
I had no claim to come.”

Rose was not aware of the import of her speech. Evan, though he felt
more in it, and had some secret nerves set tingling and dancing, was
not to be moved from his demand.

“Do you intend to withhold it, Rose?”

“Withhold what, Evan? Anything that you wish for is yours.”

“The handkerchief. Is not that mine?”

Rose faltered a word. Why did he ask for it? Because he asked for
nothing else, and wanted no other thing save that.

Why did she hesitate? Because it was so poor a gift, and so unworthy of
him.

And why did he insist? Because in honour she was bound to surrender it.

And why did she hesitate still? Let her answer.

“Oh, Evan! I would give you anything but that; and if you are going
away, I should beg so much to keep it.”

He must have been in a singular state not to see her heart in the
refusal, as was she not to see his in the request. But Love is blindest
just when the bandage is being removed from his forehead.

“Then you will not give it me, Rose? Do you think I shall go about
boasting ‘This is Miss Jocelyn’s handkerchief, and I, poor as I am,
have won it’?”

The taunt struck aslant in Rose’s breast with a peculiar sting. She
stood up.

“I will give it you, Evan.”

Turning from him she drew it forth, and handed it to him hurriedly. It
was warm. It was stained with his blood. He guessed where it had been
nestling, and, now, as if by revelation, he saw that large sole star in
the bosom of his darling, and was blinded by it and lost his senses.

“Rose! beloved!”

Like the flower of his nightly phantasy bending over the stream, he
looked and saw in her sweet face the living wonders that encircled his
image; she murmuring: “No, you must hate me.”

“I love you, Rose, and dare to say it—and it’s unpardonable. Can you
forgive me?”

She raised her face to him.

“Forgive you for loving me?” she said.

Holy to them grew the stillness: the ripple suffused in golden
moonlight: the dark edges of the leaves against superlative brightness.
Not a chirp was heard, nor anything save the cool and endless carol of
the happy waters, whose voices are the spirits of silence. Nature
seemed consenting that their hands should be joined, their eyes
intermingling. And when Evan, with a lover’s craving, wished her lips
to say what her eyes said so well, Rose drew his fingers up, and, with
an arch smile and a blush, kissed them. The simple act set his heart
thumping, and from the look of love, she saw an expression of pain pass
through him. Her fealty—her guileless, fearless truth—which the kissing
of his hand brought vividly before him, conjured its contrast as well
in this that was hidden from her, or but half suspected. Did she
know—know and love him still? He thought it might be: but that fell
dead on her asking:

“Shall I speak to Mama to-night?”

A load of lead crushed him.

“Rose!” he said; but could get no farther.

Innocently, or with well-masked design, Rose branched off into little
sweet words about his bruised shoulder, touching it softly, as if she
knew the virtue that was in her touch, and accusing her selfish self as
she caressed it:

“Dearest Evan! you must have been sure I thought no one like you. Why
did you not tell me before? I can hardly believe it now! Do you know,”
she hurried on, “they think me cold and heartless,—am I? I must be, to
have made you run such risk; but yet I’m sure I could not have survived
you.”

Dropping her voice, Rose quoted Ruth. As Evan listened, the words were
like food from heaven poured into his spirit.

“To-morrow,” he kept saying to himself, “to-morrow I will tell her all.
Let her think well of me a few short hours.”

But the passing minutes locked them closer; each had a new link—in a
word, or a speechless breath, or a touch: and to break the marriage of
their eyes there must be infinite baseness on one side, or on the other
disloyalty to love.

The moon was a silver ball, high up through the aspen-leaves. Evan
kissed the hand of Rose, and led her back to the house. He had appeased
his conscience by restraining his wild desire to kiss her lips.

In the hall they parted. Rose whispered, “Till death!” giving him her
hands.




CHAPTER XXIV.
THE COUNTESS MAKES HERSELF FELT


There is a peculiar reptile whose stroke is said to deprive men of
motion. On the day after the great Mel had stalked the dinner-table of
Beckley Court, several of the guests were sensible of the effect of
this creature’s mysterious touch, without knowing what it was that
paralyzed them. Drummond Forth had fully planned to go to Lymport. He
had special reasons for making investigations with regard to the great
Mel. Harry, who was fond of Drummond, offered to accompany him, and
Laxley, for the sake of a diversion, fell into the scheme. Mr. George
Uplift was also to be of the party, and promised them fun. But when the
time came to start, not one could be induced to move: Laxley was
pressingly engaged by Rose: Harry showed the rope the Countess held him
by; Mr. George made a singular face, and seriously advised Drummond to
give up the project.

“Don’t rub that woman the wrong way,” he said, in a private colloquy
they had. “By Jingo, she’s a Tartar. She was as a gal, and she isn’t
changed, Lou Harrington. Fancy now: she knew me, and she faced me out,
and made me think her a stranger! ’Gad, I’m glad I didn’t speak to the
others. Lord’s sake, keep it quiet. Don’t rouse that woman, now, if you
want to keep a whole skin.”

Drummond laughed at his extreme earnestness in cautioning him, and
appeared to enjoy his dread of the Countess. Mr. George would not tell
how he had been induced to change his mind. He repeated his advice with
a very emphatic shrug of the shoulder.

“You seem afraid of her,” said Drummond.

“I am. I ain’t ashamed to confess it. She’s a regular viper, my boy!”
said Mr. George. “She and I once were pretty thick—least said soonest
mended, you know. I offended her. Wasn’t quite up to her mark—a
tailor’s daughter, you know. ’Gad, if she didn’t set an Irish Dragoon
Captain on me!—I went about in danger of my life. The fellow began to
twist his damned black moustaches the moment he clapped eyes on
me—bullied me till, upon my soul, I was almost ready to fight him! Oh,
she was a little tripping Tartar of a bantam hen then. She’s grown
since she’s been countessed, and does it peacocky. Now, I give you fair
warning, you know. She’s more than any man’s match.”

“I dare say I shall think the same when she has beaten me,” quoth
cynical Drummond, and immediately went and gave orders for his horse to
be saddled, thinking that he would tread on the head of the viper.

But shortly before the hour of his departure, Mrs. Evremonde summoned
him to her, and showed him a slip of paper, on which was written, in an
uncouth small hand:

“Madam: a friend warns you that your husband is coming here. Deep
interest in your welfare is the cause of an anonymous communication.
The writer wishes only to warn you in time.”

Mrs. Evremonde told Drummond that she had received it from one of the
servants when leaving the breakfast-room. Beyond the fact that a man on
horseback had handed it to a little boy, who had delivered it over to
the footman, Drummond could learn nothing. Of course, all thought of
the journey to Lymport was abandoned. If but to excogitate a motive for
the origin of the document, Drummond was forced to remain; and now he
had it, and now he lost it again; and as he was wandering about in his
maze, the Countess met him with a “Good morning, Mr., Forth. Have I
impeded your expedition by taking my friend Mr. Harry to cavalier me
to-day?”

Drummond smilingly assured her that she had not in any way disarranged
his projects, and passed with so absorbed a brow that the Countess
could afford to turn her head and inspect him, without fear that he
would surprise her in the act. Knocking the pearly edge of her fan on
her teeth, she eyed him under her joined black lashes, and deliberately
read his thoughts in the mere shape of his back and shoulders. She read
him through and through, and was unconscious of the effective attitude
she stood in for the space of two full minutes, and even then it
required one of our unhappy sex to recall her. This was Harry Jocelyn.

“My friend,” she said to him, with a melancholy smile, “my one friend
here!”

Harry went through the form of kissing her hand, which he had been
taught, and practised cunningly as the first step of the ladder.

“I say, you looked so handsome, standing as you did just now,” he
remarked; and she could see how far beneath her that effective attitude
had precipitated the youth.

“Ah!” she sighed, walking on, with the step of majesty in exile.

“What the deuce is the matter with everybody to-day?” cried Harry. “I’m
hanged if I can make it out. There’s the Carrington, as you call her, I
met her with such a pair of eyes, and old George looking as if he’d
been licked, at her heels; and there’s Drummond and his lady fair
moping about the lawn, and my mother positively getting excited—there’s
a miracle! and Juley’s sharpening her nails for somebody, and if
Ferdinand don’t look out, your brother’ll be walking off with
Rosey—that’s my opinion.”

“Indeed,” said the Countess. “You really think so?”

“Well, they come it pretty strong together.”

“And what constitutes the ‘come it strong,’ Mr. Harry?”

“Hold of hands; you know,” the young gentleman indicated.

“Alas, then! must not we be more discreet?”

“Oh! but it’s different. With young people one knows what that means.”

“Deus!” exclaimed the Countess, tossing her head weariedly, and Harry
perceived his slip, and down he went again.

What wonder that a youth in such training should consent to fetch and
carry, to listen and relate, to play the spy and know no more of his
office than that it gave him astonishing thrills of satisfaction, and
now and then a secret sweet reward?

The Countess had sealed Miss Carrington’s mouth by one of her most
dexterous strokes. On leaving the dinner-table over-night, and seeing
that Caroline’s attack would preclude their instant retreat, the
gallant Countess turned at bay. A word aside to Mr. George Uplift, and
then the Countess took a chair by Miss Carrington. She did all the
conversation, and supplied all the smiles to it, and when a lady has to
do that she is justified in striking, and striking hard, for to abandon
the pretence of sweetness is a gross insult from one woman to another.

The Countess then led circuitously, but with all the ease in the world,
to the story of a Portuguese lady, of a marvellous beauty, and who was
deeply enamoured of the Chevalier Miguel de Rasadio, and engaged to be
married to him: but, alas for her! in the insolence of her happiness
she wantonly made an enemy in the person of a most unoffending lady,
and she repented it. While sketching the admirable Chevalier, the
Countess drew a telling portrait of Mr. George Uplift, and gratified
her humour and her wrath at once by strong truth to nature in the
description and animated encomiums on the individual. The Portuguese
lady, too, a little resembled Miss Carrington, in spite of her
marvellous beauty. And it was odd that Miss Carrington should give a
sudden start and a horrified glance at the Countess just when the
Countess was pathetically relating the proceeding taken by the
revengeful lady on the beautiful betrothed of the Chevalier Miguel de
Rasadio: which proceeding was nothing other than to bring to the
Chevalier’s knowledge that his beauty had a defect concealed by her
apparel, and that the specks in his fruit were not one, or two, but,
Oh! And the dreadful sequel to the story the Countess could not tell:
preferring ingeniously to throw a tragic veil over it. Miss Carrington
went early to bed that night.

The courage that mounteth with occasion was eminently the attribute of
the Countess de Saldar. After that dreadful dinner she (since the
weaknesses of great generals should not be altogether ignored), did
pray for flight and total obscurity, but Caroline could not be left in
her hysteric state, and now that she really perceived that Evan was
progressing and on the point of sealing his chance, the devoted lady
resolved to hold her ground. Besides, there was the pic-nic. The
Countess had one dress she had not yet appeared in, and it was for the
picnic she kept it. That small motives are at the bottom of many
illustrious actions is a modern discovery; but I shall not adopt the
modern principle of magnifying the small motive till it overshadows my
noble heroine. I remember that the small motive is only to be seen by
being borne into the range of my vision by a powerful microscope; and
if I do more than see—if I carry on my reflections by the aid of the
glass, I arrive at conclusions that must be false. Men who dwarf human
nature do this. The gods are juster. The Countess, though she wished to
remain for the pic-nic, and felt warm in anticipation of the homage to
her new dress, was still a gallant general and a devoted sister, and if
she said to herself, “Come what may, I will stay for that pic-nic, and
they shall not brow-beat me out of it,” it is that trifling pleasures
are noisiest about the heart of human nature: not that they govern us
absolutely. There is mob-rule in minds as in communities, but the
Countess had her appetites in excellent drill. This pic-nic
surrendered, represented to her defeat in all its ignominy. The largest
longest-headed of schemes ask occasionally for something substantial
and immediate. So the Countess stipulated with Providence for the
pic-nic. It was a point to be passed: “Thorough flood, thorough fire.”

In vain poor Andrew Cogglesby, to whom the dinner had been torture, and
who was beginning to see the position they stood in at Beckley, begged
to be allowed to take them away, or to go alone. The Countess laughed
him into submission. As a consequence of her audacious spirits she grew
more charming and more natural, and the humour that she possessed, but
which, like her other faculties, was usually subordinate to her plans,
gave spontaneous bursts throughout the day, and delighted her
courtiers. Nor did the men at all dislike the difference of her manner
with them, and with the ladies. I may observe that a woman who shows a
marked depression in the presence of her own sex will be thought very
superior by ours; that is, supposing she is clever and agreeable.
Manhood distinguishes what flatters it. A lady approaches. “We must be
proper,” says the Countess, and her hearty laugh dies with suddenness
and is succeeded by the maturest gravity. And the Countess can look a
profound merriment with perfect sedateness when there appears to be an
equivoque in company. Finely secret are her glances, as if under every
eye-lash there lurked the shade of a meaning. What she meant was not so
clear. All this was going on, and Lady Jocelyn was simply amused, and
sat as at a play.

“She seems to have stepped out of a book of French memoirs,” said her
ladyship. “La vie galante et devote—voila la Comtesse.”

In contradistinction to the other ladies, she did not detest the
Countess because she could not like her.

“Where’s the harm in her?” she asked. “She doesn’t damage the men, that
I can see. And a person you can laugh at and with, is inexhaustible.”

“And how long is she to stay here?” Mrs. Shorne inquired. Mrs. Melville
remarking: “Her visit appears to be inexhaustible.”

“I suppose she’ll stay till the Election business is over,” said Lady
Jocelyn.

The Countess had just driven with Melville to Fallowfield in Caroline’s
black lace shawl.

“Upwards of four weeks longer!” Mrs. Melville interjected.

Lady Jocelyn chuckled.

Miss Carrington was present. She had been formerly sharp in her
condemnation of the Countess—her affectedness, her euphuism, and her
vulgarity. Now she did not say a word, though she might have done it
with impunity.

“I suppose, Emily, you see what Rose is about?” said Mrs. Melville. “I
should not have thought it adviseable to have that young man here,
myself. I think I let you know that.”

“One young man’s as good as another,” responded her ladyship. “I’ve my
doubts of the one that’s much better. I fancy Rose is as good a judge
by this time as you or I.”

Mrs. Melville made an effort or two to open Lady Jocelyn’s eyes, and
then relapsed into the confident serenity inspired by evil
prognostications.

“But there really does seem some infatuation about these people!”
exclaimed Mrs. Shorne, turning to Miss Current. “Can you understand it?
The Duke, my dear! Things seem to be going on in the house, that
really—and so openly.”

“That’s one virtue,” said Miss Current, with her imperturbable metallic
voice, and face like a cold clear northern sky. “Things done in secret
throw on the outsiders the onus of raising a scandal.”

“You don’t believe, then?” suggested Mrs. Shorne.

Miss Current replied: “I always wait for a thing to happen first.”

“But haven’t you seen, my dear?”

“I never see anything, my dear.”

“Then you must be blind, my dear.”

“On the contrary, that’s how I keep my sight, my dear.”

“I don’t understand you,” said Mrs. Shorne.

“It’s a part of the science of optics, and requires study,” said Miss
Current.

Neither with the worldly nor the unworldly woman could the ladies do
anything. But they were soon to have their triumph.

A delicious morning had followed the lovely night. The stream flowed
under Evan’s eyes, like something in a lower sphere, now. His passion
took him up, as if a genie had lifted him into mid-air, and showed him
the world on a palm of a hand; and yet, as he dressed by the window,
little chinks in the garden wall, and nectarines under their shiny
leaves, and the white walks of the garden, were stamped on his hot
brain accurately and lastingly. Ruth upon the lips of Rose: that voice
of living constancy made music to him everywhere. “Thy God shall be my
God.” He had heard it all through the night. He had not yet broken the
tender charm sufficiently to think that he must tell her the sacrifice
she would have to make. When partly he did, the first excuse he
clutched at was, that he had not even kissed her on the forehead.
Surely he had been splendidly chivalrous? Just as surely he would have
brought on himself the scorn of the chivalrous or of the commonly
balanced if he had been otherwise. The grandeur of this or of any of
his proceedings, then, was forfeited, as it must needs be when we are
in the false position: we can have no glory though martyred. The youth
felt it, even to the seeing of why it was; and he resolved, in justice
to the dear girl, that he would break loose from his fetters, as we
call our weakness. Behold, Rose met him descending the stairs, and,
taking his hand, sang, unabashed, by the tell-tale colour coming over
her face, a stave of a little Portuguese air that they had both been
fond of in Portugal; and he, listening to it, and looking in her eyes,
saw that his feelings in the old time had been hers. Instantly the old
time gave him its breath, the present drew back.

Rose, now that she had given her heart out, had no idea of concealment.
She would have denied nothing to her aunts: she was ready to confide it
to her mother. Was she not proud of the man she loved? When Evan’s hand
touched hers she retained it, and smiled up at him frankly, as it were
to make him glad in her gladness. If before others his eyes brought the
blood to her cheeks, she would perhaps drop her eye-lids an instant,
and then glance quickly level again to reassure him. And who would have
thought that this boisterous, boyish creature had such depths of eye!
Cold, did they call her? Let others think her cold. The tender
knowledge of her—the throbbing secret they held in common sang at his
heart. Rose made no confidante, but she attempted no mystery. Evan
should have risen to the height of the noble girl. But the dearer and
sweeter her bearing became, the more conscious he was of the dead
weight he was dragging: in truth her behaviour stamped his false
position to hard print the more he admired her for it, and he had
shrinkings from the feminine part it imposed on him to play.




CHAPTER XXV.
IN WHICH THE STREAM FLOWS MUDDY AND CLEAR


An Irish retriever-pup of the Shannon breed, Pat by name, was
undergoing tuition on the sward close by the kennels, Rose’s
hunting-whip being passed through his collar to restrain erratic
propensities. The particular point of instruction which now made poor
Pat hang out his tongue, and agitate his crisp brown curls, was the
performance of the “down-charge”; a ceremony demanding implicit
obedience from the animal in the midst of volatile gambadoes, and a
simulation of profound repose when his desire to be up and bounding was
mighty. Pat’s Irish eyes were watching Rose, as he lay with his head
couched between his forepaws in the required attitude. He had but half
learnt his lesson; and something in his half-humorous, half-melancholy
look talked to Rose more eloquently than her friend Ferdinand at her
elbow. Laxley was her assistant dog-breaker. Rose would not abandon her
friends because she had accepted a lover. On the contrary, Rose was
very kind to Ferdinand, and perhaps felt bound to be so to-day. To-day,
also, her face was lighted; a readiness to colour, and an expression of
deeper knowledge, which she now had, made the girl dangerous to
friends. This was not Rose’s fault but there is no doubt among the
faculty that love is a contagious disease, and we ought not to come
within miles of the creatures in whom it lodges.

Pat’s tail kept hinting to his mistress that a change would afford him
satisfaction. After a time she withdrew her wistful gaze from him, and
listened entirely to Ferdinand: and it struck her that he spoke
particularly well to-day, though she did not see so much in his eyes as
in Pat’s. The subject concerned his departure, and he asked Rose if she
should be sorry. Rose, to make him sure of it, threw a music into her
voice dangerous to friends. For she had given heart and soul to Evan,
and had a sense, therefore, of being irredeemably in debt to her old
associates, and wished to be doubly kind to them.

Pat took advantage of the diversion to stand up quietly and have a
shake. He then began to kiss his mistress’s hand, to show that all was
right on both sides; and followed this with a playful pretence at a
bite, that there might be no subsequent misunderstanding, and then a
bark and a whine. As no attention was paid to this amount of
plain-speaking, Pat made a bolt. He got no farther than the length of
the whip, and all he gained was to bring on himself the terrible word
of drill once more. But Pat had tasted liberty. Irish rebellion against
constituted authority was exhibited. Pat would not: his ears tossed
over his head, and he jumped to right and left, and looked the
raggedest rapparee that ever his ancestry trotted after. Rose laughed
at his fruitless efforts to get free; but Ferdinand meditatively
appeared to catch a sentiment in them.

“Down-charge, Sir, will you? Ah, Pat! Pat! You’ll have to obey me, my
boy. Now, down-charge!”

While Rose addressed the language of reason to Pat, Ferdinand slipped
in a soft word or two. Presently she saw him on one knee.

“Pat won’t, and I will,” said he.

“But Pat shall, and you had better not,” said she. “Besides, my dear
Ferdinand,” she added, laughing, “you don’t know how to do it.”

“Do you want me to prostrate on all fours, Rose?”

“No. I hope not. Do get up, Ferdinand. You’ll be seen from the
windows.”

Instead of quitting his posture, he caught her hand, and scared her
with a declaration.

“Of all men, you to be on your knees! and to me, Ferdinand!” she cried,
in discomfort.

“Why shouldn’t I, Rose?” was this youth’s answer.

He had got the idea that foreign cavalier manners would take with her;
but it was not so easy to make his speech correspond with his posture,
and he lost his opportunity, which was pretty. However, he spoke plain
English. The interview ended by Rose releasing Pat from drill, and
running off in a hurry. Where was Evan? She must have his consent to
speak to her mother, and prevent a recurrence of these silly scenes.

Evan was with Caroline, his sister.

It was contrary to the double injunction of the Countess that Caroline
should receive Evan during her absence, or that he should disturb the
dear invalid with a visit. These two were not unlike both in
organization and character, and they had not sat together long before
they found each other out. Now, to further Evan’s love-suit, the
Countess had induced Caroline to continue yet awhile in the Purgatory
Beckley Court had become to her; but Evan, in speaking of Rose,
expressed a determination to leave her, and Caroline caught at it.

“Can you?—will you? Oh, dear Van! have you the courage? I—look at
me—you know the home I go to, and—and I think of it here as a place to
be happy in. What have our marriages done for us? Better that we had
married simple stupid men who earn their bread, and would not have been
ashamed of us! And, my dearest, it is not only that. None can tell what
our temptations are. Louisa has strength, but I feel I have none; and
though, dear, for your true interest, I would indeed sacrifice myself—I
would, Van! I would!—it is not good for you to stay,—I know it is not.
For you have Papa’s sense of honour—and oh! if you should learn to
despise me, my dear brother!”

She kissed him; her nerves were agitated by strong mental excitement.
He attributed it to her recent attack of illness, but could not help
asking, while he caressed her:

“What’s that? Despise you?”

It may have been that Caroline felt then, that to speak of something
was to forfeit something. A light glimmered across the dewy blue of her
beautiful eyes. Desire to breathe it to him, and have his loving aid:
the fear of forfeiting it, evil as it was to her, and at the bottom of
all, that doubt we choose to encourage of the harm in a pleasant sin
unaccomplished; these might be read in the rich dim gleam that swept
like sunlight over sea-water between breaks of clouds.

“Dear Van! do you love her so much?”

Caroline knew too well that she was shutting her own theme with iron
clasps when she once touched on Evan’s.

Love her? Love Rose? It became an endless carol with Evan. Caroline
sighed for him from her heart.

“You know—you understand me; don’t you?” he said, after a breathless
excursion of his fancy.

“I believe you love her, dear. I think I have never loved any one but
my one brother.”

His love for Rose he could pour out to Caroline; when it came to Rose’s
love for him his blood thickened, and his tongue felt guilty. He must
speak to her, he said,—tell her all.

“Yes, tell her all,” echoed Caroline. “Do, do tell her. Trust a woman
utterly if she loves you, dear. Go to her instantly.”

“Could you bear it?” said Evan. He began to think it was for the sake
of his sisters that he had hesitated.

“Bear it? bear anything rather than perpetual imposture. What have I
not borne? Tell her, and then, if she is cold to you, let us go. Let us
go. I shall be glad to. Ah, Van! I love you so.” Caroline’s voice
deepened. “I love you so, my dear. You won’t let your new love drive me
out? Shall you always love me?”

Of that she might be sure, whatever happened.

“Should you love me, Van, if evil befel me?”

Thrice as well, he swore to her.

“But if I—if I, Van Oh! my life is intolerable! Supposing I should ever
disgrace you in any way, and not turn out all you fancied me. I am very
weak and unhappy.”

Evan kissed her confidently, with a warm smile. He said a few words of
the great faith he had in her: words that were bitter comfort to
Caroline. This brother, who might save her, to him she dared not speak.
Did she wish to be saved? She only knew that to wound Evan’s sense of
honour and the high and chivalrous veneration for her sex and pride in
himself and those of his blood, would be wicked and unpardonable, and
that no earthly pleasure could drown it. Thinking this, with her hands
joined in pale dejection, Caroline sat silent, and Evan left her to lay
bare his heart to Rose. On his way to find Rose he was stopped by the
announcement of the arrival of Mr. Raikes, who thrust a bundle of notes
into his hand, and after speaking loudly of “his curricle,” retired on
important business, as he said, with a mysterious air. “I’m beaten in
many things, but not in the article Luck,” he remarked; “you will hear
of me, though hardly as a tutor in this academy.”

Scanning the bundle of notes, without a reflection beyond the thought
that money was in his hand; and wondering at the apparition of the
curricle, Evan was joined by Harry Jocelyn, and Harry linked his arm in
Evan’s and plunged with extraordinary spontaneity and candour into the
state of his money affairs. What the deuce he was to do for money he
did not know. From the impressive manner in which he put it, it
appeared to be one of Nature’s great problems that the whole human race
were bound to set their heads together to solve. A hundred pounds—Harry
wanted no more, and he could not get it. His uncles? they were as poor
as rats; and all the spare money they could club was going for Mel’s
Election expenses. A hundred and fifty was what Harry really wanted;
but he could do with a hundred. Ferdinand, who had plenty, would not
even lend him fifty. Ferdinand had dared to hint at a debt already
unsettled, and he called himself a gentleman!

“You wouldn’t speak of money-matters now, would you, Harrington?”

“I dislike the subject, I confess,” said Evan.

“And so do I” Harry jumped at the perfect similarity between them. “You
can’t think how it bothers one to have to talk about it. You and I are
tremendously alike.”

Evan might naturally suppose that a subject Harry detested, he would
not continue, but for a whole hour Harry turned it over and over with
grim glances at Jewry.

“You see,” he wound up, “I’m in a fix. I want to help that poor girl,
and one or two things—”

“It’s for that you want it?” cried Evan, brightening to him. “Accept it
from me.”

It is a thing familiar to the experience of money-borrowers, that your
“last chance” is the man who is to accommodate you; but we are always
astonished, nevertheless; and Harry was, when notes to the amount of
the largest sum named by him were placed in his hand by one whom he
looked upon as the last to lend.

“What a trump you are, Harrington!” was all he could say; and then he
was for hurrying Evan into the house, to find pen and paper, and write
down a memorandum of the loan: but Evan insisted upon sparing him the
trouble, though Harry, with the admirable scruples of an inveterate
borrower, begged hard to be allowed to bind himself legally to repay
the money.

“’Pon my soul, Harrington, you make me remember I once doubted whether
you were one of us—rather your own fault, you know!” said Harry. “Bury
that, won’t you?”

“’Till your doubts recur,” Evan observed; and Harry burst out, “’Gad,
if you weren’t such a melancholy beggar, you’d be the jolliest fellow I
know! There, go after Rosey. Dashed if I don’t think you’re ahead of
Ferdinand, long chalks. Your style does for girls. I like women.”

With a chuckle and a wink, Harry swung-off. Evan had now to reflect
that he had just thrown away part of the price of his bondage to
Tailordom; the mention of Rose filled his mind. Where was she? Both
were seeking one another. Rose was in the cypress walk. He saw the
star-like figure up the length of it, between the swelling tall dark
pillars, and was hurrying to her, resolute not to let one minute of
deception blacken further the soul that loved so true a soul. She saw
him, and stood smiling, when the Countess issued, shadow-like, from a
side path, and declared that she must claim her brother for a few
instants. Would her sweet Rose pardon her? Rose bowed coolly. The
hearts of the lovers were chilled, not that they perceived any malice
in the Countess, but their keen instincts felt an evil fate.

The Countess had but to tell Evan that she had met the insolvent in
apples, and recognized him under his change of fortune, and had no
doubt that at least he would amuse the company. Then she asked her
brother the superfluous question, whether he loved her, which Evan
answered satisfactorily enough, as he thought; but practical ladies
require proofs.

“Quick,” said Evan, seeing Rose vanish, “what do you want? I’ll do
anything.”

“Anything? Ah, but this will be disagreeable to you.”

“Name it at once. I promise beforehand.”

The Countess wanted Evan to ask Andrew to be the very best
brother-in-law in the world, and win, unknown to himself, her cheerful
thanks, by lending Evan to lend to her the sum of one hundred pounds,
as she was in absolute distress for money.

“Really, Louisa, this is a thing you might ask him yourself,” Evan
remonstrated.

“It would not become me to do so, dear,” said the Countess, demurely;
and inasmuch as she had already drawn on Andrew in her own person
pretty largely, her views of propriety were correct in this instance.

Evan had to consent before he could be released. He ran to the end of
the walk through the portal, into the park. Rose was not to be seen.
She had gone in to dress for dinner. The opportunity might recur, but
would his courage come with it? His courage had sunk on a sudden; or it
may have been that it was worst for this young man to ask for a loan of
money, than to tell his beloved that he was basely born, vile, and
unworthy, and had snared her into loving him; for when he and Andrew
were together, money was not alluded to. Andrew, however, betrayed
remarkable discomposure. He said plainly that he wanted to leave
Beckley Court, and wondered why he didn’t leave, and whether he was on
his head or his feet, and how he had been such a fool as to come.

“Do you mean that for me?” said sensitive Evan.

“Oh, you! You’re a young buck,” returned Andrew, evasively. “We
common-place business men—we’re out of our element; and there’s poor
Carry can’t sit down to their dinners without an upset. I thank God I’m
a Radical, Van; one man’s the same as another to me, how he’s born, as
long as he’s honest and agreeable. But a chap like that George Uplift
to look down on anybody! ’Gad, I’ve a good mind to bring in a Bill for
the Abolition of the Squirearchy.”

Ultimately, Andrew somehow contrived to stick a hint or two about the
terrible dinner in Evan’s quivering flesh. He did it as delicately as
possible, half begging pardon, and perspiring profusely. Evan grasped
his hand, and thanked him. Caroline’s illness was now explained to him.

“I’ll take Caroline with me to-morrow,” he said. “Louisa wishes to
stay—there’s a pic-nic. Will you look to her, and bring her with you?”

“My dear Van,” replied Andrew, “stop with Louisa? Now, in confidence,
it’s as bad as a couple of wives; no disrespect to my excellent good
Harry at home; but Louisa—I don’t know how it is—but Louisa, you lose
your head, you’re in a whirl, you’re an automaton, a teetotum! I
haven’t a notion of what I’ve been doing or saying since I came here.
My belief is, I’ve been lying right and left. I shall be found out to a
certainty: Oh! if she’s made her mind up for the pic-nic, somebody must
stop. I can only tell you, Van, it’s one perpetual vapour-bath to me.
There’ll be room for two in my trousers when I get back. I shall have
to get the tailor to take them in a full half.”

Here occurred an opening for one of those acrid pleasantries which
console us when there is horrid warfare within.

“You must give me the work,” said Evan, partly pleased with his hated
self for being able to jest on the subject, as a piece of preliminary
self-conquest.

“Aha!” went Andrew, as if the joke were too good to be dwelt on; “Hem”;
and by way of diverting from it cleverly and naturally, he remarked
that the weather was fine. This made Evan allude to his letter written
from Lymport, upon which Andrew said: “tush! pish! humbug! nonsense!
won’t hear a word. Don’t know anything about it. Van, you’re going to
be a brewer. I say you are. You’re afraid you can’t? I tell you, sir,
I’ve got a bet on it. You’re not going to make me lose, are you—eh? I
have, and a stiff bet, too. You must and shall, so there’s an end. Only
we can’t make arrangements just yet, my boy. Old Tom—very good old
fellow—but, you know—must get old Tom out of the way, first. Now go and
dress for dinner. And Lord preserve us from the Great Mel to-day!”
Andrew mumbled as he turned away.

Evan could not reach his chamber without being waylaid by the Countess.
Had he remembered the sister who sacrificed so much for him? “There,
there!” cried Evan, and her hand closed on the delicious golden
whispers of bank-notes. And, “Oh, generous Andrew! dear good Evan!”
were the exclamations of the gratified lady.

There remained nearly another hundred. Evan laid out the notes, and
eyed them while dressing. They seemed to say to him, “We have you now.”
He was clutched by a beneficent or a most malignant magician. The
former seemed due to him, considering the cloud on his fortunes. This
enigma might mean, that by submitting to a temporary humiliation, for a
trial of him—in fact, by his acknowledgement of the fact, loathed
though it was,—he won a secret overlooker’s esteem, gained a powerful
ally. Here was the proof, he held the proof. He had read Arabian Tales
and could believe in marvels; especially could he believe in the
friendliness of a magical thing that astounded without hurting him.

He, sat down in his room at night and wrote a fairly manful letter to
Rose; and it is to be said of the wretch he then saw himself, that he
pardoned her for turning from so vile a pretender. He heard a step in
the passage. It was Polly Wheedle. Polly had put her young mistress to
bed, and was retiring to her own slumbers. He made her take the letter
and promise to deliver it immediately. Would not to-morrow morning do,
she asked, as Miss Rose was very sleepy. He seemed to hesitate—he was
picturing how Rose looked when very sleepy. Why should he surrender
this darling? And subtler question—why should he make her unhappy? Why
disturb her at all in her sweet sleep?

“Well,” said Evan. “To-morrow will do.—No, take it to-night, for God’s
sake!” he cried, as one who bursts the spell of an opiate. “Go at
once.” The temptation had almost overcome him.

Polly thought his proceedings queer. And what could the letter contain?
A declaration, of course. She walked slowly along the passage,
meditating on love, and remotely on its slave, Mr. Nicholas Frim.
Nicholas had never written her a letter; but she was determined that he
should, some day. She wondered what love-letters were like? Like
valentines without the Cupids. Practical valentines, one might say. Not
vapoury and wild, but hot and to the point. Delightful things! No harm
in peeping at a love-letter, if you do it with the eye of a friend.

Polly spelt just a word when a door opened at her elbow. She dropped
her candle and curtsied to the Countess’s voice. The Countess desired
her to enter, and all in a tremble Polly crept in. Her air of guilt
made the Countess thrill. She had merely called her in to extract daily
gossip. The corner of the letter sticking up under Polly’s neck
attracted her strangely, and beginning with the familiar, “Well,
child,” she talked of things interesting to Polly, and then exhibited
the pic-nic dress. It was a lovely half-mourning; airy sorrows, gauzy
griefs, you might imagine to constitute the wearer. White delicately
striped, exquisitely trimmed, and of a stuff to make the feminine mouth
water!

Could Polly refuse to try it on, when the flattering proposal met her
ears? Blushing, shame-faced, adoring the lady who made her look
adorable, Polly tried it on, and the Countess complimented her, and
made a doll of her, and turned her this way and that way, and
intoxicated her.

“A rich husband, Polly, child! and you are a lady ready made.”

Infamous poison to poor Polly; but as the thunder destroys small
insects, exalted schemers are to be excused for riding down their few
thousands. Moreover, the Countess really looked upon domestics as being
only half-souls.

Dressed in her own attire again, Polly felt in her pockets, and at her
bosom, and sang out: “Oh, my—Oh, where! Oh!”

The letter was lost. The letter could not be found. The Countess grew
extremely fatigued, and had to dismiss Polly, in spite of her eager
petitions to be allowed to search under the carpets and inside the bed.

In the morning came Evan’s great trial. There stood Rose. She turned to
him, and her eyes were happy and unclouded.

“You are not changed?” he said.

“Changed? what could change me?”

The God of true hearts bless her! He could hardly believe it.

“You are the Rose I knew yesterday?”

“Yes, Evan. But you—you look as if you had not slept.”

“You will not leave me this morning, before I go, Rose? Oh, my darling!
this that you do for me is the work of an angel—nothing less! I have
been a coward. And my beloved! to feel vile is agony to me—it makes me
feel unworthy of the hand I press. Now all is clear between us. I go: I
am forgiven.”

Rose repeated his last words, and then added hurriedly:

“All is clear between us? Shall I speak to Mama this morning? Dear
Evan! it will be right that I should.”

For the moment he could not understand why, but supposing a scrupulous
honesty in her, said: “Yes, tell Lady Jocelyn all.”

“And then, Evan, you will never need to go.”

They separated. The deep-toned sentence sang in Evan’s heart. Rose and
her mother were of one stamp. And Rose might speak for her mother. To
take the hands of such a pair and be lifted out of the slough, he
thought no shame: and all through the hours of the morning the image of
two angels stooping to touch a leper, pressed on his brain like a
reality, and went divinely through his blood.

Toward mid-day Rose beckoned to him, and led him out across the lawn
into the park, and along the borders of the stream.

“Evan,” she said, “shall I really speak to Mama?”

“You have not yet?” he answered.

“No. I have been with Juliana and with Drummond. Look at this, Evan.”
She showed a small black speck in the palm of her hand, which turned
out, on your viewing it closely, to be a brand of the letter L. “Mama
did that when I was a little girl, because I told lies. I never could
distinguish between truth and falsehood; and Mama set that mark on me,
and I have never told a lie since. She forgives anything but that. She
will be our friend; she will never forsake us, Evan, if we do not
deceive her. Oh, Evan! it never is of any use. But deceive her, and she
cannot forgive you. It is not in her nature.”

Evan paused before he replied: “You have only to tell her what I have
told you. You know everything.”

Rose gave him a flying look of pain: “Everything, Evan? What do I
know?”

“Ah, Rose! do you compel me to repeat it?”

Bewildered, Rose thought: “Have I slept and forgotten it?”

He saw the persistent grieved interrogation of her eyebrows.

“Well!” she sighed resignedly: “I am yours; you know that, Evan.”

But he was a lover, and quarrelled with her sigh.

“It may well make you sad now, Rose.”

“Sad? no, that does not make me sad. No; but my hands are tied. I
cannot defend you or justify myself; and induce Mama to stand by us.
Oh, Evan! you love me! why can you not open your heart to me entirely,
and trust me?”

“More?” cried Evan: “Can I trust you more?” He spoke of the letter:
Rose caught his hand.

“I never had it, Evan. You wrote it last night? and all was written in
it? I never saw it—but I know all.”

Their eyes fronted. The gates of Rose’s were wide open, and he saw no
hurtful beasts or lurking snakes in the happy garden within, but Love,
like a fixed star.

“Then you know why I must leave, Rose.”

“Leave? Leave me? On the contrary, you must stay by me, and support me.
Why, Evan, we have to fight a battle.”

Much as he worshipped her, this intrepid directness of soul startled
him—almost humbled him. And her eyes shone with a firm cheerful light,
as she exclaimed: “It makes me so happy to think you were the first to
mention this. You meant to be, and that’s the same thing. I heard it
this morning: you wrote it last night. It’s you I love, Evan. Your
birth, and what you were obliged to do—that’s nothing. Of course I’m
sorry for it, dear. But I’m more sorry for the pain I must have
sometimes put you to. It happened through my mother’s father being a
merchant; and that side of the family the men and women are quite
sordid and unendurable; and that’s how it came that I spoke of
disliking tradesmen. I little thought I should ever love one sprung
from that class.”

She turned to him tenderly.

“And in spite of what my birth is, you love me, Rose?”

“There’s no spite in it, Evan. I do.”

Hard for him, while his heart was melting to caress her, the thought
that he had snared this bird of heaven in a net! Rose gave him no time
for reflection, or the moony imagining of their raptures lovers love to
dwell upon.

“You gave the letter to Polly, of course?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, naughty Polly! I must punish you,” Rose apostrophized her. “You
might have divided us for ever. Well, we shall have to fight a battle,
you understand that. Will you stand by me?”

Would he not risk his soul for her?

“Very well, Evan. Then—but don’t be sensitive. Oh, how sensitive you
are! I see it all now. This is what we shall have to do. We shall have
to speak to Mama to-day—this morning. Drummond has told me he is going
to speak to her, and we must be first. That’s decided. I begged a
couple of hours. You must not be offended with Drummond. He does it out
of pure affection for us, and I can see he’s right—or, at least, not
quite wrong. He ought, I think, to know that he cannot change me. Very
well, we shall win Mama by what we do. My mother has ten times my wits,
and yet I manage her like a feather. I have only to be honest and
straightforward. Then Mama will gain over Papa. Papa, of course, won’t
like it. He’s quiet and easy, but he likes blood, but he also likes
peace better; and I think he loves Rosey—as well as somebody—almost?
Look, dear, there is our seat where we—where you would rob me of my
handkerchief. I can’t talk any more.”

Rose had suddenly fallen from her prattle, soft and short-breathed.

“Then, dear,” she went on, “we shall have to fight the family. Aunt
Shorne will be terrible. My poor uncles! I pity them. But they will
come round. They always have thought what I did was right, and why
should they change their minds now? I shall tell them that at their
time of life a change of any kind is very unwise and bad for them. Then
there is Grandmama Bonner. She can hurt us really, if she pleases. Oh,
my dear Evan! if you had only been a curate! Why isn’t your name
Parsley? Then my Grandmama the Countess of Elburne. Well, we have a
Countess on our side, haven’t we? And that reminds me, Evan, if we’re
to be happy and succeed, you must promise one thing: you will not tell
the Countess, your sister. Don’t confide this to her. Will you
promise?”

Evan assured her he was not in the habit of pouring secrets into any
bosom, the Countess’s as little as another’s.

“Very well, then, Evan, it’s unpleasant while it lasts, but we shall
gain the day. Uncle Melville will give you an appointment, and then?”

“Yes, Rose,” he said, “I will do this, though I don’t think you can
know what I shall have to endure—not in confessing what I am, but in
feeling that I have brought you to my level.”

“Does it not raise me?” she cried.

He shook his head.

“But in reality, Evan—apart from mere appearances—in reality it does!
it does!”

“Men will not think so, Rose, nor can I. Oh, my Rose! how different you
make me. Up to this hour I have been so weak! torn two ways! You give
me double strength.”

Then these lovers talked of distant days—compared their feelings on
this and that occasion with mutual wonder and delight. Then the old
hours lived anew. And—did you really think that, Evan? And—Oh, Rose!
was that your dream? And the meaning of that by-gone look: was it what
they fancied? And such and such a tone of voice; would it bear the
wished interpretation? Thus does Love avenge himself on the
unsatisfactory Past and call out its essence.

Could Evan do less than adore her? She knew all, and she loved him!
Since he was too shy to allude more than once to his letter, it was
natural that he should not ask her how she came to know, and how much
the “all” that she knew comprised. In his letter he had told all; the
condition of his parents, and his own. Honestly, now, what with his
dazzled state of mind, his deep inward happiness, and love’s endless
delusions, he abstained from touching the subject further. Honestly,
therefore, as far as a lover can be honest.

So they toyed, and then Rose, setting her fingers loose, whispered:
“Are you ready?” And Evan nodded; and Rose, to make him think light of
the matter in hand, laughed: “Pluck not quite up yet?”

“Quite, my Rose!” said Evan, and they walked to the house, not quite
knowing what they were going to do.

On the steps they met Drummond with Mrs. Evremonde. Little imagining
how heart and heart the two had grown, and that Evan would understand
him, Drummond called to Rose playfully: “Time’s up.”

“Is it?” Rose answered, and to Mrs. Evremonde

“Give Drummond a walk. Poor Drummond is going silly.”

Evan looked into his eyes calmly as he passed.

“Where are you going, Rose?” said Mrs. Evremonde.

“Going to give my maid Polly a whipping for losing a letter she ought
to have delivered to me last night,” said Rose, in a loud voice,
looking at Drummond. “And then going to Mama. Pleasure first—duty
after. Isn’t that the proverb, Drummond?”

She kissed her fingers rather scornfully to her old friend.




CHAPTER XXVI.
MRS. MEL MAKES A BED FOR HERSELF AND FAMILY


The last person thought of by her children at this period was Mrs. Mel:
nor had she been thinking much of them till a letter from Mr. Goren
arrived one day, which caused her to pass them seriously in review.
Always an early bird, and with maxims of her own on the subject of
rising and getting the worm, she was standing in a small perch in the
corner of the shop, dictating accounts to Mrs. Fiske, who was copying
hurriedly, that she might earn sweet intervals for gossip, when Dandy
limped up and delivered the letter. Mrs. Fiske worked hard while her
aunt was occupied in reading it, for a great deal of fresh talk follows
the advent of the post, and may be reckoned on. Without looking up,
however, she could tell presently that the letter had been read
through. Such being the case, and no conversation coming of it, her
curiosity was violent. Her aunt’s face, too, was an index of something
extraordinary. That inflexible woman, instead of alluding to the letter
in any way, folded it up, and renewed her dictation. It became a
contest between them which should show her human nature first. Mrs. Mel
had to repress what she knew; Mrs. Fiske to control the passion for
intelligence. The close neighbourhood of one anxious to receive, and
one capable of giving, waxed too much for both.

“I think, Anne, you are stupid this morning,” said Mrs. Mel.

“Well, I am, aunt,” said Mrs. Fiske, pretending not to see which was
the first to unbend, “I don’t know what it is. The figures seem all
dazzled like. I shall really be glad when Evan comes to take his proper
place.”

“Ah!” went Mrs. Mel, and Mrs. Fiske heard her muttering. Then she cried
out: “Are Harriet and Caroline as great liars as Louisa?”

Mrs. Fiske grimaced. “That would be difficult, would it not, aunt?”

“And I have been telling everybody that my son is in town learning his
business, when he’s idling at a country house, and trying to play his
father over again! Upon my word, what with liars and fools, if you go
to sleep a minute you have a month’s work on your back.”

“What is it, aunt?” Mrs. Fiske feebly inquired.

“A gentleman, I suppose! He wouldn’t take an order if it was offered.
Upon my word, when tailors think of winning heiresses it’s time we went
back to Adam and Eve.”

“Do you mean Evan, aunt?” interposed Mrs. Fiske, who probably did not
see the turns in her aunt’s mind.

“There—read for yourself,” said Mrs. Mel, and left her with the letter.

Mrs. Fiske read that Mr. Goren had been astonished at Evan’s
non-appearance, and at his total silence; which he did not consider
altogether gentlemanly behaviour, and certainly not such as his father
would have practised. Mr. Goren regretted his absence the more as he
would have found him useful in a remarkable invention he was about to
patent, being a peculiar red cross upon shirts—a fortune to the
patentee; but as Mr. Goren had no natural heirs of his body, he did not
care for that. What affected him painfully was the news of Evan’s
doings at a noble house, Beckley Court, to wit, where, according to the
report of a rich young gentleman friend, Mr. Raikes (for whose custom
Mr. Goren was bound to thank Evan), the youth who should have been
learning the science of Tailoring, had actually passed himself off as a
lord, or the son of one, or something of the kind, and had got engaged
to a wealthy heiress, and would, no doubt, marry her if not found out.
Where the chances of detection were so numerous, Mr. Goren saw much to
condemn in the idea of such a marriage. But “like father like son,”
said Mr. Goren. He thanked the Lord that an honest tradesman was not
looked down upon in this country; and, in fact, gave Mrs. Mel a few
quiet digs to waken her remorse in having missed the man that he was.

When Mrs. Fiske met her aunt again she returned her the letter, and
simply remarked: “Louisa.”

Mrs. Mel nodded. She understood the implication.

The General who had schemed so successfully to gain Evan time at
Beckley Court in his own despite and against a hundred obstructions,
had now another enemy in the field, and one who, if she could not undo
her work, could punish her. By the afternoon coach, Mrs. Mel,
accompanied by Dandy her squire, was journeying to Fallowfield, bent
upon things. The faithful squire was kept by her side rather as a
security for others than for his particular services. Dandy’s arms were
crossed, and his countenance was gloomy. He had been promised a holiday
that afternoon to give his mistress, Sally, Kilne’s cook, an airing,
and Dandy knew in his soul that Sally, when she once made up her mind
to an excursion, would go, and would not go alone, and that her very
force of will endangered her constancy. He had begged humbly to be
allowed to stay, but Mrs. Mel could not trust him. She ought to have
told him so, perhaps. Explanations were not approved of by this
well-intended despot, and however beneficial her resolves might turn
out for all parties, it was natural that in the interim the children of
her rule should revolt, and Dandy, picturing his Sally flaunting on the
arm of some accursed low marine, haply, kicked against Mrs. Mel’s
sovereignty, though all that he did was to shoot out his fist from time
to time, and grunt through his set teeth: “Iron!” to express the
character of her awful rule.

Mrs. Mel alighted at the Dolphin, the landlady of which was a Mrs.
Hawkshaw, a rival of Mrs. Sockley of the Green Dragon. She was welcomed
by Mrs. Hawkshaw with considerable respect. The great Mel had sometimes
slept at the Dolphin.

“Ah, that black!” she sighed, indicating Mrs. Mel’s dress and the story
it told.

“I can’t give you his room, my dear Mrs. Harrington, wishing I could!
I’m sorry to say it’s occupied, for all I ought to be glad, I dare say,
for he’s an old gentleman who does you a good turn, if you study him.
But there! I’d rather have had poor dear Mr. Harrington in my best bed
than old or young—Princes or nobodies, I would—he was that grand and
pleasant.”

Mrs. Mel had her tea in Mrs. Hawkshaw’s parlour, and was entertained
about her husband up to the hour of supper, when a short step and a
querulous voice were heard in the passage, and an old gentleman
appeared before them.

“Who’s to carry up my trunk, ma’am? No man here?”

Mrs. Hawkshaw bustled out and tried to lay her hand on a man. Failing
to find the growth spontaneous, she returned and begged the old
gentleman to wait a few moments and the trunk would be sent up.

“Parcel o’ women!” was his reply. “Regularly bedevilled. Gets worse and
worse. I’ll carry it up myself.”

With a wheezy effort he persuaded the trunk to stand on one end, and
then looked at it. The exertion made him hot, which may account for the
rage he burst into when Mrs. Hawkshaw began flutteringly to apologize.

“You’re sure, ma’am, sure—what are you sure of? I’ll tell you what I am
sure of—eh? This keeping clear of men’s a damned pretence. You don’t
impose upon me. Don’t believe in your pothouse nunneries—not a bit.
Just like you! when you are virtuous it’s deuced inconvenient. Let one
of the maids try? No. Don’t believe in ’em.”

Having thus relieved his spleen the old gentleman addressed himself to
further efforts and waxed hotter. He managed to tilt the trunk over,
and thus gained a length, and by this method of progression arrived at
the foot of the stairs, where he halted, and wiped his face, blowing
lustily.

Mrs. Mel had been watching him with calm scorn all the while. She saw
him attempt most ridiculously to impel the trunk upwards by a similar
process, and thought it time to interfere.

“Don’t you see you must either take it on your shoulders, or have a
help?”

The old gentleman sprang up from his peculiarly tight posture to blaze
round at her. He had the words well-peppered on his mouth, but somehow
he stopped, and was subsequently content to growl: “Where’s the help in
a parcel of petticoats?”

Mrs. Mel did not consider it necessary to give him an answer. She went
up two or three steps, and took hold of one handle of the trunk,
saying: “There; I think it can be managed this way,” and she pointed
for him to seize the other end with his hand.

He was now in that unpleasant state of prickly heat when testy old
gentlemen could commit slaughter with ecstasy. Had it been the maid
holding a candle who had dared to advise, he would have overturned her
undoubtedly, and established a fresh instance of the impertinence, the
uselessness and weakness of women. Mrs. Mel topped him by half a head,
and in addition stood three steps above him; towering like a giantess.
The extreme gravity of her large face dispersed all idea of an assault.
The old gentleman showed signs of being horribly injured: nevertheless,
he put his hand to the trunk; it was lifted, and the procession
ascended the stairs in silence.

The landlady waited for Mrs. Mel to return, and then said:

“Really, Mrs. Harrington, you are clever. That lifting that trunk’s as
good as a lock and bolt on him. You’ve as good as made him a
Dolphin—him that was one o’ the oldest Green Dragons in Fallifield. My
thanks to you most sincere.”

Mrs. Mel sent out to hear where Dandy had got to after which, she said:
“Who is the man?”

“I told you, Mrs. Harrington—the oldest Green Dragon. His name, you
mean? Do you know, if I was to breathe it out, I believe he’d jump out
of the window. He’d be off, that you might swear to. Oh, such a
whimsical! not ill-meaning—quite the contrary. Study his whims, and
you’ll never want. There’s Mrs. Sockley—she’s took ill. He won’t go
there—that’s how I’ve caught him, my dear—but he pays her medicine, and
she looks to him the same. He hate a sick house: but he pity a sick
woman. Now, if I can only please him, I can always look on him as half
a Dolphin, to say the least; and perhaps to-morrow I’ll tell you who he
is, and what, but not to-night; for there’s his supper to get over, and
that, they say, can be as bad as the busting of one of his own vats.
Awful!”

“What does he eat?” said Mrs. Mel.

“A pair o’ chops. That seem simple, now, don’t it? And yet they chops
make my heart go pitty-pat.”

“The commonest things are the worst done,” said Mrs. Mel.

“It ain’t that; but they must be done his particular way, do you see,
Mrs. Harrington. Laid close on the fire, he say, so as to keep in the
juice. But he ups and bounces in a minute at a speck o’ black. So, one
thing or the other, there you are: no blacks, no juices, I say.”

“Toast the chops,” said Mrs. Mel.

The landlady of the Dolphin accepted this new idea with much
enlightenment, but ruefully declared that she was afraid to go against
his precise instructions. Mrs. Mel then folded her hands, and sat in
quiet reserve. She was one of those numerous women who always know
themselves to be right. She was also one of those very few whom
Providence favours by confounding dissentients. She was positive the
chops would be ill-cooked: but what could she do? She was not in
command here; so she waited serenely for the certain disasters to
enthrone her. Not that the matter of the chops occupied her mind
particularly: nor could she dream that the pair in question were
destined to form a part of her history, and divert the channel of her
fortunes. Her thoughts were about her own immediate work; and when the
landlady rushed in with the chops under a cover, and said: “Look at
’em, dear Mrs. Harrington!” she had forgotten that she was again to be
proved right by the turn of events.

“Oh, the chops!” she responded. “Send them while they are hot.”

“Send ’em! Why you don’t think I’d have risked their cooling? I have
sent ’em; and what do he do but send ’em travelling back, and here they
be; and what objections his is I might study till I was blind, and I
shouldn’t see ’em.”

“No; I suppose not,” said Mrs. Mel. “He won’t eat ’em?”

“Won’t eat anything: but his bed-room candle immediately. And whether
his sheets are aired. And Mary says he sniffed at the chops; and that
gal really did expect he’d fling them at her. I told you what he was.
Oh, dear!”

The bell was heard ringing in the midst of the landlady’s lamentations.

“Go to him yourself,” said Mrs. Mel. “No Christian man should go to
sleep without his supper.”

“Ah! but he ain’t a common Christian,” returned Mrs. Hawkshaw.

The old gentleman was in a hurry to know when his bed-room candle was
coming up, or whether they intended to give him one at all that night;
if not, let them say so, as he liked plain-speaking. The moment Mrs.
Hawkshaw touched upon the chops, he stopped her mouth.

“Go about your business, ma’am. You can’t cook ’em. I never expected
you could: I was a fool to try you. It requires at least ten years’
instruction before a man can get a woman to cook his chop as he likes
it.”

“But what was your complaint, sir?” said Mrs. Hawkshaw, imploringly.

“That’s right!” and he rubbed his hands, and brightened his eyes
savagely. “That’s the way. Opportunity for gossip! Thing’s well
done—down it goes: you know that. You can’t have a word over it—eh?
Thing’s done fit to toss on a dungheap, aha! Then there’s a cackle! My
belief is, you do it on purpose. Can’t be such rank idiots. You do it
on purpose. All done for gossip!”

“Oh, sir, no!” The landlady half curtsied.

“Oh, ma’am, yes!” The old gentleman bobbed his head.

“No, indeed, sir!” The landlady shook hers.

“Damn it, ma’am, I swear you do.”

Symptoms of wrath here accompanied the declaration; and, with a sigh
and a very bitter feeling, Mrs. Hawkshaw allowed him to have the last
word. Apparently this—which I must beg to call the lady’s
morsel—comforted his irascible system somewhat; for he remained in a
state of composure eight minutes by the clock. And mark how little
things hang together. Another word from the landlady, precipitating a
retort from him, and a gesture or muttering from her; and from him a
snapping outburst, and from her a sign that she held out still; in
fact, had she chosen to battle for that last word, as in other cases
she might have done, then would he have exploded, gone to bed in the
dark, and insisted upon sleeping: the consequence of which would have
been to change this history. Now while Mrs. Hawkshaw was upstairs, Mrs.
Mel called the servant, who took her to the kitchen, where she saw a
prime loin of mutton; off which she cut two chops with a cunning hand:
and these she toasted at a gradual distance, putting a plate beneath
them, and a tin behind, and hanging the chops so that they would turn
without having to be pierced. The bell rang twice before she could say
the chops were ready. The first time, the maid had to tell the old
gentleman she was taking up his water. Her next excuse was, that she
had dropped her candle. The chops ready—who was to take them?

“Really, Mrs. Harrington, you are so clever, you ought, if I might be
so bold as say so; you ought to end it yourself,” said the landlady. “I
can’t ask him to eat them: he was all but on the busting point when I
left him.”

“And that there candle did for him quite,” said Mary, the maid.

“I’m afraid it’s chops cooked for nothing,” added the landlady.

Mrs. Mel saw them endangered. The maid held back: the landlady feared.

“We can but try,” she said.

“Oh! I wish, mum, you’d face him, ’stead o’ me,” said Mary; “I do dread
that old bear’s den.”

“Here, I will go,” said Mrs. Mel. “Has he got his ale? Better draw it
fresh, if he drinks any.”

And upstairs she marched, the landlady remaining below to listen for
the commencement of the disturbance. An utterance of something
certainly followed Mrs. Mel’s entrance into the old bear’s den. Then
silence. Then what might have been question and answer. Then—was Mrs.
Mel assaulted? and which was knocked down? It really was a chair being
moved to the table. The door opened.

“Yes, ma’am; do what you like,” the landlady heard. Mrs. Mel descended,
saying: “Send him up some fresh ale.”

“And you have made him sit down obedient to those chops?” cried the
landlady. “Well might poor dear Mr. Harrington—pleasant man as he
was!—say, as he used to say, ‘There’s lovely women in the world, Mrs.
Hawkshaw,’ he’d say, ‘and there’s Duchesses,’ he’d say, ‘and there’s
they that can sing, and can dance, and some,’ he says, ‘that can cook.’
But he’d look sly as he’d stoop his head and shake it. ‘Roll ’em into
one,’ he says, ‘and not any of your grand ladies can match my wife at
home.’

And, indeed, Mrs. Harrington, he told me he thought so many a time in
the great company he frequented.”

Perfect peace reigning above, Mrs. Hawkshaw and Mrs. Mel sat down to
supper below; and Mrs. Hawkshaw talked much of the great one gone. His
relict did not care to converse about the dead, save in their practical
aspect as ghosts; but she listened, and that passed the time.
By-and-by, the old gentleman rang, and sent a civil message to know if
the landlady had ship’s rum in the house.

“Dear! here’s another trouble,” cried the poor woman. “No—none!”

“Say, yes,” said Mrs. Mel, and called Dandy, and charged him to run
down the street to the square, and ask for the house of Mr. Coxwell,
the maltster, and beg of him, in her name, a bottle of his ship’s rum.

“And don’t you tumble down and break the bottle, Dandy. Accidents with
spirit-bottles are not excused.”

Dandy went on the errand, after an energetic grunt.

In due time he returned with the bottle, whole and sound, and Mr.
Coxwell’s compliments. Mrs. Mel examined the cork to see that no
process of suction had been attempted, and then said:

“Carry it up to him, Dandy. Let him see there’s a man in the house
besides himself.”

“Why, my dear,” the landlady turned to her, “it seems natural to you to
be mistress where you go. I don’t at all mind, for ain’t it my profit?
But you do take us off our legs.”

Then the landlady, warmed by gratitude, told her that the old gentleman
was the great London brewer, who brewed there with his brother, and
brewed for himself five miles out of Fallowfield, half of which and a
good part of the neighbourhood he owned, and his name was Mr. Tom
Cogglesby.

“Oh!” said Mrs. Mel. “And his brother is Mr. Andrew.”

“That’s it,” said the landlady. “And because he took it into his head
to go and to choose for himself, and be married, no getting his
brother, Mr. Tom, to speak to him. Why not, indeed? If there’s to be no
marrying, the sooner we lay down and give up, the better, I think. But
that’s his way. He do hate us women, Mrs. Harrington. I have heard he
was crossed. Some say it was the lady of Beckley Court, who was a
Beauty, when he was only a poor cobbler’s son.”

Mrs. Mel breathed nothing of her relationship to Mr. Tom, but continued
from time to time to express solicitude about Dandy. They heard the
door open, and old Tom laughing in a capital good temper, and then
Dandy came down, evidently full of ship’s rum.

“He’s pumped me!” said Dandy, nodding heavily at his mistress.

Mrs. Mel took him up to his bed-room, and locked the door. On her way
back she passed old Tom’s chamber, and his chuckles were audible to
her.

“They finished the rum,” said Mrs. Hawkshaw.

“I shall rate him for that to-morrow,” said Mrs. Mel. “Giving that poor
beast liquor!”

“Rate Mr. Tom! Oh! Mrs. Harrington! Why, he’ll snap your head off for a
word.”

Mrs. Mel replied that her head would require a great deal of snapping
to come off.

During this conversation they had both heard a singular intermittent
noise above. Mrs. Hawkshaw was the first to ask:

“What can it be? More trouble with him? He’s in his bed-room now.”

“Mad with drink, like Dandy, perhaps,” said Mrs. Mel.

“Hark!” cried the landlady. “Oh!”

It seemed that Old Tom was bouncing about in an extraordinary manner.
Now came a pause, as if he had sworn to take his rest: now the room
shook and the windows rattled.

“One’d think, really, his bed was a frying-pan, and him a live fish in
it,” said the landlady. “Oh—there, again! My goodness! have he got a
flea?”

The thought was alarming. Mrs. Mel joined in:

“Or a ———”

“Don’t! don’t, my dear!” she was cut short. “Oh! one o’ them little
things’d be ruin to me. To think o’ that! Hark at him! It must be. And
what’s to do? I’ve sent the maids to bed. We haven’t a man. If I was to
go and knock at his door, and ask?”

“Better try and get him to be quiet somehow.”

“Ah! I dare say I shall make him fire out fifty times worse.”

Mrs. Hawkshaw stipulated that Mrs. Mel should stand by her, and the two
women went up-stairs and stood at Old Tom’s door. There they could hear
him fuming and muttering imprecations, and anon there was an interval
of silence, and then the room was shaken, and the cursings recommenced.

“It must be a fight he’s having with a flea,” said the landlady. “Oh!
pray heaven, it is a flea. For a flea, my dear—gentlemen may bring that
theirselves; but a b——, that’s a stationary, and born of a bed. Don’t
you hear? The other thing’d give him a minute’s rest; but a flea’s
hop-hop-off and on. And he sound like an old gentleman worried by a
flea. What are you doing?”

Mrs. Mel had knocked at the door. The landlady waited breathlessly for
the result. It appeared to have quieted Old Tom.

“What’s the matter?” said Mrs. Mel, severely.

The landlady implored her to speak him fair, and reflect on the
desperate things he might attempt.

“What’s the matter? Can anything be done for you?”

Mr. Tom Cogglesby’s reply comprised an insinuation so infamous
regarding women when they have a solitary man in their power, that it
cannot be placed on record.

“Is anything the matter with your bed?”

“Anything? Yes; anything is the matter, ma’am. Hope twenty live geese
inside it’s enough—eh? Bed, do you call it? It’s the rack! It’s
damnation! Bed? Ha!”

After delivering this, he was heard stamping up and down the room.

“My very best bed!” whispered the landlady. “Would it please you, sir,
to change—I can give you another?”

“I’m not a man of experiments, ma’am—’specially in strange houses.”

“So very, very sorry!”

“What the deuce!” Old Tom came close to the door. “You whimpering! You
put a man in a beast of a bed—you drive him half mad—and then begin to
blubber! Go away.”

“I am so sorry, sir!”

“If you don’t go away, ma’am, I shall think your intentions are
improper.”

“Oh, my goodness!” cried poor Mrs. Hawkshaw. “What can one do with
him?” Mrs. Mel put Mrs. Hawkshaw behind her.

“Are you dressed?” she called out.

In this way Mrs. Mel tackled Old Tom. He was told that should he
consent to cover himself decently, she would come into his room and
make his bed comfortable. And in a voice that dispersed armies of
innuendoes, she bade him take his choice, either to rest quiet or do
her bidding. Had Old Tom found his master at last, and in one of the
hated sex? Breathlessly Mrs. Hawkshaw waited his answer, and she was an
astonished woman when it came.

“Very well, ma’am. Wait a couple of minutes. Do as you like.”

On their admission to the interior of the chamber, Old Tom was
exhibited in his daily garb, sufficiently subdued to be civil and
explain the cause of his discomfort. Lumps in his bed: he was bruised
by them. He supposed he couldn’t ask women to judge for
themselves—they’d be shrieking—but he could assure them he was blue all
down his back. Mrs. Mel and Mrs. Hawkshaw turned the bed about, and
punched it, and rolled it.

“Ha!” went Old Tom, “what’s the good of that? That’s just how I found
it. Moment I got into bed geese began to put up their backs.”

Mrs. Mel seldom indulged in a joke, and then only when it had a
proverbial cast. On the present occasion, the truth struck her
forcibly, and she said:

“One fool makes many, and so, no doubt, does one goose.”

Accompanied by a smile the words would have seemed impudent; but spoken
as a plain fact, and with a grave face, it set Old Tom blinking like a
small boy ten minutes after the whip.

“Now,” she pursued, speaking to him as to an old child, “look here.
This is how you manage. Knead down in the middle of the bed. Then jump
into the hollow. Lie there, and you needn’t wake till morning.”

Old Tom came to the side of the bed. He had prepared himself for a
wretched night, an uproar, and eternal complaints against the house,
its inhabitants, and its foundations; but a woman stood there who as
much as told him that digging his fist into the flock and jumping into
the hole—into that hole under his, eyes—was all that was wanted! that
he had been making a noise for nothing, and because he had not the wit
to hit on a simple contrivance! Then, too, his jest about the
geese—this woman had put a stop to that! He inspected the hollow
cynically. A man might instruct him on a point or two: Old Tom was not
going to admit that a woman could.

“Oh, very well; thank you, ma’am; that’s your idea. I’ll try it. Good
night.”

“Good night,” returned Mrs. Mel. “Don’t forget to jump into the
middle.”

“Head foremost, ma’am?”

“As you weigh,” said Mrs. Mel, and Old Tom trumped his lips, silenced
if not beaten. Beaten, one might almost say, for nothing more was heard
of him that night.

He presented himself to Mrs. Mel after breakfast next morning.

“Slept well, ma’am.”

“Oh! then you did as I directed you,” said Mrs. Mel.

“Those chops, too, very good. I got through ’em.”

“Eating, like scratching, only wants a beginning,” said Mrs. Mel.

“Ha! you’ve got your word, then, as well as everybody else. Where’s
your Dandy this morning, ma’am?”

“Locked up. You ought to be ashamed to give that poor beast liquor. He
won’t get fresh air to-day.”

“Ha! May I ask you where you’re going to-day, ma’am?”

“I am going to Beckley.”

“So am I, ma’am. What d’ ye say, if we join company. Care for
insinuations?”

“I want a conveyance of some sort,” returned Mrs. Mel.

“Object to a donkey, ma’am?”

“Not if he’s strong and will go.”

“Good,” said Old Tom; and while he spoke a donkey-cart stopped in front
of the Dolphin, and a well-dressed man touched his hat.

“Get out of that damned bad habit, will you?” growled Old Tom. What do
you mean by wearing out the brim o’ your hat in that way? Help this
woman in.”

Mrs. Mel helped herself to a part of the seat.

“We are too much for the donkey,” she said.

“Ha, that’s right. What I have, ma’am, is good. I can’t pretend to
horses, but my donkey’s the best. Are you going to cry about him?”

“No. When he’s tired I shall either walk or harness you,” said Mrs.
Mel.

This was spoken half-way down the High Street of Fallowfield. Old Tom
looked full in her face, and bawled out:

“Deuce take it. Are you a woman?”

“I have borne three girls and one boy,” said Mrs. Mel.

“What sort of a husband?”

“He is dead.”

“Ha! that’s an opening, but ’tain’t an answer. I’m off to Beckley on a
marriage business. I’m the son of a cobbler, so I go in a donkey-cart.
No damned pretences for me. I’m going to marry off a young tailor to a
gal he’s been playing the lord to. If she cares for him she’ll take
him: if not, they’re all the luckier, both of ’em.”

“What’s the tailor’s name?” said Mrs. Mel.

“You are a woman,” returned Old Tom. “Now, come, ma’am, don’t you feel
ashamed of being in a donkeycart?”

“I’m ashamed of men, sometimes,” said Mrs. Mel; “never of animals.”

“’Shamed o’ me, perhaps.”

“I don’t know you.”

“Ha! well! I’m a man with no pretences. Do you like ’em? How have you
brought up your three girls and one boy? No pretences—eh?”

Mrs. Mel did not answer, and Old Tom jogged the reins and chuckled, and
asked his donkey if he wanted to be a racer.

“Should you take me for a gentleman, ma’am?”

“I dare say you are, sir, at heart. Not from your manner of speech.”

“I mean appearances, ma’am.”

“I judge by the disposition.”

“You do, ma’am? Then, deuce take it, if you are a woman, you’re ——” Old
Tom had no time to conclude.

A great noise of wheels, and a horn blown, caused them both to turn
their heads, and they beheld a curricle descending upon them
vehemently, and a fashionably attired young gentleman straining with
all his might at the reins. The next instant they were rolling on the
bank. About twenty yards ahead the curricle was halted and turned about
to see the extent of the mischief done.

“Pardon, a thousand times, my worthy couple,” cried the sonorous Mr.
Raikes. “What we have seen we swear not to divulge. Franco and
Fred—your pledge!”

“We swear!” exclaimed this couple.

But suddenly the cheeks of Mr. John Raikes flushed. He alighted from
the box, and rushing up to Old Tom, was shouting, “My bene—”

“Do you want my toe on your plate?” Old Tom stopped him with.

The mysterious words completely changed the aspect of Mr. John Raikes.
He bowed obsequiously and made his friend Franco step down and assist
in the task of reestablishing the donkey, who fortunately had received
no damage.




CHAPTER XXVII.
EXHIBITS ROSE’S GENERALSHIP; EVAN’S PERFORMANCE ON THE SECOND FIDDLE;
AND THE WRETCHEDNESS OF THE COUNTESS


We left Rose and Evan on their way to Lady Jocelyn. At the library-door
Rose turned to him, and with her chin archly lifted sideways, said:

“I know what you feel; you feel foolish.”

Now the sense of honour, and of the necessity of acting the part it
imposes on him, may be very strong in a young man; but certainly, as a
rule, the sense of ridicule is more poignant, and Evan was suffering
horrid pangs. We none of us like to play second fiddle. To play second
fiddle to a young woman is an abomination to us all. But to have to
perform upon that instrument to the darling of our hearts—would we not
rather die? nay, almost rather end the duet precipitately and with
violence. Evan, when he passed Drummond into the house, and quietly
returned his gaze, endured the first shock of this strange feeling.
There could be no doubt that he was playing second fiddle to Rose. And
what was he about to do? Oh, horror! to stand like a criminal, and say,
or worse, have said for him, things to tip the ears with fire! To tell
the young lady’s mother that he had won her daughter’s love, and
meant—what did he mean? He knew not. Alas! he was second fiddle; he
could only mean what she meant. Evan loved Rose deeply and completely,
but noble manhood was strong in him. You may sneer at us, if you
please, ladies. We have been educated in a theory, that when you lead
off with the bow, the order of Nature is reversed, and it is no wonder
therefore, that, having stript us of one attribute, our fine feathers
moult, and the majestic cock-like march which distinguishes us
degenerates. You unsex us, if I may dare to say so. Ceasing to be men,
what are we? If we are to please you rightly, always allow us to play
First.

Poor Evan did feel foolish. Whether Rose saw it in his walk, or had a
loving feminine intuition of it, and was aware of the golden rule I
have just laid down, we need not inquire. She hit the fact, and he
could only stammer, and bid her open the door.

“No,” she said, after a slight hesitation, “it will be better that I
should speak to Mama alone, I see. Walk out on the lawn, dear, and wait
for me. And if you meet Drummond, don’t be angry with him. Drummond is
very fond of me, and of course I shall teach him to be fond of you. He
only thinks... what is not true, because he does not know you. I do
thoroughly, and there, you see, I give you my hand.”

Evan drew the dear hand humbly to his lips. Rose then nodded meaningly,
and let her eyes dwell on him, and went in to her mother to open the
battle.

Could it be that a flame had sprung up in those grey eyes latterly?
Once they were like morning before sunrise. How soft and warm and
tenderly transparent they could now be! Assuredly she loved him. And
he, beloved by the noblest girl ever fashioned, why should he hang his
head, and shrink at the thought of human faces, like a wretch doomed to
the pillory? He visioned her last glance, and lightning emotions of
pride and happiness flashed through his veins. The generous, brave
heart! Yes, with her hand in his, he could stand at bay—meet any fate.
Evan accepted Rose because he believed in her love, and judged it by
the strength of his own; her sacrifice of her position he accepted,
because in his soul he knew he should have done no less. He mounted to
the level of her nobleness, and losing nothing of the beauty of what
she did, it was not so strange to him.

Still there was the baleful reflection that he was second fiddle to his
beloved. No harmony came of it in his mind. How could he take an
initiative? He walked forth on the lawn, where a group had gathered
under the shade of a maple, consisting of Drummond Forth, Mrs.
Evremonde, Mrs. Shorne, Mr. George Uplift, Seymour Jocelyn, and
Ferdinand Laxley. A little apart Juliana Bonner was walking with Miss
Carrington. Juliana, when she saw him, left her companion, and passing
him swiftly, said, “Follow me presently into the conservatory.”

Evan strolled near the group, and bowed to Mrs. Shorne, whom he had not
seen that morning.

The lady’s acknowledgement of his salute was constrained, and but a
shade on the side of recognition. They were silent till he was out of
earshot. He noticed that his second approach produced the same effect.
In the conservatory Juliana was awaiting him.

“It is not to give you roses I called you here, Mr. Harrington,” she
said.

“Not if I beg one?” he responded.

“Ah! but you do not want them from... It depends on the person.”

“Pluck this,” said Evan, pointing to a white rose.

She put her fingers to the stem.

“What folly!” she cried, and turned from it.

“Are you afraid that I shall compromise you?” asked Evan.

“You care for me too little for that.”

“My dear Miss Bonner!”

“How long did you know Rose before you called her by her Christian
name?”

Evan really could not remember, and was beginning to wonder what he had
been called there for. The little lady had feverish eyes and fingers,
and seemed to be burning to speak, but afraid.

“I thought you had gone,” she dropped her voice, “without wishing me
good-bye.”

“I certainly should not do that, Miss Bonner.”

“Formal!” she exclaimed, half to herself. “Miss Bonner thanks you. Do
you think I wish you to stay? No friend of yours would wish it. You do
not know the selfishness—brutal!—of these people of birth, as they call
it.”

“I have met with nothing but kindness here,” said Evan.

“Then go while you can feel that,” she answered; “for it cannot last
another hour. Here is the rose.” She broke it from the stem and handed
it to him. “You may wear that, and they are not so likely to call you
an adventurer, and names of that sort. I am hardly considered a lady by
them.”

An adventurer! The full meaning of the phrase struck Evan’s senses when
he was alone. Miss Bonner knew something of his condition, evidently.
Perhaps it was generally known, and perhaps it was thought that he had
come to win Rose for his worldly advantage! The idea was overwhelmingly
new to him. Up started self-love in arms. He would renounce her.

It is no insignificant contest when love has to crush self-love
utterly. At moments it can be done. Love has divine moments. There are
times also when Love draws part of his being from self-love, and can
find no support without it.

But how could he renounce her, when she came forth to him,—smiling,
speaking freshly and lightly, and with the colour on her cheeks which
showed that she had done her part? How could he retract a step?

“I have told Mama, Evan. That’s over. She heard it first from me.”

“And she?”

“Dear Evan, if you are going to be sensitive, I’ll run away. You that
fear no danger, and are the bravest man I ever knew! I think you are
really trembling. She will speak to Papa, and then—and then, I suppose,
they will both ask you whether you intend to give me up, or no. I’m
afraid you’ll do the former.”

“Your mother—Lady Jocelyn listened to you, Rose? You told her all?”

“Every bit.”

“And what does she think of me?”

“Thinks you very handsome and astonishing, and me very idiotic and
natural, and that there is a great deal of bother in the world, and
that my noble relatives will lay the blame of it on her. No, dear, not
all that; but she talked very sensibly to me, and kindly. You know she
is called a philosopher: nobody knows how deep-hearted she is, though.
My mother is true as steel. I can’t separate the kindness from the
sense, or I would tell you all she said. When I say kindness, I don’t
mean any ‘Oh, my child,’ and tears, and kisses, and maundering, you
know. You mustn’t mind her thinking me a little fool. You want to know
what she thinks of you. She said nothing to hurt you, Evan, and we have
gained ground so far, and now we’ll go and face our enemies. Uncle Mel
expects to hear about your appointment, in a day or two, and——”

“Oh, Rose!” Evan burst out.

“What is it?”

“Why must I owe everything to you?”

“Why, dear? Why, because, if you do, it’s very much better than your
owing it to anybody else. Proud again?”

Not proud: only second fiddle.

“You know, dear Evan, when two people love, there is no such thing as
owing between them.”

“Rose, I have been thinking. It is not too late. I love you, God knows!
I did in Portugal: I do now—more and more. But Oh, my bright angel!” he
ended the sentence in his breast.

“Well? but—what?”

Evan sounded down the meaning of his “but.” Stripped of the usual
heroics, it was, “what will be thought of me?” not a small matter to
any of us. He caught a distant glimpse of the little bit of bare
selfishness, and shrank from it.

“Too late,” cried Rose. “The battle has commenced now, and, Mr.
Harrington, I will lean on your arm, and be led to my dear friends
yonder. Do they think that I am going to put on a mask to please them?
Not for anybody! What they are to know they may as well know at once.”

She looked in Evan’s face.

“Do you hesitate?”

He felt the contrast between his own and hers; between the niggard
spirit of the beggarly receiver, and the high bloom of the exalted
giver. Nevertheless, he loved her too well not to share much of her
nature, and wedding it suddenly, he said:

“Rose; tell me, now. If you were to see the place where I was born,
could you love me still?”

“Yes, Evan.”

“If you were to hear me spoken of with contempt—”

“Who dares?” cried Rose. “Never to me!”

“Contempt of what I spring from, Rose. Names used... Names are used
...”

“Tush!—names!” said Rose, reddening. “How cowardly that is! Have you
finished? Oh, faint heart! I suppose I’m not a fair lady, or you
wouldn’t have won me. Now, come. Remember, Evan, I conceal nothing; and
if anything makes you wretched here, do think how I love you.”

In his own firm belief he had said everything to arrest her in her
course, and been silenced by transcendent logic. She thought the same.

Rose made up to the conclave under the maple.

The voices hushed as they approached.

“Capital weather,” said Rose. “Does Harry come back from London
to-morrow—does anybody know?”

“Not aware,” Laxley was heard to reply.

“I want to speak a word to you, Rose,” said Mrs. Shorne.

“With the greatest pleasure, my dear aunt”: and Rose walked after her.

“My dear Rose,” Mrs. Shorne commenced, “your conduct requires that I
should really talk to you most seriously. You are probably not aware of
what you are doing: Nobody likes ease and natural familiarity more than
I do. I am persuaded it is nothing but your innocence. You are young to
the world’s ways, and perhaps a little too headstrong, and vain.”

“Conceited and wilful,” added Rose.

“If you like the words better. But I must say—I do not wish to trouble
your father—you know he cannot bear worry—but I must say, that if you
do not listen to me, he must be spoken to.”

“Why not Mama?”

“I should naturally select my brother first. No doubt you understand
me.”

“Any distant allusion to Mr. Harrington?”

“Pertness will not avail you, Rose.”

“So you want me to do secretly what I am doing openly?”

“You must and shall remember you are a Jocelyn, Rose.”

“Only half, my dear aunt!”

“And by birth a lady, Rose.”

“And I ought to look under my eyes, and blush, and shrink, whenever I
come near a gentleman, aunt!”

“Ah! my dear. No doubt you will do what is most telling. Since you have
spoken of this Mr. Harrington, I must inform you that I have it on
certain authority from two or three sources, that he is the son of a
small shopkeeper at Lymport.”

Mrs. Shorne watched the effect she had produced.

“Indeed, aunt?” cried Rose. “And do you know this to be true?”

“So when you talk of gentlemen, Rose, please be careful whom you
include.”

“I mustn’t include poor Mr. Harrington? Then my Grandpapa Bonner is out
of the list, and such numbers of good worthy men?”

Mrs. Shorne understood the hit at the defunct manufacturer. She said:
“You must most distinctly give me your promise, while this young
adventurer remains here—I think it will not be long—not to be
compromising yourself further, as you now do. Or—indeed I must—I shall
let your parents perceive that such conduct is ruin to a young girl in
your position, and certainly you will be sent to Elburne House for the
winter.”

Rose lifted her hands, crying: “Ye Gods!—as Harry says. But I’m very
much obliged to you, my dear aunt. Concerning Mr. Harrington,
wonderfully obliged. Son of a small——! Is it a t-t-tailor, aunt?”

“It is—I have heard.”

“And that is much worse. Cloth is viler than cotton! And don’t they
call these creatures sn-snips? Some word of that sort?”

“It makes little difference what they are called.”

“Well, aunt, I sincerely thank you. As this subject seems to interest
you, go and see Mama, now. She can tell you a great deal more: and, if
you want her authority, come back to me.”

Rose then left her aunt in a state of extreme indignation. It was a
clever move to send Mrs. Shorne to Lady Jocelyn. They were
antagonistic, and, rational as Lady Jocelyn was, and with her passions
under control, she was unlikely to side with Mrs. Shorne.

Now Rose had fought against herself, and had, as she thought,
conquered. In Portugal Evan’s half insinuations had given her small
suspicions, which the scene on board the Jocasta had half confirmed:
and since she came to communicate with her own mind, she bore the
attack of all that rose against him, bit by bit. She had not been too
blind to see the unpleasantness of the fresh facts revealed to her.
They did not change her; on the contrary, drew her to him faster—and
she thought she had completely conquered whatever could rise against
him. But when Juliana Bonner told her that day that Evan was not only
the son of the thing, but the thing himself, and that his name could be
seen any day in Lymport, and that he had come from the shop to Beckley,
poor Rosey had a sick feeling that almost sank her. For a moment she
looked back wildly to the doors of retreat. Her eyes had to feed on
Evan, she had to taste some of the luxury of love, before she could
gain composure, and then her arrogance towards those she called her
enemies did not quite return.

“In that letter you told me all—all—all, Evan?”

“Yes, all—religiously.”

“Oh, why did I miss it!”

“Would it give you pleasure?”

She feared to speak, being tender as a mother to his sensitiveness. The
expressive action of her eyebrows sufficed. She could not bear
concealment, or doubt, or a shadow of dishonesty; and he, gaining force
of soul to join with hers, took her hands and related the contents of
the letter fully. She was pale when he had finished. It was some time
before she was able to get free from the trammels of prejudice, but
when she did, she did without reserve, saying: “Evan, there is no man
who would have done so much.” These little exaltations and generosities
bind lovers tightly. He accepted the credit she gave him, and at that
we need not wonder. It helped him further to accept herself, otherwise
could he—his name known to be on a shop-front—have aspired to her
still? But, as an unexampled man, princely in soul, as he felt, why, he
might kneel to Rose Jocelyn. So they listened to one another, and
blinded the world by putting bandages on their eyes, after the fashion
of little boys and girls.

Meantime the fair being who had brought these two from the ends of the
social scale into this happy tangle, the beneficent Countess, was
wretched. When you are in the enemy’s country you are dependent on the
activity and zeal of your spies and scouts, and the best of these—Polly
Wheedle, to wit—had proved defective, recalcitrant even. And because a
letter had been lost in her room! as the Countess exclaimed to herself,
though Polly gave her no reasons. The Countess had, therefore, to rely
chiefly upon personal observation, upon her intuitions, upon her
sensations in the proximity of the people to whom she was opposed; and
from these she gathered that she was, to use the word which seemed
fitting to her, betrayed. Still to be sweet, still to smile and to
amuse,—still to give her zealous attention to the business of the
diplomatist’s Election, still to go through her church-services
devoutly, required heroism; she was equal to it, for she had remarkable
courage; but it was hard to feel no longer at one with Providence. Had
not Providence suggested Sir Abraham to her? killed him off at the
right moment in aid of her? And now Providence had turned, and the
assistance she had formerly received from that Power, and given thanks
for so profusely, was the cause of her terror. It was absolutely as if
she had been borrowing from a Jew, and were called upon to pay
fifty-fold interest.

“Evan!” she writes in a gasp to Harriet. “We must pack up and depart.
Abandon everything. He has disgraced us all, and ruined himself.
Impossible that we can stay for the pic-nic. We are known, dear. Think
of my position one day in this house! Particulars when I embrace you. I
dare not trust a letter here. If Evan had confided in me! He is
impenetrable. He will be low all his life, and I refuse any more to
sully myself in attempting to lift him. For Silva’s sake I must
positively break the connection. Heaven knows what I have done for this
boy, and will support me in the feeling that I have done enough. My
conscience at least is safe.”

Like many illustrious Generals, the Countess had, for the hour, lost
heart. We find her, however, the next day, writing:

“Oh! Harriet! what trials for sisterly affection! Can I
possibly—weather the gale, as the old L—— sailors used to say? It is
dreadful. I fear I am by duty bound to stop on. Little Bonner thinks
Evan quite a duke’s son, has been speaking to her Grandmama, and
to-day, this morning, the venerable old lady quite as much as gave me
to understand that an union between our brother and her son’s child
would sweetly gratify her, and help her to go to her rest in peace. Can
I chase that spark of comfort from one so truly pious? Dearest Juliana!
I have anticipated Evan’s feeling for her, and so she thinks his
conduct cold. Indeed, I told her, point blank, he loved her. That, you
know, is different from saying, dying of love, which would have been an
untruth. But, Evan, of course! No getting him! Should Juliana ever
reproach me, I can assure the child that any man is in love with any
woman—which is really the case. It is, you dear humdrum! what the
dictionary calls ‘nascent.’ I never liked the word, but it stands for a
fact.”

The Countess here exhibits the weakness of a self-educated
intelligence. She does not comprehend the joys of scholarship in her
employment of Latinisms. It will be pardoned to her by those who
perceive the profound piece of feminine discernment which precedes it.

“I do think I shall now have courage to stay out the pic-nic,” she
continues. “I really do not think all is known. Very little can be
known, or I am sure I could not feel as I do. It would burn me up.
George Up— does not dare; and his most beautiful lady-love had far
better not. Mr. Forth may repent his whispers. But, Oh! what Evan may
do! Rose is almost detestable. Manners, my dear? Totally deficient!

“An ally has just come. Evan’s good fortune is most miraculous. His low
friend turns out to be a young Fortunatus; very original, sparkling,
and in my hands to be made much of. I do think he will—for he is most
zealous—he will counteract that hateful Mr. Forth, who may soon have
work enough. Mr. Raikes (Evan’s friend) met a mad captain in
Fallowfield! Dear Mr. Raikes is ready to say anything; not from love of
falsehood, but because he is ready to think it. He has confessed to me
that Evan told him! Louisa de Saldar has changed his opinion, and much
impressed this eccentric young gentleman. Do you know any young girl
who wants a fortune, and would be grateful?

“Dearest! I have decided on the pic-nic. Let your conscience be clear,
and Providence cannot be against you. So I feel. Mr. Parsley spoke very
beautifully to that purpose last Sunday in the morning service. A
little too much through his nose, perhaps; but the poor young man’s
nose is a great organ, and we will not cast it in his teeth more than
nature has done. I said so to my diplomatist, who was amused. If you
are sparklingly vulgar with the English, you are aristocratic. Oh! what
principle we women require in the thorny walk of life. I can show you a
letter when we meet that will astonish humdrum. Not so diplomatic as
the writer thought! Mrs. Melville (sweet woman!) must continue to
practise civility; for a woman who is a wife, my dear, in verity she
lives in a glass house, and let her fling no stones. ‘Let him who is
without sin.’ How beautiful that Christian sentiment! I hope I shall be
pardoned, but it always seems to me that what we have to endure is
infinitely worse than any other suffering, for you find no comfort for
the children of T——s in Scripture, nor any defence of their dreadful
position. Robbers, thieves, Magdalens! but, no! the unfortunate
offspring of that class are not even mentioned: at least, in my most
diligent perusal of the Scriptures, I never lighted upon any remote
allusion; and we know the Jews did wear clothing. Outcasts, verily! And
Evan could go, and write—but I have no patience with him. He is the
blind tool of his mother, and anybody’s puppet.”

The letter concludes, with horrid emphasis:

“The Madre in Beckley! Has sent for Evan from a low public-house! I
have intercepted the messenger. Evan closeted with Sir Franks. Andrew’s
horrible old brother with Lady Jocelyn. The whole house, from garret to
kitchen, full of whispers!”

A prayer to Providence closes the communication.




CHAPTER XXVIII.
TOM COGGLESEY’S PROPOSITION


The appearance of a curricle and a donkey-cart within the gates of
Beckley Court, produced a sensation among the men of the lower halls,
and a couple of them rushed out, with the left calf considerably in
advance, to defend the house from violation. Toward the curricle they
directed what should have been a bow, but was a nod. Their joint
attention was then given to the donkey-cart, in which old Tom Cogglesby
sat alone, bunchy in figure, bunched in face, his shrewd grey eyes
twinkling under the bush of his eyebrows.

“Oy, sir—you! my man!” exclaimed the tallest of the pair, resolutely.
“This won’t do. Don’t you know driving this sort of conveyance slap
along the gravel ’ere, up to the pillars, ’s unparliamentary? Can’t be
allowed. Now, right about!”

This address, accompanied by a commanding elevation of the dexter hand,
seemed to excite Mr. Raikes far more than Old Tom. He alighted from his
perch in haste, and was running up to the stalwart figure, crying,
“Fellow!” when, as you tell a dog to lie down, Old Tom called out, “Be
quiet, Sir!” and Raikes halted with prompt military obedience.

The sight of the curricle acting satellite to the donkey-cart staggered
the two footmen.

“Are you lords?” sang out Old Tom.

A burst of laughter from the friends of Mr. Raikes, in the curricle,
helped to make the powdered gentlemen aware of a sarcasm, and one with
no little dignity replied that they were not lords.

“Oh! Then come and hold my donkey.”

Great irresolution was displayed at the injunction, but having
consulted the face of Mr. Raikes, one fellow, evidently half overcome
by what was put upon him, with the steps of Adam into exile, descended
to the gravel, and laid his hand on the donkey’s head.

“Hold hard!” cried Old Tom. “Whisper in his ear. He’ll know your
language.”

“May I have the felicity of assisting you to terra firma?” interposed
Mr. Raikes, with the bow of deferential familiarity.

“Done that once too often,” returned Old Tom, jumping out. “There.
What’s the fee? There’s a crown for you that ain’t afraid of a live
donkey; and there’s a sixpenny bit for you that are—to keep up your
courage; and when he’s dead you shall have his skin—to shave by.”

“Excellent!” shouted Raikes.

“Thomas!” he addressed a footman, “hand in my card. Mr. John Feversham
Raikes.”

“And tell my lady, Tom Cogglesby’s come,” added the owner of that name.

We will follow Tom Cogglesby, as he chooses to be called.

Lady Jocelyn rose on his entering the library, and walking up to him,
encountered him with a kindly full face.

“So I see you at last, Tom?” she said, without releasing his hand; and
Old Tom mounted patches of red in his wrinkled cheeks, and blinked, and
betrayed a singular antiquated bashfulness, which ended, after a mumble
of “Yes, there he was, and he hoped her ladyship was well,” by his
seeking refuge in a chair, where he sat hard, and fixed his attention
on the leg of a table.

“Well, Tom, do you find much change in me?” she was woman enough to
continue.

He was obliged to look up.

“Can’t say I do, my lady.”

“Don’t you see the grey hairs, Tom?”

“Better than a wig,” rejoined he.

Was it true that her ladyship had behaved rather ill to Old Tom in her
youth? Excellent women have been naughty girls, and young Beauties will
have their train. It is also very possible that Old Tom had presumed
upon trifles, and found it difficult to forgive her his own folly.

“Preferable to a wig? Well, I would rather see you with your natural
thatch. You’re bent, too. You look as if you had kept away from Beckley
a little too long.”

“Told you, my lady, I should come when your daughter was marriageable.”

“Oho! that’s it? I thought it was the Election!

“Election be ——— hem!—beg pardon, my lady.”

“Swear, Tom, if it relieves you. I think it bad to check an oath or a
sneeze.”

“I’m come to see you on business, my lady, or I shouldn’t have troubled
you.”

“Malice?”

“You’ll see I don’t bear any, my lady.”

“Ah! if you had only sworn roundly twenty-five years ago, what a much
younger man you would have been! and a brave capital old friend whom I
should not have missed all that time.”

“Come!” cried Old Tom, varying his eyes rapidly between her ladyship’s
face and the floor, “you acknowledge I had reason to.”

“Mais, cela va sans dire.”

“Cobblers’ sons ain’t scholars, my lady.”

“And are not all in the habit of throwing their fathers in our teeth, I
hope!”

Old Tom wriggled in his chair. “Well, my lady, I’m not going to make a
fool of myself at my time o’ life. Needn’t be alarmed now. You’ve got
the bell-rope handy and a husband on the premises.”

Lady Jocelyn smiled, stood up, and went to him. “I like an honest
fist,” she said, taking his. “We’re not going to be doubtful friends,
and we won’t snap and snarl. That’s for people who’re independent of
wigs, Tom. I find, for my part, that a little grey on the top of any
head cools the temper amazingly. I used to be rather hot once.”

“You could be peppery, my lady.”

“Now I’m cool, Tom, and so must you be; or, if you fight, it must be in
my cause, as you did when you thrashed that saucy young carter. Do you
remember?”

“If you’ll sit ye down, my lady, I’ll just tell you what I’m come for,”
said Old Tom, who plainly showed that he did remember, and was
alarmingly softened by her ladyship’s retention of the incident.

Lady Jocelyn returned to her place.

“You’ve got a marriageable daughter, my lady?”

“I suppose we may call her so,” said Lady Jocelyn, with a composed
glance at the ceiling.

“’Gaged to be married to any young chap?”

“You must put the question to her, Tom.”

“Ha! I don’t want to see her.”

At this Lady Jocelyn looked slightly relieved. Old Tom continued.

“Happen to have got a little money—not so much as many a lord’s got, I
dare say; such as ’tis, there ’tis. Young fellow I know wants a wife,
and he shall have best part of it. Will that suit ye, my lady?”

Lady Jocelyn folded her hands. “Certainly; I’ve no objection. What it
has to do with me I can’t perceive.”

“Ahem!” went Old Tom. “It won’t hurt your daughter to be married now,
will it?”

“Oh! my daughter is the destined bride of your ‘young fellow,’” said
Lady Jocelyn. “Is that how it’s to be?”

“She”—Old Tom cleared his throat “she won’t marry a lord, my lady; but
she—’hem—if she don’t mind that—’ll have a deuced sight more hard cash
than many lord’s son’d give her, and a young fellow for a husband,
sound in wind and limb, good bone and muscle, speaks grammar and two or
three languages, and—”

“Stop!” cried Lady Jocelyn. “I hope this is not a prize young man? If
he belongs, at his age, to the unco quid, I refuse to take him for a
son-in-law, and I think Rose will, too.”

Old Tom burst out vehemently: “He’s a damned good young fellow, though
he isn’t a lord.”

“Well,” said Lady Jocelyn, “I’ve no doubt you’re in earnest, Tom. It’s
curious, for this morning Rose has come to me and given me the first
chapter of a botheration, which she declares is to end in the common
rash experiment. What is your ‘young fellow’s’ name? Who is he? What is
he?”

“Won’t take my guarantee, my lady?”

“Rose—if she marries—must have a name, you know?”

Old Tom hit his knee. “Then there’s a pill for ye to swallow, for he
ain’t the son of a lord.”

“That’s swallowed, Tom. What is he?”

“He’s the son of a tradesman, then, my lady.” And Old Tom watched her
to note the effect he had produced.

“More’s the pity,” was all she remarked.

“And he’ll have his thousand a year to start with; and he’s a tailor,
my lady.”

Her ladyship opened her eyes.

“Harrington’s his name, my lady. Don’t know whether you ever heard of
it.”

Lady Jocelyn flung herself back in her chair. “The queerest thing I
ever met!” said she.

“Thousand a year to start with,” Old Tom went on, “and if she marries—I
mean if he marries her, I’ll settle a thousand per ann. on the first
baby-boy or gal.”

“Hum! Is this gross collusion, Mr. Tom?” Lady Jocelyn inquired.

“What does that mean?”

“Have you spoken of this before to any one?”

“I haven’t, my lady. Decided on it this morning. Hem! you got a son,
too. He’s fond of a young gal, or he ought to be. I’ll settle him when
I’ve settled the daughter.”

“Harry is strongly attached to a dozen, I believe,” said his mother.
“Well, Tom, we’ll think of it. I may as well tell you: Rose has just
been here to inform me that this Mr. Harrington has turned her head,
and that she has given her troth, and all that sort of thing. I believe
such was not to be laid to my charge in my day.”

“You were open enough, my lady,” said Old Tom. “She’s fond of the young
fellow? She’ll have a pill to swallow! poor young woman!”

Old Tom visibly chuckled. Lady Jocelyn had a momentary temptation to
lead him out, but she did not like the subject well enough to play with
it.

“Apparently Rose has swallowed it,” she said.

“Goose, shears, cabbage, and all!” muttered Old Tom. “Got a
stomach!—she knows he’s a tailor, then? The young fellow told her? He
hasn’t been playing the lord to her?”

“As far as he’s concerned, I think he has been tolerably honest, Tom,
for a man and a lover.”

“And told her he was born and bound a tailor?”

“Rose certainly heard it from him.”

Slapping his knee, Old Tom cried: “Bravo!” For though one part of his
nature was disappointed, and the best part of his plot disarranged, he
liked Evan’s proceeding and felt warm at what seemed to him Rose’s
scorn of rank.

“She must be a good gal, my lady. She couldn’t have got it from t’
other side. Got it from you. Not that you—”

“No,” said Lady Jocelyn, apprehending him. “I’m afraid I have no
Republican virtues. I’m afraid I should have rejected the pill. Don’t
be angry with me,” for Old Tom looked sour again; “I like birth and
position, and worldly advantages, and, notwithstanding Rose’s pledge of
the instrument she calls her heart, and in spite of your offer, I
shall, I tell you honestly, counsel her to have nothing to do with—”

“Anything less than lords,” Old Tom struck in. “Very well. Are you
going to lock her up, my lady?”

“No. Nor shall I whip her with rods.”

“Leave her free to her choice?”

“She will have my advice. That I shall give her. And I shall take care
that before she makes a step she shall know exactly what it leads to.
Her father, of course, will exercise his judgement.” (Lady Jocelyn said
this to uphold the honour of Sir Franks, knowing at the same time
perfectly well that he would be wheedled by Rose.) “I confess I like
this Mr. Harrington. But it’s a great misfortune for him to have had a
notorious father. A tailor should certainly avoid fame, and this young
man will have to carry his father on his back. He’ll never throw the
great Mel off.”

Tom Cogglesby listened, and was really astonished at her ladyship’s
calm reception of his proposal.

“Shameful of him! shameful!” he muttered perversely: for it would have
made him desolate to have had to change his opinion of her ladyship
after cherishing it, and consoling himself with it, five-and-twenty
years. Fearing the approach of softness, he prepared to take his leave.

“Now—your servant, my lady. I stick to my word, mind: and if your
people here are willing, I—I’ve got a candidate up for Fall’field—I’ll
knock him down, and you shall sneak in your Tory. Servant, my lady.”

Old Tom rose to go. Lady Jocelyn took his hand cordially, though she
could not help smiling at the humility of the cobbler’s son in his
manner of speaking of the Tory candidate.

“Won’t you stop with us a few days?”

“I’d rather not, I thank ye.”

“Won’t you see Rose?”

“I won’t. Not till she’s married.”

“Well, Tom, we’re friends now?”

“Not aware I’ve ever done you any harm, my lady.”

“Look me in the face.”

The trial was hard for him. Though she had been five-and-twenty years a
wife, she was still very handsome: but he was not going to be melted,
and when the perverse old fellow obeyed her, it was with an aspect of
resolute disgust that would have made any other woman indignant. Lady
Jocelyn laughed.

“Why, Tom, your brother Andrew’s here, and makes himself comfortable
with us. We rode by Brook’s farm the other day. Do you remember
Copping’s pond—how we dragged it that night? What days we had!”

Old Tom tugged once or twice at his imprisoned fist, while these
youthful frolics of his too stupid self and the wild and beautiful Miss
Bonner were being recalled.

“I remember!” he said savagely, and reaching the door hurled out: “And
I remember the Bull-dogs, too! servant, my lady.” With which he
effected a retreat, to avoid a ringing laugh he heard in his ears.

Lady Jocelyn had not laughed. She had done no more than look and smile
kindly on the old boy. It was at the Bull-dogs, a fall of water on the
borders of the park, that Tom Cogglesby, then a hearty young man, had
been guilty of his folly: had mistaken her frank friendliness for a
return of his passion, and his stubborn vanity still attributed her
rejection of his suit to the fact of his descent from a cobbler, or, as
he put it, to her infernal worship of rank.

“Poor old Tom!” said her ladyship, when alone. “He’s rough at the rind,
but sound at the core.” She had no idea of the long revenge Old Tom
cherished, and had just shaped into a plot to be equal with her for the
Bull-dogs.




CHAPTER XXIX.
PRELUDE TO AN ENGAGEMENT


Money was a strong point with the Elburne brood. The Jocelyns very
properly respected blood; but being, as Harry, their youngest
representative, termed them, poor as rats, they were justified in
considering it a marketable stuff; and when they married they married
for money. The Hon. Miss Jocelyn had espoused a manufacturer, who
failed in his contract, and deserved his death. The diplomatist,
Melville, had not stepped aside from the family traditions in his
alliance with Miss Black, the daughter of a bold bankrupt, educated in
affluence; and if he touched nothing but £5000 and some very pretty
ringlets, that was not his fault. Sir Franks, too, mixed his pure
stream with gold. As yet, however, the gold had done little more than
shine on him; and, belonging to expectancy, it might be thought
unsubstantial. Beckley Court was in the hands of Mrs. Bonner, who, with
the highest sense of duty toward her only living child, was the last to
appreciate Lady Jocelyn’s entire absence of demonstrative affection,
and severely reprobated her daughter’s philosophic handling of certain
serious subjects. Sir Franks, no doubt, came better off than the
others; her ladyship brought him twenty thousand pounds, and Harry had
ten in the past tense, and Rose ten in the future; but living, as he
had done, a score of years anticipating the demise of an incurable
invalid, he, though an excellent husband and father, could scarcely be
taught to imagine that the Jocelyn object of his bargain was attained.
He had the semblance of wealth, without the personal glow which
absolute possession brings. It was his habit to call himself a poor
man, and it was his dream that Rose should marry a rich one. Harry was
hopeless. He had been his Grandmother’s pet up to the years of
adolescence: he was getting too old for any prospect of a military
career: he had no turn for diplomacy, no taste for any of the walks
open to blood and birth, and was in headlong disgrace with the fountain
of goodness at Beckley Court, where he was still kept in the tacit
understanding that, should Juliana inherit the place, he must be at
hand to marry her instantly, after the fashion of the Jocelyns. They
were an injured family; for what they gave was good, and the commercial
world had not behaved honourably to them. Now, Ferdinand Laxley was
just the match for Rose. Born to a title and fine estate, he was
evidently fond of her, and there had been a gentle hope in the bosom of
Sir Franks that the family fatality would cease, and that Rose would
marry both money and blood.

From this happy delusion poor Sir Franks was awakened to hear that his
daughter had plighted herself to the son of a tradesman: that, as the
climax to their evil fate, she who had some blood and some money of her
own—the only Jocelyn who had ever united the two—was desirous of
wasting herself on one who had neither. The idea was so utterly opposed
to the principles Sir Franks had been trained in, that his intellect
could not grasp it. He listened to his sister, Mrs. Shorne: he listened
to his wife; he agreed with all they said, though what they said was
widely diverse: he consented to see and speak to Evan, and he did so,
and was much the most distressed. For Sir Franks liked many things in
life, and hated one thing alone—which was “bother.” A smooth world was
his delight. Rose knew this, and her instruction to Evan was: “You
cannot give me up—you will go, but you cannot give me up while I am
faithful to you: tell him that.” She knew that to impress this fact at
once on the mind of Sir Franks would be a great gain; for in his
detestation of bother he would soon grow reconciled to things
monstrous: and hearing the same on both sides, the matter would assume
an inevitable shape to him. Mr. Second Fiddle had no difficulty in
declaring the eternity of his sentiments; but he toned them with a
despair Rose did not contemplate, and added also his readiness to
repair, in any way possible, the evil done. He spoke of his birth and
position. Sir Franks, with a gentlemanly delicacy natural to all lovers
of a smooth world, begged him to see the main and the insurmountable
objection. Birth was to be desired, of course, and position, and so
forth: but without money how can two young people marry? Evan’s heart
melted at this generous way of putting it. He said he saw it, he had no
hope: he would go and be forgotten: and begged that for any annoyance
his visit might have caused Sir Franks and Lady Jocelyn, they would
pardon him. Sir Franks shook him by the hand, and the interview ended
in a dialogue on the condition of the knees of Black Lymport, and on
horseflesh in Portugal and Spain.

Following Evan, Rose went to her father and gave him a good hour’s
excitement, after which the worthy gentleman hurried for consolation to
Lady Jocelyn, whom he found reading a book of French memoirs, in her
usual attitude, with her feet stretched out and her head thrown back,
as in a distant survey of the lively people screening her from a
troubled world. Her ladyship read him a piquant story, and Sir Franks
capped it with another from memory; whereupon her ladyship held him
wrong in one turn of the story, and Sir Franks rose to get the volume
to verify, and while he was turning over the leaves, Lady Jocelyn told
him incidentally of old Tom Cogglesby’s visit and proposal. Sir Franks
found the passage, and that her ladyship was right, which it did not
move her countenance to hear.

“Ah!” said he, finding it no use to pretend there was no bother in the
world, “here’s a pretty pickle! Rose says she will have that fellow.”

“Hum!” replied her ladyship. “And if she keeps her mind a couple of
years, it will be a wonder.”

“Very bad for her this sort of thing—talked about,” muttered Sir
Franks. “Ferdinand was just the man.”

“Well, yes; I suppose it’s her mistake to think brains an absolute
requisite,” said Lady Jocelyn, opening her book again, and scanning
down a column.

Sir Franks, being imitative, adopted a similar refuge, and the talk
between them was varied by quotations and choice bits from the authors
they had recourse to. Both leaned back in their chairs, and spoke with
their eyes on their books.

“Julia’s going to write to her mother,” said he.

“Very filial and proper,” said she.

“There’ll be a horrible hubbub, you know, Emily.”

“Most probably. I shall get the blame; ‘cela se conçoit’.”

“Young Harrington goes the day after to-morrow. Thought it better not
to pack him off in a hurry.”

“And just before the pic-nic; no, certainly. I suppose it would look
odd.”

“How are we to get rid of the Countess?”

“Eh? This Bautru is amusing, Franks; but he’s nothing to Vandy. “Homme
incomparable!” On the whole I find Menage rather dull. The Countess?
what an accomplished liar that woman is! She seems to have stepped out
of Tallemant’s Gallery. Concerning the Countess, I suppose you had
better apply to Melville.”

“Where the deuce did this young Harrington get his breeding from?”

“He comes of a notable sire.”

“Yes, but there’s no sign of the snob in him.”

“And I exonerate him from the charge of ‘adventuring’ after Rose.
George Uplift tells me—I had him in just now—that the mother is a woman
of mark and strong principle. She has probably corrected the too
luxuriant nature of Mel in her offspring. That is to say in this one.
‘Pour les autres, je ne dis pas’. Well, the young man will go; and if
Rose chooses to become a monument of constancy, we can do nothing. I
shall give my advice; but as she has not deceived me, and she is a
reasonable being, I shan’t interfere. Putting the case at the worst,
they will not want money. I have no doubt Tom Cogglesby means what he
says, and will do it. So there we will leave the matter till we hear
from Elburne House.”

Sir Franks groaned at the thought.

“How much does he offer to settle on them?” he asked.

“A thousand a year on the marriage, and the same amount to the first
child. I daresay the end would be that they would get all.”

Sir Franks nodded, and remained with one eye-brow pitiably elevated
above the level of the other.

“Anything but a tailor!” he exclaimed presently, half to himself.

“There is a prejudice against that craft,” her ladyship acquiesced.
“Béranger—let me see—your favourite Frenchman, Franks, wasn’t it his
father?—no, his grandfather. ‘Mon pauvre et humble grandpère,’ I think,
was a tailor. Hum! the degrees of the thing, I confess, don’t affect
me. One trade I imagine to be no worse than another.”

“Ferdinand’s allowance is about a thousand,” said Sir Franks,
meditatively.

“And won’t be a farthing more till he comes to the title,” added her
ladyship.

“Well,” resumed Sir Franks, “it’s a horrible bother!”

His wife philosophically agreed with him, and the subject was dropped.

Lady Jocelyn felt with her husband, more than she chose to let him
know, and Sir Franks could have burst into anathemas against fate and
circumstances, more than his love of a smooth world permitted. He,
however, was subdued by her calmness; and she, with ten times the
weight of brain, was manoeuvred by the wonderful dash of General Rose
Jocelyn. For her ladyship, thinking, “I shall get the blame of all
this,” rather sided insensibly with the offenders against those who
condemned them jointly; and seeing that Rose had been scrupulously
honest and straightforward in a very delicate matter, this lady was so
constituted that she could not but applaud her daughter in her heart. A
worldly woman would have acted, if she had not thought, differently;
but her ladyship was not a worldly woman.

Evan’s bearing and character had, during his residence at Beckley
Court, become so thoroughly accepted as those of a gentleman, and one
of their own rank, that, after an allusion to the origin of his
breeding, not a word more was said by either of them on that topic.
Besides, Rose had dignified him by her decided conduct.

By the time poor Sir Franks had read himself into tranquillity, Mrs.
Shorne, who knew him well, and was determined that he should not enter
upon his usual negociations with an unpleasantness: that is to say, to
forget it, joined them in the library, bringing with her Sir John
Loring and Hamilton Jocelyn. Her first measure was to compel Sir Franks
to put down his book. Lady Jocelyn subsequently had to do the same.

“Well, what have you done, Franks?” said Mrs. Shorne.

“Done?” answered the poor gentleman. “What is there to be done? I’ve
spoken to young Harrington.”

“Spoken to him! He deserves horsewhipping! Have you not told him to
quit the house instantly?”

Lady Jocelyn came to her husband’s aid: “It wouldn’t do, I think, to
kick him out. In the first place, he hasn’t deserved it.”

“Not deserved it, Emily!—the commonest, low, vile, adventuring
tradesman!”

“In the second place,” pursued her ladyship, “it’s not adviseable to do
anything that will make Rose enter into the young woman’s sublimities.
It’s better not to let a lunatic see that you think him stark mad, and
the same holds with young women afflicted with the love-mania. The
sound of sense, even if they can’t understand it, flatters them so as
to keep them within bounds. Otherwise you drive them into excesses best
avoided.”

“Really, Emily,” said Mrs. Shorne, “you speak almost, one would say, as
an advocate of such unions.”

“You must know perfectly well that I entirely condemn them,” replied
her ladyship, who had once, and once only, delivered her opinion of the
nuptials of Mr. and Mrs. Shorne.

In self-defence, and to show the total difference between the cases,
Mrs. Shorne interjected: “An utterly penniless young adventurer!”

“Oh, no; there’s money,” remarked Sir Franks.

“Money is there?” quoth Hamilton, respectfully.

“And there’s wit,” added Sir John, “if he has half his sister’s
talent.”

“Astonishing woman!” Hamilton chimed in; adding, with a shrug, “But,
egad!”

“Well, we don’t want him to resemble his sister,” said Lady Jocelyn. “I
acknowledge she’s amusing.”

“Amusing, Emily!” Mrs. Shorne never encountered her sister-in-law’s
calmness without indignation. “I could not rest in the house with such
a person, knowing her what she is. A vile adventuress, as I firmly
believe. What does she do all day with your mother? Depend upon it, you
will repent her visit in more ways than one.”

“A prophecy?” asked Lady Jocelyn, smiling.

On the grounds of common sense, on the grounds of propriety, and
consideration of what was due to themselves, all agreed to condemn the
notion of Rose casting herself away on Evan. Lady Jocelyn agreed with
Mrs. Shorne; Sir Franks with his brother, and Sir John. But as to what
they were to do, they were divided. Lady Jocelyn said she should not
prevent Rose from writing to Evan, if she had the wish to do so.

“Folly must come out,” said her ladyship. “It’s a combustible material.
I won’t have her health injured. She shall go into the world more. She
will be presented at Court, and if it’s necessary to give her a dose or
two to counteract her vanity, I don’t object. This will wear off, or,
‘si c’est veritablement une grande passion, eh bien’ we must take what
Providence sends us.”

“And which we might have prevented if we had condescended to listen to
the plainest worldly wisdom,” added Mrs. Shorne.

“Yes,” said Lady Jocelyn, equably, “you know, you and I, Julia, argue
from two distinct points. Girls may be shut up, as you propose. I don’t
think nature intended to have them the obverse of men. I’m sure their
mothers never designed that they should run away with footmen,
riding-masters, chance curates, as they occasionally do, and wouldn’t
if they had points of comparison. My opinion is that Prospero was just
saved by the Prince of Naples being wrecked on his island, from a
shocking mis-alliance between his daughter and the son of Sycorax. I
see it clearly. Poetry conceals the extreme probability, but from what
I know of my sex, I should have no hesitation in turning prophet also,
as to that.”

What could Mrs. Shorne do with a mother who talked in this manner? Mrs.
Melville, when she arrived to take part in the conference, which
gradually swelled to a family one, was equally unable to make Lady
Jocelyn perceive that her plan of bringing up Rose was, in the present
result of it, other than unlucky.

Now the two Generals—Rose Jocelyn and the Countess de Saldar—had
brought matters to this pass; and from the two tactical extremes: the
former by openness and dash; the latter by subtlety, and her own
interpretations of the means extended to her by Providence. I will not
be so bold as to state which of the two I think right. Good and evil
work together in this world. If the Countess had not woven the tangle,
and gained Evan time, Rose would never have seen his blood,—never have
had her spirit hurried out of all shows and forms and habits of
thought, up to the gates of existence, as it were, where she took him
simply as God created him and her, and clave to him. Again, had Rose
been secret, when this turn in her nature came, she would have
forfeited the strange power she received from it, and which endowed her
with decision to say what was in her heart, and stamp it lastingly
there. The two Generals were quite antagonistic, but no two, in perfect
ignorance of one another’s proceedings, ever worked so harmoniously
toward the main result. The Countess was the skilful engineer: Rose the
General of cavalry. And it did really seem that, with Tom Cogglesby and
his thousands in reserve, the victory was about to be gained. The male
Jocelyns, an easy race, decided that, if the worst came to the worst,
and Rose proved a wonder, there was money, which was something.

But social prejudice was about to claim its champion. Hitherto there
had been no General on the opposite side. Love, aided by the Countess,
had engaged an inert mass. The champion was discovered in the person of
the provincial Don Juan, Mr. Harry Jocelyn. Harry had gone on a
mysterious business of his own to London. He returned with a green box
under his arm, which, five minutes after his arrival, was entrusted to
Conning, in company with a genial present for herself, of a kind not
perhaps so fit for exhibition; at least they both thought so, for it
was given in the shades. Harry then went to pay his respects to his
mother, who received him with her customary ironical tolerance. His
father, to whom he was an incarnation of bother, likewise nodded to him
and gave him a finger. Duty done, Harry looked round him for pleasure,
and observed nothing but glum faces. Even the face of John Raikes was
heavy. He had been hovering about the Duke and Miss Current for an
hour, hoping the Countess would come and give him a promised
introduction. The Countess stirred not from above, and Jack drifted
from group to group on the lawn, and grew conscious that wherever he
went he brought silence with him. His isolation made him humble, and
when Harry shook his hand, and said he remembered Fallowfield and the
fun there, Mr. Raikes thanked him.

Harry made his way to join his friend Ferdinand, and furnished him with
the latest London news not likely to appear in the papers. Laxley was
distant and unamused. From the fact, too, that Harry was known to be
the Countess’s slave, his presence produced the same effect in the
different circles about the grounds, as did that of John Raikes. Harry
began to yawn and wish very ardently for his sweet lady. She, however,
had too fine an instinct to descend.

An hour before dinner, Juliana sent him a message that she desired to
see him.

“Jove! I hope that girl’s not going to be blowing hot again,” sighed
the conqueror.

He had nothing to fear from Juliana. The moment they were alone she
asked him, “Have you heard of it?”

Harry shook his head and shrugged.

“They haven’t told you? Rose has engaged herself to Mr. Harrington, a
tradesman, a tailor!”

“Pooh! have you got hold of that story?” said Harry. “But I’m sorry for
old Ferdy. He was fond of Rosey. Here’s another bother!”

“You don’t believe me, Harry?”

Harry was mentally debating whether, in this new posture of affairs,
his friend Ferdinand would press his claim for certain moneys lent.

“Oh, I believe you,” he said. “Harrington has the knack with you women.
Why, you made eyes at him. It was a toss-up between you and Rosey
once.”

Juliana let this accusation pass.

“He is a tradesman. He has a shop in Lymport, I tell you, Harry, and
his name on it. And he came here on purpose to catch Rose. And now he
has caught her, he tells her. And his mother is now at one of the
village inns, waiting to see him. Go to Mr. George Uplift; he knows the
family. Yes, the Countess has turned your head, of course; but she has
schemed, and schemed, and told such stories—God forgive her!”

The girl had to veil her eyes in a spasm of angry weeping.

“Oh, come! Juley!” murmured her killing cousin. Harry boasted an
extraordinary weakness at the sight of feminine tears. “I say! Juley!
you know if you begin crying I’m done for, and it isn’t fair.”

He dropped his arm on her waist to console her, and generously declared
to her that he always had been very fond of her. These scenes were not
foreign to the youth. Her fits of crying, from which she would burst in
a frenzy of contempt at him, had made Harry say stronger things; and
the assurances of profound affection uttered in a most languid voice
will sting the hearts of women.

Harry still went on with his declarations, heating them rapidly, so as
to bring on himself the usual outburst and check. She was longer in
coming to it this time, and he had a horrid fear, that instead of
dismissing him fiercely, and so annulling his words, the strange little
person was going to be soft and hold him to them. There were her tears,
however, which she could not stop.

“Well, then, Juley, look. I do, upon my honour, yes—there, don’t cry
any more—I do love you.”

Harry held his breath in awful suspense. Juliana quietly disengaged her
waist, and looking at him, said, “Poor Harry! You need not lie any more
to please me.”

Such was Harry’s astonishment, that he exclaimed,

“It isn’t a lie! I say, I do love you.” And for an instant he thought
and hoped that he did love her.

“Well, then, Harry, I don’t love you,” said Juliana; which revealed to
our friend that he had been mistaken in his own emotions. Nevertheless,
his vanity was hurt when he saw she was sincere, and he listened to
her, a moody being. This may account for his excessive wrath at Evan
Harrington after Juliana had given him proofs of the truth of what she
said.

But the Countess was Harrington’s sister! The image of the Countess
swam before him. Was it possible? Harry went about asking everybody he
met. The initiated were discreet; those who had the whispers were open.
A bare truth is not so convincing as one that discretion confirms.
Harry found the detestable news perfectly true.

“Stop it by all means if you can,” said his father.

“Yes, try a fall with Rose,” said his mother.

“And I must sit down to dinner to-day with a confounded fellow, the son
of a tailor, who’s had the impudence to make love to my sister!” cried
Harry. “I’m determined to kick him out of the house!—half.”

“To what is the modification of your determination due?” Lady Jocelyn
inquired, probably suspecting the sweet and gracious person who divided
Harry’s mind.

Her ladyship treated her children as she did mankind generally, from
her intellectual eminence. Harry was compelled to fly from her cruel
shafts. He found comfort with his Aunt Shorne, and she as much as told
Harry that he was the head of the house, and must take up the matter
summarily. It was expected of him. Now was the time for him to show his
manhood.

Harry could think of but one way to do that.

“Yes, and if I do—all up with the old lady,” he said, and had to
explain that his Grandmama Bonner would never leave a penny to a fellow
who had fought a duel.

“A duel!” said Mrs. Shorne. “No, there are other ways. Insist upon his
renouncing her. And Rose—treat her with a high hand, as becomes you.
Your mother is incorrigible, and as for your father, one knows him of
old. This devolves upon you. Our family honour is in your hands,
Harry.”

Considering Harry’s reputation, the family honour must have got low:
Harry, of course, was not disposed to think so. He discovered a great
deal of unused pride within him, for which he had hitherto not found an
agreeable vent. He vowed to his aunt that he would not suffer the
disgrace, and while still that blandishing olive-hued visage swam
before his eyes, he pledged his word to Mrs. Shorne that he would come
to an understanding with Harrington that night.

“Quietly,” said she. “No scandal, pray.”

“Oh, never mind how I do it,” returned Harry, manfully. “How am I to do
it, then?” he added, suddenly remembering his debt to Evan.

Mrs. Shorne instructed him how to do it quietly, and without fear of
scandal. The miserable champion replied that it was very well for her
to tell him to say this and that, but—and she thought him demented—he
must, previous to addressing Harrington in those terms, have money.

“Money!” echoed the lady. “Money!”

“Yes, money!” he iterated doggedly, and she learnt that he had borrowed
a sum of Harrington, and the amount of the sum.

It was a disastrous plight, for Mrs. Shorne was penniless.

She cited Ferdinand Laxley as a likely lender.

“Oh, I’m deep with him already,” said Harry, in apparent dejection.

“How dreadful are these everlasting borrowings of yours!” exclaimed his
aunt, unaware of a trifling incongruity in her sentiments. “You must
speak to him without—pay him by-and-by. We must scrape the money
together. I will write to your grandfather.”

“Yes; speak to him! How can I when I owe him? I can’t tell a fellow
he’s a blackguard when I owe him, and I can’t speak any other way. I
ain’t a diplomatist. Dashed if I know what to do!”

“Juliana,” murmured his aunt.

“Can’t ask her, you know.”

Mrs. Shorne combated the one prominent reason for the objection: but
there were two. Harry believed that he had exhausted Juliana’s
treasury. Reproaching him further for his wastefulness, Mrs. Shorne
promised him the money should be got, by hook or by crook, next day.

“And you will speak to this Mr. Harrington to-night, Harry? No allusion
to the loan till you return it. Appeal to his sense of honour.”

The dinner-bell assembled the inmates of the house. Evan was not among
them. He had gone, as the Countess said aloud, on a diplomatic mission
to Fallowfield, with Andrew Cogglesby. The truth being that he had
finally taken Andrew into his confidence concerning the letter, the
annuity, and the bond. Upon which occasion Andrew had burst into a
laugh, and said he could lay his hand on the writer of the letter.

“Trust Old Tom for plots, Van! He’ll blow you up in a twinkling, the
cunning old dog! He pretends to be hard—he’s as soft as I am, if it
wasn’t for his crotchets. We’ll hand him back the cash, and that’s
ended. And—eh? what a dear girl she is! Not that I’m astonished. My
Harry might have married a lord—sit at top of any table in the land!
And you’re as good as any man.

That’s my opinion. But I say she’s a wonderful girl to see it.”

Chattering thus, Andrew drove with the dear boy into Fallowfield. Evan
was still in his dream. To him the generous love and valiant openness
of Rose, though they were matched in his own bosom, seemed scarcely
human. Almost as noble to him were the gentlemanly plainspeaking of Sir
Franks and Lady Jocelyn’s kind commonsense. But the more he esteemed
them, the more unbounded and miraculous appeared the prospect of his
calling their daughter by the sacred name, and kneeling with her at
their feet. Did the dear heavens have that in store for him? The
horizon edges were dimly lighted.

Harry looked about under his eye-lids for Evan, trying at the same time
to compose himself for the martyrdom he had to endure in sitting at
table with the presumptuous fellow. The Countess signalled him to come
within the presence. As he was crossing the room, Rose entered, and
moved to meet him, with: “Ah, Harry! back again! Glad to see you.”

Harry gave her a blunt nod, to which she was inattentive.

“What!” whispered the Countess, after he pressed the tips of her
fingers. “Have you brought back the grocer?”

Now this was hard to stand. Harry could forgive her her birth, and pass
it utterly by if she chose to fall in love with him; but to hear the
grocer mentioned, when he knew of the tailor, was a little too much,
and what Harry felt his ingenuous countenance was accustomed to
exhibit. The Countess saw it. She turned her head from him to the
diplomatist, and he had to remain like a sentinel at her feet. He did
not want to be thanked for the green box: still he thought she might
have favoured him with one of her much-embracing smiles:

In the evening, after wine, when he was warm, and had almost forgotten
the insult to his family and himself, the Countess snubbed him. It was
unwise on her part, but she had the ghastly thought that facts were
oozing out, and were already half known. She was therefore sensitive
tenfold to appearances; savage if one failed to keep up her lie to her,
and was guilty of a shadow of difference of behaviour. The pic-nic
over, our General would evacuate Beckley Court, and shake the dust off
her shoes, and leave the harvest of what she had sown to Providence.
Till then, respect, and the honours of war! So the Countess snubbed
him, and he being full of wine, fell into the hands of Juliana, who had
witnessed the little scene.

“She has made a fool of others as well as of you,” said Juliana.

“How has she?” he inquired.

“Never mind. Do you want to make her humble and crouch to you?”

“I want to see Harrington,” said Harry.

“He will not return to-night from Fallowfield. He has gone there to get
Mr. Andrew Cogglesby’s brother to do something for him. You won’t have
such another chance of humbling them both—both! I told you his mother
is at an inn here. The Countess has sent Mr. Harrington to Fallowfield
to be out of the way, and she has told her mother all sorts of
falsehoods.”

“How do you know all that?” quoth Harry. “By Jove, Juley! talk about
plotters! No keeping anything from you, ever!”

“Never mind. The mother is here. She must be a vulgar woman. Oh! if you
could manage, Harry, to get this woman to come—you could do it so
easily! while they are at the pie-nic tomorrow. It would have the best
effect on Rose. She would then understand! And the Countess!”

“I could send the old woman a message!” cried Harry, rushing into the
scheme, inspired by Juliana’s fiery eyes. “Send her a sort of message
to say where we all were.”

“Let her know that her son is here, in some way,” Juley resumed.

“And, egad! what an explosion!” pursued Harry. “But, suppose—”

“No one shall know, if you leave it to me—if you do just as I tell you,
Harry. You won’t be treated as you were this evening after that, if you
bring down her pride. And, Harry, I hear you want money—I can give you
some.”

“You’re a perfect trump, Juley!” exclaimed her enthusiastic cousin.
“But, no; I can’t take it. I must kiss you, though.”

He put a kiss upon her cheek. Once his kisses had left a red waxen
stamp; she was callous to these compliments now.

“Will you do what I advise you to-morrow?” she asked.

After a slight hesitation, during which the olive-hued visage flitted
faintly in the distances of his brain, Harry said:

“It’ll do Rose good, and make Harrington cut. Yes! I declare I will.”

Then they parted. Juliana went to her bed-room, and flung herself upon
the bed hysterically. As the tears came thick and fast, she jumped up
to lock the door, for this outrageous habit of crying had made her
contemptible in the eyes of Lady Jocelyn, and an object of pity to
Rose. Some excellent and noble natures cannot tolerate disease, and are
mystified by its ebullitions. It was very sad to see the slight thin
frame grasped by those wan hands to contain the violence of the frenzy
that possessed her! the pale, hapless face rigid above the torment in
her bosom! She had prayed to be loved like other girls, and her
readiness to give her heart in return had made her a by-word in the
house. She went to the window and leaned out on the casement, looking
towards Fallowfield over the downs, weeping bitterly, with a hard shut
mouth. One brilliant star hung above the ridge, and danced on her
tears.

“Will he forgive me?” she murmured. “Oh, my God! I wish we were dead
together!”

Her weeping ceased, and she closed the window, and undressed as far
away from the mirror as she could get; but its force was too much for
her, and drew her to it. Some undefined hope had sprung in her
suddenly. With nervous slow steps she approached the glass, and first
brushing back the masses of black hair from her brow, looked as for
some new revelation. Long and anxiously she perused her features: the
wide bony forehead; the eyes deep-set and rounded with the scarlet of
recent tears, the thin nose—sharp as the dead; the weak irritable mouth
and sunken cheeks. She gazed like a spirit disconnected from what she
saw. Presently a sort of forlorn negative was indicated by the motion
of her head.

“I can pardon him,” she said, and sighed. “How could he love such a
face!”




CHAPTER XXX.
THE BATTLE OF THE BULL-DOGS. PART I.


At the South-western extremity of the park, with a view extending over
wide meadows and troubled mill waters, yellow barn-roofs and
weather-gray old farm-walls, two grassy mounds threw their slopes to
the margin of the stream. Here the bull-dogs held revel. The hollow
between the slopes was crowned by a bending birch, which rose
three-stemmed from the root, and hung a noiseless green shower over the
basin of green it shadowed. Beneath it the interminable growl sounded
pleasantly; softly shot the sparkle of the twisting water, and you
might dream things half-fulfilled. Knots of fern were about, but the
tops of the mounds were firm grass, evidently well rolled, and with an
eye to airy feet. Olympus one eminence was called, Parnassus the other.
Olympus a little overlooked Parnassus, but Parnassus was broader and
altogether better adapted for the games of the Muses. Round the edges
of both there was a well-trimmed bush of laurel, obscuring only the
feet of the dancers from the observing gods. For on Olympus the elders
reclined. Great efforts had occasionally been made to dispossess and
unseat them, and their security depended mainly on a hump in the middle
of the mound which defied the dance.

Watteau-like groups were already couched in the shade. There were
ladies of all sorts: town-bred and country-bred: farmers’ daughters and
daughters of peers: for this pic-nic, as Lady Jocelyn, disgusting the
Countess, would call it, was in reality a “fête champêtre”, given
annually, to which the fair offspring of the superior tenants were
invited the brothers and fathers coming to fetch them in the evening.
It struck the eye of the Countess de Saldar that Olympus would be a
fitting throne for her, and a point whence her shafts might fly without
fear of a return. Like another illustrious General at Salamanca, she
directed a detachment to take possession of the height. Courtly Sir
John Loring ran up at once, and gave the diplomatist an opportunity to
thank her flatteringly for gaining them two minutes to themselves. Sir
John waved his handkerchief in triumph, welcoming them under an awning
where carpets and cushions were spread, and whence the Countess could
eye the field. She was dressed ravishingly; slightly in a foreign
style, the bodice being peaked at the waist, as was then the Portuguese
persuasion. The neck, too, was deliciously veiled with fine lace—and
thoroughly veiled, for it was a feature the Countess did not care to
expose to the vulgar daylight. Off her gentle shoulders, as it were
some fringe of cloud blown by the breeze this sweet lady opened her
bosom to, curled a lovely black lace scarf: not Caroline’s. If she
laughed, the tinge of mourning lent her laughter new charms. If she
sighed, the exuberant array of her apparel bade the spectator be of
good cheer. Was she witty, men surrendered reason and adored her. Only
when she entered the majestic mood, and assumed the languors of
greatness, and recited musky anecdotes of her intimacy with it, only
then did mankind, as represented at Beckley Court, open an internal eye
and reflect that it was wonderful in a tailor’s daughter. And she felt
that mankind did so reflect. Her instincts did not deceive her. She
knew not how much was known; in the depths of her heart she kept low
the fear that possibly all might be known; and succeeding in this, she
said to herself that probably nothing was known after all. George
Uplift, Miss Carrington, and Rose, were the three she abhorred. Partly
to be out of their way, and to be out of the way of chance shots (for
she had heard names of people coming that reminded her of Dubbins’s,
where, in past days, there had been on one awful occasion a terrific
discovery made), the Countess selected Olympus for her station. It was
her last day, and she determined to be happy. Doubtless, she was making
a retreat, but have not illustrious Generals snatched victory from
their pursuers? Fair, then, sweet, and full of grace, the Countess
moved. As the restless shifting of colours to her motions was the
constant interchange of her semisorrowful manner and ready archness.
Sir John almost capered to please her, and the diplomatist in talking
to her forgot his diplomacy and the craft of his tongue.

It was the last day also of Caroline and the Duke. The Countess clung
to Caroline and the Duke more than to Evan and Rose. She could see the
first couple walking under an avenue of limes, and near them that young
man or monkey, Raikes, as if in ambush. Twice they passed him, and
twice he doffed his hat and did homage.

“A most singular creature!” exclaimed the Countess. “It is my constant
marvel where my brother discovered such a curiosity. Do notice him.”

“That man? Raikes?” said the diplomatist. “Do you know he is our rival?
Harry wanted an excuse for another bottle last night, and proposed the
‘Member’ for Fallowfield. Up got this Mr. Raikes and returned thanks.”

“Yes?” the Countess negligently interjected in a way she had caught
from Lady Jocelyn.

“Cogglesby’s nominee, apparently.”

“I know it all,” said the Countess. “We need have no apprehension. He
is docile. My brother-in-law’s brother, you see, is most eccentric. We
can manage him best through this Mr. Raikes, for a personal application
would be ruin. He quite detests our family, and indeed all the
aristocracy.”

Melville’s mouth pursed, and he looked very grave.

Sir John remarked: “He seems like a monkey just turned into a man.”

“And doubtful about the tail,” added the Countess.

The image was tolerably correct, but other causes were at the bottom of
the air worn by John Raikes. The Countess had obtained an invitation
for him, with instructions that he should come early, and he had
followed them so implicitly that the curricle was flinging dust on the
hedges between Fallowfield and Beckley but an hour or two after the
chariot of Apollo had mounted the heavens, and Mr. Raikes presented
himself at the breakfast table. Fortunately for him the Countess was
there. After the repast she introduced him to the Duke: and he bowed to
the Duke, and the Duke bowed to him: and now, to instance the peculiar
justness in the mind of Mr. Raikes, he, though he worshipped a coronet
and would gladly have recalled the feudal times to a corrupt land,
could not help thinking that his bow had beaten the Duke’s and was
better. He would rather not have thought so, for it upset his
preconceptions and threatened a revolution in his ideas. For this
reason he followed the Duke, and tried, if possible, to correct, or at
least chasten the impressions he had of possessing a glaring advantage
over the nobleman. The Duke’s second notice of him was hardly a nod.
“Well!” Mr. Raikes reflected, “if this is your Duke, why, egad! for
figure and style my friend Harrington beats him hollow.” And Raikes
thought he knew who could conduct a conversation with superior dignity
and neatness. The torchlight of a delusion was extinguished in him, but
he did not wander long in that gloomy cavernous darkness of the
disenchanted, as many of us do, and as Evan had done, when after a week
at Beckley Court he began to examine of what stuff his brilliant
father, the great Mel, was composed. On the contrary, as the light of
the Duke dwindled, Raikes gained in lustre. “In fact,” he said,
“there’s nothing but the title wanting.” He was by this time on a level
with the Duke in his elastic mind.

Olympus had been held in possession by the Countess about half an hour,
when Lady Jocelyn mounted it, quite unconscious that she was scaling a
fortified point. The Countess herself fired off the first gun at her.

“It has been so extremely delightful up alone here, Lady Jocelyn: to
look at everybody below! I hope many will not intrude on us!”

“None but the dowagers who have breath to get up,” replied her
ladyship, panting. “By the way, Countess, you hardly belong to us yet.
You dance?”

“Indeed, I do not.”

“Oh, then you are in your right place. A dowager is a woman who doesn’t
dance: and her male attendant is—what is he? We will call him a fogy.”

Lady Jocelyn directed a smile at Melville and Sir John, who both
protested that it was an honour to be the Countess’s fogy.

Rose now joined them, with Laxley morally dragged in her wake.

“Another dowager and fogy!” cried the Countess, musically. “Do you not
dance, my child?”

“Not till the music strikes up,” rejoined Rose. “I suppose we shall
have to eat first.”

“That is the Hamlet of the pic-nic play, I believe,” said her mother.

“Of course you dance, don’t you, Countess?” Rose inquired, for the sake
of amiable conversation.

The Countess’s head signified: “Oh, no! quite out of the question”: she
held up a little bit of her mournful draperies, adding: “Besides, you,
dear child, know your company, and can select; I do not, and cannot do
so. I understand we have a most varied assembly!”

Rose shut her eyes, and then looked at her mother. Lady Jocelyn’s face
was undisturbed; but while her eyes were still upon the Countess, she
drew her head gently back, imperceptibly. If anything, she was admiring
the lady; but Rose could be no placid philosophic spectator of what was
to her a horrible assumption and hypocrisy. For the sake of him she
loved, she had swallowed a nauseous cup bravely. The Countess was too
much for her. She felt sick to think of being allied to this person.
She had a shuddering desire to run into the ranks of the world, and
hide her head from multitudinous hootings. With a pang of envy she saw
her friend Jenny walking by the side of William Harvey, happy, untried,
unoffending: full of hope, and without any bitter draughts to swallow!

Aunt Bel now came tripping up gaily.

“Take the alternative, ‘douairiere or demoiselle’?” cried Lady Jocelyn.
“We must have a sharp distinction, or Olympus will be mobbed.”

“Entre les deux, s’il vous plait,” responded Aunt Bel. “Rose, hurry
down, and leaven the mass. I see ten girls in a bunch. It’s shocking.
Ferdinand, pray disperse yourself. Why is it, Emily, that we are always
in excess at pic-nics? Is man dying out?”

“From what I can see,” remarked Lady Jocelyn, “Harry will be lost to
his species unless some one quickly relieves him. He’s already half
eaten up by the Conley girls. Countess, isn’t it your duty to rescue
him?”

The Countess bowed, and murmured to Sir John:

“A dismissal!”

“I fear my fascinations, Lady Jocelyn, may not compete with those fresh
young persons.”

“Ha! ha! ‘fresh young persons,’” laughed Sir John for the ladies in
question were romping boisterously with Mr. Harry.

The Countess inquired for the names and condition of the ladies, and
was told that they sprang from Farmer Conley, a well-to-do son of the
soil, who farmed about a couple of thousand acres between Fallowfield
and Beckley, and bore a good reputation at the county bank.

“But I do think,” observed the Countess, “it must indeed be pernicious
for any youth to associate with that class of woman. A deterioration of
manners!”

Rose looked at her mother again. She thought “Those girls would scorn
to marry a tradesman’s son!”

The feeling grew in Rose that the Countess lowered and degraded her.
Her mother’s calm contemplation of the lady was more distressing than
if she had expressed the contempt Rose was certain, according to her
young ideas, Lady Jocelyn must hold.

Now the Countess had been considering that she would like to have a
word or two with Mr. Harry, and kissing her fingers to the occupants of
Olympus, and fixing her fancy on the diverse thoughts of the ladies and
gentlemen, deduced from a rapturous or critical contemplation of her
figure from behind, she descended the slope.

Was it going to be a happy day? The well-imagined opinions of the
gentleman on her attire and style, made her lean to the affirmative;
but Rose’s demure behaviour, and something—something would come across
her hopes. She had, as she now said to herself, stopped for the
pic-nic, mainly to give Caroline a last opportunity of binding the Duke
to visit the Cogglesby saloons in London. Let Caroline cleverly
contrive this, as she might, without any compromise, and the stay at
Beckley Court would be a great gain. Yes, Caroline was still with the
Duke; they were talking earnestly. The Countess breathed a short appeal
to Providence that Caroline might not prove a fool. Overnight she had
said to Caroline: “Do not be so English. Can one not enjoy friendship
with a nobleman without wounding one’s conscience or breaking with the
world? My dear, the Duke visiting you, you cow that infamous Strike of
yours. He will be utterly obsequious! I am not telling you to pass the
line. The contrary. But we continentals have our grievous reputation
because we dare to meet as intellectual beings, and defy the imputation
that ladies and gentlemen are no better than animals.”

It sounded very lofty to Caroline, who, accepting its sincerity,
replied:

“I cannot do things by halves. I cannot live a life of deceit. A life
of misery—not deceit.”

Whereupon, pitying her poor English nature, the Countess gave her
advice, and this advice she now implored her familiars to instruct or
compel Caroline to follow.

The Countess’s garment was plucked at. She beheld little Dorothy Loring
glancing up at her with the roguish timidity of her years.

“May I come with you?” asked the little maid, and went off into a
prattle: “I spent that five shillings—I bought a shilling’s worth of
sweet stuff, and nine penn’orth of twine, and a shilling for small wax
candles to light in my room when I’m going to bed, because I like
plenty of light by the looking-glass always, and they do make the room
so hot! My Jane declared she almost fainted, but I burnt them out! Then
I only had very little left for a horse to mount my doll on; and I
wasn’t going to get a screw, so I went to Papa, and he gave me five
shillings. And, oh, do you know, Rose can’t bear me to be with you.
Jealousy, I suppose, for you’re very agreeable. And, do you know, your
Mama is coming to-day? I’ve got a Papa and no Mama, and you’ve got a
Mama and no Papa. Isn’t it funny? But I don’t think so much of it, as
you’re grown up. Oh, I’m quite sure she is coming, because I heard
Harry telling Juley she was, and Juley said it would be so gratifying
to you.”

A bribe and a message relieved the Countess of Dorothy’s attendance on
her.

What did this mean? Were people so base as to be guilty of hideous
plots in this house? Her mother coming! The Countess’s blood turned
deadly chill. Had it been her father she would not have feared, but her
mother was so vilely plain of speech; she never opened her mouth save
to deliver facts: which was to the Countess the sign of atrocious
vulgarity.

But her mother had written to say she would wait for Evan in
Fallowfield! The Countess grasped at straws. Did Dorothy hear that? And
if Harry and Juliana spoke of her mother, what did that mean? That she
was hunted, and must stand at bay!

“Oh, Papa! Papa! why did you marry a Dawley?” she exclaimed, plunging
to what was, in her idea, the root of the evil.

She had no time for outcries and lamentations. It dawned on her that
this was to be a day of battle. Where was Harry? Still in the midst of
the Conley throng, apparently pooh-poohing something, to judge by the
twist of his mouth.

The Countess delicately signed for him to approach her. The extreme
delicacy of the signal was at least an excuse for Harry to perceive
nothing. It was renewed, and Harry burst into a fit of laughter at some
fun of one of the Conley girls. The Countess passed on, and met Juliana
pacing by herself near the lower gates of the park. She wished only to
see how Juliana behaved. The girl looked perfectly trustful, as much so
as when the Countess was pouring in her ears the tales of Evan’s
growing but bashful affection for her.

“He will soon be here,” whispered the Countess. “Has he told you he
will come by this entrance?”

“No,” replied Juliana.

“You do not look well, sweet child.”

“I was thinking that you did not, Countess?”

“Oh, indeed, yes! With reason, alas! All our visitors have by this time
arrived, I presume?”

“They come all day.”

The Countess hastened away from one who, when roused, could be almost
as clever as herself, and again stood in meditation near the joyful
Harry. This time she did not signal so discreetly. Harry could not but
see it, and the Conley girls accused him of cruelty to the beautiful
dame, which novel idea stung Harry with delight, and he held out to
indulge in it a little longer. His back was half turned, and as he
talked noisily, he could not observe the serene and resolute march of
the Countess toward him. The youth gaped when he found his arm taken
prisoner by the insertion of a small deliciously-gloved and perfumed
hand through it. “I must claim you for a few moments,” said the
Countess, and took the startled Conley girls one and all in her
beautiful smile of excuse.

“Why do you compromise me thus, sir?”

These astounding words were spoken out of the hearing of the Conley
girls.

“Compromise you!” muttered Harry.

Masterly was the skill with which the Countess contrived to speak
angrily and as an injured woman, while she wore an indifferent social
countenance.

“I repeat, compromise me. No, Mr. Harry Jocelyn, you are not the
jackanapes you try to make people think you: you understand me.”

The Countess might accuse him, but Harry never had the ambition to make
people think him that: his natural tendency was the reverse: and he
objected to the application of the word jackanapes to himself, and was
ready to contest the fact of people having that opinion at all.
However, all he did was to repeat: “Compromise!”

“Is not open unkindness to me compromising me?”

“How?” asked Harry.

“Would you dare to do it to a strange lady? Would you have the
impudence to attempt it with any woman here but me? No, I am innocent;
it is my consolation; I have resisted you, but you by this cowardly
behaviour place me—and my reputation, which is more—at your mercy.
Noble behaviour, Mr. Harry Jocelyn! I shall remember my young English
gentleman.”

The view was totally new to Harry.

“I really had no idea of compromising you,” he said. “Upon my honour, I
can’t see how I did it now!”

“Oblige me by walking less in the neighbourhood of those fat-faced
glaring farm-girls,” the Countess spoke under her breath; “and don’t
look as if you were being whipped. The art of it is evident—you are but
carrying on the game.—Listen. If you permit yourself to exhibit an
unkindness to me, you show to any man who is a judge, and to every
woman, that there has been something between us. You know my
innocence—yes! but you must punish me for having resisted you thus
long.”

Harry swore he never had such an idea, and was much too much of a man
and a gentleman to behave in that way.—And yet it seemed wonderfully
clever! And here was the Countess saying:

“Take your reward, Mr. Harry Jocelyn. You have succeeded; I am your
humble slave. I come to you and sue for peace. To save my reputation I
endanger myself. This is generous of you.”

“Am I such a clever fellow?” thought the young gentleman. “Deuced lucky
with women”: he knew that: still a fellow must be wonderfully,
miraculously, clever to be able to twist and spin about such a woman as
this in that way. He did not object to conceive that he was the fellow
to do it. Besides, here was the Countess de Saldar—worth five hundred
of the Conley girls—almost at his feet!

Mollified, he said: “Now, didn’t you begin it?”

“Evasion!” was the answer. “It would be such pleasure to you so see a
proud woman weep! And if yesterday, persecuted as I am, with dreadful
falsehoods abroad respecting me and mine, if yesterday I did seem cold
to your great merits, is it generous of you to take this revenge?”

Harry began to scent the double meaning in her words. She gave him no
time to grow cool over it. She leaned, half abandoned, on his arm. Arts
feminine and irresistible encompassed him. It was a fatal mistake of
Juliana’s to enlist Harry Jocelyn against the Countess de Saldar. He
engaged, still without any direct allusion to the real business, to
move heaven and earth to undo all that he had done, and the Countess
implied an engagement to do—what? more than she intended to fulfil.

Ten minutes later she was alone with Caroline.

“Tie yourself to the Duke at the dinner,” she said, in the forcible
phrase she could use when necessary. “Don’t let them scheme to separate
you. Never mind looks—do it!”

Caroline, however, had her reasons for desiring to maintain
appearances. The Countess dashed at her hesitation.

“There is a plot to humiliate us in the most abominable way. The whole
family have sworn to make us blush publicly. Publicly blush! They have
written to Mama to come and speak out. Now will you attend to me,
Caroline? You do not credit such atrocity? I know it to be true.”

“I never can believe that Rose would do such a thing,” said Caroline.
“We can hardly have to endure more than has befallen us already.”

Her speech was pensive, as of one who had matter of her own to ponder
over. A swift illumination burst in the Countess’s mind.

“No? Have you, dear, darling Carry? not that I intend that you should!
but to-day the Duke would be such ineffable support to us. May I deem
you have not been too cruel to-day? You dear silly English creature,
‘Duck,’ I used to call you when I was your little Louy. All is not yet
lost, but I will save you from the ignominy if I can. I will!”

Caroline denied nothing—confirmed nothing, just as the Countess had
stated nothing. Yet they understood one another perfectly. Women have a
subtler language than ours: the veil pertains to them morally as
bodily, and they see clearer through it.

The Countess had no time to lose. Wrath was in her heart. She did not
lend all her thoughts to self-defence.

Without phrasing a word, or absolutely shaping a thought in her head,
she slanted across the sun to Mr. Raikes, who had taken refreshment,
and in obedience to his instinct, notwithstanding his enormous
pretensions, had commenced a few preliminary antics.

“Dear Mr. Raikes!” she said, drawing him aside, “not before dinner!”

“I really can’t contain the exuberant flow!” returned that gentleman.
“My animal spirits always get the better of me,” he added
confidentially.

“Suppose you devote your animal spirits to my service for half an
hour.”

“Yours, Countess, from the ‘os frontis’ to the chine!” was the
exuberant rejoinder.

The Countess made a wry mouth.

“Your curricle is in Beckley?”

“Behold!” said Jack. “Two juveniles, not half so blest as I, do from
the seat regard the festive scene o’er yon park palings. They are
there, even Franko and Fred. I’m afraid I promised to get them in at a
later period of the day. Which sadly sore my conscience doth disturb!
But what is to be done about the curricle, my Countess?”

“Mr. Raikes,” said the Countess, smiling on him fixedly, “you are
amusing; but in addressing me, you must be precise, and above all
things accurate. I am not your Countess!”

He bowed profoundly. “Oh, that I might say my Queen!”

The Countess replied: “A conviction of your lunacy would prevent my
taking offence, though I might wish you enclosed and guarded.”

Without any further exclamations, Raikes acknowledged a superior.

“And, now, attend to me,” said the Countess. “Listen:

You go yourself, or send your friends instantly to Fallowfield. Bring
with you that girl and her child. Stop: there is such a person. Tell
her she is to be spoken to about the prospects of the poor infant. I
leave that to your inventive genius. Evan wishes her here. Bring her,
and should you see the mad captain who behaves so oddly, favour him
with a ride. He says he dreams his wife is here, and he will not reveal
his name! Suppose it should be my own beloved husband! I am quite
anxious.”

The Countess saw him go up to the palings and hold a communication with
his friends Franko and Fred. One took the whip, and after mutual
flourishes, drove away.

“Now!” mused the Countess, “if Captain Evremonde should come!” It would
break up the pic-nic. Alas! the Countess had surrendered her humble
hopes of a day’s pleasure. But if her mother came as well, what a
diversion that would be! If her mother came before the Captain, his
arrival would cover the retreat; if the Captain preceded her, she would
not be noticed. Suppose her mother refrained from coming? In that case
it was a pity, but the Jocelyns had brought it on themselves.

This mapping out of consequences followed the Countess’s deeds, and did
not inspire them. Her passions sharpened her instincts, which produced
her actions. The reflections ensued: as in nature, the consequences
were all seen subsequently! Observe the difference between your male
and female Generals.

On reflection, too, the Countess praised herself for having done all
that could be done. She might have written to her mother: but her
absence would have been remarked: her messenger might have been
overhauled and, lastly, Mrs. Mel—“Gorgon of a mother!” the Countess
cried out: for Mrs. Mel was like a Fate to her. She could remember only
two occasions in her whole life when she had been able to manage her
mother, and then by lying in such a way as to distress her conscience
severely.

“If Mama has conceived this idea of coming, nothing will impede her. My
prayers will infuriate her!” said the Countess, and she was sure that
she had acted both rightly and with wisdom.

She put on her armour of smiles: she plunged into the thick of the
enemy. Since they would not allow her to taste human happiness—she had
asked but for the pic-nic! a small truce! since they denied her that,
rather than let them triumph by seeing her wretched, she took into her
bosom the joy of demons. She lured Mr. George Uplift away from Miss
Carrington, and spoke to him strange hints of matrimonial
disappointments, looking from time to time at that apprehensive lady,
doating on her terrors. And Mr. George seconded her by his clouded
face, for he was ashamed not to show that he did not know Louisa
Harrington in the Countess de Saldar, and had not the courage to
declare that he did. The Countess spoke familiarly, but without any
hint of an ancient acquaintance between them. “What a post her
husband’s got!” thought Mr. George, not envying the Count. He was
wrong: she was an admirable ally. All over the field the Countess went,
watching for her mother, praying that if she did come, Providence might
prevent her from coming while they were at dinner. How clearly Mrs.
Shorne and Mrs. Melville saw her vulgarity now! By the new light of
knowledge, how certain they were that they had seen her ungentle
training in a dozen little instances.

“She is not well-bred, ‘cela se voit’,” said Lady Jocelyn.

“Bred! it’s the stage! How could such a person be bred?” said Mrs.
Shorne.

Accept in the Countess the heroine who is combating class-prejudices,
and surely she is pre-eminently noteworthy. True, she fights only for
her family, and is virtually the champion of the opposing institution
misplaced. That does not matter: the Fates may have done it purposely:
by conquering she establishes a principle. A Duke adores her sister,
the daughter of the house her brother, and for herself she has many
protestations in honour of her charms: nor are they empty ones. She can
confound Mrs. Melville, if she pleases to, by exposing an adorer to
lose a friend. Issuing out of Tailordom, she, a Countess, has done all
this; and it were enough to make her glow, did not little evils, and
angers, and spites, and alarms so frightfully beset her.

The sun of the pic-nic system is dinner. Hence philosophers may deduce
that the pic-nic is a British invention. There is no doubt that we do
not shine at the pic-nic until we reflect the face of dinner. To this,
then, all who were not lovers began seriously to look forward, and the
advance of an excellent county band, specially hired to play during the
entertainment, gave many of the guests quite a new taste for sweet
music; and indeed we all enjoy a thing infinitely more when we see its
meaning.

About this time Evan entered the lower park-gates with Andrew. The
first object he encountered was John Raikes in a state of great
depression. He explained his case:

“Just look at my frill! Now, upon my honour, you know, I’m
good-tempered; I pass their bucolic habits, but this is beyond bearing.
I was near the palings there, and a fellow calls out, ‘Hi! will you
help the lady over?’ Holloa! thinks I, an adventure! However, I advised
him to take her round to the gates. The beast burst out laughing. ‘Now,
then,’ says he, and I heard a scrambling at the pales, and up came the
head of a dog. ‘Oh! the dog first,’ says I. ‘Catch by the ears,’ says
he. I did so. ‘Pull,’ says he. ‘’Gad, pull indeed!’, The beast gave a
spring and came slap on my chest, with his dirty wet muzzle on my neck!
I felt instantly it was the death of my frill, but gallant as you know
me, I still asked for the lady. ‘If you will please, or as it meet your
favour, to extend your hand to me!’ I confess I did think it rather
odd, the idea of a lady coming in that way over the palings! but my
curst love of adventure always blinds me. It always misleads my better
sense, Harrington. Well, instead of a lady, I see a fellow—he may have
been a lineal descendant of Cedric the Saxon. ‘Where’s the lady?’ says
I. ‘Lady?’ says he, and stares, and then laughs: ‘Lady! why,’ he jumps
over, and points at his beast of a dog, ‘don’t you know a bitch when
you see one?’ I was in the most ferocious rage! If he hadn’t been a big
burly bully, down he’d have gone. ‘Why didn’t you say what it was?’ I
roared. ‘Why,’ says he, ‘the word isn’t considered polite!’ I gave him
a cut there. I said, ‘I rejoice to be positively assured that you
uphold the laws and forms of civilization, sir.’ My belief is he didn’t
feel it.”

“The thrust sinned in its shrewdness,” remarked Evan, ending a laugh.

“Hem!” went Mr. Raikes, more contentedly: “after all, what are
appearances to the man of wit and intellect? Dress, and women will
approve you: but I assure you they much prefer the man of wit in his
slouched hat and stockings down. I was introduced to the Duke this
morning. It is a curious thing that the seduction of a Duchess has
always been one of my dreams.”

At this Andrew Cogglesby fell into a fit of laughter.

“Your servant,” said Mr. Raikes, turning to him. And then he muttered
“Extraordinary likeness! Good Heavens! Powers!”

From a state of depression, Mr. Raikes—changed into one of
bewilderment. Evan paid no attention to him, and answered none of his
hasty undertoned questions. Just then, as they were on the skirts of
the company, the band struck up a lively tune, and quite unconsciously,
the legs of Raikes, affected, it may be, by supernatural reminiscences,
loosely hornpiped. It was but a moment: he remembered himself the next:
but in that fatal moment eyes were on him. He never recovered his
dignity in Beckley Court: he was fatally mercurial.

“What is the joke against this poor fellow?” asked Evan of Andrew.

“Never mind, Van. You’ll roar. Old Tom again. We’ll see by-and-by,
after the champagne. He—this young Raikes-ha! ha!—but I can’t tell
you.” And Andrew went away to Drummond, to whom he was more
communicative. Then he went to Melville, and one or two others, and the
eyes of many became concentrated on Raikes, and it was observed as a
singular sign that he was constantly facing about, and flushing the
fiercest red. Once he made an effort to get hold of Evan’s arm and drag
him away, as one who had an urgent confession to be delivered of, but
Evan was talking to Lady Jocelyn, and other ladies, and quietly
disengaged his arm without even turning to notice the face of his
friend. Then the dinner was announced, and men saw the dinner. The
Countess went to shake her brother’s hand, and with a very gratulatory
visage, said through her half-shut teeth.

“If Mama appears, rise up and go away with her, before she has time to
speak a word.” An instant after Evan found himself seated between Mrs.
Evremonde and one of the Conley girls. The dinner had commenced. The
first half of the Battle of the Bull-dogs was as peaceful as any
ordinary pic-nic, and promised to the general company as calm a
conclusion.




CHAPTER XXXI.
THE BATTLE OF THE BULL-DOGS. PART II.


If it be a distinct point of wisdom to hug the hour that is, then does
dinner amount to a highly intellectual invitation to man, for it
furnishes the occasion; and Britons are the wisest of their race, for
more than all others they take advantage of it. In this Nature is
undoubtedly our guide, seeing that he who, while feasting his body
allows to his soul a thought for the morrow, is in his digestion curst,
and becomes a house of evil humours. Now, though the epicure may
complain of the cold meats, a dazzling table, a buzzing company, blue
sky, and a band of music, are incentives to the forgetfulness of
troubles past and imminent, and produce a concentration of the
faculties. They may not exactly prove that peace is established between
yourself and those who object to your carving of the world, but they
testify to an armistice.

Aided by these observations, you will understand how it was that the
Countess de Saldar, afflicted and menaced, was inspired, on taking her
seat, to give so graceful and stately a sweep to her dress that she was
enabled to conceive woman and man alike to be secretly overcome by it.
You will not refuse to credit the fact that Mr. Raikes threw care to
the dogs, heavy as was that mysterious lump suddenly precipitated on
his bosom; and you will think it not impossible that even the springers
of the mine about to explode should lose their subterranean
countenances. A generous abandonment to one idea prevailed. As for
Evan, the first glass of champagne rushed into reckless nuptials with
the music in his head, bringing Rose, warm almost as life, on his
heart. Sublime are the visions of lovers! He knew he must leave her on
the morrow; he feared he might never behold her again; and yet he
tasted bliss, for it seemed within the contemplation of the Gods that
he should dance with his darling before dark—haply waltz with her! Oh,
heaven! he shuts his eyes, blinded. The band wheels off meltingly in a
tune all cadences, and twirls, and risings and sinkings, and passionate
outbursts trippingly consoled. Ah! how sweet to waltz through life with
the right partner. And what a singular thing it is to look back on the
day when we thought something like it! Never mind: there may be spheres
where it is so managed—doubtless the planets have their Hanwell and
Bedlam.

I confess that the hand here writing is not insensible to the effects
of that first glass of champagne. The poetry of our Countess’s
achievements waxes rich in manifold colours: I see her by the light of
her own pleas to Providence. I doubt almost if the hand be mine which
dared to make a hero play second fiddle, and to his beloved. I have
placed a bushel over his light, certainly. Poor boy! it was enough that
he should have tailordom on his shoulders: I ought to have allowed him
to conquer Nature, and so come out of his eclipse. This shall be said
of him: that he can play second fiddle without looking foolish, which,
for my part, I call a greater triumph than if he were performing the
heroics we are more accustomed to. He has steady eyes, can gaze at the
right level into the eyes of others, and commands a tongue which is
neither struck dumb nor set in a flutter by any startling question. The
best instances to be given that he does not lack merit are that the
Jocelyns, whom he has offended by his birth, cannot change their
treatment of him, and that the hostile women, whatever they may say, do
not think Rose utterly insane. At any rate, Rose is satisfied, and her
self-love makes her a keen critic. The moment Evan appeared, the
sickness produced in her by the Countess passed, and she was ready to
brave her situation. With no mock humility she permitted Mrs. Shorne to
place her in a seat where glances could not be interchanged. She was
quite composed, calmly prepared for conversation with any one. Indeed,
her behaviour since the hour of general explanation had been so
perfectly well-contained, that Mrs. Melville said to Lady Jocelyn:

“I am only thinking of the damage to her. It will pass over—this fancy.
You can see she is not serious. It is mere spirit of opposition. She
eats and drinks just like other girls. You can see that the fancy has
not taken such very strong hold of her.”

“I can’t agree with you,” replied her ladyship. “I would rather have
her sit and sigh by the hour, and loathe roast beef. That would look
nearer a cure.”

“She has the notions of a silly country girl,” said Mrs. Shorne.

“Exactly,” Lady Jocelyn replied. “A season in London will give her
balance.”

So the guests were tolerably happy, or at least, with scarce an
exception, open to the influences of champagne and music. Perhaps
Juliana was the wretchedest creature present. She was about to smite on
both cheeks him she loved, as well as the woman she despised and had
been foiled by. Still she had the consolation that Rose, seeing the
vulgar mother, might turn from Evan: a poor distant hope, meagre and
shapeless like herself. Her most anxious thoughts concerned the means
of getting money to lockup Harry’s tongue. She could bear to meet the
Countess’s wrath, but not Evan’s offended look. Hark to that Countess!

“Why do you denominate this a pic-nic, Lady Jocelyn? It is in verity a
fête!”

“I suppose we ought to lie down à la Grecque to come within the term,”
was the reply. “On the whole, I prefer plain English for such matters.”

“But this is assuredly too sumptuous for a pic-nic, Lady Jocelyn. From
what I can remember, pic-nic implies contribution from all the guests.
It is true I left England a child!”

Mr. George Uplift could not withhold a sharp grimace: The Countess had
throttled the inward monitor that tells us when we are lying, so
grievously had she practised the habit in the service of her family.

“Yes,” said Mrs. Melville, “I have heard of that fashion, and very
stupid it is.”

“Extremely vulgar,” murmured Miss Carrington.

“Possibly,” Lady Jocelyn observed; “but good fun. I have been to
pic-nics, in my day. I invariably took cold pie and claret. I clashed
with half-a-dozen, but all the harm we did was to upset the dictum that
there can be too much of a good thing. I know for certain that the
bottles were left empty.”

“And this woman,” thought the Countess, “this woman, with a soul so
essentially vulgar, claims rank above me!” The reflection generated
contempt of English society, in the first place, and then a passionate
desire for self-assertion.

She was startled by a direct attack which aroused her momentarily
lulled energies.

A lady, quite a stranger, a dry simpering lady, caught the Countess’s
benevolent passing gaze, and leaning forward, said: “I hope her
ladyship bears her affliction as well as can be expected?”

In military parlance, the Countess was taken in flank. Another would
have asked—What ladyship? To whom do you allude, may I beg to inquire?
The Countess knew better. Rapid as light it shot through her that the
relict of Sir Abraham was meant, and this she divined because she was
aware that devilish malignity was watching to trip her.

A little conversation happening to buzz at the instant, the Countess
merely turned her chin to an angle, agitated her brows very gently, and
crowned the performance with a mournful smile. All that a woman must
feel at the demise of so precious a thing as a husband, was therein
eloquently expressed: and at the same time, if explanations ensued,
there were numerous ladyships in the world, whom the Countess did not
mind afflicting, should she be hard pressed.

“I knew him so well!” resumed the horrid woman, addressing anybody. “It
was so sad! so unexpected! but he was so subject to affection of the
throat. And I was so sorry I could not get down to him in time. I had
not seen him since his marriage, when I was a girl!—and to meet one of
his children!—But, my dear, in quinsey, I have heard that there is
nothing on earth like a good hearty laugh.”

Mr. Raikes hearing this, sucked down the flavour of a glass of
champagne, and with a look of fierce jollity, interposed, as if
specially charged by Providence to make plain to the persecuted
Countess his mission and business there: “Then our vocation is at last
revealed to us! Quinsey-doctor! I remember when a boy, wandering over
the paternal mansion, and envying the life of a tinker, which my mother
did not think a good omen in me. But the traps of a Quinsey-doctor are
even lighter. Say twenty good jokes, and two or three of a practical
kind. A man most enviable!”

“It appears,” he remarked aloud to one of the Conley girls, “that
quinsey is needed before a joke is properly appreciated.”

“I like fun,” said she, but had not apparently discovered it.

What did that odious woman mean by perpetually talking about Sir
Abraham? The Countess intercepted a glance between her and the hated
Juliana. She felt it was a malignant conspiracy: still the vacuous
vulgar air of the woman told her that most probably she was but an
instrument, not a confederate, and was only trying to push herself into
acquaintance with the great: a proceeding scorned and abominated by the
Countess, who longed to punish her for her insolent presumption. The
bitterness of her situation stung her tenfold when she considered that
she dared not.

Meantime the champagne became as regular in its flow as the Bull-dogs,
and the monotonous bass of these latter sounded through the music, like
life behind the murmur of pleasure, if you will. The Countess had a not
unfeminine weakness for champagne, and old Mr. Bonner’s cellar was well
and choicely stocked. But was this enjoyment to the Countess?—this
dreary station in the background! “May I emerge?” she as much as
implored Providence.

The petition was infinitely tender. She thought she might, or it may be
that nature was strong, and she could not restrain herself.

Taking wine with Sir John, she said:

“This bowing! Do you know how amusing it is deemed by us Portuguese?
Why not embrace? as the dear Queen used to say to me.”

“I am decidedly of Her Majesty’s opinion,” observed Sir John, with
emphasis, and the Countess drew back into a mingled laugh and blush.

Her fiendish persecutor gave two or three nods. “And you know the
Queen!” she said.

She had to repeat the remark: whereupon the Countess murmured,
“Intimately.”

“Ah, we have lost a staunch old Tory in Sir Abraham,” said the lady,
performing lamentation.

What did it mean? Could design lodge in that empty-looking head with
its crisp curls, button nose, and diminishing simper? Was this pic-nic
to be made as terrible to the Countess by her putative father as the
dinner had been by the great Mel? The deep, hard, level look of Juliana
met the Countess’s smile from time to time, and like flimsy light horse
before a solid array of infantry, the Countess fell back, only to be
worried afresh by her perfectly unwitting tormentor.

“His last days?—without pain? Oh, I hope so!” came after a lapse of
general talk.

“Aren’t we getting a little funereal, Mrs. Perkins?” Lady Jocelyn
asked, and then rallied her neighbours.

Miss Carrington looked at her vexedly, for the fiendish Perkins was
checked, and the Countess in alarm, about to commit herself, was a
pleasant sight to Miss Carrington.

“The worst of these indiscriminate meetings is that there is no
conversation,” whispered the Countess, thanking Providence for the
relief.

Just then she saw Juliana bend her brows at another person. This was
George Uplift, who shook his head, and indicated a shrewd-eyed, thin,
middle-aged man, of a lawyer-like cast; and then Juliana nodded, and
George Uplift touched his arm, and glanced hurriedly behind for
champagne. The Countess’s eyes dwelt on the timid young squire most
affectionately. You never saw a fortress more unprepared for dread
assault.

“Hem!” was heard, terrific. But the proper pause had evidently not yet
come, and now to prevent it the Countess strained her energies and
tasked her genius intensely. Have you an idea of the difficulty of
keeping up the ball among a host of ill-assorted, stupid country
people, who have no open topics, and can talk of nothing continuously
but scandal of their neighbours, and who, moreover, feel they are not
up to the people they are mixing with? Darting upon Seymour Jocelyn,
the Countess asked touchingly for news of the partridges. It was like
the unlocking of a machine. Seymour was not blythe in his reply, but he
was loud and forcible; and when he came to the statistics—oh, then you
would have admired the Countess!—for comparisons ensued, braces were
enumerated, numbers given were contested, and the shooting of this one
jeered at, and another’s sure mark respectfully admitted. And how lay
the coveys? And what about the damage done by last winter’s floods? And
was there good hope of the pheasants? Outside this latter the Countess
hovered. Twice the awful “Hem!” was heard. She fought on. She kept them
at it. If it flagged she wished to know this or that, and finally
thought that, really, she should like herself to try one shot. The
women had previously been left behind. This brought in the women. Lady
Jocelyn proposed a female expedition for the morrow.

“I believe I used to be something of a shot, formerly,” she said.

“You peppered old Tom once, my lady,” remarked Andrew, and her ladyship
laughed, and that foolish Andrew told the story, and the Countess, to
revive her subject, had to say: “May I be enrolled to shoot?” though
she detested and shrank from fire-arms.

“Here are two!” said the hearty presiding dame. “Ladies, apply
immediately to have your names put down.”

The possibility of an expedition of ladies now struck Seymour vividly,
and said he: “I’ll be secretary”; and began applying to the ladies for
permission to put down their names. Many declined, with brevity,
muttering, either aloud or to themselves, “unwomanly”; varied by
“unladylike”: some confessed cowardice; some a horror of the noise
close to their ears; and there was the plea of nerves. But the names of
half-a-dozen ladies were collected, and then followed much laughter,
and musical hubbub, and delicate banter. So the ladies and gentlemen
fell one and all into the partridge pit dug for them by the Countess:
and that horrible “Hem!” equal in force and terror to the roar of
artillery preceding the charge of ten thousand dragoons, was
silenced—the pit appeared impassable. Did the Countess crow over her
advantage? Mark her: the lady’s face is entirely given up to
partridges. “English sports are so much envied abroad,” she says: but
what she dreads is a reflection, for that leads off from the point. A
portion of her mind she keeps to combat them in Lady Jocelyn and others
who have the tendency: the rest she divides between internal-prayers
for succour, and casting about for another popular subject to follow
partridges. Now, mere talent, as critics say when they are lighting
candles round a genius, mere talent would have hit upon pheasants as
the natural sequitur, and then diverged to sports—a great theme, for it
ensures a chorus of sneers at foreigners, and so on probably to a
discussion of birds and beasts best adapted to enrapture the palate of
man. Stories may succeed, but they are doubtful, and not to be trusted,
coming after cookery. After an exciting subject which has made the
general tongue to wag, and just enough heated the brain to cause it to
cry out for spiced food—then start your story: taking care that it be
mild; for one too marvellous stops the tide, the sense of climax being
strongly implanted in all bosoms. So the Countess told an anecdote—one
of Mel’s. Mr. George Uplift was quite familiar with it, and knew of one
passage that would have abashed him to relate “before ladies.” The
sylph-like ease with which the Countess floated over this foul abysm
was miraculous. Mr. George screwed his eye-lids queerly, and closed his
jaws with a report, completely beaten. The anecdote was of the
character of an apologue, and pertained to game. This was, as it
happened, a misfortune; for Mr. Raikes had felt himself left behind by
the subject; and the stuff that was in this young man being naturally
ebullient, he lay by to trip it, and take a lead. His remarks brought
on him a shrewd cut from the Countess, which made matters worse; for a
pun may also breed puns, as doth an anecdote. The Countess’s stroke was
so neat and perfect that it was something for the gentlemen to think
over; and to punish her for giving way to her cleverness and to petty
vexation, “Hem!” sounded once more, and then: “May I ask you if the
present Baronet is in England?”

Now Lady Jocelyn perceived that some attack was directed against her
guest. She allowed the Countess to answer:

“The eldest was drowned in the Lisbon waters.”

And then said: “But who is it that persists in serving up the funeral
baked meats to us?”

Mrs. Shorne spoke for her neighbour: “Mr. Farnley’s cousin was the
steward of Sir Abraham Harrington’s estates.”

The Countess held up her head boldly. There is a courageous exaltation
of the nerves known to heroes and great generals in action when they
feel sure that resources within themselves will spring up to the
emergency, and that over simple mortals success is positive.

“I had a great respect for Sir Abraham,” Mr. Farnley explained, “very
great. I heard that this lady” (bowing to the Countess) “was his
daughter.”

Lady Jocelyn’s face wore an angry look, and Mrs. Shorne gave her the
shade of a shrug and an expression implying, “I didn’t!”

Evan was talking to Miss Jenny Graine at the moment rather earnestly.
With a rapid glance at him, to see that his ears were closed, the
Countess breathed:

“Not the elder branch!—Cadet!”

The sort of noisy silence produced by half-a-dozen people respirating
deeply and moving in their seats was heard. The Countess watched Mr.
Farnley’s mystified look, and whispered to Sir John: “Est-ce qu’il
comprenne le Français, lui?”

It was the final feather-like touch to her triumph. She saw safety and
a clear escape, and much joyful gain, and the pleasure of relating her
sufferings in days to come. This vista was before her when, harsh as an
execution bell, telling her that she had vanquished man, but that
Providence opposed her, “Mrs. Melchisedec Harrington!” was announced to
Lady Jocelyn.

Perfect stillness reigned immediately, as if the pic-nic had heard its
doom.

“Oh! I will go to her,” said her ladyship, whose first thought was to
spare the family. “Andrew, come and give me your arm.”

But when she rose Mrs. Mel was no more than the length of an arm from
her elbow.

In the midst of the horrible anguish she was enduring, the Countess
could not help criticizing her mother’s curtsey to Lady Jocelyn. Fine,
but a shade too humble. Still it was fine; all might not yet be lost.

“Mama!” she softly exclaimed, and thanked heaven that she had not
denied her parent.

Mrs. Mel did not notice her or any of her children. There was in her
bosom a terrible determination to cast a devil out of the one she best
loved. For this purpose, heedless of all pain to be given, or of
impropriety, she had come to speak publicly, and disgrace and
humiliate, that she might save him from the devils that had ruined his
father.

“My lady,” said the terrible woman, thanking her in reply to an
invitation that she should be seated, “I have come for my son. I hear
he has been playing the lord in your house, my lady. I humbly thank
your ladyship for your kindness to him, but he is nothing more than a
tailor’s son, and is bound a tailor himself that his father may be
called an honest man. I am come to take him away.”

Mrs. Mel seemed to speak without much effort, though the pale flush of
her cheeks showed that she felt what she was doing. Juliana was pale as
death, watching Rose. Intensely bright with the gem-like light of her
gallant spirit, Rose’s eyes fixed on Evan. He met them. The words of
Ruth passed through his heart. But the Countess, who had given Rose to
Evan, and the Duke to Caroline, where was her supporter? The Duke was
entertaining Caroline with no less dexterity, and Rose’s eyes said to
Evan: “Feel no shame that I do not feel!” but the Countess stood alone.
It is ever thus with genius! to quote the numerous illustrious authors
who have written of it.

What mattered it now that in the dead hush Lady Jocelyn should assure
her mother that she had been misinformed, and that Mrs. Mel was
presently quieted, and made to sit with others before the fruits and
wines? All eyes were hateful—the very thought of Providence confused
her brain. Almost reduced to imbecility, the Countess imagined, as a
reality, that Sir Abraham had borne with her till her public
announcement of relationship, and that then the outraged ghost would no
longer be restrained, and had struck this blow.

The crushed pic-nic tried to get a little air, and made attempts at
conversation. Mrs. Mel sat upon the company with the weight of all
tailordom.

And now a messenger came for Harry. Everybody was so zealously employed
in the struggle to appear comfortable under Mrs. Mel, that his
departure was hardly observed. The general feeling for Evan and his
sisters, by their superiors in rank, was one of kindly pity. Laxley,
however, did not behave well. He put up his glass and scrutinized Mrs.
Mel, and then examined Evan, and Rose thought that in his interchange
of glances with any one there was a lurking revival of the scene gone
by. She signalled with her eyebrows for Drummond to correct him, but
Drummond had another occupation. Andrew made the diversion. He
whispered to his neighbour, and the whisper went round, and the laugh;
and Mr. Raikes grew extremely uneasy in his seat, and betrayed an
extraordinary alarm. But he also was soon relieved. A messenger had
come from Harry to Mrs. Evremonde, bearing a slip of paper. This the
lady glanced at, and handed it to Drummond. A straggling pencil had
traced these words:

“Just running by S.W. gates—saw the Captain coming in—couldn’t stop to
stop him—tremendous hurry—important. Harry J.”

Drummond sent the paper to Lady Jocelyn. After her perusal of it a
scout was despatched to the summit of Olympus, and his report
proclaimed the advance in the direction of the Bull-dogs of a smart
little figure of a man in white hat and white trousers, who kept
flicking his legs with a cane.

Mrs. Evremonde rose and conferred with her ladyship an instant, and
then Drummond took her arm quietly, and passed round Olympus to the
East, and Lady Jocelyn broke up the sitting.

Juliana saw Rose go up to Evan, and make him introduce her to his
mother. She turned lividly white, and went to a corner of the park by
herself, and cried bitterly.

Lady Jocelyn, Sir Franks, and Sir John, remained by the tables, but
before the guests were out of ear-shot, the individual signalled from
Olympus presented himself.

“There are times when one can’t see what else to do but to lie,” said
her ladyship to Sir Franks, “and when we do lie the only way is to lie
intrepidly.”

Turning from her perplexed husband, she exclaimed:

“Ah! Lawson?”

Captain Evremonde lifted his hat, declining an intimacy.

“Where is my wife, madam?”

“Have you just come from the Arctic Regions?”

“I have come for my wife, madam!”

His unsettled grey eyes wandered restlessly on Lady Jocelyn’s face. The
Countess standing near the Duke, felt some pity for the wife of that
cropped-headed, tight-skinned lunatic at large, but deeper was the
Countess’s pity for Lady Jocelyn, in thinking of the account she would
have to render on the Day of Judgement, when she heard her ladyship
reply—

“Evelyn is not here.”

Captain Evremonde bowed profoundly, trailing his broad white hat along
the sward.

“Do me the favour to read this, madam,” he said, and handed a letter to
her.

Lady Jocelyn raised her brows as she gathered the contents of the
letter.

“Ferdinand’s handwriting!” she exclaimed.

“I accuse no one, madam,—I make no accusation. I have every respect for
you, madam,—you have my esteem. I am sorry to intrude, madam, an
intrusion is regretted. My wife runs away from her bed, madam, and I
have the law, madam, the law is with the husband. No force!” He lashed
his cane sharply against his white legs. “The law, madam. No brute
force!” His cane made a furious whirl, cracking again on his legs, as
he reiterated, “The law!”

“Does the law advise you to strike at a tangent all over the country in
search for her?” inquired Lady Jocelyn.

Captain Evremonde became ten times more voluble and excited.

Mrs. Mel was heard by the Countess to say: “Her ladyship does not know
how to treat madmen.”

Nor did Sir Franks and Sir John. They began expostulating with him.

“A madman gets madder when you talk reason to him,” said Mrs. Mel.

And now the Countess stepped forward to Lady Jocelyn, and hoped she
would not be thought impertinent in offering her opinion as to how this
frantic person should be treated. The case indeed looked urgent. Many
gentlemen considered themselves bound to approach and be ready in case
of need. Presently the Countess passed between Sir Franks and Sir John,
and with her hand put up, as if she feared the furious cane, said:

“You will not strike me?”

“Strike a lady, madam?” The cane and hat were simultaneously lowered.

“Lady Jocelyn permits me to fetch for you a gentleman of the law. Or
will you accompany me to him?”

In a moment, Captain Evremonde’s manners were subdued and civilized,
and in perfectly sane speech he thanked the Countess and offered her
his arm. The Countess smilingly waved back Sir John, who motioned to
attend on her, and away she went with the Captain, with all the glow of
a woman who feels that she is heaping coals of fire on the heads of her
enemies.

Was she not admired now?

“Upon my honour,” said Lady Jocelyn, “they are a remarkable family,”
meaning the Harringtons.

What farther she thought she did not say, but she was a woman who
looked to natural gifts more than the gifts of accidents; and Evan’s
chance stood high with her then. So the battle of the Bull-dogs was
fought, and cruelly as the Countess had been assailed and wounded, she
gained a victory; yea, though Demogorgon, aided by the vindictive ghost
of Sir Abraham, took tangible shape in the ranks opposed to her. True,
Lady Jocelyn, forgetting her own recent intrepidity, condemned her as a
liar; but the fruits of the Countess’s victory were plentiful. Drummond
Forth, fearful perhaps of exciting unjust suspicions in the mind of
Captain Evremonde, disappeared altogether. Harry was in a mess which
threw him almost upon Evan’s mercy, as will be related. And, lastly,
Ferdinand Laxley, that insufferable young aristocrat, was thus spoken
to by Lady Jocelyn.

“This letter addressed to Lawson, telling him that his wife is here, is
in your handwriting, Ferdinand. I don’t say you wrote it—I don’t think
you could have written it. But, to tell you the truth, I have an
unpleasant impression about it, and I think we had better shake hands
and not see each other for some time.”

Laxley, after one denial of his guilt, disdained to repeat it. He met
her ladyship’s hand haughtily, and, bowing to Sir Franks, turned on his
heel.

So, then, in glorious complete victory, the battle of the Bull-dogs
ended!

Of the close of the pic-nic more remains to be told.

For the present I pause, in observance of those rules which demand that
after an exhibition of consummate deeds, time be given to the spectator
to digest what has passed before him.




CHAPTER XXXII.
IN WHICH EVAN’S LIGHT BEGINS TO TWINKLE AGAIN


The dowagers were now firmly planted on Olympus. Along the grass lay
the warm strong colours of the evening sun, reddening the pine-stems
and yellowing the idle aspen-leaves. For a moment it had hung in doubt
whether the pic-nic could survive the two rude shocks it had received.
Happily the youthful element was large, and when the band, refreshed by
chicken and sherry, threw off half-a-dozen bars of one of those
irresistible waltzes that first catch the ear, and then curl round the
heart, till on a sudden they invade and will have the legs, a rush up
Parnassus was seen, and there were shouts and laughter and commotion,
as over other great fields of battle the corn will wave gaily and mark
the reestablishment of nature’s reign.

How fair the sight! Approach the twirling couples. They talk as they
whirl. “Fancy the run-away tailor!” is the male’s remark, and he
expects to be admired for it, and is.

“That make-up Countess—his sister, you know—didn’t you see her? she
turned green,” says Creation’s second effort, almost occupying the
place of a rib.

“Isn’t there a run-away wife, too?”

“Now, you mustn’t be naughty!”

They laugh and flatter one another. The power to give and take flattery
to any amount is the rare treasure of youth.

Undoubtedly they are a poetical picture; but some poetical pictures
talk dreary prose; so we will retire.

Now, while the dancers carried on their business, and distance lent
them enchantment, Rose stood by Juliana, near an alder which hid them
from the rest.

“I don’t accuse you,” she was saying; “but who could have done this but
you? Ah, Juley! you will never get what you want if you plot for it. I
thought once you cared for Evan. If he had loved you, would I not have
done all that I could for you both? I pardon you with all my heart.”

“Keep your pardon!” was the angry answer. “I have done more for you,
Rose. He is an adventurer, and I have tried to open your eyes and make
you respect your family. You may accuse me of what you like, I have my
conscience.”

“And the friendship of the Countess,” added Rose.

Juliana’s figure shook as if she had been stung.

“Go and be happy—don’t stay here and taunt me,” she said, with a
ghastly look. “I suppose he can lie like his sister, and has told you
all sorts of tales.”

“Not a word—not a word!” cried Rose. “Do you think my lover could tell
a lie?”

The superb assumption of the girl, and the true portrait of Evan’s
character which it flashed upon Juliana, were to the latter such
intense pain, that she turned like one on the rack, exclaiming:

“You think so much of him? You are so proud of him? Then, yes! I love
him too, ugly, beastly as I am to look at! Oh, I know what you think! I
loved him from the first, and I knew all about him, and spared him
pain. I did not wait for him to fall from a horse. I watched every
chance of his being exposed. I let them imagine he cared for me.
Drummond would have told what he knew long before—only he knew there
would not be much harm in a tradesman’s son marrying me. And I have
played into your hands, and now you taunt me!”

Rose remembered her fretful unkindness to Evan on the subject of his
birth, when her feelings toward him were less warm. Dwelling on that
alone, she put her arms round Juliana’s stiffening figure, and said: “I
dare say I am much more selfish than you. Forgive me, dear.”

Staring at her, Juliana replied, “Now you are acting.”

“No,” said Rose, with a little effort to fondle her; “I only feel that
I love you better for loving him.”

Generous as her words sounded, and were, Juliana intuitively struck to
the root of them, which was comfortless. For how calm in its fortune,
how strong in its love, must Rose’s heart be, when she could speak in
this unwonted way!

“Go, and leave me, pray,” she said.

Rose kissed her burning cheek. “I will do as you wish, dear. Try and
know me better, and be sister Juley as you used to be. I know I am
thoughtless, and horribly vain and disagreeable sometimes. Do forgive
me. I will love you truly.”

Half melting, Juliana pressed her hand.

“We are friends?” said Rose. “Good-bye”; and her countenance lighted,
and she moved away, so changed by her happiness! Juliana was jealous of
a love strong as she deemed her own to overcome obstacles. She called
to her: “Rose! Rose, you will not take advantage of what I have told
you, and repeat it to any one?”

Instantly Rose turned with a glance of full contempt over her shoulder.

“To whom?” she asked.

“To any one.”

“To him? He would not love me long if I did!”

Juliana burst into fresh tears, but Rose walked into the sunbeams and
the circle of the music.

Mounting Olympus, she inquired whether Ferdinand was within hail, as
they were pledged to dance the first dance together. A few hints were
given, and then Rose learnt that Ferdinand had been dismissed.

“And where is he?” she cried with her accustomed impetuosity. “Mama!—of
course you did not accuse him—but, Mama! could you possibly let him go
with the suspicion that you thought him guilty of writing an anonymous
letter?”

“Not at all,” Lady Jocelyn replied. “Only the handwriting was so
extremely like, and he was the only person who knew the address and the
circumstances, and who could have a motive—though I don’t quite see
what it is—I thought it as well to part for a time.”

“But that’s sophistry!” said Rose. “You accuse or you exonerate. Nobody
can be half guilty. If you do not hold him innocent you are unjust!”
Lady Jocelyn rejoined: “Yes? It’s singular what a stock of axioms young
people have handy for their occasions.”

Rose loudly announced that she would right this matter.

“I can’t think where Rose gets her passion for hot water,” said her
mother, as Rose ran down the ledge.

Two or three young gentlemen tried to engage her for a dance. She gave
them plenty of promises, and hurried on till she met Evan, and, almost
out of breath, told him the shameful injustice that had been done to
her friend.

“Mama is such an Epicurean! I really think she is worse than Papa. This
disgraceful letter looks like Ferdinand’s writing, and she tells him
so; and, Evan! will you believe that instead of being certain it’s
impossible any gentleman could do such a thing, she tells Ferdinand she
shall feel more comfortable if she doesn’t see him for some time? Poor
Ferdinand! He has had so much to bear!”

Too sure of his darling to be envious now of any man she pitied, Evan
said, “I would forfeit my hand on his innocence!”

“And so would I,” echoed Rose. “Come to him with me, dear. Or no,” she
added, with a little womanly discretion, “perhaps it would not be so
well—you’re not very much cast down by what happened at dinner?”

“My darling! I think of you.”

“Of me, dear? Concealment is never of any service. What there is to be
known people may as well know at once. They’ll gossip for a month, and
then forget it. Your mother is dreadfully outspoken, certainly; but she
has better manners than many ladies—I mean people in a position: you
understand me? But suppose, dear, this had happened, and I had said
nothing to Mama, and then we had to confess? Ah, you’ll find I’m wiser
than you imagine, Mr. Evan.”

“Haven’t I submitted to somebody’s lead?”

“Yes, but with a sort of ‘under protest.’ I saw it by the mouth. Not
quite natural. You have been moody ever since—just a little. I suppose
it’s our manly pride. But I’m losing time. Will you promise me not to
brood over that occurrence? Think of me. Think everything of me. I am
yours; and, dearest, if I love you, need you care what anybody else
thinks? We will soon change their opinion.”

“I care so little,” said Evan, somewhat untruthfully, “that till you
return I shall go and sit with my mother.”

“Oh, she has gone. She made her dear old antiquated curtsey to Mama and
the company. ‘If my son has not been guilty of deception, I will leave
him to your good pleasure, my lady.’ That’s what she said. Mama likes
her, I know. But I wish she didn’t mouth her words so precisely: it
reminds me of—” the Countess, Rose checked herself from saying.
“Good-bye. Thank heaven! the worst has happened. Do you know what I
should do if I were you, and felt at all distressed? I should keep
repeating,” Rose looked archly and deeply up under his eyelids, “‘I am
the son of a tradesman, and Rose loves me,’ over and over, and then, if
you feel ashamed, what is it of?”

She nodded adieu, laughing at her own idea of her great worth; an idea
very firmly fixed in her fair bosom, notwithstanding. Mrs. Melville
said of her, “I used to think she had pride.” Lady Jocelyn answered,
“So she has. The misfortune is that it has taken the wrong turning.”

Evan watched the figure that was to him as that of an angel—no less!
She spoke so frankly to them as she passed: or here and there went on
with a light laugh. It seemed an act of graciousness that she should
open her mouth to one! And, indeed, by virtue of a pride which raised
her to the level of what she thought it well to do, Rose was veritably
on higher ground than any present. She no longer envied her friend
Jenny, who, emerging from the shades, allured by the waltz, dislinked
herself from William’s arm, and whispered exclamations of sorrow at the
scene created by Mr. Harrington’s mother. Rose patted her hand, and
said: “Thank you, Jenny dear but don’t be sorry. I’m glad. It prevents
a number of private explanations.”

“Still, dear!” Jenny suggested.

“Oh! of course, I should like to lay my whip across the shoulders of
the person who arranged the conspiracy,” said Rose. “And afterwards I
don’t mind returning thanks to him, or her, or them.”

William cried out, “I’m always on your side, Rose.”

“And I’ll be Jenny’s bridesmaid,” rejoined Rose, stepping blithely away
from them.

Evan debated whither to turn when Rose was lost to his eyes. He had no
heart for dancing. Presently a servant approached, and said that Mr.
Harry particularly desired to see him. From Harry’s looks at table,
Evan judged that the interview was not likely to be amicable. He asked
the direction he was to take, and setting out with long strides, came
in sight of Raikes, who walked in gloom, and was evidently labouring
under one of his mountains of melancholy. He affected to be quite out
of the world; but finding that Evan took the hint in his usual prosy
manner, was reduced to call after him, and finally to run and catch
him.

“Haven’t you one single spark of curiosity?” he began.

“What about?” said Evan.

“Why, about my amazing luck! You haven’t asked a question. A matter of
course.”

Evan complimented him by asking a question: saying that Jack’s luck
certainly was wonderful.

“Wonderful, you call it,” said Jack, witheringly. “And what’s more
wonderful is, that I’d give up all for quiet quarters in the Green
Dragon. I knew I was prophetic. I knew I should regret that peaceful
hostelry. Diocletian, if you like. I beg you to listen. I can’t walk so
fast without danger.”

“Well, speak out, man. What’s the matter with you?” cried Evan,
impatiently.

Jack shook his head: “I see a total absence of sympathy,” he remarked.
“I can’t.”

“Then stand out of the way.”

Jack let him pass, exclaiming, with cold irony, “I will pay homage to a
loftier Nine!”

Mr. Raikes could not in his soul imagine that Evan was really so little
inquisitive concerning a business of such importance as the trouble
that possessed him. He watched his friend striding off, incredulously,
and then commenced running in pursuit.

“Harrington, I give in; I surrender; you reduce me to prose. Thy nine
have conquered my nine!—pardon me, old fellow. I’m immensely upset.
This is the first day in my life that I ever felt what indigestion is.
Egad, I’ve got something to derange the best digestion going!

“Look here, Harrington. What happened to you today, I declare I think
nothing of. You owe me your assistance, you do, indeed; for if it
hadn’t been for the fearful fascinations of your sister—that divine
Countess—I should have been engaged to somebody by this time, and
profited by the opportunity held out to me, and which is now gone. I’m
disgraced. I’m known. And the worst of it is, I must face people. I
daren’t turn tail. Did you ever hear of such a dilemma?”

“Ay,” quoth Evan, “what is it?”

Raikes turned pale. “Then you haven’t heard of it?” “Not a word.”

“Then it’s all for me to tell. I called on Messrs. Grist. I dined at
the Aurora afterwards. Depend upon it, Harrington, we’re led by a star.
I mean, fellows with anything in them are. I recognized our Fallowfield
host, and thinking to draw him out, I told our mutual histories. Next
day I went to these Messrs. Grist. They proposed the membership for
Fallowfield, five hundred a year, and the loan of a curricle, on
condition. It’s singular, Harrington; before anybody knew of the
condition I didn’t care about it a bit. It seemed to me childish. Who
would think of minding wearing a tin plate? But now!—the sufferings of
Orestes—what are they to mine? He wasn’t tied to his Furies. They did
hover a little above him; but as for me, I’m scorched; and I mustn’t
say where: my mouth is locked; the social laws which forbid the
employment of obsolete words arrest my exclamations of despair. What do
you advise?”

Evan stared a moment at the wretched object, whose dream of meeting a
beneficent old gentleman had brought him to be the sport of a cynical
farceur. He had shivers on his own account, seeing something of himself
magnified, and he loathed the fellow, only to feel more acutely what a
stigma may be.

“It’s a case I can’t advise in,” he said, as gently as he could. “I
should be off the grounds in a hurry.”

“And then I’m where I was before I met the horrid old brute!” Raikes
moaned.

“I told him over a pint of port—and noble stuff is that Aurora port!—I
told him—I amused him till he was on the point of bursting—I told him I
was such a gentleman as the world hadn’t seen—minus money. So he
determined to launch me. He said I should lead the life of such a
gentleman as the world had not yet seen—on that simple condition, which
appeared to me childish, a senile whim; rather an indulgence of his.”

Evan listened to the tribulations of his friend as he would to those of
a doll—the sport of some experimental child. By this time he knew
something of old Tom Cogglesby, and was not astonished that he should
have chosen John Raikes to play one of his farces on. Jack turned off
abruptly the moment he saw they were nearing human figures, but soon
returned to Evan’s side, as if for protection.

“Hoy! Harrington!” shouted Harry, beckoning to him. “Come, make haste!
I’m in a deuce of a mess.”

The two Wheedles—Susan and Polly—were standing in front of him, and
after his call to Evan, he turned to continue some exhortation or
appeal to the common sense of women, largely indulged in by young men
when the mischief is done.

“Harrington, do speak to her. She looks upon you as a sort of parson. I
can’t make her believe I didn’t send for her. Of course, she knows I’m
fond of her. My dear fellow,” he whispered, “I shall be ruined if my
grandmother hears of it. Get her away, please. Promise anything.”

Evan took her hand and asked for the child.

“Quite well, sir,” faltered Susan.

“You should not have come here.”

Susan stared, and commenced whimpering: “Didn’t you wish it, sir?”

“Oh, she’s always thinking of being made a lady of,” cried Polly. “As
if Mr. Harry was going to do that. It wants a gentleman to do that.”

“The carriage came for me, sir, in the afternoon,” said Susan,
plaintively, “with your compliments, and would I come. I thought—”

“What carriage?” asked Evan.

Raikes, who was ogling Polly, interposed grandly, “Mine!”

“And you sent in my name for this girl to come here?” Evan turned
wrathfully on him.

“My dear Harrington, when you hit you knock down. The wise require but
one dose of experience. The Countess wished it, and I did dispatch.”

“The Countess!” Harry exclaimed; “Jove! do you mean to say that the
Countess—”

“De Saldar,” added Jack. “In Britain none were worthy found.”

Harry gave a long whistle.

“Leave at once,” said Evan to Susan. “Whatever you may want send to me
for. And when you think you can meet your parents, I will take you to
them. Remember that is what you must do.”

“Make her give up that stupidness of hers, about being made a lady of,
Mr. Harrington,” said the inveterate Polly.

Susan here fell a-weeping.

“I would go, sir,” she said. “I’m sure I would obey you: but I can’t. I
can’t go back to the inn. They’re beginning to talk about me,
because—because I can’t—can’t pay them, and I’m ashamed.”

Evan looked at Harry.

“I forgot,” the latter mumbled, but his face was crimson. He put his
hands in his pockets. “Do you happen to have a note or so?” he asked.

Evan took him aside and gave him what he had; and this amount, without
inspection or reserve, Harry offered to Susan. She dashed his hand
impetuously from her sight.

“There, give it to me,” said Polly. “Oh, Mr. Harry! what a young man
you are!”

Whether from the rebuff, or the reproach, or old feelings reviving,
Harry was moved to go forward, and lay his hand on Susan’s shoulder and
mutter something in her ear that softened her.

Polly thrust the notes into her bosom, and with a toss of her nose, as
who should say, “Here’s nonsense they’re at again,” tapped Susan on the
other shoulder, and said imperiously: “Come, Miss!”

Hurrying out a dozen sentences in one, Harry ended by suddenly kissing
Susan’s cheek, and then Polly bore her away; and Harry, with great
solemnity, said to Evan:

“’Pon my honour, I think I ought to! I declare I think I love that
girl. What’s one’s family? Why shouldn’t you button to the one that
just suits you? That girl, when she’s dressed, and in good trim, by
Jove! nobody’d know her from a born lady. And as for grammar, I’d soon
teach her that.”

Harry began to whistle: a sign in him that he was thinking his hardest.

“I confess to being considerably impressed by the maid Wheedle,” said
Raikes.

“Would you throw yourself away on her?” Evan inquired.

Apparently forgetting how he stood, Mr. Raikes replied:

“You ask, perhaps, a little too much of me. One owes consideration to
one’s position. In the world’s eyes a matrimonial slip outweighs a
peccadillo. No. To much the maid might wheedle me, but to Hymen! She’s
decidedly fresh and pert—the most delicious little fat lips and cocky
nose; but cease we to dwell on her, or of us two, to! one will be
undone.”

Harry burst into a laugh: “Is this the T.P. for Fallowfield?”

“M.P. I think you mean,” quoth Raikes, serenely; but a curious glance
being directed on him, and pursuing him pertinaciously, it was as if
the pediment of the lofty monument he topped were smitten with
violence. He stammered an excuse, and retreated somewhat as it is the
fashion to do from the presence of royalty, followed by Harry’s roar of
laughter, in which Evan cruelly joined.

“Gracious powers!” exclaimed the victim of ambition, “I’m laughed at by
the son of a tailor!” and he edged once more into the shade of trees.

It was a strange sight for Harry’s relatives to see him arm-in-arm with
the man he should have been kicking, challenging, denouncing, or
whatever the code prescribes: to see him talking to this young man
earnestly, clinging to him affectionately, and when he separated from
him, heartily wringing his hand. Well might they think that there was
something extraordinary in these Harringtons. Convicted of Tailordom,
these Harringtons appeared to shine with double lustre. How was it?
They were at a loss to say. They certainly could say that the Countess
was egregiously affected and vulgar; but who could be altogether
complacent and sincere that had to fight so hard a fight? In this
struggle with society I see one of the instances where success is
entirely to be honoured and remains a proof of merit. For however
boldly antagonism may storm the ranks of society, it will certainly be
repelled, whereas affinity cannot be resisted; and they who, against
obstacles of birth, claim and keep their position among the educated
and refined, have that affinity. It is, on the whole, rare, so that
society is not often invaded. I think it will have to front Jack Cade
again before another Old Mel and his progeny shall appear. You refuse
to believe in Old Mel? You know not nature’s cunning.

Mrs. Shorne, Mrs. Melville, Miss Carrington, and many of the guests who
observed Evan moving from place to place, after the exposure, as they
called it, were amazed at his audacity. There seemed such a quietly
superb air about him. He would not look out of his element; and this,
knowing what they knew, was his offence. He deserved some commendation
for still holding up his head, but it was love and Rose who kept the
fires of his heart alive.

The sun had sunk. The figures on the summit of Parnassus were seen
bobbing in happy placidity against the twilight sky. The sun had sunk,
and many of Mr. Raikes’ best things were unspoken. Wandering about in
his gloom, he heard a feminine voice:

“Yes, I will trust you.”

“You will not repent it,” was answered.

Recognizing the Duke, Mr. Raikes cleared his throat.

“A-hem, your Grace! This is how the days should pass. I think we should
diurnally station a good London band on high, and play his Majesty to
bed—the sun. My opinion is, it would improve the crops. I’m not, as
yet, a landed proprietor—”

The Duke stepped aside with him, and Raikes addressed no one for the
next twenty minutes. When he next came forth Parnassus was half
deserted. It was known that old Mrs. Bonner had been taken with a
dangerous attack, and under this third blow the pic-nic succumbed.
Simultaneously with the messenger that brought the news to Lady
Jocelyn, one approached Evan, and informed him that the Countess de
Saldar urgently entreated him to come to the house without delay. He
also wished to speak a few words to her, and stepped forward briskly.
He had no prophetic intimations of the change this interview would
bring upon him.




CHAPTER XXXIII.
THE HERO TAKES HIS RANK IN THE ORCHESTRA


The Countess was not in her dressing-room when Evan presented himself.
She was in attendance on Mrs. Bonner, Conning said; and the primness of
Conning was a thing to have been noticed by any one save a dreamy youth
in love. Conning remained in the room, keeping distinctly aloof. Her
duties absorbed her, but a presiding thought mechanically jerked back
her head from time to time: being the mute form of, “Well, I never!” in
Conning’s rank of life and intellectual capacity. Evan remained quite
still in a chair, and Conning was certainly a number of paces beyond
suspicion, when the Countess appeared, and hurling at the maid one of
those feminine looks which contain huge quartos of meaning, vented the
cold query:

“Pray, why did you not come to me, as you were commanded?”

“I was not aware, my lady,” Conning drew up to reply, and performed
with her eyes a lofty rejection of the volume cast at her, and a threat
of several for offensive operations, if need were.

The Countess spoke nearer to what she was implying “You know I object
to this: it is not the first time.”

“Would your ladyship please to say what your ladyship means?”

In return for this insolent challenge to throw off the mask, the
Countess felt justified in punishing her by being explicit. “Your
irregularities are not of yesterday,” she said, kindly making use of a
word of double signification still.

“Thank you, my lady.” Conning accepted the word in its blackest
meaning. “I am obliged to you. If your ladyship is to be believed, my
character is not worth much. But I can make distinctions, my lady.”

Something very like an altercation was continued in a sharp, brief
undertone; and then Evan, waking up to the affairs of the hour, heard
Conning say:

“I shall not ask your ladyship to give me a character.”

The Countess answering with pathos: “It would, indeed, be to give you
one.”

He was astonished that the Countess should burst into tears when
Conning had departed, and yet more so that his effort to console her
should bring a bolt of wrath upon himself.

“Now, Evan, now see what you have done for us—do, and rejoice at it.
The very menials insult us. You heard what that creature said? She can
make distinctions. Oh! I could beat her. They know it: all the servants
know it: I can see it in their faces. I feel it when I pass them. The
insolent wretches treat us as impostors; and this Conning—to defy me!
Oh! it comes of my devotion to you. I am properly chastized. I passed
Rose’s maid on the stairs, and her reverence was barely perceptible.”

Evan murmured that he was very sorry, adding, foolishly: “Do you really
care, Louisa, for what servants think and say?”

The Countess sighed deeply: “Oh! you are too thickskinned! Your mother
from top to toe! It is too dreadful! What have I done to deserve it?
Oh, Evan, Evan!”

Her head dropped in her lap. There was something ludicrous to Evan in
this excess of grief on account of such a business; but he was
tender-hearted and wrought upon to declare that, whether or not he was
to blame for his mother’s intrusion that afternoon, he was ready to do
what he could to make up to the Countess for her sufferings: whereat
the Countess sighed again: asked him what he possibly could do, and
doubted his willingness to accede to the most trifling request.

“No; I do in verity believe that were I to desire you to do aught for
your own good alone, you would demur, Van.”

He assured her that she was mistaken.

“We shall see,” she said.

“And if once or twice, I have run counter to you, Louisa—”

“Abominable language!” cried the Countess, stopping her ears like a
child. “Do not excruciate me so. You laugh! My goodness! what will you
come to!”

Evan checked his smile, and, taking her hand, said:

“I must tell you; that, on the whole, I see nothing to regret in what
has happened to-day. You may notice a change in the manners of the
servants and some of the country squiresses, but I find none in the
bearing of the real ladies, the true gentlemen, to me.”

“Because the change is too fine for you to perceive it,” interposed the
Countess.

“Rose, then, and her mother, and her father!” Evan cried impetuously.

“As for Lady Jocelyn!” the Countess shrugged:

“And Sir Franks!” her head shook: “and Rose, Rose is, simply
self-willed; a ‘she will’ or ‘she won’t’ sort of little person. No
criterion! Henceforth the world is against us. We have to struggle with
it: it does not rank us of it!”

“Your feeling on the point is so exaggerated, my dear Louisa”, said
Evan, “one can’t bring reason to your ears. The tattle we shall hear we
shall outlive. I care extremely for the good opinion of men, but I
prefer my own; and I do not lose it because my father was in trade.”

“And your own name, Evan Harrington, is on a shop,” the Countess struck
in, and watched him severely from under her brow, glad to mark that he
could still blush.

“Oh, heaven!” she wailed to increase the effect, “on a shop! a brother
of mine!”

“Yes, Louisa. It may not last... I did it—is it not better that a son
should blush, than cast dishonour on his father’s memory?”

“Ridiculous boy-notion!”

“Rose has pardoned it, Louisa—cannot you? I find that the naturally
vulgar and narrow-headed people, and cowards who never forego mean
advantages, are those only who would condemn me and my conduct in
that.”

“And you have joy in your fraction of the world left to you!” exclaimed
his female-elder.

Changeing her manner to a winning softness, she said:

“Let me also belong to the very small party! You have been really
romantic, and most generous and noble; only the shop smells! But, never
mind, promise me you will not enter it.”

“I hope not,” said Evan.

“You do hope that you will not officiate? Oh, Evan the eternal
contemplation of gentlemen’s legs! think of that! Think of yourself
sculptured in that attitude!” Innumerable little prickles and stings
shot over Evan’s skin.

“There—there, Louisa!” he said, impatiently; “spare your ridicule. We
go to London to-morrow, and when there I expect to hear that I have an
appointment, and that this engagement is over.” He rose and walked up
and down the room.

“I shall not be prepared to go to-morrow,” remarked the Countess,
drawing her figure up stiffly.

“Oh! well, if you can stay, Andrew will take charge of you, I dare
say.”

“No, my dear, Andrew will not—a nonentity cannot—you must.”

“Impossible, Louisa,” said Evan, as one who imagines he is uttering a
thing of little consequence. “I promised Rose.”

“You promised Rose that you would abdicate and retire? Sweet, loving
girl!”

Evan made no answer.

“You will stay with me, Evan.”

“I really can’t,” he said in his previous careless tone.

“Come and sit down,” cried the Countess, imperiously. “The first trifle
is refused. It does not astonish me. I will honour you now by talking
seriously to you. I have treated you hitherto as a child. Or, no—” she
stopped her mouth; “it is enough if I tell you, dear, that poor Mrs.
Bonner is dying, and that she desires my attendance on her to refresh
her spirit with readings on the Prophecies, and Scriptural converse. No
other soul in the house can so soothe her.”

“Then, stay,” said Evan.

“Unprotected in the midst of enemies! Truly!”

“I think, Louisa, if you can call Lady Jocelyn an enemy, you must read
the Scriptures by a false light.”

“The woman is an utter heathen!” interjected the Countess. “An infidel
can be no friend. She is therefore the reverse. Her opinions embitter
her mother’s last days. But now you will consent to remain with me,
dear Van!”

An implacable negative responded to the urgent appeal of her eyes.

“By the way,” he said, for a diversion, “did you know of a girl
stopping at an inn in Fallowfield?”

“Know a barmaid?” the Countess’s eyes and mouth were wide at the
question.

“Did you send Raikes for her to-day?”

“Did Mr. Raikes—ah, Evan! that creature reminds me, you have no sense
of contrast. For a Brazilian ape—he resembles, if he is not truly
one—what contrast is he to an English gentleman! His proximity and
acquaintance—rich as he may be—disfigure you. Study contrast!”

Evan had to remind her that she had not answered him: whereat she
exclaimed: “One would really think you had never been abroad. Have you
not evaded me, rather?”

The Countess commenced fanning her languid brows, and then pursued:
“Now, my dear brother, I may conclude that you will acquiesce in my
moderate wishes. You remain. My venerable friend cannot last three
days. She is on the brink of a better world! I will confide to you that
it is of the utmost importance we should be here, on the spot, until
the sad termination! That is what I summoned you for. You are now at
liberty. Ta-ta, as soon as you please.”

She had baffled his little cross-examination with regard to Raikes, but
on the other point he was firm. She would listen to nothing: she
affected that her mandate had gone forth, and must be obeyed; tapped
with her foot, fanned deliberately, and was a consummate queen, till he
turned the handle of the door, when her complexion deadened, she
started up, trembling, and tripping towards him, caught him by the arm,
and said: “Stop! After all that I have sacrificed for you! As well try
to raise the dead as a Dawley from the dust he grovels in! Why did I
consent to visit this place? It was for you. I came, I heard that you
had disgraced yourself in drunkenness at Fallowfield, and I toiled to
eclipse that, and I did. Young Jocelyn thought you were what you are: I
could spit the word at you! and I dazzled him to give you time to win
this minx, who will spin you like a top if you get her. That Mr. Forth
knew it as well, and that vile young Laxley. They are gone! Why are
they gone? Because they thwarted me—they crossed your interests—I said
they should go. George Uplift is going to-day. The house is left to us;
and I believe firmly that Mrs. Bonner’s will contains a memento of the
effect of our frequent religious conversations. So you would leave now?
I suspect nobody, but we are all human, and Wills would not have been
tampered with for the first time. Besides,” and the Countess’s
imagination warmed till she addressed her brother as a confederate, “we
shall then see to whom Beckley Court is bequeathed. Either way it may
be yours. Yours! and you suffer their plots to drive you forth. Do you
not perceive that Mama was brought here to-day on purpose to shame us
and cast us out? We are surrounded by conspiracies, but if our faith is
pure who can hurt us? If I had not that consolation—would that you had
it, too!—would it be endurable to me to see those menials whispering
and showing their forced respect? As it is, I am fortified to forgive
them. I breathe another atmosphere. Oh, Evan! you did not attend to Mr.
Parsley’s beautiful last sermon. The Church should have been your
vocation.”

From vehemence the Countess had subsided to a mournful gentleness. She
had been too excited to notice any changes in her brother’s face during
her speech, and when he turned from the door, and still eyeing her
fixedly, led her to a chair, she fancied from his silence that she had
subdued and convinced him. A delicious sense of her power, succeeded by
a weary reflection that she had constantly to employ it, occupied her
mind, and when presently she looked up from the shade of her hand, it
was to agitate her head pitifully at her brother.

“All this you have done for me, Louisa,” he said.

“Yes, Evan,—all!” she fell into his tone.

“And you are the cause of Laxley’s going? Did you know anything of that
anonymous letter?”

He was squeezing her hand—with grateful affection, as she was deluded
to imagine.

“Perhaps, dear,—a little,” her conceit prompted her to admit.

“Did you write it?”

He gazed intently into her eyes, and as the question shot like a
javelin, she tried ineffectually to disengage her fingers; her delusion
waned; she took fright, but it was too late; he had struck the truth
out of her before she could speak. Her spirit writhed like a snake in
his hold. Innumerable things she was ready to say, and strove to; the
words would not form on her lips.

“I will be answered, Louisa.”

The stern manner he had assumed gave her no hope of eluding him. With
an inward gasp, and a sensation of nakedness altogether new to her,
dismal, and alarming, she felt that she could not lie. Like a creature
forsaken of her staunchest friend, she could have flung herself to the
floor. The next instant her natural courage restored her. She jumped up
and stood at bay.

“Yes. I did.”

And now he was weak, and she was strong, and used her strength.

“I wrote it to save you. Yes. Call on your Creator, and be my judge, if
you dare. Never, never will you meet a soul more utterly devoted to
you, Evan. This Mr. Forth, this Laxley, I said, should go, because they
were resolved to ruin you, and make you base. They are gone. The
responsibility I take on myself. Nightly—during the remainder of my
days—I will pray for pardon.”

He raised his head to ask sombrely: “Is your handwriting like
Laxley’s?”

“It seems so,” she answered, with a pitiful sneer for one who could
arrest her exaltation to inquire about minutiae. “Right or wrong, it is
done, and if you choose to be my judge, think whether your own
conscience is clear. Why did you come here? Why did you stay? You have
your free will,—do you deny that? Oh, I will take the entire blame, but
you must not be a hypocrite, Van. You know you were aware. We had no
confidences. I was obliged to treat you like a child; but for you to
pretend to suppose that roses grow in your path—oh, that is paltry! You
are a hypocrite or an imbecile, if that is your course.”

Was he not something of the former? The luxurious mist in which he had
been living, dispersed before his sister’s bitter words, and, as she
designed he should, he felt himself her accomplice. But, again, reason
struggled to enlighten him; for surely he would never have done a thing
so disproportionate to the end to be gained! It was the unconnected
action of his brain that thus advised him. No thoroughly-fashioned,
clear-spirited man conceives wickedness impossible to him: but
wickedness so largely mixed with folly, the best of us may reject as
not among our temptations. Evan, since his love had dawned, had begun
to talk with his own nature, and though he knew not yet how much it
would stretch or contract, he knew that he was weak and could not
perform moral wonders without severe struggles. The cynic may add, if
he likes—or without potent liquors.

Could he be his sister’s judge? It is dangerous for young men to be too
good. They are so sweeping in their condemnations, so sublime in their
conceptions of excellence, and the most finished Puritan cannot out-do
their demands upon frail humanity. Evan’s momentary self-examination
saved him from this, and he told the Countess, with a sort of cold
compassion, that he himself dared not blame her.

His tone was distinctly wanting in admiration of her, but she was
somewhat over-wrought, and leaned her shoulder against him, and became
immediately his affectionate, only too-zealous, sister; dearly to be
loved, to be forgiven, to be prized: and on condition of inserting a
special petition for pardon in her orisons, to live with a calm
conscience, and to be allowed to have her own way with him during the
rest of her days.

It was a happy union—a picture that the Countess was lured to admire in
the glass.

Sad that so small a murmur should destroy it for ever!

“What?” cried the Countess, bursting from his arm.

“Go?” she emphasized with the hardness of determined unbelief, as if
plucking the words, one by one, out of her reluctant ears. “Go to Lady
Jocelyn, and tell her I wrote the letter?”

“You can do no less, I fear,” said Evan, eyeing the floor and breathing
a deep breath.

“Then I did hear you correctly? Oh, you must be mad—idiotic! There,
pray go away, Evan. Come in the morning. You are too much for my
nerves.”

Evan rose, putting out his hand as if to take hers and plead with her.
She rejected the first motion, and repeated her desire for him to leave
her; saying, cheerfully—

“Good night, dear; I dare say we shan’t meet till the morning.”

“You can’t let this injustice continue a single night, Louisa?” said
he.

She was deep in the business of arrangeing a portion of her attire.

“Go-go; please,” she responded.

Lingering, he said: “If I go, it will be straight to Lady Jocelyn.”

She stamped angrily.

“Only go!” and then she found him gone, and she stooped lower to the
glass, to mark if the recent agitation were observable under her eyes.
There, looking at herself, her heart dropped heavily in her bosom. She
ran to the door and hurried swiftly after Evan, pulling him back
speechlessly.

“Where are you going, Evan?”

“To Lady Jocelyn.”

The unhappy victim of her devotion stood panting.

“If you go, I—I take poison!” It was for him now to be struck; but he
was suffering too strong an anguish to be susceptible to mock tragedy.
The Countess paused to study him. She began to fear her brother. “I
will!” she reiterated wildly, without moving him at all. And the quiet
inflexibility of his face forbade the ultimate hope which lies in
giving men a dose of hysterics when they are obstinate. She tried by
taunts and angry vituperations to make him look fierce, if but an
instant, to precipitate her into an exhibition she was so well prepared
for.

“Evan! what! after all my love, my confidence in you—I need not have
told you—to expose us! Brother? would you? Oh!”

“I will not let this last another hour,” said Evan, firmly, at the same
time seeking to caress her. She spurned his fruitless affection,
feeling, nevertheless, how cruel was her fate; for, with any other save
a brother, she had arts at her disposal to melt the manliest
resolutions. The glass showed her that her face was pathetically pale;
the tones of her voice were rich and harrowing. What did they avail
with a brother? “Promise me,” she cried eagerly, “promise me to stop
here—on this spot—till I return.”

The promise was extracted. The Countess went to fetch Caroline. Evan
did not count the minutes. One thought was mounting in his brain—the
scorn of Rose. He felt that he had lost her. Lost her when he had just
won her! He felt it, without realizing it. The first blows of an
immense grief are dull, and strike the heart through wool, as it were.
The belief of the young in their sorrow has to be flogged into them, on
the good old educational principle. Could he do less than this he was
about to do? Rose had wedded her noble nature to him, and it was as
much her spirit as his own that urged him thus to forfeit her, to be
worthy of her by assuming unworthiness.

There he sat neither conning over his determination nor the cause for
it, revolving Rose’s words about Laxley, and nothing else. The words
were so sweet and so bitter; every now and then the heavy smiting on
his heart set it quivering and leaping, as the whip starts a jaded
horse.

Meantime the Countess was participating in a witty conversation in the
drawing-room with Sir John and the Duke, Miss Current, and others; and
it was not till after she had displayed many graces, and, as one or two
ladies presumed to consider, marked effrontery, that she rose and drew
Caroline away with her. Returning to her dressing-room, she found that
Evan had faithfully kept his engagement; he was on the exact spot where
she had left him.

Caroline came to him swiftly, and put her hand to his forehead that she
might the better peruse his features, saying, in her mellow caressing
voice: “What is this, dear Van, that you will do? Why do you look so
wretched?”

“Has not Louisa told you?”

“She has told me something, dear, but I don’t know what it is. That you
are going to expose us? What further exposure do we need? I’m sure,
Van, my pride—what I had—is gone. I have none left!”

Evan kissed her brows warmly. An explanation, full of the Countess’s
passionate outcries of justification, necessity, and innocence in
higher than fleshly eyes, was given, and then the three were silent.

“But, Van,” Caroline commenced, deprecatingly, “my darling! of what
use—now! Whether right or wrong, why should you, why should you, when
the thing is done, dear?—think!”

“And you, too, would let another suffer under an unjust accusation?”
said Evan.

“But, dearest, it is surely your duty to think of your family first.
Have we not been afflicted enough? Why should you lay us under this
fresh burden?”

“Because it’s better to bear all now than a life of remorse,” answered
Evan.

“But this Mr. Laxley—I cannot pity him; he has behaved so insolently to
you throughout! Let him suffer.”

“Lady Jocelyn,” said Evan, “has been unintentionally unjust to him, and
after her kindness—apart from the right or wrong—I will not—I can’t
allow her to continue so.”

“After her kindness!” echoed the Countess, who had been fuming at
Caroline’s weak expostulations. “Kindness! Have I not done ten times
for these Jocelyns what they have done for us? O mio Deus! why, I have
bestowed on them the membership for Fallowfield: I have saved her from
being a convicted liar this very day. Worse! for what would have been
talked of the morals of the house, supposing the scandal. Oh! indeed I
was tempted to bring that horrid mad Captain into the house face to
face with his flighty doll of a wife, as I, perhaps, should have done,
acting by the dictates of my conscience. I lied for Lady Jocelyn, and
handed the man to a lawyer, who withdrew him. And this they owe to me!
Kindness? They have given us bed and board, as the people say. I have
repaid them for that.”

“Pray be silent, Louisa,” said Evan, getting up hastily, for the sick
sensation Rose had experienced came over him. His sister’s plots, her
untruth, her coarseness, clung to him and seemed part of his blood. He
now had a personal desire to cut himself loose from the wretched
entanglement revealed to him, whatever it cost.

“Are you really, truly going?” Caroline exclaimed, for he was near the
door.

“At a quarter to twelve at night!” sneered the Countess, still
imagining that he, like herself, must be partly acting.

“But, Van, is it—dearest, think! is it manly for a brother to go and
tell of his sister? And how would it look?”

Evan smiled. “Is it that that makes you unhappy? Louisa’s name will not
be mentioned—be sure of that.”

Caroline was stooping forward to him. Her figure straightened: “Good
Heaven, Evan! you are not going to take it on yourself? Rose!—she will
hate you.”

“God help me!” he cried internally.

“Oh, Evan, darling! consider, reflect!” She fell on her knees, catching
his hand. “It is worse for us that you should suffer, dearest! Think of
the dreadful meanness and baseness of what you will have to
acknowledge.”

“Yes!” sighed the youth, and his eyes, in his extreme pain, turned to
the Countess reproachfully.

“Think, dear,” Caroline hurried on, “he gains nothing for whom you do
this—you lose all. It is not your deed. You will have to speak an
untruth. Your ideas are wrong—wrong, I know they are. You will have to
lie. But if you are silent, the little, little blame that may attach to
us will pass away, and we shall be happy in seeing our brother happy.”

“You are talking to Evan as if he had religion,” said the Countess,
with steady sedateness. And at that moment, from the sublimity of his
pagan virtue, the young man groaned for some pure certain light to
guide him: the question whether he was about to do right made him weak.
He took Caroline’s head between his two hands, and kissed her mouth.
The act brought Rose to his senses insufferably, and she—his Goddess of
truth and his sole guiding light—spurred him afresh.

“My family’s dishonour is mine, Caroline. Say nothing more—don’t think
of me. I go to Lady Jocelyn tonight. To-morrow we leave, and there’s
the end. Louisa, if you have any new schemes for my welfare, I beg you
to renounce them.”

“Gratitude I never expected from a Dawley!” the Countess retorted.

“Oh, Louisa! he is going!” cried Caroline; “kneel to him with me: stop
him: Rose loves him, and he is going to make her hate him.”

“You can’t talk reason to one who’s mad,” said the Countess, more like
the Dawley she sprang from than it would have pleased her to know.

“My darling! My own Evan! it will kill me,” Caroline exclaimed, and
passionately imploring him, she looked so hopelessly beautiful, that
Evan was agitated, and caressed her, while he said, softly: “Where our
honour is not involved I would submit to your smallest wish.”

“It involves my life—my destiny!” murmured Caroline.

Could he have known the double meaning in her words, and what a saving
this sacrifice of his was to accomplish, he would not have turned to do
it feeling abandoned of heaven and earth.

The Countess stood rigidly as he went forth. Caroline was on her knees,
sobbing.




CHAPTER XXXIV.
A PAGAN SACRIFICE


Three steps from the Countess’s chamber door, the knot of Evan’s
resolution began to slacken. The clear light of his simple duty grew
cloudy and complex. His pride would not let him think that he was
shrinking, but cried out in him, “Will you be believed?” and whispered
that few would believe him guilty of such an act. Yet, while something
said that full surely Lady Jocelyn would not, a vague dread that Rose
might, threw him back on the luxury of her love and faith in him. He
found himself hoping that his statement would be laughed at. Then why
make it?

No: that was too blind a hope. Many would take him at his word; all—all
save Lady Jocelyn! Rose the first! Because he stood so high with her
now he feared the fall. Ah, dazzling pinnacle! our darlings shoot us up
on a wondrous juggler’s pole, and we talk familiarly to the stars, and
are so much above everybody, and try to walk like creatures with two
legs, forgetting that we have but a pin’s point to stand on up there.
Probably the absence of natural motion inspires the prophecy that we
must ultimately come down: our unused legs wax morbidly restless. Evan
thought it good that Rose should lift her head to look at him;
nevertheless, he knew that Rose would turn from him the moment he
descended from his superior station. Nature is wise in her young
children, though they wot not of it, and are always trying to rush away
from her. They escape their wits sooner than their instincts.

But was not Rose involved in him, and part of him? Had he not sworn
never to renounce her? What was this but a betrayal?

Go on, young man: fight your fight. The little imps pluck at you: the
big giant assails you: the seductions of the soft-mouthed siren are not
wanting. Slacken the knot an instant, and they will all have play. And
the worst is, that you may be wrong, and they may be right! For is it,
can it be proper for you to stain the silvery whiteness of your skin by
plunging headlong into yonder pitch-bath? Consider the defilement!
Contemplate your hideous aspect on issuing from that black baptism!

As to the honour of your family, Mr. Evan Harrington, pray, of what
sort of metal consists the honour of a tailor’s family?

One little impertinent imp ventured upon that question on his own
account. The clever beast was torn back and strangled instantaneously
by his experienced elders, but not before Evan’s pride had answered
him. Exalted by Love, he could dread to abase himself and strip off his
glittering garments; lowered by the world, he fell back upon his innate
worth.

Yes, he was called on to prove it; he was on his way to prove it.
Surrendering his dearest and his best, casting aside his dreams, his
desires, his aspirations, for this stern duty, he at least would know
that he made himself doubly worthy of her who abandoned him, and the
world would scorn him by reason of his absolute merit. Coming to this
point, the knot of his resolve tightened again; he hugged it with the
furious zeal of a martyr.

Religion, the lack of which in him the Countess deplored, would have
guided him and silenced the internal strife. But do not despise a
virtue purely Pagan. The young who can act readily up to the Christian
light are happier, doubtless: but they are led, they are passive: I
think they do not make such capital Christians subsequently. They are
never in such danger, we know; but some in the flock are more than
sheep. The heathen ideal it is not so very easy to attain, and those
who mount from it to the Christian have, in my humble thought, a firmer
footing.

So Evan fought his hard fight from the top of the stairs to the bottom.
A Pagan, which means our poor unsupported flesh, is never certain of
his victory. Now you will see him kneeling to his Gods, and anon
drubbing them; or he makes them fight for him, and is complacent at the
issue. Evan had ceased to pick his knot with one hand and pull it with
the other: but not finding Lady Jocelyn below, and hearing that she had
retired for the night, he mounted the stairs, and the strife
recommenced from the bottom to the top. Strange to say, he was almost
unaware of any struggle going on within him. The suggestion of the
foolish little imp alone was loud in the heart of his consciousness;
the rest hung more in his nerves than in his brain. He thought: “Well,
I will speak it out to her in the morning”; and thought so sincerely,
while an ominous sigh of relief at the reprieve rose from his
over-burdened bosom.

Hardly had the weary deep breath taken flight, when the figure of Lady
Jocelyn was seen advancing along the corridor, with a lamp in her hand.
She trod heavily, in a kind of march, as her habit was; her large
fully-open grey eyes looking straight ahead. She would have passed him,
and he would have let her pass, but seeing the unusual pallor on her
face, his love for this lady moved him to step forward and express a
hope that she had no present cause for sorrow.

Hearing her mother’s name, Lady Jocelyn was about to return a
conventional answer. Recognizing Evan, she said:

“Ah! Mr. Harrington! Yes, I fear it’s as bad as it can be. She can
scarcely outlive the night.”

Again he stood alone: his chance was gone. How could he speak to her in
her affliction? Her calm sedate visage had the beauty of its youth,
when lighted by the animation that attends meetings or farewells. In
her bow to Evan, he beheld a lovely kindness more unique, if less
precious, than anything he had ever seen on the face of Rose. Half
exultingly, he reflected that no opportunity would be allowed him now
to teach that noble head and truest of human hearts to turn from him:
the clear-eyed morrow would come: the days of the future would be
bright as other days!

Wrapped in the comfort of his cowardice, he started to see Lady Jocelyn
advancing to him again.

“Mr. Harrington,” she said, “Rose tells me you leave us early in the
morning. I may as well shake your hand now. We part very good friends.
I shall always be glad to hear of you.”

Evan pressed her hand, and bowed. “I thank you, madam,” was all he
could answer.

“It will be better if you don’t write to Rose.”

Her tone was rather that of a request than an injunction.

“I have no right to do so, my lady.”

“She considers that you have: I wish her to have, a fair trial.”

His voice quavered. The philosophic lady thought it time to leave him.

“So good-bye. I can trust you without extracting a promise. If you ever
have need of a friend, you know you are at liberty to write to me.”

“You are tired, my lady?” He put this question more to dally with what
he ought to be saying.

“Tolerably. Your sister, the Countess, relieves me in the night. I
fancy my mother finds her the better nurse of the two.”

Lady Jocelyn’s face lighted in its gracious pleasant way, as she just
inclined her head: but the mention of the Countess and her attendance
on Mrs. Bonner had nerved Evan: the contrast of her hypocrisy and vile
scheming with this most open, noble nature, acted like a new force
within him. He begged Lady Jocelyn’s permission to speak with her in
private. Marking his fervid appearance, she looked at him seriously.

“Is it really important?”

“I cannot rest, madam, till it is spoken.”

“I mean, it doesn’t pertain to the delirium? We may sleep upon that.”

He divined her sufficiently to answer: “It concerns a piece of
injustice done by you, madam, and which I can help you to set right.”

Lady Jocelyn stared somewhat. “Follow me into my dressing-room,” she
said, and led the way.

Escape was no longer possible. He was on the march to execution, and
into the darkness of his brain danced John Raikes, with his grotesque
tribulations. It was the harsh savour of reality that conjured up this
flighty being, who probably never felt a sorrow or a duty. The farce
Jack lived was all that Evan’s tragic bitterness could revolve, and
seemed to be the only light in his mind. You might have seen a smile on
his mouth when he was ready to ask for a bolt from heaven to crush him.

“Now,” said her ladyship, and he found that the four walls enclosed
them, “what have I been doing?”

She did not bid him be seated. Her brevity influenced him to speak to
the point.

“You have dismissed Mr. Laxley, my lady: he is innocent.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because,”—a whirl of sensations beset the wretched youth, “because I
am guilty.”

His words had run ahead of his wits; and in answer to Lady Jocelyn’s
singular exclamation he could but simply repeat them.

Her head drew back; her face was slightly raised; she looked, as he had
seen her sometimes look at the Countess, with a sort of speculative
amazement.

“And why do you come to tell me?”

“For the reason that I cannot allow you to be unjust, madam.”

“What on earth was your motive?”

Evan stood silent, flinching from her frank eyes.

“Well, well, well!” Her ladyship dropped into a chair, and thumped her
knees.

There was lawyer’s blood in Lady Jocelyn’s veins: she had the judicial
mind. A confession was to her a confession. She tracked actions up to a
motive; but one who came voluntarily to confess needed no sifting. She
had the habit of treating things spoken as facts.

“You absolutely wrote that letter to Mrs. Evremonde’s husband!”

Evan bowed, to avoid hearing his own lie.

“You discovered his address and wrote to him, and imitated Mr. Laxley’s
handwriting, to effect the purpose you may have had?”

Her credulity did require his confirmation of it, and he repeated: “It
is my deed.”

“Hum! And you sent that premonitory slip of paper to her?”

“To Mrs. Evremonde?”

“Somebody else was the author of that, perhaps?”

“It is all on me.”

“In that case, Mr. Harrington, I can only say that it’s quite right you
should quit this house to-morrow morning.”

Her ladyship commenced rocking in her chair, and then added: “May I
ask, have you madness in your family? No? Because when one can’t
discern a motive, it’s natural to ascribe certain acts to madness. Had
Mrs. Evremonde offended you? or Ferdinand—but one only hears of such
practices towards fortunate rivals, and now you have come to undo what
you did! I must admit, that taking the monstrousness of the act and the
inconsequence of your proceedings together, the whole affair becomes
more incomprehensible to me than it was before. Would it be unpleasant
to you to favour me with explanations?”

She saw the pain her question gave him, and, passing it, said:

“Of course you need not be told that Rose must hear of this?”

“Yes,” said Evan, “she must hear it.”

“You know what that’s equivalent to? But, if you like, I will not speak
to her till you have left us.”

“Instantly,” cried Evan. “Now—to-night! I would not have her live a
minute in a false estimate of me.”

Had Lady Jocelyn’s intellect been as penetrating as it was masculine,
she would have taken him and turned him inside out in a very short
time; for one who would bear to see his love look coldly on him rather
than endure a minute’s false estimate of his character, and who could
yet stoop to concoct a vile plot, must either be mad or simulating the
baseness for some reason or other. She perceived no motive for the
latter, and she held him to be sound in the head, and what was spoken
from the mouth she accepted. Perhaps, also, she saw in the complication
thus offered an escape for Rose, and was the less inclined to elucidate
it herself. But if her intellect was baffled, her heart was unerring. A
man proved guilty of writing an anonymous letter would not have been
allowed to stand long in her room. She would have shown him to the door
of the house speedily; and Evan was aware in his soul that he had not
fallen materially in her esteem. He had puzzled and confused her, and
partly because she had the feeling that this young man was entirely
trustworthy, and because she never relied on her feelings, she let his
own words condemn him, and did not personally discard him. In fact, she
was a veritable philosopher. She permitted her fellows to move the
world on as they would, and had no other passions in the contemplation
of the show than a cultured audience will usually exhibit.

“Strange,—most strange! I thought I was getting old!” she said, and
eyed the culprit as judges generally are not wont to do. “It will be a
shock to Rose. I must tell you that I can’t regret it. I would not have
employed force with her, but I should have given her as strong a taste
of the world as it was in my power to give. Girls get their reason from
society. But, come! if you think you can make your case out better to
her, you shall speak to her first yourself.”

“No, my lady,” said Evan, softly.

“You would rather not?”

“I could not.”

“But, I suppose, she’ll want to speak to you when she knows it.”

“I can take death from her hands, but I cannot slay myself.”

The language was natural to his condition, though the note was pitched
high. Lady Jocelyn hummed till the sound of it was over, and an idea
striking her, she said:

“Ah, by the way, have you any tremendous moral notions?”

“I don’t think I have, madam.”

“People act on that mania sometimes, I believe. Do you think it an
outrage on decency for a wife to run away from a mad husband whom they
won’t shut up, and take shelter with a friend? Is that the cause? Mr.
Forth is an old friend of mine. I would trust my daughter with him in a
desert, and stake my hand on his honour.”

“Oh, Lady Jocelyn!” cried Evan. “Would to God you might ever have said
that of me! Madam, I love you. I shall never see you again. I shall
never meet one to treat me so generously. I leave you, blackened in
character—you cannot think of me without contempt. I can never hope
that this will change. But, for your kindness let me thank you.”

And as speech is poor where emotion is extreme—and he knew his own to
be especially so—he took her hand with petitioning eyes, and dropping
on one knee, reverentially kissed it.

Lady Jocelyn was human enough to like to be appreciated. She was a
veteran Pagan, and may have had the instinct that a peculiar virtue in
this young one was the spring of his conduct. She stood up and said:
“Don’t forget that you have a friend here.”

The poor youth had to turn his head from her.

“You wish that I should tell Rose what you have told me at once, Mr.
Harrington?”

“Yes, my lady; I beg that you will do so.”

“Well!”

And the queer look Lady Jocelyn had been wearing dimpled into absolute
wonder. A stranger to Love’s cunning, she marvelled why he should
desire to witness the scorn Rose would feel for him.

“If she’s not asleep, then, she shall hear it now,” said her ladyship.
“You understand that it will be mentioned to no other person.”

“Except to Mr. Laxley, madam, to whom I shall offer the satisfaction he
may require. But I will undertake that.”

“Just as you think proper on that matter,” remarked her philosophical
ladyship, who held that man was a fighting animal, and must not have
his nature repressed.

She lighted him part of the way, and then turned off to Rose’s chamber.

Would Rose believe it of him? Love combated his dismal foreboding.
Strangely, too, now that he had plunged into his pitch-bath, the guilt
seemed to cling to him, and instead of hoping serenely, or fearing
steadily, his spirit fell in a kind of abject supplication to Rose, and
blindly trusted that she would still love even if she believed him
base. In his weakness he fell so low as to pray that she might love
that crawling reptile who could creep into a house and shrink from no
vileness to win her.




CHAPTER XXXV.
ROSE WOUNDED


The light of morning was yet cold along the passages of the house when
Polly Wheedle, hurrying to her young mistress, met her loosely dressed
and with a troubled face.

“What’s the matter, Polly? I was coming to you.”

“O, Miss Rose! and I was coming to you. Miss Bonner’s gone back to her
convulsions again. She’s had them all night. Her hair won’t last till
thirty, if she keeps on giving way to temper, as I tell her: and I know
that from a barber.”

“Tush, you stupid Polly! Does she want to see me?”

“You needn’t suspect that, Miss. But you quiet her best, and I thought
I’d come to you. But, gracious!”

Rose pushed past her without vouchsafing any answer to the look in her
face, and turned off to Juliana’s chamber, where she was neither
welcomed nor repelled. Juliana said she was perfectly well, and that
Polly was foolishly officious: whereupon Rose ordered Polly out of the
room, and said to Juliana, kindly: “You have not slept, dear, and I
have not either. I am so unhappy.”

Whether Rose intended by this communication to make Juliana eagerly
attentive, and to distract her from her own affair, cannot be said, but
something of the effect was produced.

“You care for him, too,” cried Rose, impetuously. “Tell me, Juley: do
you think him capable of any base action? Do you think he would do what
any gentleman would be ashamed to own? Tell me.”

Juliana looked at Rose intently, but did not reply.

Rose jumped up from the bed. “You hesitate, Juley? What? Could you
think so?”

Young women after a common game are shrewd. Juliana may have seen that
Rose was not steady on the plank she walked, and required support.

“I don’t know,” she said, turning her cheek to her pillow.

“What an answer!” Rose exclaimed. “Have you no opinion? What did you
say yesterday? It’s silent as the grave with me: but if you do care for
him, you must think one thing or the other.”

“I suppose not, then—no,” said Juliana.

Repeating the languid words bitterly, Rose continued:

“What is it to love without having faith in him you love? You make my
mind easier.”

Juliana caught the implied taunt, and said, fretfully:

“I’m ill. You’re so passionate. You don’t tell me what it is. How can I
answer you?”

“Never mind,” said Rose, moving to the door, wondering why she had
spoken at all: but when Juliana sprang forward, and caught her by the
dress to stop her, and with a most unwonted outburst of affection,
begged of her to tell her all, the wound in Rose’s breast began to
bleed, and she was glad to speak.

“Juley, do you—can you believe that he wrote that letter which poor
Ferdinand was—accused of writing?”

Juliana appeared to muse, and then responded: “Why should he do such a
thing?”

“O my goodness, what a girl!” Rose interjected.

“Well, then, to please you, Rose, of course I think he is too
honourable.”

“You do think so, Juley? But if he himself confessed it—what then? You
would not believe him, would you?”

“Oh, then I can’t say. Why should he condemn himself?”

“But you would know—you would know that he was a man to suffer death
rather than be guilty of the smallest baseness. His birth—what is
that!” Rose filliped her fingers: “But his acts—what he is himself you
would be sure of, would you not? Dear Juley! Oh, for heaven’s sake,
speak out plainly to me.”

A wily look had crept over Juliana’s features.

“Certainly,” she said, in a tone that belied it, and drawing Rose to
her bosom, the groan she heard there was passing sweet to her.

“He has confessed it to Mama,” sobbed Rose. “Why did he not come to me
first? He has confessed it—the abominable thing has come out of his own
mouth. He went to her last night...”

Juliana patted her shoulders regularly as they heaved. When words were
intelligible between them, Juliana said:

“At least, dear, you must admit that he has redeemed it.”

“Redeemed it? Could he do less?” Rose dried her eyes vehemently, as if
the tears shamed her. “A man who could have let another suffer for his
crime—I could never have lifted my head again. I think I would have cut
off this hand that plighted itself to him! As it is, I hardly dare look
at myself. But you don’t think it, dear? You know it to be false!
false! false!”

“Why should Mr. Harrington confess it?” said Juliana.

“Oh, don’t speak his name!” cried Rose.

Her cousin smiled. “So many strange things happen,” she said, and
sighed.

“Don’t sigh: I shall think you believe it!” cried Rose. An appearance
of constrained repose was assumed. Rose glanced up, studied for an
instant, and breathlessly uttered: “You do, you do believe it, Juley?”

For answer, Juliana hugged her with much warmth, and recommenced the
patting.

“I dare say it’s a mistake,” she remarked. “He may have been jealous of
Ferdinand. You know I have not seen the letter. I have only heard of
it. In love, they say, you ought to excuse... And the want of religious
education! His sister...”

Rose interrupted her with a sharp shudder. Might it not be possible
that one who had the same blood as the Countess would stoop to a
momentary vileness.

How changed was Rose from the haughty damsel of yesterday!

“Do you think my lover could tell a lie?” “He—would not love me long if
_I_ did!”

These phrases arose and rang in Juliana’s ears while she pursued the
task of comforting the broken spirit that now lay prone on the bed, and
now impetuously paced the room. Rose had come thinking the moment
Juliana’s name was mentioned, that here was the one to fortify her
faith in Evan: one who, because she loved, could not doubt him. She
moaned in a terror of distrust, loathing her cousin: not asking herself
why she needed support. And indeed she was too young for much clear
self-questioning, and her blood was flowing too quickly for her brain
to perceive more than one thing at a time.

“Does your mother believe it?” said Juliana, evading a direct assault.

“Mama? She never doubts what you speak,” answered Rose, disconsolately.

“She does?”

“Yes.”

Whereat Juliana looked most grave, and Rose felt that it was hard to
breathe.

She had grown very cold and calm, and Juliana had to be expansive
unprovoked.

“Believe nothing, dear, till you hear it from his own lips. If he can
look in your face and say that he did it... well, then! But of course
he cannot. It must be some wonderful piece of generosity to his rival.”

“So I thought, Juley! so I thought,” cried Rose, at the new light, and
Juliana smiled contemptuously, and the light flickered and died, and
all was darker than before in the bosom of Rose. She had borne so much
that this new drop was poison.

“Of course it must be that, if it is anything,” Juliana pursued. “You
were made to be happy, Rose. And consider, if it is true, people of
very low birth, till they have lived long with other people, and if
they have no religion, are so very likely to do things. You do not
judge them as you do real gentlemen, and one must not be too harsh—I
only wish to prepare you for the worst.”

A dim form of that very idea had passed through Rose, giving her small
comfort.

“Let him tell you with his own lips that what he has told your mother
is true, and then, and not till then, believe him,” Juliana concluded,
and they kissed kindly, and separated. Rose had suddenly lost her firm
step, but no sooner was Juliana alone than she left the bed, and
addressed her visage to the glass with brightening eyes, as one who saw
the glimmer of young hope therein.

“She love him! Not if he told me so ten thousand times would I believe
it! and before he has said a syllable she doubts him. Asking me in that
frantic way! as if I couldn’t see that she wanted me to help her to her
faith in him, as she calls it. Not name his name? Mr. Harrington! I may
call him Evan: some day!”

Half-uttered, half-mused, the unconscious exclamations issued from her,
and for many a weary day since she had dreamed of love, and studied
that which is said to attract the creature, she had not been so
glowingly elated or looked so much farther in the glass than its pale
reflection.




CHAPTER XXXVI.
BEFORE BREAKFAST


Cold through the night the dark-fringed stream had whispered under
Evan’s eyes, and the night breeze voiced “Fool, fool!” to him, not
without a distant echo in his heart. By symbols and sensations he knew
that Rose was lost to him. There was no moon: the water seemed aimless,
passing on carelessly to oblivion. Now and then, the trees stirred and
talked, or a noise was heard from the pastures. He had slain the life
that lived in them, and the great glory they were to bring forth, and
the end to which all things moved. Had less than the loss of Rose been
involved, the young man might have found himself looking out on a world
beneath notice, and have been sighing for one more worthy of his
clouded excellence but the immense misery present to him in the
contemplation of Rose’s sad restrained contempt, saved him from the
silly elation which is the last, and generally successful, struggle of
human nature in those who can so far master it to commit a sacrifice.
The loss of that brave high young soul—Rose, who had lifted him out of
the mire with her own white hands: Rose, the image of all that he
worshipped: Rose, so closely wedded to him that to be cut away from her
was to fall like pallid clay from the soaring spirit: surely he was
stunned and senseless when he went to utter the words to her mother!
Now that he was awake, and could feel his self-inflicted pain, he
marvelled at his rashness and foolishness, as perhaps numerous mangled
warriors have done for a time, when the battle-field was cool, and they
were weak, and the uproar of their jarred nerves has beset them, lying
uncherished.

By degrees he grew aware of a little consolatory touch, like the point
of a needle, in his consciousness. Laxley would certainly insult him!
In that case he would not refuse to fight him. The darkness broke and
revealed this happy prospect, and Evan held to it an hour, and could
hardly reject it when better thoughts conquered. For would it not be
sweet to make the strength of his arm respected? He took a stick, and
ran his eye musingly along the length, trifling with it grimly. The
great Mel had been his son’s instructor in the chivalrous science of
fence, and a _maître d’armes_ in Portugal had given him polish. In
Mel’s time duels with swords had been occasionally fought, and Evan
looked on the sword as the weapon of combat. Face to face with his
adversary—what then were birth or position? Action!—action! he sighed
for it, as I have done since I came to know that his history must be
morally developed. A glow of bitter pleasure exalted him when, after
hot passages, and parryings and thrusts, he had disarmed Ferdinand
Laxley, and bestowing on him his life, said: “Accept this worthy gift
of the son of a tailor!” and he wiped his sword, haply bound up his
wrist, and stalked off the ground, the vindicator of man’s natural
dignity. And then he turned upon himself with laughter, discovering a
most wholesome power, barely to be suspected in him yet; but of all the
children of glittering Mel and his solid mate, Evan was the best mixed
compound of his parents.

He put the stick back in its corner and eyed his wrist, as if he had
really just gone through the pretty scene he had just laughed at. It
was nigh upon reality, for it suggested the employment of a
handkerchief, and he went to a place and drew forth one that had the
stain of his blood on it, and the name of Rose at one end. The beloved
name was half-blotted by the dull-red mark, and at that sight a strange
tenderness took hold of Evan. His passions became dead and of old date.
This, then, would be his for ever! Love, for whom earth had been too
small, crept exultingly into a nut-shell. He clasped the treasure on
his breast, and saw a life beyond his parting with her.

Strengthened thus, he wrote by the morning light to Laxley. The letter
was brief, and said simply that the act of which Laxley had been
accused, Evan Harrington was responsible for. The latter expressed
regret that Laxley should have fallen under a false charge, and, at the
same time, indicated that if Laxley considered himself personally
aggrieved, the writer was at his disposal.

A messenger had now to be found to convey it to the village-inn.
Footmen were stirring about the house, and one meeting Evan close by
his door, observed with demure grin, that he could not find the
gentleman’s nether-garments. The gentleman, it appeared, was Mr. John
Raikes, who according to report, had been furnished with a bed at the
house, because of a discovery, made at a late period over-night, that
farther the gentleman could not go. Evan found him sleeping soundly.
How much the poor youth wanted a friend! Fortune had given him instead
a born buffoon; and it is perhaps the greatest evil of a position like
Evan’s, that, with cultured feelings, you are likely to meet with none
to know you. Society does not mix well in money-pecking spheres. Here,
however, was John Raikes, and Evan had to make the best of him.

“Eh?” yawned Jack, awakened; “I was dreaming I was Napoleon Bonaparte’s
right-hand man.”

“I want you to be mine for half-an-hour,” said Evan.

Without replying, the distinguished officer jumped out of bed at a
bound, mounted a chair, and peered on tip-toe over the top, from which,
with a glance of self-congratulation, he pulled the missing piece of
apparel, sighed dejectedly as he descended, while he exclaimed:

“Safe! but no distinction can compensate a man for this state of
intolerable suspicion of everybody. I assure you, Harrington, I
wouldn’t be Napoleon himself—and I have always been his peculiar
admirer—to live and be afraid of my valet! I believe it will develop
cancer sooner or later in me. I feel singular pains already. Last
night, after crowning champagne with ale, which produced a sort of
French Revolution in my interior—by the way, that must have made me
dream of Napoleon last night, with my lower members in revolt against
my head, I had to sit and cogitate for hours on a hiding-place for
these—call them what you will. Depend upon it, Harrington, this world
is no such funny affair as we fancy.”

“Then it is true, that you could let a man play pranks on you,” said
Evan. “I took it for one of your jokes.”

“Just as I can’t believe that you’re a tailor,” returned Jack. “It’s
not a bit more extraordinary.”

“But, Jack, if you cause yourself to be contemptible——”

“Contemptible!” cried Jack. “This is not the tone I like. Contemptible!
why it’s my eccentricity among my equals. If I dread the profane
vulgar, that only proves that I’m above them. _Odi_, etc. Besides,
Achilles had his weak point, and egad, it was when he faced about! By
Jingo! I wish I’d had that idea yesterday. I should have behaved
better.”

Evan could see that the creature was beginning to rely desperately on
his humour.

“Come,” he said, “be a man to-day. Throw off your motley. When I met
you that night so oddly, you had been acting like a worthy fellow,
trying to earn your bread in the best way you could—”

“And precisely because I met you, of all men, I’ve been going round and
round ever since,” said Jack. “A clown or pantaloon would have given me
balance. Say no more. You couldn’t help it. We met because we were the
two extremes.”

Sighing, “What a jolly old inn!” Raikes rolled himself over in the
sheets, and gave two or three snug jolts indicative of his
determination to be comfortable while he could.

“Do you intend to carry on this folly, Jack?”

“Say, sacrifice,” was the answer. “I feel it as much as you possibly
could, Mr. Harrington. Hear the facts,” Jack turned round again. “Why
did I consent to this absurdity? Because of my ambition. That old
fellow, whom I took to be a clerk of Messrs. Grist, said: ‘You want to
cut a figure in the world—you’re armed now.’ A sort of Fortunatus’s
joke. It was his way of launching me. But did he think I intended this
for more than a lift? I his puppet? He, sir, was my tool! Well, I came.
All my efforts were strained to shorten the period of penance. I had
the best linen, and put on captivating manners. I should undoubtedly
have won some girl of station, and cast off my engagement like an old
suit, but just mark!—now mark how Fortune tricks us! After the pic-nic
yesterday, the domestics of the house came to clear away, and the band
being there, I stopped them and bade them tune up, and at the same time
seizing the maid Wheedle, away we flew. We danced, we whirled, we
twirled. Ale upon this! My head was lost. ‘Why don’t it last for ever?’
says I. ‘I wish it did,’ says she. The naivete enraptured me. ‘Oooo!’ I
cried, hugging her, and then, you know, there was no course open to a
man of honour but to offer marriage and make a lady of her. I proposed:
she accepted me, and here I am, eternally tied to this accurst
insignia, if I’m to keep my promise! Isn’t that a sacrifice, friend H.?
There’s no course open to me. The poor girl is madly in love. She
called me a ‘rattle!’ As a gentleman, I cannot recede.”

Evan got up and burst into damnable laughter at this burlesque of
himself. Telling the fellow the service he required, and receiving a
groaning assurance that the letter should, without loss of time, be
delivered in proper style, the egoist, as Jack heartily thought him,
fell behind his; knitted brows, and, after musing abstractedly, went
forth to light upon his fate.

But a dread of meeting had seized both Rose and Evan. She had exhausted
her first sincerity of unbelief in her interview with Juliana: and he
had begun to consider what he could say to her. More than the three
words “I did it,” would not be possible; and if she made him repeat
them, facing her truthful eyes, would he be man enough to strike her
bared heart twice? And, ah! the sullen brute he must seem, standing
before her dumb, hearing her sigh, seeing her wretched effort not to
show how unwillingly her kind spirit despised him. The reason for the
act—she would ask for that! Rose would not be so philosophic as her
mother. She would grasp at every chance to excuse the deed. He cried
out against his scheming sister in an agony, and while he did so,
encountered Miss Carrington and Miss Bonner in deep converse. Juliana
pinched her arm, whereupon Miss Carrington said: “You look merry this
morning, Mr. Harrington”: for he was unawares smiling at the image of
himself in the mirror of John Raikes. That smile, transformed to a
chuckling grimace, travelled to Rose before they met.

Why did she not come to him?

A soft voice at his elbow made his blood stop. It was Caroline. She
kissed him, answering his greeting: “Is it good morning?”

“Certainly,” said he. “By the way, don’t forget that the coach leaves
early.”

“My darling Evan! you make me so happy. For it was really a mistaken
sense of honour. For what can at all excuse a falsehood, you know,
Evan!”

Caroline took his arm, and led him into the sun, watching his face at
times. Presently she said: “I want just to be assured that you thought
more wisely than when you left us last night.”

“More wisely?” Evan turned to her with a playful smile.

“My dear brother! you did not do what you said you would do?”

“Have you ever known me not to do what I said I would do?”

“Evan! Good heaven! you did it? Then how can you remain here an
instant? Oh, no, no!—say no, darling!”

“Where is Louisa?” he inquired.

“She is in her room. She will never appear at breakfast, if she knows
this.”

“Perhaps more solitude would do her good,” said Evan.

“Remember, if this should prove true, think how you punish her!”

On that point Evan had his own opinion.

“Well, I shall never have to punish you in this way, my love,” he said
fondly, and Caroline dropped her eyelids.

“Don’t think that I am blaming her,” he added, trying to feel as
honestly as he spoke. “I was mad to come here. I see it all now. Let us
keep to our place. We are all the same before God till we disgrace
ourselves.” Possibly with that sense of shame which some young people
have who are not professors of sounding sentences, or affected by
missionary zeal, when they venture to breathe the holy name, Evan
blushed, and walked on humbly silent. Caroline murmured: “Yes, yes! oh,
brother!” and her figure drew to him as if for protection. Pale, she
looked up.

“Shall you always love me, Evan?”

“Whom else have I to love?”

“But always—always? Under any circumstances?”

“More and more, dear. I always have, and shall. I look to you now. I
have no home but in your heart now.”

She was agitated, and he spoke warmly to calm her.

The throb of deep emotion rang in her rich voice. “I will live any life
to be worthy of your love, Evan,” and she wept.

To him they were words and tears without a history.

Nothing further passed between them. Caroline went to the Countess:
Evan waited for Rose. The sun was getting high. The face of the stream
glowed like metal. Why did she not come? She believed him guilty from
the mouth of another? If so, there was something less for him to lose.
And now the sacrifice he had made did whisper a tale of mortal
magnificence in his ears: feelings that were not his noblest stood up
exalted. He waited till the warm meadow-breath floating past told that
the day had settled into heat, and then he waited no more, but quietly
walked into the house with the strength of one who has conquered more
than human scorn.




CHAPTER XXXVII.
THE RETREAT FROM BECKLEY


Never would the Countess believe that brother of hers, idiot as by
nature he might be, and heir to unnumbered epithets, would so far
forget what she had done for him, as to drag her through the mud for
nothing: and so she told Caroline again and again, vehemently.

It was about ten minutes before the time for descending to the
breakfast-table. She was dressed, and sat before the glass, smoothing
her hair, and applying the contents of a pot of cold cream to her
forehead between-whiles. With perfect sincerity she repeated that she
could not believe it. She had only trusted Evan once since their visit
to Beckley; and that this once he should, when treated as a man, turn
traitor to their common interests, and prove himself an utter baby, was
a piece of nonsense her great intelligence indignantly rejected.

“Then, if true,” she answered Caroline’s assurances finally, “if true,
he is not his father’s son!”

By which it may be seen that she had indeed taken refuge in the Castle
of Negation against the whole army of facts.

“He is acting, Carry. He is acting the ideas of his ridiculous empty
noddle!”

“No,” said Caroline, mournfully, “he is not. I have never known Evan to
lie.”

“Then you must forget the whipping he once had from his mother—little
dolt! little selfish pig! He obtains his reputation entirely from his
abominable selfishness, and then stands tall, and asks us to admire
him. He bursts with vanity. But if you lend your credence to it, Carry,
how, in the name of goodness, are you to appear at the breakfast?

“I was going to ask you whether you would come,” said Caroline, coldly.

“If I can get my hair to lie flat by any means at all, of course!”
returned the Countess. “This dreadful horrid country pomade! Why did we
not bring a larger stock of the Andalugian Regenerator? Upon my honour,
my dear, you use a most enormous quantity; I must really tell you
that.”

Conning here entered to say that Mr. Evan had given orders for the
boxes to be packed and everything got ready to depart by half-past
eleven o’clock, when the fly would call for them and convey them to
Fallowfield in time to meet the coach for London.

The Countess turned her head round to Caroline like an astonished
automaton.

“Given orders!” she interjected.

“I have very little to get ready,” remarked Caroline.

“Be so good as to wait outside the door one instant,” said the Countess
to Conning, with particular urbanity.

Conning heard a great deal of vigorous whispering within, and when
summoned to re-appear, a note was handed to her to convey to Mr.
Harrington immediately. He was on the lawn; read it, and wrote back
three hasty lines in pencil.

“Louisa. You have my commands to quit this house, at the hour named,
this day. You will go with me. E. H.”

Conning was again requested to wait outside the Countess’s door. She
was the bearer of another note. Evan read it likewise; tore it up, and
said that there was no answer.

The Castle of Negation held out no longer. Ruthless battalions poured
over the walls, blew up the Countess’s propriety, made frightful
ravages in her complexion. Down fell her hair.

“You cannot possibly go to breakfast,” said Caroline.

“I must! I must!” cried the Countess. “Why, my dear, if he has done
it—wretched creature! don’t you perceive that, by withholding our
presences, we become implicated with him?” And the Countess, from a
burst of frenzy, put this practical question so shrewdly, that
Caroline’s wits succumbed to her.

“But he has not done it; he is acting!” she pursued, restraining her
precious tears for higher purposes, as only true heroines can. “Thinks
to frighten me into submission!”

“Do you not think Evan is right in wishing us to leave, after—after—”
Caroline humbly suggested.

“Say, before my venerable friend has departed this life,” the Countess
took her up. “No, I do not. If he is a fool, I am not. No, Carry: I do
not jump into ditches for nothing. I will have something tangible for
all that I have endured. We are now tailors in this place, remember. If
that stigma is affixed to us, let us at least be remunerated for it.
Come.”

Caroline’s own hard struggle demanded all her strength yet she appeared
to hesitate. “You will surely not disobey Evan, Louisa?”

“Disobey?” The Countess amazedly dislocated the syllables. “Why, the
boy will be telling you next that he will not permit the Duke to visit
you! Just your English order of mind, that cannot—brutes!—conceive of
friendship between high-born men and beautiful women. Beautiful as you
truly are, Carry, five years more will tell on you. But perhaps my
dearest is in a hurry to return to her Maxwell? At least he thwacks
well!”

Caroline’s arm was taken. The Countess loved an occasional rhyme when a
point was to be made, and went off nodding and tripping till the time
for stateliness arrived, near the breakfast-room door. She indeed was
acting. At the bottom of her heart there was a dismal rage of passions:
hatred of those who would or might look tailor in her face: terrors
concerning the possible re-visitation of the vengeful Sir Abraham:
dread of Evan and the efforts to despise him: the shocks of many
conflicting elements. Above it all her countenance was calmly, sadly
sweet: even as you may behold some majestic lighthouse glimmering over
the tumult of a midnight sea.

An unusual assemblage honoured the breakfast that morning. The news of
Mrs. Bonner’s health was more favourable. How delighted was the
Countess to hear that! Mrs. Bonner was the only firm ground she stood
on there, and after receiving and giving gentle salutes, she talked of
Mrs. Bonner, and her night-watch by the sick bed, in a spirit of
doleful hope. This passed off the moments till she could settle herself
to study faces. Decidedly, every lady present looked glum, with the
single exception of Miss Current. Evan was by Lady Jocelyn’s side. Her
ladyship spoke to him; but the Countess observed that no one else did.
To herself, however, the gentlemen were as attentive as ever. Evan sat
three chairs distant from her.

If the traitor expected his sister to share in his disgrace, by
noticing him, he was in error. On the contrary, the Countess joined the
conspiracy to exclude him, and would stop a mild laugh if perchance he
looked up. Presently Rose entered. She said “Good morning” to one or
two, and glided into a seat.

That Evan was under Lady Jocelyn’s protection soon became generally
apparent, and also that her ladyship was angry: an exhibition so rare
with her that it was the more remarked. Rose could see that she was a
culprit in her mother’s eyes. She glanced from Evan to her. Lady
Jocelyn’s mouth shut hard. The girl’s senses then perceived the
something that was afloat at the table; she thought with a pang of
horror: “Has Juliana told?” Juliana smiled on her; but the aspect of
Mrs. Shorne, and of Miss Carrington, spoke for their knowledge of that
which must henceforth be the perpetual reproof to her headstrong youth.

“At what hour do you leave us?” said Lady Jocelyn to Evan.

“When I leave the table, my lady. The fly will call for my sisters at
half-past eleven.”

“There is no necessity for you to start in advance?”

“I am going over to see my mother.”

Rose burned to speak to him now. Oh! why had she delayed! Why had she
swerved from her good rule of open, instant explanations? But Evan’s
heart was stern to his love. Not only had she, by not coming, shown her
doubt of him,—she had betrayed him!

Between the Countess, Melville, Sir John, and the Duke, an animated
dialogue was going on, over which Miss Current played like a lively
iris. They could not part with the Countess. Melville said he should be
left stranded, and numerous pretty things were uttered by other
gentlemen: by the women not a word. Glancing from certain of them
lingeringly to her admirers, the Countess smiled her thanks, and then
Andrew, pressed to remain, said he was willing and happy, and so forth;
and it seemed that her admirers had prevailed over her reluctance, for
the Countess ended her little protests with a vanquished bow. Then
there was a gradual rising from table. Evan pressed Lady Jocelyn’s
hand, and turning from her bent his head to Sir Franks, who, without
offering an exchange of cordialities, said, at arm’s length: “Good-bye,
sir.” Melville also gave him that greeting stiffly. Harry was perceived
to rush to the other end of the room, in quest of a fly apparently.
Poor Caroline’s heart ached for her brother, to see him standing there
in the shadow of many faces. But he was not left to stand alone. Andrew
quitted the circle of Sir John, Seymour Jocelyn, Mr. George Uplift, and
others, and linked his arm to Evan’s. Rose had gone. While Evan looked
for her despairingly to say his last word and hear her voice once more,
Sir Franks said to his wife:

“See that Rose keeps up-stairs.”

“I want to speak to her,” was her ladyship’s answer, and she moved to
the door.

Evan made way for her, bowing.

“You will be ready at half-past eleven, Louisa,” he said, with calm
distinctness, and passed from that purgatory.

Now honest Andrew attributed the treatment Evan met with to the
exposure of yesterday. He was frantic with democratic disgust.

“Why the devil don’t they serve me like that; eh? ’Cause I got a few
coppers! There, Van! I’m a man of peace; but if you’ll call any man of
’em out I’ll stand your second—’pon my soul, I will. They must be
cowards, so there isn’t much to fear. Confound the fellows, I tell ’em
every day I’m the son of a cobbler, and egad, they grow civiller. What
do they mean? Are cobblers ranked over tailors?”

“Perhaps that’s it,” said Evan.

“Hang your gentlemen!” Andrew cried.

“Let us have breakfast first,” uttered a melancholy voice near them in
the passage.

“Jack!” said Evan. “Where have you been?”

“I didn’t know the breakfast-room,” Jack returned, “and the fact is, my
spirits are so down, I couldn’t muster up courage to ask one of the
footmen. I delivered your letter. Nothing hostile took place. I bowed
fiercely to let him know what he might expect. That generally stops it.
You see, I talk prose. I shall never talk anything else!”

Andrew recommenced his jests of yesterday with Jack. The latter bore
them patiently, as one who had endured worse.

“She has rejected me!” he whispered to Evan. “Talk of the ingratitude
of women! Ten minutes ago I met her. She perked her eyebrows at
me!—tried to run away. ‘Miss Wheedle’: I said. ‘If you please, I’d
rather not,’ says she. To cut it short, the sacrifice I made to her was
the cause. It’s all over the house. She gave the most excruciating
hint. Those low-born females are so horribly indelicate. I stood
confounded.”

Commending his new humour, Evan persuaded him to breakfast immediately,
and hunger being one of Jack’s solitary incitements to a sensible
course of conduct, the disconsolate gentleman followed its dictates.
“Go with him, Andrew,” said Evan. “He is here as my friend, and may be
made uncomfortable.”

“Yes, yes,—ha! ha! I’ll follow the poor chap,” said Andrew. “But what
is it all about? Louisa won’t go, you know. Has the girl given you up
because she saw your mother, Van? I thought it was all right. Why the
deuce are you running away?”

“Because I’ve just seen that I ought never to have come, I suppose,”
Evan replied, controlling the wretched heaving of his chest.

“But Louisa won’t go, Van.”

“Understand, my dear Andrew, that I know it to be quite imperative. Be
ready yourself with Caroline. Louisa will then make her choice. Pray
help me in this. We must not stay a minute more than is necessary in
this house.”

“It’s an awful duty,” breathed Andrew, after a pause. “I see nothing
but hot water at home. Why—but it’s no use asking questions. My love to
your mother. I say, Van,—now isn’t Lady Jocelyn a trump?”

“God bless her!” said Evan. And the moisture in Andrew’s eyes affected
his own.

“She’s the staunchest piece of woman-goods I ever—I know a hundred
cases of her!”

“I know one, and that’s enough,” said Evan.

Not a sign of Rose! Can Love die without its dear farewell on which it
feeds, away from the light, dying by bits? In Evan’s heart Love seemed
to die, and all the pangs of a death were there as he trod along the
gravel and stepped beneath the gates of Beckley Court.

Meantime the gallant Countess was not in any way disposed to retreat on
account of Evan’s defection. The behaviour toward him at the
breakfast-table proved to her that he had absolutely committed his
egregious folly, and as no General can have concert with a fool, she
cut him off from her affections resolutely. Her manifest disdain at his
last speech, said as much to everybody present. Besides, the lady was
in her element here, and compulsion is required to make us relinquish
our element. Lady Jocelyn certainly had not expressly begged of her to
remain: the Countess told Melville so, who said that if she required
such an invitation she should have it, but that a guest to whom they
were so much indebted, was bound to spare them these formalities.

“What am I to do?”

The Countess turned piteously to the diplomatist’s wife.

She answered, retiringly: “Indeed I cannot say.”

Upon this, the Countess accepted Melville’s arm, and had some thoughts
of punishing the woman.

They were seen parading the lawn. Mr. George Uplift chuckled
singularly.

“Just the old style,” he remarked, but corrected the inadvertence with
a “hem!” committing himself more shamefully the instant after. “I’ll
wager she has the old Dip. down on his knee before she cuts.”

“Bet can’t be taken,” observed Sir John Loring. “It requires a spy.”

Harry, however, had heard the remark, and because he wished to speak to
her, let us hope, and reproach her for certain things when she chose to
be disengaged, he likewise sallied out, being forlorn as a youth whose
sweet vanity is much hurt.

The Duke had paired off with Mrs. Strike. The lawn was fair in sunlight
where they walked. The air was rich with harvest smells, and the scent
of autumnal roses. Caroline was by nature luxurious and soft. The
thought of that drilled figure to which she was returning in bondage,
may have thrown into bright relief the polished and gracious nobleman
who walked by her side, shadowing forth the chances of a splendid
freedom. Two lovely tears fell from her eyes. The Duke watched them
quietly.

“Do you know, they make me jealous?” he said.

Caroline answered him with a faint smile.

“Reassure me, my dear lady; you are not going with your brother this
morning?”

“Your Grace, I have no choice!”

“May I speak to you as your warmest friend? From what I hear, it
appears to be right that your brother should not stay. To the best of
my ability I will provide for him: but I sincerely desire to disconnect
you from those who are unworthy of you. Have you not promised to trust
in me? Pray, let me be your guide.”

Caroline replied to the heart of his words: “I dare not.”

“What has changed you?”

“I am not changed, but awakened,” said Caroline.

The Duke paced on in silence.

“Pardon me if I comprehend nothing of such a change,” he resumed. “I
asked you to sacrifice much; all that I could give in return I offered.
Is it the world you fear?”

“What is the world to such as I am?”

“Can you consider it a duty to deliver yourself bound to that man
again?”

“Heaven pardon me, my lord, I think of that too little!”

The Duke’s next question: “Then what can it be?” stood in his eyes.

“Oh!” Caroline’s touch quivered on his arm, “Do not suppose me
frivolous, ungrateful, or—or cowardly. For myself you have offered more
happiness than I could have hoped for. To be allied to one so generous,
I could bear anything. Yesterday you had my word: give it me back
to-day!”

Very curiously the Duke gazed on her, for there was evidence of
internal torture across her forehead.

“I may at least beg to know the cause for this request?”

She quelled some throbbing in her bosom. “Yes.”

He waited, and she said: “There is one—if I offended him, I could not
live. If now I followed my wishes, he would lose his faith in the last
creature that loves him. He is unhappy. I could bear what is called
disgrace, my lord—I shudder to say it—I could sin against heaven; but I
dare not do what would make him despise me.”

She was trembling violently; yet the nobleman, in his surprise, could
not forbear from asking who this person might be, whose influence on
her righteous actions was so strong.

“It is my brother, my lord,” she said.

Still more astonished, “Your brother!” the Duke exclaimed. “My dearest
lady, I would not wound you; but is not this a delusion? We are so
placed that we must speak plainly. Your brother I have reason to feel
sure is quite unworthy of you.”

“Unworthy? My brother Evan? Oh! he is noble, he is the best of men!”

“And how, between yesterday and to-day, has he changed you?”

“It is that yesterday I did not know him, and to-day I do.”

Her brother, a common tradesman, a man guilty of forgery and the utmost
baseness—all but kicked out of the house! The Duke was too delicate to
press her further. Moreover, Caroline had emphasized the “yesterday”
and “to-day,” showing that the interval which had darkened Evan to
everybody else, had illumined him to her. He employed some courtly
eloquence, better unrecorded; but if her firm resolution perplexed him,
it threw a strange halo round the youth from whom it sprang.

The hour was now eleven, and the Countess thought it full time to
retire to her entrenchment in Mrs. Bonner’s chamber. She had great
things still to do: vast designs were in her hand awaiting the sanction
of Providence. Alas! that little idle promenade was soon to be
repented. She had joined her sister, thinking it safer to have her
upstairs till they were quit of Evan. The Duke and the diplomatist
loitering in the rear, these two fair women sailed across the lawn,
conscious, doubtless, over all their sorrows and schemes, of the
freight of beauty they carried.

What meant that gathering on the steps? It was fortuitous, like
everything destined to confound us. There stood Lady Jocelyn with
Andrew, fretting his pate. Harry leant against a pillar, Miss
Carrington, Mrs. Shorne, and Mrs. Melville, supported by Mr. George
Uplift, held watchfully by. Juliana, with Master Alec and Miss Dorothy,
were in the background.

Why did our General see herself cut off from her stronghold, as by a
hostile band? She saw it by that sombre light in Juliana’s eyes, which
had shown its ominous gleam whenever disasters were on the point of
unfolding.

Turning to Caroline, she said: “Is there a back way?”

Too late! Andrew called.

“Come along, Louisa, Just time, and no more. Carry, are you packed?”

This in reality was the first note of the retreat from Beckley; and
having blown it, the hideous little trumpeter burst into scarlet
perspirations, mumbling to Lady Jocelyn: “Now, my lady, mind you stand
by me.”

The Countess walked straight up to him.

“Dear Andrew! this sun is too powerful for you. I beg you, withdraw
into the shade of the house.”

She was about to help him with all her gentleness.

“Yes, yes. All right, Louisa,” rejoined Andrew. “Come, go and pack. The
fly’ll be here, you know—too late for the coach, if you don’t mind, my
lass. Ain’t you packed yet?”

The horrible fascination of vulgarity impelled the wretched lady to
answer: “Are we herrings?” And then she laughed, but without any
accompaniment.

“I am now going to dear Mrs. Bonner,” she said, with a tender glance at
Lady Jocelyn.

“My mother is sleeping,” her ladyship remarked.

“Come, Carry, my darling!” cried Andrew.

Caroline looked at her sister. The Countess divined Andrew’s shameful
trap.

“I was under an engagement to go and canvass this afternoon,” she said.

“Why, my dear Louisa, we’ve settled that in here this morning,” said
Andrew. “Old Tom only stuck up a puppet to play with. We’ve knocked him
over, and march in victorious—eh, my lady?”

“Oh!” exclaimed the Countess, “if Mr. Raikes shall indeed have listened
to my inducements!”

“Deuce a bit of inducements!” returned Andrew. “The fellow’s ashamed of
himself—ha! ha! Now then, Louisa.”

While they talked, Juliana had loosed Dorothy and Alec, and these imps
were seen rehearsing a remarkable play, in which the damsel held forth
a hand and the cavalier advanced and kissed it with a loud smack, being
at the same time reproached for his lack of grace.

“You are so English!” cried Dorothy, with perfect languor, and a
malicious twitter passed between two or three. Mr. George spluttered
indiscreetly.

The Countess observed the performance. Not to convert the retreat into
a total rout, she, with that dark flush which was her manner of
blushing, took formal leave of Lady Jocelyn, who, in return, simply
said: “Good-bye, Countess.” Mrs. Strike’s hand she kindly shook.

The few digs and slaps and thrusts at gloomy Harry and prim Miss
Carrington and boorish Mr. George, wherewith the Countess, torn with
wrath, thought it necessary to cover her retreat, need not be told. She
struck the weak alone: Juliana she respected. Masterly tactics, for
they showed her power, gratified her vengeance, and left her
unassailed. On the road she had Andrew to tear to pieces. O delicious
operation! And O shameful brother to reduce her to such joys! And, O
Providence! may a poor desperate soul, betrayed through her devotion,
unremunerated for her humiliation and absolute hard work, accuse thee?
The Countess would have liked to. She felt it to be the instigation of
the devil, and decided to remain on the safe side still.

Happily for Evan, she was not ready with her packing by half-past
eleven. It was near twelve when he, pacing in front of the inn,
observed Polly Wheedle, followed some yards in the rear by John Raikes,
advancing towards him. Now Polly had been somewhat delayed by Jack’s
persecutions, and Evan declining to attend to the masked speech of her
mission, which directed him to go at once down a certain lane in the
neighbourhood of the park, some minutes were lost.

“Why, Mr. Harrington,” said Polly, “it’s Miss Rose: she’s had leave
from her Ma. Can you stop away, when it’s quite proper?”

Evan hesitated. Before he could conquer the dark spirit, lo, Rose
appeared, walking up the village street. Polly and her adorer fell
back.

Timidly, unlike herself, Rose neared him.

“I have offended you, Evan. You would not come to me: I have come to
you.”

“I am glad to be able to say good-bye to you, Rose,” was his pretty
response.

Could she have touched his hand then, the blood of these lovers rushing
to one channel must have made all clear. At least he could hardly have
struck her true heart with his miserable lie. But that chance was lost:
they were in the street, where passions have no play.

“Tell me, Evan,—it is not true.”

He, refining on his misery, thought, She would not ask it if she
trusted me: and answered her: “You have heard it from your mother,
Rose.”

“But I will not believe it from any lips but yours, Evan. Oh, speak,
speak!”

It pleased him to think: How could one who loved me believe it even
then?

He said: “It can scarcely do good to make me repeat it, Rose.”

And then, seeing her dear bosom heave quickly, he was tempted to fall
on his knees to her with a wild outcry of love. The chance was lost.
The inexorable street forbade it.

There they stood in silence, gasping at the barrier that divided them.

Suddenly a noise was heard. “Stop! stop!” cried the voice of John
Raikes. “When a lady and gentleman are talking together, sir, do you
lean your long ears over them—ha?”

Looking round, Evan beheld Laxley a step behind, and Jack rushing up to
him, seizing his collar, and instantly undergoing ignominious
prostration for his heroic defence of the privacy of lovers.

“Stand aside”; said Laxley, imperiously. “Rosey so you’ve come for me.
Take my arm. You are under my protection.”

Another forlorn “Is it true?” Rose cast toward Evan with her eyes. He
wavered under them.

“Did you receive my letter?” he demanded of Laxley.

“I decline to hold converse with you,” said Laxley, drawing Rose’s hand
on his arm.

“You will meet me to-day or to-morrow?”

“I am in the habit of selecting my own company.”

Rose disengaged her hand. Evan grasped it. No word of farewell was
uttered. Her mouth moved, but her eyes were hard shut, and nothing save
her hand’s strenuous pressure, equalling his own, told that their
parting had been spoken, the link violently snapped.

Mr. John Raikes had been picked up and pulled away by Polly. She now
rushed to Evan: “Good-bye, and God bless you, dear Mr. Harrington. I’ll
find means of letting you know how she is. And he shan’t have her,
mind!”

Rose was walking by Laxley’s side, but not leaning on his arm. Evan
blessed her for this. Ere she was out of sight the fly rolled down the
street. She did not heed it, did not once turn her head. Ah, bitter
unkindness!

When Love is hurt, it is self-love that requires the opiate. Conning
gave it him in the form of a note in a handwriting not known to him. It
said:

“I do not believe it, and nothing will ever make me.
“JULIANA.”


Evan could not forget these words. They coloured his farewell to
Beckley: the dear old downs, the hopgardens, the long grey farms walled
with clipped yew, the home of his lost love! He thought of them through
weary nights when the ghostly image with the hard shut eyelids and the
quivering lips would rise and sway irresolutely in air till a shape out
of the darkness extinguished it. Pride is the God of Pagans. Juliana
had honoured his God. The spirit of Juliana seemed to pass into the
body of Rose, and suffer for him as that ghostly image visibly
suffered.




CHAPTER XXXVIII.
IN WHICH WE HAVE TO SEE IN THE DARK


So ends the fourth act of our comedy.

After all her heroism and extraordinary efforts, after, as she feared,
offending Providence—after facing Tailordom—the Countess was rolled
away in a dingy fly unrewarded even by a penny, for what she had gone
through. For she possessed eminently the practical nature of her sex;
and though she would have scorned, and would have declined to handle
coin so base, its absence was upbraidingly mentioned in her spiritual
outcries. Not a penny!

Nor was there, as in the miseries of retreat she affected indifferently
to imagine, a Duke fished out of the ruins of her enterprise, to wash
the mud off her garments and edge them with radiance. Caroline, it
became clear to her, had been infected by Evan’s folly. Caroline, she
subsequently learnt, had likewise been a fool. Instead of marvelling at
the genius that had done so much in spite of the pair of fools that
were the right and left wing of her battle array, the simple-minded
lady wept. She wanted success, not genius. Admiration she was ever
ready to forfeit for success.

Nor did she say to the tailors of earth: “Weep, for I sought to
emancipate you from opprobrium by making one of you a gentleman; I
fought for a great principle and have failed.” Heroic to the end, she
herself shed all the tears; took all the sorrow.

Where was consolation? Would any Protestant clergyman administer
comfort to her? Could he? might he do so? He might listen, and quote
texts; but he would demand the harsh rude English for everything; and
the Countess’s confessional thoughts were all innuendoish, aerial; too
delicate to live in our shameless tongue. Confession by implication,
and absolution; she could know this to be what she wished for, and yet
not think it. She could see a haven of peace in that picture of the
little brown box with the sleekly reverend figure bending his ear to
the kneeling Beauty outside, thrice ravishing as she half-lifts the
veil of her sins and her visage!—yet she started alarmed to hear it
whispered that the fair penitent was the Countess de Saldar; urgently
she prayed that no disgraceful brother might ever drive her to that!

Never let it be a Catholic priest!—she almost fashioned her petition
into words. Who was to save her? Alas! alas! in her dire distress—in
her sense of miserable pennilessness, she clung to Mr. John Raikes, of
the curricle, the mysteriously rich young gentleman; and on that
picture, with Andrew roguishly contemplating it, and Evan, with
feelings regarding his sister that he liked not to own, the curtain
commiseratingly drops.

As in the course of a stream you come upon certain dips, where, but
here and there, a sparkle or a gloom of the full flowing water is
caught through deepening foliage, so the history that concerns us
wanders out of day for a time, and we must violate the post and open
written leaves to mark the turn it takes.

First we have a letter from Mr. Goren to Mrs. Mel, to inform her that
her son has arrived and paid his respects to his future instructor in
the branch of science practised by Mr. Goren.

“He has arrived at last,” says the worthy tradesman. “His appearance in
the shop will be highly gentlemanly, and when he looks a little more
pleasing, and grows fond of it, nothing will be left to be desired. The
ladies, his sisters, have not thought proper to call. I had hopes of
the custom of Mr. Andrew Cogglesby. Of course you wish him to learn
tailoring thoroughly?”

Mrs. Mel writes back, thanking Mr. Goren, and saying that she had shown
the letter to inquiring creditors, and that she does wish her son to
learn his business from the root. This produces a second letter from
Mr. Goren, which imparts to her that at the root of the tree, of
tailoring the novitiate must sit no less than six hours a day with his
legs crossed and doubled under him, cheerfully plying needle and
thread; and that, without this probation, to undergo which the son
resolutely objects, all hope of his climbing to the top of the lofty
tree, and viewing mankind from an eminence, must be surrendered.

“If you do not insist, my dear Mrs. Harrington, I tell you candidly,
your son may have a shop, but he will be no tailor.”

Mrs. Mel understands her son and his state of mind well enough not to
insist, and is resigned to the melancholy consequence.

Then Mr. Goren discovers an extraordinary resemblance between Evan and
his father: remarking merely that the youth is not the gentleman his
father was in a shop, while he admits, that had it been conjoined to
business habits, he should have envied his departed friend.

He has soon something fresh to tell; and it is that young Mr.
Harrington is treating him cavalierly. That he should penetrate the
idea or appreciate the merits of Mr. Goren’s Balance was hardly to be
expected at present: the world did not, and Mr. Goren blamed no young
man for his ignorance. Still a proper attendance was requisite. Mr.
Goren thought it very singular that young Mr. Harrington should demand
all the hours of the day for his own purposes, up to half-past four. He
found it difficult to speak to him as a master, and begged that Mrs.
Harrington would, as a mother.

The reply of Mrs. Mel is dashed with a trifle of cajolery. She has
heard from her son, and seeing that her son takes all that time from
his right studies, to earn money wherewith to pay debts of which Mr.
Goren is cognizant, she trusts that their oldest friend will overlook
it.

Mr. Goren rejoins that he considers that he need not have been excluded
from young Mr. Harrington’s confidence. Moreover, it is a grief to him
that the young gentleman should refrain from accepting any of his
suggestions as to the propriety of requesting some, at least, of his
rich and titled acquaintance to confer on him the favour of their
patronage. “Which they would not repent,” adds Mr. Goren, “and might
learn to be very much obliged to him for, in return for kindnesses
extended to him.”

Notwithstanding all my efforts, you see, the poor boy is thrust into
the shop. There he is, without a doubt. He sleeps under Mr. Goren’s
roof: he (since one cannot be too positive in citing the punishment of
such a Pagan) stands behind a counter: he (and, oh! choke, young loves,
that have hovered around him! shrink from him in natural horror, gentle
ladies!) handles the shears. It is not my fault. He would be a Pagan.

If you can think him human enough still to care to know how he feels
it, I must tell you that he feels it hardly at all. After a big blow, a
very little one scarcely counts. What are outward forms and social
ignominies to him whose heart has been struck to the dust? His Gods
have fought for him, and there he is! He deserves no pity.

But he does not ask it of you, the callous Pagan! Despise him, if you
please, and rank with the Countess, who despises him most heartily.
Dipping further into the secrets of the post, we discover a brisk
correspondence between Juliana Bonner and Mrs. Strike.

“A thousand thanks to you, my dear Miss Bonner,” writes the latter
lady. “The unaffected interest you take in my brother touches me
deeply. I know him to be worthy of your good opinion. Yes, I will open
my heart to you, dearest Juliana; and it shall, as you wish, be quite
secret between us. Not to a soul!

“He is quite alone. My sisters Harriet and Louisa will not see him, and
I can only do so by stealth. His odd other little friend sometimes
drives me out on Sundays, to a place where I meet him; and the Duke of
Belfield kindly lends me his carriage. Oh, that we might never part! I
am only happy with him!

“Ah, do not doubt him, Juliana, for anything he does! You say, that now
the Duke has obtained for him the Secretaryship to my husband’s
Company, he should not stoop to that other thing, and you do not
understand why. I will tell you. Our poor father died in debt, and Evan
receives money which enables him by degrees to liquidate these debts,
on condition that he consents to be what _I_ dislike as much as you
can. He bears it; you can have no idea of his pride! He is too proud to
own to himself that it debases him—too proud to complain. It is a
tangle—a net that drags him down to it: but whatever he is outwardly,
he is the noblest human being in the world to me, and but for him, oh,
what should I be? Let me beg you to forgive it, if you can. My darling
has no friends. Is his temper as sweet as ever? I can answer that. Yes,
only he is silent, and looks—when you look into his eyes—colder, as men
look when they will not bear much from other men.

“He has not mentioned her name. I am sure she has not written.

“Pity him, and pray for him.”

Juliana then makes a communication, which draws forth the following:—

“Mistress of all the Beckley property—dearest, dearest Juliana! Oh! how
sincerely I congratulate you! The black on the letter alarmed me so, I
could hardly open it, my fingers trembled so; for I esteem you all at
Beckley; but when I had opened and read it, I was recompensed. You say
you are sorry for Rose. But surely what your Grandmama has done is
quite right. It is just, in every sense. But why am I not to tell Evan?
I am certain it would make him very happy, and happiness of any kind he
needs so much! I will obey you, of course, but I cannot see why. Do you
know, my dear child, you are extremely mysterious, and puzzle me. Evan
takes a pleasure in speaking of you. You and Lady Jocelyn are his great
themes. Why is he to be kept ignorant of your good fortune? The
spitting of blood is bad. You must winter in a warm climate. I do think
that London is far better for you in the late Autumn than Hampshire.
May I ask my sister Harriet to invite you to reside with her for some
weeks? Nothing, I know, would give her greater pleasure.”

Juliana answers this—

“If you love me—I sometimes hope that you do—but the feeling of being
loved is so strange to me that I can only believe it at times—but,
Caroline—there, I have mustered up courage to call you by your
Christian name at last—Oh, dear Caroline! if you do love me, do not
tell Mr. Harrington. I go on my knees to you to beg you not to tell him
a word. I have no reasons indeed not any; but I implore you again never
even to hint that I am anything but the person he knew at Beckley.

“Rose has gone to Elburne House, where Ferdinand, her friend, is to
meet her. She rides and sings the same, and keeps all her colour.

“She may not, as you imagine, have much sensibility. Perhaps not
enough. I am afraid that Rose is turning into a very worldly woman!

“As to what you kindly say about inviting me to London, I should like
it, and I am my own mistress. Do you know, I think I am older than your
brother! I am twenty-three. Pray, when you write, tell me if he is
older than that. But should I not be a dreadful burden to you?
Sometimes I have to keep to my chamber whole days and days. When that
happens now, I think of you entirely. See how I open my heart to you.
You say that you do to me. I wish I could really think it.”

A postscript begs Caroline “not to forget about the ages.”

In this fashion the two ladies open their hearts, and contrive to read
one another perfectly in their mutual hypocrisies.

Some letters bearing the signatures of Mr. John Raikes, and Miss Polly
Wheedle, likewise pass. Polly inquires for detailed accounts of the
health and doings of Mr. Harrington. Jack replies with full particulars
of her own proceedings, and mild corrections of her grammar. It is to
be noted that Polly grows much humbler to him on paper, which being
instantly perceived by the mercurial one, his caressing condescension
to her is very beautiful. She is taunted with Mr. Nicholas Frim, and
answers, after the lapse of a week, that the aforesaid can be nothing
to her, as he “went in a passion to church last Sunday and got
married.” It appears that they had quarrelled, “because I danced with
you that night.” To this Mr. Raikes rejoins in a style that would be
signified by “ahem!” in language, and an arrangement of the shirt
collar before the looking-glass, in action.




CHAPTER XXXIX.
IN THE DOMAIN OF TAILORDOM


There was peace in Mr. Goren’s shop. Badgered Ministers, bankrupt
merchants, diplomatists with a headache—any of our modern grandees
under difficulties, might have envied that peace over which Mr. Goren
presided: and he was an enviable man. He loved his craft, he believed
that he had not succeeded the millions of antecedent tailors in vain;
and, excepting that trifling coquetry with shirt-fronts, viz., the red
crosses, which a shrewd rival had very soon eclipsed by representing
nymphs triangularly posed, he devoted himself to his business from
morning to night; as rigid in demanding respect from those beneath him,
as he was profuse in lavishing it on his patrons. His public boast was,
that he owed no man a farthing; his secret comfort, that he possessed
two thousand pounds in the Funds. But Mr. Goren did not stop here.
Behind these external characteristics he nursed a passion. Evan was
astonished and pleased to find in him an enthusiastic fern-collector.
Not that Mr. Harrington shared the passion, but the sight of these
brown roots spread out, ticketed, on the stained paper, after supper,
when the shutters were up and the house defended from the hostile outer
world; the old man poring over them, and naming this and that spot
where, during his solitary Saturday afternoon and Sunday excursions, he
had lighted on the rare samples exhibited this contrast of the quiet
evening with the sordid day humanized Mr. Goren to him. He began to see
a spirit in the rigid tradesman not so utterly dissimilar to his own,
and he fancied that he, too, had a taste for ferns. Round Beckley how
they abounded!

He told Mr. Goren so, and Mr. Goren said:

“Some day we’ll jog down there together, as the saying goes.”

Mr. Goren spoke of it as an ordinary event, likely to happen in the
days to come: not as an incident the mere mention of which, as being
probable, stopped the breath and made the pulses leap.

For now Evan’s education taught him to feel that he was at his lowest
degree. Never now could Rose stoop to him. He carried the shop on his
back. She saw the brand of it on his forehead. Well! and what was Rose
to him, beyond a blissful memory, a star that he had once touched?
Self-love kept him strong by day, but in the darkness of night came his
misery; wakening from tender dreams, he would find his heart sinking
under a horrible pressure, and then the fair fresh face of Rose swam
over him; the hours of Beckley were revived; with intolerable anguish
he saw that she was blameless—that he alone was to blame. Yet worse was
it when his closed eyelids refused to conjure up the sorrowful lovely
nightmare, and he lay like one in a trance, entombed—wretched Pagan!
feeling all that had been blindly; when the Past lay beside him like a
corpse that he had slain.

These nightly torments helped him to brave what the morning brought.
Insensibly also, as Time hardened his sufferings, Evan asked himself
what the shame of his position consisted in. He grew stiff-necked. His
Pagan virtues stood up one by one to support him. Andrew, courageously
evading the interdict that forbade him to visit Evan, would meet him by
appointment at City taverns, and flatly offered him a place in the
Brewery. Evan declined it, on the pretext that, having received Old
Tom’s money for the year, he must at least work out that term according
to the conditions. Andrew fumed and sneered at Tailordom. Evan said
that there was peace in Mr. Goren’s shop. His sharp senses discerned in
Andrew’s sneer a certain sincerity, and he revolted against it. Mr John
Raikes, too, burlesqued Society so well, that he had the satisfaction
of laughing at his enemy occasionally. The latter gentleman was still a
pensioner, flying about town with the Countess de Saldar, in deadly
fear lest that fascinating lady should discover the seat of his
fortune; happy, notwithstanding. In the mirror of Evan’s little world,
he beheld the great one from which he was banished.

Now the dusk of a winter’s afternoon was closing over London, when a
carriage drew up in front of Mr. Goren’s shop, out of which, to Mr.
Goren’s chagrin, a lady stepped, with her veil down. The lady entered,
and said that she wished to speak to Mr. Harrington. Mr. Goren made way
for her to his pupil; and was amazed to see her fall into his arms, and
hardly gratified to hear her say: “Pardon me, darling, for coming to
you in this place.”

Evan asked permission to occupy the parlour.

“My place,” said Mr. Goren, with humble severity, over his spectacles,
“is very poor. Such as it is, it is at the lady’s service.”

Alone with her, Evan was about to ease his own feelings by remarking to
the effect that Mr. Goren was human like the rest of us, but Caroline
cried, with unwonted vivacity:

“Yes, yes, I know; but I thought only of you. I have such news for you!
You will and must pardon my coming—that’s my first thought, sensitive
darling that you are!” She kissed him fondly. “Juliana Bonner is in
town, staying with us!”

“Is that your news?” asked Evan, pressing her against his breast.

“No, dear love—but still! You have no idea what her fortune—Mrs. Bonner
has died and left her—but I mustn’t tell you. Oh, my darling! how she
admires you! She—she could recompense you; if you would! We will put
that by, for the present. Dear! the Duke has begged you, through me, to
accept—I think it’s to be a sort of bailiff to his estates—I don’t know
rightly. It’s a very honourable post, that gentlemen take: and the
income you are to have, Evan, will be near a thousand a year. Now, what
do I deserve for my news?”

She put up her mouth for another kiss, out of breath.

“True?” looked Evan’s eyes.

“True!” she said, smiling, and feasting on his bewilderment.

After the bubbling in his brain had a little subsided, Evan breathed as
a man on whom fresh air is blown. Were not these tidings of release?
His ridiculous pride must nevertheless inquire whether Caroline had
been begging this for him.

“No, dear—indeed!” Caroline asserted with more than natural vehemence.
“It’s something that you yourself have done that has pleased him. I
don’t know what. Only he says, he believes you are a man to be trusted
with the keys of anything—and so you are. You are to call on him
to-morrow. Will you?”

While Evan was replying, her face became white. She had heard the
Major’s voice in the shop. His military step advanced, and Caroline,
exclaiming, “Don’t let me see him!” bustled to a door. Evan nodded, and
she slipped through. The next moment he was facing the stiff marine.

“Well, young man,” the Major commenced, and, seating himself, added,
“be seated. I want to talk to you seriously, sir. You didn’t think fit
to wait till I had done with the Directors today. You’re devilishly out
in your discipline, whatever you are at two and two. I suppose there’s
no fear of being intruded on here? None of your acquaintances likely to
be introducing themselves to me?”

“There is not one that I would introduce to you,” said Evan.

The Major nodded a brief recognition of the compliment, and then,
throwing his back against the chair, fired out: “Come, sir, is this
your doing?”

In military phrase, Evan now changed front. His first thought had been
that the Major had come for his wife. He perceived that he himself was
the special object of his visitation.

“I must ask you what you allude to,” he answered.

“You are not at your office, but you will speak to me as if there was
some distinction between us,” said the Major. “My having married your
sister does not reduce me to the ranks, I hope.”

The Major drummed his knuckles on the table, after this impressive
delivery.

“Hem!” he resumed. “Now, sir, understand, before you speak a word, that
I can see through any number of infernal lies. I see that you’re
prepared for prevarication. By George! it shall come out of you, if I
get it by main force. The Duke compelled me to give you that
appointment in my Company. Now, sir, did you, or did you not, go to him
and deliberately state to him that you believed the affairs of the
Company to be in a bad condition—infamously handled, likely to involve
his honour as a gentleman? I ask you, sir, did you do this, or did you
not do it?”

Evan waited till the sharp rattle of the Major’s close had quieted.

“If I am to answer the wording of your statement, I may say that I did
not.”

“Very good; very good; that will do. Are you aware that the Duke has
sent in his resignation as a Director of our Company?”

“I hear of it first from you.”

“Confound your familiarity!” cried the irritable officer, rising. “Am I
always to be told that I married your sister? Address me, sir, as
becomes your duty.”

Evan heard the words “beggarly tailor” mumbled “out of the gutters,”
and “cursed connection.” He stood in the attitude of attention, while
the Major continued:

“Now, young man, listen to these facts. You came to me this day last
week, and complained that you did not comprehend some of our
transactions and affairs. I explained them to your damned stupidity.
You went away. Three days after that, you had an interview with the
Duke. Stop, sir! What the devil do you mean by daring to speak while I
am speaking? You saw the Duke, I say. Now, what took place at that
interview?”

The Major tried to tower over Evan powerfully, as he put this query.
They were of a common height, and to do so, he had to rise on his toes,
so that the effect was but momentary.

“I think I am not bound to reply,” said Evan.

“Very well, sir; that will do.” The Major’s fingers were evidently
itching for an absent rattan. “Confess it or not, you are dismissed
from your post. Do you hear? You are kicked in the street. A beggarly
tailor you were born, and a beggarly tailor you will die.”

“I must beg you to stop, now,” said Evan. “I told you that I was not
bound to reply: but I will. If you will sit down, Major Strike, you
shall hear what you wish to know.”

This being presently complied with, though not before a glare of the
Major’s eyes had shown his doubt whether it might not be construed into
insolence, Evan pursued:

“I came to you and informed you that I could not reconcile the
cash-accounts of the Company, and that certain of the later proceedings
appeared to me to jeopardize its prosperity. Your explanations did not
satisfy me. I admit that you enjoined me to be silent. But the Duke, as
a Director, had as strong a right to claim me as his servant, and when
he questioned me as to the position of the Company, I told him what I
thought, just as I had told you.”

“You told him we were jobbers and swindlers, sir!”

“The Duke inquired of me whether I would, under the circumstances,
while proceedings were going on which I did not approve of, take the
responsibility of allowing my name to remain—”

“Ha! ha! ha!” the Major burst out. This was too good a joke. The name
of a miserable young tailor!” Go on, sir, go on!” He swallowed his
laughter like oil on his rage.

“I have said sufficient.”

Jumping up, the Major swore by the Lord, that he had said sufficient.

“Now, look you here, young man.” He squared his finger before Evan,
eyeing him under a hard frown, “You have been playing your game again,
as you did down at that place in Hampshire. I heard of it—deserved to
be shot, by heaven! You think you have got hold of the Duke, and you
throw me over. You imagine, I dare say, that I will allow my wife to be
talked about to further your interests—you self-seeking young dog! As
long as he lent the Company his name, I permitted a great many things.
Do you think me a blind idiot, sir? But now she must learn to be
satisfied with people who’ve got no titles, or carriages, and who can’t
give hundred guinea compliments. You’re all of a piece—a set of....”

The Major paused, for half a word was on his mouth which had drawn
lightning to Evan’s eyes.

Not to be baffled, he added: “But look you, sir. I may be ruined. I
dare say the Company will go to the dogs—every ass will follow a Duke.
But, mark, this goes on no more. I will be no woman’s tally. Mind, sir,
I take excellent care that you don’t traffic in your sister!”

The Major delivered this culminating remark with a well-timed
deflection of his forefinger, and slightly turned aside when he had
done.

You might have seen Evan’s figure rocking, as he stood with his eyes
steadily levelled on his sister’s husband.

The Major, who, whatever he was, was physically no coward, did not fail
to interpret the look, and challenge it.

Evan walked to the door, opened it, and said, between his teeth, “You
must go at once.”

“Eh, sir, eh? what’s this?” exclaimed the warrior but the door was
open, Mr. Goren was in the shop; the scandal of an assault in such a
house, and the consequent possibility of his matrimonial alliance
becoming bruited in the newspapers, held his arm after it had given an
involuntary jerk. He marched through with becoming dignity, and marched
out into the street; and if necks unelastic and heads erect may be
taken as the sign of a proud soul and of nobility of mind, my artist
has the Major for his model.

Evan displayed no such a presence. He returned to the little parlour,
shut and locked the door to the shop, and forgetting that one was near,
sat down, covered his eyes, and gave way to a fit of tearless sobbing.
With one foot in the room Caroline hung watching him. A pain that she
had never known wrung her nerves. His whole manhood seemed to be
shaken, as if by regular pulsations of intensest misery. She stood in
awe of the sight till her limbs failed her, and then staggering to him
she fell on her knees, clasping his, passionately kissing them.




CHAPTER XL.
IN WHICH THE COUNTESS STILL SCENTS GAME


Mr. Raikes and his friend Frank Remand, surnamed Franko, to suit the
requirements of metre, in which they habitually conversed, were walking
arm-in-arm along the drive in Society’s Park on a fine frosty Sunday
afternoon of midwinter. The quips and jokes of Franko were lively, and
he looked into the carriages passing, as if he knew that a cheerful
countenance is not without charms for their inmates. Raikes’ face, on
the contrary, was barren and bleak. Being of that nature that when a
pun was made he must perforce outstrip it, he fell into Franko’s humour
from time to time, but albeit aware that what he uttered was good, and
by comparison transcendent, he refused to enjoy it. Nor when Franko
started from his arm to declaim a passage, did he do other than make
limp efforts to unite himself to Franko again. A further sign of
immense depression in him was that instead of the creative, it was the
critical faculty he exercised, and rather than reply to Franko in his
form of speech, he scanned occasional lines and objected to particular
phrases. He had clearly exchanged the sanguine for the bilious
temperament, and was fast stranding on the rocky shores of prose.
Franko bore this very well, for he, like Raikes in happier days,
claimed all the glances of lovely woman as his own, and on his right
there flowed a stream of Beauties. At last he was compelled to observe:
“This change is sudden: wherefore so downcast? With tigrine claw thou
mangiest my speech, thy cheeks are like December’s pippin, and thy
tongue most sour!”

“Then of it make a farce!” said Raikes, for the making of farces was
Franko’s profession. “Wherefore so downcast! What a line! There! let’s
walk on. Let us the left foot forward stout advance. I care not for the
herd.”

“’Tis love!” cried Franko.

“Ay, an’ it be!” Jack gloomily returned.

“For ever cruel is the sweet Saldar?”

Raikes winced at this name.

“A truce to banter, Franko!” he said sternly: but the subject was
opened, and the wound.

“Love!” he pursued, mildly groaning. “Suppose you adored a fascinating
woman, and she knew—positively knew—your manly weakness, and you saw
her smiling upon everybody, and she told you to be happy, and egad,
when you came to reflect, you found that after three months’ suit you
were nothing better than her errand-boy? A thing to boast of, is it
not, quotha?”

“Love’s yellow-fever, jealousy, methinks,” Franko commenced in reply;
but Raikes spat at the emphasized word.

“Jealousy!—who’s jealous of clergymen and that crew? Not I, by Pluto! I
carried five messages to one fellow with a coat-tail straight to his
heels, last week. She thought I should drive my curricle—I couldn’t
afford an omnibus! I had to run. When I returned to her I was dirty.
She made remarks!”

“Thy sufferings are severe—but such is woman!” said Franko. “’Gad, it’s
a good idea, though.” He took out a note-book and pencilled down a
point or two. Raikes watched the process sardonically.

“My tragedy is, then, thy farce!” he exclaimed. “Well, be it so! I
believe I shall come to song-writing again myself shortly—beneath the
shield of Catnach I’ll a nation’s ballads frame. I’ve spent my income
in four months, and now I’m living on my curricle. I underlet it. It’s
like trade—it’s as bad as poor old Harrington, by Jove! But that isn’t
the worst, Franko!” Jack dropped his voice: “I believe I’m furiously
loved by a poor country wench.”

“Morals!” was Franko’s most encouraging reproof.

“Oh, I don’t think I’ve even kissed her,” rejoined Raikes, who doubted
because his imagination was vivid. “It’s my intellect that dazzles her.
I’ve got letters—she calls me clever. By Jove! since I gave up driving
I’ve had thoughts of rushing down to her and making her mine in spite
of home, family, fortune, friends, name, position—everything! I have,
indeed.”

Franko looked naturally astonished at this amount of self-sacrifice.
“The Countess?” he shrewdly suggested.

“I’d rather be my Polly’s prince,
Than yon great lady’s errand-boy!”


Raikes burst into song.

He stretched out his hand, as if to discard all the great ladies who
were passing. By the strangest misfortune ever known, the direction
taken by his fingers was toward a carriage wherein, beautifully smiling
opposite an elaborately reverend gentleman of middle age, the Countess
de Saldar was sitting. This great lady is not to be blamed for deeming
that her errand-boy was pointing her out vulgarly on a public
promenade. Ineffable disdain curled off her sweet olive visage. She
turned her head.

“I’ll go down to that girl to-night,” said Raikes, with compressed
passion. And then he hurried Franko along to the bridge, where, behold,
the Countess alighted with the gentleman, and walked beside him into
the gardens.

“Follow her,” said Raikes, in agitation. “Do you see her? by yon
long-tailed raven’s side? Follow her, Franko! See if he kisses her
hand—anything! and meet me here in half an hour. I’ll have evidence!”

Franko did not altogether like the office, but Raikes’ dinners,
singular luck, and superiority in the encounter of puns, gave him the
upper hand with his friend, and so Franko went.

Turning away from the last glimpse of his Countess, Raikes crossed the
bridge, and had not strolled far beneath the bare branches of one of
the long green walks, when he perceived a gentleman with two ladies
leaning on him.

“Now, there,” moralized this youth; “now, what do you say to that? Do
you call that fair? He can’t be happy, and it’s not in nature for them
to be satisfied. And yet, if I went up and attempted to please them all
by taking one away, the probabilities are that he would knock me down.
Such is life! We won’t be made comfortable!”

Nevertheless, he passed them with indifference, for it was merely the
principle he objected to; and, indeed, he was so wrapped in his own
conceptions, that his name had to be called behind him twice before he
recognized Evan Harrington, Mrs. Strike, and Miss Bonner. The
arrangement he had previously thought good, was then spontaneously
adopted. Mrs. Strike reposed her fair hand upon his arm, and Juliana,
with a timid glance of pleasure, walked ahead in Evan’s charge. Close
neighbourhood between the couples was not kept. The genius of Mr.
Raikes was wasted in manoeuvres to lead his beautiful companion into
places where he could be seen with her, and envied. It was, perhaps,
more flattering that she should betray a marked disposition to prefer
solitude in his society. But this idea illumined him only near the
moment of parting. Then he saw it; then he groaned in soul, and
besought Evan to have one more promenade, saying, with characteristic
cleverness in the masking of his real thoughts: “It gives us an
appetite, you know.”

In Evan’s face and Juliana’s there was not much sign that any
protraction of their walk together would aid this beneficent process of
nature. He took her hand gently, and when he quitted it, it dropped.

“The Rose, the Rose of Beckley Court!” Raikes sang aloud. “Why, this is
a day of meetings. Behold John Thomas in the rear—a tower of plush and
powder! Shall I rush—shall I pluck her from the aged stem?”

On the gravel-walk above them Rose passed with her aristocratic
grandmother, muffled in furs. She marched deliberately, looking coldly
before her. Evan’s face was white, and Juliana, whose eyes were fixed
on him, shuddered.

“I’m chilled,” she murmured to Caroline. “Let us go.” Caroline eyed
Evan with a meaning sadness.

“We will hurry to our carriage,” she said.

They were seen to make a little circuit so as not to approach Rose;
after whom, thoughtless of his cruelty, Evan bent his steps slowly,
halting when she reached her carriage. He believed—rather, he knew that
she had seen him. There was a consciousness in the composed outlines of
her face as she passed: the indifference was too perfect. Let her hate
him if she pleased. It recompensed him that the air she wore should
make her appearance more womanly; and that black dress and
crape-bonnet, in some way, touched him to mournful thoughts of her that
helped a partial forgetfulness of wounded self.

Rose had driven off. He was looking at the same spot, where Caroline’s
hand waved from her carriage. Juliana was not seen. Caroline requested
her to nod to him once, but she would not. She leaned back hiding her
eyes, and moving a petulant shoulder at Caroline’s hand.

“Has he offended you, my child?”

Juliana answered harshly:

“No-no.”

The wheels rolled on, and Caroline tried other subjects, knowing
possibly that they would lead Juliana back to this of her own accord.

“You saw how she treated him?” the latter presently said, without
moving her hand from before her eyes.

“Yes, dear. He forgives her, and will forget it.”

“Oh!” she clenched her long thin hand, “I pray that I may not die
before I have made her repent it. She shall!”

Juliana looked glitteringly in Caroline’s face, and then fell
a-weeping, and suffered herself to be folded and caressed. The storm
was long subsiding.

“Dearest! you are better now?” said Caroline.

She whispered: “Yes.”

“My brother has only to know you, dear—”

“Hush! That’s past.” Juliana stopped her; and, on a deep breath that
threatened to break to sobs, she added in a sweeter voice than was
common to her, “Ah, why—why did you tell him about the Beckley
property?”

Caroline vainly strove to deny that she had told him. Juliana’s head
shook mournfully at her; and now Caroline knew what Juliana meant when
she begged so earnestly that Evan should be kept ignorant of her change
of fortune.

Some days after this the cold struck Juliana’s chest, and she sickened.
The three sisters held a sitting to consider what it was best to do
with her. Caroline proposed to take her to Beckley without delay.
Harriet was of opinion that the least they could do was to write to her
relatives and make them instantly aware of her condition.

But the Countess said “No,” to both. Her argument was, that Juliana
being independent, they were by no means bound to “bundle” her, in her
state, back to a place where she had been so shamefully maltreated:
that here she would live, while there she would certainly die: that
absence of excitement was her medicine, and that here she had it. Mrs.
Andrew, feeling herself responsible as the young lady’s hostess, did
not acquiesce in the Countess’s views till she had consulted Juliana;
and then apologies for giving trouble were breathed on the one hand;
sympathy, condolences, and professions of esteem, on the other. Juliana
said, she was but slightly ill, would soon recover. Entreated not to
leave them before she was thoroughly re-established, and to consent to
be looked on as one of the family, she sighed, and said it was the
utmost she could hope. Of course the ladies took this compliment to
themselves, but Evan began to wax in importance. The Countess thought
it nearly time to acknowledge him, and supported the idea by a citation
of the doctrine, that to forgive is Christian. It happened, however,
that Harriet, who had less art and more will than her sisters, was
inflexible. She, living in a society but a few steps above Tailordom,
however magnificent in expenditure and resources, abhorred it solemnly.
From motives of prudence, as well as personal disgust, she continued
firm in declining to receive her brother. She would not relent when the
Countess pointed out a dim, a dazzling prospect, growing out of Evan’s
proximity to the heiress of Beckley Court; she was not to be moved when
Caroline suggested that the specific for the frail invalid was Evan’s
presence. As to this, Juliana was sufficiently open, though, as she
conceived, her art was extreme.

“Do you know why I stay to vex and trouble you?” she asked Caroline.
“Well, then, it is that I may see your brother united to you all: and
then I shall go, happy.”

The pretext served also to make him the subject of many conversations.
Twice a week a bunch of the best flowers that could be got were sorted
and arranged by her, and sent namelessly to brighten Evan’s chamber.

“I may do such a thing as this, you know, without incurring blame,” she
said.

The sight of a love so humble in its strength and affluence, sent
Caroline to Evan on a fruitless errand. What availed it, that accused
of giving lead to his pride in refusing the heiress, Evan should
declare that he did not love her? He did not, Caroline admitted as
possible, but he might. He might learn to love her, and therefore he
was wrong in wounding her heart. She related flattering anecdotes. She
drew tearful pictures of Juliana’s love for him: and noticing how he
seemed to prize his bouquet of flowers, said:

“Do you love them for themselves, or the hand that sent them?”

Evan blushed, for it had been a struggle for him to receive them, as he
thought, from Rose in secret. The flowers lost their value; the song
that had arisen out of them, “Thou livest in my memory,” ceased. But
they came still. How many degrees from love gratitude may be, I have
not reckoned. I rather fear it lies on the opposite shore. From a youth
to a girl, it may yet be very tender; the more so, because their ages
commonly exclude such a sentiment, and nature seems willing to make a
transition stage of it. Evan wrote to Juliana. Incidentally he
expressed a wish to see her. Juliana was under doctor’s interdict: but
she was not to be prevented from going when Evan wished her to go. They
met in the park, as before, and he talked to her five minutes through
the carriage window.

“Was it worth the risk, my poor child?” said Caroline, pityingly.

Juliana cried: “Oh! I would give anything to live!”

A man might have thought that she made no direct answer.

“Don’t you think I am patient? Don’t you think I am very patient?” she
asked Caroline, winningly, on their way home.

Caroline could scarcely forbear from smiling at the feverish anxiety
she showed for a reply that should confirm her words and hopes.

“So we must all be!” she said, and that common-place remark caused
Juliana to exclaim: “Prisoners have lived in a dungeon, on bread and
water, for years!”

Whereat Caroline kissed her so tenderly that Juliana tried to look
surprised, and failing, her thin lips quivered; she breathed a soft
“hush,” and fell on Caroline’s bosom.

She was transparent enough in one thing; but the flame which burned
within her did not light her through.

Others, on other matters, were quite as transparent to her.

Caroline never knew that she had as much as told her the moral suicide
Evan had committed at Beckley; so cunningly had she been probed at
intervals with little casual questions; random interjections, that one
who loved him could not fail to meet; petty doubts requiring
elucidations. And the Countess, kind as her sentiments had grown toward
the afflicted creature, was compelled to proclaim her densely stupid in
material affairs. For the Countess had an itch of the simplest feminine
curiosity to know whether the dear child had any notion of
accomplishing a certain holy duty of the perishable on this earth, who
might possess worldly goods; and no hints—not even plain speaking,
would do. Juliana did not understand her at all.

The Countess exhibited a mourning-ring on her finger, Mrs. Bonner’s
bequest to her.

“How fervent is my gratitude to my excellent departed friend for this!
A legacy, however trifling, embalms our dear lost ones in the memory!”

It was of no avail. Juliana continued densely stupid. Was she not
worse? The Countess could not, “in decency,” as she observed, reveal to
her who had prompted Mrs. Bonner so to bequeath the Beckley estates as
to “ensure sweet Juliana’s future”; but ought not Juliana to divine
it?—Juliana at least had hints sufficient.

Cold Spring winds were now blowing. Juliana had resided no less than
two months with the Cogglesbys. She was entreated still to remain, and
she did. From Lady Jocelyn she heard not a word of remonstrance; but
from Miss Carrington and Mrs. Shorne she received admonishing letters.
Finally, Mr. Harry Jocelyn presented himself. In London, and without
any of that needful subsistence which a young gentleman feels the want
of in London more than elsewhere, Harry began to have thoughts of his
own, without any instigation from his aunts, about devoting himself to
business. So he sent his card up to his cousin, and was graciously met
in the drawing-room by the Countess, who ruffled him and smoothed him,
and would possibly have distracted his soul from business had his
circumstances been less straitened. Juliana was declared to be too
unwell to see him that day. He called a second time, and enjoyed a
similar greeting. His third visit procured him an audience alone with
Juliana, when, at once, despite the warnings of his aunts, the frank
fellow plunged, “medias res”. Mrs. Bonner had left him totally
dependent on his parents and his chances.

“A desperate state of things, isn’t it, Juley? I think I shall go for a
soldier—common, you know.”

Instead of shrieking out against such a debasement of his worth and
gentility, as was to be expected, Juliana said:

“That’s what Mr. Harrington thought of doing.”

“He! If he’d had the pluck he would.”

“His duty forbade it, and he did not.”

“Duty! a confounded tailor! What fools we were to have him at Beckley!”

“Has the Countess been unkind to you Harry?”

“I haven’t seen her to-day, and don’t want to. It’s my little dear old
Juley I came for.”

“Dear Harry!” she thanked him with eyes and hands. “Come often, won’t
you?”

“Why, ain’t you coming back to us, Juley?”

“Not yet. They are very kind to me here. How is Rose?”

“Oh, quite jolly. She and Ferdinand are thick again. Balls every night.
She dances like the deuce. They want me to go; but I ain’t the sort of
figure for those places, and besides, I shan’t dance till I can lead
you out.”

A spur of laughter at Harry’s generous nod brought on Juliana’s cough.
Harry watched her little body shaken and her reddened eyes. Some real
emotion—perhaps the fear which healthy young people experience at the
sight of deadly disease—made Harry touch her arm with the softness of a
child’s touch.

“Don’t be alarmed, Harry,” she said. “It’s nothing—only Winter. I’m
determined to get well.”

“That’s right,” quoth he, recovering. “I know you’ve got pluck, or you
wouldn’t have stood that operation.”

“Let me see: when was that?” she asked slyly.

Harry coloured, for it related to a time when he had not behaved
prettily to her.

“There, Juley, that’s all forgotten. I was a fool—a scoundrel, if you
like. I’m sorry for it now.”

“Do you want money, Harry?”

“Oh, money!”

“Have you repaid Mr. Harrington yet?”

“There—no, I haven’t. Bother it! that fellow’s name’s always on your
tongue. I’ll tell you what, Juley—but it’s no use. He’s a low, vulgar
adventurer.”

“Dear Harry,” said Juliana, softly; “don’t bring your aunts with you
when you come to see me.”

“Well, then I’ll tell you, Juley. It’s enough that he’s a beastly
tailor.”

“Quite enough,” she responded; “and he is neither a fool nor a
scoundrel.”

Harry’s memory for his own speech was not quick. When Juliana’s calm
glance at him called it up, he jumped from his chair, crying: “Upon my
honour, I’ll tell you what, Juley! If I had money to pay him to-morrow,
I’d insult him on the spot.”

Juliana meditated, and said: “Then all your friends must wish you to
continue poor.”

This girl had once been on her knees to him. She had looked up to him
with admiring love, and he had given her a crumb or so occasionally,
thinking her something of a fool, and more of a pest; but now he could
not say a word to her without being baffled in an elderly-sisterly tone
exasperating him so far that he positively wished to marry her, and
coming to the point, offered himself with downright sincerity, and was
rejected. Harry left in a passion. Juliana confided the secret to
Caroline, who suggested interested motives, which Juliana would not
hear of.

“Ah,” said the Countess, when Caroline mentioned the case to her, “of
course the poor thing cherishes her first offer. She would believe a
curate to be disinterested! But mind that Evan has due warning when she
is to meet him. Mind that he is dressed becomingly.”

Caroline asked why.

“Because, my dear, she is enamoured of his person. These little
unhealthy creatures are always attracted by the person. She thinks it
to be Evan’s qualities. I know better: it is his person. Beckley Court
may be lost by a shabby coat!”

The Countess had recovered from certain spiritual languors into which
she had fallen after her retreat. Ultimate victory hung still in the
balance. Oh! if Evan would only marry this little sufferer, who was so
sure to die within a year! or, if she lived (for marriage has often
been as a resurrection to some poor female invalids), there was Beckley
Court, a splendid basis for future achievements. Reflecting in this
fashion, the Countess pardoned her brother. Glowing hopes hung fresh
lamps in her charitable breast. She stepped across the threshold of
Tailordom, won Mr. Goren’s heart by her condescension, and worked Evan
into a sorrowful mood concerning the invalid. Was not Juliana his only
active friend? In return, he said things which only required a little
colouring to be very acceptable to her.

The game waxed exciting again. The enemy (the Jocelyn party) was alert,
but powerless. The three sisters were almost wrought to perform a
sacrifice far exceeding Evan’s. They nearly decided to summon him to
the house: but the matter being broached at table one evening, Major
Strike objected to it so angrily that they abandoned it, with the
satisfactory conclusion that if they did wrong it was the Major’s
fault.

Meantime Juliana had much on her conscience. She knew Evan to be
innocent, and she allowed Rose to think him guilty. Could she bring her
heart to join them? That was not in her power: but desiring to be
lulled by a compromise, she devoted herself to make his relatives
receive him; and on days of bitter winds she would drive out to meet
him, answering all expostulations with—“I should not go if he were
here.”

The game waxed hot. It became a question whether Evan should be
admitted to the house in spite of the Major. Juliana now made an
extraordinary move. Having the Count with her in the carriage one day,
she stopped in front of Mr. Goren’s shop, and Evan had to come out. The
Count returned home extremely mystified. Once more the unhappy Countess
was obliged to draw bills on the fabulous; and as she had recommenced
the system, which was not without its fascinations to her, Juliana, who
had touched the spring, had the full benefit of it. The Countess had
deceived her before—what of that? She spoke things sweet to hear. Who
could be false that gave her heart food on which it lived?

One night Juliana returned from her drive alarmingly ill. She was
watched through the night by Caroline and the Countess alternately. In
the morning the sisters met.

“She has consented to let us send for a doctor,” said Caroline.

“Her chief desire seems to be a lawyer,” said the Countess.

“Yes, but the doctor must be sent for first.”

“Yes, indeed! But it behoves us to previse that the doctor does not
kill her before the lawyer comes.”

Caroline looked at Louisa, and said: “Are you ignorant?”

“No—what?” cried the Countess eagerly.

“Evan has written to tell Lady Jocelyn the state of her health, and—”

“And that naturally has aggravated her malady!” The Countess cramped
her long fingers. “The child heard it from him yesterday! Oh, I could
swear at that brother!”

She dropped into a chair and sat rigid and square-jawed, a sculpture of
unutterable rage.

In the afternoon Lady Jocelyn arrived. The doctor was there—the lawyer
had gone. Without a word of protest Juliana accompanied her ladyship to
Beckley Court. Here was a blow!

But Andrew was preparing one more mighty still. What if the Cogglesby
Brewery proved a basis most unsound? Where must they fall then? Alas!
on that point whence they sprang. If not to Perdition—Tailordom!




CHAPTER XLI.v
REVEALS AN ABOMINABLE PLOT OF THE BROTHERS COGGLESBY


A lively April day, with strong gusts from the Southwest, and long
sweeping clouds, saluted the morning coach from London to Lymport.
Thither Tailordom triumphant was bearing its victim at a rattling pace,
to settle him, and seal him for ever out of the ranks of gentlemen:
Society, meantime, howling exclusion to him in the background: “Out of
our halls, degraded youth: The smiles of turbaned matrons: the sighs of
delicate maids; genial wit, educated talk, refined scandal, vice in
harness, dinners sentineled by stately plush: these, the flavour of
life, are not for you, though you stole a taste of them, wretched
impostor! Pay for it with years of remorse!”

The coach went rushing against the glorious high wind. It stirred his
blood, freshened his cheeks, gave a bright tone of zest to his eyes, as
he cast them on the young green country. Not banished from the breath
of heaven, or from self-respect, or from the appetite for the rewards
that are to follow duties done! Not banished from the help that is
always reached to us when we have fairly taken the right road: and that
for him is the road to Lymport. Let the kingdom of Gilt Gingerbread
howl as it will! We are no longer children, but men: men who have
bitten hard at experience, and know the value of a tooth: who have had
our hearts bruised, and cover them with armour: who live not to feed,
but look to food that we may live! What matters it that yonder
high-spiced kingdom should excommunicate such as we are? We have rubbed
off the gilt, and have assumed the command of our stomachs. We are men
from this day!

Now, you would have thought Evan’s companions, right and left of him,
were the wretches under sentence, to judge from appearances. In
contrast with his look of insolent pleasure, Andrew, the moment an eye
was on him, exhibited the cleverest impersonation of the dumps ever
seen: while Mr. Raikes was from head to foot nothing better than a moan
made visible. Nevertheless, they both agreed to rally Evan, and bid him
be of good cheer.

“Don’t be down, Van; don’t be down, my boy,” said Andrew, rubbing his
hands gloomily.

“I? do I look it?” Evan answered, laughing.

“Capital acting!” exclaimed Raikes. “Try and keep it up.”

“Well, I hope you’re acting too,” said Evan.

Raikes let his chest fall like a collapsing bellows.

At the end of five minutes, he remarked: “I’ve been sitting on it the
whole morning! There’s violent inflammation, I’m persuaded. Another
hour, and I jump slap from the summit of the coach!”

Evan turned to Andrew.

“Do you think he’ll be let off?”

“Mr. Raikes? Can’t say. You see, Van, it depends upon how Old Tom has
taken his bad luck. Ahem! Perhaps he’ll be all the stricter; and as a
man of honour, Mr. Raikes, you see, can’t very well—”

“By Jove! I wish I wasn’t a man of honour!” Raikes interposed, heavily.

“You see, Van, Old Tom’s circumstances”—Andrew ducked, to smother a
sort of laughter—“are now such that he’d be glad of the money to let
him off, no doubt; but Mr. Raikes has spent it, I can’t lend it, and
you haven’t got it, and there we all are. At the end of the year he’s
free, and he—ha! ha! I’m not a bit the merrier for laughing, I can tell
you.”

Catching another glimpse of Evan’s serious face, Andrew fell into
louder laughter; checking it with doleful solemnity.

Up hill and down hill, and past little homesteads shining with yellow
crocuses; across wide brown heaths, whose outlines raised in Evan’s
mind the night of his funeral walk, and tossed up old feelings dead as
the whirling dust. At last Raikes called out:

“The towers of Fallowfield; heigho!”

And Andrew said:

“Now then, Van: if Old Tom’s anywhere, he’s here. You get down at the
Dragon, and don’t you talk to me, but let me go in. It’ll be just the
hour he dines in the country. Isn’t it a shame of him to make me face
every man of the creditors—eh?”

Evan gave Andrew’s hand an affectionate squeeze, at which Andrew had to
gulp down something—reciprocal emotion, doubtless.

“Hark,” said Raikes, as the horn of the guard was heard. “Once that
sound used to set me caracoling before an abject multitude. I did
wonders. All London looked on me! It had more effect on me than
champagne. Now I hear it—the whole charm has vanished! I can’t see a
single old castle. Would you have thought it possible that a small
circular bit of tin on a man’s person could produce such changes in
him?”

“You are a donkey to wear it,” said Evan.

“I pledged my word as a gentleman, and thought it small, for the
money!” said Raikes. “This is the first coach I ever travelled on,
without making the old whip burst with laughing. I’m not myself. I’m
haunted. I’m somebody else.”

The three passengers having descended, a controversy commenced between
Evan and Andrew as to which should pay. Evan had his money out; Andrew
dashed it behind him; Evan remonstrated.

“Well, you mustn’t pay for us two, Andrew. I would have let you do it
once, but—”

“Stuff!” cried Andrew. “I ain’t paying—it’s the creditors of the
estate, my boy!”

Evan looked so ingenuously surprised and hurt at his lack of principle,
that Andrew chucked a sixpence at a small boy, saying,

“If you don’t let me have my own way, Van, I’ll shy my purse after it.
What do you mean, sir, by treating me like a beggar?”

“Our friend Harrington can’t humour us,” quoth Raikes. “For myself, I
candidly confess I prefer being paid for”; and he leaned contentedly
against one of the posts of the inn till the filthy dispute was
arranged to the satisfaction of the ignobler mind. There Andrew left
them, and went to Mrs. Sockley, who, recovered from her illness, smiled
her usual placid welcome to a guest.

“You know me, ma’am?”

“Oh, yes! The London Mr. Cogglesby!”

“Now, ma’am, look here. I’ve come for my brother. Don’t be alarmed. No
danger as yet. But, mind! if you attempt to conceal him from his lawful
brother, I’ll summon here the myrmidons of the law.”

Mrs. Sockley showed a serious face.

“You know his habits, Mr. Cogglesby; and one doesn’t go against any one
of his whimsies, or there’s consequences: but the house is open to you,
sir. I don’t wish to hide him.”

Andrew accepted this intelligent evasion of Tom Cogglesby’s orders as
sufficient, and immediately proceeded upstairs. A door shut on the
first landing. Andrew went to this door and knocked. No answer. He
tried to open it, but found that he had been forestalled. After
threatening to talk business through the key-hole, the door was
unlocked, and Old Tom appeared.

“So! now you’re dogging me into the country. Be off; make an
appointment. Saturday’s my holiday. You know that.”

Andrew pushed through the doorway, and, by way of an emphatic reply and
a silencing one, delivered a punch slap into Old Tom’s belt.

“Confound you, Nan!” said Old Tom, grimacing, but friendly, as if his
sympathies had been irresistibly assailed.

“It’s done, Tom! I’ve done it. Won my bet, now,” Andrew exclaimed. “The
women—poor creatures! What a state they’re in. I pity ’em.”

Old Tom pursed his lips, and eyed his brother incredulously, but with
curious eagerness.

“Oh, Lord! what a face I’ve had to wear!” Andrew continued, and while
he sank into a chair and rubbed his handkerchief over his crisp hair,
Old Tom let loose a convinced and exulting, “ha! ha!”

“Yes, you may laugh. I’ve had all the bother,” said Andrew.

“Serve ye right—marrying such cattle,” Old Tom snapped at him.

“They believe we’re bankrupt—owe fifty thousand clear, Tom!”

“Ha! ha!”

“Brewery stock and household furniture to be sold by general auction,
Friday week.”

“Ha! ha!”

“Not a place for any of us to poke our heads into. I talked about
‘pitiless storms’ to my poor Harry—no shelter to be had unless we go
down to Lymport, and stop with their brother in shop!”

Old Tom did enjoy this. He took a great gulp of air for a tremendous
burst of laughter, and when this was expended and reflection came, his
features screwed, as if the acidest of flavours had ravished his
palate.

“Bravo, Nan! Didn’t think you were man enough. Ha! ha! Nan—I say—eh?
how did ye get on behind the curtains?”

The tale, to guess by Andrew’s face, appeared to be too strongly
infused with pathos for revelation.

“Will they go, Nan, eh? d’ ye think they’ll go?”

“Where else can they go, Tom? They must go there, or on the parish, you
know.”

“They’ll all troop down to the young tailor—eh?”

“They can’t sleep in the parks, Tom.”

“No. They can’t get into Buckingham Palace, neither—’cept as
housemaids. ’Gad, they’re howling like cats, I’d swear—nuisance to the
neighbourhood—ha! ha!”

Old Tom’s cruel laughter made Andrew feel for the unhappy ladies. He
stuck his forehead, and leaned forward, saying: “I don’t know—’pon my
honour, I don’t know—can’t think we’ve—quite done right to punish ’em
so.”

This acted like cold water on Old Tom’s delight. He pitched it back in
the shape of a doubt of what Andrew had told him. Whereupon Andrew
defied him to face three miserable women on the verge of hysterics; and
Old Tom, beginning to chuckle again, rejoined that it would bring them
to their senses, and emancipate him.

“You may laugh, Mr. Tom,” said Andrew; “but if poor Harry should find
me out, deuce a bit more home for me.”

Old Tom looked at him keenly, and rapped the table. “Swear you did it,
Nan.”

“You promise you’ll keep the secret,” said Andrew.

“Never make promises.”

“Then there’s a pretty life for me! I did it for that poor dear boy.
You were only up to one of your jokes—I see that. Confound you, Old
Tom, you’ve been making a fool of me.”

The flattering charge was not rejected by Old Tom, who now had his
brother to laugh at as well. Andrew affected to be indignant and
desperate.

“If you’d had a heart, Tom, you’d have saved the poor fellow without
any bother at all. What do you think? When I told him of our smash—ha!
ha! it isn’t such a bad joke—well, I went to him, hanging my head, and
he offered to arrange our affairs—that is—”

“Damned meddlesome young dog!” cried Old Tom, quite in a rage.

“There—you’re up in a twinkling,” said Andrew. “Don’t you see he
believed it, you stupid Old Tom? Lord! to hear him say how sorry he
was, and to see how glad he looked at the chance of serving us!”

“Serving us!” Tom sneered.

“Ha!” went Andrew. “Yes. There. You’re a deuced deal prouder than fifty
peers. You’re an upside-down old despot!”

No sharper retort rising to Old Tom’s lips, he permitted his brother’s
abuse of him to pass, declaring that bandying words was not his
business, he not being a Parliament man.

“How about the Major, Nan? He coming down, too?”

“Major!” cried Andrew. “Lucky if he keeps his commission. Coming down?
No. He’s off to the Continent.”

“Find plenty of scamps there to keep him company,” added Tom. “So he’s
broke—eh? ha! ha!”

“Tom,” said Andrew, seriously, “I’ll tell you all about it, if you’ll
swear not to split on me, because it would really upset poor Harry so.
She’d think me such a beastly hypocrite, I couldn’t face her
afterwards.”

“Lose what pluck you have—eh?” Tom jerked out his hand, and bade his
brother continue.

Compelled to trust in him without a promise, Andrew said: “Well, then,
after we’d arranged it, I went back to Harry, and begged her to have
poor Van at the house: told her what I hoped you’d do for him about
getting him into the Brewery. She’s very kind, Tom, ’pon my honour she
is. She was willing, only—”

“Only—eh?”

“Well, she was so afraid it’d hurt her sisters to see him there.”

Old Tom saw he was in for excellent fun, and wouldn’t spoil it for the
world.

“Yes, Nan?”

“So I went to Caroline. She was easy enough; and she went to the
Countess.”

“Well, and she—?”

“She was willing, too, till Lady Jocelyn came and took Miss Bonner home
to Beckley, and because Evan had written to my lady to fetch her, the
Countess—she was angry. That was all. Because of that, you know. But
yet she agreed. But when Miss Bonner had gone, it turned out that the
Major was the obstacle. They were all willing enough to have Evan
there, but the Major refused. I didn’t hear him. I wasn’t going to ask
him. I mayn’t be a match for three women, but man to man, eh, Tom?
You’d back me there? So Harry said the Major’d make Caroline miserable,
if his wishes were disrespected. By George, I wish I’d known, then.
Don’t you think it odd, Tom, now? There’s a Duke of Belfield the fellow
had hooked into his Company; and—through Evan I heard—the Duke had his
name struck off. After that, the Major swore at the Duke once or twice,
and said Caroline wasn’t to go out with him. Suddenly, he insists that
she shall go. Days the poor thing kept crying! One day, he makes her
go. She hasn’t the spirit of my Harry or the Countess. By good luck,
Van, who was hunting ferns for some friends of his, met them on Sunday
in Richmond Park, and Van took her away from the Duke. But, Tom, think
of Van seeing a fellow watching her wherever she went, and hearing the
Duke’s coachman tell that fellow he had orders to drive his master and
a lady hard on to the sea that night. I don’t believe it—it wasn’t
Caroline! But what do you think of our finding out that beast of a spy
to be in the Major’s pay? We did. Van put a constable on his track; we
found him out, and he confessed it. A fact, Tom! That decided me. If it
was only to get rid of a brute, I determined I’d do it, and I did.
Strike came to me to get my name for a bill that night. ’Gad, he looked
blanker than his bill when he heard of us two bankrupt. I showed him
one or two documents I’d got ready. Says he: ‘Never mind; it’ll only be
a couple of hundred more in the schedule.’ Stop, Tom! he’s got some of
our blood. I don’t think he meant it. He is hard pushed. Well, I gave
him a twentier, and he was off the next night. You’ll soon see all
about the Company in the papers.”

At the conclusion of Andrew’s recital, Old Tom thrummed and looked on
the floor under a heavy frown. His mouth worked dubiously, and, from
moment to moment, he plucked at his waistcoat and pulled it down,
throwing back his head and glaring.

“I’ve knocked that fellow over once,” he said. “Wish he hadn’t got up
again.”

Andrew nodded.

“One good thing, Nan. He never boasted of our connection. Much obliged
to him.”

“Yes,” said Andrew, who was gladly watching Old Tom’s change of mood
with a quiescent aspect.

“Um!—must keep it quiet from his poor old mother.”

Andrew again affirmatived his senior’s remarks. That his treatment of
Old Tom was sound, he presently had proof of. The latter stood up, and
after sniffing in an injured way for about a minute, launched out his
right leg, and vociferated that he would like to have it in his power
to kick all the villains out of the world: a modest demand Andrew at
once chimed in with; adding that, were such a faculty extended to him,
he would not object to lose the leg that could benefit mankind so
infinitely, and consented to its following them. Then, Old Tom, who was
of a practical turn, meditated, swung his foot, and gave one grim kick
at the imaginary bundle of villains, discharged them headlong straight
into space. Andrew, naturally imitative, and seeing that he had now to
kick them flying, attempted to excel Old Tom in the vigour of his
delivery. No wonder that the efforts of both were heating: they were
engaged in the task of ridding the globe of the larger half of its
inhabitants. Tom perceived Andrew’s useless emulation, and with a sound
translated by “yack,” sent his leg out a long way. Not to be outdone,
Andrew immediately, with a still louder “yack,” committed himself to an
effort so violent that the alternative between his leg coming off, or
his being taken off his leg, was propounded by nature, and decided by
the laws of gravity in a trice. Joyful grunts were emitted by Old Tom
at the sight of Andrew prostrate, rubbing his pate. But Mrs. Sockley,
to whom the noise of Andrew’s fall had suggested awful fears of a
fratricidal conflict upstairs, hurried forthwith to announce to them
that the sovereign remedy for human ills, the promoter of concord, the
healer of feuds, the central point of man’s destiny in the
flesh—Dinner, was awaiting them.

To the dinner they marched.

Of this great festival be it simply told that the supply was copious
and of good quality—much too good and copious for a bankrupt host: that
Evan and Mr. John Raikes were formally introduced to Old Tom before the
repast commenced, and welcomed some three minutes after he had decided
the flavour of his first glass; that Mr. Raikes in due time preferred
his petition for release from a dreadful engagement, and furnished vast
amusement to the company under Old Tom’s hand, until, by chance, he
quoted a scrap of Latin, at which the brothers Cogglesby, who would
have faced peers and princes without being disconcerted, or performing
mental genuflexions, shut their mouths and looked injured, unhappy, and
in the presence of a superior: Mr. Raikes not being the man to spare
them. Moreover, a surprise was afforded to Evan. Andrew stated to Old
Tom that the hospitality of Main Street, Lymport,—was open to him.
Strange to say, Old Tom accepted it on the spot, observing, “You’re
master of the house—can do what you like, if you’re man enough,” and
adding that he thanked him, and would come in a day or two. The case of
Mr. Raikes was still left uncertain, for as the bottle circulated, he
exhibited such a faculty for apt, but to the brothers, totally
incomprehensible quotation, that they fled from him without leaving him
time to remember what special calamity was on his mind, or whether this
earth was other than an abode conceived in great jollity for his
life-long entertainment.




CHAPTER XLII.
JULIANA


The sick night-light burned steadily in Juliana’s chamber. On a couch,
beside her bed, Caroline lay sleeping, tired with a long watch. Two
sentences had been passed on Juliana: one on her heart: one on her
body: “Thou art not loved”; and, “Thou must die.” The frail passion of
her struggle against her destiny was over with her. Quiet as that quiet
which Nature was taking her to, her body reposed. Calm as the solitary
night-light before her open eyes, her spirit was wasting away. “If I am
not loved, then let me die!” In such a sense she bowed to her fate.

At an hour like this, watching the round of light on the ceiling, with
its narrowing inner rings, a sufferer from whom pain has fled looks
back to the shores she is leaving, and would be well with them who walk
there. It is false to imagine that schemers and workers in the dark are
destitute of the saving gift of conscience. They have it, and it is
perhaps made livelier in them than with easy people; and therefore,
they are imperatively spurred to hoodwink it. Hence, their
self-delusion is deep and endures. They march to their object, and
gaining or losing it, the voice that calls to them is the voice of a
blind creature, whom any answer, provided that the answer is ready,
will silence. And at an hour like this, when finally they snatch their
minute of sight on the threshold of black night, their souls may
compare with yonder shining circle on the ceiling, which, as the light
below gasps for air, contracts, and extends but to mingle with the
darkness. They would be nobler, better, boundlessly good to all;—to
those who have injured them to those whom they have injured. Alas! for
any definite deed the limit of their circle is immoveable, and they
must act within it. The trick they have played themselves imprisons
them. Beyond it, they cease to be.

Lying in this utter stillness, Juliana thought of Rose; of her beloved
by Evan. The fever that had left her blood, had left it stagnant, and
her thoughts were quite emotionless. She looked faintly on a far
picture. She saw Rose blooming with pleasures in Elburne House, sliding
as a boat borne by the river’s tide to sea, away from her living joy.
The breast of Rose was lucid to her, and in that hour of insight she
had clear knowledge of her cousin’s heart; how it scoffed at its base
love, and unwittingly betrayed the power on her still, by clinging to
the world and what it would give her to fill the void; how externally
the lake was untroubled, and a mirror to the passing day; and how
within there pressed a flood against an iron dam. Evan, too, she saw.
The Countess was right in her judgement of Juliana’s love. Juliana
looked very little to his qualities. She loved him when she thought him
guilty, which made her conceive that her love was of a diviner cast
than Rose was capable of. Guilt did not spoil his beauty to her; his
gentleness and glowing manhood were unchanged; and when she knew him as
he was, the revelation of his high nature simply confirmed her
impression of his physical perfections. She had done him a wrong; at
her death news would come to him, and it might be that he would bless
her name. Because she sighed no longer for those dear lips and strong
arms to close about her tremulous frame, it seemed to her that she had
quite surrendered him. Generous to Evan, she would be just to Rose.
Beneath her pillow she found pencil and paper, and with difficulty,
scarce seeing her letters in the brown light, she began to trace lines
of farewell to Rose. Her conscience dictated to her thus, “Tell Rose
that she was too ready to accept his guilt; and that in this as in all
things, she acted with the precipitation of her character. Tell her
that you always trusted, and that now you know him innocent. Give her
the proofs you have. Show that he did it to shield his intriguing
sister. Tell her that you write this only to make her just to him. End
with a prayer that Rose may be happy.”

Ere Juliana had finished one sentence, she resigned the pencil. Was it
not much, even at the gates of death, to be the instrument to send Rose
into his arms? The picture swayed before her, helping her weakness. She
found herself dreaming that he had kissed her once. Dorothy, she
remembered, had danced up to her one day, to relate what the maids of
the house said of the gentleman—(at whom, it is known, they look with
the licence of cats toward kings); and Dorothy’s fresh careless mouth
had told how one observant maid, amorously minded, proclaimed of Evan,
to a companion of her sex, that, “he was the only gentleman who gave
you an idea of how he would look when he was kissing you.” Juliana
cherished that vision likewise. Young ladies are not supposed to do so,
if menial maids are; but Juliana did cherish it, and it possessed her
fancy. Bear in your recollection that she was not a healthy person.
Diseased little heroines may be made attractive, and are now popular;
but strip off the cleverly woven robe which is fashioned to cover them,
and you will find them in certain matters bearing a resemblance to
menial maids.

While the thoughts of his kiss lasted, she could do nothing; but lay
with her two hands out on the bed, and her eyelids closed. Then waking,
she took the pencil again. It would not move: her bloodless fingers
fell from it.

“If they do not meet, and he never marries, I may claim him in the next
world,” she mused.

But conscience continued uneasy. She turned her wrist and trailed a
letter from beneath the pillow. It was from Mrs. Shorne. Juliana knew
the contents. She raised it unopened as high as her faltering hands
permitted, and read like one whose shut eyes read syllables of fire on
the darkness.

“Rose has at last definitely engaged herself to Ferdinand, you will be
glad to hear, and we may now treat her as a woman.”

Having absorbed these words, Juliana’s hand found strength to write,
with little difficulty, what she had to say to Rose. She conceived it
to be neither sublime nor generous: not even good; merely her peculiar
duty. When it was done, she gave a long, low sigh of relief.

Caroline whispered, “Dearest child, are you awake?”

“Yes,” she answered.

“Sorrowful, dear?”

“Very quiet.”

Caroline reached her hand over to her, and felt the paper. “What is
this?”

“My good-bye to Rose. I want it folded now.”

Caroline slipped from the couch to fulfil her wish. She enclosed the
pencilled scrap of paper, sealed it, and asked, “Is that right?”

“Now unlock my desk,” Juliana uttered, feebly. “Put it beside a letter
addressed to a law-gentleman. Post both the morning I am gone.”

Caroline promised to obey, and coming to Juliana to mark her looks,
observed a faint pleased smile dying away, and had her hand gently
squeezed. Juliana’s conscience had preceded her contentedly to its last
sleep; and she, beneath that round of light on the ceiling, drew on her
counted breaths in peace till dawn.




CHAPTER XLIII.
ROSE


Have you seen a young audacious spirit smitten to the earth? It is a
singular study; and, in the case of young women, a trap for
inexperienced men. Rose, who had commanded and managed every one
surrounding her since infancy, how humble had she now become!—how much
more womanly in appearance, and more child-like at heart! She was as
wax in Lady Elburne’s hands. A hint of that veiled episode, the Beckley
campaign, made Rose pliant, as if she had woven for herself a rod of
scorpions. The high ground she had taken; the perfect trust in one; the
scorn of any judgement, save her own; these had vanished from her.
Rose, the tameless heroine who had once put her mother’s philosophy in
action, was the easiest filly that turbaned matron ever yet drove into
the straight road of the world. It even surprised Lady Jocelyn to see
how wonderfully she had been broken in by her grandmother. Her ladyship
wrote to Drummond to tell him of it, and Drummond congratulated her,
saying, however: “Changes of this sort don’t come of conviction. Wait
till you see her at home. I think they have been sticking pins into the
sore part.”

Drummond knew Rose well. In reality there was no change in her. She was
only a suppliant to be spared from ridicule: spared from the
application of the scourge she had woven for herself.

And, ah! to one who deigned to think warmly still of such a disgraced
silly creature, with what gratitude she turned! He might well suppose
love alone could pour that profusion of jewels at his feet.

Ferdinand, now Lord Laxley, understood the merits of his finger-nails
better than the nature of young women; but he is not to be blamed for
presuming that Rose had learnt to adore him. Else why did she like his
company so much? He was not mistaken in thinking she looked up to him.
She seemed to beg to be taken into his noble serenity. In truth she
sighed to feel as he did, above everybody!—she that had fallen so low!
Above everybody!—born above them, and therefore superior by grace
divine! To this Rose Jocelyn had come—she envied the mind of Ferdinand.

He, you may be sure, was quite prepared to accept her homage. Rose he
had always known to be just the girl for him; spirited, fresh, and with
fine teeth; and once tied to you safe to be staunch. They walked
together, rode together, danced together. Her soft humility touched him
to eloquence. Say she was a little hypocrite, if you like, when the
blood came to her cheeks under his eyes. Say she was a heartless minx
for allowing it to be bruited that she and Ferdinand were betrothed. I
can but tell you that her blushes were blushes of gratitude to one who
could devote his time to such a disgraced silly creature, and that she,
in her abject state, felt a secret pleasure in the protection
Ferdinand’s name appeared to extend over her, and was hardly willing to
lose it.

So far Lady Elburne’s tact and discipline had been highly successful.
One morning, in May, Ferdinand, strolling with Rose down the garden
made a positive appeal to her common sense and friendly feeling; by
which she understood that he wanted her consent to his marriage with
her.

Rose answered:

“Who would have me?”

Ferdinand spoke pretty well, and ultimately got possession of her hand.
She let him keep it, thinking him noble for forgetting that another had
pressed it before him.

Some minutes later the letters were delivered. One of them contained
Juliana’s dark-winged missive.

“Poor, poor Juley!” said Rose, dropping her head, after reading all
that was on the crumpled leaf with an inflexible face. And then,
talking on, long low sighs lifted her bosom at intervals. She gazed
from time to time with a wistful conciliatory air on Ferdinand. Rushing
to her chamber, the first cry her soul framed was:

“He did not kiss me!”

The young have a superstitious sense of something incontestably true in
the final protestations of the dead. Evan guiltless! she could not
quite take the meaning this revelation involved. That which had been
dead was beginning to move within her; but blindly: and now it stirred
and troubled; now sank. Guiltless all she had thought him! Oh! she knew
she could not have been deceived. But why, why had he hidden his
sacrifice from her?

“It is better for us both, of course,” said Rose, speaking the world’s
wisdom, parrot-like, and bursting into tears the next minute.
Guiltless, and gloriously guiltless! but nothing—nothing to her!

She tried to blame him. It would not do. She tried to think of that
grovelling loathsome position painted to her by Lady Elburne’s graphic
hand. Evan dispersed the gloomy shades like sunshine. Then in a sort of
terror she rejoiced to think she was partially engaged to Ferdinand,
and found herself crying again with exultation, that he had not kissed
her: for a kiss on her mouth was to Rose a pledge and a bond.

The struggle searched her through: bared her weakness, probed her
strength; and she, seeing herself, suffered grievously in her
self-love. Am I such a coward, inconstant, cold? she asked.
Confirmatory answers coming, flung her back under the shield of
Ferdinand if for a moment her soul stood up armed and defiant, it was
Evan’s hand she took.

To whom do I belong? was another terrible question. In her ideas, if
Evan was not chargeable with that baseness which had sundered them he
might claim her yet, if he would. If he did, what then? Must she go to
him?

Impossible: she was in chains. Besides, what a din of laughter there
would be to see her led away by him. Twisting her joined hands: weeping
for her cousin, as she thought, Rose passed hours of torment over
Juliana’s legacy to her.

“Why did I doubt him?” she cried, jealous that any soul should have
known and trusted him better. Jealous and I am afraid that the kindling
of that one feature of love relighted the fire of her passion thus
fervidly. To be outstripped in generosity was hateful to her. Rose,
naturally, could not reflect that a young creature like herself,
fighting against the world, as we call it, has all her faculties at the
utmost stretch, and is often betrayed by failing nature when the will
is still valiant.

And here she sat—in chains! “Yes! I am fit only to be the wife of an
idle brainless man, with money and a title,” she said, in extreme
self-contempt. She caught a glimpse of her whole life in the horrid
tomb of his embrace, and questions whether she could yield her hand to
him—whether it was right in the eyes of heaven, rushed impetuously to
console her, and defied anything in the shape of satisfactory
affirmations. Nevertheless, the end of the struggle was, that she felt
that she was bound to Ferdinand.

“But this I will do,” said Rose, standing with heat-bright eyes and
deep-coloured cheeks before the glass. “I will clear his character at
Beckley. I will help him. I will be his friend. I will wipe out the
injustice I did him.” And this bride-elect of a lord absolutely added
that she was unworthy to be the wife of a tailor!

“He! how unequalled he is! There is nothing he fears except shame. Oh!
how sad it will be for him to find no woman in his class to understand
him and be his helpmate!”

Over, this sad subject, of which we must presume her to be accurately
cognizant, Rose brooded heavily. By mid-day she gave her Grandmother
notice that she was going home to Juliana’s funeral.

“Well, Rose, if you think it necessary to join the ceremony,” said Lady
Elburne. “Beckley is bad quarters for you, as you have learnt. There
was never much love between you cousins.”

“No, and I don’t pretend to it,” Rose answered. “I am sorry poor
Juley’s gone.”

“She’s better gone for many reasons—she appears to have been a little
venomous toad,” said Lady Elburne; and Rose, thinking of a snakelike
death-bite working through her blood, rejoined: “Yes, she isn’t to be
pitied: she’s better off than most people.”

So it was arranged that Rose should go. Ferdinand and her aunt, Mrs.
Shorne, accompanied her. Mrs. Shorne gave them their opportunities,
albeit they were all stowed together in a carriage, and Ferdinand
seemed willing to profit by them; but Rose’s hand was dead, and she sat
by her future lord forming the vow on her lips that they should never
be touched by him.

Arrived at Beckley, she, to her great delight, found Caroline there,
waiting for the funeral. In a few minutes she got her alone, and after
kisses, looked penetratingly into her lovely eyes, shook her head, and
said: “Why were you false to me?”

“False?” echoed Caroline.

“You knew him. You knew why he did that. Why did you not save me?”

Caroline fell upon her neck, asking pardon. She spared her the recital
of facts further than the broad avowal. Evan’s present condition she
plainly stated: and Rose, when the bitter pangs had ceased, made oath
to her soul she would rescue him from it.

In addition to the task of clearing Evan’s character, and rescuing him,
Rose now conceived that her engagement to Ferdinand must stand
ice-bound till Evan had given her back her troth. How could she obtain
it from him? How could she take anything from one so noble and so poor!
Happily there was no hurry; though before any bond was ratified, she
decided conscientiously that it must be done.

You see that like a lithe snake she turns on herself, and must be
tracked in and out. Not being a girl to solve the problem with tears,
or outright perfidy, she had to ease her heart to the great shock
little by little—sincere as far as she knew: as far as one who loves
may be. The day of the funeral came and went. The Jocelyns were of
their mother’s opinion: that for many reasons Juliana was better out of
the way. Mrs. Bonner’s bequest had been a severe blow to Sir Franks.
However, all was now well. The estate naturally lapsed to Lady Jocelyn.
No one in the house dreamed of a will, signed with Juliana’s name,
attested, under due legal forms, being in existence. None of the
members of the family imagined that at Beckley Court they were then
residing on somebody else’s ground.

Want of hospitable sentiments was not the cause that led to an
intimation from Sir Franks to his wife, that Mrs. Strike must not be
pressed to remain, and that Rose must not be permitted to have her own
way in this. Knowing very well that Mrs. Shorne spoke through her
husband’s mouth, Lady Jocelyn still acquiesced, and Rose, who had
pressed Caroline publicly to stay, had to be silent when the latter
renewed her faint objections; so Caroline said she would leave on the
morrow morning.

Juliana, with her fretfulness, her hand bounties, her petty egoisms,
and sudden far-leaping generosities, and all the contradictory impulses
of her malady, had now departed utterly. The joys of a landed
proprietor mounted into the head of Sir Franks. He was up early the
next morning, and he and Harry walked over a good bit of the ground
before breakfast. Sir Franks meditated making it entail, and favoured
Harry with a lecture on the duty of his shaping the course of his
conduct at once after the model of the landed gentry generally.

“And you may think yourself lucky to come into that catalogue—the son
of a younger son!” said Sir Franks, tapping Mr. Harry’s shoulder. Harry
also began to enjoy the look and smell of land. At the breakfast,
which, though early, was well attended, Harry spoke of the
adviseability of felling timber here, planting there, and so forth,
after the model his father held up. Sir Franks nodded approval of his
interest in the estate, but reserved his opinion on matters of detail.

“All I beg of you is,” said Lady Jocelyn, “that you won’t let us have
turnips within the circuit of a mile”; which was obligingly promised.

The morning letters were delivered and opened with the customary
calmness.

“Letter from old George,” Harry sings out, and buzzes over a few lines.
“Halloa!—Hum!” He was going to make a communication, but catching sight
of Caroline, tossed the letter over to Ferdinand, who read it and
tossed it back with the comment of a careless face.

“Read it, Rosey?” says Harry, smiling bluntly.

Rather to his surprise, Rose took the letter. Study her eyes if you
wish to gauge the potency of one strong dose of ridicule on an
ingenuous young heart. She read that Mr. George Uplift had met “our
friend Mr. Snip” riding, by moonlight, on the road to Beckley. That
great orbed night of their deep tender love flashed luminously through
her frame, storming at the base epithet by which her lover was
mentioned, flooding grandly over the ignominies cast on him by the
world. She met the world, as it were, in a death-grapple; she matched
the living heroic youth she felt him to be, with that dead wooden image
of him which it thrust before her. Her heart stood up singing like a
craven who sees the tide of victory setting toward him. But this passed
beneath her eyelids. When her eyes were lifted, Ferdinand could have
discovered nothing in them to complain of, had his suspicions been
light to raise: nor could Mrs. Shorne perceive that there was the
opening for a shrewd bodkin-thrust. Rose had got a mask at last: her
colour, voice, expression, were perfectly at command. She knew it to be
a cowardice to wear any mask: but she had been burnt, horribly burnt:
how much so you may guess from the supple dissimulation of such a bold
clear-visaged girl. She conquered the sneers of the world in her soul:
but her sensitive skin was yet alive to the pangs of the scorching it
had been subjected to when weak, helpless, and betrayed by Evan, she
stood with no philosophic parent to cry fair play for her, among the
skilful torturers of Elburne House.

Sir Franks had risen and walked to the window.

“News?” said Lady Jocelyn, wheeling round in her chair.

The one eyebrow up of the easy-going baronet signified trouble of mind.
He finished his third perusal of a letter that appeared to be written
in a remarkably plain legal hand, and looking as men do when their
intelligences are just equal to the comprehension or expression of an
oath, handed the letter to his wife, and observed that he should be
found in the library. Nevertheless he waited first to mark its effect
on Lady Jocelyn. At one part of the document her forehead wrinkled
slightly.

“Doesn’t sound like a joke!” he said.

She answered:

“No.”

Sir Franks, apparently quite satisfied by her ready response, turned on
his heel and left the room quickly.

An hour afterward it was rumoured and confirmed that Juliana Bonner had
willed all the worldly property she held in her own right, comprising
Beckley Court, to Mr. Evan Harrington, of Lymport, tailor. An abstract
of the will was forwarded. The lawyer went on to say, that he had
conformed to the desire of the testatrix in communicating the existence
of the aforesaid will six days subsequent to her death, being the day
after her funeral.

There had been railing and jeering at the Countess de Saldar, the
clever outwitted exposed adventuress, at Elburne House and Beckley
Court. What did the crowing cleverer aristocrats think of her now?

On Rose the blow fell bitterly. Was Evan also a foul schemer? Was he of
a piece with his intriguing sister? His close kinship with the Countess
had led her to think baseness possible to him when it was confessed by
his own mouth once. She heard black names cast at him and the whole of
the great Mel’s brood, and incapable of quite disbelieving them
merited, unable to challenge and rebut them, she dropped into her
recent state of self-contempt: into her lately-instilled doubt whether
it really was in Nature’s power, unaided by family-portraits,
coats-of-arms, ball-room practice, and at least one small phial of
Essence of Society, to make a Gentleman.




CHAPTER XLIV.
CONTAINS A WARNING TO ALL CONSPIRATORS


This, if you have done me the favour to read it aright, has been a
chronicle of desperate heroism on the part of almost all the principal
personages represented. But not the Countess de Saldar, scaling the
embattled fortress of Society; nor Rose, tossing its keys to her lover
from the shining turret-tops; nor Evan, keeping bright the lamp of
self-respect in his bosom against South wind and East; none excel
friend Andrew Cogglesby, who, having fallen into Old Tom’s plot to
humiliate his wife and her sisters, simply for Evan’s sake, and without
any distinct notion of the terror, confusion, and universal upset he
was bringing on his home, could yet, after a scared contemplation of
the scene when he returned from his expedition to Fallowfield, continue
to wear his rueful mask; and persevere in treacherously outraging his
lofty wife.

He did it to vindicate the ties of blood against accidents of position.
Was he justified? I am sufficiently wise to ask my own sex alone.

On the other side, be it said (since in our modern days every hero must
have his weak heel), that now he had gone this distance it was
difficult to recede. It would be no laughing matter to tell his solemn
Harriet that he had been playing her a little practical joke. His
temptations to give it up were incessant and most agitating; but if to
advance seemed terrific, there was, in stopping short, an awfulness so
overwhelming that Andrew abandoned himself to the current, his real
dismay adding to his acting powers.

The worst was, that the joke was no longer his: it was Old Tom’s. He
discovered that he was in Old Tom’s hands completely. Andrew had
thought that he would just frighten the women a bit, get them down to
Lymport for a week or so, and then announce that matters were not so
bad with the Brewery as he had feared; concluding the farce with a few
domestic fireworks. Conceive his dismay when he entered the house, to
find there a man in possession.

Andrew flew into such a rage that he committed an assault on the man.
So ungovernable was his passion, that for some minutes Harriet’s
measured voice summoned him from over the banisters above, quite in
vain. The miserable Englishman refused to be taught that his house had
ceased to be his castle. It was something beyond a joke, this! The
intruder, perfectly docile, seeing that by accurate calculation every
shake he got involved a bottle of wine for him, and ultimate
compensation probably to the amount of a couple of sovereigns, allowed
himself to be lugged up stairs, in default of summary ejection on the
point of Andrew’s toe into the street. There he was faced to the lady
of the house, who apologized to him, and requested her husband to state
what had made him guilty of this indecent behaviour. The man showed his
papers. They were quite in order. “At the suit of Messrs. Grist.”

“My own lawyers!” cried Andrew, smacking his forehead; and Old Tom’s
devilry flashed on him at once. He sank into a chair.

“Why did you bring this person up here?” said Harriet, like a speaking
statue.

“My dear!” Andrew answered, and spread out his hand, and waggled his
head; “My—please!—I—I don’t know. We all want exercise.”

The man laughed, which was kindly of him, but offensive to Mrs.
Cogglesby, who gave Andrew a glance which was full payment for his
imbecile pleasantry, and promised more.

With a hospitable inquiry as to the condition of his appetite, and a
request that he would be pleased to satisfy it to the full, the man was
dismissed: whereat, as one delivered of noxious presences, the Countess
rustled into sight. Not noticing Andrew, she lisped to Harriet:
“Misfortunes are sometimes no curses! I bless the catarrh that has
confined Silva to his chamber, and saved him from a bestial
exhibition.”

The two ladies then swept from the room, and left Andrew to perspire at
leisure.

Fresh tribulations awaited him when he sat down to dinner. Andrew liked
his dinner to be comfortable, good, and in plenty. This may not seem
strange. The fact is stated that I may win for him the warm sympathies
of the body of his countrymen. He was greeted by a piece of cold boiled
neck of mutton and a solitary dish of steaming potatoes. The blank
expanse of table-cloth returned his desolate stare.

“Why, what’s the meaning of this?” Andrew brutally exclaimed, as he
thumped the table.

The Countess gave a start, and rolled a look as of piteous supplication
to spare a lady’s nerves, addressed to a ferocious brigand. Harriet
answered: “It means that I will have no butcher’s bills.”

“Butcher’s bills! butcher’s bills!” echoed Andrew; “why, you must have
butcher’s bills; why, confound! why, you’ll have a bill for this, won’t
you, Harry? eh? of course!”

“There will be no more bills dating from yesterday,” said his wife.

“What! this is paid for, then?”

“Yes, Mr. Cogglesby; and so will all household expenses be, while my
pocket-money lasts.”

Resting his eyes full on Harriet a minute, Andrew dropped them on the
savourless white-rimmed chop, which looked as lonely in his plate as
its parent dish on the table. The poor dear creature’s pocket-money had
paid for it! The thought, mingling with a rush of emotion, made his
ideas spin. His imagination surged deliriously. He fancied himself at
the Zoological Gardens, exchanging pathetic glances with a melancholy
marmoset. Wonderfully like one the chop looked! There was no use in his
trying to eat it. He seemed to be fixing his teeth in solid tears. He
choked. Twice he took up knife and fork, put them down again, and
plucking forth his handkerchief, blew a tremendous trumpet, that sent
the Countess’s eyes rolling to the ceiling, as if heaven were her sole
refuge from such vulgarity.

“Damn that Old Tom!” he shouted at last, and pitched back in his chair.

“Mr. Cogglesby!” and “In the presence of ladies!” were the admonishing
interjections of the sisters, at whom the little man frowned in turns.

“Do you wish us to quit the room, sir?” inquired his wife.

“God bless your soul, you little darling!” he apostrophized that
stately person. “Here, come along with me, Harry. A wife’s a wife, I
say—hang it! Just outside the room—just a second! or up in a corner
will do.”

Mrs. Cogglesby was amazed to see him jump up and run round to her. She
was prepared to defend her neck from his caress, and refused to go: but
the words, “Something particular to tell you,” awakened her curiosity,
which urged her to compliance. She rose and went with him to the door.

“Well, sir; what is it?”

No doubt he was acting under a momentary weakness he was about to
betray the plot and take his chance of forgiveness; but her towering
port, her commanding aspect, restored his courage. (There may be a
contrary view of the case.) He enclosed her briskly in a connubial hug,
and remarked with mad ecstasy: “What a duck you are, Harry! What a
likeness between you and your mother.”

Mrs. Cogglesby disengaged herself imperiously. Had he called her aside
for this gratuitous insult? Contrite, he saw his dreadful error.

“Harry! I declare!” was all he was allowed to say. Mrs. Cogglesby
marched back to her chair, and recommenced the repast in majestic
silence.

Andrew sighed; he attempted to do the same. He stuck his fork in the
blanched whiskerage of his marmoset, and exclaimed: “I can’t!”

He was unnoticed.

“You do not object to plain diet?” said Harriet to Louisa.

“Oh, no, in verity!” murmured the Countess. “However plain it be!
Absence of appetite, dearest. You are aware I partook of luncheon at
mid-day with the Honourable and Reverend Mr. Duffian. You must not look
condemnation at your Louy for that. Luncheon is not conversion!”

Harriet observed that this might be true; but still, to her mind, it
was a mistake to be too intimate with dangerous people. “And besides,”
she added, “Mr. Duffian is no longer ‘the Reverend.’ We deprive all
renegades of their spiritual titles. His worldly ones let him keep.”

Her superb disdain nettled the Countess.

“Dear Harriet!” she said, with less languor, “You are utterly and
totally and entirely mistaken. I tell you so positively. Renegade! The
application of such a word to such a man! Oh! and it is false, Harriet
quite! Renegade means one who has gone over to the Turks, my dear. I am
almost certain I saw it in Johnson’s Dictionary, or an improvement upon
Johnson, by a more learned author. But there is the fact, if Harriet
can only bring her—shall I say stiff-necked prejudices to envisage it?”

Harriet granted her sister permission to apply the phrases she stood in
need of, without impeaching her intimacy with the most learned among
lexicographers.

“And is there no such thing as being too severe?” the Countess resumed.
“What our enemies call unchristian!”

“Mr. Duffian has no cause to complain of us,” said Harriet.

“Nor does he do so, dearest. Calumny may assail him; you may utterly
denude him—”

“Adam!” interposed Andrew, distractedly listening. He did not disturb
the Countess’s flow.

“You may vilify and victimize Mr. Duffian, and strip him of the honours
of his birth, but, like the Martyrs, he will still continue the perfect
nobleman. Stoned, I assure you that Mr. Duffian would preserve his
breeding. In character he is exquisite; a polish to defy misfortune.”

“I suppose his table is good?” said Harriet, almost ruffled by the
Countess’s lecture.

“Plate,” was remarked in the cold tone of supreme indifference.

“Hem! good wines?” Andrew asked, waking up a little and not wishing to
be excluded altogether.

“All is of the very best,” the Countess pursued her eulogy, not looking
at him.

“Don’t you think you could—eh, Harry?—manage a pint for me, my dear?”
Andrew humbly petitioned. “This cold water—ha! ha! my stomach don’t
like cold bathing.”

His wretched joke rebounded from the impenetrable armour of the ladies.

“The wine-cellar is locked,” said his wife. “I have sealed up the key
till an inventory can be taken by some agent of the creditors.”

“What creditors?” roared Andrew.

“You can have some of the servants’ beer,” Mrs. Cogglesby appended.

Andrew studied her face to see whether she really was not hoisting him
with his own petard. Perceiving that she was sincerely acting according
to her sense of principle, he fumed, and departed to his privacy,
unable to stand it any longer.

Then like a kite the Countess pounced upon his character. Would the
Honourable and Reverend Mr. Duffian decline to participate in the
sparest provender? Would he be guilty of the discourtesy of leaving
table without a bow or an apology, even if reduced to extremest
poverty? No, indeed! which showed that, under all circumstances, a
gentleman was a gentleman. And, oh! how she pitied her poor
Harriet—eternally tied to a most vulgar little man, without the gilding
of wealth.

“And a fool in his business to boot, dear!”

“These comparisons do no good,” said Harriet. “Andrew at least is not a
renegade, and never shall be while I live. I will do my duty by him,
however poor we are. And now, Louisa, putting my husband out of the
question, what are your intentions? I don’t understand bankruptcy, but
I imagine they can do nothing to wife and children. My little ones must
have a roof over their heads; and, besides, there is little Maxwell.
You decline to go down to Lymport, of course.”

“Decline!” cried the Countess, melodiously; “and do not you?”

“As far as I am concerned—yes. But I am not to think of myself.”

The Countess meditated, and said: “Dear Mr. Duffian has offered me his
hospitality. Renegades are not absolutely inhuman. They may be
generous. I have no moral doubt that Mr. Duffian would, upon my
representation—dare I venture?”

“Sleep in his house! break bread with him!” exclaimed Harriet. “What do
you think I am made of? I would perish—go to the workhouse, rather!”

“I see you trooping there,” said the Countess, intent on the vision.

“And have you accepted his invitation for yourself, Louisa?”

The Countess was never to be daunted by threatening aspects. She gave
her affirmative with calmness and a deliberate smile.

“You are going to live with him?”

“Live with him! What expressions! My husband accompanies me.”

Harriet drew up.

“I know nothing, Louisa, that could give me more pain.”

The Countess patted Harriet’s knee. “It succeeds to bankruptcy,
assuredly. But would you have me drag Silva to the—the shop, Harriet,
love? Alternatives!”

Mrs. Andrew got up and rang the bell to have the remains of their
dinner removed. When this was done, she said,

“Louisa, I don’t know whether I am justified: you told me to-day I
might keep my jewels, trinkets, and lace, and such like. To me, I know
they do not belong now: but I will dispose of them to procure you an
asylum somewhere—they will fetch, I should think, £400,—to prevent your
going to Mr. Duffian.”

No exhibition of great-mindedness which the Countess could perceive,
ever found her below it.

“Never, love, never!” she said.

“Then, will you go to Evan?”

“Evan? I hate him!” The olive-hued visage was dark. It brightened as
she added, “At least as much as my religious sentiments permit me to. A
boy who has thwarted me at every turn!—disgraced us! Indeed, I find it
difficult to pardon you the supposition of such a possibility as your
own consent to look on him ever again, Harriet.”

“You have no children,” said Mrs. Andrew.

The Countess mournfully admitted it.

“There lies your danger with Mr. Duffian, Louisa!”

“What! do you doubt my virtue?” asked the Countess.

“Pish! I fear something different. You understand me. Mr. Duffian’s
moral reputation is none of the best, perhaps.”

“That was before he renegaded,” said the Countess.

Harriet bluntly rejoined: “You will leave that house a Roman Catholic.”

“Now you have spoken,” said the Countess, pluming. “Now let me explain
myself. My dear, I have fought worldly battles too long and too
earnestly. I am rightly punished. I do but quote Herbert Duffian’s own
words: he is no flatterer though you say he has such soft fingers. I am
now engaged in a spiritual contest. He is very wealthy! I have resolved
to rescue back to our Church what can benefit the flock of which we
form a portion, so exceedingly!”

At this revelation of the Countess’s spiritual contest, Mrs. Andrew
shook a worldly head.

“You have no chance with men there, Louisa.”

“My Harriet complains of female weakness!”

“Yes. We are strong in our own element, Louisa. Don’t be tempted out of
it.”

Sublime, the Countess rose:

“Element! am I to be confined to one? What but spiritual solaces could
assist me to live, after the degradations I have had heaped on me? I
renounce the world. I turn my sight to realms where caste is unknown. I
feel no shame there of being a tailor’s daughter. You see, I can bring
my tongue to name the thing in its actuality. Once, that member would
have blistered. Confess to me that, in spite of your children, you are
tempted to howl at the idea of Lymport—”

The Countess paused, and like a lady about to fire off a gun, appeared
to tighten her nerves, crying out rapidly:

“Shop! Shears! Geese! Cabbage! Snip! Nine to a man!”

Even as the silence after explosions of cannon, that which reigned in
the room was deep and dreadful.

“See,” the Countess continued, “you are horrified you shudder. I name
all our titles, and if I wish to be red in my cheeks, I must rouge. It
is, in verity, as if my senseless clay were pelted, as we heard of Evan
at his first Lymport boys’ school. You remember when he told us the
story? He lisped a trifle then. ‘I’m the thon of a thnip.’ Oh! it was
hell-fire to us, then; but now, what do I feel? Why, I avowed it to
Herbert Duffian openly, and he said, that the misfortune of dear Papa’s
birth did not the less enable him to proclaim himself in conduct a
nobleman’s offspring—”

“Which he never was.” Harriet broke the rhapsody in a monotonous low
tone: the Countess was not compelled to hear:

“—and that a large outfitter—one of the very largest, was in reality a
merchant, whose daughters have often wedded nobles of the land, and
become ancestresses! Now, Harriet, do you see what a truly religious
mind can do for us in the way of comfort? Oh! I bow in gratitude to
Herbert Duffian. I will not rest till I have led him back to our fold,
recovered from his error. He was our own preacher and pastor. He
quitted us from conviction. He shall return to us from conviction.”

The Countess quoted texts, which I respect, and will not repeat. She
descanted further on spiritualism, and on the balm that it was to
tailors and their offspring; to all outcasts from Society.

Overpowered by her, Harriet thus summed up her opinions: “You were
always self-willed, Louisa.”

“Say, full of sacrifice, if you would be just,” added the Countess;
“and the victim of basest ingratitude.”

“Well, you are in a dangerous path, Louisa.”

Harriet had the last word, which usually the Countess was not disposed
to accord; but now she knew herself strengthened to do so, and was
content to smile pityingly on her sister.

Full upon them in this frame of mind, arrived Caroline’s great news
from Beckley.

It was then that the Countess’s conduct proved a memorable refutation
of cynical philosophy: she rejoiced in the good fortune of him who had
offended her! Though he was not crushed and annihilated (as he deserved
to be) by the wrong he had done, the great-hearted woman pardoned him!

Her first remark was: “Let him thank me for it or not, I will lose no
moment in hastening to load him with my congratulations.”

Pleasantly she joked Andrew, and defended him from Harriet now.

“So we are not all bankrupts, you see, dear brother-in-law.”

Andrew had become so demoralized by his own plot, that in every turn of
events he scented a similar piece of human ingenuity. Harriet was angry
with his disbelief, or say, the grudging credit he gave to the glorious
news. Notwithstanding her calmness, the thoughts of Lymport had
sickened her soul, and it was only for the sake of her children, and
from a sense of the dishonesty of spending a farthing of the money
belonging, as she conceived, to the creditors, that she had consented
to go.

“I see your motive, Mr. Cogglesby,” she observed. “Your measures are
disconcerted. I will remain here till my brother gives me shelter.”

“Oh, that’ll do, my love; that’s all I want,” said Andrew, sincerely.

“Both of you, fools!” the Countess interjected. “Know you Evan so
little? He will receive us anywhere: his arms are open to his kindred:
but to his heart the road is through humiliation, and it is to his
heart we seek admittance.”

“What do you mean?” Harriet inquired.

“Just this,” the Countess answered in bold English and her eyes were
lively, her figure elastic: “We must all of us go down to the old shop
and shake his hand there—every man Jack of us!—I’m only quoting the
sailors, Harriet—and that’s the way to win him.”

She snapped her fingers, laughing. Harriet stared at her, and so did
Andrew, though for a different reason. She seemed to be transformed.
Seeing him inclined to gape, she ran up to him, caught up his chin
between her ten fingers, and kissed him on both cheeks, saying:

“You needn’t come, if you’re too proud, you know, little man!”

And to Harriet’s look of disgust, the cause for which she divined with
her native rapidity, she said: “What does it matter? They will talk,
but they can’t look down on us now. Why, this is my doing!”

She came tripping to her tall sister, to ask plaintively “Mayn’t I be
glad?” and bobbed a curtsey.

Harriet desired Andrew to leave them. Flushed and indignant she then
faced the Countess.

“So unnecessary!” she began. “What can excuse your indiscretion,
Louisa?”

The Countess smiled to hear her talking to her younger sister once
more. She shrugged.

“Oh, if you will keep up the fiction, do. Andrew knows—he isn’t an
idiot—and to him we can make light of it now. What does anybody’s birth
matter, who’s well off!”

It was impossible for Harriet to take that view. The shop, if not the
thing, might still have been concealed from her husband, she thought.

“It mattered to me when I was well off,” she said, sternly.

“Yes; and to me when I was; but we’ve had a fall and a lesson since
that, my dear. Half the aristocracy of England spring from shops!—Shall
I measure you?”

Harriet never felt such a desire to inflict a slap upon mortal cheek.
She marched away from her in a tiff. On the other hand, Andrew was half
fascinated by the Countess’s sudden re-assumption of girlhood, and
returned—silly fellow! to have another look at her. She had ceased, on
reflection, to be altogether so vivacious: her stronger second nature
had somewhat resumed its empire: still she was fresh, and could at
times be roguishly affectionate and she patted him, and petted him, and
made much of him; slightly railed at him for his uxoriousness and
domestic subjection, and proffered him her fingers to try the taste of.
The truth must be told: Mr. Duffian not being handy, she in her renewed
earthly happiness wanted to see her charms in a woman’s natural mirror:
namely, the face of man: if of man on his knees, all the better and
though a little man is not much of a man, and a sister’s husband is, or
should be, hardly one at all, still some sort of a reflector he must
be. Two or three jests adapted to Andrew’s palate achieved his
momentary captivation.

He said: “’Gad, I never kissed you in my life, Louy.”

And she, with a flavour of delicate Irish brogue, “Why don’t ye catch
opportunity by the tail, then?”

Perfect innocence, I assure you, on both sides.

But mark how stupidity betrays. Andrew failed to understand her, and
act on the hint immediately. Had he done so, the affair would have been
over without a witness. As it happened, delay permitted Harriet to
assist at the ceremony.

“It wasn’t your mouth, Louy,” said Andrew.

“Oh, my mouth!—that I keep for, my chosen,” was answered.

“’Gad, you make a fellow almost wish—” Andrew’s fingers worked over his
poll, and then the spectre of righteous wrath flashed on him—naughty
little man that he was! He knew himself naughty, for it was the only
time since his marriage that he had ever been sorry to see his wife.
This is a comedy, and I must not preach lessons of life here: but I am
obliged to remark that the husband must be proof, the sister-in-law
perfect, where arrangements exist that keep them under one roof. She
may be so like his wife! Or, from the knowledge she has of his
circumstances, she may talk to him almost as his wife. He may forget
that she is not his wife! And then again, the small beginnings, which
are in reality the mighty barriers, are so easily slid over. But what
is the use of telling this to a pure generation? My constant error is
in supposing that I write for the wicked people who begat us.

Note, however, the difference between the woman and the man! Shame
confessed Andrew’s naughtiness; he sniggered pitiably: whereas the
Countess jumped up, and pointing at him, asked her sister what she
thought of that. Her next sentence, coolly delivered, related to some
millinery matter. If this was not innocence, what is?

Nevertheless, I must here state that the scene related, innocent as it
was, and, as one would naturally imagine, of puny consequence, if any,
did no less a thing than, subsequently, to precipitate the Protestant
Countess de Saldar into the bosom of the Roman Catholic Church. A
little bit of play!

It seems barely just. But if, as I have heard, a lady has trod on a
pebble and broken her nose, tremendous results like these warn us to be
careful how we walk. As for play, it was never intended that we should
play with flesh and blood.

And, oh, be charitable, matrons of Britain! See here, Andrew Cogglesby,
who loved his wife as his very soul, and who almost disliked her
sister; in ten minutes the latter had set his head spinning! The whole
of the day he went about the house meditating frantically on the
possibility of his Harriet demanding a divorce.

She was not the sort of woman to do that. But one thing she resolved to
do; and it was, to go to Lymport with Louisa, and having once got her
out of her dwelling-place, never to allow her to enter it, wherever it
might be, in the light of a resident again. Whether anything but the
menace of a participation in her conjugal possessions could have
despatched her to that hateful place, I doubt. She went: she would not
let Andrew be out of her sight. Growing haughtier toward him at every
step, she advanced to the strange old shop. EVAN HARRINGTON over the
door! There the Countess, having meantime returned to her state of
womanhood, shared her shudders. They entered, and passed in to Mrs.
Mel, leaving their footman, apparently, in the rear. Evan was not
visible. A man in the shop, with a yard measure negligently adorning
his shoulders, said that Mr. Harrington was in the habit of quitting
the shop at five.

“Deuced good habit, too,” said Andrew.

“Why, sir,” observed another, stepping forward, “as you truly say—yes.
But—ah! Mr. Andrew Cogglesby? Pleasure of meeting you once in
Fallowfield! Remember Mr. Perkins?—the lawyer, not the maltster. Will
you do me the favour to step out with me?”

Andrew followed him into the street.

“Are you aware of our young friend’s good fortune?” said Lawyer
Perkins. “Yes. Ah! Well!—Would you believe that any sane person in his
condition, now—nonsense apart—could bring his mind wilfully to continue
a beggar? No. Um! Well; Mr. Cogglesby, I may tell you that I hold here
in my hands a document by which Mr. Evan Harrington transfers the whole
of the property bequeathed to him to Lady Jocelyn, and that I have his
orders to execute it instantly, and deliver it over to her ladyship,
after the will is settled, probate, and so forth: I presume there will
be an arrangement about his father’s debts. Now what do you think of
that?”

“Think, sir,—think!” cried Andrew, cocking his head at him like an
indignant bird, “I think he’s a damned young idiot to do so, and you’re
a confounded old rascal to help him.”

Leaving Mr. Perkins to digest his judgement, which he had solicited,
Andrew bounced back into the shop.




CHAPTER XLV.
IN WHICH THE SHOP BECOMES THE CENTRE OF ATTRACTION


Under the first lustre of a May-night, Evan was galloping over the
moon-shadowed downs toward Beckley. At the ridge commanding the woods,
the park, and the stream, his horse stopped, as if from habit, snorted,
and puffed its sides, while he gazed steadily across the long lighted
vale. Soon he began to wind down the glaring chalk-track, and reached
grass levels. Here he broke into a round pace, till, gaining the first
straggling cottages of the village, he knocked the head of his whip
against the garden-gate of one, and a man came out, who saluted him,
and held the reins.

“Animal does work, sir,” said the man.

Evan gave directions for it to be looked to, and went on to the
doorway, where he was met by a young woman. She uttered a respectful
greeting, and begged him to enter.

The door closed, he flung himself into a chair, and said:

“Well, Susan, how is the child?”

“Oh! he’s always well, Mr. Harrington; he don’t know the tricks o’
trouble yet.”

“Will Polly be here soon?”

“At a quarter after nine, she said, sir.”

Evan bade her sit down. After examining her features quietly, he said:

“I’m glad to see you here, Susan. You don’t regret that you followed my
advice?”

“No, sir; now it’s over, I don’t. Mother’s kind enough, and father
doesn’t mention anything. She’s a-bed with bile—father’s out.”

“But what? There’s something on your mind.”

“I shall cry, if I begin, Mr. Harrington.”

“See how far you can get without.”

“Oh! Sir, then,” said Susan, on a sharp rise of her bosom, “it ain’t my
fault. I wouldn’t cause trouble to Mr. Harry, or any friend of yours;
but, sir, father have got hold of his letters to me, and he says,
there’s a promise in ’em—least, one of ’em; and it’s as good as law, he
says—he heard it in a public-house; and he’s gone over to Fall’field to
a law-gentleman there.” Susan was compelled to give way to some sobs.
“It ain’t for me—father does it, sir,” she pleaded. “I tried to stop
him, knowing how it’d vex you, Mr. Harrington; but he’s heady about
points, though a quiet man ordinary; and he says he don’t expect—and I
know now no gentleman’d marry such as me—I ain’t such a stupid gaper at
words as I used to be; but father says it’s for the child’s sake, and
he does it to have him provided for. Please, don’t ye be angry with me,
sir.”

Susan’s half-controlled spasms here got the better of her.

While Evan was awaiting the return of her calmer senses, the latch was
lifted, and Polly appeared.

“At it again!” was her sneering comment, after a short survey of her
apron-screened sister; and then she bobbed to Evan.

“It’s whimper, whimper, and squeak, squeak, half their lives with some
girls. After that they go wondering they can’t see to thread a needle!
The neighbours, I suppose. I should like to lift the top off some o’
their houses. I hope I haven’t kept you, sir.”

“No, Polly,” said Evan; “but you must be charitable, or I shall think
you want a lesson yourself. Mr. Raikes tells me you want to see me.
What is it? You seem to be correspondents.”

Polly replied: “Oh, no, Mr. Harrington: only accidental ones—when
something particular’s to be said. And he dances-like on the paper, so
that you can’t help laughing. Isn’t he a very eccentric gentleman,
sir?”

“Very,” said Evan. “I’ve no time to lose, Polly.”

“Here, you must go,” the latter called to her sister. “Now pack at
once, Sue. Do rout out, and do leave off thinking you’ve got a candle
at your eyes, for Goodness’ sake!”

Susan was too well accustomed to Polly’s usage to complain. She
murmured a gentle “Good night, sir,” and retired. Whereupon Polly
exclaimed: “Bless her poor dear soft heart! It’s us hard ones that get
on best in the world. I’m treated better than her, Mr. Harrington, and
I know I ain’t worth half of her. It goes nigh to make one religious,
only to see how exactly like Scripture is the way Beckley treats her,
whose only sin is her being so soft as to believe in a man! Oh, dear!
Mr. Harrington! I wish I had good news for you.”

In spite of all his self-control, Evan breathed quickly and looked
eagerly.

“Speak it out, Polly.”

“Oh, dear! I must, I suppose,” Polly answered. “Mr. Laxley’s become a
lord now, Mr. Harrington.”

Evan tasted in his soul the sweets of contrast. “Well?”

“And my Miss Rose—she—”

“What?”

Moved by the keen hunger of his eyes, Polly hesitated. Her face
betrayed a sudden change of mind.

“Wants to see you, sir,” she said, resolutely.

“To see me?”

Evan stood up, so pale that Polly was frightened.

“Where is she? Where can I meet her?”

“Please don’t take it so, Mr. Harrington.”

Evan commanded her to tell him what her mistress had said.

Now up to this point Polly had spoken truth. She was positive her
mistress did want to see him. Polly, also, with a maiden’s tender
guile, desired to bring them together for once, though it were for the
last time, and for no good on earth. She had been about to confide to
him her young mistress’s position toward Lord Laxley, when his sharp
interrogation stopped her. Shrinking from absolute invention, she
remarked that of course she could not exactly remember Miss Rose’s
words; which seemed indeed too much to expect of her.

“She will see me to-night?” said Evan.

“I don’t know about to-night,” Polly replied.

“Go to her instantly. Tell her I am ready. I will be at the West
park-gates. This is why you wrote, Polly? Why did you lose time? Don’t
delay, my good girl! Come!”

Evan had opened the door. He would not allow Polly an instant for
expostulation; but drew her out, saying, “You will attend to the gates
yourself. Or come and tell me the day, if she appoints another.”

Polly made a final effort to escape from the pit she was being pushed
into.

“Mr. Harrington! it wasn’t to tell you this I wrote.

Miss Rose is engaged, sir.”

“I understand,” said Evan, hoarsely, scarcely feeling it, as is the
case with men who are shot through the heart.

Ten minutes later he was on horseback by the Fallowfield gates, with
the tidings shrieking through his frame. The night was still, and
stiller in the pauses of the nightingales. He sat there, neither
thinking of them nor reproached in his manhood for the tears that
rolled down his cheeks. Presently his horse’s ears pricked, and the
animal gave a low neigh. Evan’s eyes fixed harder on the length of
gravel leading to the house. There was no sign, no figure. Out from the
smooth grass of the lane a couple of horsemen issued, and came straight
to the gates. He heard nothing till one spoke. It was a familiar voice.

“By Jove, Ferdy, here is the fellow, and we’ve been all the way to
Lymport!”

Evan started from his trance.

“It’s you, Harrington?”

“Yes, Harry.”

“Sir!” exclaimed that youth, evidently flushed with wine, “what the
devil do you mean by addressing me by my Christian name?”

Laxley pushed his horse’s head in front of Harry. In a manner
apparently somewhat improved by his new dignity, he said: “We have
ridden to Lymport to speak to you, sir. Favour me by moving a little
ahead of the lodge.”

Evan bowed, and moved beside him a short way down the lane, Harry
following.

“The purport of my visit, sir,” Laxley began, “was to make known to you
that Miss Jocelyn has done me the honour to accept me as her husband. I
learn from her that during the term of your residence in the house, you
contrived to extract from her a promise to which she attaches certain
scruples. She pleases to consider herself bound to you till you release
her. My object is to demand that you will do so immediately.”

There was no reply.

“Should you refuse to make this reparation for the harm you have done
to her and her family,” Laxley pursued, “I must let you know that there
are means of compelling you to it, and that those means will be
employed.”

Harry, fuming at these postured sentences, burst out:

“What do you talk to the fellow in that way for? A fellow who makes a
fool of my cousin, and then wants to get us to buy off my sister!
What’s he spying after here? The place is ours till we troop. I tell
you there’s only one way of dealing with him, and if you don’t do it, I
will.”

Laxley pulled his reins with a jerk that brought him to the rear.

“Miss Jocelyn has commissioned you to make this demand on me in her
name?” said Evan.

“I make it in my own right,” returned—Laxley. “I demand a prompt
reply.”

“My lord, you shall have it. Miss Jocelyn is not bound to me by any
engagement. Should she entertain scruples which I may have it in my
power to obliterate, I shall not hesitate to do so—but only to her.
What has passed between us I hold sacred.”

“Hark at that!” shouted Harry. “The damned tradesman means money! You
ass, Ferdinand! What did we go to Lymport for? Not to bandy words.
Here! I’ve got my own quarrel with you, Harrington. You’ve been setting
that girl’s father on me. Can you deny that?”

It was enough for Harry that Evan did not deny it. The calm disdain
which he read on Evan’s face acted on his fury, and digging his heels
into his horse’s flanks he rushed full at him and dealt him a sharp
flick with his whip. Evan’s beast reared.

“Accept my conditions, sir, or afford me satisfaction,” cried Laxley.

“You do me great honour, my lord; but I have told you I cannot,” said
Evan, curbing his horse.

At that moment Rose came among them. Evan raised his hat, as did
Laxley. Harry, a little behind the others, performed a laborious mock
salute, and then ordered her back to the house. A quick altercation
ensued; the end being that Harry managed to give his sister the context
of the previous conversation.

“Now go back, Rose,” said Laxley. “I have particular business with Mr.
Harrington.”

“I came to see him,” said Rose, in a clear voice.

Laxley reddened angrily.

“Then tell him at once you want to be rid of him,” her brother called
to her.

Rose looked at Evan. Could he not see that she had no word in her soul
for him of that kind? Yes: but love is not always to be touched to
tenderness even at the sight of love.

“Rose,” he said, “I hear from Lord Laxley, that you fancy yourself not
at liberty; and that you require me to disengage you.”

He paused. Did he expect her to say there that she wished nothing of
the sort? Her stedfast eyes spoke as much: but misery is wanton, and
will pull all down to it. Even Harry was checked by his tone, and
Laxley sat silent. The fact that something more than a tailor was
speaking seemed to impress them.

“Since I have to say it, Rose, I hold you in no way bound to me. The
presumption is forced upon me. May you have all the happiness I pray
God to give you.

Gentlemen, good night!”

He bowed and was gone. How keenly she could have retorted on that false
prayer for her happiness! Her limbs were nerveless, her tongue
speechless. He had thrown her off—there was no barrier now between
herself and Ferdinand. Why did Ferdinand speak to her with that air of
gentle authority, bidding her return to the house? She was incapable of
seeing, what the young lord acutely felt, that he had stooped very much
in helping to bring about such a scene. She had no idea of having
trifled with him and her own heart, when she talked feebly of her
bondage to another, as one who would be warmer to him were she free.
Swiftly she compared the two that loved her, and shivered as if she had
been tossed to the embrace of a block of ice.

“You are cold, Rose,” said Laxley, bending to lay his hand on her
shoulder.

“Pray, never touch me,” she answered, and walked on hastily to the
house.

Entering it, she remembered that Evan had dwelt there. A sense of
desolation came over her. She turned to Ferdinand remorsefully, saying:
“Dear Ferdinand!” and allowed herself to be touched and taken close to
him. When she reached her bed-room, she had time to reflect that he had
kissed her on the lips, and then she fell down and shed such tears as
had never been drawn from her before.

Next day she rose with an undivided mind. Belonging henceforth to
Ferdinand, it was necessary that she should invest him immediately with
transcendent qualities. The absence of character in him rendered this
easy. What she had done for Evan, she did for him. But now, as if the
Fates had been lying in watch to entrap her and chain her, that they
might have her at their mercy, her dreams of Evan’s high
nature—hitherto dreams only—were to be realized. With the purposeless
waywardness of her sex, Pony Wheedle, while dressing her young
mistress, and though quite aware that the parting had been spoken, must
needs relate her sister’s story and Evan’s share in it. Rose praised
him like one forever aloof from him. Nay, she could secretly
congratulate herself on not being deceived. Upon that came a letter
from Caroline:

“Do not misjudge my brother. He knew Juliana’s love for him and
rejected it. You will soon have proofs of his disinterestedness. Then
do not forget that he works to support us all. I write this with no
hope save to make you just to him. That is the utmost he will ever
anticipate.”

It gave no beating of the heart to Rose to hear good of Evan now: but
an increased serenity of confidence in the accuracy of her judgement of
persons.

The arrival of Lawyer Perkins supplied the key to Caroline’s
communication. No one was less astonished than Rose at the news that
Evan renounced the estate. She smiled at Harry’s contrite stupefaction,
and her father’s incapacity of belief in conduct so singular, caused
her to lift her head and look down on her parent.

“Shows he knows nothing of the world, poor young fellow!” said Sir
Franks.

“Nothing more clearly,” observed Lady Jocelyn. “I presume I shall cease
to be blamed for having had him here?”

“Upon my honour, he must have the soul of a gentleman!” said the
baronet. “There’s nothing he can expect in return, you know!”

“One would think, Papa, you had always been dealing with tradesmen!”
remarked Rose, to whom her father now accorded the treatment due to a
sensible girl.

Laxley was present at the family consultation. What was his opinion?
Rose manifested a slight anxiety to hear it.

“What those sort of fellows do never surprises me,” he said, with a
semi-yawn.

Rose felt fire on her cheeks.

“It’s only what the young man is bound to do,” said Mrs. Shorne.

“His duty, aunt? I hope we may all do it!” Rose interjected.

“Championing him again?”

Rose quietly turned her face, too sure of her cold appreciation of him
to retort. But yesterday night a word from him might have made her his;
and here she sat advocating the nobility of his nature with the zeal of
a barrister in full swing of practice. Remember, however, that a kiss
separates them: and how many millions of leagues that counts for in
love, in a pure girl’s thought, I leave you to guess.

Now, in what way was Evan to be thanked? how was he to be treated? Sir
Franks proposed to go down to him in person, accompanied by Harry. Lady
Jocelyn acquiesced. But Rose said to her mother:

“Will not you wound his sensitiveness by going to him there?”

“Possibly,” said her ladyship. “Shall we write and ask him to come to
us?”

“No, Mama. Could we ask him to make a journey to receive our thanks?”

“Not till we have solid ones to offer, perhaps.”

“He will not let us help him, Mama, unless we have all given him our
hands.”

“Probably not. There’s always a fund of nonsense in those who are
capable of great things, I observe. It shall be a family expedition, if
you like.”

“What!” exclaimed Mrs. Shorne. “Do you mean that you intend to allow
Rose to make one of the party? Franks! is that your idea?”

Sir Franks looked at his wife.

“What harm?” Lady Jocelyn asked; for Rose’s absence of conscious guile
in appealing to her reason had subjugated that great faculty.

“Simply a sense of propriety, Emily,” said Mrs. Shorne, with a glance
at Ferdinand.

“You have no objection, I suppose!” Lady Jocelyn addressed him.

“Ferdinand will join us,” said Rose.

“Thank you, Rose, I’d rather not,” he replied. “I thought we had done
with the fellow for good last night.”

“Last night?” quoth Lady Jocelyn.

No one spoke. The interrogation was renewed. Was it Rose’s swift
instinct which directed her the shortest way to gain her point? or that
she was glad to announce that her degrading engagement was at an end?
She said:

“Ferdinand and Mr. Harrington came to an understanding last night, in
my presence.”

That, strange as it struck on their ears, appeared to be quite
sufficient to all, albeit the necessity for it was not so very clear.
The carriage was ordered forthwith; Lady Jocelyn went to dress; Rose
drew Ferdinand away into the garden. Then, with all her powers, she
entreated him to join her.

“Thank you, Rose,” he said; “I have no taste for the genus.”

“For my sake, I beg it, Ferdinand.”

“It’s really too much to ask of me, Rose.”

“If you care for me, you will.”

“’Pon my honour, quite impossible!”

“You refuse, Ferdinand?”

“My London tailor’d find me out, and never forgive me.”

This pleasantry stopped her soft looks. Why she wished him to be with
her, she could not have said. For a thousand reasons: which implies no
distinct one something prophetically pressing in her blood.




CHAPTER XLVI.
A LOVERS’ PARTING


Now, to suppose oneself the fashioner of such a chain of events as this
which brought the whole of the Harrington family in tender unity
together once more, would have elated an ordinary mind. But to the
Countess de Saldar, it was simply an occasion for reflecting that she
had misunderstood—and could most sincerely forgive—Providence. She
admitted to herself that it was not entirely her work; for she never
would have had their place of meeting to be the Shop. Seeing, however,
that her end was gained, she was entitled to the credit of it, and
could pardon the means adopted. Her brother lord of Beckley Court, and
all of them assembled in the old 193, Main Street, Lymport! What matter
for proud humility! Providence had answered her numerous petitions, but
in its own way. Stipulating that she must swallow this pill, Providence
consented to serve her. She swallowed it with her wonted courage. In
half an hour subsequent to her arrival at Lymport, she laid siege to
the heart of Old Tom Cogglesby, whom she found installed in the
parlour, comfortably sipping at a tumbler of rum-and-water. Old Tom was
astonished to meet such an agreeable unpretentious woman, who talked of
tailors and lords with equal ease, appeared to comprehend a man’s
habits instinctively, and could amuse him while she ministered to them.

“Can you cook, ma’am?” asked Old Tom.

“All but that,” said the Countess, with a smile of sweet meaning.

“Ha! then you won’t suit me as well as your mother.”

“Take care you do not excite my emulation,” she returned, graciously,
albeit disgusted at his tone.

To Harriet, Old Tom had merely nodded. There he sat, in the arm-chair,
sucking the liquor, with the glimpse of a sour chuckle on his cheeks.
Now and then, during the evening, he rubbed his hands sharply, but
spoke little. The unbending Harriet did not conceal her disdain of him.
When he ventured to allude to the bankruptcy, she cut him short.

“Pray, excuse me—I am unacquainted with affairs of business—I cannot
even understand my husband.”

“Lord bless my soul!” Old Tom exclaimed, rolling his eyes.

Caroline had informed her sisters up-stairs that their mother was
ignorant of Evan’s change of fortune, and that Evan desired her to
continue so for the present. Caroline appeared to be pained by the
subject, and was glad when Louisa sounded his mysterious behaviour by
saying:

“Evan has a native love of concealment—he must be humoured.”

At the supper, Mr. Raikes made his bow. He was modest and reserved. It
was known that this young gentleman acted as shopman there. With a
tenderness for his position worthy of all respect, the Countess spared
his feelings by totally ignoring his presence; whereat he, unaccustomed
to such great-minded treatment, retired to bed, a hater of his kind.
Harriet and Caroline went next. The Countess said she would wait up for
Evan, but hearing that his hours of return were about the chimes of
matins, she cried exultingly: “Darling Papa all over!” and departed
likewise. Mrs. Mel, when she had mixed Old Tom’s third glass, wished
the brothers good night, and they were left to exchange what sentiments
they thought proper for the occasion. The Countess had certainly,
disappointed Old Tom’s farce, in a measure; and he expressed himself
puzzled by her. “You ain’t the only one,” said his brother. Andrew,
with some effort, held his tongue concerning the news of Evan—his
fortune and his folly, till he could talk to the youth in person.

All took their seats at the early breakfast next morning.

“Has Evan not come—home yet?” was the Countess’s first question.

Mrs. Mel replied, “No.”

“Do you know where he has gone, dear Mama?”

“He chooses his own way.”

“And you fear that it leads somewhere?” added the Countess.

“I fear that it leads to knocking up the horse he rides.”

“The horse, Mama! He is out on a horse all night! But don’t you see,
dear old pet! his morals, at least, are safe on horseback.”

“The horse has to be paid for, Louisa,” said her mother, sternly; and
then, for she had a lesson to read to the guests of her son, “Ready
money doesn’t come by joking. What will the creditors think? If he
intends to be honest in earnest, he must give up four-feet mouths.”

“Fourteen-feet, ma’am, you mean,” said Old Tom, counting the heads at
table.

“Bravo, Mama!” cried the Countess, and as she was sitting near her
mother, she must show how prettily she kissed, by pouting out her
playful lips to her parent. “Do be economical always! And mind! for the
sake of the wretched animals, I will intercede for you to be his
inspector of stables.”

This, with a glance of intelligence at her sisters.

“Well, Mr. Raikes,” said Andrew, “you keep good hours, at all
events—eh?”

“Up with the lark,” said Old Tom. “Ha! ’fraid he won’t be so early when
he gets rid of his present habits—eh?”

“Nec dierum numerum, ut nos, sed noctium computant,” said Mr. Raikes,
and both the brothers sniffed like dogs that have put their noses to a
hot coal, and the Countess, who was less insensible to the aristocracy
of the dead languages than are women generally, gave him the
recognition that is occasionally afforded the family tutor.

About the hour of ten Evan arrived. He was subjected to the hottest
embrace he had ever yet received from his sister Louisa.

“Darling!” she called him before them all. “Oh! how I suffer for this
ignominy I see you compelled for a moment to endure. But it is but for
a moment. They must vacate; and you will soon be out of this horrid
hole.”

“Where he just said he was glad to give us a welcome,” muttered Old
Tom.

Evan heard him, and laughed. The Countess laughed too.

“No, we will not be impatient. We are poor insignificant people!” she
said; and turning to her mother, added: “And yet I doubt not you think
the smallest of our landed gentry equal to great continental seigneurs.
I do not say the contrary.”

“You will fill Evan’s head with nonsense till you make him knock up a
horse a week, and never go to his natural bed,” said Mrs. Mel, angrily.
“Look at him! Is a face like that fit for business?”

“Certainly, certainly not!” said the Countess.

“Well, Mother, the horse is dismissed,—you won’t have to complain any
more,” said Evan, touching her hand. “Another history commences from
to-day.”

The Countess watched him admiringly. Such powers of acting she could
not have ascribed to him.

“Another history, indeed!” she said. “By the way, Van, love! was it out
of Glamorganshire—were we Tudors, according to Papa? or only Powys
chieftains? It’s of no moment, but it helps one in conversation.”

“Not half so much as good ale, though!” was Old Tom’s comment.

The Countess did not perceive its fitness, till Evan burst into a
laugh, and then she said:

“Oh! we shall never be ashamed of the Brewery. Do not fear that, Mr.
Cogglesby.”

Old Tom saw his farce reviving, and encouraged the Countess to
patronize him. She did so to an extent that called on her Mrs. Mel’s
reprobation, which was so cutting and pertinent, that Harriet was
compelled to defend her sister, remarking that perhaps her mother would
soon learn that Louisa was justified in not permitting herself and
family to be classed too low. At this Andrew, coming from a private
interview with Evan, threw up his hands and eyes as one who foretold
astonishment but counselled humility. What with the effort of those who
knew a little to imply a great deal; of those who knew all to betray
nothing; and of those who were kept in ignorance to strain a fact out
of the conflicting innuendos the general mystification waxed apace, and
was at its height, when a name struck on Evan’s ear that went through
his blood like a touch of the torpedo.

He had been called into the parlour to assist at a consultation over
the Brewery affairs. Raikes opened the door, and announced, “Sir Franks
and Lady Jocelyn.”

Them he could meet, though it was hard for his pride to pardon their
visit to him there. But when his eyes discerned Rose behind them, the
passions of his lower nature stood up armed. What could she have come
for but to humiliate, or play with him?

A very few words enabled the Countess to guess the cause for this
visit. Of course, it was to beg time! But they thanked Evan. For
something generous, no doubt.

Sir Franks took him aside, and returning remarked to his wife that she
perhaps would have greater influence with him. All this while Rose sat
talking to Mrs. Andrew Cogglesby, Mrs. Strike, and Evan’s mother. She
saw by his face the offence she had committed, and acted on by one of
her impulses, said: “Mama, I think if I were to speak to Mr.
Harrington—”

Ere her mother could make light of the suggestion, Old Tom had jumped
up, and bowed out his arm.

“Allow me to conduct ye to the drawing room, upstairs, young lady.
He’ll follow, safe enough!”

Rose had not stipulated for that. Nevertheless, seeing no cloud on her
mother’s face, or her father’s, she gave Old Tom her hand, and awaited
a movement from Evan. It was too late to object to it on either side.
Old Tom had caught the tide at the right instant. Much as if a grim old
genie had planted them together, the lovers found themselves alone.

“Evan, you forgive me?” she began, looking up at him timidly.

“With all my heart, Rose,” he answered, with great cheerfulness.

“No. I know your heart better. Oh, Evan! you must be sure that we
respect you too much to wound you. We came to thank you for your
generosity. Do you refuse to accept anything from us? How can we take
this that you thrust on us, unless in some way—”

“Say no more,” he interposed. “You see me here. You know me as I am,
now.”

“Yes, yes!” the tears stood in her eyes. “Why did I come, you would
ask? That is what you cannot forgive! I see now how useless it was.
Evan! why did you betray me?”

“Betray you, Rose?”

“You said that you loved me once.”

She was weeping, and all his spirit melted, and his love cried out: “I
said ‘till death,’ and till death it will be, Rose.”

“Then why, why did you betray me, Evan? I know it all. But if you
blackened yourself to me, was it not because you loved something better
than me? And now you think me false! Which of us two has been false?
It’s silly to talk of these things now too late! But be just. I wish
that we may be friends. Can we, unless you bend a little?”

The tears streamed down her cheeks, and in her lovely humility he saw
the baseness of that pride of his which had hitherto held him up.

“Now that you are in this house where I was born and am to live, can
you regret what has come between us, Rose?”

Her lips quivered in pain.

“Can I do anything else but regret it all my life, Evan?”

How was it possible for him to keep his strength?

“Rose!” he spoke with a passion that made her shrink, “are you bound to
this man?” and to the drooping of her eyes, “No. Impossible, for you do
not love him. Break it. Break the engagement you cannot fulfil. Break
it and belong to me. It sounds ill for me to say that in such a place.
But Rose, I will leave it. I will accept any assistance that your
father—that any man will give me. Beloved—noble girl! I see my
falseness to you, though I little thought it at the time—fool that I
was! Be my help, my guide—as the soul of my body! Be mine!”

“Oh, Evan!” she clasped her hands in terror at the change in him, that
was hurrying her she knew not whither, and trembling, held them
supplicatingly.

“Yes, Rose: you have taught me what love can be. You cannot marry that
man.”

“But, my honour, Evan! No. I do not love him; for I can love but one.
He has my pledge. Can I break it?”

The stress on the question choked him, just as his heart sprang to her.

“Can you face the world with me, Rose?”

“Oh, Evan! is there an escape for me? Think Decide!—No—no! there is
not. My mother, I know, looks on it so. Why did she trust me to be with
you here, but that she thinks me engaged to him, and has such faith in
me? Oh, help me!—be my guide. Think whether you would trust me
hereafter! I should despise myself.”

“Not if you marry him!” said Evan, bitterly. And then thinking as men
will think when they look on the figure of a fair girl marching
serenely to a sacrifice, the horrors of which they insist that she
ought to know: half-hating her for her calmness—adoring her for her
innocence: he said: “It rests with you, Rose. The world will approve
you, and if your conscience does, why—farewell, and may heaven be your
help.”

She murmured, “Farewell.”

Did she expect more to be said by him? What did she want or hope for
now? And yet a light of hunger grew in her eyes, brighter and brighter,
as it were on a wave of yearning.

“Take my hand once,” she faltered.

Her hand and her whole shape he took, and she with closed eyes let him
strain her to his breast.

Their swoon was broken by the opening of the door, where Old Tom
Cogglesby and Lady Jocelyn appeared.

“’Gad! he seems to have got his recompense—eh, my lady?” cried Old Tom.
However satisfactorily they might have explained the case, it certainly
did seem so.

Lady Jocelyn looked not absolutely displeased. Old Tom was chuckling at
her elbow. The two principal actors remained dumb.

“I suppose, if we leave young people to settle a thing, this is how
they do it,” her ladyship remarked.

“’Gad, and they do it well!” cried Old Tom.

Rose, with a deep blush on her cheeks, stepped from Evan to her mother.
Not in effrontery, but earnestly, and as the only way of escaping from
the position, she said: “I have succeeded, Mama. He will take what I
offer.”

“And what’s that, now?” Old Tom inquired.

Rose turned to Evan. He bent and kissed her hand.

“Call it ‘recompense’ for the nonce,” said Lady Jocelyn. “Do you still
hold to your original proposition, Tom?”

“Every penny, my lady. I like the young fellow, and she’s a jolly
little lass—if she means it:—she’s a woman.”

“True,” said Lady Jocelyn. “Considering that fact, you will oblige me
by keeping the matter quiet.”

“Does she want to try whether the tailor’s a gentleman still, my
lady—eh?”

“No. I fancy she will have to see whether a certain nobleman may be
one.”

The Countess now joined them. Sir Franks had informed her of her
brother’s last fine performance. After a short, uneasy pause, she said,
glancing at Evan:—

“You know his romantic nature. I can assure you he was sincere; and
even if you could not accept, at least—”

“But we have accepted, Countess,” said Rose.

“The estate!”

“The estate, Countess. And what is more, to increase the effect of his
generosity, he has consented to take a recompense.”

“Indeed!” exclaimed the Countess, directing a stony look at her
brother.

“May I presume to ask what recompense?”

Rose shook her head. “Such a very poor one, Countess! He has no idea of
relative value.”

The Countess’s great mind was just then running hot on estates, and
thousands, or she would not have played goose to them, you may be sure.
She believed that Evan had been wheedled by Rose into the acceptance of
a small sum of money, in return for his egregious gift.

With an internal groan, the outward aspect of which she had vast
difficulty in masking, she said: “You are right—he has no head. Easily
cajoled!”

Old Tom sat down in a chair, and laughed outright. Lady Jocelyn, in
pity for the poor lady, who always amused her, thought it time to put
an end to the scene.

“I hope your brother will come to us in about a week,” she said. “May I
expect the favour of your company as well?”

The Countess felt her dignity to be far superior as she responded:
“Lady Jocelyn, when next I enjoy the gratification of a visit to your
hospitable mansion, I must know that I am not at a disadvantage. I
cannot consent to be twice pulled down to my brother’s level.”

Evan’s heart was too full of its dim young happiness to speak, or care
for words. The cold elegance of the Countess’s curtsey to Lady Jocelyn:
her ladyship’s kindly pressure of his hand: Rose’s stedfast look into
his eyes: Old Tom’s smothered exclamation that he was not such a fool
as he seemed: all passed dream-like, and when he was left to the fury
of the Countess, he did not ask her to spare him, nor did he defend
himself. She bade adieu to him and their mutual relationship that very
day. But her star had not forsaken her yet. Chancing to peep into the
shop, to intrust a commission to Mr. John Raikes, who was there doing
penance for his career as a gentleman, she heard Old Tom and Andrew
laughing, utterly unlike bankrupts.

“Who’d have thought the women such fools! and the Countess, too!”

This was Andrew’s voice. He chuckled as one emancipated. The Countess
had a short interview with him (before she took her departure to join
her husband, under the roof of the Honourable Herbert Duffian), and
Andrew chuckled no more.




CHAPTER XLVII.
A YEAR LATER, THE COUNTESS DE SALDAR DE SANCORVO TO HER SISTER CAROLINE


“Rome.


“Let the post-mark be my reply to your letter received through the
Consulate, and most courteously delivered with the Consul’s
compliments. We shall yet have an ambassador at Rome—mark your Louisa’s
words. Yes, dearest! I am here, body and spirit! I have at last found a
haven, a refuge, and let those who condemn me compare the peace of
their spirits with mine. You think that you have quite conquered the
dreadfulness of our origin. My love, I smile at you! I know it to be
impossible for the Protestant heresy to offer a shade of consolation.
Earthly-born, it rather encourages earthly distinctions. It is the
sweet sovereign Pontiff alone who gathers all in his arms, not
excepting tailors. Here, if they could know it, is their blessed
comfort!

“Thank Harriet for her message. She need say nothing. By refusing me
her hospitality, when she must have known that the house was as free of
creditors as any foreigner under the rank of Count is of soap, she
drove me to Mr. Duffian. Oh! how I rejoice at her exceeding unkindness!
How warmly I forgive her the unsisterly—to say the least—vindictiveness
of her unaccountable conduct! Her sufferings will one day be terrible.
Good little Andrew supplies her place to me. Why do you refuse his
easily afforded bounty? No one need know of it. I tell you candidly, I
take double, and the small good punch of a body is only too delighted.
But then, I can be discreet.

“Oh! the gentlemanliness of these infinitely maligned Jesuits! They
remind me immensely of Sir Charles Grandison, and those frontispiece
pictures to the novels we read when girls—I mean in manners and the
ideas they impose—not in dress or length of leg, of course. The same
winning softness; the same irresistible ascendancy over the female
mind! They require virtue for two, I assure you, and so I told Silva,
who laughed.

“But the charms of confession, my dear! I will talk of Evan first. I
have totally forgiven him. Attaché to the Naples embassy, sounds
tol-lol. In such a position I can rejoice to see him, for it permits me
to acknowledge him. I am not sure that, spiritually, Rose will be his
most fitting helpmate. However, it is done, and I did it, and there is
no more to be said. The behaviour of Lord Laxley in refusing to
surrender a young lady who declared that her heart was with another,
exceeds all I could have supposed. One of the noble peers among his
ancestors must have been a pig! Oh! the Roman nobility! Grace,
refinement, intrigue, perfect comprehension of your ideas, wishes—the
meanest trifles! Here you have every worldly charm, and all crowned by
Religion! This is my true delight. I feel at last that whatsoever I do,
I cannot go far wrong while I am within hail of my gentle priest. I
never could feel so before.

“The idea of Mr. Parsley proposing for the beautiful widow Strike! It
was indecent to do so so soon—widowed under such circumstances! But I
dare say he was as disinterested as a Protestant curate ever can be.
Beauty is a good dowry to bring a poor, lean, worldly curate of your
Church, and he knows that. Your bishops and arches are quite
susceptible to beautiful petitioners, and we know here how your livings
and benefices are dispensed. What do you intend to do? Come to me; come
to the bosom of the old and the only true Church, and I engage to marry
you to a Roman prince the very next morning or two. That is, if you
have no ideas about prosecuting a certain enterprise which I should not
abandon. In that case, stay. As Duchess of B., Mr. Duffian says you
would be cordially welcome to his Holiness, who may see women. That
absurd report is all nonsense. We do not kiss his toe, certainly, but
we have privileges equally enviable. Herbert is all charm. I confess he
is a little wearisome with his old ruins, and his Dante, the poet. He
is quite of my opinion, that Evan will never wash out the trade stain
on him until he comes over to the Church of Rome. I adjure you,
Caroline, to lay this clearly before our dear brother. In fact, while
he continues a Protestant, to me he is a tailor. But here Rose is the
impediment. I know her to be just one of those little dogged minds that
are incapable of receiving new impressions. Was it not evident in the
way she stuck to Evan after I had once brought them together? I am not
at all astonished that Mr. Raikes should have married her maid. It is a
case of natural selection. But it is amusing to think of him carrying
on the old business in 193, and with credit! I suppose his parents are
to be pitied; but what better is the creature fit for? Mama displeases
me in consenting to act as housekeeper to old Grumpus. I do not object
to the fact, for it is prospective; but she should have insisted on
another place of resort than Fallowfield. I do not agree with you in
thinking her right in refusing a second marriage. Her age does not
shelter her from scandal in your Protestant communities.

“I am every day expecting Harry Jocelyn to turn up. He was rightly sent
away, for to think of the folly Evan put into his empty head! No; he
shall have another wife, and Protestantism shall be his forsaken
mistress!

“See how your Louy has given up the world and its vanities! You
expected me to creep up to you contrite and whimpering? On the
contrary, I never felt prouder. And I am not going to live a lazy life,
I can assure you. The Church hath need of me! If only for the peace it
hath given me on one point, I am eternally bound to serve it.

“Postscript: I am persuaded of this; that it is utterly impossible for
a man to be a true gentleman who is not of the true Church. What it is
I cannot say; but it is as a convert that I appreciate my husband. Love
is made to me, dear, for Catholics are human. The other day it was a
question whether a lady or a gentleman should be compromised. It
required the grossest fib. The gentleman did not hesitate. And why? His
priest was handy. Fancy Lord Laxley in such a case. I shudder. This
shows that your religion precludes any possibility of the being the
real gentleman, and whatever Evan may think of himself, or Rose think
of him, I KNOW THE THING.”