CHAPTER XXIII
If anything could have raised Mordaunt's spirits that night it would have been his supper with the joyous Bohemians—listening to their banjos and bright choruses, and hearing the tales of the "high jinks" they hold in the neighboring forests in spring-time. Many members of that genial club were charming enough to make him forget that they were fellow-townsmen of vulgarians like Bloxsome, but nothing could disperse the cloud that overshadowed him.
The girl had grown dearer to him every day, and yet she seemed further from him than ever. He would not blame her, still less would he have allowed any one else to do so. Had she not said, only six weeks ago, that she did not like him well enough to marry? Except during those three days in the train together—those three unforgettable days—they had never been alone, as they then virtually were, and nothing had passed to justify him in the belief that her heart had softened. On the contrary, she seemed to have taken special pains to prevent his forming such an erroneous idea. She treated him only a little better than the other young men round her—just so much as to rouse their jealous animosity—not enough to distinguish him as the one she had chosen from all the world. Though he had defended her against his aunt's insinuations, as regarded the "braying chorus," he did not feel the less secretly hurt. Therefore it was that he was here at the Bohemian Club to-night, instead of gliding round the Planters' sitting-room, with his arm round Clare's waist.
He did not see the Planters the following morning. Mrs. Frampton and Grace had wished them good-by the previous evening, and they were off early with a large party to San Rafael. Before the Ballingers left San Francisco that day the English mail had arrived, bringing nearly a week's budget of letters and papers. There was food enough for the mind, and to spare, to last them that short journey.
Mordaunt and his aunt sat together at the end of the car, Grace by herself a little distance off. Her letters were not very interesting, but she had several papers which Mordy had handed to her; only the last issues he and his aunt were reading. The debates naturally claimed the young member's first attention; the society journals andPall Mall Gazettegossip as naturally claimed Mrs. Frampton's.
"Look! Look here!" she whispered, suddenly, turning to her nephew, and pointing to a paragraph. "Do you see this? Have you looked at the law reports?"
Then he read the following:
"The termination of the great will case yesterday is a triumph not only to Mr. Ivor Lawrence's personal friends, but to all lovers of fair play who have declined to prejudge the case, and who have viewed with grave reprehension the disposition in society to believe the allegations recklessly brought against a gentleman who had always enjoyed an unblemished reputation. Mr. Ivor Lawrence has suffered most cruelly during the past eight months, and it is but just that the false accusations he has labored under should recoil upon the head of Mr. Giles Tracy, who, without the smallest evidence, dared to bring these charges against his cousin. That the course of the trial brought to light certain facts not wholly creditable to the accuser was the penalty he paid for his rashness."
"The termination of the great will case yesterday is a triumph not only to Mr. Ivor Lawrence's personal friends, but to all lovers of fair play who have declined to prejudge the case, and who have viewed with grave reprehension the disposition in society to believe the allegations recklessly brought against a gentleman who had always enjoyed an unblemished reputation. Mr. Ivor Lawrence has suffered most cruelly during the past eight months, and it is but just that the false accusations he has labored under should recoil upon the head of Mr. Giles Tracy, who, without the smallest evidence, dared to bring these charges against his cousin. That the course of the trial brought to light certain facts not wholly creditable to the accuser was the penalty he paid for his rashness."
Mordaunt turned to the law report in theTimes, and there read, at large, the collapse of the first day. It had been expected it would extend over several, but Mr. Eagles's testimony was so complete and crushing that Giles Tracy's counsel had no choice but to withdraw. Unfortunately for him, this withdrawal was not before certain indelible stains had been left on the young man's character by the solicitor's evidence as to the cause which led to the estrangement between the testator and his favorite nephew, an estrangement which hardened into virulent aversion as time revealed, more and more, Giles's true character. At the period of Eagles's last interview with his client, he had no idea Mr. Tracy could ever be persuaded to add a codicil to his will leaving Giles twenty thousand pounds. He felt sure that nothing but Mr. Lawrence's strong representations could have brought him to do this. Mr. Eagles had made no less than four wills for Mr. Tracy. He believed all had been destroyed but this last one, in which he left everything to Mr. Lawrence. Mr. Tracy did not wish this to be known—least of all by the nephew he resolved to make his heir—hence his fiction about the hospital.
When Mordaunt had read rapidly the half-column which contained this report, and had handed it to Mrs. Frampton, he sat brooding until she had finished. The silence was broken by her saying,
"H'm! It is most unfortunate! I mean unfortunatejust now, when one wants to distract her mind from the subject. The man has behaved disgracefully toher, at all events, and the sooner she forgets him the better."
"Yes, of course; that's all right. But I must show her the paper."
"I don't know what to say to that. She looks so much brighter lately. I hope she is beginning to forget. I watch her when she little thinks I am doing so, and I see a great change for the better. I am afraid this news will undo it all, by turning her thoughts again entirely upon this wretch, whom I hate and abominate—for he has been the only cause of real dissension between Gracey and me."
"Can't help that, aunty. Shemustknow. There's no help for it. It's an awful bore. Confound it! everything seems to go wrong since we came to California!"
Then, with a sigh which appeared to have its birth in his boots, and went quivering up his frame, he rose and walked down the car to where his sister sat.
"Look here, Gracey. Here's something you'll be glad to read. I don't like the fellow. I think he behaved like a cad, though I stuck up for him that night at Mrs. Reid's, just to please you. But, of course, I'm glad to know he is not a scoundrel."
Her eyes sparkling, her face a-flush with excitement, she had seized the paper from his hand, even while he spoke, and her eyes ran rapidly down the column to which he pointed. When she had done, a sweet smile played upon her lips. She leaned her head upon her brother's shoulder, and whispered,
"I never doubted him about this, or—or anything else, dear. You must never abuse him again—never—never, Mordy. He is the soul of honor, and of all that is noble and high-minded. His very faults are grand faults. You will learn to see that soon, dear—you will, indeed. And so will aunty, when—when it all comes right."
The branching of wide-armed cypress-trees, and the incense of sweet flowers was all they knew in the young moonlight, as they drove from the depot—surely the most poetical railway-station in the world—through the pleasure-grounds of the wonderful hotel at Monterey. They alighted at the terrace of a huge, irregular building, and the next minute found themselves in a big hall, crowded with ladies, some in evening dress, some with hats and jackets ready to sally out into the moonlight, and men smoking, drinking coffee, reading telegrams, or gathered in knots round two or three of the most favored ladies in rocking-chairs. Some of these were pretty, some, according to British ideas, very much over-dressed for the occasion; all seemed to be enjoying themselves thoroughly, and not to be afraid of showing that they were. Small children were running in and out between elderly gentlemen's legs. Young men were strolling in the corridors, looking at the billiard-players through the open door, and stopping to chaff the knots of young girls, clinging to each other with the effusive affection born of twenty-four hours' acquaintance. Aged ladies had bezique-boards between them, but were interchanging remarks in high-pitched voices, none the less. Aged men were discussing Mr. Blaine's projects, the World's Fair, and canned fruits with equal vehemence. The babel of tongues, from the piercing falsetto of childhood downwards, was deafening to the travellers as they entered, but the scene was so gay, so pervaded withbonhomie, that even Mrs. Frampton declared later that it was amusing—"amusing towatch. It would be a delightful place for deaf persons to come to. So lively. And the drum oftheirears would run no risk, you know."
In the morning, Grace looked out on the most lovely garden of its kind she had ever seen, with glimpses of a sapphire-colored sea between the red-lilac stems of pines and the gnarled boles of ilex. On the other side a little lake, surrounded by palms and bamboos; in the foreground beds of cineraria and sweet-smelling stock, with bunches of arums and lilies raising their white crests above the masses of rich color. The fresh morning air came up laden with the first breath of the flowers. As soon as she was dressed she went out and watched the Chinese gardeners at work on their borders of floral embroidery, and wandered through the winding groves, across the railway and over the sand-hills that slope to the beach, where she sat down awhile, and felt tranquilly happy. It was good that her happiness had come to her here, where there were no jarring elements; where no constant social effort was needed; where nature was so rich, so fragrant, so untroubled. She could not have nursed the peace at her heart so securely in those great cities; even the wild crags and snowy fastnesses of beautiful Colorado, much as she loved them, would have harmonized less with her present mood than did the white-lipped sea curling on the yellow sand, and the tranquil spaces of lofty shadow in the garden, upheld by the mighty columns of the Californian pines.
The only cloud in the sky that day—and she could not feel that it was one impenetrable to the sun—was her brother's gloom. He thought that he need make no exertion with his aunt and his sister to assume a cheerfulness he did not feel, and he looked as miserable as a man who has not lost his appetite can look. Mrs. Frampton was much concerned. She tried to talk of investments, but failed to rouse his interest. He was clearly in a bad way, in a worse way even than she had suspected. She was thankful to have got him from San Francisco. But now that they had brought him away, what were they to do with him, without companions, without purpose or occupation? As she watched him at breakfast, slowly consuming an egg, with the air of an early martyr, she felt at her wit's end what to do. However, they must not all three sit still; movement was better than inactivity. She wisely insisted on their going the famous "seventeen-mile drive," and taking luncheon with them. She gave him a French novel, and bade him supply himself with an unlimited amount of tobacco. She took for herself an eider-down cushion and a sketch-book. And thus armed againstennui, if the drive should prove disappointing, they started.
Though they drove along those shores repeatedly during the weeks they remained at Monterey, it never, perhaps, looked quite as beautiful as it did that morning. The sea was a wonderful color, more like the iris with which the pine wood they first drove through was carpeted than anything else in nature. Above the pine-needles and these purple-blue irises rose bushes of pinkberberis, until the road opened out upon a wide down, fringed with rocks overhanging the sea. To-day there was a west wind, which lashed it into white foam, not only against the cliffs, but far as the eye could reach. Presently they gained a group of island-rocks, two of which were literally covered with seals, whose roaring and strange plaintive cries were heard more than a mile off. On the summit of their home they lay dark and inert, sun-dried, and probably asleep. Lower down they were sprawling and floundering about, of a pale dun color, ever and anon plunging into the foaming waves, such a picture of innocent enjoyment that it was pleasant to know they were never molested. They only frequent certain portions of the coast, and considering that they deprive the fishermen there of a large portion of their spoil, it is creditable that the law which forbids them to be destroyed or disturbed is so rigidly respected.
Soon after leaving this interesting colony, our friends came upon that unique feature of this coast, the great cypress forest, which affronts the winds and waves, stretching out into the very sea itself, a sentinel now and again thrust forward upon some prominent crag, its strong gray arms lifted defiantly against the foam that breaks impotently over it. The "cypresses," as they are here called, closely resemble the cedars of Lebanon, and have no apparent relation to the columns of solid foliage usually associated with the name. Here and there the bleached skeletons of these mighty trees, silver-lighted in the sun, some still erect in death, some prone upon the sweet, warm grass that crowns the pink-gray rock, tell with magic brilliancy against the broad sovereignty of impenetrable green that dominates the sea. As Grace beheld these gnarled trunks and twisted branches, bearing their solemn crowns aloft, and immovable above the assaults of lightning and of wind till death uncrowns and unrobes them, she felt that this was the realm of epic poetry, the ocean-forest of imagination, a kingdom unrivalled upon earth for its majesty of color and richness of suggestion.
And now they rounded point after point, and she cried aloud to her companions in her glee, and they responded after their kind. The same elements formed fresh combinations at each turn—the rocks standing out like castles in the sea, the cypresses, a beleaguering army, now advancing, now retreating, their dead lying round them unmourned, slain in the mighty battle with the winds of heaven, where, after centuries of strife, they had fallen, and others had stepped forward from the ranks to take their place.
In one of these little bays they stopped the carriage, and unpacked their basket. And when they had all eaten Mrs. Frampton sharpened her pencil, and attacked the scene with characteristic vigor. She was not going to be beaten by the convolutions of a few trees—and those American trees, too. Mordy smoked his pipe in silence, and fell asleep. Grace rose, and wandered down among the rocks.
Just after this another carriage drew up a little distance off, from which a man alighted. If not an Englishman, he was very like one. In age he appeared to be near forty; strong, somewhat broad, and not very tall. He could not be said to be handsome, his upper lip, from which the hair was ruthlessly cut, being too long and straight. But he had fine, fearless eyes, and his brow was broad and massive. His walk was full of decision, and in his Norfolk jacket and knickerbockers he had the look of a man who would never waver, never turn back, nor give in, under any ordinary strain, physical or mental. He stood still for a moment, taking in the scene—in the foreground Sir Mordaunt Ballinger, Bart. and M.P., asleep, with his head on an eider-down cushion; not far off Mrs. Frampton, spectacles on nose, her attention riveted on that group of hoary cypresses; the coachman beyond, devouring the remains of the luncheon. Was there no one else? No. His eye scoured the scene; then, making up his mind that the person he sought must be hidden from him by the underwood and rocks, he strode down, unobserved by Mrs. Frampton, to the edge of the cliff.
She was sitting on a rock, sheltered by the trees from the west wind, her eyes fixed on the purple sea, with its green stains and white lips curled in anger against the pebbles on the shore below her, when she heard a rustle in the grass, the crackling of a twig, and, looking up, saw Ivor Lawrence before her.
He had been present so vividly to her mind's eye the moment before that she was scarcely startled. She caught her breath, her cheek turned pale, before the blood rushed violently back there; that was all, as she stammered out,
"Mr. Lawrence! How wonderful!"
He took her hand in both his, and held it for a moment or two before he sat down beside her.
"Yes, it is wonderful to meet you in such a spot after our long separation. I started immediately the trial was over. I had made all my preparations beforehand, and vowed that nothing should keep me a day."
"We only received the papers with the result of the trial yesterday."
"I came over in the ship that brought the mails. Had I known your address I should probably have been here before them. But I had to wait in New York, to learn from your bankers where you were." Then he leaned forward and looked yet more intently into her face. "Youknewthat I should come—and come at once, did you not?"
"I—thought you would—if you could—but, of course, I couldn't feel sure." Then she added, with that burst of sunshine in her face, and that rare naturalness which belonged to her, "But, oh, how glad I am! How wonderful it is to see you here, after all these months—here, in this lovely spot, when I have been thinking of you in London fogs! Oh! that horrid trial! How thankful you must be it is over!"
"Yes—not that I had, latterly, any anxiety as to the result. From the moment I knew Eagles was alive I knew I was safe. If Eagles had not turned up, some good-natured people might still have doubted me."
She looked at him with her quickly-flashing eye, and the color mounted again to her cheek.
"No one who knew you—whoreallyknew you—could ever have doubted, though the trial had gone against you over and over again!"
"I like to hear you say that. You can't repeat it too often; it is worth all the fortunes—all the triumphs in the world to me; it means my whole happiness in life. You have never doubted, through my silence, that I loved you better than anything in the world? You understood how it was that I kept silent till I could face your brother, your aunt, every one, without the suspicion of a stain upon my name?"
"No; I have never doubted, in my inmost heart, though I blamed you," she said, and the tears now rained down over her cheeks. He threw his arms round her, and kissed the tears away.
"My darling! it was my great love for you—my desire that your name should not be bandied about in connection with mine as long as this accusation hung over my head."
She smiled up at him through her tears, while her head lay upon his breast, and said, with a little gesture of negation,
"'Perfect love casteth out fear.'"
Nearly an hour later, Mrs. Frampton, having finished her sketch, went in search of Grace. The sight which met her when, after hunting about for some time, she reached the little cove of rocks where her niece and a man were seated, their heads very close together, nearly caused the good lady a fit. Grace—Grace, of all the girls in the world! She was thunderstruck. She could hardly believe her eyes. The man's back was turned to her. She uttered a loud exclamation and dropped her parasol.
Grace sprang up, ran towards her aunt, and embraced her. At the same moment her companion turned, and Mrs. Frampton recognized in him the man she had been abusing for the last eight months.
It was an awkward moment for her, but she was equal to the emergency. She seized the situation at a glance; congratulated him on the result of the trial; reproached him roundly for his silence; and, if I may paraphrase the poet, "saying she would ne'er forgive, forgave him." How could she do otherwise? She was too clever a woman to stick to her small field-pieces, when she found they were only loaded with blank cartridge.
Mordaunt joined them soon afterwards, and behaved like a good fellow as he was, first of all, and a man of the world as he was, afterwards. He grasped with heartiness the hand of the man whom he knew now was to be his brother. And in the ruddy gold of waning day, behind the dark columns of the trees, the four drove back to Monterey.