CHAPTER LIII.THE FLOWERAt breakfast the little party had a great deal to talk about, topics of hope, and topics of regret, glanced at in all sorts of spirits, sad and cheerful, black spirits and white, blue spirits and gray; but on the whole one would have said, looking on and a stranger to all that was possibly passing within, that it was a cheerful meal.“Five miles and a half to the station, and the up train at eleven forty-five.The cab, or whatever it is, will be here at half-past ten, and then good-bye. Farewell, perhaps, for three years to Gilroyd,” so said William, as he and Violet Darkwell stood side by side, looking out from the window, upon the glowing autumnal landscape.“Three years! you don’t mean to say you’d stay away all that time, without ever coming to see grannie?”“Of course if she wants me I’ll come; but should she not, and should she at the same time continue, as I hope she will, quite well, and shouldIbe kept close to my work, as I expect, it’s sure to turn out as I say. Three years—yes, itisa long time—room for plenty of changes, and changes enough, great ones, therewillbe, no doubt.”The uplands of Revington formed the background of the pretty prospect before him, and it needed the remembrance of the promise he had made to Aunt Dinah toprevent his speaking with less disguise, for he always felt of late an impetuous longing almost fierce to break through conventional hypocrisies, and lay bare his wounded heart, and upbraid, and implore, in the wildest passion before Violet Darkwell. To be alone with her, and yet say nothing of all that was swelling and rolling at his heart—was pain. And yet to be alone with her, even in this longing and vain anguish, and near her, was a strange despairing delight.“Oh, yes, everyone changes, every day almost, except dear grannie and old Winnie Dobbs. I’m sureIchange, and so do you, and what won’t three years do? You’ve changed very much, and not for the better,” and saying this Miss Violet laughed.“My changes, be they what they may, don’t seem to trouble you much,” replied William.“Trouble?—not at all. I dare say they are improvements, though I don’t like them,” laughed she.“I don’t think I’m abitchanged. IknowI’m not, in fact. Tell me any one thing in which I’m changed.”“Well, it isgenerally; you have grown so disagreeable, that’s all—it is not much to me, but I dare say it will be to other people,” said she.“I’m disagreeable—yes, of course—because I have my opinion about men and things, and fools and nonsense. I don’t know anything I’ve said to you, at least since I came yesterday, that could annoy you. I have not mentioned a single subject that could possibly even interest you. I dare say it is tiresome my talking so much as Aunt Dinah makes me, about myself. But I couldn’t help it.”“It won’t do, William; you know very well how cross you always are now, at least with me, not that I mind it much, but there’s no denying.”“You accused me of that before, and I said I was sorry. I—perhaps I am. I’m going away, and everything breaking up, you know, and you must make allowances. I used not to be cross long ago, and I’mnotchanged. No—I’m the same—I never said an unkind word to you, Vi, all the time when you were a little thing, and if ever I speak differently now, it is not from unkindness, only that things have gone wrong with me, and I’ve seen something of the world; and things happen to sour one, and—I don’t know—but I’mnotchanged. You mustn’t think it now that I’m going away. I’m such a fool, I’m such a beast, I can’t help talking bitterly sometimes, and sometimes I think I am a—afiendalmost, but I hope I am not as bad as I seem.”So spoke this Penruddock, who fancied himself soured for life, and soliloquised at times in the vein of Elshender of Muckle-stane Muir, but still cherished at the age of three-and-twenty some sparks of his original humanity.“There goes Tom with my things to the gate. Yes, it ought to be here now,” said William looking at his watch. “I’ll send you something pretty from Paris if you let me; nothing very splendid you know, only a little reminder such as a poor beggar like me, can offer,” and he laughed, not very merrily. “And I shall hear all the news from Aunt Dinah, and send her all mine; and I like flowers. I always remember the Gilroyd flowers along with you. You were always among them, you know, and will you give me that little violet—a namesake? No one ever refuses a flower, it is the keepsake everyone gets for the asking.”“Here it is,” said Violet, with a little laugh, but looking not mockingly, but a little downward and oddly, and William placed it very carefully in a recess of his complicated purse, that was a cardcase also, and I know notwhat else beside. He was on the point of saying something very romantic and foolish, but suddenly recollected himself, and pulled up at the verge just before he went over.“This is a souvenir of very old days, you know,” said William, remembering Trevor, and how humiliating because vain any love-making of his own must prove, “of a very early friend—one of your earliest. Wasn’t I?”“Yes, so you were, a very good-natured friend, and very useful. Sometimes a little bit prosy, you know, always giving me excellent advice; and I think I always,oftenat least, listened to your lectures with respect. But why is it, willyoutell me who know everything, that gentlemen always ask for a rose or a violet, or a flower of some sort, as a keepsake? Nothing so perishable. Would not a thimble or even a slipper be better? I suppose you have us all in what you used to call ahortus siccus, brown roses, and yellow violets, and venerable polyanthuses, thoroughly dried up and stiff as chips, and now and then with a sort of triumph review your prisoners, and please yourselves with these awful images of old maidhood. How can we tell what witchcrafts go on over our withering types and emblems. Give me back my violet and you shall have a hair-pin instead.”“Many thanks; I’ll keep my violet, however. It may grow dry and brown to other eyes, to mine it will never change. Just because it is an enchanted violet, and there is a spell upon my eyes as often as I look on it, and the glow and fragrance will never pass away.”“Very good song, and very well sung! onlyIsuspect that’s the usual speech, and you asked for the violet for an opportunity of making it.”At this moment Aunt Dinah entered the room accompanied by old Winnie Dobbs, supporting a small hampertray fashion. William recognised the old commissariat of Gilroyd in this nutritious incumbrance, against which he had often and vainly protested, as he now did more faintly by a smile and lifting his hands.“Now there’s really very little in this; just a fowl cut up, half a ham, one of the Saxton plumcakes, and a pint bottle with a little sherry. You’ll find bread by itself, and some salt in white paper, and a few Ripston pippins, and it is really no weight at all; is it, Winnie?”“No, nothing to them porter fellows. What else be they paid for, if it baint to carry loads? what’s a hamper like this here to one of them? and he’ll want something on the way. You’ll be hungry, you will, Master William.”“And whatever’s left will be of use to you when you reach your destination,” said Aunt Dinah, repeating her ancient formula on similar occasions. “Now, William, you promise me you’ll not leave this behind. Surely you can’t be such a fool as to be ashamed to take a little refreshment before the passengers. Well-bred people won’t stare at you, and I know you won’t vex me by refusing the little provision.”So William laughed and promised, and Miss Vi looked as if she could have quizzed him, but at this moment the Saxton vehicle from the Golden Posts pulled up at the iron gate of Gilroyd, and William glanced at his watch, and though he smiled, it was with the pale smile of a man going to execution, and trying to cheer his friends rather than being of good comfort himself.
CHAPTER LIII.
THE FLOWER
THE FLOWER
THE FLOWER
At breakfast the little party had a great deal to talk about, topics of hope, and topics of regret, glanced at in all sorts of spirits, sad and cheerful, black spirits and white, blue spirits and gray; but on the whole one would have said, looking on and a stranger to all that was possibly passing within, that it was a cheerful meal.
“Five miles and a half to the station, and the up train at eleven forty-five.The cab, or whatever it is, will be here at half-past ten, and then good-bye. Farewell, perhaps, for three years to Gilroyd,” so said William, as he and Violet Darkwell stood side by side, looking out from the window, upon the glowing autumnal landscape.
“Three years! you don’t mean to say you’d stay away all that time, without ever coming to see grannie?”
“Of course if she wants me I’ll come; but should she not, and should she at the same time continue, as I hope she will, quite well, and shouldIbe kept close to my work, as I expect, it’s sure to turn out as I say. Three years—yes, itisa long time—room for plenty of changes, and changes enough, great ones, therewillbe, no doubt.”
The uplands of Revington formed the background of the pretty prospect before him, and it needed the remembrance of the promise he had made to Aunt Dinah toprevent his speaking with less disguise, for he always felt of late an impetuous longing almost fierce to break through conventional hypocrisies, and lay bare his wounded heart, and upbraid, and implore, in the wildest passion before Violet Darkwell. To be alone with her, and yet say nothing of all that was swelling and rolling at his heart—was pain. And yet to be alone with her, even in this longing and vain anguish, and near her, was a strange despairing delight.
“Oh, yes, everyone changes, every day almost, except dear grannie and old Winnie Dobbs. I’m sureIchange, and so do you, and what won’t three years do? You’ve changed very much, and not for the better,” and saying this Miss Violet laughed.
“My changes, be they what they may, don’t seem to trouble you much,” replied William.
“Trouble?—not at all. I dare say they are improvements, though I don’t like them,” laughed she.
“I don’t think I’m abitchanged. IknowI’m not, in fact. Tell me any one thing in which I’m changed.”
“Well, it isgenerally; you have grown so disagreeable, that’s all—it is not much to me, but I dare say it will be to other people,” said she.
“I’m disagreeable—yes, of course—because I have my opinion about men and things, and fools and nonsense. I don’t know anything I’ve said to you, at least since I came yesterday, that could annoy you. I have not mentioned a single subject that could possibly even interest you. I dare say it is tiresome my talking so much as Aunt Dinah makes me, about myself. But I couldn’t help it.”
“It won’t do, William; you know very well how cross you always are now, at least with me, not that I mind it much, but there’s no denying.”
“You accused me of that before, and I said I was sorry. I—perhaps I am. I’m going away, and everything breaking up, you know, and you must make allowances. I used not to be cross long ago, and I’mnotchanged. No—I’m the same—I never said an unkind word to you, Vi, all the time when you were a little thing, and if ever I speak differently now, it is not from unkindness, only that things have gone wrong with me, and I’ve seen something of the world; and things happen to sour one, and—I don’t know—but I’mnotchanged. You mustn’t think it now that I’m going away. I’m such a fool, I’m such a beast, I can’t help talking bitterly sometimes, and sometimes I think I am a—afiendalmost, but I hope I am not as bad as I seem.”
So spoke this Penruddock, who fancied himself soured for life, and soliloquised at times in the vein of Elshender of Muckle-stane Muir, but still cherished at the age of three-and-twenty some sparks of his original humanity.
“There goes Tom with my things to the gate. Yes, it ought to be here now,” said William looking at his watch. “I’ll send you something pretty from Paris if you let me; nothing very splendid you know, only a little reminder such as a poor beggar like me, can offer,” and he laughed, not very merrily. “And I shall hear all the news from Aunt Dinah, and send her all mine; and I like flowers. I always remember the Gilroyd flowers along with you. You were always among them, you know, and will you give me that little violet—a namesake? No one ever refuses a flower, it is the keepsake everyone gets for the asking.”
“Here it is,” said Violet, with a little laugh, but looking not mockingly, but a little downward and oddly, and William placed it very carefully in a recess of his complicated purse, that was a cardcase also, and I know notwhat else beside. He was on the point of saying something very romantic and foolish, but suddenly recollected himself, and pulled up at the verge just before he went over.
“This is a souvenir of very old days, you know,” said William, remembering Trevor, and how humiliating because vain any love-making of his own must prove, “of a very early friend—one of your earliest. Wasn’t I?”
“Yes, so you were, a very good-natured friend, and very useful. Sometimes a little bit prosy, you know, always giving me excellent advice; and I think I always,oftenat least, listened to your lectures with respect. But why is it, willyoutell me who know everything, that gentlemen always ask for a rose or a violet, or a flower of some sort, as a keepsake? Nothing so perishable. Would not a thimble or even a slipper be better? I suppose you have us all in what you used to call ahortus siccus, brown roses, and yellow violets, and venerable polyanthuses, thoroughly dried up and stiff as chips, and now and then with a sort of triumph review your prisoners, and please yourselves with these awful images of old maidhood. How can we tell what witchcrafts go on over our withering types and emblems. Give me back my violet and you shall have a hair-pin instead.”
“Many thanks; I’ll keep my violet, however. It may grow dry and brown to other eyes, to mine it will never change. Just because it is an enchanted violet, and there is a spell upon my eyes as often as I look on it, and the glow and fragrance will never pass away.”
“Very good song, and very well sung! onlyIsuspect that’s the usual speech, and you asked for the violet for an opportunity of making it.”
At this moment Aunt Dinah entered the room accompanied by old Winnie Dobbs, supporting a small hampertray fashion. William recognised the old commissariat of Gilroyd in this nutritious incumbrance, against which he had often and vainly protested, as he now did more faintly by a smile and lifting his hands.
“Now there’s really very little in this; just a fowl cut up, half a ham, one of the Saxton plumcakes, and a pint bottle with a little sherry. You’ll find bread by itself, and some salt in white paper, and a few Ripston pippins, and it is really no weight at all; is it, Winnie?”
“No, nothing to them porter fellows. What else be they paid for, if it baint to carry loads? what’s a hamper like this here to one of them? and he’ll want something on the way. You’ll be hungry, you will, Master William.”
“And whatever’s left will be of use to you when you reach your destination,” said Aunt Dinah, repeating her ancient formula on similar occasions. “Now, William, you promise me you’ll not leave this behind. Surely you can’t be such a fool as to be ashamed to take a little refreshment before the passengers. Well-bred people won’t stare at you, and I know you won’t vex me by refusing the little provision.”
So William laughed and promised, and Miss Vi looked as if she could have quizzed him, but at this moment the Saxton vehicle from the Golden Posts pulled up at the iron gate of Gilroyd, and William glanced at his watch, and though he smiled, it was with the pale smile of a man going to execution, and trying to cheer his friends rather than being of good comfort himself.