W
ITHIN there was a gravel path, and glimpses between trees of wide pleasure-grounds. Amaryllis hesitated, and looked back; Iden drew her forward, not noticing her evident disinclination to proceed. If he had, he would have put it down to awe, instead of which it was dislike.
For she guessed they were entering the lawns in front of the Hon. Raleigh Pamment's mansion. He was the largest owner of town and country; the streets, the market-place, the open spaces, in which the fair was being held, belonged to him; so did most of the farms and hamlets out of which the people had come. The Pamments were Tories; very important Tories indeed.
The Idens, in their little way, were Tories, too, right to the centre of the cerebellum; the Flammas were hot Republicans. Now Amaryllis, being a girl, naturally loved her father most, yet she was a wilful and rebellious revolutionist. Amaryllis, who would not be a Flamma, had imbibed all the Flamma hatred of authority from her mother.
To her the Pamments were the incarnation of everything detestable, of oppression, obstruction, and mediæval darkness. She knew nothing of politics; at sixteen you do not need to know to feel vehemently, you feel vehemently without knowing. Still, she had heard a good deal about the Pamments.
She resented being brought there to admire the pleasure grounds and mansion, and to kow-tow to the grandeur of these mediæval tyrants.
Old Iden led her on till they came to the smooth lawn before the front windows; three centuries of mowing had made it as smooth as the top of his own head, where the years had mown away merrily.
There was not so much as a shrub—not a daisy—between them and the great windows of the house. They stood in full view.
Amaryllis could scarcely endure herself, so keen was her vexation; her cheeks reddened. She was obliged to face the house, but her glance was downwards; she would not look at it.
Grandfather Iden was in the height of his glory. In all Woolhorton town there was not another man who could do as he was doing at that moment.
The Pamments were very exclusive people, exceptionally exclusive even for high class Tories. Their gardens, and lawns, and grounds were jealously surrounded with walls higher than the old-fashioned houses of the street beneath them. No one dared to so much as peer through a crevice of the mighty gates. Their persons were encircled with the"divinity" that hedges the omnipotent landed proprietor. No one dared speak to a Pamment. They acknowledged no one in the town, not even the solicitors, not even the clergyman of the Abbey church; that was on account of ritual differences.
It was, indeed, whispered—high treason must always be whispered—that young Pamment, the son and heir, was by no means so exclusive, and had been known to be effusive towards ladies of low birth—and manners.
The great leaders of Greece—Alcibiades, Aristides, and so on—threw open their orchards to the people. Everyone walked in and did as he chose. These great leaders of England—the Pamments—shut up their lawns and pleasure-grounds, sealed them hermetically, you could hardly throw a stone over the walls if you tried.
But Grandfather Iden walked through those walls as if there were none; he alone of all Woolhorton town and country.
In that gossipy little town, of course, there were endless surmises as to the why and wherefore of that private key. Shrewd people said—"Ah! you may depend they be getting summat out of him. Lent 'em some of his guineas, a' reckon. They be getting summat out of him. Hoss-leeches, they gentlefolks."
Grandfather Iden alone entered when he listed: he wandered about the lawns, he looked in at the conservatories, he took a bunch of grapes if it pleased him, or a bouquet of flowers; he actuallystepped indoors occasionally and sat down on the carved old chairs, or pottered about the picture gallery. He had a private key to the nail-studded door in the wall by the Abbey church, and he looked upon that key very much as if it had been the key of Paradise.
When Grandfather Iden stood on the lawn at Pamment House he was the proudest and happiest man in what they sarcastically call "God's creation."
He was a peer at such moments; a grandee—the grandee who can wear his hat or sit down (which is it? it is most important to be accurate) in the presence of his deity, I mean his sovereign; he could actually step on the same sward pressed by the holy toes of the Pamments.
In justice to him it must be said that he was most careful not to obtrude himself into the sight of their sacred majesties. If they were at home he rarely went in, if he did he crept round unfrequented paths, the byeways of the gardens, and hid himself under the fig trees, as it were. But if by chance a Pamment did light upon him, it was noteworthy that he was literally dandled and fondled like an infant, begged to come in, and take wine, and so so, and so so.
In justice to old Iden let it be known that he was most careful not to obtrude himself; he hid himself under the fig trees.
Hardly credible is it? that a man of ninety years—a man of no common intelligence—a man ofbooks, and coins, and antiquities, should, in this nineteenth century, bend his aged knees in such a worship. Incredible as it may seem it is certainly true.
Such loyalty in others of old time, remember, seems very beautiful when we read of the devotion that was shown towards Charles Stuart.
With all his heart and soul he worshipped the very ground the Pamments trod on. He loved to see them in the Abbey church; when they were at home he never failed to attend service, rain, snow, thunder, ninety years notwithstanding, he always attended that he might bow his venerable head to them as they swept up the aisle, receiving the faintest, yet most gracious, smile of recognition in return.
He was quite happy in his pew if he could see them at their carved desks in the chancel; the organ sounded very beautiful then; the light came sweetly through the painted windows; a sanctity and heavenly presence was diffused around.
Rebellious Amaryllis knew all this, and hated it. Her Flamma foot tapped the sacred sward.
Grandfather Iden, after mopping his mouth with his silk handkerchief, began to point with his cudgel—a big hockey stick—at the various parts of the building. This was Elizabethan, that dated from James II., that went back to Henry VII., there were walls and foundations far more ancient still, out of sight.
Really, it was a very interesting place archæologically,if only you could have got rid of the Pamments.
Amaryllis made no remark during this mumbling history. Iden thought she was listening intently. At the conclusion he was just moving her—for she was passive now, like a piece of furniture—when he spied some one at a window.
Off came the great white hat, and down it swept till the top brushed the grass in the depth of his homage. It was a bow that would have delighted a lady, so evidently real in its intent, so full of the gentleman, so thoroughly courtier-like, and yet honest. There was nothing to smile at in that bow; there was not a young gentleman in Belgravia who could bow in that way, for, in truth, we have forgotten how to bow in this generation.
A writing and talking is always going on about the high place woman occupies in modern society, but the fact is, we have lost our reverence for woman as woman; it is after-dinner speech, nothing more, mere sham. We don't venerate woman, and therefore we don't bow.
Grandfather Iden's bow would have won any woman's heart had it been addressed to her, for there was veneration and courtesy, breeding, and desire to please in it.
T
HE man he had seen at the window was young Raleigh Pamment, the son and heir.
He had been sitting in an easy chair, one leg over the arm, busy with a memorandum book, a stump of pencil, and a disordered heap of telegrams, letters, and newspapers.
Everybody writes to Mr. Gladstone, a sort of human lion's mouth for post-cards, but Raleigh junior had not got to manage the House of Commons, the revenue, the nation, the Turks, South Africa, the Nile, Ganges, Indus, Afghanistan, sugar, shipping, and Homer.
Yet Raleigh junior had an occasional table beside him, from which the letters, telegrams, newspapers, and scraps of paper had overflowed on to the floor. In a company's offices it would have taken sixteen clerks to answer that correspondence; this idle young aristocrat answered it himself, entered it in his day book, "totted" it up, and balanced the—the residue.
Nothing at all businesslike, either, about him—nothingin the least like those gentlemen who consider that to go in to the "office" every morning is the sum total of life. A most unbusinesslike young fellow.
A clay pipe in his mouth, a jar of tobacco on another chair beside him, a glass of whiskey for a paper-weight on his telegrams. An idle, lounging, "bad lot;" late hours, tobacco, whiskey, and ballet-dancers writ very large indeed on his broad face. In short, a young "gent" of the latter half of the nineteenth century.
Not the slightest sign of "blue blood" anywhere; not even in the cut of his coat, no Brummel-like elegance; hardly a Bond Street coat at all—rough, large, coarse cloth. If he had stood at the door of a shop he would have done very well indeed for a shopkeeper, the sort that drives about in a cart for orders.
Of his character nothing could be learned from his features. His face was broad, rather flat, with a short but prominent nose; in spite of indulgence, he kept a good, healthy, country colour. His neck was thick, his figure stout, his hands big—a jovial, good-tempered looking man.
His neck wasverythick, tree-like; a drover's neck, no refinement or special intelligence indicated there; great power to eat, drink, and sleep—belly energy.
But let no one, therefore, suppose that the members of the upper ten thousand are any thicker in the neck, or more abdominal in their proclivities,or beneath the culture of the day. Take five hundred "blue bloods," and you will find among them a certain proportion of thick-necked people; take five hundred very common commoners, and you may count exactly the same number interspersed.
The Pamments were simply Englishmen, and liable to be born big, with broad faces, thick necks, and ultimate livers. It was no disgrace to Raleigh, that jolly neck of his.
Unless you are given to æsthetic crockery, or Francesco de Rimini, I think you would rather have liked him; a sort of fellow who would lend you his dogs, or his gun, or his horse, or his ballet-dancer, or his credit—humph!—at a moment's notice. But he was a very "bad lot;" they whispered it even in dutiful Woolhorton.
He got rid of money in a most surprising way, and naturally had nothing to show for it. The wonderful manner in which coin will disappear in London, like water into deep sand, surpasses the mysteries of the skies. It slips, it slides, it glides, it sinks, it flies, it runs out of the pocket. The nimble squirrel is nothing to the way in which a sovereign will leap forth in town.
Raleigh had a good allowance, often supplemented by soft aunts, yet he frequently walked for lack of a cab fare.Ican't blame him; I should be just as bad, if fortune favoured me. How delicious now to walk down Regent Street, along Piccadilly, up Bond Street, and so on, in a widening circle, with a thousand pounds in one's pocket, just to spend,all your own, and no need to worry when it was gone. To look in at all the shops and pick up something here and something yonder, to say, "I'll have that picture I admired ten years ago; I'll have a bit of real old oak furniture; I'll go to Paris—" but Paris is not a patch on London. To take a lady—thelady—to St. Peter Robinson's, and spread the silks of the earth before her feet, and see the awakening delight in her eyes and the glow on her cheek; to buy a pony for the "kids" and a diamond brooch for the kind, middle-aged matron who befriended you years since in time of financial need; to get a new gun, and inquire about the price of a deer-stalk in Scotland; whetting the road now and then with a sip of Moet—but only one sip, for your liver's sake—just to brighten up the imagination. And so onwards in a widening circle, as sun-lit fancy led: could Xerxes, could great Pompey, could Cæsar with all his legions, could Lucullus with all his oysters, ever have enjoyed such pleasure as this—just to spend money freely, with a jolly chuckle, in the streets of London? What is Mahomet's Paradise tothat?
The exquisite delight of utterly abandoned extravagance, no counting—anathemas on counting and calculation! If life be not a dream, what is the use of living?
Say what you will, the truth is, we all struggle on in hope of living in a dream some day. This is my dream. Dreadfully, horribly wicked, is it not, in an age that preaches thrift and—twaddle?No joy like waste in London streets; happy waste, imaginative extravagance; to and fro like a butterfly!
Besides, there's no entertainment in the world like the streets of London on a sunny day or a gas-lit night. The shops, the carriages, the people, the odds and ends of life one sees, the drifting to and fro of folk, the "bits" of existence, glimpses into shadowy corners, the dresses, the women; dear me, where shall we get to? At all events, the fact remains that to anyone with an eye the best entertainment in the world is a lounge in London streets. Theatres, concerts, séances, Albert Halls, museums, galleries, are but set and formal shows; a great weariness, for the most part, and who the deuce would care to go and gaze at them again who could lounge in Piccadilly?
It is well worth a ten-pound note any day in May; fifty pounds sometimes at 1 p.m., merely to look on, I mean, it is worth it; but you can see this living show for nothing. Let the grandees go to the opera; for me, the streets.
So I can't throw dirt at Raleigh, who often had a hatful of money, and could and did just what seemed pleasant in his sight. But the money went like water, and in order to get further supplies, the idle, good-for-nothing, lazy dog worked like a prime minister with telegrams, letters, newspapers, and so on, worked like a prime minister—at betting. Horse-racing, in short, was the explanation of the memorandum-book, the load of correspondence, andthe telegrams, kept flat with a glass of whiskey as a paper-weight.
While he wrote, and thought, and reckoned up his chances, a loud refrain of snoring arose from the sofa. It was almost as loud as the boom of the fair, but Raleigh had no nerves. His friend Freddie, becoming oppressed with so much labour, had dropped asleep, leaving his whiskey beside him on the sofa, so that the first time he moved over it went on the carpet. With one long leg stretched out, the other knee up, lying on his back, and his mouth wide open to the ceiling, Freddie was very happy.
Raleigh puffed his clay pipe, sipped, and puffed again. Freddie boomed away on the sofa. The family was in London; Raleigh and Freddie got down here in this way: it happened one night there was a row at a superb bar, Haymarket trail. The "chuckers-out" began their coarse horse-play, and in the general melée Raleigh distinguished himself. Rolled about by the crowd, he chanced to find himself for a moment in a favourable position, and punished one of these gigantic brutes pretty severely.
Though stout and short of breath, Raleigh was strong in the arm, he was "up," and he hit hard. The fellow's face was a "picture," coloured in cardinal. Such an opportunity does not occur twice in a lifetime; Raleigh's genius seized the opportunity, and he became great. Actium was a trifle to it.
There were mighty men before Agamemnon, and there are mighty men who do not figure in the papers.
Raleigh became at once an anaxandron—a King of Men. The history of his feat spread in ten minutes from one end of midnight London to the other: from the policeman in Waterloo Place to—everywhere. Never was such a stir; the fall of Sebastopol—dear me! I can remember it, look at the flight of time—was nothing to it. They would have chaired him,fêtedhim, got a band to play him about the place, literally crowned him with laurel. Ave, Cæsar! Evœ! Bacchus! But they could not find him.
Raleigh was off with Freddie, who had been in at the death, and was well "blooded." Hansom to Paddington in the small hours; creep, creep, creep, through the raw morning mist, puff, whistle, broad gauge, and they had vanished.
Raleigh was a man of his age; he lost not a moment; having got the glory, the next thing was to elude the responsibility; and, in short, he slipped out of sight till the hue-and-cry was over, and the excitement of the campaign had subsided.
In case anyone should suppose I approve of midnight battle, I may as well label the account at once: "This is a goak."
I donotapprove of brawls at the bar, but I have set myself the task to describe a bit of human life exactly as it really is, and I can assure you as a honest fact that Raleigh by that lucky knock becamea very great man indeed among people as they really are. People as they really are, are not all Greek scholars.
As I don't wish you to look down upon poor Raleigh too much because he smoked a cutty, and hit a fellow twice as big as himself, and lent his money, and made bets, and drank whiskey, and was altogether wicked, I may as well tell you something in his favour: He was a hero to his valet.
"No man is a hero to his valet," says the proverb, not even Napoleon, Disraeli, or Solomon.
But Raleighwasa hero to his valet.
He was not only a hero to Nobbs the valet; he had perfectly fascinated him. The instant he was off duty Nobbs began to be a Raleigh to himself. He put on a coat cut in the Raleigh careless style; in fact, he dressed himself Raleigh all over. His private hat was exactly like Raleigh's; so was his necktie, the same colour, shape, and bought at the same shop; so were his boots. He kept a sovereign loose in his waistcoat pocket, because that was where Raleigh carried his handy gold. He smoked a cutty-pipe, and drank endless whiskies—just like Raleigh, "the very ticket"—he had his betting-book, and his telegrams, and his money on "hosses," and his sporting paper, and his fine photographs of fine women. He swore in Raleigh's very words, and used to spit like him; Raleigh, if ever he chanced to expectorate, had an odd way of twisting up the corner of his mouth, so did Nobbs. In town Nobbs went to the very same bars (always,of course, discreetly and out of sight), the very same theatres; a most perfect Raleigh to the tiniest detail. Why, Raleigh very rarely wound up his watch—careless Raleigh; accordingly, Nobbs' watch was seldom going. "And you just look here," said Nobbs to a great and confidential friend, after they had done endless whiskies, and smoked handfuls of Raleigh's tobacco, "you look here, if I washe, and had lots of chink, and soft old parties to get money out of as easy as filling yer pipe, by Jove! wouldn'tIcut a swell! I'd do it,Iwould. I'd make that Whitechapel of his spin along, I rather guess I would. I'd liquor up. Wouldn't I put a thou on the Middle Park Plate? Ah! wouldn't I, Tommy, my boy! Just wouldn't I have heaps of wimmen; some in the trap, and some indoors, and some to go to the theatre with—respectable gals, I mean—crowds of 'em would come if Raleigh was to hold up his finger. Guess I'd fill this old shop (the Pamment mansion) choke full of wimmen! If I was only he! Shouldn't I like to fetch one of them waiter chaps a swop on the nose, likehedid! Oh, my! Oh, Tommy!" And Nobbs very nearly wept at the happy vision of being "he."
Why, Raleigh was not only a Hero, he was a Demi-god to his valet! Not only Nobbs, but the footmen, and the grooms, and the whole race of servants everywhere who had caught a glimpse of Raleigh looked upon him as the Ideal Man. So did the whole race of "cads" in the bars and atthe races, and all over town and country, all of that sort who knew anything of Raleigh sighed to be like "he."
The fellow who said that "No man is a hero to his valet" seemed to suppose that the world worships good and divine qualities only. Nothing of the sort; it is not the heroic, it is the low and coarse and blackguard part the mass of people regard with such deep admiration.
If only Nobbs could have been "he," no doubt whatever he would have "done it" very big indeed. But he would have left out of his copy that part of Raleigh's nature which, in spite of the whiskey and the cutty, and the rest of it, made him still a perfect gentleman at heart. Nobbs didn't want to be a perfect gentleman.
G
LANCING up from his betting-book, Raleigh caught sight of someone on the lawn, and went to the window to see who it was.
It was then that Grandfather Iden raised his great grey hat, and brought it with so lowly a sweep down to the very ground before this demi-god of his.
"Hullo! Fred, I say! Come, quick!" dragging him off the sofa. "Here's the Behemoth."
"The Behemoth—the Deluge!" said Fred, incoherently, still half asleep.
"Before that," said Raleigh. "I told you I'd show him to you some day. That's the Behemoth."
Some grand folk keep a hump-backed cow, or white wild cattle, or strange creatures of that sort, in their parks as curiosities. The particular preserve of the Pamments was Grandfather Iden—antediluvian Iden—in short, the Behemoth.
It is not everybody who has got a Behemoth on show.
"There's a girl with him," said Fred.
"Have her in," said Raleigh. "Wake us up," ringing the bell. And he ordered the butler to fetch old Iden in.
How thoroughly in character with Human Life it was that a man like Grandfather Iden—aged, experienced, clever, learned, a man of wise old books, should lower his ancient head, and do homage to Raleigh Pamment!
"Wherefore come ye not to court?Skelton swears 'tis glorious sport.Chattering fools and wise men listening."
Accordingly the butler went out bare-headed—his head was as bare as Mont Blanc—and, with many a gracious smile, conveyed his master's wishes. The Behemoth, mopping and mowing, wiping his slobbery old mouth in the excess of his glorification, takes Amaryllis by the arm, and proceeds to draw her towards the mansion.
"But, grandpa—grandpa—really I'd rather not go. Please, don't make me go. No—no—I can't," she cried, in a terror of disgust. She would not willingly have set foot on the Pamment threshold, no, not for a crown of gold, as the old song says unctuously.
"Don't be afraid," said Iden. "Nothing to be afraid of"—mistaking her hesitation for awe.
"Afraid!" repeated Amaryllis, in utter bewilderment. "Afraid! I don't want to go."
"There's nothing to be afraid of, I'm sure," saidthe butler in his most insidious tones. "Mr. Pamment so very particularly wished to see you."
"Come—come," said old Iden, "don't be silly," as she still hung back. "It's a splendid place inside—there, lean on me, don't be afraid," and so the grandfather pulling her one side, and the butler very, very gently pressing her forward the other, they persuaded, or rather they moved Amaryllis onward.
She glanced back, her heart beat quick, she had half a mind to break loose—easy enough to over-turn the two old fogies—but—how soon "but" comes, "but" came to Amaryllis at sixteen. She remembered her father. She remembered her mother's worn-out boots. By yielding yet a little further she could perhaps contrive to keep her grandfather in good humour and open the way to a reconciliation.
So the revolutionary Amaryllis, the red-hot republican blood seething like molten metal in her veins, stepped across the hated threshold of the ancient and mediæval Pamments.
But we have all heard about taking the horse to water and finding that he would not drink. If you cannot even make a horse, do you think you are likely tomakea woman do anything?
Amaryllis walked beside her grandfather quietly enough now, but she would not see or hear; he pointed out to her the old armour, the marble, the old oak; he mumbled on of the staircase where John Pamment, temp. Hen. VII., was seized forhigh treason; she kept her glance steadfastly on the ground.
Iden construed it to be veneration, and was yet more highly pleased.
Raleigh had taste enough to receive them in another room, not the whiskey-room; he met old Iden literally with open arms, taking both the old gentleman's hands in his he shook them till Iden tottered, and tears came into his eyes.
Amaryllis scarcely touched his fingers, and would not raise her glance.
"Raw," thought Freddie, who being tall looked over Raleigh's shoulder. "Very raw piece."
To some young gentlemen a girl is a "piece."
"My granddaughter," said Iden, getting his voice.
"Ah, yes; like to see the galleries—fond of pictures——"
Amaryllis was silent.
"Answer," said Grandfather Iden graciously, as much as to say, "you may."
"No," said Amaryllis.
"Hum—let's see—books—library—carvings. Come, Mr. Iden, you know the place better than I do, you're an antiquarian and a scholar—I've forgotten my Greek. What would you like to show her?"
"Sheisfond of pictures," said Iden, greatly flattered that he should be thought to know the house better than the heir. "She is fond of pictures; she's shy."
Amaryllis' face became a dark red. The rushing blood seemed to stifle her. She could have cried out aloud; her pride only checked her utterance.
Raleigh, not noticing the deep colour in her face, led on upstairs, down the corridors, and into the first saloon. There he paused and old Iden took the lead, going straight to a fine specimen of an old Master.
Holding his great grey hat (which he would not give up to the butler) at arm's-length and pointing, the old man began to show Amaryllis the beauties of the picture.
"A grand thing—look," said he.
"I can't see," said Amaryllis, forced to reply.
"Not see!" said Iden, in a doubtful tone.
"Not a good light, perhaps," said Raleigh. "Come this side."
She did not move.
"Go that side," said Iden.
No movement.
"Go that side," he repeated, sharply.
At last she moved over by Raleigh and stood there, gazing down still.
"Look up," said Iden. She looked up hastily—above the canvas, and then again at the floor.
Iden's dim old eyes rested a moment on the pair as they stood together; Amaryllis gazing downwards, Raleigh gazing at her. Thoughts of a possible alliance, perhaps, passed through Iden's mind; only consider, intermarriage between the Pamments and the Idens! Much more improbablethings have happened; even without the marriage license the connection would be an immense honour.
Grandfather Iden, aged ninety years, would most certainly have sacrificed the girl of sixteen, his own flesh and blood, joyously and intentionally to his worship of the aristocrat.
If she could not have been the wife he would have forced her to be the mistress.
There is no one so cruel—so utterly inhuman—as an old man, to whom feeling, heart, hope have long been dead words.
"Now you can see," he said, softly and kindly. "Is it not noble?"
"It looks smoky," said Amaryllis, lifting her large, dark eyes at last and looking her grandfather in the face.
"Smoky!" he ejaculated, dropping his great white hat, his sunken cheeks flushing. It was not so much the remark as the tone of contemptuous rebellion.
"Smoky," he repeated.
"Smoky and—dingy," said Amaryllis. She had felt without actually seeing that Raleigh's gaze had been fixed upon her the whole time since they had entered, that emphatic look which so pleases or so offends a woman.
Now there was nothing in Raleigh's manner to give offence—on the contrary he had been singularly pleasant, respectfully pleasant—but she remembered the fellow staring at her from the window at the "Lamb" and it biased her against him. Shewished to treat him, and his pictures, and his place altogether with marked contempt.
"I do not care for these pictures," she said. "I will leave now, if you please," and she moved towards the door.
"Stop!" cried Iden, stretching out his hands and tottering after her. "Stop! I order you to stop! you rude girl!"
He could not catch her, she had left the gallery—he slipped in his haste on the polished floor. Fred caught him by the arm or he would have fallen, and at the same time presented him with his great white hat.
"Ungrateful!" he shrieked, and then choked and slobbered and mumbled, and I verily believe had it not been for his veneration of the place he would have spat upon the floor.
Raleigh had rushed after Amaryllis, and overtook her at the staircase.
"Pardon me, Miss Iden," he said, as she hastily descended. "Really I should have liked you to have seen the house—will you sit down a moment? Forgive me if I said or did——. No, do stay—please—" as she made straight for the hall. "I am so sorry—really sorry—unintentional"—in fact he had done nothing, and yet he was penitent. But she would not listen, she hurried on along the path, she began to run, or nearly, as he kept up with her, still begging her to pause; Amaryllis ran at last outright. "At least let me see you through the fair—rough people. Let me open the door——"
The iron-studded door in the wall shut with a spring lock, and for a moment she could not unfasten it; she tore at it and grazed her hand, the blood started.
"Good Heavens!" cried Raleigh, now thoroughly upset. "Let me bind it up," taking out his handkerchief. "I would not have had this happen for money"—short for any amount of money. "Let me——"
"Do please leave me," cried Amaryllis, panting, not with the run, which was nothing to her, but pent-up indignation, and still trying to open the lock.
Raleigh pressed the lock and the door swung open—he could easily have detained her there, but he did not. "One moment, pray—Miss Iden." She was gone down the passage between the Abbey church and the wall; he followed, she darted out into the crowd of the fair.
W
HEN he stopped and turned, angry beyond measure, vexation biting deep lines like aquafortis on his broad, good-natured face.
"That I should have been such a fool—an infernal blockheaded fool—" shutting the iron-studded door with a kick and a clang—"muddle-headed fool—I'll never touch a drop of whiskey again—and that jackass, Fred—why, she's—" a lady, he would have said, but did not dare admit to himself now that he had thought to ask her in to "wake us up." "But what did I do? Can't think what annoyed her. Must have been something between her and that tedious old Iden. Quite sure I didn't do or say——" but still he could not quiet his conscience, for if he had not by deed or word, he knew he had in thought.
He had sent for her as he might have done for any of the vulgar wenches in the fair to amuse an idle hour, and he was ashamed of himself.
In truth, Raleigh had never seen a woman likeAmaryllis Iden. Her features were not beautiful, as general ideas go, nor had her form the grace of full increase; indeed words, and even a portrait by a master-hand, would have failed to carry the impression her nature had made upon him.
It is not the particular cast of features that makes a man great, and gives him a pre-eminence among his fellows. It is the character—the mind.
A great genius commands attention at once by his presence, and so a woman may equally impress by the power of her nature. Her moral strength asserts itself in subtle ways.
I don't say for certain that it was her character that impressed Raleigh—it might have been nothing of the sort, it might have beenbecause it was so, a woman's reason, and therefore appropriate. These things do not happen by "why and because."
Some may say it is quite out of place to suppose a whiskey-sipping, cutty-pipe smoking, horse-racing, bar-frequenting fellow like Raleigh could by any possible means fall in love at first sight. But whiskey, cutty, horse, and bar were not the real man, any more than your hat is your head, they were mere outside chaff, he had a sound heart all the same, a great deal sounder and better, and infinitely more generous than some very respectable folk who are regularly seen in their pews, and grind down their clerks and dependents to the edge of starvation.
Raleigh was capable of a good deal of heart, such as the pew-haunting Pharisee knows not of. Perhapshe was not in love: at all events he was highly excited.
Fred had contrived to keep old Iden from following Amaryllis by representing that Raleigh would be sure to bring her back. The butler, who was very well acquainted with old Iden, hastily whipped out a bottle of champagne and handed him a brimming glass. The old gentleman, still mouthing and bubbling over with rage, spluttered and drank, and spluttered again, and refusing a second, would go, and so met Raleigh in the hall.
Raleigh tried on his part to soothe the old man, and on his part the old man tried at one and the same moment to apologize for his granddaughter and to abuse her for her misconduct. Consequently neither of them heard or understood the other.
But no sooner was Iden gone than Raleigh, remembering the rough crowd in the fair, despatched the butler after him to see him safe home. It was now growing dusky as the evening came on.
Without more ado, this young gentleman then set to and swore at Fred for half an hour straight ahead. Fred at first simply stared and wondered what on earth had turned his brain; next, being equally hot-tempered, he swore in reply; then there followed some sharp recriminations (for each knew too much of the other's goings on not to have plenty of material), and finally they sparred. Two or three cuffs cooled their ardour, having nothing to quarrel about; sulks ensued; Raleigh buried himself in the papers; Fred lit a cigar and walkedout into the fair. Thus there was tribulation in the great house of the Pamments.
Grandfather Iden permitted the butler to steer him through the crowd quietly enough, because it flattered him to be thus taken care of before the world by a Pamment servitor. When they parted at the doorstep he slipped half-a-sovereign in the butler's hand—he could not offer less than gold to a Pamments' man—but once inside, his demeanour changed. He pushed away his housekeeper, went into his especial sitting-room, bolted the door, spread his hands and knees over the fire, and poked the coals, grunted, poked, and stirred till smoke and smuts filled the stuffy little place.
By-and-by there was a banging of drawers—the drawers in the bureau and the bookcases were opened and shut sharply—writing-paper was flung on the table, and he sat down to write a letter with a scratchy quill pen. The letter written was ordered to post immediately, and the poking, and stirring, and grunting recommenced. Thus there was tribulation in the house of the head of the Idens.
Amaryllis meantime had got through the town by keeping between the booths and the houses. Just as she left the last street Ned Marks rode up—he had been on the watch, thinking to talk with her as she walked home, but just as he drew rein to go slow and so speak, a heathen pig from the market rushed between his horse's legs and spoiled the game by throwing him headlong.
She did not see, or at least did not notice, buthastening on, entered the fields. In coming to town that morning she had seen everything; now, returning in her anger and annoyance, she took no heed of anything; she was so absorbed that when a man—one of those she met going to the fair for the evening—turned back and followed her some way, she did not observe him. Finding that she walked steadily on, the fellow soon ceased to pursue.
The gloom had settled when she reached home, and the candles were lit. She gave her father the sovereign, and was leaving the room, hoping to escape questioning, when Mrs. Iden asked who had the prize-guinea.
"I did," said Amaryllis, very quietly and reluctantly.
"Where is it? Why didn't you say so? Let me see," said Mrs. Iden.
"I—I—I lost it," said Amaryllis.
"You lost it! Lost a guinea! A spade-guinea!"
"What!" said Iden in his sternest tones. "Show it immediately."
"I can't; I lost it."
"Lost it!"
And they poured upon her a cross-fire of anger: a careless, wasteful hussy, an idle wretch; what did she do for her living that she could throw away spade-guineas? what would her grandfather say? how did she suppose they were to keep her, and she not earn the value of a bonnet-string? time she was apprenticed to a dressmaker; the quantity she ate, and never could touch any fat—dear me, sofine—bacon was not good enough for her—she could throw away spade-guineas.
Poor Amaryllis stood by the half-open door, her hat in her hand, her bosom heaving, her lips apart and pouting, not with indignation but sheer misery; her head drooped, her form seemed to lose its firmness and sink till she stooped; she could not face them as she would have done others, because you see she loved them, and she had done her best that day till too sorely tried.
The storm raged on; finally Iden growled "Better get out of sight." Then she went to her bedroom, and sat on the bed; presently she lay down, and sobbed silently on the pillow, after which she fell asleep, quite worn out, dark circles under her eyes. In the silence of the house, the tom-tom and blare of brazen instruments blown at the fair two miles away was audible.
S
o there was tribulation in three houses. Next morning she scarcely dared come in to breakfast, and opened the door timidly, expecting heavy looks, and to be snapped up if she spoke. Instead of which, on taking her place, Iden carefully cut for her the most delicate slice of ham he could find, and removed the superfluous fat before putting it on her plate. Mrs. Iden had a special jug of cream ready for her—Amaryllis was fond of cream—and enriched the tea with it generously.
"And what did you see at the fair?" asked Iden in his kindest voice, lifting up his saucer—from which he always drank—by putting his thumb under it instead of over, so that his thick little finger projected. He always sipped his tea in this way.
"You had plenty of fun, didn't you?" said Mrs. Iden, still more kindly.
"I—I don't know; I did not see much of the fair," said Amaryllis, at a loss to understand the change of manner.
Iden smiled at his wife and nodded; Mrs. Iden picked up a letter from the tea-tray and gave it to her daughter:
"Read."
Amaryllis read—it was from Grandfather Iden, furiously upbraiding Iden for neglecting his daughter's education; she had no reverence, no manners—an undutiful, vulgar girl; she had better not show her face in his house again till she had been taught to know her position; her conduct was not fit for the kitchen; she had not the slightest idea how to behave herself in the presence of persons of quality.
She put it down before she had finished the tirade of abuse; she did not look up, her face was scarlet.
Iden laughed.
"Horrid old wretch! Served him right!" said Mrs. Iden. "So glad you vexed him, dear!"
Amaryllis last night a wretch was this morning a heroine. The grandfather's letter had done this.
Iden never complained—never mentioned his father—but of course in his heart he bitterly felt the harsh neglect shown towards him and his wife and their child. He was a man who said the less the more he was moved; he gossiped freely with the men at the stile, or even with a hamlet old woman. Not a word ever dropped from him of his own difficulties—he kept his mind to himself. His wife knew nothing of his intentions—he was over-secretive, especially about money matters,in which he affected the most profound mystery, as if everyone in Coombe was not perfectly aware they could hardly get a pound of sugar on credit.
All the more bitterly he resented the manner in which Grandfather Iden treated him, giving away half-crowns, crown-pieces, shillings, and fourpenny bits to anyone who would flatter his peculiarities, leaving his own descendants to struggle daily with debt and insult.
Iden was in reality a very proud man, and the insults of his petty creditors fretted him.
He would have been glad if Amaryllis had become her grandfather's favourite; as the grandfather had thrown savage words at the girl, so much the more was added to the score against the grandfather.
Mrs. Iden hated the grandfather with every drop of Flamma blood in her veins—hated him above all for his pseudo-Flamma relationship, for old Iden had in his youth been connected with the Flammas in business—hated him for his veneration of the aristocratic and mediæval Pamments.
She was always impressing upon Amaryllis the necessity of cultivating her grandfather's goodwill, and always abusing him—contradicting herself in the most natural manner.
This letter had given them such delight, because it showed how deeply Amaryllis had annoyed the old gentleman. Had he been whipped he could hardly have yelled more; he screamed through his scratchy quill. Suppose they did lose his money, he had hadonegood upset, that was something.
They were eager to hear all about it. Amaryllis was at first very shy to tell, knowing that her father was a thick Tory and an upholder of the Pamments, and fearing his displeasure. But for various reasons both father and mother grew warmer in delight at every fresh incident of her story.
Mrs. Flamma Iden—revolutionary Flamma—detested the Pamments enthusiastically, on principle first, and next, because the grandfather paid them such court.
Iden was indeed an extra thick Tory, quite opaque, and had voted in the Pamment interest these thirty years, yet he had his secret reasons for disliking them personally.
Both Mr. and Mrs. Iden agreed in their scorn of the grandfather's pottering about the grounds and in and out the conservatories, as if that was the highest honour on earth. Yet Mrs. Iden used often to accuse her husband of a desire to do the very same thing: "You're just as stupid," she would say; "you'd think it wonderful to have a private key—you're every bit as silly really, only you haven't got the chance."
However, from a variety of causes they agreed in looking on Amaryllis' disgrace as a high triumph and glory.
So she was petted all the morning by both parties—a rare thing—and in the afternoon Iden gave her the sovereign she had brought home, to buy her some new boots, and to spend the rest as she chose on herself.
Away went Amaryllis to the town, happy and yet not without regret that she had increased the disagreement between her father and grandfather. She met the vans and gipsies slowly leaving the site of the fair, the children running along with bare brown feet. She went under the archæologically interesting gateway, and knocked at the door of Tiras Wise, shoemaker, "established 200 years."
Tiras Wise of the present generation was thin and nervous, weary of the centuries, worn out, and miserable-looking. Amaryllis, strong in the possession of a golden sovereign, attacked him sharply for his perfidious promises; her boots promised at Christmas were not mended yet.
Tiras, twiddling a lady's boot in one hand, and his foot measure in the other, very humbly and deprecatingly excused himself; there had been so much trouble with the workmen, some were so tipsy, and some would not work; they were always demanding higher wages, and just as he had a job in hand going off and leaving it half finished—shoemaker's tricks these. Sometimes, indeed, he could not get a workman, and then there was the competition of the ready-made boot from Northampton; really, it was most trying—it really was.
"Well, and when am I going to have the boots?" said Amaryllis, amused at the poor fellow's distress. "Whenarethey going to be finished?"
"You see, Miss Iden," said the shoemaker's mother, coming to help her son, "the fact is, he's just worried out of his life with his men—and really—"
"You don't seem to get on very well with your shoemaking, Mr. Wise," said the customer, smiling.
"The fact is," said poor Wise, in his most melancholy manner, with a deep sigh, "the fact is, the men don't know their work as they used to, they spoil the leather and cut it wrong, and leave jobs half done, and they're always drinking; the leather isn't so good as it used to be; the fact is," with a still deeper sigh, "we can't make a boot."
At which Amaryllis laughed outright, to think that people should have been in business two hundred years as shoemakers, and yet could not make a boot!
Her experience of life as yet was short, and she saw things in their first aspect; it is not till much later we observe that the longer people do one thing, the worse they do it, till in the end they cannot do it at all.
She presently selected a pair for herself, 9s., and another pair for her mother, 10s.6d., leaving sixpence over; add sixpence discount for ready-money, and she was still rich with a shilling. Carrying the parcel, she went up the street and passed old Iden's door on elate instep, happy that she had not got to cross his threshold that day, happy to think she had the boots for her mother. Looking in at two or three dingy little shops, she fixed at last on one, and bought half-a-dozen of the very finest mild bloaters, of which Mrs. Iden was so fond. This finished the savings, and she turned quickly for home. The bloaters being merely boundround with one thin sheet of newspaper, soon imparted their odour to her hand.
A lady whose hand smells of bloaters is not, I hope, too ideal; I hope you will see now that I am not imaginative, or given to the heroinesque. Amaryllis, I can tell you, was quite absorbed in the bloaters and the boots; a very sweet, true, and loving hand it was, in spite of the bloaters—one to kiss fervently.
They soon had the bloaters on over a clear fire of wood-coals, and while they cooked the mother tried her new boots, naturally not a little pleased with the thoughtful present. The Flamma blood surged with gratitude; she would have given her girl the world at that moment. That she should have remembered her mother showed such a good disposition; there was no one like Amaryllis.
"Pah!" said Iden, just then entering, "pah!" with a gasp; and holding his handkerchief to his nose, he rushed out faster than he came in, for the smell of bloaters was the pestilence to him.
They only laughed all the merrier over their supper.