‘Your scruples are engaging, they are beautiful, they are something to put in a story-book,’ said the lady. ‘You to stand for that! You, who——’
‘It is better not to go too far. I have done a great many reckless things. I am a reckless woman altogether, and have not cared what became of me for many a long day: but I have never done anything like that. Ah yes, I have scruples; every one has, you even, if one knew where to look for them.’
‘It was you,’ said Mrs. Swinford, ‘who made the suggestion at the first.’
‘To save you, Cecile, to save you.’
‘I should have found some other way to get out of it. There was never a difficulty yet but I found a way of getting out of it. I should have done so then, had you not come forward to say it was Emily—Emily, a child, a nobody—whom he loved, and that I was his confidante. I can see it all now. He had no escape. Artémise, I have loved you better than any woman all your life, and you repaid me by taking away from me—handing over to that girl——’
Her eyes were ablaze in her flushed yet withered face. Her whole frame was trembling with angry emotion. Mrs. Brown rose quickly and went to her, taking her hands, holding her fast. ‘It is twenty years ago,’ she said, ‘and it was to save your honour, your position, everything, Cecile—your child, your wealth, everything you had in the world.’
‘I can see the scene now as if it was yesterday—my husband there, blazing like white light. He never looked like that in his life but once. Andhe—confused, afraid—on the other side of me, trembling for me.’
‘And a little for himself, Cecile.’
‘Silence! If you say so, I will strike you. And you, with your smooth tongue—always with your smooth tongue. How many lies it must have told first to be capable of that!’
‘For your sake; you know it was for your sake. If you remember all that, remember, too, how the storm died down in a moment, and all was well.’
‘Well!’ said the other. She leant back her head upon the breast of the woman whom she was accusing. ‘If it had raged itself out, and done its worst, would not that have been better than all that has followed—the bitterness and the hate, and the horror, and that girl living at my very door, to make me mad?’
‘Why did you see her, Cecile? You might have ignored her altogether, forgotten her existence.’
‘You forget,’ cried Mrs. Swinford. ‘She is the great lady of the village—takes precedence’—she laughed out with a hysterical violence which shook her from head to foot—‘precedence of me, if we were in the world together! Don’t you know that? But it will soon come to an end,’ she added, laughing again with that electric tinkle which wore out the nerves of all who heard her. ‘What a good thing they are so sordid a family, those Pakenhams, loving money as other people love their children, whatever is dearest to them! She will be called on to prove every step, and she will not be able to prove one. And then!—we shall see what the village will think of her title and her precedence then.’
‘You have been agitating yourself in the most imprudent, in the most foolish way. Where are your drops? Her precedence, poor thing, will not hurt you, but a long faint will hurt you. Cecile, must I call your maid to see you in this state, or will you be quiet and listen to me?’
‘Give me my drops. I must not, I must not, have another attack. The doctor says so. Artémise, don’t leave me, don’t leave me!’
‘I will, if you do not turn from this subject at once. Throw it away from you. What on earth is Emily Plowden, or Pakenham, or whatever her name is, to you? Cecile, I begin to think a woman like you never learns, and that you are no better than a fool.’
While she said these words, however, Mrs. Brown was busy with the most affectionate cares, soothing the excited woman, bathing her forehead, rubbing her hands, administering the specific, loosening the elaborate dress, which made the heavingof the shrunken figure, and the strain of the emaciated throat, so much the more dreadful. The passion calmed down by degrees, and then Julie was summoned, and the robes of state replaced by a quilted dressing-gown, scarcely less fine, but more appropriate. After this the conversation was resumed in a less exciting vein. Mrs. Swinford was perhaps a little ashamed to have betrayed the fury of her feelings even to so trustworthy a confidante.
‘It is fine to see a family like that,’ she said, ‘not carried away by passion, Artémise, like you and me. Love or revenge are not in their way, nor hatred; but money, money. To secure a few thousands, they will be my instruments, or any one’s, to punish a traitor. And what you are horrified to think I should want to do, for such good reason as you know, they will do for nothing at all—for money, as I say.’
‘Many people think money a much more sufficient reason than what you call passion,’ said Mrs. Brown. ‘And it will be well to keep your Lord —— whatever you call him, from knowledge of me, for I can spoil his little transaction.’
‘Ah, you—you were there!’
The two women looked at each other, and Mrs. Swinford, notwithstanding her age and her knowledge of the world, was sensible of a sudden heat rising to the edge of her hair; not the blush that comes to more innocent faces, but that burning colour of shame at a self-betrayal which she ought to have been too strong to fall into. Mrs. Brown nodded her head gravely. ‘You said you had no means of knowing, but you perceive that you have: and for me, I can make an end of any such pretension. He had better not come across my path.’
‘You would not balk me, Artémise?’
‘I would balk him, as soon as look at him, and the family, bless them; and I would not bring the innocent to shame, not even for you.’
‘Artémise! after all we know of each other, such a pretension——’
‘My dear Cecile, what I know of you is one thing, what you know of me is another. I have broken every law, especially of society; but to harm the innocent is what I have never done—at least,’ she added after a moment, ‘not in that way. And though I’d give my head for you, which is, of course, a figure of speech, I will not ruin Emily Plowden for you, and that’s flat, whatever you may say.’
‘Don’t interfere, Artémise,’ said Mrs. Swinford, with a sound of tears in her voice, ‘don’t, don’t interfere. Go away, and letthings take their chance. No doubt she must have other evidence; I was a fool not to think of that. But don’t you, who are my nearest and dearest, go against me; don’t interfere. It is not, it has never been, a fit position for you, wherever you are; go to London, where I will find a home for you, Artémise.’
‘Do you think after standing out so long, I will consent to be dependent on you now—for a reason?’ Then she laughed, changing her tone. ‘If you can imagine a better place to hide myself in than the Girls’ National School at Watcham,’ she resumed, ‘you have very much the advantage of me.’
Itwas not very often the Rector found time to visit his sister. They saw each other constantly at the Rectory, at church, in the village street, in all sorts of places, almost every day; but his visits were few, especially such a visit as the present. He paused at the further end of the garden and called over the hedge to Mab, to know if her mother was alone. ‘I have got some business to talk over,’ Mr. Plowden said. ‘Take the trouble, will you, Mab, to see that no one comes in to disturb us.’
Mab thought it curious that, thus for two days within a week, her mother should have private business with Uncle James; but she said nothing except a ready assent to what he asked of her. ‘I’ll come towards the gate,’ she said; ‘I’ve got some things to put in on that border, and if any one comes that I can’t send away, you will hear me talking with them, Uncle James.’ She walked through the garden with him, so to speak, she on one side of the hedge, he on the other. ‘Fancy who turned up yesterday,’ she said; ‘a cousin whom, of course, I never saw before—a Lord William like my father; but fortunately they called him Lord Will.’
‘Lord William!’ cried the Rector, ‘a Pakenham—a son of the Marquis! Did he come to see you, or—for—for anything special?’
‘I don’t know what he wanted,’ said Mab. ‘To see us, I suppose. The funny thing is, he is like me. From this you may imagine he is not a beautiful young man, Uncle James.’
‘I don’t know why I should imagine that; I like your looks very well, my dear.’
‘Thank you, Uncle James,’ said Mab, with a laugh. ‘He is staying at the Hall, and I think he said that he would come back this morning, so, of course, if he comes I cannot send him away.’
‘I understand,’ said the Rector, with a countenance somewhattroubled. And he went into the little drawing-room, where Lady William rose up to meet him looking a little anxious. ‘You, James!’ she said. ‘I did not expect, especially at this hour, to see you.’
‘I can’t see why you should not have expected me, Emily; our last interview was serious enough,’ he said, shutting the door carefully behind him: and then he went across the room to the window, which was open. Being so nearly on a level with the garden it would, of course, have been easy enough for any one to hear from outside whatever conversation was going on within.
‘You frighten me with these precautions, James.’
‘There is nothing to be frightened about. You may imagine I have been thinking a great deal of what you told me the other day.’
‘Yes: and I heard Mab tell you the new incident.’
‘The appearance of the cousin? What is the signification of that, I wonder? But let us take the other, which is more important, first. Did you know my father kept a diary, Emily?’
‘I have seen him making little notes in various little books: but it is so long ago.’
‘And you were not here, of course, when we came into the Rectory. I found a quantity of these little books in the study, little calendars and almanacs, and so forth. I didn’t pay much attention to them—that is, I looked into one or two and they didn’t seem interesting. Queer, when people might really make such a record important, and they put in the merest trifles instead.’
‘“Chronicle small beer,”’she said, with a faint smile; but she was pale with an interest much deeper than any record of public events could have commanded.
‘Eh?’ said the Rector, who was not literary; ‘but I thought it might be just possible—so I have been making a hunt through them, and I came upon something that might—that must help us.’
‘Thank God!’ she said, clasping her hands instinctively together.
‘We must not be too sanguine: and yet, of course, a dead man’s diary is evidence itself in a way.’
‘Tell me,’ she cried, with excitement, ‘tell me what papa said.’
‘Nearly twenty years ago,’ said the Rector, with a little emotion. ‘It’s like hearing the old man talk—with abrupt sentences, don’t you know—just as he spoke.’
‘What does he say? What does he say, James?’
‘This is the one, I think; no, it’s the next—no. I hope I haven’t brought the wrong ones after all.’
Lady William sat very quietly with her hands on her knee, only her fingers, which clasped and unclasped each other, showing a little the excitement of the suspense in which she was, as he drew forth one little book after another from the ample pockets of his coat. At last the right one was found, and then a minute or two elapsed before the Rector with his spectacles could find the entry of which he was in search. Lady William made no attempt to snatch it from his hand. She sat quite still with a self-enforced patience which was belied by the glitter in her eyes.
‘Here it is at last—October 23rd. Would that be the date?’
She bowed her head quickly, and her brother began to divine that she could not speak. He gave her a keen look, and then returned to the book.
‘“October 23rd.—Very agitating and extraordinary night. Em. came home after midnight accompanied by woman M., and Lord W. Extraordinary explanations. Marriage immediately or not at all. Leaving England. Gave consent.” Is that right?’
Lady William moved impatiently in her chair. ‘If you find it in the book, it must be right.’
‘Ah, well, that is true, no doubt. Then comes another—“25th.—Emily married. Old Gepps. Gave her away. They left train, Paris.”’
‘Is that all?’
‘It is all. I suppose old Gepps is the man who performed the ceremony. Did you ever hear my father speak of any one of that name? Do you remember the man?’
‘I recollect an old man with a white beard. I think I have a vague recollection even of the name.’
‘It is most extraordinary,’ cried the Rector, getting up from his chair, ‘that on an occasion of such importance you should not have remembered both place and name!’
‘Ah! it was just because it was an occasion of such importance, and everything so dreadful and so strange.’
‘Emily, I have hesitated to ask you: why in heaven’s name were you married like that? What was the cause?’
She pointed towards the book with a hand that trembled. ‘Papa has put it down there.’
‘He has put down the fact, but no explanation. The explanation apparently was given to him, but not recorded. But you—why should you not tell me? A sudden marriage like that, in such headlong haste—why was it? What did it mean?’
Lady William was silent for some time, clasping her fingers and unclasping them, gazing into the vacant air. At last she said: ‘James, you will think me too great a fool if I say that I did not know, at the time.’
‘Emily,’ he said, with a tone so sharp and keen that it went through her like a knife, ‘it is a long time since, and I have a right to know. Was it—was it through any fault of yours?’
She turned her eyes to him with a look of the utmost amazement. ‘Fault of mine!’ she said. ‘What could that have had to do with it—any fault of mine?’
She was a mature woman, and was supposed to know the world; but Mab herself could not have given him a more limpid look, could not have received his questions with more surprise. The Rector, quite confused, stepped back a pace, and said, ‘I beg your pardon,’ with a humility which was entirely out of his habits. He had grown quite pale, and glanced at her with a sort of fright, terrified lest perhaps it might dawn upon her what he meant.
‘I was bewildered,’ she said. ‘I was taken altogether by surprise. It was the romance that dazzled me—what seemed the romance—and all that they told me: that he had to leave England, must go, would be in danger of I know not what, yet would not go without me. And poor papa thought of—oh the folly, the pettiness of it!—the title, perhaps, and what he thought the connection. My poor father thought a great deal of connection.’ She smiled a little sadly, looking back with a sort of tenderness upon the weakness and folly of a time so long past. Then she drew herself up unconsciously, holding her head high. ‘I discovered the real meaning, but not till after. It was very bitter and terrible; but after all it is Mab’s father of whom we are speaking. James, let us return to the question of most importance. What is gained by this I don’t see. I don’t understand things of that kind.’
It was very conciliating and satisfactory to Mr. Plowden that she did not understand. ‘It gives a clue,’ he said. ‘We must look up Gepps. He must have been a friend of my father’s, and he must, of course, be in the “Clergy List.” I have been looking up what old ones I have, but I cannot find him. I have not got that year, but it can be got, it can be got. He was an old man, you say, and he must have died, I suppose, but he cannot have taken his church and his registers with him. We must ascertain what was his church.’
‘It was a little old-fashioned place, very dingy, with heavy pews; a small place with an old-fashioned pulpit and canopy. Iremember the look of it—and the clergyman, an old man, with a white beard.’
‘In the City, most likely?’
Lady William shook her head. ‘I knew nothing of the City—nor anywhere except the parks and the streets round about that in which the Swinfords had a house. We went seldom, very seldom, to town in those days; I never, except with them.’
‘It must have been in the City,’ said Mr. Plowden. ‘What you describe settles the question. Well, then, I think now, Emily, there need be very little difficulty. Gepps must be in the “Clergy List.” If he is living, so much the better; he may have retired somewhere. But at all events the register must exist. I will go up to town to-morrow, and find the list for ‘sixty-five, and after that it will be plain sailing. All the same, how my father and you, but especially my father, could be such a fool!’
Lady William made no reply. To have her mind so thrown back upon that wonderful tragic moment of her life: to think of herself, the bewildered romantic girl, with all the wonderful tales poured into her ear by the flatterer by her side—that flatterer who was not the silent, disturbed bridegroom who himself said so little to explain the hot haste, the desperation of the strange wedding—was of itself painful enough and exciting. She had herself broached the subject to her brother when the question opened up by Mrs. Swinford had burst upon her, but she had not then entered into it so fully as now, and her mind was shaken by all those recollections. She seemed to see the shabby old church already, even so long ago, an anachronism among churches, with its heavy pulpit and pews and small round-headed windows, and the old clergyman with his white beard, and the complete absence of all those prettinesses with which a girl’s imagination surrounds her bridal—prettinesses, however, made up for by the thrilling romance which, when the moment came, had begun to yield a little to the natural pain of the position. She remembered with what a start of alarm she had found herself consigned to the husband of whom she knew so little, who was so little like the romantic hero of such a marriage, and who—as she only began to see when the step was irrevocable—showed so little of any sentiment for her which could justify the impetuous impatience of the proceedings. She remembered the awful sensation in her mind when she looked back from the window of the railway carriage upon her father’s smiling, complacent old face, enchanted by the consciousness that his daughter was now Lady William, sister-in-law to the Marquis of Portcullis, and on the mocking smile andexaggerated courtesies of Artémise: and felt everything she loved sliding from her, and nothing left to her but the saturnine countenance opposite—the almost strange man, who if he loved her hotly had, as yet at least, shown no signs of it to herself. She did not hear her brother’s voice speaking to her in the heat and hurry of her thoughts. Oh, what recollections were these! So much more real than anything that occurred to her now, so much more potent in their terror and excitement than anything that could happen. She had known nothing in all her experience, read nothing, so tragical and terrible as the feelings of that poor little bride of nineteen, as she woke up from her romantic dream, and saw her father’s foolish old face so fresh and ruddy, so innocent and unconscious, just before it finally dropped out of sight to be seen no more. Perhaps it was her brother’s question, though she was scarcely aware that she heard it, how could my father be such a fool? that gave the impression of foolishness, of strange, cheerful imbecility to her last view of that rosy old face.
‘I repeat, Emily,’ said the Rector, with a little heat, ‘how could my father be such a fool? A girl of your age, of course, could not be expected to think of such things—but my father!—And I suppose he knew that the man you married was not—a model of every virtue.’
‘He was Mab’s father, James, and he was at least quite honourable, so far as I was concerned; he took no advantage—in respect to me.’
‘He could scarcely have been such a brute as that,’ the Rector said. ‘Well, I’ll go, Emily. To-morrow I’ll go to town and see if I can bring back all the papers square. Hush, what is that? Who is Mab talking to? We’ve done our talk, however, and it’s no matter being interrupted now.’
‘Good morning, Lord William,’ Mab’s voice was heard saying, perhaps a little louder than was necessary, to give her uncle the warning she had promised.
Lady William started violently at the sound of the name. She put her hand upon her breast where her heart had begun to beat loudly. ‘All those old recollections have upset my nerves,’ she said, with a little piteous smile. ‘Forgive me, James; it is the young man that Mab told you of, the cousin with the same name.’
‘Poor Emily!’ he said, taking her hand in both of his. ‘You have, I fear, no pleasant memories connected with it: but why, then, in the name of heaven, or the other place perhaps——’
‘The other place,’ she said, bursting into a faint hysterical laugh. ‘But wait a moment, the boy is coming in.’
‘I thought you were going away this morning,’ said Mab, evidently leading the way into the house. ‘You need not think of shaking hands, for I am always muddy when I am working in the garden. Yes, I do a great deal of work in the garden—indeed, I’m the gardener. Patty’s father gives me a hand for the heavier things, but do you imagine I would trust any one else with my flowers? Ah, it’s a little too early, but if you came here in June, then you should see! It’s not very big, to be sure. Mr. Leo has a great deal more space at the Hall, and I don’t know how many men, but——’ Mab said, ending abruptly with a little grimace (which, of course, could not be seen indoors) which said more than words.
‘I daresay it’s great fun working in the garden,’ said Lord Will, with a very serious face.
‘A garden is no fun at all when you don’t work in it,’ said Mab, ‘and, so far as I’ve seen, most other things are just the same. They become fun if you take an interest in them, and not in any other way.’
‘But then Miss Mab was always a philosopher,’ said Leo’s voice, with the faint sound in it that was not English.
‘Oh, Swinford’s there, too,’ said the Rector to his sister inside. ‘Don’t you think, Emily, you have him a little too often here?’
‘The other is staying with him,’ Lady William said, which was no doubt a subterfuge: but then it was very evident that she had no time to say any more.
Itwas Leo who led the way, but the Rector was quite uninterested in Leo. His eyes followed to the other young man behind, who came in with something like diffidence, though that is not a common aspect for a young man of fashion to bear. He came in, indeed, with the air of a most unwilling visitor. He would have greatly preferred to go away without repeating his visit in the changed circumstances in which he found himself, but Leo had insisted that the visit should be paid. He shook hands with Lady William, and was presented to her brother, with the air of a man who wished himself a hundred miles away.
‘I’ve just come, don’t you know, to take my leave,’ said Lord Will. ‘I’m summoned to town. I thought that you would understand; but Swinford here said I ought to come—that is to say, I was glad to take the opportunity of saying good-bye.’
‘Yes,’ said Lady William, looking from one to another; ‘I should have understood, I think. It is a pity, Leo, that you gave your friend the trouble.’
‘Oh! delighted, of course,’ said Lord Will.
‘I have been telling my brother,’ said Lady William, ‘about your visit: and to see one of Mab’s relations is a pleasure—so unlooked-for.’
‘I will not say unlooked-for. I have always looked forward,’ said the Rector, ‘to making the acquaintance of the family. How do you do? And, of course, at once I perceive the likeness you spoke of, Emily. You are here on a very brief visit, it appears, Lord——.’ It seemed to Mr. Plowden that to say Will would be too familiar, and to say William would affect his sister’s nerves; therefore he stopped short there, and said no name at all. ‘You have scarcely had time to make your cousin’s acquaintance,’ he said.
Lord Will had been quite unprepared for a man and a brothertaking the part of the poor lady about whom he had been holding so many discussions. He was a little taken aback. ‘As a point of fact, a fellow has so little time,’ he said, hesitating a little. ‘I came down to see Swinford—dine and sleep, don’t you know—that sort of thing. Swinford’s such a capital fellow to know in Paris—takes you everywhere—shows you all the swells, and that sort of thing.’
Mr. Plowden had not, perhaps, very much acquaintance with the highest order of society, at least in its young and fashionable branches. To hear Lord Will Pakenham talk of swells took away his breath. He smiled, however, paternally upon the young man who was Mab’s cousin and Lord Portcullis’s son. He was unwilling to believe that a young man of such a family could make any pretext or tell any fibs about the plain duty of paying his respects to his near relations. ‘I hope,’ he said, ‘that we shall have other opportunities of seeing a little more of you. My sister, Lady William, has been for a long time established here, and all the neighbourhood would receive with pleasure any—any relation—any connection—I mean any member of such a family as yours.’
Lord Will stared a little, as is the manner of his kind, but made no reply. What reply could the poor young man make? It was so bewildering to be offered an enthusiastic welcome from the society of a village because of being related to the little gardening girl in the muddy gloves outside, that all his self-possession, which was sufficient for ordinary uses, was taken away. He gave a glance at Lady William, and espied a gleam in her eye which gave him a little comfort. There was agitation in her face, yet she saw the absurdity as well as he did. Decidedly, under other circumstances, this widow, real or fictitious, of his disreputable uncle would have been a woman not to be despised.
‘But I hear,’ said the Rector, ‘that you are the bearer of bad news. Another relation, my sister tells me, has joined the majority. I had once the pleasure, many years ago, of meeting Lord John—before there was any connection between the families. And he is gone! Well, we must all follow—we have here no abiding city. It is almost fortunate for Mab that, not having known her uncle, the shock of his loss will affect her less than it would otherwise have done.’
‘My dear James,’ said Lady William, ‘Lord Will will excuse you from all condolence, I am sure. There can be no shock to Mab, who has scarcely heard her uncle’s name: and to the other members of the family the shock is also softened by, I believe,the joys of inheritance. For he has not carried his money with him, which is always a good thing.’
‘I did not think to hear, Emily, any such cynical speech from you.’
‘But it is true,’ said Leo Swinford, ‘and my friend has come for the reason of communicating this intelligence,n’est-ce pas, Will?—which Lady William did not understand, I am sure, yesterday. Lord John has died without any will: his fortune, which is all personal, is therefore divided—is not that so?—between the nearest relations: therefore, Miss Mab, on account of her father, will become——’
‘Bless me!’ said the Rector. He had seated himself in order to do justice to the new acquaintance who was at the same time a connection, but now he sprang to his feet. ‘Bless me!’ he said, ‘an heiress! I must congratulate Mab. Emily, my dear——’
‘An heiress is a big word,’ said Lord Will, who had sucked his cane with anything but a countenance of delight while Leo was speaking. ‘There’s money,’ said the young man, ‘but it would be a pity to make the mistake of thinking it’s a big fortune. I told you,’ he said, turning to Lady William, ‘last night. I said there was no will.’
Lady William had grown very pale. ‘I did not understand,’ she said faintly. ‘I was not aware—and that my Mab would come in——’ The news had rather a painful than exhilarating effect upon her. She gave her brother an anxious look, then turned to the young man whose explanations were so disjointed. ‘It was kind, very kind,’ she said, with a troublous smile, ‘to come and hunt us up—strangers to you—to tell us this.’
‘Oh! as for that——’ said Lord Will.
‘You have no idea, dear lady,’ said Leo, ‘how disinterested, how high-minded are the golden youth in England. They will go any distance to make such an announcement, never thinking that what is given to another diminishes their own share.’
‘Shut up, Swinford,’ growled Lord Will over his cane.
‘I hope,’ said the Rector, smiling, ‘that Mr. Swinford does not think this is any information to us, Emily? I hope I know what the instinct of an English gentleman is. To a lady in my sister’s position, living out of the world, who might never have heard even of the death, let alone the inheritance, that feeling is the best protection—as I hope we both know.’
‘Oh, sh——,’ murmured Lord Will. He could not say ‘shut up’ to the Rector, but a more crestfallen and abashed young man did not exist. He sat with the head of his cane to his lips, butevidently deriving no consolation from it, when Mab, who had taken off her gardening apron and washed her hands, came in. Mab had her curiosities like other girls. She wanted to know what they were all talking of, and what was being done in the room where there were so many interesting people met together. She was by no means sure that it was not her own fate that was being decided. After all that had been said about her father’s family, the sudden appearance of her cousin was too curiously well-timed to be a mere accident, and she could not help fearing that while she was busy over her carnations they might be settling the course of her future life. Mab had no idea that this should be done without her own concurrence, or the utterance of her opinion, and accordingly, after turning it over in her mind for a few minutes, she left her flowers and hurried upstairs to make herself presentable. Such a conjunction as that of her uncle, so rare a visitor, her new unknown cousin, and Leo Swinford, her mother’s counsellor, could not, she thought, have happened for nothing. But when Mab went into the room the first thing she saw was Lord Will—in whom she took a natural interest as resembling herself, and as being a relation, and a new-comer—seated in the middle of the group with a depressed and sullen countenance, his eyes cast down, and his lips resting upon the head of his cane.
‘Mother,’ said Mab, ‘what have you been doing to Lord Will?’
No one had thought of Mab’s appearance at this particular crisis of fate, and the mere sight of her as she opened the door sent a little thrill through the party, who were all aware of troublous circumstances involving Mab, of which she herself was entirely unconscious, and of prospects utterly strange to her, which were opening before her feet. They all turned to look at her as she stood there with the fresh morning air about her, not beautiful, certainly, but honest and fresh as the morning, and so free from all embarrassment, so unaware either of troubles or hopes which could affect her beyond the wholesome round of every day, that even the Rector, the most ignorant of the party, felt something like a conspirator. Mab came forward quite unconscious of breaking into the middle of a strained situation. ‘What,’ she repeated, ‘have you been doing to Lord Will? Has he done anything wrong that you are all round about him, sitting on him like this? I’m glad I’ve come to see fair play.’
‘My dear,’ said the Rector, who was the only one who could speak, ‘you are quite mistaken. Your cousin is receiving on the contrary all our thanks for bringing some news which will be of thegreatest importance to you, I hope, and will make your future more suitable, my child, to your rank.’
‘Oh, I thought that was how it must be!’ cried Mab, in a tone of disgust. ‘Rank! I have no rank; and if it is this idea of recommending me to Lady Portcullis, and getting her to take me to Court and all that, which has brought Lord Will here—— Mother, let me speak; I am not a little child. I want to judge for myself. I don’t wish it, you must all know. I care not the least in the world for going to Court. I am quite happy as I am—a country girl. Lord Will is very kind if he came about that. I shall always remember it of him, that he is the only one of my father’s family that has been kind; though why you should sit upon him for it—for you were all sitting upon him—I’m sure I don’t know.’
‘I think I’d better go,’ said Lord Will, rising from his chair. ‘It’s true they have been sitting upon me, though what for I can’t tell—any more than I can tell why this’—he paused a little with the impulse to say little girl, but thought better of it—‘this young lady should be grateful to me; for I have done neither good nor harm that I know of. But now I think I’d better go.’
‘Have I said anything wrong? Is it I that have broken up the talk?’ cried Mab in consternation, coming to her mother’s side.
‘Well,’ said the Rector cheerfully, ‘perhaps we can scarcely go on with a business matter just now; but if Lord William Pakenham will do me the pleasure to come to the Rectory, which is close by——’
‘I’m not a business man,’ said Lord Will. ‘Swinford, you brought me into it, can’t you get me out of it?—and be hanged to you,’ he said in an undertone.
‘I am afraid you have broken up the consultation, Mab: but perhaps it is as well.’ Lady William held out her hand to the young man, who stood dangling his cane, and eager to get away. ‘I think we must have something to thank you for,’ she said, with a smile. ‘Of course, a piece of business is not settled by a friendly visit. I shall hear, no doubt, from the lawyers about what you have told me, or my brother will communicate with them for me. Thank you for the information, and for bringing it yourself. Good-bye.’
He had been standing ready to tell her, as he took his leave, with a tone that might convey some of the suspicions that were in his mind, that the lawyers would communicate with her further. But in taking the words out of his mouth, Lady William took allthe courage out of his mind. He stared at her for a moment with those heavy blue eyes, which she did not now think were so like Mab’s, and touched the hand she held out with a cold momentary touch, as if he were afraid it might sting him. Mab stood by looking on with an astonishment which slowly grew into consternation, and which burst forth as her cousin made her a stiff and slight bow.
‘What is the matter?’ she said, following him out. ‘Are you not my cousin after all? Why, you were very nice last night, and I was delighted to know somebody that belonged to me on my father’s side. And they all said we were so like each other. What has gone wrong? Are you not my cousin after all?’
She went out after him as she spoke into the garden, where a little while before she had greeted him so heartily, filled with astonishment and dismay, yet with a sense of absurdity also. And the young man, who had made so abrupt an exit, was in fact rather sore in heart, feeling that he had not done himself any credit, and that he had been snubbed and ‘sat upon,’ as Mab said. Her frank surprise and regret gave him a little consolation. He turned round when they both came out into the garden from the narrow doorway. ‘I am just the same,’ he said, still somewhat sullenly, but melting, ‘as I was last night.’
‘But then,’ cried Mab, ‘why did you call me “this young lady”? and why did you look at mother so, and let her hand drop as if it had been a frog, and do like this to me?’ Mab was not a mimic, like her cousin Florence, but the imitation she made of his stiff and angry bow was so ludicrous that he could not but laugh—stiffly. And Mab, who did not know what it was to be stiff, laughed out with all her heart, with a half childish cordial crow, which sounded into the fresh air with the most genuine tone of innocent mirth. ‘You had better shake hands with me after that, Cousin Will,’ she said.
‘You are making peace, Miss Mab,’ said Leo Swinford, who had followed them out.
‘No, I am not making peace, for we never made war,’ said Mab, who had given her cousin a warm grasp of the hand. And she stood at the gate looking after them with some regret. For Lord Will was young, and they were of the same blood, and he was a great novelty, something far more new than even Leo Swinford. She was unfeignedly sorry that he was going away. And she could not understand why, nor how it was that the young man who was so cordial yesterday should be so cold again now.
Lady William stood as she had done when young Pakenham dropped her hand until Leo Swinford, following his friend, had closed the door of the little drawing-room. I think she heard through the open window all that Mab said—at all events, the laugh so full of merriment and spontaneity bursting out into the pleasant air. Then she suddenly sank into the chair, and covering her face with her hands fell into a sudden burst of silent weeping. There was no sound, but her shoulder heaved with the effort to control and subdue the sudden emotion. Mr. Plowden had been standing, too, perplexed and disappointed by the stranger’s sudden withdrawal, but a little consoled by the laugh which seemed to prove that there was at all events a good understanding between Mab and her cousin. He did not perceive for a moment the effect upon his sister, and it was only after the young man had gone out of the garden gate, that, turning to speak to her, he perceived the attitude of abandonment, the restrained but almost irrestrainable passion by which she had been seized. He was not so much afraid of seeing women cry as men less experienced are. But Emily had never been of the weeping kind, and the Rector was startled and touched by the sight of the paroxysm with which she was struggling, to keep it down.
‘Emily,’ he cried, ‘Emily, my dear, what is it? You’re not breaking down?’
‘James,’ she cried, but very low, suddenly lifting to him a face full of anguish and exceedingly pale, ‘if we should not be able to prove it; if we can’t get the evidence! Oh James, my Mab, my child!’
‘Why shouldn’t we be able to prove it?’ he said, with half-angry calm. ‘Where is the difficulty of proving it? and what has that to do with it? Why, Emily, I never knew your good sense fail you before.’
‘My good sense!’ she said, with a miserable smile.
‘To be sure! Why, what is there to cry about? Such an unexpected windfall to Mab—a fortune, no doubt, though he did not tell us how much. You cut the young man short, Emily. I can’t see why. He seemed a very civil young man.’
Lady William raised herself up and dried her wet eyes.
‘You are quite right,’ she said, ‘it is my common sense that is failing me, James.’
‘Failed you for a moment,’ he said, indulgently patting her on the shoulder. For to be a man with a wife and daughters of his own he was very fond of his sister; and he was also agreeably excited by the sight of the second Lord William, actually one ofthe Portcullis family, Mab’s own cousin, about whom the ladies of the Rectory, when they heard, would be so deeply excited. Mr. Plowden was anxious to convey that wonderful intelligence to them as quickly as was possible. ‘Well, my dear Emily,’ he said, ‘I must go. I have no doubt you’ve been a good deal excited this morning, and I should advise you to lie down and rest a little. And to-morrow—well, no, perhaps not to-morrow, for now I remember, I have some churchings and various other things to attend to, but the very first free day I have——’
She put her hands together beseechingly. ‘Oh, go at once—don’t keep me in this suspense.’
‘My dear girl! you are frightening yourself in the most absurd way. After to-morrow, the very earliest minute that I can get away.’
Lady William did not lie down and rest when her brother left her, but she went upstairs and took refuge in her own room, very thankful that Mab had returned to her gardening. That Mab was an heiress and that ‘the family’ were seeking her acquaintance was the news Mr. Plowden longed to tell. But Mab’s mother was filled with another thought. If it could be that the search should fail! She believed more in failure than success with her experience. If it should fail, if there should fall upon Mab any cloud, any shadow of possible shame! She wrung her hands till they hurt her, but her heart was wrung more sorely still. It was a view she had not thought of before. Shame for herself would be bad enough. But for Mab! And even the possibility that Mab should turn astonished eyes upon her, should ask even with those eyes alone a question—should have such a thought suggested even for a moment, to her mind! Lady William had borne many miseries in her not yet very long life, but in that there would be the crown of all.
Itwill be recollected that Mr. Osborne, the curate, ended very suddenly, and with no small amount of heat and displeasure, that walk with Florence Plowden which had so nearly decided the whole colour of his life. He had fallen in love (as people say—and, indeed, it is as good a phrase as any, for it is often by no means a voluntary action) with the Rector’s daughter in spite of himself. It was so perfectlybanaland commonplace a thing to do; the sort of thing looked for by everybody; so suitable, that bugbear of youth; so exactly what might—except by his own ambitious relations, who thought him worthy of a loftier fate—have been expected, that the young man had resisted almost fiercely the tide of being which led him to that commonplace conclusion. But yet, when there is fate in it, what is the use of struggling? Florence Plowden was, Mr. Osborne thought, the prettiest, the most delightful and attractive of all the girls in Watcham—more than that, of all the girls he had ever seen. I do not know that this idea was justified by universal consent. Many people gave the palm in respect to good looks to Emmy, and, indeed, neither of them was at all up to the level of many of the girls from London who came down during the boating season, or of Dora Wade, for example, who was the belle of the county. However, the fact that this opinion was by no means universal did not affect the certainty of the curate, who had a very high idea of his own judgment, and, in fact, was better pleased that it should not chime in with other people’s, which was the last thing in the world he wished to do. He was a young man who was very well connected, and to lift his eyes even to Dora Wade would scarcely have been beyond his pretensions. But the mere fact that she was the acknowledged beauty was enough to make that pursuit unlikely to Edward Osborne. Thebanalitéof falling in love with his Rector’s daughter was bad enough, but it would have been nothing in comparison with thedownright vulgarity of falling in love with the beauty who had, as it were, signposts put up all round her to indicate her position as the Queen of Hearts. Edward Osborne would have died rather than follow these indications. They convinced him instead that she was not fair at all, but a most matter-of-fact and commonplace Blowsibella, whose radiant complexion was of the mere dairymaid order, and meant nothing but high health and good digestion—good enough things in their way, but altogether devoid of romance, and of any attraction which could dominate a highly trained and fastidious spirit like himself. At first, when he came to Watcham, he would have also said that the attributes of a Rector’s daughter, the delightful good young woman of the parish, acquainted with all the poor people and their wants, and occupied with clothing clubs, penny banks, sewing classes, and mothers’ meetings, were also the very last things that would attract a young philanthropist of the higher order like himself, who proposed to get at the people in a loftier way, to convince them by reason and argument of their foolish ways of living, and to inaugurate some large movement among them which would have little to do with the petty methods of feminine supervision. Florence Plowden, by universal consent, was made to be a clergyman’s wife, which was almost as strong an argument against her as if she had been an acknowledged beauty. But, as a matter of fact, there is no rule which tells in those mysterious ways of mutual attraction which draw the most unlikely or, which is worse, the most likely people together. And it had grown a certainty with Mr. Osborne that he had never met any one like Florence before her attention had been directed to him at all, and before even it had occurred to himself as possible that he could ever get over the dreadful obstacle of all that there was in her favour, and think of her as in possible relationship to himself. He represented it to himself as a thing that could affect him in no possible way, but yet a certain thing—that Florence Plowden was as a swan among the ducklings about her, that there was no one at all equal to her far and near, and that it was one of the mysteries of humanity how such a creature could spring and blossom from such a root, and among such surroundings. But I will not attempt to follow the matter from that first germ—obstinately held against all the force of the general idea that Florence was a nice girl and a very good girl (praises both calculated to drive an idealist mad), but nothing very particular—just like other girls, in fact, and a little like her mother. ‘When she is Mrs. Plowden’s age, Florence, indeed, will, I think, be very much like her mother,’ the General had once said, without the slightest idea that the curate, who wasan athletic young person, would have liked to knock him down for saying it. And why shouldn’t Florence Plowden resemble her mother? But it was blasphemy to Mr. Osborne’s ears.
I will not, I repeat, attempt to follow all that happened from that first impression to the moment when he had made up his mind that without the companionship of Florence life would be, if not unworthy living, yet so diminished in everything that was fair and sweet that all its glory and hope would be over. Many notions about life had been in this young man’s head. He had once thought that there was no institution in the world so great as that of a celibate clergy, and that it would be his highest duty to tread that austere and lofty path. I don’t know whether Florence could be justly chargeable with the destruction of that ideal. He had come to see at last that it could not be made a general rule of, or universally enforced, before he arrived at the sudden conviction that he was not himself adapted for that form of self-abnegation. I am obliged to confess that all the different steps in Mr. Osborne’s progress had been made suddenly, as with a bound, surprising himself as much as any one else. And perhaps he had no certain idea upon that morning when he found himself engaged in a discussion with his fast friend, Miss Grey, and opposed by the object of his affections—that these affections were to burst all the restraints with which he had bound them, and pour themselves forth in a burst of enthusiasm at Florry’s feet. And then, to think that when the flood could scarcely be restrained—when despite her opposition, despite all her naughty ways, he was about to tell her that there was nobody like her in the world (a statement which would have been as astounding and incredible to Florry as any miracle)—that she should have stopped him, by contradicting all his theories, by finding fault with what he felt to be, in its way, a small martyrdom, and by suggesting something quite different—she a girl, a nobody—to him, a priest and consecrated person set apart to instruct and lead mankind, as the better way!
Edward Osborne would not pause to refute, to reprove, to pour down the thunders of his wrath upon the girl whom in another moment he would have asked to be his wife. He did what was the only thing possible in the circumstances, turned and left her, flinging her image and her counsel behind him in the fury of his indignation. He walked from that spot to his lodgings, which was about a mile off, in three minutes or thereabouts, his long steps skimming over the soil, his mind in a turmoil scarcely to be described, boiling with anger, with indignation, with resentment against this interference with his superior rights of manhood andof priesthood, as well as with the strong revulsion of thoughts thrown back upon himself and disappointed feeling. It would scarcely be too much to say that for the moment he would have liked something dreadful to happen to Florence, and if there had been a thunderbolt handy, which happily is not a missile within ready reach, he would probably have blackened the face of the whole country in order to dumb and to frighten (for I don’t think he would have gone so far as to blind) the girl he loved. When he got home he shut himself into his sitting-room, giving a stern order that no one was to be admitted, and betook himself to the writing of a sermon, which seemed the best way tosfogarsi, as the Italians say, to blow off the pernicious excitement which made his veins throb and his heart beat. But he soon threw that aside, finding it quite inadequate to the occasion, and wrote a letter to the newspapers, which was so fierce that it frightened the editor to whom it was addressed. I need scarcely say that it was on the subject of temperance.
After the vehemence of the first shock was over, which, however, took some time, Mr. Osborne made a distinct but insufficient effort to cure himself altogether of Florence. He never entered the Rectory, contriving to settle any question he might have with the Rector either when they met in church or by letter. He refused all invitations lest perhaps she might be there—for where, indeed, could a man go in the parish, to dinner or tea or evening solemnity, without the chance of encountering the family of the Rector? Of course Mr. Osborne was unaware that for a somewhat similar reason Florence refused the same invitations at this crisis, and, indeed, awakened the curiosity of her mother and Emmy—to whom, even to Emmy, she had said nothing—by her disinclination to go ‘out.’ ‘I’d rather stay and keep Jim company,’ she was forced to say on several occasions—though, alas! with very little hope that the temptation of her company would have much effect in keeping Jim indoors. It did, however, once or twice, and that was both reward and justification.
But it is not to be supposed that this curious incident passed over the head of the Rev. Edward Osborne without a certain effect. His heart began to long after Florry long before the smart of the wound she had given him was healed. And what she had said rankled in his mind even before that. Was there any truth in what she had said? Was it, perhaps, a better way, to win a young man who was his equal—i.e., whom no missionary effort was likely to be brought to bear upon, a man quite beyond the blandishments of district visitors, Bible readers, temperance lecturers, oreven, in a general way, of the curate—to the paths of virtue, than to persuade an old lady to relinquish her poor little glass of beer by the sacrifice of his own very moderate glass of wine? The latter sacrifice had been mentioned in one or two papers, and held up as an example to other men. He had been applauded, but with reproof which was another kind of praise, by his own people and others. ‘Remember,’ his mother had written, ‘that Timothy was bidden by St. Paul to take a little wine for his stomach’s sake: and I am sure you are not such a giant of strength that you can afford to do without the little you take: though I quite appreciate the sacrifices you think it your duty to make, my dear boy.’ Sacrifice! It was no sacrifice. Osborne did not care in the least for the beer, which he took as a matter of habit, or the wine which was served to him at other people’s tables when he dined out. He rather liked, if truth must be told, to gently, tacitly snub his hosts by taking nothing. And it seemed to him, on the whole, an achievement which partook of the nature of the sublime to get old Mrs. Lloyd to give up her beer—not that it did her a great deal of harm, poor soul! But if she took none herself she would be strengthened to refuse it to her husband, and it would be an example to her sons and to the rest of the world—that small, dingy unenlightened world which it was so difficult to teach, which had so little to brighten or cheer it, and which pays so dearly for its indulgences in that sordid, dreadful way.
But Jim Plowden! that was a very different thing from Mrs. Lloyd. I do not for a moment believe that Mr. Osborne would have hesitated to take the pledge for and with Jim: but that was not at all what Florence had suggested. She had suggested that he should admit him to his society, take him for a companion, induce him to share in his pursuits—that last above all. She did not know, of course, that among the drawbacks to herself, of all of which Mr. Osborne was so conscious, her brother and her family took the first place. He would need to be friendly, or even more than friendly, with all the Plowdens. Nothing but the fact that Florence was unique in the world, that there was none like her, none, could make up for that. And now she demanded of him that he should take her brother into his bosom, so to speak, not as a consequence of being accepted by her, but as a matter of duty in his capacity as a priest, as a better way than that of taking the pledge along with old Mrs. Lloyd. That lout! he repeated to himself: that fellow to whom had been given all the same advantages as other people, even as Mr. Edward Osborne, and who had thrown, or was throwing, them away: the brother, whofrequented the ‘Blue Boar,’ who was the friend of the schoolmistress, who shunned all the ordinary assemblages of his kind; and yet it was suggested to him that to take up this rowdy undergraduate, sent down from Oxford, would be the better way!
Is it to be wondered at if Mr. Osborne was angry?—if, whenever it came into his head, for as long a time as a fortnight after, he flung down whatever he was doing and turned aside to something else that would be more exciting, to forget the exasperations to which he had been exposed? But this did not effectually chase the suggestion, it appeared, out of his mind. It recurred to him at times when he could not chase it away; in the middle of the night, for instance, when he could not jump out of bed and write a letter to a temperance newspaper, and when it bored in quietly to his brain, like some fine, delicate instrument used by a cunning, persistent hand. It was not the hand of Florence, it was that of some demon, or some angel, or his own.
Had he, after all, perhaps as much responsibility for Jim Plowden as for Mrs. Lloyd? Was Jim Plowden, perhaps, in his youth, and with certain faculties that might be of use in the world, of as much, nay, even of more importance, than the old washer-woman? Strange questions for a young idealist, a young man deeply compassionate of the poor, deeply indignant as concerns those who throw their own advantages, their own education, and other good gifts away.
These wonderful convolutions of thought—returns upon itself of the disturbed mind, bubblings up of a suggestion not to be got rid of, however trampled upon and thrown aside—brought Osborne to the day on which the Rector had gone up to town, and Jim was left free of that controlling influence of his father’s presence which kept him within certain limits. But the curate knew nothing of this incident of the day; indeed, save in so far as concerned the church and ‘duty’ he had known nothing of the movements of his chief since the day when Florence stopped the words on his lips which might have made him a son of her father’s house.
Mr. Plowden went up to town by a morning train, and it was Jim’s duty, of course, to go to his Sophocles, however unwillingly, as on other days. He was always unwilling, but his father being present, went grumbling to his work, as a tired horse goes into the shafts, knowing there is nothing else to be done. The morning, however, was bright, and when he got into the little room which was called his study—vain title!—the sunshine came in and called him, almost as if it had been a comrade at his door. The window was open, and the air could not have been more fresh and sweet(as far as we can tell) had it blown out of heaven. The breath of the first lilacs was upon it, and other celestial things of spring. The leaves waved above in all the first new greenness of spring leaves. The book lay open on a table before the window. It was not green nor bright, nor did it smell of the spring. A great lexicon was open beside it, and other books with prodigious notes to them, and notebooks lying ready to the hand. He was expected to construe into such halting English as he could manage that great page, and search into its difficulties by the help of the notes of a dreadful German worker (who no doubt liked that sort of thing), and some English ones. Unfortunate Jim—and the sunshine outside! and the soft air blowing in through the window! and the green leaves fluttering! and the silvery river flowing! And the Rector out of reach in London, after some private business of his own.
He made a little fight, be it said to his credit; but what virtue faintly said in favour of the Sophocles was boldly contradicted by something else, not virtue, and yet not vice either, which asked, ‘What good is there in Sophocles? I am not to go back to Oxford; I am to go to a ranche in America, or else I am to go to a merchant’s office in town. What good will Greek, or all the finest poetry in the world, do me there? If I were learning bookkeeping by double entry (whatever that may be), it might do me some good—or something about cows; but Sophocles!’ One note of admiration was not half enough to express Jim’s indignant sense of a folly which could not be defended from any point of view. Sophocles! Slaughter, the butcher, who had greasy books to keep, could have shown him a mystery more worth knowing, if he went to an office; and the vet., with all his experience of animals, was a professor worth (to Jim if he went to a ranche) more than Sophocles, Eschylus, and the rest, with the German notes and the English dons all thrown into one. Fancy construing a hard chorus when you should be out after the cows! Fancy spending your time over a disputed passage when you have a batch of letters to write for the mail—much good Sophocles would do a man in either of these circumstances! And to fancy that father, who had such sense in an ordinary way (the day was so bright that Jim felt quite just and amiable even towards his father), should be so bigoted, so ridiculous in this!
It may be imagined that after such a self-argument, the sunshine, calling him exactly as one of his comrades used to do, drumming on his window, soon had the best of it. Jim—poor Jim—learned in clandestine movements by the very fact of theanxiety of all about him, listened a little to make sure that the coast was clear. He heard his mother go upstairs, and the voices of the girls in a room they had for their work at the back of the house. All the exits of the house were therefore open to him—not a jealous eye about, not an anxious ear. He strolled out whistling softly, with his hands in his pockets—whistling, thereby convincing himself that he was afraid of nobody; that there was nothing clandestine, or stealthy, or wrong in the whole proceeding, but only that natural inclination towards the fresh air which everybody feels on such a day. When he had got beyond the bounds of the Rectory, and was quite free and at his ease on the public road, with nobody to make him afraid, and Sophocles as much out of the question as if he had never existed, Jim strolled on for a little, enjoying the air, and then paused to think what he should do. That, after all, was not so easy a question to decide. Everybody about was busy with something. No possibility of dropping in upon Mrs. Brown at this hour. There was the river, to be sure: but to go and get a boat, and then to toil up-stream by himself, which either coming or going he would have been obliged to do, seemed too much trouble on this sweet, indolent morning. It occurred to him that if he dropped in at the ‘Blue Boar’ to see the papers he might very probably meet the vet., and acquire from him some useful information; or something else might turn up; so he turned his steps that way with a delightful sense of freedom. There was nobody about, and he was responsible to nobody. For this once he would take his own way.
But Jim met Mr. Osborne before he reached the ‘Blue Boar.’