I do not recollect anything happening for a good while. Our chief event was the perfect success of Mr. Yolland's concentrated fuel, which did not blow up anything or anybody, and the production of some lovely Etruscan vases and tiles, for which I copied the designs out of a book I happily discovered in the library. They were sent up to the porcelain shops in London, and orders began to come in, to the great exultation of Harold and Co., an exultation which I could not help partaking, even while it seemed to me to be plunging him deeper and deeper in the dangerous speculation.
We put the vases into a shop in the town and wondered they did not sell; but happily people at a distance were kinder, and native genius was discovered in a youth, who soon made beautiful designs. But I do not think the revived activity of the unpopular pottery did us at that time any good with our neighbours.
Harold and Eustace sent in their subscriptions to the hunt and were not refused, but there were rumours that some of the Stympsons had threatened to withdraw.
I had half a mind to ride with them to the meet, but I could not tell who would cut me, and I knew the mortification would be so keen to them that I could not tell how they would behave, and I was afraid Eustace's pride in his scarlet coat might be as manifest to others as to us, and make me blush for him. So I kept Dora and myself at home.
I found that by the management of Dermot Tracy and his friends, the slight had been less apparent than had been intended, when all the other gentlemen had been asked in to Mr. Stympson's to breakfast, and they had been left out with the farmers; Dermot had so resented this that he had declined going into the house, and ridden to the village inn with them.
To my surprise, Eustace chose to go on hunting, because it asserted his rights and showed he did not care; and, besides, the hard riding was almost a necessity to both the young men, and the Foling hounds, beyond Biston, were less exclusive, and they were welcomed there. I believe their horsemanship extorted admiration from the whole field, and that they were gathering acquaintance, though not among those who were most desirable. The hunting that was esteemed hard exercise here was nothing to them. They felt cramped and confined even when they had had the longest runs, and disdained the inclosures they were forced to respect. I really don't know what Harold would have done but for Kalydon Moor, where he had a range without inclosures of some twelve miles. I think he rushed up there almost every day, and thus kept himself in health, and able to endure the confinement of our civilised life.
A very hard winter set in unusually early, and with a great deal of snow in December. It was a great novelty to our Australians, and was not much relished by Eustace, who did not enjoy the snow-balling and snow fortification in which Harold and Dora revelled in front of the house all the forenoon. After luncheon, when the snowstorm had come on too thickly for Dora to go out again, Harold insisted on going to see how the world looked from the moor. I entreated him not to go far, telling him how easy it was to lose the way when all outlines were changed in a way that would baffle even a black fellow; but he listened with a smile, took a plaid and a cap and sallied forth. I played at shuttle-cock for a good while with Dora, and then at billiards with Eustace; and when evening had closed darkly in, and the whole outside world was blotted out with the flakes and their mist, I began to grow a little anxious.
The hall was draughty, but there was a huge wood fire in it, and it seemed the best place to watch in, so there we sat together, and Eustace abused the climate and I told stories—dismal ones, I fear—about sheep and shepherds, dogs and snowdrifts, to the tune of that peculiar howl that the wind always makes when the blast is snow-laden; and dinner time came, and I could not make up my mind to go and dress so as to be out of reach of—I don't know what I expected to happen. Certainly what did happen was far from anything I had pictured to myself.
Battling with the elements and plunging in the snow, and seeing, whenever it slackened, so strange and new a world, was a sort of sport to Harold, and he strode on, making his goal the highest point of the moor, whence, if it cleared a little, he would be able to see to a vast distance. He was curious, too, to look down into the railway cutting. This was a sort of twig from a branch of the main line, chiefly due to Lord Erymanth, who, after fighting off the railway from all points adjacent to his estate, had found it so inconvenient to be without a station within reasonable distance, that a single line had at last been made from Mycening for the benefit of the places in this direction, but not many trains ran on it, for it was not much frequented.
Harold came to the brow of the cutting, and there beheld the funnel of a locomotive engine, locomotive no more, but firmly embedded in the snowdrift into which it had run, with a poor little train of three or four carriages behind it, already half buried. Not a person was to be seen, as Harold scrambled and slid down the descent and lighted on the top of one of the carriages; for, as it proved, the engineer, stoker, and two or three passengers had left the train an hour before, and were struggling along the line to the nearest station. Harold got down on the farther side, which was free of snow, and looked into all the carriages. No one was there, till, in a first-class one, he beheld an old gentleman, well wrapped up indeed, but numb, stiff, and dazed with the sleep out of which he was roused.
"Tickets, eh?" he said, and he dreamily held one out to Harold and tried to get up, but he stumbled, and hardly seemed to understand when Harold told him it was not the station, but that they had run into the snowdrift; he only muttered something about being met, staggered forward, and fell into Harold's arms. There was a carriage-bag on the seat, but Harold looked in vain there for a flask. The poor old man was hardly sensible. Ours was the nearest house, and Harold saw that the only chance for the poor old gentleman's life was to carry him home at once. Even for him it was no small effort, for his burthen was a sturdy man with the solidity of years, and nearly helpless, save that the warmth of Harold's body did give him just life and instinct to hold on, and let himself be bound to him with the long plaid so as least to impede his movements; but only one possessed of Harold's almost giant strength could have thus clambered the cutting at the nearest point to Arghouse and plodded through the snow. The only wonder is that they were not both lost. Their track was marked as long as that snow lasted by mighty holes.
It was at about a quarter-past seven that all the dogs barked, a fumbling was heard at the door, and a muffled voice, "Let me in."
Then in stumbled a heap of snow, panting, and amid Spitz's frantic barks, we saw it was Harold, bent nearly double by the figure tied to him. He sank on his knee, so as to place his burthen on the great couch, gasping, "Untie me," and as I undid the knot, he rose to his feet, panting heavily, and, in spite of the cold, bathed in perspiration.
"Get something hot for him directly," he said, falling back into an arm-chair, while we broke out in exclamations. "Who—where did you find him? Some poor old beggar. Not too near the fire—call Richardson—hot brandy-and-water—bed. He's some poor old beggar," and such outcries for a moment or two, till Harold, recovering himself in a second, explained, "Snowed up in the train. Here, Lucy, Eustace, rub his hands. Dora, ask Richardson for something hot. Are you better now, sir?" beginning to pull off the boots that he might rub his feet; but this measure roused the traveller, who resisted, crying out, "Don't, don't, my good man, I'll reward you handsomely. I'm a justice of the peace."
Thick and stifled as it was, the voice was familiar. I looked again, and screamed out, "Lord Erymanth, is it you?"
That roused him, and as I took hold of both hands and bent over him, he looked up, dazzled and muttering, "Lucy, Lucy Alison! Arghouse! How came I here?" and then as the hot cordial came at last, in the hand of Richardson, who had once been in his service, he swallowed it, and then leant back and gazed at me as I went on rubbing his hands. "Thank you, my dear. Is it you? I thought I was snowed up, and I have never signed that codicil about little Viola, or I could die easily. It is not such a severe mode, after all."
"But you're not dying, you're only dreaming. You are at Arghouse. Harold here found you and brought you to us."
And then we agreed that he had better be put to bed at once in Eustace's room, as there was already a fire there, and any other would take long in being warmed.
Harold and Eustace got him upstairs between them, and Richardson followed, while I looked out with dismay at the drifting snow, and wondered how to send either for a doctor or for Lady Diana in case of need. He had been a childless widower for many years, and had no one nearer belonging to him. Dora expressed her amazement that I did not go to help, but I knew this would have shocked him dreadfully, and I only sent Colman to see whether she could be of any use.
Harold came out first, and on his way to get rid of his snow-soaked garments, paused to tell me that the old gentleman had pretty well come round, and was being fed with hot soup and wine, while he seemed half asleep. "He is not frost-bitten," added Harold; "but if he is likely to want the doctor, I'd better go on to Mycening at once, before I change my things."
But I knew Lord Erymanth to be a hale, strong man of his years, little given to doctors, and as I heard he had said "No, no," when Eustace proposed to send for one, I was glad to negative the proposal from a man already wet through and tired—"well, just a little."
Our patient dropped asleep almost as soon as he had had his meal, in the very middle of a ceremonious speech of thanks, which sent Eustace down to dinner more than ever sure that there was nothing like the aristocracy, who all understood one another; and we left Richardson to watch over him, and sleep in the dressing-room in case of such a catastrophe as a rheumatic waking in the night.
We were standing about the fire in the hall, our usual morning waiting-place before breakfast, and had just received Richardson's report that his lordship had had a good night, seemed none the worse, and would presently appear, but that he desired we would not wait breakfast, when there was a hasty ring at the door, and no sooner was it opened than Dermot Tracy, battered and worn, in a sou'-wester sprinkled with snow and with boots up to his thighs, burst into the hall.
"Alison, you there? All right, I want you," shaking hands in an agitated way all round, and speaking very fast with much emotion. "I want you to come and search for my poor uncle. He was certainly in the train from Mycening that ran into a drift. Men went to get help; couldn't get back for three hours. He wasn't there—never arrived at home. My mother is in a dreadful state. Hogg is setting all the men to dig at the Erymanth end. I've got a lot to begin in the Kalydon cutting; but you'll come, Alison, you'll be worth a dozen of them. He might be alive still, you see."
"Thank you, Dermot, I am happy to say that such is the case," said a voice from the oak staircase, and down it was slowly proceeding Lord Erymanth, as trim, and portly, and well brushed-up as if he had arrived behind his two long-tailed bays.
Dermot, with his eyes full of tears, which he was squeezing and winking away, and his rapid, broken voice, had seen and heard nothing in our faces or exclamations to prepare him. He started violently and sprang forward, meeting Lord Erymanth at the foot of the stairs, and wringing both his hands—nay, I almost thought he would have kissed him, as he broke out into some incoherent cry of scarcely-believing joy, which perhaps surprised and touched the old man. "There, there, Dermot, my boy, your solicitude is—is honourable to you; but restrain—restrain it, my dear boy—we are not alone." And he advanced, a little rheumatically, to us, holding out his hand with morning greetings.
"I must send to my mother. Joe is here with the sleigh," said Dermot. "Uncle, how did you come here?" he added, as reflection only made his amazement profounder.
"It is true, as you said just now, that Mr. Harold Alison is equal to a dozen men. I owe my preservation, under Providence, to him," said Lord Erymanth, who, though not a small man, had to look far up as Harold stood towering above us all. "My most earnest acknowledgments are due to him," he added, solemnly holding out his hand.
"I might have expected that!" ejaculated Dermot, while Harold took the offered hand with a smile, and a mutter in his beard of "I am very glad."
"I'll just send a line to satisfy my mother," said Dermot, taking a pen from the inkstand on the hall-table. "Joe's here with the sleigh, and we must telegraph to George St. Glear."
Lord Erymanth repeated the name in some amazement, for he was not particularly fond of his heir.
"Hogg telegraphed to him this morning," and as the uncle observed, "Somewhat premature," he went on: "Poor Hogg was beside himself; he came to Arked at ten o'clock last night to look for you, and, luckily, I was there, so we've been hallooing half the night along the line, and then getting men together in readiness for the search as soon as it was light. I must be off to stop them at once. I came in to get the Alisons' help—never dreamt of such a thing as finding you here. And, after all, I don't understand—how did you come?"
"I cannot give you a detailed account," said his lordship. "Mr. Harold Alison roused me from a drowsiness which might soon, very probably, have been fatal, and brought me here. I have no very distinct recollection of the mode, and I fear I must have been a somewhat helpless and encumbering burthen."
Dora put in her oar. "Harry can carry anything," she said; "he brought you in so nicely on his back—just as I used to ride."
"On his back!"
"Yes," said Dora, who was fond of Mr. Tracy, and glad to impart her information, "on his back, with his boots sticking out on each side, so funnily!"
Lord Erymanth endeavoured to swallow the information suavely by the help of a classical precedent, and said, with a gracious smile, "Then I perceive we must have played the part of AEneas and Anchises—" But before he had got so far, the idea had been quite too much for Dermot, who cried out, "Pick-a-back! With his boots sticking out on both sides! Thank you, Dora. Oh! my uncle, pick-a-back!" and went off in an increasing, uncontrollable roar of laughter, while Harold, with a great tug to his moustache, observed apologetically to Lord Erymanth, "It was the only way I could do it," which speech had the effect of so prolonging poor Dermot's mirth, that all the good effect of the feeling he had previously displayed for his uncle was lost, and Lord Erymanth observed, in his most dry and solemn manner, "There are some people who can see nothing but food for senseless ridicule in the dangers of their friends."
"My dear Lord Erymanth," I said, almost wild, "do just consider Dermot has been up all night, and has had nothing to eat, and is immensely relieved to find you all safe. He can't be expected to quite know what he is about when he is so shaken. Come to breakfast, and we shall all be better."
"That might be a very sufficient excuse for you or for Viola, my dear Lucy," returned Lord Erymanth, taking, however, the arm I offered. "Youngladiesmay be very amiably hysterical, but a young man, in my day, who had not trifled away his manliness, would be ashamed of such an excuse."
There was a certain truth in what he said. Dermot was not then so strong, nor had he the self-command he would have had, if his life had been more regular; but he must always have had a much more sensitive and emotional nature than his uncle could ever understand. The reproach, however, sobered him in a moment, and he followed us gravely into the dining-room, without uttering a word for the next quarter of an hour; neither did Harold, who was genuinely vexed at having made the old man feel himself ridiculous, and was sorry for the displeasure with his friend. Nobody did say much except Eustace, who was delighted at having to play host to such distinguished guests, and Lord Erymanth himself, who was so gracious and sententious as quite to restore Dermot's usual self by the time breakfast was over, and he saw his servant bringing back his sleigh, in which he offered to convey his uncle either home or to Arked. But it was still fitfully snowing, and Lord Erymanth was evidently not without touches of rheumatism, which made him lend a willing ear to our entreaties to him not to expose himself. Harold then undertook to go in search of his portmanteau either to the scene of the catastrophe or the Hall.
"My dear sir, I could not think of exposing you to a repetition of such inclement weather as you have already encountered. I am well supplied here, my young friend—I think I may use the term, considering that two generations ago, at least, a mutual friendship existed between the houses, which, however obscured for a time—hum—hum—hum—may be said still to exist towards my dear friend's very amiable young daughter; and although I may have regretted as hasty and premature a decision that, as her oldest and most experienced—I may say paternal—friend, I ventured to question—you will excuse my plain speaking; I am always accustomed to utter my sentiments freely—yet on better acquaintance—brought about as it was in a manner which, however peculiar, and, I may say, unpleasant—cannot do otherwise than command my perpetual gratitude—I am induced to revoke a verdict, uttered, perhaps, rather with a view to the antecedents than to the individuals, and to express a hope that the ancient family ties may again assert themselves, and that I may again address as such Mr. Alison of Arghouse."
That speech absolutely cleared the field of Harold and Dermot both. One strode, the other backed, to the door, Dermot hastily said, "Good-bye then, uncle, I shall look you up to-morrow, but I must go and stop George St. Glear," and Harold made no further ceremony, but departed under his cover.
Probably, Richardson had spoken a word or two in our favour to his former master, for, when Lord Erymanth was relieved from his nephew's trying presence, he was most gracious, and his harangues, much as they had once fretted me, had now a familiar sound, as proving that we were no longer "at the back of the north wind," while Eustace listened with rapt attention, both to the long words and to anything coming from one whose name was enrolled in his favourite volume; who likewise discovered in him likenesses to generations past of Alisons, and seemed ready to admit him to all the privileges for which he had been six months pining.
At the first opportunity, Lord Erymanth began to me, "My dear Lucy, it is a confession that to some natures may seem humiliating, but I have so sedulously cultivated candour for my whole term of existence, that I hope I may flatter myself that I am not a novice in the great art of retracting a conclusion arrived at under premises which, though probable, have proved to be illusory. I therefore freely confess that I have allowed probability to weigh too much with me in my estimation of these young men." I almost jumped for joy as I cried out that I knew he would think so when he came to know them.
"Yes, I am grateful to the accident that has given me the opportunity of judging for myself," quoth Lord Erymanth, and with a magnanimity which I was then too inexperienced to perceive, he added, "I can better estimate the motives which made you decide on fixing your residence with your nephews, and I have no reluctance in declaring them natural and praiseworthy." I showed my satisfaction in my old friend's forgiveness, but he still went on: "Still, my dear, you must allow me to represent that your residence here, though it is self-innocent, exposes you to unpleasant complications. I cannot think it well that a young lady of your age should live entirely with two youths without female society, and be constantly associating with such friends as they may collect round them."
I remember now how the unshed tears burnt in my eyes as I said the female society had left me to myself, and begged to know with whom I had associated. In return I heard something that filled me with indignation about his nephew, Dermot Tracy, not being exactly the companion for an unchaperoned young lady, far less his sporting friends, or that young man who had been Dr. Kingston's partner. He was very sorry for me, as he saw my cheeks flaming, but he felt it right that I should be aware. I told him how I had guarded myself—never once come across the sportsmen, and only seen Mr. Yolland professionally when he showed me how to dress Harold's hand, besides the time when he went over the pottery with us. Nay, Dermot himself had only twice come into my company—once about his sister, and once to inquire after Harold after the adventure with the lion.
There I found I had alluded to what made Lord Erymanth doubly convinced that I must be blinded; my sight must be amiably obscured, as to the unfitness—he might say, the impropriety of such companions for me. He regretted all the more where his nephew was concerned, but it was due to me to warn, to admonish, me of the true facts of the case.
I did not see how I could want any admonition of the true facts I had seen with my own eyes.
He was intensely astonished, and did not know how to believe that I had actually seen the lion overpowered; whereupon I begged to know what he had heard. He was very unwilling to tell me, but it came out at last that Dermot and Harold—being, he feared, in an improperly excited condition—had insisted on going to the den with the keeper, and had irritated the animal by wanton mischief, and he was convinced that this could not have taken place in my presence.
I was indignant beyond measure. Had not Dermot told him the true story? He shook his head, and was much concerned at having to say so, but he had so entirely ceased to put any confidence in Dermot's statements that he preferred not listening to them. And I knew it was vain to try to show him the difference between deliberate falsehood, which was abhorrent to Dermot, and the exaggerations and mystifications to which his uncle's solemnity always prompted him. I appealed to the county paper; but he had been abroad at the time, and had, moreover, been told that the facts had been hushed up.
Happily, he had some trust in my veracity, and let me prove my perfect alibi for Harold as well as for Dermot. When I represented how those two were the only men among some hundreds who had shown either courage or coolness, he granted it with the words, "True, true. Of course, of course. That's the way good blood shows itself. Hereditary qualities are sure to manifest themselves."
Then he let me exonerate Harold from the charge of intemperance, pointing out that not even after the injury and operation, nor after yesterday's cold and fatigue, had he touched any liquor; but I don't think the notion of teetotalism was gratifying, even when I called it a private, individual vow. Nor could I make out whether his Australian life was known, and I was afraid to speak of it, lest I should be betraying what need never be mentioned. Of Viola's adventure, to my surprise, her uncle did not make much, but he had heard of that from the fountain-head, unpolluted by Stympson gossip; and, moreover, Lady Diana had been so disproportionately angry as to produce a reaction in him. Viola was his darling, and he had taken her part when he had found that she knew her brother was at hand. He allowed, too, that she might fairly be inspired with confidence by the voice and countenance of her captor, whom he seemed to view as a good-natured giant. But even this was an advance on "the prize-fighter," as Lady Diana and the Stympsons called him.
It was an amusing thing to hear the old earl moralising on the fortunate conjunction of circumstances, which had brought the property, contrary to all expectation, to the most suitable individual. Much did I long for Harold to return and show what he was, but only his lordship's servant, letters, and portmanteau came on an improvised sleigh. He had an immense political, county, and benevolent correspondence, and was busied with it all the rest of the day. Eustace hovered about reverentially and obligingly, and secured the good opinion which had been already partly gained by the statement of the police at the Quarter Sessions, whence Lord Erymanth had been returning, that they never had had so few cases from the Hydriot potteries as during this last quarter. Who could be complimented upon this happy state of things save the chairman? And who could appropriate the compliment more readily or with greater delight? Even I felt that it would be cruel high treason to demonstrate which was the mere chess king.
Poor Eustace! Harold had infected me enough with care for him to like to see him in such glory, though somewhat restless as to the appearances of this first state dinner of ours, and at Harold's absence; but, happily, the well-known step was in the hall before our guest came downstairs, and Eustace dashed out to superintend the toilette that was to be as worthy of meeting with an earl as nature and garments would permit. "Fit to be seen?" I heard Harold growl. "Of course I do when I dine with Lucy, and this is only an old man."
Eustace and Richardson had disinterred and brushed up Harold's only black suit (ordered as mourning for his wife, and never worn but at his uncle's funeral); but three years' expansion of chest and shoulder had made it pinion him so as to lessen the air of perfect ease which, without being what is called grace, was goodly to look upon. Eustace's studs were in his shirt, and the unnatural shine on his tawny hair too plainly revealed the perfumeries that crowded the young squire's dressing-table. With the purest intentions of kindness Eustace had done his best to disguise a demigod as a lout.
We had a diner a la Russe, to satisfy Eustace's aspirations as to the suitable. I had been seeking resources for it all the afternoon and building up erections with Richardson and Colman; and when poor Harold, who had been out in the snow with nothing to eat since breakfast, beheld it, he exclaimed, "Lucy, why did you not tell me? I could have gone over to Mycening and brought you home a leg of mutton."
"Don't expose what a cub you are!" muttered the despairing Eustace. "It is a deena a la Roos."
"I thought the Russians ate blubber," observed Harold, somewhat unfeelingly, though I don't think he saw the joke; but I managed to reassure him, sotto voce, as to there being something solid in the background. He was really ravenous, and it was a little comedy to see the despairing contempt with which he regarded the dainty little mouthfuls that the cook viewed with triumph, and Eustace in equal misery at his savage appetite; while Lord Erymanth, far too real a gentleman to be shocked at a man's eating when he was hungry, was quite insensible of the by-play until Harold, reduced to extremity at sight of one delicate shaving of turkey's breast, burst out, "I say, Richardson, I must have some food. Cut me its leg, please, at once!"
"Harry," faintly groaned Eustace, while Lord Erymanth observed, "Ah! there is no such receipt for an appetite as shooting in the snow. I remember when a turkey's leg would have been nothing to me, after being out duck-shooting in Kalydon Bog. Have you been there to-day? There would be good sport."
"No," said Harold, contented at last with the great leg, which seemed in the same proportion to him as a chicken's to other men. "I have been getting sheep out of the snow."
I elicited from him that he had, in making his way to Erymanth, heard the barking of a dog, and found that a shepherd and his flock had taken refuge in a hollow of the moor, which had partly protected them from the snow, but whence they could not escape. The shepherd, a drover who did not know the locality, had tried with morning light to find his way to help, but, spent and exhausted, would soon have perished, had not Harold been attracted by the dog. After dragging him to the nearest farm, Harold left the man to be restored by food and fire, while performing his own commission at the castle, and then returned to spend the remainder of the daylight hours in helping to extricate the sheep, and convey them to the farmyard, so that only five had been lost.
"An excellent, not to say a noble, manner of spending a winter's day," quoth the earl.
"I am a sheep farmer myself," was the reply.
Lord Erymanth really wanted to draw him out, and began to ask about Australian stock-farming, but Harold's slowness of speech left Eustace to reply to everything, and when once the rage of hunger was appeased, the harangues in a warm room after twenty miles' walk in the snow, and the carrying some hundreds of sheep one by one in his arms, produced certain nods and snores which were no favourable contrast with Eustace's rapt attention.
For, honestly, Eustace thought these speeches the finest things he had ever heard, and though he seldom presumed to understand them, he listened earnestly, and even imitated them in a sort of disjointed way. Now Lord Erymanth, if one could manage to follow him, was always coherent. His sentences would parse, and went on uniform principles—namely, the repeating every phrase in finer words, with all possible qualifications; whereas Eustace never accomplished more than catching up some sonorous period; but as his manners were at their best when he was overawed, and nine months in England had so far improved his taste that he did not once refer to his presentation at Government House, he made such an excellent impression that Lord Erymanth announced that he was going to give a ball to introduce his niece, Miss Tracy, on her seventeenth birthday, in January, and invited us all thereto.
Eustace's ecstacy was unbounded. He tried to wake Harold to share it, but only produced some murmurs about half-inch bullets: only when the "Good-night" came did Harold rouse up, and then, of course, he was wide awake; and while Eustace was escorting the distinguished guest to his apartment, we stood over the hall fire, enjoying his delight, and the prospect of his being righted with the county.
"And you will have your friends again, Lucy," added Harold.
"Yes, I don't suppose Lady Diana will hold out against him. He will prepare the way."
"And," said Eustace, coming downstairs, "it is absolutely necessary that you go and be measured for a dress suit, Harry."
"I will certainly never get into this again," he said, with a thwarted sigh; "it's all I can do to help splitting it down the back. You must get it off as you got it on."
"Not here!" entreated Eustace, alarmed at his gesture. "Remember the servant. Oh Harold, if you could but be more the gentleman! Why cannot you take example by me, instead of overthrowing all the advantageous impressions that such—such a service has created? I really think there's nothing he would not do for me. Don't you think so, Lucy?"
"Could he do anything for Prometesky?" asked Harold.
"He could, more than anyone," I said; "but I don't know if he would."
"I'll see about that."
"Now, Harold," cried Eustace in dismay, "don't spoil everything by offending him. Just suppose he should not send us the invitation!"
"No great harm done."
Eustace was incoherent in his wrath and horror, and Harold, too much used to his childish selfishness to feel the annoyance, answered, "I am not you."
"But if you offend him?"
"Never fear, Eu, I'll take care you don't fare the worse."
And as he lighted his candle he added to poor Eustace's discomfiture by the shocking utterance under his beard:
"You are welcome to him for me, if you can stand such an old bore."
When I came downstairs the next morning, I found Lord Erymanth at the hall window, watching the advance of a great waggon of coal which had stuck fast in the snow half way up the hill on which the house stood. Harold, a much more comfortable figure in his natural costume than he had been when made up by Eustace, was truly putting his shoulder to the wheel, with a great lever, so that every effort aided the struggling horses, and brought the whole nearer to its destination.
"A grand exhibition of strength," said his lordship, as the waggon was at last over its difficulties, and Harold disappeared with it into the back-yard; "a magnificent physical development. I never before saw extraordinary height with proportionate size and strength."
I asked if he had ever seen anyone as tall.
"I have seen one or two men who looked equally tall, but they stooped and were not well-proportioned, whereas your nephew has a wonderfully fine natural carriage. What is his measure?" he added, turning to Eustace.
"Well, really, my lord, I cannot tell; mine is six feet two and five-sixteenths, and I much prefer it to anything so out of the way as his, poor fellow."
The danger that he would go on to repeat his tailor's verdict "that it was distinguished without being excessive," was averted by Harold's entrance, and Dora interrupted the greetings by the query to her cousin, how high he really stood; but he could not tell, and when she unfraternally pressed to know whether it was not nice to be so much taller than Eustace, he replied, "Not on board ship," and then he gave the intelligence that it seemed about to thaw.
Lord Erymanth said that if so, he should try to make his way to Mycening, and he then paid his renewed compliments on the freedom of the calendar at the Quarter Sessions from the usual proportion of evils at Mycening. He understood that Mr. Alison was making most praiseworthy efforts to impede the fatal habits of intoxication that were only too prevalent.
"I shall close five beer-houses at Christmas," said Eustace. "I look on it as my duty, as landlord and man of property."
"Quite right. I am glad you see the matter in its right light. Beer-shops were a well-meaning experiment started some twenty years ago. I well remember the debate, &c."
Harold tried with all his might to listen, though I saw his chest heave with many a suppressed yawn, and his hand under his beard, tweaking it hard; but substance could be sifted out of what Lord Erymanth said, for he had real experience, and his own parish was in admirable order.
Where there was no power of expulsion, as he said, there would always be some degraded beings whose sole amusement was intoxication; but good dwelling-houses capable of being made cheerful, gardens, innocent recreations, and instruction had, he could testify from experience, no small effect in preventing such habits from being formed in the younger population, backed, as he was sure (good old man) that he need not tell his young friends, by an active and efficient clergyman, who would place the motives for good conduct on the truest and highest footing, without which all reformation would only be surface work. I was glad Harold should hear this from the lips of a layman, but I am afraid he shirked it as a bit of prosing, and went back to the cottages.
"They are in a shameful state," he said.
"They are to be improved," exclaimed Eustace, eagerly. "As I told Bullock, I am quite determined that mine shall be a model parish. I am ready to make any sacrifices to do my duty as a landlord, though Bullock says that no outlay on cottages ever pays, and that the test of their being habitable is their being let, and that the people are so ungrateful that they do not deserve to have anything done for them."
"You are not led away by such selfish arguments?" said Lord Erymanth.
"No, assuredly not," said Eustace, decidedly; "though I do wish Harold would not disagree so much with Bullock. He is a very civil man, and much in earnest in promoting my interests."
"That's not all," put in Harold.
"And I can't bear Bullock," I said. "'Our interest' has been always his cry, whenever the least thing has been proposed for the cottage people; and I know how much worse he let things get than we ever supposed."
On which Lord Erymanth spoke out his distinct advice to get rid of Bullock, telling us how he had been a servant's orphan whom my father had intended to apprentice, but, being placed with our old bailiff for a time, had made himself necessary, and ingratiated himself with my father so as to succeed to the situation; and it had been the universal belief, ever since my mother's widowhood, that he had taken advantage of her seclusion and want of knowledge of business to deal harshly by the tenants, especially the poor, and to feather his own nest.
It was only what Harold had already found out for himself, but it disposed of his scruples about old adherents, and it was well for Eustace to hear it from such oracular lips as might neutralise the effect of Bullock's flattery, for it had become quite plain to my opened eyes that he was trying to gain the squire's ear, and was very jealous of Harold.
I knew, too, that to listen to his advice was the way to Lord Erymanth's heart, and rejoiced to hear Harold begging for the names of recent books on drainage, and consulting our friend upon the means of dealing with a certain small farm in a tiny inclosed valley, on an outlying part of the property, where the yard and outhouses were in a permanent state of horrors; but interference was alike resented by Bullock and the farmer, though the wife and family were piteous spectacles of ague and rheumatism, and low fever smouldered every autumn in the hamlet.
Very sound advice was given and accepted with pertinent questions, such as I thought must convince anyone of Harold's superiority, when he must needs produce a long blue envelope, and beg Lord Erymanth to look at it and tell him how to get it presented to the Secretary of State.
It was graciously received, but no sooner did the name of Stanislas Prometesky strike the earl's eyes than he exclaimed, "That rascally old demagogue! The author of all the mischief. It was the greatest error and weakness not to have had him executed."
"You have not seen my father's statement?"
"Statement, sir! I read statements till I was sick of them, absolutely disgusted with their reiteration, and what could they say but that he was a Pole? A Pole!" (the word uttered with infinite loathing). "As if the very name were not a sufficient conviction of whatever is seditious and treasonable, only that people are sentimental about it, forsooth!"
Certainly it was droll to suspect sentiment in the great broad giant, who indignantly made reply, "The Poles have been infamously treated."
"No more than they deserved," said Lord Erymanth, startled for once into brevity. "A nation who could never govern themselves decently, and since they have been broken up, as they richly deserved, though I do not justify the manner—ever since, I say, have been acting the incendiary in every country where they have set foot. I would as soon hear of an infernal machine in the country as a Pole!"
"Poles deserve justice as well as other men," said Harold, perhaps the more doggedly because Eustace laid a restraining hand on his arm.
"Do you mean to tell me, sir, that every man has not received justice at the tribunal of this country?" exclaimed Lord Erymanth.
Perhaps he recollected that he was speaking to the son of a convict, for there was a moment's pause, into which I launched myself. "Dear Lord Erymanth," I said, "we all know that my poor brothers did offend against the laws and were sentenced according to them. They said so themselves, and that they were mistaken, did they not, Harold?"
Harold bent his head.
"And owing to whom?" demanded Lord Elymanth. "I never thought of blaming those two poor lads as I did that fellow who led them astray. I did all I could to save their lives; if they were alive this moment I would wish nothing better than to bring them home, but as to asking me to forward a petition in favour of the hoary old rebel that perverted them, I should think it a crime."
"But," I said, "if you would only read this, you would see that what they wanted to explain was that the man who turned king's evidence did not show how Count Prometesky tried to withhold them."
"Count, indeed! Just like all women. All those Poles are Counts! All Thaddeuses of Warsaw!"
"That's hard," I said. "I only called him Count because it would have shocked you if I had given him no prefix. Will you not see what poor Ambrose wanted to say for him?"
"Ah!" said Lord Erymanth, after a pause, in which he had really glanced over the paper. "Poor boys! It goes to my heart to think what fine fellows were lost there, but compassion for them cannot soften me towards the man who practised on their generous, unsuspecting youth. I am quite aware that Prometesky saved life at the fire, and his punishment was commuted on that account, contrary to my judgment, for it is a well-known axiom, that the author of a riot is responsible for all the outrages committed in it, and it is undeniable that the whole insurrection was his work. I am quite aware that the man had amiable, even fascinating qualities, and great enthusiasm, but here lay the great danger and seduction to young minds, and though I can perfectly understand the warm sympathy and generous sentiment that actuates my young friends, and though I much regret the being obliged to deny the first request of one to whom, I may say, I owe my life, I must distinctly refuse to take any part in relieving Count Stanislas Prometesky from the penalty he has incurred."
Harold's countenance had become very gloomy during this peroration. He made no attempt at reply, but gathered up his papers, and, gnawing his fringe of moustache, walked out of the room, while Eustace provoked me by volunteering explanations that Prometesky was no friend of his, only of Harold's. His lordship declared himself satisfied, provided no dangerous opinions had been imbibed, and truly Eustace might honestly acquit himself of having any opinions at all.
That afternoon he drove Lord Erymanth to Mycening, whence the railway was now open. Harold could nowhere be found, and kind messages were left for him, for which he was scarcely grateful when he came in late in the evening, calling Lord Erymanth intolerably vindictive, to bear malice for five-and-twenty years.
I could not get him to see that it was entirely judicial indignation, and desire for the good of the country, not in the least personal feeling; but Harold had not yet the perception of the legislative sentiment that actuates men of station in England. His strong inclination was not to go near the old man or his house again, but this was no small distress to Eustace, who, in spite of all his vaunting, dreaded new scenes without a protector, and I set myself to persuade him that it was due to his cousin not to hide himself, and avoid society so as to give a colour to evil report.
"It might be best to separate myself from him altogether and go back." On this, Eustace cried out with horror and dismay, and Harold answered, "Never fear, old chap; I'm not going yet. Not till I have seen you in good hands."
"And you'll accept the invitation," said Eustace, taking up one of the coroneted notes that invited us each for two nights to the castle.
"Very well."
"And you'll come up to town, and have a proper suit."
"As you please."
Eustace went off to the library to find some crested paper and envelopes worthy to bear the acceptance, and Harold stood musing. "A good agent and a good wife would set him on his feet to go alone," he said.
"Meantime he cannot do without you."
"Not in some ways."
"And even this acquaintance is your achievement, not his."
"Such as it is."
I pointed out that though Lord Erymanth refused to assist Prometesky, his introduction might lead to those who might do so, while isolation was a sort of helplessness. To this he agreed, saying, "I must free him before I go back."
"And do you really want to go back?" said I, fearing he was growing restless.
His face worked, and he said, "When I feel like a stone round Eustace's neck."
"Why should you feel so? You are a lever to lift him."
"Am I? The longer I live with you, the more true it seems to me that I had no business to come into a world with such people in it as you and Miss Tracy."
Eustace came back, fidgeting to get a pen mended, an operation beyond him, but patiently performed by the stronger fingers. We said no more, but I had had a glimpse which made me hope that the pilgrim was beginning to feel the burthen on his back.
Not that he had much time for thought. He was out all day, looking after the potteries, where orders were coming in fast, and workmen increasing, and likewise toiling in the fields at Ogden's farm, making measurements and experiments on the substrata and the waterfall, on which to base his plans for drainage according to the books Lord Erymanth had lent him.
After the second day he came home half-laughing. Farmer Ogden had warned him off and refused to listen to any explanation, though he must have known whom he was expelling—yes, like a very village Hampden, he had thrust the unwelcome surveyor out at his gate with such a trembling, testy, rheumatic arm, that Harold had felt obliged to obey it.
Eustace, angered at the treatment of his cousin, volunteered to come and "tell the ass, Ogden, to mind what he was about," and Harold added, "If you would come, Lucy, you might help to make his wife understand."
I came, as I was desired, where I had never been before, for we had always rested in the belief that the Alfy Valley was a nasty, damp, unhealthy place, with "something always about," and had contented ourselves with sending broth to the cottages whenever we heard of any unusual amount of disease. If we had ever been there!
We rode the two miles, as I do not think Dora and I would ever have floundered through the mud and torrents that ran down the lanes. It was just as if the farm had been built in the lower circle, and the cottages in Malebolge itself, where the poor little Alfy, so pure when it started from Kalydon Moor, brought down to them all the leakage of that farmyard. Oh! that yard, I never beheld, imagined, or made my way through the like, though there was a little causeway near the boundary wall, where it was possible to creep along on the stones, rousing up a sleeping pig or a dreamy donkey here and there, and barked at in volleys by dogs stationed on all the higher islets in the unsavoury lake. If Dora had not been a colonial child, and if I could have feared for myself with Harold by my side, I don't think we should ever have arrived, but Farmer Ogden and his son came out, and a man and boy or two; and when Eustace was recognised, they made what way they could for us, and we were landed at last in a scrupulously clean kitchen with peat fire and a limeash floor, where, alas! we were not suffered to remain, but were taken into a horrid little parlour, with a newly-lighted, smoking fire, a big Bible, and a ploughing-cup. Mrs. Ogden was a dissenter, so we had really no acquaintance, and, poor thing, had long been unable to go anywhere. She was a pale trembling creature, most neat and clean, but with the dreadful sallow complexion given by perpetual ague. She was very civil, and gave us cake and wine, to the former of which Dora did ample justice, but oh! the impracticability of those people!
The men had it all out of doors, but when I tried my eloquence on Mrs. Ogden I found her firmly persuaded not only that her own ill health and the sickness in the hamlet were "the will of the Lord," but in her religious fatalism, that it was absolutely profane to think that cleansing and drainage would amend them; and she adduced texts which poor uninstructed I was unable to answer, even while I knew they were a perversion; and, provoked as I was, I felt that her meek patience and resignation might be higher virtues than any to which I had yet attained.
Her husband, who, I should explain, was but one remove above a smock-frock farmer, took a different line. He had unsavoury proverbs in which he put deep faith. "Muck was the mother of money," and also "Muck was the farmer's nosegay." He viewed it as an absolute effeminacy to object to its odorous savours; and as to the poor people, "they were an ungrateful lot, and had a great deal too much done for them," the small farmer's usual creed. Mr. Alison could do as he liked, of course, but his lease had five years yet to run, and he would not consent to pay no more rent, not for what he didn't ask for, nor didn't want, and Mr. Bullock didn't approve of—that he would not, not if Mr. Alison took the law of him.
His landlord do it at his own expense? That made him look knowing. He was evidently certain that it was a trick for raising the rent at the end of the lease, if not before, upon him, whose fathers had been tenants of Alfy Vale even before the Alisons came to Arghouse; and, with the rude obstinacy of his race, he was as uncivil to Harold as he durst in Eustace's presence. "He had no mind to have his fields cut up just to sell the young gentleman's drain-pipes, as wouldn't go off at them potteries."
"Well, but all this stuff would be doing much more good upon your fields than here," Eustace said. "I—I really must insist on this farmyard being cleansed."
"You'll not find that in the covenant, sir," said the farmer with a grin.
"But, father," began the son, a more intelligent-looking man, though with the prevailing sickly tint.
"Hold your tongue, Phil," said Ogden. "It's easy to talk of cleaning out the yard; I'd like to see the gentleman set about it, or you either, for that matter."
"Would you?" said Harold. "Then you shall."
Farmer Ogden gaped. "I won't have no strange labourers about the place."
"No more you shall," said Harold. "If your son and I clean out this place with our own hands in the course of a couple of days, putting the manure in any field you may appoint, will you let the drainage plans be carried out without opposition?"
"It ain't a bet?" said the farmer; "for my missus's conscience is against bets."
"No, certainly not."
"Nor a trick?" he said, looking from one to another.
"No. It is to be honest work. I am a farmer, and know what work is, and have done it too."
Farmer Ogden, to a certain extent, gave in, and we departed. His son held the gate open for us, with a keen look at Harold, full of wonder and inquiry.
"You'll stand by me?" said Harold, lingering with him.
"Yes, sir," said Phil Ogden; "but I doubt if we can do it. Father says it is a week's work for five men, if you could get them to do it."
"Never fear," said Harold. "We'll save your mother's life yet against her will, and make you all as healthy as if you'd been born in New South Wales."
This was Friday, and Phil had an engagement on the Monday, so that Tuesday was fixed, much to Eustace's displeasure, for he did not like Harold's condescending to work which labourers would hardly undertake; and besides, he would make his hands, if not himself, absolutely unfit for the entertainment on Thursday. On which Harold asked if there were no such thing as water. Eustace implored him to give it up and send half-a-dozen unemployed men, but to this he answered, "I should be ashamed."
And when we went home he rode on into Mycening, to see about his equipment, he said, setting Eustace despairing, lest he, after all, meant to avoid the London tailor, and to patronise Mycening; but the equipment turned out to be a great smock-frock. And something very different came home with him—namely, a little dainty flower-pot and pan, with an Etruscan pattern, the very best things that had been turned out of the pottery, adorned with a design in black and white, representing a charming little Greek nymph watering her flowers.
"Don't you think, Lucy, Miss Tracy being a shareholder, and it being her birthday, the chairman might present this?" he inquired.
I agreed heartily, but Eustace, with a twist of his cat's-whisker moustache, opined that they were scarcely elegant enough for Miss Tracy; and on the Monday, when he did drag Harold up to the tailor's, he brought down a fragile little bouquet of porcelain violets, very Parisian, and in the latest fashion, which he flattered himself was the newest thing extant, and a much more appropriate offering. The violets could be made by a pinch below to squirt out perfume!
"Never mind, Harold," I said, "you can give your flower-pot all the same."
"You may," said Harold.
"Why should not you?"
He shook his head. "I've no business," he said; "Eustace is chairman."
I said no more, and I hardly saw Harold the two following days, for he was gone in the twilight of the January morning and worked as long as light would allow, and fortunately the moon was in a favourable quarter; and Phil, to whom the lighter part of the task was allotted, confided to his companion that he had been wishing to get father to see things in this light for a long time, but he was that slow to move; and since Harold had been looking about, Mr. Bullock had advised him not to give in, for it would be sure to end in the raising of his rent, and young gentlemen had new-fangled notions that only led to expense and nonsense, and it was safest in the long run to trust to the agent.
However, the sight of genuine, unflinching toil, with nothing of the amateur about it, had an eloquence of its own. Farmer Ogden looked on grimly and ironically for the first two hours, having only been surprised into consent in the belief that any man, let alone a gentleman, must find out the impracticability of the undertaking, and be absolutely sickened. Then he brought out some bread and cheese and cider, and was inclined to be huffy when Harold declined the latter, and looked satirical when he repaired to wash his hands at the pump before touching the former. When he saw two more hours go by in work of which he could judge, his furrowed old brow grew less puckered, and he came out again to request Mr. Harold to partake of the mid-day meal. I fancy Harold's going up to Phil's room, to make himself respectable for Mrs. Ogden's society, was as strange to the farmer as were to the Australian the good wife's excuses for making him sit down with the family in the kitchen; but I believe that during the meal he showed himself practical farmer enough to win their respect; and when he worked harder than ever all the afternoon, even till the last moment it was possible to see, and came back with the light the next morning, he had won his cause; above all, when the hunt swept by without disturbing the labour.
The farmer not only turned in his scanty supply of men to help to finish off the labour, and seconded contrivances which the day before he would have scouted, but he gave his own bowed back to the work. A pavement of the court which had not seen the day for forty years was brought to light; and by a series of drain tiles, for which a messenger was dispatched to the pottery, streams were conducted from the river to wash these up; and at last, when Harold appeared, after Eustace had insisted on waiting no longer for dinner, he replied to our eager questions, "Yes, it is done."
"And Ogden?"
"He thanked me, shook hands with me, and said I was a man."
Which we knew meant infinitely more than a gentleman.
Harold wanted to spend Thursday in banking up the pond in the centre of the yard, but the idea seemed to drive Eustace to distraction. Such work before going to that sublime region at Erymanth! He laid hold of Harold's hands—shapely hands, and with that look of latent strength one sees in some animals, but scarred with many a seam, and horny within the fingers—and compared them with those he had nursed into dainty delicacy of whiteness, till Harold could not help saying, "I wouldn't have a lady's fingers."
"I would not have a clown's," said Eustace.
"Keep your gloves on, Harold, and do not make them any worse. If you go out to that place to-day, they won't even be as presentable as they are."
"I shall wash them."
"Wash! As if oceans of Eau-de-Cologne would make them fit for society!" said Eustace, with infinite disgust, only equalled by the "Faugh!" with which Harold heard of the perfume. In fact, Eustace was dreadfully afraid the other hunters had seen and recognised those shoulders, even under the smock-frock, as plainly as he did, and he had been wretched about it ever since.
"You talk of not wanting to do me harm," he said, "and then you go and grub in such work as any decent labourer would despise."
So miserable was he, that Harold, who never saw the foolery in Eustace that he would have derided in others, yielded to him so far as only to give directions to Bullock for sending down the materials wanted for the pond, and likewise for mending the roof of a cottage where a rheumatic old woman was habitually obliged to sleep under a crazy umbrella.