But though Honour's words certainly aroused Mr. St. John to a sense of precaution, they did not cause him to act upon it. A doubt lay almost in his mind as to whether his wife did, or could, like Benja: it was based upon her unmistakably jealous disposition, and on the blow she had once given Benja when she was as a mad woman: but with her daily conduct before him, her love displayed as much for Benja as for her own child, he could only believe that the boy was safe in her care. Certainly the words of Honour recalled those unpleasant doubts forcibly before him; but he suffered the impression to wear away again. We all know how time, even if you count it only by days or hours, softens the aspect of things; and before November was out, the master of Alnwick had made his will, leaving both the children under the personal guardianship of his wife.
And the winter went on, and George St. John grew weaker and weaker. Not very perceptibly so to the eyes about him; the decline was too gentle for that. In February, instead of going up to London when Parliament met, he resigned his seat, and then people grew sensible of the change in him, and wondered what was wrong with Mr. Carleton St. John. Mr. Pym came up constantly, and was more and more testy at every visit. He sent drugs; he brought other doctors with him; he met a great physician from the metropolis; but the more he did, the worse seemed to be the effect upon his patient.
"You'd better give me up for a bad job, Pym, and leave off worrying yourself," Mr. St. John said to him one day as they were strolling down the park together--for Mr. St. John liked to go out with the doctor when he had paid his visits. "I do you no credit."
"It's because youwon'tdo it," gruffly retorted the surgeon. "I order you to a warm climate, and you won't go."
"No; I won't. I am best here. Send me away to those hot places, and I should only die the sooner. Pym, dear old fellow"--and Mr. St. John put his hand into the surgeon's--"you are feeling this for me more than I feel it for myself. I have settled my business affairs; I have settled--I humbly hope--other affairs of greater moment; and I can wait my summons tranquilly."
"Have you made your will?" asked Mr. Pym, after a pause, which seemed to be chiefly occupied in clearing his throat.
"No end of weeks ago. The chief thing I had to settle was the guardianship of the children. Of Benja, I may say. George would have naturally fallen to his mother without a will."
"And you have left him--Benja----?"
"To my wife, just as I have the other. Mr. St. John, of Castle Wafer, and General Carleton, are the trustees. I thought of my wife's half-brother, Captain Darling, as one of them; but his regiment will probably be ordered abroad, and he may be away for years."
They walked on a few steps further in silence, to the spot that Mr. St. John called his turning-place, for it was there he generally quitted the surgeon. As they were shaking hands, Mr. Pym retained his patient's fingers in his, and spoke.
"Will you forgive an old man for his advice? He is double your age, and has had twenty times the experience. For acquiring good practical lessons of life, commend me to a doctor."
"I'll take it," said Mr. St. John, "in anything except quitting Alnwick."
"Don't leave Benja under your wife's charge."
"Why not?" came the question, after a pause of surprise.
"I have my reasons. For one thing, she is not very strong, and the charge of the two children, with you gone, might be found a heavy task."
"I think that's nonsense, Pym," quietly replied Mr. St. John. "She has plenty of servants, and at a proper age Benja will go to school. George also. You must have some other reason."
"True. But I am not sure that you would like me to mention it."
"Mention what you will, Pym. Say anything."
"Has it occurred to you that it is within the range of possibility your wife may marry again?"
"My widow may. Yes."
"Then, should this prove the case, and she formed new ties about her, Benja might find himself neglected. George is her own child, secure in her love, whatever betide; Benja is different. Have you provided in any way for the contingency I have mentioned?"
"No. I have left my wife personal and resident guardian at Alnwick until Benja shall be twenty-one. At that period she must leave it, or only remain there as Benja's guest. It is right, I believe, that it should be so. And I have a precedent in my father's will."
"But his widow was your own mother."
Mr. St. John made no immediate reply. The distinction had probably not occurred to him.
"Take my advice, George St. John," said the surgeon impressively; "do not leave Benja under the charge of your wife. I would rather not discuss with you the why and the wherefore; but rely upon it some other plan will be better both for the boy and for Mrs. St. John."
He went away as he spoke, and George St. John turned slowly back to the Hall. The conversation recalled to his mind with vivid force the almost-forgotten words of Honour; and an uncomfortable feeling of indecision crept into it.
Still he did not see any feasible way of altering the arrangements he had made. When he died, Alnwick Hall would be Benja's, and must be the boy's chief home during his minority; he could not turn his wife out of it, and he could not place any one else in it as Benja's personal guardian. He had no means of providing a suitable residence for his widow if she left the Hall: in fact, it was only as the heir's guardian that he could at all adequately provide for her. Neither, it must be confessed, did Mr. St. John himself see any great necessity for separating them: but he was a man amenable to counsel, open to advice, and the opinion of two friends (surely both may be called so!) so attached to him as Mr. Pym and Honour, bore weight with him. It had not been George St. John had he ignored it.
"May God help me to do right!" he murmured, as he entered the house.
He dwelt much upon it during the remainder of the day; he lay awake part of the night: and only when he came to a decision did he get to sleep. Early the next morning he rang for his servant; and at eight o'clock the pony-carriage conveyed him to the railway station at Alnwick to take the train. As the market people looked at him, passing them betimes in the fresh February morning, at the bright colour in his face, the wavy brown hair stirred by the gentle breeze, they said to themselves, how well Mr. Carleton St. John was looking, though thin.
He was going over to Castle Wafer. An hour and a-quarter's journey brought him to a certain town; there he waited twenty minutes, and took another train. Rather more than another hour and a-quarter of very quick travelling, for this last was an express, conveyed him to Lexington, and thence he took a fly to Castle Wafer.
It was one of the most charming houses ever seen, nestling in lovely grounds, amidst rising trees of many species. A modern house, built by its present owner, Isaac St. John, who possessed a rare taste for the beautiful, and had made it exquisite. That house was his hobby in life; his care was his half-brother, Frederick St. John. The estate of Castle Wafer was the entailed inheritance of these St. Johns; and Frederick was heir presumptive: the positive heir, said the world; for it was beyond the range of probability that its present owner would ever marry.
They were second-cousins to the St. Johns of Alnwick, and were next in succession. Of great wealth themselves, far more so than was George St. John, and of more note in the world, they were yet below him in succession to what might be called the original family property. That was not Alnwick. An old baronet of eighty-one, Sir Thomas St. John, held it; he was childless, and therefore it would come at his death to George St. John, and to George St. John's sons after him. Had he, George St. John, also been childless, the whole, including the title, including Alnwick, would lapse to Isaac St. John.
George St. John had nearly a two-mile drive. He noted the familiar points on the road and in the fine landscape, as they stood out in the clear but not very bright February day. The sprinkling of cottages near Castle Wafer; the solitary public-house, called the Barley Mow, with its swinging sign-board; and the old-fashioned red-brick house, Lexington Rectory, which the wiseacres of other days had built nearly two miles from its church and Lexington proper. It stood close to the grounds of Castle Wafer; was the only house of any social standing very near to it; and as George St. John glanced at its windows as he passed, he remembered that its present possessor had received his title to orders from a church in the neighbourhood of Alnwick, of which his father was patron; but he had been a very, very little boy at the time. The house looked empty now; its windows were nearly all closed: and he supposed its incumbent, Dr. Beauclerc, Rector of Lexington and Dean of Westerbury, was away at his deanery.
"Mr. St. John is at home?" he asked, as the woman came out to throw back the lodge gates.
"Oh yes, sir." And indeed George St. John had little need to ask, for Mr. St. John rarely, very rarely, was away from Castle Wafer.
A few minutes' turning and winding, and then the front of the house burst upon George St. John's view, and he was close upon it. The sun broke out at the moment, and he thought he had never before seen any place so beautiful; he always did think so, whenever he thus came upon Castle Wafer. The glistening white front, long rather than high, with its elaboration of ornament; the green terraces, covered with their parterres of flowers, already in bloom, and stretching beyond to the less open grounds; the low French windows, open to the breeze--never did any dwelling impart so cheerful, so attractive a look as did Castle Wafer. To a stranger, having no idea of the sort of house he was going to see, perhaps surprise would be the first feeling; for the place was as unlike a castle as any place could be. Isaac St. John said laughingly sometimes that he ought to change its appellation. There might have been a castle on the lands in the old feudal ages, but no trace remained of it: and the house, which had been pulled down to give place to this fairy edifice, had looked like a companion to the Rectory--red, gaunt, and gloomy.
As the hall-door was thrown open, and the bright colours fell on its mosaic pavement from the stained-glass windows, gladdening the eye of George St. John, a tall, portly man, rather solemn and very respectable, not to say gentlemanly, was crossing it, and turned his head to see who the visitor might be. Mr. St. John at once stepped past the footman and greeted him. It was Mr. Brumm, Castle Wafer's chief and most respected servant; the many years' personal attendant, and in some respects a confidential one, of its master. George St. John held out his hand, as affable men will do by these valued servants, after years of absence.
"How are you, Brumm? I see I have taken you by surprise."
"You have indeed, sir," said Mr. Brumm, in the slow manner natural to him. "Not more so, I am sure, sir, than you will take my master. It was only this morning that he was mentioning your name."
"How is he now?"
"Better, sir, than he has been. But he has suffered much of late."
Mr. Brumm was leading the way into an inner hall, one light and beautiful as the first, with the same soft colours thrown from its several windows. Opening a door here, he looked in and spoke.
"A visitor, sir--Mr. Carleton St. John."
By a bright fire in this light and charming room--and if you object to the reiteration of the term, I can only plead in excuse that everything was light and charming at Castle Wafer--with its few fine paintings, its glittering mirrors, its luxuriant chairs and sofas, its scattered books, and its fine harmonium, sat a deformed gentleman. Not any hideous phase of deformity that repels the eye, but simply with a hump upon his back: a small hump, the result of an accident in infancy. He had a pale, wan face, with the sharp chin usually accompanying these cases; a face that insensibly attracted you by its look of suffering, and the thoughtful earnestness of its bright, clear, well-opened hazel eyes. Of nearly middle height, that hump was the only unsightly point about him; but he was a man of suffering; and he lived chiefly alone, he and his pain. His hair was dark, silken, rather scanty; but not a thread of silver could be seen in it, though he was close on his fiftieth year.
Laying down the book he was reading, Isaac St. John rose at the mention of the name; and stepped forward in the quiet, undemonstrative way characteristic of him, a glad smile lighting up his face.
"George! how pleased I am to see you! So you have thought of me at last?"
"I was half ashamed to come, Mr. St. John, remembering that it is five years since I came before. But I have met Mrs. St. John repeatedly in London, and sometimes Frederick; so that I have, as it were, seen you at second-hand. I have not been well, too."
Suitable, perhaps, to the difference in their ages, it might be observed that while the elder man called the younger "George," he himself was addressed as "Mr. St. John." But Mr. St. John had been almost grown up when George was a baby, and could remember having nursed him.
"You do not look well, George," he said, scanning the almost transparent face before him. "And--are you taller? You look so."
"That's because I'm thinner. See!"--opening his coat--"I'm nothing but a skeleton."
"What is wrong?"
"I can't tell you. I grow thinner and thinner and weaker and weaker, and that's about all I know. I may pick up as spring comes on, and get right again; but--it may be the other way."
Isaac St. John did not answer. An unpleasant reminiscence of how this young man's father had wasted away eight-and-twenty years ago kept him silent.
"What will you take, George? Have you come to stay with me?"
"I have come to stay with you two hours: I must be home again by nightfall if I can. And I won't take anything until my business with you is over; for I confess it is my own selfish affairs that have brought me here. Let me speak to you first."
"As you will. I am ready."
"Ever ready, ever willing to help us all!" returned George St. John, warm gratitude in his tone. "It is about the guardianship that I wish to speak. I thank you for accepting it."
Isaac smiled. "I did not see that I could do otherwise for you."
"Say for my children. Well, listen to me. I have left my wife personal guardian to my children. She will reside at the Hall until Benja is of age, and they with her, subject of course to their school and college intervals. This is absolute with regard to the younger, but in regard to the elder I wish it to be dependent upon your discretion."
"Upon my discretion?"
George St. John had his hands upon his knees, leaning forward in his great earnestness; he did not appear to notice the interruption.
"I wish you (when I shall be gone, and the boys have only their mother) to take means of ascertaining from time to time that Benja ishappyunder his stepmother's care, and that she is doing her part by him in kindness. Should you find occasion to doubt this, or to think from any other cause that he would be better elsewhere, remove him from her, and place him with any one you may consider suitable. I dare not say take him yourself: children are noisy, and your health is imperfect; but place him where you can be sure that he will be well done by. Will you undertake this, Mr. St. John?"
"Why do you ask this?" was the reply of Isaac St. John. "Is it a new thought--a sudden thought?"
"It is a new thought, imparted to me chiefly through a conversation I had yesterday with Pym, our surgeon and old friend. He does not think it well that Benja should be left under the absolute control of Mrs. St. John, as he is not her own child. He said, for one thing, that she might marry again, and Benja would be as it were isolated amidst new ties; but when I pressed him for other reasons--for I am sure he had others--he would not give them; preferred not to discuss it, he said. He was--I could see that--for having the boy entirely away from her, but that is not to be thought of. I reflected a good deal on what he said, and have come to the conclusion that it may be as well there should be some clause inserted in the will that shall take absolute power from her, and hence I come to you."
"Your wife is kind to the boy?" asked Mr. St. John. "Pardon me the question, George."
"Very much so. When George was born, she showed some jealousy of the oldest boy, but all that has passed away. Benja was nearly drowned last November, and she was quite hysterical afterwards, crying and sobbing over him like a child. The nurse, a most faithful woman, thinks, I know, with Pym, but that's nothing."
"You wish me, in the event of the children being left fatherless, to ascertain whether the elder is well done by at the Hall, and is happy there. If not, I am to remove him? This is what you ask, as I understand it?"
"Precisely so. Should you, in your judgment, deem that Benja would be better elsewhere, take him away. I shall endow you with full power."
"But how am I to ascertain that?"
"In any way you please. Use any means that may suggest themselves. Go over and see for yourself, or send some suitable substitute, or question Honour----"
"Who is Honour?"
"Benja's nurse. She took to him when my poor Caroline died. My present wife does not seem strong; at least she has had one or two serious illnesses lately; and Pym says the care of the two boys is more than I ought to put upon her. Perhaps it would be."
"Why not at once leave Benja under another guardianship?"
"I should not like to do so. The world would regard it as a slight, a tacit want of confidence in my wife: and besides, in that case I should be divided as to whether to leave the Hall as a present residence to her or to Benja. I--mark me, Mr. St. John--I place full reliance upon my wife; I believe she will do her duty by Benja, and make him happy; and in that case there is no harm done. I am only providing for a contingency."
"I see. Well, I accept the charge, George, though it might be well that you should entrust it to a more active man."
"No, no; you and you only."
They continued talking together for the brief space George St. John had allotted for his stay. Little more was said on the one subject, for George quitted it somewhat abruptly, and they had other topics in common; family matters, news on either side, as is the case when relatives meet after a prolonged separation. At the appointed time he was driven back to Lexington in Mr. St. John's carriage, took the return train, and reached Alnwick about six in the evening.
His wife had sent the close carriage for him, fearing the night air. George St. John directed the coachman to drive round by Mr. Drake, the lawyer's; and when that gentleman came out to him he asked him to step up to the Hall on the morrow, on a little matter of business relative to an alteration in his recently-made will.
But Mr. St. John of Castle Wafer, pondering on these matters after his relative's departure, remained puzzled, and could by no means arrive at a satisfactory conclusion as to whether there was danger that Mrs. Carleton St. John might be cruel to Benja, after the fashion of the vindictive uncle of the "Babes in the Wood," or whether it was feared that she would kill him with kindness.
On a charming summer day in that favourite room whose windows overlooked the broad lands of Alnwick, sat Mrs. Carleton St. John in widow's weeds. Opposite to her, in mourning also, her travelling shawl unpinned and slipping from her slim, falling shoulders, her bonnet dusty, was Mrs. Darling, not five minutes arrived.
Changes had come to Alnwick, as these signs betrayed. Its master, so much loved and respected during life, was no more. In the month of May the deceitful, as poets have it, the crisis came for George Carleton St. John, and the Hall passed to another owner--the little boy too young to be conscious of his full loss, and whose chief idea connected with it was the black attire with which officious attendants hastened to invest him.
Death at the last was sudden, and Mrs. St. John was alone when it came. Her mother, Mrs. Darling, had gone abroad, and beyond a very brief note, just telling her of the event, Mrs. Darling received no direct news from her. She wrote letter after letter, for it was not convenient to return home immediately; but all the replies--when she received any--came from Prance. And Prance, who was in a degree in the confidence of Mrs. Darling, ventured to intimate that her mistress was "sulking," and much annoyed by the will.
The last item of intelligence stirred all the curiosity possessed by Mrs. Darling. It also troubled her. She was aware that George St. John had little actual property to bequeath to his wife--and George St. John's own private opinion had been that Mrs. Darling's opposition to his marriage with her daughter arose from that sole fact--but there were ways and means of remedying this; and now Mrs. Darling supposed they had not been taken. As soon as she was able, after June came in, she made arrangements for returning to England, and hastened down to Alnwick Hall.
But for the escutcheon on the outer walls, and the badge of widowhood worn by her daughter, Mrs. Darling might have thought things were as they had been--that no change had occurred. The windows were open, the sun was shining, the park was green and flourishing: even Charlotte was not changed. And Mrs. Darling scanned her with a critical eye.
"My dear, you are looking better than I hoped for."
"I am pretty well, mamma. I wish Prance would come in with Georgy!" she continued fretfully. "I want you to see him, he is so grown!"
"Dear little fellow! I was so sorry that I could not come over at the time, Charlotte, but----"
"It did not matter," interrupted Mrs. St. John, speaking quickly. "Indeed I think I was best alone. You know, mamma"--turning her deep eyes full upon her mother--"I was always given to being independent. How is Rose?"
"Oh, dear!" returned Mrs. Darling, with a groan, as if recalled to some very annoying subject. "Don't talk of Rose."
A half smile crossed the young widow's lips. "Has she been doing anything very dreadful?"
"No: but she is so rebellious."
"Rebellious!"
"At being kept at school. Mary Anne and Margaret fully expected she would break bounds and conceal herself on board the boat. We had sighted Folkestone before they felt any sort of assurance that she was not there."
"Did Mary Anne and Margaret come over with you?"
"Yes; I left them in London. Frank is expected."
"I think Frank might come down to see me!" said Mrs. St. John, haughtily.
"My dear, I am sure he will. But he cannot always get leave when he would."
There was a pause. Charlotte, cool, haughty, reserved, as she had ever been, even to her mother, turned to the window again, looking out for her little son. Mrs. Darling was burning to ask various particulars of things she wanted to know, but did not just now see her opportunity. She rose from her chair.
"I think I will go, Charlotte, and take off my travelling things. I am as dusty as I can be."
"Do so, mamma. Your old room. Prance will not be long."
Prance was entering the house even then: she had brought Georgy in the back way. There was a boisterous meeting; Mrs. St. John coming out to join in it. Georgy chattered, and shook his fair curls from his pink cheeks, and was altogether lovely. Mrs. Darling did not wonder at the faint cry of pain--that intense love, whose expression amounts to pain--with which his mother caught him to her heart.
"Where is Benja?" asked Mrs. Darling of Prance.
Oh, Master St. John would be coming in sometime, Prance supposed. Honour had begun with her insolence, as usual, so they parted company. And Mrs. Darling, as if she would ignore the words, made her way hastily towards the staircase, Prance following in attendance.
Mrs. Darling scarcely gave the woman time to close the chamber-door before she began to question her eagerly. Remember that Prance was, so far as Mrs. Darling was concerned, a confidential servant, and she imparted all she knew. Mrs. St. John was to remain at the Hall as Master St. John's guardian, with four thousand a-year.
"I heard the will read," said Prance. "Old Drake the lawyer came to us after they returned from the funeral, and said we were wanted in the large drawing-room. Mrs. St. John was there in her new mourning and her widow's cap; and she looked very cross and haughty as we filed in. The gentlemen who had gone to the funeral were there, and Dr. Graves, and Mr. Pym. I had the little one, and Honour came in with Master St. John----"
"Why do you call him Master St. John?--he was always called Master Benja," interrupted Mrs. Darling.
"He has been called so since that same time, ma'am," was the woman's answer. "A gruff old gentleman who was one of the mourners, upright and stiff as a backboard and yellow as gold--it was General Carleton, I believe--heard one of us call the boy Master Benja, and he spoke up very severely, saying he was not Master Benja, but Master St. John, and must be nothing else to us until he should be Sir Benjamin. The servants were quite taken to, and have called him Master St. John ever since."
"Well, go on."
"We found we had been called in to hear the will read. I did not understand it altogether; but I am quite certain that Mrs. St. John is to reside at the Hall and to be paid four thousand a-year as the heir's guardian. There was something I was unable to catch, through Master Georgy's being troublesome at the moment, about the four thousand being reduced to two if Master St. John went away. And, on the other hand, it is to be increased by two, whenever he comes into the title and the other estates. Which will make six thousand a-year."
"Then what did you mean, Prance, by sending me word that your mistress was annoyed at the terms of the will? Four thousand a-year now, and six in prospective! She cannot find fault with that. It is munificent."
"You may depend upon it, ma'am, that she is so," was the unhesitating reply of Prance. "She is very much annoyed at it, and she has shown it in her manner. It is some clause in the will that vexes her. That precious Honour----"
"Stay, Prance," interrupted Mrs. Darling. "How often have I warned you not to encourage this ill-feeling against Honour!"
"It's Honour's fault," promptly answered Prance.
"It is the fault of both of you," returned Mrs. Darling; "of the one as much as the other. It is a strange thing you cannot be at peace together! You will arouse jealousy between the two children next!"
"It never comes to open quarrelling between us," rejoined Prance. "But she's uncommonly aggravating."
"Be quiet, Prance! I desire once for all that there may be more pleasantness between you. It is a scandal that the two upper maids of the Hall should be ever at variance, and it's a thoroughly bad example for the children; and it's--youknowit's not well for your mistress. Mrs. St. John requires peace, not----"
Prance uttered an exclamation: it caused Mrs. Darling, who was looking into a bandbox at the time, to turn sharply. Mrs. St. John was standing there, behind the bed-curtains--to the startled lady's intense dismay. How much had she heard?
"Charlotte, my dear, I did not know you were there. I was just giving Prance a lecture upon this ill-feeling that seems always to be going on between her and Honour. Have you come to stay with me, child, whilst I unpack?" added Mrs. Darling, seeing that her daughter was seating herself comfortably in an easy-chair. "Then, Prance, I think you may go now."
But while she so spoke, Mrs. Darling was tormenting herself, as much as one of her easy disposition can do so, as to whether shehadcaught a word of her conversation with Prance--that part of it relating to money. There had been some noise in the room from the opening of drawers and moving of boxes, which must have prevented their hearing her come in. "I'll speak of it," thought Mrs. Darling. "It's better to take the bull by the horns and make the best of it, when one does get into these dilemmas."
She stole a glance at her daughter, while busily intent to all appearance in straightening the trimmings of a bonnet she had just taken out of a bandbox. Mrs. St. John looked cold and stern.Hadshe heard anything?
"Charlotte, my dear, I am so very anxious about you: as to how things are left, and all that. I dropped a remark to poor Prance, but she seems to think it is all right; that you are left well-off and remain here. These simple servants can't know much, of course. I am glad your husband made a just and proper will."
"He made an infamous will," cried the young widow, her cheeks flaming.
The words completely took Mrs. Darling aback, and she forgot to enlarge on the opinion she had just expressed of poor, simple Prance's imperfect knowledge. "An infamous will, Charlotte!" she exclaimed, "when you have the Hall and four thousand a-year."
"Itisinfamous. I am left dependent upon the heir."
"The heir! Do you mean Benja?"
"There's no other heir but he. Why did George leave me dependent upon him?"
"I don't quite understand you, my dear. In what way are you dependent upon Benja?"
"The four thousand a-year is paid to me as his guardian only,--as his guardian and Georgy's. I only remain at the Hall as Benja's guardian. It's all on sufferance."
"But, my dear, your husband had it not in his power to leave you comfortably off in any other manner. All the settlement he could make on you at your marriage--I really don't think it will amount to more than six hundred a-year--he did make. This, of course, is yours in addition; and it will be your child's after you."
"Think of the contrast," was the rejoinder; and Mrs. St. John's bosom heaved ominously, as if the wrong were almost too great to bear. "The one with his thousands upon thousands, his title, his state, everything that's high and mighty; the other, with his few poor hundreds and his obscurity."
"But, my dear Charlotte, there was no help for this. Benja was born to it, and Mr. Carleton could no more alter it than you could."
"It is not the less unjust."
"Unjust is not the right word. The law of entail may not be an equitable law, but Englishmen live under it, and must obey it. You should not blame your husband for this."
"I do not blame him for it."
"You blame his will, which is the same thing."
Mrs. St. John was leaning back, the broad lappets of her cap thrown from her face; her elbows rested on the arms of the chair, and she pressed the tips of her fingers nervously together. The slight storm had passed outwardly, and all her habitual coldness of manner had returned to her.
"Why did he add that codicil to it?"
"Was there a codicil? What was it? But I don't know what the will itself was, Charlotte."
"He had left the children under my exclusive guardianship. They were to reside at the Hall here with me, subject to their absences for education, and he willed that a sum of four thousand a-year should be paid to me."
"Well?" said Mrs. Darling, for she had stopped.
"That was in the will. But the codicil altered this, and Benja's residence with me is subject to the pleasure of Mr. Isaac St. John. He has it in his power to remove Benja from me if he sees fitting; and if Benja is so removed, two thousand of the four are to be withdrawn, and my allowance reduced thereby one half. Why did George do this? Why did he do it secretly, and never say a word to me about it?"
"I'm sure I don't know," said Mrs. Darling, who was revolving the news in her mind. "Benja to be removed from you at the pleasure of Isaac St. John? But is he not a helpless invalid?"
"Physically he may be next door to it, but he is all powerful as to Benja. This codicil was dated the day subsequent to a visit George paid Castle Wafer at the close of winter, a long time after the will was made. Isaac St. John must have put him up to it that day. I will pay him out, if I live."
"Well, I can't tell why he should have done it," cried Mrs. Darling, who felt altogether puzzled. "Hedoes not want the two thousand a-year; he is rich and an invalid. Did you question him of his motives, Charlotte? I should have done so."
"Question whom?--Isaac St. John? I have never seen him."
"Did he not come to the funeral?"
"No; he was too ill, they said. His brother came--handsome Fred. Mamma, IhateIsaac St. John."
"Hush, my dear. It is more than likely that he will never interfere with you. I have always heard him spoken of as one of the most just and honourable men breathing."
"I don't like it to have been done. I don't like the world to know that George could put so great a slight upon me. It is known everywhere. The servants know it. He desired that they should be present while the will was read. Did you ever hear of such a thing?"
"Your husband desired it?"
"He did; at least, Mr. Drake says so. When they were about to read the will, and I had come down into the drawing-room before them all, Mr. Drake said to me, 'I am going to call in the servants, with your permission; Mr. Carleton St. John desired me to do so.' I objected, but it was of no use; Mr. Drake appeared not to hear me; and I could not make a fuss at a moment like that. But now, mamma, don't you see the drift of all this?"
"N--o," said Mrs. Darling, gathering no idea of Charlotte's meaning.
"I do," said Charlotte, the keen look sometimes seen in them gleaming from her unfathomable eyes. "That will was read out to the servants on purpose that they might know they have it in their power to carry tales to Isaac St. John. I hate him! I hate him! But for him, I am sure my husband would have entrusted me absolutely with Benja. Who is so fitting to bring him up as I?"
"And I think you will bring him up, Charlotte. I don't understand all this that you are telling me; but I feel little doubt Isaac St. John will be all that is courteous and kind. Whilst you do your part by Benja, there can be no plea for removing him. Youwilldo it?"
"I shall do it, certainly;" and Mrs. St. John fully meant what she said; "I shall make no distinction between the boys. If Benja needs correcting, I shall correcthim. If Georgy needs correcting, I shall correct him. The thing's easy enough, and simple enough; and there was not the least need for interfering with me. What I dislike most, is George's having kept it from me."
"I dare say he did not think to mention it to you," said Mrs. Darling, soothingly; and it was notable that she was in the habit of smoothing things to her daughter always, as though she were afraid of her. "And you are quite right, my dear, not to make any difference between the children; your husband did not."
"Not outwardly, or in a general way. In his heart, though, he loved the one and not the other; and I love the other and not the one. Oh, Georgy! Georgy! if you were only the heir!"
"That's an unprofitable thought, Charlotte. Don't indulge it. Benja was the first-born."
"How can I help indulging it? Georgy ismyfirst-born, and it seems as a wrong done him--done to us both."
"My dear, where's the use of this? You married George Carleton St. John with your eyes open, in defiance of me. It is too late to repent now."
"I don't repent. I would marry him again tomorrow, though he had two heirs instead of one. But I can't help--I can't help----"
"What can't you help?"
"Never mind. The position is unalterable, and it is useless to dwell upon it. Mamma, I shall never speak of this again. If you want any other particulars of the will, you can get them from old Drake. Tell me now all about Rose and her rebellion. I have often thought I should like her to live here when she leaves school."
Why, Mrs. Darling could not have told; but she felt the greatest relief when Charlotte thus quitted the subject. It was next to impossible that any child could have been born with a disposition so jealous as had Charlotte Norris; and Mrs. Darling had been pleased, but for curtailing her income, that Benja should be removed from her. She had no fear that Charlotte would be unkind to him; systematically unkind she believed Charlotte would not be to any one; but, so long as the boy was with her, he must and would keep alive the jealousy she felt on Georgy's account. Two thousand a-year, however, in Mrs. Darlings estimation, was--two thousand a-year.
Willingly she turned to the topic named by Charlotte--her youngest, her troublesome, but most lovable daughter. And it is quite time, my reader, that you made her acquaintance also. To do which it will be necessary to cross the water.
You all know that crowded seaport town on the other side the water--Belport-on-the-Sea; and are therefore aware that its educational establishments, good, bad, and indifferent, are numerous. But I must ask you not to confound the one you are about to enter, Madame de Nino's, with any of those others, no matter what their merits may be. The small, select, and most costly establishment of Madame de Nino was of the very highest standing; it was intended solely for the reception of gentlemen's daughters--was really confined to them; and no pupil could be admitted to it without an undeniable introduction. It was perhaps the only French school to which anxious parents could confide a daughter free from doubt on the score of her associations: whatever her fellow-pupils might be in mind and manners, they were sure to be of gentle birth.
On that very same day that took Mrs. Darling down to Alnwick Hall on the visit to her widowed daughter, Madame de Nino's pupils were gathered in the large schoolroom. Class was over for the day, and the girls were tired enough. They hated Fridays. There was no dancing, no drawing, no walking; nothing but hard unbroken learning, writing, and practising.
Look at this class of elder girls, their ages varying from sixteen to twenty, sitting on a bench at the first-class table. Those in the middle sit very back, their spines crooked into a bow, those beyond them on either side sit rather forward, and the two end girls are turned, each sideways, an elbow on the desk; So that they form a semicircle. They are gossiping away in English, which is against the rules; but the teachers are also fatigued with the long and hot day, and do not pay attention. The studying for prizes had begun, and during that period the work was greatly augmented, both of pupils and teachers.
Look well at the three middle girls. We shall have little to do with the others, but a great deal with them. And they are noticeable besides, for two of them are beautiful, but so unlike in their beauty. The one is a very Hebe, with laughing blue eyes, brilliant complexion, and a shower of golden curls; and she is Mrs. Darling's youngest daughter, Rose. The other is Adeline de Castella, a name and face fit for a romance in history. She is graceful, charming, with dark-brown eyes and hair, and more exquisite features than were ever carved in marble. The third is Mary Carr, quiet and ladylike, whose good sense served to keep the wildness of Miss Rose Darling somewhat in check. For Rose was one of the wildest girls that had ever kept alive Madame de Nino's staid and most respectable school; wild, wilful, clever, careless; and vain as a peacock.
Had Rose been of a more sedate disposition, less given to random ways, Mrs. Darling might not have kept her at school so long, for Rose was eighteen. She was dreadfully rebellious over it, and perhaps the judiciousness of the measure, as a restriction, may be questioned. Mrs. Darling, by way of soothing the pill, allowed Rose to visit much; and when the girls came to this age Madame de Nino acquiesced in the parents' wishes, but Rose went out more than any previous pupil had ever been known to do. She had many friends sojourning in the town, and was courted on her own account, being excessively liked by every one.
Always in scrapes of one sort or another, or getting out of them, was she: and she had her own way in the school, andwouldhave it.
One of Miss Rose Darling's propensities was to be continually falling in love. Almost every time she went out, she would favour the envious girls, on her return, with a description of some fresh cavalier who had laid siege to her heart; for half her pleasure in the thing lay in these boasts to her companions. The last idea of the kind had prevailed longer than usual. A gentleman, whom she had only seen at church or in their walks, was the new gallant. Rose did not know his name, but he was very handsome, and she raved of him. The school called him herfiancé; not in the least to Rose's displeasure. On this evening, as you look at them, Rose is in a state of semi-explosion, because one of the other girls, Miss Caroline Davis, who had been fetched out that evening by her friends, was now telling Rose that she had seen this gentleman as she was being conducted back to Madame de Nino's.
"That comes of my being kept at school. Mamma ought to be punished. You be quiet, Mary Carr! I shall talk against my mother if I like. Where did you see him, Carry Davis?"
"In the Grand' Rue. He was strolling up it. My aunt bowed to him."
"I know he was watching for me! These horrid Friday evenings! I wish the school could take scarlet fever, or something of that sort, and then perhaps Madame might send us out every day! Your aunt must know him. Davis, if she bowed: didn't you ask his name?"
"No, I forgot to ask it."
"What an idiot you are! If I don't learn it in a day or two I shall go mad. He----"
"Hush!" whispered Caroline Davis. "See how those French are listening! They'll go and tell Mademoiselle that we are speaking English. There's a new pupil come in tonight," she added aloud, in the best French she could call up.
"Not a pupil," dissented Adeline de Castella. "She used to be a pupil, but is coming now on a sort of visit to Madame, during her mother's absence in England. They have been travelling lately in Italy."
"Who is she?" asked Rose. "What's her name?"
"Eleanor Seymour. Her mother is the Honourable Mrs. Seymour; she was the daughter of Lord Loftus," continued Adeline, who spoke English perfectly, and understood our grades of rank as well as we do. "Eleanor Seymour is one of the nicest girls I know; but I suppose she will not be Eleanor Seymour very long, for she is engaged to Mr. Marlborough."
"Who's Mr. Marlborough?" asked Rose again.
"I don't know him," said Adeline. "He is very rich, I believe; he is staying at Belport."
"Le souper, mesdemoiselles," called out Mademoiselle Henriette, the head-teacher.
As Adeline de Castella said, Eleanor's mother was the Honourable Mrs. Seymour and the daughter of Lord Loftus. Being this, Mrs. Seymour held her head higher, and was allowed to do it, than any one else in the Anglo-French watering-place, and prided herself on her "blood." It sometimes happens that where this "blood" predominates, other requisites are in scarcity; and it was so with Mrs. Seymour. She was so poor that she hardly knew how to live: her aristocratic relatives helped her out, and they had paid Eleanor's heavy school bills, and so she got along somehow. Her husband, Captain Seymour, dead this many a year ago, had been of even higher connections than herself; also poor. Lord Loftus had never forgiven his daughter for marrying the portionless young officer; and to be even with her, erased her name from his will. She was a tall, faded lady now, with a hooked nose and supercilious grey eyes.
When Eleanor left school--as accomplished a young lady as ever Madame de Nino's far-famed establishment turned out--she went on a visit to her aristocratic relatives on both sides, and then travelled to Italy and other places with her mother. This spring they had returned, having been away two years, and settled down in the old place. The tattlers said (and if you want tattle in perfection, go to any of these idle continental watering-places) that Eleanor would never get the opportunity of changing away the name of Seymour: men of rank would not be very likely to seek one situated as she was, and Mrs. Seymour would never allow Eleanor to marry any other. The battle was soon to come.
There came into Belport one day, on his road to Paris, a good-looking young fellow named George Marlborough. Mrs. Seymour was introduced to him at the house of a friend, and though she bowed (figuratively) to his personal attractions, she turned up her haughty nose afterwards when alone with Eleanor, and spoke of him contemptuously. One of the rich commoners of England, indeed! she slightingly said; she hated commoners, especially these rich ones, for they were apt to forget the broad gulf that lay between them and the aristocracy. The old Marlborough, Mr. George's father, had begun life as a clerk or a servant--she could not tell which, neither did it matter--and had plodded on, until he was the proprietor of an extensive trade, and of great wealth. Iron works, or coal works; or it might be cotton works; something down in the North, she believed; and this George, the eldest son, had been brought up to be an iron man too--if it was iron. She desired Eleanor to be very distant with him, if they met again: he had seemed inclined to talk to her.
Now poor Eleanor Seymour found this difficult to obey. Mr. George Marlborough remained in the town instead of going on to Paris, and was continually meeting Eleanor. She, poor girl, had not inherited her mother's exclusive notions; labour as Mrs. Seymour would, she had never been able to beat them into her; and Eleanor grew to like these meetings just as much as Mr. Marlborough did. It was the old tale--they fell in love with each other.
Mrs. Seymour, when the news was broken to her, lifted her haughty eyelids on George Marlborough, and expressed a belief that the world was coming to an end. It might not have been disclosed to her quite so soon, but that she was about to depart for England on a lengthened visit to an elder sister, from whom she cherished expectations, during which absence Eleanor was to be the guest of Madame de Nino. Mr. Marlborough, who had never once been admitted within Mrs. Seymour's house, took the opportunity of asking for an interview one evening that he had walked from the pier in attendance on them, by Eleanor's side. With a slight gesture of surprise, a movement of her drooping eyelids, the lady led the way to the drawing-room, and Eleanor escaped upstairs.
She sat in her own room, listening. About ten minutes elapsed--it seemed to Eleanor as many hours--and then the drawing-room bell was rung. Not loud and fast, as though her mother were in anger, but quietly. The next moment she heard Mr. Marlborough's step, as he was shown out of the house. Was he rejected? Eleanor thought so.
The bell rang sharply now, and a summons came for Eleanor. She trembled from head to foot as she went down.
"Eleanor!" began her mother, in her sternest tone, "you knew of this application to me?"
Eleanor could not deny it. She burst into frightened, agitated tears.
"The disgrace of having encouraged the addresses of an iron man! It is iron: he made no scruple of avowing it. Indeed, you may well cry! Look at his people--all iron too: do you think they are fit to mate with ours? His father was nothing but a working man, and has made himself what he is by actual labour, and the son didn't blush when he said it to me! Besides--I hope I may be forgiven for plotting and planning for you--but I have always hoped that you would become the wife of John Seymour."
"Hiswife," sobbed Eleanor. "Oh, mamma, John Seymour's nobody."
"Nobody!" echoed the indignant lady. "Lord John Seymour nobody!"
"But I don't like him, mother."
"Ugh!" growled Mrs. Seymour. "Listen. I have not accepted the proposals of this Mr. Marlborough; but I have not rejected them. I must say he seems liberal enough and rich enough; proposing I don't know what in the way of settlements: but these low-born people are often lavish. So now, if you have made up your mind to abandon your rank and your order, and every good that makes life valuable, and to enter a family who don't possess as much as a crest, you must do so. Mr. Marlborough obligingly assured me your happiness was centred in him."
Ah, what mattered the contempt of the tone, while that sweet feeling of joy diffused itself through Eleanor's heart?
"No reply now," continued Mrs. Seymour, sternly. "The decision lies with you; but I will not have you speak in haste. Take the night to reflect on the advantages you enjoy in your unblemished descent; reflect well before you take any step to sully it. Tomorrow you can announce your answer."
You need not ask what Eleanor's answer was. And so, when she entered on her visit at Madame de Nino's, she was an engaged girl; and the engagement was already known to the world.
Miss Seymour requested that she might be treated entirely as a pupil. She asked even to join the classes, laughingly saying to Madame de Nino that it would rub up what she had forgotten. She took her place in the schoolroom accordingly. Rose Darling saw a pale girl, with dark hair and a sweet countenance; and Rose criticized her mercilessly, as she did every one. Another of the schoolgirls, named Emma Mowbray, a surly, envious girl, whom no one liked, made ill-natured remarks on Eleanor. Miss Seymour certainly presented a contrast to some of them, with her beautifully arranged hair, her flowing muslin dress, and her delicate hands. Schoolgirls, as a whole, are careless of their appearanceinschool; and, as a rule, they have red hands. Madame de Nino's pupils were no exception. Rose was vain, and therefore always well-dressed; Adeline de Castella was always well-dressed; but Emma Mowbray and others were not. Emma's hands, too, were red and coarse, and more so than even those of the careless schoolgirls. Adeline's were naturally beautiful; and Rose took so much care of hers, wearing gloves in bed in winter, with some mysterious pomade inside.
Rose made little acquaintance with Eleanor that day. She, Rose, went out to tea in the afternoon, and came back very cross: for she had not once set eyes on herfiancé. The story was told to Eleanor Seymour; who sympathized with her of course, having a lover of her own.
The next day was Sunday. The French girls were conducted at ten o'clock to mass; the English would leave the house as usual for church a quarter before eleven. Rose was dressed and waiting long before; her impatience on Sunday mornings was great. Rose was in mourning, and a source of secret chagrin that fact was, for she liked gay clothes better than sombre ones.
"And so would you be worrying if you had some one waiting for you at the church as I have," retorted Rose, in answer to a remark on her restless impatience, which had been proffered to Miss Seymour by Emma Mowbray.
"Waiting for you?" returned Eleanor, looking at Rose, but not understanding.
"She means her lover, Miss Seymour," said Emma Mowbray.
"Yes, I do; and I don't care if I avow it," cried Rose, her face glowing. "I know he loves me. He never takes his eyes off me in church, and every glance speaks of love."
"He looks up at the other schools as much as he looks at ours," said Emma Mowbray, who could rarely speak without a sneer. "Besides, he only returns the glances you give him: love or no love, he would be a sorry gallant not to do that."
"Last Thursday," cried Rose, unmindful of the reproof, "he smiled and took off his hat to me as the school passed him in the street."
"But little Annette Duval said she saw you nod to him first!" said Charlotte Singleton, the archdeacon's daughter.
"Annette Duval's a miserable little story-teller. I'll box her ears when she comes in from mass. The fact is, Miss Seymour," added Rose, turning to the stranger who had come amidst them, "the girls here are all jealous of me, and Emma Mowbray doubly jealous. He is one of the divinest fellows that ever walked upon the earth. You should see his eyes and his auburn hair."
"With a tinge of red in it," put in Emma Mowbray.
"Well; you must point him out to me," said Eleanor, and then hastened to change the conversation, for she had an instinctive dread of any sort of quarrelling, and disliked ill-nature. Emma Mowbray had not favourably impressed her: Rose had, in spite of her vanity and her random avowals. "You are in mourning, Miss Darling?"
"Yes, for my eldest sister's husband, Mr. Carleton St. John. But I have a new white bonnet, you see, though he has not been dead many weeks: and I don't care whether mamma finds it out or not. I told the milliner she need not specify in the bill whether the bonnet was white or black. Oh dear! where is Mademoiselle Clarisse?"
Mademoiselle Clarisse, the teacher who took them to church (and who took also a book hidden under her own arm to read surreptitiously during the sermon, not a word of which discourse could her French ears understand) came at last. As the school took its seats in the gallery of the church, the few who were in Rose's secret looked down with interest, for the gentleman in question was then coming up the middle aisle, accompanied by a lady and a little girl.
"There he is!" whispered Rose to Eleanor, next to whom she sat, and her voice was as one glow of exultation, and her cheeks flushed crimson. "Going into the pew below. There: he is handing in the little girl. Do you see?"
"Yes," replied Eleanor. "What of him?"
"It is he. He whom the girls tease me about, myfiancé, as they call him, I trust my future husband. That he loves me, I am positive."
Eleanor answered nothing. Her face was as red as Rose's just then; but Rose was too much occupied with something else to notice it. The gentleman--who was really a handsome young man--was looking up at the gallery, and a bright smile of recognition, meant for one of them, shone on his face. Rose naturally took it to herself.
"Did you see that?didyou see that?" she whispered right and left. "Emma Mowbray, who took first notice now?"
The service began. At its conclusion Rose pushed unceremoniously out of the pew, and the rest followed her, in spite of precedent, for the schools waited until last; and in spite of Mademoiselle Clarisse. But, on the previous Sunday, Rose had been too late to see him: he had left the church. On this, as the event proved, she was too early, for he had not come out; and Mademoiselle Clarisse, who was in a terrible humour with them for their rudeness, marched them home at a quick pace.
"If ever truth and faith were in man, I know they are in him!" raved Rose, when they got home, and were in the dressing-room. "He'll make the best husband in the world."
"You have not got him yet," cried Emma Mowbray.
"Bah! Did you see the look and smile he gave me? Didyousee it, Miss Seymour?--and I don't suppose you are prejudiced against me as these others are. There was true love in that smile, if ever I saw love. That ugly Mademoiselle Clarisse, to have dragged us on so! I wish she had been taken with apoplexy on the steps! He---- Where's Miss Seymour gone to?" broke off Rose, for Eleanor had quitted the dressing-room without taking off her things.
"I heard her say she was invited to dine at Mrs. Marlborough's," answered Mary Carr.
"I say! there's the dinner-bell. Make haste, all of you! I wonder they don't ring it before we get home!"
That afternoon Madame de Nino conducted the girls to church herself. A truly good Catholic, as she was, she was no bigot, and now and then sat in the English church. The young ladies did not thank her. They were obliged to be on church-behaviour then: there could be no inattention with her; no staring about, however divine might be the male part of the congregation; no rushing out early or stopping late, according to their own pleasure. Rose's lover was not there, and Rose fidgeted on her seat; but just as the service began, the lady and little girl they had noticed in the morning came up the aisle, and he followed by the side of Eleanor Seymour. The girls did not dare to bend forward to look at Rose, Madame being there. The tip of her pretty nose, all that could be seen of her, was very pale.
"The forward creature! the deceitful good-for-nothing!" broke from Rose Darling's lips when they got home. "You girls have called me bold, but look at that brazen Eleanor Seymour! She never saw him until this morning: I pointed him out to her in church for the first time; and she must go and make acquaintance with him in this barefaced manner! As sure as she lives, I'll expose her to Madame de Nino! A girl like that would contaminate the school! If our friends knew we were exposed to her companionship, they'd remove----"
Rose's passionate words were cut short by the entrance of Madame herself, who came in to give some instructions to the teachers, for she was going out for the evening. Rose, too angry to weigh her words or their possible consequences, went up to Madame, and said something in a fast, confused tone. Madame de Nino, a portly, dark-eyed, kind woman, concluded her directions, and then turned to Rose, who was a favoured pupil.
"What do you say, Mademoiselle Rose? Did I see the gentleman who was at church with Miss Seymour? Yes; a very prepossessing young man. I spoke with him today when they came for her."
A moment's puzzled wonder, and then a frightful thought took hold of Rose.
"Do you know him, Madame?" she gasped. "Who is he?"
"Young Mr. Marlborough. Mademoiselle Eleanor is betrothed to him."
Madame left the room. And the girls sat breathless with astonishment, scarcely daring to steal a glance at Rose Darling's white and stony features.
The weeks went on to the sultry days of August, and most of the girls were studying away might and main for the prizes. A day-pupil had temporarily entered the school, Anna Marlborough, the youngest of the Marlborough family, and the only one who had come abroad with her mother. It was not Madame de Nino's habit to admit day-pupils, but she had made an exception in favour of this child, who was to be in the town but a few weeks.
Will it be credited that Rose Darling was still pursuing her preposterous flirtation with George Marlborough, in the face of the discovery that he was engaged to Eleanor Seymour? But there was something to be urged in her favour, though you are no doubt surprised to hear me say it. Had a jury been trying Rose, they might have returned a verdict, "Guilty, with extenuating circumstances." Rose seemed bewitched. There is no doubt that a real, an ardent passion for George Marlborough had arisen in her heart, filling its every crevice; and she regarded Eleanor (she could not help it) with a fierce, jealous rivalry. But the girl, with all her random folly, was no fool; and but for certain events that arose, might have remained as quiescent as she could, until her ill-starred love died out.
It did not, and could not, contribute to any good resolutions she might have had strength and sense to form, to find herself on intimate terms with Mr. Marlborough, a frequent visitor to his house.Thatmistake was, in the first instance, Eleanor Seymour's. Eleanor had been commissioned by Mrs. Marlborough to invite three or four of the young ladies to accompany her there to dinner; something was said in the school about her notdaringto ask Rose; and Eleanor invited Rose forthwith. Rose went. It had been more prudent had she stayed at home: but Rose was not one of the prudent sort: and the temptation was irresistible. Mrs. Marlborough was charmed with her, and so was George. Whether the gentleman detected Rose's feelings for himself, and was flattered, or whether he had no objection to a flirtation with a pretty girl, although engaged to another, certain it was he paid Rose considerable attention, and laughed and joked with her much.
Jokedwith her. It was all done on his part in the spirit of joking, as Eleanor Seymour might have seen; but joking sometimes leads to something more. Messages from one to the other, begun in folly, often passed; and Anna Marlborough, a giddy girl of twelve, was the go-between. Just upon this, Rose's brother, Captain Darling, came to Belport; he soon struck up a friendship with Mr. Marlborough, and here was another link in Rose's chain. She would meet the two young men in the street, and leave the ranks, in defiance of rules, ostensibly to shake hands with Frank, really to talk nonsense with Mr. Marlborough. Even Eleanor Seymour, when out with the school, would conform to its rules and only bow and smile as he passed. Not so Rose. The girls would have gone the length of the street, two sometimes, before she caught them up, panting and flushed and looking radiant, and boasting of what George had said to her. It was of no use the teachers remonstrating and forbidding; do it she would, and do it she did.
This was what may be called the open, harmless stage of the affair. But it was to go on to another.
There was a large party given one night at a Scotch laird's, Sir Sandy Maxwell, and Miss Seymour and Rose were invited. You may be aware, perhaps, that it is the custom in French schools, generally speaking, for the pupils to visit or not, according to the directions left by the parents. This had been accorded to Rose by Mrs. Darling; and Eleanor Seymour was not as a schoolgirl--therefore Madame de Nino, though openly expressing her disapprobation of these large parties while young ladies were pursuing their studies, did not refuse. Emma Mowbray offered a bet to the school that Mr. Marlborough would dance more dances with Rose than with Eleanor; and so eager were the girls to hear the result, that those in the largedortoirkept awake until they came home. It had struck one o'clock, and Madame was up in arms; she had only given them to half-past eleven, and they had kept the coach waiting all that time, while Madame's own maid, old Félicité, was inside it. After all, there was nothing to hear, for Mr. Marlborough had not made his appearance at the party.
Class was not over the next morning until very late; it always was late just before giving the prizes. It was the third Thursday in August, thesortiday, and three of the girls were going with Eleanor to dine at Mrs. Marlborough's: Rose, Mary Carr, and Adeline de Castella. The invitations were left to Miss Seymour, and she always fixed on Rose, in a sort of bravado, but she never once chose Emma Mowbray; and this gave that young lady considerable offence, as was known to the school. They were to partake of the usual dinner at school by way of luncheon, the Marlboroughs not dining until six. While the cloth was being laid, the girls dispersed about, some in the courtyard, some in the garden, all in the shade, for it was very sultry. There was certainly something more than common the matter with Rose: she appeared half-crazy with joy.
"It is because she's going out," remarked Mary Carr to Eleanor.
"Is it, though!" put in Emma Mowbray; "that's only a little item in the cause. She has just had a love-letter from Mr. Marlborough."
Eleanor Seymour's cheek changed.
"Don't talk absurdities," said Mary Carr to the Mowbray girl.
"Absurdities!" she retorted, moving away. "If I can, I'll convince you."
A minute or two, and she came back with a letter in her hand--an open letter, addressed in George Marlborough's hand to Rose--and handed it to Mary Carr.
"Am I to read it?" asked the latter.
"If you choose. It ispro bono publico, Rose says." And Miss Carr read the letter aloud.