And so our adventure ended with the man of the gold ornaments. I was sorry that I had spoken English before him so heedlessly, and resolved that I would never be guilty of such gaucherie again. But, then, who would think that a Spanish bull-fighter would talk a foreign language? I was sorry, also, that I had torn his coat; it had looked so awkward; and sorry again that I had offered the man money. Altogether I was a little ashamed of myself; but I had too much to look forward to at Seville to allow any heaviness to remain long at my heart; and before I had arrived at the marvellous city I had forgotten both him and his buttons.
Nothing could be nicer than the way in which I was welcomed at Mr. Daguilar’s house, or more kind—I may almost say affectionate—than Maria’s manner to me. But it was too affectionate; and I am not sure that I should not have liked my receptionbetter had she been more diffident in her tone, and less inclined to greet me with open warmth. As it was, she again gave me her cheek to kiss, in her father’s presence, and called me dear John, and asked me specially after some rabbits which I had kept at home merely for a younger sister; and then it seemed as though she were in no way embarrassed by the peculiar circumstances of our position. Twelve months since I had asked her to be my wife, and now she was to give me an answer; and yet she was as assured in her gait, and as serenely joyous in her tone, as though I were a brother just returned from college. It could not be that she meant to refuse me, or she would not smile on me and be so loving; but I could almost have found it in my heart to wish that she would. “It is quite possible,” said I to myself, “that I may not be found so ready for this family bargain. A love that is to be had like a bale of goods is not exactly the love to suit my taste.” But then, when I met her again in the morning, I could no more have quarrelled with her than I could have flown.
I was inexpressibly charmed with the whole city, and especially with the house in which Mr. Daguilar lived. It opened from the corner of a narrow, unfrequented street—a corner like an elbow—and, as seen from the exterior, there was nothing prepossessing to recommend it; but the outer door led by a short hall or passage to an inner door or grille, made of open ornamental iron-work, and through that we entered a court, or patio, as they called it. Nothing could be more lovely or deliciously cool than was this small court. The building on each side was covered by trellis-work; and beautiful creepers, vines, and parasite flowers, now in the full magnificence of the early summer, grew up and clustered round the windows. Every inch of wall was covered, so that none of the glaring whitewash wounded the eye, In the four corners of the patio were four large orange-trees, covered with fruit. I would not say a word in special praise of these, remembering that childish promise she had made on my behalf. In the middle of the court there was a fountain, and round about on the marble floor there were chairs, and here and there a small table, as though the space were really a portion of the house. It was here that we used to take our cup of coffee and smoke our cigarettes, I and old Mr. Daguilar, while Maria sat by, not only approving, but occasionally rolling for me the thin paper round the fragrant weed with her taper fingers. Beyond the patio was an open passage or gallery, filled also with flowers in pots; and then, beyond this, one entered the drawing-room of the house.It was by no means a princely palace or mansion, fit for the owner of untold wealth. The rooms were not over large nor very numerous; but the most had been made of a small space, and everything had been done to relieve the heat of an almost tropical sun.
“It is pretty, is it not?” she said, as she took me through it.
“Very pretty,” I said. “I wish we could live in such houses.”
“Oh, they would not do at all for dear old fat, cold, cozy England. You are quite different, you know, in everything from us in the south; more phlegmatic, but then so much steadier. The men and the houses are all the same.”
I can hardly tell why, but even this wounded me. It seemed to me as though she were inclined to put into one and the same category things English, dull, useful, and solid; and that she was disposed to show a sufficient appreciation for such necessaries of life, though she herself had another and inner sense—a sense keenly alive to the poetry of her own southern clime; and that I, as being English, was to have no participation in this latter charm. An English husband might do very well, the interests of the firm might make such an arrangement desirable, such a mariage de convenance—so I argued to myself—might be quite compatible with—with heaven only knows what delights of super-terrestial romance, from which I, as being an English thick-headed lump of useful coarse mortality, was to be altogether debarred. She had spoken to me of oranges, and having finished the survey of the house, she offered me some sweet little cakes. It could not be that of such things were the thoughts which lay undivulged beneath the clear waters of those deep black eyes—undivulged to me, though no one else could have so good a right to read those thoughts! It could not be that that noble brow gave index of a mind intent on the trade of which she spoke so often! Words of other sort than any that had been vouchsafed to me must fall at times from the rich curves of that perfect mouth.
So felt I then, pining for something to make me unhappy. Ah, me! I know all about it now, and am content. But I wish that some learned pundit would give us a good definition of romance, would describe in words that feeling with which our hearts are so pestered when we are young, which makes us sigh for we know not what, and forbids us to be contented with what God sends us. We invest female beauty with impossible attributes, and are angry because our women have not the spiritualisedsouls of angels, anxious as we are that they should also be human in the flesh. A man looks at her he would love as at a distant landscape in a mountainous land. The peaks are glorious with more than the beauty of earth and rock and vegetation. He dreams of some mysterious grandeur of design which tempts him on under the hot sun, and over the sharp rock, till he has reached the mountain goal which he had set before him. But when there, he finds that the beauty is well-nigh gone, and as for that delicious mystery on which his soul had fed, it has vanished for ever.
I know all about it now, and am, as I said, content. Beneath those deep black eyes there lay a well of love, good, honest, homely love, love of father and husband and children that were to come—of that love which loves to see the loved ones prospering in honesty. That noble brow—for it is noble; I am unchanged in that opinion, and will go unchanged to my grave—covers thoughts as to the welfare of many, and an intellect fitted to the management of a household, of servants, namely, and children, and perchance a husband. That mouth can speak words of wisdom, of very useful wisdom—though of poetry it has latterly uttered little that was original. Poetry and romance! They are splendid mountain views seen in the distance. So let men be content to see them, and not attempt to tread upon the fallacious heather of the mystic hills.
In the first week of my sojourn in Seville I spoke no word of overt love to Maria, thinking, as I confess, to induce her thereby to alter her mode of conduct to myself. “She knows that I have come here to make love to her—to repeat my offer; and she will at any rate be chagrined if I am slow to do so.” But it had no effect. At home my mother was rather particular about her table, and Maria’s greatest efforts seemed to be used in giving me as nice dinners as we gave her. In those days I did not care a straw about my dinner, and so I took an opportunity of telling her. “Dear me,” said she, looking at me almost with grief, “do you not? What a pity! And do you not like music either?” “Oh, yes, I adore it,” I replied. I felt sure at the time that had I been born in her own sunny clime, she would never have talked to me about eating. But that was my mistake.
I used to walk out with her about the city, seeing all that is there of beauty and magnificence. And in what city is there more that is worth the seeing? At first this was very delightful to me, for I felt that I was blessed with a privilege that would not be granted to any other man. But its value soon fell in myeyes, for others would accost her, and walk on the other side, talking to her in Spanish, as though I hardly existed, or were a servant there for her protection. And I was not allowed to take her arm, and thus to appropriate her, as I should have done in England. “No, John,” she said, with the sweetest, prettiest smile, “we don’t do that here; only when people are married.” And she made this allusion to married life out, openly, with no slightest tremor on her tongue.
“Oh, I beg pardon,” said I, drawing back my hand, and feeling angry with myself for not being fully acquainted with all the customs of a foreign country.
“You need not beg pardon,” said she; “when we were in England we always walked so. It is just a custom, you know.” And then I saw her drop her large dark eyes to the ground, and bow gracefully in answer to some salute.
I looked round, and saw that we had been joined by a young cavalier,—a Spanish nobleman, as I saw at once; a man with jet black hair, and a straight nose, and a black moustache, and patent leather boots, very slim and very tall, and—though I would not confess it then—uncommonly handsome. I myself am inclined to be stout, my hair is light, my nose broad, I have no hair on my upper lip, and my whiskers are rough and uneven. “I could punch your head though, my fine fellow,” said I to myself, when I saw that he placed himself at Maria’s side, “and think very little of the achievement.”
The wretch went on with us round the plaza for some quarter of an hour talking Spanish with the greatest fluency, and she was every whit as fluent. Of course I could not understand a word that they said. Of all positions that a man can occupy, I think that that is about the most uncomfortable; and I cannot say that, even up to this day, I have quite forgiven her for that quarter of an hour.
“I shall go in,” said I, unable to bear my feelings, and preparing to leave her. “The heat is unendurable.”
“Oh dear, John, why did you not speak before?” she answered. “You cannot leave me here, you know, as I am in your charge; but I will go with you almost directly.” And then she finished her conversation with the Spaniard, speaking with an animation she had never displayed in her conversations with me.
It had been agreed between us for two or three days before this, that we were to rise early on the following morning for the sake of ascending the tower of the cathedral, and visiting theGiralda, as the iron figure is called, which turns upon a pivot on the extreme summit. We had often wandered together up and down the long dark gloomy aisle of the stupendous building, and had, together, seen its treasury of art; but as yet we had not performed the task which has to be achieved by all visitors to Seville; and in order that we might have a clear view over the surrounding country, and not be tormented by the heat of an advanced sun, we had settled that we would ascend the Giralda before breakfast.
And now, as I walked away from the plaza towards Mr. Daguilar’s house, with Maria by my side, I made up my mind that I would settle my business during this visit to the cathedral. Yes, and I would so manage the settlement that there should be no doubt left as to my intentions and my own ideas. I would not be guilty of shilly-shally conduct; I would tell her frankly what I felt and what I thought, and would make her understand that I did not desire her hand if I could not have her heart. I did not value the kindness of her manner, seeing that that kindness sprung from indifference rather than passion; and so I would declare to her. And I would ask her, also, who was this young man with whom she was intimate—for whom all her volubility and energy of tone seemed to be employed? She had told me once that it behoved her to consult a friend in Seville as to the expediency of her marriage with me. Was this the friend whom she had wished to consult? If so, she need not trouble herself. Under such circumstances I should decline the connection! And I resolved that I would find out how this might be. A man who proposes to take a woman to his bosom as his wife, has a right to ask for information—ay, and to receive it too. It flashed upon my mind at this moment that Donna Maria was well enough inclined to come to me as my wife, but——. I could hardly define the “buts” to myself, for there were three or four of them. Why did she always speak to me in a tone of childish affection, as though I were a schoolboy home for the holidays? I would have all this out with her on the tower on the following morning, standing under the Giralda.
On that morning we met together in the patio, soon after five o’clock, and started for the cathedral. She looked beautiful, with her black mantilla over her head, and with black gloves on, and her black morning silk dress—beautiful, composed, and at her ease, as though she were well satisfied to undertake this early morning walk from feelings of good nature—sustained, probably, by some under-current of a deeper sentiment. Well;I would know all about it before I returned to her father’s house.
There hardly stands, as I think, on the earth, a building more remarkable than the cathedral of Seville, and hardly one more grand. Its enormous size; its gloom and darkness; the richness of ornamentation in the details, contrasted with the severe simplicity of the larger outlines; the variety of its architecture; the glory of its paintings; and the wondrous splendour of its metallic decoration, its altar-friezes, screens, rails, gates, and the like, render it, to my mind, the first in interest among churches. It has not the coloured glass of Chartres, or the marble glory of Milan, or such a forest of aisles as Antwerp, or so perfect a hue in stone as Westminster, nor in mixed beauty of form and colour does it possess anything equal to the choir of Cologne; but, for combined magnificence and awe-compelling grandeur, I regard it as superior to all other ecclesiastical edifices.
It is its deep gloom with which the stranger is so greatly struck on his first entrance. In a region so hot as the south of Spain, a cool interior is a main object with the architect, and this it has been necessary to effect by the exclusion of light; consequently the church is dark, mysterious, and almost cold. On the morning in question, as we entered, it seemed to be filled with gloom, and the distant sound of a slow footstep here and there beyond the transept inspired one almost with awe. Maria, when she first met me, had begun to talk with her usual smile, offering me coffee and a biscuit before I started. “I never eat biscuit,” I said, with almost a severe tone, as I turned from her. That dark, horrid man of the plaza—would she have offered him a cake had she been going to walk with him in the gloom of the morning? After that little had been spoken between us. She walked by my side with her accustomed smile; but she had, as I flattered myself, begun to learn that I was not to be won by a meaningless good nature. “We are lucky in our morning for the view!” that was all she said, speaking with that peculiarly clear, but slow pronunciation which she had assumed in learning our language.
We entered the cathedral, and, walking the whole length of the aisle, left it again at the porter’s porch at the farther end. Here we passed through a low door on to the stone flight of steps, and at once began to ascend. “There are a party of your countrymen up before us,” said Maria; “the porter says that they went through the lodge half an hour since.” “I hope they will return before we are on the top,” said I, bethinking myself of the task that was before me. And indeed my heartwas hardly at ease within me, for that which I had to say would require all the spirit of which I was master.
The ascent to the Giralda is very long and very fatiguing; and we had to pause on the various landings and in the singular belfry in order that Miss Daguilar might recruit her strength and breath. As we rested on one of these occasions, in a gallery which runs round the tower below the belfry, we heard a great noise of shouting, and a clattering of sticks among the bells. “It is the party of your countrymen who went up before us,” said she. “What a pity that Englishmen should always make so much noise!” And then she spoke in Spanish to the custodian of the bells, who is usually to be found in a little cabin up there within the tower. “He says that they went up shouting like demons,” continued Maria; and it seemed to me that she looked as though I ought to be ashamed of the name of an Englishman. “They may not be so solemn in their demeanour as Spaniards,” I answered; “but, for all that, there may be quite as much in them.”
We then again began to mount, and before we had ascended much farther we passed my three countrymen. They were young men, with gray coats and gray trousers, with slouched hats, and without gloves. They had fair faces and fair hair, and swung big sticks in their hands, with crooked handles. They laughed and talked loud, and, when we met them, seemed to be racing with each other; but nevertheless they were gentlemen. No one who knows by sight what an English gentleman is, could have doubted that; but I did acknowledge to myself that they should have remembered that the edifice they were treading was a church, and that the silence they were invading was the cherished property of a courteous people.
“They are all just the same as big boys,” said Maria. The colour instantly flew into my face, and I felt that it was my duty to speak up for my own countrymen. The word “boys” especially wounded my ears. It was as a boy that she treated me; but, on looking at that befringed young Spanish Don—who was not, apparently, my elder in age—she had recognised a man. However, I said nothing further till I reached the summit. One cannot speak with manly dignity while one is out of breath on a staircase.
“There, John,” she said, stretching her hands away over the fair plain of the Guadalquivir, as soon as we stood against the parapet; “is not that lovely?”
I would not deign to notice this. “Maria,” I said, “I think, that you are too hard upon my countrymen?”
“Too hard! no; for I love them. They are so good and industrious; and they come home to their wives, and take care of their children. But why do they make themselves so—so—what the French call gauche?”
“Good and industrious, and come home to their wives!” thought I. “I believe you hardly understand us as yet,” I answered. “Our domestic virtues are not always so very prominent; but, I believe, we know how to conduct ourselves as gentlemen: at any rate, as well as Spaniards.” I was very angry—not at the faults, but at the good qualities imputed to us.
“In affairs of business, yes,” said Maria, with a look of firm confidence in her own opinion—that look of confidence which she has never lost, and I pray that she may never lose it while I remain with her—“but in the little intercourses of the world, no! A Spaniard never forgets what is personally due either to himself or his neighbours. If he is eating an onion, he eats it as an onion should be eaten.”
“In such matters as that he is very grand, no doubt,” said I, angrily.
“And why should you not eat an onion properly, John? Now, I heard a story yesterday from Don —— about two Englishmen, which annoyed me very much.” I did not exactly catch the name of the Don in question, but I felt through every nerve in my body that it was the man who had been talking to her on the plaza.
“And what have they done?” said I. “But it is the same everywhere. We are always abused; but, nevertheless, no people are so welcome. At any rate, we pay for the mischief we do.” I was angry with myself the moment the words were out of my mouth, for, after all, there is no feeling more mean than that pocket-confidence with which an Englishman sometimes swaggers.
“There was no mischief done in this case,” she answered. “It was simply that two men have made themselves ridiculous for ever. The story is all about Seville, and, of course, it annoys me that they should be Englishmen.”
“And what did they do?”
“The Marquis D’Almavivas was coming up to Seville in the boat, and they behaved to him in the most outrageous manner. He is here now, and is going to give a series of fêtes. Of course he will not ask a single Englishman.”
“We shall manage to live, even though the Marquis D’Almavivas may frown upon us,” said I, proudly.
“He is the richest, and also the best of our noblemen,” continued Maria; “and I never heard of anything so absurd as what they did to him. It made me blush when Don —— told me.” Don Tomàs, I thought she said.
“If he be the best of your noblemen, how comes it that he is angry because he has met two vulgar men? It is not to be supposed that every Englishman is a gentleman.”
“Angry! Oh, no! he was not angry; he enjoyed the joke too much for that. He got completely the best of them, though they did not know it; poor fools! How would your Lord John Russell behave if two Spaniards in an English railway carriage were to pull him about and tear his clothes?”
“He would give them in charge to a policeman, of course,” said I, speaking of such a matter with the contempt it deserved.
“If that were done here your ambassador would be demanding national explanations. But Almavivas did much better;—he laughed at them without letting them know it.”
“But do you mean that they took hold of him violently, without any provocation? They must have been drunk.”
“Oh, no, they were sober enough. I did not see it, so I do not quite know exactly how it was, but I understand that they committed themselves most absurdly, absolutely took hold of his coat and tore it, and—; but they did such ridiculous things that I cannot tell you.” And yet Don Tomàs, if that was the man’s name, had been able to tell her, and she had been able to listen to him.
“What made them take hold of the marquis?” said I.
“Curiosity, I suppose,” she answered. “He dresses somewhat fancifully, and they could not understand that any one should wear garments different from their own.” But even then the blow did not strike home upon me.
“Is it not pretty to look down upon the quiet town?” she said, coming close up to me, so that the skirt of her dress pressed me, and her elbow touched my arm. Now was the moment I should have asked her how her heart stood towards me; but I was sore and uncomfortable, and my destiny was before me. She was willing enough to let these English faults pass by without further notice, but I would not allow the subject to drop.
“I will find out who these men were,” said I, “and learn the truth of it. When did it occur?”
“Last Thursday, I think he said.”
“Why, that was the day we came up in the boat, Johnsonand myself. There was no marquis there then, and we were the only Englishmen on board.”
“It was on Thursday, certainly, because it was well known in Seville that he arrived on that day. You must have remarked him because he talks English perfectly—though, by-the-bye, these men would go on chattering before him about himself as though it were impossible that a Spaniard should know their language. They are ignorant of Spanish, and they cannot bring themselves to believe that any one should be better educated than themselves.”
Now the blow had fallen, and I straightway appreciated the necessity of returning immediately to Clapham, where my family resided, and giving up for ever all idea of Spanish connections. I had resolved to assert the full strength of my manhood on that tower, and now words had been spoken which left me weak as a child. I felt that I was shivering, and did not dare to pronounce the truth which must be made known. As to speaking of love, and signifying my pleasure that Don Tomàs should for the future be kept at a distance, any such effort was quite beyond me. Had Don Tomàs been there, he might have walked off with her from before my face without a struggle on my part. “Now I remember about it,” she continued, “I think he must have been in the boat on Thursday.”
“And now that I remember,” I replied, turning away to hide my embarrassment, “he was there. Your friend down below in the plaza seems to have made out a grand story. No doubt he is not fond of the English, There was such a man there, and I did take hold——”
“Oh, John, was it you?”
“Yes, Donna Maria, it was I; and if Lord John Russell were to dress himself in the same way——” But I had no time to complete my description of what might occur under so extravagantly impossible a combination of circumstances, for as I was yet speaking, the little door leading out on to the leads of the tower was opened, and my friend, the mayo of the boat, still bearing all his gewgaws on his back, stepped up on to the platform. My eye instantly perceived that the one pendule was still missing from his jacket. He did not come alone, but three other gentlemen followed him, who, however, had no peculiarities in their dress. He saw me at once, and bowed and smiled; and then observing Donna Maria, he lifted his cap from his head, and addressing himself to her in Spanish, began to converse with her as though she were an old friend.
“Señor,” said Maria, after the first words of greeting had been spoken between them; “you must permit me to present to you my father’s most particular friend, and my own,—Mr. Pomfret; John, this is the Marquis D’Almavivas.”
I cannot now describe the grace with which this introduction was effected, or the beauty of her face as she uttered the word. There was a boldness about her as though she had said, “I know it all—the whole story. But, in spite of that you must take him on my representation, and be gracious to him in spite of what he has done. You must be content to do that; or in quarrelling with him you must quarrel with me also.” And it was done at the spur of the moment—without delay. She, who not five minutes since had been loudly condemning the unknown Englishman for his rudeness, had already pardoned him, now that he was known to be her friend; and had determined that he should be pardoned by others also or that she would share his disgrace. I recognised the nobleness of this at the moment; but, nevertheless, I was so sore that I would almost have preferred that she should have disowned me.
The marquis immediately lifted his cap with his left hand while he gave me his right. “I have already had the pleasure of meeting this gentleman,” he said; “we had some conversation in the boat together.”
“Yes,” said I, pointing to his rent, “and you still bear the marks of our encounter.”
“Was it not delightful, Donna Maria,” he continued, turning to her; “your friend’s friend took me for a torero?”
“And it served you properly, señor,” said Donna Maria, laughing; “you have no right to go about with all those rich ornaments upon you.”
“Oh! quite properly; indeed, I make no complaint; and I must beg your friend to understand, and his friend also, how grateful I am for their solicitude as to my pecuniary welfare. They were inclined to be severe on me for being so extravagant in such trifles. I was obliged to explain that I had no wife at home kept without her proper allowance of dresses, in order that I might be gay.”
“They are foreigners, and you should forgive their error,” said she.
“And in token that I do so,” said the marquis, “I shall beg your friend to accept the little ornament which attracted his attention.” And so saying, he pulled the identical button out of his pocket, and gracefully proffered it to me.
“I shall carry it about with me always,” said I, accepting it, “as a memento of humiliation. When I look at it, I shall ever remember the folly of an Englishman and the courtesy of a Spaniard;” and as I made the speech I could not but reflect whether it might, under any circumstances, be possible that Lord John Russell should be induced to give a button off his coat to a Spaniard.
There were other civil speeches made, and before we left the tower the marquis had asked me to his parties, and exacted from me an unwilling promise that I would attend them. “The señora,” he said, bowing again to Maria, “would, he was sure, grace them. She had done so on the previous year; and as I had accepted his little present I was bound to acknowledge him as my friend.” All this was very pretty, and of course I said that I would go, but I had not at that time the slightest intention of doing so. Maria had behaved admirably; she had covered my confusion, and shown herself not ashamed to own me, delinquent as I was; but, not the less, had she expressed her opinion, in language terribly strong, of the awkwardness of which I had been guilty, and had shown almost an aversion to my English character. I should leave Seville as quickly as I could, and should certainly not again put myself in the way of the Marquis D’Almavivas. Indeed, I dreaded the moment that I should be first alone with her, and should find myself forced to say something indicative of my feelings—to hear something also indicative of her feelings. I had come out this morning resolved to demand my rights and to exercise them—and now my only wish was to run away. I hated the marquis, and longed to be alone that I might cast his button from me. To think that a man should be so ruined by such a trifle!
We descended that prodigious flight without a word upon the subject, and almost without a word at all. She had carried herself well in the presence of Almavivas, and had been too proud to seem ashamed of her companion; but now, as I could well see, her feelings of disgust and contempt had returned. When I begged her not to hurry herself, she would hardly answer me; and when she did speak, her voice was constrained and unlike herself. And yet how beautiful she was! Well, my dream of Spanish love must be over. But I was sure of this; that having known her, and given her my heart, I could never afterwards share it with another.
We came out at last on the dark, gloomy aisle of the cathedral, and walked together without a word up along the side of thechoir, till we came to the transept. There was not a soul near us, and not a sound was to be heard but the distant, low pattering of a mass, then in course of celebration at some far-off chapel in the cathedral. When we got to the transept Maria turned a little, as though she was going to the transept door, and then stopped herself. She stood still; and when I stood also, she made two steps towards me, and put her hand on my arm. “Oh, John!” she said.
“Well,” said I; “after all it does not signify. You can make a joke of it when my back is turned.”
“Dearest John!”—she had never spoken to me in that way before—“you must not be angry with me. It is better that we should explain to each other, is it not?
“Oh, much better. I am very glad you heard of it at once. I do not look at it quite in the same light that you do; but nevertheless——”
“What do you mean? But I know you are angry with me. And yet you cannot think that I intended those words for you. Of course I know now that there was nothing rude in what passed.”
“Oh, but there was.”
“No, I am sure there was not. You could not be rude though you are so free hearted. I see it all now, and so does the marquis. You will like him so much when you come to know him. Tell me that you won’t be cross with me for what I have said. Sometimes I think that I have displeased you, and yet my whole wish has been to welcome you to Seville, and to make you comfortable as an old friend. Promise me that you will not be cross with me.”
Cross with her! I certainly had no intention of being cross, but I had begun to think that she would not care what my humour might be. “Maria,” I said, taking hold of her hand.
“No, John, do not do that. It is in the church, you know.”
“Maria, will you answer me a question?”
“Yes,” she said, very slowly, looking down upon the stone slabs beneath our feet.
“Do you love me?”
“Love you!”
“Yes, do you love me? You were to give me an answer here, in Seville, and now I ask for it. I have almost taught myself to think that it is needless to ask; and now this horrid mischance——”
“What do you mean?” said she, speaking very quickly,“Why this miserable blunder about the marquis’s button! After that I suppose——”
“The marquis! Oh, John, is that to make a difference between you and me?—a little joke like that?”
“But does it not?”
“Make a change between us!—such a thing as that! Oh, John!”
“But tell me, Maria, what am I to hope? If you will say that you can love me, I shall care nothing for the marquis. In that case I can bear to be laughed at.”
“Who will dare to laugh at you? Not the marquis, whom I am sure you will like.”
“Your friend in the plaza, who told you of all this.”
“What, poor Tomàs!”
“I do not know about his being poor. I mean the gentleman who was with you last night.”
“Yes, Tomàs. You do not know who he is?”
“Not in the least.”
“How droll! He is your own clerk—partly your own, now that you are one of the firm. And, John, I mean to make you do something for him; he is such a good fellow; and last year he married a young girl whom I love—oh, almost like a sister.”
Do something for him! Of course I would. I promised, then and there, that I would raise his salary to any conceivable amount that a Spanish clerk could desire; which promise I have since kept, if not absolutely to the letter, at any rate, to an extent which has been considered satisfactory by the gentleman’s wife.
“But, Maria—dearest Maria——”
“Remember, John, we are in the church; and poor papa will be waiting breakfast.”
I need hardly continue the story further. It will be known to all that my love-suit throve in spite of my unfortunate raid on the button of the Marquis D’Almavivas, at whose series of fêtes through that month I was, I may boast, an honoured guest. I have since that had the pleasure of entertaining him in my own poor house in England, and one of our boys bears his Christian name.
From that day in which I ascended the Giralda to this present day in which I write, I have never once had occasion to complain of a deficiency of romance either in Maria Daguilar or in Maria Pomfret.
Thereis nothing so melancholy as a country in its decadence, unless it be a people in their decadence. I am not aware that the latter misfortune can be attributed to the Anglo-Saxon race in any part of the world; but there is reason to fear that it has fallen on an English colony in the island of Jamaica.
Jamaica was one of those spots on which fortune shone with the full warmth of all her noonday splendour. That sun has set;—whether for ever or no none but a prophet can tell; but as far as a plain man may see, there are at present but few signs of a coming morrow, or of another summer.
It is not just or proper that one should grieve over the misfortunes of Jamaica with a stronger grief because her savannahs are so lovely, her forests so rich, her mountains so green, and her rivers so rapid; but it is so. It is piteous that a land so beautiful should be one which fate has marked for misfortune. Had Guiana, with its flat, level, unlovely soil, become poverty-stricken, one would hardly sorrow over it as one does sorrow for Jamaica.
As regards scenery she is the gem of the western tropics. It is impossible to conceive spots on the earth’s surface more gracious to the eye than those steep green valleys which stretch down to the south-west from the Blue Mountain peak towards the sea; and but little behind these in beauty are the rich wooded hills which in the western part of the island divide the counties of Hanover and Westmoreland. The hero of the tale which I am going to tell was a sugar-grower in the latter district, and the heroine was a girl who lived under that Blue Mountain peak.
The very name of a sugar-grower as connected with Jamaica savours of fruitless struggle, failure, and desolation. And from his earliest growth fruitless struggle, failure, and desolation had been the lot of Maurice Cumming. At eighteen years of age hehad been left by his father sole possessor of the Mount Pleasant estate, than which in her palmy days Jamaica had little to boast of that was more pleasant or more palmy. But those days had passed by before Roger Cumming, the father of our friend, had died.
These misfortunes coming on the head of one another, at intervals of a few years, had first stunned and then killed him. His slaves rose against him, as they did against other proprietors around him, and burned down his house and mills, his homestead and offices. Those who know the amount of capital which a sugar-grower must invest in such buildings will understand the extent of this misfortune. Then the slaves were emancipated. It is not perhaps possible that we, now-a-days, should regard this as a calamity; but it was quite impossible that a Jamaica proprietor of those days should not have done so. Men will do much for philanthropy, they will work hard, they will give the coat from their back;—nay the very shirt from their body; but few men will endure to look on with satisfaction while their commerce is destroyed.
But even this Mr. Cumming did bear after a while, and kept his shoulder to the wheel. He kept his shoulder to the wheel till that third misfortune came upon him—till the protection duty on Jamaica sugar was abolished. Then he turned his face to the wall and died.
His son at this time was not of age, and the large but lessening property which Mr. Cumming left behind him was for three years in the hands of trustees. But nevertheless Maurice, young as he was, managed the estate. It was he who grew the canes, and made the sugar;—or else failed to make it. He was the “massa” to whom the free negroes looked as the source from whence their wants should be supplied, notwithstanding that, being free, they were ill inclined to work for him, let his want of work be ever so sore.
Mount Pleasant had been a very large property. In addition to his sugar-canes Mr. Cumming had grown coffee; for his land ran up into the hills of Trelawney to that altitude which in the tropics seems necessary for the perfect growth of the coffee berry. But it soon became evident that labour for the double produce could not be had, and the coffee plantation was abandoned. Wild brush and the thick undergrowth of forest reappeared on the hill-sides which had been rich with produce. And the evil re-created and exaggerated itself. Negroes squatted on the abandoned property; and being able to live with abundance fromtheir stolen gardens, were less willing than ever to work in the cane pieces.
And thus things went from bad to worse. In the good old times Mr. Cumming’s sugar produce had spread itself annually over some three hundred acres; but by degrees this dwindled down to half that extent of land. And then in those old golden days they had always taken a full hogshead from the acre;—very often more. The estate had sometimes given four hundred hogsheads in the year. But in the days of which we now speak the crop had fallen below fifty.
At this time Maurice Cumming was eight-and-twenty, and it is hardly too much to say that misfortune had nearly crushed him. But nevertheless it had not crushed him. He, and some few like him, had still hoped against hope; had still persisted in looking forward to a future for the island which once was so generous with its gifts. When his father died he might still have had enough for the wants of life had he sold his property for what it would fetch. There was money in England, and the remains of large wealth. But he would not sacrifice Mount Pleasant or abandon Jamaica; and now after ten years’ struggling he still kept Mount Pleasant, and the mill was still going; but all other property had parted from his hands.
By nature Maurice Cumming would have been gay and lively, a man with a happy spirit and easy temper; but struggling had made him silent if not morose, and had saddened if not soured his temper. He had lived alone at Mount Pleasant, or generally alone. Work or want of money, and the constant difficulty of getting labour for his estate, had left him but little time for a young man’s ordinary amusements. Of the charms of ladies’ society he had known but little. Very many of the estates around him had been absolutely abandoned, as was the case with his own coffee plantation, and from others men had sent away their wives and daughters. Nay, most of the proprietors had gone themselves, leaving an overseer to extract what little might yet be extracted out of the property. It too often happened that that little was not sufficient to meet the demands of the overseer himself.
The house at Mount Pleasant had been an irregular, low-roofed, picturesque residence, built with only one floor, and surrounded on all sides by large verandahs. In the old days it had always been kept in perfect order, but now this was far from being the case. Few young bachelors can keep a house in order, but no bachelor young or old can do so under such a doom as that ofMaurice Cumming. Every shilling that Maurice Cumming could collect was spent in bribing negroes to work for him. But bribe as he would the negroes would not work. “No, massa; me pain here; me no workee to-day,” and Sambo would lay his fat hand on his fat stomach.
I have said that he lived generally alone. Occasionally his house on Mount Pleasant was enlivened by visits of an aunt, a maiden sister of his mother, whose usual residence was at Spanish Town. It is or should be known to all men that Spanish Town was and is the seat of Jamaica legislature.
But Maurice was not over fond of his relative. In this he was both wrong and foolish, for Miss Sarah Jack—such was her name—was in many respects a good woman, and was certainly a rich woman. It is true that she was not a handsome woman, nor a fashionable woman, nor perhaps altogether an agreeable woman. She was tall, thin, ungainly, and yellow. Her voice, which she used freely, was harsh. She was a politician and a patriot. She regarded England as the greatest of countries, and Jamaica as the greatest of colonies. But much as she loved England she was very loud in denouncing what she called the perfidy of the mother to the brightest of her children. And much as she loved Jamaica she was equally severe in her taunts against those of her brother-islanders who would not believe that the island might yet flourish as it had flourished in her father’s days.
“It is because you and men like you will not do your duty by your country,” she had said some score of times to Maurice—not with much justice considering the laboriousness of his life.
But Maurice knew well what she meant. “What could I do there up at Spanish Town,” he would answer, “among such a pack as there are there? Here I may do something.”
And then she would reply with the full swing of her eloquence, “It is because you and such as you think only of yourself and not of Jamaica, that Jamaica has come to such a pass as this. Why is there a pack there as you call them in the honourable House of Assembly? Why are not the best men in the island to be found there, as the best men in England are to be found in the British House of Commons? A pack, indeed! My father was proud of a seat in that house, and I remember the day, Maurice Cumming, when your father also thought it no shame to represent his own parish. If men like you, who have a stake in the country, will not go there, of course the house is filled with men who have no stake. If they are a pack, it is you who send them there;—you, and others like you.”
All had its effect, though at the moment Maurice would shrug his shoulders and turn away his head from the torrent of the lady’s discourse. But Miss Jack, though she was not greatly liked, was greatly respected. Maurice would not own that she convinced him; but at last he did allow his name to be put up as candidate for his own parish, and in due time he became a member of the honourable House of Assembly in Jamaica.
This honour entails on the holder of it the necessity of living at or within reach of Spanish Town for some ten weeks towards the close of every year. Now on the whole face of the uninhabited globe there is perhaps no spot more dull to look at, more Lethean in its aspect, more corpse-like or more cadaverous than Spanish Town. It is the head-quarters of the government, the seat of the legislature, the residence of the governor;—but nevertheless it is, as it were, a city of the very dead.
Here, as we have said before, lived Miss Jack in a large forlorn ghost-like house in which her father and all her family had lived before her. And as a matter of course Maurice Cumming when he came up to attend to his duties as a member of the legislature took up his abode with her.
Now at the time of which we are specially speaking he had completed the first of these annual visits. He had already benefited his country by sitting out one session of the colonial parliament, and had satisfied himself that he did no other good than that of keeping away some person more objectionable than himself. He was however prepared to repeat this self-sacrifice in a spirit of patriotism for which he received a very meagre meed of eulogy from Miss Jack, and an amount of self-applause which was not much more extensive.
“Down at Mount Pleasant I can do something,” he would say over and over again, “but what good can any man do up here?”
“You can do your duty,” Miss Jack would answer, “as others did before you when the colony was made to prosper.” And then they would run off into a long discussion about free labour and protective duties. But at the present moment Maurice Cumming had another vexation on his mind over and above that arising from his wasted hours at Spanish Town, and his fruitless labours at Mount Pleasant. He was in love, and was not altogether satisfied with the conduct of his lady-love.
Miss Jack had other nephews besides Maurice Cumming, and nieces also, of whom Marian Leslie was one. The family of the Leslies lived up near Newcastle—in the mountains, that is, whichstand over Kingston—at a distance of some eighteen miles from Kingston, but in a climate as different from that of the town as the climate of Naples is from that of Berlin. In Kingston the heat is all but intolerable throughout the year, by day and by night, in the house and out of it. In the mountains round Newcastle, some four thousand feet above the sea, it is merely warm during the day, and cool enough at night to make a blanket desirable.
It is pleasant enough living up amongst those green mountains. There are no roads there for wheeled carriages, nor are there carriages with or without wheels. All journeys are made on horseback. Every visit paid from house to house is performed in this manner. Ladies young and old live before dinner in their riding-habits. The hospitality is free, easy, and unembarrassed. The scenery is magnificent. The tropical foliage is wild and luxuriant beyond measure. There may be enjoyed all that a southern climate has to offer of enjoyment, without the penalties which such enjoyments usually entail.
Mrs. Leslie was a half-sister of Miss Jack, and Miss Jack had been a half-sister also of Mrs. Cumming; but Mrs. Leslie and Mrs. Cumming had in no way been related. And it had so happened that up to the period of his legislative efforts Maurice Cumming had seen nothing of the Leslies. Soon after his arrival at Spanish Town he had been taken by Miss Jack to Shandy Hall, for so the residence of the Leslies was called, and having remained there for three days, had fallen in love with Marian Leslie. Now in the West Indies all young ladies flirt; it is the first habit of their nature—and few young ladies in the West Indies were more given to flirting, or understood the science better than Marian Leslie.
Maurice Cumming fell violently in love, and during his first visit at Shandy Hall found that Marian was perfection—for during this first visit her propensities were exerted altogether in his own favour. That little circumstance does make such a difference in a young man’s judgment of a girl! He came back full of admiration, not altogether to Miss Jack’s dissatisfaction; for Miss Jack was willing enough that both her nephew and her niece should settle down into married life.
But then Maurice met his fair one at a governor’s ball—at a ball where red coats abounded, and aides-de-camp dancing in spurs, and narrow-waisted lieutenants with sashes or epaulettes! The aides-de-camp and narrow-waisted lieutenants waltzed better than he did; and as one after the other whisked round the ball-roomwith Marian firmly clasped in his arms, Maurice’s feelings were not of the sweetest. Nor was this the worst of it. Had the whisking been divided equally among ten, he might have forgiven it; but there was one specially narrow-waisted lieutenant, who towards the end of the evening kept Marian nearly wholly to himself. Now to a man in love, who has had but little experience of either balls or young ladies, this is intolerable.
He only met her twice after that before his return to Mount Pleasant, and on the first occasion that odious soldier was not there. But a specially devout young clergyman was present, an unmarried, evangelical, handsome young curate fresh from England; and Marian’s piety had been so excited that she had cared for no one else. It appeared moreover that the curate’s gifts for conversion were confined, as regarded that opportunity, to Marian’s advantage. “I will have nothing more to say to her,” said Maurice to himself, scowling. But just as he went away Marian had given him her hand, and called him Maurice—for she pretended that they were cousins—and had looked into his eyes and declared that she did hope that the assembly at Spanish Town would soon be sitting again. Hitherto, she said, she had not cared one straw about it. Then poor Maurice pressed the little fingers which lay within his own, and swore that he would be at Shandy Hall on the day before his return to Mount Pleasant. So he was; and there he found the narrow-waisted lieutenant, not now bedecked with sash and epaulettes, but lolling at his ease on Mrs. Leslie’s sofa in a white jacket, while Marian sat at his feet telling his fortune with a book about flowers.
“Oh, a musk rose, Mr. Ewing; you know what a musk rose means!” Then, she got up and shook hands with Mr. Cumming; but her eyes still went away to the white jacket and the sofa. Poor Maurice had often been nearly broken-hearted in his efforts to manage his free black labourers; but even that was easier than managing such as Marian Leslie.
Marian Leslie was a Creole—as also were Miss Jack and Maurice Cumming—a child of the tropics; but by no means such a child as tropical children are generally thought to be by us in more northern latitudes. She was black-haired and black-eyed, but her lips were as red and her cheeks as rosy as though she had been born and bred in regions where the snow lies in winter. She was a small, pretty, beautifully made little creature, somewhat idle as regards the work of the world, but active and strong enough when dancing or riding were required from her.Her father was a banker, and was fairly prosperous in spite of the poverty of his country. His house of business was at Kingston, and he usually slept there twice a week; but he always resided at Shandy Hall, and Mrs. Leslie and her children knew but very little of the miseries of Kingston. For be it known to all men, that of all towns Kingston, Jamaica, is the most miserable.
I fear that I shall have set my readers very much against Marian Leslie;—much more so than I would wish to do. As a rule they will not know how thoroughly flirting is an institution in the West Indies—practised by all young ladies, and laid aside by them when they marry, exactly as their young-lady names and young-lady habits of various kinds are laid aside. All I would say of Marian Leslie is this, that she understood the working of the institution more thoroughly than others did. And I must add also in her favour that she did not keep her flirting for sly corners, nor did her admirers keep their distance till mamma was out of the way. It mattered not to her who was present. Had she been called on to make one at a synod of the clergy of the island, she would have flirted with the bishop before all his priests. And there have been bishops in the colony who would not have gainsayed her!
But Maurice Cumming did not rightly calculate all this; nor indeed did Miss Jack do so as thoroughly as she should have done, for Miss Jack knew more about such matters than did poor Maurice. “If you like Marian, why don’t you marry her?” Miss Jack had once said to him; and this coming from Miss Jack, who was made of money, was a great deal.
“She wouldn’t have me,” Maurice had answered.
“That’s more than you know or I either,” was Miss Jack’s reply. “But if you like to try, I’ll help you.”
With reference to this, Maurice as he left Miss Jack’s residence on his return to Mount Pleasant, had declared that Marian Leslie was not worth an honest man’s love.
“Psha!” Miss Jack replied; “Marian will do like other girls. When you marry a wife I suppose you mean to be master?”
“At any rate I shan’t marry her,” said Maurice. And so he went his way back to Hanover with a sore heart. And no wonder, for that was the very day on which Lieutenant Ewing had asked the question about the musk rose.
But there was a dogged constancy of feeling about Maurice which could not allow him to disburden himself of his love.When he was again at Mount Pleasant among his sugar-canes and hogsheads he could not help thinking about Marian. It is true he always thought of her as flying round that ball-room in Ewing’s arms, or looking up with rapt admiration into that young parson’s face; and so he got but little pleasure from his thoughts. But not the less was he in love with her;—not the less, though he would swear to himself three times in the day that for no earthly consideration would he marry Marian Leslie.
The early months of the year from January to May are the busiest with a Jamaica sugar-grower, and in this year they were very busy months with Maurice Cumming. It seemed as though there were actually some truth in Miss Jack’s prediction that prosperity would return to him if he attended to his country; for the prices of sugar had risen higher than they had ever been since the duty had been withdrawn, and there was more promise of a crop at Mount Pleasant than he had seen since his reign commenced. But then the question of labour? How he slaved in trying to get work from those free negroes; and alas! how often he slaved in vain! But it was not all in vain; for as things went on it became clear to him that in this year he would, for the first time since he commenced, obtain something like a return from his land. What if the turning-point had come, and things were now about to run the other way.
But then the happiness which might have accrued to him from this source was dashed by his thoughts of Marian Leslie. Why had he thrown himself in the way of that syren? Why had he left Mount Pleasant at all? He knew that on his return to Spanish Town his first work would be to visit Shandy Hall; and yet he felt that of all places in the island, Shandy Hall was the last which he ought to visit.
And then about the beginning of May, when he was hard at work turning the last of his canes into sugar and rum, he received his annual visit from Miss Jack. And whom should Miss Jack bring with her but Mr. Leslie.
“I’ll tell you what it is,” said Miss Jack; “I have spoken to Mr. Leslie about you and Marian.”
“Then you had no business to do anything of the kind,” said Maurice, blushing up to his ears.
“Nonsense,” replied Miss Jack, “I understand what I am about. Of course Mr. Leslie will want to know something about the estate.”
“Then he may go back as wise as he came, for he’ll learn nothing from me. Not that I have anything to hide.”
“So I told him. Now there are a large family of them, you see; and of course he can’t give Marian much.”
“I don’t care a straw if he doesn’t give her a shilling. If she cared for me, or I for her, I shouldn’t look after her for her money.”
“But a little money is not a bad thing, Maurice,” said Miss Jack, who in her time had had a good deal, and had managed to take care of it.
“It is all one to me.”
“But what I was going to say is this—hum—ha—. I don’t like to pledge myself for fear I should raise hopes which mayn’t be fulfilled.”
“Don’t pledge yourself to anything, aunt, in which Marian Leslie and I are concerned.”
“But what I was going to say is this; my money, what little I have, you know, must go some day either to you or to the Leslies.”
“You may give all to them if you please.”
“Of course I may, and I dare say I shall,” said Miss Jack, who was beginning to be irritated. “But at any rate you might have the civility to listen to me when I am endeavouring to put you on your legs. I am sure I think about nothing else, morning, noon, and night, and yet I never get a decent word from you. Marian is too good for you; that’s the truth.”
But at length Miss Jack was allowed to open her budget, and to make her proposition; which amounted to this—that she had already told Mr. Leslie that she would settle the bulk of her property conjointly on Maurice and Marian if they would make a match of it. Now as Mr. Leslie had long been casting a hankering eye after Miss Jack’s money, with a strong conviction however that Maurice Cumming was her favourite nephew and probable heir, this proposition was not unpalatable. So he agreed to go down to Mount Pleasant and look about him.
“But you may live for the next thirty years, my dear Miss Jack,” Mr. Leslie had said.
“Yes, I may,” Miss Jack replied, looking very dry.
“And I am sure I hope you will,” continued Mr. Leslie. And then the subject was allowed to drop; for Mr. Leslie knew that it was not always easy to talk to Miss Jack on such matters.
Miss Jack was a person in whom I think we may say that the good predominated over the bad. She was often morose, crabbed, and self-opinionated; but then she knew her own imperfections, and forgave those she loved for evincing their dislike of them.Maurice Cumming was often inattentive to her, plainly showing that he was worried by her importunities and ill at ease in her company. But she loved her nephew with all her heart; and though she dearly liked to tyrannise over him, never allowed herself to be really angry with him, though he so frequently refused to bow to her dictation. And she loved Marian Leslie also, though Marian was so sweet and lovely and she herself so harsh and ill-favoured. She loved Marian, though Marian would often be impertinent. She forgave the flirting, the light-heartedness, the love of amusement. Marian, she said to herself, was young and pretty. She, Miss Jack, had never known Marian’s temptation. And so she resolved in her own mind that Marian should be made a good and happy woman;—but always as the wife of Maurice Cumming.
But Maurice turned a deaf ear to all these good tidings—or rather he turned to them an ear that seemed to be deaf. He dearly, ardently loved that little flirt; but seeing that she was a flirt, that she had flirted so grossly when he was by, he would not confess his love to a human being. He would not have it known that he was wasting his heart for a worthless little chit, to whom every man was the same—except that those were most eligible whose toes were the lightest and their outside trappings the brightest. That he did love her he could not help, but he would not disgrace himself by acknowledging it.
He was very civil to Mr. Leslie, but he would not speak a word that could be taken as a proposal for Marian. It had been part of Miss Jack’s plan that the engagement should absolutely be made down there at Mount Pleasant, without any reference to the young lady; but Maurice could not be induced to break the ice. So he took Mr. Leslie through his mills and over his cane-pieces, talked to him about the laziness of the “niggers,” while the “niggers” themselves stood by tittering, and rode with him away to the high grounds where the coffee plantation had been in the good old days; but not a word was said between them about Marian. And yet Marian was never out of his heart.
And then came the day on which Mr. Leslie was to go back to Kingston. “And you won’t have her then?” said Miss Jack to her nephew early that morning. “You won’t be said by me?”
“Not in this matter, aunt.”
“Then you will live and die a poor man; you mean that, I suppose?”
“It’s likely enough that I shall. There’s this comfort, at anyrate, I’m used to it.” And then Miss Jack was silent again for a while.
“Very well, sir; that’s enough,” she said angrily. And then she began again. “But, Maurice, you wouldn’t have to wait for my death, you know.” And she put out her hand and touched his arm, entreating him as it were to yield to her. “Oh, Maurice,” she said, “I do so want to make you comfortable. Let us speak to Mr. Leslie.”
But Maurice would not. He took her hand and thanked her, but said that on this matter he must be his own master. “Very well, sir,” she exclaimed, “I have done. In future you may manage for yourself. As for me, I shall go back with Mr. Leslie to Kingston.” And so she did. Mr. Leslie returned that day, taking her with him. When he took his leave, his invitation to Maurice to come to Shandy Hall was not very pressing. “Mrs. Leslie and the children will always be glad to see you,” said he.
“Remember me very kindly to Mrs. Leslie and the children,” said Maurice. And so they parted.
“You have brought me down here on a regular fool’s errand,” said Mr. Leslie, on their journey back to town.
“It will all come right yet,” replied Miss Jack. “Take my word for it he loves her.”
“Fudge,” said Mr. Leslie. But he could not afford to quarrel with his rich connection.
In spite of all that he had said and thought to the contrary, Maurice did look forward during the remainder of the summer to his return to Spanish Town with something like impatience. It was very dull work, being there alone at Mount Pleasant; and let him do what he would to prevent it, his very dreams took him to Shandy Hall. But at last the slow time made itself away, and he found himself once more in his aunt’s house.
A couple of days passed and no word was said about the Leslies. On the morning of the third day he determined to go to Shandy Hall. Hitherto he had never been there without staying for the night; but on this occasion he made up his mind to return the same day. “It would not be civil of me not to go there,” he said to his aunt.
“Certainly not,” she replied, forbearing to press the matter further. “But why make such a terrible hard day’s work of it?”
“Oh, I shall go down in the cool, before breakfast; and then I need not have the bother of taking a bag.”
And in this way he started. Miss Jack said nothing further; but she longed in her heart that she might be at Marian’s elbow unseen during the visit.
He found them all at breakfast, and the first to welcome him at the hall door was Marian. “Oh, Mr. Cumming, we are so glad to see you;” and she looked into his eyes with a way she had, that was enough to make a man’s heart wild. But she did not call him Maurice now.
Miss Jack had spoken to her sister, Mrs. Leslie, as well as to Mr. Leslie, about this marriage scheme. “Just let them alone,” was Mrs. Leslie’s advice. “You can’t alter Marian by lecturing her. If they really love each other they’ll come together; and if they don’t, why then they’d better not.”
“And you really mean that you’re going back to Spanish Town to-day?” said Mrs. Leslie to her visitor.
“I’m afraid I must. Indeed I haven’t brought my things with me.” And then he again caught Marian’s eye, and began to wish that his resolution had not been so sternly made.
“I suppose you are so fond of that House of Assembly,” said Marian, “that you cannot tear yourself away for more than one day. You’ll not be able, I suppose, to find time to come to our picnic next week?”
Maurice said he feared that he should not have time to go to a picnic.
“Oh, nonsense,” said Fanny—one of the younger girls—“you must come. We can’t do without him, can we?”
“Marian has got your name down the first on the list of the gentlemen,” said another.
“Yes; and Captain Ewing’s second,” said Bell, the youngest.
“I’m afraid I must induce your sister to alter her list,” said Maurice, in his sternest manner. “I cannot manage to go, and I’m sure she will not miss me.”
Marian looked at the little girl who had so unfortunately mentioned the warrior’s name, and the little girl knew that she had sinned.
“Oh, we cannot possibly do without you; can we, Marian?” said Fanny. “It’s to be at Bingley’s Dell, and we’ve got a bed for you at Newcastle; quite near, you know.”
“And another for——” began Bell, but she stopped herself.
“Go away to your lessons, Bell,” said Marian. “You know how angry mamma will be at your staying here all the morning;” and poor Bell with a sorrowful look left the room.
“We are all certainly very anxious that you should come;very anxious for a great many reasons,” said Marian, in a voice that was rather solemn, and as though the matter were one of considerable import. “But if you really cannot, why of course there is no more to be said.”
“There will be plenty without me, I am sure.”
“As regards numbers, I dare say there will; for we shall have pretty nearly the whole of the two regiments;” and Marian as she alluded to the officers spoke in a tone which might lead one to think that she would much rather be without them; “but we counted on you as being one of ourselves; and as you had been away so long, we thought—we thought—,” and then she turned away her face, and did not finish her speech. Before he could make up his mind as to his answer she had risen from her chair, and walked out of the room. Maurice almost thought that he saw a tear in her eye as she went.
He did ride back to Spanish Town that afternoon, after an early dinner; but before he went Marian spoke to him alone for one minute.
“I hope you are not offended with me,” she said.
“Offended! oh no; how could I be offended with you?”
“Because you seem so stern. I am sure I would do anything I could to oblige you, if I knew how. It would be so shocking not to be good friends with a cousin like you.”
“But there are so many different sorts of friends,” said Maurice.
“Of course there are. There are a great many friends that one does not care a bit for,—people that one meets at balls and places like that—”
“And at picnics,” said Maurice.
“Well, some of them there too; but we are not like that; are we?”
What could Maurice do but say, “no,” and declare that their friendship was of a warmer description? And how could he resist promising to go to the picnic, though as he made the promise he knew that misery would be in store for him? He did promise, and then she gave him her hand and called him Maurice.
“Oh! I am so glad,” she said. “It seemed so shocking that you should refuse to join us. And mind and be early, Maurice; for I shall want to explain it all. We are to meet, you know, at Clifton Gate at one o’clock, but do you be a little before that, and we shall be there.”
Maurice Cumming resolved within his own breast as he rode back to Spanish Town, that if Marian behaved to him all thatday at the picnic as she had done this day at Shandy Hall, he would ask her to be his wife before he left her.
And Miss Jack also was to be at the picnic.
“There is no need of going early,” said she, when her nephew made a fuss about the starting. “People are never very punctual at such affairs as that; and then they are always quite long enough.” But Maurice explained that he was anxious to be early, and on this occasion he carried his point.
When they reached Clifton Gate the ladies were already there; not in carriages, as people go to picnics in other and tamer countries; but each on her own horse or her own pony. But they were not alone. Beside Miss Leslie was a gentleman, whom Maurice knew as Lieutenant Graham, of the flag-ship at Port Royal; and at a little distance which quite enabled him to join in the conversation was Captain Ewing, the lieutenant with the narrow waist of the previous year.