Lady Mabel kept him waiting some time, purposely, for delay was now her policy. Soon, however, he heard her talking in the next room, and the abrupt and crabbed tones of the voice which answered her, betrayed Moodie in one of his objecting and protesting moods. Lady Mabel was giving sundry injunctions to an unwilling agent. At length the old Scotch grieve, like one of his own ill-conditioned steers, would neither lead nor drive; for when she bid him to put the clock back an hour, he flatly refused, calling it acting a lie, as the wily Gibeonites did to Joshua.
"Or as Jacob and Rebecca did to blind old Isaac," Lady Mabel suggested; but even the example of the patriarch could not move him, and Lady Mabel had to make time move backward with her own hand.
At length she entered the room radiant with beauty and with smiles, for Moodie's obstinacy had not ruffled her in the least. She was so sorry to have kept Colonel L'Isle waiting, and so much afraid he would have to wait a while longer, as the old Lisbon coach and the mules, with their harness, were not put together so speedily, as the London turn-out of a fashionable lady. "I am to blame," she continued, "for not having looked to it before, for Antonio Lobo, my impromptu postillion, is less skilled in the management of my vehicle, than of the olive trees among which he has lived until he has taken the color of their ripe fruit."
To fill up the time she now asked L'Isle's opinion of her dress, seeing him eye it with some surprise. Turning gracefully about and showing it off to him from different points of view, she told him that, as a last compliment to her Elvas friends, she had, for once, adopted their costume.
"Improved upon it, rather," said L'Isle, for she had not closely followed the local costume where it did not please her. Then running on, from one lively topic to another, she amused L'Isle so successfully that he felt it to be an interruption when the footman came in to say that the coach was ready. After depositing her guitar in state, on a pile of music, on the front seat, L'Isle at length found himself beside Lady Mabel in this venerable vehicle, long used to bear a noble burden, having belonged to a Portuguese Marquis, who on the first approach of Junot's invading horde, had run off to Brazil, leaving his coach, his estate, his country, and perhaps his honor behind him. Slow and dignified, as became its character, was its progress up the hill of Elvas; for one pair of the team of mules which had brought it from Lisbon, had returned to their duty in the quartermaster's department, and their comrades, left to their own unaided efforts, found the coach almost as hard to handle as a nine-pounder. But in the dove-like, billing and cooing humor in which L'Isle was, time flew on the wings of the carrier-pigeon, and they arrived at Mrs. Shortridge's house too soon for him, though all the guests, but themselves, were there already. Two or three score of Portuguese, most of them ladies, and nearly as many English officers filled the rooms.
Some of these gentlemen looked surprised at seeing L'Isle, thinking he had already left Elvas. Lieutenant Goring, who was showing off his tall lithe person and dragoon uniform to the best advantage, beside his short and sturdy friend, Captain Hatton, seemed annoyed at L'Isle's presence, and Hatton shared his feelings. L'Isle stood in the way of their paying court to Lady Mabel, and Goring, at least, had reckoned on his absence.
"I had hoped," said he, "that we were rid of the Colonel for once. He is an abominable monopolist."
"He is so," said Hatton, "for Lady Mabel's smiles belong to the brigade."
"And the light dragoons quartered with it," interjected Goring. "But here he is, basking in the sunshine, and keeping us shivering in the shade, when he ought to be on the road to Alcantara. Sir Rowland is expecting him. Major Conway seemed quite anxious that he should be there betimes in the morning, and, doubtless, had some good reason for it.
"Why do you not give him a hint?" asked Hatton, "perhaps he has forgotten it."
"He is your colonel, and the hint would come better from you."
"Thank you," said Hatton. "But in our regiment, it is contrary to the etiquette to hint to the colonel that he is neglecting his duty."
"But it seems," said Goring, "that the rule does not apply to the brigade. The major tells me that L'Isle has freely censured my lord's remissness, and urged him to enforce more stringent discipline."
"How did my lord take it?"
"Like a slap in the face," answered Goring. "At least he treated it as a great piece of presumption, and L'Isle was thoroughly angered at the rough answer he got. Indeed, Conway thinks that there is nothing but ill blood between them."
"That does not look much like it," said Hatton, glancing at Lady Mabel, with L'Isle at her elbow.
"Let us go and beat about the bushes; we may start some thing worth chasing!"
The two friends, looking like a greyhound and a bull-terrier coupled together, proceeded to hunt in couple, by thrusting themselves into the cluster of gentlemen around Lady Mabel. Hatton, with a little start of admiring surprise, praised the taste displayed in her dress, regretted her being so late in adopting it, it so became her. He looked round, appealing to the bystanders, all of whom assented to his opinion, except the discriminating Goring, who asserted that it was not the costume which became Lady Mabel, but Lady Mabel who set off the costume, and he carried the popular voice with him. "No head looks so well under a Turk's turban as a Christian's," he continued, "and no native could show off the national dress here like a genuine English beauty." Lady Mabel had learned to listen complacently to the broadest language of admiration.
There were handsome women present—for Elvas could boast its share of beauty—but none to rival hers; the more conspicuous, too, from being loveliness of a different type, and not likely to be overlooked among the dumpy Portuguese ladies, few indeed of whom equaled her in height. Lady Mabel would have been no woman had she not enjoyed the admiration she excited; but she remembered the business of the night, when Goring, bowing to L'Isle, spoke of the unexpected pleasure of seeing him here.
At once interrupting him, she exclaimed: "It is probably the last time we shall have the pleasure of meeting our friends of Elvas, so I at least have come to devote myself exclusively to them. Do, Colonel L'Isle, take pity on a dumb woman, and lend me a Portuguese tongue." And gliding off among a party of the natives present, she entered into conversation with them, calling continually on L'Isle to interlard her complimentary scraps with more copious and better turned periods.
Mrs. Shortridge, too, kept her interpreter, the commissary, close at her elbow, and the quantity of uncurrent Portuguese she made him utter to her guests, in the course of the night, amounted to a wholesale issue of the counterfeit coin of that tongue. From the assiduity of both ladies in courting the natives, one might have thought that they meant to settle at Elvas, or that they were rival candidates canvassing the borough for votes.
It was a young and gay party assembled here, and Mrs. Shortridge's floor was soon covered with dancers. In private houses the national dances are often executed in a modified and less demonstrative style, at least early in the evening, than elsewhere. Still the dancing in Elvas and Badajoz were near neighbors to each other. But a change had come over Mrs. Shortridge, and now she made no protest, and saw little impropriety in displays which she had denounced a few days ago. Fashion is the religion of half the world; the mode makes the morals, and what it sanctions cannot be wrong. The commissary, not so easy a convert, sneeringly remarked that the exhibition was very suitable to ballet dancers and such folk, plainly classing most of his guests in that category; while Lady Mabel, with bare-faced hypocrisy, glided about among her foreign friends, lamenting that her English clumsiness cut her off from taking her part in a diversion, and in the displays of grace and feeling, which, she said, with double meaning, were unbecoming any but women of the Latin races.
The night was hot, and dancing made it hotter. So Mrs. Shortridge called upon Lady Mabel to fill up the interval of rest, and gratify the expectations of their friends with some of her choicest songs.
But yesterday so large an audience would have abashed her; now she scarcely saw the throng around her in her eagerness to gain her end by prolonging the amusements of the night. She sent L'Isle for her guitar, made him turn over her music, never releasing him for a moment, while she sung no Italian, French or English songs, but some of those native and cherished requidillas, the airs and words of which find here so ready an access to all hearts; and she executed them with a skill, melody, and pathos, that flattered and charmed the Portuguese. The guitar, though the cherished friend of serenading lovers of the old Spanish school, was truly but a poor accompaniment to such a voice; but L'Isle saw that, like the harp, it had the merit of displaying to advantage, the roundest, fairest, and most beautifully turned arms he had ever gazed upon.
The dancers were again upon the floor; the night sped on, and Lady Mabel made free use of her interpreter in ingratiating herself with the Portuguese. L'Isle, true to his pledge, taxed his powers to the utmost to be witty and agreeable in her name; at times a little overdoing his part. Thus, at supper, when an elaborate compliment to Dona Carlotta Seguiera, drew a reply as if it had originated with himself, he stripped it of part of its merit by saying that he was merely the mouth-piece of Lady Mabel's sentiments. When Dona Carlotta expressed her surprise that Lady Mabel's short English sentence should make so long a speech in Portuguese, he explained it by Lady Mabel's peculiar faculty of uttering a volume in three words.
Supper and the dance that followed were over; Mrs. Shortridge's great night drew to a close; and many of the company asked for one more melody from the sweet songstress before they dispersed. While turning over her music, Lady Mabel seemed to hesitate in her choice, and L'Isle thought that her hand trembled as she selected a sheet.
As the fruit of his musical gleanings in the peninsula, Major Lumley had lately sent her a parcel of old Spanish songs, among which she had found a little piece, a mere fragment, but exquisitely touching in melody and sentiment. Her father had been much taken with it, but no one else had heard it from her lips. Like a volatile perfume, that escapes in the attempt to pour it from one vessel to another, such things defy translation. How, too, Lady Mabel gave it vocal life, may be imagined, not described. She sang it with a truthfulness of feeling that seemed to grow with each succeeding line. For the mere words, we can only find this slender version for the English ear:
In joyous hall, now thronged with young and fair,Your roving eye marks every beauty here;I harbor not one doubt or jealous fear;Constant your heart; it beats for me alone.In woodland glade, when armed for sylvan war,You mark the antlered monarch from afar,Your sportive toil cannot my pleasure mar;Constant your heart; it beats for me alone.In summer night, gazing on starry sky,And on yon radiant queen, who rides on high,Your fancy seems to roam, yet hovers nigh;Constant your heart; it beats for me alone.But hark! yon trump! you start as from a dream;From your bright eyes the warrior flashes gleam;All else forgotten. War is now your theme;Constant my heart; it beats for you alone.'Midst charging hosts, the foremost rank is thine;In saddened bower, the thrilling fear is mine;You glow with ardor, I in sorrow pine;Constant my heart; it beats for you alone.
Could L'Isle's vanity be beguiling him? The tremor of her voice, her saddened troubled look, the beaming glances of her eyes, which hovered about him, yet shunned to meet his gaze—they all betrayed her. She was, perhaps half consciously, identifying him with the object of the song. Her audience were delighted, but L'Isle was entranced, and no longer a responsible man.
The guests were now fast leaving the house, and Lady Mabel, having much to say to Mrs. Shortridge, was among the last. L'Isle attended her down stairs, and was about to hand her into the old coach, when she drew back timidly.
"How dark it is, with that cloud over the moon. I am afraid Antonio Lobo is scarce postillion enough to drive down that steep rough road without accident."
L'Isle instantly recollected, that having escorted Lady Mabel to the party, it was his privilege to see her safe home again. Bidding the footman keep the coach door open, he sprang into the house for his hat, and in a moment was again seated by her side. The lumbering vehicle rolled out of thepraçaand down the sloping street to the western gate of Elvas. As the guard there closed the gate behind them, and shut them out from the light of the lantern, they seemed to plunge into "outer darkness." Lady Mabel's nervous terrors came back upon her with redoubled violence.
The fosse under the drawbridge seemed a ravenous abyss, and the deep road cut through theglacisand overhung by the outworks appeared to be leading down into the bowels of the earth. The road, too, down into the valley was steep, winding and much cut up by use and the heavy winter rains.
"I have been so much on horseback lately," she said, apologizing for her fears, "and so seldom in a carriage, and this is such a rickety old thing, that you must excuse my alarm. Besides, I do not know that Antonio ever played the part of postillion before. Why, the coach will run over the mules," she exclaimed presently, as it glided down a steep spot; then springing up and leaning out of the window, she called out in plaintive Portuguese, "Antonio, my good Antonio, beware of that short turn in the road, or we will all go tumbling down the hill together! Excuse my terrors, Colonel L'Isle, but some late occurrences have shaken my nerves sadly."
Surprised at her unusual timidity, L'Isle tried to calm her fears, and taking her hand, endeavored to keep it, while he assured her that every Portuguese peasant was familiar with mules and mountain roads from boyhood. With a little laugh, she, struggling, rescued the captured member, saying, "I shall need both my hands to scramble out with when the coach breaks down or overturns, whichever happens first," and after this she was more chary of her demonstrations of terror, to escape his demonstrations of protection.
"If you doubt honest Lobo's ability to drive you safe home," said L'Isle, "though I do not, perhaps your own man may be more skilful."
"What! cut down my two yards of footman into a postillion?" exclaimed Lady Mabel; "on a mule, too! Why, he would rebel against such degradation!"
"It would be promotion," said L'Isle, laughing, "to put a footman into the saddle; and William would be of use for once in his life."
"Neither I nor nature demand usefulness of him. His whole capital consists in being a tall footman, who becomes his livery; and he fulfills his destiny when both he and it excite the admiration of the Elvas ladies."
The coach presently turned into the olive yard, and drew up before the old monastic pile without accident. L'Isle was surprised to see the inhabited part of the building brightly lighted up at this late hour. Old Moodie, looking graver and more sour than ever, was at the open door. L'Isle handed Lady Mabel out of the coach, and she coolly took his arm, showing that he was expected to hand her up stairs, before taking leave of her. Moodie followed them into the drawing-room, and said abruptly, "Well, my lady, will you have supper now?"
"Certainly, if it be ready. By-the-bye, Colonel L'Isle, I did not see you take the least refreshment at Mrs. Shortridge's—not even half a pound of sugarplums, like the Portuguese ladies."
"I followed your example; for you yourself fasted."
"I was too busy talking my best and my last to my Portuguese friends," said Lady Mabel. "But when and where did you dine?"
"Dine?" said L'Isle, hesitating, then recollecting his luncheon; "about two o'clock, in Badajoz."
"A Spanish dinner, I'll warrant, at a Spaniard's house!" she exclaimed, throwing up her hands.
"You must be faint with hunger. Why," she added, taking up a light, and holding it close to him, "you do look pale and famished; as if you had dined like a Portuguese beggar's brat,—on a crust, rubbed over with asardinha, to give it a flavor. I cannot let you go away in this condition. If you starve yourself so, you will degenerate from a beef-eating red-coat, into a rationless Spanish soldier."
"There is no danger of that," L'Isle answered. "But how do you happen to have a supper ready at this hour?"
"It shows what a slave of habit Moodie is. Because he has a supper got for papa and his friends every night, he could not omit it; though papa is far away, and he knows that I never touch it. But here he comes to announce it. For once it is well timed, and you must do it justice, unless you would make both Moodie and myself your enemies for life."
"Supper is ready, my lady," said Moodie. Then grumbled aside to her, "If you wait awhile longer it will serve for breakfast."
"Pray send Jenny to me; and then, Moodie, I will not keep you up longer," said Lady Mabel, for she was anxious to get rid of the old marplot.
They went into the next room to supper, and she seated L'Isle sociably beside her. It was truly a tempting little supper party, without one too many at table. Lady Mabel had now been long enough in the army to feel at home there. Why should she not, like any of her comrades, bring home a friend to sup with her? Especially when that friend is the pleasantest fellow in the brigade? Having or affecting an appetite, she set the example to L'Isle, and urged him to make up for the meagre fare of the day. The table looked as if Lord Strathern and three or four of his friends had been expected to take their seats at it; and when she bid the footman hand wine to Colonel L'Isle, he promptly placed three decanters on the table.
"William mistakes me for Colonel Bradshawe," said L'Isle smiling, as he glanced at them.
"That is Moodie's doing," said she. "He provides liberally, one bottle for you, and two for himself, I suppose."
Jenny Aiken now came into the room, very neatly dressed, and, evidently not at all surprised at her mistress's summons. Upon this Lady Mabel bid William go, as he would not be wanted.
"I have not a doubt, Colonel L'Isle, that you prefer a Hebe to a Ganymede."
"Infinitely," said L'Isle; "and I only wonder how great Jove himself could differ with me."
"Then let Jenny refill your glass, that you may drink the health of the Portuguese ladies, to whom you said so many witty and pleasant things this evening."
"I only translated them," said L'Isle, bowing gaily to her.
"May I be ever blessed with such an interpreter," said Lady Mabel, "and I may, without fear, set up for a wit." And she repeated some of the best things he had said in her name, and seemed to enjoy them so much, that L'Isle, who, like some other people, had
"AheartOpen as day to meltingflattery,"
became almost as much charmed with himself as he was with his companion. Thus they amused themselves, recalling the little incidents of the evening; Lady Mabel turning satirist, at the cost of all her friends, not sparing even Mrs. Shortridge, in her attempts to play the Rome hostess, and ridiculing, without mercy, the commissary's awkward efforts at Portuguese eloquence and politeness. Then recalling and laughing at the extravagant compliments paid her after each song, she sung snatches of several of her favorite pieces, but had the grace not to allude to 'Constant my Heart;' while L'Isle longed for an occasion, yet hesitated to tell her how much better he liked it than all the others. In the midst of her extravagantly high spirits, checking herself suddenly, she said: "I see that you are surprised at me, but not more than I am at myself. Have you ever heard of our Scottish superstition of beingfie—that is, possessed by a preternatural excess of vivacity? No? It is deemed the sure forerunner of evil at hand,—a sudden and violent death; some dire misfortune; perhaps a sad and final parting of—of the dearest friends. I own," she added, with a deep sigh, "I cannot free myself from this superstition of the country."
"I will not share it with you!" L'Isle exclaimed. "And you must shake it off. What were life without hope, and high hope too!" and seizing her hand he kissed it respectfully but with a fervor which indicated the direction his hopes had taken.
"For shame, Colonel L'Isle!" she exclaimed, laughing, while she snatched her hand away. "See how much shocked Jenny is at this liberty taken with her mistress!"
L'Isle had forgotten Jenny Aiken's presence. He turned to look at her, and the Scotch Hebe was plainly more amused than shocked at what she was witnessing. Had L'Isle forgotten also his appointment to-morrow morning at Alcantara? Perhaps not. But had Sir Rowland Hill now appeared and demanded his opinion of the Andalusian levies, L'Isle would have told him that he had no leisure to think of him or them.
But all sublunary pleasure has an end. Supper was over, and L'Isle could devise no excuse for lingering here, but the pleasure of listening to Lady Mabel, who seemed willing to amuse him as long as he staid. After a pause, divining that he was about to take leave of her, she said suddenly: "What an unreasonable fellow Sir Rowland Hill must be! Because he cannot find any one to execute his delicate commissions half so well as you do, he must be thrusting them all upon you! Does he take you for a Popish saint, endowed with pluripresence, and able to be in Andalusia, at Badajoz, Elvas, and Alcantara, all at one time?"
"Not exactly so," said L'Isle, a good deal flattered at this speech. "He has indeed tasked me well, at times doing other men's work; but it is all in a good cause, you know; and I never objected to these tasks till now—My Lord, I hear, set out for Alcantara early this morning, taking Bradshawe and Conway with him."
"Yes! they rode merrily off this morning," said Lady Mabel in a gay tone. "A summons to Alcantara breaks the monotony of their life here, and they were eager to meet Sir Rowland. I hear that these conferences with his officers always conclude with a capital dinner. That sallow Major Conway, with his fastidious appetite, and his Calcutta liver, will appreciate the excellence of thecuisine. I have heard Colonel Bradshawe dilate, with enthusiasm, on Sir Rowland's choice selection of wines. Papa, too, will meet some new people there, which will give him an opportunity of once more undergoing his three years of siege, famine, and bombardment in Gibraltar thirty years ago, and of uttering a new edition to the expedition to Egypt, in which he will again put Sir Ralph Abercromby to a glorious death in the arms of victory. They tell me, Sir Rowland, too, dearly loves these occasions for repeating his favorite lecture on strategy and grand tactics. But you must have heard it so often, that you can repeat itverbatimto me, if you have nothing more entertaining to say."
"I hope I could find topics more agreeable to us both," said L'Isle, laughing and blushing. "But unluckily I have in my pocket Sir Rowland's order to meet him there, and have intelligence he is waiting for. I am afraid he will have to wait."
"I am afraid, he will," said Lady Mabel, coolly, "for I do not see how you are to get out of the house now. By this time Moodie has bolted, barred, and locked every door and window below, hidden the keys, and gone to bed in his usual condition. He never can find them again, until his head gets clear in the morning."
"What!" exclaimed L'Isle, "that respectable old man drunk every night!"
"Noteverynight!" said Lady Mabel. "But have you forgotten in what condition he came back with us from Evora?"
"True. But I thought that an accident, and more the effect of sickness than drinking. He seemed quite sober when you came home, and a graver and more sedate man I do not know."
"O, he is a Presbyterian, you know, and the more liquor he swallows the graver and more sanctimonious he becomes."
"That may be. Still Lady Mabel, I must find some way of getting out of the house. Already I shall be too late at Alcantara."
"I am afraid Sir Rowland will not drink in your news at breakfast. But if it be good, it will come in capitally after dinner, by way of dessert."
"After dinner!" said L'Isle hurriedly. "I must be there many hours before that!"
"Then I am sorry to have kept you here so long. I suppose Jenny and I must keep watch by ourselves all night, for I cannot keep those heavy-headed fellows awake."
"Awake and watching!" exclaimed L'Isle.
"Yes—awake and watching," Lady Mabel answered. "If you could stay we would not insist on your sitting up with us. I could have Papa's room made ready for you; and if I knew that you were asleep in Papa's bed, with your drawn sword on one side, and a pair of his pistols, cocked, on the other, I would not be in the least afraid."
"Afraid of what?" asked L'Isle in astonishment.
"Of these robbers, who go plundering and murdering all over the country by night!" said Lady Mabel, her large blue eyes opening wide in well-feigned terror.
"Oh, don't talk of them, my lady!" said Jenny, with a stifled scream, and an affected shudder.
"Have you not heard of them?" Lady Mabel asked in a tone of surprise.
"I cannot say I have—at least of any depredations here at Elvas."
"But we are outside of Elvas—to our sorrow; and the monks, great engineers as they have elsewhere proved themselves, have constructed but a very weak fortress in this building. Our garrison is weaker still. Papa carried off his two most efficient servants. William is a simpleton, Tomkins a craven, and Moodie, though bold as a lion, is an old man, already bound hand and foot, and gagged by his strong enemy."
"But where is the Portuguese part of your household?" L'Isle asked.
"Being thieves in a small way," said Lady Mabel, "we always, at night, lock them out of this part of the building. While the robbers were cutting our throats up-stairs, they might be stealing our silver below. We have an anxious time here, I assure you. It is as much as I can do to keep poor Jenny from going off into hysterics; she will not go to bed lest she should be robbed and murdered in her sleep. It is lucky that I, being a soldier's daughter, have a little courage."
"Courage!" exclaimed L'Isle, "I am astonished at your sudden timidity. Why, there is a sentinel day and night here at headquarters."
"But out of sight and hearing at the other end of this old rambling monk's roost," said Lady Mabel, "mounting guard over papa's musty despatches."
"And the fellow now there," said Jenny, "told me he could not quit them—no, not if we were robbed and murdered twice over. I could scream now, only that I'm afraid the villains might hear me!"
While L'Isle looked suspiciously at the maid, not so good an actress as her mistress, Lady Mabel glanced her eye at the clock. Apparent time called it one, real time said it was two hours after midnight. She felt sure of her game, and need wear the mask no longer. She had been acting a long and trying part, and began to feel tired, and now showed it by letting her terror subside into one or two little yawns, which became her so well, that L'Isle never thought her more lovely than now when she was getting tired of his company.
It was high time to get rid of him. But now a real fear come over her, and she shrunk from his searching glance with unfeigned timidity. Still the thing had to be done; so nerving herself to the task, she stepped close up beside him, and looking confidingly in his face, said: "I am truly sorry to have kept you here so long, and hope you will not find Sir Rowland fretting and fuming at the delay of your news; but I was so anxious to have your protection, having just learned that these horrid ruffians are notguerillerosfrom the Spanish band at Badajoz, but some of your own regiment disguised as banditti."
L'Isle started back one step. In an instant, from the fairy land of hope and love, his Eden of delights, with every soothing and intoxicating influence around him, he found himself transported to a bleak common, stripped of his dreamy joys, exposed to the ridicule of the enchantress, and soon to be pelted with the pitiless jests of all who might hear of his adventure. He looked at Lady Mabel, almost expecting to see her undergo some magic transformation. But there she stood unchanged, except that there was a little sneer on her lip, a glance of triumph from her eye, an expression of intense but mischievous enjoyment in her whole air, and, what he had never observed before, a strong likeness to her father.
Striving quickly and proudly to recover himself, L'Isle said, with admirable gravity, "You have convinced me, Lady Mabel, that it is my especial duty to protect you from my own banditti. I will not leave you, not close an eye in sleep, while a shadow of danger hangs over you. But," he added, slowly drawing near to a window, and gently opening it, "I have observed that house-breakers always choose the darkest hours to hide their deeds of darkness. For to-night the danger is over. The moon is overhead, and not a cloud obscures the sky. We English may envy these Southern nations their nights, though not their days." Half a dozen nightingales were now pouring out their rival melodies in the grove. Looking out on the landscape before him, its features softened rather than concealed by the sober silvery light, he repeated:
"How sweet the moonlight sleeps on yonder bank,* * * * In such a night as this,When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees,And they did make no noise—in such a nightTroilus, methinks, mounted the Trojan walls,And sighed his soul toward the Grecian tents,Where Cressid lay that night."
While repeating these lines, he measured with his eye the distance to the ground. The comfort-loving monks had provided lofty ceilings and abundant air for their apartments under the scorching sun of Alemtejo. But in L'Isle's angry, defiant mood, he would have leapt from the top of Pompey's Pillar, rather than stay to be laughed at by Lady Mabel. Seating himself on the window-sill, he turned and threw his legs out of the window.
"For Heaven's sake, Colonel L'Isle, what are you dreaming of?"
"I am dreaming that, happy as Ulysses, I have listened to the Syren, and escaped her snares."
She had sprang forward as he spoke, and now threw out her arms to draw him back. He eluded her clasp, and dropped to the ground on his feet, but fell backward, and did not at once rise again. She shrieked, and then called out in a piteous tone: "Speak to me, Colonel L'Isle. For Heaven's sake, speak. Say you are not injured—not hurt."
"Console yourself, Lady Mabel," said he, rising slowly. "I have not broken my neck, and shall not break my appointment. And, now, I must bid you good-night; or shall I say good-morning?"
As L'Isle turned, he spied old Moodie standing in the open gateway of the court, with a light in his hand, and knitting his shaggy brows. He looked neither very drunk, nor much afraid of robbers, but trembled with rage on seeing L'Isle's mode of breaking out of the mansion. With a strong effort of self-control, L'Isle walked off without limping, and was soon lost in the gloomy shades of the olive and the orange grove.
Lady Mabel had played out the comedy, and now came—reflection. What had she done? How would it tell? Above all, what would L'Isle think of her? What were his feelings now? And what would they be when the exact truth-the whole plot—was known to him? Every faculty hitherto engrossed in the part she was playing, until this moment she had never looked on this side of the picture? Now, bitter self-reproach, womanly shame, and tears—vain, useless tears—filled up the remaining hours of the night. Jenny Aiken's feeble attempts at consolation were worse than futile, and she was sent off abruptly to her room for misconstruing the cause of her mistress' grief. Lady Mabel found little relief in remembering her father's injunction, to play her part well, and not fail of success. She was hardly soothed even by the resolution she took to rate that father soundly for the gross impropriety he had permitted, induced—nay, almost commanded—her to perpetrate.
Don Pedro.—By this light he changes more and more. I think hebe angry, indeed.Claudio.—If he be, he knows how to turn his girdle.Benedict.—Shall I speak a word in your ear?Claudio.—God bless me from a challenge.Much ado about Nothing.
Sir Rowland Hill, with a stout division, had been posted during the winter at Coria, facing Marshal Soult in the valley of the Tagus—holding him to bail not to disturb the peace and quiet of the British army cantoned along the frontier. The Marshal had now swallowed or pocketed all that he could find in the rich, but hapless vale of Plasencia, and of late had been casting hungry glances on the country south of the river. This had induced Sir Rowland to ride over from Coria to Alcantara, to look to his line of communication with the southern provinces. This old city had been long sinking into decay; the French General, Lapisse, spent one night in it four years ago; and well nigh completed the work which time had begun. Still its position and its famous bridge, one arch of which had been blown up, and had now been hastily repaired, made it an important point at this time.
In a Gothic hall, which looked as if it had not long since been visited by the Vandals, but which had of old been often thronged with members of the once chivalrous order of Alcantara, now as effete in knighthood as that of Malta; a military secretary was writing at a small table, at the dictation of Sir Rowland Hill, who stood near, perchance, as good a knight as ever trod that floor. Officers came in to him, and were sent out again on various missions. Lord Strathern was seated by a larger table at the other end of the room, conversing gaily with his fellow-travelers from Elvas, and waiting Sir Rowland's leisure.
Sir Rowland presently looked at his watch, and raising his voice, inquired—"My Lord, has L'Isle come yet?"
"Not yet," Lord Strathern answered with a smiling countenance, while Sir Rowland's expressed disappointment. He knew that the commander-in-chief was about to order a combination of simultaneous movements. Every part of the allied force from Gallicia to Andalusia had its task allotted, and he was anxious to know how far theConde di Abispal'scould be relied on.
"L'Isle is usually before his time," said Sir Rowland. "Do you think he got my order yesterday?"
"I have little doubt of it," said my lord.
"But I doubt his being here soon," said Bradshawe, dipping in his oar to trouble the waters. "He had to go last night to a concert in Elvas."
"A concert detain him! I do not understand that."
"Nor I, Sir Rowland," said Bradshawe coolly. "I only heard it without pretending to understand it."
Sir Rowland looked puzzled, but his unfinished dispatch claimed his attention, and he turned again to his secretary.
Meanwhile Lord Strathern was in high spirits. "The hour has come, but not the man!" he said, and began to triumph over Conway, and laugh at L'Isle so merrily, that he would have soon found it in his heart to forgive the latter all his offensive strictures on him. But, suddenly, his merriment gave place to a look of surprise and disappointment. Conway, turning to ascertain the cause, saw L'Isle walk into the room as if he had come hither at his leisure; yet, something in his bearing, betrayed that his pride was in arms.
"I am glad to see you, L'Isle," said Sir Rowland. "I were loath to close my dispatch without adding the intelligence you might bring me. By the bye, some of these gentlemen thought that you would not be here so soon."
"They must have supposed that I had not received your order, sir," said L'Isle, glancing haughtily round on Lord Strathern; "but, having got it, I am here."
"It seems to have cost you hard riding though, and more fatigue than you are yet equal to," said Sir Rowland, remembering his late wounds. "And you have had a fall," he added, observing some marks on his clothes.
"Not from my horse," said L'Isle, shortly and somewhat bitterly. "But it is of no consequence," and he hastened to produce his notes and furnish Sir Rowland with the information expected from him.
Besides the unerased marks of a fall, L'Isle's clothes were travel-stained, and his face was pale, less, perhaps, from fatigue and loss of sleep, than from the violent excitement and revulsion of feelings he had lately undergone. But he soon withdrew Sir Rowland's attention from himself to his full and precise account of the state of the Andalusian reserve, and the garrison of Badajoz.
"I am glad to find that this body of Spanish troops are not, like too many Spanish armies, men of straw, an army on paper," said Sir Rowland. "The French are trying to occupy so extended a position here in Estremadura, that our Andalusian friends may do capital service in harassing their out-posts, and cutting off their convoys."
"If they can be kept out of the plains, and induced not to fight," said L'Isle, smiling. "But the Spaniard is always seeking to surround the enemy, and force him to battle."
"At all events," said Sir Rowland, "I can now give Lord Wellington a definite and reliable account of their condition;" and, making a sign to L'Isle to accompany him, he walked across the room and seated himself at the larger table. Here he held a somewhat prolonged conference with Lord Strathern, in which the other gentlemen were, at times, called upon to take part. When compelled to speak, L'Isle distinguished himself by giving admirable specimens of the lapidary style, not one spare word. Sir Rowland had many questions to ask and instructions to give; but, these over, he gave a less professional turn to the conversation, and then said: "I hope, my lord, you and these gentlemen will share my poor dinner to-day; but remember, I am not at home in Alcantara, and cannot feast you, as you do your friends at Elvas; neither can we sit long and drink deep, as I must return to-night to Coria."
"We will dine with you with pleasure," said Lord Strathern. "Pray, Bradshawe, who could have told Sir Rowland that we sit long and drink deep at Elvas?"
"Some thirsty fellow," said Bradshawe, "who had drained the last drop from his last bottle."
"Oh, my lord," said Sir Rowland, laughing, "I meant no insinuation. But I must finish my despatch," and he returned to his secretary.
While Lord Strathern and his companions awaited Sir Rowland's leisure, L'Isle sat moodily apart, turning an unsocial shoulder toward his lordship, giving him a glimpse of his back.
Lord Strathern smiled; he saw the earth stains, and saw, moreover, evident marks of anger and chagrin in L'Isle's demeanor. His curiosity was strongly excited, and he resolved to make the silent man find his tongue.
"Pray, L'Isle how came you to let your horse slip from under you, and measure your length in the road?"
"You are mistaken, my lord," said L'Isle, formally; "my horse did not throw me."
"You are so used to success that you will acknowledge no failure, not even a fall from your horse, or your hobby-horse. Perhaps you got tired, and took a nap by the roadside, which accounts for your getting here no sooner."
L'Isle was too angry to trust himself with an answer, but Major Conway, turning to Bradshawe, said gaily: "Colonel L'Isle is here soon enough for me; he is within the time, and I have won the fifty guineas."
L'Isle started. Here was a revelation! His last night's adventure was no secret. There were more parties to the plot than he had imagined.
"Sir!" said he, turning upon Conway, with a cold, hard manner. "Am I to understand that you have done me the honor to bet on my movements?"
"Here is gratitude for you," exclaimed Conway, pacifically appealing to his companions, and his voice attracted Sir Rowland's attention. "Here have I been showing for him the height of friendship, hazarding my best friends, my guineas, on his infallible fulfillment of duty; and my full faith in him is received as an outrage."
"I suppose, sir," said L'Isle, turning on Bradshawe, with freezing politeness, "it is you who have so obligingly afforded my volunteer backer so singular an opportunity of proving his friendship?"
"I cannot claim the credit of it," answered Bradshawe, with easy urbanity. "I am not even a stakeholder in the game; though, as a mere looker-on, I confess having watched it with keen and growing interest." And with a little wave of the hand he passed L'Isle gently over to Lord Strathern.
L'Isle looked from the imperturbable colonel to the pacific major, who professed to be so zealously his partisan, and back again to the former. Not seeing how he could fasten a quarrel on either, he turned somewhat reluctantly on Lord Strathern, who complacently awaited him.
"As for you, my lord, I might have felt surprise at your making me the subject of such a bet, but it is lost in astonishment at the means you took to win it!"
"And, after all to lose it," said Lord Strathern, in a mocking, dolorous tone. "Is it not provoking?"
"No scruple," continued L'Isle, "seems to have stood in your way, my lord, in the choice of either means or agent."
"On the contrary," said Lord Strathern, blandly, "I always scrupulously choose the best of both."
"You must have contrived this plot," L'Isle persisted, "though the chief actor be in Elvas. But I will say no more here."
"A few words more, I pray," said Lord Strathern, smiling. "I understood that you were to have been detained in Elvas. How the devil did you get away?"
L'Isle turned abruptly away, seeing that the more anger and mortification he showed, the more gratified Lord Strathern seemed to be. Rising from his seat, he walked up to Sir Rowland, who had been watching him with much curiosity, and said: "I suppose, sir, you have no further use for me here. If so, pray excuse my absence from your table to-day, as I have occasion to return at once to Elvas."
Sir Rowland bid his secretary go and send off the despatch at once; then looking fixedly at L'Isle, said: "I may need you here for a day or two."
L'Isle bit his lip till the blood came, while Sir Rowland, stepping over to Lord Strathern, asked in an undertone: "What is the matter with L'Isle, my lord? he seems strangely out of humor."
"The truth is, Sir Rowland," said his lordship, in a confidential tone, "somebody in Elvas has been quizzing L'Isle, and a man of his vanity cannot stand being quizzed."
"Quizzed!" said Sir Rowland. "Does quizzing make a man mad?"
L'Isle dared not trust himself longer in Lord Strathern's company; he wanted time to recover his self-command; so he again addressed Sir Rowland: "That I left Elvas so suddenly, and unprepared for a prolonged absence, matters little, Sir Rowland; but I have been so little with my regiment of late, that—"
"Let your major take care of it a few days longer," Sir Rowland answered, in a positive tone.
"You had better let L'Isle go, Sir Rowland," said Lord Strathern. "He is afraid to lose sight of his regiment, lest they become banditti."
L'Isle's flushed cheek and compressed lips, showed that he felt the taunt, while Sir Rowland exclaimed, in surprise: "Are they so unruly? Then you must look to them yourself, my lord, for I shall keep Colonel L'Isle a while with me. The truth is, L'Isle, I divine your urgent business at Elvas. Some one there has given you gross offence, and you seek revenge under the name of satisfaction. There is always sin and folly enough in these affairs; but here, within sight of the smoke of the enemy's camp, and now, when we are about to fall upon them, these personal feuds are criminal madness. I would put you under arrest, sooner than let you post off to Elvas on so bloodthirsty an errand."
Sir Rowland uttered this speech with an air worthy of his Puritan uncle, of Calvinistic memory; but, in spite of the respect due to the speaker, it was too much for the gravity of his hearers. Lord Strathern and his companions burst into a roar of laughter, and even L'Isle, amidst all his anger, felt tempted to join them.
"Gentlemen," said Sir Rowland, in grave astonishment, "I like a joke as well as any of you. Pray explain this, that I may share your enjoyment."
Bradshawe, with an effort, cut short his laughter, to say: "As a neutral party, Sir Rowland, I will be Colonel L'Isle's surety, that in whatever mood he may set out for Elvas, as soon as he finds himself in the presence of his enemy there, he will be gentle as a lamb."
"You deal in mysteries; who in Elvas is so safe from L'Isle's resentment?"
"Nobody but Lady Mabel Stewart."
"Lady Mabel Stewart!" exclaimed Sir Rowland, looking at Lord Strathern. "If a lady contrived this plot, I shall never unravel it; so you must do it for me."
"Perhaps the explanation," said Bradshawe, "would come more gracefully from my lord."
"If I knew the details of it," said Lord Strathern, interrupting his hearty laughter, for he seemed resolved, at all hazard, to recover his fifty guineas, in sport, out of L'Isle. "I can tell but the beginning; and then, Sir Rowland, you can squeeze the rest out of L'Isle himself."
"By all means," said Sir Rowland. "L'Isle, take a seat, and learn to stand fire. You must not dodge from a volley of laughter, that happens to be aimed at yourself."
L'Isle reluctantly sat down, while Lord Strathern said: "Have you ever discovered, Sir Rowland, that L'Isle is a monomaniac?"
"No! On what point?"
"Discipline! He is a little touched here," said my lord, laying his finger on his temple, "on the subject of discipline. He never eats heartily, nor sleeps quietly, but after detecting the breach of a dozen of the rules and regulations made for the government of his Majesty's troops. He fancies that they were made expressly to afford him the pleasure of detecting the breach of them."
"Is this disease prevalent in your brigade, my lord?" Sir Rowland inquired in a sarcastic tone.
"By no means; I have kept it down; for my method, looking to the spirit, not the letter of the law, discourages it greatly."
"I have seen something of your method, my lord," said Sir Rowland, smiling; "but cannot say that I have mastered its peculiar merits."
"That is very likely," said Lord Strathern, complacently. "As every art has its mysteries—so each man may have some peculiar gift in the application of his art; even though taught by the same master, no two men's handwriting are exactly alike; so each of us may have some inimitable peculiarity in his soldiership. It is certain that L'Isle, not understanding my more enlarged and liberal system, wished to force me into his own narrow notions, and when I would not yield to him, he intimated to me that I was training up banditti. I had to recommend to him the study of one of the articles of war, which he had overlooked. It treats of subordination, and of each man's minding his own business. Neither of us was very successful in keeping his temper; and, indeed, being a good deal ruffled, I afterward spoke pretty freely of L'Isle's conduct to these gentlemen, who dined with me. Mabel shared my feelings, and, with my consent, set a trap for him, hoping to teach him that he himself might be caught tripping. How he escaped in time to get here you must learn from himself."
"Come, L'Isle, we have heard the prologue," said Sir Rowland; "be not bashful, but give us the comedy."
What was L'Isle to do? It was evidently something more than curiosity that made Sir Rowland so earnest to sift this matter. He could hardly refuse all explanation to him—and he felt that it would never do to give an account of Lady Mabel's behavior, to himself, as he had construed it. Lord Strathern, too, did not exactly know what he was urging him to do. Suddenly recollecting Lady Mabel's note, L'Isle drew it from his pocket, and handed it to her father, for his private reading. To L'Isle's astonishment, Lord Strathern read it out with greatgusto, and commented on it.
This was capital bait for the trap. "And pray, Mr. Interpreter, how did you and your principal get through the evening?"
"You see the dilemma, Sir Rowland," exclaimed Bradshawe, with glee. "Here was a conflict of duties. Colonel L'Isle had to obey two commanders at one time, which Scripture tells us is difficult, if not impossible."
"L'Isle seems to have achieved the impossible," said Sir Rowland; "for I know you are toogallanta man, L'Isle, to neglect a lady's order for mine."
Sir Rowland's manner, though not his words, were urgent for an explanation; and L'Isle being now fairly in for it, with an effort, gathered his wits together, and opened the narrative of his last night's adventure. He recounted Lady Mabel's successful efforts to amuse and occupy him into a forgetfulness of the flying hours; her artful delays before setting out; their slow but pleasant drive up hill to Elvas; the animated and well-sustained part she had played throughout the evening; her wit, her satire, and her singing, and his labors as interpreter, acknowledging many foolish things of his own, in his efforts to be witty and amusing according to contract. He described her well-feigned fear of returning home in the dark without an escort, the brilliantly lighted house and well-timed supper, at which, unconscious of the flight of time, he sat listening to her diverting talk, including her piquant sketch of Sir Rowland's glorious dinners and tactical lectures, and the value his officers set on each. Here his auditors had each an opportunity of laughing at each other, and being laughed at in turn.
L'Isle strove to make Lady Mabel appear witty, amusing, and adroit; he gave edge to her satire—keenness to her wit; but carefully rounded off all the more salient points of her acting. He said nothing of her singing "Constant my heart," at him. He did not hint at his taking her hand in the coach, or kissing it at the supper table; but dilated on her skillful libel on old Moodie's sobriety, and her well acted dread of the house-breaking banditti, from whom he could best protect her, as they are no other than his own men.
Though L'Isle did not get through his narrative with the best possible grace, he was doubly successful in it; at once greatly amusing his auditors, yet exhibiting Lady Mabel only as a witty girl, who had merely played the part allotted to her with mischievous pleasure and consummate tact. But he attained this at the cost of showing himself an easy dupe to her arts, and getting well laughed at for his pains. It cost L'Isle no small effort to do this. It was, in fact, a heroic, self-sacrificing act; for he was not used to being laughed at, and there is something highly amusing in compelling a man to tell a story which makes him more and more ridiculous at every turn. But while showing so much consideration for Lady Mabel, so far was he from beginning to forgive her ill-usage of him, that the constraint he had put upon himself only embittered his feelings toward her.
As to Lord Strathern, he was delighted with the account ofma belle's cunning manoeuvres and witty speeches, even to the point of laughing heartily at her satire on himself; and he reveled in L'Isle's ill-concealed mortification, exclaiming: "What a pity the plot failed by Mabel's unmasking too soon. That and your good horse enabled you to keep your appointment at the risk of your neck. Why, L'Isle, you might have become a ballad hero. Mabel would have put your adventure in verse, and set it to music, and you would have been sung by all our musical folks, from Major Lumley down to the smallest drummer-boy. You are a lucky fellow; but this time your luck has lost you fame."
"And how did you get away at last?" asked Sir Rowland, fully convinced that L'Isle had been a prisoner, under lock, bolt and bar.
The earth-stains on L'Isle's clothes might have testified that he had gotten a bad fall in jumping out of a lady's window, at two o'clock in the morning. But this is a scandalous world. L'Isle remembered Bradshawe, without looking at him, and evaded the question.
"I found old Moodie, lantern in hand, at the open gate, looking as if he had drank nothing but vinegar in a month, the picture of sour sobriety!"
Sir Rowland had striven in vain not to join in the laugh; but, in spite of himself, was much diverted at L'Isle's adventure. But he was provoked at the usage his favorite colonel had incurred, for the best of faults—too much zeal for the service; and he longed to discuss with Lord Strathern the propriety of setting traps for his own officers, when posting, with important intelligence, to their common commander. But there was a lady in the case, and Sir Rowland was afraid to broach the subject; Lord Strathern, too, though his subordinate was nearly old enough for his father—a man of high rank, and a known good soldier; so he put off the discussion to a more convenient season. As to L'Isle, Sir Rowland had been watching him closely, and saw something in his eye and bearing that betrayed too much exasperation for him to be trusted to return at once to Elvas. So, Sir Rowland invented, on the spot, a special duty for him, and bid him accompany him, that evening, to Coria.
Ralph.—Help down with the hangings.Roger.—By and by, Ralph.I am making up the trunks here.Ralph.—Who looks to my lady's wardrobe? Humphrey!Down with the boxes in the gallery,And bring away the couch-cushions.Shorthose.—Will it not rain?No conjuring abroad, nor no devicesTo stop this journey.—Wit without Money.
Away, you trifler!—Love?—I love thee not:I care not for thee, Kate; this is no worldTo play with mammets, and to tilt with lips:We must have bloody noses, and cracked crowns,And pass them current, too. Godsme, my horse!—Henry IV.
Lord Strathernreturned the next day to Elvas, and found his daughter very desolate, and full of more than filial anxiety to see him. She was alone, for the Commissary had, the day before, sent off his heavy baggage toward Lisbon. Lady Mabel would, at any time, have grieved at parting with a true-hearted friend like Mrs. Shortridge; but now other troubles weighed heavy on her, and so aggravated her obvious grief, while the chief cause was hidden, that her kind friend was deeply moved and greatly flattered at perceiving it. Had she staid longer in Elvas, Lady Mabel would have confided her troubles to her, knowing that, though she might not think wisely, she could feel rightly, and give both advice and sympathy. But after a struggle of hesitation, she let Mrs. Shortridge depart in ignorance, receiving from her many kind messages and adieus for L'Isle.
Perhaps it was best that it should be so; for, had the good lady learned the usage her favorite had met with, she might, for once in her life, have boiled over with indignation.
"Well,Ma Belle," said Lord Strathern, as soon as he was alone with his daughter, "so that fellow, L'Isle, beat us, after all, at our own game. I did expect that your woman's wit would have carried it through successfully."
"Would to Heavens, papa, my woman's wit, as you call it, had been sufficient to keep me out of it altogether. How could you think of putting such a part upon me? I never would have dreamed of it, if you had not urged—insisted on my detaining him here. What is Colonel L'Isle to me, that I should manoeuvre to keep him in Elvas, when Sir Rowland Hill expects him in Alcantara? And as for my resenting your quarrels with him, there is an impropriety in it, and yet more in the mode you made me adopt. I am ashamed of myself—I am ashamed of you, papa, for conceiving it."
"And to fail, after all," said Lord Strathern. "And yet, by L'Isle's own account, you played your part well."
"His account!" exclaimed Lady Mabel. "To whom?"
"To us all—Sir Rowland, Bradshawe, Conway, and myself. He was disposed to be sulky and silent, at first; but, with Sir Rowland's help, we drew it all out of him."
"Drew it all out of him!" said Lady Mabel, in a faltering tone. She gasped for breath, and her cheek grew pale. But the next moment the blood rushed into her face, and she exclaimed: "What! Did Colonel L'Isle give you a full account of the party—of all that occurred that evening?"
"Full and minute. He was very reluctant to tell, as we were all laughing at him; but Sir Rowland is a good inquisitor, and made him speak out, and at length. I did not know he had so good a memory, or you so much wit."
"For Heaven's sake, papa, what did he tell you?" Lady Mabel sat watching her father with eager eyes, her hands firmly clasped, and her heel impatiently tapping the floor, while she strove to master her almost uncontrollable confusion and anxiety.
"Why, he handed me your note," said Lord Strathern. "Perhaps he meant it for my eye alone; but it was such capital bait for the trap, that I read it aloud. He then seemed to make up his mind to conceal nothing. He told us of your artful delays, your slow-paced coach crawling up-hill; of your efforts to entertain Mrs. Shortridge's company, and keep him employed as interpreter; your songs and your care to prolong the amusements of the evening; your affected fears at riding home in your old coach with your new postillion. He described your supper-party, and repeated your entertaining conversation, your libel on Moodie, gone drunk to bed, and your satire on Sir Rowland and the rest of us; your well-acted terror of robbers, and your triumph over him when you thought the game was won. If you had not been over-confident and too hasty, Mabel, we would have had L'Isle on the hip."
"Was thatallhe told you?" asked Lady Mabel.
"Why? Was there any thing more to tell?" inquired her father.
Lady Mabel drew a deep, long breath. "Then he said nothing about my—my singing—'Constant my heart' to him?"
"How!" exclaimed Lord Strathern. "Did you sing 'Constant my heart'athim?"
"How could I help it, papa, it came in so pat to the purpose?"
"The devil it did! It seems you did not mean to fail, by under acting your part. It is lucky he forgot to mention it. Was there any thing more?"
"And he said nothing about squeezing my hand in the coach," asked she, hesitatingly, "when I showed so much fear of its overturning?"
"Squeezing your hand?"
"Or of his kissing it, after supper?"
"What! Had he got on so far? And pray, madam, what did you tell him?"
"Tell him!" said Lady Mabel. "I was acting a part, you know, papa; so I told him his presumption had put Jenny Aiken quite out of countenance."
"By Jove! you were acting your part with a vengeance! Why not tell him, at once, never to kiss your hand when a third person was present?"
"How can you talk so, papa? I meant no such thing. But what account did he give of his leaving the house?"
"Merely that he hurried away when you unmasked the plot to him; hastened to Elvas to get his horse, and post off to Alcantara."
"Then he said nothing of his leaping out of the window?"
"Did he leap out of the window?"
"Or of my trying to hold him back?"
"What!" exclaimed Lord Strathern, starting up. "Did he escape by jumping out of the window, and you try to detain him?"
"The height was so great, I feared he would break his neck."
"Damn his neck!" said Lord Strathern, striding up and down the room. "Better a neck cracked than a reputation. Things have come to a pretty pass. You singing love-songs at him, he squeezing and kissing your hand—perhaps going further. In these cases, women never tell the whole truth! When he would escape by a leap from your window, you try to keep him by strength of arm. You get on finely, madam! Three months in the army have done wonders for you. Three months more will accomplish you so thoroughly, that you will be fit for no other society through life. I will tell you what, Mabel, I will not lose a moment, but bundle you up, and pack you off to your aunt, while you are yet worth sending!"
Between shame and indignation at this unjust assault from such a quarter, poor Lady Mabel burst into tears, and rushed off to her room, where she locked herself up, resolving never again to leave it until she commenced her journey homeward. It was not long before her hasty father repented of his coarse and violent attack on her, in a case in which the heaviest fault was his own. He came rapping at her door, and by dint of apologies, remonstrance, and commands, brought her out, and induced her to spend the evening in his company. And a very uncomfortable evening it was to both of them.
Two days after this, L'Isle rode into Elvas, and brought orders with him that set the town astir. Such a breaking up of all the comfortable and luxurious arrangements of messes and quarters had not been lately seen. For Elvas was the Capua of the brigade, which had to lighten itself of many an incumbrance, including much of what Shortridge termed its heavy baggage, in order to bring itself to a condition to march. There was many a woeful parting, too, and scandal says that the ladies of Elvas might have laid the dust with their tears. But we will leave these stories to Colonel Bradshawe.
All was confusion in the household at headquarters. Lord Strathern had to bestir himself, to get both his brigade and himself ready to march by one route, and Lady Mabel had to prepare for her journey by another. It was now that Moodie's worth shone manifestly forth. The old coach and harness were overhauled and put in order. He secured, we believe, by impressment, another pair of mules and two postillions. Every leaf of thehortus siccuswas carefully packed, and put into the hands of anarriero, bound for Lisbon, and Jenny Aiken and William, the footman, were pulled and shoved about in a way that convinced them that it was time to be moving; yet he found plenty of time to spur up my lord's own servants, and push forward their preparations. Busy as Lord Strathern was, he failed not to remark Moodie's prompt, methodical, and energetic labors. He pronounced him the prince of quartermasters, and a heavy loss to the army. "The old fellow would evacuate a fortress, or conduct a retreat with the precision of a parade, and not leave even a dropped cartridge to the enemy behind him." In fact, had Marshal Soult sworn to sack Elvas to-morrow, Moodie could not have been more on the alert in getting Lady Mabel ready to leave it. Not that he was afraid of a Frenchman—he would willingly have faced him, and made his mark upon him—but when all might be lost, and nothing gained by staying, Moodie, like Xenophon, was proving his soldiership by a speedy, yet orderly retreat. He was carrying off Lady Mabel,viathe villages of Lisbon and London, to his stronghold of Craggy-side, where, he trusted, she would be safe from L'Isle and Popery.
Many signs of a speedy flitting were now seen about head-quarters. Lady Mabel sat melancholy and alone in her half-dismantled drawing-room. To-morrow, she is again to enter the desert of Alemtejo, on her way back to Lisbon. What a relief she would have found in busy preparations, even for that dull journey, now robbed of all the charms of novelty and expectation; but Moodie's industrious alacrity had deprived her even of this resource. She was ready, and, instead of busy preparations, had only sad thoughts to occupy her. About to part with that father, of whom she had known more in the last three months than in all her life before; for hitherto her's had been but a child's knowledge of him—loving him and proud of him—for the defects she began to see she viewed but as minor blemishes, foreign to his nature, and due solely to that long career in which he had known no home, nor companionship, but what he found in garrison and field; she could not conceal from herself the new career of danger he was about to run. Everything she heard indicated that he was now to march to fields where war's wild work would be urged on with a fury, and on a scale for which the last five campaigns, great as their results had been, were but the preparation. She shuddered to think that, yet a few days or weeks, and the veteran of near forty years of service may lie on his last field. This, perhaps, was not her greatest grief, but she strove to make it so, and sat gloomily and anxiously awaiting her father's return from Elvas.
Presently she heard the sound of horses' hoofs clattering on the pavement of the court. Rising from her melancholy posture, she was going to meet her father, when, on opening the door, Colonel L'Isle stood before her.
All the incidents of the last evening they had spent together, particularly those which he had so carefully suppressed from the narrative wrung from him, rushed upon her memory. Her folly and his generous forbearance stood facing each other. Casting her eyes on the floor, and grasping the handle of the door, to steady her tottering frame, she could only gasp out, "I expected my father."
"My lord is very busy in Elvas, and so indeed was I," said L'Isle, coolly; "but, as I march at sunrise to-morrow, I felt bound to borrow a few minutes from duty to take my leave of Lady Mabel Stewart."
She now recollected herself enough to let go the handle of the door, and make room for him to enter, and, by a motion of the hand, invited him to take a seat.
Taking a chair near her, L'Isle ran his eye round the well-remembered room. Perhaps he was thinking of his last visit here—perhaps remarking its dismantled, comfortless condition. It was not more changed than he was. All his earnest frankness of manner was gone. He seemed to have borrowed a leaf from Colonel Bradshawe's book; and his air of cool self-possession, his imperturbable manner, under the present trying circumstances, would have excited that gentleman's admiration, but it added a chill to the discomfort of Lady Mabel's position.
Had he been angry, indignant, haughty, or sullen, it would have been an infinite relief to her. She might have known how to deal with him, and perchance have soon brought him round to a very different mood. Now L'Isle evidently waited with cool politeness to hear some sound from her lips; and she at length stammered out, "I am very sorry that you are going—that is, that papa and all of you are going so soon."
"Our pleasant sojourn in Elvas is over!" said L'Isle, carelessly, "and Elvas is a pleasant place. Your stay here, too, has been quite an episode in winter quarters. We cannot thank you too much for the enlivening influence of your presence among us. I, for one, will ever carry with me a vivid recollection of it."
Lady Mabel bowed. How cold and formal did this sound in her ears.
"To do ourselves justice," continued L'Isle, "some of us have not been remiss in our efforts to enable you to pass your time pleasantly. I dare say now, were I to hold myself to a strict account, I could reckon up many an hour stolen from the dull routine of duty to devote it to Lady Mabel's service."
"I am surely deeply indebted to you for the hours you so borrowed to bestow on me," Lady Mabel answered, much at a loss what to say, and looking every way but at L'Isle. "When I look back, I cannot but be surprised at the amount of my gains, the knowledge and amusement I have crowded into three short months, and chiefly through you."
"That time has passed, however," said L'Isle; "I can no longer be at hand to afford you amusement. And as for knowledge, although older than you, and knowing more of life, the world, and perchance of books, I doubt whether you have been the greatest gainer in our intercourse. But feeling a deep interest in you, I sincerely hope that you may gain one precious lesson through me."
"What is that?" asked Lady Mabel eagerly—for the first time looking fully at him.
"Never again heartlessly to throw away a friend!!" L'Isle said this more gravely than bitterly. Then rising, he bowed respectfully but formally, and was turning to go away.
Can she let him go without one word? But what can she say? She, at length, gasped out, "It was papa's doing."
"Your father's doing!" exclaimed L'Isle, with well-feigned astonishment. "Then Lady Mabel is an automaton," he added scornfully, "and I, blockhead that I am, never found it out till now! But I am thankful for wisdom even that comes too late. I now know Lady Mabel and myself."
Was not Lady Mabel now disarmed and defenceless? Completely at his mercy? By no means! In this extremity she sheltered herself behind her strongest defences. She covered her face with her hands, and burst into tears.
Was ever man more embarrassed than L'Isle? His proud, scornful air, vanished like a snow-flake in the fire—and forgetting all that had passed, he was seizing her hands to draw them away from her face, when old Moodie abruptly entered the room, and called out, "Colonel L'Isle, you are wanted in Elvas?"