'But she—' and Cherry stopped, afraid to vex him by speaking of Alice's incapacity to raise a character.
He calmly finished. 'She was not all we thought her. True, poor child; but an attachment worthily and steadily maintained, as for all his nonsense this has been, must be well for a man; and a disruption of this kind must be a breaking-up—whether he treat it lightly or no—of foundations such as one who seems to have little besides can ill afford to stand.'
It was the first time that the secret anxiety had been openly named, and Cherry clasped her hands.
'That is my chief anxiety,' resumed Felix. 'Otherwise the end of this matter is of course an advantage.'
'If she could use him so, she was not worth constancy,' said Cherry.
'No!' It was a decided No, though it was followed by 'As they had made her. Poor child! She was full of sweet womanly gifts, and might have been made everything excellent; but Edgar estimated her more truly than I did. There was always a certain spirit of intrigue, and want of substance, or she could never have so treated him.'
'Entirely unfeeling.'
'Or rather, too light to appreciate feeling otherwise than as a tribute to herself, or to dwell on the absent,' said Felix sadly. 'I now believe that she was conscious of—of my liking. Indeed, I am sure of it; I only tried to hope otherwise, though it was easy to forgive her preference for one so much more attractive. There was no harm in that. But as things stood with him, to throw him over without a word shows an essential want of comprehension of what was due to others.'
'She might at least have written through her aunts.'
'With a right sense of honour she would; but I believe she had no education in such things. Poor little thing! I hope the Frenchman will do well by her.'
'Felix dear, may I ask you—this is not the pain that it was before?'
'No' said Felix, looking steadily at her, with his chin on his hand. 'No, certainly not. I was greatly shocked and upset at first, but not personally; though of course I must always feel towards her as I never can for any other woman;' then, at Cherry's start, 'I mean that the woman who fills one's life with a certain glory and radiance of—possibility, never can be the same as others to one, even though it lasted ever so short a time, and was ever so great a mistake. But that does not mean wishing to begin it over again.'
'Not with her.'
'It is absurd to make auguries or protests,' said Felix quietly; 'but from a boy I knew well that that sort of thing could hardly be for me, and I am content to have returned to that conviction. Even ending, as it has done, the year of—of—perhaps fools' paradise was well worth having, but I hope it will serve me for life. If I can keep faithful to what I once thought Alice, it will be best for all of us. So don't be anxious about me, my Whiteheart. The trouble of last winter was over long ago, and the zest and spirit of life came back with strength and work. I am quite as happy now as I was before—happier, I think.'
'Then this need not make you ill,' breathed Cherry, aware that she was saying something foolish. Indeed, Felix laughed a little.
'Hardly,' he said playfully. 'Remember, Cherry, what a predicament I was in—obliged to act the heavy father, as Edgar calls it, when I was so much concerned myself, and with him telling me I was a fool for my pains, as I believe I was. Besides, it was a good honest cold I caught at Brompton, in a very sharp east wind. If you insist on going any further, you will become a family ghool, Cherry.' She was obliged to laugh; and he continued, 'No, don't be anxious. This was an opportune scald. I should have found the day's work severe, if I had not had time to face this thoroughly. Such a quiet day last spring would have been worth a quart of cod-liver oil later.'
Therewith the pattering of many feet resounded on the frost-bound street; and the church-goers returned, averring that Mr. Smith's sermon had been like enough to Edgar's to render it difficult to keep their countenances, and to make them rejoice in Angela's absence. Of this Felix might judge for himself, for not long after the preacher himself arrived, offering the MS. for an abstract for the paper, all unconscious of the second-sight that had reported it already.
There he lingered, trying to talk, as if he wanted to say something that would not come out; and at last he was only driven from the field by the return of Edgar and the girls, who came in open-mouthed and eager out of the cold.
Edgar had had a great deal of fun with Mrs. Harewood, and had on his side fascinated all the family; so that Robina confided to Lance that she thought Grace Harewood ought to be warned, for Edgar went on with her like 'You know what.'
'Make yourself easy,' said Lance; 'Grace and Lucy know all about that better than any girl in Minsterham. What did old Bill say? and what anthem did you have?'
Felix and Geraldine spent the Evening Service hour in very different fashion from the morning; for Edgar was their companion, and took the opportunity of making the remonstrance he had threatened about Lance and his prospects. He had never beenfinein Alda's way, and had not her feelings about losing caste; but whereas his politics were diametrically opposed to those of the Pursuivant, he thought Felix ranging himself, according to his essential Blunderbore nature, on the side of the old giants destined to destruction, and wasting talent and substance on a hopeless and thankless cause; but he knew his brother to be past remonstrance, and to be perfectly well aware that this was the losing side. Only Edgar entered a strong protest against Lance being, as he said, sacrificed just to make Wilmet's pot boil, and bolster up the old Pursuivant a little longer.
'You can't be more averse to it than I,' said Felix. 'If he could only go back to his work, he might yet get to the University.'
'Pshaw! that's not what I meant. He is not the stuff; you were the only one of us that had the making of a scholar. Now Lance has got just the taste and the talent that were baulked in my case by old Tom's sticking me down to hides and tallow, when I ought to have been cultivating them.'
'There's this difference,' said Geraldine; 'Cousin Thomas stuck you, but Lance sticks himself.'
'Under moral compulsion, eh?'
'The compulsion was on me,' said Felix. 'I was really afraid to deny him; the idleness, and the fretting over it, were doing his head so much harm.'
'That's all very well. No harm done; but to let him go on here in the stodge is a bit of short-sightedness I can't understand. He'll never be happy in it; and you'd better let him go before it is too late.'
'Go? but how, and where? His health is not fit for study, and his voice ought to rest for another year.'
Then Edgar explained his own plan. Lance had already considerable musical knowledge, and ability such that his way in the musical world would be secure. Amateur as he was himself, Edgar had such a footing there that he could secure an introduction for his brother, who while learning would be able to maintain himself; and either by violin or voice, if not by original composition, win name, fame, and fortune, in a few years. A manager of high reputation Edgar mentioned as likely to accept and train the boy; and he added that for his own part he would watch over the little fellow; and he added, with a look in his eyes that went to Felix's heart, 'And nothing would do me so much goodnowas the charge of him.'
'That Idobelieve, Edgar,' said Felix warmly; 'but it would be throwing the helve after the hatchet in a way you can't expect of a heavy father.'
'Exactly what I knew you would say. You veil it a little more; but we poor Bohemians don't meet with much more charity from you than from our stately sister. Reprobates all—eh?'
'Living a life of temptation enough to make me choose no one to be drawn into it that I can prevent. Have you been talking to Lance about it?'
'Well, it rose out of last night's talk to him. Not that he gave in to it. He's loyal to you to the back-bone, and all importance too with the charge of the shop. Besides, that cathedral—it's a sort of mother's milk to him, not out of his mouth.'
'That's a good hearing!' said Felix, with a rather defiant smile.
'But it won't last,' said Edgar; 'the drudgery and sameness will tell; and you'd better give in with a good grace in time, Blunderbore.'
'You've been persuading him,' said Cherry reproachfully.
'Well, Cherry, I'm not in the habit of confounding virtue with dulness; and when the little chap talked to me of the musical doings I had been after, I felt the sin and shame of getting a nightingale to make a barn-door fowl of.'
'I can only tell you,' said Felix, with more annoyance than he usually betrayed, 'that if you took your nightingale to the din of London, and the excitement of a concert, you'd have him with inflammation on the brain before the week was out. Why, I sent him over to see his doctor at Minsterham, and he says it would be murder to send him back to his books and the choir for this next quarter at least; and if cathedral music will not do for him, judge if London concerts would!'
'And did you think I wanted to carry off your deputy right hand while your own is hung up in a bag, you jealous old giant? Why, I proposed to devote myself to the Pursuivant to-morrow!'
'Thank you; I am afraid it would be taken for the Tribune.'
'As if I couldn't hit off the complacent, gentlemanly, stick-in-the-mud style for squiredom! I'll write you a leader—on what shall it be, municipalities, or the smut in wheat?—that you shall not know from your own.'
To wish Edgar away was impossible, and yet how feel willing that Lance should be under such influence? Withal there was the difficulty of showing Wilmet that to fret Lance with restrictions was a dangerous thing at such a moment. She would yield to Felix's desire that she would not interfere with that orgie over the kitchen fire—which he regarded all the time with as much dread as herself—but she thought his concession weak: and Lance himself was perilously like Edgar in all his bright pleasant qualities, talents, and tastes, so that the two had an enjoyment in one another's company that it was painful to regard with anxiety.
'Towered cities please us then,And the busy hum of men.* * * * * * * * * * * *And ever against eating caresLap me in soft Lydian airs.* * * * * * * * * * * *With wanton heed, and giddy cunning,The melting voice through mazes running.'Milton.
The Monday brought business instead of sentiment. Not only was the Pursuivant to be provided for, but Felix had on his mind the year's accounts. No one had ever had Froggatt and Underwood's Christmas bill later than the second week in January—and no one should. Besides, he was very anxious to balance his books this critical year, and was unwilling to employ a professional accountant for what, as far as head went, he could do perfectly well. His willing helpers began to perceive what they had never realized before—his practised power of quickness and accuracy. The Pursuivant was quite work enough for Cherry, even if she could have borne the strain of application to accounts; Lancelot was needed in the shop; and Wilmet and Clement found themselves whirled on beyond their power of speed. Robina proved the most efficient helper; for arithmetic had been so well taught by Miss Fennimore, that she understood with less trouble to herself and Felix than any of the rest. They laughed to find that five had been about what he usually did singly; and that he had all the time been the main-spring of them all—referee to Lance and Cherry, arranging for the others in pencil with his left hand, breaking off to direct one, verify for another, explain to the third, and often distracting them by whistling to Theodore, amusing Stella, or gossiping with Edgar—all with ease and without hurry, as if it came naturally to him. 'Julius Caesar was nothing to him!' laughed Geraldine, as she perceived the ability and power that she had never ascribed to him before, because he had not Edgar's brilliance. As to Edgar, though he had been trained for a merchant's clerk, he professed to have forgotten all his training: he would only proffer help to the editorial business, and there put out Cherry's arrangements more than he helped her; and finding every one much too busy to loiter, he took his departure early on Tuesday morning, leaving an unsatisfactory sense that he had not been comforted nor made welcome enough—a sense of regret and yet of relief.
The result of the balance was that the Pursuivant was a less profitable investment than hitherto, but by no means a loss; while the Tribune seemed to have reached a present level of circulation, where it might rest till some further excitement. There would henceforth be a hand-to-hand struggle; but the Pursuivant still held its own. And as to the private budget, the householdhadpulled through without exceeding their income, when all the demands of the year were answered. Moreover, Fulbert had been appointed to a well-paid office, and had sent home twenty-five pounds, begging that Lance might have the preference in the disposal; and the whole family were very proud of this, the first substantial help that had been sent in by any of the brothers—Lance proudest of all, perhaps, though he declared that it was no good to him, and begged that it might clear Bernard's first year.
Lance had said nothing all this time of Edgar's invitations, and no one was sure whether that unscrupulous person had made them to him in person or not, till one dismal foggy afternoon at the end of the week. Felix, though still helpless as to his hand and arm, had resumed his place down-stairs; and Cherry was sitting in the window, to get light to pursue her work of unpicking a dove-coloured French merino dress, a legacy of Alda's, which was to be dyed and made up again for Angela. It was a business that she disliked—it always seemed to bring the sense of grinding to her mind—and this particular dress seemed to carry in every fold the remembrance of some jar between the wearer and herself; nor was she exhilarated by the accompaniment, for Robina was dutifully puzzling out on the worn old piano a long difficult sonatina—a sort of holiday task, which lay heavy on the child's mind, and seemed to Cherry a mere labyrinth of confused sounds. The dull day, the dull work, and weary clash up to the place where Robina never failed to stumble, and then go back to the beginning with no better success, wore Cherry's spirits. She began to feel as if this were like her life—all mist, all toil, all din, everything fair and lovely closed up from her, nothing left but the yearning knowledge that it existed, and that everybody could enjoy it except herself—she, who felt such capacity for making the most of it. The sense of imprisoned tedium grew so strong at last, that she was ready to cry out to stop the only thing she could stop, when she was sensible that a very different hand was on the keys—no confused or uncertain touch, but the harmony was being read off, and the stammering spelling work was exchanged for clear, true, feeling discourse. She needed not to look round to know that Lance was standing behind Robina; but presently he came to a dull discordant note, and broke off with a growl of disgust, 'What, another gone!'
'Didn't you know that?'
'No; I can't bear to touch the wretched old thing, it makes me sick!'
'I wish we could learn to tune it.'
'Poulter did show me once, but it's no good. It is just as makeshift and disgusting as all the rest of it!'
'You've got a head-ache, Lance.'
'No, I haven't. Felix has been at me, too.'
'What! he sent you up?'
'Ay;' and as Robina sat down on a low stool, he threw himself on the floor, with his head on her lap, delivering himself of a howling yawn.
'Why did he send you up?' as she stroked his hair back from his temples.
'Oh, it has been an intolerable bother! All the samples of writing-paper have somehow been and gone and got into the wrong drawers, and Mr. Underwood has been in no end of a state of mind—quite ferocious; and Lamb and I have been sorting and struggling to get 'em right, till at last I didn't know fancy pink from widow's deepest affliction; and Felix, by way of the most cutting thing he could do to me, orders me up-stairs!'
'I am so sorry! It must have been Lamb's doing.'
'No: he's much too sober-sided. It was mine, I'm sure, one day when I was hating it all a little worse than usual.'
'Hating it all! O Lance! I thought you got on so well!'
'A nice sort of getting on! I know when it was. There were those two Miss Bayneses—out at Upham—came in with some fad about note-paper, made a monstrous fuss; but they are very pretty—something like that girl at Stoneborough. So I wrote up to Scott's—took no end of trouble. Scott had to cut it on purpose—wouldn't do less than a ream—and after all, when it came down, my young ladies just take one quire of it, turn everything over again, never say one word of thanks, but stand chattering away to an ape of a cousin that came in with them. I was in such a wax, that I believe I jumbled up the paper when they'd gone, and tumbled it all over again; and it has never got the better of it, though I always meant to set it to rights.'
'Well, I think it served you right, if you only did it because they were pretty!'
'It wasn't altogether that; but I knew they would say nothing was to be had when Mr. Underwood wasn't there. That's the way of it; one's just a bit of a machine for getting things!'
'You knew that before, when you took the work.'
'Yes; but somehow I did not know it would be so disgusting. I don't suppose that girl at Stoneborough would look at me over the counter now. No, and I don't know that she ought, either; only people might have a civil "Thank you" to throw at one. I'm an ass, that's all! Only one hates having no one to speak to!'
'It is different from the Harewoods.'
'Don't talk about that!'
'But, Lance, I thought you liked it all. You said you did when I came home; and when Felix was laid up, you were everything, and did so well. I thought you would have been pleased.'
'Yes; I saw the whole stupidity and botheration of the thing. It has got to be work instead of play—I suppose that's it.'
'But, Lance, does it follow that you must go on with it all your life, because you are helping Felix through this winter?'
'While the accounts look like this, I don't see how he is to pay a stuck-up shopman. No, it is all stuff and nonsense! I didn't think Edgar's talk would have upset me like this.'
'What? his talk about operas, and concerts, and pictures—?'
'And the spirit and the fun that are always going there. That must be life! One's eyes and ears do seem given one for something there! Do you know Bob, he wants me to come up and live with him, and get an engagement as a pianist, and learn the violin?'
'O, Lance! but Felix and Wilmet would never consent!'
'No, and they didn't ought to. No, I could never,' and he spoke low, but Cherry heard his clear voice distinctly, 'give the stage what was taught me for that other purpose. If I can't be what I want, I must do this common work for my living, and not make a market of my music. I cangivethat freely to the Church—that is if I ever get my voice again.'
'That's right, dear Lancey,' said Robina, looking down at the face on her knees; 'you could not really like that odd life Edgar leads.'
'Like it? Much you know about it, Bob. It does make everything else seem as dull as ditch-water!'
'Not always.'
'Not when I can get it out of my head. Only I do wish things wouldn't be so stupid here. It's just like a horse in a mill seeing a fine thorough-bred come and kick up his heels at him in a meadow. I say, Bob, let's go and get a turn at the organ—you can blow for me; it will get the maggots out of my brain best.'
'Oh yes, dear Lance, only—'
'Only what?'
'If you didn't much mind those horrible notes, could you just show me the sense of that thing? I must learn before I go back to school; and Angel hates it so, I did it when she was out.'
Lance made an ineffable grimace; but having undertaken to act music-master, he first played the piece as exquisitely as the cracked piano would allow, and then scolded poor Robin within an inch of her life at every blunder, for her utter lack of taste, vituperating the stupidity of those who threw good music away upon her.
She took it all as an honour and a kindness, though she cried out for a respite long before she had come up to his rather unreasonable requirements; and reminding him that it would soon be too dark for his designs on the church organ, she went to get ready; and the two were not seen again till after dark, when the patient Robina came in very cold, but there was a bright peacefulness on Lance's face, as if he had played away his repinings.
Felix explained the having sent him away by saying that the strain of the days when he had been in charge had told on him, for he had grown so confused and distressed in the endeavour to remedy the mistakes that had been made, that it had been needful for every reason to send him away from the scene of action. No doubt the responsibility, and the resistance to Edgar's invitations had been a considerable pressure on his mind; but whatever his longings might be, he said no more about them, and continued to be the sunshine of the house—so bright, frank, and open that no one would have guessed at the deep reserves within.
It was about a month later that one evening he darted into the room, exclaiming, 'Isay, who do you think is here? Why, Renville, Edgar's boss!'
'Nothing the matter, I hope?' cried Cherry.
'Oh no, nothing; only Tom Underwood has sent him down to see about some picture at Centry, and so he dropped in, and Felix has asked him to spend the evening.'
'The evening!' Wilmet started up.
'Hark! there they are on the stairs!'
The introduction was deferred, for Felix shut him into Mr. Froggatt's room, and then came himself to say, 'I couldn't but ask him; I hope it is notverytroublesome?'
'N—no—oh, no,' said Wilmet 'Only—Lance, should you mind just running down to Prothero's to get some rashers; and let me see—eggs, if he has any he can recommend, and not above sixpence for seven?'
'Little Lightfoot is there,' said Felix, who even in his shoe-cleaning days would not have liked such a commission.
'He has no sense,' returned Wilmet; 'and I can't spare one of the maids. You don't mind, Lance?'
'Not a whistle. Only how is my sense to act, if Prothero's conscience won't warrant his eggs?'
Wilmet's answer was lost in the clank of coppers, as she left the room with her willingaide-de-camp, and neither of them was seen again for the next half hour, during which time Felix had introduced the neat dapper little Mr. Renville to his sister Geraldine and little Stella; and a conversation had begun which entertained Cherry extremely—it was so like a breath from that wonderful world of art in which Edgar lived; and meantime the painter's quick eye was evidently taking stock of the drawings on the walls, and feasting on little Stella's childish beauty, though he was too polite to make remarks. There had been only just time for Felix and Cherry to look at each other, wondering what their house-keeper designed, when the door between the rooms was opened by Lance, with a face as red as a boiled lobster: and behind the tea-tray appeared Wilmet's head, likewise considerable heightened in complexion, though not so unbecomingly. Nor had they roasted themselves for nothing. Lance looked and winked with conscious pride at the poached eggs, frizzled contorted rashers, and crisp toast, wherein he had had his share of glory; and Wilmet's pile of scones in their snowy napkin divided the honours of the feast with the rissoles, previously provided for the brothers, who since Felix's health had become matter of thought, had come to make their principal meal in the leisure of the evening, when that notable housewife of theirs could provide for them.
Certainly, Mr. Renville's own Nuremburg haus-frau could not have turned out a neater little impromptu supper than Wilmet had done; though she had decidedly objected to Lance's concealment of the uncouth forms of the butter with fern-leaves from the garden, and had flatly refused to let him station either a pot of jonquils or a glass of snowdrops in the middle of the table. 'Eating, was eating, and flowers were flowers,' she said; which sentiment somehow tickled Lance so much, that choking added to the redness of his visage, as, while buttering the muffins, he tried to exercise some sculpture on the ill-shaped lump.
To a Londoner, however, all country fare was fresh, pure, and delicious, more especially when dispensed by one who, for all her disdain of the poetry of life, could not but be in herself a satisfaction to the artist's eye. He could not help a little start of amazement; and as he paused while Cherry made her slow way into the other room, he could not refrain from whispering to Felix that he had always thought the portraits Edgar brought from home a little too ideal, but that he perceived that they did not do justice to the reality; and Felix, with a little curl of his mouth, and rub of his hands, asked whether Mr. Renville had seen his other twin sister. 'Yes; she was extremely handsome, but somehow her style did not explain that classical beauty in the same manner.'
To look at Wilmet and Stella, and to talk to Felix and Geraldine, was no despicable pleasure. Felix's powers of conversation were a good deal cultivated by the clients of the reading-room, who had always gossiped with Mr. Froggatt as now with him; and Geraldine had native wit and liveliness, that were sure to flash out whenever the first chill of shyness was taken off, as it easily was when her brother was there to take the lead.
But Cherry was not prepared for that proposal of Felix's that she should show her drawings to the guest. Poor man, he must be so much used to the sight of young-lady drawings; and of late Cherry had been in the depths of despair about hers, with all their defects, that she knew not how to remedy, glaring full upon her. She would have protested, but Lance had handed out the portfolio; and fluttering, nervous, eager, she must conquer her silly sense of being 'all in a twitter.'
Those two or three fanciful groups—his 'Ah, very pretty!' was just courteous and almost weary. But then came an endeavour to produce Lance as the faithful little acolyte in the Silver Store. Mr. Renville looked at that much more attentively, smiled as he nodded at her model, and praised the accuracy of the drawing of the hand. From that moment his manner of looking was altogether different. He criticised so hard that Wilmet was in pain, and thought poor Cherry would be annihilated; but Cherry, on the other hand, was drinking in every word, asking questions, explaining difficulties, and Mr. Renville evidently extremely interested, seeing and hearing nothing but the sketches and the lame girl.
'Who had been her teacher?'
'Edgar.'
'No one else? Only your brother?' in great surprise. 'I don't know when I have seen such accuracy even in the school of art.'
'Edgar is so particular about that.'
'Well, if I could only get him to learn his own lesson!'
'I have so little to copy,' said Cherry. 'I have nothing to distract me.'
It was little enough; a few second-hand studies of his; a cast that Felix had given her off an Italian boy's board, which came opportunely on her birthday; and her living models when she could catch them, generally surreptitiously. But upon her small materials she had worked perseveringly, going back to the same subject whenever she gained a new light, profiting by every hint, till the result was an evident amazement to the artist; and as he emphatically said, pointing to an outline caught from John Harewood as he was reading last summer, 'This is not talent, it is genius! You ought to give yourself advantages, Miss Underwood.'
Cherry smiled rather sadly. 'It is quite enough that Edgar should have them,' she said.
'Ah! if he would only take half the pains with his drawing that he seems to have inculcated upon you!'
It was a disappointment. She had much rather have heard Edgar's genius praised than her own, which, be it what it might, she had come to believe must, for want of cultivation, be limited to the supply of Christmas cards and unsatisfactory illuminations.
But when the sisters had gone to bed, Mr. Renville had much more to say. He had sought Felix out a good deal for the purpose of talking over Edgar, He said that the young man's talent was of a graceful, fantastic, ingenious description, such as with application would be available for prosperity if not for eminence; but application Edgar had never perseveringly given, since he had first found himself surpassed in the higher efforts of art. His powers were too versatile for his own good, and he dabbled in everything that wasnothis proper occupation—concerts, amateur theatricals, periodical literature and journalism, comic sketches. His doings were not all wholly unremunerative; but though he viewed them as mines of wealth, they were really lures into a shifty uncertain life, and distractions from steady consistent labour. His fine voice, his brilliant wit, and engaging manner, made him a star in the lively society on the outskirts of art; and he was expensive, careless, and irregular in his hours to a degree that sorely tried the good man, a precisian in his domestic customs. He and his little German wife, however, loved the lad, as everybody did love him who came under the influence of his sunshiny grace and sweetness of temper—the unselfish manner inherited from one whose unselfishness was real; and used as they were to the freedom of artist life, their allowances were liberal; but of late there had been a recklessness and want of purpose about his ways which both grieved and alarmed them: he was more unsettled than ever, seemed to have lost all interest in his studies at the Academy, was getting into a set that had degenerated from permissible eccentricity into something very like lawlessness, and even while an undesirable inmate, had vexed his kind friend and master by proposing to remove from under his roof, and set up with a chosen comrade of his own.
Committed to his charge, as Edgar Underwood had been by the elder brother, the kind little artist felt it his duty not to let him go without an intimation to his family, though well aware that a father could have little control in such a case, how much less a brother only by two years the elder?
All that Felix could hope was, that since this state of dreary recklessness was so evidently the effect of disappointment, it might pass with the force of the shock. He himself had experiences of the irksomeness of the dull round of ordinary occupation when the heart was rent by a sudden shock; and though he had forced himself on under the load that had so nearly crushed him, he could perfectly understand the less chastened, more impetuous nature, under less pressure of necessity, breaking into aberrations under a far more astounding blow of desertion. So he hoped. But what could he do? He knew but too well the cool manner in which Edgar turned over his remonstrances as those of the would-be heavy father. He could only thank Mr. Renville, promise to write to Edgar, and entreat him not to remove from the roof which was so great a safeguard against the worst forms of temptation, advise him perhaps to study abroad for a time to pacify the restlessness of his disappointment—at any rate, if he could do nothing else, not let the brother whom he still loved best of all drift away without feeling that there were those who grieved and strove for him.
It was not only of Edgar that Mr. Renville spoke, however. He was so much impressed with Geraldine's drawings, that he argued that she should have a quarter's study in the South Kensington Museum, undertaking, as one of the masters, to facilitate her coming and going, so that she should not be involved in any scrambles, and declaring that she only needed a few opportunities of study to render her talent really excellent and profitable.
Felix declared her going to be simply impossible; but either Mr. Renville or Edgar did not let the matter rest there, for a warm invitation arrived from the family in Kensington Palace Gardens, backed by many promises of tender care from Marilda. It seemed to be absolutely throwing away opportunities for Cherry to refuse to avail herself of such an opening; and though she was in exceeding trepidation, she had enough of the sacred fire to long to perfect her art, justified by the wish to render it substantially beneficial. And then Felix could not help thinking that the presence of his favourite sister might be a wholesome check to Edgar in one direction, and incentive in another, at this critical time, and this was no small weight in his balance. While Cherry, on the one hand, dreaded going out into the world with the nervous dismay of an invalid, who had never been anywhere but to St. Faith's; and on the other, felt this opportunity for herself almost an injustice to Lance, with all his yearnings.
She was to go immediately after Easter; and whether by Edgar's suggestion or not, Marilda imperiously begged that Lance might bring her up to London, and stay as long as he could be spared. It was impossible to give him longer than from Saturday till the last train on Monday, for Felix had reporting business on hand, and must be out on Tuesday, and did not perhaps regret that things had so settled themselves.
Lance's overflowing enjoyment somewhat solaced Geraldine's alarm on the way up; he was so careful of her, and so proud of the charge; and after his wistful glance at Minsterham, the novelty was so delightful to him. His journey with John Harewood reckoned for nothing, for he had then been far too unwell to look about, and it had besides been on a different line; but now everything was wonderful, and his exclamations almost embarrassed Cherry, she thought they must so astonish their fellow-travellers. Even the hideousness of the suburbs seemed to fascinate him—there was something in the sense of the multitude that filled him with excitement. 'It is getting to the heart, Cherry,' he said, 'where the circulation is quickest.'
'Into the world—the vortex, I should call it,' returned Cherry thinking of drops being attracted by the eddy, and sucked into the whirlpool; but Lance was gone wild at the glimpse of a huge gasometer, and did not heed.
Edgar's dainty beard and moustache were the first things that met their eyes upon the platform; his strong arms helped Cherry out, and in a wonderfully short time seated her beside Alda in a great luxurious carriage.
To her disappointment, however, the two back seats remained vacant.
'No, no,' said Edgar, his white teeth gleaming in a smile; 'we must make the most of our time, Lancey boy. What do you say to walking by Westminster—then we'll get something to eat—and you shall know what Don Giovanni is like before you are many hours older, my boy?'
Cherry's last view of Lance was with a look of dancing ecstasy all over his person.
'Don Giovanni is the opera, isn't it?' she said in bewilderment.
'Of course; what did you think?'
'But I thought that was dreadfully dear.'
'Oh! Edgar can always get tickets for anything. You must not bring out Wilmet's frugalities here, Cherry. Dear old Wilmet, how does she bear this long waiting?'
Alda was really interested in home tidings, and pleased to point out matters of interest, so that Cherry was fairly happy, till the awe of the great handsome house, alone in its gravelled garden, fell on her.
But when once up the stately stone steps, she was kindly, solicitously, welcomed by Marilda and her mother. The reception-rooms (as Mrs. Underwood called them) were all on the ground floor; and Cherry had only to mount one easy flight of broad steps to reach the former school-room, with two little bed-rooms opening into it—one assigned to her, the other to Marilda's old nurse, who had been kept on with little or nothing to do, and was delighted to devote herself to the lame young lady.
She took charge of Geraldine's toilette for the late dinner, so tremendous to the imagination used to the little back-room at home, but which turned out after all more tedious than formidable. In truth, Cherry was very tired, and Alda quite kindly advised her to go to bed. She wanted to sit up and wait for her brothers, but was laughed at, and finally was deposited in her very pretty pink bed, where, however, the strangeness of all things allowed her very little sleep. Quiet as the place was, she thought something seemed to be going on all night; and at some semi-light hour in the morning she bounded up as if at a shot, for there really was a step, and a knock, and her door opening.
'Cherry, are you awake?'
'O Lance! what is the matter?'
'Matter! nothing—only I'm going out to look about me, and I thought I'd leave word with you and see how you were.'
'Out! Why, didn't I hear the clock strike five?'
'Ay. Have you been awake?'
'A good deal. Have you?'
'As if anybody could sleep after that! I've gone it all over and over. I see there's a piano in this outer room. I'll just show you.'
'O Lance!—now—and Sunday!'
'I forgot. But it is so awful, Cherry: it made one feel more than a hundred sermons;' and the far-away look came into his eyes; as in rapid words he sketched the story, described the scenes, dwelt with passionate fervour on the music, all with an intensity of feeling resulting in a great sense of awe. His excitement seemed to her so great that she begged him to go back to bed for the hours that yet remained before breakfast.
'I couldn't, I tell you, Cherry.'
'But you'll havesucha head-ache.'
'Time enough for that when I get home. I don't know what to do with myself, I tell you; I must get into a church somewhere, or I can't bear it.'
'You'll lose your way.'
'I've got the map of London. If I can I shall get to St. Matthew's; and so I thought I had better tell you, in case I wasn't back to breakfast. Edgar showed me your room.'
'Is Edgar sleeping here?'
'No; he went to Renville's when he'd put me in. I'll be back anyway by the time Robin and Angel come, but I can't stay quiet. Nobody ever gave me any notion what this place is. It makes one feel I don't know how, only just to see the people—streaming, streaming, streaming, just like a river! And then that wonderful—most wonderful music!'
The boy was gone, and Cherry felt as if his fate were sealed—the drop gone to join the other drops, and to swirl away!
Edgar was rather amazed and disconcerted, when on coming in about ten o'clock he found that he had vanished. He had meant to take him to any ecclesiastical wonder that he wished; but he laughed at Cherry's fears of the boy losing himself. 'He is a born gamin,' he said—'takes to London streets as a native element. But Felix is right, he must not have too much of it. I was heartily glad when it was over last night, and durst not keep him for the ballet, though I much wanted to see what he would say to it; but he was worked up to such a pitch I didn't know what would come next, and I'm sure his remarks taught me more about Don Giovanni than ever I saw before. He was in such a state when he came out that I hardly knew what to do with him. I should have given him a glass of ale but he wouldn't hear of that, so I could only let him have his will—a great cup of coffee—and send him to bed. I knew he wouldn't sleep.'
Lancedidappear at the moment of luncheon, when Robina and Angela arrived to spend the rest of the day. He had not reached St Matthew's; but he had found a church open early for a grand choral Celebration, and this not being customary at Minsterham, had been almost overwhelming to a nature like his. It had lasted so long, that the bell rang for matins before the congregation had left the church; and Lance had stayed on, and heard a service far exceeding in warmth and splendour that of his sober old cathedral, and such a soul-stirring sermon as was utterly unlike the steady-going discourses of his canons.
He had never even missed his breakfast, and yet seemed not to care for the meal before him, though he ate what was put on his plate; and he had that look of being all brow, eyes, and nose, that had often recurred ever since his illness; but he would not allow that he was tired; and so far from being able to sit still, wanted his little sisters to walk with him in Kensington Gardens, and Robina being a discreet person, and knowing her way, there was no reason against this; and off they went, all three supremely happy, and Cherry feeling a certain hopefulness that Robina's steady good sense would be a counterpoise to other influences and excitements. But Lance had not come to any state for sober sense. Under the trees of Kensington Gardens, the influence of the brilliant spring beauty, and the gay cheerful vivacity of the holiday crowd, still acted on his eager self; and he used his sisters as audience for all his impressions as to Don Giovanni, till he had driven Angela almost as wild as himself with his vivid descriptions—and to be sure, he treated it as a sort of religious exercise. Indeed, the sensation he seemed chiefly to have carried off with him, was that London had been maligned; he had always supposed it to be a Vanity Fair, where one's religion would be in extreme peril; and behold, he had found religion there like everything else—more quickening, more inspiriting, more exquisitely beautiful and satisfying in its ministrations, than anything that he could have conceived! Nor did the late Evening Service with which his day finished—with all its accessories of light and music, and another sermon from a celebrated preacher—lessen this impression, which made St Oswald's by comparison so utterly flat, dead, and unprofitable.
Robina could not help saying to Cherry, with that old-womanish air of wisdom that belonged to her sometimes, 'I do wish we hadn't taken Lance to such a nice church. He knows less what London really is now than he did before.'
Dear little Robin! as if she knew what Londonreallywas! And Cherry was too anxious an elder sister to give her much comfort, except by saying, 'It is fair that he should know the truth of what is to be found there, Bobbie. You see he is only getting good out of it in his own mind.'
'Yes, that's true; only he will make himself ill.'
This had come to be Edgar's fear as well as Cherry's, when they found that Lance had slept quite as little the second night as the first, though he brought down those great lustrous blue eyes of his quite as wide open and full of zest in the morning. It made Edgar cautious in his choice of sights for the Monday; but one so long habituated to London, and regarding with contempt its stock lions, could not estimate what they were to a lad at once so susceptible and so unsophisticated, and his diversion at Lance's raptures passed into anxiety, not unmingled with tedium, and almost disdain, at anything so very countrified; but his real care and good nature never flagged till he had safely, and to his positive relief, seen his little brother off for Bexley by the five o'clock train, to work off his intoxication at home, among his proper guardians.
'I am sure,' he said to Geraldine, 'if I had had any notion that his brain had continued so ticklish, I would never have had him on my hands. The difference between lionizing him and old Blunderbore! why it was—not exactly fire and water, but Ariel and Gonzalo. Shut the two up in the same shop! It is ridiculous! No, no, Lance must vegetate down there till his brains have cooled down from that unlucky stroke; but after that, you'll see, nothing will keep him down in Felix's hole; 'tisn't in the nature of things that he should be buried there. I've given him the violin I got at Liège, so he won't be quite wasting his time.'
There was rest—at least, for the present—in Edgar's acquiescence in Lance's vegetation, except so far as it gave food for present anxiety, by showing how the boy's excitability had alarmed him; and Cherry anxiously watched for reports from home. Felix and she herself were the chief letter-writers in the family, and he kept her daily supplied with tidings. His first account—written at intervals at the reporter's table at Minsterham—bore that Lance had come all right, and seemed to have enjoyed himself much. So he had kept up for one day; but on the third came the inevitable tidings, 'Poor Lance is in bed, with headache in its worst shape. Wilmet has been obliged to stay at home to attend to him. It must have been coming on yesterday, for he seems to have talked more than enough, and made more blunders than can be remedied in a day. I suppose Edgar would have laughed if I had cautioned him; but I would about as soon have put the boy to stand on the Equator as have taken him to that opera.'
The days of pleasure seemed to have a heavy price; it was not till Saturday that Felix reported Lance as in his place as usual, but still looking ill, quiet, and subdued. 'I am afraid,' proceeded the letter, 'that it has been a very fascinating glimpse he has had of Edgar's way of life, and that F. and U.'s house is more against the grain to him. I doubt whether it be suited to him; but the other course seems over-perilous. I wonder whether fathers have the power of insight and judgment that I need so much. However, for the present, health speaks plainly that home is the only place for him; and I can with a free conscience enjoy his bright face and service of good will. To have you and him both out of the waywassevere; but if it were not for his good, it is for yours.'
Yes, Geraldine trusted it was for her good. When Thomas Underwood went to the City in the morning she was always set down at the Renvilles', whence the transit to the Museum was so short, that she could make it either with her brother's arm or the master's. It was not thought fit for her to work all day, so Mrs. Sturt (the old nurse) always came to meet and take her home to luncheon; after which she either went out with Mrs. Underwood and Marilda, or was carried about by her brother, in which case her conveyance was always defrayed at the door with so little knowledge on her part, that Edgar accused her of supposing Cousin Thomas to keep innumerable very seedy equipages always in waiting on her steps.
It was great enjoyment—real instruction of the best sort in that which was most congenial to her, putting the crown on her long lonely perseverance, and giving a daily sense of progress and achievement, was delightful. She had no notion of rivalry; but when she perceived that she was excelling, that commendation almost always attended her attempts, and that in any competition she always came near the mark and was sometimes foremost, she was conscious of a startling sense of triumph; and Edgar was full of exultation. If his own studies at the Royal Academy had been fulfilling all his golden dreams, he could not have been half so uplifted as he was by Cherry's chances of a medal; while, if he had only acted on a quarter of the sensible advice he gave her, he would already have been far advanced in his profession.
If he had been imprudent in Lancelot's case, he showed much tender good judgment in his selection on Cherry's behalf of exhibitions and rehearsals—never overdoing her, and using all his grace and dexterity to obviate her fatigue and prevent embarrassments from her lameness, till she began to take courage and feel at ease.
Alda never went with them. She said Cherry's pace would be the death of her, and she knew it all by heart. Yet, go where they would, there generally appeared, soon after four o'clock, a tall, handsome, black-moustached figure, seldom uttering more than 'Good-morning!' and 'All well at home?' and then content to stalk beside them, perfectly indifferent to their object, but always ready to give an arm to Cherry, or to find a cab.
'Dogged by Montezuma's ghost!' Edgar would mutter when the inevitable black head came towering into view; and even Cherry sometimes felt the silent haunting rather a bore. Edgar and Ferdinand were both good company alone, but together she knew not what to do with them; since her sole common subject of interest to Ferdinand, church details, provoked Edgar's sarcasm; and though Edgar had enough to say on a thousand other points, Fernan was totally silent on all, except horses, of which on her side she knew nothing. Nevertheless, for very pity, he was always allowed to know their designs; and Cherry delivered messages between him and Alda, and marvelled at her never finding it possible to avail herself of such chances of meeting.
Indeed, it puzzled Cherry why Ferdinand should be banished from the house, since Marilda took pains to mark her friendly feeling towards him as Alda's betrothed; and the resentment of her parents appeared to be inactive; but Alda declared that any advance on his side would provoke great wrath, and that open intercourse was impossible; and it could only be supposed that she was the best judge.
However, to Cherry herself, Alda was far kinder than at home—perhaps because her own ground was too secure to leave room for jealousy; and she viewed her sister as guest rather than rival. During the first shyness and awe, she was a kind helper, full of tact, which parried the rather obtrusive patronage of her so-called aunt; she provided books, quietly ameliorated matters of dress, and threw in judicious hints and encouragements, so that Cherry's warm heart beat gratefully, and she thought she had never known how nice Alda could be in her proper element.
As to Marilda, she was thoroughly good-natured, perhaps rather teasing, and tyrannical as to what she thought for Cherry's good, and very careful that she should not be neglected; but there did not seem to be much in common between them, they never could get on in atête à tête; and Cherry, who had heard vast statements from her brothers about Marilda's original forms of goodness, was disappointed to find her life so entirely that of a common-place young lady. She was clumsy, over-dressed, and of a coarse complexion; and though she sometimes said odd things, they were remarkable not for wit but for frankness. It seemed as though the world had been too much for Marilda's better self, and as if she were becoming the purse-proud heiress who fancied wealth could atone for want of refinement or of delicacy towards people's feelings.
It was with the master of the house that Cherry got on best. At first he treated her like a frail china cup that a touch might break, but gradually he discovered in her resemblances to all manner of past Underwoods, talked to her about her parents in their youth, expressed endless wonder how 'that lad Felix made it out,' and by-and-by found that a few questions about the day's doings would draw forth a delightfully fresh, simple, and amusing narrative, given with animated lips, and eyes that charmed him. He became very fond of little Geraldine, and accepted her as his special evening companion when his wife took the other two girls into society. She could talk, read the paper, or play at cribbage; and was so much pleased to be of use, that she became as much at ease and therefore as amusing as with old Froggy himself.
She had been assured of exemption from parties, but she found that the sumptuous luncheon was a popular institution, and that radiant ladies, lounging men, riding parties brought home by Alda, and stout matrons on a cruise of morning calls, were always dropping in. It was diverting to sit quietly by and listen to the characteristic confidences of the city dames, to the dashing nonsense of the girls, and the languid affectations of the young men; and capital material was furnished for the long letters that amused the breakfast-table at home—journals, half full of beautiful description, half full of fun and drollery. Those gay dames and demoiselles little thought what a pair of keen grey eyes were watching them, as they passed, almost unheeded, the little sober-hued person whom they never fairly understood to be the sister of the beautiful Alda.
Of the school establishment at Brompton Cherry saw something. She was invited to drink tea there, for the sake of talking over Angela; the two heads of the establishment being very glad to get an elder sister to discuss that puzzling personage with. Of Robina, since the catastrophe eighteen months ago, they had nothing but good to say; she had really lived it down, so far as to have proved that if she had erred, it was only in judgment; but with Angela they still knew not what to do.
She had come back subdued and with better impulses, and these had carried her on up to Easter, giving such satisfaction to the Vicar, that he had sanctioned her Confirmation; but immediately after the holidays, the wild spirit had broken out again. She neither learnt nor tried to learn, attended to nothing but music, and showed up exercises and dictation flagrantly ill-spelt, and not unfrequently making fun of the whole subject. As a reward for her weeks of propriety, she had been promoted to the German class; but she had openly declared that she hated German, and saw no use in it, and she would not attempt anything but an occasional caricature of pronunciation. Everybody liked her—even those whom she most disrespectfully provoked; and she was like a kind of tame monkey to the school, turning her very punishments into absurdity. She would lighten solitary confinement by fantastically decorating the chairs and tables. If shut up in the dark, her clear shrill voice would convulse all the household with Lance's whole repertory of comic songs, the favourite being Thackeray's 'Little Billee,' which she always sang as if she expected to be rescued by the sight of 'Admiral Nelson, K.C.B.,' if not made 'Captain of a Seventy-three!' and even impositions she always managed to make ludicrous, by comments, translations, or illustrations, bringing them up with a certain irresistible innocence and simplicity of countenance. What was to be done? No, they did not want her to be taken away; she was a bright dear girl, with a great deal of good in her—very warm-hearted, and certainly devout; and Miss Fennimore confessed that she should be very sorry to part with her, or to confess herself beaten in the struggle. 'Your name is Geraldine?' she asked, suddenly; 'are you Irish?'
'My grandmother was.'
'That accounts for it!'
'She must have absorbed all the Irish nature in the family, then,' said Cherry, laughing.
'Perhaps. But it throws a light on it. I don't know which is the most curious subject, national or family character.'
Of course Cherry was set to talk to Angela—an operation that she hated almost as much as Felix did; and the result of which attempt was this, 'Now don't—don't, Cherry!'—hugging her round the neck; 'you never were made for scolding, and it is no use spoiling your own pleasure and mine! Leave it to Wilmet; she does it with dignity, you know!'
'But, Angel, I do really want to understand why you are so set against German?'
'It's a nasty crack-jaw language, that all the infidels write their books in.'
'I only wish they did!' murmured Cherry.
'And it's the Protestant language, too; and that'sworse,' persisted Angela. 'No, I won't learn it on principle.'
'I thought principle was to do what one was told.'
'That depends. Now, German will never be of use to me; I'm not going to be a governess, and I sha'n't qualify myself for it!'
'Yes, Angel, I know what you mean; but isn't obedience the qualification you must learn—if you are to come to the other thing?'
'I shall learn it fast enough when the time comes. Don't you know, Cherry, a republic is much better preparation for despotism than one of your shilly-shally rational limited monarchies?'
'That may be true,' said Cherry; 'but you know I think the rational loyalty the most wholesome training.'
'Yes, I know. Family life suits you; but I must have the—the real religious life or none. I don't like secularity.'
'O Angel, you are much worse with these fine words that deceive you, when you are really and truly only a naughty idle child!'
'That's true, Cherry; and yet it is not true,' said Angela, thoughtfully. 'I am a naughty idle child, and yet I am more.'
'How is it—after this Confirmation and all?'
'Ah!' said Angel, frankly. 'I thought it would have done me good and made me different; but instead there's just one anticipation gone, and nothing to look to.'
'Not your own possible future?' (Cherry knew of it, though not Wilmet.)
'That's such a dreadful way off! No, if you allwillkeep me in the world, I must have my fun! Come, Cherry, don't look so horribly vexed! I'll tell you what, if you'll cheer up, I won't have another flare-up with old Fen as long as you are here to be bullied about it!'
And she kept her word so faithfully, that the two ladies thought that charming little elder sister had had a great effect upon their troublesome charge.
'Affection follows Fortune's wheels,And soon is shaken from her heels;For, following beauty or estate,Her loving soon is turned to hate.'Sir Walter Raleigh.
'Do you remember,' wrote Cherry, 'poor Fernan's old rival in the Life Guards, Sir Adrian Vanderkist? I have seen him! He descended upon us at luncheon-time in all his glory; and Mrs. Underwood was like Eve entertaining the Angel. I hope that is not profane! it is only Paradise Lost. I don't comprehend her delight, for he is only the grandson of a man who made a great fortune by inventing some metal to look like silver. Though he must have been Dutch, this youth is not the conventional Dutchman in seven knickerbockers perched on a barrel, but is small and insignificant, in spite of his magnificent get-up. Never did Fernan, in his most bejewelled days, equal that studious exquisiteness; and I could pity the baronet for having had a rival with black moustaches that curl of their own accord; but pity evaporates when I find that he has got Brown Murad, and hear Mrs. Underwood's gratitude for his promise of tickets for somebody's concert. I wonder whether he is thinking about Marilda?
'April 15th. Two great events begin to loom. One is oursoirée musicale, for which the cards are actually being written; and Edgar and Alda are debating the programme. I am to have a quiet corner out of sight, and use my eyes and ears. How I wish you and Lance could send up yours!
'The other is a great function at St. Matthew's, on the opening of the new infant-schools, on Whit Tuesday. Clement is coming down for it; and Robin, Angel, and I are to go with Cousin Tom to his office, where Clem will meet and take charge of us. It certainly is a fine thing to come to London, and see the world; though the nicest part of the world to me is that odd little room of Mrs. Renville's where people are so entertaining, and one catches glimpses of great luminaries in their moments of unbending and good nature.......
'May 3rd. Where shall I begin the story of oursoirée? I will pass over the misery of serving as acorpus vile, for Alda and Mrs. Sturt to try experiments on with scraps of head-gear and jewellery, and merely state that I had the white alpaca with blue velvet edges, and blue beads round my head and neck; and then they did notvery muchmind the sight of me; and Edgar even said I looked a tidy little thing enough. He and Marilda disposed of me in a nice little nook in the recess of a window, more than half hidden by a curtain, and capital for seeing and hearing, nearly as good as my old perch in the organ gallery. Alda looked beautiful—such lovely rosy clouds of soft gauziness, and wreaths of wild roses! She has put an end to the habit of dressing like Marilda, to their mutual benefit; but, oh, if I could see old W.W. in such garb! Doesn't she look disgusted? But who knows what John may put her into?
'Oh, the things people wear! (then followed some pen-and-ink outlines,) and the colours and the festoonings! I trust that in some stratum of society somewhere there is more notion of the beautiful. If the world is all like this, I can't tell why it should be so dangerous; for, as far as I can see, it consists in conjugating the verbto bore.
'However, there was the music, and that was compensation. (A critical account ensued then.)Private.Poor Edgar was quite upset when one of the ladies varied from the programme by singing Alice's favourite old "Sands of Dee." I saw him frowning and biting the end of his moustache, as if he could hardly bear it; but, as you may guess, he was the more funny and lively when he came to me, teasing me about that Sir Adrian, whom he calls a specimen of the transmutation of metals—Dutch slime made shiny, and threatening me with who or what would be transmuted next; but I think Marilda has more principle.
'Afterwards I had a great treat, for Edgar spied Mr. Grinstead, whom we had never expected, though he had a card, as he does not care for music; and Cousin Tom only knows him through having bought his lovely group of Una and the Lion. I had met him at the Renvilles'; and Edgar brought him to my corner, where he leant against the window-shutter, and talked most pleasantly, only he would go on all through the songs; but one could excuse a great deal to a man who knew Thorwaldsen, and has seen Canova; and he told me so much that I wanted to hear, that it was a perfect feast. When he found I had never seen the Leonardo at Morecombe House, he caught Mrs. Underwood, and arranged to take us there at four o'clock on Wednesday. Fancy seeing a Leonardo! and with him to explain it! Mrs. Underwood was quite in a rapture, because she wants to see a cabinet that Lady Morecombe gave £150 for; but I thought it very nasty of Sir Adrian to say that he knew Lord Morecombe very well, and could take her there any day, to which Alda answered that she hated show houses.'
(Enclosed from Edgar.)
'The fact is, that the Cherry is a brilliant success. She is our one native genius for conversation; and I will say for the Pursuivant that it has kept her up to the day. At Renville's she is the life of everything; and even here the ocean of dullness cannot so entirely asphyxiate her but that she sparkles up through it; and luckily Alda has not so perceived it as to begin the extinguishing process—indeed, she has affairs of her own to look to. As to Grinstead—it is a case of captivation. Don't be afraid, or the reverse: he is a confirmed old bachelor, bald and spectacled. Renville showed him her sketch of his Una, and he said nothing had ever so hit off the soul. He met her at their house; and she, not knowing who he was, was not encumbered with any awe of greatness, but chattered like her own little self, till he was taken with her freshness and cleverness, came here on purpose to meet her, and is to show her the Morecombe gallery. A fine chance! Altogether, the little maid has so many feathers in her cap, that she wouldn't know where to stick them, if—poor little dear!—she ever found them out, and didn't think every attention pure pity to her lame foot.'
The next was the day of the festival at St. Matthew's. Mr. Underwood graciously consented to use a carriage large enough to transport Cherry and both her little sisters to his office, at the door of which there appeared, however, not Clement, but Ferdinand Travis. The organist had been suddenly taken ill, and Clement was supplying his place; so Ferdinand, whose firm had taken a Whitsun holiday, was the substitute, in the vain hope that Alda would have been of the party.
'No,' said Angela; 'they are going to ride. And, O Fernan! I am sure I saw Brown Murad com—'
There she stopped short, either aghast at a sort of spasm that crossed Ferdinand's countenance, or diverted by the full current of life in Holborn; and he, recovering, began to point out whatever could interest Cherry. He had a great deal to tell about St. Matthew's, where he knew his way as well as Clement himself, and piloted his charge in good time to the very place their brother had indicated for them.
The service was most beautiful, and full of life; and then ensued a procession to, and benediction of, the new school and nursery for the little ones. Afterwards came the new experience of luncheon for the large motley party in the refectory of the clergy-house—new at least to Cherry, for her sisters were not unfamiliar there; Robina had a dear friend's little brother among the choristers, and Angela was chattering to a curate or two. Clement was happy in meeting with old comrades; and Cherry was glad that she was saved from being a burthen by Ferdinand's devotion, and quite accepted his assurance that it was a great delight to him.
Then followed a feast for the school-children and the aged; but the atmosphere soon became too much for Cherry, and she thankfully accepted Ferdinand's proposal of showing her the church in detail. It was only on the other side of the quadrangle; and there was a great charm in the lofty, cool, quiet building, where she could dwell thoroughly on every decoration, permanent or temporary, and in full sympathy with her companion, who went so fully and deeply into all these subjects, as to lead her on, and open new meanings to her. At last they sat down in a sort of cloister that ran round the court, to wait for the rest.
'Do you know,' said Geraldine, 'this place gives me a sense of life and vigour. Our own seems to me, in comparison, a sort of sleeping, or rather a mechanically acting, body, wanting a spirit and soul to be breathed into it and make it effective.'
'You have never told me about your new curate,' said Ferdinand; and indeed, by tacit consent, they had avoided the subject in Edgar's presence.
'Mr. Flowerdew? Oh, he is very good, very gentle, and kind; but he is a depressed elderly man, with all the energy disappointed and worn out of him. His wife is dead; and he has two or three children, out, settled, and fighting their way; and there he is alone, still an assistant curate, tumbled about in secondary positions too long to care for any more than just doing his duty without any life or spring.'
'Do you see much of him?' said Ferdinand, surprised by this intimate knowledge.
'Yes. He makes the sick his special care, and he thinks me one; so he comes sometimes, and sits half an hour when I am painting, without saying a word. I think it is cheerful for him, in his way,' said Cherry, with a merry laugh. 'And he is very musical; so the boys like that. But do you know, Ferdinand, when I look at him, I do feel thankful that my own dear father had not the long weary wear and tear to change him. That man is older than he would be even now.'
'Of course it must be good,' said Ferdinand. 'And is there no chance of Mr. Bevan coming back?'
'He wants another summer at the baths. The absence of the head paralyses everything so. I always feel, when I go back from St. Faith's, as if we had the framework, and of course the real essentials; but we have to do all the work of bringing it home to ourselves.'
'I know what you mean,' said Ferdinand; 'though Bexley must be more to me than any other place, this one is the great help and compensation to me. How I wish Alda were near it!'
'Has she ever been here?'
'Once or twice; but only under its shadow does one enter into the real life. Some day perhaps—'
Geraldine could not imagine the day of Alda's entering into the real life of St. Matthew's; but she could only say, 'Of course there is a vast difference between only coming as an outsider, and being one of the congregation.'
'Immense; though I never found it out till I came to live here; and so it would be with her. After all, were she but near, or I could see her freely, I should enjoy my present life very much.'
'I'll tell you what I should do in your place,' said Cherry. 'I would go straight to Mr. Underwood, and ask his leave to visit her; and I don't believe he would make any objection.'
'No. Alda forbids that,' he answered, decidedly; 'and she can be the only judge.' Cherry felt small. But presently he added, 'I wish I could be rid of the doubt whether the present state of things is not burdensome to her. Perhaps I ought to to have freed her at once; I could have worked for her without binding her.'
'Nothing but affection really binds,' said Cherry, in some difficulty for her answer.
'No; I might have trusted to that, but I thought the release would cost her as much as myself; and she was at home then!' and he suppressed a heavy sigh.
'She said it would be easier to meet you in London,' said Cherry; 'but I don't think it is.'
'And absence leaves room for imaginations,' he said. 'And I have nothing tangible to set against what I hear—ay, and see.'
'What?' the word was out of Cherry's mouth before she could check it.
'You can cast it out of my mind, perhaps,' he said. 'Do you ever see a fellow of the name of Vanderkist?'
Cherry could not help starting. And his black brows bent, and his face became stern, so that she was fain to cry, 'Oh, but it's Marilda!'
'Impossible!' he said, with what she thought a terrible smile at her simplicity. 'I tell you, I saw his first look at her—at my Alda!' Some ruthless Spanish ancestor must have looked out of the deep glow of his eyes, as he added, 'I hear he has betted that she, as well as whatever I used to prize, shall be his before the end of the season.'
'Let him!' said Cherry, proudly. 'Alda can't help that. She can't hinder his coming to the house.'
'I know,' he said. 'Do not suppose that I doubt her. I trust her entirely; but I am foolish enough to long for the assurance that there is no cause for the rumour that she encourages him.'
Under such eyes of dark fire, it was well that Cherry could sincerely answer, 'Oh no! Every one does come round her; but she does not let him do so a bit more than other people.'
'You entirely believe that I may dismiss this as a base groundless suspicion?'
'I do!' she said, with all her heart. 'We all know that Alda is used to admiration; it comes to her as naturally as pity and help to me, and makes no impression on her. Mrs. Underwood likes to have him as a fashionable guest, that's all. Oh, Alda could never be so wicked!'