neckIda flung her arms round Miss Crane's neck.
Ida flung her arms round Miss Crane's neck.
Ida flung her arms round Miss Crane's neck.
Miss Crane stood in the window watching, with dim eyes, the young pair walking down the street. A kitten came and, mewing, rubbed its soft little head against her foot. She stooped, stroked it gently, saying—
"Pussy, are you lonely too? for I am—very."
marble
AA story is told of a late Bishop of Peterborough, to the effect that at a public dinner he said that he once bought a picture of a sunset on a river, which he hung in his study; it was a bad picture, but it had a beautiful influence over him, and he confessed that when he looked at the picture "a curate might play with him."
A story is told of a late Bishop of Peterborough, to the effect that at a public dinner he said that he once bought a picture of a sunset on a river, which he hung in his study; it was a bad picture, but it had a beautiful influence over him, and he confessed that when he looked at the picture "a curate might play with him."
faithFAITH.(By Alfred Drury.)
FAITH.(By Alfred Drury.)
FAITH.
(By Alfred Drury.)
The Bishop without doubt knew a good work of art when he saw one, and his knowledge informed him that technically his "sunset on a river" was bad; but it appealed to his sentiment and occupied its place on the study wall in spite of its defects. In this respect, most people are with the Bishop; it is not so much the quality of a work of art that makes it popular, but the particular strain of sentiment it contains that touches a responsive chord in the hearts of those who look at it. The English public are sentimentalists first and foremost in art, and the artist who receives the greatest acclamation is he who is most skilful in this direction. And if this is so in respect to painting, how much more so is it with regard to sculpture. Public enthusiasm is rarely roused by the sculptor's art. Next to the architectural room at the Royal Academy, the sculpture hall is the least frequented, and we fear it must be said that the majority of those who do go there go because it is the coolest place in the exhibition.
This, of course, is matter for regret, for there are as ennobling and inspiriting works of art to be seen there as in the picture galleries. The sculptor has the power to appeal to our ideals and aspirations to as great an extent as the painter, limited though he be by his materials. (It can at once be realised that the worker in marble has not the same freedom as he who uses paint and canvas—he has greater difficulties to surmount, less subjects to choose from, and far narrower scope in which to express his thoughts.) We have had "sermons in stones" which have been quite as powerful as any preached by painter or poet.
The classical tradition has undoubtedly affected the sculptor more than it has his brother-artist of the brush; it has weighed him down, and made his work cold and lifeless; and men and women of to-day want art that is living, helpful in their daily straggles, responsive to those aspirations which every one of them possesses in a measure. As a distinguished member of the Royal Academy, now dead, once wrote, "We have aspirations, we reverence something more than the ordinary life of mortals; we have before our eyes an ideal of truthfulness, piety, honour, uprightness, love, and self-sacrifice greater than any which exists on earth." To appeal to theseemotions by a beautiful and living art should be the object of our artists, and those who do can be sure of receiving the approval and the gratitude of the toilers of the world. This has been proved over and over again by the votes taken at Canon Barnett's picture exhibitions as to the most popular works shown, when men like Mr. G. F. Watts, R.A., and the late Sir Edward Burne-Jones have been first favourites. And this probably accounts in a measure for the public indifference to works of sculpture. The sculptor has for the most part neglected subjects which appeal to the hearts of the people of his day, and based his work on classic models and precepts.
In saying this we do not in any wise belittle the great works of the past. It is impossible to look on the mighty works of the ancient Egyptian workers in stone without feeling the sense of awe which the people of those days must have experienced—and were intended to experience—when gazing upon them. Mystery is the keynote of Egyptian sculpture, mystery deep and unfathomable. Look upon those inscrutable, gigantic faces in the British Museum; coldly inhuman; giants of stone, indifferent to the passions which pulsate in the human breast. Mighty works indeed—parables impossible of interpretation!
Look, too, at the works in the Assyrian galleries of the same collection. Marvellous of execution, they again draw forth admiration for the skill of their creators, for their dexterous records of the life of those far-off days, for the massive and imposing decorativeness of the semi-human lions and bulls. And then, coming down the ages, consider the beauty of form of the works of the sculptors of classic days; the wondrous productions of the Greeks, the perfection of line and grace of these representations in stone of the "human form divine." Masterpieces of the world which will never be excelled as works of art, they, nevertheless, do not appeal to the hearts of the people, and in adhering to the style of ancient Greece our sculptors have themselves to blame for the lack of popular sympathy.
motherhoodMOTHERHOOD.(By Alfred Gilbert, R.A. In the possession of Sir Henry Doulton.)
MOTHERHOOD.(By Alfred Gilbert, R.A. In the possession of Sir Henry Doulton.)
MOTHERHOOD.
(By Alfred Gilbert, R.A. In the possession of Sir Henry Doulton.)
The sculptors of Italy who shared in the revival of art in the fifteenth century understood this. Without sacrificing in the least the beauty of the classic artists, they infused into theirwork that touch of sentiment—either religious or frankly human—which won for them the admiration of their contemporaries, and enables them, though long since dead, to speak to us through their art. The charming creations of Donatello, the delightful child-forms of Lucca della Robbia, the gigantic creations of Michelangelo—gigantic both in conception and execution—appeal to us primarily for the humanity which they reflect: admiration for their beauty follows in due course.
bethanyTHE SISTERS OF BETHANY.(By Warrington Woods.)
THE SISTERS OF BETHANY.(By Warrington Woods.)
THE SISTERS OF BETHANY.
(By Warrington Woods.)
Until comparatively recent years English sculptors have failed to appreciate this public taste, and the public work all through our country has been deplorably lacking either in sentiment or art. The ghastly figures which are exposed in London streets rouse no enthusiasm, and only claim attention because of the men of which they are memorials. Curiously enough the only really beautiful piece of allegorical sculpture in our city is the work of a Frenchman, and that is smothered under a hideous cupola! I refer to the charming little group symbolising "Charity," on the drinking fountain by the Royal Exchange. This beautiful figure of a woman and two children the work of Dalou, was originally shown in stone, but the ravages of the London climate destroyed the features of the figures, and it was only when replaced by a bronze cast of the original model a year or two ago that its full beauty could be appreciated by the present generation. The symbolism is not intricate, the parable can be read by the most ignorant, and understood by all, but it is "a thing of beauty," and therefore a joy for ever.
The English sculptors who are claiming attention to-day are men influenced largely by the spirit of "modernity." They are giving us works which appeal to our sentiment as well as to our sense of beauty. Look, for instance, at the charming group by Mr. Alfred Gilbert, R.A., which is illustrated on page 345. One wishes that the original could be placed in position where people could see it every day. It is a simple subject, but what greater lesson can be enforced upon us than that of the holiness and purity of a mother's love and solicitude for her child? There is in one of the public squares of Paris a group very similar to this by Delaplanche. A mother is again giving her child its first lesson in reading. Tender and pure in sentiment, it is an object lesson to all who behold it.
The nobleness and dignity of labour provide our sculptors with a manifold variety of subjects, but there are not many English artists who have availedthemselves of it. Among these, however, is the distinguished Royal Academician, Mr. Hamo Thornycroft. "The Sower Scattering Seed" is but the representation of an English farm "hand," but it would be difficult to find a piece of work among English sculptures to excel it in grace and beauty of line. The artist has executed another work of "A Mower"—again an English farm-labourer, leaning on his scythe—which is another example of his skill in the adaptation of a subject which can be understood and appreciated by every man, down to him who actually wields the scythe.
BaptistST. JOHN THE BAPTIST.(By W. Goscombe John.)
ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST.(By W. Goscombe John.)
ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST.
(By W. Goscombe John.)
fameTHE MOUNTAIN OF FAME.(By A. C. Lucchesi.)
THE MOUNTAIN OF FAME.(By A. C. Lucchesi.)
THE MOUNTAIN OF FAME.
(By A. C. Lucchesi.)
Biblical subjects have found exponents in sculpture to a very large extent from the days of the Renaissance downwards. The old Italians decorated their churches with such to almost as great an extent as the painters of their time did; and many sculptors to-day find their inspiration in Scripture in like manner. We have chosen some for illustration in this paper—two by living artists, and one by Warrington Woods, a sculptor who lived some years ago, when "classic" style and subject were deemed necessary by the workers in the sculpturesque arts. "The Sisters of Bethany" is infected by this spirit, but is, nevertheless, pleasing to a certain extent. The "Faith" of Mr. Alfred Drury, is, on the other hand, distinctly pictorial and frankly illustrative of the subject. The "St. John the Baptist," by Mr. Goscombe John, another of our risingsculptors, is a beautiful figure which belongs to the Marquis of Bute, and stands in the centre of a fountain basin in the garden of St. John's Lodge, Regent's Park.
sowerTHE SOWER.(By W. Hamo Thornycroft, R.A.)
THE SOWER.(By W. Hamo Thornycroft, R.A.)
THE SOWER.
(By W. Hamo Thornycroft, R.A.)
On page 347 is the most ambitious of the allegorical works among our illustrations, and is the work of Mr. A. C. Lucchesi, a young sculptor of whom great things may be expected. "The Mountain of Fame" represents a warrior, who, struggling to acquire the laurel wreath, has in his efforts thrown away sword and shield and is reaching after the honour which is held temptingly before him by the figure of Fame. Almost within his grasp, it yet eludes him, and the rough path up which he has stumbled has not yet brought him to the summit. His weapons, cast aside in the assurance of victory, are left behind; but the wreath is still not his, and he is helpless against further dangers which may await him; the eagerness for fame may prove his ruin and all his strivings end in disaster. Readers of Miss Olive Schreiner's "Story of an African Farm" will remember the beautiful parable upon this subject, and I asked the sculptor if this had influenced him at all in the work. The suggestion was almost a revelation to him, for, although hehad read the book and remembered vividly this particular passage, yet confessed that it was quite out of his mind when he modelled this group. But the influence of the story is distinctly visible.
nightingale(Photo: York and Son, Notting Hill, W.)THE NIGHTINGALE MONUMENT IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.(By Roubiliac.)
(Photo: York and Son, Notting Hill, W.)THE NIGHTINGALE MONUMENT IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.(By Roubiliac.)
(Photo: York and Son, Notting Hill, W.)
THE NIGHTINGALE MONUMENT IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.
(By Roubiliac.)
Memorial sculpture, of course, forms a large part of a sculptor's work, and the example by Mr. Armstead illustrated on this page is typical of a great many of the kind. The most beautiful and dignified monument we possess is without doubt Alfred Stevens' great work in St. Paul's Cathedral in memory of the Duke of Wellington—one that can never be sufficiently admired, contrasting as it does with the grandiose monuments of the last century in the same building and at Westminster Abbey.
We illustrate on this page one of the most curious monuments in the latter building. It is the work of Roubiliac, a Frenchman who worked in England in the eighteenth century. The tomb is that of Joseph Gascoigne Nightingale, of Minehead, Somersetshire, and of the Lady Elizabeth, his wife, who died soon after her marriage. From the dark recesses of the tomb below issues the skeleton form of Death, in the act of hurling his lance at the wife, while the husband leans forward with extended arm to ward off the fatal blow from his loved partner, who is sinking to rest beside him.
daughterMEMORIAL TO AN ONLY DAUGHTER.(By H. H. Armstead, R.A.)
MEMORIAL TO AN ONLY DAUGHTER.(By H. H. Armstead, R.A.)
MEMORIAL TO AN ONLY DAUGHTER.
(By H. H. Armstead, R.A.)
Death, however, can be represented far better than by a ghastly skeleton, as Mr. George Frampton, A.R.A., has proved in his dignified "Angel of Death" which stands in the Camberwell Art Gallery. This figure of a young man, carrying the traditional scythe across his shoulder and an hour-glass in his hand, reminds us of Mr. Watts' constant representation of the "grim messenger"—no longer "grim," however, but beautiful, erect, inviting—the harbinger of the land where there shall be no more tears, neither sorrow nor sighing.
Arthur Fish.
pledged
By Katharine Tynan, Author of "A Daughter of Erin," Etc.
LLondon was under drizzle when the four-wheeler containing Mr. Graydon and Pamela drew up at Lady Jane Trevithick's house in Brook Street.
London was under drizzle when the four-wheeler containing Mr. Graydon and Pamela drew up at Lady Jane Trevithick's house in Brook Street.
As the time came for saying good-bye to her father, Pamela's heart sank lower and lower. By the time the cab stopped it was a mere dead weight of foreboding and depression.
One minute she looked at her father with blank despair. It was in her heart to put her arms about his neck and cling to him and refuse to leave him, as she had done when a small child and insubordinate to nursery rule. But the minute's glance checked the impulse. He was not thinking of her: he was wholly preoccupied: as she watched him, his lips moved as if in conversation with someone.
"'Ere you are, sir. This is the 'ouse," said the old cabman, not offering to budge from his box.
Mr. Graydon jumped out and knocked at the door. While his hand yet held the knocker the door was flung open by a pompous servant.
"Here, my man, lend me a hand with this lady's luggage. The jarvey seems old and incapable," he said brightly to the functionary.
The man came out unwillingly into the rainy street. The sight of the four-wheeler with its poor little trunk brought a look of amazed contempt to his face. But Mr. Graydon was not thinking of him.
When the luggage had gone in, he took his daughter from the cab.
"No, thank you. You need not wait," he said to the cabman as he followed Pamela up the steps.
"Her ladyship is in the drawing-room, sir," said the servant, impressed, despite himself, by the shabby visitor's easy air of command.
"Ah, thank you, I am not coming in. Good-bye, Pam, darling. I'll get the night-mail back. Be sure and enjoy yourself, and give Lady Jane my kindest regards."
He kissed her hastily, unconscious of the supercilious eyes of the footman. Then he turned towards the wet street.
Pamela stood in the hall, looking after him with her miserable heart in her eyes. He went down the steps with his hands deep in his shabby overcoat pockets—for he carried no umbrella—and his soft hat pulled down over his eyes. Another minute and he would be out of sight. A wave of intolerable loneliness rushed over his daughter's heart as she saw him vanishing and leaving her alone among strangers.
"Papa, papa!" she cried.
The genial, kind face was turned back to her for an instant. Her father's hand waved a farewell. Then he was out of sight, and she became conscious that the weary footman, forcedly polite, was holding the door open for her.
"Her ladyship is in the drawing-room," he repeated, and there was rebuke in his voice. Pamela drew back, and he shut the door.
"Poor little Pam!" said her father as he walked along briskly. "She will be home-sick to-night; to-morrow she will be better content, and the day after she will begin to enjoy herself."
"And now, let me see," he said. "This turn is it, for Hill Street? I ought to know the way, though it is so many years since I took it. I hope I shall catch his lordship before dinner. If I'm obliged to disturb him, he'll be in ahorrible rage, and things won't be propitious. Anyhow, at the worst, I'll have time to eat something at the station before I catch the mail. Perhaps his lordship will ask me to dinner if things go well."
He smiled so cheerfully, showing a row of even white teeth, that a wretched girl, carrying an infant, was moved to beg of him. He handed her a shilling, to her unbounded amazement.
"There goes part of my dinner," he said to himself. "Never mind: she needs it." And then to the astonished beggar: "Go home, my girl, with that poor little chap. It is no night for him—or you either—to be out."
Presently he came to a huge house, showing a dim light here and there in its black front. He knocked with a tremor of heart. When last he had knocked there he had stood at the threshold of new life and joy. The rain dripped from his soft hat and hung in beads of moisture on his grey moustache. It soaked unheeded into his thin overcoat.
The door was opened by an old man-servant. He peered in wonder at the shabby-looking stranger, who stepped so unquestioningly within those gloomy portals.
"Is his lordship in town?" asked the intruder. "Why, Thorndyke! It is surely Thorndyke?"
"Yes, I am Thorndyke," said the man. "But I don't think I know you, sir. Let me see."
He turned on the electric light into the front part of the hall, and brought his dim old eyes nearer to Mr. Graydon's face.
"Why, it is Master Archie!" he said quaveringly. "Master Archie after all those years! And how are you, sir? Are you well?"
"Quite well, Thorndyke. Can I see my uncle? I want very particularly to see him."
"He's none too pleasant," whispered the old man. "He has a touch of gout, and the little master's been ill. They've ordered him to Cannes."
"Indeed! I'm sorry for that. I thought he was a hearty little chap."
"So he was, so he was, till a few months gone. He's never recovered a heavy chill he took at the beginning of the winter. His lordship's bound up in him, and it do fret him to see Master Lance dwindle."
"Ah! I am very sorry," said Mr. Graydon, and a cloud came over his face. "I am sorry for the boy and for his lordship, too. Health is a great blessing, Thorndyke."
"It is, indeed, sir. I am glad you have yours. Come in here, sir, and I'll let his lordship know."
He opened the door of a room lined with books in heavy bindings, and motioned Mr. Graydon to enter. The atmosphere was close and warm, though the fire was low in the grate. But Mr. Graydon did not notice that his wet coat was steaming, and that he felt damply and uncomfortably warm. He had other things to think of.
papa"Papa, papa!" she cried.
"Papa, papa!" she cried.
"Papa, papa!" she cried.
Presently the door was sharply opened, and a red-faced, irascible-looking old man came in.He glared fiercely at his visitor as he hobbled to a chair.
"Well, Archibald," he said, using the name as if it were distasteful to him. "To what am I indebted for the honour of your visit after all those years?"
"I would have come before, sir, but for your own words."
"I'm not unsaying my words. They are as good now as they were then."
"Twenty-five years is a long time. Can't you forget and forgive?"
"I neither forget nor forgive. You did me an injury past forgiveness."
"It was no injury; Mary had chosen me."
"You chose your own lot in life. I have not interfered with it. Why do you come here?"
lord"Go!" said the old lord.
"Go!" said the old lord.
"Go!" said the old lord.
The old man grinned fiercely as if he had had a spasm of pain, and bit his under lip hard.
"I am sorry to have come when you are not well."
"Your visit would have been unpleasant at any time. Why do you come?"
Mr. Graydon took up his soft hat.
"I came partly out of hard necessity, partly because I hoped that after all the years you would have forgiven me. But there is no use in my staying, I see. I am sorry to have troubled you, sir."
"Say out what you have got to say, man. I don't know whether you know that I have an heir in your place? You have buried yourself so that you may well not know."
"I am glad you have a son, sir."
The old lord grunted.
"Your business, man, your business. I can't wait on you all night, and in five minutes the dinner-bell will ring."
"My business is very simple. I have three girls. One of them would marry after my own heart and hers; but poverty stands in the way. I was brought up as your heir. I thought perhaps that, remembering that fact, you would help my girl."
"You mean by giving her a dowry?"
"You are very rich."
"The time was, Archibald, when I would have given ten years of life to have heard you ask this and to have refused you. I refuseyou now, but it is because everything is for the boy. I am old, and even my appetite for revenge has deserted me."
"You owe me no revenge, sir."
"We think differently. Why did you cross my path? Why didn't you marry that woman who wanted you—Dunallan's daughter?"
Mr. Graydon looked thunderstruck.
"You have forgotten, sir; Lady Jane married my friend Gerald Trevithick."
"Because she couldn't marry you. He was an idiot to marry her. Everyone saw her infatuation but he and—am I to believe?—you."
"Impossible," muttered Mr. Graydon; "I barely knew her. I never thought of her."
The old lord waved away his words contemptuously.
"She had no money, but she had connections, and she would have had ambitions if she had married you and not Trevithick. The woman was head over ears in love with you, man."
"I can't believe it, sir. But let it be. It is all five-and-twenty years ago."
"And Mary is dead, and you have three girls."
"Yes, sir."
"Are they strong—are they healthy?"
"Yes, thank God. They are all a father's heart could desire."
"Ah! you have scored again. You married the woman we both desired. You have strong children, and I—my boy is not strong."
His face twitched with more than the pain of his gout.
"I am very sorry, sir. I hoped he was strong."
"I didn't ask for your pity, Archibald."
"I can't help being sorry, all the same."
"But you've outwitted me. I married a peasant—almost a peasant—that my heir in your place might be strong. He is—not strong."
Again the bitter spasm crossed his face, and the sight of it wrung Mr. Graydon's kind heart.
"I pray that he may become strong," he said earnestly; "God is good."
"Anyhow," cried the old man with sudden fury, "I shall not break up his inheritance. If he lives to do that himself one day, let him. It is like enough he would. He does not take after me. But he is my only son."
The dinner-bell pealed loudly through the house.
"Go!" said the old lord. "You have upset me. I shall not be the better of your visit for a week. Go back to your girls, and come here no more. Be thankful they are strong. Money is not everything."
He shuffled out of the room, and Mr. Graydon followed him.
"Show this gentleman out, Thorndyke," he said, and went without a word of farewell.
"Let me get you a little refreshment, Mr. Archie," said the old servant. "Do, sir! Dear, dear! you are very wet, and to think you have to turn out again without your dinner!"
"No, thank you, Thorndyke. I shall do very well till I get to Euston. I shall have some dinner there before the train starts."
"You are going back to Ireland to-night, sir?"
"Yes, Thorndyke, I must."
"Dear, dear! and you are very wet. Can we do nothing for you, sir? My wife—I married Mrs. Ellis, the housekeeper; you remember, sir?—would be so fretted to see you going off like this. Do let me get you something, sir?"
"Nothing, thank you, Thorndyke, nothing. But it is very kind of you, all the same. I remember your wife very well. She was good to me in old days. Give her my love, Thorndyke, and good-bye."
"Good-bye, till happier times, sir," said the old servant, as Mr. Graydon went out in the streaming night.
The lights of a hansom blinked through the rain as he turned north-eastward. He put his hand in his pocket and took out a few coins, and looked at them.
"No," he said, "I can't afford it. I must walk part of the way, and 'bus the rest. I shall just have time to do it."
But by the time he got to Euston he could only snatch a few fragments of food. And so it was wet, chilled, and half-fed that he made his return journey.
His uncle's suggestion about Lady Jane disturbed him oddly, though he tried to thrust it from him as impossible; but it recurred again and again.
"After all," he thought at last, "it might explain why she sought us out, and why she wanted Pamela. If I unwittingly did her the injury that she should have cared for me, who had no love to give her, it would be like a woman's generosity to repay me in that way. Ah! but women are better nowadays. She must have been a happy woman with Gerald, happier than with a worthless fellow like me, who could bring her neither honour nor glory. Ah! if it is true, and she should repay my Pam with happiness, how wonderful it would be! And there is no goodness which is impossible to a woman, praise be to the Source!"
Despite the damp and discomfort, his thoughts made him fall asleep with a smile on his face.
"Why did you do it, Auntie Janie?" asked Lady Kitty.
"Do what, darling?" answered Lady Jane in the tone that was reserved especially for her pet.
leave"Better leave her to me, Auntie Janie."
"Better leave her to me, Auntie Janie."
"Better leave her to me, Auntie Janie."
"Why, ask that poor little thing here. You know you don't like her a bit, and she's as home-sick as ever I saw anyone. Why don't you pack her off home again?"
"I asked her because—because—they were kind to Anthony, and it was only civil to do it, and because it ought to be a pleasure to the girl herself."
"Now you know you didn't, Auntie Janie, and you needn't tell me. It's not like you to do a shady thing first, and then tell a story about it."
"Kitty!"
"Yes, I know it's shocking of me. But I've always found you straight. Where you disliked you disliked, and made no pretence about it. But now you're playing a part for some reason or other, and I don't like you in a part."
"I think you're a rude, spoilt child, Kitty."
"I know I'm spoilt by you, and you're forcing me to be rude. It isn't like you, as I said before, and so I thought I'd ask you why you did it. You've become tortuous, Auntie Janie, ever since the day Anthony left for Washington. I don't recognise you as a tortuous person, and, frankly, it makes me uncomfortable."
"What fault have you to find, Kitty, with me as hostess?"
Lady Jane put down the pen she had been holding in her hand all this time, and came over from her writing-table as though she foresaw that the discussion would take time.
She looked down at Lady Kitty, who was basking in front of the fire, and her cold eyes grew maternal.
"You're fond of me, Kitty, I believe."
"It would be odd if I wasn't. I'm selfish to the heart's core, but I'm really not bad enough not to be fond of you."
"I don't think you're selfish, Kitty. It is only a pose of yours. But I am glad you are fond of me. Few people are. My life has been a mistake, Kitty. I was not formed for happiness. If I had to do it over again, perhaps I would make an effort to live otherwise. But this is not what I meant to say. You think that child unhappy?"
"Anyone can see it with half an eye."
"She went off cheerfully enough with Mrs. Molyneux to see the flowers."
"Yes, it was a relief to her. Mrs. Molyneux is an old dear, and she won't feel out of it with her. She has been feeling horribly out of it with you and me."
"Perhaps, Kitty, Imeanher to feel out of it. Perhaps I mean her to be unhappy."
"Oh! say you didn't, Auntie Janie," said Lady Kitty, suddenly lifting up a flushed face. "Say you didn't. If you really meant that, I think I should have to throw you over, and take up the cudgels for the girl. Only my loyalty to you has kept me from doing it before. She's a nice little thing, and I am sure she is as jolly as a kitten when she gets fair play."
Lady Jane winced.
"We are both talking nonsense, Kitty. But if what I said were true, how would you defend your—your new friend against me?"
"Upon my word I don't know. I couldn't dress her up in my frocks and jewels; for she's as proud as she's poor. And I couldn't tell her to stand up against going to places where she's perfectly unhappy. And I couldn't say what would be the kindest thing—'Run away, little baa-lamb, to your woods and mountains; the world is no place for you.'"
"Yet you expect me to say it."
"No, I suppose I really don't. Let me see. Her visit is half-way through. Letmetake her round now to places she'll enjoy. She'd simply love to see the Tower and Hampton Court, and to look at the shops in Regent Street, and have tea at Winter's."
"I hardly know you in this amiable mood, Kitty."
"I hardly know myself. Still, there it is. Perhaps I'm rather sick of the world, and have a longing for Arcadian pleasures."
"I can't very well go out and leave my guest alone. Yet we are pretty full for the next couple of weeks. I have been thinking myself very good-natured for taking a brace of young women about."
"I daresay," said Lady Kitty. "Yes, we are rather full. I don't mind shirking some of the engagements."
"And I, others?"
"Better leave her to me, Auntie Janie. She's afraid of you."
"Do you begin to-night?"
Lady Kitty's face fell.
"I'm afraid I can't stay at home to-night without perjuring myself."
"Mildred Sefton is going. Let her take you, and I shall stay at home—if, indeed, you think Miss Graydon would not enjoy the 'at home.'"
"She wouldn't without a proper frock. You'll be good to her, Auntie Janie?"
"I shall try to, my dear."
"And to-morrow she and I will take up ourrôleof town mouse and country mouse."
"Poor Kitty!"
"I shall like it. She likes me already, and I have an odd fancy to make her like me better."
"You amazing Kitty! But are you going to carry out those extraordinary expeditions from east to west unchaperoned?"
"I shouldn't mind at all. We aren't so particular nowadays, you know. However, I daresay Captain Leslie would go with us with joy. He admires the little Pam."
"And he is Anthony's friend."
"Yes, of course, one doesn't mind bothering him any more than one would Anthony."
When Lady Kitty announced at dinner that she was going to take Pamela a round of sight-seeing, Pamela's weary face brightened.
"You would like it better than meeting a lot of dull people who are desperately uninteresting to you."
"I should love it," said Pam, with two sudden dimples dancing into her cheeks.
"We haven't been doing our duty by you," went on Lady Kitty. "It would be an everlasting disgrace to us if you went home without seeing the sights."
"But won't it be a great bother for you?"
"On the contrary. I have long desired to see the Tower."
"You don't mean to say you never have?" said Pamela, staring.
"Well, you know, the people in a place never see the sights of it, unless they are obliged to by an amiable visitor."
"You will have such gay times with Kitty, to-morrow," said Lady Jane, with the faintest suggestion of enmity underlying the smooth words, "that you will not mind, I hope, having only my society for to-night?"
"Is Lady Kitty going out?" asked Pamela, and a cloud fell on her face.
"She must," said Lady Jane shortly. "We shall have some music," she went on, "and afterwards you must get to bed early to prepare for a tiring day to-morrow. So we shall not find the evening too long without Kitty."
Yet after dinner, when Lady Kitty, radiant, in her smartest gown, floated into the drawing-room and found Pamela alone, it was not the face of one who anticipated a pleasant evening that she beheld.
"How exquisite you look!" cried Pamela, forgetting her bad quarter of an hour to come. "I never thought anyone could look so beautiful."
Lady Kitty kissed her emphatically.
"There," she said, "I'm not the kissing sort, but you are a dear little thing to admire another girl so rapturously. Not but what you can afford to."
Pamela still gazed at her with eyes of wonder, and said nothing.
"We are going to have such a lovely day to-morrow, and don't forget it," whispered Lady Kitty; for there was thefrou-frouof Lady Jane's skirt in the distance. Then quite suddenly she kissed Pamela again.
"Thank you," she said, "for what your eyes are saying. I don't mind telling you, as a great secret, that I want very particularly to look well to-night."
She laughed as she floated away towards Lady Jane, who was just coming in, and, taking up her warm cloak, wrapped herself in it.
"Good-night, you people, and be happy," she called back to them.
Lady Jane gazed rather uneasily after her as she went.
"Kitty seems excited," she said. "I hope she hasn't been overdoing it lately."
"I think she looks very well and happy," said Pamela.
"Ah!" replied Lady Jane, as if it were hardly Pamela's business to have an opinion, and vouchsafed no further remark.
After she had turned over an evening paper, and tea had been brought, she went to the piano and began to play. She was a good musician, and Pamela, who had never heard good music, listened entranced. Then Lady Jane sang song after song, as if she had no listener; and as Pamela watched her, warmed with the emotion of the music, she felt that she could understand Lady Kitty's affection for the proud and cold woman.
At last Lady Jane stopped abruptly and came over to the fire. Pamela sat with bent head in the firelight till suddenly she lifted her eyes like wet violets. A sharp pang of memory shot through Lady Jane's heart. She turned away, and when she looked at Pamela her eyes were cold and cruel.
"You don't get much music at—at—I'm afraid I've forgotten the name?"
"Carrickmoyle," said Pamela.
"Ah! Carrickmoyle."
"No, we never hear any—except the squeaky old harmonium on Sundays. We have no piano."
"Nor newspapers, nor books, nor society, nor pictures?"
"Very few novels," said Pamela, "except old ones, but plenty of books. My father always says that newspapers are worthless reading, that they divide one's interest into snippets. But," she made haste to add, "he only really cares for classical literature. I suppose we have no society and no pictures. But the country is delightful."
Lady Jane yawned as if Pamela's answer did not interest her.
"What a pity!" she went on in tones of subtle disparagement. "What a great pity that your father cannot give his daughters the things which make life really worth living."
Pamela flushed.
"Our lives are very happy. But that our dear mother died young, I should say we are the happiest girls alive."
Again Lady Jane stifled a yawn.
"Anthony must have missed his music," she went on, "while he was with you. He is devoted to music."
"He never said——" began Pamela lamely.
"Of course he wouldn't," said Lady Jane. "By the way," she went on, "has Kitty told you how things are between her and Anthony?"
Pamela flushed, and then grew pale again. Fortunately she was not called upon for an answer.
"No, I see she hasn't," went on Lady Jane; "and, of course, the boy would be equally reticent. He has been in love with Kitty all his life. She is his ideal. Anthony cannot bear your modern damsel, romping about among the pursuits of men till she has neither voice nor complexion left. A delicate and graceful creature like Kitty is his ideal."
Pamela made no comment on this confidence. She never thought of not believing it, as a more sophisticated girl might.
"Ah!" she said in her own heart, "I was the entanglement, after all, and she was the true love."
And then she remembered oddly Sylvia's contemptuous disbelief in the love of young men.
"I'm afraid you are tired," said Lady Jane, as the conversation threatened to become more and more difficult. "Shall we say 'Good-night'? You must be fresh for Kitty to-morrow."
Pamela accepted her release thankfully. When she had reached her own room, and was alone, she knelt and hid her face in the bed-clothes, and considered Lady Jane's astounding disclosure.
It did not seem to her that it admitted of doubt. Anthony's own conduct bore it out fully. For the moment he had had a fancy for her. She was not yet at the point of doubting its genuineness—but when he went away he forgot her, and his allegiance returned to its lawful owner.
The humiliation was bitter, but it did not stir her resentment at the moment nearly so much as Lady Jane's insolence about her father.
"And to think," cried Pamela hotly, "that I have eaten the woman's bread and endured such a horrible time here simply because I would not go home and let them know things had not been right! And to think how my father loved Sir Gerald Trevithick and his people for his sake! I shall never cease to hate the name from henceforth."
And yet her thoughts took a sudden turn, in spite of her; and, in spite of herself, her heart cried out for Anthony, and again for Anthony. And though she poured seas of scorn upon herself, her heart still betrayed her.
The next morning Lady Kitty knocked at her door very early for that fashionable damsel.
"Are you up, stay-a-bed?" she cried. "It is an enchanting day, and we have the loveliest programme for it."
"Come in," said a voice, unlike Pamela's.
Lady Kitty came in on a scene of confusion. Pamela had her small trunk open on the floor, and was ramming things into it wildly. She had her hat on, and her face seemed to have become pinched with trouble out of its usual soft beauty. Her lips were set, and her eyes looked unutterable woe.