"Teach me, ye groves, some art to ease my pain,Some soft resentments that may leave no stainOn her loved name, and then I will complain."
"Teach me, ye groves, some art to ease my pain,Some soft resentments that may leave no stainOn her loved name, and then I will complain."
"Teach me, ye groves, some art to ease my pain,Some soft resentments that may leave no stainOn her loved name, and then I will complain."
Nextday, after dinner, Lord Verney said to Cleve, as they two sat alone, "I saw you at Lady Dorminster's last night. I saw you—about it. It seems to me you go to too many places, with the House to attend to; you stay too long; one can look in, you know. Sometimes one meets a person; I had a good deal of interesting conversation last night, for instance, with the French Ambassador. No one takes a hint better; they are very good listeners, the French, and that is the way they pick up so much information and opinion, and things. I had a cup of tea, and we talked about it, for half-an-hour, until I had got my ideas well before him. A very able man, a brilliant person, and seemed—he appeared to go with me—about it—and very well up upon our history—and things—and—and—looking at you, it struck me—you're looking a good deal cut up,about it—and—and as if you were doing too much. And I said, you know, you were to look about, and see if there was any young person you liked—that was suitable—and—that kind of thing; but you know you must not fatigue yourself, and I don't want to hurry you; only it is a step you ought to take with a view to strengthen your position—ultimately. And—and—I hear it is too late to consider about Ethel—that would have been very nice, it struck me; but that is now out of the question, I understand—in fact, it is certain, although the world don't know it yet; and therefore we must consider some other alliance; and I don't see any very violent hurry. We must look about—and—and—you'll want some money, Cleve, when you have made up your mind."
"You are always too good," said Cleve.
"I—I mean with yourwife—about it;" and Lord Verney coughed a little. "There's never any harm in a little money; the more you get, the more you can do. I always was of that opinion. Knowledge is power, and money is power, though in different ways; that was always my idea. What I want to impress on your mind, however, at this moment, particularly, is, that there is nothing very pressing as to time; we can afford a little time. The Onslow motto, youknow,itconveys it, and your mother was connected with the Onslows."
It would not be easy to describe how the words of his noble uncle relieved Cleve Verney. Every sentence lifted a load from his burthen, or cut asunder some knot in the cordage of his bonds. He had not felt so much at ease since his hated conversation with Lord Verney in the library.
Not very long after this, Cleve made the best speech by many degrees he had ever spoken—a really forcible reply upon a subject he had very carefully made up, of which, in fact, he was a master. His uncle was very much pleased, and gave his hearers to understand pretty distinctly from what fountain he had drawn his inspiration, and promised them better things still, now that he had got him fairly in harness, and had him into his library, and they put their heads together; and he thought his talking with him a little did him no harm, Cleve's voice was so good, he could make himself heard—you must be able to reach their ears or you can hardly hope to make an impression; and Lord Verney's physician insisted on his sparing his throat.
So Lord Verney was pleased. Cleve was Lord Verney's throat, and the throat emitted good speeches, and everyone knew where the head was.Not that Cleve was deficient; but Cleve had very unusual advantages.
Tom Sedley and Cleve were on rather odd terms now. Cleve kept up externally their old intimacy when they met. But he did not seek him out in those moods which used to call for honest Tom Sedley, when they ran down the river together to Greenwich, when Cleve was lazy, and wanted to hear the news, and say what he liked, and escape from criticism of every kind, and enjoy himself indolently.
For Verney now there was a sense of constraint wherever Tom Sedley was. Even in Tom's manner there was a shyness. Tom had learned a secret, which he had not confided to him. He knew he was safe in Tom Sedley's hands. Still he was in his power, and Sedley knew it, and that galled his pride, and made an estrangement.
In the early May, "when winds are sweet though they unruly be," Tom Sedley came down again to Cardyllian. Miss Charity welcomed him with her accustomed emphasis upon the Green. How very pretty Agnes looked. But how cold her ways had grown.
He wished she was not so pretty—sobeautiful, in fact. It pained him, and somehow he had grown strange with her; and she was changed, grave, and silent, rather, and, as it seemed, careless quite whether he was there or not, although he could never charge her with positive unkindness, much less with rudeness. He wished she would be rude. He would have liked to upbraid her. But her gentle, careless cruelty was a torture that justified no complaint, and admitted no redress.
He could talk volubly and pleasantly enough for hours with Charity, not caring a farthing whether he pleased her or not, and thinking only whether Agnes, who sat silent at her work, liked his stories and was amused by his fun; and went away elated for a whole night and day because a joke of his had made her laugh. Never had Tom felt more proud and triumphant in all his days.
But when Charity left the room to see old Vane Etherage in the study, a strange silence fell upon Tom. You could hear each stitch of her tambour-work. You could hear Tom's breathing. He fancied she might hear the beating of his heart. He was ashamed of his silence. He could have been eloquent had he spoken from that loaded heart. But he dare not, and failing this he must be silent.
By this time Tom was always thinking of Agnes Etherage, and wondering at the perversity of fate. He was in love. He could not cheat himself into any evasion of that truth—a tyranttruth that had ruled him mercilessly; and there was she pining for love of quite another, and bestowing upon him, who disdained it, all the treasure of her heart, while even a look would have been cherished with gratitude by Sedley.
What was the good of his going up every day to Hazelden, Tom Sedley thought, to look at her, and talk to Charity, and laugh, and recount entertaining gossip, and make jokes, and be agreeable, with a heavy and strangely suffering heart, and feel himself every day more and more in love with her, when he knew that the sound of Cleve's footsteps, as he walked by, thinking of himself, would move her heart more than all Tom Sedley, adoring her, could say in his lifetime?
What a fool he was! Before Cleve appeared she was fancy free; no one else in the field, and his opportunities unlimited. He had lapsed his time, and occasion had spread its wings and flown.
"What beautiful sunshine! What do you say to a walk on the Green?" said Tom to Charity, and listening for a word from Agnes. She raised her pretty eyes and looked out, but said nothing.
"Yes. I think it would be very nice; and there is no wind. What doyousay, Agnes?"
"I don't know. I'm lazy to-day, I think, and I have this to finish," said Agnes.
"But you ought to take a walk, Agnes; itwould do you good; and Thomas Sedley and I are going for a walk on the Green."
"Pray, do," pleaded Tom, timidly.
Agnes smiled and shook her head, looking out of the window, and, making no other answer, resumed her work.
"You areveryobstinate," remarked Charity.
"Yes, and lazy, like the donkeys on the Green, where you are going; but you don't want me particularly—I meanyou, Charrie—and Mr. Sedley, I know, will excuse me, for I really feel that it would tire me to-day. It would tire me to death," said Agnes, winding up with an emphasis.
"Well,I'llgo and put on my things, and if youliketo come youcancome, and if you don't you can stay where you are. But I wish you would not be a fool. It is a beautiful day, and nothing on earth to prevent you."
"I don't like the idea of a walk to-day. I know I should feel tired immediately, and have to bring you back again; and I've really grown interested in this little bit of work, and I feel as if I must finish it to-day."
"Whyneedyou finish it to-day? Youaresuch a goose, Agnes," said Charity, marching out of the room.
Tom remained there standing, his hat in hishand, looking out of the window—longing to speak, his heart being full, yet not knowing how to begin, or how to go on if he had begun.
Agnes worked on diligently, and looked out from the window at her side over the shorn grass and flower-beds, through the old trees in the foreground—over the tops of the sloping forest, with the back-ground of the grand Welsh mountains, and a glimpse of the estuary, here and there, seen through the leaves, stretching far off, in dim gold and gray.
"You like that particular window," said Tom, making a wonderful effort; "I mean, why do you like always to sit there?" He spoke in as careless a way as he could, looking still out of his window, which commanded a different view.
"This window! oh, my frame stands here always, and when one is accustomed to a particular place, it puts one out to change."
Then Agnes dropped her pretty eyes again to her worsted, and worked and hummed very faintly a little air, and Tom's heart swelled within him, and he hummed as faintly the same gay air.
"I thought perhaps you liked that view?" said Tom Sedley, arresting the music.
She looked out again.
"Well, it's very pretty."
"The best from these windows; some peoplethink, I believe, the prettiest view you have," said Tom, gathering force, "the water is always so pretty."
"Yes, the water," she assented listlessly.
"Quite a romantic view," continued Sedley, a little bitterly.
"Yes, every pretty viewisromantic," she acquiesced, looking out for a moment again. "If one knew exactly whatromanticmeans—it's a word we use so often, and so vaguely."
"And can't you define it, Agnes?"
"Define it? I really don't think I could."
"Well, that does surprise me."
"You are so much more clever than I, of course it does."
"No, quite the contrary; you are clever—I'm serious, I assure you—and I'm a dull fellow, and I know it quite well—Ican't define it; butthatdoesn't surprise me."
"Then we are both in the same case; but I won't allow it's stupidity—the idea is quite undefinable, and that is the real difficulty. You can't describe the perfume of a violet, but you know it quite well, and I really think flowers a more interesting subject than romance."
"Oh, really! not, surely, than the romance ofthatview. Itisso romantic!"
"You seem quite in love with it," said she,with a little laugh, and began again with a grave face to stitch in the glory of her saint in celestial yellow worsted.
"The water—yes—and the old trees of Ware, and just that tower, at the angle of the house."
Agnes just glanced through her window, but said nothing.
"I think," said Sedley, "ifIwere peopling this scene, you know, I should put my hero in that Castle of Ware—that is, if I could invent a romance, which, of course, I couldn't." He spoke with a meaning, I think.
"Why should there be heroes in romances?" asked Miss Agnes, looking nevertheless toward Ware, with her hand and the needle resting idly upon the frame. "Don't you think a romance ought to resemble reality a little; and do you ever find such a monster as a hero in the world?Idon't expect to see one, I know," and she laughed again, but Tom thought, a little bitterly, and applied once more diligently to her work, and hummed a few bars of her little air again.
And Tom, standing now in the middle of the room, leaning on the back of a chair, by way of looking still upon the landscape which they had been discussing, was really looking, unobserved, on her, and thinking that there was not in all the world so pretty a creature.
Charity opened the door, equipped for the walk, and bearing an alpaca umbrella, such as few gentlemen would like to walk with in May Fair.
"Well, you won't come, I see. I think you are very obstinate. Come, Thomas Sedley. Good-bye, Agnes;" and with these words the worthy girl led forth my friend Tom, and as they passed the corner of the house, he saw Agnes standing in the window, looking out sadly, with her fingertips against the pane.
"She's lonely, poor little thing!" thought he, with a pang. "Why wouldn't she come? Listlessness—apathy, I suppose. How selfish and odious any trifling with a girl's affections is;" and then aloud to Charity, walking by her side, he continued, "You have not seen Cleve since the great day of Lord Verney's visit, I suppose?"
"No, nothing of him, and don't desire to see him. He has been the cause of a great deal of suffering, as you see, and I think he has behavedodiously. She's very odd; she doesn't choose to confide in me. I don't think it's nice or kind of her, but, of course, it's her own affair; only this is plain to me, that she'll never think of any one else now but Cleve Verney."
"It's an awful pity," said Tom Sedley, quite sincerely.
They were walking down that steep and solitary road, by which Vane Etherage had made his memorable descent a few months since, now in deep shadow under the airy canopy of transparent leaves, and in total silence, except for the sounds, far below, of the little mill-stream struggling among the rocks.
"Don't you know Mr. Cleve Verney pretty well?"
"Intimately—that is, Idid. I have not lately seen so much of him."
"And do you think, Thomas Sedley, that he will ever come forward?" said blunt Miss Charity.
"Well, I happen to know that Cleve Verney has no idea of anything of the kind. In fact, I should be deceiving you, if I did not say distinctly that I know he won't."
Tom was going to say hecan't, but checked himself. However, I think he was not sorry to have an opportunity of testifying to this fact, and putting Cleve Verney quite out of the field of conjecture as a possible candidate.
"Then I must say," said Miss Charity, flushing brightly, "that Mr. Verney is a villain."
From this strong position Tom could not dislodge her, and finding that expostulation involved him in a risk of a similar classification, he abandoned Cleve to his fate.
Up and down the Green they walked until Miss Flood espied and arrested Charity Etherage, and carried her off upon a visit of philanthropy in her pony-carriage, and Tom Sedley transferred his charge to fussy, imperious Miss Flood; and he felt strangely incensed with her, and walked the Green, disappointed and bereft. Was not Charity Agnes's sister? While he walked with her, he could talk of Agnes. He was still in the halo of Hazelden, and near Agnes. But now he was adrift, in the dark. He sat down, looking toward the upland woods that indicate Hazelden, and sighed with a much more real pain than he had ever sighed toward Malory; and he thought evil of meddling Miss Flood, who had carried away his companion. After a time he walked away toward Malory, intending a visit to his old friend Rebecca Mervyn, and thinking all the way of Agnes Etherage.
Hefound himself, in a little time, under the windows of the steward's house. Old Rebecca Mervyn was seated on the bench beside the door, plying her knitting-needles; she raised her eyes on hearing his step.
"Ha, he's come!" she said, lowering her hands to her knees, and fixing her dark wild gaze upon him, "I ought to have known it—so strange a dream must have had a meaning."
"They sometimes have, ma'am, I believe. I hope you are pretty well, Mrs. Mervyn."
"No, sir, I am not well."
"Very sorry, very sorry indeed, ma'am," said Tom Sedley. "I've often thought this must be a very damp, unhealthy place—too much crowded up with trees; they say nothing is more trying to health. You'd be much better, I'm sure, anywhere else."
"Nowhere else; my next move shall be my last. I care not how soon, sir."
"Pray, don't give way to low spirits; you really mustn't," said Tom.
"Tell me what it is, sir; for I know you have come to tell me something."
"No, I assure you; merely to ask you how you are, and whether I can be of any use."
"Oh! sir; what use?—no."
"Do you wish me to give any message to that fellow, Dingwell? Pray make use of me in any way that strikes you. I hear he is on the point of leaving England again."
"I'm glad of it," exclaimed the old lady. "Why do I say so? I'm glad of nothing; but I'm sure it's better. What business could he and Mr. Larkin, and that Jew, have with my child, who, thank God, is in Heaven, and out of the reach of their hands,evilhands, I dare say."
"So I rather think also, ma'am; and Mr. Larkin tried, did he?"
"Larkin;—yes, that was the name. He came here, sir, about the time I saw you; and he talked a great deal about my poor little child. It is dead, you know, but I did not tell him so. I promised Lady Verney I'd tell nothing to strangers—they all grow angry then. Mr. Larkin was angry, I think. But I do not speak—and you advised me to be silent—and though he said he was their lawyer, I would not answer a word."
"I have no doubt you acted wisely, Mrs. Mervyn; you cannot be too cautious in holding any communication with such people."
"I'd tell you, sir—if I dare; but I've promised, and Idaren't. Till old Lady Verney's gone, I daren't. I know nothing of law papers—my poor head! How should I? Andshecould not half understand them. So I promised.Youwould understand them. Time enough—time enough."
"I should be only too happy, whenever you please," said Tom, making ready tender of his legal erudition.
"And you, sir, have come to tell me something; what is it?"
"I assure you I have nothing particular to say; I merely called to inquire how you are."
"Nothing more needless, sir; how can a poor lonely old woman be, whose last hope has perished and left her alone in the world? For twenty years—more,morethan twenty—I have been watching, day and night; and now, sir, I look at the sea no more. I will never see those headlands again. I sit here, sir, from day to day, thinking; and, oh, dear, I wish it was all over."
"Any time you should want me, I should be only too happy, and this is my address."
"And you have nothing to tell me?"
"No, ma'am, nothing more than I said."
"It was wonderful: I dreamed last night I was looking toward Pendillion, watching as I used; the moon was above the mountain, and I was standing by the water, so that the sea came up to my feet, and I saw a speck of white far away, and something told me it was his sail at last, and nearer and nearer, very fast it came; and I walked out in the shallow water, with my arms stretched out to meet it, and when it came very near, I saw it was Arthur himself coming upright in his shroud, his feet on the water, and with his feet, hands, and face, as white as snow, and his arms stretched to meet mine; and I felt I was going to die; and I covered my eyes with my hands, praying to God to receive me, expecting his touch; and I heard the rush of the water about his feet, and a voice—it wasyours, not his—said, 'Look at me,' and I did look, and saw you, and you looked like a man that had been drowned—your face as white as his, and your clothes dripping, and sand in your hair; and I stepped back, saying, 'My God! how have you come here?' and you said, 'Listen, I have great news to tell you;' and I waked with a shock. I don't believe in dreams more I believe than other people, but this troubles me still."
"Well, thank God, I have had no accident byland or by water," said Tom Sedley, smiling in spite of himself at the awful figure he cut in the old lady's vision; "and I have no news to tell, and I think it will puzzle those Jews and lawyers to draw me into their business, whatever it is. I don't like that sort of people; you need never be afraid of me, ma'am, I detest them."
"Afraid ofyou, sir! Oh no. You have been very kind. See, this view here is under the branches; you can't see the water from this, only those dark paths in the wood; and I walk round sometimes through that hollow and on the low road toward Cardyllian in the evening, when no one is stirring, just to the ash tree, from which you can see the old church and the churchyard; and oh! sir, I wish I were lying there."
"You must not be talking in that melancholy way, ma'am," said Tom, kindly; "I'll come and see you again if you allow me; I think you are a great deal too lonely here; you ought to go out in a boat, ma'am, and take a drive now and then, and just rattle about a little, and you can't think how much good it would do you; and—I must go—and I hope I shall find you a great deal better when I come back"—and with these words he took his leave, and as he walked along the low narrow road that leads by the inland track to Cardyllian, of which old Rebecca Mervyn spoke,whom should he encounter but Miss Charity coming down the hill at a brisk pace with Miss Flood in that lady's pony-carriage. Smiling, hat in hand, he got himself well against the wall to let them pass; but the ladies drew up, and Miss Charity had a message to send home if he, Thomas Sedley, would be so good as to call at Jones's they would find a messenger, merely to tell Agnes that she was going to dine with Miss Flood, and would not be home till seven o'clock.
So Tom Sedley undertook it; smiled and bowed his adieus, and then walked faster toward the town, and instead of walking direct to Mrs. Jones's, sauntered for a while on the Green, and bethought him what mistakes such messengers as Mrs. Jones could provide sometimes make, and so resolved himself to be Miss Charity's Mercury.
Sedley felt happier, with an odd kind of excited and unmeaning happiness, as he walked up the embowered steep toward Hazelden, than he had felt an hour or two before while walking down it. When he reached the little flowery platform of closely-mown grass, on which stands the pretty house of Hazelden, he closed the iron gate gently and looked toward the drawing-room windows that reach the grass, and felt a foolish flutter at his heart as he saw that the frame stood in Agnes's window without its mistress.
"Reading now, I suppose," whispered Tom, as if he feared to disturb her. "She has changed her place and she is reading;" and he began to speculate whether she sat on the ottoman, or on the sofa, or in the cushioned arm-chair, with her novel in her hands. But his sidelong glances could not penetrate the panes, which returned only reflections of the sky or black shadow, excepting of the one object, the deserted frame which stood close to their surface.
There was a time, not long ago either, when Tom Sedley would have run across the grass to the drawing-room windows, and had he seen Agnes within would have made a semi-burglarious entry through one of them. But there had come of late, on a sudden, a sort of formality in his relations with Agnes; and so he walked round by the hall-door, and found the drawing-rooms empty, and touching the bell, learned that Miss Agnes had gone out for a walk.
"I've a message to give her from Miss Charity; have you any idea which way she went?"
He found himself making excuses to the servant for his inquiry. A short time since he would have asked quite frankly where she was, without dreaming of a reason; but now had grown, as I say, a reserve, which has always the more harmless incidents of guilt. He was apprehensive of suspicion; he was shy even of this old servant, and was encountering this inquiry by an explanation of his motives.
"I saw her go by the beech-walk, sir," said the man.
"Oh! thanks; very good."
And he crossed the grass, and entered the beech-walk, which is broad and straight, with towering files of beech at each side, and a thick screen of underwood and evergreens, and turning the clump of rhododendrons at the entrance of the walk, he found himself, all on a sudden, quite close to Agnes, who was walking toward him.
She stopped. He fancied she changed colour: had she mistaken him for some one else?
"Well, Agnes, I see the sun and the flowers prevailed, though we couldn't; and I'm glad, at all events, that you have had a little walk."
"Oh! yes, after all, I couldn't really resist; and is Charity coming?"
"No, you are not to expect her till tea-time. She's gone with Miss Flood somewhere, and she sent me to tell you."
"Oh! thanks;" and Agnes hesitated, looking towards home, as if she intended returning.
"You may as well walk once more up and down; it does look so jolly, doesn't it?" said Tom; "pray do, Agnes."
"Well, yes, once more I will; but that is all, for I really am a little tired."
They set out in silence, and Tom, with a great effort, said,—
"I wonder, Agnes, you seem so cold, I mean so unfriendly, with me; I think you do; and you must be quite aware of it; you must,indeed, Agnes. Ithinkif you knew half the pain you are giving me—I really do—that you wouldn't."
The speech was very inartificial, but it had the merit of going direct to the point, and Miss Agnes began,—
"I haven't been at all unfriendly."
"Oh! but youhave—indeedyou have—you are quitechanged. And I don't know what I have done—I wish you'd tell me—to deserve it; because—even if there was—another—anything—no matter what—I'm an old friend, and I think it's very unkind;youdon't perceive it, perhaps, but you are awfully changed."
Agnes laughed a very little, and she answered, looking down on the walk before her, as Sedley thought, with a very pretty blush; and I believe there was.
"It is a very serious accusation, and I don't deserve it. No, indeed, and even if it were true, it rather surprises me that it should in the least interest you; because we down here have seen solittle of you that we might very reasonably suspect that you had begun to forget us."
"Well, Ihavebeen anawfulfool, it is quite true, and you have punished me, not more than I deserve; but I think you might have remembered that you had not on earth a better friend—I mean a more earnest one—particularlyyou, Agnes, than I."
"I really don't know what I have done," pleaded she, with another little laugh.
"I was here, you know, as intimate almost as a brother. I don't say, of course, there are not many things I had no right to expect to hear anything about; but if I had, and been thought worthy of confidence, I would at all events have spoken honestly. But—may I speak quite frankly, Agnes? You won't be offended, will you?"
"No; I shan't—I'm quite sure."
"Well, it was only this—youarechanged, Agnes, you know you are. Just this moment, for instance, you were going home, only becauseIcame here, and you fancied I might join you in your walk; and this change began when Cleve Verney was down here staying at Ware, and used to walk with you on the Green."
Agnes stopped short at these words and drew back a step, looking at Sedley with an angry surprise.
"I don't understand you—I'm certain I don't. I can't conceive what you mean," she said.
Sedley paused in equal surprise.
"I—I beg pardon; I'm awfully sorry—you'll never knowhowsorry—if I have said anything to vex you; but Ididthink it was some influence or something connected with that time."
"I really don't pretend to understand you," said Agnes, coldly, with eyes, however, that gleamed resentfully. "I do recollect perfectly Mr. Cleve Verney's walking half-a-dozen times with Charity and me upon the Green, but what that can possibly have to do with your fancied wrongs, I cannot imagine. I fancied you were a friend of Mr. Verney's."
"So I was—so I am; but no such friend as I am of yours—yourfriend, Agnes. There's no use in saying it; but, Agnes, I'd die for you—I would indeed."
"I thought it very strange, your coming so very seldom to inquire for papa, when he was so poorly last year, when you were at Cardyllian.Hedid not seem to mind it; but considering, as you say, how much you once used to be here, it did strike me as very unkind—I may as well say what I really thought—not only unkind, but rude. So that if there has been any change, you need not look to other people for the cause of it."
"If you knew how I blame myself for that, I think, bad as it was, you'd forgive me."
"I think it showed that you did not very much care what became of us."
"Oh! Agnes, you did not think that—you never thought it. Unlessyouare happy, Ican'tbe happy, nor even then unless I think you have forgiven me; and I think if I could be sure you liked me ever so little, even in the old way, I should be one of the happiest fellows in the world. I don't make any excuses—I was the stupidest fool on earth—I only throw myself on your mercy, and ask you to forgive me."
"I've nothing to forgive," said Agnes, with a cruel little laugh, but changing colour.
"Well—well,forget—oh,do! and shake hands like your old self. You've no idea how miserable I have been."
Lowering her eyes, with a very beautiful blush and a smile—a little shy, and so gratified—and a little silvery laugh, Agnes relented, and did give her hand to Tom Sedley.
"Oh, Agnes! Oh, Agnes! I'm so happy and so grateful! Oh, Agnes, you won't take it away—just for a moment."
She drew her hand to remove it, for Tom was exceeding his privilege, and kissing it.
"Nowwe are friends," said Agnes, laughing.
"Are wequitefriends?"
"Yes, quite."
"You must not take your hand away—one moment more. Oh, Agnes! I can never tell you—never, how I love you. You are my darling, Agnes, and I can't live without you."
Agnes said something—was it reproof or repulse? He only knew that the tones were very sad and gentle, and that she was drawing her hand away.
"Oh, darling, I adore you! You would not make me miserable for life. There is nothing I won't do—nothing I won't try—if you'll only say you like me—ever so little. Do sit down here just for a moment"—there was a rustic seat beside them—"only for a moment."
She did sit down, and he beside her. That "moment" of Tom Sedley's grew as such moments will, like the bean that Jack sowed in his garden, till it reached—Titania knows whither! I know that Miss Charity on her return surprised it still growing.
"I made the tea, Agnes, fancying you were in your room. I've had such a search for you. I really think you might have told Edward where you were going. Will you drink tea with us, Thomas Sedley, this evening? though I am afraid you'll find it perfectly cold."
If Miss Charity had been either suspicious or romantic, she would have seen by a glance at the young people's faces what had happened; but being neither, and quite pre-occupied with her theory about Cleve Verney, and having never dreamed of Tom Sedley as possibly making hisdébutat Hazelden in the character of a lover—she brought her prisoners home with only a vague sense now and then that there was either something a little odd in their manner or in her own perceptions, and she remarked, looking a little curiously at Tom, in reference to some query of hers,—
"I've asked you that question twice without an answer, and now you say something totally unmeaning."
"Willyoutell her?" whispered Sedley to Agnes.
"Oh, no. Doyou," she entreated.
They both looked at Charity, who was preparing the little dog's supper of bread and milk in a saucer.
"I'll go in and see papa, and you shall speak to her," said Agnes.
Which Tom Sedley did, so much to her amazement that she set the saucer down on the table beside her, and listened, and conversed for half an hour; and the poodle's screams, and wild jumping and clawing at her elbow, at last reminded her that he had been quite forgotten.
So, while its mistress was apologising earnestly to poor Bijou, and superintending his attentions to the bread and milk, now placed upon the floor, in came Agnes, and up got Charity, and kissed her with a frank, beaming smile, and said,—
"I'mexcessivelyglad, Agnes. I was alwayssofond of Thomas Sedley; and Iwonderwe never thought of it before."
They were all holding hands in a ring by this time.
"And what do you think Mr. Etherage will say?" inquired Tom.
"Papa! why ofcoursehe will bedelighted," said Miss Charity. "He likes youextremely."
"But you know, Agnes might do so much better. She's such a treasure, there's no one that would not be proud of her, and no one could help falling in love with her, and the Ad—— I mean Mr. Etherage, may think me so presumptuous; and, you know, he may think me quite too poor."
"If you mean to say that papa would object to you because you have only four hundred a year, you think most meanly of him. I knowIshould not like to be connected with anybody that I thought so meanly of, because that kind of thing I look upon as reallywicked; and I should be sorry to think papa was wicked. I'll go in and tell him all that has happened this moment."
In an awful suspense, pretty Agnes and Tom Sedley, with her hand in both his, stood side by side, looking earnestly at the double door which separated them from this conference.
In a few minutes they heard Vane Etherage'svoice raised to a pitch of testy bluster, and then Miss Charity's rejoinder with shrill emphasis.
"Oh! gracious goodness! he's very angry. What shall we do?" exclaimed poor little Agnes, in wild helplessness.
"Iknewit—Iknewit—Isaidhow it would be—he can't endure the idea, he thinks it such audacity. I knew he must, and I really think I shall lose my reason. I could not—Icouldnot live. Oh! Agnes, Icouldn't if he prevents it."
In came Miss Charity, very red and angry.
"He's just in one of his odd tempers. I don't mind onewordhe says to-night. He'll be quite different, you'llsee, in the morning. We'll sit up here, and have a good talk about it, till it's time for you to go; and you'll see I'm quite right. I'msurprised," she continued, with severity, "at his talking as he did to-night. I consider it quite worldly andwicked! But I contented myself with telling him that he did not think one word of what he said, and that heknewhe didn't, and that he'd tell me so in the morning; and instead of feeling it, as I thought he would, he said something intolerably rude."
Old Etherage, about an hour later, when they were all in animated debate, shuffled to the door,and put in his head, and looked surprised to see Tom, who looked alarmed to see him. And the old gentleman bid them all a glowering good night, and shortly afterwards they heard him wheeled away to his bed-room, and were relieved.
They sat up awfully late, and the old servant, who poked into the room oftener than he was wanted towards the close of their sitting, looked wan and bewildered with drowsiness; and at last Charity, struck by the ghastly resignation of his countenance, glanced at the French clock over the chimney-piece, and ejaculated—
"Why, merciful goodness! is it possible? A quarter to one! Itcan't possibly be. Thomas Sedley,willyou look at your watch, and tell us what o'clock it really is?"
His watch corroborated the French clock.
"Ifpapa heard this! I really can't the leastconceivehow it happened. I did not think it could have beeneleven. Well, it isundoubtedlytheoddestthing thateverhappened in this house!"
In the morning, between ten and eleven, when Tom Sedley appeared again at the drawing-room windows, he learned from Charity, in her own emphatic style of narration, what had since taken place, which was not a great deal, but still was uncomfortably ambiguous.
She had visited her father at his breakfast in the study, and promptly introduced the subject of Tom Sedley, and he broke into this line of observation—
"I'd like to know what the deuce Tom Sedley means by talking of business to girls. I'd like to know it. I say, if he has anything to say, why doesn't hesayit, that's whatIsay. Here Iam. What has he tosay. I don't object to hear him, be it sense or be it nonsense—out with it! That's my maxim; and be it sense or be it nonsense, I won't have it at second-hand. That'smyidea."
Acting upon this, Miss Charity insisted that he ought to see Mr. Etherage; and, with a beating heart, he knocked at the study door, and asked an audience.
"Come in," exclaimed the resonant voice of the Admiral. And Tom Sedley obeyed.
The Admiral extended his hand, and greeted Tom kindly, but gravely.
"Fine day, Mr. Sedley; very fine, sir. It's an odd thing, Tom Sedley, but there's more really fine weather up here, at Hazelden, than anywhere else in Wales. More sunshine, and adealless rain. You'd hardly believe, for you'd fancy on this elevated ground we should naturally havemorerain, but it'sless, by several inches, thananywhere else in Wales! And there's next to no damp—the hygrometer tellsthat. And a curious thing, you'll have a southerly wind up here when it's blowing from the east on the estuary. You can see it, by Jove! Now just look out of that window; did you ever see such sunshine as that? There's a clearness in the air up here—at theotherside, if you go up, you getmist—but there's something about it here that I would not change for any place in the world."
You may be sure Tom did not dispute any of these points.
"By Jove, Tom Sedley, it would be a glorious day for a sail round the point of Penruthyn. I'd have been down with the tide, sir, this morning if I had been as I was ten years ago; but a fellow doesn't like to be lifted into his yacht, and the girls did not care for sailing; so I sold her. There wasn't such a boat—take her for everything—in theworld—never!"
"TheFeather; wasn't she, sir?" said Tom.
"TheFeather! that she was, sir. A name pretty well known, I venture to think. Yes, theFeatherwas her name."
"Ihave, sir; yes, indeed, often heard her spoken of," said Tom, who had heard one or two of the boatmen of Cardyllian mention her with a guarded sort of commendation. I never couldlearn, indeed, that there was anything very remarkable about the boat; but Tom would just then have backed any assertion of the honest Admiral's with a loyal alacrity, bordering, I am afraid, upon unscrupulousness.
"There are the girls going out with their trowels, going to poke among those flowers; and certainly, I'll do them justice to say, their garden prospers. I don't see such flowersanywhere; do you?"
"Nowhere!" said Tom, with enthusiasm.
"By, there they're at it—grubbing and raking. And, by-the-by, Tom, what was that? Sit down for a minute."
Tom felt as if he was going to choke, but he sat down.
"What was that—some nonsense Charity was telling me last night?"
Thus invited, poor Sedley, with many hesitations, and wanderings, and falterings, did get through his romantic story. And Mr. Etherage did not look pleased by the recital; on the contrary, he carried his head unusually high, and looked hot and minatory, but he did not explode. He continued looking on the opposite wall, as he had done as if he were eyeing a battle there, and he cleared his voice.
"As I understand it, sir, there's not an incometo make it at all prudent. I don't want my girls to marry; I should, in fact, miss them very much; but if they do, there ought to be a settlement, don't you see? there should be a settlement, forIcan't do so much for them as people suppose. The property is settled, and the greater part goes to my grand-nephew after me; and I've invested, as you know, all my stock and money in the quarry at Llanrwyd; and if she married you, she should live in London the greater part of the year. And I don't see how you could get on upon what you both have; I don't, sir. And I must say, I think you ought to have spoken to me before paying your addresses, sir. I don't think that's unreasonable; on the contrary, I think itreasonable, perfectlyso, and only right and fair. And I must go further, sir; I must say this, I don't see, sir, without a proper competence, what pretensions you had to address my child."
"None, sir; none in the world, Mr. Etherage. I know, sir, I've been thinking of my presumption ever since. I betrayed myself into it, sir; it was a kind of surprise. If I had reflected I should have come to you, sir; but—but you have no idea, sir, how I adore her." Tom's eye wandered after her through the window, among the flowers. "Or what it would be to me to—to have to"——
Tom Sedley faltered, and bit his lip, andstarted up quickly and looked at an engraving of old Etherage's frigate, which hung on the study wall.
He looked at it for some time steadfastly. Never was man so affected by the portrait of a frigate, you would have thought. Vane Etherage saw him dry his eyes stealthily two or three times, and the old gentleman coughed a little, and looked out of the window, and would have got up, if he could, and stood close to it.
"It's a beautiful day, certainly; wind coming round a bit to the south, though—south by east; that's always a squally wind with us; and—and—I assure you I like you, Tom; upon my honour I do, Tom Sedley—better, sir, than any young fellow I know. I think Ido—I amsure, in fact, I do. But this thing—it wouldn't do—it really wouldn't; no, Tom Sedley, it wouldn'tdo; if you reflect you'll see it. But, of course, you may get on in the world. Rome wasn't built in a day."
"It's very kind of you, sir; but the time's so long, and so many chances," said Sedley, with a sigh like a sob; "and when I go away, sir, the sooner I die, the happier for me."
Tom turned again quickly toward the frigate—theVulcan—and old Etherage looked out of the window once more, and up at the clouds.
"Yes," said the admiral, "it will; we shall have it from south by east. And, d'ye hear, Tom Sedley? I—I've been thinking there's no need to make any fuss about this—this thing; just let it be as if you had never said a word about it, do you mind, and come here just as usual. Let us put it out of our heads; and if you find matters improve, and still wish it, there's nothing to prevent your speaking to me; only Agnes is perfectly free, you understand, and you are not to make any change in your demeanour—a—or—I mean to be more with my daughters, or anythingmarked, you understand. People begin to talk here, you know, in the club-house, on very slight grounds! and—and—you understand now; and there mustn't be any nonsense; and I like you, sir—I like you, Thomas Sedley; I do—I do, indeed, sir."
And old Vane Etherage gave him a very friendly shake by the hand, and Tom thanked him gratefully, and went away reprieved, and took a walk with the girls, and told them, as they expressed it,everything; and Vane Etherage thought it incumbent on him to soften matters a little by asking him to dinner; and Tom accepted; and when they broke up after tea, there was another mistake discovered about the hour, and Miss Charity most emphatically announced thatit wasperfectly unaccountable, and mustneveroccur again; and I hope, for the sake of the venerable man who sat up, resigned and affronted, to secure the hall-door and put out the lamps after the party had broken up, that these irregular hours were kept no more at Hazelden.
Astime proceeds, renewal and decay, its twin principles of mutation, are everywhere and necessarily active, applying to the moral as well as to the material world. Affections displace and succeed one another. The most beautiful are often the first to die. Characteristics in their beginning, minute and unsubstantial as the fairy brood that people the woodland air, enlarge and materialize till they usurp the dominion of the whole man, and the people and the world are changed.
Sir Booth Fanshawe is away at Paris just now, engaged in a great negotiation, which is to bring order out of chaos, and inform him at last what he is really worthper annum. Margaret and her cousin, Miss Sheckleton, have revisited England; their Norman retreat is untenanted for the present.
With the sorrow of a great concealment upon her, with other sorrows that she does not tell, Margaret looks sad and pale.
In a small old suburban house, that stands alone, with a rural affectation, on a little patch of shorn grass, embowered in lilacs and laburnums, and built of a deep vermillion brick, the residence of these ladies is established.
It is a summer evening, and a beautiful little boy, more than a year old, is sprawling, and babbling, and rolling, and laughing on the grass upon his back. Margaret, seated on the grass beside him, prattles and laughs with him, and rolls him about, delighted, and adoring her little idol.
Old Anne Sheckleton, sitting on the bench, smiling happily, under the window, which is clustered round with roses, contributes her quota of nonsense to the prattle.
In the midst of this comes a ring at the bell in the jessamine-covered wall, and a tidy little maid runs out to the green door, opens it, and in steps Cleve Verney.
Margaret is on her feet in a moment, with the light of a different love, something of the old romance, in the glad surprise, "Oh, darling, it is you!" and her arms are about his neck, and he stoops and kisses her fondly, and in his face for a moment, is reflected the glory of that delighted smile.
"Yes, darling. Are you better?"
"Oh, yes—ever so much; I'm always wellwhen you are here; and look, see our poor little darling."
"So he is."
"We have had such fun with him—haven't we, Anne? I'm sure he'll be so like you."
"Is this in his favour, cousin Anne?" asked Cleve, taking the old lady's hand.
"Why should it not?" said she gaily.
"A question—well, I take the benefit of the doubt," laughed Cleve. "No, darling," he said to Margaret, "you mustn't sit on the grass; it is damp; you'll sit beside our Cousin Anne, and be prudent."
So he instead sat down on the grass, and talked with them, and prattled and romped with the baby by turns, until the nurse came out to convey him to the nursery, and he was handed round to say what passes for "Good night," and give his tiny paw to each in turn.
"You look tired, Cleve, darling."
"So I am, my Guido; can we have a cup of tea?"
"Oh, yes. I'll get it in a moment," said active Anne Sheckleton.
"It's too bad disturbing you," said Cleve.
"No trouble in the world," said Anne, who wished to allow them a word together; "besides, I must kiss baby in his bed."
"Yes, darling, Iamtired," said Cleve, taking his place beside her, so soon as old Anne Sheckleton was gone. "That old man"——
"Lord Verney, do you mean?"
"Yes; he has begun plaguing me again."
"What is it about, darling?"
"Oh, fifty things; he thinks, among others, I ought to marry," said Cleve, with a dreary laugh.
"Oh, I thought he had given up that," she said, with a smile that was very pale.
"So he did for a time; but I think he's possessed. If he happens to take up an idea that's likely to annoy other people, he never lets it drop till he teases them half to death. He thinks I should marrymoneyand political connection, and I don't know what all, and I'm quite tired of the whole thing. What a vulgar little box this is—isn't it, darling? I almost wish you were back again in that place in France."
"But I can see you so much oftener here, Cleve," pleaded Margaret, softly, with a very sad look.
"And where's the good of seeing me here, dear Margaret? Just consider, I always come to you anxious; there's always a risk, besides, of discovery."
"Where you are is to me a paradise."
"Oh, darling, donottalk rubbish. Thisvulgar, odious little place! No place can beeither—quite, of course—whereyouare. But you must see what it is—a paradise"—and he laughed peevishly—"of red brick, and lilacs, and laburnums—a paradise for old Mr. Dowlas, the tallow-chandler."
There was a little tremor in Margaret's lip, and the water stood in her large eyes; her hand was, as it were, on the coffin-edge; she was looking in the face of a dead romance.
"Now, you really must not shed tears overthatspeech. You are too much given to weeping, Margaret. What have I said to vex you? It merely amounts to this, that we live just now in the future; we can't well denythat, darling. But the time will come at last, and my queen enjoy her own."
And so saying he kissed her, and told her to be a good little girl; and from the window Miss Sheckleton handed them tea, and then she ran up to the nursery.
"Youdolook very tired, Cleve," said Margaret, looking into his anxious face.
"Iamtired, darling," he said, with just a degree of impatience in his tone; "I said so—horribly tired."
"I wish so much you were liberated from that weary House of Commons."
"Now, my wise little woman is talking of what she doesn't understand—not the least; besides, what would you have me turn to? I should be totally without resource and pursuit—don't you see? We must be reasonable. No, it is not that in the least that tires me, but I'm really overwhelmed with anxieties, and worried by my uncle, who wants me to marry, and thinks I can marry whom I please—that's all."
"I sometimes think, Cleve, I've spoiled your fortunes," with a great sigh, said Margaret, watching his face.
"Now, where's the good of saying that, my little woman? I'm only talking of my uncle's teasing me, and wishing he'd let us both alone."
Here came a little pause.
"Is that the baby?" said Margaret, raising her head and listening.
"I don't hear our baby or any one else's," said Cleve.
"I fancied I heard it cry, but it wasn't."
"You must think of me more, and of that child less, darling—you must, indeed," said Cleve, a little sourly.
I think the poor heart was pleased, thinking this jealousy; but I fear it was rather a splenetic impulse of selfishness, and that the baby was, in his eyes, a bore pretty often.
"Does the House sit to-night, Cleve, darling?"
"Does it, indeed? Why it's sitting now. We are to have the second reading of the West India Bill on to-night, and I must be there—yes—in an hour"—he was glancing at his watch—"and heaven knows at what hour in the morning we shall get away."
And just at this moment old Anne Sheckleton joined them. "She's coming with more tea," she said, as the maid emerged with a little tray, "and we'll place our cups on the window-stone when we don't want them. Now, Mr. Verney, is not this a charming little spot just at this light?"
"I almost think it is," said Cleve, relenting. The golden light of evening was touching the formal poplars, and the other trees, and bringing out the wrinkles of the old bricks duskily in its flaming glow.
"Yes, just for about fifteen minutes in the twenty-four hours, when the weather is particularly favourable, ithasa sort of Dutch picturesqueness; but, on the whole, it is not the sort of cottage that I would choose for a permanent dove-cot. I should fear lest my pigeons should choke with dust."
"No, there's no dust here; it is the quietest, most sylvan little lane in the world."
"Which is a wide place," said Cleve. "Well, with smoke then."
"Nor smoke either."
"But I forgot, love does not die of smoke or of anything else," said Cleve.
"No, of course, love is eternal," said Margaret.
"Just so; the King never dies. Les roix meurent-ils? Quelquefois, madame. Alas, theory and fact conflict. Love is eternal in the abstract; but nothing is more mortal than a particular love," said Cleve.
"If you think so, I wonder you ever wished to marry," said Margaret, and a faint tinge flushed her cheeks.
"I thought so, and yet I did wish to marry," said Cleve. "It is perishable, but I can't live without it," and he patted her cheek, and laughed a rather cold little laugh.
"No, love never dies," said Margaret, with a gleam of her old fierce spirit. "But it may be killed."
"It is terrible to kill anything," said Cleve.
"To kill love," she answered, "is the worst murder of all."
"A veritable murder," he acquiesced, with a smile and a slight shrug; "once killed, it never revives."
"You like talking awfully, as if I might loseyour love," said she, haughtily; "as if, were I to vex you, you never could forgive."
"Forgiveness has nothing to do with it, my poor little woman. I no more called my love into being than I did myself; and should it die, either naturally or violently, I could no more call it to life, than I could Cleopatra or Napoleon Bonaparte. It is a principle, don't you see? that comes as direct as life from heaven. We can't create it, we can't restore it; and really about love, it is worse than mortal, because, as I said, I am sure it hasnoresurrection—no, it has no resurrection."
"That seems to me a reason," she said, fixing her large eyes upon him with a wild resentment, "why you should cherish itverymuch while it lives."
"Anddon'tI, darling?" he said, placing his arms round her neck, and drawing her fondly to his breast, and in the thrill of that momentary effusion was something of the old feeling when to lose her would have been despair, to gain her heaven, and it seemed as if the scent of the woods of Malory, and of the soft sea breeze, was around them for a moment.
And now he is gone, away to that tiresome House—lost to her, given up to his ambition, which seems more and more to absorb him; andshe remains smiling on their beautiful little baby, with a great misgiving at her heart, to see Cleve no more for four-and-twenty hours more.
As Cleve went into the House, he met old Colonel Thongs, sometime whip of the "outs."
"You've heard about old Snowdon?"
"No."
"In the Cabinet, by Jove!"
"Really?"
"Fact. Ask your uncle."
"By Jove, itisvery unlooked for; no one thought of him; but I dare say he'll do very well."
"We'll soon try that."
Itwasaveryodd appointment. But Lord Snowdon was gazetted; a dull man, but laborious; a man who had held minor offices at different periods of his life, and was presumed to have a competent knowledge of affairs. A dull man, owing all to his dulness, quite below many, and selected as a negative compromise for the vacant seat in the Cabinet, for which two zealous and brilliant competitors were contending.
"I see it all," thought Cleve; "that's the reason why Caroline Oldys and Lady Wimbledon are to be at Ware this autumn, and I'm to be married to the niece of a Cabinet minister."
Cleve sneered, but he felt very uneasy.