"And the kettles never once bumped the earthen pot—eh?" asked Mr. Phipps mocking.
"You forget," said Bessie, "I'm a little kettle myself now;" and she laughed with the gayest assurance.
That respite till September was indeed worth much to Bessie. Her mind was gently broken in to changes. Mr. Fairfax vanished from the scene, and Lady Latimer appeared on it more frequently. My lady even took upon her (out of the interest she felt in her old friend) to find a school for Bessie, and found one at Caen which everybody seemed to agree would do. The daughters of the Liberal member for Hampton were receiving their education there, and Mrs. Wiley knew the school.
It was a beautiful season in the Forest—never more beautiful—and Bessie rode with her father whenever he could go with her. Then young Musgrave came back from Wells. Perhaps it is unnecessary to repeat that Bessie was very fond of young Musgrave. It was quoted of her, when she was a fat little trot of seven years old and he a big boy of twelve, that she had cried herself to sleep because he had refused her a kiss, being absorbed in some chemical experiment that smelt abominably when her mother called her to bed. The denial was singularly unkind, and even ungrateful that evening, because Bessie had not screamed when he electrified her round, wee nose. She was still so tender at heart for him that she would probably have cried now if he had roughed her. But they were friends, the best of friends—as good as brother and sister. Harry talked of himself incessantly; but what hero to her so interesting? Not even his mother was so indulgent to his harmless vanities as Bessie, or thought him so surely predestined to be one of the great men of his day.
It was early yet to say that Harry Musgrave was born under a lucky star, but his friends did say it. He was of a most popular character, not too wise or good to dispense with indulgence, or too modest to claim it. At twelve he was a clumsy lad, bold, audacious, pleasant-humored, with a high,curly, brown head, fine bright eyes, and no features to mention. At twenty he had grown up into a tall, manly fellow, who meant to have his share in the world if courage could capture it. Plenty of staying power, his schoolmasters said he had, and it was the consciousness of force in reserve that gave him much of his charm. Jealousy, envy, emulation could find no place in him; he had been premature in nothing, and still took his work at sober pace. He had a wonderful gift of concentrativeness, and a memory to match. He loved learning for its own sake far more than for the honor of excelling, and treated the favors of fortune with such cool indifference that the seers said they were sure some day to fall upon him in a shower. He had his pure enthusiasms and lofty ambitions, as what young man of large heart and powerful intellect has not? And he was now in the poetic era of life.
Bessie Fairfax had speculated much and seriously beforehand how Harry Musgrave would receive the news that she was going to be a lady. He received it with most sovereign equanimity.
"You always were a lady, and a very nice little lady, Bessie. I don't think they can mend you," said he.
The communication and flattering response were made at Brook, in the sitting-room of the farm—a spacious, half-wainscoted room, with dark polished floor, and a shabby old Persian carpet in the centre of it. A very picture-like interior it was, with the afternoon sun pouring through its vine-shaded open lattice, though time and weather-stains were on the ceiling and pale-colored walls, and its scant furniture was cumbrous, worn, and unbeautiful. The farm-house had been the manor once, and was fast falling to pieces. Mr. Musgrave's landlord was an impoverished man, but he could not sell a rood of his land, because his heir was a cousin with whom he was at feud. It was a daily trial to Mrs. Musgrave's orderly disposition that she had not a neat home about her, but its large negligence suited her husband and son. This bare sitting-room was Harry's own, and with the wild greenery outside was warm, sweet, and fresh in hot summer weather, though a few damp days filled it with odors of damp and decay. It was a cell in winter, but in July a bower.
And none the less a bower for those two young people in it this afternoon. Mr. Carnegie had dropped Bessie at Brook in the morning, and young Musgrave was to escort her home in the cool of the evening. His mother and she had spent an hour together since the midday dinner, and now the son of the house had called for her. They sat one on each side of the long oak board which served young Musgrave for a study-table and stood endwise towards the middle lattice. Harry had a new poem before him, which he was tired of reading. The light and shadow played on both their faces. There was a likeness for those who could see it—the same frank courage in their countenances, the same turn for reverie in their eyes. Harry felt lazy. The heat, the drowsy hum of bees in the vine-blossoms, and the poetry-book combined, had made him languid. Then he had bethought him of his comrade. Bessie came gladly, and poured out in full recital the events that had happened to her of late. To these she added the projects and anticipations of the future.
"Dear little Bessie! she fancies she is on the eve of adventures. Terribly monotonous adventures a girl's must be!" said the conceit of masculine twenty.
"I wish I had been a boy—it must be much better fun," was the whimsical rejoinder of feminine fifteen.
"And you should have been my chum," said young Musgrave.
"That is just what I should have liked. Caen is nearer to Beechhurst than it is to Woldshire, so I shall come home for my holidays. Perhaps I shall never see you again, Harry, when I am transported to Woldshire." This with a pathetic sigh.
"Never is a long day. I shall find you out; and if I don't, you'll hear of me. I mean to be heard of, Bessie."
"Oh yes, Harry, I am sure you will. Shall you write a book? Will it be a play? They always seem to walk to London with a play in their pockets, a tragedy that the theatres won't look at; and then their troubles begin."
Young Musgrave smiled superior at Bessie's sentiment and Bessie's syntax. "There is the railway, and Oxford is on the road. I intend always to travel first-class," said he.
Bessie understood him to speak literally. "First-class!Oh, but that is too grand! In theLivesthey never have much money. Some are awfully poor—starving: Savage was, and Chatterton and Otway."
"Shabby, disreputable vagabonds!" answered young Musgrave lightly.
"And Samuel Johnson and ever so many more," continued Bessie, pleading his sympathy.
"There is no honor in misery; it is picturesque to read about, but it is a sorry state in reality to be very poor. Some poets have been scamps. I shall not start as the prodigal son, Bessie, for I love not swinish company nor diet of husks."
"The prodigal came home to his father, Harry."
"So he did, but I have my doubts whether he stayed."
There was a silence. Bessie had always believed in the prodigal as a good son after his repentance. Any liberty of speculation as concerning Scripture gave her pause; it was a new thing at Beechhurst and at Brook.
Young Musgrave furled over the pages of his book. A sheet of paper, written, interlined, blotted with erasures, flew out. He laid a quick hand upon it; not so quick, however, but that Bessie had caught sight of verses—verses of his own, too. She entreated him to read them. He excused himself. "Do, Harry; please do," she urged, but he was inexorable. He had read her many a fine composition before—many a poem crowded with noble words and lofty sentiments; but for once he was reserved, firm, secret. He told Bessie that she would not admire this last effort of his muse: it was a parody, an imitation of the Greek.
"Girls have no relish for humor: they don't understand it. It is sheer profanity to them," said he. Let him show her his prize-books instead.
Bessie was too humble towards Harry to be huffed. She admired the prize-books, then changed the subject, and spoke of Lady Latimer, inquiring if he had availed himself of her invitation yet to call at Fairfield.
"No," said he, "I have not called at Fairfield. What business can her ladyship have with me? I don't understand her royal message. Little Christie went to Fairfield with a portfolio of sketches in obedience to a summons ofthat sort, and was bidden to sit down to dinner in the servants' hall while the portfolio was carried up stairs. Her ladyship bought a sketch, but the money was no salve for Christie's mortification. I have nothing to sell. I took warning by my friend, and did not go."
Again Bessie was dumb. She blushed, and did not know what to say. She would not have liked to hear that Harry had been set down to dinner in the servants' hall at Fairfield, though she had not herself been hurt by a present of a cheese-cake in the kitchen. She was perfectly aware that the farmers and upper servants in the great houses did associate as equals. Evidently the conduct of life required much discretion.
Less than a year ago young Christie had helped at the painting and graining of Lady Latimer's house. Somebody, a connoisseur in art, wandering last autumn in the Forest, had found him making a drawing of yew trees, had sought him in his home at the wheelwright's, had told him he was a genius and would do wonders. On the instant young Christie expected the greatest of all wonders to be done; he expected his friends and neighbors to believe in him on the strength of the stranger's prediction. Naturally, they preferred to reserve their judgment. He and young Musgrave had learnt their letters under the same ferule, though their paths had diverged since. Some faint reminiscence of companionship survived in young Christie's memory, and in the absence of a generous sympathy at home he went to seek it at Brook. A simple, strong attachment was the result. Young Christie was gentle, vain, sensitive, easily raised and easily depressed, a slim little fellow—a contrast to Harry Musgrave in every way. "My friend" each called the other, and their friendship was a pure joy and satisfaction to them both. Christie carried everything to Brook—hopes, feelings, fears as well as work—even his mortification at Fairfield, against a repetition of which young Musgrave offered counsel, wisdom of the ancients.
"It is art you are in pursuit of, not pomps and vanities? Then keep clear of Fairfield. The first thing for success in imaginative work is a soul unruffled: what manner of work could you do to-day? You will never paint a stroke the better for anything Lady Latimer can do for you; but layyourself open to the chafe and fret of her patronage now, and you are done for. Ten, twenty years hence, she will be harmless, because you will have the confidence of a name."
"And she will remember that she bought my first sketch; she will say she made me," said young Christie.
"You will not care then: everybody knows that a man makes himself. Phipps calls her vain-glorious; Carnegie calls her the very core of goodness. In either case you don't need her. There is only one patron for men of art and literature in these days, and that is the General Public. The times are gone by for waiting in Chesterfield's ante-room and hiding behind Cave's screen."
Harry recited all this for Bessie's instruction. Bessie was convinced that he had spoken judiciously: the safest way to avoid a fall is not to be in too much haste to climb. It is more consistent with self-respect for genius in low estate to defend its independence against the assaults of rich patrons, seeking appendages to their glory, than to accept their benefits, and complain that they are given with insolence. It is an evident fact that the possessors of rank and money value themselves as of more consequence than those whom God has endowed with other gifts and not with these. Platitudes reveal themselves to the young as novel and striking truths. Bessie ruminated these in profound silence. Harry offered her a penny for her thoughts.
"I was thinking," said she, with a sudden revelation of the practical, "that young Christie will suffer a great deal in his way through the world if he stumble at such common kindness as Lady Latimer's." And then she told the story of the cheese-cake. "I beheld my lady then as a remote and exalted sphere, where never foot of mine would come. I have entered it since by reason of belonging to an old house of gentry, and I find that I can breathe there. So may he some day, when he has earned a title to it, but he would be very uncomfortable there now."
"And so may I some day, when I have earned a title to it, but I should be very uncomfortable there now. Meanwhile we have souls above cheese-cakes, and don't choose to bear my lady's patronage."
Bessie felt that she was being laughed at. She grew angry, and poured out her sentiments hot: "There is a difference between you and young Christie; you know quite well that there is, Harry. No, I sha'n't explain what it consists in. Lady Latimer meant to encourage him: to see that she thinks well enough of his sketches to buy one may influence other people to buy them. He can't live on air; and if he is to be a painter he must study. You are not going to rise in the world without working? If you went to her house, she would make you acquainted with people it might be good for you to know: it is just whether you like that sort of thing or not. I don't; I am happier at home. But men don't want to keep at home."
"Already, Bessie!" cried Harry in a rallying, reproachful tone.
"Alreadywhat, Harry? I am not giving myself airs, if that is what you mean," said she blushing.
Harry shook his head, but only half in earnest: "You are, Bessie. You are pretending to have opinions on things that you had never thought of a month ago. Give you a year amongst your grandees, and you will hold yourself above us all."
Tears filled Bessie's eyes. She was very much hurt; she did not believe that Harry could have misunderstood her so. "I shall never hold myself above anybody that I was fond of when I was little; they are more likely to forget me when I am out of sight. They have others to love." Bessie spoke in haste and excitement. She meant neither to defend herself nor to complain, but her voice imported a little pathos and tragedy into the scene. Young Musgrave instantly repented and offered atonement. "Besides," Bessie rather inconsequently ran on, "I am very fond of Lady Latimer; she has nobody of her own, so she tries to make a family in the world at large."
"All right, Bessie—then she shall adopt you. Only don't be cross, little goosey. Let us go into the garden." Young Musgrave made such a burlesque of his remorse that Bessie, wounded but skin-deep, was fain to laugh too and be friends again. And thereupon they went forth together into the bosky old garden.
What a pleasant wilderness that old garden was, even in itsneglected beauty! Whoever planted it loved open spaces, turf, and trees of foreign race; for there were some rare cedars, full-grown, straight, and stately, with feathered branches sweeping the grass, and strange shrubs that were masses of blossom and fountains of sweet odors. The flower-borders had run to waste; only a few impoverished roses tossed their blushing fragrance into the air, and a few low-growing, old-fashioned things made shift to live amongst the weeds. But the prettiest bit of all was the verdant natural slope, below which ran the brook that gave the village and the manor their names. The Forest is not a land of merry running waters, but little tranquil streams meander hither and thither, making cool its shades. Three superb beeches laved their silken leaves in the shallow flood, and amongst their roots were rustic seats all sheltered from sun and wind. Here had Harry Musgrave and Bessie Fairfax sat many a summer afternoon, their heads over one poetry-book, reading, whispering, drawing—lovers in a way, though they never talked of love.
"Shall we two ever walk together in this garden again, Harry?" said Bessie, breaking a sentimental silence with a sigh as she gazed at the sun-dimmed horizon.
"Many a time, I hope. I'll tell you my ambition." Young Musgrave spoke with vivacity; his eyes sparkled. "Listen, Bessie, and don't be astonished. I mean some day to buy Brook, and come to live here. That is my ambition."
Bessie was overawed. To buy Brook was a project too vast for her imagination. The traditions of its ancient glories still hung about it, and the proprietor, even in his poverty, was a power in the country. Harry proceeded with the confession of his day-dreams: "I shall pull down the house—if it does not fall down of itself before—and build it up again on the original plan, for I admire not all things new. With the garden replanted and the fine old trees left, it will be a paradise—as much of a paradise as any modern Adam can desire. And Bessie shall be my Eve."
"You will see so many Eves between now and then, Harry, that you will have forgotten me," cried Bessie.
Harry rejoined: "You are quite as likely to be carried away by a bluff Woldshire squire as I am to fall captive to other Eves."
"You know, Harry, I shall always be fondest of you. We have been like real cousins. But won't you be growing rather old before you are rich enough to buy Brook?"
"If I am, you will be growing rather old too, Bessie. What do you call old—thirty?"
"Yes. Do you mean to put off life till you are thirty?"
"No. I mean to work and play every day as it comes. But one must have some great events to look forward to. My visions are of being master of Brook and of marrying Bessie. One without the other would be only half a good fortune."
"Do you care so much for me as that, Harry? I was afraid you cared for little Christie more than for me now."
"Don't be jealous of little Christie, Bessie. Surely I can like you both. There are things a girl does not understand. You belong to me as my father and mother do. I have told you everything. I have not told anybody but you what I intend about Brook—not even my mother. I want it to be our secret."
"So it shall, Harry. You'll see how I can keep it," cried Bessie delighted.
"I trust you, because I know if I make a breakdown you will not change. When I missed the English verse-prize last year (you remember, Bessie?) I had made so sure of it that I could hardly show my face at home. Mother was disappointed, but you just snuggled up to me and said, 'Never mind, Harry, I love you;' and you did not care whether I had a prize or none. And that was comfort. I made up my mind at that minute what I should do."
"Dear old Harry! I am sure your verses were the best, far away," was Bessie's response; and then she begged to hear more of what her comrade meant to do.
Harry did not want much entreating. His schemes could hardly be called castles in the air, so much of the solid and reasonable was there in the design of them. He had no expectation of success by wishing, and no trust in strokes of luck. Life is a race, and a harder race than ever. Nobody achieves great things without great labors and often great sacrifices. "The labor I shall not mind; the sacrifices I shall make pay." Harry was getting out of Bessie's depth now; a little more of poetry and romance in his views would havebrought them nearer to the level of her comprehension. Then he talked to her of his school, of the old doctor, that great man, of his schoolfellows, of his rivals whom he had distanced—not a depreciatory word of any of them. "I don't believe in luck for myself," he said. "But there is a sort of better and worse fortune amongst men, independent of merit. It was the narrowest shave between me and Fordyce. I would not have given sixpence for my chance of the scholarship against his, yet I won it. He is a good fellow, Fordyce: he came up and shook hands as if he had won. That was just what I wanted: I felt so happy! Now I shall go to Oxford; in a year or two I shall have pupils, and who knows but I may gain a fellowship? I shall take you to Oxford, Bessie, when the time comes."
Bessie was as proud and as pleased in this indefinite prospect as if she were bidden to pack up and start to-morrow. Harry went on to tell her what Mr. Moxon had told him, how Oxford is one of the most beautiful of cities, and one of the most famous and ancient seats of learning in the world (which she knew from her geography-book), and there, under the beeches, with the slow ripple at their feet, they sat happy as king and queen in a fairy-tale, until the shadow of Mrs. Musgrave came gliding over the grass, and her clear caressing voice broke on their ears: "Children, children, are you never coming to tea? We have called you from the window twice. And young Christie is here."
Young Christie came forward with a bow and a blush to shake hands. He had dressed himself for Sunday to come to Brook. He had an ingenuous face, but plain in feature. The perceptive faculties were heavily developed, and his eyes were fine; and his mouth and chin suggested a firmness of character.
Mr. Musgrave, who was absent at dinner, was now come home tired from Hampton. He leant back in his chair and held out a brown hand to Bessie, who took it, and a kiss with it, as part of the regular ceremony of greeting. She slipped into the chair set for her beside him, and was quite at home, for Bessie was a favorite in the same degree at Brook as Harry was at Beechhurst. Young Christie sat next to his friendand opposite to Bessie. They had many things to say to each other, and Bessie compared them in her own mind silently. Harry was serene and quiet; Christie's color came and went with the animation of his talk. Harry's hands had the sunburnt hue of going ungloved, but they were the hands of a young man devoted to scholarly pursuits; Christie's were stained with his trade, which he practised of necessity still, wooing art only in his bye-hours. Harry's speech was decisive and simple; Christie's was hesitating and a little fine, a little over-careful. He was self-conscious, and as he talked he watched who listened, his restless eyes glancing often towards Bessie. But this had a twofold meaning, for while he talked of other things his faculty of observation was at work; it was always at work as an undercurrent.
Loveliness of color had a perpetual fascination for him. He was considering the tints in Bessie's hair and in the delicate, downy rose-oval of her cheeks, and the effect upon them of the sunshine flickering through the vine leaves. When the after-glow was red in the west, the dark green cloth of the window-curtain, faded to purple and orange, made a rich background for her fair head, and he beheld in his fancy a picture that some day he would reproduce. On the tea-table he had laid down a twig of maple, the leaves of which were curiously crenated by some insect, and with it a clump of moss, and a stone speckled in delicious scarlet and tawny patches of lichen-growth—bits of Nature and beauty in which he saw more than others see, and had picked up in his walk by Great-Ash Ford through the Forest to Brook.
"I live in hope of some lucky accident to give me the leisure and opportunity for study; till then I must stick to my mechanical trade of painting and graining," he was saying while his eyes roved about Bessie's face, and his fingers toyed first with the twig of maple and then with the pearled moss. "My father thinks scorn of art for a living, and predicts me repentance and starvation. I tell him we shall see; one must not expect to be a prophet in one's own country. But I am half promised a commission at the Hampton Theatre—a new drop-scene. My sketch is approved—it is a Forest view. The decision must come soon."
Everybody present wished the young fellow success."Though whether you have success or not you will have a share of happiness, because you are a dear lover of Nature, and Nature never lets her lovers go unrewarded," said Mrs. Musgrave kindly.
"Ah! but I shall not be satisfied with her obscure favors," cried little Christie airily.
"You must have applause: I don't think I care for applause," said young Musgrave; and he cut Bessie a slice of cake.
Bessie proceeded to munch it with much gravity and enjoyment—Harry's mother made excellent cakes—and the father of the house, smiling at her serious absorption, patted her on the shoulder and said, "And what does Bessie Fairfax care for?"
"Only to be loved," says Bessie without a thought.
"And that is what you will be, for love's a gift," rejoined Mr. Musgrave. "These skip-jacks who talk of setting the world on fire will be lucky if they make only blaze enough to warm themselves."
"Ay, indeed—and getting rich. Talk's cheap, but it takes a deal of money to buy land," said his wife, who had a shrewd inkling of her son's ambition, though he had not confessed it to her. "Young folks little think of the chances and changes of this mortal life, or it's a blessing they'd seek before anything else."
Bessie's face clouded at a word of changes. "Don't fret, Bessie, we'll none of us forget you," said the kind father. But this was too much for her tender heart. She pushed back her chair and ran out of the room. For the last hour the tears had been very near her eyes, and now they overflowed. Mrs. Musgrave followed to comfort her.
"To go all amongst strangers!" sobbed Bessie; and her philosophy quite failed her when that prospect recurred in its dreadful blankness. Happily, the time of night did not allow of long lamentation. Presently Harry called at the stair's foot that it was seven o'clock. And she kissed his mother and bade Brook good-bye.
The walk home was through the Forest, between twilight and moonlight. The young men talked and Bessie was silent. She had no favor towards young Christie previously, but sheliked his talk to-night and his devotion to Harry Musgrave, and she enrolled him henceforward amongst those friends and acquaintances of her happy childhood at Beechhurst concerning whom inquiries were to be made in writing home when she was far away.
A few days after his meeting with Bessie Fairfax at Brook, young Christie left at the doctor's door a neat, thin parcel addressed to her with his respects. Lady Latimer and Mrs. Wiley, who were still interesting themselves in her affairs, were with Mrs. Carnegie at the time, giving her some instructions in Bessie's behalf. Mrs. Carnegie was rather bothered than helped by their counsels, but she did not discourage them, because of the advantage to Bessie of having their countenance and example. Bessie, sitting apart at the farther side of the round table, untied the string and unfolded the silver paper. Then there was a blush, a smile, a cry of pleasure. At what? At a picture of herself that little Christie had painted, and begged to make an offering of. It was handed round for the inspection of the company.
"A slight thing," said Mrs. Wiley with a negligent glance. "Young Christie fishes with sprats to catch whales, as Askew told him yesterday. He brought his portfolio and a drawing of the church to show, but we did not buy anything. We are afraid that he will turn out a sad, idle fellow, going dawdling about instead of keeping to his trade. His father is much grieved."
"This is sketchy, but full of spirit," said Lady Latimer, holding the drawing at arm's length to admire.
"It is life itself! We must hear what your father says to it, Bessie," Mrs. Carnegie added in a pleased voice.
"If her father does not buy it, I will. It is a charming little picture," said my lady.
Bessie was gratified, but she hoped her father would not let anybody else possess it.
"A matter of a guinea, and it will be well paid for," said the rector's wife.
No one made any rejoinder, but Mr. Carnegie gave the aspiring artist five guineas (he would not have it as a gift, which little Christie meant), and plenty of verbal encouragement besides. Lady Latimer further invited him to paint her little friends, Dora and Dandy. He accepted the commission, and fulfilled it with effort and painstaking, but not with such signal success as his portrait of Bessie. That was an inspiration. The doctor hung up the picture in the dining-room for company every day in her absence, and promised that it should keep her place for her in all their hearts and memories until she came home again.
There are not many more events to chronicle until the great event of Bessie's farewell to Beechhurst. She gave a tea-party to her friends in the Forest, a picnic tea-party at Great-Ash Ford; and on a fine morning, when the air blew fresh from the sea, she and her handsome new baggage were packed, with young Musgrave, into the back seat of the doctor's chaise, the doctor sitting in front with his man to drive. Their destination was Hampton, to take the boat for Havre. The man was to return home with the chaise in the evening. The doctor was going on to Caen, to deliver his dear little girl safely at school, and Harry was going with them for a holiday. All the Carnegie children and their mother, the servants and the house-dog, were out in the road to bid Bessie a last good-bye; the rector and his wife were watching over the hedge; and Miss Buff panted up the hill at the last moment, with fat tears running down her cheeks. She had barely time for a word, Mr. Carnegie always cutting short leave-takings. Bessie's nose was pink with tears and her eyes glittered, but she was in good heart. She looked behind her as long as she could see her mother, and Jack and Willie coursing after the chaise with damp pocket-handkerchiefs a-flutter; and then she turned her face the way she was going, and said with a shudder, "It is a beautiful, sunny morning, but for all that it is cold."
"Have my coat-sleeve, Bessie," suggested Harry, and they both laughed, then became quiet, then merry.
About two miles out of Hampton the travellers overtooklittle Christie making the road fly behind him as he marched apace, a knapsack at his back and his chin in the air.
"Whither away so fast, young man?" shouted the doctor, hailing him.
"To Hampton Theatre," shouted Christie back again, and he flourished his hat round his head. Harry Musgrave repeated the triumphant gesture with a loud hurrah. The artist that was to be had got that commission for the new drop-scene at the theatre. His summons had come by this morning's post.
The toil-worn, dusty little figure was long in sight, for now the road ran in a direct line. Bessie wished they could have given him a lift on his journey. Harry Musgrave continued to look behind, but he said nothing. It is some men's fortune to ride cock-horse, it is some other men's to trudge afoot; but neither is the lot of the first to be envied, nor the lot of the last to be deplored. Such would probably have been his philosophy if he had spoken. Bessie, regarding externals only, and judging of things as they seemed, felt pained by the outward signs of inequality.
In point of fact, little Christie was the happiest of the three at that moment. According to his own belief, he was just about to lay hold of the key that would open for him the outer door of the Temple of Fame. After that blessed drop-scene that he was on his way to execute at Hampton, never more would he return to his mechanical painting and graining. It was an epoch that they all dated from, this shining day of September, when Bessie Fairfax bade farewell to the Forest, and little Christie set out on his career of honor with a knapsack on his back and seven guineas in his pocket. As for Harry Musgrave, his leading-strings were broken before, and he was in some sort a citizen of the world already.
The rapid action and variety of the next few days were ever after like a dream to Bessie Fairfax. A tiring day in Hampton town, a hurried walk to the docks in the sunset, the gorgeous autumnal sunset that flushed the water like fire; a splendid hour in the river, ships coming up full sail, and twilight down to the sea; a long, deep sleep. Then sunrise on rolling green waves, low cliffs, headlands of France; a vast turmoil, hubbub, and confusion of tongues; a brief excursion into Havre, by gay shops to gayer gardens, and breakfast in the gayest of glass-houses. Then embarkation on board the boat for Caen; a gentle sea-rocking; soldiers, men in blouses, women in various patterns of caps; the mouth of the Orne; fringes on the coast of fashionable resort for sea-bathers. Miles up the stream, dreary, dreary; poplars leaning aslant from the wind, low mud-banks, beds of osiers, reeds, rushes, willows; poplars standing erect as a regiment in line, as many regiments, a gray monotony of poplars; the tide flowing higher, laving the reeds, the sallows, all pallid with mist and soft driving rain. A gleam of sun on a lawn, on roses, on a conical red roof; orchards, houses here and there, with shutters closed, and the afternoon sun hot upon them; acres of market-garden, artichokes, flat fields, a bridge, rushy ditches, tall array of poplars repeated and continued endlessly.
"I think," said Bessie, "I shall hate a poplar as long as I live!"
Mr. Carnegie agreed that the scenery was not enchanting. Beautiful France is not to compare with the beautiful Forest. Harry Musgrave was in no haste with his opinion; he was looking out for Caen, that ancient and famous town of the Norman duke who conquered England. He had been reading up the guide-book and musing over history, while Bessie had been letting the poplars weigh her mind down to the brink of despondency.
A repetition of the noisy landing at Havre, despatch ofbaggage to Madame Fournier's, everybody's heart failing for fear of that august, unknown lady. A sudden resolution on the doctor's part to delay the dread moment of consigning Bessie to the school-mistress until evening, and a descent on Thunby's hotel. A walk down the Rue St. Jean to the Place St. Pierre, and by the way a glimpse, through an open door in a venerable gateway, of a gravelled court-yard planted with sycamores and surrounded by lofty walls, draped to the summit with vines and ivy; in the distance an arcade with vistas of garden beyond lying drowsy in the sunshine, the angle of a large mansion, and fluttering lilac wreaths of wisteria over the portal.
"If this is Madame Fournier's school, it is a hushed little world," said the doctor.
Bessie beheld it with awe. There was a solemn picturesqueness in the prospect that daunted her imagination.
Harry Musgrave referred to his guide-book: "Ah, I thought so—this is the place. Bessie, Charlotte Corday lived here."
Above the rickety gateway were two rickety windows. At those windows Charlotte might have sat over her copy of Plutarch's "Lives," a ruminating republican in white muslin, before the Revolution, or have gazed at the sombre church of St. Jean across the street, in the happier days before she despised going to old-fashioned worship. Bessie looked up at them more awed than ever. "I hope her ghost does not haunt the house. Come away, Harry," she whispered.
Harry laughed at her superstition. They went forward under the irregular peaked houses, stunned at intervals by side-gusts of evil odor, till they came to the place and church of St. Pierre. The market-women in white-winged caps, who had been sitting at the receipt of custom since morning surrounded by heaps of glowing fruit and flowers, were now vociferously gathering up their fragments, their waifs and strays and remnants, to go home. The men were harnessing their horses, filling their carts. It was all a clamorous, sunny, odd sort of picture amidst the quaint and ancient buildings. Then they went into the church, into the gloom and silence out of the stir. The doctor made the young ones a sign to hush. There were women on their knees, and on the steps of the altar a priest of dignified aspect, and a file of acolytes,awfully ugly, the very refuse of the species—all but one, who was a saint for beauty of countenance and devoutness of mien. Harry glanced at him and his companions as if they were beings of a strange and mysterious race; and the numerous votive offerings to "Our Lady of La Salette" and elsewhere he eyed askance with the expression of a very sound Protestant indeed. The lovely luxuriant architecture, the foliated carvings, were dim in the evening light. A young sculptor, who was engaged in the work of restoring some of these rich carvings, came down from his perch while the strangers stood to admire them.
That night by nine o'clock Bessie Fairfax was in thedortoirat Madame Fournier's—a chamber of six windows and twenty beds, narrow, hard, white, and, except her own and one other, empty. By whose advice it was that she was sent to school a week in advance of the opening she never knew. But there she was in the wilderness of a house, with only a dejected English teacher suffering from chronic face-ache, and another scholar, younger than herself, for company. The great madame was still absent at Bayeux, spending the vacation with her uncle the canon.
It was a moonlight night, and the jalousies looking upon the garden were not closed. Bessie was neither timid nor grievous, but she was desperately wide-awake. The formality of receiving her and showing her to bed had been very briefly despatched. It seemed as if she had been left at the door like a parcel, conveyed up stairs, and put away. Beechhurst was a thousand miles off, and yesterday a hundred years ago! The doctor and Harry Musgrave could hardly have walked back to Thunby's hotel before she and her new comrade were in their little beds. Now, indeed, was the Rubicon passed, and Bessie Fairfax committed to all the vicissitudes of exile. She realized the beginning thereof when she stretched her tired limbs on her unyielding mattress of straw, and recalled her dear little warm nest under the eaves at home.
Presently, from a remote couch spoke her one companion, "I am sitting up on end. What are you doing?"
"Nothing. Lying down and staring at the moon," replied Bessie, and turned her eyes in the direction of the voice.
The figure sitting up on end was distinctly visible. It was clasping its knees, its long hair flowed down its back, and its face was steadily addressed to the window at the foot of its bed. "Do you care to talk?" asked the queer apparition.
"I shall not fall asleep forhoursyet," said Bessie.
"Then let us have a good talk." The unconscious quoter of Dr. Johnson contributed her full share to the colloquy. She told her story, and why she was at Madame Fournier's: "Father's ship comes from Yarmouth in Norfolk. It is there we are at home, but he is nearly always at sea—to and fro to Havre and Caen, to Dunkirk and Bordeaux. It is a fine sailing ship, the Petrel. When the wind blows I think of father, though he has weathered many storms. To-night it will be beautiful on the water. I have often sailed with father." A prodigious sigh closed the paragraph, and drew from Bessie a query that perhaps she wished she was sailing with him now? She did, indeed! "He left me here because I was not well—it is three weeks since; it was the day of the emperor'sfête—but I am no stronger yet. I have been left here before—once for a whole half-year. I hope it won't be so long this time; I do so miss father! My mother is dead, and he has married another wife. I believe she wishes I were dead too."
"Oh no," cried Bessie, much amazed. "I have a mother who is not really my mother, but she is as good as if she were."
"Then she is not like mine. Are women all alike? Hush! there is Miss Foster at the door—listening.... She is gone now; she didn't peep in.... Tell me, do you hear anything vulgar in my speech?"
"No—it is plain enough." It was a question odd and unexpected, and Bessie had to think before she answered it.
Her questioner mistook her reflection for hesitation, and seemed disappointed. "Ah, but you do," said she, "though you don't like to tell me so. It is provincial, very provincial, Miss Foster admits.... Next week, when the young ladies come back, I shall wish myself more than ever with father."
"What for? don't you like school?" Bessie was growing deeply interested in these random revelations.
"No. How should I? I don't belong to them. Everybodyslights me but madame. Miss Hiloe has set me down as quitecommon. It is so dreadful!"
Bessie's heart had begun to beat very hard. "Is it?" said she in a tone of apprehension. "Do they profess to despise you?"
"More than that—theydodespise me; they don't know how to scorn me enough. But you are notcommon, so why should you be afraid? My father is a master-mariner—John Fricker of Great Yarmouth. What is yours?"
"Oh, mine was a clergyman, but he is long since dead, and my own mother too. The father and mother who have taken care of me since live at Beechhurst in the Forest, andheis a doctor. It is my grandfather who sends me here to school, and he is a country gentleman, a squire. But I like my common friends best—far!"
"If you have a squire for your grandfather you may speak as you please—Miss Hiloe will not call you common. Oh, I am shrewd enough: I know more than I tell. Miss Foster says I have the virtues of my class, but I have no business at a school like this. She wonders what Madame Fournier receives me for. Oh, I wish father may come over next month! Nobody can tell how lonely I feel sometimes. Will you call me Janey?" Janey's poor little face went down upon her knees, and there was the sound of sobs. Bessie's tender heart yearned to comfort this misery, and she would have gone over to administer a kiss, had she not been peremptorily warned not to risk it: there was the gleam of a light below the door. When that alarm was past, composure returned to the master-mariner's little daughter, and Bessie ventured to ask if the French girls were nice.
The answer sounded pettish: "There are all sorts in a school like this. Elise Finckel lives in the Place St. Pierre: they are clock and watchmakers, the Finckels. Once I went there; then Elise and Miss Hiloe made friends, and it was good-bye to me! but clanning is forbidden."
Bessie required enlightening as to what "clanning" meant. The explanation was diffuse, and branched off into so many anecdotes and illustrations that in spite of the moonlight, her nerves, her interest, and her forebodings, Bessie began to yield to the overpowering influence of sleep. The littlecomrade, listened to no longer, ceased her prattle and napped off too.
The next sound Bessie Fairfax heard was the irregular clangor of a bell, and behold it was morning! Some one had been into thedortoirand had opened a window or two. The warm fragrant breath of sunshine and twitter of birds entered.
"So this is being at school in France? What a din!" said Bessie, stopping her ears and looking for her comrade.
That strange child was just opening a pair of sleepy eyes and exhorting herself by name: "Now, Miss Janey Fricker, you will be wise to get up without more thinking about it, or there will be a bad mark and an imposition for you, my dear. What a blessing! five dull days yet before the arrival of the tormentors!" She slipped out upon the floor, exclaiming how tired she was and how all her bones ached, till Bessie's heart ached too for pity of the delicate, sensitive morsel of humanity.
They had soup for breakfast, greasy, flavorless stuff loaded with vegetables, and bread sour with long keeping. This was terrible to Bessie. She sipped and put down her spoon, then tried again. Miss Foster, at the same table, partook of a rough decoction of coffee with milk, and a little rancid butter on the sour bread toasted.
After breakfast the two girls were told that they were permitted to go into the garden. They spent the whole morning there, and there Mr. Carnegie and Harry Musgrave found Bessie when they came to take their final leave of her. It was good and brave of the little girl not to distress them with complaints, for she was awfully hungry, and likely to be so until her dainty appetite was broken in to French school-fare. Her few tears did not signify.
Harry Musgrave said the garden was not so pretty as it appeared from the street, and the doctor made rueful allusions to convents and prisons, and was not half satisfied to leave his dear little Bessie there. The morning sun had gone off the grass. The walls were immensely lofty—the tallest trees did not overtop them. There was a weedy, weak fountain, a damp grotto, and two shrines with white images of the Blessed Mary crowned with gilt stars.
Miss Foster came into the garden the moment the visitorsappeared, holding one hand against the flannel that enveloped her face. She made the usual polite speeches of hope, expectation, and promise concerning the new-comer, and stayed about until the gentlemen went. Then an inexpressible flatness fell upon Bessie, and she would probably have wept in earnest, but for the sight of Janey Fricker standing aloof and gazing at her wistfully for an invitation to draw near. Somebody to succor was quite in Bessie's way; helpless, timid things felt safe under covert of her wing. It gave her a vocation at once to have this weak, ailing little girl seeking to her for protection, and she called her to come. How gladly Janey came!
"What were you thinking of just now when I lost my friends?" Bessie asked her.
"Oh, of lots of things: I can't tell you of what. Is that your brother?"
"No, he is a cousin."
"Are you very fond of him? I wonder what it feels like to have many people to love? I have no one but father."
"Harry Musgrave and I have known each other all our lives. And now you and I are going to be friends."
"If you don't find somebody you like better, as Elise Finckel did. There is the bell; it means dinner in ten minutes." Bessie was looking sorry at her new comrade's suspicion. Janey was quick to see it. "Oh, I have vexed you about Elise?" cried she in a voice of pleading distress. "When shall I learn to trust anybody again?"
Bessie smiled superior. "Very soon, I hope," said she. "You must not afflict yourself with fancies. I am not vexed; I am only sorry if you won't trust me. Let us wait and see. I feel a kindness for most people, and don't need to love one less because I love another more. I promise to keep a warm place in my heart for you always, you little mite! I have even taken to Miss Foster because I pity her. She looks so overworked, and jaded, and poor."
"It is easy to like Miss Foster when you know her. She keeps her mamma, and her salary is only twenty-five pounds a year."
The dinner, to which the girls adjourned at a second summons of the bell, was as little appetizing as the breakfast hadbeen. There was the nauseous soup, a morsel of veal, a salad dressed with rank oil, a mess of sweet curd, and a dish of stewed prunes. After the fiction of dining, Miss Foster took the two pupils for a walk by the river, where groups of soldiers under shade of the trees were practising the fife and the drum. Caen seemed to be full of soldiers, marching and drilling for ever. Louise, the handsome portress at the school, frankly avowed that she did not know what the young women of her generation would do for husbands; the conscription carried away all the finest young men. Janey loved to watch the soldiers; she loved all manner of shows, and also to tell of them. She asked Bessie if she would like to hear about the emperor'sfêtelast month; and when Bessie acquiesced, she began in a discursive narrative style by which a story can be stretched to almost any length:
"There was a military mass at St. Etienne's in the morning. I had only just left father, but Mademoiselle Adelaide took me with her, and a priest sent us up into the triforium—you understand what the triforium is? a gallery in the apse looking down on the choir. The triforium at St. Etienne's is wide enough to drive a coach and four round; at the Augustines, where we went once to see three sisters take the white veil, it is quite narrow, and without anything to prevent you falling over—a dizzy place. But I am forgetting thefête.... It wassobeautiful when the doors were thrown open, and the soldiers and flags came tramping in with the sunshine, and filled the nave! The generals sat with the mayor and theprêfetin the chancel, ever so grand in their ribbons and robes and orders. The service was all music and not long: soldiers don't like long prayers. You will see them go to mass on Sunday at St. Jean's, opposite the school.... Then at night there was a procession—such a pandemonium! such a rabble-rout, with music and shouting, soldiers marching at the double, carrying blazing torches, and a cloud of paper lanterns that caught fire and flared out. We could hear the discordant riot ever so far off, and when the mob came up our street again, almost in the dark, I covered my ears. Of all horrible sounds, a mob of excited Frenchmen can make the worst. The wind in a storm at sea is nothing to it."
There was a man gathering peaches from the sunny wallof a garden-house by the river. Janey finished her tale, and remarked that here fruit could be bought. Bessie, rich in the possession of a pocketful of money, was most truly glad to hear it, and a great feast of fruit ensued, with accompaniments ofgaletteand new milk. Then the walk was continued in a circuit which brought them back to the school through the town. The return was followed by a collation of thick bread and butter and thin tea; then by a little reading aloud in Miss Foster's holiday apartment, and then by thedortoir, and another good talk in the moonlight until sleep overwhelmed the talkers. Bessie dropt off with the thought in her mind that her father and dear Harry Musgrave must be just about going on board the vessel at Havre that was to carry them to Hampton, and that when she woke up in the morning they would be on English soil once more, and riding home to Beechhurst through the dewy glades of the Forest....
This account of twenty-four hours will stand for the whole of that first week of Bessie's exile. Only the walks of an afternoon were varied. In company with dull, neuralgic Miss Foster the two pupils visited the famous stone-quarries above the town, out of which so many grand churches have been built; they compassed the shaded Cours; they investigated the museum, and Bessie was introduced to the pretty portrait of Charlotte Corday, in a simple cross-over white gown, a blue sash and mob-cap. Afterward she was made acquainted with a lady of royalist partialities, whose mother had actually known the heroine, and had lived through the terrible days of the Terror. Her tradition was that the portrait of Charlotte was imaginary, and, as to her beauty, delusive, and that the tragical young lady's moving passion was a passion for notoriety. Bessie wondered and doubted, and began to think history a most interesting study.
For another "treat," as Janey Fricker called it, they went on the Sunday to drink tea with Miss Foster at her mother's. Mrs. Foster was a widow with ideas of gentility in poverty. She was a chirping, bird-like little woman, and lived in a room as trellised as a bird-cage. The house was on the site of the old ramparts, and the garden sloped to thefosse. A magnolia blossomed in it, and delicious pears, of the sort called "Bon chrêtiens," ripened on gnarled trees. This week was, in fact,a beautiful little prelude to school life, if Bessie had but known it. But her appreciation of its simple pleasures came later, when they were for ever past. She remembered then, with a sort of remorse, laughing at Janey's notion of a "treat." Everything goes by comparison. At this time Bessie had no experience of what it is to live by inelastic rule and rote, to be ailing and unhappy, alone in a crowd and neglected. Janey believed in Mrs. Foster's sun-baked little garden as a veritable pattern of Eden, but Bessie knew the Forest, she knew Fairfield, and almost despised that mingled patch of beauty and usefulness, of sweet odors and onions, for Mrs. Foster grew potherbs and vegetables amongst her flowers.
Thus Bessie's first week of exile got over, and except for a sense of being hungry now and then, she did not find herself so very miserable after all.
One morning Bessie Fairfax rose to a new sensation. "To-day the classes open, and there is an end of treats," cried Janey Fricker with a despairing resignation. "You will soon see the day-scholars, and by degrees the boarders will arrive. Madame was to come late last night, and the next news will be of Miss Hiloe. Perhaps they will appear to-morrow. Heigh-ho!"
"You are not to care for Miss Hiloe; I shall stand up for you. I have no notion of tyrants," said Bessie in a spirited way. But her feelings were very mixed, very far from comfortable. This morning it seemed more than ever cruel to have sent her to school at her age, ignorant as she was of school ways. She shuddered in anticipation of the dreadful moment when it would be publicly revealed that she could neither play on the piano nor speak a word of French. Her deficiencies had been confided to Janey in a shy, shamefaced way, and Janey, who could chatter fluently in French and play ten tunes at least, had betrayed amazement. Afterward she had given consolation. There was one boarder who made no pretence of learning music, and several day-scholars; of course, being French, they spoke French, but not a girl of them all, not madame herself, could frame three consecutive sentences in English to be understood.
In the novelty of the situation Janey was patroness for the day. Madame Fournier had to be encountered after breakfast, and proved to be a perfectly small lady, of most intelligent countenance and kind conciliatory speech. She kissed Janey on both cheeks, and bent a penetrating pair of brown eyes on Bessie's face, which looked intensely proud in her blushing shyness. Madame had received from Mrs. Wiley (a former pupil and temporary teacher) instructions that Bessie's education and training had been of the most desultory kind, and that it was imperatively necessary to remedy her deficiencies, and give her a veneering of cultivation and a polish to fit her for the station of life to which she was called. Madame was able to judge for herself in such matters. Bessie impressed her favorably, and no humiliation was inflicted on her even as touching her ignorance of French and the piano. It was decreed that as Bessie professed no enthusiasm for music, it would be wasting time that might be more profitably employed to teach her; and a recommendation to the considerate indulgence of Mademoiselle Adelaide, who was in charge of the junior class, saved her from huffs and ridicule while going through the preliminary paces of French.
At recreation-time in the garden Janey ran up to ask how she had got on. "J'ai, tu as, il a," said Bessie, and laughed with radiant audacity. Her phantoms were already vanishing into thin air.
Not many French girls were yet present. The next noon-day they were doubled. By Saturday all were come, and answered to their names when the roll was called, the great and dreadful Miss Hiloe amongst them. They were two, Mademoiselle Ada and Mademoiselle Ellen. The younger sister was a cipher—an echo of the elder, and an example of how she ought to be worshipped. Mademoiselle Ada would be a personage wherever she was. Already herrôlein the world was adopted. She had a pale Greek face, a lofty look, and aproud spirit. She was not rude to those who paid her the homage that was her due—she was, indeed, helpful and patronizing to the humble—but for a small Mordecai like Janey Fricker she had nothing but insolence and rough words. Janey would not bow down to her; in her own way Janey was as stubborn and proud as her tyrant, but she was not as strong. She was a waif by herself, and Mademoiselle Ada was obeyed, served, and honored by a large following of admirers. Bessie Fairfax did not feel drawn to enroll herself amongst them, and before the classes had been a month assembled she had rejoiced the heart of the master-mariner's little daughter with many warm, affectionate assurances that there was no one else in all the school that she loved so well as herself.
By degrees, and very quick degrees, Bessie's tremors for how she should succeed at school wore off. What fantastic distresses she would have been saved if she had known beforehand that she possessed a gift of beauty, more precious in the sight of girls than the first place in the first class, than the utmost eloquence of tongues, and the most brilliant execution on the piano! It came early to be disputed whether Mademoiselle Ada or Mademoiselle Bessie was thebelle des belles; and Bessie, too, soon had her court of devoted partisans, who extolled her fair roseate complexion, blue eyes, and golden hair as lovelier far than Mademoiselle Ada's cold, severe perfection of feature. Bessie took their praises very coolly, and learnt her verbs, wrote herdictées, and labored at herthêmeswith the solid perseverance of a girl who has her charms to acquire. The Miss Hiloes were not unwilling to be on good terms with her, but that, she told them, was impossible while they were so ostentatiously discourteous to her friend, Janey Fricker. When to her armor of beauty Bessie added the weapon of fearless, incisive speech, the risk of affronts was much abated. Mr. Carnegie had prophesied wisely when he said for his wife's consolation that character tells more in the long-run than talking French or playing on the piano. Her companions might like Bessie Fairfax, or they might let liking alone, but very few would venture a second time on ill-natured demonstrations either towards herself or towards any one she protected.
Bessie's position in the community was established when the tug of work began. Her health and complexion triumphed over the coarse, hard fare; her habits of industry made application easy; but the dulness and monotony were sickening to her, the routine and confinement were hateful yoke and bondage. Saving one march on Sunday to the Temple under Miss Foster's escort, she went nowhere beyond the garden for weeks together. Both French and English girls were in the same case, unless some friend residing in the town or visiting it obtained leave to take them out. And nobody came for Bessie. That she should go home to Beechhurst for a Christmas holiday she had taken for granted; and while abiding the narrow discipline, and toiling at her unaccustomed tasks with conscientious diligence, that flattering anticipation made sunshine in the distance. Every falling leaf, every chill breath of advancing winter, brought it nearer. Janey and she used to talk of it half their recreation-time—by the stagnant, weedy fountain in the garden at noon, and in the twilight windows of theclasse, when thoughts of the absent are sweetest. For the Petrel had not come into port at Caen since the autumn, and Janey was still left at school in daily expectation and uncertainty.
"I am only sorry, Janey, that you are not sure of going home too," said Bessie, one day, commiserating her.
"If I am not sailing with father I would rather be here.Iam not so lonely since you came," responded Janey.
Then Bessie dilated on the pleasantness of the doctor's house, the excellent kindness of her father and mother, the goodness of the boys, the rejoicing there would be at her return, both amongst friends at Beechhurst and friends at Brook. Each day, after she had indulged her memory and imagination in this strain, her heart swelled with loving expectancy, and when the recess was spoken of as beginning "next week," she could hardly contain herself for joy.
What a cruel pity that such natural delightsome hopes must all collapse, all fall to the ground! It was ruled by Mr. Fairfax that his granddaughter had been absent so short a time that she need not go to England this winter season. Came a letter from Mrs. Carnegie to express the infinite disappointment at home. And there an end.
"I cried for three days," Bessie afterward confessed. "It seemed that there never could befall me such another misery."
It was indeed terrible. In a day the big house was empty of scholars. Madame Fournier adjourned to Bayeux. Miss Foster went to her mother. The masters, the other teachers disappeared, all except Mademoiselle Adelaide, who was to stay in charge of the two girls for a fortnight, and then to resign her office for the same period to Miss Foster. There was a month of this heartless solitude before Bessie and Janey. Mademoiselle Adelaide bemoaned herself as their jailer, as much in prison as they. They had good grounds of complaint. A deserted school at Christmas-time is not a cheerful place.
But there was compensation preparing for Bessie.
"And when does Bessie Fairfax come?" was almost the first question of Harry Musgrave when he arrived from Oxford.
"Bessie is not to come at all," was the answer.
What was that for? He proceeded to an investigation. There was a streak of lively, strong perversity in Harry Musgrave. Remarks had been passed on his accompanying Mr. Carnegie when he conveyed Bessie to school—quite uncalled-for remarks, which had originated at Fairfield and the rectory. The impertinence of them roused Harry's temper, and, boy-like, he instantly resolved that if his dear little Bessie was kept away from home and punished on his account, he would give her meddlesome friends something to talk about by going to Caen again and seeing her in spite of them. He made out with clearness enough to satisfy his conscience that Lady Latimer and Mrs. Wiley gave themselves unnecessary anxiety about Mr. Fairfax's granddaughter, and that he was perfectly justified in circumventing their cautious tactics. He did not speak of his intention to the Carnegies, lest he should meet with a remonstrance that he would be forced to yield to; but he told his sympathizing mother that he was going to spend five pounds of his pocket-money in a run across to Normandy to see Bessie Fairfax. Mrs. Musgrave asked if it was quite wise, quite kind, for Bessie's sake. He was sure that Bessie would be glad, and he did not care who was vexed.
Harry Musgrave gave himself no leisure to reconsider the matter, but went off to Hampton, to Havre, to Caen, with the lightest heart and most buoyant spirit in the world. He put up at Thunby's, and in the frosty sunshine of the next morning marched with the airs and sensations of a lover in mischief to the Rue St. Jean. Louise, that sage portress, recognized the bold young cousin of the Englishbelle des belles, and announced him to Mademoiselle Adelaide. After a parley Bessie was permitted to receive him, to go out with him, to be as happy as three days were long. Harry told her how and why he had come, and Bessie was furiously indignant at the Wileys pretending to any concern in her affairs. Towards Lady Latimer she was more indulgent. They spent many hours in company, and told all their experiences. Harry talked of dons and proctors, of work and play, of hopes and projects, of rivals and friends. Bessie had not so much to tell: she showed him theclasseand her place there, and introduced him to Janey. They visited all the public gardens and river-side walks. They were beautiful young people, and were the observed of many observers. The sagaciouscuréof St. Jean's, the confessor and director at the school, saw them by chance on the morning of a day when he had a mission to Bayeux. What more natural than that he should call upon Madame Fournier at her uncle the canon's house? and what more simple than that he should mention having met the Englishbelleand her cousin of the dangerous sex?
Bessie Fairfax and Janey Fricker attended vespers regularly on Sunday afternoons at the church of St. Jean; but they were not amongst the fair penitents who whispered their peccadilloes once a fortnight in thecuré'sear—he secluded in an edifice of chintz like a shower-bath, they kneeling outside the curtain with the blank eyes of the Holy Mother upon them, and the remote presence of a guardian-teacher out of hearing. But he took an interest in them. No overt act of proselytism was permitted in the school, but if an English girl liked vespers instead of the second service at the Temple, her preference was not discouraged. Bessie attended the Protestant ordinances at stated seasons, and went to vespers and benediction besides. Thecuréapproved of her ingenuous devotion. Once upon a time there had been Fairfaxes faithful children of the Church: this young lady was an off-set of that house, its heiress and hope in this generation; it would be a holy deed to bring her, the mother perhaps of a new line, within its sacred pale.
Madame Fournier heard his communication with alarm. Already, by her ex-teacher Mrs. Wiley, this young Musgrave had been spoken against with voice of warning. Madame returned to Caen with her worthy pastor. The enterprising lover was just flown. Bessie had a sunshine face. Mademoiselle Adelaide wept that night because of the reproaches madame made her, and the following morning Bessie was invited to resume her lessons, and was mulcted of every holiday indulgence. Janey Fricker suffered with her, and for nearly a week they were allen penitence. Then Miss Foster came; madame vanished without leave-taking, as if liable to reappear at any instant, and lessons lapsed back into leisure. Bessie felt that she had been an innocent scapegrace, and Harry very venturesome; but she had so much enjoyed her "treat," and felt so much the happier for it, that, all madame's grave displeasure notwithstanding, she never was properly sorry.
Harry Musgrave returned to England as jubilant as he left Bessie. The trip, winter though it was, exhilarated him. But it behooved him to be serious when Mr. Carnegie was angry, and Mrs. Carnegie declared that she did not know how to forgive him. If his escapade were made known to Mr. Fairfax, the upshot might be a refusal to let Bessie revisit them at Beechhurst throughout the whole continuance of her school-days. And that was what came of it. Of course his escapade was communicated to Mr. Fairfax, and Madame Fournier received a letter from Abbotsmead with the intimation that the youth who had presented himself in the Rue St. Jean as a cousin of Miss Fairfax was nothing akin to her, and that if she could not be secured from his presumptuous intrusions there, she must be removed from madame's custody. They had associated together as children, but it was desirable to stay the progress of their unequal friendship as they grew up; for the youth, though well conducted and clever, was of mean origin and poor condition; so Mr. Fairfax was credibly informed. And he trusted that Madame Fournier would see the necessity of a decisive separation between them.
Madame did see the necessity. With Mr. Fairfax's letter came to her hand another, a letter from the "youth" himself, but addressed to his dear Bessie. That it should ever reach her was improbable. There was the strictest quarantine for letters in the Rue St. Jean. Even letters to and from parents passed through madame's private office. She opened and read Harry Musgrave's as an obvious necessity, smiled over its boyish exaggeration, and relished its fun at her own expense, for madame was a woman of wisdom and humor. Little by little she had learnt the whole of Bessie's life and conversation from her own lips; and she felt that there was nothing to be feared from a lover of young Musgrave's type, unless he was set on mischief by the premature interposition of obstacles, of which this denial to Bessie of her Christmas holiday was an example.
However, madame had not to judge, but to act. She returned Harry Musgrave his letter, with a polite warning that such a correspondence with a girl at school was silly and not to be thought of. Harry blushed a little, felt foolish, and put the document into the fire. Madame made him confess to himself that he had gone to Caen as much for bravado as for love of Bessie. Bessie never knew of the letter, but she cherished her pretty romance in her heart, and when she was melancholy she thought of the garden at Brook, and of the beeches by the stream where they had sat and told their secrets on their farewell afternoon; and in her imagination her dear Harry was a perfect friend and lover.
That episode passed out of date. Bessie gave her mind to improvement. Discovery was made that she had a sweet singing voice, and, late in the day as it seemed to begin, she undertook to learn the piano, on the plea that it would be useful if she could only play enough to accompany herself in a song. She had her dancing-lessons, her drawing-lessons, and as much study of grammars, dictionaries, histories, geographies, and sciences-made-easy as was good for her, and every day showed her more and more what a dunce she was. Madame, however, treated her as a girl who haddes moyens, and she was encouraged to believe that when she had donewith school she would make as creditable a figure in the world as most of her contemporaries.
How far off herdébutmight be no one had yet inquired. Since her late experiences there was little certainty in Bessie's expectations of going to Beechhurst for the long vacation which began in July. And it was salutary that she entertained a doubt, for it mitigated disappointment when it came. About a fortnight before the breaking up madame sent for her one evening in to thesalon, and with much consideration informed her that it was arranged she should go with her to Bayeux and to the sea, instead of going to England. Bessie had acquired the art of controlling her feelings, and she accepted the fiat in silence. But she felt a throb of vindictive rage against her grandfather, and said in her heart that to live in a world where such men were masters, women ought to be made of machinery. She refused to write to him, but she wrote home to Beechhurst, and asked if any of them were coming to see her. But the loving joint reply of her father and mother was that they thought it better not.