Gilbert Arundel's visit to Fair Acres extended far beyond the limit of a week. He felt every day more absorbed by the simple, happy life, in which, as Joyce had said, Melville was the only cloud.
He was an universal favourite. A man who has been accustomed to yield respect and courtesy to his own mother, seldom fails in yielding it to the mothers of his friends.
If anyone in the household at Fair Acres was dissatisfied it was Melville himself, who found that his friend had been so entirely taken possession of by his brothers and sister, and was held in such high esteem by his father and mother, that his own light was effectually put out.
The twins, Harry and Bunny, came to him about fly-fishing, and Ralph consulted him as to a difficult passage in his Homer; while he spent a whole morning in helping Piers to re-arrange his moths and butterflies, and to look out their names withgreater precision in a book he had actually borrowed from the Palace at Wells, for this purpose.
All the time Joyce went about her accustomed duties: darned Melville's socks, mended the schoolboys' clothes, and was every morning assisting her mother in her household duties.
It was an added charm in Gilbert's eyes that Joyce made no difference in her daily routine, and that what are familiarly called "company manners" were apparently unknown at Fair Acres.
But the last day came of Gilbert Arundel's visit, as the last must come to everything, and the squire proclaimed a holiday for every one and an excursion to Wookey, and a pic-nic to Ebbor. Then there was a great packing of hampers, and loading of one of the spring carts with the boys and the provisions, and the "four-wheel" with the more grown-up members of the party.
Even Mrs. Falconer allowed herself to be enlisted in the service, and to give herself for once a day's pleasure; while Melville put on a riding-coat of the most approved cut, and a pair of wellingtons, and was graciously pleased to lend himself for the occasion, with as much show of satisfaction as was consistent with his dignity.
After depositing the party at Wookey, the squirekindly drove into Wells in the "four-wheel" to fetch Charlotte from the Vicar's Close, and before the dinner had been laid in the Ebbor Valley he was back again, bearing Charlotte in triumph, in spite of his sister's entreaties that Charlotte would be careful of adders which swarmed at Ebbor amongst the loose stones; and that she was to be sure to sit upon a cloak with four capes, made of large plaid, which Miss Falconer insisted should be put into the carriage.
But nothing spoiled Charlotte's pleasure when fairly off, and she was delighted to be helped down from the carriage by her Cousin Melville, with whose fine ways, and what she would have called "elegant dress," she had keen sympathy. Indeed, the hero of the "drooping rose" was in danger of falling from his pedestal; and the fact of a cousin, who said a great many flattering things to her was, after all, more interesting than a minor Canon, who was to be worshipped from afar, and who when actually introduced to her the day before by her aunt, when he called in virtue of his office in the cathedral, had not seemed to desire to cultivate her acquaintance; certainly had made her no pretty speeches. Melville, on the contrary, made her a great many, and she listened with unquestioning faith, and profound interest to his stories of high life, and the men with titles with whom hewas on familiar terms, and the large wine parties at Oxford to which Maythorne came.
Gilbert caught the sound of that name, and turning quickly, his deep blue eyes shot a warning glance, which could not be mistaken, as he said in a voice audible to those nearest him:
"The less said abouthimthe better."
The day passed quickly, and it was proposed that the younger portion of the party should walk up the uneven road between the rocks, and, taking the rough paths over the flat country, into which the gorge opens, reach Fair Acres by crossing it, a distance of some six miles.
Charlotte was to remain at Fair Acres for the night, but both she and Melville preferred to drive with the squire and Mrs. Falconer and Piers. Charlotte's shoes were too thin for scrambling, and a country walk was not at all to Melville's taste.
"Off with you, then," said the squire, "and mind you keep the road to the left, or you will find yourselves on Mendip, and if it gets dark that may not be so pleasant."
"I know the way, father," Ralph said; "and so do Harry and Bunny. We shall not lose ourselves."
"Perhaps Joyce had better drive," her father said,just as the five were starting. "Sunshine, what do you think?"
"I think that we are more likely to lose our way, sir," Gilbert said, "if you take the sun from us."
The squire laughed.
"Well, that may be true. Take care of your sister, boys."
The ascent through the Ebbor cliffs is difficult; there is a vast quantity of thin sharp stones, worn by the action of the water from the face of the rocks. Although not nearly so grand as Cheddar, Ebbor has many points of beauty. The rocks are fantastic in form, and as the path winds between them they assume various shapes, like miniature towers and bastions, clothed with ivy, and coloured with dark brown and yellow lichen.
The air, when they were fairly in the open country, was fresh and crisp; the lark sang his sweet song high above their heads, and the sweet, clear notes of distant thrushes and blackbirds came from the low lying copses, which fringe the head of the Ebbor valley.
Harry and Bunny chased moths for Piers: Ralph meditated and repeated to himself some lines of a Greek poet which he wanted to get by heart.
Thus, as was only to be expected, Joyce and Mr Arundel were left to themselves, and in Gilbert's heart at least was the weight of coming separation, andthe uncertainty as to whether he should ever be able to renew the sweet, free intercourse of the past fortnight. He dreaded to change the present happy relations between him and Joyce by telling her what he felt. She confided so entirely in him; she told him so much of her little joys, and home happiness, of Ralph's cleverness, of Harry and Bunny's frantic desires to be sailors, of her father's goodness to Melville, and infinite patience with him. On this last night especially, he felt that he could not bring himself to break the spell, and disturb the serenity of that sweet, pure life, by letting friendship go, to replace it by the more tumultuous and passionate love, which he knew if once this barrier were broken down, he should pour forth on her in a torrent which might distress and almost frighten, one so simple and so unversed in the world's ways.
Whilst Charlotte was always on the look-out for somepreux chevalier, who was to be at her feet and vow eternal devotion, Joyce had as yet no such airy castles. Her education had been widely different from her cousin's, and home and home interests had so filled her seventeen years with their joys and pleasures, that she had no time to dream over "keepsakes," and read Miss Burney's romances, or steep herself in the unreality of sentimental verses, which Wordsworth was beginning to break down and send into theshadows, by bringing out the beauties of creation into the strong light, which his genius threw around them.
Joyce had not wasted her youth in foolish dreams of impossible perfection, but when the real story of her life was ready to unfold itself, she would find a zest and fulness in it, that the sentimental visionary could never know.
That was a memorable walk over the sweet country side, with the west all aglow, and the sky above serenely blue. In after years both looked back on it through that mist of tender sadness, which gathers round the happy past of youth, even though the present is full of the fruition of joy to which that very past led.
"This is our last evening," Gilbert said; "I hope, if I can be of any use, you will write to me."
"Yes," Joyce said, "and I feel as if the worst were over now. If Melville has a year abroad with the gentleman the bishop recommends, he may settle afterwards. Of course it is a great pull upon father's purse; but if Harry and Bunny can get into the navy we shall be able to manage."
"When we are settled in Clifton I hope you will come and see my mother."
"Oh! I should like that very much; but I have a visitto Barley Wood to come first, and then in the winter I must do all I can to cheer father. He feels the want of out-door exercise now he has given up his hunters. He used to ride to the meet very often."
"I am sorry he has had to give that up, all through Melville's extravagance."
"Yes, and then farming has been so bad the last year or two. I hope it may be a better crop this year; but the wheat in this district is very poor at all times. We must not get too much to the right," she said, "or we shall get near the miners, who are a rough set of people. Mrs. More has had a school in these parts for many years; but there are a great many discontented folks, who seem to think the gentry are their natural enemies. That man we saw the day you came to Wells was from these parts."
Joyce raised her voice in a clear, ringing tone, and called her brothers by name.
"They have gone on so far in front," she said; "but I feel sure this is the right track." She called again, but there was no reply.
"We had better walk faster," she said, "or we shall be left behind;" then she stopped.
"I see a man lying in that dip under the gorse-bushes. I hope he will not beg."
She had scarcely spoken the words when a hugeform rose before them, and stood in the narrow track between the heather and gorse, filling up the path.
"You are Squire Falconer's lass, ain't you?" he said, defiantly.
"Yes," Gilbert answered, "yes; this is Miss Falconer, of Fair Acres. How long are you going to stand there and prevent us from passing you?"
"Till I've settled my score. Your gov'nor was hard on me t'other day; he tried to get me sent to gaol. I'll smash his head for 'im next time I come across 'im, sure as my name is Bob Priday!"
The broad, Somersetshire lingo made the man all but unintelligible to Gilbert; but Joyce understood him well enough.
"Ye hand me out a guinea, now, or a trinket, and I'll let bygones be bygones, specially"—with a horrid leer—"if you'll give me a kiss with 'em; eh?"
In a moment Gilbert had sprung over the bushes which hedged in the track on either side, and had his hand on the man's throat.
"Let this young lady pass, you villain!" he said, shaking the huge form, who, taken unawares, had very little power of resistance. "Let her pass."
There is always something in a brave, strong, young spirit which is too much for the brute force of an untutored giant like Bob Priday. He staggeredand fell back, Gilbert's hand being still at his throat.
Joyce, pale and trembling, did not lose her self-control. "Please let me pass," she said; "I have no money to give you, and if I had it would not be right to bribe you. My father only did his duty on the bench that day. You were guilty, and you know it; you got off unpunished, and you should be thankful, and try to lead a better life."
There was something wonderfully grand in the way Joyce spoke, though her face was white with girlish fear, and her lips quivered, her voice did not falter as she appealed to the huge man who might, she knew, shake off Gilbert's restraining hand, and spring on her at any moment.
"Let me pass," she said, "and this gentleman will——"
At this moment a woman's voice was heard, and a girl with a red handkerchief on her head, with an effort at respectable attire in her short, blue cotton frock, and large, thick boots, came over the tangled mass of heath and ling, and cried:
"Father! What are you about now, father?"
"You mind your own business, you hussy, and leave me alone."
"Oh, father!" the girl said, passionately, "I wishyou would be good. Think how mother used to pray for you! Oh, dear lady," the girl said, bursting into tears, "I am heart-broken about father. Please, sir, let him go."
"Let me go!" said the giant, with a loud, discordant laugh; "I'll see about that." Then, with a mighty effort, he hurled Gilbert from him, and before he could recover his feet, he had seized Joyce's arm. "Give me the money, or I'll be even with your father; curse him!"
But the girl threw herself on her father and held him back, while Gilbert, stunned and bewildered by the force with which he had been hurled over the heather, staggered to his feet again, and, with a well-aimed blow at the back of the man's head, laid him sprawling on the path.
"Oh! I hope he is not hurt!" Joyce exclaimed involuntarily, as the huge form lay motionless; the girl leaning over him.
"He is not hurt," Gilbert said, "any more than he has hurt me; it was in self-defence," he added.
"Father, father!" moaned the girl. "Oh, sir! oh, miss! I don't know what to do!"
"Hold your tongue, and let me get up and at him again," growled the man, struggling to sit upright.
But his daughter had the advantage, and seatedherself on her father's chest, saying to Gilbert, "I'll keep him quiet till you are out of sight, sir; I will indeed. I know you were driven to do it," she said. "Father is always fighting; but, oh! sir, we have a hard time of it. There is no work for the men and boys, and if it were not for the good lady's schools, and the help she gives, I don't know what would become of us. Many were starving last winter, and of course it is kind of hard, to know rich folks have plenty and we are starving. Mother died last fall; and though Mrs. More sent her physic, and the schoolmistress broth, she could not stand up against the fever, and trouble about poor father and Jim, and Dick, and the baby."
Joyce's eyes filled with tears. "What is to be done?" she said, helplessly; "what can be done?"
"I don't know, miss; I don't know. There's plenty of the ore left, but it is no use working it, there's no market for it. Mrs. More teaches us to pray to God and try to trust Him, but He does not seem to hear or help. I have been in service, and could get a place again at a Farm at Publow, through Mrs. More, but since mother is gone, there is none to look after baby. I do love the baby!"
"How long are you going to jaw like this, Sue? Let me get up and settle the question; if not now, Iwillsettle it at last."
"Come away," Gilbert said, putting his hand on Joyce's arm; "we can do no good. It is getting so dark. Do come!" He put his hand to his head, for he still felt dazed and giddy with his fall.
"Tell me your name," Joyce said, "and where I should find you."
"Susan Priday, Mendip Mines, that's my name, miss."
"I am going to see Mrs. More soon, and I will tell her about you," Joyce said, in a low tone; "and do believe I am sorry for you. How old are you?"
"Eighteen come Christmas," the girl said, looking up into Joyce's beautiful face with undisguised admiration.
"Just my age," Joyce said. "Oh, I should like to make you happy! How old is the baby?"
"Born when mother died—just nine months old; he is so pretty, he is!"
Joyce had seldom, if ever, spoken familiarly to any of the girls about the country side before. Mrs. Falconer had her views on the subject, and the "miner folks" were her especial aversion, while Mrs. More's attempts to civilise them were met with derision and scorn. The gulf set between her and her household of respectable maids, and the rough, half-clothed miner's families, was in her eyes impassable! What was the use of trying to reclaim those who preferred their own rough and evil ways? They ought to be well punished for raids made on farm yards, and snares set in copses and plantations; but to teach them to read, and talk to them about their duty to God and their neighbour, was in Mrs. Falconer's eyes worse than lost labour; it did harm rather than good.
And not only by Mrs. Falconer was this view of the unclothed and unwashed masses taken! In our days of widely spread and organised charities, and zeal, sometimes I fear hardly tempered with wisdom, it is difficult to throw ourselves back to the beginning of the century now drawing to its close, when efforts like those of the four sisters of the Mendips, of whom Hannah was the leading spirit, were met with scoffs and disapproval; or deep compassion, that educated women could be so misguided, as to wish to teach the boys and girls of their district, anything but to use their legs and arms in the service of their betters!
As I stood by the heavy stone in Wrington churchyard, in the gloom of an autumn afternoon, where the names of the four sisters are inscribed, I could but think of the gratitude we ought to feel to them for their brave efforts to spread the knowledge of the religion of Christ amongst the poor of those 'rollinghills' and peaceful valleys of Somersetshire. It must have been hard for a woman of culture like Hannah More to be met by opposition, and in some cases fierce denunciation; harder still to be smiled at by those in high places, as a fanatic and a visionary. But turning from the ugly, weather-worn stone, enclosed in high rusty railings, to the beautiful church, where what light there was yet in the sky, came through the many-coloured window lately erected to Hannah More's memory, I thought, that as nothing that is good and beautiful, coming from the Fountain of all beauty and all goodness, can ever die, so the light which Hannah More kindled in many humble hearts was still shining in the eternal kingdom, where those that have lived as in the presence of the Son of God here, shine as the stars for ever in their Heavenly Father's realm.
That touch of Nature which makes the whole world kin brought the two girls near to each other, as Joyce laid her hand upon Susan's, and said:
"I am very sorry for you; I shall not forget you;" then added, looking down on the prostrate form which Susan had so determinedly kept from doing further mischief:
"I am sorry for you, too; it must be hard to want bread—but, but—do try to be good and find work."
"Find work, find work! If that's all you can say you'd better hold your tongue."
But though the words were rough the tones grew less fierce, and Susan, finding her restraint was no longer needed, stood up and watched Gilbert Arundel and Joyce pursue the narrow track across the heather till they were lost in the shadows of the gathering twilight.
"Do you know your way?" Gilbert asked.
"I think I do," Joyce answered; "our shepherd's cottage is on the next ridge, and when we get there we can see our own valley and the tower of the church."
"Are you very tired?" Gilbert asked again.
"Not very; but I cannot help trembling; it is so silly. Do tell me if that man hurt you."
"He gave me a good shaking. What a giant he is! I felt as your Nip or Pip might feel in Duke's clutches if he were angry."
"What a comfort we had not Charlotte with us, and that the boys had gone on so far! I hope they will not be very anxious at home."
They made but slow progress. Joyce's usually swift, elastic steps were slow and faltering. She took several wrong paths, and they came once to a steep dip in the heather, and were within a few inches ofone of those rocky pits which are frequent on the face of the level country about Cheddar and the neighbouring district. Indeed Cheddar itself begins with one of these small defiles, when entered from the top of the Mendip, and the gradually increasing height of the rocks, and the widening of the gorge as the road winds through it, is one of its most striking features.
Joyce was so wholly unaccustomed to feel tired and unnerved, that she surprised herself, as well as Gilbert, by sitting down helplessly, and bursting into tears.
"Oh! we should have been killed if we had fallen down there. Won't you leave me, and go on to the shepherd's cottage? What can be the matter with me?" she said, sobbing hysterically.
Gilbert hardly knew whether distress at her condition, or delight in having her all to himself to comfort, predominated.
"Do not be frightened,' he said; we shall get on very well if you will let me carry you."
"Oh! no, no," she said, trying to spring up with her accustomed energy. "I will push on again."
But although she summoned all her courage, she was obliged to let Gilbert put his arm round her and support her, and finally she was lifted in his strong arms and carried whether she wished it or not.
"I shall tire you so dreadfully," Joyce whispered.
"If you do, it is the sweetest tiredness I ever knew; you know that, Joyce."
Then they went on in silence. Gilbert was still suffering from the treatment he had received at Bob Priday's hands, and they made slow progress.
"Just raise your head," he said, after ten minutes' tramp through the narrow track, which he lost at times through the thick tangle of heath and gorse and low-growing bracken. "Raise your head and tell me if you can see the shepherd's cottage. It is getting very dark."
Joyce did as he told her, but, after straining her eyes for a few moments, she said:
"I can't see anything, it is so dark. I don't know where we are. Oh, I don't know!"
"You are safe with me," Gilbert said; and then added, fervently: "I am not afraid for God is with us."
It was so unusual for Joyce to hear that Name spoken. She did not respond, but let her head fall upon his shoulder again.
Presently he said:
"There is a tiny light now—two lights—they must be in the shepherd's cottage. Take heart, my darling. We shall soon be home."
The word had slipped from his lips unawares.
"I am going away early to-morrow. You will not forget me?"
Once more she raised her face, and in the dim light he saw her beautiful eyes gazing at him with an expression which was half wonder and half joy. But she said, simply:
"No, I will never forget you."
The light was close to them now, and there was a sound of men's feet drawing nearer and then Duke came bounding up.
With a cry of "Father! father!" Joyce struggled to her feet, and threw herself into her father's arms.
"Why, Joyce, my Sunshine, where have you been? We have been very anxious, your mother on thorns, and poor Piers imagining all kinds of disasters. Why did you not keep up with the boys? They had been at home an hour before I started. What has happened sir?" the squire said, turning a little sharply on Gilbert Arundel.
"It is too long a story to tell now, sir," Gilbert said. "Miss Falconer and I fell into bad hands, and we may thank God nothing worse has happened."
"Some of the miners, eh?"
"One of them, sir, who is a host in himself; heblocked our way, and threatened us; but I would rather not go over it all now. She is so overwrought, though she has been so splendidly brave."
"Oh! father, dearest dad! take me home," Joyce said. "Is it far; is it far?"
"Some two miles, my Sunshine; but I can carry you. Now for it, be brave, my sweet one, and we shall soon be home. Now, then, Sam and Thomas, march on."
"I think I can walk, father now," Joyce said; "and here is Duke, dear Duke!"
"Why, of course, I brought Duke. He is cleverer at finding his way than I am. He soon snuffed you out, good old fellow."
The two other men now turned towards home, with the big lanthorns in their hands, which served for guiding stars. Duke paced slowly between the men, and his master and young mistress, and Gilbert brought up the rear.
The lights of the village were a welcome sight, and the hall door of Fair Acres was open as they came up the road, showing a group of dark, expectant figures, thrown out by the blaze of a wood fire.
"The mistress has lit a fire that we might have a welcome; that is like her wisdom," the squire said."A few tallow candles would not have been half as cheerful."
"Here we are; here we are!" the squire called out; and then there was a rush of boyish feet, and a great chorus of rejoicing, and a host of questions.
"We have been so anxious,dyingof anxiety," exclaimed Charlotte, thinking it necessary to begin to cry.
"What fools you were to walk over that rough, lonely country," Melville said. While Piers could only hover round Joyce, who, seated on a bench or old-fashioned settle by the side of the wide open hearth, held her mother in a tight embrace.
"The boys ought never to have left you," Piers said. "How could Mr. Arundel find the way?"
"Joyce knew it," said Bunny. "Joyce knew it. We have been over that track several times."
"Yes," echoed Harry, "several times; only Joyce and Mr. Arundel were talking so much, they never thought where they were going."
"'All's well that ends well,'" said the squire. "She had better go to bed, my dear; and this young gentleman looks white enough. You must get him a good hot glass of negus; and I hope supper is ready; but take the poor child to bed first."
Mrs. Falconer had not said much beyond a few words in Joyce's ear, which no one else heard. Her usual vivacity and quick, sharp words seemed to have suddenly failed her.
"Yes; I'll take her to bed, and there she will have to lie all to-morrow, I expect. It's the last time I'll allow her to separate from the rest of us, when we are out on an excursion. Order the supper in, boys; and Melville, look after your friend; he is as white as a ghost; perhaps he has seen one!"
The tone was a little bitter and satirical. Mrs. Falconer resented the hours' keen anxiety she had endured, and was inclined to lay the fault on Gilbert.
He certainly did look exhausted, and leaned back with his head against the wall, over which a large stag's head with spreading antlers gazed down upon him with liquid, meaningless eyes.
"Mother," Joyce said, as, with her brother's arm round her, she rose to go upstairs; "mother, Mr. Arundel was so very brave; he was thrown down by that dreadful man and nearly stunned; he carried me till we met father; he was—he was—so good to me. Do pray thank him." Then disengaging herself from her mother's grasp, Joyce tottered across to the old oak chair, on which Gilbert had sunk. "Good-night, and good-bye," she said; "and don't think them ungrateful. Good-bye."
He stood upright, and took one of her hands in his, raised it reverently to his lips; and so they parted.
He was off the next morning early to catch the coach at Wells. Not this time in a post-chaise with scarlet-clad post-boy, but driven by the squire himself, in a high gig, his portmanteau strapped behind. Melville roused himself to come down in a magnificent flowered dressing-gown, to see him off; and the boys were all there. Just as the gig was starting, Mrs. Falconer appeared. It was unusual for her to be later than her household, but she had a good reason, for Joyce had passed a restless night, and she had not liked to leave her. She was asleep now, she said, and a day's rest would restore her.
"I hope we shall see you here again," Mrs. Falconer added, "before long. But you won't be trusted on the Mendips again, I can tell you!"
"Let bygones be bygones, that's my motto," said the squire, as the gig went swinging out through the white gates near the house, and turned into the road which led through the village.
"And 'all's well that ends well,'" Gilbert said, as he waved his hat in token of farewell.
That evening, when the squire and his wife were alone together, Mrs. Falconer said:
"Did Mr. Arundel say anything to you as he drove into Wells?"
"Say!" exclaimed the squire. "Well, he is not dumb. He said his head ached, for one thing."
"Ah!" said Mrs. Falconer; "he did not say any thing about his heart?"
The squire puffed a little smoke from his long clay pipe; for he indulged in a pipe sometimes, though the amount of tobacco consumed in the present day would have amazed him, and shocked him also, had he known that the greatest smokers were the young men and boys, to whom, sixty years ago, smoking was forbidden. He did not seem inclined to say anything in reply to his wife's last question.
"Because," said Mrs. Falconer, with that far-seeing and oracular wisdom in which men hope in vain to rival us in these matters, at least; "because I believe Gilbert Arundel is in love with our Joyce."
"Well," said the squire, "that would be no wonder to me; but I daresay it is only one of your fancies, Kate."
"We shall see; we shall see," said Mrs. Falconer. "I only hope he has not trifled with my child, and that my 'fancies,' as you call them,arefancies, that is all."
Gilbert Arundel was to meet his mother in Clifton, where arrangements were to be made for their permanent residence there. Clifton was at this time gradually changing its position, or rather enlarging its borders! At the close of the preceding century, or during the latter half of it, Clifton Spa was the chief attraction. To these healing waters, as we know by Mason's celebrated epitaph, a sorrowing husband brought his fading wife. Dowry Square and Dowry Parade, with their little quaint pillars and balconies were in great request for invalids and visitors, from their near neighbourhood to the pump room.
Consumptive patients might be seen slowly walking under the row of trees by the banks of the muddy Avon, and gazing across at the deep recesses of the Leigh Woods with wistful eyes. To the weak and the ailing Nightingale Valley was then, though so near, very far off for them, and only the robust and vigorous could cross the river by Rownham Ferry,and scale the wooded heights which at all times and in all seasons are so fair to look upon.
But at the time of which I write the tide of visitors was setting inupwards. The word "relaxing" was coming into fashion, and enterprising builders had raised, halfway up the hill, Windsor Terrace and the Paragon, that circular range of houses which, entered from the level road before Prince's Buildings, ends abruptly in a house which may indeed be said to "be built upon a rock," the windows looking straight down its precipitous sides.
Along the road which I have mentioned, which follows the course of the river, though high above it, was erected 'Prince's Buildings;' the 'first gentleman in Europe' during his long regency appears to have supplied the names of many streets and terraces in this neighbourhood.
Coronation Road beneath commemorates the auspicious event when Queen Caroline was shut out from her rights, and Prince's Buildings above was also previously named in his honour. Crescents and terraces were quick to follow one another on the heights, and the glories of the Hot wells, and the salubrity of the waters, became things of the past.
Bracing air began to be the panacea for ailments, and the Clifton Downs, now secured to the citizensof Bristol by the merchant venturers for ever, were sought by many who, a few years before, would have buried themselves and their hopes of recovery under the shadow of the rocky heights, instead of facing the keen air upon their summit.
There was a medium preserved, however—Prince's Buildings, and the houses built on the slope of Sion Hill, were sheltered at the back and from the front commanded a view of the Leigh Woods before them, and a shoulder of the great St. Vincent Rock to their right, which might well excite the admiration of those who saw it for the first time.
After Gilbert Arundel had stepped less briskly than sometimes up the steep slope of Granby Hill, leaving the Crescent to his right, he passed along the back of Prince's Buildings and up Sion Hill, where his mother had taken up her temporary abode.
These houses are built with old-fashioned bow windows, some of them running up from the basement to the roof, and one or two with circular balconies on the second story.
As Gilbert was beginning to consider which number his mother had given as her address, he heard his name called from above, and looking up, a tall, fashionably dressed young lady said:
"Gilbert, we thought you were never coming fromFair Acres. There must have been some great attraction."
St Vincent's Rock From Leigh Woods.St Vincent's Rock, From Leigh Woods.
Gilbert did not care to have his personal history proclaimed to the people who were seated on benches at the top of the Zig-zag—a path now cut in the rock and made easier of ascent by means of flights of steps, but then scarcely more than a bridle path, rough and slippery to the feet.
The door was open and Gilbert walked in, and walked upstairs. His mother was on the watch, and came to the head of the stairs to meet him, kissing him affectionately.
"Well, my dear son, are you pleased with our quarters? But, Gilbert, you do not look well; what is the matter?"
"Nothing; I had a tussle with a Somersetshire miner last evening, and feel as if I had got the worst of it to-day. What a lovely view you have from the window!"
The young lady who had spoken to him on the balcony now stepped into the room.
"Well, Gilbert, Aunt Annabella and I had quite given you up. My dear cousin, you look very lugubrious."
"Do I?" Gilbert replied. "A head-ache is a lugubrious thing; and how are you, Gratian?"
"Pretty well. I have been rather out of sorts; but I shall soon recover, now you are come."
"That is a very pretty speech, Gratian, only I can't quite believe it."
"Well, I am going to take a walk abroad now, and leave you and your mother to have a chat together, all about Fairy Acre, or Fair Acre; which is it? I am very stupid; pray forgive me. Any commissions in the Mall or Regent Street, Aunt Bella?"
Mrs. Arundel, who had been getting her son some refreshment from one of the deep cupboards by the fire place, and was anxious to administer a glass of wine, now turned towards her niece. "No. Are you going alone, Gratian?"
"Yes, I am starting alone; I don't mean to fall over the rocks. Good-bye."
Gratian Anson was long past herpremière jeunesse, and had never been actually pretty; but she was one of those women who exercise an extraordinary fascination apparently without any effort, and have their prey in their net, before there is any suspicion that the net is spread.
Gratian dressed fashionably, and one of her perfections was a tall and well-proportioned figure. We might not, now-a-days, think it was set off by her short and full-flounced muslin gown, made with ashort waist, the body cut low, while over it she wore an enormous pelerine of muslin, edged with lace, which was crossed ever her breast and fastened with a curious antique brooch.
Even Gratian's tall figure could scarcely bear gracefully the width which fashion had decreed; and all was surmounted by a hat with a sugar-loaf crown, and a deep brim caught up on the left side by a large red rosette.
As she drew on her long, loose gloves, she surveyed her cousin with an appraising, searching glance. Her eyes were at all times too keen, and her wide mouth displayed a row of white teeth more fully than was quite agreeable.
"Ah!" she said, tapping Gilbert's shoulder; "ah! he is in love. I have no doubt of it!Adieu; au revoir, cher cousin!"
"The same as ever!" Gilbert said. "Thank you, dear mother," he said, rising with his accustomed courtesy to take the glass of wine from her hand. "Thanks. I confess I am rather knocked up; and if I had known Sion Hill was so far from the Bristol coach office I should have come up in a hackney, I think, instead of sending my luggage by the carrier. But how beautiful this is!" he said, stepping on the balcony and looking out upon the scene before him.
No piers had yet been raised for the great designof the Suspension Bridge—that vast dream of Brunel's, which for so many years seemed fated to remain only a dream; while the naked buttresses, in all their huge proportions, stood like giants on either side of the gorge, connected only by a rod of iron, over which a few people with strong nerves were allowed to pass in a sliding basket.
Gilbert looked out on a scene which can hardly be equalled for the unusual beauty of its salient points.
"We shall be happy to live here, mother," Gilbert said.
"You have no misgivings, my dear son."
"No, it is clear I must make my living in some practical way, and why not by the law?"
"There is the drudgery of the office first, and then the passing of examinations."
"I have weighed all the pros and cons with you before; why do you go over them again?" This was said in an irritable tone.
"I would as soon be a man of law as anything; and I want to make a home"—he paused—"foryou, and for one whom I have found under the Mendips."
His mother had seated herself by his side, on a bench which stood in the verandah or balcony.
"It can't be thought of yet," he said; "she is Falconer's sister! He never told me he had a sister, or, rather, I should say,sucha sister. How shouldhe be able to see what she is? I don't want to talk sentiment, mother, but I will say I did not know how beautiful and simple hearted she was, and how her beauty was supreme with no fine dress, till I saw Gratian just now."
His mother laid her hand on his. "What is her name, Gilbert?"
"Joyce: it suits her as no other name could. Joyce!" he repeated. "Joy, Sunshine, Birdie; they call her all these names at Fair Acres. Some day, when we are settled at Bristol, will you ask her to visit you, mother? and when you see her you will love her."
"I shall love her for your sake," his mother said, gently.
They had been all in all to each other for twenty-three years; and though Mrs. Arundel had told herself a hundred times that she desired nothing so much for Gilbert as the love of a true hearted woman, still she was conscious of a little thrill of pain; for she must, in the natural course of things, besecondnow.
"I could not describe her if I tried," he went on, with lover-like enthusiasm. "Then there is such strength in her as well as sweetness. Last night we were attacked by a ruffian whom her father, who is a magistrate, had offended, and her presence of mindand calmness were wonderful. The man knocked me down, and I returned the compliment, which is the cause of my stupidity to-day."
His mother scanned his face anxiously. "Have you told her of your love?"
"Not formally; but I feel she must know it."
"One word more, Gilbert, has she therealspring of all beauty and goodness within. Has she chosen the right path, following her Master?"
Gilbert was silent for a minute.
"It is not a religious household," he said. "They have no prayers, except on Sundays. It is a miserable church, with an old drone of a parson, who gallops through the service; but, I think, Joyce is ready to follow, if led in the right way."
"And you are strong enough to lead, Gilbert?"
"I hope so," he said earnestly; and then mother and son were silent for a few minutes. Afterwards they began to speak of Melville, and all the past, in which Gilbert had borne such a noble part.
"I have separated him from Maythorne, and at least that is a step in the right direction; but he is so weak. How he came to be her brother, I can't imagine; he is crazed on the subject of titles, and will roll off a list of intimate friends, when he thinks I am not listening, to whom he never spoke ten wordsin his life. I dined at the palace, and the bishop sent you his love, and so did his son, who lives with him—two courteous gentlemen, with well-turned compliments at their tongue's end. The bishop said I was like you, and that I had followed in the lines of one of the most beautiful women he ever met."
"What bare-faced flattery!" Mrs. Arundel said, laughing. "I never was a beauty. Your good looks come from the other side of the house."
"Who is flattering now?" Gilbert asked; "but seriously, mother, you shall accept an invitation to the Wells Palace, you must promise to do so. The bishop said something about November, if you did not mind the falling leaves."
"I shall wait till I am asked," Mrs. Arundel said. "If his lordship has buried me in the dust of years—out of sight and out of mind—I don't see why he should unearth me now."
"And yet you sent your son to call you to mind; now that is unfair, mother. You urged me to go to the Palace at Wells, and now you won't take advantage of what is growing out of it. But to go back to Falconer; a stout, middle-aged gentleman, of small means and weak chest, wants to travel for a year. The bishop suggested Mr. Falconer should give him his son to lead about, as he hadpreviously washed several black sheep to a very fair whiteness, paying expenses, but no further remuneration. If Melville can be got off under such auspices, it will be a grand step in the right direction. Poor fellow! he has got into his head the absolute necessity of seeing the world, and I, who know him pretty well, think that there would be less danger of mischief if he were allowed to follow his bent, than if he were to be forced to follow the pursuits of a country life at Fair Acres, which he thinks it grand to despise. He talks with amazing coolness of all he shall do when hedoescome, and till he has learned a lesson, he would be a frightful nuisance to them all. The airs he gives himself to the poor old steward are preposterous; but the worst thing about him is the way he speaks to his mother."
"What is she like?"
"She is a very good woman, rather priding herself on setting aside all conventionality, and bustling about the house, and keeping everyone up to their duty but her son! Is it not extraordinary? She has ruined him with stupid indulgence, and yet she is strict enough with the rest—even with——"
"Joyce!" His mother supplied the word with a smile.
"Yes, even with Joyce," he rejoined; but starting up, with an exclamation of dismay:
"Did you know Maythorne was in Clifton, mother?"
Mrs. Arundel followed the direction of her son's eyes, and there on the broken, uneven slopes which lay before Sion Hill, came Gratian, chatting gaily to a man of some six-and-thirty or forty, who answered very well to the description a poet gave some years after of "the dandy despot, the jewelled mass of millinery, oiled and curled, and smelling of musk and insolence."
"I am very sorry he has come to Clifton," Mrs. Arundel said quickly. "I suppose he is at the hotel."
"Gratian looks satisfied. I hope I shan't get very savage with him, mother. When we last parted it was the night when I—but I need not talk about it—he got that weak, foolish boy into his hands, and I helped to get him out, so he bears me a grudge."
"Never mind that, my dear son; and, Gilbert, remember an old watchword: 'He that ruleth his spirit is greater than he that taketh a city.'"
"I know I do flare out at Maythorne sometimes; but then was there not a cause?"
"Ah! Gilbert, there is never a cause or an excuse for wrath indulged; indignation againstwrongis one thing, rage against the wrong-doer another."
And now steps were heard in the hall, and Gratian'slaugh. She threw open the door and said in a half-mocking tone:
"My Lord Maythorne."
Mrs. Arundel advanced to meet her brother, and greeted him kindly, but with no profession of extreme delight.
"Well, my dear sister," Lord Maythorne said, "I have taken Cliftonen routeto Plymouth, and wandering aimlessly on the Downs I met your fair visitor, my kinswoman, Gratian. What a quaint little snuggery you have got, Annabella, upon my word; and Gratian tells me my hopeful nephew is here, looking after his future prospects, eh? A little Methodism mixed with law, eh?" And Lord Maythorne produced an elegant gold snuff-box, tapped the lid, and took a delicate pinch between his forefinger and thumb, in the most approved fashion of the time.
"Ha! Gilbert, how do? Where is your cub, that you were leading about with such good intentions. Have you brought him to introduce to your mother, eh?" Waiting for no answer, and just touching Gilbert's hand with his finger tips, he went on:
"Have you dined, Annabella?"
"Long ago; we keep early hours."
"Well then, I'll return to my hotel to dine, and Gilbert shall accompany me."
"No thank you," Gilbert said, "I shall sup with my mother, and go early to bed."
"You had better accept the invitation, Gilbert. Our supper will not be very recherché," Gratian said; "we do not sit down to a royal feast here, we live above such vanities."
"I dare say he will not be fastidious after his farmhouse life," said Lord Maythorne, scornfully. "How was your charge; is he walking without leading strings yet?"
Gilbert bit his lip and struggled for composure; but his mother watched him anxiously. Lord Maythorne's irony was hard for her to bear sometimes, and she never knew how Gilbert would take it.
"My dear boy, there is a wise proverb which in English sounds a little harsh, scarcely courteous; in French it is less abrupt:'Chargez de vos affaires.'There are other renderings: 'Don't put your fingers into other people's pies.'"
Poor Gilbert sprang forward and raising his voice said:
"I will not submit to your impertinence. What right have you to treat me like this? I saw you, a man almost double my age—"
"Gently, gently my dear boy, notdouble; nay, nay—"
"I say, I saw you trying to ruin a poor, weak fellow, who, weak as he was, trusted you, and I tried to save him. I wonder you are not ashamed to speak thus; you are—"
The fierce torrent of angry words suddenly stopped. His mother laid her hand upon his arm, and with a great effort he regained his composure.
"I beg your pardon, mother, for brawling here, in your presence, and in yours, Gratian, also; it is very unseemly."
A mocking laugh from Lord Maythorne was his only response, and Gratian left the room saying:
"Adieu! I hope to find you in a better temper at supper, Gilbert," which was scarcely less irritating.
Gilbert followed her, and left his mother and her brother together.
Lord Maythorne was an utterly selfish man of the world; he was the son of his father's second marriage, and therefore much younger than Mrs. Arundel. He was of the type very common in those days, of an openly avowed scoffer at all that was good. Handsome, and with gentleman-like manners when it suited him, he was unscrupulous as to truth, and could send the shafts of his satire, dipped in gall, with a smiling face of indifference. He took a strange pleasure in entrapping the weak and the foolish, andas we know, poor Melville Falconer had not escaped. Gilbert had been roused to indignation against his uncle, and pity for his victim, and he had done his best to open Melville's eyes, and had not altogether failed.
The straightforward manliness of Gilbert had an attraction for many besides Melville, and without any pretension or assumption of superiority, or many words about religion, he showed the Power that was in him was sufficient for him. His hot temper was governed, and a torrent of angry words was often checked; while he did his best to trample out the dislike it was impossible not to feel for his uncle.
When Mrs. Arundel was left alone with her brother, he threw himself carelessly on a sofa, and again drew out his snuff-box.
"So you have quite decided on the law for that boy," he said.
"Yes; this seems a good beginning here, and I have been able to article him to a most respectable firm of solicitors."
"They are a dirty lot generally; however, I am glad that young fellow is really going to earn his living, and make his own way in the world. It would be a pity if he trusted to us."
"It is very unlikely he would trust to you," Mrs. Arundel said.
"It would be leaning on a broken reed, you think; well, I will not contradict you, Annabella. In fact, I am a little short of cash, ready cash, just now. I suppose you do not happen to have a hundred pounds you don't know what to do with?"
"Certainly not; I cannot imagine, Maythorne, how you can think of such a thing."
"Well, I know you send a lot to convert the niggers and Hindoos, and that you subscribe to a society for the flinging about of Bibles, which no one reads."
"Stop, please, Maythorne; I could not listen to any more conversation like this; I will not take part in it. I can lend you no money; but once more, for our father's sake, I cannot help begging, entreating you to turn from the ways of sin."
"No cant, please, Annabella; it makes me savage, and I don't want to affront you."
"I do not care whether you are affronted or not," Mrs. Arundel said, earnestly. "I cannot help feeling that we are of the same blood, and that if you were a worthy successor of my father you might be a joy and support to me. Instead of this, I have to try to keep my son from your influence, and dread that even by hearing your irreverent way of treating sacred things, he may grow accustomed to what is wrong. Oh! it is not too late; you are still a young man, stillin your prime; let me entreat you to break off the chains which bind you, or rather, turn to God to free you from the bondage of sin—theslaveryof sin—for it is slavery, Maythorne."
"I am very much obliged to you, Annabella, for your kindly interest, but I rather prefer deeds to words. Maythornes is pretty well stripped of trees now, and I have all but exhausted the possibility of raising money on it; butlaisser alleris my motto, and I am not the one to mourn over a dark, old-fashioned house, and lands which yield no produce; if possible, I shall cut the whole concern. Well, ta-ta, till to-morrow. I have promised to hire horses and trot out Gratian over the Downs."
Mrs. Arundel felt that to say anything more would be worse than useless, and yet, as she watched her brother lounge across the road and stand on the slope looking over the river, her eyes filled with tears.
"To think what hemighthave been. May God guard my boy from men like him."
Gilbert had gone quickly away from Sion Hill, and found himself on the lower Downs—then not skirted by handsome houses, but with glades and grassy slopes covered with hawthorn bushes, whitened in May-time with blossoms like snow, and covered in autumn withfeathery masses of the wild clematis, or traveller's joy.
Gilbert found the place suited his mood, and he gave himself up to thoughts of Joyce, and forgot the late encounter with his uncle.
How delightful it was to build castles for the future—to think of a home near all this loveliness, where Joyce would reign in all her sweet beauty as his wife. The time had been when Gilbert had admired his cousin Gratian Anson, who was the daughter of his mother's aunt, and therefore his cousin only in the second degree. Now her free, bold bearing, her ringing voice, her fashionable dress and banter, jarred on him. Her laugh was like the rattle of a noisy brook over innumerable stones, when compared to Joyce's musical ripple, which was so real, and so entirely the outcome of her own happiness. Then how charming was her unconsciousness, and how her beauty was enhanced by the absence of all affectation; how pretty was her affection for her father and Piers, and how gracefully and simply she did all the little household duties which her mother expected from her! Some words of a favourite poet of his mother's recurred to him, as he pictured Joyce in her little, short, lilac frock, with an apron, as he had seen her one morning, and her round white arms bare, asshe came out of the dairy, and said she had made up twenty pats of butter while he had been asleep. Surely George Herbert's words were verified.
The action was made fine by the spirit, which was done as a loving token of obedience to the will of another.
"Mother wished me to do it, so I got up an hour earlier," she had said, as she cut a slice from one of the rolls made for breakfast and offered it to him, spread with the butter she had made, with a cup of milk, before it had been skimmed.
Dreams of first love are very sweet; and Gilbert wondered if he had been wise to leave Fair Acres without getting a definite answer from Joyce herself.
Honourable and straightforward, he determined not to return to Fair Acres unless prepared to ask her father's permission to lay all he had at her feet. He was conscious that at present thatalldid not imply much, and besides, he had his mother to think of, and he must not marry till he was really in a position to support a wife in that station of life to which he had been called. He could wait for seven years, like Jacob of old—waiting for Joyce was worth any sacrifice. But what if, when she emerged from her retirement and went to Barley Wood, some one else might set his heart on the prize and win it. Then he recalledher words, spoken in answer to his question as he carried her towards home the evening before:
"No; I will not forget you."
They seemed to possess a double meaning as he repeated them again and again, as he retraced his steps over the observatory towards Sion Hill. They were heard in the late voices of the thrushes in the woods across the river—those dark, mysterious Leigh woods which, in the dim and fading light, clothed the opposite heights with dim and motionless masses; they were heard in the call of the sailor boys from the full river below St. Vincent's Rock, on whose summit he stood; they seemed to wrap him round with a certainty that the giant rock, from which he looked over the fading landscape lying to his left, encircled by a line of hills, on which the fine tower of Dundry stood like a black sentinel against the clear sky, was not more steadfast than would Joyce's heart be, were it once given to him.
There were then no railings to protect passers-by from approaching too near the edge of the precipice which falls sheer down from this point a distance of three hundred feet, and Gilbert was startled from his dream by a voice near:
"You are perilously near the edge, unless you wish to go over!"
He turned with a sudden gesture, and, to his surprise, saw Gratian.
"I saw you wander over here from my window," she said. "Look! there are our houses, and I came to look after you."
"That was very obliging," Gilbert said, a little satirically.
"Now, don't be so high and mighty. I wish to be your friend, as I have always been, Gilbert. I was very sorry for you when you were so shamefully teazed by your young uncle; he does not like to be calledold. I hope you noticed that."
"Oh! it is over now. I had no right to get into a rage."
"I think you had every right," Gratian said. "He is too provoking; worse, since he has been so much in London, and welcomed, so we hear, by some boon companions of His Majesty. But do not let us talk of him; let us talk of you. No; I don't choose to walk so near the edge of the rocks, if you do. Tell me about the people where you have been;—tell me about the place. Is it a fine house, or a nice big farm? Fair Acres is a pretty name, and are there no fair maidens as well as acres? Come, Gilbert, you were not always so cross to me." This was said with a gentle pressure on his arm.
"I don't mean to be cross; but there is nothing at Fair Acres that would interest you. You know about poor Melville already."
"I have heard of him," she said, "and of your taking upon yourself to reform him. Well, who are the others?"
"There are two fine boys, who want to be sailors, but they are too old, I am afraid, for the navy; they are thirteen."
"They—both thirteen!"
"Yes, they are twins. Then there is a lame boy, Piers, a year younger. And oh, I forgot! a quiet, silent fellow, Ralph, he is sixteen."
"And does the great Melville, come next to him?"
"Two little girls died. But there is a daughter of seventeen."
"Ah!" exclaimed Gratian; "I knew there was a daughter. Did I not tell you I knew you were in love? Tell me her name. Come! We are such old friends. Surely you might tell me."
"Really, Gratian, I will tell you Miss Falconer's name if you so particularly wish to hear it. I—"
"I will guess it. Let me see. I love my love with an A, because she is amiable, and I took her to the sign of the Archer, and fed her with apples, and hername is Angela. Not right? Well, I will go through the alphabet, and I must surely be right at last. I love my love with a B——."
"Pray stop," Gilbert said. "I don't feel in a jesting mood, somehow."
"Not ready to wear a cap and bells? Poor Gilbert. You feel more like sitting under a willow tree and singing 'Poor Mary Anne.'"
"Which is our house?" Gilbert asked.
"Not that one; not up the steps. But you shall not go in till you tell me her name."
"She is called Joyce," Gilbert said, in despair.
"Ah! then you allow there is only oneshefor you in all the world, andsheis called Joyce."
"Now, I do hope you are satisfied," Gilbert said.
She laughed that loud, ringing laugh, as she ran upstairs before him. "Oh! of course I am satisfied," she said.