Both girls were very handsome, and for their pure and brilliant complexion were doubtless indebted to the healthful breeze that swept the green sides of the Denbigh hills, together with an occasionalsoupçonof that which comes from the waters of the Irish Sea.
It is difficult to say whether Winifred could be pronounced a brunette or a blonde, her skin was so exquisitely fair, while her splendid hair was a shade of the deepest brown, and her glorious sparkling eyes were of the darkest violet blue. Their normal expression was quiet and subdued; they only flashed up at times, and she was a girl that somehow every colour became. In pure white one might have thought her lovely, and lovelier still, perhaps, in black or blue or rose, or any other tint or shade. Her fine lithe figure appeared to perfection in her close-fitting habit of dark-blue cloth, and the masses of her hair being tightly bound up under her hat, revealed the contour of her slender neck and delicately formed ear.
Dora was a smaller and younger edition of her sister--more girlish and more of a hoyden, with her lighter tresses, half golden in hue, floating loose over her shoulders and to beneath her waist from under a smart little hat, the feather and fashion of which imparted intense piquancy to the character of her somewhat irregular but remarkably pretty face and--we must admit it--ratherretroussénose.
Pride and a little reserve were rather the predominant style of the elder and dark-eyed sister; merriment, fun, and rather noisy flirtation were that of Dora, who permitted herself to laugh at times when her sister would barely have smiled, and to say things on which the other would never have ventured; but thisespièglerieand a certain bearing of almost rantipole--if one may use such a term--were thought to become her.
Winifred rode a tall wiry nag, a hand or two higher than her father's stout active hunter; but Dora preferred to scamper about on a beautiful Welsh pony, the small head, high withers, flat legs, and round hoofs of which it no doubt inherited, as Sir Madoc would have said, from the celebrated horse Merlin.
"Hope you'll stay with us till the twelfth of next month," said he. "The grouse are looking well."
"Our time is doubtful, our short leave conditional, Sir Madoc," replied Phil Caradoc, who, however, was not looking at the Baronet, but at Winifred, in the hope that the alleged brevity of his visit might find him some tender interest in her eyes, or stir some chord by its suggestiveness in her breast; but Winny, indifferent apparently to separation and danger so far as he was concerned, seemed intent on twirling the silky mane of her horse with the lash of her whip.
"Then, in about a fortnight after, we shall be blazing at the partridges," resumed Sir Madoc, to tempt us. "But matters are looking ill for the pheasants in October, for the gamekeeper tells me that the gapes have been prevalent among them. The poults were hatched early, and the wet weather from the mountains has made more havoc than our guns are likely to do."
"Long before that time, Sir Madoc, I hope we shall be making havoc among the Russians," replied Phil, still glancing covertly at Miss Lloyd.
"Ah, I hope not!" said she, roused apparently this time. "I look forward to this most useless war with horror and dismay. So many dear friends have gone, so many more are going, it makes one quite sad! O, I shall never forget that morning in London when the poor Guards marched!"
This was addressed, not to Phil Caradoc, but tome.
"We knew that we should meet you," said she, colouring, and adding a little hastily, "We asked Lady Estelle to accompany us; but--"
"She is far too--what shall I call it?--aristocratic or unimpressionable to think of going to meet any one," interrupted her sister.
"Don't say so, Dora! Yet I thought the loveliness of the evening would have tempted her. And Bob Spurrit the groom has broken a new pad expressly for her, by riding it for weeks with a skirt."
So there was no temptation but "the loveliness of the evening," thought I; while Dora said,
"But she preferred playing over to Mr. Guilfoyle that piece of German music he gave her yesterday."
All this was not encouraging. She knew that I was coming--a friend in whom she could not help having, from the past, rather more than a common interest--and yet she had declined to accompany those frank and kindly girls. Worse than all, perhaps she had at that moment this Mr. Hawkesby Guilfoyle hanging over her admiringly at the piano, while she playedhismusic, presented to her doubtless with some suggestive, secret or implied, meaning in the sentiment or the title of it. Jealousy readily suggested much of this, and a great deal more. That Lady Estelle was at Craigaderyn Court had been my prevailing idea when accepting so readily my kind friend's invitation. Then I should see her in a very little time now! I had been resolved to watch well how she received me, though it would be no easy task to read the secret thoughts of one so well and so carefully trained to keep all human emotions under perfect control, outwardly at least--a "Belgravian thoroughbred," as I once heard Sir Madoc term her; but if she changed colour, however faintly, if there was the slightest perceptible tremor in her voice, or a flash of the eye, which indicated that which, under the supervision of the usually astute dowager her mother, she dared scarcely to betray--an interest in one such as me--it would prove at least that my presence was not indifferent to her. Thus much only did I hope, and of such faint hope had my heart been full until now, when I heard all this; and if I was piqued by her absence, I was still more by the cause of it; though had I reflected for a moment, I ought to have known that the very circumstances under which I had last parted from her in London, with an expected avowal all but uttered and hovering on my lips when leading her to the carriage, were sufficient to preclude a girl so proud as she from coming to meet me, even in the avenue, and when accompanied by Winifred and Dora Lloyd.
"Is Mr. Guilfoyle a musician?" I asked.
"A little," replied Dora; "plays and sings too; but I can't help laughing at him--and it is so rude."
"He says that he is a friend of yours, Harry Hardinge; is he so?' asked Sir Madoc, with his bushy brows depressed for a moment.
"Well, if losing to him once at pool mysteriously, also on a certain horse, while he scratched out of its engagements another on which I stood sure to win, make a friend, he is one. I have met him at his club, and should think that he--he--"
"Is not a good style of fellow, in fact," said Sir Madoc in a low tone, and rather bluntly.
"Perhaps so; nor one I should like to see at Craigaderyn Court." I cared not to add "especially in the society of Lady Cressingham," after whom he dangled, on the strength of some attentions or friendly services performed on the Continent.
"And so you lost money to him? We have a Welsh proverb beginning,Dyled ar bawb--"
"We shall have barely time to dress, dear papa," said Miss Lloyd, increasing the speed of her horse, as she seemed to dread the Welsh proclivities of her parent; "and remember that we have quite a dinner-party to-day."
"Yes," added Dora; "two country M.P.s are coming; but, O dear! they will talk nothing but blue-book with papa, or about the crops, fat pigs, and the county pack; and shake their heads about ministerial policy and our foreign prestige, whatever that may be. Then we have an Indian colonel with only half a liver, the doctor says, and two Indian judges without any at all."
"Dora!" exclaimed Miss Lloyd in a tone of expostulation. "Well, it is what the doctor said," persisted Dora; "and if he is wrong can I help it?"
"But people don't talk of such things."
"Then people shouldn't have them."
"A wild Welsh girl this," said Sir Madoc; "neither schooling in Switzerland nor London has tamed her."
"And we are to have several county gentlemen who are great in the matters of turnips, top-dressing, and Welsh mutton; four young ladies, each with a flirtation on hand; and four old ones, deep in religion and scandal, flannel and coals for the poor; so, Mr. Hardinge, you and Mr. Caradoc will be quite a double relief to us--to me, certainly."
"O, Dora, how your tongue runs on!" exclaimed Winifred.
"And then we have Lady Naseby to act as materfamilias, and play propriety for us all in black velvet and diamonds. Winny, eldest daughter of the house, is evidently unequal to the task."
"And the coming fête," said I, "is it in honour of anything in particular?"
"Yes, something very particular indeed," replied Dora.
"Of what?"
"Me."
"You!"
"My birthday--I shall be eighteen," she added, shaking back the heavy masses of her golden hair.
"And she has actually promised to have one round dance with Lord Pottersleigh," said Winny, laughing heartily.
"I did but promise out of mischief; I trust, however, the Viscount will leave off his goloshes for that day, though we are to dance on the grass, or I hope he may forget all about it. Old Potter, I call him," added the young lady in asotto-voceto me, "at least, when the Cressinghams are not present."
"Why them especially?"
"Because he is such a particular friend of theirs."
This was annoyance number two; for this wealthy but senile old peer had been a perpetual adorer of Lady Estelle, favoured too, apparently, by her mother, and had been on more than one occasion abête noireto me; and now I was to meet him here again!
"Papa has told you that I mean to part with my poor pet goat--Carneydd Llewellyn, so called from the mountain whence he came. He is to be sent to the regiment--in your care, too."
"Why deprive yourself of a favourite? Why deprive it of such care as yours? Among soldiers," said I, "the poor animal will sorely miss the kindness and caresses you bestow upon it."
"I shall be so pleased to think that our Welsh Fusileers, in the lands to which they are going, will have something so characteristic to remind them of home, of the wild hills of Wales, perhaps to make them think of the donor. Besides, papa says the corps has never been without this emblem of the old Principality since it was raised in the year of the Revolution."
"Most true; but how shall I--how shallwe--ever thank you?"
I could see that her nether lip--a lovely little pouting lip it was--quivered slightly, and that her eyes were full of strange light, though bent downward on her horse's mane; and now I felt that, for reasons apparent enough, I was cold, even unkind, to this warm-hearted girl; for we had been better and dearer friends before we knew the Cressinghams. She checked her horse a little abruptly, and began to address some of the merest commonplaces to Phil Caradoc; who, with his thick brown curly hair parted in the middle, his smiling handsome face and white regular teeth, was finding great favour in the eyes of the laughing Dora. But now we were drawing near Craigaderyn Court. The scenery was Welsh, and yet the house and all its surroundings were in character genuinely English, though to have hinted so much might have piqued Sir Madoc. The elegance and comfort of the mansion were English, and English too was the rich verdure of the velvet lawn and the stately old chase, the trees of which were ancient enough--some of them at least--to have sheltered Owen Glendower, or echoed to the bugle of Llewellyn ap Seisalt, whose tall grave-stone stands amid the battle-mounds on grassy Castell Coch.
At a carved and massive entrance-door we alighted, assisted the ladies to dismount, and then, gathering up their trains, they swept merrily up the steps and into the house, to prepare for dinner; while Sir Madoc, ere he permitted us to retire, though the first bell had been rung, led us into the hall; a low-ceiled, irregular, and oak-panelled room, decorated with deers' antlers, foxes' brushes crossed, and stuffed birds of various kinds, among others a gigantic golden eagle, shot by himself on Snowdon. This long apartment was so cool that, though the season was summer, a fire burned in the old stone fireplace; and on a thick rug before it lay a great, rough, red eyed staghound, that made one think of the faithful brach that saved Llewellyn's heir. The windows were half shaded by scarlet hangings; a hunting piece or two by Sneyders, with pictures of departed favourites, horses and dogs, indicated the tastes of the master of the house and of his ancestors; and there too was the skull of thelastwolf killed in Wales, more than a century ago, grinning on an oak bracket. The butler, Owen Gwyllim, who occasionally officiated as a harper, especially at Yule, was speedily in attendance, and Sir Madoc insisted on our joining him in a stiff glass of brandy-and-water, "as a whet," he said; and prior to tossing off which he gave a hoarse guttural toast in Welsh, which his butler alone understood, and at which he laughed heartily, with the indulged familiarity of an old servant.
I then retired to make an unusually careful toilette; to leave nothing undone or omitted in the way of cuffs, studs, rings, and so forth, in all the minor details of masculine finery; hearing the while from a distance the notes of a piano in another wing of the house come floating through an open window. The air was German;--could I doubt whose white fingers were gliding over the keys, andwhomight be standing by, and feeling himself, perhaps, somewhat master of the situation?
Apart from Welsh fable and tradition, the lands of Craigaderyn had been in possession of Sir Madoc's family for many ages, and for more generations of the line of Lloyd; but the mansion, the Court itself, is not older than the Stuart times, and portions of it were much more recent, particularly the library, the shelves of which were replete with all that a gentleman's library should contain; the billiard-room and gun-room, where all manner of firearms, from the old long-barrelled fowling-piece of Anne's time down to Joe Manton and Colt's revolver, stood side by side on racks; the kennels, where many a puppy yelped; and the stable-court, where hoofs rang and stall-collars jangled, and where Mr. Bob Spurrit--a long-bodied, short-and-crooked legged specimen of the Welsh groom--reigned supreme, and watered and corned his nags by the notes of an ancient clock in the central tower--a clock said to have been brought as spoil from the church of Todtenhausen, by Sir Madoc's grandfather, after he led the Welsh Fusileers at the battle of Minden. Masses of that "rare old plant, the ivy green," heavy, leafy, and overlapping each other, shrouded great portions of the house. Oriels, full of small panes and quaint coats of arms, abutted here and there; while pinnacles and turrets, vanes, and groups of twisted, fluted, or garlanded stone chimney stacks, rose sharply up to break the sky-line and many a panel and scutcheon of stone were there, charged with the bend, ermine, and pean of Lloyd--the lion rampant wreathed with oak, and armed with a sword--and the heraldic cognizance of many a successive matrimonial alliance.
Some portions of the house, where the walls were strong and the lower storey vaulted, were associated, of course, with visits from Llewellyn and Owen Glendower; and there also abode--a ghost. The park, too, was not without its old memories and traditions. Many of its trees were descendants of an ancient grove dedicated to Druidic worship; and bones frequently found there were alleged by some to be the relics of human sacrifice, by others to be those of Roman or of Saxon warriors slain by the sturdy Britons who, under Cadwallader, Llewellyn of the Torques, or some other hero of the Pendragonate, had held, in defiance of both, thecaeror fort on the summit of Craigaderyn. But the woodlands on which Sir Madoc mostly prided himself were those of the old acorn season, when Nature planted her own wild forests, and sowed the lawn out of her own lawns, as some writer has it. They were unquestionably the most picturesque, but the trim and orderly chase was not without its beauties too, and there had many grand Eisteddfoddiau been held under the auspices of Sir Madoc, and often fifty harpers at a time had made the woods ring to "The noble Race of Shenkin," or "The March of the Men of Harlech."
The old Court and its surroundings were such as to make one agree with what Lord Lyttelton wrote of another Welsh valley, where "the mountains seemed placed to guard the charming retreat from invasions; and where, with the woman one loves, the friend of one's heart, and a good library, one might pass an age, and think it a day."
The ghost was a tall thin figure, dressed somewhat in the costume of Henry VIII.'s time; but his full-skirted doublet with large sleeves, the cap bordered with ostrich feathers, the close tight hose, and square-toed shoes, were all deep black, hence his, orits, aspect was sombre in the extreme, shadowy and uncertain too, as he was only visible in the twilight of eve, or the first dim and similarly uncertain light of the early dawn; and these alleged appearances have been chiefly on St. David's day, the 1st of March, and were preceded by the sound of a harp about the place--but a harpunseen. He was generally supposed to leave, or be seen quitting, a portion of the house, where the old wall was shrouded with ivy, and to walk or glide swiftly and steadily, without casting either shadow or foot-mark on the grass, towards a certain ancient tree in the park, where he disappeared--faded, or melted out of sight. On the wall beneath the ivy being examined, a door--the portion of an earlier structure--was discovered to have been built up, but none knew when or why; and tradition averred that those who had seen him pass--for none dared follow--towards the old tree, could make out that his figure and face were those of a man in the prime of life, but the expression of the latter was sad, solemn, resolute, and gloomy.
The origin of the legend, as told to me by Winifred Lloyd, referred to a period rather remote in history, and was to the following effect. Some fifteen miles southward from Craigaderyn is a quaint and singular village named Dinas Mowddwy, situated very strangely on the shelf of a steep mountain overlooking the Dyfi stream--a lofty spot commanding a view of the three beautiful valleys of the Ceryst; but this place was in past times the abode and fortress of a peculiar and terrible tribe, called the Gwylliad Cochion, or Red-haired Robbers, who made all North Wales, but more particularly their own district, a by-word and reproach, from the great extent and savage nature of the outrages they committed by fire and sword; so that to this day, we are told, there may be seen, in some of the remote mountain hamlets, more especially in Cemmaes near the sea, the well-sharpened scythe-blades, which were placed in the chimney-corners overnight, to be ready for them in case of a sudden attack. They were great crossbowmen, those outlaws, and never failed in their aim; and so, like the broken clans upon the Highland border, they levied black mail on all, till the night of the 1st of March, 1534; when, during a terrific storm of thunder, lightning, and wind, Sir Jorwerth Lloyd of Craigaderyn, John Wynne ap Meredydd, and a baron named Owen, scaled the mountain at the head of their followers, fell on them sword in hand, and after slaying a great number, hung one hundred of them in a row. One wretched mother, a red-haired Celt, begged hard and piteously to have her youngest son spared; but Sir Jorwerth was relentless, so the young robber perished with the rest. Then the woman rent her garments, and laying bare her bosom, said it had nursed other sons and daughters, who would yet wash their hands in the blood of them all. Owen was waylaid and slain by them at a place named to this day Llidiart-y-Barwn, or the Baron's Gate, and Meredydd fell soon after; but for Lloyd the woman, who was a reputed witch, had prepared another fate, as if aiming at the destruction of his soul as well as his body; for after his marriage with Gwerfyl Owen, he fell madly in love with a golden-haired girl whom he met when hunting in the forest near Craigaderyn; and as he immediately relinquished all attendance at church and all forms of prayer, and seemed to be besotted by her, the girl was averred to be an evil spirit, as she was never seen save in his company, and then only (by those who watched and lurked) "in the glimpses of the moon."
On the third St. David's eve after the slaughter at Dinas Mowddwy, he was seated with Gwerfyl in her chamber, listening to a terrific storm of wind and rain that swept through the valley, overturning the oldest trees, and shaking the walls of the ancient house, while the lightning played above the dim summits of Snowdon, and every mountain stream andrhaidr, or cataract, rolled in foam and flood to Llyn Alwen or the Conway.
On a tabourette near his knee she sat, lovingly clasping his hand between her own two, for he seemed restless, petulant, and gloomy, and had his cloak and cap at hand, as if about to go forth, though the weather was frightful.
"Jorwerth," said she softly, "the last time there was such a storm as this was on that terrible night--you remember?"
"When we cut off the Gwylliad Cochion--yes, root and branch, sparing, as we thought, none, while the rain ran through my armour as through a waterspout. But why speak of it, to-night especially? Yes, root and branch, even while that woman vowed vengeance," he added, grinding his teeth. "But what sound is that?"
"Music," she replied, rising and looking round with surprise; but his tremulous hand, and, more than that, the sudden pallor of his face, arrested her, while the strains of a small harp, struck wildly and plaintively, came at times between the fierce gusts of wind that shook the forest trees and the hiss of the rain on the window-panes without. Louder they seemed to come, and to be more emphatic and sharp; and, as he heard them, a violent trembling and cold perspiration came over all the form of Sir Jorwerth Lloyd.
"Heaven pity the harper who is abroad to-night!" said Gwerfyl, clasping her white hands.
"Let Hell do so, rather!" was the fierce response of her husband, as his eyes filled with a strange light.
At that moment a hand knocked on the window, and the startled wife, as she crouched by her husband's side, could see that it was small and delicate, wondrously beautiful too, and radiant with gems or glittering raindrops; and now her husband trembled more violently than ever.
Gwerfyl crossed herself, and rushed to the window.
"Strange," said she; "I can see no one."
"No one in human form, perhaps," replied her husband gloomily, as he lifted his cloak. "Look again, dear wife."
The lady did so, and fancied that close to the window-pane she could see a female face--anon she could perceive that it was small and beautiful, with hair of golden red, all wavy, and, strange to say, unwetted by the rain, and with eyes that were also of golden red, but with a devilish smile and glare, and glitter in them and over all her features, as they appeared, but to vanish, as the successive flashes of lightning passed. With terror and foreboding of evil, she turned to her startled husband. He was a pale and handsome man, with an aquiline nose, a finely-cut mouth and chin; but now his lips were firmly compressed, a flashing and fiery light seemed to sparkle in his eyes, his forehead was covered with lines, and the veins of his temples were swollen, while his black hair and moustache seemed to have actually become streaked with gray. What unknown emotion caused all this? There were power and passion in his bearing; but something strange, and dark, and demon-like was brooding in his soul. The white drops glittered on his brow as he threw his cloak about him, andthenthe notes of the harp were heard, as if struck triumphantly and joyously.
"Stay, stay! leave me not!" implored his wife on her knees, in a sudden access of terror and pity, that proved greater even than love.
"I cannot--I cannot! God pardon me and bless you, dear, dear wife, but go I must!"
("Exactly like Rudolph, as we saw him last night in the opera, breaking away from his followers when he heard the voice of Lurline singing amid the waters of the Rhine," added Winifred in a parenthesis, as she laid her hand timidly on my arm.)
She strove on her knees to place in his hand the small ivory-bound volume of prayers which ladies then carried slung by a chain at their girdle, even as a watch is now; but he thrust it aside, as if it scorched his fingers. Then he kissed her wildly, and broke away.
She sprang from the floor, but he was gone--gone swiftly into the forest; and with sorrow and prayer in her heart his wife stealthily followed him. By this time the sudden storm had as suddenly ceased; already the gusty wind had died away, and no trace of it remained, save the strewn leaves and a quivering in the dripping branches; the white clouds were sailing through the blue sky, and whiter still, in silvery sheen 'the moonlight fell aslant in patches through the branches on the glittering grass. Amid that sheen she saw the dark figure of her husband passing, gliding onward to the old oak tree, and Gwerfyl shrunk behind another, as the notes of the infernal harp--for such she judged it to be--fell upon her ear.
"You have come, my beloved," said a sweet voice; and she saw the same strangely-beautiful girl with the red-golden hair, her skin of wondrous whiteness, and eyes that glittered with devilish triumph, though to Jorwerth Du they seemed only filled with ardour and the light of passionate love, even as the beauty of her form seemed all round and white and perfect; but lo! to the eyes of his wife, who was underno spell, that form was fast becoming like features in a dissolving view, changed to that of extreme old age--gray hairs and wrinkles seemed to come with every respiration; for this mysterious love, who had bewitched her husband, was some evil spirit or demon of the woods.
"How long you have been!" said she reproachfully, for even the sweetness of her tone had suddenly passed away; "so long that already age seems to have come upon me."
"Pardon me; have I not sworn to love you for ever and ever, though neither of us is immortal?"
"You are ready?" said she, laying her head on his breast.
"Yes, my own wild love!"
"Then let us go."
All beauty of form had completely passed away, and now Gwerfyl saw her handsome husband in the arms of a very hag; hollow-cheeked, toothless, almost fleshless, with restless shifty eyes, and grey elf-locks like the serpents of Medusa; a hag beyond all description hideous: and her long, lean, shrivelled arms she wound lovingly and triumphantly around him. Her eyes gleamed like two live coals as he kissed her wildly and passionately from time to time, the full blaze of the moonlight streaming upon both their forms.
Gwerfyl strove to pray, to cry aloud, to move. But her tongue refused its office, and her lips were powerless; all capability of volition had left her, and she was as it were rooted to the spot. A moment more, and a dark cloud came over the moon, causing a deeper shadow under the old oak tree. Then a shriek escaped her, and when again the moon shone forth on the green grass and the gnarled tree, Gwerfyl alone was there--her husband and the hag had disappeared. Neither was ever seen more. North Wales is the most primitive portion of the country, and it is there that such fancies and memories still linger longest; and such was the little family legend told me by Winifred Lloyd. I was thinking over it now, recalling the earnest expression of her bright soft face and intelligent eyes, and the tone of her pleasantly modulated voice, when she, half laughingly and half seriously, had related it, with more point than I can give it, while we sat in a corner and somewhat apart from every one--on the first night I met the Cressinghams--in a crowded London ballroom, amid the heat, the buzz, and crush of the season--about the last place in the world to hear a story ofdiablerie; and "the old time" seemed to come again, as I descended to the drawing-room, to meet her and Lady Estelle.
Already having met and been welcomed by my host and his daughters, my first glances round the room were in search of Lady Estelle and her mother. About eighteen persons were present, mostly gentlemen, and I instinctively made my way to where she I sought was seated, idling over a book of prints. Two or three gentlemen were exclusively in conversation with her; Sir Madoc, who was now in evening costume, for one.
"Come, Harry," said he, "here is a fair friend to whom I wish to present you."
"You forget, Sir Madoc, that I said we had met before; Mr. Hardinge and I are almost old friends--the friends of a season, at least," said Lady Estelle, presenting her hand to me with a bright but calm and decidedly conventional smile, and with the most perfect self-possession.
"It makes me so very happy to meet you again," said I in a low voice, the tone of which she could not mistake.
"Mamma, too, will besodelighted--you were quite a favourite with her."
I bowed, as if accepting for fact a sentiment of which I was extremely doubtful, and then after a little pause she added,--
"Mamma always preferred your escort, you remember."
Of that I was aware, when she wished to leave some more eligibleparti--old Lord Pottersleigh, for instance--to take charge of her daughter.
"I am so pleased that we are to see a little more of you, ere you depart for the East; whence, I hear, you are bound," said she after a little pause.
Simple though the words, they made my heart beat happily, and I dreaded that some sharp observer might read in my eyes the expression which I knew could not be concealed from her; and now I turned to look for some assistance from Winifred Lloyd; but, though observing us, she was apparently busy with Caradoc; luckily for me, perhaps, as there was something of awkwardness in my position with her. I had flirted rather too much at one time with Winny--been almost tender--but nothing more. Now I loved Lady Estelle, and that love was indeed destitute of all ambition, though the known difficulties attendant on the winning of such a hand as hers, added zest and keenness to its course.
When I looked at Winifred and saw how fair and attractive she was, "a creature so compact and complete," as Caradoc phrased it, with such brilliance of complexion, such deep violet eyes and thick dark wavy hair; and when I thought of the girl's actual wealth, and her kind old father's great regard for me, it seemed indeed that I might do well in offering my heart where there was little doubt it would be accepted; but the more stately and statuesque beauty, the infinitely greater personal attractions of Lady Estelle dazzled me, and rendered me blind to Winny's genuine goodness of soul The latter was every way a most attractive girl Dora was quite as much so, in her own droll and jolly way; but Lady Estelle possessed that higher style of loveliness and bearing so difficult to define; and though less natural perhaps than the Lloyds, she had usually that calm, placid, and unruffled or settled expression of features so peculiar to many Englishwomen of rank and culture, yet they could light up at times; then, indeed, she became radiant; and now, in full dinner dress, she seemed to look pretty much as I had seemed to see her in that haughty full-length by the President of the R.A., with an admiring and critical crowd about it.
The three girls I have named were all handsome--each sufficiently so to have been the belle of any room; yet, though each was different in type from the other, they were all thoroughly English; perhaps Sir Madoc would have reminded me that two were Welsh. The beauty of Winifred and Dora was less regular; yet, like Lady Estelle, in their faces each feature seemed so charmingly suited to the rest, and all so perfect, that I doubt much the story that Canova had sixty models for his single Venus, or that Zeuxis of Heraclea had even five for his Helen. Lady Estelle Cressingham was tall and full in form, with a neck that rose from her white shoulders like that of some perfect Greek model; her smile, when real, was very captivating; her eyes were dark and deep, and softly lidded with long lashes; they had neither the inquiring nor soft pleading expression of Winifred's, nor the saucy drollery of Dora's, yet at times they seemed to have the power of both; for they were eloquent eyes, and, as a writer has it, "could light up her wholepersonnelas if her whole body thought." Her colour was pale, almost creamy; her features clearly cut and delicate. She had a well-curved mouth, a short upper lip and chin, that indicated what she did not quite possess--decision. Her thick hair, which in its darkness contrasted so powerfully with her paleness, came somewhat well down, in what is called "a widow's peak," on a forehead that was broad rather than low. Her taste was perfect in dress and jewelry; for though but a girl in years, she had been carefully trained, and knew nearly as much of the world--at least oftheexclusive world in which she lived--as her cold and unimpressionable mamma, who seemed to be but a larger, fuller, older, and more stately version of herself; certainly much more of that selfish world than I, a line subaltern of seven years' foreign service, could know.
A few words more, concerning my approaching departure for the East, were all that could pass between us then; for the conversation was, of course, general, and of that enforced and heavy nature which usually precedes a dinner-party; but our memories and our thoughts were nevertheless our own still, as I could see when her glance met mine occasionally.
War was new to Britain then, and thus, even in the society at Craigaderyn Court, Caradoc and I, as officers whose regiment had already departed--more than all, as two of the Royal Welsh Fusileers--found ourselves rather objects of interest, and at a high premium.
"Ah, the dooce! Hardinge, how d'you do, how d'you do? Not off to the seat of war" (he pronounced itwaw), "to tread the path of glory that leads to--wheredoesold Gray say it leads to?" said a thin wiry-looking man of more than middle height and less than middle age, his well-saved hair carefully parted in the centre, a glass in his eye, and an easyinsouciancethat bordered on insolence in his tone and bearing, as he came bluntly forward, and interrupted me while paying the necessary court to "Mamma Cressingham," who received me with simple politeness, nothing more. I could not detect the slightest cordiality in her tone or eye. Though in theArmy List, my name was unchronicled by Debrett, and might never be.
I bowed to the speaker, who was the identical Mr. Hawkesby Guilfoyle of whom I have already spoken, and with whom I felt nettled for presuming to place himself on such a footing of apparent familiarity with me, from the simple circumstance that I had more than once--I scarcely knew how--lost money to him.
"I am going Eastward ere long, at all events," said I; "and I cannot help thinking that some of you many idlers here could not do better than take a turn of service against the Russians too."
"It don't pay, my dear fellow; moreover, I prefer to be one of the gentlemen of England, who live at home at ease. I shall be quite satisfied with reading all about it, and rejoicing in your exploits."
I smiled and bowed, but felt that he was closely scrutinising me through his glass, which he held in its place by a muscular contraction of the left eye; and I felt moreover, instinctively and intuitively, by some magnetic influence, that this man was my enemy, and yet I had done him no wrong. The aversion was certainly mutual. It was somewhat of the impulse that led Tom Brown of old to dislike Dr. Fell, yet, in my instance, it was not exactly without knowing "why."
I had quickly read the character of this Mr. Guilfoyle. He had cold, cunning, and shifty eyes of a greenish yellow colour. They seldom smiled, even when his mouth did, if that can be called a smile which is merely a grin from the teeth outwards. He was undoubtedly gentlemanlike in air and appearance, always correct in costume, suave to servility when it suited his purpose, but daringly insolent when he could venture to be so with impunity. He had that narrowness of mind which made him counterfeit regret for the disaster of his best friend, while secretly exulting in it, if that friend could serve his purposes no more; the praise or success of another never failed to excite either his envy or his malice; and doating on himself, he thought that all who knew him should quarrel with those against whom he conceived either spleen or enmity. A member of a good club in town, he was fashionable, moderately dissipated, and rather handsome in person. No one knew exactly from what source his income was derived; but vague hints of India stock, foreign bonds, and so forth, served to satisfy the few--and in the world of London few they were indeed--who cared a jot about the matter. Such was Mr. Hawkesby Guilfoyle, of whom the reader shall hear more in these pages.
"And so you don't approve of risking your valuable person in the service of the country?" said I, in a tone which I felt to be a sneering one.
"No; I am disposed to be rather economical of it--think myself too good-looking, perhaps, to fill a hole in a trench. Ha, ha! Moreover, what the deuce do I want with glory or honour?" said he, in a lower tone; "are not self-love or interest, rather than virtue, the true motives of most of our actions?"
"Do you think so?"
"Yes, by Jove! I do."
"A horrid idea, surely!"
"Not at all. Besides, virtues, as they are often called, are too often only vices disguised."
"The deuce!" said Caradoc, who overheard us; "I don't understand this paradox."
"Nor did I intendyouto do so," replied the other, in a tone that, to say the least of it, was offensive, and made Phil's eyes sparkle. "But whether in pursuit of vice or virtue, it is an awkward thing when the ruling passion makes one take a wrong turn in life."
"The ruling passion?" said I, thinking of the money I had lost to him.
"Yes, whether it be ambition, avarice, wine, or love," he replied, his eyes going involuntarily towards Lady Estelle; "but at all times there is nothing like taking precious good care of number one; and so, were I a king, I should certainly reign for myself."
"And be left to yourself," said I, almost amused by this avowed cynicism and selfishness.
"Well, as Prince Esterhazy said, when he did me the honour to present me with this ring," he began, playing the while with a splendid brilliant, which sparkled on one of his fingers.
But what the Prince had said I was never fated to know; for the aphorisms of Mr. Guilfoyle were cut short by the welcome sound of the dinner-gong, and in file we proceeded through the corridor and hall to the dining-room, duly marshalled between two rows of tall liverymen in powder and plush, Sir Madoc leading the way with the Countess on his arm, her long sweeping skirt so stiff with brocade, that, as Caradoc whispered, it looked like our regimental colours.
Lady Estelle was committed to the care of a stout old gentleman, who was the exact counterpart of our host, and whose conversation, as it evidently failed to amuse, bored her. Miss Lloyd was led by Caradoc, and Dora fell to my care. Of the other ladies I took little heed; neither did I much of the sumptuous dinner, which passed away as other dinners do, through all its courses, with entrées and relays of various wines, the serving up of the latter proving in one sense a nuisance, from the absurd breaks caused thereby in the conversation. The buzz of voices was pretty loud at times, for many of the guests were country gentlemen, hale and hearty old fellows some of them, who laughed with right good will, not caring whether to do so was goodtonor not. But while listening to the lively prattle of Dora Lloyd, I could not refrain from glancing ever and anon to where Estelle Cressingham, looking so radiant, yet withal "so delicately white" in her complexion, her slender throat and dazzling shoulders, her thick dark hair and tiny ears, at which the diamond pendants sparkled, sat listening to her elderly bore, smiling assents from time to time out of pure complaisance, and toying with her fruit knife when the dessert came, her hands and arms seeming so perfect in form and colour, and on more than one occasion--when her mamma was engrossed by courteous old Sir Madoc, who could "talk peerage," and knew the quartering of arms better than the Garter King or Rouge Dragon--giving me a bright intelligent smile, that made my heart beat happily; all the more so that I had been afflicted by some painful suspicion of coldness in her first reception of me--a coldness rather deduced from her perfect self-possession--while I had been farther annoyed to find that her somewhat questionable admirer, Guilfoyle, was seated by her side, with a lady whose presence he almost ignored in his desire to be pleasing elsewhere. Yet, had it been otherwise, if anything might console a man for fancied coldness in the woman he loved, or for a partial separation from her by a few yards of mahogany, it should be the lively rattle of a lovely girl of eighteen; but while listening and replying to Dora, my thoughts and wishes were with another.
"I told you how it would be, Mr. Hardinge," whispered Dora; "that the staple conversation of the gentlemen, if it didn't run on the county pack, would be about horses and cattle, sheep, horned and South Down; or on the British Constitution, which must be a very patched invention, to judge by all they say of it."
I confessed inwardly that much of what went on around me was so provincial and local--the bishop's visitation, the--parish poor, crops and game, grouse and turnips--and proved such boredom that, but for the smiling girl beside me, with her waggish eyes and pretty ways, and the longing and hope to have more of the society of Lady Estelle, I could have wished myself back at the mess of the depôt battalion in Winchester. Yet this restlessness was ungrateful; for Craigaderyn was as much a home to me as if I had been a son of the house, and times there were when the girls, like their father, called me simply "Harry," by my Christian name.
The long and stately dining-room, like other parts of the house, was well hung with portraits. At one end was a full-length of Sir Madoc in his scarlet coat and yellow-topped boots, seated on his favourite bay mare, "Irish Jumper," with mane and reins in hand, a brass horn slung over his shoulder, and looking every inch like what he was--the M.F.H. of the county, trotting to cover. Opposite, of course, was his lady--it might almost have passed for a likeness of Winifred--done several years ago, her dress of puce velvet cut low to show her beautiful outline, but otherwise very full indeed, as she leaned in the approved fashion against a vase full of impossible flowers beside a column and draped curtain, in what seemed a windy and draughty staircase, a view of Snowdon in the distance. "Breed and blood," as Sir Madoc used to say, "in every line of her portrait, from the bridge of her nose to the heel of her slipper;" for she was a lineal descendant ofy Marchog gwyllt o' Cae Hywel, or "the wild Knight of Caehowel," a circumstance he valued more than all her personal merits and goodness of heart.
Some of Dora's remarks about the family portraits elicited an occasional glance of reprehension from the Dowager of Naseby, who thought such relics or evidences of descent were not to be treated lightly. On my enquiring who that lady in the very low dress with the somewhat dishevelled hair was, I had for answer, "A great favourite of Charles II., Mr. Hardinge--an ancestress of ours. Papa knows her name. There was some lively scandal about her, of course. And that is her brother beside her--he in the rose-coloured doublet and black wig. He was killed in a duel about a young lady--run clean through the heart by one of the Wynnes of Llanrhaidr, at the Ring in Hyde Park."
"When men risked their lives so, love must have been very earnest in those days," said Lady Estelle.
"And very fearful," said the gentler Winny. "It is said the lady's name was engraved on the blade of the sword that slew him."
"A duel! How delightful to be the heroine of a duel!" exclaimed the volatile Dora.
"And who is that pretty woman in the sacque and puffed cap?" asked Caradoc, pointing to a brisk-looking dame in a long stomacher. She was well rouged, ratherdécolletée, had a roguish kissing-patch in the corner of her mouth, and looked very like Dora indeed.
"Papa's grandmother, who insisted on wearing a white rose when she was presented to the Elector at St. James's," replied Dora; "and her marriage to the heir of Craigaderyn is chronicled in the fashion of the Georgian era, by gossipping Mr. Sylvanus Urban, as that of 'Mistress Betty Temple, an agreeable and modest young lady with 50,000l. fortune, from the eastward of Temple Bar.' I don't think people were such tuft-hunters in those days as they are now. Doyouthink so, Mr. Guilfoyle? O, I am sure, that if all we read in novels is true, there must have been more romantic marriages and much more honest love long ago than we find in society now. What do you say to this, Estelle?"
But the fair Estelle only fanned herself, and replied by a languid smile, that somehow eluded when it might have fallen onme. So while we lingered over the dessert (the pineapples, peaches, grapes, and so forth being all the produce of Sir Madoc's own hothouses), Dora resumed:
"And so, poor Harry Hardinge, in a few weeks more you will be far away from us, and face to face with those odious Russians--in a real battle, perhaps. It is something terrible to think of! Ah, heavens, if you should be killed!" she added, as her smile certainly passed away for a moment.
"I don't think somehow there is very much danger of that--at least I can but hope--"
"Or wounded! If you should lose a leg--two legs perhaps--"
"He could scarcely losemore," said Mr. Guilfoyle.
"And come home with wooden ones!" she continued, lowering her voice. "You will look so funny! O, I could never love or marry a man with wooden stumps!"
"But," said I, a little irritated that she should see anything so very amusing in this supposed contingency, "I don't mean to marryyou."
"Of course not--I know that. It is Winny, papa thinks--or is it Estelle Cressingham you prefer?"
Lowly and whispered though the heedless girl said this, it reached the ears of Lady Estelle, and caused her to grow if possible paler, while I felt my face suffused with scarlet; but luckily all now rose from the table, as the ladies, led by Winifred, filed back alone to the drawing-room; and I felt that Dora's too palpable hints must have done much to make or mar my cause--perhaps to gain me the enmity of both her sister and the Lady Estelle.
Sir Madoc assumed his daughter's place at the head of the table, and beckonedmeto take his chair at the foot. Owen Gwyllim replenished the various decanters and the two great silver jugs of claret and burgundy, and the flow of conversation became a little louder in tone, and of course less reserved. I listened now with less patience to all that passed around me, in my anxiety to follow the ladies to the drawing-room. Every moment spent out ofherpresence seemed doubly long and doubly lost. The chances of the coming war--whereour troops were to land, whether at Eupatoria or Perecop, or were to await an attack where they were literally rotting in the camp upon the Bulgarian shore; their prospects of success, the proposed bombardment of Cronstadt, the bewildering orders issued to our admirals, the inane weakness and pitiful vacillation, if not worse, of Lord Aberdeen's government, our total want of all preparation in the ambulance and commissariat services, even to the lack of sufficient shot, shell, and gunpowder--were all freely descanted on, and attacked, explained, or defended according to the politics or the views of those present; and Guilfoyle--who, on the strength of having been attaché at the petty German court of Catzenelnbogen, affected a great knowledge of continental affairs--indulged in much "tall talk" on the European situation till once more the county pack and hunting became the chief topic, and then too he endeavoured, but perhaps vainly, to take the lead.
"You talk of fox-hunting, gentlemen," said he, raising his voice after a preliminary cough, "and some of the anecdotes you tell of wonderful leaps, mistakes, and runs, with the cunning displayed by reynard on various occasions, such as hiding in a pool up to the snout, feigning death--a notion old as the days of Olaus Magnus--throwing dogs off the scent by traversing a running stream, and so forth, are all remarkable enough; but give me a good buck-hunt, such as I have seen in Croatia! When travelling there among the mountains that lie between Carlstadt and the Adriatic, I had the good fortune to reside for a few weeks with my kind friend Ladislaus Count Mosvina, Grand Huntsman to the Emperor of Austria, and captain of the German Guard of Arzieres, and who takes his title from that wine-growing district, the vintage of which is fully equal to the finest burgundy. The season was winter. The snow lay deep among the frightful valleys and precipices of the Vellibitch range, and an enormousrehbock, or roebuck, fully five feet in height to the shoulder, with antlers of vast size--five feet, if an inch, from tip to tip--driven from the mountains by the storm andla bora, the biting north-east wind, took shelter in a thicket near the house. Several shots were fired; but no one, not evenI, could succeed in hitting him, till at last he defiantly and coolly fed among the sheep, in the yard of the Count's home farm, where, by the use of his antlers, he severely wounded and disabled all who attempted to dislodge him. At last four of the Count's farmers or foresters--some of those Croatian boors who are liable to receive twenty-five blows of a cudgel yearly if they fail to engraft at least twenty-five fruit-trees--undertook to slay or capture the intruder. But though they were powerful, hardy, and brave men, this devil of arehbock, by successive blows of its antlers, fractured the skulls of two and the thigh-bones of the others, smashing them like tobacco-pipes, and made an escape to the mountains. A combined hunt was now ordered by my friend Mosvina, and all the gentlemen and officers in thegeneralator district commanded by him set off, mounted and in pursuit. There were nearly a thousand horsemen; but the cavalry there are small and weak.Iwas perhaps the best-mounted man in the field. We pursued it for twenty-five miles, by rocky hills and almost pathless woods, by ravines and rivers. Many of our people fell. Some got staked, were pulled from their saddles by trees, or tumbled off by running foul of wild swine. Many missed their way, grew weary, got imbogged in the half-frozen marshes, and so forth, till at last only the Count and I with four dogs were on his track, and when on it, we leaped no less than four frozen cataracts, each at least a hundred feet in height--'pon honour they were. We had gone almost neck and neck for a time; but the Grand Huntsman's horse began to fail him now (for we had come over terrible ground, most of it being uphill), and ultimately it fell dead lame. Then whoop--tally-ho! I spurred onward alone. Just as the furious giant was coming to bay in a narrow gorge, and, fastening on his flanks and neck, the maddened dogs were tearing him down, their red jaws steaming in the frosty air, the Count came up on foot, breathless and thoroughly blown, to have the honour of slaying this antlered monarch of the Dinovian Alps. But I was too quick for him. I had sprung from my horse, and with my unsheathedhansharor Croatian knife had flung myself, fearlessly and regardless of all danger, upon the buck, eluding a last and desperate butt made at me with his pointed horns. Another moment saw my knife buried to the haft in his throat, and a torrent of crimson blood flowing upon the snow, then I courteously tendered my weapon by the hilt to the Count, who, in admiration of my adroitness, presented me with this ring--a very fine brilliant, you may perceive--which his grandfather had received from the Empress Maria Theresa, and the pure gold of which is native, from the sand upon the banks of the Drave."
And as he concluded his anecdote, which he related with considerable pomposity and perfect coolness, he twirled round his finger this remarkable ring, of which I was eventually to hear more from time to time.
"So, out of a thousand Croatian horsemen,youwere the only one in at the death! It says little for their manhood," said an old fox-hunter, as he filled his glass with burgundy, and pretty palpably winked to Sir Madoc, under cover of an épergne.
"This may all be true, Harry, or not--onlyentre nous, I don't believe it is," said Phil Caradoc aside to me; "for who here knows anything of Croatia? He might as well talk to old Gwyllim the butler, or any chance medley Englishman, of the land of Memnon and the hieroglyphics. This fellow Guilfoyle beats Munchausen all to nothing; but did he not before tell somethingelseabout that ring?"
"I don't remember; but now, Phil, that you have seen her," said I, in a tone of tolerably-affected carelessness, "what do you think ofla belleCressingham?"
"She is very handsome, certainly," replied Phil, in the same undertone, and luckily looking at his glass, and not at me, "a splendid specimen of her class--a proud and by no means a bashful beauty."
"Most things in this world are prized just as they are difficult of attainment, or are scarce. I reckon beauty among these, and no woman holds it cheap," said I, not knowing exactly what to think of Caradoc's criticism. "There is Miss Lloyd, for instance--"
"Ah," said he, with honest animation, "she is a beauty too, but a gentle and retiring one--a girl that is all sweetness and genuine goodness of heart."
"With some dairy-farms in the midland counties, eh?"
"The graces of such a girl are always the most attractive. We men are so constituted that we are apt to decline admiration where it is loftily courted or seemingly expected--as I fear it is in the case of Lady Cressingham--and to bestow it on the gentle and retiring."
I felt there was much truth in my friend's remarks, and yet they piqued me so that I rather turned from him coldly for the remainder of the evening.
"Her mother is haughty, intensely ambitious, and looks forward to a title for her as high, if not higher, than that her father bore," I heard Sir Madoc say to a neighbour who had been talking on the same subject--the beauty of Lady, Estelle; "the old lady is half Irish and half Welsh."
"Rather a combustible compound, I should think," added Guilfoyle, as, after coffee and curaçoa, we all rose to join the ladies in the drawing-room.