CHAPTER XXVIBRIGHTON YEARS AGO
“You may never have occasion to read these lines, yet I come to my task from time to time to prepare them for you.
“Let me resume:
“I never was reconciled to my lonely life at Weirdwaste, but as the years passed on, and I grew toward womanhood the solitude and monotony of my surroundings pressed more and more heavily upon my health and spirits.
“My father in these years seemed almost to have forgotten me. He was with my mother on one of the islands of the Grecian Archipelago—for her health. My little brother—now a well-grown schoolboy—was at Rugby. You see, our family of four was scattered.
“About this time my health and spirits became so seriously affected that Dr. Alexander thought it necessary to call my father’s attention to the fact. He wrote to him, and in due time received an answer.
“It was something to this effect:
“‘As you recommend the south coast, you will please take the girl to Brighton, and take suitable lodgings for herself and her attendants. As she is no longer a child she must have more advanced teachers. Miss Murray may be retained as her companion or chaperon, but a French governess must be engaged for her.
“‘I leave all this to you. Our good vicar will be able to assist you.
“‘My son will join his sister at the seaside for the midsummer holidays. Draw on me for the necessary funds.’
“The prospect of any change filled my soul with delightful anticipations.
“It was now the middle of June. By the first of July I was established in delightful lodgings on the King’s Road, facing the sea.
“We had the whole of the first floor, consisting of a suit of eight rooms—drawing room, dining room, schoolroom, bathroom and four bedrooms.
“I was delighted with the gay vision of life and motion all around me; there seemed to be a perpetual gala.
“The splendor of the view from my front windows was not all the splendor of sea and sky; it was fleets of gayly decked craft, of all sizes and shapes, from the queenly yacht to the pretty little rowboats; and the pier, with its bazaars of toys, trinkets and jewelry; the bathing houses, the frolicsome children in the surf or on the sands, the brilliant crowds on the esplanade, the bands of music, the magnificent shops, with displays of sumptuous fabrics and splendid jewels, not to be surpassed in those of Paris or Constantinople.
“In fact, to me, who had never been in a town before—to me, coming from lonely and dreary Weirdwaste—Brighton was a dazzling, bewildering scene of light, life, gayety, splendor and magnificence.
“And if it was all this viewed only from the front windows of my lodgings, what was it, let me ask you, afterward, when my schoolboy brother and his friends came, full of high spirits, to make the most of our opportunities?
“On the second day after our installment at our lodgings we were joined by the French governess who had been engaged for me.
“She was a small, dark, middle-aged woman, with black hair, and sharp, black eyes. Her name was De la Champe—Madame de la Champe. Her last placehad been in the service of a duchess, whose last daughter having just been married, madame found herself under the necessity of seeking a new engagement, and had found one through the vicar’s answer to her advertisement.
“I did not like her, though she came so highly recommended. But my prejudice against the Frenchwoman was not the slightest drawback to my intense enjoyment of my new and delightful surroundings.
“On the fourth day after our arrival we were joined by my brother and his friend. My brother was then a bright lad of twelve, looking older than his years, because he was really a very precocious boy. He greeted me with the warmest affection, and promised me a ‘jolly old time.’ His friend was Angus Anglesea, a young man eight years his senior, who, however, had formed a strong attachment for the bright lad, and taken him under his protection.
“Angus Anglesea was at this time about twenty years of age; with a form of medium height, slender and fair, with light hair and mustache, and blue eyes. His appearance and manners were pleasing and attractive.
“I could not have believed any evil of him then.
“On the day after the arrival of my brother and his friend, the good doctor, who had accompanied us to Brighton, took his leave, after having warned my teachers that their office was, for the present, a sinecure, and that there were really to be no lessons for the next three months, or until my health should be fully reëstablished.
“After the doctor left our days were given up to enjoyment—walks on the esplanade, sails on the sea, bathing in the surf, drives along the coast, rides over the downs, saunters on the pier—a perpetual recurrence of delightful recreations, each one enhancing the pleasures of all the others.
“It seemed paradise to me. My brother lived withus, of course. Angus Anglesea had lodgings near us, and came every day to join in our amusements.
“The Eleventh Hussars were stationed at Brighton Barracks then, and the officers were often on parade. Anglesea was not at that time in the army. He received his commission afterward; but he knew a number of the officers, and introduced some of them to me. My French governess or my English teacher was always at my side on these occasions.
“So three enchanting months passed.
“My brother’s holidays were over, and he was now to go to Eton. My father’s London solicitor was charged with the duty of making all the arrangements for his entrance into college.
“On the fifteenth of September he left me, with the promise to return and spend the Christmas holidays with me, for I was to winter at Brighton.
“Angus Anglesea remained at Brighton. Friends and neighbors of his father’s, in Lancashire—the Earl and Countess of Middlemoor, with their only daughter—had arrived at their seaside home on Brunswick Terrace, and Anglesea had remained to see them. Even then he was reported to be engaged to the Lady Mary.
“Soon I heard that young Anglesea had left his lodgings and accepted the invitation of the earl and countess to make their house his home during his sojourn at the seaside.
“After this we did not see so much of young Anglesea.
“He came but seldom to our lodgings, and never joined us in our walks on the seaside. Whenever we chanced to meet him, he was in the company of the Middlemoors, either driving or walking with them.
“If Brighton had seemed to me the paradise of life and light, splendor and gayety, in the summer months, when the season was at its lowest ebb, what was it, ifyou please, in the early autumn, when the tide of wealth and fashion set in?
“No words of mine can describe my impression of it, my delight in it.
“The bijou of a theater and the elegant assembly rooms were opened for the season. The ‘paradise’ was one panorama of brilliant crowds. It was like nothing real to my simplicity.”