They arrived in the afternoon by a train which had been selected for them by instructions from Whiteladies; and no sooner had they reached the station than the evidence of a great reception made itself apparent. The very station was decorated as if for royalty. Just outside was an arch made of green branches, and sweet with white boughs of the blossomed May. Quite a crowd of people were waiting to welcome the travellers—the tenants before mentioned, not a very large band, the village people in a mass, the clergy, and several of the neighbors in their carriages, including the Farrel-Austins. Everybody who had any right to such a privilege pressed forward to shake hands with Herbert. “Welcome home!” they cried, cheering the young man, who was so much surprised and affected that he could scarcely speak to them. As for Reine, between crying and smiling, she was incapable of anything, and had to be almost lifted into the carriage. Kate and Sophy Farrel-Austin waved theirhandkerchiefs and their parasols, and called out, “Welcome, Bertie!” over the heads of the other people. They were all invited to a great dinner at Whiteladies on the next day, at which half the county was to be assembled; and Herbert and Reine were especially touched by the kind looks of their cousins. “I used not to like them,” Reine said, when the first moment of emotion was over, and they were driving along the sunny high-road toward Whiteladies; “it shows how foolish one’s judgments are;” while Herbert declared “they were always jolly girls, and, by Jove! as pretty as any he had seen for ages.” Everard did not say anything; but then they had taken no notice of him. He was on the back seat, not much noticed by any one; but Herbert and Reine were the observed of all observers. There were two or three other arches along the rural road, and round each a little group of the country folks, pleased with the little show, and full of kindly welcomes. In front of the Almshouses all the old people were drawn up, and a large text, done in flowers, stretched along the front of the old red-brick building. “I cried unto the Lord, and He heard me,” was the inscription; and trim old Dr. Richard, in his trim canonicals, stood at the gate in the centre of his flock when the carriage stopped.
Herbert jumped down amongst them with his heart full, and spoke to the old people; while Reine sat in the carriage, and cried, and held out her hands to her friends. Miss Augustine had wished to be there too, among the others who, she thought, had brought Herbert back to life by their prayers; but her sister had interposed strenuously, and this had been given up. When the Almshouses were passed there was another arch, the finest of all. It was built up into high columns of green on each side, and across the arch was the inscription, “As welcome as the flowers in May,” curiously worked in hawthorn blossoms, with dropping ornaments of the wild blue hyacinth from each initial letter. It was so pretty that they stopped the carriage to look at it, amid the cheers of some village people who clustered round, for it was close to the village. Among them stood a tall, beautiful young woman, in a black dress, with a rosy, fair-haired boy, whose hat was decorated with the same wreath of May and hyacinth. Even in that moment of excitement, both brother and sister remarked her. “Who was that lady?—you bowed to her,” said Reine, as soon as they hadpassed. “By Jove! how handsome she was!” said Herbert. Everard only smiled, and pointed out to them the servants about the gate of Whiteladies, and Miss Susan and Miss Augustine standing out in the sunshine in their gray gowns. The young people threw the carriage doors open at either side, and had alighted almost before it stopped. And then came that moment of inarticulate delight, when friends meet after a long parting, when questions are asked in a shower and no one answers, and the eyes that have not seen each other for so long look through and through the familiar faces, leaping to quick conclusions. Everard (whom no one took any notice of) kept still in the carriage, which had drawn up at the gate, and surveyed this scene from his elevation with a sense of disadvantage, yet superiority. He was out of all the excitement and commotion. Nobody could look at him, bronzed and strong, as if he had just come back from the edge of the grave; but from his position of vantage he saw everything. He saw Miss Susan’s anxious survey of Herbert, and the solemn, simple complaisance on poor Augustine’s face, who felt it was her doing—hers and that of her old feeble chorus in the Almshouses; and he saw Reine pause, with her arms round Miss Susan’s neck, to look her closely in the eyes, asking, “What is it? what is it?” not in words, but with an alarmed look. Everard knew, as if he had seen into her heart, that Reine had found out something strange in Miss Susan’s eyes, and thinking of only one thing that could disturb her, leaped with a pang to the conclusion that Herbert was not looking so well or so strong as she had supposed. And I think that Everard, in the curious intuition of that moment when he was nothing but an onlooker, discovered also, that though Miss Susan looked so anxiously at Herbert, she scarcely saw him, and formed no opinion about his health, having something else much more keen and close in her mind.
“And here is Everard too,” Miss Susan said; “he is not such a stranger as you others. Come, Everard, and help us to welcome them; and come in, Bertie, to your own house. Oh, how glad we all are to see you here!”
“Aunt Susan,” said Reine, whispering in her ear, “I see by your eyes that you think he is not strong still.”
“By my eyes?” said Miss Susan, too much confused by many emotions to understand; but she made no disclaimer, only put herhand over her eyebrows, and led Herbert to the old porch, everybody following almost solemnly. Such a home-coming could scarcely fail to be somewhat solemn as well as glad. “My dear,” she said, pausing on the threshold, “God bless you! God has brought you safe back when we never expected it. We should all say thank God, Bertie, when we bring you in at your own door.”
And she stood with her hand on his shoulder, and stretched up to him (for he had grown tall in his illness) and kissed him, with one or two tears dropping on her cheeks. Herbert’s eyes were wet too. He was very accessible to emotion; he turned round to the little group who were all so dear and familiar, with his lip quivering. “I have most reason of all to say, ‘Thank God;’ ” the young man said, with his heart full, standing there on his own threshold, which, a little while before, no one had hoped to see him cross again.
Just then the little gate which opened into Priory Lane, and was opposite the old porch, was pushed open, and two people came in. The jar of the gate as it opened caught everybody’s ear; and Herbert in particular, being somewhat excited, turned hastily to see what the interruption was. It was the lady to whom Everard had bowed, who had been standing under the triumphal arch as they passed. She approached them, crossing the lawn with a familiar, assured step, leading her child. Miss Susan, who had been standing close by him, her hand still fondly resting on Herbert’s shoulder, started at sight of the new-comer, and withdrew quickly, impatiently from his side; but the young man, naturally enough, had no eyes for what his old aunt was doing, but stood quite still, unconscious, in his surprise, that he was staring at the beautiful stranger. Reine, standing just behind him, stared too, equally surprised, but searching in her more active brain what it meant. Giovanna came straight up to the group in the porch. “Madame Suzanne?” she said, with a self-possession which seemed to have deserted the others. Miss Susan obeyed the summons with tremulous haste. She came forward growing visibly pale in her excitement. “Herbert,” she said, “and Reine,” making a pause after the words, “this is a—lady who is staying here. This is Madame Jean Austin from Bruges, of whom you have heard—”
“And her child,” said Giovanna, putting him forward.
“Madame Jean? who is Madame Jean?” said Herbert, whispering to his aunt, after he had bowed to the stranger. Giovanna was anxious about this meeting, and her ears were very sharp, and she heard the question. Her great black eyes shone, and she smiled upon the young man, who was more deeply impressed by her sudden appearance than words could say.
“Monsieur,” she said with a curtsey, smiling, “it is the little child who is the person to look at, not me. Me, I am simple Giovanna, the widow of Jean; nobody; but the little boy is most to you: he is the heir.”
“The heir?” said Herbert, turning a little pale. He looked round upon the others with bewilderment, asking explanations; then suddenly recollecting, said, “Ah, I understand; the next of kin that was lost. I had forgotten. Then, Aunt Susan, this ismyheir?”
“Yes,” she said, with blanched lips. She could not have uttered another word, had it been to deliver herself and the race from this burden forever.
Giovanna had taken the child into her arms. At this moment she swung him down lightly as a feather on to the raised floor of the porch, where they were all standing. “Jean,” she cried, “ton devoir!” The baby turned his blue eyes upon her, half frightened; then looked round the strange faces about him, struggling with an inclination to cry; then, mustering his faculties, took his little cap off with the gravity of a judge, and flinging it feebly in the air, shouted out, “Vive M. ’Erbert!” “Encore,” cried Giovanna. “Vive Monsieur ’Erbert!” said the little fellow loudly, with a wave of his small hand.
This little performance had a very curious effect upon the assembled party. Surprise and pleasure shone in Herbert’s eyes; he was quite captivated by this last scene of his reception; and even Everard, though he knew better, was charmed by the beautiful face and beautiful attitude of the young woman, who stood animated and blooming, like the leader of an orchestra, on the lawn outside. But Reine’s suspicions darted up like an army in ambush all in a moment, though she could not tell what she was suspicious of. As for Miss Susan, she stood with her arms dropped by her side, her face fallen blank. All expression seemed to have gone out from it, everything but a kind of weary pain.
“Who is she, Reine? Everard, who is she?” Herbert whispered anxiously, when, some time later, the three went off together to visit their childish haunts; the old playroom, the musicians’ gallery, the ancient corridors in which they had once frolicked. Miss Susan had come upstairs with them, but had left them for the moment. “Tell me, quick, before Aunt Susan comes back.”
“Ah!” cried Reine, with a laugh, though I don’t think she was really merry, “this is the old time back again, indeed, when we must whisper and have secrets as soon as Aunt Susan is away.”
“But who is she?” said Herbert. They had come into the gallery overlooking the hall, where the table was already spread for dinner. Giovanna was walking round it, with her child perched on her shoulder. At the sound of the steps and voices above she turned round, and waved her hand to them. “Vive Monsieur ’Erbert!” she sang, in a melodious voice which filled all the echoes. She was so strong that it was nothing to her to hold the baby poised on her shoulder, while she pointed up to the figures in the gallery and waved her hand to them. The child, bolder this time, took up his little shout with a crow of pleasure. The three ghosts in the gallery stood and looked down upon this pretty group with very mingled feelings. But Herbert, for his part, being very sensitive to all homage, felt a glow of pleasure steal over him. “When a man has a welcome like this,” he said to himself, “it is very pleasant to come home!”
“Me! I am nobody,” said Giovanna. “Ces dames have been very kind to me. I was the son’s widow, the left-out one at home. Does mademoiselle understand? But then you can never have been the left-out one—the one who was always wrong.”
“No,” said Reine. She was not, however, so much touched by this confidence as Herbert, who, though he was not addressed, was within hearing, and gave very distracted answers to Miss Susan, who was talking to him, by reason of listening to what Giovanna said.
“But I knew that the petit was not nobody, like me; and I brought him here. He is the next, till M. Herbert will marry, and have his own heirs. This is what I desire, mademoiselle, believe me—for now I love Viteladies, not for profit, but for love. It was for money I came at first,” she said with a laugh, “to live; but now I have de l’amitié for every one, even this old Stefen, who do not love me nor my child.”
She said this laughing, while Stevens stood before her with the tray in his hands, serving her with tea; and I leave the reader to divine the feelings of that functionary, who had to receive this direct shaft levelled at him, and make no reply. Herbert, whose attention by this time had been quite drawn away from Miss Susan, laughed too. He turned his chair round to take part in this talk, which was much more interesting than anything his aunt had to say.
“That was scarcely fair,” he said; “the man hearing you; for he dared not say anything in return, you know.”
“Oh, he do dare say many things!” said Giovanna. “I like to have my little revenge, me. The domestics did not like me at first, M. Herbert; I know not why. It is the nature of you other English not to love the foreigner. You are proud. You think yourselves more good than we.”
“Not so, indeed!” cried Herbert, eagerly; “just the reverse, I think. Besides, we are half foreign ourselves, Reine and I.”
“Whatever you may be, Herbert, I count myself pure English,” said Reine, with dignity. She was suspicious and disturbed, though she could not tell why.
“Mademoiselle has reason,” said Giovanna. “It is very fine to be English. One can feel so that one is more good than all the world! As soon as I can speak well enough, I shall say so too. I am of no nation at present, me—Italian born, Belge by living—and the Belges are not a people. They are a little French, a little Flemish, not one thing or another. I prefer to be English, too. I am Austin, like all you others, and Viteladies is my ’ome.”
This little speech made the others look at each other, and Herbert laughed with a curious consciousness. Whiteladies was his. He had scarcely ever realized it before. He did not even feel quite sure now that he was not here on a visit, his Aunt Susan’s guest. Was it the others who were his guests, all of them, from Miss Susan herself, who had always been the ‘Squire, down to this piquant stranger? Herbert laughed with a sense of pleasure and strangeness, and shy, boyish wonder whether he should say something about being glad to see her there, or be silent. Happily, he decided that silence was the right thing, and nobody spoke for the moment. Giovanna, however, who seemed to have taken upon her to amuse the company, soon resumed:
“In England it is not amusing, the Winter, M. Herbert. Ah, mon Dieu! what a consolation to make the garlands to build up the arch! Figure to yourself that I was up at four o’clock this morning, and all the rooms full of those pretty aubépines, which you call May. My fingers smell of it now; and look, how they are pricked!” she said, holding them out. She had a pretty hand, large like her person, but white and shapely, and strong. There was a force about it, and about the solid round white arm with which she had tossed about the heavy child, which had impressed Herbert greatly at the time; and its beauty struck him all the morenow, from the sense of strength connected with it—strength and vitality, which in his weakness seemed to him the grandest things in the world.
“Did you prick your fingers for me?” he said, quite touched by this devotion to his service; and but for his shyness, and the presence of so many people, I think he would have ventured to kiss the wounded hand. But as it was, he only looked at it, which Reine did also with a half-disdainful civility, while Everard peeped over her shoulder, half laughing. Miss Susan had pushed her chair away.
“Not for you altogether,” said Giovanna, frankly, “for I did not know you, M. Herbert; but for pleasure, and to amuse myself; and perhaps a little that you and mademoiselle might have de l’amitié for me when you knew. What is de l’amitié in English? Friendship—ah, that is grand, serious, not what I mean. And we must not say love—that is too much, that is autre chose.”
Herbert, charmed, looking at the beautiful speaker, thought she blushed; and this moved him mightily, for Giovanna was not like a little girl at a dance, an ingénue, who blushed for nothing. She was a woman, older than himself, and not pretty, but grand and great and beautiful; nor ignorant, but a woman who knew more of that wonderful “life” which dazzled the boy—a great deal more than he himself did, or any one here. That she should blush while she spoke to him was in some way an intoxicating compliment to Herbert’s own influence and manly power.
“You meanlike,” said Reine, who persistently acted the part of a wet blanket. “That is what we say in English, when it means something not so serious as friendship and not so close as love—a feeling on the surface; when you would say ‘Il me plait’ in French, in English you say ‘I like him.’ It means just that, and no more.”
Giovanna shrugged her shoulders with a little shiver. “Comme c’est froid, ça!” she said, snatching up Miss Susan’s shawl, which lay on a chair, and winding it round her. Miss Susan half turned round, with a consciousness that something of hers was being touched, but she said nothing, and her eye was dull and veiled. Reine, who knew that her aunt did not like her properties interfered with, was more surprised than ever, and half alarmed, though she did not know why.
“Ah, yes, it is cold, very cold, you English,” said Giovanna, unwinding the shawl again, and stretching it out behind her at the full extent of her white arms. How the red drapery threw out her fine head, with the close braids of black hair, wavy and abundant, twined round and round it, in defiance of fashion! Her hair was not at all the hair of the period, either in color or texture. It was black and glossy and shining, as dark hair ought to be; and she was pale, with scarcely any color about her except her lips. “Ah, how it is cold! Mademoiselle Reine, I will not saylike—I will say de l’amitié! It is more sweet. And then, if it should come to be love after, it will be more natural,” she said with a smile.
I do not know if it was her beauty, to which women are, I think, almost more susceptible than men, vulgar prejudice notwithstanding—or perhaps it was something ingratiating and sweet in her smile; but Reine’s suspicions and her coldness quite unreasonably gave way, as they had quite unreasonably sprung up, and she drew nearer to the stranger and opened her heart unawares, while the young men struck in, and the conversation became general. Four young people chattering all together, talking a great deal of nonsense, running into wise speculations, into discussions about the meaning of words, like and love, and de l’amitié!—one knows what a pleasant jumble it is, and how the talkers enjoy it; all the more as they are continually skimming the surface of subjects which make the nerves tingle and the heart beat. The old room grew gay with the sound of their voices, soft laughter, and exclamations which gave variety to the talk. Curious! Miss Susan drew her chair a little more apart. It was she who was the one left out. In her own house, which was not her own house any longer—in the centre of the kingdom where she had been mistress so long, but was no more mistress. She said to herself, with a little natural bitterness, that perhaps it was judicious and really kind, after all, on the part of Herbert and Reine, to do it at once, to leave no doubt on the subject, to supplant her then and there, keeping up no fiction of being her guests still, or considering her the head of the house. Much better, and on the whole more kind! for of course everything else would be a fiction. Her reign had been long, but it was over. The change must be made some time, and when so well, so appropriately as now? After awhile she went softly round behind the group, and secured her shawl. She didnot like her personal properties interfered with. No one had ever done it except this daring creature, and it was a thing Miss Susan was not prepared to put up with. She could bear the great downfall which was inevitable, but these small annoyances she could not bear. She secured her shawl, and brought it with her, hanging it over the back of her chair. But when she got up and when she reseated herself, no one took any notice. She was already supplanted and set aside, the very first night! It was sudden, she said to herself with a catching of the breath, but on the whole it was best.
I need not say that Reine and Herbert were totally innocent of any such intention, and that it was the inadvertence of their youth that was to blame, and nothing else. By-and-by the door opened softly, and Miss Augustine came in. She had been attending a special evening service at the Almshouses—a thanksgiving for Herbert’s return. She had, a curious decoration for her, a bit of flowering May in the waistband of her dress, and she brought in the sweet freshness of the night with her, and the scent of the hawthorn, special and modest gem of the May from which it takes its name. She broke up without any hesitation the lively group, which Miss Susan, sore and sad, had withdrawn from. Augustine was a woman of one idea, and had no room in her mind for anything else. Like Monsieur and Madame de Mirfleur, though in a very different way, many things were tout simple to her, against which many less single-minded persons broke their heads, if not their hearts.
“You should have come with me, Herbert,” she said, half disapproving. “You may be tired, but there could be nothing more refreshing than to give thanks. Though perhaps,” she added, folding her hands, “it was better that the thanksgiving should be like the prayers, disinterested, no personal feeling mixing in. Yes, perhaps that was best. Giovanna, you should have been there.”
“Ah, pardon!” said Giovanna, with a slight imperceptible yawn, “it was to welcome mademoiselle and monsieur that I stayed. Ah! the musique! Tenez! ma sœur, I will make the music with a very good heart, now.”
“That is a different thing,” said Miss Augustine. “They trusted to you—though to me the hymns they sing themselves aremore sweet than yours. One voice may be pleasant to hear, but it is but one. When all sing, it is like heaven, where that will be our occupation night and day.”
“Ah, ma sœur,” said Giovanna, “but there they will sing in tune, n’est ce pas, all the old ones? Tenez! I will make the music now.”
And with this she went straight to the piano, uninvited, unbidden, and began aTe Deumout of one of Mozart’s masses, the glorious rolling strains of which filled not only the room, but the house. Giovanna scarcely knew how to play; her science was all of the ear. She gave the sentiment of the music, rather than its notes—a reminiscence of what she had heard—and then she sang that most magnificent of hymns, pouring it forth, I suppose, from some undeveloped instinct of art in her, with a fervency and power which the bystanders were fain to think only the highest feeling could inspire. She was not bad, though she did many wrong things with the greatest equanimity; yet we know that she was not good either, and could not by any chance have really had the feeling which seemed to swell and tremble in her song. I don’t pretend to say how this was; but it is certain that stupid people, carnal and fleshly persons, sing thus often as if their whole heart, and that the heart of a seraph, was in the strain. Giovanna sang so that she brought the tears to their eyes. Reine stole away out from among the others, and put herself humbly behind the singer, and joined her soft voice, broken with tears, to hers. Together they appealed to prophets, and martyrs, and apostles, to praise the God who had wrought this deliverance, like so many others. Herbert, for whom it all was, hid his face in his clasped hands, and felt that thrill of awed humility, yet of melting, tender pride, with which the single soul recognizes itself as the hero, the object of such an offering. He could not face the light, with his eyes and his heart so full. Who was he, that so much had been done for him? And yet, poor boy, there was a soft pleased consciousness in his heart that there must be something in him, more than most, to warrant that which had been done. Augustine stood upright by the mantelpiece, with her arms folded in her sleeves, and her poor visionary soul still as usual. To her this was something like a legal acknowledgment—a receipt, so to speak, for value received. It was due to God, who, for certain inducementsof prayer, had consented to do what was asked of Him. She had already thanked Him, and with all her heart; and she was glad that every one should thank Him, that there should be no stint of praise. Miss Susan was the only one who sat unmoved, and even went on with her knitting. To some people of absolute minds one little rift within the lute makes mute all the music. For my part, I think Giovanna, though her code of truth and honor was very loose, or indeed one might say non-existent—and though she had schemes in her mind which no very high-souled person could have entertained—was quite capable of being sincere in her thanksgiving, and not at all incapable of some kinds of religious feeling; and though she could commit a marked and unmistakable act of dishonesty without feeling any particular trouble in her conscience, was yet an honest soul in her way. This is one of the paradoxes of humanity, which I don’t pretend to understand and cannot explain, yet believe in. But Miss Susan did not believe in it. She thought it desecration to hear those sacred words coming forth from this woman’s mouth. In her heart she longed to get up in righteous wrath, and turn the deceiver out of the house. But, alas! what could she do? She too was a deceiver, more than Giovanna, and dared not interfere with Giovanna, lest she should be herself betrayed; and last of all, and, for the moment, almost bitterest of all, it was no longer her house, and she had no right to turn any one out, or take any one in, any more forever!
“Who is she? Where did they pick her up? How do they manage to keep her here, a creature like that?” said Herbert to Everard, as they lounged together for half an hour in the old playroom, which had been made into a smoking-room for the young men. Herbert was of opinion that to smoke a cigar before going to bed was a thing that every man was called upon to do. Those who did not follow this custom were boys or invalids; and though he was not fond of it, he went through the ceremony nightly. He could talk of nothing but Giovanna, and it was with difficulty that Everard prevailed upon him to go to his room after all the emotions of the day.
“I want to know how they have got her to stay,” he said, trying to detain his cousin that he might go on talking on this attractive subject.
“You should ask Aunt Susan,” said Everard, not shrugginghis shoulders. He himself was impressed in this sort of way by Giovanna. He thought her very handsome, and very clever, giving her credit for a greater amount of wisdom than she really possessed, and setting down all she had done and all she had said to an elaborate scheme, which was scarcely true; for the dangerous point in Giovanna’s wiles was that they were half nature, something spontaneous and unconscious being mixed up in every one of them. Everard resolved to warn Miss Susan, and put her on her guard, and he groaned to himself over the office of guardian and protector to this boy which had been thrust upon him. The wisest man in the world could not keep a boy of three-and-twenty out of mischief. He had done his best for him, but it was not possible to do any more.
While he was thinking thus, and Herbert was walking about his room in a pleasant ferment of excitement and pleasure, thinking over all that had happened, and the flattering attention that had been shown to him on all sides, two other scenes were going on in different rooms, which bore testimony to a kindred excitement. In the first the chief actor was Giovanna, who had gone to her chamber in a state of high delight, feeling the ball at her feet, and everything in her power. She did not object to Herbert himself; he was young and handsome, and would never have the power to coerce and control her; and she had no intention of being anything but good to him. She woke the child, to whom she had carried some sweetmeats from the dessert, and played with him and petted him—a most immoral proceeding, as any mother will allow; for by the time she was sleepy, and ready to go to bed, little Jean was broad awake, and had to be frightened and threatened with black closets and black men before he could be hushed into quiet; and the untimely bon-bons made him ill. Giovanna had not thought of all that. She wanted some one to help her to get rid of her excitement, and disturbed the baby’s childish sleep, and deranged his stomach, without meaning him any harm. I am afraid, however, it made little difference to Jean that she was quite innocent of any evil intention, and indeed believed herself to be acting the part of a most kind and indulgent mother.
But while Giovanna was playing with the child, Reine stole into Miss Susan’s room to disburden her soul, and seek that private delight of talking a thing over which women love. Shestole in with the lightest tap, scarcely audible, noiseless, in her white dressing-gown, and light foot; and in point of fact Miss Susan did not hear that soft appeal for admission. Therefore she was taken by surprise when Reine appeared. She was seated in a curious blank and stupor, “anywhere,” not on her habitual chair by the side of the bed, where her table stood with her books on it, and where her lamp was burning, but near the door, on the first chair she had come to, with that helpless forlorn air which extreme feebleness or extreme preoccupation gives. She aroused herself with a look of almost terror when she saw Reine, and started from her seat.
“How you frightened me!” she said fretfully. “I thought you had been in bed. After your journey and your fatigue, you ought to be in bed.”
“I wanted to talk with you,” said Reine. “Oh, Aunt Susan, it is so long—so long since we were here; and I wanted to ask you, do you think he looks well? Do you think he looks strong? You have something strange in your eyes, Aunt Susan. Oh, tell me if you are disappointed—if he does not look so well as you thought.”
Miss Susan made a pause; and then she answered as if with difficulty, “Your brother? Oh, yes, I think he is looking very well—better even than I thought.”
Reine came closer to her, and putting one soft arm into hers, looked at her, examining her face with wistful eyes—“Then what is it, Aunt Susan?” she said.
“What is—what? I do not understand you,” cried Miss Susan, shifting her arm, and turning away her face. “You are tired, and you are fantastic, as you always were. Reine, go to bed.”
“Dear Aunt Susan,” cried Reine, “don’t put me away. You are not vexed with us for coming back?—you are not sorry we have come? Oh, don’t turn your face from me! You never used to turn from me, except when I had done wrong. Have we done wrong, Herbert or I?”
“No, child, no—no, I tell you! Oh, Reine, don’t worry me now. I have enough without that—I cannot bear any more.”
Miss Susan shook off the clinging hold. She roused herself and walked across the room, and put off her shawl, which she had drawn round her shoulders to come upstairs. She had not begunto undress, though Martha by this time was fast asleep. In the trouble of her mind she had sent Martha also away. She took off her few ornaments with trembling hands, and put them down on the table.
“Go to bed, Reine; I am tired too—forgive me, dear,” she said with a sigh, “I cannot talk to you to-night.”
“What is it, Aunt Susan?” said Reine softly, looking at her with anxious eyes.
“It is nothing—nothing! only I cannot talk to you. I am not angry; but leave me, dear child, leave me for to-night.”
“Aunt Susan,” said the girl, going up to her again, and once more putting an arm round her, “it is something about—thatwoman. If it is not us, it is her. Why does she trouble you?—why is she here? Don’t send me away, but tell me about her! Dear Aunt Susan, you are ill, you are looking so strange, not like yourself. Tell me—I belong to you. I can understand you better than any one else.”
“Oh, hush, hush, Reine; you don’t know what you are saying. It is nothing, child, nothing!Youunderstand me?”
“Better than any one,” cried the girl, “for I belong to you. I can read what is in your face. None of the others know, but I saw it. Aunt Susan, tell me—whisper—I will keep it sacred, whatever it is, and it will do you good.”
Miss Susan leaned her head upon the fragile young creature who clung to her. Reine, so slight and young, supported the stronger, older woman, with a force which was all of the heart and soul; but no words came from the sufferer’s lips. She stood clasping the girl close to her, and for a moment gave way to a great sob, which shook her like a convulsion. The touch, the presence, the innocent bosom laid against her own in all that ignorant instinctive sympathy which is the great mystery of kindred, did her good. Then she kissed the girl tenderly, and sent her away.
“God bless you, darling! though I am not worthy to say it—not worthy!” said the woman, trembling, who had always seemed to Reine the very emblem of strength, authority, and steadfast power.
She stole away, quite hushed and silenced, to her room. What could this be? Not worthy! Was it some religious panic that had seized upon Miss Susan—some horror of doubt and darkness, likethat which Reine herself had passed through? This was the only thing the girl could think of. Pity kept her from sleeping, and breathed a hundred prayers through her mind, as she lay and listened to the old clock, telling the hours with its familiar voice. Very familiar, and yet novel and strange—more strange than if she had never heard it before—though for many nights, year after year, it had chimed through her dreams, and woke her to many another soft May morning, more tranquil and more sweet even than this.
Nextday was the day of the great dinner to which Miss Susan had invited half the county, to welcome the young master of the house, and mark the moment of her own withdrawal from her long supremacy in Whiteladies. Though she had felt with some bitterness on the previous night the supposed intention of Herbert and Reine to supplant her at once, Miss Susan was far too sensible a woman to make voluntary vexation for herself, out of an event so well known and long anticipated. That she must feel it was of course inevitable, but as she felt no real wrong in it, and had for a long time expected it, there was not, apart from the painful burden on her mind which threw a dark shadow over everything, any bitterness in the necessary and natural event. She had made all her arrangements without undue fuss or publicity, and had prepared for herself, as I have said, a house, which had providentially fallen vacant, on the other side of the village, where Augustine would still be within reach of the Almshouses. I am not sure that, so far as she was herself concerned, the sovereign of Whiteladies, now on the point of abdication, would not have preferred to be a little further off, out of daily sight of her forsaken throne; but this would have deprived Augustine of all that made life to her, and Miss Susan was too strong, too proud, and too heroic, to hesitate for a moment, or to think her own sentiment worth indulging. Perhaps, indeed, even without that powerful argument of Augustine, she would have scorned to indulge a feeling which she could not have failed to recognize as a mean and petty one. She had her faults, like most people, and she had committed a great wrong, which clouded herlife, but there was nothing petty or mean about Miss Susan. After Reine had left her on the previous night, she had made a great effort, and recovered her self-command. I don’t know why she had allowed herself to be so beaten down. One kind of excitement, no doubt, predisposes toward another; and after the triumph and joy of Herbert’s return, her sense of the horrible cloud which hung over her personally, the revelation which Giovanna at any moment had it in her power to make, the evident intention she had of ingratiating herself with the new-comers, and the success so far of the attempt, produced a reaction which almost drove Miss Susan wild! If you will think of it, she had cause enough. She, heretofore an honorable and spotless woman, who had never feared the face of man, to lie now under the horrible risk of being found out—to be at the mercy of a passionate, impulsive creature, who could at any moment cover her with shame, and pull her down from her pedestal. I think that at such moments to have the worst happen, to be pulled down finally, to have her shame published to the world, would have been the best thing that could have happened to Miss Susan. She would then have raised up her humbled head again, and accepted her punishment, and raced the daylight, free from fear of anything that could befall her. The worst of it all now was this intolerable sense that there was something to be found out, that everything was not honest and open in her life, as it had always been. And by times this consciousness overpowered and broke her down, as it had done on the previous night. But when a vigorous soul is thus overpowered and breaks down, the moment of its utter overthrow marks a new beginning of power and endurance. The old fable of Antæus, who derived fresh strength whenever he was thrown, from contact with his mother earth, is profoundly true. Miss Susan had been thrown too, had fallen, and had rebounded with fresh force. Even Reine could scarcely see in her countenance next morning any trace of the emotion of last night. She took her place at the breakfast-table with a smile, with composure which was not feigned, putting bravely her burden behind her, and resolute to make steady head as long as she could against any storm that could threaten. Even when Herbert eluded that “business consultation,” and begged to be left free to roam about the old house, and renew his acquaintance with every familiar corner, she was able to accept the postponementwithout pain. She watched the young people go out even with almost pleasure—the brother and sister together, and Everard—and Giovanna at the head of the troop, with little Jean perched on her shoulder. Giovanna was fond of wandering about without any covering on her head, having a complexion which I suppose would not spoil, and loving the sun. And it suited her somehow to have the child on her shoulder, to toss him about, to the terror of all the household, in her strong, beautiful arms. I rather think it was because the household generally was frightened by this rough play, that Giovanna had taken to it; for she liked to shock them, not from malice, but from a sort of school-boy mischief. Little Jean, who had got over all his dislike to her, enjoyed his perch upon her shoulder; and it is impossible to tell how Herbert admired her, her strength, her quick, swift, easy movements, the lightness and grace with which she carried the boy, and all her gambols with him, in which a certain risk always mingled. He could not keep his eyes from her, and followed wherever she led, penetrating into rooms where, in his delicate boyhood, he had never been allowed to go.
“I know myself in every part,” cried Giovanna gayly. “I have all visited, all seen, even where it is not safe. It is safe here, M. Herbert. Come then and look at the carvings, all close; they are beautiful when you are near.”
They followed her about within and without, as if she had been the cicerone, though they had all known Whiteladies long before she had; and even Reine’s nascent suspicions were not able to stand before her frank energy and cordial ignorant talk. For she was quite ignorant, and made no attempt to conceal it.
“Me, I love not at all what is so old,” she said with a laugh. “I prefer the smooth wall and the big window, and a floor well frotté, that shines. Wood that is all cut like the lace, what good does that do? and brick, that is nothing, that is common. I love stone châteaux, with much of window, and little tourelles at the top. But if you love the wood, and the brick, très bien! I know myself in all the little corners,” said Giovanna. And outside and in, it was she who led the way.
Once again—and it was a thing which had repeatedly happened before this, notwithstanding the terror and oppression of her presence—Miss Susan was even grateful to Giovanna, who left her free to make all her arrangements, and amused and interested the new-comers,who were strangers in a sense, though to them belonged the house and everything in it; and I doubt if it had yet entered into her head that Giovanna’s society or her beauty involved any danger to Herbert. She was older than Herbert; she was “not a lady;” she was an intruder and alien, and nothing to the young people, though she might amuse them for the moment. The only danger Miss Susan saw in her was one tragic and terrible danger to herself, which she had determined for the moment not to think of. For everybody else she was harmless. So at least Miss Susan, with an inadvertence natural to her preoccupied mind, thought.
And there were a great many arrangements to make for the great dinner, and many things besides that required looking after. However distinctly one has foreseen the necessities of a great crisis, yet it is only when it arrives that they acquire their due urgency. Miss Susan now, for almost the first time, felt the house she had secured at the other end of the village to be a reality. She felt at last that her preparations were real, that the existence in which for the last six months there had been much that was like a painful dream, had come out suddenly into the actual and certain, and that she had had a change to undergo not much unlike the change of death. Things that had been planned only, had to be done now—a difference which is wonderful—and the stir and commotion which had come into the house with the arrival of Herbert was the preface of a commotion still more serious. And as Miss Susan went about giving her orders, she tried to comfort herself with the thought that now at last Giovanna must go. There was no longer any pretence for her stay. Herbert had come home. She had and could have no claim upon Susan and Augustine Austin at the Grange, whatever claim she might have on the inmates of Whiteladies; nor could she transfer herself to the young people, and live with Herbert and Reine. Even she, though she was not reasonable, must see that now there was no further excuse for her presence—that she must go. Miss Susan settled in her mind the allowance she would offer her. It would be a kind of blackmail, blood money, the price of her secret; but better that than exposure. And then, Giovanna had not been disagreeable of late. Rather the reverse; she had tried, as she said, to show de l’amitiè. She had been friendly, cheerful, rather pleasant, in her strange way. Miss Susan, with a curious feeling for which she could not quiteaccount, concluded with herself that she would not wish this creature, who had for so long belonged to her, as it were—who had been one of her family, though she was at the same time her enemy, her greatest trouble—to fall back unaided upon the shop at Bruges, where the people had not been kind to her. No; she would, she said to herself, be very thankful to get rid of Giovanna, but not to see her fall into misery and helplessness. She should have an income enough to keep her comfortable.
This was a luxury which Miss Susan felt she could venture to give herself. She would provide for her persecutor, and get rid of her, and be free of the panic which now was before her night and day. This thought cheered her as she went about, superintending the hanging of the tapestry in the hall, which was only put there on grand occasions, and the building up of the old silver on the great oak buffet. Everything that Whiteladies could do in the way of splendor was to be exhibited to-night. There had been no feast when Herbert came of age, for indeed it had been like enough that his birthday might be his death day also. But now all these clouds had rolled away, and his future was clear. She paid a solemn visit to the cellar with Stevens to get out the best wines, her father’s old claret and Madeira, of which she had been so careful, saving it for Herbert; or if not for Herbert, for Everard, whom she had looked upon as her personal heir. Not a bottle of it should ever have gone to Farrel-Austin, the reader may be sure, though she was willing to feast him to-night, and give him of her best, to celebrate her triumph over him—a triumph which, thank heaven! was all innocent, not brought about by plotting or planning—God’s doing, and not hers.
I will not attempt to describe all the company, the best people in that corner of Berkshire, who came from all points, through the roads which were white and sweet with May, to do honor to Herbert’s home-coming. It is too late in this history, and there is too much of more importance to tell you, to leave me room for those excellent people. Lord Kingsborough was there, and proposed Herbert’s health; and Sir Reginald Parke, and Sir Francis Rivers, and the Hon. Mr. Skindle, who married Lord Markinhead’s daughter, Lady Cordelia; and all the first company in the county, down to (or up to) the great China merchant who had bought St. Dunstan’s, once the property of a Howard. It is rare to see a dinner-party so large or so important, and still more rare to see such a room so filled. The old musicians’ gallery was put to its proper use for the first time for years; and now and then, not too often, a soft fluting and piping and fiddling came from the partial gloom, floating over the heads of the well-dressed crowd who sat at the long, splendid table, in a blaze of light and reflection, and silver, and crystal, and flowers.
“I wish we could be in the gallery to see ourselves sitting here, in this great show,” Everard whispered to Reine as he passed her to his inferior place; for it was not permitted to Everard on this great occasion to hand in the young mistress of the house, in whose favor Miss Susan intended, after this night, to abdicate. Reine looked up with soft eyes to the dim corner in which the three used to scramble and rustle, and catch the oranges, and I fear thought more of this reminiscence than of what her companion said to her, who was ignorant of the old times. But, indeed, the show was worth seeing from the gallery, where old Martha, and young Jane, and the good French Julie, who had come with Reine, clustered in the children’s very corner, keeping out of sight behind the tapestry, and pointing out to each other the ladies and their fine dresses. The maids cared nothing about the gentlemen, but shook their heads over Sophy and Kate’s bare shoulders, and made notes of how the dresses were made. Julie communicated her views on the subject with an authority which her auditors received without question, for was not she French?—a large word, which takes in the wilds of Normandy as well as Paris, that centre of the civilized world.
Herbert sat with his back to these eager watchers, at the foot of the table, taking his natural place for the first time, and half hidden by the voluminous robes of Lady Kingsborough and Lady Rivers. The pinkgros grainof one of those ladies and the gorgeous whitemoireof the other dazzled the women in the gallery; but apart from such professional considerations, the scene was a charming one to look at, with the twinkle of the many lights, the brightness of the flowers and the dresses—the illuminated spot in the midst of the partial darkness of the old walls, all gorgeous with color, and movement, and the hum of sound. Miss Susan at the head of the table, in her old point lace, looked like a queen, Martha thought. It was her apotheosis, her climax, the concludingtriumph—a sort of phœnix blaze with which she meant to end her life.
The dinner was a gorgeous dinner, worthy the hall and the company; the wine, as I have said, old and rare; and everything went off to perfection. The Farrel-Austins, who were only relations, and not of first importance as county people, sat about the centre of the table, which was the least important place, and opposite to them was Giovanna, who had been put under the charge of old Dr. Richard, to keep her in order, a duty to which he devoted all his faculties. Everything went on perfectly well. The dinner proceeded solemnly, grandly, to its conclusion. Grace—that curious, ill-timed, after-dinner grace which comes just at the daintiest moment of the feast—was duly said; the fruits were being served, forced fruits of every procurable kind, one of the most costly parts of the entertainment at that season; and a general bustle of expectation prepared the way for those congratulatory and friendly speeches, welcomes of his great neighbors to the young Squire, which were the real objects of the assembly. Lord Kingsborough even had cleared his throat for the first time—a signal which his wife heard at the other end, and understood as an intimation that quietness was to be enforced, to which she replied by stopping, to set a good example, in the midst of a sentence. He cleared his throat again, the great man, and was almost on his legs. He was by Miss Susan’s side in the place of honor. He was a stout man, requiring some pulling up after dinner when his chair was comfortable—and he had actually put forth one foot, and made his first effort to rise, for the third time clearing his throat.
When—an interruption occurred never to be forgotten in the annals of Whiteladies. Suddenly there was heard a patter of small feet, startling the company; and suddenly a something, a pygmy, a tiny figure, made itself visible in the centre of the table. It stood up beside a great pyramid of flowers, a living decoration, with a little flushed rose-face and flaxen curls showing above the mass of greenery. The great people at the head and the foot of the table stood breathless during the commotion and half-scuffle in the centre of the room which attended this sudden apparition. “What is it?” everybody asked. After that first moment of excited curiosity, it became apparent that it was a child who hadbeen suddenly lifted by some one into that prominent place. The little creature stood still a moment, frightened; then, audibly prompted, woke to its duty. It plucked from its small head a small velvet cap with a white feather, and gave forth its tiny shout, which rang into the echoes.
“Vive M. ’Erbert! vive M. ’Erbert!” cried little Jean, turning round and round, and waving his cap on either side of him. Vague excitement and delight, and sense of importance, and hopes of sugar-plums, inspired the child. He gave forth his little shout with his whole heart, his blue eyes dancing, his little cheeks flushed; and I leave the reader to imagine what a sensation little Jean’s unexpected appearance, and still more unexpected shout, produced in the decorous splendor of the great hall.
“Who is it?” “What is it?” “What does it mean?” “Who is the child?” “What does he say?” cried everybody. There got up such a commotion and flutter as dispersed in a moment the respectful silence which had been preparing for Lord Kingsborough. Every guest appealed to his or her neighbor for information, and—except the very few too well-informed, like Dr. Richard, who guilty and self-reproachful, asking himself how he could have prevented it, and what he should say to Miss Susan, sat silent, incapable of speech—every one sent back the question. Giovanna, calm and radiant, alone replied, “It is the next who will succeed,” she cried, sending little rills of knowledge on either side of her. “It is Jean Austin, the little heir.”
Lord Kingsborough was taken aback, as was natural; but he was a good-natured man, and fond of children. “God bless us!” he said. “Miss Austin, you don’t mean to tell me the boy’s married, and that’s his heir?”
“It is the next of kin,” said Miss Susan, with white lips; “no morehisheir than I am, buttheheir, if Herbert had not lived. Lord Kingsborough, you will forgive the interruption; you will not disappoint us. He is no more Herbert’s heir than I am!” again she cried, with a shiver of agitation.
It was the Hon. Mr. Skindle who supported her on the other side; and having heard that there was madness in the Austin family, that gentleman was afraid. “ ‘Gad, she looked as if she would murder somebody,” he confided afterward to the friend who drove him home.
“Nothisheir, buttheheir,” said Lord Kingsborough, good-humoredly, “a fine distinction!” and as he was a kind soul, he made another prodigious effort, and got himself out of his seat. He made a very friendly, nice little speech, saying that the very young gentleman who preceded him had indeed taken the wind out of his sails, and forestalled what he had to say; but that, nevertheless, as an old neighbor and family friend, he desired to echo in honest English, and with every cordial sentiment, their little friend’s effective speech, and to wish to Herbert Austin, now happily restored to his home in perfect health and vigor, everything, etc.
He went on to tell the assembly what they knew very well; that he had known Herbert’s father and grandfather, and had the happiness of a long acquaintance with the admirable ladies who had so long represented the name of Austin among them; and to each he gave an appropriate compliment. In short, his speech composed the disturbed assembly, and brought everything back to the judicious level of a great dinner; and Herbert made his reply with modest self-possession, and the course of affairs, momentarily interrupted, flowed on again according to the programme. But in the centre of the table, where the less important people sat, Giovanna and the child were the centre of attraction. She caught every one’s eye, now that attention had been called to her. After he had made the necessary sensation, she took little Jean down from the table, and set him on the carpet, where he ran from one to another, collecting the offerings which every one was ready to give him. Sophy and Kate got hold of him in succession, and crammed him with bonbons, while their father glared at the child across the table. He made his way even so far as Lord Kingsborough, who took him on his knee and patted his curly head. “But the little chap should be in bed,” said the kind potentate, who had a great many of his own. Jean escaped a moment after, and ran behind the chairs in high excitement to the next who called him. It was only when the ladies left the room that Giovanna caught him, and swinging him up to her white shoulder, which was not half so much uncovered as Kate’s and Sophy’s, carried him away triumphant, shouting once more “Vive M. ’Erbert!” from that eminence, as he finally disappeared at the great door.
This was Giovanna’s first appearance in public, but it was a memorable one. Poor old Dr. Richard, half weeping, secured Everard as soon as the ladies were gone, and poured his pitiful story into his ears.
“What could I do, Mr. Austin?” cried the poor little, pretty old gentleman. “She took him up before I could think what she was going to do; and you cannot use violence to a lady, sir, you cannot use violence, especially on a festive occasion like this. I should have been obliged to restrain her forcibly, if at all, and what could I do?”
“I am sure you did everything that was necessary,” said Everard, with a smile. She was capable of setting Dr. Richard himself on the table, if it had served her purpose, instead of being restrained by him, was what he thought.
Theevening came to an end at last. The great people went first, as became them, filling the rural roads with the ponderous rumble of their great carriages and gleam of their lamps. The whole neighborhood was astir. A little crowd of village people had collected round the gates to see the ladies in their fine dresses, and to catch the distant echo of the festivities. There was quite an excitement among them, as carriage after carriage rolled away. The night was soft and warm and light, the moon invisible, but yet shedding from behind the clouds a subdued lightness into the atmosphere. As the company dwindled, and ceremony diminished, a group gradually collected in the great porch, and at last this group dwindled to the family party and the Farrel-Austins, who were the last to go away. This was by no means the desire of their father, who had derived little pleasure from the entertainment. None of those ulterior views which Kate and Sophy had discussed so freely between themselves had been communicated to their father, and he saw nothing but the celebration of his own downfall, and the funeral of his hopes, in this feast, which was all to the honor of Herbert. Consequently, he had been eager to get away at the earliest moment possible, and would even have preceded Lord Kingsborough, could he have moved his daughters, who did not share his feelings. On the contrary, the display which they had just witnessed had produced a very sensible effect upon Kate and Sophy. They were very well off, but they did not possess half the riches of Whiteladies; and the grandeur of the stately old hall, and the importance of the party, impressed these young women of the world. Sophy, who was the younger, was naturally the less affected; but Kate, now five-and-twenty, and beginning to perceive very distinctlythat all is vanity, was more moved than I can say. In the intervals of livelier intercourse, and especially during that moment in the drawing-room when the gentlemen were absent—a moment pleasing in its calm to the milder portion of womankind, but which fast young ladies seldom endure with patience—Kate made pointed appeals to her sister’s proper feelings.
“If you let all this slip through your fingers, I shall despise you,” she said with vehemence.
“Go in for it yourself, then,” whispered the bold Sophy; “I shan’t object.”
But even Sophy was impressed. Her first interest, Lord Alf, had disappeared long ago, and had been succeeded by others, all very willing to amuse themselves and her, as much as she pleased, but all disappearing in their turn to the regions above, or the regions below, equally out of Sophy’s reach, whom circumstances shut out from the haunts of blacklegs and sporting men, as well as from the upper world, to which the Lord Alfs of creation belong by nature. Still it was not in Sophy’s nature to be so wise as Kate. She was not tired of amusing herself, and had not begun yet to pursue her gayeties with a definite end. Sophy told her friends quite frankly that her sister was “on the look-out.” “She has had her fun, and she wants to settle down,” the younger said with admirable candor, to the delight and much amusement of her audiences from the Barracks. For this these gentlemen well knew, though both reasonable and virtuous in a man, is not so easily managed in the case of a lady. “By Jove! I shouldn’t wonder if she did,” was their generous comment. “She has had her fun, by Jove! and who does she suppose would haveher?” Yet the best of girls, and the freshest and sweetest, do have these heroes, after a great deal more “fun” than ever could have been within the reach of Kate; for there are disabilities of women which cannot be touched by legislation, and to which the most strong-minded must submit.
However, Sophy and Kate, as I have said, were both moved to exertion by this display of all the grandeur of Whiteladies. They kept their father fuming and fretting outside, while they lingered in the porch with Reine and Herbert. The whole youthful party was there, including Everard and Giovanna, who had at last permitted poor little Jean to be put to bed, but who wasstill excited by her demonstration, and the splendid company of which she had formed a part.
“How they are dull, these great ladies!” she cried; “but not more dull than ces messieurs, who thought I was mad. Mon Dieu! because I was happy about M. ’Erbert, and that he had come home.”
“It was very grand of you to be glad,” cried Sophy. “Bertie, you have gone and put everybody out. Why did you get well, sir? Papa pretends to be pleased, too, but he would like to give you strychnine or something. Oh, it wouldn’t do us any good, we are only girls; and I think you have a better right than papa.”
“Thanks for taking my part,” said Herbert, who was a little uncertain how to take this very frank address. A man seldom thinks his own problematical death an amusing incident; but still he felt that to laugh was the right thing to do.
“Oh, of course we take your part,” cried Sophy. “We expect no end of fun from you, now you’ve come back. I am so sick of all those Barrack parties; but you will always have something going on, won’t you? And Reine, you must ask us. How delicious a dance would be in the hall! Bertie, remember you are to go to Ascot withus; you areourcousin, not any one else’s. When one is related to the hero of the moment, one is not going to let one’s glory drop. Promise, Bertie! you go with us?”
“I am quite willing, if you want me,” said Herbert.
“Oh, if we want you!—of course we want you—we want you always,” cried Sophy. “Why, you are the lion; we are proud of you. We shall want to let everybody see that you don’t despise your poor relations, that you remember we are your cousins, and used to play with you. Don’t you recollect, Bertie? Kate and Reine used to be the friends always, because they were the steadiest; and you and me—we were the ones who got into scrapes,” cried Sophy. This, to tell the truth, was a very rash statement; for Herbert, always delicate, had not been in the habit of getting into scrapes. But all the more for this, he was pleased with the idea.
“Yes,” he said half doubtfully, “I recollect;” but his recollections were not clear enough to enter into details.
“Come, let us get into a scrape again,” cried Sophy; “it issuch a lovely night. Let us send the carriage on in front, and walk. Come with us, won’t you? After a party, it is so pleasant to have a walk; and we have been such swells to-night. Come, Bertie, let’s run on, and bring ourselves down.”
“Sophy, you madcap! I daresay the night air is not good for him,” said Kate.
Upon which Sophy broke forth into the merriest laughter. “As if Bertie cared for the night air! Why, he looks twice as strong as any of us. Will you come?”
“With all my heart,” said Herbert; “it is the very thing after such a tremendous business as Aunt Susan’s dinner. This is not the kind of entertainment I mean to give. We shall leave the swells, as you say, to take care of themselves.”
“And ask me!” said bold Sophy, running out into the moonlight, which just then got free of the clouds. She was in high spirits, and pleased with the decided beginning she had made. In her white dress, with her white shoes twinkling over the dark cool greenness of the grass, she looked like a fairy broken forth from the woods. “Who will run a race with me to the end of the lane?” she cried, pirouetting round and round the lawn. How pretty she was, how gay, how light-hearted—a madcap, as her sister said, who stood in the shadow of the porch laughing, and bade Sophy recollect that she would ruin her shoes.
“And you can’t run in high heels,” said Kate.
“Can’t I?” cried Sophy. “Come, Bertie, come.” They nearly knocked down Mr. Farrel-Austin, who stood outside smoking his cigar, and swearing within himself, as they rushed out through the little gate. The carriage was proceeding abreast, its lamps making two bright lines of light along the wood, the coachman swearing internally as much as his master. The others followed more quietly—Kate, Reine, and Everard. Giovanna, yawning, had withdrawn some time before.
“Sophy, really, is too great a romp,” said Kate; “she is always after some nonsense; and now we shall never be able to overtake them, to talk to Bertie about coming to the Hatch. Reine, you must settle it. We do so want you to come; consider how long it is since we have seen you, and of course everybody wants to see you; so unless we settle at once, we shall miss our chance—Everard too. We have been so long separated; and perhaps,”said Kate, dropping her voice, “papa may have been disagreeable; but that don’t make any difference to us. Say when you will come; we are all cousins together, and we ought to be friends. What a blessing when there are no horrible questions of property between people!” said Kate, who had so much sense. “Nowit don’t matter to any one, except for friendship, who is next of kin.”
“Bertie has won,” said Sophy, calling out to them. “Fancy! I thought I was sure, such a short distance; men can stay better than we can,” said the well-informed young woman; “but for a little bit like this, the girl ought to win.”
“Since you have come back, let us settle about when they are to come,” said Kate; and then there ensued a lively discussion. They clustered all together at the end of the lane, in the clear space where there were no shadowing trees—the two young men acting as shadows, the girls all distinct in their pretty light dresses, which the moon whitened and brightened. The consultation was very animated, and diversified by much mirth and laughter, Sophy being wild, as she said, with excitement, with the stimulation of the race, and of the night air and the freedom. “After a grand party of swells, where one has to behave one’s self,” she said, “one always goes wild.” And she fell to waltzing about the party. Everard was the only one of them who had any doubt as to the reality of Sophy’s madcap mood; the others accepted it with the naive confidence of innocence. They said to each other, what a merry girl she was! when at last, moved by Mr. Farrel-Austin’s sulks and the determination of the coachman, the girls permitted themselves to be placed in the carriage. “Recollect Friday!” they both cried, kissing Reine, and giving the most cordial pressure of the hand to Herbert. The three who were left stood and looked after the carriage as it set off along the moonlit road. Reine had taken her brother’s arm. She gave Everard no opportunity to resume that interrupted conversation on board the steamboat. And Kate and Sophy had not been at all attentive to their cousin, who was quite as nearly related to them as Bertie, so that if he was slightly misanthropical and inclined to find fault, it can scarcely be said that he had no justification. They all strolled along together slowly, enjoying the soft evening and the suppressed moonlight, which was now dim again, struggling faintly through a mysterious labyrinth of cloud.
“I had forgotten what nice girls they were,” said Herbert; “Sophy especially; so kind and so genial and unaffected. How foolish one is when one is young! I don’t think I liked them, even, when we were last here.”
“They are sometimes too kind,” said Everard, shrugging his shoulders; but neither of the others took any notice of what he said.
“One is so much occupied with one’s self when one is young,” said middle-aged Reine, already over twenty, and feeling all the advantages which age bestows.
“Do you think it is that?” said Herbert. He was much affected by the cordiality of his cousins, and moved by many concurring causes to a certain sentimentality of mind; and he was not indisposed for a little of that semi-philosophical talk which sounds so elevating and so improving at his age.
“Yes,” said Reine, with confidence; “one is so little sure of one’s self, one is always afraid of having done amiss; things you say sound so silly when you think them over. I blush sometimes now when I am quite alone to think how silly I must have seemed; and that prevents you doing justice to others; but I like Kate best.”
“And I like Sophy best. She has no nonsense about her; she is so frank and so simple. Which is Everard for? On the whole, there is no doubt about it, English girls have a something, a je ne sais quoi—”
“I can’t give any opinion,” said Everard laughing. “After your visit to the Hatch you will be able to decide. And have you thought what Aunt Susan will say, within the first week, almost before you have been seen at home?”
“By Jove! I forgot Aunt Susan!” cried Herbert with a sudden pause; then he laughed, trying to feel the exquisite fun of asking Aunt Susan’s permission, while they were so independent of her; but this scarcely answered just at first. “Of course,” he added, with an attempt at self-assertion, “one cannot go on consulting Aunt Susan’s opinion forever.”
“But the first week!” Everard had all the delight of mischief in making them feel the subordination in which they still stood in spite of themselves. He went on laughing. “I would not say anything about it to-night. She is not half pleased withMadame Jean, as they call her. I hope Madame Jean has been getting it hot. Everything went off perfectly well by a miracle, but that woman as nearly spoiled it by her nonsense and her boy—”
“Whom do you call that woman?” said Herbert coldly. “I think Madame Jean did just what a warm-hearted person would do. She did not wait for mere ceremony or congratulations prearranged. For my part,” said Herbert stiffly, “I never admired any one so much. She is the most beautiful, glorious creature!”
“There was no one there so pretty,” said innocent Reine.
“Pretty! she is not pretty: she is splendid! she is beautiful! By Jove! to see her with her arm raised, and that child on her shoulder—it’s like a picture! If you will laugh,” said Herbert pettishly, “don’t laugh in that offensive way! What have they done to you, and why are you so disagreeable to-night?”
“Am I disagreeable?” said Everard laughing again. It was all he could do to keep from being angry, and he felt this was the safest way. “Perhaps it is that I am more enlightened than you youngsters. However beautiful a woman may be (and I don’t deny she’s very handsome), I can see when she’s playing a part.”
“What part is she playing?” cried Herbert hotly. Reine was half frightened by his vehemence, and provoked as he was by Everard’s disdainful tone; but she pressed her brother’s arm to restrain him, fearful of a quarrel, as girls are so apt to be.
“I suppose you will say we are all playing our parts; and so we are,” said Reine. “Bertie, you have been the hero to-night, and we are all your satellites for the moment. Come in quick, it feels chilly. I don’t suppose even Everard would say Sophy was playing a part, except her natural one,” she added with a laugh.
Everard was taken by surprise. He echoed her laugh with all the imbecility of astonishment. “You believe in them too,” he said to her in an aside, then added, “No, only her natural part,” with a tone which Herbert found as offensive as the other. Herbert himself was in a state of flattered self-consciousness which made him look upon every word said against his worshippers as an assault upon himself. Perhaps the lad being younger than his years, was still at the age when a boy is more in love with himself than any one else, and loves others according to their appreciation of that self which bulks so largely in his own eyes. Giovanna’s homage to him, and Sophy’s enthusiasm of cousinship, and the flattering look in all these fine eyes, had intoxicated Herbert. He could not but feel that they were above all criticism, these young, fair women, who did such justice to his own excellences. As for any suggestion that their regard for him was not genuine, it was as great an insult to him as to them, and brought him down, in the most humbling way, from the pedestal on which they had elevated him. Reine’s hand patting softly on his arm kept him silent, but he felt that he could knock down Everard with pleasure, and fumes of anger and self-exaltation mounted into his head.