They had not made more than a quarter of a mile, when the tramp of hoofs
and trundle of wheels caused them to turn round with an exclamation of
surprise that the coach should so speedily have recovered itself. A
first glance showed them, however, that the vehicle advancing toward
them was a private carriage. Two of the horses carried postilions; the
carriage was painted red and black; and as it drew near a coat of arms
was seen emblazoned on the door-panel. The turn-out evidently belonged
to a person of quality, and there was something in its aspect which
suggested a foreign nationality. The two gentlemen stood on one side to
let it pass. As it did so, Mr. Grant said, “The lady looked at you as if
she knew you.”
“Me! a lady?” returned Lancaster, who had been so occupied in watching
the fine action of one of the leaders, as to have had no eyes for the
occupants of the carriage.
As he spoke the carriage stopped a few rods beyond them, and a lady, who
was neither young nor beautiful, put her head out of the window and
motioned to Lancaster with her lifted finger. Muttering an apology to
his companion, the young man strode forward, wondering what new
adventure might be in store for him. But on reaching the carriage-door
his wonder came to an end. There were two ladies inside, and only one of
them was unbeautiful. The other was young and in every way attractive.
Her appearance and manner were those of a personage of distinction, but
her fair visage was alive with a subtle luminousness and mobility of
expression which made formality in her seem a playful grace rather than
an artificial habit. The margin of her face was swathed in the soft
folds of a silken hood, but a strand of reddish hair curled across her
white forehead, and a pair of dark, swift-moving and very penetrating
eyes met with a laughing sparkle the eyes of Lancaster. He doffed his
hat.
“Madame la Marquise! In England! Where is Monsieur?--”
“Hush! You are the same as ever--you meet me after six months, and
instead of saying you are glad to see me, you ask where is the Marquis!
_Ma foi!_ don’t know where he is.”
“Surely Madame la Marquise does not need to be told how glad I am--”
“Pshaw! Don’t ‘Madame la Marquise’ me, Philip Lancaster! Are we not old
friends--old enough, eh? Tell me what you were doing walking along this
road with that shabby old man?”
“Old gentleman, Madame la Marquise. The coach was upset--”
“What! You were on that coach that we passed just now in the ditch? You
were not hurt?”
“If it had not been for this shabby old gentleman I might have been a
cripple for life.”
“Oh! I beg his pardon. Where do you go, then? To London?”
“Not so far. I shall look for lodgings in Hammersmith.”
“Nonsense! Hammersmith? I never heard of such a place. What should you
do there? You will live in London--near me--_n’est-ce pas_?”
“I have work to do. I must keep out of society for the present. You--”
“Listen! For the present, I keep out of society also. I am incognito. No
one knows I am here; no one will know till the time comes. We shall
keep each other’s secrets. But we cannot converse here. Get in here
beside me, and on the way I will tell you ... something! Come.”
“You are very kind, but I have made my arrangements; and, besides, I am
engaged to walk with this gentleman. If you will tell me where I may pay
my respects to you and Monsieur le Marquis--”
“You are very stupid! I shall tell you nothing unless you come into the
carriage. Monsieur le Marquis is not here--he never will be here. I am
... well you need not stare so. What do you suppose I am, then?”
“You are very mysterious.”
“I am nothing of the sort. I am ... a widow. There!”
Philip Lancaster lifted his eyebrows and bowed.
“What does that mean?” demanded the Marquise sharply; “that you
congratulate me?”
“By no means, Madame.”
She drew herself up haughtily, and eyed him for a moment. “It appears
that your coach has upset you in more ways than one. I apologize for
interrupting you in your walk. Beyond doubt, your friend there is very
charming. You are impatient to say farewell to me.”
“Nothing more than ‘_au revoir_,’ I hope.”
She let her haughtiness slip from her like a garment, and, leaning
forward, she touched with her soft fingers his hand which rested upon
the carriage door.
“You will come here and sit beside me, Philip? Yes?” Her eyes dwelt upon
his with an expectation that was almost a command.
“You force me to seem discourteous,” he said, biting his lips, “but--”
“There! do not distress yourself,” she exclaimed with a laugh, and
leaning back in her seat. “Adieu! I do not recognize you in England: in
Paris you were not so much an Englishman. If we meet in Paris perhaps
we shall know each other again. Madame Cabot, have the goodness to tell
the coachman to drive on.” These words were spoken in French.
Madame Cabot, the elderly and unbeautiful lady already alluded to, who
had sat during this colloquy with a face as unmoved as if English were
to her the same as Choctaw, gave the order desired, the horses started,
and Philip Lancaster, left alone by the roadside, put on his hat, with a
curve of his lip that was not either a smile or a sneer.
Mr. Grant, meanwhile, had strolled onward, and was now some distance
down the road. He waited for Lancaster to rejoin him, holding his open
snuff-box in his hand; and when the young man came up, he offered him a
pinch, which the latter declined. The two walked on together for several
minutes in silence, Lancaster only having said, “I am sorry to have kept
you waiting--an acquaintance whom I met abroad;” to which Mr. Grant had
replied by a mere nod of the head. By-and-by, however, he said, in
resumption of the conversation which had been going on previous to the
Marquise’s interruption:
“Is it many years then since you left England?”
“Seven or eight--long enough for a man of my age. But you have been
absent even longer?”
“Yes; much has been changed since my time. It has been a period of
changes. Now that Bonaparte is gone, we may hope for repose. England
needs repose: so do I--though my vicissitudes have not been involved in
hers. I have lived apart from the political imbroglio. But you must have
been in the midst of it. Did you see Waterloo?”
“Only the remains of it: I was a non-combatant. Major Lockhart--a
gentleman I met in Paris about three years ago, a fine fellow and a good
soldier--we ran across each other again in Brussels, a few days before
the battle. Lockhart was killed. He was a man of over sixty; was
married, and had a grown-up daughter, I believe. He had been living at
home with his family since ’13, and had hoped to see no more fighting.
When he did not come back with his regiment, I rode out to look for him,
and found his body. That’s all I know of Waterloo.”
“You never bore arms yourself?”
“No. My father was a clergyman; not that that would make much
difference; besides, he was not of the bookworm sort, and didn’t object
to a little fox-hunting and sparring. But I have never believed in
anything enough to fight for it. I am like the Duke in ‘Measure for
Measure’--a looker-on at life.”
“Ah! I can conceive that such an occupation may be not less arduous than
any. But do you confine yourself to that? Do you never record your
impressions?--cultivate literature, for example?”
Lancaster’s face flushed a little, and he turned his head toward his
companion with a quick, inquiring look. “How came you to think of that?”
he asked.
The old gentleman passed his hand down over his mouth and chin, as if to
correct an impulse to smile. “It was but a chance word of your own,
while I was at work upon your shoulder-joint,” he replied. “You let fall
some word implying that you had written poetry. I am very slightly
acquainted with modern English literature, and could not speak from
personal knowledge of your works were you the most renowned poet of the
day. Pardon me the liberty.”
Lancaster looked annoyed for a moment; but the next moment he laughed.
“You cannot do me a better service than to show me that I’m a fool,” he
said. “I’m apt to forget it. In theory, I care not a penny whether what
I write is read or not; but I do care all the same. I pretend to be a
looker-on at life from philosophical motives; but, in fact, it’s
nothing but laziness. I try to justify myself by scribbling poetry, and
am pleased when I find that any one has discovered my justification. But
if I were really satisfied with myself, I should leave justification to
whom it might concern.”
“My existence has been passed in what are called practical affairs,” Mr.
Grant returned; “but I am not ready to say that, considered in
themselves, they have as much real life in them as a single verse of
true poetry. Poetry and music are things beyond my power to achieve, but
not to enjoy. The experience of life which cannot be translated into
poetry or music is a lifeless and profitless experience.” He checked
himself, and added in his usual tone: “I mean to say that, man of
business though I am, I am not unacquainted with the writings of poets,
and I take great delight in them. The wisest thing a man can do is, I
apprehend, to augment the enjoyment of other men. Commerce and politics
aim to develop our own wealth and power at the cost of others; but
poetry, like love, gives to all, and asks for nothing except to be
received.”
“Have a care, or you will undo the service I have just thanked you for.
Besides, as a matter of fact, poetry in our days not only asks to be
received, but to be received by publishers, and paid for!”
Something in the young man’s manner of saying this, rather than the
saying itself, seemed to strike Mr. Grant, for he glanced at the other
with a momentary keenness of scrutiny, and presently said:
“Your father, I think you mentioned, was a clergyman?”
“He was Herbert Lancaster.”
Mr. Grant halted for a moment in his walk to extract his snuff-box from
his pocket. After having taken a pinch, he again gave a sharp look at
his companion, and observed as he walked on:
“My prolonged absence from my native land has made my recollection of
such matters a little rusty, but am I mistaken in supposing there is a
title in the family?”
“My uncle is Lord Croftus--the fifth baron.”
“Ah! precisely; yes, yes. Then was it not your father who married a
daughter of the Earl of Seabridge? or am I confounding him with
another?”
“You are quite right. He married the youngest daughter, Alice; and I am
their only child, for lack of a better.”
“Ah! Very singular,” returned Mr. Grant; but he did not explain in what
the singularity consisted.