All was confusion and dismay at Tilney. Bella Lyle's cold turned out
to be scarlatina, and Mark and Alice brought back tidings that old
Commodore Graham had been seized with a fit, and was seriously, if not
dangerously, ill. Of course, the company scattered like an exploded
shell. The Graham girls hastened back to their father, while the other
guests sought safety in flight, the great struggle now being who should
soonest secure post-horses to get away. Like many old people rich in
this world's comforts, Mrs. Maxwell had an especial aversion to illness
in any shape. It was a topic she never spoke on; and, if she could,
would never have mentioned before her. Her intimates understood this
thoroughly, and many were the expressions employed to imply that Mr.
Such-a-one had a fever, or Mrs. So-and-so was given over by her doctors.
As to the fatal result itself, it was always veiled in a sort of decent
mystery, as though it would not be perfectly polite to inquire whither
the missing friend had retired to.
“Dr. Reede says it is a very mild case of the malady, and that Bella
will be up in a day or two, aunt,” said Alice.
“Of course she will,” replied the old lady, pettishly. “It 's just a
cold and sore throat,--they had n't that fine name for it long ago, and
people got well all the sooner. Is he gone?”
“No; he's talking with Mark in the library; he'll be telling him, I
think, about the Commodore.”
“Well, don't ask him to stop to dinner; we have sorrow enough without
seeing a doctor.”
“Oh, here comes Mark! Where is Dr. Reede?”
“He's gone over to see Maitland. Fenton came to say that he wished to
see him.”
“Surely he's not ill,” said Alice.
“Oh, dear! what a misfortune that would be!” cried the old lady, with
real affliction in her tone; “to think of Mr. Norman Maitland taking ill
in one's house.”
“Have n't you been over to ask after him, Mark?”
“No. I was waiting till Reede came back: he's one of those men that
can't bear being inquired after; and if it should turn out that he was
not ill, he 'd not take the anxiety in good part.”
“How he has contrived to play the tyrant to you all, I can't imagine,”
said Alice; “but I can see that every whim and caprice he practises is
studied as courtiers study the moods of their masters.”
“To be sure, darling, naturally,” broke in Mrs. Maxwell, who always
misunderstood everybody. “Of course, we are only too happy to indulge
him in a whim or fancy; and if the doctor thinks turtle would suit
him--turtle is so light; I took it for several weeks for luncheon--we
can have it at once. Will you touch the bell, Mark, and I'll tell Raikes
to telegraph? Who is it he gets it from?”
Mark pulled the bell, but took no notice of her question. “I wish,”
muttered he below his breath, “we had never come here. There 's Bella
now, laid up, and here 's Maitland. I 'm certain he's going away, for I
overheard Fenton ask about the distance to Dundalk.”
“I suppose we might survive even that misfortune,” said she, haughtily.
“And one thing I'll swear to,” said Mark, walking the room with
impatience,--“it 's the last Ireland will see of him.”
“Poor Ireland! the failure in the potato-crop was bad enough, but this
is more than can be endured.”
“That's all very fine, Alice, but I 'm much mistaken if you are as
indifferent as you pretend.”
“Mark! what do you mean?” said she, angrily.
“Here's Raikes now; and will some one tell him what it is we want?” said
Mrs. Maxwell; but the others were far too deeply engaged in their own
whispered controversy now to mind her.
“Captain Lyle will tell you by and by, Raikes,” said she, gathering up
the mass of loose _impedimenta_ with which she usually moved from one
room to the other, and by which, as they fell at every step, her course
could always be tracked. “He'll tell you,” added she, moving away.
“I think it was caviare, and you are to telegraph for it to Swan and
Edgar's--but my head is confused to-day; I'll just go and lie down.”
As Mrs. Maxwell left by one door, Alice passed out by another; while
Mark, whose temper evinced itself in a flushed cheek and a contracted
brow, stood at a window, fretfully tapping the ground with his foot.
“Have you any orders, sir?” asked Raikes.
“Orders! No--stay a moment Have many gone away this morning?”
“Nearly all, sir. Except your family and Mr. Maitland, there's nobody
left but Major Clough, and he 's going, I believe, with Dr. Reede.”
“You 've heard nothing of Mr. Maitland going, have you?”
“Oh, yes, sir! his man sent for post-horses about an hour ago.”
Muttering impatiently below his breath, Mark opened the window and
passed out upon the lawn. What an unlucky turn had everything taken! It
was but a week ago, and his friend Maitland was in high delight with
all around him. The country, the scenery, the people were all charming;
indeed, in the intervals between the showers, he had a good word to say
for the climate. As for Lyle Abbey, he pronounced it the perfection of
a country-house; and Mark actually speculated on the time when these
opinions of his distinguished friend would have acquired a certain
currency, and the judgment of one that none disputed would be recorded
of his father's house. And all these successes were now to be reversed
by this stupid old sailor's folly,--insanity he might call it; for what
other word could characterize the pretension that could claim Norman
Maitland for a son-in-law?--Maitland, that might have married, if the
law would have let him, half a score of infantas and archduchesses, and
who had but to choose throughout Europe the alliance that would suit
him. And Alice--what could Alice mean by this impertinent tone she was
taking towards him? Had the great man's patience given way under it all,
and was he really going away, wearied and tired out?
While Mark thus doubted and reasoned and questioned, Maitland was seated
at his breakfast at one side of the fire, while Dr. Reede confronted him
at the other.
Though Maitland had sent a message to say he wished to see the doctor,
he only gave him now a divided attention, being deeply engaged, even
as he talked, in deciphering a telegram which had just reached him, and
which was only intelligible through a key to the cipher.
“So, then, doctor, it is simply the return of an old attack,--a thing to
be expected, in fact, at his time of life?”
“Precisely, sir. He had one last autumn twelve month, brought on by a
fit of passion. The old Commodore gives way, rather, to temper.”
“Ah! gives way, does he?” muttered Maitland, while he mumbled below his
breath, “'seventeen thousand and four D + X, and a gamba,'--a very large
blood-letting. By the way, doctor, is not bleeding--bleeding largely--a
critical remedy with a man of seventy-six or seven?”
“Very much so, indeed, sir; and, if you observe, I only applied some
leeches to the _nuchæ_. You misapprehended me in thinking I took blood
from him freely.”
“Oh, yes, very true,” said Maitland, recovering himself. “I have no
doubt you treated him with great judgment. It is a case, too, for much
caution. Forty-seven and two G's,” and he hastily turned over the leaves
of his little book, muttering continually, “and two G's, forty-six,
forty-seven, with two B's, two F's. Ah! here it is. Shivering attacks
are dangerous--are they--in these cases?”
“In which cases?” asked the doctor; for his shrewd intelligence at once
perceived the double object which Maitland was trying to contemplate.
“In a word, then,” continued Maitland, not heeding the doctor's
question, but bending his gaze fixedly on the piece of paper before him,
scrawled over and blotted by his own hand,--“in a word, then, a man
of seventy, seized with paralysis, and, though partially rallied by
bleeding, attacked with shivering, is in a very critical state? But how
long might he live in that way?”
“We are not now speaking of Commodore Graham, I apprehend?” asked the
doctor, slyly.
“No; I am simply putting a case,--a possible case, Doctors, I know, are
not fond of these imagined emergencies; lawyers like them.”
“Doctors dislike them,” broke in Reede, “because they are never given to
them in any completeness,--every important sign of pulse and tongue and
temperature omitted--”
“Of course you are right,” said Maitland, crumpling up the telegram and
the other papers; “and now for the Commodore. You are not apprehensive
of anything serious, I hope?”
“It 's an anxious case, sir,--a very anxious case; he 's eighty-four.”
“Eighty-four!” repeated Maitland, to whom the words conveyed a
considerable significance.
“Eighty-four!” repeated the other, once more. “No one would suspect
it. Why, Sally Graham is the same age as my wife; they were at school
together.”
Too polite to push a question which involved a double-shotted answer,
Maitland merely said, “Indeed!” and, after a slight pause, added, “You
said, I think, that the road to Dundalk led past Commodore Graham's
cottage?”
“By the very gate.”
“May I offer you a seat with me? I am going that way. I have received
news which calls me suddenly to England.”
“I thank you much, but I have some visits yet to make before I return to
Port-Graham. I promised to stop the night there.”
Having charged the doctor to convey to the Commodore's daughters his
sincere regret for their father's illness, and his no less sincere
hope of a speedy recovery, Maitland endeavored, in recognition of a
preliminary question or two about himself, to press the acceptance of
a fee; but the doctor, armed with that self-respect and tact his
profession so eminently upholds, refused to accept it, and took his
leave, perhaps well requited in having seen and spoken with the great
Mr. Norman Maitland, of whom half the country round were daily talking.
“Mr. Maitland is not ill, I hope?” said Alice, as she met the doctor on
his way through the garden.
“No, Mrs. Trafford; I have been making a friendly call--no more,” said
the doctor, rather vain that he could thus designate his visit; and
with a few words of advice about her sister, he went his way. Alice,
meanwhile, saw that Maitland had observed her from his window, and
rightly guessed that he would soon be in search of her.
With that feminine instinct that never deceives in such cases, she
determined that whatever was to pass between them should be undisturbed.
She selected a most unfrequented path, bordered on one side by the high
laurel-hedge, and on the other by a little rivulet, beyond which lay
some rich meadows, backed in the distance by a thick plantation.
She had not gone far when she beard a short quick footstep behind her,
and in a few minutes Maitland was at her side. “You forgot to liberate
me,” said he, “so I had to break my arrest.”
“_Signor mio_, you must forgive me; we have had such a morning of
confusion and trouble: first, Bella ill,--not seriously, but confined
to bed; and then this poor old Commodore,--the doctor has told you all
about it; and, last of all, Mark storming about the house, and angry
with every one for having caught cold or a fever, and so disgusted (the
great) Mr. Maitland that he is actually hurrying away, with a vow to
heaven nevermore to put foot in Ireland.”
“Be a little serious, and tell me of your mission this morning,” said
he, gravely.
“Three words will do it. We reached Port-Graham just as the doctor
arrived there. The Commodore, it seemed, got home all safe by about four
o'clock in the morning; and instead of going to bed, ordered a fire
in his dressing-room, and a bottle of mulled port; with which aids to
comfort he sat down to write. It would not appear, however, that he
had got far in his correspondence, for at six, when his man entered,
he found but two lines, and his master, as he thought, fast asleep; but
which proved to be a fit of some kind, for he was perfectly insensible.
He rallied, however, and recognized his servant, and asked for the
girls. And now Dr. Reede thinks that the danger has in a great measure
passed off, and that all will go well.”
“It is most unhappy,--most unhappy,” muttered Mainland. “I am sincerely
sorry for it all.”
“Of course you are, though perhaps not really to blame,--at least, not
blamable in a high degree.”
“Not in any degree, Mrs. Trafford.”
“That must be a matter of opinion. At all events, your secret is safe,
for the old man has totally forgotten all that occurred last night
between you; and lest any clew to it should remain, I carried away the
beginning of the letter he was writing. Here it is.”
“How thoughtfully done!” said he, as he took the paper and read aloud:
“'Dear Triphook, come over and help me to a shot at a rascal'--not
civil, certainly--'at a rascal; that because he calls himself--' It was
well he got no further,” added he, with a faint smile.
“A good, bold hand it is too for such an old man. I declare, Mr.
Maitland, I think your usual luck must have befriended you here. The
fingers that held the pen so steadily might have been just as unshaken
with the pistol.”
There was something so provocative in her tone that Maitland detected
the speech at once, and became curious to trace it to a cause. At this
sally, however, he only smiled in silence.
“I tried to persuade Mark to drive over and see Tony Butler,” continued
she, “but he would n't consent: in fact, a general impulse to be
disobliging would appear to have seized on the world just now. Don't you
think so?”
“By the way, I forgot to tell you that your protégé Butler refuses
to accept my offer. I got three lines from him, very dry and concise,
saying 'no' to me. Of course I trust to your discretion never to
disclose the negotiation in any way. I myself shall never speak of it;
indeed, I am very little given to doing civil things, and even less
accustomed to finding them ill-received, so that my secrecy is insured.”
“He ought not to have refused,” said she, thoughtfully.
“Perhaps not.”
“He ought certainly to have given the matter more consideration. I wish
I could have been consulted by him. Is it too late yet?”
“I suspect it is,” said he, dryly. “First of all, as I told you, I am
little in the habit of meeting a repulse; and, secondly, there is no
time to renew the negotiation. I must leave this to-day.”
“To-day?”
“Within an hour,” added he, looking at his watch; “I must manage to
reach Dublin in time to catch the mail-packet to-morrow morning.”
“This is very sudden, this determination.”
“Yes, I am called away by tidings I received awhile ago,--tidings of, to
me, the deepest importance.”
“Mark will be extremely sorry,” said she, in a low tone.
“Not sorrier than I am,” said he, despondently.
“We all counted on your coming back with us to the Abbey; and it was
only awhile ago Bella begged that we should wait here for a day or two,
that we might return together, a family party.”
“What a flattery there is in the phrase!” said he, with deep feeling.
“You don't know,” continued she, “what a favorite you are with my
mother. I dare not trust myself to repeat how she speaks of you.”
“Why will you multiply my regrets, Mrs. Trafford? Why will you make my
parting so very, very painful?”
“Because I prefer that you should stay; because I speak in the name of a
whole house who will be afflicted at your going.”
“You have told me of all save one,” said be, in a voice of deepest
feeling; “I want to learn what she thinks.”
“She thinks that if Mr. Maitland's good-nature be only on a par with his
other qualities, he would sooner face the tiresomeness of a stupid house
than make the owners of it feel that they bored him.”
“She does not think anything of the kind,” said he, with a peculiar
smile. “She knows that there is no question of good nature or of boredom
in the matter at all; but there is something at stake far more touching
than either.” He waited to see if she would speak, but as she was silent
he went on: “I will be honest, if you will not. I am not going away
of my freewill. I have been called by a telegram this morning to the
Continent; the matter is so pressing that--shall I confess it?--if this
stupid meeting with the Commodore had been arranged, I should have been
a defaulter. Yes, I'd have made I don't well know what explanation to
account for my absence. I can imagine what comments would have been
passed upon my conduct. I feel very painfully, too, for the part I
should have left to such of my friends here as would defend me, and yet
have not a fragment to guide their defence. And still, with all these
before me, I repeat, I would have gone away, so imminent is the case
that calls me, and so much is the matter one that involves the whole
future of my life. And now,” said he, while his voice became fuller and
bolder, “that I have told you this, I am ready to tell you more, and to
say that at one word of yours--one little word--I 'll remain.”
“And what may that word be?” said she, quietly; for while he was
speaking she had been preparing herself for some such issue.
“I need not tell you,” said he, gravely.
“Supposing, then, that I guess it,--I am not sure that I do,--but
suppose that,--and could it not be just as well said by another,--by
Bella, for instance?”
“You know it could not. This is only fencing, for you know it could
not.”
“You mean, in fact, that I should say, 'don't go?'”
“I do.”
“Well, I 'm willing enough to say so, if my words are not to convey more
than I intend by them.”
“I 'll risk even that,” said he, quickly. “Put your name to the bond,
and we 'll let lawyers declare what it is worth after.”
“You frighten me, Mr. Maitland,” said she, and her tone showed that now
at least she was sincere.
“Listen to me for one moment, Alice,” said he, taking her hand as he
walked beside her. “You are fully as much the mistress of your fate as
I am master of mine. You may consult, but you need not obey. Had it been
otherwise, I never would have dared on a hardihood that would probably
have wrecked my hopes. It is just as likely I never could satisfy the
friends about you on the score of my fortune,--my means,--my station,
and so on. It is possible, too, that scandal, which makes free with
better men, may not have spared me, and that they who would have the
right to advise you might say, 'Beware of that dreadful man.' I repeat,
this is an ordeal my pride would feel it hard to pass through; and so
I come to you, in all frankness, and declare I love you. To you--you
alone--I will give every guarantee that a man may give of his honor and
honesty. I will tell all my past, and so much as I mean for the future;
and in return, I only ask for time,--nothing but time, Alice. I am not
asking you for any pledge, simply that you will give me--what you would
not have refused a mere acquaintance--the happiness of seeing you daily;
and if--if, I say, you yourself should not deem the hand and the love
I offer beneath you,--if you should be satisfied with the claims of him
who would share his fortune with you,--that then--not till then--others
should hear of it. Is this too much for me to ask, or you to give,
Alice?”
“Even now I do not know what you ask of me.”
“First of all, that you bid me stay.”
“It is but this moment you have declared to me that what calls you away
is of the very last importance to you in life.”
“The last but one, Alice,--the last is here;” and he kissed her hand as
he spoke, but still with an air so deferent that she could not resent
it.
“I cannot consent that it shall be so,” said she, with energy. “It is
true I am my own mistress, and there is but the greater reason why I
should be more cautious. We are almost strangers to each other. All the
flattery of your professions--and of course, I feel it as flattery--does
not blind me to the fact that I scarcely know you at all.”
“Why not consent to know me more?” asked he, almost imploringly.
“I agree, if no pledge is to accompany my consent.”
“Is not this a somewhat hard condition?” said he, with a voice of
passionate meaning. “You bid me, in one word, place all that I have of
hope on the issue,--not even on that, but simply for leave to play the
game. Is this generous, Alice,--is it even just?”
“You bewilder me with all these subtleties, and I might ask if this were
either just or generous; but at least, I will be frank. I like you very
well. I think it not at all impossible that I might like you better; but
even after that, Mr. Mainland, there would be a long stage to travel
to that degree of regard which you profess to desire from me. Do I make
myself understood?”
“Too well for me and my hopes!” said he, despondingly. “You are able,
however, to impose hard conditions.”
“I impose none, sir. Do not mistake me.”
“You leave none others open to me, at least, and I accept them. To give
me even that faint chance of success, however, I must leave this to-day.
Is it not better I should?”
“I really cannot advise,” said she, with a well-assumed coldness.
“Even contingently, Mrs. Trafford will not involve herself in my
fortunes,” said he, half haughtily. “Well, my journey to Ireland,
amongst other benefits, has taught me a lesson that all my wanderings
never imparted. I have at last learned something of humility. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye, Mr. Maitland,” said she, with calm, but evidently not without
effort.
He stooped and kissed her hand, held it for a moment or two in his own,
and with a very faint “Good-bye,” turned away and left her. He turned
suddenly around after a few paces, and came back. “May I ask one
question, Alice, before I go?”
“I don't know whether I shall answer it,” said she, with a faint smile.
“I cannot afford to add jealousy to my other torments. Tell me, then--”
“Take care, sir, take care; your question may cost you more than you
think of.”
“Good-bye,--good-bye,” said he, sadly, and departed. “Are the horses
ready, Fenton?” asked he, as his servant came to meet him.
“Yes, sir; and Captain Lyle has been looking for you all over the
garden.”
“He's going,--he 's off, Bella,” said Alice, as she sat down beside her
sister's bed, throwing her bonnet carelessly down at her feet.
“Who is going?--who is off?” asked Bella, eagerly.
“Of course,” continued Alice, following up her own thoughts, “to say
'Stay' means more than I like to be pledged to,--I couldn't do it.”
“Poor Tony!--give him my love, Alice, and tell him I shall often
think of him,--as often as ever I think of bygone days and all their
happiness.”
“And why must it be Tony that I spoke of?” said Alice, rising, while a
deep crimson flush covered her face and brow. “I think Master Tony has
shown us latterly that he has forgotten the long ago, and has no wish to
connect us with thoughts of the future.”