DOROTHEA BY FIRELIGHT.
The waunut logs shot sparkles out
Towards the pootiest, bless her,
An' leetle fires danced all about
The chiny on the dresser;
The very room, coz she was in,
Looked warm from floor to ceilin'.
--Lowell.
Lady Sarah had left Raban to go into the drawing-room alone. It was all
very strange, he thought, and more and more like a crazy dream. He found
himself in a long room of the colour of firelight, with faded hangings,
sweeping mysteriously from the narrow windows, with some old chandeliers
swinging from the shadows. It seemed to him, though he could not clearly
see them, that there were ghosts sitting on the chairs, denizens of the
kingdom of mystery, and that there was a vague flit and consternation in
the darkness at the farther end of the room, when through the opening
door the gleam of the lantern, which by this time was travelling
upstairs, sped on with a long slanting flash. For a moment he thought
the place was empty; the atmosphere was very warm and still; the
firelight blazed comfortably; a coal started from the grate, then came a
breath, a long, low, sleepy breath from a far-away corner. Was this a
ghost? And then, as his eyes got accustomed, he saw that the girl who
had let him in sat crouching by the fire. Her face was turned away; the
light fell upon her throat and the harmonious lines of her figure.
Raban, looking at her, thought of one of Lionardo's figures in the
Louvre. But this was finer than a Lionardo. What is it in some attitudes
that is so still, and yet that thrills with a coming movement of life
and action? It is life, not inanimately resting, but suspended from
motion as we see it in the old Greek art. That flying change from the
now to the future is a wonder sometimes written in stone; it belongs to
the greatest creations of genius as well as to the living statues and
pictures among which we live.
So Dolly, unconscious, was a work of art, as she warmed her hands at the
fire: her long draperies were heaped round about her, her hair caught
the light and burnt like gold. If Miss Vanborough had been a conscious
work of art she might have remained in her pretty attitude, but being a
girl of sixteen, simple and somewhat brusque in manners, utterly
ignoring the opinions of others, she started up and came to meet Raban,
advancing quick through the dimness and the familiar labyrinth of
chairs.
'Hush--sh!' she said, pointing to a white heap in a further corner,
'Rhoda is asleep; she has been ill, and we have brought her here to
nurse.' Then she went back in the same quick silence, brought a light
from the table, and beckoning to him to follow her, led the way to the
very darkest and shadiest end of the long drawing-room, where the ghosts
had been flitting before them. There was a tall oak chair, in which she
established herself. There was an old cabinet and a sofa, and a faded
Italian shield of looking-glass, reflecting waves of brown and reddish
light. Again Dolly motioned. Raban was to sit down there on the sofa
opposite.
Since he had come into the house he had done little but obey the orders
he had received. He was amused and not a little mystified by this young
heroine's silent imperious manners. He did not admire them, and yet he
could not help watching her, half in wonder, half in admiration of her
beauty. She, as I have said, did not think of speculating upon the
impression she had created: she had other business on hand.
'I knew you at once,' said Dolly, with the hardihood of sixteen, 'when I
saw you at the gate.' As she spoke in her girlish voice, somehow the
mystery seemed dispelled, and Raban began to realise that this was only
a drawing-room and a young lady after all.
'Ever since your letter came last year,' she continued, unabashed, 'I
have hoped that you would come, and--and you have paid her the money she
lent you, have you not?' said the girl, looking into his face
doubtfully, and yet confidingly too.
Raban answered by an immense stare. He was a man almost foolishly
fastidious and reserved. He was completely taken aback and shocked by
her want of discretion--so he chose to consider it. Dolly, unused to the
ways of the world, had not yet appreciated those refinements of delicacy
with which people envelop the simplest facts of life.
As for Raban, he was at all times uncomfortably silent respecting
himself. 'Dolly' conveyed no meaning whatever to his mind, although he
might have guessed who she was. Even if Lady Sarah had not asked it of
him, he would not have answered her. Whatever they may say, reserved
people pique themselves upon some mental superiority in the reservations
they make. Miss Vanborough misinterpreted the meaning of the young man's
confused looks and silence.
He had not paid the money! she was sorry. Oh, how welcome it would have
been for Aunt Sarah's sake and for George's sake! Poor George! how
should she ever ask for money for him now? Her face fell; she tried to
speak of other things to hide her disappointment. Now she wished she had
not asked the question--it must be so uncomfortable for Mr. Raban she
thought. She tried to talk on, one little sentence came jerking out
after another, and Raban answered more or less stiffly. 'Was he not at
Cambridge? Did he know her brother there--George Vanborough?'
Raban looked surprised, and said, 'Yes, he knew a Mr. Vanborough
slightly. He had known him at his tutor's years before.' Here a vision
of a stumpy young man flourishing a tankard rose before him. Could he be
this beautiful girl's brother?
'Did he know her cousin, Robert Henley?' continued Dolly, eagerly.
Raban (who had long avoided Henley's companionship) answered even more
stiffly that he did not see much of him. So the two talked on; but they
had got into a wrong key, as people do at times, and they mutually
jarred upon each other. Even their silence was inharmonious.
Occasionally came a long, low, peaceful breath: it seemed floating on
the warm shadows.
Everything was perfectly common-place, and yet to Raban there seemed an
element of strangeness and incongruity in the ways of the old house.
There was something weird in the whole thing--the defiant girl, the
sleeping woman, Lady Sarah, with her strange hesitations and emotions,
and the darkness.--How differently events strike people from different
points of view. Here was a common-place half-hour, while old Sam
prepared the seven-o'clock tea with Marker's help--while Rhoda slept a
peaceful little sleep: to Raban it seemed a strange and puzzling
experience, quite out of the common run of half-hours.
Did he dislike poor Dolly? That off-hand manner was not Frank Raban's
ideal of womanliness. Lady Sarah, with her chilled silence and
restrained emotions, was nearer to it by far, old and ugly though she
was. And yet he could not forget Dolly's presence for a single instant.
He found himself watching, and admiring, and speculating about her
almost against his will. She, too, was aware of this silent scrutiny,
and resented it. Dolly was more brusque and fierce and uncomfortable
that evening than she had ever been in all her life before. Dorothea
Vanborough was one of those people who reflect the atmosphere somehow,
whose lights come and go, and whose brilliance comes and goes. Dull fogs
would fall upon her sometimes, at others sunlight, moonlight, or faint
reflected rays would beam upon her world. It was a wide one, and open to
all the winds of heaven.
So Frank Raban discovered when it was too late. He admired her when he
should have loved her. He judged her in secret when he should have
trusted or blamed her openly. A day came when he felt he had forfeited
all right even to help her or to protect her, and that, while he was
still repenting for the past, he had fallen (as people sometimes do who
walk backwards) into fresh pitfalls.
'My cousin Robert has asked me and Rhoda to spend a day at Cambridge in
the spring,' said Dolly, reluctantly struggling on at conversation.
Frank Raban was wondering if Lady Sarah was never coming back.
There was a sigh, a movement from the distant corner.
'Did you call me?' said a faint, shrill voice, plaintive and tremulous,
and a figure rose from the nest of soft shawls and came slowly forward,
dispersing the many wraps that lay coiling on the floor.
'Have I been asleep? I thought Mr. Henley was here?' said the voice,
confusedly.
Dolly turned towards her. 'No, he is not here, Rhoda. Sit down, don't
stand; here is Mr. Raban come to see us.'
And then in the dim light of the fire and distant candle, Raban saw two
dark eyes looking out of a pale face that he seemed to remember.
'Mr. Raban!' said the voice.
'Have you forgotten?' said Dolly, hastily, going up to the distant sofa.
'Mr. Raban, from Paris----' she began; then seeing he had followed her,
she stopped; she turned very red. She did not want to pain him. And
Raban, at the same moment, recognised the two girls he had seen once
before, and remembered where it was that he had known the deep grey
eyes, with their look of cold repulsion and dislike.
'Are you Mr. Raban?' repeated Rhoda, looking intently into his face. 'I
should have known you if it had not been so dark.' And she instinctively
put up her hand and clasped something hanging round her neck.
The young man was moved.
'I ought indeed to remember you,' he said, with some emotion.
And as he spoke, he saw a diamond flash in the firelight. This, then,
was the child who had wandered down that terrible night, to whom he had
given his poor wife's diamond cross.
Rhoda saw with some alarm that his eyes were fixed upon the cross.
'I sometimes think I ought to send this back to you,' she faltered on,
blushing faintly, and still holding it tightly clasped in her hand.
'Keep it,' said Raban, gravely; 'no one has more right to it than you.'
Then they were all silent.
Dolly wondered why Rhoda had a right to the cross, but she did not ask.
Raban turned still more hard and more sad as the old memories assailed
him suddenly from every side. Here was the past living over again.
Though he might have softened to Lady Sarah, he now hardened to himself;
and, as it often happens, the self-inflicted pain he felt seemed
reflected in his manner towards the girls.
'I know you both now,' he said, gravely, standing up. 'Good-night; will
you say good-by to your aunt for me?'
He did not offer to shake hands; it was Dolly who put out hers. He was
very stiff, and yet there was a humble look in his pale face and dark
eyes that Dolly could not forget. She seemed to remember it after he was
gone.
Lady Sarah came in only a minute after Frank had left. She looked
disappointed.
'I have just met him in the hall,' she said.
'Is he gone?' said Dolly. 'Aunt Sarah, he is still very unhappy.'
A few minutes afterwards Rhoda said what a pity that Mr. Raban was gone,
when she saw how smartly the tea-table was set out, how the silver
candlesticks were lighted, and some of the good old wine that George
liked sparkling in the decanter. Dolly felt as if Mr. Raban was more
disagreeable than ever for giving so much trouble for nothing. Rhoda was
very much interested in Lady Sarah's visitor, and asked Dolly many more
questions when they were alone upstairs. She had been ill, and was
staying at Church House to get well in quiet and away from the
schoolboys.
'Of course one can't ever like him,' Dolly said, 'but one is very sorry
for him. Good-night, Rhoda.'
'No, I don't like her,' said Raban to himself; and he thought of Dolly
all the way home. Her face haunted him. He dined at his club, and drove
to the shabby station in Bishopsgate. He seemed to see her still as he
waited for his train, stamping by the station fire, and by degrees that
bitter vision of the past vanished away and the present remained.
Dolly's face seemed to float along before him all the way back as the
second-class carriage shook and jolted through the night, out beyond
London fog into a region of starlit plains and distant glimmering
lights. Vision and visionary travelled on together, until at last the
train slackened its thunder and stopped. A few late Cambridge lights
shone in the distance. It was past midnight. When Raban, walking through
the familiar byways, reached his college-gates, he found them closed and
barred; one gas-lamp flared--a garish light of to-day shining on the
ancient carved stones and mullions of the past. A sleepy porter let him
in, and as he walked across the dark court he looked up and saw here and
there a light burning in a window, and then some far-away college-clock
clanged the half-hour, then another, and another, and then their own
clock overhead, loud and stunning. He reached his own staircase at last
and opened the oak door. Before going in, Raban looked up through the
staircase-window at George Vanborough's rooms, which happened to be
opposite his own. They were brilliantly illuminated, and the rays
streamed out and lighted up many a deep lintel and sleeping-window.