ANOTHER FALL.
Felix Graham had plenty of nurses, but Madeline was not one of them.
Augustus Staveley came home while the Alston doctor was still busy
at the broken bones, and of course he would not leave his friend. He
was one of those who had succeeded in the hunt, and consequently had
heard nothing of the accident till the end of it. Miss Tristram had
been the first to tell him that Mr. Graham had fallen in leaving the
covert, but having seen him rise to his legs she had not thought he
was seriously hurt.
"I do not know much about your friend," she had said; "but I think I
may comfort you by an assurance that your horse is none the worse. I
could see as much as that."
"Poor Felix!" said, Staveley. "He has lost a magnificent run. I
suppose we are nine or ten miles from Monkton Grange now?"
"Eleven if we are a yard," said the lady. "It was an ugly country,
but the pace was nothing wonderful." And then others dropped in, and
at last came tidings about Graham. At first there was a whisper that
he was dead. He had ridden over Orme, it was said; had nearly killed
him, and had quite killed himself. Then the report became less fatal.
Both horses were dead, but Graham was still living though with most
of his bones broken.
"Don't believe it," said Miss Tristram. "In what condition Mr. Graham
may be I won't say; but that your horse was safe and sound after he
got over the fence, of that you may take my word." And thus, in a
state of uncertainty, obtaining fresh rumours from every person he
passed, Staveley hurried home. "Right arm and two ribs," Peregrine
said to him, as he met him in the hall. "Is that all?" said Augustus.
It was clear therefore that he did not think so much about it as his
sister.
"If you'd let her have her head she'd never have come down like
that," Augustus said, as he sat that evening by his friend's bedside.
"But he pulled off, I fancy, to avoid riding over me," said
Peregrine.
"Then he must have come too quick at his leap," said Augustus. "You
should have steadied him as he came to it." From all which Graham
perceived that a man cannot learn how to ride any particular horse by
two or three words of precept.
"If you talk any more about the horse, or the hunt, or the accident,
neither of you shall stay in the room," said Lady Staveley, who came
in at that moment. But they both did stay in the room, and said a
great deal more about the hunt, and the horse, and the accident
before they left it; and even became so far reconciled to the
circumstance that they had a hot glass of brandy and water each,
sitting by Graham's fire.
"But, Augustus, do tell me how he is," Madeline said to her brother,
as she caught him going to his room. She had become ashamed of asking
any more questions of her mother.
"He's all right; only he'll be as fretful as a porcupine, shut up
there. At least I should be. Are there lots of novels in the house?
Mind you send for a batch to-morrow. Novels are the only chance a man
has when he's laid up like that." Before breakfast on the following
morning Madeline had sent off to the Alston circulating library a
list of all the best new novels of which she could remember the
names.
No definite day had hitherto been fixed for Peregrine's return to
The Cleeve, and under the present circumstances he still remained at
Noningsby assisting to amuse Felix Graham. For two days after the
accident such seemed to be his sole occupation; but in truth he was
looking for an opportunity to say a word or two to Miss Staveley, and
paving his way as best he might for that great speech which he was
fully resolved that he would make before he left the house. Once or
twice he bethought himself whether he would not endeavour to secure
for himself some confidant in the family, and obtain the sanction and
special friendship either of Madeline's mother, or her sister, or her
brother. But what if after that she should reject him? Would it not
be worse for him then that any one should have known of his defeat?
He could, as he thought, endure to suffer alone; but on such a matter
as that pity would be unendurable. So as he sat there by Graham's
fireside, pretending to read one of poor Madeline's novels for the
sake of companionship, he determined that he would tell no one of his
intention;--no one till he could make the opportunity for telling
her.
And when he did meet her, and find, now and again, some moment for
saying a word alone to her, she was very gracious to him. He had been
so kind and gentle with Felix, there was so much in him that was
sweet and good and honest, so much that such an event as this brought
forth and made manifest, that Madeline, and indeed the whole family,
could not but be gracious to him. Augustus would declare that he was
the greatest brick he had ever known, repeating all Graham's words as
to the patience with which the embryo baronet had knelt behind him on
the cold muddy ground, supporting him for an hour, till the carriage
had come up. Under such circumstances how could Madeline refrain from
being gracious to him?
"But it is all from favour to Graham!" Peregrine would say to himself
with bitterness; and yet though he said so he did not quite believe
it. Poor fellow! It was all from favour to Graham. And could he have
thoroughly believed the truth of those words which he repeated to
himself so often, he might have spared himself much pain. He might
have spared himself much pain, and possibly some injury; for if aught
could now tend to mature in Madeline's heart an affection which was
but as yet nascent, it would be the offer of some other lover. But
such reasoning on the matter was much too deep for Peregrine Orme.
"It may be," he said to himself, "that she only pities him because he
is hurt. If so, is not this time better for me than any other? If it
be that she loves him, let me know it, and be out of my pain." It did
not then occur to him that circumstances such as those in question
could not readily be made explicit;--that Madeline might refuse
his love, and yet leave him no wiser than he now was as to her
reasons for so refusing;--perhaps, indeed, leave him less wise, with
increased cause for doubt and hopeless hope, and the green melancholy
of a rejected lover.
Madeline during these two days said no more about the London doctor;
but it was plain to all who watched her that her anxiety as to the
patient was much more keen than that of the other ladies of the
house. "She always thinks everybody is going to die," Lady Staveley
said to Miss Furnival, intending, not with any consummate prudence,
to account to that acute young lady for her daughter's solicitude.
"We had a cook here, three months since, who was very ill, and
Madeline would never be easy till the doctor assured her that the
poor woman's danger was altogether past."
"She is so very warm-hearted," said Miss Furnival in reply. "It is
quite delightful to see her. And she will have such pleasure when she
sees him come down from his room."
Lady Staveley on this immediate occasion said nothing to her
daughter, but Mrs. Arbuthnot considered that a sisterly word might
perhaps be spoken in due season.
"The doctor says he is doing quite well now," Mrs. Arbuthnot said to
her, as they were sitting alone.
"But does he indeed? Did you hear him?" said Madeline, who was
suspicious.
"He did so, indeed. I heard him myself. But he says also that he
ought to remain here, at any rate for the next fortnight,--if mamma
can permit it without inconvenience."
"Of course she can permit it. No one would turn any person out of
their house in such a condition as that!"
"Papa and mamma both will be very happy that he should stay here;--of
course they would not do what you call turning him out. But, Mad,
my darling,"--and then she came up close and put her arm round
her sister's waist. "I think mamma would be more comfortable in
his remaining here if your charity towards him were--what shall I
say?--less demonstrative."
"What do you mean, Isabella?"
"Dearest, dearest; you must not be angry with me. Nobody has hinted
to me a word on the subject, nor do I mean to hint anything that can
possibly be hurtful to you."
"But what do you mean?"
"Don't you know, darling? He is a young man--and--and--people see
with such unkind eyes, and hear with such scandal-loving ears. There
is that Miss Furnival--"
"If Miss Furnival can think such things, I for one do not care what
she thinks."
"No, nor do I;--not as regards any important result. But may it not
be well to be careful? You know what I mean, dearest?"
"Yes--I know. At least I suppose so. And it makes me know also how
very cold and shallow and heartless people are! I won't ask any more
questions, Isabella; but I can't know that a fellow-creature is
suffering in the house,--and a person like him too, so clever, whom
we all regard as a friend,--the most intimate friend in the world
that Augustus has,--and the best too, as I heard papa himself
say--without caring whether he is going to live or die."
"There is no danger now, you know."
"Very well; I am glad to hear it. Though I know very well that there
must be danger after such a terrible accident as that."
"The doctor says there is none."
"At any rate I will not--" And then instead of finishing her sentence
she turned away her head and put up her handkerchief to wipe away a
tear.
"You are not angry with me, dear?" said Mrs. Arbuthnot.
"Oh, no," said Madeline; and then they parted.
For some days after that Madeline asked no question whatever about
Felix Graham, but it may be doubted whether this did not make the
matter worse. Even Sophia Furnival would ask how he was at any rate
twice a day, and Lady Staveley continued to pay him regular visits
at stated intervals. As he got better she would sit with him, and
brought back reports as to his sayings. But Madeline never discussed
any of these; and refrained alike from the conversation, whether
his broken bones or his unbroken wit were to be the subject of it.
And then Mrs. Arbuthnot, knowing that she would still be anxious,
gave her private bulletins as to the state of the sick man's
progress;--all which gave an air of secrecy to the matter, and caused
even Madeline to ask herself why this should be so.
On the whole I think that Mrs. Arbuthnot was wrong. Mrs. Arbuthnot
and the whole Staveley family would have regarded a mutual attachment
between Mr. Graham and Madeline as a great family misfortune. The
judge was a considerate father to his children, holding that a
father's control should never be brought to bear unnecessarily. In
looking forward to the future prospects of his sons and daughters
it was his theory that they should be free to choose their life's
companions for themselves. But nevertheless it could not be agreeable
to him that his daughter should fall in love with a man who had
nothing, and whose future success at his own profession seemed to be
so very doubtful. On the whole I think that Mrs. Arbuthnot was wrong,
and that the feeling that did exist in Madeline's bosom might more
possibly have died away, had no word been said about it--even by a
sister.
And then another event happened which forced her to look into her
own heart. Peregrine Orme did make his proposal. He waited patiently
during those two or three days in which the doctor's visits were
frequent, feeling that he could not talk about himself while any
sense of danger pervaded the house. But then at last a morning came
on which the surgeon declared that he need not call again till
the morrow; and Felix himself, when the medical back was turned,
suggested that it might as well be to-morrow week. He began also to
scold his friends, and look bright about the eyes, and drink his
glass of sherry in a pleasant dinner-table fashion, not as if he were
swallowing his physic. And Peregrine, when he saw all this, resolved
that the moment had come for the doing of his deed of danger. The
time would soon come at which he must leave Noningsby, and he would
not leave Noningsby till he had learned his fate.
Lady Staveley, who with a mother's eye had seen her daughter's
solicitude for Felix Graham's recovery,--had seen it, and
animadverted on it to herself,--had seen also, or at any rate had
suspected, that Peregrine Orme looked on her daughter with favouring
eyes. Now Peregrine Orme would have satisfied Lady Staveley as a
son-in-law. She liked his ways and manners of thought--in spite of
those rumours as to the rat-catching which had reached her ears. She
regarded him as quite clever enough to be a good husband, and no
doubt appreciated the fact that he was to inherit his title and The
Cleeve from an old grandfather instead of a middle-aged father. She
therefore had no objection to leave Peregrine alone with her one
ewe-lamb, and therefore the opportunity which he sought was at last
found.
"I shall be leaving Noningsby to-morrow, Miss Staveley," he said one
day, having secured an interview in the back drawing-room--in that
happy half-hour which occurs in winter before the world betakes
itself to dress. Now I here profess my belief, that out of every
ten set offers made by ten young lovers, nine of such offers are
commenced with an intimation that the lover is going away. There is
a dash of melancholy in such tidings well suited to the occasion. If
there be any spark of love on the other side it will be elicited by
the idea of a separation. And then, also, it is so frequently the
actual fact. This making of an offer is in itself a hard piece of
business,--a job to be postponed from day to day. It is so postponed,
and thus that dash of melancholy, and that idea of separation are
brought in at the important moment with so much appropriate truth.
"I shall be leaving Noningsby to-morrow, Miss Staveley," Peregrine
said.
"Oh dear! we shall be so sorry. But why are you going? What will Mr.
Graham and Augustus do without you? You ought to stay at least till
Mr. Graham can leave his room."
"Poor Graham!--not that I think he is much to be pitied either; but
he won't be about for some weeks to come yet."
"You do not think he is worse; do you?"
"Oh, dear, no; not at all." And Peregrine was unconsciously irritated
against his friend by the regard which her tone evinced. "He is quite
well; only they will not let him be moved. But, Miss Staveley, it was
not of Mr. Graham that I was going to speak."
"No--only I thought he would miss you so much." And then she blushed,
though the blush in the dark of the evening was lost upon him. She
remembered that she was not to speak about Felix Graham's health, and
it almost seemed as though Mr. Orme had rebuked her for doing so in
saying that he had not come there to speak of him.
"Lady Staveley's house has been turned up side down since this
affair, and it is time now that some part of the trouble should
cease."
"Oh! mamma does not mind it at all."
"I know how good she is; but nevertheless, Miss Staveley, I must go
to-morrow." And then he paused a moment before he spoke again. "It
will depend entirely upon you," he said, "whether I may have the
happiness of returning soon to Noningsby."
"On me, Mr. Orme!"
"Yes, on you. I do not know how to speak properly that which I have
to say; but I believe I may as well say it out at once. I have come
here now to tell you that I love you and to ask you to be my wife."
And then he stopped as though there were nothing more for him to say
upon the matter.
It would be hardly extravagant to declare that Madeline's breath was
taken away by the very sudden manner in which young Orme had made his
proposition. It had never entered her head that she had an admirer in
him. Previously to Graham's accident she had thought nothing about
him. Since that event she had thought about him a good deal; but
altogether as of a friend of Graham's. He had been good and kind to
Graham, and therefore she had liked him and had talked to him. He
had never said a word to her that had taught her to regard him as
a possible lover; and now that he was an actual lover, a declared
lover standing before her, waiting for an answer, she was so
astonished that she did not know how to speak. All her ideas too,
as to love,--such ideas as she had ever formed, were confounded by
his abruptness. She would have thought, had she brought herself
absolutely to think upon it, that all speech of love should be very
delicate; that love should grow slowly, and then be whispered softly,
doubtingly, and with infinite care. Even had she loved him, or had
she been in the way towards loving him, such violence as this would
have frightened her and scared her love away. Poor Peregrine! His
intentions had been so good and honest! He was so true and hearty,
and free from all conceit in the matter! It was a pity that he should
have marred his cause by such ill judgment.
But there he stood waiting an answer,--and expecting it to be as
open, definite, and plain as though he had asked her to take a walk
with him. "Madeline," he said, stretching out his hand when he
perceived that she did not speak to him at once. "There is my hand.
If it be possible give me yours."
"Oh, Mr. Orme!"
"I know that I have not said what I had to say very--very gracefully.
But you will not regard that I think. You are too good, and too
true."
She had now seated herself, and he was standing before her. She had
retreated to a sofa in order to avoid the hand which he had offered
her; but he followed her, and even yet did not know that he had no
chance of success. "Mr. Orme," she said at last, speaking hardly
above her breath, "what has made you do this?"
"What has made me do it? What has made me tell you that I love you?"
"You cannot be in earnest!"
"Not in earnest! By heavens, Miss Staveley, no man who has said the
same words was ever more in earnest. Do you doubt me when I tell you
that I love you?"
"Oh, I am so sorry!" And then she hid her face upon the arm of the
sofa and burst into tears.
Peregrine stood there, like a prisoner on his trial, waiting for a
verdict. He did not know how to plead his cause with any further
language; and indeed no further language could have been of any
avail. The judge and jury were clear against him, and he should have
known the sentence without waiting to have it pronounced in set
terms. But in plain words he had made his offer, and in plain words
he required that an answer should be given to him. "Well," he said,
"will you not speak to me? Will you not tell me whether it shall be
so?"
"No,--no,--no," she said.
"You mean that you cannot love me." And as he said this the agony
of his tone struck her ear and made her feel that he was suffering.
Hitherto she had thought only of herself, and had hardly recognised
it as a fact that he could be thoroughly in earnest.
"Mr. Orme, I am very sorry. Do not speak as though you were angry
with me. But--"
"But you cannot love me?" And then he stood again silent, for there
was no reply. "Is it that, Miss Staveley, that you mean to answer? If
you say that with positive assurance, I will trouble you no longer."
Poor Peregrine! He was but an unskilled lover!
"No!" she sobbed forth through her tears; but he had so framed his
question that he hardly knew what No meant.
"Do you mean that you cannot love me, or may I hope that a day will
come--? May I speak to you again--?"
"Oh, no, no! I can answer you now. It grieves me to the heart. I know
you are so good. But, Mr. Orme--"
"Well--"
"It can never, never be."
"And I must take that as answer?"
"I can make no other." He still stood before her,--with gloomy and
almost angry brow, could she have seen him; and then he thought he
would ask her whether there was any other love which had brought
about her scorn for him. It did not occur to him, at the first
moment, that in doing so he would insult and injure her.
"At any rate I am not flattered by a reply which is at once so
decided," he began by saying.
"Oh! Mr. Orme, do not make me more unhappy--"
"But perhaps I am too late. Perhaps--" Then he remembered himself and
paused. "Never mind," he said, speaking to himself rather than to
her. "Good-bye, Miss Staveley. You will at any rate say good-bye to
me. I shall go at once now."
"Go at once! Go away, Mr. Orme?"
"Yes; why should I stay here? Do you think that I could sit down to
table with you all after that? I will ask your brother to explain my
going; I shall find him in his room. Good-bye."
She took his hand mechanically, and then he left her. When she came
down to dinner she looked furtively round to his place and saw that
it was vacant.