IN WHICH CASSANDRA VISITS DAVID THRYNG'S ANCESTORS
It was a pleasant morning in London, with as clear a sky as is ever
permitted to that great city. Cassandra had placed her little son in the
middle of a huge bed which nearly filled the small room she had been
given in a hotel, recommended to her by Betty Towers as one where "nice
ladies travelling alone" could stop.
The child was dressed in a fresh white coat, and Cassandra had much ado
to keep him clean. She heaped him about with pillows and bedclothing to
make a nest for him, and gave him a spoon and a drinking cup for
entertainment, while she arranged her own toilet before a cloudy mirror
by a slant ray of daylight that managed to sift through the heavy
draperies and lace curtains that obscured the one high, narrow window of
her room.
She had tried to put them one side that she might look out when she
awoke, but she could see only chimney-pots and grimy, irregularly tiled
roofs. A narrow opening at the top of the window let in a little air;
still she felt smothered, and tried to raise the lower sash, but could
not move it. She thought of the books she had read about great cities,
and how some people had to live in places like this always; and her
heart filled with a large pity for them. Here only a small triangle of
blue sky could be seen--not a tree, not a bit of earth--and in the small
room all those heavy furnishings closed around her, dark red, stuffy,
and greasy with London smoke. She could not touch them without
blackening her hands, nor let her baby sit on the floor for the dirt he
wiped up on his clothing as he rolled and kicked about.
The room seemed to sway and tip as the ship had done, and there was a
continuous sound as of thunder, a strange undercurrent that seemed to
her strained nerves like the moaning of the lost souls of all the ages,
who had lived and toiled and smothered in this monstrous and terrible
city.
Ah, she must get out of it. She must hurry--hurry and find David. He
would be glad to see his little son. He would take him in his arms. He
would hold them both to his heart. She would see him smile again and
look in his eyes, and all this foreboding would cease, and the woful
sounds die out of the air and become only the natural roar of the
activities and traffic of a great city. She must get used to all this,
and not expect to find all the world like her own sunny mountains.
The bishop's careful little wife had tried to explain to her how to meet
her new experiences. She was to go nowhere alone, without taking a cab,
and never start out on foot, carrying her baby in her arms, as she might
do at home. She had given her written instructions how to conduct
herself under all ordinary circumstances, at her hotel or on the
street--how to ring for a servant, order her meals, or call a cab.
Now, standing before her mirror, Cassandra essayed to arrange her hair
as she had seen other young women wear theirs, but she thought the new
way looked untidy, and she took it all down and rearranged it as she was
used to wear it. David would not mind if she did not do her hair as
others did, he would be so glad to see her and his little son. Ah, the
comfort of that little son! She leaned over the bed, half dressed as she
was, and murmured pretty cooing phrases, kissing and cuddling him to
contented laughter.
Betty Towers had procured clothing for her--a modest supply--using her
own good taste, and not disguising Cassandra's natural grace and dignity
by a too-close adherence to the prevailing mode. There were a blue
travelling gown and jacket, and a toque of the same color with a white
wing; a soft clinging black silk, made with girlish simplicity which
admirably became her, and a wide, flexible brimmed hat with a single
heavy plume taken from Betty's own hat of the last winter. Cassandra
stood a long moment before the two gowns. She desired to don the silk,
but Betty had told her always to wear the blue in the morning, so at
last she obeyed her kind adviser.
While waiting with her baby in her arms for the hotel boy to call her
cab, she observed another lady, young and graceful, enter a cab, and a
maid following her wearing a pretty cap, and carrying a child. Eager,
for David's sake, to draw no adverse comment upon herself, she took note
of everything. Ought she then to arrive attended by a maid, carrying her
baby? But David would know she did not need one; bringing him his little
son in her own arms, what would he care for anything more? So the
address was given the cabman, and they were rattled away over the rough
paving, a long, lonely ride through the wonderful city--so many miles of
houses and splendid buildings, of gardens and monuments.
Strangely, the people of _Vanity Fair_ leaped out of the book she had
read, and walked the streets or dashed by her in cabs--albeit in modern
dress. The soldiers--the guardsmen--the liveried lackeys--the errand
boys--all were there, and the ladies in fine carriages. There were the
nursemaids--the babies--the beggars--the ragged urchins and the venders
of the street, with their raucous cries rending the air. Her brain
whirled, and a new feeling to which she had hitherto been blessedly a
stranger crept over her, a feeling of fear.
As the great two-story coaches and trams thundered by, she clasped her
baby closer, until he looked up in her face with round-eyed wonder and
put up his lip in pitiful protest. She soothed and comforted him until
her panic passed, and when, at last, they stopped before a great house
built in on either side by other houses, with wide steps of stone
descending directly upon the street, she had regained a measure of
composure. She was assured by the cabman, leaning respectfully down to
her with his cap in his hand, that this was "the 'ouse, ma'm," and
should he wait?
"Oh, yes. Wait," cried Cassandra. What if David were not there! And of
course, he might be out. Then they were swallowed up in the dark
interior. She was admitted to a hall that seemed to her empty and vast,
by a little old man in livery. For a moment, bewildered, she could
hardly understand what he was saying to her. "'Er ladyship's at 'er
country 'ome and the 'ouse closed."
Although dazed and baffled, Cassandra betrayed no sign of the tumult
within, and the little old man stood before her hesitating, his
curiosity piqued into a determination to discover her business and
identity. Her gravity and silence gave her a poise and dignity that
allayed suspicion, but he and his old wife liked diversion, and a spice
of gossip lightened the monotony of their lives, so he waited, then
coughed behind his hand.
"Yes, 'er ladyship and Lady Laura are at their country 'ome now, ma'm.
Maybe you came to see the 'ouse, ma'm?"
"No, it was not the house--it was--" Again she waited, not knowing how
to introduce her husband's name.
A mystery! A visitor at this hour, and seemingly a lady, yet with a baby
in her arms, and alone, and not to see the house. Again he coughed
behind his hand.
"A many do come to see the 'ouse, ma'm, with a permit from 'is lordship,
ma'm. 'E's not 'ere now, but strangers are halways welcome--to the
gallery, ma'm."
"Yes, I'm a stranger." She caught at the word. Seized by an inward
terror of the small eyes fixed curiously on her, she intuitively shrank
from betraying her identity, and the old servant had told her what she
needed to know. Of course her husband was "his lordship," over here. "I
am from America, and I would like to see the gallery." She must do so to
give a pretext for having come to visit an empty house. David must not
be compromised before the old servant, but a great lump filled her
throat, and tears were burning unshed beneath her eyes.
For all of the warm August sun shining without, a chill struck to her
bones as they passed through the vast, closed rooms. She held her now
sleeping baby close to her breast as she followed the old man about from
picture to picture.
"Yes, a many do come 'ere--especially hartists--to see this gallery.
They say as 'ow 'is lordship wouldn't take a thousand pounds for this
one, ma'm. We'll let in a little more light. A Vandyke--and worth it's
weight in gold."
Cassandra watched him cross the floor, his short bow legs reflected
grotesquely in its shining surface as he walked, then turned and gazed
again at the life-size, half-length portrait of a young man with sunny
hair like David's and warm brown eyes.
"There, you see, it's more than a Vandyke to the family, ma'm, for it's
a hancestor, and my wife says it's as like as two peas to 'is young
lordship, who has just come into the title, ma'm. And that's strange,
isn't it, for 'im to look so like, being as 'e belonged to the younger
branch who 'aven't 'eld the title for four generations; but come to
dress 'im in velvet and gold lace, and the likeness would be nigh as
perfect as if 'e 'ad stood for it."
Cassandra gazed so long silently at this picture that again the little
man coughed his deprecatory cough and essayed to lead her on; but she
was seeing visions and did not heed him. When at last she turned, her
gray eyes had deepened, and a clearly defined spot of delicate red
burned on one pale cheek. She drew a deep breath and looked down the
length of the long gallery. Everything was being impressed upon her mind
as upon sensitized paper.
She followed slowly in the old man's wake, never opening her lips until
they had made the circuit and were again standing before the portrait of
the fair-haired youth. Then, roused suddenly by a direct question, she
responded.
The old servant was saying: "You 'aven't 'appened to meet a Samuel
Cutter in America, 'ave you? 'E's our son. England was too slow for 'im.
Young men aren't like old ones; they wants hadventure, and they gets it.
That's 'ow so many of 'em joins the harmy and gets killed like 'is
lordship's two sons, and young Lord Thryng's brother as would 'ave been
'is lordship, if 'e' ad lived. You 'aven't 'appened to know a Samuel
Cutter over there? 'E went to Canada."
"No, I never met any one by that name. I live a long way from Canada."
"About 'ow far do you think, ma'm?"
Cassandra had no idea of the distance, but she knew how long David and
Hoyle were journeying there, so she answered as best she could. "It
takes three or four days to get there from my home."
The old man's eyes opened wide, and his jaw dropped. "It's a big
country--America is. England may be a small place, but she 'as
tremendous big possessions." He felt it all belonged to England, and
spoke with swelling pride as his short legs carried him toward the door.
There again he paused. He had learned nothing of this young woman to
tell his old wife, except that she came from America, and had never met
Samuel Cutter. The mystery was still unsolved.
"Yes, 'is young lordship do look amazing like that picture. If you'd
ever seen 'im, you'd think 'e'd dressed up in velvet and lace and stood
for it. 'E's lived in America five years, but if you never were in
Canada and never met our Sammy, it's more likely you never saw 'im
either."
"Is he at their country home also?" Cassandra asked. She had seated
herself in the hall, for her heart throbbed chokingly, and the lump was
heavy in her throat. It was as she had dreamed sometimes, when her feet
seemed to cling to the earth, and would not lift her weight up some
steep hill.
"'Is lordship is still in Hafrica, mam. 'E 'ave been a great traveller,
but 'e can't stay much longer now, for Lady Laura is to 'ave a grand
coming out, and 'is lordship is to be married. Her ladyship's 'eart is
set on it, and on 'is marrying 'igh, too. That's gossip, you know."
Cassandra rose and stood suddenly poised for flight. She must get out of
that house and hear no more. She had a silver shilling in her hand, for
Betty Towers had told her all servants expected a tip, and this was
intended for the cabman. Had she followed her impulse, she would have
darted by with her fingers in her ears, but instead, she dropped the
shilling in the old man's hand, and quietly turned toward the door.
"Thank you," his fingers closed over the shilling. Her pallor struck him
then, even as the red spot on her cheek deepened, and he held out his
arms for the child.
"Let me carry 'im for you, ma'm. Is it a boy?"
But her arms closed tighter about her baby. "He is my little son." It
was almost a cry, as she said it, but again she forced herself to
calmness, and, walking slowly out, added, with a quiet smile: "I always
keep him myself. We do in America."
In a moment she was gone. The warm sunlight burst in on them and flooded
the cold hall as the old man stood in the doorway looking after the
retreating cab, and down at the silver shilling.
Darker, dingier, stuffier, seemed the box of a room, as she walked into
it and laid her still sleeping babe on the bed. She felt herself moving
in an unreal world. David--her David--she had not come to him after all;
she had come to an empty place. She knelt and threw her arms about her
little son, encircling his head and his feet. She neither wept nor
prayed; and the red spot burned against the creamy whiteness of her
skin. She was not thinking, only looking, seeing into the past and down
the long vista of her future.
Pictures came to her--pictures of her girlhood--her dim aspirations--her
melancholy-eyed father--his hilltop--and beloved, sunlit mountains. In
the radiance of the spring, she saw them, and in the glory of the
autumn; she breathed the fragrance of the pines in winter and heard the
soft patter of summer rains on widespreading leaves. She saw David
walking at her side, and heard his laugh, sun-bright and glorious he
seemed, her Phoebus Apollo--the father of her little son.
She saw the terrible sea which she had crossed to come to him--the
white-crested waves, with turquoise lights and indigo depths, shifting
and sliding unceasingly where all the world seemed swallowed in space,
and the huge steamship so small a thing in the vast and perilous deep;
and now--now she was here. What was she? What was life?
She had tried to find him, her David, and had been shown the dead, and
the glory of the dead--all past and gone--her David's glory. Shown that
long, empty gallery resounding with those aged footsteps, and the
pictures--pictures--pictures--of men and women who had once been babes
like her little son and David's, now dead and gone--not one soul among
them all to greet her. Proud lords and dames in frames of gold; young
men and maidens in costly silks and velvets of marvellous dyes,
red-cheeked, red-lipped, and soullessly silent; and she, alone and
undefended in their midst, holding in her arms their last descendant.
All those painted fingers seemed lifted to point at her; those silent
red lips parted to cry out at her, "Look at this stranger claiming to be
one of us; send her away."
And David--her David--was one of these! What they had felt--what they
had thought and striven for--was it all intensified and concentrated in
him? Oh, if her soul could only reach to him, wherever he was, and
penetrate this impalpable veil that stretched between them! If her hands
could only touch him, her eyes look into his and see what lay in their
depths for her!
Then her babe stirred and tossed up his pretty hands, waking her from
her sad, vision-seeing trance. He opened his large, clear eyes, and
suddenly it seemed that her wish was granted,--that the veil was rent
and she was looking into David's eyes and seeing his soul free, no
longer chained by invisible links to those dead and gone beings, and
their traditions. This had been all a dream--a dream.
She gathered the child in her arms and held him with his sweet, warm
lips pressed to her breast and his soft little hand thrust in her bosom.
David's little son--David's little son! Surely all was good and well
with the world! Did not the old man say it was only gossip? Had not evil
things been said of David even on her own mountain? It was the trail of
the serpent of ill report. He had not confided his sacred secret to
these people, and they had thought what they pleased. Surely he had told
his mother about his wife. She would go to his mother and wait for his
return, and there she would bring her precious gift--David's little son.
Quickly she packed her few belongings and rang for a messenger, and as
she stood an instant waiting for an answer to her ring, the white-capped
nurse she had noticed in the morning passed by with the baby in her
arms. Yes, surely women of David's state did not travel about alone. Had
she not read in _Vanity Fair_ how Becky Sharp always had her maid? And
now she was in "Vanity Fair," and must be wise and not go to David's
mother unattended. Then, too, if only she had some one with her to whom
she could speak now and then, it would be better. Therefore, without
further consideration, she walked swiftly down the corridor after the
tidy nurse.
"Will you tell me, please, have you a sister?" she said. The young woman
stood still in astonishment. "Or--any friend like yourself? I--I am a
stranger from America." The look of surprise changed to one of
curiosity. "And it is right hard to go about alone with my baby, so I
thought I would ask you if you have a sister."
"Is it to the country you wish to go, ma'm?" The baby in her arms
stirred, and the nurse swayed gently back and forth to hush it.
"Yes."
"I couldn't go with you myself, ma'm--but--"
"Oh, no! I didn't mean you. I only thought if you had a sister--or a
friend, maybe, who could help me for a little while."
"I saw you this morning, ma'm, as you went out. I'll see what I can do.
What number is your room? and what name? I mustn't talk here. Mrs.
Darling is very particular."
"Oh, never mind, then." Cassandra turned away in sudden shame lest she
had not done the right thing. The nurse watched her return to her room
as swiftly as she had left it, and took note of the number.
"How very odd!" said the young woman to herself.
Cassandra felt more abashed under the round-eyed gaze of the maid than
if she had encountered the queen. Her ring for a messenger had not been
answered, and she did not know how to find her husband's country-seat.
She felt faint and weary, but did not think of hunger, nor that it was
long past the dinner-hour, and that she had eaten nothing since her
early breakfast. She only thought that she must be brave and try--try to
think how to reach David's people.
Resolutely she closed her door, and dressed her baby carefully; then she
arrayed herself in the soft silk gown, and the wide hat with the heavy
plume, and then--could David have seen her with her courageous eyes and
lifted head, and the faint color from excitement in her cheeks--he would
no longer have feared to take her by the hand and lead her to his mother
and say, "She is my wife, and the loveliest lady in the land."
People looked at her as she passed, and turned to look again. Down wide,
carpeted stairs she went, until she came to a broad landing with
recessed windows, where were round polished tables and people seated,
sipping tea and eating thin bread and butter and muffins. Then Cassandra
knew that she was hungry and sat herself in one of the windows apart,
before a table. Presently a young man came and bent down to her as if
listening. She looked up at him in bewilderment, but at the same
instant, seeing another young man similarly dressed bearing a tray of
muffins and tea to a lady and gentleman near by, she said:--
"I would like tea, please."
"W'ot kind, ma'm?" She did not care what kind, nor know for what to ask,
only to have something soon, so she said:--
"I will take what they have."
"Yes, ma'm. Muffins, ma'm?"
"Yes," she replied wearily, and turned to gaze out of the window. Cabs
and carriages were rushing up and down the street below them. She placed
her little son on the seat beside her and held him with sheltering arm,
while he watched the moving vehicles and looked from them to his
mother's face.
"What a perfectly lovely child!" said a pleasant voice. "Is it a boy?
How old is he?"
Cassandra looked up to see a rosy-cheeked girl, a little too stout and
florid, with a great mop of dark hair tied with a wide black ribbon. A
gray-haired lady followed, and paused beside her.
"Yes," said Cassandra, faintly. "He is almost six months old."
The girl reached over and patted his cheek. "How perfectly dear. See
him, mamma. Isn't he, though?"
"Babies are always dear," said the mother, with a smile. "Come, Laura,
we can't wait, you know," and they passed on. As Cassandra looked up in
the mother's face, something stirred vaguely in her heart. Had she seen
her before? Possibly, so many had paused to speak to her in this casual
way since she left home.
Then her tea and crisp, hot muffins were brought. The young girl's
pleasant words had warmed her heart, and the refreshment gave her more
courage. She made her way to the office and inquired how she might find
Lord Thryng's country home. The clerk wrote the address promptly on a
card, but the keen look of interest with which he handed it to her
caused her to shrink inwardly. Why, what was it to him what place she
asked for? She lifted her head proudly. She must not falter.
"I wish to go there. Will you tell me how, please?"
But the surprise of the clerk was quite natural, as she had signed the
hotel register the evening before with her whole name, giving no thought
to it; and now he wondered what relation she might be to the family so
lately come into the title, since she bore the name, yet seemed to know
so little about them. He explained to her courteously--almost
deferentially.
"Will you go to Daneshead Castle itself, ma'm, or stop in Queensderry?"
As she had no idea what the question involved, she replied at hazard.
"I will stop in Queensderry." And her bags were brought down, and she
was despatched to the right station without more delay.