Eoa was now sixteen years old, tall, and lithe, and graceful as the
creepers of tropic woodlands. Her face was of the clearest oval, a
quick concise terse oval, such as we find in the eggs of wild birds
rather than of tame ones. Her eyes were of bewildering brightness,
always flashing, always in motion, rarely allowing the gazer a chance
of guessing what their colour was. Very likely they were of no positive
colour, but a pure dark lustre, such as a clear swift river has, when
overhung by palm–trees. Her complexion, beautifully soft and even, was
toned with a delicate eastern tinge, like that fawn–coloured light
which sometimes flushes a cloudless sky before the midsummer sunrise.
And her warm oriental blood suffused it, at the slightest emotion, as
the leaping sun pervades that sky with a flood of limpid rubies.
She had never been flattened by education: all her qualities and
feelings, like her beauty, were in excess. You could see it in
the quick rise and fall of her breath, in the sudden grace of her
movements, in the infinite variety of her attitudes and aspects.
Whatever she thought, she said at once; yet none ever called her a
bold girl. Her modes of thought were as widely different from those of
an English maiden, as a wild honeysuckle differs in form, habit, and
scent, from a rose. She cared for no oneʼs opinion of her, any more
than the wind cares how a tree swings; unless indeed it were one whom
she loved, and then she would crawl to please him. For she loved with
all her heart and soul, and hated with no less; and she always took
care in either case to apprise the object of it. And yet, with all her
depth of passion, Eoa was pure of heart and mind,—ay, as pure as our
own Amy.
She soon recovered from her bruises, being perfectly healthy, and
elastic as india–rubber. Nevertheless, she would not have been saved
from that terrible sea but for the generosity of poor Captain Roberts,
and the gallantry of Bob Garnet.
Now Bob was hurt rather seriously, and, being (as we are well aware)
an uncommonly shy young fellow, he was greatly astonished, and shocked
a little, when on the Friday morning a beautiful girl, very strangely
dressed, ran to the side of his sofa, threw her arms round him, and
kissed him till he was out of breath, and his face was wet with the
dew of her tears.
“Oh, please donʼt,” said Bob; “I am sure I donʼt deserve it.”
“Yes, you do; and I will marry you when I am old enough. I donʼt know
what you are like, and I donʼt care two straws, directly they told me
what you had done. Only I must have papaʼs leave. Kiss me again, I like
it. Now where is my darling papa?”
“What, donʼt you know? Havenʼt they told you? Oh, poor thing!”
At the tone of his voice she leaped back, like a bird at the gun–flash,
and stood with her little hands clasped on her head, her eyes with
their deep light quivering, and the whole of her form swinging to and
fro, from the wild push of sudden terror. Then she spoke with a hollow
depth, which frightened Bob more than the kissing.
“They told me that he was well, gone to his brother somewhere, and I
thought it wasnʼt like him to leave me so, and—tell me the truth, or
Iʼll shake you to pieces.”
“No, donʼt,” said Bob, as she leaped at him; “I have had shaking
enough.”
“Yes, you poor boy, and for my sake. I am a brute, I know. Tell me the
truth, if you love me.”
“Your dear father is dead. But they have found his body.”
“Do you mean to say that God has been so wicked as to kill my father?”
“God knows best,” said Bob; he could think of nothing else to say.
“No, He doesnʼt. No, He doesnʼt. No, He never knows anything. He
couldnʼt have known who he was, and how terribly I loved him, or He
wouldnʼt have the heart to do it. Oh, you wicked boy; oh, you wicked
boy! I will never forgive you for saving me. Hya, hya, hya!”
Bob never saw such a thing before, and never will again. And he wonʼt
be much the loser; although the sight was magnificent. The screams and
shrieks of the clearest voice that ever puzzled echo brought up the
landlord and landlady, and our good friend Rufus Hutton, who had set
forth full speed from home on hearing about the _Aliwal_. He caught Eoa
in his arms, carried her back to her room, and dosed her. He gave her
some Indian specific, some powder of a narcotic fungus, which he had
brought on purpose.
It stupefied her for nearly three days, and even then she awoke into
the dreamy state of Nirwana, that bliss of semi–consciousness, like
mild annihilation, into which the Buddha is absorbed, and to which all
pious Buddhists look as their eternal happiness. Then she opened her
delicate tapering arms, where you could see the grand muscles moving,
but never once protruding, and she called for her darling father to
come. Finding that he did not come, she was satisfied with some
trifling answer, and then wanted to have Bob instead; but neither was
Bob forthcoming.
On the very day when Dr. Hutton came to look for Eoa, Mr. Garnet found
himself getting better from that wretched low nervous fever into which
his fright had thrown him. Then he asked Dr. Hutton whether there
would be any danger in moving Robert, and, finding that there would
be none whatever, if it were carefully managed, he ordered a carriage
immediately, and with some of his ancient spirit. The Crown, which had
the cross–bar of its N set up the wrong way (as is done, by–the–by,
on the roof of Hampton Court chapel, and in many other places), made
public claim to be regarded as a “commercial hotel and posting–house.”
No Rushford folk having yet been known to post anything, except a
letter at rare intervals, and a bill at rarer, this claim of the
Crown had never been challenged, and strangers entertained a languid
theoretical faith in it. But Mr. Brown looked very blue when Bull
Garnet in reviving accents ordered “a chaise and pair at the door in
half an hourʼs time; a roomy chaise, if you please, because my son must
keep his feet up.”
“Yes, sir; yes, to be sure, sir; I quite understand, sir. It shall be
attended to, sir.”
“Then why donʼt you go and order it?”
“To be sure, sir; I forgot. I will speak to Mrs. Brown, sir.”
Mrs. Brown, being a woman of resource, mounted the boy on her donkey,
the only quadruped she possessed, but a “wonner to go,” as the boy
said, “when you knows the right place to prog him in,” and sent him
post–haste to Lymington, whence the required conveyance arrived in
about an hour and a half.
Rufus Hutton, having promised to be at home that evening, left Eoa to
sleep off her heavy soporific, and followed the carriage on horseback;
neither did he leave its track where the Ringwood Road turns off, for
he had undertaken to tell Sir Cradock how his niece was getting on.
He started nearly half an hour after the Lymington chaise, for Polly
would never demean herself by trotting behind the “posters.” During
that half–hour he drank hot brown brandy–and–water, although he could
not bear it, to ingratiate him with Mrs. Brown for the sake of the poor
Eoa. For Mrs. Brown had no other hot method of crowning the flowing
bowl. And now, while I think of it, let me warn all gentle and simple
people who deign on this tale of the New Forest, never to ask for
pale brandy within the perambulations. How do you think they make it?
By mixing brown brandy with villanous gin. Rufus was up to this, of
course; and, as he must take something for the good of the house, and
to get at the kindly kernel of the heavy–browed hostess, he took that
which he thought would be least for his own evil. Then, leaving Mrs.
Brown (who, of course, had taken her own glass at his sole charge and
largesse, after fifty times “Oh no, sir, never! Oh Lord, how my Brown
would be shocked!”), having imbued that good Mrs. Brown, who really was
not a bad woman—which means that she was a good one, for women have
no medium—with a strong aromatic impression that he was a pleasant
gentleman, and no pride, not a bit of it, in him, no more than you nor
me might,—off he trotted at a furious pace, smoking two cheroots at
once.
I believe that there was and is—for I am happy to say that he still
inhales the breeze of life down his cigar, and looks browner and redder
than ever—I believe that, in spite of all his troubles in connexion
with this story, which took a good deal out of him, there was and is no
happier man in our merry England than the worthy Rufus Hutton. And, as
all happiness is negative, and goes without our knowing it, and only
becomes a positive past for us to look back upon, so his went before it
came, and goes or eʼer it comes. And yet he enjoys it none the less; he
multiplies it by three for the past and by nine for the future, and he
never finds it necessary to deduct for the present moment.
Happy man who never thinks beyond salutary average, who can accept,
in perfect faith, the traditions of his forbears, and yet is shrewd
enough to hope that his grandsons will discard at least a portion of
them,—who looks upon the passing life as a thing he need not move in,
a world which must improve itself, and every day is doing it. And all
the while he sympathises with his fellow–men, enjoys a bit of human
nature, laughs at the cross–purposes of native truth and training,
loves whatever he finds to be true, and does his best to foster it, is
pleased with his after–dinner story, and feels universally charitable;
then smiles at his wife, and kisses his children; and goes to bed with
the firm conviction that they are worth all the rest put together.
Yet this manʼs happiness is not sound, because it is built upon
selfishness.
In Nowelhurst village Dr. Hutton met Mark Stote, the gamekeeper, who
begged him to stop for a moment, just to hear a word or two. Rufus,
after hearing his news, resolved to take the upper road to the Hall,
past Mr. Garnetʼs house; it was not so very far out of his way, and
perhaps he might be of service there, and—ah, yes, Dr. Hutton, this
last was the real motive, though you may not have thought so—what
a fine opportunity to discover something which plagued him! Perhaps
I ought to say rather, the want of which was plaguing him. Rufus
took so kind an interest in his neighbours’ affairs, that anything
not thoroughly luculent in their dealings, mode of life or speech,
or management of their households, was to him the subject–matter of
continual mental scratchings. Ah, how genteel a periphrase, worthy of
Bailey Kettledrum; how happily we have shown our horror of that English
monosyllable, beginning with the third vowel, which must be (according
to Dr. Aldrich) the correlative of scratch! Score two, and go on after
Dr. Hutton.
He overtook the Garnets twain just at their front gate, whence the
house could not be seen, on account of a bank of evergreens. The maid
came out with her cap flying off, and all her mind perturbed. Rufus
Hutton, checking his mare, for the road was very narrow, heard the
entire dialogue.
“Oh, sir! oh, master! have you heard of it? Such a thing, to be sure!”
“Heard of what, Sarah? Of course I have heard of the great disaster at
Rushford.”
“No, no. Here, sir, here! The two big trees is down on the house. Itʼs
a mussy as Nanny and me wasnʼt killed. And poor Miss Pearl have been
in hysterics ever since, without no dinner. There, you can hear her
screeching now, worse than the mangle, ever so much.”
Mr. Garnet did not say a word, but set off for the house full speed,
even forgetting that Bob wanted help to get from the gate to the
doorway.
Rufus Hutton jumped down from his mare, and called to the driver to
come and hold her, just for a minute or two; no fear of _his_ horses
bolting. Then, helping Bob to limp along, he followed through the
shrubbery. When they came within full view of the house, he was quite
amazed at the mischief. The two oaks interlocked had fallen upon it,
and, crashing as they did from the height above, the breaches they
made were hideous. They had cloven the house into three ragged pieces,
from the roof–ridge down to the first floor, where the solid joists
had stopped them. It had happened in the afternoon of the second day
of the tempest; when the heart of the storm was broken, but tremendous
squalls came now and then from the bright north–west. Mr. Garnetʼs own
bed was occupied by the tree which he detested. Pearl had screamed
“Judgment, judgment!” and danced among the ruins; so the maid was
telling Mr. Garnet, as he feared to enter his own door.
“Judgment for what?” asked Rufus Hutton, and Mr. Garnet seemed not to
hear him.
“I am sure I donʼt know, sir,” answered the maid, “for none of us done
any harm, sir; unless it was the bottle of pickled onions, when master
were away, and there was very few of them left, sir, very few, I do
declare to you, and we thought they was on the turn, sir, and it seemed
such a pity to waste them. And please, sir, weʼve all been working like
horses, though frightened out of our lives ‘most; and we fetched down
all the things from your room, where the cupboards was broken open, for
‘fraid it should come on to rain, sir; and weʼve taken all our meals
standing, sir; and made up a bed in the meat–screen, and another upon
the dresser; and Miss Pearl, what turns she have given us—— Here she
comes, I do declare.”
“Dr. Hutton,” said Bull Garnet, hastily, “good–bye; I am much obliged
to you. I shall see you, I hope, next week. Good–bye, good–bye. Excuse
me.”
But, before he could get him out of the way—for Rufus lingered
strangely—Pearl Garnet came into the little hall, with her eyes
distended fearfully. “There, there it is,” she cried, “there it is, I
tell you! No wonder the tree came down upon it. No wonder the house was
crushed for it.” And she pointed to a shattered box, tilted up endwise,
among a heap of account–books, clothes, and furniture.
“Oh yes, you may look at it. To be sure you may look at it. God would
not have it hidden longer. I have done my best, God knows, and my heart
knows, and my—I mean that man there knows. Is there anything more I
can do for you, anything more, _dear father_? You have done so much for
me, you know. And I will only ask you one little thing—put me in his
coffin.”
“The girl is raving,” cried Mr. Garnet. “Poor thing, it comes from her
mother.”
“No, it comes from her father,” said Pearl, going boldly up to him, and
fixing her large bright eyes upon his. “Do as you like with me; I donʼt
care; but donʼt put it on any one else. Oh, father, father, father!”
Moaning, she turned away from him; and then sprang into his arms with
shrieks. He lifted her tenderly, and forgot all about his own safety.
His great tears fell on her wan, sick face; and his heavy heart
throbbed for his daughter only, as he felt hers bounding perilously. He
carried her off to an inner room, and left them to their own devices.
“I should like uncommonly,” said Rufus Hutton, rubbing his chin,
“to know what is in that box. Indeed, I feel it my duty at once to
ascertain.”
“No, you shanʼt,” cried Bob, limping across in front of it; “I know no
more than you do, sir. But I wonʼt have fatherʼs things pryed into.”
“You are very polite,” replied the Doctor; “a chip of the old block,
I perceive. But, perhaps, you will believe me, my boy, when I tell
you that, if ever there was a gentleman totally devoid of improper
curiosity, it is Dr. Rufus Hutton, sir.”
“Oh, I am so glad,” said Bob; “because you wonʼt be disappointed, then.”
Rufus grinned, in spite of his wrath; but he was not to be baffled
so easily. He could not push poor Bob aside, in his present disabled
state, without being guilty of cowardice. So he called in an auxiliary.
“Betsy, my dear, your young mistress wished me just to examine that
box. Be kind enough to bring it to the light here, unless it is too
heavy for your little hands.”
Oh, if he had only said “Miss Sarah,” what a difference it might have
made!
“Betsy, indeed!” cried Sarah, who had followed her mistress, but,
being locked out, had come back to see the end of it; “my name, sir,
is nothing so low as that. My name is Sarah Mackarness, sir, very
much at your service; and my mother keeps a potato–shop, the largest
business in Lyndhurst, sir. Betsy, indeed! and from a stranger, not
to say a strange gentleman, for fear of making a mistake. And as
for my hands”—she thought he had been ironical, for her hands were
above regulation size—“my hands are such as pleased God to make them,
and honest hands, anyhow, and doesnʼt want to interfere with other
peopleʼs business. Oh, what will poor Nanny say, to think of me, Sarah
Mackarness, be permiscuous called Betsy?”
At this moment, when Sarah Mackarness, having recovered breath, was
starting into another native discourse on prænomina, and Rufus was
calling upon his resources for some constitutional measure, Bull Garnet
came back, treading heavily, defiant of all that the world could do.
His quick eyes, never glimpsing that way, but taking in all the room at
once, espied the box unmeddled with, and Bob upon guard in front of it.
He was his own man now again. What did he care for anybody, so long as
he had his children?
“Dr. Hutton, I thought that you were gone.”
“You see I am not,” said Rufus, squaring his elbows, and looking big,
for he was a plucky little fellow, “and, whatʼs more, I donʼt mean to
go till I know what is in that box.”
“Box, box!” cried Bull Garnet, striking his enormous forehead, as if to
recall something; “have we a box of yours, Dr. Hutton?”
“No, no; that box of _yours_. Your daughter told us to examine it. And,
from her manner, I believe that I am bound to do so.”
“Bound to examine one of my boxes!” Bull Garnet never looked once that
way, and Rufus took note of the strange avoidance; “my boxes are full
of confidential papers; surely, sir, you have caught my daughterʼs—I
mean to say, you are labouring under some hallucination.”
“There are no papers in that box. The contents of it are metal. I
have seen one article already through the broken cover, and shall not
forget its shape. Beware; there have been strange things done in this
neighbourhood. If you refuse to allay my suspicions, you confirm them.”
The only answer he received was a powerful hand at the back of his
neck, a sensation of being lifted with no increase of facilities for
placid respiration; finally, a lateral movement of great rapidity
through the air, and a loud sound as of a bang. Recovering reasonʼs
prerogative, he found himself in a dahlia, whose blossoms, turned into
heel–balls by the recent frost, were flapping round his countenance,
and whose stake had gone through his waistcoat back, and grazed his
coxendix, or something; he knows best what it was, as a medical man
deeply interested.
He had also a very unpleasant reminiscence of some such words as these,
to which he had no responsive power—“You wonʼt take a hint like a
gentleman; so take a hit like a blackguard.”
Dr. Rufus Hutton was not the man to sit down quietly under an insult of
any sort. At the moment he felt that brute force was irresistibly in
the ascendant, and he was wonderfully calm about it. He shook himself,
and smoothed his waistcoat, and tried the stretch of his garters;
then never once looked toward the house, never shook his fist, nor
frowned even. He walked off to his darling Polly as if nothing at all
had happened; gave the man a shilling for holding her, after looking
long for a sixpence; then mounted, and rode towards Nowelhurst Hall,
showing no emotion whatever. Only Polly knew that burning tears of a
brave manʼs sense of ignominy fell upon her glossy shoulder, and were
fiercely wiped way.
At the Hall he said nothing about it; never even mentioned that he had
called at Garnetʼs cottage; but told Sir Cradock, like a true man,
of Eoaʼs troubles, of her poor forlorn condition, and power of heart
to feel it. He even contrived to interest the bereaved man, now so
listless, in the young life thrown upon his care, as if by the breath
of heaven. We are never so eloquent for another as when our own hearts
are moved deeply by the feeling of wrong to ourselves; unless, indeed,
we are very small, and that subject excludes all others.
So it came to pass that the grand new carriage was ordered to the door,
and Sir Cradock would himself have gone—only Rufus Hutton had left
him, and the eloquence was oozing. The old man, therefore, turned back
on the threshold, saying to himself that it would be hardly decent
to appear in public yet; and Mrs. OʼGaghan was sent instead, sitting
inside, and half afraid to breathe for fear of the crystal. As for her
clothes, they were good enough, she knew, for the Lord Mayorʼs coach.
“Five–and–sixpence a yard, maʼam, lave alone trimming and binding.”
But, knowing what she did of herbs, she could not answer for the
peppermint.
Of course, they did not intend to fetch poor Eoa home yet; but Biddy
had orders to stay there until the young lady was moveable. Biddy took
to her at once, in her heavy, long–drawn sleep, with the soft black
lashes now and then lifting from the rich brown cheek.
“An’ if she isnʼt illigant, then,” said Biddy to Mrs. Brown, “ate me
wiʼout a purratie. Arl coom ov’ the blude, missus. Sazins, then, if me
and Pat had oonly got a child this day! Belikes, maʼam, for the matter
o’ that, a drap o’ whisky disagrays with you.”
Biddy, feeling strongly moved, and burning to drink her new childʼs
health, showed a bottle of brown potheen.
“To tell you the truth, mem,” said Mrs. Brown, “I know nothing about
them subjects. Spirituous liquors is a thing as has always been beyond
me.”
“Thin Iʼll clap it away again,” said Biddy, “and the divvil only the
wiser. I never takes it alone, marm.”
“It would ill become me, mem,” replied Mrs. Brown, “to be churlish in
my own house, mem. I have heard of you very often, mem. Yes, I assure
you I have, from the people as comes to bathe here, as a lady of great
experience in diseases of the chest. If you recommend any cordial, mem,
on the strength of your experience, for a female of weak witality, I
should take it as a dooty, mem, strictly as a dooty to my husband and
two darters.”
“Arrah, then, Iʼm your femmale. Me witality goes crossways, like, till
I has a drap o’ the crather.” And so they made a night of it, and Mr.
Brown had some.