always getting into scrapes for chalking caricatures of the officers
on the bunks and cabin-doors; but there wasn’t a man fore or aft that
hadn’t at some time or other coaxed a picture or portrait out of him,
to send to mother or sweetheart, and never a Jack Tar amongst them
would split on good-natured Ben Travis.”
Down dropped the shaking hand that held the letter. _Ben Travis!_ What
strange coincidence was this?
“His father had been a Liverpool shipbroker, and Ben took to me because
I was a Lancashire lad like himself, though he was old enough to be my
father. He had been pressed, and as I was the youngest middy, and he
the master of the forecastle, many a time had he told me the sad story
of his life. His father had died without a will, and Ned his eldest
brother had laid his clutches on everything but a hundred pounds or so,
which had been the mother’s. Ben turned his back on Liverpool and his
brother, and being smart with his pencil, took to that to get a living.
He wandered about to pick up bits of scenery, and at Crumpsall fell
in with a widow and her daughter, both named Ann Crompton, and went
to lodge with them. After awhile he married the lass, and thinking if
he meant to earn a living for his wife and the child that was coming
he’d best seek a large town, he removed to Manchester, and took an old
cottage in Smedley Vale, where he hoped to turn his talent to account.”
The paper rattled, and Jabez leaned against the window-frame, as much
for support as light, as he read on with panting lips.
“He tried portrait-painting, but lacked a patron; he turned his head to
pattern-designing, but no one would employ a raw beginner. His money
was dwindling, and a birth was near at hand. He doted on his wife, and
for her sake wrote to his brother, who was married when their father
died. Ned wrote back, enclosing a bank-note, and begging to see him at
once. His wife had died, leaving a baby-boy, whom he had christened
Ben, after his runaway brother. Ned said her loss was killing him, and
he wished to leave his boy in his brother’s care before he died. Poor
Ben Travis kissed his wife, and went by coach to Liverpool. Before he
could reach his brother’s office in Castle-street, near the docks,
he was pounced upon by a press-gang, dragged on board a ship in the
Mersey, and never saw brother, or wife, or home again. I have seen
Ben’s tears roll down his weather-beaten cheeks many a time as he told
this. He was one of the first sent down to the cock-pit at the battle
of Trafalgar, and when Admiral Nelson’s glorious remains went home to
be buried, Ben went likewise, to hospital, and I lost sight of him.
When I was exchanged to the _Excellent_, Ben turned up again, hearty,
but aged with grief. He had sought his dear ones, but a flood had swept
through Smedley Vale in 1799, and left no trace of his home. A man
at the dye-works remembered something about an old woman they called
stiff-backed Nan being killed by the falling house in trying to save
a baby; but Ben could learn no more, and his own impression was that
wife, child, and mother-in-law had perished in the same catastrophe. He
went to Liverpool. Death had swept off his brother; executors swept off
the son Ben, his namesake. He went back to sea, and I saw the brave Ben
Travis drowned in trying to save a bumboat woman, who fell overboard
off Spithead.
“And now, mother, you used to be a good hand at patch-work—piece my
story and your story together, and see if Ellen’s poor cradle-friend is
not near of kin to your rich friend, Mr. Benjamin Travis, with quite as
good a right to be called Mr. Travis too.
“I should have a rough sketch of the old sailor, drawn with a quid of
’bacca on the fly-leaf of his Prayer-book. I’ll look it up for Nell.”
CHAPTER THE FORTY-FOURTH.
MAN AND BEAST.
The January twilight had deepened into dusk, and from dusk to dark,
before Jabez was sufficiently master of himself to descend into the
light of the rooms below.
Whatever of surprise or satisfaction Richard Chadwick’s letter had held
for him, a wave of sorrow had passed over soul and countenance for the
sad fate of the parents whom he had never known. As his footstep was
heard overhead, Ellen flew to meet him at the foot of the staircase,
and threw herself into his arms.
“My love! my own husband!” was all she said, but such an intensity
of devotion and sympathy was in the act and tone that he felt he had
indeed a true heart beating with his, as he held her close, and his
lips touched her forehead as a seal to a new bond.
It was but a single step to the parlour door, which opened on a room
all aglow with light, and radiant faces. On Mr. Ashton’s inspiriting,
Simon’s easy chair had been wheeled in from the house-place, there
being no stately Mrs. Ashton at hand to demur at the innovation, or to
whisper a syllable of class distinctions. And surely that was not—yes,
it was—Ben Travis himself standing by the rheumatic old tanner, with
both hands outstretched, to greet a new cousin in his long-time friend.
And there was Bess, proudly glancing from his face to a piece of yellow
paper. “It’s as like as two peas,” she cried for the twentieth time,
handing to her tall foster-son a sketch which, though little more than
a succession of brown smears, was a ludicrous resemblance to himself.
“Well, Jabez,” said Mr. Ashton, sitting by the fire, with his
handkerchief over his knee, after the first hubbub of congratulation
had subsided, “it is as well our new partnership has not been gazetted.
I suppose there will have to be a change of name, and Ellen there will
be Mrs. Travis after all.”
This was but a playful sally on his part, but Ben Travis visibly
winced, and quick-eyed Jabez saw it.
“No, sir,” replied Jabez, calmly, with his hand on his wife’s shoulder,
“there will be no change. I bear the name of the kind friends who saved
my infant life; fed, clothed, and kept me through evil report and good
report, through pinching poverty, privation, and pain” (he glanced
towards Bess); “as Jabez Clegg I was enrolled as a Blue-coat boy; as
Jabez Clegg I was apprenticed to you, sir; as Jabez Clegg I married my
wife; as Jabez Clegg I have been honoured with a place in your firm;
and Jabez Clegg shall go with me to the grave. I had no name when that
good man” (pointing to Simon) “lent me his; time has made it mine, and
I mean to keep it as honourable as it came to me.” He looked down:
“Mrs. Clegg, are _you_ content?”
“Perfectly, Jabez.”
A long-sustained pinch of snuff spoke Mr. Ashton’s approbation, whilst
Simon could only reiterate, “Eh, lad, when aw tuk thee eawt o’ the
wayter, aw little thowt whatn a blessin’ theawd be to us, or the credit
theaw’d bring on ar neäme! Aw nobbut wish Parson Brucks wur aloive neaw
to yer thee.”
“Our relationship will only bind our friendship closer, whatever name
you bear,” put in Ben Travis, warmly, in spite of himself pleased with
the decision which would spare him the pain of addressing Ellen as Mrs.
Travis.
“An’ meals come reawnd whatever neäme yo’ ca’ them by,” supplemented
Bess, who, like Martha, troubled with much serving, had been running in
and out during the colloquy, whilst a combination of savoury odours,
and a clatter of knives and plates, came from the adjoining room; “it’s
supper toime neaw, an’ nobbody’s had even theer tay yet.”
“Just so, just so, Mrs. Hulme. But never mind the tea,” said Mr.
Ashton; “here comes your good husband in from the cellar, with a bottle
or two of generous wine to drink to new relationships.”
“I think I shall go abroad for a few months, Cousin Jabez,” said Travis
to him, as Mr. Ashton mounted first into the gig to return home next
day. “I require to dissipate thought. If I were occupied as you are
from morning until night there might be less necessity. But—I say,
Chapman the landlord here tells me you painted this sign. I think the
faculty must run in the blood, for I do a bit in that line myself
sometimes. How is it I have not seen a brush in your hands latterly?”
“Well, I got a hint, through painting that very sign, that trade
and art were incompatible, and seeing the force of the remark, as
counselled—the ‘cobber has stuck to his last.’”
“Look you, cousin” (Travis seemed fond of the word), “the fabled
shield had two sides—stick to your trade if you like, but don’t let
your trade absorb you. A business man who allows himself no leisure,
and has no resource out of his business, is apt to degenerate into a
money-grubber. I hope better things of you.”
A nod, a shake of the hand, and the gig rolled off with its occupants,
and Jabez stood looking after them, hesitating whether to go back to
the mill or to the cottage. The casual word of warning had come not
one whit too soon. That which was sending Travis abroad had kept Jabez
close to business. He had not sought so much to dissipate thought as
to circumvent it by substitution. If he had given his leisure to the
cultivation of art, it had of late been art only as connected with
manufacture and money-making. Even his honeymoon he was casting into
the mill as grist. He was ever ready to take a hint. He turned his
steps towards Carr with something like a sigh.
“Well, perhaps I might as well give my afternoons to Ellen whilst we
are here. I did not come to work, and the poor thing does need some
compensation for the lack of a lover’s ardour. God forbid that she
should ever suspect that I married her out of pity, or that I should
become a money-grubber. I wonder if Travis thought I was likely to
neglect her? It is a thousand pities she should set her mind on me
instead of him. And why she should passes my comprehension. He has
every advantage of face, figure, and fortune, to say nothing of his
evident devotion. Ah! women are strange creatures, and men are not much
better. I fear I am very ungrateful not to reciprocate her attachment
more fully. Why, here she is running down the avenue to meet me, as if
I had been gone a month. I really ought to love her better than I do.
But love can neither be forced nor crushed. Heigho!”
* * * * *
Back to Manchester they went, rather sooner than expected; and then,
though Jabez threw himself into business with a will, he bore in mind
the parting words of Ben Travis.
The contemplated amalgamation was effected, not without extra draughts
on Jabez and his leisure. But as partner of a large firm, even
though a junior, it was obvious he could not work as designer for
calico-printers, or for any other than their own house. Consequently,
not being a man of pleasure, his evenings hung rather heavily on his
hands, especially as neither Ellen nor he cared for the card-parties
which formed the visiting staple. His very marriage had driven away his
closest friend, and broken in upon plans and schemes which otherwise
would have found sufficient occupation for his spare hours. Other
friends, however, dropped in for an occasional chat; notably George
Pilkington (to whom the wine-trade had opened a road to fortune), with
his reminiscences and jocularity, broke in on the monotony of married
life, that monotony which is as much to be dreaded by young couples as
is a first quarrel.
Ellen knew it not, but Augusta’s image often and often rose up between
husband and wife, and would not be driven back; whilst Ellen’s very
caresses were a source of pain to him, so much he felt himself a
debtor to her love. There was a void in his breast which she could
never wholly fill; he himself complained of a dearth of intellectual
recreation, and when Henry Liverseege suggested a return to painting,
he fell back upon his advice.
The fact is he needed to be alone, to have a place where he could
shut himself up with himself, whether to indulge in day-dreams or to
discipline his soul, or to think out the ideas of art, trade, or social
economy which floated through his brain, and were dispersed by actual
business or fireside chat; such a sanctum as had been his so many
years in Mosley Street; but self-conscious, he had shrunk from making
the proposal, afraid to wound his devoted wife by showing a desire to
isolate himself. The young artist’s open remark was enough for Ellen.
At once a small room, or rather closet, partitioned off from a large
one, at the top of the house, was set apart for his use. He shelved
one wall for books, set up an office-desk, carried thither easel,
papers, and painting materials; enclosed the fly-leaf of his father’s
prayer-book within glass and a black frame, suspending it on the wall
before him as a sacred relic, and there after warehouse hours he was
wont to shut himself in, and almost forget that he was a married man.
But this room acted as a safety-valve.
Luckily, in Ellen’s eyes, Jabez could do no wrong; he was gentleness
itself in all his comportment towards her, and the love which had
sprung to life unsought, and lived so long without encouragement, asked
but slight return to sustain it. It was treason for Mrs. Chadwick
to hint that Jabez was “unsocial,” or gave them “too little of his
company.” She was ever ready to resent it with the reply that—
“If he is not dull shut up there by himself, I am sure we three have no
right to complain of dullness down here together;” yet if we analysed
her heart very closely there were longings and yearnings for his
society known only to herself.
It was judged advisable for the further introduction and extension of
Ashton, Chadwick, and Clegg’s business that one of the partners should
travel occasionally as their commercial representative; and naturally
this duty devolved upon the active junior, whose capacity for the
undertaking revealed itself not only in heavy remittances and a full
order-book, but in a paucity of bad debts. Of course he travelled with
a horse and gig for the carriage of samples, and now and then he would
take Ellen with him on a short journey, an indulgence which appeared to
fill the cup of her delight. And altogether the marital yoke in a few
months adjusted itself to their shoulders very naturally.
It was during their absence on one of the earliest of these journeys
that an event occurred which set the indignant blood of Jabez on the
boil, and showed there was a fire smouldering, not extinguished.
The Aspinall home at Fallowfield was an ancient, many-gabled
grange, with mullioned windows, recessed window-seats, expansive
two-leaved entrance arched above; noble hall, with trophies from the
hunting-field; grand staircase, with massive carved oak balusters,
flights of broad low steps, and wide square landings; long corridors,
three or four rooms of magnificent proportions, and clusters of little
ones grouped around unsuspected passages and stairs; open fire-places
recently enclosed, and double doors to the chief chambers. Antiquity
had set its seal upon the place, and filled the panelled rooms with
quaint or obsolete furniture and adornments, as each successive
generation had left its quota. High-backed chairs, sofas of grotesque
device with dim worsted-work cushions and covers, heavy draperies of
silk or velvet, and tables with legs of all possible patterns.
It had come to the former Mrs. Aspinall from her ancestors, and from
her to her son on his marriage; consequently this was the home proper
of Laurence and his wife, although they had a suite of rooms set
apart for them at Ardwick, and Mr. Aspinall would fain have had his
fascinating daughter-in-law abide there always, instead of making his
house a mere convenience for visiting in town.
Stabling and other outhouses were attached, the gardens were well laid
out, there was a good quantity of grass land, all enclosed within a
high wall, and it lay away from the main road. Mr. Aspinall’s carriage
was a close one, for service as well as show. Mr. Laurence, on his
accession to his mother’s property and his wife’s dowry, added to other
extravagances not a like carriage, but a new Tilbury, and astonished
the crowd by driving tandem.
Whitsuntide is the great annual festival of Manchester. It is the race
week, the time when the Sunday-school children dress in their best to
walk in procession and have excursional treats into the country. In
1823 Whitsunday fell on the 18th of May, when the hawthorn scented the
air, and cherry-blossom snowed on the carriage which Mr. Aspinall sent
for his daughter-in-law, that she might witness from his drawing-room
windows the interesting spectacle on the Green, and preside over the
hospitalities of his open house during the week. At that time, as now,
Monday was the day set apart for the children of all the Established
Church Schools to assemble at the Collegiate Church, sing anthems,
and thence defile in long procession six abreast, attended by their
respective clergy and teachers, until they reached the Green, where the
girls in their white caps and frocks were ranged within the enclosure
of the Pond, the boys forming a dark cordon around them, and the crowd
a motley one beyond. And then from the multitudinous young throats
poured forth anthems of praise, in a volume of swelling harmony which
hushed to silence the listening birds above them.
Augusta, not in robust health, lay on a couch by the window and looked
on; her father-in-law watching her and anticipating her wants with the
homage of old world gallantry, for young Mrs. Aspinall was becoming an
important person in his eyes.
Nor was Laurence much less attentive. He had been on his best behaviour
for some time, and would scarcely let the wind of heaven blow too
roughly upon her.
At that period Manchester races were held on Kersall Moor, an extensive
tract of land generously set apart for the purpose by the owner, Miss
Byrom.
“The glass of fashion and the mould of form,” was the handsome man who
patted Augusta’s shoulders, and stooped down to kiss her, on Wednesday,
the first race day; but it was with something more than a shade of
anxiety she saw him draw on his buckskin gloves, take the long reins,
and mount his high Tilbury, with Bob beside him, and dash round the
lower end of the Green at a canter.
Evening came to verify her fears. Back from Kersall Moor came the
tandem and the tandem’s master, but the biped was _ebrius_. He was in
that stage of self-satisfied elation which a contradictory word would
change to fierceness, and the whim of the hour was to drive his wife
to Fallowfield, and show her how dexterous a whip he was, and that not
Ducrow could manage a tandem better than he.
It was in vain she or his father pleaded her delicate health, the
height of the vehicle, the shaking she would sustain; he laughed at
her fears, then fiercely insisted, and not daring to disobey, she was
hoisted to her perilous seat.
In much alarm, Mr. Aspinall mounted Bob on a saddle-horse to follow.
The roads were dotted with vehicles and people, the latter shouting and
singing, or muttering tipsy oaths, as the fortune of the day inclined
them. He proved his dexterity in guiding his far-off leader through all
intricacies, but so close did wheel often come to wheel, that Augusta’s
heart seemed to leap into her throat, and her teeth chattered, although
it was May.
After they turned off from the Stockport Road at Longsight, they “spun
along at a rattling pace,” as he said; but she had to hold by the rail
to keep her seat, notwithstanding which, at the sharp angle by Birch
Fold, the vehicle gave a lurch which almost pitched her off. At their
own gate there was an abrupt stoppage for opening, their return being
unexpected. Then the foremost horse refused to obey the rein and canter
up the drive. Laurence plied his whip, which did not mend the matter,
and but that Bob and the gardener were there to soothe the animals, and
lead them to the house, worse might have followed.
As it was, Mrs. Laurence Aspinall was half-dead with fear and the
shaking. She was lifted down and carried, almost insensible, into the
house. Cicily and one of the maids got her to bed, whilst Aspinall
himself, calling groom and gardener from the stables into the
drawing-room, sat down to have a drinking bout with _them_.
Presently Cicily put a white face in at the door, and beckoned forth
Bob, whom no drink seemed to affect, and sent him off as fast as four
legs could carry him, to bring back a doctor, and acquaint Mr. Aspinall
and the Ashtons that his young mistress was very ill.
In less time than might have been expected, Mr. Aspinall’s carriage
brought to the Grange that gentleman, Mrs. Ashton, and Mr. Windsor, a
young Quaker practitioner from Piccadilly. A competent nurse from the
Infirmary was on the box.
There was no doubt she was in a critical state, but the immediate
danger was warded off; and though Augusta was not able to leave her
room in the interim, the scent of June’s roses came in at the open
windows before her baby was born, when penitent Laurence went into
raptures over wife and son.
For two or three days he hovered about the house, nervously anxious
lest any sound should disturb the young mother. He saw that every
domestic was shod with list, stopped the great hall clock, and had the
rolled-up carpets laid down on the polished oaken stairs.
Four days sufficed. On the fifth he rode off to town on Black Ralph on
a pretence of business; but very little did Cannon Street see of Mr.
Laurence that day. With every acquaintance he met was a glass to be
drunk, “to wet the child’s head.” At the Scramble Club, where he dined,
he paid for two or three bottles of wine, also “to wet the child’s
head,” according to the practice of the club. Riding home, he stopped
at the George and Dragon, Ardwick Green, and went through the same
process.
There some one remarked that he was too drunk to stand, much less ride
home, when he swore with an oath that he would show them how he could
ride; he and Black Ralph were equal to anything. And then amid roars of
derisive laughter he flung out another oath, and laid a wager which was
regarded merely as the boasting of drunken braggadocio.
He had kissed his wife’s pale lips on leaving in the morning, and
she faintly implored him to be home early—she did not dare add, “and
sober.” Towards nightfall she began to listen for his return. Hour
after hour went by, and at one in the morning she heard the great
gates and the door thrown open for their impatient master by the
watching servants, and the strong steed come tearing up the gravel—ay,
and on up the broad, flat steps, clattering through the great oaken
hall, and, urged with whip and spur, and a madman’s voice, mount the
freshly-carpeted stairs, cross the landing at a stride, and driving
back the affrighted nurse, enter that sick chamber where, with her
baby at her side, lay the fair young wife, gasping and shrinking with
terror, and there stand with quivering flanks and panting nostrils, as
the reckless rider on his back cried in exultation—
“By G—d, I’ve done it!”
He had done it! No matter what noise accompanied the removal of horse
and rider, the wife, whom in his sober hours he professed to love so
passionately lay insensible to sight or sound, and wakened only to a
morrow of delirium.
CHAPTER THE FORTY-FIFTH.
WOUNDS INFLICTED AND ENDURED.
The spark lies cold in the flint until it is struck; and Ellen had not
believed her quiet husband capable of so much passionate indignation as
burst from him on the receipt (at Sheffield) of the details just given.
“Brute! ruffian!” burst from his lips, as the letter he had crushed
in his grasp fell to the floor; and with a stamp he rose to his feet,
pressed one hand across his knitted brows, and paced the dingy carpet
from end to end in a state of restless perturbation, his wrath finding
vent in epithets and invectives foreign to his tongue.
“Whatever is the matter, Jabez, love?” Ellen asked in amazement.
“Oh, Ellen, dear! that brute Aspinall——” He could get no further.
Feeling choked his utterance.
She picked up the crumpled letter, and with almost equal exasperation
and pain made herself mistress of its contents, in her womanly
indignation and love for her cousin losing sight of her husband’s
excessive emotion.
Jabez left his journey unfinished, and drove back home with all speed.
Ellen shared with Mrs. Ashton and her own mother the anxious watch in
that large dim room, where the favourite of the family tossed her head
from side to side, and muttered incoherent words.
In the sudden emergency, Bob the old groom’s recommendation of his own
daughter as a wet-nurse for the poor frail baby passed without cavil.
Not until long afterwards was it known that Sarah Mostyn was the last
woman to have entered that house, and on such a footing.