XXVIII

The conversation which arose between the Bishop and Lady Constantine was

of that lively and reproductive kind which cannot be ended during any

reasonable halt of two people going in opposite directions. He turned,

and walked with her along the laurel-screened lane that bordered the

churchyard, till their voices died away in the distance. Swithin then

aroused himself from his thoughtful regard of them, and went out of the

churchyard by another gate.

Seeing himself now to be left alone on the scene, Louis Glanville

descended from his post of observation in the arbour. He came through

the private doorway, and on to that spot among the graves where the

Bishop and St. Cleeve had conversed. On the tombstone still lay the

coral bracelet which Dr. Helmsdale had flung down there in his

indignation; for the agitated, introspective mood into which Swithin had

been thrown had banished from his mind all thought of securing the

trinket and putting it in his pocket.

Louis picked up the little red scandal-breeding thing, and while walking

on with it in his hand he observed Tabitha Lark approaching the church,

in company with the young blower whom she had gone in search of to

inspire her organ-practising within. Louis immediately put together,

with that rare diplomatic keenness of which he was proud, the little

scene he had witnessed between Tabitha and Swithin during the

confirmation, and the Bishop's stern statement as to where he had found

the bracelet. He had no longer any doubt that it belonged to her.

'Poor girl!' he said to himself, and sang in an undertone--

'Tra deri, dera,

L'histoire n'est pas nouvelle!'

When she drew nearer Louis called her by name. She sent the boy into the

church, and came forward, blushing at having been called by so fine a

gentleman. Louis held out the bracelet.

'Here is something I have found, or somebody else has found,' he said to

her. 'I won't state where. Put it away, and say no more about it. I

will not mention it either. Now go on into the church where you are

going, and may Heaven have mercy on your soul, my dear.'

'Thank you, sir,' said Tabitha, with some perplexity, yet inclined to be

pleased, and only recognizing in the situation the fact that Lady

Constantine's humorous brother was making her a present.

'You are much obliged to me?'

'O yes!'

'Well, Miss Lark, I've discovered a secret, you see.'

'What may that be, Mr. Glanville?'

'That you are in love.'

'I don't admit it, sir. Who told you so?'

'Nobody. Only I put two and two together. Now take my advice. Beware

of lovers! They are a bad lot, and bring young women to tears.'

'Some do, I dare say. But some don't.'

'And you think that in your particular case the latter alternative will

hold good? We generally think we shall be lucky ourselves, though all

the world before us, in the same situation, have been otherwise.'

'O yes, or we should die outright of despair.'

'Well, I don't think you will be lucky in your case.'

'Please how do you know so much, since my case has not yet arrived?'

asked Tabitha, tossing her head a little disdainfully, but less than she

might have done if he had not obtained a charter for his discourse by

giving her the bracelet.

'Fie, Tabitha!'

'I tell you it has not arrived!' she said, with some anger. 'I have not

got a lover, and everybody knows I haven't, and it's an insinuating thing

for you to say so!'

Louis laughed, thinking how natural it was that a girl should so

emphatically deny circumstances that would not bear curious inquiry.

'Why, of course I meant myself,' he said soothingly. 'So, then, you will

not accept me?'

'I didn't know you meant yourself,' she replied. 'But I won't accept

you. And I think you ought not to jest on such subjects.'

'Well, perhaps not. However, don't let the Bishop see your bracelet, and

all will be well. But mind, lovers are deceivers.'

Tabitha laughed, and they parted, the girl entering the church. She had

been feeling almost certain that, having accidentally found the bracelet

somewhere, he had presented it in a whim to her as the first girl he met.

Yet now she began to have momentary doubts whether he had not been

labouring under a mistake, and had imagined her to be the owner. The

bracelet was not valuable; it was, in fact, a mere toy,--the pair of

which this was one being a little present made to Lady Constantine by

Swithin on the day of their marriage; and she had not worn them with

sufficient frequency out of doors for Tabitha to recognize either as

positively her ladyship's. But when, out of sight of the blower, the

girl momentarily tried it on, in a corner by the organ, it seemed to her

that the ornament was possibly Lady Constantine's. Now that the pink

beads shone before her eyes on her own arm she remembered having seen a

bracelet with just such an effect gracing the wrist of Lady Constantine

upon one occasion. A temporary self-surrender to the sophism that if Mr.

Louis Glanville chose to give away anything belonging to his sister, she,

Tabitha, had a right to take it without question, was soon checked by a

resolve to carry the tempting strings of coral to her ladyship that

evening, and inquire the truth about them. This decided on she slipped

the bracelet into her pocket, and played her voluntaries with a light

heart.

* * * * *

Bishop Helmsdale did not tear himself away from Welland till about two

o'clock that afternoon, which was three hours later than he had intended

to leave. It was with a feeling of relief that Swithin, looking from the

top of the tower, saw the carriage drive out from the vicarage into the

turnpike road, and whirl the right reverend gentleman again towards

Warborne. The coast being now clear of him Swithin meditated how to see

Viviette, and explain what had happened. With this in view he waited

where he was till evening came on.

Meanwhile Lady Constantine and her brother dined by themselves at Welland

House. They had not met since the morning, and as soon as they were left

alone Louis said, 'You have done very well so far; but you might have

been a little warmer.'

'Done well?' she asked, with surprise.

'Yes, with the Bishop. The difficult question is how to follow up our

advantage. How are you to keep yourself in sight of him?'

'Heavens, Louis! You don't seriously mean that the Bishop of Melchester

has any feelings for me other than friendly?'

'Viviette, this is affectation. You know he has as well as I do.'

She sighed. 'Yes,' she said. 'I own I had a suspicion of the same

thing. What a misfortune!'

'A misfortune? Surely the world is turned upside down! You will drive

me to despair about our future if you see things so awry. Exert yourself

to do something, so as to make of this accident a stepping-stone to

higher things. The gentleman will give us the slip if we don't pursue

the friendship at once.'

'I cannot have you talk like this,' she cried impatiently. 'I have no

more thought of the Bishop than I have of the Pope. I would much rather

not have had him here to lunch at all. You said it would be necessary to

do it, and an opportunity, and I thought it my duty to show some

hospitality when he was coming so near, Mr. Torkingham's house being so

small. But of course I understood that the opportunity would be one for

you in getting to know him, your prospects being so indefinite at

present; not one for me.'

'If you don't follow up this chance of being spiritual queen of

Melchester, you will never have another of being anything. Mind this,

Viviette: you are not so young as you were. You are getting on to be a

middle-aged woman, and your black hair is precisely of the sort which

time quickly turns grey. You must make up your mind to grizzled

bachelors or widowers. Young marriageable men won't look at you; or if

they do just now, in a year or two more they'll despise you as an

antiquated party.'

Lady Constantine perceptibly paled. 'Young men what?' she asked. 'Say

that again.'

'I said it was no use to think of young men; they won't look at you much

longer; or if they do, it will be to look away again very quickly.'

'You imply that if I were to marry a man younger than myself he would

speedily acquire a contempt for me? How much younger must a man be than

his wife--to get that feeling for her?' She was resting her elbow on the

chair as she faintly spoke the words, and covered her eyes with her hand.

'An exceedingly small number of years,' said Louis drily. 'Now the

Bishop is at least fifteen years older than you, and on that account, no

less than on others, is an excellent match. You would be head of the

church in this diocese: what more can you require after these years of

miserable obscurity? In addition, you would escape that minor thorn in

the flesh of bishops' wives, of being only "Mrs." while their husbands

are peers.'

She was not listening; his previous observation still detained her

thoughts.

'Louis,' she said, 'in the case of a woman marrying a man much younger

than herself, does he get to dislike her, even if there has been a social

advantage to him in the union?'

'Yes,--not a whit less. Ask any person of experience. But what of that?

Let's talk of our own affairs. You say you have no thought of the

Bishop. And yet if he had stayed here another day or two he would have

proposed to you straight off.'

'Seriously, Louis, I could not accept him.'

'Why not?'

'I don't love him.'

'Oh, oh, I like those words!' cried Louis, throwing himself back in his

chair and looking at the ceiling in satirical enjoyment. 'A woman who at

two-and-twenty married for convenience, at thirty talks of not marrying

without love; the rule of inverse, that is, in which more requires less,

and less requires more. As your only brother, older than yourself, and

more experienced, I insist that you encourage the Bishop.'

'Don't quarrel with me, Louis!' she said piteously. 'We don't know that

he thinks anything of me,--we only guess.'

'I know it,--and you shall hear how I know. I am of a curious and

conjectural nature, as you are aware. Last night, when everybody had

gone to bed, I stepped out for a five minutes' smoke on the lawn, and

walked down to where you get near the vicarage windows. While I was

there in the dark one of them opened, and Bishop Helmsdale leant out. The

illuminated oblong of your window shone him full in the face between the

trees, and presently your shadow crossed it. He waved his hand, and

murmured some tender words, though what they were exactly I could not

hear.'

'What a vague, imaginary story,--as if he could know my shadow! Besides,

a man of the Bishop's dignity wouldn't have done such a thing. When I

knew him as a younger man he was not at all romantic, and he's not likely

to have grown so now.'

'That's just what he is likely to have done. No lover is so extreme a

specimen of the species as an old lover. Come, Viviette, no more of this

fencing. I have entered into the project heart and soul--so much that I

have postponed my departure till the matter is well under way.'

'Louis--my dear Louis--you will bring me into some disagreeable

position!' said she, clasping her hands. 'I do entreat you not to

interfere or do anything rash about me. The step is impossible. I have

something to tell you some day. I must live on, and endure--'

'Everything except this penury,' replied Louis, unmoved. 'Come, I have

begun the campaign by inviting Bishop Helmsdale, and I'll take the

responsibility of carrying it on. All I ask of you is not to make a

ninny of yourself. Come, give me your promise!'

'No, I cannot,--I don't know how to! I only know one thing,--that I am

in no hurry--'

'"No hurry" be hanged! Agree, like a good sister, to charm the Bishop.'

'I must consider!' she replied, with perturbed evasiveness.

It being a fine evening Louis went out of the house to enjoy his cigar in

the shrubbery. On reaching his favourite seat he found he had left his

cigar-case behind him; he immediately returned for it. When he

approached the window by which he had emerged he saw Swithin St. Cleeve

standing there in the dusk, talking to Viviette inside.

St. Cleeve's back was towards Louis, but, whether at a signal from her or

by accident, he quickly turned and recognized Glanville; whereupon

raising his hat to Lady Constantine the young man passed along the

terrace-walk and out by the churchyard door.

Louis rejoined his sister. 'I didn't know you allowed your lawn to be a

public thoroughfare for the parish,' he said.

'I am not exclusive, especially since I have been so poor,' replied she.

'Then do you let everybody pass this way, or only that illustrious youth

because he is so good-looking?'

'I have no strict rule in the case. Mr. St. Cleeve is an acquaintance of

mine, and he can certainly come here if he chooses.' Her colour rose

somewhat, and she spoke warmly.

Louis was too cautious a bird to reveal to her what had suddenly dawned

upon his mind--that his sister, in common with the (to his thinking)

unhappy Tabitha Lark, had been foolish enough to get interested in this

phenomenon of the parish, this scientific Adonis. But he resolved to

cure at once her tender feeling, if it existed, by letting out a secret

which would inflame her dignity against the weakness.

'A good-looking young man,' he said, with his eyes where Swithin had

vanished. 'But not so good as he looks. In fact a regular young

sinner.'

'What do you mean?'

'Oh, only a little feature I discovered in St. Cleeve's history. But I

suppose he has a right to sow his wild oats as well as other young men.'

'Tell me what you allude to,--do, Louis.'

'It is hardly fit that I should. However, the case is amusing enough. I

was sitting in the arbour to-day, and was an unwilling listener to the

oddest interview I ever heard of. Our friend the Bishop discovered, when

we visited the observatory last night, that our astronomer was not alone

in his seclusion. A lady shared his romantic cabin with him; and finding

this, the Bishop naturally enough felt that the ordinance of confirmation

had been profaned. So his lordship sent for Master Swithin this morning,

and meeting him in the churchyard read him such an excommunicating

lecture as I warrant he won't forget in his lifetime. Ha-ha-ha! 'Twas

very good,--very.'

He watched her face narrowly while he spoke with such seeming

carelessness. Instead of the agitation of jealousy that he had expected

to be aroused by this hint of another woman in the case, there was a

curious expression, more like embarrassment than anything else which

might have been fairly attributed to the subject. 'Can it be that I am

mistaken?' he asked himself.

The possibility that he might be mistaken restored Louis to good-humour,

and lights having been brought he sat with his sister for some time,

talking with purpose of Swithin's low rank on one side, and the sordid

struggles that might be in store for him. St. Cleeve being in the

unhappy case of deriving his existence through two channels of society,

it resulted that he seemed to belong to either this or that according to

the altitude of the beholder. Louis threw the light entirely on

Swithin's agricultural side, bringing out old Mrs. Martin and her

connexions and her ways of life with luminous distinctness, till Lady

Constantine became greatly depressed. She, in her hopefulness, had

almost forgotten, latterly, that the bucolic element, so incisively

represented by Messrs. Hezzy Biles, Haymoss Fry, Sammy Blore, and the

rest entered into his condition at all; to her he had been the son of his

academic father alone.

But she would not reveal the depression to which she had been subjected

by this resuscitation of the homely half of poor Swithin, presently

putting an end to the subject by walking hither and thither about the

room.

'What have you lost?' said Louis, observing her movements.

'Nothing of consequence,--a bracelet.'

'Coral?' he inquired calmly.

'Yes. How did you know it was coral? You have never seen it, have you?'

He was about to make answer; but the amazed enlightenment which her

announcement had produced in him through knowing where the Bishop had

found such an article, led him to reconsider himself. Then, like an

astute man, by no means sure of the dimensions of the intrigue he might

be uncovering, he said carelessly, 'I found such a one in the churchyard

to-day. But I thought it appeared to be of no great rarity, and I gave

it to one of the village girls who was passing by.'

'Did she take it? Who was she?' said the unsuspecting Viviette.

'Really, I don't remember. I suppose it is of no consequence?'

'O no; its value is nothing, comparatively. It was only one of a pair

such as young girls wear.' Lady Constantine could not add that, in spite

of this, she herself valued it as being Swithin's present, and the best

he could afford.

Panic-struck by his ruminations, although revealing nothing by his

manner, Louis soon after went up to his room, professedly to write

letters. He gave vent to a low whistle when he was out of hearing. He

of course remembered perfectly well to whom he had given the corals, and

resolved to seek out Tabitha the next morning to ascertain whether she

could possibly have owned such a trinket as well as his sister,--which at

present he very greatly doubted, though fervently hoping that she might.