MITCHELHURST PLACE
VOL. II
[Illustration]
MITCHELHURST PLACE
A Novel
BY
MARGARET VELEY
AUTHOR OF "FOR PERCIVAL"
"Que voulez-vous? Hélas! notre mère Nature,
Comme toute autre mère, a ses enfants gâtés,
Et pour les malvenus elle est avare et dure!"
IN TWO VOLUMES
VOL. II.
London
MACMILLAN AND CO.
1884
_The Right of Translation and Reproduction is Reserved._
Bungay:
CLAY AND TAYLOR, PRINTERS.
CONTENTS OF VOL. II.
PAGE
CHAPTER I.
NO LETTER 1
CHAPTER II.
ONE MORE HOLIDAY 27
CHAPTER III.
MOONSHINE 44
CHAPTER IV.
REYNOLD'S REGRET 69
CHAPTER V.
LOVE'S MESSENGER 85
CHAPTER VI.
A PERPLEXING REFLECTION 112
CHAPTER VII.
TWO GLANCES 144
CHAPTER VIII.
IN NUTFIELD LANE 157
CHAPTER IX.
A VERSE OF AN OLD SONG 185
CHAPTER X.
JANUARY, 1883 232
MITCHELHURST PLACE
CHAPTER I.
NO LETTER.
The Mitchelhurst postman, coming up to the Place in his daily round,
found a young man loitering to and fro within view of the gate. The
morning was a pleasant one. The roadside grass was grey with dew, and
glistening pearls and diamonds were strung on the threads of gossamer,
tangled over bush and blade. The hollies in the hedgerows were brave and
bright, and there were many-tinted leaves yet clinging to the
bramble-sprays. Sun and wet together had turned the common road to a
shining, splendid way, up which the old postman crept, a dull, little,
toiling figure, with a bag over his shoulder, and something white in his
hand. The young man timed his indolent stroll so that they met each
other on the weedy slope, which led to the iron gate, with its solid
pillars, and white stone balls. There, with the briefest possible nod by
way of salutation, he demanded his letters.
The old fellow knew him as the gentleman who was staying with Mr. Hayes,
and touched his cap obsequiously. He had carried his bag for more than
thirty years, and remembered old Squire Rothwell, and Mr. John, and he
fumbled with the letters in his hand, half expecting a curse at his
slowness, and hardly knowing what name he was to look for. The other
stood with his head high, showing a sharply-cut profile as he turned a
little, looking intently in the direction of the Place. Through the
black bars shone a pale bright picture of blue sky, and level turf, and
the gnarled and fantastic branches of the sunlit avenue. There were
yellow leaves on the straight roadway, and shadows softly interlaced,
and at the end the white, silent house.
The postman finished his investigation, and announced in a hesitating
tone, "No, sir, no letter, sir. No letter at all, name of Rothwell."
The young man turned upon him. "Harding, I said."
"Yes, sir. No, sir, no letter name of Harding."
"Are you sure? Give them to me."
He looked them over. There were letters and papers for Mr. Hayes, one or
two for the servants, and one that had come from Devonshire for
Barbara. He gave them back with a meditative frown, and turned on his
heel without a word. The postman pushed the gate just sufficiently to
permit of a crab-like entrance to the grounds, and plodded along the
avenue, while the young fellow walked definitely away towards the
village.
"The old boy doesn't write business letters on Sunday, I dare say," he
said to himself. "No, I don't suppose he would. Well, I shall hear
to-morrow. As well to-morrow as to-day, perhaps--better, perhaps. And
yet--and yet--Oh God! to get to work! I have banished myself from her
presence, I have shut that gate against me--that old fool goes crawling
up there with his letters--any one in Mitchelhurst may knock at that
door, and I may not! There's nothing left for me but to do the task she
set me, and by Heaven, I will! I shall have the right to speak to her
then, at any rate!"
Barbara had intended to see Reynold before he left that morning. She did
not know what she wanted to say, she was uneasy at the thought of the
interview, but she could not endure that he should be dismissed from the
old house without a parting word. While Harding was moodily doubting
whether he had not alienated her for ever, she was wondering what she
could say or do to atone for the wrong done to him by her timidity. She
did not fully understand the meaning of the wrathful anguish of his last
speech, but she knew that she had pained him. She planned a score of
dialogues, she wearied herself in vain endeavours to guess what he
would say, and then, tired out, she solved the question by sleeping till
the sunlight fell upon her face, and the banished man was already beyond
the gate.
She knew the truth the moment she awoke. It was only to confirm her
certainty that she dressed hurriedly and went out into the passage, to
see the door standing wide, and the vacant room. It seemed but
yesterday, and yet so long ago, since she made it ready for the coming
guest, who had left it in anger. Barbara sighed, and turned away. At the
head of the stairs she recalled the slim, dark figure that had stood
there so few hours before, fixing his angry eyes upon her, and grasping
the balustrade with long fingers as he spoke. The very ticking of the
old clock reminded her of their talk together the morning after he came,
and seemed to say "gone! gone! gone! gone!" as she went by.
Her uncle came down a few minutes later, greeted her shortly, and
glanced at the table. It was laid for two. "I suppose there is nothing
to wait for?" he said.
"Nothing," said Barbara, and she rang the bell.
He unfolded a newspaper and spoke from behind it. "You know that young
fellow is gone?"
"Yes."
"Time he did go! I wish he had never come! Did you say good-bye to him?"
"No. He went before I was down."
Mr. Hayes uttered a little sound expressive of satisfaction, and the
girl perceived that she had accidentally led him to suppose that she had
had no talk with Harding since the quarrel. She did not speak. The maid
came into the room with the urn, and Mr. Hayes turned to her. "What man
was that I saw in the hall just now?"
"He came for the gentleman's portmanteau, sir. He was to take it to Mrs.
Simmonds."
He started, but controlled himself. "Mrs. Simmonds?"
"Yes, sir, Mrs. Simmonds at the shop."
Mr. Hayes was silent only till the door was closed behind her. Then, "He
has done that to spite me!" he said furiously. "Serves me right for
trying to be civil to one of these confounded Rothwells! They have the
devil's own temper, every one of them, and if they can do you a bad
turn, they will!"
Barbara said nothing, but made tea rather drearily.
"Confound him!" Mr. Hayes began afresh. "Now I suppose the whole place
will be cackling about this! He deserves to be kicked out of the parish,
and I should like to do it! I wish to heaven, Barbara, you wouldn't pick
young men out of the ditches in this fashion! You see what comes of it!"
Barbara, appealed to in this direct and reasonable manner, plucked up
her spirit, and replied, rather loftily, that she would certainly
remember in future. She further remarked that the fish was getting cold.
Mr. Hayes threw down the paper, and took his place. There was silence
for a minute or two, and then he began again.
"There isn't a soul in Mitchelhurst that doesn't know he was staying
here. What do you suppose they will say when they find him starting off
at a moment's notice, and taking a lodging in the village, not a
stone's throw from my gate?"
Barbara privately thought that, as Mr. Harding had betaken himself to
the further end of Mitchelhurst, her uncle's talent for throwing stones
must be remarkable. She did not suggest this, however, and when he
repeated his question, "What do you suppose they will say?" she only
replied that she did not know, she was sure.
"Don't you?" said he, with withering scorn. "Well, I do." It was true
enough. He could guess pretty well what the gossips would say, and the
sting of it was that their version would not differ very much from the
actual fact.
Barbara looked down, and finished her breakfast without a word. She knew
that silence was the safest course she could adopt, since it gave him no
chance of turning his anger on her, but she also knew that it irritated
him dreadfully. That, however, she did not mind. Barbara herself was
rather cross that morning. She had meant to be up early, and she had
slept later than usual; she was vexed and disappointed, and she had been
worried by the jarring tempers of the last two days. She kept her head
bent, and her lips closed, while Mr. Hayes drank his second cup of tea
with a muttered accompaniment of abuse.
"Look here," he said suddenly, getting up, and going to the fire, "I
don't know how long that fellow means to stay in Mitchelhurst, but, till
he leaves, you don't go beyond the gate. I don't suppose you would wish
to do so"--he paused, but she was apparently absorbed in the
consideration of a little ring on her finger--"I should hope you have
proper feeling enough not to wish to do so"--this appeal was also
received in a strictly neutral manner--"but in any case you have my
express command to the contrary."
"Very well," said Barbara, with a little affectation of being rather
weary of the whole subject.
"I do not choose that you should be exposed to insult," Mr. Hayes
continued.
"Very well," said Barbara again. "I can stay in if you like, though I
don't think Mr. Harding would insult me."
"I beg your pardon, my dear, but you are not qualified to judge in this
matter. If you had heard Mr. Harding's conversation last night you might
not be quite so sure what he would or would not do. It is my duty to
protect you from an unpleasant possibility, and you will oblige me by
not going beyond--or rather by not going near the gate."
Barbara, tired of saying "Very well," said "All right."
"Wednesday is the night of Pryor's entertainment at the schools. I shall
be sorry to disappoint him, but I certainly shall not go unless Mr.
Harding has left the place. He has shown such a deplorable want of taste
and proper feeling that he would probably take that opportunity of
thrusting himself upon us."
Mr. Hayes paused once more, but the girl did not seem inclined either to
defend or to denounce their late guest. She changed her position
listlessly, and gazed out of the window.
"A gentleman would not, but that proves nothing with regard to Mr.
Harding. You are very silent this morning, Barbara."
"I have a headache," she said, "I'm tired," and to her great relief, Mr.
Hayes, after walking two or three times up and down the room, went off
to his study.
The poor little man was not happy. He sincerely regretted the quarrel of
the evening before, which had come upon him, as upon Reynold, unawares.
He was accustomed to the society of a few neighbours, who understood
him, and said behind his back, "Oh, you must not mind what Hayes says!"
or "I met Hayes yesterday--a little bit more cracked than usual!" and
took all his sallies good-humouredly, with argument, perhaps, or
loud-voiced denial at the time, but nothing in the way of consequences.
Thunder might roll, but no bolt fell, and the sky was as clear as usual
at the next meeting. Mr. Hayes had unconsciously fallen into the habit
of talking without any sense of responsibility. On this occasion a
variety of circumstances had combined to irritate him, and his personal
dislike of Reynold Harding had given a touch of acrid malice to his
attack, but he meant no more than to have the pleasure of contradicting,
and, if possible, silencing his companion. The game was played more
roughly than usual, but Mr. Hayes never realised that his adversary was
angrily in earnest till it was too late. Excitement had mastered him,
there was an interchange of speeches, swift and fierce as blows, and
then he saw Kate Rothwell's son, standing before him, trembling with
fury, and hoarsely declaring that he would leave the house at once. He
had only to close his eyes to see him again, the tall young figure
leaning forward into the light, with his clenched hands resting on the
polished table, amid the disarray of silver and glasses, his dark brows
drawn down, and his angry eyes aglow. Conciliation was impossible on
either side, though the shock of definite rupture so far sobered them
that Harding's departure was deferred to the morning. But, "I will never
break bread under _your_ roof again!" the young man had said, with a
glance round the room, and a curious significance of tone. Then he
turned away to encounter Barbara upon the stairs.
To Harding, matters had seemed at their worst during the black hours of
silence, and the morning brought something of comfort. If there is but a
possibility that work may help us in our troubles, the dullest day is
better than the night. But to Mr. Hayes the daylight came drearily,
showing the folly of a business which nothing could mend. For more than
a quarter of a century he had plumed himself on his gratitude to Kate
Rothwell for her kindness to his dead love, and had imagined that he
only lacked an opportunity to serve her. And this graceful sentiment,
being put to the test, had not prevented him from quarrelling with her
son, and turning the young fellow out of doors. Yes, he, Herbert Hayes,
had actually driven Kate's boy from Mitchelhurst Place! and what made it
worse, if anything could make it worse, was the revelation of the utter
impotence of that cherished gratitude. He regretted what he had done,
but he must abide by it. Apologise to Harding?--he would die first! Own
to one of the Rothwells that he had been in the wrong?--the mere
thought, crossing his mind, as he tied his cravat that morning, very
nearly choked him. Never--never! Not if it were Kate herself! But he
reddened to the roots of his white hair at the thought of the gossip and
laughter which would follow the unseemly squabble.
He would be unfairly judged. He said so over and over again, and in a
certain sense it was true, for he had never intended to quarrel with his
guest. But he could not prove even the innocence he felt. He remembered
two or three bitter fragments of their wrangling which would condemn him
if repeated. Yet he knew he had not meant them as his judges would take
them. "Well, but," some practical neighbour would say, "if you say such
things, what do you expect?" That was just it--he had expected nothing,
though nobody would believe it, and all at once this catastrophe had
come upon him.
So he went down to breakfast, sincerely troubled and repentant, and
consequently in a very unpleasant mood. Repentance seldom makes a man
an agreeable companion, and when it seizes the head of the house the
subordinate members naturally share his discomfort. The moment he set
foot in the breakfast-room he was met by the news of Harding's stay in
the village, and his anger blazed up again, though, through it all, he
had an uncomfortable consciousness that the young man had a right to
stay in Mitchelhurst if he pleased. If he could only have convinced
himself that Reynold was utterly in the wrong, he would have forgiven
him and been happy. But it is almost impossible to forgive a man who is
somewhat in the wrong, yet less so than oneself.
Harding had been guided by Barbara in his search for a lodging. When
they were standing together at the edge of the ditch, she had reminded
her uncle that Mrs. Simmonds had let her rooms to a man who came
surveying. The fact was so unprecedented that the good woman might be
pardoned for imagining herself an authority on what gentlemen liked, and
what gentlemen expected, on the strength of that one experience. Harding
confirmed her in her innocent belief by agreeing to everything she
proposed. Within half an hour of his arrival he was sitting down to what
the surveyor always took for breakfast, and the surveyor's favourite
dinner was cooking for him as he walked fast and far on the first road
that presented itself. He almost reached Littlemere before he turned,
and had to scramble over a hedge, to avoid what might have been an
awkward meeting with Mr. Masters. The little squire went by
unsuspectingly, though Reynold, finding himself face to face with a
bull in the meadow, nearly jumped back upon him. Happily however the
bull took time to consider, and before he had made up his mind whether
he liked his visitor or not, the coast was clear, and the young man
sprang down into the road, and set off on his way back to Mitchelhurst,
where he arrived just as Mrs. Simmonds was beginning to look out for
him. The surveyor had ordered rather an early dinner.
Harding had done his best to check any gossip about his affairs, but his
landlady was burning with curiosity. She made a remark about Mr. Hayes
as she set the dish on the table, and her lodger replied that it
certainly was a queer fancy for a lonely man to live in that great
house, and might he trouble Mrs. Simmonds for a fork? She supplied the
omission with many apologies, and said that Mr. Hayes was not very
popular in the neighbourhood, she believed.
"Isn't he?" said Reynold, slicing away. "Well, all I can say is that I
found him a very hospitable old gentleman. He had never seen me before,
and he invited me to stay there for three days. Wouldn't take any
denial."
"Well, to be sure, sir, we can but speak as we find," said Mrs.
Simmonds, handing the potatoes. "Only, you see, there are some of us who
remember the old family--you'll excuse me, sir, but it's wonderful how
you favour Mr. John--and it's not the same, sir, having a stranger
there. It's _not_ like old times."
"No," said Reynold with a jarring little laugh. "I should think it was a
good deal better. Thank you, Mrs. Simmonds, I have all I want."
And with a nod, which was exactly Mr. John's, he dismissed the old lady.
She was disconcerted; she did not know what to make of this young man
with the Rothwell features, who was not gratified by a respectful
allusion to the family. "A good deal better!" Well, of course, the
Rothwells held themselves very high, and thought other people were just
the dirt under their feet. There was no pleasing them with anything you
sent in, nothing was good enough, and they expected you to stand
curtseying and curtseying for their custom, and to wait for your money
till all the profit was gone. Mr. Hayes paid as soon as the bill was
sent in, and Miss Strange was a pleasant-spoken young lady. "A good deal
better"--well, no doubt it was.
And yet the good woman had not been insincere when she spoke of the old
times with a regretful accent in her voice. She remembered John
Rothwell's father as a middle-aged gentleman, alert and strong. Those
old times were the times when she was a rosy-cheeked girl, whom Simmonds
came courting at her father the wheel-wright's, and not Simmonds only,
for she might have done better if she had chosen. It was in the good old
times that they set up their little shop, and that their little girl was
born who had been in the churchyard three-and-twenty years come
Christmas. There were no times now like those before Mitchelhurst Place
was sold, when she didn't know what rheumatism was, and there were none
of your new-fangled Board Schools, to teach children to think little of
their elders. It was not to be supposed that Mrs. Simmonds thought that
her stiff old joints would become flexible again if the Rothwells came
back to the manor-house, but she certainly felt that in their reign the
world went its way with fewer obstructions and less weariness, and was
more brightly visible without the aid of spectacles. She had an
impression, too, that the weather was better.
She straightened herself laboriously after taking the apple-pie from the
oven, and was horrified to find the crust a little caught on one side.
Having to explain how this had occurred when she carried it in, she had
no opportunity of continuing the previous conversation, and the moment
dinner was over Reynold was out again. The fact was that Mrs. Simmonds's
parlour, which was small and low, and had been carefully shut up for
many months, was not very attractive to the young man, who was fresh
from the faded stateliness of the old Place. Besides, he was anxious to
keep down importunate thoughts by sheer weariness, if in no other way.
He went that afternoon to the Hall, the dreary old farmhouse which
Barbara had pointed out as the Rothwells' earlier home, and walked in
the sodden pastures where she picked her cowslips in the spring. He
looked more kindly at the old house, in spite of the ignoble disorder of
its surroundings, but he lingered longest at the gate where she had
shown him Mitchelhurst, spread out before him like the Promised Land. He
studied it all in the fading light, and then, with a farewell glance at
the white far-off front of the Place, he went down into the village,
tired enough to drop asleep over the fire after tea.
"To-morrow, the letter," was his last thought as he lay down.