Jack's slumbers were far too sacred in the eyes of his aunt for her to
think of disturbing them; she was preparing to retreat carefully, when
he looked up and began to laugh.
"I was not asleep, I give you my word."
"Oh, well, my dear," she said, happy again now that the shade on his
face was gone, "I am sure it would not have been wonderful if you had
dozed off after your journey, though I really don't know where you have
dropped from; and I shall be quite glad to sit down and have a long
talk, for you know there is a great deal to be told."
"Well, yes, I suppose there is."
But he did not seem inclined to begin, though Miss Cartwright looked
wistfully at him. She said presently, with rather a quavering voice,
"There is no bad news?"
Just enough of a pause followed her question to make her heart sink,
then he said quickly--
"Certainly not. What has come to you, Aunt Mary? You never used to
indulge in these sort of fancies. If Cartouche makes you nervous I
shall take him away. But I know what it is, Miss Preston has been
scolding you for all the wickedness of the world. Even in Florence that
woman is as bad as three fogs and an east wind."
And he rattled on with more nonsense of the sort, but it was so evident
that he was making talk to avoid some subject closer to each of them,
that Miss Cartwright almost grew vexed.
"My dear," she said, "do leave poor Miss Preston alone."
"She won't leave you alone, that is what I complain of. Come now,
hasn't she got some unhappy clergyman of whom she falls foul?"
"Well, she did say she thought the new chaplain had too much
self-possession for so young a man, and I said I did not think he was so
very self-possessed, because when he makes a mistake he always coughs,
which obliges one to notice it the more."
"Worse and worse," said Jack gravely; "she's making you as severe as she
is herself."
"My dear, you don't really think I was unkind? I am sure I only thought
what I could say for the poor young man, she seemed so annoyed about it.
You don't really mean it, you are only laughing, and after all there is
so much to say."
He jumped up suddenly, and walked a few steps away from his chair. The
pretty quiet little garden was full of light and colour and keenly-edged
shade; the beautiful glossy leaves stood up against the blue sky. Over
the wall they could see other houses and other trees, and catch here and
there a little glimpse of the opposite hill with its occasional
cypresses. The great bell of the Duomo was clanging, all the glory of
the day changing softly into another glory, deeper and more mysterious.
Was it of all this of which Jack was thinking? Miss Cartwright followed
him and laid her hand gently on his arm.
"My dear boy!" she said imploringly.
He looked round at once and laughed at her pleading face.
"Well, it's all--right, if that's what you want to know."
"You--"
"I'm engaged, yes, hard and fast. Why," he said, with a quick anxiety
in his voice, "what's the matter? Sit down, sit down," he went on,
dragging over a chair, and putting her into it very tenderly, for the
delicate colour had quite faded out of her face. But she smiled at him
the next moment.
"It is very silly of me, but I have been thinking so much about it; and
somehow I fancied from your manner that things were not going straight,
and I was foolishly anxious."
"You shouldn't care so much about me," said the young man with real
remorse; "nobody else in the world would trouble themselves as you do.
I should have told you directly, if it had entered my head that you were
taking it to heart like this. Let me go and get you a glass of water or
sal-volatile or something, you are as shaky as possible."
But Miss Cartwright sat up cheerfully.
"It is nothing at all, Jack; I am quite well again, and your news is the
best thing for me, if I really wanted anything. Is it all settled?"
"Yes," he said with a little restraint again, and pulling a magnolia
leaf as he spoke. "Phillis is at Bologna with the Leytons, we all came
out together. Yes, it is true; I expected it to astonish you."
"Don't tell me anything more for a minute or two," said his aunt gently,
putting up her hands; "it is one thing on another. Phillis at Bologna?
I don't quite understand."
"But you like the news, don't you?" said Jack, turning suddenly on her.
"Like it! how could I fail? Such a good girl, and all that money, and
your uncle wishing it so much. Nothing could be so desirable, only, my
dear boy--"
"What?" sharply.
"Sometimes you get odd touches of perversity, and the very fact of a
thing being quite unexceptional sets you against it. I remember it so
well when you were a boy. It would have been a sad misfortune in this
case, though, of course, it is too momentous a matter for me to have
said much about it beforehand. I suppose that is the reason you did not
know how anxious I felt, but I assure you I have scarcely thought of
anything else. And Phillis is at Bologna! When do they come on?"
"To-morrow--Saturday. I don't exactly remember. I suppose you know the
terms of the agreement?" said Jack, looking at her.
"My dear!"
"Well, it is an agreement," he said perversely; "what else would you
call it? I, Peter Thornton, of Hetherton Grange, in the county of
Surrey, Esquire, do hereby declare you, John Francis Ibbetson,
barrister--how shall I put the London lodgings, second floor, to best
advantage?--to be the heir of all my estates and properties--excluding,
let us hope, his gout and his temper--on condition that you take as your
wife my step-niece, Mary Phillis Grey, to have and to hold with the
timber, freeholds, messuages, and other etceteras of the said estate.
If that is not an agreement, I don't know the meaning of the word."
Miss Cartwright, leaning forward, tried to look into her nephew's face.
"My dear," she said slowly, "of course you are in joke, but I don't
think I like to hear you talk in such a way. I should be miserable if I
did not feel sure you were quite happy."
Jack turned round and took her soft hand very kindly in his own.
"Well, then, don't be miserable," he said lightly; "why, you know it
stands to reason that every one must be perfectly happy directly he or
she is engaged to be married. What shall I do to prove my load of
bliss?"
But she shook her head.
"I sometimes fancy it would be better if money were not mixed up with
marriages at all. I don't think it was so much thought about in old
days."
"It is a stronger necessity now."
"Your father would willingly increase your allowance."
"I don't choose to live on that woman's fortune. Aunt Mary, I thought
you would be the first to congratulate me on the splendour of my
prospects!"
"My dear, and so I do," she said quickly, laying her hand on his
shoulder; "I do, with all my heart. If I ask these questions it is only
that I care so very, very much, that I was afraid, Jack, whether you
might have rushed into this without quite thinking enough beforehand.
But I dare say that was only my foolish fancy. Tell me one thing: if
you had not married Phillis would your uncle have left the estates to
her?"
"Not he," said the young man, flinging a stone into the bushes where
Cartouche was still annoying the cat. "He told me in so many words,
that unless I married her she would be penniless, and the money would go
to some tenth cousin or so."
"I hope the poor girl did not know this," said Miss Cartwright uneasily.
"He is not the man to keep that sort of pressure to himself."
"Jack, you liked her before there was any talk of these estates?"
"Of course I did."
He spoke impatiently, as if the subject were already exhausted, whereas
Miss Cartwright, longing for fuller details, felt as if it were only
beginning.
"I wish I had known Phillis before," she said sighing, and at the sigh
the young fellow's heart reproached him again.
"She said the same," he said, turning towards her and speaking gravely;
"I fancy you'll get on with her--everybody doesn't, you know. She's--
but there's no good in attempting to describe her, I was never good at
that sort of thing; the only thing I could say about you was that you
weren't tall or black."
Miss Cartwright brightened. She had a warm corner ready in her kind
heart for the girl who was to be Jack's wife; no jealousy made the
prospect bitter, she was already planning, welcoming, sympathising.
Jack himself jumped up; he said he would go to the hotel where he was
putting up and come back to dinner. It was a concession, for he would
encounter Miss Preston, but he had not the heart to disappoint his aunt
that first evening, and afterwards he acknowledged that it had not been
so bad. The window was open, the moon was sailing through blue,
profound skies, her light fell like silver on the glossy leaves, and
there was a sort of happy hum in the air, distant talk and gay laughter.
Miss Preston fell asleep, Jack and his aunt sat near the window,
sometimes silent, sometimes chatting. As for Cartouche, he pleased
himself in his own way, rushing every now and then into the garden in
pursuit of a foe who he was quite conscious did not exist, and returning
with the proud air of one who has discomfited his enemy.
As Ibbetson strolled home that night he was thinking of many things,
half against the grain, as it were, for he would willingly have put them
aside. There were enough outer things to interest him if once he could
have got them uppermost, but we cannot do that always, try as we will.
The Arno was running along, bright with the moonshine, lights were
twinkling across the bridges, clambering up the hill opposite; black
shadows stood out strongly, and as you looked, all sorts of strange
memories seemed to rush towards you. But they took no real hold on
Jack, who was only conscious of them in a vague, dreamy way. The people
were strolling in all directions, enjoying the evening, as they do in
Italy, chatting, whispering, half-a-dozen, perhaps, linked together,
taking the whole breadth of the pathway, or coming mysteriously out of
the dark shadowy streets. In front of the Ognissanti a little lamp
threw its dim radiance upon the beautiful blue and white Luca della
Robbia over the door; the grave and sweet figures in their perpetual
adoration seemed nearer and yet more delicate than by day. Jack noted
this as he passed, but all the while it was not really Florence in which
he was living, but a more homely and pastoral country. He was provoked
with himself; he had not wanted to go over the old ground; he had said
to himself a dozen times, that having taken a certain step, there was no
need for mentally retracing it.
Only something seemed always to be carrying him back.
Would he have had it different? He said No, resolutely, when the
question took so keen a shape. He had always felt a quiet liking for
Phillis Grey, and it moved him deeply when he heard Mr Thornton's rough
declaration that if he, Jack, did not marry her she would be left with
no more than a miserable pittance. His uncle, after all, showed some
knowledge of the character of the man with whom he had to deal, for the
personal advantages did not really affect Jack half so much, although he
took pains to assure himself that they did. He used to go over them to
himself with a half-comic, half-serious air of business, as if he were
quite convinced of their value--independence, position, idleness--the
worst of it was that, try as he would, he found each carrying a sort of
contradiction with it, which prevented him from enjoying it comfortably.
But poor Phillis, how could she bear the loss of everything? Why
should he not marry her? He liked no one better, or so well. It was
the course which gave the least trouble to everyone. It offered
palpable good, and there was no drawback on which he could exactly lay
his finger. Jack Ibbetson's mind wandered away, up and down, this way
and that, but all the time it was tending slowly in one direction, so
that on the evening of the day when his uncle had made his announcement,
a walk round the shrubberies and a couple of cigars brought him to the
window where Phillis was sitting in her white dress, and when he had
asked her to come out, it was not difficult, especially on that quiet
tender evening, to ask her to marry him. It was not difficult, it was
almost pleasant. There was a tremulous happiness in the girl's answer,
and yet all the time Jack was conscious, and hating the consciousness,
of what he was saving her from. If it had not been for that, he
thought--but there it was, and, after all, was it not one motive?
Before this happened it had been decided that Phillis should go abroad
with some friends, and Peter Thornton would have no change. His wife
wanted the wedding to have been from Hetherton, but he scouted the idea
so fiercely that no one dared to repeat it. Phillis should go, and Jack
could go too. As for the marriage, he did not care where it took place,
so long as they did not lose any time about it, and then if they wanted
to honeymoon it in Italy they would be on the spot. And having
announced his wishes, he took refuge in such a violent fit of the gout,
that contradiction became an actual impossibility, and the odd little
party started. It seemed more unreal to Jack every day as they came
flying on. He had been rather unkind about the journey. Mrs Leyton
felt attractions in Paris. Captain Leyton, who went about with a very
elaborate sketching apparatus which provided against rain, sun, and all
possible evils of flood or field, and contained a larger supply of
paints than could be used in a lifetime, was desirous to turn aside into
the country of the Italian lakes, but Jack was obstinately determined to
go directly to Florence, and somehow carried his day so far as to get
them all to Bologna. There he graciously permitted them to rest; and
indeed Ward, the lady's maid, was in a state of rebellion, while Mrs
Leyton, who was good-natured but sometimes plaintive, went about
declaring that having come abroad as much for society as anything else,
it was a little hard to be whirled through the country at a rate which
prevented your seeing anyone but the horrid people to be met with in the
trains.
As for Phillis--but Phillis must wait. Jack was very kind and polite to
her, and sometimes amused by her inexperience. He would have been
surprised beyond measure if any objection to his plans had come from
her.