THE SHADOW OF THE HALL.
Such was Christina's first meeting with Lord Manister in his own county.
It occurred while his mother's invitation was exhilarating so many
homes, and on the day when the Mundham mail bag would not hold the first
draught of prompt replies. Until the garden party itself, however, no
one at the rectory saw any more of Lord Manister, who had gone for a few
days to the Marquis of Wymondham's place in Scotland, where he shot
dreadfully on the Twelfth and was otherwise in queer form, considering
that Miss Garth was also one of the guests. But under all the
circumstances it is not difficult to imagine Manister worried and
unhappy during this interval; which, on the other hand, remained in the
minds of the people at the rectory, Christina included, as the
pleasantest part of their month there.
Not that they suspected this at the time. Mrs. Erskine especially found
these days a little slow. Having knowledge of Lord Manister's
whereabouts, she was impatient for his return, and the more so because
Christina seemed to have forgotten his existence. Christina was indeed
puzzling, and on one embarrassing occasion, which with some girls would
have led to a scene, she puzzled Ruth more than ever. Ruth tried to
follow her presumptive example, and to put aside the thought of Lord
Manister for the time being. Her consolation meanwhile was the lively
_camaraderie_ between Christina and Erskine, wherein Erskine's wife took
a delight for which we may forgive her much.
"How well you two get on!" she would say gladly to each of them.
"He's a man and a brother," Tiny would reply.
To which Ruth was sure to say tenderly: "It's sweet of you, dear, to
look upon him as a brother.
"Ah, but don't you forget that he's a man, and not my brother really,
but just the very best of pals!" Tiny said once. "That's the beauty of
him. He's the only man who ever talked sense to me right through from
the beginning, so he's something new. He's the only man I ever liked
without having the least desire to flirt with him, if you particularly
want to know! And I don't believe his being my brother-in-law has
anything to do with that," added the girl reflectively; "it would have
been the same in any case. What's better still, he's the only man who
ever understood me, my dear."
"He's very clever, you see," observed Ruth slyly, but also in all
seriousness.
"That's the worst of him; he makes you feel your ignorance."
"I assure you, Tiny, he thinks _you_ very clever."
"So you're crackin'!" laughed Tiny; and as the old bush slang filled her
mouth unbidden, the smell of a hot wind at Wallandoon came into her
nostrils; and there seemed no more to be said.
But that last assurance of Ruth's was still ringing in her ears when her
thoughts got back from the bush. She did not believe a word of it. Yet
it was more or less true. Nor was Erskine far wrong in any opinion he
had expressed to his wife concerning Christina, of whom, perhaps, he had
said even less than he thought.
She was not, indeed, to be called an intellectual girl, in these days
least of all. That was her misfortune, or otherwise, as you happen to
think. Intellectual possibilities, however, she possessed: raw brain
with which much might have been done. Not much can be done by a
governess on a station in the back-blocks. Merely in curing the girls of
the twang of Australia, more successfully than of its slang, and in
teaching Tiny to sing rather nicely, the governess at Wallandoon had
done wonders. But gifts that were of more use to Christina were natural,
such as the quick perception, the long memory, and the ready tongue with
which she defended the doors of her mind, so that few might guess the
poverty of the store within. Nor had the governess been able to add much
to that store. The liking for books had not come to Christina at
Wallandoon; but in Melbourne she had taken to reading, and had reveled
in a deal of trash; and now in England she read whatever Erskine put in
her hands, and honestly enjoyed most of it, with the additional relish
of being proud of her enjoyment. Erskine thought her discriminating,
too; but converts to good books are apt to flatter the saviors of their
taste, and perhaps her brother-in-law was a poor judge of the girl's
judgment. He liked her for finding _Colonel Newcome's_ life more
touching than his death, and for placing the _Colonel_ second to _Dr.
Primrose_ in the order of her gods after reading "The Vicar of
Wakefield." He was delighted with her confession that she should "love
to be loved by Clive Newcome," while her defense of _Miss Ethel_, which
was vigorous enough to betray a fellow-feeling, was interesting at the
time, and more so later, when there was occasion to remember it. Similar
interest attached to another confession, that she had long envied
_OEnone_ and _Elaine_ "because they were really in love." She seemed to
have mixed some good poetry with the bad novels that had contented her
in Melbourne. Two more books which she learned to love now were "Sesame
and Lilies" and "Virginibus Puerisque." It was Erskine Holland's
privilege to put each into her hands for the first time, and perhaps she
never pleased him quite so much as when she said: "It makes me think
less of myself; it has made me horribly unhappy; but if they were going
to hang me in the morning I would sit up all night to read it again!"
That was her grace after "Sesame and Lilies."
"Why don't you make Ruth read too?" she asked him once, quite idly, when
they had been talking about books.
"She has a good deal to think about," Erskine replied after a little
hesitation. "She's too busy to read."
"Or too happy," suggested Tiny.
Mr. Holland made a longer pause, looking gratefully at the girl, as
though she had given him a new idea, which he would gladly entertain if
he could. "I wonder whether that's possible?" he said at last.
"I'm sure it is. Ruth is so happy that books can do nothing for her; the
happy ones show her no happiness so great as her own, and she thinks the
sad ones stupid. The other day, when I insisted on reading her my
favorite thing in 'Virginibus----'"
"What is your favorite thing?" interrupted Erskine.
"'El Dorado'--it's the most beautiful thing you have put me on to yet,
of its size. I could hardly see my way through the last page--I can't
tell you why--only because it was so beautiful, I think, and so awfully
true! But Ruth saw nothing to cry over; I'm not sure that she saw much
to admire; and that's all because you have gone and made her so happy."
For some minutes Erskine looked grim. Then he smiled.
"But aren't you happy too, Tiny?"
"I'm as happy as I deserve to be. That's good enough, isn't it?"
"Quite. You must be as happy as you're pleased to think Ruth."
"Well, then, I'm not. I should like to be some good in the world, and
I'm no good at all!"
"I am sorry to see it take you like that," said Erskine gravely. "I
wouldn't have thought this of you, Tiny!"
"Ah, there are many things you wouldn't think of me," remarked Tiny. She
spoke a little sadly, and she said no more. And this time her sudden
silence came from no vision of the bush, but from what she loved much
less--a glimpse of herself in the mirror of her own heart.
There was one thing, certainly, that none of them would have thought of
her; for she never told them of her little quiet meddlings in the
village. But I could tell you. Pleasant it would be to write of what she
did for Mrs. Clapperton (who certainly seemed to have been unfairly
treated) and of the memories that lived after her in more cottages than
one. But you are to see her as they did who saw most of her, and to
remember that nothing is more delightful than being kind to the grateful
poor, especially when one is privately depressed. Little was ever known
of the liberties taken by Christina's generosity, and nothing shall be
recorded here. She must stand or fall without that, as in the eyes of
her friends. Suffice it that she did amuse herself in this way on the
sly, and found it good for restoring her vanity, which was suffering
secretly all this time. She would have been the last to take credit for
any good she may have done in Essingham. She knew that it wiped out
nothing, and also that it made her happier than she would have been
otherwise. For though a worse time came later, even now she was not
comfortable in her heart. And she had by no means forgotten the
existence of Lord Manister, as someone feared.
Ruth, however, put her own conversation under studious restraint during
these days, many of which passed without any mention of Lord Minister's
name at the rectory. The distracting proximity of his stately home was
apparently forgotten in this peaceful spot. But the wife of one clerical
neighbor, a Mrs. Willoughby, who accompanied her husband when he came to
play lawn tennis with Mr. Holland, and indeed wherever the poor man
went, cherished a grudge against the young nobleman's family, of which
she made no secret. It was only natural that this lady should air her
grievance on the lawn at Essingham, whence there was a distant prospect
of lodge and gates to goad her tongue. Yet, when she did so, it was as
though the sun had come out suddenly and thrown the shadow of the hall
across the rectory garden.
"As for this garden party," cried Mrs. Willoughby, as it seemed for the
benefit of the gentlemen, who had put on their coats, and were handing
teacups under the trees, "I consider it an insult to the county. It
comes too late in the day to be regarded as anything else. Why didn't
they do something when first they came here? They have had the place a
year. Why didn't they give a ball in the winter, or a set of dinner
parties if they preferred that? Shall I tell you why, Mr. Holland? It
was because the general election was further off then, and it hadn't
occurred to them to put up Lord Manister for the division."
"They haven't been here a year, my dear, by any means," observed Mrs.
Willoughby's husband; "and as for dinner parties, we, at any rate, have
dined with them."
"Well, I wouldn't boast about it," answered Mrs. Willoughby, who had a
sharp manner in conversation, and a specially staccato note for her
husband. "We dined with them, it is true; I suppose they thought they
must do the civil to a neighboring rector or two. But as their footman
had the insolence to tell our coachman, Mrs. Holland, they considered
things had reached a pretty pass when it came to dining the country
clergy!'"
"Their footman considered," murmured Mr. Willoughby.
"He was repeating what he had heard at table," the lady affirmed, as
though she had heard it herself. "They had made a joke of it--before
their servants. So they don't catch me at their garden party, which is
to satisfy our social cravings and secure our votes. I don't visit with
snobs, Mrs. Holland, for all their coronets and Norman blood--of which,
let me tell you, they haven't one drop between them. Who was the present
earl's great-grandfather, I should like to know? He never had one; they
are not only snobs but upstarts, the Dromards."
"At any rate," Mr. Holland said mildly, "they can't gain anything by
being civil to _us_. We don't represent a single vote. We are here for
one calendar month."
"Ah, it is wise to be disinterested here and there," rejoined Mrs.
Willoughby, whose sharpness was not merely vocal; "it supplies an
instance, and that's worth a hundred arguments. Now I shouldn't wonder,
Mr. Holland, if they didn't go out of their way to be quite nice to you.
I shouldn't wonder a bit. It would advertise their disinterestedness.
But wait till you meet them in Piccadilly."
"Mrs. Willoughby is a cynic," laughed Erskine, turning to the clergyman,
whose wife swallowed her tea complacently with this compliment to
sweeten it. To so many minds a charge of cynicism would seem to imply
that intellectual superiority which is cheap at the price of a moral
defect.
Now Erskine had a lawn tennis player staying with him for the inside of
this week; and the lawn tennis player was a fallen cricketer, who had
played against the Eton eleven when young Manister was in it; and he
ventured to suggest that the division might find a worse candidate. "He
was a nice enough boy then," said he, "and I recollect he made runs;
he's a good fellow still, from all accounts."
"From all _my_ accounts," retorted Mrs. Willoughby, refreshed by her
tea, "he's a very fast one!"
Erskine's friend had never heard that, though he understood that
Manister had fallen off in his cricket; he had not seen the young fellow
for years, nor did he think any more about him at the moment, being
drawn by Herbert into cricket talk, which stopped his ears to the
general conversation just as this became really interesting.
"That reminds me," Mrs. Willoughby exclaimed, turning to Ruth. "Was Lord
Manister out in Australia in your time?"
Ruth said "No," rather nervously, for Mrs. Willoughby's manner alarmed
her. "I was married just before he came out," she added; "as a matter of
fact, our steamers crossed in the canal."
"Well, you know what a short time he stayed there, for a governor's
aid-de-camp?"
"Only a few months, I have heard. Do let me give you another cup of tea,
Mrs. Willoughby!"
"Now I wonder if you know," pursued this lady, having cursorily declined
more tea, "how he came to leave so suddenly?"
Poor Mrs. Holland shook her head, which was inwardly besieged with
impossible tenders for a change of subject. No one helped her: Tiny had
perhaps already lost her presence of mind; Erskine did not understand;
the other two were not listening. Ruth could think of no better
expedient than a third cup for Christina; as she passed it her own hand
trembled, but venturing to glance at her sister's face, she was amazed
to find it not only free from all sign of self-consciousness or of
anxiety, but filled with unaffected interest. For this was the occasion
on which Christina's coolness quite baffled Ruth, who for her part was
preparing for a scene.
"Shall I tell you?" asked Mrs. Willoughby.
"Do," said Christina, to whom the well-informed lady at once turned.
"He formed an attachment out there, Miss Luttrell! He could only get
out of it by fleeing the country; so he fled. You look as though you
knew all about it," she added (making Ruth shudder), for the girl had
smiled knowingly.
"About which?" asked Tiny.
"What! Were there more affairs than one?"
"Some people said so."
Mrs. Willoughby glanced around her with a glittering eye, and was sorry
to notice that two of her hearers were not listening. "That is just what
I expected," she informed the other four. "If you tell me that Melbourne
became too hot to hold him I shall not be surprised."
"Melbourne made rather a fuss about him," replied Christina in an
excusing tone that pierced Ruth's embarrassment and pricked to life her
darling hopes. "He was not greatly to blame."
"But he broke the poor girl's heart. I should blame him for that, to say
the least of it."
"You surprise me," said Christina gravely; "I thought that people at
home never blamed each other for anything they did in the colonies?
Over here you are particular, I know; but I thought it was correct not
to be too particular when out there. Your writers come out: we treat
them like lords, and then they do nothing but abuse us; your lords come
out: we treat them like princes, and, you see, they break our hearts. Of
course they do! We expect it of them. It's all we look for in the
colonies."
"You are not serious, Miss Luttrell," said Mrs. Willoughby in some
displeasure. "To my mind it is a serious thing. It seems a sad thing,
too, to me. But I may be old-fashioned; the present generation would
crack jokes across an open grave, as I am well aware. Yet there isn't
much joke in a young girl having her heart broken by such as Lord
Manister, is there? And that's what literally happened, for my friend
Mrs. Foster-Simpson knows all about it. She knows all about the
Dromards--to her cost!"
"Ah, we know the Foster-Simpsons; they called on us last year," remarked
Erskine, who devoutly trusted that they would not call again. His
amusement at Christina hardly balanced his weariness of Mrs. Willoughby,
and he took off his coat as he spoke.
"Does your friend know the poor girl's name, Mrs. Willoughby?" Tiny
asked when the men had gone back to the court; and her tone was now as
sympathetic as could possibly be desired.
"I'm sorry to say she does not; it's the one thing she has been unable
to find out," said Mrs. Willoughby naïvely. "Perhaps you could tell me,
Miss Luttrell?"
"Perhaps I could," said Christina, smiling, as she rose to seek a ball
which had been hit into the churchyard. "Only, you see, I don't know
which of them it was. It wouldn't be fair to give you a list of names to
guess from, would it?"
Fortunately Mrs. Willoughby put no further questions to Ruth, who was
intensely thankful. "For," as she told Christina afterward, "_I_ was on
pins and needles the whole time. I never did know anyone like you for
keeping cool under fire!"
"It depends on the fire," Tiny said. "Mrs. Willoughby went off by
accident, and luckily she was not pointing at anybody."
"And I'm glad she did, now it's over!" exclaimed Ruth. "Don't you see
that I was quite right about your name? So now you need have no more
qualms about the garden party."
"Perhaps I've had no qualms for some time; perhaps I've known you were
right."
"Since when? Since--since you saw Lord Manister?"
Tiny nodded.
"Do you mean to say you talked about it?" Ruth whispered in delicious
awe.
"I mustn't tell you what _he_ talked about. He was as nice as he could
be--though I should have preferred to find him less beautifully dressed
in the country; but I always felt that about him. I am sure, however, of
one thing: he was no more to blame than--I was. I have always felt this
about him, too."
"Tiny, dear, if only I could understand you!"
"If only you could! Then you might help me to understand myself."