After all these there marcht a most faire dame,
Led of two gryslie villains, th’ one Despight,
The other cleped Crueltie by name.
SPENSER.
The traces of occupation had not deceived Major Delavie; Aurelia had
been recently in Delavie House, and we must go back some way in our
narrative to her arrival there.
She had, on her return from Sedhurst on that Sunday, reached Bowstead,
and entered by the lobby door just as Lady Belamour was coming down the
stairs only attended by her woman, and ready to get into the carriage
which waited at the hall door.
Sinking on her knees before her with clasped hands, Aurelia exclaimed,
“O madam, I ought not to have come away. Here I am, do what you will
with me, but spare my father. He knew nothing of it. Only, for pity’s
sake, do not put me among the poor wicked creatures in gaol.”
“Get into that carriage immediately, and you shall know by decision,”
said Lady Belamour, with icy frigidness, but not the same fierceness
as before; and Aurelia submissively obeyed, silenced by an imperious
gesture when she would have asked, “How is it with _him_?” whom she
durst not name.
Lady Belamour waited a minute or two while sending Loveday on a last
message to the sick room, then entered the large deep carriage, signing
to her captive to take a corner where she could hardly be seen if any
one looked through the window. Loveday followed, the door was shut by a
strange servant, as it was in fact Lady Aresfield’s carriage, borrowed
both for the sake of speed, and of secrecy towards her own household.
A few words passed by which Aurelia gathered something reassuring as
to the state of the patient, and then Lady Belamour turned on her,
demanding, “So, young miss, you tried to escape me! Where have you
been?”
“Only as far as Sedhurst Church, madam. I would have gone home, but I
feared to bring trouble on my father, and I came back to implore you to
forgive.”
There was no softening of the terrible, beautiful face before her, and
she durst put no objective case to her verb. However, the answer was
somewhat less dreadful than she had anticipated.
“I have been shamefully duped,” said Lady Belamour, “but it is well that
it is no worse; nor shall I visit our offences on your father if you
show your penitence by absolute submission. The absurd ceremony you went
through was a mere mockery, and the old fool, Belamour, showed himself
crazed for consenting to such an improper frolic on the part of my son.
Whether your innocence be feigned or not, however, I cannot permit you
to go out of my custody until the foolish youth or yourself be properly
bestowed in marriage elsewhere. Meantime, you will remain where I
place you, and exactly fulfil my commands. Remember that any attempt to
communicate with any person outside the house will be followed by your
Father’s immediate dismissal.”
“May I not let him know that I am safe?”
“Certainly not; I will see to your father.”
It was a period when great ladies did not scruple to scold at the top
of their voices, and sometimes proceed to blows, but Lady Belamour never
raised her low silvery tones, and thus increased the awfulness of her
wrath and the impressiveness of her determination. Face to face with
her, there were few who did not cower under her displeasure; and poor
Aurelia, resolute to endure for her father’s sake, could only promise
implicit obedience.
She only guessed when the entered London by the louder rumbling, and for
one moment the coach paused as a horse was reined up near it, and with
plumed hat in hand the rider bent forward to the window, exclaiming,
“Successful, by all that is lovely! Captured, by Jove!”
“You shall hear all another time,” said lady Belamour. “Let us go on
now.”
They did so, but the horseman continued to flash across the windows, and
when the coach, after considerable delay, had entered the walled court,
rumbled over the pavement, and stopped before a closed door, he was
still there. When, after much thundering, the door was opened, Aurelia
had a moment’s glimpse of a splendid figure in gold and scarlet handing
out Lady Belamour, who stood talking with him on the steps of the house
for some moments. Then, shrugging his shoulders, he remounted, and
cantered off, after which my Lady signed to Aurelia to alight, and
followed her into the hall.
“Madge,” said Lady Belamour to the witch-like old woman who had admitted
her, “this young lady is to remain here. You will open a bedroom and
sitting-room for her at the back of the house. Let her be properly cared
for, and go out in the court behind, but on no account approach the
front gates. Let no one know she is here.”
Madge muttered some demands about supplies and payments, and Lady
Belamour waved her to settle them with Mrs. Loveday, turning meantime to
the prisoner and saying, “There, child, you are to remain here on
your good behaviour. Do your best to merit my good will, so that I may
overlook what is past. Recollect, the least attempt to escape, or to
hold intercourse with the young, or the old, fool, and it shall be the
worse with them and with your father.”
Therewith she departed, followed by Loveday, leaving Aurelia standing in
the middle of the hall, the old hag gazing on her with a malignant
leer. “Ho! ho’! So that’s the way! He has begun that work early, has he?
What’s your name, my lass? Oh, you need give yourself airs! I cry you
mercy,” and she made a derisive curtsey.
Poor Aurelia, pride had less to do with her silence than absolute
uncertainty what to call herself. The wedding ring was on her finger,
and she would not deny her marriage by calling herself Delavie, but
Belamour might be dangerous, and the prefix was likewise a difficulty,
so faltered, “You may call me Madam Aurelia.”
“Madam Really. That’s a queer name, but it will serve while you are
here.”
“Pray let me go to my room,” entreated the poor prisoner, who felt as
ineffable disgust at her jailor, and was becoming sensible to extreme
fatigue.
“Your room, hey? D’ye think I keep rooms and beds as though this were
an inn, single-handed as I am? You must wait, unless you be too fine to
lend a hand.”
“Anything will do,” said Aurelia, “if I may only rest. I would help, but
I am so much tired that I can hardly stand.”
“My Lady has given it to you well, Mistress Really or Mistress Falsely,
which ever you may be,” mumbled Madge, perhaps in soliloquy, fumbling
at the lock of a room which at last she opened. It smelt very close and
fusty, and most of the furniture was heaped together under a cloth in
the midst, dimly visible by the light of a heart-shaped aperture in the
shutters. Unclosing one of the leaves, the old woman admitted enough
daylight to guide Aurelia to a couch against the wall, saying, “You can
wait there till I see to your bed. And you’ll be wanting supper too!”
she added in a tone of infinite disgust.
“O never mind supper, if I can only go to bed,” sighed Aurelia, sinking
on the couch as the old woman hobbled off. Lassitude and exhaustion had
brought her to a state like annihilation--unable to think or guess, hope
or fear, with shoes hurting her footsore feet, a stiff dress cramping
her too much for sleep, and her weary aching eyes gathering a few
impressions in a passive way. On the walls hung dimly seen portraits
strangely familiar to her. The man in a green dressing gown with
floating hair had a face she knew; so had the lady in the yellow ruff.
And was that not the old crest, the Delavie butterfly, with the motto,
_Ma Vie et ma Mie_, carved on the mantelpiece? Thus she knew that
she must be in Delavie House, and felt somewhat less desolate as she
recognised several portraits as duplicates of those at the Great House
at Carminster, and thought they looked at her in pity with their eyes
like her father’s. The youngest son in the great family group was, as
she knew, an Amyas, and he put her in mind of her own. Oh, was he her
own, when she could not tell whether those great soft, dark-grey eyes
that looked so kindly on her had descended to the young baronet? She
hoped not, for Harriet and she had often agreed that they presaged the
fate of that gallant youth, who had been killed by Sir Bevil Grenville’s
side. He must have looked just as Sir Amyas did, lying senseless after
the hurt she had caused.
No more definite nor useful thought passed through the brain of the
overwearied maiden as she rest on the couch, how long she knew not; but
it was growing dark by the time Madge returned with a guttering candle,
a cracked plate and wedge of greasy-looking pie, a piece of dry bread,
a pewter cup of small beer, and an impaired repulsive steel knife with
a rounded end, and fork with broken prong. The fact of this being steel
was not distressing to one who had never seen a silver fork, but the
condition of both made her shudder, and added to the sick sense of
exhaustion that destroyed her appetite. She took a little of the bread,
and, being parched with thirst, drank some of the beer before Madge came
back again. “Oh ho, you’re nice I see, my fine Dame Really!”
“Thank you, indeed I can’t eat, I am so much tired,” said Aurelia
apologetically.
“You’ll have to put up with what serves your betters, I can tell you,”
was all the reply she received. “Well be ye coming to your bed?”
So up the creaking stairs she was guided to a room, very unlike that
fresh white bower at Bowstead, large, eerie, ghostly-looking, bare
save for a dark oak chest, and a bed of the same material, the posts
apparently absolute trees, squared and richly carved, and supporting a
solid wooden canopy with an immense boss as big as a cabbage, and carved
something like one, depending from the centre, as if to endanger the
head of the unwary, who should start up in bed. No means of ablution
were provided, and Aurelia felt so grimed and dusty that she ventured to
beg for an ewer and basin; but her amiable hostess snarled out that she
had enough to do without humouring fiddle-faddle whimsies, and that she
might wash at the pump if nothing else would serve her.
Aurelia wished she had known this before going up stairs, and, worn out
as she was, the sense implanted by her mother that it was wicked to go
to sleep dirty, actually made her drag herself down to a grim little
scullery, where she was permitted to borrow a wooden bowl, since she
was too _nice_ forsooth to wash down stairs. She carried it up with a
considerable trouble more than half full, and a bit of yellow soap and
clean towel were likewise vouchsafed to her. The wash--perhaps because
of the infinite trouble it cost her--did her great good,--it gave her
energy to recollect her prayers and bring good angels about her. If this
had been her first plunge from home, when Jumbo’s violin had so scared
her, such a place as this would have almost killed her; but the peace
that had come to her in Sedhurst Church lingered still round her, and
as she climbed up into the lofty bed the verse sang in her ears “Love is
strong as death.” Whether Love Divine or human she did not ask herself,
but with the sense of soothing upon her, she slept--and slept as a
seventeen-years’-old frame will sleep after having been thirty-six hours
awake and afoot.
When she awoke it was with the sense of some one being in the room. “O
gemini!” she heard, and starting up, only just avoiding the knob, she
saw Mrs. Loveday’s well-preserved brunette face gazing at her.
“Your servant, ma’am,” she said. “You’ll excuse me if I speak with you
here, for I must be back by the time my Lady’s bell rings.”
“Is it very late?” said Aurelia, taking from under her pillow her watch,
which had stopped long ago.
“Nigh upon ten o’clock,” said Loveday. “I must not stay, but it is my
Lady’s wish that you should have all that is comformable, and you’ll let
me know how Madge behaves herself.”
“Is there any news from Bowstead?” was all Aurelia could at first
demand.
“Not yet; but bless you, my dear young lady, you had best put all that
matter out of your head for ever and a day. I know what these young
gentlemen are. They are not to be hearkened to one moment, not the best
of them. Let them be ever so much in earnest at the time, their parents
and guardians have the mastery of them sooner or later, and the farther
it has gone, the worse it is. I saw you lying asleep here looking so
innocent that it went to my heart, and I heard you mutter in your sleep
‘Love is strong as death,’ but that’s only a bit of some play-book, and
don’t you trust to it, for I never saw love that was stronger than a
spider’s web.”
“Oh, hush, Mrs. Loveday. It is in the Bible!”
“You don’t say so, ma’am,” the woman said awestruck.
“I would show it you, only all my things are away. God is love, you
know,” said Aurelia, sitting up with clasped hands, “and He gives it, so
it must be strong.”
“Well, all the love I’ve ever seen was more the devil’s,” said Loveday
truly enough; “and you’ll find it so if you mean to trust to these fine
young beaux and what they say.”
Aurelia shook her head a little as she sat up in bed with her clasped
hands; and there was a look on her face that Mrs. Loveday did not
understand, as she went on with her advice.
“So, my dear young lady, you see all that is left for you is to frame
your mind to keep close here, and conform to my Lady’s will till all is
blown over one way or another.”
“I know that,” said Aurelia.
“Don’t’ you do anything to anger her,” added the waiting-woman, “for
there’s no one who can stand against her; and I’ll speak up for you when
I can, for I know how to come round my Lady, if any one does. Tell me
what you want, and I’ll get it for you; but don’t try to get out, and
don’t send Madge, for she is not to be trusted with money. If I were
you, I’d not let her see that watch, and I’d lock my door at night.
You’re too innocent, whatever my Lady may say. Here’s half a pound of
tea and sugar, which you had best keep to yourself, and I’ve seen
to there being things decent down stairs. Tell me, my dear, is there
anything you want? Your clothes, did you say? Oh, yes, you shall have
them--yes, and your books. Here’s some warm water,” as a growling was
heard at the door; “I must not wait till you are dressed, but there’s a
box of shells down in your room that Mr. Wayland sent home for my Lady
to line a grotto with, and she wants them all sorted out. ‘Tell her she
must make herself of use if she wants to be forgiven,’ says my Lady, for
she is in a mighty hurry for them now she has heard of the Duchess of
Portland’s grotto; though she has let them lie here unpacked for this
half year and more. So if they are all done by night, maybe may Lady
will be pleased to let you have a bit more liberty.”
Mrs. Loveday departed, having certainly cheered the captive, and Aurelia
rose, weary-limbed and sad-hearted, with a patient trust in her soul
that Love Divine would not fail her, and that earthly love would do its
best.
She found matters improved in the down-stairs room, the furniture was in
order, a clean cloth on the table, a white roll, butter, and above all
clean bright implements, showing Mrs. Loveday’s influence. She ate and
drank like a hungry girl, washed up for herself rather than let Madge
touch anything she could help, and looked from the window into a
dull court of dreary, blighted-looking turf divided by flagged walks,
radiating from a statue in the middle, representing a Triton blowing a
conch--no doubt intended to spout water, for there was a stone trough
round him, but he had long forgotten his functions, and held a sparrow’s
nest with streaming straws in his hand. This must be the prison-yard,
where alone she might walk, since it lay at the back of the house; and
with a sense of depression she turned to the task that awaited her.
A very large foreign-looking case had been partly opened, and when she
looked in she was appalled at the task to be accomplished in one day.
It was crammed with shells of every size and description, from the
large helmet-conch and Triton’s trumpet, down to the tiny pink cowry
and rice-volute, all stuffed together without arrangement or packing,
forming a mass in which the unbroken shells reposed in a kind of sand,
of _debris_ ground together out of the victims; and when she took up a
tolerably-sized univalve, quantities of little ones came tumbling out
of its inner folds. She took up a handful, and presently picked out
one perfect valve like a rose petal, three fairy cups of limpets, four
ribbed cowries, and a thing like a green pea. Of course she knew no
names, but a kind of interest was awakened by the beauty and variety
before her. A pile of papers had been provided, and the housewife [a
pocket-size container for small articles (as thread)--D.L.] which Betty
made her always carry in her pocket furnished wherewithal to make up a
number of bags for the lesser sorts; and she went to work, her troubles
somewhat beguiled by the novel beauties of each delicate creature
she disinterred, but remembering with a pang how, if she could have
described them to Mr. Belamour, he would have discoursed upon the Order
of Nature.
London noises were not the continuous roar of vehicles of the present
day, but there was sound enough to remind the country girl where she
was, and the street cries “Old Clothes!” “Sprats, oh!” “Sweep!” were
heard over the wall, sometimes with tumultuous voices that seemed
to enhance her loneliness, as she sat on the floor, hour after hour,
sifting out the entire shells, and feeling a languid pleasure in joining
the two halves of a bivalve, especially those lovely sunset shells that
have rosy rays diverging from their crimson hinge over their polished
surface, white, or just tinted with the hues of a daffodil sky. She
never clasped a pair together without a little half-uttered ejaculation,
“Oh, bring me and my dear young love thus together again!” And when she
found a couple making a perfect heart, and holding together through all,
she kissed it tenderly in the hope that thus it might be with her and
with him whose hand and whose voice returned on her, calling her his
dearest life!
She durst only quit the shells to eat the dinner which Madge served at
one o’clock--a tolerable meal of slices of cold beef from a cook’s-shop,
but seasoned with sour looks and a murmur at ladies’ fancies. The
weariness and languor of the former day’s exertions made her for the
present disinclined to explore the house, even had she had time, and
when twilight came there could have been little but fragments at the
bottom of the case, though she could see no more to sort them.
And what were these noises around her making her start? Rats! Yes, here
they were, venturing out from all the corners. They knew there had been
food in the room. This was why Madge had those to gaunt, weird-looking
cats in her kitchen! Aurelia went and sat on the step into the court to
be out of their way, but Madge hunted her in that the door might be shut
and barred; and when she returned trembling to the sitting room, she
heard such a scampering and a scrambling that she durst not enter, and
betook herself to her chamber and to bed.
Alas! that was no refuge. She had been too much tired to hear anything
the night before, but to-night there was scratching, nibbling,
careering, fighting, squeaking, recoil and rally, charge and rout, as
the grey Hanover rat fought his successful battle with his black English
cousin all over the floors and stairs--nay, once or twice came rushing
up and over the bed--frightening its occupant almost out of her senses,
as she cowered under the bed-clothes, not at all sure that they would
not proceed to eating her. Happily daylight came early. Aurelia, at its
first ray, darted across the room, starting in horror when she touched
a soft thing with her bare foot, opened the shutter, and threw open the
casement. Light drove the enemy back to their holes, and she had a few
hours’ sleep, but when Mrs. Loveday came to the room when she was
nearly dressed, she exclaimed, “Why, miss, you look paler than you did
yesterday.”
“The rats!” said Aurelia under her breath.
“Ah! the rats! Of course they are bad enough in an old desolate place
like this. But you’ve done the shells right beautiful, that I will say;
and you may leave this house this very day if you will only give your
consent to what my Lady asks. You shall be sent down this very day to
Carminster, if so be you’ll give up that ring of yours, and sign a paper
giving up all claim to be married to his Honour. See, here it is, all
ready, in my Lady’s letter.”
“I cannot,” said Aurelia, with her hands behind her.
“You can read my Lady’s letter,” said Loveday; “that can do you no
harm.”
Aurelia felt she must do that at least.
“CHILD,
“I will overlook your Transgression on the One Condition, that
you sign this Paper and send it with your so-called Wedding Ring back
to me immediately. Otherwise you must take the Consequences, and remain
where you are till after my Son’s Marriage.
“URANIA BELAMOUR.”
The paper was a formal renunciation of all rights or claims from the
fictitious marriage by which she had been deceived, and an absolute
pledge never to renew any contract with Sir Amyas Belamour, Knight
Baronet, who had grossly played on her.
“No, I cannot,” said Aurelia, pushing it from her.
“Indeed, miss, I would not persuade you to it if it were not for your
own good; but you may be sure it is no use holding out against her
Ladyship. If you sign it now, and give it up honourable, she will send
Mr. Dove home with you, and there you’ll be as if nothing had been
amiss, no one knowing nothing about it; but if you persist it will not
make the marriage a bit more true, and you will only be kept moped up in
this dismal place till his Honour is married, and there’s no saying what
worse my Lady may do to you.”
Another night of rats came up before Aurelia’s imagination in contrast
with the tender welcome at home; but the white face and the tones that
had exclaimed, “Madam, what are you doing to my wife?” arose and forbade
her. She would not fail him. So she said firmly once more, “No, Mrs.
Loveday, I cannot. I do not know what lawyers may say, but I feel myself
bound to Sir Amyas, and I will not break my vow--God helping me,” she
added under breath.
“You must write it to her ladyship then. She will never take such a
message through me. Here is paper and pen that I brought, in hopes that
you would be wise and submit for your honoured father’s sake.”
“My father cannot be persecuted for what he has nothing to do with,”
said Aurelia, with the gentle dignity that had grown on her since her
troubles. And taking the pen, she wrote her simple refusal, signing it
Aurelia Belamour.
“As you please, ma’am,” said Mrs. Loveday, “but I have my Lady’s orders
to bring this paper every day till you sign it, and it would be better
for you if you would do it at once.”
Aurelia only shook her head, and asked if Mrs. Loveday had seen that she
had finished sorting the shells. Yes; and as she was now dressed they
went down together to the sitting-room. The shutters were still closed,
Madge would not put a hand to the room except on the compulsion, and
Aurelia’s enemies had left evidence of their work; not only was the
odour of the room like that of a barn, but the paper bags had in some
cases been bitten through, and the shells scattered about, and of the
loaf and butter which Aurelia had left on a high shelf in the cupboard
nothing remained but a few fragments.
Loveday was very much shocked, all the more when Aurelia quietly said
she should not mind it so much if the rats would only stay down stairs,
and not run over her in bed.
“Yet you will not sign the paper.”
“I cannot,” again said Aurelia.
“My stars, I never could abear rats! Why they fly at one’s throat
sometimes!”
“I hope God will take care of me,” said Aurelia, in a trembling voice.
“He did last night.”
Loveday began a formal leave-taking curtsey, but presently turned back.
“There now,” she said, “I cannot do it, I couldn’t sleep a wink for
thinking of you among the rats! Look here, I shall send a porter to
bring away those shells if you’ll make up their bags again that the
nasty vermin have eaten, and there’s a little terrier dog about the
place that no one will miss, he shall bring it down, and depend upon it,
the rats won’t venture near it.”
“Oh! thank you, Mrs. Loveday, how good you are!”
“Ah, don’t then! If you could say that my dear!”
Mrs. Loveday hurried away, and after breakfasting, Aurelia repaired the
ravages of the rats, and made a last sorting of the residuum of shell
dust, discovering numerous minute beauties, which awoke in her the happy
thought of the Creator’s individual love.
She had not yet finished before Madge’s voice was heard in querulous
anger, and a heavy tread came along with her. A big man, who could have
carried ten times the weight of the box of shells, came in with a little
white dog with black ears, under his arm.
“There,” said the amiable guardian of the house, “that smart madam says
that it’s her ladyship’s pleasure you should have that little beast to
keep down the rats. As if my cats was not enough! But mind you, Madam
Really, if so be he meddles with my cats, it will be the worse for him.”
The porter took up the box, and departed, and Aurelia was left with
her new companion sniffing all round the room, much excited by the
neighbourhood of his natural enemies. However, he obeyed her call, and
let her make friends, and read the name on the brass plate upon his
collar. When she read “Sir A. Belamour, Bart.,” she took the little dog
in her arms and kissed it’s white head.
Being fairly rested, and having no task to accomplish, she felt the day
much longer, though less solitary, in the companionship of the dog, to
whom she whispered many fond compliments, and vain questions as to his
name. With him at her heels and Madge and her cats safely shut into the
kitchen, she took courage to wander about the dull court, and then to
explore the mansion and try to get a view from the higher windows, in
case they were not shuttered up like the lower ones. The emptiness
of Bowstead was nothing to this, and she smiled to herself at having
thought herself a prisoner there.
Most of the rooms were completely dismantled, or had only ghastly rags
of torn leather or tapestry hanging to their walls. The upper windows,
however, were merely obscured by dust and cobwebs. Her own bedroom
windows only showed the tall front of an opposite house, but climbing
to the higher storey, she could see at the back over the garden wall
the broad sheet of the Thames, covered with boats and wherries, and the
banks provided with steps and stairs, at the opening of every street on
the opposite side, where she beheld a confused mass of trees, churches,
and houses. Nearer, the view to the westward was closed in by a stately
edifice which she did not know to be Somerset House; and from another
window on the east side of the house she saw, over numerous tiled
roofs, a gateway which she guessed to be Temple Bar, and a crowded
thoroughfare, where the people looked like ants, toiling towards the
great dome that rose in the misty distance. Was this the way she was to
see London?
Coming down with a lagging step, she met Madge’s face peering up.
“Humph! there you be, my fine miss! No gaping after sweethearts from the
window, or it will be the worse for you.”
The terrier growled, as having already adopted his young lady’s defence,
and Aurelia, dreading a perilous explosion of his zeal in her cause,
hurried him into her parlour.