It was just two days after the interview in the wood described above,
that the Kingsward party got under weigh for home, accompanied, I need
not say, by Aubrey Leigh. Bee had not told him of that chance meeting,
restrained I do not know by what indefinite feeling that he would not
care to hear of it, and also by the sensation that she had as good as
told the lady, who was so disagreeable and impertinent as to laugh, what
change had taken place in Aubrey’s sentiments, and what she had herself
to do with that change. It was so silly, oh, so silly of her, and yet
she had said nothing, or next to nothing. And there was no reason why
she should not have said whatever she pleased, now that the engagement
was fully acknowledged and known; indeed, if that woman were in any
society at all, she must have heard of it, seeing that, as Bee was
aware, not without pleasure, it had afforded a very agreeable diversion
to the floating community, a pleasant episode in the tittle-tattle of
the gardens and the wells. Bee had no absurd objection to being talked
of. She knew that in her condition of life, which was so entirely
satisfactory as a condition, everything that concerned a family was
talked over and universally known. It was a thing inevitable to a
certain position, and a due homage of society to its members. But
somehow she did not mention it to Aubrey, nor, indeed, to anyone, which
was a very unusual amount of reticence. She did not even give him the
sketch, though it was finished. She had been quite grateful for that
person’s hints at the time, and eagerly had taken advantage of them to
improve her drawing; but it seemed to her, when she looked at it now,
that it was not her own at all, that the other hand was so visible in it
that it would be almost dishonest to call it hers. This, of course, was
wholly fantastic, for even supposing that person to have given valuable
hints, she had never touched the sketch, and Bee alone had carried them
out. But, anyhow, her heart sickened at it, and she thrust it away at
the very bottom of the box that Moulsey was packing. She had no desire
to see the horrid thing again.
In a day or two, however, Bee had altogether forgotten that interview in
the wood. She had so many things to occupy her mind. There were few
railways in those days, and the party had a long way to travel before
they came to Cologne, where that method of travelling began. They all
felt that common life would re-commence there and their delightful
wandering would be over. In the meantime, there was a long interval of
pleasure before them. The early breakfast at the hotel in the first
hours of the autumnal morning, the fun of packing everyone away in the
big coach, the books to be brought out to fill up corners, both of time
and space, and “Murray” then alone in his glory, with no competitive
American, no Badæker, no Joanne, to share his reign--spread out open at
the right place, so that mamma inside should be able to lay her finger
at once upon any village or castle that struck her--and above all the
contrivances to be carried out for securing the _banquette_, as Bee
said, for “ourselves,” made a lively beginning. Charlie and Betty
sometimes managed to secure this favourite place if the attention of the
others flagged for a moment, and though mamma generally interposed with
a nod or a whisper to restore it to the privileged pair, sometimes she
was mischievous too, and consented to their deprivation, and desired
them for once to keep her company inside. She generally, however,
repented of this before the day was over, and begged that their
favourite seat might be restored to them.
“For they are really no fun at all,” the poor lady said. “I might as
well have two images from Madame Tussaud’s.”
“It had been a little hard upon Aubrey at the moment of their departure
to find half the garrison round the carriage, and bouquets enough to
fill a separate vehicle thrust into every corner, the homage of those
warriors to the gracious ladies. He had been very cross, and had made a
great exhibition of himself, especially when Captain Kreutzner’s faggot
of forget-me-nots, tied with a ribbon like that on Bee’s hat, had been
presented with indescribable looks. What did the fellow mean by bringing
forget-me-nots? He wanted to pitch it out of the window as soon as they
were fairly started.
“What an idiotic custom!” he cried. “What do the fools think you want
with such loads of flowers when you are starting on a journey?”
“Why, it is just then you do want them,” cried Betty, who had a dozen or
so to her own share, “to smell sweet and show us how much our friends
think of us.”
“They will not smell sweet very long, and then what will your friends
think of you?” said the angry lover.
Was it possible that Bee was detaching a little knot of the blue flowers
to put in her waistband? Bee, Bee! his own property, who had no right so
much as to look at another man’s flowers! And what did she do, seeing
the cloud upon his face, but arrange another little bouquet, which,
with her sweetest smile--the little coquette--she endeavoured to put
into his, Aubrey’s, button-hole! He snatched them out of her hand in a
sort of fury. “Do you want me never to forget that heavy brute of a
German?” he cried, in his indignation. “You may put him near your heart,
but I should like to kick him!” These very natural sentiments made Bee
laugh--which was cruel: but then poor Captain Kreutzner had been blotted
out of her life some time ago, and knew his fate, and had really no
right whatever to present her with these particular flowers. His lovely
bouquet with its blue ribbon was given to a girl in the first village,
and awakened the still more furious jealousy of another swain who was
less easily appeased than Aubrey; but this _ricochet_ was not thought of
by the first and principal pair.
There was not perhaps so many remarkable features in that journey as if
it had been through Italy. There were great plains to traverse, where
the chief sights were cottages and farmhouses, women going by with great
loads of freshly cut grass full of flowers on their heads, fodder for
the home-dwelling cows--or men carrying their hops clinging to the
pole, to be picked at home, or long straggling branches of the tobacco
plant; and in the evening the postillion would whip up his horses, and
Charlie in the _banquette_, or John, the manservant, in the rumble,
would tootle upon a horn which the former had acquired clandestinely
before the party set out--as they dashed through a village or little
town with lighted windows, affording them many a flying peep of the
domestic life of those tranquil places. And in the middle of the day
they stopped to rest somewhere, where the invariable veal was to be
found at some Guest-house a little better than the ordinary, where
perhaps a bigger village stood with all its high peaked stream: and at
night rattled into an old walled town with shadowy high houses which
belonged to the fourteenth century, and had not changed a whit since
that time. There they stayed a day or two, varying the confinement of
the coach by a course through everything that was to be seen, setting
out in a party through the roughly-paved streets, but parting company
before long, so that Aubrey and Bee would find themselves alone in the
shelter of a church or in an insignificant corner by the walls, while
the others pursued their sightseeing conscientiously.
“As for me, what I like is the general aspect,” said Bee, with an air of
superiority. “I don’t care to poke into every corner, and Aubrey knows
the history, which is the chief thing.”
“Are they talking all the time of the history?” said Betty, overawed.
But this perhaps, was not the opinion of Charlie and mamma. No, they did
not care very much for the history. People are bad travellers in that
stage of life. They are too much interested in their own history. They
went about like a pair of Philistines through all these ancient streets,
talking of nothing but the things of to-day. The most serious part of
their talk was about the home in the depths of England in which they
were henceforth to spend their lives. Aubrey had ideas about
re-furnishing--about making everything new. It would be impossible to
tell the reader how bad was the taste of the time, and with what
terrible articles of furniture he proposed to replace the spindle legs
and marquetry of his grandfathers. But then these things were the
fashion, and supposed to be the best things of the time. To hear them
talking of sofas and curtains, and of the colour for the boudoir and the
hangings of the drawing-room in the midst of all those graceful old
places, was inconceivable. You would have said the stupidest,
unimpressionable pair, talking of ugly modern English furniture, when
they should have been noting the old world of Nuremberg--the unchanging
mediæval city. But you must remember that the furniture was only a
symbol of their love and their new life, and all the blessedness of
being together, and the endless delights of every day. The sofas and the
curtains meant the _Vita Nuova_, and the refurnishing of the old house a
beautiful fabric of all the honour and the joy of life.
Then came the great river, and the progress down its shining stream, and
between those beautiful banks, where again they made several pauses to
enjoy the scenery. The Rhine is not now the river it was then. It was
still the great river of romance in those days--Byron had been there,
and the young people remembered Roland and his tower, with his love in
the white convent opposite, and felt a shudder at the thought of the
Lorelei as they floated under the high and gloomy bank. I doubt,
however, whether the lovers thought much even of these things. They were
busy just now about the gardens, which Bee was fully minded to remodel
and fill with everything that was new and delightful in the way of
flowers.
“I shall have masses of colour about the terrace, and every spot
covered. I wonder which you like best, majolica vases or rustic
baskets?” Bee was saying, when her mother called her to point out the
Platz and Bishop Hatto’s tower.
“Oh, yes, mamma, it’s very pretty. But you like clematis, Aubrey, for
the balustrade--to wind in and out of the pillars. Yes, yes, I can see
it well enough. I like every kind of clematis, even the common one, the
traveller’s joy--and it would hang down, you know, over that old bit of
wall you told me of. Do go forward, Aubrey, and let them see you are
taking an interest. I do see it all quite well, and it is very romantic,
and we are quite enjoying it I can assure you, mamma.”
This was how they made their way down stream; in the moonlight nights
they ceased to talk of practical matters, and went back to the history
of their loves.
“Do you remember, Bee, that first time in the wood----?”
“Oh, Aubrey, don’t you recollect that drive coming back in the
dark--before I knew----?”
“But you always did know from the very beginning, Bee?”
“Well, perhaps I suspected--and used to think----”
“You darling, what did you think?--and did you really care--as early as
that?”
They went on like this whatever happened outside, giving a careless
glance at the heights, at the towers, at the robbers’ castle above and
the little villages below; not so much as looking at them, and yet
remembering them ever after, enclosing the flow of their young lives, as
it were, in that strong flowing of the Rhine, noting nothing and yet
seeing everything with the double sight which people possess at the
highest moment and crisis of their career. They came at length to
Cologne, where this enchanted voyage was more or less to end. To be
sure, they were still to be together; but only in the railway, with all
the others round them, hearing more or less what they said. They said
good-bye to the Rhine with a little sentiment, a delightful little
sadness full of pleasure.
“Shall we ever be so happy again?” said Bee, with a sigh.
“Oh, yes, my sweet, a hundred times, and happier, and happier,” said the
young man; and thus they were assured it was to be.
I don’t think any of them ever forgot that arrival at Cologne. They came
into sight of the town just in the evening, when the last glow of sunset
was still burning upon the great river, but lights beginning to show in
the windows, and glimmering reflected in the water. The Cathedral was
not completed then, and a crane, like some strange weird animal stood
out against the sky upon the top of the tower. The hotel to which they
were going had a covered terrace upon the river with lights gleaming
through the green leaves. They decided they would have their table
there, and dine with all that darkling panorama before their eyes
through the veil of the foliage, the glowing water, the boats moving and
passing, with now and then a raft coming down from the upper stream, and
the bridge of boats opening to give passage to a fuming fretting
steamboat. Aubrey and Bee went hand in hand up the steps; nobody noticed
in the half dark how close they were together. They parted with a close
pressure of warm hands.
“Don’t be long, darling,” he said, as they parted, only for a moment,
only to prepare a little for the evening, to slip into a fresh dress, to
take out a new ribbon, to make one’s youthful self as fair as such
unnecessary adjuncts permitted.
But what did Aubrey care for a new ribbon? The only blue he thought of
was that in Bee’s eyes.
I do not think she was more than ten minutes over these little changes.
She dressed like a flash of lightning, Betty said, who could not find
her own things half so quickly, Moulsey being occupied with mamma. Such
a short moment not worth counting, and yet enough, more than enough, to
change a whole life!
Bee ran down as light as air to the sitting-room which had been engaged
for the party. She felt sure that Aubrey would hurry, too, so as to have
a word before dinner, before the rest were ready--as if the whole day
had not been one long word, running through everything. She came lightly
to the door of the room in her fresh frock and her blue ribbons, walking
on air, knowing no shadow of any obstacle before her or cloud upon the
joyful triumphant sky. She did not even hear the sound of the subdued
voices, her faint little sob, strangest of all sounds at such a moment,
which seemed to come out to meet her as she opened the door. Bee opened
it wondering only if Aubrey were there, thinking of some jibe to address
to him about the length of time men took to their toilettes, if she
happened to be ready first.
She was very much startled by what she saw. Her mother, still in her
travelling dress, sat by the table with a letter open in her hands. She
had not made any preparation for dinner--she, usually so dainty, so
anxious to get rid of the cloaks and of the soils of the journey. She
had taken off her hat, which lay on the table, but was still enveloped
in the shawl which she had put on to keep off the evening chills. As for
Aubrey, he was exactly as he had been when they parted with him, except
that all the light had gone out of his face. He was very pale, and he,
too, had a letter in his hand. He uttered a stifled exclamation when he
saw Bee at the door, and, lifting his arms as though in protest against
something intolerable, walked away to the other end of the room.
“Oh, Bee,” said Mrs. Kingsward, “Oh, go away, my dear, go away! I
mean--get something to eat, you and Charlie, and Betty, and then get to
bed. Get to bed! I am too tired to take anything, and I am going
upstairs at once.”
“I thought you had been upstairs, mamma, half-an-hour ago. What is the
matter? You look like a ghost, and so does Aubrey. Has anything
happened? Mamma, you won’t look at me, and Aubrey turns his back. What
have I done? Is it anything about me?”
“What nonsense, child!” said Mrs. Kingsward, with a pretence at a smile.
“What could you have to do with it? We have both--Mr. Leigh and
myself--found letters, and we are busy reading them. I am sure the
dinner must be served. We ordered it in the balcony, don’t you remember?
Run away and make Charlie and Betty sit down at once. I am too tired.
Moulsey will run down in a little and get something for me.”
“Mamma,” said Bee, “you cannot make up a story. Something has happened,
I am sure of it; and it is something about me.”
“Nonsense, child! Go away and have your dinner. I would come if I could.
Don’t you see what a budget of letters I have got? And some of them I
must answer to-night.”
“Have you letters, too, Aubrey?” said Bee, in her amazement, standing
still as she had paused, arrested by the sight of them, just within the
door.
“Bee, I must beg you will not put any questions; go and do what I tell
you; your brother and sister will be coming downstairs. Yes, of course,
you can see that Mr. Leigh has his letters to read as well as I.”
“Mr. Leigh! I wonder if we have all gone mad, or what is the matter?
Aubrey! tell me--you, at least, if mamma won’t. You must have had a
quarrel. Mamma, why do you call him Mr. Leigh?”
“Oh, for goodness sake, Bee, go away.”
“I am not going away,” cried the girl. “You have had a quarrel about
something. Come, mamma, you must not quarrel with Aubrey--if he has done
something wrong or said something silly, I will answer for him, he never
intended it. Aubrey, what do you mean, sir, turning your back both on
mamma and me? Come here, quick, and ask her pardon, and say you will
never do it again.”
Poor little Bee’s heart was fluttering, but she would not allow herself
to believe there was anything really wrong. She went close up to her
mother and stood by her, with a hand upon her shoulder. “Aubrey!” she
said, “never mind if you are wrong or not, come and beg mamma’s pardon,
and she will forgive you. There must not--there must not--oh, it is too
ridiculous!--be anything wrong between mamma and you. Aubrey!”
He turned round slowly and faced them both with a face so pale that Bee
stopped short with a gasp, and could not say a word more. Mrs. Kingsward
had buried her face in her hands. Bee looked from one to the other with
a dismay which she could not explain to herself. “Oh, what is the
matter? What is the matter?” she said.