SHREDS AND PATCHES.
Lord Welter was now Lord Ascot. I was thinking at one time that I would
continue to call him by his old title, as being the one most familiar to
you. But, on second thoughts, I prefer to call him by his real name, as
I see plainly that to follow the other course would produce still worse
confusion. I only ask that you will bear his change of title in mind.
The new Lady Ascot I shall continue to call Adelaide, choosing rather to
incur the charge of undue familiarity with people so far above me in
social position, than to be answerable for the inevitable confusion
which would be caused by my speaking, so often as I shall have to speak,
of two Ladies Ascot, with such a vast difference between them of age and
character.
Colonel Whisker, a tenant of Lord Ascot's, had kindly placed his house
at the disposal of his lordship for his father's funeral. Never was
there a more opportune act of civility, for Ranford was dismantled; and
the doors of Casterton were as firmly closed to Adelaide as the gates of
the great mosque at Ispahan to a Christian.
Two or three days after Lord Ascot's death, it was arranged that he
should be buried at Ranford. That night the new Lord Ascot came to his
wife's dressing-room, as usual, to plot and conspire.
"Ascot," said she, "they are all asked to Casterton for the funeral. Do
you think she will ask me?"
"Oh dear no," said Lord Ascot.
"Why not?" said Adelaide. "She ought to. She is civil enough to me."
"I tell you I know she won't. He and I were speaking about it to-day."
He was looking over her shoulder into the glass, and saw her bite her
lip.
"Ah," said she. "And what did he say?"
"Oh, he came up in his infernal, cold, insolent way, and said that he
should be delighted to see me at Casterton during the funeral, but Lady
Hainault feared that she could hardly find rooms for Lady Ascot and her
maid."
"Did you knock him down? Did you kick him? Did you take him by the
throat and knock his hateful head against the wall?" said Adelaide, as
quietly as if she was saying "How d'ye do?"
"No, my dear, I didn't," said Lord Ascot. "Partly, you see, because I
did not know how Lord Saltire would take it. And remember, Adelaide, I
always told you that it would take years, years, before people of that
sort would receive you."
"What did you say to him?"
"Well, as much as you could expect me to say. I sneered as insolently,
but much more coarsely, than he could possibly sneer; and I said that I
declined staying at any house where my wife was not received. And so we
bowed and parted."
Adelaide turned round and said, "That was kind and manly of you, Welter.
I thank you for that, Welter."
And so they went down to Colonel Whisker's cottage for the funeral. The
colonel probably knew quite how the land lay, for he was a man of the
world, and so he had done a very good-natured action just at the right
time. She and Lord Ascot lived for a fortnight there, in the most
charming style; and Adelaide used to make him laugh, by describing what
it was possible the other party were doing up at the solemn old
Casterton. She used to put her nose in the air and imitate young Lady
Hainault to perfection. At another time she would imitate old Lady
Hainault and her disagreeable sayings equally well. She was very amusing
that fortnight, though never affectionate. She knew that was useless;
but she tried to keep Lord Ascot in good humour with her. She had a
reason. She wanted to get his ear. She wanted him to confide entirely to
her the exact state of affairs between Lord Saltire and himself. Here
was Lord Ascot dead, Charles Ravenshoe probably at Alyden in the middle
of the cholera, and Lord Saltire's vast fortune, so to speak, going
a-begging. If he were to be clumsy now--now that the link formed by his
father, Lord Ascot, between him and Lord Saltire was taken away--they
were ruined indeed. And he was so terribly outspoken!
And so she strained her wits, till her face grew sharp and thin, to keep
him in good humour. She had a hard task at times; for there was
something lying up in the deserted house at Ranford which made Lord
Ascot gloomy and savage now and then, when he thought of it. I believe
that the man, coarse and brutal as he was, loved his father, in his own
way, very deeply.
A night or so after the funeral, there was a dressing-room conference
between the two; and, as the conversation which ensued was very
important, I must transcribe it carefully.
When he came up to her, she was sitting with her hands folded on her
lap, looking so perfectly beautiful that Lord Ascot, astonished and
anxious as he was at that moment, remarked it, and felt pleased at, and
proud of, her beauty. A greater fool than she might probably have met
him with a look of love. She did not. She only raised her great eyes to
his, with a look of intelligent curiosity.
He drew a chair up close to her, and said--
"I am going to make your hair stand bolt up on end, Adelaide, in spite
of your bandoline."
"I don't think so," said she; but she looked startled, nevertheless.
"I am. What do you think of this?"
"This? I think that is the _Times_ newspaper. Is there anything in it?"
"Read," said he, and pointed to the list of deaths. She read.
"Drowned, while bathing in Ravenshoe Bay, Cuthbert Ravenshoe, Esq., of
Ravenshoe Hall. In the faith that his forefathers bled and died
for.--R.I.P."
"Poor fellow!" she said, quietly. "So _he's_ gone, and brother William,
the groom, reigns in his stead. That is a piece of nonsense of the
priests about their dying for the faith. I never heard that any of them
did that. Also, isn't there something wrong about the grammar?"
"I can't say," said Lord Ascot. "I was at Eton, and hadn't the advantage
that you had of learning English grammar. Did you ever play the game of
trying to read the _Times_ right across, from one column to another, and
see what funny nonsense it makes?"
"No. I should think it was good fun."
"Do it now."
She did. Exactly opposite the announcement of Cuthbert's death was the
advertisement we have seen before--Lord Saltire's advertisement for the
missing register.
She was attentive and eager enough now. After a time, she said, "Oho!"
Lord Ascot said, "Hey! what do you think of that, Lady Ascot?"
"I am all abroad."
"I'll see if I can fetch you home again. Petre Ravenshoe, in 1778,
married a milkmaid. She remembered the duties of her position so far as
to conveniently die before any of the family knew what a fool he had
made of himself; but so far forgot them as to give birth to a boy, who
lived to be one of the best shots, and one of the jolliest old cocks I
ever saw--Old James, the Ravenshoe keeper. Now, my dearly beloved
grandmother Ascot is, at this present speaking, no less than eighty-six
years old, and so, at the time of the occurrence, was a remarkably
shrewd girl of ten. It appears that Petre Ravenshoe, sneaking away here
and there with his pretty Protestant wife, out of the way of the
priests, and finding life unendurable, not having had a single chance to
confess his sins for two long years, came to the good-natured Sir Cingle
Headstall, grandmamma's papa, and opened his griefs, trying to persuade
him to break the matter to that fox-hunting old Turk of a father of his,
Howard. Sir Cingle was too cowardly to face the old man for a time; and
before the pair of them could summon courage to speak, the poor young
thing died at Manger Hall, where they had been staying with the
Headstalls some months. This solved the difficulty, and nothing was said
about the matter. Petre went home. They had heard reports about his
living with a woman and having had a baby born. They asked very few
questions about the child or his mother, and of course it was all
forgotten conveniently, long before his marriage with my grandaunt, Lady
Alicia Staunton, came on the tapis, which took place in 1782, when
grandma was fourteen years of age. Now grandma had, as a girl of ten,
heard this marriage of Petre Ravenshoe with Maria Dawson discussed in
her presence, from every point of view, by her father and Petre. Night
and morning, at bed-time, at meal-times, sober, and very frequently
drunk. She had heard every possible particular. When she heard of his
second marriage (my mouth is as dry as dust with this talking; ring the
bell, and send your maid down for some claret and water)--when she heard
of his second marriage, she never dreamt of saying anything, of
course--a chit of fourteen, with a great liability to having her ears
boxed. So she held her tongue. When, afterwards, my grandfather made
love to her, she held it the tighter, for my grandaunt's sake, of whom
she was fond. Petre, after a time, had the boy James home to Ravenshoe,
and kept him about his own person. He made him his gamekeeper, treated
him with marked favour, and so on; but the whole thing was a sort of
misprision of felony, and poor silly old grandma was a party to it."
"You are telling this very well, Ascot," said Adelaide. "I will, as a
reward, go so far out of my usual habits as to mix you some claret and
water. I am not going to be tender, you know; but I'll do so much. Now
that's a dear, good fellow; go on."
"Now comes something unimportant, but inexplicable. Old Lady Hainault
knew it, and held _her_ tongue. How or why is a mystery we cannot
fathom, and don't want to. Grandma says that she would have married
Petre herself, and that her hatred for grandma came from the belief that
grandma could have stopped the marriage with my grandaunt by speaking.
After it was over, she thinks that Lady Hainault had sufficient love
left for Petre to hold her tongue. But this is nothing to the purpose.
This James, the real heir of Ravenshoe, married an English girl, a
daughter of a steward on one of our Irish estates, who had been born in
Ireland, and was called Nora. She was, you see, Irish enough at heart;
for she committed the bull of changing her own child, poor dear Charles,
the real heir, for his youngest cousin, William, by way of bettering his
position, and then confessed the whole matter to the priest. Now this
new discovery would blow the honest priest's boat out of the water;
but----"
"Yes!"
"Why, grandma can't, for the life of her, remember where they were
married. She is certain that it was in the north of Hampshire, she says.
Why or wherefore, she can't say. She says they resided the necessary
time, and were married by license. She says she is sure of it, because
she heard him, more than once, say to her father that he had been so
careful of poor Maria's honour, that he sent her from Ravenshoe to the
house of the clergyman who married them, who was a friend of his;
farther than this she knows nothing."
"Hence the advertisement, then. But why was it not inserted before?"
"Why, it appears that, when the whole _esclandre_ took place, and when
you, my Lady Ascot, jilted the poor fellow for a man who is not worth
his little finger, she communicated with Lord Saltire at once, and the
result was, that she began advertising in so mysterious a manner that
the advertisement was wholly unintelligible. It appears that she and
Lord Saltire agreed not to disturb Cuthbert till they were perfectly
sure of everything. But, now he is dead, Lord Saltire has insisted on
instantly advertising in a sensible way. So you see his advertisement
appears actually in the same paper which contains Cuthbert's death, the
news of which William got the night before last by telegraph."
"William, eh? How does he like the cup being dashed from his lips like
this?"
Lord Ascot laughed. "That ex-groom is a born fool, Lady Ascot. He loves
his foster-brother better than nine thousand a year, Lady Ascot. He is
going to start to Varna, and hunt him through the army and bring him
back."
"It is incredible," said Adelaide.
"I don't know. I might have been such a fool myself once, who knows?"
"Who knows indeed," thought Adelaide, "who knows now?" "So," she said
aloud, "Charles is heir of Ravenshoe after all."
"Yes. You were foolish to jilt him."
"I was. Is Alyden healthy?"
"You know it is not. Our fellows are dying like dogs."
"Do they know what regiment he is in?"
"They think, from Lady Hainault's and Mary Corby's description, that it
is the 140th."
"Why did not William start on this expedition before?"
"I don't know. A new impulse. They have written to all sorts of
commanding officers, but he won't turn up till he chooses, if I know him
right."
"If William brings him back?"
"Why, then he'll come into nine, or more probably twelve thousand a
year. For those tin lodes have turned up trumps."
"And the whole of Lord Saltire's property?"
"I suppose so."
"And we remain beggars?"
"I suppose so," said Lord Ascot. "It is time to go to bed, Lady Ascot."
This is exactly the proper place to give the results of William's
expedition to Varna. He arrived there just after the army had gone
forward. Some men were left behind invalided, among whom were two or
three of the 140th. One of these William selected as being a likely man
from whom to make inquiries.
He was a young man, and, likely enough, a kind-hearted one; but when he
found himself inquired of by a handsome, well-dressed young gentleman,
obviously in search of a missing relative, a lying spirit entered into
him, and he lied horribly. It appeared that he had been the intimate and
cherished comrade of Charles Horton (of whom he had never heard in his
life). That they had ridden together, drunk together, and slept side by
side. That he had nursed him through the cholera, and then (seeing no
other way out of the maze of falsehood in which he had entangled
himself), that he assisted to bury him with his own hands. Lastly, lying
on through mere recklessness, into desperation, and so into a kind of
sublimity, he led William out of the town, and pointed out to him
Charles's untimely grave. When he saw William pick some dry grass from
the grave, when he saw him down on his knees, with his cheek on the
earth, then he was sorry for what he had done. And, when he was alone,
and saw William's shadow pass across the blazing white wall, for one
instant, before he went under the dark gateway of the town, then the
chinking gold pieces fell from his hand on the burning sandy ground, and
he felt that he would have given them, and ten times more, to have
spoken the truth.
So Charles was dead and buried, was he? Not quite yet, if you please.
Who is this riding, one of a gallant train, along the shores of the bay
of Eupatoria towards some dim blue mountains? Who is this that keeps
looking each minute to the right, at the noble fleet which is keeping
pace with the great scarlet and blue rainbow which men call the allied
armies? At the great cloud of smoke floating angrily seaward, and the
calm waters of the bay beaten into madness by three hundred throbbing
propellers?