A DISCOVERY.
“A note for Monsieur,” said the waiter, awaking me at the same time
from the soundest sleep and most delightful dream. The billet was
thus:—
“If your excellency does not intend to slumber during the next
twenty-four hours, it might be as well to remember that we are waiting
breakfast. Ever yours,
“Kilkee.”
“It is true, then,” said I—following up the delusion of my dream. “It
is true, I am really domesticated once more with the Callonbys. My suit
is prospering, and at length the long-sought, long-hoped for moment is
come—”
“Well, Harry,” said Kilkee, as he dashed open the door. “Well, Harry,
how are you, better than last night, I hope?”
“Oh yes, considerably. In fact, I can’t think what could have been the
matter with me; but I felt confoundedly uncomfortable.”
“You did! Why, man, what can you mean; was it not a joke?”
“A joke,” said I, with a start.
“Yes, to be sure. I thought it was only the sequel of the other
humbug.”
“The sequel of the other humbug!” Gracious mercy! thought I, getting
pale with horror, is it thus he ventures to designate my attachment to
his sister?
“Come, come, it’s all over now. What the devil could have persuaded you
to push the thing so far?”
“Really, I am so completely in the dark as to your meaning that I only
get deeper in mystery by my chance replies. What do you mean?”
“What do I mean! Why, the affair of last night of course. All Munich is
full of it, and most fortunately for you, the king has taken it all in
the most good-humoured way, and laughs more than any one else about
it.”
Oh, then, thought I, I must have done or said something last night
during my illness, that I can’t remember now. “Come, Kilkee, out with
it. What happened last night, that has served to amuse the good people
of Munich? for as I am a true man, I forget all you are alluding to.”
“And don’t remember the Greek Loan—eh?”
“The Greek Loan!”
“And your Excellency’s marked reception by his Majesty? By Jove though,
it was the rarest piece of impudence I ever heard of; hoaxing a crowned
head, quizzing one of the Lord’s anointed is un peu trop fort.”
“If you really do not wish to render me insane at once, for the love of
mercy say, in plain terms, what all this means.”
“Come, come, I see you are incorrigible; but as breakfast is waiting
all this time, we shall have your explanations below stairs.”
Before I had time for another question Kilkee passed his arm within
mine, and led me along the corridor, pouring out, the entire time a
whole rhapsody about the practical joke of my late illness, which he
was pleased to say would ring from one end of Europe to the other.
Lord Callonby was alone in the breakfast-room when we entered, and the
moment he perceived me called out,
“Eh, Lorrequer, you here still? Why, man, I thought you’d have been
over the frontier early this morning?”
“Indeed, my lord, I am not exactly aware of any urgent reason for so
rapid a flight.”
“You are not! The devil, you are not. Why, you must surely have known
his majesty to be the best tempered man in his dominions then, or you
would never have played off such a ruse, though I must say, there never
was anything better done. Old Heldersteen, the minister for foreign
affairs, is nearly deranged this morning about it—it seems that he was
the first that fell into the trap; but seriously speaking, I think it
would be better if you got away from this; the king, it is true, has
behaved with the best possible good feeling; but—”
“My lord, I have a favour to ask, perhaps, indeed in all likelihood the
last I shall ever ask of your lordship, it is this—what are you
alluding to all this while, and for what especial reason do you suggest
my immediate departure from Munich?”
“Bless my heart and soul—you surely cannot mean to carry the thing on
any further—you never can intend to assume your ministerial functions
by daylight?”
“My what!—my ministerial functions.”
“Oh no, that were too much—even though his majesty did say—that you
were the most agreeable diplomate he had met for a long time.”
“I, a diplomate.”
“You, certainly. Surely you cannot be acting now; why, gracious mercy,
Lorrequer! can it be possible that you were not doing it by design, do
you really not know in what character you appeared last night?”
“If in any other than that of Harry Lorrequer, my lord, I pledge my
honour, I am ignorant.”
“Nor the uniform you wore, don’t you know what it meant?”
“The tailor sent it to my room.”
“Why, man, by Jove, this will kill me,” said Lord Callonby, bursting
into a fit of laughter, in which Kilkee, a hitherto silent spectator of
our colloquy, joined to such an extent, that I thought he should burst
a bloodvessel. “Why man, you went as the Charge d’Affaires.”
“I, the Charge d’Affaires!”
“That you did, and a most successful debut you made of it.”
While shame and confusion covered me from head to foot at the absurd
and ludicrous blunder I had been guilty of, the sense of the ridiculous
was so strong in me, that I fell upon a sofa and laughed on with the
others for full ten minutes.
“Your Excellency is, I am rejoiced to find, in good spirits,” said Lady
Callonby, entering and presenting her hand.
“He is so glad to have finished the Greek Loan,” said Lady Catherine,
smiling with a half malicious twinkle of the eye. Just at this instant
another door opened, and Lady Jane appeared. Luckily for me, the
increased mirth of the party, as Lord Callonby informed them of my
blunder, prevented their paying any attention to me, for as I half
sprung forward toward her, my agitation would have revealed to any
observer, the whole state of my feelings. I took her hand which she
extended to me, without speaking, and bowing deeply over it, raised my
head and looked into her eyes, as if to read at one glance, my fate,
and when I let fall her hand, I would not have exchanged my fortune for
a kingdom.
“You have heard, Jane, how our friend opened his campaign in Munich
last night.”
“Oh, I hope, Mr. Lorrequer, they are only quizzing. You surely could
not—”
“Could not. What he could not—what he would not do, is beyond my
calculation to make out,” said Kilkee, laughing, “anything in life,
from breaking an axletree to hoaxing a king;” I turned, as may be
imagined, a deaf ear to this allusion, which really frightened me, not
knowing how far Kilkee’s information might lead, nor how he might feel
disposed to use it. Lady Jane turned a half reproachful glance at me,
as if rebuking my folly; but in the interest she thus took in me, I
should not have bartered it for the smile of the proudest queen in
Christendom.
Breakfast over, Lord Callonby undertook to explain to the Court the
blunder, by which I had unwittingly been betrayed into personating the
newly arrived minister, and as the mistake was more of their causing
than my own, my excuses were accepted, and when his lordship returned
to the hotel, he brought with him an invitation for me to dine at Court
in my own unaccredited character. By this time I had been carrying on
the siege as briskly as circumstances permitted; Lady Callonby being
deeply interested in her newly arrived purchases, and Lady Catherine
being good-natured enough to pretend to be so also, left me, at
intervals, many opportunities of speaking to Lady Jane.
As I feared that such occasions would not often present themselves, I
determined on making the best use of my time, and at once led the
conversation towards the goal I aimed at, by asking, “if Lady Jane had
completely forgotten the wild cliffs and rocky coast of Clare, amid the
tall mountains and glaciered peaks of the Tyrol?”
“Far from it,” she replied. “I have a most clear remembrance of bold
Mogher and the rolling swell of the blue Atlantic, and long to feel its
spray once more upon my cheek; but then, I knew it in childhood—your
acquaintance with it was of a later date, and connected with fewer
happy associations.”
“Fewer happy associations—how can you say so? Was it not there the
brightest hours of my whole life were passed, was it not there I first
met—”
“Kilkee tells me,” said Lady Jane, interrupting me shortly, “that Miss
Bingham is extremely pretty.”
This was turning my flank with a vengeance; so I muttered something
about differences of tastes, &c. and continued, “I understand my worthy
cousin Guy, had the good fortune to make your acquaintance in Paris.”
It was now her turn to blush, which she did deeply, and said nothing.
“He is expected, I believe, in a few days at Munich,” said I, fixing my
eyes upon her, and endeavouring to read her thoughts; she blushed more
deeply, and the blood at my own heart ran cold, as I thought over all I
had heard, and I muttered to myself “she loves him.”
“Mr. Lorrequer, the carriage is waiting, and as we are going to the
Gallery this morning, and have much to see, pray let us have your
escort.”
“Oh, I am sure,” said Catherine, “his assistance will be
considerable—particularly if his knowledge of art only equals his tact
in botany. Don’t you think so, Jane?”—But Jane was gone.
They left the room to dress, and I was alone—alone with my anxious, now
half despairing thoughts, crowding and rushing upon my beating brain.
She loves him, and I have only come to witness her becoming the wife of
another. I see it all, too plainly;—my Uncle’s arrival—Lord Callonby’s
familiar manner—Jane’s own confession. All—all convince me, that my
fate is decided. Now, then, for one last brief explanation, and I leave
Munich, never to see her more. Just as I had so spoken, she entered.
Her gloves had been forgotten in the room, and she came in not knowing
that I was there. What would I not have given at that moment, for the
ready witted assurance, the easy self-possession, with which I should
have made my advances had my heart not been as deeply engaged as I now
felt it. Alas! My courage was gone; there was too much at stake, and I
preferred, now, that the time was come, any suspense, any vacillation,
to the dreadful certainty of refusal.
These were my first thoughts, as she entered; how they were followed, I
cannot say. The same evident confusion of my brain, which I once felt
when mounting the breach in a storm-party, now completely beset me; and
as then, when death and destruction raged on every side, I held on my
way regardless of every obstacle, and forgetting all save the goal
before me; so did I now, in the intensity of my excitement, disregard
every thing, save the story of my love, which I poured forth with that
fervour which truth only can give. But she spoke not,—her averted
head,—her cold and tremulous hand, and half-drawn sigh were all that
replied to me, as I waited for that one word upon which hung all my
fortune. At length her hand, which I scarcely held within my own, was
gently withdrawn. She lifted it to her eyes, but still was silent.
“Enough,” said I, “I seek not to pain you more. The daring ambition
that prompted me to love you, has met its heaviest retribution.
Farewell,—You, Lady Jane, have nothing to reproach yourself with—You
never encouraged, you never deceived me. I, and I alone have been to
blame, and mine must be the suffering. Adieu, then once more, and now
for ever.”
She turned slowly round, and as the handkerchief fell from her
hand,—her features were pale as marble,—I saw that she was endeavouring
to speak, but could not; and at length, as the colour came slowly back
to her cheek, her lips moved, and just as I leaned forward, with a
beating heart to hear, her sister came running forward, and suddenly
checked herself in her career, as she said, laughingly,—
“Mille pardons, Jane, but his Excellency must take another occasion to
explain the quadruple alliance, for mamma has been waiting in the
carriage these ten minutes.”
I followed them to the door, placed them in the carriage, and was
turning again towards the house, when Lady Callonby said—
“Oh, Mr. Lorrequer, we count upon you—you must not desert us.”
I muttered something about not feeling well.
“And then, perhaps, the Greek loan is engaging your attention,” said
Catherine; “or, mayhap, some reciprocity treaty is not prospering.”
The malice of this last sally told, for Jane blushed deeply, and I felt
overwhelmed with confusion.
“But pray come—the drive will do you good.”
“Your ladyship will, I am certain, excuse”—
Just as I had got so far, I caught Lady Jane’s eye, for the first time
since we had left the drawing-room. What I read there, I could not, for
the life of me, say; but, instead of finishing my sentence, I got into
the carriage, and drove off, very much to the surprise of Lady
Callonby, who, never having studied magnetism, knew very little the
cause of my sudden recovery.
The thrill of hope that shot through my heart succeeding so rapidly the
dark gloom of my despairing thoughts, buoyed me up, and while I
whispered to myself, “all may not yet be lost,” I summoned my best
energies to my aid. Luckily for me, I was better qualified to act as
cicerone in a gallery than as a guide in a green-house; and with the
confidence that knowledge of a subject ever inspires, I rattled away
about art and artists, greatly to the edification of Lady Callonby—much
to the surprise of Lady Catherine—and, better than all, evidently to
the satisfaction of her, to win whose praise I would gladly have risked
my life.
“There,” said I, as I placed my fair friend before a delicious little
madonna of Carl Dolci—“there is, perhaps, the triumph of colouring—for
the downy softness of that cheek—the luscious depth of that blue
eye—the waving richness of those sunny locks, all is
perfect—fortunately so beautiful a head is not a monopoly, for he
painted many copies of this picture.”
“Quite true,” said a voice behind, “and mine at Elton is, I think, if
anything, better than this.”
I turned, and beheld my good old uncle, Sir Guy, who was standing
beside Lady Callonby. While I welcomed my worthy relative, I could not
help casting a glance around to see if Guy were also there, and not
perceiving him, my heart beat freely again.
My uncle, it appeared, had just arrived, and lost no time in joining us
at the gallery. His manner to me was cordial to a degree; and I
perceived that, immediately upon being introduced to Lady Jane, he took
considerable pains to observe her, and paid her the most marked
attention.
The first moment I could steal unnoticed, I took the opportunity of
asking if Guy were come. That one fact were to me all, and upon the
answer to my question, I hung with deep anxiety.
“Guy here!—no, not yet. The fact is, Harry, my boy, Guy has not got on
here as well as I could have wished. Everything had been arranged among
us—Callonby behaved most handsomely—and, as far as regarded myself, I
threw no impediment in the way. But still, I don’t know how it was, but
Guy did not advance, and the matter now”—
“Pray, how does it stand? Have you any hopes to put all to rights
again?”
“Yes, Harry, I think, with your assistance, much may be done.”
“Oh, count upon me by all means,” said I, with a sneering bitterness,
that my uncle could not have escaped remarking, had his attention not
been drawn off by Lady Callonby.
What have I done—what sin did I meditate before I was born, that I
should come into the world branded with failure in all I attempt? Is it
not enough that my cousin, my elder by some months, should be rich
while I am poor—honoured and titled, while I am unknown and
unnoticed?—but is he also to be preferred to me in every station in
life? Is there no feeling of the heart so sacred that it must not
succumb to primogeniture?
“What a dear old man Sir Guy is,” said Catherine, interrupting my sad
reflections, “and how gallant; he is absolutely flirting with Lady
Jane.”
And quite true it was. The old gentleman was paying his devoirs with a
studied anxiety to please, that went to my very heart as I witnessed
it. The remainder of that day to me was a painful and suffering one. My
intention of suddenly leaving Munich had been abandoned, why, I knew
not. I felt that I was hoping against hope, and that my stay was only
to confirm, by the most “damning proof,” how surely I was fated to
disappointment. My reasonings all ended in one point. If she really
love Guy, then my present attentions can only be a source of
unhappiness to her; if she do not, is there any prospect that from the
bare fact of my attachment, so proud a family as the Callonbys will
suffer their daughter to make a mere “marriage d’inclination?”
There was but one answer to this question, and I had at last the
courage to make it: and yet the Callonbys had marked me out for their
attentions, and had gone unusually out of their way to inflict injury
upon me, if all were meant to end in nothing. If I only could bring
myself to think that this was a systematic game adopted by them, to
lead to the subsequent arrangement with my cousin!—if I could but
satisfy my doubts on this head——What threats of vengeance I muttered, I
cannot remember, for I was summoned at that critical moment to attend
the party to the palace.
The state of excitement I was in, was an ill preparative for the rigid
etiquette of a court dinner. All passed off, however, happily, and the
king, by a most good-natured allusion to the blunder of the night
before, set me perfectly at ease on that head.
I was placed next to Lady Jane at dinner; and half from wounded pride,
half from the momentarily increasing conviction that all was lost,
chatted away gaily, without any evidence of a stronger feeling than the
mere vicinity of a pretty person is sure to inspire. What success this
game was attended with I know not; but the suffering it cost me, I
shall never cease to remember. One satisfaction I certainly did
experience—she was manifestly piqued, and several times turned towards
the person on the other side of her, to avoid the tone of indifference
in which I discussed matters that were actually wringing my own heart
at the moment. Yet such was the bitterness of my spirit, that I set
down this conduct on her part as coquetry; and quite convinced myself
that any slight encouragement she might ever have given my attentions,
was only meant to indulge a spirit of vanity, by adding another to the
list of her conquests.
As the feeling grew upon me, I suppose my manner to her became more
palpably cutting, for it ended at last in our discontinuing to speak,
and when we retired from the palace, I accompanied her to the carriage
in silence, and wished her a cold and distant good night, without any
advance to touch her hand at parting—and yet that parting, I had
destined for our last.
The greater part of that night I spent in writing letters. One was to
Jane herself owning my affection, confessing that even the “rudesse” of
my late conduct was the fruit of it, and finally assuring her that
failing to win from her any return of my passion, I had resolved never
to meet her more—I also wrote a short note to my uncle, thanking him
for all he had formerly done in my behalf, but coldly declining for the
future, any assistance upon his part, resolving that upon my own
efforts alone should I now rest my fortunes. To Lord Callonby I wrote
at greater length, recapitulating the history of our early intimacy,
and accusing him of encouraging me in expectations, which, as he never
intended to confirm them, were fated to prove my ruin. More—much more I
said, which to avow, I should gladly shrink from, were it not that I
have pledged myself to honesty in these “Confessions,” and as they
depict the bitterness and misery of my spirit, I must plead guilty to
them here. In a word, I felt myself injured. I saw no outlet for
redress, and the only consolation open to my wounded pride and crushed
affection, was to show, that if I felt myself a victim, at least I was
not a dupe. I set about packing up for the journey, whither, I knew
not. My leave was nearly expired, yet I could not bear the thought of
rejoining the regiment. My only desire was to leave Munich, and that
speedily. When all my arrangements were completed I went down
noiselessly to the inn yard to order post-horses by day-break, there to
my surprise I found all activity and bustle. Though so late at night, a
courier had arrived from England for Lord Callonby, with some important
dispatches from the Government; this would, at any other time, have
interested me deeply; now I heard the news without a particle of
feeling, and I made all the necessary dispositions for my journey,
without paying the slightest attention to what was going on about me. I
had just finished, when Lord Callonby’s valet came to say, that his
lordship wished to see me immediately in his dressing room. Though I
would gladly have declined any further interview, I saw no means of
escape, and followed the servant to his lordship’s room.
There I found Lord Callonby in his dressing gown and night cap,
surrounded by papers, letters, despatch boxes, and red tape-tied
parcels, that all bespoke business.
“Lorrequer, sit down, my boy, I have much to say to you, and as we have
no time to lose, you must forego a little sleep. Is the door closed? I
have just received most important news from England, and to begin,”
here his lordship opened a letter and read as follows:—
“My Lord—They are out at last—the majority on Friday increased to forty
yesterday evening, when they resigned; the Duke has, meanwhile, assumed
the reins till further arrangements can be perfected, and despatches
are now preparing to bring all our friends about us. The only rumours
as yet are, L——, for the Colonies, H——, to the Foreign Office, W——
President of the Council, and we anxiously hope yourself Viceroy to
Ireland. In any case lose no time in coming back to England. The
struggle will be a sharp one, as the outs are distracted, and we shall
want you much. Ever yours, my dear lord,
“Henry ——.”
“This is much sooner than I looked for, Lorrequer, perhaps almost than
I wished; but as it has taken place, we must not decline the battle;
now what I wanted with you is this—if I go to Ireland I should like
your acceptance of the Private Secretary’s Office. Come, come, no
objections; you know that you need not leave the army, you can become
unattached, I’ll arrange all that; apropos, this concerns you, it is
from the Horse Guards, you need not read it now though, it is merely
your gazette to the company; your promotion, however, shall not stop
there; however, the important thing I want with you is this, I wish you
to start for England to-morrow; circumstances prevent my going from
this for a few days. You can see L—— and W——, &c., and explain all I
have to say; I shall write a few letters, and some hints for your own
guidance; and as Kilkee never would have head for these matters, I look
to your friendship to do it for me.”
Looking only to the post, as the proposal suited my already made
resolve to quit Munich, I acceded at once, and assured Lord Callonby
that I should be ready in an hour.
“Quite right, Lorrequer, but still I shall not need this, you cannot
leave before eleven or twelve o’clock, in fact I have another service
to exact at your hands before we part with you; meanwhile, try and get
some sleep, you are not likely to know anything of a bed before you
reach the Clarendon.” So saying, he hurried me from the room, and as he
closed the door, I heard him muttering his satisfaction, that already
so far all had been well arranged.