"As he rode down the sanctified bends of the Bow,
Each carline was flyting and shaking her pow;
But the young Plants of Grace they looked couthie and slee,
Saying, 'Luck to thy bonnet, thou bonnie Dundee.'"
In the autumn of that year my chest became so troublesome that I was
obliged to try Italy. Thither I went; and, about the same time, Guy was
gazetted to the ---- Life Guards. The struggle between climate and
constitution was protracted, and for a long time doubtful; but winters
without fog, and springs without cold winds, worked wonders, and at last
carried the day. In the fourth year they told me I might risk England
again. Moving homeward slowly, I reached London about the beginning of
December--a most unfavorable season, it is true; but I was weary of
foreign wandering, and wanted to spend Christmas somewhere in the
fatherland, though where I had not yet determined.
I had heard tolerably often from Livingstone during my absence. His
letters were very amusing, containing all sorts of news, and remarks on
men and manners. They would have pleased me more if they had not
indicated a vein of sarcasm deepening into cynicism.
I stand very much alone in this world, and had few family visits to
detain me; so, on the morning after my arrival, I went down to the
Knightsbridge barracks, where Guy's regiment happened to be quartered.
It was a field-day, his servant said, and his master was out with his
troop; but he expected him in very shortly. Captain Forrester was
waiting breakfast for him up stairs.
As I entered the room, its occupant turned his head languidly on the
sofa-cushion which supported it; but when he saw it was a stranger, sat
up, and, on hearing my name, actually rose and came toward me.
"Livingstone will be charmed to find you here, Mr. Hammond," he said, in
a voice that, though slightly affected and _traînante_, was very
musical. "I don't know if he ever mentioned Charley Forrester to you,
who must do the honors of the barrack-room in his absence?"
I had heard of him very often; and, though my expectations as to his
personal appearance had been raised, I own the first glance did not
disappoint them. He was about three-and-twenty then, rather tall, but
very slightly built; his eyes long, sleepy, of a violet blue; features
small and delicately cut, with a complexion so soft and bright that his
silky, chestnut mustache hardly saved the face from effeminacy; his
hands and feet would have satisfied the Pacha of Tebelen at once as to
his purity of race; indeed, though Charley was not disposed to
undervalue any of his own bodily advantages, I imagine he considered his
extremities as his strong point. His manner was very fascinating, and,
with women, had a sort of caress in it which is hard to describe, though
even with _them_ he seldom excited himself much, preferring,
consistently, the passive to the active part in the conversation.
Indeed, his golden rule was the Arabic maxim, _Agitel lil
Shaitan_--Hurry is the Devil's--so, in the flirtations which were the
serious business of his life, he always let his fish hook themselves,
just exerting himself enough to play them afterward.
In ten minutes we were very good friends, talking pleasantly of all
sorts of things, though Forrester had resumed his recumbent posture, and
I could not help fearing it was only a strong effort of politeness or
sense of duty which enabled him always to answer at the right time.
Before long we heard the clatter of horses' hoofs and the rattle of
steel scabbards, and I looked out at the squadrons defiling into the
barrack-yard. My eye fell upon Livingstone at once: it was not difficult
to distinguish him, for few, if any, among those troopers, picked from
the flower of all the counties north of the Humber, could compare with
him for length of limb and breadth of shoulder. I felt proud of him, as
the hero of my boyhood, looking at him there, on his great black
charger, square and steadfast as the keep of a castle.
His servant spoke to him as he dismounted. I saw his features soften and
brighten in an instant; in five seconds he was in the room, and the
light was on his face still--I like to think of it--the light of a
frank, cordial welcome, as he griped my hand.
He was changed, certainly, but for the better. The features, which in
early youth had been too rugged and strongly marked, harmonized
perfectly with the vast proportions of a frame now fully developed,
though still lean in the flanks as a wolf-hound. The stern expression
about his mouth was more decided and unvarying than ever--an effect
which was increased by the heavy mustache that, dense as a Cuirassier's
of the Old Guard, fell over his lip in a black cascade. It was the face
of one of those stone Crusaders who look up at us from their couches in
the Round Church of the Temple.
Before our first sentences were concluded, Forrester had nerved himself
to the effort of rising, and turned to go.
"You must have fifty things to say to each other," he said. "You'll find
me in the mess-room. But, Guy, don't be long; I've no appetite myself
this morning, and it will refresh me to see you eat your breakfast;" and
so faded away gradually through the door.
"How do you like him?" Livingstone called out from the inner room, where
he was donning the "mufti." "He's not so conceited as he might be,
considering how the women spoil him; and, lazy as he looks, he is a very
fair officer, and goes across country like a bird. Did I ever tell you
what first made him famous?"
"No; I should like to hear."
"Well, it was at a picnic at Cliefden. Charley was hardly nineteen then,
and had just joined the ----th Lancers at Hounslow; he wandered away,
and got lost with Kate Harcourt, a self-possessed beauty in high
condition for flirting, for she had had three seasons of hard training.
When they had been away from their party about two hours, she felt, or
pretended to feel, the awkwardness of the situation, and asked her
cavalier, in a charmingly helpless and confiding way, what they were to
do. 'Well, I hardly know,' Forrester answered, languidly; 'but I don't
mind proposing to you, if that will do you any good.' A fair performance
for an untried colt, was it not? Miss Harcourt thought so, and said so,
and Charley woke next morning with an established renown. Shall we go
and find him?"
After breakfast we went with Guy to his room, to do the regulation
cigar.
"I know you've made no plans, Frank," Livingstone said, "so I have
settled every thing for you already. You are coming down to Kerton with
us. We have just got our long leave, and our horses went down three days
ago."
"It's very nice of him to say 'our horses,'" interrupted Forrester.
"Mine consist of one young one, that has been over about eight fences in
his life, and a mare, that I call the Wandering Jewess, for I don't
think she will ever die, and I am sure she will never rest till she
does: what with being park-hack in the summer and cover-hack in the
winter, with a by-day now and then when the country's light, she's the
best instance of perpetual motion I know. Well, it's not my fault the
chief won't let us hunt our second chargers--that's the charm of being
in a crack regiment--I always have one lame at least, and no one will
sell me hunters on tick."
"Don't be so plaintive, Charley; you've nearly all mine to ride: it's a
treat to them, poor things, to feel your light weight and hand, after
carrying my enormous carcass. That's settled, then, Frank; you come with
us?" Guy said.
"I shall be very glad. I only want a day to get my traps together." So
two days afterward we three came down to Kerton Manor. It was not my
first visit to Livingstone's home, but I have not described it before.
Fancy a very large, low house, built in two quadrangles--the offices and
stables forming the smaller one farthermost from the main entrance--of
the light gray stone common in Northamptonshire, darkened at the angles
and buttresses into purple, and green, and bistre by the storms of three
hundred years; on the south side, smooth turf, with islands in it of
bright flower-beds, sloped down to a broad, slow stream, where grave,
stately swans were always sailing to and fro, and moor-hens diving among
the rushes; on the other sides, a park, extensive, but somewhat
rough-looking, stretched away, and, all round, lines of tall avenue
radiated--the bones of a dead giant's skeleton--for Kerton once stood in
the centre of a royal forest.
You entered into a wide, low hall, the oak ceiling resting on broad
square pillars of the same dark wood; all round hung countless memorials
of chase and war, for the Livingstones had been hunters and soldiers
beyond the memory of man.
Often, passing through of a winter's evening, I have stopped to watch
the fitful effects of the great logs burning on the andirons, as their
light died away, deadened among brown bear-skins and shadowy antlers, or
played, redly reflected, on the mail-shirt and corslet of Crusader or
Cavalier.
There were many portraits too; one, the most remarkable, fronted you as
you came through the great doorway, the likeness of a very handsome man
in the uniform of a Light Dragoon; under this hung a cavalry sword, and
a brass helmet shaded with black horse-hair. The portrait and sword were
those of Guy's father; the helmet belonged to the Cuirassier who slew
him.
It was in a skirmish with part of Kellermann's brigade, near the end of
the Peninsular war; Colonel Livingstone was engaged with an adversary in
his front, when a trooper, delivering point from behind, ran him through
the body. He had got his death-wound, and knew it; but he came of a race
that ever died hard and dangerously; he only ground his teeth, and,
turning short in his saddle, cut the last assailant down. Look at the
helmet, with the clean, even gap in it, cloven down to the
cheek-strap--the stout old Laird of Colonsay struck no fairer blow.
It was curious to mark how the same expression of sternness and decision
about the lips and lower part of the face, which was so remarkable in
their descendants, ran through the long row of ancestral portraits. You
saw it--now, beneath the half-raised visor of Sir Malise, surnamed
_Poing-de-fer_, who went up the breach at Ascalon shoulder to shoulder
with strong King Richard--now, yet more grimly shadowed forth, under the
cowl of Prior Bernard, the ambitious ascetic, whom, they say, the great
Earl of Warwick trusted as his own right hand--now, softened a little,
but still distinctly visible, under the long love-locks of Prince
Rupert's aid-de-camp, who died at Naseby manfully in his harness--now,
contrasting strangely with the elaborately powdered peruke and delicate
lace ruffles of Beau Livingstone, the gallant, with the whitest hand,
the softest voice, the neatest knack at a sonnet, and the deadliest
rapier at the court of good Queen Anne. Nay, you could trace it in the
features of many a fair Edith and Alice, half counteracting the magnetic
attraction of their melting eyes.
On the sunny south side, looking across the flower-garden, were Lady
Catharine Livingstone's rooms, where, diligent as Matilda and her
maidens, in summer by the window, in winter by the fire; the pale
châtelaine sat over her embroidery. What rivers of tapestry must have
flowed from under those slender white fingers during their ceaseless
toil of twenty years!
The good that she did in her neighborhood can not be told. She was kind
and hospitable, too, to her female guests, in her own haughty,
undemonstrative way; nevertheless, the wives and daughters of the
squirearchy regarded her with great awe and fear. Perhaps she felt this,
though she could not alter it, and the sense of isolation may have
deepened the shades on her sad face. She had only one thing on earth to
centre her affections on, and that one she worshiped with a love
stronger than her sense of duty; for, since his father died, she had
never been able to check Guy in a single whim.
When he had a hunting-party in the house, she sometimes would not appear
for days; but, however early he might start for the meet, I do not think
he ever left his dressing-room without his mother's kiss on his cheek.
She knew, as well as any one, how recklessly her son rode; nothing but
his science, coolness, and great strength in the saddle could often have
saved him from some terrible accident. Many times, in the middle of the
day's sport, the thought has come across me piteously of that poor lady,
in her lonely rooms, trembling, and I am very sure praying, for her
darling.
On the opposite side of the court were Guy's own apartments: first, what
was called by courtesy his study--an armory of guns and other weapons, a
chaos _e rebus omnibus et quibusdam aliis_, for he never had the
faintest conception of the beauty of order; then came the smoking-room,
with its great divans and scattered card-tables; then Livingstone's
bed-room and dressing-room.
Did the distance and the doors always deaden the sounds of late revels,
so as not to break Lady Catharine's slumbers? I fear not.