'SO FAREWELL, HOPE!'
Nine months had passed since the entertainment of the foreign fleet at
Portsmouth--months that had been pregnant with events concerning the
three persons with whom this narrative deals; and Bella sat now, at
the end of a dull March afternoon, in the pretty drawing-room in West
Kensington. She sat there meditating deeply, since she happened to be
alone at the moment, owing to Mrs. Waldron having gone out to pay
several calls.
Of all who had been at those entertainments, of all in the party
which, in the preceding June, had gathered together at Portsmouth, the
three ladies of the family, Mrs. Waldron, Mrs. Pooley, and Bella, were
alone in England; the three men--the three sailors--were all gone to
different parts of the world. Captain Pooley had sailed with his
vessel to Australia; Stephen Charke had gone to China as first officer
of a large vessel; and Gilbert Bampfyld, who, in consequence of the
Rear-Admiral's retirement, no longer wore the aiguillettes of a
flag-lieutenant, had been appointed to the _Briseus_, on the East
Indian station.
And Bella, sitting now in her arm-chair in front of the drawing-room
fire, with a letter lying open on her lap before her, was thinking of
the writer of that letter, as well as of all that it contained. If one
glances at it as it lies there before her, much may be gleaned of what
has happened in those nine months; while perhaps, also, some idea,
some light, may be gained of that which is to come.
'My Darling,' it commenced (and possibly the writer, far away, may
have hoped that, as he wrote those words, they would be kissed as
often by the person to whom they were addressed as he fondly desired),
'My Darling--Your letter came to me to-day, and I must write back to
you at once--this very instant--not only because I want to put all my
thoughts on paper, but also because I can thus catch the P. and O.
mail. How good! how good you are! While, also, I do not forget how
good your mother is. I know I ought not--at least I suppose I ought
not--to ask you to do such a thing as come out to me, and I can assure
you I hesitated for weeks before daring to do so. Yet, when I
reflected that, if you could not bring yourself to come, as well as
induce your mother to give her consent to your coming, we could not
possibly be married for three years, I could not hesitate any longer.
And now--now--oh, Bella, my darling! I could dance for joy if my cabin
was big enough to allow of such a thing--you are coming! You will
come! How happy we shall be! I can think of nothing else--nothing. You
don't know how I feel, and it's useless for me to try to tell you....'
No more need be read of this letter, however, and, since the reader
will shortly be informed of what led to it, nothing more need be said
than that, after a good deal of explanation as to how the young lady
to whom it was addressed was to make her plans for reaching Bombay, it
was signed 'Gilbert Bampfyld.'
So that one sees now what had been the outcome of that week of delight
at Portsmouth during the last summer; one understands all that had
been the result of those garden-parties and that ball.
They--the festivities--were followed by a renewal of the
acquaintanceship between Mrs. Waldron and her daughter and Gilbert
Bampfyld, as, indeed, the latter had quite made up his mind should be
the case, and as--since the truth must always be spoken--Bella had
hoped would happen. They were followed, that is to say, directly the
naval man[oe]uvres were over, for which important function both
divisions of the Channel Squadron were of course utilised, while not a
week had elapsed from the time of the return of the ships to their
stations before Gilbert Bampfyld presented himself in Montmorency
Road. And that presentation of himself at this suburban retreat was,
it is surely unnecessary to say, succeeded by many other things, all
showing what was impending and what actually happened later on.
Gilbert Bampfyld told Bella that he loved her and wanted her for his
wife, and--well, one can imagine the rest. What was there to stand
between those loving hearts? What? Nothing to impede their engagement,
nothing that need have impeded their immediate marriage, except the
fact that Bella's maiden modesty could never have been brought to
consent to a union so hurriedly entered into as would have been
necessary, had she agreed to become Gilbert's wife ere he set out for
Bombay to join the _Briseus_, to which he was now appointed.
One regrets, however, when describing such soft and glowing incidents
as these, that space is so circumscribed (owing to the canvas having
to be filled with larger events now looming near) as to leave no room
for more minute description of this love idyl. It would have been
pleasant to have dwelt upon Bella's ecstatic joy at having been asked
to be the wife of the one man--the first man--whose love she had ever
desired (ah, that is it--to be the first man or the first girl who has
ever touched the heart of him or her we worship); only it must not
be--the reader's own imagination shall be asked to fill the missing
description. Let those, therefore, who remember the earliest whispered
word of love they ever spoke or had spoken to them; who recall still
the first kiss they ever gave or took; and those who can remember,
also, all the joy that came to them when first they loved and knew
themselves beloved, fill the hiatus. That will suffice.
'We shall be so happy, dearest,' Gilbert said, when all preliminaries
had been arranged in so far as their engagement was concerned, and
when he did not know at the time that he was about to be sent on
foreign service, but hoped that he would either be allowed to remain
in the Channel Squadron or be transferred to the Training Squadron,
or, at worst, appointed to the Mediterranean. 'We shall be so happy,
darling. I hoped from the first to win you--though--though sometimes I
feared there might be some one else.'
'There could never have been any one else. Never, after I had once met
you,' she murmured. 'Oh, Gilbert!' and then she, too, said she was so
happy. Yet a moment later she whispered: 'But, somehow, it seems too
good to be true. All has come so easily in the way that I--well, as
we--desired, that sometimes I think there may be--that something may
arise to--to----'
'What--prevent our marriage? Nothing can do that. Nothing could have
done that--nothing!'
'Suppose your uncle, Lord D'Abernon, had objected?' she said,
remembering that she had heard how this nobleman was not always given
to making things quite as easy and comfortable to those by whom he was
surrounded as was considered desirable. 'Suppose that had happened?'
'Oh, he's all right,' Gilbert replied. 'He expected his opinion to be
asked and his consent obtained, and all that sort of thing, but,
outside that, he's satisfied. And if he wasn't, it wouldn't have made
any difference to me--after I had once seen you.' For which remark he
was rewarded with one of those chaste salutes which Bella had learnt
by now to bestow without too much diffidence. As regards Mrs.
Waldron--well, she was a mother, and it was not to be supposed that
such a distinguished match as Bella was about to make could be aught
but satisfactory to her; while Captain Pooley, who had not yet
departed with the _Emperor of the Moon_ for Australia, told his niece
that she was a lucky girl. He also informed Gilbert that, as he was a
childless man, Bella would eventually fall heiress to anything he and
his wife might leave behind them. Matters looked, therefore, as though
they would all go merry as the proverbial marriage bell. All, as the
old romancists used to say, was very well.
Then fell the first blow--the one that was to separate those two fond
hearts. Gilbert was suddenly appointed to the _Briseus_ and ordered to
proceed to Bombay to join her at once, and a fortnight later he was
gone, and poor Bella was left behind lamenting.
She was sitting, lamenting still, before her fire on this March day,
with this newly-arrived letter on her lap--in solemn truth, she had
been lamenting his departure ever since it had taken place--when,
suddenly, there broke in upon her ears the sound of a visitor's knock
below. Then, ere she could distinguish whose voice was addressing the
servant who had answered the door, she heard a manly footstep on the
stairs, and, a moment later, the maidservant announced: 'Mr. Charke.'
Mr. Charke! the man whose memory had almost faded from her mind--as
she had reproached herself for more than once, when it did happen to
recur to her--the man whom she had learnt to like so much during all
that happy time last year. Now, as she gazed on him, and noticed how
brown he was as he came forward--more deeply browned, indeed, than she
had thought it possible for him, who was already so tanned and
sunburnt, to be--and noticed, too, the strong, self-reliant look on
his face, she reproached herself again. She acknowledged, also, that
she had liked him so much that even her new-found happiness ought not
to have driven all recollection of him entirely from her mind.
Then she greeted him warmly, saying all the pleasant little words of
welcome that a woman whose heart goes in unison with her good breeding
knows how to say; and made him welcome. Yet, as she did so, she
observed that he was graver, more sad, it seemed to her, than she had
ever remarked before.
'You are not ill?' she asked, as this fact became more and more
apparent to her. 'Surely, you, a sailor, have not come back from the
sea unwell? At least I hope not.'
'No,' he said, 'no. Nor, I hope, do I seem so. Do you know that,
besides any desire to call and see you, I came for another purpose?'
and now his eyes rested on her with so strange a light--so mournful,
deep a light--that in a moment her woman's instinct told her what he
meant as plainly as though his voice had done so.
Like a flash of lightning, that instinct revealed to her the fact that
this man loved her; that, from the moment they had parted, months ago,
she had never been absent from his mind. She knew it; she was certain
she was right--she could not be deceived! Then to herself she said:
'Heaven help him--Heaven prevent him from telling me so.'
But aloud, her heart full of pity, she said: 'Indeed,' and smiled
bravely on him while she spoke. 'Indeed, what was that purpose?'
'To congratulate you. To----
'Congratulate me!'
'Yes. I met the _Emperor of the Moon_ at Capetown. We were both
homeward bound. And--and--your uncle told me the news. I offer my
congratulations now.' Yet, as he said the words, she saw that his face
was turned a little aside so that she could not perceive his eyes.
Congratulations! Well, they might be sincere in so far as that,
because he loved her, he wished her well and desired that she should
be happy, but--but--otherwise--no! it was not to be thought upon.
As he said the words: 'I congratulate you,' he followed an old
custom--one more foreign than English--and held out his hand, taking
hers. And he kept it, too, fast in his own, while he said in the voice
that his struggles with the elements had made so deep and sonorous:
'Yes, I congratulate you. I must do that. To--to--see you happy--to
know you are so, is all that I have--all--I hope for now. Yet
there is no treachery to him in what I say. Heaven help me! I mean
none--but--but--I--from the first--I have lo----'
'No, no,' she murmured, striving to withdraw her hand, yet not doing
so angrily. 'No, no. Don't say it, Mr. Charke. Don't, pray don't.'
And, now, neither could he see her eyes nor her averted face. 'Don't
say it. You do not desire to make me unhappy?' she murmured.
'Never, as God hears me. But--I have said it. I had to say it.
Goodbye.'
'Goodbye,' she said--and then, as he neared the door, she turned once
and looked at him with eyes that were full of intense pity and
compassion.