ERLE'S VISIT TO THE GRANGE.
He gazed--he saw--he knew the face
Of beauty and the form of grace.
BYRON.
Fay was not very well the next day, and Sir Hugh insisted on sending
for Dr. Martin; Fay was much surprised when the kind old doctor
lectured her quite seriously on her imprudence; and put a veto on any
more skating and riding for the present. The sprained ankle was a
trifle, but all the same he told her grimly she must consider herself
a prisoner for a few days--a very hard sentence to Fay, whose nimble
little feet had never been still for long, and who had certainly never
known a day's illness in her healthy young life; but, with her usual
docility, she promised obedience. Sir Hugh was unusually busy just
then. Some vexatious lawsuit in which the Redmonds had been involved
for a year or two, and in which both Sir Wilfred and his son had taken
great interest, was just drawing to a conclusion, and he was obliged
to go up to town for a few hours almost daily, and but for Erle's
society, Fay would have been sadly moped; but with his usual
good-humor, Erle gave up his out-of-door pursuits to devote himself to
her amusement.
He was always contriving odd surprises for her; the mystified servants
often heard Fay's merry laugh ringing like a peal of silvery bells,
and thought that there could be very little the matter with their
young mistress; sometimes these sounds were supplemented by others
that were still more extraordinary.
One day Erle brought up the stable puppies--three black-faced,
snub-nosed, roundabout creatures in which Fay had taken a kindly
interest since the hour of their birth--and to her intense delight
deposited them on her lap, where they tumbled and rolled over each
other with their paws in the air, protesting in puppy fashion against
this invasion of their liberties.
Another time there was an extraordinary clucking to be heard outside
the door, and the next moment Erle entered with a hen under each arm,
and very red in the face from suppressed laughter.
"I thought you would be pining after your favorites, Speckles and
Tufty," he observed, with a chuckle; "so, as you could not visit the
poultry-yard, my Fairy Queen, I have brought Dame Partlet and her
sister to visit you," and he deposited the much-injured fowls on the
rug.
It was unfortunate that Sir Hugh should have come in that moment; his
disgusted look as he opened the door nearly sent Fay into hysterics;
Speckles was clucking wildly under the sofa--Tufty taking excited
flights across the room.
"How can you be so ridiculous," observed Sir Hugh, with a frown; "Fay,
do you think Dr. Martin would approve of all this excitement;" but
even he was obliged to check a smile at Erle's agonizing attempts to
catch Speckles.
Fay began to wonder what he would do next; Erle gravely assured her
that if he could have induced Bonnie Bess to walk upstairs, which she
would not do under any pretense, preferring to waltz on her hind-legs
in the hall, he would have regaled her with a sight of her favorite;
but after the baby from the lodge, a half-frozen hedgehog, some white
rats kept by the stable-boy, and old Tom, the veteran cat with half a
tail, had all been decoyed into the boudoir, Erle found himself at the
end of his resources.
But he used to go down to the vicarage with a very long face, and the
result was that every afternoon, there were fresh, girlish faces
gathering round Fay's couch. Dora Spooner would come with one of her
sisters or a Romney girl to help Erle amuse the invalid.
There were delightful little tea-parties every afternoon. Janet, who
waited on them, thought her mistress never seemed happier. Fay was
treated as though she were a little queen; Dora and Agnes Romney vied
with each other in attentions; perhaps Erle's pleasant face and bright
voice were powerful inducements in their way; the girls never seemed
to think it a trouble to plow their way through the snowy lanes--they
came in with glowing faces to narrate their little experiences.
"Yes, it is very uncomfortable walking; but we could not leave you
alone, Lady Redmond. Mr. Huntingdon begged us so hard to come," Dora
would say, and the hazel eyes looked at Erle rather mischievously.
Erle was up to his old tricks again. Fay used to take him to task when
their visitors had gone.
"You are too fond of young ladies," she would say to him, severely.
"You will make poor Dora think you are in love with her if you pay her
so much attention. Those are your London manners, I suppose, when you
are with that young person who has the go in her, or with the other
one with the pretty smile, of whom you say so little and think so
much."
"Come, now; I do call that hard on a fellow," returned Erle, in an
injured voice.
"You see I take an interest in you, my poor boy," continued Fay, with
quite a matronly air. "I can not allow you to make yourself so
captivating to our country girls. What will Dora think if you go down
to the vicarage every morning with that plausible little story that no
one believes? I am not dull one bit. I am laughing from morning to
night, and Mrs. Heron comes up and scolds me. No; Dora will believe
that you admire hazel eyes and long lashes. Poor girl, she knows
nothing about that young person with the go in her."
"Oh, do shut up, Fay," interrupted Erle quite crossly at this. "Why do
you always speak of Miss Selby in this absurd fashion? She is worth a
dozen Dora Spooners. Why, the girls who were here this afternoon could
not hold a candle to her."
"Oh, indeed!" was Fay's response to this, as she lay and looked at
Erle, with aggravating calmness.
"Why do you want to make out that girls are such duffers?" he went on
in a still more ruffled tone, as though her shrewdness had hit very
near the truth; "they have too much sense to think a fellow is in love
with them because he has a little fun with them; you married women are
so censorious," he finished, walking off in a huff; but the next
moment he came back with a droll look on his face.
"Mrs. Spooner wants me to dine there to-morrow; there is to be a
little dance; some of the Gowers are coming. Do you think you can
spare me, Fay?"
"Oh, go away; you are all alike!" returned Fay, impatiently; "you have
only to blame yourself if Mr. Spooner asks your intentions. I do not
think Mr. Huntingdon would approve of Dora one bit; she is not so very
handsome, she will not hold a candle to you know whom, and she has no
money--a vicar with a large family can not afford a dowry to his
daughter." But, as Erle had very rudely marched out of the room, she
finished this little bit of worldly wisdom to empty walls.
Erle had been over to the Grange. He had mooted the question one
evening when he and Sir Hugh were keeping Fay company; and, to Fay's
great surprise, her husband had made no objection. "I suppose it would
be right for you to call and thank them, Erle," he had said, as though
he were prepared for the suggestion; "and perhaps, Fay"--hesitating
slightly--"it might be as well for you to write a little note and say
something civil after all their attention." And Fay thanked him for
the permission with a radiant face, as though he had done her a
personal favor, and the next day wrote the prettiest and most grateful
little note, which Erle promised to deliver.
"You will be sure to keep the girls until I get back," had been his
parting request when he came to fetch the dogs.
It was not exactly the sort of afternoon that Erle would have selected
for a country walk--a thaw had set in, and the lanes were perfect
quagmires of half-melted snow and slash, in which the dogs paddled and
splashed their way with a perfect indifference to the state of their
glossy coats; any amount of slush being better than enforced inaction.
"I shall have to leave you outside, my fine fellows," observed Erle,
as Nero took a header into a heap of dirty-looking snow, in which he
rolled delightedly. "I am afraid I shall hardly be presentable myself
out these are the joys of country life, I suppose."
But he was not at all sorry when he found himself at the Grange, and a
pleasant-looking, gray-haired woman had ushered him into a room where
Mr. Ferrers and his sister were sitting. It was a far larger room than
the one where Fay had had her foot doctored that day, and was
evidently Mr. Ferrers's peculiar sanctum--two of the walls were lined
from the floor to the ceiling with well-filled book-shelves, an
ordinary writing-table occupied the center of the room; instead of the
bay-window, a glass door afforded egress to the garden, and side
windows on either side of the fire-place commanded a view of the
yew-tree walk; a Scotch deerhound was stretched on the rug in front of
the blazing fire, and two pet canaries were fluttering about a stand
of ferns.
Miss Ferrers had evidently been writing from her brother's dictation,
for several letters were lying ready for the post. As Erle had crossed
the hall he had distinctly heard the sound of her clear, musical
voice, as she read aloud: but the book was already laid aside, and she
had risen to welcome him.
Erle fancied she looked paler than on the previous occasion, and he
wondered what Mr. Ferrers would have said if he had seen those dark
lines under her eyes; perhaps she never told him when she was
tired--women liked to be martyrs sometimes.
He was received very cordially; and Miss Ferrers seemed rather touched
at the contents of her little note.
"It was good of Lady Redmond to write," she said to Erle with a smile;
"but she makes far too much of my little services."
"Oh, that is just her way," returned Erle, candidly. "She is such a
grateful little soul. Most people take all one's attentions as a
matter of course; but Fay is not like that."
"Oh, no, she is very sweet," observed Margaret, thoughtfully; somehow
she had yearned to see that pretty, bright face again.
"She is the finest little creature that ever lived," returned Erle,
with boyish enthusiasm; "it is wonderful how little she thinks about
herself. And she is about the prettiest girl one can see anywhere; and
she is clever, too, though you would not believe it to hear her; for
she always wants to make out that she can do nothing."
Mr. Ferrers smiled at this. "Lady Redmond did seem bent on proving
that fact to us."
"Of course, did I not tell you so? but don't you believe her, Mr.
Ferrers. Why, even Hugh, critical as he is, owns Fay is the best
horsewoman in these parts. I should like to see her and Bonnie Bess in
the Row; she would make a sensation there. And it is quite a treat to
see her drive her ponies; she knows how to handle a horse's mouth.
Why, those tiny hands of hers could hold in a couple of
thorough-breds. Oh, she is a good sort; the Spooner girls swear by
her."
Miss Ferrers looked kindly at the young man; she liked to hear him
vaunting his cousin's excellencies after this unsophisticated fashion.
She had taken rather a fancy to this boyish, outspoken young fellow;
and her brother shared this liking. She was about to put a question to
him, when he suddenly started up with an exclamation, and the next
moment he had crossed the room and was standing before a picture, with
a very puzzled expression on his face. It was the portrait of a girl,
and evidently painted by a good artist. Of course it was she, Erle
told himself after another quick look; in spite of the smiling mouth,
he could not mistake her. There was the small, finely shaped head, set
so beautifully on the long neck; the coils of black hair; the dark,
dreamy eyes, which always seemed to hold a shadow in them.
"I beg your pardon; but I had no idea you knew Miss Davenport," he
said at last, looking at Margaret as he spoke. But it was Mr. Ferrers
who answered.
"Davenport? We know no one of that name, do we, Margaret? What does
Mr. Huntingdon mean? Is it some picture?"
"Yes, dear, Crystal's picture. Mr. Huntingdon seems to recognize it."
"Crystal? why, that is her name, too. I have heard Miss Trafford use
it a dozen times. As though there could be two faces like
that"--pointing to the canvas. "She looks younger, yes, and happier,
in the picture; but then, of course, one has never seen her smiling
like that. But it is Miss Davenport--ay, and to the life too."
"You must be mistaken," observed Mr. Ferrers in a voice so agitated
that Erle regarded him with astonishment. He was strangely pale, and
the hand that was grasping the chair back was visibly trembling. "That
is the portrait of our young cousin, Crystal Ferrers."
"Yes, our adopted child," added Miss Ferrers, "who left our home
nearly eighteen months ago."
Erle looked more puzzled than ever. "I can not understand it," he
said, in a most perplexed voice. "If she be your cousin, Crystal
Ferrers, why does she call herself Crystal Davenport? There can be no
question of identity; that is the face of the Miss Davenport I
know--the young governess who lives with the Traffords; that is the
very ring she wears, too"--with another quick glance at the hand that
was holding a sheaf of white lilies. But here Mr. Ferrers interrupted
him.
"Will you describe that ring, Mr. Huntingdon?"
"Willingly--it is of Indian workmanship, I fancy, and has a curiously
wrought gold setting, with an emerald very deeply sunk into the
center."
"Yes, yes; it must be she," murmured Raby, and then for the moment he
seemed able to say no more; only Margaret watched him, with tears in
her eyes.
Erle's interest and curiosity were strongly excited. There must be
some strange mystery at the bottom of this he thought. He had always
been sure that Miss Davenport had some history. She was wonderfully
handsome; but with all his predilection for pretty faces he had never
quite taken to her; he had regarded her with involuntary distrust.
He looked at Mr. Ferrers as he stood evidently absorbed in thought.
What a grand-looking man he was, he said to himself, if he would only
hold his head up, and push back the mass of dull brown hair that lay
so heavily on his forehead.
There was something sad in that spectacle of sightless strength; and
to those who first saw him, Raby Ferrers always seemed like some
patient giant oppressed and bowed down, both physically and mentally,
but grand in a certain sublime resignation that endured because he was
too proud to complain.
"It must be so," he observed at last. "Margaret, I see light at last.
Mr. Huntingdon"--turning to his guest--"I have been very rude, very
uncourteous, but your words have given me a shock; you have touched
accidentally on a deep trouble. Now, will you be good and kind enough
to sit down and tell me all you can about Miss Davenport, as you call
her."
"Certainly, if you wish it, Mr. Ferrers." And, with very few
interruptions from either the brother or sister, Erle gave a full and
graphic description of Crystal's present home and surroundings--all
the more willingly that his listeners seemed to hang breathlessly on
his words.
He described eloquently that shabby room over Mrs. Watkins's, that was
yet so pleasant and home-like; the mother with her worn, beautiful
face, who moved like a duchess about her poor rooms, and was only the
head teacher in a girls' school. He dismissed the subject of the
gentle, fair-haired Fern in a few forcible words; but he spoke of
little Florence, and then of Percy, and of the curious way in which
all their lives were involved.
Only once Mr. Ferrers stopped him. "And Miss Davenport teaches, you
say?"
"Yes, both she and Miss Trafford have morning engagements. I think
Miss Martingale, where Mrs. Trafford is, has recommended both the
young ladies. There are not many gentle people living there; the
Elysian Fields and Beulah Place are not exactly aristocratic
neighborhoods. But Miss Trafford goes to the vicarage; there are young
children there; and by good luck the senior curate, Mr. Norton, wanted
some help with his two little boys. Miss Davenport is a Latin scholar,
and they took her on the Traffords' recommendation."
"And only her mornings are occupied? Excuse these seemingly trifling
questions, Mr. Huntingdon"--with a sad smile--"but you are speaking of
one who is very dear to us both."
"I will tell you all I know," returned Erle, in his kind-hearted way;
"but I am only a visitor at Mrs. Trafford's. I think, at least I am
sure, that they do a good deal of needle-work in their spare
time--embroidery for shops; they are very poor, you see. There is
always work about; sometimes they are making their gowns. They are
never ashamed of anything they do, they are such thorough gentlewomen.
I do not think you could find a prouder woman than Mrs. Trafford
anywhere, and yet she is frank, and generous to a fault."
"They must be charming people," observed Margaret, thoughtfully.
"Crystal has told us all this in her letters, Raby. Mr. Huntingdon's
account most fully indorses hers."
"Yes," he returned, quietly, "she is in good hands; our prayers have
been answered, Maggie. But now dear, if we have heard all that Mr.
Huntingdon can tell us about our poor child, will you leave me with
him a little, for I want to take him into our confidence; when he
knows all, he may be willing to help us." And Margaret rose without a
word; but her beautiful eyes rested on Erle a moment, wistfully, as
though to bid him to be patient.
And then, as the twilight crept over the room; while the girls were
laughing and chatting round Fay's couch, and wondering--Dora
especially--what could have happened to detain Mr. Huntingdon so late;
and while the blazing pine knots threw a ruddy glow over Raby's pale
face, Erle sat listening to one of the saddest stories he had ever
heard.
And when it was finished they had a long talk together, and Erle told
Raby about Percy's hopeless passion, and of the impatience and
loathing with which Crystal seemed to turn from her handsome young
lover.
"He makes his way with other girls, but not with her," went on Erle;
"and yet he is clever and fascinating, and will be rich, too, some
day. It seems strange, does it not. Mr. Ferrers?"
"Not to me," returned Raby, quietly; but there was a smile on his face
as he spoke. "Crystal will never care for your friend, Mr. Huntingdon;
it is no use, his persecuting her with his attentions."
"If I could only get Percy to believe it; but he seems absolutely
crazy on that point. Miss Davenport--Miss Ferrers, I mean--is not
quite the style I admire; but she is superbly handsome, one must own
that."
"Yes," replied Raby, with a sigh; "I always said her face would do for
Vashti's. She has Italian blood in her veins; her mother was a
Florentine. Oh, here comes Margaret," as the door opened and she
reappeared. "Maggie, what do you think? Mr. Huntingdon has invited me
to Belgrave House."
"My uncle is very hospitable, Miss Ferrers," observed Erle, with a
smile at her surprise; "Percy and I can always ask our friends. He is
old, and has his own rooms; so we never interfere with him. Mr.
Ferrers would find himself very comfortable with us, and I would take
great care of him."
"You are very good"--but rather doubtfully. "You will not go to London
without me, Raby?"
"I think it will be better, Maggie. Mr. Huntingdon has promised to
take me over to Beulah Place; we shall go there one evening. Oh, yes,
it is all arranged. Please God, I shall bring her home with me," and
there was a strange, beautiful smile on his face as he spoke.