THE FIDDLER'S RANCH.
'The _Vater Unser_ that I said
Before I went to school,
The prayers come ringing in my head
Like ripples in a pool.'
_Veritas._
Angela's conversion, as her friends did not scruple to term it, had
this happy effect at least of extinguishing her passion (if so it might
be called) for Charles Audley. It was swallowed up in the general
excitement; and once or twice Cherry had reason to think she had
persuaded herself that she had voluntarily renounced him among other
earthly vanities, such as her chignon, her church decorations, and her
balls.
If she still felt any jealousy of Stella, it only showed itself in a
pitiful contempt of the poor little unawakened creature, so contentedly
deluded by ceremonies, and drifting into the jaws of this wicked world;
but it was memorable that though she always opposed Stella's opinion,
were it only on the weather, she never attacked her direct, nor
reproached her, probably out of a certain discomfort which the little
maid's simple answers always gave her.
Stella was Clement's mainstay this summer in the thousand and one
inconveniences caused him by Angela's conscience in the thousand and
one parish affairs in which she used to be his prime helper, but where
she now disentangled the material and the spiritual, after the example
of her advisers, though with a sauciness and vexatiousness of which
they were incapable. Luckily no idea of pining after Charlie seemed to
occur to Stella, and she devoted the time once spent on poor little
Theodore to the many tasks that Angela had left on her hands and
considered just fit for such a foolish little thing.
Any secrecy as to the possible relations with Charlie had proved
unachievable, at least within the family. Charlie might be banished,
but his father carried on the courtship with unblushing assiduity,
viewing Stella as his special property, and being never happy without
seeing her two or three times in a week. In truth, after so many years
of morbid seclusion, the society of a family home--such as he had never
known--was so delightful to him, that he could not stay away, and
almost exposed himself to suspicion of being in search more of a wife
for himself than his son.
The Kittiwake, where never woman had set foot, and where Charlie,
in spite of Angela's bantering solicitations, had never ventured to
invite her, was urgently pressed on the whole party for any excursion
imaginable; and when it became evident that both the Captain and Stella
greatly wished it, the seniors consented to a day's sail along the
coast, it being decided in council between Wilmet and Cherry that sea
air might bring freshness back to Felix's looks.
The morning was all that could be wished, but the post brought an
appointment from a man of business to see the Squire respecting some
land which was to be secured in East Ewmouth, for the foundation of
buildings that might serve to Christianize the straggling population
there, making a fresh district from both parishes. For it was to this
purpose they had decided to devote the tithes cut off from Vale Leston,
since the new tenements actually stood in that parish, and the work at
home was now forward enough to enable the extension to be made.
Great was the lamentation at this inopportune arrival; but Felix owned
himself glad of it, and did not look equal to a long day's fatigue.
Clement also remained to assist at the consultation, and after the
conference, walked to the spot with the agent.
Returning soon after the hour for the second post, Clement went
to the study, where, as he entered, Felix, who was seated at his
writing-table, lifted up his face from his supporting hand, very pale,
and with eyes swimming in tears, but with a look of rest and relief
that reminded the Vicar of that which had responded to the tidings
that their little Theodore was beyond the reach of harm. He held up
something, saying, 'Look!'
'The photograph of my father.'
'See there,' pointing to the corner.
'T.E.U. Edgar's copy! Is he found?'
'Thank God! There is hope that the lost is found!' He rested his
head against Clement, heaving a mighty irrepressible sob, physically
painful, but full of relief. Those two had become inexpressibly much
to one another during these four years, and far more during the last
six weeks.
'From Travis?' asked Clement presently, observing the handwriting of
the letter on the table.
'Yes, good faithful fellow! Would you read it to me, Clem? I cannot get
on;' and he cleared his eyes of the blinding tears. 'I could only see
that there was hope at the last.'
'Of finding him?'
'Not here. No. He begins by telling us the dear fellow is dead. I think
it was something violent, and that he tried in vain to save him. Let me
hear, that we may see whether there be anything we can spare Cherry.'
Clement thought Felix even less fit for any shock or agitation than his
sister, but he could only make him lie back on his couch, whence he
watched with earnest eyes for every word.
The narrative is, however, here given more fully than it could be
written, especially as one portion of the history was reserved for
Marilda alone.
Ferdinand Travis had inherited a considerable claim to mining property
in the south-eastern portion of California. He had gone to America,
intending to dispose of it, but had ended by settling down there,
naming it Underwood, and doing his best to exert an influence for good
on the lawless races he found around him. He had enough in common with
them to obtain a partial success where another would have failed; his
little township was thriving, and to some degree civilized, and he
had even been able to obtain the building of a church and residence
of a clergyman with a kind of mission to the Indians. All around him
was safe and peaceable; but between him and the nearest cities on the
Pacific lay a tract subject to the forays of a tribe in the tiger stage
that precedes the abject decline of the unhappy red-skins. The district
was gradually becoming settled, but neither village nor traveller
was secure from horrible raids and savage massacres, and save by
letter-carriers, who trusted to speed, the region was seldom traversed
except by parties numerous enough to protect themselves.
Such a surveying party Ferdinand had joined, intending to transact
some affairs at San Francisco; and on the third day of his journey,
when descending a steep hill-side, the war-shouts of the Indians were
heard, and presently about thirty beplumed and painted savages were
seen evidently triumphing after a victory.
The travellers scarcely uttered a word, but settled themselves in
their saddles, and drew their revolvers, then charged the foe with the
full impetus of a down-hill gallop. It was the affair of a moment;
the Indians threw themselves on their horses and scoured away like
the wind, while the new comers found that they had been exulting over
the slaughter of only two men and one little child, whom they had
been proceeding to mangle after the custom of their tribe. One victim
was quite dead, and already scalped and scored; the other, though
senseless, stripped, and gashed in many places, was still breathing, as
was the child--a boy of six or seven, though shot through the breast,
and the mark of the scalping-knife already begun on his head.
The keen wiry dauntless fellow, who acted as guide, driving two of
the party in a much enduring waggon, opined that they came from
Fiddler's Ranch, about two miles off, and recognized the living one
as the Fiddler himself--the best company, he guessed, between this
and the Atlantic. It was a service of danger to lift the bodies into
the vehicle, for the Indians might be hovering about in ambush to
fall on the rescuers in great numbers; but the transit was safely
performed; up to the stockade and ditch protecting the township called
Fiddler's Ranch, whence issued a population of the rudest description,
vituperating the Indians, and bewailing 'poor Tom the Fiddler and
little Jerry, the smartest, cutest little critter that side of the
mountains.' 'Pretty nigh gone, stranger; bring him in, lay him by the
side of his father; those brutes of Injuns fix their work off too
handsome--best if neither opens his eyes again.'
A low frame-house, the outer half-store, also post-office, newspaper
office, photographic studio--such was the place into which the father
was carried, Ferdinand following with the child into an inner room,
where were some appliances of comfort, a neatly ordered bed, a few
chairs, a table, and some drawings fastened to the wall--among them a
photograph that arrested Ferdinand's attention. Had he not gazed at
the likeness from his bed in Mr. Audley's room? did he not know it in
the family parlour, and in Clement's cell at St Matthew's? It was the
likeness of Edward Underwood!
He turned hastily to the bed. Yes, the face, weather-stained yet
ghastly, overgrown with neglected beard, stained with blood and dust,
still showed the delicate chiselling of eyebrow and nose, the Underwood
characteristic!
Such remedies as the Ranch afforded produced tokens of reviving power,
and Ferdinand could not believe the wounds necessarily mortal. The rest
of the party were about to pursue their journey, and through them he
sent the most urgent entreaties and liberal promises that could induce
a surgeon to take his life in his hand, and cross that dreadful waste.
The signature of F.A. Travis was well known in the West.
While Ferdinand was washing away the soil from the face once so
fair and brilliant, bringing out more of the familiar features,
consciousness returned in groans; and when at last the lids were
raised, and showed the well remembered deep blue eyes, the first word
that struggled articulately from the lips was, 'Jerry! Baby!'
'Here!' Ferdinand laid the nerveless hand on the little flaxen head,
still motionless.
That was enough at first, but as the tide of life began to flow more
freely, Edgar called the child again; and as no answer came, used his
hand to feel, writhed his head to look. 'Jerry!--what--asleep? They've
not hurt him!' The last words in a tone of full sense and anguish.
'He does not seem to suffer,' said Ferdinand. 'I have sent for a
doctor, and I trust to keep you both up till he comes.'
'A doctor! Here?' with a contemptuous groan. 'Help me, I must see him!'
with a vain effort for a fuller view of the child, who was on a sort
of crib by his side, lying with closed eyes, and a beautiful waxen
death-like face. 'Lift me!'
It cost sobs of agony, though that seemed lost in the intense gaze. 'Is
his wound there?' he asked, looking at the bandaged head.
'That was the scalp-knife, but it has done little harm. _The_ wound is
here, but the ball passed out at the back.'
'And is _here_,' said Edgar, laying his hand on his body. 'I had him
before me on my horse, as we always went, my brave boy! One week more,
and we should have been beyond the miscreants' reach!' and he sank back
with a piteous wailing moan, too weak and shattered for demonstrative
grief, though utterly crushed. 'Put him by me,' he added presently; 'if
there be any life left in him, he will like it.'
'I am afraid of hurting you.'
'Nothing will make much odds now. We are both done for, and I am glad
it is both, if it was to be. My poor little chap, we couldn't do
without each other!'
Then, as Ferdinand placed the child where his restless hand could
stroke the cheek, tender parental pride revived. 'A jolly little face,
isn't it? if you saw it like itself. Oh, if I could see those eyes open
for once!'
There seemed a revival of strength; but with the knowledge of the
bullet-wound and the six frightful gashes of the Indian knives,
Ferdinand felt that a few questions must be risked, lest this should be
a delusive rally, and speech suddenly fail. 'You know me, Edgar?'
'Fernan Travis! Ay. You're not much altered! But how did you know me?
I'm not much like the swell I used to be! Ah! I see!' as Ferdinand
signed towards the photograph. 'How are _they_ all?'
'All well, when last I heard. Longing only to hear of you.'
'Better not.'
'And this is your boy. His mother?' he added, with more hesitation; and
it brought a fierce look.
'Never had one in any real sense. She left him at ten months
old--always hated him. But he's all right. You'll find the certificate
in that old green case.'
'Of his baptism?'
'No. Such matters don't come handy here, and she wasn't one to concern
herself about them. I don't know that she was the better for that! No:
it's my marriage lines! I kept them for his sake, though I gnashed my
teeth at them often enough.'
'Pray let me baptize him!' entreated Ferdinand, with an imploring
accent, contrasting so curiously with his bronzed face and black beard,
that Edgar again smiled, saying, 'You've not turned parson?'
'No, but this is a case of necessity.'
'Oh! all's one to me,' interrupted Edgar, with a sort of instinctive
sneer to cut short a Clementine discourse; 'since this business must
come to their ears at home, they may as well be at peace about one of
us.'
'And his name?'
'His eyes--you'll never see them--but they have so much little Cherry's
wistful look, that I've called him Gerald; you may tack Felix to it.
No mockery! He's been the happiest little soul that ever was born,
happiest maybe if he goes on as he is, knowing nothing about it.'
As Fernan repeated the Lord's Prayer, first learnt from Lance, the
tears gathered and softened Edgar's eyes, and made a mist as he saw the
pale brow sprinkled, and heard the Holy Name.
'You said that once for him. Let me hear the old echo again. I wanted
to teach him, but it never came right.'
Ferdinand was so thankful that the doxology came from his heart, though
at the moment he saw that the poor child had been almost baptized in
blood, for Edgar's caresses had displaced the bandage and some bright
red drops had started, and mingled with the water, and he could not
help silently tracing the cross with his finger before kissing and
wiping it away, and re-adjusting the handkerchief. 'He is warmer,' he
said. 'See, his lips are less deathly.'
'The death flush,' said the father.
'It need not be. I will try the brandy again. I thought we got a little
down before.'
'I tell you he shall not be tortured! Why should he wake to an hour's
conscious misery? I could not bear it! I say I will not have it done!'
and he stretched out his hand as in protection.
'Nay, why should not he live? There can hardly be any vital part here,
and it has just missed the spine. Let me try!'
'To make him a wretched orphan. Another burthen to Felix.'
'That need not be a scruple now.'
'He has not married Marilda after all!'
'No; but he has come into the property.'
He was surprised at the effect of his words, 'What! what! Felix! Vale
Leston?'
'Yes, he has been living there these four years.'
'Not married?'
'No.'
'Then that child is heir to all! Bless me! Felix at Vale Leston! It
makes one believe in a Providence at last.'
He anxiously watched Ferdinand's endeavours to restore his little son,
as though divided between the wish for his life and the apprehension
of his visible suffering; but though the stimulant was certainly
swallowed, and produced a slight revival of pulse, the lethargy
continued.
Edgar's own wounds, except the rifle-shot in the body, were the
lacerations with which the Indians mark their victims, not mortal in
themselves; but he never admitted any hope for himself, and though for
one day and night his recovery seemed possible, after that the wounds
assumed an appearance which the experienced inhabitants, many of them
fugitive Secessionists, pronounced to be fatal.
He talked a good deal at times, and was eager to hear all Fernan could
tell him about home; and though he gave no connected history, it was
possible to piece together the sad story of his life from his rambling
talk.
The sight of Spooner, the manager, in a cab, had convinced him that his
forgery had been detected, and he could hardly credit the assurance
that it was known to no creature save Marilda and Ferdinand himself,
whom she had instantly despatched to assure him of pardon and secresy.
'No! did Polly do that? A golden girl I knew she was; but that's
sublime! Yet I might have known she had held her tongue, since Felix
and Cherry are alive and well! Good old girl. I say, Travis, you must
have her after all. She deserves it!'
His relief was intense, when he thought of his son, in finding no brand
affixed to the name he had never dared own again, except at the two
most unhappy events of his life, his duel and his wedding.
'Ourselves, our souls, and bodies, to be a reasonable, holy, and lively
sacrifice,' he said. 'Those were little Lance's words--the chief reason
he assigned for burying himself at Bexley. A fanatic craze of course,
but I never got the words out of my head, and I'm sure I've been
the sacrifice, soul and body, though not what you'd call a holy or a
reasonable one! Well, whatever hindered him, it was well for him!'
He explained that Allen had been a feeble speculator, but plausible, of
personal good faith, and perniciously sanguine. His schemes had chiefly
devoured Thomas Underwood's legacy, while as to the other debts, Edgar
treated them lightly, and though he was much moved at Geraldine's
exertions to pay them, he called it an infatuation in Felix to have
allowed it.
After his flight to Ostend, Edgar had joined Allen's company at
Strasburg. Failure had disgusted him with painting, and the free
wandering life had long fascinated him, while with the Zoraya he had
a standing game at coquetry. Though her name was Hungarian, she was
almost stage-born, and her nationality was harder to analyze than
Ferdinand's. She had sung ever since she could speak, and been bred
to the boards, but as, in spite of her splendid beauty, she lacked
dramatic talent, and her voice had been too early strained, she was
never more than a third-rate prima-donna, with airs and graces that
were Edgar's sport and titillation, while to her he was the handsomest
and most gentlemanly man in the company, with wit and breeding of which
she was half afraid.
When Edgar found that the unhappy occurrence at Pau was known, he
asked eagerly after Alice, blessing the kindness that had brought her
home; but he lived where life was held too cheap to make him greatly
heed blood-guiltiness; nor had he deemed the wound more than the just
penalty of forcing the duel on him, viewing the fatal result chiefly
as an accident. But Zoraya had seen Alice shriek and faint, and Edgar
falter and blush, and knew that this pretty English doll had been the
cause of his killing his man. Thenceforth passion and jealousy awoke in
her, and made her whole being centre in the determination to turn his
trifling into earnest. Her beauty became more striking, her songs more
effective in the absorption of her soul, and her eager pursuit became
as often oppressive as amusing. When he had remained in Egypt with the
apparently dying Major Harewood, nothing could persuade her that the
Englishman was not connected with Alice; and when he joined the troop
again, she hailed him like a truant slave returned to his bondage.
Why had he not broken from it? Had the telegram announced Felix, he
could not have helped lingering for a sight of his face in spite of
everything; but Wilmet, in her cold severity, and her grief too, he
could not encounter, especially as Zoraya had threatened to descend
upon him and 'imagine the meeting.'
So he drifted back to the 'company,' which had by force of custom
become a sort of home, and was his sole resource. 'Rattle-snake and
frog,' he said; 'of course the frog succumbs at last.'
But that had not been till the retirement of the Allens had left him
to the mercy of the Prebels, and when the absence of Mrs. Allen's
unimpeachable respectability left the company at the mercy of scandal;
and a little exaggeration of evil report, with a few tears and heroics,
brought him passively to surrender his hand to his pursuer, and they
were married in New Zealand before proceeding to America to 'star it'
in the Southern States.
Even then his affectionate nature would have opened to family love; but
with the attainment of her object, Zoraya's passion ceased, and she
viewed him as a master to be resisted. His ideal of a wife had been
formed on very different women, and incensed her imperious temper; and
when her violence was met by cool sarcasm, she was lashed to frenzy.
Her repugnance to motherhood completed his disgust. He deliberately
told Fernan that first and last he had never seen a spark of even
animal yearning towards the infant, only angry impatience of the
discomfort and inconvenience, and contempt of the pleasure it gave him.
She was enough among the advocates of advanced women's rights to learn
to admire her own scorn of maternity, and but for an old negress, whom
he had hired on the poor little thing's unwelcome entrance into the
world, its chances of life would have been few.
So they had rubbed on, till at Chicago Edgar had fallen ill with
inflammation on the chest and throat, and was left voiceless, hovering
on the verge of decline. He was still confined to his room when he
received a note from Zoraya to inform him that she could not be
burthened with the support of an invalid, and had therefore made other
arrangements, in pursuance of which she enclosed a deed of divorce.
To him it was liberty, and satisfaction that she had not heart enough
to rob him of his child, but it was also destitution. However, there
was compassion enough for the sick and deserted vocalist to render
landlord and doctor merciful, and he was allowed to liquidate his debt
by taking portraits as soon as he could reach the drawing-room of the
boarding-house and wield his crayons.
'I don't know whether the divorce would hold water at home,' he said;
'but keep it, to guard the boy. If he is heir to anything she will
scent it, like a vulture, carrion. Stay, while I can sign it, you draw
up a form, giving the custody of him to my brothers, and forbidding her
having anything to do with him.'
He was uneasy till this was done. His success at Chicago had given
him hopes of gaining a livelihood with his brush, but he soon found
photography too strong for him, and could meet with no employment as a
violinist. His health was too much shattered for settled exertion, and
though he said little of his struggles and sufferings, they must have
been frightful, as he dropped from one failure to another, striving as
he had never striven before, till he actually became a teamster to a
party prospecting far West. 'I can't think how they came to take such a
screw!' he said; 'but I believe they forgave me my child for the sake
of my fiddle. Such a child as it was too, not eighteen months old, but
never fretting for a moment. Most of the way I carried him strapped on
my back, and always felt his little hand in my beard, and heard his
voice in my ear as blithe as a katydid, and he was always ready to
play, till he was a regular pet-kitten among them. Ah, well, Jerry, you
and I have had good times together. How will he ever stand the high
polite at home? Pah! You must have him out now and then, and let him
breathe the prairies, and gallop after the buffaloes.'
It had ended in Edgar's settling down on this spot, having found the
Editor of the 'Soaring Eagle of the Far West' closing with a favourable
offer at the other end of the Continent. 'Tell Felix I took to his
trade,' he said. 'Take home a sheet or two to be preserved alongside
of the Pursuivant in the family archives. It is dated Violinia, a
free translation of Fiddler's Ranch. Before I came, it used to be
Broken-head Ranch; but it got the other name when I took to playing to
hinder my boy from hearing more foul tongues than I could help. Take
Lance my violin. He may some day make it over to Jerry, if he has a
turn that way, though maybe he had best not.'
Perhaps nothing he said was sadder than this, considering what music
could have been to him.
It appeared that though the wonderful spring of health in that
salubrious air had made his first years there enjoyable, he had begun
to feel the lack of all good influences as his child grew older.
What he heard with indifference from his comrades, was shocking when
echoed from the tender lips that brought back the thought of home; and
when Gerald began to ask those deep questions of why and wherefore,
life and death, that we only cease to wonder over as we grow used to
them, Edgar, who had never reflected before, only undergone a few
intellectual impressions and influences, answered as one bewildered;
and when the fair head nestled to him, longed to see it bent over the
clasped hands, like the heads so like it at home. He tried to teach;
but prayers, cast off half a life-time ago, came not at his beck, and
the very framework of the religion he had never attended to, and then
thrown aside, had almost passed from him. Fragments floated before
him, and his perplexity became longing to clear his mind; and when
the foul habits and language of the Ranch came prominently before the
child's growing perception, he had resolved to remove to where order
and decency prevailed. He had answered an advertisement offering
employment as an editor in a more advanced settlement, and was in the
act of riding to an isolated station to collect his debts before his
departure, when the attack had been made.
It was as if he had been just turning back from the husks which the
swine did eat, and making his first step from the far country; and
perhaps he thought so himself, for when Fernan's kindness as well as
his own suffering had demolished his proud irony, he said, 'A fellow
like you carries his Bible as a charm. Read me the old story of the
younger son. It is not an original idea to ask for it, but the cadences
have rung in my head ever since that "Pater noster" of yours.'
It was as if the old irreverence must still tinge whatever he said.
Very perplexing it was. Was it repentance, that self-condemnation for
wasted kindness? Was it faith, that increasing craving for Gospel
messages? Was it prayer, the entreaty for the forms whose words, all
broken, haunted the memory of the clergyman's son? He showed neither
fear nor regret; he knew he had his death-warrant, he had made a bad
business of life, and was weary of it--he, his thirty-second year not
yet complete--he, the most gifted of the brothers. He sent no direct
message, either to ask pardon for himself, or protection for his
child--perhaps he was too secure of both to feel the need, for he spoke
more and more of Felix and Cherry--nay, seemed to be talking to them
when fever obscured his mind. Over and over recurred Lance's answer, 'a
reasonable, holy, and lively sacrifice,' as if it had been the riddle
of his life--or again the opening words of the Lord's Prayer, running
into 'I will arise and go to my Father.'
The loving hearts must trust to the Father, Who can meet the son even
while yet a great way off. And it was well for them that kind Ferdinand
dropped the veil over the day when the doctor came too late for
alleviation, though in time to save the child, as the lethargic trance
gave way, and the moan of 'Daddy, daddy!' began. The last conscious
light of the father's eyes met those of the boy; his last word replied
to the feeble call. So Edgar Underwood passed away, and Ferdinand
buried him beneath a pine-tree, amid many evidences that he had
endeared himself to the rude spirits around, who mourned him in their
rough sort, with many an anecdote of his ready wit and good-nature, and
many another of little Jerry's drollery, simplicity, or courage.
The doctor recommended transporting the child to Sacramento before
recovery of his senses should aggravate the danger of the journey. The
spine, though not actually touched, had received a shock, and would
require most careful treatment, beyond his own skill. So a bark cradle
like that of a papoose, had been constructed, and slung to Ferdinand's
shoulders so that he could raise it in his arms and break the jolting
of the waggon over the roadless waste. When clasped in a pair of kind
arms, with a beard to put his hand into, and a soothing voice to hush
his moan, he did not waken to miss his father, though more than once he
asked how soon they should arrive, and many times begged to go to bed.
The best surgeons of Sacramento and San Francisco had consulted over
the little fellow, and pronounced that the spine had escaped by so
little that the nerves would long feel the shock, though it might be
outgrown in time. They thought he might be removed as soon as the
external wounds were healed and the constitution had somewhat rallied.
A nurse had been obtained, but at present the boy would endure no
attendance but Ferdinand's, and seemed satisfied and lulled into a
half-conscious doze by his English voice and accent.
All that Edgar had said about his son being Felix's next heir was
omitted in the letter; but Ferdinand said he supposed that Felix would
wish the boy to be brought home as soon as he could safely travel, but
if not, he should be sure of a loving home at 'Underwood.' If he were
not to be received, a telegram should be sent to Sacramento, but there
would probably be time for a letter, since weeks might pass before a
move would be prudent. Of course, too, all respecting the forgery was
suppressed, and only written to Marilda, who was attending her mother
on her yearly visit to Spa.
Clement read the letter through without pause or remark, though his
voice shook and thickened when he read of Edgar feeling about for
the Lord's Prayer, and Fernan helping him. Truly, the last had been
first, and the first last. He was disappointed too, not to find more to
justify the hope that his brother had evidently gathered.
Felix lay back all the time, his eyes fixed with a kind of unseeing
steadiness on his own photograph of his father, hanging against the
wall. His hands were clasped over his breast, sometimes trembling
slightly, but never unlocking. 'Thank you,' he said; 'there seems
nothing to keep from Cherry.'
'She might imagine much worse things if she did not see the letter.'
'If we prepare her, and give it to her to read, it will be almost a
comfort. Call her in when they come home. No, I will, or she will take
alarm for me.'
Care for Cherry seemed his first thought; and Clement said, 'It is well
we never told her what we thought about the Australian report. How much
it has spared her!'
'Ay; mark the time, Clem! It was spring, five years ago, just when you
and I began those prayers, that he was left with a little child to lead
him. How often that is brought about!'
'I am glad he named the child after Cherry,' said Clement, willing to
blink the full reply, for never having been able to love Edgar as
did his elder brother, he could not as entirely 'believe all things
and hope all things.' He felt the terrible deficiency, knowing that
Ferdinand would have put foremost whatever truth would allow him to say.
The indirect reply made Felix shrink from that heart's core of the
subject, unwilling to hear the faint qualified hope that conscience
would suffer his brother to utter, dashing the comfort that he had
embraced.
With a heavy sigh he began to lament the great unhappiness that had
come upon one so formed for light and sunshine. Edgar and Lance had
always been of the same temperament and tastes, and yet they had been
the two arrows, shot by the same hand, but of such different course.
'A very sinister blast came on one!' said Clement.
'Yet, change their places,' said Felix. 'Lance would at fifteen have
stood the foreign college, and I doubt if the Minsterham choir would
have been good for Edgar!'
'The real key lies in those words that haunted poor Edgar. The
sacrifice must be to One or to the other--the Rood, or the heavier
weight,' said Clement.
'Heavy indeed!' sighed Felix, as if the severity cut him, giving way
to a sobbing groan. 'Such a life, and such a death! Our father's
pride--the flower of us all! O Edgar, our nursery king, that it should
have come to this! What would not I give to have been where Travis was,
if only to cry, Alas! my brother!'
And as the beautiful features, gallant bearing, and winning speech, so
affectionate when most blameworthy, came over him, his enfeebled state
broke down his ordinary reserve, and sorrow had its course.
Then came a long stillness while Clement wrote to Lance; but when the
bell rang, Felix rose to accompany his brother; and when Clement,
perceiving how painfully he moved, would have dissuaded him, he made
his usual answer, that 'After a time, there is no use in favouring a
strain.'
His management of himself was right, for after the quiet little
service, almost a duet between the brothers, in which both could afford
to falter or choke when the _De Profundis_ came among the Psalms,
Clement found him standing under the willow-tree, quite himself again,
as he looked at Theodore's little green bed, with Stella's wreath
of white roses. No doubt his thoughts were on the lone unhallowed
grave parted from them by half the world; but he would not risk his
self-control again, and took Clement's arm without speaking.
The twilight of the July evening was falling when the waggonette came
to the door with rippling laughter and merry voices, calling to the two
brothers who stood in the porch.
Clement went forward and lifted Cherry out, then left her to Felix. It
was too dark to see faces; but silence was already taking effect, and
when she found herself beckoned into the study, she knew her brother
was strongly moved, and was too sure of the cause by intuition to utter
her former cry, 'Is it Edgar?' only she trembled as Felix made her sit
down on the sofa, and placing himself beside her, said, 'My Cherry, our
long waiting is over;' and then while her fingers closed on the hand
that held them, he calmly told her the facts.
She bore it better than he had expected, unknowing how he himself
absorbed her chief anxiety. Indeed, the hours which had intervened had
brought him to so resigned and thankful a tone, that it almost hid from
her the full force of his tidings. She asked for the letter, and then
rose in search of light.
'You would like to go to your room,' he said, and gave her his arm,
both too much absorbed to remember that he had not helped her upstairs
since the accident. When he had kissed her, and shut her into her room,
he leant for some seconds on the rail, and his face was contracted by
suffering, more physical than mental.
He was at the evening meal, and so was Cherry. She would not have her
supper sent up, she wanted to be in his presence, and be supported by
it. She was so far stunned, that the horrors that would yet haunt her
for many a night had not dawned on her imagination; but when he said,
'It is well,' she felt it so, but she needed to look at his face to be
soothed and comforted--yes, though it was terribly pale. The colour,
save in chance flushes, had never come back, and to-night the whiteness
was like marble, but the quiet strength and peace seemed to hush, bear
her up, and quell the wailings of her heart.
And when John Harewood came full of anxious inquiry, he really thought
the tidings had overcome them less than his own wife, who had never
quite recovered the effect of her exertions at the accident, and coming
home over-tired, had been quite crushed by the intelligence--the more
because, like those whose judgment was stronger than their yearning
over Edgar, she did not trust much to those few tokens of penitence.
And Angela was not withheld from loudly blaming Fernan for not having,
as she assumed, insisted on proclaiming the sinner's Hope, and when
assured, that no doubt he must have done so, though he did not set down
his own words, she shook her head, and said, 'How could he, when he did
not know it himself?' There she was silenced by Felix, and went to the
Hepburns for sympathy.
For the rest, the family spoke little of the new loss. Felix quietly
busied himself in the arrangements that the discovery of of his new
heir made him think desirable. Mrs. Fulbert's remarriage, and the
lapse of her annuity, made him better able to carry out his plans at
once; and if his heir were not Clement, it was necessary to make the
arrangements more definitively.
Of course the little Gerald was telegraphed and written for. He must be
welcomed and loved, but he was on the whole dreaded as much as hoped
for. The Mays spoke of the self-reliance of the best-trained colonial
children; and what could this poor boy be--the deserted son of the
singing-woman--but at best a sort of 'Luck of Roaring Camp.' Wilmet
infinitely pitied Geraldine, and rejoiced that the river lay between,
to keep Kester and Edward out of the way of corruption.