DEAD-SEA FRUIT.
VOL. I.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY J. OGDEN AND CO.,
172, ST. JOHN STREET, E.C.
DEAD-SEA FRUIT
A Novel
BY THE AUTHOR OF
“LADY AUDLEY’S SECRET,”
ETC., ETC., ETC.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
LONDON
WARD, LOCK, AND TYLER
WARWICK HOUSE, PATERNOSTER ROW
1868.
[_All rights reserved_]
LONDON:
PRINTED BY J. OGDEN AND CO.,
172, ST. JOHN STREET, E.C.
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
I. QUITE ALONE 1
II. A RETROSPECTIVE SURVEY 18
III. “TAKE BACK THESE LETTERS, MEANT FOR HAPPINESS” 38
IV. UN MENAGE A DEUX 61
V. THE EDITOR OF THE “AREOPAGUS” 78
VI. AT BAYHAM 97
VII. MR. JERNINGHAM’S QUEST 123
VIII. GREENLANDS 144
IX. HOW THEY PARTED 169
X. THERE IS ALWAYS THE SKELETON 192
XI. “J’AIME: IL FAUT QUE J’ESPERE” 209
XII. THE GREEN-EYED MONSTER 240
XIII. MISS ST. ALBANS 264
XIV. IN THE GREEN-ROOM 289
DEAD-SEA FRUIT.
CHAPTER I.
QUITE ALONE.
THE marble image of Hubert Van Eyck stood out against the warm blue
sky, and cast a slanting shadow across the sunlit flags. The July
afternoon was drawing to a close. Low sunlight shone golden on the
canals of Villebrumeuse, and changed every westward-looking window into
a casement of gold. Those are no common windows which look out upon
the quiet streets and lonely squares of that sleepy Belgian city. No
handiwork of modern speculative builder is visible amid that grand old
architecture--no flimsy nineteenth-century villa perks its tawdry head
among those mediæval splendours--no upstart semi-detached abominations
of spurious Gothic, picked out with rainbow-coloured brick, affright
the eye by their hideous aspect. To live in Villebrumeuse is to live
in the sixteenth century. A quiet calm, as of the past, pervades the
shady streets. Green trees reflect themselves in the still waters of
the slow canal which creeps athwart the city; and by the side of the
tranquil waters there are pleasant walks o’er-shadowed by the umbrage
of limes, and wooden benches whereon the peaceful citizens may repose
themselves in the evening dusk. In despite of its solemn tranquillity,
this Villebrumeuse is not a dreary dwelling-place. If it has drifted
from amidst the busy places of this earth--if the blustrous ocean of
modern progress has receded from its shores, leaving it far away across
a level waste of reef and sand--this quiet city has, at the worst, been
left stationary, while the noisy tide sweeps on with all its tumult of
success and failure--its prosperous ventures and forgotten wrecks. The
peace which pervades Villebrumeuse is the tranquillity of slumber,
and not the awful stillness of death. There is a jog-trot prosperity
in the place, a comfortable air, which is soothing to the world-worn
spirit; but the wrestling, and scuffling, and striving, and struggling
of modern commerce is unknown among the quiet merchants, who content
themselves with supplying the simple wants of their fellow-citizens in
the simplest fashion. And yet this city was once a mart to which the
Orient brought her richest merchandise; and in the days gone by, these
quaint old squares have been clamorous with the voices of many traders,
and bright with the holiday raiment of busy multitudes.
A young Englishman walked slowly up and down the broad flagged
square, across which the painter’s statue cast its sombre shadow.
He was teacher of English and mathematics in a great public academy
near at hand, and his name was Eustace Thorburn. For three years he
had held his post in the Villebrumeuse academy; for three years he
had done his duty, quietly and earnestly, to the satisfaction of
every one concerned in the performance. And yet he was something of
an enthusiast, and something of a poet, and possessed many of those
attributes which are commonly supposed to constitute a letter of
license for the neglect of vulgar every-day duties.
That was an ardent and an ambitious spirit which shone out of Eustace
Thorburn’s gray eyes; but if the fiery sword had chafed the scabbard
a little during three years of academical routine and Villebrumeuse
monotony, the young man had been patient and contented withal. There
was a public library in Villebrumeuse to which the tutor had free
entrance, and in the mediæval chambers of this institution his leisure
had been spent. That dreamy idleness amongst good books had been very
pleasant to him; his work in the academy was endurable, despite its
tedious and laborious nature; and he had a lurking tenderness for the
quaint old city, the slow canals overshadowed by green trees, the
simple people, and the old-world customs. Thus, if there were times
when the eager spirit would fain have soared to loftier and fairer
regions, the young student and teacher had not been altogether unhappy
since his destiny had brought him to this place to earn his bread
amongst strangers.
Amongst strangers? Were the inhabitants of this Belgian city any
more strange to him than all the other inhabitants of this populous
earth--except the one man and woman who made the sum-total of his
kindred and friends? Amongst strangers? Why, if the statue of Van Eyck
could have descended from yonder pedestal, to walk in the streets of
the city, the animated effigy could scarcely have been a lonelier
creature than the young man who passed to and fro athwart the sloping
shadow on the flags this July afternoon.
Looking backward, through the shadows of the past, how many of those
images, familiar to most men, were wanting in the mystic pictures that
memory presented to Eustace Thorburn! Memory, let him question her
never so closely, could not show him any faint tracing of a father’s
face flickering dimly athwart the half-consciousness of infancy.
Nor could he, in surveying the events of his childhood, recall so
much as one visit to a father’s grave, one accidental utterance of a
father’s name, one object, however trivial, associated with a father’s
existence--a picture, a sword, a book, a watch, a tress of hair. The
time had been when he had been wont to question his mother about this
missing father; but that was long ago. The time had come, and too
quickly in this young man’s life, when a precocious wisdom had checked
his questioning, and he had learned to refrain from all reference to
a father’s name, as the one subject, of all others, most scrupulously
to be avoided by his lips. He was twenty-three years of age, and he
had never been told his father’s name or position in the world. For
the last ten years of his life it had been a common thing for him to
lie awake in the solemn quiet of the night, thinking of that unknown
father, and wondering whether he were alive or dead. He knew that he
had no claim to the name which he bore, and that he had as good a right
to call himself a Guelph or a Plantagenet as he had to call himself
Thorburn.
How many childless men upon this earth would have been glad to call
Eustace Thorburn son! How many of this world’s magnates, with mighty
names to transmit, would have rejoiced with unspeakable rapture, could
they have set the joy-bells ringing for the coming of age of such an
heir! As there are rare and peerless flowers that adorn inaccessible
regions where no hand can gather them, where no eye may delight in
their loveliness, so there are friendless creatures in the world who
might make the joy of empty hearts, and be the pride of desolate
households. The “something in this world amiss,” which the poet has
sung of, pervades every social relation. The plaintive wailing of the
minor mingles itself with every earthly melody; and it is only by and
by that the veil shall be lifted; it is only by and by that the mystic
enigma shall be unriddled, and the full chords of perfect harmony peal
on our ears, unmarred by that undertone of pain.
Not often has a nobler face looked upward to the countenance of
the statue than that which looked at it with a dreamy gaze to-day.
The face of the young man was, like the face of the statue, more
beautiful by reason of, its nobility of expression than because of its
perfect regularity of feature. In Eustace Thorburn’s countenance the
intellectual radiance so far surpassed the physical beauty, that those
who looked at him for the first time were impressed chiefly by the
brightness of his expression, and were likely to take their leave of
him in complete ignorance as to the shape of his nose or the modelling
of his mouth.
It is but a thankless task to catalogue such a face; the dark gray eyes
which pass for black; the mobile mouth which, in one moment, seems
formed to express an unbending pride and an indomitable will, and in
the next will wreathe itself into such a smile that it must needs
appear incapable of any expression but manly tenderness or playful
humour; the loosely arranged auburn hair, which gives something of a
leonine aspect to the lofty head; the complexion of almost womanly
fairness, with a rich glow that comes and goes with every changing
impulse or emotion--all these go such a little way towards the
individuality of the young Englishman, walking up and down the lonely
square during his half-hour’s respite from the monotonous duties of the
afternoon.
This half-hour’s holiday was not Mr. Thorburn’s only privilege. He
had two hours in every day for his own studies--two hours which he
generally spent in the public library, for his ambition had shaped
itself into a palpable form, and had mapped the outline of a career.
He was to be a man of letters. If he had been a rich man, he would
have shut himself in his library and made himself a poet. But as he
was nothing but a nameless and penniless stripling, with his bread to
earn, he had no right to indulge in the luxury of verse-making. The
wide arena of literary labour lay before him, and he had no choice but
to force his way into the lists, and fight for any place that might
happen to be vacant. Fate might make of him what she would--journalist,
novelist, dramatist, magazine hack, penny-a-liner: but she must use him
very cruelly before she could quench the fire of his young ambition, or
bend the crest with which he was prepared to confront the world.
He had selected for himself this profession of literature chiefly
because it was the only calling which demanded no capital from the
beginner, and a little because the only kinsman he had in the world
was a man who lived by his pen, and who might have prospered and won
distinction by means of that fluent pen, had he not chosen to do
otherwise.
The half-hour’s respite expired presently, and a great clanging bell in
the academy near at hand summoned the pupils to their evening lesson.
It was a summons for the master also, and Mr. Thorburn ran across the
square and turned into the street on which one side of the academy
looked. He pushed open a little wooden door in the big gateway, and
passed under the arched entrance; but before going to his class-room,
he stopped to examine a rack in which letters addressed to the masters
were wont to be kept. He rarely omitted to look at this rack, though
he had very few correspondents, and only received about one letter in
a fortnight. To-day there was a letter. His heart turned cold as he
looked at it, for the envelope was bordered with black, and addressed
in the hand of his mother’s brother, who very seldom wrote to him. His
mother had been an invalid for a long time, and such a letter as that
could have but one fatal meaning. For months he had looked forward to
his August holiday, which would enable him to go to England and spend a
few happy weeks with that dear mother--and now the holiday would come
too late.
He went out into one of the dismal playgrounds, a gravelled yard
surrounded by high whitewashed walls, and read his letter.
His tears fell thick and fast upon the flimsy paper as he read. Ten
minutes ago, walking to and fro in the sunshine, he had lamented his
loneliness, remembering that he had only two friends in the world. He
knew now that the dearer of these two was lost to him. The letter told
him of his mother’s death.
“There is no need for you to hurry back, my poor lad,” wrote his uncle.
“The funeral is to take place to-morrow, and will be over when you get
this letter. I saw your mother a fortnight before her death, and she
then told me what she could never find the courage to tell you--that
the end was very near. It came suddenly at the last, and I was out of
the way at the time; but they tell me it was a calm and holy ending.
Her last words were of you. She dwelt much on your goodness and
devotion, Mrs. Bane tells me. The last two days were spent in prayer,
poor innocent soul; and I, who stand in so much greater need of that
kind of thing, can’t bring myself to it for half an hour! Poor soul!
Bane thinks it was for you she was praying, she repeated your name
so often--sometimes in her sleep, sometimes when she was lying in a
languid state between sleeping and waking. But she did not wish you to
be sent for. ‘It is better that he should be away,’ she said; ‘I think
he knew that this day must soon come.’
“And now, my dear boy, try to bear up against this sorrow like a brave,
true-hearted lad, as you are. I say nothing of what I feel myself, for
there are some things which come with a bad grace from certain people.
You know that I loved my sister; though, God knows, _I_ never knew
how dearly till yesterday, when I saw the blinds down at Mrs. Bane’s,
and guessed what had happened. Remember, Eustace, that so long as I
can earn a crust, my sister Celia’s son shall be welcome to his share
of it; and though I may be a disreputable acquaintance, I can be a
faithful friend. If you are tired of that slow old Belgian city, come
back to England. We will manage your establishment here somehow. The
impracticable Daniel has a certain kind of influence; and though he
rarely cares to use it on his own account,--being so bad a lot that he
dare not give himself a decent character,--he will employ it to the
uttermost for a spotless nephew.
“Come, then, dear boy; a kind of heart-sickness has come over me, and
I want to see the brightest face that I know in this world, and the
only face that I love. Come, even if you must needs return to the
whitewashed saloons of the Parthenée. There are letters and papers
of your poor mother’s which it might be well for you to destroy. My
profane hand shall not tamper with them.”
The young man thrust his kinsman’s letter in his breast, and paced the
playground slowly for some time, meditating the loss that had come
upon him. In one of the big class-rooms near at hand his pupils were
waiting for him; and there was wonderment and consternation at this
delay in the most punctual of all the masters. His tears had dropped
fast upon the letter some time ago; but his eyes were dry now. The
dull agony which filled his breast was rather a sense of desolation
than a poignant grief. He had seen and known that his mother was fading
from this troubled earth before his coming to Belgium; and poverty’s
bitterest penalty had been the necessity which had separated him from
her. The shadow of this coming sorrow had long darkened the horizon of
his young life. The sad reality had come upon him a little sooner than
he had expected it, and that was all. He bowed his head, and resigned
himself to this affliction; but there was something to which he could
not resign himself, and that was the manner of his loss.
“Alone--in a hired lodging--with a poor, ill-paid, hard-working drudge
for her sole companion and consoler! O mother, mother, you were too
bright a creature for so sad a fate!”
And then there arose before this young man’s eyes one of those pictures
which were continually haunting him--the picture of what his life and
his mother’s life might have been, had things been different with
them. He fancied himself the beloved and acknowledged son of a good
and honourable man; he fancied his mother a happy wife. Ah! then how
changed all would have been! Sickness and death would have come all
the same, perhaps, since there is no earthly barrier that can exclude
those dark visitors from happy households. They would have come, the
dreaded guests, but with how different an aspect! He made for himself
the picture of two death-beds. By one there knelt a group of loving
children, weeping silently for a dying mother, while a grief-stricken
husband suppressed all outward evidence of his sorrow, lest he should
trouble the departing spirit whose earthly tabernacle was supported
by his fond arms. And the other death-bed! Alas, how sad the contrast
between the two pictures! A woman lying alone in a dingy chamber,
abandoned and forgotten by every creature in the world except her son,
and even he away from her.
“And for this, as well as for all the rest, we have to thank
_him_!” muttered the young man. His face, which until now had
been overshadowed only by a quiet despondency, darkened suddenly as he
said this. It was not the first time he had apostrophized a nameless
enemy in the same bitter spirit. He had very often abandoned himself
to vengeful thoughts about this unknown foe, to whose evil-doing he
attributed every sorrow of his own, and all those hidden griefs and
silent agonies so patiently endured by his mother. He kept a close
account of his mother’s wrongs, and of his own, and he set them all
against this person, whom he had never seen and whose name he might
never discover.
This nameless enemy was his father.