the appointment."
"Then poor papa must get pleased again," said the young man, petulantly.
"I cannot, and I will not, stand a clerk's desk. I'd sooner enlist."
"Frank!" cried his mother, reproachfully.
"Well, I declare I would, mother," he said, thrusting his hands into his
pockets, and walking up and down the room.
"To find freedom?" said his mother, with a smile.
"Oh! I dare say there would be discipline to attend to, and officers to
obey; but there would be some change. I should not have to be tied down
to a wretched writing-table, copy, copy, copy, the whole day long."
"Change?" said Mrs Mallow, and she gazed wistfully in her son's face.
"Yes, of course; one must have some excitement."
He stood gazing out of the window, and did not notice the strange
despairing look in his mother's eyes, one which seemed to tell of her
own weary hours--weary years, passed upon that couch, with no hope of
change save that of some day sinking into the eternal rest. It was
evident that she was contrasting the selfishness of her son and his
position with her own, and she sighed as she closed her eyes and lay
there in silence for a time, uttering no reproach.
Then came the day when the Rector was goaded almost to madness by the
young man's follies, and the reports constantly reaching his ears of
Frank's exploits at the principal hotel in billiard-playing and various
unsavoury pursuits with one or other of the young farmers round.
Reports these that lost nothing doubtless in the telling, and which
never failed to reach the Rector in a way that seemed to suggest that he
was answerable for his son's misdoings.
Then followed other troubles, culminating in an affray with the keepers,
an affair which, from the family friendship with old Lord Artingale,
could easily have been hushed up; but the Rector jumped at the
opportunity he found in his son's dread and evident anxiety to get away
from the neighbourhood, so quite in a hurry Frank was shipped off to New
Zealand.
And there was peace at the Rectory? Nothing of the kind. There was the
misery of hearing endless little stories of Frank's "carryings on," as
they were termed; some bill was constantly being brought to the house,
with a request that the Rector would pay it, and, to hide his son's
disgrace, this he sometimes did. But the annoyance was none the less,
and the Rector used to declare plaintively to his wife that if it were
not for Julia and Cynthia he would run right away.
"And for me, Eli," said the suffering woman, with a smile.
"And for you, dear," he said, tenderly, and there was peace until some
new peccadillo of the eldest son was discovered.
Then to the Rector's dismay he found that Cyril--his mother's darling--
seemed to have taken a leaf out of his brother's book. If the younger
brother's career had been to run upon a tram-line laid down by his elder
brother, he could not have followed in the course more truly, and just
as the Rector was beginning to feel calmed down and happy in the society
of his two pretty daughters, troubles concerning Cyril kept cropping up.
"Nice chaps for a parson's sons," said Jabez Fullerton, the principal
draper at Lawford, who could afford to speak out, as Mrs Mallow and her
daughters sent to Swan and Edgar's for everything. And he did speak
out; for, as deacon at his chapel and occasional preacher, he never lost
an opportunity of saying a few words by way of practice.
"Nice chaps for a parson's sons! This is the sort of stuff they send to
college, and then send back to teach us, in their surplices which we
have to pay for the washing of, though we never go to church. Nice
fellows they'll be to preach sermons--out of books too--read 'em. We at
chapel never read our sermons, eh?"
There was a murmur of acquiescence here, and Mr Jabez Fullerton felt
happy.
Not that the Rev Eli Mallow had thought of making his sons clergymen
after testing them for a short time. Cyril had, like his brother, been
to college, and with a view to his succeeding to the living of Lawford,
but, as in the case of Frank, the Rector soon gave him up in despair.
Matters grew worse; then worse still. Expostulation, prayer, anger, all
were tried in vain, and, having to bear the trouble to a great extent in
silence, so as to hide it from the sick mother, who idolised Cyril, the
Rector was at times almost beside himself.
At last there came a crash, and the Rector determined to get this son
away before something worse should result.
Emigration was being much talked of just then, and plenty of young men
were going out to the various colonies to commence life as squatters
both in the far east and west. A couple of the young farmers of the
neighbourhood of Lawford were about to start, and, after a stormy scene
with his father, Cyril came one day to propose that he should be
furnished with a little capital and an outfit, so that he could go and
try his luck in Australia.
For a few moments the Rev Eli Mallow was aghast at the idea. He
wished Cyril to leave the town, but not to go abroad.
"I don't care where I go," said Cyril; "I'll either try Australia, or go
and hunt out Frank and chum with him."
"But we don't know where he is," said the Rector.
"New Zealand."
"Yes, but New Zealand is large."
"Not so large but what a fellow might find out Frank. Everyone would
know him."
The Rector sighed, and wished his sons were not so popular with a
certain class, and then he thought over the position, and shrank from
giving his consent. Knowing the mother's intense love for her son, he
felt that the parting would nearly break her heart, and after a few
moments' pause he said so.
"Oh, you need not fidget about that," said the young man. "I've talked
to her about it for days past."
"And what does she say?"
"Well, it upset her a bit at first, but she soon came round, and she
thinks it would be the best thing I could do."
It was then with a sense of relief that made him feel ashamed, that the
father, after a liberal endowment of money, saw his son sent from
Liverpool, after the heartiest promises on the part of the young man to
do battle with life and make himself a name and a position in the
colony.
"If not for my sake, Cyril, for your mother's," the father had said, as
he held his son's hand upon the deck of the Great Central liner.
"Depend upon me this time, father," was the earnest reply, and Cyril
went his way across the sea, fully believing in himself that his wild
oats were sown, and that now he was about to make a position of
substantial basis for himself.
It was a strange thing, and as if a curious kind of clairvoyance made
him prophetic, for the Rev Eli Mallow went home, and that evening
busied himself over his next Sunday's sermon, involuntarily choosing the
parable of the Prodigal Son, and not waking up to the fact of what he
had done till he sat there in his study reading the manuscript over by
the light of his shaded lamp.
"Give me the portion of goods that falleth to me," he muttered in a low
voice, as, with the manuscript in his hand, he sat gazing straight
before him into the darker part of the room, and then became silent.
"And took his journey into a far country," he muttered again, in the
same dreamy abstracted manner, and then there was a longer pause,
followed by a deep sigh.
The Rev Eli Mallow rose slowly from his seat, and, with an agonised
look in his face, walked up and down the room for some time before
sinking back into his chair.
"And there wasted his substance with riotous living."
It did not seem to be his voice that spoke in the silence of that room;
but he knew it was his that exclaimed piteously as the king of old--"Ah,
Cyril, my son, my son!" Again there was absolute silence in that room,
till, quoting once more from the parable which he had made the subject
of his discourse, the Rector said softly--
"Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee, and am no more
worthy to be called thy son."
"Yes, and I should forgive him," he continued, after a pause. "I do try
to practise as I preach. Poor Cyril! poor wilful boy. I pray heaven
that my thoughts have been doing thee wrong."
There was a gentle smile upon his lips then as he took the manuscript of
his sermon and tore it up into very small pieces before consigning it to
the waste-paper basket.
"No," he said, "I must not preach a sermon such as that: it is too
prophetic of my own position with my sons;" and as we know this prodigal
did return penniless, having worked his way back in a merchant brig, to
present himself one day at the rectory in tarry canvas trousers, with
blackened horny hands and a reckless defiant look in his eyes that
startled the quiet people of the place.
He made no reference as to his having wasted his substance; he talked
not of sin, and he alluded in nowise to forgiveness, to being made as
one of his father's hired servants, but took his place coolly enough
once more in the house, and if no fatted calf was killed, and no
rejoicings held, he was heartily welcomed and forgiven once again.
He was his mother's favourite, and truly, in spite of all, there was
forgiveness ready in the father's heart. As there was also for Frank,
who after some years' silence had suddenly walked in at the rectory
gates, rough-looking and boisterous, but not in such a condition as his
brother, who had quite scandalised the men-servants, neatly clad in the
liveries, of which a new supply had come from London, greatly to the
disgust of Smithson in the market-place, who literally scowled at every
seam.
PART ONE, CHAPTER SIXTEEN.
AT THE KING'S HEAD.
"What I say is this," exclaimed Jabez Fullerton. "Justice is justice,
and right is right."
"Hear, hear!" murmured several voices, as Mr Fullerton glanced round
the room, and drew himself up with the pride of a man who believed that
he had said something original.
"I hope I'm too good a Christian to oppose the parson," he continued,
"and I wouldn't if it had been Mr Paulby, but it's time we stopped
somewhere, gentlemen."
"Hear, hear!" again; and several of the gentlemen addressed took their
long pipes from their mouths to say it, and then, replacing them,
continued to smoke.
"Ever since parson has been back he has been meddling and interfering.
First he kills poor old Sammy Warmoth. Broke his heart, he did. Then
he makes Joe Biggins saxon, a man most unfitted for the post, gentlemen.
I say a man most unfitted for the post."
"Hear, hear!"
"Chap as is always looking at you as if he wanted to measure you for a
coffin," said Smithson, the tailor.
"Natural enough," said the Churchwarden, chuckling; "you always look at
our clothes, Smithson, eh?"
"Ay, I do, Master Portlock, sir; but I don't want you to die for it. I
want you to live and grow stout, and want new suits, not a last one."
"Stiff, hard suit o' mourning, eh, Smithson, made o' wood?"
"Yes, sir, well seasoned; ellum, eh?"
There was a general laugh at this lugubrious joking, and Fullerton
tapped impatiently with his pipe-bowl upon the table.
"I say, gentlemen, a most unsuitable man," he continued.
"Who would you have had then?" said Churchwarden Portlock.
"Why Thomas Morrison, the wheelwright," said Fullerton, "if you must
have a churchman."
"Yes, a good man," was murmured in assent.
"Then he must be pulling the church all to pieces, and quarrelling with
the curate, and refusing to bury his dead. We wouldn't have refused to
bury our dead at chapel, gentlemen."
"Not you," chuckled Portlock. "You'd like to bury the lot of us, parson
and all."
"Gentlemen, this is begging the question," said Fullerton, with plump
dignity, and he settled his neck in his white cravat. "What I say is,
that I have no enmity against the parson, nayther have you."
"Nay, nay," said Warton, the saddler, who had the rectory pair horse
harness on his mind, the new double set, that he saw, by the name on the
packing-case, came from Peak's; "we only pity him. He has plenty of
trouble wi' those two boys of his. I hear the Bad Shilling's come back
now."
"Ay, he's back," said Smithson. "I've got a pair of his trousers to
mend. One never gets anything to make. Up at thy place last night,
wasn't he, Master Portlock?"
The Churchwarden nodded.
"Nice boys!" said Smithson. "Dessay the father was like 'em, for the
girls really are nice, like their mother."
"Then he was twice as hard as he need be on Jock Morrison," continued
Fullerton, who would finish. "Fancy sending a man to gaol for three
months just when his brother's got a death in the house."
"Fair play," cried Portlock. "The bairn died afterwards."
"Well, maybe it did," said Fullerton, "but he needn't have been so hard
on the poor bairn's uncle. Why not give him another chance? He's no
worse in his way than the parson's boys are in theirs."
"Boys will be boys," said Smithson, who wondered whether that pair of
trousers to mend might result in an order for a suit.
Fullerton was impatient, and cut in almost before the tailor had
finished.
"Clergymen's all very well in their way, gentlemen, but the dismissing
of old schoolmasters and appointing of new ones don't seem to me to be
in their way, especially where there's governors to a school."
"Parson's a governor too," said Warton, the saddler.
"_Ex officio_?" said Tomlinson, the ironmonger, who kept the bank.
"Of course, of course," acquiesced Fullerton, who had not the least idea
of what _ex officio_ meant; "but I said it before, and I said it to
parson's own face, just the same as I'm saying it here behind his back,
and any man who likes can tell him what I said," and he looked round
defiantly as he spoke; "what I say is, that, whatever Humphrey Bone's
faults may be, he's as good a land measurer as ever stepped."
"Yes, he _is_ that," said a broad farmer-looking man. "Joseph Portlock,
you said the very same thing to me yesternight."
"He's a first-class penman."
"Capital," said Tomlinson.
"And if you know a man with a clearer head for figures," continued
Fullerton, "I should be glad to see him."
"Capital man at ciphering," said Smithson, the tailor, whose yearly
accounts Humphrey Bone always made up.
"Then, what do you want?" said Fullerton, angrily. "We've all got our
faults, and if Humphrey Bone does take a little too much sometimes,
hasn't he been master of Lawford school these thirty years?"
The latter part of Jabez Fullerton's argument was not very clear to his
fellow-townsmen assembled at their weekly social meeting at the King's
Head; but they all granted that they had their faults, and Jabez
Fullerton waved the spoon with which he had been stirring his
brandy-and-water in a very statesmanlike way.
"Look here," he said, "I never go to church, for chapel's good enough
for me; but all the same I don't bear enmity against the church, and
never would."
"But you did oppose the church rates, Fullerton," said Tomlinson, with a
chuckle.
"On principle, neighbour, on principle; I couldn't help that. But in
this case what I say is, that though I'd be the last man in the world to
oppose parson, it would be a disgrace to the town if we let poor
Humphrey Bone be pitched out of the living, just because parson wants
the place for Churchwarden Ross's boy."
"Well, I don't know what to say about it," said Tomlinson, smoking
meditatively at his pipe. "Michael Ross is a very good neighbour of
mine, and brings his money to our bank regular. I should be sorry to
hurt his feelings, 'specially as his boy has been to London on purpose
to be trained."
"Let him get a school somewhere else. There's always plenty on the way,
I'll be bound."
"Don't seem to me as the boys'll take to a lad as was brought up, as you
may say, among 'em," said Smithson. "Bless my soul, gentlemen, I made
that boy his fust suit with three rows o' brass buttons, with marigolds
stamped on 'em. Bottle-green the suit was, and the trousers buttoned
over the jacket. You know, Fullerton; I had the cloth of you."
"Oh, yes, I know," said the draper suavely.
"Well," continued Smithson--
"Excuse me, Smithson," said Fullerton, "we're just discussing the
question of Mr Mallow carrying everything with a high hand, and turning
out old Humphrey Bone without our consent."
Smithson, the tailor, jumped up, scowled round at the assembled company,
stuck his hat upon his head with a bang, and walked straight out of the
room.
"He's huffed," said Fullerton, with a sidewise wag of the head, "but I
can't help his being offended. When a man becomes a public man, he's
got a public man's dooty to do to his fellow townsfolk, and at times
like this he's bound to speak. So what I say, gentlemen, is this; will
you all come to the meeting to-morrow, and back me up?"
No one spoke, and it was remarkable that every man present just then
seemed to feel his mouth dry, and reached out his hand for his glass.
"I say again, gentlemen," cried Fullerton, "will you all come and back
me up?"
Every man present seemed to consider that it was the duty of the others
to speak out and tackle Fullerton--so they mentally put it--and each
looked at the other in turn without avail, till the regards of all
present seemed to be concentrated upon Tomlinson, the ironmonger, who
after a little hesitation said--
"I don't think it was wise to upset Smithson. It's like sending a man
over to the enemy."
"I hope he hasn't got a long bill against you for clothes, Fullerton,"
said Warton, the saddler, with a chuckle. "You'll have it in before it
comes due."
"If I owed my tailor a bill I dare say I could pay it, Mr Warton," said
Fullerton, haughtily; "and I should be glad to know, gentlemen, whether
you mean to discuss the question of the appointment of a new master,
because if you don't I shall throw the whole matter up."
"Oh, no, no, no," came in a murmur; "don't do that, Fullerton," and an
appealing look was directed at Tomlinson, who drew a long breath,
refreshed himself, and went on.
"You see I don't think it would be wise to go and upset Mr Mallow if we
could help it," he said; "he's a very good customer of mine, and very
neighbourly. I don't think he's a bad sort of man."
"Not a bad sort of man!" cried Fullerton, indignantly; "why, it's a
burning shame for him to have charge of this parish at all. What's a
parson for?"
"Well," said Tomlinson, mildly, "I suppose to have the care of the
parish."
"Yes, and to rule and manage it," said Warton.
"Yes," cried Fullerton, "of course; and here's a man who can't manage
his own household, which is the wastefullest in the place."
"Might keep your family on what they waste, eh, Fullerton?" said Warton,
the saddler, with a chuckle, for he was a great friend of Smithson; and
it was a fact often commented upon by neighbours, that Fullerton's
domestic economy was of the most parsimonious character.
"I'm not the man to eat the parson's leavings," said Fullerton, angrily,
"nor yet the man to go cringing and touching my hat to him in hopes of
getting a harness-mending order."
Mr Warton refilled his pipe.
"I say," continued Fullerton, "that a man who can't rule his own sons
can't properly rule a parish."
"Nay, nay, nay," cried Tomlinson; "don't be too hard upon him, man.
He's a very good sort of fellow is Mallow, and I should be very sorry to
go against him."
"But you will go against him," said Fullerton, triumphantly; and he
looked very hard in the ironmonger's face.
Mr Tomlinson's pipe needed seeing to just then, and he let his eyes
rest upon the glowing fire therein, as he recalled certain little
speculative money transactions that had taken place between him and
Fullerton, and felt how awkward it might be if he offended his
fellow-townsman.
It would be very awkward to have to side against the Rector, but of two
evils Tomlinson felt bound to choose the least.
"I'm afraid that in this instance I must go against Mr Mallow," said
Tomlinson, deliberately; and Fullerton gave a triumphant glance round
the room.
"Hah!" he said to himself, "there's a wonderful power in money, and one
never knows what it will do."
PART ONE, CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.
THE GOVERNORS' MEETING.
Market morning again at Lawford, and the customary business going on.
There were a few pigs in the pens; a larger amount of butter than usual
at the cross, some of it holding a good two ounces of salt to the pound.
A sale by auction of some old furniture was to take place, and gigs,
cars, and carts were coming in.
The rectory carriage, with Julia and Cynthia Mallow looking sweet and
attractive enough to tempt the tradespeople who quarrelled with the
father to touch their hats, came in quite early, setting down the
Rector, who had to visit the bookseller's and order a new volume for the
society library, and soon after he was on his way to the chief point of
attraction that morning, to wit, the special meeting of the governors of
Lawford School, with the Rector in the chair.
The meeting, according to custom, had been called for the vestry-room,
which would only comfortably hold six, and then adjourned to the King's
Head, where the townspeople and those interested in the important event
were gathered in force.
Thirty years before, when Humphrey Bone obtained his appointment, only
three people were present--to wit, the then rector of the parish and a
couple of governors. But there was no opposition in those days.
Dissent had not taken so strong a hold on the little town, and the
disposition for making a party fight over every trifling matter had not
grown into the ascendant.
On this particular day, however, though to a man every one present,
whether Nonconformist or supporter of Church and State, would have
stoutly denied that party feeling or local politics had anything to do
with his presence, it was very evident that there were two opposing
sides, and that the meeting was pretty evenly divided between the
supporters of the Rector, who believed in the time being come for the
appointment of a new master, and those who nailed their colours to the
mast old style, and openly declared that any change made must be for the
worse.
Humphrey Bone was there one of the first, making the boards echo with
his thick boot, and it was noticed that the said boot had been
thoroughly blacked, that Humphrey was well shaved, his hair had been
cut, and that he had on a clean white shirt.
Fullerton was there, too, talking to him aside, and Tomlinson, Smithson,
and Warton soon put in an appearance, one and all looking as important
and solemn as if the constitution of the country were at stake, in place
of so mild a question as that which was to be settled--whether Humphrey
Bone was to be superseded, or not.
The room was growing pretty full. Michael Ross, the tanner, had
entered, followed by his son, who looked very pale and determined,
speaking in a quick, decided way to Portlock, the churchwarden, who came
up and shook hands with both his father and him in turn.
Then the Rector entered, followed by Cyril, who sauntered into the room
with a careless air, nodding at first one and then another, till his
eyes met those of Luke Ross, when he started slightly, but returned the
keen fixed gaze with one full of angry resentment before looking down.
Then there was a little bustle and settling down in seats as the Rector
took the chair. The vestry clerk opened a big calf-skin covered book,
stuck a new quill pen behind his ear, and drew the ink a little nearer
to him, when there was a breathless pause, during which all who could
looked from Luke Ross, the young, to Humphrey Bone, the old, as if they
were the champions of the two causes assembled here, and as though they
were expected to come forward in front of the Rector's chair and do
battle manfully for the post.
Then the Rector quietly announced that the meeting that day was for the
purpose of confirming the appointment of the new master to the boys'
school, and also to accept the resignation of the late master, Mr
Humphrey Bone.
"Never resigned," shouted that individual; and he involuntarily wiped
his mouth, as if to remove all traces of his having been seeking for
support at the King's Head bar.
Mr Mallow frowned slightly, and there was a low buzz of satisfaction on
one side of the room.
"Didn't resign, and don't want to resign," said Humphrey Bone more
loudly, being encouraged by the looks of approbation he received.
"And to confirm the dismissal of Mr Humphrey Bone from the office of
master of the school," said the Rector, firmly. "I beg pardon,
gentlemen, I was under the impression that Mr Bone had resigned. I may
add, gentlemen, that the preliminaries have been settled at the former
meeting, and all that is requisite now is for a majority of the
governors to sign the minute that the clerk to the vestry will prepare.
If any gentleman has a remark or two he would like to make, we shall be
most happy to hear him."
"Yes, that's easy enough to say," whispered Warton to Smithson. "He's
used to speaking in public. I always feel as if my heart's getting into
my mouth."
"Mr Fullerton, I think, wishes to address you, gentlemen," said the
Rector, smiling and sitting down.
Mr Fullerton looked as if he would have liked to strangle the Rector
for that smile. It was a perfectly innocent smile, in no wise directed
at the would-be speaker, but it seemed to Fullerton that the Rector was
ridiculing him, and it put him off his text for the moment, but he
recovered himself, and in a very florid speech, full of wanderings from
the point, opposed the appointment of a new master on the ground that
Humphrey Bone having been duly nominated and appointed, unless he had in
some special way become unfit for his post, the Rector had no right to
dismiss him.
Mr Bone uttered a very loud "Hear, hear!"
Two more of the townsmen, followers of Fullerton, rose in turn to speak,
but were silenced on the spot by the announcement of the Rector, that
this was not an ordinary meeting of ratepayers, but of the governors of
the school, who alone had a right to make any motion and speak to the
proposition before the meeting.
This being so, Tomlinson was forced into action by his neighbour, and in
smooth tones regretted that he was compelled to go in opposition to "our
worthy Rector," but, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, he must object to the
appointment of so young a man as Mr Luke Ross to so important a post,
and after a long speech, in which he went round and round the subject a
dozen times, he ended by declaring that he should vote against the
appointment.
To his annoyance, the Rector, as the meeting went on, found himself
undoubtedly in the minority, and he felt bitterly the position in which
Luke Ross had been placed.
Just then, however, a couple of the governors, upon whom he knew that he
could depend, entered the room, and the tables, he felt, were turned.
Luke had been sitting, chafing at every word that had been said against
his appointment, and every now and then, as he met Cyril Mallow's eye,
it seemed to him to be full of triumph at his discomfiture.
Then, too, he kept glancing at Portlock, and as he did so the bluff,
wealthy farmer's words came back, mingled with the contempt he seemed to
feel for the pittance that was to be the young master's for the first
few years.
Five hundred a year--five hundred a year--seemed to keep repeating
itself to Luke Ross, as his eyes once more met those of Cyril Mallow,
whose countenance wore a decided sneer.
"Then now, gentlemen, I think," said the Rector, "we will proceed to
vote."
"Stop!" cried Luke Ross.
It was on the impulse of the moment. He had had no such thought when he
entered the room.
"We will hear you, Mr Ross, after the voting is over," said the Rector,
quietly.
"No, sir," replied Luke, "I must ask you to hear me first. I have
decided not to accept the post."
There was a dead silence in the room for a few moments after Luke Ross's
decisive words, a silence broken by Humphrey Bone, who relieved the
excitement under which he laboured by starting from his seat, and
bringing his thick-soled boot down with a tremendous clump upon the
floor.
"Do I understand you to say, Mr Ross, that you decline the post?"
exclaimed the Rector.
"Yes, sir, definitely," replied Luke. "I could not, under the
circumstances, think of accepting the appointment."
There was another pause here, and then, led by Fullerton, the opposition
party broke into a loud cheer.
"Silence if you please, gentlemen," exclaimed the Rector, with a greater
show of indignation than any one present remembered him to have
displayed. "This is no time for showing party feeling. Of course, as
Mr Ross declines to accept the appointment--"
"But he don't," cried old Michael Ross, "he wants time to think it
over."
"Hush, father," exclaimed the young man, firmly, "I know my own mind.
Mr Mallow, I am sorry to have given all this trouble, and, as it were,
placed you in a false position; but until a few minutes back I did not
see this matter in the light I do now, and I definitely decline the
post."
"Your action does you great credit, young man," said Fullerton,
pompously; "and I am glad to congratulate my fellow-townsman, Michael
Ross, on the possession of such a son."
"Your compliment is misplaced, sir," said Luke, coldly, "for my action
in this matter is in nowise creditable to me. But that is my affair,
and it need not be discussed."
Mr Fullerton scowled on receiving this snub, and he was about to make
some angry retort, but the Rector said at once--
"Then, gentlemen, we need say no more, unless you wish to discuss the
question of Mr Bone's dismissal."
"I claim," said Fullerton, "that he cannot be dismissed."
"A majority of the school governors have the power to dismiss him, Mr
Fullerton," replied the Rector, with dignity; and after a few more words
he left the chair, the meeting being declared adjourned until
application had been made to one of the institutions for another master.
"I am sorry to find that you have come to such a decision, Mr Ross,"
said the Rector, as he encountered Luke outside the inn.
"I was sorry to come to such a decision, sir," replied Luke; "but,
believe me that I have been in no way influenced by those who seem to be
in opposition to you, and I hope that you will persist in Humphrey
Bone's dismissal, and the appointment of another man."
The Rector bowed and walked on with his son, who raised his hat slightly
to Luke, that salute being returned as the young men's eyes met once
more, each reading in those of the other a growing dislike which must
some day ripen into enmity.
Then they passed on their several ways, both having the same object in
view.
PART ONE, CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.
DOUBTS.
It was nearly twelve o'clock, and in spite of her efforts, Sage
Portlock's thoughts had wandered a good deal from the work she had in
hand. It was the morning upon which Luke Ross's appointment was to be
confirmed, and her face flushed as she thought of the time when he would
be conducting the next school, and the future looked very rosy and
bright, for she told herself that in secret she was very fond of Luke.
Julia and Cynthia Mallow had been there to take a class and chat with
her for a few minutes, Cynthia being ready with a sly allusion to the
business upon which papa had been left.
"We are going to pick up papa after he has fastened your schoolmaster,
Sage," she said; "but first of all we are going to drive over to the
farm and see Mrs Berry and the little ones. When does she go away?"
"To-morrow, Miss Cynthia," said Sage, turning rather white, "and--and
she is not very well. Would you mind not calling, Miss Julia?"
"Oh, no, certainly not," said Julia; "but I am sorry. Give our kind
love to her, Sage, and say we will drive over to Lewby some day and see
her there."
"Thank you, Miss Julia," said Sage, and she gladly saw the school
visitors depart, with the intention of going on to the ford.
Sage sighed as she stood at the door and saw the sisters get into the
handsomely appointed carriage that was waiting, and then she wished that
she had asked them when they were going back to London, for it seemed to
her that both she and Rue would feel happier and more at ease if the
Mallow family were gone.
Then she recalled her last meeting with Luke at home, and his words upon
learning--short conversation interrupted by her aunt--that there was to
be no engagement until he had realised a better income than would accrue
from the schools.
"That does not matter," she said, brightening up. "Luke is so brave and
determined, and has such spirit, that he will soon become rich enough
for us to marry, and, of course, we can wait."
There was no impatience in Sage's love for Luke Ross. She told herself
that she was very fond of him, and some day they would be man and wife,
but when did not seem to her to matter, and she busied herself once
more, light-hearted enough, with the children.
Then came the beginning of another train of thought, and there was once
more a slight flush in her cheeks as her mind turned to Cyril Mallow,
his coming to the school with his father, his meeting and speaking to
her once or twice when she was leaving school, and then, too, of his
coming to the farm to sit, and smoke, and talk with her uncle.
The colour deepened in her cheeks a little more as she thought of all
this; but, directly after, she drove these thoughts away, and busied
herself with the conclusion of the morning lessons.
Twelve o'clock, and the buzz and hurry of the dismissal, and then the
pleasant scent of the cool outer air as the windows were thrown open,
and again the bright elasticity of feeling as, well wrapped in warm
furry jacket and with her natty little, not-too-fashionable hat setting
off the freshness of her complexion and youthful looks, she started for
her brisk walk along the lane and across the field to the farm.
She had to pass Mrs Searby's cottage on her way, where that worthy
woman with upturned sleeves was standing at the open door in converse
with another of the mothers whose children attended the school.
"Good-morning," said Sage, as she passed them, and the second woman
returned the salutation; but Miss Searby's mamma replied by giving her
an uncompromising stare, and saying aloud before the young mistress was
out of hearing--
"Ah, she's going to meet young Cyril Mallow. Nice goings on, indeed,
for one like her."
Sage's cheeks turned scarlet as she hurried on, and a strange feeling of
shame and confusion troubled her. It was nothing that she was perfectly
innocent of any such intent, she felt horribly guilty all the same, and
it was only by a great effort that she kept back the hot tears of
indignation.
Then her conscience smote her with the recollection that she had thought
a good deal of Cyril Mallow lately, and she asked herself whether she
was turning traitorous to Luke Ross, but only to indignantly repel the
self-inflicted charge.
It was monstrous, she told herself. She was sure that she loved Luke
very dearly, as she always had from a child, when he had been like a
brother to her. Some day when he had climbed higher she would be his
wife, for she was sure her uncle never meant all that he had said. He
was too fond of her, and too eager to do all he could to make her happy.
"Such a shameful thing to say! A wicked woman!" exclaimed Sage then;
"as if I ever thought--Oh!"
She quickened her steps with her face growing scarlet once more, the red
flush having died out to leave it pale, for there were footsteps behind
her coming on quickly, and it was Cyril Mallow, she felt, hurrying to
catch her; and that was why the spiteful woman had spoken in that bitter
way.
The steps were coming nearer in spite of Sage's efforts to get home
before she was overtaken. _Pat, pat, pat, pat_! just as her heart was
beating with excitement. She felt frightened, she hardly knew why, and
dreaded being overtaken by Cyril, who seemed to have obtained some power
over her that she could not understand.
He was very pleasant spoken, and frank, and manly-looking, but she did
not like him nor his ways, for she was sure that he was a bad son.
"I wonder whether he would try to improve if I asked him, and pointed
out how wrong it is of him to be so much trouble to his parents,"
thought Sage; and then she shivered with a strange kind of dread.
Why had she thought all that? What was Cyril Mallow to her? It was
only out of civility that he had spoken to her as he had, but she felt
that it was out of place, and that Mr Mallow would not have approved of
it at all, and--and it was very dreadful.
As a rule, Sage Portlock was a firm, determined girl, full of decision
and strength of character, but the words of the spiteful woman seemed to
have quite unnerved her, and with the sense of being very guilty, and of
having behaved treacherously to Luke Ross, she had hard work to keep
from starting off, and breaking into a run.
"And he is coming on so quickly," she thought. "He will overtake me
before I get to the gate. How dare he follow me about like this, and
why is not Luke here to protect me!"
Sage Portlock's excitement had thoroughly mastered her, and she uttered
quite a hysterical little cry, as the steps drew quite near now, and a
voice exclaimed--
"Why, Sage, I almost had to run."
"Luke!"
"Yes; Luke," he replied, smiling, as he took her hand in his. "Who did
you think it was?"
"I--I--didn't know; I wanted to get home quickly," she faltered. "I did
not know it was you."
"I know that," he said, drawing her hand through his arm, "or else you
would have stopped, wouldn't you?"
"Why, of course, Luke," she said, smiling in his face, and with a calm
feeling of rest and protection coming over her disturbed spirit.
"I'm glad I caught you," he said. "Let's walk slowly, for I've a great
deal to say to you before you go in."
"But, first of all, tell me, Luke, dear," she cried eagerly, "is the
appointment confirmed?"
"No."
"No? Not confirmed? Then, that wicked old Bone--"
"That wicked old Bone of contention," he said, laughingly taking her up,
"has had very little to do with it. At one time I thought that it would
be very cruel to take his post, but I do not think so now."
"But not confirmed, Luke?" she cried, stopping short and clinging to his
arm, the picture of bitter disappointment. "Why, this is the meaning,
then, of the opposition uncle spoke of yesterday. Who has dared to stop
you from having the school?"
"You," said Luke, as he gazed admiringly in her animated face.
"I, Luke? I?" she exclaimed, in a puzzled way.
"Well, it is through you, dear," he said, smiling.
"But I have done nothing, Luke," she cried. "You are teasing me! Has
the meeting taken place?"
"Yes; I have just come from it."
"Well? Mr Bone was there I know, for he gave the boys a holiday, so
that he might come."
"Yes, he was there, evidently looking upon me as the greatest enemy he
had in the world till he heard me decline the post."
"You?--you declined the post, Luke?"
"Yes, I declined the post."
"And you told me you loved me," she said, reproachfully, as she drew
back.
"As I do with all my heart," he cried, taking her hand, and drawing it
through his arm once more. "Sage, dear, it is because I love you so
well that I have declined to take the school."
"When it was so near," she cried; and her tears seemed to have stolen
into her voice. "And now you will go and take a school ever so far
away. Oh, Luke," she cried, piteously, "it is too bad!"
"Hush, little one," he said, firmly. "It is not like you to talk like
that. I shall not take a school far away, though I shall have to leave
you. Sage, dear, I have felt that I must give up present pleasure for a
future joy."
"I--I--don't understand you," she cried; "your talk is all a puzzle to
me."
"Is it, dear? There, it shall not be long. You know what your uncle
said to me the other day?"
"Oh, yes, Luke; but I don't think he quite meant it."
"I am sure he did mean it," he replied; "and he is quite right. For the
past year I have been learning lessons of self-denial, and been taught
to place the schoolmaster's duty above questions of a pecuniary kind;
but your uncle has placed my position in a practical light, and, Sage,
dear, it is as if all the past teaching has been undone."
"Oh, Luke, Luke," she cried, "don't talk like that!"
"I must. I have had another talk with your uncle. This morning I
overtook him, and he asked me, as a man, whom he says he can trust, to
set aside all love-making, as he called it in his homely Saxon-English,
and to treat you only as a friend! `Let matters stand for the present,
and see what a couple of years bring forth, if you are doing well,' he
said, `in your new position.'"
"In your new position, Luke? Why, what do you mean?"
"Sage, dear, I have decided to set aside the idea of being the master of
a school."
"Oh, Luke!"
"And to read for the bar."
"Read for the bar?"
"Yes, read for the bar: become a barrister; and I shall work hard to win
a name."
"But the school, Luke--the training college. It is not honest to take
advantage of their teaching, gain all you can, and then take to some
other career."
"You think that?" he said, smiling. "Yes, of course," she said,
indignantly. "The principal at Westminster spoke very warmly about two
of the students giving up their schools directly, and taking situations
as governesses in good families."
"I quite agree with her," said Luke, quietly; "and I have appraised the
cost to the institution at fifty pounds. That sum I feel bound to send.
It is quite as much as so bad a master as I should have turned out is
worth."
"Oh, Luke, that is nonsense," she cried, as she looked proudly in his
face.
"Nay," he said, "it is truth. And now listen to me. This has all been
very sudden."
"Yes, and you never said a word to me."
"I came and told you as soon as I knew," retorted Luke, firmly. "And
now I say once more this has been very sudden, but it is irrevocably in
obedience to your uncle's wishes. I shall exact no promises from you,
tie you down in no way, but go away in perfect faith that in a few years
as the reward of my hard struggle, and when I can go and say to your
uncle, `See, here, I can command the income you said that I ought to
have!' you will be my little wife."
"But must you go away, Luke?" she said, with a pitiful look in her eyes.
"Yes, it is absolutely certain. How could I climb up in the world if I
stayed here?"
"But I don't want you to go," she cried, excitedly.
"And I don't want to leave you," he said, fondly.
"I want you to stop and protect me, and take care of me and keep me for
yours, Luke."
"Don't--don't talk like that," he cried, speaking hoarsely, "or you will
make me forget my promise to your uncle. Let us be firm and true, and
look the matter seriously in the face. It is for our future, and I pray
and believe that I am acting wisely here."
"But you will be away," she said, with a piteous look in her eyes.
"There will be no one to take care of me when you are gone."
"Nonsense, little one," he exclaimed. "There is your uncle. What have
you to fear? Only be true to me."
"Oh, yes, yes," she sobbed; "but you do not know, Luke. I might be
tempted, I might be led away from you--I might--"
"Might!" he said, with scorn in his voice. "My little Sage, whom I have
known from the day when she gave me first her innocent sisterly love,
could not be untrue to the man she has promised to wed. Sage, dear," he
continued, holding her hands in his, and gazing in her agitated, tearful
face, "look at me--look me fully in the eyes."
"Yes, Luke," she said, hesitatingly; and her pretty, troubled face
looked so winning that it was all he could do to keep from clasping her
in his arms tightly to his own trusting breast.
"Now," he said, smiling, "you see me. Can you doubt, dear, that I
should ever be untrue to you?"
"No, no! oh, no, Luke," she cried.
"Neither could I, dearest," he said, softly. "I am a very plain,
unimpulsive man, wanting, perhaps, in the soft speech and ways that are
said to please women; but I think my heart is right, and that in spite
of my quiet ways I love you very, very dearly."
"I know, I know you do," sobbed the girl.
"Yes, and I trust you, my dear," he said. "I know that you could never
give look or word to another that would cause me pain."
"No, no, dear Luke, I could not," she sobbed; "but I want you with me.
I cannot bear for you to leave me helpless here."
"Nonsense, my little pet," he said, tenderly. "The years will soon slip
by, and then all will be well. There, we understand each other, do we
not?"
"Yes, yes, Luke, I think so," she sobbed.
"One kiss, then, darling, the last I shall take, perhaps, for years, and
then--"
"Oh, no, not now--not now," she cried, hastily, as he sought to take her
in his arms in the sheltered lane. "Uncle is coming with Mr Cyril
Mallow;" and then she moaned passionately to herself, "Him again! Oh,
Luke, Luke, I wish that I was dead."
PART ONE, CHAPTER NINETEEN.
JULIA'S HORROR.
Two young men leaning over the park railings on a bright spring morning,
when the soot-blackened, well-worn grass that had been suffering from a
winter's chronic cold was beginning to put forth its tender green shoots
and dress itself for the season.
The rather muddy drive was on one side, the Serpentine on the other, and
indications that London was coming to town could be seen in the
increasing string of carriages.
One of the young men was undoubtedly dressed by Poole--well dressed; and
he looked worthy of his tailor's care. Frank, manly, handsome, there
was a pleasant look in his grey eyes; and if his fair moustache had not
been quite so heavy, a well-cut firm mouth would have been better seen.
Perhaps that very glossy hat was worn a trifle too much on one side, and
with the well set up appearance it suggested military, but the gold
horse-shoe pin with diamond nails directly after hinted equine: the
result being a compromise, and the looker-on concluded cavalry.
The other was of a heavier build, and was decidedly not dressed by a
good tailor. He was not shabby, but careless; and while his companion
was carefully gloved, he carried his hand-shoes in his hands, and
certainly his hat had not been touched by a brush that morning.
He was a good-looking, manly fellow, with very short hair and a very
long beard, thick enough to hide three parts of his chest.
The judge of human nature who had tried to read him at a glance, would,
if right, have said, "Good fellow, somewhat of a cynic, don't care a
_sou_ for appearances."
Two of the characters in this comedy, to wit, Henry Lord Artingale, man
of fashion with a good income; and James Magnus, artist of a manly
school, who had cut deeply his mark upon the time.
Another character was seated upon a bench some twenty yards away,
cutting his mark, not on the time, but upon the park seat, with an ugly,
sharp-pointed clasp-knife, which he closed with a snap, and then threw
one great leg over the newly-cut wood, as he seemed to feel more than
see the appearance of a policeman, who ran his eye shrewdly over the
fellow as if considering him a "party" likely to be "wanted."
Jock Morrison looked decidedly like the proverbial fish out of water as
he stared sullenly about, but not as one might stare who finds himself
in an incongruous position by accident. About the only ill-dressed
person in his neighbourhood, Jock seemed in no wise abashed, nor yet the
worse for his course of imprisonment, his dark beard having rapidly
grown and got well over the blacking-brush stage so affected by the
Parisian "swell." Far from seeming abashed, Jock Morrison was ready
with a cool, defiant look for every one not in the law, and as a rule
those who stared at the great swarthy fellow once were satisfied not to
repeat the look.
Jock was evidently in the park for a purpose, and every now and then his
eyes wandered over the lines of carriages, but without seeing that of
which he was in quest, and as soon as the policeman was gone he once
more opened his knife, and began to carve, handily enough, a new
design--this time a couple of hearts locked together after the
time-honoured fashion shown in a valentine.
"That's about as picturesque-looking a blackguard as I've seen for
months," said Magnus, looking across the road at where the fellow
lounged. "I wonder whether he'd come and stand for me."
"H'm, yes," said his companion; "nice-looking youth."
"He'd make a splendid bull-fighter in a Spanish scene."
"H'm, bull-dog fighter, I should have said, Mag. By the way, I'd have a
certificate from the baths and wash-houses before I admitted him to the
studio. He looks disgustingly dirty."
"Yah! horrible! Take me away, Harry. I feel as if I were going to be
sick."
"Why, what's the matter now?"
"Talk about that great blackguard looking disgusting: here's my great
horror!"
"What, Perry-Morton?"
"Yes. Look at his hideously fat, smooth face, and his long greasy hair
tucked behind his ears. Look at his open throat, and--confound the
animal, yes--a crimson satin tie. Harry, I shall be had up one of these
days for an atrocious assault upon that creature. I shall lie in wait
for him like a bravo, and armed with a pair of new scissors I shall cut
his hair. Is it possible to prevail upon him to go about clothed, and
in his right mind?"
"For shame, Jemmy! and you a brother artist."
"Brother artist be hanged! You don't call that thing an artist."
"Why, my dear boy, he's acknowledged in society as the apostle of the
poet-painters' school."
"Good God!"
"My dear boy, do restrain yourself," laughed the other.
"I can't help it. I do like a man to be a man, and for goodness' sake
look at that thing."
"That thing," as Magnus so contemptuously dubbed him, was certainly
striking in appearance, as the open carriage in which he was riding came
to a standstill, and he signed to the footman to let him out. For as he
descended it was to stand upon a very thin pair of legs that in no sense
corresponded with his plump, white, boyish face.
It was a handsome, well-appointed carriage from whose front seat he had
alighted, the back being occupied by two ladies of between twenty and
thirty, who looked as if their costume had been copied from a
disinterred bas-relief; so cold and neutral were their lines that they
might have been lady visitors to the Grosvenor Gallery, instead of
maidens to whom the word "aesthetic" was hardly known. For the
Graeco-Roman extended to their hair, which stood out from their
foreheads, looking singed and frizzed as if scorched by the burning
thoughts that were in their brains; for even in those days there were
ladies who delighted to belong to the pre-Raphaelic _cum_ fleshly school
of painting and poetry, and took pains to show by their uniform that
they were of the blessed.
As the footman folded the steps and closed the door, the gentleman--to
wit, Mr Perry-Morton, of Saint Agnes', Park Road--posed himself in an
artistic attitude with one arm upon the carriage-door, crossed one leg
over the other, and gazed in the faces of his sisters, one
delicately-gloved hand in correct harmony of tint playing with a cambric
handkerchief, specked with toy flowers of the same tone.
As he posed himself, so did the two ladies. The nearer curled herself
gracefully, all but the legs, in a pantherine style in the corner of the
carriage, and looked at her brother sweetly through the frizz of hair,
as if she were asking him to see if there were a parting. The further
drooped over florally in a manner that in another ordinary being would
have suggested crick in the neck, but here, as with her brother and
sister, everything was so deliriously unstudied--or well studied--that
she only gave the idea of a bending flower--say, a bud--or a pallid
virgin and martyr upon painted glass.
"Oh, Lord!" said Magnus, aloud.
"Hush! don't. Come along, though. Gently, man, or they'll see us, and
we shall have to talk to the girls."
"I'm an ostrich," said the artist; "my head is metaphorically buried in
sand. Whatever my pursuers see, I am blind."
As it happened a group of people came along, and under their cover the
two young men escaped.
"He is an awful fool," said Artingale, "but the people believe in him."
"Bah! so they will in any lunatic who makes himself fashionably absurd.
I'll be reasonable, Harry, though that fellow has half driven me wild
with his airs and patronage. He gave me a thumping price for one of my
pictures, for he's immensely rich. Then he had the impudence to want me
to alter it--the composition of months of hard, honest study--and began
to lecture me on art."
"From his point of view."
"Yes, from his point of view. But as I said, I will be reasonable.
There is a deal in this pre-Raphaelitism, and it has done its part in
reviving some of the best of the ancient art, and made its mark on our
schools of to-day. But there it was not allowed to stop. A pack of
idiots--there, I can call them nothing else--go into frantic worship of
all the worst portions of old art, and fall down and idolise things that
are ugly, ill-coloured, and grotesque."
"True, O magnate! and they'll grow worse."
"They imitate it in their paintings, drawing impossible trees,
landscapes, and houses for backgrounds, and people their foregrounds
with resurrections in pigment of creatures that seem as if they had been
dead and buried for a month, and clothe them in charnel-house garb."
"Bravo! charnel-house garb is good."
"Thankye, Polonius junior," said the artist; "I tell you, Harry, I get
out of patience with the follies perpetrated under the name of art, to
the exclusion of all that is natural and beautiful and pure. Now I ask
you, my dear boy, would you like to see a sister of yours dressing up
and posing like those two guys of girls?"
"Haven't got a sister, worse luck, or you should have her, old fellow."
"Thanks. Well, say, then, the woman you loved."
"Hush! stop here, old fellow. Here they come."
"Who? Those two stained-glass virgins?"
"No, no, be quiet; the Mallow girls."
There was so much subdued passion in the young man's utterance that the
artist glanced sidewise at him, to see that there was an intensity of
expression in his eyes quite in keeping with his words, and following
the direction of his gaze, he saw that it was fixed upon a barouche,
drawn by a fine pair of bays, which champed their bits and flecked their
satin coats with foam as they fretted impatiently at the restraint put
upon them, and keeping them dawdling in a line of slow-moving carriages
going east.
There was another line of carriages going west between the two young men
and the equipage in question, and Magnus could see that his companion
was in an agony of dread lest his salute should not be noticed, but,
just at the right moment, the occupants of the barouche turned in their
direction, acknowledged the raised hat of Lord Artingale, and, the pace
just then increasing, the carriage passed on.
"Feel better?" said Magnus, cynically.
"Better? yes," cried the young man, turning to him flushed and with a
gratified smile upon his face. "There, don't laugh at me, old fellow, I
can't help it."
"I'm not going to laugh at you. But you seem to have got it badly."
"Awfully," replied the other.
"Shouldn't have thought it of you, Harry. So those are the Mallow
girls, eh?"
"Yes. Isn't she charming?"
"What, that girl with the soft dreamy eyes? Yes, she is attractive."
"No, man," cried Artingale, impatiently; "that's Julia. I mean the
other."
"What, the fair-haired, bright-looking little maiden who looks as if she
paints?"
"Paints be hanged!" cried Artingale, indignantly, "it's her own sweet
natural colour, bless her."
"Oh, I say, my dear boy," said Magnus, with mock concern, "I had no idea
that you were in such a state as this."
"Chaff away, old fellow, I don't care. Call me in a fool's paradise, if
you like. I've flirted about long enough, but I never knew what it was
before."
"Then," said Magnus, seriously, "you are what they call--in love?"
"Don't I tell you, Mag, that I don't care for your chaff. There, yes:
in love, if you like to call it so, for I've won the sweetest little
girl that ever looked truthfully at a man."
"And the lady--does she reciprocate, and that sort of thing?"
"I don't know: yes, I hope so. I'm afraid to be sure; it seems so
conceited, for I'm not much of a fellow, you see."
"Let's see, it happened abroad, didn't it?"
"Well, yes, I suppose so. I met them at Dinan, and then at Baden, and
afterwards at Rome and in Paris."
"Which means, old fellow, that you followed them all over the
Continent."
"Well, I don't know; I suppose so," said the young man, biting his
moustache. "You see, Mag, I used to know Cynthia when she was little
and I was a boy--when the governor was alive, you know. I was at
Harrow, too, with her brothers--awful cads though, by the by. She can't
help that, Mag," he said, innocently.
"Why, Artingale, it makes you quite sheepish," laughed the artist. "I
wish I could catch that expression for a Corydon."
"For a what?"
"Corydon--gentle shepherd, my boy."
"Get out! Well, as I was telling you, old fellow, I met them abroad,
and now they've come back to England, and they've been down at the
rectory--Lawford Rectory, you know, six miles from my place. And now
they've come up again."
"So it seems," said Magnus, drily.
"Chaff away, I don't mind," said Artingale.
"Not I; I won't chaff you, Harry," said the other, quietly. "'Pon my
soul I should miss you, for you and I have been very jolly together; but
I wouldn't wish you a better fate than to have won some really sweet,
lovable girl. It's a fate that never can be mine, as the song says, and
I won't be envious of others. Come along."
"No, no, don't let's go, old fellow. They'll only drive as far as the
corner, and then come back on this side. Perhaps they'll stop to speak.
If they do, I'll introduce you to Julia; she's a very nice girl."
"But not so nice as, as--"
"Cynthia," said the other, innocently. "No: of course not."
Magnus burst out laughing, and his friend looked at him inquiringly.
"I could not help it, old fellow," exclaimed Magnus; "you did seem so
innocent over it. But never mind that. Plunge head foremost into the
sweetest life idyll you can, and, worldly-minded old sinner as I am, I
will only respect you the more."
He spoke so sincerely, and in such a feeling tone, that the younger man
half turned and gazed at him, saying directly after--
"Thank you, old fellow; I'm not demonstrative, so just consider that I
have given you a hearty grip of the hand."
"All right," was the gruff reply. "Hallo! here comes my brigand. By
Jove, he's a fine-looking specimen of the _genus homo_. He's six feet
two, if he's an inch."
Jock Morrison, who seemed at home beneath the trees, came slouching
along with his hands deep in his pockets, with a rolling gait, the whole
of one side at a time; there was an end of his loose cotton neckerchief
between his teeth, and a peculiar satisfied smile in his eye which
changed to a scowl of defiance as he saw that he was observed.
"I say, my man," said Magnus, "would you give me a sitting, if I paid
you?"
"Would I give you what?" growled the fellow. "I don't let out cheers."
Before Magnus could explain himself, the man had turned impatiently
away, and gone on towards Kensington Gardens.
"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed Artingale. "Our friend is not a model in any way.
Have a cigarette, old fellow?"
The artist took one, and they stood smoking for a few minutes, till
Artingale, who had been watchfully looking in the direction of the
Achilles statue, suddenly threw down his half-smoked cigarette, for the
Mallow carriage came into sight, and, as the young man had hoped, a
voice cried "stop!" and the coachman drew up by the rails.
"Ah, Harry!" cried Cynthia, leaning forward to shake hands, and looking
very bright and charming in the new floral bonnet that had caused her
such anxiety that morning; "I didn't know you had come up to town."
"Didn't you," he replied, earnestly. "I knew you had. I went over to
the rectory yesterday, and saw your brothers."
"Oh, Harry!" cried Cynthia, blushing with pleasure.
"It didn't matter; I drove over to do the horse good," said the young
man, shaking hands warmly with Julia in turn. "Here, let me introduce
my friend Magnus. Julia, this is James Magnus. Cynthia, Magnus the
artist."
"Lord Artingale has often spoken of you, Mr Magnus," said Cynthia,
looking at him rather coquettishly, in fact as if she was better used to
London society than the quietude of a country rectory. "He has promised
to bring me some day to see your pictures."
"I shall only be too proud to show you what I am doing," said the
artist, meeting frankly the bright eyes that were shooting at him, but
which gave him up directly as a bad mark, as he turned and began talking
to Julia Mallow, who seemed to have become singularly quiet and dreamy,
but who brightened up directly and listened eagerly, for she found that
Magnus could talk sensibly and well.
"Are you going to stay up long?" said Lord Artingale, gazing imploringly
in Cynthia's eyes.
"I don't know, indeed," she replied, pouting. "Papa has brought mamma
to see a fresh physician, but is so cross and strange now. He has been
reforming the parish, as he calls it."
"Yes; so I heard," said Lord Artingale, laughing.
"And that has meant quarrelling with all the stupid townspeople, and
setting them against us."
"Not against you, Cynthia," said the young man in a low voice. "I don't
believe that."
"Don't talk nonsense, Harry," she replied, laughing; "not now. But
really it is very unpleasant, you know, for it makes papa so cross."
"Of course it would," said Lord Artingale, sympathisingly.
"And he talks about being so poor, and says that we shall all be ruined,
and makes poor mamma miserable."
"But he is not in want of money, is he?" cried the young man, eagerly.
"Nonsense! No: that's how he always talks when Frank and Cyril are at
home. Oh, Harry, I'm afraid they are dreadful boys."
"Well, let's try and make them better, eh, Cynthia?"
"I said you were not to talk nonsense now," said Cynthia, shaking her
pretty little head at him.
"Oh, murder!" he exclaimed, suddenly. "Hadn't you better drive on?
Here's Perry-Morton."
"No, no," exclaimed the younger girl, "it would look so rude. You silly
thing, don't blush so," she whispered to her sister; "it looks so
strange."
"Good-morning--" said the subject of the thoughts of the group; and Mr
Perry-Morton descended poetically upon them, for he did not seem to walk
up like an ordinary being. "Cynthia," he continued, with an air of
affectionate solicitude, and leaving out the full-stops he had placed
after his two first words, "you look too flushed this morning, my child.
Julia, is not the morning charming? Did you notice the effect of light
and shade across the water?"
Julia Mallow, who looked troubled and bored, replied that she had not.
"You observed it, of course, Mr Magnus?" continued the new-comer, with
a sweet smile.
"No," said the gentleman addressed, shortly. "I was talking to the
ladies."
"Ah! yes," said Mr Perry-Morton, sweetly; and he held his head on one
side, as if he were posing for a masculine Penseroso. "But Nature will
appeal so to our inmost heart."
"Yes, she's a jolly nuisance sometimes," said Lord Artingale, but only
to evoke a pitying smile from Mr Perry-Morton, who, in spite of the
decidedly annoyed looks of Cynthia and her lover, leaned his arm upon
the carriage-door, and began talking to Julia, making James Magnus look
like _Harry Hotspur_ must have appeared when the "certain lord" came to
him, holding the "pouncet box, which ever and anon he gave his nose."
Cynthia Mallow made a pretty little grimace at Artingale, and, then
turning with a smile to the worshipper of Nature, she stretched out her
hand for the check-string so unmistakably that the gentlemen drew back,
and raised their hats as the carriage rejoined the stream.
"Won't you come and speak to the girls, Artingale?" said Mr
Perry-Morton in a softly imploring tone; and suppressing a sigh of
annoyance, the young man suffered himself to be led off with his
unwilling friend, while the carriage went slowly on towards Kensington
Gardens, stopping with the stream again and again.
"Julia," cried Cynthia, flushing with annoyance, as soon as they were
alone, "has papa gone mad?"
"Hush! the servants will hear you," said her sister, reprovingly.
"I can't help it, dear, it makes me so excited that I can't bear it.
How you can let that hateful creature come and patronise and monopolise,
and seem to constrict you as he does, like a horrible short fat snake, I
can't imagine. Papa must be going mad to encourage it. If he were as
rich as Cassius or Croesus, or whatever the man's name was, it ought to
be no excuse. I declare if you do not pluck up spirit and make a fight,
I will. You can't like him."
"Oh, no," cried her sister, with a look of revulsion.
"Then you must--you shall put a stop to his pretensions. Why, I declare
to-day he behaved before Harry's friend as if he were engaged to you. I
felt as if I'd have given my pearls to have been at liberty to box his
ears."
"I think him detestable," said Julia, sadly.
"Then you shall speak up, dear, or I will. I declare I'll revolt, or
no--Harry shall shoot him. I shall command him never to approach our
presence again till he has rid society of that dreadful monster with his
Nature worship and stuff. Good gracious, Julia, what is the matter?"
The carriage had stopped, as the younger sister prattled on, close by
the railings near the Gardens, and Julia Mallow crouched shrinking in
the carriage, gazing with a horrified, fascinated fixity of eye at the
great half-gipsy-looking vagabond, who, with his folded arms resting
upon one of the iron posts, and his bearded chin upon them, was staring
at her in an insolent mocking fashion.
The spell only lasted for a few moments before the carriage went on, and
with a low hysterical cry, Julia caught at her sister's hand to whisper
hoarsely--
"Oh, Cynthia, that dreadful man again!"
------------------------------------------------------------------------
End of Volume One.
PART ONE, CHAPTER TWENTY.
JOCK MORRISON'S THREAT.
The visit to town was but a flying one upon this occasion. The poverty
at the rectory did not seem to be extreme, for the horses and carriage
were sent up for the fortnight's stay, and Mrs Mallow had her interview
with the new specialist, who talked to her as some specialists do talk,
and then she returned to the house taken for the short stay, and her
girls had the use of the carriage.
It was a curious thing, and at first it had passed almost unnoticed, but
just before the Mallows left the rectory, undergoing a process of
smoking out, Frank and Cyril being the smoke producers, Jock Morrison,
whose three months had been over now for some time, appeared once more
in the neighbourhood of Lawford.
Julia and Cynthia met him one day by Tom Morrison's cottage, leaning
against the doorpost and talking to little Polly.
He had stared hard at them and then slouched away, Polly apologising for
his presence.
"You see, Miss Julia, Miss Cynthia, he's my husband's own brother, and
we don't want him to feel that we turn our backs upon him."
"No, of course not," said Cynthia, "but I wish he would keep away;" and
then they had a long chat with the little wife. She looked very pretty
and pathetic in her deep mourning, and they parted very tenderly,
Julia's heart bleeding for the stricken woman.
"I'd have given anything to have asked her to show me where they buried
poor baby," said Cynthia, "but I dare not even allude to it."
"No, of course not," said Julia, with a shiver. "It was very sad; I
can't bear to think of it at all. Keep close to me, Cynthy," she
whispered.
They had suddenly come upon Jock Morrison, smoking his pipe as he sat
upon a stile by the side of the lane, and as they passed he stared hard
at Julia and laughed in a half-mocking way.
"How dare he stare at us like that!" said Cynthia haughtily, and then
she began chatting about Polly Morrison's trouble, and wishing that papa
had not been so strict, and the meeting was forgotten till, three days
later, when they reached London, and as they got out of the train, Julia
started, for there, leaning against a barrier with his hands in his
pockets, was Jock Morrison again.
The next day she saw him staring up at the house, and day after day
afterwards she was sure to encounter his bold fierce gaze somewhere or
another, till she grew quite nervous, telling her sister that she was
certain that the mail was meditating some form of revenge against their
father for sending him to prison.
"Nonsense!" cried Cynthia. "Papa is a magistrate, and he would not
dare."
Back at Lawford, and they were free of the incubus, in fact Jock
Morrison passed out of mind; for in spite of his breathing out
threatenings of poverty, the Reverend Eli Mallow, now that he found his
eldest son had not come to him for money, had opened the rectory doors
to receive visitors.
"We must entertain a little while we are down here, my dear, for the
girls' sake. Perhaps it is as well too for the boys."
"Yes, dear," said Mrs Mallow, looking up from her sofa with her
customary patient smile; and the company arrived, and was entertained in
a manner that made Fullerton hope that no one would suffer for it, that
was all he could say.
Among the guests who had been staying at the rectory were the
Perry-Mortons--_the_ Perry-Mortons in society meaning Mr Perry-Morton
and his two sisters, for though it was believed that they had, or had
had, a father and mother, the seniors were never even heard of, much
less seen. Ill-natured people said that Perry-Morton the elder had been
a pawnbroker who had made money largely. Be that as it may,
Perry-Morton the younger was very rich, and never mentioned any
relatives but his sisters.
Lord Artingale was there from Gatton every day, but his friend and
companion, James Magnus, was in the North sketching, so the young man,
having no restraining arm on which to lean, fell more in love as fast as
he could with little Cynthia.
Claudine Perry-Morton--by the way, there was a good deal of familiar
nicknaming at the house of the Perry-Mortons, Mr Perry-Morton having
been known to call Claudine--Bessy, and the younger sister--Faustine
Judy. But that was in the privacy of their home life, and showed the
simplicity and deep affection of their natures.
Claudine Perry-Morton had made a dead set at the young nobleman, but
finding at once that her chance was _nil_, she graciously made way for
her sister, who sang "Jock of Hazeldine" at him, in a very deep
contralto voice, and with a graceful stoop over the piano; but Faustine
Perry-Morton was woman of the world enough to see that Lord Artingale's
thoughts ran in quite another direction, so she also resigned herself to
circumstances, and thought him a man of exceedingly low tastes.
So all the smiles and sweetness of the sisters were lavished upon the
rectory girls for their brother's sake. Nothing particular was said,
but it soon became evident that Perry-Morton found favour with the
Rector, and it was quite understood that the wealthy visitor would,
sooner or later, propose for his elder daughter's hand.
She was nearly as bright at this time as her sister, and Artingale
declared that she was the dearest girl he knew, not from any amiable
passages between them, but because she laughingly helped him to pleasant
little _tete-a-tetes_ with her sister, especially when they were out
riding; horse exercise and good long gallops being a great deal in
vogue, when the weather was mild and clear.
Lord Artingale would canter over from Gatton, sending two or three or
more horses by his grooms, an arrangement highly approved of by Frank
and Cyril Mallow, who were very civil to him, though in private they
compared notes, and said that he would be an awful fool if he had not
borne a title and kept such good cigars.
Sometimes the Rector joined the equestrian parties upon a quiet cob, but
he generally turned homeward after two or three miles, either to make a
call or two at the outlying farms, or to meet the carriage. Then, to
make things pleasant, poor Julia talked art on horseback with Mr
Perry-Morton, while her sister and Lord Artingale had a brisk canter
over some heath, and the groom behind sat and grinned.
"Talk about the guv'nor," said the last-named individual, as he returned
to the stables with the horses, and compared notes with Lord Artingale's
man, "he is a sight on horseback. That there old cob holds him on
almost. But if you want to see riding you should go behind that there
Perry-Morton."
This was in the midst of a chorus of hissing from the helpers, who were
rubbing down the horses after one of the morning rides.
"He do look a rum un," said one of the men.
"Look!" said the groom; "he _is_ a rum un. He gets them little thin
legs of his one on each side of the horse, and keeps yer altering his
sterrups for ever so long. Now they're too long, and now they're too
short, and when we starts he holds his reins one in each hand, and bends
forward so that if his horse didn't have on a martingale he'd always be
finding his nose between its ears."
"Can't he ride, then?"
"Ride! Yes; like a sack o' sharps on a miller's pony. It's freezing
work going out with him, worse than with the guv'nor, for he keeps his
'oss at a walk the whole time. Lor', I'd give something to see him on
his lordship's _Mad Sal_."
But the groom was not destined to see Mr Perry-Morton upon that
greyhound-framed hunter, which was full of fire and fidget with every
one but Cynthia, who could have curbed her with a silken thread, for
that gentleman was an admirer of repose even on horseback, and would
only ride the quietest horse he could hire at the King's Head, although
Lord Artingale offered him the pick of his little stud.
Repose, too, gave him so many excellent opportunities for putting
forward his suit with Julia, upon whom he beamed in a mezzo-tinto style,
the lady hardly realising his meaning, only thinking him very absurd,
and laughingly telling her sister that she owed her a long debt of
gratitude for giving her so many opportunities for a long canter--one of
those delightful long canters from which Cynthia used to come back with
a delicious glow upon her cheeks, and with eyes that literally sparkled
with health and pleasure combined.
"Looking like a wild gal," Mr Jabez Fullerton said, as he stood at his
shop door. "I declare it's immoral, that's what it is; a parson's
daughter gadding about like a jockey, Smithson; it's disgusting."
"Yes," said Mr Smithson, who was calculating how many yards, at how
much a yard, were in Cynthia's well-fitting riding-habit.
"There's a horse--look at it--for a young gal to ride! Well, all I can
say is that I hope his lordship means to marry her. I never saw such
goings on."
"That there habit do fit well though, I must say that," said Smithson.
"Fit?" said Fullerton. "Hah! The rectory's a disgrace!"
But it so happened that riding was not always the order of the day.
Long brisk walks were taken at times, much to the bemiring of Mr
Perry-Morton's patent leather shoes; and upon one of these occasions it
had been arranged that Julia and Cynthia were to make a call or two upon
some of the poor cottagers, who had been rather neglected during the
past two weeks. Lord Artingale was going to ride over, and he and Mr
Perry-Morton were to bring forward the ladies to meet them, if the
Misses Perry-Morton could walk so far.
"Why, Julie, it's quite a treat to be alone once more," said Cynthia,
merrily, as they walked briskly along the sandy lanes, calling at first
one cottage and then another.
"Treat!" said her sister, smiling, "I thought--"
"Hush! I won't be teased. But, Julie dear, I won't be a hypocrite to
you. I do tease him and laugh at him, but he _is_ nice, and I think I'm
beginning to like him ever so."
"I like him very, very much," said Julia, naively. "He's a very
pleasant, manly fellow."
"Yes, isn't he, dear? But, Julie, it's too bad, I know, of me to leave
you so long with that dreadful bore. What does he say to you?"
"Say!" said Julia, with a smile; "really I hardly know. Talks about art
and nature's colour, and asks me if I do not find a want of thoroughness
in our daily life."
"Thoroughness! why that's what his sisters are always talking about. I
think it thorough nonsense. Oh, I shall be so glad when they're gone."
"Yes, it will be nicer," said Julia, thoughtfully; "but papa seems to
like them very much."
"Yes, isn't it extraordinary?" cried Cynthia. "He wants papa to take a
house in town, and to furnish it upon plans designed by him. I heard
them talking about it, and papa seems to be guided by him in everything.
And what do you think?"
"I don't know, dear."
"I'm as good as certain that that wicked Cyril has been borrowing money
of Perry-Morton."
"Why do you think that?" said Julia, quickly.
"Because Cyril does not make fun of him a bit, but both he and Frank are
wonderfully civil."
Julia sighed.
"Hadn't we better turn back now, dear?"
"Oh, no! let's go as far as old Mrs Meadows's, poor old lady; she'll
think we are never coming again."
They walked a few hundred yards farther on, and sat for a quarter of an
hour to learn how the poor old lady's jyntes was uncommon painful just
now, thanky, and that she hadn't seen them since before Christmas, and
that it had been the mildest Christmas she had knowed this sixty year;
and then the old lady sent her visitors on their return walk, with the
cheerful announcement that a green Christmas "allers made a full
churchyard, my dears," which well she knowed it to be true.
"Oh, what a dreadful old woman, Julie," cried Cynthia, merrily.
"Poor old thing! but how well she is for eighty."
"No troubles but her jyntes to harass her," laughed Cynthia.
"How long will it be before we meet anybody?"
A much shorter time than they either of them anticipated, for as they
turned a bend in the road, two rough-looking men who had been leaning
against a gate came towards them, making no movement to let them pass,
but staring offensively.
"Don't be frightened, Julie," whispered Cynthia, with spirit, "I'm not
afraid."
She walked on boldly, and darted such an imperious look at the lesser of
the two men, that he slunk aside to let her pass, but the other, Jock
Morrison, stood his ground. He stared in a peculiar, half-smiling way
at Julia, making her shrink aside, and following her up, as, turning
pale, her lips parting, and with dilated eyes, she felt as it were
fascinated by his gaze, shuddering the next moment as he exclaimed with
a coarse laugh--
"Bob, old matey, I mean to have this girl."
PART ONE, CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.
AT KILBY FARM.
"Well--well--well--well," said Mrs Portlock, folding her apron full of
pleats, as Luke Ross sat talking to her for a while, and ended by
telling her his intentions for the future. "Barrister, eh? Well, of
all the trades I ever heard tell of--but can barristers make a living?"
"Yes, and a good one, too," said Luke, laughing.
"Then you are not going to take to the school after all?"
"No, I have quite altered my plans, and I hope all will turn out for the
best."
"Ah, I hope so, I'm sure," said Mrs Portlock, smoothing down her black
silk dress, and then arranging a necklace of oblong amber beads, which
she wore on market-days, one which bore a striking resemblance to a
string of bilious beetles. "But what does your father say?"
"I have not told him my plans yet, for they have only been made since
the governor's meeting."
"Well, Luke Ross," said Mrs Portlock, in a resigned fashion, "I'm sure
I don't wish you any harm."
"I'm sure you do not," he said, laughing.
"Indeed I do not," she continued: "but, for my part, I think you had a
great deal better have kept to your father's trade. Such a business as
that is not to be picked up every day. But there, I suppose you know
best."
"Of course he does," said the Churchwarden, who heard the latter part of
her sentence. "You let Luke Ross alone for that. His head's screwed on
the right way."
"Don't be so foolish, Joseph," cried Mrs Portlock. "Do talk sense.
Has Mr Cyril Mallow gone?"
"Yes, he's gone back home," said the farmer.
"Why didn't you ask him to stay and have a bit of dinner with us?"
"Because I didn't want him, mother. He only walked home with me to ask
about a bit o' rabbit shooting."
"But still, it would have been civil to ask him to stop. It's
market-day, and there's the hare you shot on Friday, and a bit o'
sirloin."
"Tchah! he wouldn't have cared to stay. He dines late and
fashionable-like at home."
"I'll be bound to say he'd have been very glad to stop," said Mrs
Portlock, bridling. "Fashionable, indeed! He got no fashionable
dinners when he was working his way home at sea, nor yet when he was out
in the bush."
"Where he had much better have stayed--eh, Luke?" said the farmer. "He
does no good but idle about here."
"Idle, indeed!" cried Mrs Portlock, taking up the cudgels, rather
indignantly, on the young man's behalf. "It might be idling if it was
Luke Ross here, but Mr Cyril Mallow's a gentleman and a gentleman's
son, and he has a right to work when he likes and leave off when he
likes."
"Oh! has he?" said the Churchwarden, smiling at their visitor, as much
as to say, `Now, just you listen.' "Well, I'm not a learned man, like
Luke Ross here, who has got his Bible at his tongue's end."
"As every man who calls himself a good man ought to," said Mrs
Portlock, tartly. "Sage!"
"Yes, aunt," came from the next room, where the speaker could hear every
word.
"Tell them to take the dinner in directly. And, for my part, Joseph, I
think if you'd read your Bible a little more o' Sundays you'd be a
better man."
"You wouldn't like me so well if I was a better man, old lady," he
laughed; "but, as I was going to say, when I used to read of such things
I got it into my head that the first specimen of a man as was made was a
working man, to till the ground, and not idle and loaf about, and eat
the fruit and shoot the rabbits in the Garden of Eden."
"For shame, father, to talk in that way!" cried the lady. "And I wonder
that you speak so disrespectfully of Mr Cyril Mallow. For my part, I
think he's a very nice, gentlemanly young fellow, and it's too bad for
people to be always sneering about him as they are."
"And, for my part," said the Churchwarden, good-humouredly, "I'm a bit
of a Radical, and don't believe in taking off your hat to a man because
he happens to have a few thousand pounds more than one's got oneself.
If he's a wonderful clever chap, with more brains than I've got, why, I
do look up to him; but I'm not going down on my knees to a set of folks
who yawn through their lives, doing nothing, except telling you by word
and look that they are a better class of people than you are; and as for
Master Cyril Mallow, he's a well-built, strapping young fellow, who can
talk well, and shoot well, but if he had happened to be my sod, instead
of old Mallow's, I'd have licked him into a different shape to what he's
in now, ay, and his brother too, or I'd have known the reason why.
Dinner in, my lass? That's well. Come along, Luke. Tchah! nonsense!
you shall stay. You can tell the old man your reasons better when
you've got a bit of roast beef under your waistcoat, and some of my ale.
Why, Sage, lass, what ails you? Your face is as white as a bit o'
dough."
"Oh, nothing, uncle, nothing," she replied, forcing a smile, as she
hurried to a tall press to get out a napkin for their visitor, and soon
after they were seated at the hospitable meal, which was more bounteous
on a market-day, the nearness of the farm to the town making it always
probable that the Churchwarden might bring up a friend.
But Luke Ross was the only stranger on that occasion, and he sat
opposite Sage, whose countenance, though less troubled than when she had
overheard her uncle's words, was lacking in its ordinary composure.
Luke saw this, and attributed it to their conversation, and the interest
she took in his affairs. Her aunt saw it, too, and, with the idea of
comforting her niece, kept turning the conversation to the Rector and
his family, but not to do any good, for out of mere contrariety, and
with a twinkle in his eye as he glanced at Luke, the Churchwarden set to
and roundly abused the Rector and his sons for their ways.
"Come, Luke," he said, "you are not making half a meal. I suppose by
and by, sir, you will be as fashionable as Master Cyril Mallow, and
won't eat a bit at dinner-time without calling it lunch. Ha, ha, ha!"
"There, do have done, Joseph," cried Mrs Portlock. "What have you got
to laugh at now?"
"I was thinking of the horse-whipping I gave the young dogs--ay, it's
twelve or fourteen years ago now--that night I caught them in the
orchard."
"There, do let bygones be bygones, Joseph," cried Mrs Portlock,
sharply. "Boys will be boys. I'll be bound to say you stole apples
yourself when you were young."
"Ay, that I did, and got thrashed for it, too. But I must say that
Cyril Mallow don't bear any malice for what I did."
A regular duel was fought over that meal between the heads, Sage hardly
raising her eyes, but looking more and more troubled as the Mallow
attack and defence went on, while Luke Ross was so intent upon his own
thoughts that he hardly heard a word.
It was with quite a feeling of relief, then, that Sage heard her uncle
say--
"I like parson, not as a parson, but as a man: for the way in which he
has tended that poor sick woman 's an honour to him; but, as for his way
of bringing up children, why, if I had carried on my farm in such a
fashion I should have been in the Court o' Bankruptcy years ago. Best
thing Mallow could do would be to put the fellow with me to learn
farming, and me have the right to do what I liked with him, and
five-and-twenty to two? Is it, my dear? I didn't know it was so late--
and make us truly thankful, Amen."
There was a general scrooping of chairs after this condensed grace, Sage
hurrying off to put on her hat and jacket, and her aunt running after
her to say, in a mysterious whispered confidence--
"Don't you take any notice of uncle, my dear. He don't mean half he
says."
"You'll walk back with Sage, of course, Luke?" said the Churchwarden,
quietly, as he drew his chair to the fire for his after-dinner pipe.
"Well, my boy, I think you're right about what you settled; but I
suppose I had something to do with your altering your mind?"
"Yes, sir, I must own to that."
"Well," said the Churchwarden, thoughtfully, "I hope it's for the best;
I meant it to be. You'll go back to London, then, soon?"
"Almost directly, sir, to begin working hard."
"That's right, my boy. I believe in work. Come over here whenever you
are down at Lawford. I shall be very glad to see you, my lad, very."
Then, pulling out his watch, he consulted it, and went on chatting for a
few minutes as if to keep Luke from speaking about the subject near to
his heart, but at last he broke in--"I need hardly say, sir, that I go
meaning to work up to the point you named, and--"
"Yes, yes, yes, my lad; let that rest. Let's see how things go. You're
both young," he cried, pulling out his big silver watch once more. "I
say, mother," he shouted, "tell Sage that Luke's waiting to walk back
with her. She'll be late for school."
Then like a chill to Luke Ross came back Mrs Portlock's voice--
"Sage? Oh, she went out by the back way ten minutes ago."
PART ONE, CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.
CYNTHIA'S KNIGHTS.
That was all--those few insolent, grossly-insulting words--and then the
big fellow stood staring after the frightened girls.
"Take my hand, Julia," whispered the younger sister; and if, as we read
in the old novelists, a glance would kill, the flash of indignant
lightning that darted from her bright eyes would have laid Jock Morrison
dead in the road.
But, powerful as are the effects of a lady's eyes, they had none other
here than to make the great picturesque fellow smile at her mockingly
before turning his hawk-like gaze on the frightened girl who clung to
her sister's hand as they hurried away.
"Has he gone, Cynthy?" whispered Julia, at the end of a few moments.
"I don't know. I can't hear them, and I won't look back, or they'll
think we are afraid--and we are not."
"I am--horribly afraid," said Julia, in a choking voice.
"I'm not," said Cynthia. "A nasty, rude, impudent pig that he is. Oh,
if I were a man, I'd whip him till he lay down on the ground and begged
for mercy. To insult two inoffensive girls like that! Harry shall beat
him well, that he shall, or I'll never speak to him again."
"Make haste," whispered Julia. "Let's run."
"I won't run," cried Cynthia. "I wouldn't run away from the biggest man
that ever lived. I never heard of such a thing. Oh, how cross papa
will be."
"We had better not tell him," said Julia, faintly; and her face was
deadly pale.
"Not tell papa? Why, you foolish little coward, Julie! But only to
think of the insufferable impudence of the wretch. I wish he had said
it to me."
"No, no: don't wish that," cried Julia, excitedly. "It is too horrible.
Oh, Cynthy dear, I shall dream of that man."
"You shan't do anything of the kind," cried her sister, whose eyes
sparkled and face flushed with excitement. "Such nonsense! Two
unprotected maidens walking through the forest met a wicked ogre, and he
opened his ugly great mouth, and gaped as he showed his big white teeth
like a lion, and then he said, I am going to gobble up the prettiest of
those two little maids; and then they ran away, and a gallant knight
coming along, they fled to him for help, and fell upon their poor knees
in a wet place, and said, `Oh, brave and gallant paladin, go and smite
down that wicked ogre, and we will give you smiles, and gloves to wear
in your helm, and tie scarves round your waist, and if you will promise
not to eat us, you shall some day have one of us for a pet!' And the
name of the gallant knight was Sir Perrino Mortoni, and--"
"Oh pray be quiet, Cynthy, I feel so upset you cannot tell."
"Stuff and nonsense! Don't interrupt my story. The ogre has gone."
"I shall always be afraid of meeting that man."
"What, after the gallant knight has killed him? Oh, I see, you are
afraid that Sir Perrino would not slay him, but would bind him in
chains, and keep him at his castle for an artist's model. Then we will
appeal to another knight, Lord Harry the Saucy, and he shall do the
deed. Where is the gallant I wis not," she added, laughing.
"I know who he is," said Julia, who was trembling still.
"So do I," said Cynthia, merrily. "Well, never mind, my darling sissy;
don't let a thing like that upset you. Come: be brave. They are gone
now, and we shall never see them again."
"Never see them again," said Julia, with a wild look in her eye. "That
man will haunt me wherever I go."
"Will he, dear?" said Cynthia, merrily; "then the gallant knight shall
not quite kill him, though I don't believe in haunting ghosts. Here
they are."
"Cynthia!" gasped Julia, with a cry of horror.
"I don't mean the ogres, you little coward; I mean the gallant knights."
"Why, we began to think we had missed you," cried Lord Artingale, who,
with Mr Perry-Morton, met them at a turn of the road, the latter
gentleman's patent leather shoes being a good deal splashed, in spite of
the care with which he had picked his way.
"Oh, Mr Perry-Morton," cried Cynthia, ignoring Artingale, and, with a
mischievous light in her eye, addressing their artistic friend, "my
sister has been so shamefully insulted by a great big man."
"Who? where? my dear Miss Julia? Where is the scoundrel?" cried
Perry-Morton, excitedly.
"Just down the road a little way," said Cynthia. "I hope you will go
and beat him well."
"A big scoundrel of a fellow?" cried Mr Perry-Morton.
"Yes, and he looks like a gipsy," said Cynthia, innocently. "He said
something so insulting to my sister."
"Hush, pray, Cynthia," cried the latter, faintly.
"Oh, poor girl, she is going to faint. Miss Mallow, pray look up. I am
here. Take my arm. Let me hasten with you home. This scoundrel shall
be pursued, and brought to justice."
"I am better now," said Julia, speaking more firmly. "No, thank you,
Mr Perry-Morton, I can walk well enough."
"Oh, I cannot leave you like this, dear Miss Julia," whispered
Perry-Morton, while Cynthia's eyes were sparkling with malicious glee,
as she turned them upon Artingale, whose face, however, startled her
into seriousness, as he caught her arm, gripping it so hard that it gave
her pain.
"Tell me, Cynthia," he said, hoarsely, "what sort of a fellow was this?"
"A big, gipsy-looking man, and there was a dirty-looking fellow with
him," faltered the girl, for her lover's look alarmed her. "But stop,
Harry; what are you going to do?"
"Break his cursed neck--if I can," cried Artingale, in a low, angry
growl.
"No, no: don't go," she whispered, catching at him. "You may be hurt."
"One of us will be," he said, hoarsely.
"But, Harry, please!"
She looked at him so appealingly that he took her hands in his.
"Cynthia--my darling!" he whispered; and if they had been alone he would
have caught her in his arms.
But they were not alone, and bending down he whispered--
"You have made me so happy, but you would not have me be a cur. Take
your sister home."
Without another word he turned and started off down the lane at a trot,
Cynthia watching him till he was out of sight.
"Oh, Harry! If you are hurt!" she whispered to herself; and then,
recalling her sister's trouble, she ran to her side, where Perry-Morton
was making a pretence of affording support that was not required.
"We can soon get home, Mr Perry-Morton," said Cynthia, with the
malicious look coming back into her eyes, and chasing away one that was
very soft and sweet. "Wouldn't you like to go after Lord Artingale?"
"What! and leave you two unprotected?" said the apostle, loudly. "No, I
could not, to save my life."
He did not, but attended the ladies right up to the rectory, sending
their father into a fury, and then leading a party of servants to the
pursuit of the tramps, as they were dubbed, but only to meet Lord
Artingale at the end of a couple of hours returning unsuccessful from
his chase.
For he had not seen either of the fellows, from the fact that as soon as
the ladies had gone they had quietly entered the wood, to lie down
amongst the mossy hazel stubbs, from which post of vantage they had seen
the young man go by.
"Hadn't we better hook it, Jock?" said the lesser vagabond.
"Hook it? No. What for? We haven't done nothing agen the lor."
There was hot indignation at the rectory, and Frank and Cyril went
straight to Tom Morrison's cottage, frightening the wheelwright's wife,
and making her look paler as she took refuge with Budge in the back,
only coming forward after repeated summonses, and then keeping the girl
with her, as she said, truthfully, that Jock Morrison had not been there
for days.
"What's the matter?" said Tom, coming from his workshop, and looking
sternly at the two visitors.
"Matter!" cried Frank, fiercely; "we want that brother of yours; he has
been insulting my sister."
"Then you had better find him and punish him," said Tom, coldly.
"Where is he?"
"You are a parson's sons," said Tom, bitterly, "and ought to know
Scripture. `Am I my brother's keeper?'"
"Look here, you Tom Morrison," cried Frank, "no insolence; I've only
just come back home, but while I stay I'll not have my sisters insulted
by a blackguard family who have got a hold in the parish, and do it out
of spite because my father could not act as they wanted."
"Out of my place!" roared Tom, fiercely. "How dare you bring up that,
you coward!"
"Tom! Tom! oh, for my sake, pray!" cried Polly, throwing herself upon
his breast just as he was about to seize Cyril, who had stepped before
his brother.
"Well, for thy sake, yes," said Tom, passing his arm round his wife.
"Frank and Cyril Mallow, don't come to my place again, or there may be
mischief."
"Do you dare to threaten us, you dog?" cried Frank.
"He ought to know what a magistrate's power--" began Cyril, but he
glanced at Polly and checked himself. "Here, come away, Frank. Look
here, Tom Morrison, where is your brother Jock?"
"I don't know," said Tom, sternly, "and if I did I should not tell you.
This is my house, gentlemen, and I want neither truck nor trade with you
and yours."
"I'll have you both flogged," cried Frank. "A pretty thing that two
ladies can't go along the lanes without being insulted! By Gad, if--"
"Look here," said Tom Morrison, stoutly, "who are you and yours that
they are not to be spoken to? How long is it since a respectable girl
couldn't hardly walk along one of our lanes for fear of being insulted
by the parson's sons? I tell you--"
"Tom! Tom!" moaned Polly, "I--I--"
"Hush, bairn!" he whispered, and Frank hustled his brother out of the
cottage, angrily threatening punishment to the brothers Morrison before
many days were over their heads, and went back to the rectory, where Mr
Perry-Morton informed Lord Artingale, in confidence, that he would have
liked to delete such creatures as that ruffian. They were only blurs,
spots, and blemishes upon the face of this beautiful earth, marring its
serenity, and stealing space that was the inheritance of those who could
appreciate the gift.
"I can handle my fists," said Artingale, in reply, "for we had a good
fellow to teach us, and nothing would have given me greater pleasure
than to have had ten minutes' interview with that blackguard."
"It is very brave and bold of you," said Mr Perry-Morton, holding his
too fleshy head up with one white hand, as it drooped sidewise, and
supporting his elbow with another white hand, as he gazed at him with a
kindly, patronising, smiling pity, "but it would be better to hand him
over to the police."
"Oh, the police might have had him when I had done with him," said the
young man, nodding. "I should have liked to have had my bit of
satisfaction first."
The sisters, that is to say, Mr Perry-Morton's sisters, wound their
arms round each other, the elder laying her head upon her sister's
shoulder, so that arms, hair, and dresses were intertwined and mingled
into a graceful whole. Doubtless their legs would have been woven into
the figure, only they were required to stand on; and then with a series
of changes passing over their faces with beautiful regularity, and with
wonderful gradations by minor tones or tints, they suggested horror,
fear, dread, suffering, pity, pain, with a grand finale representing
wakeful repose, as they listened to Cynthia's history of the encounter,
while their brother, after gazing at them diagonally through his
eyelashes, softly crossed the room, touched the Rector upon the arm, and
pointed to the sisterly group with a smile of satisfied affection.
"Heaven has its reflections upon earth," he said softly, "and the poetic
mind reads rapture in angelic form," he added, with a fat smile of
serene satisfaction and repose.
"Quite so," said the Rector, and he balanced his double eyeglass upon
his nose; "but really, Mr Perry-Morton, I have so many troubles and
petty cares upon my mind, that this new one has filled me with
indignation, and I hardly know what I say or do. Whether as clergyman
or county magistrate, I am sure no one could be so troubled as I have
been."
But the indignation even of a county magistrate availed nothing,
although it took the form of a hunt about the place with the resident
rural policeman, supplemented by the presence of two more resident rural
policemen from two neighbouring villages. Lord Artingale's keepers,
too, were admonished to be on the look-out, but Jock Morrison was not
seen, though his companion was traced to one or two casual wards, and
then seemed to have made for London.
PART ONE, CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.
CLERICAL DIFFICULTIES.
The Fullerton party proved triumphant in the struggle which ensued, and
in spite of the Rector's efforts to produce a better state of things at
the boys' school, Mr Humphrey Bone kept on teaching in his good
old-fashioned way--good in the eyes of many of the Lawfordites--when he
was sober, but breaking out with a week's drinking fit from time to
time, when the school would be either closed or carried on by the
principal monitors, Sage Portlock going in from time to time at the
Rector's request when the noise became uproarious.
Those who had been the most determined on Bone's retention shut their
eyes to these little weaknesses on the master's part; and, if the boys
were not well taught, the tradesmen's accounts were written in a
copperplate hand, while the length and amount of the bill was made less
painful to its recipient by finding his name made to look quite handsome
with a wonderful flourish which literally framed it in curves--a
flourish which it had taken Mr Bone years to acquire.
The Rector resigned himself in disgust to the state of things, and
devoted his attention to the girls' school.
"It can't be helped, Miss Portlock," he said, with a smile; "if we
cannot make good boys in the place we must make super-excellent girls,
and by and by as they grow up they'll exercise their influence on the
young men."
He thought a great deal of his words as he went homewards, according to
his custom, with his hands behind his back, holding his walking-cane as
if it were a tail, thinking very deeply of his sons, and whether some
day good, true women would have an influence upon their lives and make
them better men.
The Rector never knew why the boys laughed at him, setting it down
entirely to their rudeness and Humphrey Bone's bad teaching, for no one
ever took the trouble to tell him it was on account of that thick black
stick he was so fond of carrying, depending from his clasped hands
behind.
Upon the present occasion, as he walked homeward, and in fact as he
would at any time when excited by his thoughts, he now and then gave the
stick a toss up, or a wag sideways, ending with a regular flourish,
after the manner of a cow in a summer pasture when much troubled by the
flies, adding thereby greatly to the resemblance borne by the stick to a
pendent tail.
The Rector was more than usually excited on the morning of his remark to
Sage Portlock. There had been something tender and paternal in his way
of addressing her, and she had a good deal filled his thoughts of late.
There were several reasons for this.
He had had no right to plan out Sage's future, but somehow he had
thoroughly mapped it out long before.
He knew of Luke Ross's attachment to her, and from his position as
spiritual head of the parish, it was only natural that he should think
of the duty that so often fell to his lot--that of joining couples in
the "holy estate of matrimony."
But a short time back and in Sage's case it all came so natural and
easy. Luke Ross had been trained, he was to have the boys' school, he
would soon marry her, the schoolhouses would be occupied, and the
schools be as perfect under such guidance as schools could be.