‘WE ARE PAST THE SEASON OF DIVIDED ILLS.’
IF any one had asked Maurice Clissold why he had bared old wounds in the
dreamy restfulness of that June afternoon in the hayfield, and why he
had chosen Martin Trevanard for his father-confessor, he would have been
sorely puzzled to answer so natural a question. That inexpressible
longing to talk of himself and his own sorrows which seizes upon men now
and then had laid hold of him, and there had been a kind of bitter
pleasure, a half-cynical enjoyment in going over that story of the dead
past. There was something sympathetic about Martin, too, a man who might
have been crossed in love himself, Maurice thought, or who at least had
a latent capacity for sincerest passion. Friendship had proved a plant
of rapid growth in the utter solitude of Borcel End. Maurice felt that
he could talk to this young Trevanard very much as he had talked to
James Penwyn, knowing very well that he might not be always understood
when his flights of fancy went widest, but very sure of sympathy at all
times.
That afternoon was Saturday, and on the following morning perfect rest
reigned at Borcel End. Even the ducks seemed less noisy than usual, as
if their own voices startled them unpleasantly in the universal silence.
Mr. and Mrs. Trevanard came down to the eight o’clock breakfast,
luxurious Sabbath hour, in their best clothes, the farmer seeming
somewhat embarrassed by the burden of respectability involved in sleek
new broad cloth and a buff waistcoat starched to desperation, Mrs.
Trevanard stern and even dignified of aspect in her dark grey silk gown
and smart Sunday cap.
‘Would you like to go to church?’ Martin asked, with some faint
hesitation, lest his new friend, being something of a poet, should also
be something of an infidel.
‘By all means. You drive, I suppose, as it’s so far?’
Penwyn church, that lonely church among the hills, was the nearest to
Borcel, a good four miles off at least.
‘Yes, we drive to church and back. Mother says it goes against her to
have the horse out on the Sabbath, but the distance is more than she
could manage.’
The morning service began at half-past ten, so at half-past nine the
dog-cart was at the door, for there was a good deal of walking up and
down hill to be allowed for, driving in this part of the country being
not altogether a lazy business. The two young men, who occupied the back
seat, were continually getting up and down, and had walked about half
the distance by the time they came to the quiet old church whose single
bell clanged over the green hill-side.
‘I’m blest if the Squire and Mrs. Penwyn haven’t come back!’ cried
Martin, descrying a handsome landau and pair in front of them as they
drew near the church.
‘Are you sure that’s the Penwyn carriage? They were not expected three
days ago,’ said Maurice.
‘Quite sure. We’ve no other gentry hereabouts, except the Morgrave Park
people, and they hardly ever are at home. There is no doubt about it.
That is Mr. Penwyn’s carriage.’
‘Then I’ll renew my acquaintance with him after church,’ said Maurice.
The old grey church, which he had explored two days ago, had quite a gay
look in its Sunday guise. The farmers’ wives and daughters in their fine
bonnets—the villagers, with their sunburnt faces and Sabbath
cleanliness—the servants from the Manor, occupying two pews under the
low gallery, within which dusky recess the livery of Churchill Penwyn’s
serving-men gleamed gaily, while the bonnets of the maids, all more or
less in the last Parisian fashion, made the shadowy corner a perfect
flower-bed. And most important of all, in a large square pew in the
chancel appeared the Manor House family—Churchill, gentlemanlike and
inscrutable, with his pale, thoughtful face, and grave grey eyes—Madge,
looking verily the young queen of that western land—and Viola, fair and
flower-like, a beauty to be worshipped so much the more for that frail
loveliness which had a fatal air of evanescence.
‘I’m afraid she won’t live long,’ whispered Martin to his companion, in
one of the pauses of the service, while the purblind old clerk was
hunting for the antiquated psalm, Tate and Brady, which it was his duty
to give out.
‘Not Mrs. Penwyn? Why, she looks the picture of health,’ replied
Maurice, in a similar undertone.
Martin coloured like a schoolboy justly suspected of felonious views in
relation to apples.
‘I meant the fair one,’ he gasped, ‘her sister.’
‘She! Ah! looks rather consumptive,’ replied Maurice, heartlessly.
The Borcel End and Manor House families met in the churchyard after the
service—Borcel End respectful, and not intrusive—the Manor House kindly,
cordial even, with no taint of patronage. In sooth, Michael Trevanard
was the best tenant a landowner could have; a man who was always
improving his holding, and paid his rent to the hour; a man to take the
chair at audit dinners, and stumble through a proposal of his landlord’s
health.
‘You didn’t expect to see us so soon, did you, Mrs. Trevanard?’ said
Madge, with her bright smile; ‘but we all grew tired of town in the
middle of the season.’
‘We’re always glad to see you back,’ said Michael, screwing up his
courage, and jerking out the words as if they were likely to choke him.
‘The place doesn’t seem homelike when there’s no family at the Manor
House. You see we were accustomed to see the old Squire pottering about
the place from year’s end to year’s end, and entering into every little
bit of improvement we made; and as familiar, you know, as if he was one
of ourselves. That spoiled us a bit, I make no doubt.’
‘It shall not be my fault if you do not come to consider me one of
yourselves in good time, Mr. Trevanard,’ said Churchill kindly—kindly,
but without that real heartiness which makes a country gentleman popular
among his vassals.
Maurice was standing in the background, and it was only at this moment
that Mr. Penwyn recognised him. Something like a spasm of pain changed
his face for a moment, as if some unwelcome memory were suddenly brought
back to him.
‘Natural enough,’ thought Maurice. ‘The last time we met was at his
cousin’s funeral, and it is hardly a pleasant idea for any man that he
stands in the shoes of the untimely dead.’
That momentary flush of pain past, Mr. Penwyn welcomed the stranger in
the land with exceeding cordiality.
‘How long have you been in Cornwall, Mr. Clissold?’ he asked. ‘You ought
not to come to Penwyn without putting up at the Manor House.’
‘You are very good. I have been to the Manor House, and ventured to put
forward my acquaintance with you as a reason why your faithful old
housekeeper should let me see your house. I dare say she has forgotten
to mention the fact.’
‘There has been scarcely time. We only arrived last night. Let me
present you to my wife.—Madge, this is the Mr. Clissold of whom you have
heard me speak; Mr. Clissold, Mrs. Penwyn, her sister Miss Bellingham.’
Madge acknowledged the introduction with something less than her
accustomed sweetness. Although Churchill was so thoroughly convinced of
the man’s innocence, Madge had not quite made up her mind that he was
guiltless of his friend’s blood. He had been suspected, and the taint
clung to him yet.
Still when she looked at the dark earnest eyes, the open brow, the firm
mouth with its expression of subdued power, the countenance on which
thought had exercised its refining influence, she began to think that
Churchill must be right in this opinion as in all other things, and that
this man was incapable of crime.
So when, after questioning Mr. Clissold as to his whereabouts, Churchill
asked him to go back to the Manor House with them for luncheon, and to
bring his friend Martin Trevanard, Madge seconded the invitation. ‘If
Mrs. Trevanard can spare her son for a few hours,’ she added graciously.
Mrs. Trevanard curtseyed, and thanked Mrs. Penwyn for her condescension,
but added that she did not hold with young people keeping company with
their superiors, and thought that Martin would be better at home in his
own sphere.
‘If I had ever seen good come of it I might think differently,’ said the
farmer’s wife with a gloomy look, ‘but I never have.’
Martin looked angry, and his father embarrassed.
‘I hope you’ll excuse my wife for being so free-spoken,’ Mr. Trevanard
said, in a rather clumsy apology. ‘She doesn’t mean to be uncivil, but
there are points——’ here he came aground hopelessly, and could only
repeat in a feeble tone—‘There are points.’
‘Thanks for your kind invitation, Mr. Penwyn,’ said Martin, still
flushed with shame and anger, ‘but you see I’m not supposed to have a
will of my own yet awhile, and must do as my mother tells me.’
‘Come along, old lady,’ said Michael, and after making their salaams to
the quality, the Borcel End party retired to the dog-cart. The horse had
been tethered on the sward near at hand, browsing calmly throughout the
hour and a half service.
Maurice drove off with the Penwyns in the landau.
‘What a very disagreeable person that Mrs. Trevanard seems!’ said Madge.
‘I should think it could be hardly pleasant staying in her house, Mr.
Clissold.’
‘She is eccentric rather than disagreeable, I think,’ replied Maurice,
‘a woman with a fixed idea which governs all her conduct. I had hard
work to persuade her to let me stop at the farm, but she has been an
excellent hostess. And her son Martin is a capital fellow—one of
Nature’s gentlemen.’
‘Yes, I liked his manner, except when he got so angry with his mother.
But she was really too provoking, with her preachment about equality,
more especially as these Trevanards belong to a good old Cornish family.
Do they not, Churchill?’
‘Yes, love. By Tre, Pol, and Pen, you may know the Cornish men. I
believe these are some of the original Tres. Admirable tenants too. One
can hardly make too much of them.’
‘Do you know anything about their daughter?’ asked Maurice of Mr.
Penwyn.
‘Yes, I have heard of her, but never seen her. A poor half-witted
creature, I believe.’
‘Not half-witted, but deranged. Her brain has evidently been turned by
some great sorrow. From what I can gather she must have loved some one
superior to her in rank, and been ill-treated by him. I fancy this is
why Mrs. Trevanard says bitter things about inequality of station.’
‘An all-sufficient reason. I shall never feel angry with Mrs. Trevanard
again,’ said Madge.
The Manor House looked much gayer and brighter to-day, with servants
passing to and fro, great bowls of roses on all the tables, banks of
flowers in the windows, new books scattered on the tables, holland
covers banished to the limbo of household stores, and two pretty women
lending the charm of their presence to the scene.
Never had Maurice Clissold seen husband and wife so completely happy, or
more entirely suited to each other than these two seemed. Domestic life
at Penwyn Manor House was like an idyll. Simple, unaffected happiness
showed itself in every look, in every word and tone. There was just that
amount of plenteousness and luxury in all things which makes life smooth
and pleasant, without the faintest ostentation. A certain subdued
comfort reigned everywhere, and Churchill in no wise fell into the
common errors of men who have suffered a sudden elevation to wealth. He
neither ‘talked rich,’ nor told his friends with a deprecating shrug of
his shoulders that he had just enough for bread and cheese. In a word,
he took things easily.
As a husband he was, in Viola’s words, ‘simply perfect.’ It was
impossible to imagine devotedness more thorough yet less obtrusive. His
face never turned towards his wife without brightening like a landscape
in a sudden gleam of sunlight. There was nothing that could be condemned
as ‘spooning’ between these married lovers, yet no one would fail to
understand that they were all the world to each other.
Viola had long since altered her mind about Mr. Penwyn. From thinking
him ‘not quite nice,’ she had grown to consider him adorable. To her he
had been all generosity and kindness, treating her in every way as if
she had been his own sister, and a sister well beloved. She had the
prettiest possible suite of rooms at Penwyn, a horse of Churchill’s own
choosing, her own piano, her own maid, and more pocket-money than she
had ever had in her life before.
‘It comes rather hard upon Churchill to have two young women to provide
for instead of one.’ Viola remarked to her sister; ‘but he is so
divinely good about it—she was a young lady who delighted in strong
adverbs—that I hardly realize what a sponge I am.’
And then came sisterly embracings and protestations. Thus the Penwyn
Manor people were altogether the happiest of families.
Maurice thoroughly enjoyed his day at Penwyn. After luncheon they all
rambled about the grounds, Churchill and his wife always side by side,
so that the guest had the pretty Miss Bellingham for his companion.
‘It might be dangerous for another man,’ he said to himself, ‘but I’ve
had my lesson. No more fair soft beauties for me. If ever I suffer
myself to fall in love again it shall be with a girl who looks as if she
could knock me down if I offended her. A girl with as much character in
her face as that actress poor James was so fond of. Of the two I think I
would rather have Clytemnestra than Helen. I dare say Menelaus believed
his wife a pattern of innocence and purity till he woke one morning and
found she had levanted with Paris.’
Thus secure from the influence of her attractions Mr. Clissold made
himself very much at home with Miss Bellingham. She showed him all the
beauties of Penwyn, spots where a glimpse of the sea looked brightest
through a break in the pine grove, hollows where the ferns grew deepest
and greenest, and proved a very different guide from Elspeth.
‘I have been through the grounds before,’ said Maurice, ‘but on that
occasion my companion did not enhance the beauties of nature by the
charm of her society.’
‘Who was your companion?’
‘The granddaughter of the woman at the Lodge. Rather curious people, are
they not?’
‘Yes, I have often wondered how my brother came to pick them up, for
they are not natives of the soil, as almost every one else is at Penwyn.
But Churchill says the old woman is a very estimable person, well worthy
of her post, so one can say no more about it.’
When Maurice wanted to take leave, his new friends insisted that he
should stay to dinner, Mr. Penwyn offering to send him home in a
dog-cart. This favour, however, the sturdy pedestrian steadfastly
declined.
‘I am not afraid of a night walk across the hills,’ he said, ‘and am
getting as familiar with the country about here as if I were to the
manner born.’
So he stayed, and assisted at Mrs. Penwyn’s kettledrum, which was held
in the old Squire’s yewtree bower on the bowling-green, an arbour made
of dense walls of evergreen, cool in summer, and comfortably sheltered
in winter.
Here they drank tea, lazily enjoying the freshening breeze from the
great wide sea, the sea which counts so many argosies for her spoil, the
mighty Atlantic! Here they talked of literature and the world, and
rapidly progressed in friendliness. But not one word was said of James
Penwyn, who, save for that shot fired from behind a hedge, would have
been master of grounds and bower, manor and all thereto belonging. That
was a thought which flashed more than once across Maurice’s mind.
‘How happy these people seem in the possession of a dead man’s goods!’
he thought, ‘how placidly they enjoy his belongings, how coolly they
accept fate’s awful decree! Only human nature I suppose.’
‘“Les morts durent bien peu, laissons les sous la pierre.”’
He stayed till ten o’clock, and left charmed with host and hostess.
Churchill Penwyn had been at his best all day, a man whose talk was
worth hearing, and whose opinions were not feeble echoes of Saturday’s
literary journals. After dinner they had music, as well as conversation,
and Madge played some of Mozart’s finest church music—choice bits culled
from the Masses.
‘How long do you stay in Cornwall?’ was the question at parting.
‘About a week longer at Borcel End, I suppose. But I am my own master as
to time. I have no legitimate profession—for I believe literature hardly
comes under that head,—and am therefore something of a Bohemian: not in
a bad sense, Miss Bellingham, so please don’t look alarmed.’
‘Why not come to us instead of staying at Borcel End?’ asked Churchill.
‘You are too good. But I could hardly do that. When I offered myself to
Mrs. Trevanard as a lodger, I said I should stay for a week or two, and
she is just the kind of woman to feel wounded if I left her abruptly.
And then, Martin and I are great friends. He is really one of the best
fellows I ever met, except—except the friend I lost,’ he added, quickly
and huskily, feeling that any allusion of that kind was ill-judged here.
‘Well, you must do just as you please about it, but give us as much of
your company as you can. We shall have a dinner next week, I believe.’
‘Saturday,’ said Madge.
‘You will come to us then, of course. And as often in the meanwhile as
you can.’
‘Thanks. The dinner-party is out of the question. I travel with a
knapsack, and am three hundred miles from my dress suit. But if you will
allow me to drop in now and then between this and Saturday I shall be
delighted.’
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