And yet if each the other’s name
In some unguarded moment heard,
The heart that once you thought so tame
Would flutter like a wounded bird.--ANON.
Letters continued to come with fair regularity; and it was understood
that Gerald, with Lida, had taken up his quarters in an
“inexpensive” boarding-house at New York, where he had sent Lida to a
highly-recommended day-school, and he was looking out for employment.
His articles had been accepted, he said; but the accounts of his
adventures and of his fellow-inmates gave the sense that there was more
humour in the retrospect than in the society, and that they were better
to write about than to live with. He never confessed it, but to his
aunt, who understood him, it was plain that he found it a different
thing to talk philanthropic socialism, or even to work among the poor,
and to live in the society of the unrefined equals.
Then he wrote that Lida had come one day and told him that one of the
girls, with whom she had made friends, had a bad attack of cough and
bronchitis, and could not fulfil an engagement that she had made to come
and sing for a person who was giving lectures upon national music. “‘I
looked at some of her songs,’ little Lida said in her humble way, ‘and
I know them. Don’t you think, brother, I might take her part?’ Well, not
to put too fine a point upon it, it was not an unwelcome notion, for my
articles, though accepted, don’t bring in the speedy remuneration with
which fiction beguiles the aspirant. Only one of them, which I send you,
has seen the light, and the ‘Censor’ is slow, though sure, so dollars
for immediate expenses run short. I called on the fellow, Mr. Gracchus
B. Van Tromp, to see whether he were fit company for my sister, and I
found him much superior to his name--gentlemanlike and intelligent, not
ill-read, and pretty safe, like most Yankees, to know how to behave to a
young girl. When he found I could accompany my sister on piano or violin
he was transported. Moreover, he could endure to be enlightened by a
Britisher on such little facts as the true history of Auld Robin Gray
and the Wacht am Rhein. The lecture was a marked success. We have
another tonight, 16th. It has resulted in a proposal to these two
interesting performers to accompany the great Gracchus on a tour through
the leading ‘cities,’ lecturing by turns with him and assisting. He
has hitherto picked up as he could ‘local talent,’ but is glad of less
uncertain help, and so far as appears, he is superior to jealousy,
though he sees that I’m better read, ‘and of the cut that takes the
ladies.’ It is no harm for Lida; she was not learning much, and I can
cultivate her better when I have her to myself, and get her not to
regard me so much like a lion, to be honoured with distant respect and
obedience. We shall get dollars enough to keep us going till my talents
break upon the world, and obtain stunning experiences for the ‘Censor’.
My father’s dear old violin is coming to the front. Our first start will
be at Boston; but continue to write to Gerald F. Wood, care of Editor of
‘Cole’s Weekly’.”
“How like his father!” was the natural exclamation; but the details that
followed in another week were fairly satisfactory, and the spirit of
independence was a sound one, which had stood harder proofs than perhaps
his home was allowed to know, though these were early days.
February was beginning to open the buds and to fill the slopes with
delicate anemones, as well as to bring back Mr. White’s workmen, among
whom Clement could make inquiries. One young man knew the name of
Benista as belonging to a family in a valley beyond his own, but it was
not an easily accessible one, and a fresh fall of snow had choked the
ravine, and would do so for weeks to come.
Yet all was lovely on the coast, and Mr. White having occasion to go to
San Remo, offered to take the three girls with him.
“Young ladies always have a turn for shops,” said he.
“I want to see the coast,” said Franceska, with a little dignity.
“But I do want some gloves--and some blue embroidery silk, thank you,
Mr. White,” said Anna, more courteously.
“And I want some handkerchiefs, if Mr. White will take me too!” returned
Uncle Clement in the same tone.
“I know so well what you mean, dear,” observed Maura, sotto voce to
Francie. “It is so trying to be supposed mere common-place, when one’s
thoughts are on the beautiful and romantic.”
It was just one of the sayings that had begun to go against Francie’s
taste, and she answered--
“Mr. White is very good-natured.”
“Ah, yes, but so--so--you know.”
Francie was called, and left Mr. White’s description to be unutterable.
The two elder ladies spent the day together, and Mrs. Grinstead then
heard that Jane Mohun had written, that both Lord Ivinghoe and Lady
Phyllis Devereux were recovering from the influenza, and that Lord
Rotherwood had had a slight touch of the complaint.
“It is a very serious thing in our family,” said Adeline, with all the
satisfaction of having a family, especially with a complaint, and she
began to enumerate the victims of the Devereux house and her own, only
breaking off to exclaim, “I really shall write at once to beg them all
to come here for the rest of the winter, March winds and all. My cousin
Rotherwood has never been here, and they might be quite quiet among
relations. So unlike a common health resort.”
Mrs. White’s hospitable anticipations were forestalled. The party came
home from San Remo in high spirits. They had met Lord Rotherwood and
his son in the street, they had been greeted most warmly, and brought
to luncheon at the villa, where they found not only Lady Rotherwood and
Phyllis, but Mysie Merrifield.
It was explained that their London doctor had strongly advised immediate
transplantation before there was time to catch fresh colds, and a friend
of the Marchioness, who permanently possessed a charming house at San
Remo, had offered it just as it was for the spring. The journey had been
made at once, with one deviation on Lord Rotherwood’s part, to beg for
Mysie, as an essential requisite to his “Fly’s” perfect recovery. A
visit had been due before, only deferred by the general illness, and no
difficulty was made in letting it be paid in these new and delightful
scenes. Phyllis had been there before. She was weak and languid, and
would much rather have stayed at home, except for seeing Mysie’s delight
in the mountains and the blue Mediterranean, which she dimly remembered
from her infancy at Malta. Only she made it a point of honour not to
allow that the sea was bluer than the bay of Rockquay.
Ivinghoe was looking ill and disgusted, but brightened up at the sight
of the visitors, and his mother, who thought Monte Carlo too near,
though she had kept as far from it as possible, accepted the more
willingly Mr. White’s cordial invitation to come and spend a day or two
at Rocca Marina. Trifles were so much out of the good lady’s focus of
vision that the possible dangers in that quarter never occurred to her,
though Maura was demurely bridling, and Francie, all unawakened, but
prettier than ever, was actually wearing a scarlet anemone that Ivinghoe
had given to her.
In the intervening days, Rocca Marina was in a wonderful state of
preparation. The master of it was genuinely and honestly kindly and
simple-hearted, and had entertained noble travellers before, who had
been attracted by his extensive and artistic works; but no words can
describe the satisfaction of his wife. In part there was the heartfelt
pleasure of receiving the cousin who had been like one of her brothers
in the home of her childhood; but to this was added the glory of knowing
that this same cousin was a marquis, and that the society of San Remo,
nay of all the Riviera and the Italian papers to boot, would know that
she was a good deal more than the quarry-owner’s wife. Moreover, like
all her family, there was a sense of Lady Rotherwood’s coming from a
different sphere, and treating them with condescension. Jane and Lily
might laugh, but to Adeline it was matter of a sort of aggressive awe,
half as asserting herself as “Victoria’s” equal and relation, half as
protecting her from inferior people.
Geraldine perceived and was secretly amused. Of course all the party
dined at the castle on Saturday night, and heard some lamentations that
there was no one else to meet the distinguished guests, for the young
doctor was not thought worthy.
“But I knew you would like a family party best, and the Underwoods
are--almost connections, though--”
In that “though” was conveyed their vast inferiority to the house of
Mohun.
“I always understood that it was a very good old family,” said Lady
Rotherwood.
“Clement Underwood is one of the most valuable clergy in London,” said
her lord; “I am glad he is recovering. I shall be delighted to hear him
again.”
Maura was standing under the pergola with Lord Ivinghoe.
“And is not it sad for poor Franceska Vanderkist?--Oh! you know about
poor Mr. Gerald Underwood?” said Maura, blushing a little at the awkward
subject.
“Of course,” said Ivinghoe impatiently. “He is in America, is he not?
But what has she to do with it?”
“Oh, you know, after being his Mona, and all. It can’t go any further
till it is cleared up.”
Phyllis and Mysie came up, asking Maura to tell them the name of a
mountain peak with a white cap. The party came up to dinner, which was
as genial and easy as the host and Lord Rotherwood could make it, and as
stiff and grand as the hostess could accomplish, aided by the deftness
and grace of her Italian servants. In the evening Theodore came up to
assist in the singing of glees, and Clement’s voice was a delightful and
welcome sound in his sister’s ears. Ivinghoe stood among the circle at
the piano, and enjoyed. He and his sister were not particularly musical,
but enough to enjoy those remarkable Underwood voices. After that Maura
never promoted musical evenings.
An odd little Sunday-school for the children of the English workmen had
been instituted at Rocca Marina, where Maura had always assisted the
chaplain’s wife, and Anna and Francie shared the work. Mysie heard of it
with enthusiasm, for, as Ivinghoe told her, she was pining for a breath
of the atmosphere, but she came down to enjoy the delights thereof
alone, taking Maura’s small class. Maura was supposed to be doing the
polite to Lady Phyllis, but in point of fact Phyllis was lying down
in the balcony of her mother’s dressing-room, and Maura was gracefully
fanning herself under a great cork tree, while Lord Ivinghoe was lying
on the grass.
Francie looked languid, and said it was getting dreadfully hot, but
Mrs. Grinstead took no notice, trusting that the cessation of attentions
would hinder any feeling from going deeper, so that--as she could not
help saying to herself--she might not have brought the poor child out of
the frying-pan into the fire--not an elegant proverb, but expressing her
feeling!
More especially did it do so, when she found that Lord Rotherwood was
so much delighted with the beauty and variety of the marbles of Rocca
Marina as to order a font to be made of them for the church that was
being restored at Clarebridge, and he, and still more his son, found
constant diversion in running over by train from San Remo to superintend
the design, and to select the different colours and patterns of the
stones as they were quarried out and bits polished so as to show their
beauty. Their ladies often accompanied them, and these expeditions
generally involved luncheon at the castle, and often tea at the
parsonage, but it might be gradually observed, as time went on, that
there was a shade of annoyance on the part of the great house at the
preference sometimes unconsciously shown for the society of the smaller
one.
Mysie openly claimed Anna as her own friend of some standing, and
both she and Phyllis had books to discuss, botanical or geological
discoveries to communicate or puzzle out, with Mrs. Grinstead or her
nieces. Lord Rotherwood had many more interests in common with Clement
Underwood than with Mr. White, and even the Marchioness, though more
impartial and on her guard, was sensible to Mrs. Grinstead’s charm of
manner and depth of comprehension. She patronized Adeline, but respected
Mrs. Grinstead as incapable of and insensible to patronage.
That her gentlemen should have found such safe and absorbing occupation
in the opposite direction to Monte Carlo was an abiding satisfaction
to her, and she did not analyze the charms of the place as regarded her
son. She had seen him amused by other young ladies, as he certainly was
now by that Miss White, who was very handsome and very obliging.
She knew and he knew all the antecedents too well for alarm, till one
day she saw Maura’s face, as she made him pull down a spray of banksia
from the side of a stone wall, and watched the air of gallant courtesy
with which he presented it.
Francie watched it too, as she had watched the like before, and said
nothing, but there was an odd, dull sense of disappointment, and the
glory had faded away from sea and sky, spring though it was. Yet there
were pressures of the hand in greeting and parting, and kind, wistful
looks, as if of sympathy, little services and little attentions, that
set her foolish little heart bounding, in a way she was much ashamed
to feel, and would have been more utterly ashamed to speak of, or to
suppose observed. She only avowed to Anna that it was very warm, weary
weather, and that she was tired of absence, and felt homesick, but Aunt
Cherry was so kind that she must not be told.
Lady Rotherwood proposed moving away, but her husband and son would not
hear of it till their font was finished.
It was not unwelcome to any one of the elder ladies that the young
officer’s leave would be over in another week. Geraldine was glad that
Francie should be freed from the trial of seeing attention absorbed by
Maura, and herself so often left in the lurch, so far as that young lady
could contrive it, for though not a word was said, the brightened eye
and glowing cheek, whenever Lord Ivinghoe brought her forward, or paid
her any deference or civility, were dangerous symptoms. Peace of mind
in so modest and innocent a maiden would probably come back when the
excitement was once over.
As to Adeline, there was nothing she dreaded so much as the commotion
that would be excited if Ivinghoe’s flirtation came to any crisis. His
mother would never forgive her, his father would hardly do so; she would
feel like a traitor to the whole family, and all her attempts to put a
check on endeavours on Maura’s part to draw him on--an endeavour that
began to be visible to her--were met by apparent unconsciousness or by
tears. And when she ventured a word to her husband, he gruffly answered
that his niece’s father had been an officer in the army, and he could
make it worth any one’s while to take her! Young lords were glad enough
in these days to have something to put into their pockets.