What Harry admired and submitted to in the pretty lad, his kinsman, was
(for why should he resist it?) the calmness of patronage which my young
lord assumed, as if to command was his undoubted right, and all the world
(below his degree) ought to bow down to Viscount Castlewood.
“I know my place, Harry,” he said. “I’m not proud—the boys at Winchester
College say I’m proud: but I’m not proud. I am simply Francis James
Viscount Castlewood in the peerage of Ireland. I might have been (do you
know that?) Francis James Marquis and Earl of Esmond in that of England.
The late lord refused the title which was offered to him by my godfather,
his late Majesty. You should know that—you are of our family, you know—you
cannot help your bar sinister, Harry, my dear fellow; and you belong to
one of the best families in England, in spite of that; and you stood by my
father, and by G——! I’ll stand by you. You shall never want a friend,
Harry, while Francis James Viscount Castlewood has a shilling. It’s now
1703—I shall come of age in 1709. I shall go back to Castlewood; I shall
live at Castlewood; I shall build up the house. My property will be pretty
well restored by then. The late viscount mismanaged my property, and left
it in a very bad state. My mother is living close, as you see, and keeps
me in a way hardly befitting a peer of these realms; for I have but a pair
of horses, a governor, and a man that is valet and groom. But when I am of
age, these things will be set right, Harry. Our house will be as it should
be. You’ll always come to Castlewood, won’t you? You shall always have
your two rooms in the court kept for you; and if anybody slights you, d——
them! let them have a care of _me_. I shall marry early—’Trix will be a
duchess by that time, most likely; for a cannon-ball may knock over his
grace any day, you know.”
“How?” says Harry.
“Hush, my dear!” says my lord viscount. “You are of the family—you are
faithful to us, by George, and I tell you everything. Blandford will marry
her—or ——” and here he put his little hand on his sword—“you understand
the rest. Blandford knows which of us two is the best weapon. At
small-sword, or back-sword, or sword and dagger, if he likes: I can beat
him. I have tried him, Harry; and begad, he knows I am a man not to be
trifled with.”
“But you do not mean,” says Harry, concealing his laughter, but not his
wonder, “that you can force my Lord Blandford, the son of the first man of
this kingdom, to marry your sister at sword’s point?”
“I mean to say that we are cousins by the mother’s side, though that’s
nothing to boast of. I mean to say that an Esmond is as good as a
Churchill; and when the king comes back, the Marquis of Esmond’s sister
may be a match for any nobleman’s daughter in the kingdom. There are but
two marquises in all England, William Herbert, Marquis of Powis, and
Francis James, Marquis of Esmond; and hark you, Harry, now swear you’ll
never mention this. Give me your honour as a gentleman, for you _are_ a
gentleman, though you are a——”
“Well, well,” says Harry, a little impatient.
“Well, then, when after my late viscount’s misfortune, my mother went up
with us to London, to ask for justice against you all (as for Mohun, I’ll
have his blood, as sure as my name is Francis Viscount Esmond), we went to
stay with our cousin my Lady Marlborough, with whom we had quarrelled for
ever so long. But when misfortune came, she stood by her blood:—so did the
dowager viscountess stand by her blood,—so did you. Well, sir, whilst my
mother was petitioning the late Prince of Orange—for I will never call him
king—and while you were in prison, we lived at my Lord Marlborough’s
house, who was only a little there, being away with the army in Holland.
And then ... I say, Harry, you won’t tell, now?”
Harry again made a vow of secrecy.
“Well, there used to be all sorts of fun, you know: my Lady Marlborough
was very fond of us, and she said I was to be her page; and she got ’Trix
to be a maid of honour, and while she was up in her room crying, we used
to be always having fun, you know; and the duchess used to kiss me, and so
did her daughters, and Blandford fell tremendous in love with ’Trix, and
she liked him; and one day he—he kissed her behind a door—he did
though,—and the duchess caught him, and she banged such a box of the ear
both to ’Trix and Blandford—you should have seen it! And then she said
that we must leave directly, and abused my mamma, who was cognizant of the
business; but she wasn’t—never thinking about anything but father. And so
we came down to Walcote. Blandford being locked up, and not allowed to see
’Trix. But _I_ got at him. I climbed along the gutter, and in through the
window, where he was crying.
“ ‘Marquis,’ says I, when he had opened it and helped me in, ‘you know I
wear a sword,’ for I had brought it.
“ ‘Oh, viscount,’ says he—‘oh, my dearest Frank!’ and he threw himself
into my arms and burst out a-crying. ‘I do love Mistress Beatrix so, that
I shall die if I don’t have her.’
“ ‘My dear Blandford,’ says I, ‘you are young to think of marrying;’ for
he was but fifteen, and a young fellow of that age can scarce do so, you
know.
“ ‘But I’ll wait twenty years, if she’ll have me,’ says he. ‘I’ll never
marry—no never, never, never, marry anybody but her. No, not a princess,
though they would have me do it ever so. If Beatrix will wait for me, her
Blandford swears he will be faithful.’ And he wrote a paper (it wasn’t
spelt right, for he wrote: ‘I’m ready to _sine with my blode_’, which you
know, Harry, isn’t the way of spelling it), and vowing that he would marry
none other but the Honourable Mistress Gertrude Beatrix Esmond, only
sister of his dearest friend Francis James, fourth Viscount Esmond. And so
I gave him a locket of her hair.”
“A locket of her hair!” cries Esmond.
“Yes. ’Trix gave me one after the fight with the duchess that very day. I
am sure I didn’t want it; and so I gave it him, and we kissed at parting,
and said—‘Good-bye, brother.’ And I got back through the gutter; and we
set off home that very evening. And he went to King’s College, in
Cambridge, and _I’m_ going to Cambridge soon; and if he doesn’t stand to
his promise (for he’s only wrote once),—he knows I wear a sword, Harry.
Come along, and let’s go see the cocking-match at Winchester.
“....But I say,” he added laughing, after a pause, “I don’t think ’Trix
will break her heart about him. Law bless you! Whenever she sees a man,
she makes eyes at him; and young Sir Wilmot Crawley of Queen’s Crawley,
and Anthony Henley of Alresford, were at swords drawn about her, at the
Winchester Assembly, a month ago.”
That night Mr. Harry’s sleep was by no means so pleasant or sweet as it
had been on the first two evenings after his arrival at Walcote. “So the
bright eyes have been already shining on another,” thought he, “and the
pretty lips, or the cheeks at any rate, have begun the work which they
were made for. Here’s a girl not sixteen, and one young gentleman is
already whimpering over a lock of her hair, and two country squires are
ready to cut each other’s throats that they may have the honour of a dance
with her. What a fool am I to be dallying about this passion, and singeing
my wings in this foolish flame. Wings!—why not say crutches? There is but
eight years’ difference between us, to be sure; but in life I am thirty
years older. How could I ever hope to please such a sweet creature as
that, with my rough ways and glum face? Say that I have merit ever so
much, and won myself a name, could she ever listen to me? She must be my
lady marchioness, and I remain a nameless bastard. O my master, my
master!” (here he fell to thinking with a passionate grief of the vow
which he had made to his poor dying lord); “O my mistress, dearest and
kindest, will you be contented with the sacrifice which the poor orphan
makes for you, whom you love, and who so loves you?”
And then came a fiercer pang of temptation. “A word from me,” Harry
thought, “a syllable of explanation, and all this might be changed; but
no, I swore it over the dying bed of my benefactor. For the sake of him
and his; for the sacred love and kindness of old days; I gave my promise
to him, and may kind Heaven enable me to keep my vow!”
The next day, although Esmond gave no sign of what was going on in his
mind, but strove to be more than ordinarily gay and cheerful when he met
his friends at the morning meal, his dear mistress, whose clear eyes it
seemed no emotion of his could escape, perceived that something troubled
him, for she looked anxiously towards him more than once during the
breakfast, and when he went up to his chamber afterwards she presently
followed him, and knocked at his door.
As she entered, no doubt the whole story was clear to her at once, for she
found our young gentleman packing his valise, pursuant to the resolution
which he had come to over-night of making a brisk retreat out of this
temptation.
She closed the door very carefully behind her, and then leant against it,
very pale, her hands folded before her, looking at the young man, who was
kneeling over his work of packing. “Are you going so soon?” she said.
He rose up from his knees, blushing, perhaps, to be so discovered, in the
very act, as it were, and took one of her fair little hands—it was that
which had her marriage ring on—and kissed it.
“It is best that it should be so, dearest lady,” he said.
“I knew you were going, at breakfast. I—I thought you might stay. What has
happened? Why can’t you remain longer with us? What has Frank told you—you
were talking together late last night?”
“I had but three days’ leave from Chelsea,” Esmond said, as gaily as he
could. “My aunt—she lets me call her aunt—is my mistress now; I owe her my
lieutenancy and my laced coat. She has taken me into high favour; and my
new general is to dine at Chelsea to-morrow—General Lumley, madam—who has
appointed me his aide de camp, and on whom I must have the honour of
waiting. See, here is a letter from the dowager; the post brought it last
night; and I would not speak of it, for fear of disturbing our last merry
meeting.”
My lady glanced at the letter, and put it down with a smile that was
somewhat contemptuous. “I have no need to read the letter,” says
she—(indeed, ’twas as well she did not; for the Chelsea missive, in the
poor dowager’s usual French jargon, permitted him a longer holiday than he
said. “_Je vous donne_,” quoth her ladyship, “_oui jour, pour vous fatigay
parfaictement de vos parens fatigans_”)—“I have no need to read the
letter,” says she. “What was it Frank told you last night?”
“He told me little I did not know,” Mr. Esmond answered. “But I have
thought of that little, and here’s the result; I have no right to the name
I bear, dear lady; and it is only by your sufferance that I am allowed to
keep it. If I thought for an hour of what has perhaps crossed your mind
too——”
“Yes, I did, Harry,” said she; “I thought of it; and think of it. I would
sooner call you my son than the greatest prince in Europe—yes, than the
greatest prince. For who is there so good and so brave, and who would love
her as you would? But there are reasons a mother can’t tell.”
“I know them,” said Mr. Esmond, interrupting her with a smile.—“I know
there’s Sir Wilmot Crawley of Queen’s Crawley, and Mr. Anthony Henley of
the Grange, and my Lord Marquis of Blandford, that seems to be the
favoured suitor. You shall ask me to wear my lady marchioness’s favours
and to dance at her ladyship’s wedding.”
“Oh, Harry, Harry, it is none of these follies that frighten me,” cried
out Lady Castlewood. “Lord Churchill is but a child, his outbreak about
Beatrix was a mere boyish folly. His parents would rather see him buried
than married to one below him in rank. And do you think that I would stoop
to sue for a husband for Francis Esmond’s daughter; or submit to have my
girl smuggled into that proud family to cause a quarrel between son and
parents, and to be treated only as an inferior? I would disdain such a
meanness. Beatrix would scorn it. Ah! Henry, ’tis not with you the fault
lies, ’tis with her. I know you both, and love you: need I be ashamed of
that love now? No, never, never, and ’tis not you, dear Harry, that is
unworthy. ’Tis for my poor Beatrix I tremble—whose headstrong will
frightens me; whose jealous temper (they say I was jealous too, but, pray
God, I am cured of that sin) and whose vanity no words or prayers of mine
can cure—only suffering, only experience, and remorse afterwards. Oh,
Henry, she will make no man happy who loves her. Go away, my son, leave
her: love us always, and think kindly of us: and for me, my dear, you know
that these walls contain all that I love in the world.”
In after-life, did Esmond find the words true which his fond mistress
spoke from her sad heart? Warning he had: but I doubt others had warning
before his time, and since: and he benefited by it as most men do.
My young lord viscount was exceeding sorry when he heard that Harry could
not come to the cock-match with him, and must go to London, but no doubt
my lord consoled himself when the Hampshire cocks won the match; and he
saw every one of the battles, and crowed properly over the conquered
Sussex gentlemen.
As Esmond rode towards town his servant, coming up to him, informed him
with a grin, that Mistress Beatrix had brought out a new gown and blue
stockings for that day’s dinner, in which she intended to appear, and had
flown into a rage and given her maid a slap on the face soon after she
heard he was going away. Mistress Beatrix’s woman, the fellow said, came
down to the servants’ hall, crying, and with the mark of a blow still on
her cheek: but Esmond peremptorily ordered him to fall back and be silent,
and rode on with thoughts enough of his own to occupy him—some sad ones,
some inexpressibly dear and pleasant.
His mistress, from whom he had been a year separated, was his dearest
mistress again. The family from which he had been parted, and which he
loved with the fondest devotion, was his family once more. If Beatrix’s
beauty shone upon him, it was with a friendly lustre, and he could regard
it with much such a delight as he brought away after seeing the beautiful
pictures of the smiling Madonnas in the convent at Cadiz, when he was
dispatched thither with a flag: and as for his mistress, ’twas difficult
to say with what a feeling he regarded her. ’Twas happiness to have seen
her: ’twas no great pang to part; a filial tenderness, a love that was at
once respect and protection, filled his mind as he thought of her; and
near her or far from her, and from that day until now, and from now till
death is past, and beyond it, he prays that sacred flame may ever burn.