"I took it for a faery vision
Of some bright creatures of the element,
That in the colours of the rainbow live
And play i' the plighted clouds; I was awe-struck,
And, as I passed, I worshipped."
Comus.
The long, long illness that followed, and the weary time which it took
to heal the mutilated hand, proved the greatest blessings that could
have befallen the weak and erring heart of Edward Kennedy. They spared
him the necessity of that heart-rending meeting with those whom he best
loved, the dread of which had been the most powerful incitement to urge
upon him the thought of suicide. They gave him time to look before and
after--they relieved the painful tension of his overwrought mind--they
calmed him with the necessity for quiet thought and deep rest after the
anguish and turmoil of the bygone months.
When he awoke to consciousness, Eva was sitting by his bedside in the
sick-room. Slowly the well-remembered objects and the beloved face
broke upon his recollection, but at first he could remember nothing
more, nor connect the strange present with the excited past. Still more
slowly--as when one breaks the azure sleep of some unruffled mountain
mere by the skimming of a stone, and for a long time the clear images of
blue sky, and wreathing cloud, and green mountain-top, are shaken and
confused on the tremulous and twinkling wave, but unite together into
the old picture when the water has recovered its glassy smoothness--so
still more slowly did Kennedy's troubled memory reflect the incidents,
(alas! unbeautiful and threatening incidents), of the preceding days.
They came back to him as he lay there quite still; and then he groaned.
"Hush! dearest Edward," said Eva, who had watched his face, and guessed
from its expressive workings the progress of his thoughts; "hush, we are
with you, and all is going on well. Your hand is healing."
He found that his right hand was tightly and firmly bandaged, and kept
still by a splint.
"Was it much hurt? Shall I recover the use of it?"
"Yes, almost certainly, Dr Leesby says. I will tell papa that you are
awake."
"Is he very, very angry?" asked poor Kennedy.
"He has forgiven all, dear," she said, kissing his forehead. "It was
all very dreadful,"--and a cold shiver ran over her--"but none of us
will ever allude to it again. Banish it from your thoughts, Eddy; we
will leave Camford as soon as you can be moved."
She went to fetch her father, and as he came in and leant fondly over
his son's sick-bed, and grasped warmly his unwounded hand, tears of
afflicting memory coursed each other fast down the old man's cheeks. He
had been hard, too hard upon Edward; perhaps his severity had driven him
of late into such bad courses, and to the brink of such an awful and
disgraceful end; perhaps if he had been kinder, gentler, more
sympathising for this first offence, he might have been saved the
anguish of driving his poor boy to lower and wilder depths of sin and
sorrow. It was all over now; and amid the apparent wreck of all his
hopes, even after the death-blows which recent events had dealt to his
old pride in his noble child, he yet regarded him as he lay there--
wounded and in such a way--with all the pity of a Christian's
forgiveness, with all the fondness of a father's love.
"Oh, father, I have suffered unspeakably. If God ever raises me to
health and strength again, I vow with all my heart to serve Him as I
have never done before."
"Yes, Edward, I trust and believe it; think no more of the past; let the
dead bury their dead. The golden present is before you, and you will
have two friends who never desert the brave man--your Maker and
yourself."
A silence followed, and then Eva said, "I have just seen Dr Leesby,
Eddy, and he says that if you are now quite yourself, and the
light-headedness has ceased, you may be moved on Monday."
"And to-day is?--I have lost all count of time."
"To-day is Saturday. Won't it be charming, dear, to find ourselves once
more at home; quietly at home, with no one but ourselves, and our own
love to make us happy."
"And what am I to do, Eva?"
"Hush, Eddy; sufficient for the day--"
"Does she know, Eva? Do you ever hear from her now?"
"Yes, often--but do not think too much of those things just yet."
"And Julian?"
"He has often come to ask after you," she said blushing, "but he is
afraid to see you, lest it should do you harm just now."
"Perhaps he is right. We are not all enemies, then?"
"Enemies with Julian and Violet? _Oh no_."
Though the engagement of Kennedy with Violet had been broken off by the
common desire of Julian and Mr Kennedy, the two families still
continued their affectionate intercourse, and bewailed the sad necessity
which drove them to a step so painful, yet so unavoidably required by
the welfare of all concerned. And from the first they hoped that all
might yet be well, while some among them began to fancy that if Kennedy
and Violet should ever be united, it would not be the only close bond
between hearts already full of mutual affection.
So Julian still came daily during Kennedy's illness to see Eva and Mr
Kennedy, and to inquire after the sufferer's health. And sometimes he
took them for a walk in the grounds or the immediate neighbourhood of
Camford, a place which they had never visited before, and which to them
was full of interest.
Eva had often heard of the glories of Saint Werner's chapel, and on the
Sunday she asked Julian if it would be possible for her to go with her
father to the evening service there.
"Oh yes," said Julian; "certainly. I will get one of the Fellows to
take you in. It is a remarkable sight, and I think you ought to go."
The Sunday evening came, and Julian escorted them to the ante-chapel,
and showed them the various sculptures and memorials of mighty names.
They then waited by the door till some Fellow whom Julian knew should
pass into the chapel to escort them to a vacant place in the Fellows'
seats.
Saint Werner's Chapel consists of a single aisle, along the floor of
which are placed rows of benches for the undergraduates; raised above
these to a height of three steps are the long seats appropriated to the
scholars and the Bachelors of Arts; and again, two steps above these are
the seats of the Fellows and Masters of Arts, together with room for
such casual strangers as may chance to be admitted. In the centre of
these long rows, on either side, are the places for the choristers, men
and boys, and the lofty thrones whence the Deans "look down with
sleepless eyes upon the world." By the door on either side are the
red-curtained and velvet-cushioned seats of the Master and Vice-master,
beyond whom sit the noblemen and fellow-commoners. By the lectern and
reading-desk is a step of black and white marble, which extends to the
altar, on which are two candlesticks of massive silver; and over them
some beautiful carved oaken work covers a great painting, flanked on
either side by old gilded pictures of the Saviour and the Madonna.
Imagine this space all lighted from wall to wall by wax candles, and at
the end by large lamps which shed a brighter and softer light, and
imagine it filled, if you can, by five hundred men in snowy surplices,
and you have a faint fancy of the scene which broke on the eyes of Mr
Kennedy and Eva, as they passed between the statues of the ante-chapel,
and under the pealing organ into the inner sanctuary of Saint Werner's
chapel.
"Could they behold--
Who, less insensible than sodden clay
In a sea river's bed at ebb of tide--
Could have beheld with undelighted heart
So many happy youths, so wide and fair
A congregation in its budding-time
Of health, and hope, and beauty, all at once
So many divers samples from the growth
Of life's sweet season--could have seen unmoved
That miscellaneous garland of wild flowers,
Decking the matron temples of a place,
So famous through the world?"
It was Mr Norton whom Julian caught hold of as an escort for his
friends into the chapel. I well remember, (who that saw it does not?)
that entrance. It was rather late; the organ was playing a grand
overture, the men were all in their seats, and the service just going to
begin, when Eva entered leaning on Mr Norton's arm, and followed by her
father and Julian. Many of the Saint Werner's men had seen her walking
in the grounds the last day or two, and as Kennedy's sister a peculiar
interest attached to her just then. But she needed no such accidental
source of interest to attract the liveliest attention of such keen and
warm enthusiasts for beauty as the Camford undergraduates. Ladies are
comparatively rare apparitions in that semi-monastic body of scholars;
and ladies both young and lovely are rare indeed. So as Eva entered, so
young and so fair, the bright and graceful and beautiful Eva--with that
exquisite rose-tinge which the air of Orton-on-the-Sea had given her,
and the folded softness of the tresses which flowed down beside her
perfect face, and the light of beaming eyes seen like jewels under her
long eyelashes as she bent her glance upon the ground--as Eva entered, I
say, leaning on Mr Norton's arm, and touched, with the floating of her
pale silk dress, the surplices of the Saint Werner's men as they sat on
either side down the narrow passage, it was no wonder that every single
eye from that of the Senior Dean [Pace Decani dixerim!] to that of the
little chorister boy was turned upon her for an instant, as she passed
up to the only vacant seats, and Mr Norton caused room to be made for
her beside the tutor's cushion by the chaplain's desk. She was happily
unconscious of the admiration, and the perfect simplicity of her sweet
girlish unconsciousness added a fresh charm to the whole grace of her
manner and appearance. Only by the slightest possible blush did she
show her sense of her unusual position as the cynosure for the admiring
gaze of five hundred English youths; and that too though the dark and
handsome countenance of Mr Norton glowed visibly with a brighter
colour, (as though he were conscious of the thought respecting him,
which darted across many an undergraduate's mind), and even the face of
Julian, as he walked to the scholars' seats among the familiar ranks of
his compeers, was flushed with the crimson of a sensitiveness which he
would fain have hidden.
And I cannot help it, if even during the noble service--even amid the
sound "Of solemn psalms and silver litanies," the eyes of many men
wandered towards a sweet face, and gazed upon it as they might have
gazed upon a flower, and if the thoughts of many men were absorbed
unwontedly in other emotions than those of prayer; nor can I help it if
Julian was one of those whose eyes and thoughts were so employed.
What an evening star she was! And how her very presence filled all
hearts with a livelier sense of happiness and hope, and sweet pure
yearnings for wedded calm and bridal love! But she--innocent young
Eva--little knew of the sensation she had caused by the rare beauty of
her blossoming womanhood. _Her_ whole heart was in the act of worship,
except when it wandered for a moment to her poor sick Eddy, whom they
had left alone, or for another moment to one whom she could not but see
before her in the scholars' seats. She did not know that men were
looking at her, as she raised her clear warbling voice amid the silvery
trebles of the choir, and uttered with all the expressiveness of genuine
emotion those strains of poetry and passion which thrilled from the
heart to the harp of the warrior-prophet and poet-king. And never did
truer prayers come from a woman's lips than those which her heart
offered as her head was bowed that night.
The service was over, and the congregation streamed out. That evening
the ante-chapel was fuller than usual of men, who stayed nominally to
hear the organ; but besides those musical souls, who always linger to
hear the voluntary, or to talk in little groups, there were others who,
on that pretence, waited to catch another glimpse--a last glimpse of
eyes whose deep and lovely colour had flowed into their souls. They
were disappointed though, for Eva dropped her veil. With a graceful bow
to Mr Norton, which he returned with courteous dignity, she took
Julian's proffered arm, and walked out into the court, her father
following. A proud man was Julian that evening, and the subject of
kindly envy to not a few.
But that little incident--the many eyes that had seen his treasure--
determined Julian to take the step which he had long decided upon in his
secret heart. He was half-jealous of the open, unconcealed admiration
which Eva had excited, and it made him fear lest another should approach
the object of his love, and occupy a place in the heart which he had not
even demanded as his own. He was positively in a hurry. What if some
undergraduate should get an introduction to Eva--some gay and handsome
Adonis--and should suddenly carry away her heart?
So when Mr Kennedy went into the sick-room to read to Edward the
lessons for the day, and Julian stayed with Eva in the sitting-room, he
drew his chair beside hers, and they began to talk about Saint Werner's.
"Do you think you shall ever be a Fellow, Julian? I should so like you
to be?"
"And if I am, I shall hope very soon to exchange it for a happier
fellowship, Eva."