ACCOMPLISHMENTS AT A DISCOUNT.
Now began for Ida a life of supreme dullness--an empty, almost hopeless,
life, waiting upon fortune. Her father was kind to her in his easy-going,
lymphatic way, liking well enough to have her about him, pleased with her
affection for his boy, proud of her beauty and her talents, but with no
earnest care for her welfare in the present or the future. What was to
become of wife, son and daughter when he was dead and gone, was a
question which Captain Palliser dared not ask himself. For the widow
there would be a pittance, for son and daughter nothing. It was therefore
vital that Ida should either marry well or become a money-earning
personage. Of marriage at Les Fontaines there seemed not the faintest
probability, since the experiences of the past afford so few instances of
wandering swains caught and won by a face at a window, or the casual
appearance of a beautiful girl on a country road.
Of friends or acquaintance, in his present abode, Captain Palliser had
none. The only people he had ever cared for were the men and women he had
known in India; and he had lost sight of those since his marriage. They
were scattered; and he was too proud to expose his fallen fortunes to
those who had known him in his happier days, those days when the careless
expenditure of his modest capital had given him a false air of easy
circumstances.
His life at Les Fontaines suited him well enough, individually. It was a
kind of hibernation. He slept a good deal, and ate a good deal, and
smoked incessantly, and took very little exercise. For all that is best
and noblest in life, Captain Palliser might just as well have been dead.
He had outlived hope and ambition, thought, invention. He exercised no
influence upon the lives of others, except upon the little homely wife,
who was a slave to him. He was no possible good in the world. Yet his
daughter was fond of him, and pleased to bear him company when he would
have her; and under her influence his sluggish intellect brightened a
little.
For the first few weeks of her residence at Les Fontaines, Ida was
tortured by a continually recurring fear of Brian Wendover's pursuit. He
had let her go coolly enough; but what if he were to change his mind and
follow and claim her? She belonged to him. She was his goods, his
chattels--to have and to hold till death did them part. Her life was no
longer her own to dispose of as she pleased. Would he let her alone?--he
who had held her in his arms with passionate force, who had entreated her
to stay with him, and had surrendered her reluctantly in sullen anger.
What if anger, which had been stronger with him than love at that last
moment, should urge him to denounce her--to tell the world how base a
thing she was--a woman who had been eager to marry a rich man and had
been trapped by a pauper! She glanced with a sickening dread at every
letter which her father received, lest it should be from Brian, telling
her shameful story. She counted the days as they went by, saying to
herself, 'A fortnight since we were married; surely if he had meant to
claim me he would have come before now.' 'Three weeks! now I must be
safe!' And then came the dull November morning which completed the
calendar month since her wedding-day, and her husband had made no sign.
She began to feel easier, to believe that he repented his marriage as
deeply as she did, and that he was very glad to be free from its bondage.
And now she was able to think more seriously of her future. She had
answered a great many advertisements in the _Times_, wherein paragons
were demanded for the tuition of youth or the companionship of age; but
as she saw the papers only on the day after their publication, other
paragons, on the spot, were beforehand with her. She did not receive a
single answer to those carefully written letters, setting forth her
qualifications and her willingness to work hard.
'I shall waste a small fortune in postage-stamps, father,' she said at
last, 'and shall be no nearer the mark. My only chance is to advertise.
Will you give me the money for an advertisement? I am sorry to ask you,
but--'
'My dear, you are always asking me for money,' replied Captain Palliser,
peevishly; which was hardly fair, as she had asked him nothing since
her return, except the sum of thirty shillings, being the exact amount
of which she stood indebted to kind-hearted Miss Cobb. 'However, I
suppose you must have it.' He produced a half sovereign from his
meagrely-furnished purse. 'It is only right you should do something;
indeed, anything is better than wasting your life in such a hole as this.
But what if you do get any answers to your advertisement? Who is to give
you a character, since that old witch at Mauleverer Manor has chosen to
put up her back against you?'
'That must be managed somehow,' answered Ida, moodily. 'Will it not be
enough for the people to know who you are, and that I have never been in
a situation before? Why should they apply to the schoolmistress who
finished my education?'
'People are so suspicious,' said the Captain, 'and the handsomer a girl
is the more questions they ask. They seem to think she has no right to be
so handsome. However you must risk it.'
Ida wrote her advertisement, an unvarnished statement of her
qualifications as a teacher, and of her willingness to be useful; not a
word about references. The advertisement appeared a few days later, and
the little family at Les Fontaines anxiously awaited the result, even
little Vernon eagerly expressing himself on the subject, his youthful
ears being open to every topic discussed in his presence, and his
youthful mind quick to form opinions.
'You shan't go away!' he exclaimed. 'Ma, she shan't go, shall she? lady
shan't have her; I want her always; you mustn't go, sissie,' all in baby
language, with a curious perversion of consonants. He had climbed on her
knee, and had his arms round her neck--energetic young arms which almost
throttled her. She had been his chief companion and playfellow for the
last five weeks, had read him all his favourite fairy-tales over and over
again, had sat with him of an evening till he fell asleep, an invincible
defence against bogies and vague fears of darkness. She had taken him for
long rural rambles, over breezy downs towards the sea, had dug and delved
with him on the lonely beach below the great white lighthouse, warmly
coated and shawled, and working hard in the November wind; and now, just
when he had grown fonder of her than anyone else in the world, she was
going to leave him. He lifted up his head and howled, and refused all
comfort from mother or father. Ida cried with him. 'My pet, I can't bear
to leave you, but I must; my darling, I shall come back,' she protested,
clasping him to her breast, kissing his fair tearful face, soft round
cheeks, lovely blue eyes swimming in tears.
'To-morrow?' inquired Vernon, with a strangled sob.
'No, darling, not to-morrow; there would be no use in my going just for
one day; but I am not going yet--I don't know when I am going--Vernon
must not cry. See how unhappy he is making poor mamma.'
Mrs. Palliser put her hands before her face, and made a bohooing noise to
keep up the illusion; whereupon the affectionate little fellow slipped
off his sister's knee, and ran to his mother to administer comfort.
'I am not going away yet, Vernon; indeed, I hardly know whether I am ever
going at all. I have come back like a bad penny, and I seem likely to be
as difficult to get rid of as other bad pennies,' said Ida, despondingly,
for three posts had gone by since the insertion of her advertisement, and
had brought her nothing. The market was evidently overstocked with young
ladies knowing French and German, able to play and sing, and willing to
be useful.
After this Vernon would hardly let his sister out of his sight. He had a
suspicion that she would leave him unawares--slip out of the door some
day, and be gone without a moment's warning. That is how joy flees.
'My pet, be reasonable,' said Ida; 'I can't go away without my trunk.'
This comforted him a little, and he made a point of sitting upon one of
Ida's trunks, when they two were alone in that barely furnished chamber
which served for her bed-room and his day-nursery.
She contrived to tell him fairy-tales, and to keep him amused; albeit she
was now busy at carefully overhauling, patching, and repairing her scanty
wardrobe--trying to make neat mending do duty for new clothes, and
getting ready against any sudden summons. She could not bring herself to
ask her father for money, sadly as she wanted new garments. He had given
her five pounds in August, and two sovereigns since her return, and the
way he had doled out those sums indicated the low state of his funds. No,
the gown that had been new at The Knoll must still be her best gown. Last
winter's jacket, albeit threadbare in places, must do duty for this
winter. Before the next summer she might be in the receipt of a salary
and able to clothe herself decently, and to send presents to this beloved
boy, who was not much better clad than herself.
But the days wore on, and brought no answer to her advertisement.
'I shouldn't wonder if it were the foreign address,' said Captain
Palliser, when they were all speculating upon the cause of this dismal
silence. 'People are suspicious of anyone living abroad. If you had been
able to advertise from a rectory in Lincolnshire, or even an obscure
street at the west end of London, they'd have thought better of you. But
Boulogne, Calais, Dieppe, they all hint at impecuniosity and enforced
exile. It's very unlucky.'
The postman stopped at the little green gate next morning, and Ida flew
to receive his packet. It was a letter for her--a bulky letter--in a hand
she knew well, and her heart seemed to stop beating as she looked at the
address.
The hand was Bessie Wendover's. Who could tell what new trouble the
letter might announce? Brian might have told his family the whole history
of his marriage and her unworthy conduct. Oh, what shame, what agony, if
this were so! And how was she to face her father when he asked her the
contents of the letter? She ran out into the garden--the little bare,
joyless garden--to read her letter alone, and to gain time.
This is how the dreaded epistle ran:--
'My dear darling, ill-used, cruel thing,--
'However could you treat me so badly? What is friendship worth, if you
set no higher value upon it than this? I don't believe you know what
friendship means, or you never could act so. How miserable you have made
me! how wretched you must have been yourself! you proud, noble-minded
darling--under the sting of such vile treatment.
'I wrote to you three times last month, and could not imagine why my
letters were unanswered. Brian had told me that you were perfectly well,
and looking splendid when he saw you in October, so I did not think it
could be illness that kept you silent; and at last I began to feel angry,
and to fancy you had forgotten me, and were ungrateful. No, I don't mean
that, dearest. What reason had you for gratitude? The obligation was all
on my side.
'Towards the end of October I wrote to Brian, telling him of your
silence, and asking if he could find out if you were well. He answered
with one of his short, unsatisfactory scrawls that he had reason to know
you were quite well. After this I felt _really_ offended; for I thought
you must have deceived me all along, and that you had never cared a straw
about me; so I coiled myself up in my dignity, and, although I felt very
unhappy, I resolved never to write you another line till you wrote to me.
I was very miserable, but still I felt that I owed a duty to my own
self-respect, don't you know; and just at this time we all went to
Bournemouth, where we were very gay. Father and mother knew no end of
people there, and I began to feel what it really is to be out, which no
girl ever could at Kingthorpe, where there are about three parties in a
twelvemonth.
'Well, darling, so I went on leading a frivolous life among people I did
not care twopence for, and hardening my heart against my dearest friend,
when, on the day we came home, I happened to take up the _Times_ in the
railway carriage. I hate newspapers in a common way, but one reads such
things when one is travelling, and out of mere idleness I amused myself
skimming the advertisements, which I found ever so much more interesting
than the leading articles. What should my eye light upon but an
advertisement from a young lady wanting to go out as a governess--address
I.P., Le Rosier, Les Fontaines, near Dieppe--and the whole murder was
out. You must have left old Pew's and be living with your father. I was
horribly indignant with you--as, indeed, I am still--for not having
told me anything about it; but directly I got home I telegraphed to
Polly Cobb, as the best-natured girl I knew at Mauleverer, asking where
you were, and why you had left. I had such a letter from her next
day--spelling bad, but full of kind feeling--giving me a full account of
the row, and old Pew's detestable conduct. She told me that Fräulein
vouched for your having behaved with the most perfect propriety, and
never having seen Brian out of her presence; but Brian's meanness in not
having told me about the trouble he had brought upon you is more than I
can understand.
'Well, darling, I went off to Aunt Betsy, who is always my _confidante_
in all delicate matters, because she's ever so much cleverer than dear
warm-hearted mother, who never could keep a secret in her life, sweet
soul, and is no better than a speaking-tube for conveying information to
the Colonel. I told Aunt Betsy everything--how it was all Brian's fault,
and how I adore you, and how miserable I felt about you, and how you were
trying to get a situation as governess, in spite of that malignant old
Pew--she must be a lineal descendant of the wicked fairy--having said she
would give you no certificate of character or ability.
'Now, what do you think that sweetest and best of aunties said? "Let her
come to me," she said; "I am getting old and dull, and I want something
bright and clever about me, to cheer me and rouse me when I feel
depressed. Let her come to me as a companion and amanuensis, help me to
look after my cottagers, who are getting too much for me, and play to me
of an evening. I like that girl, and I should like to have her in my
house."
'I was enchanted at the thought of your being always near us, and I
fancied you wouldn't altogether dislike it; although Kingthorpe certainly
is the dullest, sleepiest old hole in the universe. So I begged Aunt
Betsy to write to you _instanter_; said I knew you would be charmed to
accept such a situation, and that she would secure a treasure; and, in
all probability, you'll have a letter from her to-morrow.
'And now, dear, I must repeat that you have treated me shamefully. Why
did you not write to me directly you left Mauleverer? Could you think
that I could believe you had really done wrong--that I could possibly be
influenced by the judgment of that old monster, Pew? If you could think
so, you are not worthy to be loved as I love you. However, come to us,
sweetest, directly you get auntie's letter, and all shall be forgiven and
forgotten, as the advertisements say.'
Ida kissed the loving letter. So far, therefore, Brian had not betrayed
her; and, having kept her secret so long, it might be supposed he would
keep it for all time.
Poor little warm-hearted Bessie! Was not she by her foolish
falsification--a piece of mild jocosity, no doubt--the prime author of
all the evil that had followed? And yet Ida could not feel angry with
her, any more than she could have been angry with Vernon for some piece
of sportive mischief.
'Thank God, he has kept our wretched secret,' she thought, as she folded
Bessie's long letter, and went back to the house. 'I am grateful to him
for that.'
She went in radiant, gladdened at the thought of being able to relieve
her father and step-mother of the burden of her maintenance; for the fact
that she was a burden had not been hidden from her. They had been kind;
they had given her to eat and to drink of their best, and had admired her
talents and accomplishments; but they had let her know at the same time
that she was a failure, and that her future was a dark problem still far
from solution--a problem which troubled them in the silent watches of the
night. Nor did they forget to remind her from time to time that by her
imprudence--pardonable although that imprudence might be--she had
forfeited six months' board and lodging, together with those educational
advantages the Captain's fifty pounds had been intended to purchase for
her. These facts had been reiterated, not altogether unkindly, but in a
manner that made life intolerable; and she felt that were she to continue
at Les Fontaines for the natural term of her existence, the same theme
would still furnish the subject for parental harpings.
'Father,' she said, going behind Captain Palliser's chair, as he smoked
his after-breakfast cigar, and read yesterday's _Times_, 'I want you to
read this letter. It is a foolish schoolgirl letter, perhaps; but it will
show you that my friends are not going to discard me on account of Miss
Pew.'
The Captain laid down his paper, and slowly made his way through Bessie's
lengthy epistle, which, although prettily written, with a good deal of
grace in the slopes and curves of the penmanship, gave him considerable
trouble to decipher. It was only when he had discovered that all the B's
looked like H's, and that all the G's were K's, and all the L's S's, and
had, as it were, made a system for himself, that he was able to get on
comfortably.
'Bless my soul,' he murmured, 'why cannot girls write legibly?'
'It is the real Mauleverer hand, papa, and is generally thought very
pretty,' said Ida.
'Pretty, yes; you might have a zigzag pattern over the paper that would
be just as pretty. One wants to be able to read a letter. This is almost
as bad as Arabic. However, the girl seems a good, warm-hearted creature,
and very fond of you; and I should think you could not do better than
accept her aunt's offer. It will be a beginning.'
'It is Hobson's choice, papa; but I am sure I shall be happy with Miss
Wendover,' said Ida; and then she gave a faint sigh, and her heart
sank at the thought of that Damoclesian sword always hanging over her
head--the possibility of her husband claiming her.
Mrs. Palliser was much more rapturous when she heard the contents of
the letter--much more interested in all details about Ida's future home.
She wanted to know what Miss Wendover was like--how many servants she
kept--whether carriage or no carriage--what kind of a house she lived in,
and how it was furnished.
'You will be quite a grand lady,' she said, with a touch of envy, when
Ida had described the cosy red-brick cottage, the verandahed drawing-room
and conservatory added by Miss Wendover, the pair of cobs which that lady
drove, the large well-kept gardens; 'you will look down upon us with our
poor ways, and this house, in which all the rooms smell of whitewash.'
'No, indeed, mamma, I shall always think of you with affection; for you
have been very kind to me, although I know I have been a burden.'
'Everything is a burden when one is poor,' sighed her stepmother; 'even
one extra in the washing-bills makes a difference; and we shall feel it
awfully when Vernon grows up. Boys are so extravagant; and one cannot
talk to them as one can to girls.'
'But I hope you will be better off then, mamma.'
'My dear, you might as well hope we should be dukes and duchesses. What
chance is there of any improvement? Your poor papa has no idea of earning
money. I'm sure I have said to him, often and often, "Reginald, do
_something_. Write for the magazines! Surely you can do _that_? Other men
in your position do it." "Yes," he growled, "and that's why the magazines
are so stupid." No, Ida, your father's circumstances will never improve;
and when the time comes for giving Vernon a proper education we shall be
paupers.'
'Poor papa!' sighed Ida; 'I am afraid he is not strong enough to make any
great effort.'
'He has given way, my dear; that is the root of it all. We shall never be
better off, unless those two healthy, broad-shouldered young men were to
go and get themselves swallowed up by an earthquake; and that is rather
too much for anyone to expect.'
'What young men?' asked Ida, absently.
'Your two cousins.'
'Oh, Sir Vernon and his brother. No, I don't suppose they will die to
oblige us poor creatures.'
'They went up the what's-its-name Horn, in Switzerland,' said Mrs.
Palliser, plaintively. 'It made my blood run cold to hear them talk about
it. "By Jove, Peter, I thought it was all over with you," said Sir
Vernon, when he told us how foolhardy his brother had been. But you see
they got to the bottom all safe and sound, though ever so many people
have been killed on that very mountain.'
'I'm glad they did, mamma. We may want their money very badly, but we are
not murderers, even in thought.'
'God forbid!' sighed the little woman. 'They are fine-grown, gentlemanly
young men, too. Sir Vernon gave my Vernie a sovereign, and promised him a
pony next year; but, good gracious! how could we afford to keep a pony,
even if we had a stable? "You had better make it the other kind of pony,"
says your father, and then they all burst out laughing.'
'So little makes a man laugh!' said Ida, somewhat contemptuously. That
picture of her father making sport of his poverty irritated her. 'Well,
dear mamma,' she said presently, moved by one of those generous impulses
which were a part of her frank, unwise nature, 'if ever I can earn a
hundred a year--and there are many governesses who get as much--you shall
have fifty to help pay Vernon's schooling.'
'You are a dear generous 'arted girl,' exclaimed the stepmother, and the
two women kissed again with tears, an operation which they usually
performed in the hour of domestic trouble.
Miss Wendover's letter came next day, a hearty, frank, affectionate
letter, offering a home that was really meant to be like home, and a
salary of forty pounds a year, 'just to buy your gowns,' Miss Wendover
said. 'I know it is not sufficient remuneration for such accomplishments
as yours, but I want _you_ rather than your accomplishments and I am not
rich enough to give as much as you are worth. But you will, at least,
stave off the drudgery of a governess's life till you are older, and
better able to cope with domineering mothers and insolent pupils.'
Such a salary was a long way off that hundred per annum which Ida had set
before her eyes as the golden goal to be gained by laborious pianoforte
athletics and patient struggles with the profundities of German grammar;
but, as Captain Palliser paid, it was a beginning; and Ida was very glad
so to begin. She wrote to Miss Wendover gratefully accepting her offer,
and in a very humble spirit.
'I fear it is pity that prompts your kind offer,' she wrote, 'and that
you take me because you know I left Mauleverer Manor in disgrace, and
that nobody else would have me. I am a bad penny. That is what my father
called me when I came home to him. And now I am to go back to Kingthorpe
as a bad penny. But, please God, I will try to prove to you that I am not
altogether worthless; and, whatever may happen, I shall love you and be
grateful to you till the end of my life.
'As you are so kind as to say I may come as soon as I like, I shall be
with you on the day after you receive this letter.'
Ida's preparations for departure were not elaborate. Her scanty wardrobe
had been put in the neatest possible order. A few hours sufficed for
packing trunk and bonnet-box. On the last afternoon Mrs. Palliser came to
her highly elated, and proposed a walk to Dieppe, and a drive home in the
diligence which left the Market Place at five o'clock.
'I am going to give you a new hat,' she said, triumphantly. 'You must
have a new hat.'
'But, dear mamma, I know you can't afford it.'
'I _will_ afford it, Ida. You will have to go to church at
Kingthorpe'--Mrs. Palliser regarded church-going as an oppressive
condition of prosperous respectability. One of the few privileges of
being hard up and quite out of society was that one need not go to
church--'and I should like you to appear like a lady. You owe it to your
pa and I. A hat you must 'ave. I can pay for it out of the housekeeping
money, and your pa will never know the difference.'
'No, mamma, but you and Vernon will have to pinch for it,' said Ida,
knowing that there was positively no margin to that household's narrow
means of existence.
'A little pinching won't hurt us. Vernie is as bilious as he can be; he
eats too many compots and little fours. I shall keep him to plain bread
and butter for a bit, and it will do him a world of good. There's no use
talking, Ida, I mean you to 'ave a 'at; and if you won't come and choose
it I must choose it myself,' concluded the little woman, dropping more
aspirates as she grew more excited.
So mother and daughter walked to Dieppe in the dull November afternoon,
Vernon trudging sturdily by his sister's side. They bought the hat, a
gray felt with partridge plumage, which became Ida's rich dark bloom to
perfection; and then they went to the Cathedral, and knelt in the dusky
aisle, and heard the solemn melody of the organ, and the subdued voices
of the choir, in the plaintive music of Vesper Psalms, monotonous
somewhat, but with a sweet soothing influence, music that inspired gentle
thoughts.
Then they went back to the Market-Place, and were in time to get good
places on the _banquette_ of the diligence, before the big white Norman
horses trotted and ambled noisily along the stony street.
Ida left Dieppe late on the following evening, by the same steamer that
had brought her from Newhaven. The British stewardess recognised her.
'Why, you was only across the other day, miss!' she said; 'what a
gad-about you must be!'
She arrived in London by ten o'clock next morning, and left Waterloo at a
quarter-past eleven, reaching Winchester early in the day. How different
were her feelings this time, as the train wound slowly over those chalky
hills! how full of care was her soul! And yet she was no longer a visitor
going among strangers--this time she went to an assured home, she was to
be received among friends. But the knowledge that her liberty was
forfeited for ever, that she was a free-agent only on sufferance, made
her grave and depressed. Never again could she feel as glad and frank a
creature as she had been in the golden prime of the summer that was gone,
when she and Bessie and Urania Rylance came by this same railway, over
those green English hill-sides, to the city that was once the chief seat
of England's power and splendour.
A young man in a plain gray livery and irreproachable top-boots stood
contemplatively regarding the train as it came into the station. He
touched his hat at sight of Miss Palliser, and she remembered him as Miss
Wendover's groom.
'Any luggage, ma'am?' he asked, as she alighted; as if it were as likely
as not that she had come without any.
'There is one box, Needham. That is all besides these things.'
Her bonnet-box--frail ark of woman's pride--was in the carriage, with a
wrap and an umbrella, and her dressing bag.
'All right, ma'am. If you'll show me which it is I'll tell the porter to
bring it. I've got the cobs outside.'
'Oh, I am so sorry,--how good of Miss Wendover!'
'They wanted exercise, 'um. They was a bit above themselves, and the
drive has done 'em good.'
Miss Wendover's cherished brown cobs, animals which in the eyes of
Kingthorpe were almost as sacred as that Egyptian beast whose profane
slaughter was more deeply felt than the nation's ruin--to think that
these exalted brutes should have been sent to fetch that debased
creature, a salaried companion. But then Aunt Betsy was never like anyone
else.
Needham took the cobs across the hills at a pace which he would have
highly disapproved in any other driver. Had Miss Wendover so driven them,
he would have declared she was running them off their legs. But in his
own hands, Brimstone and Treacle--so called to mark their difference of
disposition--could come to no harm. 'They wanted it,' he told Miss
Palliser, when she remarked upon their magnificent pace, 'they never got
half work enough.'
The hills looked lovely, even in this wintry season--yew trees and grass
gave no token of November's gloom. The sky was bright and blue, a faint
mist hung like a veil over the city in the valley, the low Norman tower
of the cathedral, the winding river, and flat fertile meadows--a vision
very soon left far in the rear of Brimstone and Treacle.
'How handsome they look!' said Ida, admiring their strong, bold crests,
like war-horses in a Ninevite picture, their shining black-brown coats.
'Is Brimstone such a very vicious horse?'
'Vicious, mum? no, not a bit of vice about him,' answered Needham
promptly, 'but he's a rare difficult horse to groom. There ain't none but
me as dares touch him. I let the boy try it once, and I found the poor
lad half an hour afterwards standing in the middle of the big loose box
like a statter, while Brimstone raced round him as hard as he could go,
just like one of them circus horses. The boy dursn't stir. If he'd moved
a limb, Brimstone 'ud have 'molished him.'
'What an awful horse! But isn't that viciousness?'
'Lor', no mum. That ain't vice,' answered the groom smiling amusedly at
the lady's ignorance. Vice is crib-biting, or jibbing, or boring or
summat o' that kind. Brimstone is a game hoss, and he's got a bit of a
temper, but he ain't got no vice.'
Here was Kingthorpe, looking almost as pretty as it had looked when she
gazed upon it with tearful eyes in her sad farewell at the close of
summer. The big forest trees were bare, but there were flowers in all the
cottage gardens, even late lingering roses on southern walls, and the
clipped yew-tree abominations--dumb-waiters, peacocks, and other
monstrosities--were in their pride of winter beauty. The ducks were
swimming gaily in the village pond, and the village inn was still
glorious with red geraniums, in redder pots. The Knoll stood out grandly
above all other dwellings--the beds full of chrysanthemums, and a bank of
big scarlet geraniums on each side of the hall door.
It seemed strange to be driven swiftly past the familiar carriage-drive,
and round into the lane leading to Miss Wendover's cottage. It was only
an accommodation lane--or a back-out lane, as the boys called it, since
no two carriages could pass each other in that narrow channel--and in bad
weather the approach to the Homestead was far from agreeable. A carriage
and horses had been known to stick there, with wheels hopelessly embedded
in the clay, while Miss Wendover's guests picked their footsteps through
the mud.
But the Homestead, when attained, was such a delightful house that one
forgot all impediments in the way thither. The red brick front--old red
brick, be it noted, which has a brightness and purity of colour never
retained for above a twelvemonth by the red brick of to-day--glowing,
athwart its surrounding greenery, like the warm welcome of a friend; the
exquisite neatness of the garden, where every flower that could be coaxed
into growing in the open air bloomed in perfection; the spick-and-span
brightness of the windows; the elegant order that prevailed within, from
cellar to garret; the old, carefully-chosen furniture, which had for the
most part been collected from other old-world homesteads; the artistic
colouring of draperies and carpets--all combined to make Miss Wendover's
house delightful.
'My house had need be orderly,' she said, when her friends waxed
rapturous; 'I have so little else to think about.'
Yet the sick and poor, within a radius of ten miles, might have testified
that Miss Wendover had thought and care for all who needed them, and that
she devoted the larger half of her life to other people's interests.
It was a clear, balmy day, one of those lovely autumn days which hang
upon the edge of winter, and Miss Wendover was pacing her garden walks
bare-headed, armed with gardening scissors and formidable brown leather
gauntlets, nipping a leaf here, or a withered rosebud there, with eyes
whose eagle glance not so much as an aphis could escape. From the slope
of her lawn Aunt Betsy saw the cobs turn into the lane, and she was
standing at the gate to welcome the traveller when the carriage drew up.
There was no carriage-drive on this side of the house, only a lawn with a
world of flower-beds. Those visitors who wanted to enter in a ceremonious
manner had to drive round by shrubbery and orchard to the back, where
there were an old oak door and an entrance-hall. On this garden front
there were only glass doors and long French windows, verandahs, and sunny
parlours, opening one out of another.
'How do you do, my dear?' said the spinster heartily, as Ida alighted; 'I
am very glad to see you. Why, how bright and blooming you look--not a bit
like a sea-sick traveller.'
'Dear Miss Wendover, I ought to look bright when I am so glad to come to
you; and, as to the other thing, I am never sea-sick.'
'What a splendid girl! That unhappy little Bessie can't cross to the
Wight without being a martyr. But, Ida, I am not going to be called Miss
Wendover. Only bishops and county magnates, and people of that kind, call
me by that name. To you I am to be Aunt Betsy, as I am to the children at
The Knoll.'
'Is not that putting me too much on a level--'
'With my own flesh and blood? Nonsense! I mean you to be as my own flesh
and blood. I could not bear to have anyone about me who was not.'
'You are too good,' faltered Ida. 'How can I ever repay you?'
'You have only to be happy. It is your nature to be frank and truthful,
so I will say nothing about that.'
Ida blushed deepest scarlet. Frank and truthful--she--whose very name was
a lie! And yet there could be no wrong done to Miss Wendover, she told
herself, by her suppression of the truth. It was a suppression that
concerned only Brian Walford and herself. No one else could have any
interest in the matter.
Betsy Wendover herself led the way to the bed-chamber that had been
prepared for the new inmate. It was a dear old room, not spacious, but
provided with two most capacious closets, in each of which a small gang
of burglars could have hidden--dear old closets, with odd little corner
cupboards inside them, and a most elaborate system of shelves. One closet
had a little swing window at the top for ventilation, and this, Miss
Wendover told Ida, was generally taken for a haunted corner, as the
ventilating window gave utterance to unearthly noises in the dead watches
of the night, and sometimes gave entrance to a stray cat from adjacent
tiles. A cat less agile than the rest of his species had been known to
entangle himself in the little swing window, and to hang there all the
night, sending forth unearthly caterwaulings, to the unspeakable terror
of Miss Wendover's guest, unfamiliar with the mechanism of the room, and
wondering what breed of Hampshire demon or afrit was thus making night
hideous.
There was a painted wooden dado halfway up the wall, and a florid rose
and butterfly paper above it. There was a neat little brass bedstead
on one side of the room, a tall Chippendale chest of drawers, with
writing-table and pigeon-holes on the other side; the dearest, oldest
dressing-table and shield-shaped glass in front of the broad latticed
window; while in another window there was a cushioned seat, such as
Mariana of the Moated Grange sat upon when she looked across the fens and
bewailed her dead-and-gone joys. There were old cups and saucers on the
high, narrow chimney-piece, below which a cosy fire burned in a little
old basket grate. Altogether the room was the picture of homely comfort.
'Oh, what a lovely room!' cried Ida, inwardly contrasting this cheery
chamber with that white-washed den at Les Fontaines, with its tawdry
mahogany and brass fittings, its florid six feet of carpet on a deal
floor stained brown, its alabaster clock and tin candelabra--a cheap
caricature of Parisian elegance.
'I'm glad you like it, my dear, 'answered Miss Wendover. 'Bessie said it
would suit you; and all I ask you is to keep it tidy. I hope I am not a
tyrant; but I am an old maid. Of course, I shall never pry into your
room; but I warn you that I have an eye which takes in everything at a
flash; and if I happen to go past when your door is open, and see a
bonnet and shawl on your bed, or a gown sprawling on your sofa, my teeth
will be set on edge for the next half-hour.'
'Dear Miss Wen--, dear Aunt Betsy,' said Ida, corrected by a frown, 'I
hope you will come into my room every day, and give me a good scolding if
it is not exactly as you like. Everything in this house looks lovely. I
want to learn your nice neat ways.'
'Well, my love, you might learn something worse,' replied Miss Wendover,
with innocent pride. 'And now come down to luncheon; I kept it back on
purpose for you, and I am sure you must be starving.'
The luncheon was excellent, served with a tranquil perfection only to be
attained by careful training; and yet Miss Wendover's youthful butler
three years ago had been a bird boy; while her rosy-cheeked parlour-maid
was only eighteen, and had escaped but two years from the primitive
habits of cottage life. Aunt Betsy had a genius for training young
servants.
'You had better unpack your boxes directly after luncheon, said Miss
Wendover, when Ida had eaten with very good appetite, 'and arrange your
things in your drawers. That will take you an hour or so, I suppose--say
till five o'clock, when Bessie is coming over to afternoon tea.'
'Oh, I am so glad! I am longing to see Bessie. Is she as lovable and
pretty as ever?'
'Well, yes,' replied Aunt Betsy, with a critical air; 'I think she has
rather improved. She is plump enough still, in all conscience, but not
quite so stumpy as she was last summer. Her figure is a little less like
a barrel.'
'I hope she was very much admired at Bournemouth.'
'Yes, strange to say, she had a good many admirers,' answered Miss
Wendover coolly. 'She made a point of never being enthusiastic about her
relations. She had always partners at the dances, I am told, even when
there was a paucity of dancing men; and she was considered rather
remarkable at lawn tennis. No doubt she will tell you all about it this
afternoon. I have some work to do in the village, and I shall leave you
two girls together.'
This was a delicacy which touched Ida. She was very anxious to see
Bessie, and to talk to her as they could only talk when they were alone.
She wanted to know her faithful friend's motive for that cruel deception
about Brian Walford. That the frank, tender-hearted Bessie could have so
deceived her from any unworthy motive was impossible.
Five o'clock struck, and Ida was sitting alone in the drawing-room,
waiting to receive her friend, just as if she were the daughter of the
house, instead of a salaried dependent. The pretty carved Indian
tea-table--a gem in Bombay blackwood--was wheeled in front of the
fire-place, which was old, as regarded the high wooden mantel-piece and
capacious breadth of the hearth, but essentially new in its glittering
tiles and dainty brass fire-irons.
The clock had hardly finished striking when Bessie bounced into the room,
rosy and smiling, in sealskin jacket and toque.
'Oh, you darling! isn't this lovely?' she exclaimed, hugging Ida. 'You
are to live here for ever and ever, and never, never, never to leave us
again, and never to marry, unless you marry one of the Brians. Don't
shudder like that, pet, they are both nice! And I'm sure you like Brian
Walford, though, perhaps, not quite so much as he liked you. You do like
him now, don't you, darling?' urged Bess.
Ida had withdrawn from her embrace, and was seated before the low Bombay
table, occupied with the tea pot. There was no light but the fire and one
shaded lamp on a distant table. The curtains were not yet drawn, and
white mists were rising in the garden outside, like a sea.
'Bessie,' Ida began, gravely, as her old schoolfellow sat on a low stool
in front of the fire, 'how could you deceive me like that? What could put
such a thing in your head--_you_, so frank, so open?'
'I am sure I hardly know,' answered Bess, innocently. 'It was my
birthday, don't you know, and we were all wild. Perhaps the champagne had
something to do with it, though I didn't take any. But that sort of
excitement communicates itself; and running up and down hill gets into
one's head. We all thought it would be such fun to pass off penniless B.
W. for his wealthy cousin--and just to see how you liked him, with that
extra advantage. But there was no harm in it, was there, dear? Of course,
he told you afterwards, when you saw him at Mauleverer?
'Yes, he told me--afterwards.'
'Naturally; and having begun to like him as the rich Brian, you didn't
leave off liking him because of his poverty--did you, darling? The man
himself was the same.'
Ida was silent, remembering how, with the revelation of the fraud that
had been practised upon her, the very man himself had seemed to undergo a
transformation--as if a disguise, altering his every characteristic, had
been suddenly flung aside.
She did not answer Bessie's question, but, looking down at her with
grave, searching eyes, she said,--'Dear Bessie, it was a very foolish
jest. I know it is not in your nature to mean unkindly to anyone, least
of all to me, to whom you have been an angel of light; but all practical
jokes of that kind are liable to inflict pain and humiliation upon the
victim--however innocently meant. Whose idea was it, Bess? Not yours, I
think?'
'No; it was Urania who proposed it. She said it would be such fun.'
'Miss Rylance is not usually so--funny.'
'No; but she was particularly jolly that day, don't you remember? in
positively boisterous spirits--for her.'
'And the outcome of her amiability was this suggestion?'
'Yes, darling. She had noticed that you had a kind of romantic fancy
about Brian of the Abbey--that you had idealised his image, as it
were--and set him up as a kind of demi-god. Not because of his wealth,
darling--don't suppose that we supposed that--but on account of that dear
old Abbey and its romantic associations, which gave a charm to the owner.
And so she said what fun it would be to pass off Brian Walford as his
cousin, and see if you fell in love with him. 'I know she is ready to lay
her heart at the feet of the owner of the Abbey,' Urania said; and I
thought it would be too delicious if you were to fall in love with Brian
Walford, who could not help falling in love with you, for of course it
would end in your marrying him, and his getting on splendidly at the Bar;
for, with his talents, he must do well. He only wants a motive for
industry. And then you would be our very own cousin! I hope it wasn't a
very wicked idea, Ida, and that you will find it in your heart to forgive
me,' pleaded Bess, kneeling by her friend's chair, with clasped bands
upon Ida's knees, and sweet, half-tearful face looking up, 'My darling, I
have never been angry with you,' answered Ida, clasping the girl to her
heart, with a stifled sob. 'But I don't think Miss Rylance meant so
kindly. Her idea sprang from a malevolent heart. She wanted to humiliate
me--to drag my most sordid characteristics into the light of day--to make
me more abject than poverty had made me already. That was the motive of
her joke.'
'Never mind her motive, dear. All I am interested in is your opinion of
Brian. I hope he behaved nicely at Mauleverer.'
'Very nicely.'
'Cobb says that Fräulein positively raves about him--declares he is quite
the most gentlemanly young man she ever saw--a godly young man she called
him, in her funny English. And, she says, that he was madly in love with
you. Of course he made you an offer?'
'How could he do that when I was always with the Fräulein?'
'Oh, nonsense. Brian is not the kind of young man to be kept at bay by a
mild nonentity like the Fräulein. He told me before he left that he was
desperately in love with you, and that he meant to win you for his wife.
I asked him how he intended to keep a wife, and he said he should write
for the magazines, and do theatrical criticisms for the newspapers, till
briefs began to drop in. He was determined to win you if you were to be
won. So I feel sure that he made you an offer, unless, indeed, that
horrid old Pew spoiled all by her venomous conduct.'
'That is it, dear. Miss Pew brought matters to an abrupt close.'
'And you are not engaged to Brian?' said Bess, dolefully.
'No.'
'And he didn't follow you to Dieppe?'
'No.'
'Then he is not half so fine a fellow as I thought him.'
'Suppose, Bessie, that after a little mild flirtation, with Fräulein Wolf
for an audience, we both discovered that our liking for each other was of
the very coolest order, and that it was wiser to let the acquaintance
end?'
'You might feel that; but I would never believe it of Brian. Why, he
raved about you; he was passionately in love. He told me there was no
sacrifice he would not make to call you his wife.'
'He had so much to sacrifice,' said Ida, with a cynical air.
'Don't be unkind, Ida. Of course I know that he has his fortune to make;
but he is so thoroughly nice--so full of fun.'
'Did you ever know him do anything good or great, anything worth being
remembered--anything that proved the depth and nobility of his nature?'
asked Ida, earnestly.
'Good gracious! no, not that I can remember. He is always nice, and
amusing. He doesn't like carrying a basket, or skates, and things; but of
course, where there are younger boys one couldn't expect him to do that;
and he hates plain girls and old women; but I suppose that is natural,
for even father does it, in his secret soul, though he is always so
utterly sweet to the poor things. But I am sure Brian Walford has a
tender heart, because he is so fond of kittens.'
'I didn't mean to insinuate that he was a modern Domitian,' answered Ida,
smiling at Bessie's childish earnestness. 'What I mean is that there is
no depth in his nature, no nobility in his character. He is shallow, and,
I fear, selfish. But, Bessie, my pet, I am going to ask you a favour.'
'Ask away,' cried Bessie, cheerfully; 'I can't give you the moon, but
anything which I really do possess is yours this instant.'
'Don't let us ever talk of Brian Walford. I can never get over the
feeling of humiliation which Miss Rylance's practical joke caused me; and
my only chance of forgetting it is to forget your cousin's existence.'
'Oh, but he will come to The Knoll, I hope, at Christmas, and then you
will think better of him.'
'If he should come I--I hope I shall not see him.'
'Has he offended you so deeply?'
'Don't let us talk about him, Bess. Tell me all about your Bournemouth
triumphs. I hear you were the belle of the place.'
'Then you have heard a most egregious fib. There were dozens of girls
with nineteen-inch waists, before whom I felt myself a monster of
dumpiness. But I got on pretty well. I don't pretend to be a good dancer,
but I can generally adapt myself to the badness of other people's steps,
and that goes for something.'
And now having got away from all painful subjects, Bessie rattled on at a
tremendous pace, describing girls and gowns, and partners, and tennis
tournaments, and yachting excursions, all in a breath, as she sat in
front of the fire sipping her tea, and devouring a particular kind of
buttered bun for which Miss Wendover's cook was famous.
'Aunt Betsy's tea is always nicer than any one else's; and so are her
buns and her butter; in fact everything in this house is nicer than it is
anywhere else,' said Bessie, pausing in her reminiscences. 'You are in
clover here, Ida.'
'Thanks to your goodness, Bess.'
'To mine? But I have positively nothing to do with it.'
'Yes, you have. It is from the wish to please her warm-hearted little
niece that Miss Wendover has been so good to me.'
'But if you had been plain or stupid she would have only been kind to you
at a distance. Aunt Betsy has her idiosyncrasies, and one of them is a
liking for beauty in individuals, as well as in chairs and tables and
cups and saucers. You will see that all her servants are pretty. She
picks them for their good looks, I believe, and trains them afterwards.
She would not have so much as a bad-looking stable boy.'
'Hard upon ugliness to be shut out of this paradise,' said Ida.
'Oh, but she finds places for the ugly boys and girls, with people whose
teeth are not so easily set on edge, she says herself. And now I must
be off, to change my frock for dinner. You know the back way to The
Knoll--across the fields to the little door in the kitchen-garden. You
will always come that way, of course. When are you coming to see us?
To-morrow?'
'You forget that my time is not my own. I will come whenever Miss
Wendover can best spare me.'
'Oh, you will have plenty of spare time, I am sure.'
'I hope not too much, or I shall be too sharply reminded that Miss
Wendover has taken me out of charity.'
'Charity fiddlestick! A prize-winner like you! And now good-bye, pet, or
I shall be late for dinner, which offends the Colonel beyond measure.'
Bessie scampered off, Ida following her to the glass door, only in time
to see her running across the lawn as fast as her feet could carry her.
It was characteristic of Bessie to cut everything very fine in the way of
time.