disposal. I really have a fair cook; and now tell me, what does your
mother like? For breakfast, now? Is it grilled kidneys? You must put
me up to all her little fancies, and I will instruct my cook to meet
them. She is a good soul and does what I desire. When will you come?
To-morrow? Oh, try to come this evening. Well--if not, at what
o'clock? Tell me the time and I will have a dainty meal ready. Orange!
I have a pheasant in the larder. I hope you like pheasant.'
'We shall be with you at noon. How good and kind you are, Mrs.
Trelake!'
'Not at all. I am delighted.'
Then Orange left. Ten minutes later Mrs. Trelake wrote an elaborate
note of apology, to say that her servants objected to receiving so large
a party at once. The cook would not stay, and how could she replace so
valuable and obliging a servant? The housemaid said that three persons
extra would throw too much work upon her, and she would go. So, she,
Mrs. Trelake, was very sorry, but for peace and quietness sake, she had
to yield, and must withdraw the promise to receive the Trampleasure
party. She herself had nothing to do with this, but servants were
becoming so masterful that the only way in which she, an elderly lady,
could get on was to yield to them in every point.
'We live in the world, we didn't make it,' concluded Mrs. Trelake; 'we
must shape ourselves to the world, not force the world to fit us.'
Whilst Orange was standing at the window, reading this letter to her
mother, she saw a woman whom she knew coming to the back door. This was
a rough girl who did the scullery work at Trecarrel. She brought the
answer from the Captain.
Orange at once darted into the garden and intercepted the girl on her
way to the kitchen.
'You bear a letter for me.'
'Yes, miss.'
She handed her a letter. Orange turned it in her hands. The address
was badly written by some uneducated person.
'Who gave you this?'
'Mrs. Kneebone, the housekeeper.'
'Is there nothing from Captain Trecarrel?'
The girl hesitated.
Orange tore the note open. It was written in the same hand as the
address.
'Please, miss, the Captain be very serius indispodged, and heve a took
to his bed. He carnt rite, according hev axed me to say so. Your's full
of respex, JOANNA KNEEBONE.'
Orange looked up, angry, her heart beating violently. The girl was
still there, but moving towards the kitchen.
'What do you want in the house?' asked Orange.
'There be another letter, miss, I hev to deliver.'
'Well, give it to me.'
'It be for the other young lady,' answered the girl; 'and I hev to give
it only into her hand.'
'You cannot do that,' said Orange; 'she is gone out.'
'Please, miss, will she be gone for long?'
'She will not return till late at night. Give it me.'
'But, miss, I were told by the Cap'n partickler not to let nobody hev it
but the young lady herself; it were very partickler.'
'Then you must wait here till night. This is not my house. I cannot
ask you into the kitchen to sit down; you must wait about in the road.
It is raining, and you will be wet through. I cannot help it; it must
be so unless you let me have the letter.'
'You'll be sure to give it, miss?'
'Of course I will. Do you mistrust me?'
'There it be, miss; but I doubt if the Captain will be best pleased I
haven't waited and let the lady have it herself.'
The letter was delivered. The address was in the Captain's handwriting.
The seal was large, in red wax, stamped with the Trecarrel arms; Orange
knew them well--two chevronels, a crescent for a difference. The girl
turned to go away.
'Good afternoon, miss.'
Orange took no notice of the salutation. She was looking at the letter.
As the girl departed, she glanced back. Orange was turning the letter,
and examining, first the superscription, then the seal. There was an
expression in her face which made the girl say, 'I doubt if I have done
right now in giving her thicky letter.'
Orange went in. She ascended the stairs to her own room, or rather, to
the room she shared with Mirelle. Mirelle was there. That which Orange
had told the girl was not true; Orange had told an untruth deliberately,
knowing it was an untruth. Orange stood in the doorway and looked at
Mirelle, and a flash shot from her dark eyes. Mirelle had not raised her
head to see who entered, and she did not therefore encounter and observe
the glance of hatred and jealousy flung at her.
Orange quickly shut the door and descended the stairs again.
She took her bonnet and went out,--went out into the rain. What cared
she for rain? She went into a lane where she saw no one, and would be
unobserved. Then she tore the letter open. It was written in Captain
Trecarrel's best hand, and ran as follows:--
'My dear Mirelle,--Indisposition prevents my calling and paying my
respects to you as I should have desired. I am in profound distress to
learn the predicament in which you have been placed by the
unscrupulousness of a man whom I will not designate as he deserves,
because he is dead. _De mortuis nil nisi bonum_. Observe this maxim
strictly, and Mr. Trampleasure will never be heard of again. I write
now to entreat you to accept the asylum of my aunt's house. She lives
at Penzance, and is both a charming old lady and a strict Catholic. I
have written to her to-day, stating your case, and by the middle of the
week will have her reply. I make no question but that she will open her
house and her heart to you. One little bit of advice I know you will
excuse my offering. I saw, on the night of the ball at Dolbeare, that
you wore a very valuable set of diamonds, worth, I dare say, over a
thousand pounds. On no account allow the vultures--you know to whom I
allude--to set their claws in them. Mrs. T. and Miss O. are at the
present moment impecunious, and impecuniosity is a temptation to
unscrupulousness,--an infirmity that runs in the blood of a family that
I will not name. You do not know the value of these stones, and might
be sorely taken in if you disposed of them to a country jeweller.
Moreover, I presume they belonged to your dear mother, and it would be
unjust to her memory to get rid of them to relieve the present pressing
necessities of persons in whom she could feel no possible interest. If
you doubt being able to keep them safely--I feel convinced that you will
be besieged with entreaties to sell them--trust them to my aunt or to
me. I remain, my dear Mirelle, yours very faithfully,
'HARRY TRECARREL.'
Mirelle never saw that letter. Orange tore it with her teeth, and then
trampled the fragments into the mire. She walked up and down that lane
in a fever, regardless of the rain that fell and drenched her.
Her faith in Trecarrel was gone. She was a girl who had been brought up
to believe in nothing; neither in truth, nor honesty, nor sincerity.
But she had believed in Trecarrel, and now that one faith was in
fragments. She saw him as he really was, in all his despicable meanness.
She scorned him, she hated him, but with that hate was mingled love, or
rather that hate was but wounded, writhing, anguished love. During the
night she rose from her bed. Mirelle slept with her. The rain had
ceased, the clouds had broken, and the moon shone into the room. She
left her bed because she could not endure the silver glare over her
face. As she stood by the bed she looked down on the face of the
sleeping Mirelle. It was like the face of a dead woman sculptured in
the purest Carrara marble, and lovely as the noblest chisel could cut.
Orange drew the pillow from the bed. and held it up, that the pillow
might shadow the white face. The heart of Orange beat furiously. She
hated Mirelle. She had but to put that pillow over her mouth, throw
herself upon it, and with her strong arms hold down the tossing
figure,--that figure so frail and feeble, and then she could laugh at
the schemes of Captain Trecarrel.
But no. Orange put the pillow back with a curl of the lip. She could
not do that, easy as it was to do. But as she stood over Mirelle she
vowed never to permit Captain Trecarrel to take that pale girl to the
hearth from which he had cast Orange Tramplara.
'You're a beggar! you're a beggar!' that terrible screech of the parrot
came back in her ear at that moment. 'True, true!' said Orange, between
her teeth, 'I am a beggar. I have asked for love! I have begged for
help! I have begged for sympathy! I have implored advice! I have been
refused everything, and given rebuffs and insults. I have but one thing
remaining to me, a hold on Mirelle, beggar though I be, and never shall
he who has refused me all I asked, give to her what he has denied to me,
his betrothed.'
The sleeping girl turned her head away. The fierce eyes of Orange
stabbed her and distressed her, even in sleep.
Orange put her hands over her heart. It was bounding noisily, the
moonlight throbbed in her eyes, the thoughts beat in her brain. That
horrible idea of the pillow, and Mirelle under it, came over her again.
She saw the feet beating in the bed in rhythm with the pulsation of her
heart, and her hands clenched as though gripping the delicate wrists.
As one at the edge of a precipice turns giddy and feels impelled to
throw himself where he fears to fall, so was it now with Orange. A
dread--a dread was on her lest this horrible thought might in a moment
become a fact. She turned away. She paced the room; she could not rest
in a bed. She was like a wild beast in a cage.
'Orange!'
She started. Mirelle was sitting up.
'What do you want?' asked Orange hoarsely, and stood between Mirelle and
the moonlight, that her face might not be seen and betray her heart.
'He is coming.'
'Who is coming?' asked Orange, fiercely.
'I knew he would.'
'Who? who? who?' Orange clutched the pillow convulsively.
'John Herring. I wrote to him. I have been dreaming, and I saw him
open my letter, and he started up and cried, "I am coming to you,
Mirelle. I am coming to you with help."'
*CHAPTER XXXVI.*
*MIRELLE'S GUESTS.*
A truce was concluded between the Reverend Israel and his wife. He
undertook to depart on a missionary circuit during the remainder of the
time that the ladies were in her house. Mrs. Flamank very unreasonably
charged her husband with encouraging Orange in disorderly ways, the
encouragement consisting in privately combating his wife's attack on
Orange's character, and finding a charitable explanation for her leaving
the house at night. Mr. Flamank departed early in the morning as a
deputation for the parent missionary society of the religious community
to which he belonged, to advocate the claims of a very promising mission
to the heathen in the Imaginary Islands.
Hitherto this station had been promising rather than performing, but now
it had real cause for congratulation and for appealing to the
charitable. A native chieftain, with his entire family, consisting of
several wives and a tail of children like the tail of a comet, had
become a convert.
Ho-hum was the capital of the Imaginary Isles, situated in the largest
of them, with a good port at which vessels from England called with
gowns and novels for the missionaries' wives and daughters. At Ho-hum
there were four rival missionary churches. The Imaginary group formed an
archipelago, but as Ho-hum was most considerable of all the islands, not
one of the churches would be content with evangelising a smaller island,
and thereby confess itself inferior in pretensions to those communities
which occupied the major island. Penelope by night unravelled her
embroidery of the day. The work of Christian missions is like that of
Penelope, with this difference, that each is engaged in unravelling the
work of all the others.
In the island of Ho-ha, a chieflet of indifferent character,
Hokee-Pokee-Wankee-Fum by name, had proved himself such a nuisance to
the heathen society that he was expelled the island with his family and
took refuge in that of Ho-hum, where, however, he met with a chilling
reception from his native friends. Finding himself destitute of means,
and cold-shouldered by his own people, he lent a ready ear to the
solicitations of the One-and-Only-Christian missionary to receive
instructions in his catechetical school. As this instruction was
supplemented with mealies, he listened and ate. He liked the chapel of
the station, because it was adorned with pictures and gilding and much
frippery. Then the Reverend the Superior of the establishment wrote home
to the 'Annals of the Faith' a letter in the most remarkable English
ever penned. It was to this effect, 'that Ho-kee, a chieftain of the
island of Ho-ha, having heard the verities which were at this time now
inculcated at the mission of the Immaculate Joseph in Ho-hum, had left,
like Abraham, his home, and had come, to seek the verity. This
aborigine, passionated with a vivid desire to apprehend, had commenced
to receive the holy instructions into a heart truly recognisant,' &c.
But, presently, the rival station of the Pure and Reformed Christians
drew away the 'recognisant aborigine,' having offered him meat as well
as mealies with its instructions. At this station the missionary
laboured to divest his catechumen of the imprimitive and erroneous
teaching in which his mind had been enveloped by the One-and-Onlies.
And he wrote home, in good English, an account of the enlightened
'native chief Pokee, who had been unable to digest the erroneous
doctrines of the sister Church of the One-and-Onlies, and whose soul was
refreshed by the pure and primitive truths (divested of human
accretions); but as some expense had been incurred,' &c. &c.
Hokee-Pokee-Wankee-Fum was, however, before long shaken in his
attachment to the Pure and Reformed, by the missionary insisting on his
limiting himself to one wife. This was more than he could endure, and
he opened his ears to the ministrations of the pastor of the Universal
Christians. By him also he was told that he must have but one wife, but
a concession was made that the rest might be retained under the
designation of domestics. With the Universals, the name, not the thing,
was essential. The Universal teacher set vigorously to work to strip
the mind of Wankee of all the unevangelical instructions he had received
from the Pure and Reformed, and he wrote home concerning his convert, to
the 'Universal Missionary Reporter,' that Wankee in testimony of his
sincerity had retained but one wife out of the three score; but he
added, as wives were valuable commodities, this was much like a farmer
voluntarily abandoning his flock of sheep and limiting himself to one
ewe lamb. Under these circumstances, it became the duty of Christians
to indemnify this zealous Wankee, therefore he must solicit
subscriptions, &c. &c.
Unfortunately, this missionary was strict on the subject of temperance,
and forbade the use of spirits. Now Wankee was fond of grog, and when
he had been reprimanded and put on short commons of food, for yielding
to his passions, he grew sulky and deserted to the Particular
Christians, who allowed grog and had no sharp and defined belief or code
of morals, but a very decided disbelief in everything taught in the
other churches. Accordingly the missioner proceeded still further to
divest Wankee-Fum of his acquired faith, and he was brought to that
condition in which he protested against every thing and professed
nothing. To his bewildered mind, Christianity seemed a bird of paradise
on which the sectaries had fallen with the object of restoring it to its
primitive condition as it emerged from the egg. One pulled out the
gorgeous tail, another stripped off the coronal of plumes, a third reft
off the wing feathers, and the last, after having plucked and singed it,
held up a naked and expiring monster as typical primitive Christianity.
The Particular pastor wrote home to say that he had converted a native
prince of the name of Fum, with his entire family, consisting of one
hundred and six souls; that a great door was open for the advance of
vague and vapid Christianity. He was resolved (D.V.) to send Prince Fum
to his own island of Ho-ha, as native teacher and founder of a church.
To do this effectually, money was needed, &c. &c.
This was the glad news received by Mr. Flamank, and he hastened to
divulge it in missionary meetings of the Particular Christians in
Cornwall, and to collect money for establishing Hokee-Pokee-Wankee-Fum
in the island of Ho-ha as an evangelist.
On the one condition that the Reverend Israel Flamank should absent
himself from home did his 'sweet soul' Betsy Delilah consent to allow
Mrs. Trampleasure, her daughter, and Mirelle to remain a couple of days
longer in the house.
Mrs. Flamank was a kind woman in her way, but that way was a hard one.
She felt pity for the widow, and as much tenderness as it was possible
for her to feel for Mirelle; but she detested Orange. And the reason
why she liked Mirelle was because Mirelle had snubbed her husband, and
if there was one thing in the world that Mrs. Flamank delighted in it
was in seeing Israel suffer rebuff.
Thus it was that Mrs. Trampleasure and Orange were left without even the
minister to advise them what to do and whither to go.
The day had come on which they must depart. It was the day announced
for the auction at Dolbeare. Whenever Orange went into the town and
passed under the old gateway she saw plastered against the wall an
announcement of the sale, and details of the desirable lots into which
the Trampleasure furniture had been assorted.
Mrs. Trampleasure was all day in tears. She was thinking of mats and
cushions, worked with her own hands, which would go to the hammer. The
cruet-stand, also; O woe! woe! There was, moreover, a set of Blair's
'Sermons' she had been wont to read on rainy Sundays--sermons devoid of
ideas, and therefore adapted to a mind incapable of receiving ideas.
She lamented, likewise, a Rollin's 'Ancient History,' which she had
attempted ineffectually to read for the last thirty years. Though she
had not read Rollin, the sight of his back on her shelf, in many
volumes, gave her a sensation of solidity and well-grounding. But the
thought that especially troubled her was that she had left behind in
Dolbeare two pillow pincushions fastened to the back of the best bed.
In her hurry and distress at leaving she had forgotten these treasures,
and they would be sold with the furniture. The pincushions were of
white satin, ornamented with figures and flowers in coloured beads.
They were heart-shaped--of the size of a bullock's heart, heavily
stuffed. They depended, by white satin ribands, from mother-of-pearl
buttons. These pincushions had been given to Mrs. Trampleasure on her
marriage by a great-aunt. They would hold, on a moderate computation, a
thousand pins apiece. What any one in bed could want two thousand pins
for did not enter into the consideration of the artist who constructed
them. For some years these pincushions had adorned the head of the bed
occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Trampleasure. But they exhibited a tendency to
fall down on the sleepers in an unprovoked and startling manner. Mrs.
Trampleasure had sewn them up repeatedly, passing the stitches through
the mother-of-pearl buttons; but whether spiders ate the threads, or the
damask bed back was unable to support the burden, down one or other
would come, till at length Mr. Trampleasure, upon whose nose one had
pounded whilst enjoying a refreshing slumber, woke with an oath, and
flung both the guilty and the innocent pincushion across the room,
vowing not to suffer their re-erection above his head any more. After
this they were banished to the spare bedroom, and, though not under Mrs.
Trampleasure's daily observation, they did not cease to be dear to her
soul. These precious pincushions, through inadvertence, were doomed to
fall into strange, perhaps inappreciative, hands. The thought made her
weep and sniff.
'Mother,' said Orange, 'everything is packed. All is ready for us to
start. We must decide now whither we will go.'
'There was Charity on one, with a feeding-bottle in her hand--I believe
a Florence flask, and a backie-pipe stem stuck through the cork--as
nat'ral as nat'ral; and on the other was Hope with her anchor, and a
serpent twined round it, as I thought; but your dear father would insist
it was a rope. "But," said I, "look: it has an eye." However, your
father maintained that was only a loop in the cord.' Mrs. Trampleasure
was thinking of the pincushions.
'Whither are we to go, mother?' asked Orange.
'I am sure I don't know,' answered Mrs. Trampleasure, 'without my Blair,
and my Rollin, and my pinkies.' Mirelle was sitting at the window. The
day was passing, and no signs were seen of John Herring.
'I wonder how them pinkies have sold,' mused the old woman; 'I shouldn't
wonder if they've fetched a lot of money. I should say they were cheap
at five pounds. If I get a chance I'll buy them back at that figure.'
'We have no money,' said Orange, 'except a trifle which will be consumed
in inn expenses; we must go to one, as we have seen nothing about
lodgings. Mirelle, are you awake?'
'Yes, Orange.'
'You will have to give French lessons, and I will do the housework at
home and take in sewing. So perhaps we shall be able to keep body and
soul together.'
'I am waiting,' answered Mirelle.
'What nonsense!' said Orange, impatiently. 'Do you suppose that Mr.
Herring will trouble himself about us?'
'I am sure he will.'
'He has not come, and he must have received your letter.'
'Please, ma'am'--it was the servant who spoke from the doorway--'the
mistress hev sent to say, shall I go and fetch a coach?'
Orange looked at her mother. Mrs. Trampleasure wept.
'Yes,' said Orange; 'we will go at once. Yes, girl: go and fetch one.'
'It is unnecessary,' said Mirelle, rising. 'A coach has come. John
Herring is here.'
A rap at the door, and in another moment John Herring was ushered into
the room.
'Thank you! thank you for coming,' said Mirelle, advancing to meet him,
and holding out both her hands.
Herring was not looking strong. His fall, and a hard ride during the
night from West Wyke to Launceston, had made him look pale and worn and
unwell. But Orange, her mother, and Mirelle were too engaged in their
own troubles to notice the change in him.
'You have come to take us away from this house?' asked Mirelle.
'Yes, I have. You called me.'
He held her hands, and looked into her eyes, and was lost in wonder at
their depth and beauty, and in a dream of love. She met his gaze
frankly, but, as it was prolonged, her eyes fell.
'Whither are you going to take us?' asked Orange.
But Herring had ears for one voice only; he had thoughts at that moment
for one person only, who stood before him.
'Oh, Mr. Herring,' said Mirelle--and she looked up timidly again, but,
again encountering his eyes, lowered her dark lashes--'take us
away--anywhere. We cannot remain here any longer. We are turned out of
the house. We trust you perfectly; take us where you will.'
'Let me lead you to the coach.'
Then Orange said to Mrs. Trampleasure, 'Mother, you must go and thank
Mrs. Flamank before leaving.' But at that moment this good lady
appeared, relieved by the sight of the carriage standing at the house
door. Her visitors were departing.
She received the thanks given her for her hospitality with graciousness.
She even kissed Mirelle on the brow. 'I hope,' she said,
condescendingly, 'that you will find a comfortable and happy home, my
child. Aha!'--she looked at Herring, and then at Mirelle--'I have my
suspicions. Well, well! Time will show if they are justified.'
Herring saw the ladies into the coach, and mounted the box beside the
driver.
The carriage drew up at the door of Dolbeare. Herring descended, opened
the coach door, let down the steps, and presented his arm to Mrs.
Trampleasure.
'Mr. Herring,' exclaimed Orange, turning white, 'what is the meaning of
this? Do you not know that this is no longer our home? You have not
heard. You have made a mistake.'
'Pray step inside, ladies,' said he, smiling.
Bewildered, not knowing what to say, all three descended. No; Mirelle
was not bewildered; she was perfectly collected. What Mr. Herring did
was right. Where he led she followed with confidence; she had entire
reliance on him.
They entered the hall. Everything was as it had been: the clock on the
stairs was ticking; the door of the dining-room was open; a fire burned
in the grate; on the table lay a bundle of old walking-sticks, tied
together. Herring took up this bundle.