‘Lesbia hath a beaming eye,
But no one knows for whom it beameth,
Right and left its arrows fly,
But what they aim at, no one dreameth.’
By the advice, or rather by the express desire, of her trustees, Mrs.
Brownlow remained at Belforest, while they accepted an offer of renting
the London house for the season. Mr. Wakefield declared that there was
no reason that she should contract her expenditure; but she felt as if
everything she spent beyond her original income, except of course the
needful outlay on keeping up the house and gardens, were robbery of
Elvira, and she therefore did not fill up the establishment of servants,
nor of horses, using only for herself the little pair of ponies which
had been turned out in the park.
No one had perhaps realised the amount of worry that this arrangement
entailed. As Barbara said, if they could have gone away at once and
worked for their living like sensible people in a book, it would
have been all very well--but this half-and-half state was dreadful.
Personally it did not affect Babie much, but she was growing up to the
part of general sympathiser, and for the first time in their lives there
was a pull in contrary directions by her mother, and Armine.
Every expenditure was weighed before it was granted. Did it belong
rightly to Belforest estate or to Caroline Brownlow? And the claims
of the church and parish at Woodside were doubtful. Armine, under the
influence of Miss Parsons, took a wide view of the dues of the parish,
thought there was a long arrear to be paid off, and that whatever could
be given was so much out of the wolf’s mouth.
His mother, with ‘Be just before you are generous’ ringing in her ears,
referred all to the Colonel, and he had long had a fixed scale of the
duties of the property as a property, and was only rendered the more
resolute in it by that vehemence of Armine’s which enhanced his dislike
and distrust of the family at the vicarage.
“Bent on getting all they could while they could,” he said, quite
unjustly as to the vicar, and hardly fairly by the sister, whose demands
were far exceeded by those of her champion.
The claims of the cottages for repair, and of the school for
sufficient enlargement and maintenance to obviate a School Board,
were acknowledged; but for the rest, the Colonel said, “his sister was
perfectly at liberty. No one could blame her if she threw her balance at
the bank into the sea. She would never be called to account; but since
she asked him whether the estate was bound to assist in pulling the
church to pieces, and setting up a fresh curate to bring in more
absurdities, he could only say what he thought,” etc.
These thoughts of his were of course most offensive to Armine, who set
all down to sordid Puritan prejudice, could not think how his mother
could listen, and, when Babie stood up for her mother, went off to blend
his lamentations with those of Miss Parsons, whose resignation struck
him as heroic. “Never mind, Armine, it will all come in time. Perhaps
we are not fit for it yet. We cannot expect the world’s justice to
understand the outpouring of the saints’ liberality.”
Armine repeated this interesting aphorism to Barbara, and was much
disappointed that the shrewd little woman did not understand it, or only
so far as to say, “But I did not know that it was saintly to be liberal
with other people’s money.”
He said Babie had a prejudice against Miss Parsons; and he was so far
right that the Infanta did not like her, thought her a humbug, and
sorely felt that for the first time something had come between herself
and Armine.
Allen was another trouble. He did not agree to the retrenchments, in
which he saw no sense, and retained his horse and groom. Luckily he had
retained only one when going abroad, and at this early season he needed
no more. But his grievous anxiety and restlessness about Elvira did
not make him by any means insensible to the effects of a reduced
establishment in a large house, and especially to the handiwork of the
good woman who had been left in charge, when compared with that of the
80L cooks who had been the plague of his mother’s life.
No one, however, could wonder at his wretchedness, as day after day
passed without hearing from Elvira, and all that was known was that
she had left Mrs. Evelyn and gone to stay with Lady Flora Folliott, a
flighty young matron, who had been enraptured with her beauty at a table
d’hote a year ago, and had made advances not much relished by the rest
of the party.
No more was to be learnt till Lucas found a Saturday to come down.
Before he could say three words, he was cross-examined. Had he seen
Elvira?
“Several times.”
“Spoken to her?”
“Yes.”
“What had she said?”
“Asked him to look at a horse.”
“Did she know he was coming home?”
“Yes.”
“Had she sent any message?”
“Well--yes. To desire that her Algerine costume should be sent up.
Whew!” as Allen flung himself out of the room. “How have I put my foot
in it, mother?”
“You don’t mean that that was all?”
“Every jot! What, has she not written? The abominable little elf! I’m
coming.” And he shrugged his shoulders as Allen, who had come round to
the open window, beckoned to him.
“He was absolutely grappled by a trembling hand, and a husky voice
demanded, ‘What message did she really send? I can’t stand foolery’.”
“Just that, Allen--to Emma. Really just that. You can’t shake more out
of me. You might as well expect anything from that Chinese lantern. Hold
hard. ‘Tis not I--”
“Don’t speak! You don’t know her! I was a fool to think she would
confide to a mere buffoon,” cried poor Allen, in his misery. “Yet if
they were intercepting her letters--”
Wherewith he buried himself in the depths of the shrubbery, while Jock,
with a long whistle, came back through the library window to his mother,
observing--
“Intercepted! Poor fellow! Hardly necessary, if possible, though Lady
Flora might wish to catch her for Clanmacnalty. Has the miserable imp
really vouchsafed no notice of any of you?”
“Not the slightest; and it is breaking Allen’s heart.”
“As if a painted little marmoset were worth a man’s heart! But Allen
has always been infatuated about her, and there’s a good deal at stake,
though, if he could only see it in the right fight, he is well quit
of such a bubble of a creature. I wouldn’t be saddled with it for all
Belforest.”
“Don’t call her any more names, my dear! I only wish any one would
represent to her the predicament she keeps Allen in. He can’t press for
an answer, of course; but it is cruel to keep him in this suspense. I
wonder Mrs. Evelyn did not make her write.
“I don’t suppose it entered her mind that the little wretch (beg your
pardon) had not done it of her own accord, and with those Folliotts
there’s no chance. They live in a perpetual whirl, enough to distract an
Archbishop. Twenty-four parties a week at a moderate computation.”
“Unlucky child!”
“Wakefield is heartily vexed at her having run into such hands,” said
Jock; “but there is no hindering it, no one has any power, and even if
he had, George Gould is a mere tool in his wife’s hands.”
“Still, Mr. Wakefield might insist on her answering Allen one way or the
other. Poor fellow! I don’t think it would cost her much, for she
was too childish ever to be touched by that devotion of his. I always
thought it a most dangerous experiment, and all I wish for now is
that she would send him a proper dismissal, so that his mind might be
settled. It would be bad enough, but better than going on in this way.”
“I’ll see him,” said Jock, “or may be I can do the business myself, for,
strange to say, the creature doesn’t avoid me, but rather runs after
me.”
“You meet her in society?”
“Yes, I’ve not come to the end of my white kids yet, you see. And
mother, I came to tell you of something that has turned up. You know the
Evelyns are all dead against my selling out. I dined with Sir James on
Tuesday, and found next day it was for the sake of walking me out before
Sir Philip Cameron, the Cutteejung man, you know. He is sure to be sent
out again in the autumn, and he has promised Sir James that if I can
get exchanged into some corps out there, he will put me on his staff at
once. Mother!”
He stopped short, astounded at the change of countenance, that for a
moment she could neither control nor conceal, as she exclaimed “India!”
but rallying at once she went on “Sir Philip Cameron! My dear boy,
that’s a great compliment. How delighted your uncle will be!”
“But you, mother!”
“Oh yes, my dear, I shall, I will, like it. Of course I am glad and
proud for my Jock! How very kind of Sir James!”
“Isn’t it? He talked it over with me as if I had been Cecil, and said I
was quite right not to stay in the Guards; and that in India, if a man
has any brains at all and reasonable luck, he can’t help getting on.
So I shall be quite and clean off your hands, and in the way of working
forward, and perhaps of doing something worth hearing of. Mother, you
will be pleased then?”
“Shall I not, my dear, dear Jockey! I don’t think you could have a
better chief. I have always heard that Sir Philip was such a good man.”
“So Mrs. Evelyn said. She was sure you would be satisfied. You can’t
think how kind they were, making the affair quite their own,” said Jock,
with a little colour in his face. “They absolutely think it would be
wrong to give up the service.”
“Yes; Mrs. Evelyn wrote to me that you ought not to be thrown away. It
was very kind and dear, but with a little of the aristocratic notion
that the army is the only profession in the world. I can’t help it; I
can’t think your father’s profession unworthy of his son.”
“She didn’t say so!”
“No, but I understood it. Perhaps I am touchy; I don’t think I am
ungrateful. They have always made you like one of themselves.”
“Yes, so much that I don’t like to run counter to their wishes when they
have taken such pains. Besides, there are things that can be thought of,
even by a poor man, as a soldier, which can’t in the other line.”
This speech, made with bent head, rising colour, and hand playing with
his mother’s fan, gave her, all unwittingly on his part, a keen sense
that her Jock was indeed passing from her, but she said nothing to damp
his spirits, and threw herself heartily into his plans, announcing
them to his uncle with genuine exultation. To this the Colonel fully
responded, telling Jock that he would have given the world thirty years
ago for such a chance, and commending him for thus getting off his
mother’s hands.
“I only wish the rest of you were doing the same,” he said, “but each
one seems to think himself the first person to be thought of, and her
the last.”
“The Colonel’s wish seemed in course of fulfilment, for when Lucas went
a few days later to his brother Robert’s rooms, he found him collecting
testimonials for his fitness to act as Vice-principal to a European
college at Yokohama for the higher education of the Japanese.
“Mother has not heard of it,” said Jock.
“She need not till it is settled,” answered Bobus. “It will save her
trouble with her clerical friends if she only knows too late for a
protest.”
Jock understood when he saw the stipulations against religious teaching,
and recognised in the Principal’s name an essayist whose negations of
faith had made some stir. However, he only said, “It will be rather a
blow.”
“There are limits to all things,” replied Bobus. “The truest kindness to
her is to get afloat away from the family raft as speedily as possible.
She has quite enough to drag her down.”
“I should hope to act the other way,” said Jock.
“Get your own head above water first,” said Bobus. “Here’s some good
advice gratis, though I’ve no expectation of your taking it. Don’t go in
for study in the old quarters! Go to Edinburgh or Paris or anywhere you
please, but cut the connection, or you’ll never be rid of loafers for
life. Wherever mother is, all the rest will gravitate. Mark me, Allen is
spoilt for anything but a walking gentleman, Armine will never be good
for work, and how many years do you give Janet’s Athenian to come to
grief in? Then will they return to the domestic hearth with a band of
small Grecians, while Dr. Lucas Brownlow is reduced to a rotifer or
wheel animal, circulating in a trap collecting supplies, with ‘sic vos
non vobis’ for his motto.”
Jock looked startled. “How if there be no such rotifer?” he said. “You
don’t really think there will be nothing to depend when we are both
gone?”
“When?”
“Yes, I’ve a chance of getting on Cameron’s staff in India.”
“Oh, that’s all right, old fellow! Why, you’ll be my next neighbour.”
“But about mother? You don’t seriously think Ali and Armie will be
nothing but dead weights on her?”
“Only as long as there’s anybody to hold them up”, said Bobus,
perceiving that his picture had taken an effect the reverse of what he
intended. “They have no lack of brains, and are quite able to shift for
themselves and mother too, if only they have to do it, even if she were
a pauper, which she isn’t.”
But it was with a less lightsome heart that Jock went to his quarters
to prepare for a fancy ball, where he expected to meet Elvira, though
whether he should approach her or not would depend on her own caprice.
It was a very splendid affair. A whole back garden, had been transformed
into a vast pavilion, containing an Armida’s garden, whose masses of
ferns and piles of gorgeous flowers made delightful nooks for strangers
who left the glare of the dancing-room, and the quaint dresses
harmonised with the magic of the gaslight and the strange forms of the
exotics.
The simple scarlet of the young Guardsman was undistinguished among the
brilliant character-groups which represented old fairy tales and nursery
rhymes. There were ‘The White Cat and her Prince,’ ‘Puss-in-Boots and
the Princess,’ ‘Little Snowflake and her Bear,’ and, behold, here was
the loveliest Fatima ever seen, in the well-known Algerine dress, mated
with a richly robed and turbaned hero, whose beard was blue, though in
ordinary life red, inasmuch as he was Lady Flora’s impecunious and
not very reputable Scottish peer of a brother. That lady herself, in
a pronounced bloomer, represented the little old woman of doubtful
identity, and her husband the pedlar, whose ‘name it was Stout’; while
not far off the Spanish lady, in garments gay, as rich as may be, wooed
her big Englishman in a dress that rivalled Sir Nicolas Blount’s.
There was a pretty character quadrille, and then a general melee, in
which Jock danced successively with Cinderella and the fair equestrian
of Banbury Cross, and lost sight of Fatima, till, just as he was
considering of offering himself to little Bo-peep, he saw her looking a
good deal bored by the Spanish lady’s Englishman.
Tossing her head till the coins danced on her forehead, she exclaimed,
“Oh, there’s my cousin; I must speak to him!” and sprang to her old
companion as if for protection. “Take me to a cool corner, Jock,” she
said, “I am suffocating.”
“No wonder, after waltzing with a mountain.”
“He can no more waltz than fly! And he thinks himself irresistible! He
says his dress is from a portrait of his ancestor, Sir Somebody; and
Flora declares his only ancestor must have been the Fat Boy! And he
thought I was a Turkish Sultana! Wasn’t it ridiculous! You know he never
says anything but ‘Exactly.’”
“Did he intone it so as to convey all this?”
“He is a little inspired by his ruff and diamonds. Flora says he wants
to dazzle me, and will have them changed into paste before he makes them
over to his young woman. He has just tin enough to want more, and she
says I must be on my guard.”
“You want no guard, I should think, but your engagement.”
“What are you bringing that up for? I suppose you know how Allen wrote
to me?” she pouted.
“I know that he thought it due to you to release you from your promise,
and that he is waiting anxiously for your reply. Have you written?”
“Don’t bore so, Jock,” said Elvira pettishly. “It was no doing of mine,
and I don’t see why I should be teased.”
“Then you wish me to tell him that he is to take your silence as a
release from you.”
“I authorise nothing,” she said. “I hate it all.”
“Look here, Elvira,” said Jock, “do you know your own mind? Nobody wants
you to take Allen. In fact, I think he is much better quit of you; but
it is due to him, and still more to yourself, to cancel the old affair
before beginning a new one.”
“Who told you I was beginning a new one?” asked she pertly.
“No one can blame you, provided you let him loose first. It is
considered respectable, you know, to be off with the old love before you
are on with the new. Nay, it may be only a superstition.”
“Superstition!” she repeated in an awed voice that gave him his cue, and
he went on--“Oh yes, a lady has been even known to come and shake hands
with the other party after he had been hanged to give back her troth,
lest he should haunt her.”
“Allen isn’t hanged,” said Elvira, half frightened, half cross. “Why
doesn’t he come himself?”
“Shall he?” said Jock.
“My dear child, I’ve been running madly up and down for you!” cried Lady
Flora, suddenly descending on them, and carrying off her charge with
a cursory nod to the Guardsman, marking the difference between a
detrimental and even the third son of a millionaire.
He saw Elvira no more that night, and the next post carried a note to
Belforest.
31st May.
DEAR ALLEN--I don’t know whether you will thank me, but I tried to get a
something definite out of your tricksy Elf, and the chief result, so far
as I can understand the elfish tongue, is, that she sought no change,
and the final sentence was, ‘Why doesn’t he come himself?’ I believe it
is her honest wish to go on, when she is left to her proper senses;
but that is seldom. You must take this for what it is worth from the
buffoon, J. L. B.
Allen came full of hope, and called the next morning. Miss Menella was
out riding. He got a card for a party where she was sure to be present,
and watched the door, only to see her going away on the arm of Lord
Clanmacnalty to some other entertainment. He went to Mr. Folliott’s
door, armed with a note, and heard that Lady Flora and Miss Menella were
gone out of town for a few days. So it went on, and he turned upon
Jock with indignation at having been summoned to be thus deluded.
The undignified position added venom to the smart of the disregarded
affection and the suspense as to the future, and Jock had much to endure
after every disappointment, though Allen clung to him rather than to
any one else because of his impression that Elvira’s real preference was
unchanged (such as it was), and that these failures were rather due to
her friend than to herself.
This became more clear through Mrs. Evelyn. Her family had connections
in common with the Dowager Lady Clanmacnalty, and the two ladies met
at the house of their relation. Listening in the way of duty to the old
Scottish Countess’s profuse communications, she heard what explained a
good deal.
Did she know the Spanish girl who was with Flora--a handsome creature
and a great heiress? Oh yes; she had presented her. Strange affair!
Flora understood that there was a deep plot for appropriating the young
lady and her fortune.
“She had been engaged to Mr. Brownlow long before claims were known,”
began Mrs. Evelyn.
“Oh yes! It was very ingeniously arranged, only the discovery was made
too soon. I have it on the best authority. When the girl came to stay
with Flora, her aunt asked for an interview--such a nice sensible
woman--so completely understanding her position. She said it was such a
distress to her not to be qualified to take her niece into society,
yet she could not take her home, living so near, to be harassed by this
young man’s pursuit.”
“I saw Mrs. Gould myself,” said Mrs. Evelyn. “I cannot say I was
favourably impressed.”
“Oh, we all know she is not a lady; never professes it poor thing. She
is quite aware that her niece must move in a different sphere, and all
she wants is to have her guarded from that young Brownlow. He follows
them everywhere. It is quite the business of Flora’s life to avoid him.”
“Perhaps you don’t know that Mrs. Brownlow took that girl out of a
farmhouse, and treated her like a daughter, merely because they were
second or third cousins. The engagement to Allen Brownlow was made when
the fortune was entirely on his side.”
“Precaution or conscience, eh?” said the old lady, laughing. “By the by,
you were intimate with Mrs. Brownlow abroad. How fortunate for you that
nothing took place while they had such expectations! Of no family, I
hear, of quite low extraction. A parish doctor he was, wasn’t he?”
“A distinguished surgeon.”
“And _she_ came out of some asylum or foundling hospital?”
“Only the home for officers’ daughters,” said Mrs. Evelyn, not able to
help laughing. “Her father, Captain Allen, was in the same regiment with
Colonel Brownlow, her husband’s brother. I assure you the Menellas and
Goulds have no reason to boast.”
“A noble Spanish family,” said the dowager. “One can see it every
gesture of the child.”
It was plain that the old lady intended Mr. Barnes’s hoards to repair
the ravages of dissipation on the never very productive estates of
Clanmacnalty, and that while Elvira continued in Lady Flora’s custody,
there was little chance of a meeting between her and Allen. The girl
seemed to be submitting passively, and no doubt her new friends could
employ tact and flattery enough to avoid exciting her perverseness.
No doubt she had been harassed by Allen’s exaction of response to his
ardent affection, and wearied of his monopoly of her. Maiden coyness and
love of liberty might make her as willing to elude his approach as her
friends could wish.
Once only, at a garden party, did he touch the tips of her fingers, but
no more. She never met his eye, but threw herself into eager flirtation
with the men he most disliked, while the lovely carnation was mounting
in her cheek, and betraying unusual excitement. It became known that she
was going early in July into the country with some gay people who were
going to give a series of fetes on some public occasion, and then that
she was to go with Lady Clanmacnalty and her unmarried daughter to
Scotland, to help them entertain the grouse-shoot-party.
Allen’s stay in London was clearly of no further use, as Jock perceived
with a sensation of relief, for all his pity could not hinder him from
being bored with Allen’s continual dejection, and his sighs over each
unsuccessful pursuit. He was heartily tired of the part of confidant,
which was the more severe, because, whenever Allen had a fit of shame
at his own undignified position, he vented it in reproaches to Jock for
having called him up to London; and yet as long as there was a chance
of seeing Elvira, he could not tear himself away, was wild to get
invitations to meet her, and lived at his club in the old style and
expense.
Bobus was brief with Allen, and ironical on Jock’s folly in having
given the summons. For his own part he was much engrossed with his
appointment, going backwards and forwards between Oxford and London,
with little time for the concerns of any one else; but the evening after
this unfortunate garden party, when Jock had accompanied his eldest
brother back to his rooms, and was endeavouring, by the help of a pipe,
to endure the reiteration of mournful vituperations of destiny in the
shape of Lady Flora and Mrs. Gould, the door suddenly opened and Bobus
stood before them with his peculiarly brisk, self-satisfied air, in
itself an aggravation to any one out of spirits.
“All right,” he said, “I didn’t expect to find you in, but I thought
I would leave a note for the chance. I’ve heard of the very identical
thing to suit you, Ali, my boy.”
“Indeed,” said Allen, not prepared with gratitude for his younger
brother’s patronage.
“I met Bulstrode at Balliol last night, and he asked if I knew of any
one (a perfect gentleman he must be, that matters more than scholarship)
who would take a tutorship in a Hungarian count’s family. Two little
boys, who live like princes, tutor the same, salary anything you like
to ask. It is somewhere in the mountains, a feudal castle, with capital
sport.”
“Wolves and bears,” cried Jock, starting up with his old boyish
animation. “If I wasn’t going pig-sticking in India, what wouldn’t I
give for such a chance. The tutor will teach the young ideas how to
shoot, of course.”
“Of course,” said Bobus. “The Count is a diplomate, and there’s not
a bad chance of making oneself useful, and getting on in that line. I
should have jumped at it, if I hadn’t got the Japs on my hands.”
“Yes, you,” said Allen languidly.
“Well, you can do quite as well for a thing like this,” said Bobus, “or
better, as far as looking the gentleman goes. In fact, I suspect as much
classics as Mother Carey taught us at home would serve their countships’
turn. Here’s the address. You had better write by the first post
to-morrow, for one or two others are rising at it; but Bulstrode said he
would wait to hear from you. Here’s the letter with all the details.”
“Thank you. You seem to take a good deal for granted,” said Allen, not
moving a finger towards the letter.
“You won’t have it?”
“I have neither spirits nor inclination for turning bear-leader, and it
is not a position I wish to undertake.”
“What position would you like?” cried Jock. “You could take that rifle
you got for Algeria, and make the Magyars open their eyes. Seriously,
Allen, it is the right thing at the right time. You know Miss Ogilvie
always said the position was quite different for an English person among
these foreigners.”
“Who, like natives, are all the same nation,” quietly observed Allen.
“For that matter,” said Jock, “wasn’t it in Hungarie that the beggar of
low degree married the king’s daughter? There’s precedent for you, Ali!”
Allen had taken up the letter, and after glancing it slightly over,
said--
“Thanks, Vice-principal, but I won’t stand in the light of your other
aspirants.”
“What can you want better than this?” cried Jock. “By the time the law
business is over, one may look in vain for such a chance. It is a new
country too, and you always said you wanted to know how those fellows
with long-tailed names lived in private life.”
Both brothers talked for an hour, till they hoped they had persuaded
him that even for the most miserable and disappointed being on earth the
Hungarian castle might prove an interesting variety, and they left
him at last with the letter before him, undertaking to write and make
further inquiries.
The next day, however, just as Jock was about to set forth, intending,
as far as might be, to keep him up to the point, Bobus made his
appearance, and scornfully held out an envelope. There was the letter,
and therewith these words:--
“On consideration, I recur to my first conclusion, that this situation
is out of the question. To say nothing of the injury to my health and
nerves from agitation and suspense, rendering me totally unfit for
drudgery and annoyance, I cannot feel it right to place myself in a
situation equivalent to the abandonment of all hope. It is absurd to act
as if we were reduced to abject poverty, and I will never place myself
in the condition of a dependent. This season has so entirely knocked me
up that I must at once have sea air, and by the time you receive this I
shall be on my way to Ryde for a cruise in the Petrel.”
“_His_ health!” cried Bobus, his tone implying three notes, scarcely of
admiration.
“Well, poor old Turk, he is rather seedy,” said Jock. “Can’t sleep, and
has headaches! But ‘tis a regular case of having put him to flight!”
“Well, I’ve done with him,” said Bobus, “since there’s a popular
prejudice against flogging, especially one’s elder brother. This is a
delicate form of intimation that he intends doing the dolce at mother’s
expense.”
“The poor old chap has been an ornamental appendage so long that he
can’t make up his mind to anything else,” said Jock.
“He is no worse off than the rest of us,” said Bobus.
“In age, if in nothing else.”
“The more reason against throwing away a chance. The yacht, too! I
thought there was a Quixotic notion of not dipping into that Elf’s
money. I’m sure poor mother is pinching herself enough.”
“I don’t think Ali knows when he spends money more than when he spends
air,” returned Jock. “The Petrel can hardly cost as much in a month as
I have seen him get through in a week, protesting all the while that he
was living on absolutely nothing.”
“I know. You may be proud to get him down Oxford Street under thirty
shillings, and he never goes out in the evening much under half that.”
“Yes, he told me selling my horses was shocking bad economy.”
“Well, it was your own doing, having him up here,” said Bobus.
“I wonder how he will go on when the money is really not there.”
“Precisely the same,” said Bobus; “there’s no cure for that sort of
complaint. The only satisfaction is that we shall be out of sight of
it.”
“And a very poor one,” sighed Jock, “when mother is left to bear the
brunt.”
“Mother can manage him much better than we can,” said Bobus; “besides,
she is still a youngish woman, neither helpless nor destitute; and as I
always tell you, the greatest kindness we can do her is to look out for
ourselves.”
Bobus himself had done so effectually, for he was secure of a handsome
salary, and his travelling expenses were to be paid, when, early in the
next year, he was to go out with his Principal to confer on the Japanese
the highest possible culture in science and literature without any bias
in favour of Christianity, Buddhism, or any other sublime religion.
Meantime he was going home to make his preparations, and pack such
portions of his museum as he thought would be unexampled in Japan.
He had fulfilled his intention of only informing his mother after his
application had been accepted; and as it had been done by letter, he
had avoided the sight of the pain it gave her and the hearing of her
remonstrances, all of which he had referred to her maternal dislike of
his absence, rather than to his association with the Principal, a writer
whose articles she kept out of reach of Armine and Barbara.
The matter had become irrevocable and beyond discussion, as he intended,
before his return to Belforest, which he only notified by the post of
the morning before he walked into luncheon. By that time it was a fait
accompli, and there was nothing to be done but to enter on a lively
discussion on the polite manners and customs of the two-sworded nation
and the wonderful volcanoes he hoped to explore.
Perhaps one reason that his notice was so short was that there might
be the less time for Kencroft to be put on its guard. Thus, when, by
accident of course, he strolled towards the lodge, he found his cousin
Esther in the wood, with no guardians but the three youngest children,
who had coaxed her, in spite of the heat, to bring them to the slopes of
wood strawberries on their weekly half-holiday.
He had seen nothing, but had only been guided by the sound of voices
to the top of the sloping wooded bank, where, under the shade of the
oak-trees, looking over the tall spreading brackens, he beheld Essie
in her pretty gipsy hat and holland dress, with all her bird-like
daintiness, kneeling on the moss far below him, threading the scarlet
beads on bents of grass, with the little ones round her.
“I heard a chattering,” he said, as, descending through the fern, he met
her dark eyes looking up like those of a startled fawn; “so I came to
see whether the rabbits had found tongues. How many more are there? No,
thank you,” as Edmund and Lina answered his greeting with an offer of
very moist-looking fruit, and an ungrammatical “Only us.”
“Then _us_ run away. They grow thick up that bank, and I’ve got a prize
here for whoever keeps away longest. No, you shan’t see what it is. Any
one who comes asking questions will lose it. Run away, Lina, you’ll miss
your chance. No, no, Essie, you are not a competitor.”
“I must, Robert; indeed I must.”
“Can’t you spare me a moment when I am come down for my last farewell
visit?”
“But you are not going for a good while yet.”
“So you call it, but it will seem short enough. Did you ever hear of
minutes seeming like diamond drops meted out, Essie?”
“But, you know, it is your own doing,” said Essie.
“Yes, and why, Essie? Because misfortune has made such an exile as this
the readiest mode of ceasing to be a burden to my mother.”
“Papa said he was glad of it,” said Esther, “and that you were quite
right. But it is a terrible way off!”
“True! but there is one consideration that will make up to me for
everything.”
“That it is for Aunt Caroline!”
“Partly, but do you not know the hope which makes all work sweet to me?”
And the look of his eyes, and his hand seeking hers, made her say,
“Oh don’t, Robert, I mustn’t.”
“Nay, my queen, you were too duteous to hearken to me when I was rich
and prosperous. I would not torment you then, I meant to be patient;
but now I am poor and going into banishment, you will be generous and
compassionate, and let me hear the one word that will make my exile
sweet.”
“I don’t think I ought,” said the poor child under her breath. “O,
Robert, don’t you know I ought not.”
“Would you if that ugly cypher of an ought did not stand in the way?”
“Oh don’t ask me, Robert; I don’t know.”
“But I do know, my queen,” said he. “I know my little Essie better than
she knows herself. I know her true heart is mine, only she dares not
avow it to herself; and when hearts have so met, Esther, they owe one
another a higher duty than the filial tie can impose.”
“I never heard that before,” she said, puzzled, but not angered.
“No, it is not a doctrine taught in schoolrooms, but it is true and
universal for all that, and our fathers and mothers acted on it in their
day, and will give way to it now.”
Esther had never been told all her father’s objections to her cousin.
Simple prohibition had seemed to her parents sufficient for the gentle,
dutiful child. Bobus had always been very kind to her, and her heart
went out enough to him in his trouble to make coldness impossible to
her. Tears welled into her eyes with perplexity at the new theory, and
she could only falter out--
“That doesn’t seem right for me.”
“Say one word and trust to me, and it shall be right. Yes, Esther, say
the word, and in it I shall be strong to overcome everything, and win
the consent you desire. Say only that, with it, you would love me.”
“If?” said Esther.
It was an interrogative _if,_ and she did not mean it for “the one
word,” but Bobus caught at it as all he wanted. He meant it for the
fulcrum on which to rest the strong lever of his will, and before Esther
could add any qualification, he was overwhelming her with thanks and
assurances so fervent that she could interpose no more doubts, and
yielded to the sweetness of being able to make any one so happy, above
all the cousin whom most people thought so formidably clever.
Edmund interrupted them by rushing up, thus losing the prize, which was
won by the last comer, and proved to be a splendid bonbon; but there was
consolation for the others, since Bobus had laid in a supply as a means
of securing peace.
He would fain have waited to rivet his chains before manifesting them,
but he knew Essie too well to expect her to keep the interview a secret;
and he had no time to lose if, as he intended, though he had not told
her so, he was to take her to Japan with him.
So he stormed the castle without delay, walked to Kencroft with the
strawberry gatherers, found the Colonel superintending the watering of
his garden, and, with effrontery of which Essie was unconscious, led
her up, and announced their mutual love, as though secure of an ardent
welcome.
He did, mayhap, expect to surprise something of the kind out of his
slowly-moving uncle, but the only answer was a strongly accentuated
“Indeed! I thought I had told you both that I would have none of this
foolery. Esther, I am ashamed of you. Go in directly.”
The girl repaired to her own room to weep floods of tears over her
father’s anger, and the disobedience that made itself apparent as soon
as she was beyond the spell of that specious tongue. There were a few
fears too for his disappointment; but when her mother came up in great
displeasure, the first words were--
“O, mamma, I could not help it!”
“You could not prevent his accosting you, but you might have prevented
his giving all this trouble to papa. You know we should never allow it.”
“Indeed I only said if!”
“You had no right to say anything. When a young lady knows a man is not
to be encouraged, she should say nothing to give him an advantage. You
could never expect us to let you go to a barbarous place at the other
end of the world with a man of as good as no religion at all.”
“He goes to church,” said Essie, too simple to look beyond.
“Only here, to please his mother. My dear, you must put this out of your
head. Even if he were very different, we should never let you marry a
first cousin, and he knows it. It was very wrong in him to have spoken
to you.”
“Please don’t let him do it again,” said Esther, faintly.
“That’s right, my dear,” with a kiss of forgiveness. “I am sure you are
too good a girl really to care for him.”
“I wish he would not care for me,” sighed poor Essie, wearily. “He
always was so kind, and now they are in trouble I couldn’t vex him.”
“Oh, my dear, young men get over things of this sort half a dozen times
in their lives.”
Essie was not delighted with this mode of consolation, and when her
mother tenderly smoothed back her hair, and bade her bathe her face and
dress for dinner, she clung to her and said--
“Don’t let me see him again.”
It was a wholesome dread, which Mrs. Brownlow encouraged, for both she
and her husband were annoyed and perplexed by Robert’s cool reception
of their refusal. He quietly declared that he could allow for their
prejudices, and that it was merely a matter of time, and he was
provokingly calm and secure, showing neither anger nor disappointment.
He did not argue, but having once shown that his salary warranted his
offer, that the climate was excellent, and that European civilisation
prevailed, he treated his uncle and aunt as unreasonably prejudiced
mortals, who would in time yield to his patient determination.
His mother was as much annoyed as they were, all the more because her
sister-in-law could hardly credit her perfect innocence of Robert’s
intentions, and was vexed at her wish to ascertain Esther’s feelings.
This was not easy! the poor child was so unhappy and shamefaced, so
shocked at her involuntary disobedience, and so grieved at the pain
she had given. If Robert had been set before her with full consent of
friends, she would have let her whole heart go out to him, loved him,
and trusted him for ever, treating whatever opinions were unlike hers
as manly idiosyncrasies beyond her power to fathom. But she was no Lydia
Languish to need opposition as a stimulus. It rather gave her tender
and dutiful spirit a sense of shame, terror, and disobedience; and she
thankfully accepted the mandate that sent her on a visit to her married
sister for as long as Bobus should remain at Belforest.
He did not show himself downcast, but was quietly assured that he should
win her at last, only smiling at the useless precaution, and declaring
himself willing to wait, and make a home for her.
But this matter had not tended to make his mother more at ease in her
enforced stay at Belforest, which was becoming a kind of gilded prison.