NEW INFLUENCES.
Once more the Old Wood Lodge stood solitary under the darkening wintry
skies, with no bright faces at its windows, nor gleam of household
firelight in the dim little parlour, where Miss Bridget’s shadow came
back to dwell among the silence, a visionary inhabitant. Once more
Hannah sat solitary in her kitchen, lamenting that it was “lonesomer nor
ever,” and pining for the voices of the children. Hannah would have
almost been content to leave her native place and her own people to
accompany the family to London; but that was out of the question; and,
spite of all Mamma’s alarms, Susan had really conducted herself in a
very creditable manner under her great responsibility as housekeeper at
Bellevue.
The journey home was not a very eventful one. They were met by Papa and
Louis on their arrival, and conducted in triumph to their own little
house, which did not look so attractive, by any means, as it used to do.
Then they settled down without more ado into the family use and wont.
With so great a change in all their prospects and intentions--so strange
an enlargement of their horizon and extension of their hopes--it was
remarkable how little change befell the outward life and customs of the
family. Marian, it was true, was “engaged;” but Marian might have been
engaged to poor Harry Oswald without any great variation of
circumstances; and that was always a possibility lying under everybody’s
eyes. It did not yet disturb the _habits_ of the family; but this new
life which they began to enter--this life of separated and individual
interest--took no small degree of heart and spirit out of those joint
family pleasures and occupations into which Marian constantly brought a
reference to Louis, which Agnes passed through with a preoccupied and
abstracted mind, and from which Charlie was far away. The stream
widened, the sky grew broader, yet every one had his or her separate and
peculiar firmament. A maturer, perhaps, and more complete existence was
opening upon them; but the first effect was by no means to increase the
happiness of the family. They loved each other as well as ever; but they
were not so entirely identical. It was a disturbing influence, foreign
and unusual; it was not the quiet, assured, undoubting family happiness
of the days which were gone.
Then there were other unaccordant elements. Rachel, whom Mrs Atheling
insisted upon retaining with them, and who was extremely eager on her
own part to find something to do, and terrified to think herself a
burden upon her friends; and Louis, who contented himself with his
pittance of income, but only did his mere duty at the office, and gave
all his thoughts and all his powers to the investigation which engrossed
him. Mrs Atheling was very much concerned about Louis. If all this came
to nothing, as was quite probable, she asked her husband eagerly what
was to become of these young people--what were they to do? For at
present, instead of trying to get on, Louis, who had no suspicion of the
truth, gave his whole attention to a visionary pursuit, and was content
to have the barest enough which he could exist upon. Mr Atheling shook
his head, and could not make any satisfactory reply. “There was no
disposition to idleness about the boy,” Papa said, with approval. “He
was working very hard, though he might make nothing by it; and when this
state of uncertainty was put an end to, then they should see.”
And Marian of late had become actively suspicious and observant. Marian
attacked her mother boldly, and without concealment. “Mamma, it is
something about Louis that Charlie has gone abroad for!” she said, in
an unexpected sally, which took the garrison by surprise.
“My dear, how could you think of such a thing?” cried the prudent Mrs
Atheling. “What could Miss Anastasia have to do with Louis? Why, she
never so much as saw him, you know. You must, by no means, take foolish
fancies into your head. I daresay, after all, he must belong to Lord
Winterbourne.”
Marian asked no more; but she did not fail to communicate her suspicions
to Louis at the earliest opportunity. “I am quite sure,” said Marian,
not scrupling even to express her convictions in presence of Agnes and
Rachel, “that Charlie has gone abroad for something about you.”
“Something about me!” Louis was considerably startled; he was even
indignant for a moment. He did not relish the idea of having secret
enterprises undertaken for him, or to know less about himself than
Marian’s young brother did. “You must be mistaken,” he said, with a
momentary haughtiness. “Charlie is a very acute fellow, but I do not see
that he is likely to trouble himself about me.”
“Oh, but it was Miss Anastasia,” said Marian, eagerly.
Then Louis coloured, and drew himself up. His first idea was that Miss
Anastasia looked for evidence to prove him the son of Lord Winterbourne;
and he resented, with natural vehemence, the interference of the old
lady. “We are come to a miserable pass, indeed,” he said, with
bitterness, “when people investigate privately to prove this wretched
lie against us.”
“But you do not understand,” cried Rachel. “Oh, Louis, I never told you
what Miss Anastasia said. She said you were to take the name of
Atheling, because it meant illustrious, and because the exiled princes
were named so. Both Marian and Agnes heard her. She is a friend, Louis.
Oh, I am sure, if she is inquiring anything, it is all for our good!”
The colour rose still higher upon Louis’s cheek. He did not quite
comprehend at the moment this strange, sudden side-light which glanced
down upon the question which was so important to him. He did not pause
to follow, nor see to what it might lead; but it struck him as a clue to
something, though he was unable to discover what that something was.
Atheling! the youth’s imagination flashed back in a moment upon those
disinherited descendants of Alfred, the Edgars and Margarets, who,
instead of princely titles, bore only that addition to their name. He
was as near the truth at that moment as people wandering in profound
darkness are often near the light. Another step would have brought him
to it; but Louis did not take that step, and was not enlightened. His
heart rose, however, with the burning impatience of one who comes within
sight of the goal. He started involuntarily with haste and eagerness. He
was jealous that even friendly investigations should be the first to
find out the mystery. He felt as if he would have a better right to
anything which might be awaiting him, if he discovered it himself.
Upon all this tumult of thought and feeling, Agnes looked on, saying
nothing--looked on, by no means enjoying her spectatorship and superior
knowledge. It was a “situation” which might have pleased Mr Endicott,
but it terribly embarrassed Agnes, who found it no pleasure at all to be
so much wiser than her neighbours. She dared not confide the secret to
Louis any more than she could to the Rector; and she would have been
extremely unhappy between them, but for the relief and comfort of that
fable, which was quickly growing into shape and form. It had passed out
of her controlling hands already, and began to exercise over her the
sway which a real created thing always exercises over the mind even of
its author: it had ceased to be the direct personal affair she had
intended to make it; it told its story, but after a more delicate
process, and Agnes expended all her graceful fancy upon its perfection.
She thought now that Louis might find it out as well as the Rector. It
was an eloquent appeal, heart-warm and touching to them both.