When the scenes in some long diorama pass solemnly before us, there is
sometimes one solitary object, contrasting, perhaps, the view of stately
cities or the march of a mighty river, that halts on the eye for a
moment, and then glides away, leaving on the mind a strange, comfortless,
undefined impression.
Why was the object presented to us? In itself it seemed comparatively
insignificant. It may have been but a broken column, a lonely pool with
a star-beam on its quiet surface,--yet it awes us. We remember it when
phantasmal pictures of bright Damascus, or of colossal pyramids, of
bazaars in Stamboul, or lengthened caravans that defile slow amidst the
sands of Araby, have sated the wondering gaze. Why were we detained in
the shadowy procession by a thing that would have been so commonplace had
it not been so lone? Some latent interest must attach to it. Was it
there that a vision of woe had lifted the wild hair of a Prophet; there
where some Hagar had stilled the wail of her child on her indignant
breast? We would fain call back the pageantry procession, fain see again
the solitary thing that seemed so little worth the hand of the artist,
and ask, "Why art thou here, and wherefore dost thou haunt us?"
Rise up,--rise up once more, by the broad great thoroughfare that
stretches onward and onward to the remorseless London! Rise up, rise up,
O solitary tree with the green leaves on thy bough, and the deep rents in
thy heart; and the ravens, dark birds of omen and sorrow, that build
their nest amidst the leaves of the bough, and drop with noiseless plumes
down through the hollow rents of the heart, or are heard, it may be in
the growing shadows of twilight, calling out to their young.
Under the old pollard-tree, by the side of John Avenel's house, there
cowered, breathless and listening, John Avenel's daughter Nora. Now,
when that fatal newspaper paragraph, which lied so like truth, met her
eyes, she obeyed the first impulse of her passionate heart,--she tore the
wedding ring from her finger, she enclosed it, with the paragraph itself,
in a letter to Audley,--a letter that she designed to convey scorn and
pride--alas! it expressed only jealousy and love. She could not rest
till she had put this letter into the post with her own hand, addressed
to, Audley at Lord Lansmere's. Scarce had it left her ere she repented.
What had she done,--resigned the birth-right of the child she was so soon
to bring into the world, resigned her last hope in her lover's honour,
given up her life of life--and from belief in what?--a report in a
newspaper! No, no; she would go herself to Lansmere; to her father's
home,--she could contrive to see Audley before that letter reached his
hand. The thought was scarcely conceived before obeyed. She found a
vacant place in a coach that started from London some hours before the
mail, and went within a few miles of Lansmere; those last miles she
travelled on foot. Exhausted, fainting, she gained at last the sight of
home, and there halted, for in the little garden in front she saw her
parents seated. She heard the murmur of their voices, and suddenly she
remembered her altered shape, her terrible secret. How answer the
question,
"Daughter, where and who is thy husband?" Her heart failed her; she
crept under the old pollard-tree, to gather up resolve, to watch, and to
listen. She saw the rigid face of the thrifty, prudent mother, with the
deep lines that told of the cares of an anxious life, and the chafe of
excitable temper and warm affections against the restraint of decorous
sanctimony and resolute pride. The dear stern face never seemed to her
more dear and more stern. She saw the comely, easy, indolent, good-
humoured father; not then the poor, paralytic sufferer, who could yet
recognize Nora's eyes under the lids of Leonard, but stalwart and
jovial,--first bat in the Cricket Club, first voice in the Glee Society,
the most popular canvasser of the Lansmere Constitutional True Blue
Party, and the pride and idol of the Calvinistical prim wife; never from
those pinched lips of hers had come forth even one pious rebuke to the
careless, social man. As he sat, one hand in his vest, his profile
turned to the road, the light smoke curling playfully up from the pipe,
over which lips, accustomed to bland smile and hearty laughter, closed as
if reluctant to be closed at all, he was the very model of the
respectable retired trader in easy circumstances, and released from the
toil of making money while life could yet enjoy the delight of spending
it.
"Well, old woman," said John Avenel, "I must be off presently to see to
those three shaky voters in Fish Lane; they will have done their work
soon, and I shall catch 'em at home. They do say as how we may have an
opposition; and I know that old Smikes has gone to Lonnon in search of a
candidate. We can't have the Lansmere Constitutional Blues beat by a
Lonnoner! Ha, ha, ha!"
"But you will be home before Jane and her husband Mark come? How ever
she could marry a common carpenter!"
"Yes," said John, "he is a carpenter; but he has a vote, and that
strengthens the family interest. If Dick was not gone to Amerikay, there
would be three on us. But Mark is a real good Blue! A Lonnoner, indeed!
a Yellow from Lonnon beat my Lord and the Blues! Ha, ha!"
"But, John, this Mr. Egerton is a Lonnoner!"
"You don't understand things, talking such nonsense. Mr. Egerton is the
Blue candidate, and the Blues are the Country Party; therefore how can he
be a Lonnoner? An uncommon clever, well-grown, handsome young man, eh!
and my young Lord's particular friend."
Mrs. Avenel sighed.
"What are you sighing and shaking your head for?"
"I was thinking of our poor, dear, dear Nora!"
"God bless her!" cried John, heartily.
There was a rustle under the boughs of the old hollow-hearted pollard-
tree.
"Ha, ha! Hark! I said that so loud that I have startled the ravens!"
"How he did love her!" said Mrs. Avenel, thoughtfully. "I am sure he
did; and no wonder, for she looks every inch a lady; and why should not
she be my lady, after all?"
"He? Who? Oh, that foolish fancy of yours about my young Lord? A
prudent woman like you!--stuff! I am glad my little beauty is gone to
Lonnon, out of harm's way."
"John, John, John! No harm could ever come to my Nora. She 's too pure
and too good, and has too proper a pride in her, to--"
"To listen to any young lords, I hope," said John; "though," he added,
after a pause, "she might well be a lady too. My Lord, the young one,
took me by the hand so kindly the other day, and said, 'Have not you
heard from her--I mean Miss Avenel--lately?' and those bright eyes of his
were as full of tears as--as--as yours are now."
"Well, John, well; go on."
"That is all. My Lady came up, and took me away to talk about the
election; and just as I was going, she whispered, 'Don't let my wild boy
talk to you about that sweet girl of yours. We must both see that she
does not come to disgrace.' 'Disgrace!' that word made me very angry for
the moment. But my Lady has such a way with her that she soon put me
right again. Yet, I do think Nora must have loved my young Lord, only
she was too good to show it. What do you say?" And the father's voice
was thoughtful.
"I hope she'll never love any man till she's married to him; it is not
proper, John," said Mrs. Avenel, somewhat starchly, though very mildly.
"Ha, ha!" laughed John, chucking his prim wife under the chin, "you did
not say that to me when I stole your first kiss under that very pollard-
tree--no house near it then!"
"Hush, John, hush!" and the prim wife blushed like a girl.
"Pooh," continued John, merrily, "I don't see why we plain folk should
pretend to be more saintly and prudish-like than our betters. There's
that handsome Miss Leslie, who is to marry Mr. Egerton--easy enough to
see how much she is in love with him,--could not keep her eyes off from
him even in church, old girl! Ha, ha! What the deuce is the matter with
the ravens?"
"They'll be a comely couple, John. And I hear tell she has a power of
money. When is the marriage to be?"
"Oh, they say as soon as the election is over. A fine wedding we shall
have of it! I dare say my young Lord will be bridesman. We'll send for
our little Nora to see the gay doings!"
Out from the boughs of the old tree came the shriek of a lost spirit,--
one of those strange, appalling sounds of human agony which, once heard,
are never forgotten. It is as the wail of Hope, when SHE, too, rushes
forth from the Coffer of Woes, and vanishes into viewless space; it is
the dread cry of Reason parting from clay, and of Soul, that would wrench
itself from life! For a moment all was still--and then a dull, dumb,
heavy fall!
The parents gazed on each other, speechless: they stole close to the
pales, and looked over. Under the boughs, at the gnarled roots of the
oak, they saw--gray and indistinct--a prostrate form. John opened the
gate, and went round; the mother crept to the road-side, and there stood
still.
"Oh, wife, wife!" cried John Avenel, from under the green boughs, "it is
our child Nora! Our child! our child!"
And, as he spoke, out from the green boughs started the dark ravens,
wheeling round and round, and calling to their young!
And when they had laid her on the bed, Mrs. Avenel whispered John to
withdraw for a moment; and with set lips but trembling hands began to
unlace the dress, under the pressure of which Nora's heart heaved
convulsively. And John went out of the room bewildered, and sat himself
down on the landing-place, and wondered whether he was awake or sleeping;
and a cold numbness crept over one side of him, and his head felt very
heavy, with a loud, booming noise in his ears. Suddenly his wife stood
by his side, and said, in a very low voice,
"John, run for Mr. Morgan,--make haste. But mind--don't speak to any one
on the way. Quick, quick!"
"Is she dying?"
"I don't know. Why not die before?" said Mrs. Avenel, between her teeth;
"but Mr. Morgan is a discreet, friendly man."
"A true Blue!" muttered poor John, as if his mind wandered; and rising
with difficulty, he stared at his wife a moment, shook his head, and was
gone.
An hour or two later, a little, covered, taxed cart stopped at Mr.
Avenel's cottage, out of which stepped a young man with pale face and
spare form, dressed in the Sunday suit of a rustic craftsman; then a
homely, but pleasant, honest face bent down to him, smilingly; and two
arms emerging from under covert of a red cloak extended an infant, which
the young man took tenderly. The baby was cross and very sickly; it
began to cry. The father hushed, and rocked, and tossed it, with the air
of one to whom such a charge was familiar.
"He'll be good when we get in, Mark," said the young woman, as she
extracted from the depths of the cart a large basket containing poultry
and home-made bread.
"Don't forget the flowers that the squire's gardener gave us," said Mark
the Poet.
Without aid from her husband, the wife took down basket and nosegay,
settled her cloak, smoothed her gown, and said, "Very odd! they don't
seem to expect us, Mark. How still the house is! Go and knock; they
can't ha' gone to bed yet."
Mark knocked at the door--no answer. A light passed rapidly across the
windows on the upper floor, but still no one came to his summons. Mark
knocked again. A gentleman dressed in clerical costume, now coming from
Lansinere Park, on the opposite side of the road, paused at the sound of
Mark's second and more impatient knock, and said civilly,
"Are you not the young folks my friend John Avenel told me this morning
he expected to visit him?"
"Yes, please, Mr. Dale," said Mrs. Fairfield, dropping her courtesy.
"You remember me! and this is my dear good man!"
"What! Mark the Poet?" said the curate of Lansmere, with a smile. "Come
to write squibs for the election?"
"Squibs, sir!" cried Mark, indignantly.
"Burns wrote squibs," said the curate, mildly.
Mark made no answer, but again knocked at the door.
This time, a man, whose face, even seen by the starlight, was much
flushed, presented himself at the threshold.
"Mr. Morgan!" exclaimed the curate, in benevolent alarm; no illness here,
I hope?"
"Cott! it is you, Mr. Dale!--Come in, come in; I want a word with you.
But who the teuce are these people?"
"Sir," said Mark, pushing through the doorway, "my name is Fairfield, and
my wife is Mr. Avenel's daughter!"
"Oh, Jane--and her baby too!--Cood! cood! Come in; but be quiet, can't
you? Still, still--still as death!"
The party entered, the door closed; the moon rose, and shone calmly on
the pale silent house, on the sleeping flowers of the little garden, on
the old pollard with its hollow core. The horse in the taxed cart dozed
unheeded; the light still at times flitted across the upper windows.
These were the only signs of life, except when a bat, now and then
attracted by the light that passed across the windows, brushed against
the panes, and then, dipping downwards, struck up against the nose of the
slumbering horse, and darted merrily after the moth that fluttered round
the raven's nest in the old pollard.