BALNACLUITH PLACE.
"It often surprises me," said Mr. Anerley, as the little party made its
way across the common of St. Mary-Kirby in the warm evening glow, "that
Hubbard cares to keep up acquaintance with us. We always dislike people
who have known us in ill-fortune, or penury, or great depression. I
even hate the flavour of cigars that I have smoked when recovering from
sickness; I must have others when I get quite well again. Now, Hubbard,
with his deer-park, and harriers, and thirty thousand a year, ought to
be disgusted with people who knew him as a tea-broker."
"Don't be so ill-natured about Mr. Hubbard, dear," said his wife, with a
smile. "I'm sure he is a big, soft, stupid, well-meaning sort of man."
Mr. Anerley was not quite so certain about the softness and good
intentions of the Count; but he charitably forbore to speak. Dove and
Will, who had stood for a few seconds on the bridge, to watch the two
swans come sailing towards them in expectation of crumbs--cleaving the
burnished gold of the mill-head into long purple lines--now came up; and
they walked away from the still little village, along the green lanes,
until they drew near the Place.
It was a great, sombre, fine old building, which had figured in history
under another name--a large building of gloomy red brick, with
innumerable mullioned windows, and peaks, and stone griffins--a building
that had here and there grown grey and orange with the lichens and rain
and wind of many years. It stood upon a high terrace on the side of a
hill sloping down to the river, which ran along the valley to St.
Mary-Kirby; and at this point the stream--a line of flashing gold
winding through the soft green--divided the terrace and lawn of the
house from the great park opposite, with its magnificent elms and its
small close-lying herd of deer. Round about the Place, too, were some
fine trees, on a particular cluster of which a colony of rooks had
established themselves at some bygone time. Altogether a noble and
handsome old building was this Balnacluith Place, for which the Graf von
Schoenstein had--not without a purpose--expended a large sum of money,
on his accession to fortune. Alas! the influence of the Place had fled
the moment he bought it. The brilliant gentlemen and lovely ladies whom
the Count had pictured to himself dining in the great hall, or walking
in the broad park, never appeared. The grand old house had lost its
mesmeric power; and no longer drew down from London those brilliant
parties of wits, and beaux, and belles who once--as the Count had
informed himself--held their merry revels there. He had sparkling wines
at his command; lights he could have in abundance; when he chose, the
dining-hall was brilliant with plate, and flowers, and fruit--but the
ladies and gentlemen whom he had mentally invited stayed away. And he
was not the man to go out into the highways and byways, and gather in
beggars to his feast. He had aimed at a particular kind of guests: they
had not come; but there was yet hope of their coming.
When the Anerleys drew near they perceived the figure of a man walking
solitarily up and down the stone terrace in front of the house. His
only companions were the couchant lions at each end of the terrace,
which had kept guard there, over the few steps, for nearly a couple of
centuries.
"It is Hubbard himself," said Mr. Anerley.
"He looks like the ghost of some dead owner of the house, come back to
take his accustomed stroll," said Will.
"At all events, he is smoking," said Dove.
When the Count perceived his visitors, he threw away his cigar, and came
down to meet them, saluting them with florid and formal courtesy.
"No need to ask how _you_ are, Miss Anerley--charming as ever.
Persuaded our friend Will to give up his wandering life, eh?"
This was the Count's great joke: it had never been known to fail--at
least in rendering Dove very uncomfortable.
"What a fine evening! Look how beautiful the trees are down there!" he
continued, allowing his eye to roam over the prospect before him in
innocent pride--looking, indeed, as if he thought that God had prepared
the sunset simply to light up Count Schoenstein's park.
"It is a fine park; and a beautiful evening, too," said Mr. Anerley.
"It is a pity that most beautiful things make one sad."
"That is because we don't possess them," said the Count, laughing; he
was of a practical turn of mind.
The Count turned to the ladies, and--as was his universal custom when he
wished to be polite--he insisted on their going inside and having a
glass of wine.
"Look here, Anerley," he said, when both of them declined, "you must
come and try some port I got down last night--bought it at the sale of
Major Benson's cellar on Thursday--10*l.* a dozen, and cheap at the
money."
"If it was sent home last night, I'd rather not," said Mr. Anerley, with
a smile.
"I didn't mean that particular wine," replied the Count, unblushingly.
"Or will you all stay and dine with me? Do; I dine at eight."
This was what is bluntly called a lie; the Count--except when
circumstances compelled him--never forsook his old dinner-hour of five.
He had, in fact, only begun his second cigar after dinner when the
Anerley's arrived. But the Count probably fancied that a mere
courtesy-lie wasn't much, and trusted to his visitors declining the
invitation, which they did.
"I would rather go down and see the deer," said Dove. "Didn't you say
you had some roe-deer amongst them?"
"Those I had brought from Schoenstein?" said the Count, rather
pompously. "They all died, as Hermann said they would. But it was an
experiment, you know. I must get Hermann, if we're going into the park;
the deer won't come to me."
He went into the house for a few moments, and reappeared, followed by
the keeper, a splendid-looking fellow, with a brown, handsome face,
great shoulders, and long legs encased in rough top-boots. This Hermann
had been the head-keeper, chief forester, and what not, of Schoenstein,
when Mr. Hubbard bought the place; and on the principle of the
Portuguese navigators, who brought home men and women from the Guinea
Coast to prove that they had been there, the Count carried the big
Schwarzwalder over to England with him, as a specimen of what he had
purchased abroad. Unlike most of his Schwarzwald brethren, Hermann knew
not a word of English; Hubbard knew not a word of German; and for many a
month after his expatriation the efforts of master and man to understand
each other formed a constant comedy at the Place. In one or two cases
Mr. Anerley was besought to act as interpreter; and even now nothing
delighted the stalwart, good-natured Blackforester so much as a long
talk in his native language with any of his master's guests who were
complaisant enough to humour him.
"Hermann," said the Count, loudly, to let his visitors know that _now_
he could support his rank by talking in the language of the country
which gave it him, "das Fraeulein wunscht die--die Rehe zu sehen----"
"The Rehe are all died, Herr Graf," said the sturdy keeper, who would
not have his native tongue burlesqued.
"Ich meine die--die--the deer that are there," said the Count, sharply
and hotly, "und sie muessen, wissen Sie, etwas--etwas--eh--ah--etwas
Speise----"
"Futter, nicht wahr?" suggested Will, looking gravely at Dove.
"Yes, yes, of course; the fellow knows well enough. I mean to get the
deer to come up to him."
"They will come without nothing, Herr Graf," said the tall forester.
They crossed the small iron bridge leading from the lawn over the river
into the park. The deer were for the most part lying down, underneath
the shadow of three large oaks, one or two only still standing and
nibbling the grass. When our party drew near, however, the whole herd
rose and retreated a little, while one of the bucks came proudly to the
front and stood with his small head and tall horns erect, watching the
approach of the strangers.
"Will you come with me, Fraeulein?" said Hermann; and Dove went forward
with him, leaving the others behind.
No sooner had the keeper thus made himself distinctly visible, than two
or three of the does came timidly forward, alternating a little quiet
canter with a distrustful pause, and at last one of them came quite up
to the keeper, and looked rather wistfully at his hand with her large
soft brown eyes.
"This is her I call _Laemmchen_," said Hermann, stroking the small neck
of the hind, "she is so tame. And there is _Leopard_ over there, with
the spots on him. I speak to them in German; they know it all the
same."
One of the bucks now seemed also desirous to approach; looking about him
in a sheepish way, however, as if it were beneath his dignity for him to
follow the example of the women of his tribe.
"Komm her, du furchtsamer Kerl!" said Hermann, going forward, and taking
hold of him by one of his broad, palmated horns; "he is a fine deer, is
he not? Look at his horns and his bright colours. He is better than for
to be in a park, like the cows. He should be in the woods."
He took a piece of brown bread from his pocket and gave it to Dove, who
held it to the small mouth of the buck, where it was speedily nibbled
up. Then she stroked his neck, and looked at his big, apprehensive
eyes; and then they went back to the group whom they had left.
"Miss Anerley," said the Count, "won't you persuade those people to go
inside and have some tea? I ought to be able to give you good tea, you
know."
It was when the Count wished to be very modest and complaisant indeed
that he joked about his old calling.
They went inside, and sat in a large, sombre, oaken-panelled room, with
the fast fading light coldly falling through the diamond panes of the
tall and narrow windows. Then lamps were brought in, and tea; and they
sat talking and chatting for nearly an hour.
When they went out upon the terrace again to go home, there was a pale
moonlight lying over the lawn, hitting sharply here and there on the
stone mullions of the windows, and touching greyly and softly a thin
mist which had settled down upon the park. It was a beautiful, still
night; and as Dove and Will went home, they allowed Mr. and Mrs. Anerley
to get on so far in front of them, that at last they were only visible
as dark specks on the white road.
For some time they walked on in silence; and then Will said, carelessly:
"Will you go up to town with me to-morrow morning, Dove, and I'll devote
the whole day to you; or will you come up with my father in the
afternoon?"
She did not answer him; and then, in a second or two, when he looked
down, he was surprised to find her eyes full of tears.
"Whatever is the matter, Dove?"
"Oh, Will," she said, turning the beautiful, wet eyes up to his
face--and they were very beautiful in the soft moonlight--"I have been
wanting to speak to you all day; and I have been so afraid. I wanted to
ask you not to--not to go to Honduras--won't you give it up, if I ask
you, Will?"
"Why should that trouble you, Dove? If I do go, it will only be a short
trip; and then it will be of great advantage to me in this way, that
if----"
"But Will, dear, listen to me for a moment," she said, with a piteous
entreaty in her voice. "I know why you have always to go away from
England, although you have been too kind-hearted to speak of it--I know
it quite well--it's because I am to have the money that belongs to you,
and you have to fight your way all by yourself, and leave your family
year after year, and all because of me--and I won't have the money,
Will--I hate it--and it's making me more miserable every day."
"Darling, don't distress yourself like that," he said, soothingly, for
she was now crying very bitterly. "I assure you, you mistake the whole
affair. I won't go to Honduras, if you like--I'll do anything you ask
me. But really, Dove, I go abroad merely because, as I believe, one of
my ancestors must have married a gipsy. I like to wander about, and see
people, and live differently, and get generally woke up to what's going
on in the world. Bless you, my darling, if it were money I wanted, I
ought to have remained at home from the beginning. My father has only
done what any well-thinking man would have done in his place--and you
mustn't fret yourself about such a trifle----"
"I knew you would never acknowledge I was robbing you, Will; but I am.
And all the time you were in Russia, and in Canada, whenever there was a
heavy storm blowing, I used to lie awake at night and cry; because I
knew it was I who had sent you away out there, and I thought you might
be in a ship and in danger--all through me. And this morning, when
you--when you said you were going to Honduras, I made up my mind then to
go to papa to-morrow morning, and I'll tell him I won't have the
money--I'll go away from you altogether rather, and be a governess----"
"Now, now, Dove, don't vex me and yourself about nothing," he said to
her kindly. "I won't go to Honduras."
"You won't?"
"I won't."
She raised her head a little bit--in an entreating way--and the compact
was sealed.
"I'll tell you what I shall do," he said, taking the hand that lay on
his arm into his own. "I will stay at home, get myself into some
regular work, take a small house somewhere near here, and then you'll
come and be my wife, won't you, Dove?"
There was a slight pressure on his hand: that was her only answer. They
walked on for some little time in silence; and then, catching a glimpse
of her face, he stopped to dry the tears from her cheeks. While engaged
in that interesting occupation, she said to him, with a little smile:
"It looks as if _I_ had asked _you_, Will--doesn't it?"
"I don't think so," he said.
"It wouldn't matter, if I did--would it?" she asked, simply. "For you
know how fond I am of you, Will."
They talked of that and a good many other relevant matters until they
had reached St. Mary-Kirby. They paused for a moment on the bridge--to
look at the dark shadows about the mill and the white sheen of the
moonlight on the water; and then she whispered timidly:
"When shall we be married, Will?"
"We shall be maghied whenever you like, Dove," he said, lightly and
cheerfully.