“_Adieu! I never wait till my friends have yawned twice_.”
--Hercule d'Enville.
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ELL, I am back in London after all, amid the murmur of millions of
English voices, the rumble of millions of wheels, the painted omnibus,
and the providential policeman--all the things to which I bade a long
farewell last night. And my reader, if indeed he has kept me company so
far, now fidgets a little for fear I am about to mix myself in further
complications and pour more follies into the surfeited ear. But no! I
have rambled and confessed enough, and in a few more pages I, like the
Indian juggler Dick compared me to, shall throw a rope into the sky,
and, climbing up it, disappear--into heaven? Again no! It may be a
surprise to many, but it was not there that these memoirs were written.
To round up and finish off a narrative that has no plot, no moral, and
only the most ridiculous hero, is not so easy as I thought it was going
to be. Probably the best plan will be not to say too much about this
hero and just a little about his friends.
As I had given up and dismantled my rooms, Dick insisted that I must
return to Helmscote with him that same day and finish my Christmas
visit, and need it be said that I accepted this invitation?
At the station, upon our arrival in London, I parted with Teddy Lumme
and General Sholto.
“By-bye,” said Teddy, cheerfully; “I must trot along and look after the
governor; he's in a terrible stew; I don't suppose he has missed two
meals running before in his life--poor old beggar! It'll do him good,
though; don't you worry, old chap.”
And with a friendly wave of his hand this filial son drove off with the
still muttering Bishop.
The General wrung my hand, hoped he would see me again soon, and then,
without more words, left us. He was not so cheerful, for that final
escapade of his niece had hurt him more than he would allow. Still, it
was a fine red neck and a very erect back that I last saw marching down
the platform.
“And now, my good Halfred,” I said, “I suppose you fly to Miss Titch and
happiness? Lucky fellow!”
“I 'aven't been dismissed yet, sir,” he replied, solemnly, and with no
answering smile, “but if you gives me the sack, o' course I'll 'ave to
go.”
“Then you think I need your watchful eye on me a little longer?”
From the expression of that watchful eye it was evident that he was very
far from disposed to let me take my chance of escaping the consequences
of my errors without his assistance. Indeed, to this day he firmly holds
the opinion that it was his vigilance alone that insured so harmless an
end to our desperate expedition, and that if he had not stood by me I
should have conspired again within a week.
“I puts hit to Mr. Shafthead,” he replied, casting a glance at my
friend which might be compared to a warning in cipher addressed to some
potentate by an allied sovereign.
“You certainly had better come down with us, Halfred,” said Dick. “The
Lord only knows what the monsieur would be up to without you.”
And accordingly Halfred went with us to Helmscote.
Behold me now once more beneath the ancient, hospitable roof, the kind
hostess smiling graciously, the genial baronet roaring with unrestrained
mirth at the tale of our adventures--and Daisy? She was not looking
directly at me; but her face was smiling, with pleasure a little, I
thought, as well as amusement. At night the same welcoming chamber and a
fire as bright as before; only this time no missives thrown through the
casement window. Next morning I am severely left alone; Dick has been
summoned by his father. Half an hour passes, and then, with an air of
triumph, he returns.
“You'll have to look after yourself to-day, monsieur,” he says. “I'm off
to town to bring her back with me.”
“Her!” So the stern parent has relented, and some day in the distant
future, I suppose, Agnes Grey will be Lady Shafthead and rule this
house. What Dick added regarding my own share in this issue I need not
repeat, though I confess it will always be a satisfaction for me to
think of one headlong performance, unguided even by Halfred, which
resulted so prosperously.
Being thus bereft of Dick, what more natural than that I should be
entertained by his sister?
She speaks of Dick's happiness with a bright gleam in her eye.
“He should feel very grateful to you,” she says.
I should have preferred “we” to “he,” but, unluckily, I have no choice
in the matter.
“I envy him,” I reply, with meaning in my voice.
Her face is composed and as demure as ever, only her color seems to
me to be a little higher and her eye certainly does not meet mine as
frankly as usual.
Suddenly I am emboldened to exclaim:
“I do not mean that I envy him Miss Grey, but his happiness in being
loved!”
And then I tell her whose love I myself covet.
She is embarrassed, she is kind, she is not offended, but her look
checks me.
“How often have you felt like this within the last few months--towards
some one or other?” she asks.
Alas! How dangerous a thing to let the brother of the adored one know
too much! Dick meant no harm; he never knew how his tales would affect
me; but evidently he has jested at home about my amours, and now I am
regarded by his sister either as a Don Juan or a perpetually love-sick
sentimentalist. And the worst of it is that there are some superficial
grounds for either theory.
“Ah,” I cry, “you have heard then of my wanderings in search of the
ideal? But I have only just found it!”
“How can you be sure of that?” she asks, a little smile appearing in
her eye like a sudden break in a misty sky. “You haven't known me long
enough to say. In a month you may make a jest of me.”
“I am serious at last. I swear it!”
“I am afraid you will have to remain serious for some time to make me
believe it,” she replies, the smile still lingering. “When any one has
treated women, and everything else, flippantly so long as you, I--”
She hesitated.
“You do not trust them?”
“No,” she confesses.
“If I am serious for six months will you trust me then?”
“Perhaps,” she allows at last.
It means a good deal, does that word, said in such circumstances, but
I am not going to drag you through the experiences of a faithful lover,
sustained by a “perhaps.” _Mon Dieu!_ You have the privations of Dr.
Nansen on his travels to read if that is the literature you admire.
No; in the words of Halfred on the eve of his nuptials with Aramatilda,
“I ain't what you'd call solemn nat'rally but this here matrimonial
business do make a man stop talkin' as free as he'd wish.”
I also shall stop talking, and, with the blotting-pad already in my
hand, pray Heaven to grant my readers an indulgent and a not too solemn
spirit.
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