“With her venturous climbings, and tumbles, and childish escapes.”
TENNYSON.
HUBERT DELRIO, pleased and gratified, but very shy, joined the ladies
from the Goyle in their walk to Clipstone, expecting perhaps a good deal
of stiffness and constraint, since every one at St. Kenelm’s told him
what a severe and formidable person Sir Jasper Merrifield was, and that
all Lady Merrifield’s surroundings were “so very clever.” “They did want
_such_ books ordered in the library.”
Magdalen laughed, and said her only chance of seeing a book she wanted
was that Lady Merrifield should have asked for it. At Clipstone, they
were directed to the dell where the foxgloves were unusually fine that
year, covering one of the banks of the ravine with a perfect cloud of
close-grown spikes, nodding with thick clustered bells, spotted
withinside, and without, of that indescribable light crimson or purple,
enchanting in reality but impossible to reproduce. It was like a dream
of fairy land to Hubert to wander thither with his Vera, count the tiers
of bells, admire the rings of purple and the crooked stamens, measure the
height of the tall ones, some almost equal to himself in stature, and
recall the fairy lore and poetry connected with them, while Vera listened
and thought she enjoyed, but kept herself entertained by surreptitiously
popping the blossoms, and trying to wreath her hat with wild roses.
Thekla meantime admired from the opposite bank, in a state of much
elevation at acquiring a dear delicious brother-in-law, and insisted on
Primrose sharing her sentiments till her boasting at last provoked the
exclamation, “I wouldn’t be so cocky! I don’t make such a fuss if my
sisters do go and fall in love. I have two brothers-in-law out in India,
and Gillian has a captain, an Egyptian hero, with a medal, a post captain
out at sea in the _Nivelle_. You shall see his photograph coloured in
his lovely uniform, with his sword and all! Your Flapsy’s man isn’t even
an officer!”
“He is a poet, and that’s better!”
“Better! why, if you _will_ have it, Wilfred and Fergus always call him
that ‘painter cad,’” broke out Primrose, who had not outgrown her
childish power of rudeness, especially out of hearing of her elders.
“Then it is very wicked of them,” exclaimed Thekla, “when the Marquis of
Rotherwood himself said that Hubert Delrio is a very superior young man”
(each syllable triumphantly rounded off).
Primrose was equal to the occasion. “Oh, they all laugh at Cousin
Rotherwood; and, besides, a superior young man does not mean a
gentleman.”
Thekla burst into angry tears and sobs, which brought Gillian, and a
grave, dark young lady from the other side of a rock to inquire what was
the matter—there was a confession on the two tongues of “she did,” and “I
didn’t” of “painter cad, superior young man and no gentleman,” but at
last it cleared itself into Primrose allowing that, to take down Thekla’s
conceit, she had declared that a very superior young man did not mean a
gentleman.
“I could not have believed that you could have been so abominably
ill-mannered,” said Gillian gravely; “you ought to apologise to Thekla.”
“Oh, never mind,” began Thekla ashamed; and at that moment a frantic
barking was heard in the depths, and Valetta, Wilfred, Fergus and a dog
or two darted headlong past, calling out, “Hedgehogs, hedgehogs! Run!
come!” And Primrose, giving a hand to Thekla, joined in the general rush
down the glade.
“A situation relieved!” said the newcomer.
“For all ran to see,
For they took him to be
An Egyptian porcupig,”
quoted Gillian. “They have wanted such a beast for some time for their
menagerie; but really Primrose is getting much too old to indulge in such
babyish incivility to a guest, true though the speech was, ‘a superior
young man,’ not necessarily a gentleman.”
“I am colonial enough to like him the better for the absence of a hall
mark.”
“Should you have missed it? He is very good looking, and has a sensible
refined countenance, poor man!”
“He is a little too point device, too obviously got up for the occasion!”
“Too like the best electroplate! No; that is not fair, for it is not
pretence, at least, I should think there was sound material below, and
that never would brighten instead of dimming it.”
“According to Mysie and Fly, there is plenty of good taste; and his
principle is vouched for. Mysie is quite furious at any lady-love having
gone to sleep to the sound of original verses from a lover!”
“Dear old Mysie! No, she would not. She has a practical vein in her!
Would you?”
“I’m not likely to be tried!” said Gillian merrily. “Catch Ernley either
practising or not minding his boat! But come! Mamma will want me, I
feel only deputy daughter, with Mysie away.”
The two girls rose from the mossy bank, and proceeded across the paddock
to the opening of the glade.
On the turf Lady Merrifield sat enthroned; making a nucleus to the
festivities and delicacies of all sorts, from sandwiches and cakes down
to strawberries, cherries and Devonshire cream, were displayed before
her; and the others drifted up gradually, Miss Mohun first. “I am later
than I meant to be,” she said, “but I was delayed by a talk with Sister
Beata. I never saw a woman more knocked down than she is by that
adventure of Vera’s.”
“I know,” said Magdalen, rousing herself. “It has made her look ten
years older, and she could not talk it over or let a word be said to
comfort her. She says it was all her fault, and I should have thought it
was that silly little Sister Mena’s, if that is her name.
“She considers it her fault for objecting to strict discipline in things
of which she did not see the use,” said Jane Mohun, “and so getting
absorbed in her own work, and having no fixed rule by which to train
Mena.”
“I see,” said Lady Merrifield; “it reminds me of a story told in Madame
de Chantal’s life, how, when, _par mortification_, a Sister quietly ate
up a rotten apple without complaint and another made signs of amusement,
a rule was made that no one should raise her eyes at meals. It shows
that some rules which seem unreasonable may have a foundation.”
“It is an unnatural life altogether,” said Dolores. “Why should the
rotten apple have been swallowed? or, if it was, I should think a joke
over it might have been wholesome.”
“Hindering priggishness in the mortified Sister,” said Gillian.
“The fact is,” said Lady Merrifield, “that if you vow yourself to an
unnatural life, so to speak, you must submit to the rules that have been
found best to work for it.”
“And poor Sister Beata did neither the one nor the other, by her own
account,” said Jane. “She called herself a Sister, but disliked each
rule, and chose to go her own way, like any other benevolent woman, doing
very admirable work herself, but letting little Mena have the prestige of
a Sister, while too busy to look after her, and without rules to restrain
her.”
“But surely there has been no harm!” exclaimed Lady Merrifield.
“No harm, only a little incipient flirtation with the organist, nothing
in any one else, but not quite like a convent maid.”
“Ah! I rather suspected,” said Agatha.
“I should think the best thing for Sister Mena would be to go to a good
school, leave off her veil, in which she looks so pretty, and be treated
like an ordinary girl,” said Lady Merrifield.
“That is just what Sister Beata intends,” said Miss Mohun. “She is to
sink down into Miss Marian Jenkins, to wear a straw hat and blue frock,
and go to school with the other girls, the pupils, while Sister Beata
begins life as a probationer at Dearport.”
“Poor Sister Beata!”
“She says she has experienced that it is best to learn to obey before one
begins to rule. It is most touching to see how humble she is. Such a
real good woman too! I doubt whether she gets a night’s rest three days
in a week, and she looks quite haggard with this distress,” said Jane.
“She will be a great power by and by! But what will Mr. Flight and St.
Kenelm’s do without her?”
“He is promised relays of Sisters from Dearport, which has stood so many
years that they have a supply. You see, he, like Sister Beata, tried a
little too much to be original and stand aloof.”
“Ah!” said Lady Merrifield, “that is the benefit of institutions. They
hinder works from dying away with the original clergyman or the wonderful
woman.”
“But, Aunt Lily,” put in Dolores, “institutions get slack?”
“They have their _downs_, but they also have their ups. There is
something to fall back upon with public schools.”
“Yes, like croquet,” laughed Aunt Jane. “We saw it rise and saw it fall;
and here come all the players, the revival. Well, how went the game?”
So the party collected, and the two Generals came in from some vanity of
inspection to grumble a little merrily at the open air banquet, but to
take their places in all good humour, and the lively meal began with all
the home witticisms, yet not such as to exclude strangers. Indeed,
Hubert Delrio was treated with something like distinction, and was
evidently very happy, with Vera by his side. Perhaps Magdalen perceived
that there was not the perfect ease of absolute equality and familiarity;
but his poetical and chivalrous nature was gratified by the notice of a
Crimean hero, and he infinitely admired the dignity and courtesy of Lady
Merrifield, and the grace and ease of her daughters, finding himself in a
new world of exquisite charm for him.
And before they broke up, Magdalen had a quiet time with Lady Merrifield,
in which she was able, not without a tell-tale blush even at her years,
to ascertain that there were two Henry Merrifields, and that, alas! there
was nothing good known of the son of Stokesley, except that anonymous
attempt at restitution which gave hopes of repentance.