BERTIE.
In the greenest growth of the Maytime
We rode where the roads were wet;
Between the dawn and the daytime
The spring was glad that we met.
--Swinburne.
Two or three months passed, the bluebirds and robins had all
disappeared, and the snow-birds, hardy scions of the feathered tribe
capable of withstanding the rigours of a Canadian winter, were alone to
be seen. The Rinks had been flooded, and skating was going on with
vigour; the snow was not quite in a satisfactory state as yet; but a few
sleighs jingled merrily about with their bright bits of colour, the
edging of fur robes and ribbon on the sleigh bells. A general impulse of
joyful anticipation ran through all the young people as winter unlocked
her stores of amusement, and the keen sabre-like air, so bracing and
exhilarating, stirred the life in young veins, and set their spirits
dancing with exuberant vitality.
The Rollestons, who had only come out in the spring, were attracted with
everything. Not a sleigh passed but there was a rush from the children to
the window, and Colonel Rolleston, who was building one, received fresh
suggestions about it most days from his excited family.
Every morning Cecil, under Bluebell's tuition, practised skating at the
Rink, and had devised an original and becoming costume to be assumed as
soon as she had attained sufficient command of her limbs not to object to
a share of public attention. In the afternoon the Rink was generally
crowded, and many of the Colonel's regiment evinced an eagerness to help
Cecil along, and pretend to receive instruction from the skilful and
blooming Bluebell; so poor Mrs. Rolleston was then invariably detailed by
the Colonel for chaperone duty, and sat shivering on the platform while
Cecil was being initiated in the mysteries of "Dutch rolls" and "outside
edge." On one of these occasions she was roused by a well-known voice
calling her by name, and turned round in joyful surprise to greet a young
man just come in.
"My dear Bertie, were have you sprung from? Have you been to our house?"
"Just left it and my traps. Lascelles suddenly gave up his leave, which
I applied for, and have got a week certain, and most likely all of it,
for there are plenty of Captains down there; so I thought I would look
you up to begin with."
"To begin with! You must stay here all the time--make it head quarters,
at any rate. You have been travelling all the summer, and there's nothing
to do now."
"Moose," murmured Bertie. "Ah! there's Cecil."
Cecil, skating hand-in-hand to the tune of "Paddle your own canoe,"
was not sufficiently disengaged to remark her mother's companion. His
eyes followed her with a keen, comprehensive glance, which Mrs. Rolleston
observed complacently.
"Don't you think her much improved?--much prettier?" asked she.
"Skating always suits a well-made girl. That black and scarlet get-up,
too, is very becoming, but pretty--hardly."
"She is, however, very much admired," said Mrs. Rolleston, warmly, for a
step-mother.
"Ah!" cried Bertie, with a slight accent of bitterness, "reasons enough
for that. How well some of these girls skate! Who is that shooting-star?"
The planet in question gyrated towards them, dropped on one knee on the
platform for the relief of strained ankles, and, as she addressed Mrs.
Rolleston, caught a look of decided admiration on Bertie's face.
A Canadian girl is nothing if not self-possessed; she sustained the gaze
with the most perfect calmness.
"Bluebell, this is my brother, Captain Du Meresq. Cecil ought to rest;
will you go and tell her to come here?"
"Who is that young beauty whom you addressed in the language of flowers?"
asked he.
"Nonsense, Bertie! she is Freddy's governess. You must not begin to talk
absurdity to her; you will annoy Edward."
"He don't object to fair faces on his own account."
"Well, this particular one is more bother than pleasure to him. You
know his horror of 'danglers'; he is afraid of aimless flirtations
with Bluebell, who, being also Cecil's companion, is constantly in the
drawing-room."
"Ah, my beloved niece," said Captain Du Meresq, as he gave Cecil
considerable support from the ice to the platform.
"What has given us this unexpected treat?" said she, with a warmer hue
than usual in her clear, pale cheek.
"My anxiety to see your new companion."
"Whose existence, I suppose, you have just heard of."
"It has been my loss," retorted he. "Fascinating young creature! The name
Bluebell just describes those wild hyacinth eyes."
"Oh! Bertie," said his sister and Cecil together, "how absurd you are
about girls."
"And then," persisted he, "that charming tawny hair and milk white skin."
"One might think you were describing an Alderney cow. It's a pity she is
not called 'Daisy' or 'Cowslip.'"
"Girls are all alike," said Captain Du Meresq, sententiously. "Even you,
my beloved Cecil, who are a woman of mind, can't stand my wild admiration
of--Cowslip."
Cecil raised her eyebrows, and a scornful beam shot from the dark eyes
that were her chief attraction.
"Nor could the 'dairy flower' herself, I should think. It's no use
rhapsodizing before me, Bertie; _I_ shall not tell her in any
confidential communication, whatever you may think."
"Ah, well," said Captain Du Meresq, with a sigh, "let us hope the
ingenious child may understand the universal language of the eyes, for
I hear papa would not approve of my speaking to her."
Mrs. Rolleston was becoming fidgetty. To some women, as they advance
in years, an inability of separating chaff from earnest becomes more
pronounced, and the uppermost wish of her mind at present was to see a
real attachment between Bertie and Cecil. Albert Du Meresq was only her
half-brother; but he had become her charge in infancy under terrible
circumstances, which we will briefly relate.
When Mr. Du Meresq married his mother, a wilful Irish beauty, Mrs.
Rolleston was a shy, reserved girl of thirteen, and became very jealous
of her father's exclusive devotion to his bride and neglect of herself.
Lady Inez looked upon her as rather a nuisance, and was coldly critical
upon her appearance and manner. She was an unsparing mimic, and
frequently exercised the faculty on her step-daughter, whose nervousness
became awkwardness in the constant expectation of being turned into
ridicule. Consequently, she cordially disliked not only Lady Inez, but
the little step-brother, who was made of so much importance, till one
ghastly day changed the aspect of events.
Like a fearful dream it had seemed--a strange carriage rolling to the
door, from which emerged her father and another gentleman carrying a
terrible burden, looking supernaturally long in a riding-habit. White
scared faces flitted about; but life was extinct, and there was no
frantic riding for doctors.
There had been a hunt-breakfast that morning, and she well remembered the
envy she had felt at seeing Lady Inez ride gaily forth with the rest on a
favourite horse.
"She has everything," thought Bella, "'Reindeer' was promised to me when
he was a foal, and I have never been on his back."
But Lady Inez was lying there, with the mark of "Reindeer's" iron hoof on
her temple. They had come down together at a blind fence; the horse,
entangled in her habit, struck out _once_, as thorough-breds will, but it
was a death-blow.
The voice of the child, crying alone and neglected in the nursery,
aroused Bella from a horror stricken stupor. Her father's despair made
him unapproachable, but she might comfort Bertie, forgotten by his
attendants.
From this time she became almost a mother to him, for Mr. Du Meresq went
abroad, and they were left alone in the deserted house for some years.
Bertie had left Eton, and just obtained a commission in the ---- Hussars,
when his father died, leaving him a moderate fortune, which steadily
decreased as years went by. It had approached attenuation by this time,
and Mrs. Rolleston felt as distracted and perplexed as a duckling's hen
foster-mother, at the vagaries of the happy-go-lucky, reckless Irish
blood in Bertie, which did not flow in her own veins.
She looked forward to marrying him to Cecil, as the best chance of
relieving his pecuniary difficulties and reforming his unsteadiness.
Captain Du Meresq had stayed with them for six weeks some time ago,
when he and Cecil became inseparable companions, and it was then that
the idea had dawned upon her. She would not openly discuss it with her
brother--that would have too much the appearance of a plot: but her
lively satisfaction at the prospect was apparent enough, and Bertie knew
her co-operation would not be wanting.
He had thought of it more than once. What chance had he not calculated
to get him through his sea of difficulties; but a thousand a year alone
seemed scarcely sufficient temptation to matrimony, to which he did not
seriously incline. Indeed, his warm impressionable nature was not the
temperament of a fortune-hunter.
He was attracted with Cecil, and got rather fond of her in the six weeks
he had been trying to make her in love with him, not with any mercenary
view, but because such was his usual custom with girls.
But he was afflicted with a keen eye for beauty, and Cecil was plain to
most eyes, and too colourless for his taste, though she possessed a
lovely figure, thorough-bred little head, and a pale, intelligent,
expressive face.
Bluebell's lilies and roses and Hebe-like contour caught his eye in a
moment, of which Cecil felt an instinctive conviction; but though, with a
woman's keenness, underrating no point of attraction in her friend, she
considered her wanting in style, which deficiency she dwelt on now with
secret satisfaction. For though not in the least anxious to monopolize
general admiration, that of Bertie Du Meresq was unfortunately a
sensitive point with Cecil, for that six weeks had been the intensest
period of her life--the dawning of "love's young dream."
She had never met him since childhood till then, when they were thrown
together with the intimacy of near connexions. There was not, of course,
the slightest real relationship, but Bertie jestingly called her his
niece, perhaps, to establish a right of chaperonage.
He used to make her come down to breakfast _en Amazone_, and took her the
most enchanting rides in that Seductive April weather. Her equestrian
experience previously had been limited to steady macadamizing on the
roads. Bertie took her as the crow flies, never pulled a fence, but
merely gave her a lead, and Cecil, who had plenty of nerve, exulted in
the new excitement. The farmers might not have thought it a very orthodox
month for this amusement; but hunting was scarcely over, though the
copses were filled with primroses, and violets scented the hedgerows; the
birds sang as they only do when the great business of their year is
commencing. And then she had such a mount, a perfect hunter of her
_quasi_-uncle's. It never refused, and took its fences with such ease a
child might have sat it.
Or they would ride dreamily on in woody glades, both alike susceptible
to the shafts of sunlight, quivering on the leaves, the sudden gush
of fragrance after a shower, and all the myriad appeals of spring to
those who have that touch of poetry in their clay which is the key of
fairy-land, their horses meantime snatching at the young green boughs as
they sauntered lazily on; and Du Meresq, who had travelled in all sorts
of strange out-of-the way places, described weirder scenes in other
lands, and pictured a fuller, more vivid life than she in her routine
existence had dreamed of.
Bertie was always all in all to the woman he was with, provided no other
was present; and Cecil, young, and full of sympathy and intelligence, was
a delightful companion. His appreciation, felt and expressed, of her
quickness of comprehension was most agreeable flattery; the more so as he
confided in her so fully, even consulting her about his own private
affairs, for he was very hard pressed at this time, and she, who had
never known the want of money, took the deepest interest in it all.
He seemed never able to bear her out of his sight. If she played, he
was hanging over the piano; if he had letters to write, Cecil must do
it from his dictation; and yet he would avow sometimes before her such
extravagant adoration for some pretty girl, that Cecil, chilled and
surprised, would feel more than ever doubtful of her own influence;
and the honeyed words she had treasured up, faded away as void of
significance. And then one day,--suddenly,--on her return from a
croquet-party, she heard he had received a telegram, and gone, leaving
a careless message of adieu.
Poor Cecil! with the instinct of the wounded animal to its lair, she
rushed to her own room, locked the door, and walked about in a tearless
abandonment of grief, disappointment, and surprise. How could he leave
her without one word? She felt half stunned, and her brain seemed capable
of only the dull reiteration that "Bertie was gone." Tears welled up to
her eyes then, when the sound of the first dinner-bell drove them back.
She felt she must battle alone with this strange affliction; and trying
to efface from her features all evidence of the shock she had sustained,
descended to dinner, looking rather more stately than usual.
It annoyed her to observe that her step-mother glanced deprecatingly at
her, and was inclined to be extra affectionate. This would never do. Like
most young girls, she was generally rather silent when not interested in
the discussions of her elders. But now she never let conversation drop.
The incidents of the croquet-party furnished a safe topic. Colonel
Rolleston thought the gentle dissipation had made his daughter quite
lively. Afterwards she took refuge at the piano, which was imprudent, for
music only too surely touches the chord of feeling, and every piece was
associated with Bertie. Cecil shut the instrument, and effected a
strategical retreat to her bed-room, where, in the luxury of solitude,
she might worry and torment herself to her heart's content. His absence
was trial enough, but the sting lay in the way it was done, which was
such a proof of indifference, that shame urged her to crush out all
thoughts of him, and suffer anything rather than let him see the
impression his careless affection had made on her.
And so Cecil passed through her first "baptism of fire" alone and
unsuspected; but time had softened much of her resentment ere they met
again.