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MIRK ABBEY,
By James Payn
The Author of “Lost Sir Massengberd;” “the Clyffards Of Glyffe;”
etc., etc.
In Three Volumes. Vol. I.
London: Hurst And Blackett, Publishers,
1866.
TO
Charles Dickens,
This Book Is, By Permission,
Cordially dedicated.
CHAPTER I. IN MY LADY'S CHAMBER.
|IT is an hour short of midnight, and the depth of winter. The morrow is
Christmas Day. Mirk Abbey bears snow everywhere; inches thick upon its
huge broad coping-stones; much even on its sloping roof, save on the
side where the north wind makes fitful rushes, and, wolf-like, tears and
worries the white fleeces. Mirk woods sway mournfully their naked arms,
and grind and moan without; the ivy taps unceasingly against the pane,
as though entreating shelter.
The whole earth lies cold and dead beneath its snow-shroud, and yet the
snow falls and falls, flake by flake, soft and noiseless in its white
malice, like a woman's hate upon her rival.
It hides the stars, it dims the moon, it dulls the murmur of the river
to which the Park slopes down, and whose voice the frost has striven in
vain to hush these three weeks. Only the Christmas-bells are heard,
now faint, now full--that sound more laden with divine regret than
any other that falls on human ear. Like one who, spurring from the
battle-field, proclaims “The fight is ours, but our great chief is
slain!” there is sorrow in that message of good tidings; and not only
for pious Christian folk; in every bosom it stirs some sleeping memory,
and reminds it of the days that are no more. No wonder, then, that such
music should touch my Lady's heart--the widowed mistress of Mirk
Abbey. Those Christmas-bells which are also wedding-bells, remind her
doubtless of the hour when Sir Robert lifted her lace-veil aside, and
kissed her brow before all the people in the little church by the sea,
and called her for the first time his Wife. He will never do so more. He
has been dead for years. But what of that? Our dead are with us still.
Our acts, our dealings with the world, form but a portion of our lives;
our thoughts still dwell with those dear ones who have gone home before
us, and in our dreams they still are our companions. My Lady is not
alone in her private chamber, although no human being is there besides
herself. Her eyes are fixed upon the fire, and in its flame she sees a
once-loved face invisible to others, whose smile has power to move her
even to tears. How foolish are those who ascribe romance to Youth alone
--to Youth, that has scarcely learned to love, far less to lose! My Lady
is five-and-forty at the least, although still comely; and yet there are
memories at work within that broad white brow, which, for interest and
pathos, outweigh the fancies of a score of girls. Even so far as we--the
world--are acquainted with her past, it is a strange one, and may well
give her that thoughtful air.
Lady Lisgard, of Mirk Abbey, has looked at life from a far other
station than that which she now occupies. When a man of fortune does not
materially increase his property by marriage, we call the lady of his
choice, although she may have a few thousand pounds of her own, “a
girl without a sixpence.” But Sir Robert Lisgard did literally make
a match of this impecunious sort. Moreover, he married a very
“unsuitable young person;” by which expression you will understand
that he was blamed, not for choosing a bride very much junior to
himself, but for not selecting her from the proper circles. When
accidentally interrogated by blundering folks respecting her ancestry,
the baronet used good-humouredly to remark, that his wife was the
daughter of Neptune and Thetis. When asked for her maiden name, he would
reply drily: “She was a Miss Anna Dyomene;” for the simple fact
was, that she had been thrown up almost at his feet by the sea--the sole
survivor of a crowded emigrant-ship that went to pieces before his
eyes while he was staying one stormy autumn at a sea-side village in the
South. Lashed to a spar, the poor soul came ashore one terrible night in
a very insufficient costume, so as to excite the liveliest compassion
in all beholders. There was a subscription got up among some visitors of
fashion to supply her with a wardrobe; and they do say that Sir Robert
Lisgard's name is still to be seen set down with the rest of the
benevolent donors, for five pounds, in the list that is kept among the
archives of the village post-office.
But it was not until three years afterwards that he bought her a
_trousseau_; for the baronet, intending to make her his wife not only in
name--a companion for life, and not a plaything, which is prized so long
as it is new, and no longer--caused Lucy Gavestone, during the greater
part of that interval, to be educated for her future position. If it was
madness in him, as many averred, to marry so far beneath him, there
was much method in his madness, Not ashamed of her as a bride, he was
resolved not to be ashamed of her as the mistress of his house, or as
the mother of his children, if it should please Heaven to grant him
issue. It was in France, folks said, that her Ladyship acquired those
manners which subsequently so excited the envy of the midland county in
which she lived. She bore the burden of the honours unto which she was
not born as gracefully as the white rose in her blue-black hair. But
to perform her loving duties as a mother, in the way even her enemies
admitted that she did perform them, could scarcely have been learned in
France. Only love and natural good sense could have taught her those.
Never once had Sir Robert Lisgard cause to regret the gift which the sea
had given him. He used, however, smilingly to remark, in his later years
--and his words were not without their pathos then--that he wished that
he could have married his Lucy earlier, and while he was yet a young
man; but in that case she would have been fitter for the font than
the altar, inasmuch as there was a quarter of a century between their
respective ages. He always averred that five-and-twenty years of his
manhood had been thrown away.
But good wife and matron as Lady Lisgard had been, she was no less
excellent a widow and mother. If Sir Robert could have risen from that
grave in Mirk churchyard, where he had preferred to lie, rather than
in the family vault, so that she might come to visit him in his lonely
sleep, and daily lay a flower or two, culled with her own hands, upon
him--not perhaps unconscious of that loving service--he would have
found all things at the Abbey as he would have wished them to be during
life: that is, so far as she could keep them so. Sir Richard, their
eldest son, was within a few months of his majority, and, of course, had
become in a great degree his own master; not that he misused his
years so as to place himself in opposition to his mother, for he was a
gentleman above everything; but he was of a disposition more haughty
and stern than her kindly nature could well cope with, and she
nervously shrank from any contest with it, although, on a question of
principle--which, however, had not occurred--she might have braved even
him.
Walter Lisgard, the younger son, was as genial and good-humoured as his
father before him, and although (in common with every one who knew her)
loved and respected my Lady, it must be confessed that he was too openly
his mother's favourite, as he was the favourite of all at Mirk, in the
Abbey or out of it.
Lastly, there was Letty Lisgard--but she shall speak for her sweet self.
While her mother sits and thinks before her fire, there is a knock at
the chamber-door, and on the instant the picture in her brain dissolves,
which was affecting her so deeply, and she has no eyes save for her only
daughter. A girl of seventeen enters the room, not gaily, as would have
become her age, but with a certain gentle gravity that becomes her at
least as well, since it is impossible to imagine that she could look
more lovely. Fair as a lily, but not pale, for her usually delicate
colour is heightened by some mental emotion, which causes, too, the
little diamond cross upon her bosom to rise and fall, and the hazel
eyes to melt and glitter beneath their dark lashes; lithe and tall as
a sapling wooed too roughly by the north wind, she glides in, with her
fair head slightly bowed, and casting herself upon her knees beside my
Lady, exclaims: “Ah, do not weep, dear mother--do not weep!” at the
same time herself bursting into a passion of tears. “I knew what you
would be thinking of,” continues she, “upon this sad night, and
therefore I came to comfort you a little, if I could. If not a merry
Christmas, let me at least wish you a happy one, my own dear mother. I
am sure that if dear papa can see us now, he wishes you the same.”
“Yes, dearest Letty, that is true. How thoughtful and kind it was of
you to leave your friend--breaking off, no doubt, some pleasant chat
over school-days”----
“Nay, mother,” interrupted the girl; “what is Rose to me in
comparison with you? Was it likely that I should forget this anniversary
of our common loss!”
Lady Lisgard did not answer in words, but shedding by the wealth of
golden brown hair that had fallen over her daughter's forehead, she
kissed that pure brow tenderly. Upon her own cheeks, a crimson flush,
called thither by the young girl's words, was lingering yet. Reader,
happy are you if you have never known a loving voice say: “What are
you thinking of, dearest?” expecting to receive the answer: “Of
you,” when you have no such reply to give--when your mind has been
wandering far from that trustful being, and perhaps even whither it
should not have wandered. Such a flush may then have visited your
cheeks, as now touched those of Lady Lisgard, although it is certain
that memory never played _her_ so false as to remind her of aught
whereof she need have been ashamed. The fact was, she had not been
thinking of Sir Robert at all, albeit it was upon that very day, five
years back, that she had received from his failing hand its last loving
pressure, and in that very room. Human nature cannot be trained like
those wondrous mechanical inventions of the monks, that indicated the
fasts and festivals of the church so accurately--to suffer or rejoice at
particular times and seasons; we are often sad when the jest is upon
our lips, and bear a light heart beneath the sackcloth. Lady Lisgard's
thoughts had, Heaven knew, been far from merry ones; but because she
had not been mourning with chronological propriety, her woman's heart
unjustly smote her with a sense of want of fealty to the memory of him
for whom she still wore--and intended to wear to her dying day--the
visible tokens of regret.
It is the fashion to jeer at widows; but, to a reverent mind, there are
few things more touching than that frequent sight in honest England--a
widowed mother, whose only joy seems to be in what remains to her of her
dead lover, husband, counsellor--his children; and the only grief that
has power to wring whose heart, past sense of common pain through the
dread anguish that it has once undergone, arises from their misfortunes
and misdoings. Ah, selfish boy, beware how you still further burden that
sorrow-laden soul!--ah, thoughtless girl, exchange not that faithful
breast too hastily for one that may spurn your head in the hour of need!
My Lady--for that was what we always called her about Mirk--was neither
more nor less fortunate with her children than most mothers. They all
three loved her; but they did not all love one another. Between Sir
Richard and Walter was only a year of time, but upon it had arisen a
thousand quarrels. The former thought that the privilege of an elder
brother was a divine right, extending over every circumstance of
fraternal life; the latter conceived it to be an immoral institution,
borrowed in an evil hour from the Jews, and one to be strictly
kept within its peculiar limits--themselves more than sufficiently
comprehensive--the inheritance of the family title, and the succession
to the landed estates.
“Where are Richard and Walter, Letty?” asked Lady Lisgard, breaking
a long silence. “They, too, have been always mindful, like yourself,
of this sad day.”
“They are mindful still, dear mother. I hear Walter's foot in the
corridor even now.”
A swift elastic footfall it was, such as is very suggestive of the
impulsive nature of him who uses it; for a phlegmatic man may move
swiftly on rare occasions--such as bayonets behind him, or a mad
bull--but there will be no more elasticity in his gait, even then, than
in that of a walking-doll; whereas every step of Captain Walter
Lisgard had a double action, a rise and fall in it, independent of the
progressive motion altogether.
He was of a slim, yet not delicate build; his every movement (and, as
I have said, there was plenty of it) had a native grace like that of a
child; childlike and trustful, too, were those blue eyes; soft in
their expression as his sister's, while he stooped down to kiss
his mother's cheek, scarce more smooth than his own. Upon his lip,
however, was a fairy moustache, which being, fortunately, coal-black
like his somewhat close-cropped hair, made itself apparent to all
beholders, and rescued his comeliness from downright effeminacy. But no
woman ever owned a softer voice, or could freight it with deeper feeling
than Walter Lisgard.
“God bless you, dearest mother, and give you all the good you
deserve!” murmured he tenderly.
“And God bless _you_, my darling!” answered Lady Lisgard, holding
him at the full distance of her white and rounded arms, clasped with two
costly jewels, which had a worth, however, in her eyes far beyond their
price, being Sir Robert's wedding-gift. “Ah me! how you remind me of
your father's picture, Watty, taken on the day when he came of age. I
trust you will grow up to be like him in other respects, dear boy.”
“I hope so, mother; although,” added he, with a sudden petulancy,
“there will be a vast difference between us in some things, you know.
He was an only son, whereas I am not even an eldest one; and when _I_
come of age, there will be no picture taken, nor any fuss made, such as
is to happen in June, I hear, upon Richard's majority.”
“Walter, Walter!” exclaimed Lady Lisgard reprovingly, “this is not
like yourself, for it's envious--and--and--covetous!”----
“At all events, it is very foolish, mother,” interrupted the young
man drily; “for what can't be cured must be endured.”
“And very, very cruel to me,” added Lady Lisgard.
“Then I am sincerely sorry I spoke,” returned Walter hastily,
the moodiness upon his features chased away at once by loving regret.
“Only, when a fellow leaves his regiment to spend Christmas-eve at
home--as I am sure I was delighted to do, so far as you and Letty were
concerned--he does not want to find there another commanding officer,
uncommissioned and self-appointed.”
“Walter, Walter! this is very sad,” broke in Lady Lisgard piteously:
“you know what is Richard's manner, and how much less kind it is
than his true meaning. Can you not make some allowance for your own
brother?”
“That's exactly what I said to _him_, mother,” answered Walter,
laughing bitterly. “Here have I just got my troop, with no more to
keep myself on than when I was a cornet, and had no back debts to speak
of; and yet, so far from helping me a little, as Richard might easily
do, by _making some allowance for his own brother_, he complains of that
which you are so good as to let me have out of your own income. Why,
that's not _his_ business, if it were twice as much--although, I am
sure, dear mother, you are liberality itself. Has he not got enough
of his own--and of what should be mine and Letty's here, by
rights--without grudging me your benevolences? Is he not Sir Richard
Lisgard of Mirk Abbey?”----
“I will not listen to this, Walter,” cried his mother sternly.
“This is mere mean jealousy of your elder brother.”
“Oh, dear no, mother; indeed, it is not that,” answered the young
man coldly. “I envy him nothing. I hold him superior to me in no
respect whatever; and that is exactly why I will not submit to his
dictation. Here he comes stalking along the gallery, as though conscious
that every foot of oak belongs to him, and every picture on the wall.”
It was undoubtedly a firm determined step enough--unusually so, for one
so young as Sir Richard. The face of the new-comer, too, was stem almost
to harshness; and as he entered the room, and beheld Walter standing by
his mother's side, his features seemed to stiffen into stone. A
fine face, too; more aristocratic if not so winning as his younger
brother's, and not without considerable sagacity: if his manner was
not graceful, it had a high chivalric air about it which befitted his
haughty person very well. When he taught himself submission (a rare
lesson with him), as now, while he raised his mother's fingers to his
lips, and kissed them with dutiful devotion, it would have been hard to
find a man with a more noble presence than Richard Lisgard.
“A merry Christmas and a happy New Year to you, mother.” The words,
though conventional, had an earnest kindness, which came from the heart.
Lady Lisgard kissed him fondly.
“Thank you, dear Richard,” said she; “but, alas! no Christmas can
be a merry one, no year a happy one, when I see my children disagree.”
“Ah, Master Walter has been here before me, I see,” quoth Sir
Richard bitterly, “stealing, like Jacob, his mother's blessing from
her first-born, and giving his own account of matters. But please now to
listen to _my_ version.”
“Not to-night, Richard,” exclaimed Lady Lisgard with deep emotion.
“Let not tonight, sacred to the memory of your common father, be a
witness to your mutual accusations. In this room, almost at this very
hour, but a few years back, he died, bequeathing you with his last
breath to my tenderest care. Here it was that you kissed his white
lips, weary with prayers for your future welfare; here it was that you
promised, in return, to be good and dutiful sons. I know--I think, at
least--that you both love your mother. No, I will kiss neither of you
while thus unreconciled. That was not all that he required of you: he
would have bidden you, could he have looked forward to this evil time,
to love one another also; and O Richard! O Walter! hark to those bells,
that seem to strive to beat their message into the most stubborn ears.
Do you not hear what they say?--Letty, dear, do you tell them, then, for
there are no lips better suited to deliver it.”
The young girl lifted up her head from her mother's lap, to gaze into
her eyes; then, with exquisite pathos and softness, repeated, like a
silver peal of bells: “Peace and good-will, peace and good-will, peace
and good-will to all mankind.”
Sir Richard looked at his brother fixedly, but no longer in wrath. “It
is my part to make the first advance,” said he, “although I was not
the first to quarrel;” and he frankly stretched forth his hand.
The other paused a second; then reading on his mother's anxious lips:
“For _my_ sake, Walter,” he grasped his brother's fingers. There
was grace in the very delay, as in the motion tenderness and genial
ease, but scarcely the warmth of reconciliation. It was more like the
action of a woman who wishes to please; and if you had seen the small
hand apart from its owner, as it lay with its one glittering ring half
hid in the other's huge white palm, you would have said it was a
woman's hand.