IN WHICH MISS VIOLET SAYS WHAT SHE THINKS OF MR. VANE TREVOR, AND IS
VIOLET NO LONGER.
“Now, I tell you,” continued William Maubray, and he glanced at Aunt
Dinah; but she was reading, with her gold spectacles on, the second of a
series of old letters, which she had in an old stamped leather box
beside her, and had forgotten all else. “You really must tell me what
you think of Vane Trevor?”
Miss Vi fixed her glowing eyes full upon his for a moment, and then
dropped them suddenly. His were full of their old, gentle, good-natured
mirth.
There was a little pause, and, suddenly looking up, she said rather
petulantly:
“Think of him? Why, I suppose I think what everyone else does. I think
him handsome; I think him agreeable; I think he has an estate; I think
he looks like a gentleman; and I think he is the only man who appears in
this neighbourhood that is not in one way or other a bore. Shall I sing
you a song?”
And with heightened colour and bright eyes, this handsome girl sat down
to the piano, which had a cracked and ancient voice, like the reedy
thrum of a hurdy-gurdy, contrasting quaintly with her own mellow tones,
and she sang—nothing to the purpose, nothing with a sly, allegoric
satire in it, but the first thing that came into her head—sweet and sad
as a song of old times; and ancient Miss Perfect, for a verse or so,
lowered her letter, and listened, smiling, with a little sigh; and
William, listening also, fell into a brown study, as he looked on the
pretty songstress, and her warblings mingled with his dreams.
“Thank you, little Vi,” said he, rising with a sudden smile, and
standing beside her as the music ceased. “Very pretty—very sweet.”
“I am glad you like it, William,” she said, kindly.
“_William_, again!” he repeated.
“Well—_yes_.”
“And why not _Willie_, as it used to be?” he persisted.
“Because it sounds foolish, somehow. I’m sure you think so. I do.”
It seemed to him as, with a sad smile, he looked at her, thinking over
the words that sounded so like a farewell, so light and cruel, too, that
there yet was wisdom—that precocious wisdom with which nature
accomplishes the weaker sex—in her decision; and something of approval
lighted up his sad smile, and he said, with a little nod:
“I believe the young lady says wisely; yes, you are a wise little woman,
and I submit.”
Perhaps she was a little disappointed at his ready acquiescence; at all
events she wound up with a loud chord on the piano, and, standing up,
said:
“Yes, it sounds foolish, and so, indeed, I think does _William_; and
people can’t go on being children always, and talking nonsense; and you
know we are no relations—at least that I know of—and I’ll call you—yes I
_will_—_Mr. Maubray_. People may be just as friendly, and yet—and yet
call one another by their right names. And now, Mr. Maubray, will you
have some tea?”
“No, thanks; no more tea to-night. I’m sure it has lost its flavour. It
would not taste like tea.”
“What’s the matter with the tea?” asked Miss Perfect, over the edge of
her letter. “You don’t like your tea, William? Is not it strong enough?”
“Quite; too much; almost bitter, and a little cold.”
“Fancy, child,” said Aunt Dinah, who apprehended a new attack on her
tea-chest, and hated waste. “I think it particularly _good_ this
evening,” and she sipped a little in evidence of her liking, and once
more relapsed into reading.
“I can add water,” said Violet, touching the little ivory handle of the
tea-urn with the tip of her finger, and not choosing to apprehend
William’s allegory.
“No, thank you, Vi—Violet, I mean—Miss Darkwell; indeed, I forgot. What
shall I read to-night?” and he strode listlessly to the little bookcase,
whose polished surface flashed pleasantly to the flicker of the wood
fire. “‘Boswell’s Johnson,’ ‘Sir Charles Grandison,’ ‘Bishop Horsley’s
Sermons,’ ‘Trimmer’s Works,’ ‘A Simple Story,’ ‘Watts’ Sacred Songs,’
‘Rasselas,’ ‘Poems, by Alfred Tennyson.’”
His quiet voice as he read the names on the backs of Aunt Dinah’s
miscellaneous collection, sounded changed and older, ever so much, in
Violet’s ear. All on a sudden for both, a part of their lives had been
cut off, and a very pleasant time changed irrevocably to a retrospect.
“I think ‘Tennyson.’ What do you?” he asked, turning a smile that seemed
faded now, but kindly as ever, upon her.
As the old name was gone, and the new intolerable, he compounded by
calling her by none; and she, likewise, in her answer.
“Oh! yes, Tennyson, Tennyson, by all means; that is, if Miss Perfect
wishes.”
“Yes—oh! to be sure; but haven’t you read it before?” acquiesced Miss
Perfect.
William smiled at Violet, and said to Miss Dinah, “I think—and don’t
you?”—this was to Vi, parenthetically, “that poetry is never heard
fairly on a first reading. It resembles music—you must know it a little
to enjoy it.”
“That’s just what I think,” said Violet, eagerly.
“Very good, young people,” said my aunt, with a little toss of her head.
“For my part, I think there’s but one Book will bear repeated reading,
and that is the Bible.”
“Not even ‘Elihu Bung?’” suggested William.
“There—read your poetry,” said Miss Perfect. “I shan’t interrupt; I’m
reading these, looking back for the date of a family event.”
This was an exercise not unfrequently imposed on her by Henbane, who now
and then made a slip in such matters, and thus perplexed and troubled
Aunt Dinah, who had sometimes her secret misgivings about his accuracy
and morality.
“What shall I read?” asked William in a lower tone.
“Anything, ‘Mariana,’” she answered.
“The ‘Moated Grange,’” repeated William, and smiled. “‘The poetry of
monotony.’ I could fancy, if a few pleasant faces were gone, this
Gilroyd Hall, much as I like it, very like the Moated Grange.”
And without more preface he read that exquisite little poem through, and
then leaned back in his chair, the book open upon the table; pretty
Violet sat opposite, working at her crochet, in a reverie, as was he as
he gazed on her.
“Where did she learn all that? How much wiser they are than we. What a
jolly ass _I_ was at seventeen, and all the fellows. What fools—weren’t
they?—in things like that; and by Jove! she’s quite right, I could not
go on _Vi_-ing her all my days, just because when she was a child she
used to be here. They are certainly awfully wise in that sort of thing.
Pretty head she has—busy, busy—quite a little world within it now, I
dare say. What a wonder of wonders, that little casket! Pretty hair,
awfully pretty; and the shape of her head, so pretty; yet the oval
reminds me, right or wrong, of a serpent’s head; but she has nothing of
that in her, only the wisdom; yes, the wisdom, and, perhaps, the
fascination. She’ll make some fellow’s heart sore yet; she’ll make some
great match, I dare say; but that’s a long way off, eight years; yes,
she’ll be twenty-four then; time enough before her.”
“Is there any cricket for to-morrow?” asked Vi on a sudden.
“No match. I’m going up to look at Revington. Trevor said he’d call for
me early—eleven o’clock—for _me_, mind; and you know I begin to feel an
interest in Revington.”
“Oh! it’s very pretty, great old timber,” she said, “and a handsome
place, and a good estate—three thousand a year, only it owes some money.
What an ambitious, audacious person I must be. I’m certain you think so,
because it is quite plain I covet my neighbour’s house, and his ox, and
his ass, and everything that is his; and coveting, Dr. Mainwaring tells
us, is the fountain-head of all iniquity, for how could a person so poor
as I ever obtain all these fine things without fraud and chicanery?”
Miss Violet was talking a little recklessly and angrily, but she looked
unusually handsome, her colour was so beautiful, and there was so
strange a fire in her vexed eyes. What was the meaning of this
half-suppressed scorn, and who its real object? How enigmatical they
grow so soon as the summer hours of fascination, and of passion with its
disguises and sorrows, in all their transient glow and beauty,
approach—the season of hope, of triumph, and of aching hearts.
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