A NEW COUSIN.
Lydia had indeed as little prospect of going abroad as any girl could
have. Her own kindred dreamt of no such indulgences, and she had no
friends likely to suggest them. In these days people stayed still where
their home was, and did not think of the continued changes and absences
which make up our modern life--though the spirit of travel was beginning
to be in the air, and younger spirits, even in the Fell-country, began
to form dreams on the subject. Perhaps there never was a time when the
idea of travelling was not attractive to the young, and when Italy was
not a name to conjure withal. Lydia Joscelyn had read everything that
fell into her hands all her life, even the Book of Beauty, which her
brother-in-law, Philip Selby, presented to her with an inscription on
the flyleaf, at Christmas. Half the stories, and half, almost all, the
poetry there, bore reference to “the sunny South.” She was resolute to
go “abroad” some time or other; to live among the dark-eyed Antonios and
lovely Rosalbas of romance. And there, she had made up her mind, she
would find Harry, and bring him back to her mother. It was her dream.
Whenever she had nothing else to do she thought of it, and represented
to herself how she should find him, how he would try to conceal himself
from her, and by what wonderful ruses and clever expedients she would
discover his secret and prove him to be her brother. It is not to be
supposed that there did not mingle in Lydia’s dreams, visions of some
other figure still more attractive than that of her brother, who having
been five-and-twenty when he disappeared, ten years ago, was according
to her calculation “quite old” by this time. It is not quite certain
that she did not expect him to be grey-haired, and a little decrepit;
but there would be some friend, some protector, some handsome young
count, or even prince, who would have afforded the stranger hospitality,
and in whom Liddy felt the possible hero of her life to be embodied. He
was quite vague, except a pair of beautiful eyes; there was nothing at
all about him else that she was certain of; but those eyes looked out of
the mists upon her, with every kind of tender and delightful look. He
would help her, could any one doubt, to bring Harry home? and
afterwards--perhaps--would ask for his reward. Such was the natural
sequence of events. To do Lydia justice, however, this visionary prince
was a secondary personage, only indulged in as a dream by way of
recreation, after she had, in her thoughts, tracked Harry down, and got
him at her mercy.
She had not much society or recreation at the White House. There were
times, indeed, when, if it had been possible for a girl to have done so,
Lydia would have had no objection to try, as Harry had done, what the
society of the “Red Lion” could do for her; but to do her justice one
trial would have been enough. She did what was quite as good, and more
innocent; she ran off sometimes into the kitchen of the White House, and
talked with the servants, and heard a hundred stories both of the past
and present, and learned the countryside, so that she knew who everybody
was, and their mothers, and their wives, and all that had happened to
them. It was there, rather than from her mother and her sister, that she
heard about Harry. The old cook remembered everything about him, from
the time when he had cut his teeth. She had a recollection of that night
when he had gone away, and still excused herself for not having gone to
the rescue. “T’ master was all about t’ house, travelling up and down in
his stocking-feet--was it my part to oop and open the door?” Thus her
apologies accused her according to the proverb. The other women were
younger, but they too had something to tell. And then Liddy would go
back to the quietude of the parlour, where her mother was sitting in the
same attitude, reading the same book. The parlour looked cheerful
enough, but there was never any change in it, not half so much as in the
kitchen, where some one was always moving about, and there was a
perpetual flow of talk. Liddy never spent an evening away from home,
except two or three times a year to her sister’s, when there was “a
party” prepared weeks in advance, and talked of for months after; or at
Dr. Selby’s in the village, where now and then there were entertainments
of a homelier kind.
Young Selby, who had been Harry’s friend and a frequenter of the “Red
Lion,” though he had not yet sown all his wild oats, was a person of
some importance in the village society. He was his father’s assistant,
and although it was said that he was far more interested in the fees
than in the Doctor’s patients, yet the fact that he was almost the only
unmarried man in the neighbourhood gave him a certain importance. He was
continually meeting Liddy when she went out to ride, and he looked very
well on horseback, and gave her a great deal of good advice about the
management of her horse. Perhaps but for that young Count in her dream,
she would have got to understand what young Selby meant, though she
scoffed at the adjective, and declared that he was not young, but as old
as his father. He was the most entertaining person in the neighbourhood
all the same, and the hero of Joan’s parties when they came round, one
in summer, one about Christmas. These entertainments were pretty much
alike, whatever was the time of year. Garden parties were not known in
those days. In summer the windows were open, in winter the shutters shut
over them and the curtains drawn. In other ways they were very much
alike. There was a great round game carried on at the round table in the
centre of the room. The tea had been served in the dining-room, so it
did not interfere with the evening’s arrangements. Mr. Pilgrim’s family
from Wyburgh were among the guests, and all the clergymen round, and any
other notability who was not too great for the occasion. Few of the
guests indeed could be called county people; but there were a good many
who visited with the county people, and is not that very nearly the
same? Joan, though she was homely enough, held her head somewhat high at
her own table. The Selbys were but of moderate pretensions, but she
never forgot that she was a Joscelyn. And she kept Liddy by her, not
allowing any indiscriminate flirtations, and distinctly discouraging
young Selby, who was her cousin by marriage, but had never won her
heart. Mrs. Joscelyn never came to her daughter’s parties, though she
was pleased to hear all about them; and it was only on condition that
Liddy was to keep by her sister’s side that she was permitted to go,
“You needn’t fear, mother, that she’ll meet with anyone she oughtn’t to
meet with at my house,” Joan said, and she took care of her accordingly.
It troubled her mind on the occasion to which we are about to refer,
that a young man had come with Mrs. Pilgrim’s party, about whom she knew
nothing. He was nice-looking, but she had not even caught his name. She
could not help thinking it a little wrong of Mrs. Pilgrim to bring a
stranger to such an assembly. If he had been in love with one of her
girls, Joan allowed that would have made a difference; but there was not
the least appearance that he was in love with one of the Pilgrim girls.
They were very assiduous in their attention to him, pointing out
everybody and making conversation for the young man, who, without being
rude or disagreeable, held himself just a little aloof from the company
in general, as if he had come there solely because he was brought, and
had no special interest in the proceedings. His head, for he was tall,
appearing steadily over Mrs. Pilgrim’s, at last began to irritate Mrs.
Selby, who felt herself to be in every way a greater personage. She
called her husband to her again and again to point out to him this
wholly ineffective member of the party.
“What is he wanting here?” she said.
“My dear, what they all want--to enjoy himself,” Philip Selby replied.
“Enjoy himself--do you call that enjoyment? He looks as if he had
swallowed a poker; and is never trusted for a moment out of the charge
of two or three Pilgrims. I don’t think I’ll ask these people again.”
“They are very good sort of people, Joan; and considering the position
in which they stood to your uncle Henry----”
“I’m very tired of Uncle Henry, Phil; besides, the girls didn’t stand in
any position--and I never authorised them to bring a strange young man.”
“He will be after Amy or Tiny--or----”
“He’s after none of them. Can’t you see that with half an eye? It’s my
belief he’s spying out for our Liddy. And what will mother say to me if
I let her make acquaintance with a stranger? I said, ‘You needn’t fear,
mother; she’ll meet nobody you don’t want her to meet at my house.’”
“Well, well,” said Philip Selby, soothingly; “there’s half the room
between them; and nobody can say, my dear, that it’s your fault.”
“But that’s just what mother will do,” said Joan, with a puckered brow,
as if her mother had been the most alarming critic in existence. She
laughed at herself afterwards, and went to the table to superintend the
round game, in which Liddy was deeply involved, seated by young Selby’s
side. There was a strong sense of responsibility on Joan’s mind, or
rather, she was a little cross. Her cakes had not come quite so well out
of the oven as she intended, and Mrs. Doctor Selby had suggested a fault
in the flavour of the tea. She went up to the players in a stormy state
of mind. “Come, come,” she said, “you’re not sitting right. Liddy, you
come over here and help little Ellen; all you strong ones are together.
Raaf,” this was to young Selby, “stay where you are. I’ll put Miss
Armstrong, she’s not playing at all, next to you.”
At this young Selby made a grimace, but Liddy tripped out of her place
with all the alacrity possible, leaving her seat and devoting herself to
little Ellen. She even gave her sister a smiling look of gratitude.
“Thank you,” she said, in an under-tone, “but it was rude, Joan.”
“Now you are a deal better arranged, and the game will go faster; there
will be no cheating,” Joan said. She did not care a bit for being called
rude. Raaf Selby should know that he was not good enough for a Joscelyn
whatever his cousin might be. “One’s enough,” she said to herself.
Besides, she wanted for Liddy something that should be out of the common
altogether. She herself had done very well in marriage. She had got an
excellent man, with enough to be comfortable upon. But she did not feel
that she would be satisfied with only so much for her little sister. Not
that Raaf Selby at his best could hold a candle to Phil. He was not much
except when he was on a horse; then she was obliged to allow he looked
pretty well. But a man can’t always be on a horse’s back, and anywhere
else he was not worth looking twice at; very different from Phil. Even
Phil, however, much as she respected her husband, was not the kind of
person she wanted for Liddy. A fairy prince, if any such fantastic being
had ever existed in Joan’s steady imagination, was the sort of person
who ought to be Lydia’s fate; a fine young fellow (young to start with),
and handsome, and well off, and with an air above the rest of the world.
Unawares, as her eyes went round her guests, they fell once more upon
the tall young stranger behind Mrs. Pilgrim’s chair. Was that the kind
of man? Well, if he had not been an intruder, a stranger, a hanger-on
of the Pilgrims’ (though certainly not in love with either of the
girls), that was the kind of person. She drew near Mrs. Pilgrim as this
unsolicited thought arose in her mind. She was annoyed with herself to
think that a person whom she did not know, and who had no right to be
here, should thus have taken her eye.
“You are doing nothing, Amy,” she said to the eldest Miss Pilgrim; “I’m
sure they want you in the game yonder--or you might give us some music.
You and your sister might play a duet. I like to see everybody
employed.”
“That is what I always say. You don’t let the grass grow beneath your
feet, Mrs. Selby, neither in work nor in pleasure. I was just saying
to----” here she made signs with her thumb, pointing to the stranger,
who was inspecting the party from his eminence, and talking languidly to
one of the girls. “He was introduced to you,” she added, in a whisper,
“when he came in?”
“I should think,” said Joan, “that nobody would bring a strange man into
my house without introducing him to me. But your friend is doing nothing
either,” she said, with compunction, and a relenting of hospitality. “He
has just got into a corner; and the evening’s lost when you once do
that.”
“Oh, Mrs. Selby, he doesn’t know anybody. We promised we would take care
of him if he came with us,” Amy Pilgrim said; and the object of Joan’s
mingled interest and indignation laughed a little, and said that he
hoped Mrs. Selby would not trouble herself, that he was very well there.
Then Joan sought her husband again. “Look at them,” she said, “all
sitting in a corner with this strange man, as if they were above the
rest of us: as if it was my lady Countess and her party from the Castle
looking at the poor people’s amusements. I will never ask these Pilgrims
again.”
“My dear, my dear,” said Philip Selby, “they are very good sort of
people; and if they have a strange man with them that knows nobody, in
civility what can they do?”
“Then in civility it’s your part to make him know somebody. Are you not
the master of the house? Phil, you are lazy; you are not doing your
duty,” Joan said, giving him a little push towards the corner in which
the Pilgrims were enthroned. “If there is one thing I cannot put up
with it is a knot of people in a company making their observations.” She
was quite excited by the Pilgrims and their guest--“for he is their
guest, and not mine, though it’s in my house,” Joan said to herself. But
alas for her consistency! Next time that she disengaged herself from the
lesser crowd round the card-table, Joan saw a sight which displeased and
satisfied her at the same time. The group of the Pilgrims had broken up;
that is to say, “the strange man” had been led or had strayed away, and
Amy and Tiny, having no longer anyone to take care of, and describe the
company to, had sought refuge at the card-table, and were much merrier,
if not so fine, as in their former position. That was all very well;
but, on the other hand, there was Lydia, seated demurely in a chair
apart, with Raaf Selby standing on one side of her like a thunder-cloud,
and on the other, talking and making himself very agreeable, the
Pilgrims’ “strange young man.”
“Raaf,” said Joan, promptly, “you’re as bad as Phil; you’re taking no
trouble. How is the game to go on without you to look after it, when
it’s well known that you are far the best player here?”
“I have been playing all the evening. I think I may be permitted a
little rest,” Raaf said, with a gloomy countenance. He was older and
shorter than the strange young man, and not so tall, and there was a
something about this personage which was above the level of young Selby.
He could not tell what it was. He himself had more ornaments, he had a
finer head of hair, and more shirt-front, but yet there was something.
Lydia was replying very gravely to what the stranger said to her, but
she gave him her whole attention, and the other girls had given evidence
that they saw something in this new comer which was not in their
familiar hero. He felt crestfallen, and he felt angry. He was not in a
humour to be ordered about by Joan.
“Then sing us one of your songs,” Mrs. Selby said. “Things are going a
bit slow; I don’t know what is the matter: or perhaps it’s only me
that’s the matter. But I think things are going a bit slow.”
“That’s my opinion, too,” Raaf said; “but I don’t think it’s my fault.”
Upon which Lydia suddenly struck in, “Never mind how they are going,
Joan, Joan! Let the people alone; they will amuse themselves. Mr.
Brotherton has never been among the Fells before, and he wants to learn
about us and all our ways. We are the natives--a kind of savages, but
friendly; and talking a kind of dialect that can be understood with a
little trouble. Come, Joan, and listen. It is nice to hear so much good
of ourselves.”
This she said a little vindictively, with a glance at her new companion
which brought the colour to his face. He had opened the conversation
unguardedly, as fine people are often in the habit of doing with each
other, by talking about the natives and the barbarous people. It was a
compliment, if Lydia had known, to the superior air of her dress, and
her appearance generally; how it is that one individual looks _comme il
faut_, and another does not, is the most difficult of questions. Lydia
in fact was no way superior to the rest: but the stranger thought she
was a young person of the world, somebody who was in society,
storm-stayed like himself.
“Do not take me at such a disadvantage,” he said; “if I spoke nonsense,
it was because I did not know any better. I have got a relation
somewhere among these good natives. You cannot think I do anything but
respect them when that is the case.”
“Do you always respect your relations?” Lydia asked. She was perfectly
disposed to flirt, and had an instinctive knowledge how to do it, though
she had so little practice--no practice, it may be said; for young Selby
was not light enough in hand to give her any experience, and he was
almost the only individual with whom it would have been possible to
flirt.
“If you are looking for friends,” said Joan, with immediate interest,
“we have been here in this country since before the memory of man, and,
if anybody can help you, we should be able to do it. Who is it you
want?” She took a vacant chair and sat down by her sister--partly to
guard Lydia, partly because she was full of curiosity about the strange
young man--and partly, also, because Joan was a great genealogist, and
knew everybody’s descent and how their grandfathers had married--when
they had any grandfathers, it must be said.
“They are people of my own name,” said the stranger, “or, I should
rather say--it is a distant cousin of my own name, who married somewhere
hereabouts heaven knows how many years ago. My father recollects her
well enough. She was a pretty girl in his day, and he told me to look
her up; but as he had forgotten her present name (if she is still
living), and she was married some forty years ago or more, I doubt if I
am very likely to succeed.”
“Your--own name?” said Joan, with a little confusion. In her own house,
and in the capacity of hostess to the stranger, she felt that it was
rude not to know his name. She gave a glance of appeal at Liddy, who was
mischievous, and in no humour to throw any light on the subject.
“Joan will tell you,” the girl said. “She knows everyone, and whom they
married, and all their aunts and uncles. You have only to ask my
sister.”
More and mere confused grew Joan. She looked at Liddy with reproachful
eyes; she even addressed a plaintive glance to Raaf, who did not
understand her embarrassment, and for the moment was too angry to have
helped if he had. “Of your--own name?” she said, faltering.
“Yes; forty years ago, or so, she was Lydia Brotherton.”
“Why, it’s mother!” said Joan, her countenance beaming. There was a
victory over everybody, Pilgrims and all; while the young man,
starting, turned round with amazed pleasure, and looked, not at Joan,
who spoke, however, but at Lydia, who listened, looking up at him, as
much astonished as he.
“Mother!” Lydia said, and her fair countenance brightened into smiles
from which all the mischievous meaning had gone.
“Well, that’s as easy a find as I ever heard of,” cried Joan, “and how
lucky you should have come here! Mother _will_ be pleased! She has not
seen any of her relations for years. She was an only child, so she had
never any near friends. How pleased she will be, to be sure! The best
thing you can do is to stay here all night, and ride over with Liddy
to-morrow: she is going home to-morrow. Bless me, I think I’ll go too,
just to see mother so pleased!”
“It is a delightful discovery,” said young Brotherton. “How fortunate
that I mentioned it now; my father charged me to find out--but I confess
I had forgotten till this moment. How lucky I thought of it! I am afraid
I must go home to-night with these good people who have been so kind to
me; but I will come back in the morning. It is delightful to fall among
kindred,” the young man said, looking at Lydia, whose face reflected
all manner of pleasant sensations, surprises, a delightful sense of
novelty and exhilaration. She had but few relatives, and a new cousin
was delightful--especially a cousin so completely creditable, a
gentleman, one about whom there could not be two opinions. The Pilgrims,
who had been so proud of this “strange young man,” had altogether
disappeared now, and Raaf was left entirely out of the little group of
three, all so pleased with themselves and each other. Joan forgot even
those duties which usually she performed with such devotion, leaving the
round game and its players to themselves, and no longer thinking either
of the duet of the Pilgrim girls, or Raaf’s song.
“I took the greatest notice of you from the moment you came in,” she
said. “I cannot tell you how it was. It’s not that there is any family
likeness, for I can’t see any. Liddy favours mother, and there’s not a
feature alike in her and you; but all the same I took notice of you from
the first. I didn’t catch your name, or it might have made me think--but
there was something. I was more vexed than pleased with those Pilgrims;
but all the same, when I caught sight of you----”
“It was kindred at first sight,” said the young man.
“That’s a new way of putting it,” said Joan, laughing; and it glanced
through her mind that she had already thought, if he had not been with
the Pilgrims, that this might be the right sort of man; and now it was
clear that he did not belong to the Pilgrims. She gave a rapid glance
from him to Lydia, and back again. As yet she had not the least idea who
he was. She had never seen any of the Brotherton connections, and knew
nothing about them. Mrs. Joscelyn had often told her children that she
had no relations nearer than cousins, and with them even she had kept up
no acquaintance. Her children were entirely in the dark about the
family. They knew that there was a Sir John who gave dignity to it; but
that was all. Joan was very straightforward, but she did not like to
plunge at once into details, and ask him who he was. But when she had
talked a great deal to the new relative, and arranged the expedition to
the White House to-morrow, she went back to Mrs. Pilgrim, who sat
somewhat deserted in her corner, a little humiliated by the desertion of
her “gentleman,” with the most cheerful cordiality. “I did not catch
the gentleman’s name,” she said, “when you brought him in; but what a
good thing you brought him! He’s a cousin of ours, and came here looking
for mother; for her own friends live far away, and we’ve long lost sight
of them. Of course,” said Joan, with a little artifice, “he had no
notion whose house he was coming to. There’s always a great confusion in
a family about your married name.”
“Came here--looking for----? I thought he came looking for a place for
the shooting,” Mrs. Pilgrim said, confounded. She could scarcely allow
herself to believe it. It had been a distinction to bring a new
“gentleman,” a person of such distinguished appearance, in her train;
and to have him taken from her bodily, nay, carried off soul and body,
so to speak, not indeed to her enemy’s side, but at all events into
another family, was hard to bear.