RUPERT
None of us can stand still in life. Everything rolls on its course
towards the end of all things. In noting down a family's or a life's
history, its periods will be differently marked. Years will glide
quietly on, giving forth few events worthy of record; again, it will
happen that occurrences, varied and momentous, will be crowded into an
incredibly short space of time. Events, sufficient to fill up the
allotted life of man, will follow one another in rapid succession in the
course of as many months; nay, of as many days.
Thus it was with the Trevlyns, and those connected with them. After the
lamentable death of Mr. Ryle, the new agreement touching money-matters
between Mr. Chattaway and Mrs. Ryle, and the settling of George Ryle
into his own home, it may be said in his father's place, little occurred
for some years worthy of note. Time seemed to pass uneventfully. Girls
and boys grew into men and women; children into girls and boys. Cris
Chattaway lorded it in his own offensive manner as the Squire's son--as
the future Squire; his sister Octavia was not more amiable than of yore,
and Maude Trevlyn was governess to Mr. and Mrs. Chattaway's younger
children. Miss Diana Trevlyn had taken care that Maude should be well
educated, and she paid the cost of it out of her own pocket, in spite of
Mr. Chattaway's sneers. When Maude was eighteen years of age, the
question arose, What shall be done with her? "She shall go out and be a
governess," said Mr. Chattaway. "Of what profit her fine education, if
it's not to be made use of?" "No," dissented Miss Diana; "a Trevlyn
cannot be sent out into the world to earn her own living: our family
have not come to that." "I won't keep her in idleness," growled
Chattaway. "Very well," said Miss Diana; "make her governess to your
girls, Edith and Emily: it will save the cost of schooling." The advice
was taken; and Maude for the past three years had been governess at
Trevlyn Hold.
But Rupert? Rupert was found not to be so easily disposed of. There's no
knowing what Chattaway, in his ill-feeling, might have put Rupert to,
had he been at liberty to place him as he pleased. If he had not shown
any superfluous consideration in placing out George Ryle--or rather in
essaying to place him out--it was not likely he would show it to one
whom he hated as he hated Rupert. But here Miss Diana again stepped in.
Rupert was a Trevlyn, she said, and consequently could not be converted
into a chimney-sweep or a shoe-black: he must get his living at
something befitting his degree. Chattaway demurred, but he knew better
than run counter to any mandate issued by Diana Trevlyn.
Several things were tried for Rupert. He was placed with a clergyman to
study for the Church; he went to an LL.D. to read for the Bar; he was
consigned to a wealthy grazier to be made into a farmer; he was posted
off to Sir John Rennet, to be initiated into the science of civil
engineering. And he came back from all. As one venture after the other
was made, so it failed, and a very short time would see Rupert return as
ineligible to Trevlyn Hold. Ineligible! Was he deficient in capacity?
No. He was only deficient in that one great blessing, without which life
can bring no enjoyment--health. In his weakness of chest--his liability
to take cold--his suspiciously delicate frame, Rupert Trevlyn was
ominously like his dead father. The clergyman, the doctor, the hearty
grazier, and the far-famed engineer, thought after a month's trial they
would rather not take charge of him. He had a fit of illness--it may be
better to say of weakness--in the house of each; and they, no doubt, one
and all, deemed that a pupil predisposed to disease--it may be almost
said to death--as Rupert Trevlyn appeared to be, would bring with him
too much responsibility.
So, times and again, Rupert was returned on the hands of Mr. Chattaway.
To describe that gentleman's wrath would take a pen dipped in gall. Was
Rupert _never_ to be got rid of? It was like the Eastern slippers which
persisted in turning up. And, in like manner, up came Rupert Trevlyn.
The boy could not help his ill-health; but you may be sure Mr.
Chattaway's favour was not increased by it. "I shall put him in the
office at Blackstone," said he. And Miss Diana acquiesced.
Blackstone was the locality where Mr. Chattaway's mines were situated.
An appropriate name, for the place was black enough, and stony enough,
and dreary enough for anything. A low, barren, level country, its
flatness alone broken by signs of the pits, its uncompromising gloom
enlivened only by ascending fires which blazed up at night, and
illumined the country for miles round. The pits were not all coal: iron
mines and other mines were scattered with them. On Chattaway's property,
however, there was coal alone. Long rows of houses, as dreary as the
barren country, were built near: occupied by the workers in the mines.
The overseer or manager for Mr. Chattaway was named Pinder, a brother to
John Pinder, who was on Mrs. Ryle's farm: but Chattaway chose to
interfere very much with the executive himself, and may almost have been
called his own overseer. He had an office near the pits, in which
accounts were kept, the men paid, and other business items transacted: a
low building, of one storey only, consisting of three or four rooms. In
this office he kept one regular clerk, a young man named Ford, and into
this same office he put Rupert Trevlyn.
But many and many and many a day was Rupert ailing; weak, sick,
feverish, coughing, and unable to go to it. But for Diana Trevlyn,
Chattaway might have driven him there ill or well. Not that Miss Diana
possessed any extraordinary affection for Rupert: she did not keep him
at home out of love, or from motives of indulgence. But hard, cold, and
imperious though she was, Miss Diana owned somewhat of the large
open-handedness of the Trevlyns: she could not be guilty of trivial
spite, or petty meanness. She ruled the servants with an iron hand; but
in case of their falling into sickness or trouble, she had them
generously cared for. So with respect to Rupert. It may be that she
regarded him as an interloper; that she would have been better pleased
were he removed elsewhere. She had helped to deprive him of his
birthright, but she did not treat him with personal unkindness; and she
would have been the last to say he must go out to his daily occupation,
if he felt ill or incapable of it. She deplored his ill-health; but, ill
health upon him, Miss Diana was not one to ignore it, to reproach him
with it, or put hindrances in the way of his being nursed.
It was a tolerably long walk for Rupert in a morning to Blackstone. Cris
Chattaway, when he chose to go over, rode on horseback; and Mr. Cris did
not infrequently choose to go over, for he had the same propensity as
his father--that of throwing himself into every petty detail, and
interfering unwarrantably. In disposition, father and son were
alike--mean, stingy, grasping. To save a sixpence, Chattaway would
almost have sacrificed a miner's life. Improvements which other mine
owners had introduced into their pits, into the working of them,
Chattaway held aloof from. In his own person, however, Cris was not
disposed to be saving. He had his horse, and he had his servant, and he
favoured an extensive wardrobe, and was given altogether to various
little odds and ends of self-indulgence.
Yes, Cris Chattaway rode to Blackstone; with his groom behind him
sometimes, when he chose to make a dash; and Rupert Trevlyn walked.
Better that the order of travelling had been reversed, for that walk,
morning and evening, was not too good for Rupert in his weakly state. He
would feel it particularly in an evening. It was a gradual ascent nearly
all the way from Blackstone to Trevlyn Hold, almost imperceptible to a
strong man, but sufficiently apparent to Rupert Trevlyn, who would be
fatigued with the day's work.
Not that he had hard work to do. But even sitting on the office stool
tired him. Another thing that tired him--and which, no doubt, was
excessively bad for him--was the loss of his regular meals. Excepting on
Sundays, or on days when he was not well enough to leave Trevlyn Hold,
he had no dinner: what he had at Blackstone was only an apology for one.
The clerk, Ford, who lived at nearly as great a distance from the place
as Rupert, used to cook himself a chop or steak at the office grate. But
that the coals were lying about in heaps and cost nothing, Chattaway
might have objected to the fire being used for such a purpose. Rupert
occasionally cooked himself some meat; but he more frequently dined upon
bread and cheese, or scraps brought from Trevlyn Hold. It was not often
that Rupert had the money to buy meat or anything else, his supply of
that indispensable commodity, the current coin of the realm, being very
limited. Deprived of his dinner, deprived of his tea--tea being
generally over when he got back to the Hold--that, of itself, was almost
sufficient to bring on the disease feared for Rupert Trevlyn. One sound
in constitution, revelling in health and strength, might not have been
much the worse in the long-run; but Rupert did not come under the head
of that favoured class of humanity.
It was a bright day in that mellow season when summer is merging into
autumn. A few fields of the later grain were lying out yet, but most of
the golden store had been gathered into barns. The sunlight glistened on
the leaves of the trees, lighting up their rich tints of brown and
red--tints which never come until the season of passing away.
Halting at a stile which led to a field white with stubble, were two
children and a young lady. Not very young children, either, for the
younger of the two must have been thirteen. Pale girls both, with light
hair, and just now a disagreeable expression of countenance. They were
insisting upon crossing that stile to pass through the field: one of
them, in fact, had already mounted, and they did not like to be thwarted
in their wish.
"You cross old thing!" cried she on the stile. "You always object to our
going where we want to go. What dislike have you to the field, pray,
that we may not cross it?"
"I have no dislike to it, Emily. I am only obeying your father's
injunctions. You know he has forbidden you to go on Mrs. Ryle's lands."
She spoke in calm tones; a sweet, persuasive voice. She had a sweet and
gentle face, too, with delicate features, and large blue eyes. It is
Maude Trevlyn. Eight years have passed since you last saw her, and she
is twenty-one. In spite of her girlish, graceful figure, which scarcely
reaches middle height, she bears a look of the Trevlyns. Her head is
well set upon her shoulders, thrown somewhat back, as you may see in
Miss Diana Trevlyn. She wears a grey flowing cloak, and pretty blue
bonnet.
"The lands are not Mrs. Ryle's," retorted the girl on the stile. "They
are papa's."
"They are Mrs. Ryle's as long as she rents them. It is all the same. Mr.
Chattaway has forbidden you to cross them. Come down from the stile,
Emily."
"No. I shall jump over it."
It was ever thus. Except in the presence of Miss Diana Trevlyn, the
girls were openly rude and disobedient to Maude. Expected to teach them,
she was denied the ordinary authority vested in a governess. And Maude
could not emancipate herself: she must suffer and submit.
Emily Chattaway put her foot over the top bar of the stile, preparatory
to jumping over it, when the sound of a horse was heard, and she turned
her head. Riding along the lane at a quick pace was a gentleman of some
three or four-and-twenty years: a tall man, as far as could be seen, who
sat his horse well. He reined in when he saw them, and bent down a
pleasant face, with a pleasant smile upon it. The sun shone into his
fine dark eyes, as he stooped to shake hands with Maude.
Maude's cheeks had turned crimson. "Quite well," she stammered, in
answer to his greeting, somewhat losing her self-possession. "When did
you return home?"
"Last night. I was away two days only, instead of the four anticipated.
Emily, you'll fall backwards if you don't mind."
"No, I sha'n't," said Emily. "Why did you not stay longer?"
"I found Treve away when I reached Oxford, so I came back again, and got
home last night--to Nora's discomfiture."
Maude looked into his face with a questioning glance. She had quite
recovered her self-possession. "Why?" she asked.
George Ryle laughed. "Nora had turned my bedroom inside out, and accused
me, in her vexation, of coming back on purpose."
"Where did you sleep?" asked Emily.
"In Treve's room. Take care, Edith!"
Maude hastily drew back Edith Chattaway, who had gone too near the
horse. "How is Mrs. Ryle?" asked Maude. "We heard yesterday she was not
well."
"She is suffering from a cold. I have scarcely seen her. Maude," leaning
down and whispering, "are things any brighter than they were?"
Again the soft colour came into her face, and she threw him a glance
from her dark blue eyes. If ever glance spoke of indignation, hers did.
"What change can there be?" she breathed. "Rupert is ill again," she
added in louder tones.
"Rupert!"
"At least, he is not well, and is at home to-day. But he is better than
he was yesterday----"
"Here comes Octave," interrupted Emily.
George Ryle gathered up his reins. Shaking hands with Maude, he said a
hasty good-bye to the other two, and cantered down the lane, lifting his
hat to Miss Chattaway, who was coming up from a distance.
She was advancing quickly across the common, behind the fence on the
other side of the lane. A tall, thin young woman, looking her full age
of four or five-and-twenty, with the same leaden complexion as of yore,
and the disagreeably sly grey eyes. She wore a puce silk paletot, and a
brown hat trimmed with black lace; an unbecoming costume for one so
tall.
"That was George Ryle!" she exclaimed, as she came up. "What brings him
back already?"
"He found his brother away when he reached Oxford," was Maude's reply.
"I think he was very rude not to stop and speak to you, Octave,"
observed Emily Chattaway. "He saw you coming."
Octave made no reply. She mounted the stile and gazed after the
horseman, apparently to see what direction he would take on reaching the
end of the lane. Patiently watching, she saw him turn into another lane,
which branched off to the left. Octave Chattaway jumped over the stile,
and went swiftly across the field.
"She's gone to meet him," was Emily's comment.
It was precisely what Miss Chattaway _had_ gone to do. Passing through a
copse after quitting the field, she emerged from it just as George was
riding quietly past. He halted and stopped to shake hands, as he had
done with Maude.
"You are out of breath, Octave. Have you been hastening to catch me?"
"I need not have done so but for your gallantry in riding off the moment
you saw me," she answered, resentfully.
"I beg your pardon. I did not know you wanted me. And I am in a hurry."
"It seems so--stopping to speak so long to the children and Maude," she
returned, with irony. And George Ryle's laugh was a conscious one.
Latent antagonism was seated in the minds of both, and a latent
consciousness of it running through their hearts. When George Ryle saw
Octave hastening across the common, he knew she was speeding to reach
him ere he should be gone; when Octave saw him ride away, a voice
whispered that he did so to avoid meeting her; and each felt that their
secret thoughts and motives were known to the other. Yes, there was
constant antagonism between them; if the word may be applied to Octave
Chattaway, who had learnt to value the society of George Ryle more
highly than was good for her. Did he so value hers? Octave wore out her
heart, hoping for it. But in the midst of her unwise love for him, her
never-ceasing efforts to be in his presence, near to him, there
constantly arose the bitter conviction that he did not care for her.
"I wished to ask you about the book you promised to get me," she said.
"Have you procured it?"
"No; and I am sorry to say that I cannot meet with it," replied George.
"I thought of it at Oxford, and went into nearly every bookseller's shop
in the place, unsuccessfully. I told you it was difficult to find. I
must get them to write to London for it from Barmester."
"Will you come to the Hold this evening?" she asked, as he was riding
away.
"Thank you. I am not sure that I can. My day or two's absence has made
me busy."
Octave Chattaway drew back under cover of the trees and halted: never
retreating until every trace of that fine young horseman had passed out
of sight.