_PRELIMINARIES._
Mr. Cecil Burleigh met Bessie Fairfax again with a courteous vivacity
and an air of intimate acquaintance. If he was not very glad to see her
he affected gladness well, and Bessie's vivid blushes were all the
welcome that was necessary to delude the witnesses into a belief that
they already understood one another. He was perfectly satisfied
himself, and his sister Mary, who worshipped him, thought Bessie sweetly
modest and pretty. And her mind was at peace for the results.
There was a dinner-party at Abbotsmead that evening. Colonel and Mrs.
Stokes came, and Mr. Forbes and his mother, who lived with him (for he
was unmarried), a most agreeable old lady. It was much like other
dinner-parties in the country. The guests were all of one mind on
politics and the paramount importance of the landed interest, which gave
a delightful unanimity to the conversation. The table was round, so that
Miss Fairfax did not appear conspicuous as the lady of the house, but
she was not for that the less critically observed. Happily, she was
unconscious of the ordeal she underwent. She looked lovely in the face,
but her dress was not the elaborate dress of the other ladies; it was
still her prize-day white muslin, high to the throat and long to the
wrists, with a red rose in her belt, and an antique Normandy gold cross
for her sole ornament. The cross was a gift from Madame Fournier. Mr.
Cecil Burleigh, being seated next to her, was most condescending in his
efforts to be entertaining, and Bessie was not quite so uneasy under his
affability as she had been on board the yacht. Mrs. Stokes, who had
heard much of the Tory candidate, but now met him for the first time,
regarded him with awe, impressed by his distinguished air and fine
manners. But Bessie was more diffident than impressed. She did not talk
much; everybody else was so willing to talk that it was enough for her
to look charming. Once or twice her grandfather glanced towards her,
wishing to hear her voice--which was a most tunable voice--in reply to
her magnificent neighbor, but Bessie sat in beaming, beautiful silence,
lending him her ears, and at intervals giving him a monosyllabic reply.
She might certainly have done worse. She might have spoken foolishly, or
she might have said what she occasionally thought in contradiction of
his solemn opinions. And surely this would have been unwise? Her silence
was pleasing, and he wished for nothing in her different from what she
seemed. He liked her youthfulness, and approved her simplicity as an
eminently teachable characteristic; and if she was not able greatly to
interest or amuse him, perhaps that was not from any fault or
deficiency in herself, but from circumstances over which she had no
control. An old love, a true love, unwillingly relinquished, is a
powerful rival.
The whole of the following day was at his service to walk and talk with
Bessie if he and she pleased, but Bessie invited Miss Burleigh into her
private parlor and went into seclusion. That was after breakfast, and
Mr. Cecil made a tour of the stables with the squire, and saw Janey take
her morning gallop. Then he spoke in praise of Janey's mistress while on
board the Foam, and with all the enthusiasm at his command of his own
hopes. They had not become expectations yet.
"It is uphill work with Elizabeth," said her grandfather. "She cares for
none of us here."
"The harder to win the more constant to keep," replied the aspirant
suitor cheerfully.
"I shall put no pressure on her. Here is your opportunity, and you must
rely on yourself. She has a heart for those who can reach it, but my
efforts have fallen short thus far." This was not what the squire had
once thought to say.
Mr. Cecil Burleigh did not admire gushing, demonstrative women, and a
gushing wife would have wearied him inexpressibly. He felt an attraction
in Bessie's aloofness, and said again, "She is worth the pains she will
cost to win: a few years will mature her fine intelligence and make of
her a perfect companion. I admire her courageous simplicity; there is a
great deal in her character to work upon."
"She is no cipher, certainly; if you are satisfied, I am," said Mr.
Fairfax resignedly. "Yet it is not flattering to think that she would
toss up her cap to go back to the Forest to-morrow."
"Then she is loyal in affection to very worthy people. I have heard of
her Forest friends from Lady Latimer."
"Lady Latimer has a great hold on Elizabeth's imagination. It would be a
good thing if she were to pay a visit to Hartwell; she might give her
young devotee some valuable instructions. Elizabeth is prejudiced
against me, and does not fall into her new condition so happily as I was
led to anticipate that she might."
"She will wear to it. My sister Mary has an art of taming, and will
help her. I prefer her indifference to an undue elation: that would
argue a commonness of mind from which I imagine her to be quite free."
"She has her own way of estimating us, and treats the state and luxury
of Abbotsmead as quite external to her. In her private thoughts, I fear,
she treats them as cumbrous lendings that she will throw off after a
season, and be gladly quit of their burden."
"Better so than in the other extreme. A girl of heart and mind cannot be
expected to identify herself suddenly with the customs of a strange
rank. She was early trained in the habits of a simple household, but
from what I see there can have been nothing wanting of essential
refinement in Mrs. Carnegie. There is a crudeness in Miss Fairfax
yet--she is very young--but she will ripen sound and sweet to the core,
or I am much mistaken in the quality of the green fruit."
The squire replied that he had no reason to believe his granddaughter
was otherwise than a good girl. And with that they left discussing her
and fell upon the election. Mr. Cecil Burleigh had a good courage for
the encounter, but he also had received intimations not to make too sure
of his success. The Fairfax influence had been so long in abeyance, so
long only a name in Norminster, that Mr. John Short began to quake the
moment he began to test it. Once upon a time Norminster had returned a
Fairfax as a matter of course, but for a generation its tendencies had
been more and more towards Liberalism, and at the last election it had
returned its old Whig member at the head of the poll, and in lieu of its
old Tory member a native lawyer, one Bradley, who professed Radicalism
on the hustings, but pruned his opinions in the House to the useful
working pattern of a supporter of the ministry. This prudent gentleman
was considered by a majority of his constituents not to have played
fair, and it was as against him, traitor and turncoat, that the old
Tories and moderate Conservatives were going to try to bring in Mr.
Cecil Burleigh. Both sides were prepared to spend money, and Norminster
was enjoying lively anticipations of a good time coming.
While the gentlemen were thus discoursing to and fro the terrace under
the library window, Miss Burleigh in Bessie's parlor was instructing her
of her brother's political views. It is to be feared that Bessie was
less interested than the subject deserved, and also less interested in
the proprietor of the said views than his sister supposed her to be. She
listened respectfully, however, and did not answer very much at random,
considering that she was totally ignorant beforehand of all that was
being explained to her. At length she said, "I must begin to read the
newspapers. I know much better what happened in the days of Queen
Elizabeth than what has happened in my own lifetime;" and then Miss
Burleigh left politics, and began to speak of her brother's personal
ambition and personal qualities; to relate anecdotes of his signal
success at Eton and at Oxford; to expatiate on her own devotion to him,
and the great expectations founded by all his family upon his high
character and splendid abilities. She added that he had the finest
temper in the world, and that he was ardently affectionate.
Bessie smiled at this. She believed that she knew where his ardent
affections were centred; and then she blushed at the tormenting
recollection of how she had interpreted his assiduities to herself
before making that discovery. Miss Burleigh saw the blush, seeming to
see nothing, and said softly, "I envy the woman who has to pass her life
with Cecil. I can imagine nothing more contenting than his society to
one he loves."
Bessie's blush was perpetuated. She would have liked to mention Miss
Julia Gardiner, but she felt a restraining delicacy in speaking of what
had come to her knowledge in such a casual way, and more than ever
ashamed of her own ridiculous mistake. Suddenly she broke out with an
odd query, at the same moment clapping her hands to her traitorous
cheeks: "Do you ever blush at your own foolish fancies? Oh, how tiresome
it is to have a trick of blushing! I wish I could get over it."
"It is a trick we get over quite early enough. The fancies girls blush
at are so innocent. I have had none of that pretty sort for a long
while."
Miss Burleigh looked sympathetic and amused. Bessie was silent for a few
minutes and full of thought. Presently, in a musing, meditative voice,
she said, "Ambition! I suppose all men who have force enough to do great
things long for an opportunity to do them; and that we call ambition.
Harry Musgrave is ambitious. He is going to be a lawyer. What can a
famous lawyer become?"
"Lord chancellor, the highest civil dignity under the Crown."
"Then I shall set my mind on seeing Harry lord chancellor," cried Bessie
with bold conclusion.
"And when he retires from office, though he may have held it for ever so
short a time, he will have a pension of five thousand a year."
"How pleasant! What a grateful country! Then he will be able to buy
Brook and spend his holidays there. Dear old Harry! We were like brother
and sister once, and I feel as if I had a right to be proud of him, as
you are of your brother Cecil. Women have no chance of being ambitious
on their own account, have they?"
"Oh yes. Women are as ambitious of rank, riches, and power as men are;
and some are ambitious of doing what they imagine to be great deeds. You
will probably meet one at Brentwood, a most beautiful lady she is--a
Mrs. Chiverton."
Bessie's countenance flashed: "She was a Miss Hiloe, was she not--Ada
Hiloe? I knew her. She was at Madame Fournier's--she and a younger
sister--during my first year there."
"Then you will be glad to meet again. She was married in Paris only the
other day, and has come into Woldshire a bride. They say she is showing
herself a prodigy of benevolence round her husband's magnificent seat
already: she married him that she might have the power to do good with
his immense wealth. There must always be some self-sacrifice in a lofty
ambition, but hers is a sacrifice that few women could endure to pay."
Bessie held her peace. She had been instructed how all but impossible it
is to live in the world and be absolutely truthful; and what perplexed
her in this new character of her old school-fellow she therefore
supposed to be the veil of glamour which the world requires to have
thrown over an ugly, naked truth.
About eleven o'clock the two young ladies walked out across the park
towards the lodge, to pay a visit to Mrs. Stokes. Then they walked on to
the village, and home again by the mill. The morning seemed long drawn
out. Then followed luncheon, and after it Mr. Cecil Burleigh drove in an
open carriage with Bessie and his sister to Hartwell. The afternoon was
very clear and pleasant, and the scenery sufficiently varied. On the
road Bessie learnt that Hartwell was the early home of Lady Latimer, and
still the residence of her bachelor brother and two maiden sisters.
The very name of Lady Latimer acted like a spell on Bessie. She had been
rather silent and reserved until she heard it, and then all at once she
roused up into a vivid interest. Mr. Cecil Burleigh studied her more
attentively than he had done hitherto. Miss Burleigh said, "Lady Latimer
is another of our ambitious women. Miss Fairfax fancies women can have
no ambition on their own account, Cecil. I have been telling her of Mrs.
Chiverton."
"And what does Miss Fairfax say of Mrs. Chiverton's ambition?" asked Mr.
Cecil Burleigh.
"Nothing," rejoined Bessie. But her delicate lip and nostril expressed a
great deal.
The man of the world preferred her reticence to the wisest speech. He
mused for several minutes before he spoke again himself. Then he gave
air to some of his reflections: "Lady Latimer has great qualities. Her
marriage was the blunder of her youth. Her girlish imagination was
dazzled by the name of a lord and the splendor of Umpleby. It remains to
be considered that she was not one of the melting sort, and that she
made her life noble."
Here Miss Burleigh took up the story: "That is true. But she would have
made it more noble if she had been faithful to her first love--to your
grandfather, Miss Fairfax."
Bessie colored. "Oh, were they fond of each other when they were young?"
she asked wondering.
"Your grandfather was devoted to her. He had just succeeded to
Abbotsmead. All the world thought it would be a match, and great
promotion for her too, when she met Lord Latimer. He was sixty and she
was nineteen, and they lived together thirty-seven years, for he
survived into quite extreme old age."
"And she had no children, and my grandfather married somebody else?"
said Bessie with a plaintive fall in her voice.
"She had no children, and your grandfather married somebody else. Lady
Latimer was a most excellent wife to her old tyrant."
Bessie looked sorrowful: "Was he a tyrant? I wonder whether she ever
pities herself for the love she threw away? She is quite alone--she
would give anything that people should love her now, I have heard them
say in the Forest."
"That is the revenge that slighted love so often takes. But she must
have satisfaction in her life too. She was always more proud than
tender, except perhaps to her friend, Dorothy Fairfax. You have heard of
your great-aunt Dorothy?"
"Yes. I have succeeded to her rooms, to her books. My grandfather says I
remind him of her."
"Dorothy Fairfax never forgave Lady Latimer. They had been familiar
friends, and there was a double separation. Oh, it is quite a romance!
My aunt, Lady Angleby, could tell you all about it, for she was quite
one with them at Abbotsmead and Hartwell in those days; indeed, the
intimacy has never been interrupted. And you know Lady Latimer--you
admire her?"
"I used to admire her enthusiastically. I should like to see her again."
After this there was silence until the drive ended at Hartwell. Bessie
was meditating on the glimpse she had got into the pathetic past of her
grandfather's life, and Mr. Cecil Burleigh and his sister were
meditating upon her.
Hartwell was a modest brick house within a garden skirting the road. It
had a retired air, as of a poor gentleman's house whose slender fortunes
limit his tastes: Mr. Oliver Smith's fortunes were very slender, and he
shared them with two maiden sisters. The shrubs were well grown and the
grass was well kept, but there was no show of the gorgeous scentless
flowers which make the gardens of the wealthy so gay and splendid in
summer. Ivy clothed the walls, and old-fashioned flowers bloomed all
the year round in the borders, but it was not a very cheerful garden in
the afternoon.
Two elderly ladies were pacing the lawn arm-in-arm, with straw hats
tilted over their noses, when the Abbotsmead carriage stopped at the
gate. They stood an instant to see whose it was, and then hurried
forward to welcome their visitors.
"This is very kind, Mr. Cecil, very kind, Miss Mary; but you always are
kind in remembering old friends," said the elder, Miss Juliana, and then
was silent, gazing at Bessie.
"This is Miss Fairfax," said Mr. Cecil Burleigh. "Lady Latimer has no
doubt named her in her letters."
"Ah! yes, yes--what am I dreaming about? Charlotte," turning to her
sister, "who is she like?"
"She is like poor Dorothy," was the answer in a tremulous, solemn voice.
"What will Oliver say?"
"How long is it since Lady Latimer saw you, my dear?" asked Miss
Juliana.
"Three years. I have not been home to the Forest since I left it to go
to school in France."
"Ah! Then that accounts for our sister not having mentioned to us your
wonderful resemblance to your great-aunt, Dorothy Fairfax. Three years
alter and refine a child's chubby face into a young woman's face."
Miss Juliana seemed to be thrown into irretrievable confusion by
Bessie's apparition and her own memory. She was quite silent as she led
the way to the house, walking between Mr. Cecil Burleigh and his sister.
Miss Charlotte walked behind with Bessie, and remarked that she was
pleased to have a link of acquaintance with her already by means of Lady
Latimer. Bessie asked whether Lady Latimer was likely soon to come into
Woldshire.
"We have not heard that she has any present intention of visiting us.
Her visits are few and far between," was the formal reply.
"I wish she would. When I was a little girl she was my ideal of all that
is grand, gracious, and lovely," said Bessie.
Bessie's little outbreak had done her good, had set her tongue at
liberty. Her self-consciousness was growing less obtrusive. Mr. Cecil
Burleigh explained to her the legal process of an election for a member
of Parliament, and Miss Burleigh sat by in satisfied silence, observing
the quick intelligence of her face and the flattered interest in her
brother's. At the park gates, Mr. Fairfax, returning from a visit to one
of his farmsteads where building was in progress, met the carriage and
got in. His first question was what Mr. Oliver Smith had said about the
coming election, and whether he would be in Norminster the following
day.
The news about Buller troubled him no little, to judge by his
countenance, but he did not say much beyond an exclamation that they
would carry the contest through, let it cost what it might. "We have
been looking forward to this contest ever since Bradley was returned
five years ago; we will not be so faint-hearted as to yield without a
battle. If we are defeated again, we may count Norminster lost to the
Conservative interest."
"Oh, don't talk of defeat! We shall be far more likely to win if we
refuse to contemplate the possibility of defeat," cried Bessie with
girlish vivacity.
Mr. Cecil Burleigh laughed and said, "Miss Fairfax is right. She will
wear my colors and I will adopt her logic, and, ostrich-like, refuse to
see the perils that threaten me."
"No, no," remonstrated Bessie casting off her shy reserve under
encouragement. "So far from hiding your face, you must make it familiar
in every street in Norminster. You must seek if you would find, and ask
if you would have. I would. I should hate to be beaten by my own
neglect, worse than by my rival."
Mr. Fairfax was electrified at this brusque assertion of her sentiments
by his granddaughter. Her audacity seemed at least equal to her shyness.
"Very good advice, Elizabeth; make him follow it," said he dryly.
"We will give him no rest when we have him at Brentwood," added Miss
Burleigh. "But though he is so cool about it, I believe he is dreadfully
in earnest. Are you not, Cecil?"
"I will not be beaten by my own neglect," was his rejoinder, with a
glance at Bessie, blushing beautifully.
They did not relapse into constraint any more that day. There was no
addition to the company at dinner, and the evening being genially warm,
they enjoyed it in the garden. Mr. Cecil Burleigh and Miss Fairfax even
strolled as far as the ruins in the park, and on the way he enlightened
her respecting some of his opinions, tastes, and prejudices. She heard
him attentively, and found him very instructive. His clever conversation
was a compliment to which, as a bright girl, she was not insensible. His
sister had detailed to him her behavior on her introduction to Lady
Angleby, and had deplored her lively sense of the ridiculous. Miss
Burleigh had the art of taming that her brother credited her with, and
Elizabeth was already at ease and happy with her--free to be herself, as
she felt, and not always on guard and measuring her words; and the more
of her character that she revealed, the better Miss Burleigh liked her.
Her gayety of temper was very attractive when it was kept within due
bounds, and she had a most sweet docility of tractableness when
approached with caution. At the close of the evening she retired to her
white parlor with a rather exalted feeling of responsibility, having
promised, at Mr. Cecil Burleigh's instigation, to study certain essays
of Lord Bacon on government and seditions in states for the informing of
her mind. She took the volume down from Dorothy Fairfax's bookshelf, and
laid it on her table for a reminder. Miss Burleigh saw it there in the
morning.
"Ah, dear Cecil! He will try to make you very wise and learned," said
she, nodding her head and smiling significantly. "But never mind: he
waltzes to perfection, and delights in a ball, no man more."
"Does he?" cried Bessie, amused and laughing. "That potent, grave, and
reverend signor can condescend, then, to frivolities! Oh, when shall we
have a ball that I may waltz with him?"
"Soon, if all go successfully at the election. Lady Angleby will give a
ball if Cecil win and you ask her."
"_I_ ask her! But I should never dare."
"She will be only too glad of the opportunity, and you may dare anything
with her when she is pleased. She has always been dear Cecil's fast
friend, and his triumph will be hers. She will want to celebrate it
joyously, and nothing is really so joyous as a good dance. We will have
a good dance."