days of Louis Renouf looked down upon a dilapidated farm- and
stable-yard, the gate of which, turned back upon its hinges, stood
wide open to the world. Within might be seen granaries empty of grain,
stables where no horses fed, a long cow-house crumbling into ruin, and
the broken stone sections of a cider trough dismantled more than half
a century back. Cushions of emerald moss studded the thatches, and
lilliputian forests of grass blades sprang thick between the cobble
stones. The place might have been mistaken for some deserted grange,
but for the contradiction conveyed in a bright pewter full-bellied
water-can standing near the well, in a pile of firewood, with chopper
still stuck in the topmost billet, and in a tatterdemalion troop of
barn-door fowl lagging meditatively across the yard.
On a certain day, when summer warmth and unbroken silence brooded over
all, and the broad sunshine blent the yellows, reds, and greys of tile
and stone, the greens of grass and foliage, into one harmonious whole,
a visitor entered the open gate. This was a tall, large young woman,
with a fair, smooth, thirty-year-old face. Dressed in what was
obviously her Sunday best, although it was neither Sunday nor even
market-day, she wore a bonnet diademed with gas-green lilies of the
valley, a netted black mantilla, and a velvet-trimmed violet silk
gown, which she carefully lifted out of dust's way, thus displaying a
stiffly starched petticoat and kid spring-side boots.
Such attire, unbeautiful in itself and incongruous with its
surroundings, jarred harshly with the picturesque note of the scene.
From being a subject to perpetuate on canvas, it shrunk, as it were,
to the background of a cheap photograph, or the stage adjuncts to the
heroine of a farce. The silence too was shattered as the new comer's
foot fell upon the stones. An unseen dog began to mouth a joyous
welcome, and the fowls, lifting their thin, apprehensive faces towards
her, flopped into a clumsy run as though their last hour were visible.
The visitor meanwhile turned familiar steps to a door in the wall on
the left, and raising the latch, entered the flower garden of Les
Calais. This garden, lying to the south, consisted then, and perhaps
does still, of two square grass-plots with a broad gravel path running
round them and up to the centre of the house.
In marked contrast with the neglect of the farmyard was this
exquisitely kept garden, brilliant and fragrant with flowers. From a
raised bed in the centre of each plot standard rose-trees shed out
gorgeous perfume from chalices of every shade of loveliness, and
thousands of white pinks justled shoulder to shoulder in narrow bands
cut within the borders of the grass.
Busy over these, his back towards her, was an elderly man, braces
hanging, in coloured cotton shirt. "Good afternoon, Tourtel," cried
the lady, advancing. Thus addressed, he straightened himself slowly
and turned round. Leaning on his hoe, he shaded his eyes with his
hand. "Eh den! it's you, Missis Pedvinn," said he; "but we didn't
expec' you till to-morrow?"
"No, it's true," said Mrs. Poidevin, "that I wrote I would come
Saturday, but Pedvinn expects some friends by the English boat, and
wants me to receive them. Yet as they may be staying the week, I did
not like to put poor Cousin Louis off so long without a visit, so
thought I had better come up to-day."
Almost unconsciously, her phrases assumed apologetic form. She had an
uneasy feeling Tourtel's wife might resent her unexpected advent;
although why Mrs. Tourtel should object, or why she herself should
stand in any awe of the Tourtels, she could net have explained.
Tourtel was but gardener, the wife housekeeper and nurse, to her
cousin Louis Renouf, master of Les Calais. "I sha'n't inconvenience
Mrs. Tourtel, I hope? Of course I shouldn't think of staying tea if
she is busy; I'll just sit an hour with Cousin Louis, and catch the
six o'clock omnibus home from Vauvert."
Tourtel stood looking at her with wooden countenance, in which two
small shifting eyes alone gave signs of life. "Eh, but you won't be no
inconvenience to de ole woman, ma'am," said he suddenly, in so loud a
voice that Mrs. Poidevin jumped; "only de apple-gôche, dat she was
gain' to bake agen your visit, won't be ready, dat's all."
He turned, and stared up at the front of the house; Mrs. Poidevin, for
no reason at all, did so too. Door and windows were open wide. In the
upper storey, the white roller-blinds were let down against the sun,
and on the broad sills of the parlour windows were nosegays placed in
blue china jars. A white trellis-work criss-crossed over the façade,
for the support of climbing rose and purple clematis which hung out a
curtain of blossom almost concealing the masonry behind. The whole
place breathed of peace and beauty, and Louisa Poidevin was lapped
round with that pleasant sense of well-being which it was her chief
desire in life never to lose. Though poor Cousin Louis--feeble,
childish, solitary--was so much to be pitied, at least in his
comfortable home and his worthy Tourtels he found compensation.
An instant after Tourtel had spoken, a woman passed across the wide
hall. She had on a blue linen skirt, white stockings, and shoes of
grey list. The strings of a large, bibbed, lilac apron drew the folds
of a flowered bed-jacket about her ample waist; and her thick
yellow-grey hair, worn without a cap, was arranged smoothly on either
side of a narrow head. She just glanced out, and Mrs. Poidevin was on
the point of calling to her, when Tourtel fell into a torrent of words
about his flowers. He had so much to say on the subject of
horticulture; was so anxious for her to examine the freesia bulbs
lying in the tool-house, just separated from the spring plants; he
denounced so fiercely the grinding policy of Brehault the middleman,
who purchased his garden stuff to resell it at Covent Garden--"my
good! on dem freesias I didn't make not two doubles a bunch!"--that
for a long quarter of an hour all memory of her cousin was driven from
Mrs. Poidevin's brain. Then a voice said at her elbow, "Mr. Rennuf is
quite ready to see you, ma'am," and there stood Tourtel's wife, with
pale composed face, square shoulders and hips, and feet that moved
noiselessly in her list slippers.
"Ah, Mrs. Tourtel, how do you do?" said the visitor; a question which
in the Islands is no mere formula, but demands and obtains a detailed
answer, after which the questioner's own health is politely inquired
into. Not until this ceremony had been scrupulously accomplished, and
the two women were on their way to the house, did Mrs. Poidevin beg to
know how things were going with her "poor cousin."
There lay something at variance between the ruthless, calculating
spirit which looked forth from the housekeeper's cold eye, and the
extreme suavity of her manner of speech.
"Eh, my good! but much de same, ma'am, in his health, an' more fancies
dan ever in his head. First one ting an' den anudder, an' always
tinking dat everybody is robbin' him. You rem-ember de larse time you
was here, an' Mister Rennuf was abed? Well, den, after you was gone,
if he didn't deck-clare you had taken some of de fedders of his bed
away wid you. Yes, my good! he tought you had cut a hole in de tick,
as you sat dere beside him an' emptied de fedders away into your
pocket."
Mrs. Poidevin was much interested. "Dear me, is it possible?... But
it's quite a mania with him. I remember now, on that very day he
complained to me Tourtel was wearing his shirts, and wanted me to go
in with him to Lepage's to order some new ones."
"Eh! but what would Tourtel want wid fine white shirts like dem?" said
the wife placidly. "But Mr. Louis have such dozens an' dozens of 'em
dat dey gets hidden away in de presses, an' he tinks dem stolen."
They reached the house. The interior is quite as characteristic of the
Islands as is the outside. Two steps take you down into the hall,
crossing the further end of which is the staircase with its balustrade
of carved black oak. Instead of the mean painted sticks, known
technically as "raisers," and connected together at the top by a
vulgar mahogany hand-rail--a fundamental article of faith with the
modern builder--these old Island balustrades are formed of wooden
panels, fretted out into scrolls, representing flower, or leaf, or
curious beaked and winged creatures, which go curving, creeping, and
ramping along in the direction of the stairs. In every house you will
find the detail different, while each resembles all as a whole. For in
the old days the workman, were he never so humble, recognised the
possession of an individual mind, as well as of two eyes and two
hands, and he translated fearlessly this individuality of his into his
work. Every house built in those days and existing down to these, is
not only a confession, in some sort, of the tastes, the habits, the
character, of the man who planned it, but preserves a record likewise
of every one of the subordinate minds employed in the various parts.
Off the hall of Les Calais are two rooms on the left and one on the
right. The solidity of early seventeenth-century walls is shown in the
embrasure depth (measuring fully three feet) of windows and doors. Up
to fifty years ago all the windows had leaded casements, as had every
similar Island dwelling-house. To-day, to the artist's regret, you
will hardly find one. The showy taste of the Second Empire spread from
Paris even to these remote parts, and plate-glass, or at least oblong
panes, everywhere replaced the mediæval style. In 1854, Louis Renouf,
just three and thirty, was about to bring his bride, Miss Marie
Mauger, home to the old house. In her honour it was done up
throughout, and the diamonded casements were replaced by guillotine
windows, six panes to each sash.
The best parlour then became a "drawing-room"; its raftered ceiling
was whitewashed, and its great centre-beam of oak infamously papered
to match the walls. The newly married couple were not in a position to
refurnish in approved Second Empire fashion. The gilt and marble, the
console tables and mirrors, the impossibly curved sofas and chairs,
were for the moment beyond them; the wife promised herself to acquire
these later on. But later on came a brood of sickly children (only one
of whom reached manhood); to the consequent expenses Les Calais owed
the preservation of its inlaid wardrobes, its four-post bedsteads with
slender fluted columns, and its Chippendale parlour chairs, the backs
of which simulate a delicious intricacy of twisted ribbons. As a
little girl, Louisa Poidevin had often amused herself studying these
convolutions, and seeking to puzzle out among the rippling ribbons
some beginning or some end; but as she grew up, even the simplest
problem lost interest for her, and the sight of the old Chippendale
chairs standing along the walls of the large parlour scarcely stirred
her bovine mind now to so much as reminiscence.
It was the door of this large parlour that the housekeeper opened as
she announced, "Here is Mrs. Pedvinn come to see you, sir," and
followed the visitor in.
Sitting in a capacious "berceuse," stuffed and chintz-covered, was the
shrunken figure of a more than seventy-year-old man. He was wrapped in
a worn grey dressing-gown, with a black velvet skull-cap, napless at
the seams, covering his spiritless hair, and he looked out upon his
narrow world from dim eyes set in cavernous orbits. In their
expression was something of the questioning timidity of a child,
contrasting curiously with the querulousness of old age, shown in the
thin sucked-in lips, now and again twitched by a movement in unison
with the twitching of the withered hands spread out upon his knees.
The sunshine, slanting through the low windows, bathed hands and
knees, lean shanks and slippered feet, in mote-flecked streams of
gold. It bathed anew rafters and ceiling-beam, as it had done at the
same hour and season these last three hundred years; it played over
the worm-eaten furniture, and lent transitory colour to the faded
samplers on the walls, bringing into prominence one particular
sampler, which depicted in silks Adam and Eve seated beneath the fatal
tree, and recorded the fact that Marie Hochedé was seventeen in 1808
and put her "trust in God"; and the same ray kissed the check of that
very Marie's son, who at the time her girlish fingers pricked the
canvas belonged to the enviable myriads of the unthought-of and the
unborn.
"Why, how cold you are, Cousin Louis," said Mrs. Poidevin, taking his
passive hand between her two warm ones, and feeling a chill strike
from it through the violet kid gloves; "and in spite of all this
sunshine too!"
"Ah, I'm not always in the sunshine," said the old man; "not always,
not always in the sunshine." She was not sure that he recognised her,
yet he kept hold of her hand and would not let it go.
"No; you are not always in de sunshine, because de sunshine is not
always here," observed Mrs. Tourtel in a reasonable voice, and with a
side glance for the visitor.
"And I am not always here either," he murmured, half to himself. He
took a firmer hold of his cousin's hand, and seemed to gain courage
from the comfortable touch, for his thin voice changed from complaint
to command. "You can go, Mrs. Tourtel," he said; "we don't require you
here. We want to talk. You can go and set the tea-things in the next
room. My cousin will stay and drink tea with me."
"Why, my cert'nly! of course Mrs. Pedvinn will stay tea. P'r'aps you'd
like to put your bonnet off in the bedroom, first, ma'am?"
"No, no," he interposed testily, "she can lay it off here. No need for
you to take her upstairs."
Servant and master exchanged a mute look; for the moment his old eyes
were lighted up with the unforeseeing, unveiled triumph of a child;
then they fell before hers. She turned, leaving the room with
noiseless tread; although a large-built, ponderous woman, she walked
with the softness of a cat.
"Sit down here close beside me," said Louis Renouf to his cousin,
"I've something to tell you, something very important to tell you." He
lowered his voice mysteriously, and glanced with apprehension at
window and door, squeezing tight her hand. "I'm being robbed, my dear,
robbed of everything I possess."
Mrs. Poidevin, already prepared for such a statement, answered
complacently, "Oh, it must be your fancy, Cousin Louis. Mrs. Tourtel
takes too good care of you for that."
"My dear," he whispered, "silver, linen, everything is going; even my
fine white shirts from the shelves of the wardrobe. Yet everything
belongs to poor John, who is in Australia, and who never writes to his
father now. His last letter is ten years old--ten years old, my dear,
and I don't need to read it over, for I know it by heart."
Tears of weakness gathered in his eyes, and began to trickle over on
to his check.
"Oh, Cousin John will write soon, I'm sure," said Mrs. Poidevin, with
easy optimism; "I shouldn't wonder if he has made a fortune, and is on
his way home to you at this moment."
"Ah, he will never make a fortune, my dear, he was always too fond of
change. He had excellent capabilities, Louisa, but he was too fond of
change.... And yet I often sit and pretend to myself he has made
money, and is as proud to be with his poor old father as he used to be
when quite a little lad. I plan out all we should do, and all he would
say, and just how he would look ... but that's only my make-believe;
John will never make money, never. But I'd be glad if he would come
back to the old home, though it were without a penny. For if he don't
come soon, he'll find no home, and no welcome.... I raised all the
money I could when he went away, and now, as you know, my dear, the
house and land go to you and Pedvinn.... But I'd like my poor boy to
have the silver and linen, and his mother's furniture and needlework
to remember us by."
"Yes, cousin, and he will have them some day, but not for a great
while yet, I hope."
Louis Renouf shook his head, with the immovable obstinacy of the very
old or the very young.
"Louisa, mark my words, he will get nothing, nothing. Everything is
going. They'll make away with the chairs and the tables next, with the
very bed I lie on."
"Oh, Cousin Louis, you mustn't think such things," said Mrs. Poidevin
serenely; had not the poor old man accused her to the Tourtels of
filching his mattress feathers?
"Ah, you don't believe me, my dear," said he, with a resignation which
was pathetic; "but you'll remember my words when I am gone. Six dozen
rat-tailed silver forks, with silver candlesticks, and tray, and
snuffers. Besides odd pieces, and piles and piles of linen. Your
cousin Marie was a notable housekeeper, and everything she bought was
of the very best. The large table-cloths were five guineas apiece, my
dear, British money--five guineas apiece."
Louisa listened with perfect calmness and scant attention.
Circumstances too comfortable, and a too abundant diet, had gradually
undermined with her all perceptive and reflective powers. Though, of
course, had the household effects been coming to her as well as the
land, she would have felt more interest in them; but it is only human
nature to contemplate the possible losses of others with equanimity.
"They must be handsome cloths, cousin," she said pleasantly; "I'm sure
Pedvinn would never allow me half so much for mine."
At this moment there appeared, framed in the open window, the hideous
vision of an animated gargoyle, with elf-locks of flaming red, and an
intense malignancy of expression. With a finger dragging down the
under eyelid of either eye, so that the eyeball seemed to bulge
out--with a finger pulling back either corner of the wide mouth, so
that it seemed to touch the ear--this repulsive apparition leered at
the old man in blood-curdling fashion. Then catching sight of Mrs.
Poidevin, who sat dumfounded, and with her "heart in her mouth," as
she afterwards expressed it, the fingers dropped from the face, the
features sprang back into position, and the gargoyle resolved itself
into a buxom red-haired girl, who, bursting into a laugh, impudently
stuck her tongue out at them before skipping away.
The old man had cowered down in his chair with his hands over his
eyes; now he looked up. "I thought it was the old Judy," he said, "the
old Judy she is always telling me about. But it's only Margot."
"And who is Margot, cousin?" inquired Louisa, still shaken from the
surprise.
"She helps in the kitchen. But I don't like her. She pulls faces at
me, and jumps out upon me from behind doors. And when the wind blows
and the windows rattle she tells me about the old Judy from Jethou,
who is sailing over the sea on a broomstick, to come and beat me to
death. Do you know, my dear," he said piteously, "you'll think I'm
very silly, but I'm afraid up here by myself all alone? Do not leave
me, Louisa; stay with me, or take me back to town with you. Pedvinn
would let me have a room in your house, I'm sure? And you wouldn't
find me much trouble, and of course I would bring my own bed linen,
you know."
"You had best take your tea first, sir," said Mrs. Tourtel from
outside the window; she held scissors in her hand, and was busy
trimming the roses. She offered no excuse for eavesdropping.
The meal was set out, Island fashion, with abundant cakes and sweets.
Louisa saw in the silver tea-set another proof, if need be, of her
cousin's unfounded suspicions. Mrs. Tourtel stood in the background,
waiting. Renouf desired her to pack his things; he was going into
town. "To be sure, sir," she said civilly, and remained where she
stood. He brought a clenched hand down upon the table, so that the
china rattled. "Are you master here, or am I?" he cried; "I am going
down to my cousin Pedvinn's. To-morrow I shall send my notary to put
seals on everything, and to take an inventory. For the future I shall
live in town."
His senility had suddenly left him; he spoke with firmness; it was a
flash-up of almost extinct fires. Louisa was astounded. Mrs. Tourtel
looked at him steadily. Through the partition wall, Tourtel in the
kitchen heard the raised voice, and followed his curiosity into the
parlour. Margot followed him. Seen near, and with her features at
rest, she appeared a plump touzle-headed girl, in whose low forehead
and loose-lipped mouth, crassness, cruelty, and sensuality were
unmistakably expressed. Yet freckled cheek, rounded chin, and bare red
mottled arms, presented the beautiful curves of youth, and there was a
certain sort of attractiveness about her not to be gainsaid.
"Since my servants refuse to pack what I require," said Renouf with
dignity, "I will do it myself. Come with me, Louisa."
At a sign from the housekeeper, Tourtel and Margot made way. Mrs.
Poidevin would have followed her cousin, as the easiest thing to
do--although she was confused by the old man's outbreak, and incapable
of deciding what course she should take--when the deep vindictive
baying of the dog ushered a new personage upon the scene.
This was an individual who made his appearance from the kitchen
regions--a tall thin man of about thirty years of age, with a pallid
skin, a dark eye and a heavy moustache. His shabby black coat and tie,
with the cords and gaiters that clothed his legs, suggested a
combination of sportsman and family practitioner. He wore a bowler
hat, and was pulling off tan driving gloves as he advanced.
"Ah my good! Doctor Owen, but dat's you?" said Mrs. Tourtel. "But we
wants you here badly. Your patient is in one of his tantrums, and no
one can't do nuddin wid him. He says he shall go right away into town.
Wants to make up again wid Doctor Lelever for sure."
The new comer and Mrs. Poidevin were examining each other with the
curiosity one feels on first meeting a person long known by reputation
or by sight. But now she turned to the housekeeper in surprise.
"Has my cousin quarrelled with his old friend Doctor Lelever?" she
asked. "I've heard nothing of that."
"Ah, dis long time. He tought Doctor Lelever made too little of his
megrims. He won't have nobody but Dr. Owen now. P'r'aps you know
Doctor Owen, ma'am? Mrs. Pedvinn, Doctor; de master's cousin, come up
to visit him."
Renouf was heard moving about overhead; opening presses, dragging
boxes.
Owen hung up his hat, putting his gloves inside it. He rubbed his lean
discoloured hands lightly together, as a fly cleans its forelegs.
"Shall I just step up to him?" he said. "It may calm him, and distract
his thoughts."
With soft nimbleness, in a moment he was upstairs. "So that's Doctor
Owen?" observed Mrs. Poidevin with interest. "A splendid-looking
gentleman! He must be very clever, I'm sure. Is he beginning to get a
good practice yet?"
"Ah, bah, our people, as you know, ma'am, dey don't like no strangers,
specially no Englishmen. He was very glad when Mr. Renouf sent for
him.... 'Twas through Margot there. She got took bad one Saturday
coming back from market from de heat or de squidge" (crowd), "and
Doctor Owen he overtook her on the road in his gig, and druv her home.
Den de master, he must have a talk with him, and so de next time he
fancy hisself ill, he send for Doctor Owen, and since den he don't
care for Dr. Lelever no more at all."
"I ought to be getting off," remarked Mrs. Poidevin, remembering the
hour at which the omnibus left Vauvert; "had I better go up and bid
cousin Louis good-bye?"
Mrs. Tourtel thought Margot should go and ask the Doctor's opinion
first, but as Margot had already vanished, she went herself.
There was a longish pause, during which Mrs. Poidevin looked uneasily
at Tourtel; he with restless furtive eyes at her. Then the housekeeper
reappeared, noiseless, cool, determined as ever.
"Mr. Rennuf is quiet now," she said; "de Doctor have given him a
soothing draught, and will stay to see how it acts. He tinks you'd
better slip quietly away."
On this, Louisa Poidevin left Les Calais; but in spite of her easy
superficiality, her unreasoning optimism, she took with her a sense of
oppression. Cousin Louis's appeal rang in her ears: "Do not leave me;
stay with me, or take me back with you. I am afraid up here, quite
alone." And after all, though his fears were but the folly of old age,
why, she asked herself, should he not come and stay with them in town
if he wished to do so? She resolved to talk it over with Pedvinn; she
thought she would arrange for him the little west room, being the
furthest from the nurseries; and in planning out such vastly important
trifles as to which easy-chair and which bedroom candlestick she would
devote to his use, she forgot the old man himself and recovered her
usual stolid jocundity.