WILMINGDON HALL.
Lionel Westford yielded to the influence of the bright face which had
looked at him so compassionately in the moment of his despair. He
gave way to the temptation against which he had struggled resolutely
and manfully, only to break down in the end; and he wrote to Rupert
Godwin, accepting the engagement offered him.
Before writing this letter the young man called upon an old college
companion, a shallow-minded but kind-hearted young idler, from whom
he had kept aloof since his reverse of fortune. It was very much
against the grain that he went to ask a favour at the hands of this
gentleman, but he had no alternative. Mr. Godwin required some
testimony as to the respectability of the stranger whom he was to
admit into his household, and Frederick Dudley, his once familiar
chum, was the only person to whom Lionel could apply.
Mr. Dudley willingly consented to testify to his old friend’s merits.
He knew very little of the changes that had befallen the Westfords,
and he jumped at once to the conclusion that Lionel’s assumption of a
false name was only a part of some romantic scheme.
“I see it all, Westford,” exclaimed the young man, “though you are
so confoundedly close with a fellow. It’s a love affair, that’s what
it is; you’ve fallen head over heels in love with this old fogy’s
handsome daughter--I’ve met Julia Godwin in society, and a remarkably
fine girl she is, though not _my_ style--and you want to get into the
house disguised as a poor artist. Quite a romantic dodge, upon my
word, and I envy you the spirits for the adventure! I’m so deucedly
used-up myself that I should never have thought of such a thing. Come
now, confess that I’ve hit it;--eh, old boy?”
“I can confess nothing,” answered Lionel; “but I must not allow you
to entertain any false ideas with regard to Miss Godwin. I have
only seen that young lady once in my life, and then only for a few
minutes.”
“Very likely, my dear boy; and for all that you may be awfully in
love with her. There’s such a thing as love at first sight, you
know, if we’re to believe those prosy old poets. I don’t understand
the thing myself; but then I’m so deucedly used-up. I have not
experienced the tender passion since I was spoony on a pretty little
pastrycook at Eton,” added the young simpleton, whose moustache had
only lately begun to sprout.
“At any rate, I may rely upon your kind offices, Dudley?” asked
Lionel, as he prepared to leave his friend’s chambers.
“You shall have them with all my heart, dear boy. But you’ll stop
to luncheon, won’t you? I can give you a grilled chicken, and a dry
sherry that you’ll not match every day in the week. I shall so enjoy
a smoke and a chat with you. It will recall the old times, you know,
when we were young and fresh. What have you been doing with yourself
lately, old fellow? I haven’t seen you for the last six months.”
“No, my dear Dudley,” answered Lionel; “and very few of my friends
have seen me during that time.”
“Why not?”
“Because your world is no longer my world. Since my poor father was
lost at sea, a great change has taken place in my fortunes. Such
lucky young scapegraces as you can no longer be my companions, for I
have entered the ranks of the breadwinners.”
“But, my dear Lionel,” exclaimed the young man, “surely your friends
could be of some service to you! I haven’t a very large balance at my
banker’s, for the relieving officer has all the parochial hardness of
heart, but so far as it goes it is entirely at your disposal.”
Lionel wrung his friend’s hand with a grateful pressure.
“My dear Fred, I know what a good fellow you are, and I thank you
most heartily; but I am now certain of employment which will be
tolerably remunerative. Good-bye, old friend!”
“And you don’t like me well enough to borrow a few tenners just to
carry on the war with?”
“No, thanks, Dudley; I can do without the tenners, if I get the five
pounds a week Mr. Godwin is willing to give me for some very easy
work.”
“Do you want an introduction to my tailor? I keep the fellow an
unconscionable time waiting for his money, but I make a point of
recommending him to my friends. What a pity a fellow’s friends have
such a knack of going through the Bankruptcy Court, by the way! It
takes so much off the value of one’s introductions. Shall I give you
a line to my snip?”
“No, dear boy, I’ll not victimise him, this time. I have the remnant
of my University extravagances in that way, and can make a decent
appearance at Wilmingdon Hall.”
“You will come and see me again, dear boy?”
“Yes, when my position has improved; until then, good-bye.”
Three days after this interview, Lionel Westford left King’s Cross on
his way to Hertfordshire. For the first time in his life the young
man had told his mother a falsehood. He had told her that artistic
work had been offered him in the town of Hertford, and that he was
about to occupy himself for a few weeks in that place.
Clara Westford was grieved at the thought of even a brief separation
from her son; but she had seen his spirit drooping, and a dark cloud
upon his brow, so she was glad to think that he would have employment
and change of scene. Lionel’s conscience upbraided him cruelly as he
left that devoted mother; and yet he tried to reason with himself
against his scruples. Was not Rupert Godwin’s money as good as that
of any other man? and would it not purchase comfort for that dear
patient sufferer? and was he, Lionel Westford the pauper, to fling
away the chance of fortune because it was offered by the banker’s
hand?
Thus it was that he went to Wilmingdon Hall. Rupert Godwin had
only yielded to a caprice of his daughter’s when he consented to
engage the young artist. Julia’s influence over her father was
almost unbounded. The cold heart for her grew warm and human; the
remorseless nature became softened. Rupert Godwin hated his son; for
he knew that the young man had read the secrete of his inner nature,
and despised him. He hated his son; but he loved his beautiful
daughter with a morbid and exaggerated affection, and there were few
requests of hers which he cared to refuse.
At any other time Mr. Godwin might certainly have been inclined to
question the prudence of his daughter’s views with regard to the
stranger whose desperate condition had excited her compassion. He
was by no means given to the Quixotic impulses which were common
to Julia’s nature; and whatever benefits he had bestowed upon his
fellow creatures had been given in obedience to the prejudices of
society rather than to the impulses of his own heart. At another time
he would have sided with the outraged guardian of his daughter’s
youth, and would have protested against Julia’s philanthropic schemes
as absurd and impracticable. Julia had been prepared to encounter
such opposition, and had been just a little inclined to repent her
somewhat precipitate offer of employment in the interval which
elapsed between her meeting with Lionel Westford and her father’s
next flying visit to Hertfordshire.
To her surprise, however, the young lady met with only the faintest
possible opposition. Of late Rupert Godwin’s mind had been entirely
occupied by one all-absorbing care, and he had grown strangely
indifferent to the details of his daily life.
He made one or two peevish objections to Julia’s proposition, and
then gave way to her wish, but not with the good grace with which he
had once been accustomed to grant a favour asked by that fondly loved
daughter.
“You want me to write to this young man,” he said half absently,
as if it were almost too much trouble for him to concentrate his
thoughts for even a few moments on the subject in question. “Very
well, Julia--very well; I will write. Don’t worry me any further
about the business. I think the whole affair very absurd, but you
must have your wish. What does it matter?”
“What does it matter?” That was a phrase which Rupert Godwin had
used very frequently of late when called upon to discuss the trifles
that make up the sum of existence. These things had become of such
complete indifference to him, and it seemed to him that people
made such fuss and noise about the petty details that appeared so
contemptible in his eyes;--in his eyes, before which for ever loomed
one dark awful shape, the shadow whereof shut out all other things
from his sight.
* * * * *
Lionel Westford arrived at the Hall in the afternoon of a brilliant
August day. Not a leaf stirred in the verdant depths of the park, not
a blade of grass was ruffled by a passing breeze. The lake, lying in
a green hollow overshadowed by spreading chestnuts and beeches, was
smooth as the face of a mirror, and reflected the rich blue of the
cloudless summer sky.
Lionel had been for many months a prisoner in the dreary desert of
London;--London, which is a delightful city for the denizens of
Mayfair or Belgravia, who, if called upon to make a map of the
British capital, would place its centre at Apsley House, and its
eastern boundary on the further side of Regent-street; but a dismal
abode for those needy wayfarers who contemplate it from the purlieus
of the New-cut. For months he had looked only on shabby houses, close
streets whose blackened walls shut out the light of day; and the
pleasantest sound which had announced to him the advent of summer had
been the shrill cry of the costermonger vending his “Cauliflow-vers!”
to the small householders of the neighbourhood. So it was that,
entering the banker’s grand old domain, a kind of intoxication stole
over his senses. He looked about him, and drew a deep inspiration--a
long breath of rapture. His chest heaved, his head was lifted to the
summer sky, his step grew elastic as he trod the crisp springy turf.
“It is a paradise!” he exclaimed--“a paradise, and she is its queen!”
The distance from the lodge-gates to the house was a long one.
Lionel had left his portmanteau at the lodge, and had there obtained
instructions as to the nearest road to the Hall. The lodge-keeper
had directed him to go by a narrow pathway winding through a thick
shrubbery, and leading past the grotto and fernery.
In the depths of this leafy arcade a solemn gloom prevailed, even on
this brilliant summer day; and as Lionel Westford advanced further
into that forest darkness, the sombre twilight of the place, together
with its perfect stillness, produced a strange effect upon his mind.
He was no longer elated, he was no longer carried away by a sense of
rapture. On the contrary, he felt all at once strangely depressed; a
mysterious burden seemed to weigh down his heart. It was almost as
if there had been something stifling in the very atmosphere of that
luxuriant shrubbery. And under this strange influence even the image
of Julia Godwin faded out of the young man’s mind. All other feelings
seemed absorbed by that mysterious sensation, the nature of which he
could not define.
He quickened his pace. The solitude of the scene was distasteful to
him. He hurried on, eager to reach the Hall, eager to behold human
faces, to hear cheerful voices.
After walking a considerable distance, he came at last to a spot
which he recognized as the grotto and fernery.
The spot was darker, wilder, and more solitary than any other part of
Wilmingdon Park.
Great craggy masses of limestone and granite were mingled with the
ruins of some classic temple; and amongst the broken pillars and the
rugged rockwork the ferns grew high in rank luxuriance.
A small cascade trickled noiselessly amongst the moss-grown stones,
and dropped into a smooth pool of water--a pool that looked as if
beneath its quiet surface there lurked a treacherous depth.
“It looks like a spot that has been blighted by the influence of
some evil deed,” thought Lionel, as he paused for a few moments to
contemplate the scene. “It looks like a place upon which the red hand
of murder had set its stamp. I could fancy some Eugene Aram lying
in wait for his victim behind one of those Doric columns, prepared
to shoot him through the head, and then drop him quietly to the
bottom of that pool. It’s the sort of place a Highlander would call
‘uncanny.’”
While this thought was still in his mind he was startled by long
melancholy moan, which sounded near him.
Lionel Westford inherited his father’s courage, and yet his heart
sank within him as he heard that strange unearthly utterance.
The hardiest nature succumbs, for a moment at least, beneath the
influence of the supernatural.
But that sudden thrill of fear passed with the moment.
“Pshaw!” exclaimed the young man; “the sound was human enough, I
daresay, though it was awfully like the wail of a departed soul. I
have only to discover its cause. It seemed to come from behind this
rockery.”
As he said this, Lionel Westford walked round the irregular pile of
stonework, and speedily discovered whence that mysterious moaning had
proceeded.
An old man, dressed in a suit of well-worn corduroy, was sitting on a
block of moss-grown stone, with his elbows resting on his bony knees,
and his face hidden in his tanned and withered hands.
He seemed very old, for long thin locks of snowy whiteness fell over
his spare shoulders. He was evidently employed about the grounds, for
gardening implements lay on the grass near him.
As Lionel stood looking at this strange figure, the dismal moan was
repeated.
Then the old man spoke.
“O Lord, O Lord!” he cried, “it’s dreadful to bear; it’s dreadful,
dreadful, dreadful!”
This time Lionel Westford’s only feeling was one of compassion.
He laid his hand lightly upon the gardener’s shoulder. The old man
started to his feet as if under the influence of a galvanic shock.
The face he turned towards Lionel was blanched with fear, and his
whole frame was shaken by a convulsive trembling.
“Who are you?” he gasped. “Who are you, and where did come from?”
“I am a perfect stranger here,” answered Lionel. “I heard you moaning
just now, and naturally felt anxious to discover the cause of your
distress.”
“A stranger!” repeated the old man in a hoarse whisper, wiping the
sweat-drops from his forehead as he spoke. “A stranger! Are you sure
of that?--eh?”
He peered earnestly into Lionel’s frank face, as if he would fain
have read the truth there.
“Yes, yes,” he muttered; “I see you don’t deceive me. You _are_ a
stranger to this dreadful place. But just now I was talking, wasn’t
I? I talk sometimes without knowing it. I’m an old man, and my
brain’s getting muddled. Did I say much--did I say anything--anything
queer--anything that made your blood run cold and your hair stand on
end?--eh?”
Lionel Westford looked compassionately at the old gardener.
What could this be but madness, or at least the cloudy twilight of a
fading mind, through which there flitted the dark and hideous shadows
of delirium?
“My good man, there is no occasion for this distress,” Lionel said
gently. “You said nothing, except that something or other was
dreadful. Pray calm yourself. It was only the sound of your moaning
that attracted me here.”
“And I said nothing? Ah! but I say queer things sometimes--very queer
things! But there’s no meaning in ’em--no meaning; no more meaning
than there is in the screeching of them old ravens as you’ll hear
sometimes in this here shrubbery. They’re as old as I am and older,
them ravens, and they screeches awful sometimes after dark. _That_
sounds dreadful; but there’s nothing in it. I’m a very old man. I’ve
served the Godwins, man and boy, for seventy years. I remember this
Mr. Godwin--Rupert Godwin--a baby; and I remember his father a boy--a
bright-faced, free-hearted boy; not dark and silent, like this one,
but bright and open; the right sort he was--yes, the right sort. I’ve
served ’em long, and faithful; and they’ve been good masters to me.
It isn’t likely that I should turn against ’em and betray ’em, now
I’m an old man. Is it?”
“Of course not,” answered Lionel. “What should you have to betray?”
“No, no,” muttered the old gardener, speaking to himself rather than
to Lionel, “it isn’t likely. I’ve eaten their bread for seventy
years, and it isn’t likely I should speak agen ’em, though I feel now
sometimes as if that bread would choke me. But I musn’t be talking,
sir; I musn’t stand talking here to you, for I say queer things
sometimes, only there’s no meaning in ’em; mind that--there’s never
any meaning in ’em.”
The old man shouldered his spade and walked off, leaving Lionel very
much bewildered by his manner.
“Mad!” thought the young man. “Mad! Poor old fellow; I wonder the
banker doesn’t pension off such an old servant. I should scarcely
like to have such a melancholy object about my place, if I were Mr.
Godwin. _Frère, il faut mourir!_ The man must be a perpetual reminder
of the horrors of old age.”
Lionel Westford walked on a few paces further, and presently emerged
from the shrubberies on to a smooth lawn, across which he saw the
grand old mansion that had sheltered so many noble inhabitants.
In a moment the recollection of the mad old gardener was blotted out
of his mind. He thought only of that radiant vision which had so
bewitched and enchanted him a week before in the printseller’s shop.
He could only think of the wondrous dark eyes of Julia Godwin.
He arrived at the house, and was received by a stately butler, who
ushered him immediately up the broad staircase and along a corridor,
out of which a great many doors opened. One of these doors was
thrown open by the aristocratic butler, and Lionel found himself in
a comfortably furnished sitting-room, out of which there opened a
bedroom and dressing-room.
These were the apartments which the housekeeper had caused to be
prepared for the artist. Lionel could but compare their simple though
luxurious furniture with the dingy curtains and meagre-looking
weak-legged chairs and tables of the shabby lodging in which he had
left his mother and sister.
He seated himself before a table near the window, on which a large
portfolio had been placed ready for him, and began to consider his
work without further delay. But his mind was oppressed by the thought
that he was acting a treacherous part towards both his mother and
Rupert Godwin; and the image of the half-imbecile old gardener
mingled itself strangely with the radiant vision of Julia in all her
proud young beauty.