COME AT LAST.
Now, as if in all things Tom Thurnall and John Briggs were fated to
take opposite sides, Campbell lost ground with Elsley as fast as he
gained it with Thurnall. Elsley had never forgiven himself for his
passion that first morning. He had shown Campbell his weak side, and
feared and disliked him accordingly. Beside, what might not Thurnall
have told Campbell about him? And what use might not the Major make of
his secret? Besides, Elsley's dread and suspicion increased rapidly when
he discovered that Campbell was one of those men who live on terms of
peculiar intimacy with many women; whether for his own good or not,
still for the good of the women concerned. For only by honest purity,
and moral courage superior to that of the many, is that dangerous post
earned; and women will listen to the man who will tell them the truth,
however sternly; and will bow, as before a guardian angel, to the strong
insight of him whom they have once learned to trust. But it is a
dangerous office, after all, for layman as well as for priest, that of
father-confessor. The experience of centuries has shown that they must
needs exist, wherever fathers neglect their daughters, husbands their
wives; wherever the average of the women cannot respect the average of
the men. But the experience of centuries should likewise have taught
men, that the said father-confessors are no objects of envy; that their
temptations to become spiritual coxcombs (the worst species of all
coxcombs), if not intriguers, bullies, and worse, are so extreme, that
the soul which is proof against them must be either very great, or very
small indeed. Whether Campbell was altogether proof, will be seen
hereafter. But one day Elsley found out that such was Campbell's
influence, and did not love him the more for the discovery.
They were walking round the garden after dinner; Scoutbush was licking
his foolish lips over some commonplace tale of scandal.
"I tell you, my dear fellow, she's booked; and Mellot knows it as well
as I. He saw her that night at Lady A's."
"We saw the third act of the comi-tragedy. The fourth is playing out
now. We shall see the fifth before the winter."
"Non sine sanguine!" said the Major.
"Serve the wretched stick right, at least," said Scoutbush. "What right
had he to marry such a pretty woman?"
"What right had they to marry her up to him?" said Claude. "I don't
blame poor January. I suppose none of us, gentlemen, would have refused
such a pretty toy, if we could have afforded it as he could."
"Whom do you blame then?" asked Elsley.
"Fathers and mothers who prate hypocritically about keeping their
daughters' minds pure; and then abuse a girl's ignorance, in order to
sell her to ruin. Let them keep her mind pure, in heaven's name; but let
them consider themselves all the more bound in honour to use on her
behalf the experience in which she must not share."
"Well," drawled Scoutbush, "I don't complain of her bolting; she's a
very sweet creature, and always was: but, as Longreach says,--and a very
witty fellow he is, though you laugh at him,--'If she'd kept to us, I
shouldn't have minded: but as Guardsmen, we must throw her over. It's an
insult to the whole Guards, my dear fellow, after refusing two of us, to
marry an attorney, and after all to bolt with a plunger.'"
What bolting with a plunger might signify, Elsley knew not: but ere he
could ask, the Major rejoined, in an abstracted voice--
"God help us all! And this is the girl I recollect, two years ago,
singing there in Cavendish Square, as innocent as a nestling thrush!"
"Poor child!" said Mellot, "sold at first--perhaps sold again now. The
plunger has bills out, and she has ready money. I know her settlements."
"She shan't do it," said the Major quietly: "I'll write to her
to-night."
Elsley looked at him keenly. "You think, then, sir, that you can, by
simply writing, stop this intrigue?"
The Major did not answer. He was deep in thought.
"I shouldn't wonder if he did," said Scoutbush; "two to one on his
baulking the plunger!"
"She is at Lord ----'s now, at those silly private theatricals. Is he
there?"
"No," said Mellot; "he tried hard for an invitation--stooped to work me
and Sabina. I believe she told him that she would sooner see him in the
Morgue than help him; and he is gone to the moors now, I believe."
"There is time then: I will write to her to-night;" and Campbell took up
his hat and went home to do it.
"Ah," said Scoutbush, taking his cigar meditatively from his mouth, "I
wonder how he does it! It's a gift, I always say, a wonderful gift!
Before he has been a week in a house, he'll have the confidence of every
woman in it,--and 'gad, he does it by saying the rudest things!--and the
confidence of all the youngsters the week after."
"A somewhat dangerous gift," said Elsley, drily.
"Ah, yes; he might play tricks if he chose: but there's the wonder, that
he don't. I'd answer for him with my own sister. I do every day of my
life--for I believe he knows how many pins she puts into her dress--and
yet there he is. As I said once in the mess-room--there was a youngster
there who took on himself to be witty, and talked about the still sow
supping the milk--the snob! You recollect him, Mellot? the attorney's
son from Brompton, who sold out;--we shaved his mustachios, put a bear
in his bed, and sent him home to his ma--And he said that Major Campbell
might be very pious, and all that: but he'd warrant--they were the
fellow's own words,--that he took his lark on the sly, like other men--
the snob! so I told him, I was no better than the rest, and no more I
am; but if any man dared to say that the Major was not as honest as his
own sister, I was his man at fifteen paces. And so I am, Claude!"
All which did not increase Elsley's love to the Major, conscious as he
was that Lucia's confidence was a thing which he had not wholly; and
which it would be very dangerous to him for any other man to have at
all.
Into the drawing-room they went. Frank Headley had been asked up to tea;
and he stood at the piano, listening to Valencia's singing.
As they came in, the maid came in also. "Mr. Thurnall wished to speak to
Major Campbell."
Campbell went out, and returned in two minutes somewhat hurriedly.
"Mr. Thurnall wishes Lord Scoutbush to be informed at once, and I think
it is better that you should all know it--that--it is a painful
surprise:--but there is a man ill in the street, whose symptoms he does
not like, he says."
"Cholera?" said Elsley.
"Call him in," said Scoutbush.
"He had rather not come in, he says."
"What! is it infectious?"
"Certainly not, if it be cholera, but--"
"He don't wish to frighten people, quite right:" (with a half glance at
Elsley;) "but is it cholera, honestly?"
"I fear so."
"Oh, my children!" said poor Mrs. Vavasour.
"Will five pounds help the poor fellow?" said Scoutbush.
"How far off is it?" asked Elsley.
"Unpleasantly near. I was going to advise you to move at once."
"You hear what they are saying?" asked Valencia of Frank.
"Yes, I hear it," said Frank, in a quiet meaning tone.
Valencia thought that he was half pleased with the news. Then she
thought him afraid; for he did not stir.
"You will go instantly, of course?"
"Of course I shall. Good-bye! Do not be afraid. It is not infectious."
"Afraid? And a soldier's sister?" said Valencia, with a toss of her
beautiful head, by way of giving force to her somewhat weak logic.
Frank left the room instantly, and met Thurnall in the passage.
"Well, Headley, it's here before we sent for it, as bad luck usually
is."
"I know. Let me go! Where is it? Whose house?" asked Frank in an excited
tone.
"Humph!" said Thurnall, looking intently at him, "that is just what I
shall not tell you."
"Not tell me?"
"No, you are too pale, Headley. Go back and get two or three glasses of
wine, and then we will talk of it."
"What do you mean? I must go instantly! It is my duty,--my parishioner!"
"Look here, Headley! Are you and I to work together in this business, or
are we not?"
"Why not, in heaven's name?"
"Then I want you, not for cure, but for prevention. You can do them no
good when they have once got it. You may prevent dozens from having it
in the next four-and-twenty hours, if you will be guided by me."
"But my business is with their souls, Thurnall."
"Exactly;--to give them the consolations of religion, as they call it.
You will give them to the people who have not taken it. You may bring
them safe through it by simply keeping up their spirits; while if you
waste your time on poor dying wretches--"
"Thurnall, you must not talk so! I will do all you ask: but my place is
at the death-bed, as well as elsewhere. These perishing souls are in my
care."
"And how do you know, pray, that they are perishing?" answered Tom, with
something very like a sneer. "And if they were, do you honestly believe
that any talk of yours can change in five minutes a character which has
been forming for years, or prevent a man's going where he ought to go,--
which, I suppose, is the place to which he deserves to go?"
"I do," said Frank, firmly.
"Well. It is a charitable and hopeful creed. My great dread was, lest
you should kill the poor wretches before their time, by adding to the
fear of cholera the fear of hell. I caught the Methodist parson at that
work an hour ago, took him by the shoulders and shot him out into the
street. But, my dear Headley" (and Tom lowered his voice to a whisper),
"wherever poor Tom Beer deserved to go to, he is gone to it already. He
has been dead this twenty minutes."
"Tom Beer dead? One of the finest fellows in the town! And I never sent
for?"
"Don't speak so loud, or they will hear you. I had no time to send for
you; and if I had, I should not have sent, for he was past attending to
you from the first. He brought it with him, I suppose, from C----. Had
had warnings for a week, and neglected them. Now listen to me: that man
was but two hours ill; as sharp a case as I ever saw, even in the West
Indies. You must summon up all your good sense, and play the man for a
fortnight; for it's coming on the poor souls like hell!" said Tom
between his teeth, and stamped his foot upon the ground. Frank had never
seen him show so much feeling; he fancied he could see tears glistening
in his eyes.
"I will, so help me God!" said Frank.
Tom held out his hand, and grasped Frank's.
"I know you will. You're all right at heart. Only mind three things:
don't frighten them; don't tire yourself; don't go about on an empty
stomach; and then we can face the worst like men. And now go in, and say
nothing to these people. If they take a panic we shall have some of them
down to-night as sure as fate. Go in, keep quiet, persuade them to bolt
anywhere on earth by daylight to-morrow. Then go home, eat a good
supper, and come across to me; and if I'm out, I'll leave word where."
Frank went back again; he found Campbell, who had had his cue from Tom,
urging immediate removal as strongly as he could, without declaring the
extent of the danger. Valencia was for sending instantly for a fly to
the nearest town, and going to stay at a watering-place some forty miles
off. Elsley was willing enough at heart, but hesitated; he knew not, at
the moment, poor fellow, where to find the money. His wife knew that she
could borrow of Valencia; but she, too, was against the place. The
cholera would be in the air for miles round. The journey in the hot sun
would make the children sick and ill; and watering-place lodgings were
such horrid holes, never ventilated, and full of smells--people caught
fevers at them so often. Valencia was inclined to treat this as
"mother's nonsense;" but Major Campbell said gravely, that Mrs. Vavasour
was perfectly right as to fact, and her arguments full of sound reason;
whereon Valencia said that "of course if Lucia thought it, Major
Campbell would prove it; and there was no arguing with such Solons as
he--"
Which Elsley heard, and ground his teeth. Whereon little Scoutbush cried
joyfully,--
"I have it; why not go by sea? Take the yacht, and go! Where? Of course
I have it again. 'Pon my word I'm growing clever, Valencia, in spite of
all your prophecies. Go up the Welsh coast. Nothing so healthy and airy
as a sea-voyage: sea as smooth as a mill-pond, too, and likely to be.
And then land, if you like, at Port Madoc, as I meant to do; and there
are my rooms at Beddgelert lying empty. Engaged them a week ago,
thinking I should be there by now; so you may as well keep them aired
for me. Come, Valencia, pack up your millinery! Lucia, get the cradles
ready, and we'll have them all on board by twelve. Capital plan,
Vavasour, isn't if? and, by Jove, what stunning poetry you will write
there under Snowdon!"
"But will you not want your rooms yourself, Lord Scoutbush?" said
Elsley.
"My dear fellow, never mind me. I shall go across the country, I think,
see an old friend, and get some otter-hunting. Don't think of me, till
you're there, and then send the yacht back for me. She must be doing
something, you know; and the men are only getting drunk every day here.
Come--no arguing about it, or I shall turn you all out of doors into the
lane, eh?"
And the little fellow laughed so good-naturedly, that Elsley could not
help liking him: and feeling that he would be both a fool, and cruel to
his family, if he refused so good an offer, he gave in to the scheme,
and went out to arrange matters: while Scoutbush went out into the hall
with Campbell, and scrambled into his pea-jacket, to go off to the yacht
that moment.
"You'll see to them, there's a good fellow," as they lighted their
cigars at the door. "That Vavasour is greener than grass, you know,
_tant pis_ for my poor sister."
"I am not going."
"Not going?"
"Certainly not; so my rooms will be at their service; and you had much
better escort them yourself. It will be much less disagreeable for
Vavasour, who knows nothing of commanding sailors," or himself, thought
the Major, "than finding himself master of your yacht in your absence,
and you will get your fishing as you intended."
"But why are you going to stay?"
"Oh, I have not half done with the sea-beasts here. I found too new ones
yesterday."
"Quaint old beetle-hunter you are, for a man who has fought in
half-a-dozen battles!" and Scoutbush walked on silently for five minutes.
Suddenly he broke out--
"I cannot! By George, I cannot; and what's more, I won't!"
"What?"
"Run away. It will look so--so cowardly, and there's the truth of it,
before those fine fellows down there: and just as I am come among them,
too! The commander-in-chief to turn tail at the first shot! Though I
can't be of any use, I know, and I should have liked a fortnight's
fishing so," said he in a dolorous voice, "before going to be eaten up
with flies at Varna--for this Crimean expedition is all moonshine."
"Don't be too sure of that," said Campbell. "We shall go; and some of us
who go will never come back, Freddy. I know those Russians better than
many, and I have been talking them over lately with Thurnall, who has
been in their service."
"Has he been at Sevastopol?"
"No. Almost the only place on earth where he has not been: but from all
he says, and from all I know, we are undervaluing our foes, as usual,
and shall smart for it!"
"We'll lick them, never fear!"
"Yes; but not at the first round. Scoutbush, your life has been child's
play as yet. You are going now to see life in earnest,--the sort of life
which average people have been living, in every age and country, since
Adam's fall; a life of sorrow and danger, tears and blood, mistake,
confusion, and perplexity; and you will find it a very new sensation;
and, at first, a very ugly one. All the more reason for doing what good
deeds you can before you go; for you may have no time left to do any on
the other side of the sea."
Scoutbush was silent awhile.
"Well; I'm afraid of nothing, I hope: only I wish one could meet this
cholera face to face, as one will those Russians, with a good sword in
one's hand, and a good horse between one's knees; and have a chance of
giving him what he brings, instead of being kicked off by the cowardly
Rockite, no one knows how; and not even from behind a turf dyke, but out
of the very clouds."
"So we all say, in every battle, Scoutbush. Who ever sees the man who
sent the bullet through him? And yet we fight on. Do you not think the
greatest terror, the only real terror, in any battle, is the chance
shot? which come from no one knows where, and hit no man can guess whom?
If you go to the Crimea, as you will, you will feel what I felt at the
Cape, and Cabul, and the Punjab, twenty times,--the fear of dying like a
dog, one knew not how."
"And yet I'll fight, Campbell!"
"Of course you will, and take your chance. Do so now!"
"By Jove, Campbell--I always say it--you're the most sensible man I ever
met; and, by Jove, the doctor comes the next. My sister shall have the
yacht, and I'll go up to Penalva."
"You will do two good deeds at once, then," said the Major. "You will do
what is right, and you will give heart to many a poor wretch here.
Believe me, Scoutbush, you will never repent of this."
"By Jove, it always does one good to hear you talk in that way,
Campbell! One feels--I don't know--so much of a man when one is with
you; not that I shan't take uncommonly good care of myself, old fellow;
that is but fair: but as for running away, as I said, why--why--why I
can't, and so I won't!"
"By the by," said the Major, "there is one thing which I have forgotten,
and which they will never recollect. Is the yacht victualled--with fresh
meat and green stuff, I mean?"
"Whew--w--"
"I will go back, borrow a lantern, and forage in the garden, like an old
campaigner. I have cut a salad with my sword before now."
"And made it in your helmet, with macassar sauce?" And the two went
their ways.
Meanwhile, before they had left the room, a notable conversation had
been going on between Valencia and Headley.
Headley had re-entered the room so much paler than he went out, that
everybody noticed his altered looks. Valencia chose to attribute them to
fear.
"So! Are you returned from the sick man already, Mr. Headley?" asked
she, in a marked tone.
"I have been forbidden by the doctor to go near him at present, Miss St.
Just," said he quietly, but in a sort of under-voice, which hinted that
he wished her to ask no more questions. A shade passed over her
forehead, and she began chatting rather noisily to the rest of the
party, till Elsley, her brother, and Campbell went out.
Valencia looked up at him, expecting him to go too. Mrs. Vavasour began
bustling about the room, collecting little valuables, and looking over
her shoulders at the now unwelcome guest. But Frank leaned back in a
cosy arm-chair, and did not stir. His hands were clasped on his knees;
he seemed lost in thought; very pale: but there was a firm set look
about his lips which attracted Valencia's attention. Once he looked up
in Valencia's face, and saw that she was looking at him. A flush came
over his cheeks for a moment, and then he seemed as impassive as ever.
What could he want there! How very gauche and rude of him; so unlike
him, too! And she said, civilly enough, to him, "I fear, Mr. Headley, we
must begin packing up now."
"I fear you must, indeed," answered he, as if starting from a dream. He
spoke in a tone, and with a look, which made both the women start; for
what they meant it was impossible to doubt.
"I fear you must. I have foreseen it a long time; and so, I fear (and he
rose from his seat), must I, unless I mean to be very rude. You will at
least take away with you the knowledge, that you have given to one
person's existence, at least for a few weeks, pleasure more intense than
he thought earth could hold."
"I trust that pretty compliment was meant for me," said Lucia, half
playful, half reproving.
"I am sure that it ought not to have been meant for me," said Valencia,
more downright than her sister. Both could see for whom it was meant, by
the look of passionate worship which Frank fixed on a face which, after
all, seemed made to be worshipped.
"I trust that neither of you," answered he, quietly, "think me
impertinent enough to pretend to make love, as it is called, to Miss St.
Just. I know who she is, and who I am. Gentleman as I am, and the
descendant of gentlemen" (and Frank looked a little proud, as he spoke,
and very handsome), "I see clearly enough the great gulf fixed between
us; and I like it; for it enables me to say truth which I otherwise dare
not have spoken; as a brother might say to a sister, or a subject to a
queen. Either analogy will do equally well and equally ill."
Frank, without the least intending it, had taken up the very strongest
military position. Let a man once make a woman understand, or fancy,
that he knows that he is nothing to her; and confess boldly that there
is a great gulf fixed between them, which he has no mind to bridge over:
and then there is little that he may not see or do, for good or for
evil.
And therefore it was that Lucia answered gently, "I am sure you are not
well, Mr. Headley. The excitement of the night has been too much for
you."
"Do I look excited, my dear madam?" he answered quietly. "I assure you
that I am as calm as a man must be who believes that he has but a few
days to live, and trusts, too, that when he dies, he will be infinitely
happier than he ever has been on earth, and lay down an office which he
has never discharged otherwise than ill; which has been to him a
constant source of shame and sorrow."
"Do not speak so!" said Valencia, with her Irish impetuous generosity;
"you are unjust to yourself. We have watched you, felt for you, honoured
you, even when we differed from you"--What more she would have said, I
know not, but at that moment Elsley's peevish voice was heard calling
over the stairs, "Lucia! Lucia?"
"Oh dear! He will wake the children!" cried Lucia, looking at her
sister, as much as to say, "How can I leave you!"
"Run, run, my dear creature!" said Valencia, with a self-confident
smile: and the two were left alone.
The moment that Mrs. Vavasour left the room, there vanished from Frank's
face that intense look of admiration which had made even Valencia
uneasy. He dropped his eyes, and his voice faltered as he spoke again.
He acknowledged the change in their position, and Valencia saw that he
did so, and liked him the better for it.
"I shall not repeat, Miss St. Just, now that we are alone, what I said
just now of the pleasure which I have had during the last month. I am
not poetical, or given to string metaphors together; and I could only go
over the same dull words once more. But I could ask, if I were not
asking too much, leave to prolong at least a shadow of that pleasure to
the last moment. That I shall die shortly, and of this cholera, is with
me a fixed idea, which nothing can remove. No, madam--it is useless to
combat it! But had I anything, by which to the last moment I could bring
back to my fancy what has been its sunlight for so long; even if it were
a scrap of the hem of your garment, aye, a grain of dust off your feet--
God forgive me! He and His mercy ought to be enough to keep me up: but
one's weakness may be excused for clinging to such slight floating
straws of comfort."
Valencia paused, startled, and yet affected. How she had played with
this deep pure heart! And yet, was it pure? Did he wish, by exciting her
pity, to trick her into giving him what he might choose to consider a
token of affection?
And she answered coldly enough--
"I should be sorry, after what you have just said, to chance hurting you
by refusing. I put it to your own good feeling--have you not asked
somewhat too much?"
"Certainly too much, madam, in any common case," said he, quite unmoved.
"Certainly too much, if I asked you for it, as I do not, as the token of
an affection which I know well you do not, cannot feel. But--take my
words as they stand--were you to--It would be returned if I die, in a
few weeks; and returned still sooner if I live. And, madam," said he
lowering his voice, "I vow to you, before Him who sees us both, that, as
far as I am concerned, no human being shall ever know of the fact."
Frank had at last touched the wrong chord.
"What, Mr. Headley? Can you think that I am to have secrets in common
with you, or with any other man? No, sir! If I granted your request, I
should avow it as openly as I shall refuse it."
And she turned sharply toward the door.
Frank Headley was naturally a shy man: but extreme need sometimes
bestows on shyness a miraculous readiness--(else why, in the long run,
do the shy men win the best wives? which is a fact, and may be proved by
statistics, at least as well as anything else can) so he quietly stepped
to Valencia's side, and said in a low voice--
"You cannot avow the refusal half as proudly as I shall avow the
request, if you will but wait till your sister's return. Both are
unnecessary, I think: but it will only be an honour to me to confess,
that, poor curate as I am--"
"Hush!" and Valencia walked quietly up to the table, and began turning
over the leaves of a book, to gain time for her softened heart and
puzzled brain.
In five minutes Frank was beside her again. The book was Tennyson's
"Princess." She had wandered--who can tell why?--to that last exquisite
scene, which all know; and as Valencia read, Frank quietly laid a finger
on the book, and arrested her eyes at last--
"If you be, what I think you, some sweet dream.
Stoop down, and seem to kiss me ere I die!"
Valencia shut the book up hurriedly and angrily. A moment after she had
made up her mind what to do, and with the slightest gesture in the
world, motioned Frank proudly and coldly to follow her back into the
window. Had she been a country girl, she would have avoided the ugly
matter; but she was a woman of the world enough to see that she must,
for her own sake and his, talk it out reasonably.
"What do you mean, Mr. Headley? I must ask! You told me just now that
you had no intention of making love to me."
"I told you the truth," said he, in his quiet impassive voice. "I fixed
on these lines as a _pis aller_; and they have done all and more than I
wished, by bringing you back here for at least a moment."
"And do you suppose--you speak like a rational man, therefore, I must
treat you as one--that I can grant your request?"
"Why not? It is an uncommon one. If I have guessed your character
aright, you are able to do uncommon things. Had I thought you enslaved
by etiquette, and by the fear of a world which you can make bow at your
feet if you will, I should not have asked you. But,"--and here his voice
took a tone of deepest earnestness--"grant it--only grant it, and you
shall never repent it. Never, never, never will I cast one shadow over a
light which has been so glorious, so life-giving; which I watched with
delight, and yet lose without regret. Go your way, and God be with you!
I go mine; grant me but a fortnight's happiness, and then, let what will
come!"
He had conquered. The quiet earnestness of the voice, the child-like
simplicity of the manner, of which every word conveyed the most delicate
flattery--yet, she could see, without intending to flatter, without an
after-thought--all these had won the impulsive Irish nature. For all the
dukes and marquises in Belgravia she would not have done it; for they
would have meant more than they said, even when they spoke more
clumsily: but for the plain country curate she hesitated, and asked
herself, "What shall I give him?"
The rose from her bosom? No. That was too significant at once, and too
commonplace; besides, it might wither, and he find an excuse for not
restoring it. It must be something valuable, stately, formal, which he
must needs return. And she drew off a diamond hoop, and put it quietly
into his hand.
"You promise to return if?"
"I promised long ago."
He took it, and lifted it--she thought that he was going to press it to
his lips. Instead, he put it to his forehead, bowing forward and moved
it slightly. She saw that he made with it the sign of the Cross.
"I thank you," he said, with a look of quiet gratitude. "I expected as
much, when you came to understand my request. Again, thank you!" and he
drew back humbly, and left her there alone; while her heart smote her
bitterly for all the foolish encouragement which she had given to one so
tender and humble, and delicate and true.
And so did Frank Headley get what he wanted; by that plain earnest
simplicity, which has more power (let worldlings pride themselves as
they will on their knowledge of women) than all the cunning wiles of the
most experienced rake; and only by aping which, after all, can the rake
conquer. It was a strange thing for Valencia to do, no doubt: but the
strange things which are done in the world (which are some millions
daily) are just what keep the world alive.