Ring, ring, ring, broke forth the chimes on the frosty midday air. Not
midnight, you perceive, but midday, for the church clock had just given
forth its twelve strokes. Another round of the dial, and the old year
would have departed into the womb of the past.
Bowling along the smooth turnpike road which skirted the churchyard
on one side came a gig containing a gentleman, a tall, slender,
frank-looking young man, with a fair face and the pleasantest blue eyes
ever seen. He wore a white top-coat, the fashion then, and was driving
rapidly in the direction of Leet Hall; but when the chimes burst forth
he pulled up abruptly.
"Why, what in the world----" he began--and then sat still listening to
the sweet strains of "The Bay of Biscay." The day, though in mid-winter,
was bright and beautiful, and the golden sunlight, shining from the
dark-blue sky, played on the young man's golden hair.
"Have they mistaken midday for midnight?" he continued, as the chimes
played out their tune and died away on the air. "What's the meaning of
it?"
He, Harry Carradyne, was not the only one to ask this. No human being
in and about Church Leet, save Captain Monk and they who executed his
orders, knew that he had decreed that the chimes should play that day at
midday. Why did he do it? What could his motive be? Surely not that they
should, by playing (according to Mrs. Carradyne's theory), inaugurate
ill-luck for Eliza! At the moment they began to play she was coming out
of church on Mr. Hamlyn's arm, having left her maiden name behind her.
A few paces more, for he was driving gently on now, and Harry pulled up
again, in surprise, as before, for the front of the church was now in
view. Lots of spectators, gentle and simple, stood about, and a handsome
chariot, with four post-horses and a great coat-of-arms emblazoned on
its panels, waited at the church gate.
"It must be a wedding!" decided Harry.
The next moment the chariot was in motion; was soon about to pass him,
the bride and bridegroom within it. A very dark but good-looking man,
with an air of command in his face, he, but a stranger to Harry; she,
Eliza. She wore a grey silk dress, a white bonnet, with orange blossoms
and a veil, which was quite the fashionable wedding attire of the day.
Her head was turned, nodding its farewells yet to the crowd, and she did
not see her cousin as the chariot swept by.
"Dear me!" he exclaimed, mentally. "I wonder who she has married?"
Staying quietly where he was until the spectators should have dispersed,
whose way led them mostly in opposite directions, Harry next saw the
clerk come out of the church by the small vestry door, lock it and cross
over to the stile: which brought him out close to the gig.
"Why, my heart alive!" he exclaimed. "Is it Captain Carradyne?"
"That's near enough," said Harry, who knew the title was accorded him by
the rustic natives of Church Leet, as he bent down with his sunny smile
to shake the old clerk's hand. "You are hearty as ever, I see, John. And
so you have had a wedding here?"
"Ay, sir, there have been one in the church. I was not in my place,
though. The Captain, he ordered me to let the church go for once, and to
be ready up aloft in the belfry to set the chimes going at midday. As
chance had it, the party came out just at the same time; Miss Eliza was
a bit late in coming, ye see; so it may be said the chimes rang 'em out.
I guess the sound astonished the people above a bit, for nobody knew
they were going to play."
"But how was it all, Cale? Why should the Captain order them to chime at
midday?"
John Cale shook his head. "I can't tell ye that rightly, Mr. Harry; the
Captain, as ye know, sir, never says why he does this or why he does
t'other. Young William Threpp, who had to be up there with me, thought
he must have ordered 'em to play in mockery--for he hates the marriage
like poison."
"Who is the bridegroom?"
"It's a Mr. Hamlyn, sir. A gentleman who is pretty nigh as haughty as
the Captain himself; but a pleasant-spoken, kindly man, as far as I've
seen: and a rich one, too."
"Why did Captain Monk object to him?"
"It's thought 'twas because he was a stranger to the place and has lived
over in the Indies; and he wanted Miss Eliza, so it's said, to have
young Tom Rivers. That's about it, I b'lieve, Mr. Harry."
Harry Carradyne drove away thoughtfully. At the foot of the slight
ascent leading to Leet Hall, one of the grooms happened to be standing.
Harry handed over to him the horse and gig, and went forward on foot.
"Bertie!" he called out. For he had seen Hubert before him, walking at a
snail's pace: the very slightest hill tried him now. The only one left
of the wedding-party, for the bridesmaid drove off from the church door.
Hubert turned at the call.
"Harry! Why, Harry!"
Hand locked in hand, they sat down on a bench beside the path; face
gazing into face. There had always been a likeness between them: in
the bright-coloured, waving hair, the blue eyes and the well-favoured
features. But Harry's face was redolent of youth and health; in the
other's might be read approaching death.
"You are very thin, Bertie; thinner even than I expected to see you,"
broke from the traveller involuntarily.
"_You_ are looking well, at any rate," was Hubert's answer. "And I am so
glad you are come: I thought you might have been here a month ago."
"The voyage was unreasonably long; we had contrary winds almost from
port to port. I got on to Worcester yesterday, slept there, and hired
a horse and gig to bring me over this morning. What about Eliza's
wedding, Hubert? I was just in time to see her drive away. Cale, with
whom I had a word down yonder, says the master does not like it."
"He does not like it and would not countenance it: washed his hands of
it (as he told us) altogether."
"Any good reason for that?"
"Not particularly good, that I see. Somehow he disliked Hamlyn; and Tom
Rivers wanted Eliza, which would have pleased him greatly. But Eliza
was not without blame. My father gave way so far as to ask her to delay
things for a few months, not to marry in haste, and she would not. She
might have conceded as much as that."
"Did you ever know Eliza concede anything, Bertie?"
"Well, not often."
"Who gave her away?"
"I did: look at my gala toggery"--opening his overcoat. "He wanted
to forbid it. 'Don't hinder me, father,' I pleaded; 'it is the last
brotherly service I can ever render her.' And so," his tone changing to
lightness, "I have been and gone and done it."
Harry Carradyne understood. "Not the last, Hubert; don't say that. I
hope you will live to render her many another yet."
Hubert smiled faintly. "Look at me," he said in answer.
"Yes, I know; I see how you look. But you may take a turn yet."
"Ah, miracles are no longer wrought for us. Shall I surprise you very
much, cousin mine, if I say that were the offer made me of prolonged
life, I am not sure that I should accept it?"
"Not unless health were renewed with it; I can understand that. You have
had to endure suffering, Bertie."
"Ay. Pain, discomfort, fears, weariness. After working out their
torment upon me, they--why then they took a turn and opened out the
vista of a refuge."
"A refuge?"
"The one sure Refuge offered by God to the sick and sorrowful, the
weary and heavy-laden--Himself. I found it. I found _Him_ and all His
wonderful mercy. It will not be long now, Harry, before I see Him face
to face. And here comes His true minister, but for whom I might have
missed the way."
Harry turned his head, and saw, advancing up the drive, a good-looking
young clergyman. "Who is it?" he involuntarily cried.
"Your brother-in-law, Robert Grame. Lucy's husband."
It was not the fashion in those days for a bride's mother (or one acting
as her mother) to attend the bride to church; therefore Mrs. Carradyne,
following it, was spared risk of conflict with Captain Monk on that
score. She was in Eliza's room, assisting at the putting on of the
bridal robes (for we have to go back an hour or so) when a servant came
up to say that Mr. Hamlyn waited below. Rather wondering--for he was to
have driven straight to the church--Mrs. Carradyne went downstairs.
"Pardon me, dear Mrs. Carradyne," he said, as he shook hands, and she
had never seen him look so handsome, "I could not pass the house without
making one more effort to disarm Captain Monk's prejudices, and asking
for his blessing on us. Do you think he will consent to see me?"
Mrs. Carradyne felt sure he would not, and said so. But she sent Rimmer
to the library to ask the question. Mr. Hamlyn pencilled down a few
anxious words on paper, folded it, and put it into the man's hand.
No; it proved useless. Captain Monk was harder than adamant; he sent
Rimmer back with a flea in his ear, and the petition torn in two.
"I feared so," sighed Mrs. Carradyne. "He will not this morning see even
Eliza."
Mr. Hamlyn did not sigh in return; he spoke a cross, impatient word: he
had never been able to see reason in the Captain's dislike to him, and,
with a brief good-morning, went out to his carriage. But, remembering
something when crossing the hall, he came back.
"Forgive me, Mrs. Carradyne; I quite forgot that I have a note for you.
It is from Mrs. Peveril, I believe; it came to me this morning, enclosed
in a letter of her husband's."
"You have heard at last, then!"
"At last--as you observe. Though Peveril had nothing particular to write
about; I daresay he does not care for letter writing."
Slipping the note into her pocket, to be opened at leisure, Mrs.
Carradyne returned to the adorning of Eliza. Somehow, it was rather
a prolonged business--which made it late when the bride with her
bridesmaid and Hubert drove from the door.
Mrs. Carradyne remained in the room--to which Eliza was not to
return--putting up this, and that. The time slipped on, and it was close
upon twelve o'clock when she got back to the drawing-room. Captain Monk
was in it then, standing at the window, which he had thrown wide open.
To see more clearly the bridal party come out of church, was the thought
that crossed Mrs. Carradyne's mind in her simplicity.
"I very much feared they would be late," she observed, sitting down near
her brother: and at that moment the church clock began to strike twelve.
"A good thing if they were _too_ late!" he answered. "Listen."
She supposed he wanted to count the strokes--what else could he be
listening to? And now, by the stir at the distant gates, she saw that
the bridal party had come out.
"Good heavens, what's that?" shrieked Mrs. Carradyne, starting from her
chair.
"The chimes," stoically replied the Captain. And he proceeded to
hum through the tune of "The Bay of Biscay," and beat a noiseless
accompaniment with his foot.
"_The Chimes_, Emma," he repeated, when the melody had finished itself
out. "I ordered them to be played. It's the last day of the old year,
you know."
Laughing slightly at her consternation, Captain Monk closed the window
and quitted the room. As Mrs. Carradyne took her handkerchief from her
pocket to pass it over her face, grown white with startled terror, the
note she had put there came out also, and fell on the carpet.
Picking it up, she stood at the window, gazing forth. Her sight was not
what it used to be; but she discerned the bride and bridegroom enter
their carriage and drive away; next she saw the bridesmaid get into the
carriage from the Hall, assisted by Hubert, and that drive off in its
turn. She saw the crowd disperse, this way and that; she even saw the
gig there, its occupant talking with John Cale. But she did not look at
him particularly; and she had not the slightest idea but that Harry was
in India.
And all that time an undercurrent of depression was running riot in her
heart. None knew with what a strange terror she had grown to dread the
chimes.
She sat down now and opened Mrs. Peveril's note. It treated chiefly of
the utterly astounding ways that untravelled old lady was meeting with
in foreign parts. "If you will believe me," wrote she, "the girl that
waits on us wears carpet slippers down at heel, and a short cotton
jacket for best, and she puts the tea-tray before me with the handle of
the tea-pot turned to me and the spout standing outwards, and she comes
right into the bed-room of a morning with Charles's shaving-water
without knocking." But the one sentence that arrested Mrs. Carradyne's
attention above any other was the following: "I reckon that by this time
you have grown well acquainted with our esteemed young friend. He is a
good, kindly gentleman, and I'm sure never could have done anything to
deserve his wife's treatment of him."
"Can she mean Mr. Hamlyn?" debated Mrs. Carradyne, all sorts of ideas
leaping into her mind with a rush. "If not--what other 'esteemed friend'
can she allude to?--_she_, old herself, would call _him_ young. But Mr.
Hamlyn has not any wife. At least, had not until to-day."
She read the note over again. She sat with it open, buried in a reverie,
thinking no end of things, good and bad: and the conclusion she at last
came to was, that, with the unwonted exercise of letter-writing, poor
old Mrs. Peveril's head had grown confused.
"Well, Hubert, did it all go off well?" she questioned, as her nephew
entered the room, some sort of excitement on his wasted face. "I saw
them drive away."
"Yes, it went off well; there was no hitch anywhere," replied Hubert.
"But, Aunt Emma, I have brought a friend home with me. Guess who it is."
"Some lady or other who came to see the wedding," she returned. "I can't
guess."
"You never would, though I were to give you ten guesses; no, though je
vous donne en mille, as the French have it. What should you say to a
young man come all the way over seas from India? There, that's as good
as telling you, Aunt Emma. Guess now."
"Oh, Hubert!" clasping her trembling hands. "It cannot be Harry! What is
wrong?"
Harry brought his bright face into the room and was clasped in his
mother's arms. She could not understand it one bit, and fears assailed
her. Come home in _this_ unexpected manner! Had he left the army? What
had he done? _What_ had he done? Hubert laughed and told her then.
"He has done nothing wrong; everything that's good. He has sold out at
my father's request and left with honours--and is come home the heir of
Leet Hall. I said all along it was a shame to keep you out of the plot,
Aunt Emma."
Well, it was glorious news for her. But, as if to tarnish its delight,
like an envious sprite of evil, deep down in her mind lay that other
news, just read--the ambiguous remark of old Mrs. Peveril's.