_BEFORE AND AFTER BREAKFAST_
Next morning early I visited my favourite full-length portrait in the
chocolate coat and top-boots. Scanty as had been my cousin Monica's notes
upon this dark and eccentric biography, they were everything to me. A soul
had entered that enchanted form. Truth had passed by with her torch, and a
sad light shone for a moment on that enigmatic face.
There stood the _roué_--the duellist--and, with all his faults, the hero
too! In that dark large eye lurked the profound and fiery enthusiasm of his
ill-starred passion. In the thin but exquisite lip I read the courage of
the paladin, who would have 'fought his way,' though single-handed, against
all the magnates of his county, and by ordeal of battle have purged the
honour of the Ruthyns. There in that delicate half-sarcastic tracery of the
nostril I detected the intellectual defiance which had politically isolated
Silas Ruthyn and opposed him to the landed oligarchy of his county, whose
retaliation had been a hideous slander. There, too, and on his brows and
lip, I traced the patience of a cold disdain. I could now see him as he
was--the prodigal, the hero, and the martyr. I stood gazing on him with a
girlish interest and admiration. There was indignation, there was pity,
there was hope. Some day it might come to pass that I, girl as I was, might
contribute by word or deed towards the vindication of that long-suffering,
gallant, and romantic prodigal. It was a flicker of the Joan of Arc
inspiration, common, I fancy, to many girls. I little then imagined how
profoundly and strangely involved my uncle's fate would one day become with
mine.
I was interrupted by Captain Oakley's voice at the window. He was leaning
on the window-sill, and looking in with a smile--the window being open, the
morning sunny, and his cap lifted in his hand.
'Good-morning, Miss Ruthyn. What a charming old place! quite the setting
for a romance; such timber, and this really _beautiful_ house. I _do_ so
like these white and black houses--wonderful old things. By-the-by, you
treated us very badly last night--you did, indeed; upon my word, now, it
really was too bad--running away, and drinking tea with Lady Knollys--so
she says. I really--I should not like to tell you how very savage I felt,
particularly considering how very short my time is.'
I was a shy, but not a giggling country miss. I knew I was an heiress; I
knew I was somebody. I was not the least bit in the world conceited, but
I think this knowledge helped to give me a certain sense of security and
self-possession, which might have been mistaken for dignity or simplicity.
I am sure I looked at him with a fearless enquiry, for he answered my
thoughts.
'I do really assure you, Miss Ruthyn, I am quite serious; you have no idea
how very much we have missed you.'
There was a little pause, and, like a fool, I lowered my eyes, and blushed.
'I--I was thinking of leaving today; I am so unfortunate--my leave is just
out--it is so unlucky; but I don't quite know whether my aunt Knollys will
allow me to go.'
'_I_?--certainly, my dear Charlie, _I_ don't want you at all,' exclaimed a
voice--Lady Knollys's--briskly, from an open window close by; 'what could
put that in your head, dear?'
And in went my cousin's head, and the window shut down.
'She is _such_ an oddity, poor dear Aunt Knollys,' murmured the young
man, ever so little put out, and he laughed. 'I never know quite what she
wishes, or how to please her; but she's _so_ good-natured; and when she
goes to town for the season--she does not always, you know--her house is
really very gay--you can't think----'
Here again he was interrupted, for the door opened, and Lady Knollys
entered. 'And you know, Charles,' she continued, 'it would not do to forget
your visit to Snodhurst; you wrote, you know, and you have only to-night
and to-morrow. You are thinking of nothing but that moor; I heard you
talking to the gamekeeper; I know he is--is not he, Maud, the brown man
with great whiskers, and leggings? I'm very sorry, you know, but I really
must spoil your shooting, for they do expect you at Snodhurst, Charlie; and
do not you think this window a little too much for Miss Ruthyn? Maud, my
dear, the air is very sharp; shut it down, Charles, and you'd better tell
them to get a fly for you from the town after luncheon. Come, dear,' she
said to me. 'Was not that the breakfast bell? Why does not your papa get a
gong?--it is so hard to know one bell from another.'
I saw that Captain Oakley lingered for a last look, but I did not give it,
and went out smiling with Cousin Knollys, and wondering why old ladies are
so uniformly disagreeable.
In the lobby she said, with an odd, goodnatured look--
'Don't allow any of his love-making, my dear. Charles Oakley has not a
guinea, and an heiress would be very convenient. Of course he has his eyes
about him. Charles is not by any means foolish; and I should not be at all
sorry to see him well married, for I don't think he will do much good
any other way; but there are degrees, and his ideas are sometimes very
impertinent.'
I was an admiring reader of the _Albums_, the _Souvenirs_, the _Keepsakes_,
and all that flood of Christmas-present lore which yearly irrigated
England, with pretty covers and engravings; and floods of elegant
twaddle--the milk, not destitute of water, on which the babes of literature
were then fed. On this, my genius throve. I had a little album, enriched
with many gems of original thought and observation, which I jotted down in
suitable language. Lately, turning over these faded leaves of rhyme
and prose, I lighted, under this day's date, upon the following sage
reflection, with my name appended:--
'Is there not in the female heart an ineradicable jealousy, which, if it
sways the passions of the young, rules also the _advice_ of the _aged_? Do
they not grudge to youth the sentiments (though Heaven knows how _shadowed_
with sorrow) which they can _no longer inspire_, perhaps even _experience_;
and does not youth, in turn, sigh over the envy which has _power to
blight_?
MAUD AYLMER RUTHYN.'
'He has not been making love to me,' I said rather tartly, 'and he does not
seem to me at all impertinent, and I really don't care the least whether he
goes or stays.'
Cousin Monica looked in my face with her old waggish smile, and laughed.
'You'll understand those London dandies better some day, dear Maud; they
are very well, but they like money--not to keep, of course--but still they
like it and know its value.'
At breakfast my father told Captain Oakley where he might have shooting, or
if he preferred going to Dilsford, only half an hour's ride, he might have
his choice of hunters, and find the dogs there that morning.
The Captain smiled archly at me, and looked at his aunt. There was a
suspense. I hope I did not show how much I was interested--but it would not
do. Cousin Monica was inexorable.
'Hunting, hawking, fishing, fiddle-de-dee! You know, Charlie, my dear, it
is quite out of the question. He is going to Snodhurst this afternoon, and
without quite a rudeness, in which I should be involved too, he really
can't--you know you can't, Charles! and--and he _must_ go and keep his
engagement.'
So papa acquiesced with a polite regret, and hoped another time.
'Oh, leave all that to me. When you want him, only write me a note, and
I'll send him or bring him if you let me. I always know where to find
him--don't I, Charlie?--and we shall be only too happy.'
Aunt Monica's influence with her nephew was special, for she 'tipped' him
handsomely every now and then, and he had formed for himself agreeable
expectations, besides, respecting her will. I felt rather angry at his
submitting to this sort of tutelage, knowing nothing of its motive; I was
also disgusted by Cousin Monica's tyranny.
So soon as he had left the room, Lady Knollys, not minding me, said briskly
to papa, 'Never let that young man into your house again. I found him
making speeches, this morning, to little Maud here; and he really has not
two pence in the world--it is amazing impudence--and you know such absurd
things do happen.'
'Come, Maud, what compliments did he pay you?' asked my father.
I was vexed, and therefore spoke courageously. 'His compliments were not to
me; they were all to the house,' I said, drily.
'Quite as it should be--the house, of course; it is that he's in love
with,' said Cousin Knollys.
''Twas on a widow's jointure land,
The archer, Cupid, took his stand.'
'Hey! I don't quite understand,' said my father, slily.
'Tut! Austin; you forget Charlie is my nephew.'
'So I did,' said my father.
'Therefore the literal widow in this case _can_ have no interest in view
but one, and that is yours and Maud's. I wish him well, but he shan't put
my little cousin and her expectations into his empty pocket--_not_ a bit of
it. And _there's_ another reason, Austin, why you should marry--you have no
eye for these things, whereas a clever _woman_ would see at a glance and
prevent mischief.'
'So she would,' acquiesced my father, in his gloomy, amused way. 'Maud, you
must try to be a clever woman.'
'So she will in her time, but that is not come yet; and I tell you, Austin
Ruthyn, if you won't look about and marry somebody, somebody may possibly
marry you.'
'You were always an oracle, Monica; but _here_ I am lost in total
perplexity,' said my father.
'Yes; sharks sailing round you, with keen eyes and large throats; and you
have come to the age precisely when men _are_ swallowed up alive like
Jonah.'
'Thank you for the parallel, but you know that was not a happy union, even
for the fish, and there was a separation in a few days; not that I mean to
trust to that; but there's no one to throw me into the jaws of the monster,
and I've no notion of jumping there; and the fact is, Monica, there's no
monster at all.'
'I'm not so sure.'
'But I'm quite sure,' said my father, a little drily. 'You forget how old
I am, and how long I've lived alone--I and little Maud;' and he smiled and
smoothed my hair, and, I thought, sighed.
'No one is ever too old to do a foolish thing,' began Lady Knollys.
'Nor to say a foolish thing, Monica. This has gone on too long. Don't you
see that little Maud here is silly enough to be frightened at your fun.'
So I was, but I could not divine how he guessed it.
'And well or ill, wisely or madly, I'll _never_ marry; so put that out of
your head.'
This was addressed rather to me, I think, than to Lady Knollys, who smiled
a little waggishly on me, and said--
'To be sure, Maud; maybe you are right; a stepdame is a risk, and I ought
to have asked you first what you thought of it; and upon my honour,' she
continued merrily but kindly, observing that my eyes, I know not exactly
from what feeling, filled with tears, 'I'll never again advise your papa to
marry, unless you first tell me you wish it.'
This was a great deal from Lady Knollys, who had a taste for advising her
friends and managing their affairs.
'I've a great respect for instinct. I believe, Austin, it is truer than
reason, and yours and Maud's are both against me, though I know I have
reason on my side.'
My father's brief wintry smile answered, and Cousin Monica kissed me, and
said--
'I've been so long my own mistress that I sometimes forget there are such
things as fear and jealousy; and are you going to your governess, Maud?'