FAR ABOVE RUBIES.
A Novel.
BY
MRS. J. H. RIDDELL,
AUTHOR OF “GEORGE GEITH,” “CITY AND SUBURB,” “TOO MUCH ALONE,” “THE RACE
FOR WEALTH,” ETC., ETC.
_IN THREE VOLUMES._
VOL. I.
LONDON:
TINSLEY BROTHERS, CATHERINE STREET, STRAND.
1867.
[_The Right of Translation and Reproduction reserved._]
LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING
CROSS.
CONTENTS OF VOL. I.
CHAPTER I.
PAGE
QUITE IN THE COUNTRY 1
CHAPTER II.
SQUIRE DUDLEY 18
CHAPTER III.
THE FAMILY HISTORY 37
CHAPTER IV.
HEATHER 57
CHAPTER V.
AT SUPPER 89
CHAPTER VI.
BESSIE’S LETTER 119
CHAPTER VII.
MORE VISITORS 149
CHAPTER VIII.
IN HEATHER’S DRESSING-ROOM 172
CHAPTER IX.
A LITTLE BIOGRAPHY 202
CHAPTER X.
MR. BLACK GAINS HIS POINT 229
CHAPTER XI.
NELLIE 252
CHAPTER XII.
LIFE AT THE HOLLOW 284
FAR ABOVE RUBIES.
CHAPTER I.
QUITE IN THE COUNTRY.
The way to Berrie Down Hollow lay along a lane, winding and narrow: not
a prosaic lane, bounded to right and left by low-cropped, unromantic
hedges, and scanty banks covered with coarse wiry grass, where never a
wild flower would dream of blooming, but a delicious lane, bordered by
old elms and beech trees; where were smooth bits of turf, pleasantly
suggestive of a gallop over the sward; a lane by the sides whereof
trailed brambles and the dark-leaved ivy; a lane where the hawthorn in
the sweet May-time, when it opened its earliest buds, stretched its
white arms out across the grass, striving to touch the passer-by who
idly paused to inhale its fragrance; a lane where twined in picturesque
disorder wild bryony and traveller’s joy, dog-roses and honeysuckles,
the woody nightshade and the greater bindweed (old man’s nightcap as the
children irreverently call it); where the eye was refreshed by looking
on soft cushions of moss and ferns, graceful, and drooping, and cool;
where blossomed in their due season primroses and violets, the wild
hyacinth, the blue speedwell, delicious clumps of birds-foot trefoil,
the pink cranesbill, the wood strawberry and anemone, ground ivy, the
“hindering” knot grass, “everywhere humble and everywhere green;” St.
John’s Wort, that balm of the warrior wound; tufted vetch, the creeping
cinquefoil, with many another wild flower, which in the early days
little hands love to gather; which boyhood, and manhood, and middle age
pass by unnoticed, but which come back fresh and bright as ever to the
memory of the old man too feeble to totter away to the shady lane, to
the warm sunny bank where the buds are springing, and the flowers
blooming, and the lights and shadows flitting backwards and forwards,
coming and going, coming and going just as they did half a century
previously, when he was young and strong, and active like the best.
We all know such a lane: it may be in one county or it may be in
another; in the far-away shire where the happiest years of our lives
were spent, or within a walk of the great Babylon.
To the north of London there is still a perfect tangle of narrow country
lanes, in some of which Lamb assured Barton he “made most of his
tragicomedy.”
There are several not far from the churchyard where he sleeps so well.
Close to his old home they wander away from Chace Side, up hill and down
dale; they strike out of the Southgate Road; they wind in and out from
Angel Lane to Bury Street, and thence by devious routes to Winchmore
Hill and Enfield.
Some of the loveliest lanes on earth, perhaps, are those on the opposite
side of the Lea, leading from Higham Hill to Chingford and Woodford.
Utterly still! utterly quiet! There the bee hums and the wild roses
bloom, and there is heard no din or sound of that great city which lies
so near at hand.
But Berrie Down Lane, as the road leading to Berrie Down Hollow was
styled, wound on its pleasant way many and many a mile distant from
London; so completely in the country, so entirely out of the way of
strangers, or even ordinary traffic, that very few persons, excepting
the family resident at the Hollow, and their visitors (who, save of
their own kin), were far and few between, knew anything of the beauty of
that quiet walk, of that lonely approach, to a still more lonely house.
Do you mind sauntering along it with me—sauntering slowly and
lingeringly? It is in the bright summer noon-tide we follow its windings
for the first time; but you can fancy how it looks in the spring and the
autumn likewise; and the beauty of the lane grows upon you like the face
of a woman who is more lovely than handsome, till you come to understand
that even in mid-winter it will not look desolate; that even when the
buds of spring, and the flowers of summer, and the last leaves of autumn
have departed, there will still be something left for the snows and
frosts of winter to deck and crown right royally with diadems and jewels
that sparkle and glitter in the cold gleams of the December sun.
There are the banks where the earliest primrose is to be found; over
which the full luxuriance of the summer greenery spreads and twines in
lavish profusion of tendril, and branch, and drooping bough, and slender
spray; against which the brown leaves pile themselves when the storm
king rides abroad, and the October winds begin to strip the foliage off
the trees.
You can imagine now how the place looks in every season; when the holly
berries shine red and warm and glossy in the hedgerow; when their
branches, clad with polished green leaves, are torn down to welcome
Christmas in hall, and church, and cottage; when the birds begin to
build; when children part the boughs of the privet and the hawthorn in
order to look for the thrush and the linnet’s nest; when the hyacinths
come with the sweet mid-spring; when the dog-roses, perishable as
beautiful, open to the sun; when the May bursts into flower, and the
honeysuckle perfumes the air; when you can pass over the brook dry-shod;
when the August sun is pouring his beams on fields where the reapers are
at work; when the leaves first change their colour, and then commence to
fall; when autumn’s blasts whistle amongst the topmost branches of the
elms, and winter’s hail and snow descend upon the earth. You can fancy
how Berrie Down Lane must look under all these aspects; you know
hereafter you could sketch the place from memory, when you come to
recall its sweet tranquillity amidst the din and bustle of that great
Babylon where your lot is cast.
The nearest railway-station, Palinsbridge, is eight miles distant; the
nearest town, South Kemms, four; the nearest village, Fifield, more than
two; so that, although, as the crow flies, Berrie Down Hollow is not
actually above thirty miles from London, it might be a hundred or two in
point of accessibility.
“Quite in the country, Mr. Dudley,” enchanted towns-people were wont to
remark; whereupon, if the speaker chanced to be a man or one of his own
kin, Mr. Dudley would answer, “Confoundedly in the country;” from which
speech it will rightly be inferred that the owner of Berrie Down Hollow
did not appreciate the advantages of his rural residence quite so highly
as strangers had a way of doing.
And it was a pity, for a more picturesque spot could not have been found
had you searched the home counties through. It was a place which took
every one’s fancy. The great men, who came down from London to stay with
Lord Kemms when the season was over and the Row deserted, were wont to
draw rein and turn a little round in their saddles as they passed The
Hollow; after which they would ride slowly on, looking back often at the
dear old house planted on the side of a sloping hill.
But you shall not jump to the house in a minute after this fashion. You
shall walk with me under the elm-trees; you shall go gently down the
declivity whence you catch the first view of Arthur Dudley’s home; you
shall look over the fields lying on the south side of Berrie Down Lane,
where the corn, his corn, is ripening for the harvest; you shall pause
and see in the distance, meadows where the haymakers, his haymakers, are
at work; you shall watch the men, and the women, and the children mowing
and tossing that which in due time will be converted into money, to buy
bread for him and his; you shall descend the hill and cross the ford by
means of a narrow foot-bridge, and, as you do so, you shall see his cows
lying in the pasture lands chewing the cud, reflectively; you shall
ascend more leisurely, if possible, the steeper hill beyond the brook;
and, still pursuing your way onward, become conscious of hedges less
picturesque, only because kept trim and closely cropped; of banks where
the grass is smooth and even, by reason of constant cutting; where no
brambles are allowed to trail their length along the ground; where even
the honeysuckle has to submit to pruning and clipping; where the road is
free from ruts; and now you know that to right as well as left lies
Squire Dudley’s land, and that you are drawing close to his house, which
is to be reached through those gates not more than half-a-dozen paces
distant from where we stand.
One moment, however, ere entering. Do you notice how the grey pillars on
which the gates are hinged scarcely show through the branches of the two
trees of pyracantha that have grown around them?
Those shrubs are considered one of the great beauties of Berrie Down
House. They are all white in the early spring. They are covered with
green berries during the summer, which change into great masses of
bright scarlet during the pleasant autumn weather, retaining their rich
colour when the frost pinches the leaves of the evergreens, and the ice
is thick on the mill-pond, and the snow lying on the ground.
They have taken years and years to grow, and the Dudleys are as proud of
them as they are of their quaint home, of their broad acres, of their
rich pasture lands, of the Hollow (whence their place takes its name),
where the blackberries still grow, as they once grew over all the fields
around; where there is quite a tangled thicket of underwood and broom
and brambles, in which the children hide themselves, and tear their
frocks, and pass the long summer days; whence they emerge, when the
blackberrying season comes, with faces and hands dyed purple with the
rich, luscious juice.
As the great men from London are wont to admire Berrie Down Hollow, so
with all the strength of their souls the younger Dudleys love its every
tree, and shrub, and stick, and stone.
The domestic chronicles contain no record as to whether Arthur Dudley,
owner of the Hollow, had ever similarly cherished any such attachment.
Of one thing, however, the reader may be certain, which is, that in his
manhood he did not entertain the slightest affection for the place.
What was the old house, with its many gables—what were the fields, the
trees, the tangle of brambles, the bloom of the broom, the scent of the
hawthorn, the ripple of the brook to him?
Let us pass through the gates, and approach by means of a drive, hedged
almost with laurestina and laurel, Arthur Dudley’s home.
The house is built of brick with curious dark stone facings, and over
the doorway, carved in the same material, is the Dudley coat of arms;
for before Lord Kemms, or Kemms’ Park, was so much as thought of, the
Dudleys were great people in the county.
Their day had gone by, however, and their fortunes, when we make their
acquaintance, are like their coat of arms—a good deal the worse for
wear; for which reason, although the Hollow is a pretty place, it is not
a grand one. It is a sweet home, but not a great mansion; and the front,
which shows towards the road, is unpretentious in the extreme.
But there is another side—that which catches the last rays of the
setting sun—that which reveals itself to Lord Kemms’ visitors when they
have passed the gates flanked by pyracantha, and taken the turn leading
away towards Kemms’ Park.
The north front of the house is nothing: it is red brick and grey stone,
with two windows on each side the hall door, and five on the first
floor, and three dormant windows looking out from the roof like heads
thrust forth from among the slates to survey the world. It is masked a
good deal from the road by evergreens and great trees of arbor-vitæ; and
the dwelling-rooms in that part of the house are dark, and somewhat dull
in consequence.
To the west all is different; there the ground sweeps down from the
house to the Hollow, and the drawing-room windows look out on the rich
champaign country lying beyond, which is steeped and bathed every
evening in the golden beams of the setting sun. Over this west front
climb roses, and clematis, and honeysuckle. Here is a westeria, which
puts forth its purple blossoms long before the laburnums think of
blooming. Pleasanter bedchambers there are none in England than those on
the first floor, into the windows of which the earliest roses peep
blushingly.
The lawn is shaded by many a grand old tree; beyond the Hollow trickles
a stream, which runs through Mr. Dudley’s property, after supplying a
mill on the road leading to South Kemms. There are sheep browsing in the
fields beyond. There is a great peace in the quiet landscape; there is a
stillness which strikes Londoners as almost oppressive. No hermitage
could be more retired, no spot more perfect in its utterly homelike
repose.
In such a place as this Time glides by, leaving few marks upon the road
to show that his chariot has passed over it. Here the philosopher thinks
he could meditate in peace, and eliminate truths which the world would
not willingly let die. Here the clergyman deludes himself with the
belief that he could compose sermons which might stir the hearts of
thousands. Here, where the pace of life is slow, and the mental pulse
languid, the author fancies that alone with himself and nature he could
discourse eloquently about man. Here the musician imagines he might
discover that roc’s egg—a melody resembling no other melody; but no!
here indeed might the statesman rest, and the weary physician recruit
his own exhausted energies; here the great engineer might forget his
thousand schemes, and the speculator almost withdraw his mind from the
price of shares and the rise and fall of debentures;—here is Nature’s
temple, if you will, where men may come and hold communion with her;
here is her infirmary likewise, where she visits with sleep the heavy
eyelids, and recruits with wine and oil the body which has been worsted
in the world’s fight; here she lays her cool hand on burning foreheads,
and compels the overtaxed mind to lie fallow; here is the place for
rest, if you will; but it is not the place for work.
Out in the battle-field, where the city streets are full of eager
soldiers; out where the fray is fiercest, the fire strongest; out where
life is not a tranquil dream, but a mad struggle; where men go to their
long rest not rusted, but worn; where the night’s slumber is short, and
the day’s labour long; out where as iron sharpeneth iron, so doth the
face of a man his friend;—there is the only place for energies to be
aroused and genius developed, for profitable work to be accomplished,
for life’s best lessons to be learned.
Thus, at least a dozen times a day, Arthur Dudley, owner of “The
Hollow,” is in the habit of expressing himself; and yet you know, as you
look in his face, that he is a man whose energy is not to be depended
on, whose genius even to a stranger seems problematical; who has never
practically conjugated the word “work;” who could not be an apt pupil in
any of life’s many schools, no matter who were his teachers, no matter
what his opportunities.
A handsome man if you will, with his thick brown hair, with his soft,
silky moustache, with his kindly-blue eyes, with his regular
delicately-cut features, and yet many a plainer face might better, I
should imagine, win and retain a woman’s love.
His body, like his mind, lacks thews and sinews. He is not one of whom
you dare prophecy that God, giving him health and ordinary success, he
would climb high. Rather he is one of those of whom you might safely
predict, that if he attempted to climb at all, he would fall back
grievously worsted.
There are some people who seem to be mentally surefooted; and there are
others who find every step to fortune so slippery, that giving them time
enough, they are certain ultimately to get their necks broken in
attempting the ascent.
But, under the shelter of his own trees, what can Squire Dudley need
with strength beyond that wherewith nature has provided him? It is for
men to have their way to make that bone and muscle, an iron will, a
ready wit are needful; and all the fields you have surveyed, all the
broad meadows, all the rich pastures came to him, not because of the
strength of his own right hand, or because of the capacity of his own
brain, but simply because his father had owned Berrie Down Hollow before
him, and left it to his eldest son.
“What could any human being desire more?” friend and stranger, looking
over the property, were wont mentally to ask themselves; for the world
knew that Squire Dudley was a dissatisfied and discontented man.
He had youth, strength, health, a happy home, a devoted wife—what more
could any rational being ask of Heaven? What could the skeleton be which
walked with Arthur Dudley under the elms, and across the meadows, or
beside the brook? This was the question every person, who met the Squire
even for the first time, put to those who knew him best. His manifest
discontent inspired a certain curiosity in the mind of each individual
who looked in his handsome, effeminate face. He had a certain grace of
manner and lazy elegance of movement which attracted attention to him,
and caused many eyeglasses to be directed towards the good-looking
stranger in various assemblies in London to which he had the entrée. He
was not a bad man in any relation of life. He was a gentleman by birth,
education, and taste; and yet in his own neighbourhood Squire Dudley was
not popular. His skeleton was too apparent, and people rather disliked
one who had not mental strength enough to shake off the depressing
influence of such a companion.
“Have your closets full of bones and bodies at home, if you will,” says
society; “but for Heaven’s sake do not carry them about in the sunlight
on your back. Weep your tears an’ you like to do so; but get through the
ceremony in private. We have, every one of us, our troubles, yet we do
not proclaim them aloud from the house-tops. We demand that if, either
from choice or necessity, a man fast, he shall not appear in public with
a sad countenance, but that he shall ‘anoint his head and wash his
face,’ and bear his trouble bravely and with good courage.”
Virtually those were the words his neighbours addressed to Squire
Dudley. Not for his skeleton did the world forsake him, but only because
he had not courage to turn and grapple with it, and either lay the
ghost, or shut it up in one chamber at home.
And, after all, it was such a commonplace ghost! If your curiosity be at
all excited about the matter, in the next chapter you shall see its
face.