“THE TIME OF LOVERS IS BRIEF.”
When a man is sole master of his estate and thoroughly independent of
his kindred, his choice of a wife, if not altogether outrageous and
unpardonable, must needs be accepted by his belongings. Vansittart lost
not an hour in telling his sister and her husband that henceforth they
must look upon Eve Marchant as a very close connection.
“We shall be married at midsummer,” he said, “so you may as well begin
to think of her as a sister-in-law.”
Sir Hubert, who was the essence of good nature, received the
announcement with unalloyed cordiality.
“She is a bright, frank girl, very pretty, very winning, and very
intelligent,” he said. “I congratulate you, Jack--though naturally one
would have wished----”
“That she were the daughter of a duke, or that she had half a million
of money,” interjected Vansittart. “I understand you. It is a bad
match from a worldly point of view. I, who have between three and four
thousand a year, should have stood out for other three or four thousand
with a wife, and thus solidified my income. I ought at least to have
tried America; seen if the heiress market there would have supplied the
proper article. Well, you see, Hubert, I am of too impatient a temper
for that kind of thing. I have found the woman I can love with all my
heart and mind, and I have lost no time in winning her.”
“You are a paladin, Jack--a troubadour--all that there is of the most
romantic and chivalrous,” laughed Sir Hubert.
“She is a dear, dear girl,” sighed Maud, “and I could hardly be
fonder of her if she were my sister--but it certainly is the most
disappointing choice you could have made.”
“Is it? Why, I might have chosen a barmaid.”
“Not you. You are not that kind of man. But except a barmaid--or”--with
the tips of her lips--“a chorus girl, you could scarcely have done
worse than this. Now, don’t rage and fume, Jack. I tell you I think
the girl herself adorable--but four sisters and an impossible father!
_Quelle corvée!_”
“It is a _corvée_ that need never trouble you,” cried Vansittart,
indignantly.
“You are extremely ungrateful. Haven’t I been forming her for you?”
“She needed no forming. She has never been less than a lady--simple and
straightforward--never affecting to be rich when she was poor--or to be
smarter than her surroundings warranted.”
“Yes, yes, she is perfect, that is understood. She is the betrothed of
yesterday, a stage of being which touches the seraphic. But what will
you do with her father, and what will you do with her sisters?”
“Her sisters are very good girls, and I hope to treat them in a not
unbrotherly fashion. As for her father--there, though the obligation
is small, I grant the difficulty may be great. However, I shall know
how to cope with it. No miner ever thought to get gold without some
intermixture of quartz. The Colonel shall be to me as the gold-digger’s
quartz. I shall get rid of him as speedily as I can.”
* * * * *
Through all that Easter week Vansittart lived in the blissful dream
which beginneth every man’s betrothal. At such a time as this the
dumpiest damsel of the milkmaid type is as fair as she who brought
slaughter and burning upon Troy; but for Vansittart’s abject condition
there was the excuse of undeniable beauty, and a charm of manner which
even village gossip had never disputed. The young ladies who condemned
the Miss Marchants en bloc as “bad style” had been fain to confess that
Eve had winning ways, which made one almost forgive her cheap boots and
mended gloves.
Vansittart was happy. He had promised to join his mother in
Charles Street on the Wednesday after Easter; but he wrote to her
apologetically on Tuesday, deferring his arrival till the beginning of
the following week--and the beginning of a week is a term so lax that
it is sometimes made to mean Wednesday.
He was utterly happy. His mother’s letter received on Tuesday morning
was grave and kindly, and in no way damped his ardour.
“You have been so good a son to me, my dear Jack, that I should be hard
and ungrateful if I murmured at your choice, although that choice has
serious drawbacks in surrounding circumstances. You are too honest and
frank and true yourself not to be able to distinguish the difference
between realities and semblances. I do not doubt, therefore, that
your pretty Eve is all you think her. She certainly is a graceful and
gracious creature, with a delicate prettiness of the wild rose type,
which I prefer greatly to the azalea or the camellia order of beauty.
She cannot fail to love you--nor can she fail to be deeply grateful to
you for having rescued her from shabby surroundings and a neglectful
father. God grant that this step which you have taken--the most solemn
act in a man’s life--may bring you the happiness which the marriage of
true minds must always bring.”
There was much more, the outpouring of a mother’s love, which ran away
with the mother’s pen, and covered three sheets of paper; but even this
long letter did not suffice without a postscript.
“P.S.--Miss Marchant spoke to me--incidentally--of a brother, and from
her evident embarrassment I fear that the brother is as undesirable a
connection as the father. It would be well that you should know all
that is to be known about him before he becomes your brother-in-law; so
as to avoid unpleasant surprises in the future.”
Happily the idea of this brother’s existence was already familiar. In
their first ramble together as engaged lovers Eve had told Vansittart
a great deal about her brother. She dwelt with the younger sister’s
fond admiration upon his youthful gifts, which seemed to be chiefly of
the athletic order; his riding, his shooting, his rowing, his running:
in all which exercises he appeared to have excelled. At Cambridge
his chief sins, as Eve knew them, had been tandem driving, riding in
steeplechases, with frequent absences at Newmarket. Whatever darker
sins had distinguished his college career were but dimly suspected by
Eve.
“My father was very proud of him while he was a boy,” Eve told her
lover, “but when he grew up, and began to spend money, they were always
quarrelling. Poor mother! It was so sad to see her between them--loving
them both, and trying to be loyal to both; her poor heart torn asunder
in the struggle.”
“And he was fond of you, this brother of yours?” questioned Vansittart,
to whom such fondness seemed a redeeming virtue.
“Yes, he was very fond of me; he was always good to me. When there was
unhappiness in the dining-room and drawing-room--when Harold was what
father called sulky--he used to come to the schoolroom, and sit over
the fire roasting chestnuts all the evening. He would go without his
dinner rather than sit down with father, and would have some supper
brought to the schoolroom at ten o’clock, and my good old governess
and I used to share his supper and wait upon him. What merry suppers
they were! I was too thoughtless to consider that his being with us
meant bad blood between him and father, and unhappiness for my poor
mother. She used to look in at the schoolroom door sometimes, and shake
her head, and call us naughty children; but I know it was a relief
to her to see him eating and drinking and laughing and talking with
dear little Mütterchen and me. But I am tiring you with these childish
reminiscences.”
“No, love; there is no detail in your past life so trifling that I
would not care to know it. I want to feel as if I had known you from
your cradle. We will go to see the old place near Beverley some day, if
you like, and you shall show me the gardens where you played, the rooms
in which you lived. One can always get into another man’s house by a
little management.”
* * * * *
That Easter week was a time of loveliest weather. Even the sun and
the winds were gracious to these happy lovers, and for them April
put on the bloom of May. Vansittart spent almost all his days at the
Homestead, or rambling with the sisters, Eve and he walking side by
side, engrossed in each other’s company, as if the world held no one
else--the sisters ahead of them or in the rear, as caprice dictated.
Every lane and thicket and hillside between Fernhurst and Blackdown was
explored in those happy wanderings; every pathway in Verdley Copse was
trodden by those light footsteps; and Henley Hill and its old Roman
village grew as familiar to Vansittart as Pall Mall and the clubs. They
revelled in the primroses which carpeted all those woodland ways; they
found the earliest bluebells, and many a hollow whitened with the fairy
cups of the wood-anemone.
One morning, as they were walking over the soft brown carpet of fir
needles and withered oak leaves in Verdley Copse, Vansittart opened
a little dark-blue velvet box, and showed Eve a ring--a half-hoop of
sapphires set with brilliants.
“I chose the colour in memory of the blue flower of happiness that you
and I found on the hilltop,” he said, as he put the ring on the third
finger of his sweetheart’s slender hand. “If ever you are inclined to
be angry with me, or to care for me a little less than you do now,
let the memory of the mystical blue flower plead for me, Eve, and the
thought of how dearly we loved each other that Easter Sunday years and
years ago.”
She gave a faint, shuddering sigh at the image those words evoked.
“Years and years ago! Will this day when we are young and happy ever be
years and years ago? It seems so strange!”
“Age is strange and death is stranger; but they must come, Eve. All we
have to hope for is that we may go on loving each other to the end.”
After those ramblings in the coppices and over the hill, there was
afternoon tea at the Homestead--a feast for the gods. Colonel Marchant,
well content with the progress of affairs, had gone to Brighton for
the volunteer review, and was not expected home again till the end
of the week; so the sisters were sovereign rulers of the house, and
afternoon tea was the order of the day. It is doubtful whether dinner
had any part in the scheme of their existence at this time. The
short-petticoated youngsters generally carried some hunks of currant
cake in a basket, and these hunks were occasionally shared with the
elder sisters, and even with Vansittart, who went without his luncheon
day after day, scarcely knowing that he had missed a meal. Then they
all tramped home in their muddy boots--for however blue the sky and
however dry the roads there was always plenty of mud in the copses--and
then they all sat round the big loo table to what Hetty called a stodgy
tea. Stodgy being interpreted meant a meal of cake and toast, and eggs,
and bread and jam, and a succession of teapots. Vansittart only left
the Homestead in time to hurry back to Redwold and dress for dinner.
On the Thursday evening the Miss Marchants who were “out” were all
bidden to dinner at Redwold, and were to be driven thither by that
very fly which had broken down on the crest of the snowy hill. It was
a grand occasion, for an invitation to dinner rarely found its way
to the Homestead. Cards for garden-parties were the highest form of
courtesy to which the Miss Marchants had hitherto been accustomed.
And this dinner was to be a solemn affair, for Eve was to appear at
it in all the importance of her position as Vansittart’s future wife.
Mrs. Vansittart was coming from London for a night or two in order to
be present at the festivity, which would be in a manner Eve’s formal
acceptance as a member of the family.
It was only on Thursday morning that Vansittart discovered with some
vexation that Sefton had been asked to this family dinner. Sir Hubert
had met him, and had invited him in a casual way, having not the
faintest idea that his society would be displeasing either to Eve or
her lover. The first person Eve’s eyes lighted on when she and her
sisters entered the drawing-room was Mr. Sefton. He was standing near
the door, and she had to pass him on her way to her hostess. He stood
waiting until Lady Hartley turned to greet the younger sisters, and
then at once took possession of Eve.
“As an old friend I venture to congratulate you most warmly,” he
said, holding her hand, after the inevitable shake-hands of old
acquaintances. “You have done wonderfully well for yourself. It is
really a brilliant match.”
“For me, you mean,” she said, looking at him with an angry light in her
eyes. “Why don’t you finish your sentence, Mr. Sefton, and say, ‘for
you, Miss Marchant, with your disadvantages’?”
“I am sorry I have offended you.”
“I don’t like to be told I have done well for myself. God has given me
the love of a good man. If he were not Mr. Vansittart, but Mr. Smith
with only a hundred a year, I should be just as happy.”
Vansittart, that moment approaching, overheard the familiar British
patronymic. “What are you saying about Mr. Smith?” he said, remembering
how two men, one the slain and the other the slayer, had hidden their
identity under that name.
“I was only talking of an imaginary Smith,” she answered, her face
lighting up as she turned to her lover. “There is no such person.”
“Come and look at the azaleas,” said Vansittart; “they are worth a
visit;” and so, after the lover’s fashion, he who had only parted from
her at six o’clock took her away to the conservatory at the other end
of the room, and absorbed her into a solitude of azaleas and orange
trees.
Mr. Sefton in the mean while was talking to Mrs. Vansittart, and not
having done over well with his congratulation of the future bride, now
occupied himself in congratulating the elder lady upon the advantage of
having secured so charming a daughter-in-law.
“I quite agree with you,” replied Mrs. Vansittart. “She is very pretty,
and altogether charming. The match is not of my making, but I am
pleased to see my son happy, and pleased to welcome so fair a daughter.
You talk as if you were an old friend of the family. Have you known
Colonel Marchant long?”
“Ever since he came to this neighbourhood, nine years ago. He has been
good enough to accept any little shooting I have had to offer--and he
and I have seen a good deal of each other. I knew his son before I knew
him. Harold Marchant and I were at Trinity together.”
“Harold Marchant is dead, I conclude?”
“That is more than I or any of his friends can tell you. He is one
of that numerous family--the lost tribe of society--the men who have
dropped through.”
“I don’t quite follow you.”
“My dear Mrs. Vansittart, the less said about Harold Marchant the
better. If he is dead the good old saying comes in--_de mortuis_. If
he is alive I think the less you, or your son, or your daughter-in-law
have to do with him the happier it will be for you.”
“Mr. Sefton, it is not fair to talk to me in this way. I am personally
interested in Eve’s brother. What do you mean?”
“Only what I might mean about a good many young men who have lived
within the walls that sheltered Bacon and Newton, Whewell and Macaulay.
Harold Marchant’s career at Cambridge was a foolish career. Instead
of devoting himself to the higher mathematics he gave himself up to
hunting, horse-racing, and other amusement of a more dangerous order.
He had to leave the University hurriedly--he had to leave the country
still more hastily. He has never within my knowledge come back to
England. Eve is, or was, passionately attached to him, and to gratify
her I have taken a good deal of trouble in trying to find out his
present whereabouts and mode of life; but without avail. It is nearly
ten years since he left this country. He was then two and twenty years
of age. He was last heard of more than five years ago with an exploring
party in Mashonaland. He is exactly the kind of young man one would
like to hear of in Central Africa, and intending to stay there!”
“Poor Eve; how sad for her!”
“But that is all over now. She has a new love, and will soon forget her
brother.”
“I do not think she is so shallow as that.”
“Not shallow, but intense.”
Dinner was announced at this moment, and Sir Hubert came to offer Mrs.
Vansittart his arm. He was to have his mother-in-law on his right
hand and Eve on his left, and Mr. Sefton was to sit by his hostess on
the other side of the table. This ended the conversation about Harold
Marchant, and it was not renewed after dinner.