lane came Oliver Luxmore with his children, Hillary junior and Kate
bringing up the rear.
'Now then, you kids, big and little!' shouted Charles, 'see what I have
got. A handful of halfpence. Scramble for them. Who gets most buys
most sweeties.' Then he threw the coppers down among the children. The
little ones held up their hands, jumped, tumbled over each other,
quarrelled, tore and dirtied their Sunday clothes, whilst Charles stood
above laughing and applauding. Oliver Luxmore said nothing.
'Come in, come in at once!' cried Honor, rushing to the door with angry
face. 'Charles, is this the way you keep your promises?'
'I must give the children something, and amuse myself as well,' said the
soldier.
Honor looked down the road and saw Kate with young Hillary Nanspian.
They were laughing together.
'There now,' said Kate, as she reached the foot of the steps, 'Honor,
see the young fellow who boasts he will make you fall down and worship
his waistcoat.'
'It was a joke,' said Larry, turning red. He poked his hat up from his
right, then from his left ear, he was overcome with shame.
Honor's colour slightly changed at the words of her sister, but she
rapidly recovered herself.
'So,' continued the mischievous Kate, 'you have come round all this way
to blaze your new waistcoat in the eyes of Honor, because she could not
come to church to worship it?'
Young Nanspian looked up furtively at Honor, ashamed to say a word in
self-exculpation.
'Talk of girls giving themselves airs over their fine clothes!' said
Kate, 'men are as proud as peacocks when they put on spring plumage.'
'It serves you right, Mr. Larry,' said Honor, 'that Kate torments you.
Vanity must be humbled.'
'I spoke in jest,' explained Hillary. 'All the parish knows that when I
joke I do not mean what I say. When a word comes to my lips, out it
flies, good or bad. All the world knows that.'
'All the world knows that,' she repeated. 'It is bad to wear no drag on
the tongue, but let it run down hill to a smash. Instead of boasting of
this you should be ashamed of it.'
'I am not boasting,' he said, with a little irritation.
'Then I misunderstood you. When a man has a fault, let him master it,
and not excuse himself with the miserable reason, that his fault is
known to all the world.'
'Come, Honor, do not be cross with me,' he said, running up the steps,
and holding out his hand.
'I am not cross with you,' she answered, but she did not give him her
hand.
'How can I know that, if you will not shake hands?'
'Because all the world knows I tell no lies,' she answered coldly, and
turned away.
*CHAPTER X.*
*ON THE STEPS.*
For a week Charles Luxmore made a pretence of looking for work. Work of
various kind was offered him, but none was sufficiently to his taste for
him to accept it. He had still money in his pocket. He did not renew
his offer of it to Honor. She had fitted him in a suit of his father's
clothes, and he looked respectable. He was often in the 'Ring of
Bells,' or at a public-house in a neighbouring parish. He was an amusing
companion to the young men who met in the tavern to drink. He had
plenty to say for himself, had seen a great deal of life, and had been
to the other side of the world. Thus he associated with the least
respectable, both old and young, the drunkards and the disorderly.
He was not afflicted with bashfulness, nor nice about truth, and over
his ale he boasted of what he had seen and done in India. He said no
more about his self-inflicted wound; and was loud in his declamation
against the injustice of his officers, and the ingratitude of his
country which cast him adrift, a maimed man, without compensation and
pension. When he had drunk he was noisy and quarrelsome; and those who
sat with him about the tavern table were cautious not to fall into
dispute with him. There was a fire in his eye which led them to shirk a
quarrel.
About a mile from the church in a new house lived a certain Squire
Impey, a gentleman who had bought a property there, but who did not
belong to those parts. No one knew exactly whence he came. He was a
jovial man, who kept hounds, hunted and drank. Charles went to him, and
he was the only man for whom he condescended to do some work, and from
whom to take pay; but the work was occasional, Charles was an amusing
man to talk to, and Impey liked to have a chat with him. Then he
rambled away to Coombe Park, where he made himself so disagreeable by
his insolence, that he was ordered off the premises. His father and
brothers and sisters did not see much of him; he returned home
occasionally to sleep, and when the mind took him to go to market, he
went in the van with his father.
Much was said in the place of the conduct of Charles Luxmore--more, a
great deal, than came to the ears of Honor. Oliver heard everything,
for in the van the parish was discussed on the journey to market, and
those who sat within did not consider whether the driver on the box
heard what they said. Oliver never repeated these things to his eldest
daughter, but Honor knew quite enough of the proceedings of Charles
without this. She spoke to Charles himself, rebuked him, remonstrated
with him, entreated him with tears in her eyes to be more steady; but
she only made matters worse; she angered him the more because he knew
that she was right. He scoffed at her anxiety about himself; he swore
and burst into paroxysms of fury when she reprimanded him.
'Do not you suppose,' said he, 'that I am going to be brought under your
thumb, like father and the rest.'
Possibly she might have been more successful had she gone to work more
gently. But with her clear understanding she supposed that every one
else could be governed by reason, and she appealed to his sense, not to
his heart. He must see, she argued, to what end this disorderly life
would lead, if she put it before him nakedly. She supposed she could
prove to him her sisterly affection in no truer way than by rebuke and
advice.
Although Honor's heart was full of womanly tenderness, there was
something masculine in her character. There could not fail to be. Since
her mother's death she had been the strength of the house, to her all
had held. Circumstances had given her a hardness which was not natural
to her.
Charles vowed after each fresh contest with Honor that he could not go
near the cottage again. He would go elsewhere, out of range of her
guns; but he did not keep his vow. It was forgotten on the morrow.
Honor was not a scold. She had too good judgment to go on rebuking and
grumbling, but she spoke her mind once, and acted with decision. She
withstood Charles whenever his inconsiderate good nature or his
disorderly conduct threatened to disturb the clocklike working of the
house, to upset the confidence the children had in her, and to mar their
simplicity. She encountered his violence with fearlessness. She never
became angry, and returned words for words, but she held to her decision
with toughness. Her father was afraid of Charles, and counselled his
daughter to yield. Opposition, he argued, was unavailing, and would
aggravate unpleasantnesses.
Honor suffered more than transpired. Her brother's disrepute rankled in
her heart. She was a proud girl, and though she placed no store on her
father's dreams of Coombe Park, she had a strong sense of family
dignity, and she was cut to the quick when Charles's conduct became the
talk of the neighbourhood. Never a talker, she grew more than ever
reserved. When she went to or returned from church on Sunday, she
shunned acquaintances; she would not linger for a gossip in the
churchyard, or join company with a neighbour in the lane. She took a
child by each hand, and with set face, and brows sternly contracted,
looking neither right nor left, she went her way. Brightness had faded
from her face. She was too proud to show the humiliation she felt at
heart. 'Oh my,' said the urchins, 'bain't Red Spider mighty stuck up!
Too proud to speak to nobody, now, seeming.'
Honor saw little of young Larry. Once or twice he made as though he
would walk home with her from church, but she gave him no encouragement;
she held little Charity's hand, and made Charity hold that of Martha,
and kept Charity and Martha between her and the young man, breaking all
familiar converse. She had not the heart to talk to him.
'You need not take on about Charles,' said her father one day. 'Every
one knows that you are a good girl, and makes allowances for a soldier.'
'Disorderly ways,' answered Honor, 'are like infectious diseases. When
one has an attack, it runs through the house.'
'Why do you not encourage folk to be friendly? You hold yourself aloof
from all.'
Honor sighed.
'I cannot forget Charles, and the shame he is bringing on us. For me it
matters little, but it matters much to the rest. The children will lose
sense of fear at bad language, lies and bragging. Kate is a pretty
girl, and some decent lad may take a fancy to her; but who would make a
maid his wife who had such a brother?'
'Oh! as for that, young Larry Nanspian is after her. You should see how
they go on together, tormenting and joking each other.'
Honor coloured and turned her face aside. She said nothing for a minute,
then with composed voice and manner she went on.
'See the bad example set to Joe. He tries his wings to fly away from
me, as is natural; boys resist being controlled by the apron. He sees
his elder brother, he hears him, he copies him, and he will follow him
down the road to destruction. We must get Joe away into service unless
we can make Charles go, which would be the better plan of the two.'
'Charles has been away for some years. We must not drive him out of the
house now we have him home again.'
'Father, I wish you would be firm with him.'
'I--I!' he shook his head, 'I cannot be hard with the boy. Remember
what he has gone through in India, in the wars. Look at his poor hand.
Home is a place to which a child returns when no other house is open to
it.'
Honor looked sadly at the carrier. No help was to be had from him.
'I suppose, father,' she said, 'that there are rights all round. If
Charles comes home claiming the shelter of our roof and a place at our
table, he is bound in some way. He has no right to dishonour the roof
and disturb the table. I grudge him no pains to make him comfortable,
but I do expect he will not make it impossible for me to keep the home
decent.'
'Of course, of course, Honor,' said the carrier, rubbing his palms
slowly between his knees, and looking vacantly into the fire. 'That is
reasonable.'
'And right,' Honor. 'And, father, you should make a stand. Now, all
the responsibility falls on me.'
'Oh, yes. I will make a stand; certainly, certainly,' said Luxmore.
'Now let us change the subject.'
'No,' the girl. 'I cannot, and I will not. Charles must be made to
conduct himself properly. I will not allow the little ones to hear his
profane talk, see his devil-may-care ways. Mother committed them to me,
and I will stand between them and evil. If it comes to a fight, we shall
fight. All I wish is that the fight not to be between brother and
sister.' Her voice became hard, her brows contracted, her face became
pale with intensity of feeling.
'There, there!' groaned Oliver Luxmore, 'don't make out matters worse
they are. A sheep looks as big as a cow in a fog. You see ghosts where
I see thorn-trees. Be gentler with Charles, not so peremptory. Men
will not be ordered about by women. Charles is not a bad boy. There is
meat on a trout as well as bones. All will come right in the end.'
Honor said no more. Her eyes filled; she stooped over her needlework to
conceal them; her hand moved quickly, but the stitches were uneven.
'I will do something, I will indeed,' said Luxmore, rising. He took his
hat and went out, but returned quickly a few minutes later, agitated,
and went through the room, saying hastily, 'Honor! he is coming, and--I
think--drunk.'
Then he escaped into the back kitchen and out into the paddock in the
rear where he kept his horse. That was all the help Honor was likely to
get from him--to be forewarned.
Next moment two of the children flew up the steps frightened and heated.
'O, Honor! Charlie is tight!'
Honor stood up, folded her needlework, put it aside, and went to the
door.
'Children,' she said, 'go behind into the field to father.' Then she
went to the head of the steps and looked down the lane.
She saw her brother, coming on with a lurching walk, holding a stick,
followed by a swarm of school-children, recently dismissed, who jeered,
pelted him, and when he turned to threaten, dispersed to gather again
and continue tormenting. Charles was not thoroughly drunk, but he was
not sober. Honor's brow became blood-red for a moment, and her hand
trembled on the rail; but the colour left her forehead again, and her
hand was firm as she descended the steps.
At the sight of Honor Luxmore the children fell back, and ceased from
their molestations.
'Halloa, Honor!' shouted Charles, staggering to the foot of the steps.
'A parcel of gadflies, all buzz and sting! I'll teach 'em to touch a
soldier! Let me pass, Honor, and get away from the creatures.'
'No, Charles,' answered his sister, 'you do not pass.'
'Why not?'
'Because I will not let you--drunk.'
'I am not drunk, not at all. It is you who are in liquor. Let me
pass.' He put his hand on the rail, and took a step up.
'You shall not pass!' she spoke coolly, resolutely.
'Curse you for a pig-headed fool,' said Charles, 'I'm not going to be
stopped by such as you.'
'Such as I shall stop you,' answered Honor. 'Shame on you to dishonour
the steps by which our mother went down to her burial! Verily, I saw
her in my dreams, putting her hands over her face in her grave to hide
the sight of her son.'
'Stand aside.'
'I will not budge!'
'I was a fool to come home,' muttered Charles, 'to be pickled in vinegar
like walnuts. I wish I'd stayed away.'
'I wish you had, Charles, till you had learned to conduct yourself with
decency.'
'I will not be preached to,' he growled; then becoming lachrymose, he
said, 'I come home after having been away, a wanderer, for many years.
I come home from bloody wars, covered with wounds, and find all against
me. This is a heartless world. I did expect to find love at home, and
pity from my sister.'
'I love and pity you,' said Honor, 'but I can only respect him who is
respectable.'
'Let me pass!
'I will not, Charles.'
Then he laid hold of her, and tried to pull her off the steps; but she
had a firm grip of the rail, and she was strong.
The children in the lane, seeing the scuffle, drew near and watched with
mischievous delight. Charles was not so tipsy that he did not know what
he was about, not so far gone as to be easily shaken off. Honor was
obliged to hold with both hands to the rail. He caught her round the
waist, and slung her from side to side, whilst oaths poured from his
lips. In the struggle her hair broke loose, and fell about her
shoulders.
She set her teeth and her eyes glittered. Fire flamed in her cheeks.
She was resolved at all costs not to let him go by. She had threatened
that she would fight him, and now, before she had expected it, the fight
was forced upon her.
Finding himself foiled, unable to dislodge her, and unable to pass her,
Charles let go, went down the steps, and kicked and thrust at the
support of the handrail, till he broke it down. Then, with a laugh of
defiance, he sprang up the steps brandishing the post. But, when the
rail gave way, Honor seized it, and ascending before him, facing him,
stepping backward, she planted herself against the cottage door, with
the rail athwart it, behind her, held with both hands, blocking the
entrance.
Charles was forced to stay himself with the broken post he held, as he
ascended the steps.
'Honor!' he shouted, 'get out of the way at once, I am dangerous when
opposed.'
'Not to me,' she answered; 'I am not afraid of you, drunk or sober. You
shall not cross this doorstep.'
He stood eyeing her, with the post half raised, threateningly. She met
his unsteady gaze without flinching. Was there no one to see her there
but the tipsy Charles and the frightened children? A pity if there was
not. She was erect, dignified, with bosom expanded, as her bare arms
were behind her. Her cheeks were brilliant with colour, her fallen hair,
raining about her shoulders, blazed with the reel evening sun on it, her
large hazel eyes were also full of fire. Her bosom heaved as she
breathed fast and hard. She wore a pale, faded print dress, and a white
apron. Below, her red ankles and feet were planted firm as iron on the
sacred doorstep of Home, that she protected.
As Charles stood irresolute, opposite her, the children in the lane,
thinking he was about to strike her, began to scream.
In a moment Hillary Nanspian appeared, sprang up the steps, caught
Charles by the shoulder, struck the post out of his hand, and dragging
him down the steps, flung him his length in the road.
'Lie there, you drunken blackguard!' he said; 'you shall not stand up
till you have begged your sister's pardon, and asked permission to sleep
off your drink in the stable.'
*CHAPTER XI.*
*IN THE LINNEY.*
Next morning, when Charles Luxmore awoke, he found himself lying on the
hay in the little 'linney,' or lean-to shed, of his father. The door
was open and the sun streamed in, intense and glaring. In the doorway,
on a bundle of straw, sat his sister Honor, knitting. The sun was
shining in and through her golden hair, and the strong, fiery light
shone through her hands, and nose, and lips, crimson--or seemed to do
so. Charles watched her for some time out of his half-closed eyes, and
confessed to himself that she was a fine, noble-looking girl, a girl for
a brother to be proud of. Her profile was to the light, the nose
straight, the lips sharp-cut, now expanded, then closed tight, as moved
by her thoughts, and her hair shone like the morning clouds above the
rising sun.
'What! sentinel, keeping guard?' shouted Charles, stretching his limbs
and sitting up. 'In custody, am I? Eh?'
'I have brought you your breakfast, Charles,' answered Honor. 'There is
a bowl of bread and milk at your elbow.'
He was hungry, so he took the bowl. His hair was ruffled, and full of
strands of hay; he passed his hand over his face.
'I've had many a sleep in a barn before now,' he said; 'there are worse
bedrooms, but there is one drawback. You can't smoke a pipe in one, or
you run the chance of setting fire to bed and house. I did that once,
and had a near scratch to escape before the flames roasted me. Best
was, I managed to escape before any one was on the spot, so I was not
taken up; suspicion fell on a labourer who had been dismissed a
fortnight before.'
'And you said nothing?'
'Certainly not. Do you take me for a fool?'
Honor's lips contracted, so did her brow.
Charles put the spoon into the bread and milk, then, as he was setting
it to his mouth, burst out laughing, and spilt the sop over his clothes.
'It was enough to make a fellow laugh,' he explained. 'To see last
night how scared the kids were--Martha and Charity--and how they cut
along when they saw me coming home.'
'This is not a cause for laughter. If you had a heart you would weep.'
'I thought I caught sight of father.'
'You did, but he also turned and left you. He could not face you as you
were. You should be ashamed of yourself, Charles.'
'There, there!' he exclaimed impatiently, 'I will listen to no rebukes.
I was not drunk, only a bit fresh.'
'Drunk or fresh matters little, you were not in a fit condition to come
home; and what is more, I will not allow you to live in this cottage
longer.'
'You will not?'
'No, I will not.'
'Who is to prevent me?'
'I will.'
'You!--and what if I force you out of the way, and go in and brave you?'
'You may go in, but I leave and take with me all the little ones. I
have made up my mind what to do; I can work and earn enough to support
the children, but I will not--no, I will not let them see you and hear
you more.'
He looked at her. Her face was resolute. She was the girl to carry out
her threat.
'I curse the day I came back to see your wry face,' he muttered, and
rolled over on his side, away from her.
She made no reply. Her lips quivered. He did not see it, as he was no
longer looking at the door.
'Home is home,' he said, 'and go where one will there are threads that
draw one back to it.'
Honor was softened. 'I am glad, Charles, that you love home. If you
love it, respect it.'
'Don't fancy that I came home out of love for you.'
Honor sighed.
'I came home to see how father fared about Coombe Park, and how mother
was flourishing.'
'Well, Charles, I am glad you thought of father and mother. You must
have a right heart, at ground. Mother is dead, but I know she shames
over your bad conduct, and would rejoice were you to mend.'
'How do you know that? There is no postal communication with the other
world, that I am aware of.'
'Never mind how I know it, but I do.'
'I was a fool to return. There is no kindness left in the world. If
there were I should find a pinch at home, and pity from you.'
'Charles, if I have been harsh with you, it has been through your own
fault. God, who reads all hearts, knows that I love you. But then, I
love all the rest of my brothers and sisters, and now that mother is not
here to see after them, whom have they got but myself to protect them?
I defend them as a cat defends her kittens from a dog. Charles, I am
sorry if I have been rough and unkind, and unsisterly to you, but
indeed, indeed I cannot help myself. Mother laid the duty on me when
she was dying. She caught my hand--so,' she grasped his wrist, and
looking earnestly in his face, said, 'and laid it on me to be father and
mother to the little ones. I bent over her and kissed her, and promised
I would, and she died with her hand still holding my wrist. I feel her
grip there to this day, whenever danger threatens the children. When
you first came into the house, on your return, I felt her fingers close
as tight on me as when she died. She is always with me, keeping me up
to my duty. I cannot help myself, Charles; I must do what I know I
ought, and I am sure it is wrong for me to allow you to remain with us
longer. Consider, Charles, what the life is that you are now leading.'
'The life is all right,' said he moodily. 'I can pay my way. I have
more brains than any of these clodhoppers round, and can always earn my
livelihood.'
'Begin about it,' urged Honor.
'Time enough for that when the last copper is gone wherewith to stop a
pipe and fill a can of ale.'
'O Charles! Charles!' exclaimed his sister, 'your own coppers are spent
long ago. Now you are smoking the clothes off your little brothers' and
sisters' backs, and drinking and squandering the little money I have for
feeding them. For shame!' the blood rushed into her cheeks with sudden
anger, as the injustice of his conduct presented itself before her
vividly. 'Your father works that you may idle! It is a shame! It is a
sin.'
'Hold your tongue!'
'I will not hold my tongue,' she answered hotly. 'You know how good,
and gentle, and forbearing father is, how ready he is to give everything
to his children, how unwilling to say to any one a harsh word, and you
take advantage of his good nature; you, that should be building up the
house, are tearing it down on the heads of all of us, father, Kate,
Patience, Joe, Willy--down to little Temperance, all, all!'
'That is right, Honor, comb his head with a rake and the locks will lie
smooth.'
Both Honor and Charles looked up. Hillary stood before them in the
doorway. The girl had turned her face to her brother, and had not
observed his approach. She was ill-pleased at his arrival. She wished
no stranger to inter-meddle with her family troubles.
'You here?' exclaimed Charles, starting to one knee. 'Mr. Larry
Nanspian, I owe you something, and I shall repay it when the occasion
comes. Not now, though I have a mind to it, because I have a headache.
But I can order you off the premises. Get along, or I'll kick you.'
Larry gave a contemptuous shrug with his shoulders, and looked to Honor.
'Well, Honor, have you a good-morning for me?'
'I have ordered you off the premises,' shouted Charles.
'Shall I pitch him into the road again?' asked Larry of the girl.
Then Honor said, 'I did not ask your help yesterday, and I do not seek
your interference now.'
Charles burst into a rude laugh. 'You have your answer, Mr. Larry,' he
said; 'about face and away with you, and learn that there is one girl in
the place whose head you have not turned.'