SPECULATIONS.
"I saw old Brown-boots Boldero at the station to-day," quoth Dr.
Humphrey Craig, the doctor of the neighbourhood, as he shook himself out
of his greatcoat and wiped the October mist from his beard, within the
hall of his comfortable house. "Spick and span as usual, and boots as
glossy as if there were no such things as muddy lanes in the world. To
be sure he had his carriage to-day, though."
"His carriage?" The doctor's cheerful little wife was at once all
interest; something in her husband's tone awakened interest.
"He was bringing home that poor girl of his."
"Leonore? Did you speak to them?"
"To him--not to her. We had to stand together on the platform, but I
sheered off directly the train came in. He had told me what he was there
for."
"But you saw Leonore arrive?"
"I saw her, yes,--poor black little thing. There seemed nothing of her
at all beneath her widow's trappings. Handsome trappings they were too;
the furs of a millionairess."
"Did she look----?"
"Rather miserable and frightened. Scared at seeing her father, I
daresay. Bland and civil as the old ruffian is, every one knows how the
girls quake before him. There he was, doing the polite, footman in
attendance, big carriage outside--all to be taken note of as evidence
that Mrs. Godfrey Stubbs was worth it."
"You are always down on that poor old man."
"Can't help it. I hate him."
"I do think you might give him credit for some fatherly feeling."
"I don't--not a ha'porth. Fatherly feeling? Bless my soul, I can never
forget his face at the time of the marriage; it was simply bursting with
greedy exultation, and at what? At getting rid of the poor child to such
a high bidder. Stubbs wasn't a bad fellow, but it would have been all
the same if he had been. Leonore was chucked at his head----"
"Hush--hush!"--Mrs. Craig, with a look of alarm, pointed to the green
baize door which shut off the back regions. "You really should be more
careful, dear; you can be heard in the kitchen, when you speak so
loud."
"Don't care if I am. They know all about it;" but as the doctor had by
this time divested himself of his outer garments, and extracted the
contents of their various pockets, he suffered himself to be drawn into
a side room, his own sanctum, still talking. "Marriages like that are
the very deuce, and the law should forbid them."
"Plenty of girls do marry at eighteen," demurred she.
"Plenty of follies are committed,"--but the gruff voice got no further.
"Come, come, old bear, _I_ am not the person to be growled at; _I_
wasn't eighteen when I married you; that's to say, ha--ha--ha!--that's
funny,--" and the brisk little woman, who had a sense of humour, laughed
heartily. "You don't see? It sounded as if I were younger still,--well,
never mind. You have had a horrid day, I know; comfort your poor
soul,"--and with the words the wearied man was gently pushed down into
his own armchair, that roomy bed of luxury into which he nightly sank
when the labours of the day were over. When late like this, he had dined
elsewhere, where and when he could.
And next the mistress of the house cast around her eagle eye. She was a
born housewife, and particular about all her domain, but woe betide the
servant who scamped her work in this room. Mary Craig had what might be
called a convincing demeanour when she chose.
And she had not had a moment to run in and see that all was right on the
present occasion; and the night was dark and chill, and her husband
later than usual, having been far afield on his rounds,--it was just
like Eliza to be careless--but Eliza had not been careless.
All was as it should be; a pleasant warmth was diffused throughout the
whole snug apartment by a fire which had been lit in time, and was now a
mass of glowing coals; the hearth glittered, the curtains were properly
drawn, the lamp properly trimmed, and books and papers neatly piled upon
the various tables. She had not even to fetch the favourite pipe of the
moment, as it and a couple of matchboxes lay handy at the doctor's
elbow.
"Eliza's conception of her part," nodded Eliza's mistress, pleasantly
familiar with current quotations. "As she forgot a matchbox yesterday,
she puts two to-day."
"And that with a fire big enough to roast an ox!" grunted the doctor,
scornfully ignoring the extra contribution, and tearing off a strip from
the envelope in his hand. "Wasteful hussy--like all the rest of you;"
but when he had lit up, and thrown the burning end of paper into the
fender, where it was suffered to expire without a motion on his wife's
part, he leaned back and his hand stole along the arm of the chair till
it found quite naturally another hand, and a round, warm cheek, a dear
little cheek, lay presently upon both. For a few minutes neither spoke
again.
Then Mary looked up. "Very tired to-night, Humpty?"
Oh, if the patients who thought such worlds of their grim, overbearing
Scotch doctor, and the nurses who trembled before him at the county
infirmary, could have heard him called "Humpty"!--but to do so they must
also have beheld the softening brow, the relaxing of the stern lips, the
gradual light which crept into the piercing eyes--and only one person
was ever suffered to behold these. Her tender accents unveiled what was
hidden from the world.
"Tired, darling?"
"Well, may-be." Humpty made an effort and roused himself. "Perhaps I am,
a bit. Those idiots at the infirmary let me in for a lot more trouble
than I need have had,--but I daresay it will work out all right. I'm
worried about a new case, too,--however, no shop. Let's gossip.--What
have you been about?"
To meet this invariable question was part of her daily business, and
however trifling the happenings of morning and afternoon might be, they
were taxed to yield something whereby Humpty might be beguiled from his
own thoughts.
To-night, however, was an unlucky night, she had only such very small
beer to chronicle that he soon fell back upon them, and they comprised
the return of General Boldero's widowed daughter, and her probable
future under his roof.
"She won't have a gay time of it--at least she would not, if she had
come empty-handed,--perhaps as things are, it may be different."
"You forget, Humpty, that he always made a fuss about Leonore."
"I don't forget;" the doctor shook his head; "but I remember other
things as well. It's all very well to try to whitewash that old sinner,
but you don't know human nature as I do, my bairn. For that matter, I am
not the only one to say nasty things of old Brown-boots. It is common
talk that for all his posing as the genial squire and jolly
paterfamilias, Brown-boots is as mean a skunk as breathes."
"I know he is rather a martinet at home, but----"
"But what?" He protruded his head eagerly, scenting something in her
hesitation.
"The fault is not all on his side. Sue is straight: she is perfectly
straight----"
"Oh, aye; we know old Sue, dull as ditch-water, but honest. Well?"
"The other two are just a little--sly."
"Sly? You don't say so? I hadn't thought of that. I daresay they are, I
quite believe they are. Sly? And from _you_? Bless my life, they must be
sly indeed for _you_ to say so!" And he chuckled with keen enjoyment.
"What I mean is that they have no sense of duty. They simply pretend to
give in to their father--and of course they are afraid of him--but
behind his back it is a very different story. I don't like to say so,
but it's true."
"Serves him right, the old tom-cat. I only wish they snapped their
fingers in his face."
"No, no, Humpty----"
"But I do. However, I daresay they prefer a quiet life; and as for
Leonore, I do wonder how Leonore will get on?"--and he puffed a long
breath of smoke and looked down at his wife's upturned face. "If you
should ever have a chance of doing Leonore Stubbs a good turn, do it.
She'll need it," he prophesied.
The return of Leonore was the event of the neighbourhood. Others besides
Dr. Craig had seen General Boldero's carriage, with its glittering
harness and champing horses, in waiting at the station; and it was
noticed that not merely its presence but that of the general himself on
the occasion, was designed to give the young widow importance in the
public eye. The Reverend Eustace Custance, the rector, and very much the
rector, had both seen and understood.
Eustace was one of the excellent of the earth. His spare frame, long
neck, and hanging head were to be seen year in year out entering
familiarly every door in his parish,--entering with a friend's step, and
departing with a note-book, well-worn and blessed by not a few, in his
hand.
There were some among his richer parishioners who voted their clergyman
a bore, but he was never so thought of by the poor. Their wants, their
cares, their welfare was the burden of his thoughts--and we know that
such a burden is not always a welcome guest in the seats of the mighty.
General Boldero, for instance, would raise a curt hand to his hat, and
mutter something about being in haste, if he chanced upon the rector on
the road,--if possible, he would scuffle out of the way. "I never see
that man but he has a subscription list in his hand," he would fretfully
exclaim,--and though it did not suit his dignity to ignore the list, he
would have disliked the person whose fingers thus found their way into
his pocket, if it had been possible. Since it was not possible, he
yielded a cold esteem, and secretly wondered why so worthy a recipient
for promotion did not obtain it.
On the present occasion, however, Mr. Custance did not cross his
neighbour's path; voluntarily he never did so, and he had, as it
happened, no very pressing case demanding assistance on hand at the
moment.
Wherefore, he only blinked his mild blue eyes as the handsome turn-out,
designed to edify all beholders, thundered past him on the station road,
and recalled what his sister had told him about the Bolderos that
morning at breakfast. Emily was his purveyor of news, and his fondness
for her made him often affect an interest in it which he did not feel.
It might be an effort to say "Ah! Indeed?" and follow on with a proper
question or comment when his thoughts were wandering; but he never
failed to try, and from trying faithfully for many years, he had finally
attained some measure of success.
Occasionally, also, Emily's chit-chat bore fruit; the good man had the
scent of a sleuth-hound for any event which bore, however remotely, on
his life's object; and though he might now have been secretly amused by
his sister's excitement over what to him was a very ordinary
circumstance, a single remark in connection with it arrested his
coffee-cup on its way to his lips.
"To be sure I had forgotten that," he murmured.
"Forgotten that Leonore made a wealthy marriage, my dear Eustace? Why,
it is only three years ago, and we were all full of it."
"Then I suppose she----" he paused and mused.
"You may be sure she brings back her money with her," nodded Emily
cheerfully. "Poor dear child, it's all she has left. So sad to be
widowed so young, is it not? I don't think you seem quite to take in how
sad it is, Eustace," and she cast a gentle look of reproach.
The rector put down his cup and stirred its contents thoughtfully,
debating the question within himself. He was so accustomed to sad cases
that perhaps--well, perhaps it was as she said: certainly it had not
occurred to him to bestow the same pity on a young girl, bereaved
indeed, but with a good home to come back to, as he did on Peggy, the
ploughman's wife, for instance--that valiant Peggy who, with her ten
children, was suddenly reduced from comparative affluence to naked
poverty, by the death of the bread-winner of the family.
Peggy was getting on in years, and her strength was not what it had
been. She had toiled and moiled, and brought up her boys and girls in a
way that won her pastor's heart. His smile would be its kindest, his
shake of the hand its heartiest when he entered the ploughman's hut; and
there were others;--there was the case of Widow Barnaby whose only son
had just returned upon her hands, maimed for life, after starting out
into the world a fine, strapping youngster, the best lad in the village,
only a year before! No, he had not classed the calamity which had
befallen pretty little Leonore Boldero as on a plane with these.
But perhaps he was wrong, he was growing hard-hearted? Contact with the
very poor, and with material misery, was apt to blunt sympathy with
sorrows of another nature. "I daresay you are right, Emily," he said
candidly; for once convicted, no one was swifter to acknowledge a fault.
"I had not looked upon it in that light. Yes, it is certainly very sad
about Leonore, poor thing."
"People say it is a blessing she does not come back poor and dependent;"
thus encouraged, Emily proceeded with gusto, "for we all know the
general."
"Aye, that we do. So Leonore is rich?" and he obviously pondered on the
idea.
"My dear brother," Emily laughed, but the laugh was full of affection,
"now what is to come first? The Christmas coals, or the Old Folks'
Dinner, or----?"
"Peggy Farmiloe," said he, succinctly. "Her needs at the present time
are paramount. The rest can wait."
"So you will call on Leonore?"
"I shall make a point of doing so--presently."
"You will have to get at her when she is alone, you know. It would be no
good making it a topic of general conversation."
"I shall be as wise as the serpent, Emily," the good man permitted
himself an appreciative sally. "Perhaps I shall not even introduce the
subject at all on a first call, eh? It might not be in good taste--not
that one should heed that. But if my clumsiness were to prejudice the
cause--oh, I must certainly beware of clumsiness. Let me see, to-day is
Thursday," and out came the note-book; and after due consideration
Monday was fixed upon, whereupon Mr. Custance rose briskly.
"You may depend upon it, I shall go to the Abbey on Monday. And if this
poor little widow's heart is in the right place----" a glance shot from
his eye.
He foresaw sacks of coal and piles of blankets. He fed and he clothed.
He distributed the older Farmiloe orphans hither and thither, and
gathered the little ones together under his wing, which, weak before,
would now be strong to shelter and support. The Barnaby lad should have
better nursing and an easier couch. There was the old couple at the
disused toll-gate too. It was a blissful dream; and it is sad to
think--but we will not anticipate.
At Claymount Hall, the theme was treated from another point of view.
Here dwelt a very fine old lady with a youthful grandson, of whom it may
be briefly said that the neighbourhood thought Valentine Purcell a fool,
and that Val himself was very much of its opinion.
"_She's_ clever enough for two though, ain't she?" opined he,--and on
this point it was the neighbourhood who endorsed his opinion.
The pair were an unfailing source of interest and amusement. Mrs.
Purcell's latest word and Val's latest deed invariably went the round,
and to their house as a centre every fresh topic made its way.
It was there, we may observe, that the doctor's wife had met the Boldero
girls and heard about Leonore, and it might be added that it was there
also the Reverend Eustace Custance gained the like intelligence. Let us
hear how it was taken by the Purcells themselves.
Val, as usual, grinned from ear to ear, and had nothing to say--but his
grandmother had plenty, and directly her guests had departed she
summoned the young man to her side.
"What is this I hear about the Bolderos?"
This was Mrs. Purcell's little way of finding out what others had heard.
It is true that she was slightly deaf as she was partially blind,--but
she heard a great deal more and saw a vast deal further than most of her
neighbours, and Val was never in the least taken in by a parade of
infirmities. On the present occasion he simply waited for the speaker to
proceed.
"Did those girls say their sister was coming back to live with them? I
thought they did--but you know how badly I hear, especially if there is
a hubbub going on. Were they expecting her to-day? And had their father
gone to meet her, and was that why they had to hurry off, so as to be
back at home before the carriage returned? I thought so, but those girls
gabble like ducks. Eh? I was right then? And this is the end of poor
little Leonore's great marriage? At twenty-one she is left a widow, with
too much money to know what to do with--what? What did you say?"
"Didn't say anything, ma'am."
"But it _is_ so, is it not? I am sure I heard Maud telling you----?" and
Mrs. Purcell paused and peered sharply.
"_I_ didn't, then. But I knew you would tell me afterwards if there was
anything to tell."
"Humph!" The old lady paused again, and twisted her cap strings. Val was
gazing stupidly out of the window, but whatever the expression of his
face might be no one could deny that the face itself was worthy of
notice. It was an almost perfect outline which was now cut sharp against
the light, the unusually bright light of an autumn sun, setting in a
cloudless sky.
Val was looking at the sun, and wondering if a slight haze surrounding
it portended rain. He was learned in weather lore and most of his life
was passed out of doors,--so that it was important to him to ascertain
if he could, the forecast of each day. It meant whether he might expect
a hunting, or a shooting, or a fishing day. This was infinitely more
interesting than the conversation, though he was always ready for
conversation if nothing better offered.
"Humph!" muttered his grandmother a second time, and stole a glance, a
long, furtive, appraising glance--not at the sunset, but at the profile
which it threw into such bold relief.
Apparently it satisfied her, for her own features relaxed, and her eyes
sought the floor in meditation.
("She might be caught by his looks, why not? The other two are always
glad to talk to Val, and Heaven knows it is not for anything he says. He
contrives to make them laugh--he has a kind of oddity that goes
down--but if he were an ugly fellow they would not trouble their heads
about that. Now, if Leonore----she is but a child still, and as she
could marry a man called Stubbs to begin with, she can't be particular.
Anyhow it is worth trying for.")
"Val?"--suddenly the peremptory old voice rang out.
Val yawned and turned round.
"I am so sorry for dear little Leonore, I can't get her out of my head."
"Well, I'm sorry too." With an effort Val recalled what he had to be
sorry for, but that done, he assumed a solemn air that did him
credit--and indeed we are wrong in using the word "assumed," since
directly he remembered or reflected upon the woes of others, Valentine
Purcell's kind heart was touched.
"I'm awfully sorry," he reiterated now, shaking his head.
"It is so sad for her, is it not?"
"Awfully sad; I say, do you think she'd join the hunt?" Suddenly his
eyes lit up, and he started to attention. "We do want some more
subscribers jolly badly. If Leonore----"
"Not just at present, my dear,--but, yes, certainly, by-and-by, when she
has settled down here, and left off her weeds."
"Her what?" he stared.
"Her widow's weeds, dear boy. The poor child must wear them, you know.
White collars and cuffs, and that kind of thing. Happily she need not
disfigure her sweet face by a frightful cap as _I_ had to do."
"Oh, Lor! Do you mean Leo will have to turn out in a thing like that?"
"My dear, I just said she would _not_."
"But she might, he-he-he!" he chuckled, but the next moment was again
preternaturally grave. "I had no idea. Poor Leo!"
This was better. The old lady sighed sympathetically. "Yes, indeed. Poor
Leo! You always liked Leo, Val?"
"Rather. I can't imagine her in a beastly widow's cap, he-he-he! It's a
beastly shame, but I can't help laughing."
"It does seem incongruous. I don't wonder that you can hardly picture
that bright little sunbeam of a face with those golden curls hanging
round it----"
"She's not as good-looking as Maud, you know."
"Indeed I think she is a great deal better looking," said Mrs. Purcell,
shortly.
But she knew better than to argue the point, and resorted to one more
likely to yield a favourable result.
"You were talking about Leonore's joining the hunt; and I fancy if you
are content to wait a little and approach the matter delicately, she is
quite likely to be persuaded. Every one knows that it is only stinginess
on General Boldero's part which stands in the way of his daughters'
hunting. _That_ need not affect Leonore, who will now be quite
independent, and can keep as many horses as she chooses."
"You don't say so? Yoicks! I'll be at her like a shot."
"And you can offer to pilot her, you know. She will be nervous at
first."
"Oh, I'll pilot her. But she can ride all right, for we used to have
great larks when they were out on their ponies, and Leo was always the
best of the bunch. It will be fun if I can get her to follow hounds, and
the hunt will be awfully obliged to me."
"Don't let any one else--it is your idea, and you ought to have the
benefit of it."
"Trust me for that, ma'am," looking very wise. "I've never brought them
a subscriber yet, and it would be jolly mean of any one to try to cut me
out."
"If it is suggested, you must pooh-pooh the notion."
"How can I though, when I'm thinking of it all the time myself?"
"Leonore might be prevailed upon by _you_, by an old friend for whom she
has a kindly feeling, and on whose judgment she could rely," replied
Mrs. Purcell, softly; "while at the same time she would not think nor
dream of such a thing if left to herself. And certainly she would resent
being approached on the subject by strangers. Therefore it would be
quite correct, absolutely correct, to say that no such approach would
have a chance of success. You see that, my dear boy?"
He was further instructed that, in order to prepare the ground for his
future mission, he was to take an early opportunity of calling at the
Abbey, and of being especially respectful and sympathetic in his manner
towards poor dear little Leo.
He was to show that as an old friend and playmate he felt for her; and
he might, if he saw his way to it, intimate delicately that though he
might grieve on her account at her return to dwell among them, he could
not do so on his own.
"Well, I can say that, you know," Val brightened up. He did not much
like being on the respectful and sympathetic lay, he told himself; he
was pretty sure to make a mess of it there;--but if it came to saying he
was glad----
"You can't _say_ such a thing, my dear, you can only infer it. You can
look it; look kind and--and tender."
"And jolly well show old Maud she needn't book me too sure as her man,
eh?"
At last he seemed to have caught up what she was struggling against
heavy odds to inculcate. It was up-hill work teaching Val anything,
especially anything requiring _finesse_--but occasionally he would
startle his mentor. He would emit a flash of intelligence when such was
least expected, and there was now such a humorous light in his grey eyes
that the old lady laughed in her heart. Dear, dear--how naughty he was!
So he had the vanity to suppose that Maud Boldero reckoned him an
admirer?
Whereat Val complacently knew she did.
By degrees he was led to reveal all his artless thoughts upon the
subject, and somehow found it more engrossing than he had ever done
before.
In truth, his grandmother had never encouraged mention of it before. She
had ignored the Boldero girls when she could, and bracketed them
together in faint, damning praise when to ignore was impossible. She
knew exactly how to treat Val. An incipient flame could be warmed,
cooled, or blown out by her breath--and as hitherto she had had no
intention of receiving a daughter-in-law out of Boldero Abbey, she had
simply never permitted a spark to be lit.
Here, in justice to the old lady, a solitary fact must be stated. Her
grandson was not her heir, and the Claymount estate, of which she had a
life rent, was strictly entailed; wherefore Val must be provided for
otherwise.
A woman of another sort would have attained this end by saving out of
her income, or by insuring her life--but Mrs. Purcell argued that she
had so much to keep up, and Valentine's requirements were so manifold
and costly that she could neither put by anything worth having, nor
afford the heavy premiums an Insurance Office would demand at her age.
She had not taken the matter into consideration till too late.
And the boy had been bred to no profession--indeed his grandmother
secretly doubted his ability to pursue one--and she had been only too
glad of the excuse to have him as her companion at Claymount. He had a
pittance of his own, derived from his parents who were both dead,--but
he had nothing further to look to, as his uncle, who in the course of
time would succeed to the estate, openly flouted him for a "loafer," and
made no secret of his opinion that the money spent on his hunters and
keepers would have been better bestowed upon almost anything else.
What then was to become of Val--Val, who was the apple of her eye, whose
very childishness and helplessness were dear to her, whose beauty of
face and form--stop, she had it, she laughed as she told herself she had
it. And how often she strained those dim old eyes of hers to see more
clearly when her darling's step was heard, and how fondly they rested on
the approaching figure and strove to appraise at its exact value the
curiously beautiful face, no one but herself knew.
It was a face without a soul--and she was pathetically aware of this,
but what then? Val would make a good husband--he would certainly make a
good husband. Husbands were not required to be clever; and it was quite
on the cards that even an intelligent girl might fall in love with a man
who had only a kind heart and an amiable disposition to recommend him,
provided his exterior were to her fancy.
But of course the girl must be rich; and now we come to the crux of the
whole little scene above narrated--Leonore Stubbs, the wealthy young
widow, with no ties, no drawbacks, and not too much discrimination (or
she could not have married as she did in the first instance), was the
very first person to solve the problem. In her own mind Mrs. Purcell
decided that her grandson should call at Boldero Abbey the very first
moment that decency permitted.
There is no need to multiply instances, it will now be perceived that in
no quarter was the real secret of the unfortunate Leonore's return to
the home of her childhood so much as suspected.
She was a pauper--but she was received as a princess. She had hardly a
penny of her own--but she was marked down as a benefactress. She was
bereft, denuded, bewildered, humiliated--but she was hailed with acclaim
by the shrewdest woman in the neighbourhood on the look-out for an
heiress.