Jenny looked, if possible, lovelier than usual as she tripped
downstairs beside her mother and her aunt. Her face was still flushed
from sleep, and her hair had been twisted up anyhow, whilst the pale
blue gown she wore accorded well with her rose-leaf complexion. Mrs
Crampton and Miss Bostock accompanied her in trembling dread of the
coming encounter, but the girl herself was perfectly confident and
fearless. As they reached the door of the library, where her father
awaited her, she caught sight of Aunt Clem’s visage and burst out
laughing.
‘Oh, dear!’ she cried, ‘Aunt Clem, if you don’t put on some other kind
of face, you’ll kill me! When you assume that lugubrious expression,
you look so like a cow that I always expect to hear you low.’
‘Dearest child! that is not kind,’ remarked her mother, with mild
reproof.
‘Oh! never mind, it doesn’t signify, I am sure dear Jenny doesn’t mean
it,’ interposed Aunt Clem, who had, nevertheless, winced under the
sarcasm.
‘I did mean it, though,’ cried Jenny boldly; ‘one would think I was
going to be hanged to see your long faces. Well, papa!’ she continued,
as they entered the presence of Mr Crampton, ‘and what may you have
to say to me this morning? You’ll have to pay for dragging me out of
my bed in this outrageous manner, you know, and I sha’n’t be pacified
until you buy me that little Arab mare of Mr Winchers’. Is it a
bargain?’
She looked so saucy and so pretty as she said this, and perched herself
on her father’s knee, that Mr Crampton, in his pride and affection,
was very nearly granting her request without further protest. But
the remembrance of the Popish admirer intruded itself just in time to
prevent the folly. Nevertheless, he kissed his daughter’s blooming
cheek, and said,--
‘If you will be a good girl, and do exactly as I tell you, you shall
have a dozen Arab mares if they will please you, Jenny.’
‘All right, old gentleman! that’s a bargain. Now for the conditions.’
‘But we must speak seriously, my dear, for I am quite in earnest in
this matter. You have been encouraging a young man to come about here,
Jenny, of whose acquaintanceship you know I do not approve--I mean Mr
Frederick Walcheren. Now, I must have a stop put to it at once. He
never comes here again, nor will I allow you to meet him out of the
house, unless it should be by accident, nor to dance with him if you do
meet him. I hope you understand me plainly. I will not permit you to
know any of the Walcherens from this time forward. You must entirely
drop them. Nor shall your mother ask them to my house. And I shall
never remove this prohibition from you--_never_!’
‘Anything more?’ asked Jenny, shortly.
A close observer might have seen and interpreted the change in her
countenance as she listened to her father’s mandate. Into the light
hazel eyes had crept a much darker shade, and the full lips had pouted
till they had become sullen. But all she said was ‘Anything more?’
‘I do not know that, as your father, I am in any way called upon to
give you my reasons, my dear, but, since you seem to ask for them,
I will. You appear to me to have shown a marked preference for Mr
Frederick Walcheren’s society, and, as it would be impossible for you
to marry him, it is best the affair should be put an end to at once.’
‘He has plenty of money,’ argued the young lady.
‘I am aware of that, and the uses he has hitherto put his money to. He
is a gambler and a loose liver. But that is not the chief objection
to him in my eyes. His vices might be reformed, but not his religion.
Young creatures like yourself do not think of such things, but the
Walcherens are all Roman Catholics, and that fact puts an insuperable
barrier between them and us. I would never, under any circumstances,
give my consent to your marriage with a Papist. I would rather see you
in your grave, Jenny, and I cannot say more than that. If you have
entertained any such idea, you must dismiss it from your mind at once.
And in order that there may be no fear of such a thing--in order to
secure your happiness and safety, I insist upon your giving up the
acquaintanceship of this young man altogether. You must not ask him to
the house again, and, if he calls, your mother will order the servant
to say that she is not at home. If you meet him out, you have my
strict commands not to dance with him, or to talk more than the merest
politeness necessitates. If, notwithstanding these precautions, I find
Mr Walcheren is obstinately bent on thrusting himself where he is not
welcome, I shall take the law into my own hands, by carrying you away
from Hampstead to some place where it is impossible you can meet him.
Don’t think me harsh, Jenny, for, God knows, that is the last thing
I wish to be towards you, but I have spoken to you on this subject
several times before, and I find you have taken no heed, so you force
me to speak more plainly. Do you quite understand me now?’
‘Yes, I understand,’ said the girl sullenly.
‘And you promise obedience?’
‘How can I do otherwise than obey?’ she broke out passionately. ‘The
house is yours, and you can do as you choose with it and those who
enter it. And Frederick Walcheren is not a man to thrust his company
where it is not wanted. All these accusations you bring against
him--what authority have you for them? He is to be condemned unheard,
and his religion is brought against him as a crime. If that is what
you call Christian, I’d rather be a Jew any day.’
The tone she had adopted made the old man angry. He was devotedly fond
and proud of her, but he had an obstinate temper, and would not brook
opposition to his wishes.
‘Now, now, that’s enough!’ he answered. ‘My word is law here, and
I will stand no arguments about the matter. I don’t approve of the
man--that is sufficient! Neither shall my daughter know him. As for
condemning him unheard, that is all rubbish. Hindes knows his character
as well as I do. He says--’
‘Oh! then it is to Mr Hindes I owe this unpleasant interview,’ cried
Jenny. ‘What business has he to poke his nose into my affairs? He’s
always meddling in some way or another. Mr Hindes made you sell my
beautiful hunter, because he said it was not safe for me to ride; and
Mr Hindes prevented my accepting Lady Makewell’s invitation to the
Castle, on account of some absurd rumours he had heard of her former
life. But, if Mr Hindes thinks he is to be the judge of all my actions
and the ruler of my destinies, he is very much mistaken, and so I
will let him know before he is many days older. I won’t have any man
interfering with me in this way, and turning my own parents against me.’
‘Don’t be a fool!’ exclaimed Mr Crampton, roughly. ‘Hindes is the best
friend you have--that any of us have--and it would be a bad day for the
firm and the family, that saw our interests divided. I mentioned him as
an authority for the sort of life Mr Frederick Walcheren lives, but,
far from setting me against you, he has stood up for your good sense
and filial obedience all through the discussion of this unfortunate
affair. It is I alone--your father--who has come to the conclusion to
cut Mr Walcheren’s acquaintance, and now I demand your obedience to my
commands. Once and for all, your implicit obedience. Do you promise it
me?’
‘I have no alternative!’ said Jenny.
‘All the same, I must have your promise given here, before your mother
and your aunt.’
‘Very well, then, I promise!’ replied the girl after a pause.
‘That is all I require,’ said the old man; ‘and now, I suppose, I can
go about my business. But remember! if I ever catch you trying to
outwit me by any d--d subterfuges, I will take you away from Hampstead,
and you shall never see it again whilst that man is in it.’
He turned then, as if to leave the room, but, perceiving that both his
wife and her sister were in tears, he thought he might have spoken too
harshly to this child whom he so dearly loved, and came back again for
a moment.
‘Kiss me, Jenny,’ he said; ‘I’m not angry with you, my girl, though I
may have seemed so, but it’s your happiness I have at heart and not my
own. There! there!’ with a sounding kiss on her cheek, ‘you won’t fret
about the matter, will you? and we’ll ride over together to Winchers’
to-morrow and secure the little mare you’ve set your heart on. God
bless you, my dear!’ and, with another kiss, he left them to themselves.
Jenny stood for a minute silent and motionless, then walked quickly
towards the door, as if to return to her own room.
‘Jenny, my darling,’ pleaded her mother, ‘you see the force of your
dear father’s argument, don’t you?’
She went towards the girl as she spoke, and would have wound her arms
about her, but Jenny pushed her impatiently aside.
‘Don’t bother me, mamma,’ she said, ‘you know how I hate a fuss. All
this worry is mostly your fault, you might have prevented it if you had
chosen.’
‘Oh! Jenny, my dear, how?’
‘Why, do you suppose I don’t know it has come of some repetition of
yours or Aunt Clem’s? How should papa, who is all day in the city,
and never goes with us anywhere in the evenings, have heard that I
danced more with Fred Walcheren than any other man, unless you had
told him? And I think it is beastly mean of you, too! Why can’t I
have my pleasure the same as other girls? I conclude you and papa made
love enough to each other when you were young, and yet you grudge me
a choice in the matter. I’m only to dance, and talk, and be agreeable
with such people as you select for me. It’s bitterly unfair.’
‘Oh, no, darling, don’t say that! Your dear father is only desirous
of one thing, to promote your welfare. And Mr Walcheren is very wild,
Jenny. He would not make you a good husband. Everybody says so.’
‘And so my happiness is to be sacrificed because “everybody” chooses to
tell lies of the man I like, and papa and you choose to believe them.
Well! I sha’n’t forget it in a hurry, I can tell you, mamma. And now,
please let me go to my room in peace. I suppose I may claim a right to
so much indulgence of my own wishes.’
‘My dear girl, when have any of your wishes been ungratified, unless
they were likely to prove hurtful to yourself. We should take a knife
away from a baby, my darling, however much it cried for it, for fear it
should cut itself.’
‘Thank you for comparing me to a baby, mamma, but I think you will find
I am not quite such a child as you imagine. Anyway, I am woman enough
to wish to be left alone to think over this matter by myself.’
And, without waiting for an answer, Jenny ran up the staircase, and
locked herself into her bedroom.
The two ladies downstairs were left in a very uncomfortable condition.
‘I hope,’ remarked Mrs Crampton to her sister, ‘I hope dear papa
did not go too far in what he said. Jenny is so high-spirited and
quick-tempered, that she might be tempted to do something wilful just
because she was crossed. And if she dances with Mr Walcheren at the
Bouchers’ to-night, I don’t know what her papa will say.’
‘Oh, she would never dare to do so, surely,’ replied Aunt Clem; ‘she
would never fly in John’s face in that manner! She is a little fond of
her own way sometimes, I admit, but she has a good heart, poor darling,
and says far more than she means. And John is right, Emma. Mr Walcheren
is a very wild young man, and it would never do for our Jenny to marry
him.’
‘Of course, John is right,’ acquiesced the wife; ‘but I wish Jenny
could see it in the same light. However, I will take care not to let
her out of my sight this evening, and then it will be impossible for Mr
Walcheren to get speech of her, without my overhearing what he may say.’
Meanwhile, Jenny, having reached the sanctuary of her own room, drank
off her chocolate hastily, and dismissed her maid who was in attendance.
‘Is my bath ready, Ellen?’ she inquired; ‘that is right. Well! you can
go now and I will ring when I am ready to dress. Tell Brunell that I
will have the Ralli cart at one.’
‘Before luncheon, miss?’ said the maid.
‘At one o’clock, sharp! And don’t go out of the way; I shall want you
in ten minutes.’
She turned the key of her door on the inside as the maid disappeared,
and, sitting down before her writing-table, drew out pen and paper, and
commenced to write a letter, which ran as follows:--
‘DARLING,--There has been a row here this morning, and papa has
forbidden me ever to speak to you again. What are we to do? I shall be
at the Bouchers’ to-night, without fail. I must not dance with you,
but, if you will be in the picture gallery after the fourth dance, I
will contrive to speak to you. Oh, Fred, where is all this going to
end? They shall never make me give you up, if you remain of the same
mind, but open communication with you seems almost impossible. I can’t
write any more, my head and my heart are both in a whirl. Ever your
loving
JENNY.’
She sealed this letter, and directed it to Frederick Walcheren,
Esq., 308 Nevern Mansions, Earl’s Court, London, and placed it on one
side. Her next concern was to see in what condition this unpleasant
excitement had left her. But she found no reason to complain.
The exercise of her temper had made her cheeks rosier, and lent an
extra brightness to her eyes. She was glad of this--glad that she had
not given way to the weakness of tears, and swelled up her eyelids and
made her face look puffy. She might meet Frederick during her drive. He
spent most of his spare time in wandering about Hampstead in the hopes
of meeting her. But she seldom drove out until the afternoon. Still,
there was just the chance of a _rencontre_ with her lover, and for that
chance Jenny would have taken more trouble than this.
When she came downstairs again, an hour later, dressed in a tailor-made
suit of light fawn tweed, with her jaunty little felt hat on her
head, and her hands in white doeskin driving-gloves, holding a
handsome ivory-handled whip, few people would have guessed the state
of excitement she was still in, she looked so fresh and lovely and
smiling. In the hall she encountered her mother, who had heard the
wheels of the Ralli cart draw up to the door.
‘Out so early, my darling?’ Mrs Crampton said, kindly; ‘where are you
going to?’
‘For a drive,’ answered the girl curtly.
‘But doesn’t it look a little like rain,’ continued her mother timidly,
for she was half afraid of her idol, particularly when the idol was put
out.
‘I don’t care if it does,’ replied Jenny, in the same tone; ‘I’m not
made of sugar.’
‘But take an umbrella, darling,’ said her mother, anxiously, ‘and let
Brunell hold it over you, if it should be wet.’
But Miss Crampton rejected all her suggestions with scorn.
‘If it thunders and lightens, and I get wet through and go into a
consumption, so much the better,’ she exclaimed impatiently. ‘You and
papa between you have contrived to make me so supremely miserable,
that I don’t care what happens to me! In fact, the sooner I’m dead the
better; and I’ve a good mind to take a dose of prussic acid and end it
at once.’
This is a very usual threat of selfish and ill-tempered people,
particularly if they have loving and anxious hearts to deal with. To
Mrs Crampton, to whom the girl was everything in the world, Jenny’s
words seem full of bitter portent.
‘Oh! my darling! my darling!’ she exclaimed, in a voice of the deepest
concern, ‘don’t say such terrible things, even in jest, for Heaven’s
sake! You will break my heart, Jenny, and your poor father would go mad
if he heard you speak in such an awful way. Why! we would cut off our
right hands to save you a moment’s trouble.’
‘Yes! it looks like it, doesn’t it?’ said the young lady, sarcastically.
‘My dearest, don’t discuss the subject again. Wait a little and you
will see it perhaps in a different light. My head aches so, Jenny, I
am not fit to argue it with you, and you have been upset as well. Go
for a nice drive, and the fresh air will make your head clearer. But be
careful, my love, and don’t do anything rash! I’m half afraid of those
cobs, Jenny, they’re so fresh and spirited.’
‘Oh! you’re afraid of everything,’ replied her daughter in a tone of
contempt; ‘and as for Aunt Clem, she’s alarmed at her own shadow.’
‘I was never brought up to horses and dogs, as you have been, dear,’
said Miss Bostock, who was standing near.
‘No; nor to anything, I should think,’ replied her niece, as she
prepared to get into her Ralli cart. ‘I often think you and mamma must
have been born and reared on a desert island, you seem so utterly
ignorant of the things most people do.’
With which Miss Crampton gently touched her steeds with the lash of her
whip, and they went prancing down the drive as if they intended to
bolt, whilst her mother and aunt held their breath with anxiety, lest
the wilful driver should come to any harm.
Jenny drove at a smart pace through the principal ways of Hampstead,
whilst the pedestrians whom she passed said to each other ‘There
goes the beautiful Miss Crampton,’ and she overheard some of their
remarks and flushed with pleasure at the notice she excited. For this
young lady’s besetting sin was an inordinate vanity of her personal
attractions, which she had cultivated to the exclusion of all the
Christian graces. She was a specimen of that most odious of all modern
innovations, the fast girl of the nineteenth century, and she was
vulgar in consequence, for all fast women are vulgar, and obnoxious
in the eyes of everybody but their male admirers. For when will men
be ever sensible enough to separate the value of personal beauty and
mental charm? Not while they have eyes to see. Once touch their senses,
and, for the time their infatuation lasts, you cannot convince them
but that the mind and soul of their goddess equal her body in charm.
Frederick Walcheren was infatuated with the beauty of this girl, and
he believed her disposition to be all that was good and lovable as
well. It appeared so to him, for, whenever they met, Jenny was in her
best temper, and ready to be pleased with everything. Had he even seen
her, as she had been on the present occasion, rude and impertinent to
her parents, cruelly sarcastic to her meek and unoffending aunt, and
obstinately resolved upon having her own way, he would still have taken
her part, declared her to be a suffering angel, and her father and
mother most unjust and tyrannical towards her. Shakespeare never wrote
a greater truism than when he made Rosalind declare that ‘Love is a
madness,’ a madness that blinds our vision, distorts our judgment, and
makes all things, not only apparently, but actually, different from
what they are; when the rose-coloured spectacles have been torn by
circumstance from our eyes, and we wonder we could ever have been such
egregious fools as to think that they were otherwise.
Miss Crampton, then, with her heart on fire and her soul up in arms,
stopped at the first pillar-box she passed, and bade Brunell post the
letter which she gave him, the letter she had written in her bedroom
and which she knew would reach town before Mr Walcheren left it to meet
her at the house of their mutual friends, the Bouchers.
And as she flew over the highway, one sentence kept revolving itself
over and over in her mind, and the burden of it was, ‘I will never give
him up, I will never give him up.’