There was a very dull dinner at Ranford that day. Lord Ascot scarcely spoke a word; he was kind and polite — he always was that — but he was very different from his usual self. The party missed his jokes; which, though feeble and sometimes possibly “rather close to the wind,” served their purpose, served to show that the maker of them was desirous to make himself agreeable to the best of his ability. He never laughed once during dinner, which was very unusual. It was evident that Lord Saltire had performed his commission, and Charles was afraid that he was furiously angry with Welter; but, on one occasion, when the latter looked up suddenly and asked him some question, his father answered him kindly in his usual tone of voice, and spoke to him so for some time.
Lady Ascot was a host in herself. With a noble self-sacrifice, she, at the risk of being laughed at, resolved to attract attention by airing some of her most remarkable opinions. She accordingly attacked Lord Saltire on the subject of the end of the world, putting its total destruction by fire at about nine months from that time. Lord Saltire had no opinion to offer on the probability of Dr. Going’s theory, but sincerely hoped that it might last his time, and that he might he allowed to get out of the way in the ordinary manner. He did not for a moment doubt the correctness of her calculations; but he put it to her as a woman of the world, whether or no such an occurrence as she described would not be in the last degree awkward and disconcerting?
Adelaide said she didn’t believe a word of it, and nothing should induce her to do so until it took place. This brought the old lady’s wrath down upon her and helped the nagging conversation on a little. But, after dinner, it got so dull in spite of every one’s efforts, that Lord Sal tire confided to his young friend, as they went upstairs, that he had an idea that something was wrong; but at all events, that the house was getting so insufferably dull that he must rat, pardieu, for he couldn’t stand it. He should rat into Devon to his friend Lord Begur.
Welter took occasion to tell Charles that Lord Ascot had sent for him, and told him that he knew all about what had happened, and his debts. That he did not wish the subject mentioned (as if I were likely to talk about it!); that his debts should, if possible, be paid. That he had then gone on to say, that he did not wish to say anything harsh to Welter on the subject — that he doubted whether he retained the right of reproving his son. That they both needed forgiveness one from the other, and that he hoped in what was to follow they would display that courtesy and mutual forbearance to ne another which gentlemen should. “And what the deuce does he mean, eh? He never spoke like this before. Is he going to marry again? Ay, that’s what it is, depend upon it,” said this penetrating young gentleman; “ that will be rather a shame of 1dm, you know, particularly if he has two or three cubs to cut into my fortune;” and so from that time Lord Welter began to treat his father with a slight coolness, and an air of injured innocence most amusing, though painful, to Charles and Adelaide, who knew the truth.
As for Adelaide, she seemed to treat Charles like a brother once more. She kept no secret from him; she walked with him, rode with him, just as of old. She did not seem to like Lord Welter’s society, though she was very kind to him; and he seemed too much taken up with his dogs and horses to care much for her. So Charles and she were thrown together, and Charles’s love for her grew stronger day by day, until that studied indifferent air which he had assumed on his arrival became almost impossible to sustain. He sustained it, nevertheless, treating Adelaide almost with rudeness, and flinging about his words so carelessly, that sometimes she would look suddenly up indignant, and make some passionate reply, and sometimes she would rise and leave the room — for aught I know, in tears.
It was a sad house to stay in; and his heart began to yearn for his western home in spite of Adelaide. After a short time came a long letter from his father, a scolding loving letter, in which Densil showed plainly that he as trying to be angry, and could not, for joy at having his son home with him — and concluded by saying that he should never allude to the circumstance again, and by praying him to come back at once from that wicked, cock-fighting, horse-racing, Ranford. There was an inclosure for Lord Saltire, the reading of which caused his lordship to take a great deal of snuff, in which he begged him, for old friendship’s sake, to send his boy home to him, as he had once sent him home to his father. And so Lord Saltire appeared in Charles’s dressing-room before dinner one day, and, sitting down, said that he was come to take a great liberty, and, in fact, was rather presuming on his being an old man, but he hoped that his young friend would not take it amiss from a man old enough to be his grandfather, if he recommended him to leave that house, and go home to his father’s. Ranford was a most desirable house in every way; but, at the same time, it was what he believed the young men of the day called a fast house; and he would not conceal from his young friend that his father had requested him to use his influence to make him return home; and he did beg his old friend’s son to believe that he was actuated by the best of motives.
“Dear Lord Saltire,” said Charles, taking the old man’s hand; “I am going home tomorrow; and you don’t know how heartily I thank you for the interest you always take in me.”
“I know nothing,” said Lord Saltire, “more pleasing to a battered old fellow like myself than to contemplate he ingenuousness of youth, and you must allow me to gay that your ingenuousness sits uncommonly well upon you — in fact, is very becoming. I conceived a considerable interest in you the first time I saw you, on that very account. I should like to have had a son like you, but it was not to be. I had a son, who was all that could be desired by the most fastidious person, brought up in a far better school than mine; but he got shot in his first duel, at one-and-twenty. I remember to have been considerably annoyed at the time,” continued the old gentleman, taking a pinch of snuff, and looking steadily at Charles without moving a muscle, “but I flare say it was all for the best; he might have run in debt, or married a woman with red hair, or fifty things. Well, I wish you good day, and beg your forgiveness once more for the liberty I have taken.”
Charles slipped away from the dinner-table early that evening, and, while Lady Ascot was having her after-dinner nap, had a long conversation with Adelaide in the dark, which was very pleasant to one of the parties concerned, at any rate.
“Adelaide, I am going home tomorrow.”
“Are you really? Are you going so suddenly?”
“I am, positively. I got a letter from home today. Are you very sorry or very glad?”
“I am very sorry, Charles. You are the only friend I have in the world to whom I can speak as I like. Make me a promise.” “Well?”
“This is the last night we shall he together. Promise that you won’t be rude and sarcastic as you are sometimes — almost always, now, to poor me — but talk kindly, as we used to do.”
“Very well,” said Charles. “And you promise you won’t he taking such a black view of the state of affairs as you do in general. Do you remember the conversation we had the day the colt was tried?”
“I remember.”
“Well, don’t talk like that, you know.”
“I won’t promise that. The time will come very soon when we shall have no more pleasant talks together.”
“When will that be?”
“When I am gone out for a governess.”
“What wages will you get? You will not get so much as some girls, because you are so pretty and so wilful, and you will lead them such a deuce of a life.”
“Charles, you said you wouldn’t be rude.”
“I choose to be rude. I have been drinking wine, and we are in the dark, and aunt is asleep and snoring, and I shall say just what I like.”
“I’ll wake her.”
“I should like to see you. What shall we talk about? What an old Roman Lord Saltire is. He talked about his son who was killed, to me today, just as I should talk about a pointer dog.”
“Then he thought he had been showing some signs of weakness. He always speaks of his son like that when he thinks he has been betraying some feeling.”
“I admire him for it,” said Charles. — “So you are going to be a governess, eh?”
“I suppose so.”
“Why don’t you try being barmaid at a public-house? Welter would get you a place directly; he has great influence in the licensed victualling way. You might come to many a commercial traveller, for anything you know.”
“I would not have believed this,” she said, in a fierce, low voice. “You have turned against me and insult me, because Unkind, unjust, ungentlemanlike.”
He heard her passionately sobbing in the dark, and the next moment he had her in his arms, and was covering her face with kisses.
“Lie there, my love,” he said; “that is your place . All the world can’t harm or insult my Adelaide while she is there. Why did you fly from me and repulse me my darling, when I told you I was your own true love?”
“Oh, let me go, Charles,” she said, trying, ever so feebly, to repulse him. “Dear Charles, pray do; I am frightened.”
“Not till you tell me you love me, false one.”
H I love you more than all the world.”
“Traitress! And why did you repulse me and laugh at me?”
“I did not think you were in earnest.”
“Another kiss for that wicked, wicked falsehood. Do you know that this rustication business has all come from the despair consequent on your wicked behaviour the other day?”
“You said Welter caused it, Charles. But oh, please let me go.”
“Will you go as a governess now?”
“I will do nothing but what you tell me.”
“Then give me one, your own, own self, and I will let you go.”
Have the reader’s feelings of horror, indignation, astonishment, outraged modesty, or ridicule, given him time to remember that all this went on in the dark, within six feet of an unconscious old lady? Such, however, was the case. And scarcely had Adelaide determined that it was time to wake her, and barely had she bent over her for that purpose, when the door was thrown open, and — enter attendants with lights. Now, if the reader will reflect a moment, he will see what an awful escape they had; for the chances were about a thousand to one in favour of two things having happened: 1st, the groom of the chambers might have come into the room half a minute sooner; and 2d, they might have sat as they were half a minute longer; in either of which cases, Charles would have been discovered with his arm round Adelaide’s waist, and a fearful scandal would have been the consequence. And I mention this as a caution to young persons in general, and to remind them that, if they happen to be sitting hand in hand, it is no use to jump apart and look very ed just as the door opens, because the incomer can see what they have been about as plain as if he had been there. On this occasion, also, Charles and Adelaide set down as usual to their own sagacity what was the result of pure accident.
Adelaide was very glad to get away after tea, for she felt rather guilty and confused. On Charles’s offering to go, however, Lady Ascot, who had been very silent and glum all tea-time, requested him to stay, as she had something serious to say to him. Which set that young gentleman speculating whether she could possibly have been awake before the advent of candles, and caused him to await her pleasure with no small amount of trepidation.
Her ladyship began, by remarking that digitalis was invaluable for palpitation, and that she had also found camomile, combined with gentle purgatives, efficient for the same thing, when suspected to proceed from stomach. She opined that, if this weather continued, there would be heavy running for the Cambridgeshire, and Commissioner would probably stand as well as any horse. And then, having, like a pigeon, taken a few airy circles through stable-management, theology, and agriculture, she descended on her subject, and frightened Charles out of his five wits, by asking him if he didn’t think Adelaide a very nice girl.
Charles decidedly thought she was a very nice girl; but he rather hesitated, and said — “Yes, that she was charming.”
“Now, tell me, my dear,” said Lady Ascot, manoeuvring a great old fan, “for young eyes are quicker than old ones. Did you ever remark anything between her and Welter?”
Charles caught up one of his legs, and exclaimed, “The devil!”
“What a shocking expression, my dear! Well, I agree with you. I fancy I have noticed that they entertained a decided preference for one another. Of course, Welter will be throwing himself away, and all that sort of thing, but he is pretty sure to do that. I expect every time he comes home, that he will bring a wife from behind the bar of a public-house. Now, Adelaide —”
“Aunt! Lady Ascot! Surely you are under a mistake. I never saw anything between them.”
“Hm.”
“I assure you I never did. I never heard Welter speak of her in that sort of way, and I don’t think she cares for him.”
“What reason have you for thinking that?”
“Well — why, you know it’s hard to say. The fa< I have rather a partiality for Adelaide myself, and I have watched her in the presence of other men.”
“Oho! Do you think she cares for you? Do you know she won’t have a sixpence?”
“We shall have enough to last till next year, aunt; and then the world is to come to an end, you know, and we shan’t want anything.”
“Never you mind about the world, sir. Don’t you be flippant and impertinent, sir. Don’t evade my question, sir. Do you think Adelaide cares for you, sir?”
Charles looked steadily and defiantly at his aunt, and asked her whether she didn’t think it was very difficult to find out what a girl’s mind really was — whereby we may conclude that he was profiting by Lord Saltire’s lesson on the command of feature.
“This is too bad, Charles,” broke out Lady Ascot, “to put me off like this, after your infamous and audacious conduct of this evening — after kissing and hugging that girl under my very nose — ”
“I thought it!” said Charles, with a shout of laughter. “I thought it you were awake all the time!” “I was not awake all the time, sir — ” “You were awake quite long enough, it appears, aunty. Now, what do you think of it?”
At first Lady Ascot would think nothing of it, but that the iniquity of Charles’s conduct was only to be equalled by the baseness and ingratitude of Adelaide’s; but by degrees she was brought to think that it was possible that some good might come of an engagement; and, at length, becoming garrulous on this point, it leaked out by degrees, that she had set her heart on it for years, that she had noticed for some time Charles’s partiality for her with the greatest pleasure, and recently had feared that something had disturbed it. In short, that it was her pet scheme, and that she had been coming to an explanation that very night, but had been anticipated.
Gives us an insight into Charles’s domestic relations, and shows how the Great Conspirator soliloquized to the Grand Chandelier.
It may be readily conceived that a considerable amount of familiarity existed between Charles and his servant and foster-brother William. But, to the honour of both of them be it said, there was more than this — a most sincere and hearty affection; a feeling for one another which, we shall see, lasted through everything. Till Charles went to Shrewsbury he had never had another playfellow. He and William had been allowed to paddle about on the sand, or ride together on the moor, as they would, till a boy’s friendship had arisen, sufficiently strong to obliterate all considerations of rank between them. This had grown with age, till William had become his confidential agent at home during his absence, and Charles had come to depend very much on his account of the state of things at headquarters. He had also another confidential agent, to whom we shall be immediately introduced. She, however, was of another sex and rank.
William’s office was barely a pleasant one. His affection for his master led him most faithfully to attend to his interests; and, as a Catholic, he was often rought into collision with Father Mackworth, who took a laudable interest in Charles’s affairs, and considered himself injured on two or three occasions by the docked refusal of “William to communicate the substance and result of a message forwarded through William, from Shrewsbury, to Densil, which seemed to cause the old gentleman some thought and anxiety. William’s religious opinions, however, had got to be somewhat loose, and to sit somewhat easily upon him, more particularly since his sojourn at Oxford. He had not very long ago confided to Charles, in a private sitting, that the conviction which was strong on his mind was that Father Mackworth was not to be trusted, God forgive him for saying so; and, on being pressed by Charles to state why, he point-blank refused to give any reason whatever, but repeated his opinion with redoubled emphasis. Charles had a great confidence in William’s shrewdness, and forbore to press him, but saw that something had occurred which had impressed the above conviction on William’s mind most strongly.
He had been sent from Oxford to see how the land lay at home, and had met Charles at the Rose and Crown, at Stonnington, with saddle horses. No sooner were they clear of the town than William, without waiting for Charles’s leave, put spurs to his horse and rode up alongside of him.
“What is your news, William?”
“Nothing very great. Master looks bothered and worn.”
“About this business of mine.”
“The priest goes on talking about it, and plaguing him with it, when he wants to forget it.”
“The deuce take him! He talks about me a goo deal.”
“Yes; he has begun about you again. Master wouldn’t stand it the other day. and told him to hold his tongue, just like his own self. Tom heard him. They made it up afterwards, though.”
“What did Cuthbert say?”
“Master Cuthbert spoke up for you, and said he hoped there wasn’t going to be a scene, and that you weren’t coming to — live in disgrace, for that would be punishing every one in the house for you.”
“How’s Mary?”
“She’s well. Master don’t trust her out of his sight much. They will never set him against you while she is there. I wish you would marry her, “Master Charles, if you can give up the other one.”
Charles laughed and told him he wasn’t going to do anything of the sort. Then he asked, “Any visitors?”
“Ay; one. Father Tiernay, a stranger.”
“What sort of man?”
“A real good one. I don’t think our man likes him, though.”
They had now come to the moor’s edge, and were looking down on the amphitheatre which formed the domain of Ravenshoe. Far and wide the tranquil sea, vast, dim, and grey, flooded bay and headland, cave and slet. Beneath their feet slept the winter woodlands; from whose brown bosom rose the old house, many-gabled, throwing aloft from its chimneys hospitable columns of smoke, which hung in the still autumn air, and made a hazy cloud on the hill-side. Everything was so quiet that they could hear the gentle whisper of the ground-swell, and the voices of the children at play upon the beach, and the dogs barking in the kennels.
“How calm and quiet old home looks, William,” said Charles; “I like to get back here after Oxford.”
“No wine parties here. No steeple-chases. No bloomer balls,” said William.
“No! and no chapels and lectures, and being sent for by the Dean,” said Charles.
“And none of they dratted bones, neither,” said William, with emphasis.
“Ahem! why, no! Suppose we ride on.”
So they rode down the road through the woodland to the lodge, and so through the park — sloping steeply up on their left, with many a clump of oak and holly, and many a broad patch of crimson fern. The deer stood about in graceful groups, while the bucks belled and rattled noisily, making the thorn-thickets echo with the clatter of their horns. The rabbits scudded rapidly across the road; and the blackbird fled screaming from the mountain ash tree, now all afire with golden fruit. So they passed on until a sudden sweep brought them upon the terrace between the old grey house and the murmuring sea.
Charles jumped off, and William led the horses round to the stable. A young lady in a straw hat and brown gloves, with a pair of scissors and a basket, standing half-way up the steps, came down to meet him, dropping the basket, and holding out the brown gloves before her. This young lady he took in his arms, and kissed; and she, so far from resenting the liberty, after she was set on her feet again, held him by both hands, and put up a sweet dark face towards his, as if she wouldn’t care if he kissed her again. Which he immediately did.
It was not a very pretty face, but oh! such a calm, quiet, pleasant one. There was scarcely a good feature in it, and yet the whole was so gentle and pleasing, and withal so shrewd and espiègle, that to look at it once was to think about it till you looked again; and to look again was to look as often as you had a chance, and to like the face the more each time you looked. I said there was not a good feature in the face. Well, I misled you; there was a pair of calm, honest, black eyes, a very good feature indeed, and which, once seen, you were not likely to forget. And also, when I tell you that this face and eyes belonged to the neatest, trimmest little figure imaginable, I hope I have done my work sufficiently well to make you envy that lucky rogue Charles, who, as we know, cares for no woman in the world but Adelaide, and who, between you and me, seems to be much too partial to this sort of thing.
“A thousand welcomes home, Charley,” said the pleasant little voice which belonged to this pleasant little personage. “Oh! I am so glad you’re come.”
“You’ll soon wish me away again. I’ll plague you.”
“I like to be plagued by you, Charley. How is Adelaide?”
“Adelaide is all that the fondest lover could desire ” (for they had no secrets, these two), “and either sent her love, or meant to do so.”
“Charles, dearest,” she said eagerly, “come and see him now! come and see him with me!”
“Where is he?”
“In the shrubbery, with Flying Guilders.”
“Is he alone?”
“All alone, except the dog.”
“Where are they?”
“They are gone out coursing. Come on; they will be back in an hour, and the Book never leaves him. Come, come.”
It will be seen that these young folks had a tolerably good understanding with one another, and could carry on a conversation about “third parties ” without even mentioning their names. We shall see how this came about presently; but, for the present, let us follow these wicked conspirators, and see in what deep plot they are engaged.
They passed rapidly along the terrace, and turned the corner of the house to the left, where the west front overhung the river glen, and the broad terraced garden went down step by step towards the brawling stream.
This they passed, and, opening an iron gate, came suddenly into a gloomy maze of shrubbery that stretched its long vistas up the valley.
Down one dark alley after another they hurried. The yellow leaves rustled beneath their feet, and all nature was pervaded with the smell of decay. It was hard to believe that these bare damp woods were the same as those they had passed through but four months ago, decked out with their summer bravery — an orchestra to a myriad birds. Here and there a bright berry shone out among the dull-coloured twigs, and a solitary robin quavered his soft melancholy song alone. The flowers were dead, the birds were flown or mute, and brave, green leaves were stamped under foot; everywhere decay, decay.
In the dampest, darkest walk of them all, in a far-off path, hedged with holly and yew, they found a bent and grey old man walking with a toothless, grey, old hound for his silent companion. And, as Charles moved forward with rapid elastic step, the old man looked up, and tottered to meet him, showing as he did so, the face of Densil Ravenshoe.
“Now, the Virgin be praised,” he said, “for putting it in your head to come so quick, my darling. Whenever you go away now, I am in terror lest I should die and never see you again. I might be struck with paralysis, ami not know you, my boy. Don’t go away from me again.”
“I like never to leave you any more, father ear. See how well you get on with my arm. Let us come out into the sun; why do you walk in this dismal wood?”
“Why?” said the old man, with sudden animation, his grey eye kindling as he stopped. “Why? I come here because I can catch sight of a woodcock, lad! I sprang one by that holly just before you came up. Flip flap, and away through the hollies like a ghost! Cuthbert and the priest are away coursing. Now you are come, surely I can get on the grey pony, and go up to see a hare killed. You’ll lead him for me, won’t you? I don’t like to trouble them”
“We can go tomorrow, dad, after lunch, you and I, and William. We’ll have Leopard and Blue-ruin — by George, it will be like old times again.”
“And we’ll take our little quiet bird on her pony, won’t we?” said Densil, turning to Mary. “She’s such a good little bird, Charley. We sit and talk of you many an hour. Charley, can’t you get me down on the shore, and let me sit there? I got Cuthbert to take me down once; but Father Mackworth came and talked about the Immaculate Conception through his nose all the time. I didn’t want to hear him talk; I wanted to hear the surf on the shore. Good man! he thought he interested me, I dare say.”
“I hope he is very kind to you, father i r
“Kind! I assure you, my dear boy, he is the kindest creature; he never lets me out of his sight; and so attentive !”
“He’ll have to be a little less attentive in future, confound him!” muttered Charles. “There he is; talk of the devil! Mary, my dear,” he added aloud, “go and amuse the Rooks for a little, and let us have Cuthbert to ourselves.”
The old man looked curious at the idea of Mary talking to the rooks; but his mind was drawn off by Charles having led him into a warm, southern corner, and set him down in the sun.
Mary did her errand well; for, in a few moments, Cuthbert advanced rapidly towards them. Coming up, he took Charles’s hand, and shook it with a faint, kindly smile.
He had grown to be a tall and somewhat handsome young man — certainly handsomer than Charles. His face, even now he was warmed by exercise, was very pale, though the complexion was clear and healthy. His hair was slightly gone from his forehead, and he looked much older than he really was. The moment that the smile was gone his face resumed the expression of passionless calm that it had borne before; and, sitting down by his brother, he asked him how he did.
“I am as well, Cuthbert,” said Charles, “as youth, health, a conscience of brass, and a whole world full of friends can make me. Fm all right, bless you. But you look very peaking and pale. Do you take exercise enough?”
“I? Oh, dear, yes. But 1 am very glad to see you, Charles. Our father misses you. Don’t you, father?”
“Very much, Cuthbert.”
“Yes. I bore him. I do, indeed. I don’t take interest in the things he does; I can’t; it’s not my nature. You and he will be as happy as kings talking about salmon, and puppies, and colts.”
“I know, Cuthbert; I know. You never cared about those things as we do.”
“No, never, brother; and now less than ever. I hope you will stay with me — with us. You are my own brother. I will have you stay here,” he continued, in a slightly raised voice; “and I desire that any opposition or impertinence you may meet with may be immediately reported to me.”
“It will be immediately reported to those who use it, and in a way they won’t like, Cuthbert. Don’t you be afraid; I shan’t quarrel. Tell me something about yourself, old boy.”
“I can tell you but little to interest you, Charles. You are of this world, and rejoice in being so. I, day by day, wean myself more and more from it, knowing-its worthlessness. Leave me to my books and my religious exercises, and go on your way. The time will come when your pursuits and pleasures will turn to bitter dust in your mouth, as mine never can. “When the world is like a howling wilderness to you, as it will be soon, then come to me and I will show you where to find happiness. At present you will not listen to me.”
“Not I,” said Charles. “Youth, health, talent, like yours — are these gifts to despise?”
“They are clogs to keep me from higher things. Study, meditation, life in the past with those good men who have walked the glorious road before us — in these consist happiness. Ambition! I have one earthly ambition — to purge myself from earthly affections, so that, when I hear the cloister-gate close behind me for ever, my heart may leap with joy, and I may feel that I am in the antechamber of heaven.”
Charles was deeply affected, and bent clown his head. “Youth, love, friends, joy in this beautiful world — all to be buried between four dull white walls, my brother!”
“This beautiful earth, which is beautiful indeed — alas! how I love it still! shall become a burden to us in a few years. Love! the greater the love, the greater the bitterness. Charles, remember that, one day, will you, when your heart is torn to shreds? I shall have ceased to love you then more than any other fellow-creature; but remember my words. You are leading a life which can only end in misery, as even the teachers of the false and corrupt religion which you profess would tell you. If you were systematically to lead the life you do now, it were better almost that there were no future. You are not angry, Charles?”
There was such a spice of truth in what Cuthbert said that it would have made nine men in ten angry. I am pleased to record of my favourite Charles that he was not; he kept his head bent down, and groaned.
“Don’t be hard on our boy, Cuthbert,” said Densil;
“lie is a good boy, though he is not like you. It has always been so in our family — one a devotee and the other a sportsman. Let us go in, boys; it gets chill.”
Charles rose up, and, throwing his arm round his brother’s neck, boisterously gave him a kiss on the cheek; then he began laughing and talking at the top of his voice, making the nooks and angles in the grey old facade echo with his jubilant voice.
Under the dark porch they found a group of three — Mackworth; a jolly-looking, round-faced, Irish priest, by name Tiernay; and Mary. Mackworth received Charles with a pleasant smile, and they joined in conversation together heartily. Few men could be more agreeable than Mackworth, and he chose to be agreeable now. Charles was insensibly carried away by the charm of his frank, hearty manner, and for a time forgot who was talking to him.
Mackworth and Charles were enemies. If we reflect a moment, we shall see that it could hardly be otherwise.
Charles’s existence, holding, as he did, the obnoxious religion, was an offence to him. He had been prejudiced against him from the first; and, children not being very slow to find out who are well disposed towards them, or the contrary, Charles had early begun to regard the priest with distrust and dislike. So a distant, sarcastic line of treatment on the one hand, and childish insolence and defiance on the other, had grown at last into omething very like hatred on both sides. Every soul in the house adored Charles but the priest; and, on the other hand, the priest’s authority and dignity were questioned by none but Charles. And, all these small matters being taken into consideration, it is not wonderful, I say, that Charles and the priest were not good friends even before anything had occurred to bring about an open rupture.
Charles and Mackworth seldom met of late years without a “sparring match; ” on this day, however — partly owing, perhaps, to the presence of a jolly good-humoured Irish priest — they got through dinner pretty well. Charles was as brave as a lion, and, though by far the priest’s inferior in scientific “sparring,” had a rough, strong, effective method of fighting, which was by no means to be despised. His great strength lay in his being always ready for battle. As he used to tell his crony William, he would as soon fight as not; and often, when rebuked by Cuthbert for what he called insolence to the priest, he would exclaim, “I don’t care; what did he begin at me for? If he lets me alone, I’ll let him alone.” And, seeing that he had been at continual war with the reverend gentleman for sixteen years or more, I think it speaks highly for the courage of both parties that neither had hitherto yielded. When Charles afterwards came to know what a terrible card the man had held in his hand, he was struck with amazement at his self-possession in not playing it, despite his interest.
Mackworth was hardly so civil after dinner as he was before; but Cuthbert was hoping that Charles and he would get on without a battle-royal, when a slight accident brought on a general engagement, and threw all his hopes to the ground. Densil and Mary had gone up to the drawingroom, and Charles, having taken as much wine as he cared for, rose from the table and sauntered towards the door, when Cuthbert quite innocently asked him where he was going.
Charles said also in perfect good faith that he was going to smoke a cigar, and talk to William.
Cuthbert asked him, Would he get William or one of them to give the grey colt a warm mash with some nitre in it; and Charles said he’d see it done for him himself; when, without warning or apparent cause, Father Mackworth said to Father Tiernay,
“This William is one of the grooms. A renegade, I fancy! I believe the fellow is a Protestant at heart. He and Mr. Charles Ravenshoe are very intimate; they keep up a constant correspondence when apart, I assure you.”
Charles faced round instantly, and confronted his enemy with a smile on his lips; but he said not a word, trying to force Mackworth to continue.
“Why don’t you leave him alone?” said Cuthbert.
“My dear Cuthbert,” said Charles, “pray don’t humiliate me by interceding; I assure you I am greatly amused. You see he doesn’t speak to me’; he addressed himself to Mr. Tiernay.”
“I wished,” said Mackworth, “to call Father Tiernay’s attention, as a stranger to this part of the world, to the fact of a young gentleman’s corresponding with an illiterate groom in preference to any member of his family.”
“The reason I do it,” said Charles, speaking to Tiernay, but steadily watching Mackworth to see if any of his shafts hit, “is to gain information. I like to know what goes on in my absence. Cuthbert here is buried in his books, and does not know everything.”
No signs of flinching there. Mackworth sat with a scornful smile on his pale face, without moving a muscle.
“He likes to get information,” said Mackworth, “about his village amours, I suppose. But, dear me, he can’t know anything that the whole parish don’t know. I could have told him that that poor deluded fool of an underkeeper was going to marry Mary Lee, after all that had happened. He will be dowering a wife for his precious favourite some day.”
“My precious favourite, Father Tiernay,” said Charles, still closely watching Mackworth, “is my foster-brother. He used to be a great favourite with our reverend friend; his pretty sister Ellen is so still, I believe.”
This was as random an arrow as ever was shot, and yet it went home to the feather. Charles saw Mackworth give a start and bite his lip, and knew that he had smote him deep; he burst out laughing.
“With regard to the rest, Father Tiernay, any man who says that there was anything wrong between me nd Mary Leo tells, saving your presence, a lie. It’s infernally hard if a man mayn’t play at love-making with the whole village for a confidant, and the whole matter a merry joke, but one must be accused of all sorts of villainy. Isn’t ours a pleasant household, Mr. Tiernay?”
Father Tiernay shook his honest sides with a wondering laugh, and said, “Faix it is. But I hope ye’ll allow me to put matters right betune you two. Father Mackworth begun on the young man; he was going out to his dudeen as peaceful as an honest young gentleman should. And some of the best quality are accustomed to converse their grooms in the evening over their cigar. I myself can instance Lord Mountdown whose hospitality I have partook frequent. And I’m hardly aware of any act of parliament,brother, whereby a young man shouldn’t kiss a pretty girl in the way of fun, as I’ve done myself, sure. Whist now, both on ye! I’ll come with ye, ye heretic, and smoke a cigar meself.”
“I call you to witness that he insulted me,” said Mackworth, turning round from the window.
“I wish you had let him alone, Father,” said Cuthbert peevishly; “we were getting on very happily till you began. Do go, Charles, and smoke your cigar with Father Tiernay.”
“I am waiting to see if he wants any more,” said Charles, with a laugh. “Come on, Father Tiernay, and I’ll show you the miscreant, and his pretty sister, too, if you like.”
“I wish he hadn’t come home,” said Cuthbert, as soon as he and Mackworth were alone together. “Why do you and he fight like cat and dog? You make me perfectly miserable. I know he is going to the devil, in a worldly point of view, and that his portion will be hell necessarily as a heretic; but I don’t see why you should “worry him to death, and make the house miserable to him.”
“It is for his good,”
“Nonsense,” rejoined Cuthbert. “You make him hate you; and I don’t think you ought to treat a son of this house in the way you treat him. You are under obligations to this house. Yes, you are. I won’t be contradicted now. I will have my say when I am in this temper, and you know it. The devil is not dead yet by a long way, you see. “Why do you rouse him?”
“Go on, go on.”
“Yes, I will go on. I’m in my own house, I believe. By the eleven thousand virgins, more or less, of the holy St. Ursula, virgin and martyr, that brother of mine is a brave fellow. Why, he cares as much for you as for a little dog barking at him. And you’re a noble enemy for any man. You’d better let him alone, I think; you won’t get much out of him. Adieu.”
“What queer wild blood there is in these Ravenshoes,” said Mackworth to himself, when he was alone. “A younger hand than myself would have been surprised at Cuthbert’s kicking after so much schooling. Not I. I shall never quite tame him, though he is roken in enough for all practical purposes. He will be on his knees tomorrow for this. I like to make him kick; I shall do it sometimes for my amusement; he is so much easier managed after one of these tantrums. By Jove! I love the man better every day; he is one after my own heart. As for Charles, I hate him, and yet I like him after a sort. I like to break a pointless lance with that boy, and let him fancy he is my equal. It amuses me.
“I almost fancy that I could have fallen in love with that girl Ellen. I was uncommon near it. I must be very careful. What a wild hawk she is! What a magnificent move that was of hers, risking a prosecution for felony on one single throw, and winning. How could she have guessed that there was anything there? She couldn’t have guessed it. It was an effort of genius. It was a splendid move.
“How nearly that pigheaded fool of a young nobleman has gone to upset my calculations. His namesake the chessplayer could not have done more mischief by his talents than his friend had by stupidity. I wish Lord Ascot would get ruined as quickly as possible, and then my friend would be safe out of the way. But he won’t.”
Containing a Song by Charles Ravenshoe, and Also Father Tiernay’s Opinion About the Family.
Charles and the good-natured Father Tiernay wandered out across the old courtyard, towards the stables — a pile of buildings in the same style as the house, which lay back towards the hill. The moon was full, although obscured by clouds, and the whole courtyard was bathed in a soft mellow light. They both paused for a moment to look at the fine old building, standing silent for a time; and then Charles startled the contemplative priest by breaking into a harsh scornful laugh, as unlike his own cheery Ha! Ha! as it was possible to be.
“What are you disturbing a gentleman’s meditations in that way for?” said the Father. “Is them your Oxford manners? Give me ye’r cigar-case, ye haythen, if ye can’t appreciate the beauties of nature and art combined — laughing like that at the cradle of your ancestors too.”
Charles gave him the cigar-case, and trolled out in a rich bass voice —
“The old falcon’s nest
Was built up on the crest
Of the cliff that hangs over the sea;
And the jackdaws and crows,
As every one knows,
Were confounded respectful to he, to he — e — e.”
“Howld yer impudence, ye young heretic doggrel-writer; can’t I see what ye are driving at?”
“But the falcon grew old,
And the nest it grew cold,
And the carrion birds they grew bolder;
So the jackdaws and crows,
Underneath his own nose,
Gave both the young falcons cold shoulder.”
“Bedad,” said the good-natured Irishman, “some one got hot shoulder today. Aren’t ye ashamed of yourself, singing such ribaldry, and all the servants hearing e?”
“Capital song, Father; only one verse more.”
“The elder was quelled,
But the younger rebelled;
So he spread his wide wings and fled over the sea.
Said the jackdaws and crows,
‘ He’ll be hanged I suppose,
But what in the deuce does that matter to we?’ ”
There was something in the wild, bitter tone in which he sang the last verse that made Father Tiernay smoke his cigar in silence as they sauntered across the yard, till Charles began again.
“Not a word of applause for my poor impromptu song? Hang it, I’d have applauded anything you sang.”
“Don’t be so reckless and bitter. Mr. Ravenshoe,” said Tiernay, laying his Land on his shoulder. “I can feel for you, though there is so little in common between us. You might lead a happy, peaceful life if you were to come over to us; which you will do, if I know anything of my trade, in the same day that the sun turns pea-green. Allons, as we used to say over the water; let us continue our travels.”
“Reckless! I am not reckless. The jolly old world is very wide, and I am young and strong. There will be a wrench when the tooth comes out; but it will soon be over, and the toothache will be cured.”
Tiernay remained silent a moment, and then in an absent manner sang this line, in a sweet low voice —
“For the girl of my heart that I’ll never see more.”
“She must cast in her lot with me,” said Charles. “Ay, and she will do it, too. She will follow me to the world’s end, sir. Are you a judge of horses? What a question to ask of an Irishman! here are the stables.”
The lads were bedding down, and all the great building was alive with the clattering of busy feet and the neighing of horses. The great Ravenshoe Stud was being tucked up for the night; and over that two thousand pounds’ worth of horseflesh at least six thousand pounds’ worth of fuss was being made, under the superintendence of the stud groom, Mr. Dickson.
The physical appearance of Mr. Dickson was as hough you had taken an aged Newmarket jockey and put a barrel of oysters, barrel and all, inside his waistcoat. His face was thin; his thighs were hollow; calves to his legs he had none. He was all stomach. Many years had elapsed since he had been brought to the verge of dissolution by severe training; and since then all that he had eaten, or drunk, or done, had flown to his stomach, producing a tympanitic action in that organ, astounding to behold. In speech he was, towards his superiors, courteous and polite; towards his equals, dictatorial; towards his subordinates, abusive, not to say blasphemous. To this gentleman Charles addressed himself, inquiring if he had seen William: and he, with a lofty, though courteous, sense of injury, inquired, in a loud tone of voice, of the stable-men generally, if any one had seen Mr. Charles’s pad-groom.
In a dead silence which ensued, one of the lads was ill-advised enough to say that he didn’t exactly know where he was; which caused Mr. Dickson to remark that, if that was all he had to say, he had better go on with his work, and not make a fool of himself — which the man did, growling out something about always putting his foot in it,
“Your groom comes and goes pretty much as he likes, sir,” said Mr. Dickson. “I don’t consider him as under my orders. Had he been so, I should have felt it my duty to make complaint on more than one occasion; he is a little too much of the gentleman for my stable, sir.”
“Of course, my good Dickson,” interrupted Charles, “the fact of his being my favourite makes you madly jealous of him; that is not the question now. If you don’t know where he is, be so good as to hold your tongue.”
Charles was only now and then insolent and abrupt with servants, and they liked him the better for it. It was one of Cuthbert’s rules to be coldly, evenly polite, and, as he thought, considerate to the whole household; and yet they did not like him half so well as Charles, who would sometimes, when anything went wrong, “kick up,” what an intelligent young Irish footman used to call “the diwle’s own shindy.” Cuthbert, they knew, had no sympathy for them, but treated them, as he treated himself, as mere machines; while Charles had that infinite capacity of goodwill which none are more quick to recognise than servants and labouring people. And on this occasion, though Mr. Dickson might have sworn a little more than usual after Charles’s departure, yet his feeling, on the whole, was, that he was sorry for having vexed the young gentleman by sneering at his favourite.
But Charles, having rescued the enraptured Father Tiernay from the stable, and having listened somewhat inattentively to a long description of the Curragh of Kildare, led the worthy priest round the back of the stables, up a short path through the wood, and knocked at the door of a long, low keeper’s lodge, which stood within a stone’s throw of the other buildings, in an pen, grassy glade, through which flowed a musical, slender stream of water. In one instant, night was hideous with rattling chains and barking dogs, who made as though they would tear the intruders to pieces; all except one foolish pointer pup, who was loose, and who, instead of doing his duty by barking, came feebly up, and cast himself on his back at their feet, as though they were the car of Juggernaut, and he was a candidate for paradise. Finding that he was not destroyed, he made a humiliating feint of being glad to see them, and nearly overthrew the priest by getting between his legs. But Charles, finding that his second summons was unanswered, lifted the latch, and went into the house.
The room they entered was dark, or nearly so, and at the first moment appeared empty; but, at the second glance, they made out that a figure was kneeling before the dying embers of a fire, and trying to kindle a match by blowing on the coals.
“Hullo!” said Charles.
“William, my boy,” said a voice which made the priest start, “where have you been, lad?”
At the same moment a match was lit, and then a candle; as the light blazed up, it fell on the features of a greyheaded old man, who was peering through, the darkness at them, and the priest cried, “Good God! Mr. Ravenshoe!”
The likeness for one moment was very extraordinary; but, as the eye grew accustomed to the light, one saw hat the face was the face of a taller man than Densil, and one, too, who wore the dress of a gamekeeper. Charles laughed at the priest, and said —
“Yon were struck, as many have been, by the likeness. He has been so long with my father that he has the very trick of his voice, and the look of the eye. “Where have you been tonight, James?” he added affectionately. “Why do you go out so late alone? If any of those mining rascals were to be round poaching, you might be killed.”
“I can take care of myself yet, Master Charles,” said the old man, laughing; and, to do him justice, he certainly looked as if he could.
“Where is Nora?”
“Gone down to young James Holby’s wife; she is lying-in.”
“Pretty early, too. Where’s Ellen?”
“Gone up to the house.”
“See, Father, I shall be disappointed in showing you the belle of Ravenshoe; and now you will go back to Ireland, fancying you can compete with us.”
Father Tiernay was beginning a story about five Miss Moriartys, who were supposed to rival in charms and accomplishments any five young ladies in the world, when his eye was attracted by a stuffed hare in a glass case, of unusual size and very dark colour.
“That, sir,” said James, the keeper, in a bland, polite, explanatory tone of voice, coming and leaning over him, is old Mrs. Jewel, that lived in the last cottage on the ight hand side, under the cliff. I always thought it had been Mrs. Simpson, but it was not. I shot this hare on the Monday, not three hundred yards from Mrs. Jewel’s house; and on the Wednesday the neighbours noticed the shutters hadn’t been down for two days, and broke the door open; and there she was, sure enough, dead in her bed. I had shot her as she was (Coming home from some of her devilries. A quiet old .soul she was, though. No, I never thought it had been she.”
It would be totally impossible to describe the changes through which the broad, sunny face of Father Tiernay went, during the above astounding narration; horror, astonishment, inquiry, and humour were so strangely blended. He looked into the face of the old gamekeeper, and met the expression of a man who had mentioned an interesting fact, and had contributed to the scientific experience of the listener. He looked at Charles, and met no expression whatever; but the latter said —
“Our witches in these parts, Father, take the form of some inferior animal when attending their Sabbath or general meetings, which I believe are presided over by an undoubted gentleman, who is not generally named in polite society. In this case, the old woman was -caught sneaking home under the form of a hare, and promptly rolled over by James; and here she is.”
Father Tiernay said, “Oh, indeed!” but looked as if he thought the more.
“And there’s another of them out now, sir,” said the eeper; “and, Master Charles dear, if you’re going to take the greyhounds out tomorrow, do have a turn at that big black hare under Birch Tor — ”
“A black hare!” said Father Tiernay, aghast.
“Nearly coal-black, your reverence,” said James. “She’s a witch, your reverence, and who she is the blessed saints only know. I’ve seen her three or four times. If the master was on terms with Squire Humby to Hele, we might have the harriers over and run her down. But that can’t be, in course. If you take Blue-ruin and Lightning out tomorrow, Master Charles, and turn her out of the brambles under the rocks, and leave the Master and Miss Mary against the corner of the stone wall to turn her down the gully, you must have her.”
The look of astonishment had gradually faded from Father Tiernay’s face. It is said, that one of the great elements of power in the Roman Catholic priesthood, is that they can lend themselves to any little bit of — well, of mild deception — which happens to be going. Father Tiernay was up to the situation. He looked from the keeper to Charles with a bland and stolid expression of face, and said —
“If she is a witch, mark my words, the dogs will never touch her. The way would be to bite up a crooked sixpence and fire at her with that. I shall be there to see the sport. I never hunted a witch yet.”
“Has your reverence ever seen a white polecat?” said the keeper.
“No, never,” said the priest; “I have heard of them hough. My friend, Mr. Moriarty, of Castledown (not Mountdown Castle, ye understand; tliat is the sate of my lord Mountdown, whose blessed mother was a Mi >riarty, the heavens he her bed), claimed to have seen one; but, bedad, no one else ever saw it, and he said it turned brown again as the season came round. May the — may the saints have my sowl, if I believe a word of it.”
“I have one, your reverence; and it is a rarity, I allow. Stoats turn white often in hard winters, but polecats rarely. If your reverence and your honour will excuse me a moment, I will fetch it. It was shot by my Lord Welter when he was staying here last winter. A fine shot is my lord, your reverence, for so young a mam”
He left the room, and the priest and Charles were left alone together.
“Does he believe all this rubbish about witches?” said Father Tiernay.
“As firmly as you do the liquefaction of the blood of —”
“There, there; we don’t want all that. Do you believe in it?”
“Of course I don’t,” said Charles; “but why should I tell him so?”
“Why do you lend yourself to such a humbug?”
“Why do you?”
“Begorra, I don’t know. I am always lending. I lent a low-browed, hang-jawed spalpeen of a Belgian riest two pound the other day, and sorra a halfpenny of it will me mother’s son ever see again. Hark!”
There were voices approaching the lodge — the voices of two uneducated persons quarrelling; one that of a man, and the other of a woman. They both made so much out in a moment. Charles recognised the voices, and would have distracted the priest’s attention, and given those without warning that there were strangers within; but, in his anxiety to catch, what was said, he was not ready enough, and they both heard this.
The man’s voice said fiercely, “You did.”
The woman’s voice said, after a wild sob, “I did not.”
“You did. I saw you. You are a liar as well as — ”
“I swear I didn’t. Strike me dead, Bill, if there’s been anything wrong.”
“No. If I thought there had, I’d cut his throat first and yours after.”
“If it had been Mm, Bill, you wouldn’t have used me like this.”
“Never you mind that.”
“You want to drive me mad. You do. You hate me. Master Charles hates me. Oh, I wish I was mad.”
“I’d sooner see you chained by the waist in the straw, than see what I saw tonight.” Then followed an oath.
The door was rudely opened, and there entered first of all our old friend, Charles’s groom, William, who seemed beside himself with passion, and after him a figure which struck the good Irishman dumb with amazement and admiration — a girl as beautiful as the summer morning, with her bright brown hair tangled over her forehead, and an expression of wild terror and wrath on her face, such as one may conceive the old sculptor wished to express, when he tried, and failed, to carve the face of the Gorgon.
She glared on them both in her magnificent beauty only one moment. Yet that look, as of a lost soul out of another world, mad, hopeless, defiant, has never past from the memory of either of them.
She was gone, in an instant, into an inner room, and William was standing looking savagely at the priest. In another moment his eyes had wandered to Charles, and then his face grew smooth and quiet, and he said —
“We’ve been quarrelling, sir; don’t you and this good gentleman say anything about it. Master Charles, dear, she drives me mad sometimes. Things are not going right with her.”
Charles and the priest walked thoughtfully home together.
“Allow me to say, Ravenshoe,” said the priest, “that, as an Irishman, I consider myself a judge of remarkable establishments. I must say honestly that I have seldom or never met with a great house with so many queer “laments about it as yours. You are all remarkable people. And, on my honour, I think that our friend Mackworth is the most remarkable man of the lot.”
It was a glorious breezy November morning; the sturdy oaks alone held on to the last brown remnants of their summer finery; all the rest of the trees in the vast sheets of wood which clothed the lower parts of the downs overhanging Ravenshoe, had changed the bright colours of autumn for the duller, but not less beautiful, browns and purples of winter. Below, in the park, the deer were feeding among the yellow fern brakes, and the rabbits were basking and hopping in the narrow patches of slanting sunlight, which streamed through the leaf-less trees. Aloft, on the hill, the valiant blackcock led out his wives and family from the whortle-grown rocks, to flaunt his plumage in the warmest corner beneath the Tor.
And the Tors, too, how they hung aloft above the brown heather, which was relieved here and there by patches of dead, brown, king-fern; hung aloft like brilliant, clearly defined crystals, with such mighty breadths of light and shadow as Sir Charles Barry never could accomplish, though he had Westminster Abbey to look at every day.
Up past a narrow sheep path, where the short grass faded on the one side into feathery broom, and on the other into brown heather and grey stone, under the shadow of the Tor which lay nearest to Ravenshoe, and overhung those dark woods in which we saw Densil just now walking with his old hound; there was grouped, on the morning after the day of Charles’s arrival, a happy party, every one of whom is already known to the reader. Of which circumstance I, the writer, am most especially glad. For I am already as tired of introducing new people to you as my lord chamberlain must be of presenting strangers to Her Majesty at a levee.
Densil first, on a grey cob, looking very old and feeble, straining his eyes up the glen whither Charles, and James, the old keeper, had gone with the greyhounds. At his rein stood William, whom we knew at Oxford. Beside the old man sat Mary on her pony, looking so radiant and happy, that, even if there had been no glorious autumn sun overhead, one glance at her face would have made the dullest landscape in Lancashire look bright. Last, not least, the good Father Tiernay, who sat on his horse, hatless, radiant, scratching his tonsure.
“And so you’re determined to back the blue dog, Miss Mary,” said he.
“I have already betted a pair of gloves with Charles, Mr. Tiernay,” said Mary, “and I will be rash enough to do so with you. Euin is the quickest striker we have ever bred.”
“I kuow it; they all say so,” said the priest; “but come, I must have a bet on the course. I will back Lightning.”
“Lightning is the quicker dog,” said Densil; “but Euin! you will see him lie behind the other dog all the run, and strike the hare at last. Father Mackworth, a good judge of a dog, always backs him against the kennel.”
“Where is Father Mackworth?”
“I don’t know,” said Densil. “I am surprised he is not with us; he is very fond of coursing.”
“His reverence, sir,” said William, “started up the moor about an hour ago. I saw him going.”
“Where was he going to?”
“I can’t say, sir. He took just over past the rocks ion the opposite side of the bottom from Mr. Charles.”
“I wonder,” said Father Tiernay, “whether James will find his friend, the witch, this morning.”
“Ah,” said Densil, “he was telling me about that. I am sure I hope not.”
Father Tiernay was going to langh, but didn’t.
“Do you believe in witches, then, Mr. Ravenshoe?”
“Why, no,” said Densil, stroking his chin thoughtfully, “I suppose not. It don’t seem to me now, as an old man, a more absurd belief than this new electrobiology and table-turning. Charles tells me that they use magic crystals at Oxford, and even claim to have raised the devil himself in Merton; which, at this time of day, seems rather like reverting to first principles.
But I am not sure I believe in any of it. I only know that, if any poor old woman has sold herself to Satan, and taken it into her head to transform herself into a black hare, my greyhounds won’t light upon her. She must have made such a deuced hard bargain that I shouldn’t like to cheat her out of any of the small space left her between this and, and — thingamy.”
William, as a privileged servant, took the liberty of remarking that old Mrs. Jewel didn’t seem to have been anything like a match for Satan in the way of a bargain, for she had had hard times of it seven years before she died. From which —
Father Tiernay deduced the moral lesson, that that sort of thing didn’t pay; and —
Mary said she didn’t believe a word of such rubbish, for old Mrs. Jewel was as nice an old body as ever was seen, and had worked hard for her living, until her strength failed, and her son went down in one of the herring-boats.
Densil said that his little bird was too positive. There was the witch of Endor, for instance —
Father Tiernay, who had been straining his eyes and attention at the movements of Charles and the greyhounds, and had only caught the last word, said with remarkable emphasis and distinctness —
“A broomstick of the Witch of Endor, Well shod wi’ brass,” and then looked at Densil as though he had helped him out of a difficulty, and wanted to be thanked. Densil continued without noticing him —
“There was the Witch of Endor. And ‘ thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.’ If there weren’t such things as witches, you know, St. Paul wouldn’t have said that.”
“I don’t think it was St. Paul, papa, was it?” said Mary.
“It was one of them, my love; and, for that matter, I consider St. Peter quite as good as St. Paul, if not better. St. Peter was always in trouble, I know; but he was the only one who struck a blow for the good cause, all honour to him. Let me see, he married St. Veronica, didn’t he?”
“Marry St. Veronica, virgin and martyr?” said the priest, aghast. “My good sir, you are really talking at random.”
“Ah, well, I may be wrong; she was virgin, but she was no martyr.”
“St. Veronica,” said Father Tiernay, dogmatically, and somewhat sulkily, “was martyred under Tiberius; no less than that.”
“I bet you what you like of it,” cried Densil, “she died —”
But what was Densil’s opinion about the last days of St. Veronica will for ever remain a mystery; for at this moment there came a “See, HO!” from Charles; in the next a noble hare had burst from a tangled mass of brambles at his feet; in another the two dogs were on er haunches, and Charles, carrying two little flags furled in his hand, had dashed at the rough rocks on the bottom of the valley, had brought his horse on Iris nose, recovered him, and was half way up the hill after the flying greyhounds.
It was but a short course. Puss raced for some broken ground under the hill, opposite to — where our party stood. She was too close pressed, and doubled back for the open, but, meeting James, turned as a last desperate chance back to her first point. Too late; the dogs were upon her. There was a short scuffle, and then Charles, rising in his saddle, unfurled his blue flag, and waved it.
“Hurrah!” cried Mary, clapping her hands, “two pairs of gloves this morning; where will he try now, I wonder? Here comes James; let us ask him.”
James approached them with the dead hare, and Densil asked where he was going to try. He said, just where they were.
Densil asked, had he seen Father Mackworth? and he was in the act of saying that he was gone over the down, when a shout from Charles, and a still louder one from James, made them all start. A large black hare had burst from the thorns at Charles’s feet, and was bowling down the glen straight toward them, with the dogs close behind her.
“The witch,” shouted James, “the witch! we shall know who she is now.”
It seemed very likely indeed. Densil broke away rom William, and, spurring his pony down the sheep-path at the risk of his neck, made for the entrance of the wood. The hare, one of such dark colour that she looked almost black, scudded along in a parallel direction, and dashed into the grass ride just in front of Densil; they saw her flying down it, just under the dogs’ noses, and then they saw her dash into a cross ride, one of the dogs making a strike at her as she did so; then hare and greyhounds disappeared round the corner.
“She’s dead, sir, confound her! we shall have her now, the witch!”
They all came round the corner pell-mell. Here stood the dogs, panting and looking foolishly about them, while, in front of them, a few yards distant, stood Father Mackworth, looking disturbed and flushed, as though he had been running.
Old James stared aghast; William gave a long whistle; Mary, for a moment, was actually terrified. Densil looked puzzled, Charles amused; while Father Tiernay made the forest ring with peal after peal of uproarious laughter.
“I am afraid I have spoilt sport, Mr. Ravenshoe,” said Mackworth, coming forward; “the hare ran almost against my legs, and doubled into the copse, puzzling the dogs. They seemed almost inclined to revenge themselves on me for a moment,”
“Ha, ha!” cried the jolly priest, not noticing, as Charles did, how confused the priest was. “So we’ve aught you sneaking home from your appointment with your dear friend.”
“What do you mean, sir, by appointment? You are overstepping the bounds of decorum, sir. Mr. Ravenshoe, I beg you to forgive me for inadvertently spoiling your sport.”
“Not at all, my dear Father,” said Densil, thinking it best, from the scared look of old James, to enter into no urther explanations; “we have killed one hare, and now I think it is time to come home to lunch.”
“Don’t eat it all before I come; I must run up to the Tor; I have dropped my whip there,” said Charles. “James, ride my horse home; you look tired. I shall be there on foot in half the time.”
He had cast the reins to James, and was gone, and they all turned homewards together.
Charles, fleet of foot, was up on the Tor in a few minutes, and had picked up his missing property; then he sat him down on a stone, thinking.
“There is something confoundedly wrong somewhere; and I should like to find out what it is. What had that Jack priest been up to, that made him look so queer? And, also, what was the matter between Ellen and William last night? Whom has she been going on with? I will go down. I wish I could find some trace of him. One thing I know, and one thing only, that he hates me worse than poison; and that his is not likely to be a passive hatred.”
The wood into which Charles descended was of very large extent, and composed of the densest copse, intersected by long straight grass rides. The day had turned dark and chilly; and a low moaning wind began to sweep through the bare boughs, rendering still more dismal the prospect of the long-drawn vistas of damp grass and rotting leaves.
He passed musing on from one ride to another, and, in one of them, came in sight of a low, white building, partly ruinous, which had been built in the deepest recesses of the wood for a summerhouse. Years ago Cuthbert and Charles used to come and play there on happy summer holidays — play at being Robinson Crusoe and what not; but there had been a light with the poachers there, and one of their young men had been kicked in the head by one of the gang, and rendered idiotic; and Charles had seen the blood on the grass next morning; and so they voted it a dismal place, and never went near it again. Since then it had been taken possession of by the pheasants to dust themselves in. Altogether it was a solitary, ghostly sort of place; and, therefore, Charles was considerably startled, on looking in at the low door, to see a female figure, sitting unmoveable in the darkest corner.
It was not a ghost for it spoke. It said, “Are you come back to upbraid me again? I know my power, and you shall never have it.” And Charles said “Ellen!”
She looked up, and began to cry. At first a low, moaning cry, and afterwards a wild passionate burst of grief.
He drew her towards him, and tried to quiet her, but she drew away. “Not today,” she cried, “not today.”
“What is the matter, pretty one? What is the matter, sister?” said Charles.
“Call me sister again,” she said, looking up. “I like that name. Kiss me, and call me sister, just for once.”
“Sister dear,” said Charles kindly, kissing her on the forehead, “What is the matter?”
“I have had a disagreement with Father Mackworth, and he has called me names. He found me here walking with Master Cuthbert.”
“With Cuthbert?”
“Ay, why not? I might walk with you or him any time, and no harm. I must go.”
Before Charles had time to say one word of kindness, or consolation, or wonder, she had drawn him towards her, given him a kiss, and was gone down the ride towards the house. He saw her dress nutter round the last comer, and she disappeared.
There followed on the events above narrated two or three quiet months — a time well remembered by Charles, as one of the quietest and most peaceful in his life, in all the times which followed. Every fine day there was a ramble with his father through the kennels and stables, and down through the wood, or over the farm. Charles, who at Oxford thought no day complete, after riding with the drag, or Drakes, or rowing to Sandford; without banquier, vingt-et-un, or loo, till three o’clock in the morning, now found, greatly to his astonishment, that he got more pleasure by leaning over a gate with his father, and looking at fat beasts and pigs, chewing a straw the while. A noisy wine party, where he met the same men he had met the night before, who sang the same songs, and told the same silly stories, was well enough; but he began to find that supper in the oak dining-room, sitting between Mary and his father, and talking of the merest trifles, was a great deal pleasanter. Another noticeable fact was, that Father Mackworth’s sarcasms were turned off with a good-natured laugh, and that battle was on all occasions refused to the worthy priest. In short, Charles, away from company and issipation, was himself. The good, worthy fellow, whom I learnt to like years ago. The man whose history I am proud to write.
Lord Saltire had arrived meanwhile; he had written to Densil, to say that he was horribly bored; that he wished, as an ethical study, to settle, once for all, the amount of boredom a man could stand without dying under it; that, having looked carefully about him, to select a spot and a society where that object could be obtained, he had selected Ravenshoe, as being the most eligible; that he should wish his room to have a south aspect; and that his man would arrive with his things three days after date. To this Densil had written an appropriate reply, begging his kind old friend to come and make his house his home; and Lord Saltire had arrived one evening, when every one was out of the way but Mary, who received him in the hall.
She was in some little trepidation. She had read and heard enough of “the wild prince and Poyns,” and of Lord Saltire’s powers of sarcasm, to be thoroughly frightened at her awful position. She had pictured to herself a terrible old man, with overhanging eyebrows, and cruel gleaming eyes beneath them. Therefore she was astonished to see a gentleman, old it is true, but upright as a young oak, of such remarkable personal beauty, and such a pleasant expression of countenance as she had never seen before.
She was astonished, I said; but, mind you, Mary was too much of a lady to show too much of it. She sailed owards him through the gloom of the old hall with a frank smile, and just that amount of admiration in her sweet eyes which paid Lord Saltire the truest compliment he had had for many a day.
“Mr. Ravenshoe will be sorry to have missed receiving you, my lord,” she said.
“If Mr. Ravenshoe is sorry,” he said, “I certainly am not. Mr. Ravenshoe has done me the honour to show me the most beautiful thing in his house first. I rather think that is a pretty compliment, Miss Corby, unless I am getting out of practice.”
“That is a very pretty compliment, indeed,” she answered, laughing. “I most heartily thank you for it. I know nothing in life so pleasant as being flattered. May I introduce Father Mackworth?”
Lord Saltire would be delighted. Father Mackworth came forward, and Mary saw them look at one another. She saw at a glance that either they had met before, or there was some secret which both of them knew. She never forgot Mackworth’s defiant look, or Lord Saltire’s calm considerate glance, which said as plain as words, “This fellow knows it.”
This fellow knew it — had known it for years. The footman who had left Mackworth at the lodge of the French Lye￡e, the nameless domestic, who formed the last link with his former life — this man had worn Lord Saltire’s livery, and he remembered it.
“I see,” said Lord Saltire, “that Miss Corby is prepared for walking. I guess that she is going to meet Mr. Ravenshoe, and, if my surmise is correct, I beg to be allowed to accompany her.”
“You are wonderfully correct, my lord. Cuthbert and Charles are shooting pheasants in the wood, and Mr. Ravenshoe is with them on his pony. If you will walk with me, we shall meet them.”
So the grand old eagle and the pretty sweet-voiced robin passed out on to the terrace, and stood looking together, under the dull December sky, at the whispering surges. Eight and left the misty headlands seemed to float on the quiet grey sea, which broke in sighs at their feet, as the long majestic groundswell rolled in from the ocean; and these two stood there for a minute or more without speaking.
“The new school of men,” said Lord Saltire at last, looking out to sea, “have perhaps done wisely, in thinking more of scenery and the mere externals of nature than we did. We lived the life of clubs and crowds, and we are going to our places one after another. There are but few left now. These Stephensons and Taxtons are fine men enough. They are fighting inert matter, but we fought the armies of the Philistine. We had no time for botany and that sort of thing; which was unfortunate. You young folks shouldn’t laugh at us though.”
“I laugh at you!” she said suddenly and rapidly; “laugh at the giants who warred with the gods. My lord, the men of our time have not shown themselves equal to their fathers.”
Lord Saltire laughed.
“No, not yet,” she continued; “when the time comes they will. The time has not come yet.”
“Not yet, Miss Corby. It will come, — mind the words of a very old man; an old fellow who has seen a confounded deal of the world.”
“Are we to have any more wars, Lord Saltire?”
“Wars such as we never dreamt of, young lady.”
“Is all this new inauguration of peace to go for nothing?”
“Only as the inauguration of a new series of wars, more terrible than those which have gone before.”
“France and England combined can give the law to Europe.”
Lord Saltire turned upon her and laughed. “And so you actually believe that France and England can actually combine for anything more important than a raid against Eussia. Not that they will ever fight Eussia you know. There will be no fight. If they threaten loud enough, Eussia will yield. Nicholas knows his weakness, and will give way. If he is fool enough to fight the Western powers, it will end in another duel a Voutrance between France and England. They will never work together for long. If they do, Europe is enslaved, and England lost.”
M But why, Lord Saltire?”
“Well, well; I think so. Allow me to say that I was not prepared to find a deep-thinking, though misguided politician in such an innocent-looking young lady. God defend the clear old land, for every fresh acre I see of it confirms my belief that it is the first country in the world.”
They were crossing the old terraced garden towards the wood, where they heard the guns going rapidly, and both were silent for a minute or so. The leafless wood was before them, and the village at their feet. The church spire rose aloft among the trees. Some fisherman patriarch had gone to his well-earned rest that day, and the bell was tolling for him. Mary looked at the quiet village, at the calm winter’s sea, and then up at the calm stern face of the man who walked beside her, and said —
“Tell me one thing, Lord Saltire; you have travelled in many countries. Is there any land, east or west, that can give us what this dear old England does — settled order, in which each man knows his place and his duties? It is so easy to be good in England.”
“Well, no. It is the first country in the world. A few bad harvests would make a hell of it, though. Has Ravenshoe got many pheasants down here?”
And, so talking, this strange pair wandered on towards the wood, side by side.
Charles was not without news in his retirement, for a few friends kept him pretty well au fait with what was going on in the world. First, there was news from Oxford; one sort of which was communicated by Charles Marston, and another sort by one Marker of Brazenose, otherwise known as “Bodger,” though why, I know not, nor ever could get any one to tell me. He was purveyor of fashionable intelligence, while Charles Marston dealt more in example and advice. About this time the latter wrote as follows:—
“How goes Issachar? Is the ass stronger or weaker than formerly? Has my dearly-beloved ass profited, or otherwise, by his stay at Ranford? How is the other ass, my Lord Welter? He is undoubtedly a fool, but I think an honest one, so long as you keep temptation out of his way. He is shamefully in debt; but I suppose, if their horse wins the Derby, he will pay; otherwise I would sooner be my lord than his tradesmen. How goes the ‘ grand passion,’ — has Chloe relented? She is a great fool if she does. Why, if she refuses you, she may marry Lord Welter, and he may settle his debts on her. A word in your ear. I have an invitation to Ranford. I must go, I suppose. The dear old woman, whose absurdities your honour is pleased to laugh at, has been always kind to me and mine; and I shall go. I shall pay my just tribute of flattery to the noble honest old soul, who is struggling to save a falling house. Don’t you laugh at lady Ascot, you impudent young rascal. I have no doubt that she offers some prominent points for the exercise of your excellency’s wit, but she is unmeasurably superior to you, you young scape-grace.
“Bless your dear old face; how I long to see it again! I am coming to see it. I shall come to you at the beginning of the Christmas vacation. I shall come to you a beaten man, Charley. I shall only get a econd. Never mind; I would sooner come to you and yours and hide my shame, than to any one else.
“Charles, old friend, if I get a third, I shall break my heart. Don’t show this letter to any one. I have lost the trick of Greek prose. Oh, old Charley!. believe this, that the day once lost can never, never come back any more! They preach a future hell; but what hell could be worse than the eternal contemplation of opportunities thrown away — of turning-points in the affairs of a man’s life, when, instead of rising, he has fallen — not by a bold stroke, like Satan, but by laziness and neglect?”
Charles was very sorry, very grieved, and vexed, to find his shrewd old friend brought to this pass by over-reading, and over-anxiety about a subject, which, to a non-university man, does not seem of such vital importance. He carried the letter to his father, in spite of the prohibitation contained in it, and he found his father alone with the good, honest Father Tiernay; to whom, not thinking that thereby he was serving his friend ill, he read it aloud.
“Charley dear,” said his father, half rising from his chair, “he must come to us, my boy; he must come here to us, and stay with us till he forgets his disappointment. He is a noble lad. He has been a good friend to my boy; and, by George, the house is his own.”
“I dout think, dad,” said Charles, looking from Densil to Father Tiernay, “that he is at all justified in he dark view he is taking of matters. The clever fellows used to say that he was safe of his first. You know he is going in for mathematics as well.”
“He is a good young man, any way,” said Father Tiernay; “his sentiments do honour to him; and none the worst of them is his admiration for my heretic young friend here, which does him most honour of all. Mr. Ravenshoe, I’ll take three to one against his double first; pity he ‘aint a Catholic. What the diwle do ye Prothestants mean by absorbing (to use no worse language) the rints and revenues left by Catholic testators for the good of the hooly Church, for the edication of heretics? Tell me that, now.”
The other letter from Oxford was of a very different tenor. Mr. Marker, of Brazenose, began by remarking that —
“He didn’t know what was come over the place; it was getting confoundedly slow, somehow. They had had another Bloomer ball at Abingdon, but the thing was a dead failure, sir. Jemmy Dane, of University, had driven two of them home in a cart, by way of Nunenham. He had past the Pro’s at Magdalen turnpike, and they never thought of stopping him, by George. Their weak intellects were not capable of conceiving such glorious audacity. Both the Proctors were down at Coldharbour turnpike, stopping every man who came from Abingdon way. Toreker, of Exeter, was coming home on George Simmond’s Darius, and, seeing the Proctors in the light of the turnpike-gate, had put his orse at the fence (Charles would remember it, a stubbed hedge and a ditch), had got over the back water by the White House, and so home by the Castle. Above forty men had been rusticated over this business, and some good fellows too.” (Here followed a list of names, which I could produce, if necessary; but seeing that some names on the list are now rising at the bar or in the Church, think it better not.) “Pembroke had won the fours, very much in consequence of Exeter having gone round the flag, and, on being made to row again, of fouling them in the gut. The water was out heavily, and had spoilt the boating. The Christchurch grind had been slow, but the best that year. L— n was going down, and they said was going to take the Pychley. C— n was pretty safe of his first — so reading men said. Martin of Trinity had got his testamur, at which event astonishment, not unmixed with awe, had fallen on the University generally. That he himself was in for his viva voce two days after date, and he wished himself out of the hands of his enemies.”
There was a postscript, which interested Charles as much as all the rest of the letter put together. It ran thus:—
“By-the-bye, Welter has muckered; you know that by this time. But, worse than that, they say that Charles Marston’s classical first is fishy. The old cock has overworked himself, they say.”
Lord Saltire never went to bed without having Charles up into his drawing-room for a chat. “Not having,” as is lordship most truly said, “any wig to take off, or any false teeth to come out. I cannot see why I should deny myself the pleasure of my young friend’s company at night. Every evening, young gentleman, we are one day older, and one day wiser. I myself have got so confoundedly wise with my many years that I have nothing left to learn. But it amuses me to hear your exceedingly naive remarks on tilings in general, and it also natters and soothes me to contrast my own consummate wisdom with your folly. Therefore, I will trouble you to come up to my dressing-room every night, and give me your crude reflections on the events of the day.”
So Charles came up one night, with Mr. Marker’s letter, which he read to Lord Saltire, while his valet was brushing his hair; and then Charles, by way of an easily answered question, asked Lord Saltire, What did he think of his friend’s chances?
“I must really remark,” said Lord Saltire, “even if I use unparliamentary language, which I should be very sorry to do; that that is one of the silliest questions I ever had put to me. When I held certain seals, I used to have some very foolish questions put to me (which, by the way, I never answered), but I don’t know that I ever had such a foolish question put to me as that. Why, how on earth can I have any idea of what your friend’s chances are 1 Do be reasonable.”
“Dear Lord Saltire, don’t be angry with me. Tell me, as far as your experience can. how far a man who nows iris work, by George, as well as a man can know it, is likely to fail through nervousness. You have seen the same thing in Parliament You know how much mischief nervousness may do. Now, do give me your opinion.”
“Well, you are putting your question in a slightly more reasonable form; but it is a very silly one yet. I have seen a long sort of man, with black hair and a hook nose, like long Montague, for instance, who has been devilishly nervous till he got on his legs, and then has astonished every one, and no one more than myself, not so much by his power of declamation, as by the extraordinary logical tenacity with which he clung to his subject. Yes, I don’t know but what I have heard more telling and logical speeches from unprepared men than I ever have from one of the law lords. But I am a bad man to ask. I never was in the lower house. About your friend’s chance; — well, I would not give twopence for it; in after life he may succeed. But, from what you have told me, I should prepare myself for a disappointment.”
Very shortly after this, good Lord Saltire had to retire for a time in the upper chambers; he had a severe attack of gout.
There had been no more quarrelling between Father Mackworth and Charles; Peace was proclaimed, — an armed truce; and Charles was watching, watching in silence. Never since he met her in the wood had he had an opportunity of speaking to Ellen. She always voided him. William, being asked confidentially by Charles what he thought was the matter, said that Ellen had been “carrin on ” with some one, and he had been blowing her up; which was all the explanation he offered. In the mean time, Charles lived under the comforting assurance that there was mischief brewing, and that Mackworth was at the bottom of it.
A growing anxiety began to take possession of Charles shortly before Christmas, arising from the state of his father’s health. Densil was failing. His memory was getting defective, and his sense dulled. His eye always was searching for Charles, and he was uneasy at his absence. So it was with a vague sense of impending misfortune that he got a letter from the dean of his college, summoning him back after the Christmas vacation.
Mr. Dean said, “That Mr. Ravenshoe’s case had been reconsidered, and that, at the warm, and, he thought, misguided, intercession of the Bursar, a determination had been come to, to allow Mr. Ravenshoe to come into residence again for the Lent term. He trusted that this would be a warning, and that, while there was time, he would arrest himself in that miserable career of vice and folly which could only have one termination — utter ruin in this world, and in the next.”
A college “Don ” by long practice, acquires a power of hurting a young man’s feelings, utterly beyond competition, save by a police magistrate. Charles winced nder this letter; but the same day Mary, coming singing down stairs as was her wont, was alarmed by the descent of a large opaque body of considerable weight down the well of the staircase, which lodged in the wood basket at the bottom, and which, on examining, she found to be a Liddell and Scott’s Lexicon. At which she rejoiced; for she concluded that Charles had taken to reading again, though why he should begin by throwing his books down stairs she could not well understand, until he joined her and explained that he had been dusting it on the landing, and that it had slipped out of his hand.
“What a crack it came down,” added he; “I wish Father Mackworth’s head had been underneath it.”
“I have no doubt of it, young gentleman,” said the priest quietly from behind; and there he was with his hand on the library door, and in he went and shut it behind him.
Mary and Charles were both awfully disconcerted. Mary felt horribly guilty; in fact, if the priest had remained quiet one moment more, he would undoubtedly have heard one or two candid, and far from complimentary remarks about himself from that young lady, which would have made his ears tingle.
“Confound him,” said Charles; “how he glides about! He learned that trick, and a few others, at that precious Jesuit College of his. They teach them that sort of thing as the old Jews teach the young pick-pockets. The old father inquisitor puts the door ajar ith a bell against it, and they all have to come in one after another. The one who rings it gets dropped on to like blazes.”
Mary was going to ask what exact amount of personal suffering being dropped on to like blazes involved; but Charles stopped her, and took her hand.
“Mary dear,” he said, “do you ever think of the future?”
“Night and day, Charles, — night and day.”
“If he dies, Mary? When he dies?”
“Night and day, brother,” she answered, taking one of his great brown hands between her two white little palms. “I dream in my sleep of the new regime which is to come, and I see only trouble, and again trouble.”
“And then?”
“There is a God in heaven, Charles.”
“Ay, but, Mary, what will you do?”
“I?” and she laughed the merriest little laugh ever you heard. “Little me? Why, go for a governess to be sure. Charles, they shall love me so that this life shall be a paradise. I will go into a family where there are two beautiful girls; and, when I am old and withered, there shall be two nurseries in which I shall be often welcome, where the children shall come babbling to my knee, the darlings, and shall tell me how they love me, almost as well as their mother. There is my future. Would you change it?”
Charles was leaning against the oak banister; and, when he saw her there before him, when he saw that valiant true-hearted face, in the light which streamed from the old window above, he was rebuked, and bent down his head on the rail. The Dean’s letter of that morning had done something; but the sight of that brave little woman, so fearless with all the world before her, did more. She weak, friendless, moneyless, and so courageous! He with the strong arm, so cowardly! It taught him a lesson indeed, a lesson he never forgot. But oh! for that terrible word — too late!
Ah! too late! What word is so terrible as that? You will see what I mean soon. That is the cry which one writer puts in the mouths of the lost spirits in hell. God’s mercy is infinite, and it is yet a question whether it were better for Charles to have fallen into the groove of ordinary life, or to have gone through those humiliating scenes through which we must follow him. "Charley dear,” said Mary, laying her hand on his shoulder, “it is not about myself I am thinking; it is about you. What are you going to do when he is gone? are you going into the Church?”
“Oh, no!” said Charles, “I couldn’t bear the idea of that.”
“Then, why are you at Oxford?”
“To get an education, I suppose.”
“But what use will a university education be to you, Charles? Have you no plans?”
“I give you my word, my dear Mary, that I am as much in the dark about the future as a five days old puppy.”
“Has he made any provision for you?”
“Oh, yes! I am to have six thousand.”
“Do you know that the estate is involved, Charles?”
“No.”
“I believe it is. There has been a great deal of state kept up here, and I believe it is the case.”
“Cuthbert would soon bring that round.”
“I tremble to think of the future, Charles. Are your debts at Oxford heavy?”
“Pretty well. Five hundred would clear me.”
“Don’t get any more in debt, that’s a dear.”
“No, Mary dear, I won’t. I don’t care for the future. I shall have ￡180. a year. That will be enough for William and me. Then I shall go to the bar and make a deuce of a lot of money, and marry Adelaide. Then you will come to live with us, and we shall have such jolly times of it. — Take that, you villain!”
This last elegant apostrophe was addressed to William (who at that moment had come in by the side door), and was accompanied by the dexterous delivery of the Liddell and Scott, in the manner of a cricket ball. Our friend William stood to catch it in a style worthy of Box, with his knees a yard apart, and one palm over the other; but, as luck would have it, he missed it, and it alighted full on the shins of Father Mackworth, who had selected that time for coming out of the library; and so it lay sillily open at λαυ, γεμ, at his feet.
Mackworth really thought that it was intentional, and was furious. He went back into the library; and Charles, seeing what must come, followed him, while Mary fled upstairs. There was no one in the room but Cuthbert and Father Tiernay.
“I will be protected from insult in this house,” began Mackworth; “twice today I have been insulted by Mr. Charles Ravenshoe, and I demand protection.”
“What have you been doing, Charley?” said Cuthbert, “I thought you two had given, up quarrelling. You will wear my life out. Sometimes, what with one thing and another, I wish I were dead. Oh! if the great problem were solved! Surely my brother may avoid brawling with a priest, a man sacred by his office, though of another faith. Surely my brother has taste enough to see the propriety of that.”
“Your brother has no taste or sense, sir,” said Father Mackworth. “He has no decency. He has no gentlemanly feeling. Within ten minutes he has dropped a book downstairs, and lamented, to my face, that it hadn’t fallen on my head; and just now he has thrown the same book at me, and hit me with it.”
“I thank God, Charles,” said poor weary Cuthbert, “that our father is spared this. It would kill him. Brother, brother, why do you vex me like this? I have always stood on your side, Charley. Don’t let me be killed with these ceaseless brawls.”
“They will soon cease, sir,” said Father Mackworth; “I leave this house tomorrow.”
“Cuthbert, hear me now. I never intended to insult him.”
“Why did you throw your book at him, Charley? It is not decorous. You must know when you wound him you wound me. And I have fought such battles for you, Charley.”
“Cuthbert! brother! do hear me. And let him hear me. And let Father Tiernay hear me. Cuthbert, you know I love you. Father Tiernay, you are a good and honest man; hear what I have to say. You Mackworth, you are a scoundrel. You are a double-dyed villain What were you doing with that girl in the wood, the day you hunted the black hare a month ago? Cuthbert, tell me, like an honest gentleman, did you ever walk in the wood with Ellen?”
“I?” said Cuthbert, scared; “I never walked with Ellen there. I have walked with Mary there, brother. Why should I not?”
“There, look at the lie that this man has put into her mouth. She told me that he had found you and her walking together there.”
“I am not answerable for any young woman’s lies,” said Father Mackworth, “I decline to continue this discussion. It is humiliating. As for you. yon poor little moth,” he said, turning to Charles, “when tho time comes, I will crush you with my thumb against the wall My liking for your father prevents my doing my duty as yet. In that I err. Wait.”
Charles had been in a passion before this; but, seeing danger, and real danger abroad, he got cool, and said —
“Wait.”
And they both waited, and we shall see who waited the longest.
“I have done it now, Mary dear,” said Charles, returning upstairs with the unlucky lexicon. “It is all over now.”
“Has there been a scene?”
“A terrible scene. I swore at him, and called him a villain.”
“Why did you do that, Charles? Why are you so violent? You are not yourself, Charles, when you give way to your temper like that.”
“Well, I’ll tell you, my Robin. He is a villain.”
“I don’t think so, Charles. I believe he is a high-minded man.”
“I know he is not, birdie. At least, I believe he is not.”
“I believe him to be so, Charles.”
“I know him to be otherwise; at least, I think so.”
“Are you doing him justice, Charley dear? Are you sure you are doing him justice?”
“I think so.”
“Why?”
“I cannot tell you, Mary. When the end of all things comes, and you and I are thrown abroad like two corks on the great sea, you will know. But I cannot tell you.”
“I believe, dear, that you are so honest that you ould not do injustice even to him. But, oh! be sure that you are right. Hush! Change the subject. What were you going to read when that unlucky book fell downstairs?”
“Demosthenes.”
“Let me come in and sit with you, Charley dear, and look out the words; you don’t know how clever I am. Is it the “De Corona”?
Charles took her hand and kissed it; and so they two poor fools went on with their Demosthenes.
The night after the terrible lexicon quarrel, which, you will observe, arose entirely from Charles’s good resolution to set to work reading — whereby we should take warning not to be too sanguine of good resolutions, taken late, bringing forth good fruit — the very evening I say after this fracas, Charles, his father, and Mary, were sitting in the library together. Of course Densil had heard nothing of the disturbance, and was, good old gentleman, as happy as you please; all his elements of pleasure were there. Father Mackworth was absent. Father Tiernay was throwing his whole hearty soul into a splendid copy of Bewick’s birds, date 1799. Cuthbert was before the upper fireplace, beyond the pillar, poring over goodness only knows what monkish lore; while close to him was bird Mary sewing, and Charles leading aloud a book, very often quoted in everyday life, unconsciously.
Charles read how Mr. Quilp begged Mr. Brass would take particular care of himself, or he would never forgive him; how there was a dog in the lane who had killed a boy on Tuesday, and bitten a man on Friday; how the og lived on the right hand side, but generally lurked on the left, ready for a spring: and they were laughing over Mr. Brass’s horror, when there came a noise of wheels on the gravel.
“That is Marston, father, for a thousand pounds,” said Charles.
He hurried into the hall, as the men were undoing the door; Mary, dropping her work, went after him; and Densil, taking his stick, came too. Cuthbert looked up from the further end of the room, and then bent his head over his book again. Father Tiernay looked up, inquisitive and interested, but sat still. They who followed into the hall saw this.
Charles stood in front of the hall door, and out of the winter’s darkness came a man, with whom, as Mary once playfully said, she had fallen in love at once. It was Marston.
Charles went up to him quickly with both hands out, and said —
“We are so glad.”
“It is very kind of you. God bless you; how did you know it?”
“We know nothing, my dear Marston, except that you are welcome. Now put me out of my pain.”
“Why, well,” said the other, “I don’t know how it has happened; but I have got my double first.”
Charles gave a wild cheer, and the others were all on him directly — Densil, Tiernay, Cuthbert, and all. Never was such a welcome; not one of them, save Charles, had ver seen him before, yet they welcomed him as an old friend.
“You have not been to Ranford then?” said Charles.
“Why, no. I did not feel inclined for it after so much work. I must take it on my way back.”
Lord Saltire’s gout was better tonight, and he was down stairs. He proceeded to remark that, having been n; well, he wouldn’t shock Miss Corby by saying here — for a day or so, he had suddenly, through no merit of his own, got promoted back into purgatory. That, having fought against the blue devils, and come down stairs, for the sole purpose of making himself disagreeable, he had been rewarded, for that display of personal energy and self-sacrifice, by most unexpectedly meeting a son of his old friend, Jackdaw Marston. He begged to welcome his old friend’s son, and to say that, by Jove, he was proud of him. His young friend’s father had not been a brilliant scholar, as his young friend was; but had been one of the first whist-players in England. His young friend had turned his attention to scholastic honours, in preference to whist, which might or might not be a mistake: though he believed he was committing no breach of trust in saying that the position had been thrust on his young friend from pecuniary motives. Property had an infernal trick of deteriorating. His own property had not happened to deteriorate (none knew why, for he had given it every chance); but the property of his young friend’s father having eteriorated in a confounded rapid sort of way, he must say that it was exceedingly creditable in his young friend to have made such a decided step towards bringing matters right again as he had.”
“My father’s son, my Lord, thanks you for your kind remembrance of his father. I have always desired to see and meet my father’s old friends, of whom you, Mr. Ravenshoe, were among the kindest. We have given up the greater vices lately, my Lord, but we do our best among the smaller ones.”
There was a quiet supper, at which Lord Saltire consented to stay, provided no one used the expression “cheese; ” in which case he said he should have to retire. There wasn’t cheese on the table, but there was more than cheese; there was scolloped cockles, and Lord Saltire ate some. He said at the time that they would have the same effect on him as swallowing the flreshovel. But, to relieve your mind at once, I may tell you that they didn’t do him any harm at all, and he was as well as ever next morning.
Father Tiernay said grace; and, when the meal was half over, in came Father Mackworth. Densil said, “Father Mackworth, Mr. Marston;” and Marston said, after a moment’s glance at him, “How do you do, sir?”
Possibly a more courteous form of speaking to a new acquaintance might have been used. But Marston had his opinions about Father Mackworth, and had no objection that the holy father should know them.
“We got, Mary,” said Cuthbert suddenly, “more cocks than pheasants today. Charles killed five couple, and I four. I was very vexed at being beaten by Charles, because I am so much the better shot.”
Charles looked up and met his eyes — a look he never forgot. Accompanying the apparent petulance of the remark was a look of love and pity and sorrow. It pleased him, above everything, during the events which were to come, to recall that look, and say, “Well, he liked me once.”
That evening Charles and Marston retired to Charles’s study (a deal of study had been carried on there, you may depend), and had a long talk over future prospects. Charles began by telling him all about Madam Adelaide, and Marston said, “Oh, indeed! what are you going to do, Charley, boy, to keep her? She comes out of an extravagant house, you know.”
“I must get called to the bar.”
“Hard work for nothing, for many years, you know.”
“I know. But I won’t go into the Church; and what else is there?”
“Nothing I know of, except billiard marking and steeple-chase riding.”
“Then, you approve of it?”
“I do, most heartily. The work will be good for you. You have worked before, and can do it again, remember how well you got on at Shrewsbury.”
Then Charles told him about the relations between imself and Father Mackworth, and what had happened that day.
“Yon and he have had disgraceful scenes like this before, haven’t yon?”
“Yes, but never so bad as this.
“He is a very passionate man, isn’t he? You took utterly wrong grounds for what you did today. Don’t you see that you have no earthly grounds for what you said, except your own suspicions? The girl’s own account of the matter seems natural enough. That she was walking with your most saint-like brother, and the priest found them, and sent them to the right-about with fleas in their ears.”
“I believe that man to be a gre’at villain,” said Charles.
“So may I,” said the other, “but I shan’t tell him so till I can prove it. As for that quarrel between William and Ms sister the night you came home, that proves nothing, except that she has been going too far with some one. But who? What have you been doing that empowers him to say that he will crush you like a moth?”
“Oh, bravado, I take it! You should have seen how mad he looked when he said it.”
“I am glad I did not. Let us talk no more about him. Is that sweet little bird Mary Corby?”
“You know it is.”
“Well, so I do know, but I wanted an excuse for saying the name over again. Charles, you are a. fool.”
“That is such a very novel discovery of yours,” said Charles, laughing. “What have I been a-doing on now?”
“Why didn’t you fall in love with Mary Corby instead of Madam Adelaide?”
“I am sure I don’t know. Why, I never thought of such a thing as that.”
“Then you ought to have done so. Now go to bed.”
Time jogged on very pleasantly to the party assembled at Ravenshoe that Christmas. There were woodcocks and pheasants in the woods; there were hares, snipes, and rabbits on the moor. In the sea there were fish; and many a long excursion they had in the herring-boats — sometimes standing boldly out to sea towards the distant blue island in the main, sometimes crawling lazily along under the lofty shoreless cliffs which towered above their heads from 200 to 1,100 feet high.
It was three days before Christmas-day, and they were returning from fishing along the coast, and were about ten miles or so from home. I say returning, though in fact there was not a breath of wind, and the boat was drifting idly along on the tide. Two handsome simple-looking young men were lolling by the useless tiller; an old man, hale and strong as a lion, with a courteous highbred look about him, was splicing a rope; and a tall, pale, black-haired man was looking steadily seaward, with his hands in his pockets, while Charles and Marston were standing in the bows smoking.
“What a curious, dreamy, dosy, delicious kind of winter you have down here,” said Marston.
“I am very fond of it,” said Charles; “it keeps you in continual hope for the spring that is coming. In the middle of frost and snow and ice one is apt to lose one’s faith in waving boughs and shady pools.”
“I have had such a quiet time with you down here, Charley. I am so pleased with the way in which you are going on. You are quite an altered man. I think we shall both look back to the last few quiet weeks as a happy time.”
“Here the tall dark man, who was looking out to sea, suddenly said —
“Bain and hail, snow and tempest, stormy wind fulfilling His word.”
“Ay, ay,” said the old man; “going to blow tonight, I expect.”
“We shall go home pretty fast, may be.”
“Not us, Master Charles dear,” said the tall man. “We are going to have it from south and by west, and so through west round to north. Before which time there’ll be souls in glory, praise be to God.”
The old man took off his hat reverently.
“There won’t be amuch surf on when we beaches she,” said one of the young men. “It won’t get up afore the wind be full round west for an hour.”
“You’re a spaking like a printed buke, Jan,” said the old man.
“I’m a thinking differently, Master Evans,” said the dark man. “It will chop round very sudden, and be west before we know where we are. I speak with humility to a man who has seen the Lord’s wonders in the deep so many years longer nor me. But I think, under God, I am right.”
“You most in general be right. They as converses with the Lord night and day, day and night, like as you do, knows likely more of his works nor we, as ain’t your gifts.”
“The Lord has vouchsafed me nothing in the way of a vision, about this afternoon, Master Evans.”
“Didn’t ’ee dream never at all last night?” said one of the young men, “Think ’ee now.”
“Nought to bear on wind or weather, Jan. I judges from the glass. It’s a dropping fast.”
Jan would have had more faith in one of Matthew’s dreams, and didn’t seem to think much of the barometer. Meanwhile Marston had whispered Charles —
“Who is Matthews? What sect is he?”
“Oh, he’s a Brianite.”
“What is that?”
“A sort of Ranter, I believe.”
Marston looked up, and saw the two great black eyes under the lofty forehead fixed full upon him. With the instinct of a gentleman, he said at once —
“I was asking Mr. Charles what sect you were of; that was all. He tells me you are a Brianite, and I had never heard of that sect before. I hope you will let me talk to you about your matters of belief some day.”
Matthews took off his hat, and said — That with the Lord’s will he would speak to his honour. “Will your onour bear with a poor fisherman, ignorant of the world’s learning, but who has had matters revealed to him by the Lord in dreams and visions of the night. Peter was only a fisherman, your honour, and, oh, if we could only hear him speak now!”
He paused, and looked again to seaward. Charles had gone again into the bow, and Marston was standing among the men right aft. Suddenly Matthews turned again upon him, and said —
“In the beaching of this here boat tonight, your honour, there may be danger. In such case my place will be alongside of him,” pointing to Charles. “There’d be a many kind hearts aching, if aught happened to him. You stick close to these young men. They’ll see after you, sir.”
“You keep close alongside of we, sir. You hold on of we, sir. We’ll see you all right, sir,” said the two young men.
“But, my dear good souls, I am as good a swimmer as any in England, and as active as a cat. Pray, don’t mind me.” You keep hold of we and run, sir,” said one of the young men, “that’s all you’re a’got to do, sir.”
“I shall most certainly run,” said Marston laughing, “but I decline drowning any one but myself — ”
Charles said at this moment, “Do come here, and look at this.”
It was worth looking at, indeed. They were about a mile from shore, floating about anyhow on an oily mooth sea; for the tide had changed, and they were making no headway. Before them one of the noblest headlands on the coast, an abrupt cone of slate, nigh a thousand feet high, covered almost entirely with grass, sloped suddenly into the water; and in advance of it, but slightly on one side, a rugged mound of black rock, nearly six hundred feet, stood out into the sea, and contrasted its horrid jagged lines with the smooth green of the peak behind. Round its base, dividing it from the glossy sea, ran a delicate line of silver — the surf caused by the ground swell; and in front the whole promontory was dimly mirrored in the quietly heaving ocean.
“What a noble headland,” said Marston; “is that grass on the further peak too steep to walk upon?”
“There’s some one a’walking on it now,” said old Evans. “There’s a woman a’walking on it.”
None could see it but he, except Matthews, who said he couldn’t tell if it was a sheep or no.
Charles got out his glass, and the old man was right. A woman was walking rapidly along the peak, about the third of the way down.
“What a curious place for a woman to be in!” he remarked. “It is almost terrible to look at.”
“I never saw any one there before, save the shepherd,” said the old man.
“It’s a sheep-path,” said one of the young ones. “I have been along there myself. It is the short way round to Coombe.”
Charles would have thought more of the solitary emale figure on that awful precipice, but that their attention was diverted by something else. From the south-westward black flaws of wind began to creep towards them, alternated with long irregular bands of oily calm. Soon the calm bands disappeared, and the wind reached them. Then they had steerage, and in a very short time were roaring out to sea close hauled, with a brisk and ever increasing breeze.
They saw that they would have to fetch a very long .ml make a great offing, in order to reach Ravenshoe at all. The wind was freshening every moment, changing to the west, and the sea was getting up. It took them three hours to open Ravenshoe bay; and, being about five miles from the shore, they could see that already there was an ugly side-sirrf sweeping in, and that the people were busy on the beach, hauling up their boats out of harm’s way.
“How beautifully these craft sail,” said Marston, as they were all hanging on by her weather gunwale, and the green sea was rushing past to leeward, almost under their feet, in sheets of angry foam.
“It is amazing what speed is got out of them on a wind,” said Charles, “but they are dangerous craft:’
“Why so?”
“These lug-sails are so awkward in tacking, you will see.”
They ran considerably past Ravenshoe and about six miles to sea. when the word was given to go about. In an instant the half-deck was lumbered with the heavy ed sails; and, after five minutes of unutterable confusion, she got about. Marston was expecting her to broach to every moment during this long five minutes, but fortune favoured them. They went freer on this tack, for the wind was now north of west, and the brave little craft went nearly before it at her finest pace. The men kept on her as much sail as she could stand, but that was very little; fast as they went, the great seas went faster, as though determined to be at the dreadful rendezvous before the boat. Still the waves rose higher and the wind howled louder. They were nearing the shore rapidly.
Now they began to see, through the mist, the people gathered in a crowd on the shore, densest at one point, but with a few restless stragglers right and left of that point, who kept coming and going. This spot was where they expected to come ashore. They were apparently the last boat out, and all the village was watching them with the deepest anxiety.
They began to hear a sound other than the howling of the wind in the rigging, and the rush of waters around them — a continuous thunder, growing louder each moment as the boat swept onward. The thimder of the surf upon the sand. And, looking forward, they could see just the top of it as it leapt madly up.
It was a nervous moment. They stood ready in their shirts and trousers, for a rush, should it be necessary. And the old man was at the helm. They saw the seas begin to curl. Then they were in the middle of them.
Then the water left them on the sand, and three brave fellows from the shore dashed to hook on the tackles; bnt they were too late. Back with a roar like a hungry lion came the sea; the poor boat broached to, and took the whole force of the deluge on her broadside. In a moment more, blinded and stunned, they were all in the water, trying to stand against the backward rush which took them near midthigh. Old Master Evans was nearest to Marston; he was tottering to fall when Marston got hold of him, and saved him. The two young men got hold of both of them. Then three men from the shore dashed in and got hold of Charles; and then, as the water went down and they dared move their feet, they all ran for their lives. Marston and his party got on to dry land on their feet, but Charles and his assistants were tumbled over and over, and washed up ignominiously covered with sand. Charles, however, soon recovered himself, and, looking round to thank those who had done him this service, found that one of them was William, who, when the gale had come on, had, with that bland indifference to the stud-groom’s personal feelings which we have seen him exhibit before, left his work, and dressed in a Jersey and blue trousers, and come down to lend a hand. He had come in time to help his foster-brother out of the surf.
“I am so very thankful to you,” said Charles to the two others. “I will never forget you. I should have been drowned but for you. William, when I am in trouble I am sure to find you at my elbow.”
“You won’t find me far off, Master Charles,” said William. They ‘didn’t say any more to one another those two. There was no need.
The tall man Matthews had been cast up with a broken head, and, on the whole, seemed rather disappointed at not finding himself in paradise. He had stumbled in leaping out of the boat, and hurt his foot, and had had a hard time of it, poor fellow.
As Charles and William stood watching the poor boat breaking up, and the men venturing their lives to get the nets out of her, a hand was laid on Charles’s shoulder, and, turning round, he faced Cuthbert.
“Oh, Charles, Charles, I thought I had lost you. Come home and let us dry you, and take care of you. William, you have risked your life for one who is very dear to us. God reward you for it! Brother, you are shivering with cold, and you have nothing but your trousers and Jersey on, and your head and feet are bare, and your poor hair is wet and full of sand; let me carry you up, Charles, the stones will cut your feet. Let me carry you, Charles. I used to do it when you were little.”
There was water in Charles’s eyes (the salt water out of his hair, you understand), as he answered:
“I think I can walk, Cuthbert; my feet are as hard as iron.”
“No, but I must carry you,” said Cuthbert. “Get up, brother.”
Charles prepared to comply, and Cuthbert suddenly pulled off his shoes and stockings, and made ready. i Oh, Cuthbert, don’t do that,” said Charles, “You break my heart.”
“Do let me, dear Charles. I seldom ask you a favour. If I didn’t know that it was acceptable to God, do you think I would do it?”
Charles hesitated one moment; but he caught William’s eye, and William’s eye and William’s face said so plainly “ do it,” that Charles hesitated no longer, but got on his brother’s back. Cuthbert ordered William, who was bare-foot, to put on his discarded shoes and stockings, which William did; and then Cuthbert went toiling up the stony path towards the hall with his brother on his back — glorying in his penance.
Is this ridiculous? I cannot say I can see it in this light. I may laugh to scorn the religion which teaches men that, by artificially producing misery and nervous terror, and in that state flying to religion as a comfort and refuge, we in any way glorify God, or benefit ourselves. I can laugh, I say, at a form of religion like this; but I cannot laugh at the men who believe in it, and act up to it. No. I may smoke my pipe, and say that the fool Cuthbert Ravenshoe took off his shoes, and gave them to the groom, and carried a twelve-stone brother for a quarter of a mile barefoot, and what a fool he must be, and so forth. But the sneer is a failure, and the laugh dies away; and I say, “ Well, Cuthbert, if you are a fool, you are a consistent and manly one at all events.”
Let us leave these three toiling up the steep rocky path, and take a glance elsewhere. When the gale had come on, little Mary had left Densil, and, putting on her bonnet, gone down to the beach. She had asked the elder fishermen whether there would be any danger in beaching the boat, and they had said in chorus, “Oh, bless her sweet ladyship’s heart, no. The young men would have the tackles on her and have her up, oh, ever so quick; and so she had been reassured, and walked up and down. But, as the wind came stronger and stronger, and she had seen the last boat taken in half full of water — and as the women kept walking up and down uneasily, with their hands under their aprons — and as she saw many an old eagle eye, shaded by a horny hand, gazing anxiously seaward, at the two brown sails plunging about in the offing — she had lost heart again, and had sat her down on a windlass apart, with a pale face, and a sick heart,
A tall gaunt brown woman came up to her and said,
“My lady musn’t fret. My lady would never do for a fisherman’s wife. Why, my dear tender flesh, there’s a hundred strong arms on the beach now, as would fetch a Ravenshoe out of anywhere a’most. ’Tis a cross surf, Miss Mary; but, Lord love ye, they’ll have the tackles on her afore she’s in it. Don’t ye fret, dear, don’t ye fret.”
But she had set apart and fretted nevertheless; and, hen she saw the brown bows rushing madly through the yellow surf, she had shut her eyes and prayed, and had opened them to see the boat on her beam ends, and a dozen struggling figures in the pitiless water.
Then she had stood up and wrung her hands.
They were safe. She heard that, and she buried her face in her hands, and murmured a prayer of thanksgiving.
Some one stood beside her. It was Marston, bare-headed and barefooted.
“Oh, thank God,” she said.
“We have given you a sad fright.”
“I have been terribly frightened. But you must not stand dripping there. Please, come up, and let me attend you.”
So she got him a pair of shoes, and they went up together. The penance procession had passed on before; and a curious circumstance is this, that, although on ordinary occasions Marston was as lively a talker as need be, on this occasion he was an uncommonly stupid one, as he never said one word all the way up t< i the hall, and then separated from her with a formal little salutation.
Mary did not wonder at Marston’s silence. She imagined that perhaps he had been sobered by being cast on shore so unceremoniously, and thought but little more of it. Then she dressed for dinner, and went and stood in one of the deep windows of the hall, looking out.
The great fire which leapt and blazed in the hall chimney was fast superseding the waning daylight outside. It was very pleasant to look at the fire, and the firelight on wall and ceiling, on antler and armour, and then to get behind the curtain and look out into the howling winters evening, over the darkening raging sea, and the tossing trees, and think how all the boats were safe in, and the men sitting round the pleasant fires with their wives and children, and that the dogs were warm in the kennels, and the horses in the stable; and to pity the poor birds, and hope they had good warm nooks and corners to get to; and then to think of the ships coming up the channel, and hope they might keep a good offing.
This brought her to thinking, for the first time, of her own little self — how, so many years ago, she had been cast up like a little piece of seaweed out of that awful cean. She thought of the Warren Hastings, and how she and Charles, on summer-days, when out gathering hells on the rocks, used to look over to where the ship lay beneath the sea, and wonder whereabout it was. Then she had a kindly smile on her face as she thought of Mr. Archer, the brave and good (now I am happy to say Captain Archer), and looked over the hall to a hideous and diabolical graven image, which he had sent the year before, among some very valuable presents, and had begged her to be particularly careful of, as he had risked his life in getting it; and which she and Charles had triumphantly placed in the hall, and maintained there, too, in spite of the sarcasms of Father Mackworth, and the pious horror of the servants and villagers. And so she went on thinking — thinking of her dead parents, of the silence maintained by her relations, of old Densil’s protection, and then of the future. That protection must cease soon, and then —
A governess! There were many stories about governesses not being well treated. Perhaps it was their own fault, or they were exceptional cases. She would like the nursery best, and to keep away from the drawingroom altogether! “ Yes,” she said, “I will make them love me; I will be so gentle, patient, and obliging. I am not afraid of the children — I know I can win them — or of my mistress much; I believe I can win her. I am most afraid of the superior servants; but, surely, kindness P“d submission will win them in time.
“My sheet-anchor is old Lady Ascot. She got very fond of me during that six months I staid with her; and she is very kind. Surely she will get me a place where I shall be well treated; and, if not, why then — I shall only be in the position of thousands of other girls. I must fight through it. There is another life after this.
“It will be terribly hard parting from all the old friends though! After that, I think I shall have no heart left to suffer with. Yes; I suppose the last details of the break-up will be harder to bear than anything which will follow. That will tear one’s heart terribly. That over, I suppose my salary will keep me in drawing materials, and give rue the power, at every moment of leisure, of taking myself into fairyland.
“I suppose actual destitution is impossible. I should think so. Yes, yes; Lady Ascot would take care of that. If that were to come though? They say a girl can always make fourpence a day by her needle. How I would fight, and strive, and toil! And then how sweet death would be!”
She paused, and looked out on the darkened ocean. “And yet,” she thought again, “I would follow — follow him to the world’s end:—
“’ Across the hills, and far away,
Beyond their utmost purple rim; Beyond the night, across the day, The happy princess followed him.’ ”
A door opened into the hall, and a man’s step was on he stone-floor: she raised the curtain to see who it was. It was Marston; and he came straight towards her, and stood beside her, looking out over the wild stormy landscape.
“Miss Corby,” he said, “I was coming to try and find you.”
“You were very lucky in your search,” she said, smiling on him. “I was alone here with the storm; and, if I had not raised the curtain, you would never have seen me. How it blows! I am glad you are not out in this. This is one of your lucky days.”
“I should be glad to think so. Will you listen to me for a very few minutes, while I tell you something?”
“Surely,” she said. “Who is there that I would sooner listen to?”
“I fear I shall tire your patience now, though. I am a comparatively poor man.”
“And what of that, my dear Mr. Marston? You are rich in honour, in future prospects. You have a noble future before you.”
“Will you share it, Mary?”
“Oh! what do you mean?”
“Will you be my wife? I love you beyond all the riches and honours of the world — I love you as you will never be loved again. It is due to you and to myself to say that, although I call myself poor, I have enough to keep you like a lady, and all my future prospects beside. Don’t give me a hasty answer, but tell me is it possible you can become my wife?”
“Oh, I am so sorry for this!” said poor Mary. “I never dreamt of this. Oh, no! it is utterly and entirely impossible, Mr. Marston — utterly and hopelessly impossible! You must forgive me, if you can; but you must never, never think about me more.”
“Is there no hope?” said Marston.
“No hope, no hope!” said Mary. “Please never think about me any more, till you have forgiven me; and then, with your children on your knee, think of me as a friend who loves you dearly.”
“I shall think of you till I die. I was afraid of this: it is just as I thought.”
“What did you think?”
“Nothing — nothing! Will you let me kiss your hand?”
“Surely; and God bless you!”
“Are we to say goodbye for ever, then?” said poor Marston.
“I hope not. I should be sorry to think that,” said poor Mary, crying. “But you must never speak to me like this again, dear Mr. Marston. God bless you, once more!”
Charles was dressing while this scene was going on, and was thinking, while brushing his hair, what there was for dinner, and whether there would be a turbot or not, and whether the cook would send in the breast of the venison. The doe, Charles sagely reflected, had been killed five days before, and the weather had been warm: surely That Woman would let them have the breast. He was a fool not to have told her of it in the morning before he went out; but she was such an irate old catamaran that she very likely wouldn’t have done it. “There was no greater mistake,” this young Heliogabalna proceeded to remark, than “hanging your breasts too long. Now, your haunch, on the other hand — ” but we cannot follow him into such a vast and important field of speculation. “There would be a couple of cocks, though — pretty high, near about the mark ”
The door opened, and in walked Father Mackworth.
“Hallo, Father!” said Charles, “how are you? Did you hear of our spill today? We were deuced near done for, I assure you.”
“Charles,” said the priest, “your nature is frank and noble. I was in terror today lest you should go to your account bearing me malice.”
“A Ravenshoe never bears malice, Father,” said Charles.
“A Ravenshoe never does, I am aware,” said Father Mackworth, with such a dead equality of emphasis, that Charles could not have sworn that he laid any on tin-word “Ravenshoe.”
“But I have got an apology to make to you, Father,” said Charles: “I have to apologize to you for losing my temper with you the other day, and breaking out into I can’t say what tirade of unjust anger. I pray you t<> forgive me. We don’t love one another, you know. How can we? But I behaved like a blackguard, as I always do when I am in a passion. “Will you forgive me?”
“I had forgotten the circumstance.” (“Good heaven!” said Charles to himself, “can’t this man help lying?”) “But, if I have anything to forgive, I freely do so. I have come to ask for a peace. As long as your father lives, let there be outward peace between us, if no more.”
“I swear there shall,” said Charles. “I like you tonight, sir, better than ever I did before, for the kindness and consideration you show to my father. “When he is gone there will be peace between us, for I shall leave this house and trouble you no more.”
“I suppose you will,” said Father Mackworth, with the same deadness of emphasis remarked before. And so he departed.
“That is a manly young fellow, and a gentleman,” thought Father Mackworth. “Obstinate and headstrong, without much brains; but with more brains than the other, and more education. The other will be very troublesome and headstrong; but I suppose I shall be able to manage him.”
What person do you think Father Mackworth meant by the “other”? He didn’t mean Cuthbert.
At dinner Densil was garrulous, and eager to hear of their shipwreck. He had made a great rally the last fortnight, and was Iris old self again. Lord Saltire, whose gout had fled before careful living and moderate exercise, informed them, after the soup, that he intended to leave them after four days’ time, as he had business in another part of the country. They were rather surprised at his abrupt departure, and he said that he was very sorry to leave such pleasant society, in which he had been happier than he had been for many years.
“There is a pleasant, innocent, domestic sort of atmosphere which radiates from you, my old friend,” he said, “such as I seldom or never get, away from you or Marnwaring, grim warrior though he be (you remember him at Ranford, Charles?) But the law of the Medes and Persians is not amenable to change, and I go on Thursday.”
The post arrived during dinner, and there was a letter for Charles, It was from Ranford. “Welter comes on Thursday, father — the very day Lord Saltire goes. How annoying!”
“I must try to bear up under the affliction!” said that nobleman, taking snuff, and speaking very drily.
“Where is he to go, I wonder?” mused Mary, aloud. “He must go into the west wing, for he always smokes in his bedroom.”
Charles expected that Cuthbert would have had a sneer at Welter, whom he cordially disliked; but Cuthbert had given up sneering lately. “Not much more reading for you, Charles!” he said.
“I am afraid not,” said Charles. “I almost wish he wasn’t coming; we were very happy before.”
Charles was surprised to see Marston so silent at dinner. He feared he might have offended him, but ouldn’t tell how. Then he wondered to see Mary so silent too, for she generally chirruped away like a lark; but he didn’t refer the two similar phenomena to a common cause, and so he arrived at no conclusion.
When Lord Saltire went to bed that night, he dismissed Charles from attendance, and took Marston’s arm; and, when they were alone together, he thus began:—
“Does your shrewdness connect my abrupt departure with the arrival of Lord Welter?”
“I was inclined to, my lord; but I did not see how you were to have known of it.”
“I heard yesterday from Lady Ascot. ”
“I am sorry he is coming,” said Marston.
“So am I. I cant stay in the house with him. The contrast of his loud coarse voice and stable slang to the sort of quiet conversation we have had lately would be intolerable; besides, he is an atrocious young ruffian, and will ruin our boy if he can.”
“Charles wont let him, now, Lord Saltire.’ ’
“Charles is young and foolish. I am glad, however, that Welter does not go back to Oxford with him. But there will be Welter’s set in their glory, I suppose, unless some of them have got hung. I would sooner see him at home. He is naturally quiet and domestic. I suppose he was in a sad set up there.”
“He was in a very good set, and a very bad one. He was a favourite everywhere.”
“He had made some acquaintances he ought to be roud of, at least,” said Lord Saltire, in a way which made honest Marston blush. “I wish he wasn’t going to Ranford.”
“Report says,” said Marston, “that affairs are getting somewhat shaky there: Welter’s tradesmen can’t get any money.”
Lord Saltire shook his head significantly, and then said: “Now I want to speak to you about yourself. Did not you have a disappointment today!”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Ha!”
They both sat silent for a moment.
“How did you guess that, Lord Saltire?”
“I saw what was going on; and, by your manner and hers today, I guessed something had taken place. Is there no hope for you?”
“None.”
“I feared not; but what right had I to tell you so?”
“Perhaps, my lord, I should not have believed you if you had,” said Marston, smiling.
“What man would have? You are not angry?”
“How could I be? The world is out of joint, that is all.”
“You are a true gentleman. I swear to you,” said the old man, eagerly, “that there is no one in fault. She has given her honest little heart away — and what wonder! — but, believe me, that you are behaving as a man should behave, in not resenting it. If you were a heathen and a Frenchman (synonymous terms, my arston’s disappointment. ear boy), you might find it your duty to cut somebody’s throat; but, being a’ Christian and a gentleman, you will remain a true friend to somebody who loves you dearly, and is worth loving in return. This sort of thing cuts a man up confoundedly. It happened to me once but, believe me, you will get over it.”
“I mean to do so. How kind and generous you are to me! how shall I ever repay you?”
“By kindness to those I love,” said the old man. “I take this opportunity of telling you that your fortunes are my particular care. I cannot get you the wife you love, but I am rich and powerful, and can do much. Not another word. Go to bed, sir — to bed.”
Marston, sitting on his bedside that night, said aloud to himself, “And so that is that dicing old rowe, Saltire, is it? Well, well; it is a funny world. “What a noble fellow he would have been if he had had a better chance. Nay, what a noble fellow he is. I am ten years older since this morning “(he wasn’t, but he thought it). And so he said his prayers like an honest man, and prayed for the kind old heathen who had such a warm heart; and then, being nowise ashamed to do so, he prayed that he might sleep well; and, for a time, he forgot all about his disappointment, and slept like a child.
Lord Saltire’s valet was a staid and sober-minded gentleman of sixty-four. Generally, when he was putting his lordship to bed, he used to give him the news of the day; but tonight Lord Saltire said, “Never mind he news, Simpson, if you please; I am thinking of something.” My lord used to wear a sort of muffler, like a footless stocking, to keep his old knees warm in bed. He remained silent till he got one on, and then, without taking the other from the expectant Simpson, he addressed the fire-irons aloud.
“This is a pretty clumsy contrivance to call a world!” he said, with profound scorn. “Look here (to the poker), here’s as fine a lad as ever you saw, goes and falls in love with a charming girl, who cares no more for him than the deuce. He proposes to her, and is refused. Why? because she has given her heart away to another fine young fellow, who don’t care twopence for her, and has given his heart away to the most ambitious young Jezebel in the three kingdoms, who I don’t believe cares so very much for him. I am utterly disgusted with the whole system of mundane affairs! Simpson, give me that muffler, if you please; and pray don’t wake me before nine. I must try to sleep off the recollection of some of this folly.”
After all the fatigues and adventures of the day before, Charles slept well — long pleasant dreams of roaming in sunny places on summer days fell to his happy lot — and so he was not pleased when he found himself shaken by the shoulder.
It was William come to wake him. Charles was at once alarmed to see him there, and started up, saying —
“Is anything the matter, Will? is my father ill?”
“The master’s well, I trust, Master Charles. I want to tell you something that I want others to find out for themselves.”
“What is it?” said Charles, seriously alarmed, for he had had his suspicions lately, though he had dreaded to give them a name.
“Ellen is gone!”
“My dear lad,” said Charles hurriedly, “what makes you think so? Since when have you missed her?”
“Since yesterday afternoon.”
“Have you been in her room?”
“Yes. She has not been to bed, and the window is open just as it was yesterday morning at bed-making time.”
“Hush — wait! There may be time yet. Go down and saddle two horses at once. I will tell you what I know as we ride, but there is not time now. Tell me only one thing, Is there any one she would be likely to go to at Coombe?”
“No one that I know of.”
William departed to get the horses. Charles had suddenly thought of the solitary female figure he had seen passing along the dizzy sheep-path the day before, and he determined to follow that till he lost sight of it.
“For the poor dear girl’s sake — for the honour of the old house — I wonder who is at the bottom of all this? I must tell Marston,” he said, when he was out on the landing. “George, tell them to get me some coffee instantly. I am going out hunting.”
Marston thought as Charles did. The right thing to do would be to follow her, see that she wanted for nothing, and leave her brother with her for a time. “He won’t quarrel with her now, you’ll see. He is a good fellow, mind you, Charles, though he did lose his temper with her that night.”
So they rode forth side by side into the wild winter’s morning. The rain had ceased for a time, but the low dark clouds were hurrying swiftly before the blast, and eddying among the loftier tors and summits. The wind was behind them, and their way was east, across the lofty downs.
“William,” said Charles at last, “who is at the bottom of this?”
“I don’t know. Master Charles. If I did there would be mischief, unless it was one of two.”
“Ay, Will, but it ain’t. You don’t think it is Cuthbert?”
“No, no! He, forsooth! Father Mackworth knows, I believe, more than we do. You do not suspect him?”
“Certainly not. I did, but I don’t now. I suspect he knows, as I said, more than we do. He has been speaking harshly to her about it.”
They had arrived at the hill round which Charles suspected he had seen her pass the day before. It was impossible to pass round the promontory on horseback in the best of weathers; now doubly so. They would have to pass inland of it. They both pulled up their horses and looked. The steep slope of turf, the top of winch, close over head, was hid by flying mists, trended suddenly downwards, and disappeared. Eight hundred feet below was the raging sea.
As they stood there, the same thought came across both of them. It was a dreadful place. They neither spoke at all, but spurred on faster, till the little grey village of Coombe, down at their feet, sheltered from the storm by the lofty hills around, opened to their view; and they pushed on down the steep rocky path.
No. No one had seen her yesterday at such a time. The streets would have been full of the miners coming from work; or, if she had come earlier, there would have been plenty of people to see her. It was a small place, nd no stranger, they said, could eve)— pass through it unnoticed.
And, though they scoured the country far and wide, and though for months after the fishermen fished among the quiet bays beneath the cliffs in fear, lest they should find there something which should be carried in silent awe up the village, and laid quietly in the old churchyard, beneath the elm: yet Ellen was gone — gone from their ken like a summer cloud. They thought it a pious fraud to tell Densil that she was gone — with some excuse, I forget what, but which satisfied him. In a conclave held over the matter, Cuthbert seemed only surprised and shocked, but evidently knew nothing of the matter. Father Mackworth said that he expected something of the kind for some little time, and William held his peace. The gossips in the village laid their heads together, and shook them. There was but one opinion there.
“Never again shall she put garland on;
Instead of it she’ll wear sad cypress now,
And bitter elder broken from the bough.”
Nora — poor old Nora — took to her bed. Father Mackworth was with her continually, but she sank and sank. Father Mackworth was called away across the moors, one afternoon, to an outlying Catholic tenant’s family; and, during his absence, William was sent to Charles to pray him to come, in God’s name, to his mother. Charles ran across at once, but Nora was speechless. She had something to say to Charles; but the great
Sower, which shall sow us all in the ground, and tread us down, had his hand heavy on her, and she could not speak. In the morning; when the gale had broken, and the white seahirds were soaring and skimming between the blue sky and the noble green rolling sea, and the ships were running up channel, and the fishing-boats were putting out gaily from the pier, and all nature was brilliant and beautiful, old Nora lay dead, and her secret with her.
“Master Charles,” said William, as they stood on the shore together, “she knew something, and Ellen knows it too, I very much suspect. The time will come, Master Charles, when we shall have to hunt her through the world, and get the secret from her.”
“William, I would go many weary journeys to bring poor Ellen back into the ways of peace. The fact of her being your sister would be enough to make me do that.”