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Title: The Hand of Ethelberta: A Comedy in Chapters

Author: Thomas Hardy

Release date: October 1, 2002 [eBook #3469]
                Most recently updated: January 8, 2021

Language: English

Credits: This eBook was produced from the 1907 Macmillan and Co. edition by Les Bowler, St. Ives, Dorset


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HAND OF ETHELBERTA: A COMEDY IN CHAPTERS ***




This eBook was produced from the 1907 Macmillan and Co. edition by Les
Bowler, St. Ives, Dorset.





THE HAND OF ETHELBERTA--A COMEDY IN CHAPTERS
by Thomas Hardy.


   "Vitae post-scenia celant."--Lucretius.




PREFACE


This somewhat frivolous narrative was produced as an interlude between
stories of a more sober design, and it was given the sub-title of a
comedy to indicate--though not quite accurately--the aim of the
performance.  A high degree of probability was not attempted in the
arrangement of the incidents, and there was expected of the reader a
certain lightness of mood, which should inform him with a good-natured
willingness to accept the production in the spirit in which it was
offered.  The characters themselves, however, were meant to be consistent
and human.

On its first appearance the novel suffered, perhaps deservedly, for what
was involved in these intentions--for its quality of unexpectedness in
particular--that unforgivable sin in the critic's sight--the immediate
precursor of 'Ethelberta' having been a purely rural tale.  Moreover, in
its choice of medium, and line of perspective, it undertook a delicate
task: to excite interest in a drama--if such a dignified word may be used
in the connection--wherein servants were as important as, or more
important than, their masters; wherein the drawing-room was sketched in
many cases from the point of view of the servants' hall.  Such a reversal
of the social foreground has, perhaps, since grown more welcome, and
readers even of the finer crusted kind may now be disposed to pardon a
writer for presenting the sons and daughters of Mr. and Mrs. Chickerel as
beings who come within the scope of a congenial regard.

T. H.

December 1895.




CONTENTS


 1.  A STREET IN ANGLEBURY--A HEATH NEAR IT--INSIDE THE 'RED LION' INN
 2.  CHRISTOPHER'S HOUSE--SANDBOURNE TOWN--SANDBOURNE MOOR
 3.  SANDBOURNE MOOR (continued)
 4.  SANDBOURNE PIER--ROAD TO WYNDWAY--BALLROOM IN WYNDWAY HOUSE
 5.  AT THE WINDOW--THE ROAD HOME
 6.  THE SHORE BY WYNDWAY
 7.  THE DINING-ROOM OF A TOWN HOUSE--THE BUTLER'S PANTRY
 8.  CHRISTOPHER'S LODGINGS--THE GROUNDS ABOUT ROOKINGTON
 9.  A LADY'S DRAWING-ROOMS--ETHELBERTA'S DRESSING-ROOM
10.  LADY PETHERWIN'S HOUSE
11.  SANDBOURNE AND ITS NEIGHBOURHOOD--SOME LONDON STREETS
12.  ARROWTHORNE PARK AND LODGE
13.  THE LODGE (continued)--THE COPSE BEHIND
14.  A TURNPIKE ROAD
15.  AN INNER ROOM AT THE LODGE
16.  A LARGE PUBLIC HALL
17.  ETHELBERTA'S HOUSE
18.  NEAR SANDBOURNE--LONDON STREETS--ETHELBERTA'S
19.  ETHELBERTA'S DRAWING-ROOM
20.  THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF THE HALL--THE ROAD HOME
21.  A STREET--NEIGH'S ROOMS--CHRISTOPHER'S ROOMS
22.  ETHELBERTA'S HOUSE
23.  ETHELBERTA'S HOUSE (continued)
24.  ETHELBERTA'S HOUSE (continued)--THE BRITISH MUSEUM
25.  THE ROYAL ACADEMY--THE FARNFIELD ESTATE
26.  ETHELBERTA'S DRAWING-ROOM
27.  MRS. BELMAINE'S--CRIPPLEGATE CHURCH
28.  ETHELBERTA'S--MR. CHICKEREL'S ROOM
29.  ETHELBERTA'S DRESSING-ROOM--MR. DONCASTLE'S HOUSE
30.  ON THE HOUSETOP
31.  KNOLLSEA--A LOFTY DOWN--A RUINED CASTLE
32.  A ROOM IN ENCKWORTH COURT
33.  THE ENGLISH CHANNEL--NORMANDY
34.  THE HOTEL BEAU SEJOUR, AND SPOTS NEAR IT
35.  THE HOTEL (continued), AND THE QUAY IN FRONT
36.  THE HOUSE IN TOWN
37.  KNOLLSEA--AN ORNAMENTAL VILLA
38.  ENCKWORTH COURT
39.  KNOLLSEA--MELCHESTER
40.  MELCHESTER (continued)
41.  WORKSHOPS--AN INN--THE STREET
42.  THE DONCASTLES' RESIDENCE, AND OUTSIDE THE SAME
43.  THE RAILWAY--THE SEA--THE SHORE BEYOND
44.  SANDBOURNE--A LONELY HEATH--THE 'RED LION'--THE HIGHWAY
45.  KNOLLSEA--THE ROAD THENCE--ENCKWORTH
46.  ENCKWORTH (continued)--THE ANGLEBURY HIGHWAY
47.  ENCKWORTH AND ITS PRECINCTS--MELCHESTER
SEQUEL.  ANGLEBURY--ENCKWORTH--SANDBOURNE




1. A STREET IN ANGLEBURY--A HEATH NEAR IT--INSIDE THE 'RED LION' INN


Young Mrs. Petherwin stepped from the door of an old and well-appointed
inn in a Wessex town to take a country walk.  By her look and carriage
she appeared to belong to that gentle order of society which has no
worldly sorrow except when its jewellery gets stolen; but, as a fact not
generally known, her claim to distinction was rather one of brains than
of blood.  She was the daughter of a gentleman who lived in a large house
not his own, and began life as a baby christened Ethelberta after an
infant of title who does not come into the story at all, having merely
furnished Ethelberta's mother with a subject of contemplation.  She
became teacher in a school, was praised by examiners, admired by
gentlemen, not admired by gentlewomen, was touched up with
accomplishments by masters who were coaxed into painstaking by her many
graces, and, entering a mansion as governess to the daughter thereof, was
stealthily married by the son.  He, a minor like herself, died from a
chill caught during the wedding tour, and a few weeks later was followed
into the grave by Sir Ralph Petherwin, his unforgiving father, who had
bequeathed his wealth to his wife absolutely.

These calamities were a sufficient reason to Lady Petherwin for pardoning
all concerned.  She took by the hand the forlorn Ethelberta--who seemed
rather a detached bride than a widow--and finished her education by
placing her for two or three years in a boarding-school at Bonn.  Latterly
she had brought the girl to England to live under her roof as daughter
and companion, the condition attached being that Ethelberta was never
openly to recognize her relations, for reasons which will hereafter
appear.

The elegant young lady, as she had a full right to be called if she cared
for the definition, arrested all the local attention when she emerged
into the summer-evening light with that diadem-and-sceptre bearing--many
people for reasons of heredity discovering such graces only in those
whose vestibules are lined with ancestral mail, forgetting that a bear
may be taught to dance.  While this air of hers lasted, even the
inanimate objects in the street appeared to know that she was there; but
from a way she had of carelessly overthrowing her dignity by versatile
moods, one could not calculate upon its presence to a certainty when she
was round corners or in little lanes which demanded no repression of
animal spirits.

'Well to be sure!' exclaimed a milkman, regarding her.  'We should freeze
in our beds if 'twere not for the sun, and, dang me! if she isn't a
pretty piece.  A man could make a meal between them eyes and chin--eh,
hostler?  Odd nation dang my old sides if he couldn't!'

The speaker, who had been carrying a pair of pails on a yoke, deposited
them upon the edge of the pavement in front of the inn, and straightened
his back to an excruciating perpendicular.  His remarks had been
addressed to a rickety person, wearing a waistcoat of that preternatural
length from the top to the bottom button which prevails among men who
have to do with horses.  He was sweeping straws from the carriage-way
beneath the stone arch that formed a passage to the stables behind.

'Never mind the cursing and swearing, or somebody who's never out of
hearing may clap yer name down in his black book,' said the hostler, also
pausing, and lifting his eyes to the mullioned and transomed windows and
moulded parapet above him--not to study them as features of ancient
architecture, but just to give as healthful a stretch to the eyes as his
acquaintance had done to his back.  'Michael, a old man like you ought to
think about other things, and not be looking two ways at your time of
life.  Pouncing upon young flesh like a carrion crow--'tis a vile thing
in a old man.'

''Tis; and yet 'tis not, for 'tis a naterel taste,' said the milkman,
again surveying Ethelberta, who had now paused upon a bridge in full
view, to look down the river.  'Now, if a poor needy feller like myself
could only catch her alone when she's dressed up to the nines for some
grand party, and carry her off to some lonely place--sakes, what a pot of
jewels and goold things I warrant he'd find about her!  'Twould pay en
for his trouble.'

'I don't dispute the picter; but 'tis sly and untimely to think such
roguery.  Though I've had thoughts like it, 'tis true, about high
women--Lord forgive me for't.'

'And that figure of fashion standing there is a widow woman, so I hear?'

'Lady--not a penny less than lady.  Ay, a thing of twenty-one or
thereabouts.'

'A widow lady and twenty-one.  'Tis a backward age for a body who's so
forward in her state of life.'

'Well, be that as 'twill, here's my showings for her age.  She was about
the figure of two or three-and-twenty when a' got off the carriage last
night, tired out wi' boaming about the country; and nineteen this morning
when she came downstairs after a sleep round the clock and a clane-washed
face: so I thought to myself, twenty-one, I thought.'

'And what's the young woman's name, make so bold, hostler?'

'Ay, and the house were all in a stoor with her and the old woman, and
their boxes and camp-kettles, that they carry to wash in because hand-
basons bain't big enough, and I don't know what all; and t'other folk
stopping here were no more than dirt thencefor'ard.'

'I suppose they've come out of some noble city a long way herefrom?'

'And there was her hair up in buckle as if she'd never seen a clay-cold
man at all.  However, to cut a long story short, all I know besides about
'em is that the name upon their luggage is Lady Petherwin, and she's the
widow of a city gentleman, who was a man of valour in the Lord Mayor's
Show.'

'Who's that chap in the gaiters and pack at his back, come out of the
door but now?' said the milkman, nodding towards a figure of that
description who had just emerged from the inn and trudged off in the
direction taken by the lady--now out of sight.

'Chap in the gaiters?  Chok' it all--why, the father of that nobleman
that you call chap in the gaiters used to be hand in glove with half the
Queen's court.'

'What d'ye tell o'?'

'That man's father was one of the mayor and corporation of Sandbourne,
and was that familiar with men of money, that he'd slap 'em upon the
shoulder as you or I or any other poor fool would the clerk of the
parish.'

'O, what's my lordlin's name, make so bold, then?'

'Ay, the toppermost class nowadays have left off the use of wheels for
the good of their constitutions, so they traipse and walk for many years
up foreign hills, where you can see nothing but snow and fog, till
there's no more left to walk up; and if they reach home alive, and ha'n't
got too old and weared out, they walk and see a little of their own
parishes.  So they tower about with a pack and a stick and a clane white
pocket-handkerchief over their hats just as you see he's got on his.  He's
been staying here a night, and is off now again.  "Young man, young man,"
I think to myself, "if your shoulders were bent like a bandy and your
knees bowed out as mine be, till there is not an inch of straight bone or
gristle in 'ee, th' wouldstn't go doing hard work for play 'a b'lieve."'

'True, true, upon my song.  Such a pain as I have had in my lynes all
this day to be sure; words don't know what shipwreck I suffer in these
lynes o' mine--that they do not!  And what was this young widow lady's
maiden name, then, hostler?  Folk have been peeping after her, that's
true; but they don't seem to know much about her family.'

'And while I've tended horses fifty year that other folk might straddle
'em, here I be now not a penny the better!  Often-times, when I see so
many good things about, I feel inclined to help myself in common justice
to my pocket.

   "Work hard and be poor,
   Do nothing and get more."

But I draw in the horns of my mind and think to myself, "Forbear, John
Hostler, forbear!"--Her maiden name?  Faith, I don't know the woman's
maiden name, though she said to me, "Good evening, John;" but I had no
memory of ever seeing her afore--no, no more than the dead inside church-
hatch--where I shall soon be likewise--I had not.  "Ay, my nabs," I think
to myself, "more know Tom Fool than Tom Fool knows."'

'More know Tom Fool--what rambling old canticle is it you say, hostler?'
inquired the milkman, lifting his ear.  'Let's have it again--a good
saying well spit out is a Christmas fire to my withered heart.  More know
Tom Fool--'

'Than Tom Fool knows,' said the hostler.

'Ah!  That's the very feeling I've feeled over and over again, hostler,
but not in such gifted language.  'Tis a thought I've had in me for
years, and never could lick into shape!--O-ho-ho-ho!  Splendid!  Say it
again, hostler, say it again!  To hear my own poor notion that had no
name brought into form like that--I wouldn't ha' lost it for the world!
More know Tom Fool than--than--h-ho-ho-ho-ho!'

'Don't let your sense o' vitness break out in such uproar, for heaven's
sake, or folk will surely think you've been laughing at the lady and
gentleman.  Well, here's at it again--Night t'ee, Michael.'  And the
hostler went on with his sweeping.

'Night t'ee, hostler, I must move too,' said the milkman, shouldering his
yoke, and walking off; and there reached the inn in a gradual diminuendo,
as he receded up the street, shaking his head convulsively, 'More
know--Tom Fool--than Tom Fool--ho-ho-ho-ho-ho!'

The 'Red Lion,' as the inn or hotel was called which of late years had
become the fashion among tourists, because of the absence from its
precincts of all that was fashionable and new, stood near the middle of
the town, and formed a corner where in winter the winds whistled and
assembled their forces previous to plunging helter-skelter along the
streets.  In summer it was a fresh and pleasant spot, convenient for such
quiet characters as sojourned there to study the geology and beautiful
natural features of the country round.

The lady whose appearance had asserted a difference between herself and
the Anglebury people, without too clearly showing what that difference
was, passed out of the town in a few moments and, following the highway
across meadows fed by the Froom, she crossed the railway and soon got
into a lonely heath.  She had been watching the base of a cloud as it
closed down upon the line of a distant ridge, like an upper upon a lower
eyelid, shutting in the gaze of the evening sun.  She was about to return
before dusk came on, when she heard a commotion in the air immediately
behind and above her head.  The saunterer looked up and saw a wild-duck
flying along with the greatest violence, just in its rear being another
large bird, which a countryman would have pronounced to be one of the
biggest duck-hawks that he had ever beheld.  The hawk neared its intended
victim, and the duck screamed and redoubled its efforts.

Ethelberta impulsively started off in a rapid run that would have made a
little dog bark with delight and run after, her object being, if
possible, to see the end of this desperate struggle for a life so small
and unheard-of.  Her stateliness went away, and it could be forgiven for
not remaining; for her feet suddenly became as quick as fingers, and she
raced along over the uneven ground with such force of tread that, being a
woman slightly heavier than gossamer, her patent heels punched little D's
in the soil with unerring accuracy wherever it was bare, crippled the
heather-twigs where it was not, and sucked the swampy places with a sound
of quick kisses.

Her rate of advance was not to be compared with that of the two birds,
though she went swiftly enough to keep them well in sight in such an open
place as that around her, having at one point in the journey been so near
that she could hear the whisk of the duck's feathers against the wind as
it lifted and lowered its wings.  When the bird seemed to be but a few
yards from its enemy she saw it strike downwards, and after a level
flight of a quarter of a minute, vanish.  The hawk swooped after, and
Ethelberta now perceived a whitely shining oval of still water, looking
amid the swarthy level of the heath like a hole through to a nether sky.

Into this large pond, which the duck had been making towards from the
beginning of its precipitate flight, it had dived out of sight.  The
excited and breathless runner was in a few moments close enough to see
the disappointed hawk hovering and floating in the air as if waiting for
the reappearance of its prey, upon which grim pastime it was so intent
that by creeping along softly she was enabled to get very near the edge
of the pool and witness the conclusion of the episode.  Whenever the duck
was under the necessity of showing its head to breathe, the other bird
would dart towards it, invariably too late, however; for the diver was
far too experienced in the rough humour of the buzzard family at this
game to come up twice near the same spot, unaccountably emerging from
opposite sides of the pool in succession, and bobbing again by the time
its adversary reached each place, so that at length the hawk gave up the
contest and flew away, a satanic moodiness being almost perceptible in
the motion of its wings.

The young lady now looked around her for the first time, and began to
perceive that she had run a long distance--very much further than she had
originally intended to come.  Her eyes had been so long fixed upon the
hawk, as it soared against the bright and mottled field of sky, that on
regarding the heather and plain again it was as if she had returned to a
half-forgotten region after an absence, and the whole prospect was
darkened to one uniform shade of approaching night.  She began at once to
retrace her steps, but having been indiscriminately wheeling round the
pond to get a good view of the performance, and having followed no path
thither, she found the proper direction of her journey to be a matter of
some uncertainty.

'Surely,' she said to herself, 'I faced the north at starting:' and yet
on walking now with her back where her face had been set, she did not
approach any marks on the horizon which might seem to signify the town.
Thus dubiously, but with little real concern, she walked on till the
evening light began to turn to dusk, and the shadows to darkness.

Presently in front of her Ethelberta saw a white spot in the shade, and
it proved to be in some way attached to the head of a man who was coming
towards her out of a slight depression in the ground.  It was as yet too
early in the evening to be afraid, but it was too late to be altogether
courageous; and with balanced sensations Ethelberta kept her eye sharply
upon him as he rose by degrees into view.  The peculiar arrangement of
his hat and pugree soon struck her as being that she had casually noticed
on a peg in one of the rooms of the 'Red Lion,' and when he came close
she saw that his arms diminished to a peculiar smallness at their
junction with his shoulders, like those of a doll, which was explained by
their being girt round at that point with the straps of a knapsack that
he carried behind him.  Encouraged by the probability that he, like
herself, was staying or had been staying at the 'Red Lion,' she said,
'Can you tell me if this is the way back to Anglebury?'

'It is one way; but the nearest is in this direction,' said the
tourist--the same who had been criticized by the two old men.

At hearing him speak all the delicate activities in the young lady's
person stood still: she stopped like a clock.  When she could again fence
with the perception which had caused all this, she breathed.

'Mr. Julian!' she exclaimed.  The words were uttered in a way which would
have told anybody in a moment that here lay something connected with the
light of other days.

'Ah, Mrs. Petherwin!--Yes, I am Mr. Julian--though that can matter very
little, I should think, after all these years, and what has passed.'

No remark was returned to this rugged reply, and he continued
unconcernedly, 'Shall I put you in the path--it is just here?'

'If you please.'

'Come with me, then.'

She walked in silence at his heels, not a word passing between them all
the way: the only noises which came from the two were the brushing of her
dress and his gaiters against the heather, or the smart rap of a stray
flint against his boot.

They had now reached a little knoll, and he turned abruptly: 'That is
Anglebury--just where you see those lights.  The path down there is the
one you must follow; it leads round the hill yonder and directly into the
town.'

'Thank you,' she murmured, and found that he had never removed his eyes
from her since speaking, keeping them fixed with mathematical exactness
upon one point in her face.  She moved a little to go on her way; he
moved a little less--to go on his.

'Good-night,' said Mr. Julian.

The moment, upon the very face of it, was critical; and yet it was one of
those which have to wait for a future before they acquire a definite
character as good or bad.

Thus much would have been obvious to any outsider; it may have been
doubly so to Ethelberta, for she gave back more than she had got,
replying, 'Good-bye--if you are going to say no more.'

Then in struck Mr. Julian: 'What can I say?  You are nothing to me. . . .
I could forgive a woman doing anything for spite, except marrying for
spite.'

'The connection of that with our present meeting does not appear, unless
it refers to what you have done.  It does not refer to me.'

'I am not married: you are.'

She did not contradict him, as she might have done.  'Christopher,' she
said at last, 'this is how it is: you knew too much of me to respect me,
and too little to pity me.  A half knowledge of another's life mostly
does injustice to the life half known.'

'Then since circumstances forbid my knowing you more, I must do my best
to know you less, and elevate my opinion of your nature by forgetting
what it consists in,' he said in a voice from which all feeling was
polished away.

'If I did not know that bitterness had more to do with those words than
judgment, I--should be--bitter too!  You never knew half about me; you
only knew me as a governess; you little think what my beginnings were.'

'I have guessed.  I have many times told myself that your early life was
superior to your position when I first met you.  I think I may say
without presumption that I recognize a lady by birth when I see her, even
under reverses of an extreme kind.  And certainly there is this to be
said, that the fact of having been bred in a wealthy home does slightly
redeem an attempt to attain to such a one again.'

Ethelberta smiled a smile of many meanings.

'However, we are wasting words,' he resumed cheerfully.  'It is better
for us to part as we met, and continue to be the strangers that we have
become to each other.  I owe you an apology for having been betrayed into
more feeling than I had a right to show, and let us part friends.  Good
night, Mrs. Petherwin, and success to you.  We may meet again, some day,
I hope.'

'Good night,' she said, extending her hand.  He touched it, turned about,
and in a short time nothing remained of him but quick regular brushings
against the heather in the deep broad shadow of the moor.

Ethelberta slowly moved on in the direction that he had pointed out.  This
meeting had surprised her in several ways.  First, there was the
conjuncture itself; but more than that was the fact that he had not
parted from her with any of the tragic resentment that she had from time
to time imagined for that scene if it ever occurred.  Yet there was
really nothing wonderful in this: it is part of the generous nature of a
bachelor to be not indisposed to forgive a portionless sweetheart who, by
marrying elsewhere, has deprived him of the bliss of being obliged to
marry her himself.  Ethelberta would have been disappointed quite had
there not been a comforting development of exasperation in the middle
part of his talk; but after all it formed a poor substitute for the
loving hatred she had expected.

When she reached the hotel the lamp over the door showed a face a little
flushed, but the agitation which at first had possessed her was gone to a
mere nothing.  In the hall she met a slender woman wearing a silk dress
of that peculiar black which in sunlight proclaims itself to have once
seen better days as a brown, and days even better than those as a
lavender, green, or blue.

'Menlove,' said the lady, 'did you notice if any gentleman observed and
followed me when I left the hotel to go for a walk this evening?'

The lady's-maid, thus suddenly pulled up in a night forage after lovers,
put a hand to her forehead to show that there was no mistake about her
having begun to meditate on receiving orders to that effect, and said at
last, 'You once told me, ma'am, if you recollect, that when you were
dressed, I was not to go staring out of the window after you as if you
were a doll I had just manufactured and sent round for sale.'

'Yes, so I did.'

'So I didn't see if anybody followed you this evening.'

'Then did you hear any gentleman arrive here by the late train last
night?'

'O no, ma'am--how could I?' said Mrs. Menlove--an exclamation which was
more apposite than her mistress suspected, considering that the speaker,
after retiring from duty, had slipped down her dark skirt to reveal a
light, puffed, and festooned one, put on a hat and feather, together with
several pennyweights of metal in the form of rings, brooches, and
earrings--all in a time whilst one could count a hundred--and enjoyed
half-an-hour of prime courtship by an honourable young waiter of the
town, who had proved constant as the magnet to the pole for the space of
the day and a half that she had known him.

Going at once upstairs, Ethelberta ran down the passage, and after some
hesitation softly opened the door of the sitting-room in the best suite
of apartments that the inn could boast of.

In this room sat an elderly lady writing by the light of two candles with
green shades.  Well knowing, as it seemed, who the intruder was, she
continued her occupation, and her visitor advanced and stood beside the
table.  The old lady wore her spectacles low down her cheek, her glance
being depressed to about the slope of her straight white nose in order to
look through them.  Her mouth was pursed up to almost a youthful shape as
she formed the letters with her pen, and a slight move of the lip
accompanied every downstroke.  There were two large antique rings on her
forefinger, against which the quill rubbed in moving backwards and
forwards, thereby causing a secondary noise rivalling the primary one of
the nib upon the paper.

'Mamma,' said the younger lady, 'here I am at last.'

A writer's mind in the midst of a sentence being like a ship at sea,
knowing no rest or comfort till safely piloted into the harbour of a full
stop, Lady Petherwin just replied with 'What,' in an occupied tone, not
rising to interrogation.  After signing her name to the letter, she
raised her eyes.

'Why, how late you are, Ethelberta, and how heated you look!' she said.
'I have been quite alarmed about you.  What do you say has happened?'

The great, chief, and altogether eclipsing thing that had happened was
the accidental meeting with an old lover whom she had once quarrelled
with; and Ethelberta's honesty would have delivered the tidings at once,
had not, unfortunately, all the rest of her attributes been dead against
that act, for the old lady's sake even more than for her own.

'I saw a great cruel bird chasing a harmless duck!' she exclaimed
innocently.  'And I ran after to see what the end of it would be--much
further than I had any idea of going.  However, the duck came to a pond,
and in running round it to see the end of the fight, I could not remember
which way I had come.'

'Mercy!' said her mother-in-law, lifting her large eyelids, heavy as
window-shutters, and spreading out her fingers like the horns of a snail.
'You might have sunk up to your knees and got lost in that swampy
place--such a time of night, too.  What a tomboy you are!  And how did
you find your way home after all!'

'O, some man showed me the way, and then I had no difficulty, and after
that I came along leisurely.'

'I thought you had been running all the way; you look so warm.'

'It is a warm evening. . . .  Yes, and I have been thinking of old times
as I walked along,' she said, 'and how people's positions in life alter.
Have I not heard you say that while I was at Bonn, at school, some family
that we had known had their household broken up when the father died, and
that the children went away you didn't know where?'

'Do you mean the Julians?'

'Yes, that was the name.'

'Why, of course you know it was the Julians.  Young Julian had a day or
two's fancy for you one summer, had he not?--just after you came to us,
at the same time, or just before it, that my poor boy and you were so
desperately attached to each other.'

'O yes, I recollect,' said Ethelberta.  'And he had a sister, I think.  I
wonder where they went to live after the family collapse.'

'I do not know,' said Lady Petherwin, taking up another sheet of paper.
'I have a dim notion that the son, who had been brought up to no
profession, became a teacher of music in some country town--music having
always been his hobby.  But the facts are not very distinct in my
memory.'  And she dipped her pen for another letter.

Ethelberta, with a rather fallen countenance, then left her mother-in-
law, and went where all ladies are supposed to go when they want to
torment their minds in comfort--to her own room.  Here she thoughtfully
sat down awhile, and some time later she rang for her maid.

'Menlove,' she said, without looking towards a rustle and half a footstep
that had just come in at the door, but leaning back in her chair and
speaking towards the corner of the looking-glass, 'will you go down and
find out if any gentleman named Julian has been staying in this house?
Get to know it, I mean, Menlove, not by directly inquiring; you have ways
of getting to know things, have you not?  If the devoted George were here
now, he would help--'

'George was nothing to me, ma'am.'

'James, then.'

'And I only had James for a week or ten days: when I found he was a
married man, I encouraged his addresses very little indeed.'

'If you had encouraged him heart and soul, you couldn't have fumed more
at the loss of him.  But please to go and make that inquiry, will you,
Menlove?'

In a few minutes Ethelberta's woman was back again.  'A gentleman of that
name stayed here last night, and left this afternoon.'

'Will you find out his address?'

Now the lady's-maid had already been quick-witted enough to find out
that, and indeed all about him; but it chanced that a fashionable
illustrated weekly paper had just been sent from the bookseller's, and
being in want of a little time to look it over before it reached her
mistress's hands, Mrs. Menlove retired, as if to go and ask the
question--to stand meanwhile under the gas-lamp in the passage,
inspecting the fascinating engravings.  But as time will not wait for
tire-women, a natural length of absence soon elapsed, and she returned
again and said,

'His address is, Upper Street, Sandbourne.'

'Thank you, that will do,' replied her mistress.

The hour grew later, and that dreamy period came round when ladies'
fancies, that have lain shut up close as their fans during the day, begin
to assert themselves anew.  At this time a good guess at Ethelberta's
thoughts might have been made from her manner of passing the minutes
away.  Instead of reading, entering notes in her diary, or doing any
ordinary thing, she walked to and fro, curled her pretty nether lip
within her pretty upper one a great many times, made a cradle of her
locked fingers, and paused with fixed eyes where the walls of the room
set limits upon her walk to look at nothing but a picture within her
mind.




2. CHRISTOPHER'S HOUSE--SANDBOURNE TOWN--SANDBOURNE MOOR


During the wet autumn of the same year, the postman passed one morning as
usual into a plain street that ran through the less fashionable portion
of Sandbourne, a modern coast town and watering-place not many miles from
the ancient Anglebury.  He knocked at the door of a flat-faced brick
house, and it was opened by a slight, thoughtful young man, with his hat
on, just then coming out.  The postman put into his hands a book packet,
addressed, 'Christopher Julian, Esq.'

Christopher took the package upstairs, opened it with curiosity, and
discovered within a green volume of poems, by an anonymous writer, the
title-page bearing the inscription, 'Metres by E.'  The book was new,
though it was cut, and it appeared to have been looked into.  The young
man, after turning it over and wondering where it came from, laid it on
the table and went his way, being in haste to fulfil his engagements for
the day.

In the evening, on returning home from his occupations, he sat himself
down cosily to read the newly-arrived volume.  The winds of this
uncertain season were snarling in the chimneys, and drops of rain spat
themselves into the fire, revealing plainly that the young man's room was
not far enough from the top of the house to admit of a twist in the flue,
and revealing darkly a little more, if that social rule-of-three inverse,
the higher in lodgings the lower in pocket, were applicable here.
However, the aspect of the room, though homely, was cheerful, a somewhat
contradictory group of furniture suggesting that the collection consisted
of waifs and strays from a former home, the grimy faces of the old
articles exercising a curious and subduing effect on the bright faces of
the new.  An oval mirror of rococo workmanship, and a heavy cabinet-piano
with a cornice like that of an Egyptian temple, adjoined a harmonium of
yesterday, and a harp that was almost as new.  Printed music of the last
century, and manuscript music of the previous evening, lay there in such
quantity as to endanger the tidiness of a retreat which was indeed only
saved from a chronic state of litter by a pair of hands that sometimes
played, with the lightness of breezes, about the sewing-machine standing
in a remote corner--if any corner could be called remote in a room so
small.

Fire lights and shades from the shaking flames struck in a butterfly
flutter on the underparts of the mantelshelf, and upon the reader's cheek
as he sat.  Presently, and all at once, a much greater intentness
pervaded his face: he turned back again, and read anew the subject that
had arrested his eyes.  He was a man whose countenance varied with his
mood, though it kept somewhat in the rear of that mood.  He looked sad
when he felt almost serene, and only serene when he felt quite cheerful.
It is a habit people acquire who have had repressing experiences.

A faint smile and flush now lightened his face, and jumping up he opened
the door and exclaimed, 'Faith! will you come here for a moment?'

A prompt step was heard on the stairs, and the young person addressed as
Faith entered the room.  She was small in figure, and bore less in the
form of her features than in their shades when changing from expression
to expression the evidence that she was his sister.

'Faith--I want your opinion.  But, stop, read this first.'  He laid his
finger upon a page in the book, and placed it in her hand.

The girl drew from her pocket a little green-leather sheath, worn at the
edges to whity-brown, and out of that a pair of spectacles, unconsciously
looking round the room for a moment as she did so, as if to ensure that
no stranger saw her in the act of using them.  Here a weakness was
uncovered at once; it was a small, pretty, and natural one; indeed, as
weaknesses go in the great world, it might almost have been called a
commendable trait.  She then began to read, without sitting down.

These 'Metres by E.' composed a collection of soft and marvellously
musical rhymes, of a nature known as the vers de societe.  The lines
presented a series of playful defences of the supposed strategy of
womankind in fascination, courtship, and marriage--the whole teeming with
ideas bright as mirrors and just as unsubstantial, yet forming a
brilliant argument to justify the ways of girls to men.  The pervading
characteristic of the mass was the means of forcing into notice, by
strangeness of contrast, the single mournful poem that the book
contained.  It was placed at the very end, and under the title of
'Cancelled Words,' formed a whimsical and rather affecting love-lament,
somewhat in the tone of many of Sir Thomas Wyatt's poems.  This was the
piece which had arrested Christopher's attention, and had been pointed
out by him to his sister Faith.

'It is very touching,' she said, looking up.

'What do you think I suspect about it--that the poem is addressed to me!
Do you remember, when father was alive and we were at Solentsea that
season, about a governess who came there with a Sir Ralph Petherwin and
his wife, people with a sickly little daughter and a grown-up son?'

'I never saw any of them.  I think I remember your knowing something
about a young man of that name.'

'Yes, that was the family.  Well, the governess there was a very
attractive woman, and somehow or other I got more interested in her than
I ought to have done (this is necessary to the history), and we used to
meet in romantic places--and--and that kind of thing, you know.  The end
of it was, she jilted me and married the son.'

'You were anxious to get away from Solentsea.'

'Was I?  Then that was chiefly the reason.  Well, I decided to think no
more of her, and I was helped to do it by the troubles that came upon us
shortly afterwards; it is a blessed arrangement that one does not feel a
sentimental grief at all when additional grief comes in the shape of
practical misfortune.  However, on the first afternoon of the little
holiday I took for my walking tour last summer, I came to Anglebury, and
stayed about the neighbourhood for a day or two to see what it was like,
thinking we might settle there if this place failed us.  The next evening
I left, and walked across the heath to Flychett--that's a village about
five miles further on--so as to be that distance on my way for next
morning; and while I was crossing the heath there I met this very woman.
We talked a little, because we couldn't help it--you may imagine the kind
of talk it was--and parted as coolly as we had met.  Now this strange
book comes to me; and I have a strong conviction that she is the writer
of it, for that poem sketches a similar scene--or rather suggests it; and
the tone generally seems the kind of thing she would write--not that she
was a sad woman, either.'

'She seems to be a warm-hearted, impulsive woman, to judge from these
tender verses.'

'People who print very warm words have sometimes very cold manners.  I
wonder if it is really her writing, and if she has sent it to me!'

'Would it not be a singular thing for a married woman to do?  Though of
course'--(she removed her spectacles as if they hindered her from
thinking, and hid them under the timepiece till she should go on
reading)--'of course poets have morals and manners of their own, and
custom is no argument with them.  I am sure I would not have sent it to a
man for the world!'

'I do not see any absolute harm in her sending it.  Perhaps she thinks
that, since it is all over, we may as well die friends.'

'If I were her husband I should have doubts about the dying.  And "all
over" may not be so plain to other people as it is to you.'

'Perhaps not.  And when a man checks all a woman's finer sentiments
towards him by marrying her, it is only natural that it should find a
vent somewhere.  However, she probably does not know of my downfall since
father's death.  I hardly think she would have cared to do it had she
known that.  (I am assuming that it is Ethelberta--Mrs. Petherwin--who
sends it: of course I am not sure.)  We must remember that when I knew
her I was a gentleman at ease, who had not the least notion that I should
have to work for a living, and not only so, but should have first to
invent a profession to work at out of my old tastes.'

'Kit, you have made two mistakes in your thoughts of that lady.  Even
though I don't know her, I can show you that.  Now I'll tell you! the
first is in thinking that a married lady would send the book with that
poem in it without at any rate a slight doubt as to its propriety: the
second is in supposing that, had she wished to do it, she would have
given the thing up because of our misfortunes.  With a true woman the
second reason would have had no effect had she once got over the first.
I'm a woman, and that's why I know.'

Christopher said nothing, and turned over the poems.

* * * * *

He lived by teaching music, and, in comparison with starving, thrived;
though the wealthy might possibly have said that in comparison with
thriving he starved.  During this night he hummed airs in bed, thought he
would do for the ballad of the fair poetess what other musicians had done
for the ballads of other fair poetesses, and dreamed that she smiled on
him as her prototype Sappho smiled on Phaon.

The next morning before starting on his rounds a new circumstance induced
him to direct his steps to the bookseller's, and ask a question.  He had
found on examining the wrapper of the volume that it was posted in his
own town.

'No copy of the book has been sold by me,' the bookseller's voice replied
from far up the Alpine height of the shop-ladder, where he stood dusting
stale volumes, as was his habit of a morning before customers came.  'I
have never heard of it--probably never shall;' and he shook out the
duster, so as to hit the delicate mean between stifling Christopher and
not stifling him.

'Surely you don't live by your shop?' said Christopher, drawing back.

The bookseller's eyes rested on the speaker's; his face changed; he came
down and placed his hand on the lapel of Christopher's coat.  'Sir,' he
said, 'country bookselling is a miserable, impoverishing, exasperating
thing in these days.  Can you understand the rest?'

'I can; I forgive a starving man anything,' said Christopher.

'You go a long way very suddenly,' said the book seller.  'Half as much
pity would have seemed better.  However, wait a moment.'  He looked into
a list of new books, and added: 'The work you allude to was only
published last week; though, mind you, if it had been published last
century I might not have sold a copy.'

Although his time was precious, Christopher had now become so interested
in the circumstance that the unseen sender was somebody breathing his own
atmosphere, possibly the very writer herself--the book being too new to
be known--that he again passed through the blue shadow of the spire which
stretched across the street to-day, and went towards the post-office,
animated by a bright intention--to ask the postmaster if he knew the
handwriting in which the packet was addressed.

Now the postmaster was an acquaintance of Christopher's, but, as regarded
putting that question to him, there was a difficulty.  Everything turned
upon whether the postmaster at the moment of asking would be in his under-
government manner, or in the manner with which mere nature had endowed
him.  In the latter case his reply would be all that could be wished; in
the former, a man who had sunk in society might as well put his tongue
into a mousetrap as make an inquiry so obviously outside the pale of
legality as was this.

So he postponed his business for the present, and refrained from entering
till he passed by after dinner, when pleasant malt liquor, of that
capacity for cheering which is expressed by four large letter X's
marching in a row, had refilled the globular trunk of the postmaster and
neutralized some of the effects of officiality.  The time was well
chosen, but the inquiry threatened to prove fruitless: the postmaster had
never, to his knowledge, seen the writing before.  Christopher was
turning away when a clerk in the background looked up and stated that
some young lady had brought a packet with such an address upon it into
the office two days earlier to get it stamped.

'Do you know her?' said Christopher.

'I have seen her about the neighbourhood.  She goes by every morning; I
think she comes into the town from beyond the common, and returns again
between four and five in the afternoon.'

'What does she wear?'

'A white wool jacket with zigzags of black braid.'

Christopher left the post-office and went his way.  Among his other
pupils there were two who lived at some distance from Sandbourne--one of
them in the direction indicated as that habitually taken by the young
person; and in the afternoon, as he returned homeward, Christopher
loitered and looked around.  At first he could see nobody; but when about
a mile from the outskirts of the town he discerned a light spot ahead of
him, which actually turned out to be the jacket alluded to.  In due time
he met the wearer face to face; she was not Ethelberta Petherwin--quite a
different sort of individual.  He had long made up his mind that this
would be the case, yet he was in some indescribable way disappointed.

Of the two classes into which gentle young women naturally divide, those
who grow red at their weddings, and those who grow pale, the present one
belonged to the former class.  She was an April-natured, pink-cheeked
girl, with eyes that would have made any jeweller in England think of his
trade--one who evidently took her day in the daytime, frequently caught
the early worm, and had little to do with yawns or candlelight.  She came
and passed him; he fancied that her countenance changed.  But one may
fancy anything, and the pair receded each from each without turning their
heads.  He could not speak to her, plain and simple as she seemed.

It is rarely that a man who can be entered and made to throb by the
channel of his ears is not open to a similar attack through the channel
of his eyes--for many doors will admit to one mansion--allowance being
made for the readier capacity of chosen and practised organs.  Hence the
beauties, concords, and eloquences of the female form were never without
their effect upon Christopher, a born musician, artist, poet, seer,
mouthpiece--whichever a translator of Nature's oracles into simple speech
may be called.  The young girl who had gone by was fresh and pleasant;
moreover, she was a sort of mysterious link between himself and the past,
which these things were vividly reviving in him.

The following week Christopher met her again.  She had not much dignity,
he had not much reserve, and the sudden resolution to have a holiday
which sometimes impels a plump heart to rise up against a brain that
overweights it was not to be resisted.  He just lifted his hat, and put
the only question he could think of as a beginning: 'Have I the pleasure
of addressing the author of a book of very melodious poems that was sent
me the other day?'

The girl's forefinger twirled rapidly the loop of braid that it had
previously been twirling slowly, and drawing in her breath, she said,
'No, sir.'

'The sender, then?'

'Yes.'

She somehow presented herself as so insignificant by the combined effect
of the manner and the words that Christopher lowered his method of
address to her level at once.  'Ah,' he said, 'such an atmosphere as the
writer of "Metres by E." seems to breathe would soon spoil cheeks that
are fresh and round as lady-apples--eh, little girl?  But are you
disposed to tell me that writer's name?'

By applying a general idea to a particular case a person with the best of
intentions may find himself immediately landed in a quandary.  In saying
to the country girl before him what would have suited the mass of country
lasses well enough, Christopher had offended her beyond the cure of
compliment.

'I am not disposed to tell the writer's name,' she replied, with a
dudgeon that was very great for one whose whole stock of it was a trifle.
And she passed on and left him standing alone.

Thus further conversation was checked; but, through having rearranged the
hours of his country lessons, Christopher met her the next Wednesday, and
the next Friday, and throughout the following week--no further words
passing between them.  For a while she went by very demurely, apparently
mindful of his offence.  But effrontery is not proved to be part of a
man's nature till he has been guilty of a second act: the best of men may
commit a first through accident or ignorance--may even be betrayed into
it by over-zeal for experiment.  Some such conclusion may or may not have
been arrived at by the girl with the lady-apple cheeks; at any rate,
after the lapse of another week a new spectacle presented itself; her
redness deepened whenever Christopher passed her by, and embarrassment
pervaded her from the lowest stitch to the tip of her feather.  She had
little chance of escaping him by diverging from the road, for a figure
could be seen across the open ground to the distance of half a mile on
either side.  One day as he drew near as usual, she met him as women meet
a cloud of dust--she turned and looked backwards till he had passed.

This would have been disconcerting but for one reason: Christopher was
ceasing to notice her.  He was a man who often, when walking abroad, and
looking as it were at the scene before his eyes, discerned successes and
failures, friends and relations, episodes of childhood, wedding feasts
and funerals, the landscape suffering greatly by these visions, until it
became no more than the patterned wall-tints about the paintings in a
gallery; something necessary to the tone, yet not regarded.  Nothing but
a special concentration of himself on externals could interrupt this
habit, and now that her appearance along the way had changed from a
chance to a custom he began to lapse again into the old trick.  He gazed
once or twice at her form without seeing it: he did not notice that she
trembled.

He sometimes read as he walked, and book in hand he frequently approached
her now.  This went on till six weeks had passed from the time of their
first encounter.  Latterly might have been once or twice heard, when he
had moved out of earshot, a sound like a small gasping sigh; but no
arrangements were disturbed, and Christopher continued to keep down his
eyes as persistently as a saint in a church window.

The last day of his engagement had arrived, and with it the last of his
walks that way.  On his final return he carried in his hand a bunch of
flowers which had been presented to him at the country-house where his
lessons were given.  He was taking them home to his sister Faith, who
prized the lingering blossoms of the seeding season.  Soon appeared as
usual his fellow-traveller; whereupon Christopher looked down upon his
nosegay.  'Sweet simple girl,' he thought, 'I'll endeavour to make peace
with her by means of these flowers before we part for good.'

When she came up he held them out to her and said, 'Will you allow me to
present you with these?'

The bright colours of the nosegay instantly attracted the girl's
hand--perhaps before there had been time for thought to thoroughly
construe the position; for it happened that when her arm was stretched
into the air she steadied it quickly, and stood with the pose of a
statue--rigid with uncertainty.  But it was too late to refuse:
Christopher had put the nosegay within her fingers.  Whatever pleasant
expression of thanks may have appeared in her eyes fell only on the bunch
of flowers, for during the whole transaction they reached to no higher
level than that.  To say that he was coming no more seemed scarcely
necessary under the circumstances, and wishing her 'Good afternoon' very
heartily, he passed on.

He had learnt by this time her occupation, which was that of
pupil-teacher at one of the schools in the town, whither she walked daily
from a village near.  If he had not been poor and the little teacher
humble, Christopher might possibly have been tempted to inquire more
briskly about her, and who knows how such a pursuit might have ended?  But
hard externals rule volatile sentiment, and under these untoward
influences the girl and the book and the truth about its author were
matters upon which he could not afford to expend much time.  All
Christopher did was to think now and then of the pretty innocent face and
round deep eyes, not once wondering if the mind which enlivened them ever
thought of him.




3. SANDBOURNE MOOR (continued)


It was one of those hostile days of the year when chatterbox ladies
remain miserably in their homes to save the carriage and harness, when
clerks' wives hate living in lodgings, when vehicles and people appear in
the street with duplicates of themselves underfoot, when bricklayers,
slaters, and other out-door journeymen sit in a shed and drink beer, when
ducks and drakes play with hilarious delight at their own family game, or
spread out one wing after another in the slower enjoyment of letting the
delicious moisture penetrate to their innermost down.  The smoke from the
flues of Sandbourne had barely strength enough to emerge into the
drizzling rain, and hung down the sides of each chimney-pot like the
streamer of a becalmed ship; and a troop of rats might have rattled down
the pipes from roof to basement with less noise than did the water that
day.

On the broad moor beyond the town, where Christopher's meetings with the
teacher had so regularly occurred, were a stream and some large pools;
and beside one of these, near some hatches and a weir, stood a little
square building, not much larger inside than the Lord Mayor's coach.  It
was known simply as 'The Weir House.'  On this wet afternoon, which was
the one following the day of Christopher's last lesson over the plain, a
nearly invisible smoke came from the puny chimney of the hut.  Though the
door was closed, sounds of chatting and mirth fizzed from the interior,
and would have told anybody who had come near--which nobody did--that the
usually empty shell was tenanted to-day.

The scene within was a large fire in a fireplace to which the whole floor
of the house was no more than a hearthstone.  The occupants were two
gentlemanly persons, in shooting costume, who had been traversing the
moor for miles in search of wild duck and teal, a waterman, and a small
spaniel.  In the corner stood their guns, and two or three wild mallards,
which represented the scanty product of their morning's labour, the
iridescent necks of the dead birds replying to every flicker of the fire.
The two sportsmen were smoking, and their man was mostly occupying
himself in poking and stirring the fire with a stick: all three appeared
to be pretty well wetted.

One of the gentlemen, by way of varying the not very exhilarating study
of four brick walls within microscopic distance of his eye, turned to a
small square hole which admitted light and air to the hut, and looked out
upon the dreary prospect before him.  The wide concave of cloud, of the
monotonous hue of dull pewter, formed an unbroken hood over the level
from horizon to horizon; beneath it, reflecting its wan lustre, was the
glazed high-road which stretched, hedgeless and ditchless, past a
directing-post where another road joined it, and on to the less regular
ground beyond, lying like a riband unrolled across the scene, till it
vanished over the furthermost undulation.  Beside the pools were
occasional tall sheaves of flags and sedge, and about the plain a few
bushes, these forming the only obstructions to a view otherwise unbroken.

The sportsman's attention was attracted by a figure in a state of gradual
enlargement as it approached along the road.

'I should think that if pleasure can't tempt a native out of doors to-
day, business will never force him out,' he observed.  'There is, for the
first time, somebody coming along the road.'

'If business don't drag him out pleasure'll never tempt en, is more like
our nater in these parts, sir,' said the man, who was looking into the
fire.

The conversation showed no vitality, and down it dropped dead as before,
the man who was standing up continuing to gaze into the moisture.  What
had at first appeared as an epicene shape the decreasing space resolved
into a cloaked female under an umbrella: she now relaxed her pace, till,
reaching the directing-post where the road branched into two, she paused
and looked about her.  Instead of coming further she slowly retraced her
steps for about a hundred yards.

'That's an appointment,' said the first speaker, as he removed the cigar
from his lips; 'and by the lords, what a day and place for an appointment
with a woman!'

'What's an appointment?' inquired his friend, a town young man, with a
Tussaud complexion and well-pencilled brows half way up his forehead, so
that his upper eyelids appeared to possess the uncommon quality of
tallness.

'Look out here, and you'll see.  By that directing-post, where the two
roads meet.  As a man devoted to art, Ladywell, who has had the honour of
being hung higher up on the Academy walls than any other living painter,
you should take out your sketch-book and dash off the scene.'

Where nothing particular is going on, one incident makes a drama; and,
interested in that proportion, the art-sportsman puts up his eyeglass (a
form he adhered to before firing at game that had risen, by which
merciful arrangement the bird got safe off), placed his face beside his
companion's, and also peered through the opening.  The young
pupil-teacher--for she was the object of their scrutiny--re-approached
the spot whereon she had been accustomed for the last many weeks of her
journey home to meet Christopher, now for the first time missing, and
again she seemed reluctant to pass the hand-post, for that marked the
point where the chance of seeing him ended.  She glided backwards as
before, this time keeping her face still to the front, as if trying to
persuade the world at large, and her own shamefacedness, that she had not
yet approached the place at all.

'Query, how long will she wait for him (for it is a man to a certainty)?'
resumed the elder of the smokers, at the end of several minutes of
silence, when, full of vacillation and doubt, she became lost to view
behind some bushes.  'Will she reappear?'  The smoking went on, and up
she came into open ground as before, and walked by.

'I wonder who the girl is, to come to such a place in this weather?  There
she is again,' said the young man called Ladywell.

'Some cottage lass, not yet old enough to make the most of the value set
on her by her follower, small as that appears to be.  Now we may get an
idea of the hour named by the fellow for the appointment, for, depend
upon it, the time when she first came--about five minutes ago--was the
time he should have been there.  It is now getting on towards five--half-
past four was doubtless the time mentioned.'

'She's not come o' purpose: 'tis her way home from school every day,'
said the waterman.

'An experiment on woman's endurance and patience under neglect.  Two to
one against her staying a quarter of an hour.'

'The same odds against her not staying till five would be nearer
probability.  What's half-an-hour to a girl in love?'

'On a moorland in wet weather it is thirty perceptible minutes to any
fireside man, woman, or beast in Christendom--minutes that can be felt,
like the Egyptian plague of darkness.  Now, little girl, go home: he is
not worth it.'

Twenty minutes passed, and the girl returned miserably to the hand-post,
still to wander back to her retreat behind the sedge, and lead any chance
comer from the opposite quarter to believe that she had not yet reached
this ultimate point beyond which a meeting with Christopher was
impossible.

'Now you'll find that she means to wait the complete half-hour, and then
off she goes with a broken heart.'

All three now looked through the hole to test the truth of the
prognostication.  The hour of five completed itself on their watches; the
girl again came forward.  And then the three in ambuscade could see her
pull out her handkerchief and place it to her eyes.

'She's grieving now because he has not come.  Poor little woman, what a
brute he must be; for a broken heart in a woman means a broken vow in a
man, as I infer from a thousand instances in experience, romance, and
history.  Don't open the door till she is gone, Ladywell; it will only
disturb her.'

As they had guessed, the pupil-teacher, hearing the distant town-clock
strike the hour, gave way to her fancy no longer, and launched into the
diverging path.  This lingering for Christopher's arrival had, as is
known, been founded on nothing more of the nature of an assignation than
lay in his regular walk along the plain at that time every Monday,
Wednesday, and Friday of the six previous weeks.  It must be said that he
was very far indeed from divining that his injudicious peace-offering of
the flowers had stirred into life such a wearing, anxious, hopeful,
despairing solicitude as this, which had been latent for some time during
his constant meetings with the little stranger.

She vanished in the mist towards the left, and the loiterers in the hut
began to move and open the door, remarking, 'Now then for Wyndway House,
a change of clothes, and a dinner.'




4. SANDBOURNE PIER--ROAD TO WYNDWAY--BALL-ROOM IN WYNDWAY HOUSE


The last light of a winter day had gone down behind the houses of
Sandbourne, and night was shut close over all.  Christopher, about eight
o'clock, was standing at the end of the pier with his back towards the
open sea, whence the waves were pushing to the shore in frills and coils
that were just rendered visible in all their bleak instability by the row
of lights along the sides of the jetty, the rapid motion landward of the
wavetips producing upon his eye an apparent progress of the pier out to
sea.  This pier-head was a spot which Christopher enjoyed visiting on
such moaning and sighing nights as the present, when the sportive and
variegated throng that haunted the pier on autumn days was no longer
there, and he seemed alone with weather and the invincible sea.

Somebody came towards him along the deserted footway, and rays from the
nearest lamp streaked the face of his sister Faith.

'O Christopher, I knew you were here,' she said eagerly.  'You are
wanted; there's a servant come from Wyndway House for you.  He is sent to
ask if you can come immediately to play at a little dance they have
resolved upon this evening--quite suddenly it seems.  If you can come,
you must bring with you any assistant you can lay your hands upon at a
moment's notice, he says.'

'Wyndway House; why should the people send for me above all other
musicians in the town?'

Faith did not know.  'If you really decide to go,' she said, as they
walked homeward, 'you might take me as your assistant.  I should answer
the purpose, should I not, Kit? since it is only a dance or two they seem
to want.'

'And your harp I suppose you mean.  Yes; you might be competent to take a
part.  It cannot be a regular ball; they would have had the quadrille
band for anything of that sort.  Faith--we'll go.  However, let us see
the man first, and inquire particulars.'

Reaching home, Christopher found at his door a horse and wagonette in
charge of a man-servant in livery, who repeated what Faith had told her
brother.  Wyndway House was a well-known country-seat three or four miles
out of the town, and the coachman mentioned that if they were going it
would be well that they should get ready to start as soon as they
conveniently could, since he had been told to return by ten if possible.
Christopher quickly prepared himself, and put a new string or two into
Faith's harp, by which time she also was dressed; and, wrapping up
herself and her instrument safe from the night air, away they drove at
half-past nine.

'Is it a large party?' said Christopher, as they whizzed along.

'No, sir; it is what we call a dance--that is, 'tis like a ball, you
know, on a small scale--a ball on a spurt, that you never thought of till
you had it.  In short, it grew out of a talk at dinner, I believe; and
some of the young people present wanted a jig, and didn't care to play
themselves, you know, young ladies being an idle class of society at the
best of times.  We've a house full of sleeping company, you
understand--been there a week some of 'em--most of 'em being mistress's
relations.'

'They probably found it a little dull.'

'Well, yes--it is rather dull for 'em--Christmas-time and all.  As soon
as it was proposed they were wild for sending post-haste for somebody or
other to play to them.'

'Did they name me particularly?' said Christopher.

'Yes; "Mr. Christopher Julian," she says.  "The gent who's turned music-
man?" I said.  "Yes, that's him," says she.'

'There were music-men living nearer to your end of the town than I.'

'Yes, but I know it was you particular: though I don't think mistress
thought anything about you at first.  Mr. Joyce--that's the butler--said
that your name was mentioned to our old party, when he was in the room,
by a young lady staying with us, and mistress says then, "The Julians
have had a downfall, and the son has taken to music."  Then when dancing
was talked of, they said, "O, let's have him by all means."'

'Was the young lady who first inquired for my family the same one who
said, "Let's have him by all means?"'

'O no; but it was on account of her asking that the rest said they would
like you to play--at least that's as I had it from Joyce.'

'Do you know that lady's name?'

'Mrs. Petherwin.'

'Ah!'

'Cold, sir?'

'O no.'

Christopher did not like to question the man any further, though what he
had heard added new life to his previous curiosity; and they drove along
the way in silence, Faith's figure, wrapped up to the top of her head,
cutting into the sky behind them like a sugar-loaf.  Such gates as
crossed the roads had been left open by the forethought of the coachman,
and, passing the lodge, they proceeded about half-a-mile along a private
drive, then ascended a rise, and came in view of the front of the
mansion, punctured with windows that were now mostly lighted up.

'What is that?' said Faith, catching a glimpse of something that the
carriage-lamp showed on the face of one wall as they passed, a marble bas-
relief of some battle-piece, built into the stonework.

'That's the scene of the death of one of the squire's forefathers--Colonel
Sir Martin Jones, who was killed at the moment of victory in the battle
of Salamanca--but I haven't been here long enough to know the rights of
it.  When I am in one of my meditations, as I wait here with the carriage
sometimes, I think how many more get killed at the moment of victory than
at the moment of defeat.  This is the entrance for you, sir.'  And he
turned the corner and pulled up before a side door.

They alighted and went in, Christopher shouldering Faith's harp, and she
marching modestly behind, with curly-eared music-books under her arm.
They were shown into the house-steward's room, and ushered thence along a
badly-lit passage and past a door within which a hum and laughter were
audible.  The door next to this was then opened for them, and they
entered.

* * * * *

Scarcely had Faith, or Christopher either, ever beheld a more shining
scene than was presented by the saloon in which they now found
themselves.  Coming direct from the gloomy park, and led to the room by
that back passage from the servants' quarter, the light from the
chandelier and branches against the walls, striking on gilding at all
points, quite dazzled their sight for a minute or two; it caused Faith to
move forward with her eyes on the floor, and filled Christopher with an
impulse to turn back again into some dusky corner where every thread of
his not over-new dress suit--rather moth-eaten through lack of feasts for
airing it--could be counted less easily.

He was soon seated before a grand piano, and Faith sat down under the
shadow of her harp, both being arranged on a dais within an alcove at one
end of the room.  A screen of ivy and holly had been constructed across
the front of this recess for the games of the children on Christmas Eve,
and it still remained there, a small creep-hole being left for entrance
and exit.

Then the merry guests tumbled through doors at the further end, and
dancing began.  The mingling of black-coated men and bright ladies gave a
charming appearance to the groups as seen by Faith and her brother, the
whole spectacle deriving an unexpected novelty from the accident of
reaching their eyes through interstices in the tracery of green leaves,
which added to the picture a softness that it would not otherwise have
possessed.  On the other hand, the musicians, having a much weaker light,
could hardly be discerned by the performers in the dance.

The music was now rattling on, and the ladies in their foam-like dresses
were busily threading and spinning about the floor, when Faith, casually
looking up into her brother's face, was surprised to see that a change
had come over it.  At the end of the quadrille he leant across to her
before she had time to speak, and said quietly, 'She's here!'

'Who?' said Faith, for she had not heard the words of the coachman.

'Ethelberta.'

'Which is she?' asked Faith, peeping through with the keenest interest.

'The one who has the skirts of her dress looped up with convolvulus
flowers--the one with her hair fastened in a sort of Venus knot behind;
she has just been dancing with that perfumed piece of a man they call Mr.
Ladywell--it is he with the high eyebrows arched like a girl's.'  He
added, with a wrinkled smile, 'I cannot for my life see anybody answering
to the character of husband to her, for every man takes notice of her.'

They were interrupted by another dance being called for, and then, his
fingers tapping about upon the keys as mechanically as fowls pecking at
barleycorns, Christopher gave himself up with a curious and far from
unalloyed pleasure to the occupation of watching Ethelberta, now again
crossing the field of his vision like a returned comet whose
characteristics were becoming purely historical.  She was a plump-armed
creature, with a white round neck as firm as a fort--altogether a
vigorous shape, as refreshing to the eye as the green leaves through
which he beheld her.  She danced freely, and with a zest that was
apparently irrespective of partners.  He had been waiting long to hear
her speak, and when at length her voice did reach his ears, it was the
revelation of a strange matter to find how great a thing that small event
had become to him.  He knew the old utterance--rapid but not frequent, an
obstructive thought causing sometimes a sudden halt in the midst of a
stream of words.  But the features by which a cool observer would have
singled her out from others in his memory when asking himself what she
was like, was a peculiar gaze into imaginary far-away distance when
making a quiet remark to a partner--not with contracted eyes like a
seafaring man, but with an open full look--a remark in which little words
in a low tone were made to express a great deal, as several single
gentlemen afterwards found.

The production of dance-music when the criticizing stage among the
dancers has passed, and they have grown full of excitement and animal
spirits, does not require much concentration of thought in the producers
thereof; and desultory conversation accordingly went on between Faith and
her brother from time to time.

'Kit,' she said on one occasion, 'are you looking at the way in which the
flowers are fastened to the leaves?--taking a mean advantage of being at
the back of the tapestry?  You cannot think how you stare at them.'

'I was looking through them--certainly not at them.  I have a feeling of
being moved about like a puppet in the hands of a person who legally can
be nothing to me.'

'That charming woman with the shining bunch of hair and convolvuluses?'

'Yes: it is through her that we are brought here, and through her writing
that poem, "Cancelled Words," that the book was sent me, and through the
accidental renewal of acquaintance between us on Anglebury Heath, that
she wrote the poem.  I was, however, at the moment you spoke, thinking
more particularly of the little teacher whom Ethelberta must have
commissioned to send the book to me; and why that girl was chosen to do
it.'

'There may be a hundred reasons.  Kit, I have never yet seen her look
once this way.'

Christopher had certainly not yet received look or gesture from her; but
his time came.  It was while he was for a moment outside the recess, and
he caught her in the act.  She became slightly confused, turned aside,
and entered into conversation with a neighbour.

It was only a look, and yet what a look it was!  One may say of a look
that it is capable of division into as many species, genera, orders, and
classes, as the animal world itself.  Christopher saw Ethelberta
Petherwin's performance in this kind--the well-known spark of light upon
the well-known depths of mystery--and felt something going out of him
which had gone out of him once before.

Thus continually beholding her and her companions in the giddy whirl, the
night wore on with the musicians, last dances and more last dances being
added, till the intentions of the old on the matter were thrice exceeded
in the interests of the young.  Watching the couples whirl and turn,
advance and recede as gently as spirits, knot themselves like house-flies
and part again, and lullabied by the faint regular beat of their
footsteps to the tune, the players sank into the peculiar mesmeric quiet
which comes over impressionable people who play for a great length of
time in the midst of such scenes; and at last the only noises that
Christopher took cognizance of were those of the exceptional kind,
breaking above the general sea of sound--a casual smart rustle of silk, a
laugh, a stumble, the monosyllabic talk of those who happened to linger
for a moment close to the leafy screen--all coming to his ears like
voices from those old times when he had mingled in similar scenes, not as
servant but as guest.




5. AT THE WINDOW--THE ROAD HOME


The dancing was over at last, and the radiant company had left the room.
A long and weary night it had been for the two players, though a
stimulated interest had hindered physical exhaustion in one of them for a
while.  With tingling fingers and aching arms they came out of the alcove
into the long and deserted apartment, now pervaded by a dry haze.  The
lights had burnt low, and Faith and her brother were waiting by request
till the wagonette was ready to take them home, a breakfast being in
course of preparation for them meanwhile.

Christopher had crossed the room to relieve his cramped limbs, and now,
peeping through a crevice in the window curtains, he said suddenly,
'Who's for a transformation scene?  Faith, look here!'

He touched the blind, up it flew, and a gorgeous scene presented itself
to her eyes.  A huge inflamed sun was breasting the horizon of a wide
sheet of sea which, to her surprise and delight, the mansion overlooked.
The brilliant disc fired all the waves that lay between it and the shore
at the bottom of the grounds, where the water tossed the ruddy light from
one undulation to another in glares as large and clear as mirrors,
incessantly altering them, destroying them, and creating them again;
while further off they multiplied, thickened, and ran into one another
like struggling armies, till they met the fiery source of them all.

'O, how wonderful it is!' said Faith, putting her hand on Christopher's
arm.  'Who knew that whilst we were all shut in here with our puny
illumination such an exhibition as this was going on outside!  How sorry
and mean the grand and stately room looks now!'

Christopher turned his back upon the window, and there were the hitherto
beaming candle-flames shining no more radiantly than tarnished javelin-
heads, while the snow-white lengths of wax showed themselves clammy and
cadaverous as the fingers of a corpse.  The leaves and flowers which had
appeared so very green and blooming by the artificial light were now seen
to be faded and dusty.  Only the gilding of the room in some degree
brought itself into keeping with the splendours outside, stray darts of
light seizing upon it and lengthening themselves out along fillet, quirk,
arris, and moulding, till wasted away.

'It seems,' said Faith, 'as if all the people who were lately so merry
here had died: we ourselves look no more than ghosts.'  She turned up her
weary face to her brother's, which the incoming rays smote aslant, making
little furrows of every wrinkle thereon, and shady ravines of every
little furrow.

'You are very tired, Faith,' he said.  'Such a heavy night's work has
been almost too much for you.'

'O, I don't mind that,' said Faith.  'But I could not have played so long
by myself.'

'We filled up one another's gaps; and there were plenty of them towards
the morning; but, luckily, people don't notice those things when the
small hours draw on.'

'What troubles me most,' said Faith, 'is not that I have worked, but that
you should be so situated as to need such miserable assistance as mine.
We are poor, are we not, Kit?'

'Yes, we know a little about poverty,' he replied.

While thus lingering

   'In shadowy thoroughfares of thought,'

Faith interrupted with, 'I believe there is one of the dancers now!--why,
I should have thought they had all gone to bed, and wouldn't get up again
for days.'  She indicated to him a figure on the lawn towards the left,
looking upon the same flashing scene as that they themselves beheld.

'It is your own particular one,' continued Faith.  'Yes, I see the blue
flowers under the edge of her cloak.'

'And I see her squirrel-coloured hair,' said Christopher.

Both stood looking at this apparition, who once, and only once, thought
fit to turn her head towards the front of the house they were gazing
from.  Faith was one in whom the meditative somewhat overpowered the
active faculties; she went on, with no abundance of love, to theorize
upon this gratuitously charming woman, who, striking freakishly into her
brother's path, seemed likely to do him no good in her sisterly
estimation.  Ethelberta's bright and shapely form stood before her critic
now, smartened by the motes of sunlight from head to heel: what Faith
would have given to see her so clearly within!

'Without doubt she is already a lady of many romantic experiences,' she
said dubiously.

'And on the way to many more,' said Christopher.  The tone was just of
the kind which may be imagined of a sombre man who had been up all night
piping that others might dance.

Faith parted her lips as if in consternation at possibilities.
Ethelberta, having already become an influence in Christopher's system,
might soon become more--an indestructible fascination--to drag him about,
turn his soul inside out, harrow him, twist him, and otherwise torment
him, according to the stereotyped form of such processes.

They were interrupted by the opening of a door.  A servant entered and
came up to them.

'This is for you, I believe, sir,' he said.  'Two guineas;' and he placed
the money in Christopher's hand.  'Some breakfast will be ready for you
in a moment if you like to have it.  Would you wish it brought in here;
or will you come to the steward's room?'

'Yes, we will come.'  And the man then began to extinguish the lights one
by one.  Christopher dropped the two pounds and two shillings singly into
his pocket, and looking listlessly at the footman said, 'Can you tell me
the address of that lady on the lawn?  Ah, she has disappeared!'

'She wore a dress with blue flowers,' said Faith.

'And remarkable bright in her manner?  O, that's the young widow,
Mrs--what's that name--I forget for the moment.'

'Widow?' said Christopher, the eyes of his understanding getting
wonderfully clear, and Faith uttering a private ejaculation of thanks
that after all no commandments were likely to be broken in this matter.
'The lady I mean is quite a girlish sort of woman.'

'Yes, yes, so she is--that's the one.  Coachman says she must have been
born a widow, for there is not time for her ever to have been made one.
However, she's not quite such a chicken as all that.  Mrs. Petherwin,
that's the party's name.'

'Does she live here?'

'No, she is staying in the house visiting for a few days with her mother-
in-law.  They are a London family, I don't know her address.'

'Is she a poetess?'

'That I cannot say.  She is very clever at verses; but she don't lean
over gates to see the sun, and goes to church as regular as you or I, so
I should hardly be inclined to say that she's the complete thing.  When
she's up in one of her vagaries she'll sit with the ladies and make up
pretty things out of her head as fast as sticks a-breaking.  They will
run off her tongue like cotton from a reel, and if she can ever be got in
the mind of telling a story she will bring it out that serious and awful
that it makes your flesh creep upon your bones; if she's only got to say
that she walked out of one door into another, she'll tell it so that
there seems something wonderful in it.  'Tis a bother to start her, so
our people say behind her back, but, once set going, the house is all
alive with her.  However, it will soon be dull enough; she and Lady
Petherwin are off to-morrow for Rookington, where I believe they are
going to stay over New Year's Day.'

'Where do you say they are going?' inquired Christopher, as they followed
the footman.

'Rookington Park--about three miles out of Sandbourne, in the opposite
direction to this.'

'A widow,' Christopher murmured.

Faith overheard him.  'That makes no difference to us, does it?' she said
wistfully.

Forty minutes later they were driving along an open road over a ridge
which commanded a view of a small inlet below them, the sands of this
nook being sheltered by crumbling cliffs.  Here at once they saw, in the
full light of the sun, two women standing side by side, their faces
directed over the sea.

'There she is again!' said Faith.  'She has walked along the shore from
the lawn where we saw her before.'

'Yes,' said the coachman, 'she's a curious woman seemingly.  She'll talk
to any poor body she meets.  You see she had been out for a morning walk
instead of going to bed, and that is some queer mortal or other she has
picked up with on her way.'

'I wonder she does not prefer some rest,' Faith observed.

The road then dropped into a hollow, and the women by the sea were no
longer within view from the carriage, which rapidly neared Sandbourne
with the two musicians.




6. THE SHORE BY WYNDWAY


The east gleamed upon Ethelberta's squirrel-coloured hair as she said to
her companion, 'I have come, Picotee; but not, as you imagine, from a
night's sleep.  We have actually been dancing till daylight at Wyndway.'

'Then you should not have troubled to come!  I could have borne the
disappointment under such circumstances,' said the pupil-teacher, who,
wearing a dress not so familiar to Christopher's eyes as had been the
little white jacket, had not been recognized by him from the hill.  'You
look so tired, Berta.  I could not stay up all night for the world!'

'One gets used to these things,' said Ethelberta quietly.  'I should have
been in bed certainly, had I not particularly wished to use this
opportunity of meeting you before you go home to-morrow.  I could not
have come to Sandbourne to-day, because we are leaving to return again to
Rookington.  This is all that I wish you to take to mother--only a few
little things which may be useful to her; but you will see what it
contains when you open it.'  She handed to Picotee a small parcel.  'This
is for yourself,' she went on, giving a small packet besides.  'It will
pay your fare home and back, and leave you something to spare.'

'Thank you,' said Picotee docilely.

'Now, Picotee,' continued the elder, 'let us talk for a few minutes
before I go back: we may not meet again for some time.'  She put her arm
round the waist of Picotee, who did the same by Ethelberta; and thus
interlaced they walked backwards and forwards upon the firm flat sand
with the motion of one body animated by one will.

'Well, what did you think of my poems?'

'I liked them; but naturally, I did not understand all the experience you
describe.  It is so different from mine.  Yet that made them more
interesting to me.  I thought I should so much like to mix in the same
scenes; but that of course is impossible.'

'I am afraid it is.  And you posted the book as I said?'

'Yes.'  She added hurriedly, as if to change the subject, 'I have told
nobody that we are sisters, or that you are known in any way to me or to
mother or to any of us.  I thought that would be best, from what you
said.'

'Yes, perhaps it is best for the present.'

'The box of clothes came safely, and I find very little alteration will
be necessary to make the dress do beautifully for me on Sundays.  It is
quite new-fashioned to me, though I suppose it was old-fashioned to you.
O, and Berta, will the title of Lady Petherwin descend to you when your
mother-in-law dies?'

'No, of course not.  She is only a knight's widow, and that's nothing.'

'The lady of a knight looks as good on paper as the lady of a lord.'

'Yes.  And in other places too sometimes.  However, about your journey
home.  Be very careful; and don't make any inquiries at the stations of
anybody but officials.  If any man wants to be friendly with you, try to
find out if it is from a genuine wish to assist you, or from admiration
of your fresh face.'

'How shall I know which?' said Picotee.

Ethelberta laughed.  'If Heaven does not tell you at the moment I
cannot,' she said.  'But humanity looks with a different eye from love,
and upon the whole it is most to be prized by all of us.  I believe it
ends oftener in marriage than do a lover's flying smiles.  So that for
this and other reasons love from a stranger is mostly worthless as a
speculation; and it is certainly dangerous as a game.  Well, Picotee, has
any one paid you real attentions yet?'

'No--that is--'

'There is something going on.'

'Only a wee bit.'

'I thought so.  There was a dishonesty about your dear eyes which has
never been there before, and love-making and dishonesty are inseparable
as coupled hounds.  Up comes man, and away goes innocence.  Are you going
to tell me anything about him?'

'I would rather not, Ethelberta; because it is hardly anything.'

'Well, be careful.  And mind this, never tell him what you feel.'

'But then he will never know it.'

'Nor must he.  He must think it only.  The difference between his
thinking and knowing is often the difference between your winning and
losing.  But general advice is not of much use, and I cannot give more
unless you tell more.  What is his name?'

Picotee did not reply.

'Never mind: keep your secret.  However, listen to this: not a kiss--not
so much as the shadow, hint, or merest seedling of a kiss!'

'There is no fear of it,' murmured Picotee; 'though not because of me!'

'You see, my dear Picotee, a lover is not a relative; and he isn't quite
a stranger; but he may end in being either, and the way to reduce him to
whichever of the two you wish him to be is to treat him like the other.
Men who come courting are just like bad cooks: if you are kind to them,
instead of ascribing it to an exceptional courtesy on your part, they
instantly set it down to their own marvellous worth.'

'But I ought to favour him just a little, poor thing?  Just the smallest
glimmer of a gleam!'

'Only a very little indeed--so that it comes as a relief to his misery,
not as adding to his happiness.'

'It is being too clever, all this; and we ought to be harmless as doves.'

'Ah, Picotee! to continue harmless as a dove you must be wise as a
serpent, you'll find--ay, ten serpents, for that matter.'

'But if I cannot get at him, how can I manage him in these ways you speak
of?'

'Get at him?  I suppose he gets at you in some way, does he not?--tries
to see you, or to be near you?'

'No--that's just the point--he doesn't do any such thing, and there's the
worry of it!'

'Well, what a silly girl!  Then he is not your lover at all?'

'Perhaps he's not.  But I am his, at any rate--twice over.'

'That's no use.  Supply the love for both sides?  Why, it's worse than
furnishing money for both.  You don't suppose a man will give his heart
in exchange for a woman's when he has already got hers for nothing?
That's not the way old Adam does business at all.'

Picotee sighed.  'Have you got a young man, too, Berta?'

'A young man?'

'A lover I mean--that's what we call 'em down here.'

'It is difficult to explain,' said Ethelberta evasively.  'I knew one
many years ago, and I have seen him again, and--that is all.'

'According to my idea you have one, but according to your own you have
not; he does not love you, but you love him--is that how it is?'

'I have not quite considered how it is.'

'Do you love him?'

'I have never seen a man I hate less.'

'A great deal lies covered up there, I expect!'

'He was in that carriage which drove over the hill at the moment we met
here.'

'Ah-ah--some great lord or another who has his day by candlelight, and so
on.  I guess the style.  Somebody who no more knows how much bread is a
loaf than I do the price of diamonds and pearls.'

'I am afraid he's only a commoner as yet, and not a very great one
either.  But surely you guess, Picotee?  But I'll set you an example of
frankness by telling his name.  My friend, Mr. Julian, to whom you posted
the book.  Such changes as he has seen!--from affluence to poverty.  He
and his sister have been playing dances all night at Wyndway--What is the
matter?'

'Only a pain!'

'My dear Picotee--'

'I think I'll sit down for a moment, Berta.'

'What--have you over-walked yourself, dear?'

'Yes--and I got up very early, you see.'

'I hope you are not going to be ill, child.  You look as if you ought not
to be here.'

'O, it is quite trifling.  Does not getting up in a hurry cause a sense
of faintness sometimes?'

'Yes, in people who are not strong.'

'If we don't talk about being faint it will go off.  Faintness is such a
queer thing that to think of it is to have it.  Let us talk as we were
talking before--about your young man and other indifferent matters, so as
to divert my thoughts from fainting, dear Berta.  I have always thought
the book was to be forwarded to that gentleman because he was a
connection of yours by marriage, and he had asked for it.  And so you
have met this--this Mr. Julian, and gone for walks with him in evenings,
I suppose, just as young men and women do who are courting?'

'No, indeed--what an absurd child you are!' said Ethelberta.  'I knew him
once, and he is interesting; a few little things like that make it all
up.'

'The love is all on one side, as with me.'

'O no, no: there is nothing like that.  I am not attached to any one,
strictly speaking--though, more strictly speaking, I am not unattached.'

''Tis a delightful middle mind to be in.  I know it, for I was like it
once; but I had scarcely been so long enough to know where I was before I
was gone past.'

'You should have commanded yourself, or drawn back entirely; for let me
tell you that at the beginning of caring for a man--just when you are
suspended between thinking and feeling--there is a hair's-breadth of time
at which the question of getting into love or not getting in is a matter
of will--quite a thing of choice.  At the same time, drawing back is a
tame dance, and the best of all is to stay balanced awhile.'

'You do that well, I'll warrant.'

'Well, no; for what between continually wanting to love, to escape the
blank lives of those who do not, and wanting not to love, to keep out of
the miseries of those who do, I get foolishly warm and foolishly cold by
turns.'

'Yes--and I am like you as far as the "foolishly" goes.  I wish we poor
girls could contrive to bring a little wisdom into our love by way of a
change!'

'That's the very thing that leading minds in town have begun to do, but
there are difficulties.  It is easy to love wisely, but the rich man may
not marry you; and it is not very hard to reject wisely, but the poor man
doesn't care.  Altogether it is a precious problem.  But shall we clamber
out upon those shining blocks of rock, and find some of the little yellow
shells that are in the crevices?  I have ten minutes longer, and then I
must go.'




7. THE DINING-ROOM OF A TOWN HOUSE--THE BUTLER'S PANTRY


A few weeks later there was a friendly dinner-party at the house of a
gentleman called Doncastle, who lived in a moderately fashionable square
of west London.  All the friends and relatives present were nice people,
who exhibited becoming signs of pleasure and gaiety at being there; but
as regards the vigour with which these emotions were expressed, it may be
stated that a slight laugh from far down the throat and a slight
narrowing of the eye were equivalent as indices of the degree of mirth
felt to a Ha-ha-ha! and a shaking of the shoulders among the minor
traders of the kingdom; and to a Ho-ho-ho! contorted features, purple
face, and stamping foot among the gentlemen in corduroy and fustian who
adorn the remoter provinces.

The conversation was chiefly about a volume of musical, tender, and
humorous rhapsodies lately issued to the world in the guise of verse,
which had been reviewed and talked about everywhere.  This topic,
beginning as a private dialogue between a young painter named Ladywell
and the lady on his right hand, had enlarged its ground by degrees, as a
subject will extend on those rare occasions when it happens to be one
about which each person has thought something beforehand, instead of, as
in the natural order of things, one to which the oblivious listener
replies mechanically, with earnest features, but with thoughts far away.
And so the whole table made the matter a thing to inquire or reply upon
at once, and isolated rills of other chat died out like a river in the
sands.

'Witty things, and occasionally Anacreontic: and they have the
originality which such a style must naturally possess when carried out by
a feminine hand,' said Ladywell.

'If it is a feminine hand,' said a man near.

Ladywell looked as if he sometimes knew secrets, though he did not wish
to boast.

'Written, I presume you mean, in the Anacreontic measure of three feet
and a half--spondees and iambics?' said a gentleman in spectacles,
glancing round, and giving emphasis to his inquiry by causing bland
glares of a circular shape to proceed from his glasses towards the person
interrogated.

The company appeared willing to give consideration to the words of a man
who knew such things as that, and hung forward to listen.  But Ladywell
stopped the whole current of affairs in that direction by saying--

'O no; I was speaking rather of the matter and tone.  In fact, the Seven
Days' Review said they were Anacreontic, you know; and so they are--any
one may feel they are.'

The general look then implied a false encouragement, and the man in
spectacles looked down again, being a nervous person, who never had time
to show his merits because he was so much occupied in hiding his faults.

'Do you know the authoress, Mr. Neigh?' continued Ladywell.

'Can't say that I do,' he replied.

Neigh was a man who never disturbed the flesh upon his face except when
he was obliged to do so, and paused ten seconds where other people only
paused one; as he moved his chin in speaking, motes of light from under
the candle-shade caught, lost, and caught again the outlying threads of
his burnished beard.

'She will be famous some day; and you ought at any rate to read her
book.'

'Yes, I ought, I know.  In fact, some years ago I should have done it
immediately, because I had a reason for pushing on that way just then.'

'Ah, what was that?'

'Well, I thought of going in for Westminster Abbey myself at that time;
but a fellow has so much to do, and--'

'What a pity that you didn't follow it up.  A man of your powers, Mr.
Neigh--'

'Afterwards I found I was too steady for it, and had too much of the
respectable householder in me.  Besides, so many other men are on the
same tack; and then I didn't care about it, somehow.'

'I don't understand high art, and am utterly in the dark on what are the
true laws of criticism,' a plain married lady, who wore archaeological
jewellery, was saying at this time.  'But I know that I have derived an
unusual amount of amusement from those verses, and I am heartily thankful
to "E." for them.'

'I am afraid,' said a gentleman who was suffering from a bad shirt-front,
'that an estimate which depends upon feeling in that way is not to be
trusted as permanent opinion.'

The subject now flitted to the other end.

'Somebody has it that when the heart flies out before the understanding,
it saves the judgment a world of pains,' came from a voice in that
quarter.

'I, for my part, like something merry,' said an elderly woman, whose face
was bisected by the edge of a shadow, which toned her forehead and
eyelids to a livid neutral tint, and left her cheeks and mouth like metal
at a white heat in the uninterrupted light.  'I think the liveliness of
those ballads as great a recommendation as any.  After all, enough misery
is known to us by our experiences and those of our friends, and what we
see in the newspapers, for all purposes of chastening, without having
gratuitous grief inflicted upon us.'

'But you would not have wished that "Romeo and Juliet" should have ended
happily, or that Othello should have discovered the perfidy of his
Ancient in time to prevent all fatal consequences?'

'I am not afraid to go so far as that,' said the old lady.  'Shakespeare
is not everybody, and I am sure that thousands of people who have seen
those plays would have driven home more cheerfully afterwards if by some
contrivance the characters could all have been joined together
respectively.  I uphold our anonymous author on the general ground of her
levity.'

'Well, it is an old and worn argument--that about the inexpedience of
tragedy--and much may be said on both sides.  It is not to be denied that
the anonymous Sappho's verses--for it seems that she is really a
woman--are clever.'

'Clever!' said Ladywell--the young man who had been one of the shooting-
party at Sandbourne--'they are marvellously brilliant.'

'She is rather warm in her assumed character.'

'That's a sign of her actual coldness; she lets off her feeling in
theoretic grooves, and there is sure to be none left for practical ones.
Whatever seems to be the most prominent vice, or the most prominent
virtue in anybody's writing is the one thing you are safest from in
personal dealings with the writer.'

'O, I don't mean to call her warmth of feeling a vice or virtue exactly--'

'I agree with you,' said Neigh to the last speaker but one, in tones as
emphatic as they possibly could be without losing their proper character
of indifference to the whole matter.  'Warm sentiment of any sort,
whenever we have it, disturbs us too much to leave us repose enough for
writing it down.'

'I am sure, when I was at the ardent age,' said the mistress of the
house, in a tone of pleasantly agreeing with every one, particularly
those who were diametrically opposed to each other, 'I could no more have
printed such emotions and made them public than I--could have helped
privately feeling them.'

'I wonder if she has gone through half she says?  If so, what an
experience!'

'O no--not at all likely,' said Mr. Neigh.  'It is as risky to calculate
people's ways of living from their writings as their incomes from their
way of living.'

'She is as true to nature as fashion is false,' said the painter, in his
warmth becoming scarcely complimentary, as sometimes happens with young
persons.  'I don't think that she has written a word more than what every
woman would deny feeling in a society where no woman says what she means
or does what she says.  And can any praise be greater than that?'

'Ha-ha!  Capital!'

'All her verses seem to me,' said a rather stupid person, 'to be simply--

   "Tral'-la-la-lal'-la-la-la',
   Tral'-la-la-lal'-la-la-lu',
   Tral'-la-la-lal'-la-la-lalla',
   Tral'-la-la-lu'."

When you take away the music there is nothing left.  Yet she is plainly a
woman of great culture.'

'Have you seen what the London Light says about them--one of the finest
things I have ever read in the way of admiration?' continued Ladywell,
paying no attention to the previous speaker.  He lingered for a reply,
and then impulsively quoted several lines from the periodical he had
named, without aid or hesitation.  'Good, is it not?' added Ladywell.

They assented, but in such an unqualified manner that half as much
readiness would have meant more.  But Ladywell, though not experienced
enough to be quite free from enthusiasm, was too experienced to mind
indifference for more than a minute or two.  When the ladies had
withdrawn, the young man went on--

'Colonel Staff said a funny thing to me yesterday about these very poems.
He asked me if I knew her, and--'

'Her?  Why, he knows that it is a lady all the time, and we were only
just now doubting whether the sex of the writer could be really what it
seems.  Shame, Ladywell!' said his friend Neigh.

'Ah, Mr. Ladywell,' said another, 'now we have found you out.  You know
her!'

'Now--I say--ha-ha!' continued the painter, with a face expressing that
he had not at all tried to be found out as the man possessing
incomparably superior knowledge of the poetess.  'I beg pardon really,
but don't press me on the matter.  Upon my word the secret is not my own.
As I was saying, the Colonel said, "Do you know her?"--but you don't care
to hear?'

'We shall be delighted!'

'So the Colonel said, "Do you know her?" adding, in a most comic way,
"Between U. and E., Ladywell, I believe there is a close
affinity"--meaning me, you know, by U.  Just like the Colonel--ha-ha-ha!'

The older men did not oblige Ladywell a second time with any attempt at
appreciation; but a weird silence ensued, during which the smile upon
Ladywell's face became frozen to painful permanence.

'Meaning by E., you know, the "E" of the poems--heh-heh!' he added.

'It was a very humorous incident certainly,' said his friend Neigh, at
which there was a laugh--not from anything connected with what he said,
but simply because it was the right thing to laugh when Neigh meant you
to do so.

'Now don't, Neigh--you are too hard upon me.  But, seriously, two or
three fellows were there when I said it, and they all began laughing--but,
then, the Colonel said it in such a queer way, you know.  But you were
asking me about her?  Well, the fact is, between ourselves, I do know
that she is a lady; and I don't mind telling a word--'

'But we would not for the world be the means of making you betray her
confidence--would we, Jones?'

'No, indeed; we would not.'

'No, no; it is not that at all--this is really too bad!--you must listen
just for a moment--'

'Ladywell, don't betray anybody on our account.'

'Whoever the illustrious young lady may be she has seen a great deal of
the world,' said Mr. Doncastle blandly, 'and puts her experience of the
comedy of its emotions, and of its method of showing them, in a very
vivid light.'

'I heard a man say that the novelty with which the ideas are presented is
more noticeable than the originality of the ideas themselves,' observed
Neigh.  'The woman has made a great talk about herself; and I am quite
weary of people asking of her condition, place of abode, has she a
father, has she a mother, or dearer one yet than all other.'

'I would have burlesque quotation put down by Act of Parliament, and all
who dabble in it placed with him who can cite Scripture for his
purposes,' said Ladywell, in retaliation.

After a pause Neigh remarked half-privately to their host, who was his
uncle: 'Your butler Chickerel is a very intelligent man, as I have
heard.'

'Yes, he does very well,' said Mr. Doncastle.

'But is he not a--very extraordinary man?'

'Not to my knowledge,' said Doncastle, looking up surprised.  'Why do you
think that, Alfred?'

'Well, perhaps it was not a matter to mention.  He reads a great deal, I
dare say?'

'I don't think so.'

'I noticed how wonderfully his face kindled when we began talking about
the poems during dinner.  Perhaps he is a poet himself in disguise.  Did
you observe it?'

'No.  To the best of my belief he is a very trustworthy and honourable
man.  He has been with us--let me see, how long?--five months, I think,
and he was fifteen years in his last place.  It certainly is a new side
to his character if he publicly showed any interest in the conversation,
whatever he might have felt.'

'Since the matter has been mentioned,' said Mr. Jones, 'I may say that I
too noticed the singularity of it.'

'If you had not said otherwise,' replied Doncastle somewhat warmly, 'I
should have asserted him to be the last man-servant in London to infringe
such an elementary rule.  If he did so this evening, it is certainly for
the first time, and I sincerely hope that no annoyance was caused--'

'O no, no--not at all--it might have been a mistake of mine,' said Jones.
'I should quite have forgotten the circumstance if Mr. Neigh's words had
not brought it to my mind.  It was really nothing to notice, and I beg
that you will not say a word to him about it on my account.'

'He has a taste that way, my dear uncle, nothing more, depend upon it,'
said Neigh.  'If I had such a man belonging to me I should only be too
proud.  Certainly do not mention it.'

'Of course Chickerel is Chickerel,' Mr. Doncastle rejoined.  'We all know
what that means.  And really, on reflecting, I do remember that he is of
a literary turn of mind--not further by an inch than is commendable, you
know.  I am quite aware as I glance down the papers and prints any
morning that Chickerel's eyes have been over the ground before mine, and
that he generally forestalls the rest of us by a chapter or so in the
last new book sent home; but in these vicious days that particular
weakness is really virtue, just because it is not quite a vice.'

'Yes,' said Mr. Jones, the reflective man in spectacles, 'positive
virtues are getting moved off the stage: negative ones are moved on to
the place of positives; we thank bare justice as we used only to thank
generosity; call a man honest who steals only by law, and consider him a
benefactor if he does not steal at all.'

'Hear, hear!' said Neigh.  'We will decide that Chickerel is even a
better trained fellow than if he had shown no interest at all in his
face.'

'The action being like those trifling irregularities in art at its
vigorous periods, which seemed designed to hide the unpleasant monotony
of absolute symmetry,' said Ladywell.

'On the other hand, an affected want of training of that sort would be
even a better disguise for an artful man than a perfectly impassible
demeanour.  He is two removes from discovery in a hidden scheme, whilst a
neutral face is only one.'

'You quite alarm me by these subtle theories,' said Mr. Doncastle,
laughing; and the subject then became compounded with other matters, till
the speakers rose to rejoin the charming flock upstairs.

* * * * *

In the basement story at this hour Mr. Chickerel the butler, who had
formed the subject of discussion on the floor above, was busily engaged
in looking after his two subordinates as they bustled about in the
operations of clearing away.  He was a man of whom, if the shape of
certain bones and muscles of the face is ever to be taken as a guide to
the character, one might safely have predicated conscientiousness in the
performance of duties, a thorough knowledge of all that appertained to
them, a general desire to live on without troubling his mind about
anything which did not concern him.  Any person interested in the matter
would have assumed without hesitation that the estimate his employer had
given of Chickerel was a true one--more, that not only would the butler
under all ordinary circumstances resolutely prevent his face from showing
curiosity in an unbecoming way, but that, with the soul of a true
gentleman, he would, if necessary, equivocate as readily as the noblest
of his betters to remove any stain upon his honour in such trifles.  Hence
it is apparent that if Chickerel's countenance really appeared, as Neigh
had asserted, full of curiosity with regard to the gossip that was going
on, the feelings which led to the exhibition must have been of a very
unusual and irrepressible kind.

His hair was of that peculiar bluish-white which is to be observed when
the oncoming years, instead of singling out special locks of a man's head
for operating against, advance uniformly over the whole field, and
enfeeble the colour at all points before absolutely extinguishing it
anywhere; his nose was of the knotty shape in the gristle and earthward
tendency in the flesh which is commonly said to carry sound judgment
above it, his eyes were thoughtful, and his face was thin--a contour
which, if it at once abstracted from his features that cheerful assurance
of single-minded honesty which adorns the exteriors of so many of his
brethren, might have raised a presumption in the minds of some beholders
that perhaps in this case the quality might not be altogether wanting
within.

The coffee having been served to the people upstairs, one of the footmen
rushed into his bedroom on the lower floor, and in a few minutes emerged
again in the dress of a respectable clerk who had been born for better
things, with the trifling exceptions that he wore a low-crowned hat, and
instead of knocking his heels on the pavement walked with a gait as
delicate as a lady's.  Going out of the area-door with a cigar in his
mouth, he mounted the steps hastily to keep an appointment round the
corner--the keeping of which as a private gentleman necessitated the
change of the greater part of his clothes twice within a quarter of an
hour--the limit of his time of absence.  The other footman was upstairs,
and the butler, finding that he had a few minutes to himself, sat down at
the table and wrote:--

   'MY DEAR ETHELBERTA,--I did not intend to write to you for some few
   days to come, but the way in which you have been talked about here
   this evening makes me anxious to send a line or two at once, though I
   have very little time to spare, as usual.  We have just had a dinner-
   party--indeed the carriages have not yet been brought round--and the
   talk at dinner was about your verses, of course.  The thing was
   brought up by a young fellow named Ladywell--do you know him?  He is a
   painter by profession, but he has a pretty good private income beyond
   what he gets by practising his line of business among the nobility,
   and that I expect is not little, for he is well known, and encouraged
   because he is young, and good-looking, and so forth.  His family own a
   good bit of land somewhere out Aldbrickham way.  However, I am before
   my story.  From what they all said it is pretty clear that you are
   thought a great deal of in fashionable society as a poetess--but
   perhaps you know this as well as I--moving in it as you do yourself,
   my dear.

   'The ladies afterwards got very curious about your age, so curious, in
   fact, and so full of certainty that you were thirty-five and a
   blighted existence, if an hour, that I felt inclined to rap out there
   and then, and hang what came of it: "My daughter, ladies, was to my
   own and her mother's certain knowledge only twenty-one last birthday,
   and has as bright a heart as anybody in London."  One of them actually
   said that you must be fifty to have got such an experience.  Her guess
   was a very shrewd one in the bottom of it, however, for it was
   grounded upon the way you use those strange experiences of mine in the
   society that I tell you of, and dress them up as if they were yours;
   and, as you see, she hit off my own age to a year.  I thought it was
   very sharp of her to be so right, although so wrong.

   'I do not want to influence your plans in any way about things which
   your school learning fits you to understand much better than I, who
   never had such opportunities, but I think that if I were in your
   place, Berta, I would not let my name be known just yet, for people
   always want what's kept from them, and don't value what's given.  I am
   not sure, but I think that after the women had gone upstairs the
   others turned their thoughts upon you again; what they said about you
   I don't know, for if there's one thing I hate 'tis hanging about the
   doors when the men begin to get moved by their wine, which they did to
   a large extent to-night, and spoke very loud.  They always do here,
   for old Don is a hearty giver in his way.  However, as you see these
   people from their own level now, it is not much that I can tell you in
   seeing them only from the under side, though I see strange things
   sometimes, and of course--

      "What great ones do the less will prattle of,"

   as it says in that book of select pieces that you gave me.

   'Well, my dear girl, I hope you will prosper.  One thing above all
   others you'll have to mind, and it is that folk must continually
   strain to advance in order to remain where they are: and you
   particularly.  But as for trying too hard, I wouldn't do it.  Much
   lies in minding this, that your best plan for lightness of heart is to
   raise yourself a little higher than your old mates, but not so high as
   to be quite out of their reach.  All human beings enjoy themselves
   from the outside, and so getting on a little has this good in it, you
   still keep in your old class where your feelings are, and are
   thoughtfully treated by this class: while by getting on too much you
   are sneered at by your new acquaintance, who don't know the skill of
   your rise, and you are parted from and forgot by the old ones who do.
   Whatever happens, don't be too quick to feel.  You will surely get
   some hard blows when you are found out, for if the great can find no
   excuse for hitting with a mind, they'll do it and say 'twas in fun.
   But you are young and healthy, and youth and health are power.  I wish
   I could have a decent footman here with me, but I suppose it is no use
   trying.  It is such men as these that provoke the contempt we get.
   Well, thank God a few years will see the end of me, for I am growing
   ashamed of my company--so different as they are to the servants of old
   times.--Your affectionate father,             R. CHICKEREL.

   'P.S.--Do not press Lady Petherwin any further to remove the rules on
   which you live with her.  She is quite right: she cannot keep us, and
   to recognize us would do you no good, nor us either.  We are content
   to see you secretly, since it is best for you.'




8. CHRISTOPHER'S LODGINGS--THE GROUNDS ABOUT ROOKINGTON


Meanwhile, in the distant town of Sandbourne, Christopher Julian had
recovered from the weariness produced by his labours at the Wyndway
evening-party where Ethelberta had been a star.  Instead of engaging his
energies to clear encumbrances from the tangled way of his life, he now
set about reading the popular 'Metres by E.' with more interest and
assiduity than ever; for though Julian was a thinker by instinct, he was
a worker by effort only; and the higher of these kinds being dependent
upon the lower for its exhibition, there was often a lamentable lack of
evidence of his power in either.  It is a provoking correlation, and has
conduced to the obscurity of many a genius.

'Kit,' said his sister, on reviving at the end of the bad headache which
had followed the dance, 'those poems seem to have increased in value with
you.  The lady, lofty as she appears to be, would be flattered if she
only could know how much you study them.  Have you decided to thank her
for them?  Now let us talk it over--I like having a chat about such a
pretty new subject.'

'I would thank her in a moment if I were absolutely certain that she had
anything to do with sending them, or even writing them.  I am not quite
sure of that yet.'

'How strange that a woman could bring herself to write those verses!'

'Not at all strange--they are natural outpourings.'

Faith looked critically at the remoter caverns of the fire.

'Why strange?' continued Christopher.  'There is no harm in them.'

'O no--no harm.  But I cannot explain to you--unless you see it partly of
your own accord--that to write them she must be rather a fast lady--not a
bad fast lady; a nice fast lady, I mean, of course.  There, I have said
it now, and I daresay you are vexed with me, for your interest in her has
deepened to what it originally was, I think.  I don't mean any absolute
harm by "fast," Kit.'

'Bold, forward, you mean, I suppose?'

Faith tried to hit upon a better definition which should meet all views;
and, on failing to do so, looked concerned at her brother's somewhat
grieved appearance, and said, helplessly, 'Yes, I suppose I do.'

'My idea of her is quite the reverse.  A poetess must intrinsically be
sensitive, or she could never feel: but then, frankness is a rhetorical
necessity even with the most modest, if their inspirations are to do any
good in the world.  You will, for certain, not be interested in something
I was going to tell you, which I thought would have pleased you
immensely; but it is not worth mentioning now.'

'If you will not tell me, never mind.  But don't be crabbed, Kit!  You
know how interested I am in all your affairs.'

'It is only that I have composed an air to one of the prettiest of her
songs, "When tapers tall"--but I am not sure about the power of it.  This
is how it begins--I threw it off in a few minutes, after you had gone to
bed.'

He went to the piano and lightly touched over an air, the manuscript copy
of which he placed in front of him, and listened to hear her opinion,
having proved its value frequently; for it was not that of a woman
merely, but impersonally human.  Though she was unknown to fame, this was
a great gift in Faith, since to have an unsexed judgment is as precious
as to be an unsexed being is deplorable.

'It is very fair indeed,' said the sister, scarcely moving her lips in
her great attention.  'Now again, and again, and again.  How could you do
it in the time!'

Kit knew that she admired his performance: passive assent was her usual
praise, and she seldom insisted vigorously upon any view of his
compositions unless for purposes of emendation.

'I was thinking that, as I cannot very well write to her, I may as well
send her this,' said Christopher, with lightened spirits, voice to
correspond, and eyes likewise; 'there can be no objection to it, for such
things are done continually.  Consider while I am gone, Faith.  I shall
be out this evening for an hour or two.'

When Christopher left the house shortly after, instead of going into the
town on some errand, as was customary whenever he went from home after
dark, he ascended a back street, passed over the hills behind, and walked
at a brisk pace inland along the road to Rookington Park, where, as he
had learnt, Ethelberta and Lady Petherwin were staying for a time, the
day or two which they spent at Wyndway having formed a short break in the
middle of this visit.  The moon was shining to-night, and Christopher
sped onwards over the pallid high-road as readily as he could have done
at noonday.  In three-quarters of an hour he reached the park gates; and
entering now upon a tract which he had never before explored, he went
along more cautiously and with some uncertainty as to the precise
direction that the road would take.  A frosted expanse of even grass, on
which the shadow of his head appeared with an opal halo round it, soon
allowed the house to be discovered beyond, the other portions of the park
abounding with timber older and finer than that of any other spot in the
neighbourhood.  Christopher withdrew into the shade, and wheeled round to
the front of the building that contained his old love.  Here he gazed and
idled, as many a man has done before him--wondering which room the fair
poetess occupied, waiting till lights began to appear in the upper
windows--which they did as uncertainly as glow-worms blinking up at
eventide--and warming with currents of revived feeling in perhaps the
sweetest of all conditions.  New love is brightest, and long love is
greatest; but revived love is the tenderest thing known upon earth.

Occupied thus, Christopher was greatly surprised to see, on casually
glancing to one side, another man standing close to the shadowy trunk of
another tree, in a similar attitude to his own, gazing, with arms folded,
as blankly at the windows of the house as Christopher himself had been
gazing.  Not willing to be discovered, Christopher stuck closer to his
tree.  While he waited thus, the stranger began murmuring words, in a
slow soft voice.  Christopher listened till he heard the following:--

   'Pale was the day and rayless, love,
      That had an eve so dim.'

Two well-known lines from one of Ethelberta's poems.

Jealousy is a familiar kind of heat which disfigures, licks playfully,
clouds, blackens, and boils a man as a fire does a pot; and on
recognizing these pilferings from what he had grown to regard as his own
treasury, Christopher's fingers began to nestle with great vigour in the
palms of his hands.  Three or four minutes passed, when the unknown rival
gave a last glance at the windows, and walked away.  Christopher did not
like the look of that walk at all--there was grace enough in it to
suggest that his antagonist had no mean chance of finding favour in a
woman's eyes.  A sigh, too, seemed to proceed from the stranger's breast;
but as their distance apart was too great for any such sound to be heard
by any possibility, Christopher set down that to imagination, or to the
brushing of the wind over the trees.

The lighted windows went out one by one, and all the house was in
darkness.  Julian then walked off himself, with a vigour that was
spasmodic only, and with much less brightness of mind than he had
experienced on his journey hither.  The stranger had gone another way,
and Christopher saw no more of him.  When he reached Sandbourne, Faith
was still sitting up.

'But I told you I was going to take a long walk,' he said.

'No, Christopher: really you did not.  How tired and sad you do
look--though I always know beforehand when you are in that state: one of
your feet has a drag about it as you pass along the pavement outside the
window.'

'Yes, I forgot that I did not tell you.'

He could not begin to describe his pilgrimage: it was too silly a thing
even for her to hear of.

'It does not matter at all about my staying up,' said Faith assuringly;
'that is, if exercise benefits you.  Walking up and down the lane, I
suppose?'

'No; not walking up and down the lane.'

'The turnpike-road to Rookington is pleasant.'

'Faith, that is really where I have been.  How came you to know?'

'I only guessed.  Verses and an accidental meeting produce a special
journey.'

'Ethelberta is a fine woman, physically and mentally, both.  I wonder
people do not talk about her twice as much as they do.'

'Then surely you are getting attached to her again.  You think you
discover in her more than anybody else does; and love begins with a sense
of superior discernment.'

'No, no.  That is only nonsense,' he said hurriedly.  'However, love her
or love her not, I can keep a corner of my heart for you, Faith.  There
is another brute after her too, it seems.'

'Of course there is: I expect there are many.  Her position in society is
above ours, so that it is an unwise course to go troubling yourself more
about her.'

'No.  If a needy man must be so foolish as to fall in love, it is best to
do so where he cannot double his foolishness by marrying the woman.'

'I don't like to hear you talk so slightingly of what poor father did.'

Christopher fixed his attention on the supper.  That night, late as it
was, when Faith was in bed and sleeping, he sat before a sheet of music-
paper, neatly copying his composition upon it.  The manuscript was
intended as an offering to Ethelberta at the first convenient
opportunity.

* * * * *

'Well, after all my trouble to find out about Ethelberta, here comes the
clue unasked for,' said the musician to his sister a few days later.

She turned and saw that he was reading the Wessex Reflector.

'What is it?' asked Faith.

'The secret of the true authorship of the book is out at last, and it is
Ethelberta of course.  I am so glad to have it proved hers.'

'But can we believe--?'

'O yes.  Just hear what "Our London Correspondent" says.  It is one of
the nicest bits of gossip that he has furnished us with for a long time.'

'Yes: now read it, do.'

'"The author of 'Metres by E.'"' Christopher began, '"a book of which so
much has been said and conjectured, and one, in fact, that has been the
chief talk for several weeks past of the literary circles to which I
belong, is a young lady who was a widow before she reached the age of
eighteen, and is now not far beyond her fourth lustrum.  I was
additionally informed by a friend whom I met yesterday on his way to the
House of Lords, that her name is Mrs. Petherwin--Christian name
Ethelberta; and that she resides with her mother-in-law at their house in
Exonbury Crescent.  She is, moreover, the daughter of the late Bishop of
Silchester (if report may be believed), whose active benevolence, as your
readers know, left his family in comparatively straitened circumstances
at his death.  The marriage was a secret one, and much against the wish
of her husband's friends, who are wealthy people on all sides.  The death
of the bridegroom two or three weeks after the wedding led to a
reconciliation; and the young poetess was taken to the home which she
still occupies, devoted to the composition of such brilliant effusions as
those the world has lately been favoured with from her pen."'

'If you want to send her your music, you can do so now,' said Faith.

'I might have sent it before, but I wanted to deliver it personally.
However, it is all the same now, I suppose, whether I send it or not.  I
always knew that our destinies would lie apart, though she was once
temporarily under a cloud.  Her momentary inspiration to write that
"Cancelled Words" was the worst possible omen for me.  It showed that,
thinking me no longer useful as a practical chance, she would make me
ornamental as a poetical regret.  But I'll send the manuscript of the
song.'

'In the way of business, as a composer only; and you must say to
yourself, "Ethelberta, as thou art but woman, I dare; but as widow I fear
thee."'

Notwithstanding Christopher's affected carelessness, that evening saw a
great deal of nicety bestowed upon the operation of wrapping up and
sending off the song.  He dropped it into the box and heard it fall, and
with the curious power which he possessed of setting his wisdom to watch
any particular folly in himself that it could not hinder, speculated as
he walked on the result of this first tangible step of return to his old
position as Ethelberta's lover.




9. A LADY'S DRAWING-ROOMS--ETHELBERTA'S DRESSING-ROOM


It was a house on the north side of Hyde Park, between ten and eleven in
the evening, and several intelligent and courteous people had assembled
there to enjoy themselves as far as it was possible to do so in a neutral
way--all carefully keeping every variety of feeling in a state of
solution, in spite of any attempt such feelings made from time to time to
crystallize on interesting subjects in hand.

'Neigh, who is that charming woman with her head built up in a novel way
even for hair architecture--the one with her back towards us?' said a man
whose coat fitted doubtfully to a friend whose coat fitted well.

'Just going to ask for the same information,' said Mr. Neigh, determining
the very longest hair in his beard to an infinitesimal nicety by drawing
its lower portion through his fingers.  'I have quite forgotten--cannot
keep people's names in my head at all; nor could my father either--nor
any of my family--a very odd thing.  But my old friend Mrs. Napper knows
for certain.'  And he turned to one of a small group of middle-aged
persons near, who, instead of skimming the surface of things in general,
like the rest of the company, were going into the very depths of them.

'O--that is the celebrated Mrs. Petherwin, the woman who makes rhymes and
prints 'em,' said Mrs. Napper, in a detached sentence, and then continued
talking again to those on the other side of her.

The two loungers went on with their observations of Ethelberta's
headdress, which, though not extraordinary or eccentric, did certainly
convey an idea of indefinable novelty.  Observers were sometimes half
inclined to think that her cuts and modes were acquired by some secret
communication with the mysterious clique which orders the livery of the
fashionable world, for--and it affords a parallel to cases in which
clever thinkers in other spheres arrive independently at one and the same
conclusion--Ethelberta's fashion often turned out to be the coming one.

'O, is that the woman at last?' said Neigh, diminishing his broad general
gaze at the room to a close criticism of Ethelberta.

'"The rhymes," as Mrs. Napper calls them, are not to be despised,' said
his companion.  'They are not quite virginibus puerisque, and the
writer's opinions of life and society differ very materially from mine,
but I cannot help admiring her in the more reflective pieces; the songs I
don't care for.  The method in which she handles curious subjects, and at
the same time impresses us with a full conviction of her modesty, is very
adroit, and somewhat blinds us to the fact that no such poems were
demanded of her at all.'

'I have not read them,' said Neigh, secretly wrestling with his jaw, to
prevent a yawn; 'but I suppose I must.  The truth is, that I never care
much for reading what one ought to read; I wish I did, but I cannot help
it.  And, no doubt, you admire the lady immensely for writing them: I
don't.  Everybody is so talented now-a-days that the only people I care
to honour as deserving real distinction are those who remain in
obscurity.  I am myself hoping for a corner in some biographical
dictionary when the time comes for those works only to contain lists of
the exceptional individuals of whom nothing is known but that they lived
and died.'

'Ah--listen.  They are going to sing one of her songs,' said his friend,
looking towards a bustling movement in the neighbourhood of the piano.  'I
believe that song, "When tapers tall," has been set to music by three or
four composers already.'

'Men of any note?' said Neigh, at last beaten by his yawn, which courtesy
nevertheless confined within his person to such an extent that only a few
unimportant symptoms, such as reduced eyes and a certain rectangular
manner of mouth in speaking, were visible.

'Scarcely,' replied the other man.  'Established writers of music do not
expend their energies upon new verse until they find that such verse is
likely to endure; for should the poet be soon forgotten, their labour is
in some degree lost.'

'Artful dogs--who would have thought it?' said Neigh, just as an exercise
in words; and they drew nearer to the piano, less to become listeners to
the singing than to be spectators of the scene in that quarter.  But
among some others the interest in the songs seemed to be very great; and
it was unanimously wished that the young lady who had practised the
different pieces of music privately would sing some of them now in the
order of their composers' reputations.  The musical persons in the room
unconsciously resolved themselves into a committee of taste.

One and another had been tried, when, at the end of the third, a lady
spoke to Ethelberta.

'Now, Mrs. Petherwin,' she said, gracefully throwing back her face, 'your
opinion is by far the most valuable.  In which of the cases do you
consider the marriage of verse and tune to have been most successful?'

Ethelberta, finding these and other unexpected calls made upon herself,
came to the front without flinching.

'The sweetest and the best that I like by far,' she said, 'is none of
these.  It is one which reached me by post only this morning from a place
in Wessex, and is written by an unheard-of man who lives somewhere down
there--a man who will be, nevertheless, heard a great deal of some day, I
hope--think.  I have only practised it this afternoon; but, if one's own
judgment is worth anything, it is the best.'

'Let us have your favourite, by all means,' said another friend of
Ethelberta's who was present--Mrs. Doncastle.

'I am so sorry that I cannot oblige you, since you wish to hear it,'
replied the poetess regretfully; 'but the music is at home.  I had not
received it when I lent the others to Miss Belmaine, and it is only in
manuscript like the rest.'

'Could it not be sent for?' suggested an enthusiast who knew that
Ethelberta lived only in the next street, appealing by a look to her, and
then to the mistress of the house.

'Certainly, let us send for it,' said that lady.  A footman was at once
quietly despatched with precise directions as to where Christopher's
sweet production might be found.

'What--is there going to be something interesting?' asked a young married
friend of Mrs. Napper, who had returned to her original spot.

'Yes--the best song she has written is to be sung in the best manner to
the best air that has been composed for it.  I should not wonder if she
were going to sing it herself.'

'Did you know anything of Mrs. Petherwin until her name leaked out in
connection with these ballads?'

'No; but I think I recollect seeing her once before.  She is one of those
people who are known, as one may say, by subscription: everybody knows a
little, till she is astonishingly well known altogether; but nobody knows
her entirely.  She was the orphan child of some clergyman, I believe.
Lady Petherwin, her mother-in-law, has been taking her about a great deal
latterly.'

'She has apparently a very good prospect.'

'Yes; and it is through her being of that curious undefined character
which interprets itself to each admirer as whatever he would like to have
it.  Old men like her because she is so girlish; youths because she is
womanly; wicked men because she is good in their eyes; good men because
she is wicked in theirs.'

'She must be a very anomalous sort of woman, at that rate.'

'Yes.  Like the British Constitution, she owes her success in practice to
her inconsistencies in principle.'

'These poems must have set her up.  She appears to be quite the correct
spectacle.  Happy Mrs. Petherwin!'

The subject of their dialogue was engaged in a conversation with Mrs.
Belmaine upon the management of households--a theme provoked by a
discussion that was in progress in the pages of some periodical of the
time.  Mrs. Belmaine was very full of the argument, and went on from
point to point till she came to servants.

The face of Ethelberta showed caution at once.

'I consider that Lady Plamby pets her servants by far too much,' said
Mrs. Belmaine.  'O, you do not know her?  Well, she is a woman with
theories; and she lends her maids and men books of the wrong kind for
their station, and sends them to picture exhibitions which they don't in
the least understand--all for the improvement of their taste, and morals,
and nobody knows what besides.  It only makes them dissatisfied.'

The face of Ethelberta showed venturesomeness.  'Yes, and dreadfully
ambitious!' she said.

'Yes, indeed.  What a turn the times have taken!  People of that sort
push on, and get into business, and get great warehouses, until at last,
without ancestors, or family, or name, or estate--'

'Or the merest scrap of heirloom or family jewel.'

'Or heirlooms, or family jewels, they are thought as much of as if their
forefathers had glided unobtrusively through the peerage--'

'Ever since the first edition.'

'Yes.'  Mrs. Belmaine, who really sprang from a good old family, had been
going to say, 'for the last seven hundred years,' but fancying from
Ethelberta's addendum that she might not date back more than a trifling
century or so, adopted the suggestion with her usual well-known courtesy,
and blushed down to her locket at the thought of the mistake that she
might have made.  This sensitiveness was a trait in her character which
gave great gratification to her husband, and, indeed, to all who knew
her.

'And have you any theory on the vexed question of servant-government?'
continued Mrs. Belmaine, smiling.  'But no--the subject is of far too
practical a nature for one of your bent, of course.'

'O no--it is not at all too practical.  I have thought of the matter
often,' said Ethelberta.  'I think the best plan would be for somebody to
write a pamphlet, "The Shortest Way with the Servants," just as there was
once written a terribly stinging one, "The Shortest Way with the
Dissenters," which had a great effect.'

'I have always understood that that was written by a dissenter as a
satire upon the Church?'

'Ah--so it was: but the example will do to illustrate my meaning.'

'Quite so--I understand--so it will,' said Mrs. Belmaine, with clouded
faculties.

Meanwhile Christopher's music had arrived.  An accomplished gentleman who
had every musical talent except that of creation, scanned the notes
carefully from top to bottom, and sat down to accompany the singer.  There
was no lady present of sufficient confidence or skill to venture into a
song she had never seen before, and the only one who had seen it was
Ethelberta herself; she did not deny having practised it the greater part
of the afternoon, and was very willing to sing it now if anybody would
derive pleasure from the performance.  Then she began, and the sweetness
of her singing was such that even the most unsympathetic honoured her by
looking as if they would be willing to listen to every note the song
contained if it were not quite so much trouble to do so.  Some were so
interested that, instead of continuing their conversation, they remained
in silent consideration of how they would continue it when she had
finished; while the particularly civil people arranged their countenances
into every attentive form that the mind could devise.  One emotional
gentleman looked at the corner of a chair as if, till that moment, such
an object had never crossed his vision before; the movement of his finger
to the imagined tune was, for a deaf old clergyman, a perfect mine of
interest; whilst a young man from the country was powerless to put an end
to an enchanted gaze at nothing at all in the exact middle of the room
before him.  Neigh, and the general phalanx of cool men and celebrated
club yawners, were so much affected that they raised their chronic look
of great objection to things, to an expression of scarcely any objection
at all.

'What makes it so interesting,' said Mrs. Doncastle to Ethelberta, when
the song was over and she had retired from the focus of the company, 'is,
that it is played from the composer's own copy, which has never met the
public eye, or any other than his own before to-day.  And I see that he
has actually sketched in the lines by hand, instead of having ruled
paper--just as the great old composers used to do.  You must have been as
pleased to get it fresh from the stocks like that as he probably was
pleased to get your thanks.'

Ethelberta became reflective.  She had not thanked Christopher; moreover,
she had decided, after some consideration, that she ought not to thank
him.  What new thoughts were suggested by that remark of Mrs.
Doncastle's, and what new inclination resulted from the public
presentation of his tune and her words as parts of one organic whole, are
best explained by describing her doings at a later hour, when, having
left her friends somewhat early, she had reached home and retired from
public view for that evening.

Ethelberta went to her room, sent away the maid who did double duty for
herself and Lady Petherwin, walked in circles about the carpet till the
fire had grown haggard and cavernous, sighed, took a sheet of paper and
wrote:--

   'DEAR MR. JULIAN,--I have said I would not write: I have said it
   twice; but discretion, under some circumstances, is only another name
   for unkindness.  Before thanking you for your sweet gift, let me tell
   you in a few words of something which may materially change an aspect
   of affairs under which I appear to you to deserve it.

   'With regard to my history and origin you are altogether mistaken; and
   how can I tell whether your bitterness at my previous silence on those
   points may not cause you to withdraw your act of courtesy now?  But
   the gratification of having at last been honest with you may
   compensate even for the loss of your respect.

   'The matter is a small one to tell, after all.  What will you say on
   learning that I am not the trodden-down "lady by birth" that you have
   supposed me?  That my father is not dead, as you probably imagine;
   that he is working for his living as one among a peculiarly
   stigmatized and ridiculed multitude?

   'Had he been a brawny cottager, carpenter, mason, blacksmith, well-
   digger, navvy, tree-feller--any effective and manly trade, in short, a
   worker in which can stand up in the face of the noblest and daintiest,
   and bare his gnarled arms and say, with a consciousness of superior
   power, "Look at a real man!" I should have been able to show you
   antecedents which, if not intensely romantic, are not altogether
   antagonistic to romance.  But the present fashion of associating with
   one particular class everything that is ludicrous and bombastic
   overpowers me when I think of it in relation to myself and your known
   sensitiveness.  When the well-born poetess of good report melts into.
   . .'

Having got thus far, a faint-hearted look, which had begun to show itself
several sentences earlier, became pronounced.  She threw the writing into
the dull fire, poked and stirred it till a red inflammation crept over
the sheet, and then started anew:--

   'DEAR MR. JULIAN,--Not knowing your present rank as composer--whether
   on the very brink of fame, or as yet a long way off--I cannot decide
   what form of expression my earnest acknowledgments should take.  Let
   me simply say in one short phrase, I thank you infinitely!

   'I am no musician, and my opinion on music may not be worth much: yet
   I know what I like (as everybody says, but I do not use the words as a
   form to cover a hopeless blank on all connected with the subject), and
   this sweet air I love.  You must have glided like a breeze about
   me--seen into a heart not worthy of scrutiny, jotted down words that
   cannot justify attention--before you could have apotheosized the song
   in so exquisite a manner.  My gratitude took the form of wretchedness
   when, on hearing the effect of the ballad in public this evening, I
   thought that I had not power to withhold a reply which might do us
   both more harm than good.  Then I said, "Away with all emotion--I wish
   the world was drained dry of it--I will take no notice," when a lady
   whispered at my elbow to the effect that of course I had expressed my
   gratification to you.  I ought first to have mentioned that your
   creation has been played to-night to full drawing-rooms, and the
   original tones cooled the artificial air like a fountain almost.

   'I prophesy great things of you.  Perhaps, at the time when we are
   each but a row of bones in our individual graves, your genius will be
   remembered, while my mere cleverness will have been long forgotten.

   'But--you must allow a woman of experience to say this--the undoubted
   power that you possess will do you socially no good unless you mix
   with it the ingredient of ambition--a quality in which I fear you are
   very deficient.  It is in the hope of stimulating you to a better
   opinion of yourself that I write this letter.

   'Probably I shall never meet you again.  Not that I think
   circumstances to be particularly powerful to prevent such a meeting,
   rather it is that I shall energetically avoid it.  There can be no
   such thing as strong friendship between a man and a woman not of one
   family.

   'More than that there must not be, and this is why we will not meet.
   You see that I do not mince matters at all; but it is hypocrisy to
   avoid touching upon a subject which all men and women in our position
   inevitably think of, no matter what they say.  Some women might have
   written distantly, and wept at the repression of their real feeling;
   but it is better to be more frank, and keep a dry eye.--Yours,
   ETHELBERTA.'

Her feet felt cold and her heart weak as she directed the letter, and she
was overpowered with weariness.  But murmuring, 'If I let it stay till
the morning I shall not send it, and a man may be lost to fame because of
a woman's squeamishness--it shall go,' she partially dressed herself,
wrapped a large cloak around her, descended the stairs, and went out to
the pillar-box at the corner, leaving the door not quite close.  No gust
of wind had realized her misgivings that it might be blown shut on her
return, and she re-entered as softly as she had emerged.

It will be seen that Ethelberta had said nothing about her family after
all.




10. LADY PETHERWIN'S HOUSE


The next day old Lady Petherwin, who had not accompanied Ethelberta the
night before, came into the morning-room, with a newspaper in her hand.

'What does this mean, Ethelberta?' she inquired in tones from which every
shade of human expressiveness was extracted by some awful and imminent
mood that lay behind.  She was pointing to a paragraph under the heading
of 'Literary Notes,' which contained in a few words the announcement of
Ethelberta's authorship that had more circumstantially appeared in the
Wessex Reflector.

'It means what it says,' said Ethelberta quietly.

'Then it is true?'

'Yes.  I must apologize for having kept it such a secret from you.  It
was not done in the spirit that you may imagine: it was merely to avoid
disturbing your mind that I did it so privately.'

'But surely you have not written every one of those ribald verses?'

Ethelberta looked inclined to exclaim most vehemently against this; but
what she actually did say was, '"Ribald"--what do you mean by that?  I
don't think that you are aware what "ribald" means.'

'I am not sure that I am.  As regards some words as well as some persons,
the less you are acquainted with them the more it is to your credit.'

'I don't quite deserve this, Lady Petherwin.'

'Really, one would imagine that women wrote their books during those
dreams in which people have no moral sense, to see how improper some,
even virtuous, ladies become when they get into print.'

'I might have done a much more unnatural thing than write those poems.
And perhaps I might have done a much better thing, and got less praise.
But that's the world's fault, not mine.'

'You might have left them unwritten, and shown more fidelity.'

'Fidelity! it is more a matter of humour than principle.  What has
fidelity to do with it?'

'Fidelity to my dear boy's memory.'

'It would be difficult to show that because I have written so-called
tender and gay verse, I feel tender and gay.  It is too often assumed
that a person's fancy is a person's real mind.  I believe that in the
majority of cases one is fond of imagining the direct opposite of one's
principles in sheer effort after something fresh and free; at any rate,
some of the lightest of those rhymes were composed between the deepest
fits of dismals I have ever known.  However, I did expect that you might
judge in the way you have judged, and that was my chief reason for not
telling you what I had done.'

'You don't deny that you tried to escape from recollections you ought to
have cherished?  There is only one thing that women of your sort are as
ready to do as to take a man's name, and that is, drop his memory.'

'Dear Lady Petherwin--don't be so unreasonable as to blame a live person
for living!  No woman's head is so small as to be filled for life by a
memory of a few months.  Four years have passed since I last saw my boy-
husband.  We were mere children; see how I have altered since in mind,
substance, and outline--I have even grown half an inch taller since his
death.  Two years will exhaust the regrets of widows who have long been
faithful wives; and ought I not to show a little new life when my husband
died in the honeymoon?'

'No.  Accepting the protection of your husband's mother was, in effect,
an avowal that you rejected the idea of being a widow to prolong the idea
of being a wife; and the sin against your conventional state thus assumed
is almost as bad as would have been a sin against the married state
itself.  If you had gone off when he died, saying, "Thank heaven, I am
free!" you would, at any rate, have shown some real honesty.'

'I should have been more virtuous by being more unfeeling.  That often
happens.'

'I have taken to you, and made a great deal of you--given you the
inestimable advantages of foreign travel and good society to enlarge your
mind.  In short, I have been like a Naomi to you in everything, and I
maintain that writing these poems saps the foundation of it all.'

'I do own that you have been a very good Naomi to me thus far; but Ruth
was quite a fast widow in comparison with me, and yet Naomi never blamed
her.  You are unfortunate in your illustration.  But it is dreadfully
flippant of me to answer you like this, for you have been kind.  But why
will you provoke me!'

'Yes, you are flippant, Ethelberta.  You are too much given to that sort
of thing.'

'Well, I don't know how the secret of my name has leaked out; and I am
not ribald, or anything you say,' said Ethelberta, with a sigh.

'Then you own you do not feel so ardent as you seem in your book?'

'I do own it.'

'And that you are sorry your name has been published in connection with
it?'

'I am.'

'And you think the verses may tend to misrepresent your character as a
gay and rapturous one, when it is not?'

'I do fear it.'

'Then, of course, you will suppress the poems instantly.  That is the
only way in which you can regain the position you have hitherto held with
me.'

Ethelberta said nothing; and the dull winter atmosphere had far from
light enough in it to show by her face what she might be thinking.

'Well?' said Lady Petherwin.

'I did not expect such a command as that,' said Ethelberta.  'I have been
obedient for four years, and would continue so--but I cannot suppress the
poems.  They are not mine now to suppress.'

'You must get them into your hands.  Money will do it, I suppose?'

'Yes, I suppose it would--a thousand pounds.'

'Very well; the money shall be forthcoming,' said Lady Petherwin, after a
pause.  'You had better sit down and write about it at once.'

'I cannot do it,' said Ethelberta; 'and I will not.  I don't wish them to
be suppressed.  I am not ashamed of them; there is nothing to be ashamed
of in them; and I shall not take any steps in the matter.'

'Then you are an ungrateful woman, and wanting in natural affection for
the dead!  Considering your birth--'

'That's an intolerable--'

Lady Petherwin crashed out of the room in a wind of indignation, and went
upstairs and heard no more.  Adjoining her chamber was a smaller one
called her study, and, on reaching this, she unlocked a cabinet, took out
a small deed-box, removed from it a folded packet, unfolded it, crumpled
it up, and turning round suddenly flung it into the fire.  Then she stood
and beheld it eaten away word after word by the flames, 'Testament'--'all
that freehold'--'heirs and assigns' appearing occasionally for a moment
only to disappear for ever.  Nearly half the document had turned into a
glossy black when the lady clasped her hands.

'What have I done!' she exclaimed.  Springing to the tongs she seized
with them the portion of the writing yet unconsumed, and dragged it out
of the fire.  Ethelberta appeared at the door.

'Quick, Ethelberta!' said Lady Petherwin.  'Help me to put this out!'  And
the two women went trampling wildly upon the document and smothering it
with a corner of the hearth-rug.

'What is it?' said Ethelberta.

'My will!' said Lady Petherwin.  'I have kept it by me lately, for I have
wished to look over it at leisure--'

'Good heavens!' said Ethelberta.  'And I was just coming in to tell you
that I would always cling to you, and never desert you, ill-use me how
you might!'

'Such an affectionate remark sounds curious at such a time,' said Lady
Petherwin, sinking down in a chair at the end of the struggle.

'But,' cried Ethelberta, 'you don't suppose--'

'Selfishness, my dear, has given me such crooked looks that I can see it
round a corner.'

'If you mean that what is yours to give may not be mine to take, it would
be as well to name it in an impersonal way, if you must name it at all,'
said the daughter-in-law, with wet eyelids.  'God knows I had no selfish
thought in saying that.  I came upstairs to ask you to forgive me, and
knew nothing about the will.  But every explanation distorts it all the
more!'

'We two have got all awry, dear--it cannot be concealed--awry--awry.  Ah,
who shall set us right again?  However, now I must send for Mr.
Chancerly--no, I am going out on other business, and I will call upon
him.  There, don't spoil your eyes: you may have to sell them.'

She rang the bell and ordered the carriage; and half-an-hour later Lady
Petherwin's coachman drove his mistress up to the door of her lawyer's
office in Lincoln's Inn Fields.




11. SANDBOURNE AND ITS NEIGHBOURHOOD--SOME LONDON STREETS


While this was going on in town, Christopher, at his lodgings in
Sandbourne, had been thrown into rare old visions and dreams by the
appearance of Ethelberta's letter.  Flattered and encouraged to ambition
as well as to love by her inspiriting sermon, he put off now the last
remnant of cynical doubt upon the genuineness of his old mistress, and
once and for all set down as disloyal a belief he had latterly acquired
that 'Come, woo me, woo me; for I am like enough to consent,' was all a
young woman had to tell.

All the reasoning of political and social economists would not have
convinced Christopher that he had a better chance in London than in
Sandbourne of making a decent income by reasonable and likely labour; but
a belief in a far more improbable proposition, impetuously expressed,
warmed him with the idea that he might become famous there.  The greater
is frequently more readily credited than the less, and an argument which
will not convince on a matter of halfpence appears unanswerable when
applied to questions of glory and honour.

The regulation wet towel and strong coffee of the ambitious and
intellectual student floated before him in visions; but it was with a
sense of relief that he remembered that music, in spite of its drawbacks
as a means of sustenance, was a profession happily unencumbered with
those excruciating preliminaries to greatness.

Christopher talked about the new move to his sister, and he was vexed
that her hopefulness was not roused to quite the pitch of his own.  As
with others of his sort, his too general habit of accepting the most
clouded possibility that chances offered was only transcended by his
readiness to kindle with a fitful excitement now and then.  Faith was
much more equable.  'If you were not the most melancholy man God ever
created,' she said, kindly looking at his vague deep eyes and thin face,
which was but a few degrees too refined and poetical to escape the
epithet of lantern-jawed from any one who had quarrelled with him, 'you
would not mind my coolness about this.  It is a good thing of course to
go; I have always fancied that we were mistaken in coming here.
Mediocrity stamped "London" fetches more than talent marked "provincial."
But I cannot feel so enthusiastic.'

'Still, if we are to go, we may as well go by enthusiasm as by
calculation; it is a sensation pleasanter to the nerves, and leads to
just as good a result when there is only one result possible.'

'Very well,' said Faith.  'I will not depress you.  If I had to describe
you I should say you were a child in your impulses, and an old man in
your reflections.  Have you considered when we shall start?'

'Yes.'

'What have you thought?'

'That we may very well leave the place in six weeks if we wish.'

'We really may?'

'Yes.  And what is more, we will.'

* * * * *

Christopher and Faith arrived in London on an afternoon at the end of
winter, and beheld from one of the river bridges snow-white scrolls of
steam from the tall chimneys of Lambeth, rising against the livid sky
behind, as if drawn in chalk on toned cardboard.

The first thing he did that evening, when settled in their apartments
near the British Museum, before applying himself to the beginning of the
means by which success in life might be attained, was to go out in the
direction of Ethelberta's door, leaving Faith unpacking the things, and
sniffing extraordinary smoke-smells which she discovered in all nooks and
crannies of the rooms.  It was some satisfaction to see Ethelberta's
house, although the single feature in which it differed from the other
houses in the Crescent was that no lamp shone from the fanlight over the
entrance--a speciality which, if he cared for omens, was hardly
encouraging.  Fearing to linger near lest he might be detected,
Christopher stole a glimpse at the door and at the steps, imagined what a
trifle of the depression worn in each step her feet had tended to
produce, and strolled home again.

Feeling that his reasons for calling just now were scarcely sufficient,
he went next day about the business that had brought him to town, which
referred to a situation as organist in a large church in the north-west
district.  The post was half ensured already, and he intended to make of
it the nucleus of a professional occupation and income.  Then he sat down
to think of the preliminary steps towards publishing the song that had so
pleased her, and had also, as far as he could understand from her letter,
hit the popular taste very successfully; a fact which, however little it
may say for the virtues of the song as a composition, was a great
recommendation to it as a property.  Christopher was delighted to
perceive that out of this position he could frame an admissible, if not
an unimpeachable, reason for calling upon Ethelberta.  He determined to
do so at once, and obtain the required permission by word of mouth.

He was greatly surprised, when the front of the house appeared in view on
this spring afternoon, to see what a white and sightless aspect pervaded
all the windows.  He came close: the eyeball blankness was caused by all
the shutters and blinds being shut tight from top to bottom.  Possibly
this had been the case for some time--he could not tell.  In one of the
windows was a card bearing the announcement, 'This House to be let
Furnished.'  Here was a merciless clash between fancy and fact.
Regretting now his faint-heartedness in not letting her know beforehand
by some means that he was about to make a new start in the world, and
coming to dwell near her, Christopher rang the bell to make inquiries.  A
gloomy caretaker appeared after a while, and the young man asked whither
the ladies had gone to live.  He was beyond measure depressed to learn
that they were in the South of France--Arles, the man thought the place
was called--the time of their return to town being very uncertain; though
one thing was clear, they meant to miss the forthcoming London season
altogether.

As Christopher's hope to see her again had brought a resolve to do so, so
now resolve led to dogged patience.  Instead of attempting anything by
letter, he decided to wait; and he waited well, occupying himself in
publishing a 'March' and a 'Morning and Evening Service in E flat.'  Some
four-part songs, too, engaged his attention when the heavier duties of
the day were over--these duties being the giving of lessons in harmony
and counterpoint, in which he was aided by the introductions of a man
well known in the musical world, who had been acquainted with young
Julian as a promising amateur long before he adopted music as the staff
of his pilgrimage.

It was the end of summer when he again tried his fortune at the house in
Exonbury Crescent.  Scarcely calculating upon finding her at this
stagnant time of the town year, and only hoping for information, Julian
was surprised and excited to see the shutters open, and the house wearing
altogether a living look, its neighbours having decidedly died off
meanwhile.

'The family here,' said a footman in answer to his inquiry, 'are only
temporary tenants of the house.  It is not Lady Petherwin's people.'

'Do you know the Petherwins' present address?'

'Underground, sir, for the old lady.  She died some time ago in
Switzerland, and was buried there, I believe.'

'And Mrs. Petherwin--the young lady,' said Christopher, starting.

'We are not acquainted personally with the family,' the man replied.  'My
master has only taken the house for a few months, whilst extensive
alterations are being made in his own on the other side of the park,
which he goes to look after every day.  If you want any further
information about Lady Petherwin, Mrs. Petherwin will probably give it.  I
can let you have her address.'

'Ah, yes; thank you,' said Christopher.

The footman handed him one of some cards which appeared to have been left
for the purpose.  Julian, though tremblingly anxious to know where
Ethelberta was, did not look at it till he could take a cool survey in
private.  The address was 'Arrowthorne Lodge, Upper Wessex.'

'Dear me!' said Christopher to himself, 'not far from Melchester; and not
dreadfully far from Sandbourne.'




12. ARROWTHORNE PARK AND LODGE


Summer was just over when Christopher Julian found himself rattling along
in the train to Sandbourne on some trifling business appertaining to his
late father's affairs, which would afford him an excuse for calling at
Arrowthorne about the song of hers that he wished to produce.  He
alighted in the afternoon at a little station some twenty miles short of
Sandbourne, and leaving his portmanteau behind him there, decided to walk
across the fields, obtain if possible the interview with the lady, and
return then to the station to finish the journey to Sandbourne, which he
could thus reach at a convenient hour in the evening, and, if he chose,
take leave of again the next day.

It was an afternoon which had a fungous smell out of doors, all being
sunless and stagnant overhead and around.  The various species of trees
had begun to assume the more distinctive colours of their decline, and
where there had been one pervasive green were now twenty greenish
yellows, the air in the vistas between them being half opaque with blue
exhalation.  Christopher in his walk overtook a countryman, and inquired
if the path they were following would lead him to Arrowthorne Lodge.

''Twill take 'ee into Arr'thorne Park,' the man replied.  'But you won't
come anigh the Lodge, unless you bear round to the left as might be.'

'Mrs. Petherwin lives there, I believe?'

'No, sir.  Leastwise unless she's but lately come.  I have never heard of
such a woman.'

'She may possibly be only visiting there.'

'Ah, perhaps that's the shape o't.  Well, now you tell o't, I have seen a
strange face thereabouts once or twice lately.  A young good-looking maid
enough, seemingly.'

'Yes, she's considered a very handsome lady.'

'I've heard the woodmen say, now that you tell o't, that they meet her
every now and then, just at the closing in of the day, as they come home
along with their nitches of sticks; ay, stalking about under the trees by
herself--a tall black martel, so long-legged and awful-like that you'd
think 'twas the old feller himself a-coming, they say.  Now a woman must
be a queer body to my thinking, to roam about by night so lonesome and
that?  Ay, now that you tell o't, there is such a woman, but 'a never
have showed in the parish; sure I never thought who the body was--no, not
once about her, nor where 'a was living and that--not I, till you spoke.
Well, there, sir, that's Arr'thorne Lodge; do you see they three elms?'
He pointed across the glade towards some confused foliage a long way off.

'I am not sure about the sort of tree you mean,' said Christopher, 'I see
a number of trees with edges shaped like edges of clouds.'

'Ay, ay, they be oaks; I mean the elms to the left hand.'

'But a man can hardly tell oaks from elms at that distance, my good
fellow!'

'That 'a can very well--leastwise, if he's got the sense.'

'Well, I think I see what you mean,' said Christopher.  'What next?'

'When you get there, you bear away smart to nor'-west, and you'll come
straight as a line to the Lodge.'

'How the deuce am I to know which is north-west in a strange place, with
no sun to tell me?'

'What, not know nor-west?  Well, I should think a boy could never live
and grow up to be a man without knowing the four quarters.  I knowed 'em
when I was a mossel of a chiel.  We be no great scholars here, that's
true, but there isn't a Tom-rig or Jack-straw in these parts that don't
know where they lie as well as I.  Now I've lived, man and boy, these
eight-and-sixty years, and never met a man in my life afore who hadn't
learnt such a common thing as the four quarters.'

Christopher parted from his companion and soon reached a stile,
clambering over which he entered a park.  Here he threaded his way, and
rounding a clump of aged trees the young man came in view of a light and
elegant country-house in the half-timbered Gothic style of the late
revival, apparently only a few years old.  Surprised at finding himself
so near, Christopher's heart fluttered unmanageably till he had taken an
abstract view of his position, and, in impatience at his want of nerve,
adopted a sombre train of reasoning to convince himself that, far from
indulgence in the passion of love bringing bliss, it was a folly, leading
to grief and disquiet--certainly one which would do him no good.  Cooled
down by this, he stepped into the drive and went up to the house.

'Is Mrs. Petherwin at home?' he said modestly.

'Who did you say, sir?'

He repeated the name.

'Don't know the person.'

'The lady may be a visitor--I call on business.'

'She is not visiting in this house, sir.'

'Is not this Arrowthorne Lodge?'

'Certainly not.'

'Then where is Arrowthorne Lodge, please?'

'Well, it is nearly a mile from here.  Under the trees by the high-road.
If you go across by that footpath it will bring you out quicker than by
following the bend of the drive.'

Christopher wondered how he could have managed to get into the wrong
park; but, setting it down to his ignorance of the difference between oak
and elm, he immediately retraced his steps, passing across the park
again, through the gate at the end of the drive, and into the turnpike
road.  No other gate, park, or country seat of any description was within
view.

'Can you tell me the way to Arrowthorne Lodge?' he inquired of the first
person he met, who was a little girl.

'You are just coming away from it, sir,' said she.  'I'll show you; I am
going that way.'

They walked along together.  Getting abreast the entrance of the park he
had just emerged from, the child said, 'There it is, sir; I live there
too.'

Christopher, with a dazed countenance, looked towards a cottage which
stood nestling in the shrubbery and ivy like a mushroom among grass.  'Is
that Arrowthorne Lodge?' he repeated.

'Yes, and if you go up the drive, you come to Arrowthorne House.'

'Arrowthorne Lodge--where Mrs. Petherwin lives, I mean.'

'Yes.  She lives there along wi' mother and we.  But she don't want
anybody to know it, sir, cause she's celebrate, and 'twouldn't do at
all.'

Christopher said no more, and the little girl became interested in the
products of the bank and ditch by the wayside.  He left her, pushed open
the heavy gate, and tapped at the Lodge door.

The latch was lifted.  'Does Mrs. Petherwin,' he began, and, determined
that there should be no mistake, repeated, 'Does Mrs. Ethelberta
Petherwin, the poetess, live here?' turning full upon the person who
opened the door.

'She does, sir,' said a faltering voice; and he found himself face to
face with the pupil-teacher of Sandbourne.




13. THE LODGE (continued)--THE COPSE BEHIND


'This is indeed a surprise; I--am glad to see you!' Christopher
stammered, with a wire-drawn, radically different smile from the one he
had intended--a smile not without a tinge of ghastliness.

'Yes--I am home for the holidays,' said the blushing maiden; and, after a
critical pause, she added, 'If you wish to speak to my sister, she is in
the plantation with the children.'

'O no--no, thank you--not necessary at all,' said Christopher, in haste.
'I only wish for an interview with a lady called Mrs. Petherwin.'

'Yes; Mrs Petherwin--my sister,' said Picotee.  'She is in the
plantation.  That little path will take you to her in five minutes.'

The amazed Christopher persuaded himself that this discovery was very
delightful, and went on persuading so long that at last he felt it to be
so.  Unable, like many other people, to enjoy being satirized in words
because of the irritation it caused him as aimed-at victim, he sometimes
had philosophy enough to appreciate a satire of circumstance, because
nobody intended it.  Pursuing the path indicated, he found himself in a
thicket of scrubby undergrowth, which covered an area enclosed from the
park proper by a decaying fence.  The boughs were so tangled that he was
obliged to screen his face with his hands, to escape the risk of having
his eyes filliped out by the twigs that impeded his progress.  Thus
slowly advancing, his ear caught, between the rustles, the tones of a
voice in earnest declamation; and, pushing round in that direction, he
beheld through some beech boughs an open space about ten yards in
diameter, floored at the bottom with deep beds of curled old leaves, and
cushions of furry moss.  In the middle of this natural theatre was the
stump of a tree that had been felled by a saw, and upon the flat stool
thus formed stood Ethelberta, whom Christopher had not beheld since the
ball at Wyndway House.

Round her, leaning against branches or prostrate on the ground, were five
or six individuals.  Two were young mechanics--one of them evidently a
carpenter.  Then there was a boy about thirteen, and two or three younger
children.  Ethelberta's appearance answered as fully as ever to that of
an English lady skilfully perfected in manner, carriage, look, and
accent; and the incongruity of her present position among lives which had
had many of Nature's beauties stamped out of them, and few of the
beauties of Art stamped in, brought him, as a second feeling, a pride in
her that almost equalled his first sentiment of surprise.  Christopher's
attention was meanwhile attracted from the constitution of the group to
the words of the speaker in the centre of it--words to which her auditors
were listening with still attention.

It appeared to Christopher that Ethelberta had lately been undergoing
some very extraordinary experiences.  What the beginning of them had been
he could not in the least understand, but the portion she was describing
came distinctly to his ears, and he wondered more and more.

'He came forward till he, like myself, was about twenty yards from the
edge.  I instinctively grasped my useless stiletto.  How I longed for the
assistance which a little earlier I had so much despised!  Reaching the
block or boulder upon which I had been sitting, he clasped his arms
around from behind; his hands closed upon the empty seat, and he jumped
up with an oath.  This method of attack told me a new thing with wretched
distinctness; he had, as I suppose, discovered my sex, male attire was to
serve my turn no longer.  The next instant, indeed, made it clear, for he
exclaimed, "You don't escape me, masquerading madam," or some such words,
and came on.  My only hope was that in his excitement he might forget to
notice where the grass terminated near the edge of the cliff, though this
could be easily felt by a careful walker: to make my own feeling more
distinct on this point I hastily bared my feet.'

The listeners moistened their lips, Ethelberta took breath, and then went
on to describe the scene that ensued, 'A dreadful variation on the game
of Blindman's buff,' being the words by which she characterized it.

Ethelberta's manner had become so impassioned at this point that the lips
of her audience parted, the children clung to their elders, and
Christopher could control himself no longer.  He thrust aside the boughs,
and broke in upon the group.

'For Heaven's sake, Ethelberta,' he exclaimed with great excitement,
'where did you meet with such a terrible experience as that?'

The children shrieked, as if they thought that the interruption was in
some way the catastrophe of the events in course of narration.  Every one
started up; the two young mechanics stared, and one of them inquired, in
return, 'What's the matter, friend?'

Christopher had not yet made reply when Ethelberta stepped from her
pedestal down upon the crackling carpet of deep leaves.

'Mr. Julian!' said she, in a serene voice, turning upon him eyes of such
a disputable stage of colour, between brown and grey, as would have
commended itself to a gallant duellist of the last century as a point on
which it was absolutely necessary to take some friend's life or other.
But the calmness was artificially done, and the astonishment that did not
appear in Ethelberta's tones was expressed by her gaze.  Christopher was
not in a mood to draw fine distinctions between recognized and
unrecognized organs of speech.  He replied to the eyes.

'I own that your surprise is natural,' he said, with an anxious look into
her face, as if he wished to get beyond this interpolated scene to
something more congenial and understood.  'But my concern at such a
history of yourself since I last saw you is even more natural than your
surprise at my manner of breaking in.'

'That history would justify any conduct in one who hears it--'

'Yes, indeed.'

'If it were true,' added Ethelberta, smiling.  'But it is as false as--'
She could name nothing notoriously false without raising an image of what
was disagreeable, and she continued in a better manner: 'The story I was
telling is entirely a fiction, which I am getting up for a particular
purpose--very different from what appears at present.'

'I am sorry there was such a misunderstanding,' Christopher stammered,
looking upon the ground uncertain and ashamed.  'Yet I am not, either,
for I am very glad you have not undergone such trials, of course.  But
the fact is, I--being in the neighbourhood--I ventured to call on a
matter of business, relating to a poem which I had the pleasure of
setting to music at the beginning of the year.'

Ethelberta was only a little less ill at ease than Christopher showed
himself to be by this way of talking.

'Will you walk slowly on?' she said gently to the two young men, 'and
take the children with you; this gentleman wishes to speak to me on
business.'

The biggest young man caught up a little one under his arm, and plunged
amid the boughs; another little one lingered behind for a few moments to
look shyly at Christopher, with an oblique manner of hiding her mouth
against her shoulder and her eyes behind her pinafore.  Then she
vanished, the boy and the second young man followed, and Ethelberta and
Christopher stood within the wood-bound circle alone.

'I hope I have caused no inconvenience by interrupting the proceedings,'
said Christopher softly; 'but I so very much wished to see you!'

'Did you, indeed--really wish to see me?' she said gladly.  'Never mind
inconvenience then; it is a word which seems shallow in meaning under the
circumstances.  I surely must say that a visit is to my advantage, must I
not?  I am not as I was, you see, and may receive as advantages what I
used to consider as troubles.'

'Has your life really changed so much?'

'It has changed.  But what I first meant was that an interesting visitor
at a wrong time is better than a stupid one at a right time.'

'I had been behind the trees for some minutes, looking at you, and
thinking of you; but what you were doing rather interrupted my first
meditation.  I had thought of a meeting in which we should continue our
intercourse at the point at which it was broken off years ago, as if the
omitted part had not existed at all; but something, I cannot tell what,
has upset all that feeling, and--'

'I can soon tell you the meaning of my extraordinary performance,'
Ethelberta broke in quickly, and with a little trepidation.  'My mother-
in-law, Lady Petherwin, is dead; and she has left me nothing but her
house and furniture in London--more than I deserve, but less than she had
distinctly led me to expect; and so I am somewhat in a corner.'

'It is always so.'

'Not always, I think.  But this is how it happened.  Lady Petherwin was
very capricious; when she was not foolishly kind she was unjustly harsh.
A great many are like it, never thinking what a good thing it would be,
instead of going on tacking from side to side between favour and cruelty,
to keep to a mean line of common justice.  And so we quarrelled, and she,
being absolute mistress of all her wealth, destroyed her will that was in
my favour, and made another, leaving me nothing but the fag-end of the
lease of the town-house and the furniture in it.  Then, when we were
abroad, she turned to me again, forgave everything, and, becoming ill
afterwards, wrote a letter to the brother, to whom she had left the bulk
of her property, stating that I was to have twenty-thousand of the one-
hundred-thousand pounds she had bequeathed to him--as in the original
will--doing this by letter in case anything should happen to her before a
new will could be considered, drawn, and signed, and trusting to his
honour quite that he would obey her expressed wish should she die abroad.
Well, she did die, in the full persuasion that I was provided for; but
her brother (as I secretly expected all the time) refused to be morally
bound by a document which had no legal value, and the result is that he
has everything, except, of course, the furniture and the lease.  It would
have been enough to break the heart of a person who had calculated upon
getting a fortune, which I never did; for I felt always like an intruder
and a bondswoman, and had wished myself out of the Petherwin family a
hundred times, with my crust of bread and liberty.  For one thing, I was
always forbidden to see my relatives, and it pained me much.  Now I am
going to move for myself, and consider that I have a good chance of
success in what I may undertake, because of an indifference I feel about
succeeding which gives the necessary coolness that any great task
requires.'

'I presume you mean to write more poems?'

'I cannot--that is, I can write no more that satisfy me.  To blossom into
rhyme on the sparkling pleasures of life, you must be under the influence
of those pleasures, and I am at present quite removed from
them--surrounded by gaunt realities of a very different description.'

'Then try the mournful.  Trade upon your sufferings: many do, and
thrive.'

'It is no use to say that--no use at all.  I cannot write a line of
verse.  And yet the others flowed from my heart like a stream.  But
nothing is so easy as to seem clever when you have money.'

'Except to seem stupid when you have none,' said Christopher, looking at
the dead leaves.

Ethelberta allowed herself to linger on that thought for a few seconds;
and continued, 'Then the question arose, what was I to do?  I felt that
to write prose would be an uncongenial occupation, and altogether a poor
prospect for a woman like me.  Finally I have decided to appear in
public.'

'Not on the stage?'

'Certainly not on the stage.  There is no novelty in a poor lady turning
actress, and novelty is what I want.  Ordinary powers exhibited in a new
way effect as much as extraordinary powers exhibited in an old way.'

'Yes--so they do.  And extraordinary powers, and a new way too, would be
irresistible.'

'I don't calculate upon both.  I had written a prose story by request,
when it was found that I had grown utterly inane over verse.  It was
written in the first person, and the style was modelled after De Foe's.
The night before sending it off, when I had already packed it up, I was
reading about the professional story-tellers of Eastern countries, who
devoted their lives to the telling of tales.  I unfastened the manuscript
and retained it, convinced that I should do better by telling the story.'

'Well thought of!' exclaimed Christopher, looking into her face.  'There
is a way for everybody to live, if they can only find it out.'

'It occurred to me,' she continued, blushing slightly, 'that tales of the
weird kind were made to be told, not written.  The action of a teller is
wanted to give due effect to all stories of incident; and I hope that a
time will come when, as of old, instead of an unsocial reading of fiction
at home alone, people will meet together cordially, and sit at the feet
of a professed romancer.  I am going to tell my tales before a London
public.  As a child, I had a considerable power in arresting the
attention of other children by recounting adventures which had never
happened; and men and women are but children enlarged a little.  Look at
this.'

She drew from her pocket a folded paper, shook it abroad, and disclosed a
rough draft of an announcement to the effect that Mrs. Petherwin,
Professed Story-teller, would devote an evening to that ancient form of
the romancer's art, at a well-known fashionable hall in London.  'Now you
see,' she continued, 'the meaning of what you observed going on here.
That you heard was one of three tales I am preparing, with a view of
selecting the best.  As a reserved one, I have the tale of my own life--to
be played as a last card.  It was a private rehearsal before my brothers
and sisters--not with any view of obtaining their criticism, but that I
might become accustomed to my own voice in the presence of listeners.'

'If I only had had half your enterprise, what I might have done in the
world!'

'Now did you ever consider what a power De Foe's manner would have if
practised by word of mouth?  Indeed, it is a style which suits itself
infinitely better to telling than to writing, abounding as it does in
colloquialisms that are somewhat out of place on paper in these days, but
have a wonderful power in making a narrative seem real.  And so, in
short, I am going to talk De Foe on a subject of my own.  Well?'

The last word had been given tenderly, with a long-drawn sweetness, and
was caused by a look that Christopher was bending upon her at the moment,
in which he revealed that he was thinking less of the subject she was so
eagerly and hopefully descanting upon than upon her aspect in explaining
it.  It is a fault of manner particularly common among men newly imported
into the society of bright and beautiful women; and we will hope that,
springing as it does from no unworthy source, it is as soon forgiven in
the general world as it was here.

'I was only following a thought,' said Christopher:--'a thought of how I
used to know you, and then lost sight of you, and then discovered you
famous, and how we are here under these sad autumn trees, and nobody in
sight.'

'I think it must be tea-time,' she said suddenly.  'Tea is a great meal
with us here--you will join us, will you not?'  And Ethelberta began to
make for herself a passage through the boughs.  Another rustle was heard
a little way off, and one of the children appeared.

'Emmeline wants to know, please, if the gentleman that come to see 'ee
will stay to tea; because, if so, she's agoing to put in another spoonful
for him and a bit of best green.'

'O Georgina--how candid!  Yes, put in some best green.'

Before Christopher could say any more to her, they were emerging by the
corner of the cottage, and one of the brothers drew near them.  'Mr.
Julian, you'll bide and have a cup of tea wi' us?' he inquired of
Christopher.  'An old friend of yours, is he not, Mrs. Petherwin?  Dan
and I be going back to Sandbourne to-night, and we can walk with 'ee as
far as the station.'

'I shall be delighted,' said Christopher; and they all entered the
cottage.  The evening had grown clearer by this time; the sun was peeping
out just previous to departure, and sent gold wires of light across the
glades and into the windows, throwing a pattern of the diamond quarries,
and outlines of the geraniums in pots, against the opposite wall.  One
end of the room was polygonal, such a shape being dictated by the
exterior design; in this part the windows were placed, as at the east end
of continental churches.  Thus, from the combined effects of the
ecclesiastical lancet lights and the apsidal shape of the room, it
occurred to Christopher that the sisters were all a delightful set of
pretty saints, exhibiting themselves in a lady chapel, and backed up by
unkempt major prophets, as represented by the forms of their big
brothers.

Christopher sat down to tea as invited, squeezing himself in between two
children whose names were almost as long as their persons, and whose tin
cups discoursed primitive music by means of spoons rattled inside them
until they were filled.  The tea proceeded pleasantly, notwithstanding
that the cake, being a little burnt, tasted on the outside like the
latter plums in snapdragon.  Christopher never could meet the eye of
Picotee, who continued in a wild state of flushing all the time, fixing
her looks upon the sugar-basin, except when she glanced out of the window
to see how the evening was going on, and speaking no word at all unless
it was to correct a small sister of somewhat crude manners as regards
filling the mouth, which Picotee did in a whisper, and a gentle
inclination of her mouth to the little one's ear, and a still deeper
blush than before.

Their visitor next noticed that an additional cup-and-saucer and plate
made their appearance occasionally at the table, were silently
replenished, and then carried off by one of the children to an inner
apartment.

'Our mother is bedridden,' said Ethelberta, noticing Christopher's look
at the proceeding.  'Emmeline attends to the household, except when
Picotee is at home, and Joey attends to the gate; but our mother's
affliction is a very unfortunate thing for the poor children.  We are
thinking of a plan of living which will, I hope, be more convenient than
this is; but we have not yet decided what to do.'  At this minute a
carriage and pair of horses became visible through one of the angular
windows of the apse, in the act of turning in from the highway towards
the park gate.  The boy who answered to the name of Joey sprang up from
the table with the promptness of a Jack-in-the-box, and ran out at the
door.  Everybody turned as the carriage passed through the gate, which
Joey held open, putting his other hand where the brim of his hat would
have been if he had worn one, and lapsing into a careless boy again the
instant that the vehicle had gone by.

'There's a tremendous large dinner-party at the House to-night,' said
Emmeline methodically, looking at the equipage over the edge of her
teacup, without leaving off sipping.  'That was Lord Mountclere.  He's a
wicked old man, they say.'

'Lord Mountclere?' said Ethelberta musingly.  'I used to know some
friends of his.  In what way is he wicked?'

'I don't know,' said Emmeline, with simplicity.  'I suppose it is because
he breaks the commandments.  But I wonder how a big rich lord can want to
steal anything.'  Emmeline's thoughts of breaking commandments
instinctively fell upon the eighth, as being in her ideas the only case
wherein the gain could be considered as at all worth the hazard.

Ethelberta said nothing; but Christopher thought that a shade of
depression passed over her.

'Hook back the gate, Joey,' shouted Emmeline, when the carriage had
proceeded up the drive.  'There's more to come.'

Joey did as ordered, and by the time he got indoors another carriage
turned in from the public road--a one-horse brougham this time.

'I know who that is: that's Mr. Ladywell,' said Emmeline, in the same
matter-of-fact tone.  'He's been here afore: he's a distant relation of
the squire's, and he once gave me sixpence for picking up his gloves.'

'What shall I live to see?' murmured the poetess, under her breath,
nearly dropping her teacup in an involuntary trepidation, from which she
made it a point of dignity to recover in a moment.  Christopher's eyes,
at that exhibition from Ethelberta, entered her own like a pair of
lances.  Picotee, seeing Christopher's quick look of jealousy, became
involved in her turn, and grew pale as a lily in her endeavours to
conceal the complications to which it gave birth in her poor little
breast likewise.

'You judge me very wrongly,' said Ethelberta, in answer to Christopher's
hasty look of resentment.

'In supposing Mr. Ladywell to be a great friend of yours?' said
Christopher, who had in some indescribable way suddenly assumed a right
to Ethelberta as his old property.

'Yes: for I hardly know him, and certainly do not value him.'

After this there was something in the mutual look of the two, though
their words had been private, which did not tend to remove the anguish of
fragile Picotee.  Christopher, assured that Ethelberta's embarrassment
had been caused by nothing more than the sense of her odd social
subsidence, recovered more bliss than he had lost, and regarded calmly
the profile of young Ladywell between the two windows of his brougham as
it passed the open cottage door, bearing him along unconscious as the
dead of the nearness of his beloved one, and of the sad buffoonery that
fate, fortune, and the guardian angels had been playing with Ethelberta
of late.  He recognized the face as that of the young man whom he had
encountered when watching Ethelberta's window from Rookington Park.

'Perhaps you remember seeing him at the Christmas dance at Wyndway?' she
inquired.  'He is a good-natured fellow.  Afterwards he sent me that
portfolio of sketches you see in the corner.  He might possibly do
something in the world as a painter if he were obliged to work at the art
for his bread, which he is not.'  She added with bitter pleasantry: 'In
bare mercy to his self-respect I must remain unseen here.'

It impressed Christopher to perceive how, under the estrangement which
arose from differences of education, surroundings, experience, and
talent, the sympathies of close relationship were perceptible in
Ethelberta's bearing towards her brothers and sisters.  At a remark upon
some simple pleasure wherein she had not participated because absent and
occupied by far more comprehensive interests, a gloom as of banishment
would cross her face and dim it for awhile, showing that the free habits
and enthusiasms of country life had still their charm with her, in the
face of the subtler gratifications of abridged bodices, candlelight, and
no feelings in particular, which prevailed in town.  Perhaps the one
condition which could work up into a permanent feeling the passing
revival of his fancy for a woman whose chief attribute he had supposed to
be sprightliness was added now by the romantic ubiquity of station that
attached to her.  A discovery which might have grated on the senses of a
man wedded to conventionality was a positive pleasure to one whose faith
in society had departed with his own social ruin.

The room began to darken, whereupon Christopher arose to leave; and the
brothers Sol and Dan offered to accompany him.




14. A TURNPIKE ROAD


'We be thinking of coming to London ourselves soon,' said Sol, a
carpenter and joiner by trade, as he walked along at Christopher's left
hand.  'There's so much more chance for a man up the country.  Now, if
you was me, how should you set about getting a job, sir?'

'What can you do?' said Christopher.

'Well, I am a very good staircase hand; and I have been called neat at
sash-frames; and I can knock together doors and shutters very well; and I
can do a little at the cabinet-making.  I don't mind framing a roof,
neither, if the rest be busy; and I am always ready to fill up my time at
planing floor-boards by the foot.'

'And I can mix and lay flat tints,' said Dan, who was a house painter,
'and pick out mouldings, and grain in every kind of wood you can
mention--oak, maple, walnut, satinwood, cherry-tree--'

'You can both do too much to stand the least chance of being allowed to
do anything in a city, where limitation is all the rule in labour.  To
have any success, Sol, you must be a man who can thoroughly look at a
door to see what ought to be done to it, but as to looking at a window,
that's not your line; or a person who, to the remotest particular,
understands turning a screw, but who does not profess any knowledge of
how to drive a nail.  Dan must know how to paint blue to a marvel, but
must be quite in the dark about painting green.  If you stick to some
such principle of specialty as this, you may get employment in London.'

'Ha-ha-ha!' said Dan, striking at a stone in the road with the stout
green hazel he carried.  'A wink is as good as a nod: thank'ee--we'll
mind all that now.'

'If we do come,' said Sol, 'we shall not mix up with Mrs. Petherwin at
all.'

'O indeed!'

'O no.  (Perhaps you think it odd that we call her "Mrs. Petherwin," but
that's by agreement as safer and better than Berta, because we be such
rough chaps you see, and she's so lofty.)  'Twould demean her to claim
kin wi' her in London--two journeymen like we, that know nothing besides
our trades.'

'Not at all,' said Christopher, by way of chiming in in the friendliest
manner.  'She would be pleased to see any straightforward honest man and
brother, I should think, notwithstanding that she has moved in other
society for a time.'

'Ah, you don't know Berta!' said Dan, looking as if he did.

'How--in what way do you mean?' said Christopher uneasily.

'So lofty--so very lofty!  Isn't she, Sol?  Why she'll never stir out
from mother's till after dark, and then her day begins; and she'll
traipse about under the trees, and never go into the high-road, so that
nobody in the way of gentle-people shall run up against her and know her
living in such a little small hut after biding in a big mansion-place.
There, we don't find fault wi' her about it: we like her just the same,
though she don't speak to us in the street; for a feller must be a fool
to make a piece of work about a woman's pride, when 'tis his own sister,
and hang upon her and bother her when he knows 'tis for her good that he
should not.  Yes, her life has been quare enough.  I hope she enjoys it,
but for my part I like plain sailing.  None of your ups and downs for me.
There, I suppose 'twas her nater to want to look into the world a bit.'

'Father and mother kept Berta to school, you understand, sir,' explained
the more thoughtful Sol, 'because she was such a quick child, and they
always had a notion of making a governess of her.  Sums?  If you said to
that child, "Berta, 'levenpence-three-farthings a day, how much a year?"
she would tell 'ee in three seconds out of her own little head.  And that
hard sum about the herrings she had done afore she was nine.'

'True, she had,' said Dan.  'And we all know that to do that is to do
something that's no nonsense.'

'What is the sum?' Christopher inquired.

'What--not know the sum about the herrings?' said Dan, spreading his gaze
all over Christopher in amazement.

'Never heard of it,' said Christopher.

'Why down in these parts just as you try a man's soul by the Ten
Commandments, you try his head by that there sum--hey, Sol?'

'Ay, that we do.'

'A herring and a half for three-halfpence, how many can ye get for
'levenpence: that's the feller; and a mortal teaser he is, I assure 'ee.
Our parson, who's not altogether without sense o' week days, said one
afternoon, "If cunning can be found in the multiplication table at all,
Chickerel, 'tis in connection with that sum."  Well, Berta was so clever
in arithmetic that she was asked to teach summing at Miss Courtley's, and
there she got to like foreign tongues more than ciphering, and at last
she hated ciphering, and took to books entirely.  Mother and we were very
proud of her at that time: not that we be stuck-up people at all--be we,
Sol?'

'Not at all; nobody can say that we be that, though there's more of it in
the country than there should be by all account.'

'You'd be surprised to see how vain the girls about here be getting.
Little rascals, why they won't curtsey to the loftiest lady in the land;
no, not if you were to pay 'em to do it.  Now, the men be different.  Any
man will touch his hat for a pint of beer.  But then, of course, there's
some difference between the two.  Touching your hat is a good deal less
to do than bending your knees, as Berta used to say, when she was blowed
up for not doing it.  She was always one of the independent sort--you
never seed such a maid as she was!  Now, Picotee was quite the other
way.'

'Has Picotee left Sandbourne entirely?'

'O no; she is home for the holidays.  Well, Mr. Julian, our road parts
from yours just here, unless you walk into the next town along with us.
But I suppose you get across to this station and go by rail?'

'I am obliged to go that way for my portmanteau,' said Christopher, 'or I
should have been pleased to walk further.  Shall I see you in Sandbourne
to-morrow?  I hope so.'

'Well, no.  'Tis hardly likely that you will see us--hardly.  We know how
unpleasant it is for a high sort of man to have rough chaps like us
hailing him, so we think it best not to meet you--thank you all the same.
So if you should run up against us in the street, we should be just as
well pleased by your taking no notice, if you wouldn't mind.  'Twill save
so much awkwardness--being in our working clothes.  'Tis always the plan
that Mrs. Petherwin and we agree to act upon, and we find it best for
both.  I hope you take our meaning right, and as no offence, Mr. Julian.'

'And do you do the same with Picotee?'

'O Lord, no--'tisn't a bit of use to try.  That's the worst of
Picotee--there's no getting rid of her.  The more in the rough we be the
more she'll stick to us; and if we say she shan't come, she'll bide and
fret about it till we be forced to let her.'

Christopher laughed, and promised, on condition that they would retract
the statement about their not being proud; and then he wished his friends
good-night.




15. AN INNER ROOM AT THE LODGE


At the Lodge at this time a discussion of some importance was in
progress.  The scene was Mrs. Chickerel's bedroom, to which,
unfortunately, she was confined by some spinal complaint; and here she
now appeared as an interesting woman of five-and-forty, properly dressed
as far as visible, and propped up in a bed covered with a quilt which
presented a field of little squares in many tints, looking altogether
like a bird's-eye view of a market garden.

Mrs. Chickerel had been nurse in a nobleman's family until her marriage,
and after that she played the part of wife and mother, upon the whole,
affectionately and well.  Among her minor differences with her husband
had been one about the naming of the children; a matter that was at last
compromised by an agreement under which the choice of the girls' names
became her prerogative, and that of the boys' her husband's, who limited
his field of selection to strict historical precedent as a set-off to
Mrs. Chickerel's tendency to stray into the regions of romance.

The only grown-up daughters at home, Ethelberta and Picotee, with their
brother Joey, were sitting near her; the two youngest children, Georgina
and Myrtle, who had been strutting in and out of the room, and otherwise
endeavouring to walk, talk, and speak like the gentleman just gone away,
were packed off to bed.  Emmeline, of that transitional age which causes
its exponent to look wistfully at the sitters when romping and at the
rompers when sitting, uncertain whether her position in the household is
that of child or woman, was idling in a corner.  The two absent brothers
and two absent sisters--eldest members of the family--completed the round
ten whom Mrs. Chickerel with thoughtless readiness had presented to a
crowded world, to cost Ethelberta many wakeful hours at night while she
revolved schemes how they might be decently maintained.

'I still think,' Ethelberta was saying, 'that the plan I first proposed
is the best.  I am convinced that it will not do to attempt to keep on
the Lodge.  If we are all together in town, I can look after you much
better than when you are far away from me down here.'

'Shall we not interfere with you--your plans for keeping up your
connections?' inquired her mother, glancing up towards Ethelberta by
lifting the flesh of her forehead, instead of troubling to raise her face
altogether.

'Not nearly so much as by staying here.'

'But,' said Picotee, 'if you let lodgings, won't the gentlemen and ladies
know it?'

'I have thought of that,' said Ethelberta, 'and this is how I shall
manage.  In the first place, if mother is there, the lodgings can be let
in her name, all bills will be receipted by her, and all tradesmen's
orders will be given as from herself.  Then, we will take no English
lodgers at all; we will advertise the rooms only in Continental
newspapers, as suitable for a French or German gentleman or two, and by
this means there will be little danger of my acquaintance discovering
that my house is not entirely a private one, or of any lodger being a
friend of my acquaintance.  I have thought over every possible way of
combining the dignified social position I must maintain to make my story-
telling attractive, with my absolute lack of money, and I can see no
better one.'

'Then if Gwendoline is to be your cook, she must soon give notice at her
present place?'

'Yes.  Everything depends upon Gwendoline and Cornelia.  But there is
time enough for them to give notice--Christmas will be soon enough.  If
they cannot or will not come as cook and housemaid, I am afraid the plan
will break down.  A vital condition is that I do not have a soul in the
house (beyond the lodgers) who is not one of my own relations.  When we
have put Joey into buttons, he will do very well to attend to the door.'

'But s'pose,' said Joey, after a glassy look at his future appearance in
the position alluded to, 'that any of your gentle-people come to see ye,
and when I opens the door and lets 'em in a swinging big lodger stalks
downstairs.  What will 'em think?  Up will go their eye-glasses at one
another till they glares each other into holes.  My gracious!'

'The one who calls will only think that another visitor is leaving, Joey.
But I shall have no visitors, or very few.  I shall let it be well known
among my late friends that my mother is an invalid, and that on this
account we receive none but the most intimate friends.  These intimate
friends not existing, we receive nobody at all.'

'Except Sol and Dan, if they get a job in London?  They'll have to call
upon us at the back door, won't they, Berta?' said Joey.

'They must go down the area steps.  But they will not mind that; they
like the idea.'

'And father, too, must he go down the steps?'

'He may come whichever way he likes.  He will be glad enough to have us
near at any price.  I know that he is not at all happy at leaving you
down here, and he away in London.  You remember that he has only taken
the situation at Mr. Doncastle's on the supposition that you all come to
town as soon as he can see an opening for getting you there; and as
nothing of the sort has offered itself to him, this will be the very
thing.  Of course, if I succeed wonderfully well in my schemes for story-
tellings, readings of my ballads and poems, lectures on the art of
versification, and what not, we need have no lodgers; and then we shall
all be living a happy family--all taking our share in keeping the
establishment going.'

'Except poor me!' sighed the mother.

'My dear mother, you will be necessary as a steadying power--a flywheel,
in short, to the concern.  I wish that father could live there, too.'

'He'll never give up his present way of life--it has grown to be a part
of his nature.  Poor man, he never feels at home except in somebody
else's house, and is nervous and quite a stranger in his own.  Sich is
the fatal effects of service!'

'O mother, don't!' said Ethelberta tenderly, but with her teeth on edge;
and Picotee curled up her toes, fearing that her mother was going to
moralize.

'Well, what I mean is, that your father would not like to live upon your
earnings, and so forth.  But in town we shall be near him--that's one
comfort, certainly.'

'And I shall not be wanted at all,' said Picotee, in a melancholy tone.

'It is much better to stay where you are,' her mother said.  'You will
come and spend the holidays with us, of course, as you do now.'

'I should like to live in London best,' murmured Picotee, her head
sinking mournfully to one side.  'I HATE being in Sandbourne now!'

'Nonsense!' said Ethelberta severely.  'We are all contriving how to live
most comfortably, and it is by far the best thing for you to stay at the
school.  You used to be happy enough there.'

Picotee sighed, and said no more.




16. A LARGE PUBLIC HALL


It was the second week in February, Parliament had just met, and
Ethelberta appeared for the first time before an audience in London.

There was some novelty in the species of entertainment that the active
young woman had proposed to herself, and this doubtless had due effect in
collecting the body of strangers that greeted her entry, over and above
those friends who came to listen to her as a matter of course.  Men and
women who had become totally indifferent to new actresses, new readers,
and new singers, once more felt the freshness of curiosity as they
considered the promise of the announcement.  But the chief inducement to
attend lay in the fact that here was to be seen in the flesh a woman with
whom the tongue of rumour had been busy in many romantic ways--a woman
who, whatever else might be doubted, had certainly produced a volume of
verses which had been the talk of the many who had read them, and of the
many more who had not, for several consecutive weeks.

What was her story to be?  Persons interested in the inquiry--a small
proportion, it may be owned, of the whole London public, and chiefly
young men--answered this question for themselves by assuming that it
would take the form of some pungent and gratifying revelation of the
innermost events of her own life, from which her gushing lines had sprung
as an inevitable consequence, and which being once known, would cause
such musical poesy to appear no longer wonderful.

The front part of the room was well filled, rows of listeners showing
themselves like a drilled-in crop of which not a seed has failed.  They
were listeners of the right sort, a majority having noses of the
prominent and dignified type, which when viewed in oblique perspective
ranged as regularly as bow-windows at a watering place.  Ethelberta's
plan was to tell her pretended history and adventures while sitting in a
chair--as if she were at her own fireside, surrounded by a circle of
friends.  By this touch of domesticity a great appearance of truth and
naturalness was given, though really the attitude was at first more
difficult to maintain satisfactorily than any one wherein stricter
formality should be observed.  She gently began her subject, as if
scarcely knowing whether a throng were near her or not, and, in her fear
of seeming artificial, spoke too low.  This defect, however, she soon
corrected, and ultimately went on in a charmingly colloquial manner.  What
Ethelberta relied upon soon became evident.  It was not upon the
intrinsic merits of her story as a piece of construction, but upon her
method of telling it.  Whatever defects the tale possessed--and they were
not a few--it had, as delivered by her, the one pre-eminent merit of
seeming like truth.  A modern critic has well observed of De Foe that he
had the most amazing talent on record for telling lies; and Ethelberta,
in wishing her fiction to appear like a real narrative of personal
adventure, did wisely to make De Foe her model.  His is a style even
better adapted for speaking than for writing, and the peculiarities of
diction which he adopts to give verisimilitude to his narratives acquired
enormous additional force when exhibited as viva-voce mannerisms.  And
although these artifices were not, perhaps, slavishly copied from that
master of feigning, they would undoubtedly have reminded her hearers of
him, had they not mostly been drawn from an easeful section in society
which is especially characterized by the mental condition of knowing
nothing about any author a week after they have read him.  The few there
who did remember De Foe were impressed by a fancy that his words greeted
them anew in a winged auricular form, instead of by the weaker channels
of print and eyesight.  The reader may imagine what an effect this well-
studied method must have produced when intensified by a clear, living
voice, animated action, and the brilliant and expressive eye of a
handsome woman--attributes which of themselves almost compelled belief.
When she reached the most telling passages, instead of adding exaggerated
action and sound, Ethelberta would lapse to a whisper and a sustained
stillness, which were more striking than gesticulation.  All that could
be done by art was there, and if inspiration was wanting nobody missed
it.

It was in performing this feat that Ethelberta seemed first to discover
in herself the full power of that self-command which further onward in
her career more and more impressed her as a singular possession, until at
last she was tempted to make of it many fantastic uses, leading to
results that affected more households than her own.  A talent for
demureness under difficulties without the cold-bloodedness which renders
such a bearing natural and easy, a face and hand reigning unmoved outside
a heart by nature turbulent as a wave, is a constitutional arrangement
much to be desired by people in general; yet, had Ethelberta been framed
with less of that gift in her, her life might have been more comfortable
as an experience, and brighter as an example, though perhaps duller as a
story.

'Ladywell, how came this Mrs. Petherwin to think of such a queer trick as
telling romances, after doing so well as a poet?' said a man in the
stalls to his friend, who had been gazing at the Story-teller with a rapt
face.

'What--don't you know?--everybody did, I thought,' said the painter.

'A mistake.  Indeed, I should not have come here at all had I not heard
the subject mentioned by accident yesterday at Grey's; and then I
remembered her to be the same woman I had met at some place--Belmaine's I
think it was--last year, when I thought her just getting on for handsome
and clever, not to put it too strongly.'

'Ah! naturally you would not know much,' replied Ladywell, in an eager
whisper.  'Perhaps I am judging others by myself a little more than--but,
as you have heard, she is an acquaintance of mine.  I know her very well,
and, in fact, I originally suggested the scheme to her as a pleasant way
of adding to her fame.  "Depend upon it, dear Mrs. Petherwin," I said,
during a pause in one of our dances together some time ago, "any public
appearance of yours would be successful beyond description."'

'O, I had no idea that you knew her so well!  Then it is quite through
you that she has adopted this course?'

'Well, not entirely--I could not say entirely.  She said that some day,
perhaps, she might do such a thing; and, in short, I reduced her vague
ideas to form.'

'I should not mind knowing her better--I must get you to throw us
together in some way,' said Neigh, with some interest.  'I had no idea
that you were such an old friend.  You could do it, I suppose?'

'Really, I am afraid--hah-hah--may not have the opportunity of obliging
you.  I met her at Wyndway, you know, where she was visiting with Lady
Petherwin.  It was some time ago, and I cannot say that I have ever met
her since.'

'Or before?' said Neigh.

'Well--no; I never did.'

'Ladywell, if I had half your power of going to your imagination for
facts, I would be the greatest painter in England.'

'Now Neigh--that's too bad--but with regard to this matter, I do speak
with some interest,' said Ladywell, with a pleased sense of himself.

'In love with her?--Smitten down?--Done for?'

'Now, now!  However, several other fellows chaff me about her.  It was
only yesterday that Jones said--'

'Do you know why she cares to do this sort of thing?'

'Merely a desire for fame, I suppose.'

'I should think she has fame enough already.'

'That I can express no opinion upon.  I am thinking of getting her
permission to use her face in a subject I am preparing.  It is a fine
face for canvas.  Glorious contour--glorious.  Ah, here she is again, for
the second part.'

'Dream on, young fellow.  You'll make a rare couple!' said Neigh, with a
flavour of superciliousness unheeded by his occupied companion.

Further back in the room were a pair of faces whose keen interest in the
performance contrasted much with the languidly permissive air of those in
front.  When the ten minutes' break occurred, Christopher was the first
of the two to speak.  'Well, what do you think of her, Faith?' he said,
shifting restlessly on his seat.

'I like the quiet parts of the tale best, I think,' replied the sister;
'but, of course, I am not a good judge of these things.  How still the
people are at times!  I continually take my eyes from her to look at the
listeners.  Did you notice the fat old lady in the second row, with her
cloak a little thrown back?  She was absolutely unconscious, and stayed
with her face up and lips parted like a little child of six.'

'She well may! the thing is a triumph.  That fellow Ladywell is here, I
believe--yes, it is he, busily talking to the man on his right.  If I
were a woman I would rather go donkey-driving than stick myself up there,
for gaping fops to quiz and say what they like about!  But she had no
choice, poor thing; for it was that or nothing with her.'

Faith, who had secret doubts about the absolute necessity of Ethelberta's
appearance in public, said, with remote meanings, 'Perhaps it is not
altogether a severe punishment to her to be looked at by well-dressed
men.  Suppose she feels it as a blessing, instead of an affliction?'

'She is a different sort of woman, Faith, and so you would say if you
knew her.  Of course, it is natural for you to criticize her severely
just now, and I don't wish to defend her.'

'I think you do a little, Kit.'

'No; I am indifferent about it all.  Perhaps it would have been better
for me if I had never seen her; and possibly it might have been better
for her if she had never seen me.  She has a heart, and the heart is a
troublesome encumbrance when great things have to be done.  I wish you
knew her: I am sure you would like each other.'

'O yes,' said Faith, in a voice of rather weak conviction.  'But, as we
live in such a plain way, it would be hardly desirable at present.'

* * * * *

Ethelberta being regarded, in common with the latest conjurer, spirit-
medium, aeronaut, giant, dwarf or monarch, as a new sensation, she was
duly criticized in the morning papers, and even obtained a notice in some
of the weekly reviews.

'A handsome woman,' said one of these, 'may have her own reasons for
causing the flesh of the London public to creep upon its bones by her
undoubtedly remarkable narrative powers; but we question if much good can
result from such a form of entertainment.  Nevertheless, some praise is
due.  We have had the novel-writer among us for some time, and the novel-
reader has occasionally appeared on our platforms; but we believe that
this is the first instance on record of a Novel-teller--one, that is to
say, who relates professedly as fiction a romantic tale which has never
been printed--the whole owing its chief interest to the method whereby
the teller identifies herself with the leading character in the story.'

Another observed: 'When once we get away from the magic influence of the
story-teller's eye and tongue, we perceive how improbable, even
impossible, is the tissue of events to which we have been listening with
so great a sense of reality, and we feel almost angry with ourselves at
having been the victims of such utter illusion.'

'Mrs. Petherwin's personal appearance is decidedly in her favour,' said
another.  'She affects no unconsciousness of the fact that form and
feature are no mean vehicles of persuasion, and she uses the powers of
each to the utmost.  There spreads upon her face when in repose an air of
innocence which is charmingly belied by the subtlety we discover beneath
it when she begins her tale; and this amusing discrepancy between her
physical presentment and the inner woman is further illustrated by the
misgiving, which seizes us on her entrance, that so impressionable a lady
will never bear up in the face of so trying an audience. . . .  The
combinations of incident which Mrs. Petherwin persuades her hearers that
she has passed through are not a little marvellous; and if what is
rumoured be true, that the tales are to a great extent based upon her own
experiences, she has proved herself to be no less daring in adventure
than facile in her power of describing it.'




17. ETHELBERTA'S HOUSE


After such successes as these, Christopher could not forego the seductive
intention of calling upon the poetess and romancer, at her now
established town residence in Exonbury Crescent.  One wintry afternoon he
reached the door--now for the third time--and gave a knock which had in
it every tender refinement that could be thrown into the somewhat
antagonistic vehicle of noise.  Turning his face down the street he
waited restlessly on the step.  There was a strange light in the
atmosphere: the glass of the street-lamps, the varnished back of a
passing cab, a milk-woman's cans, and a row of church-windows glared in
his eyes like new-rubbed copper; and on looking the other way he beheld a
bloody sun hanging among the chimneys at the upper end, as a danger-lamp
to warn him off.

By this time the door was opened, and before him stood Ethelberta's young
brother Joey, thickly populated with little buttons, the remainder of him
consisting of invisible green.

'Ah, Joseph,' said Christopher, instantly recognizing the boy.  'What,
are you here in office?  Is your--'

Joey lifted his forefinger and spread his mouth in a genial manner, as if
to signify particular friendliness mingled with general caution.

'Yes, sir, Mrs. Petherwin is my mistress.  I'll see if she is at home,
sir,' he replied, raising his shoulders and winking a wink of strategic
meanings by way of finish--all which signs showed, if evidence were
wanted, how effectually this pleasant young page understood, though quite
fresh from Wessex, the duties of his peculiar position.  Mr. Julian was
shown to the drawing-room, and there he found Ethelberta alone.

She gave him a hand so cool and still that Christopher, much as he
desired the contact, was literally ashamed to let her see and feel his
own, trembling with unmanageable excess of feeling.  It was always so,
always had been so, always would be so, at these meetings of theirs: she
was immeasurably the strongest; and the deep-eyed young man fancied, in
the chagrin which the perception of this difference always bred in him,
that she triumphed in her superior control.  Yet it was only in little
things that their sexes were thus reversed: Christopher would receive
quite a shock if a little dog barked at his heels, and be totally unmoved
when in danger of his life.

Certainly the most self-possessed woman in the world, under pressure of
the incongruity between their last meeting and the present one, might
have shown more embarrassment than Ethelberta showed on greeting him to-
day.  Christopher was only a man in believing that the shyness which she
did evince was chiefly the result of personal interest.  She might or
might not have been said to blush--perhaps the stealthy change upon her
face was too slow an operation to deserve that name: but, though pale
when he called, the end of ten minutes saw her colour high and wide.  She
soon set him at his ease, and seemed to relax a long-sustained tension as
she talked to him of her arrangements, hopes, and fears.

'And how do you like London society?' said Ethelberta.

'Pretty well, as far as I have seen it: to the surface of its front
door.'

'You will find nothing to be alarmed at if you get inside.'

'O no--of course not--except my own shortcomings,' said the modest
musician.  'London society is made up of much more refined people than
society anywhere else.'

'That's a very prevalent opinion; and it is nowhere half so prevalent as
in London society itself.  However, come and see my house--unless you
think it a trouble to look over a house?'

'No; I should like it very much.'

The decorations tended towards the artistic gymnastics prevalent in some
quarters at the present day.  Upon a general flat tint of duck's-egg
green appeared quaint patterns of conventional foliage, and birds, done
in bright auburn, several shades nearer to redbreast-red than was
Ethelberta's hair, which was thus thrust further towards brown by such
juxtaposition--a possible reason for the choice of tint.  Upon the glazed
tiles within the chimney-piece were the forms of owls, bats, snakes,
frogs, mice, spiders in their webs, moles, and other objects of aversion
and darkness, shaped in black and burnt in after the approved fashion.

'My brothers Sol and Dan did most of the actual work,' said Ethelberta,
'though I drew the outlines, and designed the tiles round the fire.  The
flowers, mice, and spiders are done very simply, you know: you only press
a real flower, mouse, or spider out flat under a piece of glass, and then
copy it, adding a little more emaciation and angularity at pleasure.'

'In that "at pleasure" is where all the art lies,' said he.

'Well, yes--that is the case,' said Ethelberta thoughtfully; and
preceding him upstairs, she threw open a door on one of the floors,
disclosing Dan in person, engaged upon a similar treatment of this floor
also.  Sol appeared bulging from the door of a closet, a little further
on, where he was fixing some shelves; and both wore workmen's blouses.  At
once coming down from the short ladder he was standing upon, Dan shook
Christopher's hand with some velocity.

'We do a little at a time, you see,' he said, 'because Colonel down
below, and Mrs. Petherwin's visitors, shan't smell the turpentine.'

'We be pushing on to-day to get it out of the way,' said Sol, also coming
forward and greeting their visitor, but more reluctantly than his brother
had done.  'Now I'll tell ye what--you two,' he added, after an uneasy
pause, turning from Christopher to Ethelberta and back again in great
earnestness; 'you'd better not bide here, talking to we rough ones, you
know, for folks might find out that there's something closer between us
than workmen and employer and employer's friend.  So Berta and Mr.
Julian, if you'll go on and take no more notice o' us, in case of
visitors, it would be wiser--else, perhaps, if we should be found out
intimate with ye, and bring down your gentility, you'll blame us for it.
I get as nervous as a cat when I think I may be the cause of any disgrace
to ye.'

'Don't be so silly, Sol,' said Ethelberta, laughing.

'Ah, that's all very well,' said Sol, with an unbelieving smile; 'but if
we bain't company for you out of doors, you bain't company for we
within--not that I find fault with ye or mind it, and shan't take
anything for painting your house, nor will Dan neither, any more for
that--no, not a penny; in fact, we are glad to do it for 'ee.  At the
same time, you keep to your class, and we'll keep to ours.  And so, good
afternoon, Berta, when you like to go, and the same to you, Mr. Julian.
Dan, is that your mind?'

'I can but own it,' said Dan.

The two brothers then turned their backs upon their visitors, and went on
working, and Ethelberta and her lover left the room.  'My brothers, you
perceive,' said she, 'represent the respectable British workman in his
entirety, and a touchy individual he is, I assure you, on points of
dignity, after imbibing a few town ideas from his leaders.  They are
painfully off-hand with me, absolutely refusing to be intimate, from a
mistaken notion that I am ashamed of their dress and manners; which, of
course, is absurd.'

'Which, of course, is absurd,' said Christopher.

'Of course it is absurd!' she repeated with warmth, and looking keenly at
him.  But, finding no harm in his face, she continued as before: 'Yet,
all the time, they will do anything under the sun that they think will
advance my interests.  In our hearts we are one.  All they ask me to do
is to leave them to themselves, and therefore I do so.  Now, would you
like to see some more of your acquaintance?'

She introduced him to a large attic; where he found himself in the
society of two or three persons considerably below the middle height,
whose manners were of that gushing kind sometimes called Continental,
their ages ranging from five years to eight.  These were the youngest
children, presided over by Emmeline, as professor of letters, capital and
small.

'I am giving them the rudiments of education here,' said Ethelberta; 'but
I foresee several difficulties in the way of keeping them here, which I
must get over as best I can.  One trouble is, that they don't get enough
air and exercise.'

'Is Mrs. Chickerel living here as well?' Christopher ventured to inquire,
when they were downstairs again.

'Yes; but confined to her room as usual, I regret to say.  Two more
sisters of mine, whom you have never seen at all, are also here.  They
are older than any of the rest of us, and had, broadly speaking, no
education at all, poor girls.  The eldest, Gwendoline, is my cook, and
Cornelia is my housemaid.  I suffer much sadness, and almost misery
sometimes, in reflecting that here are we, ten brothers and sisters, born
of one father and mother, who might have mixed together and shared all in
the same scenes, and been properly happy, if it were not for the strange
accidents that have split us up into sections as you see, cutting me off
from them without the compensation of joining me to any others.  They are
all true as steel in keeping the secret of our kin, certainly; but that
brings little joy, though some satisfaction perhaps.'

'You might be less despondent, I think.  The tale-telling has been one of
the successes of the season.'

'Yes, I might; but I may observe that you scarcely set the example of
blitheness.'

'Ah--that's not because I don't recognize the pleasure of being here.  It
is from a more general cause: simply an underfeeling I have that at the
most propitious moment the distance to the possibility of sorrow is so
short that a man's spirits must not rise higher than mere cheerfulness
out of bare respect to his insight.

      "As long as skies are blue, and fields are green,
      Evening must usher night, night urge the morrow,
   Month follow month with woe, and year wake year to sorrow."'

Ethelberta bowed uncertainly; the remark might refer to her past conduct
or it might not.  'My great cause of uneasiness is the children,' she
presently said, as a new page of matter.  'It is my duty, at all risk and
all sacrifice of sentiment, to educate and provide for them.  The grown-
up ones, older than myself, I cannot help much, but the little ones I
can.  I keep my two French lodgers for the sake of them.'

'The lodgers, of course, don't know the relationship between yourself and
the rest of the people in the house?'

'O no!--nor will they ever.  My mother is supposed to let the ground and
first floors to me--a strange lady--as she does the second and third
floors to them.  Still, I may be discovered.'

'Well--if you are?'

'Let me be.  Life is a battle, they say; but it is only so in the sense
that a game of chess is a battle--there is no seriousness in it; it may
be put an end to at any inconvenient moment by owning yourself beaten,
with a careless "Ha-ha!" and sweeping your pieces into the box.
Experimentally, I care to succeed in society; but at the bottom of my
heart, I don't care.'

'For that very reason you are likely to do it.  My idea is, make ambition
your business and indifference your relaxation, and you will fail; but
make indifference your business and ambition your relaxation, and you
will succeed.  So impish are the ways of the gods.'

'I hope that you at any rate will succeed,' she said, at the end of a
silence.

'I never can--if success means getting what one wants.'

'Why should you not get that?'

'It has been forbidden to me.'

Her complexion changed just enough to show that she knew what he meant.
'If you were as bold as you are subtle, you would take a more cheerful
view of the matter,' she said, with a look signifying innermost things.

'I will instantly!  Shall I test the truth of my cheerful view by a word
of question?'

'I deny that you are capable of taking that view, and until you prove
that you are, no question is allowed,' she said, laughing, and still
warmer in the face and neck.  'Nothing but melancholy, gentle melancholy,
now as in old times when there was nothing to cause it.'

'Ah--you only tease.'

'You will not throw aside that bitter medicine of distrust, for the
world.  You have grown so used to it, that you take it as food, as some
invalids do their mixtures.'

'Ethelberta, you have my heart--my whole heart.  You have had it ever
since I first saw you.  Now you understand me, and no pretending that you
don't, mind, this second time.'

'I understood you long ago; you have not understood me.'

'You are mysterious,' he said lightly; 'and perhaps if I disentangle your
mystery I shall find it to cover--indifference.  I hope it does--for your
sake.'

'How can you say so!' she exclaimed reproachfully.  'Yet I wish it did
too--I wish it did cover indifference--for yours.  But you have all of me
that you care to have, and may keep it for life if you wish to.  Listen,
surely there was a knock at the door?  Let us go inside the room: I am
always uneasy when anybody comes, lest any awkward discovery should be
made by a visitor of my miserable contrivances for keeping up the
establishment.'

Joey met them before they had left the landing.

'Please, Berta,' he whispered, 'Mr. Ladywell has called, and I've showed
him into the liberry.  You know, Berta, this is how it was, you know: I
thought you and Mr. Julian were in the drawing-room, and wouldn't want
him to see ye together, and so I asked him to step into the liberry a
minute.'

'You must improve your way of speaking,' she said, with quick
embarrassment, whether at the mention of Ladywell's name before Julian,
or at the way Joey coupled herself with Christopher, was quite uncertain.
'Will you excuse me for a few moments?' she said, turning to Christopher.
'Pray sit down; I shall not be long.'  And she glided downstairs.

They had been standing just by the drawing-room door, and Christopher
turned back into the room with no very satisfactory countenance.  It was
very odd, he thought, that she should go down to Ladywell in that
mysterious manner, when he might have been admitted to where they were
talking without any trouble at all.  What could Ladywell have to say, as
an acquaintance calling upon her for a few minutes, that he was not to
hear?  Indeed, if it came to that, what right had Ladywell to call upon
her at all, even though she were a widow, and to some extent chartered to
live in a way which might be considered a trifle free if indulged in by
other young women.  This was the first time that he himself had ventured
into her house on that very account--a doubt whether it was quite proper
to call, considering her youth, and the fertility of her position as
ground for scandal.  But no sooner did he arrive than here was Ladywell
blundering in, and, since this conjunction had occurred on his first
visit, the chances were that Ladywell came very often.

Julian walked up and down the room, every moment expanding itself to a
minute in his impatience at the delay and vexation at the cause.  After
scrutinizing for the fifth time every object on the walls as if afflicted
with microscopic closeness of sight, his hands under his coat-tails, and
his person jigging up and down upon his toes, he heard her coming up the
stairs.  When she entered the apartment her appearance was decidedly that
of a person subsiding after some little excitement.

'I did not calculate upon being so long,' she said sweetly, at the same
time throwing back her face and smiling.  'But I--was longer than I
expected.'

'It seemed rather long,' said Christopher gloomily, 'but I don't mind
it.'

'I am glad of that,' said Ethelberta.

'As you asked me to stay, I was very pleased to do so, and always should
be; but I think that now I will wish you good-bye.'

'You are not vexed with me?' she said, looking quite into his face.  'Mr.
Ladywell is nobody, you know.'

'Nobody?'

'Well, he is not much, I mean.  The case is, that I am sitting to him for
a subject in which my face is to be used--otherwise than as a
portrait--and he called about it.'

'May I say,' said Christopher, 'that if you want yourself painted, you
are ill-advised not to let it be done by a man who knows how to use the
brush a little?'

'O, he can paint!' said Ethelberta, rather warmly.  'His last picture was
excellent, I think.  It was greatly talked about.'

'I imagined you to say that he was a mere nobody!'

'Yes, but--how provoking you are!--nobody, I mean, to talk to.  He is a
true artist, nevertheless.'

Christopher made no reply.  The warm understanding between them had quite
ended now, and there was no fanning it up again.  Sudden tiffs had been
the constant misfortune of their courtship in days gone by, had been the
remote cause of her marriage to another; and the familiar shadows seemed
to be rising again to cloud them with the same persistency as ever.
Christopher went downstairs with well-behaved moodiness, and left the
house forthwith.  The postman came to the door at the same time.

Ethelberta opened a letter from Picotee--now at Sandbourne again; and,
stooping to the fire-light, she began to read:--

   'MY DEAR ETHELBERTA,--I have tried to like staying at Sandbourne
   because you wished it, but I can't endure the town at all, dear Berta;
   everything is so wretched and dull!  O, I only wish you knew how
   dismal it is here, and how much I would give to come to London!  I
   cannot help thinking that I could do better in town.  You see, I
   should be close to you, and should have the benefit of your
   experience.  I would not mind what I did for a living could I be there
   where you all are.  It is so like banishment to be here.  If I could
   not get a pupil-teachership in some London school (and I believe I
   could by advertising) I could stay with you, and be governess to
   Georgina and Myrtle, for I am sure you cannot spare time enough to
   teach them as they ought to be taught, and Emmeline is not old enough
   to have any command over them.  I could also assist at your
   dressmaking, and you must require a great deal of that to be done if
   you continue to appear in public.  Mr. Long read in the papers the
   account of your first evening, and afterwards I heard two ladies of
   our committee talking about it; but of course not one of them knew my
   personal interest in the discussion.  Now will you, Ethelberta, think
   if I may not come: Do, there's a dear sister!  I will do anything you
   set me about if I may only come.--Your ever affectionate,
   PICOTEE.'

'Great powers above--what worries do beset me!' cried Ethelberta, jumping
up.  'What can possess the child so suddenly?--she used to like
Sandbourne well enough!'  She sat down, and hastily scribbled the
following reply:--

   'MY DEAR PICOTEE--There is only a little time to spare before the post
   goes, but I will try to answer your letter at once.  Whatever is the
   reason of this extraordinary dislike to Sandbourne?  It is a nice
   healthy place, and you are likely to do much better than either of our
   elder sisters, if you follow straight on in the path you have chosen.
   Of course, if such good fortune should attend me that I get rich by my
   contrivances of public story-telling and so on, I shall share
   everything with you and the rest of us, in which case you shall not
   work at all.  But (although I have been unexpectedly successful so
   far) this is problematical; and it would be rash to calculate upon all
   of us being able to live, or even us seven girls only, upon the
   fortune I am going to make that way.  So, though I don't mean to be
   harsh, I must impress upon you the necessity of going on as you are
   going just at present.  I know the place must be dull, but we must all
   put up with dulness sometimes.  You, being next to me in age, must aid
   me as well as you can in doing something for the younger ones; and if
   anybody at all comes and lives here otherwise than as a servant, it
   must be our father--who will not, however, at present hear of such a
   thing when I mention it to him.  Do think of all this, Picotee, and
   bear up!  Perhaps we shall all be happy and united some day.  Joey is
   waiting to run to the post-office with this at once.  All are well.
   Sol and Dan have nearly finished the repairs and decorations of my
   house--but I will tell you of that another time.--Your affectionate
   sister,                 BERTA.'




18. NEAR SANDBOURNE--LONDON STREETS--ETHELBERTA'S


When this letter reached its destination the next morning, Picotee, in
her over-anxiety, could not bring herself to read it in anybody's
presence, and put it in her pocket till she was on her walk across the
moor.  She still lived at the cottage out of the town, though at some
inconvenience to herself, in order to teach at a small village
night-school whilst still carrying on her larger occupation of
pupil-teacher in Sandbourne.

So she walked and read, and was soon in tears.  Moreover, when she
thought of what Ethelberta would have replied had that keen sister known
the wildness of her true reason in wishing to go, she shuddered with
misery.  To wish to get near a man only because he had been kind to her,
and had admired her pretty face, and had given her flowers, to nourish a
passion all the more because of its hopeless impracticability, were
things to dream of, not to tell.  Picotee was quite an unreasoning
animal.  Her sister arranged situations for her, told her how to conduct
herself in them, how to make up anew, in unobtrusive shapes, the valuable
wearing apparel she sent from time to time--so as to provoke neither
exasperation in the little gentry, nor superciliousness in the great.
Ethelberta did everything for her, in short; and Picotee obeyed orders
with the abstracted ease of mind which people show who have their
thinking done for them, and put out their troubles as they do their
washing.  She was quite willing not to be clever herself, since it was
unnecessary while she had a much-admired sister, who was clever enough
for two people and to spare.

This arrangement, by which she gained an untroubled existence in exchange
for freedom of will, had worked very pleasantly for Picotee until the
anomaly of falling in love on her own account created a jar in the
machinery.  Then she began to know how wearing were miserable days, and
how much more wearing were miserable nights.  She pictured Christopher in
London calling upon her dignified sister (for Ethelberta innocently
mentioned his name sometimes in writing) and imagined over and over again
the mutual signs of warm feeling between them.  And now Picotee resolved
upon a noble course.  Like Juliet, she had been troubled with a
consciousness that perhaps her love for Christopher was a trifle forward
and unmaidenly, even though she had determined never to let him or
anybody in the whole world know of it.  To set herself to pray that she
might have strength to see him without a pang the lover of her sister,
who deserved him so much more than herself, would be a grand penance and
corrective.

After uttering petitions to this effect for several days, she still felt
very bad; indeed, in the psychological difficulty of striving for what in
her soul she did not desire, rather worse, if anything.  At last, weary
of walking the old road and never meeting him, and blank in a general
powerlessness, she wrote the letter to Ethelberta, which was only the
last one of a series that had previously been written and torn up.

Now this hope had been whirled away like thistledown, and the case was
grievous enough to distract a greater stoic than Picotee.  The end of it
was that she left the school on insufficient notice, gave up her cottage
home on the plea--true in the letter--that she was going to join a
relative in London, and went off thither by a morning train, leaving her
things packed ready to be sent on when she should write for them.

Picotee arrived in town late on a cold February afternoon, bearing a
small bag in her hand.  She crossed Westminster Bridge on foot, just
after dusk, and saw a luminous haze hanging over each well-lighted street
as it withdrew into distance behind the nearer houses, showing its
direction as a train of morning mist shows the course of a distant stream
when the stream itself is hidden.  The lights along the riverside towards
Charing Cross sent an inverted palisade of gleaming swords down into the
shaking water, and the pavement ticked to the touch of pedestrians' feet,
most of whom tripped along as if walking only to practise a favourite
quick step, and held handkerchiefs to their mouths to strain off the
river mist from their lungs.  She inquired her way to Exonbury Crescent,
and between five and six o'clock reached her sister's door.

Two or three minutes were passed in accumulating resolution sufficient to
ring the bell, which when at last she did, was not performed in a way at
all calculated to make the young man Joey hasten to the door.  After the
lapse of a certain time he did, however, find leisure to stroll and see
what the caller might want, out of curiosity to know who there could be
in London afraid to ring a bell twice.

Joey's delight exceeded even his surprise, the ruling maxim of his life
being the more the merrier, under all circumstances.  The beaming young
man was about to run off and announce her upstairs and downstairs, left
and right, when Picotee called him hastily to her.  In the hall her quick
young eye had caught sight of an umbrella with a peculiar horn handle--an
umbrella she had been accustomed to meet on Sandbourne Moor on many happy
afternoons.  Christopher was evidently in the house.

'Joey,' she said, as if she were ready to faint, 'don't tell Berta I am
come.  She has company, has she not?'

'O no--only Mr. Julian!' said the brother.  'He's quite one of the
family!'

'Never mind--can't I go down into the kitchen with you?' she inquired.
There had been bliss and misery mingled in those tidings, and she
scarcely knew for a moment which way they affected her.  What she did
know was that she had run her dear fox to earth, and a sense of
satisfaction at that feat prevented her just now from counting the cost
of the performance.

'Does Mr. Julian come to see her very often?' said she.

'O yes--he's always a-coming--a regular bore to me.'

'A regular what?'

'Bore!--Ah, I forgot, you don't know our town words.  However, come
along.'

They passed by the doors on tiptoe, and their mother upstairs being,
according to Joey's account, in the midst of a nap, Picotee was unwilling
to disturb her; so they went down at once to the kitchen, when forward
rushed Gwendoline the cook, flourishing her floury hands, and Cornelia
the housemaid, dancing over her brush; and these having welcomed and made
Picotee comfortable, who should ring the area-bell, and be admitted down
the steps, but Sol and Dan.  The workman-brothers, their day's duties
being over, had called to see their relations, first, as usual, going
home to their lodgings in Marylebone and making themselves as spruce as
bridegrooms, according to the rules of their newly-acquired town
experience.  For the London mechanic is only nine hours a mechanic,
though the country mechanic works, eats, drinks, and sleeps a mechanic
throughout the whole twenty-four.

'God bless my soul--Picotee!' said Dan, standing fixed.  'Well--I say,
this is splendid! ha-ha!'

'Picotee--what brought you here?' said Sol, expanding the circumference
of his face in satisfaction.  'Well, come along--never mind so long as
you be here.'

Picotee explained circumstances as well as she could without stating
them, and, after a general conversation of a few minutes, Sol interrupted
with--'Anybody upstairs with Mrs. Petherwin?'

'Mr. Julian was there just now,' said Joey; 'but he may be gone.  Berta
always lets him slip out how he can, the form of ringing me up not being
necessary with him.  Wait a minute--I'll see.'

Joseph vanished up the stairs; and, the question whether Christopher were
gone or not being an uninteresting one to the majority, the talking went
on upon other matters.  When Joey crept down again a minute later,
Picotee was sitting aloof and silent, and he accordingly singled her out
to speak to.

'Such a lark, Picotee!' he whispered.  'Berta's a-courting of her young
man.  Would you like to see how they carries on a bit?'

'Dearly I should!' said Picotee, the pupils of her eyes dilating.

Joey conducted her to the top of the basement stairs, and told her to
listen.  Within a few yards of them was the morning-room door, now
standing ajar; and an intermittent flirtation in soft male and female
tones could be heard going on inside.  Picotee's lips parted at thus
learning the condition of things, and she leant against the stair-newel.

'My?  What's the matter?' said Joey.

'If this is London, I don't like it at all!' moaned Picotee.

'Well--I never see such a girl--fainting all over the stairs for nothing
in the world.'

'O--it will soon be gone--it is--it is only indigestion.'

'Indigestion?  Much you simple country people can know about that!  You
should see what devils of indigestions we get in high life--eating
'normous great dinners and suppers that require clever physicians to
carry 'em off, or else they'd carry us off with gout next day; and waking
in the morning with such a splitting headache, and dry throat, and inward
cusses about human nature, that you feel all the world like some great
lord.  However, now let's go down again.'

'No, no, no!' said the unhappy maiden imploringly.  'Hark!'

They listened again.  The voices of the musician and poetess had changed:
there was a decided frigidity in their tone--then came a louder
expression--then a silence.

'You needn't be afeard,' said Joey.  'They won't fight; bless you, they
busts out quarrelling like this times and times when they've been over-
friendly, but it soon gets straight with 'em again.'

There was now a quick walk across the room, and Joey and his sister drew
down their heads out of sight.  Then the room door was slammed, quick
footsteps went along the hall, the front door closed just as loudly, and
Christopher's tread passed into nothing along the pavement.

'That's rather a wuss one than they mostly have; but Lord, 'tis nothing
at all.'

'I don't much like biding here listening!' said Picotee.

'O, 'tis how we do all over the West End,' said Joey.  ''Tis yer
ignorance of town life that makes it seem a good deal to 'ee.'

'You can't make much boast about town life; for you haven't left off
talking just as they do down in Wessex.'

'Well, I own to that--what's fair is fair, and 'tis a true charge; but if
I talk the Wessex way 'tisn't for want of knowing better; 'tis because my
staunch nater makes me bide faithful to our old ancient institutions.
You'd soon own 'twasn't ignorance in me, if you knowed what large
quantities of noblemen I gets mixed up with every day.  In fact 'tis
thoughted here and there that I shall do very well in the world.'

'Well, let us go down,' said Picotee.  'Everything seems so overpowering
here.'

'O, you'll get broke in soon enough.  I felt just the same when I first
entered into society.'

'Do you think Berta will be angry with me?  How does she treat you?'

'Well, I can't complain.  You see she's my own flesh and blood, and what
can I say?  But, in secret truth, the wages is terrible low, and barely
pays for the tobacco I consooms.'

'O Joey, you wicked boy!  If mother only knew that you smoked!'

'I don't mind the wickedness so much as the smell.  And Mrs. Petherwin
has got such a nose for a fellow's clothes.  'Tis one of the greatest
knots in service--the smoke question.  'Tis thoughted that we shall make
a great stir about it in the mansions of the nobility soon.'

'How much more you know of life than I do--you only fourteen and me
seventeen!'

'Yes, that's true.  You see, age is nothing--'tis opportunity.  And even
I can't boast, for many a younger man knows more.'

'But don't smoke, Joey--there's a dear!'

'What can I do?  Society hev its rules, and if a person wishes to keep
himself up, he must do as the world do.  We be all Fashion's slave--as
much a slave as the meanest in the land!'

They got downstairs again; and when the dinner of the French lady and
gentleman had been sent up and cleared away, and also Ethelberta's
evening tea (which she formed into a genuine meal, making a dinner of
luncheon, when nobody was there, to give less trouble to her
servant-sisters), they all sat round the fire.  Then the rustle of a
dress was heard on the staircase, and squirrel-haired Ethelberta appeared
in person.  It was her custom thus to come down every spare evening, to
teach Joey and her sisters something or other--mostly French, which she
spoke fluently; but the cook and housemaid showed more ambition than
intelligence in acquiring that tongue, though Joey learnt it readily
enough.

There was consternation in the camp for a moment or two, on account of
poor Picotee, Ethelberta being not without firmness in matters of
discipline.  Her eye instantly lighted upon her disobedient sister, now
looking twice as disobedient as she really was.

'O, you are here, Picotee?  I am glad to see you,' said the mistress of
the house quietly.

This was altogether to Picotee's surprise, for she had expected a round
rating at least, in her freshness hardly being aware that this reserve of
feeling was an acquired habit of Ethelberta's, and that civility stood in
town for as much vexation as a tantrum represented in Wessex.

Picotee lamely explained her outward reasons for coming, and soon began
to find that Ethelberta's opinions on the matter would not be known by
the tones of her voice.  But innocent Picotee was as wily as a
religionist in sly elusions of the letter whilst infringing the spirit of
a dictum; and by talking very softly and earnestly about the wondrous
good she could do by remaining in the house as governess to the children,
and playing the part of lady's-maid to her sister at show times, she so
far coaxed Ethelberta out of her intentions that she almost accepted the
plan as a good one.  It was agreed that for the present, at any rate,
Picotee should remain.  Then a visit was made to Mrs. Chickerel's room,
where the remainder of the evening was passed; and harmony reigned in the
household.




19. ETHELBERTA'S DRAWING-ROOM


Picotee's heart was fitfully glad.  She was near the man who had enlarged
her capacity from girl's to woman's, a little note or two of young
feeling to a whole diapason; and though nearness was perhaps not in
itself a great reason for felicity when viewed beside the complete
realization of all that a woman can desire in such circumstances, it was
much in comparison with the outer darkness of the previous time.

It became evident to all the family that some misunderstanding had arisen
between Ethelberta and Mr. Julian.  What Picotee hoped in the centre of
her heart as to the issue of the affair it would be too complex a thing
to say.  If Christopher became cold towards her sister he would not come
to the house; if he continued to come it would really be as Ethelberta's
lover--altogether, a pretty game of perpetual check for Picotee.

He did not make his appearance for several days.  Picotee, being a
presentable girl, and decidedly finer-natured than her sisters below
stairs, was allowed to sit occasionally with Ethelberta in the afternoon,
when the teaching of the little ones had been done for the day; and thus
she had an opportunity of observing Ethelberta's emotional condition with
reference to Christopher, which Picotee did with an interest that the
elder sister was very far from suspecting.

At first Ethelberta seemed blithe enough without him.  One more day went,
and he did not come, and then her manner was that of apathy.  Another day
passed, and from fanciful elevations of the eyebrow, and long breathings,
it became apparent that Ethelberta had decidedly passed the indifferent
stage, and was getting seriously out of sorts about him.  Next morning
she looked all hope.  He did not come that day either, and Ethelberta
began to look pale with fear.

'Why don't you go out?' said Picotee timidly.

'I can hardly tell: I have been expecting some one.'

'When she comes I must run up to mother at once, must I not?' said clever
Picotee.

'It is not a lady,' said Ethelberta blandly.  She came then and stood by
Picotee, and looked musingly out of the window.  'I may as well tell you,
perhaps,' she continued.  'It is Mr. Julian.  He is--I suppose--my lover,
in plain English.'

'Ah!' said Picotee.

'Whom I am not going to marry until he gets rich.'

'Ah--how strange!  If I had him--such a lover, I mean--I would marry him
if he continued poor.'

'I don't doubt it, Picotee; just as you come to London without caring
about consequences, or would do any other crazy thing and not mind in the
least what came of it.  But somebody in the family must take a practical
view of affairs, or we should all go to the dogs.'

Picotee recovered from the snubbing which she felt that she deserved, and
charged gallantly by saying, with delicate showings of indifference, 'Do
you love this Mr. What's-his-name of yours?'

'Mr. Julian?  O, he's a very gentlemanly man.  That is, except when he is
rude, and ill-uses me, and will not come and apologize!'

'If I had him--a lover, I would ask him to come if I wanted him to.'

Ethelberta did not give her mind to this remark; but, drawing a long
breath, said, with a pouting laugh, which presaged unreality, 'The idea
of his getting indifferent now!  I have been intending to keep him on
until I got tired of his attentions, and then put an end to them by
marrying him; but here is he, before he has hardly declared himself,
forgetting my existence as much as if he had vowed to love and cherish me
for life.  'Tis an unnatural inversion of the manners of society.'

'When did you first get to care for him, dear Berta?'

'O--when I had seen him once or twice.'

'Goodness--how quick you were!'

'Yes--if I am in the mind for loving I am not to be hindered by shortness
of acquaintanceship.'

'Nor I neither!' sighed Picotee.

'Nor any other woman.  We don't need to know a man well in order to love
him.  That's only necessary when we want to leave off.'

'O Berta--you don't believe that!'

'If a woman did not invariably form an opinion of her choice before she
has half seen him, and love him before she has half formed an opinion,
there would be no tears and pining in the whole feminine world, and poets
would starve for want of a topic.  I don't believe it, do you say?  Ah,
well, we shall see.'

Picotee did not know what to say to this; and Ethelberta left the room to
see about her duties as public story-teller, in which capacity she had
undertaken to appear again this very evening.




20. THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF THE HALL--THE ROAD HOME


London was illuminated by the broad full moon.  The pavements looked
white as if mantled with snow; ordinary houses were sublimated to the
rank of public buildings, public buildings to palaces, and the faces of
women walking the streets to those of calendared saints and
guardian-angels, by the pure bleaching light from the sky.

In the quiet little street where opened the private door of the Hall
chosen by Ethelberta for her story-telling, a brougham was waiting.  The
time was about eleven o'clock; and presently a lady came out from the
building, the moonbeams forthwith flooding her face, which they showed to
be that of the Story-teller herself.  She hastened across to the
carriage, when a second thought arrested her motion: telling the
man-servant and a woman inside the brougham to wait for her, she wrapped
up her features and glided round to the front of the house, where she
paused to observe the carriages and cabs driving up to receive the
fashionable crowd stepping down from the doors.  Standing here in the
throng which her own talent and ingenuity had drawn together, she
appeared to enjoy herself by listening for a minute or two to the names
of several persons of more or less distinction as they were called out,
and then regarded attentively the faces of others of lesser degree: to
scrutinize the latter was, as the event proved, the real object of the
journey from round the corner.  When nearly every one had left the doors,
she turned back disappointed.  Ethelberta had been fancying that her
alienated lover Christopher was in the back rows to-night, but, as far as
could now be observed, the hopeful supposition was a false one.

When she got round to the back again, a man came forward.  It was
Ladywell, whom she had spoken to already that evening.  'Allow me to
bring you your note-book, Mrs. Petherwin: I think you had forgotten it,'
he said.  'I assure you that nobody has handled it but myself.'

Ethelberta thanked him, and took the book.  'I use it to look into
between the parts, in case my memory should fail me,' she explained.  'I
remember that I did lay it down, now you remind me.'

Ladywell had apparently more to say, and moved by her side towards the
carriage; but she declined the arm he offered, and said not another word
till he went on, haltingly:

'Your triumph to-night was very great, and it was as much a triumph to me
as to you; I cannot express my feeling--I cannot say half that I would.
If I might only--'

'Thank you much,' said Ethelberta, with dignity.  'Thank you for bringing
my book, but I must go home now.  I know that you will see that it is not
necessary for us to be talking here.'

'Yes--you are quite right,' said the repressed young painter, struck by
her seriousness.  'Blame me; I ought to have known better.  But perhaps a
man--well, I will say it--a lover without indiscretion is no lover at
all.  Circumspection and devotion are a contradiction in terms.  I saw
that, and hoped that I might speak without real harm.'

'You calculated how to be uncalculating, and are natural by art!' she
said, with the slightest accent of sarcasm.  'But pray do not attend me
further--it is not at all necessary or desirable.  My maid is in the
carriage.'  She bowed, turned, and entered the vehicle, seating herself
beside Picotee.

'It was harsh!' said Ladywell to himself, as he looked after the
retreating carriage.  'I was a fool; but it was harsh.  Yet what man on
earth likes a woman to show too great a readiness at first?  She is
right: she would be nothing without repulse!'  And he moved away in an
opposite direction.

'What man was that?' said Picotee, as they drove along.

'O--a mere Mr. Ladywell: a painter of good family, to whom I have been
sitting for what he calls an Idealization.  He is a dreadful simpleton.'

'Why did you choose him?'

'I did not: he chose me.  But his silliness of behaviour is a hopeful
sign for the picture.  I have seldom known a man cunning with his brush
who was not simple with his tongue; or, indeed, any skill in particular
that was not allied to general stupidity.'

'Your own skill is not like that, is it, Berta?'

'In men--in men.  I don't mean in women.  How childish you are!'

The slight depression at finding that Christopher was not present, which
had followed Ethelberta's public triumph that evening, was covered over,
if not removed, by Ladywell's declaration, and she reached home serene in
spirit.  That she had not the slightest notion of accepting the impulsive
painter made little difference; a lover's arguments being apt to affect a
lady's mood as much by measure as by weight.  A useless declaration like
a rare china teacup with a hole in it, has its ornamental value in
enlarging a collection.

No sooner had they entered the house than Mr. Julian's card was
discovered; and Joey informed them that he had come particularly to speak
with Ethelberta, quite forgetting that it was her evening for
tale-telling.

This was real delight, for between her excitements Ethelberta had been
seriously sick-hearted at the horrible possibility of his never calling
again.  But alas! for Christopher.  There being nothing like a dead
silence for getting one's off-hand sweetheart into a corner, there is
nothing like prematurely ending it for getting into that corner one's
self.

'Now won't I punish him for daring to stay away so long!' she exclaimed
as soon as she got upstairs.  'It is as bad to show constancy in your
manners as fickleness in your heart at such a time as this.'

'But I thought honesty was the best policy?' said Picotee.

'So it is, for the man's purpose.  But don't you go believing in sayings,
Picotee: they are all made by men, for their own advantages.  Women who
use public proverbs as a guide through events are those who have not
ingenuity enough to make private ones as each event occurs.'

She sat down, and rapidly wrote a line to Mr. Julian:--

   'EXONBURY CRESCENT.

   'I return from Mayfair Hall to find you have called.  You will, I
   know, be good enough to forgive my saying what seems an unfriendly
   thing, when I assure you that the circumstances of my peculiar
   situation make it desirable, if not necessary.  It is that I beg you
   not to give me the pleasure of a visit from you for some little time,
   for unhappily the frequency of your kind calls has been noticed; and I
   am now in fear that we may be talked about--invidiously--to the injury
   of us both.  The town, or a section of it, has turned its bull's-eye
   upon me with a brightness which I did not in the least anticipate; and
   you will, I am sure, perceive how indispensable it is that I should be
   circumspect.--Yours sincerely,

   E. PETHERWIN.'




21. A STREET--NEIGH'S ROOMS--CHRISTOPHER'S ROOMS


As soon as Ethelberta had driven off from the Hall, Ladywell turned back
again; and, passing the front entrance, overtook his acquaintance Mr.
Neigh, who had been one of the last to emerge.  The two were going in the
same direction, and they walked a short distance together.

'Has anything serious happened?' said Neigh, noticing an abstraction in
his companion.  'You don't seem in your usual mood to-night.'

'O, it is only that affair between us,' said Ladywell.

'Affair?  Between you and whom?'

'Her and myself, of course.  It will be in every fellow's mouth now, I
suppose!'

'But--not anything between yourself and Mrs. Petherwin?'

'A mere nothing.  But surely you started, Neigh, when you suspected it
just this moment?'

'No--you merely fancied that.'

'Did she not speak well to-night!  You were in the room, I believe?'

'Yes, I just turned in for half-an-hour: it seems that everybody does, so
I thought I must.  But I had no idea that you were feeble that way.'

'It is very kind of you, Neigh--upon my word it is--very kind; and of
course I appreciate the delicacy which--which--'

'What's kind?'

'I mean your well-intentioned plan for making me believe that nothing is
known of this.  But stories will of course get wind; and if our
attachment has made more noise in the world than I intended it should,
and causes any public interest, why--ha-ha!--it must.  There is some
little romance in it perhaps, and people will talk of matters of that
sort between individuals of any repute--little as that is with one of the
pair.'

'Of course they will--of course.  You are a rising man, remember, whom
some day the world will delight to honour.'

'Thank you for that, Neigh.  Thank you sincerely.'

'Not at all.  It is merely justice to say it, and one must he generous to
deserve thanks.'

'Ha-ha!--that's very nicely put, and undeserved I am sure.  And yet I
need a word of that sort sometimes!'

'Genius is proverbially modest.'

'Pray don't, Neigh--I don't deserve it, indeed.  Of course it is well
meant in you to recognize any slight powers, but I don't deserve it.
Certainly, my self-assurance was never too great.  'Tis the misfortune of
all children of art that they should be so dependent upon any scraps of
praise they can pick up to help them along.'

'And when that child gets so deep in love that you can only see the
whites of his eyes--'

'Ah--now, Neigh--don't, I say!'

'But why did--'

'Why did I love her?'

'Yes, why did you love her?'

'Ah, if I could only turn self-vivisector, and watch the operation of my
heart, I should know!'

'My dear fellow, you must be very bad indeed to talk like that.  A poet
himself couldn't be cleaner gone.'

'Now, don't chaff, Neigh; do anything, but don't chaff.  You know that I
am the easiest man in the world for taking it at most times.  But I can't
stand it now; I don't feel up to it.  A glimpse of paradise, and then
perdition.  What would you do, Neigh?'

'She has refused you, then?'

'Well--not positively refused me; but it is so near it that a dull man
couldn't tell the difference.  I hardly can myself.'

'How do you really stand with her?' said Neigh, with an anxiety
ill-concealed.

'Off and on--neither one thing nor the other.  I was determined to make
an effort the last time she sat to me, and so I met her quite coolly, and
spoke only of technicalities with a forced smile--you know that way of
mine for drawing people out, eh, Neigh?'

'Quite, quite.'

'A forced smile, as much as to say, "I am obliged to entertain you, but
as a mere model for art purposes."  But the deuce a bit did she care.  And
then I frequently looked to see what time it was, as the end of the
sitting drew near--rather a rude thing to do, as a rule.'

'Of course.  But that was your finesse.  Ha-ha!--capital!  Yet why not
struggle against such slavery?  It is regularly pulling you down.  What's
a woman's beauty, after all?'

'Well you may say so!  A thing easier to feel than define,' murmured
Ladywell.  'But it's no use, Neigh--I can't help it as long as she
repulses me so exquisitely!  If she would only care for me a little, I
might get to trouble less about her.'

'And love her no more than one ordinarily does a girl by the time one
gets irrevocably engaged to her.  But I suppose she keeps you back so
thoroughly that you carry on the old adoration with as much vigour as if
it were a new fancy every time?'

'Partly yes, and partly no!  It's very true, and it's not true!'

''Tis to be hoped she won't hate you outright, for then you would
absolutely die of idolizing her.'

'Don't, Neigh!--Still there's some truth in it--such is the perversity of
our hearts.  Fancy marrying such a woman!'

'We should feel as eternally united to her after years and years of
marriage as to a dear new angel met at last night's dance.'

'Exactly--just what I should have said.  But did I hear you say "We,"
Neigh?  You didn't say "WE should feel?"'

'Say "we"?--yes--of course--putting myself in your place just in the way
of speaking, you know.'

'Of course, of course; but one is such a fool at these times that one
seems to detect rivalry in every trumpery sound!  Were you never a little
touched?'

'Not I.  My heart is in the happy position of a country which has no
history or debt.'

'I suppose I should rejoice to hear it,' said Ladywell.  'But the
consciousness of a fellow-sufferer being in just such another hole is
such a relief always, and softens the sense of one's folly so very much.'

'There's less Christianity in that sentiment than in your confessing to
it, old fellow.  I know the truth of it nevertheless, and that's why
married men advise others to marry.  Were all the world tied up, the
pleasantly tied ones would be equivalent to those at present free.  But
what if your fellow-sufferer is not only in another such a hole, but in
the same one?'

'No, Neigh--never!  Don't trifle with a friend who--'

'That is, refused like yourself, as well as in love.'

'Ah, thanks, thanks!  It suddenly occurred to me that we might be dead
against one another as rivals, and a friendship of many long--days be
snapped like a--like a reed.'

'No--no--only a jest,' said Neigh, with a strangely accelerated speech.
'Love-making is an ornamental pursuit that matter-of-fact fellows like me
are quite unfit for.  A man must have courted at least half-a-dozen women
before he's a match for one; and since triumph lies so far ahead, I shall
keep out of the contest altogether.'

'Your life would be pleasanter if you were engaged.  It is a nice thing,
after all.'

'It is.  The worst of it would be that, when the time came for breaking
it off, a fellow might get into an action for breach--women are so fond
of that sort of thing now; and I hate love-affairs that don't end
peaceably!'

'But end it by peaceably marrying, my dear fellow!'

'It would seem so singular.  Besides, I have a horror of antiquity: and
you see, as long as a man keeps single, he belongs in a measure to the
rising generation, however old he may be; but as soon as he marries and
has children, he belongs to the last generation, however young he may be.
Old Jones's son is a deal younger than young Brown's father, though they
are both the same age.'

'At any rate, honest courtship cures a man of many evils he had no power
to stem before.'

'By substituting an incurable matrimony!'

'Ah--two persons must have a mind for that before it can happen!' said
Ladywell, sorrowfully shaking his head.

'I think you'll find that if one has a mind for it, it will be quite
sufficient.  But here we are at my rooms.  Come in for half-an-hour?'

'Not to-night, thanks!'

They parted, and Neigh went in.  When he got upstairs he murmured in his
deepest chest note, 'O, lords, that I should come to this!  But I shall
never be such a fool as to marry her!  What a flat that poor young devil
was not to discover that we were tarred with the same brush.  O, the
deuce, the deuce!' he continued, walking about the room as if
passionately stamping, but not quite doing it because another man had
rooms below.

Neigh drew from his pocket-book an envelope embossed with the name of a
fashionable photographer, and out of this pulled a portrait of the lady
who had, in fact, enslaved his secret self equally with his frank young
friend the painter.  After contemplating it awhile with a face of cynical
adoration, he murmured, shaking his head, 'Ah, my lady; if you only knew
this, I should be snapped up like a snail!  Not a minute's peace for me
till I had married you.  I wonder if I shall!--I wonder.'

Neigh was a man of five-and-thirty--Ladywell's senior by ten years; and,
being of a phlegmatic temperament, he had glided thus far through the
period of eligibility with impunity.  He knew as well as any man how far
he could go with a woman and yet keep clear of having to meet her in
church without her bonnet; but it is doubtful if his mind that night were
less disturbed with the question how to guide himself out of the natural
course which his passion for Ethelberta might tempt him into, than was
Ladywell's by his ardent wish to secure her.

* * * * *

About the time at which Neigh and Ladywell parted company, Christopher
Julian was entering his little place in Bloomsbury.  The quaint figure of
Faith, in her bonnet and cloak, was kneeling on the hearth-rug
endeavouring to stir a dull fire into a bright one.

'What--Faith! you have never been out alone?' he said.

Faith's soft, quick-shutting eyes looked unutterable things, and she
replied, 'I have been to hear Mrs. Petherwin's story-telling again.'

'And walked all the way home through the streets at this time of night, I
suppose!'

'Well, nobody molested me, either going or coming back.'

'Faith, I gave you strict orders not to go into the streets after two
o'clock in the day, and now here you are taking no notice of what I say
at all!'

'The truth is, Kit, I wanted to see with my spectacles what this woman
was really like, and I went without them last time.  I slipped in behind,
and nobody saw me.'

'I don't think much of her after what I have seen tonight,' said
Christopher, moodily recurring to a previous thought.

'Why? What is the matter?'

'I thought I would call on her this afternoon, but when I got there I
found she had left early for the performance.  So in the evening, when I
thought it would be all over, I went to the private door of the Hall to
speak to her as she came out, and ask her flatly a question or two which
I was fool enough to think I must ask her before I went to bed.  Just as
I was drawing near she came out, and, instead of getting into the
brougham that was waiting for her, she went round the corner.  When she
came back a man met her and gave her something, and they stayed talking
together two or three minutes.  The meeting may certainly not have been
intentional on her part; but she has no business to be going on so coolly
when--when--in fact, I have come to the conclusion that a woman's
affection is not worth having.  The only feeling which has any dignity or
permanence or worth is family affection between close blood-relations.'

'And yet you snub me sometimes, Mr. Kit.'

'And, for the matter of that, you snub me.  Still, you know what I
mean--there's none of that off-and-on humbug between us.  If we grumble
with one another we are united just the same: if we don't write when we
are parted, we are just the same when we meet--there has been some
rational reason for silence; but as for lovers and sweethearts, there is
nothing worth a rush in what they feel!'

Faith said nothing in reply to this.  The opinions she had formed upon
the wisdom of her brother's pursuit of Ethelberta would have come just
then with an ill grace.  It must, however, have been evident to
Christopher, had he not been too preoccupied for observation, that
Faith's impressions of Ethelberta were not quite favourable as regarded
her womanhood, notwithstanding that she greatly admired her talents.




22. ETHELBERTA'S HOUSE


Ethelberta came indoors one day from the University boat-race, and sat
down, without speaking, beside Picotee, as if lost in thought.

'Did you enjoy the sight?' said Picotee.

'I scarcely know.  We couldn't see at all from Mrs. Belmaine's carriage,
so two of us--very rashly--agreed to get out and be rowed across to the
other side where the people were quite few.  But when the boatman had us
in the middle of the river he declared he couldn't land us on the other
side because of the barges, so there we were in a dreadful state--tossed
up and down like corks upon great waves made by steamers till I made up
my mind for a drowning.  Well, at last we got back again, but couldn't
reach the carriage for the crowd; and I don't know what we should have
done if a gentleman hadn't come--sent by Mrs. Belmaine, who was in a
great fright about us; then he was introduced to me, and--I wonder how it
will end!'

'Was there anything so wonderful in the beginning, then?'

'Yes.  One of the coolest and most practised men in London was
ill-mannered towards me from sheer absence of mind--and could there be
higher flattery?  When a man of that sort does not give you the
politeness you deserve, it means that in his heart he is rebelling
against another feeling which his pride suggests that you do not deserve.
O, I forgot to say that he is a Mr. Neigh, a nephew of Mr. Doncastle's,
who lives at ease about Piccadilly and Pall Mall, and has a few acres
somewhere--but I don't know much of him.  The worst of my position now is
that I excite this superficial interest in many people and a deep
friendship in nobody.  If what all my supporters feel could be collected
into the hearts of two or three they would love me better than they love
themselves; but now it pervades all and operates in none.'

'But it must operate in this gentleman?'

'Well, yes--just for the present.  But men in town have so many
contrivances for getting out of love that you can't calculate upon
keeping them in for two days together.  However, it is all the same to
me.  There's only--but let that be.'

'What is there only?' said Picotee coaxingly.

'Only one man,' murmured Ethelberta, in much lower tones.  'I mean, whose
wife I should care to be; and the very qualities I like in him will, I
fear, prevent his ever being in a position to ask me.'

'Is he the man you punished the week before last by forbidding him to
come?'

'Perhaps he is: but he does not want civility from me.  Where there's
much feeling there's little ceremony.'

'It certainly seems that he does not want civility from you to make him
attentive to you,' said Picotee, stifling a sigh; 'for here is a letter
in his handwriting, I believe.'

'You might have given it to me at once,' said Ethelberta, opening the
envelope hastily.  It contained very few sentences: they were to the
effect that Christopher had received her letter forbidding him to call;
that he had therefore at first resolved not to call or even see her more,
since he had become such a shadow in her path.  Still, as it was always
best to do nothing hastily, he had on second thoughts decided to ask her
to grant him a last special favour, and see him again just once, for a
few minutes only that afternoon, in which he might at least say Farewell.
To avoid all possibility of compromising her in anybody's eyes, he would
call at half-past six, when other callers were likely to be gone, knowing
that from the peculiar constitution of the household the hour would not
interfere with her arrangements.  There being no time for an answer, he
would assume that she would see him, and keep the engagement; the request
being one which could not rationally be objected to.

'There--read it!' said Ethelberta, with glad displeasure.  'Did you ever
hear such audacity?  Fixing a time so soon that I cannot reply, and thus
making capital out of a pretended necessity, when it is really an
arbitrary arrangement of his own.  That's real rebellion--forcing himself
into my house when I said strictly he was not to come; and then, that it
cannot rationally be objected to--I don't like his "rationally."'

'Where there's much love there's little ceremony, didn't you say just
now?' observed innocent Picotee.

'And where there's little love, no ceremony at all.  These manners of his
are dreadful, and I believe he will never improve.'

'It makes you care not a bit about him, does it not, Berta?' said Picotee
hopefully.

'I don't answer for that,' said Ethelberta.  'I feel, as many others do,
that a want of ceremony which is produced by abstraction of mind is no
defect in a poet or musician, fatal as it may be to an ordinary man.'

'Mighty me! You soon forgive him.'

'Picotee, don't you be so quick to speak.  Before I have finished, how do
you know what I am going to say?  I'll never tell you anything again, if
you take me up so.  Of course I am going to punish him at once, and make
him remember that I am a lady, even if I do like him a little.'

'How do you mean to punish him?' said Picotee, with interest.

'By writing and telling him that on no account is he to come.'

'But there is not time for a letter--'

'That doesn't matter.  It will show him that I did not mean him to come.'

At hearing the very merciful nature of the punishment, Picotee sighed
without replying; and Ethelberta despatched her note.  The hour of
appointment drew near, and Ethelberta showed symptoms of unrest.  Six
o'clock struck and passed.  She walked here and there for nothing, and it
was plain that a dread was filling her: her letter might accidentally
have had, in addition to the moral effect which she had intended, the
practical effect which she did not intend, by arriving before, instead of
after, his purposed visit to her, thereby stopping him in spite of all
her care.

'How long are letters going to Bloomsbury?' she said suddenly.

'Two hours, Joey tells me,' replied Picotee, who had already inquired on
her own private account.

'There!' exclaimed Ethelberta petulantly.  'How I dislike a man to
misrepresent things!  He said there was not time for a reply!'

'Perhaps he didn't know,' said Picotee, in angel tones; 'and so it
happens all right, and he has got it, and he will not come after all.'

They waited and waited, but Christopher did not appear that night; the
true case being that his declaration about insufficient time for a reply
was merely an ingenious suggestion to her not to be so cruel as to forbid
him.  He was far from suspecting when the letter of denial did reach
him--about an hour before the time of appointment--that it was sent by a
refinement of art, of which the real intention was futility, and that but
for his own misstatement it would have been carefully delayed.

The next day another letter came from the musician, decidedly short and
to the point.  The irate lover stated that he would not be made a fool of
any longer: under any circumstances he meant to come that self-same
afternoon, and should decidedly expect her to see him.

'I will not see him!' said Ethelberta.  'Why did he not call last night?'

'Because you told him not to,' said Picotee.

'Good gracious, as if a woman's words are to be translated as literally
as Homer!  Surely he is aware that more often than not "No" is said to a
man's importunities because it is traditionally the correct modest reply,
and for nothing else in the world.  If all men took words as
superficially as he does, we should die of decorum in shoals.'

'Ah, Berta! how could you write a letter that you did not mean should be
obeyed?'

'I did in a measure mean it, although I could have shown Christian
forgiveness if it had not been.  Never mind; I will not see him.  I'll
plague my heart for the credit of my sex.'

To ensure the fulfilment of this resolve, Ethelberta determined to give
way to a headache that she was beginning to be aware of, go to her room,
disorganize her dress, and ruin her hair by lying down; so putting it out
of her power to descend and meet Christopher on any momentary impulse.

Picotee sat in the room with her, reading, or pretending to read, and
Ethelberta pretended to sleep.  Christopher's knock came up the stairs,
and with it the end of the farce.

'I'll tell you what,' said Ethelberta in the prompt and broadly-awake
tone of one who had been concentrated on the expectation of that sound
for a length of time, 'it was a mistake in me to do this!  Joey will be
sure to make a muddle of it.'

Joey was heard coming up the stairs.  Picotee opened the door, and said,
with an anxiety transcending Ethelberta's, 'Well?'

'O, will you tell Mrs. Petherwin that Mr. Julian says he'll wait.'

'You were not to ask him to wait,' said Ethelberta, within.

'I know that,' said Joey, 'and I didn't.  He's doing that out of his own
head.'

'Then let Mr. Julian wait, by all means,' said Ethelberta.  'Allow him to
wait if he likes, but tell him it is uncertain if I shall be able to come
down.'

Joey then retired, and the two sisters remained in silence.

'I wonder if he's gone,' Ethelberta said, at the end of a long time.

'I thought you were asleep,' said Picotee.  'Shall we ask Joey?  I have
not heard the door close.'

Joey was summoned, and after a leisurely ascent, interspersed by various
gymnastic performances over the handrail here and there, appeared again.

'He's there jest the same: he don't seem to be in no hurry at all,' said
Joey.

'What is he doing?' inquired Picotee solicitously.

'O, only looking at his watch sometimes, and humming tunes, and playing
rat-a-tat-tat upon the table.  He says he don't mind waiting a bit.'

'You must have made a mistake in the message,' said Ethelberta, within.

'Well, no.  I am correct as a jineral thing.  I jest said perhaps you
would be engaged all the evening, and perhaps you wouldn't.'

When Joey had again retired, and they had waited another ten minutes,
Ethelberta said, 'Picotee, do you go down and speak a few words to him.  I
am determined he shall not see me.  You know him a little; you remember
when he came to the Lodge?'

'What must I say to him?'

Ethelberta paused before replying.  'Try to find out if--if he is much
grieved at not seeing me, and say--give him to understand that I will
forgive him, Picotee.'

'Very well.'

'And Picotee--'

'Yes.'

'If he says he must see me--I think I will get up.  But only if he says
must: you remember that.'

Picotee departed on her errand.  She paused on the staircase trembling,
and thinking between the thrills how very far would have been the conduct
of her poor slighted self from proud recalcitration had Mr. Julian's
gentle request been addressed to her instead of to Ethelberta; and she
went some way in the painful discovery of how much more tantalizing it
was to watch an envied situation that was held by another than to be out
of sight of it altogether.  Here was Christopher waiting to bestow love,
and Ethelberta not going down to receive it: a commodity unequalled in
value by any other in the whole wide world was being wantonly wasted
within that very house.  If she could only have stood to-night as the
beloved Ethelberta, and not as the despised Picotee, how different would
be this going down!  Thus she went along, red and pale moving in her
cheeks as in the Northern Lights at their strongest time.

Meanwhile Christopher had sat waiting minute by minute till the evening
shades grew browner, and the fire sank low.  Joey, finding himself not
particularly wanted upon the premises after the second inquiry, had
slipped out to witness a nigger performance round the corner, and Julian
began to think himself forgotten by all the household.  The perception
gradually cooled his emotions and enabled him to hold his hat quite
steadily.

When Picotee gently thrust open the door she was surprised to find the
room in darkness, the fire gone completely out, and the form of
Christopher only visible by a faint patch of light, which, coming from a
lamp on the opposite side of the way and falling upon the mirror, was
thrown as a pale nebulosity upon his shoulder.  Picotee was too flurried
at sight of the familiar outline to know what to do, and, instead of
going or calling for a light, she mechanically advanced into the room.
Christopher did not turn or move in any way, and then she perceived that
he had begun to doze in his chair.

Instantly, with the precipitancy of the timorous, she said, 'Mr. Julian!'
and touched him on the shoulder--murmuring then, 'O, I beg pardon, I--I
will get a light.'

Christopher's consciousness returned, and his first act, before rising,
was to exclaim, in a confused manner, 'Ah--you have come--thank you,
Berta!' then impulsively to seize her hand, as it hung beside his head,
and kiss it passionately.  He stood up, still holding her fingers.

Picotee gasped out something, but was completely deprived of articulate
utterance, and in another moment being unable to control herself at this
sort of first meeting with the man she had gone through fire and water to
be near, and more particularly by the overpowering kiss upon her hand,
burst into hysterical sobbing.  Julian, in his inability to imagine so
much emotion--or at least the exhibition of it--in Ethelberta, gently
drew Picotee further forward by the hand he held, and utilized the
solitary spot of light from the mirror by making it fall upon her face.
Recognizing the childish features, he at once, with an exclamation,
dropped her hand and started back.  Being in point of fact a complete
bundle of nerves and nothing else, his thin figure shook like a
harp-string in painful excitement at a contretemps which would scarcely
have quickened the pulse of an ordinary man.

Poor Picotee, feeling herself in the wind of a civil d---, started back
also, sobbing more than ever.  It was a little too much that the first
result of his discovery of the mistake should be absolute repulse.  She
leant against the mantelpiece, when Julian, much bewildered at her
superfluity of emotion, assisted her to a seat in sheer humanity.  But
Christopher was by no means pleased when he again thought round the
circle of circumstances.

'How could you allow such an absurd thing to happen?' he said, in a
stern, though trembling voice.  'You knew I might mistake.  I had no idea
you were in the house: I thought you were miles away, at Sandbourne or
somewhere!  But I see: it is just done for a joke, ha-ha!'

This made Picotee rather worse still.  'O-O-O-O!' she replied, in the
tone of pouring from a bottle.  'What shall I do-o-o-o!  It is--not done
for a--joke at all-l-l-l!'

'Not done for a joke?  Then never mind--don't cry, Picotee.  What was it
done for, I wonder?'

Picotee, mistaking the purport of his inquiry, imagined him to refer to
her arrival in the house, quite forgetting, in her guilty sense of having
come on his account, that he would have no right or thought of asking
questions about a natural visit to a sister, and she said: 'When you--went
away from--Sandbourne, I--I--I didn't know what to do, and then I ran
away, and came here, and then Ethelberta--was angry with me; but she says
I may stay; but she doesn't know that I know you, and how we used to meet
along the road every morning--and I am afraid to tell her--O, what shall
I do!'

'Never mind it,' said Christopher, a sense of the true state of her case
dawning upon him with unpleasant distinctness, and bringing some
irritation at his awkward position; though it was impossible to be long
angry with a girl who had not reasoning foresight enough to perceive that
doubtful pleasure and certain pain must be the result of any meeting
whilst hearts were at cross purposes in this way.

'Where is your sister?' he asked.

'She wouldn't come down, unless she MUST,' said Picotee.  'You have vexed
her, and she has a headache besides that, and I came instead.'

'So that I mightn't be wasted altogether.  Well, it's a strange business
between the three of us.  I have heard of one-sided love, and reciprocal
love, and all sorts, but this is my first experience of a concatenated
affection.  You follow me, I follow Ethelberta, and she follows--Heaven
knows who!'

'Mr. Ladywell!' said the mortified Picotee.

'Good God, if I didn't think so!' said Christopher, feeling to the soles
of his feet like a man in a legitimate drama.

'No, no, no!' said the frightened girl hastily.  'I am not sure it is Mr.
Ladywell.  That's altogether a mistake of mine!'

'Ah, yes, you want to screen her,' said Christopher, with a withering
smile at the spot of light.  'Very sisterly, doubtless; but none of that
will do for me.  I am too old a bird by far--by very far!  Now are you
sure she does not love Ladywell?'

'Yes!'

'Well, perhaps I blame her wrongly.  She may have some little good
faith--a woman has, here and there.  How do you know she does not love
Ladywell?'

'Because she would prefer Mr. Neigh to him, any day.'

'Ha!'

'No, no--you mistake, sir--she doesn't love either at all--Ethelberta
doesn't.  I meant that she cannot love Mr. Ladywell because he stands
lower in her opinion than Mr. Neigh, and him she certainly does not care
for.  She only loves you.  If you only knew how true she is you wouldn't
be so suspicious about her, and I wish I had not come here--yes, I do!'

'I cannot tell what to think of it.  Perhaps I don't know much of this
world after all, or what girls will do.  But you don't excuse her to me,
Picotee.'

Before this time Picotee had been simulating haste in getting a light;
but in her dread of appearing visibly to Christopher's eyes, and showing
him the precise condition of her tear-stained face, she put it off moment
after moment, and stirred the fire, in hope that the faint illumination
thus produced would be sufficient to save her from the charge of stupid
conduct as entertainer.

Fluttering about on the horns of this dilemma, she was greatly relieved
when Christopher, who read her difficulty, and the general painfulness of
the situation, said that since Ethelberta was really suffering from a
headache he would not wish to disturb her till to-morrow, and went off
downstairs and into the street without further ceremony.

Meanwhile other things had happened upstairs.  No sooner had Picotee left
her sister's room, than Ethelberta thought it would after all have been
much better if she had gone down herself to speak to this admirably
persistent lover.  Was she not drifting somewhat into the character of
coquette, even if her ground of offence--a word of Christopher's about
somebody else's mean parentage, which was spoken in utter forgetfulness
of her own position, but had wounded her to the quick nevertheless--was
to some extent a tenable one?  She knew what facilities in suffering
Christopher always showed; how a touch to other people was a blow to him,
a blow to them his deep wound, although he took such pains to look stolid
and unconcerned under those inflictions, and tried to smile as if he had
no feelings whatever.  It would be more generous to go down to him, and
be kind.  She jumped up with that alertness which comes so spontaneously
at those sweet bright times when desire and duty run hand in hand.

She hastily set her hair and dress in order--not such matchless order as
she could have wished them to be in, but time was precious--and descended
the stairs.  When on the point of pushing open the drawing-room door,
which wanted about an inch of being closed, she was astounded to discover
that the room was in total darkness, and still more to hear Picotee
sobbing inside.  To retreat again was the only action she was capable of
at that moment: the clash between this picture and the anticipated scene
of Picotee and Christopher sitting in frigid propriety at opposite sides
of a well-lighted room was too great.  She flitted upstairs again with
the least possible rustle, and flung herself down on the couch as before,
panting with excitement at the new knowledge that had come to her.

There was only one possible construction to be put upon this in
Ethelberta's rapid mind, and that approximated to the true one.  She had
known for some time that Picotee once had a lover, or something akin to
it, and that he had disappointed her in a way which had never been told.
No stranger, save in the capacity of the one beloved, could wound a woman
sufficiently to make her weep, and it followed that Christopher was the
man of Picotee's choice.  As Ethelberta recalled the conversations,
conclusion after conclusion came like pulsations in an aching head.  'O,
how did it happen, and who is to blame?' she exclaimed.  'I cannot doubt
his faith, and I cannot doubt hers; and yet how can I keep doubting them
both?'

It was characteristic of Ethelberta's jealous motherly guard over her
young sisters that, amid these contending inquiries, her foremost feeling
was less one of hope for her own love than of championship for Picotee's.




23. ETHELBERTA'S HOUSE (continued)


Picotee was heard on the stairs: Ethelberta covered her face.

'Is he waiting?' she said faintly, on finding that Picotee did not begin
to speak.

'No; he is gone,' said Picotee.

'Ah, why is that?' came quickly from under the handkerchief.  'He has
forgotten me--that's what it is!'

'O no, he has not!' said Picotee, just as bitterly.

Ethelberta had far too much heroism to let much in this strain escape
her, though her sister was prepared to go any lengths in the same.  'I
suppose,' continued Ethelberta, in the quiet way of one who had only a
headache the matter with her, 'that he remembered you after the meeting
at Anglebury?'

'Yes, he remembered me.'

'Did you tell me you had seen him before that time?'

'I had seen him at Sandbourne.  I don't think I told you.'

'At whose house did you meet him?'

'At nobody's.  I only saw him sometimes,' replied Picotee, in great
distress.

Ethelberta, though of all women most miserable, was brimming with
compassion for the throbbing girl so nearly related to her, in whom she
continually saw her own weak points without the counterpoise of her
strong ones.  But it was necessary to repress herself awhile: the
intended ways of her life were blocked and broken up by this jar of
interests, and she wanted time to ponder new plans.  'Picotee, I would
rather be alone now, if you don't mind,' she said.  'You need not leave
me any light; it makes my eyes ache, I think.'

Picotee left the room.  But Ethelberta had not long been alone and in
darkness when somebody gently opened the door, and entered without a
candle.

'Berta,' said the soft voice of Picotee again, 'may I come in?'

'O yes,' said Ethelberta.  'Has everything gone right with the house this
evening?'

'Yes; and Gwendoline went out just now to buy a few things, and she is
going to call round upon father when he has got his dinner cleared away.'

'I hope she will not stay and talk to the other servants.  Some day she
will let drop something or other before father can stop her.'

'O Berta!' said Picotee, close beside her.  She was kneeling in front of
the couch, and now flinging her arm across Ethelberta's shoulder and
shaking violently, she pressed her forehead against her sister's temple,
and breathed out upon her cheek:

'I came in again to tell you something which I ought to have told you
just now, and I have come to say it at once because I am afraid I shan't
be able to to-morrow.  Mr. Julian was the young man I spoke to you of a
long time ago, and I should have told you all about him, but you said he
was your young man too, and--and I didn't know what to do then, because I
thought it was wrong in me to love your young man; and Berta, he didn't
mean me to love him at all, but I did it myself, though I did not want to
do it, either; it would come to me!  And I didn't know he belonged to you
when I began it, or I would not have let him meet me at all; no I
wouldn't!'

'Meet you? You don't mean to say he used to meet you?' whispered
Ethelberta.

'Yes,' said Picotee; 'but he could not help it.  We used to meet on the
road, and there was no other road unless I had gone ever so far round.
But it is worse than that, Berta!  That was why I couldn't bide in
Sandbourne, and--and ran away to you up here; it was not because I wanted
to see you, Berta, but because I--I wanted--'

'Yes, yes, I know,' said Ethelberta hurriedly.

'And then when I went downstairs he mistook me for you for a moment, and
that caused--a confusion!'

'O, well, it does not much matter,' said Ethelberta, kissing Picotee
soothingly.  'You ought not of course to have come to London in such a
manner; but, since you have come, we will make the best of it.  Perhaps
it may end happily for you and for him.  Who knows?'

'Then don't you want him, Berta?'

'O no; not at all!'

'What--and don't you really want him, Berta?' repeated Picotee, starting
up.

'I would much rather he paid his addresses to you.  He is not the sort of
man I should wish to--think it best to marry, even if I were to marry,
which I have no intention of doing at present.  He calls to see me
because we are old friends, but his calls do not mean anything more than
that he takes an interest in me.  It is not at all likely that I shall
see him again! and I certainly never shall see him unless you are
present.'

'That will be very nice.'

'Yes.  And you will be always distant towards him, and go to leave the
room when he comes, when I will call you back; but suppose we continue
this to-morrow?  I can tell you better then what to do.'

When Picotee had left her the second time, Ethelberta turned over upon
her breast and shook in convulsive sobs which had little relationship
with tears.  This abandonment ended as suddenly as it had begun--not
lasting more than a minute and a half altogether--and she got up in an
unconsidered and unusual impulse to seek relief from the stinging sarcasm
of this event--the unhappy love of Picotee--by mentioning something of it
to another member of the family, her eldest sister Gwendoline, who was a
woman full of sympathy.

Ethelberta descended to the kitchen, it being now about ten o'clock.  The
room was empty, Gwendoline not having yet returned, and Cornelia, being
busy about her own affairs upstairs.  The French family had gone to the
theatre, and the house on that account was very quiet to-night.
Ethelberta sat down in the dismal place without turning up the gas, and
in a few minutes admitted Gwendoline.

The round-faced country cook floundered in, untying her bonnet as she
came, laying it down on a chair, and talking at the same time.  'Such a
place as this London is, to be sure!' she exclaimed, turning on the gas
till it whistled.  'I wish I was down in Wessex again.  Lord-a-mercy,
Berta, I didn't see it was you!  I thought it was Cornelia.  As I was
saying, I thought that, after biding in this underground cellar all the
week, making up messes for them French folk, and never pleasing 'em, and
never shall, because I don't understand that line, I thought I would go
out and see father, you know.'

'Is he very well?' said Ethelberta.

'Yes; and he is going to call round when he has time.  Well, as I was a-
coming home-along I thought, "Please the Lord I'll have some chippols for
supper just for a plain trate," and I went round to the late
greengrocer's for 'em; and do you know they sweared me down that they
hadn't got such things as chippols in the shop, and had never heard of
'em in their lives.  At last I said, "Why, how can you tell me such a
brazen story?--here they be, heaps of 'em!"  It made me so vexed that I
came away there and then, and wouldn't have one--no, not at a gift.'

'They call them young onions here,' said Ethelberta quietly; 'you must
always remember that.  But, Gwendoline, I wanted--'

Ethelberta felt sick at heart, and stopped.  She had come down on the
wings of an impulse to unfold her trouble about Picotee to her
hard-headed and much older sister, less for advice than to get some heart-
ease by interchange of words; but alas, she could proceed no further.  The
wretched homeliness of Gwendoline's mind seemed at this particular
juncture to be absolutely intolerable, and Ethelberta was suddenly
convinced that to involve Gwendoline in any such discussion would simply
be increasing her own burden, and adding worse confusion to her sister's
already confused existence.

'What were you going to say?' said the honest and unsuspecting
Gwendoline.

'I will put it off until to-morrow,' Ethelberta murmured gloomily; 'I
have a bad headache, and I am afraid I cannot stay with you after all.'

As she ascended the stairs, Ethelberta ached with an added pain not much
less than the primary one which had brought her down.  It was that old
sense of disloyalty to her class and kin by feeling as she felt now which
caused the pain, and there was no escaping it.  Gwendoline would have
gone to the ends of the earth for her: she could not confide a thought to
Gwendoline!

'If she only knew of that unworthy feeling of mine, how she would
grieve,' said Ethelberta miserably.

She next went up to the servants' bedrooms, and to where Cornelia slept.
On Ethelberta's entrance Cornelia looked up from a perfect wonder of a
bonnet, which she held in her hands.  At sight of Ethelberta the look of
keen interest in her work changed to one of gaiety.

'I am so glad--I was just coming down,' Cornelia said in a whisper;
whenever they spoke as relations in this house it was in whispers.  'Now,
how do you think this bonnet will do?  May I come down, and see how I
look in your big glass?'  She clapped the bonnet upon her head.  'Won't
it do beautiful for Sunday afternoon?'

'It looks very attractive, as far as I can see by this light,' said
Ethelberta.  'But is it not rather too brilliant in colour--blue and red
together, like that?  Remember, as I often tell you, people in town never
wear such bright contrasts as they do in the country.'

'O Berta!' said Cornelia, in a deprecating tone; 'don't object.  If
there's one thing I do glory in it is a nice flare-up about my head o'
Sundays--of course if the family's not in mourning, I mean.'  But, seeing
that Ethelberta did not smile, she turned the subject, and added
docilely: 'Did you come up for me to do anything?  I will put off
finishing my bonnet if I am wanted.'

'I was going to talk to you about family matters, and Picotee,' said
Ethelberta.  'But, as you are busy, and I have a headache, I will put it
off till to-morrow.'

Cornelia seemed decidedly relieved, for family matters were far from
attractive at the best of times; and Ethelberta went down to the next
floor, and entered her mother's room.

After a short conversation Mrs. Chickerel said, 'You say you want to ask
me something?'

'Yes: but nothing of importance, mother.  I was thinking about Picotee,
and what would be the best thing to do--'

'Ah, well you may, Berta.  I am so uneasy about this life you have led us
into, and full of fear that your plans may break down; if they do,
whatever will become of us?  I know you are doing your best; but I cannot
help thinking that the coming to London and living with you was wild and
rash, and not well weighed afore we set about it.  You should have
counted the cost first, and not advised it.  If you break down, and we
are all discovered living so queer and unnatural, right in the heart of
the aristocracy, we should be the laughing-stock of the country: it would
kill me, and ruin us all--utterly ruin us!'

'O mother, I know all that so well!' exclaimed Ethelberta, tears of
anguish filling her eyes.  'Don't depress me more than I depress myself
by such fears, or you will bring about the very thing we strive to avoid!
My only chance is in keeping in good spirits, and why don't you try to
help me a little by taking a brighter view of things?'

'I know I ought to, my dear girl, but I cannot.  I do so wish that I
never let you tempt me and the children away from the Lodge.  I cannot
think why I allowed myself to be so persuaded--cannot think!  You are not
to blame--it is I.  I am much older than you, and ought to have known
better than listen to such a scheme.  This undertaking seems too big--the
bills frighten me.  I have never been used to such wild adventure, and I
can't sleep at night for fear that your tale-telling will go wrong, and
we shall all be exposed and shamed.  A story-teller seems such an
impossible castle-in-the-air sort of a trade for getting a living by--I
cannot think how ever you came to dream of such an unheard-of thing.'

'But it is not a castle in the air, and it does get a living!' said
Ethelberta, her lip quivering.

'Well, yes, while it is just a new thing; but I am afraid it cannot
last--that's what I fear.  People will find you out as one of a family of
servants, and their pride will be stung at having gone to hear your
romancing; then they will go no more, and what will happen to us and the
poor little ones?'

'We must all scatter again!'

'If we could get as we were once, I wouldn't mind that.  But we shall
have lost our character as simple country folk who know nothing, which
are the only class of poor people that squires will give any help to; and
I much doubt if the girls would get places after such a discovery--it
would be so awkward and unheard-of.'

'Well, all I can say is,' replied Ethelberta, 'that I will do my best.
All that I have is theirs and yours as much as mine, and these
arrangements are simply on their account.  I don't like my relations
being my servants; but if they did not work for me, they would have to
work for others, and my service is much lighter and pleasanter than any
other lady's would be for them, so the advantages are worth the risk.  If
I stood alone, I would go and hide my head in any hole, and care no more
about the world and its ways.  I wish I was well out of it, and at the
bottom of a quiet grave--anybody might have the world for me then!  But
don't let me disturb you longer; it is getting late.'

Ethelberta then wished her mother good-night, and went away.  To attempt
confidences on such an ethereal matter as love was now absurd; her hermit
spirit was doomed to dwell apart as usual; and she applied herself to
deep thinking without aid and alone.  Not only was there Picotee's misery
to disperse; it became imperative to consider how best to overpass a more
general catastrophe.




24. ETHELBERTA'S HOUSE (continued)--THE BRITISH MUSEUM


Mrs. Chickerel, in deploring the risks of their present speculative mode
of life, was far from imagining that signs of the foul future so much
dreaded were actually apparent to Ethelberta at the time the lament was
spoken.  Hence the daughter's uncommon sensitiveness to prophecy.  It was
as if a dead-reckoner poring over his chart should predict breakers ahead
to one who already beheld them.

That her story-telling would prove so attractive Ethelberta had not
ventured to expect for a moment; that having once proved attractive there
should be any falling-off until such time had elapsed as would enable her
to harvest some solid fruit was equally a surprise.  Future expectations
are often based without hesitation upon one happy accident, when the only
similar condition remaining to subsequent sets of circumstances is that
the same person forms the centre of them.  Her situation was so peculiar,
and so unlike that of most public people, that there was hardly an
argument explaining this triumphant opening which could be used in
forecasting the close; unless, indeed, more strategy were employed in the
conduct of the campaign than Ethelberta seemed to show at present.

There was no denying that she commanded less attention than at first: the
audience had lessened, and, judging by appearances, might soon be
expected to be decidedly thin.  In excessive lowness of spirit,
Ethelberta translated these signs with the bias that a lingering echo of
her mother's dismal words naturally induced, reading them as conclusive
evidence that her adventure had been chimerical in its birth.  Yet it was
very far less conclusive than she supposed.  Public interest might
without doubt have been renewed after a due interval, some of the falling-
off being only an accident of the season.  Her novelties had been hailed
with pleasure, the rather that their freshness tickled than that their
intrinsic merit was appreciated; and, like many inexperienced dispensers
of a unique charm, Ethelberta, by bestowing too liberally and too
frequently, was destroying the very element upon which its popularity
depended.  Her entertainment had been good in its conception, and partly
good in its execution; yet her success had but little to do with that
goodness.  Indeed, what might be called its badness in a histrionic
sense--that is, her look sometimes of being out of place, the sight of a
beautiful woman on a platform, revealing tender airs of domesticity which
showed her to belong by character to a quiet drawing-room--had been
primarily an attractive feature.  But alas, custom was staling this by
improving her up to the mark of an utter impersonator, thereby
eradicating the pretty abashments of a poetess out of her sphere; and
more than one well-wisher who observed Ethelberta from afar feared that
it might some day come to be said of her that she had

   'Enfeoffed herself to popularity:
   That, being daily swallowed by men's eyes,
   They surfeited with honey, and began
   To loathe the taste of sweetness, whereof a little
   More than a little is by much too much.'

But this in its extremity was not quite yet.

We discover her one day, a little after this time, sitting before a table
strewed with accounts and bills from different tradesmen of the
neighbourhood, which she examined with a pale face, collecting their
totals on a blank sheet.  Picotee came into the room, but Ethelberta took
no notice whatever of her.  The younger sister, who subsisted on scraps
of notice and favour, like a dependent animal, even if these were only an
occasional glance of the eye, could not help saying at last, 'Berta, how
silent you are.  I don't think you know I am in the room.'

'I did not observe you,' said Ethelberta.  'I am very much engaged: these
bills have to be paid.'

'What, and cannot we pay them?' said Picotee, in vague alarm.

'O yes, I can pay them.  The question is, how long shall I be able to do
it?'

'That is sad; and we are going on so nicely, too.  It is not true that
you have really decided to leave off story-telling now the people don't
crowd to hear it as they did?'

'I think I shall leave off.'

'And begin again next year?'

'That is very doubtful.'

'I'll tell you what you might do,' said Picotee, her face kindling with a
sense of great originality.  'You might travel about to country towns and
tell your story splendidly.'

'A man in my position might perhaps do it with impunity; but I could not
without losing ground in other domains.  A woman may drive to Mayfair
from her house in Exonbury Crescent, and speak from a platform there, and
be supposed to do it as an original way of amusing herself; but when it
comes to starring in the provinces she establishes herself as a woman of
a different breed and habit.  I wish I were a man!  I would give up this
house, advertise it to be let furnished, and sally forth with confidence.
But I am driven to think of other ways to manage than that.'

Picotee fell into a conjectural look, but could not guess.

'The way of marriage,' said Ethelberta.  'Otherwise perhaps the poetess
may live to become what Dryden called himself when he got old and poor--a
rent-charge on Providence. . . . .  Yes, I must try that way,' she
continued, with a sarcasm towards people out of hearing.  I must buy a
"Peerage" for one thing, and a "Baronetage," and a "House of Commons,"
and a "Landed Gentry," and learn what people are about me.  'I must go to
Doctors' Commons and read up wills of the parents of any likely gudgeons
I may know.  I must get a Herald to invent an escutcheon of my family,
and throw a genealogical tree into the bargain in consideration of my
taking a few second-hand heirlooms of a pawnbroking friend of his.  I
must get up sham ancestors, and find out some notorious name to start my
pedigree from.  It does not matter what his character was; either villain
or martyr will do, provided that he lived five hundred years ago.  It
would be considered far more creditable to make good my descent from
Satan in the age when he went to and fro on the earth than from a
ministering angel under Victoria.'

'But, Berta, you are not going to marry any stranger who may turn up?'
said Picotee, who had creeping sensations of dread when Ethelberta talked
like this.

'I had no such intention.  But, having once put my hand to the plough,
how shall I turn back?'

'You might marry Mr. Ladywell,' said Picotee, who preferred to look at
things in the concrete.

'Yes, marry him villainously; in cold blood, without a moment to prepare
himself.'

'Ah, you won't!'

'I am not so sure about that.  I have brought mother and the children to
town against her judgment and against my father's; they gave way to my
opinion as to one who from superior education has larger knowledge of the
world than they.  I must prove my promises, even if Heaven should fall
upon me for it, or what a miserable future will theirs be!  We must not
be poor in London.  Poverty in the country is a sadness, but poverty in
town is a horror.  There is something not without grandeur in the thought
of starvation on an open mountain or in a wide wood, and your bones lying
there to bleach in the pure sun and rain; but a back garret in a rookery,
and the other starvers in the room insisting on keeping the window
shut--anything to deliver us from that!'

'How gloomy you can be, Berta!  It will never be so dreadful.  Why, I can
take in plain sewing, and you can do translations, and mother can knit
stockings, and so on.  How much longer will this house be yours?'

'Two years.  If I keep it longer than that I shall have to pay rent at
the rate of three hundred a year.  The Petherwin estate provides me with
it till then, which will be the end of Lady Petherwin's term.'

'I see it; and you ought to marry before the house is gone, if you mean
to marry high,' murmured Picotee, in an inadequate voice, as one
confronted by a world so tragic that any hope of her assisting therein
was out of the question.

It was not long after this exposition of the family affairs that
Christopher called upon them; but Picotee was not present, having gone to
think of superhuman work on the spur of Ethelberta's awakening talk.
There was something new in the way in which Ethelberta received the
announcement of his name; passion had to do with it, so had
circumspection; the latter most, for the first time since their reunion.

'I am going to leave this part of England,' said Christopher, after a few
gentle preliminaries.  'I was one of the applicants for the post of
assistant-organist at Melchester Cathedral when it became vacant, and I
find I am likely to be chosen, through the interest of one of my father's
friends.'

'I congratulate you.'

'No, Ethelberta, it is not worth that.  I did not originally mean to
follow this course at all; but events seemed to point to it in the
absence of a better.'

'I too am compelled to follow a course I did not originally mean to
take.'  After saying no more for a few moments, she added, in a tone of
sudden openness, a richer tincture creeping up her cheek, 'I want to put
a question to you boldly--not exactly a question--a thought.  Have you
considered whether the relations between us which have lately prevailed
are--are the best for you--and for me?'

'I know what you mean,' said Christopher, hastily anticipating all that
she might be going to say; 'and I am glad you have given me the
opportunity of speaking upon that subject.  It has been very good and
considerate in you to allow me to share your society so frequently as you
have done since I have been in town, and to think of you as an object to
exist for and strive for.  But I ought to have remembered that, since you
have nobody at your side to look after your interests, it behoved me to
be doubly careful.  In short, Ethelberta, I am not in a position to
marry, nor can I discern when I shall be, and I feel it would be an
injustice to ask you to be bound in any way to one lower and less
talented than you.  You cannot, from what you say, think it desirable
that the engagement should continue.  I have no right to ask you to be my
betrothed, without having a near prospect of making you my wife.  I don't
mind saying this straight out--I have no fear that you will doubt my
love; thank Heaven, you know what that is well enough!  However, as
things are, I wish you to know that I cannot conscientiously put in a
claim upon your attention.'

A second meaning was written in Christopher's look, though he scarcely
uttered it.  A woman so delicately poised upon the social globe could not
in honour be asked to wait for a lover who was unable to set bounds to
the waiting period.  Yet he had privily dreamed of an approach to that
position--an unreserved, ideally perfect declaration from Ethelberta that
time and practical issues were nothing to her; that she would stand as
fast without material hopes as with them; that love was to be an end with
her henceforth, having utterly ceased to be a means.  Therefore this
surreptitious hope of his, founded on no reasonable expectation, was like
a guilty thing surprised when Ethelberta answered, with a predominance of
judgment over passion still greater than before:

'It is unspeakably generous in you to put it all before me so nicely,
Christopher.  I think infinitely more of you for being so unreserved,
especially since I too have been thinking much on the indefiniteness of
the days to come.  We are not numbered among the blest few who can afford
to trifle with the time.  Yet to agree to anything like a positive
parting will be quite unnecessary.  You did not mean that, did you? for
it is harsh if you did.'  Ethelberta smiled kindly as she said this, as
much as to say that she was far from really upbraiding him.  'Let it be
only that we will see each other less.  We will bear one another in mind
as deeply attached friends if not as definite lovers, and keep up
friendly remembrances of a sort which, come what may, will never have to
be ended by any painful process termed breaking off.  Different persons,
different natures; and it may be that marriage would not be the most
favourable atmosphere for our old affection to prolong itself in.  When
do you leave London?'

The disconnected query seemed to be subjoined to disperse the crude
effect of what had gone before.

'I hardly know,' murmured Christopher.  'I suppose I shall not call here
again.'

Whilst they were silent somebody entered the room softly, and they turned
to discover Picotee.

'Come here, Picotee,' said Ethelberta.

Picotee came with an abashed bearing to where the other two were
standing, and looked down steadfastly.

'Mr. Julian is going away,' she continued, with determined firmness.  'He
will not see us again for a long time.'  And Ethelberta added, in a lower
tone, though still in the unflinching manner of one who had set herself
to say a thing, and would say it--'He is not to be definitely engaged to
me any longer.  We are not thinking of marrying, you know, Picotee.  It
is best that we should not.'

'Perhaps it is,' said Christopher hurriedly, taking up his hat.  'Let me
now wish you good-bye; and, of course, you will always know where I am,
and how to find me.'

It was a tender time.  He inclined forward that Ethelberta might give him
her hand, which she did; whereupon their eyes met.  Mastered by an
impelling instinct she had not reckoned with, Ethelberta presented her
cheek.  Christopher kissed it faintly.  Tears were in Ethelberta's eyes
now, and she was heartfull of many emotions.  Placing her arm round
Picotee's waist, who had never lifted her eyes from the carpet, she drew
the slight girl forward, and whispered quickly to him--'Kiss her, too.
She is my sister, and I am yours.'

It seemed all right and natural to their respective moods and the tone of
the moment that free old Wessex manners should prevail, and Christopher
stooped and dropped upon Picotee's cheek likewise such a farewell kiss as
he had imprinted upon Ethelberta's.

'Care for us both equally!' said Ethelberta.

'I will,' said Christopher, scarcely knowing what he said.

When he had reached the door of the room, he looked back and saw the two
sisters standing as he had left them, and equally tearful.  Ethelberta at
once said, in a last futile struggle against letting him go altogether,
and with thoughts of her sister's heart:

'I think that Picotee might correspond with Faith; don't you, Mr.
Julian?'

'My sister would much like to do so,' said he.

'And you would like it too, would you not, Picotee?'

'O yes,' she replied.  'And I can tell them all about you.'

'Then it shall be so, if Miss Julian will.'  She spoke in a settled way,
as if something intended had been set in train; and Christopher having
promised for his sister, he went out of the house with a parting smile of
misgiving.

He could scarcely believe as he walked along that those late words, yet
hanging in his ears, had really been spoken, that still visible scene
enacted.  He could not even recollect for a minute or two how the final
result had been produced.  Did he himself first enter upon the
long-looming theme, or did she?  Christopher had been so nervously alive
to the urgency of setting before the hard-striving woman a clear outline
of himself, his surroundings and his fears, that he fancied the main
impulse to this consummation had been his, notwithstanding that a faint
initiative had come from Ethelberta.  All had completed itself quickly,
unceremoniously, and easily.  Ethelberta had let him go a second time;
yet on foregoing mornings and evenings, when contemplating the necessity
of some such explanation, it had seemed that nothing less than Atlantean
force could overpower their mutual gravitation towards each other.

On his reaching home Faith was not in the house, and, in the restless
state which demands something to talk at, the musician went off to find
her, well knowing her haunt at this time of the day.  He entered the
spiked and gilded gateway of the Museum hard by, turned to the wing
devoted to sculptures, and descended to a particular basement room, which
was lined with bas-reliefs from Nineveh.  The place was cool, silent, and
soothing; it was empty, save of a little figure in black, that was
standing with its face to the wall in an innermost nook.  This spot was
Faith's own temple; here, among these deserted antiques, Faith was always
happy.  Christopher looked on at her for some time before she noticed
him, and dimly perceived how vastly differed her homely suit and
unstudied contour--painfully unstudied to fastidious eyes--from
Ethelberta's well-arranged draperies, even from Picotee's clever bits of
ribbon, by which she made herself look pretty out of nothing at all.  Yet
this negligence was his sister's essence; without it she would have been
a spoilt product.  She had no outer world, and her rusty black was as
appropriate to Faith's unseen courses as were Ethelberta's correct lights
and shades to her more prominent career.

'Look, Kit,' said Faith, as soon as she knew who was approaching.  'This
is a thing I never learnt before; this person is really Sennacherib,
sitting on his throne; and these with fluted beards and hair like plough-
furrows, and fingers with no bones in them, are his warriors--really
carved at the time, you know.  Only just think that this is not imagined
of Assyria, but done in Assyrian times by Assyrian hands.  Don't you feel
as if you were actually in Nineveh; that as we now walk between these
slabs, so walked Ninevites between them once?'

'Yes. . . .  Faith, it is all over.  Ethelberta and I have parted.'

'Indeed.  And so my plan is to think of verses in the Bible about
Sennacherib and his doings, which resemble these; this verse, for
instance, I remember: "Now in the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah did
Sennacherib, King of Assyria, come up against all the fenced cities of
Judah and took them.  And Hezekiah, King of Judah, sent to the King of
Assyria to Lachish," and so on.  Well, there it actually is, you see.
There's Sennacherib, and there's Lachish.  Is it not glorious to think
that this is a picture done at the time of those very events?'

'Yes.  We did not quarrel this time, Ethelberta and I.  If I may so put
it, it is worse than quarrelling.  We felt it was no use going on any
longer, and so--Come, Faith, hear what I say, or else tell me that you
won't hear, and that I may as well save my breath!'

'Yes, I will really listen,' she said, fluttering her eyelids in her
concern at having been so abstracted, and excluding Sennacherib there and
then from Christopher's affairs by the first settlement of her features
to a present-day aspect, and her eyes upon his face.  'You said you had
seen Ethelberta.  Yes, and what did she say?'

'Was there ever anybody so provoking!  Why, I have just told you!'

'Yes, yes; I remember now.  You have parted.  The subject is too large
for me to know all at once what I think of it, and you must give me time,
Kit.  Speaking of Ethelberta reminds me of what I have done.  I just
looked into the Academy this morning--I thought I would surprise you by
telling you about it.  And what do you think I saw?  Ethelberta--in the
picture painted by Mr. Ladywell.'

'It is never hung?' said he, feeling that they were at one as to a topic
at last.

'Yes.  And the subject is an Elizabethan knight parting from a lady of
the same period--the words explaining the picture being--

   "Farewell! thou art too dear for my possessing,
   And like enough thou know'st thy estimate."

The lady is Ethelberta, to the shade of a hair--her living face; and the
knight is--'

'Not Ladywell?'

'I think so; I am not sure.'

'No wonder I am dismissed!  And yet she hates him.  Well, come along,
Faith.  Women allow strange liberties in these days.'




25. THE ROYAL ACADEMY--THE FARNFIELD ESTATE


Ethelberta was a firm believer in the kindly effects of artistic
education upon the masses.  She held that defilement of mind often arose
from ignorance of eye; and her philanthropy being, by the simple force of
her situation, of that sort which lingers in the neighbourhood of home,
she concentrated her efforts in this kind upon Sol and Dan.  Accordingly,
the Academy exhibition having now just opened, she ordered the brothers
to appear in their best clothes at the entrance to Burlington House just
after noontide on the Saturday of the first week, this being the only day
and hour at which they could attend without 'losing a half' and therefore
it was necessary to put up with the inconvenience of arriving at a
crowded and enervating time.

When Ethelberta was set down in the quadrangle she perceived the faithful
pair, big as the Zamzummims of old time, standing like sentinels in the
particular corner that she had named to them: for Sol and Dan would as
soon have attempted petty larceny as broken faith with their admired lady-
sister Ethelberta.  They welcomed her with a painfully lavish exhibition
of large new gloves, and chests covered with broad triangular areas of
padded blue silk, occupying the position that the shirt-front had
occupied in earlier days, and supposed to be lineally descended from the
tie of a neckerchief.

The dress of their sister for to-day was exactly that of a respectable
workman's relative who had no particular ambition in the matter of
fashion--a black stuff gown, a plain bonnet to match.  A veil she wore
for obvious reasons: her face was getting well known in London, and it
had already appeared at the private view in an uncovered state, when it
was scrutinized more than the paintings around.  But now homely and
useful labour was her purpose.

Catalogue in hand she took the two brothers through the galleries,
teaching them in whispers as they walked, and occasionally correcting
them--first, for too reverential a bearing towards the well-dressed
crowd, among whom they persisted in walking with their hats in their
hands and with the contrite bearing of meek people in church; and,
secondly, for a tendency which they too often showed towards straying
from the contemplation of the pictures as art to indulge in curious
speculations on the intrinsic nature of the delineated subject, the
gilding of the frames, the construction of the skylights overhead, or
admiration for the bracelets, lockets, and lofty eloquence of persons
around them.

'Now,' said Ethelberta, in a warning whisper, 'we are coming near the
picture which was partly painted from myself.  And, Dan, when you see it,
don't you exclaim "Hullo!" or "That's Berta to a T," or anything at all.
It would not matter were it not dangerous for me to be noticed here to-
day.  I see several people who would recognize me on the least
provocation.'

'Not a word,' said Dan.  'Don't you be afeard about that.  I feel that I
baint upon my own ground to-day; and wouldn't do anything to cause an
upset, drown me if I would.  Would you, Sol?'

In this temper they all pressed forward, and Ethelberta could not but be
gratified at the reception of Ladywell's picture, though it was accorded
by critics not very profound.  It was an operation of some minutes to get
exactly opposite, and when side by side the three stood there they
overheard the immediate reason of the pressure.  'Farewell, thou art too
dear for my possessing' had been lengthily discoursed upon that morning
by the Coryphaeus of popular opinion; and the spirit having once been
poured out sons and daughters could prophesy.  But, in truth, Ladywell's
work, if not emphatically original, was happily centred on a middle
stratum of taste, and apart from this adventitious help commanded, and
deserved to command, a wide area of appreciation.

While they were standing here in the very heart of the throng
Ethelberta's ears were arrested by two male voices behind her, whose
words formed a novel contrast to those of the other speakers around.

'Some men, you see, with extravagant expectations of themselves, coolly
get them gratified, while others hope rationally and are disappointed.
Luck, that's what it is.  And the more easily a man takes life the more
persistently does luck follow him.'

'Of course; because, if he's industrious he does not want luck's
assistance.  Natural laws will help him instead.'

'Well, if it is true that Ladywell has painted a good picture he has done
it by an exhaustive process.  He has painted every possible bad one till
nothing more of that sort is left for him.  You know what lady's face
served as the original to this, I suppose?'

'Mrs. Petherwin's, I hear.'

'Yes, Mrs. Alfred Neigh that's to be.'

'What, that elusive fellow caught at last?'

'So it appears; but she herself is hardly so well secured as yet, it
seems, though he takes the uncertainty as coolly as possible.  I knew
nothing about it till he introduced the subject as we were standing here
on Monday, and said, in an off-hand way, "I mean to marry that lady."  I
asked him how.  "Easily," he said; "I will have her if there are a
hundred at her heels."  You will understand that this was quite in
confidence.'

'Of course, of course.'  Then there was a slight laugh, and the
companions proceeded to other gossip.

Ethelberta, calm and compressed in manner, sidled along to extricate
herself, not daring to turn round, and Dan and Sol followed, till they
were all clear of the spot.  The brothers, who had heard the words
equally well with Ethelberta, made no remark to her upon them, assuming
that they referred to some peculiar system of courtship adopted in high
life, with which they had rightly no concern.

Ethelberta ostensibly continued her business of tutoring the young
workmen just as before, though every emotion in her had been put on the
alert by this discovery.  She had known that Neigh admired her; yet his
presumption in uttering such a remark as he was reported to have uttered,
confidentially or otherwise, nearly took away her breath.  Perhaps it was
not altogether disagreeable to have her breath so taken away.

'I mean to marry that lady.'  She whispered the words to herself twenty
times in the course of the afternoon.  Sol and Dan were left considerably
longer to their private perceptions of the false and true in art than
they had been earlier in the day.

When she reached home Ethelberta was still far removed in her
reflections; and it was noticed afterwards that about this time in her
career her openness of manner entirely deserted her.  She mostly was
silent as to her thoughts, and she wore an air of unusual stillness.  It
was the silence and stillness of a starry sky, where all is force and
motion.  This deep undecipherable habit sometimes suggested, though it
did not reveal, Ethelberta's busy brain to her sisters, and they said to
one another, 'I cannot think what's coming to Berta: she is not so nice
as she used to be.'

The evening under notice was passed desultorily enough after the
discovery of Neigh's self-assured statement.  Among other things that she
did after dark, while still musingly examining the probabilities of the
report turning out true, was to wander to the large attic where the
children slept, a frequent habit of hers at night, to learn if they were
snug and comfortable.  They were talking now from bed to bed, the person
under discussion being herself.  Herself seemed everywhere to-day.

'I know that she is a fairy,' Myrtle was insisting, 'because she must be,
to have such pretty things in her house, and wear silk dresses such as
mother and we and Picotee haven't got, and have money to give us whenever
we want it.'

'Emmeline says perhaps she knows the fairy's godmother, and is not a
fairy herself, because Berta is too tall for a real fairy.'

'She must be one; for when there was a notch burnt in the hem of my
pretty blue frock she said it should be gone in the morning if I would go
to bed and not cry; and in the morning it was gone, and all nice and
straight as new.'

Ethelberta was recalling to mind how she had sat up and repaired the
damage alluded to by cutting off half an inch of the skirt all round and
hemming it anew, when the breathing of the children became regular, and
they fell asleep.  Here were bright little minds ready for a training,
which without money and influence she could never give them.  The wisdom
which knowledge brings, and the power which wisdom may bring, she had
always assumed would be theirs in her dreams for their social elevation.
By what means were these things to be ensured to them if her skill in
bread-winning should fail her?  Would not a well-contrived marriage be of
service?  She covered and tucked in one more closely, lifted another upon
the pillow and straightened the soft limbs to an easy position; then sat
down by the window and looked out at the flashing stars.  Thoughts of
Neigh's audacious statement returned again upon Ethelberta.  He had said
that he meant to marry her.  Of what standing was the man who had uttered
such an intention respecting one to whom a politic marriage had become
almost a necessity of existence?

She had often heard Neigh speak indefinitely of some estate--'my little
place' he had called it--which he had purchased no very long time ago.
All she knew was that its name was Farnfield, that it lay thirty or forty
miles out of London in a south-westerly direction, a railway station in
the district bearing the same name, so that there was probably a village
or small town adjoining.  Whether the dignity of this landed property was
that of domain, farmstead, allotment, or garden-plot, Ethelberta had not
the slightest conception.  She was almost certain that Neigh never lived
there, but that might signify nothing.  The exact size and value of the
estate would, she mused, be curious, interesting, and almost necessary
information to her who must become mistress of it were she to allow him
to carry out his singularly cool and crude, if tender, intention.
Moreover, its importance would afford a very good random sample of his
worldly substance throughout, from which alone, after all, could the true
spirit and worth and seriousness of his words be apprehended.
Impecuniosity may revel in unqualified vows and brim over with
confessions as blithely as a bird of May, but such careless pleasures are
not for the solvent, whose very dreams are negotiable, and are expressed
with due care accordingly.

That Neigh had used the words she had far more than prima-facie
appearances for believing.  Neigh's own conduct towards her, though
peculiar rather than devoted, found in these words alone a reasonable
key.  But, supposing the estate to be such a verbal hallucination as, for
instance, hers had been at Arrowthorne, when her poor, unprogressive,
hopelessly impracticable Christopher came there to visit her, and was so
wonderfully undeceived about her social standing: what a fiasco, and what
a cuckoo-cry would his utterances about marriage seem then.  Christopher
had often told her of his expectations from 'Arrowthorne Lodge,' and of
the blunders that had resulted in consequence.  Had not Ethelberta's
affection for Christopher partaken less of lover's passion than of old-
established tutelary tenderness she might have been reminded by this
reflection of the transcendent fidelity he had shown under that trial--as
severe a trial, considering the abnormal, almost morbid, development of
the passion for position in present-day society, as can be prepared for
men who move in the ordinary, unheroic channels of life.

By the following evening the consideration of this possibility, that
Neigh's position might furnish scope for such a disillusive discovery by
herself as hers had afforded to Christopher, decoyed Ethelberta into a
curious little scheme.  She was piqued into a practical undertaking by
the man who could say to his friend with such sangfroid, 'I mean to marry
that lady.'

Merely telling Picotee to prepare for an evening excursion, of which she
was to talk to no one, Ethelberta made ready likewise, and they left the
house in a cab about half-an-hour before sunset, and drove to the
Waterloo Station.

With the decline and departure of the sun a fog gathered itself out of
the low meadow-land that bordered the railway as they went along towards
the west, stretching over it like a placid lake, till at the end of the
journey, the mist became generally pervasive, though not dense.  Avoiding
observation as much as they conveniently could, the two sisters walked
from the long wooden shed which formed the station here, into the rheumy
air and along the road to the open country.  Picotee occasionally
questioned Ethelberta on the object of the strange journey: she did not
question closely, being satisfied that in such sure hands as Ethelberta's
she was safe.

Deeming it unwise to make any inquiry just yet beyond the simple one of
the way to Farnfield, Ethelberta led her companion along a newly-fenced
road across a heath.  In due time they came to an ornamental gate with a
curved sweep of wall on each side, signifying the entrance to some
enclosed property or other.  Ethelberta, being quite free from any
digested plan for encouraging Neigh in his resolve to wive, was startled
to find a hope in her that this very respectable beginning before their
eyes was the entrance to the Farnfield property: that she hoped it was
nevertheless unquestionable.  Just beyond lay a turnpike-house, where was
dimly visible a woman in the act of putting up a shutter to the front
window.

Compelled by this time to come to special questions, Ethelberta
instructed Picotee to ask of this person if the place they had just
passed was the entrance to Farnfield Park.  The woman replied that it
was.  Directly she had gone indoors Ethelberta turned back again towards
the park gate.

'What have we come for, Berta?' said Picotee, as she turned also.

'I'll tell you some day,' replied her sister.

It was now much past eight o'clock, and, from the nature of the evening,
dusk.  The last stopping up-train was about ten, so that half-an-hour
could well be afforded for looking round.  Ethelberta went to the gate,
which was found to be fastened by a chain and padlock.

'Ah, the London season,' she murmured.

There was a wicket at the side, and they entered.  An avenue of young fir
trees three or four feet in height extended from the gate into the mist,
and down this they walked.  The drive was not in very good order, and the
two women were frequently obliged to walk on the grass to avoid the rough
stones in the carriage-way.  The double line of young firs now abruptly
terminated, and the road swept lower, bending to the right, immediately
in front being a large lake, calm and silent as a second sky.  They could
hear from somewhere on the margin the purl of a weir, and around were
clumps of shrubs, araucarias and deodars being the commonest.

Ethelberta could not resist being charmed with the repose of the spot,
and hastened on with curiosity to reach the other side of the pool,
where, by every law of manorial topography, the mansion would be situate.
The fog concealed all objects beyond a distance of twenty yards or
thereabouts, but it was nearly full moon, and though the orb was hidden,
a pale diffused light enabled them to see objects in the foreground.
Reaching the other side of the lake the drive enlarged itself most
legitimately to a large oval, as for a sweep before a door, a pile of
rockwork standing in the midst.

But where should have been the front door of a mansion was simply a rough
rail fence, about four feet high.  They drew near and looked over.

In the enclosure, and on the site of the imaginary house, was an
extraordinary group.  It consisted of numerous horses in the last stage
of decrepitude, the animals being such mere skeletons that at first
Ethelberta hardly recognized them to be horses at all; they seemed rather
to be specimens of some attenuated heraldic animal, scarcely thick enough
through the body to throw a shadow: or enlarged castings of the fire-dog
of past times.  These poor creatures were endeavouring to make a meal
from herbage so trodden and thin that scarcely a wholesome blade
remained; the little that there was consisted of the sourer sorts common
on such sandy soils, mingled with tufts of heather and sprouting ferns.

'Why have we come here, dear Berta?' said Picotee, shuddering.

'I hardly know,' said Ethelberta.

Adjoining this enclosure was another and smaller one, formed of high
boarding, within which appeared to be some sheds and outhouses.
Ethelberta looked through the crevices, and saw that in the midst of the
yard stood trunks of trees as if they were growing, with branches also
extending, but these were sawn off at the points where they began to be
flexible, no twigs or boughs remaining.  Each torso was not unlike a huge
hat-stand, and suspended to the pegs and prongs were lumps of some
substance which at first she did not recognize; they proved to be a
chronological sequel to the previous scene.  Horses' skulls, ribs,
quarters, legs, and other joints were hung thereon, the whole forming a
huge open-air larder emitting not too sweet a smell.

But what Stygian sound was this?  There had arisen at the moment upon the
mute and sleepy air a varied howling from a hundred tongues.  It had
burst from a spot close at hand--a low wooden building by a stream which
fed the lake--and reverberated for miles.  No further explanation was
required.

'We are close to a kennel of hounds,' said Ethelberta, as Picotee held
tightly to her arm.  'They cannot get out, so you need not fear.  They
have a horrid way of suddenly beginning thus at different hours of the
night, for no apparent reason: though perhaps they hear us.  These poor
horses are waiting to be killed for their food.'

The experience altogether, from its intense melancholy, was very
depressing, almost appalling to the two lone young women, and they
quickly retraced their footsteps.  The pleasant lake, the purl of the
weir, the rudimentary lawns, shrubberies, and avenue, had changed their
character quite.  Ethelberta fancied at that moment that she could not
have married Neigh, even had she loved him, so horrid did his belongings
appear to be.  But for many other reasons she had been gradually feeling
within this hour that she would not go out of her way at a beck from a
man whose interest was so unimpassioned.

Thinking no more of him as a possible husband she ceased to be afraid to
make inquiries about the peculiarities of his possessions.  In the high-
road they came on a local man, resting from wheeling a wheelbarrow, and
Ethelberta asked him, with the air of a countrywoman, who owned the
estate across the road.

'The man owning that is one of the name of Neigh,' said the native,
wiping his face.  ''Tis a family that have made a very large fortune by
the knacker business and tanning, though they be only sleeping partners
in it now, and live like lords.  Mr. Neigh was going to pull down the old
huts here, and improve the place and build a mansion--in short, he went
so far as to have the grounds planted, and the roads marked out, and the
fish-pond made, and the place christened Farnfield Park; but he did no
more.  "I shall never have a wife," he said, "so why should I want a
house to put her in?"  He's a terrible hater of women, I hear,
particularly the lower class.'

'Indeed!'

'Yes, and since then he has let half the land to the Honourable Mr.
Mountclere, a brother of Lord Mountclere's.  Mr. Mountclere wanted the
spot for a kennel, and as the land is too poor and sandy for cropping,
Mr. Neigh let him have it.  'Tis his hounds that you hear howling.'

They passed on.  'Berta, why did we come down here?' said Picotee.

'To see the nakedness of the land.  It was a whim only, and as it will
end in nothing, it is not worth while for me to make further
explanation.'

It was with a curious sense of renunciation that Ethelberta went
homeward.  Neigh was handsome, grim-natured, rather wicked, and an
indifferentist; and these attractions interested her as a woman.  But the
news of this evening suggested to Ethelberta that herself and Neigh were
too nearly cattle of one colour for a confession on the matter of lineage
to be well received by him; and without confidence of every sort on the
nature of her situation, she was determined to contract no union at all.
The sympathy of unlikeness might lead the scion of some family, hollow
and fungous with antiquity, and as yet unmarked by a mesalliance, to be
won over by her story; but the antipathy of resemblance would be
ineradicable.




26. ETHELBERTA'S DRAWING-ROOM


While Ethelberta during the next few days was dismissing that evening
journey from her consideration, as an incident altogether foreign to the
organized course of her existence, the hidden fruit thereof was rounding
to maturity in a species unforeseen.

Inferences unassailable as processes, are, nevertheless, to be suspected,
from the almost certain deficiency of particulars on some side or other.
The truth in relation to Neigh's supposed frigidity was brought before
her at the end of the following week, when Dan and Sol had taken Picotee,
Cornelia, and the young children to Kew for the afternoon.

Early that morning, hours before it was necessary, there had been such a
chatter of preparation in the house as was seldom heard there.  Sunday
hats and bonnets had been retrimmed with such cunning that it would have
taken a milliner's apprentice at least to discover that any thread in
them was not quite new.  There was an anxious peep through the blind at
the sky at daybreak by Georgina and Myrtle, and the perplexity of these
rural children was great at the weather-signs of the town, where
atmospheric effects had nothing to do with clouds, and fair days and foul
came apparently quite by chance.  Punctually at the hour appointed two
friendly human shadows descended across the kitchen window, followed by
Sol and Dan, much to the relief of the children's apprehensions that they
might forget the day.

The brothers were by this time acquiring something of the airs and
manners of London workmen; they were less spontaneous and more
comparative; less genial, but smarter; in obedience to the usual law by
which the emotion that takes the form of humour in country workmen
becomes transmuted to irony among the same order in town.  But the fixed
and dogged fidelity to one another under apparent coolness, by which this
family was distinguished, remained unshaken in these members as in all
the rest, leading them to select the children as companions in their
holiday in preference to casual acquaintance.  At last they were ready,
and departed, and Ethelberta, after chatting with her mother awhile,
proceeded to her personal duties.

The house was very silent that day, Gwendoline and Joey being the only
ones left below stairs.  Ethelberta was wishing that she had thrown off
her state and gone to Kew to have an hour of childhood over again in a
romp with the others, when she was startled by the announcement of a male
visitor--none other than Mr. Neigh.

Ethelberta's attitude on receipt of this information sufficiently
expressed a revived sense that the incidence of Mr. Neigh on her path
might have a meaning after all.  Neigh had certainly said he was going to
marry her, and now here he was come to her house--just as if he meant to
do it forthwith.  She had mentally discarded him; yet she felt a shock
which was scarcely painful, and a dread which was almost exhilarating.
Her flying visit to Farnfield she thought little of at this moment.  From
the fact that the mind prefers imaginings to recapitulation, conjecture
to history, Ethelberta had dwelt more upon Neigh's possible plans and
anticipations than upon the incidents of her evening journey; and the
former assumed a more distinct shape in her mind's eye than anything on
the visible side of the curtain.

Neigh was perhaps not quite so placidly nonchalant as in ordinary; still,
he was by far the most trying visitor that Ethelberta had lately faced,
and she could not get above the stage--not a very high one for the
mistress of a house--of feeling her personality to be inconveniently in
the way of his eyes.  He had somewhat the bearing of a man who was going
to do without any fuss what gushing people would call a philanthropic
action.

'I have been intending to write a line to you,' said Neigh; 'but I felt
that I could not be sure of writing my meaning in a way which might
please you.  I am not bright at a letter--never was.  The question I mean
is one that I hope you will be disposed to answer favourably, even though
I may show the awkwardness of a fellow-person who has never put such a
question before.  Will you give me a word of encouragement--just a hope
that I may not be unacceptable as a husband to you?  Your talents are
very great; and of course I know that I have nothing at all in that way.
Still people are happy together sometimes in spite of such things.  Will
you say "Yes," and settle it now?'

'I was not expecting you had come upon such an errand as this,' said she,
looking up a little, but mostly looking down.  'I cannot say what you
wish, Mr. Neigh.

'Perhaps I have been too sudden and presumptuous.  Yes, I know I have
been that.  However, directly I saw you I felt that nobody ever came so
near my idea of what is desirable in a lady, and it occurred to me that
only one obstacle should stand in the way of the natural results, which
obstacle would be your refusal.  In common kindness consider.  I daresay
I am judged to be a man of inattentive habits--I know that's what you
think of me; but under your influence I should be very different; so pray
do not let your dislike to little matters influence you.'

'I would not indeed.  But believe me there can be no discussion of
marriage between us,' said Ethelberta decisively.

'If that's the case I may as well say no more.  To burden you with my
regrets would be out of place, I suppose,' said Neigh, looking calmly out
of the window.

'Apart from personal feeling, there are considerations which would
prevent what you contemplated,' she murmured.  'My affairs are too
lengthy, intricate, and unpleasant for me to explain to anybody at
present.  And that would be a necessary first step.'

'Not at all.  I cannot think that preliminary to be necessary at all.  I
would put my lawyer in communication with yours, and we would leave the
rest to them: I believe that is the proper way.  You could say anything
in confidence to your family-man; and you could inquire through him
anything you might wish to know about my--about me.  All you would need
to say to myself are just the two little words--"I will," in the church
here at the end of the Crescent.'

'I am sorry to pain you, Mr. Neigh--so sorry,' said Ethelberta.  'But I
cannot say them.'  She was rather distressed that, despite her
discouraging words, he still went on with his purpose, as if he imagined
what she so distinctly said to be no bar, but rather a stimulant, usual
under the circumstances.

'It does not matter about paining me,' said Neigh.  'Don't take that into
consideration at all.  But I did not expect you to leave me so entirely
without help--to refuse me absolutely as far as words go--after what you
did.  If it had not been for that I should never have ventured to call.  I
might otherwise have supposed your interest to be fixed in another
quarter; but your acting in that manner encouraged me to think you could
listen to a word.'

'What do you allude to?' said Ethelberta.  'How have I acted?'

Neigh appeared reluctant to go any further; but the allusion soon became
sufficiently clear.  'I wish my little place at Farnfield had been
worthier of you,' he said brusquely.  'However, that's a matter of time
only.  It is useless to build a house there yet.  I wish I had known that
you would be looking over it at that time of the evening.  A single word,
when we were talking about it the other day, that you were going to be in
the neighbourhood, would have been sufficient.  Nothing could have given
me so much delight as to have driven you round.'

He knew that she had been to Farnfield: that knowledge was what had
inspired him to call upon her to-day!  Ethelberta breathed a sort of
exclamation, not right out, but stealthily, like a parson's damn.  Her
face did not change, since a face must be said not to change while it
preserves the same pleasant lines in the mobile parts as before; but
anybody who has preserved his pleasant lines under the half-minute's peer
of the invidious camera, and found what a wizened, starched kind of thing
they stiffen to towards the end of the time, will understand the tendency
of Ethelberta's lovely features now.

'Yes; I walked round,' said Ethelberta faintly.

Neigh was decidedly master of the position at last; but he spoke as if he
did not value that.  His knowledge had furnished him with grounds for
calling upon her, and he hastened to undeceive her from supposing that he
could think ill of any motive of hers which gave him those desirable
grounds.

'I supposed you, by that, to give some little thought to me
occasionally,' he resumed, in the same slow and orderly tone.  'How could
I help thinking so?  It was your doing that which encouraged me.  Now,
was it not natural--I put it to you?'

Ethelberta was almost exasperated at perceiving the awful extent to which
she had compromised herself with this man by her impulsive visit.  Lightly
and philosophically as he seemed to take it--as a thing, in short, which
every woman would do by nature unless hindered by difficulties--it was no
trifle to her as long as he was ignorant of her justification; and this
she determined that he should know at once, at all hazards.

'It was through you in the first place that I did look into your
grounds!' she said excitedly.  'It was your presumption that caused me to
go there.  I should not have thought of such a thing else.  If you had
not said what you did say I never should have thought of you or Farnfield
either--Farnfield might have been in Kamtschatka for all I cared.'

'I hope sincerely that I never said anything to disturb you?'

'Yes, you did--not to me, but to somebody,' said Ethelberta, with her
eyes over-full of retained tears.

'What have I said to somebody that can be in the least objectionable to
you?' inquired Neigh, with much concern.

'You said--you said, you meant to marry me--just as if I had no voice in
the matter!  And that annoyed me, and made me go there out of curiosity.'

Neigh changed colour a little.  'Well, I did say it: I own that I said
it,' he replied at last.  Probably he knew enough of her nature not to
feel long disconcerted by her disclosure, however she might have become
possessed of the information.  The explanation was certainly a great
excuse to her curiosity; but if Ethelberta had tried she could not have
given him a better ground for making light of her objections to his suit.
'I felt that I must marry you, that we were predestined to marry ages
ago, and I feel it still!' he continued, with listless ardour.  'You seem
to regret your interest in Farnfield; but to me it is a charm, and has
been ever since I heard of it.'

'If you only knew all!' she said helplessly, showing, without perceiving
it, an unnecessary humility in the remark, since there was no more reason
just then that she should go into details about her life than that he
should about his.  But melancholy and mistaken thoughts of herself as a
counterfeit had brought her to this.

'I do not wish to know more,' said Neigh.

'And would you marry any woman off-hand, without being thoroughly
acquainted with her circumstances?' she said, looking at him curiously,
and with a little admiration, for his unconscionably phlegmatic treatment
of her motives in going to Farnfield had a not unbecoming daring about it
in Ethelberta's eye.

'I would marry a woman off-hand when that woman is you.  I would make you
mine this moment did I dare; or, to speak with absolute accuracy, within
twenty-four hours.  Do assent to it, dear Mrs. Petherwin, and let me be
sure of you for ever.  I'll drive to Doctors' Commons this minute, and
meet you to-morrow morning at nine in the church just below.  It is a
simple impulse, but I would adhere to it in the coolest moment.  Shall it
be arranged in that way, instead of our waiting through the ordinary
routine of preparation?  I am not a youth now, but I can see the bliss of
such an act as that, and the contemptible nature of methodical
proceedings beside it!'

He had taken her hand.  Ethelberta gave it a subtle movement backwards to
imply that he was not to retain the prize, and said, 'One whose inner
life is almost unknown to you, and whom you have scarcely seen except at
other people's houses!'

'We know each other far better than we may think at first,' said Neigh.
'We are not people to love in a hurry, and I have not done so in this
case.  As for worldly circumstances, the most important items in a
marriage contract are the persons themselves, and, as far as I am
concerned, if I get a lady fair and wise I care for nothing further.  I
know you are beautiful, for all London owns it; I know you are talented,
for I have read your poetry and heard your romances; and I know you are
politic and discreet--'

'For I have examined your property,' said she, with a weak smile.

Neigh bowed.  'And what more can I wish to know?  Come, shall it be?'

'Certainly not to-morrow.'

'I would be entirely in your hands in that matter.  I will not urge you
to be precipitate--I could not expect you to be ready yet.  My suddenness
perhaps offended you; but, having thought deeply of this bright
possibility, I was apt to forget the forbearance that one ought to show
at first in mentioning it.  If I have done wrong forgive me.'

'I will think of that,' said Ethelberta, with a cooler manner.  'But
seriously, all these words are nothing to the purpose.  I must remark
that I prize your friendship, but it is not for me to marry now.  You
have convinced me of your goodness of heart and freedom from unworthy
suspicions; let that be enough.  The best way in which I in my turn can
convince you of my goodness of heart is by asking you to see me in
private no more.'

'And do you refuse to think of me as ---.  Why do you treat me like that,
after all?' said Neigh, surprised at this want of harmony with his
principle that one convert to matrimony could always find a second ready-
made.

'I cannot explain, I cannot explain,' said she, impatiently.  'I would
and I would not--explain I mean, not marry.  I don't love anybody, and I
have no heart left for beginning.  It is only honest in me to tell you
that I am interested in watching another man's career, though that is not
to the point either, for no close relationship with him is contemplated.
But I do not wish to speak of this any more.  Do not press me to it.'

'Certainly I will not,' said Neigh, seeing that she was distressed and
sorrowful.  'But do consider me and my wishes; I have a right to ask it
for it is only asking a continuance of what you have already begun to do.
To-morrow I believe I shall have the happiness of seeing you again.'

She did not say no, and long after the door had closed upon him she
remained fixed in thought.  'How can he be blamed for his manner,' she
said, 'after knowing what I did!'

Ethelberta as she sat felt herself much less a Petherwin than a
Chickerel, much less a poetess richly freighted with fancy than an
adventuress with a nebulous prospect.  Neigh was one of the few men whose
presence seemed to attenuate her dignity in some mysterious way to its
very least proportions; and that act of espial, which had so quickly and
inexplicably come to his knowledge, helped his influence still more.  She
knew little of the nature of the town bachelor; there were opaque depths
in him which her thoughts had never definitely plumbed.  Notwithstanding
her exaltation to the atmosphere of the Petherwin family, Ethelberta was
very far from having the thoroughbred London woman's knowledge of sets,
grades, coteries, cliques, forms, glosses, and niceties, particularly on
the masculine side.  Setting the years from her infancy to her first look
into town against those linking that epoch with the present, the former
period covered not only the greater time, but contained the mass of her
most vivid impressions of life and its ways.  But in recognizing her
ignorance of the ratio between words to women and deeds to women in the
ethical code of the bachelor of the club, she forgot that human nature in
the gross differs little with situation, and that a gift which, if the
germs were lacking, no amount of training in clubs and coteries could
supply, was mother-wit like her own.




27. MRS. BELMAINE'S--CRIPPLEGATE CHURCH


Neigh's remark that he believed he should see Ethelberta again the next
day referred to a contemplated pilgrimage of an unusual sort which had
been arranged for that day by Mrs. Belmaine upon the ground of an
incidental suggestion of Ethelberta's.  One afternoon in the week
previous they had been chatting over tea at the house of the former lady,
Neigh being present as a casual caller, when the conversation was
directed upon Milton by somebody opening a volume of the poet's works
that lay on a table near.

   'Milton! thou shouldst be living at this hour:
   England hath need of thee--'

said Mrs. Belmaine with the degree of flippancy which is considered
correct for immortal verse, the Bible, God, etc., in these days.  And
Ethelberta replied, lit up by a quick remembrance, 'It is a good time to
talk of Milton; for I have been much impressed by reading the "Life;" and
I have decided to go and see his tomb.  Could we not all go?  We ought to
quicken our memories of the great, and of where they lie, by such a visit
occasionally.'

'We ought,' said Mrs. Belmaine.

'And why shouldn't we?' continued Ethelberta, with interest.

'To Westminster Abbey?' said Mr. Belmaine, a common man of thirty,
younger than his wife, who had lately come into the room.

'No; to where he lies comparatively alone--Cripplegate Church.'

'I always thought that Milton was buried in Poet's Corner,' said Mr.
Belmaine.

'So did I,' said Neigh; 'but I have such an indifferent head for places
that my thinking goes for nothing.'

'Well, it would be a pretty thing to do,' said Mrs. Belmaine, 'and
instructive to all of us.  If Mrs. Petherwin would like to go, I should.
We can take you in the carriage and call round for Mrs. Doncastle on our
way, and set you both down again coming back.'

'That would be excellent,' said Ethelberta.  'There is nowhere I like
going to so much as the depths of the city.  The absurd narrowness of
world-renowned streets is so surprising--so crooked and shady as they are
too, and full of the quaint smells of old cupboards and cellars.  Walking
through one of them reminds me of being at the bottom of some crevasse or
gorge, the proper surface of the globe being the tops of the houses.'

'You will come to take care of us, John?  And you, Mr. Neigh, would like
to come?  We will tell Mr. Ladywell that he may join us if he cares to,'
said Mrs. Belmaine.

'O yes,' said her husband quietly; and Neigh said he should like nothing
better, after a faint aspect of apprehension at the remoteness of the
idea from the daily track of his thoughts.  Mr. Belmaine observing this,
and mistaking it for an indication that Neigh had been dragged into the
party against his will by his over-hasty wife, arranged that Neigh should
go independently and meet them there at the hour named if he chose to do
so, to give him an opportunity of staying away.  Ethelberta also was by
this time doubting if she had not been too eager with her proposal.  To
go on such a sentimental errand might be thought by her friends to be
simply troublesome, their adherence having been given only in the regular
course of complaisance.  She was still comparatively an outsider here,
her life with Lady Petherwin having been passed chiefly in alternations
between English watering-places and continental towns.  However, it was
too late now to muse on this, and it may be added that from first to last
Ethelberta never discovered from the Belmaines whether her proposal had
been an infliction or a charm, so perfectly were they practised in
sustaining that complete divorce between thinking and saying which is the
hall-mark of high civilization.

But, however she might doubt the Belmaines, she had no doubt as to
Neigh's true sentiments: the time had come when he, notwithstanding his
air of being oppressed by almost every lively invention of town and
country for charming griefs to rest, would not be at all oppressed by a
quiet visit to the purlieus of St Giles's, Cripplegate, since she was the
originator, and was going herself.

It was a bright hope-inspiring afternoon in this mid-May time when the
carriage containing Mr. and Mrs. Belmaine, Mrs. Doncastle, and
Ethelberta, crept along the encumbered streets towards Barbican; till
turning out of that thoroughfare into Redcross Street they beheld the
bold shape of the old tower they sought, clothed in every neutral shade,
standing clear against the sky, dusky and grim in its upper stage, and
hoary grey below, where every corner of every stone was completely
rounded off by the waves of wind and storm.

All people were busy here: our visitors seemed to be the only idle
persons the city contained; and there was no dissonance--there never
is--between antiquity and such beehive industry; for pure industry, in
failing to observe its own existence and aspect, partakes of the
unobtrusive nature of material things.  This intra-mural stir was a
flywheel transparent by excessive motion, through which Milton and his
day could be seen as if nothing intervened.  Had there been ostensibly
harmonious accessories, a crowd of observing people in search of the
poetical, conscious of the place and the scene, what a discord would have
arisen there!  But everybody passed by Milton's grave except Ethelberta
and her friends, and for the moment the city's less invidious conduct
appeared to her more respectful as a practice than her own.

But she was brought out of this rumination by the halt at the church
door, and completely reminded of the present by finding the church open,
and Neigh--the, till yesterday, unimpassioned Neigh--waiting in the
vestibule to receive them, just as if he lived there.  Ladywell had not
arrived.  It was a long time before Ethelberta could get back to Milton
again, for Neigh was continuing to impend over her future more and more
visibly.  The objects along the journey had distracted her mind from him;
but the moment now was as a direct renewal and prolongation of the
declaration-time yesterday, and as if in furtherance of the conclusion of
the episode.

They all alighted and went in, the coachman being told to take the
carriage to a quiet nook further on, and return in half-an-hour.  Mrs.
Belmaine and her carriage some years before had accidentally got jammed
crosswise in Cheapside through the clumsiness of the man in turning up a
side street, blocking that great artery of the civilized world for the
space of a minute and a half, when they were pounced upon by half-a-dozen
policemen and forced to back ignominiously up a little slit between the
houses where they did not mean to go, amid the shouts of the hindered
drivers; and it was her nervous recollection of that event which caused
Mrs. Belmaine to be so precise in her directions now.

By the time that they were grouped around the tomb the visit had assumed
a much more solemn complexion than any one among them had anticipated.
Ashamed of the influence that she discovered Neigh to be exercising over
her, and opposing it steadily, Ethelberta drew from her pocket a small
edition of Milton, and proposed that she should read a few lines from
'Paradise Lost.'  The responsibility of producing a successful afternoon
was upon her shoulders; she was, moreover, the only one present who could
properly manage blank verse, and this was sufficient to justify the
proposal.

She stood with her head against the marble slab just below the bust, and
began a selected piece, Neigh standing a few yards off on her right
looking into his hat in order to listen accurately, Mr. and Mrs. Belmaine
and Mrs. Doncastle seating themselves in a pew directly facing the
monument.  The ripe warm colours of afternoon came in upon them from the
west, upon the sallow piers and arches, and the infinitely deep brown
pews beneath, the aisle over Ethelberta's head being in misty shade
through which glowed a lurid light from a dark-stained window behind.  The
sentences fell from her lips in a rhythmical cadence one by one, and she
could be fancied a priestess of him before whose image she stood, when
with a vivid suggestiveness she delivered here, not many yards from the
central money-mill of the world, yet out from the very tomb of their
author, the passage containing the words:

         'Mammon led them on;
   Mammon, the least erected spirit that fell
   From heaven.'

When she finished reading Ethelberta left the monument, and then each one
present strayed independently about the building, Ethelberta turning to
the left along the passage to the south door.  Neigh--from whose usually
apathetic face and eyes there had proceeded a secret smouldering light as
he listened and regarded her--followed in the same direction and vanished
at her heels into the churchyard, whither she had now gone.  Mr. and Mrs.
Belmaine exchanged glances, and instead of following the pair they went
with Mrs. Doncastle into the vestry to inquire of the person in charge
for the register of the marriage of Oliver Cromwell, which was solemnized
here.  The church was now quite empty, and its stillness was as a vacuum
into which an occasional noise from the street overflowed and became
rarefied away to nothing.

Something like five minutes had passed when a hansom stopped outside the
door, and Ladywell entered the porch.  He stood still, and, looking
inquiringly round for a minute or two, sat down in one of the high pews,
as if under the impression that the others had not yet arrived.

While he sat here Neigh reappeared at the south door opposite, and came
slowly in.  Ladywell, in rising to go to him, saw that Neigh's attention
was engrossed by something he held in his hand.  It was his pocket-book,
and Neigh was looking at a few loose flower-petals which had been placed
between the pages.  When Ladywell came forward Neigh looked up, started,
and closed the book quickly, so that some of the petals fluttered to the
ground between the two men.  They were striped, red and white, and
appeared to be leaves of the Harlequin rose.

'Ah! here you are, Ladywell,' he said, recovering himself.  'We had given
you up: my aunt said that you would not care to come.  They are all in
the vestry.'  How it came to pass that Neigh designated those in the
vestry as 'all,' when there was one in the churchyard, was a thing that
he himself could hardly have explained, so much more had it to do with
instinct than with calculation.

'Never mind them--don't interrupt them,' said Ladywell.  'The plain truth
is that I have been very greatly disturbed in mind; and I could not
appear earlier by reason of it.  I had some doubt about coming at all.'

'I am sorry to hear that.'

'Neigh--I may as well tell you and have done with it.  I have found that
a lady of my acquaintance has two strings to her bow, or I am very much
in error.'

'What--Mrs. Petherwin?' said Neigh uneasily.  'But I thought that--that
fancy was over with you long ago.  Even your acquaintance with her was at
an end, I thought.'

'In a measure it is at an end.  But let me tell you that what you call a
fancy has been anything but a fancy with me, to be over like a spring
shower.  To speak plainly, Neigh, I consider myself badly used by that
woman; damn badly used.'

'Badly used?' said Neigh mechanically, and wondering all the time if
Ladywell had been informed that Ethelberta was to be one of the party to-
day.

'Well, I ought not to talk like that,' said Ladywell, adopting a lighter
tone.  'All is fair in courtship, I suppose, now as ever.  Indeed, I mean
to put a good face upon it: if I am beaten, I am.  But it is very
provoking, after supposing matters to be going on smoothly, to find out
that you are quite mistaken.'

'I told you you were quite mistaken in supposing she cared for you.'

'That is just the point I was not mistaken in,' said Ladywell warmly.
'She did care for me, and I stood as well with her as any man could stand
until this fellow came, whoever he is.  I sometimes feel so disturbed
about it that I have a good mind to call upon her and ask his name.
Wouldn't you, Neigh?  Will you accompany me?'

'I would in a moment, but, but-- I strongly advise you not to go,' said
Neigh earnestly.  'It would be rash, you know, and rather unmannerly; and
would only hurt your feelings.'

'Well, I am always ready to yield to a friend's arguments. . . .  A
sneaking scamp, that's what he is.  Why does he not show himself?'

'Don't you really know who he is?' said Neigh, in a pronounced and
exceptional tone, on purpose to give Ladywell a chance of suspecting, for
the position was getting awkward.  But Ladywell was blind as Bartimeus in
that direction, so well had indifference to Ethelberta's charms been
feigned by Neigh until he thought seriously of marrying her.  Yet,
unfortunately for the interests of calmness, Ladywell was less blind with
his outward eye.  In his reflections his glance had lingered again upon
the pocket-book which Neigh still held in his hand, and upon the two or
three rose-leaves on the floor, until he said idly, superimposing
humorousness upon misery, as men in love can:

'Rose-leaves, Neigh?  I thought you did not care for flowers.  What makes
you amuse yourself with such sentimental objects as those, only fit for
women, or painters like me?  If I had not observed you with my own eyes I
should have said that you were about the last man in the world to care
for things of that sort.  Whatever makes you keep rose-leaves in your
pocket-book?'

'The best reason on earth,' said Neigh.  'A woman gave them to me.'

'That proves nothing unless she is a great deal to you,' said Ladywell,
with the experienced air of a man who, whatever his inferiority in years
to Neigh, was far beyond him in knowledge of that sort, by virtue of his
recent trials.

'She is a great deal to me.'

'If I did not know you to be such a confirmed misogynist I should say
that this is a serious matter.'

'It is serious,' said Neigh quietly.  'The probability is that I shall
marry the woman who gave me these.  Anyhow I have asked her the question,
and she has not altogether said no.'

'I am glad to hear it, Neigh,' said Ladywell heartily.  'I am glad to
hear that your star is higher than mine.'

Before Neigh could make further reply Ladywell was attracted by the glow
of green sunlight reflected through the south door by the grass of the
churchyard, now in all its spring freshness and luxuriance.  He bent his
steps thither, followed anxiously by Neigh.

'I had no idea there was such a lovely green spot in the city,' Ladywell
continued, passing out.  'Trees too, planted in the manner of an orchard.
What a charming place!'

The place was truly charming just at that date.  The untainted leaves of
the lime and plane trees and the newly-sprung grass had in the sun a
brilliancy of beauty that was brought into extraordinary prominence by
the sable soil showing here and there, and the charcoaled stems and
trunks out of which the leaves budded: they seemed an importation, not a
produce, and their delicacy such as would perish in a day.

'What is this round tower?' Ladywell said again, walking towards the iron-
grey bastion, partly covered with ivy and Virginia creeper, which stood
obtruding into the enclosure.

'O, didn't you know that was here?  That's a piece of the old city wall,'
said Neigh, looking furtively around at the same time.  Behind the
bastion the churchyard ran into a long narrow strip, grassed like the
other part, but completely hidden from it by the cylinder of ragged
masonry.  On rounding this projection, Ladywell beheld within a few feet
of him a lady whom he knew too well.

'Mrs. Petherwin here!' exclaimed he, proving how ignorant he had been of
the composition of the party he was to meet, and accounting at the same
time for his laxity in attending it.

'I forgot to tell you,' said Neigh awkwardly, behind him, 'that Mrs.
Petherwin was to come with us.'

Ethelberta's look was somewhat blushful and agitated, as if from some
late transaction: she appeared to have been secluding herself there till
she should have recovered her equanimity.  However, she came up to him
and said, 'I did not see you before this moment: we had been thinking you
would not come.'

While these words were being prettily spoken, Ladywell's face became pale
as death.  On Ethelberta's bosom were the stem and green calyx of a rose,
almost all its flower having disappeared.  It had been a Harlequin rose,
for two or three of its striped leaves remained to tell the tale.

She could not help noticing his fixed gaze, and she said quickly, 'Yes, I
have lost my pretty rose: this may as well go now,' and she plucked the
stem from its fastening in her dress and flung it away.

Poor Ladywell turned round to meet Mr. and Mrs. Belmaine, whose voices
were beginning to be heard just within the church door, leaving Neigh and
Ethelberta together.  It was a graceful act of young Ladywell's that, in
the midst of his own pain at the strange tale the rose-leaves
suggested--Neigh's rivalry, Ethelberta's mutability, his own defeat--he
was not regardless of the intense embarrassment which might have been
caused had he remained.

The two were silent at first, and it was evident that Ethelberta's mood
was one of anger at something that had gone before.  She turned aside
from him to follow the others, when Neigh spoke in a tone somewhat bitter
and somewhat stern.

'What--going like that!  After being compromised together, why don't you
close with me?  Ladywell knows all: I had already told him that the rose-
leaves were given me by my intended wife.  We seem to him to be
practising deceptions all of a piece, and what folly it is to play off
so!  As to what I did, that I ask your forgiveness for.'

Ethelberta looked upon the ground and maintained a compressed lip.  Neigh
resumed: 'If I showed more feeling than you care for, I insist that it
was not more than was natural under the circumstances, if not quite
proper.  Opinions may differ, but my experience goes to prove that
conventional squeamishness at such times as these is more talked and
written about than practised.  Plain behaviour must be expected when
marriage is the question.  Nevertheless, I do say--and I cannot say
more--that I am sincerely sorry to have offended you by exceeding my
privileges.  I will never do so again.'

'Don't say privileges.  You have none.'

'I am sorry that I thought otherwise, and that others will think so too.
Ladywell is, at any rate, bent on thinking so. . . .  It might have been
made known to him in a gentle way--but God disposes.'

'There is nothing to make known--I don't understand,' said Ethelberta,
going from him.

By this time Ladywell had walked round the gravel walks with the two
other ladies and Mr. Belmaine, and they were all turning to come back
again.  The young painter had deputed his voice to reply to their
remarks, but his understanding continued poring upon other things.  When
he came up to Ethelberta, his agitation had left him: she too was free
from constraint; while Neigh was some distance off, carefully examining
nothing in particular in an old fragment of wall.

The little party was now united again as to its persons; though in spirit
far otherwise.  They went through the church in general talk, Ladywell
sad but serene, and Ethelberta keeping far-removed both from him and from
Neigh.  She had at this juncture entered upon that Sphinx-like stage of
existence in which, contrary to her earlier manner, she signified to no
one of her ways, plans, or sensations, and spoke little on any subject at
all.  There were occasional smiles now which came only from the face, and
speeches from the lips merely.

The journey home was performed as they had come, Ladywell not accepting
the seat in Neigh's cab which was phlegmatically offered him.  Mrs.
Doncastle's acquaintance with Ethelberta had been slight until this day;
but the afternoon's proceeding had much impressed the matron with her
younger friend.  Before they parted she said, with the sort of affability
which is meant to signify the beginning of permanent friendship: 'A
friend of my husband's, Lord Mountclere, has been anxious for some time
to meet you.  He is a great admirer of the poems, and more still of the
story-telling invention, and your power in it.  He has been present many
times at the Mayfair Hall to hear you.  When will you dine with us to
meet him?  I know you will like him.  Will Thursday be convenient?'

Ethelberta stood for a moment reflecting, and reflecting hoped that Mrs.
Doncastle had not noticed her momentary perplexity.  Crises were becoming
as common with her as blackberries; and she had foreseen this one a long
time.  It was not that she was to meet Lord Mountclere, for he was only a
name and a distant profile to her: it was that her father would
necessarily be present at the meeting, in the most anomalous position
that human nature could endure.

However, having often proved in her disjointed experience that the
shortest way out of a difficulty lies straight through it, Ethelberta
decided to dine at the Doncastles', and, as she murmured that she should
have great pleasure in meeting any friend of theirs, set about contriving
how the encounter with her dearest relative might be made safe and
unsuspected.  She bade them adieu blithely; but the thoughts engendered
by the invitation stood before her as sorrowful and rayless ghosts which
could not be laid.  Often at such conjunctures as these, when the
futility of her great undertaking was more than usually manifest, did
Ethelberta long like a tired child for the conclusion of the whole
matter; when her work should be over, and the evening come; when she
might draw her boat upon the shore, and in some thymy nook await eternal
night with a placid mind.




28. ETHELBERTA'S--MR. CHICKEREL'S ROOM


The question of Neigh or no Neigh had reached a pitch of insistence which
no longer permitted of dallying, even by a popular beauty.  His character
was becoming defined to Ethelberta as something very differently composed
from that of her first imagining.  She had set him down to be a man whose
external in excitability owed nothing to self-repression, but stood as
the natural surface of the mass within.  Neigh's urban torpor, she said,
might have been in the first instance produced by art, but, were it thus,
it had gone so far as to permeate him.  This had been disproved, first
surprisingly, by his reported statement; wondrously, in the second place,
by his call upon her and sudden proposal; thirdly, to a degree simply
astounding, by what had occurred in the city that day.  For Neigh, before
the fervour had subsided which was produced in him by her look and
general power while reading 'Paradise Lost,' found himself alone with her
in a nook outside the church, and there had almost demanded her promise
to be his wife.  She had replied by asking for time, and idly offering
him the petals of her rose, that had shed themselves in her hand.  Neigh,
in taking them, pressed her fingers more warmly than she thought she had
given him warrant for, which offended her.  It was certainly a very
momentary affair, and when it was over seemed to surprise himself almost
as much as it had vexed her; but it had reminded her of one truth which
she was in danger of forgetting.  The town gentleman was not half so far
removed from Sol and Dan, and the hard-handed order in general, in his
passions as in his philosophy.  He still continued to be the male of his
species, and when the heart was hot with a dream Pall Mall had much the
same aspect as Wessex.

Well, she had not accepted him yet; indeed, for the moment they were in a
pet with one another.  Yet that might soon be cleared off, and then
recurred the perpetual question, would the advantage that might accrue to
her people by her marriage be worth the sacrifice?  One palliative
feature must be remembered when we survey the matrimonial ponderings of
the poetess and romancer.  What she contemplated was not meanly to
ensnare a husband just to provide incomes for her and her family, but to
find some man she might respect, who would maintain her in such a stage
of comfort as should, by setting her mind free from temporal anxiety,
enable her to further organize her talent, and provide incomes for them
herself.  Plenty of saleable originality was left in her as yet, but it
was getting crushed under the rubbish of her necessities.

She was not sure that Neigh would stand the test of her revelations.  It
would be possible to lead him to marry her without revealing anything--the
events of the last few days had shown her that--yet Ethelberta's honesty
shrank from the safe course of holding her tongue.  It might be pleasant
to many a modern gentleman to find himself allied with a lady, none of
whose ancestors had ever pandered to a court, lost an army, taken a
bribe, oppressed a community, or broken a bank; but the added disclosure
that, in avoiding these stains, her kindred had worked and continued to
work with their hands for bread, might lead such an one to consider that
the novelty was dearly purchased.

Ethelberta was, upon the whole, dissatisfied with her progress thus far.
She had planned many things and fulfilled few.  Had her father been by
this time provided for and made independent of the world, as she had
thought he might be, not only would her course with regard to Neigh be
quite clear, but the impending awkwardness of dining with her father
behind her chair could not have occurred.  True, that was a small matter
beside her regret for his own sake that he was still in harness; and a
mere change of occupation would be but a tribute to a fastidiousness
which he did not himself share.  She had frequently tried to think of a
vocation for him that would have a more dignified sound, and be less
dangerously close to her own path: the post of care-taker at some
provincial library, country stationer, registrar of births and deaths,
and many others had been discussed and dismissed in face of the
unmanageable fact that her father was serenely happy and comfortable as a
butler, looking with dread at any hint of change short of perfect
retirement.  Since, then, she could not offer him this retirement, what
right had she to interfere with his mode of life at all?  In no other
social groove on earth would he thrive as he throve in his present one,
to which he had been accustomed from boyhood, and where the remuneration
was actually greater than in professions ten times as stately in name.

For the rest, too, Ethelberta had indulged in hopes, the high education
of the younger ones being the chief of these darling wishes.  Picotee
wanted looking to badly enough.  Sol and Dan required no material help;
they had quickly obtained good places of work under a Pimlico builder;
for though the brothers scarcely showed as yet the light-fingered
deftness of London artizans, the want was in a measure compensated by
their painstaking, and employers are far from despising country hands who
bring with them strength, industry, and a desire to please.  But their
sister had other lines laid down for them than those of level progress;
to start them some day as masters instead of men was a long-cherished
wish of Ethelberta's.

Thus she had quite enough machinery in her hands to keep decently going,
even were she to marry a man who would take a kindly view of her peculiar
situation, and afford her opportunities of strengthening her powers for
her kindred's good.  But what would be the result if, eighteen months
hence--the date at which her occupation of the house in Exonbury Crescent
came to an end--she were still a widow, with no accumulated capital, her
platform talents grown homely and stunted through narrow living, and her
tender vein of poesy completely dispersed by it?  To calmly relinquish
the struggle at that point would have been the act of a stoic, but not of
a woman, particularly when she considered the children, the hopes of her
mother for them, and her own condition--though this was least--under the
ironical cheers which would greet a slip back into the mire.

It here becomes necessary to turn for a moment to Master Joey Chickerel,
Ethelberta's troublesome page and brother.  The face of this juvenile was
that of a Graeco-Roman satyr to the furthest degree of completeness.
Viewed in front, the outer line of his upper lip rose in a double arch
nearly to his little round nostrils, giving an expression of a jollity so
delicious to himself as to compel a perpetual drawing in of his breath.
During half-laughs his lips parted in the middle, and remained closed at
the corners, which were small round pits like his nostrils, the same form
being repeated as dimples a little further back upon his cheek.  The
opening for each eye formed a sparkling crescent, both upper and under
lid having the convexity upwards.

But during some few days preceding the dinner-party at the Doncastles'
all this changed.  The luxuriant curves departed, a compressed lineality
was to be observed everywhere, the pupils of his eyes seemed flattened,
and the carriage of his head was limp and sideways.  This was a feature
so remarkable and new in him that Picotee noticed it, and was lifted from
the melancholy current of her own affairs in contemplating his.

'Well, what's the matter?' said Picotee.

'O--nothing,' said Joey.

'Nothing?  How can you say so?'

'The world's a holler mockery--that's what I say.'

'Yes, so it is, to some; but not to you,' said Picotee, sighing.

'Don't talk argument, Picotee.  I only hope you'll never feel what I feel
now.  If it wasn't for my juties here I know what I'd do; I'd 'list,
that's what I'd do.  But having my position to fill here as the only
responsible man-servant in the house, I can't leave.'

'Has anybody been beating you?'

'Beating!  Do I look like a person who gets beatings?  No, it is a
madness,' said Joey, putting his hand upon his chest.  'The case is, I am
in love.'

'O Joey, a boy no bigger than you are!' said Picotee reprovingly.  Her
personal interest in the passion, however, provoked her to inquire, in
the next breath, 'Who is it?  Do tell, Joey.'

'No bigger than I!  What hev bigness to do with it?  That's just like
your old-fashioned notions.  Bigness is no more wanted in courting
nowadays than in soldiering or smoking or any other duty of man.  Husbands
is rare; and a promising courter who means business will fetch his price
in these times, big or small, I assure ye.  I might have been engaged a
dozen times over as far as the bigness goes.  You should see what a
miserable little fellow my rival is afore you talk like that.  Now you
know I've got a rival, perhaps you'll own there must be something in it.'

'Yes, that seems like the real thing.  But who is the young woman?'

'Well, I don't mind telling you, Picotee.  It is Mrs. Doncastle's new
maid.  I called to see father last night, and had supper there; and you
should have seen how lovely she were--eating sparrowgrass sideways, as if
she were born to it.  But, of course, there's a rival--there always is--I
might have known that, and I will crush him!'

'But Mrs. Doncastle's new maid--if that was she I caught a glimpse of the
other day--is ever so much older than you--a dozen years.'

'What's that to a man in love?  Pooh--I wish you would leave me, Picotee;
I wants to be alone.'

A short time after this Picotee was in the company of Ethelberta, and she
took occasion to mention Joey's attachment.  Ethelberta grew exceedingly
angry directly she heard of it.

'What a fearful nuisance that boy is becoming,' she said.  'Does father
know anything of this?'

'I think not,' said Picotee.  'O no, he cannot; he would not allow any
such thing to go on; she is so much older than Joey.'

'I should think he wouldn't allow it!  The fact is I must be more strict
about this growing friendliness between you all and the Doncastle
servants.  There shall be absolutely no intimacy or visiting of any sort.
When father wants to see any of you he must come here, unless there is a
most serious reason for your calling upon him.  Some disclosure or
reference to me otherwise than as your mistress, will certainly be made
else, and then I am ruined.  I will speak to father myself about Joey's
absurd nonsense this evening.  I am going to see him on another matter.'
And Ethelberta sighed.  'I am to dine there on Thursday,' she added.

'To dine there, Berta?  Well, that is a strange thing!  Why, father will
be close to you!'

'Yes,' said Ethelberta quietly.

'How I should like to see you sitting at a grand dinner-table, among
lordly dishes and shining people, and father about the room unnoticed!
Berta, I have never seen a dinner-party in my life, and father said that
I should some day; he promised me long ago.'

'How will he be able to carry out that, my dear child?' said Ethelberta,
drawing her sister gently to her side.

'Father says that for an hour and a half the guests are quite fixed in
the dining-room, and as unlikely to move as if they were trees planted
round the table.  Do let me go and see you, Berta,' Picotee added
coaxingly.  'I would give anything to see how you look in the midst of
elegant people talking and laughing, and you my own sister all the time,
and me looking on like puss-in-the-corner.'

Ethelberta could hardly resist the entreaty, in spite of her recent
resolution.

'We will leave that to be considered when I come home to-night,' she
said.  'I must hear what father says.'

After dark the same evening a woman, dressed in plain black and wearing a
hood, went to the servants' entrance of Mr. Doncastle's house, and
inquired for Mr. Chickerel.  Ethelberta found him in a room by himself,
and on entering she closed the door behind her, and unwrapped her face.

'Can you sit with me a few minutes, father?' she said.

'Yes, for a quarter of an hour or so,' said the butler.  'Has anything
happened?  I thought it might be Picotee.'

'No.  All's well yet.  But I thought it best to see you upon one or two
matters which are harassing me a little just now.  The first is, that
stupid boy Joey has got entangled in some way with the lady's-maid at
this house; a ridiculous affair it must be by all account, but it is too
serious for me to treat lightly.  She will worm everything out of him,
and a pretty business it will be then.'

'God bless my soul! why, the woman is old enough to be his mother!  I
have never heard a sound of it till now.  What do you propose to do?'

'I have hardly thought: I cannot tell at all.  But we will consider that
after I have done.  The next thing is, I am to dine here Thursday--that
is, to-morrow.'

'You going to dine here, are you?' said her father in surprise.  'Dear
me, that's news.  We have a dinner-party to-morrow, but I was not aware
that you knew our people.'

'I have accepted the invitation,' said Ethelberta.  'But if you think I
had better stay away, I will get out of it by some means.  Heavens! what
does that mean--will anybody come in?' she added, rapidly pulling up her
hood and jumping from the seat as the loud tones of a bell clanged forth
in startling proximity.

'O no--it is all safe,' said her father.  'It is the area door--nothing
to do with me.  About the dinner: I don't see why you may not come.  Of
course you will take no notice of me, nor shall I of you.  It is to be
rather a large party.  Lord What's-his-name is coming, and several good
people.'

'Yes; he is coming to meet me, it appears.  But, father,' she said more
softly and slowly, 'how wrong it will be for me to come so close to you,
and never recognize you!  I don't like it.  I wish you could have given
up service by this time; it would have been so much less painful for us
all round.  I thought we might have been able to manage it somehow.'

'Nonsense, nonsense,' said Mr. Chickerel crossly.  'There is not the
least reason why I should give up.  I want to save a little money first.
If you don't like me as I am, you must keep away from me.  Don't be
uneasy about my comfort; I am right enough, thank God.  I can mind myself
for many a year yet.'

Ethelberta looked at him with tears in her eyes, but she did not speak.
She never could help crying when she met her father here.

'I have been in service now for more than seven-and-thirty years,' her
father went on.  'It is an honourable calling; and why should you
maintain me because you can earn a few pounds by your gifts, and an old
woman left you her house and a few sticks of furniture?  If she had left
you any money it would have been a different thing, but as you have to
work for every penny you get, I cannot think of it.  Suppose I should
agree to come and live with you, and then you should be ill, or such
like, and I no longer able to help myself?  O no, I'll stick where I am,
for here I am safe as to food and shelter at any rate.  Surely,
Ethelberta, it is only right that I, who ought to keep you all, should at
least keep your mother and myself?  As to our position, that we cannot
help; and I don't mind that you are unable to own me.'

'I wish I could own you--all of you.'

'Well, you chose your course, my dear; and you must abide by it.  Having
put your hand to the plough, it will be foolish to turn back.'

'It would, I suppose.  Yet I wish I could get a living by some simple
humble occupation, and drop the name of Petherwin, and be Berta Chickerel
again, and live in a green cottage as we used to do when I was small.  I
am miserable to a pitiable degree sometimes, and sink into regrets that I
ever fell into such a groove as this.  I don't like covert deeds, such as
coming here to-night, and many are necessary with me from time to time.
There is something without which splendid energies are a drug; and that
is a cold heart.  There is another thing necessary to energy, too--the
power of distinguishing your visions from your reasonable forecasts when
looking into the future, so as to allow your energy to lay hold of the
forecasts only.  I begin to have a fear that mother is right when she
implies that I undertook to carry out visions and all.  But ten of us are
so many to cope with.  If God Almighty had only killed off three-quarters
of us when we were little, a body might have done something for the rest;
but as we are it is hopeless!'

'There is no use in your going into high doctrine like that,' said
Chickerel.  'As I said before, you chose your course.  You have begun to
fly high, and you had better keep there.'

'And to do that there is only one way--that is, to do it surely, so that
I have some groundwork to enable me to keep up to the mark in my
profession.  That way is marriage.'

'Marriage?  Who are you going to marry?'

'God knows.  Perhaps Lord Mountclere.  Stranger things have happened.'

'Yes, so they have; though not many wretcheder things.  I would sooner
see you in your grave, Ethelberta, than Lord Mountclere's wife, or the
wife of anybody like him, great as the honour would be.'

'Of course that was only something to say; I don't know the man even.'

'I know his valet.  However, marry who you may, I hope you'll be happy,
my dear girl.  You would be still more divided from us in that event; but
when your mother and I are dead, it will make little difference.'

Ethelberta placed her hand upon his shoulder, and smiled cheerfully.
'Now, father, don't despond.  All will be well, and we shall see no such
misfortune as that for many a year.  Leave all to me.  I am a rare hand
at contrivances.'

'You are indeed, Berta.  It seems to me quite wonderful that we should be
living so near together and nobody suspect the relationship, because of
the precautions you have taken.'

'Yet the precautions were rather Lady Petherwin's than mine, as you know.
Consider how she kept me abroad.  My marriage being so secret made it
easy to cut off all traces, unless anybody had made it a special business
to search for them.  That people should suspect as yet would be by far
the more wonderful thing of the two.  But we must, for one thing, have no
visiting between our girls and the servants here, or they soon will
suspect.'

Ethelberta then laid down a few laws on the subject, and, explaining the
other details of her visit, told her father soon that she must leave him.

He took her along the passage and into the area.  They were standing at
the bottom of the steps, saying a few parting words about Picotee's visit
to see the dinner, when a female figure appeared by the railing above,
slipped in at the gate, and flew down the steps past the father and
daughter.  At the moment of passing she whispered breathlessly to him,
'Is that you, Mr. Chickerel?'

'Yes,' said the butler.

She tossed into his arms a quantity of wearing apparel, and adding,
'Please take them upstairs for me--I am late,' rushed into the house.

'Good heavens, what does that mean?' said Ethelberta, holding her
father's arm in her uneasiness.

'That's the new lady's-maid, just come in from an evening walk--that
young scamp's sweetheart, if what you tell me is true.  I don't yet know
what her character is, but she runs neck and neck with time closer than
any woman I ever met.  She stays out at night like this till the last
moment, and often throws off her dashing courting-clothes in this way, as
she runs down the steps, to save a journey to the top of the house to her
room before going to Mrs. Doncastle's, who is in fact at this minute
waiting for her.  Only look here.'  Chickerel gathered up a hat decked
with feathers and flowers, a parasol, and a light muslin train-skirt, out
of the pocket of the latter tumbling some long golden tresses of hair.

'What an extraordinary woman,' said Ethelberta.  'A perfect Cinderella.
The idea of Joey getting desperate about a woman like that; no doubt she
has just come in from meeting him.'

'No doubt--a blockhead.  That's his taste, is it!  I'll soon see if I
can't cure his taste if it inclines towards Mrs. Menlove.'

'Mrs. what?'

'Menlove; that's her name.  She came about a fortnight ago.'

'And is that Menlove--what shall we do!' exclaimed Ethelberta.  'The idea
of the boy singling out her--why it is ruin to him, to me, and to us
all!'

She hastily explained to her father that Menlove had been Lady
Petherwin's maid and her own at some time before the death of her mother-
in-law, that she had only stayed with them through a three months' tour
because of her flightiness, and hence had learnt nothing of Ethelberta's
history, and probably had never thought at all about it.  But
nevertheless they were as well acquainted as a lady and her maid well
could be in the time.  'Like all such doubtful characters,' continued
Ethelberta, 'she was one of the cleverest and lightest-handed women we
ever had about us.  When she first came, my hair was getting quite weak;
but by brushing it every day in a peculiar manner, and treating it as
only she knew how, she brought it into splendid condition.'

'Well, this is the devil to pay, upon my life!' said Mr. Chickerel, with
a miserable gaze at the bundle of clothes and the general situation at
the same time.  'Unfortunately for her friendship, I have snubbed her two
or three times already, for I don't care about her manner.  You know she
has a way of trading on a man's sense of honour till it puts him into an
awkward position.  She is perfectly well aware that, whatever scrape I
find her out in, I shall not have the conscience to report her, because I
am a man, and she is a defenceless woman; and so she takes advantage of
one's feeling by making me, or either of the menservants, her
bottle-holder, as you see she has done now.'

'This is all simply dreadful,' said Ethelberta.  'Joey is shrewd and
trustworthy; but in the hands of such a woman as that!  I suppose she did
not recognize me.'

'There was no chance of that in the dark.'

'Well, I cannot do anything in it,' said she.  'I cannot manage Joey at
all.'

'I will see if I can,' said Mr. Chickerel.  'Courting at his age,
indeed--what shall we hear next!'

Chickerel then accompanied his daughter along the street till an empty
cab passed them, and putting her into it he returned to the house again.




29. ETHELBERTA'S DRESSING-ROOM--MR. DONCASTLE'S HOUSE


The dressing of Ethelberta for the dinner-party was an undertaking into
which Picotee threw her whole skill as tirewoman.  Her energies were
brisker that day than they had been at any time since the Julians first
made preparations for departure from town; for a letter had come to her
from Faith, telling of their arrival at the old cathedral city, which was
found to suit their inclinations and habits infinitely better than
London; and that she would like Picotee to visit them there some day.
Picotee felt, and so probably felt the writer of the letter, that such a
visit would not be very practicable just now; but it was a pleasant idea,
and for fastening dreams upon was better than nothing.

Such musings were encouraged also by Ethelberta's remarks as the dressing
went on.

'We will have a change soon,' she said; 'we will go out of town for a few
days.  It will do good in many ways.  I am getting so alarmed about the
health of the children; their faces are becoming so white and thin and
pinched that an old acquaintance would hardly know them; and they were so
plump when they came.  You are looking as pale as a ghost, and I daresay
I am too.  A week or two at Knollsea will see us right.'

'O, how charming!' said Picotee gladly.

Knollsea was a village on the coast, not very far from Melchester, the
new home of Christopher; not very far, that is to say, in the eye of a
sweetheart; but seeing that there was, as the crow flies, a stretch of
thirty-five miles between the two places, and that more than one-third
the distance was without a railway, an elderly gentleman might have
considered their situations somewhat remote from each other.

'Why have you chosen Knollsea?' inquired Picotee.

'Because of aunt's letter from Rouen--have you seen it?'

'I did not read it through.'

'She wants us to get a copy of the register of her baptism; and she is
not absolutely certain which of the parishes in and about Knollsea they
were living in when she was born.  Mother, being a year younger, cannot
tell of course.  First I thought of writing to the clergyman of each
parish, but that would be troublesome, and might reveal the secret of my
birth; but if we go down there for a few days, and take some lodgings, we
shall be able to find out all about it at leisure.  Gwendoline and Joey
can attend to mother and the people downstairs, especially as father will
look in every evening until he goes out of town, to see if they are
getting on properly.  It will be such a weight off my soul to slip away
from acquaintances here.'

'Will it?'

'Yes.  At the same time I ought not to speak so, for they have been very
kind.  I wish we could go to Rouen afterwards; aunt repeats her
invitation as usual.  However, there is time enough to think of that.'

Ethelberta was dressed at last, and, beholding the lonely look of poor
Picotee when about to leave the room, she could not help having a
sympathetic feeling that it was rather hard for her sister to be denied
so small an enjoyment as a menial peep at a feast when she herself was to
sit down to it as guest.

'If you still want to go and see the procession downstairs you may do
so,' she said reluctantly; 'provided that you take care of your tongue
when you come in contact with Menlove, and adhere to father's
instructions as to how long you may stay.  It may be in the highest
degree unwise; but never mind, go.'

Then Ethelberta departed for the scene of action, just at the hour of the
sun's lowest decline, when it was fading away, yellow and mild as candle-
light, and when upper windows facing north-west reflected to persons in
the street dissolving views of tawny cloud with brazen edges, the
original picture of the same being hidden from sight by soiled walls and
slaty slopes.

Before entering the presence of host and hostess, Ethelberta contrived to
exchange a few words with her father.

'In excellent time,' he whispered, full of paternal pride at the superb
audacity of her situation here in relation to his.  'About half of them
are come.'

'Mr. Neigh?'

'Not yet; he's coming.'

'Lord Mountclere?'

'Yes.  He came absurdly early; ten minutes before anybody else, so that
Mrs. D. could hardly get on her bracelets and things soon enough to
scramble downstairs and receive him; and he's as nervous as a boy.  Keep
up your spirits, dear, and don't mind me.'

'I will, father.  And let Picotee see me at dinner if you can.  She is
very anxious to look at me.  She will be here directly.'

And Ethelberta, having been announced, joined the chamberful of assembled
guests, among whom for the present we lose sight of her.

* * * * *

Meanwhile the evening outside the house was deepening in tone, and the
lamps began to blink up.  Her sister having departed, Picotee hastily
arrayed herself in a little black jacket and chip hat, and tripped across
the park to the same point.  Chickerel had directed a maid-servant known
as Jane to receive his humbler daughter and make her comfortable; and
that friendly person, who spoke as if she had known Picotee
five-and-twenty years, took her to the housekeeper's room, where the
visitor deposited her jacket and hat, and rested awhile.

A quick-eyed, light-haired, slight-built woman came in when Jane had
gone.  'Are you Miss Chickerel?' she said to Picotee.

'Yes,' said Picotee, guessing that this was Menlove, and fearing her a
little.

'Jane tells me that you have come to visit your father, and would like to
look at the company going to dinner.  Well, they are not much to see, you
know; but such as they are you are welcome to the sight of.  Come along
with me.'

'I think I would rather wait for father, if you will excuse me, please.'

'Your father is busy now; it is no use for you to think of saying
anything to him.'

Picotee followed her guide up a back staircase to the height of several
flights, and then, crossing a landing, they descended to the upper part
of the front stairs.

'Now look over the balustrade, and you will see them all in a minute,'
said Mrs. Menlove.  'O, you need not be timid; you can look out as far as
you like.  We are all independent here; no slavery for us: it is not as
it is in the country, where servants are considered to be of different
blood and bone from their employers, and to have no eyes for anything but
their work.  Here they are coming.'

Picotee then had the pleasure of looking down upon a series of human
crowns--some black, some white, some strangely built upon, some smooth
and shining--descending the staircase in disordered column and great
discomfort, their owners trying to talk, but breaking off in the midst of
syllables to look to their footing.  The young girl's eyes had not
drooped over the handrail more than a few moments when she softly
exclaimed, 'There she is, there she is!  How lovely she looks, does she
not?'

'Who?' said Mrs. Menlove.

Picotee recollected herself, and hastily drew in her impulses.  'My dear
mistress,' she said blandly.  'That is she on Mr. Doncastle's arm.  And
look, who is that funny old man the elderly lady is helping downstairs?'

'He is our honoured guest, Lord Mountclere.  Mrs. Doncastle will have him
all through the dinner, and after that he will devote himself to Mrs.
Petherwin, your "dear mistress."  He keeps looking towards her now, and
no doubt thinks it a nuisance that she is not with him.  Well, it is
useless to stay here.  Come a little further--we'll follow them.'  Menlove
began to lead the way downstairs, but Picotee held back.

'Won't they see us?' she said.

'No.  And if they do, it doesn't matter.  Mrs. Doncastle would not object
in the least to the daughter of her respected head man being accidentally
seen in the hall.'

They descended to the bottom and stood in the hall.  'O, there's father!'
whispered Picotee, with childlike gladness, as Chickerel became visible
to her by the door.  The butler nodded to his daughter, and became again
engrossed in his duties.

'I wish I could see her--my mistress--again,' said Picotee.

'You seem mightily concerned about your mistress,' said Menlove.  'Do you
want to see if you have dressed her properly?'

'Yes, partly; and I like her, too.  She is very kind to me.'

'You will have a chance of seeing her soon.  When the door is nicely open
you can look in for a moment.  I must leave you now for a few minutes,
but I will come again.'

Menlove departed, and Picotee stood waiting.  She wondered how Ethelberta
was getting on, and whether she enjoyed herself as much as it seemed her
duty to do in such a superbly hospitable place.  Picotee then turned her
attention to the hall, every article of furniture therein appearing
worthy of scrutiny to her unaccustomed eyes.  Here she walked and looked
about for a long time till an excellent opportunity offered itself of
seeing how affairs progressed in the dining-room.

Through the partly-opened door there became visible a sideboard which
first attracted her attention by its richness.  It was, indeed, a
noticeable example of modern art-workmanship, in being exceptionally
large, with curious ebony mouldings at different stages; and, while the
heavy cupboard doors at the bottom were enriched with inlays of paler
wood, other panels were decorated with tiles, as if the massive
composition had been erected on the spot as part of the solid building.
However, it was on a space higher up that Picotee's eyes and thoughts
were fixed.  In the great mirror above the middle ledge she could see
reflected the upper part of the dining-room, and this suggested to her
that she might see Ethelberta and the other guests reflected in the same
way by standing on a chair, which, quick as thought, she did.

To Picotee's dazed young vision her beautiful sister appeared as the
chief figure of a glorious pleasure-parliament of both sexes, surrounded
by whole regiments of candles grouped here and there about the room.  She
and her companions were seated before a large flowerbed, or small hanging
garden, fixed at about the level of the elbow, the attention of all being
concentrated rather upon the uninteresting margin of the bed, and upon
each other, than on the beautiful natural objects growing in the middle,
as it seemed to Picotee.  In the ripple of conversation Ethelberta's
clear voice could occasionally be heard, and her young sister could see
that her eyes were bright, and her face beaming, as if divers social
wants and looming penuriousness had never been within her experience.  Mr.
Doncastle was quite absorbed in what she was saying.  So was the queer
old man whom Menlove had called Lord Mountclere.

'The dashing widow looks very well, does she not?' said a person at
Picotee's elbow.

It was her conductor Menlove, now returned again, whom Picotee had quite
forgotten.

'She will do some damage here to-night you will find,' continued Menlove.
'How long have you been with her?'

'O, a long time--I mean rather a short time,' stammered Picotee.

'I know her well enough.  I was her maid once, or rather her mother-in-
law's, but that was long before you knew her.  I did not by any means
find her so lovable as you seem to think her when I had to do with her at
close quarters.  An awful flirt--awful.  Don't you find her so?'

'I don't know.'

'If you don't yet you will know.  But come down from your perch--the
dining-room door will not be open again for some time--and I will show
you about the rooms upstairs.  This is a larger house than Mrs.
Petherwin's, as you see.  Just come and look at the drawing-rooms.'

Wishing much to get rid of Menlove, yet fearing to offend her, Picotee
followed upstairs.  Dinner was almost over by this time, and when they
entered the front drawing-room a young man-servant and maid were there
rekindling the lights.

'Now let's have a game of cat-and-mice,' said the maid-servant cheerily.
'There's plenty of time before they come up.'

'Agreed,' said Menlove promptly.  'You will play, will you not, Miss
Chickerel?'

'No, indeed,' said Picotee, aghast.

'Never mind, then; you look on.'

Away then ran the housemaid and Menlove, and the young footman started at
their heels.  Round the room, over the furniture, under the furniture,
through the furniture, out of one window, along the balcony, in at
another window, again round the room--so they glided with the swiftness
of swallows and the noiselessness of ghosts.

Then the housemaid drew a jew's-harp from her pocket, and struck up a
lively waltz sotto voce.  The footman seized Menlove, who appeared
nothing loth, and began spinning gently round the room with her, to the
time of the fascinating measure

   'Which fashion hails, from countesses to queens,
   And maids and valets dance behind the scenes.'

Picotee, who had been accustomed to unceiled country cottages all her
life, wherein the scamper of a mouse is heard distinctly from floor to
floor, exclaimed in a terrified whisper, at viewing all this, 'They'll
hear you underneath, they'll hear you, and we shall all be ruined!'

'Not at all,' came from the cautious dancers.  'These are some of the
best built houses in London--double floors, filled in with material that
will deaden any row you like to make, and we make none.  But come and
have a turn yourself, Miss Chickerel.'

The young man relinquished Menlove, and on the spur of the moment seized
Picotee.  Picotee flounced away from him in indignation, backing into a
corner with ruffled feathers, like a pullet trying to appear a hen.

'How dare you touch me!' she said, with rounded eyes.  'I'll tell
somebody downstairs of you, who'll soon see about it!'

'What a baby; she'll tell her father.'

'No I shan't; somebody you are all afraid of, that's who I'll tell.'

'Nonsense,' said Menlove; 'he meant no harm.'

Playtime was now getting short, and further antics being dangerous on
that account, the performers retired again downstairs, Picotee of
necessity following.  Her nerves were screwed up to the highest pitch of
uneasiness by the grotesque habits of these men and maids, who were quite
unlike the country servants she had known, and resembled nothing so much
as pixies, elves, or gnomes, peeping up upon human beings from their
shady haunts underground, sometimes for good, sometimes for ill--sometimes
doing heavy work, sometimes none; teasing and worrying with impish
laughter half suppressed, and vanishing directly mortal eyes were bent on
them.  Separate and distinct from overt existence under the sun, this
life could hardly be without its distinctive pleasures, all of them being
more or less pervaded by thrills and titillations from games of hazard,
and the perpetual risk of sensational surprises.

Long before this time Picotee had begun to be anxious to get home again,
but Menlove seemed particularly to desire her company, and pressed her to
sit awhile, telling her young friend, by way of entertainment, of various
extraordinary love adventures in which she had figured as heroine when
travelling on the Continent.  These stories had one and all a remarkable
likeness in a certain point--Menlove was always unwilling to love the
adorer, and the adorer was always unwilling to live afterwards on account
of it.

'Ha-ha-ha!' in men's voices was heard from the distant dining-room as the
two women went on talking.

'And then,' continued Menlove, 'there was that duel I was the cause of
between the courier and the French valet.  Dear me, what a trouble that
was; yet I could do nothing to prevent it.  This courier was a very
handsome man--they are handsome sometimes.'

'Yes, they are.  My aunt married one.'

'Did she?  Where do they live?'

'They keep an hotel at Rouen,' murmured Picotee, in doubt whether this
should have been told or not.

'Well, he used to follow me to the English Church every Sunday regularly,
and I was so determined not to give my hand where my heart could never
be, that I slipped out at the other door while he stood expecting me by
the one I entered.  Here I met M. Pierre, when, as ill luck would have
it, the other came round the corner, and seeing me talking to the valet,
he challenged him at once.'

'Ha-ha-ha!' was heard again afar.

'Did they fight?' said Picotee.

'Yes, I believe they did.  We left Nice the next day; but I heard some
time after of a duel not many miles off, and although I could not get
hold of the names, I make no doubt it was between those two gentlemen.  I
never knew which of them fell; poor fellow, whichever it was.'

'Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!' came from the dining-room.

'Whatever are those boozy men laughing at, I wonder?' said Menlove.  'They
are always so noisy when the ladies have gone upstairs.  Upon my soul,
I'll run up and find out.'

'No, no, don't,' entreated Picotee, putting her hand on her entertainer's
arm.  'It seems wrong; it is no concern of ours.'

'Wrong be hanged--anything on an impulse,' said Mrs. Menlove, skipping
across the room and out of the door, which stood open, as did others in
the house, the evening being sultry and oppressive.

Picotee waited in her seat until it occurred to her that she could escape
the lady's-maid by going off into her father's pantry in her absence.  But
before this had been put into effect Menlove appeared again.

'Such fun as they are having up there,' she said.  'Somebody asked Mr.
Neigh to tell a story which he had told at some previous time, but he was
very reluctant to do so, and pretended he could not recollect it.  Well,
then, the other man--I could not distinguish him by his voice--began
telling it, to prompt Mr. Neigh's memory; and, as far as I could
understand, it was about some lady who thought Mr. Neigh was in love with
her, and, to find whether he was worth accepting or not, she went with
her maid at night to see his estate, and wandered about and got lost, and
was frightened, and I don't know what besides.  Then Mr. Neigh laughed
too, and said he liked such common sense in a woman.  No names were
mentioned, but I fancy, from the awkwardness of Mr. Neigh at being
compelled to tell it, that the lady is one of those in the drawing-room.
I should like to know which it was.'

'I know--have heard something about it,' said Picotee, blushing with
anger.  'It was nothing at all like that.  I wonder Mr. Neigh had the
audacity ever to talk of the matter, and to misrepresent it so greatly!'

'Tell all about it, do,' said Menlove.

'O no,' said Picotee.  'I promised not to say a word.'

'It is your mistress, I expect.'

'You may think what you like; but the lady is anything but a mistress of
mine.'

The flighty Menlove pressed her to tell the whole story, but finding this
useless the subject was changed.  Presently her father came in, and,
taking no notice of Menlove, told his daughter that she had been called
for.  Picotee very readily put on her things, and on going outside found
Joey awaiting her.  Mr. Chickerel followed closely, with sharp glances
from the corner of his eye, and it was plain from Joey's nervous manner
of lingering in the shadows of the area doorway instead of entering the
house, that the butler had in some way set himself to prevent all
communion between the fair lady's-maid and his son for that evening at
least.

He watched Picotee and her brother off the premises, and the pair went on
their way towards Exonbury Crescent, very few words passing between them.
Picotee's thoughts had turned to the proposed visit to Knollsea, and Joey
was sulky under disappointment and the blank of thwarted purposes.




30. ON THE HOUSETOP


'Picotee, are you asleep?' Ethelberta whispered softly at dawn the next
morning, by the half-opened door of her sister's bedroom.

'No, I keep waking, it is so warm.'

'So do I.  Suppose we get up and see the sun rise.  The east is filling
with flame.'

'Yes, I should like it,' said Picotee.

The restlessness which had brought Ethelberta hither in slippers and
dressing-gown at such an early hour owed its origin to another cause than
the warmth of the weather; but of that she did not speak as yet.
Picotee's room was an attic, with windows in the roof--a chamber dismal
enough at all times, and very shadowy now.  While Picotee was wrapping
up, Ethelberta placed a chair under the window, and mounting upon this
they stepped outside, and seated themselves within the parapet.

The air was as clear and fresh as on a mountain side; sparrows chattered,
and birds of a species unsuspected at later hours could be heard singing
in the park hard by, while here and there on ridges and flats a cat might
be seen going calmly home from the devilries of the night to resume the
amiabilities of the day.

'I am so sorry I was asleep when you reached home,' said Picotee.  'I was
so anxious to tell you something I heard of, and to know what you did;
but my eyes would shut, try as I might, and then I tried no longer.  Did
you see me at all, Berta?'

'Never once.  I had an impression that you were there.  I fancied you
were from father's carefully vacuous look whenever I glanced at his face.
But were you careful about what you said, and did you see Menlove?  I
felt all the time that I had done wrong in letting you come; the
gratification to you was not worth the risk to me.'

'I saw her, and talked to her.  But I am certain she suspected nothing.  I
enjoyed myself very much, and there was no risk at all.'

'I am glad it is no worse news.  However, you must not go there again:
upon that point I am determined.'

'It was a good thing I did go, all the same.  I'll tell you why when you
have told me what happened to you.'

'Nothing of importance happened to me.'

'I expect you got to know the lord you were to meet?'

'O yes--Lord Mountclere.'

'And it's dreadful how fond he is of you--quite ridiculously taken up
with you--I saw that well enough.  Such an old man, too; I wouldn't have
him for the world!'

'Don't jump at conclusions so absurdly, Picotee.  Why wouldn't you have
him for the world?'

'Because he is old enough to be my grandfather, and yours too.'

'Indeed he is not; he is only middle-aged.'

'O Berta!  Sixty-five at least.'

'He may or may not be that; and if he is, it is not old.  He is so
entertaining that one forgets all about age in connection with him.'

'He laughs like this--"Hee-hee-hee!"'  Picotee introduced as much
antiquity into her face as she could by screwing it up and suiting the
action to the word.

'This very odd thing occurred,' said Ethelberta, to get Picotee off the
track of Lord Mountclere's peculiarities, as it seemed.  'I was saying to
Mr. Neigh that we were going to Knollsea for a time, feeling that he
would not be likely to know anything about such an out-of-the-way place,
when Lord Mountclere, who was near, said, "I shall be at Enckworth Court
in a few days, probably at the time you are at Knollsea.  The Imperial
Archaeological Association holds its meetings in that part of Wessex this
season, and Corvsgate Castle, near Knollsea, is one of the places on our
list."  Then he hoped I should be able to attend.  Did you ever hear
anything so strange?  Now, I should like to attend very much, not on Lord
Mountclere's account, but because such gatherings are interesting, and I
have never been to one; yet there is this to be considered, would it be
right for me to go without a friend to such a place?  Another point is,
that we shall live in menagerie style at Knollsea for the sake of the
children, and we must do it economically in case we accept Aunt
Charlotte's invitation to Rouen; hence, if he or his friends find us out
there it will be awkward for me.  So the alternative is Knollsea or some
other place for us.'

'Let it be Knollsea, now we have once settled it,' said Picotee
anxiously.  'I have mentioned to Faith Julian that we shall be there.'

'Mentioned it already!  You must have written instantly.'

'I had a few minutes to spare, and I thought I might as well write.'

'Very well; we will stick to Knollsea,' said Ethelberta, half in doubt.
'Yes--otherwise it will be difficult to see about aunt's baptismal
certificate.  We will hope nobody will take the trouble to pry into our
household. . . .  And now, Picotee, I want to ask you something--something
very serious.  How would you like me to marry Mr. Neigh?'

Ethelberta could not help laughing with a faint shyness as she asked the
question under the searching east ray.  'He has asked me to marry him,'
she continued, 'and I want to know what you would say to such an
arrangement.  I don't mean to imply that the event is certain to take
place; but, as a mere supposition, what do you say to it, Picotee?'
Ethelberta was far from putting this matter before Picotee for advice or
opinion; but, like all people who have an innate dislike to
hole-and-corner policy, she felt compelled to speak of it to some one.

'I should not like him for you at all,' said Picotee vehemently.  'I
would rather you had Mr. Ladywell.'

'O, don't name him!'

'I wouldn't have Mr. Neigh at any price, nevertheless.  It is about him
that I was going to tell you.'  Picotee proceeded to relate Menlove's
account of the story of Ethelberta's escapade, which had been dragged
from Neigh the previous evening by the friend to whom he had related it
before he was so enamoured of Ethelberta as to regard that performance as
a positive virtue in her.  'Nobody was told, or even suspected, who the
lady of the anecdote was,' Picotee concluded; 'but I knew instantly, of
course, and I think it very unfortunate that we ever went to that
dreadful ghostly estate of his, Berta.'

Ethelberta's face heated with mortification.  She had no fear that Neigh
had told names or other particulars which might lead to her
identification by any friend of his, and she could make allowance for
bursts of confidence; but there remained the awkward fact that he himself
knew her to be the heroine of the episode.  What annoyed her most was
that Neigh could ever have looked upon her indiscretion as a humorous
incident, which he certainly must have done at some time or other to
account for his telling it.  Had he been angry with her, or sneered at
her for going, she could have forgiven him; but to see her manoeuvre in
the light of a joke, to use it as illustrating his grim theory of
womankind, and neither to like nor to dislike her the more for it from
first to last, this was to treat her with a cynicism which was
intolerable.  That Neigh's use of the incident as a stock anecdote ceased
long before he had decided to ask her to marry him she had no doubt, but
it showed that his love for her was of that sort in which passion makes
war upon judgment, and prevails in spite of will.  Moreover, he might
have been speaking ironically when he alluded to the act as a virtue in a
woman, which seemed the more likely when she remembered his cool bearing
towards her in the drawing-room.  Possibly it was an antipathetic
reaction, induced by the renewed recollection of her proceeding.

'I will never marry Mr. Neigh!' she said, with decision.  'That shall
settle it.  You need not think over any such contingency, Picotee.  He is
one of those horrid men who love with their eyes, the remainder part of
him objecting all the time to the feeling; and even if his objections
prove the weaker, and the man marries, his general nature conquers again
by the time the wedding trip is over, so that the woman is miserable at
last, and had better not have had him at all.'

'That applies still more to Lord Mountclere, to my thinking.  I never saw
anything like the look of his eyes upon you.'

'O no, no--you understand nothing if you say that.  But one thing be sure
of, there is no marriage likely to take place between myself and Mr.
Neigh.  I have longed for a sound reason for disliking him, and now I
have got it.  Well, we will talk no more of this--let us think of the
nice little pleasure we have in store--our stay at Knollsea.  There we
will be as free as the wind.  And when we are down there, I can drive
across to Corvsgate Castle if I wish to attend the Imperial Association
meeting, and nobody will know where I came from.  Knollsea is not more
than five miles from the Castle, I think.'

Picotee was by this time beginning to yawn, and Ethelberta did not feel
nearly so wakeful as she had felt half-an-hour earlier.  Tall and swarthy
columns of smoke were now soaring up from the kitchen chimneys around,
spreading horizontally when at a great height, and forming a roof of haze
which was turning the sun to a copper colour, and by degrees spoiling the
sweetness of the new atmosphere that had rolled in from the country
during the night, giving it the usual city smell.  The resolve to make
this rising the beginning of a long and busy day, which should set them
beforehand with the rest of the world, weakened with their growing
weariness, and an impulse to lie down just for a quarter of an hour
before dressing, ended in a sound sleep that did not relinquish its hold
upon them till late in the forenoon.




31. KNOLLSEA--A LOFTY DOWN--A RUINED CASTLE


Knollsea was a seaside village lying snug within two headlands as between
a finger and thumb.  Everybody in the parish who was not a boatman was a
quarrier, unless he were the gentleman who owned half the property and
had been a quarryman, or the other gentleman who owned the other half,
and had been to sea.

The knowledge of the inhabitants was of the same special sort as their
pursuits.  The quarrymen in white fustian understood practical geology,
the laws and accidents of dips, faults, and cleavage, far better than the
ways of the world and mammon; the seafaring men in Guernsey frocks had a
clearer notion of Alexandria, Constantinople, the Cape, and the Indies
than of any inland town in their own country.  This, for them, consisted
of a busy portion, the Channel, where they lived and laboured, and a dull
portion, the vague unexplored miles of interior at the back of the ports,
which they seldom thought of.

Some wives of the village, it is true, had learned to let lodgings, and
others to keep shops.  The doors of these latter places were formed of an
upper hatch, usually kept open, and a lower hatch, with a bell attached,
usually kept shut.  Whenever a stranger went in, he would hear a
whispering of astonishment from a back room, after which a woman came
forward, looking suspiciously at him as an intruder, and advancing slowly
enough to allow her mouth to get clear of the meal she was partaking of.
Meanwhile the people in the back room would stop their knives and forks
in absorbed curiosity as to the reason of the stranger's entry, who by
this time feels ashamed of his unwarrantable intrusion into this hermit's
cell, and thinks he must take his hat off.  The woman is quite alarmed at
seeing that he is not one of the fifteen native women and children who
patronize her, and nervously puts her hand to the side of her face, which
she carries slanting.  The visitor finds himself saying what he wants in
an apologetic tone, when the woman tells him that they did keep that
article once, but do not now; that nobody does, and probably never will
again; and as he turns away she looks relieved that the dilemma of having
to provide for a stranger has passed off with no worse mishap than
disappointing him.

A cottage which stood on a high slope above this townlet and its bay
resounded one morning with the notes of a merry company.  Ethelberta had
managed to find room for herself and her young relations in the house of
one of the boatmen, whose wife attended upon them all.  Captain Flower,
the husband, assisted her in the dinner preparations, when he slipped
about the house as lightly as a girl and spoke of himself as cook's mate.
The house was so small that the sailor's rich voice, developed by
shouting in high winds during a twenty years' experience in the coasting
trade, could be heard coming from the kitchen between the chirpings of
the children in the parlour.  The furniture of this apartment consisted
mostly of the painting of a full-rigged ship, done by a man whom the
captain had specially selected for the purpose because he had been seven-
and-twenty years at sea before touching a brush, and thereby offered a
sufficient guarantee that he understood how to paint a vessel properly.

Before this picture sat Ethelberta in a light linen dress, and with
tightly-knotted hair--now again Berta Chickerel as of old--serving out
breakfast to the rest of the party, and sometimes lifting her eyes to the
outlook from the window, which presented a happy combination of grange
scenery with marine.  Upon the irregular slope between the house and the
quay was an orchard of aged trees wherein every apple ripening on the
boughs presented its rubicund side towards the cottage, because that
building chanced to lie upwards in the same direction as the sun.  Under
the trees were a few Cape sheep, and over them the stone chimneys of the
village below: outside these lay the tanned sails of a ketch or smack,
and the violet waters of the bay, seamed and creased by breezes
insufficient to raise waves; beyond all a curved wall of cliff,
terminating in a promontory, which was flanked by tall and shining
obelisks of chalk rising sheer from the trembling blue race beneath.

By one sitting in the room that commanded this prospect, a white
butterfly among the apple-trees might be mistaken for the sails of a
yacht far away on the sea; and in the evening when the light was dim,
what seemed like a fly crawling upon the window-pane would turn out to be
a boat in the bay.

When breakfast was over, Ethelberta sat leaning on the window-sill
considering her movements for the day.  It was the time fixed for the
meeting of the Imperial Association at Corvsgate Castle, the celebrated
ruin five miles off, and the meeting had some fascinations for her.  For
one thing, she had never been present at a gathering of the kind,
although what was left in any shape from the past was her constant
interest, because it recalled her to herself and fortified her mind.
Persons waging a harassing social fight are apt in the interest of the
combat to forget the smallness of the end in view; and the hints that
perishing historical remnants afforded her of the attenuating effects of
time even upon great struggles corrected the apparent scale of her own.
She was reminded that in a strife for such a ludicrously small object as
the entry of drawing-rooms, winning, equally with losing, is below the
zero of the true philosopher's concern.

There could never be a more excellent reason than this for going to view
the meagre stumps remaining from flourishing bygone centuries, and it had
weight with Ethelberta this very day; but it would be difficult to state
the whole composition of her motive.  The approaching meeting had been
one of the great themes at Mr. Doncastle's dinner-party, and Lord
Mountclere, on learning that she was to be at Knollsea, had recommended
her attendance at some, if not all of the meetings, as a desirable and
exhilarating change after her laborious season's work in town.  It was
pleasant to have won her way so far in high places that her health of
body and mind should be thus considered--pleasant, less as personal
gratification, than that it casually reflected a proof of her good
judgment in a course which everybody among her kindred had condemned by
calling a foolhardy undertaking.

And she might go without the restraint of ceremony.
Unconventionality--almost eccentricity--was de rigueur for one who had
been first heard of as a poetess; from whose red lips magic romance had
since trilled for weeks to crowds of listeners, as from a perennial
spring.

So Ethelberta went, after a considerable pondering how to get there
without the needless sacrifice either of dignity or cash.  It would be
inconsiderate to the children to spend a pound on a brougham when as much
as she could spare was wanted for their holiday.  It was almost too far
too walk.  She had, however, decided to walk, when she met a boy with a
donkey, who offered to lend it to her for three shillings.  The animal
was rather sad-looking, but Ethelberta found she could sit upon the pad
without discomfort.  Considering that she might pull up some distance
short of the castle, and leave the ass at a cottage before joining her
four-wheeled friends, she struck the bargain and rode on her way.

This was, first by a path on the shore where the tide dragged huskily up
and down the shingle without disturbing it, and thence up the steep crest
of land opposite, whereon she lingered awhile to let the ass breathe.  On
one of the spires of chalk into which the hill here had been split was
perched a cormorant, silent and motionless, with wings spread out to dry
in the sun after his morning's fishing, their white surface shining like
mail.  Retiring without disturbing him and turning to the left along the
lofty ridge which ran inland, the country on each side lay beneath her
like a map, domains behind domains, parishes by the score, harbours, fir-
woods, and little inland seas mixing curiously together.  Thence she
ambled along through a huge cemetery of barrows, containing human dust
from prehistoric times.

Standing on the top of a giant's grave in this antique land, Ethelberta
lifted her eyes to behold two sorts of weather pervading Nature at the
same time.  Far below on the right hand it was a fine day, and the silver
sunbeams lighted up a many-armed inland sea which stretched round an
island with fir-trees and gorse, and amid brilliant crimson heaths
wherein white paths and roads occasionally met the eye in dashes and
zigzags like flashes of lightning.  Outside, where the broad Channel
appeared, a berylline and opalized variegation of ripples, currents,
deeps, and shallows, lay as fair under the sun as a New Jerusalem, the
shores being of gleaming sand.  Upon the radiant heather bees and
butterflies were busy, she knew, and the birds on that side were just
beginning their autumn songs.

On the left, quite up to her position, was dark and cloudy weather,
shading a valley of heavy greens and browns, which at its further side
rose to meet the sea in tall cliffs, suggesting even here at their back
how terrible were their aspects seaward in a growling southwest gale.
Here grassed hills rose like knuckles gloved in dark olive, and little
plantations between them formed a still deeper and sadder monochrome.  A
zinc sky met a leaden sea on this hand, the low wind groaned and whined,
and not a bird sang.

The ridge along which Ethelberta rode divided these two climates like a
wall; it soon became apparent that they were wrestling for mastery
immediately in her pathway.  The issue long remained doubtful, and this
being an imaginative hour with her, she watched as typical of her own
fortunes how the front of battle swayed--now to the west, flooding her
with sun, now to the east, covering her with shade: then the wind moved
round to the north, a blue hole appeared in the overhanging cloud, at
about the place of the north star; and the sunlight spread on both sides
of her.

The towers of the notable ruin to be visited rose out of the furthermost
shoulder of the upland as she advanced, its site being the slope and
crest of a smoothly nibbled mount at the toe of the ridge she had
followed.  When observing the previous uncertainty of the weather on this
side Ethelberta had been led to doubt if the meeting would be held here
to-day, and she was now strengthened in her opinion that it would not by
the total absence of human figures amid the ruins, though the time of
appointment was past.  This disposed of another question which had
perplexed her: where to find a stable for the ass during the meeting, for
she had scarcely liked the idea of facing the whole body of lords and
gentlemen upon the animal's back.  She now decided to retain her seat,
ride round the ruin, and go home again, without troubling further about
the movements of the Association or acquaintance with the members
composing it.

Accordingly Ethelberta crossed the bridge over the moat, and rode under
the first archway into the outer ward.  As she had expected, not a soul
was here.  The arrow-slits, portcullis-grooves, and staircases met her
eye as familiar friends, for in her childhood she had once paid a visit
to the spot.  Ascending the green incline and through another arch into
the second ward, she still pressed on, till at last the ass was unable to
clamber an inch further.  Here she dismounted, and tying him to a stone
which projected like a fang from a raw edge of wall, performed the
remainder of the ascent on foot.  Once among the towers above, she became
so interested in the windy corridors, mildewed dungeons, and the tribe of
daws peering invidiously upon her from overhead, that she forgot the
flight of time.

Nearly three-quarters of an hour passed before she came out from the
immense walls, and looked from an opening to the front over the wide
expanse of the outer ward, by which she had ascended.

Ethelberta was taken aback to see there a file of shining carriages,
which had arrived during her seclusion in the keep.  From these began to
burst a miscellany of many-coloured draperies, blue, buff, pied, and
black; they united into one, and crept up the incline like a cloud, which
then parted into fragments, dived into old doorways, and lost substance
behind projecting piles.  Recognizing in this the ladies and gentlemen of
the meeting, her first thought was how to escape, for she was suddenly
overcome with dread to meet them all single-handed as she stood.  She
drew back and hurried round to the side, as the laughter and voices of
the assembly began to be audible, and, more than ever vexed that she
could not have fallen in with them in some unobtrusive way, Ethelberta
found that they were immediately beneath her.

Venturing to peep forward again, what was her mortification at finding
them gathered in a ring, round no object of interest belonging to the
ruin, but round her faithful beast, who had loosened himself in some way
from the stone, and stood in the middle of a plat of grass, placidly
regarding them.

Being now in the teeth of the Association, there was nothing to do but to
go on, since, if she did not, the next few steps of their advance would
disclose her.  She made the best of it, and began to descend in the broad
view of the assembly, from the midst of which proceeded a laugh--'Hee-hee-
hee!'  Ethelberta knew that Lord Mountclere was there.

'The poor thing has strayed from its owner,' said one lady, as they all
stood eyeing the apparition of the ass.

'It may belong to some of the villagers,' said the President in a
historical voice: 'and it may be appropriate to mention that many were
kept here in olden times: they were largely used as beasts of burden in
victualling the castle previous to the last siege, in the year sixteen
hundred and forty-five.'

'It is very weary, and has come a long way, I think,' said a lady;
adding, in an imaginative tone, 'the humble creature looks so aged and is
so quaintly saddled that we may suppose it to be only an animated relic,
of the same date as the other remains.'

By this time Lord Mountclere had noticed Ethelberta's presence, and
straightening himself to ten years younger, he lifted his hat in answer
to her smile, and came up jauntily.  It was a good time now to see what
the viscount was really like.  He appeared to be about sixty-five, and
the dignified aspect which he wore to a gazer at a distance became
depreciated to jocund slyness upon nearer view, when the small type could
be read between the leading lines.  Then it could be seen that his upper
lip dropped to a point in the middle, as if impressing silence upon his
too demonstrative lower one.  His right and left profiles were different,
one corner of his mouth being more compressed than the other, producing a
deep line thence downwards to the side of his chin.  Each eyebrow rose
obliquely outwards and upwards, and was thus far above the little eye,
shining with the clearness of a pond that has just been able to weather
the heats of summer.  Below this was a preternaturally fat jowl, which,
by thrusting against cheeks and chin, caused the arch old mouth to be
almost buried at the corners.

A few words of greeting passed, and Ethelberta told him how she was
fearing to meet them all, united and primed with their morning's
knowledge as they appeared to be.

'Well, we have not done much yet,' said Lord Mountclere.  'As for myself,
I have given no thought at all to our day's work.  I had not forgotten
your promise to attend, if you could possibly drive across, and--hee-hee-
hee!--I have frequently looked towards the hill where the road descends.
. . .  Will you now permit me to introduce some of my party--as many of
them as you care to know by name?  I think they would all like to speak
to you.'

Ethelberta then found herself nominally made known to ten or a dozen
ladies and gentlemen who had wished for special acquaintance with her.
She stood there, as all women stand who have made themselves remarkable
by their originality, or devotion to any singular cause, as a person
freed of her hampering and inconvenient sex, and, by virtue of her
popularity, unfettered from the conventionalities of manner prescribed by
custom for household womankind.  The charter to move abroad unchaperoned,
which society for good reasons grants only to women of three sorts--the
famous, the ministering, and the improper--Ethelberta was in a fair way
to make splendid use of: instead of walking in protected lanes she
experienced that luxury of isolation which normally is enjoyed by men
alone, in conjunction with the attention naturally bestowed on a woman
young and fair.  Among the presentations were Mr. and Mrs. Tynn, member
and member's mainspring for North Wessex; Sir Cyril and Lady Blandsbury;
Lady Jane Joy; and the Honourable Edgar Mountclere, the viscount's
brother.  There also hovered near her the learned Doctor Yore; Mr. Small,
a profound writer, who never printed his works; the Reverend Mr. Brook,
rector; the Very Reverend Dr. Taylor, dean; and the undoubtedly Reverend
Mr. Tinkleton, Nonconformist, who had slipped into the fold by chance.

These and others looked with interest at Ethelberta: the old county
fathers hard, as at a questionable town phenomenon, the county sons
tenderly, as at a pretty creature, and the county daughters with great
admiration, as at a lady reported by their mammas to be no better than
she should be.  It will be seen that Ethelberta was the sort of woman
that well-rooted local people might like to look at on such a free and
friendly occasion as an archaeological meeting, where, to gratify a
pleasant whim, the picturesque form of acquaintance is for the nonce
preferred to the useful, the spirits being so brisk as to swerve from
strict attention to the select and sequent gifts of heaven, blood and
acres, to consider for an idle moment the subversive Mephistophelian
endowment, brains.

'Our progress in the survey of the castle has not been far as yet,' Lord
Mountclere resumed; 'indeed, we have only just arrived, the weather this
morning being so unsettled.  When you came up we were engaged in a
preliminary study of the poor animal you see there: how it could have got
up here we cannot understand.'

He pointed as he spoke to the donkey which had brought Ethelberta
thither, whereupon she was silent, and gazed at her untoward beast as if
she had never before beheld him.

The ass looked at Ethelberta as though he would say, 'Why don't you own
me, after safely bringing you over those weary hills?'  But the pride and
emulation which had made her what she was would not permit her, as the
most lovely woman there, to take upon her own shoulders the ridicule that
had already been cast upon the ass.  Had he been young and gaily
caparisoned, she might have done it; but his age, the clumsy trappings of
rustic make, and his needy woful look of hard servitude, were too much to
endure.

'Many come and picnic here,' she said serenely, 'and the animal may have
been left till they return from some walk.'

'True,' said Lord Mountclere, without the slightest suspicion of the
truth.  The humble ass hung his head in his usual manner, and it demanded
little fancy from Ethelberta to imagine that he despised her.  And then
her mind flew back to her history and extraction, to her father--perhaps
at that moment inventing a private plate-powder in an underground
pantry--and with a groan at her inconsistency in being ashamed of the
ass, she said in her heart, 'My God, what a thing am I!'

They then all moved on to another part of the castle, the viscount
busying himself round and round her person like the head scraper at a pig-
killing; and as they went indiscriminately mingled, jesting lightly or
talking in earnest, she beheld ahead of her the form of Neigh among the
rest.

Now, there could only be one reason on earth for Neigh's presence--her
remark that she might attend--for Neigh took no more interest in
antiquities than in the back of the moon.  Ethelberta was a little
flurried; perhaps he had come to scold her, or to treat her badly in that
indefinable way of his by which he could make a woman feel as nothing
without any direct act at all.  She was afraid of him, and, determining
to shun him, was thankful that Lord Mountclere was near, to take off the
edge of Neigh's manner towards her if he approached.

'Do you know in what part of the ruins the lecture is to be given?' she
said to the viscount.

'Wherever you like,' he replied gallantly.  'Do you propose a place, and
I will get Dr. Yore to adopt it.  Say, shall it be here, or where they
are standing?'

How could Ethelberta refrain from exercising a little power when it was
put into her hands in this way?

'Let it be here,' she said, 'if it makes no difference to the meeting.'

'It shall be,' said Lord Mountclere.

And then the lively old nobleman skipped like a roe to the President and
to Dr. Yore, who was to read the paper on the castle, and they soon
appeared coming back to where the viscount's party and Ethelberta were
beginning to seat themselves.  The bulk of the company followed, and Dr.
Yore began.

He must have had a countenance of leather--as, indeed, from his colour he
appeared to have--to stand unmoved in his position, and read, and look up
to give explanations, without a change of muscle, under the dozens of
bright eyes that were there converged upon him, like the sticks of a fan,
from the ladies who sat round him in a semicircle upon the grass.
However, he went on calmly, and the women sheltered themselves from the
heat with their umbrellas and sunshades, their ears lulled by the hum of
insects, and by the drone of the doctor's voice.  The reader buzzed on
with the history of the castle, tracing its development from a mound with
a few earthworks to its condition in Norman times; he related monkish
marvels connected with the spot; its resistance under Matilda to Stephen,
its probable shape while a residence of King John, and the sad story of
the Damsel of Brittany, sister of his victim Arthur, who was confined
here in company with the two daughters of Alexander, king of Scotland.  He
went on to recount the confinement of Edward II. herein, previous to his
murder at Berkeley, the gay doings in the reign of Elizabeth, and so
downward through time to the final overthrow of the stern old pile.  As
he proceeded, the lecturer pointed with his finger at the various
features appertaining to the date of his story, which he told with
splendid vigour when he had warmed to his work, till his narrative,
particularly in the conjectural and romantic parts, where it became
coloured rather by the speaker's imagination than by the pigments of
history, gathered together the wandering thoughts of all.  It was easy
for him then to meet those fair concentred eyes, when the sunshades were
thrown back, and complexions forgotten, in the interest of the history.
The doctor's face was then no longer criticized as a rugged boulder, a
dried fig, an oak carving, or a walnut shell, but became blotted out like
a mountain top in a shining haze by the nebulous pictures conjured by his
tale.

Then the lecture ended, and questions were asked, and individuals of the
company wandered at will, the light dresses of the ladies sweeping over
the hot grass and brushing up thistledown which had hitherto lain
quiescent, so that it rose in a flight from the skirts of each like a
comet's tail.

Some of Lord Mountclere's party, including himself and Ethelberta,
wandered now into a cool dungeon, partly open to the air overhead, where
long arms of ivy hung between their eyes and the white sky.  While they
were here, Lady Jane Joy and some other friends of the viscount told
Ethelberta that they were probably coming on to Knollsea.

She instantly perceived that getting into close quarters in that way
might be very inconvenient, considering the youngsters she had under her
charge, and straightway decided upon a point that she had debated for
several days--a visit to her aunt in Normandy.  In London it had been a
mere thought, but the Channel had looked so tempting from its brink that
the journey was virtually fixed as soon as she reached Knollsea, and
found that a little pleasure steamer crossed to Cherbourg once a week
during the summer, so that she would not have to enter the crowded routes
at all.

'I am afraid I shall not see you in Knollsea,' she said.  'I am about to
go to Cherbourg and then to Rouen.'

'How sorry I am.  When do you leave?'

'At the beginning of next week,' said Ethelberta, settling the time there
and then.

'Did I hear you say that you were going to Cherbourg and Rouen?' Lord
Mountclere inquired.

'I think to do so,' said Ethelberta.

'I am going to Normandy myself,' said a voice behind her, and without
turning she knew that Neigh was standing there.

They next went outside, and Lord Mountclere offered Ethelberta his arm on
the ground of assisting her down the burnished grass slope.  Ethelberta,
taking pity upon him, took it; but the assistance was all on her side;
she stood like a statue amid his slips and totterings, some of which
taxed her strength heavily, and her ingenuity more, to appear as the
supported and not the supporter.  The incident brought Neigh still
further from his retirement, and she learnt that he was one of a yachting
party which had put in at Knollsea that morning; she was greatly relieved
to find that he was just now on his way to London, whence he would
probably proceed on his journey abroad.

Ethelberta adhered as well as she could to her resolve that Neigh should
not speak with her alone, but by dint of perseverance he did manage to
address her without being overheard.

'Will you give me an answer?' said Neigh.  'I have come on purpose.'

'I cannot just now.  I have been led to doubt you.'

'Doubt me?  What new wrong have I done?'

'Spoken jestingly of my visit to Farnfield.'

'Good ---!  I did not speak or think of you.  When I told that incident I
had no idea who the lady was--I did not know it was you till two days
later, and I at once held my tongue.  I vow to you upon my soul and life
that what I say is true.  How shall I prove my truth better than by my
errand here?'

'Don't speak of this now.  I am so occupied with other things.  I am
going to Rouen, and will think of it on my way.'

'I am going there too.  When do you go?'

'I shall be in Rouen next Wednesday, I hope.'

'May I ask where?'

'Hotel Beau Sejour.'

'Will you give me an answer there?  I can easily call upon you.  It is
now a month and more since you first led me to hope--'

'I did not lead you to hope--at any rate clearly.'

'Indirectly you did.  And although I am willing to be as considerate as
any man ought to be in giving you time to think over the question, there
is a limit to my patience.  Any necessary delay I will put up with, but I
won't be trifled with.  I hate all nonsense, and can't stand it.'

'Indeed.  Good morning.'

'But Mrs. Petherwin--just one word.'

'I have nothing to say.'

'I will meet you at Rouen for an answer.  I would meet you in Hades for
the matter of that.  Remember this: next Wednesday, if I live, I shall
call upon you at Rouen.'

She did not say nay.

'May I?' he added.

'If you will.'

'But say it shall be an appointment?'

'Very well.'

Lord Mountclere was by this time toddling towards them to ask if they
would come on to his house, Enckworth Court, not very far distant, to
lunch with the rest of the party.  Neigh, having already arranged to go
on to town that afternoon, was obliged to decline, and Ethelberta thought
fit to do the same, idly asking Lord Mountclere if Enckworth Court lay in
the direction of a gorge that was visible where they stood.

'No; considerably to the left,' he said.  'The opening you are looking at
would reveal the sea if it were not for the trees that block the way.  Ah,
those trees have a history; they are half-a-dozen elms which I planted
myself when I was a boy.  How time flies!'

'It is unfortunate they stand just so as to cover the blue bit of sea.
That addition would double the value of the view from here.'

'You would prefer the blue sea to the trees?'

'In that particular spot I should; they might have looked just as well,
and yet have hidden nothing worth seeing.  The narrow slit would have
been invaluable there.'

'They shall fall before the sun sets, in deference to your opinion,' said
Lord Mountclere.

'That would be rash indeed,' said Ethelberta, laughing, 'when my opinion
on such a point may be worth nothing whatever.'

'Where no other is acted upon, it is practically the universal one,' he
replied gaily.

And then Ethelberta's elderly admirer bade her adieu, and away the whole
party drove in a long train over the hills towards the valley wherein
stood Enckworth Court.  Ethelberta's carriage was supposed by her friends
to have been left at the village inn, as were many others, and her
retiring from view on foot attracted no notice.

She watched them out of sight, and she also saw the rest depart--those
who, their interest in archaeology having begun and ended with this spot,
had, like herself, declined the hospitable viscount's invitation, and
started to drive or walk at once home again.  Thereupon the castle was
quite deserted except by Ethelberta, the ass, and the jackdaws, now
floundering at ease again in and about the ivy of the keep.

Not wishing to enter Knollsea till the evening shades were falling, she
still walked amid the ruins, examining more leisurely some points which
the stress of keeping herself companionable would not allow her to attend
to while the assemblage was present.  At the end of the survey, being
somewhat weary with her clambering, she sat down on the slope commanding
the gorge where the trees grew, to make a pencil sketch of the landscape
as it was revealed between the ragged walls.  Thus engaged she weighed
the circumstances of Lord Mountclere's invitation, and could not be
certain if it were prudishness or simple propriety in herself which had
instigated her to refuse.  She would have liked the visit for many
reasons, and if Lord Mountclere had been anybody but a remarkably
attentive old widower, she would have gone.  As it was, it had occurred
to her that there was something in his tone which should lead her to
hesitate.  Were any among the elderly or married ladies who had appeared
upon the ground in a detached form as she had done--and many had appeared
thus--invited to Enckworth; and if not, why were they not?  That Lord
Mountclere admired her there was no doubt, and for this reason it behoved
her to be careful.  His disappointment at parting from her was, in one
aspect, simply laughable, from its odd resemblance to the unfeigned
sorrow of a boy of fifteen at a first parting from his first love; in
another aspect it caused reflection; and she thought again of his
curiosity about her doings for the remainder of the summer.

* * * * *

While she sketched and thought thus, the shadows grew longer, and the sun
low.  And then she perceived a movement in the gorge.  One of the trees
forming the curtain across it began to wave strangely: it went further to
one side, and fell. Where the tree had stood was now a rent in the
foliage, and through the narrow rent could be seen the distant sea.

Ethelberta uttered a soft exclamation.  It was not caused by the surprise
she had felt, nor by the intrinsic interest of the sight, nor by want of
comprehension.  It was a sudden realization of vague things hitherto
dreamed of from a distance only--a sense of novel power put into her
hands without request or expectation.  A landscape was to be altered to
suit her whim.  She had in her lifetime moved essentially larger
mountains, but they had seemed of far less splendid material than this;
for it was the nature of the gratification rather than its magnitude
which enchanted the fancy of a woman whose poetry, in spite of her
necessities, was hardly yet extinguished.  But there was something more,
with which poetry had little to do.  Whether the opinion of any pretty
woman in England was of more weight with Lord Mountclere than memories of
his boyhood, or whether that distinction was reserved for her alone; this
was a point that she would have liked to know.

The enjoyment of power in a new element, an enjoyment somewhat resembling
in kind that which is given by a first ride or swim, held Ethelberta to
the spot, and she waited, but sketched no more.  Another tree-top swayed
and vanished as before, and the slit of sea was larger still.  Her mind
and eye were so occupied with this matter that, sitting in her nook, she
did not observe a thin young man, his boots white with the dust of a long
journey on foot, who arrived at the castle by the valley-road from
Knollsea.  He looked awhile at the ruin, and, skirting its flank instead
of entering by the great gateway, climbed up the scarp and walked in
through a breach.  After standing for a moment among the walls, now
silent and apparently empty, with a disappointed look he descended the
slope, and proceeded along on his way.

Ethelberta, who was in quite another part of the castle, saw the black
spot diminishing to the size of a fly as he receded along the dusty road,
and soon after she descended on the other side, where she remounted the
ass, and ambled homeward as she had come, in no bright mood.  What,
seeing the precariousness of her state, was the day's triumph worth after
all, unless, before her beauty abated, she could ensure her position
against the attacks of chance?

      'To be thus is nothing;
   But to be safely thus.'

--she said it more than once on her journey that day.

On entering the sitting-room of their cot up the hill she found it empty,
and from a change perceptible in the position of small articles of
furniture, something unusual seemed to have taken place in her absence.
The dwelling being of that sort in which whatever goes on in one room is
audible through all the rest, Picotee, who was upstairs, heard the
arrival and came down.  Picotee's face was rosed over with the brilliance
of some excitement.  'What do you think I have to tell you, Berta?' she
said.

'I have no idea,' said her sister.  'Surely,' she added, her face
intensifying to a wan sadness, 'Mr. Julian has not been here?'

'Yes,' said Picotee.  'And we went down to the sands--he, and Myrtle, and
Georgina, and Emmeline, and I--and Cornelia came down when she had put
away the dinner.  And then we dug wriggles out of the sand with Myrtle's
spade: we got such a lot, and had such fun; they are in a dish in the
kitchen.  Mr. Julian came to see you; but at last he could wait no
longer, and when I told him you were at the meeting in the castle ruins
he said he would try to find you there on his way home, if he could get
there before the meeting broke up.'

'Then it was he I saw far away on the road--yes, it must have been.'  She
remained in gloomy reverie a few moments, and then said, 'Very well--let
it be.  Picotee, get me some tea: I do not want dinner.'

But the news of Christopher's visit seemed to have taken away her
appetite for tea also, and after sitting a little while she flung herself
down upon the couch, and told Picotee that she had settled to go and see
their aunt Charlotte.

'I am going to write to Sol and Dan to ask them to meet me there,' she
added.  'I want them, if possible, to see Paris.  It will improve them
greatly in their trades, I am thinking, if they can see the kinds of
joinery and decoration practised in France.  They agreed to go, if I
should wish it, before we left London.  You, of course, will go as my
maid.'

Picotee gazed upon the sea with a crestfallen look, as if she would
rather not cross it in any capacity just then.

'It would scarcely be worth going to the expense of taking me, would it?'
she said.

The cause of Picotee's sudden sense of economy was so plain that her
sister smiled; but young love, however foolish, is to a thinking person
far too tragic a power for ridicule; and Ethelberta forbore, going on as
if Picotee had not spoken: 'I must have you with me.  I may be seen
there: so many are passing through Rouen at this time of the year.
Cornelia can take excellent care of the children while we are gone.  I
want to get out of England, and I will get out of England.  There is
nothing but vanity and vexation here.'

'I am sorry you were away when he called,' said Picotee gently.

'O, I don't mean that.  I wish there were no different ranks in the
world, and that contrivance were not a necessary faculty to have at all.
Well, we are going to cross by the little steamer that puts in here, and
we are going on Monday.'  She added in another minute, 'What had Mr.
Julian to tell us that he came here?  How did he find us out?'

'I mentioned that we were coming here in my letter to Faith.  Mr. Julian
says that perhaps he and his sister may also come for a few days before
the season is over.  I should like to see Miss Julian again.  She is such
a nice girl.'

'Yes.'  Ethelberta played with her hair, and looked at the ceiling as she
reclined.  'I have decided after all,' she said, 'that it will be better
to take Cornelia as my maid, and leave you here with the children.
Cornelia is stronger as a companion than you, and she will be delighted
to go.  Do you think you are competent to keep Myrtle and Georgina out of
harm's way?'

'O yes--I will be exceedingly careful,' said Picotee, with great
vivacity.  'And if there is time I can go on teaching them a little.'
Then Picotee caught Ethelberta's eye, and colouring red, sank down beside
her sister, whispering, 'I know why it is!  But if you would rather have
me with you I will go, and not once wish to stay.'

Ethelberta looked as if she knew all about that, and said, 'Of course
there will be no necessity to tell the Julians about my departure until
they have fixed the time for coming, and cannot alter their minds.'

The sound of the children with Cornelia, and their appearance outside the
window, pushing between the fuchsia bushes which overhung the path, put
an end to this dialogue; they entered armed with buckets and spades, a
very moist and sandy aspect pervading them as far up as the high-water
mark of their clothing, and began to tell Ethelberta of the wonders of
the deep.




32. A ROOM IN ENCKWORTH COURT


'Are you sure the report is true?'

'I am sure that what I say is true, my lord; but it is hardly to be
called a report.  It is a secret, known at present to nobody but myself
and Mrs. Doncastle's maid.'

The speaker was Lord Mountclere's trusty valet, and the conversation was
between him and the viscount in a dressing-room at Enckworth Court, on
the evening after the meeting of archaeologists at Corvsgate Castle.

'H'm-h'm; the daughter of a butler.  Does Mrs. Doncastle know of this
yet, or Mr. Neigh, or any of their friends?'

'No, my lord.'

'You are quite positive?'

'Quite positive.  I was, by accident, the first that Mrs. Menlove named
the matter to, and I told her it might be much to her advantage if she
took particular care it should go no further.'

'Mrs. Menlove!  Who's she?'

'The lady's-maid at Mrs. Doncastle's, my lord.'

'O, ah--of course.  You may leave me now, Tipman.'  Lord Mountclere
remained in thought for a moment.  'A clever little puss, to hoodwink us
all like this--hee-hee!' he murmured.  'Her education--how finished; and
her beauty--so seldom that I meet with such a woman.  Cut down my elms to
please a butler's daughter--what a joke--certainly a good joke!  To
interest me in her on the right side instead of the wrong was strange.
But it can be made to change sides--hee-hee!--it can be made to change
sides!  Tipman!'

Tipman came forward from the doorway.

'Will you take care that that piece of gossip you mentioned to me is not
repeated in this house?  I strongly disapprove of talebearing of any
sort, and wish to hear no more of this.  Such stories are never true.
Answer me--do you hear?  Such stories are never true.'

'I beg pardon, but I think your lordship will find this one true,' said
the valet quietly.

'Then where did she get her manners and education?  Do you know?'

'I do not, my lord.  I suppose she picked 'em up by her wits.'

'Never mind what you suppose,' said the old man impatiently.  'Whenever I
ask a question of you tell me what you know, and no more.'

'Quite so, my lord.  I beg your lordship's pardon for supposing.'

'H'm-h'm.  Have the fashion-books and plates arrived yet?'

'Le Follet has, my lord; but not the others.'

'Let me have it at once.  Always bring it to me at once.  Are there any
handsome ones this time?'

'They are much the same class of female as usual, I think, my lord,' said
Tipman, fetching the paper and laying it before him.

'Yes, they are,' said the viscount, leaning back and scrutinizing the
faces of the women one by one, and talking softly to himself in a way
that had grown upon him as his age increased.  'Yet they are very well:
that one with her shoulder turned is pure and charming--the brown-haired
one will pass.  All very harmless and innocent, but without character; no
soul, or inspiration, or eloquence of eye.  What an eye was hers!  There
is not a girl among them so beautiful. . . .  Tipman!  Come and take it
away.  I don't think I will subscribe to these papers any longer--how
long have I subscribed?  Never mind--I take no interest in these things,
and I suppose I must give them up.  What white article is that I see on
the floor yonder?'

'I can see nothing, my lord.'

'Yes, yes, you can.  At the other end of the room.  It is a white
handkerchief.  Bring it to me.'

'I beg pardon, my lord, but I cannot see any white handkerchief.
Whereabouts does your lordship mean?'

'There in the corner.  If it is not a handkerchief, what is it?  Walk
along till you come to it--that is it; now a little further--now your
foot is against it.'

'O that--it is not anything.  It is the light reflected against the
skirting, so that it looks like a white patch of something--that is all.'

'H'm-hm.  My eyes--how weak they are!  I am getting old, that's what it
is: I am an old man.'

'O no, my lord.'

'Yes, an old man.'

'Well, we shall all be old some day, and so will your lordship, I
suppose; but as yet--'

'I tell you I am an old man!'

'Yes, my lord--I did not mean to contradict.  An old man in one sense--old
in a young man's sense, but not in a house-of-parliament or historical
sense.  A little oldish--I meant that, my lord.'

'I may be an old man in one sense or in another sense in your mind; but
let me tell you there are men older than I--'

'Yes, so there are, my lord.'

'People may call me what they please, and you may be impertinent enough
to repeat to me what they say, but let me tell you I am not a very old
man after all.  I am not an old man.'

'Old in knowledge of the world I meant, my lord, not in years.'

'Well, yes.  Experience of course I cannot be without.  And I like what
is beautiful.  Tipman, you must go to Knollsea; don't send, but go
yourself, as I wish nobody else to be concerned in this.  Go to Knollsea,
and find out when the steamboat for Cherbourg starts; and when you have
done that, I shall want you to send Taylor to me.  I wish Captain Strong
to bring the Fawn round into Knollsea Bay.  Next week I may want you to
go to Cherbourg in the yacht with me--if the Channel is pretty calm--and
then perhaps to Rouen and Paris.  But I will speak of that to-morrow.'

'Very good, my lord.'

'Meanwhile I recommend that you and Mrs. Menlove repeat nothing you may
have heard concerning the lady you just now spoke of.  Here is a slight
present for Mrs. Menlove; and accept this for yourself.'  He handed
money.

'Your lordship may be sure we will not,' the valet replied.




33. THE ENGLISH CHANNEL--NORMANDY


On Monday morning the little steamer Speedwell made her appearance round
the promontory by Knollsea Bay, to take in passengers for the transit to
Cherbourg.  Breezes the freshest that could blow without verging on
keenness flew over the quivering deeps and shallows; and the sunbeams
pierced every detail of barrow, path and rabbit-run upon the lofty
convexity of down and waste which shut in Knollsea from the world to the
west.

They left the pier at eight o'clock, taking at first a short easterly
course to avoid a sinister ledge of limestones jutting from the water
like crocodile's teeth, which first obtained notoriety in English history
through being the spot whereon a formidable Danish fleet went to pieces a
thousand years ago.  At the moment that the Speedwell turned to enter
upon the direct course, a schooner-yacht, whose sheets gleamed like
bridal satin, loosed from a remoter part of the bay; continuing to bear
off, she cut across the steamer's wake, and took a course almost due
southerly, which was precisely that of the Speedwell.  The wind was very
favourable for the yacht, blowing a few points from north in a steady
pressure on her quarter, and, having been built with every modern
appliance that shipwrights could offer, the schooner found no difficulty
in getting abreast, and even ahead, of the steamer, as soon as she had
escaped the shelter of the hills.

The more or less parallel courses of the vessels continued for some time
without causing any remark among the people on board the Speedwell.  At
length one noticed the fact, and another; and then it became the general
topic of conversation in the group upon the bridge, where Ethelberta, her
hair getting frizzed and her cheeks carnationed by the wind, sat upon a
camp-stool looking towards the prow.

'She is bound for Guernsey,' said one.  'In half-an-hour she will put
about for a more westerly course, you'll see.'

'She is not for Guernsey or anywhere that way,' said an acquaintance,
looking through his glass.  'If she is out for anything more than a
morning cruise, she is bound for our port.  I should not wonder if she is
crossing to get stocked, as most of them do, to save the duty on her wine
and provisions.'

'Do you know whose yacht it is?'

'I do not.'

Ethelberta looked at the light leaning figure of the pretty schooner,
which seemed to skate along upon her bilge and make white shavings of all
the sea that touched her.  She at first imagined that this might be the
yacht Neigh had arrived in at the end of the previous week, for she knew
that he came as one of a yachting party, and she had noticed no other
boat of that sort in the bay since his arrival.  But as all his party had
gone ashore and not yet returned, she was surprised to see the supposed
vessel here.  To add to her perplexity, she could not be positive, now
that it came to a real nautical query, whether the craft of Neigh's
friends had one mast or two, for she had caught but a fragmentary view of
the topsail over the apple-trees.

'Is that the yacht which has been lying at Knollsea for the last few
days?' she inquired of the master of the Speedwell, as soon as she had an
opportunity.

The master warmed beneath his copper-coloured rind.  'O no, miss; that
one you saw was a cutter--a smaller boat altogether,' he replied.  'Built
on the sliding-keel principle, you understand, miss--and red below her
water-line, if you noticed.  This is Lord Mountclere's yacht--the Fawn.
You might have seen her re'ching in round Old-Harry Rock this morning
afore we started.'

'Lord Mountclere's?'

'Yes--a nobleman of this neighbourhood.  But he don't do so much at
yachting as he used to in his younger days.  I believe he's aboard this
morning, however.'

Ethelberta now became more absorbed than ever in their ocean comrade, and
watched its motions continually.  The schooner was considerably in
advance of them by this time, and seemed to be getting by degrees out of
their course.  She wondered if Lord Mountclere could be really going to
Cherbourg: if so, why had he said nothing about the trip to her when she
spoke of her own approaching voyage thither?  The yacht changed its
character in her eyes; losing the indefinite interest of the unknown, it
acquired the charm of a riddle on motives, of which the alternatives
were, had Lord Mountclere's journey anything to do with her own, or had
it not?  Common probability pointed to the latter supposition; but the
time of starting, the course of the yacht, and recollections of Lord
Mountclere's homage, suggested the more extraordinary possibility.

She went across to Cornelia.  'The man who handed us on board--didn't I
see him speaking to you this morning?' she said.

'O yes,' said Cornelia.  'He asked if my mistress was the popular Mrs.
Petherwin?

'And you told him, I suppose?'

'Yes.'

'What made you do that, Cornelia?'

'I thought I might: I couldn't help it.  When I went through the toll-
gate, such a gentlemanly-looking man asked me if he should help me to
carry the things to the end of the pier; and as we went on together he
said he supposed me to be Mrs. Petherwin's maid.  I said, "Yes."  The two
men met afterwards, so there would ha' been no good in my denying it to
one of 'em.'

'Who was this gentlemanly person?'

'I asked the other man that, and he told me one of Lord Mountclere's
upper servants.  I knew then there was no harm in having been civil to
him.  He is well-mannered, and talks splendid language.'

'That yacht you see on our right hand is Lord Mountclere's property.  If
I do not mistake, we shall have her closer by-and-by, and you may meet
your gentlemanly friend again.  Be careful how you talk to him.'

Ethelberta sat down, thought of the meeting at Corvsgate Castle, of the
dinner-party at Mr. Doncastle's, of the strange position she had there
been in, and then of her father.  She suddenly reproached herself for
thoughtlessness; for in her pocket lay a letter from him, which she had
taken from the postman that morning at the moment of coming from the
door, and in the hurry of embarking had forgotten ever since.  Opening it
quickly, she read:--

   'MY DEAR ETHELBERTA,--Your letter reached me yesterday, and I called
   round at Exonbury Crescent in the afternoon, as you wished.  Everything
   is going on right there, and you have no occasion to be anxious about
   them.  I do not leave town for another week or two, and by the time I
   am gone Sol and Dan will have returned from Paris, if your mother and
   Gwendoline want any help: so that you need not hurry back on their
   account.

   'I have something else to tell you, which is not quite so
   satisfactory, and it is this that makes me write at once; but do not
   be alarmed.  It began in this way.  A few nights after the
   dinner-party here I was determined to find out if there was any truth
   in what you had been told about that boy, and having seen Menlove go
   out as usual after dark, I followed her.  Sure enough, when she had
   got into the park, up came master Joe, smoking a cigar.  As soon as
   they had met I went towards them, and Menlove, seeing somebody draw
   nigh, began to edge off, when the blockhead said, "Never mind, my
   love, it is only the old man."  Being very provoked with both of them,
   though she was really the most to blame, I gave him some smart cuts
   across the shoulders with my cane, and told him to go home, which he
   did with a flea in his ear, the rascal.  I believe I have cured his
   courting tricks for some little time.

   'Well, Menlove then walked by me, quite cool, as if she were merely a
   lady passing by chance at the time, which provoked me still more,
   knowing the whole truth of it, and I could not help turning upon her
   and saying, "You, madam, ought to be served the same way."  She
   replied in very haughty words, and I walked away, saying that I had
   something better to do than argue with a woman of her character at
   that hour of the evening.  This so set her up that she followed me
   home, marched into my pantry, and told me that if I had been more
   careful about my manners in calling her a bad character, it might have
   been better both for me and my stuck-up daughter--a daw in eagle's
   plumes--and so on.  Now it seems that she must have coaxed something
   out of Joey about you--for what lad in the world could be a match for
   a woman of her experience and arts!  I hope she will do you no serious
   damage; but I tell you the whole state of affairs exactly as they are,
   that you may form your own opinions.  After all, there is no real
   disgrace, for none of us have ever done wrong, but have worked
   honestly for a living.  However, I will let you know if anything
   serious really happens.'

This was all that her father said on the matter, the letter concluding
with messages to the children and directions from their mother with
regard to their clothes.

Ethelberta felt very distinctly that she was in a strait; the old
impression that, unless her position were secured soon, it never would be
secured, returned with great force.  A doubt whether it was worth
securing would have been very strong ere this, had not others besides
herself been concerned in her fortunes.  She looked up from her letter,
and beheld the pertinacious yacht; it led her up to a conviction that
therein lay a means and an opportunity.

Nothing further of importance occurred in crossing.  Ethelberta's head
ached after a while, and Cornelia's healthy cheeks of red were found to
have diminished their colour to the size of a wafer and the quality of a
stain.  The Speedwell entered the breakwater at Cherbourg to find the
schooner already in the roadstead; and by the time the steamer was
brought up Ethelberta could see the men on board the yacht clewing up and
making things snug in a way from which she inferred that they were not
going to leave the harbour again that day.  With the aspect of a fair
galleon that could easily out-manoeuvre her persevering buccaneer,
Ethelberta passed alongside.  Could it be possible that Lord Mountclere
had on her account fixed this day for his visit across the Channel?

'Well, I would rather be haunted by him than by Mr. Neigh,' she said; and
began laying her plans so as to guard against inconvenient surprises.

The next morning Ethelberta was at the railway station, taking tickets
for herself and Cornelia, when she saw an old yet sly and somewhat merry-
faced Englishman a little way off.  He was attended by a younger man, who
appeared to be his valet.

'I will exchange one of these tickets,' she said to the clerk, and having
done so she went to Cornelia to inform her that it would after all be
advisable for them to travel separate, adding, 'Lord Mountclere is in the
station, and I think he is going on by our train.  Remember, you are my
maid again now.  Is not that the gentlemanly man who assisted you
yesterday?'  She signified the valet as she spoke.

'It is,' said Cornelia.

When the passengers were taking their seats, and Ethelberta was thinking
whether she might not after all enter a second-class with Cornelia
instead of sitting solitary in a first because of an old man's proximity,
she heard a shuffling at her elbow, and the next moment found that he was
overtly observing her as if he had not done so in secret at all.  She at
once gave him an unsurprised gesture of recognition.  'I saw you some
time ago; what a singular coincidence,' she said.

'A charming one,' said Lord Mountclere, smiling a half-minute smile, and
making as if he would take his hat off and would not quite.  'Perhaps we
must not call it coincidence entirely,' he continued; 'my journey, which
I have contemplated for some time, was not fixed this week altogether
without a thought of your presence on the road--hee-hee!  Do you go far
to-day?'

'As far as Caen,' said Ethelberta.

'Ah!  That's the end of my day's journey, too,' said Lord Mountclere.
They parted and took their respective places, Lord Mountclere choosing a
compartment next to the one Ethelberta was entering, and not, as she had
expected, attempting to join her.

Now she had instantly fancied when the viscount was speaking that there
were signs of some departure from his former respectful manner towards
her; and an enigma lay in that.  At their earlier meetings he had never
ventured upon a distinct coupling of himself and herself as he had done
in his broad compliment to-day--if compliment it could be called.  She
was not sure that he did not exceed his license in telling her
deliberately that he had meant to hover near her in a private journey
which she was taking without reference to him.  She did not object to the
act, but to the avowal of the act; and, being as sensitive as a barometer
on signs affecting her social condition, it darted upon Ethelberta for
one little moment that he might possibly have heard a word or two about
her being nothing more nor less than one of a tribe of thralls; hence his
freedom of manner.  Certainly a plain remark of that sort was exactly
what a susceptible peer might be supposed to say to a pretty woman of far
inferior degree.  A rapid redness filled her face at the thought that he
might have smiled upon her as upon a domestic whom he was disposed to
chuck under the chin.  'But no,' she said.  'He would never have taken
the trouble to follow and meet with me had he learnt to think me other
than a lady.  It is extremity of devotion--that's all.'

It was not Ethelberta's inexperience, but that her conception of self
precluded such an association of ideas, which led her to dismiss the
surmise that his attendance could be inspired by a motive beyond that of
paying her legitimate attentions as a co-ordinate with him and his in the
social field.  Even if he only meant flirtation, she read it as of that
sort from which courtship with an eye to matrimony differs only in
degree.  Hence, she thought, his interest in her was not likely, under
the ordinary influences of caste feeling, to continue longer than while
he was kept in ignorance of her consanguinity with a stock proscribed.
She sighed at the anticipated close of her full-feathered towering when
her ties and bonds should be uncovered.  She might have seen matters in a
different light, and sighed more.  But in the stir of the moment it
escaped her thought that ignorance of her position, and a consequent
regard for her as a woman of good standing, would have prevented his
indulgence in any course which was open to the construction of being
disrespectful.

Valognes, Carentan, Isigny, Bayeux, were passed, and the train drew up at
Caen.  Ethelberta's intention had been to stay here for one night, but
having learnt from Lord Mountclere, as previously described, that this
was his destination, she decided to go on.  On turning towards the
carriage after a few minutes of promenading at the Caen station, she was
surprised to perceive that Lord Mountclere, who had alighted as if to
leave, was still there.

They spoke again to each other.  'I find I have to go further,' he
suddenly said, when she had chatted with him a little time.  And
beckoning to the man who was attending to his baggage, he directed the
things to be again placed in the train.

Time passed, and they changed at the next junction.  When Ethelberta
entered a carriage on the branch line to take her seat for the remainder
of the journey, there sat the viscount in the same division.  He
explained that he was going to Rouen.

Ethelberta came to a quick resolution.  Her audacity, like that of a
child getting nearer and nearer a parent's side, became wonderfully
vigorous as she approached her destination; and though there were three
good hours of travel to Rouen as yet, the heavier part of the journey was
past.  At her aunt's would be a safe refuge, play what pranks she might,
and there she would to-morrow meet those bravest of defenders Sol and
Dan, to whom she had sent as much money as she could conveniently spare
towards their expenses, with directions that they were to come by the
most economical route, and meet her at the house of her aunt, Madame
Moulin, previous to their educational trip to Paris, their own
contribution being the value of the week's work they would have to lose.
Thus backed up by Sol and Dan, her aunt, and Cornelia, Ethelberta felt
quite the reverse of a lonely female persecuted by a wicked lord in a
foreign country.  'He shall pay for his weaknesses, whatever they mean,'
she thought; 'and what they mean I will find out at once.'

'I am going to Paris,' she said.

'You cannot to-night, I think.'

'To-morrow, I mean.'

'I should like to go on to-morrow.  Perhaps I may.  So that there is a
chance of our meeting again.'

'Yes; but I do not leave Rouen till the afternoon.  I first shall go to
the cathedral, and drive round the city.'

Lord Mountclere smiled pleasantly.  There seemed a sort of encouragement
in her words.  Ethelberta's thoughts, however, had flown at that moment
to the approaching situation at her aunt's hotel: it would be extremely
embarrassing if he should go there.

'Where do you stay, Lord Mountclere?' she said.

Thus directly asked, he could not but commit himself to the name of the
hotel he had been accustomed to patronize, which was one in the upper
part of the city.

'Mine is not that one,' said Ethelberta frigidly.

No further remark was made under this head, and they conversed for the
remainder of the daylight on scenery and other topics, Lord Mountclere's
air of festivity lending him all the qualities of an agreeable companion.
But notwithstanding her resolve, Ethelberta failed, for that day at
least, to make her mind clear upon Lord Mountclere's intentions.  To that
end she would have liked first to know what were the exact limits set by
society to conduct under present conditions, if society had ever set any
at all, which was open to question: since experience had long ago taught
her that much more freedom actually prevails in the communion of the
sexes than is put on paper as etiquette, or admitted in so many words as
correct behaviour.  In short, everything turned upon whether he had
learnt of her position when off the platform at Mayfair Hall.

Wearied with these surmises, and the day's travel, she closed her eyes.
And then her enamoured companion more widely opened his, and traced the
beautiful features opposite him.  The arch of the brows--like a slur in
music--the droop of the lashes, the meeting of the lips, and the sweet
rotundity of the chin--one by one, and all together, they were adored,
till his heart was like a retort full of spirits of wine.

It was a warm evening, and when they arrived at their journey's end
distant thunder rolled behind heavy and opaque clouds.  Ethelberta bade
adieu to her attentive satellite, called to Cornelia, and entered a cab;
but before they reached the inn the thunder had increased.  Then a cloud
cracked into flame behind the iron spire of the cathedral, showing in
relief its black ribs and stanchions, as if they were the bars of a
blazing cresset held on high.

'Ah, we will clamber up there to-morrow,' said Ethelberta.

A wondrous stillness pervaded the streets of the city after this, though
it was not late; and their arrival at M. Moulin's door was quite an event
for the quay.  No rain came, as they had expected, and by the time they
halted the western sky had cleared, so that the newly-lit lamps on the
quay, and the evening glow shining over the river, inwove their
harmonious rays as the warp and woof of one lustrous tissue.  Before they
had alighted there appeared from the archway Madame Moulin in person,
followed by the servants of the hotel in a manner signifying that they
did not receive a visitor once a fortnight, though at that moment the
clatter of sixty knives, forks, and tongues was audible through an open
window from the adjoining dining-room, to the great interest of a group
of idlers outside.  Ethelberta had not seen her aunt since she last
passed through the town with Lady Petherwin, who then told her that this
landlady was the only respectable relative she seemed to have in the
world.

Aunt Charlotte's face was an English outline filled in with French shades
under the eyes, on the brows, and round the mouth, by the natural effect
of years; she resembled the British hostess as little as well could be,
no point in her causing the slightest suggestion of drops taken for the
stomach's sake.  Telling the two young women she would gladly have met
them at the station had she known the hour of their arrival, she kissed
them both without much apparent notice of a difference in their
conditions; indeed, seeming rather to incline to Cornelia, whose country
face and homely style of clothing may have been more to her mind than
Ethelberta's finished travelling-dress, a class of article to which she
appeared to be well accustomed.  Her husband was at this time at the head
of the table-d'hote, and mentioning the fact as an excuse for his non-
appearance, she accompanied them upstairs.

After the strain of keeping up smiles with Lord Mountclere, the rattle
and shaking, and the general excitements of the chase across the water
and along the rail, a face in which she saw a dim reflex of her mother's
was soothing in the extreme, and Ethelberta went up to the staircase with
a feeling of expansive thankfulness.  Cornelia paused to admire the clean
court and the small caged birds sleeping on their perches, the boxes of
veronica in bloom, of oleander, and of tamarisk, which freshened the air
of the court and lent a romance to the lamplight, the cooks in their
paper caps and white blouses appearing at odd moments from an Avernus
behind; while the prompt 'v'la!' of teetotums in mob caps, spinning down
the staircase in answer to the periodic clang of bells, filled her with
wonder, and pricked her conscience with thoughts of how seldom such
transcendent nimbleness was attempted by herself in a part so nearly
similar.




34. THE HOTEL BEAU SEJOUR AND SPOTS NEAR IT


The next day, much to Ethelberta's surprise, there was a letter for her
in her mother's up-hill hand.  She neglected all the rest of its contents
for the following engrossing sentences:--

   'Menlove has wormed everything out of poor Joey, we find, and your
   father is much upset about it.  She had another quarrel with him, and
   then declared she would expose you and us to Mrs. Doncastle and all
   your friends.  I think that Menlove is the kind of woman who will
   stick to her word, and the question for you to consider is, how can
   you best face out any report of the truth which she will spread, and
   contradict the lies that she will add to it?  It appears to me to be a
   dreadful thing, and so it will probably appear to you.  The worst part
   will be that your sisters and brothers are your servants, and that
   your father is actually engaged in the house where you dine.  I am
   dreadful afraid that this will be considered a fine joke for gossips,
   and will cause no end of laughs in society at your expense.  At any
   rate, should Menlove spread the report, it would absolutely prevent
   people from attending your lectures next season, for they would feel
   like dupes, and be angry with theirselves, and you, and all of us.

   'The only way out of the muddle that I can see for you is to put some
   scheme of marrying into effect as soon as possible, and before these
   things are known.  Surely by this time, with all your opportunities,
   you have been able to strike up an acquaintance with some gentleman or
   other, so as to make a suitable match.  You see, my dear Berta,
   marriage is a thing which, once carried out, fixes you more firm in a
   position than any personal brains can do; for as you stand at present,
   every loose tooth, and every combed-out hair, and every new wrinkle,
   and every sleepless night, is so much took away from your chance for
   the future, depending as it do upon your skill in charming.  I know
   that you have had some good offers, so do listen to me, and warm up
   the best man of them again a bit, and get him to repeat his words
   before your roundness shrinks away, and 'tis too late.

   'Mr. Ladywell has called here to see you; it was just after I had
   heard that this Menlove might do harm, so I thought I could do no
   better than send down word to him that you would much like to see him,
   and were wondering sadly why he had not called lately.  I gave him
   your address at Rouen, that he might find you, if he chose, at once,
   and be got to propose, since he is better than nobody.  I believe he
   said, directly Joey gave him the address, that he was going abroad,
   and my opinion is that he will come to you, because of the
   encouragement I gave him.  If so, you must thank me for my foresight
   and care for you.

   'I heave a sigh of relief sometimes at the thought that I, at any
   rate, found a husband before the present man-famine began.  Don't
   refuse him this time, there's a dear, or, mark my words, you'll have
   cause to rue it--unless you have beforehand got engaged to somebody
   better than he.  You will not if you have not already, for the
   exposure is sure to come soon.'

'O, this false position!--it is ruining your nature, my too thoughtful
mother!  But I will not accept any of them--I'll brazen it out!' said
Ethelberta, throwing the letter wherever it chose to fly, and picking it
up to read again.  She stood and thought it all over.  'I must decide to
do something!' was her sigh again; and, feeling an irresistible need of
motion, she put on her things and went out to see what resolve the
morning would bring.

No rain had fallen during the night, and the air was now quiet in a warm
heavy fog, through which old cider-smells, reminding her of Wessex,
occasionally came from narrow streets in the background.  Ethelberta
passed up the Rue Grand-Pont into the little dusky Rue Saint-Romain,
behind the cathedral, being driven mechanically along by the fever and
fret of her thoughts.  She was about to enter the building by the
transept door, when she saw Lord Mountclere coming towards her.

Ethelberta felt equal to him, or a dozen such, this morning.  The looming
spectres raised by her mother's information, the wearing sense of being
over-weighted in the race, were driving her to a Hamlet-like fantasticism
and defiance of augury; moreover, she was abroad.

'I am about to ascend to the parapets of the cathedral,' said she, in
answer to a half inquiry.

'I should be delighted to accompany you,' he rejoined, in a manner as
capable of explanation by his knowledge of her secret as was Ethelberta's
manner by her sense of nearing the end of her maying.  But whether this
frequent glide into her company was meant as ephemeral flirtation, to
fill the half-hours of his journey, or whether it meant a serious love-
suit--which were the only alternatives that had occurred to her on the
subject--did not trouble her now.  'I am bound to be civil to so great a
lord,' she lightly thought, and expressing no objection to his presence,
she passed with him through the outbuildings, containing Gothic lumber
from the shadowy pile above, and ascended the stone staircase.  Emerging
from its windings, they duly came to the long wooden ladder suspended in
mid-air that led to the parapet of the tower.  This being wide enough for
two abreast, she could hardly do otherwise than wait a moment for the
viscount, who up to this point had never faltered, and who amused her as
they went by scraps of his experience in various countries, which, to do
him justice, he told with vivacity and humour.  Thus they reached the end
of the flight, and entered behind a balustrade.

'The prospect will be very lovely from this point when the fog has blown
off,' said Lord Mountclere faintly, for climbing and chattering at the
same time had fairly taken away his breath.  He leant against the masonry
to rest himself.  'The air is clearing already; I fancy I saw a sunbeam
or two.'

'It will be lovelier above,' said Ethelberta.  'Let us go to the platform
at the base of the fleche, and wait for a view there.'

'With all my heart,' said her attentive companion.

They passed in at a door and up some more stone steps, which landed them
finally in the upper chamber of the tower.  Lord Mountclere sank on a
beam, and asked smilingly if her ambition was not satisfied with this
goal.  'I recollect going to the top some years ago,' he added, 'and it
did not occur to me as being a thing worth doing a second time.  And
there was no fog then, either.'

'O,' said Ethelberta, 'it is one of the most splendid things a person can
do!  The fog is going fast, and everybody with the least artistic feeling
in the direction of bird's-eye views makes the ascent every time of
coming here.'

'Of course, of course,' said Lord Mountclere.  'And I am only too happy
to go to any height with you.'

'Since you so kindly offer, we will go to the very top of the spire--up
through the fog and into the sunshine,' said Ethelberta.

Lord Mountclere covered a grim misgiving by a gay smile, and away they
went up a ladder admitting to the base of the huge iron framework above;
then they entered upon the regular ascent of the cage, towards the hoped-
for celestial blue, and among breezes which never descended so low as the
town.  The journey was enlivened with more breathless witticisms from
Lord Mountclere, till she stepped ahead of him again; when he asked how
many more steps there were.

She inquired of the man in the blue blouse who accompanied them.  'Fifty-
five,' she returned to Lord Mountclere a moment later.

They went round, and round, and yet around.

'How many are there now?' Lord Mountclere demanded this time of the man.

'A hundred and ninety, Monsieur,' he said.

'But there were only fifty-five ever so long ago!'

'Two hundred and five, then,' said the man.  'Perhaps the mist prevented
Mademoiselle hearing me distinctly?'

'Never mind: I would follow were there five thousand more, did
Mademoiselle bid me!' said the exhausted nobleman gallantly, in English.

'Hush!' said Ethelberta, with displeasure.

'He doesn't understand a word,' said Lord Mountclere.

They paced the remainder of their spiral pathway in silence, and having
at last reached the summit, Lord Mountclere sank down on one of the
steps, panting out, 'Dear me, dear me!'

Ethelberta leaned and looked around, and said, 'How extraordinary this
is.  It is sky above, below, everywhere.'

He dragged himself together and stepped to her side.  They formed as it
were a little world to themselves, being completely ensphered by the fog,
which here was dense as a sea of milk.  Below was neither town, country,
nor cathedral--simply whiteness, into which the iron legs of their
gigantic perch faded to nothing.

'We have lost our labour; there is no prospect for you, after all, Lord
Mountclere,' said Ethelberta, turning her eyes upon him.  He looked at
her face as if there were, and she continued, 'Listen; I hear sounds from
the town: people's voices, and carts, and dogs, and the noise of a
railway-train.  Shall we now descend, and own ourselves disappointed?'

'Whenever you choose.'

Before they had put their intention in practice there appeared to be
reasons for waiting awhile.  Out of the plain of fog beneath, a stone
tooth seemed to be upheaving itself: then another showed forth.  These
were the summits of the St. Romain and the Butter Towers--at the western
end of the building.  As the fog stratum collapsed other summits
manifested their presence further off--among them the two spires and
lantern of St. Ouen's; when to the left the dome of St. Madeline's caught
a first ray from the peering sun, under which its scaly surface glittered
like a fish.  Then the mist rolled off in earnest, and revealed far
beneath them a whole city, its red, blue, and grey roofs forming a
variegated pattern, small and subdued as that of a pavement in mosaic.
Eastward in the spacious outlook lay the hill of St. Catherine, breaking
intrusively into the large level valley of the Seine; south was the river
which had been the parent of the mist, and the Ile Lacroix, gorgeous in
scarlet, purple, and green.  On the western horizon could be dimly
discerned melancholy forests, and further to the right stood the hill and
rich groves of Boisguillaume.

Ethelberta having now done looking around, the descent was begun and
continued without intermission till they came to the passage behind the
parapet.

Ethelberta was about to step airily forward, when there reached her ear
the voices of persons below.  She recognized as one of them the slow
unaccented tones of Neigh.

'Please wait a minute!' she said in a peremptory manner of confusion
sufficient to attract Lord Mountclere's attention.

A recollection had sprung to her mind in a moment.  She had half made an
appointment with Neigh at her aunt's hotel for this very week, and here
was he in Rouen to keep it.  To meet him while indulging in this vagary
with Lord Mountclere--which, now that the mood it had been engendered by
was passing off, she somewhat regretted--would be the height of
imprudence.

'I should like to go round to the other side of the parapet for a few
moments,' she said, with decisive quickness.  'Come with me, Lord
Mountclere.'

They went round to the other side.  Here she kept the viscount and their
suisse until she deemed it probable that Neigh had passed by, when she
returned with her companions and descended to the bottom.  They emerged
into the Rue Saint-Romain, whereupon a woman called from the opposite
side of the way to their guide, stating that she had told the other
English gentleman that the English lady had gone into the fleche.

Ethelberta turned and looked up.  She could just discern Neigh's form
upon the steps of the fleche above, ascending toilsomely in search of
her.

'What English gentleman could that have been?' said Lord Mountclere,
after paying the man.  He spoke in a way which showed he had not
overlooked her confusion.  'It seems that he must have been searching for
us, or rather for you?'

'Only Mr. Neigh,' said Ethelberta.  'He told me he was coming here.  I
believe he is waiting for an interview with me.'

'H'm,' said Lord Mountclere.

'Business--only business,' said she.

'Shall I leave you?  Perhaps the business is important--most important.'

'Unfortunately it is.'

'You must forgive me this once: I cannot help--will you give me
permission to make a difficult remark?' said Lord Mountclere, in an
impatient voice.

'With pleasure.'

'Well, then, the business I meant was--an engagement to be married.'

Had it been possible for a woman to be perpetually on the alert she might
now have supposed that Lord Mountclere knew all about her; a mechanical
deference must have restrained such an illusion had he seen her in any
other light than that of a distracting slave.  But she answered quietly,
'So did I.'

'But how does he know--dear me, dear me!  I beg pardon,' said the
viscount.

She looked at him curiously, as if to imply that he was seriously out of
his reckoning in respect of her if he supposed that he would be allowed
to continue this little play at love-making as long as he chose, when she
was offered the position of wife by a man so good as Neigh.

They stood in silence side by side till, much to her ease, Cornelia
appeared at the corner waiting.  At the last moment he said, in somewhat
agitated tones, and with what appeared to be a renewal of the respect
which had been imperceptibly dropped since they crossed the Channel, 'I
was not aware of your engagement to Mr. Neigh.  I fear I have been acting
mistakenly on that account.'

'There is no engagement as yet,' said she.

Lord Mountclere brightened like a child.  'Then may I have a few words in
private--'

'Not now--not to-day,' said Ethelberta, with a certain irritation at she
knew not what.  'Believe me, Lord Mountclere, you are mistaken in many
things.  I mean, you think more of me than you ought.  A time will come
when you will despise me for this day's work, and it is madness in you to
go further.'

Lord Mountclere, knowing what he did know, may have imagined what she
referred to; but Ethelberta was without the least proof that he had the
key to her humour.  'Well, well, I'll be responsible for the madness,' he
said.  'I know you to be--a famous woman, at all events; and that's
enough.  I would say more, but I cannot here.  May I call upon you?'

'Not now.'

'When shall I?'

'If you must, let it be a month hence at my house in town,' she said
indifferently, the Hamlet mood being still upon her.  'Yes, call upon us
then, and I will tell you everything that may remain to be told, if you
should be inclined to listen.  A rumour is afloat which will undeceive
you in much, and depress me to death.  And now I will walk back: pray
excuse me.'  She entered the street, and joined Cornelia.

Lord Mountclere paced irregularly along, turned the corner, and went
towards his inn, nearing which his tread grew lighter, till he scarcely
seemed to touch the ground.  He became gleeful, and said to himself,
nervously palming his hip with his left hand, as if previous to plunging
it into hot water for some prize: 'Upon my life I've a good mind!  Upon
my life I have!. . . .  I must make a straightforward thing of it, and at
once; or he will have her.  But he shall not, and I will--hee-hee!'

The fascinated man, screaming inwardly with the excitement, glee, and
agony of his position, entered the hotel, wrote a hasty note to
Ethelberta and despatched it by hand, looked to his dress and appearance,
ordered a carriage, and in a quarter of an hour was being driven towards
the Hotel Beau Sejour, whither his note had preceded him.




35. THE HOTEL (continued), AND THE QUAY IN FRONT


Ethelberta, having arrived there some time earlier, had gone straight to
her aunt, whom she found sitting behind a large ledger in the office,
making up the accounts with her husband, a well-framed reflective man
with a grey beard.  M. Moulin bustled, waited for her remarks and
replies, and made much of her in a general way, when Ethelberta said,
what she had wanted to say instantly, 'Has a gentleman called Mr. Neigh
been here?'

'O yes--I think it is Neigh--there's a card upstairs,' replied her aunt.
'I told him you were alone at the cathedral, and I believe he walked that
way.  Besides that one, another has come for you--a Mr. Ladywell, and he
is waiting.'

'Not for me?'

'Yes, indeed.  I thought he seemed so anxious, under a sort of assumed
calmness, that I recommended him to remain till you came in.'

'Goodness, aunt; why did you?' Ethelberta said, and thought how much her
mother's sister resembled her mother in doings of that sort.

'I thought he had some good reason for seeing you.  Are these men
intruders, then?'

'O no--a woman who attempts a public career must expect to be treated as
public property: what would be an intrusion on a domiciled gentlewoman is
a tribute to me.  You cannot have celebrity and sex-privilege both.'  Thus
Ethelberta laughed off the awkward conjuncture, inwardly deploring the
unconscionable maternal meddling which had led to this, though not
resentfully, for she had too much staunchness of heart to decry a
parent's misdirected zeal.  Had the clanship feeling been universally as
strong as in the Chickerel family, the fable of the well-bonded fagot
might have remained unwritten.

Ladywell had sent her a letter about getting his picture of herself
engraved for an illustrated paper, and she had not replied, considering
that she had nothing to do with the matter, her form and feature having
been given in the painting as no portrait at all, but as those of an
ideal.  To see him now would be vexatious; and yet it was chilly and
formal to an ungenerous degree to keep aloof from him, sitting lonely in
the same house.  'A few weeks hence,' she thought, 'when Menlove's
disclosures make me ridiculous, he may slight me as a lackey's girl, an
upstart, an adventuress, and hardly return my bow in the street.  Then I
may wish I had given him no personal cause for additional bitterness.'
So, putting off the fine lady, Ethelberta thought she would see Ladywell
at once.

Ladywell was unaffectedly glad to meet her; so glad, that Ethelberta
wished heartily, for his sake, there could be warm friendship between
herself and him, as well as all her lovers, without that insistent
courtship-and-marriage question, which sent them all scattering like
leaves in a pestilent blast, at enmity with one another.  She was less
pleased when she found that Ladywell, after saying all there was to say
about his painting, gently signified that he had been misinformed, as he
believed, concerning her future intentions, which had led to his
absenting himself entirely from her; the remark being of course, a
natural product of her mother's injudicious message to him.

She cut him short with terse candour.  'Yes,' she said, 'a false report
is in circulation.  I am not yet engaged to be married to any one, if
that is your meaning.'

Ladywell looked cheerful at this frank answer, and said tentatively, 'Am
I forgotten?'

'No; you are exactly as you always were in my mind.'

'Then I have been cruelly deceived.  I was guided too much by
appearances, and they were very delusive.  I am beyond measure glad I
came here to-day.  I called at your house and learnt that you were here;
and as I was going out of town, in any indefinite direction, I settled
then to come this way.  What a happy idea it was!  To think of you
now--and I may be permitted to--'

'Assuredly you may not.  How many times I have told you that!'

'But I do not wish for any formal engagement,' said Ladywell quickly,
fearing she might commit herself to some expression of positive denial,
which he could never surmount.  'I'll wait--I'll wait any length of time.
Remember, you have never absolutely forbidden my--friendship.  Will you
delay your answer till some time hence, when you have thoroughly
considered; since I fear it may be a hasty one now?'

'Yes, indeed; it may be hasty.'

'You will delay it?'

'Yes.'

'When shall it be?'

'Say a month hence.  I suggest that, because by that time you will have
found an answer in your own mind: strange things may happen before then.
"She shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them; and
she shall seek them, but shall not find them; then shall she say, I will
go and return to my first"--however, that's no matter.'

'What--did you--?' Ladywell began, altogether bewildered by this.

'It is a passage in Hosea which came to my mind, as possibly applicable
to myself some day,' she answered.  'It was mere impulse.'

'Ha-ha!--a jest--one of your romances broken loose.  There is no law for
impulse: that is why I am here.'

Thus fancifully they conversed till the interview concluded.  Getting her
to promise that she would see him again, Ladywell retired to a sitting-
room on the same landing, in which he had been writing letters before she
came up.  Immediately upon this her aunt, who began to suspect that
something peculiar was in the wind, came to tell her that Mr. Neigh had
been inquiring for her again.

'Send him in,' said Ethelberta.

Neigh's footsteps approached, and the well-known figure entered.
Ethelberta received him smilingly, for she was getting so used to awkward
juxtapositions that she treated them quite as a natural situation.  She
merely hoped that Ladywell would not hear them talking through the
partition.

Neigh scarcely said anything as a beginning: she knew his errand
perfectly; and unaccountable as it was to her, the strange and
unceremonious relationship between them, that had originated in the
peculiar conditions of their first close meeting, was continued now as
usual.

'Have you been able to bestow a thought on the question between us?  I
hope so,' said Neigh.

'It is no use,' said Ethelberta.  'Wait a month, and you will not require
an answer.  You will not mind speaking low, because of a person in the
next room?'

'Not at all.--Why will that be?'

'I might say; but let us speak of something else.'

'I don't see how we can,' said Neigh brusquely.  'I had no other reason
on earth for calling here.  I wished to get the matter settled, and I
could not be satisfied without seeing you.  I hate writing on matters of
this sort.  In fact I can't do it, and that's why I am here.'

He was still speaking when an attendant entered with a note.

'Will you excuse me one moment?' said Ethelberta, stepping to the window
and opening the missive.  It contained these words only, in a scrawl so
full of deformities that she could hardly piece its meaning together:--

   'I must see you again to-day unless you absolutely deny yourself to
   me, which I shall take as a refusal to meet me any more.  I will
   arrive, punctually, five minutes after you receive this note.  Do pray
   be alone if you can, and eternally gratify,--Yours,

   'MOUNTCLERE.'

'If anything has happened I shall be pleased to wait,' said Neigh, seeing
her concern when she had closed the note.

'O no, it is nothing,' said Ethelberta precipitately.  'Yet I think I
will ask you to wait,' she added, not liking to dismiss Neigh in a hurry;
for she was not insensible to his perseverance in seeking her over all
these miles of sea and land; and secondly, she feared that if he were to
leave on the instant he might run into the arms of Lord Mountclere and
Ladywell.

'I shall be only too happy to stay till you are at leisure,' said Neigh,
in the unimpassioned delivery he used whether his meaning were a trite
compliment or the expression of his most earnest feeling.

'I may be rather a long time,' said Ethelberta dubiously.

'My time is yours.'

Ethelberta left the room and hurried to her aunt, exclaiming, 'O, Aunt
Charlotte, I hope you have rooms enough to spare for my visitors, for
they are like the fox, the goose, and the corn, in the riddle; I cannot
leave them together, and I can only be with one at a time.  I want the
nicest drawing-room you have for an interview of a bare two minutes with
an old gentleman.  I am so sorry this has happened, but it is not
altogether my fault!  I only arranged to see one of them; but the other
was sent to me by mother, in a mistake, and the third met with me on my
journey: that's the explanation.  There's the oldest of them just come.'

She looked through the glass partition, and under the arch of the court-
gate, as the wheels of the viscount's carriage were heard outside.
Ethelberta ascended to a room on the first floor, Lord Mountclere was
shown up, and the door closed upon them.

At this time Neigh was very comfortably lounging in an arm-chair in
Ethelberta's room on the second floor.  This was a pleasant enough way of
passing the minutes with such a tender interview in prospect; and as he
leant he looked with languid and luxurious interest through the open
casement at the spars and rigging of some luggers on the Seine, the
pillars of the suspension bridge, and the scenery of the Faubourg St.
Sever on the other side of the river.  How languid his interest might
ultimately have become there is no knowing; but there soon arose upon his
ear the accents of Ethelberta in low distinctness from somewhere outside
the room.

'Yes; the scene is pleasant to-day,' she said.  'I like a view over a
river.'

'I should think the steamboats are objectionable when they stop here,'
said another person.

Neigh's face closed in to an aspect of perplexity.  'Surely that cannot
be Lord Mountclere?' he muttered.

Had he been certain that Ethelberta was only talking to a stranger, Neigh
would probably have felt their conversation to be no business of his,
much as he might have been surprised to find her giving audience to
another man at such a place.  But his impression that the voice was that
of his acquaintance, Lord Mountclere, coupled with doubts as to its
possibility, was enough to lead him to rise from the chair and put his
head out of the window.

Upon a balcony beneath him were the speakers, as he had
suspected--Ethelberta and the viscount.

Looking right and left, he saw projecting from the next window the head
of his friend Ladywell, gazing right and left likewise, apparently just
drawn out by the same voice which had attracted himself.

'What--you, Neigh!--how strange,' came from Ladywell's lips before he had
time to recollect that great coolness existed between himself and Neigh
on Ethelberta's account, which had led to the reduction of their intimacy
to the most attenuated of nods and good-mornings ever since the Harlequin-
rose incident at Cripplegate.

'Yes; it is rather strange,' said Neigh, with saturnine evenness.  'Still
a fellow must be somewhere.'

Each then looked over his window-sill downwards, upon the speakers who
had attracted them thither.

Lord Mountclere uttered something in a low tone which did not reach the
young men; to which Ethelberta replied, 'As I have said, Lord Mountclere,
I cannot give you an answer now.  I must consider what to do with Mr.
Neigh and Mr. Ladywell.  It is too sudden for me to decide at once.  I
could not do so until I have got home to England, when I will write you a
letter, stating frankly my affairs and those of my relatives.  I shall
not consider that you have addressed me on the subject of marriage until,
having received my letter, you--'

'Repeat my proposal,' said Lord Mountclere.

'Yes.'

'My dear Mrs. Petherwin, it is as good as repeated!  But I have no right
to assume anything you don't wish me to assume, and I will wait.  How
long is it that I am to suffer in this uncertainty?'

'A month.  By that time I shall have grown weary of my other two
suitors.'

'A month!  Really inflexible?'

Ethelberta had returned inside the window, and her answer was inaudible.
Ladywell and Neigh looked up, and their eyes met.  Both had been
reluctant to remain where they stood, but they were too fascinated to
instantly retire.  Neigh moved now, and Ladywell did the same.  Each saw
that the face of his companion was flushed.

'Come in and see me,' said Ladywell quickly, before quite withdrawing his
head.  'I am staying in this room.'

'I will,' said Neigh; and taking his hat he left Ethelberta's apartment
forthwith.

On entering the quarters of his friend he found him seated at a table
whereon writing materials were strewn.  They shook hands in silence, but
the meaning in their looks was enough.

'Just let me write a note, Ladywell, and I'm your man,' said Neigh then,
with the freedom of an old acquaintance.

'I was going to do the same thing,' said Ladywell.

Neigh then sat down, and for a minute or two nothing was to be heard but
the scratching of a pair of pens, ending on the one side with a more
boisterous scratch, as the writer shaped 'Eustace Ladywell,' and on the
other with slow firmness in the characters 'Alfred Neigh.'

'There's for you, my fair one,' said Neigh, closing and directing his
letter.

'Yours is for Mrs. Petherwin?  So is mine,' said Ladywell, grasping the
bell-pull.  'Shall I direct it to be put on her table with this one?'

'Thanks.'  And the two letters went off to Ethelberta's sitting-room,
which she had vacated to receive Lord Mountclere in an empty one beneath.
Neigh's letter was simply a pleading of a sudden call away which
prevented his waiting till she should return; Ladywell's, though stating
the same reason for leaving, was more of an upbraiding nature, and might
almost have told its reader, were she to take the trouble to guess, that
he knew of the business of Lord Mountclere with her to-day.

'Now, let us get out of this place,' said Neigh.  He proceeded at once
down the stairs, followed by Ladywell, who--settling his account at the
bureau without calling for a bill, and directing his portmanteau to be
sent to the Right-bank railway station--went with Neigh into the street.

They had not walked fifty yards up the quay when two British workmen, in
holiday costume, who had just turned the corner of the Rue Jeanne d'Arc,
approached them.  Seeing him to be an Englishman, one of the two
addressed Neigh, saying, 'Can you tell us the way, sir, to the Hotel Bold
Soldier?'

Neigh pointed out the place he had just come from to the tall young men,
and continued his walk with Ladywell.

Ladywell was the first to break silence.  'I have been considerably
misled, Neigh,' he said; 'and I imagine from what has just happened that
you have been misled too.'

'Just a little,' said Neigh, bringing abstracted lines of meditation into
his face.  'But it was my own fault: for I ought to have known that these
stage and platform women have what they are pleased to call Bohemianism
so thoroughly engrained with their natures that they are no more constant
to usage in their sentiments than they are in their way of living.  Good
Lord, to think she has caught old Mountclere!  She is sure to have him if
she does not dally with him so long that he gets cool again.'

'A beautiful creature like her to think of marrying such an infatuated
idiot as he!'

'He can give her a title as well as younger men.  It will not be the
first time that such matches have been made.'

'I can't believe it,' said Ladywell vehemently.  'She has too much poetry
in her--too much good sense; her nature is the essence of all that's
romantic.  I can't help saying it, though she has treated me cruelly.'

'She has good looks, certainly.  I'll own to that.  As for her romance
and good-feeling, that I leave to you.  I think she has treated you no
more cruelly, as you call it, than she has me, come to that.'

'She told me she would give me an answer in a month,' said Ladywell
emotionally.

'So she told me,' said Neigh.

'And so she told him,' said Ladywell.

'And I have no doubt she will keep her word to him in her usual precise
manner.'

'But see what she implied to me!  I distinctly understood from her that
the answer would be favourable.'

'So did I.'

'So does he.'

'And he is sure to be the one who gets it, since only one of us can.
Well, I wouldn't marry her for love, money, nor--'

'Offspring.'

'Exactly: I would not.  "I'll give you an answer in a month"--to all
three of us!  For God's sake let's sit down here and have something to
drink.'

They drew up a couple of chairs to one of the tables of a wine-shop close
by, and shouted to the waiter with the vigour of persons going to the
dogs.  Here, behind the horizontal-headed trees that dotted this part of
the quay, they sat over their bottles denouncing womankind till the sun
got low down upon the river, and the houses on the further side began to
be toned by a blue mist.  At last they rose from their seats and
departed, Neigh to dine and consider his route, and Ladywell to take the
train for Dieppe.

While these incidents had been in progress the two workmen had found
their way into the hotel where Ethelberta was staying.  Passing through
the entrance, they stood at gaze in the court, much perplexed as to the
door to be made for; the difficulty was solved by the appearance of
Cornelia, who in expectation of them had been for the last half-hour
leaning over the sill of her bed-room window, which looked into the
interior, amusing herself by watching the movements to and fro in the
court beneath.

After conversing awhile in undertones as if they had no real right there
at all, Cornelia told them she would call their sister, if an old
gentleman who had been to see her were gone again.  Cornelia then ran
away, and Sol and Dan stood aloof, till they had seen the old gentleman
alluded to go to the door and drive off, shortly after which Ethelberta
ran down to meet them.

'Whatever have you got as your luggage?' she said, after hearing a few
words about their journey, and looking at a curious object like a huge
extended accordion with bellows of gorgeous-patterned carpeting.

'Well, I thought to myself,' said Sol, ''tis a terrible bother about
carrying our things.  So what did I do but turn to and make a carpet-bag
that would hold all mine and Dan's too.  This, you see, Berta, is a deal
top and bottom out of three-quarter stuff, stained and varnished.  Well,
then you see I've got carpet sides tacked on with these brass nails,
which make it look very handsome; and so when my bag is empty 'twill shut
up and be only a couple of boards under yer arm, and when 'tis open it
will hold a'most anything you like to put in it.  That portmantle didn't
cost more than three half-crowns altogether, and ten pound wouldn't ha'
got anything so strong from a portmantle maker, would it, Dan?'

'Well, no.'

'And then you see, Berta,' Sol continued in the same earnest tone, and
further exhibiting the article, 'I've made this trap-door in the top with
hinges and padlock complete, so that--'

'I am afraid it is tiring you after your journey to explain all this to
me,' said Ethelberta gently, noticing that a few Gallic smilers were
gathering round.  'Aunt has found a nice room for you at the top of the
staircase in that corner--"Escalier D" you'll see painted at the
bottom--and when you have been up come across to me at number thirty-four
on this side, and we'll talk about everything.'

'Look here, Sol,' said Dan, who had left his brother and gone on to the
stairs.  'What a rum staircase--the treads all in little blocks, and
painted chocolate, as I am alive!'

'I am afraid I shall not be able to go on to Paris with you, after all,'
Ethelberta continued to Sol.  'Something has just happened which makes it
desirable for me to return at once to England.  But I will write a list
of all you are to see, and where you are to go, so that it will make
little difference, I hope.'

Ten minutes before this time Ethelberta had been frankly and earnestly
asked by Lord Mountclere to become his bride; not only so, but he pressed
her to consent to have the ceremony performed before they returned to
England.  Ethelberta had unquestionably been much surprised; and, barring
the fact that the viscount was somewhat ancient in comparison with
herself, the temptation to close with his offer was strong, and would
have been felt as such by any woman in the position of Ethelberta, now a
little reckless by stress of circumstances, and tinged with a bitterness
of spirit against herself and the world generally.  But she was
experienced enough to know what heaviness might result from a hasty
marriage, entered into with a mind full of concealments and suppressions
which, if told, were likely to stop the marriage altogether; and after
trying to bring herself to speak of her family and situation to Lord
Mountclere as he stood, a certain caution triumphed, and she concluded
that it would be better to postpone her reply till she could consider
which of two courses it would be advisable to adopt; to write and explain
to him, or to explain nothing and refuse him.  The third course, to
explain nothing and hasten the wedding, she rejected without hesitation.
With a pervading sense of her own obligations in forming this compact it
did not occur to her to ask if Lord Mountclere might not have duties of
explanation equally with herself, though bearing rather on the moral than
the social aspects of the case.

Her resolution not to go on to Paris was formed simply because Lord
Mountclere himself was proceeding in that direction, which might lead to
other unseemly rencounters with him had she, too, persevered in her
journey.  She accordingly gave Sol and Dan directions for their guidance
to Paris and back, starting herself with Cornelia the next day to return
again to Knollsea, and to decide finally and for ever what to do in the
vexed question at present agitating her.

Never before in her life had she treated marriage in such a terribly cool
and cynical spirit as she had done that day; she was almost frightened at
herself in thinking of it.  How far any known system of ethics might
excuse her on the score of those curious pressures which had been brought
to bear upon her life, or whether it could excuse her at all, she had no
spirit to inquire.  English society appeared a gloomy concretion enough
to abide in as she contemplated it on this journey home; yet, since its
gloominess was less an essential quality than an accident of her point of
view, that point of view she had determined to change.

There lay open to her two directions in which to move.  She might annex
herself to the easy-going high by wedding an old nobleman, or she might
join for good and all the easy-going low, by plunging back to the level
of her family, giving up all her ambitions for them, settling as the wife
of a provincial music-master named Julian, with a little shop of fiddles
and flutes, a couple of old pianos, a few sheets of stale music pinned to
a string, and a narrow back parlour, wherein she would wait for the
phenomenon of a customer.  And each of these divergent grooves had its
fascinations, till she reflected with regard to the first that, even
though she were a legal and indisputable Lady Mountclere, she might be
despised by my lord's circle, and left lone and lorn.  The intermediate
path of accepting Neigh or Ladywell had no more attractions for her taste
than the fact of disappointing them had qualms for her conscience; and
how few these were may be inferred from her opinion, true or false, that
two words about the spigot on her escutcheon would sweep her lovers'
affections to the antipodes.  She had now and then imagined that her
previous intermarriage with the Petherwin family might efface much
besides her surname, but experience proved that the having been wife for
a few weeks to a minor who died in his father's lifetime, did not weave
such a tissue of glory about her course as would resist a speedy undoing
by startling confessions on her station before her marriage, and her
environments now.




36. THE HOUSE IN TOWN


Returning by way of Knollsea, where she remained a week or two,
Ethelberta appeared one evening at the end of September before her house
in Exonbury Crescent, accompanied by a pair of cabs with the children and
luggage; but Picotee was left at Knollsea, for reasons which Ethelberta
explained when the family assembled in conclave.  Her father was there,
and began telling her of a surprising change in Menlove--an unasked-for
concession to their cause, and a vow of secrecy which he could not
account for, unless any friend of Ethelberta's had bribed her.

'O no--that cannot be,' said she.  Any influence of Lord Mountclere to
that effect was the last thing that could enter her thoughts.  'However,
what Menlove does makes little difference to me now.'  And she proceeded
to state that she had almost come to a decision which would entirely
alter their way of living.

'I hope it will not be of the sort your last decision was,' said her
mother.

'No; quite the reverse.  I shall not live here in state any longer.  We
will let the house throughout as lodgings, while it is ours; and you and
the girls must manage it.  I will retire from the scene altogether, and
stay for the winter at Knollsea with Picotee.  I want to consider my
plans for next year, and I would rather be away from town.  Picotee is
left there, and I return in two days with the books and papers I
require.'

'What are your plans to be?'

'I am going to be a schoolmistress--I think I am.'

'A schoolmistress?'

'Yes.  And Picotee returns to the same occupation, which she ought never
to have forsaken.  We are going to study arithmetic and geography until
Christmas; then I shall send her adrift to finish her term as
pupil-teacher, while I go into a training-school.  By the time I have to
give up this house I shall just have got a little country school.'

'But,' said her mother, aghast, 'why not write more poems and sell 'em?'

'Why not be a governess as you were?' said her father.

'Why not go on with your tales at Mayfair Hall?' said Gwendoline.

'I'll answer as well as I can.  I have decided to give up romancing
because I cannot think of any more that pleases me.  I have been trying
at Knollsea for a fortnight, and it is no use.  I will never be a
governess again: I would rather be a servant.  If I am a schoolmistress I
shall be entirely free from all contact with the great, which is what I
desire, for I hate them, and am getting almost as revolutionary as Sol.
Father, I cannot endure this kind of existence any longer; I sleep at
night as if I had committed a murder: I start up and see processions of
people, audiences, battalions of lovers obtained under false
pretences--all denouncing me with the finger of ridicule.  Mother's
suggestion about my marrying I followed out as far as dogged resolution
would carry me, but during my journey here I have broken down; for I
don't want to marry a second time among people who would regard me as an
upstart or intruder.  I am sick of ambition.  My only longing now is to
fly from society altogether, and go to any hovel on earth where I could
be at peace.'

'What--has anybody been insulting you?' said Mrs. Chickerel.

'Yes; or rather I sometimes think he may have: that is, if a proposal of
marriage is only removed from being a proposal of a very different kind
by an accident.'

'A proposal of marriage can never be an insult,' her mother returned.

'I think otherwise,' said Ethelberta.

'So do I,' said her father.

'Unless the man was beneath you, and I don't suppose he was that,' added
Mrs. Chickerel.

'You are quite right; he was not that.  But we will not talk of this
branch of the subject.  By far the most serious concern with me is that I
ought to do some good by marriage, or by heroic performance of some kind;
while going back to give the rudiments of education to remote hamleteers
will do none of you any good whatever.'

'Never you mind us,' said her father; 'mind yourself.'

'I shall hardly be minding myself either, in your opinion, by doing
that,' said Ethelberta dryly.  'But it will be more tolerable than what I
am doing now.  Georgina, and Myrtle, and Emmeline, and Joey will not get
the education I intended for them; but that must go, I suppose.'

'How full of vagaries you are,' said her mother.  'Why won't it do to
continue as you are?  No sooner have I learnt up your schemes, and got
enough used to 'em to see something in 'em, than you must needs bewilder
me again by starting some fresh one, so that my mind gets no rest at
all.'

Ethelberta too keenly felt the justice of this remark, querulous as it
was, to care to defend herself.  It was hopeless to attempt to explain to
her mother that the oscillations of her mind might arise as naturally
from the perfection of its balance, like those of a logan-stone, as from
inherent lightness; and such an explanation, however comforting to its
subject, was little better than none to simple hearts who only could look
to tangible outcrops.

'Really, Ethelberta,' remonstrated her mother, 'this is very odd.  Making
yourself miserable in trying to get a position on our account is one
thing, and not necessary; but I think it ridiculous to rush into the
other extreme, and go wilfully down in the scale.  You may just as well
exercise your wits in trying to swim as in trying to sink.'

'Yes; that's what I think,' said her father.  'But of course Berta knows
best.'

'I think so too,' said Gwendoline.

'And so do I,' said Cornelia.  'If I had once moved about in large
circles like Ethelberta, I wouldn't go down and be a schoolmistress--not
I.'

'I own it is foolish--suppose it is,' said Ethelberta wearily, and with a
readiness of misgiving that showed how recent and hasty was the scheme.
'Perhaps you are right, mother; anything rather than retreat.  I wonder
if you are right!  Well, I will think again of it to-night.  Do not let
us speak more about it now.'

She did think of it that night, very long and painfully.  The arguments
of her relatives seemed ponderous as opposed to her own inconsequent
longing for escape from galling trammels.  If she had stood alone, the
sentiment that she had begun to build but was not able to finish, by
whomsoever it might have been entertained, would have had few terrors;
but that the opinion should be held by her nearest of kin, to cause them
pain for life, was a grievous thing.  The more she thought of it, the
less easy seemed the justification of her desire for obscurity.  From
regarding it as a high instinct she passed into a humour that gave that
desire the appearance of a whim.  But could she really set in train
events, which, if not abortive, would take her to the altar with Viscount
Mountclere?

In one determination she never faltered; to commit her sin thoroughly if
she committed it at all.  Her relatives believed her choice to lie
between Neigh and Ladywell alone.  But once having decided to pass over
Christopher, whom she had loved, there could be no pausing for Ladywell
because she liked him, or for Neigh in that she was influenced by him.
They were both too near her level to be trusted to bear the shock of
receiving her from her father's hands.  But it was possible that though
her genesis might tinge with vulgarity a commoner's household,
susceptible of such depreciation, it might show as a picturesque contrast
in the family circle of a peer.  Hence it was just as well to go to the
end of her logic, where reasons for tergiversation would be most
pronounced.  This thought of the viscount, however, was a secret for her
own breast alone.

Nearly the whole of that night she sat weighing--first, the question
itself of marrying Lord Mountclere; and, at other times, whether, for
safety, she might marry him without previously revealing family
particulars hitherto held necessary to be revealed--a piece of conduct
she had once felt to be indefensible.  The ingenious Ethelberta, much
more prone than the majority of women to theorize on conduct, felt the
need of some soothing defence of the actions involved in any ambiguous
course before finally committing herself to it.

She took down a well-known treatise on Utilitarianism which she had
perused once before, and to which she had given her adherence ere any
instance had arisen wherein she might wish to take it as a guide.  Here
she desultorily searched for argument, and found it; but the application
of her author's philosophy to the marriage question was an operation of
her own, as unjustifiable as it was likely in the circumstances.

   'The ultimate end,' she read, 'with reference to and for the sake of
   which all other things are desirable (whether we are considering our
   own good or that of other people) is an existence exempt as far as
   possible from pain, and as rich as possible in enjoyments, both in
   point of quantity and quality. . . .  This being, according to the
   utilitarian opinion, the end of human action, is necessarily also the
   standard of morality.'

It was an open question, so far, whether her own happiness should or
should not be preferred to that of others.  But that her personal
interests were not to be considered as paramount appeared further on:--

   'The happiness which forms the standard of what is right in conduct is
   not the agent's own happiness but that of all concerned.  As between
   his own happiness and that of others, utilitarianism requires him to
   be as strictly impartial as a disinterested and benevolent spectator.'

As to whose happiness was meant by that of 'other people,' 'all
concerned,' and so on, her luminous moralist soon enlightened her:--

   'The occasions on which any person (except one in a thousand) has it
   in his power to do this on an extended scale--in other words, to be a
   public benefactor--are but exceptional; and on these occasions alone
   is he called on to consider public utility; in every other case
   private utility, the interest or happiness of some few persons, is all
   he has to attend to.'

And that these few persons should be those endeared to her by every
domestic tie no argument was needed to prove.  That their happiness would
be in proportion to her own well-doing, and power to remove their risks
of indigence, required no proving either to her now.

By a sorry but unconscious misapplication of sound and wide reasoning did
the active mind of Ethelberta thus find itself a solace.  At about the
midnight hour she felt more fortified on the expediency of marriage with
Lord Mountclere than she had done at all since musing on it.  In respect
of the second query, whether or not, in that event, to conceal from Lord
Mountclere the circumstances of her position till it should be too late
for him to object to them, she found her conscience inconveniently in the
way of her theory, and the oracle before her afforded no hint.  'Ah--it
is a point for a casuist!' she said.

An old treatise on Casuistry lay on the top shelf.  She opened it--more
from curiosity than from guidance this time, it must be observed--at a
chapter bearing on her own problem, 'The disciplina arcani, or, the
doctrine of reserve.'

Here she read that there were plenty of apparent instances of this in
Scripture, and that it was formed into a recognized system in the early
Church.  With reference to direct acts of deception, it was argued that
since there were confessedly cases where killing is no murder, might
there not be cases where lying is no sin?  It could not be right--or,
indeed, anything but most absurd--to say in effect that no doubt
circumstances would occur where every sound man would tell a lie, and
would be a brute or a fool if he did not, and to say at the same time
that it is quite indefensible in principle.  Duty was the key to conduct
then, and if in such cases duties appeared to clash they would be found
not to do so on examination.  The lesser duty would yield to the greater,
and therefore ceased to be a duty.

This author she found to be not so tolerable; he distracted her.  She put
him aside and gave over reading, having decided on this second point,
that she would, at any hazard, represent the truth to Lord Mountclere
before listening to another word from him.  'Well, at last I have done,'
she said, 'and am ready for my role.'

In looking back upon her past as she retired to rest, Ethelberta could
almost doubt herself to be the identical woman with her who had entered
on a romantic career a few short years ago.  For that doubt she had good
reason.  She had begun as a poet of the Satanic school in a sweetened
form; she was ending as a pseudo-utilitarian.  Was there ever such a
transmutation effected before by the action of a hard environment?  It
was not without a qualm of regret that she discerned how the last
infirmity of a noble mind had at length nearly departed from her.  She
wondered if her early notes had had the genuine ring in them, or whether
a poet who could be thrust by realities to a distance beyond recognition
as such was a true poet at all.  Yet Ethelberta's gradient had been
regular: emotional poetry, light verse, romance as an object, romance as
a means, thoughts of marriage as an aid to her pursuits, a vow to marry
for the good of her family; in other words, from soft and playful
Romanticism to distorted Benthamism.  Was the moral incline upward or
down?




37. KNOLLSEA--AN ORNAMENTAL VILLA


Her energies collected and fermented anew by the results of the vigil,
Ethelberta left town for Knollsea, where she joined Picotee the same
evening.  Picotee produced a letter, which had been addressed to her
sister at their London residence, but was not received by her there, Mrs.
Chickerel having forwarded it to Knollsea the day before Ethelberta
arrived in town.

The crinkled writing, in character like the coast-line of Tierra del
Fuego, was becoming familiar by this time.  While reading the note she
informed Picotee, between a quick breath and a rustle of frills, that it
was from Lord Mountclere, who wrote on the subject of calling to see her,
suggesting a day in the following week.  'Now, Picotee,' she continued,
'we shall have to receive him, and make the most of him, for I have
altered my plans since I was last in Knollsea.'

'Altered them again?  What are you going to be now--not a poor person
after all?'

'Indeed not.  And so I turn and turn.  Can you imagine what Lord
Mountclere is coming for?  But don't say what you think.  Before I reply
to this letter we must go into new lodgings, to give them as our address.
The first business to-morrow morning will be to look for the gayest house
we can find; and Captain Flower and this little cabin of his must be
things we have never known.'

The next day after breakfast they accordingly sallied forth.

Knollsea had recently begun to attract notice in the world.  It had this
year undergone visitation from a score of professional gentlemen and
their wives, a minor canon, three marine painters, seven young ladies
with books in their hands, and nine-and-thirty babies.  Hence a few
lodging-houses, of a dash and pretentiousness far beyond the mark of the
old cottages which formed the original substance of the village, had been
erected to meet the wants of such as these.  To a building of this class
Ethelberta now bent her steps, and the crush of the season having
departed in the persons of three-quarters of the above-named visitors,
who went away by a coach, a van, and a couple of wagonettes one morning,
she found no difficulty in arranging for a red and yellow streaked villa,
which was so bright and glowing that the sun seemed to be shining upon it
even on a cloudy day, and the ruddiest native looked pale when standing
by its walls.  It was not without regret that she renounced the sailor's
pretty cottage for this porticoed and balconied dwelling; but her lines
were laid down clearly at last, and thither she removed forthwith.

From this brand-new house did Ethelberta pen the letter fixing the time
at which she would be pleased to see Lord Mountclere.

When the hour drew nigh enormous force of will was required to keep her
perturbation down.  She had not distinctly told Picotee of the object of
the viscount's visit, but Picotee guessed nearly enough.  Ethelberta was
upon the whole better pleased that the initiative had again come from him
than if the first step in the new campaign had been her sending the
explanatory letter, as intended and promised.  She had thought almost
directly after the interview at Rouen that to enlighten him by writing a
confession in cold blood, according to her first intention, would be
little less awkward for her in the method of telling than in the facts to
be told.

So the last hair was arranged and the last fold adjusted, and she sat
down to await a new page of her history.  Picotee sat with her, under
orders to go into the next room when Lord Mountclere should call; and
Ethelberta determined to waste no time, directly he began to make
advances, in clearing up the phenomena of her existence to him; to the
end that no fact which, in the event of his taking her to wife, could be
used against her as an example of concealment, might remain unrelated.
The collapse of his attachment under the test might, however, form the
grand climax of such a play as this.

The day was rather cold for the season, and Ethelberta sat by a fire; but
the windows were open, and Picotee was amusing herself on the balcony
outside.  The hour struck: Ethelberta fancied she could hear the wheels
of a carriage creeping up the steep ascent which led to the drive before
the door.

'Is it he?' she said quickly.

'No,' said Picotee, whose indifference contrasted strangely with the
restlessness of her who was usually the coolest.  'It is a man shaking
down apples in the garden over the wall.'

They lingered on till some three or four minutes had gone by.  'Surely
that's a carriage?' said Ethelberta, then.

'I think it is,' said Picotee outside, stretching her neck forward as far
as she could.  'No, it is the men on the beach dragging up their boats;
they expect wind to-night.'

'How wearisome!  Picotee, you may as well come inside; if he means to
call he will; but he ought to be here by this time.'

It was only once more, and that some time later that she again said
'Listen!'

'That's not the noise of a carriage; it is the fizz of a rocket.  The
coastguardsmen are practising the life-apparatus to-day, to be ready for
the autumn wrecks.'

'Ah!' said Ethelberta, her face clearing up.  Hers had not been a
sweetheart's impatience, but her mood had intensified during these
minutes of suspense to a harassing mistrust of her man-compelling power,
which was, if that were possible, more gloomy than disappointed love.  'I
know now where he is.  That operation with the cradle-apparatus is very
interesting, and he is stopping to see it. . . .  But I shall not wait
indoors much longer, whatever he may be stopping to see.  It is very
unaccountable, and vexing, after moving into this new house too.  We were
much more comfortable in the old one.  In keeping any previous
appointment in which I have been concerned he has been ridiculously
early.'

'Shall I run round?' said Picotee, 'and if he is not watching them we
will go out.'

'Very well,' said her sister.

The time of Picotee's absence seemed an age.  Ethelberta heard the roar
of another rocket, and still Picotee did not return.  'What can the girl
be thinking of?' she mused. . . .  'What a half-and-half policy mine has
been!  Thinking of marrying for position, and yet not making it my rigid
plan to secure the man the first moment that he made his offer.  So I
lose the comfort of having a soul above worldliness, and my compensation
for not having it likewise!'  A minute or two more and in came Picotee.

'What has kept you so long--and how excited you look,' said Ethelberta.

'I thought I would stay a little while, as I had never seen a
rocket-apparatus,' said Picotee, faintly and strangely.

'But is he there?' asked her sister impatiently.

'Yes--he was.  He's gone now!'

'Lord Mountclere?'

'No.  There is no old man there at all.  Mr Julian was there.'

A little 'Ah!' came from Ethelberta, like a note from a storm-bird at
night.  She turned round and went into the back room.  'Is Mr. Julian
going to call here?' she inquired, coming forward again.

'No--he's gone by the steamboat.  He was only passing through on his way
to Sandbourne, where he is gone to settle a small business relating to
his father's affairs.  He was not in Knollsea ten minutes, owing to
something which detained him on the way.'

'Did he inquire for me?'

'No.  And only think, Ethelberta--such a remarkable thing has happened,
though I nearly forgot to tell you.  He says that coming along the road
he was overtaken by a carriage, and when it had just passed him one of
the horses shied, pushed the other down a slope, and overturned the
carriage.  One wheel came off and trundled to the bottom of the hill by
itself.  Christopher of course ran up, and helped out of the carriage an
old gentleman--now do you know what's likely?'

'It was Lord Mountclere.  I am glad that's the cause,' said Ethelberta
involuntarily.

'I imagined you would suppose it to be Lord Mountclere.  But Mr. Julian
did not know the gentleman, and said nothing about who he might be.'

'Did he describe him?'

'Not much--just a little.'

'Well?'

'He said he was a sly old dog apparently, to hear how he swore in
whispers.  This affair is what made Mr. Julian so late that he had no
time to call here.  Lord Mountclere's ankle--if it was Lord
Mountclere--was badly sprained.  But the servants were not injured beyond
a scratch on the coachman's face.  Then they got another carriage and
drove at once back again.  It must be he, or else why is he not come?  It
is a pity, too, that Mr. Julian was hindered by this, so that there was
no opportunity for him to bide a bit in Knollsea.'

Ethelberta was not disposed to believe that Christopher would have
called, had time favoured him to the utmost.  Between himself and her
there was that kind of division which is more insurmountable than enmity;
for estrangements produced by good judgment will last when those of
feeling break down in smiles.  Not the lovers who part in passion, but
the lovers who part in friendship, are those who most frequently part for
ever.

'Did you tell Mr. Julian that the injured gentleman was possibly Lord
Mountclere, and that he was coming here?' said Ethelberta.

'I made no remark at all--I did not think of him till afterwards.'

The inquiry was hardly necessary, for Picotee's words would dry away like
a brook in the sands when she held conversation with Christopher.

As they had anticipated, the sufferer was no other than their intending
visitor.  Next morning there was a note explaining the accident, and
expressing its writer's suffering from the cruel delay as greater than
that from the swollen ankle, which was progressing favourably.

Nothing further was heard of Lord Mountclere for more than a week, when
she received another letter, which put an end to her season of
relaxation, and once more braced her to the contest.  This epistle was
very courteously written, and in point of correctness, propriety, and
gravity, might have come from the quill of a bishop.  Herein the old
nobleman gave a further description of the accident, but the main
business of the communication was to ask her if, since he was not as yet
very active, she would come to Enckworth Court and delight himself and a
small group of friends who were visiting there.

She pondered over the letter as she walked by the shore that day, and
after some hesitation decided to go.




38. ENCKWORTH COURT


It was on a dull, stagnant, noiseless afternoon of autumn that Ethelberta
first crossed the threshold of Enckworth Court.  The daylight was so
lowered by the impervious roof of cloud overhead that it scarcely reached
further into Lord Mountclere's entrance-hall than to the splays of the
windows, even but an hour or two after midday; and indoors the glitter of
the fire reflected itself from the very panes, so inconsiderable were the
opposing rays.

Enckworth Court, in its main part, had not been standing more than a
hundred years.  At that date the weakened portions of the original
mediaeval structure were pulled down and cleared away, old jambs being
carried off for rick-staddles, and the foliated timbers of the hall roof
making themselves useful as fancy chairs in the summer-houses of rising
inns.  A new block of masonry was built up from the ground of such height
and lordliness that the remnant of the old pile left standing became as a
mere cup-bearer and culinary menial beside it.  The rooms in this old
fragment, which had in times past been considered sufficiently dignified
for dining-hall, withdrawing-room, and so on, were now reckoned barely
high enough for sculleries, servants' hall, and laundries, the whole of
which were arranged therein.

The modern portion had been planned with such a total disregard of
association, that the very rudeness of the contrast gave an interest to
the mass which it might have wanted had perfect harmony been attempted
between the old nucleus and its adjuncts, a probable result if the
enlargement had taken place later on in time.  The issue was that the
hooded windows, simple string-courses, and random masonry of the Gothic
workman, stood elbow to elbow with the equal-spaced ashlar, architraves,
and fasciae of the Classic addition, each telling its distinct tale as to
stage of thought and domestic habit without any of those artifices of
blending or restoration by which the seeker for history in stones will be
utterly hoodwinked in time to come.

To the left of the door and vestibule which Ethelberta passed through
rose the principal staircase, constructed of a freestone so milk-white
and delicately moulded as to be easily conceived in the lamplight as of
biscuit-ware.  Who, unacquainted with the secrets of geometrical
construction, could imagine that, hanging so airily there, to all
appearance supported on nothing, were twenty or more tons dead weight of
stone, that would have made a prison for an elephant if so arranged?  The
art which produced this illusion was questionable, but its success was
undoubted.  'How lovely!' said Ethelberta, as she looked at the fairy
ascent.  'His staircase alone is worth my hand!'

Passing along by the colonnade, which partly fenced the staircase from
the visitor, the saloon was reached, an apartment forming a double cube.
About the left-hand end of this were grouped the drawing-rooms and
library; while on the right was the dining-hall, with billiard, smoking,
and gun rooms in mysterious remoteness beyond.

Without attempting to trace an analogy between a man and his mansion, it
may be stated that everything here, though so dignified and magnificent,
was not conceived in quite the true and eternal spirit of art.  It was a
house in which Pugin would have torn his hair.  Those massive blocks of
red-veined marble lining the hall--emulating in their surface-glitter the
Escalier de Marbre at Versailles--were cunning imitations in paint and
plaster by workmen brought from afar for the purpose, at a prodigious
expense, by the present viscount's father, and recently repaired and re-
varnished.  The dark green columns and pilasters corresponding were brick
at the core.  Nay, the external walls, apparently of massive and solid
freestone, were only veneered with that material, being, like the
pillars, of brick within.

To a stone mask worn by a brick face a story naturally appertained--one
which has since done service in other quarters.  When the vast addition
had just been completed King George visited Enckworth.  Its owner pointed
out the features of its grand architectural attempt, and waited for
commendation.

'Brick, brick, brick,' said the king.

The Georgian Lord Mountclere blushed faintly, albeit to his very poll,
and said nothing more about his house that day.  When the king was gone
he sent frantically for the craftsmen recently dismissed, and soon the
green lawns became again the colour of a Nine-Elms cement wharf.  Thin
freestone slabs were affixed to the whole series of fronts by copper
cramps and dowels, each one of substance sufficient to have furnished a
poor boy's pocket with pennies for a month, till not a speck of the
original surface remained, and the edifice shone in all the grandeur of
massive masonry that was not massive at all.  But who remembered this
save the builder and his crew? and as long as nobody knew the truth,
pretence looked just as well.

What was honest in Enckworth Court was that portion of the original
edifice which still remained, now degraded to subservient uses.  Where
the untitled Mountclere of the White Rose faction had spread his knees
over the brands, when the place was a castle and not a court, the still-
room maid now simmered her preserves; and where Elizabethan mothers and
daughters of that sturdy line had tapestried the love-scenes of Isaac and
Jacob, boots and shoes were now cleaned and coals stowed away.

Lord Mountclere had so far recovered from the sprain as to be nominally
quite well, under pressure of a wish to receive guests.  The sprain had
in one sense served him excellently.  He had now a reason, apart from
that of years, for walking with his stick, and took care to let the
reason be frequently known.  To-day he entertained a larger number of
persons than had been assembled within his walls for a great length of
time.

Until after dinner Ethelberta felt as if she were staying at an hotel.
Few of the people whom she had met at the meeting of the Imperial
Association greeted her here.  The viscount's brother was not present,
but Sir Cyril Blandsbury and his wife were there, a lively pair of
persons, entertaining as actors, and friendly as dogs.  Beyond these all
the faces and figures were new to her, though they were handsome and
dashing enough to satisfy a court chronicler.  Ethelberta, in a dress
sloped about as high over the shoulder as would have drawn approval from
Reynolds, and expostulation from Lely, thawed and thawed each friend who
came near her, and sent him or her away smiling; yet she felt a little
surprise.  She had seldom visited at a country-house, and knew little of
the ordinary composition of a group of visitors within its walls; but the
present assemblage seemed to want much of that old-fashioned stability
and quaint monumental dignity she had expected to find under this
historical roof.  Nobody of her entertainer's own rank appeared.  Not a
single clergyman was there.  A tendency to talk Walpolean scandal about
foreign courts was particularly manifest.  And although tropical
travellers, Indian officers and their wives, courteous exiles, and
descendants of Irish kings, were infinitely more pleasant than Lord
Mountclere's landed neighbours would probably have been, to such a
cosmopolite as Ethelberta a calm Tory or old Whig company would have
given a greater treat.  They would have struck as gratefully upon her
senses as sylvan scenery after crags and cliffs, or silence after the
roar of a cataract.

It was evening, and all these personages at Enckworth Court were merry,
snug, and warm within its walls.  Dinner-time had passed, and everything
had gone on well, when Mrs. Tara O'Fanagan, who had a gold-clamped tooth,
which shone every now and then, asked Ethelberta if she would amuse them
by telling a story, since nobody present, except Lord Mountclere, had
ever heard one from her lips.

Seeing that Ethelberta had been working at that art as a profession, it
can hardly be said that the question was conceived with tact, though it
was put with grace.  Lord Mountclere evidently thought it objectionable,
for he looked unhappy.  To only one person in the brilliant room did the
request appear as a timely accident, and that was to Ethelberta herself.
Her honesty was always making war upon her manoeuvres, and shattering
their delicate meshes, to her great inconvenience and delay.  Thus there
arose those devious impulses and tangential flights which spoil the works
of every would-be schemer who instead of being wholly machine is half
heart.  One of these now was to show herself as she really was, not only
to Lord Mountclere, but to his friends assembled, whom, in her ignorance,
she respected more than they deserved, and so get rid of that
self-reproach which had by this time reached a morbid pitch, through her
over-sensitiveness to a situation in which a large majority of women and
men would have seen no falseness.

Full of this curious intention, she quietly assented to the request, and
laughingly bade them put themselves in listening order.

'An old story will suit us,' said the lady who had importuned her.  'We
have never heard one.'

'No; it shall be quite new,' she replied.  'One not yet made public;
though it soon will be.'

The narrative began by introducing to their notice a girl of the poorest
and meanest parentage, the daughter of a serving-man, and the fifth of
ten children.  She graphically recounted, as if they were her own, the
strange dreams and ambitious longings of this child when young, her
attempts to acquire education, partial failures, partial successes, and
constant struggles; instancing how, on one of these occasions, the girl
concealed herself under a bookcase of the library belonging to the
mansion in which her father served as footman, and having taken with her
there, like a young Fawkes, matches and a halfpenny candle, was going to
sit up all night reading when the family had retired, until her father
discovered and prevented her scheme.  Then followed her experiences as
nursery-governess, her evening lessons under self-selected masters, and
her ultimate rise to a higher grade among the teaching sisterhood.  Next
came another epoch.  To the mansion in which she was engaged returned a
truant son, between whom and the heroine an attachment sprang up.  The
master of the house was an ambitious gentleman just knighted, who,
perceiving the state of their hearts, harshly dismissed the homeless
governess, and rated the son, the consequence being that the youthful
pair resolved to marry secretly, and carried their resolution into
effect.  The runaway journey came next, and then a moving description of
the death of the young husband, and the terror of the bride.

The guests began to look perplexed, and one or two exchanged whispers.
This was not at all the kind of story that they had expected; it was
quite different from her usual utterances, the nature of which they knew
by report.  Ethelberta kept her eye upon Lord Mountclere.  Soon, to her
amazement, there was that in his face which told her that he knew the
story and its heroine quite well.  When she delivered the sentence ending
with the professedly fictitious words: 'I thus was reduced to great
distress, and vainly cast about me for directions what to do,' Lord
Mountclere's manner became so excited and anxious that it acted
reciprocally upon Ethelberta; her voice trembled, she moved her lips but
uttered nothing.  To bring the story up to the date of that very evening
had been her intent, but it was beyond her power.  The spell was broken;
she blushed with distress and turned away, for the folly of a disclosure
here was but too apparent.

Though every one saw that she had broken down, none of them appeared to
know the reason why, or to have the clue to her performance.  Fortunately
Lord Mountclere came to her aid.

'Let the first part end here,' he said, rising and approaching her.  'We
have been well entertained so far.  I could scarcely believe that the
story I was listening to was utterly an invention, so vividly does Mrs.
Petherwin bring the scenes before our eyes.  She must now be exhausted;
we will have the remainder to-morrow.'

They all agreed that this was well, and soon after fell into groups, and
dispersed about the rooms.  When everybody's attention was thus occupied
Lord Mountclere whispered to Ethelberta tremulously, 'Don't tell more:
you think too much of them: they are no better than you!  Will you meet
me in the little winter garden two minutes hence?  Pass through that
door, and along the glass passage.'  He himself left the room by an
opposite door.

She had not set three steps in the warm snug octagon of glass and plants
when he appeared on the other side.

'You knew it all before!' she said, looking keenly at him.  'Who told
you, and how long have you known it?'

'Before yesterday or last week,' said Lord Mountclere.  'Even before we
met in France.  Why are you so surprised?'

Ethelberta had been surprised, and very greatly, to find him, as it were,
secreted in the very rear of her position.  That nothing she could tell
was new to him was a good deal to think of, but it was little beside the
recollection that he had actually made his first declaration in the face
of that knowledge of her which she had supposed so fatal to all her
matrimonial ambitions.

'And now only one point remains to be settled,' he said, taking her hand.
'You promised at Rouen that at our next interview you would honour me
with a decisive reply--one to make me happy for ever.'

'But my father and friends?' said she.

'Are nothing to be concerned about.  Modern developments have shaken up
the classes like peas in a hopper.  An annuity, and a comfortable
cottage--'

'My brothers are workmen.'

'Manufacture is the single vocation in which a man's prospects may be
said to be illimitable.  Hee-hee!--they may buy me up before they die!
And now what stands in the way?  It would take fifty alliances with fifty
families so little disreputable as yours, darling, to drag mine down.'

Ethelberta had anticipated the scene, and settled her course; what had to
be said and done here was mere formality; yet she had been unable to go
straight to the assent required.  However, after these words of
self-depreciation, which were let fall as much for her own future ease of
conscience as for his present warning, she made no more ado.

'I shall think it a great honour to be your wife,' she said simply.




39. KNOLLSEA--MELCHESTER


The year was now moving on apace, but Ethelberta and Picotee chose to
remain at Knollsea, in the brilliant variegated brick and stone villa to
which they had removed in order to be in keeping with their ascending
fortunes.  Autumn had begun to make itself felt and seen in bolder and
less subtle ways than at first.  In the morning now, on coming
downstairs, in place of a yellowish-green leaf or two lying in a corner
of the lowest step, which had been the only previous symptoms around the
house, she saw dozens of them playing at corkscrews in the wind, directly
the door was opened.  Beyond, towards the sea, the slopes and scarps that
had been muffled with a thick robe of cliff herbage, were showing their
chill grey substance through the withered verdure, like the background of
velvet whence the pile has been fretted away.  Unexpected breezes broomed
and rasped the smooth bay in evanescent patches of stippled shade, and,
besides the small boats, the ponderous lighters used in shipping stone
were hauled up the beach in anticipation of the equinoctial attack.

A few days after Ethelberta's reception at Enckworth, an improved
stanhope, driven by Lord Mountclere himself, climbed up the hill until it
was opposite her door.  A few notes from a piano softly played reached
his ear as he descended from his place: on being shown in to his
betrothed, he could perceive that she had just left the instrument.
Moreover, a tear was visible in her eye when she came near him.

They discoursed for several minutes in the manner natural between a
defenceless young widow and an old widower in Lord Mountclere's position
to whom she was plighted--a great deal of formal considerateness making
itself visible on her part, and of extreme tenderness on his.  While thus
occupied, he turned to the piano, and casually glanced at a piece of
music lying open upon it.  Some words of writing at the top expressed
that it was the composer's original copy, presented by him, Christopher
Julian, to the author of the song.  Seeing that he noticed the sheet
somewhat lengthily, Ethelberta remarked that it had been an offering made
to her a long time ago--a melody written to one of her own poems.

'In the writing of the composer,' observed Lord Mountclere, with
interest.  'An offering from the musician himself--very gratifying and
touching.  Mr. Christopher Julian is the name I see upon it, I believe?  I
knew his father, Dr. Julian, a Sandbourne man, if I recollect.'

'Yes,' said Ethelberta placidly.  But it was really with an effort.  The
song was the identical one which Christopher sent up to her from
Sandbourne when the fire of her hope burnt high for less material ends;
and the discovery of the sheet among her music that day had started
eddies of emotion for some time checked.

'I am sorry you have been grieved,' said Lord Mountclere, with gloomy
restlessness.

'Grieved?' said Ethelberta.

'Did I not see a tear there? or did my eyes deceive me?'

'You might have seen one.'

'Ah! a tear, and a song.  I think--'

'You naturally think that a woman who cries over a man's gift must be in
love with the giver?'  Ethelberta looked him serenely in the face.

Lord Mountclere's jealous suspicions were considerably shaken.

'Not at all,' he said hastily, as if ashamed.  'One who cries over a song
is much affected by its sentiment.'

'Do you expect authors to cry over their own words?' she inquired,
merging defence in attack.  'I am afraid they don't often do that.'

'You would make me uneasy.'

'On the contrary, I would reassure you.  Are you not still doubting?' she
asked, with a pleasant smile.

'I cannot doubt you!'

'Swear, like a faithful knight.'

'I swear, my fairy, my flower!'

After this the old man appeared to be pondering; indeed, his thoughts
could hardly be said to be present when he uttered the words.  For though
the tabernacle was getting shaky by reason of years and merry living, so
that what was going on inside might often be guessed without by the
movement of the hangings, as in a puppet-show with worn canvas, he could
be quiet enough when scheming any plot of particular neatness, which had
less emotion than impishness in it.  Such an innocent amusement he was
pondering now.

Before leaving her, he asked if she would accompany him to a morning
instrumental concert at Melchester, which was to take place in the course
of that week for the benefit of some local institution.

'Melchester,' she repeated faintly, and observed him as searchingly as it
was possible to do without exposing herself to a raking fire in return.
Could he know that Christopher was living there, and was this said in
prolongation of his recent suspicion?  But Lord Mountclere's face gave no
sign.

'You forget one fatal objection,' said she; 'the secrecy in which it is
imperative that the engagement between us should be kept.'

'I am not known in Melchester without my carriage; nor are you.'

'We may be known by somebody on the road.'

'Then let it be arranged in this way.  I will not call here to take you
up, but will meet you at the station at Anglebury; and we can go on
together by train without notice.  Surely there can be no objection to
that?  It would be mere prudishness to object, since we are to become one
so shortly.'  He spoke a little impatiently.  It was plain that he
particularly wanted her to go to Melchester.

'I merely meant that there was a chance of discovery in our going out
together.  And discovery means no marriage.'  She was pale now, and sick
at heart, for it seemed that the viscount must be aware that Christopher
dwelt at that place, and was about to test her concerning him.

'Why does it mean no marriage?' said he.

'My father might, and almost certainly would, object to it.  Although he
cannot control me, he might entreat me.'

'Why would he object?' said Lord Mountclere uneasily, and somewhat
haughtily.

'I don't know.'

'But you will be my wife--say again that you will.'

'I will.'

He breathed.  'He will not object--hee-hee!' he said.  'O no--I think you
will be mine now.'

'I have said so.  But look to me all the same.'

'You malign yourself, dear one.  But you will meet me at Anglebury, as I
wish, and go on to Melchester with me?'

'I shall be pleased to--if my sister may accompany me.'

'Ah--your sister.  Yes, of course.'

They settled the time of the journey, and when the visit had been
stretched out as long as it reasonably could be with propriety, Lord
Mountclere took his leave.

When he was again seated on the driving-phaeton which he had brought that
day, Lord Mountclere looked gleeful, and shrewd enough in his own opinion
to outwit Mephistopheles.  As soon as they were ascending a hill, and he
could find time to free his hand, he pulled off his glove, and drawing
from his pocket a programme of the Melchester concert referred to,
contemplated therein the name of one of the intended performers.  The
name was that of Mr. C. Julian.  Replacing it again, he looked ahead, and
some time after murmured with wily mirth, 'An excellent test--a lucky
thought!'

Nothing of importance occurred during the intervening days.  At two
o'clock on the appointed afternoon Ethelberta stepped from the train at
Melchester with the viscount, who had met her as proposed; she was
followed behind by Picotee.

The concert was to be held at the Town-hall half-an-hour later.  They
entered a fly in waiting, and secure from recognition, were driven
leisurely in that direction, Picotee silent and absorbed with her own
thoughts.

'There's the Cathedral,' said Lord Mountclere humorously, as they caught
a view of one of its towers through a street leading into the Close.

'Yes.'

'It boasts of a very fine organ.'

'Ah.'

'And the organist is a clever young man.'

'Oh.'

Lord Mountclere paused a moment or two.  'By the way, you may remember
that he is the Mr. Julian who set your song to music!'

'I recollect it quite well.'  Her heart was horrified and she thought
Lord Mountclere must be developing into an inquisitor, which perhaps he
was.  But none of this reached her face.

They turned in the direction of the Hall, were set down, and entered.

The large assembly-room set apart for the concert was upstairs, and it
was possible to enter it in two ways: by the large doorway in front of
the landing, or by turning down a side passage leading to council-rooms
and subsidiary apartments of small size, which were allotted to
performers in any exhibition; thus they could enter from one of these
directly upon the platform, without passing through the audience.

'Will you seat yourselves here?' said Lord Mountclere, who, instead of
entering by the direct door, had brought the young women round into this
green-room, as it may be called.  'You see we have come in privately
enough; when the musicians arrive we can pass through behind them, and
step down to our seats from the front.'

The players could soon be heard tuning in the next room.  Then one came
through the passage-room where the three waited, and went in, then
another, then another.  Last of all came Julian.

Ethelberta sat facing the door, but Christopher, never in the least
expecting her there, did not recognize her till he was quite inside.  When
he had really perceived her to be the one who had troubled his soul so
many times and long, the blood in his face--never very much--passed off
and left it, like the shade of a cloud.  Between them stood a table
covered with green baize, which, reflecting upwards a band of sunlight
shining across the chamber, flung upon his already white features the
virescent hues of death.  The poor musician, whose person, much to his
own inconvenience, constituted a complete breviary of the gentle
emotions, looked as if he were going to fall down in a faint.

Ethelberta flung at Lord Mountclere a look which clipped him like
pincers: he never forgot it as long as he lived.

'This is your pretty jealous scheme--I see it!' she hissed to him, and
without being able to control herself went across to Julian.

But a slight gasp came from behind the door where Picotee had been
sitting.  Ethelberta and Lord Mountclere looked that way: and behold,
Picotee had nearly swooned.

Ethelberta's show of passion went as quickly as it had come, for she felt
that a splendid triumph had been put into her hands.  'Now do you see the
truth?' she whispered to Lord Mountclere without a drachm of feeling;
pointing to Christopher and then to Picotee--as like as two snowdrops
now.

'I do, I do,' murmured the viscount hastily.

They both went forward to help Christopher in restoring the fragile
Picotee: he had set himself to that task as suddenly as he possibly could
to cover his own near approach to the same condition.  Not much help was
required, the little girl's indisposition being quite momentary, and she
sat up in the chair again.

'Are you better?' said Ethelberta to Christopher.

'Quite well--quite,' he said, smiling faintly.  'I am glad to see you.  I
must, I think, go into the next room now.'  He bowed and walked out
awkwardly.

'Are you better, too?' she said to Picotee.

'Quite well,' said Picotee.

'You are quite sure you know between whom the love lies now--eh?'
Ethelberta asked in a sarcastic whisper of Lord Mountclere.

'I am--beyond a doubt,' murmured the anxious nobleman; he feared that
look of hers, which was not less dominant than irresistible.

Some additional moments given to thought on the circumstances rendered
Ethelberta still more indignant and intractable.  She went out at the
door by which they had entered, along the passage, and down the stairs.  A
shuffling footstep followed, but she did not turn her head.  When they
reached the bottom of the stairs the carriage had gone, their exit not
being expected till two hours later.  Ethelberta, nothing daunted, swept
along the pavement and down the street in a turbulent prance, Lord
Mountclere trotting behind with a jowl reduced to a mere nothing by his
concern at the discourtesy into which he had been lured by jealous
whisperings.

'My dearest--forgive me; I confess I doubted you--but I was beside
myself,' came to her ears from over her shoulder.  But Ethelberta walked
on as before.

Lord Mountclere sighed like a poet over a ledger.  'An old man--who is
not very old--naturally torments himself with fears of losing--no, no--it
was an innocent jest of mine--you will forgive a joke--hee-hee?' he said
again, on getting no reply.

'You had no right to mistrust me!'

'I do not--you did not blench.  You should have told me before that it
was your sister and not yourself who was entangled with him.'

'You brought me to Melchester on purpose to confront him!'

'Yes, I did.'

'Are you not ashamed?'

'I am satisfied.  It is better to know the truth by any means than to die
of suspense; better for us both--surely you see that?'

They had by this time got to the end of a long street, and into a
deserted side road by which the station could be indirectly reached.
Picotee appeared in the distance as a mere distracted speck of girlhood,
following them because not knowing what else to do in her sickness of
body and mind.  Once out of sight here, Ethelberta began to cry.

'Ethelberta,' said Lord Mountclere, in an agony of trouble, 'don't be
vexed!  It was an inconsiderate trick--I own it.  Do what you will, but
do not desert me now!  I could not bear it--you would kill me if you were
to leave me.  Anything, but be mine.'

Ethelberta continued her way, and drying her eyes entered the station,
where, on searching the time-tables, she found there would be no train
for Anglebury for the next two hours.  Then more slowly she turned
towards the town again, meeting Picotee and keeping in her company.

Lord Mountclere gave up the chase, but as he wished to get into the town
again, he followed in the same direction.  When Ethelberta had proceeded
as far as the Red Lion Hotel, she turned towards it with her companion,
and being shown to a room, the two sisters shut themselves in.  Lord
Mountclere paused and entered the White Hart, the rival hotel to the Red
Lion, which stood in an adjoining street.

Having secluded himself in an apartment here, walked from window to
window awhile, and made himself generally uncomfortable, he sat down to
the writing materials on the table, and concocted a note:--

   'WHITE HART HOTEL.

   'MY DEAR MRS. PETHERWIN,--You do not mean to be so cruel as to break
   your plighted word to me?  Remember, there is no love without much
   jealousy, and lovers are ever full of sighs and misgiving.  I have
   owned to as much contrition as can reasonably be expected.  I could
   not endure the suspicion that you loved another.--Yours always,

   'MOUNTCLERE.'

This he sent, watching from the window its progress along the street.  He
awaited anxiously for an answer, and waited long.  It was nearly twenty
minutes before he could hear a messenger approaching the door.  Yes--she
had actually sent a reply; he prized it as if it had been the first
encouragement he had ever in his life received from woman:--

   'MY LORD' (wrote Ethelberta),--'I am not prepared at present to enter
   into the question of marriage at all. The incident which has occurred
   affords me every excuse for withdrawing my promise, since it was given
   under misapprehensions on a point that materially affects my
   happiness.

   'E. PETHERWIN.'

'Ho-ho-ho--Miss Hoity-toity!' said Lord Mountclere, trotting up and down.
But, remembering it was her June against his November, this did not last
long, and he frantically replied:--

   'MY DARLING,--I cannot release you--I must do anything to keep my
   treasure.  Will you not see me for a few minutes, and let bygones go
   to the winds?'

Was ever a thrush so safe in a cherry net before!

The messenger came back with the information that Mrs. Petherwin had
taken a walk to the Close, her companion alone remaining at the hotel.
There being nothing else left for the viscount to do, he put on his hat,
and went out on foot in the same direction.  He had not walked far when
he saw Ethelberta moving slowly along the High Street before him.

Ethelberta was at this hour wandering without any fixed intention beyond
that of consuming time.  She was very wretched, and very indifferent: the
former when thinking of her past, the latter when thinking of the days to
come.  While she walked thus unconscious of the streets, and their groups
of other wayfarers, she saw Christopher emerge from a door not many paces
in advance, and close it behind him: he stood for a moment on the step
before descending into the road.

She could not, even had she wished it, easily check her progress without
rendering the chance of his perceiving her still more certain.  But she
did not wish any such thing, and it made little difference, for he had
already seen her in taking his survey round, and came down from the door
to her side.  It was impossible for anything formal to pass between them
now.

'You are not at the concert, Mr. Julian?' she said.  'I am glad to have a
better opportunity of speaking to you, and of asking for your sister.
Unfortunately there is not time for us to call upon her to-day.'

'Thank you, but it makes no difference,' said Julian, with somewhat sad
reserve.  'I will tell her I have met you; she is away from home just at
present.'  And finding that Ethelberta did not rejoin immediately he
observed, 'The chief organist, old Dr. Breeve, has taken my place at the
concert, as it was arranged he should do after the opening part.  I am
now going to the Cathedral for the afternoon service.  You are going
there too?'

'I thought of looking at the interior for a moment.'

So they went on side by side, saying little; for it was a situation in
which scarcely any appropriate thing could be spoken.  Ethelberta was the
less reluctant to walk in his company because of the provocation to
skittishness that Lord Mountclere had given, a provocation which she
still resented.  But she was far from wishing to increase his jealousy;
and yet this was what she was doing, Lord Mountclere being a perturbed
witness from behind of all that was passing now.

They turned the corner of the short street of connection which led under
an archway to the Cathedral Close, the old peer dogging them still.
Christopher seemed to warm up a little, and repeated the invitation.  'You
will come with your sister to see us before you leave?' he said.  'We
have tea at six.'

'We shall have left Melchester before that time.  I am now only waiting
for the train.'

'You two have not come all the way from Knollsea alone?'

'Part of the way,' said Ethelberta evasively.

'And going back alone?'

'No.  Only for the last five miles.  At least that was the arrangement--I
am not quite sure if it holds good.'

'You don't wish me to see you safely in the train?'

'It is not necessary: thank you very much.  We are well used to getting
about the world alone, and from Melchester to Knollsea is no serious
journey, late or early. . . .  Yet I think I ought, in honesty, to tell
you that we are not entirely by ourselves in Melchester to-day.'

'I remember I saw your friend--relative--in the room at the Town-hall.  It
did not occur to my mind for the moment that he was any other than a
stranger standing there.'

'He is not a relative,' she said, with perplexity.  'I hardly know,
Christopher, how to explain to you my position here to-day, because of
some difficulties that have arisen since we have been in the town, which
may alter it entirely.  On that account I will be less frank with you
than I should like to be, considering how long we have known each other.
It would be wrong, however, if I were not to tell you that there has been
a possibility of my marriage with him.'

'The elderly gentleman?'

'Yes.  And I came here in his company, intending to return with him.  But
you shall know all soon.  Picotee shall write to Faith.'

'I always think the Cathedral looks better from this point than from the
point usually chosen by artists,' he said, with nervous quickness,
directing her glance upwards to the silent structure, now misty and
unrelieved by either high light or deep shade.  'We get the grouping of
the chapels and choir-aisles more clearly shown--and the whole culminates
to a more perfect pyramid from this spot--do you think so?'

'Yes.  I do.'

A little further, and Christopher stopped to enter, when Ethelberta bade
him farewell.  'I thought at one time that our futures might have been
different from what they are apparently becoming,' he said then,
regarding her as a stall-reader regards the brilliant book he cannot
afford to buy.  'But one gets weary of repining about that.  I wish
Picotee and yourself could see us oftener; I am as confirmed a bachelor
now as Faith is an old maid.  I wonder if--should the event you
contemplate occur--you and he will ever visit us, or we shall ever visit
you!'

Christopher was evidently imagining the elderly gentleman to be some
retired farmer, or professional man already so intermixed with the
metamorphic classes of society as not to be surprised or inconvenienced
by her beginnings; one who wished to secure Ethelberta as an ornament to
his parlour fire in a quiet spirit, and in no intoxicated mood regardless
of issues.  She could scarcely reply to his supposition; and the parting
was what might have been predicted from a conversation so carefully
controlled.

Ethelberta, as she had intended, now went on further, and entering the
nave began to inspect the sallow monuments which lined the grizzled pile.
She did not perceive amid the shadows an old gentleman who had crept into
the mouldy place as stealthily as a worm into a skull, and was keeping
himself carefully beyond her observation.  She continued to regard
feature after feature till the choristers had filed in from the south
side, and peals broke forth from the organ on the black oaken mass at the
junction of nave and choir, shaking every cobweb in the dusky vaults, and
Ethelberta's heart no less.  She knew the fingers that were pressing out
those rolling sounds, and knowing them, became absorbed in tracing their
progress.  To go towards the organ-loft was an act of unconsciousness,
and she did not pause till she stood almost beneath it.

Ethelberta was awakened from vague imaginings by the close approach of
the old gentleman alluded to, who spoke with a great deal of agitation.

'I have been trying to meet with you,' said Lord Mountclere.  'Come, let
us be friends again!--Ethelberta, I MUST not lose you!  You cannot mean
that the engagement shall be broken off?'  He was far too desirous to
possess her at any price now to run a second risk of exasperating her,
and forbore to make any allusion to the recent pantomime between herself
and Christopher that he had beheld, though it might reasonably have
filled him with dread and petulance.

'I do not mean anything beyond this,' said she, 'that I entirely withdraw
from it on the faintest sign that you have not abandoned such miserable
jealous proceedings as those you adopted to-day.'

'I have quite abandoned them.  Will you come a little further this way,
and walk in the aisle?  You do still agree to be mine?'

'If it gives you any pleasure, I do.'

'Yes, yes.  I implore that the marriage may be soon--very soon.'  The
viscount spoke hastily, for the notes of the organ which were plunging
into their ears ever and anon from the hands of his young rival seemed
inconveniently and solemnly in the way of his suit.

'Well, Lord Mountclere?'

'Say in a few days?--it is the only thing that will satisfy me.'

'I am absolutely indifferent as to the day.  If it pleases you to have it
early I am willing.'

'Dare I ask that it may be this week?' said the delighted old man.

'I could not say that.'

'But you can name the earliest day?'

'I cannot now.  We had better be going from here, I think.'

The Cathedral was filling with shadows, and cold breathings came round
the piers, for it was November, when night very soon succeeds noon in
spots where noon is sobered to the pallor of eve.  But the service was
not yet over, and before quite leaving the building Ethelberta cast one
other glance towards the organ and thought of him behind it.  At this
moment her attention was arrested by the form of her sister Picotee, who
came in at the north door, closed the lobby-wicket softly, and went
lightly forward to the choir.  When within a few yards of it she paused
by a pillar, and lingered there looking up at the organ as Ethelberta had
done.  No sound was coming from the ponderous mass of tubes just then;
but in a short space a whole crowd of tones spread from the instrument to
accompany the words of a response.  Picotee started at the burst of music
as if taken in a dishonest action, and moved on in a manner intended to
efface the lover's loiter of the preceding moments from her own
consciousness no less than from other people's eyes.

'Do you see that?' said Ethelberta.  'That little figure is my dearest
sister.  Could you but ensure a marriage between her and him she listens
to, I would do anything you wish!'

'That is indeed a gracious promise,' said Lord Mountclere.  'And would
you agree to what I asked just now?'

'Yes.'

'When?'  A gleeful spark accompanied this.

'As you requested.'

'This week?  The day after to-morrow?'

'If you will.  But remember what lies on your side of the contract.  I
fancy I have given you a task beyond your powers.'

'Well, darling, we are at one at last,' said Lord Mountclere, rubbing his
hand against his side.  'And if my task is heavy and I cannot guarantee
the result, I can make it very probable.  Marry me on Friday--the day
after to-morrow--and I will do all that money and influence can effect to
bring about their union.'

'You solemnly promise?  You will never cease to give me all the aid in
your power until the thing is done?'

'I do solemnly promise--on the conditions named.'

'Very good.  You will have ensured my fulfilment of my promise before I
can ensure yours; but I take your word.'

'You will marry me on Friday!  Give me your hand upon it.'

She gave him her hand.

'Is it a covenant?' he asked.

'It is,' said she.

Lord Mountclere warmed from surface to centre as if he had drunk of
hippocras, and, after holding her hand for some moments, raised it gently
to his lips.

'Two days and you are mine,' he said.

'That I believe I never shall be.'

'Never shall be?  Why, darling?'

'I don't know.  Some catastrophe will prevent it.  I shall be dead
perhaps.'

'You distress me.  Ah,--you meant me--you meant that I should be dead,
because you think I am old!  But that is a mistake--I am not very old!'

'I thought only of myself--nothing of you.'

'Yes, I know.  Dearest, it is dismal and chilling here--let us go.'

Ethelberta mechanically moved with him, and felt there was no retreating
now.  In the meantime the young ladykin whom the solemn vowing concerned
had lingered round the choir screen, as if fearing to enter, yet loth to
go away.  The service terminated, the heavy books were closed, doors were
opened, and the feet of the few persons who had attended evensong began
pattering down the paved alleys.  Not wishing Picotee to know that the
object of her secret excursion had been discovered, Ethelberta now
stepped out of the west doorway with the viscount before Picotee had
emerged from the other; and they walked along the path together until she
overtook them.

'I fear it becomes necessary for me to stay in Melchester to-night,' said
Lord Mountclere.  'I have a few matters to attend to here, as the result
of our arrangements.  But I will first accompany you as far as Anglebury,
and see you safely into a carriage there that shall take you home.  To-
morrow I will drive to Knollsea, when we will make the final
preparations.'

Ethelberta would not have him go so far and back again, merely to attend
upon her; hence they parted at the railway, with due and correct
tenderness; and when the train had gone, Lord Mountclere returned into
the town on the special business he had mentioned, for which there
remained only the present evening and the following morning, if he were
to call upon her in the afternoon of the next day--the day before the
wedding--now so recklessly hastened on his part, and so coolly assented
to on hers.

By the time that the two young people had started it was nearly dark.
Some portions of the railway stretched through little copses and
plantations where, the leaf-shedding season being now at its height, red
and golden patches of fallen foliage lay on either side of the rails; and
as the travellers passed, all these death-stricken bodies boiled up in
the whirlwind created by the velocity, and were sent flying right and
left of them in myriads, a clean-fanned track being left behind.

Picotee was called from the observation of these phenomena by a remark
from her sister: 'Picotee, the marriage is to be very early indeed.  It
is to be the day after to-morrow--if it can.  Nevertheless I don't
believe in the fact--I cannot.'

'Did you arrange it so?  Nobody can make you marry so soon.'

'I agreed to the day,' murmured Ethelberta languidly.

'How can it be?  The gay dresses and the preparations and the people--how
can they be collected in the time, Berta?  And so much more of that will
be required for a lord of the land than for a common man.  O, I can't
think it possible for a sister of mine to marry a lord!'

'And yet it has been possible any time this last month or two, strange as
it seems to you. . . .  It is to be not only a plain and simple wedding,
without any lofty appliances, but a secret one--as secret as if I were
some under-age heiress to an Indian fortune, and he a young man of
nothing a year.'

'Has Lord Mountclere said it must be so private?  I suppose it is on
account of his family.'

'No.  I say so; and it is on account of my family.  Father might object
to the wedding, I imagine, from what he once said, or he might be much
disturbed about it; so I think it better that he and the rest should know
nothing till all is over.  You must dress again as my sister to-morrow,
dear.  Lord Mountclere is going to pay us an early visit to conclude
necessary arrangements.'

'O, the life as a lady at Enckworth Court!  The flowers, the woods, the
rooms, the pictures, the plate, and the jewels!  Horses and carriages
rattling and prancing, seneschals and pages, footmen hopping up and
hopping down.  It will be glory then!'

'We might hire our father as one of my retainers, to increase it,' said
Ethelberta drily.

Picotee's countenance fell.  'How shall we manage all about that?  'Tis
terrible, really!'

'The marriage granted, those things will right themselves by time and
weight of circumstances.  You take a wrong view in thinking of glories of
that sort.  My only hope is that my life will be quite private and
simple, as will best become my inferiority and Lord Mountclere's
staidness.  Such a splendid library as there is at Enckworth,
Picotee--quartos, folios, history, verse, Elzevirs, Caxtons--all that has
been done in literature from Moses down to Scott--with such companions I
can do without all other sorts of happiness.'

'And you will not go to town from Easter to Lammastide, as other noble
ladies do?' asked the younger girl, rather disappointed at this aspect of
a viscountess's life.

'I don't know.'

'But you will give dinners, and travel, and go to see his friends, and
have them to see you?'

'I don't know.'

'Will you not be, then, as any other peeress; and shall not I be as any
other peeress's sister?'

'That, too, I do not know.  All is mystery.  Nor do I even know that the
marriage will take place.  I feel that it may not; and perhaps so much
the better, since the man is a stranger to me.  I know nothing whatever
of his nature, and he knows nothing of mine.'




40. MELCHESTER (continued)


The commotion wrought in Julian's mind by the abrupt incursion of
Ethelberta into his quiet sphere was thorough and protracted.  The
witchery of her presence he had grown strong enough to withstand in part;
but her composed announcement that she had intended to marry another,
and, as far as he could understand, was intending it still, added a new
chill to the old shade of disappointment which custom was day by day
enabling him to endure.  During the whole interval in which he had
produced those diapason blasts, heard with such inharmonious feelings by
the three auditors outside the screen, his thoughts had wandered wider
than his notes in conjectures on the character and position of the
gentleman seen in Ethelberta's company.  Owing to his assumption that
Lord Mountclere was but a stranger who had accidentally come in at the
side door, Christopher had barely cast a glance upon him, and the wide
difference between the years of the viscount and those of his betrothed
was not so particularly observed as to raise that point to an item in his
objections now.  Lord Mountclere was dressed with all the cunning that
could be drawn from the metropolis by money and reiterated
dissatisfaction; he prided himself on his upright carriage; his stick was
so thin that the most malevolent could not insinuate that it was of any
possible use in walking; his teeth had put on all the vigour and
freshness of a second spring.  Hence his look was the slowest of possible
clocks in respect of his age, and his manner was equally as much in the
rear of his appearance.

Christopher was now over five-and-twenty.  He was getting so well
accustomed to the spectacle of a world passing him by and splashing him
with its wheels that he wondered why he had ever minded it.  His habit of
dreaming instead of doing had led him up to a curious discovery.  It is
no new thing for a man to fathom profundities by indulging humours: the
active, the rapid, the people of splendid momentum, have been surprised
to behold what results attend the lives of those whose usual plan for
discharging their active labours has been to postpone them indefinitely.
Certainly, the immediate result in the present case was, to all but
himself, small and invisible; but it was of the nature of highest things.
What he had learnt was that a woman who has once made a permanent
impression upon a man cannot altogether deny him her image by denying him
her company, and that by sedulously cultivating the acquaintance of this
Creature of Contemplation she becomes to him almost a living soul.  Hence
a sublimated Ethelberta accompanied him everywhere--one who never teased
him, eluded him, or disappointed him: when he smiled she smiled, when he
was sad she sorrowed.  He may be said to have become the literal
duplicate of that whimsical unknown rhapsodist who wrote of his own
similar situation--

   'By absence this good means I gain,
      That I can catch her,
      Where none can watch her,
   In some close corner of my brain:
      There I embrace and kiss her;
      And so I both enjoy and miss her.'

This frame of mind naturally induced an amazing abstraction in the
organist, never very vigilant at the best of times.  He would stand and
look fixedly at a frog in a shady pool, and never once think of
batrachians, or pause by a green bank to split some tall blade of grass
into filaments without removing it from its stalk, passing on ignorant
that he had made a cat-o'-nine-tails of a graceful slip of vegetation.  He
would hear the cathedral clock strike one, and go the next minute to see
what time it was.  'I never seed such a man as Mr. Julian is,' said the
head blower.  'He'll meet me anywhere out-of-doors, and never wink or
nod.  You'd hardly expect it.  I don't find fault, but you'd hardly
expect it, seeing how I play the same instrument as he do himself, and
have done it for so many years longer than he.  How I have indulged that
man, too!  If 'tis Pedals for two martel hours of practice I never
complain; and he has plenty of vagaries.  When 'tis hot summer weather
there's nothing will do for him but Choir, Great, and Swell altogether,
till yer face is in a vapour; and on a frosty winter night he'll keep me
there while he tweedles upon the Twelfth and Sixteenth till my arms be
scrammed for want of motion.  And never speak a word out-of-doors.'
Somebody suggested that perhaps Christopher did not notice his
coadjutor's presence in the street; and time proved to the organ-blower
that the remark was just.

Whenever Christopher caught himself at these vacuous tricks he would be
struck with admiration of Ethelberta's wisdom, foresight, and
self-command in refusing to wed such an incapable man: he felt that he
ought to be thankful that a bright memory of her was not also denied to
him, and resolved to be content with it as a possession, since it was as
much of her as he could decently maintain.

Wrapped thus in a humorous sadness he passed the afternoon under notice,
and in the evening went home to Faith, who still lived with him, and
showed no sign of ever being likely to do otherwise.  Their present place
and mode of life suited her well.  She revived at Melchester like an
exotic sent home again.  The leafy Close, the climbing buttresses, the
pondering ecclesiastics, the great doors, the singular keys, the
whispered talk, echoes of lonely footsteps, the sunset shadow of the tall
steeple, reaching further into the town than the good bishop's teaching,
and the general complexion of a spot where morning had the stillness of
evening and spring some of the tones of autumn, formed a proper
background to a person constituted as Faith, who, like Miss Hepzibah
Pyncheon's chicken, possessed in miniature all the antiquity of her
progenitors.

After tea Christopher went into the streets, as was frequently his
custom, less to see how the world crept on there than to walk up and down
for nothing at all.  It had been market-day, and remnants of the rural
population that had visited the town still lingered at corners, their
toes hanging over the edge of the pavement, and their eyes wandering
about the street.

The angle which formed the turning-point of Christopher's promenade was
occupied by a jeweller's shop, of a standing which completely outshone
every other shop in that or any trade throughout the town.  Indeed, it
was a staple subject of discussion in Melchester how a shop of such
pretensions could find patronage sufficient to support its existence in a
place which, though well populated, was not fashionable.  It had not long
been established there, and was the enterprise of an incoming man whose
whole course of procedure seemed to be dictated by an intention to
astonish the native citizens very considerably before he had done.  Nearly
everything was glass in the frontage of this fairy mart, and its contents
glittered like the hammochrysos stone.  The panes being of plate-glass,
and the shop having two fronts, a diagonal view could be had through it
from one to the other of the streets to which it formed a corner.

This evening, as on all evenings, a flood of radiance spread from the
window-lamps into the thick autumn air, so that from a distance that
corner appeared as the glistening nucleus of all the light in the town.
Towards it idle men and women unconsciously bent their steps, and closed
in upon the panes like night-birds upon the lantern of a lighthouse.

When Christopher reached the spot there stood close to the pavement a
plain close carriage, apparently waiting for some person who was
purchasing inside.  Christopher would hardly have noticed this had he not
also perceived, pressed against the glass of the shop window, an unusual
number of local noses belonging to overgrown working lads, tosspots, an
idiot, the ham-smoker's assistant with his sleeves rolled up, a scot-and-
lot freeholder, three or four seamstresses, the young woman who brought
home the washing, and so on.  The interest of these gazers in some
proceedings within, which by reason of the gaslight were as public as if
carried on in the open air, was very great.

'Yes, that's what he's a buying o'--haw, haw!' said one of the young men,
as the shopman removed from the window a gorgeous blue velvet tray of
wedding-rings, and laid it on the counter.

''Tis what you may come to yerself, sooner or later, God have mercy upon
ye; and as such no scoffing matter,' said an older man.  'Faith, I'd as
lief cry as laugh to see a man in that corner.'

'He's a gent getting up in years too.  He must hev been through it a few
times afore, seemingly, to sit down and buy the tools so cool as that.'

'Well, no.  See what the shyest will do at such times.  You bain't
yerself then; no man living is hisself then.'

'True,' said the ham-smoker's man.  ''Tis a thought to look at that a
chap will take all this trouble to get a woman into his house, and a
twelvemonth after would as soon hear it thunder as hear her sing!'

The policeman standing near was a humane man, through having a young
family he could hardly keep, and he hesitated about telling them to move
on.  Christopher had before this time perceived that the articles were
laid down before an old gentleman who was seated in the shop, and that
the gentleman was none other than he who had been with Ethelberta in the
concert-room.  The discovery was so startling that, constitutionally
indisposed as he was to stand and watch, he became as glued to the spot
as the other idlers.  Finding himself now for the first time directly
confronting the preliminaries of Ethelberta's marriage to a stranger, he
was left with far less equanimity than he could have supposed possible to
the situation.

'So near the time!' he said, and looked hard at Lord Mountclere.

Christopher had now a far better opportunity than before for observing
Ethelberta's betrothed.  Apart from any bias of jealousy, disappointment,
or mortification, he was led to judge that this was not quite the man to
make Ethelberta happy.  He had fancied her companion to be a man under
fifty; he was now visibly sixty or more.  And it was not the sort of
sexagenarianism beside which a young woman's happiness can sometimes
contrive to keep itself alive in a quiet sleepy way.  Suddenly it
occurred to him that this was the man whom he had helped in the carriage
accident on the way to Knollsea.  He looked again.

By no means undignified, the face presented that combination of slyness
and jocundity which we are accustomed to imagine of the canonical jolly-
dogs in mediaeval tales.  The gamesome Curate of Meudon might have
supplied some parts of the countenance; cunning Friar Tuck the remainder.
Nothing but the viscount's constant habit of going to church every Sunday
morning when at his country residence kept unholiness out of his
features, for though he lived theologically enough on the Sabbath, as it
became a man in his position to do, he was strikingly mundane all the
rest of the week, always preferring the devil to God in his oaths.  And
nothing but antecedent good-humour prevented the short fits of crossness
incident to his passing infirmities from becoming established.  His look
was exceptionally jovial now, and the corners of his mouth twitched as
the telegraph-needles of a hundred little erotic messages from his heart
to his brain.  Anybody could see that he was a merry man still, who loved
good company, warming drinks, nymph-like shapes, and pretty words, in
spite of the disagreeable suggestions he received from the pupils of his
eyes, and the joints of his lively limbs, that imps of mischief were busy
sapping and mining in those regions, with the view of tumbling him into a
certain cool cellar under the church aisle.

In general, if a lover can find any ground at all for serenity in the
tide of an elderly rival's success, he finds it in the fact itself of
that ancientness.  The other side seems less a rival than a makeshift.
But Christopher no longer felt this, and the significant signs before his
eyes of the imminence of Ethelberta's union with this old hero filled him
with restless dread.  True, the gentleman, as he appeared illuminated by
the jeweller's gas-jets, seemed more likely to injure Ethelberta by
indulgence than by severity, while her beauty lasted; but there was a
nameless something in him less tolerable than this.

The purchaser having completed his dealings with the goldsmith, was
conducted to the door by the master of the shop, and into the carriage,
which was at once driven off up the street.

Christopher now much desired to know the name of the man whom a nice
chain of circumstantial evidence taught him to regard as the happy winner
where scores had lost.  He was grieved that Ethelberta's confessed
reserve should have extended so far as to limit her to mere indefinite
hints of marriage when they were talking almost on the brink of the
wedding-day.  That the ceremony was to be a private one--which it
probably would be because of the disparity of ages--did not in his
opinion justify her secrecy.  He had shown himself capable of a
transmutation as valuable as it is rare in men, the change from pestering
lover to staunch friend, and this was all he had got for it.  But even an
old lover sunk to an indifferentist might have been tempted to spend an
unoccupied half-hour in discovering particulars now, and Christopher had
not lapsed nearly so far as to absolute unconcern.

That evening, however, nothing came in his way to enlighten him.  But the
next day, when skirting the Close on his ordinary duties, he saw the same
carriage standing at a distance, and paused to behold the same old
gentleman come from a well-known office and re-enter the vehicle--Lord
Mountclere, in fact, in earnest pursuit of the business of yesternight,
having just pocketed a document in which romance, rashness, law, and
gospel are so happily made to work together that it may safely be
regarded as the neatest compromise which has ever been invented since
Adam sinned.

This time Julian perceived that the brougham was one belonging to the
White Hart Hotel, which Lord Mountclere was using partly from the
necessities of these hasty proceedings, and also because, by so doing, he
escaped the notice that might have been bestowed upon his own equipage,
or men-servants, the Mountclere hammer-cloths being known in Melchester.
Christopher now walked towards the hotel, leisurely, yet with anxiety.  He
inquired of a porter what people were staying there that day, and was
informed that they had only one person in the house, Lord Mountclere,
whom sudden and unexpected business had detained in Melchester since the
previous day.

Christopher lingered to hear no more.  He retraced the street much more
quickly than he had come; and he only said, 'Lord Mountclere--it must
never be!'

As soon as he entered the house, Faith perceived that he was greatly
agitated.  He at once told her of his discovery, and she exclaimed, 'What
a brilliant match!'

'O Faith,' said Christopher, 'you don't know!  You are far from knowing.
It is as gloomy as midnight.  Good God, can it be possible?'

Faith blinked in alarm, without speaking.

'Did you never hear anything of Lord Mountclere when we lived at
Sandbourne?'

'I knew the name--no more.'

'No, no--of course you did not.  Well, though I never saw his face, to my
knowledge, till a short time ago, I know enough to say that, if earnest
representations can prevent it, this marriage shall not be.  Father knew
him, or about him, very well; and he once told me--what I cannot tell
you.  Fancy, I have seen him three times--yesterday, last night, and this
morning--besides helping him on the road some weeks ago, and never once
considered that he might be Lord Mountclere.  He is here almost in
disguise, one may say; neither man nor horse is with him; and his object
accounts for his privacy.  I see how it is--she is doing this to benefit
her brothers and sisters, if possible; but she ought to know that if she
is miserable they will never be happy.  That's the nature of women--they
take the form for the essence, and that's what she is doing now.  I
should think her guardian angel must have quitted her when she agreed to
a marriage which may tear her heart out like a claw.'

'You are too warm about it, Kit--it cannot be so bad as that.  It is not
the thing, but the sensitiveness to the thing, which is the true measure
of its pain.  Perhaps what seems so bad to you falls lightly on her mind.
A campaigner in a heavy rain is not more uncomfortable than we are in a
slight draught; and Ethelberta, fortified by her sapphires and gold cups
and wax candles, will not mind facts which look like spectres to us
outside.  A title will turn troubles into romances, and she will shine as
an interesting viscountess in spite of them.'

The discussion with Faith was not continued, Christopher stopping the
argument by saying that he had a good mind to go off at once to Knollsea,
and show her her danger.  But till the next morning Ethelberta was
certainly safe; no marriage was possible anywhere before then.  He passed
the afternoon in a state of great indecision, constantly reiterating, 'I
will go!'




41. WORKSHOPS--AN INN--THE STREET


On an extensive plot of ground, lying somewhere between the Thames and
the Kensington squares, stood the premises of Messrs. Nockett and Perch,
builders and contractors.  The yard with its workshops formed part of one
of those frontier lines between mangy business and garnished domesticity
that occur in what are called improving neighbourhoods.  We are
accustomed to regard increase as the chief feature in a great city's
progress, its well-known signs greeting our eyes on every outskirt.  Slush-
ponds may be seen turning into basement-kitchens; a broad causeway of
shattered earthenware smothers plots of budding gooseberry-bushes and
vegetable trenches, foundations following so closely upon gardens that
the householder may be expected to find cadaverous sprouts from
overlooked potatoes rising through the chinks of his cellar floor.  But
the other great process, that of internal transmutation, is not less
curious than this encroachment of grey upon green.  Its first erections
are often only the milk-teeth of a suburb, and as the district rises in
dignity they are dislodged by those which are to endure.  Slightness
becomes supplanted by comparative solidity, commonness by novelty,
lowness and irregularity by symmetry and height.

An observer of the precinct which has been named as an instance in point
might have stood under a lamp-post and heard simultaneously the peal of
the visitor's bell from the new terrace on the right hand, and the stroke
of tools from the musty workshops on the left.  Waggons laden with deals
came up on this side, and landaus came down on the other--the former to
lumber heavily through the old-established contractors' gates, the latter
to sweep fashionably into the square.

About twelve o'clock on the day following Lord Mountclere's exhibition of
himself to Christopher in the jeweller's shop at Melchester, and almost
at the identical time when the viscount was seen to come from the office
for marriage-licences in the same place, a carriage drove nearly up to
the gates of Messrs. Nockett and Co.'s yard.  A gentleman stepped out and
looked around.  He was a man whose years would have been pronounced as
five-and-forty by the friendly, fifty by the candid, fifty-two or three
by the grim.  He was as handsome a study in grey as could be seen in
town, there being far more of the raven's plumage than of the gull's in
the mixture as yet; and he had a glance of that practised sort which can
measure people, weigh them, repress them, encourage them to sprout and
blossom as a March sun encourages crocuses, ask them questions, give them
answers--in short, a glance that could do as many things as an American
cooking-stove or a multum-in-parvo pocket-knife.  But, as with most men
of the world, this was mere mechanism: his actual emotions were kept so
far within his person that they were rarely heard or seen near his
features.

On reading the builders' names over the gateway he entered the yard, and
asked at the office if Solomon Chickerel was engaged on the premises.  The
clerk was going to be very attentive, but finding the visitor had come
only to speak to a workman, his tense attitude slackened a little, and he
merely signified the foot of a Flemish ladder on the other side of the
yard, saying, 'You will find him, sir, up there in the joiner's shop.'

When the man in the black coat reached the top he found himself at the
end of a long apartment as large as a chapel and as low as a malt-room,
across which ran parallel carpenters' benches to the number of twenty or
more, a gangway being left at the side for access throughout.  Behind
every bench there stood a man or two, planing, fitting, or chiselling, as
the case might be.  The visitor paused for a moment, as if waiting for
some cessation of their violent motions and uproar till he could make his
errand known.  He waited ten seconds, he waited twenty; but, beyond that
a quick look had been thrown upon him by every pair of eyes, the muscular
performances were in no way interrupted: every one seemed oblivious of
his presence, and absolutely regardless of his wish.  In truth, the
texture of that salmon-coloured skin could be seen to be aristocratic
without a microscope, and the exceptious artizan has an offhand way when
contrasts are made painfully strong by an idler of this kind coming,
gloved and brushed, into the very den where he is sweating and muddling
in his shirt-sleeves.

The gentleman from the carriage then proceeded down the workshop, wading
up to his knees in a sea of shavings, and bruising his ankles against
corners of board and sawn-off blocks, that lay hidden like reefs beneath.
At the ninth bench he made another venture.

'Sol Chickerel?' said the man addressed, as he touched his plane-iron
upon the oilstone.  'He's one of them just behind.'

'Damn it all, can't one of you show me?' the visitor angrily observed,
for he had been used to more attention than this.  'Here, point him out.'
He handed the man a shilling.

'No trouble to do that,' said the workman; and he turned and signified
Sol by a nod without moving from his place.

The stranger entered Sol's division, and, nailing him with his eye, said
at once: 'I want to speak a few words with you in private.  Is not a Mrs.
Petherwin your sister?'

Sol started suspiciously.  'Has anything happened to her?' he at length
said hurriedly.

'O no.  It is on a business matter that I have called.  You need not mind
owning the relationship to me--the secret will be kept.  I am the brother
of one whom you may have heard of from her--Lord Mountclere.'

'I have not.  But if you will wait a minute, sir--'  He went to a little
glazed box at the end of the shop, where the foreman was sitting, and,
after speaking a few words to this person, Sol led Mountclere to the
door, and down the ladder.

'I suppose we cannot very well talk here, after all?' said the gentleman,
when they reached the yard, and found several men moving about therein.

'Perhaps we had better go to some room--the nearest inn will answer the
purpose, won't it?'

'Excellently.'

'There's the "Green Bushes" over the way.  They have a very nice private
room upstairs.'

'Yes, that will do.'  And passing out of the yard, the man with the
glance entered the inn with Sol, where they were shown to the parlour as
requested.

While the waiter was gone for some wine, which Mountclere ordered, the
more ingenuous of the two resumed the conversation by saying, awkwardly:
'Yes, Mrs. Petherwin is my sister, as you supposed, sir; but on her
account I do not let it be known.'

'Indeed,' said Mountclere.  'Well, I came to see you in order to speak of
a matter which I thought you might know more about than I do, for it has
taken me quite by surprise.  My brother, Lord Mountclere, is, it seems,
to be privately married to Mrs. Petherwin to-morrow.'

'Is that really the fact?' said Sol, becoming quite shaken.  'I had no
thought that such a thing could be possible!'

'It is imminent.'

'Father has told me that she has lately got to know some nobleman; but I
never supposed there could be any meaning in that.'

'You were altogether wrong,' said Mountclere, leaning back in his chair
and looking at Sol steadily.  'Do you feel it to be a matter upon which
you will congratulate her?'

'A very different thing!' said Sol vehemently.  'Though he is your
brother, sir, I must say this, that I would rather she married the
poorest man I know.'

'Why?'

'From what my father has told me of him, he is not--a more desirable
brother-in-law to me than I shall be in all likelihood to him.  What
business has a man of that character to marry Berta, I should like to
ask?'

'That's what I say,' returned Mountclere, revealing his satisfaction at
Sol's estimate of his noble brother: it showed that he had calculated
well in coming here.  'My brother is getting old, and he has lived
strangely: your sister is a highly respectable young lady.'

'And he is not respectable, you mean?  I know he is not.  I worked near
Enckworth once.'

'I cannot say that,' returned Mountclere.  Possibly a certain fraternal
feeling repressed a direct assent: and yet this was the only
representation which could be expected to prejudice the young man against
the wedding, if he were such an one as the visitor supposed Sol to be--a
man vulgar in sentiment and ambition, but pure in his anxiety for his
sister's happiness.  'At any rate, we are agreed in thinking that this
would be an unfortunate marriage for both,' added Mountclere.

'About both I don't know.  It may be a good thing for him.  When do you
say it is to be, sir--to-morrow?'

'Yes.'

'I don't know what to do!' said Sol, walking up and down.  'If half what
I have heard is true, I would lose a winter's work to prevent her
marrying him.  What does she want to go mixing in with people who despise
her for?  Now look here, Mr. Mountclere, since you have been and called
me out to talk this over, it is only fair that you should tell me the
exact truth about your brother.  Is it a lie, or is it true, that he is
not fit to be the husband of a decent woman?'

'That is a curious inquiry,' said Mountclere, whose manner and aspect,
neutral as a winter landscape, had little in common with Sol's warm and
unrestrained bearing.  'There are reasons why I think your sister will
not be happy with him.'

'Then it is true what they say,' said Sol, bringing down his fist upon
the table.  'I know your meaning well enough.  What's to be done?  If I
could only see her this minute, she might be kept out of it.'

'You think your presence would influence your sister--if you could see
her before the wedding?'

'I think it would.  But who's to get at her?'

'I am going, so you had better come on with me--unless it would be best
for your father to come.'

'Perhaps it might,' said the bewildered Sol.  'But he will not be able to
get away; and it's no use for Dan to go.  If anybody goes I must!  If she
has made up her mind nothing can be done by writing to her.'

'I leave at once to see Lord Mountclere,' the other continued.  'I feel
that as my brother is evidently ignorant of the position of Mrs.
Petherwin's family and connections, it is only fair in me, as his nearest
relative, to make them clear to him before it is too late.'

'You mean that if he knew her friends were working-people he would not
think of her as a wife?  'Tis a reasonable thought.  But make your mind
easy: she has told him.  I make a great mistake if she has for a moment
thought of concealing that from him.'

'She may not have deliberately done so.  But--and I say this with no ill-
feeling--it is a matter known to few, and she may have taken no steps to
undeceive him.  I hope to bring him to see the matter clearly.
Unfortunately the thing has been so secret and hurried that there is
barely time.  I knew nothing until this morning--never dreamt of such a
preposterous occurrence.'

'Preposterous!  If it should come to pass, she would play her part as his
lady as well as any other woman, and better.  I wish there was no more
reason for fear on my side than there is on yours!  Things have come to a
sore head when she is not considered lady enough for such as he.  But
perhaps your meaning is, that if your brother were to have a son, you
would lose your heir-presumptive title to the cor'net of Mountclere?
Well, 'twould be rather hard for ye, now I come to think o't--upon my
life, 'twould.'

'The suggestion is as delicate as the --- atmosphere of this vile room.
But let your ignorance be your excuse, my man.  It is hardly worth while
for us to quarrel when we both have the same object in view: do you think
so?'

'That's true--that's true.  When do you start, sir?'

'We must leave almost at once,' said Mountclere, looking at his watch.
'If we cannot catch the two o'clock train, there is no getting there to-
night--and to-morrow we could not possibly arrive before one.'

'I wish there was time for me to go and tidy myself a bit,' said Sol,
anxiously looking down at his working clothes.  'I suppose you would not
like me to go with you like this?'

'Confound the clothes!  If you cannot start in five minutes, we shall not
be able to go at all.'

'Very well, then--wait while I run across to the shop, then I am ready.
How do we get to the station?'

'My carriage is at the corner waiting.  When you come out I will meet you
at the gates.'

Sol then hurried downstairs, and a minute or two later Mr. Mountclere
followed, looking like a man bent on policy at any price.  The carriage
was brought round by the time that Sol reappeared from the yard.  He
entered and sat down beside Mountclere, not without a sense that he was
spoiling good upholstery; the coachman then allowed the lash of his whip
to alight with the force of a small fly upon the horses, which set them
up in an angry trot.  Sol rolled on beside his new acquaintance with the
shamefaced look of a man going to prison in a van, for pedestrians
occasionally gazed at him, full of what seemed to himself to be ironical
surprise.

'I am afraid I ought to have changed my clothes after all,' he said,
writhing under a perception of the contrast between them.  'Not knowing
anything about this, I ain't a bit prepared.  If I had got even my second-
best hat, it wouldn't be so bad.'

'It makes no difference,' said Mountclere inanimately.

'Or I might have brought my portmantle, with some things.'

'It really is not important.'

On reaching the station they found there were yet a few minutes to spare,
which Sol made use of in writing a note to his father, to explain what
had occurred.




42. THE DONCASTLES' RESIDENCE, AND OUTSIDE THE SAME


Mrs. Doncastle's dressing-bell had rung, but Menlove, the lady's maid,
having at the same time received a letter by the evening post, paused to
read it before replying to the summons:--

   'ENCKWORTH COURT, Wednesday.

   DARLING LOUISA,--I can assure you that I am no more likely than
   yourself to form another attachment, as you will perceive by what
   follows.  Before we left town I thought that to be able to see you
   occasionally was sufficient for happiness, but down in this lonely
   place the case is different.  In short, my dear, I ask you to consent
   to a union with me as soon as you possibly can.  Your prettiness has
   won my eyes and lips completely, sweet, and I lie awake at night to
   think of the golden curls you allowed to escape from their confinement
   on those nice times of private clothes, when we walked in the park and
   slipped the bonds of service, which you were never born to any more
   than I. . . .

   'Had not my own feelings been so strong, I should have told you at the
   first dash of my pen that what I expected is coming to pass at
   last--the old dog is going to be privately married to Mrs. P.  Yes,
   indeed, and the wedding is coming off to-morrow, secret as the grave.
   All her friends will doubtless leave service on account of it.  What
   he does now makes little difference to me, of course, as I had already
   given warning, but I shall stick to him like a Briton in spite of it.
   He has to-day made me a present, and a further five pounds for
   yourself, expecting you to hold your tongue on every matter connected
   with Mrs. P.'s friends, and to say nothing to any of them about this
   marriage until it is over.  His lordship impressed this upon me very
   strong, and familiar as a brother, and of course we obey his
   instructions to the letter; for I need hardly say that unless he keeps
   his promise to help me in setting up the shop, our nuptials cannot be
   consumed.  His help depends upon our obedience, as you are aware. . .
   .'

This, and much more, was from her very last lover, Lord Mountclere's
valet, who had been taken in hand directly she had convinced herself of
Joey's hopeless youthfulness.  The missive sent Mrs. Menlove's spirits
soaring like spring larks; she flew upstairs in answer to the bell with a
joyful, triumphant look, which the illuminated figure of Mrs. Doncastle
in her dressing-room could not quite repress.  One could almost forgive
Menlove her arts when so modest a result brought such vast content.

Mrs. Doncastle seemed inclined to make no remark during the dressing, and
at last Menlove could repress herself no longer.

'I should like to name something to you, m'm.'

'Yes.'

'I shall be wishing to leave soon, if it is convenient.'

'Very well, Menlove,' answered Mrs. Doncastle, as she serenely surveyed
her right eyebrow in the glass.  'Am I to take this as a formal notice?'

'If you please; but I could stay a week or two beyond the month if
suitable.  I am going to be married--that's what it is, m'm.'

'O!  I am glad to hear it, though I am sorry to lose you.'

'It is Lord Mountclere's valet--Mr. Tipman--m'm.'

'Indeed.'

Menlove went on building up Mrs. Doncastle's hair awhile in silence.

'I suppose you heard the other news that arrived in town to-day, m'm?'
she said again.  'Lord Mountclere is going to be married to-morrow.'

'To-morrow?  Are you quite sure?'

'O yes, m'm.  Mr. Tipman has just told me so in his letter.  He is going
to be married to Mrs. Petherwin.  It is to be quite a private wedding.'

Mrs. Doncastle made no remark, and she remained in the same still
position as before; but a countenance expressing transcendent surprise
was reflected to Menlove by the glass.

At this sight Menlove's tongue so burned to go further, and unfold the
lady's relations with the butler downstairs, that she would have lost a
month's wages to be at liberty to do it.  The disclosure was almost too
magnificent to be repressed.  To deny herself so exquisite an indulgence
required an effort which nothing on earth could have sustained save the
one thing that did sustain it--the knowledge that upon her silence hung
the most enormous desideratum in the world, her own marriage.  She said
no more, and Mrs. Doncastle went away.

It was an ordinary family dinner that day, but their nephew Neigh
happened to be present.  Just as they were sitting down Mrs. Doncastle
said to her husband: 'Why have you not told me of the wedding
to-morrow?--or don't you know anything about it?'

'Wedding?' said Mr. Doncastle.

'Lord Mountclere is to be married to Mrs. Petherwin quite privately.'

'Good God!' said some person.

Mr. Doncastle did not speak the words; they were not spoken by Neigh:
they seemed to float over the room and round the walls, as if originating
in some spiritualistic source.  Yet Mrs. Doncastle, remembering the
symptoms of attachment between Ethelberta and her nephew which had
appeared during the summer, looked towards Neigh instantly, as if she
thought the words must have come from him after all; but Neigh's face was
perfectly calm; he, together with her husband, was sitting with his eyes
fixed in the direction of the sideboard; and turning to the same spot she
beheld Chickerel standing pale as death, his lips being parted as if he
did not know where he was.

'Did you speak?' said Mrs. Doncastle, looking with astonishment at the
butler.

'Chickerel, what's the matter--are you ill?' said Mr. Doncastle
simultaneously.  'Was it you who said that?'

'I did, sir,' said Chickerel in a husky voice, scarcely above a whisper.
'I could not help it.'

'Why?'

'She is my daughter, and it shall be known at once!'

'Who is your daughter?'

He paused a few moments nervously.  'Mrs. Petherwin,' he said.

Upon this announcement Neigh looked at poor Chickerel as if he saw
through him into the wall.  Mrs. Doncastle uttered a faint exclamation
and leant back in her chair: the bare possibility of the truth of
Chickerel's claims to such paternity shook her to pieces when she viewed
her intimacies with Ethelberta during the past season--the court she had
paid her, the arrangements she had entered into to please her; above all,
the dinner-party which she had contrived and carried out solely to
gratify Lord Mountclere and bring him into personal communication with
the general favourite; thus making herself probably the chief though
unconscious instrument in promoting a match by which her butler was to
become father-in-law to a peer she delighted to honour.  The crowd of
perceptions almost took away her life; she closed her eyes in a white
shiver.

'Do you mean to say that the lady who sat here at dinner at the same time
that Lord Mountclere was present, is your daughter?' asked Doncastle.

'Yes, sir,' said Chickerel respectfully.

'How did she come to be your daughter?'

'I--  Well, she is my daughter, sir.'

'Did you educate her?'

'Not altogether, sir.  She was a very clever child.  Lady Petherwin took
a deal of trouble about her education.  They were both left widows about
the same time: the son died, then the father.  My daughter was only
seventeen then.  But though she's older now, her marriage with Lord
Mountclere means misery.  He ought to marry another woman.'

'It is very extraordinary,' Mr. Doncastle murmured.  'If you are ill you
had better go and rest yourself, Chickerel.  Send in Thomas.'

Chickerel, who seemed to be much disturbed, then very gladly left the
room, and dinner proceeded.  But such was the peculiarity of the case,
that, though there was in it neither murder, robbery, illness, accident,
fire, or any other of the tragic and legitimate shakers of human nerves,
two of the three who were gathered there sat through the meal without the
least consciousness of what viands had composed it.  Impressiveness
depends as much upon propinquity as upon magnitude; and to have honoured
unawares the daughter of the vilest Antipodean miscreant and murderer
would have been less discomfiting to Mrs. Doncastle than it was to make
the same blunder with the daughter of a respectable servant who happened
to live in her own house.  To Neigh the announcement was as the
catastrophe of a story already begun, rather than as an isolated wonder.
Ethelberta's words had prepared him for something, though the nature of
that thing was unknown.

'Chickerel ought not to have kept us in ignorance of this--of course he
ought not!' said Mrs. Doncastle, as soon as they were left alone.

'I don't see why not,' replied Mr. Doncastle, who took the matter very
coolly, as was his custom.

'Then she herself should have let it be known.'

'Nor does that follow.  You didn't tell Mrs. Petherwin that your
grandfather narrowly escaped hanging for shooting his rival in a duel.'

'Of course not.  There was no reason why I should give extraneous
information.'

'Nor was there any reason why she should.  As for Chickerel, he doubtless
felt how unbecoming it would be to make personal remarks upon one of your
guests--Ha-ha-ha!  Well, well--Ha-ha-ha-ha!'

'I know this,' said Mrs. Doncastle, in great anger, 'that if my father
had been in the room, I should not have let the fact pass unnoticed, and
treated him like a stranger!'

'Would you have had her introduce Chickerel to us all round?  My dear
Margaret, it was a complicated position for a woman.'

'Then she ought not to have come!'

'There may be something in that, though she was dining out at other
houses as good as ours.  Well, I should have done just as she did, for
the joke of the thing.  Ha-ha-ha!--it is very good--very.  It was a case
in which the appetite for a jest would overpower the sting of conscience
in any well-constituted being--that, my dear, I must maintain.'

'I say she should not have come!' answered Mrs. Doncastle firmly.  'Of
course I shall dismiss Chickerel.'

'Of course you will do no such thing.  I have never had a butler in the
house before who suited me so well.  It is a great credit to the man to
have such a daughter, and I am not sure that we do not derive some lustre
of a humble kind from his presence in the house.  But, seriously, I
wonder at your short-sightedness, when you know the troubles we have had
through getting new men from nobody knows where.'

Neigh, perceiving that the breeze in the atmosphere might ultimately
intensify to a palpable black squall, seemed to think it would be well to
take leave of his uncle and aunt as soon as he conveniently could;
nevertheless, he was much less discomposed by the situation than by the
active cause which had led to it.  When Mrs. Doncastle arose, her husband
said he was going to speak to Chickerel for a minute or two, and Neigh
followed his aunt upstairs.

Presently Doncastle joined them.  'I have been talking to Chickerel,' he
said.  'It is a very curious affair--this marriage of his daughter and
Lord Mountclere.  The whole situation is the most astounding I have ever
met with.  The man is quite ill about the news.  He has shown me a letter
which has just reached him from his son on the same subject.  Lord
Mountclere's brother and this young man have actually gone off together
to try to prevent the wedding, and Chickerel has asked to be allowed to
go himself, if he can get soon enough to the station to catch the night
mail.  Of course he may go if he wishes.'

'What a funny thing!' said the lady, with a wretchedly factitious smile.
'The times have taken a strange turn when the angry parent of the comedy,
who goes post-haste to prevent the undutiful daughter's rash marriage, is
a gentleman from below stairs, and the unworthy lover a peer of the
realm!'

Neigh spoke for almost the first time.  'I don't blame Chickerel in
objecting to Lord Mountclere.  I should object to him myself if I had a
daughter.  I never liked him.'

'Why?' said Mrs. Doncastle, lifting her eyelids as if the act were a
heavy task.

'For reasons which don't generally appear.'

'Yes,' said Mr. Doncastle, in a low tone.  'Still, we must not believe
all we hear.'

'Is Chickerel going?' said Neigh.

'He leaves in five or ten minutes,' said Doncastle.

After a few further words Neigh mentioned that he was unable to stay
longer that evening, and left them.  When he had reached the outside of
the door he walked a little way up the pavement and back again, as if
reluctant to lose sight of the street, finally standing under a lamp-post
whence he could command a view of Mr. Doncastle's front.  Presently a man
came out in a great-coat and with a small bag in his hand; Neigh at once
recognizing the person as Chickerel, went up to him.

'Mr. Doncastle tells me you are going on a sudden journey.  At what time
does your train leave?' Neigh asked.

'I go by the ten o'clock, sir: I hope it is a third-class,' said
Chickerel; 'though I am afraid it may not be.'

'It is as much as you will do to get to the station,' said Neigh, turning
the face of his watch to the light.  'Here, come into my cab--I am
driving that way.'

'Thank you, sir,' said Chickerel.

Neigh called a cab at the first opportunity, and they entered and drove
along together.  Neither spoke during the journey.  When they were
driving up to the station entrance Neigh looked again to see the hour.

'You have not a minute to lose,' he said, in repressed anxiety.  'And
your journey will be expensive: instead of walking from Anglebury to
Knollsea, you had better drive--above all, don't lose time.  Never mind
what class the train is.  Take this from me, since the emergency is
great.'  He handed something to Chickerel folded up small.

The butler took it without inquiry, and stepped out hastily.

'I sincerely hope she--  Well, good-night, Chickerel,' continued Neigh,
ending his words abruptly.  The cab containing him drove again towards
the station-gates, leaving Chickerel standing on the kerb.

He passed through the booking-office, and looked at the paper Neigh had
put into his hand.  It was a five-pound note.

Chickerel mused on the circumstance as he took his ticket and got into
the train.




43. THE RAILWAY--THE SEA--THE SHORE BEYOND


By this time Sol and the Honourable Edgar Mountclere had gone far on
their journey into Wessex.  Enckworth Court, Mountclere's destination,
though several miles from Knollsea, was most easily accessible by the
same route as that to the village, the latter being the place for which
Sol was bound.

From the few words that passed between them on the way, Mountclere became
more stubborn than ever in a belief that this was a carefully laid trap
of the fair Ethelberta's to ensnare his brother without revealing to him
her family ties, which it therefore behoved him to make clear, with the
utmost force of representation, before the fatal union had been
contracted.  Being himself the viscount's only remaining brother and near
relative, the disinterestedness of his motives may be left to
imagination; that there was much real excuse for his conduct must,
however, be borne in mind.  Whether his attempt would prevent the union
was another question: he believed that, conjoined with his personal
influence over the viscount, and the importation of Sol as a firebrand to
throw between the betrothed pair, it might do so.

About half-an-hour before sunset the two individuals, linked by their
differences, reached the point of railway at which the branch to
Sandbourne left the main line.  They had taken tickets for Sandbourne,
intending to go thence to Knollsea by the steamer that plied between the
two places during the summer months--making this a short and direct
route.  But it occurred to Mountclere on the way that, summer being over,
the steamer might possibly have left off running, the wind might be too
high for a small boat, and no large one might be at hand for hire:
therefore it would be safer to go by train to Anglebury, and the
remaining sixteen miles by driving over the hills, even at a great loss
of time.

Accident, however, determined otherwise.  They were in the station at the
junction, inquiring of an official if the Speedwell had ceased to sail,
when a countryman who had just come up from Sandbourne stated that,
though the Speedwell had left off for the year, there was that day
another steamer at Sandbourne.  This steamer would of necessity return to
Knollsea that evening, partly because several people from that place had
been on board, and also because the Knollsea folk were waiting for
groceries and draperies from London: there was not an ounce of tea or a
hundredweight of coal in the village, owing to the recent winds, which
had detained the provision parcels at Sandbourne, and kept the colliers
up-channel until the change of weather this day.  To introduce
necessaries by a roundabout land journey was not easy when they had been
ordered by the other and habitual route.  The boat returned at six
o'clock.

So on they went to Sandbourne, driving off to the pier directly they
reached that place, for it was getting towards night.  The steamer was
there, as the man had told them, much to the relief of Sol, who, being
extremely anxious to enter Knollsea before a late hour, had known that
this was the only way in which it could be done.

Some unforeseen incident delayed the boat, and they walked up and down
the pier to wait.  The prospect was gloomy enough.  The wind was north-
east; the sea along shore was a chalky-green, though comparatively calm,
this part of the coast forming a shelter from wind in its present
quarter.  The clouds had different velocities, and some of them shone
with a coppery glare, produced by rays from the west which did not enter
the inferior atmosphere at all.  It was reflected on the distant waves in
patches, with an effect as if the waters were at those particular spots
stained with blood.  This departed, and what daylight was left to the
earth came from strange and unusual quarters of the heavens.  The zenith
would be bright, as if that were the place of the sun; then all overhead
would close, and a whiteness in the east would give the appearance of
morning; while a bank as thick as a wall barricaded the west, which
looked as if it had no acquaintance with sunsets, and would blush red no
more.

'Any other passengers?' shouted the master of the steamboat.  'We must be
off: it may be a dirty night.'

Sol and Mountclere went on board, and the pier receded in the dusk.

'Shall we have any difficulty in getting into Knollsea Bay?' said
Mountclere.

'Not if the wind keeps where it is for another hour or two.'

'I fancy it is shifting to the east'ard,' said Sol.

The captain looked as if he had thought the same thing.

'I hope I shall be able to get home to-night,' said a Knollsea woman.  'My
little children be left alone.  Your mis'ess is in a bad way, too--isn't
she, skipper?'

'Yes.'

'And you've got the doctor from Sandbourne aboard, to tend her?'

'Yes.'

'Then you'll be sure to put into Knollsea, if you can?'

'Yes.  Don't be alarmed, ma'am.  We'll do what we can.  But no one must
boast.'

The skipper's remark was the result of an observation that the wind had
at last flown to the east, the single point of the compass whence it
could affect Knollsea Bay.  The result of this change was soon
perceptible.  About midway in their transit the land elbowed out to a
bold chalk promontory; beyond this stretched a vertical wall of the same
cliff, in a line parallel with their course.  In fair weather it was
possible and customary to steer close along under this hoary facade for
the distance of a mile, there being six fathoms of water within a few
boats' lengths of the precipice.  But it was an ugly spot at the best of
times, landward no less than seaward, the cliff rounding off at the top
in vegetation, like a forehead with low-grown hair, no defined edge being
provided as a warning to unwary pedestrians on the downs above.

As the wind sprung up stronger, white clots could be discerned at the
water level of the cliff, rising and falling against the black band of
shaggy weed that formed a sort of skirting to the base of the wall.  They
were the first-fruits of the new east blast, which shaved the face of the
cliff like a razor--gatherings of foam in the shape of heads, shoulders,
and arms of snowy whiteness, apparently struggling to rise from the
deeps, and ever sinking back to their old levels again.  They reminded an
observer of a drowning scene in a picture of the Deluge.  At some points
the face of rock was hollowed into gaping caverns, and the water began to
thunder into these with a leap that was only topped by the rebound
seaward again.  The vessel's head was kept a little further to sea, but
beyond that everything went on as usual.

The precipice was still in view, and before it several huge columns of
rock appeared, detached from the mass behind.  Two of these were
particularly noticeable in the grey air--one vertical, stout and square;
the other slender and tapering.  They were individualized as husband and
wife by the coast men.  The waves leapt up their sides like a pack of
hounds; this, however, though fearful in its boisterousness, was nothing
to the terrible games that sometimes went on round the knees of those
giants in stone.  Yet it was sufficient to cause the course of the frail
steamboat to be altered yet a little more--from south-west-by-south to
south-by-west--to give the breakers a still wider berth.

'I wish we had gone by land, sir; 'twould have been surer play,' said Sol
to Mountclere, a cat-and-dog friendship having arisen between them.

'Yes,' said Mountclere.  'Knollsea is an abominable place to get into
with an east wind blowing, they say.'

Another circumstance conspired to make their landing more difficult,
which Mountclere knew nothing of.  With the wind easterly, the highest
sea prevailed in Knollsea Bay from the slackening of flood-tide to the
first hour of ebb.  At that time the water outside stood without a
current, and ridges and hollows chased each other towards the beach
unchecked.  When the tide was setting strong up or down Channel its flow
across the mouth of the bay thrust aside, to some extent, the landward
plunge of the waves.

We glance for a moment at the state of affairs on the land they were
nearing.

This was the time of year to know the truth about the inner nature and
character of Knollsea; for to see Knollsea smiling to the summer sun was
to see a courtier before a king; Knollsea was not to be known by such
simple means.  The half-dozen detached villas used as lodging-houses in
the summer, standing aloof from the cots of the permanent race, rose in
the dusk of this gusty evening, empty, silent, damp, and dark as tombs.
The gravel walks leading to them were invaded by leaves and tufts of
grass.  As the darkness thickened the wind increased, and each blast
raked the iron railings before the houses till they hummed as if in a
song of derision.  Certainly it seemed absurd at this time of year that
human beings should expect comfort in a spot capable of such moods as
these.

However, one of the houses looked cheerful, and that was the dwelling to
which Ethelberta had gone.  Its gay external colours might as well have
been black for anything that could be seen of them now, but an unblinded
window revealed inside it a room bright and warm.  It was illuminated by
firelight only.  Within, Ethelberta appeared against the curtains, close
to the glass.  She was watching through a binocular a faint light which
had become visible in the direction of the bluff far away over the bay.

'Here is the Spruce at last, I think,' she said to her sister, who was by
the fire.  'I hope they will be able to land the things I have ordered.
They are on board I know.'

The wind continued to rise till at length something from the lungs of the
gale alighted like a feather upon the pane, and remained there sticking.
Seeing the substance, Ethelberta opened the window to secure it.  The
fire roared and the pictures kicked the walls; she closed the sash, and
brought to the light a crisp fragment of foam.

'How suddenly the sea must have risen,' said Picotee.

The servant entered the room.  'Please, mis'ess says she is afraid you
won't have your things to-night, 'm.  They say the steamer can't land,
and mis'ess wants to know if she can do anything?'

'It is of no consequence,' said Ethelberta.  'They will come some time,
unless they go to the bottom.'

The girl left the room.  'Shall we go down to the shore and see what the
night is like?' said Ethelberta.  'This is the last opportunity I shall
have.'

'Is it right for us to go, considering you are to be married to-morrow?'
said Picotee, who had small affection for nature in this mood.

Her sister laughed.  'Let us put on our cloaks--nobody will know us.  I
am sorry to leave this grim and primitive place, even for Enckworth
Court.'

They wrapped themselves up, and descended the hill.

On drawing near the battling line of breakers which marked the meeting of
sea and land they could perceive within the nearly invisible horizon an
equilateral triangle of lights.  It was formed of three stars, a red on
the one side, a green on the other, and a white on the summit.  This,
composed of mast-head and side lamps, was all that was visible of the
Spruce, which now faced end-on about half-a-mile distant, and was still
nearing the pier.  The girls went further, and stood on the foreshore,
listening to the din.  Seaward appeared nothing distinct save a black
horizontal band embodying itself out of the grey water, strengthening its
blackness, and enlarging till it looked like a nearing wall.  It was the
concave face of a coming wave.  On its summit a white edging arose with
the aspect of a lace frill; it broadened, and fell over the front with a
terrible concussion.  Then all before them was a sheet of whiteness,
which spread with amazing rapidity, till they found themselves standing
in the midst of it, as in a field of snow.  Both felt an insidious chill
encircling their ankles, and they rapidly ran up the beach.

'You girls, come away there, or you'll be washed off: what need have ye
for going so near?'

Ethelberta recognized the stentorian voice as that of Captain Flower,
who, with a party of boatmen, was discovered to be standing near, under
the shelter of a wall.  He did not know them in the gloom, and they took
care that he should not.  They retreated further up the beach, when the
hissing fleece of froth slid again down the shingle, dragging the pebbles
under it with a rattle as of a beast gnawing bones.

The spot whereon the men stood was called 'Down-under-wall;' it was a
nook commanding a full view of the bay, and hither the nautical portion
of the village unconsciously gravitated on windy afternoons and nights,
to discuss past disasters in the reticent spirit induced by a sense that
they might at any moment be repeated.  The stranger who should walk the
shore on roaring and sobbing November eves when there was not light
sufficient to guide his footsteps, and muse on the absoluteness of the
solitude, would be surprised by a smart 'Good-night' being returned from
this corner in company with the echo of his tread.  In summer the six or
eight perennial figures stood on the breezy side of the wall--in winter
and in rain to leeward; but no weather was known to dislodge them.

'I had no sooner come ashore than the wind began to fly round,' said the
previous speaker; 'and it must have been about the time they were off Old-
Harry Point.  "She'll put back for certain," I said; and I had no more
thought o' seeing her than John's set-net that was carried round the
point o' Monday.'

'Poor feller: his wife being in such a state makes him anxious to land if
'a can: that's what 'tis, plain enough.'

'Why that?' said Flower.

'The doctor's aboard, 'a believe: "I'll have the most understanding man
in Sandbourne, cost me little or much," he said.'

''Tis all over and she's better,' said the other.  'I called half-an-hour
afore dark.'

Flower, being an experienced man, knew how the judgment of a ship's
master was liable to be warped by family anxieties, many instances of the
same having occurred in the history of navigation.  He felt uneasy, for
he knew the deceit and guile of this bay far better than did the master
of the Spruce, who, till within a few recent months, had been a stranger
to the place.  Indeed, it was the bay which had made Flower what he was,
instead of a man in thriving retirement.  The two great ventures of his
life had been blown ashore and broken up within that very semicircle.  The
sturdy sailor now stood with his eyes fixed on the triangle of lights
which showed that the steamer had not relinquished her intention of
bringing up inside the pier if possible; his right hand was in his
pocket, where it played with a large key which lay there.  It was the key
of the lifeboat shed, and Flower was coxswain.  His musing was on the
possibility of a use for it this night.

It appeared that the captain of the Spruce was aiming to pass in under
the lee of the pier; but a strong current of four or five knots was
running between the piles, drifting the steamer away at every attempt as
soon as she slowed.  To come in on the other side was dangerous, the hull
of the vessel being likely to crash against and overthrow the fragile
erection, with damage to herself also.  Flower, who had disappeared for a
few minutes, now came back.

'It is just possible I can make 'em hear with the trumpet, now they be to
leeward,' he said, and proceeded with two or three others to grope his
way out upon the pier, which consisted simply of a row of rotten piles
covered with rotten planking, no balustrade of any kind existing to keep
the unwary from tumbling off.  At the water level the piles were eaten
away by the action of the sea to about the size of a man's wrist, and at
every fresh influx the whole structure trembled like a spider's web.  In
this lay the danger of making fast, for a strong pull from a headfast
rope might drag the erection completely over.  Flower arrived at the end,
where a lantern hung.

'Spruce ahoy!' he blared through the speaking trumpet two or three times.

There seemed to be a reply of some sort from the steamer.

'Tuesday's gale hev loosened the pier, Cap'n Ounce; the bollards be too
weak to make fast to: must land in boats if ye will land, but dangerous;
yer wife is out of danger, and 'tis a boy-y-y-y!'

Ethelberta and Picotee were at this time standing on the beach a hundred
and fifty yards off.  Whether or not the master of the steamer received
the information volunteered by Flower, the two girls saw the triangle of
lamps get narrow at its base, reduce themselves to two in a vertical
line, then to one, then to darkness.  The Spruce had turned her head from
Knollsea.

'They have gone back, and I shall not have my wedding things after all!'
said Ethelberta.  'Well, I must do without them.'

'You see, 'twas best to play sure,' said Flower to his comrades, in a
tone of complacency.  'They might have been able to do it, but 'twas
risky.  The shop-folk be out of stock, I hear, and the visiting lady up
the hill is terribly in want of clothes, so 'tis said.  But what's that?
Ounce ought to have put back afore.'

Then the lantern which hung at the end of the jetty was taken down, and
the darkness enfolded all around from view.  The bay became nothing but a
voice, the foam an occasional touch upon the face, the Spruce an
imagination, the pier a memory.  Everything lessened upon the senses but
one; that was the wind.  It mauled their persons like a hand, and caused
every scrap of their raiment to tug westward.  To stand with the face to
sea brought semi-suffocation, from the intense pressure of air.

The boatmen retired to their position under the wall, to lounge again in
silence.  Conversation was not considered necessary: their sense of each
other's presence formed a kind of conversation.  Meanwhile Picotee and
Ethelberta went up the hill.

'If your wedding were going to be a public one, what a misfortune this
delay of the packages would be,' said Picotee.

'Yes,' replied the elder.

'I think the bracelet the prettiest of all the presents he brought to-
day--do you?'

'It is the most valuable.'

'Lord Mountclere is very kind, is he not?  I like him a great deal better
than I did--do you, Berta?'

'Yes, very much better,' said Ethelberta, warming a little.  'If he were
not so suspicious at odd moments I should like him exceedingly.  But I
must cure him of that by a regular course of treatment, and then he'll be
very nice.'

'For an old man.  He likes you better than any young man would take the
trouble to do.  I wish somebody else were old too.'

'He will be some day.'

'Yes, but--'

'Never mind: time will straighten many crooked things.'

'Do you think Lord Mountclere has reached home by this time?'

'I should think so: though I believe he had to call at the parsonage
before leaving Knollsea.'

'Had he?  What for?'

'Why, of course somebody must--'

'O yes.  Do you think anybody in Knollsea knows it is going to be except
us and the parson?'

'I suppose the clerk knows.'

'I wonder if a lord has ever been married so privately before.'

'Frequently: when he marries far beneath him, as in this case.  But even
if I could have had it, I should not have liked a showy wedding.  I have
had no experience as a bride except in the private form of the ceremony.'

'Berta, I am sometimes uneasy about you even now and I want to ask you
one thing, if I may.  Are you doing this for my sake?  Would you have
married Mr. Julian if it had not been for me?'

'It is difficult to say exactly.  It is possible that if I had had no
relations at all, I might have married him.  And I might not.'

'I don't intend to marry.'

'In that case you will live with me at Enckworth.  However, we will leave
such details till the ground-work is confirmed.  When we get indoors will
you see if the boxes have been properly corded, and are quite ready to be
sent for?  Then come in and sit by the fire, and I'll sing some songs to
you.'

'Sad ones, you mean.'

'No, they shall not be sad.'

'Perhaps they may be the last you will ever sing to me.'

'They may be.  Such a thing has occurred.'

'But we will not think so.  We'll suppose you are to sing many to me
yet.'

'Yes.  There's good sense in that, Picotee.  In a world where the blind
only are cheerful we should all do well to put out our eyes.  There, I
did not mean to get into this state: forgive me, Picotee.  It is because
I have had a thought--why I cannot tell--that as much as this man brings
to me in rank and gifts he may take out of me in tears.'

'Berta!'

'But there's no reason in it--not any; for not in a single matter does
what has been supply us with any certain ground for knowing what will be
in the world.  I have seen marriages where happiness might have been said
to be ensured, and they have been all sadness afterwards; and I have seen
those in which the prospect was black as night, and they have led on to a
time of sweetness and comfort.  And I have seen marriages neither joyful
nor sorry, that have become either as accident forced them to become, the
persons having no voice in it at all.  Well, then, why should I be afraid
to make a plunge when chance is as trustworthy as calculation?'

'If you don't like him well enough, don't have him, Berta.  There's time
enough to put it off even now.'

'O no.  I would not upset a well-considered course on the haste of an
impulse.  Our will should withstand our misgivings.  Now let us see if
all has been packed, and then we'll sing.'

That evening, while the wind was wheeling round and round the dwelling,
and the calm eye of the lighthouse afar was the single speck perceptible
of the outside world from the door of Ethelberta's temporary home, the
music of songs mingled with the stroke of the wind across the iron
railings, and was swept on in the general tide of the gale, and the noise
of the rolling sea, till not the echo of a tone remained.

An hour before this singing, an old gentleman might have been seen to
alight from a little one-horse brougham, and enter the door of Knollsea
parsonage.  He was bent upon obtaining an entrance to the vicar's study
without giving his name.

But it happened that the vicar's wife was sitting in the front room,
making a pillow-case for the children's bed out of an old surplice which
had been excommunicated the previous Easter; she heard the newcomer's
voice through the partition, started, and went quickly to her husband,
who was where he ought to have been, in his study.  At her entry he
looked up with an abstracted gaze, having been lost in meditation over a
little schooner which he was attempting to rig for their youngest boy.  At
a word from his wife on the suspected name of the visitor, he resumed his
earlier occupation of inserting a few strong sentences, full of the
observation of maturer life, between the lines of a sermon written during
his first years of ordination, in order to make it available for the
coming Sunday.  His wife then vanished with the little ship in her hand,
and the visitor appeared.  A talk went on in low tones.

After a ten minutes' stay he departed as secretly as he had come.  His
errand was the cause of much whispered discussion between the vicar and
his wife during the evening, but nothing was said concerning it to the
outside world.




44. SANDBOURNE--A LONELY HEATH--THE 'RED LION'--THE HIGHWAY


It was half-past eleven before the Spruce, with Mountclere and Sol
Chickerel on board, had steamed back again to Sandbourne.  The direction
and increase of the wind had made it necessary to keep the vessel still
further to sea on their return than in going, that they might clear
without risk the windy, sousing, thwacking, basting, scourging Jack Ketch
of a corner called Old-Harry Point, which lay about halfway along their
track, and stood, with its detached posts and stumps of white rock, like
a skeleton's lower jaw, grinning at British navigation.  Here strong
currents and cross currents were beginning to interweave their scrolls
and meshes, the water rising behind them in tumultuous heaps, and
slamming against the fronts and angles of cliff, whence it flew into the
air like clouds of flour.  Who could now believe that this roaring abode
of chaos smiled in the sun as gently as an infant during the summer days
not long gone by, every pinnacle, crag, and cave returning a doubled
image across the glassy sea?

They were now again at Sandbourne, a point in their journey reached more
than four hours ago.  It became necessary to consider anew how to
accomplish the difficult remainder.  The wind was not blowing much beyond
what seamen call half a gale, but there had been enough unpleasantness
afloat to make landsmen glad to get ashore, and this dissipated in a
slight measure their vexation at having failed in their purpose.  Still,
Mountclere loudly cursed their confidence in that treacherously short
route, and Sol abused the unknown Sandbourne man who had brought the news
of the steamer's arrival to them at the junction.  The only course left
open to them now, short of giving up the undertaking, was to go by the
road along the shore, which, curving round the various little creeks and
inland seas between their present position and Knollsea, was of no less
length than thirty miles.  There was no train back to the junction till
the next morning, and Sol's proposition that they should drive thither in
hope of meeting the mail-train, was overruled by Mountclere.

'We will have nothing more to do with chance,' he said.  'We may miss the
train, and then we shall have gone out of the way for nothing.  More than
that, the down mail does not stop till it gets several miles beyond the
nearest station for Knollsea; so it is hopeless.'

'If there had only been a telegraph to the confounded place!'

'Telegraph--we might as well telegraph to the devil as to an old booby
and a damned scheming young widow.  I very much question if we shall do
anything in the matter, even if we get there.  But I suppose we had
better go on now?'

'You can do as you like.  I shall go on, if I have to walk every step
o't.'

'That's not necessary.  I think the best posting-house at this end of the
town is Tempett's--we must knock them up at once.  Which will you
do--attempt supper here, or break the back of our journey first, and get
on to Anglebury?  We may rest an hour or two there, unless you feel
really in want of a meal.'

'No.  I'll leave eating to merrier men, who have no sister in the hands
of a cursed old Vandal.'

'Very well,' said Mountclere.  'We'll go on at once.'

An additional half-hour elapsed before they were fairly started, the
lateness and abruptness of their arrival causing delay in getting a
conveyance ready: the tempestuous night had apparently driven the whole
town, gentle and simple, early to their beds.  And when at length the
travellers were on their way the aspect of the weather grew yet more
forbidding.  The rain came down unmercifully, the booming wind caught it,
bore it across the plain, whizzed it against the carriage like a sower
sowing his seed.  It was precisely such weather, and almost at the same
season, as when Picotee traversed the same moor, stricken with her great
disappointment at not meeting Christopher Julian.

Further on for several miles the drive lay through an open heath, dotted
occasionally with fir plantations, the trees of which told the tale of
their species without help from outline or colour; they spoke in those
melancholy moans and sobs which give to their sound a solemn sadness
surpassing even that of the sea.  From each carriage-lamp the long rays
stretched like feelers into the air, and somewhat cheered the way, until
the insidious damp that pervaded all things above, around, and
underneath, overpowered one of them, and rendered every attempt to
rekindle it ineffectual.  Even had the two men's dislike to each other's
society been less, the general din of the night would have prevented much
talking; as it was, they sat in a rigid reticence that was almost a third
personality.  The roads were laid hereabouts with a light sandy gravel,
which, though not clogging, was soft and friable.  It speedily became
saturated, and the wheels ground heavily and deeply into its substance.

At length, after crossing from ten to twelve miles of these eternal
heaths under the eternally drumming storm, they could discern eyelets of
light winking to them in the distance from under a nebulous brow of pale
haze.  They were looking on the little town of Havenpool.  Soon after
this cross-roads were reached, one of which, at right angles to their
present direction, led down on the left to that place.  Here the man
stopped, and informed them that the horses would be able to go but a mile
or two further.

'Very well, we must have others that can,' said Mountclere.  'Does our
way lie through the town?'

'No, sir--unless we go there to change horses, which I thought to do.  The
direct road is straight on.  Havenpool lies about three miles down there
on the left.  But the water is over the road, and we had better go round.
We shall come to no place for two or three miles, and then only to
Flychett.'

'What's Flychett like?'

'A trumpery small bit of a village.'

'Still, I think we had better push on,' said Sol.  'I am against running
the risk of finding the way flooded about Havenpool.'

'So am I,' returned Mountclere.

'I know a wheelwright in Flychett,' continued Sol, 'and he keeps a beer-
house, and owns two horses.  We could hire them, and have a bit of sommat
in the shape of victuals, and then get on to Anglebury.  Perhaps the rain
may hold up by that time.  Anything's better than going out of our way.'

'Yes.  And the horses can last out to that place,' said Mountclere.  'Up
and on again, my man.'

On they went towards Flychett.  Still the everlasting heath, the black
hills bulging against the sky, the barrows upon their round summits like
warts on a swarthy skin.  The storm blew huskily over bushes of heather
and furze that it was unable materially to disturb, and the travellers
proceeded as before.  But the horses were now far from fresh, and the
time spent in reaching the next village was quite half as long as that
taken up by the previous heavy portion of the drive.  When they entered
Flychett it was about three.

'Now, where's the inn?' said Mountclere, yawning.

'Just on the knap,' Sol answered.  ''Tis a little small place, and we
must do as well as we can.'

They pulled up before a cottage, upon the whitewashed front of which
could be seen a square board representing the sign.  After an infinite
labour of rapping and shouting, a casement opened overhead, and a woman's
voice inquired what was the matter.  Sol explained, when she told them
that the horses were away from home.

'Now we must wait till these are rested,' growled Mountclere.  'A pretty
muddle!'

'It cannot be helped,' answered Sol; and he asked the woman to open the
door.  She replied that her husband was away with the horses and van, and
that they could not come in.

Sol was known to her, and he mentioned his name; but the woman only began
to abuse him.

'Come, publican, you'd better let us in, or we'll have the law for't,'
rejoined Sol, with more spirit.  'You don't dare to keep nobility waiting
like this.'

'Nobility!'

'My mate hev the title of Honourable, whether or no; so let's have none
of your slack,' said Sol.

'Don't be a fool, young chopstick,' exclaimed Mountclere.  'Get the door
opened.'

'I will--in my own way,' said Sol testily.  'You mustn't mind my trading
upon your quality, as 'tis a case of necessity.  This is a woman nothing
will bring to reason but an appeal to the higher powers.  If every man of
title was as useful as you are to-night, sir, I'd never call them lumber
again as long as I live.'

'How singular!'

'There's never a bit of rubbish that won't come in use if you keep it
seven years.'

'If my utility depends upon keeping you company, may I go to h--- for
lacking every atom of the virtue.'

'Hear, hear!  But it hardly is becoming in me to answer up to a man so
much older than I, or I could say more.  Suppose we draw a line here for
the present, sir, and get indoors?'

'Do what you will, in Heaven's name.'

A few more words to the woman resulted in her agreeing to admit them if
they would attend to themselves afterwards.  This Sol promised, and the
key of the door was let down to them from the bedroom window by a string.
When they had entered, Sol, who knew the house well, busied himself in
lighting a fire, the driver going off with a lantern to the stable, where
he found standing-room for the two horses.  Mountclere walked up and down
the kitchen, mumbling words of disgust at the situation, the few of this
kind that he let out being just enough to show what a fearfully large
number he kept in.

'A-calling up people at this time of morning!' the woman occasionally
exclaimed down the stairs.  'But folks show no mercy upon their flesh and
blood--not one bit or mite.'

'Now never be stomachy, my good soul,' cried Sol from the fireplace,
where he stood blowing the fire with his breath.  'Only tell me where the
victuals bide, and I'll do all the cooking.  We'll pay like
princes--especially my mate.'

'There's but little in house,' said the sleepy woman from her bedroom.
'There's pig's fry, a side of bacon, a conger eel, and pickled onions.'

'Conger eel?' said Sol to Mountclere.

'No, thank you.'

'Pig's fry?'

'No, thank you.'

'Well, then, tell me where the bacon is,' shouted Sol to the woman.

'You must find it,' came again down the stairs.  ''Tis somewhere up in
chimley, but in which part I can't mind.  Really I don't know whether I
be upon my head or my heels, and my brain is all in a spin, wi' being
rafted up in such a larry!'

'Bide where you be, there's a dear,' said Sol.  'We'll do it all.  Just
tell us where the tea-caddy is, and the gridiron, and then you can go to
sleep again.'

The woman appeared to take his advice, for she gave the information, and
silence soon reigned upstairs.

When one piece of bacon had been with difficulty cooked over the newly-
lit fire, Sol said to Mountclere, with the rasher on his fork: 'Now look
here, sir, I think while I am making the tea, you ought to go on
griddling some more of these, as you haven't done nothing at all?'

'I do the paying. . . .  Well, give me the bacon.'

'And when you have done yours, I'll cook the man's, as the poor feller's
hungry, I make no doubt.'

Mountclere, fork in hand, then began with his rasher, tossing it about
the gridiron in masterly style, Sol attending to the tea.  He was
attracted from this occupation by a brilliant flame up the chimney,
Mountclere exclaiming, 'Now the cursed thing is on fire!'

'Blow it out--hard--that's it!  Well now, sir, do you come and begin upon
mine, as you must be hungry.  I'll finish the griddling.  Ought we to
mind the man sitting down in our company, as there's no other room for
him?  I hear him coming in.'

'O no--not at all.  Put him over at that table.'

'And I'll join him.  You can sit here by yourself, sir.'

The meal was despatched, and the coachman again retired, promising to
have the horses ready in about an hour and a half.  Sol and Mountclere
made themselves comfortable upon either side of the fireplace, since
there was no remedy for the delay: after sitting in silence awhile, they
nodded and slept.

How long they would have remained thus, in consequence of their fatigues,
there is no telling, had not the mistress of the cottage descended the
stairs about two hours later, after peeping down upon them at intervals
of five minutes during their sleep, lest they should leave without her
knowledge.  It was six o'clock, and Sol went out for the man, whom he
found snoring in the hay-loft.  There was now real necessity for haste,
and in ten minutes they were again on their way.

* * * * *

Day dawned upon the 'Red Lion' inn at Anglebury with a timid and watery
eye.  From the shadowy archway came a shining lantern, which was seen to
be dangling from the hand of a little bow-legged old man--the hostler,
John.  Having reached the front, he looked around to measure the
daylight, opened the lantern, and extinguished it by a pinch of his
fingers.  He paused for a moment to have the customary word or two with
his neighbour the milkman, who usually appeared at this point at this
time.

'It sounds like the whistle of the morning train,' the milkman said as he
drew near, a scream from the further end of the town reaching their ears.
'Well, I hope, now the wind's in that quarter, we shall ha'e a little
more fine weather--hey, hostler?'

'What be ye a talking o'?'

'Can hear the whistle plain, I say.'

'O ay.  I suppose you do.  But faith, 'tis a poor fist I can make at
hearing anything.  There, I could have told all the same that the wind
was in the east, even if I had not seed poor Thomas Tribble's smoke
blowing across the little orchard.  Joints be a true weathercock enough
when past three-score.  These easterly rains, when they do come, which is
not often, come wi' might enough to squail a man into his grave.'

'Well, we must look for it, hostler. . . .  Why, what mighty ekkypage is
this, come to town at such a purblinking time of day?'

''Tis what time only can tell--though 'twill not be long first,' the
hostler replied, as the driver of the pair of horses and carriage
containing Sol and Mountclere slackened pace, and drew rein before the
inn.

Fresh horses were immediately called for, and while they were being put
in the two travellers walked up and down.

'It is now a quarter to seven o'clock,' said Mountclere; 'and the
question arises, shall I go on to Knollsea, or branch off at Corvsgate
Castle for Enckworth?  I think the best plan will be to drive first to
Enckworth, set me down, and then get him to take you on at once to
Knollsea.  What do you say?'

'When shall I reach Knollsea by that arrangement?'

'By half-past eight o'clock.  We shall be at Enckworth before eight,
which is excellent time.'

'Very well, sir, I agree to that,' said Sol, feeling that as soon as one
of the two birds had been caught, the other could not mate without their
knowledge.

The carriage and horses being again ready, away they drove at once, both
having by this time grown too restless to spend in Anglebury a minute
more than was necessary.

The hostler and his lad had taken the jaded Sandbourne horses to the
stable, rubbed them down, and fed them, when another noise was heard
outside the yard; the omnibus had returned from meeting the train.
Relinquishing the horses to the small stable-lad, the old hostler again
looked out from the arch.

A young man had stepped from the omnibus, and he came forward.  'I want a
conveyance of some sort to take me to Knollsea, at once.  Can you get a
horse harnessed in five minutes?'

'I'll make shift to do what I can master, not promising about the
minutes.  The truest man can say no more.  Won't ye step into the bar,
sir, and give your order?  I'll let ye know as soon as 'tis ready.'

Christopher turned into a room smelling strongly of the night before, and
stood by the newly-kindled fire to wait.  He had just come in haste from
Melchester.  The upshot of his excitement about the wedding, which, as
the possible hour of its solemnization drew near, had increased till it
bore him on like a wind, was this unpremeditated journey.  Lying awake
the previous night, the hangings of his bed pulsing to every beat of his
heart, he decided that there was one last and great service which it
behoved him, as an honest man and friend, to say nothing of lover, to
render to Ethelberta at this juncture.  It was to ask her by some means
whether or not she had engaged with open eyes to marry Lord Mountclere;
and if not, to give her a word or two of enlightenment.  That done, she
might be left to take care of herself.

His plan was to obtain an interview with Picotee, and learn from her
accurately the state of things.  Should he, by any possibility, be
mistaken in his belief as to the contracting parties, a knowledge of the
mistake would be cheaply purchased by the journey.  Should he not, he
would send up to Ethelberta the strong note of expostulation which was
already written, and waiting in his pocket.  To intrude upon her at such
a time was unseemly; and to despatch a letter by a messenger before
evidence of its necessity had been received was most undesirable.  The
whole proceeding at best was clumsy; yet earnestness is mostly clumsy;
and how could he let the event pass without a protest?  Before daylight
on that autumn morning he had risen, told Faith of his intention, and
started off.

As soon as the vehicle was ready, Christopher hastened to the door and
stepped up.  The little stable-boy led the horse a few paces on the way
before relinquishing his hold; at the same moment a respectably dressed
man on foot, with a small black bag in his hand, came up from the
opposite direction, along the street leading from the railway.  He was a
thin, elderly man, with grey hair; that a great anxiety pervaded him was
as plainly visible as were his features.  Without entering the inn, he
came up at once to old John.

'Have you anything going to Knollsea this morning that I can get a lift
in?' said the pedestrian--no other than Ethelberta's father.

'Nothing empty, that I know of.'

'Or carrier?'

'No.'

'A matter of fifteen shillings, then, I suppose?'

'Yes--no doubt.  But yond there's a young man just now starting; he might
not take it ill if ye were to ask him for a seat, and go halves in the
hire of the trap.  Shall I call out?'

'Ah, do.'

The hostler bawled to the stable-boy, who put the question to
Christopher.  There was room for two in the dogcart, and Julian had no
objection to save the shillings of a fellow-traveller who was evidently
not rich.  When Chickerel mounted to his seat, Christopher paused to look
at him as we pause in some enactment that seems to have been already
before us in a dream long ago.  Ethelberta's face was there, as the
landscape is in the map, the romance in the history, the aim in the deed:
denuded, rayless, and sorry, but discernible.

For the moment, however, this did not occur to Julian.  He took the whip,
the boy loosed his hold upon the horse, and they proceeded on their way.

'What slap-dash jinks may there be going on at Knollsea, then, my sonny?'
said the hostler to the lad, as the dogcart and the backs of the two men
diminished on the road.  'You be a Knollsea boy: have anything reached
your young ears about what's in the wind there, David Straw?'

'No, nothing: except that 'tis going to be Christmas day in five weeks:
and then a hide-bound bull is going to be killed if he don't die afore
the time, and gi'ed away by my lord in three-pound junks, as a reward to
good people who never curse and sing bad songs, except when they be
drunk; mother says perhaps she will have some, and 'tis excellent if well
stewed, mother says.'

'A very fair chronicle for a boy to give, but not what I asked for.  When
you try to answer a old man's question, always bear in mind what it was
that old man asked.  A hide-bound bull is good when well stewed, I make
no doubt--for they who like it; but that's not it.  What I said was, do
you know why three fokes, a rich man, a middling man, and a poor man,
should want horses for Knollsea afore seven o'clock in the morning on a
blinking day in Fall, when everything is as wet as a dishclout, whereas
that's more than often happens in fine summer weather?'

'No--I don't know, John hostler.'

'Then go home and tell your mother that ye be no wide-awake boy, and that
old John, who went to school with her father afore she was born or
thought o', says so. . . .  Chok' it all, why should I think there's
sommat going on at Knollsea?  Honest travelling have been so rascally
abused since I was a boy in pinners, by tribes of nobodies tearing from
one end of the country to t'other, to see the sun go down in salt water,
or the moon play jack-lantern behind some rotten tower or other, that,
upon my song, when life and death's in the wind there's no telling the
difference!'

'I like their sixpences ever so much.'

'Young sonny, don't you answer up to me when you baint in the
story--stopping my words in that fashion.  I won't have it, David.  Now
up in the tallet with ye, there's a good boy, and down with another lock
or two of hay--as fast as you can do it for me.'

The boy vanished under the archway, and the hostler followed at his
heels.  Meanwhile the carriage bearing Mr. Mountclere and Sol was
speeding on its way to Enckworth.  When they reached the spot at which
the road forked into two, they left the Knollsea route, and keeping
thence under the hills for the distance of five or six miles, drove into
Lord Mountclere's park.  In ten minutes the house was before them, framed
in by dripping trees.

Mountclere jumped out, and entered without ceremony.  Sol, being anxious
to know if Lord Mountclere was there, ordered the coachman to wait a few
moments.  It was now nearly eight o'clock, and the smoke which ascended
from the newly-lit fires of the Court painted soft blue tints upon the
brown and golden leaves of lofty boughs adjoining.

'O, Ethelberta!' said Sol, as he regarded the fair prospect.

The gravel of the drive had been washed clean and smooth by the night's
rain, but there were fresh wheelmarks other than their own upon the
track.  Yet the mansion seemed scarcely awake, and stillness reigned
everywhere around.

Not more than three or four minutes had passed when the door was opened
for Mountclere, and he came hastily from the doorsteps.

'I must go on with you,' he said, getting into the vehicle.  'He's gone.'

'Where--to Knollsea?' said Sol.

'Yes,' said Mountclere.  'Now, go ahead to Knollsea!' he shouted to the
man.  'To think I should be fooled like this!  I had no idea that he
would be leaving so soon!  We might perhaps have been here an hour
earlier by hard striving.  But who was to dream that he would arrange to
leave it at such an unearthly time of the morning at this dark season of
the year?  Drive--drive!' he called again out of the window, and the pace
was increased.

'I have come two or three miles out of my way on account of you,' said
Sol sullenly.  'And all this time lost.  I don't see why you wanted to
come here at all.  I knew it would be a waste of time.'

'Damn it all, man,' said Mountclere; 'it is no use for you to be angry
with me!'

'I think it is, for 'tis you have brought me into this muddle,' said Sol,
in no sweeter tone.  'Ha, ha!  Upon my life I should be inclined to
laugh, if I were not so much inclined to do the other thing, at Berta's
trick of trying to make close family allies of such a cantankerous pair
as you and I!  So much of one mind as we be, so alike in our ways of
living, so close connected in our callings and principles, so matched in
manners and customs! 'twould be a thousand pities to part us--hey, Mr.
Mountclere!'

Mountclere faintly laughed with the same hideous merriment at the same
idea, and then both remained in a withering silence, meant to express the
utter contempt of each for the other, both in family and in person.  They
passed the Lodge, and again swept into the highroad.

'Drive on!' said Mountclere, putting his head again out of the window,
and shouting to the man.  'Drive like the devil!' he roared again a few
minutes afterwards, in fuming dissatisfaction with their rate of
progress.

'Baint I doing of it?' said the driver, turning angrily round.  'I ain't
going to ruin my governor's horses for strangers who won't pay double for
'em--not I.  I am driving as fast as I can.  If other folks get in the
way with their traps I suppose I must drive round 'em, sir?'

There was a slight crash.

'There!' continued the coachman.  'That's what comes of my turning
round!'

Sol looked out on the other side, and found that the forewheel of their
carriage had become locked in the wheel of a dogcart they had overtaken,
the road here being very narrow.  Their coachman, who knew he was to
blame for this mishap, felt the advantage of taking time by the forelock
in a case of accusation, and began swearing at his victim as if he were
the sinner.  Sol jumped out, and looking up at the occupants of the other
conveyance, saw against the sky the back elevation of his father and
Christopher Julian, sitting upon a little seat which they overhung, like
two big puddings upon a small dish.

'Father--what, you going?' said Sol.  'Is it about Berta that you've
come?'

'Yes, I got your letter,' said Chickerel, 'and I felt I should like to
come--that I ought to come, to save her from what she'll regret.  Luckily,
this gentleman, a stranger to me, has given me a lift from Anglebury, or
I must have hired.'  He pointed to Christopher.

'But he's Mr. Julian!' said Sol.

'You are Mrs. Petherwin's father?--I have travelled in your company
without knowing it!' exclaimed Christopher, feeling and looking both
astonished and puzzled.  At first, it had appeared to him that, in direct
antagonism to his own purpose, her friends were favouring Ethelberta's
wedding; but it was evidently otherwise.

'Yes, that's father,' said Sol.  'Father, this is Mr. Julian.  Mr.
Julian, this gentleman here is Lord Mountclere's brother--and, to cut the
story short, we all wish to stop the wedding.'

'Then let us get on, in Heaven's name!' said Mountclere.  'You are the
lady's father?'

'I am,' said Chickerel.

'Then you had better come into this carriage.  We shall go faster than
the dogcart.  Now, driver, are the wheels right again?'

Chickerel hastily entered with Mountclere, Sol joined them, and they sped
on.  Christopher drove close in their rear, not quite certain whether he
did well in going further, now that there were plenty of people to attend
to the business, but anxious to see the end.  The other three sat in
silence, with their eyes upon their knees, though the clouds were
dispersing, and the morning grew bright.  In about twenty minutes the
square unembattled tower of Knollsea Church appeared below them in the
vale, its summit just touching the distant line of sea upon sky.  The
element by which they had been victimized on the previous evening now
smiled falsely to the low morning sun.

They descended the road to the village at a little more mannerly pace
than that of the earlier journey, and saw the rays glance upon the hands
of the church clock, which marked five-and-twenty minutes to nine.




45. KNOLLSEA--THE ROAD THENCE--ENCKWORTH


All eyes were directed to the church-gate, as the travellers descended
the hill.  No wedding carriages were there, no favours, no slatternly
group of women brimming with interest, no aged pauper on two sticks, who
comes because he has nothing else to do till dying time, no nameless
female passing by on the other side with a laugh of indifference, no
ringers taking off their coats as they vanish up a turret, no
hobbledehoys on tiptoe outside the chancel windows--in short, none
whatever of the customary accessories of a country wedding was anywhere
visible.

'Thank God!' said Chickerel.

'Wait till you know he deserves it,' said Mountclere.

'Nothing's done yet between them.'

'It is not likely that anything is done at this time of day.  But I have
decided to go to the church first.  You will probably go to your
relative's house at once?'

Sol looked to his father for a reply.

'No, I too shall go to the church first, just to assure myself,' said
Chickerel.  'I shall then go on to Mrs Petherwin's.'

The carriage was stopped at the corner of a steep incline leading down to
the edifice.  Mountclere and Chickerel alighted and walked on towards the
gates, Sol remaining in his place.  Christopher was some way off,
descending the hill on foot, having halted to leave his horse and trap at
a small inn at the entrance to the village.

When Chickerel and Mountclere reached the churchyard gate they found it
slightly open.  The church-door beyond it was also open, but nobody was
near the spot.

'We have arrived not a minute too soon, however,' said Mountclere.
'Preparations have apparently begun.  It was to be an early wedding, no
doubt.'

Entering the building, they looked around; it was quite empty.  Chickerel
turned towards the chancel, his eye being attracted by a red kneeling-
cushion, placed at about the middle of the altar-railing, as if for early
use.  Mountclere strode to the vestry, somewhat at a loss how to proceed
in his difficult task of unearthing his brother, obtaining a private
interview with him, and then, by the introduction of Sol and Chickerel,
causing a general convulsion.

'Ha! here's somebody,' he said, observing a man in the vestry.  He
advanced with the intention of asking where Lord Mountclere was to be
found.  Chickerel came forward in the same direction.

'Are you the parish clerk?' said Mountclere to the man, who was dressed
up in his best clothes.

'I hev the honour of that calling,' the man replied.

Two large books were lying before him on the vestry table, one of them
being open.  As the clerk spoke he looked slantingly on the page, as a
person might do to discover if some writing were dry.  Mountclere and
Chickerel gazed on the same page.  The book was the marriage-register.

'Too late!' said Chickerel.

There plainly enough stood the signatures of Lord Mountclere and
Ethelberta.  The viscount's was very black, and had not yet dried.  Her
strokes were firm, and comparatively thick for a woman's, though paled by
juxtaposition with her husband's muddled characters.  In the space for
witnesses' names appeared in trembling lines as fine as silk the
autograph of Picotee, the second name being that of a stranger, probably
the clerk.

'Yes, yes--we are too late, it seems,' said Mountclere coolly.  'Who
could have thought they'd marry at eight!'

Chickerel stood like a man baked hard and dry.  Further than his first
two words he could say nothing.

'They must have set about it early, upon my soul,' Mountclere continued.
'When did the wedding take place?' he asked of the clerk sharply.

'It was over about five minutes before you came in,' replied that
luminary pleasantly, as he played at an invisible game of pitch-and-toss
with some half-sovereigns in his pocket.  'I received orders to have the
church ready at five minutes to eight this morning, though I knew nothing
about such a thing till bedtime last night.  It was very private and
plain, not that I should mind another such a one, sir;' and he secretly
pitched and tossed again.

Meanwhile Sol had found himself too restless to sit waiting in the
carriage for more than a minute after the other two had left it.  He
stepped out at the same instant that Christopher came past, and together
they too went on to the church.

'Father, ought we not to go on at once to Ethelberta's, instead of
waiting?' said Sol, on reaching the vestry, still in ignorance.  ''Twas
no use in coming here.'

'No use at all,' said Chickerel, as if he had straw in his throat.  'Look
at this.  I would almost sooner have had it that in leaving this church I
came from her grave--well, no, perhaps not that, but I fear it is a bad
thing.'

Sol then saw the names in the register, Christopher saw them, and the man
closed the book.  Christopher could not well command himself, and he
retired.

'I knew it.  I always said that pride would lead Berta to marry an
unworthy man, and so it has!' said Sol bitterly.  'What shall we do now?
I'll see her.'

'Do no such thing, young man,' said Mountclere.  'The best course is to
leave matters alone.  They are married.  If you are wise, you will try to
think the match a good one, and be content to let her keep her position
without inconveniencing her by your intrusions or complaints.  It is
possible that the satisfaction of her ambition will help her to endure
any few surprises to her propriety that may occur.  She is a clever young
woman, and has played her cards adroitly.  I only hope she may never
repent of the game!  A-hem.  Good morning.'  Saying this, Mountclere
slightly bowed to his relations, and marched out of the church with
dignity; but it was told afterwards by the coachman, who had no love for
Mountclere, that when he stepped into the fly, and was as he believed
unobserved, he was quite overcome with fatuous rage, his lips frothing
like a mug of hot ale.

'What an impertinent gentleman 'tis,' said Chickerel.  'As if we had
tried for her to marry his brother!'

'He knows better than that,' said Sol.  'But he'll never believe that
Berta didn't lay a trap for the old fellow.  He thinks at this moment
that Lord Mountclere has never been told of us and our belongings.'

'I wonder if she has deceived him in anything,' murmured Chickerel.  'I
can hardly suppose it.  But she is altogether beyond me.  However, if she
has misled him on any point she will suffer for it.'

'You need not fear that, father.  It isn't her way of working.  Why
couldn't she have known that when a title is to be had for the asking,
the owner must be a shocking one indeed?'

'The title is well enough.  Any poor scrubs in our place must be fools
not to think the match a very rare and astonishing honour, as far as the
position goes.  But that my brave girl will be miserable is a part of the
honour I can't stomach so well.  If he had been any other lord in the
kingdom, we might have been merry indeed.  I believe he will ruin her
happiness--yes, I do--not by any personal snubbing or rough conduct, but
by other things, causing her to be despised; and that is a thing she
can't endure.'

'She's not to be despised without a deal of trouble--we must remember
that.  And if he insults her by introducing new favourites, as they say
he did his first wife, I'll call upon him and ask his meaning, and take
her away.'

'Nonsense--we shall never know what he does, or how she feels; she will
never let out a word.  However unhappy she may be, she will always deny
it--that's the unfortunate part of such marriages.'

'An old chap like that ought to leave young women alone, damn him!'

The clerk came nearer.  'I am afraid I cannot allow bad words to be spoke
in this sacred pile,' he said.  'As far as my personal self goes, I
should have no objection to your cussing as much as you like, but as a
official of the church my conscience won't allow it to be done.'

'Your conscience has allowed something to be done that cussing and
swearing are godly worship to.'

'The prettiest maid is left out of harness, however,' said the clerk.
'The little witness was the chicken to my taste--Lord forgive me for
saying it, and a man with a wife and family!'

Sol and his father turned to withdraw, and soon forgot the remark, but it
was frequently recalled by Christopher.

'Do you think of trying to see Ethelberta before you leave?' said Sol.

'Certainly not,' said Chickerel.  'Mr. Mountclere's advice was good in
that.  The more we keep out of the way the more good we are doing her.  I
shall go back to Anglebury by the carrier, and get on at once to London.
You will go with me, I suppose?'

'The carrier does not leave yet for an hour or two.'

'I shall walk on, and let him overtake me.  If possible, I will get one
glimpse of Enckworth Court, Berta's new home; there may be time, if I
start at once.'

'I will walk with you,' said Sol.

'There is room for one with me,' said Christopher.  'I shall drive back
early in the afternoon.'

'Thank you,' said Sol.  'I will endeavour to meet you at Corvsgate.'

Thus it was arranged.  Chickerel could have wished to search for Picotee,
and learn from her the details of this mysterious matter.  But it was
particularly painful to him to make himself busy after the event; and to
appear suddenly and uselessly where he was plainly not wanted to appear
would be an awkwardness which the pleasure of seeing either daughter
could scarcely counterbalance.  Hence he had resolved to return at once
to town, and there await the news, together with the detailed directions
as to his own future movements, carefully considered and laid down, which
were sure to be given by the far-seeing Ethelberta.

Sol and his father walked on together, Chickerel to meet the carrier just
beyond Enckworth, Sol to wait for Christopher at Corvsgate.  His wish to
see, in company with his father, the outline of the seat to which
Ethelberta had been advanced that day, was the triumph of youthful
curiosity and interest over dogged objection.  His father's wish was
based on calmer reasons.

Christopher, lone and out of place, remained in the church yet a little
longer.  He desultorily walked round.  Reaching the organ chamber, he
looked at the instrument, and was surprised to find behind it a young
man.  Julian first thought him to be the organist; on second inspection,
however, he proved to be a person Christopher had met before, under far
different circumstances; it was our young friend Ladywell, looking as
sick and sorry as a lily with a slug in its stalk.

The occasion, the place, and their own condition, made them kin.
Christopher had despised Ladywell, Ladywell had disliked Christopher; but
a third item neutralized the other two--it was their common lot.

Christopher just nodded, for they had only met on Ethelberta's stairs.
Ladywell nodded more, and spoke.  'The church appears to be interesting,'
he said.

'Yes.  Such a tower is rare in England,' said Christopher.

They then dwelt on other features of the building, thence enlarging to
the village, and then to the rocks and marine scenery, both avoiding the
malady they suffered from--the marriage of Ethelberta.

'The village streets are very picturesque, and the cliff scenery is good
of its kind,' rejoined Ladywell.  'The rocks represent the feminine side
of grandeur.  Here they are white, with delicate tops.  On the west coast
they are higher, black, and with angular summits.  Those represent
grandeur in its masculine aspect.  It is merely my own idea, and not very
bright, perhaps.'

'It is very ingenious,' said Christopher, 'and perfectly true.'

Ladywell was pleased.  'I am here at present making sketches for my next
subject--a winter sea.  Otherwise I should not have--happened to be in
the church.'

'You are acquainted with Mrs. Petherwin--I think you are Mr. Ladywell,
who painted her portrait last season?'

'Yes,' said Ladywell, colouring.

'You may have heard her speak of Mr. Julian?'

'O yes,' said Ladywell, offering his hand.  Then by degrees their tongues
wound closer round the subject of their sadness, each tacitly owning to
what he would not tell.

'I saw it,' said Ladywell heavily.

'Did she look troubled?'

'Not in the least--bright and fresh as a May morning.  She has played me
many a bitter trick, and poor Neigh too, a friend of mine.  But I cannot
help forgiving her. . . .  I saw a carriage at the door, and strolled in.
The ceremony was just proceeding, so I sat down here.  Well, I have done
with Knollsea.  The place has no further interest for me now.  I may own
to you as a friend, that if she had not been living here I should have
studied at some other coast--of course that's in confidence.'

'I understand, quite.'

'I only arrived in the neighbourhood two days ago, and did not set eyes
upon her till this morning, she has kept so entirely indoors.'

Then the young men parted, and half-an-hour later the ingenuous Ladywell
came from the visitors' inn by the shore, a man walking behind him with a
quantity of artists' materials and appliances.  He went on board the
steamer, which this morning had performed the passage in safety.
Ethelberta single having been the loadstone in the cliffs that had
attracted Ladywell hither, Ethelberta married was the negative pole of
the same, sending him away.  And thus did a woman put an end to the only
opportunity of distinction, on Art-exhibition walls, that ever offered
itself to the tortuous ways, quaint alleys, and marbled bluffs of
Knollsea, as accessories in the picture of a winter sea.

Christopher's interest in the village was of the same evaporating nature.
He looked upon the sea, and the great swell, and the waves sending up a
sound like the huzzas of multitudes; but all the wild scene was irksome
now.  The ocean-bound steamers far away on the horizon inspired him with
no curiosity as to their destination; the house Ethelberta had occupied
was positively hateful; and he turned away to wait impatiently for the
hour at which he had promised to drive on to meet Sol at Corvsgate.

Sol and Chickerel plodded along the road, in order to skirt Enckworth
before the carrier came up.  Reaching the top of a hill on their way,
they paused to look down on a peaceful scene.  It was a park and wood,
glowing in all the matchless colours of late autumn, parapets and
pediments peering out from a central position afar.  At the bottom of the
descent before them was a lodge, to which they now descended.  The gate
stood invitingly open.  Exclusiveness was no part of the owner's
instincts: one could see that at a glance.  No appearance of a
well-rolled garden-path attached to the park-drive; as is the case with
many, betokening by the perfection of their surfaces their proprietor's
deficiency in hospitality.  The approach was like a turnpike road full of
great ruts, clumsy mendings; bordered by trampled edges and incursions
upon the grass at pleasure.  Butchers and bakers drove as freely herein
as peers and peeresses.  Christening parties, wedding companies, and
funeral trains passed along by the doors of the mansion without check or
question.  A wild untidiness in this particular has its recommendations;
for guarded grounds ever convey a suspicion that their owner is young to
landed possessions, as religious earnestnesss implies newness of
conversion, and conjugal tenderness recent marriage.

Half-an-hour being wanting as yet to Chickerel's time with the carrier,
Sol and himself, like the rest of the world when at leisure, walked into
the extensive stretch of grass and grove.  It formed a park so large that
not one of its owners had ever wished it larger, not one of its owner's
rivals had ever failed to wish it smaller, and not one of its owner's
satellites had ever seen it without praise.  They somewhat avoided the
roadway passing under the huge, misshapen, ragged trees, and through fern
brakes, ruddy and crisp in their decay.  On reaching a suitable eminence,
the father and son stood still to look upon the many-chimneyed building,
or rather conglomeration of buildings, to which these groves and glades
formed a setting.

'We will just give a glance,' said Chickerel, 'and then go away.  It
don't seem well to me that Ethelberta should have this; it is too much.
The sudden change will do her no good.  I never believe in anything that
comes in the shape of wonderful luck.  As it comes, so it goes.  Had she
been brought home today to one of those tenant-farms instead of these
woods and walls, I could have called it good fortune.  What she should
have done was glorify herself by glorifying her own line of life, not by
forsaking that line for another.  Better have been admired as a governess
than shunned as a peeress, which is what she will be.  But it is just the
same everywhere in these days.  Young men will rather wear a black coat
and starve than wear fustian and do well.'

'One man to want such a monstrous house as that!  Well, 'tis a fine
place.  See, there's the carpenters' shops, the timber-yard, and
everything, as if it were a little town.  Perhaps Berta may hire me for a
job now and then.'

'I always knew she would cut herself off from us.  She marked for it from
childhood, and she has finished the business thoroughly.'

'Well, it is no matter, father, for why should we want to trouble her?
She may write, and I shall answer; but if she calls to see me, I shall
not return the visit; and if she meets me with her husband or any of her
new society about her, I shall behave as a stranger.'

'It will be best,' said Chickerel.  'Well, now I must move.'

However, by the sorcery of accident, before they had very far retraced
their steps an open carriage became visible round a bend in the drive.
Chickerel, with a servant's instinct, was for beating a retreat.

'No,' said Sol.  'Let us stand our ground.  We have already been seen,
and we do no harm.'

So they stood still on the edge of the drive, and the carriage drew near.
It was a landau, and the sun shone in upon Lord Mountclere, with Lady
Mountclere sitting beside him, like Abishag beside King David.

Very blithe looked the viscount, for he rode upon a cherub to-day.  She
appeared fresh, rosy, and strong, but dubious; though if mien was
anything, she was a viscountess twice over.  Her dress was of a
dove-coloured material, with a bonnet to match, a little tufted white
feather resting on the top, like a truce-flag between the blood of noble
and vassal.  Upon the cool grey of her shoulders hung a few locks of
hair, toned warm as fire by the sunshiny addition to its natural hue.

Chickerel instinctively took off his hat; Sol did the same.

For only a moment did Ethelberta seem uncertain how to act.  But a
solution to her difficulty was given by the face of her brother.  There
she saw plainly at one glance more than a dozen speeches would have
told--for Sol's features thoroughly expressed his intention that to him
she was to be a stranger.  Her eyes flew to Chickerel, and he slightly
shook his head.  She understood them now.  With a tear in her eye for her
father, and a sigh in her bosom for Sol, she bowed in answer to their
salute; her husband moved his hat and nodded, and the carriage rolled on.
Lord Mountclere might possibly be making use of the fine morning in
showing her the park and premises.  Chickerel, with a moist eye, now went
on with his son towards the highroad.  When they reached the lodge, the
lodge-keeper was walking in the sun, smoking his pipe.  'Good morning,'
he said to Chickerel.

'Any rejoicings at the Court to-day?' the butler inquired.

'Quite the reverse.  Not a soul there.  'Tisn't knowed anywhere at all.  I
had no idea of such a thing till he brought my lady here.  Not going off,
neither.  They've come home like the commonest couple in the land, and
not even the bells allowed to ring.'

They walked along the public road, and the carrier came in view.

'Father,' said Sol, 'I don't think I'll go further with you.  She's gone
into the house; and suppose she should run back without him to try to
find us?  It would be cruel to disappoint her.  I'll bide about here for
a quarter of an hour, in case she should.  Mr. Julian won't have passed
Corvsgate till I get there.'

'Well, one or two of her old ways may be left in her still, and it is not
a bad thought.  Then you will walk the rest of the distance if you don't
meet Mr. Julian?  I must be in London by the evening.'

'Any time to-night will do for me.  I shall not begin work until
to-morrow, so that the four o'clock train will answer my purpose.'

Thus they parted, and Sol strolled leisurely back.  The road was quite
deserted, and he lingered by the park fence.

'Sol!' said a bird-like voice; 'how did you come here?'

He looked up, and saw a figure peering down upon him from the top of the
park wall, the ground on the inside being higher than the road.  The
speaker was to the expected Ethelberta what the moon is to the sun, a
star to the moon.  It was Picotee.

'Hullo, Picotee!' said Sol.

'There's a little gate a quarter of a mile further on,' said Picotee.  'We
can meet there without your passing through the big lodge.  I'll be there
as soon as you.'

Sol ascended the hill, passed through the second gate, and turned back
again, when he met Picotee coming forward under the trees.  They walked
together in this secluded spot.

'Berta says she wants to see you and father,' said Picotee breathlessly.
'You must come in and make yourselves comfortable.  She had no idea you
were here so secretly, and she didn't know what to do.'

'Father's gone,' said Sol.

'How vexed she will be!  She thinks there is something the matter--that
you are angry with her for not telling you earlier.  But you will come
in, Sol?'

'No, I can't come in,' said her brother.

'Why not?  It is such a big house, you can't think.  You need not come
near the front apartments, if you think we shall be ashamed of you in
your working clothes.  How came you not to dress up a bit, Sol?  Still,
Berta won't mind it much.  She says Lord Mountclere must take her as she
is, or he is kindly welcome to leave her.'

'Ah, well!  I might have had a word or two to say about that, but the
time has gone by for it, worse luck.  Perhaps it is best that I have said
nothing, and she has had her way.  No, I shan't come in, Picotee.  Father
is gone, and I am going too.'

'O Sol!'

'We are rather put out at her acting like this--father and I and all of
us.  She might have let us know about it beforehand, even if she is a
lady and we what we always was.  It wouldn't have let her down so
terrible much to write a line.  She might have learnt something that
would have led her to take a different step.'

'But you will see poor Berta?  She has done no harm.  She was going to
write long letters to all of you to-day, explaining her wedding, and how
she is going to help us all on in the world.'

Sol paused irresolutely.  'No, I won't come in,' he said.  'It would
disgrace her, for one thing, dressed as I be; more than that, I don't
want to come in.  But I should like to see her, if she would like to see
me; and I'll go up there to that little fir plantation, and walk up and
down behind it for exactly half-an-hour.  She can come out to me there.'
Sol had pointed as he spoke to a knot of young trees that hooded a knoll
a little way off.

'I'll go and tell her,' said Picotee.

'I suppose they will be off somewhere, and she is busy getting ready?'

'O no.  They are not going to travel till next year.  Ethelberta does not
want to go anywhere; and Lord Mountclere cannot endure this changeable
weather in any place but his own house.'

'Poor fellow!'

'Then you will wait for her by the firs?  I'll tell her at once.'

Picotee left him, and Sol went across the glade.




46. ENCKWORTH (continued)--THE ANGLEBURY HIGHWAY


He had not paced behind the firs more than ten minutes when Ethelberta
appeared from the opposite side.  At great inconvenience to herself, she
had complied with his request.

Ethelberta was trembling.  She took her brother's hand, and said, 'Is
father, then, gone?'

'Yes,' said Sol.  'I should have been gone likewise, but I thought you
wanted to see me.'

'Of course I did, and him too.  Why did you come so mysteriously, and, I
must say, unbecomingly?  I am afraid I did wrong in not informing you of
my intention.'

'To yourself you may have.  Father would have liked a word with you
before--you did it.'

'You both looked so forbidding that I did not like to stop the carriage
when we passed you.  I want to see him on an important matter--his
leaving Mrs. Doncastle's service at once.  I am going to write and beg
her to dispense with a notice, which I have no doubt she will do.'

'He's very much upset about you.'

'My secrecy was perhaps an error of judgment,' she said sadly.  'But I
had reasons.  Why did you and my father come here at all if you did not
want to see me?'

'We did want to see you up to a certain time.'

'You did not come to prevent my marriage?'

'We wished to see you before the marriage--I can't say more.'

'I thought you might not approve of what I had done,' said Ethelberta
mournfully.  'But a time may come when you will approve.'

'Never.'

'Don't be harsh, Sol.  A coronet covers a multitude of sins.'

'A coronet: good Lord--and you my sister!  Look at my hand.'  Sol
extended his hand.  'Look how my thumb stands out at the root, as if it
were out of joint, and that hard place inside there.  Did you ever see
anything so ugly as that hand--a misshaped monster, isn't he?  That comes
from the jackplane, and my pushing against it day after day and year
after year.  If I were found drowned or buried, dressed or undressed, in
fustian or in broadcloth, folk would look at my hand and say, "That man's
a carpenter."  Well now, how can a man, branded with work as I be, be
brother to a viscountess without something being wrong?  Of course
there's something wrong in it, or he wouldn't have married you--something
which won't be righted without terrible suffering.'

'No, no,' said she.  'You are mistaken.  There is no such wonderful
quality in a title in these days.  What I really am is second wife to a
quiet old country nobleman, who has given up society.  What more
commonplace?  My life will be as simple, even more simple, than it was
before.'

'Berta, you have worked to false lines.  A creeping up among the useless
lumber of our nation that'll be the first to burn if there comes a flare.
I never see such a deserter of your own lot as you be!  But you were
always like it, Berta, and I am ashamed of ye.  More than that, a good
woman never marries twice.'

'You are too hard, Sol,' said the poor viscountess, almost crying.  'I've
done it all for you!  Even if I have made a mistake, and given my
ambition an ignoble turn, don't tell me so now, or you may do more harm
in a minute than you will cure in a lifetime.  It is absurd to let
republican passions so blind you to fact.  A family which can be
honourably traced through history for five hundred years, does affect the
heart of a person not entirely hardened against romance.  Whether you
like the peerage or no, they appeal to our historical sense and love of
old associations.'

'I don't care for history.  Prophecy is the only thing can do poor men
any good.  When you were a girl, you wouldn't drop a curtsey to 'em,
historical or otherwise, and there you were right.  But, instead of
sticking to such principles, you must needs push up, so as to get girls
such as you were once to curtsey to you, not even thinking marriage with
a bad man too great a price to pay for't.'

'A bad man?  What do you mean by that?  Lord Mountclere is rather old,
but he's worthy.  What did you mean, Sol?'

'Nothing--a mere sommat to say.'

At that moment Picotee emerged from behind a tree, and told her sister
that Lord Mountclere was looking for her.

'Well, Sol, I cannot explain all to you now,' she said.  'I will send for
you in London.'  She wished him goodbye, and they separated, Picotee
accompanying Sol a little on his way.

Ethelberta was greatly perturbed by this meeting.  After retracing her
steps a short distance, she still felt so distressed and unpresentable
that she resolved not to allow Lord Mountclere to see her till the clouds
had somewhat passed off; it was but a bare act of justice to him to hide
from his sight such a bridal mood as this.  It was better to keep him
waiting than to make him positively unhappy.  She turned aside, and went
up the valley, where the park merged in miles of wood and copse.

She opened an iron gate and entered the wood, casually interested in the
vast variety of colours that the half-fallen leaves of the season wore:
more, much more, occupied with personal thought.  The path she pursued
became gradually involved in bushes as well as trees, giving to the spot
the character rather of a coppice than a wood.  Perceiving that she had
gone far enough, Ethelberta turned back by a path which at this point
intersected that by which she had approached, and promised a more direct
return towards the Court.  She had not gone many steps among the hazels,
which here formed a perfect thicket, when she observed a belt of holly-
bushes in their midst; towards the outskirts of these an opening on her
left hand directly led, thence winding round into a clear space of
greensward, which they completely enclosed.  On this isolated and mewed-
up bit of lawn stood a timber-built cottage, having ornamental
barge-boards, balconettes, and porch.  It was an erection interesting
enough as an experiment, and grand as a toy, but as a building
contemptible.

A blue gauze of smoke floated over the chimney, as if somebody was living
there; round towards the side some empty hen-coops were piled away; while
under the hollies were divers frameworks of wire netting and sticks,
showing that birds were kept here at some seasons of the year.

Being lady of all she surveyed, Ethelberta crossed the leafy sward, and
knocked at the door.  She was interested in knowing the purpose of the
peculiar little edifice.

The door was opened by a woman wearing a clean apron upon a not very
clean gown.  Ethelberta asked who lived in so pretty a place.

'Miss Gruchette,' the servant replied.  'But she is not here now.'

'Does she live here alone?'

'Yes--excepting myself and a fellow-servant.'

'Oh.'

'She lives here to attend to the pheasants and poultry, because she is so
clever in managing them.  They are brought here from the keeper's over
the hill.  Her father was a fancier.'

'Miss Gruchette attends to the birds, and two servants attend to Miss
Gruchette?'

'Well, to tell the truth, m'm, the servants do almost all of it.  Still,
that's what Miss Gruchette is here for.  Would you like to see the house?
It is pretty.'  The woman spoke with hesitation, as if in doubt between
the desire of earning a shilling and the fear that Ethelberta was not a
stranger.  That Ethelberta was Lady Mountclere she plainly did not dream.

'I fear I can scarcely stay long enough; yet I will just look in,' said
Ethelberta.  And as soon as they had crossed the threshold she was glad
of having done so.

The cottage internally may be described as a sort of boudoir extracted
from the bulk of a mansion and deposited in a wood.  The front room was
filled with nicknacks, curious work-tables, filigree baskets, twisted
brackets supporting statuettes, in which the grotesque in every case
ruled the design; love-birds, in gilt cages; French bronzes, wonderful
boxes, needlework of strange patterns, and other attractive objects.  The
apartment was one of those which seem to laugh in a visitor's face and on
closer examination express frivolity more distinctly than by words.

'Miss Gruchette is here to keep the fowls?' said Ethelberta, in a puzzled
tone, after a survey.

'Yes.  But they don't keep her.'

Ethelberta did not attempt to understand, and ceased to occupy her mind
with the matter.  They came from the cottage to the door, where she gave
the woman a trifling sum, and turned to leave.  But footsteps were at
that moment to be heard beating among the leaves on the other side of the
hollies, and Ethelberta waited till the walkers should have passed.  The
voices of two men reached herself and the woman as they stood.  They were
close to the house, yet screened from it by the holly-bushes, when one
could be heard to say distinctly, as if with his face turned to the
cottage--

'Lady Mountclere gone for good?'

'I suppose so.  Ha-ha!  So come, so go.'

The speakers passed on, their backs becoming visible through the opening.
They appeared to be woodmen.

'What Lady Mountclere do they mean?' said Ethelberta.

The woman blushed.  'They meant Miss Gruchette.'

'Oh--a nickname.'

'Yes.'

'Why?'

The woman whispered why in a story of about two minutes' length.
Ethelberta turned pale.

'Is she going to return?' she inquired, in a thin hard voice.

'Yes; next week.  You know her, m'm?'

'No.  I am a stranger.'

'So much the better.  I may tell you, then, that an old tale is flying
about the neighbourhood--that Lord Mountclere was privately married to
another woman, at Knollsea, this morning early.  Can it be true?'

'I believe it to be true.'

'And that she is of no family?'

'Of no family.'

'Indeed.  Then the Lord only knows what will become of the poor thing.
There will be murder between 'em.'

'Between whom?'

'Her and the lady who lives here.  She won't budge an inch--not she!'

Ethelberta moved aside.  A shade seemed to overspread the world, the sky,
the trees, and the objects in the foreground.  She kept her face away
from the woman, and, whispering a reply to her Good-morning, passed
through the hollies into the leaf-strewn path.  As soon as she came to a
large trunk she placed her hands against it and rested her face upon
them.  She drew herself lower down, lower, lower, till she crouched upon
the leaves.  'Ay--'tis what father and Sol meant!  O Heaven!' she
whispered.

She soon arose, and went on her way to the house.  Her fair features were
firmly set, and she scarcely heeded the path in the concentration which
had followed her paroxysm.  When she reached the park proper she became
aware of an excitement that was in progress there.

Ethelberta's absence had become unaccountable to Lord Mountclere, who
could hardly permit her retirement from his sight for a minute.  But at
first he had made due allowance for her eccentricity as a woman of
genius, and would not take notice of the half-hour's desertion,
unpardonable as it might have been in other classes of wives.  Then he
had inquired, searched, been alarmed: he had finally sent men-servants in
all directions about the park to look for her.  He feared she had fallen
out of a window, down a well, or into the lake.  The next stage of search
was to have been drags and grapnels: but Ethelberta entered the house.

Lord Mountclere rushed forward to meet her, and such was her contrivance
that he noticed no change.  The searchers were called in, Ethelberta
explaining that she had merely obeyed the wish of her brother in going
out to meet him.  Picotee, who had returned from her walk with Sol, was
upstairs in one of the rooms which had been allotted to her.  Ethelberta
managed to run in there on her way upstairs to her own chamber.

'Picotee, put your things on again,' she said.  'You are the only friend
I have in this house, and I want one badly.  Go to Sol, and deliver this
message to him--that I want to see him at once.  You must overtake him,
if you walk all the way to Anglebury.  But the train does not leave till
four, so that there is plenty of time.'

'What is the matter?' said Picotee.  'I cannot walk all the way.'

'I don't think you will have to do that--I hope not.'

'He is going to stop at Corvsgate to have a bit of lunch: I might
overtake him there, if I must!'

'Yes.  And tell him to come to the east passage door.  It is that door
next to the entrance to the stable-yard.  There is a little yew-tree
outside it.  On second thoughts you, dear, must not come back.  Wait at
Corvsgate in the little inn parlour till Sol comes to you again.  You
will probably then have to go home to London alone; but do not mind it.
The worst part for you will be in going from the station to the Crescent;
but nobody will molest you in a four-wheel cab: you have done it before.
However, he will tell you if this is necessary when he gets back.  I can
best fight my battles alone.  You shall have a letter from me the day
after to-morrow, stating where I am.  I shall not be here.'

'But what is it so dreadful?'

'Nothing to frighten you.'  But she spoke with a breathlessness that
completely nullified the assurance.  'It is merely that I find I must
come to an explanation with Lord Mountclere before I can live here
permanently, and I cannot stipulate with him while I am here in his
power.  Till I write, good-bye.  Your things are not unpacked, so let
them remain here for the present--they can be sent for.'

Poor Picotee, more agitated than her sister, but never questioning her
orders, went downstairs and out of the house.  She ran across the
shrubberies, into the park, and to the gate whereat Sol had emerged some
half-hour earlier.  She trotted along upon the turnpike road like a lost
doe, crying as she went at the new trouble which had come upon Berta,
whatever that trouble might be.  Behind her she heard wheels and the
stepping of a horse, but she was too concerned to turn her head.  The
pace of the vehicle slackened, however, when it was abreast of Picotee,
and she looked up to see Christopher as the driver.

'Miss Chickerel!' he said, with surprise.

Picotee had quickly looked down again, and she murmured, 'Yes.'

Christopher asked what he could not help asking in the circumstances,
'Would you like to ride?'

'I should be glad,' said she, overcoming her flurry.  'I am anxious to
overtake my brother Sol.'

'I have arranged to pick him up at Corvsgate,' said Christopher.

He descended, and assisted her to mount beside him, and drove on again,
almost in silence.  He was inclined to believe that some supernatural
legerdemain had to do with these periodic impacts of Picotee on his path.
She sat mute and melancholy till they were within half-a-mile of
Corvsgate.

'Thank you,' she said then, perceiving Sol upon the road, 'there is my
brother; I will get down now.'

'He was going to ride on to Anglebury with me,' said Julian.

Picotee did not reply, and Sol turned round.  Seeing her he instantly
exclaimed, 'What's the matter, Picotee?'

She explained to him that he was to go back immediately, and meet her
sister at the door by the yew, as Ethelberta had charged her.
Christopher, knowing them so well, was too much an interested member of
the group to be left out of confidence, and she included him in her
audience.

'And what are you to do?' said Sol to her.

'I am to wait at Corvsgate till you come to me.'

'I can't understand it,' Sol muttered, with a gloomy face.  'There's
something wrong; and it was only to be expected; that's what I say, Mr.
Julian.'

'If necessary I can take care of Miss Chickerel till you come,' said
Christopher.

'Thank you,' said Sol.  'Then I will return to you as soon as I can, at
the "Castle" Inn, just ahead.  'Tis very awkward for you to be so
burdened by us, Mr. Julian; but we are in a trouble that I don't yet see
the bottom of.'

'I know,' said Christopher kindly.  'We will wait for you.'

He then drove on with Picotee to the inn, which was not far off, and Sol
returned again to Enckworth.  Feeling somewhat like a thief in the night,
he zigzagged through the park, behind belts and knots of trees, until he
saw the yew, dark and clear, as if drawn in ink upon the fair face of the
mansion.  The way up to it was in a little cutting between shrubs, the
door being a private entrance, sunk below the surface of the lawn, and
invisible from other parts of the same front.  As soon as he reached it,
Ethelberta opened it at once, as if she had listened for his footsteps.

She took him along a passage in the basement, up a flight of steps, and
into a huge, solitary, chill apartment.  It was the ball-room.  Spacious
mirrors in gilt frames formed panels in the lower part of the walls, the
remainder being toned in sage-green.  In a recess between each mirror was
a statue.  The ceiling rose in a segmental curve, and bore sprawling upon
its face gilt figures of wanton goddesses, cupids, satyrs with
tambourines, drums, and trumpets, the whole ceiling seeming alive with
them.  But the room was very gloomy now, there being little light
admitted from without, and the reflections from the mirrors gave a
depressing coldness to the scene.  It was a place intended to look joyous
by night, and whatever it chose to look by day.

'We are safe here,' said she.  'But we must listen for footsteps.  I have
only five minutes: Lord Mountclere is waiting for me.  I mean to leave
this place, come what may.'

'Why?' said Sol, in astonishment.

'I cannot tell you--something has occurred.  God has got me in his power
at last, and is going to scourge me for my bad doings--that's what it
seems like.  Sol, listen to me, and do exactly what I say.  Go to
Anglebury, hire a brougham, bring it on as far as Little Enckworth: you
will have to meet me with it at one of the park gates later in the
evening--probably the west, at half-past seven.  Leave it at the village
with the man, come on here on foot, and stay under the trees till just
before six: it will then be quite dark, and you must stand under the
projecting balustrade a little further on than the door you came in by.  I
will just step upon the balcony over it, and tell you more exactly than I
can now the precise time that I shall be able to slip out, and where the
carriage is to be waiting.  But it may not be safe to speak on account of
his closeness to me--I will hand down a note.  I find it is impossible to
leave the house by daylight--I am certain to be pursued--he already
suspects something.  Now I must be going, or he will be here, for he
watches my movements because of some accidental words that escaped me.'

'Berta, I shan't have anything to do with this,' said Sol.  'It is not
right!'

'I am only going to Rouen, to Aunt Charlotte!' she implored.  'I want to
get to Southampton, to be in time for the midnight steamer.  When I am at
Rouen I can negotiate with Lord Mountclere the terms on which I will
return to him.  It is the only chance I have of rooting out a scandal and
a disgrace which threatens the beginning of my life here!  My letters to
him, and his to me, can be forwarded through you or through father, and
he will not know where I am.  Any woman is justified in adopting such a
course to bring her husband to a sense of her dignity.  If I don't go
away now, it will end in a permanent separation.  If I leave at once, and
stipulate that he gets rid of her, we may be reconciled.'

'I can't help you: you must stick to your husband.  I don't like them, or
any of their sort, barring about three or four, for the reason that they
despise me and all my sort.  But, Ethelberta, for all that I'll play fair
with them.  No half-and-half trimming business.  You have joined 'em, and
'rayed yourself against us; and there you'd better bide.  You have
married your man, and your duty is towards him.  I know what he is and so
does father; but if I were to help you to run away now, I should scorn
myself more than I scorn him.'

'I don't care for that, or for any such politics!  The Mountclere line is
noble, and how was I to know that this member was not noble, too?  As the
representative of an illustrious family I was taken with him, but as a
man--I must shun him.'

'How can you shun him?  You have married him!'

'Nevertheless, I won't stay!  Neither law nor gospel demands it of me
after what I have learnt.  And if law and gospel did demand it, I would
not stay.  And if you will not help me to escape, I go alone.'

'You had better not try any such wild thing.'

The creaking of a door was heard.  'O Sol,' she said appealingly, 'don't
go into the question whether I am right or wrong--only remember that I am
very unhappy.  Do help me--I have no other person in the world to ask!  Be
under the balcony at six o'clock.  Say you will--I must go--say you
will!'

'I'll think,' said Sol, very much disturbed.  'There, don't cry; I'll try
to be under the balcony, at any rate.  I cannot promise more, but I'll
try to be there.'

She opened in the panelling one of the old-fashioned concealed modes of
exit known as jib-doors, which it was once the custom to construct
without architraves in the walls of large apartments, so as not to
interfere with the general design of the room.  Sol found himself in a
narrow passage, running down the whole length of the ball-room, and at
the same time he heard Lord Mountclere's voice within, talking to
Ethelberta.  Sol's escape had been marvellous: as it was the viscount
might have seen her tears.  He passed down some steps, along an area from
which he could see into a row of servants' offices, among them a kitchen
with a fireplace flaming like an altar of sacrifice.  Nobody seemed to be
concerned about him; there were workmen upon the premises, and he nearly
matched them.  At last he got again into the shrubberies and to the side
of the park by which he had entered.

On reaching Corvsgate he found Picotee in the parlour of the little inn,
as he had directed.  Mr. Julian, she said, had walked up to the ruins,
and would be back again in a few minutes.  Sol ordered the horse to be
put in, and by the time it was ready Christopher came down from the hill.
Room was made for Sol by opening the flap of the dogcart, and Christopher
drove on.

He was anxious to know the trouble, and Sol was not reluctant to share
the burden of it with one whom he believed to be a friend.  He told,
scrap by scrap, the strange request of Ethelberta.  Christopher, though
ignorant of Ethelberta's experience that morning, instantly assumed that
the discovery of some concealed spectre had led to this precipitancy.

'When does she wish you to meet her with the carriage?'

'Probably at half-past seven, at the west lodge; but that is to be
finally fixed by a note she will hand down to me from the balcony.'

'Which balcony?'

'The nearest to the yew-tree.'

'At what time will she hand the note?'

'As the Court clock strikes six, she says.  And if I am not there to take
her instructions of course she will give up the idea, which is just what
I want her to do.'

Christopher begged Sol to go.  Whether Ethelberta was right or wrong, he
did not stop to inquire.  She was in trouble; she was too clear-headed to
be in trouble without good reason; and she wanted assistance out of it.
But such was Sol's nature that the more he reflected the more determined
was he in not giving way to her entreaty.  By the time that they reached
Anglebury he repented having given way so far as to withhold a direct
refusal.

'It can do no good,' he said mournfully.  'It is better to nip her notion
in its beginning.  She says she wants to fly to Rouen, and from there
arrange terms with him.  But it can't be done--she should have thought of
terms before.'

Christopher made no further reply.  Leaving word at the 'Red Lion' that a
man was to be sent to take the horse of him, he drove directly onwards to
the station.

'Then you don't mean to help her?' said Julian, when Sol took the
tickets--one for himself and one for Picotee.

'I serve her best by leaving her alone!' said Sol.

'I don't think so.'

'She has married him.'

'She is in distress.'

'She has married him.'

Sol and Picotee took their seats, Picotee upbraiding her brother.  'I can
go by myself!' she said, in tears.  'Do go back for Berta, Sol.  She said
I was to go home alone, and I can do it!'

'You must not.  It is not right for you to be hiring cabs and driving
across London at midnight.  Berta should have known better than propose
it.'

'She was flurried.  Go, Sol!'

But her entreaty was fruitless.

'Have you got your ticket, Mr. Julian?' said Sol.  'I suppose we shall go
together till we get near Melchester?'

'I have not got my ticket yet--I'll be back in two minutes.'

The minutes went by, and Christopher did not reappear.  The train moved
off: Christopher was seen running up the platform, as if in a vain hope
to catch it.

'He has missed the train,' said Sol.  Picotee looked disappointed, and
said nothing.  They were soon out of sight.

'God forgive me for such a hollow pretence!' said Christopher to himself.
'But he would have been uneasy had he known I wished to stay behind.  I
cannot leave her in trouble like this!'

He went back to the 'Red Lion' with the manner and movement of a man who
after a lifetime of desultoriness had at last found something to do.  It
was now getting late in the afternoon.  Christopher ordered a one-horse
brougham at the inn, and entering it was driven out of the town towards
Enckworth as the evening shades were beginning to fall.  They passed into
the hamlet of Little Enckworth at half-past five, and drew up at a beer-
house at the end.  Jumping out here, Julian told the man to wait till he
should return.

Thus far he had exactly obeyed her orders to Sol.  He hoped to be able to
obey them throughout, and supply her with the aid her brother refused.  He
also hoped that the change in the personality of her confederate would
make no difference to her intention.  That he was putting himself in a
wrong position he allowed, but time and attention were requisite for such
analysis: meanwhile Ethelberta was in trouble.  On the one hand was she
waiting hopefully for Sol; on the other was Sol many miles on his way to
town; between them was himself.

He ran with all his might towards Enckworth Park, mounted the lofty stone
steps by the lodge, saw the dark bronze figures on the piers through the
twilight, and then proceeded to thread the trees.  Among these he struck
a light for a moment: it was ten minutes to six.  In another five minutes
he was panting beneath the walls of her house.

Enckworth Court was not unknown to Christopher, for he had frequently
explored that spot in his Sandbourne days.  He perceived now why she had
selected that particular balcony for handing down directions; it was the
only one round the house that was low enough to be reached from the
outside, the basement here being a little way sunk in the ground.

He went close under, turned his face outwards, and waited.  About a foot
over his head was the stone floor of the balcony, forming a ceiling to
his position.  At his back, two or three feet behind, was a blank
wall--the wall of the house.  In front of him was the misty park, crowned
by a sky sparkling with winter stars.  This was abruptly cut off upward
by the dark edge of the balcony which overhung him.

It was as if some person within the room above had been awaiting his
approach.  He had scarcely found time to observe his situation when a
human hand and portion of a bare arm were thrust between the balusters,
descended a little way from the edge of the balcony, and remained hanging
across the starlit sky.  Something was between the fingers.  Christopher
lifted his hand, took the scrap, which was paper, and the arm was
withdrawn.  As it withdrew, a jewel on one of the fingers sparkled in the
rays of a large planet that rode in the opposite sky.

Light steps retreated from the balcony, and a window closed.  Christopher
had almost held his breath lest Ethelberta should discover him at the
critical moment to be other than Sol, and mar her deliverance by her
alarm.  The still silence was anything but silence to him; he felt as if
he were listening to the clanging chorus of an oratorio.  And then he
could fancy he heard words between Ethelberta and the viscount within the
room; they were evidently at very close quarters, and dexterity must have
been required of her.  He went on tiptoe across the gravel to the grass,
and once on that he strode in the direction whence he had come.  By the
thick trunk of one of a group of aged trees he stopped to get a light,
just as the Court clock struck six in loud long tones.  The transaction
had been carried out, through her impatience possibly, four or five
minutes before the time appointed.

The note contained, in a shaken hand, in which, however, the well-known
characters were distinguishable, these words in pencil:

'At half-past seven o'clock.  Just outside the north lodge; don't fail.'

This was the time she had suggested to Sol as that which would probably
best suit her escape, if she could escape at all.  She had changed the
place from the west to the north lodge--nothing else.  The latter was
certainly more secluded, though a trifle more remote from the course of
the proposed journey; there was just time enough and none to spare for
fetching the brougham from Little Enckworth to the lodge, the village
being two miles off.  The few minutes gained by her readiness at the
balcony were useful now.  He started at once for the village, diverging
somewhat to observe the spot appointed for the meeting.  It was
excellently chosen; the gate appeared to be little used, the lane outside
it was covered with trees, and all around was silent as the grave.  After
this hasty survey by the wan starlight, he hastened on to Little
Enckworth.

An hour and a quarter later a little brougham without lamps was creeping
along by the park wall towards this spot.  The leaves were so thick upon
the unfrequented road that the wheels could not be heard, and the horse's
pacing made scarcely more noise than a rabbit would have done in limping
along.  The vehicle progressed slowly, for they were in good time.  About
ten yards from the park entrance it stopped, and Christopher stepped out.

'We may have to wait here ten minutes,' he said to the driver.  'And then
shall we be able to reach Anglebury in time for the up mail-train to
Southampton?'

'Half-past seven, half-past eight, half-past nine--two hours.  O yes,
sir, easily.  A young lady in the case perhaps, sir?'

'Yes.'

'Well, I hope she'll be done honestly by, even if she is of humble
station.  'Tis best, and cheapest too, in the long run.'  The coachman
was apparently imagining the dove about to flit away to be one of the
pretty maid-servants that abounded in Enckworth Court; such escapades as
these were not unfrequent among them, a fair face having been deemed a
sufficient recommendation to service in that house, without too close an
inquiry into character, since the death of the first viscountess.

'Now then, silence; and listen for a footstep at the gate.'

Such calmness as there was in the musician's voice had been produced by
considerable effort.  For his heart had begun to beat fast and loud as he
strained his attentive ear to catch the footfall of a woman who could
only be his illegally.

The obscurity was as great as a starry sky would permit it to be.  Beneath
the trees where the carriage stood the darkness was total.




47. ENCKWORTH AND ITS PRECINCTS--MELCHESTER


To be wise after the event is often to act foolishly with regard to it;
and to preserve the illusion which has led to the event would frequently
be a course that omniscience itself could not find fault with.  Reaction
with Ethelberta was complete, and the more violent in that it threatened
to be useless.  Sol's bitter chiding had been the first thing to
discompose her fortitude.  It reduced her to a consciousness that she had
allowed herself to be coerced in her instincts, and yet had not triumphed
in her duty.  She might have pleased her family better by pleasing her
tastes, and have entirely avoided the grim irony of the situation
disclosed later in the day.

After the second interview with Sol she was to some extent composed in
mind by being able to nurse a definite intention.  As momentum causes the
narrowest wheel to stand upright, a scheme, fairly imbibed, will give the
weakest some power to maintain a position stoically.

In the temporary absence of Lord Mountclere, about six o'clock, she
slipped out upon the balcony and handed down a note.  To her relief, a
hand received it instantly.

The hour and a half wanting to half-past seven she passed with great
effort.  The main part of the time was occupied by dinner, during which
she attempted to devise some scheme for leaving him without suspicion
just before the appointed moment.

Happily, and as if by a Providence, there was no necessity for any such
thing.

A little while before the half-hour, when she moved to rise from dinner,
he also arose, tenderly begging her to excuse him for a few minutes, that
he might go and write an important note to his lawyer, until that moment
forgotten, though the postman was nearly due.  She heard him retire along
the corridor and shut himself into his study, his promised time of return
being a quarter of an hour thence.

Five minutes after that memorable parting Ethelberta came from the little
door by the bush of yew, well and thickly wrapped up from head to heels.
She skimmed across the park and under the boughs like a shade, mounting
then the stone steps for pedestrians which were fixed beside the park
gates here as at all the lodges.  Outside and below her she saw an oblong
shape--it was a brougham, and it had been drawn forward close to the
bottom of the steps that she might not have an inch further to go on foot
than to this barrier.  The whole precinct was thronged with trees; half
their foliage being overhead, the other half under foot, for the
gardeners had not yet begun to rake and collect the leaves; thus it was
that her dress rustled as she descended the steps.

The carriage door was held open by the driver, and she entered instantly.
He shut her in, and mounted to his seat.  As they drove away she became
conscious of another person inside.

'O! Sol--it is done!' she whispered, believing the man to be her brother.
Her companion made no reply.

Ethelberta, familiar with Sol's moods of troubled silence, did not press
for an answer.  It was, indeed, certain that Sol's assistance would have
been given under a sullen protest; even if unwilling to disappoint her,
he might well have been taciturn and angry at her course.

They sat in silence, and in total darkness.  The road ascended an
incline, the horse's tramp being still deadened by the carpet of leaves.
Then the large trees on either hand became interspersed by a low
brushwood of varied sorts, from which a large bird occasionally flew, in
its fright at their presence beating its wings recklessly against the
hard stems with force enough to cripple the delicate quills.  It showed
how deserted was the spot after nightfall.

'Sol?' said Ethelberta again.  'Why not talk to me?'

She now noticed that her fellow-traveller kept his head and his whole
person as snugly back in the corner, out of her way, as it was possible
to do.  She was not exactly frightened, but she could not understand the
reason.  The carriage gave a quick turn, and stopped.

'Where are we now?' she said.  'Shall we get to Anglebury by nine?  What
is the time, Sol?'

'I will see,' replied her companion.  They were the first words he had
uttered.

The voice was so different from her brother's that she was terrified; her
limbs quivered.  In another instant the speaker had struck a wax vesta,
and holding it erect in his fingers he looked her in the face.

'Hee-hee-hee!'  The laugher was her husband the viscount.

He laughed again, and his eyes gleamed like a couple of tarnished brass
buttons in the light of the wax match.

Ethelberta might have fallen dead with the shock, so terrible and hideous
was it.  Yet she did not.  She neither shrieked nor fainted; but no poor
January fieldfare was ever colder, no ice-house more dank with
perspiration, than she was then.

'A very pleasant joke, my dear--hee-hee!  And no more than was to be
expected on this merry, happy day of our lives.  Nobody enjoys a good
jest more than I do: I always enjoyed a jest--hee-hee!  Now we are in the
dark again; and we will alight and walk.  The path is too narrow for the
carriage, but it will not be far for you.  Take your husband's arm.'

While he had been speaking a defiant pride had sprung up in her,
instigating her to conceal every weakness.  He had opened the carriage
door and stepped out.  She followed, taking the offered arm.

'Take the horse and carriage to the stables,' said the viscount to the
coachman, who was his own servant, the vehicle and horse being also his.
The coachman turned the horse's head and vanished down the woodland track
by which they had ascended.

The viscount moved on, uttering private chuckles as numerous as a
woodpecker's taps, and Ethelberta with him.  She walked as by a miracle,
but she would walk.  She would have died rather than not have walked
then.

She perceived now that they were somewhere in Enckworth wood.  As they
went, she noticed a faint shine upon the ground on the other side of the
viscount, which showed her that they were walking beside a wet ditch.  She
remembered having seen it in the morning: it was a shallow ditch of mud.
She might push him in, and run, and so escape before he could extricate
himself.  It would not hurt him.  It was her last chance.  She waited a
moment for the opportunity.

'We are one to one, and I am the stronger!' she at last exclaimed
triumphantly, and lifted her hand for a thrust.

'On the contrary, darling, we are one to half-a-dozen, and you
considerably the weaker,' he tenderly replied, stepping back adroitly,
and blowing a whistle.  At once the bushes seemed to be animated in four
or five places.

'John?' he said, in the direction of one of them.

'Yes, my lord,' replied a voice from the bush, and a keeper came forward.

'William?'

Another man advanced from another bush.

'Quite right.  Remain where you are for the present.  Is Tomkins there?'

'Yes, my lord,' said a man from another part of the thicket.

'You go and keep watch by the further lodge: there are poachers about.
Where is Strongway?'

'Just below, my lord.'

'Tell him and his brother to go to the west gate, and walk up and down.
Let them search round it, among the trees inside.  Anybody there who
cannot give a good account of himself to be brought before me to-morrow
morning.  I am living at the cottage at present.  That's all I have to
say to you.'  And, turning round to Ethelberta: 'Now, dearest, we will
walk a little further if you are able.  I have provided that your friends
shall be taken care of.'  He tried to pull her hand towards him, gently,
like a cat opening a door.

They walked a little onward, and Lord Mountclere spoke again, with
imperturbable good-humour:

'I will tell you a story, to pass the time away.  I have learnt the art
from you--your mantle has fallen upon me, and all your inspiration with
it.  Listen, dearest.  I saw a young man come to the house to-day.
Afterwards I saw him cross a passage in your company.  You entered the
ball-room with him.  That room is a treacherous place.  It is panelled
with wood, and between the panels and the walls are passages for the
servants, opening from the room by doors hidden in the woodwork.  Lady
Mountclere knew of one of these, and made use of it to let out her
conspirator; Lord Mountclere knew of another, and made use of it to let
in himself.  His sight is not good, but his ears are unimpaired.  A
meeting was arranged to take place at the west gate at half-past seven,
unless a note handed from the balcony mentioned another time and place.
He heard it all--hee-hee!

'When Lady Mountclere's confederate came for the note, I was in waiting
above, and handed one down a few minutes before the hour struck,
confirming the time, but changing the place.  When Lady Mountclere handed
down her note, just as the clock was striking, her confederate had gone,
and I was standing beneath the balcony to receive it.  She dropped it
into her husband's hands--ho-ho-ho-ho!

'Lord Mountclere ordered a brougham to be at the west lodge, as fixed by
Lady Mountclere's note.  Probably Lady Mountclere's friend ordered a
brougham to be at the north gate, as fixed by my note, written in
imitation of Lady Mountclere's hand.  Lady Mountclere came to the spot
she had mentioned, and like a good wife rushed into the arms of her
husband--hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo!'

As if by an ungovernable impulse, Ethelberta broke into laughter
also--laughter which had a wild unnatural sound; it was hysterical.  She
sank down upon the leaves, and there continued the fearful laugh just as
before.

Lord Mountclere became greatly frightened.  The spot they had reached was
a green space within a girdle of hollies, and in front of them rose an
ornamental cottage.  This was the building which Ethelberta had visited
earlier in the day: it was the Petit Trianon of Enckworth Court.

The viscount left her side and hurried forward.  The door of the building
was opened by a woman.

'Have you prepared for us, as I directed?'

'Yes, my lord; tea and coffee are both ready.'

'Never mind that now.  Lady Mountclere is ill; come and assist her
indoors.  Tell the other woman to bring wine and water at once.'

He returned to Ethelberta.  She was better, and was sitting calmly on the
bank.  She rose without assistance.

'You may retire,' he said to the woman who had followed him, and she
turned round.  When Ethelberta saw the building, she drew back quickly.

'Where is the other Lady Mountclere?' she inquired.

'Gone!'

'She shall never return--never?'

'Never.  It was not intended that she should.'

'That sounds well.  Lord Mountclere, we may as well compromise matters.'

'I think so too.  It becomes a lady to make a virtue of a necessity.'

'It was stratagem against stratagem.  Mine was ingenious; yours was
masterly!  Accept my acknowledgment.  We will enter upon an armed
neutrality.'

'No.  Let me be your adorer and slave again, as ever.  Your beauty,
dearest, covers everything!  You are my mistress and queen!  But here we
are at the door.  Tea is prepared for us here.  I have a liking for life
in this cottage mode, and live here on occasion.  Women, attend to Lady
Mountclere.'

The woman who had seen Ethelberta in the morning was alarmed at
recognizing her, having since been informed officially of the marriage:
she murmured entreaties for pardon.  They assisted the viscountess to a
chair, the door was closed, and the wind blew past as if nobody had ever
stood there to interrupt its flight.

* * * * *

Full of misgivings, Christopher continued to wait at the north gate.  Half-
past seven had long since been past, and no Ethelberta had appeared.  He
did not for the moment suppose the delay to be hers, and this gave him
patience; having taken up the position, he was induced by fidelity to
abide by the consequences.  It would be only a journey of two hours to
reach Anglebury Station; he would ride outside with the driver, put her
into the train, and bid her adieu for ever.  She had cried for help, and
he had heard her cry.

At last through the trees came the sound of the Court clock striking
eight, and then, for the first time, a doubt arose in his mind whether
she could have mistaken the gate.  She had distinctly told Sol the west
lodge; her note had expressed the north lodge.  Could she by any accident
have written one thing while meaning another?  He entered the carriage,
and drove round to the west gate.  All was as silent there as at the
other, the meeting between Ethelberta and Lord Mountclere being then long
past; and he drove back again.

He left the carriage, and entered the park on foot, approaching the house
slowly.  All was silent; the windows were dark; moping sounds came from
the trees and sky, as from Sorrow whispering to Night.  By this time he
felt assured that the scheme had miscarried.  While he stood here a
carriage without lights came up the drive; it turned in towards the
stable-yard without going to the door.  The carriage had plainly been
empty.

Returning across the grass by the way he had come, he was startled by the
voices of two men from the road hard by.

'Have ye zeed anybody?'

'Not a soul.'

'Shall we go across again?'

'What's the good? let's home to supper.'

'My lord must have heard somebody, or 'a wouldn't have said it.'

'Perhaps he's nervous now he's living in the cottage again.  I thought
that fancy was over.  Well, I'm glad 'tis a young wife he's brought us.
She'll have her routs and her rackets as well as the high-born ones,
you'll see, as soon as she gets used to the place.'

'She must be a queer Christian to pick up with him.'

'Well, if she've charity 'tis enough for we poor men; her faith and hope
may be as please God.  Now I be for on-along homeward.'

As soon as they had gone Christopher moved from his hiding, and, avoiding
the gravel-walk, returned to his coachman, telling him to drive at once
to Anglebury.

Julian was so impatient of the futility of his adventure that he wished
to annihilate its existence.  On reaching Anglebury he determined to get
on at once to Melchester, that the event of the night might be summarily
ended; to be still in the neighbourhood was to be still engaged in it.  He
reached home before midnight.

Walking into their house in a quiet street, as dissatisfied with himself
as a man well could be who still retained health and an occupation, he
found Faith sitting up as usual.  His news was simple: the marriage had
taken place before he could get there, and he had seen nothing of either
ceremony or viscountess.  The remainder he reserved for a more convenient
season.

Edith looked anxiously at him as he ate supper, smiling now and then.

'Well, I am tired of this life,' said Christopher.

'So am I,' said Faith.  'Ah, if we were only rich!'

'Ah, yes.'

'Or if we were not rich,' she said, turning her eyes to the fire.  'If we
were only slightly provided for, it would be better than nothing.  How
much would you be content with, Kit?'

'As much as I could get.'

'Would you be content with a thousand a year for both of us?'

'I daresay I should,' he murmured, breaking his bread.

'Or five hundred for both?'

'Or five hundred.'

'Or even three hundred?'

'Bother three hundred.  Less than double the sum would not satisfy me.  We
may as well imagine much as little.'

Faith's countenance had fallen.  'O Kit,' she said, 'you always
disappoint me.'

'I do.  How do I disappoint you this time?'

'By not caring for three hundred a year--a hundred and fifty each--when
that is all I have to offer you.'

'Faith!' said he, looking up for the first time.  'Ah--of course!  Lucy's
will.  I had forgotten.'

'It is true, and I had prepared such a pleasant surprise for you, and now
you don't care!  Our cousin Lucy did leave us something after all.  I
don't understand the exact total sum, but it comes to a hundred and fifty
a year each--more than I expected, though not so much as you deserved.
Here's the letter.  I have been dwelling upon it all day, and thinking
what a pleasure it would be; and it is not after all!'

'Good gracious, Faith, I was only supposing.  The real thing is another
matter altogether.  Well, the idea of Lucy's will containing our names!  I
am sure I would have gone to the funeral had I known.'

'I wish it were a thousand.'

'O no--it doesn't matter at all.  But, certainly, three hundred for two
is a tantalizing sum: not enough to enable us to change our condition,
and enough to make us dissatisfied with going on as we are.'

'We must forget we have it, and let it increase.'

'It isn't enough to increase much.  We may as well use it.  But how?  Take
a bigger house--what's the use?  Give up the organ?--then I shall be
rather worse off than I am at present.  Positively, it is the most
provoking amount anybody could have invented had they tried ever so long.
Poor Lucy, to do that, and not even to come near us when father died. . .
.  Ah, I know what we'll do.  We'll go abroad--we'll live in Italy.'




SEQUEL. ANGLEBURY--ENCKWORTH--SANDBOURNE


Two years and a half after the marriage of Ethelberta and the evening
adventures which followed it, a man young in years, though considerably
older in mood and expression, walked up to the 'Red Lion' Inn at
Anglebury.  The anachronism sat not unbecomingly upon him, and the voice
was precisely that of the Christopher Julian of heretofore.  His way of
entering the inn and calling for a conveyance was more off-hand than
formerly; he was much less afraid of the sound of his own voice now than
when he had gone through the same performance on a certain chill evening
the last time that he visited the spot.  He wanted to be taken to
Knollsea to meet the steamer there, and was not coming back by the same
vehicle.

It was a very different day from that of his previous journey along the
same road; different in season; different in weather; and the humour of
the observer differed yet more widely from its condition then than did
the landscape from its former hues.  In due time they reached a
commanding situation upon the road, from which were visible knots and
plantations of trees on the Enckworth manor.  Christopher broke the
silence.

'Lord Mountclere is still alive and well, I am told?'

'O ay.  He'll live to be a hundred.  Never such a change as has come over
the man of late years.'

'Indeed!'

'O, 'tis my lady.  She's a one to put up with!  Still, 'tis said here and
there that marrying her was the best day's work that he ever did in his
life, although she's got to be my lord and my lady both.'

'Is she happy with him?'

'She is very sharp with the pore man--about happy I don't know.  He was a
good-natured old man, for all his sins, and would sooner any day lay out
money in new presents than pay it in old debts.  But 'tis altered now.
'Tisn't the same place.  Ah, in the old times I have seen the floor of
the servants' hall over the vamp of your boot in solid beer that we had
poured aside from the horns because we couldn't see straight enough to
pour it in.  See?  No, we couldn't see a hole in a ladder!  And now, even
at Christmas or Whitsuntide, when a man, if ever he desires to be
overcome with a drop, would naturally wish it to be, you can walk out of
Enckworth as straight as you walked in.  All her doings.'

'Then she holds the reins?'

'She do!  There was a little tussle at first; but how could a old man
hold his own against such a spry young body as that!  She threatened to
run away from him, and kicked up Bob's-a-dying, and I don't know what
all; and being the woman, of course she was sure to beat in the long run.
Pore old nobleman, she marches him off to church every Sunday as regular
as a clock, makes him read family prayers that haven't been read in
Enckworth for the last thirty years to my certain knowledge, and keeps
him down to three glasses of wine a day, strict, so that you never see
him any the more generous for liquor or a bit elevated at all, as it used
to be.  There, 'tis true, it has done him good in one sense, for they say
he'd have been dead in five years if he had gone on as he was going.'

'So that she's a good wife to him, after all.'

'Well, if she had been a little worse 'twould have been a little better
for him in one sense, for he would have had his own way more.  But he was
a curious feller at one time, as we all know and I suppose 'tis as much
as he can expect; but 'tis a strange reverse for him.  It is said that
when he's asked out to dine, or to anything in the way of a jaunt, his
eye flies across to hers afore he answers: and if her eye says yes, he
says yes: and if her eye says no, he says no.  'Tis a sad condition for
one who ruled womankind as he, that a woman should lead him in a string
whether he will or no.'

'Sad indeed!'

'She's steward, and agent, and everything.  She has got a room called "my
lady's office," and great ledgers and cash-books you never see the like.
In old times there were bailiffs to look after the workfolk, foremen to
look after the tradesmen, a building-steward to look after the foremen, a
land-steward to look after the building-steward, and a dashing grand
agent to look after the land-steward: fine times they had then, I assure
ye.  My lady said they were eating out the property like a honeycomb, and
then there was a terrible row.  Half of 'em were sent flying; and now
there's only the agent, and the viscountess, and a sort of surveyor man,
and of the three she does most work so 'tis said.  She marks the trees to
be felled, settles what horses are to be sold and bought, and is out in
all winds and weathers.  There, if somebody hadn't looked into things
'twould soon have been all up with his lordship, he was so very
extravagant.  In one sense 'twas lucky for him that she was born in
humble life, because owing to it she knows the ins and outs of
contriving, which he never did.'

'Then a man on the verge of bankruptcy will do better to marry a poor and
sensible wife than a rich and stupid one.  Well, here we are at the tenth
milestone.  I will walk the remainder of the distance to Knollsea, as
there is ample time for meeting the last steamboat.'

When the man was gone Christopher proceeded slowly on foot down the hill,
and reached that part of the highway at which he had stopped in the cold
November breeze waiting for a woman who never came.  He was older now,
and he had ceased to wish that he had not been disappointed.  There was
the lodge, and around it were the trees, brilliant in the shining greens
of June.  Every twig sustained its bird, and every blossom its bee.  The
roadside was not muffled in a garment of dead leaves as it had been then,
and the lodge-gate was not open as it always used to be.  He paused to
look through the bars.  The drive was well kept and gravelled; the grass
edgings, formerly marked by hoofs and ruts, and otherwise trodden away,
were now green and luxuriant, bent sticks being placed at intervals as a
protection.

While he looked through the gate a woman stepped from the lodge to open
it.  In her haste she nearly swung the gate into his face, and would have
completely done so had he not jumped back.

'I beg pardon, sir,' she said, on perceiving him.  'I was going to open
it for my lady, and I didn't see you.'

Christopher moved round the corner.  The perpetual snubbing that he had
received from Ethelberta ever since he had known her seemed about to be
continued through the medium of her dependents.

A trotting, accompanied by the sound of light wheels, had become
perceptible; and then a vehicle came through the gate, and turned up the
road which he had come down.  He saw the back of a basket carriage, drawn
by a pair of piebald ponies.  A lad in livery sat behind with folded
arms; the driver was a lady.  He saw her bonnet, her shoulders, her
hair--but no more.  She lessened in his gaze, and was soon out of sight.

He stood a long time thinking; but he did not wish her his.

In this wholesome frame of mind he proceeded on his way, thankful that he
had escaped meeting her, though so narrowly.  But perhaps at this remote
season the embarrassment of a rencounter would not have been intense.  At
Knollsea he entered the steamer for Sandbourne.

Mr. Chickerel and his family now lived at Firtop Villa, in that place, a
house which, like many others, had been built since Julian's last visit
to the town.  He was directed to the outskirts, and into a fir plantation
where drives and intersecting roads had been laid out, and where new
villas had sprung up like mushrooms.  He entered by a swing gate, on
which 'Firtop' was painted, and a maid-servant showed him into a neatly-
furnished room, containing Mr. Chickerel, Mrs. Chickerel, and Picotee,
the matron being reclined on a couch, which improved health had permitted
her to substitute for a bed.

He had been expected, and all were glad to see again the sojourner in
foreign lands, even down to the ladylike tabby, who was all purr and
warmth towards him except when she was all claws and nippers.  But had
the prime sentiment of the meeting shown itself it would have been the
unqualified surprise of Christopher at seeing how much Picotee's face had
grown to resemble her sister's: it was less a resemblance in contours
than in expression and tone.

They had an early tea, and then Mr. Chickerel, sitting in a patriarchal
chair, conversed pleasantly with his guest, being well acquainted with
him through other members of the family.  They talked of Julian's
residence at different Italian towns with his sister; of Faith, who was
at the present moment staying with some old friends in Melchester: and,
as was inevitable, the discourse hovered over and settled upon
Ethelberta, the prime ruler of the courses of them all, with little
exception, through recent years.

'It was a hard struggle for her,' said Chickerel, looking reflectively
out at the fir trees.  'I never thought the girl would have got through
it.  When she first entered the house everybody was against her.  She had
to fight a whole host of them single-handed.  There was the viscount's
brother, other relations, lawyers, ladies, servants, not one of them was
her friend; and not one who wouldn't rather have seen her arrive there in
evil relationship with him than as she did come.  But she stood her
ground.  She was put upon her mettle; and one by one they got to feel
there was somebody among them whose little finger, if they insulted her,
was thicker than a Mountclere's loins.  She must have had a will of iron;
it was a situation that would have broken the hearts of a dozen ordinary
women, for everybody soon knew that we were of no family, and that's what
made it so hard for her.  But there she is as mistress now, and everybody
respecting her.  I sometimes fancy she is occasionally too severe with
the servants and I know what service is.  But she says it is necessary,
owing to her birth; and perhaps she is right.'

'I suppose she often comes to see you?'

'Four or five times a year,' said Picotee.

'She cannot come quite so often as she would,' said Mrs. Chickerel,
'because of her lofty position, which has its juties.  Well, as I always
say, Berta doesn't take after me.  I couldn't have married the man even
though he did bring a coronet with him.'

'I shouldn't have cared to let him ask ye,' said Chickerel.  'However,
that's neither here nor there--all ended better than I expected.  He's
fond of her.'

'And it is wonderful what can be done with an old man when you are his
darling,' said Mrs. Chickerel.

'If I were Berta I should go to London oftener,' said Picotee, to turn
the conversation.  'But she lives mostly in the library.  And, O, what do
you think?  She is writing an epic poem, and employs Emmeline as her
reader.'

'Dear me.  And how are Sol and Dan?  You mentioned them once in your
letters,' said Christopher.

'Berta has set them up as builders in London.'

'She bought a business for them,' said Chickerel.  'But Sol wouldn't
accept her help for a long time, and now he has only agreed to it on
condition of paying her back the money with interest, which he is doing.
They have just signed a contract to build a hospital for twenty thousand
pounds.'

Picotee broke in--'You knew that both Gwendoline and Cornelia married two
years ago, and went to Queensland?  They married two brothers, who were
farmers, and left England the following week.  Georgie and Myrtle are at
school.'

'And Joey?'

'We are thinking of making Joseph a parson,' said Mrs. Chickerel.

'Indeed! a parson.'

'Yes; 'tis a genteel living for the boy.  And he's talents that way.
Since he has been under masters he knows all the strange sounds the old
Romans and Greeks used to make by way of talking, and the love stories of
the ancient women as if they were his own.  I assure you, Mr. Julian, if
you could hear how beautiful the boy tells about little Cupid with his
bow and arrows, and the rows between that pagan apostle Jupiter and his
wife because of another woman, and the handsome young gods who kissed
Venus, you'd say he deserved to be made a bishop at once!'

The evening advanced, and they walked in the garden.  Here, by some
means, Picotee and Christopher found themselves alone.

'Your letters to my sister have been charming,' said Christopher.  'And
so regular, too.  It was as good as a birthday every time one arrived.'

Picotee blushed and said nothing.

Christopher had full assurance that her heart was where it always had
been.  A suspicion of the fact had been the reason of his visit here to-
day.

'Other letters were once written from England to Italy, and they acquired
great celebrity.  Do you know whose?'

'Walpole's?' said Picotee timidly.

'Yes; but they never charmed me half as much as yours.  You may rest
assured that one person in the world thinks Walpole your second.'

'You should not have read them; they were not written to you.  But I
suppose you wished to hear of Ethelberta?'

'At first I did,' said Christopher.  'But, oddly enough, I got more
interested in the writer than in her news.  I don't know if ever before
there has been an instance of loving by means of letters.  If not, it is
because there have never been such sweet ones written.  At last I looked
for them more anxiously than Faith.'

'You see, you knew me before.'  Picotee would have withdrawn this remark
if she could, fearing that it seemed like a suggestion of her love long
ago.

'Then, on my return, I thought I would just call and see you, and go away
and think what would be best for me to do with a view to the future.  But
since I have been here I have felt that I could not go away to think
without first asking you what you think on one point--whether you could
ever marry me?'

'I thought you would ask that when I first saw you.'

'Did you.  Why?'

'You looked at me as if you would.'

'Well,' continued Christopher, 'the worst of it is I am as poor as Job.
Faith and I have three hundred a year between us, but only half is mine.
So that before I get your promise I must let your father know how poor I
am.  Besides what I mention, I have only my earnings by music.  But I am
to be installed as chief organist at Melchester soon, instead of deputy,
as I used to be; which is something.'

'I am to have five hundred pounds when I marry.  That was Lord
Mountclere's arrangement with Ethelberta.  He is extremely anxious that I
should marry well.'

'That's unfortunate.  A marriage with me will hardly be considered well.'

'O yes, it will,' said Picotee quickly, and then looked frightened.

Christopher drew her towards him, and imprinted a kiss upon her cheek, at
which Picotee was not so wretched as she had been some years before when
he mistook her for another in that performance.

'Berta will never let us come to want,' she said, with vivacity, when she
had recovered.  'She always gives me what is necessary.'

'We will endeavour not to trouble her,' said Christopher, amused by
Picotee's utter dependence now as ever upon her sister, as upon an
eternal Providence.  'However, it is well to be kin to a coach though you
never ride in it.  Now, shall we go indoors to your father?  You think he
will not object?'

'I think he will be very glad,' replied Picotee.  'Berta will, I know.'









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