On this day, therefore, began my brief reign as Queen of the Wells. Mr. Walsingham was one of the first to salute me. With courtly grace he bowed low, saying —
“We greet our Queen, and trust her Majesty is in health and spirits.”
Then all the gentlemen round formed a lane, down which we walked, my old courtier marching backwards.
The scene, Mrs. Esther said afterwards, reminded her of a certain day long ago, when they crowned a Queen of Beauty at Bagnigge Wells, in the presence of the Lord Mayor, her father.
To be sure, it was a very pretty sight to watch all these gallants making legs and handling their canes with such grace as each could command, some of them having studied in those noble schools of manners, the salons of Paris or the reception-rooms of great ladies in London. Yet it was certain to me that not one of them could compare with my lord – my own lord, I mean.
Presently we came upon Lady Levett and her party, when, after a few words of kind greeting from her ladyship, and an admonition not to believe more of what I was told than I knew to be true, we divided, Nancy coming with me and Mrs. Esther remaining with Lady Levett. The music was playing and the sun shining, but a fine air blew from the Downs, and we were beneath the shade of the trees. We sat upon one of the benches, and the gentlemen gathered round us.
“Gentlemen,” said Nancy, “I am the Queen’s maid of honour. You may all of you do your best to amuse her Majesty – and me. We give you permission to exhaust yourselves in making the court happy.”
What were they to do? What had they to offer? There was a bull-baiting in the market at which my maid of honour cried fie! There was a match with quarterstaves on the Downs for the afternoon, but that met with little favour.
“We need not leave home,” said Nancy, “to see two stout fellows bang each other about the head with sticks. That amusement may be witnessed any summer evening, with grinning through a horse-collar and fighting with gloves on the village green at home. Pray go on to the next amusement on the list. The cock-pit you can leave out.”
One young gentleman proposed that we might play with pantines, a ridiculous fashion of paper doll then in vogue as a toy for ladies with nothing to do: another that we should go hear the ingenious Mr. King lecture on Astronomy: another that we should raffle for chocolate creams: another that we should do nothing at all, “for,” said he, “why do we come to the Wells but for rest and quiet? and if Miss Pleydell and her maid of honour do but grant us the privilege of beholding their charms, what need we of anything but rest?
“‘To walk and dine, and walk and sup,
To fill the leisure moments up,
Idly enough but to the few
Who’ve really nothing else to do.
Yet here the sports exulting reign,
And laughing loves, a num’rous train;
Here Beauty holds her splendid court,
And flatt’ring pleasures here resort.’”
I, for one, should have enjoyed the witnessing of a little sport better than the homage of lovers.
“Here is Miss Peggy Baker,” cried Nancy, jumping up. “Oh! I must speak to my dear friend Miss Peggy.”
Miss Baker was walking slowly down the Terrace, accompanied by her little troop of admirers. At sight of us her face clouded for a moment, but she quickly recovered and smiled a languid greeting.
“Dear Miss Peggy,” cried Nancy – I knew she was going to say something mischievous – “you come in the nick of time.”
“Pray command me,” she replied graciously.
“It is a simple question” – Miss Baker looked suspicious. “Oh! a mere trifle” – Miss Baker looked uneasy. “It is only – pray, gentlemen, were any of you in the book-shop this morning?”
All protested that they were not – a denial which confirmed my opinion that impertinence was coming.
“Nay,” said Nancy, “we all know the truthfulness of gallants, which is as notorious as their constancy. Had you been there you would not have paid Miss Pleydell those pretty compliments which are as well deserved as they are sincere. But, Miss Peggy, a scandalous report hath got abroad. They say that you said, this morning, at the book-shop, that Kitty Pleydell’s eyes squinted.”
“Oh! oh!” cried Mr. Walsingham, holding up his hands, and all the rest cried “Oh! oh!” and held up theirs.
“I vow and protest,” cried Peggy Baker, blushing very much. “I vow and protest – ”
“I said,” interrupted Nancy, “that it was the cruellest slander. You are all good-nature. Stand up, Kitty dear. Now tell us, Miss Peggy, before all these gentlemen, do those eyes squint?”
“Certainly not,” said poor Peggy, in great confusion.
“Look at them well,” continued Nancy. “Brown eyes, full and clear – eyes like an antelope. Saw any one eyes more straight!”
“Never,” said Peggy, fanning herself violently.
“Or more beautiful eyes?”
“Never,” replied Miss Peggy.
“There,” said Nancy, “I knew it. I said that from the lips of Miss Peggy Baker nothing but kind words can fall. You hear, gentlemen; women are sometimes found who can say good things of each other: and if we find the malicious person who dared report that Miss Peggy Baker said such a thing, I hope you will duck her in the horse-pond.”
Miss Peggy bowed to us with her most languishing air, and passed on. Nancy held up her hands, while the gentlemen looked at one another and laughed.
“Oh, calumny!” she cried. “To say that Kitty’s eyes were askew!”
For there had been a discussion at the book-shop that morning, in which the name of Miss Pleydell was frequently mentioned; and her person, bearing, and face were all particularly dwelt upon. Miss Baker, as usual in their parliaments, spoke oftenest, and with the most animation. She possessed, on such occasions, an insight into the defects of women that was truly remarkable, and a power of representing them to others which, while it was eloquent and persuasive, perhaps erred on the side of exaggeration. She summed up what she had to say in these kind words —
“After all, one could forgive fine clothes worn as if the girl had never had a dress on fit to be seen before, and manners like a hoyden trying to seem a nun, and the way of dancing taught to the cits who go to Sadler’s Wells, and a sunburnt complexion, and hands as big as my fan – all these things are rustic, and might be cured – or endured. But I cannot forgive her squint!”
And now she had to recant publicly, and confess that there was no squint at all.
This audacious trick of Nancy’s was, you may be sure, immediately spread abroad, so that for that day at least the unfortunate creature found the people looking after and laughing wherever she went. Naturally, she hated me, who really had done her no harm at all, more and more.
The gentlemen, or one among them, I knew not who, offered this evening a general tea-drinking with the music. It was served under the trees upon the open walk, and was very gay and merry. After the tea, when the day began to decline, we went to the rooms where, though there was no dancing, there was talking and laughing, in one room, and in the other games of cards of every kind – cribbage, whist, quadrille, hazard, and lansquenet. We wandered round the tables, watching the players intent upon the chances of the cards. I thought of poor Sir Miles Lackington, who might, had it not been for his love of gaming, have been now, as he began, a country gentleman with a fine estate. In this room we found Lord Chudleigh. He was not playing, but was looking on at a table where sat a young gentleman and an officer in the army. He did not see us, and, under pretence of watching the play of a party of four ladies playing quadrille, one of whom was Lady Levett, I sat down to watch him. Was he a gambler?
I presently discovered that he was not looking at the game, but the players. Presently he laid his hand upon the shoulder of the younger man, and said, in a quiet voice —
“Now, Eardesley, you have had enough. This gentleman knows the game better than you.”
“I hope, my lord,” cried the other player, springing to his feet, “that your lordship doth not insinuate – ”
“I speak what I mean, sir. Lord Eardesley will, if he takes my advice, play no more with you.”
“Your lordship,” cried the gentleman in scarlet, “will perhaps remember that you are speaking to a gentleman – ”
“Who left Bath, a fortnight ago, under such circumstances as makes it the more necessary for me to warn my friend. No, sir,” – his eye grew hard, and his face stern. “No, sir. Do not bluster or threaten. I will neither play with you, nor suffer my friends to play with you; nor, sir, will I fight with you, unless you happen to attack me upon the road. And, sir, if I see you here to-morrow, the master of the ceremonies will put you to the door by means of his lackeys. Come, Eardesley.”
The gamester, thus roundly accused, began to bluster. His honour was at stake; he had been grossly insulted; he would have the satisfaction of a gentleman; he would let his lordship know that his rank should not protect him. With these noble sentiments, he left the room, and the Wells saw him no more.
Then, seeing me alone, for I had escaped from my court, being weary of compliments and speeches, he came to my chair.
“I saw you, my lord,” I said, “rescue that young gentleman from the man who, I suppose, would have won his money. Is it prudent to engage in such quarrels?”
“The young gentleman,” he replied, “is, in a sense, my ward. The man is a notorious sharper, who hath been lately expelled from Bath, and will now, I think, find it prudent to leave the Wells. I hope, Miss Kitty, that you do not like gaming?”
“Indeed, my lord, I do not know if I should like what I have never tried. ’Tis the first time I have seen card-playing.”
“Then you must have been brought up in a nunnery.”
“Not quite that, but in a village, where, as I have already told you, my father was vicar. I do not know any games of cards.”
“How did you amuse yourself in your village?”
“I read, made puddings, worked samplers, cut out and sewed my dresses, and learned lessons with Nancy Levett.”
“The pretty little girl who is always laughing? She should always remain young – never grow old and grave. What else did you do?”
“We had a choir for the Sunday psalms – many people came every Sunday to hear us sing. That was another occupation. Then I used to ride with the boys, or sometimes we would go fishing, or nutting, or black-berrying – oh! there was plenty to do, and the days were never too long.”
“A better education than most ladies can show,” he replied, with his quiet air of authority.
“And you, my lord. Do you never play cards?”
“No,” he replied. “Pray do not question me further on my favourite vices, Miss Kitty. I would not confess all my sins even to so charming and so kind a confessor as yourself.”
“I forgive you, my lord,” I said, “beforehand. Especially if you promise to abandon them all.”
“There are sins,” he said slowly, “which sometimes leave behind them consequences which can never be forgotten or undone.”
Alas! I knew what he meant. His sin had left him burdened with a wife – a creature who had been so wicked as to take advantage of his wickedness; a woman whom he feared to hear of and already loathed. Poor wife! poor sinner! poor Kitty!
CHAPTER VI
HOW THE DOCTOR WROTE TO KITTY
The next morning at dinner, we heard the summons of the post-boy’s horn, and Cicely presently ran in with a letter in her hand. It was addressed to me, in a large bold handwriting, and was sealed with red wax. I opened it and found a smaller letter inside it, marked “Private. For my niece’s eye alone.” So that both letters were from my uncle, the Doctor.
“Your private letter,” said Mrs. Esther, “doubtless contains some admonition or advice designed for you alone. Put it in your pocket, child, and read it in your own room. As for the other letter, as it is not marked private, it would be well for you to read it aloud, after dinner, and while we are eating one of my Lord Chudleigh’s delicious peaches.”
To this I willingly complied, because I greatly feared the private letter would contain some instructions concerning the secret which the Doctor and I possessed between us. Accordingly, the dinner over, I began the perusal of my uncle’s letter.
“My dear Niece, – You will first of all, and before reading any further, convey my dutiful respects to the lady by whose goodness you have been placed in a position as much above what you could have wished, as her benevolence is above the ordinary experience of mortals.”
“Oh, the excellent man!” cried Mrs. Esther.
“I have to report that, under Providence, I am well in health, and in all respects doing well; the occupation in which I am now engaged having received a stimulus by the threatening of a new Act for the prevention of (so-called) unlawful marriages. The increase in the number of applicants for marriage hath also (as is natural) caused an increase in the upstarts and pretenders who claim to have received canonical orders, being most of them as ignorant as a butcher’s block, and no more ordained than the fellows who bang a cushion in a conventicle. The clergymen of London complain that the parsons of the Fleet take away their parishioners, and deprive them of their fees: they cannot say that I, who never take less than a guinea, undersell them. You will be glad to learn that Sir Miles Lackington hath left this place. He hath lately received a legacy from a cousin of a small estate, and hath made an arrangement with his creditors, by virtue of which his detainers are now removed. Nevertheless, we expect him back before long, being well assured that the same temptation and vice of gambling, which brought him here before, will again beset him. Yet he promiseth brave things. We gave him a farewell evening, in which his health was toasted, and more punch drunk than was good for the heads of some present, among whom were gentlemen members of the Utter Bar, from the two Temples and Lincoln’s Inn, with many others, and honourable company.
“It will also be a pleasure to you to learn that the ingenious Mr. Stallabras is also at large. Probably he, too, will return to us ere long. For the present his sole detaining creditor, who had supplied him for years with such articles of apparel (at second-hand) as were necessary for his decent appearance on the credit of his future glory, agreed to take ten guineas in full discharge of a bill for forty, which the poet could never hope to pay, nor the tradesman to receive. The calling of poet is at best but a poor one, nor should I counsel any one to practise the writing of verse unless he be a man of fortune, like Mr. Alexander Pope (unfortunately a Papist), or a Fellow of some substantial college, such as the Houses of Trinity, Peter, and Christ, at Cambridge, like Mr. Ray. Nor is there any greater unhappiness than to draw a bill, to speak after the manner of merchants, upon your future success and industry, and to be compelled to discount it. He hath now conceived the idea of a tragedy and of an epic poem. The first he will endeavour to produce at Drury Lane as soon as it is written: the second he will immediately get subscribed among his friends and patrons. Unfortunately he has already obtained subscriptions, for a volume of verses, and, having eaten the subscriptions, cannot now find a publisher: in truth, I believe the verses are not yet written. This melancholy accident obliges him to seek for new patrons. I wish him well.
“It is, my dear niece, with the greatest satisfaction that I learn you have, with Mrs. Esther, gone to Epsom. The situation of the place, the purity of the air upon the Downs, the salubrity of the waters, the gaiety of the company, will, I hope, all be conducive to the health of that most excellent lady, your best friend – ”
“Oh, the good man!” cried Mrs. Esther.
“To whom I charge you be dutiful, obedient, and careful in the smallest punctilio. The cheerfulness of the amusements (if Epsom be the same as when I once visited it, when tutor to a young gentleman of quality) should communicate to her spirits something of the joy with which I could now wish her to regard the world. As for yourself, my child, I am under no apprehension but that music, gay companions, and your time of life will together make you as mirthful as is possible for human being. Remember, however, that happiness is but for a season: that mirth must never pass beyond the bound of good manners: and that when a woman is no longer young, the reputation she has earned as a girl remains with her, even to the grave. Wherefore, Kitty, be circumspect. The town news is but little: the (so-styled) young Pretender is said to be moving again, but little importance is now attached to his doings, and for the moment the Protestant dynasty seems firm. But Heaven knows – ”
Here followed a quantity of news about the ministers, the Houses of Parliament, the foreign news, and so forth, which I omit.
“I have seen a sermon, published this year by one Laurence Sterne, on ‘Conscience,’ which I would commend to Mrs. Pimpernel. I also commend to you Dr. Samuel Johnson’s ‘Vanity of Human Wishes,’ and the first number of the ‘Rambler,’ of which I hear great things. Mr. Henry Fielding hath produced a novel called ‘Tom Jones,’ of which the town is talking. I mention it here in order that you may be cautioned against a book whose sole merit is the faithful delineation of scenes and characters shocking to the female moralist. For the same reason I would have thee beware of Mr. Smollett’s ‘Peregrine Pickle,’ in which, as a man who knows – alas! the wickedness of the world, I find a great deal to commend.
“The weather has been strangely hot even for July, and fever is rife in this neighbourhood. I hear that the Bishop of London threatens me with pains and penalties. I have sent word to his lordship, that if he will not allow me to marry, I will bury, and that at such prices as will leave his clergy nothing but the fees of the paupers, beggars, and malefactors.
“I think that I have no more news to send. I would that I were able to send thee such tidings as might be looked for in a London letter; but I know not what actor is carrying away all hearts, nor what lady is the reigning toast, nor what is the latest fashion in cardinal, sack, patch, or tie-wig, nor anything at all that is dear to the hearts of an assembly on the Terrace of Epsom. Therefore, with my duty to Mrs. Pimpernel, – I remain, my dear niece, your loving uncle,
“Gregory Shovel, Doctor of Divinity.
“Post Scriptum.– I enclose herewith a short letter of admonition, which thou mayest read by thyself, as such things are not interesting to Mistress Pimpernel.”
“Now,” cried Mrs. Esther, “was there ever such a man? Living in such a place, he preserves his virtue: among such dregs and offscourings of mankind he stands still erect, proclaiming and preaching Christian virtue. O Kitty! why was not that man made a bishop? Sure, there is no other position in the world fit for him. With what eloquence would he defend Christian faith? With what righteous indignation would he not expel evil-doers?”
I did not dare to ask, which of course occurred to me, what indignation he would show against such as violated the law by marrying in the Fleet.
“Now,” I said, “with your permission, madam, I will retire, in order to read my uncle’s private letter of admonition.”
I opened the short note in fear; yet there was nothing alarming in it.
“My dear Niece, – I add a word to say that Lord Chudleigh is going to visit Epsom, and hath either engaged or been offered the mansion of Durdans for the summer: perhaps he is already there. It may be that you will make his acquaintance: in any case you cannot fail of being interested in his doings. Since his visit to the Fleet, I hear that he has been afflicted with a continual melancholy, of which you and I know the cause. He has also led a very regular and almost monastic life, reproaching himself continually for that lapse from temperance which led to what he regards as the curse of his life.
“Child, if he pays you attentions, receive them with such coquettish allurements as your sex knows how to hang out. On this point I cannot advise. But if he is attracted by more showy and more beautiful women” – I looked at the glass and smiled – “then be careful not to exhibit any jealousy or anger. Remember that jealousy and anger have ruined many a femina furens, or raging woman. Let things go on, as if nothing of all that you and I wot of had happened. He will be watched, and at the right time will be called upon to acknowledge his wife. Such a return for the evil done me by his father shall be mine. And with such a return of good for evil, a brilliant position for yourself. If he should fall in love, if he hath not already done so, with another woman, you would, in one moment, blast his hopes, trample on all that he held dear, and make him ridiculous, a criminal, and a deceiver. But it is at all times a more Christian thing for a man to fall in love with his own wife.
“Remember, my dear Kitty, I place the utmost reliance on thy good sense. Above all, no woman’s jealousies, rages, and fits of madness. These things will only do thee harm.
“Your loving uncle,“Gregory Shovel, Doctor of Divinity.”
Were one a stock or a stone; had one no feelings; were one destitute of pity, sympathy, and compassion, these letters might have been useful as guides to conduct. But the thing had happened to me which my uncle, in his worldly wisdom, could never calculate upon: I had fallen in love with Lord Chudleigh: I was passionately anxious that he should fall in love with me. What room, in such a condition of mind as was this man, for advice so cold, so interested as this? Return good for evil? What had I to do with that? I wanted to wreak no vengeance on my lord: I would have surrounded him with love, and been willing to become his servant, his slave, anything, if only he would forgive me, take me for his sweetheart, and make me his wife. But to lay those snares: to look on coldly while he made love to other women: to wait my time, so as to bring shame and remorse upon that noble heart – that, Kitty, was impossible. Yet I could not write to my uncle things which he could not understand. I could not say that I repented and was very sorry: that I loved my lord, and was determined to inflict no harm upon him: and that, if he chose to fall in love with another woman – who was I, indeed, that he should love me? – I was firmly resolved that no act or word of mine should injure him, even though I had to stand in the church and see him with my own eyes married to that other – that happy woman – before the altar.