“Now,” added Eleonora, “Camilla has made me understand that nothing will induce her to let papa consent; and though I know he would, if he were left to himself, I also see how all this family must hate and loathe the connection.”
“May I ask, has Frank ever spoken?”
“Oh no! I think he implied it all to Camilla when she bade him wait till our return, fancying, I suppose, that one could forget the other.”
“But why does she seem so friendly with him?”
“It is her way; she can’t be other than smooth and caressing, and likes to have young men about; and I try to be grave and distant, because—the sooner he is cured of me the better for him,” she uttered, with a sob; “but when he is there, and I see those grieved eyes of his, I can’t keep it up! And papa does like him! Oh! if Camilla would but leave us alone! See here, Jenny!” and she showed, on her watch-chain, a bit of ruddy polished pebble. “Is it wrong to keep this? He and I found the stone in two halves, on the beach, the last day we were together, and had them set, pretending to one another it was only play. Sometimes I think I ought to send mine back; I know he has his, he let me see it one day. Do you think I ought to give it up?”
“Why should you?”
“Because then he would know that it must be all over.”
“But is it all over? Within, I mean?”
“Jenny, you know better!”
“Then, Lenore, if so, and it is only your sister who objects, not your father himself, ought you to torment poor Frank by acting indifference when you do not feel it?”
“Am I untrue? I never thought of that. I thought I should be sacrificing myself for his good!”
“His good? O, Lenore, I believe it is the worst wrong a woman can do a man, to let him think he has wasted his heart upon her, and that she is trifling with him. You don’t know what a bad effect this is having, even on his prospects. He cannot get his brain or spirits free to work for his examination.”
“How hard it is to know what is right! Here have I been thinking that what made me so miserable must be the best for him, and would it not make it all the worse to relax, and let him see?”
“I do not think so,” returned Jenny. “His spirits would not be worn by doubt of you—the worst doubt of all: and he would feel that he had something to strive for.”
Eleonora walked on for some steps in silence, then exclaimed, “Yes, but there’s his family. It would only stir up trouble for them there. They can’t approve of me.”
“They don’t know you. When they do, they will. Now they only see what looks like—forgive me, Lena—caprice and coquetry; they will know you in earnest, if you will let them.”
“You don’t mean that they know anything about it!” exclaimed Eleonora.
Jenny almost laughed. “Not know where poor Frank’s heart is? You don’t guess how those sons live with their mother!”
“I suppose I have forgotten what sincerity and openness are,” said Eleonora, sadly. “But is not she very much vexed?”
“She was vexed to find it had gone so deep with him,” said Jenny; “but I know that you can earn her affection and trust by being staunch and true yourself—and it is worth having, Lena!”
For Jenny knew Eleonora of old, through Emily’s letters, and had no doubt of her rectitude, constancy, and deep principle, though she was at the present time petrified by constant antagonism to such untruthfulness as, where it cannot corrupt, almost always hardens those who come in contact with it. And this cruel idea of self-sacrifice was, no doubt, completing the indurating process.
Jenny knew the terrible responsibility of giving such advice. She had not done it lightly. She had been feeling for years past that “’Tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all;” and she knew that uncertainty of the right to love and trust would have been a pang beyond all she had suffered. To give poor Eleonora, situated as she now was, admission to the free wholesome atmosphere of the Charnock family, was to her kind heart irresistible; and it was pleasant to feel the poor girl clinging to her, as people do to those who have given the very counsel the heart craved for.
It was twilight when the walk was over, and the drawing-room was empty; but Anne came to invite them to Mrs. Poynsett’s tea, saying that Cecil had Lady Tyrrell in her own sitting-room. Perhaps Mrs. Poynsett had not realized who was Jenny’s companion, for she seemed startled at their entrance; and Jenny said, “You remember Lenore Vivian?”
“I must have seen you as a child,” said Mrs. Poynsett, courteously. “You are very like your sister.”
This, though usually a great compliment, disappointed Eleonora, as she answered, rather frigidly, “So people say.”
“Have you walked far?”
“To the Outwood Lodge.”
“To-day? Was it not very damp in the woods?”
“Oh no, delightful!”
“Lena and I are old friends,” said Jenny; “too glad to meet to heed the damp.”
Here Raymond entered, with the air of a man who had just locked up a heavy post-bag at the last possible moment; and he too was amazed, though he covered it by asking why the party was so small.
“Rosamond has gone to meet her husband, and Cecil has her guest in her own domains.”
Then Jenny asked after his day’s work—a county matter, interesting to all the magistracy, and their womankind in their degree; and Eleonora listened in silence, watching with quiet heedfulness Frank’s mother and brother.
When Frank himself came in, his face was a perfect study; and the colour mantled in her cheeks, so that Jenny trusted that both were touched by the wonderful beauty that a little softness and timidity brought out on the features, usually so resolutely on guard. But when, in the later evening, Jenny crept in to her old friend, hoping to find that the impression had been favourable, she only heard, “Exactly like her sister, who always had the making of a fine countenance.”
“The mask—yes, but Lena has the spirit behind the mask. Poor girl! she is not at all happy in the atmosphere her sister has brought home.”
“Then I wish they would marry her!”
“Won’t you believe how truly nice and good she is?”
“That will not make up for the connection. My heart sank, Jenny, from the time I heard that those Vivians were coming back. I kept Frank away as long as I could—but there’s no help for it. It seems the fate of my boys to be the prey of those sirens.”
“Well, then, dear Mrs. Poynsett, do pray believe, on my word, that Eleonora is a different creature!”
“Is there no hope of averting it? I thought Camilla would—poor Frank is such insignificant game!”
“And when it does come, don’t be set against her, please, dear Mrs. Poynsett. Be as kind to her—as you were to me,” whispered Jenny, nestling up, and hiding her face.
“My dear, but I knew you! You were no such case.”
“Except that you all were horribly vexed with us, because we couldn’t help liking each other,” said Jenny.
“Ah! my poor child! I only wish you could have liked any one else!”
“Do you?” said Jenny, looking up. “Oh no, you don’t! You would not have me for your supplementary child, if I had,” she added playfully; then very low—“It is because the thought of dear Archie, even ending as it did, is my very heart’s joy, that I want you to let them have theirs!”
And then came a break, which ended the pleading; and Jenny was obliged to leave Compton without much notion as to the effect of her advice, audacious as she knew it to have been.
CHAPTER XIV
Neither Land Nor Water
A light that never was on sea or land.
—WORDSWORTH
Nothing could be prettier than Rosamond’s happiness in welcoming her school-boy brothers, and her gratitude to Mrs. Poynsett for inviting them, declaring that she liked boys. Her sons, however, dreaded the inroad of two wild Irish lads, and held council what covers and what horses could most safely be victimized to them, disregarding all testimony in their favour from interested parties. When, therefore, Terence and Thomas de Lancey made their appearance, and were walked in for exhibition by their proud and happy sister, there was some surprise at the sight of two peculiarly refined, quiet boys, with colourless complexions, soft, sleepy, long-lashed, liquid brown eyes, the lowest of full voices, and the gentlest of manners, as if nothing short of an explosion could rouse them.
And it was presently manifest that their sister had said rather too little than too much of Terry’s abilities. Not only had he brought home a huge pile of prizes, but no sooner was the séance after dinner broken up, than he detained Julius, saying, in a very meek and modest tone, “Rose says you know all the books in the library.”
“Rose undertakes a great deal for me. What is this the prelude to?”
“I wanted to ask if I might just look at any book about the physical geography of Italy, or the History of Venice, or the Phœnicians.”
“Why, Terry?”
“It is for the Prize Essay,” explained the boy; “the subject is the effect of the physical configuration of a country upon the character of a nation.”
Julius drew a long breath, astounded at the march of intellect since his time. “They don’t expect such things of fellows like you!” he said.
“Only of the sixth, but the fifth may go in for it, and I want to get up to the Doctor himself; I thought, as I was coming to such a jolly library, I might try; and if I do pretty well, I shall be put up, if any more fellows leave. Do you think I may use the books? I’m librarian, so I know how to take care of them.”
“You can be trusted for that, you book-worm,” said Julius; “here’s the library, but I fear I don’t know much about those modern histories. My mother is a great reader, and will direct us. Let us come to her.”
Quiet as Terry was, he was neither awkward nor shy; and when Julius had explained his wishes, and Mrs. Poynsett had asked a few good-natured questions, she was charmed as well as surprised at the gentle yet eager modesty with which the low-pitched tones detailed the ideas already garnered up, and inquired for authorities, in which to trace them out, without the least notion of the remarkable powers he was evincing. She was delighted with the boy; Julius guided his researches; and he went off to bed as happy as a king, with his hands full of little dark tarnished French duodecimos, and with a ravenous appetite for the pasture ground he saw before him. Lower Canada had taught him French, and the stores he found were revelry to him.
Cecil’s feelings may be better guessed than described when the return of Mudie’s box was hastened that he might have Motley’s Dutch Republic. She thought this studiousness mere affectation; but it was indisputable that Terry’s soul was in books, and that he never was so happy as when turned loose into the library, dipping here and there, or with an elbow planted on either side of a folio.
Offers of gun or horse merely tormented him, and only his sister could drag him out by specious pleas of need, to help in those Christmas works, where she had much better assistance in Anne and the curates—the one for clubs and coals, the other for decorations.
Mrs. Poynsett was Terry’s best friend. He used to come to her in the evening and discuss what he had been reading till she was almost as keen about his success as Frank’s. He talked over his ambition, of getting a scholarship, becoming a fellow, and living for ever among the books, for which the scanty supply in his wandering boyhood had but whetted his fervour. He even confided to her what no one else knew but his sister Aileen, his epic in twenty-four books on Brian Boromhe and the Battle of Clontarf; and she was mother enough not to predict its inevitable fate, nor audibly to detect the unconscious plagiarisms, but to be a better listener than even Aileen, who never could be withheld from unfeeling laughter at the touching fate of the wounded warriors who were tied to stakes that they might die fighting.
Tom was a more ordinary youth, even more lazy and quiet in the house, though out of it he amazed Frank and Charlie by his dash, fire, and daring, and witched all the stable-world with noble horsemanship. Hunting was prevented, however, by a frost, which filled every one with excitement as to the practicability of skating.
The most available water was a lake between Sirenwood and Compton; and here, like eagles to the slaughter, gathered, by a sort of instinct, the entire skating population of the neighbourhood on the first day that the ice was hard enough. Rosamond was there, of course, with both her brothers, whom she averred, by a bold figure of speech, to have skated in Canada before they could walk. Anne was there, studying the new phenomena of ice and snow under good-natured Charlie’s protection, learning the art with unexpected courage and dexterity. Cecil was there but not shining so much, for her father had been always so nervous about his darling venturing on the ice, that she had no skill in the art; and as Raymond had been summoned to some political meeting, she had no special squire, as her young brother-in-law eluded the being enlisted in her service; and she began to decide that skating was irrational and unwomanly; although Lady Tyrrell had just arrived, and was having her skates put on; and Eleonora was only holding back because she was taking care of the two purple-legged, purple-faced, and purple-haired little Duncombes, whom she kept sliding in a corner, where they could hardly damage themselves or the ice.
Cecil had just thanked Colonel Ross for pushing her in a chair, and on his leaving her was deliberating whether to walk home with her dignity, or watch for some other cavalier, when the drag drew up on the road close by, and from it came Captain and Mrs. Duncombe, with two strangers, who were introduced to her as ‘Mrs. Tallboys and the Professor, just fetched from the station.’
The former was exquisitely dressed in blue velvet and sealskin, and had the transparent complexion and delicate features of an American, with brilliant eyes, and a look of much cleverness; her husband, small, sallow, and dark, and apparently out of health. “Are you leaving off skating, Cecil?” asked Mrs. Duncombe; “goodness me, I could go on into next year! But if you are wasting your privileges, bestow them on Mrs. Tallboys, for pity’s sake. We came in hopes some good creature had a spare pair of skates. Gussie Moy offered, but hers were yards too long.”
“I hope mine are not too small,” said Cecil, not quite crediting that an American foot could be as small as that of a Charnock; but she found herself mistaken, they were a perfect fit; and as they were tried, there came a loud laugh, and she saw a tall girl standing by her, whom, in her round felt hat and thick rough coat with metal buttons, she had really taken for one of the Captain’s male friends.
“I wouldn’t have such small feet,” she said; “I shouldn’t feel secure of my understanding.”
“Mrs. Tallboys would not change with you, Gussie,” said Captain Duncombe. “I’d back her any day—”
“What odds will you take, Captain—”
But Mrs. Duncombe broke in. “Bless me, if there aren’t those little dogs of mine! Lena Vivian does spoil them. Send them home, for pity’s sake, Bob.”
“Poor little kids, they are doing no harm.”
“We shall have them tumbling in, and no end of a row! I can’t stand a swarm of children after me, and they are making a perfect victim of Lena. Send them home, Bob, or I shall have to do it.”
The Captain obeyed somewhat ruefully. “Come, my lads, Bessie says you must go home, and leave Miss Vivian in peace.”
“O, Bob, please let us stay; Lena is taking care of us—”
“Indeed I like nothing so well,” protested Lenore; but the Captain murmured something about higher powers, and cheerfully saying he would give the boys a run, took each by an unwilling hand, and raced them into a state of frightened jollity by a short cut, by which he was able to dispose of them in the drag.
The Professor, meanwhile, devoted himself to Mrs. Charnock Poynsett, took her chair for a whirl on the ice; described American sleighing parties; talked of his tour in Europe. He was really a clever, observant man, and Cecil had not had any one to talk Italy to her for a long time past, and responded with all her full precision. The Professor might speak a little through his nose, but she had seldom met any one more polite and accomplished.
Meantime, a quadrille was being got up. Such a performance and such partners had never been seen in light that shone on water or on land, being coupled by their dexterity in the art. They were led off by Mrs. Duncombe and the Reverend James Bindon. Mrs. Tallboys paired with Terry De Lancey, Lady Tyrrell with Herbert Bowater, Lady Rosamond with one of the officers. Tom was pounced on by the great ‘Gussy Moy,’ who declared, to his bitter wrath, that she preferred little boys, turning her back on Mr. Strangeways and two or three more officers, as she saw them first solicitous to engage Eleonora Vivian—who, however, was to skate with Charlie.
A few wistful glances were cast towards the Wil’sbro’ road, for Frank had been obliged by the cruel exigencies of the office to devote this magnificent frosty day to the last agonies of cram. This, however, had gone on better for the last fortnight—owing, perhaps, to some relaxation of Eleonora’s stern guard over her countenance in their few meetings since Jenny’s departure.
“And after all,” as Charlie said, with the cheeriness of one who has passed his own ordeal, “a man who had taken such a degree as Frank could not depend on a few weeks of mere cramming.”
Frank did come speedily up the road just as the quadrille was in full force; and perhaps the hindrance had stood him in good stead; for when the performance ceased in the twilight, and voices were eagerly talking of renewing it as a fackel-tanz in the later evening, and only yielding at the recollection of dinner engagements, it was not Charlie who was taking off Eleonora’s skates; and when, after fixing grand plans for the morrow, Lady Tyrrell mounted her pony-carriage and looked for her sister, she heard that Miss Vivian was walking home.
Yes, Miss Vivian was walking home; and there was a companion by her side feeling as if that dark, hard gravelled road were the pebbly beach of Rockpier.
“When do you go to London?” she asked.
“To-morrow afternoon. Wish me well through, Lenore.”
“Indeed I do.”
“Say it again, Lenore! Give me the elixir that will give me power to conquer everything.”
“Don’t say such exaggerated things.”
“Do you think it is possible to me to exaggerate what a word from you is to me?” said Frank, in a low voice of intense feeling.
“O Frank! it is wiser not to say such things.”
“Wise! what is that to me? It is true, and you have known it—and why will you not allow that you do, as in those happy old days—”
“That’s what makes me fear. It would be so much better for you if all this had never begun.”
“It has begun, then!” murmured Frank, with joy and triumph in the sound. “As long as you allow that, it is enough for me.”
“I must! It is true; and truth must be somewhere!” was whispered in a strange, low, resolute whisper.
“True! true that you can feel one particle of the intensity—Oh! what words can I find to make you understand the glow and tenderness the very thought of you has been!”
“Hush, hush!—pray, Frank. Now, if I do own it—”
“It—what? Let me hear! I’m very stupid, you know!” said Frank, in a voice of exulting comprehension, belying his alleged stupidity.
“What you have been to me—”
“Have been—eh?” said this cruel cross-examiner.
“Do not let us waste time,” said Eleonora, in a trembling voice; “you know very well.”
“Do I?”
“Now, Frank!”
“If you only knew what it would be worth to me to hear you say it!”
“I’m afraid it would be only worth pain and grief to you, and anger from every one,” said she, in a low dejected voice, “far more than I am worth.”
“You? Trust me to judge of that, Lenore. Would not you be worth all, and more than all, that flesh or spirit could feel! I could face it all for one look from you!” said Frank, with fervour from his heart of hearts.
“You make me more and more afraid. It is all too wretched to lead any one into. Since I knew the whole truth, I have tried to spare you from it.”
“That is why you have been so cold, and held so cruelly aloof all this time, so that if I had not caught one ray now and then, you would have broken my heart, Lenore; as it is, I’ve been wretched beyond description, hardly able to sleep by night or speak rationally by day. How had you the heart to serve me so, like a stony Greek statue?”
“I thought it must be right. It seemed to break my own heart too.”
“That’s the woman’s way of showing a thing is right; but why I can’t see. If you did hate me, it might be all very well to throw me over; but if not, why torture two as well as one? Are you afraid of my people? I’ll manage them.”
“You little know—”
“Know what?”
“All that made it cruel in Camilla to throw us together.”
“Cruel! when it was the crowning joy of my past life, and is to be the crowning joy of the future?”
“How can it? Frank, you must know the causes your mother has for abhorring any connection with our unhappy family.”
“My mother has too much sense to think a little extravagance among the men of a family can affect the daughters. I know the outer world is afraid of her, but she is the tenderest and most indulgent of mothers to us. No fear of her!”
“Ah! but that’s not all.”
“You mean that she has not taken much to your sister. I know; and I’m very sorry; but bring them together, and it would soon be got over. Besides, it is not your sister, but you. What do you mean?” rather disconcerted.
“Then you really did not know of the old engagement between Camilla and your eldest brother?”
“Oh, oh! So she consented once! Then she will do so again.”
“Listen! Camilla broke it off because your mother could not resign her position to her.”
He gave a whistle of dismay, then recovering himself with a laugh, said, “Fourth sons don’t have such expectations founded on them. Don’t fear, dearest; that can’t be all the story, though no doubt it was part of it. My mother would rather go into a hermitage than stand in the way of Raymond’s happiness. Some one must have made mischief.”
“It was not all,” said the girl; “it was Lord Tyrrell’s coming in the way. Yes, my father told me so; he held it up to me as an example of what one ought to do for one’s family.”
“Then she was coerced?”
“I don’t know; but such a marriage for me, with some one who would redeem the property, is their scheme for me. Even if your mother and brother could tolerate the thought of one of us, my poor dear father will never dare to consent as long as she is with him.”
“Nay, Lenore; have I not often heard her say she prefers happiness to ambition? Whatever she may have done, she has come to think differently. She has well-nigh told me so.”
“Yes, at Rockpier,” sighed Eleonora. “Hark!” The sound of the ponies’ bells and hoofs was heard; Lenore put her hand on his arm, and drew him aside on the grass, behind a clump of trees, hushing him by a silent pressure as he tried to remonstrate. He clasped her hand, and felt her trembling till the tinkling and tramp were gone by.
“You frightened darling!” were his first words, when she let him speak. “Who would have thought you would be so shy? But we’ll have it out, and—”
“It is not that,” interrupted Lenore, “not maidenly shyness. That’s for girls who are happy and secure. No; but I don’t want to have it all overthrown at once—the first sweetness—”
“It can’t be overthrown!” he said, holding arm and hand in the intense grasp.
“Not really, never; but there is no use in attempting anything till I am of age—next autumn, the 7th of November.”
“Say nothing till then!” exclaimed Frank, in some consternation.
“We are only where we were before! We are sure of each other now. It will be only vexation and harass,” said she, with the instinct of a persecuted creature.
“I couldn’t,” said Frank. “I could not keep it in with mother! It would not be right if I could, nor should I feel as if I were acting fairly by your father.”
“You are right, Frank. Forgive me! You don’t know what it is to have to be always saving one’s truth only by silence. Speak when you think right.”
“And I believe we shall find it far easier than you think. I’m not quite a beggar—except for you, my Lena. I should like to go home this minute, and tell mother and Charlie and Rose, that I’m—I’m treading on air; but I should only be fallen upon for thinking of anything but my task-work. So I’ll take a leaf out of your book, you cautious Lenore, and wait till I come down victorious, happy and glorious—and I shall now. I feel as if you had given me power to scale Olympus, now I know I may carry your heart with me. Do you remember this, Lena?” He guided her hand to the smooth pebble on his chain. She responded by putting her own into his.
“My talisman!” he said. “It has been my talisman of success many a time. I have laid my hand on it, and thought I was working for you. Mine! mine! mine! Waters cannot quench love—never fear.”
“Hush!” as the light of the opening hall door was seen, and Lady Tyrrell’s voice was heard, saying, “I thought we passed her; I am sure she was near.”
Eleonora withdrew her arm, patted Frank back, waved him into silence, and went forward, saying, “Here I am, Camilla; I walked home.”
Her voice was calm and self-contained as ever—the unassailable dignity just as usual. The hall was full of officers, standing about the fire and drinking tea, and Eleonora’s well-worn armour was instantly on, as her sister asked where she had been, since others had walked home and had not overtaken her.
“I came by the lower road,” said she.
“Indeed! I never saw you.”
“I saw you pass—or rather heard you.”
“And did not let me pick you up! Did you hide yourself?”
“It was much warmer to walk.”
“So you seem to have found it, to judge by your cheeks,” said Lady Tyrrell.
And Mr. Strangeways and one or two others could not restrain a murmured exclamation on the exceeding loveliness of that deepened colour and brightened eye; but Lenore only knew that an equally bright and keen eye was watching her heedfully, and knew that she was suspected, if not read through and through.
She mingled in the discussion of the skating, with those outward society-senses that she learnt to put on, and escaped as soon as possible to her own room.
Again she almost fell on the ground in her own little oratory chamber, in a tumult of gladness that was almost agony, and fear that was almost joy.
She wanted to give thanks that Frank had become so wholly and avowedly hers, and for that deep intense affection that had gone on, unfed, uncherished, for years; but the overflow of delight was checked with foreboding—there was the instinctive terror of a basilisk eye gazing into her paradise of joy—the thanksgiving ran into a half-despairing deprecation.
And she knew that Frank was under Camilla’s spell, and admired and trusted her still; nor had she been able to utter a word of caution to undeceive him. Should she have the power on the morrow? Camilla really loved skating, and surrounded as she was sure to be, there was hope of escaping her vigilant eye once more. To-morrow there would be another meeting with Frank! perhaps another walk with him!
That anticipation was soothing enough to bring back the power of joyful gratitude, and therewith of hopeful prayer.