"Don't hunch, sir!" exclaimed the Colonel, throwing his broad shoulders back and his chin to the position of "eyes front." "Put your chin in and your chest out, and don't hunch! You have about as much carriage, my nephew Jack, as a rheumatic camel. Well!" (as poor Jack straightened his awkward length and tried to govern his prancing legs). "So Mrs. Grahame is a connection, after all; and a very charming woman, too. And how did you find the young lady, sir? Did she give you any points on tree-climbing? Ho! ho! I was wrong, though, about her being a tomboy. She hasn't the voice of one. Did you notice her voice, nephew? it is very sweet and melodious. It reminded me of—of a voice I remember."
"I like her voice!" replied Jack Ferrers. By the way, his own voice was a very pleasant one, a well-bred and good-tempered voice. "I couldn't see her face very well. I can't talk to girls!" he added. "I don't know what to say to them. Why did you tell them about mother, Uncle Tom? There was no need of their knowing."
"Why did I tell them?" exclaimed Colonel Ferrers. "Harry Monmouth! I told them, you young noodle, because I chose to tell them, and because it was the truth, and a mighty lucky thing for you, too. What with your poor mother's dying young, and your father's astonishing and supernatural wrong-headedness, you have had no bringing up whatever, my poor fellow! Talk of your going to college next year! why, you don't know how to make a bow. I present you to two charming women, and you double yourself up as if you had been run through the body, and then stumble over your own legs and tumble over everything else. Shade of Chesterfield! How am I to take you about, if this is the way you behave?"
"It was dark," said poor Jack. "And—and I don't want to be taken about, uncle, thank you. Can't I just keep quiet while I am here, and not see people? I don't know how to talk, really I don't."
"Pooh! pooh! sir," roared the Colonel, smiting the earth with his stick. "Have the goodness to hold your tongue! You know how to talk nonsense, and I request you'll not do it to me. You are my brother's son, sir, and I shall make it my business to teach you to walk, and to talk, and to behave like a rational Christian, while you are under my roof. If your father had the smallest atom of common sense in his composition—"
"Please don't say anything against father, Uncle Tom," cried the lad. "I can't stand that!" and one felt in the dark the fiery flush that made his cheeks tingle.
"Upon my soul!" cried Colonel Ferrers (who did not seem in the least angry), "you are the most astounding young rascal it has ever been my good fortune to meet. Are you aware, sir, that your father is my brother? that I first made the acquaintance of Raymond Ferrers when he was one hour old, a squeaking little scarlet wretch in a flannel blanket? Are you aware of this, pray?"
"I suppose I am," answered the lad. "But that doesn't make any difference. Nobody body must say anything against him, even if it is his own brother."
"Who is saying anything against him?" demanded Colonel Ferrers, fiercely. "He is an angel, sir; every idiot knows that. A combination of angel and infant, Raymond Ferrers is, and always has been. But the combination does not qualify him for bringing up children. Probatum est! Here we are! Now let me see if you can open the gate without fumbling, sir. If there is one thing I cannot endure, it is fumbling."
Thus adjured, Jack Ferrers opened the heavy wooden gate, and the two passed through a garden which seemed, from the fragrance, to be full of roses. The old house frowned dark and gloomy, with only one light twinkling feebly in a lower window. When they had entered, and were standing in the pleasant library, book-lined from floor to ceiling, Colonel Ferrers turned suddenly to his nephew, who was in a brown study, and dealt him a blow on the shoulder which sent him staggering half-way across the room, unexpected as it was.
"You're right to stand up for your father, my lad," he said, with gruff heartiness. "It was unnecessary in this case, for I would be cut into inch pieces and served up on toast if it would do my brother Raymond any good; but you are right all the same. If anybody else ever says he hasn't common sense, knock him down, do you hear? A blow from the shoulder, sir! that's the proper answer."
"Yes, uncle," said the boy demurely; but he looked up with a twinkle in his eye. "It's lucky for me that I don't have to knock you down, sir," he added. "You're awfully strong, aren't you? I wish I were!"
"You, sir!" rejoined the Colonel. "You have the frame of an ox, if you had any flesh to cover it. Exercise is what you need, Nephew Jack! Fencing is what you want, sir! Take that walking-stick! Harry Monmouth! I'll give you a lesson, now. On guard! So! defend yourself! Ha! humph!" The last exclamation was one of disgust, for at the Colonel's first thrust, Jack's stick flew out of his hand, and knocked over a porcelain vase, shattering it in pieces, Jack, meanwhile, standing rubbing his arm and looking very foolish.
"Humph!" repeated Colonel Ferrers, looking rather disconcerted himself, and all the more fierce therefore. "That comes of trying to instruct a person who has not been taught to hold himself together. You are a milksop, my poor fellow! a sad milksop! but we are going to change all that. There! never mind about the pieces. Giuseppe will pick up the pieces. Get your supper, and then go to bed."
"I don't care about supper, thank you, uncle," said the lad.
"Pooh! pooh! don't talk nonsense!" cried the Colonel. "You don't go to bed without supper."
He led the way into the dining-room, a long, low room, panelled with dark oak. Walls, table, sideboard, shone like mirrors, with the polish of many years. Over the sideboard was the head of a gigantic moose, with huge, spreading antlers. On the sideboard itself were some beautiful pieces of old silver, shining with the peculiar blue lustre that comes from long rubbing, and from that alone. A tray stood on the table, and on it was a pitcher of milk, two glasses, and a plate of very attractive-looking little cakes. The colonel filled Jack's glass, and stood by with grim determination till he had drunk every drop.
"Now, a cake, sir," he added, sipping his own glass leisurely. "A plummy cake, of Mrs. Beadle's best make. Down with it, I insist!" In the matter of the plum cake, little insistence was necessary, and between uncle and nephew both plate and pitcher were soon empty.
"There," said the good Colonel, as they returned to the library, "now you have something to sleep on, my friend. No empty stomachs in this house, to distract people's brains and make mooncalves of them. Ten minutes' exercise with the Indian clubs—you have them in your room?—and then to bed. Hand me the 'Worthies of England,' will you? Bookcase on the right of the door, third shelf from the bottom, fifth book from the left. Thomas Fuller. Yes, thank you. Good-night, my boy! don't forget the clubs, and don't poke your head forward like a ritualist parson, because you are not otherwise cut out for one."
Leaving his uncle comfortably established with his book and reading-lamp, Jack Ferrers took his way upstairs. It was not late, but he had already found out that his uncle had nothing to say to him or any one else after the frugal nine o'clock supper, and his own taste for solitude prompted him to seek his room. As he passed along a dark corridor, a gleam of light shot out from a half-open door.
"Are you awake, Biddy?" he asked.
"Yes, dear!" answered a kind, hearty voice. "Come in, Master Jack, if you've a mind."
The room was so bright that Jack screwed up his eyes for a moment. The lamp was bright, the carpet was bright, the curtains almost danced on the wall from their own gayety, while the coloured prints, in shining gilt frames, sang the whole gamut of colour up and down and round and round. But brighter than all else in the gay little room was the gay little woman who sat by the round table (which answered every purpose of a mirror), piecing a rainbow-coloured quilt. Her face was as round and rosy as a Gravenstein apple. She had bright yellow ribbons in her lace cap, and her gown was of the most wonderful merino that ever was seen, with palm-leaves three inches long curling on a crimson ground.
"How very bright you are in here, Biddy!" said Jack, sitting down on the floor, with his long legs curled under him. "You positively make my eyes ache."
"It's cheerful, dear," replied the good housekeeper. "I like to see things cheerful, that I do. Will you have a drop of shrub, Master Jack? there's some in the cupboard there, and 'twill warm you up, like, before going to bed."
Then, as Jack declined the shrub with thanks, she continued, "And so you have been to call on the ladies at Braeside, you and the Colonel. Ah! and very sweet ladies, I'm told."
"Very likely!" said Jack absently. "Do you mind if I pull the cat's tail, Biddy?"
He stretched out his hand toward a superb yellow Angora cat which lay curled up on a scarlet cushion, fast asleep.
"Oh! my dear!" cried Mrs. Beadle. "Don't you do it! He's old, and his temper not what it was. Poor old Sunshine! and why would you pull his tail, you naughty boy?"
"Oh! well—no matter!" said Jack. "There's a fugue—that's a piece of music, Biddy—that I am practising, called the 'Cat's Fugue,' and I thought I would see if it really sounded like a cat, that's all."
"Indeed, that's not such music as I should like your uncle to hear!" exclaimed Mrs. Beadle. "And what did you say to the young lady, Master Jack?" she added, as she placed a scarlet block against a purple one. "I'm glad enough you've found some young company, to make you gay, like. You're too quiet for a young lad, that you are."
"Oh, bother!" responded Jack, shaking his shoulders. "Tell me about my father, Biddy. I don't believe he liked g—company, any better than I do. What was he like when he was a boy?"
"An angel!" said Mrs. Beadle fervently. "An angel with his head in his pocket; that is what Mr. Raymond was like."
"Uncle Tom called him an angel, too!" said the lad. "Of course he is; a combination of angel and—why did you say 'with his head in his pocket,' Biddy?"
"Well, dear, it wasn't on his shoulders," replied the housekeeper. "He was in a dream, like, all the time; oh, much worse than you are yourself, Master Jack."
"Thank you!" muttered Jack.
"And forgetful! well! well! he needed to be tied to some one, Mr. Raymond did. To see him come in for his luncheon, and then forget all about it, and stand with a book in his hand, reading as if there was nothing else in the world. And then Mr. Tom—dear! dear! would put his head down and run and butt him right in the stomach, and down they would go together and roll over and over; great big lads, like you, sir, and their father would take the dog-whip and thrash 'em till they got up. 'Twas all in sport like, d'ye see; but Mr. Raymond never let go his book, only beat Mr. Tom with it. Dear! dear! such lads!"
"Tell me about his running away," said Jack.
"After the fiddler, do you mean, dear? That was when he was a little lad. Always mad after music he was, and playing on anything he could get hold of, and singing like a serup, that boy. So one day there came along an Italian, with a fiddle that he played on, and a little boy along with him, that had a fiddle, too. Well, and if Mr. Raymond didn't persuade that boy to change clothes with him, and he to stay here and Mr. Raymond to go with the fiddler and learn to play. Of course the man was a scamp, and had no business; and Mr. Raymond gave him his gold piece to take him, and all! But when the old Squire—that's your grandfather, dear!—when he came in and found that little black-eyed fellow dressed in his son's clothes, and crying with fright, and not a word of English—well, he was neither to hold nor to bind, as the saying is. Luckily Mrs. Ferrers—that's your grandmother, dear! she came in before the child was frightened into a fit, though very near it; and she spoke the language, and with her quiet ways she got the child quiet, and he told her all about it, and how the fiddler beat him, and showed the great bruises. And when she told the Squire, he got black in the face, like he used, and took his dog-whip and rode off on his big grey horse like mad; and when he came back with Mr. Raymond in front of him, the whip was all in pieces, and Mr. Raymond crying and holding the little fiddle tight. And the Italian boy stayed, and the Squire made a man of him, from being a Papist outlandish-man. And that's all the story, Master Jack."
"And he is Giuseppe?" asked Jack.
"And he is Jew Seppy," Mrs. Beadle assented. "Though it seems a hard name to give him, and no Jew blood in him that any one can prove, only his eyes being black. But he won't hear to its being shortened. And now it is getting to be night-cap time, Master Jack," said the good woman, beginning to fold up her work, "and I hope you are going to bed, too, like a good young gentleman. But if you don't, you'll shut the door careful, won't you dear?"
"Never fear," said the boy, gathering himself up from the floor. "I'm sleepy to-night, anyhow; I may go straight to bed. Good-night, Biddy. You're quite sure you like me to call you 'Biddy'?"
"My dear, it makes me feel five-and-twenty years younger!" said the good woman; "and I seem to see your dear father, coming in with his curls a-shaking, calling his Biddy. Ah, well! Good-night, Master Jack, dear! Don't forget to look in when you go by."
"Good-night, Biddy!"
The lad went off with his candle, fairly stumbling along the corridor from sheer sleepiness; but when he reached his own room, which was flooded with moonlight, the drowsiness seemed to take wings and disappear. He sat down by the open window and looked out. Below lay the garden, all black and silver in the intense white light. The smell of the roses came up to him, exquisitely sweet. He leaned his head against the window-frame, and felt as if he were floating away on the buoyant fragrance—far, far away, to the South, where his home was, and where the roses were in bloom so long that it seemed as if there were always roses.
The silver-lit garden vanished from his sight, and he saw instead a long, low room, half garret, half workshop, where a man stood beside a long table, busily at work with some fine tools. The spare, stooping figure, the long, delicate hands, the features carved as if in ivory, the blue, near-sighted eyes peering anxiously at the work in his hands,—all these were as actually present to the boy as if he could put out his own hand and touch them. It was with a start that he came back to the world of tangible surroundings, as a sudden breath of wind waved the trees below him, and sent whisperings of leaf and blossom through his room.
"Daddy!" he said half to himself; and he brushed away something which had no possible place in the eyes of a youth who was to go to college next year. Giving himself a violent shake, Jack Ferrers rose, and, going to a cupboard, took out with great care a long, black, oblong box. This he deposited on the bed; then took off his boots and put on a pair of soft felt slippers. His coat, too, was taken off; and then, holding the black box in his arms, as if it were a particularly delicate baby, he left the room, and softly made his way to the stairs which led to the attic. There was a door at the foot of the stairs, which he opened noiselessly, and then he stopped to listen. All was still. He must have been sitting for some time at the window, for the light in the hall was extinguished, which was a sign that his uncle had gone to bed. In fact, as he listened intently, his ear caught a faint, rhythmic sound, rising and falling at regular intervals, like the distant murmur of surf on the sea-shore; his uncle was asleep. Closing the door softly after him, and clasping the black box firmly, Jack climbed the attic stairs and disappeared in the darkness.
CHAPTER VI.
"Good-morning, Cousin Jack!" said Hildegarde pleasantly. "What lovely roses! Are they from Colonel Ferrers's garden?"
"Yes," replied Jack Ferrers. "Uncle sends them with his compliments. I'm sorry I knocked over the basket last night. Good-by."
He was about to fling himself down the steps again, but Hildegarde, controlling her desire to laugh, said cordially: "Oh, don't go! Sit down a moment, and tell me the names of some of these beauties."
"Thank you!" muttered the youth, blushing redder than the roses. "I—I think I must go back."
"Are you so very busy?" asked Hildegarde innocently. "I thought this was your vacation. What have you to do?"
"Oh—nothing!" said the lad awkwardly. "Nothing in particular."
"Then sit down," said Hildegarde decidedly.
And Jack Ferrers sat down. A pause followed. Then Hildegarde said in a matter-of-fact tone, "You have no sisters, have you, Cousin Jack?"
"No," was the reply. "How did you know?"
"Because you are so shy," said Hildegarde, smiling. "Boys who have no sisters are apt to regard girls as a kind of griffin. There used to be a boy at dancing-school, two or three years ago, who was so shy it was really painful to dance with him at first, but he got over it after a while. And it was all because he had no sisters."
"Did you like dancing-school?" Jack inquired, venturing to look up at her shyly.
"Yes, very much indeed!" replied Hildegarde. "Didn't you?"
"No; hated it."
Then they both laughed a little, and after that things went a good deal better. Jack came up on the piazza (he had been sitting on the steps, shuffling his feet in a most distressing manner), and helped to clip the long stems of the roses, and pulled off superfluous leaves. It appeared that he did not care much for flowers, though he admitted that roses were "pretty." He did not care for fishing or shooting; tennis had made his head ache ever since he began to grow so fast. Did he like walking? Pretty well, when it wasn't too hot. Reading? Well enough, when the book wasn't stupid.
"Wot are we to do with this 'ere 'opeless chap?" said Hildegarde to herself, quoting from "Pinafore."
As a last resort she asked if he were fond of music. Instantly his face lighted up.
"Awfully fond of it," he said with animation, and the embarrassed wrinkle disappeared as if by magic from between his eyebrows.
"Oh, I am so glad!" cried Hildegarde. "I haven't had any music the last two summers. I had everything else that was nice, but still I missed it, of course. Do you play, or sing?"
"A little of both," said Jack modestly.
"Oh, how delightful! We must make music together for mamma sometimes. My own piano has not come yet, but there is the dearest old funny thing here which belonged to the Misses Aytoun."
"Uncle Tom has no piano," said Jack, "but I have my violin, so I don't mind."
"Oh, a violin!" said Hildegarde, opening her eyes wide. "Have you been studying it long?"
"Ever since I was six years old," was the reply. "My mother would not let me begin earlier, though my father said that as soon as I could hold a knife and fork I could hold a bow. He's a little cracked about violins, my father. He makes them, you know."
"I don't know," cried Hildegarde. "Tell me about it; how very interesting!"
"Well—I don't mean that it's his business," said Jack, who seemed to have forgotten his shyness entirely; "he's a lawyer, you know. But it's the only thing he really cares about. He has a workshop, and he has made—oh, ever so many violins! He went to Cremona once, and spent a year there, poking about, and he found an old church that was going to be repaired, and bought the sounding-board. Oh, it must have been a couple of hundred years old. Then he moused about more and found an old fellow, a descendant of one of Amati's workmen, and I believe he would have bought him, too, if he could; but, anyhow, they were great chums, and he taught my father all kinds of tricks. When he came home he made this violin out of a piece of the old sounding-board, and gave it to me on my birthday. It's—oh, it's no end, you know! And he made another for himself, and we play together. Do you know the Mozart Concerto in F, for two violins? It begins with an allegro."
And being fairly mounted on his hobby, Jack Ferrers pranced about on it as if he had done nothing but talk to Hildegarde all his life. Hildegarde, meanwhile, listened with a mixture of surprise, amusement, and respect. He did not look in the least like a musical genius, this long-legged, curly-haired lad, with his blue eyes and his simple, honest face. She thought of the lion front of Beethoven, and the brilliant, exquisite beauty of Mozart, and tried to imagine honest Jack standing between them, and almost laughed in the midst of an animated description of the andante movement. Then she realised that he was talking extremely well, and talking a great deal over her head.
"I am afraid you will find me very ignorant," she said meekly, when her cousin paused, a little out of breath, but with glowing cheeks and sparkling eyes. "I have heard a great deal of music, of course, and I love it dearly; but I don't know about it as you do, not a bit. I play the piano a little, and I sing, just simple old songs, you know, and that is all."
Hildegarde might have added that she had a remarkably sweet voice, and sang with taste and feeling, but that her cousin must find out for himself; besides, she was really over-awed by this superior knowledge in one whom the night before she had been inclined to set down as a booby. "Shall I ever learn," she thought remorsefully, "not to make these ridiculous judgments of people, before I know anything about them?"
Just then Mrs. Grahame came out and asked her new-found nephew, as she called him, to stay to dinner; but at sight of her the lad's shyness returned in full force. His animation died away; he hung his head, and muttered that he "couldn't possibly, thank you! Uncle Tom—stayed too long already. Good-by!" and, without even a farewell glance at Hildegarde, went down all the steps at once with a breakneck plunge, and disappeared.
"Tragedy of the Gorgon's Head! Medusa, Mrs. Grahame," said that lady, laughing softly. "Has my hair turned to snakes, Hilda, or what is there so frightful in my appearance? I heard your voices sounding so merrily I thought the ice was completely broken."
"Oh, I think it is," said Hildegarde. "You came upon him suddenly, that was all."
"Next time," said her mother, "I will appear gradually, like the Cheshire Cat, beginning with the grin."
Hildegarde laughed, and went to pin a red rose on her mother's dress. Then she said: "I was wrong, Mammina, and you were right, as usual. It is a tiresome way you have, so monotonous! But really he is a very nice boy, and he knows, oh! ever so much about music. He must be quite a wonder." And she told her mother about the violin, and all the rest of it.
Mrs. Grahame agreed with her that it would be delightful to have some musical evenings, and Hildegarde resolved to practise two hours a day regularly.
"But there are so few hours in the day!" she complained. "I thought getting up at seven would give me—oh! ever so much time, and I have none at all. Here is the morning nearly gone, and we have had no reading, not a word." And she looked injured.
"There is an hour before dinner," said Mrs. Grahame, "and the 'Makers of Florence' is lying on my table at this minute. Come up, and I will read while you—need I specify the occupation?"
"You need not," said Hildegarde. "I really did mean to mend it this morning, love, but things happened. I had to sew on boot-buttons before breakfast, three of them, and then Janet wanted me to show her about something. But now I will really be industrious."
This was destined to be a day of visits. In the afternoon Mrs. Loftus and her daughter called, driving up in great state, with prancing horses and clinking harness. Hildegarde, who was in her own room, meditated a plunge down her private staircase and an escape by way of the back door, but decided that it would be base to desert her mother; so she smoothed her waving hair, inspected her gown to make sure that it was spotless, and came down into the parlour.
Mrs. Loftus was a very large lady, with a very red face, who talked volubly about "our place," "our horses," "our hot-houses," etc., etc. Miss Loftus, whose name was Leonie, was small and rather pretty, though she did not look altogether amiable. She was inclined to patronise Hildegarde, but that young person did not take kindly to patronage, and was a little stately, though very polite, in her manner.
"Yes, it is pretty about here," said Miss Loftus, "though one tires of it very quickly. We vegetate here for three months every summer; it's papa's" (she pronounced it "puppa") "whim, you see. How long a season do you make?"
"None at all," said Hildegarde quietly. "We are going to live here."
Miss Loftus raised her eyebrows. "Oh! you can hardly do that, I should think!" she said with a superior smile. "A few months will probably change your views entirely. There is no life here, absolutely none."
"Indeed!" said Hildegarde. "I thought it was a very prosperous neighbourhood. All the farms look thrifty and well cared for; the crops are alive, at least."
"Oh, farmers and crops!" said Miss Loftus. "Very likely. I meant social life."
"I don't like social life," said Hildegarde.
This was not strictly true, but she could not help saying it, as she told her mother afterward.
Miss Loftus passed over the remark with another smile, which made our heroine want to pinch her, and added, "You must consider us your only neighbours, as indeed we really are."
"Yes, indeed!" said Mrs. Loftus, who was now rising ponderously to depart. "We shall hope to see you often at The Poplars, Mrs. Grahame. There is not another house within five miles where one can visit. Of course I don't include that old bear, Colonel Ferrers, who never speaks a civil word to any one."
Hildegarde flushed and looked at her mother, but Mrs. Grahame said very quietly, "I have known Colonel Ferrers for many years. He was a friend of my husband's."
"Oh, I beg your pardon!" said Mrs. Loftus, looking scared. "I had no idea—I never heard of any one knowing Colonel Ferrers. Come, Leonie, we must be going."
They departed, first engaging Hildegarde, rather against her will, to lunch with them the following Friday; and the grand equipage rolled clinking and jingling away.
"We seem to have fallen upon a Montague and Capulet neighbourhood," said Mrs. Grahame, smiling, as she turned to go upstairs.
"Yes, indeed!" said Hildegarde. "Shall we be Tybalts or Mercutios?"
"Neither, I hope," said her mother, "as both were run through the body. Of course, however, there is no question as to which neighbour we shall find most congenial. And now, child, get your hat, and let us take a good walk, to drive the cobwebs out of our brains."
"Have with you!" said Hildegarde, running lightly up the stairs; "only, darling, don't be so—so—incongruous as to call Mrs. Loftus a cobweb!"
CHAPTER VII.
"What have you found, darling?" asked Mrs. Grahame, looking up from her writing. "Not your wits, for example? I should be so glad!"
"One may not shake one's mother," said Hildegarde, "but beware, lest you 'rouse an Indian's indomitable nature.' I have found the keys of Miss Agatha's cabinet."
"Really!" cried Mrs. Grahame, laying down her pen. "Are you sure? where were they?"
"In that old secretary in Uncle Aytoun's room," said Hildegarde. "You know you said I might rummage in it some day, and this rainy afternoon seemed to be the very time. They were in a little drawer, all by themselves; and see, they are marked, 'Keys of the cabinet in my sister Agatha's room, containing miniatures, etc.'"
"This is indeed a discovery!" said Mrs. Grahame, rising. "We will examine the cabinet together, dear; as you say, it is just the day for it."
Hildegarde led the way, dancing with excitement and pleasure; her mother followed more slowly. There might be sadness, she thought, as well as pleasure, in looking over the relics of a family which had died out, leaving none of the name, so far as she knew, in this country at least. Miss Agatha's room did not look very cheerful in the grey light of a wet day. The prevailing tint of walls and ceiling was a greyish yellow; the faded curtains were held back by faded ribbons; the furniture was angular and high-shouldered. On the wall was a coloured print of "London in 1802," from which the metropolis would seem to have been a singular place. The only interesting feature in the room was the cabinet which they had come to explore, and this was really a beautiful piece of furniture. It stood seven feet high at least, and was apparently of solid ebony, inlaid with yellow ivory in curious spiral patterns. In the centre was a small door, almost entirely covered with the ivory tracery; above, below, and around were drawers, large and small, deep and shallow, a very wilderness of drawers. All had silver keyholes of curious pattern, and all were fast locked, a fact which had seriously interfered with Hildegarde's peace of mind ever since they came to the house. Now, however, that she actually stood before it with the "Open sesame," this bunch of quaint silver keys in her hand, she shrank back, and felt shy and afraid.
"You must open it, mamma," she said. "I dare not."
Mrs. Grahame fitted a key to one of the larger drawers, and opened it. A faint perfume floated out, old roses and lavender, laid away one knows not how many years. Under folds of silver paper lay some damask towels, fine and thick and smooth, but yellow with age. They were tied with a lilac ribbon, and on the ribbon was pinned a piece of paper, covered with writing in a fine, cramped hand.
"Lift them out carefully, dear," said Mrs. Grahame, "and read the label."
Hildegarde complied, and read aloud: "These towels were spun and woven by my grandmother Grahame in Scotland, before she came to this country. Her maiden name was Annot McIntosh."
"What beautiful linen!" said Mrs. Grahame, smoothing the glossy folds with the hand of a housewife. "I always wished I had learned to spin and weave. Linen that one buys has no feeling in it. Lay it back reverently, degenerate daughter of the nineteenth century, and your degenerate mother will open another drawer."
The next drawer contained several sets of baby-clothes, at sight of which Hildegarde opened her eyes very wide indeed. Her mother was an exquisite needle-woman, so was her cousin Wealthy Bond, and she herself had no need to be ashamed of the "fine seam" she could sew; but never had she seen such needlework as this: tiny caps, wrought so thick with flower and leaf that no spot of the plain linen could be seen; robes of finest lawn, with wonderful embroidered fronts; shawls of silk flannel, with deep borders of heavy "laid work." One robe was so beautiful that both Hildegarde and her mother cried over it, and took it up to examine it more carefully. On the breast was pinned a piece of paper, with an inscription in the same delicate hand: "Hester's christening-robe. We think it was in consequence of this fine work that our dear mother lost her eyesight."
"I should think it highly probable," said Mrs. Grahame, laying the exquisite monument of folly back in the drawer. "I did not know that old Madam Aytoun was blind. What is written on that tiny cap, in the corner there? It must be a doll's cap; no baby could be so small."
Hildegarde read the inscription: "Worn by our uncle Hesketh, who weighed two pounds at birth. He grew to be six feet and six inches in height, and weighed three hundred pounds."
"What a wonderful person Miss Agatha must have been!" said Hildegarde. "Who else would think of all these pleasant bits of information? And now for the next drawer!"
She opened it, and gave a little shriek of delight. Here truly were beautiful things, such as neither she nor her mother had ever seen before: three short aprons of white silk, trimmed with deep gold lace, and covered with silk-embroidered flowers of richest hues, one with tulips, another with roses, a third with carnations. Folds of tissue paper separated them from each other, and the legend told that they had been worn by "our great-grandmother Ponsonby, when she was Maid of Honour to Queen Caroline. She was an Englishwoman."
Then came a tippet of white marabou feathers, buttoned into a silk case, and smelling faintly of camphor; a gown of rose-coloured satin, brocaded with green, and one of ruby-coloured velvet, which bore the inscription: "This was the gown on which our great-grandmother Ponsonby wore the diamond buttons which have since been divided among her descendants. A sinful waste of money which might have been put to good purpose."
"How very frivolous Great-grandmother Ponsonby must have been!" said Hildegarde. "I think Miss Agatha is rather hard on her, though. Perhaps the buttons were wedding presents. I wonder what has become of them all! See, Mammina, here are her red shoes—just like Beatrix Esmond's, aren't they? My foot would not begin to go into them. And here—oh! the lace! the lace!" For there was a whole drawer full of lace, all in little bundles neatly tied up and marked. Here was Madam Aytoun's wedding veil, Grandmother This One's Mechlin tabs, Aunt That One's Venetian flounces. It would take pages to describe all the laces, and the pleasure that mother and daughter had in examining them. What woman or girl does not love lace? Finally, in a corner of the drawer, was a morocco box containing a key, whose ivory label said: "Central compartment. Miniatures."
"This will be the best of all!" cried Hildegarde, eagerly. "Perhaps we shall find Great-grandmother Ponsonby herself. Who knows?"
The ivory door flew open as the key turned, and revealed a space set round with tiny drawers. Each drawer contained one or more miniatures, in cases of red or green morocco, and Hildegarde and her mother examined them with delight. Here, to be sure, was Great-grandmother Ponsonby; in fact, she appeared twice: first, as a splendid young matron, clad in the identical ruby velvet with the diamond buttons, her hair powdered high and adorned with feathers; and, again, as a not less superb old lady, with folds of snowy muslin under her chin, and keen dark eyes flashing from under her white curls, and a wonderful cap. Here was Grandfather Aytoun, first as a handsome boy, with great dark eyes, and a parrot on his hand, then as a somewhat choleric-looking gentleman with a great fur collar.
"How they do change!" said Hildegarde. "I am not sure that I like to see two of the same person. Let me see, now! He married—"
"The daughter of Great-grandmother Ponsonby," replied Mrs. Grahame. "Here she is! Caroline Regina Ponsonby, æt. 16. Named after the royal patroness, you see. What a sweet, gentle-looking girl! I fear her magnificent mother and her decided-looking husband may have been too much for her, for I see she died at twenty-three."
"Oh! and he married again!" cried Hildegarde, opening another case. "See here! Selina Euphemia McKenzie, second wife of John Aytoun. Oh! and here is a slip of paper inside the frame.
In Rapture's fervid noon.
'J. A.'
"Dear me! he must have written it himself!" she added. "It is not like Miss Agatha's handwriting. Why, she only lived three months, poor dear! He makes very sure about the rapture, doesn't he?"
"I think he does," said her mother, smiling, "considering that he married a third time, inside a year from the fading of the sweet flower. Look at this aquiline dame, with the remarkably firm mouth, and the bird of paradise in her turban. 'Adelaide McLeod, third wife of John Aytoun. She survived him.' I'll warrant she did!" said Mrs. Grahame. "She carries conquest in her face. All the children were of the first marriage, and I fear she was not a gentle stepmother. I wonder who this may be!" She took up a heavy bracelet of dark hair, with a small miniature set in the clasp. "What a pretty, pretty child! Good Miss Agatha has surely not left us in the dark concerning him. 'Little John Hesketh, 1804.' That is all."
"Why Hesketh?" asked Hildegarde. "I have never heard of any Heskeths."
Mrs. Grahame was about to plunge into genealogical depths, when Hildegarde, who had been opening a case of purple morocco, carefully secured with silver clasps, gave an exclamation of pleasure.
"Hester!" she cried. "This is Hester, I know."
Her mother looked, and nodded; and they both gazed in silence at the lovely face, with its earnest grey eyes.
"The dear!" murmured Hildegarde. "How I should have loved her! I am sure we should have liked the same things. I wish she had not died."
"You must remember that she would be a dear old lady now, were she alive, and not a young lassie. What does the slip say, darling? Miss Agatha's hand is rather trying for my eyes."
"'Our dearest Hester,'" Hildegarde read. "'A duplicate of the one painted for Robert Ferrers.' Robert Ferrers!" she repeated thoughtfully. "Is that Colonel Ferrers? and do you suppose—"
At this moment came a knock at the door, and Janet informed them that Mrs. Lankton was in the hall, and would like to speak to one of the ladies.
"I will go," said Hildegarde, laying down the miniature reluctantly.
"We will both go," said her mother. "The poor old dame! We have neglected her all these days."
They locked the drawer of the treasure-cabinet, and Hildegarde ran to put the precious keys in a safe place, while her mother went directly downstairs. By the time Hildegarde appeared, Mrs. Lankton was launched on the full tide of her woes, and was sailing along with a good breeze.
"And it's comin' in, Mis' Grahame—I'd say like a house afire, if 'twa'n't that 'twas wet. Dreepin' all down the chimbley, and runnin' over the floor in streams. I stepped into a pool o' water with my bar' feet, gittin' out o' bed; likely I caught my death, but it's no great matter. Ah! Mis' Grahame, I've seen trouble all my life. Mr. Aytoun, he was like a father to me. He wouldn't never ha' let me go bar'foot in water if he'd ben alive. I've ben a hard-workin' woman all my life, and he knowed it. I hope your own health is good, dear?"
"What can I do for you, Mrs. Lankton?" asked Mrs. Grahame, kindly, as a moment's pause gave her a chance to get in a word. "Does the roof need shingling?"
"Mr. Aytoun was goin' to have it shingled for me last Janooary," said Mrs. Lankton, with a sigh that was almost a groan; "and he was called on to die in Febooary. Jest afore he passed away, he was tryin' dretful hard to say somethin', and I ain't no manner o' doubt myself but what 'twas 'Shingle!' He had it on his mind; they needn't tell me. But nobody seemed to feel a call after he was gone. Ah, dear me! You don't know nothin' about it, Mis' Grahame. You ain't never stepped bar'foot out o' your bed into a pool o' water, and you all doubled up with neurology in your j'ints. Ah, well, 'twon't be long now that I shall trouble anybody."
"Which is your house, Mrs. Lankton?" asked Mrs. Grahame. "I will try to have something done about the roof at once."
"I know!" said Hildegarde, quickly. "It is a brown cottage with a green door."
"See how she knows!" exclaimed Mrs. Lankton, with a sad smile. "Ain't that thoughtful? Ah! she'll be a comfit to you, Mis' Grahame, if you've luck to raise her, but there's no knowin'. Don't you set your heart on it, that's all. Ah! I know what trouble is."
"Don't you think I am 'raised' already, Mrs. Lankton?" Hilda asked, smiling down on the weazened face that did not reach to her shoulder.
"So fur ye be, dear!" replied the widow, with a doleful shake of the head. "So fur ye be, but there's no knowin'. My Phrony was jest like you, hearty and stout, and she's gone. Ah! dear me! She had a store tooth, where she knocked out one of hers, slidin', and she swallered it one night, and she never got over it. Lodged on her liver, the doctor said. He went down and tried to fetch it up, but 'twa'n't no use. She was fleshy, same as you be. Yes, gals is hard to raise."
At this, Hildegarde retreated suddenly into the parlour, and Mrs. Grahame, in a voice which shook a little, expressed proper regret and sympathy, and repeated that she would have the roof attended to.
"And now," she added, "go into the kitchen, and auntie shall give you a cup of hot tea. You must dry your feet, too, before you go out again."
"The Lord'll reward you, dear!" said Mrs. Lankton, turning with a faint gleam of cheerfulness toward the kitchen door. "It ain't long before I shall go the way of all, but it doos seem as if I mought go dry, 'stead o' dreepin'. But you'll be rewarded, Mis' Grahame. I felt as if you'd be a mother to me, soon as I sot eyes on ye. Good-mornin', dear!" and with a groan that ended in a half-chuckle, she disappeared.