But now how far things had gone! Douglas had been a month at the Rectory, and as his eyes followed the two Ashleys along the white sun-swept road and away under the shadow of the park trees, the idea came to him, with a curious sense of expansive and enlarged being, that the masses of foliage sweeping away towards the west, amid which the two solemn wayfarers soon disappeared, would one day, in all probability, be his own. ‘No, by the bye, not that; that’s the entailed part,’ he said to himself; then laughed again, this time partly in gentle self-ridicule, partly in pleasure, and turned his face the other way, towards Lower Lilford—for he had made himself master of the whole particulars. Facing this way, and with the laugh still on his lips, he suddenly found himself in the presence of the Rector, who had come out by his own study window at the sight of the solitary figure on the lawn. Douglas felt himself taken in the act—though of what it would have been hard to say. He grew red in spite of himself under the gaze of the Rector’s mild and dull eyes.
‘Have the boys left you alone? I can’t think how they could be so rude,’ Mr. Ashley said.
‘Not rude at all, sir. It is I who am rude. I was lazy, and promised to follow them when I had finished my—novel.’ Happily, he recollected in time that he had been holding one in his hand. ‘I am going now,’ he added. ‘I dare say I shall catch them up before they get to the house.’
‘I was afraid they were leaving you to take care of yourself—that is not our old-fashioned way,’ said the old clergyman. ‘I wish you a pleasant walk. It is a fine afternoon, but you will find the road dusty. I advise you to go over the meadows and round the lower way.’
‘That is just how I intended to go.’
‘Very sensible. The boys always take the high road. The other takes you round by the Beeches, much the prettiest way; but it is longer round, and that is why they never use it. A pleasant walk to you,’ Mr. Ashley said, waving his hand as he went back to the house.
Douglas laughed to himself as he took the path through the meadows which Mr. Ashley had indicated. The Rector had not as yet interested himself much in what was going on, and the simplicity with which he had suggested the way which the lovers had chosen, and which led to their trysting-place, amused the intruder still more. ‘If he but knew!’ Douglas said to himself, transferring to the old clergyman the thoughts that filled the mind of his son, by a very natural heightening of his own importance. And yet, to tell the truth, had Mr. Ashley known, it would have been a great relief to his mind, as releasing Charley from a great danger and the parish from a possible convulsion. To know this, however, might have lessened the extreme satisfaction with which Douglas set out for the meeting. He went slowly on across the green fields, all bright in the sunshine, across the little stream, and up the leafy woodland road that led to the Beeches, his heart pleasantly agitated, his mind full of delightful anticipations. Anne herself was sweet to him, and his conquest of her flattered him in every particular. Happiness, importance, wealth, an established place in the world, were all coming to him, linked hand in hand with the loves and joys which surrounded the girl’s own image. He had no fear of the consequences. Remorseless fathers were not of his time. Such mediæval furniture had been cleared out of the world. He expected nothing from this meeting but acceptance, reconciliation, love, and happiness.
CHAPTER IV.
THE BEECHES.
The Beeches were a beautiful clump of trees on a knoll in the middle of the park. They were renowned through the county, and one of the glories of Mount. When the family was absent—which did not happen often—picnic parties were made up to visit them. There was nothing like them in all the country round. The soil was rich and heavy round them with the shedding of their own leaves, and when the sun got in through their big branches and touched that brown carpet it shone like specks of gold. Some of the branches were like trees in themselves, and the great grey trunks like towers. One of them had been called, from time immemorial, the lover’s tree. It was scrawled over with initials, some of them half a century old, or more. From the elevation on which they stood the spectator looked down upon the house lying below among its gardens, on the green terrace and the limes, and could watch what the group there was doing, while himself safe from all observation. When Douglas had informed Anne of her father’s rejection of his suit, she had bidden him come to this spot to hear the issue of her own interview with Mr. Mountford. He seated himself tranquilly enough under the lover’s tree to await her coming. He was not too much agitated to smoke his cigar. Indeed, he was not much agitated at all. He had no fear for the eventual issue. True, it might not come immediately. He did not know that he wanted it to come immediately. To love is one thing, to marry another. So long as he was sure of Anne, he did not mind waiting for a year or two. And he felt that he was sure of Anne, and in that case, eventually, of her father too. Consequently, he sat still and waited, pleased, in spite of himself, with the little lawlessness. To be received in the ordinary way as a son-in-law, to kiss the ladies of the house, and shake hands with the men, and be told in a trembling voice that it was the choicest treasure of the family that was being bestowed upon him, were all things which a man of courage has to go through, and does go through without flinching. But on the whole it was more delightful to have Anne steal away to him out of all commonplace surroundings and make him sure of her supreme and unfailing love, whatever anyone might say—with, bien entendu, the paternal blessing in the background, to be won after a little patience. Douglas was flattered in all his wishes and fancies by this romantic beginning. He would have the good, he thought, both of the old system of love-making and the new—Anne by herself, without any drawbacks, willing to dare any penalties for his sake; but at the end everything that was legitimate and proper—settlements and civilities. He liked it better so than if it had been necessary to wind up everything in a few months, and marry and be settled; indeed it pleased him much, being so sure as he was of all that was to follow, to have this little secret and clandestine intercourse. He liked it. To get Anne to do so much as this for him was a triumph; his vanity overflowed while he sat and waited for her, though vanity was but a small part of his character. He reached that spot so soon that he saw the beginning of the ‘game,’ and Anne’s white figure going back through the flower garden all blazing with colour, to the house. What excuse had she been able to find for leaving them? She must have invented some excuse. And he saw the curate settling himself to that ‘game,’ with unspeakable amusement. He took his cigar from between his lips to laugh. Poor old Charley! his heart was broken, but he did his duty like a man. He watched him settling to his afternoon’s work with Gertrude Woodhead as his partner, and laughed, feeling the full humour of the event, and enjoying the tremendous seriousness with which that sacrifice to duty was made. Then, while the game went on in the bright foreground of the picture, he saw the moving speck of that white figure re-issuing on the other side of the house, and advancing towards him, threading her way among the trees. It was for him that Anne did this, and he it was alone of all concerned who could sit here calmly puffing the blue smoke among the branches, and waiting for his happiness to come to him. Never was man more elated, more flattered, more perfectly contented with himself.
He threw the cigar away when she was within a short distance of the spot, and went to meet her with triumphant pleasure.
‘My faithful Anne—my true love,’ he said as he met her. And Anne came to him; her eyes shining, her lips apart with eagerness. What a meeting it was! No tame domestic reception and hubbub of family excitement could compare with it. How glad and flattered he felt that it was a clandestine indulgence, and that papa had not vulgarised everything by giving his consent! Then they sat down upon the knoll, arm linked in arm, and clasping each other’s hands. There was the peaceful house within sight, and the party on the green terrace absorbed in their inferior amusement, in complete ignorance, not knowing what romance was going on, scarcely out of their range of vision, under the trees. All these experiences served to enhance the delight of his position. For the first few minutes he attached less importance to the words which Anne said.
‘But you do not seem to understand me. My father will not consent.’
‘If you consent, my darling, what do I want more? I am not afraid of your father.’
‘But Cosmo—listen! you are not really paying any attention——’
‘Every attention, to the real matter in question. I am reading that in your eyes, in your hands, in you altogether. If I am too happy to take any notice of those vulgarer symbols, words——’
‘But they are not vulgar symbols. Yes, I am happy too. I am not afraid of anything. But, Cosmo, you must listen, and you must understand. My father refuses his consent.’
‘For how long?’ he said with a smile. ‘I also should like to refuse you something for the pleasure of being persuaded to forswear myself. I think papa is right. I should hold out as long as you would put any faith in the delusion of my resistance.’
‘It is no delusion,’ said Anne, shaking her head. ‘You must not think so. It is very serious. He has threatened me. There was no make-believe in his mind, Cosmo.’
‘Threatened you? With what? Ah! so should I if I thought you were going to desert me.’
‘You will not see how serious it is! I do not believe he will give in, Cosmo. He has threatened me that if I persevere he will leave everything he has to leave, away from me.’
‘Away from you? But he has no power to do that,’ said the young man. ‘It is skilful of him to try your faithfulness—but he might have tried it by less conventional means.’
‘Yes, he has the power,’ said Anne, neglecting the other part of this speech. ‘He has power over everything, except, indeed, the entail; and I believe he will do what he says. My father is not a man at all likely to try my faithfulness. He knows me, for one thing.’
‘And knows you true as steel,’ said Cosmo, looking admiringly in her face and still quite unimpressed by the news.
‘Knows that I am not one to give way. He knows that very well. So here is something for your serious consideration. No, indeed, it is no joke. You must not laugh. We must face what is before us,’ said Anne, endeavouring to withdraw her hand and half offended by his unbelief.
‘I cannot face your frown,’ said Cosmo; ‘that is the only thing I am really afraid of. What! must it really be so stern as this? But these hard fathers, my darling, belong to the fifteenth century. You don’t mean to tell me that rebellious daughters are shut up in their rooms, and oaths insisted upon, and paternal curses uttered now!’
‘I said nothing about being shut up in my room; but it is quite certain,’ said Anne, with a little heat, ‘that if I oppose him in this point my father will take all that ought to come to me and give it to Rose.’
‘To Rose!’ a shade of dismay stole over Cosmo’s face. ‘But I thought,’ he said—showing an acquaintance with the circumstances which after, when she thought of it, surprised Anne—‘I thought your fortune came from your mother, not from Mr. Mountford at all.’
‘And so it does; but it is all in his hands; my mother trusted in my father entirely, as she was of course quite right to do.’
‘As it must have been the height of imprudence to permit her to do!’ cried Douglas, suddenly reddening with anger. ‘How could the trustees be such fools? So you, like the money, are entirely in Mr. Mountford’s hands?’
All at once the tone had ceased to be that of a lovers’ interview. Anne, startled and offended, this time succeeded in drawing her hand out of his.
‘Yes,’ she said, with a chill of surprise in her voice, ‘entirely in his hands.’
What was going to follow? Under the great beechen boughs, through the warm summer sunshine there seemed all at once to breathe a wintry gale which penetrated to the heart.
This sudden cloud was dissipated in a moment by another laugh, which rang almost too loudly among the trees. ‘Well,’ he said, drawing her arm through his again, and holding the reluctant hand clasped fast, ‘what of that? Because you are in his hands, Anne, my own, do you think I am going to let you slip out of mine?’
The sun grew warm again, and the air delicious as before. Two on one side, and all the world on the other, is not that a perfectly fair division? So long as there are two—if there should come to be but one, then the aspect of everything is changed. Anne’s hands clasped between two bigger ones all but disappeared from view. It would be hard, very hard, to slip out of that hold; and it was a minute or two before she regained possession of what Cosmo had called the vulgarer symbols, words. Without recurrence to their aid between people who love each other, how much can be said!
‘That is all very well,’ said Anne, at last; ‘but whatever we may do or say we must come back to this: My father has promised to disinherit me, Cosmo, and he will not go back from his word.’
‘Disinherit! the very word sounds romantic. Are we in a novel or are we not? I thought disinherit was only a word for the stage.’
‘But you know this is mere levity,’ said Anne. She smiled in spite of herself. It pleased her to the bottom of her heart that he should take it so lightly, that he should refuse to be frightened by it. ‘We are not boy and girl,’ she said, with delightful gravity of reproof. ‘We must think seriously of a thing which affects our interests so much. The question is, what is to be done?’
Had she but known how keenly under his levity he was discussing that question within himself! But he went on, still half laughing as if it were the best joke in the world.
‘The only thing, so far as I can see, that is not to be done,’ he said, ‘is to obey papa and give me up.’
‘Give up—I would not give up a dog!’ cried Anne, impetuously; ‘and Cosmo, you!’
‘I am not a dog; and yet in one sense, in Mr. Mountford’s eyes—— What is it, Anne, that hedges you round with such divinity, you landed people? Mountford of Mount: it sounds very well, I confess. And why was I not Douglas of somewhere or other? It is very hard upon you, but yet it is not my fault.’
‘I like you infinitely better,’ cried Anne, with proud fervour, ‘that you are Douglas of nowhere, but stand upon yourself—the father of your own fortunes. That is the thing to be proud of—if one has ever any right to be proud.’
‘I have not achieved much to be proud of as yet,’ he said, shaking his head; and then there was again a pause, perhaps not quite so ecstatic a pause, for practical necessity and the urgent call for a decision of one kind or other began to be felt, and silenced them. It was easy to say that there was one thing that was not to be done—but after? Then for the first time in her life Anne felt the disability of her womanhood. This tells for little so long as the relations between men and women are not in question. It is when these ties begin—and a girl, who has perhaps taken the initiative all her life, finds herself suddenly reduced to silence in face of her lover—that the bond is felt. What could she say or suggest? She had exhausted her powers when she declared with such proud emphasis that to give up was impossible. Then nature, which is above all law, stepped in and silenced her. What could she do further? It was for him to speak. The first sense of this compulsion was both sweet and painful to her—painful, because her mind was overflowing with active energy and purpose which longed for utterance: sweet, as the sign and symbol of a new condition, a union more rich and strange than any individuality. Anne had hesitated little in her life, and had not known what it was to wait. Now she bent her head to the necessity in a curious maze of feeling—bewildered, happy, a little impatient, wondering and hoping, silent as she had never in all her life before been tempted to be.
As for Douglas, he was silent too, with a much less delightful consciousness. In such circumstances what are the natural things for a man to say? That what his love has is nothing to him, so long as she brings him herself—that if there is only a sacrifice of money in question, no money can be allowed to stand in the way of happiness; that he has no fear, unless it might be for her; that to labour for her, to make her independent of all the fathers in the world, is his first privilege; and that the only thing to be considered is, when and how she will make his happiness complete by trusting herself to his care. These are, no doubt, the right things for a man to say, especially if they happen to be true, but even whether they are quite true or not, as his natural rôle requires. Then, on the other side, the woman (if she has any sense) will certainly come in and impose conditions and limit the fulness of the sacrifice; so that, what by masculine boldness of plan, and feminine caution of revisal, something reasonable and practical is at last struck out. But the caution, the repression, the prudence, ought not to be on the man’s side. Nothing can be more distinct than this great law. It becomes the woman to see all the drawbacks, to hold back, and to insist upon every prudential condition, not to make herself a burden upon him or permit him to be overwhelmed by his devotion. But it is not from his side that these suggestions of prudence can be allowed to come, however strongly he may perceive them. Perhaps it is as hard upon the man, who sees all the difficulties, to be compelled to adopt this part, as it is on the woman, accustomed to lead the way, to be silent and hold back. Douglas was in this predicament, if Anne felt all the mingled penalties and privileges of the other. He must do it, or else acknowledge himself a poor creature. And Cosmo had not the slightest inclination to appear a poor creature in Anne’s eyes. Yet at the same time he felt that to propose to this impetuous girl—who was quite capable of taking him at his word—that she should marry him at once in face of her father’s menace, was madness. What was he to do? He sat silent—for more minutes than Anne’s imagination approved. Her heart began to sink, a wondering pang to make itself felt in her breast, not for herself so much as for him. Was he about to fail to the emergency? to show himself unprepared to meet it? Was he, could it be possible, more concerned about the loss of the money than herself?
‘Here am I in a nice predicament,’ he burst forth at last; ‘what am I to say to you? Anne—you who have been brought up to wealth, who have known nothing but luxury—what am I to say to you? Is it to be my part to bring you down to poverty, to limit your existence? I who have no recommendation save that of loving you, which heaven knows many a better man must share with me; I an intruder whom you did not know a year ago—an interloper——’
There are some cases in which there is no policy like the naked truth. Anne held up her hands to stop him as he went on, exclaiming softly, ‘Cosmo, Cosmo!’ in various tones of reproach and horror. Then at last she stopped him practically, by putting one of her hands upon his mouth—an action which made her blush all over with tender agitation, pleasure, and shame.
‘How can you say such things? Cosmo! I will not hear another word.’
‘Am I anything but an interloper? How is any man worth calling a man to let you sacrifice yourself to him, Anne?’
‘I shall soon think it is you that want to throw me over,’ she said.
This shifted the tragic issue of the question and put him more at ease. If it could but be brought back to the general ground, on which mutual professions of fidelity would suffice and time could be gained! So far as that went, Cosmo knew very well what to say. It was only the practical result that filled him with alarm. Why had he been so hasty in declaring himself? The preliminaries of courtship may go on for years, but the moment an answer has been asked and given, some conclusion must be come to. However, it is always easy to answer a girl when she utters such words as these. He eluded the real difficulty, following her lead, and so filled up the time with lovers’ talk that the hour flew by without any decision. They talked of the one subject in a hundred different tones—it was all so new, and Anne was so easily transported into that vague and beautiful fairyland where her steps were treading for the first time. And she had so much to say to him on her side; and time has wings, and can fly on some occasions though he is so slow on others. It was she who at the end of many digressions finally discovered that while they had been talking the green terrace below had become vacant, the company dispersed. She started up in alarm.
‘They have all gone in. The game is over. How long we must have been sitting here! And they will be looking for me. I was obliged to say I had a headache. Indeed I had a headache,’ said Anne, suddenly waking to a sense of her subterfuge and hanging her head—for he had laughed—which was a failure of perception on his part and almost roused her pride to arms. But Cosmo was quick-sighted and perceived his mistake.
‘Dear Anne! is this the first issue of faith to me?’ he said. ‘What am I to do, my darling? Kill myself for having disturbed your life and made your head ache, or——’
‘Do not talk nonsense, Cosmo; but I must go home.’
‘And we have been talking nonsense, and have come to no settlement one way or another,’ he said, with a look of vexation. Naturally Anne took the blame to herself. It could only be her fault.
‘The time has gone so fast,’ she said, with a sigh. ‘But, perhaps, on the whole, it is best not to settle anything. Let us take a little time to think. Is there any hurry? Nobody can separate us so long as we are faithful to each other. There is no need that I know for—any conclusion.’
Poor Cosmo! there were points in which at this moment his was a hard case. He was obliged to look vexed and complain, though he was so fully convinced of the wisdom of this utterance. ‘You forget,’ he said tenderly, ‘that I have to go away, to return to my life of loneliness—perhaps to ask myself if Anne was only a heavenly dream, a delusion, and to find myself waking——’
‘To what?’ she replied, in her enthusiasm, half angry, ‘to what?’ ‘If you have my heart with you and my thoughts, is not that the best part of me? The Anne that will be with you will be the true Anne, not the outside of her which must stay here.’
‘But I want the outside too. Ah, Anne, if I were to stay here, if I could live at your gate like Charley Ashley (poor fellow!). But you forget that I must go away.’
‘I don’t forget it. When must you go?’ She sank her voice a little and drew closer to him, and looked at him with a cloud rising over her face. He must go, there was no eluding that certainty, and to think of it was like thinking of dying—yet of a sweet death to be borne heroically for the sake each of each, and with a speedy bright resurrection in prospect; but it would be an extinction of all the delight of living so long as it lasted. Cosmo’s mind was not so elevated as Anne’s, nor his imagination so inspiring, but the look of visionary anguish and courage went to his heart.
‘I don’t deserve it,’ he cried with a broken voice; which was very true. Then recovering himself, ‘It would not do for me to linger after what has passed between your father and me. It will be a terrible wrench, and without knowing when we are to meet again. Love, it must be before Saturday,’ he said.
They were standing close, very close together, clasping each other’s hands. Two tears came into Anne’s eyes, great lakes of moisture not falling, though brimming over. But she gave him such a smile as was all the sweeter reflected in them. ‘By Friday, then—we must make up our minds what we are to do.’
His fears and doubtfulness yielded for the moment to an impulse of real emotion. ‘How am I to live without you, now that I know you?’ he said.
‘You will not be without me, Cosmo! Did I not tell you the best of me would be with you always? Let us both think with all our might what will be the right thing for us.’
‘I know what I shall feel to be the best, Anne.’ He said this with a little fervour, suddenly coming to see—as now and then a man does—by a sudden inspiration, entirely contrary to his judgment, what would be his only salvation. This answered his purpose far better than any cleverness he could have invented. She shook her head.
‘We must not insist on choosing the happiest way,’ she said. ‘We must wait—in every way, I feel sure that to wait is the only thing we can do.’
‘Certainly not the happiest,’ he said, with emphasis. ‘There is no reason because of that interview with your father why I should not come to say good-bye. I will come on Friday publicly; but to-morrow, Anne, to-morrow, here——’
She gave him her promise without hesitation. There had been no pledge against seeing him asked or given, and it was indispensable that they should settle their plans. And then they parted, he, in the agitation and contagious enthusiasm of the moment, drawn closer to the girl whom he loved, but did not understand, nearer knowing her than he had ever been before. The impulse kept him up as on borrowed wings as far as the enclosure of the park. Then Cosmo Douglas dropped down to earth, ceased to reflect Anne Mountford, and became himself. She on wings which were her own, and borrowed from no one—wings of pure visionary passion, devotion, faith—skimmed through the light air homeward, her heart wrung, her sweet imagination full of visions, her courage and constancy strong as for life or death.
CHAPTER V.
EXPLANATIONS.
It is an awkward and a painful thing to quarrel with a friend when he is staying under your roof; though in that case it will no doubt make a breach, and he will go away, which will relieve you, even if you regret it afterwards. But if there is no quarrel, yet you find out suddenly that you have a grievance—a grievance profound and bitter, but not permitting of explanation—the state of affairs is more painful still; especially if the friend is thrown into your special society, and not taken from you by the general courtesies of the house. It was in this unfortunate position that the young men at the Rectory found themselves on the evening that followed. There was nobody in the house to diminish the pressure. Mrs. Ashley had died some years before, and the Rector, at that time left much alone, as both his sons were absent at school and university, had fallen into the natural unsocial habits of a solitary. He had been obliged to make life bearable for himself by perpetual reading, and now he could do little but read. He was very attentive to his duty, visiting his sick parishioners with the regularity of clockwork, and not much more warmth; but when he came in he went to his study, and even at table would furtively bring a book with him, to be gone on with if the occasion served. Charley and Willie were resigned enough to this shutting out of their father from the ordinary social intercourse. It liberated them from the curb imposed by his grave looks and silence. He had always been a silent man. Now that he had not his wife to speak to, utterance was a trouble to him. And even his meals were a trouble to Mr. Ashley. He would have liked his tray brought into his study among his books, which was the doleful habit he had fallen into when he was left to eat the bread of tears alone. He gave up this gratification when the boys were at home, but it cost him something. And he painfully refrained even from a book when there were visitors, and now and then during the course of a meal would make a solemn remark to them. He was punctilious altogether about strangers, keeping a somewhat dismal watch to see that they were not neglected. This it was which had brought him out of his study when he saw Douglas alone upon the lawn. ‘In your mother’s time,’ he would say, ‘this was considered a pleasant house to stay at. I have given up asking people on my own account; but when you have friends I insist upon attention being paid them.’ This made the curate’s position doubly irksome; he had to entertain the stranger who was his own friend, yet had, he felt, betrayed him. There was nothing to take Douglas even for an hour off his hands. Willie, as the spectator and sympathiser, was even more indignant than his brother, and disposed to show his indignation; and the curate had to satisfy his father and soothe Willie, and go through a semblance of intimate intercourse with his friend all at the same time. His heart was very heavy; and, at the best of times, his conversation was not of a lively description; nor had he the power of throwing off his troubles. The friend who had proved a traitor to him had been his leader, the first fiddle in every orchestra where Charley Ashley had produced his solemn bass. All this made the state of affairs more intolerable. In the evening what could they do? They had to smoke together in the little den apportioned to this occupation, which the Rector himself detested; for it rained, to wind up all those miseries. As long as it was fine, talk could be eluded by strolling about the garden; but in a little room, twelve feet by eight, with their pipes lit and everything calculated to make the contrasts of the broken friendship seem stronger, what could be done? The three young men sat solemnly, each in a corner, puffing forth clouds of serious smoke. Willie had got a ‘Graphic,’ and was turning it over, pretending to look at the pictures. Charley sat at the open window, with his elbow leaning upon the sill, gazing out into the blackness of the rain. As for Douglas, he tilted his chair back on its hind legs, and looked just as usual—a smile even hovered about his mouth. He was the offender, but there was no sense of guilt in his mind. The cloud which had fallen on their relationship amused him instead of vexing him. It wrapped Charley Ashley in the profoundest gloom, who was innocent; but it rather exhilarated the culprit. Ten minutes had passed, and not a word had been said, which was terrible to the sons of the house, but agreeable enough to their guest. He had so much to think of; and what talk could be so pleasant as his own thoughts? certainly not poor Ashley’s prosy talk. He swayed himself backward now and then on his chair, and played a tune with his fingers on the table; and a smile hovered about his mouth. He had passed another hour under the Beeches before the rain came on, and everything had been settled to his satisfaction. He had not required to make any bold proposal, and yet he had been argued with and sweetly persuaded as if he had suggested the rashest instantaneous action. He could not but feel that he had managed this very cleverly, and he was pleased with himself, and happy. He did not want to talk; he had Anne to think about, and all her tender confidences, and her looks and ways altogether. She was a girl whose love any man might have been proud of. And no doubt the father’s opposition would wear away. He saw no reason to be uneasy about the issue. In these days there is but one way in which such a thing can end, if the young people hold out. And, with a smile of happy assurance, he said to himself that Anne would hold out. She was not a girl that was likely to change.
Some trifling circumstance here attracted Cosmo’s attention to the very absurd aspect of affairs. A big moth, tumbling in out of the rain, flew straight at the candle, almost knocked the light out, burned off its wings, poor imbecile! and fell with a heavy thud, scorched and helpless, upon the floor. The curate, whose life was spent on summer evenings in a perpetual crusade against those self-destroying insects, was not even roused from his gloom by this brief and rapidly-concluded tragedy. He turned half round, gave a kind of groan by way of remark, and turned again to his gloomy gaze into the rain. Upon this an impulse, almost of laughter, seized Douglas in spite of himself. ‘Charley, old fellow, what are you so grumpy about?’ he said.
This observation from the culprit, whom they were both trying their best not to fall upon and slay, was as a thunderbolt falling between the two brothers. The curate turned his pale countenance round with a look of astonishment. But Willie jumped up from his chair. ‘I can’t stand this,’ he said, ‘any longer. Why should one be so frightened of the rain? I don’t know what you other fellows mean to do, but I am going out.’
‘And we are going to have it out,’ said Cosmo, as the other hurried away. He touched the foot of the curate, who had resumed his former attitude, with his own. ‘Look here, Charley, don’t treat me like this; what have I done?’ he said.
‘Done? I don’t know what you mean. Nothing,’ said the curate, turning his head round once more, but still with his eyes fixed on the rain.
‘Come in, then, and put it into words. You should not condemn the greatest criminal without a hearing. You think somehow—why shouldn’t you own it? it shows in every look—you think I have stood in your way.’
‘No,’ said Ashley again. His under-lip went out with a dogged resistance, his big eyelids drooped. ‘I haven’t got much of a way—the parish, that’s about all—I don’t see how you could do me any damage there.’
‘Why are you so bitter, Charley? If you had ever taken me into your confidence you may be sure I would not have interfered—whatever it might have cost me.’
‘I should like to know what you are talking about,’ the other said, diving his hands into the depths of his pockets, and turning to the rain once more.
‘Would you? I don’t think it; and it’s no good naming names. Look here. Will you believe me if I say I never meant to interfere? I never found out what was in your mind till it was too late.’
‘I don’t know that there is anything in my mind,’ Charley said. He was holding out with all his might: but the fibres of his heart were giving way, and the ice melting. To be sure, how should any one have found out? had it not been hidden away at the very bottom of his heart? Anne had never suspected it, how should Cosmo? He would not even turn his head to speak; but he was going, going! he felt it, and Douglas saw it. The offender got up, and laid his hand upon the shoulder of his wounded friend.
‘I’d rather have cut off my hand, or tugged out my heart, than wound you, Charley; but I never knew till it was too late.’
All this, perhaps, was not quite true; but it was true—enough. Douglas did not want to quarrel; he liked his faithful old retainer. A bird in the hand—that is always worth something, though perhaps not so much as is the worth of the two who are in the bush; and he is a foolish man who will turn away the certain advantage of friendship for the chance of love; anyhow, the address went entirely into the simple, if wounded, heart.
‘I didn’t mean to show I was vexed. I don’t know that I’m vexed—a man is not always in the same disposition,’ he said, but his voice was changing. Douglas patted him on the shoulder, and went back to his seat.
‘You needn’t envy me—much,’ said Douglas. ‘We don’t know what’s to come of it; the father won’t hear of me. He would have had nothing to say to you either, and think what a rumpus it would have made in the parish! And there’s the Rector to think of. Charley——’
‘Perhaps you are right,’ Charley said, with a great heave of his shoulders. His pipe had gone out. As he spoke, he got up slowly, and came to the table to look for the matches. Cosmo lighted one, and held it out to him, looking on with interest while the solemn process of rekindling was gone through. Charley’s face, lighted by the fitful flame as he puffed, was still as solemn as if it had been a question of life and death; and Cosmo, looking on, kept his gravity too. When this act was accomplished, the curate in silence gripped his friend’s hand, and thus peace was made. Poor faithful soul; his heart was still as heavy as lead—but pain was possible, though strife was not possible. A load was taken off his honest breast.
‘I’ve seen it coming,’ he said, puffing harder than was needful. ‘I oughtn’t to have felt it so much. After all, why should I grumble? I never could have been the man.’
‘You are a far better fellow than I am,’ cried the other, with a little burst of real feeling.
Charley puffed and puffed, with much exertion. The red gleam of the pipe got reflected under his shaggy eyebrows in something liquid. Then he burst into an unsteady laugh.
‘You might as well fire a damp haystack as light a pipe that’s gone out,’ was the next sentimental remark he made.
‘Have a cigar?’ said Cosmo, tenderly, producing a case out of his pocket, with eager benevolence. And thus their peace was made. Anne’s name was not mentioned, neither was there anything said but these vague allusions to the state of affairs generally. Of all things in the world sentimental explanations are most foreign to the intercourse of young Englishmen with each other. But when Willie Ashley returned, very wet, and with an incipient cold in his head from the impatient flight he had made, he was punished for his cowardly abandonment of an unpleasant position by finding his brother with the old bonds refitted upon him, completely restored to his old devotion and subjection to Cosmo. Willie retired to bed soon after, kicking off his boots with an energy which was full of wrath. ‘The fool!’ he said to himself; while the reconciled pair carried on their tobacco and their reunion till far in the night. They were not conversational, however, though they were reconciled. Conversation was not necessary to the curate’s view of social happiness, and Cosmo was glad enough to go back upon his own thoughts.
While this was going on at the Rectory, Anne for her part was submitting to a still more severe course of interrogation. Mrs. Mountford had discussed the question with herself at some length, whether she should take any notice or not of the domestic convulsion which had occurred under her very eye without having been brought openly to her cognisance. Her husband had of course told her all about it; but Anne had not said anything—had neither consulted her stepmother nor sought her sympathy. After a while, however, Mrs. Mountford sensibly decided that to ignore a matter of such importance, or to make-believe that she was not acquainted with it, would be equally absurd. Accordingly she arranged that Rose should be sent for after dinner to have a dress tried on; which was done, to that young lady’s great annoyance and wrath. Mrs. Worth, Mrs. Mountford’s maid, was not a person who could be defied with impunity. She was the goddess Fashion, La Mode impersonified at Mount. Under her orders she had a niece, who served as maid to Anne and Rose; and these two together made the dresses of the family. It was a great economy, Mrs. Mountford said, and all the county knew how completely successful it was. But to the girls it was a trouble, if an advantage. Mrs. Worth studied their figures, their complexions, and what she called their ‘hidiousiucrasies’—but she did not study the hours that were convenient for them, or make allowance for their other occupations. And she was a tyrant, if a beneficent one. So Rose had to go, however loth. Lady Meadowlands was about to give a fête, a great garden party, at which all ‘the best people’ were to be assembled. And a new dress was absolutely necessary. Wouldn’t it do in the morning?’ she pleaded. But Mrs. Worth was inexorable. And so it happened that her mother had a quiet half-hour in which to interrogate Anne.
The drawing-room was on the side of the house overlooking the flower garden; the windows, a great row of them, flush with the wall outside and so possessing each a little recess of its own within, were all open, admitting more damp than air, and a chilly freshness and smell of the earth instead of the scents of the mignonette. There were two lamps at different ends of the room, which did not light it very well: but Mrs. Mountford was economical. Anne had lit the candles on the writing-table for her own use, and she was a long way off the sofa on which her stepmother sat, with her usual tidy basket of neatly-arranged wools beside her. A little time passed in unbroken quiet, disturbed by nothing but the soft steady downfall of the rain through the great open space outside, and the more distant sound of pattering upon the trees. When Mrs. Mountford said ‘Anne,’ her stepdaughter did not hear her at first. But there was a slight infraction of the air, and she knew that something had been said.
‘Did you speak, mamma?’
‘I want to speak to you, Anne. Yes, I think I did say your name. Would you mind coming here for a little? I want to say something to you while Rose is away.’
Anne divined at once what it must be. And she was not unreasonable—it was right that Mrs. Mountford should know: how could she help but know, being the wife of one of the people most concerned? And the thing which Anne chiefly objected to was that her stepmother knew everything about her by a sort of back way, thus arriving at a clandestine knowledge not honestly gained. It was not the stepmother that was to blame, but the father and fate. She rose and went forward slowly through the partial light—reluctant to be questioned, yet not denying that to ask was Mrs. Mountford’s right.
‘I sent her away on purpose, Anne. She is too young. I don’t want her to know any more than can be helped. My dear, I was very sorry to hear from your father that you had got into that kind of trouble so soon.’
‘I don’t think I have got into any trouble,’ said Anne.
‘No, of course I suppose you don’t think so; but I have more experience than you have, and I am sorry your mind should have been disturbed so soon.’
‘Do you call it so very soon?’ said Anne. ‘I am twenty-one.’
‘So you are; I forgot. Well! but it is always too soon when it is not suitable, my dear.’
‘It remains to be seen whether it is not suitable, mamma.’
‘My love! do you think so little of your father’s opinion? That ought to count above everything else, Anne. A gentleman is far better able to form an opinion of another gentleman than we are. Mr. Douglas, I allow, is good-looking and well-bred. I liked him well enough myself; but that is not all—you must acknowledge that is not half enough.’
‘My father seems to want a great deal less,’ said Anne; ‘all that he asks is about his family and his money.’
‘Most important particulars, Anne, however romantic you may be; you must see that.’
‘I am not romantic,’ said Anne, growing red, and resenting the imputation, as was natural; ‘and I do not deny they are important details; but not surely to be considered first as the only things worth caring for—which is what my father does.’
‘What do you consider the things worth caring for, dear? Be reasonable. Looks?’ said Mrs. Mountford, laying down her work upon her lap with a benevolent smile. ‘Oh, Anne, my dear child, at your age we are always told that beauty is skin-deep, but we never believe it. And I am not one that would say very much in that respect. I like handsome people myself; but dear, dear, as life goes on, if you have nothing but looks to trust to——!’
‘I assure you,’ said Anne, vehemently, succeeding after two or three attempts to break in, ‘I should despise myself if I thought that beauty was anything. It is almost as bad as money. Neither the one nor the other is yourself.’
‘Oh, I would not go so far as that,’ said Mrs. Mountford, with indulgence. ‘Beauty is a great deal in my opinion, though perhaps it is gentlemen that think most about it. But, my dear Anne, you are a girl that has always thought of duty. I will do you the justice to say that. You may have liked your own way, but even to me, that have not the first claim upon you, you have always been very good. I hope you are not going to be rebellious now. You must remember that your father’s judgment is far more mature than yours. He knows the world. He knows what men are.’
‘So long as he does not know—one thing,’ said Anne, indignantly, ‘what can all that other information matter to me?’
‘And what is the one thing, dear?’ Mrs. Mountford said.
Anne did not immediately reply. She went to the nearest window and closed it, for sheer necessity of doing something; then lingered, looking out upon the rain and the darkness of the night.
‘Thank you, that is quite right,’ said her stepmother. ‘I did not know that window was open. How damp it is, and how it rains! Anne, what is the one thing? Perhaps I might be of some use if you would tell me. What is it your father does not know?’
‘Me,’ said Anne, coming slowly back to the light. Her slight white figure had the pose of a tall lily, so light, so firm, that its very fragility looked like strength. And her face was full of the constancy upon which, perhaps, she prided herself a little—the loyalty that would not give up a dog, as she said. Mrs. Mountford called it obstinacy, of course. ‘But what does that matter,’ she added, with some vehemence, ‘when in every particular we are at variance? I do not think as he does in anything. What he prizes I do not care for—and what I prize——’
‘My dear, it is your father you are speaking of. Of course he must know better than a young girl like you——’
‘Mamma, it is not his happiness that is involved—it is mine! and I am not such a young girl—I am of age. How can he judge for me in what is to be the chief thing in my life?’
‘Anne,’ said Mrs. Mountford kindly, ‘this young man is almost a stranger to you—you had never seen him a year ago. Is it really true, and are you quite sure that this involves the happiness of your life?’
Anne made no reply. How otherwise? she said indignantly in her heart. Was she a girl to deceive herself in such a matter—was she one to make protestations? She held her head high, erecting her white throat more like a lily than ever. But she said nothing. What was there to say? She could not speak or tell anyone but herself what Cosmo was to her. The sensitive blood was ready to mount into her cheeks at the mere breathing of his name.
Mrs. Mountford shook her head. ‘Oh, foolish children,’ she said, ‘you are all the same. Don’t think you are the only one, Anne. When you are as old as I am you will have learned that a father’s opinion is worth taking, and that your own is not so infallible after all.’
‘I suppose,’ said Anne softly, ‘you are twice my age, mamma—that would be a long time to wait to see which of us was right.’
‘I am more than twice your age,’ said Mrs. Mountford, with a little heat; then suddenly changing her tone, ‘Well! so this is the new fashion we have been hearing so much of. Turn round slowly that I may see if it suits you, Rose.’
CHAPTER VI.
GOOD-BYE.
Next day was one of those crowning days of summer which seem the climax, and at the same time the conclusion, of the perfect year. From morning till night there was no shadow upon it, no threatening of a cloud, no breath of unfriendly air. The flowers in the Mount gardens blazed from the level beds in their framework of greenness, the great masses of summer foliage stood out against the soft yet brilliant sky; every outline was round and distinct, detaching itself in ever-varying lines, one curve upon another. Had the weather been less perfect their distinctness would have been excessive and marred the unity of the landscape, but the softness of the summer air harmonised everything in sight and sound alike. The voices on the terrace mingled in subtle musical tones at intervals; and, though every branch of the foliage was perfect in itself, yet all were melodiously mingled, and belonged to each other. On the sea-shore and among the hills distance seemed annihilated, and every outline pressed upon the eye, too bright, too near for pleasure, alarming the weather-wise. But here, so warmly inland, in a landscape so wealthy and so soft, the atmosphere did not exaggerate, it only brightened. It was the end of August, and changes were preparing among the elements. Next day it might be autumn with a frost-touch somewhere, the first yellow leaf; but to-day it was full summer, a meridian more rich than that of June, yet still meridian, full noon of the seasons.