CHAPTER IV. SIR RICHARD GAINS HIS POINT.
I DON'T know how it was in the Monkish times in England, but it appears that the keeping of religious days—always excepting the Sabbath—is not in accordance with the genius of this country as it exists at present. By general habit, we are devout, or certainly reverent; and yet the majority seem unable to discriminate between a fast and a festival. Christmas Day, for example, is kept by the evangelical folks exactly like Sunday, which is with them very much the reverse of a feast-day. With the High Church people, again, it is a Holiday, to be enjoyed after a certain peculiar fashion of their own; while the great mass of the population outrage both these parties by treating half the day as a fast and the other half as a festival. After morning church, it is generally understood that one may enjoy one's self—that is, within the limit of the domestic circle. There is the rub. It is not every disposition which can appreciate forfeits and snap-dragon. My own respected grandfather used to thank Heaven with much devotion that he had always been a domestic man, who knew how to enjoy a peaceful Christmas in the bosom of his family; but then he always went to sleep immediately after dinner, and nobody ventured to wake him until the servants came in to prayers, after which he went to bed.
It is a pleasant sight, says Holy Writ, to see brethren dwelling together in unity; but the remark would not have been put on record had the spectacle been a very common one. It is a sad confession to make, but I think most of us must own that the “family gathering” in the country, even at Christmas-tide, is not the most agreeable sort of social entertainment. There is too much predetermination to be jolly about such festivities, too much resolution to put up with Polly's temper and Jack's rudeness, and to please grandpapa (who is funded) at all hazards. When we find ourselves in the up-train again after that domestic holiday-week, we are not altogether displeased that it is over, and secretly congratulate ourselves that there has not been a row. I am, of course, speaking of ordinary folks, such as the world is mainly composed of, and not of such exemplary people as my readers and myself. We have no family jealousies, no struggles for grandpapa's favour, no difficulties in having common patience with Polly, no private opinion—if he was not our brother—about Jack; no astonishment at Henry's success, no envy at Augusta's prospects. But with the majority of grown-up brothers and sisters, this is not so. Since they parted from one another under the paternal roof, their lines of life have diverged daily; their interests, so far from being identical, have become antagonistic. Margaret is as nice as ever, but Penelope is not a bit improved, and yet one must seem to be as glad to see one as the other. One must not only forgive, but forget; it is not (unhappily) necessary that we should be polite, but we must be affectionate; nay, we must not only be affectionate—grandpapa will think it extremely odd if we are not “gushing.”
The Lisgard family circle was not large, though, as we have seen, there was room in it for disagreement; moreover, there was not a “dead set” of domestic element, the consanguinity being relieved by the presence of Miss Rose Aynton. If grandpapa were wise, this should always be the case; for it prevents Courtesy from taking leave of the company, which she is only too apt to do, under the mistaken notion that near relations can afford to do without her. It was with no such intention, however, that my Lady had asked Miss Aynton to visit Mirk. She would have thought it hard, indeed, if her two sons could not have spent a week together under the same roof without the presence of a stranger to prevent their quarrelling. Rose had been a school-friend of Letty, and the latter young lady had asked permission to invite her young friend to the Abbey for Christmas. She had no home of her own to go to, poor thing, having neither father nor mother. She lived with her aunt, Miss Colyfield, a fashionable old lady in Mayfair, very popular among her acquaintance, but a sort of person, not uncommon in that locality, whom it is not altogether charming to reside with as a dependent. Miss Aynton was evidently accustomed to suppression. It made a man positively indignant to see one whose youth and intelligence entitled her to be the mistress of all who approached her, so humble, so unegotistic, so grateful. It was evident that she had plenty of natural good spirits, and every faculty for enjoyment, if she had only dared exhibit them. Her very accomplishments, which were numerous, were timidly concealed, and peeped forth one by one, almost, as it seemed, by compulsion. She might have left Mirk, for instance, without a soul knowing of her taste for ecclesiastical decoration, if it had not been for a sore throat which prevented Letty from superintending the Christmas ornamentations in the chancel.
“Can't you do it, my dear?” said Letty, a little peevish at the disappointment, and hopeless that her place could be satisfactorily filled by a London-bred girl like Rose, who had never seen holly-berries except in the greengrocers' shops, or at the artificial florist's. “Now, do try, and Richard and Walter will both help.”
“I will do my best, dear,” this young lady had answered simply. And never had anything so beautiful been seen in the county, as was the result of her efforts. So much was said of them that Letty had ventured to go to church that morning, despite her ailment, and was as earnest in her praise as any in the congregation. There was no such thing as jealousy in her composition, and the success of her friend was a genuine pleasure to her.
“O mamma, you have missed such a sight!” cried she, as Lady Lisgard made her first appearance that morning at the luncheon-table, looking a little grave and pale, but gracious and dignified as a queen in exile, as usual. “Not only the chancel, but the whole church a perfect bower of evergreens, and everything so exquisitely done! The pillars, alternately ivy and laurel; and under the gallery, beautiful texts in holly-berries set in green. As for the wall at the back of the altar—the decorations there are such that it makes one cry to think they are ever to be taken down again. Oh, I do hope you will feel well enough, dear mamma, to come to church this afternoon and see them.”
“Really, Lady Lisgard,” said Miss Aynton, blushing deeply, and with her soft eyes looking very much inclined to be tearful, “you must not believe all that Lefty's kindness induces her to say about me.”
“Nay, but it's true, mother,” broke forth Sir Richard. “I never could have dreamt of anything so beautiful being made out of leaves and berries. The old church looks enchanted, and Miss Aynton is the fairy that has done it.”
“Sir Richard suggested the centre design himself,” returned Rose gravely; “and the fact is, I am nothing but a plagiarist in the whole affair. Our curate in Park Street gives himself up to floral religion, and dresses up his church in a dozen different garbs according to the season. I am one of its volunteer tiring-women, and am therefore accustomed to the business—that is all.”
“It is very honest of you to tell us that, Rose,” said my Lady approvingly.
“Yes, mamma,” broke in Letty; “but it was very wicked of her not to tell Mr Mosely, who came to thank her in the churchyard after service. He actually made an allusion to her in his sermon—talked about her 'pious hands.' She never told him one word about this London curate.”
Letty's laugh rang merrily out as she thus twitted her friend, but her brothers did not echo it. Neither of them relished this mention of the Mayfair clergyman. They had each in turn enjoyed that religious work, in which they had been fellow-labourers with Miss Aynton, and each perhaps flattered himself that she had been most pleased when his own fingers were looping the berries for her, or holding the ivy while she fastened it in its place. Of course there was nothing serious between either of them and herself. Sir Richard would naturally look higher for a bride than to the dependent niece of a fickle old woman of fashion; while as to Walter, with his comparatively small fortune and expensive tastes, it was absolutely necessary that he should “marry money,” and not mere expectations. Still, no man is altogether pleased to hear that a young girl he admires is engaged to somebody else; and although this had not been said of Rose, yet Mayfair curates are dangerous persons, and church decoration (as they were aware by recent experience) is a fascinating occupation when indulged in by both sexes at the same time.
So Letty had all the laughter to herself.
“How strange it was to hear the people when they first came in,” continued she. “Their 'Ohs!' and Ahhs!' and 'Well I nevers!' were quite irrepressible.”
“Especially the gentleman in the gallery, who expressed his opinion that it was for all the world like May-day,” observed Walter slily. “Miss Aynton's chef-d'oeuvre reminded him, it seems, of Jack-in-the-Green.”
“Yes, was it not shocking, mamma?” exclaimed Letty. “He spoke quite loud. I shouldn't suppose that the creature had ever been in a church before. How he did stare about him!”
“You must have been looking in his direction yourself, miss,” returned the young dragoon, “as, indeed, were all the female part of the congregation. We don't see such awful beards as his in Mirk church every Sunday.”
“How touchy dear Walter is upon the subject of beards,” observed Letty demurely.
The captain's smooth face coloured like a girl's, while Miss Rose Aynton sought concealment in her pocket-handkerchief. Even Lady Lisgard forced herself to smile at the embarrassment of her handsome boy. But Sir Richard did not smile; he was not on sufficiently good terms with his younger brother to enjoy even so innocent a joke at his expense.
“You have not yet seen this distinguished stranger, I suppose, mamma?” resumed Letty, without whom—what with Rose's shyness and the coldness between the two young men—the conversation would have languished altogether.
“What stranger do you mean, my dear?” said my Lady coldly.
“Why, the man that came with the Waits last night, and sang beneath your window. Surely you must have noticed his voice, so different from poor old Ash and the rest of them.”
“Now you mention it, Letty, I think I did remark that there was a strange singer among them. He had a voice like Mr Steve's.”
“Very probably, my dear mother,” observed Walter laughing; “for they both use the same tuning-key—the Spigot. Steve is said to be quite jealous because this gentleman from foreign parts can take two glasses to his one, although it cannot be added that he doesn't shew it. Steve can look like a Methodist parson when he pleases, whereas his new friend has made a sacrifice of his very countenance to Bacchus; and yet he must have been a handsome fellow at one time.—Don't you think so, Miss Aynton?”
“I really scarcely looked at him,” returned the young lady addressed. “I should hesitate to pass an opinion upon this distinguished——”
“O Rose,” interrupted Letty archly; “how dare you!—Why, Walter, she told me herself, only five minutes ago, while we were taking off our bonnets, that she thought his expression 'magnificent '—that was her very word—and that she would like to take him in chalks.”
“I must confess,” said Rose, “without venturing to call it good-looking or otherwise, that his countenance, artistically speaking, seems to me very striking. He is just one of those wicked people, I fancy, in whom one feels a sort of interest in spite of one's self.—Now, don't you think so, Sir Richard?”
“My dear Miss Aynton,” returned the baronet with an air of hauteur that neutralised the familiarity implied by his words, “if this person has won your sympathy, he is fortunate indeed; but I must say that I don't see that he deserves it. His beard, which is certainly a handsome one, has also—as it seems to me—the great advantage of obscuring half his countenance. I confess, I think he looks to be a scoundrel of the first salt-water.”
“That's what Rose means!” cried Letty, clapping her hands. “He's one of those dear handsome villains who used to—ah, infest—yes, that's the phrase—who used to infest the Spanish Main. How charmingly mysterious was the very place in which they carried on their profession! If it was not for seasickness, I should like to have had something to do in the Spanish Main myself. I have not the shadow of a doubt that this Mr Derrick—evidently an assumed name—— What's the matter, dearest mother?”
My Lady had uttered a low cry, such as is evoked by sudden and acute physical pain.
“Nothing, my love—nothing: it was a passing spasm, nothing more. A tinge of my old rheumatism again, I fear, which is a sign of old age, and therefore a malady I do not wish to be taken notice of.—Now, don't distress yourselves, my dears”—for all had risen with looks of genuine and affectionate anxiety, except Miss Aynton, who had rapidly poured out a glass of wine.—“Thank you, Rose; that was all I wanted. Nobody offered me any sherry, so I thought I would try whether I could not obtain it medicinally.—What were you saying, Letty, about this—this person?”
“I was merely remarking that he had probably been a buccaneer, mamma.”
“In other words, that he deserves hanging,” observed Sir Richard gruffly. “I hope he will soon take himself out of the parish, for we have got tipplers enough in it already.”
“Dear, dear, dear!” said Letty sedately; “to make such an observation as that, just after mamma has been craving for sherry! Besides, how can this gentleman annoy you, Sir Richard? He isn't come here to dispute the title, is he?”
My Lady kept her lips closed this time; but an anguish passed over her face that would have been easy to see, had not the eyes of those at table been otherwise engaged.
Letty was looking at her friend, in hopes that she should get her to laugh at her high and mighty brother; Rose did not dare look up, for fear she should do so. Walter, his handsome lips slightly curled, was contemptuously watching the baronet, who stared, Sphinx-like, right before him, as was his custom whenever he was in one of his autocratic humours, as at present.
“I don't choose to have persons of that sort in the parish,” said he with icy distinctness.
“But, my dear Richard, you can't turn him out,” reasoned Letty, rather vexed by an exhibition of her brother's pride before her school-friend beyond what she had calculated upon. “He has a right to stop at the Lisgard Arms as long as he pleases.”
“And I have a right to turn Steve out as a tenant”——
“You have nothing of the kind, Richard,” interposed Walter quietly; “you have no more right than I—not even legal right, for the inn is not yet yours, and as for moral right, it would be the most monstrous piece of territorial oppression ever heard of out of Poland. So long as the man behaves himself”——
“He does not behave himself,” put in Sir Richard angrily. “He is a drunkard, and a brawler in church.”
“Gracious mercy! how you must have been looking up Burn's Justice. But you will not be a magistrate, a custos rotulorum, till you are of age, remember, so that he is safe for six months. In the meantime, he certainly means to stay here. He is so good as to say he likes Mirk, I understand; and the village folks like him. He is a great addition to the choir; and I shall certainly ask him, in case he remains, to join our Mirk volunteers: Steve tells me he is a most admirable shot with a rifle, and will do the corps credit.”
“That is all the worse,” quoth Sir Richard violently; “he is only the more likely to be a poacher. We have more than enough of that sort already, and I beg that you will give none such your encouragement.”
“Encouragement!” returned Walter airily. “What patronage have I to offer? I am not Sir Richard, who can make a man happy with a word.”
“Very well,” continued the baronet with suppressed passion, “let him take care how he trespasses upon the Abbey-lands—that's all.”
“Nay, you'll see him at the Abbey itself,” laughed Walter carelessly, “and that pretty often, unless I quite misinterpreted Mistress Forest's manner when she parted from him at the Lych Gate: I never saw two people more affectionate upon so short an acquaintance.”
“A most ineligible suitor, I am sure,” broke forth the baronet. “I trust Mary is not fool enough to disgrace herself at her time of life by any such alliance.”
“She is almost old enough to choose for herself,” responded Walter drily. “The selection of a husband for one's servant is scarcely the privilege of even a lord of the manor, and when the servant is not one's own”——
“I believe, sir,” interrupted Sir Richard hastily, “that I am only speaking the sentiments of her mistress, in whose hands, of course, the matter lies.—Mother, do you not agree with me that it would be very unwise to encourage any attachment between Mary Forest and this reprobate stranger, Derrick?”
It was plain my Lady had not recovered from her late ailment, of whatever nature the attack might have been; otherwise, she would have interfered between the brothers before a direct appeal for her decision had been made by either of them, it being a rule with her never to place herself in an invidious position with respect to her children. To the astonishment of the baronet himself, however, Lady Lisgard now forced her pale lips to utter deliberately enough: “I think it would be very unwise.”
“And therefore,” pursued Sir Richard, hastening to push his advantage, “it would be worse than unwise, it would be absolute cruelty, since you do not intend her to marry this fellow, that opportunities should be afforded her of meeting him under the same roof. I do not say that his offence of brawling in church this morning is a sufficient ground of itself for forbidding him the house, although to most persons with any sense of decency it would be a serious misdemeanour: but would it not be well, under these particular circumstances, to treat it so?”
“Yes,” returned my Lady, rising from the table, white as a ghost, “you are right, Richard; let this Mr Derrick be forbidden the house.”
CHAPTER V. MASTER WALTER.
THE day after Christmas Day was friendly to the fox; in other words, a hard frost; and since Miss Rose Aynton and Letty had declined to play at billiards with Walter until the afternoon—for it is vicious (in the country) to indulge in that pastime in the morning, as it is to play at cards before candle-light—that young gentleman, being no reader, felt the time rather heavy on his hands, and strolled into the village to get rid of it. The snow had ceased to fall, but not before, like a good housekeeper when the family has left town, it had covered up everything very carefully, except the tops of the chimneys, through which the tidings of good-cheer rolled forth in dusky columns from every cottage; for there were no abject poor in Mirk, thanks to my Lady, or any that lacked victuals at that joyous season.
The Lisgards had ever been a free-handed race, as generous out of doors as hospitable within; and their influence for good had been felt for generations throughout the village. I do not say that they expected no repayment; their rule was paternal, and they looked for something like filial obedience in return. If a villager had passed any member of that august family without pulling his hair, as though it were a bell-handle, in token of respect, it would have been considered a sign of revolution, and they would have congratulated themselves that the yeomanry were in a state of efficiency. The feudal system was still in vogue at Mirk, but tempered not only by excellent beef-tea in sickness, and port wine from the Abbey cellar during convalescence, but by the best Gothic architecture, as applied to cottages. If eleven human beings did sometimes sleep in a single room, and the domestic arrangements were inferior to those which Mr Chifney of the Farm provided for his race-horses, the tenement looked outside very picturesque, as seen from the Abbey windows. Nay, it must be owned that even this inconvenience of overcrowding was rare in the home-village, in comparison with other places on the Lisgard estate, not so near the family seat, about which everything was in externals, at least, becomingly spick and span.
Dr Haldane, indeed, who had property of his own, and could afford to entertain political opinions at variance with those in favour at the Abbey, had been of old accustomed irreverently to adapt a certain popular nursery ballad to the state of things at Mirk.
Who built the infant school so red?
Who set that striking-clock o'erhead,
To tell us all the time for bed?
The Lisgards.
Who made, and at such great expense,
Around our pond that iron fence,
To keep the pigs and boys from thence?
The Lisgards, &c.
In short, Mirk was a pet hamlet, and exhibited a hundred tokens of its patron's favour. It was surely only right and proper, therefore, that all the votes in the village at election-time, except the doctor's, went the same way with the squire's, and that even in social matters he exercised unquestioned sway. Mirk was as respectable as the brotherhood of Quakers, and was rendered so by the same simple machinery; any one in the place who shewed a disposition to be otherwise was immediately turned out. Did a man drink, so as to cause public disturbance, or pick up sticks (to save himself trouble) out of the park-fences—or, worse than all, did he Poach—were it but a pheasant's egg—he received the most peremptory notice to quit the model village. The issuing of these ukases of banishment had been, now and then, a severe trial to the popularity of the Lisgards; but it had overlived all such acts—nay, more, even its favouritism, that seemingly indispensable element of the feudal system, had been forgiven it. Nobody now complained that George Steve, who notoriously never went to bed quite sober, still continued tenant of the Lisgard Arms; while Jacob Flail and Joseph Dibble had been condemned, with their families, to banishment for life for a less habitual commission of the same offence.
Much less did it strike the villagers that it was inconsistent in a landlord, so careful for the morality of his people, to let so large a portion of the Abbey Farm to a trainer of race-horses, of which there were at present upwards of thirty in Mirk; and in summer, when the Downland above was fit for their exercise, there were often twice as many. But then Mr Chifney was not like an ordinary trainer; nor did his jockey-boys, thanks to his strict supervision, behave like ordinary jockey-boys. They attended divine service on alternate Sundays, and half-a-dozen of them were in the choir. Mr Mosely (who was Anglican) had even taken into consideration the advisability of putting these last into surplices, but Mr Chifney had dissuaded him from that experiment. They had always been accustomed to the most tight-fitting of garments, strait-waistcoats, buck-skin breeches, and gaiters—and perhaps he thought the transition would be too abrupt. Their habits, in some other respects, were loose, and yet they were suffered to breathe the Lisgard air. Mr Chifney's boys were like the servants of ambassadors at foreign courts, who enjoy a separate jurisdiction from that to which the native inhabitants submit. The law itself—at least in the case of petty offences—was not called in to punish these young gentlemen; but I believe they were “colted”—for the whole discipline was “horsey”—by Mr Chifney's head-groom. I do not know the exact manner in which this chastisement was inflicted, but it must have differed from the ordinary method, since they never failed to pursue their daily equestrian duties as usual. Mr Chifney looked after that himself, and exceedingly sharp. Nothing went amiss through oversight in his establishment, and his employers had every reason to put confidence in him. He left no means untried to insure the success of the costly animals it was his mission to groom and guard. His very acceptance of the post of churchwarden had been described by his enemies as an attempt to “hedge”—to make friends with those powers of good which are generally supposed, to be antagonistic, if they have anything to do with it at all, to the profession of horse-racing. It is certain that Mr Chifney, whose occupations seldom permitted his own attendance at public worship, never failed to come to church upon those Sundays which immediately preceded the Derby and the St Leger, and indeed it is very likely that he treated them (without knowing it) as the eves of his patron saints' days.
It was to the Abbey Farm that Mr Walter Lisgard was now bound; for to the young gentlemen of England, what is a more interesting spectacle than a racing-stable—what is a more charming subject of conversation than the next Great Event? And who more fitted to afford every information upon that important topic—if he chose—than Mr Tite Chifney? If he chose. Therein lay the whole matter; for Mr Chifney was reticent, as became one intrusted with a hundred thousand pounds' worth of horseflesh, upon whose performances depended perhaps, in the aggregate, millions of money. He had put “Master Walter” up to a “good thing,” however, more than once, and the captain had no doubt but that he would do it again. He never did doubt of his own success either with man or woman. Confidence, but without swagger, self-content, but without vanity, were evident enough in those handsome features, illuminated almost at all times with the desire to please. He lit his cigar at the hall-door, smoothed away a fallen spark from his sealskin waistcoat, and took his way down the leafless avenue, humming the latest lively air, as he crunched the snow beneath his dainty boots. How different from Sir Richard's measured step and haughty silence, thought the gatekeeper's wife, as she hastened out of the lodge, from the side-window of which she had marked her favourite approach. “Never mind me, Martha,” cried he laughing; “I'm tall enough now to lift the latch for myself. My boots are thicker than yours are—look—and I have no rheumatism, which, I am afraid, you have not quite got rid of yet. There—I won't speak a word with you till you go inside. How's the guidman? Ah, out, is he? How's little Polly? Hullo, Polly, how you're grown! Why, I daresay she won't kiss me now, as she always used to do.”
“Oh yes, she'll kiss you, Master Walter,” answered the old dame; “there's no harm in kissing o' you; although I wouldn't say that to my daughter of ne'er another young man in the county.—Come, lass, you need not blush so, for I've had many a one from the same young gentleman.” And the old dame laughed and chuckled, until that dread enemy of honest-hearted mirth, the lumbago, twitched her into her chair.
Polly, a very pretty country lassie, about sixteen, stood pink and hesitating while the captain removed his cigar, and waited—smiling demigod—for the promised favour.
“Come, gi'e it to him, and ha' done wi' it,” cried the old lady, exasperated by her torments. Thereupon the girl stepped forward, head aside. Master Walter met her, touched her soft cheek with his lip, and as his silken moustache brushed her ear, whispered an airy something which turned her crimson. There was nothing in the words themselves save the merest compliment; their magic lay in the tone of him who used them; so tender, yet so frank, so familiar, and yet so gracious. Then, with a smile, he bade them both “good-bye,” and strolling through the gate, resumed his interrupted ditty, as though kissing were the most innocent as well as the most natural of all pastimes; but Polly pressed her throbbing brow against the pane for its very coolness, and watched him saunter down the village street with quite a flutter at her heart, and promised to herself that she would not forget the captain's kiss—no, not though Joe, the under-gardener, should speak his mind next “feast” (as it was rumoured in well-informed circles that he intended to do), and “keep her company” in earnest.
That she was doing no wrong in this was certain, for not only her mother, but everybody else in Mirk, agreed that there was no sort of harm in Master Walter, let him do what he might. He had a way of doing things so very different from others. How the very dogs fawned upon him as he sauntered on, and the old horse in the straw-yard stretched its gray head over the gate in hopes of a caress as he went by! How the boys by the roadside left their Snow-man an unfinished torso, and ran to make their bows before the good-natured captain, with an eye to largesse, in the form of a copper scramble; and how the school-girls courtesied, with admiring awe, as they pictured to themselves how fine a figure handsome Master Walter must needs cut in gold and scarlet! He had a nod or a word for almost everybody, young or old; but if his look but lit upon another's face, it left a pleasure there, as the Sun leaves when it has shone upon one. Delayed by these reciprocal manifestations of good-will, like a young prince making a Royal Progress among a well-affected people, Walter Lisgard at length got free of the village, and climbing a steep hill (never used by the race-horses even in much less slippery weather), arrived at his destination, the Abbey Farm. This was a long, low, ancient building, belonging to one could scarce tell what date, so pieced, and restored, and added to, had been the original structure; but when the Abbey was an Abbey, the Abbey Farm had been a sort of branch-establishment, in the occupation of the monks; there were traces of their sojourn even now: over the pointed porch yet stood a cross of stone, though broken; and in the garden, now all white and hoar, that lay between the house and road, there was a mighty sundial, carved like a font with noseless saints in niches, and round the rim a scripture, of which alone the words nox venit could be deciphered. The night had come, not only upon those who built and blessed such things, but on the faith which they professed. The very memory of themselves and it had faded from men's minds. Not one in ten at Mirk—where all had owned the Abbot for liege-lord, and bowed their heads before his meanest monk, in token of their soul's humility, but a few centuries back—not one in ten, I say, could tell even what that niche on the south side of the communion-table meant, which the learned called Piscina. The mighty bower that had once been the granary of the Abbey, and to which the poor had looked with thankful eyes in times of scarcity, still stood beside the homestead, but the remembrance of its very use was gone; the only legend clinging to its moss-grown walls was that a Long Parliament had once held its sittings there. Save the farmhouse and the barn, all relics of the past had been swept away. Immediately behind them was quite a town of stables and loose boxes, all of the most modern construction, and furnished with the latest inventions for equine comfort. The enormous farmyard, strewn with a thick carpet of clean straw, was now the exercising-ground for the horses; but in the summer, a gate at the back of the premises opened immediately upon the grassy upland, the proximity of which had tempted Mr Tite Chifney to pitch his tent and enlarge his boundaries at the Abbey Farm. So high had been the rent he offered for this eligible situation, that the late Sir Robert had removed his own agricultural head-quarters elsewhere, and suffered Mr Chifney and his race-horses to occupy the whole place, which was now the capital of the Houwhyhims—the largest establishment in Great Britain, wherein man held the secondary position, and the Horse the principal.
CHAPTER VI. THE RACING-STABLE.
IT was Mr Chifney in person who admitted Walter Lisgard, after a precautionary glance at him through a little grating, which doubtless the monks had used for a similar purpose, although without the same excuse, for they had never possessed any Derby “cracks” to be poisoned. Mr Chifney might have been himself a monk but for his apparel, which, although scrupulously neat and plain, fitted him almost like war-paint, so that there was not a crease to be seen, except at the knees, of which he made as much use as the holy fathers themselves did, though not precisely in the same way. His dark hair was closely cropped, and a little bald spot on the top of the crown might well have been taken for a tonsure. Moreover, he had a grave and secretive look, which would have well enough become one in whom were reposed the secrets of the Confessional; and when he smiled, he looked sorry for it immediately afterwards, as though he had given way to a carnal pleasure.
Captain Lisgard shook the trainer's hand with his usual hearty warmth, and Mr Chifney returned his pressure with unwonted cordiality. He was accustomed to meet men of a much higher social rank than his present visitor on something like equal terms; many of them shook hands with him; all of them treated him with familiarity. The Turf, like the Grave, levels all distinctions. Between the Lord and the Blackleg (to make an antithetical use of terms that are not seldom synonymous), there is but slight partition on that common ground; the widest gulf of social difference is bridged over, pro tem, by the prospect of an advantageous bet. How much more, then, was this wont to be the case in view of the trustworthy “information” which Mr Tite Chifney had it so often in his power to bestow? Marquises had taken his arm in a confidential manner before now in the most public places, and dukes had called him “Tite;” even ladies of the highest fashion had treated him to pretty speeches, and to what they hoped might turn out literally “winning ways.” But the great trainer estimated all these condescensions at their true value. He never concealed from himself the motives that caused these people to be so civil to him; and perhaps he had seen too much of the turfite aristocracy to be flattered by their attentions, even had they been disinterested. But Walter Lisgard's greeting was different from those which he was wont to receive from his great patrons; there was not only a cordial frankness about it, but a something of sympathy, conveyed with marvellous tact, in his air and manner; which seemed to say: “I unfeignedly regret that anything like friendship should be impossible between us, for I am your social superior; and yet, how ridiculous a thing it is that this should be so! I, but the younger brother of a man himself of no great position, and you, at the head of that profession in which the noblest in the land take so great and personal an interest.” If Mr Chifney did not read all this, it is certain that so acute an observer could not fail to read some of it. He was as far from being moved by any considerations not strictly practical as any man connected with horseflesh; his calling, too, rendered him as suspicious of his fellow-creatures as a police detective; but Master Walter's sort of flattery was too subtle for him. He had always had a liking for this genial young fellow, with his handsome face and pleasant speech, and who, moreover, rode across country like a centaur; he was one of his own landlord's family, too, and the heir-presumptive of the property, whose favour it was just as well to win and keep; and lastly, the lad had been so unfeignedly grateful to him for the little hints he had occasionally afforded him, as well as so wisely reticent about his informant, that he was not unwilling to help him again to a few “fivers,” if he could do so without the betrayal of professional confidence.
“Come for another 'tip,' eh, Master Walter?” whispered he good-naturedly as he led the way into the house. “You see I did not deceive you the last time you were here about Cambyses!”
“No, indeed, you did not, Mr Chifney” (Walter never addressed this friend of his without the Mister), “and a very great blessing it was to yours thankfully at a time when he was even more hard-up than usual. Is your Derby 'crack' visible today? I am poor, but honest. I have no motive beyond that of curiosity, and if suspected of a concealed weapon, will submit to be searched.”
“Well, Master Walter,” grinned the trainer, “I can't say that I much credit the honesty of anybody myself; but I don't see why you should not have a look at his majesty, particularly as there is one coming here this morning already upon the same errand, and I'm sure I'd as soon oblige you as him—or, indeed, as any man, let it be who it will.”
“You are very kind to say so, Mr Chifney, and still more to mean it, as I am sure you do; but I feel that I have no right with my bagatelle of a stake depending upon the matter to take up your time—nay, I must insist upon throwing my cigar away before entering your house; it is all very well for Mrs Chifney to give you the privilege of smoking within doors, but I could not venture to take such a liberty myself. What a jolly place this is of yours; I always think it is so much snugger than the Abbey. I should never sit anywhere but in your grand old kitchen, if I were you.”
“Well, the fact is we do sit a good deal in the kitchen,” returned Mr Chifney reddening. “It's warm, you see, although it's large, and my wife likes to see how things are going on. She's engaged there just at present, and—you're a great favourite of hers; but I would recommend you to step in as you go out, instead of now. A queer thing is woman, Master Walter, and no man can tell how queer till he comes to be married! Young gals is all sweetness and easily cajoled; but wives—O lor! Now, it's exactly different with horseflesh, for the brood-mares one can manage with a little care, and it's only the fillies that give us trouble, and have such tempers of their own. There; that's a Derby nag, Blue Ruin, in the cloths yonder, and I believe the Duke would not sell him for three thousand pounds; but I have told His Grace, as I tell you, that I wouldn't back the horse even for a place.”
“A splendid stepper, too,” exclaimed Walter admiringly, as the beautiful creature paced slowly round the straw-yard, with arching neck and distended nostrils, as though he were aware of the trainer's depreciating remarks, and could afford to despise them.
“That's true,” rejoined Mr Chifney drily; “but we don't want steppers, but goers; there's a vast of steppers in this world, both men and horses.—Now, in that box yonder, there is an animal who, in my opinion, could give Blue Ruin ten pounds; but you shall judge for yourself presently. The King's palace is this next one.”
And truly, scarce could horse be better housed than was his equine majesty. No light-house could be more exquisitely clean; no drawing-room in Mayfair more neat, or better suited to the requirements of its inhabitant, although of ornament, save the plaited straw that fringed the royal couch, there was nothing. A dim religious light pervaded this sanctuary, which was kept at a moderate temperature by artificial means, while an admirable ventilation prevented the slightest “smell of the stable” from being perceptible. The object of all this consideration was a magnificent bay horse, by rule of Liliput, very fitly named The King, since, if not a head taller than his fellows, he was fully “a hand.” His coat quite shone amid the gloom, and as the key turned in the door, he pricked his long fine ears, and turned his full eyes upon his two visitors inquiringly, with far more expression in his lean-jawed face than is possessed by many a human creature.
“This gives the world assurance of a horse indeed,” muttered Walter to himself as he contemplated this wonder. “Shew me his faults, Mr Chifney, for his excellences dazzle me.”
“Well, sir,” whispered the trainer, looking up towards a square hole in the ceiling, “it is not for me to depreciate 'the crack;' and there's a boy up yonder—for the horse is never left for a moment, night or day—who is getting too sharp to live, at least in my stables. But look at what he stands on.”
Most men who ride think it a disgrace not to know all about a horse. Every man who keeps a pony thinks himself qualified to “pick” out the winner from any number of thoroughbreds before “the start;” and when the race is over, protests that he had picked him out in his own mind, only something (not quite satisfactorily explained) made him distrust his own judgment, and back a loser.
It was a great temptation to Captain Walter Lisgard, of the 104th Light Dragoons, to shew himself horse-wise, but he put it from him manfully, or rather, with strength of mind far beyond that of most men of his class. “The pasterns seem to be long and strong enough,” answered he, “and the feet neither too large nor too small.”
“Just what my lord says,” observed the trainer in the same low tones; “nor can I make him see that there is any degree of contraction. But he is not your horse, so tell me; look now—is it not so?”
It was so, or at least it seemed to be so to the captain, as the trainer returned the faulty member to its proprietor, with the air of a banker declining a forged cheque.
“It is of small consequence to me,” said Walter; “but I shall be sorry if the winner does not come out of your stable. I took a thousand to twenty in October, which I can now hedge to great advantage.”
“If you take my advice, you will hold on,” said Mr Chifney confidentially. “Twenty pound is little to lose, and what I have shewn you by no means destroys his chance; moreover, The King will not be deposed in the betting. I shall be surprised if, in the paddock, they lay more than three to one.”
“You were going to tell me something, Mr Chifney, only you thought better of it,” said Captain Lisgard, laying his finger upon the other's coat-cuff as they emerged from the royal presence. “And yet you trusted me when I was but a boy at school, and I never abused your confidence.”
“What a fellow you are to read a chap!” returned the trainer admiringly. “Burst my buttons, but you are a cunning one, Master Walter! It is true that I was thinking of letting you into a little secret—though, after all, it mayn't be worth much. Let us come on to the tan-gallop for five minutes, for nowhere else can we get out of earshot of these boys.” With that, passing through a paddock, itself provided with a straw-ride, so that the race-horses need not set foot upon the frost-bound turf as they issued forth to exercise, Mr Chifney led the way to the upland, where a broad brown road of tan was permanently laid on the level down. Here the trainer paused, and speaking aloud for the first time, observed in a solemn tone: “Now, look you, true as fate, I would tell no other man but you. What I said about The King's feet was on the square: but that ain't all. There's a horse here as nobody ever heard of, and yet who's a real good un. He's the one that I said could give Blue Ruin ten pounds. You may get two hundred to one against him at this blessed moment, and he'll be at twenty to one before April Fool Day. It's the best thing we've had at Mirk yet, and—— Ah, the devil! here comes the man I was expecting; remember, we were talking about The King.”
“Morning, Mr Chifney,” said the new-comer, nodding familiarly to the trainer.—“And morning to you, sir, if you ain't too proud to accept it.”
He was a large-built middle-aged man, with a sunburnt countenance, generally good-humoured enough, notwithstanding the presence of a truculent red beard, but upon this occasion, somewhat sullen, and even defiant. Walter recognised in him the stranger stopping at the Lisgard Arms, at once, and was at no loss to account for his displeasure. He had doubtless received some hint that his presence at the Abbey would not be welcome.
“Good-morning, Mr Derrick,” returned the captain cheerfully. “There is no pride about me, since, unfortunately, I have nothing to be proud of; but if there was, why should I not return a civil reply to a civil speech?”
“Oh, because I ain't good enough to speak to,” answered the other scornfully. “Because I ain't a gentleman, forsooth, like your high and mighty family. But the fact is, sir, although I have got decent blood in my veins myself, I come from a country where we don't care that”—and he snapped his fingers with a noise equal to the crack of a whip—“for who is a man's father, unless the man himself is worth his salt.”
“That, then, must have been the reason why this good-for-nothing ruffian left that country,” thought the captain; but he answered with humility: “Then, I fear, I should be giving up my best chance if I went there.”
“Well,” answered the stranger, somewhat mollified, “you don't speak like one of them beastly aristocrats—that I will say—as though it were too much trouble to open their darned lips.”
Mr Derrick himself did not speak like an aristocrat either; his voice, though rich in song, had in speech a strong northern burr, which rescued it from any such imputations. “Why, if a man in my country,” continued he, “should venture to warn another off his land—unless, of course, it was a mining claim—as Sir Richard Lisgard”——
“Mr Derrick,” interrupted the captain firmly, “I am sure that it is not the custom in any country in the world to abuse a man's brother to his face. Having said that much, I will add that, if you have received any rudeness from any one at the Abbey, I am sincerely sorry for it. It did not emanate from me. Mr Chifney here will give me a character so far.”
“Master Walter is as civil-spoken and well-behaved a young gentleman as any in the county,” exclaimed the trainer warmly; “and I will go bail has never given you or any man offence. He has just stepped in, like you, to see 'the crack' on which he has a little money; and since I am not one of those who say: 'It is no use now a days to attempt to take in your enemies, and therefore your friends must suffer,' I have been giving him some advice.”
“About Manylaws?” inquired the stranger suspiciously, turning sharp round upon the captain.
The look of blank astonishment upon that gallant officer's face would have set at rest the doubts of a Pollaky.
“It is not my habit to disclose my customer's secrets,” observed the trainer tartly; “although I may say that, with Master Walter, everything is as safe as wax.”
“Is it so?” quoth Mr Derrick warmly; “then let him come with us and see the Black.—Only mind, Mr Walter Lisgard, I will not have that brother of yours bettered by a fourpenny-piece by anything you may see or hear to-day.”
“My brother never bets upon any race,” answered the captain quietly; “so that promise is easily given.”
“Then come along with me and Mr Chifney,” said the stranger, holding out his hairy hand in token of amity. “You've read a deal about that crack as I've just been looking at; but I dare say, now, you have never so much as heard of this same Manylaws.”
“Not unless you mean the French horse, about which there were a few lines in Bell some time ago—Menelaus.”
“Ay, that's him. But it's called Manylaws” explained Mr Derrick; “for you wouldn't think of calling the Oaks' mare Antigown, I suppose, Antigone. Well, the Black ain't fancied much, I reckon; but he will be, Mr Chifney, eh? He will be?”
“It is my opinion that he will be at very short odds indeed,” returned the trainer; “and many more people will be desirous of paying him a call than do him that honour just at present. This is his stable. He does not look quite such a likely horse as The King, Master Walter, does he? There's bone for you!”
“An ounce of blood is worth a pound of bone, says the proverb,” remarked the captain.
“So far as that goes, although he is a Frenchman,” answered the trainer, “he has Godolphin's blood in his veins. But only look at his ragged hips!”
“Ragged enough, Mr Chifney. And do you mean to say that this animal will be a public favourite?”
“We hope not,” returned the trainer, winking facetiously at his bearded friend; “but—— Shall we tell him what we do hope, Mr Derrick?”
“I'll tell him myself,” quoth the other impulsively, “for you say the young gentleman is safe, and I have taken a sort of unaccountable fancy to him. We hope, and more than that, believe, Captain Lisgard, that that same ragged-hipped horse will Win the Derby!”
“Two hundred to one against Mr Blanquette's Menelaus,” murmured Walter pathetically, as though it were a line from some poem of the affections.
“That's the present quotation,” answered Mr Derrick with a chuckle, and rattling a quantity of loose silver and gold in his breeches' pockets. “Perhaps you would like to lay it in ponies with Mr Chifney and me.”
“No, Mr Derrick; but I should like to thank you very much for letting me into this secret, which, I assure you, shall never pass my lips;” and he held out his hand to the stranger.
“Our way lies together as far as the inn,” returned the other warmly; “we'll liquor—— But there; I forgot I was no longer in Cariboo. I dare say a gentleman like you don't liquor so early in the day.”
“At all events, I will walk with you, my good sir,” answered the captain laughing; and so, forgetting to repeat his request to be permitted to pay his respects to the trainer's wife, he took his departure with his new acquaintance.
“And who is this Monsieur Blanquette?” inquired Walter carelessly as they walked down the village street.
“He was a mate of mine at the gold-diggings in British Columbia, and the only Frenchman as ever I saw there. We did a pretty good stroke of work together; and when we came home, he invested his money in horseflesh, and that there Manylaws was one of his cheapest bargains.”
“I think I saw it stated somewhere that Mr Blanquette is only part-owner of the horse?” observed the captain inquiringly.
“That's so,” rejoined the other. “It belongs to him and a company.”
“And you are the company, eh, Mr Derrick?”
“You have hit it,” responded the bearded man with the air of a proprietor. “This here child is the Co. in question.”