Olivia

Two days after that of the incident with Liz Lee, Harold Faradeane walked with his slow, firm step up to the Grange, and inquired for Mr. Vanley, and as he stood in the drawing-room, to which the footman had conducted him, his handsome face wore a look of half-bitter, half-cynical self-contempt. Only a few days ago he had assured Bertie that nothing would induce him to emerge from his seclusion, and here he was returning the squire’s visit.

“No man is so great a fool as he who knows himself to be one!” he muttered; then, as the door opened, he turned to greet the squire.

He was received by the squire as if the latter had quite forgotten that he had been refused admittance to The Dell; and Mr. Faradeane was too cultivated a gentleman to offer any apologies for the denial.

The two men got into conversation at once, and the squire, who had been much prejudiced against the newcomer, almost unconsciously began to be “taken” with him. The grave and self-restrained manner and the handsome face, which had fascinated Olivia, prepossessed her father.

Whatever mystery hung like a dark cloud about Mr. Faradeane, it was patent that he was a gentleman, and anything but one of the common or garden kind. No matter what topic the squire started, his visitor could converse upon it, and, what was more, evidently knew something about it.

And he talked in that most pleasing of fashions, as if he were talking for the sake of hearing what his host had to say, and with the easy deference which marks the man of good birth and breeding and high refinement.

Nearly three-quarters of an hour passed before Mr. Faradeane, glancing at the clock on the mantelshelf, rose, and said:

“I have detained you an unconscionable time, Mr. Vanley; but, indeed, that is more your fault than mine.”

“You have not detained me at all,” responded the squire, in his quiet, direct way. “I am an old man, and am delighted to meet with one so well informed, and, permit me to add, so good a talker as yourself. You must have seen a great deal of life, Mr. Faradeane.”

A grave look seemed to settle for a moment on the handsome face, and the dark eyes grew momentarily sadder, and the squire instantly saw that he had touched a tender spot; but almost immediately the younger man replied, with a smile:

“Yes, more than most men of my years, sir.”

“I am afraid you will find Hawkwood rather dull, and the inhabitants very old fogies; but we must do our best to amuse you. I don’t know whether you care for fishing; if you do, I hope you will flog the river as often as you please. I am afraid to say how long it is since I threw a fly.”

“Thank you,” said Mr. Faradeane. “Yes, I am an angler.”

“And in the autumn I can promise you some fair shooting. The keepers tell me that the birds are looking well. I hope you intend staying with us. We’ve a very good pack of foxhounds, and I know that you ride, for I have heard one of my grooms expatiating on the fine qualities of your horse.”

“Thank you again, sir,” said Mr. Faradeane. “He is a fairish hunter, and a very good companion. Yes, I intend remaining for some time, I hope, in Hawkwood. I have purchased The Dell, as you may have heard.”

“Yes,” assented the squire, almost reddening angrily as he thought of the unwarranted suspicions Mr. Sparrow had given expression to about the newcomer.

“I came to The Dell for rest,” said Mr. Faradeane, “and had intended playing the hermit, but”—and the rare smile shone in his eyes for a moment—“but your kindness has rendered that impossible.”

“I should think so,” returned the squire, with unusual heartiness. “You are not the stuff of which hermits are made, Mr. Faradeane, and I am only afraid we shall trespass on your good nature. Hawkwood does not get a novelty very often, and will, very properly, regard you as an acquisition. I understand my sister Amelia has already cajoled you into assisting at one of her local enterprises. Take care! If you give an inch to one of these charitable ladies, they will take an ell!”

“It is a very small inch,” said Harold Faradeane, simply. “I am only going to recite at some penny readings.”

“And the next thing she will want you to do will be to take a tray at a tea-meeting,” said the squire, with a laugh.

“Would that be very difficult?” inquired the younger man, with such quaint gravity that the squire burst into a laugh of keen appreciation.

It happened that Olivia was passing through the hall at the moment, and the sound of her father’s laughter, which had become so rare of late, almost startled her.

“Who is in the drawing-room?” she asked of the butler.

“The squire, miss, and Mr. Faradeane of The Dell,” he replied.

Olivia stopped short with a sudden throb of her heart that sent the blood to her face, and she bent down and gathered the skirt of her habit—she had just come in from a gallop—to hide it.

“Mr. Faradeane, the new gentleman, miss,” said the butler, and he moved toward the door as if to open it for her, but Olivia shook her head.

“No, I am not going in,” she said, and went quickly upstairs. As she did so, the drawing-room opened, and she heard the squire say, in his most genial tone—the tone which indicated that he was peculiarly well pleased, “You must let me show you round the old place, Mr. Faradeane,” and she paused and listened for the grave, musical voice replying in the affirmative; then, leaning over the old oak balustrade, looked down at them as they passed out, with a strange expression on her lovely face—an expression which it had never yet worn for any man she had seen!

The squire and Mr. Faradeane made their way round the grounds, and presently, as if unconsciously, the elder man linked his arm within that of the younger, an action very unusual with the squire, and one which indicated the favorable impression his visitor had made upon him.

“It is a very beautiful place,” said Mr. Faradeane, when they had made the round of the flower gardens and lawns, and looked in at the great, walled garden, with its hundreds of peach and nectarine trees, and at the long length of green-houses in which the gardener grew the choice flowers which would, if he had entered them, have taken the first prize at all the local shows, “a very beautiful place; I think it would be sinful not to be proud of it, Mr. Vanley.”

The squire looked at him with a nod of appreciation, then suddenly his face clouded, and he stifled a sigh.

“There is plenty of room for improvement,” he said, as if to account for the sigh.

“There always is,” said Faradeane. “Fortunately, no place is perfect—we should tire of it very soon if it were. Don’t you think a plantation on that rise to the left of the lawn would be a good thing?”

The squire nodded.

“Yes,” he said, moodily. “Yes; but it would cost——” He stopped and glanced at the handsome face quickly. “I’m afraid you think I must be very niggardly to grudge a few hundreds for so evident an improvement; but——”

He paused; and Faradeane, with the tact which seemed so easy when he chose to display it, said:

“In these days no man has too much money.”

“That is true,” assented the squire, as if glad of the excuse so pleasantly offered. “Quite true; these are hard times for us landlords everywhere.”

“Indeed they are,” acquiesced Faradeane.

The squire looked at him.

“Are you one of the unfortunate army of landowners?” he inquired.

Faradeane paused for half a second, then he laughed.

“You forget that I am the landlord of The Dell, and quite half an acre of garden land! And that reminds me that I must be going. Thank you very much, Mr. Vanley.”

The squire shook the strong, shapely hand warmly, and stood for a moment looking after the tall, patrician figure as it made its way with strong, easy stride across the grass; then he went back to the house with a grave, wistful face. Perhaps he was wishing that Heaven had given him such a son as a brother to his precious Olivia; or, perhaps he was thinking of the plantation and the hard times which made the expenditure of the “few hundreds” not only difficult, but impossible.

Olivia was standing at the door, waiting for him.

“You have had a visitor, papa?” she said, quietly, and in the tone one uses when one has rehearsed a speech—almost too careless and indifferent.

“Yes, yes,” he said, “Mr. Faradeane. He has just gone. I am sorry you were not in to see him.”

“Was he worth seeing, then?” said Olivia, still too carelessly.

“He is one of the most cultivated men I have ever met,” replied the squire, warmly and emphatically, “and when I think of the absurd nonsense old Sparrow talked the other day, I am inclined to call him an idiot. Mr. Faradeane is a gentleman every inch of him, and one of the most charming young men possible.”

“I am very glad you like him, as he is so near a neighbor,” she said.

“Yes, liking is the word. He has quite taken a hold on me. The reason for his coming and burying himself at The Dell may be a mystery, but it is no unworthy one; I am quite convinced of that. He talks admirably; not with the straining after-effect which is the great vice of the present day, but with the pleasant manner of a man who wants to hear you as well as himself. By the way, your aunt has caught him for that entertainment of hers on the twenty-ninth. Do you think he would dine with us?”

“Do I think?” replied Olivia, raising her dark brows with a smile. “You know more of Mr. Faradeane than I do, papa? What do you think?”

“I don’t know,” said the squire, thoughtfully. “I’ve an idea that he forced himself to call, and that he might decline. It isn’t pride; no, that man couldn’t foster so vulgar a sentiment; not pride, but a strange kind of reserve that crops up now and again in his manner and conversation. Strange! Perhaps it is some past trouble. Well, we can but ask him.”

Olivia turned her head aside, and toyed with a branch of Virginia creeper.

“Very well, papa; any one else?”

“Eh? Oh, yes, if you like. Bartley Bradstone and Bertie. Bertie likes him, I’m sure; and Annie and Mary Penstone. As many as you like—no, don’t make it a large party. I fancy he would prefer a very small one.”

“You are more considerate of Mr. Faradeane’s whims and fancies than you usually are of other people’s, papa,” she said, with a smile.

He looked at her as if the same idea had struck him.

“Am I? Well, I’ve taken a fancy to him, I suppose; at any rate, I should like to know more of him. Ask him, and see what he says.”

Faradeane was sitting at his desk writing, when, the next morning, a groom rode over with the invitation, and he took it and looked at the address, in Olivia’s handwriting, for a good minute before opening the envelope. Then he read the short, formal note, and reread it; got up and lit a pipe, and paced up and down with the letter in his hand, a troubled, wistful expression on his face, an expression of hesitation, over which longing predominated.

“Too late!” he muttered; “too late to draw back now. I have passed the Rubicon, and yet—oh, fool! fool!”

Then he sat down and wrote a formal acceptation.

People did not refuse an invitation to dine at the Grange unless they were positively compelled, for the squire’s dinners were as nearly perfect as they could be; and those who did not set their hearts on the dinner found the prospect of a couple of hours spent in the Grange drawing-room, with Olivia to talk to and perhaps to sing for them, equally irresistible; and all the guests the squire had named to Olivia came up to time on the twenty-ninth.

It was an early dinner, for the entertainment commenced at eight, and all but the squire, whom wild horses would not have drawn out of his house after dinner to an entertainment, were going to Aunt Amelia’s concert.

Annie and Mary Penstone had driven over in the afternoon to snatch a very precious quiet hour with Olivia, and they were both on the tiptoe of feverish curiosity and excitement about the mysterious Mr. Faradeane.

“Is he so very strange, Olly dear?” asked Mary, eagerly, and in a hushed voice. “We hear such extraordinary stories—all invented, of course—but do tell us! What is he like? Of course, we know he is handsome. Annie says that he is the handsomest man she has ever seen; but that’s nonsense while Lord Granville is here. What does he seem like? What does he talk about?”

“Papa could tell you better than I can,” replied Olivia, smiling. “I have only spoken to him once or twice. He has a very pleasant voice and—but you heard him speak at the picnic.”

“Oh, yes, wasn’t that awful! I shall never forget the look of his eyes! If he had looked at me like that, so—so, not contemptuously quite, but so calmly and indifferently—I can’t express it—as he looked at Mr. Bradstone, I should have gone through the ground!”

“Like one of the patent tube wells,” said Olivia.

“Don’t laugh at me. I mean what I say, dear,” said Mary, pouting. “I’m sure I shall be afraid to speak to him, in case he should snub me. He looks as if he could be awfully severe.”

“He is not, I assure you; a child could play with him,” said Olivia.

“There you are, laughing again. It’s all very well for you; of course, he’d be nice to you, everybody always is; nobody could be otherwise to such a dear, beautiful girl; but poor Annie and me——”

“Poor Annie and me will be quite safe,” laughed Olivia. “Mr. Faradeane does not even bark, least of all bite.”

This was a few minutes before dinner, and the entrance of Bertie and Bartley Bradstone stopped the interesting conversation.

“We are only waiting for Mr. Faradeane,” said the squire, glancing at his watch, after the usual greetings had been got through.

“Faradeane?” said Bartley Bradstone as he stood in an easy—too easy—attitude, his evening suit cut in the very last fashion, and a costly diamond blazing in the center of his white shirt-front. “Faradeane? Is he coming?” and his brows came down with the half-sullen, half-suspicious frown.

“Yes,” said the squire, “and I am glad to say we have struck up a friendship. He is one of the pleasantest men——”

“He might be polite as well as pleasant,” said Bartley Bradstone, looking at his watch. “It isn’t quite the thing for a newcomer to keep us all waiting.”

Bertie cut in quickly.

“It wants two minutes to six,” he said; “your watch is fast, Mr. Bradstone.”

“It’s one of Dent & Frodsham’s chronometers,” he retorted.

“It’s fast all the same,” said Bertie, firmly, but pleasantly. “I timed mine at the station an hour or two ago.”

Before Bartley Bradstone could meet this argument, the door opened, and the footman announced Mr. Faradeane, and the great hall clock chimed the hour.

Every eye was, not unnaturally, turned upon the latest guest, and Olivia thought that Annie was right as she glanced at the tall figure and handsome face. Unlike Mr. Bartley Bradstone, his dress-suit was not in the latest cut, and instead of a blazing diamond was a plain black pearl.

An expression of approval shone in the squire’s eyes, for Faradeane’s appearance in evening dress confirmed the squire in his good opinion of him.

“You have just come in time to prevent a duel of time-pieces,” he said.

Aunt Amelia simpered.

“I, at any rate, was sure Mr. Faradeane was not late,” said she, graciously.

“Then, as a reward, you shall be taken in by him,” said the squire, offering his arm to Mary. Bertie, the highest in rank, escorted Annie; and, Faradeane having Aunt Amelia, Olivia was left to Bartley Bradstone.

“This is a rough-and-scramble meal,” said the squire, as the butler lifted the cover from the fish, “but if you will perpetrate such follies as penny readings, you must pay the penalty.”

“My brother ridicules our humble efforts to amuse and instruct our brethren, Mr. Faradeane; but he is always doing good himself, which he never mentions.”

“Nor permits any one else to mention,” said the squire.

“‘Do not let your right hand know what your left hand doeth,’ as the man said who put a bad shilling in the collecting-box,” said Faradeane.

Annie and Mary almost started. Was this the mysterious stranger whose dark, contemptuous eyes had smitten them with awe? And could it be possible that his first words should be a frivolous jest? They began by being astonished, and continued so during the whole of the meal, for Mr. Faradeane, if he did not quite “set the table in a roar,” kept them all perpetually amused.

If it had not been so perfectly natural and free from the appearance of effort, it would almost have seemed as if he were playing the part of the wit with a purpose; but the musical voice was quite easy and unstrained, and the dark eyes were cloudless and unreserved. The squire glowed with sympathetic delight as epigram after epigram fell quite naturally from his guest, and Bertie’s eyes sparkled with fun as he laughed at the dry humor and happy repartee.

Only two persons seemed unmoved. One was Bartley Bradstone, who sat in half-sullen, half-envious silence, taking no part in the conversation beyond a monosyllabic response, and inwardly and palpably chafing at the success the newcomer was obviously making.

The other was Olivia. At first she had smiled with the rest, but presently she happened to glance round the épergne which stood between her and Mr. Faradeane, and at that instant she caught his face off its guard, as it were, and saw a strange sadness falling like a shadow on his eyes and hovering about his lips. It was gone in a moment, but its remembrance haunted her, and she knew that the wit and the humor and the light-heartedness were assumed, and magnificently assumed, to hide some secret sorrow.

And as she listened as he told a story which convulsed Bertie and Annie and Mary, and made the squire laugh the hearty laugh which was so rare with him, there flashed upon her the well-known anecdote of the comedian who succeeded in convulsing a theatre with laughter while his thoughts were fixed upon his favorite child, who lay dying while he played.

“A most delightful man!” exclaimed Aunt Amelia, as the ladies filed into the drawing-room. “I never laughed so much in my life.”

“Nor I!” exclaimed Mary and Annie. “And he scarcely smiled himself. Did you see the squire laugh, Olly, dear? Why, he isn’t at all what I fancied he would be! I’m not a bit afraid of him. But you didn’t seem so amused, dear; you didn’t laugh scarcely at all. Why was that?” and she wound her arm round Olivia’s waist.

“It’s because I’m so stupid,” replied Olivia. “You must make allowances, Annie.”

Meanwhile the butler—who had only succeeded in maintaining his solemn gravity through the dinner by going out into the hall and getting rid of his laughter—had placed the Hawkwood port on the table, and left the gentlemen to discuss it.

“You have a wonderful memory, Faradeane——No, that’s unfair, a wonderful vein of humor, I ought to say,” said the squire.

Faradeane, who had sunk into his chair after the ladies’ exodus, looked up with a slight start. “Your first remark is the right one,” he said; “I have a good memory.”

“Yes,” said Bartley Bradstone. “It reminds me of Russell, who said once in the House that ‘a man was indebted to his memory for his wit, and to his imagination for his facts.’”

There was a moment of ghostly silence; then Faradeane said, with perfect ease and amiability:

“Quite right, Mr. Bradstone, your quotation hits me to a nicety. I have a good memory.”

“I’ve heard most of the stories a score of times,” said Bartley Bradstone, filling his glass.

“And I haven’t heard one,” said the squire; “but I have been out of the world so long.”

“You couldn’t have heard them, squire,” said Bertie, warmly, “seeing that Faradeane invented them on the spot.”

“Not all, Cherub,” put in Faradeane, with a faint smile.

“Well, nearly all. I remember you telling that one about Limerick races——” He stopped and caught at his wine glass as Faradeane’s eyes grew grave and warning. “I mean I remember that story years ago.”

“I never heard it before,” said the squire, “and am just as grateful as if Mr. Faradeane had invented it,” and he laughed. “Well, now, take some wine, for we must have a cup of tea with the ladies before you start.”

Bartley Bradstone filled his glass, but Faradeane and Bertie left theirs empty, and a few minutes afterward they went into the drawing-room.