The House of Egremont

THE May came and waned, and so did the early and late summer, and Roger Egremont’s days so melted one into another that the Sundays seemed only a day, instead of a week, apart. In spite of that kind promise of the Queen’s that he should not be forever driving a quill, there was much writing to do. Roger solaced the long hours he spent listening to the droning voice of the King dictating to him, by the thought that in the autumn there would be an invasion of England; and if not in the autumn, in the winter; and if aught should prevent in the winter, certainly the spring would see the King at Whitehall, and himself at Egremont. One of the recompenses he promised himself for his three years’ imprisonment, and for his present poverty,—living frugally on the scanty pay of one of the King’s gentlemen-at-arms,—was that of kicking his half-brother out of the hall door of Egremont. For it was not enough for this hot-blooded and very faulty Roger to dispossess his brother of a stolen estate; he longed, with a strenuous longing, to feel his hand on Hugo’s collar, and the sole of his well-made foot trampling Hugo’s prostrate form.

It sometimes came to him, as he steadily covered reams of paper, that William of Orange could no more be written out of England than he could be sung out, as Mademoiselle d’Orantia had said. The same thought haunted many of the great multitude of exiles, who waited and waited for they knew not what. Except the King’s secretaries, never had people as much time as these dwellers in a foreign land. Men must be doing something, and most of them killed time in either a trivial or an evil way. Roger and Berwick spent a good many hours taming a squirrel for the little Prince of Wales. These two men, entertaining themselves with a child and a squirrel, looked uneasily into each other’s eyes. Roger said quietly,—

“As well be doing this as anything else;” to which Berwick gravely nodded. It was quite as well as spending long days, as Berwick often did, at Marly-le-Roi, only two miles away, where Louis le Grand, grown pious, held his court.

Roger too had a sight of Marly,—going there in company with Berwick,—and was neither pleased nor edified with what he saw there: a tedious ceremonial, a King who majestically ate and drank, dressed and undressed in public, and a horde of place and pension hunters after a snivelling hypocrite of a woman, as Roger truly esteemed Madame de Maintenon to be. As, however, all the people at St. Germains, from the King down to the kitchen scullions, lived upon the bounty of Louis le Grand, which was, it cannot be denied, very nobly given, Roger felt rather a painful sense of obligation. The pay he received monthly for his services in the corps, the little packet of money gently put into his hand by King James, saying, “Mr. Egremont, take this little sum to buy you a horse,”—all—all—came from the coffers of the French King, and were wrung from those toiling peasants in the fields and vineyards. The dead and gone Florentine who said,—

might have looked into the hearts of the people at St. Germains for his words.

Yet they bore their hard fortune bravely and meekly, as became gentlemen. They had some alleviations; there was the hay-making in the harvest time, when all the fine ladies and gentlemen, whose hay in England other folks were making, turned in and made the King’s hay for him. Roger Egremont had two great consolations,—the friendship of Berwick, and the possession of the horse which poor James Stuart had scraped up the money to give him. The horse was a beast of considerable merit, and named Merrylegs, after his worthy predecessor; for Roger Egremont had in him a deep vein of sentiment, and just as he every night put under his pillow his little bag of earth from Egremont, so he swore he would ever have a horse named Merrylegs, in honor of the faithful creature given him by Diccon the ploughman.

The friendship of Berwick he reckoned to be the greatest good fortune of his life. There was a sort of manly perfection in Berwick; he was, in every bone and fibre, a man and a gentleman, just, merciful, nobly forgetful of injuries, and showing forth even then that great and robust genius which afterward ranked him as great in war as his uncle John, Duke of Marlborough, and infinitely greater in all that makes a man. Well might Berwick be called “the great, tall devil of an Englishman who must have everything his own way,” as Madame de Beaumanoir had said. Berwick’s way was commonly superior to anybody else’s way. He was not only the right hand of the King, but of the gentle, courageous, and sad-faced Queen. And nothing was prettier than the sight of Berwick with his little half-brother, the Prince of Wales,—the tall, grave elder brother walking in the gardens and on the terrace with the little Prince’s hand in his, listening seriously to the child’s chatter, carrying him when tired and sleepy, and always his favorite playfellow. Roger could find but one fault in Berwick,—that strange insensibility to the stain upon his birth, which was the more singular in a man of the nicest and most delicate honor; an insensibility which Monsieur le duc de St. Simon remarks upon in those pungent memoirs which it was known he was engaged in writing; and which was always a subject of amazed comment. Roger hated bastards so that he never quite understood or forgave Berwick this idiosyncrasy; but, apart from that, he loved Berwick with a manly and noble love.

Among the few letters to England which Roger wrote in his own proper person, was a long and grateful one to Bess Lukens, describing all his adventures after being taken from Newgate, and all which had befallen him at St. Germains, except the most important of all,—that he had fallen deeply and madly in love with a lady as far above him as he was above poor Bess. He had not once seen Michelle since that night at Madame de Beaumanoir’s, and, not daring to ask what had become of her, was at last enlightened on that point by Madame de Beaumanoir.

“Gone to the convent of the Scotch Benedictines in Paris—and for what, in the name of God, think you? To study the German language! She could have had a master here, but she says she cannot be as studious here as she would wish, and she likes the quiet and retirement of the convent, where she lives as sedately as any nun. And she a beautiful young woman! I warrant I spent not my youth that way. She is greedy of knowledge, and, hoping and longing as she does to play a great part, she wants to know all about everything.”

“And when does Mademoiselle d’Orantia return to St. Germains?” Roger Egremont ventured to ask, adding a gruesome joke,—“I hope before we all depart for England.”

“Surely. You need not be packing your portmanteau yet awhile, Mr. Egremont. Well, my niece will come back in time for the hay-making in August, for that is one of the few amusements my lady condescends to,—that, and taking long rides a-horseback with nobody but François for an escort.”

After this, Roger watched the hay-fields with a learned and critical eye, knowing, as he did, all the lore of growing crops. And on a fair day in August it was given forth that on the next day all the ladies and gentlemen would assemble at noon to make the King’s hay for him.

Be sure that Roger Egremont was in the meadow long before the procession of hay-makers started from the old palace, and walked the length of the terrace to the low-lying fields. It was a glorious midsummer day, and never were the prospects of King James better in the way of haying. The hay-makers, bearing the proudest names of England, Scotland, Ireland, and France, were dressed as peasants, but their costumes were made of silken stuffs such as no peasant ever wore. The dress of the exiles, both ladies and gentlemen, was a little shabby; their old brocades and laces brought from England were showing signs of wear and tear. They all carried gilded hay-forks, and rakes tied with ribbons, except Berwick, who did nothing by halves, and was worth two ordinary day laborers in haying time; he carried an iron hay-fork and rake, borrowed from a gardener.

Roger Egremont, loitering amid the cherry trees in Madame Michot’s orchard, came out and joined the merry crew when it reached the meadow. He was dressed as a peasant, in true peasant’s clothes, borrowed from Jacques Michot, but clean and well fitting, as became the work of Madame Michot’s fingers. The shirt, open at the neck, showed the white column of his throat, as fair as a duchess’s, next the manly tan and sunburn of his face. His hat, also borrowed from Jacques, was trimmed with the field poppies and the blue cornflower. His eyes sought but one figure, and there she was, walking daintily along, near the end of the procession,—Michelle, Princess d’Orantia. She was dressed as a true peasant maiden, in a gown of white linen, and her hat was bound with a wreath of wild roses.

Then, to the singing of harvest songs, they fell to work. The hay had been cut early in the morning; it was their business to rake and stack it.

Roger Egremont in some way divined that to work well was a way to win Michelle’s favor; so he fell to work with an intelligent energy that fairly rivalled Berwick’s. And—oh, joy!—Michelle raked the hay for him to cock! She too as far surpassed the ladies in work as Roger surpassed all the men except Berwick. She seemed as insensible to fatigue as he was, and making hay in August is no merry jest. Roger thought he had never seen so fascinating an employment for a graceful woman,—raking and tossing the hay, lightly, yet with strength, every motion revealing the grace of her figure, and the beauty of her arms and her dainty feet, and bringing a flush, deep yet delicate, to her usually colorless face. She worked even when Roger rested, mercilessly prodding him with her hay-fork until he resumed his work, rated Berwick soundly for not making his hay-stack as well as usual, and was easily the star of the hay-field.

All through the golden afternoon they worked. Roger tried in vain to engage Michelle in conversation about other matters than haying, to which she gave her undivided attention.

“Mademoiselle, you have been much missed at St. Germains since your departure for Paris,” he ventured.

“I should have truly been missed had I been absent from the hay-field to-day, for I never saw the King’s hay more lazily attended to,” she replied tartly. “There is more singing than work.” For just then a song was being trolled forth by Captain Ogilvie, the Irish gentleman who composed such beautiful songs, all about—

“I agree with you, mademoiselle, that we sing too much at St. Germains,” said Roger, significantly; and Michelle’s reply to this was,—

“Pray, Mr. Egremont, attend to your work. If you do not better, I shall ask the King not to pay you your wage;” at which Roger went furiously to work, declaring he could not afford to lose so much.

At five o’clock the King and Queen descended the great flight of two hundred stone steps from the terrace, and calling the hay-makers about them, proceeded to inspect their work and give them their dole of money,—a few pence each, which were treasured, as even the smallest gifts of royalty are. So pleased were their Majesties with the two hay-cocks made by Roger and Michelle—none of the rest had made more than one, except Berwick—that they were each given an extra coin. To this, great complaint was made by Berwick, but the King declined to pay him more.

And then, in the purple twilight, the whole party turned homeward, walking along with their forks and rakes upon their shoulders, singing chansons that floated through the mellow air, fragrant with the new-mown hay. Roger walked by Michelle’s side, and sang with her the song that echoed sweetly over fields and woods:

He felt as in a dream; and the spell seemed over Michelle too, for when the party separated he found himself walking alone with her in the dusk, along the road, under over-arching trees, that led through the park to the château. They were still singing softly, and Roger, without knowing why or even when he did it, held out his hand, and she laid hers within it, and so, like a shepherd and shepherdess, they passed along together. What sweet and peaceful thoughts, like birds nesting in the trees after the day’s work, were theirs! All the world was left behind and out of sight. They were Corydon and Amaryllis returning to their cot at eve. Not one whole day had they ever spent in each other’s company, yet had their souls rushed together when first they found themselves alone.

They had begun with acting a little part of shepherd and his shepherdess, but now it seemed quite real; they had quite forgotten the every-day world. Michelle’s eyes were softly gleaming. At first they had been merry and full of quiet laughter; now they smiled at each other but no longer laughed. Presently they came to an open spot, before which stood the great gates and porter’s lodge of the château. Instinctively both stopped, and Roger raised Michelle’s hand to his lips; it seemed the simplest and most natural thing in the world. She stood still for a while, and there was a pause—the sweetest pause—filled in with the faint and musical sounds of evening. They came back slowly and gently to the every-day world, but the world about them was so beautiful that it seemed rather a continuation of their dream.

“I shall not forget this day as long as I live,” said Roger.

Michelle looked at him a moment with startled eyes, and then replied: “I love these haying-days. I would not miss one if I could help it.”

“Would that every day in summer were a haying-day,” cried Roger, “and that you and I—”

“Good-night, Mr. Egremont,” was Michelle’s reply.

Her figure melted away in the darkness under the trees, but Roger’s keen eyes saw her turn and look back at him, standing still where she had left him.

When she was out of sight Roger turned homeward, through the forest. He was glad to be alone, he disdained any other company after Michelle’s. He was in a kind of ecstasy, and his spirit was as light as a lark upon the wing. The forest was wrapped in the silence of the coming night and the owls were beginning to hoot. The harvest moon, a great, golden, smoky lamp, shone through the trees, but the west still held a faint glory of crimson and green and gold. The dusk of evening was descending fast, when Roger noticed, approaching him from a side avenue, a person, apparently a young and slender man, wrapped in a black cloak, with a black hat drawn down over the eyes. By the time Roger had made out the outlines of this figure, they were face to face; and then the stranger suddenly whipped out a sword from the folds of his cloak, and pointed it straight at Roger. It did not take Roger a second to seize the blade deftly in his left hand and wrench it away, while with his right he caught the stranger by the throat,—a throat as white as milk, and from which came gurgling sounds of laughter; and the hat falling off, he saw the laughing, upturned face of Bess Lukens, with her curly, reddish hair falling about her shoulders.

Not the appearance of Satan himself could have disconcerted Roger Egremont more at that moment than the sight of the woman whom he justly called his best friend. Like a blaze of lightning in a murky night, he saw in one flash all the difficulties of the case, the chiefest of which would be to make the little world of St. Germains believe in the perfect honesty of Bess’s character. He felt acutely for the shame the girl might suffer, and when he thought of Michelle, he likewise felt acutely for himself. But he was man enough to greet Bess warmly, after the first momentary astonishment, to kiss her hand—ah, it was not like kissing Michelle’s hand an hour ago!—and to lie to Bess like a gentleman.

“Dear Bess, how glad I am to see you!” he cried, and then he noticed, as she threw aside her cloak, that she was dressed in a man’s riding-suit. “And why this disguise?”

“Because,” said Bess, taking him by the arm affectionately, but not familiarly, “I an’t a bad-looking girl, and some of the mounseers might have bothered me, and I, not knowing the lingo, shouldn’t have known what to say. So I bought me this suit in Dover, and also this sword; ’tis nothing but a brass-handled thing, but it went well with the breeches. And I called myself Mr. Wat Jones. I don’t believe a soul on the vessel suspected me. I got here from a place they called Calais, by riding in country wagons and walking. Nobody troubled me, because they thought I was a poor young gentleman, driven out of England by the Whigs, and coming to my King at St. Germains, and I didn’t have anything in sight worth stealing,—maybe that’s why the mounseers was so honest; so that’s how I got here. I went to a tavern where the wagon stopped that I made the last stage by, and I determined to hang about the town until I could get private speech of you, for I came yesterday. I held my tongue about you, but I kept both eyes open. This afternoon I heard about the hay-making in the meadow—what queer things gentlefolks do by way of pleasure! I was afraid to go near the meadow, for fear you might see me, and cry, ‘Oh, Lord!’ or something of the sort; so I walked about the place they called the terrace, and saw you making hay in the meadow with a young lady. She wasn’t so beautiful; there were others comelier, I thought. Then, when you all started home, I walked toward the forest, and then into it; and it was growing so dark that I thought I should have to go back to the tavern. And then I saw you, and the devil put it into my head to stick this sword at you, but you didn’t flinch;” and Bess concluded by putting herself in an impossible attitude, and flourishing her sword with a kind of awkward gracefulness under Roger’s nose.

And Roger, gallantly fulfilling his obligations as a gentleman, lied and lied again.

“However you come, Bess, and whenever, I must ever be glad to see you;” and then he told the truth for a change: “and I, and all I have—not much of the last—are at your disposal.”

Being a gentleman, he did not ask her the question that disquieted him,—what she had come for,—but Bess relieved him by telling him.

“Thank you, Roger, but I hope I sha’n’t be any great bother to you. I have some money, near forty pound, and that will last me till I can get work. You see, my uncle got married again, the old fool, and there was no room for me and a step-aunt. And I saw the chance I’d been longing and praying for of getting away from Newgate gaol. I found I had some little money my daddy had left me, besides some I had made myself, and I went to my uncle and made him give it me: he warn’t very anxious to do it. His minx of a new wife was so glad to get rid of me, though, that neither of ’em asked me any questions about where I was going. But, Roger, I knew where I was going. I was going somewhere that nobody would know I was the niece of old Lukens, the turnkey; and that place was France, where I knew there were a plenty of English, and my King and my best friend among ’em. I left my own country with a light heart, and if ever I go back there, ’twill be as something people won’t point their thumbs at and say, ‘There goes the turnkey’s girl!’ And if I starve and freeze in this country, I reckon it won’t be any worse than starving and freezing in England; and besides, I’m a Jacobite, I am. I hate them common, vulgar Whigs, and all their doings; and when King James goes back, Miss Lukens will go along with him!”

Roger could not forbear laughing at Bess’s politics, but the coolness, courage, and readiness with which she had carried out the plan she had devised so cunningly gave him ease about her; Bess Lukens could take care of herself anywhere. Excellent, however, as all her motives were, there was an uncomfortable haunting feeling in Roger’s mind, that all of those reasons would have applied equally to any country where he could be found.

“Well, then,” said Roger, cheerfully, “let us now determine what is best to be done for you. But first put that damned sword of yours out of the way, else you will run me through the body before you know it.”

Bess restored the sword to its scabbard, and turning with Roger, they walked under the trees at the edge of the forest. It was an odorous summer night, and the nightingales were singing. Bess was very happy, and Roger was wretched and uncomfortable beyond description; but he hid it manfully.

“I have other clothes than these,” said Bess, “and working people can find work the world over; so you need not be unhappy about me. Only let me get decent quarters, and I’ll not be afraid.”

“True, Bess; but you are a girl of sense, and you must see that if I would not be your worst enemy, I must be careful how I befriend you. So, my girl, be not doubtful of me if I shall seem not to seek thy company. This is an evil-thinking world.”

“I know it,” Bess cut in. “You can’t tell me anything about this ugly old world. One doesn’t see the pretty side of it, fetched up as I was. But I think ’twill be brighter for me if I can live free from that everlasting, tormenting, hideous ghost, which walked after me in England,—‘Red Bess, the turnkey’s niece.’ I hope I’ve left the shade on t’other side of the water.”

“I hope so, too, Bess. And now go we back to your inn, and you stay there the night, and I will write you a letter in the morning.”

They turned and walked toward the town, Bess talking happily, and Roger acting his part with perfect success, but with a sinking heart. It is ever an evil time with your lover, when the other woman turns up.

Leaving Bess at the entrance of the little lane that led to her humble inn, Roger made great strides toward Madame Michot’s. He met Berwick coming out.

“Return with me,” cried Roger; and taking him up into his large room under the eaves, Roger poured out the whole story of Bess Lukens.

Berwick laughed a little. Roger’s chagrin was comical; and when Berwick asked him the point-blank question, “Now, since you say the girl is good and honest and beautiful, and yet you are not in love with her, can you tell me whether she is in love with you, or not?” Roger changed countenance so quickly that Berwick laughed aloud.

“I swear,” cried Roger, “I never knew—I never asked. Hang it, man, the devil take you and your questions.” Berwick laughed more than ever at this.

“Come,” said he, “let us consult our good friend Madame Michot. I am but mortal, and I know not how to advise a man concerning a handsome girl whom he has seen daily for three years, who, he declares, has been his best friend, and he does not know whether she is in love with him or not!”

So they put out in search of Madame Michot, whom they found in her usual place on the platform, with the lights from the common room shining through the iron grille, and making fantastic shadows on the table before her.

“Madam,” said Berwick, in his most seductive voice, and with his finest bow, “we have come to you as our help in time of trouble;” and then, seating himself close to Madame Michot, on the right, while Roger planted himself on the step at her feet, these two artful creatures told the good woman all they thought it expedient for her to know concerning Red Bess,—not mentioning, as Roger had warned Berwick, her ignoble condition in England. And as for the poor landlady, what chance had she against the machinations of two of her favorite customers? She succumbed at once.

“There is always much washing to do at an inn,—sheets and towels and table-cloths,—and I could easily give her three days’ work out of the week,” said Madame Michot, with her finger on her lip. “The young person may be above that, though.”

“No, indeed she is not,” cried Roger, earnestly; “and besides, being a girl of sense, she sees how necessary it is that she shall have respectable surroundings, and to be employed by you, madam—with the very great respect which you command—”

“’Twould establish the poor girl’s character forever,” said Berwick, decisively, bringing the point of his sword down on the floor. “Employed by Madame Michot, who could say a word against her?”

“You may send her to-morrow morning,” replied Madame Michot, with the greatest amiability.

“What a wonderful woman is Madame Michot!” exclaimed Roger. “But for that one little word ‘send’ I should have brought Bess Lukens myself, and thereby set every wicked tongue in St. Germains wagging. But I cannot be too careful not to do that poor girl the slightest harm, because she stood my friend when most I needed friends.”

Next morning, about nine o’clock, Bess, having heard from Roger, presented herself at the inn of Michot. Madame Michot was in the orchard near which the sparkling river made a bend, and where the weekly washing was taking place, when the vision of a tall and beautiful young woman, stepping with careless grace over the grass, presented itself before her. It had not occurred to Roger to mention Bess’s sumptuous beauty, and when Madame Michot saw it, a thrill of fear ran up and down the good woman’s backbone. She had not meant to take the responsibility of a girl as heavily handicapped with beauty as Bess was. Why, Jacques might— However, Madame Michot, by an inspiration, glanced at Bess’s hands. They were well shaped, and not large for her size, but they bore the unmistakable marks of toil. A load was lifted from Madame Michot’s shoulders—Bess had lived by honest toil.

Bess proceeded to introduce herself, and Madame Michot met her advances kindly, replying in broken but intelligible English to her, but understanding fully all Bess had to say. And Bess, then and there rolling up the sleeves of her linen gown, fell to work with such ferocious energy and despatch that Madame Michot was astounded and delighted. Twenty-four hours made both her and Jacques enthusiastic supporters of Bess Lukens. For whatever Bess turned her hand to, she did so capably and so rapidly that it was a marvel; and Madame Michot, with her shrewd French common-sense, was the very woman to be impressed by Bess’s undeniable talent for work.

That night Roger was detained at the palace. Many despatches had come in from England, and replies had to be sent at once; so he worked in the King’s closet all day, and then, after a hurried supper in the mess-room, returned and worked until late in the evening. It was near midnight before he left the palace and crept up the stairs to his room at the inn, fearful of being caught by the roysterers in the common room; and he was in no mood for roystering. That sweet, delicate spell that had been cast over him by the twilight walk with Michelle the night before had been rudely broken. Since then he had scarcely a moment in which to recall the sound of her charming voice as she spoke, the velvety blackness of her eyes, the sweet, sweet thought that she too had lapsed into the dream which had enthralled him. He had leisure now, and when the merry crowd below had gone off singing roundels in French and English, Roger, like a true lover, hung out of his one great window, watching the stars, and trying to believe that he could catch a glimpse of the roof under which Michelle slept, far across the meadows and the woods. And when he laid himself upon his bed, it was to live over in his dreams that enchanted walk.

The sun was high in the heavens next morning when Roger was awakened by a far-off sound of singing. Down in the orchard, Bess Lukens had begun her day’s work; and as she beat the linen, her rich, untrained voice soared in a simple English ballad. Roger lay and listened, half in pleasure, half in rage, and calling himself a base, ungrateful villain to this girl, who had befriended him in his darkest hour.

He rose and dressed quickly, and went down to the orchard. There, under the dappled shade of the cherry trees in the bright morning, was Bess at work alone. She had curtly dismissed all her assistants, and by that time was hanging out the linen upon the lines strung between the trees. Madame Michot, who had come to give her some directions, was watching her with admiration. Bess wore the usual dress of girls of her class,—a short brown skirt, a white linen bodice, with the sleeves rolled up, showing her shapely arms, and a spotless white cap. Her reddish hair was plaited and tied with a black ribbon, and little curls rested upon her forehead and the white nape of her neck.

The most interested listener to her untutored singing was, however, a little old man quite unseen by any one, at the window of a house whose garden was separated from the orchard only by a wall with a door in it. This little old man, with his nightcap awry, and a dressing-gown around his shoulders, listened intently, drumming on the stone window-sill with his fingers to mark time.

“Good-morning, madam,” cried Roger, advancing, hat in hand, the August sun shining on his fair, curling hair, “and good-morning, Bess; what an excellent singer you are, and ever were!”

“’Tis not much, Master Roger,” replied Bess, who had sense enough not to call Roger familiarly by his name in the presence of others. She smiled and colored with pleasure, however, at his praise.

Madame Michot in her awkward English began to praise the singing too, but finding it insufficient, burst into a torrent of French, describing the wonderful capacity for work there was in Bess.

“What is she saying about me?” asked Bess suspiciously; and while Roger was trying to make the two ladies intelligible to each other, the little old gentleman, who had been listening at the window and had disappeared, was seen coming through the garden door. He was a benevolent-looking old gentleman, and evidently wildly excited about something. He seemed to have jumped into his clothes in such haste that it was a wonder he had not got into them inside out. His waistcoat was loose, though his coat was buttoned over it; his shoes were unbuckled, and he carried his peruke and his garters in his hand, and he had forgotten to remove his nightcap. Bess had paused for a moment from hanging out table-cloths and napkins, and stood with one white arm on her hip, while with the other she shaded her eyes; and the old gentleman, approaching her, made a profound bow.

“Mademoiselle,” he said, “you are truly one of heaven’s favorites. That glorious voice of yours is fit for the choir of angels; nay, more,—it is worthy of the King’s Opera.”

“Tell him,” said Bess, turning to Roger, “that I don’t understand his lingo.”

Roger translated this, as follows,—

“Sir, Mademoiselle Lukens desires me to say to you that she highly appreciates your admiration of her voice, and begs to explain that she cannot yet understand or converse in the French language.”

With another profound bow, the old gentleman said,—

“Monsieur, I have the honor to introduce myself. I am Monsieur Mazet, one of the directors of the King’s Opera; and wherever I go—on my little journeys for pleasure, or my expeditions for business, by day or by night—I am on the lookout for good voices. I have been an enraptured listener this morning to this young woman’s singing. And I beg of you to say to her that, if she wishes to study under my direction, and is willing to pay the dole of labor which art exacts, I can promise her great success, great fame—all, all that a beautiful voice can bring to a beautiful woman.”

Here Madame Michot interrupted vigorously. “Now, Monsieur Roger, don’t put any such notions in the girl’s head. Don’t I know what becomes of poor girls who go to Paris? She will rue it the longest day she lives. I have seen them go, and, oh, my God! I have seen them return,—a sorry sight. So tell her, instead, that she had much better remain here. I will give her a good home if she will work and behave herself; and I have little doubt that she does both work well and behave well.”

Monsieur Mazet heard this with a sniff of scorn. He threw a whole volume of expression in his face as, with a grimace indicating the utmost distaste for Madame Michot, he waved his long arms about. Madame Michot, on her part, gave him a look of contemptuous pity, as much as to say, “Poor creature!”

Monsieur began hostilities by saying,—

“Madame, perhaps, does not understand the feeling for art which—”

“No, I don’t,” vigorously replied Madame Michot, “but I know, as I tell you, what waits for a girl like this, poor and handsome and ignorant, in Paris, and—”

“My position madam, as director—”

“My profession, sir, of keeping an inn, has taught me to know human nature.”

The altercation grew warmer, Bess and Roger remaining silent. At last, when Madame Michot’s usually placid voice rose to a high key, and Monsieur Mazet used some ugly words, Roger interfered politely, and proposed to lay the two propositions before Bess. This was agreed to by both combatants, upon condition that he offered no advice. Bess listened gravely while he explained to her in English all that Monsieur Mazet and Madame Michot had been saying, and then she replied promptly,—

“Would I rather go to Paris and learn to be a singer in the King’s Opera, or would I rather stay here and wash linen? Why, Master Roger, I would rather go to Paris; and if Madame Michot or that gentleman thinks I can’t take care of myself, show you them that scar I left on your skull.”

“But I would not advise you to go until you learn something of the French tongue,” said Roger, pledged not to advise, but eager to protect her.

“Right. I always said you had some brains under your curly hair. Now say to them that I will stay here and work for a couple of months, until I learn to know what people are saying to me; and after that, if the gentleman will come and fetch me, I will go to Paris and learn to sing in the King’s Opera.”

This Solomonic decision had the uncommon effect of pleasing both parties to the controversy.

Madame Michot considered, if she saved the brand for two months from the burning, she could save it altogether; while Monsieur Mazet had no doubt whatever that two months’ experience of the drudgery of a village inn would secure his prize for Paris. Roger, too, was pleased with the decision, which showed the strong good sense that Bess usually displayed in practical affairs.

Madame Michot invited them all to breakfast with her and Jacques; and they all accepted. The table was spread in the orchard, and the proud Roger Egremont enjoyed very much this meal with the director of the King’s Opera, the landlady and her son, and the turnkey’s niece. They were a very merry party. Bess was in the highest spirits; here at last was that chance, so longed for, to rise into a respectable sphere of life,—for Bess did not count the gaoler’s trade as respectable. And singing was so easy! She could not keep from doing it if she tried. She supposed there would be some hardships, but she knew the ugly face of hardship too well to be frightened at it, and perhaps Roger—here Bess sternly checked her vagrant imagination. The others did not know, and she earnestly hoped might never find out, the story of her childhood and youth; but Roger knew it, and could never forget it.

That day and for some days afterward, there was much carolling to the accompaniment of a crazy clavichord in Monsieur Mazet’s lodgings; for he was to remain some days at St. Germains, and immediately began Bess’s musical education. Bess took to music and singing with ardor and intelligence; she had a strong frame and was never tired, although everybody within hearing, except Monsieur Mazet, got a little weary sometimes of her incessant trilling. On the third day, after meeting with Monsieur Mazet, she found an instrument more to her liking than Monsieur Mazet’s clavichord. This was Dicky Egremont’s fiddle.

On that afternoon, Bess, who was always provided with knitting, was sitting on a bench in the orchard, her fingers flying. Monsieur Mazet, having thrummed and strummed the whole morning on the clavichord, teaching his apt pupil, was taking a rest in his lodgings. Madame Michot and Jacques were at the inn. Madame Michot noticed with approval that Bess showed no inclination to hang about the inn, but when her work was over went off to the orchard, or to the little closet of a room she had, to spend her leisure. It was not possible that the presence of a girl so handsome, and lately from England, should not be known to the merry gentlemen who frequented Madame Michot’s common room; and had not Bess kept out of the way she could easily have made herself a toast, and likewise a subject of gossip, among those same merry gentlemen. But Bess had learned prudence in a hard school, and had learned it well, and, her ideas of the chivalry of men having been formed upon those who dwelt in Newgate, she had by no means a high opinion of the sex in general. Therefore, when she saw approaching her in the pleasant August afternoon a young man in the black dress of a seminarian, she quickly determined that the orchard would not very long be large enough for both. And having heard bad accounts of papists and papistry in general, the fact that the young man wore a monkish dress set her still more against him. Presently he came near, and bowed and smiled and blushed,—for Dicky Egremont seemed always blushing,—and Bess could not for the life of her keep from returning his friendly glance.

“’Tis Mistress Bess Lukens I have the honor of addressing,” said Dicky in his sweet and youthful voice.

Bess rose and dropped a courtesy, trying to scowl, but failing.

“Pray let me introduce myself. I am Mr. Richard Egremont, a cousin of Mr. Roger Egremont.”

“Are you Dicky?” cried Bess, surprised out of herself, and then coloring at her inadvertence.

“I am Dicky to Roger,” replied Dicky, “and naturally you never heard him speak of me by any other name. Know, Mistress Bess, Roger has told me of all your goodness to him while he was in prison, and for that reason, when I came to the inn just now and heard you were here, I ventured to come and pay you my respects. For all who are good to my cousin, Roger Egremont, are friends of mine.”

“Thank you, Mr. D—I mean Mr. Egremont. ’Twas little I could do for Mr. Roger, but I had the best will in the world.”

Dicky had seated himself at the other end of the garden bench, and Bess had resumed her knitting. The afternoon sun sifted down upon her great plaits of auburn hair, bringing out all the red and gold in it, and the tawny depths in her brown eyes. Dicky noticed what Madame Michot had,—the evidences of hard work on Bess’s hands, and he thought he knew her to be, from Roger’s description, one of the best women in the world.

“Madame Michot told me, just now in the house, that you had a mighty pretty voice, and would go to Paris some time before long, to study for the King’s Opera,” he began, by way of making acquaintance.

“Yes,” replied Bess, her face lighting up with pleasure at the mere mention of her becoming a singer. “I think I must be the fortunatest poor girl that ever lived. A kind gentleman here, Mr. Mazet, heard me singing, and offered to teach me at Paris, and Mr. Roger thinks it all right that I should go. They all tell me ’twill be hard work, but I can’t think singing hard work; ’twould be hard work for me to keep from singing.”

“Yes,” said Dicky, gravely, “’Tis monstrous hard work for me to keep from fiddling. At the seminary where I am studying to be a priest, I am not allowed to fiddle all I want; and my superiors are right. For the hours fly when I have the bow in my hand, and my fingers dancing upon the strings; and often, when I think I have been playing but a few minutes, ’tis a whole hour.”

For the first time Bess found some one who could talk and feel as she did about music, and she replied eagerly,—

“So ’tis with me! So ’tis with me!”

“Only those who love music can understand it,” continued Dicky, as eager as Bess. “’Tis life and light and joy and hope and solace—”

“And meat and drink and coals,” responded the practical Bess.

And then their talk drifted to Roger. Every moment Bess felt more and more drawn to this frank, boyish Dicky, and insensibly she adopted Roger’s attitude of superior age. Dicky was really only a little younger than Bess, but she felt as if he were born yesterday, and she were as old as the Pharaohs by comparison. As for his monkish religion, she looked on it as she did on Roger’s—as a departure from the ordinary, like children who are born with six toes—singular, but harmless. And then something inspired Bess to give Dicky her confidence about that black spectre of her past—her life in Newgate.

“Mr. Di—I mean, Mr. Egremont, I don’t believe you are the man to do an ill turn to a poor girl, or a child, or a dog, or anything that’s not very strong,” she burst out presently, “and I want you to do me a kindness. I hate worse than pi’sen the notion that people should know that—that—I am the niece of a gaoler and turnkey. ’Twas that which chiefly made me seek my fortune in France; and will you please to promise to keep it to yourself?—for I know that Master Roger must have told it you.”

“Truly, I will keep your secret, Mistress Bess. No one shall ever hear anything of you from me, except that you befriended Roger in prison, and nobody knows how you did it.”

“My uncle’s calling was the sorest thing to me in the world, Mr. Egremont. It sickens me to think how much I learned of wickedness in that dreadful prison the seven years I lived there. But knowing wickedness only made me hate it the more. I swore I would never be as most of the creatures were there, and the hatred of evil, more than the love of good, has kept me in the straight path. Madame Michot, and that good, industrious, lame Jacques do not know about the gaol, and I think not the grand gentleman, the Duke of Berwick, who helped Mr. Roger to get me in this place; but I am not sure,—I dared not ask Mr. Roger if he had told him. You knew it, though, and it takes a great load off my heart to know you’ll not tell it abroad.”

“Indeed I will not. And—and—Mistress Bess, I have my fiddle within. Could we not have some sweet music together?”

“Yes,” cried Bess, delighted, and Dicky, running toward the house, presently returned with his fiddle. He tuned up, and Bess asking if he could play “Green Sleeves,” her sweet, strong voice, and the soft and thrilling strains of the violin rose in harmony. The summer sun was near setting, and the shadows were long in the orchard. The birds ceased their twittering to listen to the music, that rose, full and strong and rich, and melted away in the darkening blue of the sky. They both stood, Dicky drawing his bow, slowly and softly, and bringing the tenderest melody forth, and then quickly changing to the merriest laughing, dancing measure, and Bess, with her heart in her eyes, her glorious voice following and intertwining and melting into the sweet strains of the violin. It was as if their two souls met and sang together. One song succeeded another, and so absorbed were they that Bess, for once, actually forgot she had work to do. Nor was it possible for the music to remain unheard at the inn. Presently Bess realized that figures were stealing into the orchard, from which the afternoon light was fading.

A loud clapping of hands after Bess had sung “Drink to me only with thine eyes” broke the spell. All the idlers from the inn had strolled out to listen. A handsome Scotch gentleman was for singing with Bess, but she, curtly declining, curtseyed and walked toward the inn.

“An ungracious jade,” said the Scotch gentleman, turning on his heel.

“The girl has sense,” muttered Monsieur Mazet, who was listening and watching from his window, overlooking the orchard.

And in that orchard, singing those simple English songs, was made the beginning of a friendship between an Egremont and the turnkey’s niece that was to last until life ended.