CHAPTER XXVIII.
THE CAPTAIN’S WIFE
Lottie could do nothing but stand bewildered and gaze at this new claimant of her regard. Surprise took all the meaning, all the intelligence out of her face. She stood with her eyes wide open, her lips dropping apart. Her new mamma! She had the indescribable misfortune of not being able to think upon her own mother with any reverence or profound affection. Mrs. Despard was but “poor mamma” to her—no more. Lottie could not shut her eyes to the deficiencies of that poor woman, of whom the best that could be said was that she was dead, and beyond the reach of blame. There was no cherished and vaunted idea, therefore, to be outraged; but perhaps all the more Lottie’s soul rose up in rebellion against the title as applied to anyone else. She had known what was coming, and yet she was as entirely taken by surprise as if this idea had never been suggested to her. With eyes suddenly cleared out of all the dazzling that had clouded them, she looked at the woman thus brought in upon her—this intruder, who, however, had more right to be there than even Lottie had—the Captain’s wife. If this event had happened a month or two ago, while she retained all her natural vigour, no doubt, foolish as it was, Lottie would have made some show of resistance. She would have protested against the sudden arrival. She would have withdrawn from company so undesirable. She would have tried, however absurd it might have been, to vindicate herself, to hold the new-comer at arm’s length. But this had all become impossible now. At no other moment could she have been so entirely taken by surprise. All the apprehensions about her father which had been communicated to her on former occasions had died out of her mind. She had never said very much about this danger, or been alarmed by it, as Law was. It had not occurred to her to inquire how it would affect herself. And now she was taken altogether by surprise. She stood struck dumb with amazement, and gazed at the woman, instinctively taking in every particular of her appearance, as only a woman could do. Unconsciously to herself, Lottie appraised the other, saw through her, calculating the meaning of her and all her finery. No man could have done it, and she was not herself aware of having done it; but Polly knew very well what that look meant. Notwithstanding her own confidence in her bridal array, even Polly felt it coming to pieces, felt it being set down for what it was worth; and, naturally, the feeling that this was so made her angry and defiant.
“How do you do, miss?” she said, feeling that even her voice sounded more vulgar than it need have done. “I hope as we shall be good friends. Your pa has played you a nice trick, hasn’t he? But men is men, and when they’re like he is there’s allowances to be made for them.” Polly was aware that this speech was in her very worst style. She had not intended to call Lottie Miss; but with that girl standing staring, in a plain cotton frock, looking a lady, every inch of her, from the crown of her head to the sole of her foot—a bride, in a fine bonnet covered with orange-blossoms, and a bright silk dress that matched, was not in possession of her faculties. Bold as she was, she could not but be conscious of a tremor which mingled with her very defiance. “Well, I’m sure, what a pretty table!” she resumed. “They might have known we were coming home, Captain. There ain’t much on it, perhaps—not like the nice chicken and sausages you’d have got at mother’s. But mother would never have set it out so pretty, that I’ll allow.” Then Polly looked round upon the dim old walls, faintly lighted by the lamp. “So this is the dining-room,” she said; “this is my new ’ome. To think I never should have been inside the door till now! Let me alone, Harry. I don’t want none of your huggings. I want to make acquaintance with my new ’ome. You know well enough I married just as much for the sake of living in the Lodges as for you—don’t you, now?” she said, with a laugh. Perhaps only fathers and mothers, and not even these long-suffering persons always, can look on at the endearments of newly-married couples with tolerance. Lottie was offended, as if their endearments had been insulting to herself. She looked at them with an annoyed contempt. No sympathetic touch of fellow-feeling moved her. To compare this, as she thought, hideous travesty of love with her own, would have but hardened her the more against them. She turned away, and shut the window, and drew down the blind with an energy uncalled for by such simple duties. When the Captain led his wife upstairs, that she might take off her bonnet, Lottie sat down and tried to think. But she could not think. It had all happened in a moment, and her mind was in an angry confusion, not capable of reason. She could not realise what had happened, or what was going to happen—an indignant sense of being intruded upon, of having to receive and be civil to an unwelcome visitor, and an impatience almost beyond bearing of this strait into which her father had plunged her, filled her mind. Something more, she dimly felt, lay behind—something more important, more serious; but in the meantime she did not feel that her occupation was gone, or her kingdom taken from her. A disagreeable person to entertain—a most unwelcome, uncongenial guest. For the moment she could not realise anything more. But her mind was in the most painful ferment, her heart beating. How was she to behave to this new, strange visitor? What was she to say to her? She must sit down at table with her, she supposed. She was Captain Despard’s—guest. What more? But Lottie knew very well she was something more.
Mary came in, bringing tea, which she placed at the head of the table, where Lottie usually sat. Mary’s eyes were dancing in her head with curiosity and excitement. “What is it, miss? oh, what is it, miss? What’s happened?” said Mary. But Lottie made her no reply. She did not herself know what had happened. She waited for the return of “the woman” with a troubled mind. Everything was ready, and Lottie stood by ready to take her seat the moment they should come back. She heard them come downstairs, laughing and talking. The woman’s voice filled all the house. It flowed on in a constant stream, loud enough to be heard in the kitchen, where Mary was listening with all her ears. “Very nice on the whole,” the new-comer was saying; “but of course I shall make a few changes. I’ve always heard that a room should be like its mistress. There’s not half enough pretty things to please me. I do love a pretty room, and plenty of antimacassars and pink ribbons. Oh, I shan’t tell you what I am going to do to it!—not a word. Gentlemen must be taught their place. I am going to make it look very nice, and that should be enough for you. Oh yes, I am quite ready for supper. I haven’t touched a bit of anything since five o’clock, when we had tea. Poor Harry! I can see how you have been put upon.” This was said at the foot of the stairs, where not only Lottie but Mary could hear every word. Mary understood it all, but Lottie did not understand it. She could not receive Polly’s programme into her mind, nor think what was meant by it. While she still stood waiting, the two came in—the bride, with her tower of hair upon her head, and all her cheap ribbons and bangles. She came in, drawing herself away from the Captain’s encircling arm. “Behave!” said Polly, shaking a finger at him; and she swept in and round the table, almost pushing against the surprised spectator who stood looking on, and deposited herself in Lottie’s chair. “It’s best to begin as you mean to end,” said Polly; “I’m not tired to speak of, and I’ll take my own place at once. You can sit here, Miss Lottie, between him and me.”
Still, Lottie did not know what to think or to say. She stood still, bewildered, and then took the place pointed out to her. What did it mean? It was easy enough to see what it meant, if her head had not been so confused. “Yes, dear,” said Polly, “a little bit of cold beef—just a very little bit. I am not fond of cold victuals. That’s not how we’ve been living, is it? and that’s not how I mean you to live. Oh, no, I don’t blame Lottie. Unmarried girls don’t know any better. They don’t study a man like his wife knows how to do. I can see how it’s been; oh, I can see! Too many mouths to feed, and the meat has to be bought according. Who is your butcher, miss? Oh, him! I don’t hold with him. I shall send for Jones to-morrow; he’s the man for my money. Wasn’t that a lovely sweetbread that we had at our wedding breakfast? You didn’t remark? Oh, nonsense, I’m sure you remarked! It was a beauty! Well, that was from Jones’s. I’ll send for him to-morrow. Do you take sugar in your tea, Miss Lottie? Dear! I shouldn’t have thought it; so careful a young lady. ’Enery, darling, what are you drinking? Do you take tea?”
“I don’t mind what I take, my love, so long as you give it me,” said the gallant Captain; “tea or poison, I’d take it from that hand; and I don’t want anything but to look at you at the head of my table. This is how it should be. To think how long I have been denying myself, forgetting what happiness was!”
“You poor dear Harry! all for the sake of your children! Well, I hope you’ll find it repaid. They ought to be grateful. The times and times that you and me has talked it over, and given it up for their sakes! You’re very quiet, miss; you don’t say much,” added Polly; “but I dare say it was a surprise to you, seeing me come home?”
“Why don’t you speak up and make yourself pleasant?” said the Captain, with a kind of growl, under his breath.
Lottie came to herself a little by dint of this pressure. She did not seem to know how it had come about, or what the emergency meant. “I beg your pardon,” she said, her head swimming and everything going round with her, “I am—taken very much by surprise. If I had known what was going to happen I—might have been more prepared.”
“I can understand that,” said Polly. “Hold your tongue, Captain. She is quite right. You ought to have written and told her, as I asked you. But now that you do know I hope you mean to be friendly, miss. Them that treats me well, I treats them well. I don’t wonder that you don’t like it at first,” she added graciously; “a girl no older than yourself! But he would have it, you know, and what could I do? When a man’s in that way, it’s no use talking to him. I resisted as long as I could, but I had to give in at the last.”
“By George!” said the Captain, helping the beef. He had some one to stand by him now, who he felt might be a match for Lottie; but he was still a little afraid of Lottie, and consequently eager to crow over her in the strength of his backer. “The trouble I’ve had to bring matters to this point!” he said. “But never mind, my love, it is all right now you are here. At one time I thought it never was going to be accomplished. But perseverance——”
“Perseverance does a deal; but, bless you, I never had no doubt on the subject,” said the new Mrs. Despard, taking up her teacup in a way that was very offensive to Lottie. The Captain looked at her from the other end of the table with a kind of adoration; but nevertheless the Captain himself, with all his faults, was painfully aware of her double negatives, and thought to himself, even when he looked at her so admiringly, that he must give her a few lessons. He had never paid much attention to Lottie, and yet he could not help getting a glimpse of his new wife through Lottie’s eyes.
“Where is my son?” said Polly. “Harry, darling, where is that dear Law? He won’t be so much surprised, will he? He had a notion how things were going. But I’ve got a great deal to say to him, I can tell you. I don’t approve of his goings on. There’s a many things as I mean to put a stop to. Nobody shall say as I don’t do my duty by your children. I shall tell him——”
“Do you know Law?” said Lottie. This gave her a little chill of horror; though indeed she remembered that Law had spoken of some one—some one about whom Lottie had not cared to inquire.
“Oh, yes, miss, I know Law.” (Polly did not know how it was that she said Miss to Lottie. She did not mean to do it. She did it, not in respect, but in derision; but the word came to her lips, whether she would or not.) “Law and I are old friends. Time was when I didn’t feel sure—not quite sure, you know,” she said, with a laugh of mingled vanity and malice, “if it was to be the father or the son; but, Lord, there’s no comparison,” she added hastily, seeing that even on the Captain’s fine countenance this boast produced a momentary cloud. “Law will never be as fine a man as his father. He hasn’t got the Captain’s carriage, nor he ain’t so handsome. Bless us, are you listening, Harry? I didn’t mean you to hear. I don’t think you handsome a bit, now, do I? I’m sure I’ve told you times and times——”
The two thus exchanging glances and pretty speeches across the table were too much occupied with themselves to think of anything else. And no one heard Law’s approach till he pushed open the door, and with a “Hillo!” of absolute amazement, stood thunderstruck, gazing upon this astonishing spectacle. The sight that Law beheld was not a disagreeable sight in itself: the table, all bright with its bouquet of crimson leaves, which the Captain had pushed to one side in order that he might see his wife—and the three faces round it, two of them beaming with triumph and satisfaction. The young man stood at the door and took it all in, with a stare at first, of dismay. Opposite to him sat Lottie, put out of her place, looking stunned, as if she had fallen from a height and did not know where she was. As he stood there she lifted her eyes to him with a look of wondering and bewildered misery which went to Law’s heart; but the next moment he burst into a loud laugh, in spite of himself. To see the governor casting languishing looks at Polly was more than his gravity could bear. He could think of nothing, after the first shock, but “what a joke” it was. A man in love, especially a man in the first imbecility of matrimonial bliss, is a joke at any time; but when it’s your governor, Law said to himself! He gave a great roar of laughter. “Polly, by Jove!” he said; “so you’ve been and done it!” It had alarmed him much beforehand, and no doubt it might be tragical enough after; but for the moment it was the best joke that Law had encountered for years.
“Yes, we’ve been and done it,” said Polly, rising and holding out her hand to him. “Come here and kiss me, my son. I am delighted to see you. It’s so nice to hear a good laugh, and see a bright face. Lottie, Law, hasn’t found her tongue yet. She hasn’t a word to throw at a dog, much less her new mamma. But you, it’s a pleasure to see you. Ah!” said Polly, with effusion, “the gentlemen for me! Ladies, they’re spiteful, and they’re jealous, and they’re stuck up; but gentlemen does you justice. You mustn’t call me Polly, however, though I forgive you the first time. You must know that I am your mamma.”
Law laughed again, but it was not a pleasant laugh; and he grasped the hand which his father held out to him with a desire to crush it, if he could, which was natural enough. Law thought it a joke, it is true; but he was angry at bottom, though amused on the surface. And he did hurt his father’s somewhat flabby, unworking hand. The Captain, however, would not complain. He was glad even to be met with a semblance of cordiality at such a moment. He helped Law largely to the beef, in the satisfaction of this family union, and this was a sign of anxiety which Law did not despise.
“Oh, and I assure you I mean to be a mother to you,” said Polly. “It shan’t be said now that you haven’t anyone to look after you. I mean to look after you. I am not at all satisfied with some of your goings on. A gentleman shouldn’t make too free with them that are beneath him. Yes, yes, Harry, darling; it’s too early to begin on that point; but he shall know my mind, and I mean to look after him. Now this is what I call comfortable,” said Mrs. Despard, looking round with a beaming smile; “quite a family party, and quite a nice tea; though the beef’s dry to my taste (but I never was one for cold victuals), and everybody satisfied——”
“Lottie,” said the Captain, looking up from his beef with some sternness, “you seem the only exception. Don’t you think, my child, when you see everybody so happy, that you might find a word to say?”
“Oh, don’t hurry her,” said Polly; “we’ve took her by surprise. I told you not to, but you would. We’ll have a nice long talk to-morrow, when she gives me over the housekeeping; and when she sees as I mean to act like a mother, why things will come right between her and me.”
The Despards were not highly educated people, but yet a shiver ran through them when Polly, unconscious, said, “We’ve took her by surprise.” The Captain even shrank a little, and took a great deal too much mustard, and made himself cough; while Law, in spite of himself, laughed, looking across the table to the place where Lottie sat. Lottie noticed it the least of all. She heard every word they all said, and remembered every word, the most trifling; but at the moment she scarcely distinguished the meaning of them. She said, “I think, papa, if you don’t mind, I will go to my room. I am rather tired; and perhaps I had better give some orders to Mary.”
“Oh, never mind; never mind about Mary, if it’s on my account. I shall look after her myself,” said Polly. “What’s good enough for the Captain is good enough for me; at least, till I settle it my own way, you know. I don’t want to give any trouble at all, till I can settle things my own way.”
“It is not I that have to be consulted,” said Captain Despard; “but if you are going to sit sulky and not say a word, I don’t see—what do you think, my pet?—that it matters whether you go or stay——”
“Oh, don’t mind me, Miss,” said Polly. She could not look Miss Despard in the face and call her Lottie, knowing, however she might consent to waive her own rights, that Miss Despard was still Miss Despard, whatever Polly might do. Not a thing on her that was worth five shillings, not a brooch even; nothing like a bracelet; a bit of a cotton frock, no more; but she was still Miss Despard, and unapproachable. Polly, with her bracelets on each wrist, rings twinkling on her hands as she took her supper, in a blue silk, and knowing herself to be an officer’s lady—Mrs. Captain Despard—with all this, could not speak to her husband’s daughter except as Miss. She could not understand it, but still it was so.
The little crooked hall was full of boxes when Lottie came out; and Mary stood among them, wondering how she was to get them upstairs. Perhaps she had been listening a little at the door, for Mary’s consternation was as great as Lottie’s. “Do you think, Miss, it’s real and true? Do you think as she’s married, sure? Mother wouldn’t let me stay a day if there was anything wrong, and I don’t know as I’ll stay anyhow,” Mary said.
“Wrong? what could be wrong?” said Lottie. She was less educated in knowledge of this kind than the little maid-of-all-work. It troubled her to see the boxes littering the hall, but she could not carry them upstairs. For a moment the impulse to do it, or, at least, to help Mary in doing it, came into her mind; but, on second thoughts, she refrained. What had she to do with this new-comer into the house, who was not even a visitor, who had come to remain? Lottie went upstairs without saying any more. She went first into the little faded drawing-room, where there was no light except that which came from the window and the lamp in the Dean’s Walk. It was not beautiful. She had never had any money to decorate it, to make it what it might have been, nor pretty furniture to put into it. But she sat down on her favourite little chair, in the dark, and felt as if she had gone to sit by somebody that was dead, who had been a dear friend. How friendly and quiet the little room had been! giving her a centre for her life, a refuge for her thoughts. But all that was over. She had never known before that she had liked it or thought of it much; but now, all at once, what a gentle and pleasant shelter it had been! As Lottie thought of everything, the tears came silently and bitterly into her eyes. She herself had been ungrateful, unkind to the little old house, the venerable old place, the kind people. They had all been kind to her. She had visited her own disappointment upon them, scorning the neighbours because they were less stately than she expected them to be; visiting upon them her own discontent with her position, her own disappointment in being less important than she expected. Lottie was hard upon herself, for she had not been unkind to anyone, but was, on the contrary, a favourite with her neighbours—the only girl in the place, and allowed by the old people to have a right to whims and fancies. Now, in the face of this strange, incomprehensible misfortune, she felt the difference. Her quiet old room! where kind voices had spoken to her, where he had come, saying such words as made her heart beat; where she had sung to him, and received those tender applauses which had been like treasure to Lottie. She seemed to see a series of past scenes like pictures rising before her. Not often had Rollo been there—yet two or three times; and Mrs. O’Shaughnessy, with her mellow brogue, and Mr. Ashford, and even the stately person of the Dean himself. She had been at home here, to receive them, whoever came. The room had never been invaded by anything that was unfriendly or unpleasing. Now—what was it that woman said of changes—making it look nice? Lottie had not understood the words when they were said, but they came back upon her now.
By-and-by she heard some one coming upstairs, and, starting, rose to steal away to her own room, afraid to meet the stranger again; but no light made its appearance, and Law put in his head at the door, then seeing something moving against the window, came to her, and threw himself down on the window-seat. “They’re going on so downstairs, that I couldn’t stand it,” said Law; “it’s enough to make a fellow sick”—and then, after a pause, “Well! I told you what was coming, but you wouldn’t believe me; what do you think of it now?”
“Oh, Law, what does it mean?—Are we not dreaming? Can it be true?”
“True! of course it is true. I told you what was going to happen.” Then his tone softened. “Poor Lottie, it’s you I’m sorry for. If you could only see yourself beside her! And where were his eyes, that he couldn’t see?” Here Law paused abruptly, wondering all at once whether the difference would be as marked between his sister and the girls whom he too liked to spend his evenings with. He was sure that Emma was not like that woman; but still the thought subdued his indignation. “I say,” he added hastily, “I want to give you a bit of advice. Just you give in to her, Lottie. Fighting is no good: she has got a tongue that you couldn’t stand, and the things she would say you wouldn’t understand. I understand her well enough; but you wouldn’t know what she meant, and it would make you angry and hurt you. Give in, Lottie. Since the governor’s been so silly, she has a right. And don’t you make any stand as if you could do it—for you can’t. It is a great deal better not to resist——”
“What do you mean by resist? How can I resist? The house is papa’s, I suppose?” said Lottie. “The thing is, I don’t understand it. I can’t understand it: that somebody should be coming to stay here, to be one of us, to be mixed up in everything—whom we don’t know——”
“To be mistress,” said Law, “that’s the worst—not to be mixed up with us, but to be over us. To take everything out of your hands——”
“Do you think I care for that? I do not mind who is mistress,” said Lottie, all unaware of her own characteristics. Law was wiser than she was in this respect. He shook his head.
“That’s the worst,” he said; “she’ll be mistress—she’ll change everything. Oh, I know Polly well; though I suppose, for decency, I mustn’t say Polly now.”
“How is it you know her so well? And how did papa know her?” said Lottie. “I should have thought you never could have met such women. Ah! you told me once about—others. Law! you can’t like company like that; surely, you can’t like company like that! how did you get to know her?” Law was very much discomfited by this sudden question. In the midst of his sympathy and compassion for his sister, it was hard all at once to be brought to book, when he had forgotten the possibility of such a danger.
“Well, you know,” he said, “fellows do; I don’t know how it is—you come across some one, and then she speaks to you, and then you’re forced to speak back; or perhaps it’s you that speaks first—it isn’t easy to tell. This was as simple as anything,” Law went on, relieved by the naturalness of his own explanation. “They all work in the same house where Langton lives, my old coach, you know, before I went to old Ashford. I don’t know how the governor got there. Perhaps it was the same way. Going in and out, you know, day after day, why, how could you help it? And when a woman speaks to you, what can you do, but say something? That’s exactly how it was.”
“But, Law,” she said, grasping his arm—all this conversation was so much easier in the dark—“Law, you will take care? she said she was not quite sure whether it was to be the father or the son. Ah! a woman who could say that, Law——”
“It’s a lie,” said Law, fiercely, “and she knows it. I never thought anything of her—never. It’s a lie, if she were to swear it! Polly! why, she’s thirty, she’s—— I give my word of honour, it’s a lie.”
“But, Law! oh, Law dear——”
“I know what you’re going to say. I’ll take care of myself; no fear of me getting entangled,” said Law briskly. Then he stopped, and, still favoured by the dark, took her hands in his. “Lottie, it’s my turn now. I know you won’t stand questioning, nor being talked to. But, look here—don’t shilly-shally if you can care for anybody, and he’ll marry you and give you a place of your own—You needn’t jump up as if I had shot you. If you talk about such things to me, I may surely talk to you. And mind what I say. I don’t expect you’ll be able to put up with your life here——”
“I hear them stirring downstairs,” said Lottie, drawing her hands out of his hold. “Don’t keep me, don’t hold me, Law. I cannot see her again to-night.”
“You won’t give me any answer,” said the lad regretfully. There was real feeling in his voice—“But, Lottie, mind what I say. I don’t believe you’ll be able to put up with it, and if there’s anyone you care for and he’ll marry you——”
Lottie freed herself from him violently, and fled. Even in the dark there were things that Law could not be permitted to say, or she to hear.
CHAPTER XXIX.
THE HEAVINGS OF THE EARTHQUAKE.
The next morning dawned very strangely on all the members of the little household. Lottie was down early, as she generally was; but the advantages of early rising were neutralised by the condition of the little maid, Mary, who was too much excited to do her work, and kept continually coming back to pour her doubts and her difficulties into Lottie’s ear. “I can’t get no rest till I’ve told mother,” Mary said. “If there’s anything wrong, mother won’t let me stay, not a day. And even if there’s nothing wrong, I don’t know as I’ll stay. I haven’t got no fault to find with you, Miss; nor the Captain, nor even Mr. Law: though he’s a dreadful bother with his boots cleaning; but to say as you’re beginning as you mean to end, and then to give all that trouble! every blessed thing, I had to drag it upstairs. Mr. Law was very kind; he took up the big box—I couldn’t ha’ done it; but up and down, up and down, all the little boxes and the bags, and the brown paper parcels—‘It saves trouble if you begins as you means to end,’ she says——”
“I don’t want to hear what Mrs. Despard says,” said Lottie. Mrs. Despard: it was her mother’s name. And though that mother had not been an ideal mother, or one of those who are worshipped in their children’s memories, it is wonderful, what a gush of tender recollections came into Lottie’s mind with the name. Poor mamma! she had been very kind in her way, always ready to indulge and to pardon, if indifferent to what happened in more important matters. She had never exacted anything, never worried her children about idleness or untidiness, or any of those minor sins which generally make a small girl’s life a burden to her. Lottie’s mind went back to her, lying on her sofa, languid, perhaps lazy—badly dressed; yet never anything but a lady, with a kind of graciousness in her faded smile, and grace in her faded gown. Not a woman to be held in adoration, and yet—the girl sighed, but set to work to make the little brown dining-room neat, to get the table set, making up for Mary’s distracted service by her own extra activity. For amid all the horrors of last night there was one which had cut Lottie very deeply, and that was the many references to the cold beef, and the bride’s dislike of “cold victuals.” It is inconceivable, among all the more important matters involved, how deeply wounded Lottie’s pride had been by this reproach. She resolved that no one should be able to speak so to-day; and she herself put on her hat and went out to the shop on the Abbey Hill almost as soon as it had opened, that this intolerable reproach should not be in the interloper’s power. She met more than one of the old Chevaliers as she came up, for most of them kept early hours and paced the terrace pavement in the morning as if it had been morning parade. They all looked at her curiously, and one or two stopped her to say “good morning.” “And a fine morning it is, and you look as fresh as a flower,” one of the old gentlemen said; and another laid his hand on her shoulder, patting her with a tender fatherly touch. “God bless you, my dear, the sight of you is a pleasure,” said this old man. How little she had thought or cared for them, and how kind they were in her trouble! She could see that everybody knew. Lottie did not know whether she did not half resent the universal knowledge. Most likely they had known it before she did. The whole town knew it, and everybody within the Precincts. Captain Despard had got married! Such a thing had not occurred before in the memory of man. Many people believed, indeed, that there was a law against it, and that Captain Despard was liable to be turned out of his appointment. Certainly it was unprecedented; for the old Chevaliers before they came to St. Michael’s had generally passed the age at which men marry. The whole scene seemed to have taken a different aspect to Lottie. Since her home had become impossible to her, it had become dear. For the first time she felt how good it was to look across upon the noble old buttresses of the Abbey, to inhabit that “retired leisure,” that venerable quietness. If only that woman were not there! But that woman was there, and everything was changed. Lottie had been rudely awakened, dragged, as it were, out of her dreams. She could not think as she usually did of the meetings that were sure to come somehow in the Abbey, or on the Slopes—or count how long it would be till the afternoon or evening, when she should see him. This, though it was her life, had been pushed out of the way. She thought of all last night’s remarks about the cold beef and the poor fare, and the changes that were going to be made. Would she think bacon good enough for breakfast?—would she be satisfied with the rolls, which Lottie herself felt to be a holiday indulgence? Pride, and nothing but pride, had thrown the girl into such excesses. She could not endure those criticisms again. Her brain was hot and hazy, without having any power of thought. The confusion of last night was still in her. Would it all turn out a dream? or would the door open by-and-by and show this unaccustomed figure? Lottie did not feel that she could be sure of anything. The first to come down was Law, who had been forced from his bed for once by sympathy. Law was very kind to Lottie. “I thought I wouldn’t leave you to face her by yourself,” he said; “they’re coming down directly.” Then Lottie knew that it was no dream.
The bride came down in a blue merino dress, as blue as the silk of last night. Polly was of opinion that she looked well in blue; and it was not one of the ethereal tints that are now used, but a good solid, full blue, quite uncompromising in point of colour. And the hair on her head was piled up as if it would reach the skies, or the ceiling at least. She came down arm-in-arm with her husband, the two smiling upon each other, while Law and Lottie stood one on each side of the table with no smiles, looking very serious. It was Mrs. Despard who did the most of the conversation; for the Captain was passive, feeling, it must be allowed, somewhat embarrassed by the presence of his children, who did not embarrass her at all. But she did not think the bacon very good. She thought it badly cooked. She thought the girl could not have been well trained to send it up like that. And she was not pleased either with the rolls; but announced her intention of changing the baker as well as the butcher. “We’ve always gone to Willoughby’s, as long as I can recollect, and I don’t fancy any bread but his.” Lottie did not say anything, she was nearly as silent as on the previous night; and Law, who was opposite, though he made faces at her now and then, and did his best to beguile his sister into a laugh, did not contribute much to the conversation. He got up as soon as he had swallowed his breakfast and got his books. “I’m off to old Ashford,” he said.
“Where are you going, Law?—you must never get up from table without asking my leave—it is dreadful unmannerly. You have got into such strange ways; you want me to bring you back to your manners, all of you. Who are you going to?—not to Mr. Langton as you used to do—I’m glad of that.”
“I don’t see why you should be glad of that. I’m going to old Ashford,” said Law, gloomily. “He is a much better coach than Langton. I have not anything to do to-day, Lottie; I shall be back at twelve o’clock.”
“Dear me,” said Mrs. Despard, “how long is Law going on going to school like a little boy? I never heard of such a thing, at his age. He should be put into something where he could earn a little money for himself, instead of costing money; a great, strong young fellow like that. I think you’re all going to sleep here. You want me, as anybody can see, to wake you up, and save you from being put upon, my poor man. But I hope I know how to take care of my own husband, and see that he gets the good of what he has, and don’t just throw it away upon other folks. And I begin as I means to end,” said Polly, with a little toss of her head. Law, stopped by the sound of her voice, had turned round at the door, and contemplated her with gloomy looks; but seeing it was not to come to anything bad, went away. And the bell began, and the Captain rose. His bride came to him fondly, and brushed a crumb or two off his coat and arranged the flower in his button-hole. “Now you look quite sweet,” she said with genuine enthusiasm. “I ain’t going in the morning, when none but the regular folks is there, but I mean to go, my dear, in the afternoon. It’s only proper respect, living in the Precincts; but you won’t be long, dear? You’ll come home to your poor little wife, that don’t know what to do without her handsome husband? Now, won’t you, dear?”
“I’ll be back as fast as my legs can carry me,” said the Captain. “Come and meet me, my pet. Lottie will tell you when the voluntary begins——”
“Oh, I can tell very well without Lottie,” said the bride, hanging upon him till he reached the door. All these endearments had an indescribable effect upon the girl, who was compelled to stand by. Lottie turned her back to them and re-arranged the ornaments on the mantelpiece, with trembling hands, exasperated almost beyond the power of self-restraint. But when the Captain was gone, looking back in his imbecility to kiss his hand to his bride, the situation changed at once. Polly turned round, sharp and business-like, in a moment. “Ring the bell, Miss,” she said, “and tell the girl to clear them things away. And then, if you will just hand me over the keys, and let me see your housekeeping things and your stores and all that, we may settle matters without any trouble. I likes to begin as I mean to end,” said Polly peremptorily. Lottie stood and looked at her for a moment, her spirit rekindling, her mind rising up in arms against the idea of obedience to this stranger. But what would be the use of trying to resist? Resist! what power had she? The very pride which rebelled against submission made the submission inevitable. She could not humiliate herself by a vain struggle. Polly, who was very doubtful of the yielding of this natural adversary, and rather expected to have a struggle for her “rights,” was quite bewildered by the meekness with which the proud girl, who scarcely took any notice of her, she thought, acquiesced in the orders she gave. Lottie rang the bell. She said, “You will prefer, I am sure, to give Mary her orders without me. There are not many keys, but I will go and get what I have.”
“Not many keys! and you call yourself a housekeeper?” said Polly. Lottie turned away as the little maid came in, looking impertinent enough to be a match for the new mistress; but Lottie was no match for her. She went and got out her little housekeeping-book, which she had kept so neatly. She gathered the keys of the cupboards, which generally stood unlocked, for there was not so much in them that she should lock them up. Lottie had all the instincts of a housekeeper. It gave her positive pain to hand over the symbols of office—to give up her occupation. Her heart sank as she prepared to do it. All her struggles about the bills, her anxious thought how this and that was to be paid, seemed elements of happiness now. She could not bear to give them up. The pain of this compulsory abdication drove everything else out of her head. Love, they say, is all a woman’s life, but only part of a man’s; yet Lottie forgot even Rollo—forgot his love and all the consolation it might bring, in this other emergency, which was petty enough, yet all-important to her. She trembled as she got together these little symbols of her domestic sovereignty. She heard the new mistress of the house coming up the stairs as she did so, talking all the way. “I never heard such impudence,” Polly was saying. “Speak back to her mistress! a bit of a chit of a maid-of-all-work like that. I suppose she’s been let do whatever she pleased; but she’ll find out the difference.” Behind Polly’s voice came a gust of weeping from below, and a cry of, “I’m going to tell mother:” thus hostilities had commenced all along the line.
“I can’t think how ever you got on with a creature like that,” said Polly, throwing herself down in the easy-chair. “She don’t know how to do a single thing, as far as I can see; but some folks never seem to mind. She shan’t stay here not a day longer than I can help. I’ve given her warning on the spot. To take impudence from a servant the very first day! But that’s always the way when things are let go; the moment they find a firm hand over them there’s a to-do. To be sure it wasn’t to be looked for that you could know much, Miss, about managing a house.”
“Mary is a very good girl,” said Lottie hastily. “She has always done what I told her. Here are the keys of the cupboards, since you wish for them; but there are not any stores to lock away. I get the things every week, just enough to use——”
“And don’t lock them up!” Polly threw up her hands. “That’s one way of housekeeping; but how should you know any better, poor thing, brought up like that! I’m sure I don’t mean to be hard upon you; but you should have thought a bit of your papa, and not have wasted his money. However, that’s all over now. A man wants a nice ’ome to come back to, he wants a nice dinner on the table, he wants somebody that can talk to him, to keep him out of mischief. Oh, I know very well the Captain’s been fond of having his fling. I ain’t one of the ignorant ones, as don’t know a man’s ways. And I like that sort much the best myself. I like a man to be a man, and know what’s what. But you’ll soon see the difference, now that he’s got some one to amuse him, and some one to make him comfortable at home. So these are all, Miss Lottie? And what’s this? oh, a book! I don’t think much of keeping books. You know how much you has to spend, and you spend it; that’s my way.”
Lottie made no reply. She felt it to be wiser for herself, but no doubt it was less respectful to Polly, who paused now and then for a reply, then went on again, loving to hear herself talk, yet feeling the contempt involved in this absence of all response. At last she cried angrily, “Have you lost your tongue, Miss, or do you think as I’m not good enough to have an answer, though I’m your papa’s wife?”
“I beg your pardon,” said Lottie; “I—don’t know what to say to you. We don’t know each other. I don’t understand—— Don’t you see,” she cried suddenly, unable to restrain herself, “that since you came into the house you have done nothing but—find fault with all my—arrangements—” (these mild words came with the utmost difficulty; but Lottie was too proud to quarrel). “You can’t think that I could like that. I have done my best, and if you try as I have done, you will find it is not so easy. But I don’t want to defend myself; that is why I don’t say anything. There can be no good in quarrelling, whether you think me a bad housekeeper or not.”
“I ain’t so sure of that,” said Polly. “Have a good flare-up, and be done with it, that’s my way. I don’t hold with your politeness, and keeping yourself to yourself. I’d rather quarrel than be always bursting with spite and envy, like some folks. It stands to reason as you must hate me, taking things out of your hands; and it stands to reason as I should think more of my own husband than of keeping up your brother and you in idleness. But for all that, and though we might fight now and then—everybody does, I don’t care nothing for a girl as is always the same—I don’t see why we shouldn’t get on neither. The Captain says as you’ve a very good chance of a husband yourself. And though I’m just about your own age, I’ve had a deal of experience. I know how to bring a man to the point, if he’s shilly-shallying, or won’t speak up like a man, as a girl has a right to expect.”
“Oh! stop, stop, stop!” cried Lottie, wild with horror. She cast a hurried glance round, to see what excuse she could make for getting away. Then she seized eagerly upon her music which lay on the old square piano. “I must go to my lesson,” she said.
“Your lesson! Are you having lessons too? Upon my word! Oh, my poor husband! my poor Captain! No wonder as he has nothing but cold beef to eat,” said Polly, with all the fervour of a deliverer, finding out one misery after another. “And if one might make so bold as to ask, Miss, who is it as has the honour to give lessons to you?”
“The Signor—Mr. Rossinetti,” Lottie added, after a moment. It seemed desecration to talk of any of the familiar figures within the Abbey precincts by their familiar title to this intruder.
“Oh! I’m not so ignorant as not to know who the Signor is. That will be half-a-guinea, or at the least seven-and-six a lesson!” she said, raising her hands in horror. “Oh, my poor ’usband! This is how his money goes! Miss,” said Polly, severely, “you can’t expect as I should put up with such goings on. I have your papa to think of, and I won’t see him robbed—no, not whatever you may do. For I call that robbery, just nothing else. Half-a-guinea a lesson, and encouraging Law to waste his time! I can’t think how you can do it: with that good, dear, sweet, confiding man letting you have your own way, and suspecting nothing,” cried Polly, clasping her hands. Then she got up suddenly. “I declare,” she cried, “church is near over, and me not ready to go out and meet him! I can’t go out a figure, in a common rag like this, and me a bride. I must put on my silk. Of course, he wants to show me off a bit before his friends. I’ll run and get ready, and we can talk of this another time.”
Thus Lottie escaped for the moment. She was asked a little later to see if Mrs. Despard’s collar was straight, and to pin on her veil. “Do I look nice?” said Polly triumphant, and at the same time mollified by the services which Lottie rendered without objection. She had put on her “blue silk” and the bonnet with the orange-blossoms, and neckties enough to stock a shop. “Perhaps, as there’s nothing ordered, and I mean to make a change with the tradespeople, the Captain and me won’t come back to dinner,” said Polly. “There’s your favourite cold beef, Miss, for Law and you.” Lottie felt that she began to breathe when, rustling and mincing, her strange companion swept out, in the face of all the people who were dispersing from matins, to meet her husband. Polly liked the wondering encounter of all their eyes. With her blue silk sweeping the pavement after her, and her pink parasol, and the orange-blossoms on her bonnet, her figure descending the Dean’s Walk alone, while all the others issued out of the Abbey doors, was conspicuous enough. She was delighted to find that everybody looked at her, and even that some stood still to watch her, looking darkly at her finery. These were the people who were jealous, envious of her fine clothes and her happiness, or jealous of her handsome husband, who met her presently, but who perhaps was not so much delighted to see her amidst all his fellow-Chevaliers as she thought. Captain Despard was not a man of very fine perceptions; but though his blooming young wife was a splendid object indeed beside the dark, little old figure of Mrs. Temple, he had seen enough to feel that the presence of the old lady brought out into larger prominence something which the younger lacked. But he met her with effusive delight, and drew her hand within his arm, and thus they disappeared together. Outside the Precincts there was no need to make any comparison, and Polly’s brilliancy filled all hearts with awe.
When Law returned, he found Lottie seated in her little chair, with her face hidden in her hands. It was not that she was crying, as he feared at first. The face she raised to him was crimson with excitement. “Oh, Law!” she said, “Law, Law!” Lottie had got beyond the range of words. After a while she told him all the events of the morning, which did not look half so important when they were told, and they tried to lay their heads together and think what was best to be done. But what could anyone do? Mary could scarcely put the remnants of the cold beef on the table, for her eagerness to tell that she had been to mother, and mother would not hear of her staying. “Places isn’t so hard to get as all that, for a girl with a good character,” she said. When she was gone, Lottie looked piteously at her brother.
“What kind of a place could I get?” she said. “What am I fit for? Oh, Law! I think it is a mistake to be brought up a lady. I never thought it before, but I do now. How can we go on living here? and where are we to go?”
“That’s what I always said,” said Law. He was horribly grave, but he had not a word to say except that he had got a match at football, and perhaps might stay and sup with the fellows afterwards. “I’m just as well out of the way, for what can I do for you? only make things worse,” he said. And though he had been so kind and sympathetic at first, Law stole away, glad to escape, and left Lottie alone, to bear it as she might. She had no lesson that day, though she had pretended to have one. She would not go to the Abbey, where the new member of the family meant to appear, she knew. Lottie stayed in the familiar room which was hers no longer, until the silence became too much for her, and she felt that any human voice would be a relief. She went out in the afternoon, when all seemed quiet, when everybody had gone to the Abbey for the evening service. There would be nobody about, and it seemed to Lottie that the shame was upon her, that it was she who must shrink from all eyes. Mrs. O’Shaughnessy, however, knocking on the window violently, instantly gave her to understand that this was impracticable. The girl tried to resist, being afraid of what she might say, and of what might be said to her. But as she hurried on, Mrs. O’Shaughnessy’s maid rushed after her. Lottie had to go to her old friend, though very reluctantly. Mrs. O’Shaughnessy had a bad cold. She was sitting wrapped up in a shawl, and a visitor with something to tell was beyond price to her. “Come and tell me all about it, then!” she cried, “me poor darlin’!” enveloping Lottie in her large embrace. “And tell the Major, Sally, and let nobody come in.” The Major came instantly to the call, and Lottie tried to tell her story to the kind couple who sat on either side of her, with many an exclamation.
“I knew that was what it would come to,” Mrs. O’Shaughnessy said.
“And I never thought Despard (saving your presence, my dear) could have been such a fool!” cried the Major.
“Oh, sure, Major, you’re old enough to know that every man is a fool where a woman’s concerned.”
But what was Lottie to do? They petted her and condoled with her, soothing her with their sympathy, and all the tender words they could think of; but they could throw no light upon one point: what could the girl do? Nothing, but put up with it. They shook their heads, but could give her no comfort. If Law had but been doing something instead of idling all his time away! But then Law was not doing anything. What was he good for, any more than Lottie?
“Mary can get another place. Her mother will not let her stay, and she can get another place, she says; but here are two of us, Law and I, and we are good for nothing!” cried Lottie. How her thoughts were altered from the time when she thought it necessary to stay at home, to do no visible work, for the credit of the family! Lottie was not young enough to feel that it was necessary to be consistent. “We are young and strong and able to work, but we are good for nothing!” she said. And they both looked at her blankly, not knowing what to say.
By-and-by Lottie escaped again into the open air, notwithstanding their anxious invitation that she should stay with them. She was too wretched to stay, and there had come upon her a longing to see another face in which there might be comfort. As she went out she almost walked into Captain Temple’s arms, who was walking slowly along looking up at her window. The old man took both her hands into his. “My poor child!” he said. He was not so frankly inquisitive as the good people she had just left, but he drew her hand through his arm and walked with her, bending over her.
“I do not want to tempt you from your duty, my dear; you’ll do what is right, I am sure you will do what is right. But I can’t bear to think you are in trouble, and we so near. And my wife,” said the old man slightly faltering, “my wife thinks so, too.” He was not quite so sure of his wife. She had the restraining effect upon her husband which a more reserved and uncommunicative mind has over an impulsive one. He knew what he would like to do, but he was not sure of her, and this put hesitation into his speech.
“Oh! Captain Temple,” cried Lottie, moved at last to tears, “what am I to do? If I cannot bear it, what am I to do?”
“Come and speak to my wife,” he said; “come, dear, and see my wife. She can’t talk about everything as I do, but she has more sense than anyone, and knows the world. Come with me, Lottie, and see what Mrs. Temple says.”
He thought the sight of the girl in her trouble would be enough, and that his wife would certainly say what it was on his own lips to say. Just then, however, there was a sound of doors opening, and old Wykeham came out and looked upon the world with a defiant countenance from the south door of the Abbey, which was a sign that service was over; and the notes of the voluntary began to peal out into the air. Lottie drew her arm from that of her old friend—she could not bear the eyes of the crowd. “Another time, another time; but I must go now,” she cried, escaping from him and turning towards the Slopes. The old Captain’s first impulse was to follow. He stood for a moment gazing after her as she sped along, slim and swift and young, up the deserted road. It was beginning to grow dark, and the evening was colder than it had been yet. Where was she going? To her favourite haunt on the Slopes to get the wind in her face; to let her thoughts go, like birds, into the wide space and distance? If that had been all! The old man thought of an alternative which filled him with alarm. He took a step after her, and then he paused again, and shaking his head, turned back, meeting all the people as they streamed out of the Abbey. Poor child! if she did meet him there, what then? It would comfort her to see her lover; and if he was good, as the anxious old Chevalier hoped, had not the lover more power to save her than all the world? There was no question of taking Lottie from her father and mother, separating her from her home. If this young man were to offer her a home of her own, where could there be so good a solution to the problem? Captain Temple turned and walked home with a sigh. It was not his way of delivering Lottie, but perhaps it was the way that would be most for her happiness, and who was he that he should interfere? He let her go to her fate with a sigh.
CHAPTER XXX.
LOTTIE’S FATE.
Lottie went up the Dean’s Walk hastily, feeling as if she had taken flight. And she was taking flight. She could not bear to meet the people coming from the Abbey, among whom no doubt her father and his wife would be. Lottie was scarcely aware that there was anything else in her mind. She hurried to the Slopes as the natural refuge of her trouble. The wind blowing fresh in her face, the great sweep of distance, the air and the clouds, the familiar rustle of the trees, seemed to have become part of her, a necessity of her living. And the Slopes were almost deserted now. In October the night comes early, the afternoon is short, even before the winds become chill; already it was darkening, though the afternoon service was but newly over. The trees were beginning to lose their gorgeous apparel: every breeze shook down hosts of leaves, shreds of russet brown and pale gold; the wind was wistful and mournful, with a sigh in it that promised rain. Lottie saw nobody about. She stole through the trees to her favourite corner, and leaned upon the low parapet, looking over the familiar scene. She was so familiar with it, every line; and yet it seemed to her to-night like scenery in a theatre which by-and-by would collapse and split asunder, and give place to something different. It would vanish from her sight, and in place of it there would appear the dim background of one of the little rooms at home, with a figure in a blue gown relieved against it, tossing about a mountain of braids and plaits. Lottie did not feel sure that this figure would not appear at her very side, lay an imperative hand on her shoulder, and order her to give up the secrets of her own being. Thus she carried her care within her. She stood leaning over the parapet, with the trees rustling around, scarcely aware what she was thinking of. Did she expect anyone? She would have said, No. The night was overcast and growing dismal, why should she expect anyone? What reason could he have for coming out here? He could have no instinctive knowledge of her misery, to bring him, and he had no longer that excuse of his cigar after dinner as on the happy nights when the air was still like summer. No! it was only for the stillness, only for the air, only to fling her troublesome thoughts out to the horizon and empty her mind, and thus feel it possible to begin again, that she had come. And never had that stillness been so still before. By-and-by this scene would melt away, and it would be the little dining-room in the Lodge, with the white tablecloth and the lamp lighted upon it. She had been weary of her home, she had half despised it; but never had she been disgusted, afraid of it, never loathed the thought of going back to it before. And she could not talk to anybody about this; they were all very kind, ready to be sorry for her, to do anything they could for her, but she could not bear their sympathy to-night.
All at once, in the silence which was so full of the whisper of the leaves and the sighs of the wind, that she had not heard any footstep, there came a voice close to her elbow which made Lottie start.
“Is it really you, Miss Despard? I had almost given up hopes;—and alone! I thought you were never to be alone again?” said Rollo, with pleasure in his voice.
How it startled her! She looked round upon him with so much fright in her eyes that he was half vexed, half angered. Was it possible that Lottie after all was just like the rest, pretending to be astonished by his appearance when she knew as well——
“You surely are not surprised to see me?” he said, with a short laugh.
“I did not think of seeing you,” she said quietly, and looked away from him again.
Rollo was angry, yet he was touched by something in her tone; and there must be something to cause this sudden change. She had always been so frank and simple in her welcome of him, always with a light of pleasure on her face when he came in sight; but she would not so much as let him see her face now. She looked round with that first start, then turned again and resumed her dreamy gaze into the night. And there was dejection in every line of her figure as she stood dimly outlined against the waning light. Suddenly there came into Rollo’s mind a recollection that he had heard something to account for this, without accusing her of petty pretence or affectation.
“Something has happened,” he said, with a sense of relief which surprised himself. “I remember now. I fear you are not happy about it.”
“No,” she said, with a sigh. Then Lottie made a little effort to recover herself; perhaps he would not care about her troubles. “It has been a great shock,” she said, “but perhaps it may not be so bad after a while.”
“Tell me,” said Rollo; “you know how much interest I take in everything that concerns you. Surely, Miss Despard, after this long time that we have been seeing each other, you know that? Won’t you tell me? I cannot bear to see you so sad, so unlike yourself.”
“Perhaps that is the best thing that could happen,” said Lottie, “that I should be unlike myself. I wish I could be like someone with more sense; I have been so foolish! Everybody knows that we are poor; I never concealed it, but I never thought—— Oh! how silly we have been, Law and I! I used to scold him, but I never saw that I was just the same myself. We ought to have learned to do something, if it were only a trade. We are both young and strong, but we are good for nothing, not able to do anything. I used to scold him: but I never thought that I was just as bad myself.”
“Don’t say so, don’t say so! You were quite right to scold him; men ought to work. But you” cried Rollo with real agitation, “it is not to be thought of. You! don’t speak of such a thing. What is the world coming to, when you talk of working, while such a fellow as I——”
“Ah! that is quite different,” said Lottie. “You are rich, or, at least, you are the same as if you were rich; but we are really poor, we have no money: and everything we have, it is papa’s. I suppose he has a right to do whatever he likes with it; it seems strange, but I suppose he has a right. And, then, what is to become of us? How could I be so silly as not to think of that before? It is all my own fault; don’t think I am finding fault with papa, Mr. Ridsdale. I suppose he has a right, and I don’t want to grumble; it only—seems natural—to tell you.” Lottie did not know what an admission she was making. She sighed again into that soft distant horizon, then turned to him with a smile trembling about her lips. It was a relief to tell him—she could speak to him as she could not speak to Captain Temple or Mrs. O’Shaughnessy, though she had known them so much longer. “Perhaps I am only out of temper,” she said. She could not but feel more light of heart standing beside him with nobody near; they seemed to belong to each other so.
“How good, how sweet of you to say so,” he cried. “Then treat me as if it were natural; come and sit down—nobody will interrupt us—and tell me everything I want to know.”
They had met together in Lottie’s little drawing-room before, in the eye of day, and three or four times under Lady Caroline’s eye; but never before like this, in the twilight, all alone in the world, as it were, two of them, and no more. Lottie hesitated for a moment; but what could be wrong in it? There was nobody to disturb them, and her heart was so full; and to talk to him was so pleasant. She seemed able to say more to him than to any other. He understood her at half a word, whereas to the others she had to say everything, to say even more than she meant before they saw what she meant. She sat down, accordingly, in the corner of the seat, and told him all that had happened; herself beginning to see some humour in it as she told the story, half laughing one moment, half crying the next. And Rollo went into it with all his heart. All their meetings had produced their natural effect; for the last fortnight he had felt that he ought to go away, but he had not gone away. He could not deprive himself of her, of their intercourse, which was nothing yet implied so much, those broken conversations, and the language of looks, that said so much more than words. Never, perhaps, had his intercourse with any girl been so simple, yet so unrestrained. If the old Captain sometimes looked at him with suspicion, he was the only one who did so; and Lottie had neither suspicion nor doubt of him, nor had any question as to his “intentions” arisen in her mind. She told him her grief now, not dully, with the heavy depression that cannot be moved, but with gleams of courage, of resolution, even of fun, unable to resist the temptation of Polly’s absurdity, seeing it now as she had not been able to see it before. “I never knew before,” she said fervently, “what a comfort it was to talk things over—but, then, whom could I talk them over with? Law, who thinks it best not to think, never to mind—but sometimes one is obliged to mind: or Mrs. O’Shaughnessy, whom I cannot say everything to—— or;—Mr. Ridsdale!” said Lottie, in alarm—“pray, pray forgive me if I have bored you. I have been pouring out everything to you. I never thought—I did not intend——”
“Don’t tell me that,” he said. “I hoped you did intend to confide in me, to trust to my sympathy. Who can be so much interested? to whom can it be so important——?” He leaned forward closer to her, and Lottie instinctively drew away from him a hairs-breadth; but she thought that quite natural too, as natural as that she should be able to speak to him better than to anyone else. They had both made the whole avowal of their hearts in saying these words; but it had not been done in words which frightened either or changed their position towards each other. Meanwhile she was content enough, quieted by the sense of leaning her trouble upon him, while he was gradually growing into agitation. Lottie had got all her emergency required—his sympathy, his support, the understanding that was so dear to her. After all her trouble she had a moment of ease; her heart was no longer sore, but soothed with the balm of his tender pity and indignation.
But that which calmed Lottie threw Rollo into ever-increasing agitation. A man who has said so much as that to a girl, especially to one who is in difficulty and trouble, is bound even to himself to say more. The crisis began for him where for her it momentarily ended. To love her and as good as tell her so, to receive, thus ingenuously given, that confession of instinctive reliance upon him which was as good as a betrayal of her love; and to let her go and say nothing more—could a man do that and yet be a man? Rollo was not a man who had done right all the days of his life. He had been in very strange company, and had gone through many an adventure; but he was a man whom vice had never done more than touch. Even among people of bad morals he had not known how to abandon the instincts of honour; and in such an emergency what was he to do? Words came thronging to his lips, but his mind was distracted with his own helplessness. What had he to offer? how could he marry? he asked himself with a kind of despair. Yet something must be thought of, something suggested. “Lottie,” he said after that strange pause—“Lottie—I cannot call you Miss Despard any more, as if I were a stranger. Lottie, you know very well that I love you. I am as poor as you are, but I cannot bear this. You must trust to me for everything—you must—Lottie, you are not afraid to trust yourself to me—you don’t doubt me?” he cried. His mind was driven wildly from one side to another. Marry! how could he marry in his circumstances? Was it possible that there was anything else that would answer the purpose, any compromise? His heart beat wildly with love and ardour and shame. What would she say? Would she understand him, though he could not understand himself?
“Mr. Ridsdale!” cried Lottie, shrinking back from him a little. She covered her face with her hands and began to cry, being overcome with so many emotions, one heaped on another. At another moment she would not have been surprised; she would have been able to lift her eyes to the glow of the full happiness which, in half-light, had been for weeks past the illumination of her life. But for the moment it dazzled her. She put up her hands between her and that ecstasy of light.
As for Rollo, very different were the thoughts in his mind. He thought Lottie as wise as himself: he thought she had investigated his words; had not found in them the one that is surety for all, and shrank from him. Shame overwhelmed him: the agony of a mind which was really honest and a heart which was full of tenderness, yet found themselves on the verge of dishonour. “Lottie!” he cried with anguish in his voice, “you do not understand me—you will not listen to me. Do not shrink as if I meant any harm.”
Then she uncovered her face, and he saw dimly through the twilight a countenance all trembling with emotion and happiness and astonishment. “Harm!” she said, with wonder in her voice—“harm!” His heart seemed to stand still, and all his confused thinkings broken off in the unspeakable contrast between the simplicity of her innocence thinking no evil, and the mere knowledge in his mind which, if nothing more, made guilt possible. Such a contrast shamed and horrified, and filled with an adoration of penitence, the man who might have drawn her into evil, ambiguously, had it been possible. He found himself with one knee on the cold gravel, before he knew, pressing his suit upon her with passion. “Lottie, you must marry me, you must be my wife, you must let me be the one to work, to take care of you, to protect you from all trouble,” he cried. But what did Lottie want with those more definite words which he had thought she missed and waited for? Had she not known his secret long ago before he ever spoke a word to her? Had she not been led delicately, tenderly, step by step, through infinite dreams and visions, towards this climax? She cried with happiness and trouble, and the sense of deliverance.
“Oh, why should you kneel to me?” she said. “Do you think it needs that?” While he, more happy than ever he had been in his life, alarmed, disturbed, shaken out of all his habits and traditions, held her fast, like a new-found treasure, and lavished every tender word upon her that language could supply. He owed her a million apologies, of not one of which Lottie was conscious. How could it have been possible for her to suppose that even for a second, in his inmost thoughts, he had been less than reverent of her? And he—had he meant any harm! He did not think he had meant any harm; yet how, in the name of heaven, was he to marry—how was he to marry—in his present circumstances? While he was pouring out upon Lottie his love and worship, telling her how she had gathered to herself day by day all his thoughts and wishes, this question rose up again in his heart.
“I know,” said Lottie, very low—her voice still trembling with the first ecstasy of feeling. It was like the dove’s voice, all tenderness and pathos, coming out of her very heart. “I guessed it long—oh, long ago——”