nobody can be more ignorant than I am of our neighbours at Elfdale. As far as my childish recollections go, we seemed to live as in a monastery, seeing and knowing nothing of the world outside the Park walls. I hated the place, and everybody in it, especially my grandmother, who was the principal figure there; and even now it is the last place on God’s earth I should choose to reside in.”
“I have never seen it,” said the young man. “Strange to say, I have never been to Staughton since I was old enough to remember. My father said it did not agree with him, and he could not live there. I want my mother to let us go there now; or, at all events, to let me go—but she objects that the sight of the place would give her so much pain, and that she cannot part from me. However, I must go by-and-by; but I am very fond of Paris, and we are become so thoroughly continental in our habits and tastes, that probably none of us would like England.”
“But your sister—I mean Clara, will be getting married,” said I, with a beating heart, seizing the first opportunity to sound him.
“Well, I suppose she will,” said he; “she has had several admirers already.”
“And has she fixed her affections on any of them?” said I with assumed carelessness. It was an important question, for what business had I to inquire into the state of the young lady’s affections? However, he did not seem to see it in that light; and answered, laughing, that he did not know; but there was a little Italian marquis that he was in the habit of quizzing her about.
I need not say that in my secret soul, I sent him, the marquis, to the infernal regions, with all dispatch: aloud I hinted that I had frequently heard it observed that it was a bad thing for English girls to marry foreigners.
“Well,” he said, “but we are foreigners ourselves—all our ideas are foreign; I don’t think Clara would like to marry an Englishman—at least, not to live in England. She was in London a year or two ago, and she could not bear it.”
“I quite agree with her,” said I, eagerly, resolved not to lose an opportunity of recommending myself. “I very much prefer continental life, though I took to it later than you. It is not my intention to reside at Elfdale—in short, I detest the place; it’s associated with all sorts of disagreeable recollections in my mind;—besides, it is very gloomy, although I believe it has a romantic kind of beauty; but I don’t care for that sort of thing.” As he never alluded to the family feud my father spoke of, I took care not to do so either; and I earnestly hoped that neither he nor the ladies knew of its existence, lest it should be an obstacle to the realisation of my wishes.
From this period our intimacy advanced with rapid strides. We were almost like one family, and I could not but see that my unremitting attentions to Clara were most welcome to all. Indeed I might be considered as an unexceptionable parti, while the close vicinity of our estates rendered the union particularly eligible.
It is unnecessary to dilate on our courtship; suffice it to say that the day appointed for our marriage was fixed, and everything satisfactorily arranged; Lady Wellwood and her son, knowing me to be the heir of Elfdale I supposed, raising no difficulties on the score of the settlement.
It just wanted a week of the one I anticipated as the happiest of my life. I had been spending the evening as usual, with the Wellwoods, sitting beside Clara with her hand in mine, in the possession of something as much like perfect felicity as it is possible, I imagine, for a human being to enjoy here below, when I was awakened out of my first sleep by a furious ringing and knocking at the porte cochère. As the apartments au troisième were vacant, I concluded the disturbance arose from the arrival of the locataire; and turning to the other side, I addressed myself again to that sweet and peaceful rest that, alas! I was to seek henceforth in vain.
Presently, I heard feet ascending the stairs, but instead of passing my door, as I expected, they paused there, and the bell was rung. “They’ve mistaken the door,” thought I; and so thought Benoit; for I heard him calling out:
“Ce n’est pas ici—montez au troisième!”
Then a voice answered something that I could not distinguish, and immediately afterwards I heard Benoit turn the key and admit the stranger.
“Qu’est ce que c’est?” I cried, jumping out of bed, and opening my door, with an apprehension that some accident had happened to Sir Ralph, who had gone out late in the evening to take a stroll on the Boulevards.
“Voici un homme qui vous demande, monsieur. Il dit, qu’il vient de la part de monsieur votre père qui vient d’ arriver.”
“Comment donc! Mon père! C’est impossible!” said I, reflecting that even if he had arrived in Paris, he would not have sent for me at that time of night.
“C’est ici que loge Monsieur Herbert fils,” said the man.
“Oui,” said Benoit.
“Eh bien, c’est Monsieur Herbert, père, qui est arrivé ce soir à l’Hotel d’Angleterre, avec son valet de chambre; et il était en train de se coucher, quand il est tombé à terre, frappé de je ne sais pas quel mal—et on m’ a dépêché ici chercher monsieur.”
This looked like truth, for the Hotel d’Angleterre was the one my father frequented when in Paris; and, indeed, we had been there together, and were known to the people of the house.
I called the man into my room, and questioned him. He said the gentleman had arrived at six o’clock. He, himself, was one of the porters and had unloaded the carriage. “Un monsieur pâle et maigre, il paraissait très frêle.” He had gone out, and probably dined somewhere; he, the porter, had been talking to the valet who was sitting up for his master; he told him they came from Pau and asked if he knew Monsieur Herbert, fils. He saw nothing of them till he heard people calling out for a doctor; and presently the valet came down and dispatched him to fetch me.
I dressed myself with a strange mixture of feelings. I do not know what was the prevailing one. I had often contemplated the probability of my father’s death—for he had become, as the man said, très frêle, and his living or dying concerned me little. I was not eager for the inheritance, and