Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 11/Lord Oakburn's daughters - Part 20
LORD OAKBURN'S DAUGHTERS.
BY THE AUTHOR OF "EAST LYNNE".
CHAPTER XXXIX.RIVALRY.
Was it a scene of enchantment?—such as those we read of in the Arabian Nights? Indeed it seemed like it. The assembly rooms, brilliant with light, with garlands, with mirrors and beautiful statues, were thrown open to the outside, where the hanging terraces, redolent with the perfume of the night flowers, reposed so calmly in the moonlight. If only from the contrast, the scene would have told upon the heart and upon the senses. The garish rooms, speaking of the world and its votaries, hot, noisy, turbulent in their gaiety; the calm cool night, lying clear and still under the starred canopy of the blue heavens! Fairy forms were flitting in the rooms, strains of the sweetest music charmed the ear; hearts were beating, pulses quickening; and care, in that one dizzy spot, seemed to have gone from the world.
These Seaford assembly rooms were made gay for that one night. A fête in aid of some local charity had been projected, and the first names amidst the visitors at Seaford were down as patrons of it. The Right Honourable the Countess of Oakburn's headed the list, and amidst the rest might be read those of Lieutenant-General and Mrs. Vaughan. The Vaughans and the Oakburn family had become acquainted. General Vaughan's eldest son came to join them at Seaford, and he remembered his one night of introduction years before to Lord Oakburn's house. Lady Grey and Mrs. Vaughan were also intimate—the intimacy, you know, that we form at watering places, warm while it lasts, but ceasing when the sojourn is over. So Lucy Chesney and Miss Helen Vaughan had been brought into repeated contact, and—if the truth must be told—desperately jealous were they of each other. Lucy heard the rumours obtaining in Seaford—that Mr. Frederick Grey was "in love" with Helen Vaughan. She looked around her and saw, or thought she saw, many proofs to confirm it. That Frederick Grey was the one object of attraction to half the young ladies staying at Seaford could not be disputed; the chief part of his time was spent with them without any seeking of his own. They sought him; they laid their pretty little plans to meet him, to form engagements with him, to get him to their side. In the morning lounge, on the sands, in the walk, in the ride or drive of the afternoon, in some of the réunions of gaiety of the night, there would he be with some or other of them; more especially would he be with Helen Vaughan. Do not fancy he disliked it, although it was the fault of the young ladies more than of his; Frederick Grey was no more insensible to the charms of pretty girls than are other men.
And Lucy saw all this; saw it with the bitterest pain, with fierce resentment. It might be, that things looked a great deal worse to her than they would have looked to unprejudiced eyes, for jealousy, you remember, makes the food it feeds on. He had not spoken to her; he had not told her that he loved; and it may be excused to Lucy if she took up the notion that he never had loved her; that the sweet consciousness that it was so, recently filling her heart, had been altogether a mistake; and her cheeks tingled at the thought with a scarlet shame.
Frederick Grey himself helped on the delusion. Lucy's manners had so altered to him, had become so unaccountably cold and haughty, that he was avoiding her in very resentment.
Ah, who knew?—the intricacies of this subtle heart of ours are so cunningly profound!—it might be that this haunting of the other demoiselles, this making love to them—if his flirtations could be called such—was but done to plague Lucy Chesney, and bring her love back to him. In the midst of it all, Lady Oakburn had become acquainted with the state of affairs. By the merest accident, her eyes, so long shut, were suddenly opened, and she saw that Lucy loved Frederick Grey. She had little doubt that he returned the love; she as little doubted that the passion was of some standing. There occurred to her dismayed memory the intimacy that had subsisted between them all in town; the interviews without number, in which he could have made love to Lucy had he chosen so to do.
The countess sat down aghast. She liked Frederick Grey herself beyond anyone she knew; but what of Lady Jane? Would she deem him a suitable parti for Lucy? Would she not rather condemn him as entirely unsuitable?—and how should she herself answer to Lady Jane for her lax care of Lucy? Care?—as applied to love? Lady Oakburn in her self-condemnation forgot that the one is rarely a preventive to the other. She did the best that she could do. In her open straightforwardness she wrote that hasty letter to summon Lady Jane; Lucy meanwhile remaining entirely ignorant of the discovery and its results. Lucy had enough on her heart just then, if not on her hands, in looking out for food for her new jealousy.
It was not an ordinary evening at ordinary sea-side gala rooms, but a grand fête for which the rooms had for once been lent, and to which everybody of note flocked, not only of the temporary visitors, but of the local, standing society. Much had been made of it, and the arrangements were of that complete, it may be said superb, nature, not often seen. You may be very sure the ladies’ toilettes were not behind the rest in attraction.
Lady Oakburn and Lucy arrived late. So late indeed that Miss Helen Vaughan was saying to herself they certainly would not come. The little Earl of Oakburn was with them. The little earl was indulged a great deal more than was good for him, especially by Lucy, and his mamma had yielded to the young gentleman’s demand of “going to the ball,” upon the condition that when he had taken a twenty minutes’ peep at it, he should retire quietly and be conveyed home by Pompey. The delay in their arrival was caused by their expectancy of Lady Jane. Jane had telegraphed to the countess that she was on her road, and they waited to receive her. But it grew late, and she had not come.
As Lucy entered the rooms, her eyes were dazzled for a moment by the blaze of light, and then they ranged themselves abroad in search of—what? Exactly in search of what she saw, and nothing less; of what her jealous heart had pictured. Whirling round the room in the mazy waltz, to the tones of the sweetest music, his arm encircling her waist, his hand clasping hers, his eyes bent upon her with admiration, or what looked like it, and his voice lowered to whispered tones of softness, were Frederick Grey and Helen Vaughan. A pang, almost as of death, shot through Lucy’s heart, and she shivered in her excess of pain.
Helen Vaughan looked well. She always did look so. Tall, regal, stately, fair: a fit companion for the distinguished Frederick Grey—and many were thinking so. But what was her beauty, compared to that of Lucy Chesney?—with her retiring grace, her exquisite features, her complexion of damask purity, and her sweet brown eyes? Both were dressed in white; robes soft, flowing, fleecy as a cloud; Miss Vaughan displayed an elaborate set of ornaments, emeralds set in much gold; Lucy wore only pearls, the better taste for a young lady. Both of them looked very very beautiful, and the room thought so; Helen Vaughan was praised in words, but a murmur of hushed admiration followed Lucy Chesney.
The waltz was over, and Frederick Grey made his way to Lucy. She affected not to see him; she had her head turned, and was talking volubly to Fanny Darlington: he had to touch her at length to obtain her attention.
“Oh, I beg your pardon,” she coldly said. “Good evening.”
“How late you are, Lucy! The dance for which you were engaged to me is over.”
“I supposed it would be,” she said in her bitter resentment. “I told you at the time I promised that it was more than probable I should not perform.”
“You will dance this next with me. I think it is to be the Lancers.”
Was she deaf? She made no reply whatever, and her head was turned from him. At that moment, a gentleman was brought up and introduced to her; a little man who looked as if he had not two ideas in his whole brain, with an eyeglass popped artistically in his eye, and his sandy hair parted down the middle, back and front. She did not catch his name; it was Viscount Somebody, one of the county notabilities; but she put her hand within his arm when he solicited the honour of it for the forthcoming quadrille, and was moving away with him.
Mr. Frederick Grey’s blood boiled up, dyeing his brow crimson. He laid his hand on Lucy’s arm to detain her.
“I asked you first, Lucy.”
She recoiled from the touch, as if there had been contamination in it. “I beg your pardon. Did you speak to me?”
“I asked you for this quadrille. You are engaged to me for it, not to him.”
“If you are anxious to dance it, there’s no lack of partners”—and her tone stung him with its indifferent coldness. “Plenty are waiting for you: Miss Lake, Miss Vaughan, Miss Darlington—look at them. Pray choose one.”
She moved away in her haughty pride; a looker-on might have said in her calm indifference. But every pulse in her body was throbbing with pain, every fibre of her heart was sick with love—love for Frederick Grey.
His face was ablaze with anger, and he stood still for a moment, possibly undecided whether to make a scene and pull the little viscount’s nose, or to let it alone. Then he went straight up to Helen Vaughan and asked her for the quadrille. They took their places in it, vis-à-vis to the viscount and Lucy.
Lady Grey was seated between the Countess of Oakburn and Mrs. Delcie. The latter, an inveterate busy-body, one of those wretched people who can never let anybody else be at peace, her eyes sharp as a needle, her brain active as a mischief-maker’s tongue, watched Frederick Grey and Helen Vaughan for some minutes, and then turned to Lady Grey with a whisper:
“Is it a settled thing?” she asked.
“Is what a settled thing?”
“That your son marries Helen Vaughan?”
It was the first time the idea had been presented to Lady Grey. Living much in seclusion, she had seen and known nothing of the doings of the outer world of Seaford. Her heart leaped up with a bound of dismay, for she did not like Helen Vaughan.
“Pray do not mention anything so improbable,” she faintly said. “My son marry Helen Vaughan! Indeed I hope not!”
“Improbable you call it?” was Mrs. Delcie’s answer. “Look at them.”
Lady Grey did look. The Lancers were over, and he was taking Helen Vaughan back to her place. He was bending down to talk to her, and there was an impressement in his manner that she, the mother, did not like. The evening’s pleasure had gone out for her.
Back came Lucy, escorted by the viscount; she sat down by Lady Oakburn. The seat next her was vacant now, and Frederick Grey dropped into it. My Lady Lucy’s cheeks grew pale with inward agitation.
“Lucy, what have I done to you?”
“Done?” repeated Lucy, in a tone of supreme indifference mingled with a dash of surprise. “Nothing.”
He bit his lip. “Will you tell me how I have offended you?”
“You have not offended me.”
“Then what is the matter with you?”
“What should be the matter with me? Really I do not understand you.”
Neither in real truth did he understand Lucy. Frederick Grey was not a vain man, and it never occurred to him to think that she could be jealous. He thought nothing of that foolish dalliance—flirtation—call it what you will—in which his hours were often spent; the society of those pretty girls was pleasant pastime, but to him nothing more. If Miss Vaughan threw herself rather more in his way than the rest did, he never gave it a second thought; and most certainly he did not cast a suspicion that it was changing the manners of Lucy Chesney. In the few days that had elapsed since her arrival at Seaford, he had been at times greatly pained by her behaviour to him. He had set it down hitherto to some unaccountable caprice: now he began to think that her feelings to him were changing. And he had felt so sure of her love!
“Lucy, you must know that you are behaving very strangely to me. You heard me ask you for the Lancers, and you turned and engaged yourself to that little puppy, who is not worth a kick. Will you stand up with me the next?”
“Thank you: I do not intend to dance the next. I feel a little tired.”
He paused a minute, rose from his seat, and stood before her. “There must be some reason for all this.”
“Reason for all what?”
“For your indifference to me.”
“You may think so if you please.”
“It looks very like caprice, Lucy.”
“Caprice? Oh yes, that is it. It is caprice.”
“Once for all,” he rejoined, quite savagely, “will you dance the next dance with me, Lady Lucy?”
“No I will not. Thank you all the same.”
He turned on his heel.
Lucy caught her little brother, who was running up to them.
“I am going home, Lucy. Pompey’s come, and I am going without being naughty, because I promised I would.”
“There’s my darling Frank,” said Lucy, bending over the child. “Wish mamma good night.”
He was a brave, honourable little fellow, and he intended to go off blithely with Pompey, whose black face was seen at the door. The Oakburns were noted for holding a promise sacred; and it seemed that the future chief would be no degenerate descendant. Kissing his mamma, he put up his face to Lady Grey; but that lady was too much engaged to pay attention to him, and the boy ran away without it.
Lady Grey had her face turned to her son. She had pulled him to her when he was quitting Lucy. Mrs. Delcie had left her seat then, and Frederick halted before it, listening to his mother’s whisper.
“Frederick! only a word—to ease my troubled heart. Surely you are not—you are not falling in love with Helen Vaughan!”
“I don’t think I am, mother.”
The answer was given gaily, lightly. All conscious of that other love so deeply seated in his heart, he could afford to joke at this. But he caught the anxious look of pain in his mother’s eyes.
“You would not like her for a daughter-in-law?” he breathed, laughing still.
“I confess I should not.”
“Very well. Be at ease, mother mine. What put such a thing into your head?”
“They say she is in love with you—that you love her. They are saying she is your chosen wife.”
“I am much obliged to them, I’m sure. Who are ‘they?’”
“Oh—the room of course,” replied Lady Grey. “The people stopping at Seaford. Frederick———"
“Mr. Grey do waltz with me if you are not engaged.”
The interruption came from Miss Fanny Darlington. She was quite young, and therefore deemed herself justified in acting as a child or a romp. He was not engaged, he said, and laughed as he took her on his arm.
“When is the wedding to be?” she asked, as he whirled her to the strains of Strauss’s music.
“What wedding?”
“As if you did not know! It can mean nothing else, when your attentions are so marked. Mrs. Delcie says she knows for a fact the general has consented.”
“When did she say that?”
“A minute or two ago. She was talking to me and Lady Lucy Chesney.”
A change came over his features. Was this the secret of Lucy’s inexplicable conduct to him—some wretched gossip linking his name with General Vaughan’s daughter? All his gaiety seemed to have gone from him, and his tone, as he spoke to Fanny Darlington, was changed into one of grave earnestness.
“Miss Darlington, will you allow me to remind you—as I most certainly shall Mrs. Delcie—that to speak of Miss Vaughan in this way, or of any other young lady, is unjustifiable. I am certain it would seriously displease her—and it has displeased me.”
He went through the rest of the waltz in silence. Miss Darlington grew cross, and asked what had come over him. At its conclusion he looked for Lucy and could not see her.
Lucy Chesney had gone out from the garish rooms: they accorded ill with her aching heart. In a corner of the terrace, shaded from observation by the clustering trees, she stood, leaning over the rails and gazing on the sloping gardens beneath, lying so cold and still in the light summer’s night. Cold and still was her own face; cold and still her unhappy heart, for its pulses felt as if frozen into stone. The waltz was over; she could hear that; and she pictured him with her happy rival, whispering his sweet vows in her ear. She stood there in her bitter misery, believing that he, whom she so passionately loved, had deserted her for another! The sound of laughter, of merriment, came from the rooms; the rich strains of the music were again floating on the air; the fragrant flowers, giving forth their strong night perfume, rose at her feet: all pleasant things in themselves, but they grated inharmoniously on Lucy’s heart.
What had become of the old bliss that had made her days seem like a dream of Eden? It was gone. All had changed since their sojourn at Seaford; the joy had left her, the sweet half-consciousness of being beloved had departed, to give place to the bitterest jealousy.
Why did Helen Vaughan so seek him? Why do girls thus beset attractive men?—ay, and men who are not attractive? Perhaps she hoped she should gain him; perhaps she but thought to while away her idle hours. However it might have been, it brought to Lucy Chesney fruits that seemed like bitter ashes. But she had to digest them; and never, never had they been harsher or more cruel than at that moment, as she hung over the terrace in the moonlight.
Her hands were clasped together in pain, and her forehead was pressed upon the cold iron of the rails, as if its chill could soothe the throbbing fire within. A cloud of images was in her brain, all bearing the beautiful but dreaded form of Helen Vaughan, and—some one touched her shoulder, and Lucy shivered and looked up.
It was Frederick Grey. What had he come out there for? He to see her in her abandonment of grief!
“Lucy!” he whispered, and the tone of his voice spoke of love if ever tone spoke it. “Lucy, are you ill?”
She would have been glad to fling his hand away, to fly from him, to meet his words with scorn; but she could not: for the heart will be true to itself, and the startled agitation unnerved her. She shook like a leaf.
He gently wound his arms round her, he bent over her and poured forth his tale of love—to be suppressed no longer: he told her how passionately he had hoped to make her his; that if he had been silent, it was because he feared the time to speak had not come. Lucy, in the revulsion of feeling, burst into tears, and yielded herself up to the moment’s fascination.
“Oh, Lucy, how could you suffer this cloud to come between us?” he whispered. “How could you suspect me of faithlessness? My darling, let me speak plainly. We have loved each other, and we both knew it, though it may be that you scarcely acknowledged the fact to yourself; but here, without witnesses—save One, who knows how ardently and loyally I will cherish you, under Him—surely we may lift the veil from our dearest feelings! Lucy, I say, we have loved each other.”
She did not answer, but she did not lift her face from its sheltering place on his breast. The moment of rapture, shadowed forth in her dreams, had come!
“I was not conscious until to night, ten minutes ago, that my name had been made free with, as it appears it has been, in connection with Helen Vaughan’s. Lucy,” he resumed, “I swear to you that I have not willingly given cause for it; I swear to you that I have had no love for her, or thought of love. I certainly have been brought much into contact with her, for you have estranged yourself from me since you came, and the idle hours of this place have hung upon my hands; but I cast my thoughts back and ask how far it has been my fault, and I believe I can truly say”—he paused with a quaint smile—“that I have been more sinned against than sinning. Lucy, when I have been walking by her side, my heart has wished that it was you: in conversing with her, I longed for your voice to answer me. Will you forgive me?”
Forgive him? ay. Her heart answered, if words failed. He bent his face to hers in the hushed night:
“Believe me, Lucy, I love you as few men can love; I picture to myself the future, when you shall be mine; my cherished wife, the guiding-star of my home; my whole hopes, my love, my wishes are centered in you. You will not reject me? My darling, you will not reject me!”
How little likely she was to reject him, he contrived to gather. And the twinkling stars shone down on vows, than which none sweeter or purer had ever been registered.
“Lucy, you will waltz with me now?”
She dried her happy tears; and, as she returned to the room to take her place with him in the dance, she laughed aloud. The contrast between that time and this was so great! Miss Helen Vaughan and the little viscount whirled past them, and Frederick darted a saucy glance into Lucy’s eyes. It made hers fall on her blushing cheeks.
Lady Jane Chesney had arrived when they reached home. After Lucy had retired for the night, Lady Oakburn opened her mind to Jane; she could not rest until she had told her all—how that Frederick and Lucy were in love with each other. Jane at first looked very grave: the Chesney pride was rising.
“I could not help it,” bewailed the countess in her contrition. “I declare to you, Lady Jane, often as Frederick Grey came to us in Portland Place, that I never for a moment thought or suspected love was arising between him and Lucy. Our great intimacy with the Greys, and Sir Stephen’s attendance as a medical man, must have blinded me. I would give the world—should this be displeasing to you—to recall the past.”
“Nay, do not blame yourself,” said Jane kindly. “It is very probable that I should have seen no further than you. Frederick Grey! It is not the match altogether that Lucy should make.”
“In some respects it is not.”
Jane remained silent, communing with her self, her custom when troubled or perplexed. Presently she looked at Lady Oakburn. “Tell me what your opinion is. What do you think of it?”
“May I tell it freely?”
“Indeed I wish you would,” was Jane’s answer. “You have Lucy’s welfare at heart as much as I have.”
“Her welfare and her happiness,” emphatically pronounced Lady Oakburn. “And the latter I do fear is now bound up in this young man. In regard to him, as a suitor for her, there are advantages and disadvantages. In himself he is all that can be desired, and his prospects are very fair; Sir Stephen must be a rich man, and there’s the baronetcy. On the other hand, there’s his profession, and his birth is wholly inferior; and—forgive me for saying it, Lady Jane—the Chesneys are a proud race.”
“Tell me what your own decision would be, were it left to you.”
“I should let her have him.”
Jane paused. “I will sleep upon this, Lady Oakburn, and talk with you further in the morning.”
And when the morning came, Jane, like a sensible woman, had arrived at a similar decision. The first to run up and greet her as she quitted her chamber, was the little lord. Jane took him upon her knee in the breakfast-room, and turned his face upwards.
“He does not look ill, Lady Oakburn.”
“I have no real fears for him,” replied the countess “In a few years I hope he will have acquired strength. Frank, tell sister Jane what Sir Stephen says.”
“Sir Stephen says that mamma and Lucy are too fidgety over me; that if I were a poor little country boy, sent out in the corn-fields all day to keep the crows off, with only brown bread and milk for food, I should be all right,” cried Frank, looking up to his sister. Jane smiled, and thought it very probable Sir Stephen was in reason.
“Do you know, sister Jane, what I mean to be when I grow up a big man?” he continued. “I mean to be a sailor.”
Jane faintly smiled and shook her head.
“Yes, I do. Mamma says that if I were the poor little country boy, I might be one; but as I am the Earl of Oakburn I shall have other duties. Oh Jane, I do wish I could be a sailor! When I see the ships here, I long to run through the waves and get to them.”
“It is surprising what a taste he has for the sea,” murmured the countess to Jane; “he must have inherited it.” And poor Jane sighed with sad reminiscences.
Lucy came in. Jane took her hand, and smiled as she gazed at the bright and blushing face.
“And so, Lucy, you have contrived to fall in love without leave or licence!”
Lucy coloured to the roots of her hair, to the very nape of her delicate neck; her eyelids were cast down, and her fingers trembled in the hand of Lady Jane. All signs of true love, and Jane knew them to be so. The Countess of Oakburn approached Jane.
“I know you have felt the separation from Lucy,” she said, with emotion. “Had the terms of the will been such that I could have departed from them, Lucy should have been yours. I could not help myself, Lady Jane; but I have tried to make her all you could wish.”
“All any one could wish,” generously returned Jane, as she took Lady Oakburn’s hand. “You have nobly done your part by her. Do it by the boy, Lady Oakburn, and make him worthy of his father. I know you will.”
“Being helped to do so by a better Help than mine,” murmured the countess, as her eyes filled with tears.
And when Mr. Frederick Grey arrived that day and spoke out-as he did do—he was told that Lucy should be his.
CHAPTER XL.A TALE FROM MRS. PEPPERFLY.
The afternoon’s sun was shining on South Wennock: shining especially hard and full upon a small cottage standing by itself down Blister Lane. More especially did it appear to be shining upon a stout lady who was seated on a chair, placed midway in the narrow path leading from the little entrance gate to the cottage door. Her dress was light, what could be seen of it for snuff,—and so broad was she, taking up the width of the path and a great deal more, that she looked like a great tower, planted there to guard the approach of the cottage against assaulters.
Judith came down the lane. Two or three weeks had passed since the events recorded in the last chapter, and Lady Jane was back at South Wennock again. Jane had some poor pensioners in some of the smaller cottages lower down this lane, and the servant’s errand in it this afternoon was connected with them. Judith’s eyes fell upon the lady, airing herself in the sun.
“What, is it you, Mother Pepperfly! Why I have not seen you for an age. Well, you don’t get thinner!”
“I gets dreadful,” said Mrs. Pepperfly. “They might take me about in a caravan, and show me off to the public as the fat woman from South Wennock. Particularly if they could invent a decent way of exhibiting of the legs. Mine’s a sight, Judith.”
Mrs. Pepperfly gingerly lifted her petticoats a little, and Judith saw that the ankles were indeed a sight. “I wonder you don’t take exercise,” she said.
“Me take exercise!” uttered Mrs. Pepperfly, resentfully, “what’s the good of your talking to a woman of my size about exercise? It a'most kills me to get about when I changes my places. It’s my perfession as have brought me to it, Judith; always a sitting by a bedside, or a dandling a babby upon my knees; I haven’t been able to get exercise, and, in course, now I’m too fat to do it. But I must be thankful it’s no worse, for I retains my appetite, and can eat a famous good meal every time it’s set afore me.”
“I should eat less and leave off beer,” said Judith. “Beer’s very fattening.”
The tears rushed into Mrs. Pepperfly’s eyes at the cruel suggestion. “Beer’s the very prop and stay of my life,” cried she. “Nobody but a barbarian would tell a poor woman that has to sit up often o'nights, tending upon others, to leave off her beer. Il never shall leave off my beer, Judith, till it leaves off me.”
Judith thought that likely, and did not contest the point.
“I suppose you are nursing somebody up here,” she remarked. “Who lives in the cottage? The last time I came by, it wasn’t let.”
“I ain’t a nursing nobody,” returned Mrs. Pepperfly. “I’m up here on a visit. I left my place yesterday, and I expects to be fetched to another in a day or two, and I was invited here to spend the time atween.”
“Who’s the cottage let to?” continued Judith, dropping her voice.
“It’s a widder. She ain’t at home; she took the opportunity of my being here to get in a store of things she wanted, so she’s gone about it. We haven’t got nobody to overhear us that you should set on to whisper. I say, wasn’t it a curious thing,” added Mrs. Pepperfly, dropping her own voice to a whisper in opposition to what she had just said to Judith, “she came here, it’s my firm belief, just to find out the rights and the wrongs about the death of that poor young lady.”
“What young lady?”
“Why, that poor creature that the poisoned draught was gave to. She———"
“Who is she? Where does she come from?” interrupted Judith, aroused to interest.
“I’ll just tell ye about it,” said Mrs. Pepperfly, “but if you go to ask me who she is, and what she is, and where she comes from, I can’t tell; for I don’t know any more nor the babby that has not yet got its life’s breath into it. My missis that I nursed last didn’t get strong as soon as she ought, so it was settled she should go over to Great Wennock and stop a week or two with her relatives, and I went to take her there; it were Mrs. Tupper, the butcher’s wife, and the babby died a week old, which I daresay you heered on. We went over on a Tuesday morning in the omnibus, and it’s the first time I’ve been in the new omnibus or along the new road, for I’m no traveller, as is well known, which it’s beautiful and smooth they both is, and gives no jolts. I took my missis on to her mother’s, carrying her parcel of clothes for her, and I had a good dinner with ’em—a lovely shoulder o’ mutton and inion sauce, and was helped three times to beer. After that, I goes back to the station, which it’s not three minutes’ walk, and sits myself in the omnibus agen it started to come home; it were waiting, you see, for the London train. Well, it came in, the train, and there got into the omnibus a widder and a little boy and some luggage, and that was all. She begun a talking to me, asking if I knowed any lady living about here o’ the name of Crane. ‘No, mum,’ says I, ‘I never knowed but one lady o’ that name, and I didn’t know much of her, for it’s eight year ago, and she died promiscuous.’ ‘How do you mean?’ says she, a snapping of me up short, as if she’d lost her breath. Well, Judith, one word led to another, and I told her all about the lady’s death in Palace Street, she a listening to me all the time as if her eyes were coming out of her head with wonder. I never see a body so eager.”
“Who is she?” asked Judith.
“I tell ye I don’t know. I’m sure o’ one thing, though—that she knowed that poor lady, and is come to the place to ferret out what she can about the death.”
“How is it that she is living in this cottage?” returned Judith, completely absorbed in the tale.
“I’m coming to it, if you’ll let me,” answered Mrs. Pepperfly. “I never see a body interrupt as you do, Judith. We talked on, the widder and me, till we come to South Wennock, and got out at the Red Lion. With that she looks about her, like a person in a quandary, up the street and down the street, and then she stretches out her hand and points. ‘That’s the way to the house where the lady was lying,’ says she; ‘And you’re right, mum,’ says I, ‘for it just is.’ ‘I wonder whether them same lodgings is to let?’ says she; ‘if so, they’d suit me.’ So upon that I tolled her, Judith, what every body knows, that the lodgings was not to let, through the widder Gould keeping of the parlours for herself now, having had a income left her, and the new curate occupying of her drawing-room. Well, then she asked me did I know of a cottage to let, where there was plenty of fresh air about it, her child being poorly, and I cast it over in my mind and thought of this—which it belongs you know to Tupper hisself, and them be his fields at the back where he keeps his beastesses.”
“And she took it?”
“She looked at it that same afternoon, and she went straight off to Tupper and took it of him, paying three pound ten down for the first quarter’s rent, for she said she’d not bother him with no references, and then she asked me where she could buy or hire a bit of second hand furniture, and I took her off to Knagg the broker’s, and she got what she wanted. She invited me to stop with her, but I couldn’t, for I had agreed to be at Tupper’s and look after the children while his wife was away, and the widder said, then come up to her as soon as I was at liberty. Which I was a day ago, through Tupper’s wife returning home hearty, and I come up here, and she has asked me to stop till I’m called out again, which it’ll be in a day or two I expect, and happens to be Knaggs’s wife—and I thought it uncommon genteel and perlite of her, Judy; and so here I am, a enjoying of myself in the country air.”
“And in the sun also,” said Judith. “You’ll get your face browner than it is.”
“Tain’t often I gets the chance of sitting in it out o'doors, so I thought I’d take advantage of it when I could, and I don’t care whether I’m brown or white.”
“But why do you think the person came to find out about the young lady?”
“Look here,” cried Mother Pepperfly, “I can see as far through a milestone as most folks, and I argue why should she invite me here, a stranger (though it were perlite to do it), unless she wanted to get something out of me. Not a blessed minute, Judy, have I been in the cottage, and I got here at two o’clock yesterday, but she has been a questioning of me about it: now it’s the draught, and now it’s the doctors, and now it’s the nurse, and now it’s the inquest, till I declare I’m a'most moithered. She wants to know where she can get a old newspaper with the history of it in, but I can’t tell who keeps ’em unless Mrs. Fitch at the Lion do. ‘You won’t say nothing to nobody, as I’ve asked you these questions about Mrs. Crane, I’ve a reason not,’ says she to me last night. ‘Mum, you may put your faith in me as I won’t,’ says I.”
“And you have gone and told me to-day!” retorted Judith.
“But you are safe, you are, Judy, and won’t repeat it, I know. You were one of us with her, too. I thought to myself this morning, ‘Now, if I could see Judy Ford, I’d tell her this;’ but I wouldn’t open my lips to nobody else: and shan’t, as the widder has asked me not. That other widder, Gould, I wouldn’t furnish with a hint of it, if it was to save my life; she’s such a magpie, it would be over the town the next hour if she got hold of it.”
“Does she mean to live here all alone?” retotred Judith.
“I suppose so. She has a woman in to clean, and puts out her washing. The child’s a sickly little fellow: I don’t think he’ll make old bones. Come and see him.”
Mrs. Pepperfly rose and sailed in-doors; Judith followed. Upon a rude sort of bed on the parlour floor, which opened from the kitchen, and that opened from the garden, after the manner of cottages, lay a boy asleep; a fair, quiet-looking child, with light flaxen hair falling over his features. Judith looked at him, and looked again; she was struck with his likeness to somebody, but could not for the life of her recollect to whom.
“He has got a white swelling in his knee,” said Mrs. Pepperfly. “Leastways, I’m sure it’s coming into one.”
“A white swelling in his knee? Poor little fellow! that’s dangerous.”
“Kills youngsters nineteen times out of twenty,” returned the nurse, with professional equanimity.
“How thin and white he is,” exclaimed Judith. “How his forehead’s drawn! Whenever you see that lined forehead in a child, you may be sure it comes from long-endured pain.”
“His mother says he has never been strong. Take a wee drop short, Judy?” continued Mrs. Pepperfly insinuatingly, as she produced a small bottle from some unseen receptacle beneath her capacious petticoats.
“Not I,” answered Judith. “I’d rather pour it down the garden than down my throat: and I must be off, or I don’t know what time I shall get back, and my lady will say I have been gossiping.”
Judith proceeded on her way, and executed her commission with Lady Jane’s pensioners. As she returned, she saw a stranger seated in the chair Mrs. Pepperfly had occupied, but which was now drawn close to the cottage in the shade; a respectable looking widow woman of fifty years. The child lay in her arms, still asleep, and Mrs. Pepperfly had disappeared. Could Judith’s eyes have penetrated inside the cottage, she would have seen her comfortably stretched out on an arm-chair, overcome either by the sun or the bottle, and fast asleep as a church.
Judith scanned the hard features of the stranger, and remembered them, having probably been assisted thereunto by the conversation with the nurse. An impulse prompted her to enter the gate and speak.
“Good afternoon. I think I have seen you before.”
The stranger scanned her in turn, but did not recognise her.
“May be,” she quietly replied. “I don’t remember you.”
“I was the young woman who was so much with that poor lady, Mrs. Crane, during the few days she lay ill.”
Intelligence, glad intelligence, flashed into the stranger’s face. “I am glad to see you,” she exclaimed. “I wonder you remembered me.”
“You are Mrs. Smith, who came down and took away the baby.”
“Yes, I am. But now I’d rather it wasn’t spoken of, if you’d oblige me. If it got about, I should have the whole parish up here, wanting to know what I can’t tell them; and I have another reason besides. Mrs. What’s-her-name, the fat nurse, says nothing has been heard as to who the young lady was, and people would be asking me. I could not answer them; I don’t know anything to tell; so I’d rather not be questioned.”
“Where’s the baby?” inquired Judith, believing as little of the last words as she chose.
“Dead.”
“Is it, indeed! Well, ’twas but a little mite. I thought perhaps this was it.”
“This is mine,” said Mrs. Smith. “And a great sufferer he is, poor thing. He has always been weakly.”
“He seems to sleep well,” observed Judith.
“That’s because he gets no sleep at night. Every afternoon he’s dead asleep, so I put him down a mattress in the kitchen or parlour, or wherever I may happen to be, for he don’t like to go away from me. Why, if that child had lived, he would have been getting on for nine years old. This, you may see, isn't seven."
"I can't think who he's like," remarked Judith, again looking attentively at the child.
"He is the very model of somebody, some face that's familiar to me; but I can't call to mind whose."
"I know nobody he's like when he's asleep," said Mrs. Smith, also regarding the boy. "Asleep and awake, it is not the same face—not a bit; I have often noticed that; it must be the eyes and the expression that make the difference."
"Has he light eyes?" inquired Judith.
"No; dark. But now, do just tell me what you can, about that horrible death. Was it a mistake, or was it wilful?"
"That's what people are unable to decide," said Judith.
"That old nurse is not very explicit; she speaks of one doctor and speaks of another, mixing the two up together. I want to know who really was attending her."
"Mr. Stephen Grey had been attending her—he is Sir Stephen Grey now; and Mr. Carlton had seen her once or twice; the night of her death, and the night before it."
"Was she ill enough to have two doctors?"
"Not at all. Mr. Carlton was to have attended her, but when she was taken ill he was away from South Wennock, so the other came for him. Mr. Carlton was to have taken her the next day."
"Were they both married men?"
"Mr. Grey was; had been a long while; and Mr. Carlton married directly after. He married a peer's daughter. But I can't stay to talk now."
"Oh, do stay! I want you to tell me all that passed; you'll do it clearer than that woman. Step in, and take a cup of tea with us."
"You might as well ask me to stay for good," returned Judith. "My lady will wonder, as it is, what is keeping me. I'll get an hour's leave, and come up another time."
"Just one word before you go, then; I hear of Messrs. Grey and Lycett, and I hear of Mr. Carlton; which would be the most skilful to call in, in case my child gets worse? I am a stranger here, and don't know their characters. "
"I believe they are all clever; all skilful men. I like Mr. Grey best; I am most used to him."
"It doesn't matter much, then, as far as skill goes, which I call in?"
"As far as skill goes, no," replied Judith. And she said good afternoon, and left.
She went home, pondering on the likeness she had traced in the boy's face; she could not recollect who it was he resembled. Her suspicions had been aroused that it might be the same child, in spite of the apparent difference in the age; but, even allowing that Mrs. Smith had deceived her in saying it was not, and Judith did not see why she should, the fact would not have helped her, since it was certainly not the deceased lady's face that the child's struck her as being like.
But all in a moment, as Judith was turning in at the gate of Cedar Lodge, a face flashed on her mind's remembrance, and she saw whose it was that the boy's resembled. The fact seemed to stagger her; for she started aside amidst the trees as one who has received a blow. And when she at length went in-doors, it was with a perplexed gaze and knitted brow.