Under the Mendips: A Tale

She had just finished this part of her daily routine when the door opened and her son Melville came in. His appearance would be ridiculous in the eyes of the dandies of to-day, but in his own, at least, it was as near perfection as possible.

His hair was curled in tight and very-much-oiled curls on his forehead and round his ears. He wore a high neckcloth, tied evidently with much care, supporting his retreating chin. His coat was of Lincoln green, very short in the waist, with large silver buttons, and turned back with a wide collar to display two waistcoats, the white one only showing an edge beyond the darker one of deep salmon-colour, which opened to set off a frilled shirt. The trousers were tight, and caught at the ankles by straps, and his shoes were tied with large bows. The servile imitators of "the first gentleman in Europe" followed in his steps with as much precision as possible, and Melville Falconer spared no pains to let the county folk of Somersetshire see what the real scion of bon ton looked like.

Melville had a pleasant, weak face; he was almost entirely forgetful of the interests or tastes of anyone but himself, and he had never given up his own wishes for the sake of another in his life.

He had a ridiculous idea of his own importance, and a supreme contempt for what he called old-fashioned usage; from the vantage-ground of superior wisdom he looked down on the county gentry of Somersetshire, who, in those days, did not frequent London in the season, or tread hard on the heels of the nobility in all their customs, as is now the case.

The great mercantile wealth which rose into colossal importance, when railway traffic brought the small towns near the large ones, and the large ones near the metropolis, had not begun to overshadow the land; the tide of speculation had not set in; and there was less hastening to be rich and desire to display all that riches could give. It was a time of comparative stagnation, which preceded the great rush, which was to bear on its tide, as the stream of progress and discovery gathered strength, the next generation with relentless power. Of all that lay outside Fair Acres, Mrs. Falconer was almost indifferent, if not ignorant. She liked things as they were, and was averse to change, lest that change should be for the worse. Her tongue, which was a sharp one, had been swift to condemn the establishment of the schools in her neighbourhood, and she resisted all invitations from her husband to make the acquaintance of Mrs. Hannah More. Teaching lads and lasses to read and write was, in the opinion of Mrs. Falconer, a crying evil. They had enough learning if they kept their church once a week, and as to arithmetic, if they could count their own fingers it was enough; and she, for one, would never take a servant who had schooling. "A pack of nonsense," she called it; and she would tell Mrs. Hannah More so if only she had the chance. Mrs. Falconer turned from her occupation at the table, when her son entered.

"Breakfast!" she exclaimed. "No, indeed; breakfast is over and done with. I can't keep the things about half the morning."

The prototype of the fine gentleman seated himself in a chair at the table, and said in a drawling voice, suppressing a yawn:

"Joyce, get me some clean plates, and go and order a rasher of bacon; and let the eggs be poached; and – "

But Mrs. Falconer pushed Joyce aside:

"No," she said; "your sister has something else to do than wait on you. I'll get your breakfast; and if you have to wait an hour, it will serve you right; lie-a-beds don't generally have sharp appetites."

"Nay, mother," Melville said, "do not let the want of appetite be laid to my door, with so many other sins; I am particularly hungry this morning. And I beseech you, do not do servant's work for me."

Mrs. Falconer's face betrayed that she felt the thrust.

"Servant's work must be done for folks too lazy to do it for themselves," she said, as she let the heavy door swing behind her, and repaired to the kitchen to prepare, far too carefully, a breakfast for her son.

Joyce hesitated a moment, and then said:

"It always vexes mother when you are late, Melville. I wish you would get up earlier."

"My dear little sister, I should have vexed mother if I had come down at six. She is out of temper with me, and so is my father, simply because I desire to get a little education, to fit me for my position here, you know, when I come into the place."

"Oh, Melville, you have had every advantage; you ought to know everything. But Aunt Letitia was quite right – the money spent upon you at Oxford was wasted."

"Thanks for your high opinion. I ought to be vastly grateful for it. But to speak of other things: I have bidden a friend to stay here for a week. He will like country air, and to drink milk and curds-and-whey. He arrives at Wells by the Bath mail; and I shall drive in with you and my father, and hire a post-chaise at the Swan to bring him out."

"I hope he is not a fine gentleman," Joyce said.

"He is a very fine gentleman indeed," was the answer; "and, Joyce, persuade mother not to put on that big bib, and make herself look like a housekeeper. It will appal Arundel, and make him feel out of his element."

"If he is to feel that, what does he come for?" Joyce said, angrily. "We want no upstarts here."

"Upstarts! that is fine talking. Arundel comes of one of the oldest families in England. Not older than ours; though, unhappily, we live as if we had sprung from the gutter, and do not get any proper respect."

"Respect!" exclaimed Joyce, indignantly. "Respect! As if father were not respected as a justice! and as if you– " Joyce stopped; she felt too indignant to go on.

"My dear little sister," Melville said, with a grand air of pity – "my dear little sister, you are only ignorant. If you knew a little more of the habits and customs of the higher classes, you would not talk so foolishly."

"I do not wish to know more about them if you have got your habits from associating with them."

Melville smiled, and did not betray the least irritation.

"My dear," he said, "facts are stubborn things. Does it never strike you, that though my father dines at the houses of the gentry in the county, sits on the bench, and rides to cover, you and my mother are not invited to accompany him. The truth is my good mother dislikes the usages of genteel life."

Melville used that objectionable word with emphasis. Genteel was in those days used as some of us now use words which are scarcely more significant, though generally accepted – "Good form," "A 1," and so forth.

"It is," Melville continued, grandly, "the result of early associations; and so we eat heavy one o'clock meals and nine o'clock suppers, instead of dining at three or four o'clock; and my mother, instead of receiving company in the house, works in it like a servant. It is a vast pity, my dear. It keeps the family down, and destroys your chances in life. So I advise you to try to alter things. Now Arundel is coming, I want to dine at a less outlandish hour, and I – "

Whatever Mr. Melville Falconer wanted Joyce did not stay to hear. She left the large hall by one door as her mother entered by the other, bearing in her hand a tray of delicately prepared breakfast for her son, who was wholly unworthy of her attentions, and would have been better without them.

"Thank you, mother," Melville said. "I hope the toast is not dried up. There is so much skill even in the poaching of an egg."

"There are two ways of doing everything," was Mrs. Falconer's rejoinder. "Now I must be quick, for I have a deal of work upstairs."

"Why should you have work, mother?"

"Why did you invite a fine gentleman here? You had better answer that question. The best room must be got ready, and the feather bed laid before the fire."

"A fire in this weather!" exclaimed Melville.

"No one ever sleeps in my house in an unaired bed; and never will, while I am mistress of it, that I can tell you. I hope your fine gentleman is not one to scoff at plain people."

"Arundel is far too well bred to make invidious remarks. But for all that, things may strike him as a little odd. I was going to suggest that we should dine at four o'clock while he is here, and that the boys should not sit down with us elders. It is not the custom in great houses."

"It is the custom here, and mine is not a great house: it is a comfortable English home, where there is no waste, and no extravagance, and no show. I'll warrant your grand friend never slept in a better bed nor between finer sheets than he will to-night. They are as sweet as lavender can make them, and – "

Melville shrugged his shoulders.

"Nay, spare me, mother, and let us leave the arrangements of bed-chambers to the fitting people. And, if I might suggest it, let all things wear their best appearance when Arundel arrives, including the mistress of the mansion. It is a pity when one so young and comely-looking as my mother should pay such scant heed to the little feminine ornaments which are – Phaugh! what is this? Positively a red ant crawling from the bread-trencher. What a beast! Quick! catch it, mother. I hope we shall have no red ants when Arundel is here."

Mrs. Falconer darted down upon the ant with her forefinger, and speedily despatched it, exclaiming there was a perfect plague of ants in the larder, and she did not know how to be rid of them.

"Disgusting!" said her son, carefully covering the body of the ant with a leaf which had garnished the pat of butter. "It is enough to make one sick. I must have a little brandy to settle myself, or rather, my breakfast, before I start."

Mrs. Falconer made no response to this request. But the spirit-stand was in the sideboard, and when his mother was gone Melville helped himself to a pretty strong dram, and then lounged about till it was time to mount the "four-wheel" and drive into Wells.

CHAPTER II.

THE CITY OF THE DEEP SPRINGS

The squire's high "four-wheel" drew up before the door of the Swan Hotel at Wells about twelve o'clock that day. Mr. Falconer was well-known there, and there was a general rush to meet him. The landlord came briskly to the side of the vehicle to assist Miss Joyce to alight, while the ostler and stable-boy ran to the head of the mare; and in the dark entrance below the portico the landlady and a waiter with a napkin over his arm, were in readiness.

"Good-day to you," said the squire, in a cheery voice.

"We are proud to see you, sir. Nice weather for the hay. Will you please to walk in, sir? and Mrs. Maltby will receive your orders for dinner."

"Thank ye kindly. Dinner for two at one o'clock. My daughter will go up to the Liberty, to her aunt's."

"Here, you fellow," exclaimed the prototype of the first gentleman in Europe. "Here, can't you get the carriage nearer the pavement? I don't care to set my foot in that puddle."

The ostler backed the horse, and the landlord advanced to give Melville his arm, while a knot of people had assembled in Saddler Street, watching with some curiosity the movements of the smart young gentleman in the back seat.

The squire, provoked at the tone in which his son had spoken, vanished within the dark lobby of the inn, while Joyce said, laughing:

"Melville, surely you don't want to be helped from the carriage!"

"Look at 'im, now," said a poor woman, who was carrying a basket of vegetables to one of the Canon's houses; "did ye ever see the like? His shoes are made of paper; and, lor! what bows!"

"Take care; you'll be heerd," said an old man, who was leaning on his stick. "Take care. Don't 'ee chatter like a magpie. You'll be heerd, Peggy Loxley."

"Ha, ha!" laughed the woman, "I know why you are affrighted; I know. You've got your 'nephy' up to-day afore the justices, and you don't want to affront one of the justices; I see."

The old man shook his stick at the woman, and meantime Melville had accomplished his descent without splashing his shoes or the edge of his trowsers.

"I shall want a post-chaise ready, in the afternoon, after the Bath mail arrives," he said. "I expect a friend by the coach."

"Very good, sir," said the landlord, who now reappeared; "very good. The squire has ordered dinner for two at one o'clock."

"Where are you off to, Joyce?" Melville said.

"I am going to do some shopping, and to wait at Aunt Letitia's for father." Then Joyce drew a little nearer Melville. "Why can't your friend ride with you in the back seat?"

"Why? Because I don't choose to let him jog over the roads in such a rough conveyance."

Joyce's lip curled.

"It is good enough for father and for me," she said, "and ought to be good enough for you."

Melville arranged his hair, and touched the ends of his lace cravat.

"My dear child, don't make a scene before witnesses, I beseech you."

Joyce waited to hear no more, but tripped away, turning, through a quaint archway, to the Cathedral Green, where the cathedral stood before her in all its majesty.

The great west front of Wells Cathedral has few rivals, and dull indeed must be the heart that does not respond in some measure to its grandeur.

Involuntarily Joyce said, "How beautiful!" and then, leaving the road, she passed through a turnstile and pursued her way under the shadow of a row of limes, which skirted the wide expanse of turf before the cathedral.

The blue sky of the summer day over-arched the stately church, and a few white clouds sailed above the central tower. There were no jarring sounds of wheels, no tread of many feet, no traffic which could tell of trade. Although it was high noontide, the stillness was profound: the jackdaw's cry, the distant voices of children in the market-square, the rustle of the leaves in the trees, and a faint murmur of tinkling water, only seemed to make the quiet more quiet, the silence more complete.

The great west door was open, and Joyce walked towards it, and passed under it into the cool shadows of the nave. She had often done this before, going out from the north porch into the Close again, but to-day there seemed, she scarcely knew why, the stirring of a new life within her.

It was the moment, perhaps, of crossing the barrier which divides childhood from womanhood; the pause which comes in most young lives, when there is, as it were, a hush before the dawn of the coming day.

Joyce had been silent during the drive from Fair Acres; her father had invited no conversation, and a glance now and then at his profile as he sat on the high box seat at her side, had convinced Joyce that the lines of care on his forehead were not traced there without a reason.

The fop, who condescended to sit in the back seat of the cumbrous vehicle, indulged in sundry grumbles at the bad road, the dust, the slow pace of Mavis the mare, the heat, and such like trifles, which were, however, sufficient to disturb the serenity of Melville Falconer.

Joyce had felt ashamed and annoyed as she had never done before; and when a neighbouring squire jogged past on horseback with his son, and looked back with a smile at the highly-decorated figure in the back seat, Joyce felt sure they were laughing at him! Why could not Melville wear a short riding coat like Charlie Paget, and top-boots, and bear himself like a country gentleman, instead of bringing down London fashions into the heart of Somersetshire, and finding fault with everything in his own home; bring his fine friends there without warning, and behave as if he were indeed monarch of all he surveyed.

Joyce's sweet young face was shadowed with the awakening sense of responsibility and the longing to do something, which might smooth the rough places in her father's life, which her brother apparently made without the slightest compunction.

As Joyce stood in the cathedral, not far from the north porch, her head raised towards the belfry-tower, which the great inverted arches support, a ray of sunshine entering at a window in the south transept touched her figure, and illuminated it with a subdued and chastened beauty. Her head was thrown back, and the high coal-scuttle or gipsy bonnet did not hide the sweet face, which, when she had walked demurely down the nave, had been hardly visible.

The little quaint figure was motionless, and the old verger turned twice to look at it, with a strange and curious thrill of admiration. Presently the cloister door opposite opened, and the Dean's swift footsteps were heard approaching, with a regular pit-pat, on the floor of the nave.

He, like the verger, was attracted by Joyce's attitude and the rapt expression on her fair face.

"Why, it's Falconer's little girl!" he thought. "She is generally all smiles and sunshine; now she looks like a nun."

As the Dean passed her, Joyce started. The brightest colour came to her face, and she turned hastily towards the north porch.

The Dean, with old-fashioned and chivalrous courtesy, held the little door, which was cut out of the big one for ordinary use, to let her pass, and then he said:

"Miss Falconer, I think. I hope your good father is well. Is he in Wells to-day?"

"Yes, sir," Joyce replied, bright smiles rippling over her face. "Yes, sir; on magistrates' business."

"Ah, ah! I heard there was some bad case brought in from Mendip. The good lady at Barley Wood will have to learn that much prating about religion ain't what we want. It's like the crackling of thorns under the pot. Let us see you at the Deanery before long; make my compliments to your good father and Mrs. Falconer." And then the Dean ambled away, his thin, black-stockinged legs beneath the decanal coat and apron giving him the appearance of a black stork.

Joyce now hastened towards the Vicar's Close, where her aunt, her father's only sister, lived.

The Vicar's Close at Wells is a sight to delight the heart of the antiquary and the lover of ancient buildings and olden times.

It is entered from the north end of the cathedral by a wide, low gateway, and on either side of a fairly broad footway stands a row of small, picturesque houses with twisted chimneys and low doorways, round which the clematis and honeysuckle climb at their own sweet will. The Vicar's Close, at the further end, is closed in by a small chapel, which entirely blocks the entrance, for any but foot passengers, who obtain egress into the North Liberty by some uneven stone steps at the side of the chapel, leading into the road a few feet above the level of the Close.

If Wells is quiet outside the Vicar's Close, it is quiet indeed within it. Since the summer day when Joyce went into the little garden before a house half-way up on the right side, the hand of the modern Wells builder and plasterer may have marred the complete effect, with stucco and sash-windows; but for the most part the houses in the second decade of the century were guiltless of plate glass and white-wash, and their antique frontage was, even more than now, one of the most picturesque features of the city of Wells.

Joyce had scarcely touched the bright brass handle of the bell when the door opened, and a girl of two or three and twenty sprang out.

"Oh, Joyce, how glad I am to see you! Come in Aunt Letitia, here is Joyce."

Miss Falconer was in the parlour on the right-hand side of the little, low-roofed lobby, and rose somewhat feebly from her chair by the wide grate, which was gay with pots of flowers and evergreens.

"Well, my child, welcome. Have you come to Wells with your father?"

"Yes, auntie; and I am come here for dinner, and after dinner may Charlotte come and do some shopping with me? I have a long list of commissions at the china shop and at Wilmott's."

"Charlotte will be pleased to accompany you, dear child; and when you have taken off your bonnet, come and tell me home news."

There were not many stairs to ascend to Charlotte's bedroom, which looked into the gardens at the back of two other houses of some pretension, between the Vicar's Close and the Deanery.

Charlotte curled herself up in the deep window-seat, and watched her cousin as she laid aside her large bonnet, smoothed her hair, and arranged her white pelerine over her pelisse. Charlotte had a genuine, if rather romantic, admiration for her cousin Joyce. Though a good girl, she was somewhat given to sentiment and languishing, complained of being fatigued, of headaches, and low spirits. She fed upon romance and poetry – the poetry of albums and keepsakes, which was then fashionable. Of course she had a hero who figured in her day-dreams; and she would spend hours at the little window of the sitting-room to catch a sight of him as he passed along the Close. Charlotte would have been much better for some active employment; but Miss Falconer was getting old and feeble in health, and if Charlotte was obedient and gentle, she was well satisfied. So she worked covers in cross-stitch for the chairs, knitted her own stockings, read all the light literature which came in her way, and played on the cabinet piano which stood against the wall in the sitting-room, with its crimson silk front gathered into the centre by a large rosette, and displaying, when open, a very narrow keyboard with very yellow keys.

"How sweetly pretty you look to-day, Joyce. I can't help saying so. Don't be angry. I want to read you some verses I have written, called, 'The Drooping Rosebud.'" And Charlotte took out of her pocket the crumpled page of a copy-book.

"You had better not read it now, Charlotte; Aunt Letitia will expect us to go downstairs."

"Only the first verse," Charlotte said, and then she began:

"'She bent her head in sorrow,

The pretty fragile rose;She languished for the morrow,Where light and gladness growsShe languished for a rain dropTo cheer her thirsty heart:She was so sad and weary;In joy she had no part.'As the raindrop to the rosebud,So is his smile to me;As – '"

Here Charlotte stopped and blushed. "You know who I mean by the rosebud, and who the raindrop is?"

Joyce laughed merrily.

"Oh, Charlotte, you must not come to me for sympathy. I can't understand such sentiment. You have never spoken to Mr. Bamfylde in your life."

"Not spoken; no, but there is such a thing as the language of eyes. Joyce, you don't understand."

"No, I don't; and I think, Charlotte, it is nonsense to waste your thoughts on Mr. Bamfylde, who probably has never given you a thought in his life."

"I am not so sure about thoughts, dear. However, I see you don't care about it, or my verses, or me."

"Come, Charlotte, don't be silly! Of course I care about you, but I don't think I am poetical or romantic. Indeed, we ought to go downstairs."

"You must go first, and I will follow," said poor Charlotte, putting "The Drooping Rosebud" in her pocket again, with a sigh; and Joyce tripped downstairs alone.

"Well, my little rustic," Miss Falconer said; "come and sit down by me, and tell me the news."

"Melville came home last week," Joyce said. "He is determined to travel, and father did so want him to settle down at home and help him with the estate. But, oh! Aunt Lettice, nothing will ever make him into a farmer. He is dressed to-day, to come into Wells, like a fine gentleman. I get so angry with Melville, Aunt Lettice."

"He will come round in time, my dear. Young men are often a little difficult to manage, and then sober down so wonderfully."

"But Melville is twenty-three, nearly twenty-four, Aunt Lettice. Father has given him every advantage, and all he wished for, and now he says he cannot possibly live a country gentleman's life."

"Oxford was a poor preparation for that life, I must own," said Miss Falconer; "only it was natural perhaps, that your father should yield to your mother's wishes."

"Mother suffers the most," said Joyce hotly, "far, far the most. It makes me so angry when I think of the way mother is treated."

"My dear child, she has spoiled Melville, and this is the result."

"It would not be the result if Melville had an atom of gentleman-like feeling. Looking down on mother, who – " Joyce's voice faltered.

"It was unfortunate that your father married below him in the social scale; he was caught in the rebound, as we say. But all that is over and done with: still, we may deplore it; though no one can respect your dear mother more than I do. Marriage," said Miss Falconer, slowly and deliberately, "has not been successful in our family. Charlotte's mother, our only sister, made a very unwise marriage, and her only child has been thrown upon me to support. Not that I regret it. Charlotte is an amiable, gentle girl, and a companion to me. I have given her such advantages as I could afford, and she is fairly accomplished. I had a visitor yesterday I little expected, at her very advanced age. Mrs. Hannah More paid her first call on our new Bishop, and was so obliging as to come on here. She was speaking of you with interest, my dear."