Dorrien of Cranston

“Hold yer rouw, ye beast – wull ye!” said Johnston spitefully, just opening a crack in the door and raising the stick cunningly. But Roy was not quite such a fool. He had withdrawn from the door and crouched away at the back of the room, growling savagely.

“Aha, ye cowardly beastie,” jeered the man. “Iss-ss!” and he poked at him with the stick.

Roy wae now walking to and fro, growling, and every time drawing nearer and nearer to the door, but keeping carefully out of reach of the blows which the biped brute every now and then aimed at him. Suddenly, with a terrific snarl, he made a rush. The trap-door let into the large ones flew open as he flung himself against it, and Johnston, knocked aside by the unexpected weight, rolled sprawling in the dust, and the dog was free. Pausing a moment to make his teeth meet in the thigh of his enemy as he lay, now thoroughly frightened, Roy darted off like an arrow on the track of his master, and came up with him, as we have seen.

“My dear old beauty!” said Roland, passing his hand lovingly over the smooth head, and looking down into the soft, faithful eyes. “You’re worth a regiment of mere human animals! And yet they call you only a dumb, soulless brute. Well, you won’t be sorry to shake the Cranston dust off your paws, anyhow. Come along!”

He turned into the footpath across the fields, which saved a mile of hot, shelterless high road, and his face never relaxed its hard frown as he went over that terrible interview again. “Well, the old man and I opened our minds to one another with a refreshing candour, at any rate,” he said, half aloud. – “Hallo!”

He stood staring blankly, not quite certain whether he was dreaming or not. For there, as if she had started out of the earth itself, was Olive – Roy meanwhile leaping around her and thrusting his importunate nose into her hand, and otherwise claiming his meed of attention.

Roland paused for a moment, staggered. She was looking very lovely, in the neatest of cool walking-dresses, and the blood rose softly to the bewitching face as she met his astonished gaze. She had seen him long before he had caught sight of her, and half shyly, half mischievously had noted the effect of the surprise. But overhearing his last reflection, the glad look changed into one of concern.

“What has happened, dear?” she began.

Instead of immediately replying he gave a couple of quick looks around, and – a few seconds afterwards Olive was readjusting a somewhat displaced hat, a soft, bright blush suffusing her face.

“There! I feel better now?” cried he who had treated her so unceremoniously, speaking with quick vehemence. “What has happened? Squalls – breakers – high seas – everything. To put it tersely, my venerable ancestor and I have been exchanging opinions of each other in terms far more forcible than polite.” But Olive looked very grave.

“Oh, Roland. Was it about – about – I mean anything to do with ourselves?”

“H’m! H’m! Well, as to that, it was about things in general. But don’t distress yourself, darling. It was bound to come sooner or later, and for some time past the South Cone has been hoisted on that particular coast. And now we have agreed to keep carefully out of each other’s way henceforth.”

“But you’ll make it up again, dear. People get in a rage with each other and quarrel, but it doesn’t last for ever. It would be awful if it did.”

“But this will. Olive, you don’t know him, and I’m afraid, darling, you don’t half know me. He would have to sing very abjectly small indeed, before I could forgive what he said – certainly no consideration of loss or gain would induce me to do so. So here I stand – as here I came – nobody.”

“You are everybody to me, love,” she answered bravely and cheerfully. “All will come right one of these days, and even if not, we cannot do without each other, whatever we can do without.”

Sunshine after storm: balm to the wounded spirit. It is probable that, for the time being, all considerations were forgotten, except that they were alone together. The summer air breathed warm and free around them. Underfoot the grass, recently mown, was short and turfy, beneath the shade of the trees couched a few lazy, ruminating sheep, and the drowsy roll of a mill-wheel, with its accompanying drip-drip of water, was just audible, but everything was soft and slumbrous in the silent meadows. They were alone – and he who had just bartered away his splendid birthright for the love of this girl beside him, felt that he had his reward. He could hardly believe that not an hour had passed since that tornado scene of wrathful passion in yonder Hall, which they could just discern through the trees.

“But, Olive, how on earth did you put in an appearance here just in the nick of time?” he asked presently.

“Pure accident. I had been visiting two bed-ridden crones whom Margaret had promised to go and see, but couldn’t. The path leading home struck into yours – so – so I couldn’t help being behind you and hearing your wicked words – and they were dreadfully wicked,” she answered mischievously. “But – hark!”

A male voice was heard approaching, alternately whistling and singing snatches of a popular song of the day, then a tall, active figure cleared the stile in front of them and drew up short.

“Hallo!”

“Oh, Eusty, you disgraceful defaulter. Is that how you keep your promises?” cried Olive. “Didn’t you vow you would come and meet me, and now I’ve had to walk through two fields full of horrid cows all by myself – and it’s no thanks to you that I haven’t been frightened to death.”

“Oh, here – ahem – I say, hold hard!” cried the Oxonian, quizzically surveying the pair. “All by yourself – eh? Well, it strikes me, young woman, you’ve fallen in with a pretty substantial escort.”

“But not until I had passed the cows, you detestable boy,” replied she, with a tinge of colour in her bright, laughing face.

“I say, Dorrien, she implies that you’re nobody,” went on her brother, without heeding her. “Says she had to come along all by herself. Rough on you, that – eh?”

Roland laughed, and coming to the rescue turned the scale of “chaff” against Eustace, who was fain to acknowledge at last that he was in a minority, and to cry quarter.

“Hallo, Dorrien, don’t sheer off,” cried Eustace, as, having reached the town, a halt suddenly took place. “Tack in and get your eye-teeth into some cold sirloin, anglicè– lunch!”

But the other shook his head.

“Oh, stow all that,” went on the reckless youth in response to some excuse. “Now, don’t let’s have any more talk over it, but ’bout ship and steer for the ecclesiastical hang-out. There are only our two selves. The reverend Padre won’t be in till this afternoon, and the other girls have gone out to lunch at the Gaskells. Olive, tell him he must. He’ll obey orders from you.”

Roland hesitated. He had frequently dropped in in this informal way, and now the temptation to sit for an hour at the same table with Olive, with the prospect of a whole afternoon of her society, was strong. But he remembered that his negotiations with her father were still pending, and he had a shrewd idea that the next interview might not go off quite so pleasantly. Meanwhile, it might strike the rector in the light of a shabby thing, were he in a sort of way to steal a march upon him in his absence. So he heroically and steadfastly refused. Had he known what was to happen within the next twenty-four hours he would probably have yielded.

“I’ll look round later,” he said. “I want to see the rector as soon as he comes in. That’ll do instead, Eustace, won’t it?”

“Hang it! I suppose it must!” was the careless reply.

And then he bade good-bye to Olive. Only a pressure of the hand, and a look into each other’s eyes – no sweet, clinging embrace. An unceremonious good-bye, as between people who expect to meet again in the course of the same day, no murmured word of love and trust and moving farewell. Yet perhaps it was better so. A little nod and a bright smile as she turned away, and thus they parted, these two. Little recked they how and where they would meet again.

Roland turned away in a very restless, dissatisfied frame of mind. Everything seemed to be working round unfavourably. The rector might not return home till late, and meanwhile he was condemned to these hours of waiting. Though cool enough in an emergency, he was of a nervous disposition, and uncertainty and inaction in a matter of this kind was intolerable. Everything assumed an exaggerated aspect. What if the rector should, after all, refuse his consent? Hitherto he had not believed Dr Ingelow would offer any serious opposition; now, on turning things over, it seemed first possible, then only too probable, that he might. And Olive – he felt pretty certain she would, however reluctantly, refuse to disregard her father’s wishes, once they were clearly laid down; nor in his heart of hearts would he have desired that she should, paradoxical as it may seem. Lovers are proverbially selfish, and it might be that Roland Dorrien was less so than the general man. He had lived his life very much alone, with the result that he had thought much, and developed a maturity of judgment considerably beyond his years. How could he expect this girl to give up her bright, happy home – how happy he himself had had ample opportunity of observing – to wound, beyond all healing, those who had surrounded her life with every tenderness and care, at the bidding of one whom, six months ago, she had hardly heard of? He knew that he had won her heart as no man would ever again win it, yet he would despise himself were he to require such a sacrifice of her. No, the only thing would be to wait for more favourable times.

So the afternoon wore on, and his restlessness increased more and more. He could not read, thinking was worse, and there was no one to talk to. Well, he would stroll round towards the Rectory again. This time luck favoured him. As he approached it he caught sight of Dr Ingelow coming from the opposite direction, and the two met at the gate.

“Ah, I was half expecting you yesterday,” said the rector, as they shook hands. “But come into the study. There we shan’t be disturbed.”

“And I fully intended to have returned yesterday,” replied Roland, when they were seated. “But the fact is, my father didn’t get back till late, and I had no opportunity of speaking to him until this morning.”

“Yes. And – ”

“The result was precisely what I expected. He was utterly unreasonable and impracticable. In short, Dr Ingelow, I don’t see how I can avoid explaining that he has a violent prejudice against you and yours. That may have had a great deal to do with it, but he had reasons of his own, which, as they concern others, I am hardly at liberty to mention. Anyhow, I could not for a moment think of falling in with his views, and the result was a regular row.”

“Do you mean that you quarrelled?” asked the rector.

“If a tolerably brisk interchange of compliments, and a mutual agreement to keep carefully out of each other’s way for the rest of our mutual lives constitute a quarrel – and I rather think they do – why, then I must admit we did,” was the grim reply, and his face grew dark over the recollection thus revived.

“Excuse me, Dorrien – you see I always consider myself to a certain extent privileged – but I can see at a glance that you’re a quick-tempered man. Now, isn’t it just possible that you were rather hasty?” said the rector, in his kindest manner, bending a searching glance upon the young man. “I mean,” he went on in response to a decided shake of the head, “you may have forgotten that, however harsh – even unjust, as you think – your father may be, you still owe him a certain amount of respect – of duty. Nothing can get rid of that fact.”

Roland looked up quickly.

“Duty?” he echoed, with an intensity of bitterness which was not lost upon the other. “Duty! My dear sir, I can assure you that that very word formed subject matter for a pretty lively discussion between us, ending as I have described. However, to drop these wretched family details, which must be most tedious to you, you see now I have done my best to meet your wishes, and if I have failed it has been through no fault of my own – that I can say with a perfectly clear conscience.” He spoke with a suppressed eagerness which had been absent from his speech in their first interview. Then the last thing he had anticipated was failure in this quarter; now it was different.

The rector shook his head deprecatorily.

“I don’t like to hear you take that tone. I fear your view of the relation between father and son cannot be borne out. The Fifth Commandment is explicit on the point. But there, this isn’t the time for sermonising, you’ll say,” he added with a grave, kind smile. “Only, the idea of a breach of this relationship is, to my mind, one of the most painful things in the world.”

Roland looked unconvinced. He conjectured rightly that the good priest’s early youth had been fortunate in its natural guardians, and now his own children adored him, which made all the difference.

“You will think me bold in stating that the religious side of the question does not weigh with me in the least – circumstances alter cases,” was his reply. “And at any rate, Dr Ingelow, you will allow that I have never tried to win your favour by feigning a religion which I did not feel. However, to confine ourselves to the matter in hand. I have tried my utmost to satisfy you in what you asked, and have failed. But as I am perfectly in a position to marry independently of my father’s consent, I trust your answer will be favourable.”

Outwardly calmness itself, the rector was in reality much perplexed. A terrible family quarrel had taken place, indirectly owing to him and his – a reflection sufficiently distressing to one of his refinement of feeling. Then, again, this young man must not be allowed to throw up his prospects for life in a fit of rash impulse and hot temper. No – at all costs this must be prevented.

“We will waive the question of duty,” he said. “But is there no chance of a reconciliation? Surely there is. When you get to my age you will realise that life is too short for these prolonged feuds; quarrels between blood relations are of all things the most heart-rending, and the day may come when you will bitterly regret this one. And then, to take a lower ground. How can you, in a moment of anger, and all for the sake of a few hasty words, throw up your really splendid prospects? And how can I be a party to your doing so. Surely you must see that it is impossible.”

“There is no chance of any reconciliation,” answered Roland deliberately. “I would hardly forgive one or two of the things he dared to say, even if he were to go down on his knees and beg me to – and I think even you would hardly expect him to do that. As for what you are good enough to call ‘a few hasty words,’ I tell you we exchanged opinions of each other that would have made your hair stand on end could you have heard us; nor was that all. In the matter of prospects, I have always considered my chances of ever possessing Cranston to be so very vague and shadowy as not seriously worth reckoning in the light of prospects. And then, look what such ‘prospects’ would involve. Perhaps twenty years of absolute slavery to the whims and caprices of the hardest and most unloving of masters. Only think of that! And at fifty I might find myself in possession, and Heaven knows I should deserve to. So, in renouncing these most shadowy prospects, this morning, I could not feel that I was actually undergoing any real loss. But I thought I had made all this clear to you yesterday – I mean as regarded the uncertainty of any prospects beyond the actual means in my possession,” he added in an anxious tone.

“I don’t think you understand me, Mr Dorrien,” said the rector, rather stiffly. “I might have hoped you would have known me better than to suppose that I was reasoning otherwise than disinterestedly in this matter of your eventually possessing Cranston or not; or that the latter contingency would detract in my eyes from your eligibility to become my daughter’s husband, you being otherwise in a satisfactory position. What I did mean to convey was this. You are young now; all your feelings and aspirations are strong, and warm, and healthful, and you are capable of self-sacrifice; you dearly love my child. I can see that readily enough, although you are not one of the effusive order of lovers,” he went on, his tone softening, and a quiet, kindly smile gleaming in his eyes. “You would make any sacrifice for her – and for all this I honour you. But, as I said before, you are young. Well. You give up this inheritance, and you do so cheerfully. Middle age comes on, and you see what should have been yours in other hands. You are a stranger in the home of your ancestors – you have the cares and vexations – ay, and the disappointments of life crowding upon you, while another enjoys in ease and luxury your noble birthright, which has then passed away from you for ever. How will you feel then? Will you have the strength resolutely to bear up against this most mortifying contrast, to banish the thought of it far from you – or will it embitter – eventually perhaps crush the remainder of your existence? This is what I have been thinking of while we have been sitting here. Now have you thought of it?”

He laid his hand on the other’s arm with an affectionate gesture, and his dark eyes were full of sympathy as he bent his glance upon the young man’s face, awaiting the answer.

“I have thought of it, Dr Ingelow,” was the quiet reply. “I had already done so – had weighed the pros and cons most carefully before I spoke to you yesterday. And – ”

He stopped short. He was nearly giving the rector an inkling of the other insurmountable obstacle which stood in the way of reconciliation, and any material advantage it might bring with it, but with a natural distaste for discussing family matters with an outsider – however sympathetic – he forebore. Had he not done so, it is possible that the answer to his wishes might have been different; as it was, Dr Ingelow would not give up the notion that the quarrel between Roland and his father, however grave, was yet capable of being healed, and it was not for him, a Christian priest, irrespective of other considerations, to be the means of widening the breach.

“Well now, Dorrien,” he went on, after pausing to allow the other to continue the remark if he wished, “you must see yourself in what an extremely difficult position I am placed. How can I allow my child to marry into a family which positively refuses to receive her? I cannot do so, I fear, with any consideration for our own self-respect. Then, apart from that, you are man of the world enough to know that nothing remains private for long, and that this family quarrel of yours will soon be in everybody’s mouth. Now, I ask you, how can I and mine accept the position of arch-mischief-makers, feud fomenters, schemers – call it what you will – in which common consent will place us when it becomes known how you have renounced your brilliant worldly prospects for Olive’s sake? Put yourself into my place for a moment – that may bring it home to you. No, Dorrien, surely you must see that this is a position we cannot consent to occupy, and, honoured as we are by your proposal, I fear we must pain you by declining it – for the present, at any rate.”

Roland did not answer at once. In the rector’s decided tones he felt that his fate was sealed. There was no getting over this opposition, and now, day by day, an insurmountable barrier would rise between him and his love. The room seemed to go round with him – the heavily-bound, solemn-looking volumes, the carved chairs, the still, white Christ upon the black cross in the niche, all passed in succession before his eyes.

“And yet I had thought, Dr Ingelow,” he said at last, and his voice was thick and unsteady, “that you, if any man, would be above mere worldly considerations, when the life’s happiness of two people was in the balance.”

“My dear boy, don’t – pray don’t talk in that awfully desponding tone,” said the rector, moved to the heart by the utter dejection set forth upon the other’s countenance. “Now, listen,” and going over to him he placed his hands upon his shoulders, in heart-felt, sympathetic touch. “Wait a little while, then do your best to make up this lamentable difference – who knows but what you may succeed far more readily than you think? Then you shall have my hearty consent.”

“That will be never,” came the reply, quiet, but decided. “The thing is impossible. So I suppose you will tell me that it’s a case of resigning oneself to the will of Providence,” he continued in a tone of indescribable bitterness, and with an approach to a sneer.

The other made no reply, and for some moments there was silence. There was not a spark of anger or resentment in the priest’s heart at the implied scoff, and the compassion in his countenance deepened as he gazed upon the man before him, plunged in the depths of disappointment. He was no mean judge of character, and he had seen much in Roland Dorrien to like and admire – yet he felt sure that the course he himself had adopted in the present instance was the right – in fact, the only safe one.

And Roland himself? As he sat there he was going through a mighty struggle. He had tried fair means and failed, now he would be justified in employing foul, said the tempter. If he could induce Olive surreptitiously to link her lot with his, why then, when the step was irremediable, her father would soon forgive her. The rector was the very last man to bear rancour, especially towards his favourite child. He would soon come round, and then how happy they would all be! The end in this case would amply justify the means, and then – was not all fair in love and war? No, it was not. Roland Dorrien had a code of honour of his own. Had Dr Ingelow been such a man as his own father, for instance, he would have felt abundantly justified in throwing all scruple to the winds, but now he could not do it. He had sat at this man’s table and been treated by him in every respect as a trusted friend. His doors had ever been open to him to come and go as he listed, he had been admitted unreservedly and welcomed in this family circle at a time when in his own home he was a stranger. Months had passed in this pleasant, trustful intimacy, and now he felt that he would rather die than betray the confidence of this kindly, open-hearted friend, for whom, in spite of what had happened, he felt no whit less of warm regard. It would be a mean and shabby trick, the very thought of which he would strive to put far from him.

“Forgive me,” he said at length. “I am an unmannerly brute to talk like that. A cad, in fact.”

“Roland, my dear boy,” answered the rector in his most affectionate tone, casting all ceremony to the winds. “Believe me, I have already forgotten it, whatever it was. Now try and face your trouble bravely – you are not alone in it, remember. And, Roland, you will not – not attempt to see Olive alone until – at any rate until I have spoken to her. You are too honourable for that, I know.”

“I will not. But, Dr Ingelow, I cannot promise to give her up altogether. It is only fair to tell you that.”

The rector shook his head sadly.

“I am afraid you must bring yourself to face facts,” he replied, as they clasped hands. “Good-bye. We need not look upon each other as enemies on account of this, need we?” he added, laying an affectionate, detaining hand on the other’s shoulder. “Good-bye for the present – and, God bless you!”

Chapter Twenty.

Darker Still

“Things are never so bad but that they might be worse,” is a clap-trap disguised beneath the gold leaf of philosophy. When a man’s leg has to come off – without chloroform – it doesn’t make the impending “bad quarter of an hour” a bit less redoubtable to impress upon him the indisputable fact that he might have had to lose an arm as well.

When Roland awoke the next morning – he had engaged a room in the principal inn at Wandsborough – it seemed as if the outlook before him was about as black as it could be. He had made an enormous sacrifice for love, and all in vain; the fruition of that love was denied him. Wrapped in gloomy reflections, he hardly noticed a letter lying beside his bed. It had come the previous evening, but he had chucked it aside as not worth bothering about. Now he took it up and carelessly tore it open. Suddenly an alarming change came over his features, an awful, rigid, grey look, as if he had been suddenly turned to stone. This is what he read: