Wild Margaret

"He lived but in a living sleep,Too old to laugh or smile or weep."

"If one were to be married or buried by him on Monday he would forget it on Tuesday," Austin Ambrose murmured to himself as he sat at the back of one of the high backed pews and watched the old gentleman.

There was a parish clerk, too, who droned out the responses, and slept through the sermon – and snored – who was almost as old as the clergyman, and Mr. Austin Ambrose waylaid him and got into conversation with him after the service. It could scarcely be called conversation, however, for the old man merely grunted a "Yes," or "No," and smiled a toothless smile to Austin Ambrose's questions and remarks.

He seemed to remember nothing – excepting that "It were forty-two years agone since the small bell were cracked, and that's why we doan't ring 'em at marriages; they do seem so like a tolling, sir."

"You don't have many weddings, I suppose?" asked Mr. Ambrose.

The old man shook his head.

"Not a main sight," he said without exhibiting the faintest trace of interest. "Moast of our folks is too old to marry, and the young 'uns goes to the big church at Belton – away over there."

"When was the last?" asked Mr. Ambrose.

The clerk took up his hat slowly and scratched his head.

"I do scarce remember, sir," he said; "my memory ain't what it were. I'm getting on in years, you see – nearly eighty, sir; me and the parson runs a closish race," and he chuckled. "When was the last? Lemme see! Well, I could tell 'ee by the book, but the parson keeps that. I dare say he could put his hand upon it."

Mr. Ambrose laughed softly.

"You seem half asleep here at Sefton," he said pleasantly.

The old clerk grunted.

"I think we be sometimes, sir," he said. "But, you see, it's a miserable place now the coach has given up running through. Them railways and steam indians have a'most ruined the country."

"How long ago is it since the last coach ran?" asked Mr. Ambrose.

The poor old man looked bored to death.

"Thirty – forty year," he said. "I can't call to mind exactly; my memory hain't what it were."

Mr. Ambrose wished him good-day, and without tipping him – he did not want to fix himself in the old man's feeble memory – and repaired to the inn.

He called for a glass of ale, which he took care not to drink, and asked for a paper.

The landlord brought him a local one.

"Could I see a London one?" asked Mr. Ambrose.

The landlord shook his head.

"All the news as we care about, such as the state of the crops, and the prices at Coving Garden Market, is in that there paper; we don't trouble about a Lunnon one," he said.

Mr. Ambrose nodded and smiled, paid for his ale, and went back to London.

"Sefton is the place," he said. "It is so out of the world that they never see a London newspaper; so asleep that the noise of the great world rushing onward never wakes it, and the parson and clerk are faster asleep than anything else in it!"

He described the place in glowing colors to Margaret and Blair, a few nights afterward, as they three were sitting in a cool corner of the Botanical Gardens.

"A most delightful nook, my dear Miss Margaret; quite a typical old English village. I could spend the rest of my days there, and if I were going to be married – alas! why should it be one's fate to assist at other people's happiness, and have none oneself? – it is the place of all others I should choose for the ceremony."

"What does it matter where the church is?" said Blair, in his blunt fashion, and with a point-blank look of love at the sweet, downcast face beside him.

"It matters a great deal, my dear Blair; but I'm addressing Miss Margaret, who can appreciate the beauties of a scene, being an artist. I assure you it is a most charming spot, and it is so quiet and out of the way that I really think one might commit bigamy three times running there in as many weeks, and no one would be any the wiser. Why did you start, Blair?"

Margaret looked up at Blair at the question, and he met both her and Austin Ambrose's gaze with astonishment.

"Why did I what? Start? I didn't start," he said. "Why should I? What were you saying? To tell you the truth, I was looking at Madge's foot at the moment, and wondering how anybody could walk with such a mite, and comparing it with my own elephant's hoof. I didn't hear what you said quite."

Margaret drew her foot in, and looked up at him rebukingly.

"You shouldn't be frivolous, sir," she said.

"You shouldn't have such a small foot, miss," he retorted, in the fashion which is so sweet to lovers, and so silly to other people. "Now, what was it you said, Austin?"

Austin Ambrose laughed.

"Oh, some joke about bigamy, not worth repeating. I thought I had said something funny, you started so."

"But I didn't start," replied Blair, with a laugh.

"All right," assented Austin Ambrose; "you didn't, then. But I was going to say that another advantage is that Sefton is on the main line, and that you start from the church to that place in Devonshire where you are to be happier than ever two mortals have ever yet been. What is the name of it?"

"Appleford," said Blair.

"You will be down there about five o'clock," continued Austin Ambrose. "Just in time for dinner."

"What do you say, Madge?" asked Lord Blair, in a low voice.

Austin Ambrose rose and strolled toward some flowers.

"I say as you say, dearest," she answered, with a little sigh.

He looked at her.

"Just give me half a hint that you don't like all this secrecy – " he began; but she stopped him, raising her eyes to his with a trustful smile.

"We won't open all that again, Blair," she said. "Yes, Sefton will do."

"And you won't mind doing without the bridemaids and the white satin dress, and the bishop, and all that?" he asked, with half anxious but wholly loving regard.

Margaret returned his gaze steadily and unflinchingly.

"I care for none of them," she said, quietly. "If I could have had my choice I should have liked my grandmother; but we haven't our choice, and so nothing matters, Blair."

"You are the best-natured girl that ever breathed, Madge!" he said in a passionate whisper. "All my life through I shall remember what sacrifices you made for me. I shall never forget them! Never!"

"Have you made up your minds?" asked Austin, coming back.

"Yes; it is to be Sefton," said Madge herself.

"Very well, then," he answered. "Then, all the rest of the arrangements I can make easily."

And he was as good as his word.

He went down with Blair to get the special license; he engaged a sweet little cottage at Appleford; he saw the parson's clerk, and informed him of the date of the wedding; he even went with Blair to his tailor's to order some clothes.

The day approached. Margaret had made her preparations. They were simple enough, wonderfully and strangely simple, seeing that the man she was going to marry was a viscount, and heir to one of the oldest coronets in England.

"Don't buy a lot of dresses, Madge," Blair had said. "We shall be going to Paris and Italy after Appleford, and you can buy anything you want at Paris, don't you know."

She gave notice to quit to her landlady, and wrote a line or two to some of her companions. She did not say that she was going to be married, but that she was going for a long stay in the country, and she did not add what part.

The morning – the wedding morning – was as bright and even brilliant as a real summer morning in England can be – when it likes; and the sun shone on the new traveling dress – which was to be her wedding dress as well – as bravely as if it had been white satin itself.

All the way down to Sefton, Blair looked at her with the loving, wistful admiration of a bridegroom, and seemed never tired of telling her that she was all that was beautiful and lovable.

Austin Ambrose had gone into a smoking carriage and left them to themselves, but when the train pulled up at Sefton he came to the door.

"Are we going to walk?" inquired Blair.

"No, there is a fly," said Austin, and he led them to it quietly and got them inside.

Blair laughed.

"Poor old Austin! Upon my word, I think he enjoys all this mystery! He'd make a first-rate conspirator, wouldn't he? I say, he was right about the place, though, wasn't he? It is dead and alive!"

Margaret looked through the window. There were a few scattered cottages, one solitary farm, and at a little distance, half hidden amongst the trees, the old dilapidated church.

"It is quiet," she said; "but it is very pretty."

"Quiet!" and he laughed. "I'd no idea there were such spots near London. Austin must have had some trouble in finding such an out-of-the-way place."

And he spoke truly. Mr. Ambrose had taken a great deal of trouble.

The fly drove up to the church door, and Austin Ambrose got down from the box.

"You need not wait," he said to the flyman; "we are going to take a stroll through the church. It looks interesting."

The flyman pocketed his fare – the exact fare – and concluding that they were sight-seeing, drove sleepily off.

"Come along," said Austin Ambrose in a matter-of-fact fashion, and they followed him.

But the door was locked, and there was no sign of parson, or clerk, or pew-opener.

Austin Ambrose bit his lip, then laughed.

"I know where the old fellow lives," he said; "I'll rout him out."

He went to a little ivy-grown cottage just outside the churchyard, and presently returned with the ancient clerk.

"Mornin', miss; mornin', sir," he said, touching his battered old beaver. "I begs ten thousand pardons, but I quite forgot as how there was a wedding this mornin'; but I dessay the parson have recollected. Howsomever, I'll open the church," and he unlocked the door and signed for them to enter.

Margaret tremblingly clung a little closer to Blair's arm and he murmured a few words of encouragement.

"Hang it, Austin!" he said, aside; "it scarcely seems as if we were going to be married. It only wants a hearse – "

Austin laughed.

"Nonsense. It is just what you want. They have forgotten you are to be married, and they'll forget all about it half an hour after it is over. Here is the parson; I did his memory an injustice!"

The old gentleman came shuffling up the porch and blinked at them over his spectacles.

"Good-morning, Mr. Stanley," he said.

Blair stared, then, remembering that that was the name he had arranged to assume, returned the greeting.

The pew-opener, an ancient dame, with a "front" slipping down nearly to her nose, now made her appearance, and the party went into the church.

The clerk assisted the clergyman into his surplice, and got out the register, and Blair, pressing Margaret's hand, walked up to the altar.

Austin Ambrose paused a moment before accompanying, and whispered to Margaret:

"You will take care not to address either of us by name?"

She made a motion of assent, and, pale and trembling, followed with the pew-opener and clerk.

The service began. It was scarcely audible; at times the old clergyman was taken with a cough that threatened to shake him, and the book he held, and, indeed, the church itself, into pieces, but he struggled through it; and in a few minutes Margaret found herself leaning upon Blair's arm, and heard him murmur – with what intensity of love! – "My wife!"

"Now, if you'll sign the book," said the clerk. "Lemme see; what is the name?" and he peered at the license.

"Here is the name!" said Austin Ambrose. "It is rather a long one, and I've written it down," and he handed him a slip of paper.

Blair, to whom the remainder of the formalities was caviare, was bending over Margaret at a little distance, and buttoning her gloves.

"Ah! yes! ahem! thank you!" said the clerk. "Now, if you'll sign, please."

They signed, the old clergyman peering down at them with a benign and utterly senile smile.

He had never heard of Lord Ferrers or of Lord Leyton, and this string of names might belong to some young shopkeeper's assistant for all he knew or cared; but he did inquire for the license.

"I put it in the book," said Austin Ambrose. He had got it in his pocket.

"Oh, very well! Yes, thank you! Well, I trust you will be happy, young couple; yes, with all my heart. You have got a beautiful morning; and where are you going to spend your honeymoon?"

"In France," said Austin Ambrose, blandly. "So we must hurry away. Good-morning, sir," and slipping their fees into the hands of parson, clerk, and pew-opener, he made for the door.

"My wife!" said Blair again. "George! I can scarcely believe it is true!" and he looked round with a half-dazed glance; but it changed to one of triumph and happiness as he drew her arm within his and pressed it to his side.

"Yes, you are man and wife," said Austin Ambrose, "and I echo the good old clergyman's wish, 'May you be very happy,'" and he held out his hand.

Blair seized it and wrung it.

"Thank you, Austin," he said simply, but with a ring of deep feeling in his voice. "You have been a true friend to us both, eh, Madge?" and he passed the hand on to her.

She took it and looked at the owner. Then suddenly she started and drew back. For a moment – in his secret exultation – Mr. Austin Ambrose had been off his guard, and there shone a light in his eyes that almost betrayed him.

It was gone in an instant, however, and with the pleasant, friendly smile, he pressed Margaret's hand.

"We mustn't try her too much, my dear Blair," he said. "It has been an exciting morning. Would you like to rest, or will you go on, Lady Leyton? There is just time to catch the train."

Margaret started. Lady Leyton!

Blair laughed.

"Margaret doesn't know her own name!" he said. "Which will you do, my lady?"

"Let us go on," she murmured, a desire that was almost absorbing possessed her – the longing to get rid of Mr. Austin Ambrose. It was very ungrateful, but so it was.

"All right," said Blair.

They walked to the station. As Austin Ambrose had said, there was just time to catch the down train to Devon, and in a few minutes it came puffing up.

A faithful friend to the last, Austin Ambrose got them a carriage, and tipped the guard.

"Good-bye," he said, standing on the step and waving his hand; "good-bye, and Heaven bless you!" and there seemed to be something really like tears in his voice.

And, indeed, he was paler than usual as he walked up and down the platform, waiting for the train to London.

Sometimes our very success frightens us.

The train reached Waterloo pretty punctually, and Mr. Austin Ambrose sprung out and got into a cab.

"Drive to No. 9, Anglesea Terrace," he said.

CHAPTER XV

It was a week after Margaret's wedding in the moldy and dilapidated old church at Sefton, and she and Lord Blair – she and her husband! – were sitting on the cliff at Appleford looking out upon the sea, which lay at their feet like a level opal glistening in the rays of the morning sun.

The history of these seven days might be epitomized in the three words – They were happy!

Happy with the happiness that few mortals experience. Lord Blair had been in love before his marriage, but he was – and, believe me, dear reader, what I am going to state is not too common – he was more in love now, after these seven days, than before.

Margaret was not a girl of whom even the most fickle of mankind could tire easily, and Blair was not the most fickle.

He had often declared that his Madge, as he delighted to call her, was an angel; he married the angel, and discovered that she was a lovely and lovable woman, and I make bold to say – that for sublunary purposes – that is better, from a husband's point of view, than an angel.

"With each rising sun some fresh charm comes to view," says the poet; and Lord Blair found it so with Margaret.

Under the spell, the witchery of her presence, Lord Blair seemed to grow handsomer, younger, more taking, and to Margaret more charming. Oh, why cannot such epochs last forever, until they glide unconsciously into that eternity where all is love and happiness?

On this morning Blair lay stretched at her feet, near enough to be able to touch her hand, to put his arm round her waist. He was dressed in his flannels, she in a plain dress of some soft comfortable material which, while it showed the deliciously graceful outlines of her figure, enabled her to move about freely and without hindrance.

The light of love and happiness played like sunlight on her beautiful face, and glowed starlike in her eyes, which had rested on the glorious view, and now sought her husband's – and lover's – face.

"Madge," he said, after a long silence, during which he puffed at his pipe, "I am going to pay you a big and an awful compliment, and yet it's true – you are the only woman I ever met who didn't bore me!"

"In-deed!" she said, flashing a smile upon him which seemed like a sunbeam.

"It's true," he said with lazy emphasis. "Some women are pretty, and are content with that, and think it's good enough for you to sit and look at them; others are clever, and consider that if they talk and you listen it's all right. But you – why, you are the loveliest woman I know, and you are the cleverest. Madge, dear, I have no right to get the whole thing like this. There are so many better men who deserve it more than I do."

Margaret laughed.

"We don't get our deserts, Blair," she said. "You, for instance, might have married a dragon of propriety, who would keep you in order by the terror of her eye; or a plain heiress, who would bring you a large fortune to waste, anything but a foolish girl, who has no money and no family to bless herself with. There's that boat again! Where is it going?" she broke off.

He raised himself on his elbow indolently.

"That is the Days' boat," he said drowsily. "I don't know where it is going. Fishing, I suppose."

"They can't fish on this tide," said Margaret, who, though she had been only a week in Appleford, had learned more about its ways and habits than Blair would have gleaned in a year.

"No!" he said carelessly. "I can't quite make these Days out. They let us these lodgings, and they make us very comfortable, but I've a kind of feeling that they have some other way of getting their living that I don't understand. Now, why should he go out to sea this morning if he isn't going fishing?"

"The ways of Appleford are mysterious," said Margaret with a laugh, "and it would take a clever man to fathom them."

"Austin, for instance," he said, drawing a little nearer so that he could take her hand.

A slight cloud crossed Margaret's brow.

"I don't know that Mr. Ambrose even would fathom them," she said. "But I have discovered one thing, Blair," and she laughed softly.

"What's that, dear?" he asked.

"Why, that smuggling is not the extinct profession it is generally considered to be!"

"Smuggling!" he exclaimed incredulously.

"Yes," said Margaret. "I am certain that it is carried on here, and I have a shrewd suspicion that the landlord, Mr. Day, is engaged in it."

"Nonsense, Madge!" he said. "What a romantic child it is!"

"But my romance lies within reach of my hand," she murmured, touching his lips with her forefinger and receiving the inevitable kiss. "But I am sure of it. On Thursday night – do you remember how it blew? – no, you were fast asleep! Well, the wind woke me, and I went to the window to close it. And as I stood there I heard Day and his son talking outside. They, of course, thought themselves unheard, or they wouldn't have spoken so loudly."

"And what did they say?" Blair asked, smiling.

"I did not hear all of their talk, but I caught some of it. There were words spoken about 'kegs' and 'brandy' and 'tobacco.' That I am sure of."

Blair laughed.

"Nonsense, darling, you dreamt it!" he said.

Margaret smiled.

"Perhaps so, but it was a very lifelike dream then, and to put a touch of reality to it, I saw a keg of something – spirits or tobacco – in the kitchen the next morning. I asked Mrs. Day what it was, and she said, 'Water.' But there is a capital well just outside the door!"

"Upon my word you would make a first-class detective, Madge!" said Lord Blair, with a laugh, in which she joined.

"Should I not? I had a great mind to ask Mrs. Day to let me have a glass of the water, but I felt that if I were right, the consequences would be too embarrassing."

"I should think so," said Blair. "And you imagine that Day and his son are going on a smuggling expedition now?" and he looked at the boat dancing on the waves beneath them.

Margaret nodded.

"Yes, I do," she replied lightly. "I think that presently Mr. Day, with his little boat, will meet one of those rakish-looking craft in the offing there, and then the rakish-looking craft – isn't that the proper nautical phrase?"

"First rate!" he assented, languidly. "You would make your fortune as a novelist, Madge."

– "Will put a couple of small barrels on board of Day's boat," she said, pinching his ear tenderly. "Day will wait until the tide turns, and then, it being dark, will sail into Appleford harbor with a cargo of fish – and the two barrels. No one will suspect him, least of all the merry and comfortable coastguard; and those two barrels, after resting there for a night, will be sent off to Exeter – or somewhere else!"

Lord Blair laughed with indolent enjoyment.

"Bravo!" he said. "Well, Austin is better than his word. He said Appleford was pretty, but he didn't add that it possessed all the charms that you credit it with."

Once more the faint cloud crossed Margaret's happy face.

"Have you heard from him?" she asked, after a moment's pause.

Lord Blair pulled a letter from his pocket.

"Yes, this came this morning. I didn't read it through. Austin writes such awfully long letters. Read it yourself, darling, and tell me what it's all about."

Margaret read it.

"There is not much," she said. "He says that no one suspects what – what we did at Sefton, and that he has told every one that you have gone abroad."

Blair laughed.

"Trust Austin to keep a thing secret," he said. "He is the best man in the world at this sort of thing. Now, I should blare out the whole story to the first man I met; but Austin! Oh, Austin could keep his lips shut till he died!"

Margaret looked out to sea, and sighed.

"Now, what does that mean?" he demanded instantly. "Are you tired? Would you like to go in-doors? Are you – unhappy?"

She laughed slowly and softly.

"I think I am too happy!" she said in a low voice. "Blair, it seems to me sometimes as if there were something wicked in being so happy! We are told, you know, that there is no real happiness in this world, and that joy cannot last. If it is true, then – then – " she let her lovely eyes rest upon him doubtfully.

"Nonsense, my darling!" he retorted. "Don't believe it! We were all meant to be happy, but some of us have missed the way. I know what is the matter with you."

"What?" she demanded, her fingers clinging to his lovingly.

"Why, you feel strange without your work. You are an artist, don't you know; and you haven't touched a brush for – well, for seven days. That's bad for you. Oh, I know. I am a simple idiot, but I understand all about this sort of thing. You want to paint. Well, do it," and he threw himself back with a confident air.

Margaret laughed.

"If I wanted to paint ever so much," she said, "I couldn't; I haven't any materials. No colors, no canvas – "

He raised himself on his elbow.

"Oh, that's an easy matter; we can get all that at Ilfracombe. I'll go and get them; it's only a walk, or I can take the boat."

Margaret stopped him with a gesture of curiosity.

"Blair, there is that woman I spoke to you about last night," she said; "there, on that rock."

"What woman?" he asked, without moving.

"That young woman dressed in mourning," said Margaret. "I have seen her three times. I think she must be a widow."

"Oh," he said lazily; "I dare say. Well, about these said drawing materials. I'll walk into Ilfracombe, and get them. No; you sha'n't go. It is too hot, and you will get a headache."

"And do you think I will let you go all that way to gratify a whim which you have fastened upon me, you silly boy?" she said. "Seriously, Blair – don't trouble."