Barrington. Volume 1

“That’s what you could not, sir,” said Tom, sturdily. “It’s a poor heart hasn’t some pride in it; and I would not go back and meet my father, after my disgrace, if it was to cost me my right hand, – so don’t say another word about it. Good-bye, sir, and my blessing go with you wherever you are. I ‘ll never forget how you stood to me.”

“That money there is yours, Dill,” said Conyers, half haughtily. “You may refuse my advice and reject my counsel, but I scarcely suppose you ‘ll ask me to take back what I once have given.”

Tom tried to speak, but he faltered and moved from one foot to the other, in an embarrassed and hesitating way. He wanted to say how the sum originally intended for one object could not honestly be claimed for another; he wanted to say, also, that he had no longer the need of so much money, and that the only obligation he liked to submit to was gratitude for the past; but a consciousness that in attempting to say these things some unhappy word, some ill-advised or ungracious expression might escape him, stopped him, and he was silent.

“You do not wish that we should part coldly, Tom?”

“No, sir, – oh, no!” cried he, eagerly.

“Then let not that paltry gift stand in the way of our esteem. Now, another thing. Will you write to me? Will you tell me how the world fares with you, and honestly declare whether the step you have taken to-day brings with it regret or satisfaction?”

“I’m not over-much of a letter-writer,” said he, falter-ingly, “but I’ll try. I must be going, Mr. Conyers,” said he, after a moment’s silence; “I must get back before I’m missed.”

“Not as you came, Tom, however. I’ll pass you out of the barrack-gate.”

As they walked along side by side, neither spoke till they came close to the gate; then Conyers halted and said, “Can you think of nothing I can do for you, or is there nothing you would leave to my charge after you have gone?”

“No, sir, nothing.” He paused, and then, as if with a struggle, said, “Except you ‘d write one line to my sister Polly, to tell her that I went away in good heart, that I did n’t give in one bit, and that if it was n’t for thinking that maybe I ‘d never see her again – ” He faltered, his voice grew thick, he tried to cough down the rising emotion, but the feeling overcame him, and he burst out into tears. Ashamed at the weakness he was endeavoring to deny, he sprang through the gate and disappeared.

Conyers slowly returned to his quarters, very thoughtful and very sad.

CHAPTER XXVII. THE CONVENT ON THE MEUSE

While poor Tom Dill, just entering upon life, went forth in gloom and disappointment to his first venture, old Peter Barrington, broken by years and many a sorrow, set out on his journey with a high heart and a spirit well disposed to see everything in its best light and be pleased with all around him. Much of this is, doubtless, matter of temperament; but I suspect, too, that all of us have more in our power in this way than we practise. Barrington had possibly less merit than his neighbors, for nature had given him one of those happy dispositions upon which the passing vexations of life produce scarcely any other effect than a stimulus to humor, or a tendency to make them the matter of amusing memory.

He had lived, besides, so long estranged from the world, that life had for him all the interests of a drama, and he could no more have felt angry with the obtrusive waiter or the roguish landlord than he would with their fictitious representatives on the stage. They were, in his eyes, parts admirably played, and no more; he watched them with a sense of humorous curiosity, and laughed heartily at successes of which he was himself the victim. Miss Barrington was no disciple of this school; rogues to her were simply rogues, and no histrionic sympathies dulled the vexation they gave her. The world, out of which she had lived so long, had, to her thinking, far from improved in the mean while. People were less deferential, less courteous than of old. There was an indecent haste and bustle about everything, and a selfish disregard of one’s neighbor was the marked feature of all travel. While her brother repaid himself for many an inconvenience by thinking over some strange caprice, or some curious inconsistency in human nature, – texts for amusing afterthought, – she only winced under the infliction, and chafed at every instance of cheating or impertinence that befell them.

The wonderful things she saw, the splendid galleries rich in art, the gorgeous palaces, the grand old cathedrals, were all marred to her by the presence of the loquacious lackey whose glib tongue had to be retained at the salary of the “vicar of our parish,” and who never descanted on a saint’s tibia without costing the price of a dinner; so that old Peter at last said to himself, “I believe my sister Dinah would n’t enjoy the garden of Eden if Adam had to go about and show her its beauties.”

The first moment of real enjoyment of her tour was on that morning when they left Namur to drive to the Convent of Bramaigne, about three miles off, on the banks of the Meuse. A lovelier day never shone upon a lovelier scene. The river, one side guarded by lofty cliffs, was on the other bounded by a succession of rich meadows, dotted with picturesque homesteads half hidden in trees. Little patches of cultivation, labored to the perfection of a garden, varied the scene, and beautiful cattle lay lazily under the giant trees, solemn voluptuaries of the peaceful happiness of their lot.

Hitherto Miss Dinah had stoutly denied that anything they had seen could compare with their own “vale and winding river,” but now she frankly owned that the stream was wider, the cliffs higher, the trees taller and better grown, while the variety of tint in the foliage far exceeded all she had any notion of; but above all these were the evidences of abundance, the irresistible charm that gives the poetry to peasant life; and the picturesque cottage, the costume, the well-stored granary, bespeak the condition with which we associate our ideas of rural happiness. The giant oxen as they marched proudly to their toil, the gay-caparisoned pony who jingled his bells as he trotted by, the peasant girls as they sat at their lace cushions before the door, the rosy urchins who gambolled in the deep grass, all told of plenty, – that blessing which to man is as the sunlight to a landscape, making the fertile spots more beautiful, and giving even to ruggedness an aspect of stern grandeur.

“Oh, brother Peter, that we could see something like this at home,” cried she. “See that girl yonder watering the flowers in her little garden, – how prettily that old vine is trained over the balcony, – mark the scarlet tassels in the snow-white team, – are not these signs of an existence not linked to daily drudgery? I wish our people could be like these.”

“Here we are, Dinah: there is the convent!” cried Barrington, as a tall massive roof appeared over the tree-tops, and the little carriage now turned from the high-road into a shady avenue of tall elms. “What a grand old place it is! some great seigniorial château once on a time.”

As they drew nigh, nothing bespoke the cloister. The massive old building, broken by many a projection and varied by many a gable, stood, like the mansion of some rich proprietor, in a vast wooded lawn. The windows lay open, the terrace was covered with orange and lemon trees and flowering plants, amid which seats were scattered; and in the rooms within, the furniture indicated habits of comfort and even of luxury. With all this, no living thing was to be seen; and when Barrington got down and entered the hall, he neither found a servant nor any means to summon one.

“You’ll have to move that little slide you see in the door there,” said the driver of the carriage, “and some one will come to you.”

He did so; and after waiting a few moments, a somewhat ruddy, cheerful face, surmounted by a sort of widow’s cap, appeared, and asked his business.

“They are at dinner, but if you will enter the drawing-room she will come to you presently.”

They waited for some time; to them it seemed very long, for they never spoke, but sat there in still thoughtfulness, their hearts very full, for there was much in that expectancy, and all the visions of many a wakeful night or dreary day might now receive their shock or their support. Their patience was to be further tested; for, when the door opened, there entered a grim-looking little woman in a nun’s costume, who, without previous salutation, announced herself as Sister Lydia. Whether the opportunity for expansiveness was rare, or that her especial gift was fluency, never did a little old woman hold forth more volubly. As though anticipating all the worldly objections to a conventual existence, or rather seeming to suppose that every possible thing had been actually said on that ground, she assumed the defence the very moment she sat down. Nothing short of long practice with this argument could have stored her mind with all her instances, her quotations, and her references. Nor could anything short of a firm conviction have made her so courageously indifferent to the feelings she was outraging, for she never scrupled to arraign the two strangers before her for ignorance, apathy, worldliness, sordid and poor ambitions, and, last of all, a levity unbecoming their time of life.

“I ‘m not quite sure that I understand her aright,” whispered Peter, whose familiarity with French was not what it had once been; “but if I do, Dinah, she ‘s giving us a rare lesson.”

“She’s the most insolent old woman I ever met in my life,” said his sister, whose violent use of her fan seemed either likely to provoke or to prevent a fit of apoplexy.

“It is usual,” resumed Sister Lydia, “to give persons who are about to exercise the awful responsibility now devolving upon you the opportunity of well weighing and reflecting over the arguments I have somewhat faintly shadowed forth.”

“Oh, not faintly!” groaned Barrington.

But she minded nothing the interruption, and went on, —

“And for this purpose a little tract has been composed, entitled ‘A Word to the Worldling.’ This, with your permission, I will place in your hands. You will there find at more length than I could bestow – But I fear I impose upon this lady’s patience?”

“It has left me long since, madam,” said Miss Dinah, as she actually gasped for breath.

In the grim half-smile of the old nun might be seen the triumphant consciousness that placed her above the “mundane;” but she did not resent the speech, simply saying that, as it was the hour of recreation, perhaps she would like to see her young ward in the garden with her companions.

“By all means. We thank you heartily for the offer,” cried Barrington, rising hastily.

With another smile, still more meaningly a reproof, Sister Lydia reminded him that the profane foot of a man had never transgressed the sacred precincts of the convent garden, and that he must remain where he was.

“For Heaven’s sake! Dinah, don’t keep me a prisoner here a moment longer than you can help it,” cried he, “or I’ll not answer for my good behavior.”

As Barrington paced up and down the room with impatient steps, he could not escape the self-accusation that all his present anxiety was scarcely compatible with the long, long years of neglect and oblivion he had suffered to glide over.

The years in which he had never heard of Josephine – never asked for her – was a charge there was no rebutting. Of course he could fall back upon all that special pleading ingenuity and self-love will supply about his own misfortunes, the crushing embarrassments that befell him, and such like. But it was no use, it was desertion, call it how he would; and poor as he was he had never been without a roof to shelter her, and if it had not been for false pride he would have offered her that refuge long ago. He was actually startled as he thought over all this. Your generous people, who forgive injuries with little effort, who bear no malice nor cherish any resentment, would be angels – downright angels – if we did not find that they are just as indulgent, just as merciful to themselves as to the world at large. They become perfect adepts in apologies, and with one cast of the net draw in a whole shoal of attenuating circumstances. To be sure, there will now and then break in upon them a startling suspicion that all is not right, and that conscience has been “cooking” the account; and when such a moment does come, it is a very painful one.

“Egad!” muttered he to himself, “we have been very heartless all this time, there’s no denying it; and if poor George’s girl be a disciple of that grim old woman with the rosary and the wrinkles, it is nobody’s fault but our own.” He looked at his watch; Dinah had been gone more than half an hour. What a time to keep him in suspense! Of course there were formalities, – the Sister Lydia described innumerable ones, – jail delivery was nothing to it, but surely five-and-thirty minutes would suffice to sign a score of documents. The place was becoming hateful to him. The grand old park, with its aged oaks, seemed sad as a graveyard, and the great silent house, where not a footfall sounded, appeared a tomb. “Poor child! what a dreary spot you have spent your brightest years in, – what a shadow to throw over the whole of a lifetime!”

He had just arrived at that point wherein his granddaughter arose before his mind a pale, careworn, sorrow-struck girl, crushed beneath the dreary monotony of a joyless life, and seeming only to move in a sort of dreamy melancholy, when the door opened, and Miss Barrington entered with her arm around a young girl tall as herself, and from whose commanding figure even the ungainly dress she wore could not take away the dignity.

“This is Josephine, Peter,” said Miss Dinah; and though Barrington rushed forward to clasp her in his arms, she merely crossed hers demurely on her breast and courtesied deeply.

“It is your grandpapa, Josephine,” said Miss Dinah, half tartly.

The young girl opened her large, full, lustrous eyes, and stared steadfastly at him, and then, with infinite grace, she took his hand and kissed it.

“My own dear child,” cried the old man, throwing his arms around her, “it is not homage, it is your love we want.”

“Take care, Peter, take care,” whispered his sister; “she is very timid and very strange.”

“You speak English, I hope, dear?” said the old man.

“Yes, sir, I like it best,” said she. And there was the very faintest possible foreign accent in the words.

“Is n’t that George’s own voice, Dinah? Don’t you think you heard himself there?”

“The voice is certainly like him,” said Miss Dinah, with a marked emphasis.

“And so are – no, not her eyes, but her brow, Dinah. Yes, darling, you have his own frank look, and I feel sure you have his own generous nature.”

“They say I’m like my mother’s picture,” said she, unfastening a locket she wore from its chain and handing it. And both Peter and his sister gazed eagerly at the miniature. It was of a very dark but handsome woman in a rich turban, and who, though profusely ornamented with costly gems, did, in reality, present a resemblance to the cloistered figure before them.

“Am I like her?” asked the girl, with a shade more of earnestness in her voice.

“You are, darling; but like your father, too, and every word you utter brings back his memory; and see, Dinah, if that is n’t George’s old trick, – to lay one hand in the palm of the other.”

As if corrected, the young girl dropped her arms to her sides and stood like a statue.

“Be like him in everything, dearest child,” said the old man, “if you would have my heart all your own.”

“I must be what I am,” said she, solemnly.

“Just so, Josephine; well said, my good girl. Be natural,” said Miss Dinah, kissing her, “and our love will never fail you.”

There was the faintest little smile of acknowledgment to this speech; but faint as it was, it dimpled her cheek, and seemed to have left a pleasant expression on her face, for old Peter gazed on her with increased delight as he said, “That was George’s own smile; just the way he used to look, half grave, half merry. Oh, how you bring him back tome!”

“You see, my dear child, that you are one of us; let us hope you will share in the happiness this gives us.”

The girl listened attentively to Miss Dinah’s words, and after a pause of apparent thought over them, said, “I will hope so.”

“May we leave this, Dinah? Are we free to get away?” whispered Barrington to his sister, for an unaccountable oppression seemed to weigh on him, both from the place and its belongings.

“Yes; Josephine has only one good-bye to say; her trunks are already on the carriage, and there is nothing more to detain us.”

“Go and say that farewell, dear child,” said he, affectionately; “and be speedy, for there are longing hearts here to wish for your return.”

With a grave and quiet mien she walked away, and as she gained the door turned round and made a deep, respectful courtesy, – a movement so ceremonious that the old man involuntarily replied to it by a bow as deep and reverential.

CHAPTER XXVIII. GEORGE’S DAUGHTER

I suppose, nay, I am certain, that the memory of our happiest moments ought ever to be of the very faintest and weakest, since, could we recall them in all their fulness and freshness, the recollection would only serve to deepen the gloom of age, and imbitter all its daily trials. Nor is it, altogether, a question of memory! It is in the very essence of happiness to be indescribable. Who could impart in words the simple pleasure he has felt as he lay day-dreaming in the deep grass, lulled by the humming insect, or the splash of falling water, with teeming fancy peopling the space around, and blending the possible with the actual? The more exquisite the sense of enjoyment, the more will it defy delineation. And so, when we come to describe the happiness of others, do we find our words weak, and our attempt mere failure.

It is in this difficulty that I now find myself. I would tell, if I could, how enjoyably the Barringtons sauntered about through the old villages on the Rhine and up the Moselle, less travelling than strolling along in purposeless indolence, resting here, and halting there, always interested, always pleased. It was strange into what perfect harmony these three natures – unlike as they were – blended!

Old Peter’s sympathies went with all things human, and he loved to watch the village life and catch what he could of its ways and instincts. His sister, to whom the love of scenery was a passion, never wearied of the picturesque land they travelled; and as for Josephine, she was no longer the demure pensionnaire of the convent, – thoughtful and reserved, even to secrecy, – but a happy child, revelling in a thousand senses of enjoyment, and actually exulting in the beauty of all she saw around her. What depression must come of captivity, when even its faintest image, the cloister, could have weighed down a heart like hers! Such was Barrington’s thought as he beheld her at play with the peasant children, weaving garlands for a village fête, or joyously joining the chorus of a peasant song. There was, besides, something singularly touching in the half-consciousness of her freedom, when recalled for an instant to the past by the tinkling bell of a church. She would seem to stop in her play, and bethink her how and why she was there, and then, with a cry of joy, bound away after her companions in wild delight.

“Dearest aunt,” said she, one day, as they sat on a rocky ledge over the little river that traverses the Lahnech, “shall I always find the same enjoyment in life that I feel now, for it seems to me this is a measure of happiness that could not endure?”

“Some share of this is owing to contrast, Fifine. Your convent life had not too many pleasures.”

“It was, or rather it seems to me now, as I look back, a long and weary dream; but, at the same time, it appears more real than this; for do what I may I cannot imagine this to be the world of misery and sorrow I have heard so much of. Can any one fancy a scene more beautiful than this before us? Where is the perfume more exquisite than these violets I now crush in my hand? The peasants, as they salute us, look happy and contented. Is it, then, only in great cities that men make each other miserable?”

Dinah shook her head, but did not speak.

“I am so glad grandpapa does not live in a city. Aunt, I am never wearied of hearing you talk of that dear cottage beside the river; and through all my present delight I feel a sense of impatience to be there, to be at ‘home.’”

“So that you will not hold us to our pledge to bring you back to Bramaigne, Fifine,” said Miss Dinah, smiling.

“Oh no, no! Not if you will let me live with you. Never!”

“But you have been happy up to this, Fifine? You have said over and over again that your convent life was dear to you, and all its ways pleasant.”

“It is just the same change to me to live as I now do, as in my heart I feel changed after reading out one of those delightful stories to grandpapa, – Rob Roy, for instance. It all tells of a world so much more bright and beautiful than I know of, that it seems as though new senses were given to me. It is so strange and so captivating, too, to hear of generous impulses, noble devotion, – of faith that never swerved, and love that never faltered.

“In novels, child; these were in novels.”

“True, aunt; but they had found no place there had they been incredible; at least, it is clear that he who tells the tale would have us believe it to be true.”

Miss Dinah had not been a convert to her brother’s notions as to Fifine’s readings; and she was now more disposed to doubt than ever. To overthrow of a sudden, as though by a great shock, all the stem realism of a cloister existence, and supply its place with fictitious incidents and people, seemed rash and perilous; but old Peter only thought of giving a full liberty to the imprisoned spirit, – striking off chain and fetter, and setting the captive free, – free in all the glorious liberty of a young imagination.

“Well, here comes grandpapa,” said Miss Dinah, “and, if I don’t mistake, with a book in his hand for one of your morning readings.”

Josephine ran eagerly to meet him, and, fondly drawing her arm within his own, came back at his side.

“The third volume, Fifine, the third volume,” said he, holding the book aloft. “Only think, child, what fates are enclosed within a third volume! What a deal of happiness or long-living misery are here included!”

She straggled to take the book from his hand, but he evaded her grasp, and placed it in his pocket, saying, —

“Not till evening, Fifine. I am bent on a long ramble up the Glen this morning, and you shall tell me all about the sisterhood, and sing me one of those little Latin canticles I’m so fond of.”

“Meanwhile, I ‘ll go and finish my letter to Polly Dill. I told her, Peter, that by Thursday next, or Friday, she might expect us.”

“I hope so, with all my heart; for, beautiful as all this is, it wants the greatest charm, – it’s not home! Then I want, besides, to see Fifine full of household cares.”

“Feeding the chickens instead of chasing the butterflies, Fifine. Totting up the house-bills, in lieu of sighing over ‘Waverley.’”

“And, if I know Fifine, she will be able to do one without relinquishing the other,” said Peter, gravely. “Our daily life is all the more beautiful when it has its landscape reliefs of light and shadow.”

“I think I could, too,” cried Fifine, eagerly. “I feel as though I could work in the fields and be happy, just in the conscious sense of doing what it was good to do, and what others would praise me for.”

“There’s a paymaster will never fail you in such hire,” said Miss Dinah, pointing to her brother; and then, turning away, she walked back to the little inn. As she drew nigh, the landlord came to tell her that a young gentleman, on seeing her name in the list of strangers, had made many inquiries after her, and begged he might be informed of her return. On learning that he was in the garden, she went thither at once.

“I felt it was you. I knew who had been asking for me, Mr. Conyers,” said she, advancing towards Fred with her hand out. “But what strange chance could have led you here?”

“You have just said it, Miss Barrington; a chance, – a mere chance. I had got a short leave fron| my regiment, and came abroad to wander about with no very definite object; but, growing impatient of the wearisome hordes of our countrymen on the Rhine, I turned aside yesterday from that great high-road and reached this spot, whose greatest charm – shall I own it? – was a fancied resemblance to a scene I loved far better.”