The Caxtons: A Family Picture — Complete

But of all those houses that in the street one passes by, unsuspicious of what’s the matter within, there is not one in a hundred but what there has been the devil to do to cure the chimneys of smoking! At that reflection Philosophy dismisses the subject, and decides that, whether one lives in a but or a palace, the first thing to do is to look to the hearth and get rid of the vapors.

New beauties demand us. What endless undulations in the various declivities and ascents,—here a slant, there a zigzag! With what majestic disdain yon roof rises up to the left! Doubtless a palace of Genii, or Gin (which last is the proper Arabic word for those builders of halls out of nothing, employed by Aladdin). Seeing only the roof of that palace boldly breaking the sky-line, how serene your contemplations! Perhaps a star twinkles over it, and you muse on soft eyes far away; while below at the threshold—No, phantoms! we see you not from our attic. Note, yonder, that precipitous fall,—how ragged and jagged the roof-scene descends in a gorge! He who would travel on foot through the pass of that defile, of which we see but the picturesque summits, stops his nose, averts his eyes, guards his pockets, and hurries along through the squalor of the grim London lazzaroni. But seen above, what a noble break in the sky-line! It would be sacrilege to exchange that fine gorge for a dead flat of dull rooftops. Look here, how delightful! that desolate house with no roof at all,—gutted and skinned by the last London fire! You can see the poor green-and-white paper still clinging to the walls, and the chasm that once was a cupboard, and the shadows gathering black on the aperture that once was a hearth! Seen below, how quickly you would cross over the way! That great crack forebodes an avalanche; you hold your breath, not to bring it down on your head. But seen above, what a compassionate, inquisitive charm in the skeleton ruin! How your fancy runs riot,—re-peopling the chambers, hearing the last cheerful good-night of that destined Pompeii, creeping on tiptoe with the mother when she gives her farewell look to the baby. Now all is midnight and silence; then the red, crawling serpent comes out. Lo! his breath; hark! his hiss. Now, spire after spire he winds and he coils; now he soars up erect,—crest superb, and forked tongue,—the beautiful horror! Then the start from the sleep, and the doubtful awaking, and the run here and there, and the mother’s rush to the cradle; the cry from the window, and the knock at the door, and the spring of those on high towards the stair that leads to safety below, and the smoke rushing up like the surge of a hell! And they run back stifled and blinded, and the floor heaves beneath them like a bark on the sea. Hark! the grating wheels thundering low; near and nearer comes the engine. Fix the ladders,—there! there! at the window, where the mother stands with the babe! Splash and hiss comes the water; pales, then flares out, the fire! Foe defies foe; element, element. How sublime is the war! But the ladder, the ladder,—there, at the window! All else are saved,—the clerk and his books; the lawyer with that tin box of title-deeds; the landlord, with his policy of insurance; the miser, with his bank-notes and gold: all are saved,—all but the babe and the mother. What a crowd in the streets; how the light crimsons over the gazers, hundreds on hundreds! All those faces seem as one face, with fear. Not a man mounts the ladder. Yes, there,—gallant fellow! God inspires, God shall speed thee! How plainly I see him! his eyes are closed, his teeth set. The serpent leaps up, the forked tongue darts upon him, and the reek of the breath wraps him round. The crowd has ebbed back like a sea, and the smoke rushes over them all. Ha! what dim forms are those on the ladder? Near and nearer,—crash come the roof-tiles! Alas and alas! no! a cry of joy,—a “Thank Heaven!” and the women force their way through the men to come round the child and the mother. All is gone save that skeleton ruin. But the ruin is seen from above. O Art! study life from the roof-tops!

CHAPTER III

I was again foiled in seeing Trevanion. It was the Easter recess, and he was at the house of one of his brother ministers somewhere in the North of England. But Lady Ellinor was in London, and I was ushered into her presence. Nothing could be more cordial than her manner, though she was evidently much depressed in spirits, and looked wan and careworn.

After the kindest inquiries relative to my parents and the Captain, she entered with much sympathy into my schemes and plans, which she said Trevanion had confided to her. The sterling kindness that belonged to my old patron (despite his affected anger at my not accepting his proffered loan) had not only saved me and my fellow-adventurer all trouble as to allotment orders, but procured advice as to choice of site and soil, from the best practical experience, which we found afterwards exceedingly useful. And as Lady Ellinor gave me the little packet of papers, with Trevanion’s shrewd notes on the margin, she said, with a half sigh, “Albert bids me say that he wishes he were as sanguine of his success in the Cabinet as of yours in the Bush.” She then turned to her husband’s rise and prospects, and her face began to change; her eyes sparkled, the color came to her cheeks. “But you are one of the few who know him,” she said, interrupting herself suddenly; “you know how he sacrifices all things,—joy, leisure, health,—to his country. There is not one selfish thought in his nature. And yet such envy,—such obstacles still! And”—her eyes dropped on her dress, and I perceived that she was in mourning, though the mourning was not deep—“and,” she added, “it has pleased Heaven to withdraw from his side one who would have been worthy his alliance.”

I felt for the proud woman, though her emotion seemed more that of pride than sorrow. And perhaps Lord Castleton’s highest merit in her eyes had been that of ministering to her husband’s power and her own ambition. I bowed my head in silence, and thought of Fanny. Did she, too, pine for the lost rank, or rather mourn the lost lover?

After a time I said, hesitatingly, “I scarcely presume to condole with you, Lady Ellinor, yet, believe me, few things ever shocked me like the death you allude to. I trust Miss Trevanion’s health has not much suffered. Shall I not see her before I leave England?”

Lady Ellinor fixed her keen bright eyes searchingly on my countenance, and perhaps the gaze satisfied her; for she held out her hand to me with a frankness almost tender, and said “Had I had a son, the dearest wish of my heart had been to see you wedded to my daughter.”

I started up; the blood rushed to my cheeks, and then left me pale as death. I looked reproachfully at Lady Ellinor, and the word “cruel!” faltered on my lips.

“Yes,” continued Lady Ellinor, mournfully, “that was my real thought, my impulse of regret, when I first saw you. But as it is, do not think me too hard and worldly if I quote the lofty old French proverb, Noblesse oblige. Listen to me, my young friend: we may never meet again, and I would not have your father’s son think unkindly of me, with all my faults. From my first childhood I was ambitious,—not, as women usually are, of mere wealth and rank, but ambitious as noble men are, of power and fame. A woman can only indulge such ambition by investing it in another. It was not wealth, it was not rank, that attracted me to Albert Trevanion: it was the nature that dispenses with the wealth and commands the rank. Nay,” continued Lady Ellinor, in a voice that slightly trembled, “I may have seen in my youth, before I knew Trevanion, one [she paused a moment, and went on hurriedly]—one who wanted but ambition to have realized my ideal. Perhaps even when I married—and it was said for love—I loved less with my whole heart than with my whole mind. I may say this now, for now every beat of this pulse is wholly and only true to him with whom I have schemed and toiled and aspired; with whom I have grown as one; with whom I have shared the struggle, and now partake the triumph, realizing the visions of my youth.”

Again the light broke from the dark eyes of this grand daughter of the world, who was so superb a type of that moral contradiction,—an ambitious woman.

“I cannot tell you,” resumed Lady Ellinor, softening, “how pleased I was when you came to live with us. Your father has perhaps spoken to you of me and of our first acquaintance!”

Lady Ellinor paused abruptly, and surveyed me as she paused. I was silent.

“Perhaps, too, he has blamed me?” she resumed, with a heightened color.

“He never blamed you, Lady Ellinor!”

“He had a right to do so,—though I doubt if he would have blamed me on the true ground. Yet no; he never could have done me the wrong that your uncle did when, long years ago, Mr. de Caxton in a letter—the very bitterness of which disarmed all anger—accused me of having trifled with Austin,—nay, with himself! And he, at least, had no right to reproach me,” continued Lady Ellinor warmly, and with a curve of her haughty lip; “for if I felt interest in his wild thirst for some romantic glory, it was but in the hope that what made the one brother so restless might at least wake the other to the ambition that would have become his intellect and aroused his energies. But these are old tales of follies and delusions now no more: only this will I say, that I have ever felt, in thinking of your father, and even of your sterner uncle, as if my conscience reminded me of a debt which I longed to discharge,—if not to them, to their children. So when we knew you, believe me that your interests, your career, instantly became to me an object. But mistaking you, when I saw your ardent industry bent on serious objects, and accompanied by a mind so fresh and buoyant, and absorbed as I was in schemes or projects far beyond a woman’s ordinary province of hearth and home, I never dreamed, while you were our guest,—never dreamed of danger to you or Fanny. I wound you,—pardon me; but I must vindicate myself. I repeat that if we had a son to inherit our name, to bear the burden which the world lays upon those who are born to influence the world’s destinies, there is no one to whom Trevanion and myself would sooner have intrusted the happiness of a daughter. But my daughter is the sole representative of the mother’s line, of the father’s name: it is not her happiness alone that I have to consult, it is her duty,—duty to her birthright, to the career of the noblest of England’s patriots; duty, I may say, without exaggeration, to the country for the sake of which that career is run!”

“Say no more, Lady Ellinor, say no more; I understand you. I have no hope, I never had hope—it was a madness—it is over. It is but as a friend that I ask again if I may see Miss Trevanion in your presence before—before I go alone into this long exile, to leave, perhaps, my dust in a stranger’s soil! Ay, look in my face,—you cannot fear my resolution, my honor, my truth! But once, Lady Ellinor,—but once more. Do I ask in vain?”

Lady Ellinor was evidently much moved. I bent down almost in the attitude of kneeling; and brushing away her tears with one hand, she laid the other on my head tenderly, and said in a very low voice,—

“I entreat you not to ask me; I entreat you not to see my daughter. You have shown that you are not selfish,—conquer yourself still. What if such an interview, however guarded you might be, were but to agitate, unnerve my child, unsettle her peace, prey upon—”

“Oh! do not speak thus,—she did not share my feelings!”

“Could her mother own it if she did? Come, come; remember how young you both are. When you return, all these dreams will be forgotten; then we can meet as before; then I will be your second mother, and again your career shall be my care: for do not think that we shall leave you so long in this exile as you seem to forbode. No, no; it is but an absence, an excursion,—not a search after fortune. Your fortune,—leave that to us when you return!”

“And I am to see her no more!” I murmured, as I rose, and went silently towards the window to conceal my face. The great struggles in life are limited to moments. In the drooping of the head upon the bosom, in the pressure of the hand upon the brow, we may scarcely consume a second in our threescore years and ten; but what revolutions of our whole being may pass within us while that single sand drops noiseless down to the bottom of the hour-glass!

I came back with firm step to Lady Ellinor, and said calmly: “My reason tells me that you are right, and I submit; forgive me! And do not think me ungrateful and overproud if I add that you must leave me still the object in life that consoles and encourages me through all.”

“What object is that?” asked Lady Ellinor, hesitatingly.

“Independence for myself, and ease to those for whom life is still sweet. This is my twofold object; and the means to effect it must be my own heart and my own hands. And now, convey all my thanks to your noble husband, and accept my warm prayers for yourself and her—whom I will not name. Farewell, Lady Ellinor!”

“No, do not leave me so hastily; I have many things to discuss with you,—at least to ask of you. Tell me how your father bears his reverse,—tell me at least if there be aught he will suffer us to do for him? There are many appointments in Trevanion’s range of influence that would suit even the wilful indolence of a man of letters. Come, be frank with me!”

I could not resist so much kindness; so I sat down, and as collectedly as I could, replied to Lady Ellinor’s questions, and sought to convince her that my father only felt his losses so far as they affected me, and that nothing in Trevanion’s power was likely to tempt him from his retreat, or calculated to compensate for a change in his habits. Turning at last from my parents, Lady Ellinor inquired for Roland, and on learning that he was with me in town, expressed a strong desire to see him. I told her I would communicate her wish, and she then said thoughtfully,—

“He has a son, I think; and I have heard that there is some unhappy dissension between them.”

“Who could have told you that?” I asked in surprise, knowing how closely Roland had kept the secret of his family afflictions.

“Oh! I heard so from some one who knew Captain Roland,—I forget when and where I heard it; but is it not the fact?”

“My uncle Roland has no son.”

“How!”

“His son is dead.”

“How such a loss must grieve him!”

I did not speak.

“But is he sure that his son is dead? What joy if he were mistaken,—if the son yet lived!”

“Nay, my uncle has a brave heart, and he is resigned. But, pardon me, have you heard anything of that son?”

“I!—what should I hear? I would fain learn, however, from your uncle himself what he might like to tell me of his sorrows—or if, indeed, there be any chance that—”

“That—what?”

“That—that his son still survives.”

“I think not,” said I; “and I doubt whether you will learn much from my uncle. Still, there is something in your words that belies their apparent meaning, and makes me suspect that you know more than you will say.”

“Diplomatist!” said Lady Ellinor, half smiling; but then, her face settling into a seriousness almost severe, she added,—“it is terrible to think that a father should hate his son!”

“Hate!—Roland hate his son! What calumny is this?”

“He does not do so, then! Assure me of that; I shall be so glad to know that I have been misinformed.”

“I can tell you this, and no more (for no more do I know), that if ever the soul of a father were wrapped up in a son,—fear, hope, gladness, sorrow, all reflected back on a father’s heart from the shadows on a son’s life,—Roland was that father while the son lived still.”

“I cannot disbelieve you!” exclaimed Lady Ellinor, though in a tone of surprise. “Well, do let me see your uncle.”

“I will do my best to induce him to visit you, and learn all that you evidently conceal from me.”

Lady Ellinor evasively replied to this insinuation, and shortly afterwards I left that house in which I had known the happiness that brings the folly, and the grief that bequeathes the wisdom.

CHAPTER IV

I had always felt a warm and almost filial affection for Lady Ellinor, independently of her relationship to Fanny, and of the gratitude with which her kindness inspired me; for there is an affection very peculiar in its nature, and very high in its degree, which results from the blending of two sentiments not often allied,—namely, pity and admiration. It was impossible not to admire the rare gifts and great qualities of Lady Ellinor, and not to feel pity for the cares, anxieties, and sorrows which tormented one who, with all the sensitiveness of woman, went forth into the rough world of man.

My father’s confession had somewhat impaired my esteem for Lady Ellinor, and had left on my mind the uneasy impression that she had trifled with his deep and Roland’s impetuous heart. The conversation that had just passed, allowed me to judge her with more justice, allowed me to see that she had really shared the affection she had inspired in the student, but that ambition had been stronger than love,—an ambition, it might be, irregular, and not strictly feminine, but still of no vulgar nor sordid kind. I gathered, too, from her hints and allusions her true excuse for Roland’s misconception of her apparent interest in himself; she had but seen, in the wild energies of the elder brother, some agency by which to arouse the serener faculties of the younger. She had but sought, in the strange comet that flashed before her, to fix a lever that might move the star. Nor could I withhold my reverence from the woman who, not being married precisely from love, had no sooner linked her nature to one worthy of it, than her whole life became as fondly devoted to her husband as if he had been the object of her first romance and her earliest affections. If even her child was so secondary to her husband; if the fate of that child was but regarded by her as one to be rendered subservient to the grand destinies of Trevanion,—still it was impossible to recognize the error of that conjugal devotion without admiring the wife, though one might condemn the mother. Turning from these meditations, I felt a lover’s thrill of selfish joy, amidst all the mournful sorrow comprised in the thought that I should see Fanny no more. Was it true, as Lady Ellinor implied, though delicately, that Fanny still cherished a remembrance of me which a brief interview, a last farewell, might reawaken too dangerously for her peace? Well, that was a thought that it became me not to indulge.

What could Lady Ellinor have heard of Roland and his son? Was it possible that the lost lived still? Asking myself these questions, I arrived at our lodgings, and saw the Captain himself before me, busied with the inspection of sundry specimens of the rude necessaries an Australian adventurer requires. There stood the old soldier, by the window, examining narrowly into the temper of hand-saw and tenon-saw, broad-axe and drawing-knife; and as I came up to him, he looked at me from under his black brows with gruff compassion, and said peevishly,—

“Fine weapons these for the son of a gentleman! One bit of steel in the shape of a sword were worth them all.”

“Any weapon that conquers fate is noble in the hands of a brave man, uncle.”

“The boy has an answer for everything,” quoth the Captain, smiling, as he took out his purse and paid the shopman.

When we were alone, I said to him: “Uncle, you must go and see Lady Ellinor; she desires me to tell you so.”

“Pshaw!”

“You will not?”

“No!”

“Uncle, I think that she has something to say to you with regard to—to—pardon me!—to my cousin.”

“To Blanche?”

“No, no; the cousin I never saw.”

Roland turned pale, and sinking down on a chair, faltered out—“To him,—to my son?”

“Yes; but I do not think it is news that will afflict you. Uncle, are you sure that my cousin is dead?”

“What!—how dare you!—who doubts it? Dead,—dead to me forever! Boy, would you have him live to dishonor these gray hairs?”

“Sir, sir, forgive me,—uncle, forgive me. But pray go to see Lady Ellinor; for whatever she has to say, I repeat that I am sure it will be nothing to wound you.”

“Nothing to wound me, yet relate to him!”

It is impossible to convey to the reader the despair that was in those words.

“Perhaps,” said I, after a long pause and in a low voice, for I was awe-stricken, “perhaps—if he be dead—he may have repented of all offence to you before he died.”

“Repented—ha, ha!”

“Or if he be not dead—”

“Hush, boy, hush!”

“While there is life, there is hope of repentance.”

“Look you, nephew,” said the Captain, rising, and folding his arms resolutely on his breast,—“look you, I desired that that name might never be breathed. I have not cursed my son yet; could he come to life—the curse might fall! You do not know what torture your words have given me just when I had opened my heart to another son, and found that son in you. With respect to the lost, I have now but one prayer, and you know it,—the heart-broken prayer that his name never more may come to my ears!”

As he closed these words, to which I ventured no reply, the Captain took long, disordered strides across the room; and suddenly, as if the space imprisoned, or the air stifled him, he seized his hat and hastened into the streets. Recovering my surprise and dismay, I ran after him; but he commanded me to leave him to his own thoughts, in a voice so stern, yet so sad, that I had no choice but to obey. I knew, by my own experience, how necessary is solitude in the moments when grief is strongest and thought most troubled.

CHAPTER V

Hours elapsed, and the Captain had not returned home. I began to feel uneasy, and went forth in search of him, though I knew not whither to direct my steps. I thought it, however, at least probable that he had not been able to resist visiting Lady Ellinor, so I went first to St. James’s Square. My suspicions were correct; the Captain had been there two hours before. Lady Ellinor herself had gone out shortly after the Captain left. While the porter was giving me this information, a carriage stopped at the door, and a footman, stepping up, gave the porter a note and a small parcel, seemingly of books, saying simply, “From the Marquis of Castleton.” At the sound of that name I turned hastily, and recognized Sir Sedley Beaudesert seated in the carriage and looking out of the window with a dejected, moody expression of countenance, very different from his ordinary aspect, except when the rare sight of a gray hair or a twinge of the toothache reminded him that he was no longer twenty-five. Indeed, the change was so great that I exclaimed dubiously,—“Is that Sir Sedley Beaudesert?” The footman looked at me, and touching his hat, said, with a condescending smile, “Yes, sir, now the Marquis of Castleton.”

Then, for the first time since the young lord’s death, I remembered Sir Sedley’s expressions of gratitude to Lady Castleton and the waters of Ems for having saved him from “that horrible marquisate.” Meanwhile my old friend had perceived me, exclaiming,—

“What! Mr. Caxton? I am delighted to see you. Open the door, Thomas. Pray come in, come in.”

I obeyed, and the new Lord Castleton made room for me by his side.

“Are you in a hurry?” said he. “If so, shall I take you anywhere? If not, give me half an hour of your time while I drive to the city.”

As I knew not now in what direction more than another to prosecute my search for the Captain, and as I thought I might as well call at our lodgings to inquire if he had not returned, I answered that I should be very happy to accompany his lordship; “Though the City,” said I, smiling, “sounds to me strange upon the lips of Sir Sedley—I beg pardon, I should say of Lord—”