Johnny Ludlow, Second Series

Well, Temple was taken there and a doctor was called in. The doctor shook his head, looked grave, and asked to have another doctor. Then, for the first time, doubts stole over us that it might be more serious than we had thought for. A dreadful feeling of fear took possession of me, and, in spite of all I could do, that scene at Oxford, when poor Fred Temple had been carried into old Mrs. Golding’s to die, would not go out of my mind.

We got into our reserve clothes, as if conscious that the boating flannels were done with for the present, left one of the farmer’s men to watch our boat and things, and stayed with Temple. He continued very faint, and lay almost motionless. The doctors tried some remedies, but they did no good. He did not revive. One of them called it “syncope of the heart;” but the other said hastily, “No, no, that was not the right name.” It struck me that perhaps they did not know what the right name was. At last they said Mrs. Temple had better be sent for.

“I was just thinking so,” cried Rupert. “My mother ought to be here. Who will go for her?”

“Johnny can,” said Tod. “He is of no good here.”

For that matter, none of us were any good, for we could do nothing for Temple.

I did not relish the task: I did not care to tell a mother that her son, whom she believes is well and hearty, is lying in danger. But I had to go: Rupert seemed to take it as a matter of course.

“Don’t alarm her more than you can help, Ludlow,” he said. “Say that Slingsby turned faint in the water this morning, and the medical men seem anxious. But ask her not to lose time.”

Mr. Best started me on his own horse—a fine hunter, iron-grey. The weather was broiling. Templemore lay right across country, about six miles off by road. It was a beautiful place; I could see that much, though I had but little time to look at it; and it stood upon an eminence, the last mile of the road winding gradually up to its gates.

As ill-luck had it, or perhaps good-luck—I don’t know which—Mrs. Temple was at one of the windows, and saw me ride hastily in. Having a good memory of faces, she recollected mine. Knowing that I had started with her sons in the boat, she was seized with a prevision that something was wrong, and came out before I was well off the horse.

“It is Mr. Ludlow, I think,” she said, her plain dark face (so much like Slingsby’s) very pale. “What ill news have you brought?”

I told her in the best manner I was able, just in the words Rupert had suggested, speaking quietly, and not showing any alarm in my own manner.

“Is there danger?” she at once asked.

“I am not sure that there is,” I said, hardly knowing how to frame my answer. “The doctors thought you had better come, in case—in case of danger arising; and Rupert sent me to ask you to do so.”

She rang the bell, and ordered her carriage to be round instantly. “The bay horses,” she added: “they are the fleetest. What will you take, Mr. Ludlow?”

I would not take anything. But a venerable old gentleman in black, with a powdered bald head—the butler, I concluded—suggested some lemonade, after my hot ride: and that I was glad of.

I rode on first, piloting the way for the carriage, which contained Mrs. Temple. She came alone: her daughter was away on a visit—as I had learnt from Rupert.

Slingsby lay in the same state, neither better nor worse: perhaps the breathing was somewhat more difficult. He smiled when he saw his mother, and put out his hand.

The day dragged itself slowly on. We did not know what to do with ourselves; that was a fact. Temple was to be kept quiet, and we might not intrude into his room—one on the ground-floor that faced the east: not even Rupert. Mr. and Mrs. Best entertained us well as far as meals went, but one can’t be eating for ever. Now down in the meadow by the boat—which seemed to have assumed a most forlorn aspect—and now hovering about the farm, waiting for the last report of Temple. In that way the day crept through.

“Is it here that Mr. Temple is lying?”

I was standing under the jessamine-covered porch, sheltering my head from the rays of the setting sun, when a stranger came up and put the question. An extraordinarily tall, thin man, with grey hair, clerical coat, and white neckcloth.

It was the Reverend Mr. Webster, perpetual curate of the parish around Templemore. And I seemed to know him before I heard his name, for he was the very image of his son, Long Webster, who used to be at Oxford.

“I am so grieved not to have been able to get here before,” he said; “but I had just gone out for some hours when Mrs. Temple’s message was brought to the Parsonage. Is he any better?”

“I am afraid not,” I answered. “We don’t know what to make of it; it all seems so sudden and strange.”

“But what is it?” he asked in a whisper.

“I don’t know, sir. The doctors have said something about the heart.”

“I should like to see the doctors before I go in to Mrs. Temple. Are they here?”

“One of them is, I think. They have been going in and out all day.”

I fetched the doctor out to him; and they talked together in low tones in the shaded and quiet porch. Not a ray of hope sat on the medical man’s face: he as good as intimated that Temple was dying.

“Dear me!” cried the dismayed Mr. Webster.

“He seems to know it himself,” continued the doctor. “At least, we fancy so, I and my brother-practitioner. Though we have been most cautious not to alarm him by any hint of the kind.”

“I should like to see him,” said the parson. “I suppose I can?”

He went in, and was shut up for some time alone with Temple. Yes, he said, when he came out again, Temple knew all about it, and was perfectly resigned and prepared.

You may be sure there was no bed for any of us that night. Temple’s breathing grew worse; and at last we went in by turns, one of us at a time, to prop up the pillows behind, and keep them propped; it seemed to make it firmer and easier for him as he lay against them. Towards morning I was called in to replace Rupert. The shaded candle seemed to be burning dim.

“You can lie down, my dear,” Mrs. Temple whispered to Rupert. “Should there be any change, I will call you.”

He nodded, and left the room. Not to lie down. Only to sit over the kitchen fire with Tod, and so pass away the long hours of discomfort.

“Who is this now?” panted Slingsby, as I took my place.

“It is I. Johnny Ludlow. Do you feel any better?”

He made a little sound of dissent in answer.

“Nay, I think you look easier, my dear,” said Mrs. Temple, gently.

“No, no,” he said, just opening his eyes. “Do not grieve, mother. I shall be better off. I shall be with my father and Fred.”

“Oh, my son, my son, don’t lose heart!” she said, with a sob. “That will never do.”

“I saw my father last night,” said Temple.

The words seemed to strike her with a sort of shock. “No!” she exclaimed, perhaps thinking of the Temple superstition, and drawing back a step. “Pray, pray don’t fancy that!”

“The tent was open to give us air,” he said, speaking with difficulty. “I suddenly saw some one standing in the moonlight. I was next the opening; and I had not been able to get to sleep. For a moment I thought it was some man, some intruder passing by; but he took a strange likeness to my father, and I thought he beckoned–”

“We are not alone, Slingsby,” interrupted Mrs. Temple, remembering me, her voice cold, not to say haughty.

“Ludlow knows. He knew the last time. Fred said he saw him, and I—I ridiculed it. Ludlow heard me. My father came for Fred, mother; he must have come for me.”

“Oh, I can’t—I can’t believe this, Slingsby,” she cried, in some excitement. “It was fancy—nervousness; nothing else. My darling, I cannot lose you! You have ever been dearer to me than my other children.”

“Only for a little while, mother. It is God’s will. That is our true home, you know; and then there will be no more parting. I am quite happy. I seem to be half there now. What is that light?”

Mrs. Temple looked round, and saw a faint streak coming in over the tops of the shutters. “It must be the glimmering of dawn in the east,” she said. “The day is breaking.”

“Ay,” he answered: “my day. Where’s Rupert? I should like to say good-bye to him. Yes, mother, that’s the dawn of heaven.”

And just as the sun rose, he went there.

That was the end of our boating tour. Ridicule has been cast on some of the facts, and will be again. It is a painful subject; and I don’t know that I should have related it, but for its having led to another (and more lively) adventure, which I proceed to tell of.

XVIII.

ROSE LODGE

It looked the prettiest place imaginable, lying under the sunlight, as we stood that first morning in front of the bay. The water was smooth and displayed lovely colours: now green, now blue, as the clouds passed over the face of the sky, now taking tinges of brown and amber; and towards evening it would be pink and purple. Further on, the waters were rippling and shining in the sun. Fishing-vessels stood out at sea, plying their craft; little cockle-shells, their white sails set, disported on it; rowing boats glided hither and thither. In the distance the grand waves of the sea were ebbing and flowing; a noble merchant-man, all her canvas filled, was passing proudly on her outward-bound course.

“I should like to live here,” cried Tod, turning away at last.

And I’m sure I felt that I should. For I could watch the ever-changing sea from morning to night and not tire of it.

“Suppose we remain here, Johnny?”

“To live?”

“Nonsense, lad! For a month. I am going for a sail. Will you come?”

After the terrible break-up of our boating tour, poor Slingsby Temple was taken home to Templemore, ourselves going back to Sanbury to wait for the funeral, and for our black garments, for which we had sent. Rupert was fearfully cut up. Although he was the heir now, and would be chief of Templemore, I never saw any brother take a death more to heart. “Slingsby liked you much, Ludlow,” said Rupert to me, when he came to us at the inn at Sanbury the day before the funeral, and the hot tears were in his eyes as he spoke. “He always liked you at Oxford: I have heard him say so. Like himself, you kept yourself free from the lawlessness of the place–”

“As if a young one like Johnny would go in for anything of the kind!” interrupted Tod.

“Young?” repeated Rupert Temple. “Well, I don’t know. When I was there myself, some young ones—lads—went in for a pretty good deal. He liked you much, Ludlow.”

And somehow I liked to hear Rupert say it.

Quitting Sanbury after the funeral, we came to this little place, Cray Bay, which was on the sea-coast, a few miles beyond Templemore. Our pleasure cut short at the beginning of the holiday, we hardly knew what to do with the rest of it, and felt like a couple of fish suddenly thrown out of water. Mrs. Temple, taking her son and daughter, went for change to her brother’s, Lord Cracroft.

At Cray Bay we found one small inn, which bore the odd sign of the Whistling Wind, and was kept by Mrs. Jones, a stout Welshwoman. The bedroom she gave us enjoyed a look-out upon some stables, and would not hold much more than the two small beds in it. In answer to Tod’s remonstrances, she said that she had a better room, but it was just now occupied.

The discomforts of the lodging were forgotten when we strolled out to look about us, and saw the beauties of the sea and bay. Cray Bay was a very primitive spot: little else than a decent fishing-place. It had not then been found out by the tour-taking world. Its houses were built anyhow and anywhere; its shops could be counted on your fingers: a butcher’s, a baker’s, a grocer’s, and so on. Fishermen called at the doors with fish, and countrywomen with butter and fowls. There was no gas, and the place at night was lighted with oil-lamps. A trout-stream lay at the back of the village, half-a-mile away.

Stepping into a boat, on this first morning, for the sail proposed by Tod, we found its owner a talkative old fellow. His name was Druff, he said; he had lived at Cray Bay most of his life, and knew every inch of its land and every wave of its sea. There couldn’t be a nicer spot to stop at for the summer, as he took it; no, not if you searched the island through: and he supposed it was first called Cray Bay after the cray-fish, they being caught in plenty there.

“More things than one are called oddly in this place,” remarked Tod. “Look at that inn: the Whistling Wind; what’s that called after?”

“And so the wind do hoostle on this here coast; ‘deed an’ it do,” returned Druff. “You’d not forget it if you heered it in winter.”

The more we saw of Cray Bay that day, the more we liked it. Its retirement just suited our mood, after the experience of only four or five days back: for I can tell you that such a shock is not to be forgotten all in a moment. And when we went up to bed that night, Tod had made up his mind to stay for a time if lodgings could be found.

“Not in this garret, that you can’t swing a cat in,” said he, stretching out his hands towards the four walls. “Madame Jones won’t have me here another night if I can help it.”

“No. Our tent in the meadow was ten times livelier.”

“Are there any lodgings to be had in this place?” asked Tod of the slip-shod maid-servant, when we were at breakfast the next morning. But she professed not to know of any.

“But, Tod, what would they say at home to our staying here?” I asked after awhile, certain doubts making themselves heard in my conscience.

“What they chose,” said Tod, cracking his fourth egg.

“I am afraid the pater–”

“Now, Johnny, you need not put in your word,” he interrupted, in the off-hand tone that always silenced me. “It’s not your affair. We came out for a month, and I am not going back home, like a bad sixpence returned, before the month has expired. Perhaps I shall tack a few weeks on to it. I am not dependent on the pater’s purse.”

No; for he had his five hundred pounds lying untouched at the Worcester Old Bank, and his cheque-book in his pocket.

Breakfast over, we went out to look for lodgings; but soon feared it might be a hopeless search. Two little cottages had a handboard stuck on a stick in the garden, with “Lodgings” on it. But the rooms in each proved to be a tiny sitting-room and a more tiny bedroom, smaller than the garret at the Whistling Wind.

“I never saw such a world as this,” cried Tod, as we paced disconsolately before the straggling dwellings in front of the bay. “If you want a thing you can’t get it.”

“We might find rooms in those houses yonder,” I said, nodding towards some scattered about in the distance. “They must be farms.”

“Who wants to live a mile off?” he retorted. “It’s the place itself I like, and the bay, and the– Oh, by George! Look there, Johnny!”

We had come to the last house in the place—a fresh-looking, charming cottage, with a low roof and a green verandah, that we had stopped to admire yesterday. It faced the bay, and stood by itself in a garden that was a perfect bower of roses. The green gate bore the name “Rose Lodge,” and in the parlour window appeared a notice “To Let;” which notice, we both felt sure, had not been there the previous day.

“Fancy their having rooms to let here!” cried Tod. “The nicest little house in all the place. How lucky!”

In he went impulsively, striding up the short gravel-path, which was divided from the flower-beds by two rows of sea-shells, and knocked at the door. It was opened by a tall grenadier of a female, rising six feet, with a spare figure and sour face. She had a large cooking-apron on, dusted with flour.

“You have lodgings to let,” said Tod; “can I see them?”

“Lodgings to let?” she repeated, scanning us up and down attentively; and her voice sounded harsh and rasping. “I don’t know that we have. You had better see Captain Copperas.”

She threw open the door of the parlour: a small, square, bright-looking room, rather full of furniture; a gay carpet, a cottage piano, and some green chairs being among the articles.

Captain Copperas came forward: a retired seaman, as we heard later; tall as the grenadier, and with a brown, weather-beaten face. But in voice and manners he, at any rate, did not resemble her, for they were just as pleasant as they could be.

“I have no lodgings,” said he; “my servant was mistaken. My house is to let; and the furniture to be taken too.”

Which announcement was of course a check to Tod. He sat looking very blank, and then explained that we only required lodgings. We had been quite charmed with Cray Bay, and would like to stay in it for a month or so: and that it was his misapprehension, not the servant’s.

“It’s a pity but you wanted a little house,” said Captain Copperas. “This is the most compact, desirable, perfect little dwelling mortal man ever was in. Rent twenty-six pounds a-year only, furniture to be bought out-and-out for a hundred and twenty-five. It would be a little Eden—a paradise—to those who had the means to take it.”

As he spoke, he regarded us individually and rather pointedly. It looked as much as to doubt whether we had the means. Tod (conscious of his five hundred pounds in the bank) threw his head up.

“Oh, I have the means,” said he, as haughtily as poor Slingsby Temple had ever spoken. “Johnny, did you put any cards in your pocket? Give Captain Copperas one.”

I laid one of Tod’s cards on the table. The captain took it up.

“It’s a great grief to me to leave the house,” he remarked. “Especially after having been only a few months in it!—and laying in a stock of the best furniture in a plain way, purchased in the best market! Downright grief.”

“Then why do you leave it?” naturally asked Tod.

“Because I have to go afloat again,” said the sailor, his face taking a rueful expression. “I thought I had given up the sea for good; but my old employers won’t let me give it up. They know my value as a master, and have offered me large terms for another year or two of service. A splendid new East Indiaman, two thousand tons register, and—and, in short, I don’t like to be ungrateful, so I have said I’ll go.”

“Could you not keep on the house until you come back?”

“My sister won’t let me keep it on. Truth to say, she never cared for the sea, and wants to get away from it. That exquisite scene”—extending his hand towards the bay, and to a steamer working her way onwards near the horizon—“has no charms for Miss Copperas; and she intends to betake herself off to our relatives in Leeds. No: I can only give the place up, and dispose of the furniture to whomsoever feels inclined to take it. It will be a fine sacrifice. I shall not get the one half of the money I gave for it: don’t look to. And all of it as good as new!”

I could read Tod’s face as a book, and the eager look in his eyes. He was thinking how much he should like to seize upon the tempting bargain; to make the pretty room we sat in, and the prettier prospect yonder, his own. Captain Copperas appeared to read him also.

“You are doubting whether to close with the offer or not,” he said, with a frank smile. “You might make it yours for a hundred and twenty-five pounds. Perhaps—pardon me; you are both but young—you may not have the sum readily at command?”

“Oh yes, I have,” said Tod, candidly. “I have it lying at my banker’s, in Worcester. No, it’s not for that reason I hesitate. It is—it is—fancy me with a house on my hands!” he broke off, turning to me with a laugh.

“It is an offer that you will never be likely to meet with again, sir.”

“But what on earth could I do with the house and the things afterwards—allowing that we stayed here for a month or two?” urged Tod.

“Why, dispose of them again, of course,” was the ready answer of Captain Copperas. “You’d find plenty of people willing to purchase, and to take the house off your hands. Such an opportunity as this need not go begging. I only wish I had not to be off all in a jiffy; I should make a very different bargain.”

“I’ll think of it,” said Tod, as we got up to leave. “I must say it is a nice little nest.”

In the doorway we encountered a tall lady with a brown face and a scarlet top-knot. She wore a thick gold chain, and bracelets to match.

“My sister, Miss Copperas,” said the captain. And he explained to her in a few words our business, and the purport of what had passed.

“For goodness’ sake, don’t lose the opportunity!” cried she, impressively affectionate, as though she had known us all our lives. “So advantageous an offer was never made to any one before: and but for my brother’s obstinately and wickedly deciding to go off to that wretched sea again, it would not be made now. Yes, Alexander,” turning to him, “I do call it quite wicked. Only think, sir”—to Tod—“a house full of beautiful furniture, every individual thing that a family can want; a piano here, a table-cloth press in the kitchen; plate, linen, knives, forks; a garden full of roses and a roller for the paths; and all to go for the miserably inadequate sum of a hundred and twenty-five pounds! But that’s my brother all over. He’s a true sailor. Setting himself up in a home to-day, and selling it off for an old song to-morrow.”

“Well, well, Fanny,” he said, when he could get a word in edgeways to stem the torrent of eloquence, “I have agreed to go, and I must go.”

“Have you been over the house?” she resumed, in the same voluble manner. “No? Then do pray come and see it. Oh, don’t talk of trouble. This is the dining-room,” throwing open a door behind her.

It was a little side-room, looking up the coast and over the fields; just enough chairs and tables in it for use. Upstairs we found three chambers, with their beds and other things. It all looked very comfortable, and I thought Captain Copperas was foolish to ask so small a sum.

“This is the linen closet,” said Miss Copperas, opening a narrow door at the top of the stairs, and displaying some shelves that seemed to be well-filled. “Sheets, table-cloths, dinner-napkins, towels, pillow-cases; everything for use. Anybody, taking the house, has only to step in, hang up his hat, and find himself at home. Look at those plates and dishes!” she ran on, as we got down again and entered the kitchen. “They are very nice—and enough to dine ten people.”

They were of light blue ware, and looked nice enough on the dresser shelves. The grenadier stood at the table, chopping parsley on a trencher, and did not condescend to take any notice of us.

Out in the garden next, amidst the roses—which grew all round the house, clustering everywhere. They were of that species called the cabbage-rose: large, and fragrant, and most beautiful. It made me think of the Roses by Bendemeer’s stream.

“I should like the place of all things!” cried Tod, as we strolled towards the bay for a sail; and found Druff seated in his boat, smoking. “I say, Druff, do you know Captain Copperas? Get in, Johnny.”

“Lives next door to me, at Rose Lodge,” answered Druff.

“Next door! What, is that low whitewashed shanty your abode? How long has Copperas lived here?”

“A matter of some months,” said Druff. “He came in the spring.”

“Are they nice kind of people?”

“They be civil to me,” answered Druff. “Sent my old missis a bottle o’ wine in, and some hot broth t’ other day, when she was ill. The captain–”

A sudden lurch put a stop to the discourse, and in a few minutes we glided out of the bay, Tod sitting in a brown reverie, his gaze fixed on the land and on Rose Lodge.

“My mind’s made up, Johnny. I shall take the place.”

I dropped my knife and fork in very astonishment. Our sail over, we were at dinner in the bar-parlour of the Whistling Wind.

“Surely you won’t do it, Tod!”

“Surely I shall, lad. I never saw such a nice little nest in all my life. And there’s no risk; you heard what Copperas said; I shall get my money back again when we want to leave it.”

“Look here, Tod: I was thinking a bit whilst we sat in the boat. Does it not seem to you to be too good to be genuine?”

It was Tod’s turn now to drop his knife and fork: and he did it angrily. “Just tell me what you mean, Johnny Ludlow.”

“All that furniture, and the piano, and the carpets, and the plate and linen: it looks such a heap to be going for only a hundred and twenty-five pounds.”

“Well?”

“I can’t think that Copperas means it.”

“Not mean it! Why, you young muff? There are the things, and he has offered them to me. If Copperas chooses to part with them for half their value, is it my place to tell him he’s a fool? The poor man is driven into a corner through want of time. Sailors are uncommonly improvident.”