The Three Brides

“Yes.  Wouldn’t he be flattered to hear of the stunning excitement when they heard of Captain Bowater, and how the old lady, their mother, talked by the yard about him?  You’ll get a welcome indeed when you come, old fellow.  When shall it be?”

“No, thank you, Phil,” said Herbert, gravely.  “I shall come back here as soon as I am well enough.  But there is one thing I wish you would do for me.”

“Well, what?  I’ll speak about having any horse you please taken up for you to ride; I came over on Brown Ben, but he would shake you too much.”

“No, no, it’s about a young fellow.  If you could take him back to York to enlist—”

“My dear Herbert, I ain’t a recruiting-sergeant.”

“No, but it might be the saving of him,” said Herbert, raising himself and speaking with more animation.  “It is Harry Hornblower.”

“Why, that’s the chap that bagged your athletic prizes!  Whew!  Rather strong, ain’t it, Joan!”

“He did no such thing,” said Herbert, rather petulantly; “never dreamt of it.  He only was rather a fool in talking of them—vaunting of me, I believe, as not such a bad fellow for a parson; so his friends got out of him where to find them.  But they knew better than to take him with them.  Tell him, Jenny; he won’t believe me.”

“It is quite true, Phil,” said Jenny, “the poor fellow did get into bad company at the races, but that was all.  He did not come home that night, but he was stupefied with drink and the beginning of the fever, and it was proved—perfectly proved—that he was fast asleep at a house at Backsworth when the robbery was committed, and he was as much shocked about it as any one—more, I am sure, than Herbert, who was so relieved on finding him clear of it, that he troubled himself very little about the things.  And now he has had the fever—not very badly—and he is quite well now, but he can’t get anything to do.  Truelove turned him off before the races for hanging about at the Three Pigeons, and nobody will employ him.  I do think it is true what they say—his mother, and Julius, and Herbert, and all—that he has had a lesson, and wants to turn over a new leaf, but the people here won’t let him.  Julius and Herbert want him to enlist, and I believe he would, but his mother—as they all do—thinks that the last degradation; but she might listen if Captain Bowater came and told her about his own regiment—cavalry too—and the style of men in it—and it is the only chance for him.”

Philip made a wry face.

“You see I took him up and let him down,” said Herbert, sadly and earnestly.

“I really do believe,” said Jenny, clenching the matter, “that Herbert would get well much faster if Harry Hornblower were off his mind.”

Phil growled, and his younger brother and sister knew that they would do their cause no good by another word.  There was an odd shyness about them all.  The elder brother had not yet said anything about Jenny’s prospects, and only asked after the party at the Hall.

“All nearly well, except Frank’s deafness,” said Jenny.  “In a day or two he is going up to London to consult an aurist, and see whether he can keep his clerkship.  Miles is going with him, and Rosamond takes Terry up to see his brother in London, and then, I believe, she is going on to get rooms at Rockpier, while Miles comes home to fetch his mother there.”

“Mrs. Poynsett!” with infinite wonder.

“Oh yes, all this has really brought out much more power of activity in her.  You know it was said that there was more damage to the nervous system than anything else, and the shock has done her good.  Besides, Miles is so much less timid about her than dear Raymond, who always handled her like a cracked teapot, and never having known much of any other woman, did not understand what was good for her.”

“Miles has more pith in him than ever poor old Raymond had,” said Phil.  “Poor old Poynsett, I used to think he wanted to be spoony on you, Joan, if he had only known his own mind.  If he had, I suppose he would have been alive now!”

“What a pleasing situation for Jenny!” Herbert could not help muttering.

“Much better than running after ostriches in the wilderness,” quoth Philip.  “You ride them double, don’t you?”

“Two little negro boys at a time,” replied Jenny, “according to the nursery-book.  Will you come and try, Phil?”

“You don’t mean to go out?”

“I don’t know,” said Jenny; “it depends on how mamma is, and how Edith gets on.”

Philip gave a long whistle of dismay.  Herbert looked at him wistfully, longing to hear him utter some word of congratulation or sympathy with his sister; but none was forthcoming.  Philip had disliked the engagement originally—never had cared for Archie Douglas, and was not melted now that Jenny was more valuable than ever.  She knew him too well to expect it of him, and did not want to leave him to vex Herbert by any expression of his opinion on the matter, and on this account, as well as on that of the fatigue she saw on her patient’s features, she refused his kind offer of keeping guard while she went in the afternoon to church, adding that Herbert must rest, as Mrs. Duncombe was coming afterwards to take leave of him.

Philip shrugged his shoulders in horror, and declared that he should not return again till that was over; but he should look in again before he went home to settle about Herbert’s coming to York.

“York!” said Herbert, with a gasp, as Jenny brought his jelly, and arranged his pillows for a rest, while the dragoon’s boots resounded on the stairs.  “Please tell him to say no more about it.  I want them all to understand that I’m not going in for that sort of thing any more.”

“My dear, I think you had better not say things hotly and rashly; you may feel so very differently by and by.”

“I know that,” said Herbert; “but after all it is only what my ordination vows mean, though I did not see it then.  And this year must be a penance year; I had made up my mind to that before I fell ill.”

“Only you must get well,” said Jenny.

“That takes care of itself when one is sound to begin with,” said Herbert.  “And now that I have been brought back again, and had my eyes opened, and have got another trial given me, it would be double shame to throw it away.”

“I don’t think you will do that.”

“I only pray that all that seems burnt out of me by what I have seen, and heard, and felt, may not come back with my strength.”

“I could hardly pray that for you, Herbert,” said Jenny.  “Spirits are wanted to bear a clergyman through his work, and though you are quite right not to go in for those things, I should be sorry if you never enjoyed what came in your way.”

“If I never was tempted.”

“It need not be temptation.  It would not be if your mind were full of your work—it would only be refreshment.  I don’t want my boy to turn stern, and dry, and ungenial.  That would not be like your Rector.”

“My Rector did not make such a bad start, and can trust himself better,” said Herbert.  “Come, Jenny, don’t look at me in that way.  You can’t wish me to go to York, and meet those rattling girls again?”

“No, certainly not, though Sister Margaret told Rosamond they had never had such a sobering lesson in their lives as their share in the mischief to you.”

“It was not their fault,” said Herbert.  “It was deeper down than that.  And they were good girls after all, if one only had had sense.”

“Oh!—”

“Nonsense, Jenny,” with a little smile, as he read her face, “I’m not bitten—no—but they, and poor Lady Tyrrell, and all are proof enough that it is easy to turn my head, and that I am one who ought to keep out of that style of thing for the future.  So do silence Phil, for you know when he gets a thing into his head how he goes on, and I do not think I can bear it now.”

“I am sure you can’t,” said Jenny, emphatically, “and I’ll do my best.  Only, Herbie, dear, do one thing for me, don’t bind yourself by any regular renunciations of moderate things now your mind is excited, and you are weak.  I am sure Julius or Dr. Easterby would say so.”

“I’ll think,” said Herbert.  “But if I am forgiven for this year, nothing seems to me too much to give up to the Great Shepherd to show my sorrow.  ‘Feed My sheep’ was the way He bade St. Peter prove his love.”

Jenny longed to say it was feeding the sheep rather than self-privation, but she was not sure of her ground, and Herbert’s low, quiet, soft voice went to her heart.  There were two great tears on his cheeks, he shut his eyes as if to keep back any more, and turned his face inwards on the sofa, his lips still murmuring over ‘Feed My sheep.’  She looked at him, feeling as if, while her heart had wakened to new glad hopes of earth, her brother, in her fulfilled prayer, had soared beyond her.  They were both quite still till Mrs. Duncombe came to the door.

She was at the Rectory, her house being dismantled, and she, having stayed till the last case of fever was convalescent, and the Sisters recalled, was to go the next day to her mother-in-law’s.  She was almost as much altered as Herbert himself.  Her jaunty air had given way to something equally energetic, but she looked wiry and worn, and her gold pheasant’s crest had become little more than a sandy wisp, as she came quietly in and took the hand that Herbert held out to her, saying how glad she was to see him on the mend.

He asked after some of the people whom they had attended together, and listened to the details, asking specially after one or two families, where one or both parents had been taken away.  “Poor Cecil Poynsett is undertaking them,” was the answer in each case.  Some had been already sent to orphanages; others were boarded out till places could be found for them; and the Sisters had taken charge of two.

Then one widow was to ‘do for’ the Vicar, who had taken solitary possession of the Vicarage, but would soon be joined there by one or more curates.  He had been inducted into the ruinous chancel of the poor old church, had paid the architect of the Rat-house fifty pounds (a sum just equalling the proceeds of the bazaar) to be rid of his plans; had brought down a first-rate architect; and in the meantime was working the little iron church vigorously.

“Everything seems to be beginning there just as I go into exile!” said Mrs. Duncombe.  “It seems odd that I should have to go from what I have only just learnt to prize.  But you have taught mo a good deal—”

“Every one must have learnt a good deal,” said Herbert wearily.  “If one only has!”

“I meant you yourself, and that is what I came to thank you for.  Yes, I did; even if you don’t like to hear it, your sister does, and I must have it out.  I shall recollect you again and again standing over all those beds, and shrinking from nothing, and I shall hold up the example to my boys.”

“Do hold up something better!”

“Can you write?” she said abruptly.

“I have written a few lines to my mother.”

“Do you remember what you said that night, when you had to hold that poor man in his delirium, and his wife was so wild with fright that she could not help?”

“I am not sure what you mean.”

“You said it three or four times.  It was only—”

“I remember,” said Herbert, as she paused; “it was the only thing I could recollect in the turmoil.”

“Would it tire you very much to write it for me in the flyleaf of this Prayer-Book that Mr. Charnock has given me?”

Herbert pulled himself into a sitting posture, and signed to his sister to give him the ink.

“I shall spoil your book,” he said, as his hand shook.

“Never mind,” she said, eagerly, “the words come back to me whenever I think of the life I have to face, and I want them written; they soothe me, as they soothed that frightened woman and raving man.”

And Herbert wrote.  It was only—‘The Lord is a very present help in trouble.’

“Yes,” she said; “thank you.  Put your initials, pray.  There—thank you.  No, you can never tell what it was to me to hear those words, so quietly, and gravely, and strongly, in that deadly struggle.  It seemed to me, for the first time in all my life, that God is a real Presence and an actual Help.  There!  I see Miss Bowater wants me gone; so I am off.  I shall hear of you.”

Herbert was exhausted with the exertion, and only exchanged a close pressure of the hand, and when Jenny came back, after seeing the lady to the door, she thought there were tears on his cheek, and bent down to kiss him.

“That was just the way, Jenny,” his low, tired voice said.  “I never could recollect what I wanted to say.  Only just those few Psalms that you did manage to teach me before I went to school, they came back and back.”

Jenny had no time to answer, for the feet of Philip were on the stairs.  He had been visiting Mrs. Hornblower, and persuading her that to make a dragoon of her son was the very best thing for him—great promotion, and quite removed from the ordinary vulgar enlistment in the line—till he had wiled consent out of her.  And though Philip declared it was blarney, and was inclined to think it infra dig. to have thus exerted his eloquence, it was certain that Mrs. Hornblower would console herself by mentioning to her neighbours that her son was gone in compliment to Captain Bowater, who had taken a fancy to him.

The relief to Herbert was infinite; but he was by this time too much tired to do anything but murmur his thanks, and wish himself safe back in his bed, and Philip’s strong-armed aid in reaching that haven was not a little appreciated.

Julius looked in with his mother’s entreaty that Philip, and if possible his sister, should come up to eat their Christmas dinner at the Hall; and Herbert, wearily declaring that sleep was all he needed, and that Cranky would be more than sufficient for him, insisted on their accepting the invitation; and Jenny was not sorry, for she did not want a tête-à-tête with Philip so close to her patient’s room, that whatever he chose to hear, he might.

She had quite enough of it in the walk to the Hall.  Phil, with the persistency of a person bent on doing a kind thing, returned to his York plan, viewing it as excellent relaxation for a depressed, over-worked man, and certain it would be a great treat to ‘little Herb.’  He still looked on the tall young man as the small brother to be patronized, and protected, and dragged out of home-petting; so he pooh-poohed all Jenny’s gentler hints as to Herbert’s need of care and desire to return to his work, until she was obliged to say plainly that he had entreated her to beg it might not be argued with him again, as he was resolved against amusement for the present.

Then Phil grew very angry both with Herbert and Jenny.

“Did they suppose he wanted the boy to do anything unclerical?”

“No; but you know it was by nothing positively unclerical that he was led aside before.”

Phil broke out into a tirade against the folly of Jenny’s speech.  In his view, Herbert’s conduct at Wil’sbro’ had confuted the Bishop’s censure, and for his own part, he only wished to amuse the boy, and give him rest, and if he did take him to a ball, or even out with the hounds, he would be on leave, and in another diocese, where the Bishop had nothing to do with him.

Jenny tried to make him understand that dread of the Bishop was the last thing in Herbert’s mind.  It was rather that he did not think it right to dissipate away a serious impression.

That was worse than before.  She was threatened with the most serious displeasure of her father and mother, if she encouraged Herbert in the morbid ascetic notions ascribed to Dr. Easterby.

“It was always the way with the women—they never knew where to stop.”

“No,” said Jenny, “I did not know there was anywhere to stop in the way of Heaven.”

“As if there were no way to Heaven without making a fool of oneself.”

This answer made Jenny sorry for her own, as needlessly vexatious, and yet she recollected St. Paul’s Christian paradoxes, and felt that poor Herbert might have laid hold of the true theory of the ministry.  At any rate, she was glad that they were at that moment hailed and overtaken by the party from the Rectory, and that Phil pounced at once on Julius, to obtain his sanction to giving Herbert a little diversion at York.

Julius answered more warily, “Does he wish it?”

“No; but he is too weak yet, and is hipped and morbid.”

“Well, Phil, I would not put it into his head.  No doubt you would take very good care of him, but I doubt whether your father would like the Bishop to hear of him—under the circumstances—going to disport himself at the dragoon mess.  Besides, I don’t think he will be well enough before Lent, and then of course he could not.”

This outer argument in a man’s voice pacified Phil, as Julius knew it would, much better than the deeper one, and he contented himself with muttering that he should write to his father about it, which every one knew he was most likely not to do.

Who could have foretold last Christmas who would be the party at that dinner?  Mrs. Poynsett at the head of her own table, and Miles in the master’s place, and the three waifs from absent families would have seemed equally unlikely guests; while of last year’s party—Charlie was in India, Tom De Lancey with the aunts in Ireland, Cecil at Dunstone.  Mrs. Duncombe was perfectly quiet, not only from the subduing influence of all she had undergone, but because she felt herself there like an intruder, and would have refused, but that to leave her at home would have distressed her hostess.  Mrs. Poynsett had never seen her before, and after all she had heard about her, was quite amazed at the sight of such an insignificant little person as she was without her dash and sparkle, and in a dress which, when no longer coquettish, verged upon the slovenly.

Poor thing, she was waiting till the Christmas visit of the elder Mrs. Duncombe’s own daughter was over, so that there might be room for her, and she was thankful for the reprieve, which left her able to spend Christmas among the privileges she had only learnt to value just as she was deprived of them.  She looked at Mrs. Poynsett, half in curiosity, half in compunction, as she remembered how she had helped to set Cecil against her.

“But then,” as she said to Rosamond, in going home, “I had prejudices about the genus belle-mère.  And mine always knew and said I should ruin her son, in which, alas! she was quite right!”

“She will be pleased now,” said Rosamond.

“No, indeed, I believe she had rather I were rapidity personified than owe the change to any one of your Rector’s sort.  I have had a letter or two, warning me against the Sisters, or thinking there is any merit in works of mercy.  Ah, well!  I’ll try to think her a good old woman!  But if she had only not strained the cord till it snapped, how much happier Bob and I should have been!”

What a difference there is between straining the cord for one’s self and for other people!  So Julius could not help feeling when Herbert, in spite of all that could be said to him, about morbid haste in renunciation, sent for the village captain of the cricket-club, and delivered over to him the bat, which had hitherto been as a knightly sword to him, resigning his place in the Compton Poynsett Eleven, and replying to the dismayed entreaties and assurances of the young farmer that he would reconsider his decision, and that he would soon be quite strong again, that he had spent too much time over cricket, and liked it too well to trust himself at it again.

That was the last thing before on a New Year’s Day, which was like an April day, Herbert came into church once more, and then was carried off in the Strawyers carriage, lying back half ashamed, half astonished, at the shower of strange tears which the ecstatic shouts and cheers of the village boys had called forth.

CHAPTER XXXVI

Rockpier

For Love himself took part against himselfTo warn us off.—TENNYSON

Rosamond was to have a taste of her old vocation, and go campaigning for lodgings, the searching for which she declared to be her strongest point.  Rockpier was to be the destination of the family; Eleonora Vivian, whose letters had been far fewer than had been expected of her, was known to be there with her father, and this was lure sufficient for Frank.  Frank’s welfare again was the lure to Mrs. Poynsett; and the benefit Rosamond was to derive from sea air, after all she had gone through, made Julius willing to give himself the holiday that everybody insisted on his having until Lent.

First, however, was sent off an advanced guard, consisting of Rosamond and Terry, who went up to London with Frank, that he might there consult an aurist, and likewise present himself to his chief, and see whether he could keep his clerkship.  All this turned out well, his duties did not depend on his ears, and a month’s longer leave of absence was granted to him; moreover, his deafness was pronounced to be likely to yield to treatment, and a tube restored him to somewhat easier intercourse with mankind, and he was in high spirits, when, after an evening spent with Rosamond’s friends, the M’Kinnons, the trio took an early train for Rockpier, where Rosamond could not detain Frank even to come to the hotel with them and have luncheon before hurrying off to Verdure Point, the villa inhabited by Sir Harry.  All he had done all the way down was to impress upon her, in the fulness of his knowledge of the place, that the only habitable houses in Rockpier were in that direction—the nearer to Verdure Point the more perfect!

Terry listened with smiling eyes, sometimes viewing the lover as a bore, sometimes as a curious study, confirming practical statements.  Terry was thoroughly well, only with an insatiable appetite, and he viewed his fellow convalescent’s love with double wonder when he found it caused oblivion of hunger, especially as Frank still looked gaunt and sallow, and was avowedly not returned to his usual health.

Rosamond set forth house-hunting, dropping Terry ere long at the Library, where she went to make inquiries, and find the sine quâ non.  When she reached the sitting-room at the hotel, she found Frank cowering over the fire in an arm-chair, the picture of despondency.  Of course, he did not hear her entrance, and she darted up to him, and put her hand on his shoulder.  He looked up to her with an attempt at indifference.

“Well, Frank!”

“Well, Rose!  How have you sped?”

“I have got a house; but it is in Marine Terrace.  I don’t know what you’ll say to me.”

“I don’t know that it signifies.”

“You are shivering!  What’s the matter?”

“Only, it is very cold!”

(Aside.  “Ring the bell, Terry, he is as cold as ice.”)  “Did you see her?”

“Oh yes.  Did you have any luncheon?”  (“Some port-wine and hot water directly, please.”)

“Yes, I believe so.  You are not ordering anything for me?  There’s nothing amiss—only it is so cold.”

“It is cold, and you are not to be cold; nor are we to be cold, sir.  You must go to bed early in the evening, Terry,” said Rosamond, at last.  “I shall make nothing of him while you are by, and an hour’s more sleep will not be lost on you.”

“Will you come and tell me then, Rosey?  I deserve something.”

“What, for sleeping there instead of here, when you’ve nothing to do?”

“Indeed, but I have.  I want to make out this little Chaucer.  I shall go down to the coffee-room and do it.”

“Well, if you like poking out your eyes with the gas in the coffee-room, I have no objection, since you are too proud to go to bed.  Wish him good night first, and do it naturally.”

“Nature would be thrown away on him, poor fellow,” said Terry, as he roused Frank with difficulty to have ‘Good night’ roared into his ear, and give a listless hand.  He was about to deal with Rosamond in the same way, but she said—

“No, I am not going yet,” and settled herself opposite to him, with her half-knitted baby’s shoe in her hands, and her feet on the fender, her crape drawn up from the fire, disposed for conversation.  Frank, on the other hand, fell back into the old position, looking so wretched that she could bear it no longer, picked up the tube, forced it on him, and said, “Do tell me, dear Frank.  You used to tell me long ago.”

He shook his head.  “That’s all over.  You are very good, Rosamond, but you should not have forced her to come to me.”

“Not!”

“My life was not worth saving.”

“She has not gone back from you again?—the horrible girl!” (this last aside).