Dynevor Terrace; Or, The Clue of Life. Volume 1

It was a second youth of the affections, but it was purchased by a step towards age. The anxiety, fatigue, and various emotions of the past year had told on the Earl, and though still strong, vigorous, and healthy, the first touch of autumn had fallen on him—he did not find his solitary life so self-sufficing as formerly, and craved the home feeling of the past Christmas. So the welcome was twice as warm as Louis had expected; and as he saw the melancholy chased away, the stern grey eyes lighted up, and the thin, compressed lips relaxed into a smile, he forgot his aversion to the well-appointed rooms in Jermyn Street, and sincerely apologized that he had not brought home more credit to satisfy his father.

'Oakstead was talking it over with me,' was the answer; 'and we reckoned up many more third-class men than first who have distinguished themselves.'

'Many thanks to Sir Miles,' said Louis, laughing. 'My weak mind would never have devised such consolation.'

'Perhaps the exclusive devotion to study which attains higher honours may not be the beat introduction to practical life.'

'It is doing the immediate work with the whole might.'

'You do work with all your might.'

'Ay! but too many irons in the fire, and none of them red-hot through, have been my bane.'

'You do not set out in life without experience; I am glad your education is finished, Louis!' said his father, turning to contemplate him, as if the sight filled up some void.

'Are you?' said Louis, wearily. 'I don't think I am. It becomes my duty—or yours, which is a relief—to find out the next stage.'

'Have you no wishes?'

'Not at the present speaking, thank you. If I went out and talked to any one, I might have too many.'

'No views for your future life?'

'Thus far: to do as little harm as may be—to be of some use at home—and to make turnips grow in the upland at Inglewood, I have some vague fancy to see foreign parts, especially now they are all in such a row—it would be such fun—but I suppose you would not trust me there now. Here I am for you to do as you please with me—a gracious permission, considering that you did not want it. Only the first practical question is how to get this money from Jem to Clara. I should like to call on her, but I suppose that would hardly be according to the proprieties.'

'I would walk to the school with you, if you wish to see her. My aunt will be glad to hear of her, if we go home to-morrow.'

'Are you thinking of going home?' exclaimed Louis, joyfully coming to life.

'Yes; but for a cause that will grieve you. Mrs. Ponsonby is worse, and has written to ask me to come down.'

'Materially worse?'

'I fear so. I showed my aunt's letter to Hastings, who said it was the natural course of the disease, but that he thought it would have been less speedy. I fear it has been hastened by reports from Peru. She had decided on going out again; but the agitation overthrew her, and she has been sinking ever since,' said Lord Ormersfield, mournfully.

'Poor Mary!'

'For her sake I must be on the spot, if for no other cause. If I had but a home to offer her!'

Louis gave a deep sigh, and presently asked for more details of Mrs. Ponsonby's state.

'I believe she is still able to sit up and employ herself at times, but she often suffers dreadfully. They are both wonderfully cheerful. She has little to regret.'

'What a loss she will be! Oh, father! what will you do without her?'

'I am glad that you have known her. She has been more than a sister to me. Things might have been very different, if that miserable marriage had not separated us for so many years.'

'How could it have happened? How was it that she—so good and wise—did not see through the man?'

'She would, if she had been left to herself; but she was not. My mother discovered, when too late, that there had been foolish, impertinent jokes of that unfortunate trifler, poor Henry Frost, that made her imagine herself suspected of designs on me.'

'Mary would never have attended to such folly!' cried Louis.

'Mary is older. Besides, she loved the man, or thought she did. I believe she thinks herself attached to him still. But for Mary's birth, there would have been a separation long ago. There ought to have been; but, after my father's death, there was no one to interfere! What would I not have given to have been her brother! Well! I never could see why one like her was so visited—!' Then rousing himself, as though tender reminiscences were waste of time, he added, 'There you see the cause of the caution I gave you with regard to Clara Dynevor. It is not fair to expose a young woman to misconstructions and idle comments, which may goad her to vindicate her dignity by acting in a manner fatal to her happiness. Now,' he added, having drawn his moral, 'if we are to call on Clara, this would be the fittest time. I have engaged for us both to dine at Lady Conway's this evening: I thought you would not object.'

'Thank you; but I am sure you cannot wish to go out after such news.'

'There is not sufficient excuse for refusing. There is to be no party, and it would be a marked thing to avoid it.'

Louis hazarded a suggestion that the meeting with Clara would be to little purpose if they were all to sit in state in the drawing-room; and she was asked for on the plea of going to see the new Houses of Parliament. The Earl of Ormersfield's card and compliments went upstairs, and Miss Frost Dynevor appeared, with a demure and astonished countenance, which changed instantly to ecstasy when she saw that the Earl was not alone. Not at all afraid of love, but only of misconstructions, he goodnaturedly kept aloof, while Clara, clinging to Louis's arm, was guided through the streets, and in and out among the blocks of carved stone on the banks of the Thames, interspersing her notes of admiration and his notes on heraldry with more comfortable confidences than had fallen to their lot through the holidays.

His first hope was that Clara might reveal some fact to throw light on the object of her brother's affections, but her remarks only added to his perplexity. Once, when they had been talking of poor Mary, and lamenting her fate in having to return to her father, Louis hazarded the conjecture that she might find an English home.

'There is her aunt in Bryanston Square,' said Clara. 'Or if she would only live with us! You see I am growing wise, as you call it: I like her now.'

'That may be fortunate,' said Louis. 'You know her destination according to Northwold gossip.'

'Nonsense! Jem would scorn an heiress if she were ten times prettier. He will never have an escutcheon of pretence like the one on the old soup tureen that the Lady of Eschalott broke, and Jane was so sorry for because it was the last of the old Cheveleigh china.'

Louis made another experiment. 'Have you repented yet of giving away your clasp?'

'No, indeed! Miss Conway always wears it. She should be richly welcome to anything I have in the world.'

'You and Jem saw much more of them than I did.'

'Whose fault was that? Jem was always raving about your stupidity in staying at home.'

He began to question whether his interview with James had been a dream. As they were walking back towards the school, Clara went on to tell him that Lady Conway had called and taken her to a rehearsal of a concert of ancient music, and that Isabel had taken her for one or two drives into the country.

'This must conduce to make school endurable,' said Louis.

'I think I hate it more because I hate it less.'

'Translate, if you please.'

'The first half-year, I scorned them all, and they scorned me; and that was comfortable—'

'And consistent. Well?'

'The next, you had disturbed me; I could not go on being savage with the same satisfaction, and their tuft-hunting temper began to discharge itself in such civility to me, that I could not give myself airs with any peace.'

'Have you made no friends?'

One and a half. The whole one is a good, rough, stupid girl, who comes to school because she can't learn, and is worth all the rest put together. The half is Caroline Salter, who is openly and honestly purse-proud, has no toad-eating in her nature, and straight-forwardly contemns high-blood and no money. We fought ourselves into respect for one another; and now, I verily believe, we are fighting ourselves into friendship. She is the only one that is proud, not vain; so we understand each other. As to the rest, they adore Caroline Halter's enamelled watch one day; and the next, I should be their 'dearest' if I would but tell them what we have for dinner at Ormersfield, and what colour your eyes are!'

'The encounters have made you so epigrammatic and satirical, that there is no coming near you.'

'Oh, Louis! if you knew all, you would despise me as I do myself! I do sometimes get drawn into talking grandly about Ormersfield; and though I always say what I am to be, I know that I am as vain and proud as any of them: I am proud of being poor, and of the Pendragons, and of not being silly! I don't know which is self-respect, and which is pride!'

'I have always had my doubts about that quality of self-respect. I never could make out what one was to respect.'

'Oh, dear! les voila!' cried Clara, as, entering Hanover Square, they beheld about twenty damsels coming out of the garden in couples. 'I would not have had it happen for the whole world!' she added, abruptly withdrawing the arm that had clung to him so trustfully across many a perilous crossing.

She seemed to intend to slip into the ranks without any farewells, but the Earl, with politeness that almost confounded the little elderly governess, returned thanks for having been permitted the pleasure of her company, and Louis, between mischief and good-nature, would not submit to anything but a hearty, cousinly squeeze of the hand, nor relinquish it till he had forced her to utter articulately the message to grandmamma that she had been muttering with her head averted. At last it was spoken sharply, and her hand drawn petulantly away, and, without looking back at him, her high, stiff head vanished into the house, towering above the bright rainbow of ribbons, veils, and parasols.

The evening would have been very happy, had not Lord Ormersfield looked imperturbably grave and inaccessible to his sister-in-law's blandishments. She did not use the most likely means of disarming him when she spoke of making a tour in the summer. It had been a long promise that Isabel and Virginia should go to see their old governess at Paris; but if France still were in too disturbed a state, they might enjoy themselves in Belgium, and perhaps her dear Fitzjocelyn would accompany them as their escort.

His eyes had glittered at the proposal before he recollected the sorrow that threatened his father, and began to decline, protesting that he should be the worst escort in the world, since he always attracted accidents and adventures. But his aunt, discovering that he had never been abroad, became doubly urgent, and even appealed to his father.

'As far as I am concerned, Fitzjocelyn may freely consult his own inclinations,' said the Earl, so gravely, that Lady Conway could only turn aside the subject by a laugh, and assurance that she did not mean to give him up. She began to talk of James Frost, and her wishes to secure him a second time as Walter's tutor in the holidays.

'You had better take him with you,' said Louis; 'he would really be of use to you, and how he would enjoy the sight of foreign parts!'

Isabel raised her head with a look of approbation, such as encouraged him to come a little nearer, and apeak of the pleasure that her kindness had given to Clara.

'There is a high spirit and originality about Clara, which make her a most amusing companion.'

Isabel replied, 'I am very glad of an hour with her, especially now that I am without my sisters.'

'She must be such a riddle to her respectable school-fellows, that intercourse beyond them must be doubly valuable.'

'Poor child! Is there no hope for her but going out as a governess?'

'Unluckily, we have no Church patronage for her brother; the only likely escape—unless, indeed, the uncle in Peru, whom I begin to regard as rather mythical, should send an unavoidable shower of gold on them.'

'I hope not,' said Isabel, 'I could almost call their noble poverty a sacred thing. I never saw anything so beautiful as the reverent affection shown to Mrs. Dynevor on Walter's birthday, when she was the Queen of the Night, and looked it, and her old pupils vied with each other in doing her honour. I have remembered the scene so often in looking at our faded dowagers here.'

'I would defy Midas to make my Aunt Catharine a faded dowager,' said Louis.

'No; but he could have robbed their homage of half—nay, all its grace.'

They talked of Northwold, and Isabel mentioned various details of Mrs. Ponsonby, which she had learnt from Miss King, and talked of Mary with great feeling and affection. Never had Louis had anything so like a conversation with Isabel, and he was more bewitched than ever by the enthusiasm and depth of sensibilities which she no longer concealed by coldness and reserve. In fact, she had come to regard him as an accessory of Northwold, and was delighted to enjoy some exchange of sympathy upon Terrace subjects—above all, when separated from the school-room party. Time had brought her to perceive that the fantastic Viscount did not always wear motley, and it was almost as refreshing as meeting with Clara, to have some change from the two worlds in which she lived. In her imaginary world, Adeline had just been rescued from the Corsairs by a knight hospitalier, with his vizor down, and was being conducted home by him, with equal probabilities of his dying at her feet of a concealed mortal wound, or conducting her to her convent gate, and going off to be killed by the Moors. The world of gaiety was more hollow and wearisome than ever; and the summons was as unwelcome to her as to Fitzjocelyn, when Lord Ormersfield reminded him that the ladies were going to an evening party, and that it was time to take leave.

'Come with us, Fitzjocelyn,' said his aunt. 'They would be charmed to have you;' and she mentioned some lions, whose names made Louis look at his father.

'I will send the carriage for you,' said the Earl; but Louis had learnt to detect the tone of melancholy reluctance in that apparently unalterable voice, and at once refused. Perhaps it was for that reason that Isabel let him put on her opera-cloak and hand her down stairs. 'I don't wonder at you,' she said; 'I wish I could do the same.'

'I wished it at first,' he answered; 'but I could not have gone without a heavy heart.'

'Are you young enough to expect to go to any gaieties without a heavy heart?'

'I am sorry for you,' said he, in his peculiar tone: 'I suppose I am your elder.'

'I am almost twenty-four,' she said, with emphasis.

'Indeed! That must be the age for care, to judge by the change it has worked in Jem Frost.'

The words were prompted by a keen, sudden desire to mark their effect; but he failed to perceive any, for they were in a dark part of the entry, and her face was turned away.

'Fitzjocelyn,' said the Earl, on the way home, 'do not think it necessary to look at me whenever you receive an invitation. It makes us both appear ridiculous, and you are in every respect your own master.'

'I had rather not, thank you,' said Louis, in an almost provokingly indifferent tone.

'It is full time you should assume your own guidance.'

'How little he knows how little that would suit him!' thought Louis, sighing despondingly. 'Am I called on to sacrifice myself in everything, and never even satisfy him?'

CHAPTER XVIII

REST FOR THE WEARY

Therefore, arm thee for the strifeAll throughout this mortal life,Soldier now and servant true,Earth behind, and heaven in view.REV. I. WILLIAMS.

The first impression on arriving at Northwold was, that the danger had been magnified. Mrs. Frost's buoyant spirits had risen at the first respite; and though there was a weight on Mary's brow, she spoke cheerfully, and as if able to attend to other interests, telling Louis of her father's wish for some good workmen to superintend the mines, and asking him to consult his friends at Illershall on the subject.

Lord Ormersfield came down encouraged by his visit to the invalid, whom he had found dressed and able to converse nearly as usual. She begged him to come to dinner the next day, and spend the evening with her, promising with a smile that if he would bring Louis, their aunt should chaperon Mary.

When the Earl went upstairs after dinner, the other three closed round the fire, and talked in a tranquil, subdued strain, on various topics, sometimes grave, sometimes enlivened by the playfulness inherent in two of the party. Aunt Kitty spoke of her earlier days, and Louis and Mary ventured questions that they would have ordinarily deemed intrusive. Yet it was less the matter than the manner of their dialogue—the deep, unavowed fellow-feeling and mutual reliance—which rendered it so refreshing and full of a kind of repose. Louis felt it like the strange bright stillness, when birds sing their clearest, fullest notes, and the horizon reach of sky beams with the softest, brightest radiance, just ere it be closed out by the thunder-cloud, whose first drops are pausing to descend; and to Mary it was peace—peace which she was willing gratefully to taste to the utmost, from the instinctive perception that the call had come for her to brace all her powers of self-control and fortitude; while to the dear old aunt, besides her enjoyment of her darling's presence, each hour was a boon that she could believe the patient or the daughter, relieved and happy.

Louis was admitted for a few minutes' visit to the sick-chamber, and went up believing that he ought to be playful and cheerful; but he was nearly overcome by Mrs. Ponsonby's own brightness, as she hoped that her daughter and aunt had made themselves agreeable.

'Thank you, I never was so comfortable, not even when my foot was bad.'

'I believe you consider that a great compliment.'

'Yes, I never was so much off my own mind, nor on other people's:' and the recollection of all he owed to Mrs. Ponsonby's kindness rushing over him, he looked so much affected, that Mary was afraid of his giving way, and spoke of other matters; her mother responded, and he came away quite reassured, and believing Mrs. Frost's augury that at the next call, the invalid would be in the drawing-room.

On the way home, however, his father overthrew such hopes, and made him aware of the true state of the case,—namely, that this was but the lull before another attack, which, whether it came within weeks or days, would probably be the last.

'Does Mary know?'

'She does. She bears up nobly.'

'And what is to become of her?'

The Earl sighed deeply. 'Lima is her destiny. Her mother is bent on it, and says that she wishes it herself; but on one thing I am resolved: she shall not go alone! I have told her mother that I will go with her, and not leave her without seeing what kind of home that man has for her. Mary—the mother, I mean—persists in declaring that he has real affection for his child, and that her presence will save him.'

'If anything could—' broke out Louis.

'It should! it ought; but I do not trust him. I know Robert Ponsonby as his wife has never chosen to know him. This was not a time for disguise, and I told her plainly what I thought of risking her daughter out there. But she called it Mary's duty—said that he was fully to be trusted where his child was concerned, and that Mary was no stranger at Lima, but could take care of herself, and had many friends besides Oliver Dynevor there. But I told her that go with her I would!'

'You to take the voyage! Was not she glad?'

'I think she was relieved; but she was over-grateful and distressed, and entreating me to be patient with him. She need not fear. I never was a hasty man; and I shall only remember that she bears his name, and that he is Mary's father—provided always that it is fit Mary should remain with him. Miserable! I can understand that death may well come as a friend—But her daughter!' he exclaimed, giving way more than he might have done anywhere but in the dark; 'how can she endure to leave her to such a father—to such prospects!'

'She knows it is not only to such a father that she leaves her,' murmured Louis.

'Her words—almost her words,' said the Earl, between earnestness and impatience; 'but when these things come to pressing realities, it is past me how such sayings are a consolation.'

'Not if they were no more than sayings.'

There was silence. Louis heard an occasional groaning sigh from his father, and sat still, with feelings strongly moved, and impelled to one of his sudden and impetuous resolutions.

The next morning, he ordered his horse, saying he would bring the last report from the Terrace.

That afternoon, Mrs. Ponsonby observed a tremulousneas in Mary's hand, and a willingness to keep her face turned away; and, on more minute glances, a swelling of the eyelids was detected.

'My dear,' said Mrs. Ponsonby, 'you should take a walk to-day. Pray go out with the Conways.'

'Oh no, thank you, mamma.'

'If the cousins come in from Ormersfield, I shall tell Louis to take you to look at his farm. It would be very good for you—My dear, what is it?' for Mary's ears and neck, all that she could see, were crimson.

'Oh, mamma! he has been doing it again. I did not mean to have told you—' said Mary, the strong will to be calm forcing back the tears and even the flush.

'Nay, dear child, nothing can hurt me now. You must let me share all with you to the last. What did you say to him?'

'I told him that I could not think of such things now,' said Mary, almost indignantly.

'And he?'

'He begged my pardon, and said he only did it because he thought it might be a relief to you.'

'Only; did he say 'only?'

'I am not sure. At least,' she added, with a deep sigh, 'I thought he meant only—'

'And you, my dearest, if you had not thought he meant only?'

'Don't ask me, mamma; I cannot think about it!'

'Mary, dearest, I do wish to understand you.'

'Is it of any use for me to ask myself?' said Mary.

'I think it is. I do not say that there might not be insuperable obstacles; but I believe we ought to know whether you are still indifferent to Louis.'

'Oh, that I never was! Nobody could be!'

'You know what I mean,' said her mother, slightly smiling.

'Mamma, I don't know what to say,' replied Mary, after a pause. 'I had thought it wrong to let my thoughts take that course; but when he spoke in his own soft, gentle voice, I felt, and I can't help it, that—he—could—comfort—me—better—than—any one.'

Not hesitating, but slowly, almost inaudibly, she brought out the words; and, as the tears gushed out irrepressibly with the last, she hastened from the room, and was seen no more till she had recovered composure, and seemed to have dismissed the subject.

Louis kept this second attempt a secret; he was not quite sure how he felt, and did not wish to discuss his rejection. At breakfast, he received a note from Mrs. Ponsonby, begging him to come to the Terrace at three o'clock; and the hope thus revived made him more conversational than he had been all the former day.

He found that Mary was out walking, and he was at once conducted to Mrs. Ponsonby's room, where he looked exceedingly rosy and confused, till she began by holding out her hand, and saying, 'I wish to thank you.'

'I am afraid I vexed Mary,' said Louis, with more than his usual simplicity; 'but do you think there is no hope? I knew it was a bad time, but I thought it might make you more at ease on her account.'

'You meant all that was most kind.'

'I thought I might just try,' pursued he, disconsolately, 'whether she did think me any steadier. I hope she did not think me very troublesome. I tried not to harass her much.'

'My dear Louis, it is not a question of what you call steadiness. It is the old story of last summer, when you thought us old ones so much more romantic than yourself.'

'You are thinking of Miss Conway,' said Louis, blushing, but with curious naivete. 'Well, I have been thinking of that, and I really do not believe there was anything in it. I did make myself rather a fool at Beauchastel, and Jem would have made me a greater one; but you know my father put a stop to it. Thinking her handsomer than other people can't be love, can it?'