Hopes and Fears or, scenes from the life of a spinster

And regards it as little, perhaps, thought Honor, sadly.  ‘Poor Robin!’ she said; ‘I suppose he had better get his mind settled; but indeed it is a fearful responsibility for my poor foolish Lucy—’ and but for the fear of grieving Phœbe, she would have added, that such a purpose as that of entering Holy Orders ought not to have been made dependent upon the fancy of a girl.  Possibly her expression betrayed her sentiments, for Phœbe answered—‘There can be no doubt that Lucy will set him at rest.  I am certain that she would be shocked at the notion that her tastes were making him doubt whether to be a clergyman.’

‘I hope so!  I trust so!’ said Honora, almost mournfully.  ‘It may be very good for her, as I believe it is for every woman of any soundness, to be taught that her follies tell upon man’s greater aims and purposes.  It may be wholesome for her and a check, but—’

Phœbe wondered that her friend paused and looked so sad.

‘Oh! Phœbe,’ said Honora, after a moment’s silence, speaking fervently, ‘if you can in any way do so, warn your brother against making an idol!  Let nothing come between him and the direct devotion of will and affection to the Higher Service.  If he decide on the one or the other, let it be from duty, not with respect to anything else.  I do not suppose it is of any use to warn him,’ she added, with the tears in her eyes.  ‘Every one sets the whole soul upon some one object, not the right, and then comes the shipwreck.’

‘Dear Robin!’ said Phœbe.  ‘He is so good!  I am sure he always thinks first of what is right.  But I think I see what you mean.  If he undertake the business, it should be as a matter of obedience to papa, not to keep Lucy in the great world.  And, indeed, I do not think my father does care much, only he would like the additional capital; and Robert is so much more steady than Mervyn, that he would be more useful.  Perhaps it would make him more important at home; no one there has any interest in common with him; and I think that moves him a little; but, after all, those do not seem reasons for not giving himself to God’s service,’ she finished, reverently and considerately.

‘No, indeed!’ cried Miss Charlecote.

‘Then you think he ought not to change his mind?’

‘You have thought so all along,’ smiled Honor.

‘I did not like it,’ said Phœbe, ‘but I did not know if I were right.  I did tell him that I really believed Lucy would think the more highly of him if he settled for himself without reference to her.’

‘You did!  You were a capital little adviser, Phœbe!  A woman worthy to be loved at all had always rather be set second instead of first:—

“I could not love thee, dear, so much,Loved I not honour more.”

That is the true spirit, and I am glad you judged Lucy to be capable of it.  Keep your brother up to that, and all may be well!’

‘I believe Robert knows it all the time,’ said Phœbe.  ‘He always is right at the bottom; but his feelings get so much tried that he does not know how to bear it!  I hope Lucy will be kind to him if they meet in London, for he has been so much harassed that he wants some comfort from her.  If she would only be in earnest!’

‘Does he go to London, at all events?’

‘He has promised to attend to the office in Great Whittington-street for a month, by way of experiment.’

‘I’ll tell you what, Phœbe,’ cried Honora, radiantly, ‘you and I will go too!  You shall come with me to Woolstone-lane, and Robin shall be with us every day; and we will try and make this silly Lucy into a rational being.’

‘Oh! Miss Charlecote, thank you—thank you.’  The quiet girl’s face and neck were all one crimson glow of delight.

‘If you can sleep in a little brown cupboard of a room in the very core of the City’s heart.’

‘Delightful!  I have so wished to see that house.  Owen has told me such things about it.  Oh, thank you, Miss Charlecote!’

‘Have you ever seen anything in London?’

‘Never.  We hardly ever go with the rest; and if we do, we only walk in the square.  What a holiday it will be!’

‘We will see everything, and do it justice.  I’ll get an order for the print-room at the British Museum.  I day say Robin never saw it either; and what a treat it will be to take you to the Egyptian Gallery!’ cried Honora, excited into looking at the expedition in the light of a party of pleasure, as she saw happiness beaming in the young face opposite.

They built up their schemes in the open window, pausing to listen to the nightingales, who, having ceased for two hours, apparently for supper, were now in full song, echoing each other in all the woods of Hiltonbury, casting over it a network of sweet melody.  Honora was inclined to regret leaving them in their glory; but Phœbe, with the world before her, was too honest to profess poetry which she did not feel.  Nightingales were all very well in their place, but the first real sight of London was more.

The lamp came in, and Phœbe held out her hands for something to do, and was instantly provided with a child’s frock, while Miss Charlecote read to her one of Fouqué’s shorter tales by way of supplying the element of chivalrous imagination which was wanting in the Beauchamp system of education.

So warm was the evening, that the window remained open, until Ponto erected his crest as a footfall came steadily along, nearer and nearer.  Uplifting one of his pendant lips, he gave a low growl through his blunted teeth, and listened again; but apparently satisfied that the step was familiar, he replaced his head on his crossed paws, and presently Robert Fulmort’s head and the upper part of his person, in correct evening costume, were thrust in at the window, the moonlight making his face look very white, as he said, ‘Come, Phœbe, make haste; it is very late.’

‘Is it?’ cried Phœbe, springing up; ‘I thought I had only been here an hour.’

‘Three, at least,’ said Robert, yawning; ‘six by my feelings.  I could not get away, for Mr. Crabbe stayed to dinner; Mervyn absented himself, and my father went to sleep.’

‘Robin, only think, Miss Charlecote is so kind as to say she will take me to London!’

‘It is very kind,’ said Robert, warmly, his weary face and voice suddenly relieved.

‘I shall be delighted to have a companion,’ said Honora; ‘and I reckon upon you too, Robin, whenever you can spare time from your work.  Come in, and let us talk it over.’

‘Thank you, I can’t.  The dragon will fall on Phœbe if I keep her out too late.  Be quick, Phœbe.’

While his sister went to fetch her hat, he put his elbows on the sill, and leaning into the room, said, ‘Thank you again; it will be a wonderful treat to her, and she has never had one in her life!’

‘I was in hopes she would have gone to Germany.’

‘It is perfectly abominable!  It is all the others’ doing!  They know no one would look at them a second time if anything so much younger and pleasanter was by!  They think her coming out would make them look older.  I know it would make them look crosser.’

Laughing was the only way to treat this tirade, knowing, as Honor did, that there was but too much truth in it.  She said, however, ‘Yet one could hardly wish Phœbe other than she is.  The rosebud keeps its charm longer in the shade.’

‘I like justice,’ quoth Robert.

‘And,’ she continued, ‘I really think that she is much benefited by this formidable governess.  Accuracy and solidity and clearness of head are worth cultivating.’

‘Nasty latitudinarian piece of machinery,’ said Robert, with his fingers over his mouth, like a sulky child.

‘Maybe so; but you guard Phœbe, and she guards Bertha; and whatever your sense of injustice may be, this surely is a better school for her than gaieties as yet.’

‘It will be a more intolerable shame than ever if they will not let her go with you.’

‘Too intolerable to be expected,’ smiled Honora.  ‘I shall come and beg for her to-morrow, and I do not believe I shall be disappointed.’

She spoke with the security of one not in the habit of having her patronage obstructed by relations; and Phœbe coming down with renewed thanks, the brother and sister started on their way home in the moonlight—the one plodding on moodily, the other, unable to repress her glee, bounding on in a succession of little skips, and pirouetting round to clap her hands, and exclaim, ‘Oh! Robin, is it not delightful?’

‘If they will let you go,’ said he, too desponding for hope.

‘Do you think they will not?’ said Phœbe, with slower and graver steps.  ‘Do you really think so?  But no!  It can’t lead to coming out; and I know they like me to be happy when it interferes with nobody.’

‘Great generosity,’ said Robert, dryly.

‘Oh, but, Robin, you know elder ones come first.’

‘A truth we are not likely to forget,’ said Robert.  ‘I wish my uncle had been sensible of it.  That legacy of his stands between Mervyn and me, and will never do me any good.’

‘I don’t understand,’ said Phœbe; ‘Mervyn has always been completely the eldest son.’

‘Ay,’ returned Robert, ‘and with the tastes of an eldest son.  His allowance does not suffice for them, and he does not like to see me independent.  If my uncle had only been contented to let us share and share alike, then my father would have had no interest in drawing me into the precious gin and brandy manufacture.’

‘You did not think he meant to make it a matter of obedience,’ said Phœbe.

‘No; he could hardly do that after the way he has brought me up, and what we have been taught all our lives about liberty of the individual, absence of control, and the like jargon.’

‘Then you are not obliged?’

He made no answer, and they walked on in silence across the silvery lawn, the maythorns shining out like flaked towers of snow in the moonlight, and casting abyss-like shadows, the sky of the most deep and intense blue, and the carols of the nightingales ringing around them.  Robert paused when he had passed through the gate leading into the dark path down-hill through the wood, and setting his elbows on it, leant over it, and looked back at the still and beautiful scene, in all the white mystery of moonlight, enhanced by the white-blossomed trees and the soft outlines of slumbering sheep.  One of the birds, in a bush close to them, began prolonging its drawn-in notes in a continuous prelude, then breaking forth into a varied complex warbling, so wondrous that there was no moving till the creature paused.

It seemed to have been a song of peace to Robert, for he gave a long but much softer sigh, and pushed back his hat, saying, ‘All good things dwell on the Holt side of the boundary.’

‘A sort of Sunday world,’ said Phœbe.

‘Yes; after this wood one is in another atmosphere.’

‘Yet you have carried your cares there, poor Robin.’

‘So one does into Sunday, but to get another light thrown on them.  The Holt has been the blessing of my life—of both our lives, Phœbe.’

She responded with all her heart.  ‘Yes, it has made everything happier, at home and everywhere else.  I never can think why Lucilla is not more fond of it.’

‘You are mistaken,’ exclaimed Robert; ‘she loves no place so well; but you don’t consider what claims her relations have upon her.  That cousin Horatia, to whom she is so much attached, losing both her parents, how could she do otherwise than be with her?’

‘Miss Charteris does not seem to be in great trouble now,’ said Phœbe.

‘You do not consider; you have never seen grief, and you do not know how much more a sympathizing friend is needed when the world supposes the sorrow to be over, and ordinary habits to be resumed.’

Phœbe was willing to believe him right, though considering that Horatia Charteris lived with her brother and his wife, she could hardly be as lonely as Miss Charlecote.

‘We shall see Lucy in London,’ she said.

Robert again sighed heavily.  ‘Then it will be over,’ he said.  ‘Did you say anything there?’ he pursued, as they plunged into the dark shadows of the woodland path, more congenial to the subject than the light.

‘Yes, I did,’ said Phœbe.

‘And she thought me a weak, unworthy wretch for ever dreaming of swerving from my original path.’

‘No!’ said Phœbe, ‘not if it were your duty.’

‘I tell you, Phœbe, it is as much my duty to consult Lucilla’s happiness as if any words had passed between us.  I have never pledged myself to take Orders.  It has been only a wish, not a vocation; and if she have become averse to the prospect of a quiet country life, it would not be treating her fairly not to give her the choice of comparative wealth, though procured by means her family might despise.’

‘Yes, I knew you would put right and duty first; and I suppose by doing so you make it certain to end rightly, one way or other.’

‘A very few years, and I could realize as much as this Calthorp, the millionaire, whom they talk of as being so often at the Charterises.’

‘It will not be so,’ said Phœbe.  ‘I know what she will say;’ and as Robert looked anxiously at her, she continued—

‘She will say she never dreamt of your being turned from anything so great by any fancies she has seemed to have.  She will say so more strongly, for you know her father was a clergyman, and Miss Charlecote brought her up.’

Phœbe’s certainty made Robert catch something of her hopes.

‘In that case,’ he said, ‘matters might be soon settled.  This fortune of mine would be no misfortune then; and probably, Phœbe, my sisters would have no objection to your being happy with us.’

‘As soon as you could get a curacy!  Oh, how delightful! and Maria and Bertha would come too.’

Robert held his peace, not certain whether Lucilla would consider Maria an embellishment to his ideal parsonage; but they talked on with cheerful schemes while descending through the wood, unlocking a gate that formed the boundary between the Holt and the Beauchamp properties, crossing a field or two, and then coming out into the park.  Presently they were in sight of the house, rising darkly before them, with many lights shining in the windows behind the blinds.

‘They are all gone up-stairs!’ said Phœbe, dismayed.  ‘How late it must be!’

‘There’s a light in the smoking-room,’ said Robert; ‘we can get in that way.’

‘No, no!  Mervyn may have some one with him.  Come in quietly by the servants’ entrance.’

No danger that people would not be on foot there!  As the brother and sister moved along the long stone passage, fringed with labelled bells, one open door showed two weary maidens still toiling over the plates of the late dinner; and another, standing ajar, revealed various men-servants regaling themselves; and words and tones caught Robert’s ear making his brow lower with sudden pain.

Phœbe was proceeding to mount the stone stairs, when a rustling and chattering, as of maids descending, caused her and her brother to stand aside to make way, and down came a pair of heads and candles together over a green bandbox, and then voices in vulgar tones half suppressed.  ‘I couldn’t venture it, not with Miss Juliana—but Miss Fulmort—she never looks over her bills, nor knows what is in her drawers—I told her it was faded, when she had never worn it once!’

And tittering, they passed by the brother and sister, who were still unseen, but Robert heaved a sigh and murmured, ‘Miserable work!’ somewhat to his sister’s surprise, for to her the great ill-regulated household was an unquestioned institution, and she did not expect him to bestow so much compassion on Augusta’s discarded bonnet.  At the top of the steps they opened a door, and entered a great wide hall.  All was exceedingly still.  A gas-light was burning over the fire-place, but the corners were in gloom, and the coats and cloaks looked like human figures in the distance.  Phœbe waited while Robert lighted her candle for her.  Albeit she was not nervous, she started when a door was sharply pushed open, and another figure appeared; but it was nothing worse than her brother Mervyn, in easy costume, and redolent of tobacco.

About three years older than Robert, he was more neatly though not so strongly made, shorter, and with more regular features, but much less countenance.  If the younger brother had a worn and dejected aspect, the elder, except in moments of excitement, looked bored.  It was as if Robert really had the advantage of him in knowing what to be out of spirits about.

‘Oh! it’s you, is it?’ said he, coming forward, with a sauntering, scuffling movement in his slippers.  ‘You larking, Phœbe?  What next?’

‘I have been drinking tea with Miss Charlecote,’ explained Phœbe.

Mervyn slightly shrugged his shoulders, murmuring something about ‘Lively pastime.’

‘I could not fetch her sooner,’ said Robert, ‘for my father went to sleep, and no one chose to be at the pains of entertaining Crabbe.’

‘Ay—a prevision of his staying to dinner made me stay and dine with the –th mess.  Very sagacious—eh, Pheebe?’ said he, turning, as if he liked to look into her fresh face.

‘Too sagacious,’ said she, smiling; ‘for you left him all to Robert.’

Manner and look expressed that this was a matter of no concern, and he said ungraciously: ‘Nobody detained Robert, it was his own concern.’

‘Respect to my father and his guests,’ said Robert, with downright gravity that gave it the effect of a reproach.

Mervyn only raised his shoulders up to his ears in contempt, took up his candle, and wished Phœbe good night.

Poor Mervyn Fulmort!  Discontent had been his life-long comrade.  He detested his father’s occupation as galling to family pride, yet was greedy both of the profits and the management.  He hated country business and country life, yet chafed at not having the control of his mother’s estate, and grumbled at all his father’s measures.  ‘What should an old distiller know of landed property?’  In fact he saw the same difference between himself and his father as did the ungracious Plantagenet between the son of a Count and the son of a King: and for want of Provençal troubadours with whom to rebel, he supplied their place by the turf and the billiard-table.  At present he was expiating some heavy debts by a forced residence with his parents, and unwilling attention to the office, a most distasteful position, which he never attempted to improve, and which permitted him both the tedium of idleness and complaints against all the employment to which he was necessitated.

The ill-managed brothers were just nearly enough of an age for rivalry, and had never loved one another even as children.  Robert’s steadiness had been made a reproach to Mervyn, and his grave, rather surly character had never been conciliating.  The independence left to the younger brother by their mother’s relative was grudged by the elder as an injury to himself, and it was one of the misfortunes of Beauchamp that the two sons had never been upon happy terms together.  Indeed, save that Robert’s right principles and silent habits hindered him from readily giving or taking offence, there might have been positive outbreaks of a very unbrotherly nature.

CHAPTER II

Enough of science and of art,Close up those barren leaves!Come forth, and bring with you a heartThat watches and receives.—Wordsworth

‘Half-past five, Miss Phœbe.’

‘Thank you;’ and before her eyes were open, Phœbe was on the floor.

Six was the regulation hour.  Systematic education had discovered that half-an-hour was the maximum allowable for morning toilette, and at half-past six the young ladies must present themselves in the school-room.

The Bible, Prayer Book, and ‘Daily Meditations’ could have been seldom touched, had not Phœbe, ever since Robert had impressed on her the duty of such constant study, made an arrangement for gaining an extra half-hour.  Cold mornings and youthful sleepiness had received a daily defeat: and, mayhap, it was such a course of victory that made her frank eyes so blithesome, and her step so free and light.

That bright scheme, too, shone before her, as such a secret of glad hope, that, knowing how uncertain were her chances of pleasure, she prayed that she might not set her heart on it.  It was no trifle to her, and her simple spirit ventured to lay her wishes before her loving Father in Heaven, and entreat that she might not be denied, if it were right for her and would be better for Robert; or, if not, that she might be good under the disappointment.

Her orisons sent her forth all brightness, with her small head raised like that of a young fawn, her fresh lips parted by an incipient smile of hope, and her cheeks in a rosy glow of health, a very Hebe, as Mr. Saville had once called her.

Such a morning face as hers was not always met by Miss Fennimore, who, herself able to exist on five hours’ sleep, had no mercy on that of her pupils; and she rewarded Phœbe’s smiling good-morrow with ‘This is better than I expected, you returned home so late.’

‘Robert could not come for me early,’ said Phœbe.

‘How did you spend the evening?’

‘Miss Charlecote read aloud to me.  It was a delightful German story.’

‘Miss Charlecote is a very well-informed person, and I am glad the time was not absolutely lost.  I hope you observed the condensation of the vapours on your way home.’

‘Robert was talking to me, and the nightingales were singing.’

‘It is a pity,’ said Miss Fennimore, not unkindly, ‘that you should not cultivate the habit of observation.  Women can seldom theorize, but they should always observe facts, as these are the very groundwork of discovery, and such a rare opportunity as a walk at night should not be neglected.’

It was no use to plead that this was all very well when there was no brother Robert with his destiny in the scales, so Phœbe made a meek assent, and moved to the piano, suppressing a sigh as Miss Fennimore set off on a domiciliary visit to the other sisters.

Mr. Fulmort liked his establishment to prove his consequence, and to the old family mansion of the Mervyns he had added a whole wing for the educational department.  Above, there was a passage, with pretty little bed-rooms opening from it; below there were two good-sized rooms, with their own door opening into the garden.  The elder ones had long ago deserted it, and so completely shut off was it from the rest of the house, that the governess and her pupils were as secluded as though in a separate dwelling.  The schoolroom was no repulsive-looking abode; it was furnished almost well enough for a drawing-room; and only the easels, globes, and desks, the crayon studies on the walls, and a formidable time-table showed its real destination.

The window looked out into a square parterre, shut in with tall laurel hedges, and filled with the gayest and sweetest blossoms.  It was Mrs. Fulmort’s garden for cut flowers; supplying the bouquets that decked her tables, or were carried to wither at balls; and there were three long, narrow beds, that Phœbe and her younger sisters still called theirs, and loved with the pride of property; but, indeed, the bright carpeting of the whole garden was something especially their own, rejoicing their eyes, and unvalued by the rest of the house.  On the like liberal scale were the salaries of the educators.  Governesses were judged according to their demands; and the highest bidder was supposed to understand her own claims best.  Miss Fennimore was a finishing governess of the highest order, thinking it an insult to be offered a pupil below her teens, or to lose one till nearly beyond them; nor was she far from being the treasure that Mrs. Fulmort pronounced her, in gratitude for the absence of all the explosions produced by the various imperfections of her predecessors.

A highly able woman, and perfectly sincere, she possessed the qualities of a ruler, and had long experience in the art.  Her discipline was perfect in machinery, and her instructions admirably complete.  No one could look at her keen, sensible, self-possessed countenance, her decided mouth, ever busy hands, and unpretending but well-chosen style of dress, without seeing that her energy and intelligence were of a high order; and there was principle likewise, though no one ever quite penetrated to the foundation of it.  Certainly she was not an irreligious person; she conformed, as she said, to the habits of each family she lived with, and she highly estimated moral perfections.  Now and then a degree of scorn, for the narrowness of dogma, would appear in reading history, but in general she was understood to have opinions which she did not obtrude.

As a teacher she was excellent; but her own strong conformation prevented her from understanding that young girls were incapable of such tension of intellect as an enthusiastic scholar of forty-two, and that what was sport to her was toil to a mind unaccustomed to constant attention.  Change of labour is not rest, unless it be through gratification of the will.  Her very best pupil she had killed.  Finding a very sharp sword, in a very frail scabbard, she had whetted the one and worn down the other, by every stimulus in her power, till a jury of physicians might have found her guilty of manslaughter; but perfectly unconscious of her own agency in causing the atrophy, her dear Anna Webster lived foremost in her affections, the model for every subsequent pupil.  She seldom remained more than two years in a family.  Sometimes the young brains were over-excited; more often they fell into a dreary state of drilled diligence; but she was too much absorbed in the studies to look close into the human beings, and marvelled when the fathers and mothers were blind enough to part with her on the plea of health and need of change.