by George Moore
“How beautifully he writes,” said Sally reflectively.
“You never had a lover who wrote to you like that. Do you remember how Jimmy used to write?”
“I don’t know how he wrote to you, but his letters to me, I will say that, were quite as nice as anything Frank could write. You needn’t toss your head, you are not Lady Mount Rorke yet.”
Sally refused to hear, but presently, seeing a cloud on her sister’s face, and thinking the letter contained some piece of unpleasantness, she relented, and pressed her to continue.
“The house is full of people — people whom I have known all my life — and
they make a great deal of me. I have to tell them about Italy, and they
ask me absurd questions about Michael Angelo or Titian, Leonardo or
Watteau.... The house party is a large one, and we have people to dinner
every day; and in the evening the drawing-room, with its grim oak and
escutcheons and rich modern furniture, is a pretty sight indeed. There
is a lady here whom I knew in London, Lady Seveley; and I have had
suspicions that Mount Rorke would like me to marry her. But she has
the reputation of being rather fast, so perhaps the old gentleman is
allowing his thoughts to wander where they should not. I hope not for
his sake, for I hear she is devoted to a young Irishman, a Mr. Fletcher,
a journalist in London. I met them at Reading once in most suspicious
circumstances. He is the son of a large grazier, one of my uncle’s
tenants, and she is, I suppose, so infatuated that she could not resist
the temptation of calling on his family. She was careful not to speak
of her intentions to anybody, but waited until she got a favourable
opportunity and slipped off to pay her visit. The Fletchers live about
half a mile from the castle. I was riding that way, and met her coming
out of their house. I got off my horse and walked back together. I hope
Mount Rorke will not hear of her ladyship’s escapade; he would be very
angry, for the Fletchers are people who would be asked to have something
to eat in the housekeeper’s room if they called at the Castle. In London
one knows everybody, but in the country we are more conservative.”
“I hope she won’t cut you out,” said Sally. “It would be a sell for
you if she did. Go on.”
“No, I shan’t, you are too insulting.”
“Who began it? You told me that I didn’t get such nice letters as you. Pray go on.”
“I do not know if you would think her handsome. I don’t. She is, however, an excellent musician; we play duets together every evening, to Mount Rorke’s intense delight. You know my dialogue between a lady and a gentleman? She has written it down for me and corrected a few mistakes; I think I shall publish it. Darling, I love you better than any one in the world; you are all the world to me; try to love me a little — you will never find any one to love you as I do.”
“Well, you can’t find anything peculiarly disagreeable to say about that, I think.”
Extract from another letter: —
“All the visitors have gone; Mount Rorke and I are quite alone. He is kindness itself, and does not bother me about his memoirs; but from what I hear that book will make one of the biggest sensations ever made in the literary world. I want him to publish it now, but he only smiles and shakes his head. He says: ‘What is the use of setting the world talking about you when you are alive; as long as I am alive I can see those I want to see, and be with them far more personally than I could by placing in their hands three volumes in 8vo; the 8vos are only useful when you have passed into darkness, and are not yet reconciled to dying quite out of the minds of men. I do not desire to be remembered by those who will live three hundred years hence, but I confess that I should like to modulate the pace of forgetfulness according to my fancy, and be remembered, let us say, for the next sixty or seventy years. I find no fault with death but its abruptness, and that I hope to be able to correct. The vulgar and most usual plan is children, but children are no anodyne to oblivion, whereas a good book in a certain measure is.’
“These are almost the words Mount Rorke used, and I quote them as exactly as possible, so that you may see what kind of man he is. We pulled our chairs round to the fire and had a real good talk. I know no better company than Mount Rorke. He has seen everything, read everything, and known everybody worth knowing; he is a mine of information, and, what is far better, he is a complete man of the world; and long contact with the world has left him a little cynical, otherwise he is perfect. I told him the story about Berkins, and he laughed; I never saw him laugh so before; and when I told him that I had told Berkins, as he was tying up his leg, that so far as the incident with the dog was concerned, I regretted deeply what had occurred, he could not contain himself. He rang the bell, and we had old Triss up. He asked a great deal about you; I leave you to imagine what I said. How did he expect me to describe my darling? I told him of your subtle, fascinating ways, of your picturesque attitudes, and your exquisite little black eyes. ‘I think I see her,’ he said; ‘little eyes that light up are infinitely more interesting than those big, limpid, silly eyes that everybody admires.’ I am now doing a water-colour sketch from the photograph — the one in which you stand with your hands behind your back and your head on one side — for him. I am getting on with it pretty well. Ah! if only I had you here for an hour (I should like to have you here for ever, of course; but now I am speaking artistically, not humanly), I think I could get it really like you; there are one or two things that the photo does not give me. I shall send the sketch to Dublin to be framed; it will be a nice present for Mount Rorke.
“My darling, you must not be anxious; all will come right in time — have a little patience. He is already much more reconciled to the match than he was when I arrived, and if your father will refrain from speaking too much about that hateful question, I am sure that all difficulties can be surmounted.”
She wrote to him three or four times a week, and on beautiful hand-made paper, delicately scented.
Extract from a letter: —
“We went up to town yesterday by the ten o’clock train West Brighton; and so that we might have more money to spend, we went third class. Father doesn’t like us going third class, but I don’t think it matters if you get in with nice people. We were very jolly. The Shaws went with us. They are very nice girls. They had to leave us at Victoria, and I and my cousin, Agnes Keating, went shopping together. We met the Harrisons at Russell & Allen’s. We saw there some lovely dresses — I wish you had been with us, for I have confidence in your taste, and when I choose a thing myself I am never sure that I like it. The assistant was so polite; she told me to ask for Miss —— ; she said she would like to fit me. Sally was coming up with us, but she changed her mind and remained at home, I was very glad, for she is wretchedly cross, and not looking at all well. You would not admire her in the least; she is growing very yellow. But I don’t mean to be ill-natured, so we’ll let Sally bide, as we say in Sussex. After Russell & Allen’s we went to Blanchard’s, and had a nice lunch. Grace was in town; she chaperoned us, and paid for everything; it was very kind of her. Then we went to the theatre, and saw a play which we did not care about much. There was a very stupid ‘tart’ in it. I do like ‘gadding,’ don’t I? But, oh, my darling Frank, gadding is not really gadding without you. How I miss you, how we all miss you, but I especially. The Keatings came over to tea to-day, and they asked about you. Blanche wants you to write something in her album, and she admired immensely the drawing you gave me. She is very artistic in her tastes; I think you would like her.
“But I have a bit of news that I think will amuse you. You remember Mrs. Horlock’s old dog — not the blind Angel; he’s old too. But I mean the real old dog, — the one twenty years old, that o
nce belonged to a butcher. He never smelt very sweet, as you know, but latterly he was unbearable, and the General resolved on a silent and secret destruction. He purchased in Brighton a bottle of chloroform. It was the dead of the night and pitch dark. However, he reached the end of the passage in safety; but suddenly he uttered a fearful shriek and dropped the chloroform. He thought he had seen a ghost; but it was only Mrs. Horlock, who was going her rounds, letting down the mouse-traps and supplying the little creatures with food. The General blurted out various excuses. He said that he had come to relieve the cock parrot’s tooth-ache — that he feared the Circassian goat was suffering from spinal complaint and the squirrels from neuralgia. But his protestations proved unavailing, and now he eats his meals in silence. And to make matters worse, the old dog did die a few days after — the General says from old age, but Mrs. Horlock avows that his death resulted from fright. ‘He was a sweet, cunning old thing, and no doubt knew all about that plan to destroy him.’ I think this would make an excellent subject for a comic sketch; I wish you would do one — the General dropping the bottle; Mrs. Horlock, surrounded by closed mouse-traps and crumbs, sternly upbraiding him.
“I see lots of Emily Pierce. Every Sunday I have tea with her, and sometimes lunch; but she doesn’t come here. I am afraid I couldn’t get on at all without her; we do everything together, and we hit it off so well.
“Sally has been staying in Kent. I do not know what’s up, but she seems to see everything couleur de rose; everything in Kent is better in her estimation than anywhere else. The men dance so much better for one thing. I am glad she is so happy, and I wish she would get married and stay there. Father says he has a cough that tears him to pieces, but I haven’t heard it yet.”
The elementary notion of a woman in love is to surround, to envelop the man she loves, with her individuality, and to draw him from all other influences. And the woman in love strives to accomplish this by ceaseless reiteration of herself or himself seen through herself. So Maggie with her nervous, highly-strung, febrile temperament could not refrain from constantly striking the lyre of love. Her hands were for ever on the chords. Letters and notes of all kinds; impetuous messages asking him when he would return; letters apologising for her selfishness — he had better remain with Mount Rorke until his consent had been obtained; resolutions and irresolutions, ardours, lassitudes, forgetfulness followed fast in strange and incomprehensible contradiction. And Frank was asked daily to perform some small task. There was always something; and Frank undertook all he was asked to do, for he loved to be as much as possible in that circle of life in which his sweetheart lived, and to feel her presence about him.
Extract from a letter: —
“Mount Rorke and I had a long and serious talk about you last night. He is against the marriage, but then he is against marriage in general. He said with his quiet, cynical laugh, ‘I daresay she is a pretty girl — I can read the truth through your romantic descriptions. I am convinced that she is very charming. But are you quite sure that you will never meet another equally charming girl? Remember the world is a very big place, and the stock of women is large; are you sure that you will be able to enjoy the charm which now rules and enchants you for thirty, forty years without wearying of it? These are the questions you have to consider, which marriage entails.’ I need hardly tell you what answer I made, and how I tried to convince him that your charms are those that a man capable of appreciating them could not weary of. Indeed I think I made him rather a neat answer — I said there are books in one volume, in two volumes, in three volumes, and there are books that you can take down and read at any time. He laughed; it rather tickled his fancy. And he said, ‘Quite true, there are some books and some women that one never tires of — that is to say, that some people never tire of. I haven’t been so fortunate or unfortunate, but that by the way. I admit such cases may occur. I will go further — I will admit that a man’s life may be made or marred by his taking to himself a wife; and if Miss Brookes were a really nice girl — if she were the one girl in a million, and if I were sure that your passion for each other has its root in deeper and more lasting sympathies than those of the skin (these were his exact words) — believe me, my dear Frank, I should not think of opposing the marriage. I shall be in London during the season, and no doubt an occasion will arise, of which I promise you to avail myself, of making this model young lady’s acquaintance. I will tell you what I think of her; she won’t deceive me, let her try how she will. There is only one thing I bar — one thing must not be, one thing I will not tolerate — a bad marriage.’ I lost my temper for a moment, but Mount Rorke did not lose his, and I soon came round. It is annoying to be spoken to in that way; but I remembered that he had not seen you, and I consoled myself by thinking of how great his conversion will be when he does. My only fear is that he’ll want to marry you himself. So, you see, my own darling, my uncle is on the ‘give,’ and we shall win soon and easily. The only real obstacle is your father’s pig-headedness on all matters in which money enters. I think with terror of his meeting with Mount Rorke. If he speaks to Mount Rorke as he spoke to me, my uncle will take up his hat and wish him good-morning. Do you exert all your influence. Do leave no stone unturned. All depends upon you.”
Extract from another letter: —
“I am weary of this place, and I long to see you. My longing is such that I can resist it no longer. Besides, nothing would be gained by remaining here. Mount Rorke will not say more than he has said. In a few days — think of that — I shall be with you. With what eagerness I look forward. How gladly I shall see the train leave the dreary bogs and the blue mountains of the West and pass into the pasture lands of Meath; how gladly I shall hail the brown, slobber-faced city of Dublin; with what delight I shall step on board the packet — I shall not think of sea sickness — and watch the line of the low coast disappear, then the Welsh mountains and castles, looking so like an illustrated history of England. I must spend two days in London, alas! I must order some new clothes. Victoria Station, with all its doors and cab stands, and book-stalls, the Sussex scenery, the woodlands, the Downs, the plunging through tunnels, and then you. Darling, I cannot believe that such happiness is in store for me.”
All happened as he had anticipated. At Victoria the usual difficulties had arisen about the dog. Triss was growling, the guard was cringing, and, with reference to no stoppage before we come to Redhill, the necessity of a muzzle was being argued.
“I am certain it is she,” and he followed with his eyes the tall, swinging figure in the black cloth dress. Then he saw the clear plump profile, so white, of Lizzie Baker.
“Here, give me the chain, I’ll tie the dog up.”
“But the muzzle, sir.”
A muzzle was procured, and Frank ran to the third class carriage where he had seen Lizzie enter.
“Lizzie! Lizzie!”
“Oh, Mr. Escott, who would have thought of seeing you! It is such a time—”
“Yes, isn’t it; how long? But are you going to Brighton?”
“Yes.”
“So am I; but — let me get you a first-class ticket. Guard, have I time to change my ticket?”
“No, sir, the train is going to start; get in.”
“Do you get out, Lizzie; I’ll pay the difference at Brighton.”
“No time for changing now, sir; are you getting into this carriage?”
He could not forego the pleasure of being with Lizzie. An old woman with a provision basket on her lap drew her skirts aside and made way for him; there were three dirtily dressed girls — probably shop girls; they sat whispering together, a little troubled by the publicity; there were two youths, shabbily dressed, their worn boots and trousers covered with London mud. He was surprised, and he did not for a moment understand or realise his company. Frank had never been in a third-class carriage before.
“I’m afraid you won’t be comfortable here.”
“Oh, yes, I shall; I’d just as soon travel in one class as another — muc
h sooner when it means being with you.”
“None of your nonsense; I see you haven’t changed. Well, who’d have thought it? Just fancy meeting you, and after all this time.”
“How long is it? It must be nearly two years. I haven’t seen you sincethat day we went up the river.”
“Yes, you have.”
“No; where did I see you since?”
“At the bar; I didn’t leave the ‘Gaiety’ for several days after.”
“No more you did; I remember now. But why did you leave without letting me know where you were going?”
“I didn’t know I was leaving till the morning, and I left in the afternoon. A lot of us were changed suddenly. The firm couldn’t get enough young ladies to do the work at the Exhibition.”
“But you didn’t leave an address.”
“Yes, I did.”
“No, you didn’t; I asked the manager, and he told me you had left no address. They didn’t know where you had gone.”
“Did he say so? You mean Mr. Fairlie, I suppose — now I come to think of it, it is the rule of the firm not to give information about the young ladies. I am sorry.”
“Are you?”
“I am, really. We had a very pleasant day up the river — Reading; you took me to Reading.”
