A Cousinly Connection

by Sheila Simonson

  He smiled and shook his head. "My lips are sealed."

  * * * *

  Mr. Thomas was next afternoon seen, heard, and approved. The Calverts, surprized but flattered by his lordship's unannounced visit, soon agreed to share the music master. Thomas, an intense Welshman, must also be persuaded. At first he seemed disinclined to take on a blind pupil. Meriden explained that Felix already played tolerably well, that what was chiefly required was a competent pianist to play for him and criticise his techniques. Thomas relented.

  Jane thought Thomas too astringent, but when she saw in the ensuing weeks how pleased and excited Felix was, and how quickly his temper as well as his performance mended, she was glad to have remembered the musician's existence.

  Vincent did not return. However, a stiff note came for her ladyship, indicating that he was bound for Brighton to console himself at the races. If Jane had not believed him to be desperate, her aunt had. The news that Vincent meant to lay his blunt on a nag he knew to be a sure thing instead of laying a pistol to his head, restored Lady Meriden to some semblance of good cheer, but she did not forgive Meriden.

  Meriden himself did not mention Vincent, nor did he trouble his stepmother with any further visitations. It appeared that he was far too busy. Having deposed Peavey, his lordship apparently took on the agent's duties as well as his office. Jane questioned the wisdom of such a course, for Meriden must necessarily be inexperienced in the management of large estates, but she did not consider it prudent or proper to remonstrate with him. Instead she breakfasted with him.

  Previous to his lordship's coming, Jane had been the only early riser in the family. Now she found herself companioned with fair frequency over the buttered eggs and toast. At first she was inclined to resent the intrusion of another person on her solitude, but gradually she came to rely upon his lordship's presence.

  She had now a great many more household decisions to make. Some required Meriden's consent, and more required the kind of discussion he seemed willing to enter. It was convenient to have such a time--free from fear of interruption--available. Besides, Jane found him a pleasant table partner and began to form a good opinion of his judgement. When he loaded the twins and their traps into the gig and carried them off to Lyme Regis at such an early hour that Lady Meriden, dragged down to bid them farewell, was too sleepy to create a Scene, Jane silently applauded. First-rate tactics.

  She noticed with amusement that he took Thorpe along as reinforcements, but the twins, like March, went out like lambs. It occurred to Jane that perhaps they wanted to leave, a reflexion that made her feel uncomfortable--but not so uncomfortable as to wish for their speedy return.

  She considered the family to be shaping well, much better than she had hoped. His lordship--though by no means a paragon, especially in regard to Vincent--shewed both a general and a particular sense of his brothers' and sisters' needs and seemed inclined to do more than the letter of his duty towards them. After several weeks she felt herself to be tolerably well acquainted with him and ready to form a few tentative judgements.

  He was odd, at least in the context of Meriden Place. His habit of living seemed unnecessarily austere, and his thirst for activity drove him to work like a Puritan on estate matters, so that she might have thought him a sort of Malvolio and felt very sorry for Vincent, whose style was more that of one of the caterpillars of the Commonwealth, had his lordship's austere ways not dissolved so often into comedy.

  True, his disposition to be amused took the form of satire more often than Jane liked, and his irreverence towards her aunt sometimes bordered on disrespect, but he kept within the line of what was tolerable, and his manners had nothing of the rustic or the boor, nothing to disgust. Jane thought he might Do.

  Almost she wrote as much to her father. However, she found she was even less inclined to return to Edward Wincanton's courtship than before, and considered with only a small twinge of guilt that what her father did not know couldn't injure him. With that unfilial resolve, she entered happily into the new regime at Meriden.

  Chapter X

  In the evenings after dinner his lordship formed the habit of listening to Felix play. Sometimes the press of affairs kept him from the small first-storey salon in which the pianoforte and the children's game table had been set up, but he was remarkably faithful. Afterwards, when he could spare the time, he contested Felix at chess.

  At first the girls were intimidated by Meriden's presence and took themselves off, but when he shewed no disposition to be rid of them, his sisters began, rather shyly, to stay and listen. Felix played well. The old Felix must have driven his sisters off with howls of rage, but when he indicated resentment of their presence, his brother merely pointed out that all good musicians require an audience and the new Felix, after visible cogitation, agreed.

  Jane found the manoeuver amusing. It put Maria and Drusilla on their best manners and forced Felix to behave as if he were civilised. After the music, the girls read or sewed or drew Jane and Miss Goodnight into a card game while Felix and Meriden played chess.

  Jane would have found Felix's game maddening. At first Meriden had to wait while his young brother felt where every piece was--the problem of distinguishing whose men belonged to whom was solved by using pieces from two sets of different weights and carved in dissimilar style. Play was constantly interrupted by Meriden saying, "No, no. Only consider, Felix, if you move your pawn there, what an advantage you give me," or "What courses are open to you? I have moved that bishop a pace to the right. Your king is in check."

  And Felix would scowl and touch the men and sometimes knock them over. Gradually, however, the boy gained confidence. He memorised the board. Since it soon grew impossible to complete an entire game in an hour or so, Meriden always set him the task of recalling where each piece lay when they quit for the evening.

  Jane marveled at Meriden's patience, and even more at Felix's, and grew greatly to respect Felix's intellect. It was not many weeks before he was devising strategies and even winning a game or two. She perceived that, as Felix grew in skill, Meriden was gradually reverting to a more ordinary style of play and in the process teaching Felix the manners of the game.

  She remarked on the fact one morning at breakfast.

  Meriden looked up from a slice of cold beef. "What a noticing female you are. He will be wanting other partners soon, and the less eccentric his style the easier it must be to find him a match. When I discover a tutor for him, I have to look first into the man's capacities as a chess master."

  "Shall you take Felix from Miss Winchell?"

  "Yes. I'd like to see Felix at one of the universities. He will require a companion, of course." He cocked an eyebrow at her. "I think he'd benefit from a good classical education rather more than Vincent has, don't you?"

  Jane laughed, but it seemed to her so elegant a solution to the complex problem that was Felix Stretton she wondered why no one else had thought of it. "Shall you tell Felix now?"

  "Not yet. He has some distance to go with Greek, and besides there may be an impediment I can't foresee. I shouldn't like to disappoint him." He frowned. "Do you know whether Felix has been away from Meriden Place?"

  "I believe only once since his loss of sight."

  The frown deepened. "He'll be frightened, then. Has no one ever taken him to Dorchester or Lyme Regis?"

  "No." Jane read censure in Meriden's expression and added defensively, "He was used to kick up such a dust over the least change."

  "Rather like his mother."

  Jane sighed. "I don't know how it is, my lord, but just when I am most in charity with you, you contrive to spoil everything with some such satiric comment."

  "It's very bad in me, to be sure. But come, I'm in earnest. Felix must learn to go about in the world. Will you help me?"

  "Of course."

  "Thank you. I'll not be free before Thursday, but I could drive him into Whitchurch then. It's a small enough place. I think it wouldn't frighten him overmuch. Help me think of
a reason to give him for going."

  "If you asked him, sir, he would probably go without a reason."

  He looked startled. "Why should he?"

  Jane regarded Meriden in some amusement. "You must have observed that he is in a fair way to idolising you."

  "Good God!"

  "You object to being toad-eaten?"

  His eyes lit, "I should enjoy it of all things, but I think you must be mistaken, Miss Ash. Only last evening Felix flung a pawn and two rooks at my head. Come, you were a witness."

  "He hangs upon your lips," Jane said firmly. "It is 'Meriden says this' and 'My brother would not like that' with him all day until we are heartily sick of it."

  "If that is true, I must pick a quarrel with him directly."

  He did not, however.

  On Thursday Felix was borne off, bolt upright and white as linen, to Whitchurch. He returned in high gig several hours later wearing a deplorable spotted neckerchief which he had, he announced, chosen himself, He had also apparently examined the famous brasses in the church and tried out the organ.

  As Jane and Miss Goodnight had been lurking in the garden in some apprehension over the outcome of Felix's excursion, Meriden delivered the boy into their charge.

  "Thank you for your opinion of the organ," he said to Felix gravely. "I'm sure the vicar will be grateful to know of the defective reed."

  "Well, it made a devilish racket," Felix replied. "I'm surprized the organist can bear to play with it howling away. Oh, is it you, Goody? I daresay Thomas is waiting for me. My musical lesson, you know, sir."

  "Of course. Give Mr. Thomas my compliments, and tell him I'm sorry I delayed you."

  "Oh, stuff," Felix said scornfully. "He don't care..."

  "Nevertheless, startle him with your suave good manners."

  Felix grinned, and Miss Goodnight bore him off, chattering, to the house.

  "Felix's adventure seems to have gone off well." Jane raised her brows. "The kerchief..."

  Meriden smiled. "Some of the Spanish guerrilleros wore that style of thing, and I made the mistake of saying so. How fortunate he's too young to grow mustachios."

  "It doesn't bear thinking of. Was he very frightened?"

  "Apprehensive, at first. I explained the noises that startled him, and he soon began to enjoy himself. The vicar will recover in time."

  "Unfortunate man. Shall you organise further expeditions?"

  He was silent a moment, then said slowly, "It must be followed up, but I've a deal of work in these next weeks."

  "I had planned to take the girls to Lyme Regis to fetch Arthur and Horatio home for the holidays. Perhaps Felix could be persuaded to accompany us."

  Meriden frowned.

  "It might prove confusing to him," she admitted, "but I 'd be very careful."

  "I'm sure of it." He hesitated, "Do you think the twins could be kept from teazing him? He has gained some confidence, but what must appear to him a voyage of great peril must seem very small beer to them. They're not necessarily tactful."

  "Oh, dear, no."

  He smiled. "Don't look so downcast, Miss Ash. The holidays are some time off, and perhaps we may contrive something."

  * * * *

  The musical evenings continued, and the chess. It amused Jane to see how quickly Maria and Drusilla came to require his lordship's attention also. Drusilla must shew him her sketches, Maria the latest bonnet she had trimmed. When her ladyship did not dine with them--she seldom appeared above once or twice in the week--the conversation, like the food, was lighter. On those evenings the party, for Felix now dined en famille, moved naturally from the small dining room to the music room for Felix's performance. When his lordship must occasionally be absent, Jane found herself almost as blue devilled as Felix.

  She came to realise what a task she had taken on that winter.

  Before Meriden's arrival the burden of civility had fallen on her shoulders. She had been forced to plan every evening like a general taking the field. Now everything was ease and good temper except, of course, when Felix roared at his sisters for whispering while he played or, frustrated in some strategy, overturned the chessboard. These reminders of the old savage in the new Felix grew rarer, however, for when he did overturn the board, Meriden required him to replace all the pieces as they had been and quit the room himself. Annihilating.

  The worst hurdle to general family harmony was that Felix did not wish to allow anyone else accomplishments. Unfortunately, he was so far superior at the pianoforte to either of his sisters that Jane had not the heart to request them to shew themselves up.

  One evening, however, when Felix had played for them the first movement of a sonata he had not completely mastered, instead of requesting an encore, Jane ventured that Drusilla had a very pretty voice and his lordship might sometime care to listen to one of her airs. Drusilla the Bold blushed and sat rooted to her chair.

  "I won't play for her," Felix said flatly, "and I don't care to listen to niminy-piminy ballads."

  "No, why should you? I'm sure it's nearly your bedtime," Jane said.

  "Jane! My bedtime?"

  Meriden listened to this interchange with a bemused expression. He made some civil remark to soothe Drusilla, who clearly did not wish to sing under the circumstances, and later left off the chess game after a few moves. Felix stalked from the room and knocked over a whatnot table, a thing he generally did not do accidentally. Meriden excused himself and left, too.

  "Jane, how could you?" Drusilla wailed.

  "You do have a pretty voice," Jane said coolly. "You were taken unawares and I'm sorry for that, but surely you are not shy?" Drusilla, if anything, tended to put herself forward unbecomingly.

  "I don't care to sing for my brother," she said sullenly.

  "Why not? I fancy Meriden has heard girls sing before."

  "But Felix..."

  "Oh, don't let Felix's distempered freaks overset you. If he does not care for ballads, it's only because he is at the wrong age to understand the words."

  Maria giggled. "Only fancy what Felix will be like when he turns romantical."

  Drusilla burst into tears. "You have spoilt the whole evening, Jane."

  It occurred to Jane that such dependence on Meriden's good opinion could not be well for any of them and would probably give him a swelled head when he came to know of it. She went off to her room rather depressed. Even Miss Goodnight had looked at her censoriously.

  However, a scheme presented itself to her in the middle of the night in the form of a dream--or nightmare. In this vision, Felix, who bore a much more marked resemblance to Lord Meriden than was the case, wore the infamous spotted scarf and chewed a flaming black seegar, As he chewed he played a martial air over and over on some twanging instrument. He kept shouting at his sisters to be still.

  In the dream, however, Maria and Drusilla were not present. Instead Jane herself talked on and on in a raucous yet governess-like voice, all the while tromping up and down the music room, in spite of the fact that the music Felix played changed midway to a saccharine ballad and she did not keep the time.

  Waking, she sat bolt upright in bed. Several minutes passed before she could laugh at herself and several more before her inspiration occurred.

  The Spanish guitarra. Of course. Felix had been playing upon that instrument in her dream. Half asleep, Jane resolved to ferret out Meriden's guitarra, if he had brought it from Yorkshire. He had claimed expertise, after all, the first morning she had met him. She would require him to accompany Drusilla. Unexceptionable--and calculated to spike Felix guns.

  The project did not seem so brilliant by light of day. To be rummaging among his lordship's belongings must strike any genteel lady as improper in the extreme. He doubtless kept it in his chambers, Jane reflected, and it would not do for her to intrude there, but surely no one would object if she happened on it in the lumber room. No harm to look.

  Nevertheless she caused the housekeeper to open the lumber room on a specious excuse. She dis
covered her own bandboxes and trunks, and dusted them, remarked the quantity of chairs and tables in every style and period that jumbled the attic, and fortuitously stumbled upon Meriden's gear. These consisted of a battered portmanteau and a sea trunk that looked the worse for a saltwater dunking, and beside them a squidgy cloth-wrapped parcel which must be her quarry.

  "What is this, Mrs. Pruitt?"

  "I'm sure I don't know, miss," Mrs. Pruitt said repressively.

  Jane arranged her features to express surprize. "Why, it's a musical instrument of some sort! His lordship's, I collect."

  "No doubt." Mrs. Pruitt drew her lips into a severe line.

  "What can you be thinking of to allow a fine instrument to lie in the dust? It must be cared for properly." She eyed the housekeeper warily, for the fine instrument, when she drew it from its wrappings, proved to be battered and scratched, and adorned with a knot of disreputable faded ribbons. It looked like something that had strayed into the house from a gypsy wagon. "Not the sort of thing I am accustomed to, miss." If Jane had heard refrain once from Mrs. Pruitt since Meriden's arrival, she had heard it fifty times.

  Mrs. Pruitt sniffed.

  "I shall remove it at once to the music room," Jane announced. "I hope his lordship will not be angry at this instance of carelessness."

  Mrs. Pruitt was heard to murmur that his lordship had only himself to blame for the niffy-naffy way his belongings was knocked about being as he had caused That Person--Jane took her to mean Thorpe--to drag the traps up here.

  Jane rather fancied herself as a burglar. She was conscious of having behaved ill, however, and was so pensive at dinner that Miss Goodnight asked her if she were sickening for something.

  Jane started. Finding Meriden's ironic grey gaze upon her, she flushed scarlet.

  "No, I'm perfectly well. Fit as, er, a fiddle."

  "I am relieved to hear you say so, dear Jane," Miss Goodnight said earnestly, "for I have thought you was looking hagged lately. It will not do to have you pulled about." She continued in that vein, prosing on about all the illnesses Jane had endured in the previous five years until she put Jane out of countenance. The other members of the party regarded Jane with some surprize.