"Ah! I, haven't been a surgeon's wife for nothing. Your father put me through a course of arms and legs."
"And we borrowed a baby," said Babie. "Mrs. Jones, our old groom's wife, who lives in the Mews, was only too happy to bring it, and when it was shy, it clung beautifully."
"Then the helmet."
"That was out of the British Museum."
"Has Grinstead seen it?"
"No, I kept it for my own public first."
"What will you do with it? Put it into the Royal Academy?"
"No, it is not big enough. I thought of offering it to the Works that used to take my things in the old Folly days. They might do it in terra cotta, or Parian."
"Too good for a toy material like that," said Jock. "Get some good opinion before you part with it, mother. I wish we could keep it. I'm proud of my Mother Carey."
Allen, who came home next, only sighed at the cruel necessity of selling such a work. He was in deplorable spirits, for Gilbert Gould was superintending the refitting of a beautiful steam yacht, in which Miss Menella meant to sail to the West Indies, with her uncle and aunt.
"I knew she would! I knew she would," softly said Babie.
That did not console Allen, and his silence and cynicism about his hosts gave the impression that he had outstayed his welcome, since he had neither wealth, nor the social brilliance or subservience that might have supplied its place. He had scarcely energy to thank his mother for her faultless transcription of "The Single Eye," and only just exerted himself to direct the neat roll of MS. to the Editor.
The next day a note came for him.
"Mother what _have_ you done?" he exclaimed. "What _did_ you send to the 'Weathercock'?"
"'The Single Eye.' What? Not rejected?"
"See there!"
"DEAR MR. BROWNLOW,-I am afraid there has been some mistake. The story I wished for is not this one, but another in the same MS. Magazine; a charming little history of a boy's capture by, and escape from, the Moorish corsairs. Can you let me have it by Tuesday? I am very sorry to have given so much trouble, but 'The Single Eye' will not suit my purpose at all."
"What does she mean?" demanded Allen.
"I see! It is a story of the children's! 'Marco's Felucca.' I looked at it while I was copying, and thought how pretty it was. And now I remember there were some pencil-marks!"
"Well, it will please the children," graciously said Allen. "I am not sorry; I did not wish to make my debut in a second-rate serial like that, and now I am quit of it. She is quite right. It is not her style of thing."
But Allen did not remember that he had spent the £15 beforehand, so as to make it £25, and this made it fortunate that his mother's group had been purchased by the porcelain works, and another pair ordered.
Thus she could freely leave their gains to Armine and Babie, for the latter declared the sum was alike due to both, since if she had the readiest wit, her brother had the most discrimination, and the best choice of language. The story was only signed A. B., and their mother made a point of the authorship being kept a secret; but little notices of the story in the papers highly gratified the young authors.
Armine, who had returned from a round of visits to St. Cradocke's, Fordham, Kenminster, and Woodside, confirmed the report of Elvira's intended voyage; but till the yacht was ready, the party had gone abroad, leaving the management of the farm, and agency of the estate, to a very worthy man named Whiteside, who had long been a suitor to Mary Gould, and whom she was at last allowed to marry. He had at once made the Kencroft party free of the park and gardens, and indeed John and Armine came laden with gifts in poultry, fruit, and flowers from the dependants on the estate to Mrs. Brownlow.
Armine really looked quite healthy, nothing remaining of his former ethereal air, but a certain expansiveness of brow and dreaminess of eye.
He greatly scrupled at halving the £15 when it was paid, but Barbara insisted that he must take his share, and he then said-
"After all it does not signify, for we can do things together with it, as we have always done."
"What things?"
"Well, I am afraid I do want a few books."
"So do I, terribly."
"And there are some Christmas gifts I want to send to Woodside."
"Woodside! oh!"
"And wouldn't it be pleasant to put the choir at the iron Church into surplices and cassocks for Christmas?"
"Oh, Armie, I do think we might have a little fun out of our own money."
"What fun do you mean?" said Armine.
"I want to subscribe to Rolandi's, and to take in the 'Contemporary,' and to have one real good Christmas party with tableaux vivants, and charades. Mother says we can't make it a mere surprise party, for people must have real food, and I think it would be more pleasure to all of us than presents and knicknacks."
"Of course you can do it," said Armine, rather disappointed. "And if we had in Percy Stagg, and the pupil teachers, and the mission people-"
"It would be awfully edifying and good-booky! Oh yes, to be sure, nearly as good as hiding your little sooty shoe-blacks in surplices! But, my dear Armie, I am so tired of edifying! Why should I never have any fun? Come, don't look so dismal. I'll spare five shillings for a gown for old Betty Grey, and if there's anything left out after the party, you shall have it for the surplices, and you'll be Roland Graeme in my tableau?"
The next day Mother Carey found Armine with an elbow on each side of his book and his hands in his hair, looking so dreamily mournful that she apprehended a fresh attack of Petronella, but made her approaches warily.
"What have you there?" she asked.
"Dean Church's lectures," he said.
"Ah! I want to make time to read them! But why have they sent you into doleful dumps?"
"Not they," said Armine; "but I wanted to read Babie a passage just now, and she said she had no notion of making Sundays of week days, and ran away. It is not only that, mother, but what is the matter with Babie? She is quite different."
"Have you only just seen it?"
"No, I have felt something indefinable between us, though I never could bear to speak of it, ever since Bobus went. Do you think he did her any harm?"
"A little, but not much. Shall I tell you the truth, Armine; can you bear it?"
"What! did I disgust her when I was so selfish and discontented?"
"Not so much you, my boy, as the overdoing at Woodside! I can venture to speak of it now, for I fancy you have got over the trance."
"Well, mother," said Armine, smiling back to her in spite of himself, "I have not liked to say so, it seemed a shame; but staying at the Vicarage made me wonder at my being such an egregious ass last year! Do you know, I couldn't help it; but that good lady would seem to me quite mawkish in her flattery! And how she does domineer over that poor brother of hers! Then the fuss she makes about details, never seeming to know which are accessories and which are principles. I don't wonder that I was an absurdity in the eyes of all beholders. But it is very sad if it has really alienated my dear Infanta from all deeper and higher things!"
"Not so bad as that, my dear; my Babie is a good little girl."
"Oh yes, mother, I did not mean-"
"But it did break that unity between you, and prevent your leading her insensibly. I fancy your two characters would have grown apart anyhow, but this was the moving cause. Now I fancy, so far as I can see, that she is more afraid of being wearied and restrained than of anything else. It is just what I felt for many years of my life."
"No, mother?"
"Yes, my boy; till the time of your illness, serious thought, religion and all the rest, seemed to me a tedious tax; and though I always, I believe, made it a rule to my conscience in practical matters, it has only very, very lately been anything like the real joy I believe it has always been to you. Believe that, and be patient with your little sister, for indeed she is an unselfish, true, faithful little being, and some day she will go deeper."
Armine looked up to h
is mother, and his eyes were full of tears, as she kissed him, and said-
"You will do her much more good if you sympathise with her in her innocent pleasures than if you insist on dragging her into what she feels like privations."
"Very well, mother," he said. "It is due to her."
And so, though the choir did have at least half Armine's share of the price of "Marco's Felucca," he threw himself most heartily into the Christmas party, was the poet of the versified charade, acted the strong-minded woman who was the chief character in "Blue Bell;" and he and Jock gained universal applause.
Allen hardly appeared at the party. He had a fresh attack of sleepless headache and palpitation, brought on by the departure of Miss Menella for the Continent, and perhaps by the failure of "A Single Eye" with some of the magazines. He dabbled a little with his mother's clay, and produced a nymph, who, as he persuaded her and himself, was a much nobler performance than Andromache, but unfortunately she did not prove equally marketable. And he said it was quite plain that he could not succeed in anything imaginative till his health and spirits had recovered from the blow; but he was ready to do anything.
So Dr. Medlicott brought in one day a medical lecture that he wanted to have translated from the German, and told Allen that it would be well paid for. He began, but it made his head ache; it was not a subject that he could well turn over to Babie; and when Jock brought a message to say the translation must be ready the next day, only a quarter had been attempted. Jock sat up till three o'clock in the morning and finished it, but he could not pain his mother by letting her know that her son had again failed, so Allen had the money, and really believed, as he said, that all Jock had done was to put the extreme end to it, and correct the medical lingo of which he could not be expected to know anything. Allen was always so gentle, courteous, and melancholy, that every one was getting out of the habit of expecting him to do anything but bring home news, discover anything worth going to see, sit at the foot of the table, and give his verdict on the cookery. Babie indeed was sometimes provoked into snapping at him, but he bore it with the amiable magnanimity of one who could forgive a petulant child, ignorant of what he suffered.
Jock was borne up by a great pleasure that winter. One day at dinner, his mother watched his eyes dancing, and heard the old boyish ring of mirth in his laugh, and as she went up stairs at night, he came after and said-
"Fancy, I met Evelyn on the ice to-day. He wants to know if he may call."
"What prevents him?"
"Well, I believe the poor old chap is heartily ashamed of his airs. Indeed he as good as said so. He has been longing to make a fresh start, only he didn't know how."
"I think he used you very ill, Jock; but if you wish to be on the old terms, I will do as you like."
"Well," said Jock, in an odd apologetic voice, "you see the old beggar had got into a pig-headed sort of pet last year. He said he would cut me if I left the service, and so he felt bound to be as good as his word; but he seems to have felt lost without us, and to have been looking out for a chance of meeting. He was horribly humiliated by the Friar looking over his head last week."
"Very well. If he chooses to call, here we are."
"Yes, and don't put on your cold shell, mother mine. After all, Evelyn is Evelyn. There are wiser fellows, but I shall never warm to any one again like him. Why, he was the first fellow who came into my room at Eton! I am to meet him to-morrow after the lecture. May I bring him home?"
"If he likes. His mother's son must have a welcome."
She could not feel cordial, and she so much expected that the young gentleman might be seized with a fresh fit of exclusive disdain, that she would not mention the possibility, and it was an amazement to all save herself when Jock appeared with the familiar figure in his wake. Guardsman as he was, Cecil had the grace to look bashful, not to say shamefaced, and more so at Mrs. Brownlow's kindly reception, than at Barbara's freezing dignity. The young lady was hotly resentful on Jock's behalf, and showed it by a stiff courtesy, elevated eyebrows, and the merest tips of her fingers.
Allen took it easily. He had been too much occupied with his own troubles to have entered into all the complications with the Evelyn family; and though he had never greatly cared for them, and had viewed Cecil chiefly as an obnoxious boy, he was, in his mournful way, gratified by any reminder of his former surroundings. So without malice prepense he stung poor Cecil by observing that it was long since they had met; but no one could be expected to find the way to the other end of nowhere. Cecil blushed and stammered something about Hounslow, but Allen, who prided himself on being the conversational man of the world, carried off the talk into safe channels.
As Cecil was handing Mrs. Brownlow down to the dining-room, wicked Barbara whispered to her cousin John-
"We've such a nice vulgar dinner. It couldn't have been better if I'd known it!"
John, whose wrath had evaporated in his "cut," shook his head at her, but partook of her diversion at her brother's resignation at sight of a large dish of boiled beef, with a suet pudding opposite to it, Allen was too well bred to apologise, but he carved in the dainty and delicate style befitting the single slice of meat interspersed between countless entrees.
Barbara began to relent as soon as Cecil, after making four mouthfuls of Allen's help, sent his plate with a request for something more substantial. And before the meal was over, his evident sense of bien-etre and happiness had won back her kindness; she remembered that he was Sydney's brother, and took no more trouble to show her indignation.
Thenceforth, Cecil was as much as ever Jock's friend, and a frequenter of the family, finding that the loss of their wealth and place in the great world made wonderfully little difference to them, and rather enhanced the pleasant freedom and life of their house. The rest of the family were seen once or twice, when passing through London, but only in calls, which, as Babie said, were as good as nothing, except, as she forgot to add, that they broke through the constraint on her correspondence with Sydney.
CHAPTER XXXV. THE PHANTOM BLACKCOCK OF KILNAUGHT.
And we alike must shun regard From painter, player, sportsman, bard, Wasp, blue-bottle, or butterfly, Insects that swim in fashion's sky. Scott.
"At home? Then take these. There's a lot more. I'll run up," said Cecil Evelyn one October evening nearly two years later, as he thrust into the arms of the parlour-maid a whole bouquet of game, while his servant extracted a hamper from his cab, and he himself dashed up stairs with a great basket of hot-house flowers.
But in the drawing-room he stood aghast, glancing round in the firelit dusk to ascertain that he had not mistaken the number, for though the maid at the door had a well-known face, and though tables, chairs, and pictures were familiar, the two occupants of the room were utter strangers, and at least as much startled as himself.
A little pale child was hurriedly put down from the lap of a tall maiden who rose from a low chair by the fire, and stood uncertain.
"I beg your pardon," he said; "I came to see Mrs. Brownlow."
"My aunt. She will be here in a moment. Will you run and call her, Lina?"
"You may tell her Cecil Evelyn is here," said he; "but there is no hurry," he added, seeing that the child clung to her protector, too shy even to move. "You are John Brownlow's little sister, eh?" he added, bending towards her; but as she crept round in terror, still clinging, he addressed the elder one: "I am so glad; I thought I had rushed into a strange house, and should have to beat a retreat."
The young lady gave a little shy laugh which made her sweet oval glowing face and soft brown eyes light up charmingly, and there was a fresh graceful roundness of outline about her tall slender figure, as she stood holding the shy child, which made her a wondrously pleasant sight. "Are you staying here?" he asked.
"Yes; we came for advice for my little sister, who is not strong."
"I'm so glad. I mean I hope there is only enough amiss to make you stay a long time. Were you ever in town before?"
; "Only for a few hours on our way to school."
Here a voice reached them-
"Fee, fa, fum, I smell the breath of geranium."
And through the back drawing-room door came Babie, in walking attire, declaiming-
"'Tis Cecil, by the jingling steel, 'Tis Cecil, by the pawing bay, 'Tis Cecil, by the tall two-wheel, 'Tis Cecil, by the fragrant spray."
"O Cecil, how lovely! Oh, the maiden-hair. You've been making acquaintance with Essie and Lina?"
"I did not know you were out, Babie," said Essie. "Was my aunt with you?"
"Yes. We just ran over to see Mrs. Lucas, and as we were coming home, a poor woman besought us to buy two toasting-forks and a mouse- trap, by way of ornament to brandish in the streets. She looked so frightfully wretched, that mother let her follow, and is having it out with her at the door. So you are from Fordham, Cecil; I see and I smell. How are they?"
"Duke is rather brisk. I actually got him out shooting yesterday, but he didn't half like it, and was thankful when I let him go home again. See, Sydney said I was to tell you that passion-flower came from the plant she brought from Algiers."
"The beauty! It must go into Mrs. Evelyn's Venice glass," said Babie, bustling about to collect her vases.
Lina, with a cry of delight, clutched at a spray of butterfly-like mauve and white orchids, in spite of her sister's gentle "No, no, Lina, you must not touch."
Babie offered some China asters in its stead, Cecil muttered "Let her have it;" but Esther was firm in making her relinquish it, and when she began to cry, led her away with pretty tender gestures of mingled comfort and reproof.
"Poor little thing," said Babie, "she is sadly fretful. Nobody but Essie can manage her."
"I should think not!" said Cecil, looking after the vision, as if he did not know what he was saying. "You never told me you had any one like _that_ in the family?"
"O yes; there are two of them, as much alike as two peas."
"What! the Monk's sisters?"
"To be sure. They are a comely family; all but poor little Lina."
"Will they be long here ?"
Magnum Bonum Page 52
