The officers of the —— regiment, a detachment of which had been quartered there for a twelvemonth, gallantly determined to give the neighbouring families a fête before they left the town, in return for the hospitalities they had received. I am writing of the year 1813, a period when the palmy days of country quarters still existed, and many may still remember the tender sensibilities excited by a departing regiment, and the gay hopes generated by an arriving one. Either of these events were well-calculated to chase the composure of spirits arising from the unbroken routine of ordinary existence, and it may easily be imagined that, upon an occasion where the effects of both were brought to act upon the hearts and souls of a set of provincial fair ones at the same moment, the emotions produced must have been of no ordinary nature.
Such was the case at the fête given by the first battalion of the —— regiment on their leaving Silverton; for, as it chanced that they were to be replaced by the second battalion of the same corps, the compliment intended for the neighbourhood was so arranged as to be shared by the officers who were about to be introduced to it; and thus an immense mass of joys and sorrows, regrets and hopes, tears and smiles, all came into action at once; and volumes might be filled in the most interesting manner, solely in describing the states of mind produced in the most charming portion of the inhabitants of twenty-seven of the principal houses of Silverton and its vicinity.
“It was so quite unlike any other party that ever was given,” as Mrs. Compton well observed, in talking over the matter with her daughters, “that it was downright impossible not to make some difference in the way of preparing for it.”
“Different!... I believe it is different!” exclaimed Miss Martha; “it is the first ball we ever showed ourselves at by daylight, and I should like to know how we, that always lead everything, are to present ourselves in broad sunshine with dyed pink muslin and tarnished silver?”
“You can’t and you shan’t,” replied her affectionate mother, “if I sell the silver spoons and buy plated ones instead.... I will not have my girls disgraced in the face of two regiments at once. But, upon my life, girls, money is not to be had for the asking; for truth it is, and no lie, that there is not above twenty pounds in the bank to last till Michaelmas, and the butcher has not been paid these five months. But don’t look glum, Martha!... Shall I tell you what I have made up my mind to do?”
“Carry a plate round the mess-room, mamma, when they are all assembled, perhaps,” replied the lively young lady, “and if you asked for aid for the sake of our bright eyes, it is likely enough you might get something; but if it is not that, what is it, mother?”
“Why, I will walk over to Compton Basett, Martha, and ask the ram’s-horn, your aunt, for five pounds outright, and tell her into the bargain what it is for, and, stingy and skinflint as she is, I can’t say that I shall be much surprised if she gives it; for she is as proud as she’s ugly; and it won’t be difficult to make her see, this time, that I am asking more for credit’s sake than for pleasure.”
“Go, mother, by all means,” replied the young lady with a sneer, that seemed to indicate despair of any aid from Miss Betsy. “All I know is, that she never gave me anything since I was born but a bible and prayer-book, and it don’t strike me as very likely she’ll begin now. Set off, however, by all manner of means, and if you come back empty-handed, I’ll tell you what my scheme shall be.”
“Tell me now, Martha,” said the mother. “It’s no joke, I can tell you, striding over the hill this broiling day. I don’t want to go for nothing, I promise you. Tell us your scheme, girl, at once.”
“Why, if I was you, mother, I would go to Smith’s shop, and tell him confidentially that I wanted a little more credit, and that everything would be sure to be settled at Christmas.”
“That won’t do, Martha Compton. Your father has given him a bill already for thirty pounds, due in November, and it is a chance if it gets honoured, I promise you. Smith knows too much about our money matters to be caught napping.”
“Well then, set off, mother! I’d offer to go with you, only I know that Captain Tate will be sure to be walking on the Hatherton Road, and I shouldn’t wonder yet if he was to come out with a proposal.”
“Oh! never mind me, child, I can go alone, and that’s what you can’t do, my dear.... You must take Sophy with you, mind that, and don’t get talked of just as the new set are coming in.”
“Nay, for that matter, Sophy will be as likely to meet Willoughby as I shall be to meet Tate, so there is no fear I should have to go alone.”
“Well!... take care of yourselves, and don’t let the sun get to tan your necks, mind that.”
Having given these parting injunctions, Mrs. Compton set forth upon her expedition, the result of which shall be given in the next chapter.
CHAPTER II.
A SISTERLY VISIT, AND A CHEERFUL RECEPTION. — THE RETREAT OF A RURAL HEIRESS. — INTERESTING CONVERSATION. — AN UNSATISFACTORY LETTER.
Mrs. Compton said no more than the truth, when she declared that it was no joke to walk from Silverton to Compton Basett in the dog-days. A long shadeless hill was to be mounted, several pastures, beautifully open to the sun, with all their various stiles, were to be conquered, and finally a rough stony lane, that might have crippled the hoof of a jackass, was to be painfully threaded before she could find herself at Miss Betsy’s door. Yet all this she undertook, and all this she performed, strengthened by the noble energy of maternal love.
On reaching at length the comfortable, well-conditioned abode of her husband’s rural ancestors, she so far suspended her steadfast purpose as to permit herself to drop into a deliciously cool woodbine-covered seat in the porch, and there indulged the greatly-needed luxuries of panting and fanning herself at her ease for a few minutes, before she set to work on the stony heart of the spinster.
Just as she was beginning to think that it was time her rest should end, and her important labour begin, a curly-headed little girl, of some eight or nine years old, came from the house, and very civilly asked her “What she pleased to want?”
“I want to see Miss Betsy ... can’t you go to her, my little girl, and tell her that her sister, Mrs. Compton, is come to pay her a visit?”
“Yes, ma’am,” replied the child, “there she is, you can see her, if you please to look this way ... there ... at the end of the long walk, where you see the bit of grass-plat and the two elm trees. Miss Betsy always sits in her bower in a sun-shiny morning watching the bees.”
“Well!... trot away to tell her Mrs. Compton is coming, and then she won’t be surprised, you know.”
The child did as she was bid, tripping lightly along a well-kept gravel walk which led to the grass-plat, while Mrs. Compton followed with sedater step behind.
How the announcement of her arrival was received by the little spinster she could not judge, though she was at no great distance when it was made; but her messenger having entered beneath the flowery shelter of Miss Betsy’s bower, both parties were effectually concealed from her sight, and despite the profound contempt she constantly expressed for the “little fright,” she paused at some paces from the entrance, to await the child’s return.
The interval was not long; but though her little envoy speedily reappeared, she brought no message, and silently pointing to the bower, ran back towards the house.
Mrs. Compton looked after her, as if she had rather she would have remained; but she called her courage (of which she had usually a very sufficient stock) to aid her in meeting “the ugly little body’s queer ways,” and marched forward to the encounter.
A few steps brought her to the front of Miss Betsy’s bower, and there she saw the still happy heiress seated on a bench, which, though it might upon occasion hold two persons, had nevertheless very much the comfortable air of an arm-chair, with a last year’s new novel on a little table before her (a subscription to a library at Exeter being one of her very few expensive indulgences).
Miss Betsy’s dress was always
as precisely neat and nice as that of a quaker; and on the present occasion no bonnet concealed the regular plaiting of her snow-white muslin cap, which, closely fitting round her pale but intelligent features, was so peculiarly becoming, that her visitor muttered in her heart, “She can dress herself up, nasty crooked little thing, and we shall soon see if she has generosity enough to make her nieces look half as smart.”
“Good morning to you, sister Betsy,” it was thus she began the difficult colloquy that she was come to hold. “You look charming well to-day, with your beautiful cap, and your pretty arbour, and your book, and your arm-chair, and all so very snug and comfortable.... Ah, goodness me! nobody knows but those who have tried, what a much finer thing it is to be single than married!”
“Did you come all the way from Silverton, Mrs. Compton, to tell me that?” said the lady of the bower, pointing to a stool that stood at the entrance.
“Why no, sister Betsy, I can’t say I did,” replied Mrs. Compton, seating herself. “I am come upon an errand not over agreeable, I assure you — neither more nor less than to talk of your poor brother’s troubles and difficulties; and what is worst of all, I don’t feel over sure that you will care anything about it.”
“And what makes you think that, Mrs. Compton?” said Miss Betsy in a sort of cheerful, clear voice, that certainly did not evince any painful acuteness of sympathy.
“How can I think that you care much about him, or any of us, sister Betsy, since ’tis months and months that you have never come near us?... I am sure we often talk of you, and wish you would be a little more sociable.”
“That is exceedingly obliging, Mrs. Compton,” replied Miss Betsy in the same cheering, happy tone of voice, “and I should be very wrong not to oblige you, if I could fancy that my doing so could be of any real use or service. But to tell you the truth, I suspect that my poor brother likes to have a better dinner when I am at table than when I am not; and if all’s true that gossips tell about his butcher’s bill, that can be neither right nor convenient; ... and as for you, Mrs. Compton, and the young ladies, I greatly doubt if my frequent appearance among you would contribute much to your intimacy with the officers.”
“You talk very strangely, sister Betsy.... I am sure I was not thinking of the officers at all, but only of how glad we always were to see you.”
“That is very kind, indeed!” replied the provoking spinster in the same happy voice; “and I assure you that I do believe my brother likes to see me very much, and what is more remarkable still, I have more than once fancied that my niece Sophy looked rather pleased when I came in.”
“And so did Martha, I am sure, ... and so did I, sister Betsy; you can’t deny that: ... then why don’t you come to see us oftener?”
“For no reason in the world,” replied Miss Betsy gaily, “but because I like to stay at home better.”
“So much the worse for us, ... so much the worse for us, sister Betsy.... If you had been to see us, you must have found out what I am now come to tell you, and that is, that poor dear Josiah is in very great difficulty indeed; and though we generally, I must say, bear all our hardships remarkably well, yet just at this time it comes upon us with unbearable severity.”
“Does it indeed, Mrs. Compton?... But you have never yet turned your head to look at my bees; ... for my part, I can sit and watch them by the hour together, if my book is not too interesting: ... careful little fellows! It is but just three o’clock,” (standing up as she spoke to look out upon a sundial that glittered in the middle of the grass-plat,) “but just past three, and they are beginning to come home with their work already.”
Mrs. Compton felt what the French call desoutée, but she recovered herself, and returned to the charge.
“You are a happy woman, sister Betsy,” said she, “with nothing to care about but your books and your bees!”
“I am very happy indeed!” replied the maiden, in an accent that well befitted the words; “and so are my bees too, for it is beautiful weather, and one can almost see the flowers grow, they come on so finely.”
“But I want to talk to you, sister Betsy, about our troubles.... You don’t know how I slave and fag to make our poor girls look like somebody.... No Saturday night ever comes that I do not sit up till past midnight striving to make their things decent for Sunday!”
“Do you indeed, Mrs. Compton?... I was told that they wore pink bows in their bonnets last Sunday, and green the Sunday before; ... but I did not know that you sat up to change them.”
“Change them!... God bless you!... I wish that was all I have got to do.... Why, I had to wash those pink ribbons, and then dip them in saucer pink, and then rub them very nearly dry, till my poor arms almost came off, and then iron them, and then sew in the wire ribbon again, and then make them up.... I’ll leave you to judge how much sleep I was likely to get; for I could not have the bonnets till after the girls came home from the evening parade, where they had been with Mrs. Colonel Williamson — they never go to parade without one of the regimental ladies as a chaperon.”
“But why don’t the young ladies rub their ribbons a little themselves?” asked Miss Betsy.
“Oh! that would not answer at all, sister Betsy. Why, that very Saturday night they were at a musical party at Colonel Williamson’s, and Sophy was the principal lady singer. She and that elegant young Willoughby always sing together, and the best judges in Silverton say it is as fine as anything in London.”
“Well, that’s very nice indeed, Mrs. Compton, ... and I don’t suppose she could well rub her ribbons while she was singing.”
As she said this, Miss Betsy’s eye returned, as if drawn by some strong attraction (as had been often the case before since the conversation began) to the volume that lay open on the little table before her. Mrs. Compton became desperate, and rising from her stool, approached the table, and boldly closed the book.
“Upon my word, you must hear what I have got to say, sister Betsy, and leave alone reading for a minute or so, while I talk to you of what concerns the honour of your family.”
“The honour of the family?...” said the spinster in an accent of some alarm, employing herself, however, in finding her place again, and then putting a mark in it. “I hope you have got nothing very bad to tell me about the young ladies, Mrs. Compton?”
“Nothing in the world but good, sister Betsy, if you will but lend us a helping hand, once and away.... You seem to know all the news, and therefore I dare say you have heard that the first battalion of the —— are to go to Plymouth on the seventeenth, and that the second battalion are to march into Silverton on the same day; so the colonels have agreed that a fête, a public breakfast and dancing to the band, in tents, in a field behind the Spread Eagle, shall be given by the officers of the first battalion on the sixteenth, and that all or nearly all the officers of the second battalion shall have leave to come forward one day’s march to join it, and be introduced to all the neighbourhood. Now, just fancy our girls being invited to such a party as this, and not having a dress in the world that they can go in.... Just tell me what you think of this, sister Betsy?”
“Not having had much experience in such matters, Mrs. Compton, I really am quite at a loss to guess what it is that young ladies are likely to do in such a case.”
“Don’t you think it would be very natural, sister Betsy, to turn towards some kind, generous, rich relation, and ask their help out of such a strait?... don’t you think this would be natural and right, sister Betsy?”
“Yes, very natural and right indeed, Mrs. Compton.”
“Thank God!... then all our troubles are at an end!... Dear, blessed, sister Betsy!... ten pounds, ten pounds will be quite enough for us all, and buy a pair of new black stockings for Josiah into the bargain, in case he should like to go.”
Miss Betsy made no reply, but drawing the table a little towards her, opened her book, and began to read.
“It’s a long walk I have to go, sister,” resumed Mrs. Compton, “and I shall be parti
cularly glad to get home; ... so, will you have the kindness to give me the money at once?”
“Ma’am?...” said Miss Betsy, looking up with a most innocent expression of countenance.
“Whatever sum you may be pleased to grant us, sister Betsy, I beg and entreat you to give me directly.”
“So I would, Mrs. Compton, without a moment’s delay,” replied Miss Betsy, with the most cheerful good-humour, “only I don’t intend to give you any money at all.”
“Oh! isn’t that treachery?... isn’t that cruelty?” exclaimed the agitated matron, wringing her hands. “Did not you say, sister Betsy, that it would be the most natural and right thing in the world to ask one’s rich relations in such a moment as this?”
“But I never said it would be right to ask me, Mrs. Compton.”
“But you meant it, if you did not say it, and that I’m sure you can’t deny, ... and isn’t it hard-hearted to disappoint me now?”
“It is a great deal more hard-hearted in you, Mrs. Compton, to take upon you to say that I am rich. I am a poor crooked ram’s-horn of a body, as you know well enough, and I want the comfort and the consolation of all the little countrified indulgences that my good father provided for me by his will. You were a beauty, Mrs. Compton, and your daughters are beauties, and it must be a great blessing to be a beauty; but when God denied me this, he gave me a kind-hearted father, who took care that if I could not have lovers, I should have wherewithal to do tolerably well without them; and I am not going to fly in the face of Providence, or of my father either, in order to dress you and your daughters up to please the officers. So now, Mrs. Compton, I think you had better go home again.”
Collected Works of Frances Trollope Page 105
