Collected Works of Frances Trollope

by Frances Milton Trollope

  Most heartily ashamed did the good Major feel as he made this confession, and very nobly honest was it of him to make it at all. He could not, however, have hit upon a better confidante than his loving wife; for not only did she perfectly well and sympathetically understand him, but she felt also, that the sin to which he pleaded guilty was one that must very resolutely be battled with; and if, from the original depravity of their natures, it could not be positively eradicated, root and branch, that it must at any rate be so far conquered and kept down, as to prevent its ever influencing their words and actions, in any way whatever.

  “You are right.... you are right, dear wife, he replied, after patiently listening to her conscientious statement of what ought to be their conduct; “and so it shall be. Her money gives her a right to have her own way, if there is nothing wrong in that way; and we have no better right to thwart her, even in wish, than we have to insist upon her laughing like our young ones, instead of looking grave like herself. So now the matter’s settled, Poppsy, and I feel easier in my mind, ten to one. And besides, you and I shall understand one another now, without having to exchange looks whenever she happens to seem rather queer. And that’s a good thing, I can tell you, particularly where there happens to be young people.”... Nothing could more plainly show that the star of Miss Martin Thorpe was in the ascendant than the happy chance which had led the good Major and his faithful wife to this frank interchange of sentiments; for it left them both exactly in the state most favourable to all her ideas of happiness, namely, with minds and tempers firmly bent to let her have her own way in everything, without permitting even a look to interfere with her.

  CHAPTER XVII.

  On the day appointed by the heiress for her departure from Bamboo Cottage, Mr. Thorpe’s old-fashioned but very handsome coach, carefully cleaned, and with four fine horses, two spruce postilions, and a most respectable groom-like looking servant in deep mourning on the box, stopped at Major Heathcote’s door, precisely at the moment it was expected by the young head, which had arranged not only its coming, but every circumstance, whether trifling or important, which could make the journey about to be performed commodious, agreeable, and dignified.

  The staid-looking Mrs. Roberts, also in deep mourning, stepped out of the carriage as soon as the sable groom had let down the step; and with a sort of solemn pace, that seemed to speak of decorum, discretion, respectfulness, watchfulness, carefulness, all personified, made her way to the apartment of her mistress, followed by the man-servant, carrying trunk-covers and straps in his hands.

  Miss Martin Thorpe, her uncle, aunt, and all her cousins, were engaged in eating their breakfasts when this happened; so that her servants, who had been made as well acquainted with what they had to do, as if they had passed as many years in their new lady’s service as in truth they had done hours, were neither challenged nor impeded by meeting any one.

  Mrs. Roberts, when bringing home the two handsomest dresses ever made at King’s Cross, had been initiated into all the mysteries of her young lady’s packing arrangements; had herself, indeed, lingered an hour to deposit the result of her own labours, with her own hands, in the trunk destined for their reception, and now assumed the insignia of her new office, by closing the various boxes, and putting the keys of them in her pocket. The experienced William then enveloped them carefully in their covers, fastened in all directions, exactly according to rule; and conveying them, with the assistance of Mrs. Heathcote’s forbidden maids, to the carriage, strapped them in their various places with equal skill and promptitude. it was then, and then only, that the parlour-door was opened, and Miss Martin Thorpe’s carriage announced in the unknown voice of her new groom.

  The whole family looked up with surprise, and Major Heathcote smiled, but speedily recovering his gravity he quietly said, “hope you have had time to finish your breakfast, Sophia?”

  “I thank you, sir,.... I will take another cup of tea, if you please”.... replied the heiress with philosophical composure.

  The “other cup of tea” was handed to her with the good-humoured haste which betokens a zealous wish to expedite that for which no extra time can be allowed; but Sophia sipped it leisurely, and with an air that seemed to say she’ should never do anything in a hurry.

  The younger girls stared at her with almost comic astonishment. She had never, it is true, indulged them with any very frolicsome familiarity of intercourse; but then everybody knew that poor cousin Sophy had neither father nor mother, and so, that it was no wonder she was grave. But still, her twelvemonths’ residence among them had removed every feeling of restraint, and sober cousin Sophy was as touch one of the family as if she had been merry cousin Sophy. But now she seemed suddenly to stand out and apart from them, in a manner they could in no way understand. The eldest girl, indeed, had one day said to her mother after some particular display of solemn dignity.... “Isn’t cousin Sophy grown proud, mamma, since she got rich?”.... But the two younger ones after great puzzling, came to the conclusion that the new Miss Martin Thorpe was certainly very unhappy still, about something or other, though it was not easy to guess what.... because it was not possible it could be about losing her uncle, though he was so kind to her, for she had known him such a very little time.

  The little girls were quite mistaken, however. It was not unhappiness which caused the new Miss Martin Thorpe to rise from her chair with a deliberate quietness which seemed to defy the suspicion that any combination of events could overset her equanimity. Nor was it unhappiness that made her put forth two fingers of her stiff little hand to each of the family to succession, with the air of a machine, which could make one movement but no other. No, Miss Martin Thorpe was not unhappy, when she passed out through the ivyed porch of Bamboo Cottage, nor when she slightly touched the extended hand of the Major and stepped for the first time into her own carriage.

  As in her final interview with her servant William, at the dwelling of her some while mantuamaker, Miss Martin Thorpe had ordered him to inform the postilions who were to drive her, that “as they drove so should they be paid,” and as relays of horses had been bespoken at the different stages, by post-paid letters thoughtfully despatched by the young lady herself, the journey was rapidly performed, notwithstanding the weight of the carriage. A few minutes indeed were spent at Hereford by the thoughtful Sophia’s driving to the bank, for the purpose of depositing her cheque, receiving fifty pounds upon it, writing her name in the presence of the head clerk, and receiving a cheque-book. This done, the still well-warned postboys galloped off, and brought the solitary but most happy possessor of Thorpe-Combe to the beautiful esplanade before the door, precisely half an hour before the time at which her last letter to Mrs. Barnes had ordered dinner.

  If Major Heathcote felt something like astonishment at the style in which his ward left his house, the feeling must have increased to unmitigated wonder bad he witnessed the state with which she entered her own. Every part of the mansion was by her own order prepared for her, exactly as it had been at the general gathering of the family at Christmas. There were not indeed so many men-servants. There was no portly Mr. Grimstone, and no figure resembling that of Sir Charles Temple’s smart Frenchman appearing as the hall-door opened to her. But there was Mrs. Barnes herself, the very perfection of a deeply-mourning housekeeper, standing in act to receive and welcome the new heir; and there was Jem, in a very tolerably well-fitted black skin, with buttons enough to justify the title of page, in any land. As she mounted to the chamber prepared for her (which by her order was the same she had before occupied) two more females in deep mourning contrived to be visible; so that her new maid and her new man perceived no air of desolation in the spacious and noble-looking mansion that was to be their home.

  Although, of course, no eye but her own and those of her servants could profit thereby, Sophia, though extremely well prepared to do honour to the dinner she expected to find ready for her at six o’clock, patiently endured witnessing the process of unpacking more than one
trunk, in order to obtain all things needful for a well-appointed evening toilet. But Mrs. Roberts was active, and exceedingly intelligent, and it was not more than five minutes past the appointed hour, when little Miss Martin Thorpe rustled in her rich silk from her drawing-room into her dining-room.

  Many young girls of twenty would have found the sitting down thus in solitary state extremely dull, not to say melancholy. But not so Miss Martin Thorpe. The only feeling she experienced, in the slightest degree approaching to annoyance, arose from the necessity of not permitting her eyes to wander freely over every part of the room, and every article in it, from the fine Vandyck over the chimneypiece to the saltspoons on the table. As long as William and the page remained in the room, this was impossible. But at length she was left, with her oranges, East India ginger, and sherry, having secured herself from interruption by saying, “I shall want coffee and lights in the drawing-room in half an hour.”

  Having received these instructions the servants retired; and then it was that the very soul of Sophia looked forth at her eyes as she contemplated the many indications of wealth which surrounded her. Obedient to the command, ‘“Let me find everything in the same order as when I visited my late uncle Thorpe at Christmas,” the observant Mrs. Barnes had herself seen that the sideboard should have its colossal silver waiters and its golden cups. The rich damask furniture, though taken down within a week after the party broke up, again hung in heavy splendour before the windows; the massive chairs, fitted up en suite, were uncovered; the lustres blazed with wax lights; and the whole apartment, save that the table was now comparatively a small one, wore the same air of wealth and elegance as when it had caused her heart to leap at her first entrance into it.

  A young female figure, in a richly adorned picturesque sort of an old room, with rich draperies, massive plate, and a multitude of graceful though antiquated candélabres, has often been a favourite subject with artists, Flemish, English, and German. Some have made the fair one looking gay, and others sad; some have given her a book, and some a billet-doux; but no one ever yet bethought him of representing her in the act of taking an inventory of all the furniture with her eyes, that she might engrave it on her heart. It was thus, however, that the heiress of Thorpe-Combe beguiled her solitude; and if, as most philosophers have taught, contentment be really the most desirable object that the mind of man can obtain, the perfection of that enjoyed by Sophia might authorise her laying claim to the envy and admiration of the whole world.

  Nor did less of the same measureless, content hallow the first hours which she passed in her splendid drawing-room as its mistress. One by one, was each article of price examined; and one by one did each seem to become, as it were, part of herself, and take its own distinct and separate niche in the widely-spreading temple of her affections.

  The coffee was sipped with luxurious deliberation as her lingering eye slowly made the circuit of the room. It was an hour of very exquisite enjoyment, that; and Sophia, as she cordially acknowledged to herself that it was so, felt that she was not undeserving of the lot which had fallen upon her, for that she well knew how to value it.

  And did the three solitary hours which followed lie heavily? No... she had enough, and more than enough wherewith to weave a web, which like Penelope’s should never come to an end, though, not like hers, to be unravelled as soon as woven.

  Yet notwithstanding this activity of fancy, the ordinary materials of romance were but little called upon to assist her meditations. Instead of giving way to any such idleness, she employed herself in thinking over all the business she had to do. And there was enough of it. She was aware that in order to satisfy the craving for power unchecked, which ruled above all others in her heart, she had insisted upon bearing a very costly burden; and her brow contracted as she remembered it. One by one all the members of the Heathcote family who would have to feed at her board, and be partially or wholly sheltered by her roof, during the next year, passed in very tormenting review before her. But with an unflinching spirit she consoled herself, and said, “Were it to do again I would not change it... What! Submit to continue still as one of Mrs. Heathcote’s ‘young folks?’ Rather, ten thousand-fold, would I squander the entire income allowed me, in buying bread wherewith to feed them, so I were mistress of the ungraceful feast, than board it in my coffers, living the while their guest. Thank Heaven!” she murmured on, as she sat luxuriant pillowed in a deep arm-chair, precisely on the spot where three short months before she had looked gratitude unspeakable at being permitted to stand, “thank heaven! I need not bear it long! Eleven months; and eight days will set me free! But while the torment lasts it behoves me to study deeply how it may be most lightly borne. I cannot, and I will not, pass the time without occasionally letting other eyes than those of the Heathcote race see what I am; and that, despite the poverty so many have loved to speculate upon, I am not quite unfit to sustain the weight of wealth that has fallen on me... My guardian, too, my young and graceful guardian... HR. shall see it, and perhaps may wonder, and perhaps may wish — I know not exactly how his guardianship may end... The lackland baronet may perhaps be brought to fancy poor Sophy Martin as well worth thinking of, as the fair penniless Florence... We shall see. It may amuse me to let him watch me wear my state, as I know how to wear it, and yet, it may be, I shall prove too wise at last to let him share it. Time will show... and this shall be left to time, without withdrawing an atom of my care from the important present. I must feed these people, and I must endure though I detest them. But neither shall the food nor the endurance cost more than I can help.”

  So passed the time away. Miss Martin Thorpe was no great reader; and, even if she had been, her mind was in no state that night to profit by it.

  * * * * * * * * * *

  Very delightful to the heiress was the waking of the morning following. At the first moment that she opened her eyes on Mrs Roberts’ approaching to draw her curtains she started up, and half-exclaimed, “Where am I?” But the next brought with it all the delightful truth. She remembered that she was Miss Martin Thorpe, an heiress who knew how to have her own way in all things, and the possessor of all she could see, and a great deal more besides.

  Notwithstanding the quantity of business she had upon her hands, Sophia was in no hurry to get through her morning toilet. Mrs. Roberts was exceedingly obsequious; and not a comb or a pin, a ribbon or a frill, was handed to her, without such demonstrations of respect as made her feel herself extremely comfortable, sο that altogether she was employed for more than an hour in getting ready to go down stairs, and breakfast by herself.

  By herself! Could the whole world have furnished better company? As all was ordered to be as it had been during the Christmas festivities, the solitary coffee-cup was placed in the great dining-room. The disproportion was strikingly incongruous, but Sophia was in no humour to be pained by it. “It is really a noble room,” said she, with a quiet smile; “I feel lost in it... But how I love its magnificence now that it is my own!”

  In days of yore, Sophia had never ventured to breakfast upon Mrs. Barnes’ exquisite coffee, because everybody praised it so very much, and because she thought there might not be enough of it, and that Mr. Thorpe might have watched her take it, and not liked her the better for it. But she now atoned to herself for this restraint, and bugged herself in an embrace of most fond selfishness, as she remembered that never, never more should she be called upon to sacrifice her own wishes to please another.

  But this delightful thought led on to others of a more mixed character. Sophia was exceedingly fond of very nice coffee, and, to say truth, of all other nice things. Like her immortal namesake in Jean Jacques’ “Emile,” she might indeed have been very justly called “friande;” and with a degree of self-knowledge that did her great honour, she mentally exclaimed as she poured forth the third cup of the rich and steaming beverage, “How on earth am I to manage about having such coffee as this for my breakfast when the Heathcotes come? I must make purchase of a West-India isla
nd, or else submit to breakfast upon tea, during the hateful period of their stay.... or else....” And here she nodded her head, and smiled, as those only can smile who are inwardly pleased with themselves. “Yes, yes,” she murmured, “it will not be so very difficult. I must speak to Barnes about it.”

  And this idea of speaking to Barnes, about the thousand and one things which crowded her memory as necessary to be said to her, perhaps did, in some trifling degree, shorten her breakfast; for she did not remain at the table, notwithstanding the many delicacies which were upon it, for above an hour. At the end of this time she rose, rang the bell, and left the room.

  On entering the drawing-room she rang another bell, and when her page answered it, commanded that Mrs. Barnes should come to her. That really very excellent person approached her new lady with the most respectful compliments of the morning, and hopes that she had rested well during the night.

  “Pretty well, I thank you, Barnes,” was the reply. “But I shall do better when I get into the room which I mean permanently to occupy as my own. I have now sent for you on purpose to go through all the apartments, in order to make my selection; and of course you will be able to tell me all particulars respecting their different advantages, as to wind, sun, and so forth.”

  “I know the rooms well, ma’am, no doubt of it; nobody alive, so well,” replied the housekeeper, as she stood back to let the lady pass.

  “Go before me, Barnes,” said Miss Martin Thorpe. “It is you must lead the way, and remember I mean to see every room in the house.”

  “Then I am afraid, ma’am; said the housekeeper, stopping short, “that it will not be possible to do it just yet. The windows most be opened first, ma’am, or you would have to stand waiting In the dark and the cold while it was done.”