Kitabı oku: «The Knight Of Gwynne, Vol. 1», sayfa 29

CHAPTER XXXVII. A SCENE OF HOME

If the climate of northern Ireland be habitually one of storm and severity, it must be confessed that, in the rare but happy intervals of better weather, the beauty of the coast scenery is unsurpassed. Indented with little bays, whose sides are formed of immense cliffs of chalk, or the more stately grandeur of that columnar basalt which extends for miles on either side of the Causeway, the most vivid coloring unites with forms the wildest and most fantastic; crag and precipice, sandy beach and rocky shore, alternate in endless variety; while islands are there, some, green and sheep-clad, others, dark and frowning, form the home of nothing but the sea-gull.

It was on such an evening of calm as displayed the scene to its greatest advantage, when a long column of burnished golden light floated over the sea, tipping each crested wave, and darkened into deeper beauty between them, that the Knight, Lady Eleanor, and Helen sat under the little porch of their cottage and gazed upon the fair and gorgeous picture.

If the leafy grove or the dark wood seem sweeter to our senses when the thrilling notes of the blackbird or the thrush sing in their solitude, so the deepest silence, the most unbroken stillness, has a wonderful effect of soothing to the mind beside the seashore we have so often seen terrible in the fury of the storm. A gentle calm steals over us as we listen to the long sweeping of the waves, heaving and breaking in measured melody; and our thoughts, enticed by some dreaming ecstasy, wander away over the boundless ocean, not to the far-off lands of other climes alone, but into worlds of brighter and more beauteous mould.

They sat in silence, at first only occupied by the lovely scene that stretched away before them, but at last each deeply immersed in his own thoughts, – thoughts which, unconnected with the objects around, yet by some strange mystery were tinctured by all their calm and tranquil beauty. A fisherman was mending his net upon the little beach below, and his children were playing around him, now running merrily along the strand, now dabbling in the white foam left by the retreating waves; the father looked up from time to time to watch them, but without interrupting the low monotonous chant by which he lightened his labor.

Towards the little group at length their eyes were turned. “Yes,” said the Knight, as if interpreting what was passing in the minds of those at his side, “that is about as near to human happiness as life affords. I believe there would be very few abortive ambitions if men were content to see their children occupy the same station as themselves; and yet, when the time of one’s own reverses arrives, how very little of true happiness is lost by the change of fortune.”

“My dearest father!” said Helen, as in a transport of delight she threw her arms around him, “how happy your words make me! You are, then, contented?”

“Do I not look so, my sweet Helen? And your mother, too, when have you seen her so well? – when do you remember her walking, as she did to-day, to the top of the great cliff of Dunluce?”

“With no other ill consequence,” said Lady Eleanor, smiling, “than a most acute attack of vanity; for I begin to fancy myself quite young again.”

“Well, Mamma, don’t forget we have a visit to pay, some of these days, to Ballintray, – that’s the name of the place, I think, Miss Daly resides at.”

“Yes, we really must not neglect it. There was a delicacy in her note of welcome to us here, judging that we might not be prepared for a personal visit, which prepossesses me in her favor. You promised to make our acknowledgments, but I believe you forgot all about it.”

“No, not that,” said the Knight, hesitatingly; “but in the midst of so many things to do and think about, I deferred it from day to day.”

“Shall we go to-morrow, then?” cried Helen, eagerly.

“I think it were better if your father went first, lest the way should prove too long for us. I am so proud of my pedestrianism, Helen, I’ll not risk any failure.”

“Be it so,” said the Knight, quietly. “And now of this other matter Bagenal presses so strongly upon us. I feel the greatest repugnance to assume any name but that I have always borne, and, I hope, not disgraced; he says we shall be objects of impertinent curiosity here to the neighborhood.”

“Ruins to dispute the honors of lionship with Dunluce,” said Lady Eleanor, smiling faintly.

“Just so; that might, however, be borne patiently; they will soon leave off talking of us when we give them little matter for speculative gossip. Besides, we are so far away from anything that could be called neighborhood.”

“But he suggests some other reasons, if I mistake not,” said Lady Eleanor.

“He does, but so darkly and mysteriously that I cannot even guess his drift. Here is his letter.” And the Knight took several papers from his pocket, from among which he selected one, whose large and blotted writing unmistakably pronounced it Bagenal Daly’s. “Yes, here it is: ‘Bicknell says that Hickman’s people are fully persuaded that you have left Ireland with the intention of never returning; that this impression should be maintained, because it will induce them to be less guarded than if they believed you were still here, directing any legal proceeding. The only case, therefore, he will prepare for trial will be one respecting the leases falsely signed. The bond and its details must be unravelled by time; here also your incognito is all-essential, – it need only be for a short time, and on scruples of delicacy so easily got over: your grandfather called himself Gwynne, and wrote it also.’ That is quite true, Eleanor, so he did; his letters are signed Matthew Gwynne, Knight of – . I remember the signature well.”

“I think, with Mr. Daly,” said Lady Eleanor, “it will save us a world of observant impertinence; this place is tranquil and solitary enough just now, but in summer the coast and the Causeway have many visitors, and although ‘the Corvy’ is out of the common track, if our names be bruited about, we shall not escape that least graceful of all attentions, the tender commiseration of mere acquaintances.”

“Mamma is right,” said Helen; “we should be hunted out by every tourist to report on how we bore our reverses, and tormented with anonymous condolences in prose, and short stanzas on the beauty of resignation.”

“Well, and, my dear Helen, perhaps the lessons might not be so very inapplicable,” said the Knight, smiling affectionately.

“But very inefficient, sir,” replied Helen, with a toss of her head; “I’m not a bit resigned.”

“Helen, dearest,” interposed Lady Eleanor, rebukingly.

“Not a bit, Mamma; I am happy, – happier than I ever knew myself before, if you like that phrase better, – because we are together, because this life realizes to me all I ever dreamed of, – that quiet and tranquil pleasure people might, but somehow never please to, taste of; but if you ask me am I resigned to see you and my dear father in a station so much beneath your expectations and your habits, I cannot say that I am.”

“Then, my dear girl, you accuse us of bearing our misfortunes badly, if we cannot partake of your enjoyments on account of our own vain regrets?”

“No, no, Papa, don’t mistake me; if I grieve over the altered fortunes that limit your sphere of usefulness as well as of pleasure, it is because I know how well you understood the privileges and demands of your high station, and how little a life so humble as this is can exact of qualities that were not given to be wasted in obscurity.”

“My sweet child,” said the Knight, fondly, “it is a very dangerous practice to blend up affection with principle; depend upon it, the former will always coerce the latter, and bend it to its will; and as for those good gifts you speak of, had I really as many of them as your fond heart would endow me with, believe me there is no station so humble as not to admit of their exercise. There never yet was a walk in life without its sphere of duties; now I intend that not only are we to be happy here, but that we should contribute to the well-being of those about us.”

There was a pause after the Knight had done speaking, during which he busied himself in turning over some letters, the seals of which were still unbroken; he knew the handwriting on most of them, and yet hesitated about inflicting on himself the pain of reading allusions to that condition he had once occupied. “Yes,” muttered he to himself, “we are always flattering ourselves of how essential we are to our friends, our party, and so forth; and yet, when any events occur which despoil us of our brief importance, we see the whole business of the world go on as currently as ever. What a foretaste this gives one of death! So it is, the stream of life flows on, whether the bubble on its surface float or burst.”

“That’s Lord Netherby’s hand, is it not?” said Lady Eleanor, as she lifted a letter which had fallen to the ground.

“Yes,” said Darcy, carelessly; “written probably soon after his return to England. I have no doubt it contains a most courtly acknowledgment of our poor hospitality, and an assurance of undying regard.”

“If it be of that tenor, I have no curiosity to read it,” said Lady Eleanor, handing the letter to the Knight.

“Helen would like to study so great a master of epistolary flatteries,” said the Knight, smiling; “and provided she will keep the whole for her private reading, I am willing to indulge her.”

“I accept the favor with thanks,” said Helen, receiving the letter; “you know I plead guilty to liking our noble relative. I ‘m not skilled enough to distinguish between an article trebly gilded and one of pure gold, and his Lordship, to my eyes, looked as like the true metal as possible: he said so many pretty things to Mamma, and so many fine things of you and Lionel – ”

“And paid so many compliments to the fair Helen herself,” interposed the Knight.

“With so much of good tact – ”

“And good taste, Helen,” added Lady Eleanor, smiling; “why not say that?”

“Well, I see I shall have to defend myself as well as my champion, so I ‘ll even go and read my letter.”

And so saying, she arose, and sauntered down to the shore; under the shelter of a tall rock, from whence the view extended for miles along, she sat down. “What a contrast!” said she, as she broke the seal, “a courtier’s letter in such a scene as this!”

Lord Netherby’s letter was, as the Knight suspected, written soon after his return to England, expressing, in his own most courtly phrase, the delightful memory he retained of his visit to Ireland. Gracefully contrasting the brilliant excitement of that brief period with the more staid quietude of the life to which he returned, he lightly suggested that none other than one native to the soil could support an existence so overflowing with pleasurable emotions. With all the artifice of a courtier, he recalled certain little incidents, too small, as mere matters of memory, to find a resting-place in the mind, but all of them indicative of the deep impression made, upon him who remarked them.

He spoke also of the delight with which his Royal Highness the Prince listened to his narrative of life in Ireland. “In truth,” wrote his Lordship, “I do not believe that the exigencies of his station ever cost him more than when he reflected on the impossibility of his witnessing such perfection in the life of a country house as I feebly endeavored to convey to him. Again and again has he asked me to repeat the tale of the hunt – the brilliant ball the night of your arrival – and I have earned a character for story-telling of which Kelly and Sheridan are beginning to feel jealous, by the mere retail of your anecdotes. Lionel’s return is anxiously looked for by all here, and the Prince has more than once expressed himself impatient to see him back again. My sweet favorite Helen, too, – when is she to be presented? There will be a court in the early part of next month, of which I shall not fail to apprise you, most earnestly entreating that my cousin Eleanor will not think the journey too far which shall bring her once again among those scenes she so gracefully adorned, and where her triumphs will be renewed in the admiration of her lovely daughter. I need not tell you that my house in town is entirely at her disposal, either as my guests, or, if you prefer it, I shall be theirs, whenever I am not in waiting.”

Here the writer detailed, with an eloquence all his own, the advantage to Helen of making her entrée into life under circumstances so favorable, remarking, with that conventional philosophy just then the popular cant of the day, that the enthusiasm of the world was never long-lived, and that even his beautiful cousin Helen should not be above profiting by the favorable reception the kindly disposition of the court was sure to procure for her. This was said in a tone of half-serious banter, but at the same time the invitation was reiterated with an evident desire for its acceptance.

As the letter drew near its conclusion, the lines became more closely written, as though some circumstances hitherto forgotten had suddenly occurred to the writer; and so it proved.

“I was about, my dear Knight, to write myself, with what truth I will not say, your ‘most affectionate friend, Netherby,’ when I received a letter which requires some mention at my hands. It is, indeed, one of the most extraordinary documents I have ever perused; nothing very wonderful in that, when I tell you from whom it comes, – your old sweetheart, Julia Wallincourt, or, as you will better remember her, Julia d’Esterre; she is still very beautiful, and just as capricious, just as maligne, as when she endeavored, by every artifice of her coquetry, to make you jilt my cousin Eleanor. There ‘s no doubt of it, Darcy, this woman loved you! at least, as much as she could love anything, except the pleasure of torturing her fellow-creatures. Well, it would seem that a younger son of hers, popularly known as Dick Forester, paid you a visit in Ireland, and, no very unnatural occurrence, fell desperately in love with your daughter, – not so Helen with him. She probably regarded him as one of that class upon which London has so stamped its impress of habit and manner that all individualism is lost in the quiet observance of certain proprieties. He must have been a rare contrast to the high-souled enthusiasm and waywardness of her own brother! Certain it is she refused him; and he, taking the thing much more to heart than a young Guardsman usually does a similar catastrophe, hastened home, and endeavored to interest his mother in his suit. Lady Julia had an old vengeance to exact, and, like a true woman, could not forego it; she not only positively refused all intercession on her part, but went what you and I will probably feel to be a very unnecessary length, and actually declared she never would consent to such an alliance. We used to remember (some years ago), at Eton, of a certain Dido who never forgave, and we are told how, for many years after, the lethalis arundo lateri adhosit; but assuredly the poet was speaking less of the woes of an individual than of the sorrows of fine ladies in all ages. Unfortunately, the similitude between her ladyship and Dido ends here; the classic fair one exhibited, as we are told, the most delicate fondness for the son of her lover. But, to grow serious, Lady Wallincourt’s conduct must have been peremptory and harsh; she actually went the length of writing to the Duke of York to request an exchange for her son into a regiment serving in India: whether Forester obtained some clew to this manouvre or not, he anticipated the stroke by selling out and leaving the army altogether; whither he is gone, or what has become of him since, no one can tell. Such, my dear Knight, is the emergency in which Lady Wallincourt addresses her letter to me, – a letter so peculiarly her own, so full of reproaches against you, and vindication of herself, that I actually scruple to transmit to you this palpable evidence of still enduring affection.

“Were you both thirty years younger, I should claim great credit to my morality for the forbearance. Let that pass, however, and let me rather ask you if you know, or have heard anything, of this wayward boy? Personally, I am unacquainted with him; but his friends agree in saying that he is high-spirited, honorable, and brave; and it would be a great pity that his affection for a young lady, and his anger with an old one, should mar all the prospects of his life. Could you, by any means, find a clew to him? I do not, of course, ask you to interfere in person, lest it might seem that you encouraged an attachment which you have far more reason to discountenance for your daughter than has Lady Wallincourt for her son; however, your doing so would go far to reconcile the young man to his mother by showing that, if there was a difficulty on one side, a still greater obstacle existed on the other.”

Requesting a speedy answer, and begging that the whole might be in strict confidence between them, the letter concluded.

“I do not doubt, my dear Knight,” said the postscript, “that you will see in all this a reason the more for coming up to town. Helen’s appearance at the Drawing-Room would be the best, if not the only, rebuke Lady Wallin-court’s insolence could receive. By all means, come.

“Another complication! Lady W., on first hearing of her son’s duel, and the kind treatment he met with after being wounded, wrote a letter of grateful acknowledgments, which she enclosed to her son, neither knowing nor caring for the address of his benefactor. When she did hear it at length, she was excessively angry that she had been, as she terms it, ‘the first to make advances.’ Ainsi, telles sont les femmes du monde!”

Such was Lord Netherby’s letter. With what a succession of emotions Helen read it we confess ourselves unable to depict. If she sometimes hesitated to read on, an influence, too powerful to control, impelled her to continue, while a secret interest in Forester’s fortunes – a feeling she had never known till now – induced her to learn his fate. More than once, in the alteration of her condition, had she recalled the proffer of affection she had with such determination rejected, and with what gratitude did she remember the firmness of her decision!

“Poor fellow!” thought she, “I deemed it the mere caprice of one whose gratitude for kindness had outrun his calmer convictions. And so he really loved me!”

We must avow the fact: Helen’s indifference to Forester had, in the main, proceeded from a false estimate of his character; she saw in him nothing but a well-bred, good-looking youth, who, with high connections and moderate abilities, had formed certain ambitious views, to be realized rather by the adventitious aid of fortune than his own merits. He was, in her eyes, a young politician, cautions and watchful, trained up to regard Lord Castlereagh as the model of statesmen, and political intrigue as the very climax of intellectual display. To know that she had wronged him was to make a great revolution in her feelings towards him, to see that this reserved and calmly minded youth should have sacrificed everything – position, prospects, all – rather than resign his hope, faint as it was, of one day winning her affection!

If these were her first thoughts on reading that letter, those that followed were far less pleasurable. How should she ever be able to show it to her father? The circumstances alluded to were of a nature he never could be cognizant of without causing the greatest pain both to him and herself. To ask Lady Eleanor’s counsel would be even more difficult. Helen witnessed the emotion the sight of Lady Wallincourt’s name had occasioned her mother the day Forester first visited them; the old rivalry had, then, left its trace on her mind as well as on that of Lady Julia! What embarrassment on every hand! Where could she seek counsel, and in whom? Bagenal Daly, the only one she could have opened her heart to, was away; and was it quite certain she would have ventured to disclose, even to him, the story of that affection which already appeared so different from at first? Forester was not now in her eyes the fashionable guardsman, indulging a passing predilection, or whiling away the tedious hours of a country-house by a flirtation, in which he felt interested because repulsed; he was elevated in her esteem by his misfortunes, and the very uncertainty of his fate augmented her concern. And yet she must forego the hope of saving him, or else, by showing the letter to her father, acknowledge her acquaintance with events she should never have known, or, knowing, should never reveal.

There was no help for it, the letter could not be shown. In all likelihood neither the Knight nor Lady Eleanor would ever think more about it; and if they did, there was still enough to speak of in the courteous sentiments of the writer, and the polite attention of his invitation, – a civility which even Helen’s knowledge of life informed her was rather proffered in discharge of a debt than as emanating from any real desire to play their host in London.

Thus satisfying herself that no better course offered for the present, she turned homewards, but with a heavier heart and more troubled mind than had ever been her fortune in life to have suffered.

END OF VOL. I.