Kitabı oku: «Lettice», sayfa 4

But before Nina had time to reply, the carriage stopped. They had reached their destination.

Faxleham Cottage was what its name implied – a real cottage. It had no drive or “approach,” save the simple, old-fashioned little footpath, leading from the garden-gate to the wide, low porch entrance. But unpretending as it was, an exclamation of pleasure broke involuntarily from the lips of its new tenants, as they stepped out of the carriage and entered the sweet, trim, and yet luxuriant little garden, gay with early flowers, not a weed to be seen, bright and smiling in the soft evening sunlight.

Lettice, too, felt the pleasant influence.

“How I wish mamma could see it!” was her unspoken thought. “If it were she who was to welcome us instead of – ” And as she went forward she glanced before her apprehensively, half expecting to see realised the unattractive personage she had ingeniously constructed in her imagination.

A lady was standing in the porch, and, as the new-comers came forward, she stepped out to meet them.

“I am so glad to see you all safe,” she said in a bright, pleasant voice. “I must introduce myself, but you know who I am?”

“Miss Branksome,” said Nina, always the ready one on such occasions, probably because her mind was never over occupied with herself or her own concerns. But, with her usual tact, she stepped back a very little, leaving Lettice, as the eldest, to shake hands first with the lady-companion.

And Lettice, to her own surprise as she did so, found herself thinking, “How pretty she is! She is certainly not like a decayed gentlewoman.”

Miss Branksome was very pretty; some people might think it better to say “had been,” for she was more than middle-aged; she was almost elderly. Her hair was perfectly white, and her soft face had the faint delicate pink flush that comes to fair complexions with age, so different from the brilliant roses of youth. Her eyes were bright, but very gentle in expression, and her figure was daintily small.

“She looks like an old fairy,” Nina said afterwards, and the description was not a bad one.

Everything that genuine kindliness, based on thorough good principle, and aided by great natural tact, could do to make the orphans feel as happy in their new home as was possible for them, was done by Miss Branksome that first evening. Even Lettice succumbed to the pleasant influence. It was new for her to be taken care of, even, as it were, petted, and it came so naturally to the bright, kind-hearted, active little woman to make everybody about her happy, or at least comfortable, that she could not help trying her hand on even the redoubtable Miss Morison, as to whom Mr Auriol had given her some salutary warning.

“You must be so tired, my dears,” she said, with the smiles and tears struggling together at the same time, “I thought you would like tea better than anything; and perhaps – this first evening – would you like me to pour it out?”

It was perfectly impossible to stand on one’s dignity or to keep up any prejudice with one so genuine and single-minded; and Nina’s heart was relieved of an immense weight when they all went to bed that night.

For some time everything went better than could have been hoped. By dint of her simple goodness, by dint, perhaps, of in no way planning or scheming to get it, Miss Branksome unconsciously gained Lettice’s confidence; and when Mr Auriol came down to see his young charges two or three weeks after their arrival, he was most agreeably surprised by the happy state of things. Not being above human weakness, he could not help congratulating himself on the skill which he had displayed in an undoubtedly awkward situation, though, at the same time, he was only too ready to give credit to all concerned.

“You have done marvels,” he said to Miss Branksome, who had been a friend of his from his childhood. “They all seem as fond of you as possible. Not that I had any fear for Nina or the little ones; only for – Lettice.”

“And yet of all, she, I think, has most gained my heart,” said the little lady. “She is so thorough; there is nothing small or ungenerous about her. Nina is very sweet; but if there is any triumph for me, or satisfaction rather, it is certainly with regard to Lettice. I feel so sure of her. I cannot quite understand your having found her what you described. Are you sure – forgive me now, Godfrey – are you sure there was no sort of prejudice on your side?” Godfrey’s face flushed.

“None whatever,” he exclaimed. “I met her as free from prejudice, from any preconceived idea even, as was possible. And the first time I saw her I thought her as charming and gentle as she is personally attractive. It all came out when the question of the Morison feud was raised. It seemed to change her very nature. You have not come upon that as yet, I suppose?”

“Not in the least. Of course I have no right to do so, unless she does; but she knows that I do not know her uncle and aunt, and that they do not know me. I think that has given me an advantage with her. At first I fancied she suspected, or was ready to suspect, that Mr and Mrs Morison had had to do with my being chosen, and I was glad to be able, indirectly, to let her see they had not.”

Mr Auriol seemed lost in reflection.

“I wonder when I should speak to her – to them all – about their uncle again,” he said at last. “He is so very anxious for some happier state of things, and he trusts to me to bring it about. Lettice could not be pleasanter than she is now, just like what she was at the very first. I wonder if I dare risk it?”

“Not yet,” said Miss Branksome. “At least, that is my impression. Let her not think that you came down this time with any purpose except to see how they all are. Leave it all a little longer to her own good sense. She might commit herself to some decision she would afterwards be ashamed to withdraw from, if you spoke of it all again before she has had time thoroughly to consider it.”

Mr Auriol shrugged his shoulders.

“She has had time enough, it seems to me,” he said. “However, I know you are wiser than I.”

Just at that moment Lettice and Nina joined them in the garden.

“We are going to fetch Auriol home from school,” said Lettice. “Would you come with us?” she added, looking up at her cousin.

“Certainly, with the greatest pleasure,” he said; and the three set off.

But they had not gone far when Lettice stopped and hesitated.

“If you won’t think me rude for changing my mind,” she said, “I think I would rather not go to-day. I want to write to Arthur.”

Nina looked at her in surprise, and a slight look of annoyance crossed Mr Auriol’s face. But Lettice did not see it.

“Of course it doesn’t matter,” said Nina good-naturedly. “But I don’t think you need be in such a very great hurry about writing to Arthur.”

“I want to write to-night,” Lettice repeated, “and I know Mr Auriol won’t mind;” and she smiled so pleasantly that the annoyance left his face.

“She is an odd girl,” he thought to himself. “However, it is as well perhaps that my walk is to be tête-à-tête with Nina and not with her. I might have been tempted to try the ground again in spite of Miss Branksome’s advice, and might have done more harm than good. With Nina I am quite safe.”

And, so far as Nina was concerned, the result of their talk was perfectly satisfactory. It was with a more hopeful feeling than he had yet had on the subject that Mr Auriol re-entered the cottage on their return from the walk to Gardon. He and Nina stood for a moment in the porch – they did not notice that Lettice was at an open window above, whence she could clearly see them, and for a moment or two Godfrey stood with Nina’s hand in his, her fair face, in which was more colour than usual, raised towards him.

“You may depend on me,” she said softly, “to do all I can. There is nothing – really nothing almost, that I wish so earnestly.”

“I am sure of it,” said Godfrey. “Perhaps, indeed,” he added with a little hesitation, “I understand more about what you feel than you think. Not that I think you are selfish, dear Nina. I think you one of the most unselfish people I ever knew, and,” – he hesitated still more this time – “he will be a happy man who wins you.”

Nina’s face was crimson by now. But she stood by her cousin a moment longer. He was leaving the next morning, and it might be her last chance of seeing him alone.

“Then I am to do what I can, and, in a sort of way, to report progress. You will come down again in two or three weeks?”

“Yes, and in the meantime I shall see Arthur;” and then he released her hand and she ran upstairs to take off her hat.

“Have you had a nice walk, dear?” said Lettice, who was waiting in their room.

“Very,” said Nina heartily.

“I think you and Godfrey are getting to understand each other wonderfully,” lattice remarked.

“Yes?” said Nina, with a happy little laugh.

“I almost think so too;” and Lettice, observing the flush on her face, congratulated herself on her generalship.

“She is evidently forgetting all about Philip Dexter,” she thought. “How pretty she looks! How nice it must be to be so sweet and attractive; not hard, and cold, and repellent, like me. But it is forced on me.”

And though she told herself things were going just as she wished, there was a little sigh in her heart as she kissed her sister on their way downstairs.

Chapter Six.
A Cavalier Reception

“Fell his warm wishes chilled by wintry fear, And resolution sicken at the view: As near the moment of decision drew.”

Trans. of Dante.

But things seldom turn out as even the most reasonable people expect. Much more than two or three weeks elapsed before Godfrey Auriol came down to Faxleham again. This was owing to a complication of circumstances – unusual pressure of business on him, for one thing, Lotty Morison’s catching the measles for another; and the difficulties in the way were yielded to more easily than might have been the case had the same urgency existed for bringing matters to a decision. But Mr Ingram Morison and his wife were early in the summer obliged to go for several months to an out-of-the-way part of Ireland, where some of Mrs Morison’s family lived, on account of sudden and serious trouble among them. So the question he, and, indeed, she, too, had so much at heart, was left dormant for the time, and Nina heard no more, except a few words of explanation which Godfrey enclosed to her in a letter to Miss Branksome.

It is an ill wind that blows nobody any good. Perhaps, had he known it, Godfrey did not lose in the good graces of his cousins during these rather dull and monotonous weeks. Nina, for more reasons than one, longed to see him, and would have made him most heartily welcome had he appeared. And even Lettice, though she had sturdily refused all offers of introductions to any families in the neighbourhood, would in her heart have been glad of some break in the tranquil round of their daily life.

She was disappointed, too, that Godfrey did not seem more eager to see Nina again, and there were times when Nina’s rather troubled and anxious expression made her tremble for the success of her scheme.

“If that Philip Dexter were to appear just now, there is no saying what influence he might again acquire over her,” she said to herself. “It is very stupid of Godfrey.”

But he came at last, though not till Arthur’s holidays were more than half over, and the lanes were no longer without their summer coating of dust, for it was an unusually dry season. The rain could not be far off, however, for the law of average required that the drought should be compensated for.

“There must be a break in the weather soon,” said Mr Auriol, the evening of his arrival, “and I suppose rain will be welcome when it comes. But, if it is not too selfish, I hope it will hold off for two days. I have never felt so tired of London in my life as during the last three weeks; and I do want to enjoy my breath of country air.”

“I am afraid you won’t get much air even here,” remarked Arthur cheerfully. “It has been stifling these two or three days.”

Something in the tone of his voice struck his cousin, and he glanced up at him.

“You don’t look very bright yourself, my boy,” he said. “You’ve not been working too hard, I hope?”

“He has been working rather hard even during the holidays,” said Lettice, though not without a certain complacence in her tone. “You know, Arthur is not merely to get through, cousin Godfrey, he is to come off with flying colours.”

“But in the meantime the colour is all flying out of his face,” said Godfrey kindly, and with concern. “That won’t do;” and Nina, whose own face had grown paler during this conversation, was startled on looking at her brother to see how white, almost ghastly he had grown. She was helping Lettice with afternoon tea, which in these fine days they were fond of having under a big tree on the little lawn, and she made some excuse for sending Arthur to the house on an errand.

“They will all think there is something the matter,” she whispered to him, “if you look like that;” though in her heart she would scarcely have regretted anything which would have brought to an end the unhappiness which she felt convinced Arthur was enduring, though she had not succeeded in getting him again to confide in her as he had done that last evening at Esparto.

“Arthur is really looking ill,” Godfrey went on. “And he seems so dull and quiet. Of course I have seen too little of him to judge, and the last time there was every reason for his looking very depressed – but even then he had not the same dull, hopeless look. He must either be ill, or – But that is impossible!”

“What?” said Lettice coldly.

“I was going to say he looks as if he had something on his mind.”

Lettice smiled with a sort of contemptuous superiority. “He has something on his mind,” she said, “as every one might understand. He is exceedingly anxious to do more than well at his examination, and he is perhaps working a little too hard.”

Mr Auriol was silent for a moment. When he spoke again he did not seem to be addressing any one in particular.

“I don’t feel satisfied about him,” he said shortly.

Lettice’s face flushed.

“I do not see, Mr Auriol, that you need feel uneasy about him if we do not,” she said. “It is impossible to judge of any one you know so little. Of course, naturally, Arthur is unusually anxious to do well. He knows it would half break my heart if he failed. He knows, what matters far more, that it would have been a most bitter disappointment to my father and mother. It is enough to make him serious.”

Mr Auriol glanced up quickly.

“Were they – were your father and mother so very desirous that he should go into the army?” he said. “I should rather have thought – ”

But here he stopped.

“I wish you would say all you mean,” said Lettice curtly.

“I have no objection whatever to doing so, except the fear of annoying you,” he replied. “I was going to say that, remembering his own experience I should have thought your father the very last man to force, or even advise a profession unless the lad himself thoroughly liked it.”

“Force it?” exclaimed Lettice, really surprised, and Nina added hastily —

“Oh no, while papa was alive there was no question but that Arthur wished it.”

“While papa was alive, Nina,” repeated Lettice. “What do you mean? You speak as if Arthur did not wish it now.”

Nina blushed painfully, and seemed at a loss for an answer.

“I did not mean to say that,” she said at last. And Lettice, too prepossessed by her own wishes and beliefs to take in the possibility of any others, thought no more of Nina’s agitation. But Mr Auriol did not forget it.

He was, however, painfully anxious to come to an understanding with his cousins as to their relations with their uncle. Mr Morison was now at home again, and eager to receive his nephews and nieces and to discuss with them the best arrangements for a permanent home, which he and his wife earnestly hoped would be, if not with, at least near them.

But though he had plenty of opportunities for talks with Nina, he tried in vain to have any uninterrupted conversation with Lettice. She almost seemed to avoid it purposely, and he disliked to ask for it in any formal and ceremonious way.

“Though I shall be forced to do so,” he said to Nina one day, when, as usual, he found himself alone with her, Lettice having made some excuse at the last minute for not going out with them. “Do you think she avoids me on purpose, Nina?” he asked, with some irritation.

“I really do not know,” said Nina. “Sometimes I do not understand Lettice at all.”

“I fear I rubbed her the wrong way that first day by the way I spoke of Arthur,” said Godfrey reflectively. “And Arthur, too, baffles me. I have tried to talk to him and to lead him on to confide in me if he has anything on his mind, but it is no use. So I must just leave him for the present. But about this other matter I must do and say something. It is not my own concern. I have promised to see about it.”

Nina listened with great sympathy and great anxiety.

“I wish I could do anything,” she said. “But I, too, have tried in vain. Lettice seems to avoid the subject.”

“Well, then there is nothing for it but to meet it formally. I must ask Lettice to give me half an hour, and I will read her your uncle’s last letter. There she is,” he added hurriedly, pointing to a figure which suddenly appeared in the lane a short way before them. “So she has been out, after all.”

“Where have you been, Lettice?” asked Nina, as they came up with her, for she was walking slowly. “I thought you were not coming out.”

“I changed my mind,” said Lettice. “I have been some little way on the Garford road.”

The words were slightly defiant, but the tone was subdued, and Nina, looking at her sister, was struck by the curious expression of her face. It had a distressed, almost a frightened look. What could it be?

Mr Auriol, intent on his own ideas, did not notice it.

“Lettice,” he began, “I never seem to see you at leisure, and I must leave the day after to-morrow. When can you give me half an hour?”

“Any time you like – any time to-morrow, I mean,” said Lettice. “It is too late this evening.”

“Very well,” he said; “just as you like.”

Lettice was longing to get away – to be alone in her own room to think over what had happened, and what she had done that afternoon.

She had not meant to go out after refusing to walk with Nina and her cousin. But Lotty had come to ask her advice about a little garden she was making; and, after this important business was settled, Lettice, feeling at a loss what to do with herself, strolled a short way down the road. It was too soon to meet Nina and Mr Auriol; they would not be back for an hour at least, and Arthur was as usual shut up in his own room with his books. Who, then, could the figure be whom she saw, when about a quarter of a mile from the house, coming quickly up the road? It was not Godfrey, nor Arthur, and yet it was but seldom that any one not making for the cottage came along this road, which for half a mile or so was almost like a private one. And then, too – yes, it did seem to Lettice that there was something familiar about the walk and carriage of the gentleman she now clearly perceived to be such, though he was still too far off for her to distinguish his features. Another moment or two and she no longer hesitated. It was – there could be no doubt about it – it was the person whom of all others she most dreaded to see – Philip Dexter!

And yet there was nothing very alarming in the young man’s appearance as, on catching sight of her, he hastened his steps and came on hurriedly, his features lit up with eagerness, while Lettice walked more and more slowly, at every step growing more dignified and icy. The smile faded from Philip’s face as he distinguished her clearly.

“Miss Morison!” he exclaimed. “I saw you some way off, but I was not sure – I thought – ”

“You thought I was my sister, probably,” said Lettice calmly, as she held out her hand. “I, too, saw you some way off, Mr Dexter, and at first I could scarcely believe my eyes. Are you staying anywhere near here?”

“No,” said Philip, braced by her coldness to an equal composure; “I have no acquaintances close to this. I came by rail to Garford, and left my portmanteau at the hotel there, and walked on here. I have come, Miss Morison, on purpose to see – you.”

“Not me, personally?” said Lettice, raising her eyebrows.

“Yes, you, personally, though not only you. I am, I think, glad to have met you alone. If that is your house,” – for they were approaching the cottage – “will you turn and walk back a little? I would rather talk to you a little first, before any one knows I am here.”

With the greatest readiness, though she strove to conceal it, Lettice agreed. They retraced their steps down the road, and then she led him along a lane to the left, also in the Garford direction, though she knew that by it Mr Auriol and Nina could not return.

“I will not beat about the bush, Miss Morison,” said Philip. “I have come to see Nina – to ask her to marry me. I would have done so already – last winter at Esparto – but your mother’s illness, the difficulty of seeing any of you the latter part of the time, interfered, and I thought it, for other reasons too, better to wait. Nina has no father and mother – you are not much older, but you are the eldest, and I know you have immense influence over her. Before seeing her, I should like to know my ground with you. Do you wish me well?”

In face of this straightforward address Lettice felt, for a moment, off her guard.

“You have never consulted me hitherto,” she said evasively.

“That is not the question now,” said Philip. “Tell me, do you wish me well, and, still more, do you – do you think I am likely to succeed?” At this Lettice looked up at him.

“I don’t know,” she said, and she spoke honestly. “Almost the only thing I am sure of is that I wish you had not thought of it – not come here.”

Philip’s bright, handsome face fell; he looked in a moment years older.

“You think there is something in the way, I see,” he said. “Ah! well, there is nothing for it but to make sure. I must see Nina herself. Where is she?”

“She is out,” said Lettice, and her face flushed. “She is out walking with Godfrey Auriol.” Something in her tone and expression made Philip stop short and look at her sharply. She bore his look unflinchingly, and that perhaps impressed him more than her words. She was able to do so, for she was not conscious of deceiving him. She deceived herself; her determined prejudice and self-will blinded her to all but their own tendencies and conclusions. Mr Dexter’s eyes dropped. At this same moment there flashed before his memory the strangely enthusiastic tone with which Godfrey had spoken of – as Philip thought —Nina, that first morning at Esparto. His face was very pale when he looked up again.

“Miss Morison – Lettice,” he said, “you do not like me, but you are incapable of misleading me. You think there is something between Nina and Mr Auriol?”

“He is very fond of her,” said Lettice. “I do not know exactly, but I think – ”

“You think she returns it?”

Lettice bowed her head in agreement. “Then I will go – as I came – and no one need know anything about my having been,” said Philip. “You will tell no one?”

“Not if you wish me not to do so; certainly not,” she replied, only too delighted to be, as she said to herself, obliged to conceal his visit. “I very earnestly beg you not to tell of it,” he said; “it could serve no purpose, things being as you say they are.”

Lettice made a little movement as if she would have interrupted him. Then she hesitated. At last —

“I did not – exactly – ” was all she got out.

“No, you did not exactly in so many words say, ‘Nina is engaged, or just going to be, to Godfrey Auriol.’ But you have said all you could, and I thank you for your honesty. It must have been difficult for you, disliking me, and knowing that I know you dislike me, to have been honest.” Philip spoke slowly, as if weighing every word. Something in his manner, in his white, almost ghastly face, appalled Lettice.

“Mr Dexter,” she exclaimed, involuntarily laying her hand on his arm, “I don’t think I do dislike you, personally;” and she felt that never before had she been so near liking, and certainly respecting, the young man. “But you know all the feelings involved. I am very, very sorry it should have gone so far with you. Yet I could not have warned you sooner last winter; it would have been impossible. I had no reason to think there was anything so serious.”

“Last winter,” repeated Philip. “I don’t understand you. There was no reason to warn me off then. Before she had ever seen him? I had all the field to myself. You don’t suppose I am giving it up now out of deference to that shameful, wicked nonsense of prejudice and dig like to the best man in the world – your uncle, and mine, as I am proud to call him?” And Philip gave a bitter and contemptuous laugh. “I am going away because I see I have no chance. I esteem and admire Godfrey Auriol too much to enter into useless rivalry with him. He is not likely to care for any woman in vain. But if I had not been so afraid of hurting you last winter, if I had thrown all the prejudice to the winds, I believe I might have won her. Godfrey would never have come between us had he had any idea of how it was with me. So, after all, it is that wicked, unchristian nonsense that has done it all. You may think it is right; you cannot expect me to agree with you. At the same time, I repeat that I thank you for your honesty. Good-bye. Can I reach Garford by this way?” and Philip, in a white fever of indignation and most bitter disappointment, turned to go.

Lettice had never perhaps in all her life felt more discomposed.

“Mr Dexter,” she said, “don’t leave me like this; don’t be so angry with me. I have tried to do rightly – by you, too.”

“I have not denied it; but I cannot stand and discuss it as if it were anything else. I am only human. I must go. I am afraid of – of meeting them. Tell me, is this the right way?”

“Yes,” replied Lettice mechanically; “straight on brings you out on the road again. It is a short cut.”

Philip raised his hat; and before Lettice had time for another word, had she indeed known what to say, he was gone. She stood and looked after him for some moments with a blank, half-scared expression; and then, retracing her steps, she walked slowly back, and thus came to be observed by her sister and Godfrey returning in the other direction.

It was not a happy moment for Mr Auriol to choose for his renewed attempt. Lettice slept badly, and woke in the morning feverish and excited; but, by way perhaps of shifting the misgiving and self-reproach which would insinuate themselves, more blindly determined than ever to stand to her colours. She listened to her uncle’s letter and to all Mr Auriol had to say, and then quietly announced her decision. Nothing could induce her to regard as a relation the man who had supplanted her father, the representative of the unnatural family who had treated him all his life long as a pariah and an outcast, and had been the cause of sorrows and trials without end to him and her mother.

“I am the eldest,” she said. “I can remember more distinctly than the others the privations and trials they went through – at the very time when my father’s father and brother were rolling in riches, some part of which surely, by every natural law, should have been his.”

“And some part of which was his,” said Godfrey. “Everything he had came from his father. And why it was not more was his own fault. He would not take it.”

“Neither will I,” said Lettice, crimsoning. “What my father accepted and left to us I considers ours; but I will take no more in any shape, directly or indirectly.”

“Then,” said Godfrey, also losing his self-control, “you had better give up all you have. For, is surely as I stand here, you would not, as I have already explained to you, have had one farthing left but for what Ingram Morison did and risked. You owe all to him.”

Lettice turned upon him, very pale now.

“You may some day repent taunting me so cruelly with what I am in no way responsible for,” she said.

Godfrey, recognising the truth of this, tried to make her better understand him; but it was useless.

“I must bear it for the present,” was all she would say; and Nina heard her mutter something to herself about “once I am of age,” which made her still more uneasy.

“I have done more harm than good,” said Godfrey at last. “There is no more to be said.”

He glanced at Nina and Arthur, but neither spoke. Lettice saw the glance.

“We are all of one mind,” she said proudly. “Are we not, Nina? Are we not, Arthur?”

Nina’s eyes filled with tears; Arthur was very pale.

“You know, Lettice,” said Nina, “at all costs we must cling together;” and Lettice preferred not to press her more closely.

And Godfrey Auriol returned to town the next morning.