Mrs. Brownlow had intended to go at once to London on her return to England, but the joint entreaties of Armine and Barbara prevailed on her to give them one week at Belforest, now in that early spring beauty in which they had first seen it.

How delightful the arrival was! Easter had been very late, so it was the last week of the vacation, and dear old Friar John's handsome face was the first thing they saw at the station, and then his father's portly form, with a tall pretty creature on each side of him, causing Babie to fall back with a cry of glad amazement, "Oh! Essie and Ellie! Such women!"

Then the train stopped, and there was a tumult of embracings and welcomes, in the midst of which Jock appeared, having just come by the down train.

"You'll all come to dinner this evening?" entreated Caroline. "My love to Ellen. Tell her you must all of you come."

It was a most delightsome barouche full that drove from the station.

Jock took the reins, and turned over coachman and footman to the break, and in defiance of dignity, his mother herself sprang up beside him. The sky was blue, the hedges were budding with pure light-green above, and resplendent with rosy campion and white spangles of st.i.tchwort below.

Stars of anemone, smiling bunches of primrose, and azure clouds of bluebell made the young hearts leap as at that first memorable sight.

Armine said he was ready to hurrah and throw up his hat, and though Elvira declared that she saw nothing to be so delighted about, they only laughed at her.

Gorgeous rhododendrons and gay azaleas rose in brilliant ma.s.ses nearer the house, beds of hyacinths and jonquils perfumed the air, judiciously arranged parterres of gay little Van Thol tulips and white daisies flashed on the eyes of the arriving party, while the exquisite fresh green provoked comparisons with parched Africa.

Bobus was standing on the steps to receive them, and when they had crossed the hall, with due respect to its Roman mosaic pavement, they found the Popinjay bowing, dancing, and chattering for joy, and tea and coffee for parched throats in the favourite Dresden set in the morning room, the prettiest and cosiest in the house.

"How nice it is! We are all together except Janet,' exclaimed Babie.

"And Janet is coming to us in London," said her mother. "Did you see her on her way to Edinburgh boys?"

"No," said Jock. "She never let us know she was there."

"But I'll tell you an odd thing I have just found out," said Bobus. "It seems she came down here on her way, unknown to anyone, got out at the Woodside station, and walked across here. She told Brock that she wanted something out of the drawers of her library-table, of which the key had been lost, and desired him to send for Higg to break it open; but Brock wouldn't hear of it. He said his Missus had left him in charge, and he could not be answerable to her for having locks picked without her authority--or leastways the Colonel's. He said Miss Brownlow was in a way about it, and said as how it was her own private drawer that no one had a right to keep her out of, but he stood to his colours; he said the house was Mrs. Brownlow's, and under his care, and he would have no tampering with locks, except by her authority or the Colonel's. He even offered to send to Kenminster if she would write a note to my uncle, but she said she had not time, and walked off again, forbidding him to mention that she had been here."

"Janet always was a queer fish!" said Jock.

"Poor Janet, I suppose she wanted some of her notes of lectures," said her mother. "Brock's sound old house-dog instinct must have been very inconvenient to her. I must write and ask what she wanted."

"But she forbade him to mention it," said Bobus.

"Of course that was only to avoid the fuss there would have been if it had been known that she had been here without coming to Kencroft. By the bye, I didn't tell Brock those good people were coming to dinner. How well the dear old Monk looks, and how charming Essie and Ellie! But I shall never know them apart, now they are both the same size."

"You won't feel that difficulty long," said Bobus. "There really is no comparison between them."

"Just the insipid English Mees," said Elvira. "You should hear what the French think of the ordinary English girl!"

"So much the better," said Bobus. "No respectable English girl would wish for a foreigner's insulting admiration."

"Well done, Bobus! I never heard such an old-fashioned insular sentiment from you. One would think it was your namesake. By the bye, where is the great Rob?"

"At Aldershot," said Jock. "I a.s.sure you he improves as he grows older.

I had him to dine the other day at our mess, and he cut a capital figure by judiciously holding his tongue and looking such a fine fellow, that people were struck with him."

"There," said Armine, slyly, "he has the seal of the Guards' approval."

Jock could afford to laugh at himself, for he was entirely devoid of conceit, but he added, good humouredly--

"Well, youngster, I can tell you it goes for something. I wasn't at all sure whether the a.s.s mightn't get his head out of the lion-skin."

"Oh, yes! they are all lions and no a.s.ses in the Guards," said Babie; whereupon Jock fell on her, and they had a playful skirmish.

n.o.body came to dinner but John and his two sisters. It had turned out that the horse had been too much worked to be used again, and there was a fine moon, so that the three had walked over together. Esther and Eleanor Brownlow had always been like twins, and were more than ever so now, when both were at the same height of five feet eight, both had the same thick glossy dark-brown hair, done in the very same rich coils, the same clearly-cut regular profiles, oval faces, and soft carnation cheeks, with liquid brown eyes, under pencilled arches. Caroline was in confusion how to distinguish them, and trusted at first solely to the little coral charms which formed Esther's ear-rings, but gradually she perceived that Esther was less plump and more mobile than her sister--her colour was more variable, and she seemed as timid as ever, while Eleanor was developing the st.u.r.dy Friar texture. Their aunt had been the means of sending them to a good school, and they had a much more trained and less homely appearance than Jessie at the same age, and seemed able to take their part in conversation with their cousins, though Essie was manifestly afraid of her aunt. They had always been fond of Barbara, and took eager possession of her, while John's Oxford talk was welcome to all,--and it was a joyous evening of interchange of travellers' anecdotes and local and family news, but without any remarkable feature till the time came for the cousins to return. They had absolutely implored not to be sent home in the carriage, but to walk across the park in the moonlight; and it was such a lovely night that when Bobus and Jock took up their hats to come with them, Babie begged to go too, and the same desire strongly possessed her mother, above all when John said, "Do come, Mother Carey;" and "rowed her in a plaidie."

That youthful inclination to frolic had come on her, and she only waited to a.s.sure herself that Armine did not partake of her madness, but was wisely going to bed. Allen was holding out a scarf to Elvira, but she protested that she hated moonlight, and that it was a sharp frost, and she went back to the fire.

As they went down the steps in the dark shadow of the house, John gave his aunt his arm, and she felt that he liked to have her leaning on him, as they walked in the strong contrasts of white light and dark shade in the moonshine, and pausing to look at the wonderful snowy appearance of the white azaleas, the sparkling of the fountain, and the stars struggling out in the pearly sky; but John soon grew silent, and after they had pa.s.sed the garden, said--

"Aunt Caroline, if you don't mind coming on a little way, I want to ask you something."

The name, Aunt Caroline, alarmed her, but she professed her readiness to hear.

"You have always been so kind to me" (still more alarming, thought she); "indeed," he added, "I may say I owe everything to you, and I should like to know that you would not object to my making medicine my profession."

"My dear Johnny!" in an odd, m.u.f.fled voice.

"Had you rather not?" he began.

"Oh, no! Oh, no, no! It is the very thing. Only when you began I was so afraid you wanted to marry some dreadful person!"

"You needn't be afraid of that. Ars Medico, will be bride enough for me till I meet another Mother Carey, and that I shan't do in a hurry."

"You silly fellow, you aren't practising the smoothness of tongue of the popular physician."

"Don't you think I mean it?" said John, rather hurt.

"My dear boy, you must excuse me. It is not often one gets so many compliments in a breath, besides having one of the first wishes of one's heart granted."

"Do you mean that you really wished this?"

"So much that I am saying, 'Thank G.o.d!' in my heart all the time."

"Well, my father and mother thought you might be wishing me to be a barrister, or something swell."

"As if I could--as if I ever could be so glad of anything," said she with rejoicing that surprised him. "It is the only thing that could make up for none of my own boys taking that line. I can't tell you now how much depends on it, John, you will know some day. Tell me what put it into your head--"

He told her, as he had told his father nearly four years before, how the dim memory of his uncle had affected him, and how the bent had been decidedly given by his attendance on Jock, and his intercourse with Dr.

Medlicott. At Oxford, he had availed himself of all opportunities, and had come out honourably in all examinations, including physical science, and he was now reading for his degree, meaning to go up for honours. His father, finding him steady to his purpose, had consented, and his mother endured, but still hoped his aunt would persuade him out of it. She was so far from any such intention, that a hint of the Magnum Bonum had very nearly been surprised out of her. For the first time since Belforest had come to her, did she feel in the course of carrying out her husband's injunctions; and she felt strengthened against that attack from Janet to which she looked forward with dread. She talked with John of his plans till they actually reached the lodge gate, and there found Jock, Babie, and Eleanor chattering merrily about fireflies and glowworms a little way behind, and Bobus and Esther paired together much further back. When all had met at the gate and the parting good-nights had been spoken, Bobus became his mother's companion, and talked all the way home of his great satisfaction at her wandering time being apparently over, of his delight in her coming to settle at home at last, his warm attachment to the place, and his desire to cultivate the neighbouring borough with a view to representing it in Parliament, since Allen seemed to be devoid of ambition, and so much to hate the mud and dust of public life, that he was not likely to plunge into it, unless Elvira should wish for distinction. Then Bobus expatiated on the awkward connection the Goulds would be for Allen, stigmatising the amiable Lisette, who of course by this time had married poor George Gould, as an obnoxious, presuming woman, whom it would be very difficult to keep in her right position. It was not a bad thing that Elvira should have a taste of London society, to make her less likely to fall under her influence.

"That is not a danger I should have apprehended," said Caroline.

"The woman can fawn, and that is exactly what a haughty being like Elvira likes. She is always pining for a homage she does not get in the family."

"Except from poor Allen."

"Except from Allen, but that is a matter of course. He is a slave to be flouted! Did you ever see a greater contrast than that between her and our evening guests?"

"Esther and Eleanor? They have grown up into very sweet-looking girls."