XIII

Next day w.i.l.l.y called at the studio, and Frank told him what had occurred.

"But I don't see why you shouldn't come to the Manor House," said w.i.l.l.y. "If you will only say something about the Measons, I think it can be made all right."

"No, I'm not going to turn against Meason; I have always found him a good fellow. I know nothing about his flirtation with Sally."

"No more do I; I think it has been exaggerated, but, as you know, I never interfere. I wish you would come in to dinner one night."

"Supposing I were to meet Berkins?"

w.i.l.l.y stroked his moustache.

"No, it is quite impossible that I could return to the Manor House.

Your father behaved in a way--well, I will not say what I think of it."

"Berkins hasn't been to the City since. Grace was over here yesterday, she says he limps about the garden. He'll never forgive you; he says that you didn't call the dog off at once."

"That's a lie; and I said, 'So far as the incident with the dog is concerned, I am very sorry.'"

"I think that made him more angry than anything else; he thought you were laughing at him."

"I was not. It was most unfortunate. I shall not give Maggie up. I am writing to-morrow or next day to Mount Rorke."

All were agreed that things must come right sooner or later. Maggie fought for her lover, and emphatically a.s.serted her engagement. She yielded on one point only--not to visit the studio; but she maintained her right in theory and in practice to go where she liked with him in train or in cart, to walk with him on the cliff, to lunch with him at Mutton's. They found pleasure in thus affirming their love, and it pleased them to see they were observed, and to hear that they were spoken about. Nevertheless the string that sung their happiness had slipped a little, and the note was now not quite so clear or true.

Frank could not go to the Manor House; Maggie could not go to the studio. Whether Mount Rorke would consent to their marriage perplexed them as it had not done before.

The summer fades, the hills grow grey, and a salt wind blew up from the sea, blackening the trees, and the beauty of autumn was done.

Frank thought of Ireland, and what personal intercession might achieve. She begged of him to go, and he promised to write to her every day.

"Every day, darling, or I shall be miserable."

"Every day."

"Arrived safe after a very rough pa.s.sage. Every one was ill, I most of all."

She received a post-card:-- "It was raining cats and dogs when I got out of the train. Mount Rorke sent a car to meet me; the result is that I am in bed with a bad cold.

The house is full of company--people I have known, or known of, since I was a boy; we shall begin pheasant-shooting in a few days. When I am out of bed I shall write a long letter. Do you write to me; I shall be awfully disappointed if I do not get a letter to-morrow morning."

Extract from a letter:--

"Mount Rorke is considered to be a handsome place, but as I have known it from childhood, as my earliest memories are of it, I cannot see it with the eyes of a professed scenery hunter. I have loved it always, but I do not think I ever loved it more than now, for now I think that one day I shall give it to you. Should that day come--and it will come--what happiness it will be to walk with you under the old trees, made lovelier by your presence, to pa.s.s down the glades to the river, watching your shadow on the gra.s.s and your image in the stream. We will roam together through the old castle, and I will show you the little bed I used to sleep in, the school-room where I learned my lessons. When I entered the old room I saw in imagination--and oh, how clearly!--the face of my governess; and how easily I see her in the corridor she used to walk down to get to her room.

"Poor, dear, old thing, I wonder what has become of her!

"I saw again the pictures that stirred my childish fancy, and whose meaning I once vainly strove to decipher.

"I came to live here when I was four, immediately after my father's death. I can just remember coming here. I remember Mount Rorke taking me up in his arms and kissing me. I will not say there is no place like home--I do not believe that; but certainly no place seems so real. Every spot of ground has its own particular recollections. Every bend of the avenue evokes some incident of childish life (in Ireland we call any road leading to a house an avenue, even if it is absolutely bare of trees; we also speak of rooks as crows, and these two provincialisms jarred on my ear after my long stay in Suss.e.x).

Mount Rorke is covered with trees--great woods of beech and fir--and at the end of every vista you see a piece of blue mountain. A river pa.s.ses behind the castle, winding through the park; there are bridges, and swans float about the sedges, and there are deer in the glades.

The garden,--I do not know if you would like the garden; it is old- fashioned--full of old-fashioned flowers--convolvuluses, Michaelmas daisies, marigolds; hedges clipped into all sorts of strange and close shapes. There is a beautiful avenue behind the garden (an avenue in the English sense of the word) where you may pace to and fro and feel an exquisite sense of solitude; for when the castle had pa.s.sed out of the hands of Irish princes--that is to say, brigands--it was turned into a monastery, and I often think, as I look on the mossy trees--the progeny of those under whose leaf.a.ge the monks told their beads--that all happened that I might throw my arm about you some beautiful day, and whisper, 'My wife, this is yours.'"

"How beautifully he writes," said Sally reflectively.

"You never had a lover who wrote to you like that. Do you remember how Jimmy used to write?"

"I don't know how he wrote to you, but his letters to me, I will say that, were quite as nice as anything Frank could write. You needn't toss your head, you are not Lady Mount Rorke yet."

Sally refused to hear, but presently, seeing a cloud on her sister's face, and thinking the letter contained some piece of unpleasantness, she relented, and pressed her to continue.

"The house is full of people--people whom I have known all my life-- and they make a great deal of me. I have to tell them about Italy, and they ask me absurd questions about Michael Angelo or t.i.tian, Leonardo or Watteau.... The house party is a large one, and we have people to dinner every day; and in the evening the drawing-room, with its grim oak and escutcheons and rich modern furniture, is a pretty sight indeed. There is a lady here whom I knew in London, Lady Seveley; and I have had suspicions that Mount Rorke would like me to marry her. But she has the reputation of being rather fast, so perhaps the old gentleman is allowing his thoughts to wander where they should not. I hope not for his sake, for I hear she is devoted to a young Irishman, a Mr. Fletcher, a journalist in London. I met them at Reading once in most suspicious circ.u.mstances. He is the son of a large grazier, one of my uncle's tenants, and she is, I suppose, so infatuated that she could not resist the temptation of calling on his family. She was careful not to speak of her intentions to anybody, but waited until she got a favourable opportunity and slipped off to pay her visit. The Fletchers live about half a mile from the castle. I was riding that way, and met her coming out of their house. I got off my horse and walked back together. I hope Mount Rorke will not hear of her ladyship's escapade; he would be very angry, for the Fletchers are people who would be asked to have something to eat in the housekeeper's room if they called at the Castle. In London one knows everybody, but in the country we are more conservative."

"I hope she won't cut you out," said Sally. "It would be a sell for you if she did. Go on."

"No, I shan't, you are too insulting."

"Who began it? You told me that I didn't get such nice letters as you.

Pray go on."

"I do not know if you would think her handsome. I don't. She is, however, an excellent musician; we play duets together every evening, to Mount Rorke's intense delight. You know my dialogue between a lady and a gentleman? She has written it down for me and corrected a few mistakes; I think I shall publish it. Darling, I love you better than any one in the world; you are all the world to me; try to love me a little--you will never find any one to love you as I do."

"Well, you can't find anything peculiarly disagreeable to say about that, I think."

Extract from another letter:--

"All the visitors have gone; Mount Rorke and I are quite alone. He is kindness itself, and does not bother me about his memoirs; but from what I hear that book will make one of the biggest sensations ever made in the literary world. I want him to publish it now, but he only smiles and shakes his head. He says: 'What is the use of setting the world talking about you when you are alive; as long as I am alive I can see those I want to see, and be with them far more personally than I could by placing in their hands three volumes in 8vo; the 8vos are only useful when you have pa.s.sed into darkness, and are not yet reconciled to dying quite out of the minds of men. I do not desire to be remembered by those who will live three hundred years hence, but I confess that I should like to modulate the pace of forgetfulness according to my fancy, and be remembered, let us say, for the next sixty or seventy years. I find no fault with death but its abruptness, and that I hope to be able to correct. The vulgar and most usual plan is children, but children are no anodyne to oblivion, whereas a good book in a certain measure is.'

"These are almost the words Mount Rorke used, and I quote them as exactly as possible, so that you may see what kind of man he is. We pulled our chairs round to the fire and had a real good talk. I know no better company than Mount Rorke. He has seen everything, read everything, and known everybody worth knowing; he is a mine of information, and, what is far better, he is a complete man of the world; and long contact with the world has left him a little cynical, otherwise he is perfect. I told him the story about Berkins, and he laughed; I never saw him laugh so before; and when I told him that I had told Berkins, as he was tying up his leg, that so far as the incident with the dog was concerned, I regretted deeply what had occurred, he could not contain himself. He rang the bell, and we had old Triss up. He asked a great deal about you; I leave you to imagine what I said. How did he expect me to describe my darling? I told him of your subtle, fascinating ways, of your picturesque att.i.tudes, and your exquisite little black eyes. 'I think I see her,' he said; 'little eyes that light up are infinitely more interesting than those big, limpid, silly eyes that everybody admires.' I am now doing a water-colour sketch from the photograph--the one in which you stand with your hands behind your back and your head on one side--for him. I am getting on with it pretty well. Ah! if only I had you here for an hour (I should like to have you here for ever, of course; but now I am speaking artistically, not humanly), I think I could get it really like you; there are one or two things that the photo does not give me.

I shall send the sketch to Dublin to be framed; it will be a nice present for Mount Rorke.

"My darling, you must not be anxious; all will come right in time-- have a little patience. He is already much more reconciled to the match than he was when I arrived, and if your father will refrain from speaking too much about that hateful question, I am sure that all difficulties can be surmounted."

She wrote to him three or four times a week, and on beautiful hand- made paper, delicately scented.

Extract from a letter:--

"We went up to town yesterday by the ten o'clock train West Brighton; and so that we might have more money to spend, we went third cla.s.s.

Father doesn't like us going third cla.s.s, but I don't think it matters if you get in with nice people. We were very jolly. The Shaws went with us. They are very nice girls. They had to leave us at Victoria, and I and my cousin, Agnes Keating, went shopping together. We met the Harrisons at Russell & Allen's. We saw there some lovely dresses--I wish you had been with us, for I have confidence in your taste, and when I choose a thing myself I am never sure that I like it. The a.s.sistant was so polite; she told me to ask for Miss ---; she said she would like to fit me. Sally was coming up with us, but she changed her mind and remained at home, I was very glad, for she is wretchedly cross, and not looking at all well. You would not admire her in the least; she is growing very yellow. But I don't mean to be ill-natured, so we'll let Sally bide, as we say in Suss.e.x. After Russell & Allen's we went to Blanchard's, and had a nice lunch. Grace was in town; she chaperoned us, and paid for everything; it was very kind of her. Then we went to the theatre, and saw a play which we did not care about much. There was a very stupid 'tart' in it. I do like 'gadding,' don't I? But, oh, my darling Frank, gadding is not really gadding without you. How I miss you, how we all miss you, but I especially. The Keatings came over to tea to-day, and they asked about you. Blanche wants you to write something in her alb.u.m, and she admired immensely the drawing you gave me. She is very artistic in her tastes; I think you would like her.

"But I have a bit of news that I think will amuse you. You remember Mrs. Horlock's old dog--not the blind Angel; he's old too. But I mean the real old dog,--the one twenty years old, that once belonged to a butcher. He never smelt very sweet, as you know, but latterly he was unbearable, and the General resolved on a silent and secret destruction. He purchased in Brighton a bottle of chloroform. It was the dead of the night and pitch dark. However, he reached the end of the pa.s.sage in safety; but suddenly he uttered a fearful shriek and dropped the chloroform. He thought he had seen a ghost; but it was only Mrs. Horlock, who was going her rounds, letting down the mouse- traps and supplying the little creatures with food. The General blurted out various excuses. He said that he had come to relieve the c.o.c.k parrot's tooth-ache--that he feared the Circa.s.sian goat was suffering from spinal complaint and the squirrels from neuralgia. But his protestations proved unavailing, and now he eats his meals in silence. And to make matters worse, the old dog did die a few days after--the General says from old age, but Mrs. Horlock avows that his death resulted from fright. 'He was a sweet, cunning old thing, and no doubt knew all about that plan to destroy him.' I think this would make an excellent subject for a comic sketch; I wish you would do one --the General dropping the bottle; Mrs. Horlock, surrounded by closed mouse-traps and crumbs, sternly upbraiding him.

"I see lots of Emily Pierce. Every Sunday I have tea with her, and sometimes lunch; but she doesn't come here. I am afraid I couldn't get on at all without her; we do everything together, and we hit it off so well.

"Sally has been staying in Kent. I do not know what's up, but she seems to see everything _couleur de rose_; everything in Kent is better in her estimation than anywhere else. The men dance so much better for one thing. I am glad she is so happy, and I wish she would get married and stay there. Father says he has a cough that tears him to pieces, but I haven't heard it yet."

The elementary notion of a woman in love is to surround, to envelop the man she loves, with her individuality, and to draw him from all other influences. And the woman in love strives to accomplish this by ceaseless reiteration of herself or himself seen through herself. So Maggie with her nervous, highly-strung, febrile temperament could not refrain from constantly striking the lyre of love. Her hands were for ever on the chords. Letters and notes of all kinds; impetuous messages asking him when he would return; letters apologising for her selfishness--he had better remain with Mount Rorke until his consent had been obtained; resolutions and irresolutions, ardours, la.s.situdes, forgetfulness followed fast in strange and incomprehensible contradiction. And Frank was asked daily to perform some small task.