The vehicle had been drawn close up to the boundary of the course, and Laura sat at the open window, pale and anxious, straining her eyes towards the weighing-house and the paddock, the little bit of enclosed ground where the horses were saddled. She could see the gentleman riders going in and out, and the one rider on whose safety her happiness depended, m.u.f.fled in his greatcoat, and very busy and animated amongst his grooms and helpers. Everybody knew who Miss Dunbar was, and that she was going to be married to the young baronet; and people looked with interest at that pale face, keeping such anxious watch at the carriage-window. I am speaking now of the simple country people, for whom a race meant a day"s pleasure. There were people on the other side of the course who cared very little for Miss Dunbar or her anxiety; who would have cared as little if the handsome young baronet had rolled upon the sward, crushed to death under the weight of his chestnut mare, so long as they themselves were winners by the event. In the little enclosure below the grand stand the betting men--that strange fraternity which appears on every racecourse from Berwick-on-Tweed to the Land"s-End, from the banks of the Shannon to the smooth meads of pleasant Normandy--were gathered thick, and the talk was loud about Sir Philip and his compet.i.tors.
Among the men who were ready to lay against anything, and were most unpleasantly vociferous in the declaration of their readiness, there was one man who was well known to the humbler cla.s.s of bookmen with whom he a.s.sociated, who was known to speculate upon very small capital, but who had never been known as a defaulter. The knowing ones declared this man worthy to rank high amongst the best of them; but no one knew where he lived, or what he was. He was rarely known to miss a race; and he was conspicuous amongst the crowd in those mysterious purlieus where the plebeian bookmen, who are unworthy to enter the sacred precincts of Tattersall"s, mostly do congregate, in utter defiance of the police. No one had ever heard the name of this man; but in default of any more particular cognomen, they had christened him the Major; because in his curt manners, his closely b.u.t.toned-up coat, tightly-strapped trousers, and heavy moustache, there was a certain military flavour, which had given rise to the rumour that the unknown had in some remote period been one of the defenders of his country. Whether he had enlisted as a private, and had been bought-off by his friends; whether he had borne the rank of an officer, and had sold his commission, or had been cashiered, or had deserted, or had been drummed-out of his regiment,--no one pretended to say. People called him the Major; and wherever he appeared, the Major made himself conspicuous by means of a very tall white hat, with a broad black c.r.a.pe band round it.
He was tall himself, and the hat made him seem taller. His clothes were very shabby, with that peculiar shiny shabbiness which makes a man look as if he had been oiled all over, and then rubbed into a high state of polish. He wore a greenish-brown greatcoat with a poodle collar, and was supposed to have worn the same for the last ten years. Round his neck, be the weather ever so sultry, he wore a comforter of rusty worsted that had once been scarlet, and above this comforter appeared his nose, which was a prominent aquiline. n.o.body ever saw much more of the Major than his nose and his moustache. His hat came low down over his forehead, which was itself low, and a pair of beetle brows, of a dense purple-black, were faintly visible in the shadow of the brim. He never took off his hat in the presence of his fellow-men; and as he never encountered the fair s.e.x, except in the person of the barmaid at a sporting public, he was not called upon to unbonnet himself in ceremonious obeisance to lovely woman. He was eminently a mysterious man, and seemed to enjoy himself in the midst of the cloud of mystery which surrounded him.
The Major had inspected the starters for the great event of the day, and had sharply scrutinized the gentleman riders as they went in and out of the paddock. He was so well satisfied with the look of Sir Philip Jocelyn, and the chestnut mare Guinevere, that he contented himself with laying the odds against all the other horses, and allowed the baronet and the chestnut to run for him. He asked a few questions presently about Sir Philip, who had taken off his greatcoat by this time, and appeared in all the glory of a scarlet satin jacket and a black velvet cap. A Warwickshire farmer, who had found his way in among the knowing ones, informed the Major that Sir Philip Jocelyn was going to be married to Miss Dunbar, only daughter and sole heiress of the great Mr. Dunbar.
The great Mr. Dunbar! The Major, usually so imperturbable, gave a little start at the mention of the banker"s name.
"What Mr. Dunbar?" he asked.
"The banker. Him as come home from the Indies last August."
The Major gave a long low whistle; but he asked no further question of the farmer. He had a memorandum-book in his hand--a greasy and grimy-looking little volume, whose pages he was wont to study profoundly from time to time, and in which he jotted down all manner of queer hieroglyphics with half an inch of fat lead-pencil. He relapsed into the contemplation of this book now; but he muttered to himself ever and anon in undertones, and his mutterings had relation to Henry Dunbar.
"It"s him," he muttered; "that"s lucky. I read all about that Winchester business in the Sunday papers. I"ve got it all at my fingers"-ends, and I don"t see why I shouldn"t make a trifle out of it. I don"t see why I shouldn"t win a little money upon Henry Dunbar. I"ll have a look at my gentleman presently, when the race is over."
The bell rang, and the seven starters went off with a rush; four abreast, and three behind. Sir Philip was among the four foremost riders, keeping the chestnut well in hand, and biding his time very quietly. This was his last race, and he had set his heart upon winning.
Laura leaned out of the carriage-window, pale and breathless, with a powerful race-gla.s.s in her hand. She watched the riders as they swept round the curve in the course. Then they disappeared, and the few minutes during which they were out of sight seemed an age to that anxious watcher. The people run away to see them take the double leap in the lane, and then come trooping back again, panting and eager, as three of the riders appear again round another bend of the course.
The scarlet leads this time. The honest country people hurrah for the master of Jocelyn"s Rock. Have they not put their money upon him, and are they not proud of him?--proud of his handsome face, which, amid all its easy good-nature, has a certain dash of hauteur that befits one who has a sprinkling of the blood of Saxon kings in his veins; proud of his generous heart, which beats with a thousand kindly impulses towards his fellow-men. They shout aloud as he flies past them, the long stride of the chestnut skimming over the ground, and spattering fragments of torn gra.s.s and ploughed-up earth about him as he goes. Laura sees the scarlet jacket rise for a moment against the low grey sky, and then fly onward, and that is about all she sees of the dreaded leap which she had looked at in fear and trembling the day before. Her heart is still beating with a strange vague terror, when her lover rides quietly past the stand, and the people about her cry out that the race has been n.o.bly won. The other riders come in very slowly, and are oppressed by that indescribable air of sheepishness which is peculiar to gentleman jockeys when they do not win.
The girl"s eyes fill suddenly with tears, and she leans back in the carriage, glad to hide her happy face from the crowd.
Ten minutes afterwards Sir Philip Jocelyn came across the course with a great silver-gilt cup in his arms, and surrounded by an admiring throng, amongst whom he had just emptied his purse.
"I"ve brought you the cup, Laura; and I want you to be pleased with my victory. It"s the last triumph of my bachelor days, you know, darling."
"Three cheers for Miss Dunbar!" shouted some adventurous spirit among the crowd about the baronet.
In the next moment the cry was taken up, and two or three hundred voices joined in a loud hurrah for the banker"s daughter. The poor girl drew back into the carriage, blushing and frightened.
"Don"t mind them, Laura dear," Sir Philip said; "they mean well, you know, and they look upon me as public property. Hadn"t you better give them a bow, Mr. Dunbar?" he added, in an undertone to the banker. "It"ll please them, I know."
Mr. Dunbar frowned, but he bent forward for a moment, and, leaning his head a little way out of the window, made a stately acknowledgment of the people"s enthusiasm. As he did so, his eyes met those of the Major, who had crossed the course with Sir Philip and his admirers, and who was staring straight before him at the banker"s carriage. Henry Dunbar drew back immediately after making that very brief salute to the populace.
"Tell them to drive home, Sir Philip," he said. "The people mean well, I dare say; but I hate these popular demonstrations. There"s something to be done about the settlements, by-the-bye; you"d better dine at the Abbey this evening. John Lovell will be there to meet you."
The carriage drove away; and though the Major pushed his way through the crowd pretty rapidly, he was too late to witness its departure. He was in a very good temper, however, for he had won what his companions called a hatful of money on the steeple-chase, and he stood to win on other races that were to come off that afternoon. During the interval that elapsed before the next race, he talked to a sociable bystander about Sir Philip Jocelyn, and the young lady he was going to marry. He ascertained that the wedding was to take place the next morning, and at Lisford church.
"In that case," thought the Major, as he went back to the ring, "I shall sleep at Lisford to-night; I shall make Lisford my quarters for the present, and I shall follow up Henry Dunbar."
CHAPTER XXIII.
THE BRIDE THAT THE RAIN RAINS ON.
There was no sunshine upon Laura Dunbar"s wedding morning. The wintry sky was low and dark, as if the heavens had been coming gradually down to crush this wicked earth. The damp fog, the slow, drizzling rain shut out the fair landscape upon which the banker"s daughter had been wont to look from the pleasant cushioned seat in the deep bay-window of her dressing-room.
The broad lawn was soddened by that perpetual rain. The incessant rain-drops dripped from the low branches of the black spreading cedars of Lebanon; the smooth beads of water ran off the shining laurel-leaves; the rhododendrons, the feathery furze, the glistening arbutus--everything was obscured by that cruel rain.
The water gushed out of the quaint dragons" mouths, ranged along the parapet of the Abbey roof; it dripped from every stone coping and abutment; from window-ledge and porch, from gable-end and sheltering ivy. The rain was everywhere, and the incessant pitter-patter of the drops beating against the windows of the Abbey made a dismal sound, scarcely less unpleasant to hear than the perpetual lamentation of the winds, which to-day had the sound of human voices; now moaning drearily, with a long, low, wailing murmur, now shrieking in the shrilly tones of an angry vixen.
Laura Dunbar gave a long discontented sigh as she seated herself at her favourite bay-window, and looked out at the dripping trees upon the lawn below.
She was a petted heiress, remember, and the world had gone so smoothly with her hitherto, that perhaps she scarcely endured calamity or contradiction with so good a grace as she might have done had she been a little nearer perfection. She was hardly better than a child as yet, with all a child"s ignorant hopefulness and blind trust in the unknown future. She was a pampered child, and she expected to have life made very smooth for her.
"What a horribly dismal morning!" Miss Dunbar exclaimed. "Did you ever see anything like it, Elizabeth?"
Mrs. Madden was bustling about, arranging her young mistress"s breakfast upon a little table near the blazing fire. Laura had just emerged from her bath room, and had put on a loose dressing-gown of wadded blue silk, prior to the grand ceremonial of the wedding toilet, which was not to take place until after breakfast.
I think Miss Dunbar looked lovelier in this _deshabille_ than many a bride in her lace and orange-blossoms. The girl"s long golden hair, wet from the bath, hung in rippling confusion about her fresh young face.
Two little feet, carelessly thrust into blue morocco slippers, peeped out from amongst the folds of Miss Dunbar"s dressing-gown, and one coquettish scarlet heel tapped impatiently upon the floor as the young lady watched that provoking rain.
"What a wretched morning!" she said.
"Well, Miss Laura, it is rather wet," replied Mrs. Madden, in a conciliating tone.
"Rather wet!" echoed Laura, with an air of vexation; "I should think it was _rather_ wet, indeed. It"s miserably wet; it"s horribly wet. To think that the frost should have lasted very nearly three weeks, and then must needs break up on my wedding morning. Did ever anybody know anything so provoking?"
"Lor", Miss Laura," rejoined the sympathetic Madden, "there"s all manner of provoking things allus happenin" in this blessed, wicked, rampagious world of ours; only such young ladies as you don"t often come across "em. Talk of being born with a silver spoon in your mouth, Miss Laura; I do think as you must have come into this mortal spear with a whole service of gold plate. And don"t you fret your precious heart, my blessed Miss Laura, if the rain _is_ contrairy. I dare say the clerk of the weather is one of them rampagin" radicals that"s allus a goin" on about the bloated aristocracy, and he"s done it a purpose to aggeravate you. But what"s a little rain more or less to you, Miss Laura, when you"ve got more carriages to ride in than if you was a princess in a fairy tale, which I think the Princess Baltroubadore, or whatever her hard name was, in the story of Aladdin, must have had no carriage whatever, or she wouldn"t have gone walkin" to the baths. Never you mind the rain, Miss Laura."
"But it"s a bad omen, isn"t it, Elizabeth?" asked Laura Dunbar. "I seem to remember some old rhyme about the bride that the sun shines on, and the bride that the rain rains on."
"Laws, Miss Laura, you don"t mean to say as you"d bemean yourself by taking any heed of such low rubbish as that?" exclaimed Mrs. Madden; "why, such stupid rhymes as them are only made for vulgar people that have the banns put up in the parish church. A deal it matters to such as you, Miss Laura, if all the cats and dogs as ever was come down out of the heavens this blessed day."
But though honest-hearted Elizabeth Madden did her best to comfort her young mistress after her own simple fashion, she was not herself altogether satisfied.
The low, brooding sky, the dark and murky atmosphere, and that monotonous rain would have gone far to depress the spirits of the gayest reveller in all the universe.
In spite of ourselves, we are the slaves of atmospheric influences; and we cannot feel very light-hearted or happy upon black wintry days, when the lowering heavens seem to frown upon our hopes; when, in the darkening of the earthly prospect, we fancy that we see a shadowy curtain closing round an unknown future.
Laura felt something of this; for she said, by-and-by, half impatiently, half mournfully,--
"What is the matter with me, Elizabeth. Has all the world changed since yesterday? When I drove home with papa, after the races yesterday, everything upon earth seemed so bright and beautiful. Such an overpowering sense of joy was in my heart, that I could scarcely believe it was winter, and that it was only the fading November sunshine that lit up the sky. All my future life seemed spread before me, like an endless series of beautiful pictures--pictures in which I could see Philip and myself, always together, always happy. To-day, to-day, oh!
_how_ different everything is!" exclaimed Laura, with a little shudder.
"The sky that shuts in the lawn yonder seems to shut in my life with it.
I can"t look forward. If I was going to be parted from Philip to-day, instead of married to him, I don"t think I could feel more miserable than I feel now. Why is it, Elizabeth, dear?"
"My goodness gracious me!" cried Mrs. Madden, "how should I tell, my precious pet? You talk just like a poetry-book, and how can I answer you unless I was another poetry-book? Come and have your breakfast, do, that"s a dear sweet love, and try a new-laid egg. New-laid eggs is good for the spirits, my poppet."
Laura Dunbar seated herself in the comfortable arm-chair between the fireplace and the little breakfast-table. She made a sort of pretence at eating, just to please her old nurse, who fidgeted about the room; now stopping by Laura"s chair, and urging her to take this, that, or the other; now running to the dressing-table to make some new arrangement about the all-important wedding-toilet; now looking out of the window and perjuring her simple soul by declaring that "it"--namely, the winter sky--was going to clear up.
"It"s breaking up above the elms yonder, Miss Laura," Elizabeth said; "there"s a bit of blue peepin" through the clouds; leastways, if it ain"t quite blue, it"s a much lighter black than the rest of the sky, and that"s something. Eat a bit of Perrigorge pie, or a thin wafer of a slice off that Strasbog "am, Miss Laura, do now. You"ll be ready to drop with feelin" faint when you get to the altar-rails, if you persist on bein" married on a empty stummick, Miss Laura. It"s a moriel impossible as you can look your best, my precious love, if you enter the church in a state of starvation, just like one of them respectable beggars wot pins a piece of paper on their weskits with "I AM HUNGRY" wrote upon it in large hand, and stands at the foot of one of the bridges on the Surrey side of the water. And I shouldn"t think as you would wish to look like _that_, Miss Laura, on your wedding-day? _I_ shouldn"t if _I_ was goin" to be own wife to a baronet!"
Laura Dunbar took very little notice of her nurse"s rambling discourse; and I am fain to confess that, upon this occasion, Mrs. Madden talked rather more for the sake of talking than from any overflow of animal spirits.