I need not have feared. It was a very short sermon, the services had been so long, but wonderfully beautiful. You might have heard a pin drop in the church, and old Brandon himself never stirred hand or foot.
At the end of the pew sat he, I next to him; his eyes fixed on the preacher, his att.i.tude that of one who is absorbed in what he hears.
Just a few words Mr. Lake spoke of himself, of the new relation between himself and his hearers; very quiet, modest words hearing the ring of truth and good-fellowship.
"That man would do his duty in whatever position of life he might be placed," p.r.o.nounced old Brandon, as we got out. "Robert Tenby"s choice has been a good and wise one."
"Thanks to Johnny Ludlow, here," said Miss Deveen, laughing.
"I don"t say but what Johnny Ludlow has his head on his shoulders the right way. He means to do well always, I believe; and does do it sometimes."
Which I am sure was wonderful praise, conceded by old Brandon, calling to my face no end of a colour. And, if you"ll believe me, he put his arm within mine; a thing he had never done before; and walked so across the churchyard.
The next week was a busy one. What with Mrs. Selwyn"s preparations for going away, and what with the commotion caused by the new state of things, the parish had plenty on its hands. Mr. Lake had begged Mrs.
Selwyn not to quit the Rectory until it should be quite and entirely convenient to her; if he got into it six or twelve months hence, he kindly urged, it would be time enough for him. But Mrs. Selwyn, while thanking him for his consideration, knowing how earnestly he meant it, showed him that she was obliged to go. She had taken to the school at Brighton, and had to enter upon it as speedily as might be. A few days afterwards she had vacated the Rectory, and her furniture was packed into vans to be carried away. Some women went into the empty house to clean it down; that it might be made ready for its new tenant. Poor Mr.
Selwyn had repaired and decorated the house only the previous year, little thinking his tenure of it would be so short.
Then began the fun. The polite attentions to Mr. Lake, as curate, had been remarkable; to Mr. Lake, as Rector, they were unique. Mrs.
Topcroft"s door was besieged with notes and parcels. The notes contained invitations to teas and dinners, the parcels small offerings to himself.
A person about to set up housekeeping naturally wants all kinds of articles; and the ladies of St. Matthew"s were eager to supply contributions. Slippers fell to a discount, purses and silk watch-guards ditto. More useful things replaced them. Ornamental baskets for the mantelpiece, little match-boxes done in various devices, card-racks hastily painted, serviette rings composed of coloured beads, pincushions and scent-mats for the dressing-table, with lots more things that I can"t remember. These were all got up on the spur of the moment; more elaborate presents, that might take weeks to complete, were put in hand.
In vain Mr. Lake entreated them not to do these things; not to send _anything_; not to trouble themselves about him, a.s.suring them it made him most uncomfortable; that he preferred not to receive presents of any kind: and he said it so emphatically, they might see he was in earnest.
All the same. He might as well have talked to the moon. The ladies laughed, and worked on.
"Mrs. Topcroft, I think you had better refuse to take the parcels in,"
he said to her one day, when a huge packet had arrived, which proved to be a market-basket, sent conjointly by three old maiden sisters. "I don"t wish to be rude, or do anything that would hurt kind people"s feelings: but, upon my word, I should like to send all the things back again with thanks."
"They would put them into the empty Rectory if I did not take them in,"
returned Mrs. Topcroft. "The only way to stop it is to talk to the ladies yourself. Senseless girls!"
Mr. Lake did talk--as well, and as impressively as he knew how. It made not the slightest impression; and the small presents flocked in as before. Mrs. Jonas did not brew a "blessed great jug of camomile-tea,"
as did one of the admirers of Mr. Weller, the elder; but she did brew some "ginger-cordial," from a valued receipt of her late husband, the colonel, and sent it, corked up in two ornamental bottles, with her best regards. The other widow, Mrs. Herriker, was embroidering a magnificent table-cover, working against time.
We had the felicity of tasting the ginger-cordial. Mrs. Jonas gave a small "at home," and brought out a bottle of it as we were leaving.
Cattledon sniffed at her liqueur-gla.s.s surrept.i.tiously before drinking it.
"The chief ingredient in that stuff is rum," she avowed to me as we walked home, stretching up her neck in displeasure. "_Pine-apple rum!_ My nose could not be mistaken."
"The cordial was very good," I answered. "Rum"s not a bad thing, Miss Cattledon."
"Not at all bad, Johnny," laughed Miss Deveen. "An old sailor-uncle of mine, who had been round the world and back again more times than he could count, looked upon it as the panacea for all earthly ills."
"Any way, before I would lay myself out to catch Mr. Lake, as that widow woman does, and as some others are doing, I would hide my head for ever," retorted Cattledon. And, to give her her due, though she did look upon the parson as safe to fall to her own lot, she did not fish for him. No presents, large or small, went out from her hands.
That week we dined in Upper Brook Street. Miss Deveen, Mr. Brandon, the new Rector, and I; and two strange ladies whom we did not previously know. Mr. Brandon took Anne in to dinner; she put me on her left hand at table, and told me she and Sir Robert hoped I should often go to see them at Bellwood.
"My husband has taken such a fancy to you, Johnny," she whispered. "He does rather take likes and dislikes to people--just as I know you do. He says he took a great liking to me the first time he ever spoke to me.
Do you remember it, Johnny?--you were present. We were kneeling in the parlour at Maythorn Bank. You were deep in that child"s book of mine, "Les contes de ma bonne," and I had those cuttings of plants, which I had brought from France, spread out on newspapers on the carpet, when Sir Robert came in at the gla.s.s-doors. That was the first time he spoke to me; but he had seen me at Timberdale Church the previous day. Papa and I and you walked over there: and a very hot day it was, I remember."
"That Sir Robert should take a liking to you, Anne, was only a matter of course; other people have done the same," I said, calling her "Anne"
unconsciously, my thoughts back in the past. "But I don"t understand why he should take a liking to me."
"Don"t you?" she returned. "I can tell you that he has taken it--a wonderful liking. Why, Johnny, if my little baby-girl were twenty years older, you would only need to ask and have her. I"m not sure but he"d offer her to you without asking."
We both laughed so, she and I, that Sir Robert looked down the table, inquiring what our mirth was. Anne answered that she would not forget to tell him later.
"So mind, Johnny, that you come to Bellwood as often as you please whenever you are staying at Crabb Cot. Robert and I would both like it."
And perhaps I may as well mention here that, although the business which had brought Mr. Brandon to London was concluded, he did not go home. When that event would take place, or how long it would be, appeared to be hidden in the archives of the future. For a certain matter had arisen to detain him.
Mr. Brandon had a nephew in town, a young medical student, of whom you once heard him say that he was "going to the bad." By what we learnt now, the young fellow appeared to have gone to it; and Mr. Brandon"s prolonged stay was connected with this.
"I shall see you into a train at Paddington, Johnny," he said to me, "and you must make your way home alone. For all I know, I may be kept here for weeks."
But Miss Deveen would not hear of this. "Mr. Brandon remains on for his own business, Johnny, and you shall remain for my pleasure," she said to me in her warm manner. "I had meant to ask Mr. Brandon to leave you behind him."
And that is how I was enabled to see the play played out between the ladies and the new Rector. I did wonder which of them would win the prize; I would not have betted upon Cattledon. It also caused me to see something of another play that was being played in London just then; not a comedy but a tragedy. A fatal tragedy, which I may tell of sometime.
All unexpectedly a most distressing rumour set in; and though none knew whence it arose, a conviction of its truth took the parish by storm. Mr.
Lake was about to be married! Distressing it was, and no mistake: for each individual lady had good cause to know that _she_ was not the chosen bride, being unpleasantly conscious that Mr. Lake had not asked her to be.
Green-eyed jealousy seized upon the community. They were ready to rend one another"s veils. The young ladies vowed it must be one or other of those two designing widows; Mrs. Jonas and Mrs. Herriker, on their parts, decided it was one of those minxes of girls. What with lady-like innuendos pitched at each other personally, and sharp hints levelled apparently at the air, all of which provoked retort, the true state of the case disclosed itself pretty clearly to the public--that neither widows nor maidens were being thought of by Mr. Lake.
And yet--that the parson had marriage in view seemed to be certain; the way in which he was furnishing his house proved it. No end of things were going into it--at least, if vigilant eyes might be believed--that could be of no use to a bachelor-parson. There must be a lady in the case--and Mr. Lake had not a sister.
With this apparent proof of what was in the wind, and with the conviction that not one of themselves had been solicited to share his hearth and home--as the widow Herriker poetically put it--the world was at a nonplus; though polite hostilities were not much less freely exchanged. Suddenly the general ill-feeling ceased. One and all metaphorically shook hands and made common cause together. A frightful conviction had set in--it must be Emma Topcroft.
Miss Cattledon was the first to scent the fox. Cattledon herself.
She--but I had better tell it in order.
It was Monday morning, and we were at breakfast: Cattledon pouring out the coffee, and taking anxious glances upwards through the open window between whiles. What could be seen of the sky was blue enough, but clouds, some dark, some light, were pa.s.sing rapidly over it.
"Are you fearing it will rain, Miss Cattledon?"
"I am, Johnny Ludlow. I thought," she added, turning to Miss Deveen, "of going after that chair this morning, if you have no objection, and do not want me."
"Go by all means," returned Miss Deveen. "It is time the chair went, Jemima, if it is to go at all. Take Johnny with you: he would like the expedition. As for myself, I have letters to write that will occupy me the whole morning."
Miss Cattledon wished to buy an easy-chair that would be comfortable for an aged invalid: her sick aunt at Chelmsford. But, as Miss Cattledon"s purse was not as large as her merits, she meant to get a second-hand chair: which are often just as good as new. Dr. Galliard, who knew all about invalid-chairs and everything else, advised her to go to a certain shop in Oxford Street, where they sold most kinds of furniture, old and new. So we agreed to go this same morning. Cattledon, however, would not miss the morning service; trust her for that.
"It might do _you_ no harm to attend for once, Johnny Ludlow."
Thus admonished, I went over with her, and reaped the benefit of the young deacon"s ministry. Mr. Lake did not make his appearance at all: quite an unusual omission. I don"t think it pleased Cattledon.
"We had better start at once, Johnny Ludlow," she said to me as we came out; and her tone might have turned the very sweetest of cream to curds and whey. "Look at those clouds! I believe it _is_ going to rain."
So we made our way to an omnibus, then on the point of starting, got in, and were set down at the shop in Oxford Street. Cattledon described what she wanted; and the young man invited us to walk upstairs.
Dodging our way dexterously through the things that crowded the shop, and up the narrow staircase, we reached a room that seemed, at first sight, big enough to hold half the furniture in London.