and quite right; they may remind some fellows of worse things, but they always remind me of heaven and the angels; and my hat goes off to her by instinct, just as it does when I go into a church."
That was all; simple chivalrous admiration, and delight in her loveliness, as in that of a lake, or a mountain sunset; but nothing more. The good fellows had no time, indeed, to fancy themselves in love with her, or her with them, for every day was too short for them; what with reading all the morning, and starting out in the afternoon in strange garments (which became shabbier and more ragged very rapidly as the weeks slipped on) upon all manner of desperate errands; walking unheard-of-distances, and losing their way upon the mountains; scrambling cliffs and now and then falling down them; camping all night by unp.r.o.nounceable lakes, in the hope of catching mythical trout; trying in all ways how hungry, thirsty, dirty, and tired a man could make himself, and how far he could go without breaking his neck, any approach to which catastrophe was hailed (as were all other mishaps) as "all in the day"s work," and "the finest fun in the world," by that unconquerable English "lebensgluckseligkeit," which is a perpetual wonder to our sober German cousins. Ah, glorious twenty-one, with your inexhaustible powers of doing and enjoying, eating and hungering, sleeping and sitting up, reading and playing! Happy are those who still possess you, and can take their fill of your golden cup, steadied, but not saddened, by the remembrance, that for all things a good and loving G.o.d will bring them into judgment. Happier still those who (like a few) retain in body and soul the health and buoyancy of twenty-one on to the very verge of forty, and seeming to grow younger-hearted as they grow older-headed, can cast off care and work at a moment"s warning, laugh and frolic now as they did twenty years ago, and say with Wordsworth--
"So was it when I was a boy, So let it be when I am old, Or let me die!"
Unfortunately, as will appear hereafter, Elsley"s especial _betes noirs_ were this very Wynd and his inseparable companion, Naylor, who happened to be not only the best men of the set, but Mellot"s especial friends. Both were Rugby men, now reading for their degree. Wynd was a Shropshire squire"s son, a lissom fair-haired man, the handiest of boxers, rowers, riders, shots, fishermen, with a noisy superabundance of animal spirits, which maddened Elsley. Yet Wynd had sentiment in his way, though he took good care never to show it Elsley; could repeat Tennyson from end to end; spouted the Mort d"Arthur up hill and down dale, and chaunted rapturously, "Come into the garden, Maud!" while he expressed his opinion of Maud"s lover in terms more forcible than delicate. Naylor, fidus Achates, was a Gloucestershire parson"s son, a huge heavy-looking man, with a thick curling lip, and a sleepy eye; but he had brains enough to become a first-rate cla.s.sic; and in that same sleepy eye and heavy lip lay an infinity of quiet humour; racy old country stories, quaint sc.r.a.ps of out-of-the-way learning, jovial old ballads, which he sang with the mellowest of voices, and a slang vocabulary, which made him the dread of all bargees from Newnham pool to Upware. Him also Elsley hated, because Naylor looked always as if he was laughing at him, which indeed he was.
And the worst was, that Elsley had always to face them both at once. If Wynd vaulted over a gate into his very face, with a "How de" do, Mr.
Vavasour? Had any verses this morning?" in the same tone as if he had asked, "Had any sport?" Naylor"s round face was sure to look over the stone-wall, pipe in mouth, with a "Don"t disturb the gentleman, Tom; don"t you see he"s a composing of his rhymes!" in a strong provincial dialect put on for the nonce. In fact, the two young rogues, having no respect whatsoever for genius, perhaps because they had each of them a little genius of their own, made a b.u.t.t of the poet, as soon as they found out that he was afraid of them.
But worse _betes noirs_ than either Wynd or Naylor were on their way to fill up the cup of Elsley"s discomfort. And at last, without a note of warning, appeared in Beddgelert a phenomenon which rejoiced some hearts, but perturbed also the spirits not only of the Oxford "philanderers,"
but those of Elsley Vavasour, and, what is more, of Valencia herself.
She was sitting one evening at the window with Lucia, looking out into the village and the pleasure-grounds before the hotel. They were both laughing and chatting over the groups of tourists in their pretty Irish way, just as they had done when they were girls; for Lucia"s heart was expanding under the quiet beauty of the place, the freedom from household care, and what was more, from money anxieties; for Valencia had slipped into her hand a cheque for fifty pounds from Scoutbush, and a.s.sured her that he would be quite angry if she spoke of paying the rent of the rooms; Elsley was mooning down the river by himself; Claude was entertaining his Cambridge acquaintances, as he did every night, with his endless fun and sentiment. Gradually the tourists slipt in one by one, as the last rays of the sun faded off the peaks of Aran, and the mist settled down upon the dark valley beneath, and darkness fell upon that rock-girdled paradise; when up to the door below there drove a car, at sight whereof out rushed, not waiters only and landlady, but Mr.
Bowie himself, who helped out a very short figure in a pea-jacket and a shining boating hat, and then a very tall one in a wild shooting-coat and a military cap.
"My brother, and mon Saint Pere! Lucia! too delightful! This is why they did not write." And Valencia sprang up, and was going to run down stairs to them, when she paused at Lucia"s call.
"Who have they with them"? Val,--come and look! who can it be?"
Campbell and Bowie were helping out carefully a tall man, covered up in many wrappers. It was too dark to see the face; but a fancy crossed Valencia"s mind which made her look grave, in spite of her pleasure.
He was evidently weak, as from recent illness; for his two supporters led him up the steps, and Scoutbush seemed full of directions and inquiries, and fussed about with the landlady, till she was tired of curtseying to "my lord."
A minute afterwards Bowie threw open the door grandly. "My lord, my ladies!" and in trotted Scoutbush, and began kissing them fiercely, and then dancing about.
"Oh my dears! Here at last--out of that horrid city of the plague! Such sights as I have seen--" and then he paused. "Do you know, Val and Lucia, I"m glad I"ve seen it: I don"t know, but I feel as if I should be a better man all my life; and those poor people, how well they did behave! And the Major, he"s an angel! And so"s that brick of a doctor, and the mad schoolmistress, and the curate. Everybody, I think, but me.
Hang it, Val! but your words shan"t come true! I will be of some use yet before I die! But I"ve--" and Valencia went up to him and kissed him, while he ran on, and Lucia said,--
"You have been of use already, dear Fred. You have sent me and the dear children to this sweet place, where we have been safer and happier than--" (she checked herself); "and your generous present too. I feel quite a girl again, thanks to you. Val and I have done nothing but laugh all day long;" and she began kissing him too.
""How happy could I be with either, Were t"other dear charmer away!""
broke out Scoutbush. "What a pity it is now, that I should have two such sweet creatures making love to me, and can"t marry either of them? Why did ye go and be my father"s daughters, mavourneen? I"d have made a peeress of the one of ye, if ye"d had the sense to be anybody else"s sisters."
At which they all laughed, and laughed, and chattered broad Irish together as they used to do for fun in old Kilanbaggan Castle, before Lucia was a weary wife, and Valencia a worldly fine lady, and Scoutbush a rackety guardsman, breaking half of the ten commandments every week, rather from ignorance than vice.
"Well, I"m glad ye"re pleased with me, asth.o.r.e," said he at last to Lucia; "but I"ve done another little good deed, I flatter myself; for I"ve brought away the poor spalpeen of a priest, and have got him safe in the house."
Valencia stopped short in her fun.
"Why, what have ye to say against that, Miss Val?"
"Why, won"t he be a little in the way?" said Valencia, not knowing what to say.
"Faith, he needn"t trouble you; and I shall take very good care--I wonder when the supper is coming--that neither he nor any else troubles me. But really," said he, in his natural voice, and with some feeling, "I was ashamed to go away and leave him there. He would have died if we had. He worked day and night. Talk of saints and martyrs! Campbell himself said he was an idler by the side of him."
"Oh! I hope Major Campbell has not over-exerted himself!"
"He? nothing hurts him. He"s as hard as his own sword. But the poor curate worked on till he got the cholera himself. He always expected it, longed for it; Campbell said--wanted to die. Some love affair, I suppose, poor fellow?--and a terrible bout he had for eight-and-forty hours. Thurnall thought him gone again and again; but he pulled the poor fellow through, after all, and we got some one (that is, Campbell did) to take his duty; and brought him away, after a good deal of persuasion; for he would not move as long as there was a fresh case in the town; that is why we never wrote. We did not know till the last hour when we should start; and we expected to be with you in two days, and give you a pleasant surprise. He was half dead when we got him on board; but the week"s sea-air helped him through; so I must not grumble at these northerly breezes. "It"s an ill wind that blows n.o.body good," they say!"
Valencia heard all this as in a dream; and watched her chattering brother with a stupefied air. She comprehended all now; and bitterly she blamed herself. He had really loved her, then; set himself manfully to die at his post, that he might forget her in a better world. How shamefully she had trifled with that n.o.ble heart! How should she ever meet--how have courage to look him in the face? And not love, or anything like love, but sacred pity and self-abas.e.m.e.nt filled her heart, as his fair, delicate face rose up before her, all wan and shrunken, with sad upbraiding eyes; and round it such a halo, pure and pale, as crowns, in some old German picture, a martyr"s head.
"He has had the cholera! he has been actually dying?" asked she at last, with that strange wish to hear over again bad news, which one knows too well already.
"Of course he has. Why, you are not going away, Valencia? You need not be afraid of infection. Campbell, and Thurnall, too, says that"s all nonsense; and they must know, having seen it so often. Here comes Bowie at last with supper!"
"Has Mr. Headley had anything to eat?" asked Valencia, who longed to run away to her own room, but dared not.
"He is eating now like any ged, ma"am; and Major Campbell"s making him eat too."
"He must be very ill," thought she, "for mon Saint Pere never to have come near us yet:" and then she thought with terror that her Saint Pere might have guessed the truth, and be angry with her. And yet she trusted in Frank"s secrecy. He would not betray her.
Take care, Valencia. When a woman has to trust a man not to betray her, and does trust him, she may soon find it not only easy, but necessary, to do more than trust him.
However, in five minutes Campbell came in. Valencia saw at once that there was no change in his feelings to her: but he could talk of nothing but Headley, his self-devotion, courage, angelic gentleness, and humility; and every word of his praise was a fresh arrow in Valencia"s conscience; at last,--
"One knows well enough what is the matter," said he, almost bitterly-- "what is the matter, I sometimes think, with half the n.o.blest men in the world, and nine-tenths of the n.o.blest women; and with many a one, too, G.o.d help them! who is none of the n.o.blest, and therefore does not know how to take the bitter cup, as he knows--"
"What does the philosopher mean now?" asked Scoutbush, looking up from the cold lamb. Valencia knew but too well what he meant.
"He has a history, my dear lord."
"A history? What! is he writing a book?"
Campbell laughed a quiet under-laugh, half sad, half humorous.
"I am very tired," said Valencia; "I really think I shall go to bed."
She went to her room; but to bed she did not go: she sat down and cried till she could cry no more, and lay awake the greater part of the night, tossing miserably. She would have done better if she had prayed; but prayer, about such a matter, was what Valencia knew nothing of. She was regular enough at church, of course, and said her prayers and confessed her sins in a general way, and prayed about her "soul," as she had been taught to do,--unless she was too tired: but to pray really, about a real sorrow, a real sin like this, was a thought which never entered her mind; and if it had, she would have driven it away again: just because the anxiety was so real, practical, human, it was a matter which had nothing to do with religion; which it seemed impertinent--almost wrong to lay before the Throne of G.o.d.
So she came downstairs next morning, pale, restless, unrefreshed in body or mind; and her peace of mind was not improved by seeing, seated at the breakfast-table, Frank Headley, whom Lucia and Scoutbush were stuffing with all manner of good things.
She blushed scarlet--do what she would she could not help it--when he rose and bowed to her. Half choked, she came forward and offered her hand. She was so "shocked to hear that he had been so dangerously ill,-- no one had even told them of it,--it had come upon them so suddenly;"
and so forth.
She spoke kindly, but avoided the least tone of tenderness: for she felt that if she gave way, she might be only too tender; and to re-awaken hope in his heart would be only cruelty. And, therefore, and for other reasons also, she did not look him in the face as she spoke.
He answered so cheerfully that she was half disappointed, in spite of her remorse, at his not being as miserable as she had expected. Still, if he had overcome the pa.s.sion, it was so much better for him. But yet Valencia hardly wished that he should have overcome it, so self-contradictory is woman"s heart; and her pity had sunk to half-ebb, and her self-complacency was rising with a flowing tide, as he chatted on quietly, but genially, about the voyage, and the scenery, and Snowdon, which he had never seen, and which he would ascend that very day.
"You will do nothing of the kind, Mr. Headley!" cried Lucia. "Is he not mad, Major Campbell, quite mad?"
"I know I am mad, my dear Mrs. Vavasour; I have been so a long time: but Snowdon ponies are in their sober senses,--and I shall take one of them."
"Fulfil the old pun?--Begin beside yourself, and end beside your horse!
I am sure he is not strong enough to sit over those rocks. No, you shall stay at home comfortably here; Valencia and I will take care of you."
"And mon Saint Pere too. I have a thousand things to say to him."