Books: The Pillars of the House, V1

C >> Charlotte M. Yonge >> The Pillars of the House, V1

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45

'Nonsense, child; you have misunderstood some joke.'

'No,' said Robina, looking full in his face with sturdy offended
dignity. 'They both were in earnest when they told me about it.'

'About what?' said he, still severely, as he sat down on a bench,
unheeding February damp.

'About--' she was not far from tears, as she faltered out, 'their
engagement.'

'Theirs! he wrung the hand that he still retained; 'Edgar and--'

'And Alice Knevett,' said Robin. 'I would not promise not to tell. I
hope it is not treachery!'

'How long?' asked Felix, hoarsely.

'Ever since the holidays. They used to walk together when Miss
Pearson thought she was with us, but none of us ever knew it then.'

'You are certain? Remember, this is a graver matter than perhaps you
understand.'

'I think I do understand, and it is that which makes me so unhappy;
but, indeed, it can't be fancy. I have seen her ring, emerald and
amethyst, for Edgar and Alice, and the locket with their hairs
twisted together. The very first Sunday we were here, he gave me a
note for her, and when I told him it was not allowed, he tried
quizzing me at first, and at last told me I was a silly child who did
not know what was proper between engaged people. So I said,'
continued Robina, with dignity, 'that I could allow much to be proper
in that case, but I wanted to know whether this was only kept from me
because I was a baby, and was known to you and the grown-up people.'

'Right, Robin,' muttered Felix, feeling that she needed
encouragement.

'Then he laughed at me more than ever about expecting things to be
proclaimed on the market-cross, and tried to puzzle me out of my
senses, till I could only stick to one thing, that I couldn't take
his notes unless somebody knew. And after all I found the thing in my
jacket pocket. He must have put it in when I was not looking.'

'And what did you do with it!'

'Oh! the dreadful thing! I felt as if it would bite me all the week
long, but I didn't think it would be honourable to tear it or burn
it, and I kept it. Luckily Alice didn't ask if I had a note, only
whether he had said anything; and when she found I knew, she told me
all about it, and said all sorts of things about my being unkind and
mean to stand out, but I never promised to keep the secret.'

'Are you still keeping this note!'

'No. I gave it back to Edgar on Sunday, and told him to play no such
tricks. I thought he would have been in a rage, but he was--oh! so
provoking! just as if he didn't care for a little spite in a naughty
child.'

'Then is this intercourse checked!'

'No, that's the worst of it. When I would not, they took to Angel.
You know she got very fond of Edgar in the winter, and was always
running after him and waiting on him. So she did what he told her
quite innocently at first, till I found out what was going on, and
tried to stop her; but she doesn't care for me as she does for Edgar,
and thinks it grand to be in all their secrets, when I am too cross.
And then there's a class that goes to the South Kensington Museum,
and Alice is one of them, and Edgar is about there. I'm sure Miss
Fulmort ought not to be deceived as they are doing; it's all nonsense
about school-mistresses being designed by nature to be hoodwinked. It
makes me so miserable, I don't know what to do; and when I heard you
were come, it was as if you had been sent on purpose to help me.'

'Poor child!' said Felix, with a heavy sigh. 'You have kept this all
to yourself.'

'I could not tell any one. I could have told Miss Lyveson, because
she is one's friend; but it would only be being a tell-tale and
informer here. And one's own brother, too! And I could not write, for
they look over all the letters that are not to fathers and mothers.

'They must make an exception for me!' said Felix, in an indignant
tone.

'I knew you would say so. O Felix, tell them so! I do feel like
having Papa now I have you.'

'If you only had!' sighed Felix. 'My poor Bob, it is a grievous
business, but you have been very upright and considerate, as far as I
can see.'

'I'm so glad you don't want me to have told!' she said, with a sigh
of relief, as unlike his as that of one who throws off a burden is to
that of him who takes it up.

'Not if it can be helped. It would be a mischievous and cruel
exposure, and would be hard on one who has been led into it,' he
said, with breaks and pauses, half for breath, half for considering.
'It is most reckless, most unjustifiable, in Edgar!' He knit his
brows, so that she gazed at him in awe and wonder, as having
something in his countenance that she did not comprehend. Then, after
a silence, he said, 'Robin, I will speak to Edgar, and if you do not
find that this is stopped after one communication, which of course
there must be, write to me. These ladies must make an exception in
favour of such as we are!'

'O Felix, it is so nice to hold you and feel you! Only I wish I had
not had to grieve you so much!'

'Dishonourable conduct is not what I was prepared for!' he said,
setting his teeth.

'And will you speak to Angel? I hear them coming in,' said Robina.

'Yes. Let me have her alone at first. Come back in ten minutes'
time.'

He was still sitting on the bench, with his elbows on his knees, and
his hands over his brow, when Angela came towards him. She was of the
same long-limbed make as Clement, was nearly as tall as the square
sturdy Robina nearly three years older, and had Clement's small,
almost baby mould of features, relieved only by such arch deep blue
eyes as shone in Edgar's face. She looked such a mere child, that
when her step and exclamation caused Felix to raise his head, it
seemed absurd to imagine her to be knowingly engaged as go-between in
a clandestine correspondence, and with a sort of pity and compunction
for the blame he had intended, he held out his arms to her.

'O Felix, how cold you are! Your face is like marble. Now if I was to
sit there, in this weather, wouldn't they be at me like wild cats?'

Thus reminded, Felix rose, and certainly shivered after the exercise
of his privilege. 'Are you happy here, Angel?' he asked in a
constrained tone.

'Yes, it is jollier than Miss Pearson's. There are more girls, and we
do have such fun!'

'I hope you are good and steady, and very careful of all the rules.'

Angela fidgeted, as if she didn't like the style of the conversation.

'You know,' he continued, 'there may be rules that you may not see
the use of, but that must be obeyed for all that.'

'What a tiresome dry old Blunderbore you are!' broke out Angela, with
ill-assured sauciness; 'this isn't the way Edgar goes on when he
comes to see us.'

Felix could not check a sort of groan or grunt; and Angela, whose
pertness was defensive, quailed a little. She had driven him out of
the due sequence of his discourse, but he resumed it. 'Angel, I must
tell you; if anybody asks you to break rules--by giving letters--you
must not'

Angela kicked pebbles about.

'Have you ever been asked to do so?'

She hung her head, and a pout came over her face.

'Angel,' he said, in a voice from the sadness of his heart, 'I will
not ask any questions, in case you have made promises not to betray
secrets; but you must never make such promises again. Tell me you
will never do--this thing again.'

She was silent.

'Angela!' he said, reprovingly.

'I don't know why I should promise you more than Edgar,' broke out
Angela, petulantly. 'He is my brother too, and he isn't cross; and I
love him, and _will_ keep his secret.'

Between this flat defiance of his authority, and his scruple about
interfering with the child's sense of honour, Felix was in no slight
perplexity even as to this interview with his little sister. His
disclaimer came first. 'I ask about no one's secret,' he said, 'but,
Angel, I must have you understand this. If you break the rules that
forbid the giving of notes from any person outside the school, it
will be doing more harm than you can understand. I shall put a stop
to it at once, and most likely you will be sent away in disgrace.'

She was somewhat awed, but she did not speak.

'Whatever any one may say to you,' said Felix, 'recollect that it is
dishonesty and treachery to do anything underhand, and the greatest
possible mischief to those you wish to be kind to. Don't you see, it
is no kindness to help any one to do wrong?'

She began to cry. 'They don't want to do wrong. It is very nasty and
mean of Bobbie to have told.'

'You will know some day how good and trustworthy it is in Bobbie,'
said her elder brother. 'You cannot understand the rights and wrongs
in such a manner as this, at your age, Angel.' (To tell the child
this was a mistake, if he had but known it.) 'You must be satisfied
with knowing that whatever breaks rules and must be kept secret is
necessarily disobedient and deceitful, and may have terrible
consequences. Do you believe me? Then give me your word to have no
more to do with it.'

She muttered something among her tears like 'I won't,' and Felix was
satisfied, for the exaction of promises had necessarily been the
chief mode of government with the two youthful pillars of the house,
who spent so much time apart from their dominions; and it was almost
unprecedented that such a promise was not observed.

Robina was lingering near, and as they joined her Felix found that
his time was up. He was taken back to the drawing-room, where he
found himself in presence of the lady he had seen, and of a much
younger smaller person, with a slight cast in her eye, and a peculiar
jerking manner such as he could well believe would frighten away a
young girl's confidence. When he made his request for free
correspondence from his little sisters, there was no demur; only Miss
Fulmort said, half vexed, 'It ought to have been mentioned before;
she did not know why the children had not told her.' And then she
made a point of ascertaining Felix's individual address; for she
said, 'A great deal of undesirable stuff may be scribbled to brothers
and sisters.'

Felix possessed no card, unless such might be reckoned the
announcement of photographs and stationery, etc., which was wont to
be put up with parcels for strangers; and when he tried to write 'Mr.
F. C. Underwood,' the shivering chill so affected his fingers that he
could hardly guide the pencil. He took leave, and soon found the
assiduous Ferdinand, who presently asked, shyly, 'What the little
ones thought of it?'

Felix bethought himself. 'Really, Fernan, it was put out of my head;
and, moreover, perhaps it had better not be known more widely than
needful.'

'You do not doubt--'

All the ground that had been gone over before was argued out once
again by the eager Mexican before they reached the National Gallery,
the appointed place of meeting with Edgar. He was not within, but
without, and, throwing away his cigar, hailed them as Fernan drew up
his horse.

'At last! The storm must have been pitiless, to judge by the effects!
You are blue with cold, Felix.'

'Ferdinand, thank you,' said Felix, getting out. 'I am sorry, but I
must have Edgar alone a little while.'

'Look here, Travis,' said Edgar, seeing his blank look, 'we'll give
you the honour of giving us a spread. You go on and order it at --'s,
and I'll walk this fellow there. Curry soup that will astonish him,
and warm the cockles of his heart, mind.'

Ferdinand nodded, and drove off, perfectly satisfied with this
compensation.

'Let's see if we can walk a little life into you,' said Edgar, taking
his brother's arm. 'Bless thy five wits, Tom's a cold! Was it Madame!
I always thought she could not be many generations from
Billingsgate.'

'I have been to Brompton.'

'That tragical hoarseness would lead me to conclude something. Eh!
has that Robin been chirping out her fancies? And do you mean to say
that you are struck all of a heap by the awful discovery of a
boarding-school mystery?'

'It is naturally distressing to find you acting such a part.'

'Then I am afraid you have a good deal to go through in the course of
your life. If every little flirtation on the part of your
Geschwister is to produce this effect, there won't be much left of
you by the time it comes to Stella.'

'What meaning do you attach to the words "little flirtation?"'

'When the head of the family puts the question in that solemn tone,
how is it to be answered? Bless me, Blunderbore, such a countenance
can only proceed from being smitten yourself! To be sure, when there
was only one girl you ever spoke to, it was no wonder. Poor old
fellow! I'd never have poached on your manor, but how was I to
imagine a pillar of the house giving way to such levities?'

'This is mere bravado, Edgar,' was the grave answer, in a tone not
disconcerted, but full of repression, and with a pale but steady
countenance. 'Gloss it over as you will, a correspondence such as you
have begun is unjustifiable. It risks damaging for ever the
prospects, at once not only of--of the object--but those of your
little sisters.'

'O Felicissimo mio, how green a spot is Bexley! As though secrets and
mysteries were not the elixir of life to the boarding-school.'

'Have you ever considered what a discovery must involve?'

'I need not, it seems, since you had not the sense to box that
child's ears for a meddlesome tell-tale. Did the scene equal Madame's
performance?'

'You do not imagine that I mentioned it.'

'Oh! The revered prop of the state soars so far above my head that I
did not know what he might regard as his duty.'

'You shall know it now, Edgar. There are two choices. If you are
really engaged to this young lady' (Edgar made a nod of impatient
scornful acquiescence, but certainly of acquiescence), 'then ask her
honourably from her friends, and let whatever you do be open!
Otherwise, give it up as an impossible imprudence, but drop all
attempt at what is clandestine. Unless you do one or other of these,
I warn you that I shall speak to Miss Pearson.'

'If you were a reasonable and experienced paterfamilias, instead of
only a poor conscientious over-harassed prig of a boy, with more
brothers and sisters than he knows what to do with, I'll tell you, in
candid unprejudice, what you would do. Just let it alone! There are
as many of such little affairs going as there are midges in a
sunbeam; and they never do any one any harm, unless the higher powers
make an unadvised hubbub.'

'Am I to understand that as an avowal that you know yourself to be
trifling?'

'I know nothing about it. I don't live in the heroics, like some of
my friends. In the rural seclusion of Bexley I saw a pretty lively
girl, who, not to put too fine a point upon it, made quite as much up
to the romantic young artist as ever the young artist did to her. Of
course, there was an exchange of prettinesses, and life on either
side became a blank when she was immured at Brompton, and the only
solace left was the notes that so outrage your and Bobbie's united
sense of propriety.'

'And what is to follow?'

'Is it to lead to?' he corrected, with a mimicry of Wilmet's tone.
'That depends. If you make the explosion, I shall have to rise to the
occasion--keep the slip-knot ready and patent, and as soon as I get
my head above water, have a wife and family on my back to keep me
down, and hinder me from coming to your rescue. If not--why, it will
take its chance, and we shall have a reasonable chance of trying
whether we get tired of one another--the best thing that could happen
to us, by the by--though she is such a saucy little darling, that
were that picture of mine painted, I should be fool enough to marry
her to-morrow.'

'And why--may I ask--seeing these things so clearly, did you draw the
poor child into an engagement!

Edgar shrugged his shoulders. 'You had better ask why she drew me. If
you didn't know it before, my dear Felix, "'Tis human natur to be
fools."'

'Allowing it to be folly, you do not mean to persist?'

'As if a poor fellow must always have a meaning! Life is not worth
having if one is to be always so awfully in earnest.'

'I have the misfortune to be in earnest,' said Felix, with the
formality of one past patience, but resolved to keep his temper in
hand, 'when I warn you, that if I find that this intercourse is
continued, unless you choose to ask her properly of her father, it
will be my duty to let Miss Pearson know.

'So be it,' was the answer, in a tone of half mocking, half
compassionate submission, that was more provoking than all, except
for the sudden change to the gay kindliness that followed, as Edgar
threw aside his own affairs, to laugh over Ferdinand Travis's honest
simplicity of adoration of Alda and all her household, declaring that
it had been as much for his delight, as to be rid of him, that he
himself had devised that commission of the luncheon. 'What a spread
it will be!' Edgar chuckled to himself; 'and how it will be thrown
away on the present company! not that there ever was a man who wanted
it more!' he added, as he saw how white his brother's face was.
'You've been and got a chill!'

Felix did not deny it; and if his unsophisticated palate did not
appreciate all that Ferdinand had ordered on the principle that
nothing could be too good for him either in his individual capacity
or as Alda's brother, he at least submitted to what his two
companions required of him in the way of hot soup, and even of one
glass of wine, before he grew restive, and insisted on carrying the
head that their solicitude had succeeded in rendering heated and
flushed to burning pitch, to do the business in the City that always
sprang up whenever any one had to go to town.

Edgar bade him adieu; and the faithful Ferdinand drove him wherever
he had to go, and finally to Kensington Palace Gardens, where he was
ushered into the drawing-room, to find Marilda, resolved upon
unconsciousness, but only succeeding in a kind of obstreperous
cordiality and good will, which, together with the hot room, made him
quite dizzy; and his answers were so much at random, that he sent
Fulbert to an examination at Cambridge, and Clement prospecting in
Australia. Neither Mr. nor Mrs. Underwood made their appearance; but
when Felix spoke of getting a cab, Marilda said the carriage was
ordered. Then Alda was explicit about the boxes that were to follow,
but on the whole she was behaving very prettily and unobtrusively.
Marilda kissed her warmly, and detained Felix a moment to say, 'This
will blow over, and then she will come back, unless things have
settled themselves better. If I can do any good, write to me.'

So Alda quitted her adopted home; but the change might be lightened
to her by being handed out of the carriage at the station by a
military-looking figure, who announced that he wanted to see a fellow
at Aldershot, and meant to dine there. It was not his fault that he
got out at Farnborough.

CHAPTER XVI

THE WINTER OF DISCONTENT

'Peace, brother, be not exquisite,
To cast the fashion of uncertain evils;
For, grant they be so, while they rest unknown,
What need a man forestall his date of grief?'
MILTON.

Wilmet was so devoted to Alda and her hopes and fears, that she let
Felix escape with less reproof than usual, for the cold that sat
heavily upon him after the last day's chill. He did not give way to
it. There might have been some temptation to sit over the fire if
Geraldine had been alone there; but Alda, when Wilmet was out of
reach, engrossed Cherry's ears with descriptions of her feelings, and
cravings for sympathy in her suspense, treating every other subject
as futile, and the interruption of the children's lessons as an
insult. No one might talk of anybody but Ferdinand; and Cherry did
not wonder that Felix looked wearied and harassed, and always
betrayed some anxiety to come first into possession of the morning
post. One day, nearly a fortnight after his visit to London, he
called Wilmet away from the breakfast table into the sitting-room:
'Wilmet,' he said, 'I must go and see Miss Pearson before school
hours.'

'You! Is there anything the matter with Alice?' asked Wilmet,
startled at his tone.

'Had they--had you--any notion of anything between her and Edgar?'

'No! Miss Pearson has taken to saying, "My dear, your brothers are
quite grown into young men," and I thought she did not like the
play.'

'Ah! that play! It threw them together!'

'Is it really so? I suppose nothing is too foolish and provoking for
Edgar!'

'The fact of admiration is not wonderful,' said Felix, rather in a
tone of defence; 'but the worst of it is, that he has been trying to
communicate with her through those poor girls at school.'

Wilmet's horror was surpassing; and when she found that he had known
it all this fortnight, she was so indignant, that to his reply that
it was not fair to leave both parties the chance of acting
honourably, she replied with scorn for his weakness in expecting
anything from Edgar, and exposing the children to the chance of
expulsion, which might be a lasting blight, such as merely in thought
put her into a perfect agony. Nevertheless, angry and excited as she
was, she flew at him when he gave her the letters, and was off to
Miss Pearson's--'Go there without breakfast, in the sleet, sitting
and still with that bad cold not half gone!' and she dragged him back
reluctantly to the other room, where, ignominiously ordering off
Bernard and Stella to finish their stir-about elsewhere, she insisted
on his breakfasting while she told the story. She was far too loyal
to blame him except tete-a-tete, but she burst on him now and then.

'You are not eating, Felix!'

'A cup of tea, then, please, Cherry. No one can swallow stir-about in
hot haste but Wilmet herself.' He spoke good-humouredly, but with a
force upon himself that Cherry detected, and she further saw that he
took nothing but that one cup and a fragment of bread, and then
hurried off, saying that he must catch Miss Pearson for the little
girls' sake.

The letters he had left were Robina's and another enfolding it
containing these words:

Dear Sir--According to my promise, I have refrained from opening this
letter, though I own that the discovery of the purpose for which free
correspondence was asked, has been no small amazement to me. In the
first shock, I will not trust myself to say more, until after
consultation with my brother; but you shall hear from me again
respecting your sisters.--I remain, your obedient servant,
R. M. FULMORT.

The letter within was--

MY DEAR FELIX--It has all come out. There is a dreadful uproar, and
nobody will believe me. If only Miss Lyveson was here! This was the
way. Edgar came yesterday and took us for a long walk in Kensington
Gardens, and afterwards I saw Angela going towards Alice Knevett's
room; and as we are not allowed to run into other people's bedrooms,
I stopped her and put her in mind of what you said; but she began to
cry and struggle with me, and Alice came out, and made a fuss to get
the note Angel had for her, till I got into a passion, and spoke so
loud that Miss Fennimore came out upon us. Angel did not know what
she was about by that time, and cried, saying that I was unkind, and
was hurting her; and Alice took her part, accusing me of tyrannising
and being jealous, so that I faced round and told all on the spot.
Miss Fennimore took us all straight down to Miss Fulmort, and it was
a dreadful business. They are frightfully angry with us all, and me
the most, for having told you instead of them. They cannot understand
the difference between you and any common brother. They think I have
not told the whole truth, and it is very hard. Nobody ever distrusted
me before. We are just living on sufferance till Mr. Fulmort comes to
see about it, and then I think we shall be sent away. I hope so, for
I know my own dear Miss Lyveson will believe me and take me back to
justice and confidence. Here the girls are as angry with me for
telling as the ladies are for not telling; they have no idea of such
loyalty and love as we had at Catsacre. There is a report that Miss
Pearson has been sent for. If we are sent home with her, it will be a
horrid shame and injustice; but I shall not be able to be sorry one
bit, for I know you will stand by me.--Dear, dear brother Felix, your
affectionate sister, BOBBIE.

When the three sisters had made out all that could be understood,
Geraldine owned herself less amazed than Wilmet; and Alda laughed at
both for not being aware that Edgar was a universal flirt. All that
surprised her was his having let it proceed to such dangerous
extremities; but of course that was the girl's own fault--he would
give it up when it came to the point.

'Why should you expect Edgar to be more inconstant than Ferdinand?'
asked Cherry.

Both twins turned on her, and told her she was a child and knew
nothing about it--their favourite way of annihilating her; and then
Alda, in her excitement, walked with Wilmet to the school, leaving
Cherry, as usual, to wash up the breakfast things. She felt a
conviction that all this accounted for the weary oppressed look,
broken by occasional starts of vivacity, which ever since Felix's day
in London had been laid to the score of the cold he had brought home.