Читать книгу In Silk Attire - Black William - Страница 5
ОглавлениеCHAPTER VI.
CHESNUT BANK.
At last they reached the brow of the hill, and beneath them lay St. Mary-Kirby, the sunlight falling lightly on the grey church, the white wooden cottages, the broad green common, and on two tall-necked swans floating on the glasslike mill-head.
Mr. Anerley's house—known in the neighbourhood as Chesnut Bank—was separated from the common by a large circular pond which was fed by a spring, and that again was divided from the house by a tall hedge, a row of short limes with black stems and young green leaves, and a pretty large lawn. Behind the house was a long garden now almost smothered in blossom, and along the carriage-drive stood rows of lilacs and acacias, with here and there an almond-tree, which bore a sprinkling of deep pink flowers. It was an old-fashioned house of red brick, the original builder's intention having clearly been to sacrifice to inside comfort outside appearance. When Mr. Anerley, therefore, had one side of it partly rebuilt, he had no scruple in adorning the drawing-room with French windows, which opened out upon the lawn, while the dining-room at the other side of the building had two large bay windows of the usual height from the ground. The house, nevertheless, was very snug and comfortable; and if you looked across the common and the pond, and saw it nestled among the thick foliage of lime and lilac and birch, you would say it was a very charming little country residence.
When Dove and her companion got down to this sheltered little place, they found it as usual alive with children. The gathering together from all his friends and relations of whatever small boys and girls they could spare, was a hobby of Mr. Anerley's. He liked to keep a perpetual children's party going at Chesnut Bank; and there was not a governess in one of his friends' houses who did not owe to him many a grateful holiday. Then this monstrous ogre of a materialist, who already smelt of brimstone in the nostrils of the people around, was as careful about the proprieties and go-to-bed prayers of the little ones as he was convinced that amusement ought to be their chief education. Indeed he once caught the Buttons of the small establishment amusing himself and a companion by teaching a little boy to repeat some highly improper phrases, and before the youthful joker knew where he was he felt the lithe curl of a horsewhip round his legs—a sensation he remembered for many a day after while gaily polishing his spoons and washing out his decanters.
At this moment a little girl was seated at the piano laboriously playing a hymn-tune possessed of no very recondite chords; while on the lawn in front Mr. Anerley lay at full length, a book between his face and the sunshine. Mrs. Anerley sat on a low chair beside him, also reading, a large deerhound at her feet; while two or three more children were scampering over the lawn, occasionally "coming a cropper" over a croquet-hoop. She was a pretty little woman, with dark brown hair and eyes—nervous, sensitive, and full of the tenderest idealisms—altogether a noble, affectionate, and lovable little woman. Her husband was a rather tall and spare man, with short rough grey hair and whiskers, an aquiline nose, and gentle grey eyes. He was a keen sportsman and a languid student: a man who liked to cover his weaknesses of sentiment with a veil of kindly humour; and seemed to live very easily and comfortably, considering that he was accused of harbouring materialism—that terrible quicklime, which, according to some profound calculators, is about to shrivel up the heavens and the earth, and all the gentle humanities which have been growing up through so many thousand years.
"Hillo, Will," said Mr. Anerley, as the young man approached and kissed his mother, "why didn't you come down last night?"
"Old Hubbard got me to stay in town with him that we might go to a supper."
"He told me he would likely see you; and asked us all to walk over to the Place in the evening. Poor man, he has never been himself since the Lord Chamberlain refused to let him attend a levee as the Count von Schönstein. Will, when anybody offers you 30,000*l.* a year, don't take it."
"I won't, father."
"Hubbard used to be as jolly, happy, and stupid a man as you could wish to meet; and since he got that money left him, he has been the most miserable of mortals. I asked him yesterday why he did not go amongst the city people, become a councillor, or alderman, or mayor, or get a baronetcy by buying a railway, or do something of the kind; and he crushed me with his contemptuous silence. He must have spent a lot of money in buying his countship; and yet he can't get one of the old families to look at him. If some indigent lady does not marry him, or if the Prince of Wales does not pick him up as a butt, he will die of spleen."
"And he is a good sort of fellow, too," said Will. "It is a shame to invent stories about his frantic efforts to get among the aristocracy, as they're doing in town just now. I think it's one's duty to cheer him up a bit. Fancy him living all by himself in that great house—a man who can no more read than he can shoot, or fish, or ride. By the way, he tumbled off his horse in the Park on Friday morning, and nearly knocked over a little girl of Lady Charlton's, who was out for the first time. And I had half promised to introduce him to Lady Charlton; I suppose he'll decline now, after making an exhibition of himself."
"He won't, you'll see. My poor Hubbard would kiss the ground on which Lady Charlton treads, although I suppose he hasn't seen her yet."
"I think you are two spiteful wretches," said Dove, "lying there, on such a beautiful day, and laughing at one of your own friends. I think the Count a very nice gentleman, and——"
"And he brought you down a coronet of blue pearls the other day," said Mrs. Anerley, with a smile.
"Why, I've never seen that wonderful head-gear you were talking about, Dove," said Will. "Do go and put it on now."
Dove was nowise loth; she knew as well as anybody how pretty she looked in her new article of attire. In a few minutes she returned, and stood at the open glass door, the creepers on the front of the house framing her in as if she were a picture. This head-dress—which I cannot describe scientifically—the Count had purchased abroad; and, had he gone over Europe, he could not have found anything to suit Dove's face and hair so well. There was first a simple tiara of blue pearls fixed on a gleaming blue band; then there were one or two loose strings of the pearls taken back to bind down a soft thick swathe of white muslin which came down under the chin and encompassed the pretty head. The blue strings among the light brown hair, the thick, soft, snowy circle round the slightly flushed face, the pleased, self-conscious eyes, and the half-smiling mouth—altogether they formed such a bright, soft, charming little picture that Mr. Anerley cried out:
"Come here at once, Dove, and kiss me, or I shall believe you're a fairy!"
And when he had his arm round her neck, he said:
"I expected every moment to see you fly right away up into the air, and then we should have seen no more of you than if you were a little white pigeon quite lost up in the blue."
"But I should come down again, papa, when I wanted something to eat."
"Or your glass of port wine after dinner, eh?"
They had dinner early at Chesnut Bank on Sundays, to let the servants get to afternoon church. And on Sundays, also, all the children dined downstairs; so that they had quite a fine party to-day, when they assembled round the table. Dove had seen that all the little boys' and girls' costume was correct; had got fresh flowers for the table; and wore herself a pretty white dress with blue ribbons—adding considerably to the brightness and liveliness of the family gathering.
"Had you a good sermon to-day, Dove?" asked Mr. Anerley.
"Yes, papa; but I don't like Mr. Oldham."
She had never forgiven the good man for his too great anxiety about the Athanasian Creed.
"By the way, mamma," continued Mr. Anerley, "don't let me forget to tell you what I was reading in the papers this morning—although it will shock you, I know. They are going to secularize the Church."
Mrs. Anerley looked up—vaguely conscious that something dreadful was going to happen.
"The Ecclesiastical Commissioners are to be abolished; the churches are to be turned into schoolrooms; and the clergymen may, if they like, remain and be schoolmasters. If they don't, they must walk out."
"Quite true, mother," continued Will, taking up the wondrous tale; "and the Government means to cut up the entire ecclesiastical property, the glebe-lands, and what not, into small farms for the use of the poor people all over the three Kingdoms."
"The Prime Minister himself says it is useless trying to save the soul of a man until you give him a soul; and says that no man has a soul who is not properly fed and educated."
"He says no man can have a soul," repeated Will, "who has less than twenty shillings a week; and until that minimum is reached, the clergymen must turn farm-bailiffs or teachers. After then, the people may think about getting up churches once more. All the bishops are to be provided with a home in the Dramatic College at Maybury; the archbishops, in consideration of their inexperience of the world——"
"They're only laughing at you, mamma," said Dove.
"And a pretty example to set the children," said Mrs. Anerley. "Whoever laughs at mamma is sent upstairs to bed at once."
"Dove," said Will, suddenly, "do you know where you are going to-morrow?"
"No."
"Up to town. We're all going, except those young people who must remain in expectation of what we shall bring them when we return. You shall see, Dove—what shall you not see? I have always promised to give you a good dose of town; and now you shall have it. You shall sit up in a wire cage in the House of Commons, and look over the heads of the reporters on the drowsy gentlemen beneath. You shall see Mr. Gladstone, lying back, with his head in the air; you shall see Mr. Disraeli, apparently going to cry; and Lord Stanley, with his hat on the back of his head, and his hands in his pockets, looking as if he had just lost a bet."
"I shouldn't care a bit about one of them," said Dove.
"Then you shall go to another wire cage at Evans's; and you shall see a row of pale little boys in black, with their hands behind them, singing to rows of decorous gentlemen; or you may light upon the audience in its idiotic stage, and find them applauding Philistinic politics over their raw chops. Then—and listen, mamma!—the programme begins with a box, to-morrow evening, at the—— theatre, where Miss Annie Brunel is playing her 'Juliet.'"
"The new actress, Will?" asked his father.
"Yes."
"Ah! now you promise us something worth seeing," said Dove, with glad eyes. "And oh, mamma, Will knows Miss Brunel, and has spoken to her, and says that she is——"
"Lovely," she was about to say; but she added "pretty," moderating her enthusiasm.
"Yes, I think she is rather pghetty," said Will; at which all the children laughed. "But you'll judge for yourself to-morrow night."
After dinner, and when the children had received a tiny sip of port wine along with their fruit, Mr. Anerley proposed to Will that they should smoke outside; and so a small table, some decanters and glasses, and a few chairs were carried out, and placed under a great cedar tree, which was now beginning to get a soft green velvet over its dark shelves of branches.
"Dove," whispered Mr. Anerley, "go and ask mamma if I mayn't have my song to-day?"
"But, papa, it's Sunday."
"Tell mamma to take all the children into the meadow, with some bread for the pony. They won't hear it, then."
This was accordingly done; and then Dove, opening the French window of the drawing-room, so that the music might pass out to the gentlemen underneath the cedar, sang, very prettily indeed, Mr. Anerley's particular song—"Where the bee sucks." Her voice was not a powerful one, but it was very tender and expressive; and there was a quaint softness in that purring habit of hers which made her sing, "Meghily, meghily shall I sleep now."
And when she went outside to Mr. Anerley, and knelt down beside him, to ask him if he was satisfied, he put his arm round her waist and said, with a smile,
"Meghily, meghily shall I sleep now, my darling. I should have been miserable all the afternoon if I had not heard my own song. I believe I wrote it, Dove."
"You mustn't sleep now, papa," she said, blushing a little over her bad pronunciation, "for you said we were going to walk over to the Place this afternoon."
"So I did; and we will start presently."
CHAPTER VII.
BALNACLUITH PLACE.
"It often surprises me," said Mr. Anerley, as the little party made its way across the common of St. Mary-Kirby in the warm evening glow, "that Hubbard cares to keep up acquaintance with us. We always dislike people who have known us in ill-fortune, or penury, or great depression. I even hate the flavour of cigars that I have smoked when recovering from sickness; I must have others when I get quite well again. Now, Hubbard, with his deer-park, and harriers, and thirty thousand a year, ought to be disgusted with people who knew him as a tea-broker."
"Don't be so ill-natured about Mr. Hubbard, dear," said his wife, with a smile. "I'm sure he is a big, soft, stupid, well-meaning sort of man."
Mr. Anerley was not quite so certain about the softness and good intentions of the Count; but he charitably forbore to speak. Dove and Will, who had stood for a few seconds on the bridge, to watch the two swans come sailing towards them in expectation of crumbs—cleaving the burnished gold of the mill-head into long purple lines—now came up; and they walked away from the still little village, along the green lanes, until they drew near the Place.
It was a great, sombre, fine old building, which had figured in history under another name—a large building of gloomy red brick, with innumerable mullioned windows, and peaks, and stone griffins—a building that had here and there grown grey and orange with the lichens and rain and wind of many years. It stood upon a high terrace on the side of a hill sloping down to the river, which ran along the valley to St. Mary-Kirby; and at this point the stream—a line of flashing gold winding through the soft green—divided the terrace and lawn of the house from the great park opposite, with its magnificent elms and its small close-lying herd of deer. Round about the Place, too, were some fine trees, on a particular cluster of which a colony of rooks had established themselves at some bygone time. Altogether a noble and handsome old building was this Balnacluith Place, for which the Graf von Schönstein had—not without a purpose—expended a large sum of money, on his accession to fortune. Alas! the influence of the Place had fled the moment he bought it. The brilliant gentlemen and lovely ladies whom the Count had pictured to himself dining in the great hall, or walking in the broad park, never appeared. The grand old house had lost its mesmeric power; and no longer drew down from London those brilliant parties of wits, and beaux, and belles who once—as the Count had informed himself—held their merry revels there. He had sparkling wines at his command; lights he could have in abundance; when he chose, the dining-hall was brilliant with plate, and flowers, and fruit—but the ladies and gentlemen whom he had mentally invited stayed away. And he was not the man to go out into the highways and byways, and gather in beggars to his feast. He had aimed at a particular kind of guests: they had not come; but there was yet hope of their coming.
When the Anerleys drew near they perceived the figure of a man walking solitarily up and down the stone terrace in front of the house. His only companions were the couchant lions at each end of the terrace, which had kept guard there, over the few steps, for nearly a couple of centuries.
"It is Hubbard himself," said Mr. Anerley.
"He looks like the ghost of some dead owner of the house, come back to take his accustomed stroll," said Will.
"At all events, he is smoking," said Dove.
When the Count perceived his visitors, he threw away his cigar, and came down to meet them, saluting them with florid and formal courtesy.
"No need to ask how you are, Miss Anerley—charming as ever. Persuaded our friend Will to give up his wandering life, eh?"
This was the Count's great joke: it had never been known to fail—at least in rendering Dove very uncomfortable.
"What a fine evening! Look how beautiful the trees are down there!" he continued, allowing his eye to roam over the prospect before him in innocent pride—looking, indeed, as if he thought that God had prepared the sunset simply to light up Count Schönstein's park.
"It is a fine park; and a beautiful evening, too," said Mr. Anerley. "It is a pity that most beautiful things make one sad."
"That is because we don't possess them," said the Count, laughing; he was of a practical turn of mind.
The Count turned to the ladies, and—as was his universal custom when he wished to be polite—he insisted on their going inside and having a glass of wine.
"Look here, Anerley," he said, when both of them declined, "you must come and try some port I got down last night—bought it at the sale of Major Benson's cellar on Thursday—10*l.* a dozen, and cheap at the money."
"If it was sent home last night, I'd rather not," said Mr. Anerley, with a smile.
"I didn't mean that particular wine," replied the Count, unblushingly. "Or will you all stay and dine with me? Do; I dine at eight."
This was what is bluntly called a lie; the Count—except when circumstances compelled him—never forsook his old dinner-hour of five. He had, in fact, only begun his second cigar after dinner when the Anerley's arrived. But the Count probably fancied that a mere courtesy-lie wasn't much, and trusted to his visitors declining the invitation, which they did.
"I would rather go down and see the deer," said Dove. "Didn't you say you had some roe-deer amongst them?"
"Those I had brought from Schönstein?" said the Count, rather pompously. "They all died, as Hermann said they would. But it was an experiment, you know. I must get Hermann, if we're going into the park; the deer won't come to me."
He went into the house for a few moments, and reappeared, followed by the keeper, a splendid-looking fellow, with a brown, handsome face, great shoulders, and long legs encased in rough top-boots. This Hermann had been the head-keeper, chief forester, and what not, of Schönstein, when Mr. Hubbard bought the place; and on the principle of the Portuguese navigators, who brought home men and women from the Guinea Coast to prove that they had been there, the Count carried the big Schwarzwalder over to England with him, as a specimen of what he had purchased abroad. Unlike most of his Schwarzwald brethren, Hermann knew not a word of English; Hubbard knew not a word of German; and for many a month after his expatriation the efforts of master and man to understand each other formed a constant comedy at the Place. In one or two cases Mr. Anerley was besought to act as interpreter; and even now nothing delighted the stalwart, good-natured Blackforester so much as a long talk in his native language with any of his master's guests who were complaisant enough to humour him.
"Hermann," said the Count, loudly, to let his visitors know that now he could support his rank by talking in the language of the country which gave it him, "das Fräulein wunscht die—die Rehe zu sehen——"
"The Rehe are all died, Herr Graf," said the sturdy keeper, who would not have his native tongue burlesqued.
"Ich meine die—die—the deer that are there," said the Count, sharply and hotly, "und sie müssen, wissen Sie, etwas—etwas—eh—ah—etwas Speise——"
"Futter, nicht wahr?" suggested Will, looking gravely at Dove.
"Yes, yes, of course; the fellow knows well enough. I mean to get the deer to come up to him."
"They will come without nothing, Herr Graf," said the tall forester.
They crossed the small iron bridge leading from the lawn over the river into the park. The deer were for the most part lying down, underneath the shadow of three large oaks, one or two only still standing and nibbling the grass. When our party drew near, however, the whole herd rose and retreated a little, while one of the bucks came proudly to the front and stood with his small head and tall horns erect, watching the approach of the strangers.
"Will you come with me, Fräulein?" said Hermann; and Dove went forward with him, leaving the others behind.
No sooner had the keeper thus made himself distinctly visible, than two or three of the does came timidly forward, alternating a little quiet canter with a distrustful pause, and at last one of them came quite up to the keeper, and looked rather wistfully at his hand with her large soft brown eyes.
"This is her I call Lämmchen," said Hermann, stroking the small neck of the hind, "she is so tame. And there is Leopard over there, with the spots on him. I speak to them in German; they know it all the same."
One of the bucks now seemed also desirous to approach; looking about him in a sheepish way, however, as if it were beneath his dignity for him to follow the example of the women of his tribe.
"Komm her, du furchtsamer Kerl!" said Hermann, going forward, and taking hold of him by one of his broad, palmated horns; "he is a fine deer, is he not? Look at his horns and his bright colours. He is better than for to be in a park, like the cows. He should be in the woods."
He took a piece of brown bread from his pocket and gave it to Dove, who held it to the small mouth of the buck, where it was speedily nibbled up. Then she stroked his neck, and looked at his big, apprehensive eyes; and then they went back to the group whom they had left.
"Miss Anerley," said the Count, "won't you persuade those people to go inside and have some tea? I ought to be able to give you good tea, you know."
It was when the Count wished to be very modest and complaisant indeed that he joked about his old calling.
They went inside, and sat in a large, sombre, oaken-panelled room, with the fast fading light coldly falling through the diamond panes of the tall and narrow windows. Then lamps were brought in, and tea; and they sat talking and chatting for nearly an hour.
When they went out upon the terrace again to go home, there was a pale moonlight lying over the lawn, hitting sharply here and there on the stone mullions of the windows, and touching greyly and softly a thin mist which had settled down upon the park. It was a beautiful, still night; and as Dove and Will went home, they allowed Mr. and Mrs. Anerley to get on so far in front of them, that at last they were only visible as dark specks on the white road.
For some time they walked on in silence; and then Will said, carelessly:
"Will you go up to town with me to-morrow morning, Dove, and I'll devote the whole day to you; or will you come up with my father in the afternoon?"
She did not answer him; and then, in a second or two, when he looked down, he was surprised to find her eyes full of tears.
"Whatever is the matter, Dove?"
"Oh, Will," she said, turning the beautiful, wet eyes up to his face—and they were very beautiful in the soft moonlight—"I have been wanting to speak to you all day; and I have been so afraid. I wanted to ask you not to—not to go to Honduras—won't you give it up, if I ask you, Will?"
"Why should that trouble you, Dove? If I do go, it will only be a short trip; and then it will be of great advantage to me in this way, that if——"
"But Will, dear, listen to me for a moment," she said, with a piteous entreaty in her voice. "I know why you have always to go away from England, although you have been too kind-hearted to speak of it—I know it quite well—it's because I am to have the money that belongs to you, and you have to fight your way all by yourself, and leave your family year after year, and all because of me—and I won't have the money, Will—I hate it—and it's making me more miserable every day."
"Darling, don't distress yourself like that," he said, soothingly, for she was now crying very bitterly. "I assure you, you mistake the whole affair. I won't go to Honduras, if you like—I'll do anything you ask me. But really, Dove, I go abroad merely because, as I believe, one of my ancestors must have married a gipsy. I like to wander about, and see people, and live differently, and get generally woke up to what's going on in the world. Bless you, my darling, if it were money I wanted, I ought to have remained at home from the beginning. My father has only done what any well-thinking man would have done in his place—and you mustn't fret yourself about such a trifle——"
"I knew you would never acknowledge I was robbing you, Will; but I am. And all the time you were in Russia, and in Canada, whenever there was a heavy storm blowing, I used to lie awake at night and cry; because I knew it was I who had sent you away out there, and I thought you might be in a ship and in danger—all through me. And this morning, when you—when you said you were going to Honduras, I made up my mind then to go to papa to-morrow morning, and I'll tell him I won't have the money—I'll go away from you altogether rather, and be a governess——"
"Now, now, Dove, don't vex me and yourself about nothing," he said to her kindly. "I won't go to Honduras."
"You won't?"
"I won't."
She raised her head a little bit—in an entreating way—and the compact was sealed.
"I'll tell you what I shall do," he said, taking the hand that lay on his arm into his own. "I will stay at home, get myself into some regular work, take a small house somewhere near here, and then you'll come and be my wife, won't you, Dove?"
There was a slight pressure on his hand: that was her only answer. They walked on for some little time in silence; and then, catching a glimpse of her face, he stopped to dry the tears from her cheeks. While engaged in that interesting occupation, she said to him, with a little smile:
"It looks as if I had asked you, Will—doesn't it?"
"I don't think so," he said.
"It wouldn't matter, if I did—would it?" she asked, simply. "For you know how fond I am of you, Will."
They talked of that and a good many other relevant matters until they had reached St. Mary-Kirby. They paused for a moment on the bridge—to look at the dark shadows about the mill and the white sheen of the moonlight on the water; and then she whispered timidly:
"When shall we be married, Will?"
"We shall be maghied whenever you like, Dove," he said, lightly and cheerfully.
CHAPTER VIII.
JULIET.
By the time the "playing-in" farce was over, the house was quite full. That morning's papers had written in such a fashion about the new triumph of Miss Brunel on Saturday night, that long before the box-office was closed there was not a registered place in the building which had not been seized upon. Will foresaw what was likely to happen, and had asked Mr. Melton to secure him a box.
When the little party drove from the Langham—Will's rooms in town scarcely offering them the accommodation they required—Dove was in high spirits. It was the first time she had gone anywhere with the young gentleman opposite her since their "engagement;" and she already felt that comfortable sense of extended possession which married people enjoy. She took her seat in the brougham, which Count Schönstein had kindly placed at their disposal, with a new and fluttering pleasure; she already imagined herself to have the importance and the claims to attention of a wife; and she accepted Will's little courtesies in this light, and made herself very happy over the altered aspect of their relations.
When her opera-cloak had been hung up, and her tiny bouquet, opera-glass, and bill placed daintily before her, the graceful little woman ensconced herself in the corner, and timidly peeped round the curtain. She was dressed in a very faint blue silk, with sharp broad lines of white about it; and over and through her rippling brown hair ran the strings of blue pearls which Count Schönstein had given her. Not even Mrs. Anerley, who saw her often enough, could forbear to look with a tender pride upon the girl; and as for Mr. Anerley, whose tall, upright figure was hid in the shadow of the box, he would fain have sat down beside his adopted daughter, with his arm round her waist, and forgotten all about what they had come to see.
The orchestra finished its overture, chiefly composed of the delicate "Sonnambula" music, and the curtain rose. Dove was disappointed at not seeing Miss Brunel; and paid but little attention to the preliminary scenes.
Suddenly there was an extraordinary commotion throughout the house, and a burst of that fine, strong, thunderous music which artists love to hear—and then Dove saw advance a girlish-looking creature with a calm, somewhat pale, and interesting face, and beautiful black hair. She was only girlish in the slightness of her figure: there was an artistic completeness in her motions and a self-possession in her bearing which gave her something of a queenly look. She wore a magnificent white satin dress, the train of which lay in splendid masses behind her; and down over this white and gold fell a black lace veil, partly hiding the rich hair, and enclosing the clear, beautiful dark face. Dove was spell-bound by that face. It somehow suggested Italy to her, and blue skies, and music, and the passionate artistic warmth of the South. Nor was the illusion destroyed by the low chest-voice with which the girl replied to the questions of Lady Capulet. And from that moment, Dove thought no more of Miss Brunel and Will's friend. She was only Juliet, and Dove followed her sad story with an aching heart and a trembling lip.
During the matchless balcony scene, Will saw this intense sympathetic emotion growing upon the girl. I believe it is considered to be the proper thing for young ladies to be able to turn round and smile compassionately to each other, when the tragic sadness on the stage is making the women in the pit sob bitterly, and raising great lumps in the throats of the men. It is a pretty accomplishment, in its way; and may be indicative of other qualities which these young persons are accused of possessing. Dove's emotional tendencies had never been educated, however; and in this balcony-scene, as I say, she watched the lovers with a painful interest, which wrote its varying story every moment on her face. The theatre was still as death. The scarcely-uttered tendernesses of Juliet were heard as distinctly as if they had been breathed into one's ear; and the eyes of the audience drank in the trembling lights and shadows of her girlish passion with an unconscious delight and admiration. The abandonment of her affection, the reluctant declarations, the coy shrinkings, and piteous, playful, tender apologies were so blended as to make the scene an artistic marvel; and Dove sat "laughin' maist like to greet," as the old Scotch song says. Indeed she scarcely knew whether to laugh or cry with the delight—the absolute delight—which this piece of true art gave her; and when at last Juliet had forced herself to the parting—
"'Tis almost morning; I would have thee gone:
And yet no farther than a wanton's bird;
Who lets it hop a little from her hand,
Like a poor prisoner in his twisted gyves,
And with a silk thread plucks it back again,
So loving-jealous of his liberty"—
when, lingeringly and sadly, she had withdrawn from the balcony, Dove rose suddenly, and with a half-choked sob in her voice, said:
"Oh, Will, I should like so much to see her—and—and——"
"Kiss her," she had nearly said; but thinking it might be ridiculous, she stopped.
"It's against the rules, Dove," said Will, with a smile. "Besides, that isn't Miss Brunel you've been looking at; that is Juliet. Both are very nice ladies; but they are quite unlike each other."
Dove was terribly disappointed. She would like to have declared her conviction that Miss Brunel was Juliet, that she had every bit the same tenderness, and sweetness, and loveliness; but she was afraid her enthusiasm might make Mrs. Anerley laugh at her, and so she bore the rebuff patiently.
Presently, however, some one tapped at the box-door; and the next moment Will was introducing the manager, Mr. Melton, to his companions.
"My young friend here," said Will to Melton, while Dove's pretty face assumed an extra tinge of colour, "has been so much struck by Miss Brunel, that she would like to go and thank her personally."
Now Mr. Melton was in a very good humour. The house was crammed; there was almost no "paper" in it; and the prospect of a good run through the popularity of his new acquisition had warmed up his impassive nature into quite a pronounced geniality.
"Then you ought to introduce the young lady to Miss Brunel," said Mr. Melton, blithely. "If you like, I'll take you round at the end of the act, when Miss Brunel will have a little 'wait.'"
"Will you go, Dove?" asked Will.
"Yes," she said, timidly.
Just as the curtain fell upon the scene in Friar Lawrence's cell, at the end of the second act, Mr. Melton conducted Dove and Will down a tortuous little stone stair into a narrow passage, from which they entered into the wings. A noisy and prolonged recall was thundering throughout the house, and Miss Brunel was being led on to the stage by Romeo to receive renewed plaudits. When she returned and passed under the glare of the jets in one of the entrances, Will went forward to shake hands with her.
"I have to congratulate you again," he said.
"Thank you," she said, simply.
There had been a pleased smile of welcome in her eyes when they met; and yet it seemed to him that there was a strange, intense expression in her look which was not natural to it. Once or twice before he had seen her in the same circumstances; and invariably this unconscious, mesmeric intensity was present in her eyes. He explained it to himself by supposing that the emotional idealism of her assumed character had not quite died out of her yet.
Then she turned and saw Dove standing with Mr. Melton. Will begged to introduce his "sister;" and the brief ceremony was sufficiently singular. For a moment the dark, lambent eyes of Miss Brunel were fixed upon the fair young girl with a sort of hesitating look—an inquiring, apprehensive look, which Will never forgot; then all at once she frankly extended her hand. Dove, a little frightened, approached and shook hands with her.
"Mr. Anerley has spoken to me about you," said Annie Brunel; and Dove was conscious that the dark-haired girl before her knew her secret.
How singular it was to hear herself addressed in those low, rich tones which a few minutes ago were addressing Romeo in the moonlight! Dove almost felt herself enchanted; and could have believed at that moment that she herself belonged to the old, sad, sweet play, which seems to contain everything that was ever uttered about man's love and woman's devotion.
"I must go down to my dressing-room now," said Miss Brunel to Dove. "Will you come with me, if you are curious to see the place? I will send some one round with you to your box afterwards."
Will saw that Dove would like to go, so he settled the proposal by telling her not to be in Miss Brunel's way; and then he and Melton returned to the front of the house.
Dove was now conducted by her companion down into the theatrical Hades which lies beneath the stage. She saw the figures of the carpenters gliding like the spirits of the damned through the dusky twilight; she saw the cumbrous woodwork, the machinery of the traps, and what not, rendered faintly visible by the glimmering jets; and then she was led into the bright little room which was appropriated to Miss Brunel's use.
"You may go home if you like, now, Sarah," said the latter to her dresser. "Mrs. Christmas is in the theatre, and will be here presently."
"Thank you, miss," said the tidy little woman, who immediately hurried away home to get supper ready for her husband, a gasman in the theatre.
It was the best single dressing-room in the place; but it was not a very grand apartment. There was, however, a full-length mirror at one end, which had been privately presented (with a hint as to its destination) by Count Schönstein to Mr. Melton; and the manager had thought that the least he could do was to newly paper the little chamber. At present it was in a state of confusion which largely excited Dove's curiosity. The implements of stage effect were displayed before her, on the floor, on the table, and on the marble slab underneath the smaller looking-glass; and all around lay or hung divers articles of costume and ornament, the peculiarly bright materials and prominent decorations of which were very new to her. But it needed only a glance at Juliet's clear, beautiful face to see that she required very little "making-up," nor was Dove less surprised to find that the lace and similar little delicacies of the young actress's costume were real and valuable.
"My mother taught me to make all these things myself," she explained to Dove. "She was very particular about them; and used to say that when one meant to spend one's life in a profession, one ought to have as much pride in wearing real lace on the stage as out of doors."
"And do you mean to spend all your life in your profession?" asked Dove, timidly.
"Yes; why not?" said the girl, with a smile.
"I—I don't know," stammered Dove, blushing dreadfully.
"Come, be frank with me," said Annie Brunel, taking the girl's hand in hers. "Don't you think it very wicked to be an actress?"
Dove was now forced to explain herself.
"I don't, indeed," she said. "But I couldn't help thinking that you are too young and—and too pretty—to waste all your life in a theatre."
"Oh, nonsense," said Miss Brunel, laughing in a motherly sort of way. "I live only in the theatre. I find my life wasted whenever I go out of it, and spend my time in amusing myself like a child. I have nothing to interest me but the theatre; nothing to live for out of it; and it is only when I get into the spirit of my part that I feel myself all throbbing over with a delicious life. You cannot understand that? Why, my very fingers tingle with enjoyment; I get quite a new warmth within me; and many a time I can't help laughing or crying quite naturally when the scene suggests it. I'm sure no one in front has half the delight in a play that I have. I scarcely see the wings, and the prompter, and the scene-shifters; I forget the abominable smell of gas; and I should like to keep on the character for ever—if it is one that pleases me. When I get a new and unpleasant part, I hate acting. I feel as if I were doing exactly what Mrs. Christmas taught me; and that the people must be laughing at me; and I become afraid of the critics, and hope that I shan't forget the cues."
Here the call-boy came running to the door; Juliet was wanted for the second scene. She hastily departed; and Dove was left alone.
"How very friendly she must be with Will, to receive me so kindly, and talk to me so frankly," thought Dove; when it was her own pretty face that had won upon the young actress's heart.
The scene in Capulet's House is a short one, and Annie Brunel was speedily back in her room. She brought with her Mrs. Christmas; and the bright, white-haired little woman made a pert courtesy when she was introduced, and said how sorry she was to hear that the young lady had been sitting alone. The next moment she was running into a series of ludicrous stories about the mistakes inexperienced people had made in trying to find their way about the theatre by themselves; and it must be confessed that her anecdotes were sometimes so very humorous that it was as well that only ladies heard them.
"And something of the same kind," she continued, with her merry little eyes sparkling, "happened to Mr. ——, the celebrated author, you know, with Nelly Featherstone, who is in this theatre at the present moment—or ought to be. You know it was a benefit night, Miss—Anerley?—yes, Miss Anerley; and there was a general hurry-scurry, and he had been left in the wings. He asked a super how he should get to Mr. Crimp (and it was his benefit, my dear, and he had several friends with him, all drinking in his room), and the man told him to go to the first dressing-room on the right when he went downstairs. But his right was our left, as you know, my dear; and there were in the first dressing-room on the left Nelly Featherstone and her sister, and another girl, all dressing as hard as ever they could for the burlesque. Nelly was 'Perseus,' and before she had got on her tights, she was in—in a transition state, shall we say, my dear?"
Here the merry little woman laughed until the tears ran down her withered grey cheeks. "And up to the door goes Mr. ——, and opens it without thinking. Oh, Lor! what a fright he must have got! Nelly screamed at the pitch of her voice, and fell into a chair, and screamed again; and her sister Jeanie (she had some clothes on) ran at the poor man, and said something very offensive, and slammed the door in his face. Poor fellow, he nearly died of shame; and Nelly's scream told everybody of his blunder, and Crimp and all his friends shrieked over it—but not before him, my dear, for he was much too celebrated a man to be laughed at. Only he sent her next day an explanation and an apology through the manager, and as beautiful a bouquet as ever you saw; and he got a friend of his to write a lovely notice of her in the Diurnal itself, when old Yellowjaw's piece was—Mercy, gracious me! There's the call-boy again—run, Miss Annie!"
"Good-bye," said Miss Brunel, hurriedly, shaking hands with Dove. "I should like you to come often and see me."
She bent over her for a moment, kissed her lightly, and left.
"You know what that means?" said Mrs. Christmas to Dove. "That means that she will speak to no one this night again until her part is finished. All the theatre knows her way, and humours her. It's when the genius is working on her—that's what I say; and I know it, for I've seen it in her mother. There was the sweetest woman you ever heard of—not very friendly, Miss, you know, in the way of talking of her own affairs—and it's nothing I could ever make out about her life before I knew her—but the sweetest creature! the tenderest creature! And she was such a rare good actress, too—but nothing like her daughter; she knew that, and used to sit and talk for hours—it was the only thing she would talk about—over what she expected Miss Annie to be. And once she said to me, with tears running down her face, 'I pray every night that my little girl may be kept always an actress; and that she may never look for happiness outside her own profession.' But it's a shame to keep you here, Miss, if you've never seen Miss Annie's 'Juliet;' she said I was to take you back to your box when you wished to go."
So once more Dove passed through the gloomy region and worked her way upward to the light of the theatre. Her friends were astonished at her long absence; but they were too much enthralled by what was going on upon the stage to speak to her. And again Dove looked down upon that queenly little person with whom she had been talking; and could not explain to herself the strange sensation she then experienced. It seemed as if her visit to the dressing-room had been a trance; and that she had really been speaking with Juliet. In the dressing-room she had seen before her only a fine-looking, intellectual, and very courteous lady; but now upon the stage, she could not see this lady at all. She even lost the power of remembering her. Those jet-black tresses, those fine eyes, and that pale, beautiful forehead—above all, that rich, majestic voice—all these belonged to Juliet, were Juliet, and she knew that it was a Juliet in nature, if not in name, who had spoken to her, and taken her hand, and kissed her.
This is perhaps the severest test to which an artist can be put. When you know the writer of a book, you cannot help under-estimating the book. You are familiar with the author's personality, his habit of thought, perhaps with the material on which he works; you think of him more than of his book; and nothing but the soundest and most concentrated effort will overcome the influence of this unwittingly unjust scrutiny. When you know an actor or an actress, you involuntarily search for himself or herself in the assumed character; you look at the character from within, not from without; you destroy the illusion by a knowledge of its material elements. Nothing but the power of genius will force upon you under these circumstances the idealism which the artist is labouring to complete.
But Dove was an easy subject for the spiritual magnetism of art. Her keenly sympathetic nature vibrated to the least motion of the magician's hand; and when the passionate climax of Juliet's misery was reached, Dove had entirely lost self-control. For a little time she tried to retain her composure, although Mrs. Anerley saw her lips suddenly tremble when Juliet begged the Friar to show her some means of remaining faithful to her husband—
"And I will do it without fear or doubt,
To live an unstain'd wife to my sweet love."
But in the final scene she quite broke down. She rose and went to the back of the box, and stood in a corner, sobbing bitterly. Mr. Anerley drew her towards him; and tried to soothe her, in his quiet, kindly way.
"My darling, why should you vex yourself? You will see 'Juliet' alive in a few minutes."
"I know it well enough," she said, trying to assume her ordinary manner, "but it's very wrong for any one to write things like that, to make people cry."
"The naughty Shakespeare shan't do it again, that he shan't," said Will, compassionately. "And as for Miss Brunel, who is most in fault—but here she comes!"
Will picked out of the corner the large bouquet which lay there; and returned in time to let it drop—nearly the first of a fine collection of similar tributes which welcomed the triumph of the young actress—almost at her feet. Romeo picked it up, along with two others; she took this particular one and sent a single bright look so clearly up to the box, that a good many heads were turned thither. When Romeo had picked up the remaining bouquets, and when she had again and again bowed her acknowledgments of the cordial applause of the theatre, the girl with the pale face and the black hair retired, and the people calmed down.
"Now, Dove," said Will, "if you wish to be cheered up a bit before going, there is as absurd a farce as ever was written to follow. Shall we stay?"
"Just as you please, Will," said Dove, looking down.
The first of her new duties, she thought, was submission and obedience; and she hoped neither Mr. nor Mrs. Anerley noticed her little conjugal effort.
It was agreed, however, that they should go home at once; and Will went off to hunt up Count Schönstein's brougham. In a short space of time they were seated in the Langham hotel, awaiting supper.
"And not the least pleasant part of a play," said Mr. Anerley, dogmatically, as he fingered one of his wine-glasses, "is the supper after. You come out of the gas and the heat into a cool, fresh room; and—and—waiter! bring some ice, please."
"Yes, sir."
