Читать книгу Broad Arrow - Caroline Leakey - Страница 9

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AT the date of this story's commencement Mr. Evelyn had been one year in England, and six months prior to that date he had lost his wife in Van Diemen's Land. The suddenness of the event preyed on his already impaired health; and listening to the solicitations of his brother and only child, he resigned his chaplaincy in Hobart Town in order to return to England to seek that repose for himself which has jaded energies so much required, and for his daughter those advantages which colonial education but sparely afforded.

The arrival of their Tasmanian cousin was looked forward to with no small excitement by the D'Urban family. Bridget D'Urban, ever full of fun and drollery, had many a good-natured laugh in store for all the uncouth barbarities she expected in the young colonist; while her mother had secret misgivings that her girls would find no beneficial associate in one who must have imbibed a wrong view of things from unavoidable contact with the mixed and sometimes questionable society of Van Diemen's Land.

Both aunt and cousins were, therefore, sufficiently surprised when, late on a summer evening, Uncle Herbert (as henceforward we shall have to distinguish the Reverend Mr. Evelyn) introduced to them their cousin Emmeline, a young lady, who, from ease of manner and grace of deportment, might have done credit to any English drawing-room.

In a quarter of an hour Bridget was as proud of her cousin's appearance and manners as she had meant to be tender with her failings and faults. The contrast between the two girls was very striking--the more so, as they were of the same age--both on the verge of seventeen. The young English maiden was a girl in every sense--a good-looking, bright-eyed, rosy, laughter-loving creature, showing a decided preference for the sunny side of life, and for ever trying to shun the shadowy side; not by any means from a selfish indifference to the troubles of her neighbour but because, in her own words, 'It's so horrid to see wretchedness without being able to relieve it.'

She was the idol of the servants--ever ready to help them over a scrape, or to put her best construction on their worst action: they were never in fear of dismissal when Miss Bridget stood by them. Uncle Herbert told her that she would make a capital convict mistress, and advised her to try her alchymic powers of turning bad to good on a few of the Queen's specimens: on which she clapped her hands, and declared that nothing would be better fun than to go out there and cure a few kitchen rows; and then jumped up to cure uncle and cousin's grave faces by a hearty kiss and a second declaration that that was only her way of saying how delightful it would be to go to Van Diemen's Land. She knew she should be the last to think it fun, and the first to call it horrid to see the poor, dear beings so miserable.

Prematured by a southern clime, and pre-aged by constitutional delicacy, Miss Evelyn had little of the girl in her, but all the appearance of finished womanhood in her gentle gravity of countenance and quiet dignity of carriage. After Mr. Evelyn had remained a short time in his sister's family, he determined on making a tour, partly with the view of renovating his strength, and partly to give himself ample scope for choice of a healthy locality in which to settle. But his daughter's rapidly-increasing ill-health caused him suddenly to return, and on consulting a physician he was advised to take Emmeline back to Tasmania, as much to give her the benefit of a sea voyage as to try what her almost native air might accomplish for her. On the evening of that day, Mr. Evelyn was closeted with his brother-in-law and sister for more than three hours, and when he came from conference with them, it was only to commence another with Emmeline, and then to begin a third with Bridget. The result of the three conferences was that Bridget flew into her cousin's room, and exclaimed, ere the door had time to slam after her:

'I may go! They'll let me go with you!'

Then flinging herself into Emmeline's arms, she forgot the nearer prospect of rows in the kitchen in her joy at being companion-elect to the being she loved best in the world.