Читать книгу Monica, Volume 1 (of 3) - Everett-Green Evelyn - Страница 2

The next morning dawned fair and clear, as is often the case after a storm. Monica rose early, her first thought, as usual, for Arthur. She crept on tip-toe to his room, to find him as she had left him, sleeping calmly – as he was likely now to do for hours, after the attack of the previous day; and finding herself no longer required by him, the girl was not long in making up her mind how these early hours of glimmering daylight were to be spent.

Seven o’clock found her in the saddle, mounted on her glossy black thorough-bred, who, gentle under her hand, would brook no other rider, and showed his mettle in every graceful eager movement, and in the restless quivering of his shapely limbs. His coat shone like satin in the pale early sunlight; he pranced and curvetted as he felt his rider upon his back. Monica and her horse together made a picture that for beauty and grace could hardly meet its match in the length and breadth of the land.

The girl was perfectly at home in the saddle. She heeded no whit the pawing of her steed, or the delighted baying of the great hounds who formed her escort, and whose noise caused Guy’s delicate nerves many a restive start. She gathered up her reins with practised hand, soothed him by a gentle caress, and rode quietly and absently out of the great grass-grown court-yard and through a stretch of tangled park beyond. Once outside the gates, she turned to the right, and quickly gained a narrow grass-grown track, which led for miles along the edge of the great frowning cliffs that almost overhung at a giddy height the tossing ocean far below. It was a perilous-looking path enough – one false step would be enough to hurl both horse and rider to certain destruction, but Monica rode fearlessly onward; she and her horse were familiar with every step of the way, both knew the wild cliff path, and both loved it; and Guy stretched his delicate supple limbs in one of those silent gallops over the elastic turf in which his heart delighted.

Monica seldom passed more than a day without traversing that well-known track. She loved to feel the fresh salt wind as it blew off the sea and met her face. Sometimes it was warm and tender as a caress, sometimes fierce and boisterous, a wet, blinding blast, laden with spray from the tempest-tossed waves below; but to-day it was a keen, fresh wind, salt, and strong, and life-giving – a wind that brought the warm colour to her cheek, the light to her eye and gave a peculiar and indescribable radiance to her usually cold and statuesque beauty.

To-day she felt strangely restless and uneasy. A sort of haunting fear was upon her, a presentiment of coming trouble, that was perhaps all the harder to bear from its very vagueness. She had never before realised that the future would bring any change to the course of her life, save that of gradually increasing age. Not for an instant had it ever occurred to her that a possibility such as that hinted at last night by her father could by any chance arise. That she and Arthur might ever have to leave Trevlyn seemed the wildest of all wild dreams, and yet that is what in all probability must happen in the event of her father’s death. Monica shuddered at the bare idea. Her beautiful dark eyes glowed strangely. It must not, it should not be. It would be too cruel, too hard, too unjust!

In deep abstraction, Monica rode along the cliff for some three miles, then turning her horse’s head inland, she crossed an open space of wind-swept down, leaped a low stone wall, and found herself in a road, which she followed for some considerable distance. It led at length to the quaint little town of St. Maws, a pretty little place, nestling down in a wooded hollow, and intersected by a narrow inlet from the sea, which was spanned by a many-arched bridge. All the trees in the neighbourhood seemed to have collected round St. Maws, and its inhabitants were justly proud of their stately oaks and graceful beeches.

Monica rode quietly through the empty streets, returning now and again a salutation from some tradesman or rustic. It was still early – only eight o’clock – and the sleepy little place was slowly awaking from its night’s repose. At the far end of the town stood a good-sized house, well hidden from view behind a high brick wall. Guy turned in at the gate of his own accord, and, following a short, winding carriage drive, halted before the front door. The house was of warm red brick, mellowed by age; there was an indescribable air of comfort and hospitality hanging over it. It was mantled by glossy ivy, and its gables, steep pitched roof, and twisted chimneys were charmingly picturesque. The door stood wide open as if to invite entrance. Monica’s hounds had already announced her approach, and a tall, wiry-looking man of some thirty summers was standing upon the threshold. He was not much like his brother, the blue-eyed, brown-bearded Raymond, having a thin, sharp, closely-shaved face, very keen penetrating eyes, and a cynical mouth. Tom Pendrill was himself a doctor, like his brother; but he did not practise on his own account, being a man of scientific predilections, with a taste for authorship. His college fellowship rendered him independent of lucrative employment, and, save for assisting his brother with critical cases, his time was spent in study and research.

“Well, Monica, you are abroad early to-day,” was his greeting. Arthur’s cousins had been like cousins to Monica almost ever since she could remember. “You have come to breakfast, of course?”

“I came to tell Raymond not to trouble to call at Trevlyn to-day, if he is busy. Arthur is much better. I want to see Aunt Elizabeth; but I should like some breakfast very much.”

“I will take your horse,” said Tom, as the girl slipped from the saddle. “You will find Aunt Elizabeth in the breakfast-room.”

The “Aunt Elizabeth” thus alluded to was the widow of the Pendrills’ uncle, and she had lived with them for many years, keeping their house, and bringing into it that element of womanly refinement and comfort which can never be found in a purely bachelor establishment. The young men were both warmly attached to her, as was her other nephew, Arthur, at the Castle. As for Monica, “Aunt Elizabeth” had been to her almost like a mother, supplying that great want in the girl’s life of which she was only vaguely conscious – the want of tender womanly comprehension and sympathy in the trials and troubles of childhood and youth.

It had been her habit for many years to bring all her troubles to Mrs. Pendrill. She did not discuss them with Arthur. Her mission was to soothe and cheer him, not to infect him with any fears or sorrows. He was her boy, her charge, her dearly-loved brother, but Aunt Elizabeth was her confidant and friend.

She was a very sweet-looking old lady, with snow-white hair, and a gentle, placid, earnest face. She greeted Monica with a peculiarly tender smile, and asked after Arthur with the air of one who loved him.

“He is better,” said Monica, “much better, or I could not have come. He is asleep; he will most likely sleep till noon. I want to talk to you, Aunt Elizabeth. I felt I must come to you. When breakfast is over, please let us go somewhere together. There is so much I want to say.”

When they found themselves at length secure from interruption in Mrs. Pendrill’s pretty little parlour, Monica stood very quiet for a minute or two, and then turning abruptly to her aunt, she asked:

“Is my father very much out of health?”

Mrs. Pendrill was a little startled.

“What makes you ask that, my love?”

“I can hardly say – I think it is the way he looked, the way he spoke. Please tell me the truth, dear Aunt Elizabeth. I have nobody but you to turn to,” and there was a pathetic quiver in the voice as well as in the pale, sweet face.

Mrs. Pendrill did not try to deceive her. She knew from both her nephews that Lord Trevlyn’s health was in a very precarious state, and she loved Monica too well not to wish to see her somewhat prepared for a change that must inevitably fall upon her sooner or later. She had always shrunk from thinking of this trouble, she shrank from bringing it home to Monica now; but a plain question had been asked, and her answer must not be too ambiguous.

Monica listened very quietly, as was her wont, not betraying any emotion save in the strained look of pain in her great dark eyes. Then very quietly, too, she told Mrs. Pendrill what her father had said the previous evening about his heir, and about the prospective visit.

“Aunt Elizabeth,” said Monica suddenly after a long pause, betraying for the first time the emotion she felt, “Aunt Elizabeth, I do not wish to be wicked or ungenerous, but I hate that man! He has no right to be at Trevlyn, yet he will some day come and turn out Arthur and me. I cannot help hating him for it; but oh, if only he would be good to Arthur, if only he would let him stay, I could bear anything else I think. Do you think he would be generous, and would let him keep his own little corner of the Castle? It does not seem much to ask, yet father thought it might be difficult. Arthur is so patient, so good, he might learn to love him – he might even adopt him, so to speak. Am I very foolish to hope such things, Aunt Elizabeth? – they do not seem impossible to me.”

Mrs. Pendrill mused a little while.

“Has this Mr. Trevlyn any family?”

“I do not know. Father did not speak of a wife. I fancy he is an old bachelor.”

“He is old, then?”

“I fancy he is elderly, or at any rate middle-aged, or father would hardly care to have him on a visit. He must be younger than father, of course, but I do not know anything more about him. Oh, it will be very hard; but if he will only be good to Arthur, I will try to bear the rest.”

“I am sure you will, my Monica,” said Mrs. Pendrill tenderly. “I am sure you will never be ungenerous or act unworthily. A dark cloud seems hanging over your life, but there is light behind, though we cannot always see it. And, remember, my darling, that gold shines all the brighter for having been tried in the furnace.”

“I know the fellow,” said Tom Pendrill, an hour later, when Monica had gone, and he had heard from his aunt part of what had passed between them. “Monica is out about his age; he can’t be more than six or seven and twenty, and a right good fellow he is too, and would make my lady a capital husband, if he is not married already. Randolph Trevlyn was at Oxford; I knew him there pretty well, though he was only an undergraduate when I had taken my degree. The name sounded home-like, and I made friends with him. He wasn’t anywhere near the title then, but I suppose there have been deaths in the family since. Well, well, the earl is quite right to have him down, and if he could manage to fall in love with Monica and marry her, it would simplify matters wonderfully; but that wild bird will need a good deal of training before she will come at a husband’s call, and there is such a thing as spreading the snare too much in the sight of the quarry.”

No thought of this kind, however, entered into Monica’s head. She was far too unversed in the ways of the world to entertain the smallest suspicion of the hopes entertained on her account. She thought a good deal of the coming guest as the days went by – thought of him with bitterness, with aversion, with mistrust, but in the light of a possible husband – never for a single instant.

It was the day before the stranger was expected, and Monica, as the sun was sinking in the sky, was riding alone in the pine wood that surrounded the Castle. She was grave and pre-occupied, as she had been for the week past, haunted by the presage of coming sorrow and change. Her face was pale and sad, yet there was a wonderful depth of sweetness in its expression of wistful melancholy. The setting sun, slanting through the ruddy trunks of the tall pines, shone full upon her, lighting her golden hair, and making an aureole of glory round her head, showing off with peculiar clear distinctness the graceful outline of her supple figure and the beauty of the horse she rode.

She was in a very thoughtful mood, so absent and pre-occupied as to be quite lost to outside impressions, when Guy suddenly swerved and reared, with a violence that would have unseated a less practised rider. Monica was not in the least alarmed, but the movement aroused her from her reverie, and she was quickly made aware of what had frightened the horse.

A tall, broad-shouldered young man stepped forward, and laid a hand upon Guy’s bridle, lifting his hat at the same time, and disclosing a broad brow, with a sweeping wave of dark hair lying across it.

“I beg a thousand pardons; I believe I frightened your horse. He is evidently unused to the sight of trespassers. I trust you have not been alarmed.”

Monica smiled at the notion; her face had been somewhat set and cold till the apology had been made. The stranger had no right to be there, certainly, but his frank admission of the fact went far to palliate the crime. She allowed herself to smile, and the smile was in itself a revelation.

“It does not matter,” she said quietly. “I know the wood is perplexing; but if you keep bearing to the west you will find the road before long. No, I was not frightened, thank you. Good afternoon.”

She bent her head slightly, and the stranger uncovered again. He was smiling now, and she could not deny that he was very good-looking, and every inch the gentleman.

She had not an idea who he was nor what he could be doing there; but it was no business of hers. He was probably some tourist who had lost his way exploring the beauties of the coast. She was just a little puzzled by the look his face had worn as he turned away: there was a sort of subdued amusement in the dark blue eyes, and his long brown moustache had quivered as if with the effort to subdue a smile. Yet there had been nothing in the least impertinent in his manner; on the contrary, he had been particularly courtly and polished in his bearing. Monica dismissed the subject from her mind, and rode home as the sun dipped beneath the far horizon.