Читать книгу Under the Mendips: A Tale - Marshall Emma - Страница 4

The squire's high "four-wheel" drew up before the door of the Swan Hotel at Wells about twelve o'clock that day. Mr. Falconer was well-known there, and there was a general rush to meet him. The landlord came briskly to the side of the vehicle to assist Miss Joyce to alight, while the ostler and stable-boy ran to the head of the mare; and in the dark entrance below the portico the landlady and a waiter with a napkin over his arm, were in readiness.

"Good-day to you," said the squire, in a cheery voice.

"We are proud to see you, sir. Nice weather for the hay. Will you please to walk in, sir? and Mrs. Maltby will receive your orders for dinner."

"Thank ye kindly. Dinner for two at one o'clock. My daughter will go up to the Liberty, to her aunt's."

"Here, you fellow," exclaimed the prototype of the first gentleman in Europe. "Here, can't you get the carriage nearer the pavement? I don't care to set my foot in that puddle."

The ostler backed the horse, and the landlord advanced to give Melville his arm, while a knot of people had assembled in Saddler Street, watching with some curiosity the movements of the smart young gentleman in the back seat.

The squire, provoked at the tone in which his son had spoken, vanished within the dark lobby of the inn, while Joyce said, laughing:

"Melville, surely you don't want to be helped from the carriage!"

"Look at 'im, now," said a poor woman, who was carrying a basket of vegetables to one of the Canon's houses; "did ye ever see the like? His shoes are made of paper; and, lor! what bows!"

"Take care; you'll be heerd," said an old man, who was leaning on his stick. "Take care. Don't 'ee chatter like a magpie. You'll be heerd, Peggy Loxley."

"Ha, ha!" laughed the woman, "I know why you are affrighted; I know. You've got your 'nephy' up to-day afore the justices, and you don't want to affront one of the justices; I see."

The old man shook his stick at the woman, and meantime Melville had accomplished his descent without splashing his shoes or the edge of his trowsers.

"I shall want a post-chaise ready, in the afternoon, after the Bath mail arrives," he said. "I expect a friend by the coach."

"Very good, sir," said the landlord, who now reappeared; "very good. The squire has ordered dinner for two at one o'clock."

"Where are you off to, Joyce?" Melville said.

"I am going to do some shopping, and to wait at Aunt Letitia's for father." Then Joyce drew a little nearer Melville. "Why can't your friend ride with you in the back seat?"

"Why? Because I don't choose to let him jog over the roads in such a rough conveyance."

Joyce's lip curled.

"It is good enough for father and for me," she said, "and ought to be good enough for you."

Melville arranged his hair, and touched the ends of his lace cravat.

"My dear child, don't make a scene before witnesses, I beseech you."

Joyce waited to hear no more, but tripped away, turning, through a quaint archway, to the Cathedral Green, where the cathedral stood before her in all its majesty.

The great west front of Wells Cathedral has few rivals, and dull indeed must be the heart that does not respond in some measure to its grandeur.

Involuntarily Joyce said, "How beautiful!" and then, leaving the road, she passed through a turnstile and pursued her way under the shadow of a row of limes, which skirted the wide expanse of turf before the cathedral.

The blue sky of the summer day over-arched the stately church, and a few white clouds sailed above the central tower. There were no jarring sounds of wheels, no tread of many feet, no traffic which could tell of trade. Although it was high noontide, the stillness was profound: the jackdaw's cry, the distant voices of children in the market-square, the rustle of the leaves in the trees, and a faint murmur of tinkling water, only seemed to make the quiet more quiet, the silence more complete.

The great west door was open, and Joyce walked towards it, and passed under it into the cool shadows of the nave. She had often done this before, going out from the north porch into the Close again, but to-day there seemed, she scarcely knew why, the stirring of a new life within her.

It was the moment, perhaps, of crossing the barrier which divides childhood from womanhood; the pause which comes in most young lives, when there is, as it were, a hush before the dawn of the coming day.

Joyce had been silent during the drive from Fair Acres; her father had invited no conversation, and a glance now and then at his profile as he sat on the high box seat at her side, had convinced Joyce that the lines of care on his forehead were not traced there without a reason.

The fop, who condescended to sit in the back seat of the cumbrous vehicle, indulged in sundry grumbles at the bad road, the dust, the slow pace of Mavis the mare, the heat, and such like trifles, which were, however, sufficient to disturb the serenity of Melville Falconer.

Joyce had felt ashamed and annoyed as she had never done before; and when a neighbouring squire jogged past on horseback with his son, and looked back with a smile at the highly-decorated figure in the back seat, Joyce felt sure they were laughing at him! Why could not Melville wear a short riding coat like Charlie Paget, and top-boots, and bear himself like a country gentleman, instead of bringing down London fashions into the heart of Somersetshire, and finding fault with everything in his own home; bring his fine friends there without warning, and behave as if he were indeed monarch of all he surveyed.

Joyce's sweet young face was shadowed with the awakening sense of responsibility and the longing to do something, which might smooth the rough places in her father's life, which her brother apparently made without the slightest compunction.

As Joyce stood in the cathedral, not far from the north porch, her head raised towards the belfry-tower, which the great inverted arches support, a ray of sunshine entering at a window in the south transept touched her figure, and illuminated it with a subdued and chastened beauty. Her head was thrown back, and the high coal-scuttle or gipsy bonnet did not hide the sweet face, which, when she had walked demurely down the nave, had been hardly visible.

The little quaint figure was motionless, and the old verger turned twice to look at it, with a strange and curious thrill of admiration. Presently the cloister door opposite opened, and the Dean's swift footsteps were heard approaching, with a regular pit-pat, on the floor of the nave.

He, like the verger, was attracted by Joyce's attitude and the rapt expression on her fair face.

"Why, it's Falconer's little girl!" he thought. "She is generally all smiles and sunshine; now she looks like a nun."

As the Dean passed her, Joyce started. The brightest colour came to her face, and she turned hastily towards the north porch.

The Dean, with old-fashioned and chivalrous courtesy, held the little door, which was cut out of the big one for ordinary use, to let her pass, and then he said:

"Miss Falconer, I think. I hope your good father is well. Is he in Wells to-day?"

"Yes, sir," Joyce replied, bright smiles rippling over her face. "Yes, sir; on magistrates' business."

"Ah, ah! I heard there was some bad case brought in from Mendip. The good lady at Barley Wood will have to learn that much prating about religion ain't what we want. It's like the crackling of thorns under the pot. Let us see you at the Deanery before long; make my compliments to your good father and Mrs. Falconer." And then the Dean ambled away, his thin, black-stockinged legs beneath the decanal coat and apron giving him the appearance of a black stork.

Joyce now hastened towards the Vicar's Close, where her aunt, her father's only sister, lived.

The Vicar's Close at Wells is a sight to delight the heart of the antiquary and the lover of ancient buildings and olden times.

It is entered from the north end of the cathedral by a wide, low gateway, and on either side of a fairly broad footway stands a row of small, picturesque houses with twisted chimneys and low doorways, round which the clematis and honeysuckle climb at their own sweet will. The Vicar's Close, at the further end, is closed in by a small chapel, which entirely blocks the entrance, for any but foot passengers, who obtain egress into the North Liberty by some uneven stone steps at the side of the chapel, leading into the road a few feet above the level of the Close.

If Wells is quiet outside the Vicar's Close, it is quiet indeed within it. Since the summer day when Joyce went into the little garden before a house half-way up on the right side, the hand of the modern Wells builder and plasterer may have marred the complete effect, with stucco and sash-windows; but for the most part the houses in the second decade of the century were guiltless of plate glass and white-wash, and their antique frontage was, even more than now, one of the most picturesque features of the city of Wells.

Joyce had scarcely touched the bright brass handle of the bell when the door opened, and a girl of two or three and twenty sprang out.

"Oh, Joyce, how glad I am to see you! Come in Aunt Letitia, here is Joyce."

Miss Falconer was in the parlour on the right-hand side of the little, low-roofed lobby, and rose somewhat feebly from her chair by the wide grate, which was gay with pots of flowers and evergreens.

"Well, my child, welcome. Have you come to Wells with your father?"

"Yes, auntie; and I am come here for dinner, and after dinner may Charlotte come and do some shopping with me? I have a long list of commissions at the china shop and at Wilmott's."

"Charlotte will be pleased to accompany you, dear child; and when you have taken off your bonnet, come and tell me home news."

There were not many stairs to ascend to Charlotte's bedroom, which looked into the gardens at the back of two other houses of some pretension, between the Vicar's Close and the Deanery.

Charlotte curled herself up in the deep window-seat, and watched her cousin as she laid aside her large bonnet, smoothed her hair, and arranged her white pelerine over her pelisse. Charlotte had a genuine, if rather romantic, admiration for her cousin Joyce. Though a good girl, she was somewhat given to sentiment and languishing, complained of being fatigued, of headaches, and low spirits. She fed upon romance and poetry – the poetry of albums and keepsakes, which was then fashionable. Of course she had a hero who figured in her day-dreams; and she would spend hours at the little window of the sitting-room to catch a sight of him as he passed along the Close. Charlotte would have been much better for some active employment; but Miss Falconer was getting old and feeble in health, and if Charlotte was obedient and gentle, she was well satisfied. So she worked covers in cross-stitch for the chairs, knitted her own stockings, read all the light literature which came in her way, and played on the cabinet piano which stood against the wall in the sitting-room, with its crimson silk front gathered into the centre by a large rosette, and displaying, when open, a very narrow keyboard with very yellow keys.

"How sweetly pretty you look to-day, Joyce. I can't help saying so. Don't be angry. I want to read you some verses I have written, called, 'The Drooping Rosebud.'" And Charlotte took out of her pocket the crumpled page of a copy-book.

"You had better not read it now, Charlotte; Aunt Letitia will expect us to go downstairs."

"Only the first verse," Charlotte said, and then she began:

"'She bent her head in sorrow,

Here Charlotte stopped and blushed. "You know who I mean by the rosebud, and who the raindrop is?"

Joyce laughed merrily.

"Oh, Charlotte, you must not come to me for sympathy. I can't understand such sentiment. You have never spoken to Mr. Bamfylde in your life."

"Not spoken; no, but there is such a thing as the language of eyes. Joyce, you don't understand."

"No, I don't; and I think, Charlotte, it is nonsense to waste your thoughts on Mr. Bamfylde, who probably has never given you a thought in his life."

"I am not so sure about thoughts, dear. However, I see you don't care about it, or my verses, or me."

"Come, Charlotte, don't be silly! Of course I care about you, but I don't think I am poetical or romantic. Indeed, we ought to go downstairs."

"You must go first, and I will follow," said poor Charlotte, putting "The Drooping Rosebud" in her pocket again, with a sigh; and Joyce tripped downstairs alone.

"Well, my little rustic," Miss Falconer said; "come and sit down by me, and tell me the news."

"Melville came home last week," Joyce said. "He is determined to travel, and father did so want him to settle down at home and help him with the estate. But, oh! Aunt Lettice, nothing will ever make him into a farmer. He is dressed to-day, to come into Wells, like a fine gentleman. I get so angry with Melville, Aunt Lettice."

"He will come round in time, my dear. Young men are often a little difficult to manage, and then sober down so wonderfully."

"But Melville is twenty-three, nearly twenty-four, Aunt Lettice. Father has given him every advantage, and all he wished for, and now he says he cannot possibly live a country gentleman's life."

"Oxford was a poor preparation for that life, I must own," said Miss Falconer; "only it was natural perhaps, that your father should yield to your mother's wishes."

"Mother suffers the most," said Joyce hotly, "far, far the most. It makes me so angry when I think of the way mother is treated."

"My dear child, she has spoiled Melville, and this is the result."

"It would not be the result if Melville had an atom of gentleman-like feeling. Looking down on mother, who – " Joyce's voice faltered.

"It was unfortunate that your father married below him in the social scale; he was caught in the rebound, as we say. But all that is over and done with: still, we may deplore it; though no one can respect your dear mother more than I do. Marriage," said Miss Falconer, slowly and deliberately, "has not been successful in our family. Charlotte's mother, our only sister, made a very unwise marriage, and her only child has been thrown upon me to support. Not that I regret it. Charlotte is an amiable, gentle girl, and a companion to me. I have given her such advantages as I could afford, and she is fairly accomplished. I had a visitor yesterday I little expected, at her very advanced age. Mrs. Hannah More paid her first call on our new Bishop, and was so obliging as to come on here. She was speaking of you with interest, my dear."

"Of me!" exclaimed Joyce. "What does she know of me?"

"She knows about most people in the county; and, naturally, your mother's opposition to Mrs. More's views has reached her. She forbade a dairy-maid to read, who had once been in Mrs. More's school, and when she disobeyed her, dismissed her on the spot. It was much to be regretted. Greatly as I respect your mother, I must confess this act annoyed me."

"Did Mrs. More mention it yesterday, Aunt Lettice?"

"Yes; and she said she would like to have some communication with you. She had seen you riding with your father, and was taken by your looks. She inquired what education you had, and was shocked when I told her absolutely none. I told her I had implored your father to send you to a boarding-school at Clifton, but that he was obstinate. For, with all his good qualities, Joyce, we must concede that your father is obstinate."

"He is determined to do what is right," said Joyce, "if that is obstinacy."

Miss Falconer smiled.

"I have known him longer than you have, little Joyce," she said. "But tell me about this proposition of Mrs. More's: is it possible to carry it out? Mrs. More has such frequent attacks of illness, that it is well to lose no time. Shall I write to Mrs. More, and propose that you should spend a week at Barley Wood?"

"Oh! I don't think mother could spare me for a week. Did Mrs. More ask Charlotte?"

"No, but I may suggest it. Probably she thinks Charlotte is in good hands; she knows that I have not neglected her education. She has refined, poetical tastes; she can work beautifully in coloured silks; she can paint flowers, and she can play on the piano very prettily. These are the accomplishments which we look for in a young gentlewoman; and – "

"I have none of them!" Joyce exclaimed; not hopelessly, but almost defiantly: "but, Aunt Lettice, I am not sure that I want them."

"Dear child, I am sure that you do want them," was the reply, with a smile. "There is a want of 'finish' about you; the more to be lamented – "

Miss Falconer's speech was interrupted by the appearance of the neat maid-servant, who laid the cloth, and set out, with the utmost precision, the glasses and plates and dishes.

"We will adjourn to the sitting-room after dinner," Miss Falconer said. "I am glad to be spared coming down twice in the day. It was fortunate that I was seated in this room yesterday when Mrs. More called; she could not have mounted the stairs. Oh! here is Charlotte. Now we will sit down to the table; say grace, dear Charlotte."

Charlotte obeyed, and then the cover was lifted from a fowl, done to a turn; and Patty handed round the vegetables, and poured out cider for Miss Falconer, while Charlotte had a glass of port-wine, as she had been rather "below par" for a day or two; and Joyce drank water from preference.

Before the meal was concluded, Miss Falconer had decided that she would write to Mrs. More, and propose that her niece from Fair Acres should accept her invitation to Barley Wood, at such time as might be most convenient to her to arrange it. She did not tell Joyce of this decision, but she considered by making it she was conferring a real favour on the "little rustic," whose beauty she was inwardly comparing to that of a wild rose; scarcely the drooping rose of Charlotte's poem!

The two girls set out, soon after dinner, for the market-place, where the shops were situated. The market-place at Wells is not without its picturesque features; old gabled houses skirt the north side and part of the south side, while a cross stands at the bottom of the square. Clear water, from one of the many springs, which first attracted the College of Priests, in the time of Alfred's son Edward, to found their religious house in Wells, makes soft music as it runs down the streets in crystal streams. Two quaint archways, or, as they were in old documents called, the Palace Eye and the Deanery Eye, stand at the head of the market-square, and between them are two ancient houses, one of which was built by Bishop Beckington, and has rooms over the porch, or gateway, through which foot-passengers pass into the Cathedral Green.

There is a delightful sense that life flows easily and peacefully at Wells by the appearance of its citizens. The master of the large shop where the two girls stopped, was standing complacently at the door, his hands in his pockets, calmly surveying the rush of the cathedral choristers across the square, for the first chime had sounded for afternoon service.

Joyce was known as Squire Falconer's daughter at Fair Acres, and treated

"Look, Joyce, what lovely ribbon! Do get some, Joyce."

But Joyce was intently examining some homely towelling, and weighing the respective merits of bird's-eye and huckaback.

"I don't want any ribbons," she said. "Yes, it is pretty, but what are you going to do with it?" Then turning to the counter: "I want a box of needles – all sizes, and half-a-dozen reels of cotton, and – "

"Joyce, I think I will go to the door while you are finishing all these dull things; and then – "

Joyce glanced at the large clock over the counter:

"Then, I think, we will go to the service, and if we are not too late – "

"Oh, yes," Charlotte said, eagerly. "Do let us go, and come back to the china-shop afterwards."

Charlotte had her own reasons for desiring to go to the cathedral. The hero of her silent worship was Mr. Bamfylde, a new minor Canon, and it was his week for doing the duty.

Joyce completed her purchases, and left orders for them to be sent to the Swan; and then, just as the last chime was ringing and the old clock struck three, the two girls passed up the nave to the choir.

The work of restoration had not been begun, and the beautiful proportions of the choir of Wells Cathedral, were disfigured by high seats and an ugly pulpit. But Joyce's eyes were not critical, and she gave herself up to the soothing and elevating influence of the place, without any very distinct idea of why it was soothing and elevating. The service was slovenly enough in those days, and the new minor Canon got through it as fast as he could. The choristers straggled in, with no regard to order, and the lay-vicars conversed freely with each other, now and then giving the head of the chorister nearest to them a sharp rap with the corner of an anthem-book, or their own knuckles, through the open desk. The boys' behaviour was a little better than that of the men, for they had a wholesome fear of being reported to the Dean and Chapter, and feeling the weight of the old Grammar School master's birch-rod.

When the service was half over there was a sound of feet and voice's in one of the side aisles, and the Dean, who was in his stall, looked sharply round. The verger hobbled out to see what his coadjutor outside the choir could be about, to allow such a disturbance. The verger was sound asleep, with his chin upon his capacious breast, and quite unconscious of the presence of the two young gentlemen who were chatting and laughing with each other, in the south transept.

The verger stumped after them, vainly endeavouring to rouse his heavy friend, and said:

"There's service going on; you mustn't make a disturbance, gentlemen; it's contrary to the Dean's wishes."

The elder of the two men answered with a laugh, but the younger said:

"Be quiet, Falconer. Don't you hear they are reading prayers?"

"Well, I am neither reading them nor saying them," was the answer. "I had enough of that at Pembroke. Now, old fellow, keep a civil tongue in your head, will you?" as the verger, angry at the contemptuous disregard of his commands, said:

"I'll turn you out, if you don't go peaceably."

Again another laugh; and the fat verger, who had now recovered from his heavy afternoon nap, came bearing down on the young men.

"You'll walk out this instant," he said, raising his staff of office. "I wonder you ain't ashamed of yourself."

"No, my good man; on the contrary, I am proud of myself."

"Proud! Yes, a popinjay like you is proud enough, I'll warrant," murmured the other verger.

"Can we get into the choir, Arundel?"

"We had better wait here," was the answer. "The service is nearly over. Come this way into the cloisters. Don't be aggressive, Falconer, and make a row."

"I hate rows as much as you do," was the answer; "but I am not inclined to knock under, to this pair of drivelling old idiots."

I cannot say how this unseemly wrangle might have ended had not the verger in charge of the Dean heard the blowing of the organ pipes, which was a warning that he was to hasten to perform his office, and conduct the Dean back to the Deanery.

Almost immediately the organ sounded, and those who had taken part in the service came out. Joyce and Charlotte were amongst the last of the very scanty congregation.

Melville, for reasons of his own, did not care to introduce his friend at that moment, and Mr. Arundel was quite unconscious that the fair face of which he caught sight, from under the shadow of the large bonnet, was that of Melville's sister.

"What a sweet face!" he thought; and then, as Joyce turned suddenly towards the spot by the font where the two gentlemen were standing, a bright blush and smile, made her look irresistibly lovely.

"Who is that young lady, Melville? She knows you." For Joyce had made a step forward, and then apparently changed her mind and went towards the north door with Charlotte.

Melville fingered his cravat, and settled his chin in its place above it. "That little girl dressed as if she came out of Noah's ark is my sister! Come, you will have another opportunity of cultivating her acquaintance, and you want to call at the Palace, don't you?"

"My mother charged me to do so; but there is no haste."

"Oh, you had better not lose time, or you may not find your legs under the Bishop's mahogany. We live some miles out, you know."

Mr. Arundel turned his head round twice to take a last look at the retreating figures, and then allowed Melville to tuck his arm in his, and walk down the cloisters with him to the Palace.

Melville was in fact very anxious to show off his intimacy with Mr. Arundel to the bishop, for he could not hide from himself the fact that the ecclesiastical élite of Wells had not paid him the attention he hoped to receive. The truth was that rumours of Melville's gay and careless life, and the anxiety he had given his father, had reached the ears of some in authority. Heads of colleges reported his behaviour at Oxford, and Melville had been sent down, not for what may be called serious offences; but still the character hung about him of a man who cared for nothing earnestly; reading or rowing, it was all alike. Nothing that Melville did was done with singleness of purpose, except, as his father sometimes said, with a sigh, "dress himself like a mountebank and copy London fashions."