Читать книгу In Silk Attire: A Novel - William Black - Страница 6

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."