Love and Life: An Old Story in Eighteenth Century Costume
“My mother utterly denied all knowledge of her, when I cried out in
anguish when she came to see me!” said Sir Amyas.
“So she does to Hargrave, whom she sent off to interrogate Mrs. Arden,”
said Mr. Belamour.
“Have you any reason to think the child could have reached my Lady?”
inquired Betty, seeing that none of the gentlemen regarded my Lady’s
denials as making any difference to their belief, though not one of them
chose to say so.
“Merely negative evidence,” said Mr. Belamour. “I find that no one
in the house actually beheld the departure of my Lady on that Sunday
afternoon. The little girls had been found troublesome, and sent out
into the park with Molly, and my nephew was giving full employment to
Jumbo and Mrs. Aylward in my room. The groom, who was at the horses’
heads, once averred that he saw two women get into the carriage
besides her ladyship; but he is such a sodden confused fellow, and so
contradicts himself, that I can make nothing of him.”
“He would surely know his young mistress,” said Sir Amyas.
“Perhaps not in the camlet hood, which Dame Wheatfield says she wore.”
“Was good old Dove acting as coachman?” said Betty. “We should learn
something from him.”
“It was not her own coach,” said Mr. Belamour. “All the servants were
strangers, the liveries sanguine, and the panels painted with helmets
and trophies.”
“Mar’s,” said Sir Amyas, low and bitterly.
“I guessed as much,” said his uncle. “It was probably chosen on purpose,
if the child has friends in your own household.”
“Then I must demand her,” said the Major. “She cannot be denied to her
father.”
“At any rate we must go to town to-morrow,” said Mr. Belamour. “We have
done all we can here.”
“Let us send for horses and go on at once,” cried Sir Amyas.
“Not so fast, nephew. I see, by her face, that Miss Delavie does not
approve, though our side of the town is safer than Hounslow.”
“I was not thinking of highwaymen, sir, but we set forth at five this
morning, and Sir Amyas always becomes flushed and feverish if he is over
fatigued; nor is my father so strong as he was.”
“Ah, ha! young sir, in adopting Betty for a sister you find you have
adopted a quartermaster-general, eh?” said the Major; “but she is quite
right. We should not get to town before ten or eleven at night, and what
good would that do? No, no, let us sup and have a good night’s rest, and
we will drive into town long enough before fine ladies are astir in the
morning, whatever may be the fashionable hour nowadays.”
“Yes, nephew, you must content yourself with acting host to your father
and sister-in-law in your own house,” said his uncle.
“It seems to me more like yours, sir,” rejoined the youth; but at the
hall door, with all his native grace, he turned and gave his welcome,
kissing Betty on the cheek with the grave ceremony of the host, and
lamenting, poor fellow, that he stood alone without his bride to receive
them.
“Is that Jumbo?” asked Betty. “I must thank him for all his kind service
to my dear sister.”
Faithful Jumbo fairly wept when--infinite condescension for those
days--Major Delavie shook hands with him and thanked him.
“If pretty Missie Madam were but safe and well, Jumbo would wish no
more,” he sobbed out.
“Poor Jumbo,” said Mr. Belamour, “he has never been the same man since
pretty Missie Madam has been lost. I hear his violin mourning for her
till it is enough to break one’s heart!”
However Eugene created a diversion by curious inquiries whether Jumbo
would indeed play the fiddle of which he had heard from Archer and
Amoret, and he ran off most eagerly after the negro to be introduced to
the various curiosities of the place.
Mrs. Aylward attended Miss Delavie to her room, and showed herself much
softened. As a good, conscientious woman, she felt that she had acted
a selfish part towards the lonely maiden, and Betty’s confident belief
that she had been a kind friend was a keen reproach.
“Indeed, madam,” she said, “I would lief you could truly call me such,
but when young Miss came here first I took her for one of that flighty
sort that it is wise not to meddle with more than needful. I have
kept my place here these thirty years by never making or meddling, and
knowing nothing about what don’t concern me, and is out of my province.
Now, I wish I had let the poor young lady be more friendly with me, for
maybe I could have been of use to her in her need.
“You had no suspicion?”
“No, ma’am; though I find there were those who suspected some one
came up here disguised as Jumbo; but I was never one to lend an ear to
gossip, and by that time I trusted the dear young lady altogether, and
knew she would never knowingly do aught that was unbecoming her station,
or her religion.”
“I am glad the dear child won your good opinion,” said Betty.
“Indeed, ma’am, that you may say,” returned Mrs. Aylward, whom anxiety
had made confidential; “for I own I was prejudiced against her from the
first, as, if you’ll excuse me, ma’am, all we Bowstead people are apt
to be set against whatever comes from my Lady’s side. However, one must
have been made of the nether millstone not to feel the difference she
made in the house. She was the very life of it with her pretty ways,
singing and playing with the children, and rousing up the poor gentleman
too that had lived just like a mere heathen in a dungeon, and wouldn’t
so much as hear a godly word in his despair. And now he has a minister
once a fortnight to read prayers, and is quite another man--all through
that blessed young lady, who has brought him back to light and life.”
And as Betty’s tears flowed at this testimony to her sister, the
housekeeper added, “Never you fear, ma’am; she is one of God’s innocents
and His Hand will be over her.”
Meantime, having dismissed the young lover to take, if he could, a
much needed night’s rest, the Major was listening to Mr. Belamour’s
confession. “I was the most to blame, in as much as an old fool is worse
than a young one; and I would that the penalty fell on me alone.”
“If she be in my cousin’s hands I cannot believe that she will permit
any harm to befall her,” said the good Major, still clinging to his
faith in Urania--the child he had taught to ride, and with whom he had
danced her first minuet.
“What I dread most is her being forced into some low marriage,” said Mr.
Belamour. “The poor child’s faith in the ceremony that passed must have
been overthrown, and who can tell what she may be induced to accept?”
“It was that threat which moved you?” said the Major.
“Yes. Hargrave assured me that my Lady had actually offered her to him,
with a bribe of a farm on easy terms; and when she found that he had
other intentions, there seemed to be some broken-down sycophant of Mar’s
upon the cards, but of course I was preferable, both because my fair
sister-in-law has some lingering respect for the honour of her own
blood, and because the bar between Aurelia and my nephew would be
perpetual. I knew likewise that it was my brother’s earnest desire that
a match should take place between your children and his.
“He did me too much honour. The lad showed me the extract from his
letter.”
“I could not give him the whole. It was fit for no eyes but mine, who
had so long neglected it, and barely understood that it existed. My poor
brother’s eyes were fully opened to his wife’s character, and even while
he loved her to distraction, and yielded to her fascinating mastery
against his better judgment, he left me the charge of trying in some
degree to repair the injustice he believed you to be suffering, and of
counteracting evil influences on her son.”
“That seems at least to have been done.”
“By no efforts of mine; but because the boy was happily permitted to
remain with the worthy tutor his father had chosen for him, and because
Wayland is an excellent man, wise and prudent in all things save in
being bewitched by a fair face. Would that he were returned! When I
first consented to act this fool’s part, I trusted that he would have
been at home soon enough to prevent more than the nominal engagement,
and when my Lady’s threats rendered it needful to secure the poor child
by giving her my name, I still expected him before my young gentleman
should utterly betray himself by his warmth.”
“He tells me that he has written.”
“True. On that I insisted, and I am the more uneasy, for there has been
ample time for a reply. It is only too likely, from what my nephew tells
me of his venturesome explorations, that he may have fallen into the
hands of the Moorish corsairs! Hargrave says it is rumoured; but my Lady
will not be checked in her career of pleasure, and if she is fearful of
his return, she may precipitate matters with the poor girl!”
“Come, come, sir, I cannot have you give way to despondency. You
did your best, and if it did not succeed, it was owing to my foolish
daughter Arden. Why, if she was not satisfied about her sister, could
she not have come here, and demanded an explanation? That would have
been the straightforward way!”
“Would that she had! Or would that I had sooner discovered my own entire
recovery, which I owe in very truth to the sweet being who has brought
new life alike of body and mind to me, and who must think I have
requited her so cruelly.”
CHAPTER XXVII. CYTHEREA’S BOWER.
There Citherea, goddesse was and quene,
Honourid highly for her majeste,
And eke her sonne, the mighty god I weene,
Cupid the blinde, that for his dignite
A M lovers worshipp on ther kne.
There was I bid on pain of dethe to pere,
By Mercury, the winged messengre.--CHAUCER.
By twelve o’clock on the ensuing day Mr. Belamour, with Eugene and
Jumbo, was set down at a hotel near Whitehall, to secure apartments,
while the Major went on to demand his daughter from Lady Belamour,
taking with him Betty, whom he allowed to be a much better match for my
Lady than he could be. Very little faith in his cousin Urania remained
to him in the abstract, yet even now he could not be sure that she would
not talk him over and hoodwink him in any actual encounter. Sir Amyas
likewise accompanied him, both to gratify his own anxiety and to secure
admission. The young man still looked pale and worn with restless
anxiety; but he had, in spite of remonstrances, that morning discarded
his sling, saying that he should return to his quarters. Let his Colonel
do his worst then; he had still more liberty than if compelled to return
to his mother’s house.
Lady Belamour had, on her second marriage, forsaken her own old
hereditary mansion in the Strand, where Sir Jovian had died, and which,
she said, gave her the vapours. Mr. Wayland, whose wealth far exceeded
her own, had purchased one of the new houses in Hanover Square, the
fashionable quarter and very much admired; but the Major regretted the
gloomy dignity of the separate enclosure and walled court of Delavie
House, whereas the new one, in modern fashion, had only an area and
steps between the front and the pavement.
The hall door stood wide open, with a stately porter within, and lackeys
planted about at intervals. Grey descended from the box, and after some
inquiry, brought word that “her Ladyship was at breakfast,” then, at a
sign from his master, opened the carriage door. Sir Amyas, taking
Betty by the tips of her fingers, led her forward, receiving by the way
greetings and inquiries from the servants, whose countenances showed him
to be a welcome arrival.
“Is it a reception day, Maine?” he asked of a kind of major-domo whom he
met on the top of the broad stairs.
“No, your honour.”
“Is company with her ladyship?”
“No, not company, sir,” with a certain hesitation, which damped Betty’s
satisfaction in the first assurance.