Shirley
restless I burn day and night--for what I can hardly tell--to be--to
do--to suffer, I think."
"Harry, it is your mind, which is stronger and older than your frame,
that troubles you. It is a captive; it lies in physical bondage. But it
will work its own redemption yet. Study carefully not only books but the
world. You love nature; love her without fear. Be patient--wait the
course of time. You will not be a soldier or a sailor, Henry; but if you
live you will be--listen to my prophecy--you will be an author, perhaps
a poet."
"An author! It is a flash--a flash of light to me! I will--I _will_!
I'll write a book that I may dedicate it to you."
"You will write it that you may give your soul its natural release.
Bless me! what am I saying? more than I understand, I believe, or can
make good. Here, Hal--here is your toasted oatcake; eat and live!"
"Willingly!" here cried a voice outside the open window. "I know that
fragrance of meal bread. Miss Keeldar, may I come in and partake?"
"Mr. Hall"--it was Mr. Hall, and with him was Louis Moore, returned from
their walk--"there is a proper luncheon laid out in the dining-room and
there are proper people seated round it. You may join that society and
share that fare if you please; but if your ill-regulated tastes lead you
to prefer ill-regulated proceedings, step in here, and do as we do."
"I approve the perfume, and therefore shall suffer myself to be led by
the nose," returned Mr. Hall, who presently entered, accompanied by
Louis Moore. That gentleman's eye fell on his desk, pillaged.
"Burglars!" said he.--"Henry, you merit the ferule."
"Give it to Shirley and Caroline; they did it," was alleged, with more
attention to effect than truth.
"Traitor and false witness!" cried both the girls. "We never laid hands
on a thing, except in the spirit of laudable inquiry!"
"Exactly so," said Moore, with his rare smile. "And what have you
ferreted out, in your 'spirit of laudable inquiry'?"
He perceived the inner drawer open.
"This is empty," said he. "Who has taken----"
"Here, here!" Caroline hastened to say, and she restored the little
packet to its place. He shut it up; he locked it in with a small key
attached to his watch-guard; he restored the other papers to order,
closed the repository, and sat down without further remark.
"I thought you would have scolded much more, sir," said Henry. "The
girls deserve reprimand."
"I leave them to their own consciences."
"It accuses them of crimes intended as well as perpetrated, sir. If I
had not been here, they would have treated your portfolio as they have
done your desk; but I told them it was padlocked."
"And will you have lunch with us?" here interposed Shirley, addressing
Moore, and desirous, as it seemed, to turn the conversation.
"Certainly, if I may."
"You will be restricted to new milk and Yorkshire oatcake."
"Va--pour le lait frais!" said Louis. "But for your oatcake!" and he
made a grimace.
"He cannot eat it," said Henry. "He thinks it is like bran, raised with
sour yeast."
"Come, then; by special dispensation we will allow him a few cracknels,
but nothing less homely."
The hostess rang the bell and gave her frugal orders, which were
presently executed. She herself measured out the milk, and distributed
the bread round the cosy circle now enclosing the bright little
schoolroom fire. She then took the post of toaster-general; and kneeling
on the rug, fork in hand, fulfilled her office with dexterity. Mr. Hall,
who relished any homely innovation on ordinary usages, and to whom the
husky oatcake was from custom suave as manna, seemed in his best
spirits. He talked and laughed gleefully--now with Caroline, whom he had
fixed by his side, now with Shirley, and again with Louis Moore. And
Louis met him in congenial spirit. He did not laugh much, but he uttered
in the quietest tone the wittiest things. Gravely spoken sentences,
marked by unexpected turns and a quite fresh flavour and poignancy, fell
easily from his lips. He proved himself to be--what Mr. Hall had said he
was--excellent company. Caroline marvelled at his humour, but still more
at his entire self-possession. Nobody there present seemed to impose on
him a sensation of unpleasant restraint. Nobody seemed a bore--a
check--a chill to him; and yet there was the cool and lofty Miss Keeldar
kneeling before the fire, almost at his feet.
But Shirley was cool and lofty no longer, at least not at this moment.
She appeared unconscious of the humility of her present position; or if
conscious, it was only to taste a charm in its lowliness. It did not
revolt her pride that the group to whom she voluntarily officiated as
handmaid should include her cousin's tutor. It did not scare her that
while she handed the bread and milk to the rest, she had to offer it to
him also; and Moore took his portion from her hand as calmly as if he
had been her equal.
"You are overheated now," he said, when she had retained the fork for
some time; "let me relieve you."
And he took it from her with a sort of quiet authority, to which she
submitted passively, neither resisting him nor thanking him.
"I should like to see your pictures, Louis," said Caroline, when the
sumptuous luncheon was discussed.--"Would not you, Mr. Hall?"
"To please you, I should; but, for my own part, I have cut him as an
artist. I had enough of him in that capacity in Cumberland and
Westmoreland. Many a wetting we got amongst the mountains because he
would persist in sitting on a camp-stool, catching effects of
rain-clouds, gathering mists, fitful sunbeams, and what not."
"Here is the portfolio," said Henry, bringing it in one hand and leaning
on his crutch with the other.
Louis took it, but he still sat as if he wanted another to speak. It
seemed as if he would not open it unless the proud Shirley deigned to
show herself interested in the exhibition.
"He makes us wait to whet our curiosity," she said.
"You understand opening it," observed Louis, giving her the key. "You
spoiled the lock for me once; try now."
He held it. She opened it, and, monopolizing the contents, had the first
view of every sketch herself. She enjoyed the treat--if treat it
were--in silence, without a single comment. Moore stood behind her chair
and looked over her shoulder, and when she had done and the others were
still gazing, he left his post and paced through the room.
A carriage was heard in the lane--the gate-bell rang. Shirley started.
"There are callers," she said, "and I shall be summoned to the room. A
pretty figure--as they say--I am to receive company. I and Henry have
been in the garden gathering fruit half the morning. Oh for rest under
my own vine and my own fig-tree! Happy is the slave-wife of the Indian
chief, in that she has no drawing-room duty to perform, but can sit at
ease weaving mats, and stringing beads, and peacefully flattening her
pickaninny's head in an unmolested corner of her wigwam. I'll emigrate
to the western woods."
Louis Moore laughed.
"To marry a White Cloud or a Big Buffalo, and after wedlock to devote
yourself to the tender task of digging your lord's maize-field while he
smokes his pipe or drinks fire-water."
Shirley seemed about to reply, but here the schoolroom door unclosed,
admitting Mr. Sympson. That personage stood aghast when he saw the group
around the fire.
"I thought you alone, Miss Keeldar," he said. "I find quite a party."
And evidently from his shocked, scandalized air, had he not recognized
in one of the party a clergyman, he would have delivered an extempore
philippic on the extraordinary habits of his niece: respect for the
cloth arrested him.
"I merely wished to announce," he proceeded coldly, "that the family
from De Walden Hall, Mr., Mrs., the Misses, and Mr. Sam Wynne, are in
the drawing-room." And he bowed and withdrew.
"The family from De Walden Hall! Couldn't be a worse set," murmured
Shirley.
She sat still, looking a little contumacious, and very much indisposed
to stir. She was flushed with the fire. Her dark hair had been more than
once dishevelled by the morning wind that day. Her attire was a light,
neatly fitting, but amply flowing dress of muslin; the shawl she had
worn in the garden was still draped in a careless fold round her.
Indolent, wilful, picturesque, and singularly pretty was her
aspect--prettier than usual, as if some soft inward emotion, stirred who
knows how, had given new bloom and expression to her features.
"Shirley, Shirley, you ought to go," whispered Caroline.
"I wonder why?"
She lifted her eyes, and saw in the glass over the fireplace both Mr.
Hall and Louis Moore gazing at her gravely.
"If," she said, with a yielding smile--"if a majority of the present
company maintain that the De Walden Hall people have claims on my
civility, I will subdue my inclinations to my duty. Let those who think
I ought to go hold up their hands."
Again consulting the mirror, it reflected an unanimous vote against her.
"You must go," said Mr. Hall, "and behave courteously too. You owe many
duties to society. It is not permitted you to please only yourself."
Louis Moore assented with a low "Hear, hear!"
Caroline, approaching her, smoothed her wavy curls, gave to her attire a
less artistic and more domestic grace, and Shirley was put out of the
room, protesting still, by a pouting lip, against her dismissal.
"There is a curious charm about her," observed Mr. Hall, when she was
gone. "And now," he added, "I must away; for Sweeting is off to see his
mother, and there are two funerals."
"Henry, get your books; it is lesson-time," said Moore, sitting down to
his desk.
"A curious charm!" repeated the pupil, when he and his master were left
alone. "True. Is she not a kind of white witch?" he asked.
"Of whom are you speaking, sir?"
"Of my cousin Shirley."
"No irrelevant questions; study in silence."
Mr. Moore looked and spoke sternly--sourly. Henry knew this mood. It was
a rare one with his tutor; but when it came he had an awe of it. He
obeyed.
CHAPTER XXVII.
THE FIRST BLUESTOCKING.
Miss Keeldar and her uncle had characters that would not harmonize, that
never had harmonized. He was irritable, and she was spirited. He was
despotic, and she liked freedom. He was worldly, and she, perhaps,
romantic.
Not without purpose had he come down to Yorkshire. His mission was
clear, and he intended to discharge it conscientiously. He anxiously
desired to have his niece married, to make for her a suitable match,
give her in charge to a proper husband, and wash his hands of her for
ever.
The misfortune was, from infancy upwards, Shirley and he had disagreed
on the meaning of the words "suitable" and "proper." She never yet had
accepted his definition; and it was doubtful whether, in the most
important step of her life, she would consent to accept it.
The trial soon came.
Mr. Wynne proposed in form for his son, Samuel Fawthrop Wynne.
"Decidedly suitable! most proper!" pronounced Mr. Sympson. "A fine
unencumbered estate, real substance, good connections. _It must be
done!_"
He sent for his niece to the oak parlour; he shut himself up there with
her alone; he communicated the offer; he gave his opinion; he claimed
her consent.
It was withheld.
"No; I shall not marry Samuel Fawthrop Wynne."
"I ask why. I must have a reason. In all respects he is more than worthy
of you."
She stood on the hearth. She was pale as the white marble slab and
cornice behind her; her eyes flashed large, dilated, unsmiling.
"And _I_ ask in what sense that young man is worthy of _me_?"
"He has twice your money, twice your common sense, equal connections,
equal respectability."
"Had he my money counted fivescore times I would take no vow to love
him."