The Passionate Elopement
ventured out, he would sit in a little pagoda whence every few minutes
he would pop out his head, and in the same wheezy monotone lament 'Rain!
Rain! on the windowpane!' and retire as abruptly as a cuckoo that has
told the hour.
With this aged janitor Phyllida used to have a daily conversation which
never varied by a single letter.
"Nobody in the garden this morning?"
"Not a soul nor a body, young miss."
"Are you better of your cold?"
"Very much worse."
As Phyllida used to tell Betty when they had left the gateway behind
them, 'he must be very ill indeed because he has been very much worse
every day.'
This customary conversation interrupted the argument over Mr. Lovely's
romantick character of mind, and when they turned down the path which
led to the Maze all discussion went to the wind at the prospect of again
seeing her dear Amor.
Vernon had met Phyllida in the Maze but a bare two weeks ago. It
happened to be his first visit to the Wells, and he was in the act of
being solemnly lost when he accosted her for direction. Betty had
encouraged the chance acquaintanceship and Mr. Vernon, who was tired of
the mechanick Dryads of Vauxhall, embarked upon a new pleasure. The
natural secretiveness of his disposition led him to adopt Amor as a
fantastick pseudonym, and neither Betty nor Phyllida had troubled
themselves to inquire farther into his antecedents. Indeed, it would
have puzzled them to do so, for he had but lately appeared at the Pump
Room in response to Phyllida's earnest entreaty, and absolutely refused
to meet her at the Assembly Rooms. Consequently, had she felt inclined
to indulge a suspicion, there was no one to whom she could appeal except
perhaps Beau Ripple: and he, of course, was not to be thought of in
connection with so trivial a matter.
You will recollect that Vernon's toilet of this morning was considerably
perturbed by the image of Phyllida. Over his coffee he had reviewed the
situation with great contempt for himself.
To begin with, he had moved into lodgings opposite his charmer's abode.
What foolish enthusiasm! worthy of a stripling of sixteen, as he told
himself. Then he had seriously contemplated matrimony. To be sure, he
had made a few cautious inquiries and heard it stated on good authority
that she was an heiress, but odds his life! was that enough to make him
commit himself irreparably. He was jaded, and the rustick seclusion (so
he characterized the Wells!) had affected his head. A boarding-school
miss with gawky tendencies--a boarding-school miss with the smile of a
young nymph--a boarding-school miss with little fingers that tugged the
manhood--the weariness--out of his heart! It was impossible. His friends
would sneer unmercifully, and he would settle in the country as he had
often wished, and by heavens! he would seek her mother's consent. Pshaw!
the chit would become more insipid than ever, more delightful, more
enthralling, more utterly subjugating. Z----ds! what an impetuous fool
he would be considered. No! No! country misses were very well in the
country, and might bear transplantation for a season, but London
bough-pots should be renewed every Spring. Meanwhile the affair was
progressing very well, and if he could pluck a pigeon or two--there were
always pigeons in the country--why a Summer in town--and after that--why
after that--meanwhile his coffee was growing cold.
But when he saw her radiance among the dark hedges of yew, all his
cynical plans withered away, and it would have taken mighty little to
transform the libertine into as honest a lover as ever galloped across
the horizon of a romantick imagination. What grace! What charm! What
movement! What colour! It was incredible she would ever grow old. He
rose from the stone seat in the heart of the Maze and saluted her with a
sculptured bow.
"That's true romantick," whispered Betty. "See him bow, see him stand up
tall and white like a great wax candle."
The swansdown tippet rose and fell to the beating of the eager heart
beneath.
"My charmer takes the sun like a flower," said Mr. Vernon, bending over
her hand.
Betty's eyes were a very quick and fiery blue as she turned away to her
post, and, indeed, the scene would have ravished a block.
Never were yews so dark and velvety, so full of whispered secrets, as
the gentle wind stirred their crisped leaves continually. In a silence
made by cushions of moss set with many green stars that muffled every
footstep, the stone image of Cupid, poised upon his damp-stained
pedestal caught from the February sunlight the veritable bloom and
semblance of divinity.
Vernon, as he led Phyllida to the seat and saw her eyes flash over the
swansdown muff, was sure that such beauty must capture something of the
permanence expressed by the statue and remain for ever young, for ever
provocative of desire.
High over their heads a flight of pigeons circled against the azure,
gathered and broke into a scattered multitude of snowy wings whose
fluttering echoes travelled along the sunlight to the sombre heart of
the Maze.
The simple grace with which Phyllida seated herself held Vernon
entranced. He could have sworn that the stone wings of the Cupid
trembled faintly as if, animate and inanimate, the whole world stood
ready to scale the empyrean. Blinded by an ecstasy of hope, the man
forgot himself, discarded the mean ambitions that for so long had guided
his actions, and conceived the idea of a fresher existence. Great
moments, like great men, have a solitary life, and there was nothing in
Phyllida to respond to the fire which he had waked from a pile of ashes.
Actually she was wondering whether her dear Amor had remembered
Valentine day, whether, indeed, his burning gaze was a prelude to the
offer of a trinket.
"'Tis surely a pleasant Valentine morning," she murmured screwing up her
eyes to the sun.
Vernon cursed the want of practice with young misses which had let him
forget what every fair esteemed a man's sacred duty. However, he was a
resourceful gentleman and, without any perceptible hesitation, produced
from his pocket a paste brooch cut to the likeness of a basket of
twinkling blue forget-me-nots.
The history of this little ornament possesses enough irony to warrant a
short digression. It used to hang in the window of a Midland toy-shop,
and had made a pretty birthday gift from a young man deep in love to his
betrothed. She wore it in her kerchief for ten years and sent it at last
to her lover in London with some other trinkets not very valuable, but
all of the same fresh beauty. At the bottom of the packet was a faded
sprig of whitethorn. The young gentleman--not quite so young now--opened
it as a London dawn empearled the city smoke. It had lain all day in his
room neglected while the dice-box rattled like a skeleton at the feast
of Love--a feast of pimps and blowsy carmine furies. The contents of the
packet went with the last of his guineas, and at the division of the
stake Mr. Vernon contemptuously accepted the brooch. The latter never
troubled himself to take the ornament out of his pocket. Now once more
it came back to Youth and Beauty.
As she pinned it to her kerchief, Phyllida thanked him for his sweet
thoughtfulness, and wondered if he would always remember this morning.
By this time, Vernon had clambered down from his mountain top. Perhaps
the brooch made his descent more easy. Yet I think he was sincere when
he swore he would never forget.
Anyway Phyllida believed him and so there is nothing more to be said.
"When we are wed," she began, and startled him with such an abrupt
disclosure of her dreams. "When we are wed, I think we will live in Hyde
Park. Where is Hyde Park?"
"On the confines of Kensington, my dear."
"Yes, but where is Kensington?"
"A mile or so Westward of Temple Bar."
"I think we will live in Kensington."
"Nay, prithee! would you have us die of dullness."
"Is Kensington dull?"
"'Tis very rustick. No! my charmer shall lodge in the Haymarket."
Phyllida pouted. There was a Haymarket in the country town to which she
made an occasional visit from the little village of Newton Candover, and
she remembered it as a dusty spot not fit for a new pair of shoes.
"I vow I should detest the Haymarket."
"Nay, 'tis the gayest place, with hackney coaches passing to and fro all
day. You shall sit at your window and all the fine ladies of rank and
fashion will envy you."
"And what will my Amor be doing?"
"He will be looking over his angel's shoulder."
"Then they'll envy me more than ever," said Phyllida with a contented
laugh. Vernon pressed her hand and looked round quickly as a man will
before he attempts the first kiss. But Phyllida drew back.
"What shall we do when we are tired of sitting at the windows--if one
could ever tire of anything so pleasant," she added with a sigh.
"We'll call a hackney-coach and drive to Westminster Steps, to the
river."
"To the river? Now that will be most diverting."
"And we'll hail the waterman with the most elegant wherry, and row up
through the dusk to Vauxhall."
Phyllida was staring at him with the round eyes of a child who listens
to an old fairy-tale.
"Then what should we do?" she asked earnestly.
"We should choose a box for two and sit with our elbows over a very
small table and look at each other just as we are looking now."
"Yes! go on," cried Phyllida clapping her hands.
"Then we should call for chicken-wings and eat our supper and listen to
the new song and the musick of the orchestra playing the finest tunes
high up among a thousand sparkling coloured lamps and watch the
masqueraders and row back to Westminster under a great moon."
Mr. Vernon was so much inspired by the interest of his listener that he
began to believe in the reality of this proposed idyll, quite forgetting
that it was a chastened account of a hundred similar adventures enjoyed
with the domino passion of a night.
"Vauxhall must be the properest place in the world," sighed Phyllida, "I
doubt everybody wears their jewels."
"Everybody," replied her lover with a quick glance.
"I should wear my pearls."
"Your pearls?"
"My necklace that was left by Grandmother Courteen. Mamma won't let me
wear it till I'm one-and-twenty."
"But supposing you ran away?"
"Oh I should never dare. I should be frightened."
Vernon changed the subject, perceiving at present the courtship was
nothing more serious than a Springtime diversion.
He told himself if the child surrendered to his blandishments, it would
be an easy matter to induce her to run away. He must weave a strong web
of personal attraction round her, and if her prudence sustained her to
the end, why perhaps he might commit himself to a serious offer of
marriage. He must inquire further into her fortune. He wished it were
not so difficult to put an arm round her waist. Innocence was very well
and the prospect of a siege amusing enough at first, but a long deferred
capitulation would be immensely fatiguing; and yet how charming she was.
Not for anything would he have her different.
"When we are wed," he began and for the first time echoed her lately
expressed hopes. In some way he felt that she would be to blame, if harm
came of it. She had given the cue.
"When we are wed, we shall go to routs."
"But we shall be old and wise and able to go then. It won't be near so
diverting then as 'twould be now--if you came to the Assemblies."
"My angel forgets the risque of discovery."
"There could be no more danger in that than there is in sitting here in
the Maze."
"Come!"
"I'm sure if we were prudent nobody would suspect us of a love-affair."
"But consider my ardour. 'Twould illuminate the whole matter."
"Well! and if the old maids did talk, they would only talk into their