The Small House at Allington
"He shan't be banished unless he likes it," said Mrs. Dale. "If he
finds us women too much for his unaided strength--"
John Eames muttered something about being very well as he was, and
then got himself into an arm-chair. He had shaken hands with Lily,
trying as he did so to pronounce articulately a little speech which
he had prepared for the occasion. "I have to congratulate you, Lily,
and I hope with all my heart that you will be happy." The words were
simple enough, and were not ill-chosen, but the poor young man never
got them spoken. The word "congratulate" did reach Lily's ears, and
she understood it all;--both the kindness of the intended speech and
the reason why it could not be spoken.
"Thank you, John," she said; "I hope I shall see so much of you in
London. It will be so nice to have an old Guestwick friend near me."
She had her own voice, and the pulses of her heart better under
command than had he; but she also felt that the occasion was trying
to her. The man had loved her honestly and truly,--still did love
her, paying her the great homage of bitter grief in that he had lost
her. Where is the girl who will not sympathize with such love and
such grief, if it be shown only because it cannot be concealed, and
be declared against the will of him who declares it?
Then came in old Mrs. Hearn, whose cottage was not distant two
minutes' walk from the Small House. She always called Mrs. Dale "my
dear," and petted the girls as though they had been children. When
told of Lily's marriage, she had thrown up her hands with surprise,
for she had still left in some corner of her drawers remnants of
sugar-plums which she had bought for Lily. "A London man is he? Well,
well. I wish he lived in the country. Eight hundred a year, my dear?"
she had said to Mrs. Dale. "That sounds nice down here, because we
are all so poor. But I suppose eight hundred a year isn't very much
up in London?"
"The squire's coming, I suppose, isn't he?" said Mrs. Hearn, as she
seated herself on the sofa close to Mrs. Dale.
"Yes, he'll be here by-and-by; unless he changes his mind, you know.
He doesn't stand on ceremony with me."
"He change his mind! When did you ever know Christopher Dale change
his mind?"
"He is pretty constant, Mrs. Hearn."
"If he promised to give a man a penny, he'd give it. But if he
promised to take away a pound, he'd take it, though it cost him years
to get it. He's going to turn me out of my cottage, he says."
"Nonsense, Mrs. Hearn!"
"Jolliffe came and told me"--Jolliffe, I should explain, was the
bailiff,--"that if I didn't like it as it was, I might leave it, and
that the squire could get double the rent for it. Now all I asked was
that he should do a little painting in the kitchen; and the wood is
all as black as his hat."
"I thought it was understood you were to paint inside."
"How can I do it, my dear, with a hundred and forty pounds for
everything? I must live, you know! And he that has workmen about him
every day of the year! And was that a message to send to me, who have
lived in the parish for fifty years? Here he is." And Mrs. Hearn
majestically raised herself from her seat as the squire entered the
room.
With him entered Mr. and Mrs. Boyce, from the parsonage, with Dick
Boyce, the ungrown gentleman, and two girl Boyces, who were fourteen
and fifteen years of age. Mrs. Dale, with the amount of good-nature
usual on such occasions, asked reproachfully why Jane, and Charles,
and Florence, and Bessy, did not come,--Boyce being a man who had
his quiver full of them,--and Mrs. Boyce, giving the usual answer,
declared that she already felt that they had come as an avalanche.
"But where are the--the--the young men?" asked Lily, assuming a look
of mock astonishment.
"They'll be across in two or three hours' time," said the squire.
"They both dressed for dinner, and, as I thought, made themselves
very smart; but for such a grand occasion as this they thought a
second dressing necessary. How do you do, Mrs. Hearn? I hope you
are quite well. No rheumatism left, eh?" This the squire said very
loud into Mrs. Hearn's ear. Mrs. Hearn was perhaps a little hard of
hearing; but it was very little, and she hated to be thought deaf.
She did not, moreover, like to be thought rheumatic. This the squire
knew, and therefore his mode of address was not good-natured.
"You needn't make me jump so, Mr. Dale. I'm pretty well now, thank
ye. I did have a twinge in the spring,--that cottage is so badly
built for draughts! 'I wonder you can live in it,' my sister said to
me the last time she was over. I suppose I should be better off over
with her at Hamersham, only one doesn't like to move, you know, after
living fifty years in one parish."
"You mustn't think of going away from us," Mrs. Boyce said, speaking
by no means loud, but slowly and plainly, hoping thereby to flatter
the old woman. But the old woman understood it all. "She's a sly
creature, is Mrs. Boyce," Mrs. Hearn said to Mrs. Dale, before the
evening was out. There are some old people whom it is very hard to
flatter, and with whom it is, nevertheless, almost impossible to live
unless you do flatter them.
At last the two heroes came in across the lawn at the drawing-room
window; and Lily, as they entered, dropped a low curtsey before them,
gently swelling down upon the ground with her light muslin dress,
till she looked like some wondrous flower that had bloomed upon the
carpet, and putting her two hands, with the backs of her fingers
pressed together, on the buckle of her girdle, she said, "We are
waiting upon your honours' kind grace, and feel how much we owe to
you for favouring our poor abode." And then she gently rose up again,
smiling, oh, so sweetly, on the man she loved, and the puffings and
swellings went out of her muslin.
I think there is nothing in the world so pretty as the conscious
little tricks of love played off by a girl towards the man she loves,
when she has made up her mind boldly that all the world may know that
she has given herself away to him.
I am not sure that Crosbie liked it all as much as he should have
done. The bold assurance of her love when they two were alone
together he did like. What man does not like such assurances on such
occasions? But perhaps he would have been better pleased had Lily
shown more reticence,--been more secret, as it were, as to her
feelings, when others were around them. It was not that he accused
her in his thoughts of any want of delicacy. He read her character
too well;--was, if not quite aright in his reading of it, at least
too nearly so to admit of his making against her any such accusation
as that. It was the calf-like feeling that was disagreeable to him.
He did not like to be presented, even to the world of Allington, as
a victim caught for the sacrifice, and bound with ribbon for the
altar. And then there lurked behind it all a feeling that it might be
safer that the thing should not be so openly manifested before all
the world. Of course, everybody knew that he was engaged to Lily
Dale; nor had he, as he said to himself, perhaps too frequently,
the slightest idea of breaking from that engagement. But then the
marriage might possibly be delayed. He had not discussed that matter
yet with Lily, having, indeed, at the first moment of his gratified
love, created some little difficulty for himself by pressing for an
early day. "I will refuse you nothing," she had said to him; "but
do not make it too soon." He saw, therefore, before him some little
embarrassment, and was inclined to wish that Lily would abstain from
that manner which seemed to declare to all the world that she was
about to be married immediately. "I must speak to her to-morrow," he
said to himself, as he accepted her salute with a mock gravity equal
to her own.
Poor Lily! How little she understood as yet what was passing through
his mind. Had she known his wish she would have wrapped up her love
carefully in a napkin, so that no one should have seen it,--no one
but he, when he might choose to have the treasure uncovered for his
sight. And it was all for his sake that she had been thus open in her
ways. She had seen girls who were half ashamed of their love; but she
would never be ashamed of hers or of him. She had given herself to
him; and now all the world might know it, if all the world cared
for such knowledge. Why should she be ashamed of that which, to her
thinking, was so great an honour to her? She had heard of girls who
would not speak of their love, arguing to themselves cannily that
there may be many a slip between the cup and the lip. There could be
no need of any such caution with her. There could surely be no such
slip! Should there be such a fall,--should any such fate, either by
falseness or misfortune, come upon her,--no such caution could be of
service to save her. The cup would have been so shattered in its fall
that no further piecing of its parts would be in any way possible. So
much as this she did not exactly say to herself; but she felt it all,
and went bravely forward,--bold in her love, and careful to hide it
from none who chanced to see it.
They had gone through the ceremony with the cake and teacups, and had
decided that, at any rate, the first dance or two should be held upon
the lawn when the last of the guests arrived.
"Oh, Adolphus, I am so glad he has come," said Lily. "Do try to like
him." Of Dr. Crofts, who was the new comer, she had sometimes spoken
to her lover, but she had never coupled her sister's name with that
of the doctor, even in speaking to him. Nevertheless, Crosbie had in
some way conceived the idea that this Crofts either had been, or was,
or was to be, in love with Bell; and as he was prepared to advocate
his friend Dale's claims in that quarter, he was not particularly
anxious to welcome the doctor as a thoroughly intimate friend of the
family. He knew nothing as yet of Dale's offer, or of Bell's refusal,
but he was prepared for war, if war should be necessary. Of the
squire, at the present moment, he was not very fond; but if his
destiny intended to give him a wife out of this family, he should
prefer the owner of Allington and nephew of Lord De Guest as a
brother-in-law to a village doctor,--as he took upon himself, in his
pride, to call Dr. Crofts.
"It is very unfortunate," said he, "but I never do like Paragons."
"But you must like this Paragon. Not that he is a Paragon at all, for
he smokes and hunts, and does all manner of wicked things." And then
she went forward to welcome her friend.
Dr. Crofts was a slight, spare man, about five feet nine in height,
with very bright dark eyes, a broad forehead, with dark hair that
almost curled, but which did not come so forward over his brow as it
should have done for purposes of beauty,--with a thin well-cut nose,
and a mouth that would have been perfect had the lips been a little
fuller. The lower part of his face, when seen alone, had in it
somewhat of sternness, which, however, was redeemed by the brightness
of his eyes. And yet an artist would have declared that the lower
features of his face were by far the more handsome.
Lily went across to him and greeted him heartily, declaring how glad
she was to have him there. "And I must introduce you to Mr. Crosbie,"
she said, as though she was determined to carry her point. The two
men shook hands with each other, coldly, without saying a word, as
young men are apt to do when they are brought together in that way.
Then they separated at once, somewhat to the disappointment of Lily.
Crosbie stood off by himself, both his eyes turned up towards the
ceiling, and looking as though he meant to give himself airs; while
Crofts got himself quickly up to the fireplace, making civil little