The Child Wife

It was a disappointment to be regretted, and, combined with the quiet gloom of the chamber into which he had been ushered, argued ill for the success of his application.

“Your business, sir?” demanded the august personage into whose presence he had penetrated. The demand was not made in a tone of either rudeness or austerity. Lord – was noted for a suavity of manners, that, in the eyes of the uninitiated, gave him a character for benevolence! In answer to it, the ex-guardsman presented his letter of introduction. He could do no more, and stood awaiting the result.

But he reflected how different this might be if the interview had been taking place in the drawing-room, instead of that dismal repository of books.

“I am sorry, Mr Swinton,” said his lordship, after reading Sir Robert’s letter, “sorry, indeed, that I can do nothing to serve you. I don’t know of a post that isn’t filled. I have applicants coming to me every day, thinking I can do something for them. I should have been most happy to serve any friend of Sir Robert Cottrell, had it been in my power. I assure you it isn’t.”

Richard Swinton was disconcerted – the more so that he had spent thirty shillings in chartering the pony phaeton with its attendant groom. It was part of the five pounds borrowed from the obliging baronet. It would be so much cash thrown away – the sprat lost without catching the salmon.

He stood without knowing what to say. The interview seemed at an end – his lordship appearing wearied of his presence, and wishing him to be gone.

At this crisis an accident came to his aid. A squadron of “Coldstreams” was passing along the Park drive. Their bugle, sounding the “double-quick,” was heard in the interior of the dwelling. His lordship, to ascertain the cause of the military movement, sprang up from the huge leathern chair, in which he had been seated, and passed suddenly into the drawing-room, leaving Mr Swinton outside in the hall. Through the window Lord – saw the dragoons filing past. But his glance dwelt, not long upon them. Underneath, and close in to the curb-stone, was an object to his eyes a hundred times more attractive than the bright uniforms of the Guards. It was a young and beautiful lady, seated in an open phaeton, and holding the reins – as if waiting for some one who had gone into a house.

It was in front of his own house; and the party absent from the phaeton must be inside. It should be Mr Swinton, the very good-looking fellow who was soliciting him for an appointment!

In a trice the applicant, already half dismissed, was recalled into his presence – this time into the drawing-room.

“By the way, Mr Swinton,” said he, “you may as well leave me your address. I’m anxious to oblige my friend, Sir Robert; and although I can speak of nothing now, who knows – Ha! that lady in the carriage below. Is she of your belonging?”

“My wife, your lordship.”

“What a pity to have kept her waiting outside! You should have brought her in with you.”

“My lord, I could not take the liberty of intruding.”

“Oh, nonsense! my dear sir! A lady can never intrude. Well, leave your address; and if anything should turn up, be sure I shall remember you. I am most anxious to serve Cottrell.”

Swinton left the address; and with an obsequious salute, parted from the dispenser of situations.

As he drove back along the pavement of Piccadilly, he reflected to himself that the pony equipage had not been chartered in vain.

He now knew the character of the man to whom he had addressed his solicitation.

Chapter Forty Three.

To the Country

There is but one country in the world where country-life is thoroughly understood, and truly enjoyable. It is England!

True, this enjoyment is confined to the few – to England’s gentry. Her farmer knows nought of it; her labourer still less.

But the life of an English country gentleman leaves little to be desired!

In the morning he has the chase, or the shooting party, complete in their kind, and both varied according to the character of the game. In the evening he sits down to a dinner, as Lucullian as French cooks can make it, in the company of men and women the most accomplished upon earth.

In the summer there are excursions, picnics, “garden parties”; and of late years the grand croquet and tennis gatherings – all ending in the same desirable dinner, with sometimes a dance in the drawing-room, to the family music of the piano; on rarer occasions, to the more inspiriting strains of a military band, brought from the nearest barracks, or the headquarters of volunteers, yeomanry, or militia.

In all this there is neither noise nor confusion; but the most perfect quiet and decorum. It could not be otherwise in a society composed of the flower of England’s people – its nobility and squirearchy – equal in the social scale – alike spending their life in the cultivation of its graces.

It was not strange that Captain Maynard – a man with but few great friends, and lost to some of these through his republican proclivities – should feel slightly elated on receiving an imitation to a dinner as described.

A further clause in the note told him, he would be expected to stay a few days at the house of his host, and take part in the partridge-shooting that had but lately commenced.

The invitation was all the more acceptable coming from Sir George Vernon, of Vernon Hall, near Sevenoaks, Kent.

Maynard had not seen the British baronet since that day when the British flag, flung around his shoulders, saved him from being shot. By the conditions required to get him clear of his Parisian scrape, he had to return instanter to England, in the metropolis of which he had ever since been residing.

Not in idleness. Revolutions at an end, he had flung aside his sword, and taken to the pen. During the summer he had produced a romance, and placed it in the hands of a publisher. He was expecting it soon to appear.

He had lately written to Sir George – on hearing that the latter had got back to his own country – a letter expressing grateful thanks for the protection that had been extended to him.

But he longed also to thank the baronet in person. The tables were now turned. His own service had been amply repaid; and he hesitated to take advantage of the old invitation – in fear of being deemed an intruder. Under these circumstances the new one was something more than welcome.

Sevenoaks is no great distance from London. For all that, it is surrounded by scenery as retired and rural as can be found in the shires of England – the charming scenery of Kent.

It is only of late years that the railway-whistle has waked the echoes of those deep secluded dales stretching around Sevenoaks.

With a heart attuned to happiness, and throbbing with anticipated pleasure, did the late revolutionary leader ride along its roads. Not on horseback, but in a “fly” chartered at the railway station, to take him to the family mansion of the Vernons, which was to be found at about four miles’ distance from the town.

The carriage was an open one, the day clear and fine, the country looking its best – the swedes showing green, the stubble yellow, the woods and copses clad in the ochre-coloured livery of autumn. The corn had been all cut. The partridges, in full covey, and still comparatively tame, were seen straying through the “stubs”; while the pheasants, already thinned off by shot, kept more shy along the selvedge of the cover. He might think what fine sport was promised him!

He was thinking not of this. The anticipated pleasure of shooting parties had no place in his thoughts. They were all occupied by the image of that fair child, first seen on the storm-deck of an Atlantic steamer, and last in a balcony overlooking the garden of the Tuileries; for he had not seen Blanche Vernon since.

But he had often thought of her. Often! Every day, every hour!

And his soul was now absorbed by the same contemplation – in recalling the souvenirs of every scene or incident in which she had figured – his first view of her, followed by that strange foreshadowing – her face reflected in the cabin mirror – the episode in the Mersey, that had brought him still nearer – her backward look, as they parted on the landing-stage at Liverpool – and, last of all, that brief glance he had been enabled to obtain, as, borne along by brutal force, he beheld her in the balcony above him.

From this remembrance did he derive his sweetest reflection. Not from the sight of her there; but the thought that through her interference he had been rescued from an ignominious death, and a fate perhaps never to be recorded! He at least knew, that he owed his life to her father’s influence.

And now was he to be brought face to face with this fair young creature – within the sacred precincts of the family circle, and under the sanction of parental rule – to be allowed every opportunity of studying her character – perhaps moulding it to his own secret desires!

No wonder that, in the contemplation of such a prospect, he took no heed of the partridges straying through the stubble, or the pheasants skulking along the edge of their cover!

It was nigh two years since he had first looked upon her. She would now be fifteen, or near to it. In that quick, constrained glance given to the balcony above, he saw that she had grown taller and bigger.

So much the better, thought he, as bringing nearer the time when he should be able to test the truth of his presentiment.

Though sanguine, he was not confident. How could he? A nameless, almost homeless adventurer, a wide gulf lay between him and this daughter of an English baronet, noted in name as for riches, What hope had he of being able to bridge it?

None, save that springing from hope itself: perhaps only the wish father to the thought.

It might be all an illusion. In addition to the one great obstacle of unequal wealth – the rank he had no reason to consider – there might be many others.

Blanche Vernon was an only child, too precious to be lightly bestowed – too beautiful to go long before having her heart besieged. Already it may have been stormed and taken.

And by one nearer her own age – perhaps some one her father had designed for the assault.

While thus cogitating, the cloud that flung its shadow over Maynard’s face told how slight was his faith in fatalism.

It commenced clearing away, as the fly was driven up to the entrance of Vernon Park, and the gates were flung open to receive him.

It was quite gone when the proprietor of that park, meeting him in the vestibule of the mansion, bade him warm welcome to its hospitality.

Chapter Forty Four.

At the Meet

There is perhaps no more superb sight than the “meet” of an English hunting-field – whether it be staghounds or fox. Even the grand panoply of war, with its serried ranks and braying band, is not more exciting than the tableau of scarlet coats grouped over the green, the hounds bounding impatiently around the gold-laced huntsman; here and there a horse rearing madly, as if determined on dismounting his rider; and at intervals the mellow horn, and sharply-cracked whip keeping the dogs in check.

The picture is not complete without its string of barouches and pony phaetons, filled with their fair occupants, a grand “drag” driven by the duke, and carrying the duchess; beside it the farmer in his market cart; and outside of all the pedestrian circle of smock-frocks, “Hob, Dick, and Hick, with clubs and clouted shoon,” their dim attire contrasting with the scarlet, though each – if it be a stag-hunt – with bright hopes of winning the bounty money by being in at the death of the deer.

At such a meet was Captain Maynard, mounted upon a steed from the stables of Sir George Vernon. Beside him was the baronet himself and near by his daughter, seated in an open barouche, with Sabina for her sole carriage companion.

The tawny-skinned and turbaned attendant – more like what might have been seen at an Oriental tiger hunt – nevertheless added to the picturesqueness of the tableau.

It was a grouping not unknown in those districts of England, where the returned East Indian “nabobs” have settled down to spend the evening of their days.

In such places even a Hindoo prince, in the costume of Tippoo Sahib, not unfrequently makes appearance.

The day was as it should be for a hunt. There was a clear sky, an atmosphere favourable to the scent, and cool enough for for putting a horse to his speed. Moreover, the hounds had been well rested.

The gentlemen were jocund, the ladies wreathed in smiles, the smock-frocks staring at them with a pleased expression upon their stolid faces.

All appeared happy, as they waited for the huntsman’s horn to signal the array.

There was one in that gathering who shared not its gaiety; a man mounted upon a chestnut hunter, and halted alongside the barouche that carried Blanche Vernon.

This man was Maynard.

Why did he not participate in the general joy?

The reason might have been discovered on the opposite side of the barouche, in the shape of an individual on horseback also, who called Blanche Vernon his cousin.

Like Maynard too, he was staying at Vernon Park – a guest admitted to a still closer intimacy than himself.

By name Scudamore – Frank Scudamore – he was a youth still boyish and beardless. All the more, on this account, was the man of mature age uneasy at his presence.

But he was handsome besides; fair-haired and of florid hue, a sort of Saxon Endymion or Adonis.

And she of kindred race and complexion – of nearly equal age – how could she do other than admire him?

There could be no mistaking his admiration of her. Maynard had discovered it – in an instant – on the day when the three had been first brought together.

And often afterward had he observed it; but never more than now, as the youth, leaning over in his saddle, endeavoured to engross the attention of his cousin.

And he appeared to succeed. She had neither look nor word for any one else. She heeded not the howling of the hounds; she was not thinking of the fox; she was listening only to the pretty speeches of young Scudamore.

All this Maynard saw with bitter chagrin. Its bitterness was only tempered by reflecting how little right he had to expect it otherwise.

True he had done Blanche Vernon a service. He believed it to have been repaid; for it must have been through her intercession he had been rescued from the Zouaves. But the act on her part was one of simple reciprocity – the responsive gratitude of a child!

How much more would he have liked being the recipient of those sentiments, seemingly lavished on young Scudamore, and spoken in half-whisper into his ear.

As the ex-captain sate chafing in his saddle, the reflection passed through his mind:

“There is too much hair upon my face. She prefers the cheek that is beardless.”

The jealous thought must have descended to his heels; since, striking them against the flanks of his horse, he rode wide away from the carriage!

And it must have continued to excite him throughout the chase, for, plying the spur, he kept close to the pack; and was first in at the death.

That day a steed was returned to the stables of Sir George Vernon with panting reins and bleeding ribs.

A guest sat down to his dinner-table – a stranger among the scarlet-coated hunters around him, who had won their respect by having ridden well up to the hounds.

Chapter Forty Five.

In the Cover

The day after the hunt it was pheasant-shooting.

The morning was one of the finest known to the climate of England: a bright blue sky, with a warm October sun.

“The ladies are going to accompany us to the cover,” said Sir George, making glad the hearts of his sportsmen guests. “So, gentlemen,” he added, “you must have a care how you shoot.”

The expedition was not a distant one. The pheasant preserves of Vernon Park lay contiguous to the house, between the pleasure grounds and the “home farm.” They consisted of a scrub wood, with here and there a large tree overshadowing the undergrowth of hazel, holly, white birch, gone, dogwood, and briar. They extended over a square mile of hilly land, interspersed with deep dells and soft shaded vales, through which meandered many a crystal rivulet.

It was a noted cover for woodcock; but too early for these, and pheasant-killing was to be the pastime of the day.

After breakfast the shooting party set forth. The ladies were, many of them, staying at the house; the wives, sisters, and daughters of Sir George’s gentlemen guests. But there were others invited to the sport – the élite of the neighbourhood.

All went out together – guided by the head gamekeeper, and followed by spaniels and retrievers.

Once clear of the grounds, the business of the day began; and the banging of double-barrelled guns soon put a period to the conversation that had continued in a general way up to the edge of the woodland.

Once inside the cover, the shooting party soon became dismembered. Small groups, each consisting of two or three ladies and the same number of gentlemen, strayed off through the thicket, as chance, the ground, or the gamekeepers, conducted them.

With one of these went Maynard, though not the one he would have elected to accompany. A stranger, he had no choice, but was thrown along with the first set that offered – a couple of country squires, who cared far more for the pheasants than the fair creatures who had come to see them slaughtered.

With this trio of shooters there was not a single lady. One or two had started along with them. But the squires, being keen sportsmen, soon left their long-skirted companions following in the distance; and Maynard was compelled either to keep up with them and their dogs, or abandon the shooting altogether.

Treading on with the sportsmen he soon lost sight of the ladies, who fell far behind. He had no great regret at their defection. None of them chanced to be either very young or very attractive, and they were luckily attended by a servant. He had bidden adieu to them by exhibiting a pretended zeal in pheasant-shooting far from being felt, and which he would scarce have done had Sir George Vernon’s daughter been one of their number.

He was far from feeling cheerful as he strode through the preserves. He was troubled with an unpleasant reflection – arising from an incident observed. He had seen the baronet’s daughter pair off with the party in which shot young Scudamore. As she had done so unsolicited, she must have preferred this party to any other.

The ex-officer was not so expert in his shooting as he had shown himself at the hunt.

Several times he missed altogether; and once or twice the strong-winged gallinaceae rose whirring before him, without his attempting to pull trigger or even elevate his gun!

The squires, who on the day before had witnessed his dexterity in the saddle, rather wondered at his being such a poor shot.

They little dreamt of what was disqualifying him. They only observed that he was abstracted, but guessed not the cause.

After a time he and they became separated; they thinking only of the pheasants, he of that far brighter bird, in some distant quarter of the cover, gleaming amidst the foliage, and radiating delight all around.

Perhaps alone, in some silent dell, with young Scudamore by her side – authorised to keep apart through their cousinly relationship – he, perhaps, pouring into her ear the soft, confident whisperings of a cousin’s love!

The thought rendered Maynard sad.

It might hive excited him to anger; but he knew he had no pretext. Between him and the daughter of Sir George Vernon, as yet, only a few speeches had been exchanged; these only commonplace expressions of civility, amidst a surrounding of people, her friends and relatives. He had not even found opportunity to talk over those incidents that had led to the present relationship between them.

He longed for, and yet dreaded it! That presentiment, at first so confidently felt, had proved a deception.

The very opposite was the impression now upon him as he stood alone in the silent thicket, with the words falling mechanically from his lips:

“She can never be mine!”

“You will, Blanche? You will?” were other words not spoken by himself, but heard by him, as he stood within a holly copse, screened by its evergreen frondage.

It was young Scudamore who was talking, and in a tone of appealing tenderness.

There was no reply, and the same words, with a slight addition, were repeated: “You will promise it, Blanche? You will?”

Stilling his breath, and the wild beating of his heart, Maynard listened for the answer. From the tone of the questioner’s voice he knew it to be a dialogue, and that the cousins were alone.

He soon saw that they were. Walking side by side along a wood-road, they came opposite to the spot where he was standing.

They stopped. He could not see them. Their persons were concealed by the prickly fascicles of the holly hanging low. These did not hinder him from hearing every word exchanged between the two.

How sweet to his ears was the answer given by the girl.

“I won’t, Frank! I won’t!”

He knew not its full significance, nor the nature of the promise appealed for.

But the éclaircissement was near, and this gave him a still greater gratification.

“Indeed,” said Scudamore, reproachfully, “I know why you won’t promise me. Yes, I know it.”

“What do you know, Frank?”

“Only, what everybody can see: that you’ve taken a liking to this Captain Maynard, who’s old enough to be your father, or grandfather! Ah! and if your father finds it out – well, I shan’t say what – ”

“And if it were so,” daringly retorted the daughter of the baronet, “who could blame me? You forget that the gentleman saved my life! I’m sure I’d have been drowned but for his noble behaviour. Courageous, too. You should have seen the big waves wanting to swallow me. And there wasn’t any one else to run the risk of stretching forth a hand to me! He did save my life. Is it any wonder I should feel grateful to him?”

“You’re more than grateful, Blanche! You’re in love with him!”

“In love with him! Ha! ha! ha! What do you mean by that, cousin?”

“Oh! you needn’t make light of it. You know well enough!”

“I know that you’re very disagreeable, Frank; you’ve been so all the morning.”

“Have I? I shan’t be so any longer – in your company. Since you don’t seem to care for mine, no doubt you’ll be pleased at my taking leave of you. I presume you can find the way home without me? You’ve only to keep up this wood-road. It’ll bring you to the park-gate.”

“You needn’t concern yourself about me,” haughtily rejoined the daughter of Sir George. “I fancy I can find my way home without any assistance from my gallant cousin Scudamore.”

The provoking irony of this last speech brought the dialogue to an end.

Irritated by it, the young sportsman turned his back upon his pretty partner, and whistling to his spaniel, broke abruptly away, soon disappearing behind a clump of copse wood.

Chapter Forty Six.

A Recreant Sportsman

“I owe you an apology, Miss Vernon,” said Maynard, coming out from under the hollies.

“For what?” asked the young girl, startled by his sudden appearance, but in an instant becoming calm.

“For having overheard the closing of a conversation between you and your cousin.”

She stood without making rejoinder, as if recalling what had been said.

“It was quite unintentional, I assure you,” added the intruder. “I should have disclosed myself sooner, but I – I can scarce tell what hindered me. The truth is, I – ”

“Oh?” interrupted she, as if to relieve him from his evident embarrassment, “it doesn’t in the least signify. Frank was talking some nonsense – that’s all.”

“I’m glad you’re not angry with me. Though I’ve reason to be ashamed of my conduct, I must be candid and tell you, that I scarce deem it a misfortune having overheard you. It is so pleasant to listen to one’s own praises.”

“But who was praising you?”

The question was asked with an air of naïveté that might have been mistaken for coquetry.

Perhaps she had forgotten what she had said.

“Not your cousin,” replied Maynard, with a smile – “he who thinks me old enough to be your grandfather.”