Springhaven: A Tale of the Great War

by R. D. Blackmore

  CHAPTER XX

  AMONG THE LADIES

  It would have surprised the stout Captain Stubbard, who thought no smallbeer of his gunnery, to hear that it was held in very light esteem bythe "Frenchified young man overhead," as he called Caryl Carne, to hislandlady. And it would have amazed him to learn that this young man wasa captain of artillery, in the grand army mustering across the sea, andone of the most able among plenty of ability, and favoured by the greatFirst Consul.

  In the gully where the Tugwell boats were built, behind a fringeof rough longshore growth, young Carne had been sitting with a goodfield-glass, observing the practice of the battery. He had also beenable to observe unseen the disobedient practices of young ladies, whentheir father is widely out of sight. Upon Faith, however, no blame couldfall, for she went against her wish, and only to retrieve the rebelliousDolly.

  Secure from the danger, these two held council in the comfort of theAdmiral's Round-house. There Miss Dolly, who considered it her domain,kept sundry snug appliances congenial to young ladies, for removingall traces of sudden excitement, and making them fit to be seen again.Simple and unfashionable as they were in dress, they were sure to havesomething to do to themselves after the late derangement, ere ever theycould run the risk of meeting any of the brave young officers, who wereso mysteriously fond of coming for orders to Springhaven Hall.

  "You look well enough, dear," said Faith at last, "and much better thanyou deserve to look, after leading me such a dance by your self-will.But one thing must be settled before we go back--are we to speak of thismatter, or not?"

  "How can you ask such a question, Faith?" Miss Dolly loved a bit ofsecrecy. "Of course we must rather bite our tongues out, than break thesolemn pledges which we have given." She had cried a good deal, and shebegan to cry again.

  "Don't cry, that's a darling," said the simple-hearted sister. "Youmake the whole world seem so cruel when you cry, because you look soinnocent. It shall be as you please, if I can only think it right. ButI cannot see how we gave a pledge of any sort, considering that we ranaway without speaking. The question is--have we any right to conceal it,when father has a right to know everything?"

  "He would be in such a sad passion," pleaded Dolly, with a stock offresh tears only waiting, "and he never would look again at poor CaptainStubbard, and what would become of all his family?"

  "Father is a just and conscientious man," replied the daughter whoinherited those qualities; "he would not blame Captain Stubbard; hewould blame us, and no others."

  "Oh, I could not bear to hear you blamed, Faith. I should have tosay that it was all my fault. And then how I should catch it, and bepunished for a month! Confined to the grounds for a month at least,and never have a bit of appetite. But I am not thinking of myself, I amquite sure of that. You know that I never do that much. I am thinking ofthat heroic gentleman, who stamped out the sparks so cleverly. All thetime I lay on the sand I watched him, though I expected to be blownto pieces every single moment. Oh! what a nasty sensation it was! Iexpected to find all my hair turned grey. But, thank Heaven, I don't seea streak in it!" To make sure of that, she went to the glass again.

  "If all mine had turned grey, 'twould be no odds to nobody--as CaptainZeb says about his income--because I am intended for an old maid." MissDarling, whose beauty still lacked many years of its prime, turned awayfor a moment, because her eyes were glistening, and her sister wastired of the subject. "But for yours there are fifty to weep, Dolly.Especially perhaps this young gentleman, towards whom you feel so muchgratitude."

  "How unkind you are, Faith! All the gratitude I owe him is for savingyour life. As for myself, I was flat upon the sand, with a heap ofsea-weed between me and the thing. If it had gone off, it would havegone over me; but you chose to stand up, like a stupid. Your life wassaved, beyond all doubt, by him; and the way you acknowledge it is to goand tell his chief enemy that he was there observing him!"

  "Well, I never!" Faith exclaimed, with more vigour than grace oflanguage. "A minute ago you knew nothing of him, and even wondered whohe was, and now you know all about his enemies! I am afraid that youstick at nothing."

  "I don't stick thinking, as you do, Miss," Dolly answered, withoutabashment, and knowing that the elder hated to be so addressed; "butthings come to me by the light of nature, without a twelvemonth ofbrown-study. When I said what you remind me of, in such a hurry, it wasperfectly true--so true that you need have no trouble about it, with allyour truth. But since that, a sudden idea flashed across me, the sort ofidea that proves itself. Your hero you are in such a hurry to betray canbe nobody but the mysterious lodger in Widow Shanks' dimity-parlour, asshe calls it; and Jenny has told me all she knows about him, which isa great deal less than she ought to know. I meant to have told you, butyou are so grand in your lofty contempt of what you call gossip, butwhich I call good neighbourly intercourse! You know that he is Mr. CarylCarne, of course. Everybody knows that, and there the knowledge seems toterminate. Even the Twemlows, his own aunt and uncle, are scarcely everfavoured with his company; and I, who am always on the beach, or in thevillage, have never had the honour of beholding him, until--until itcame to this"--here she imitated with her lips the spluttering of thefuse so well that her sister could not keep from laughing. "He nevergoes out, and he never asks questions, any more than he answers them,and he never cares to hear what fish they have caught, or anything else,about anybody. He never eats or drinks, and he never says a word aboutthe flowers they put upon his table; and what he does all day longnobody knows, except that he has a lot of books with him. Widow Shanks,who has the best right to know all about him, has made up her mind thathis head has been turned by the troubles of his family, except forhis going without dinner, which no lunatic ever does, according to herknowledge. And he seems to have got 'Butter Cheeseman,' as they callhim, entirely at his beck and call. He leaves his black horse thereevery morning, and rides home at night to his ancestral ruins. There,now, you know as much as I do."

  "There is mischief at the bottom of all this," said Faith; "in thesedangerous times, it must not be neglected. We are bound, as you say,to consider his wishes, after all that he has done for us. But thetale about us will be over the place in a few hours, at the latest. Thegunners will have known where their bad shot fell, and perhaps they willhave seen us with their glasses. How will it be possible to keep thisaffair from gossip?"

  "They may have seen us, without seeing him at all, on account of thesmoke that came afterwards. At any rate, let us say nothing about ituntil we hear what other people say. The shell will be washed awayor buried in the sand, for it fell upon the shingle, and then rolledtowards the sea; and there need be no fuss unless we choose to make it,and so perhaps ruin Captain Stubbard and his family. And his wife hasmade such pretty things for us. If he knew what he had done, he would goand shoot himself. He is so excessively humane and kind."

  "We will not urge his humanity to that extreme. I hate all mystery, asyou know well. But about this affair I will say nothing, unless there iscause to do so, at least until father comes back; and then I shall tellhim if it seems to be my duty."

  "It won't be your duty, it can't be your duty, to get good people intotrouble, Faith. I find it my duty to keep out of trouble, and I like totreat others the same as myself."

  "You are such a lover of duty, dear Dolly, because everything youlike becomes your duty. And now your next duty is to your dinner. Mrs.Twemlow is coming--I forgot to tell you--as well as Eliza, and Mrs.Stubbard. And if Johnny comes home in time from Harrow, to be Jack amongthe ladies, we shall hear some wonders, you may be quite sure."

  "Oh, I vow, I forgot all about that wicked Johnny. What a blessing thathe was not here just now! It is my black Monday when his holidays begin.Instead of getting steadier, he grows more plaguesome. And the wonder ofit is that he would tie your kid shoes; while he pulls out my jaconet,and sits on my French hat. How I wish he was old enough for hiscommission! To-morrow he will be dancing in and out of every cottage,boat, or gun, or rabb
it-hole, and nothing shall be hidden from his eyesand ears. Let him come. 'I am accustomed to have all things go awry,'as somebody says in some tragedy. The only chance is to make him fallin love, deeply in love, with Miss Stubbard. He did it with somebody forhis Easter week, and became as harmless as a sucking dove, till he foundhis nymph eating onions raw with a pocketful of boiled limpets. MaggieStubbard is too perfect in her style for that. She is twelve years old,and has lots of hair, and eyes as large as oysters. I shall introduceJohnny to-morrow, and hope to keep him melancholy all his holidays."

  "Perhaps it will be for his good," said Faith, "because, without somehigh ideas, he gets into such dreadful scrapes; and certainly it will befor our good."

  After making light of young love thus, these girls deserved the shaftsof Cupid, in addition to Captain Stubbard's shells. And it would havebeen hard to find fairer marks when they came down dressed for dinner.Mrs. Twemlow arrived with her daughter Eliza, but without her husband,who was to fetch her in the evening; and Mrs. Stubbard came quitealone, for her walkable children--as she called them--were all up at thebattery. "Can't smell powder too young in such days as these," was theCaptain's utterance; and, sure enough, they took to it, like sons ofguns.

  "I should be so frightened," Mrs. Twemlow said, when Johnny (who sat atthe foot of the table representing his father most gallantly) had saidgrace in Latin, to astonish their weak minds, "so nervous all the time,so excessively anxious, the whole time that dreadful din was proceeding!It is over now, thank goodness! But how can you have endured it, howcan you have gone about your household duties calmly, with seven of yourchildren--I think you said--going about in that fiery furnace?"

  "Because, ma'am," replied Mrs. Stubbard, who was dry of speech, and fitmother of heroes, "the cannons are so made, if you can understand, thatthey do not shoot out of their back ends."

  "We are quite aware of that"--Miss Twemlow came to her mother's reliefvery sharply--"but still they are apt to burst, or to be overloaded, orbadly directed, or even to fly back suddenly, as I have heard on goodauthority."

  "Very likely, miss, when they are commanded by young women."

  Eliza Twemlow coloured, for she was rather quick of temper; but she didnot condescend to pay rudeness in kind.

  "It would hardly be a lady-like position, I suppose," she answered, witha curve of her graceful neck--the Carnes had been celebrated for theirnecks, which were longer than those of the Darlings; "but even underthe command of a most skilful man, for instance Captain Stubbard, littleaccidents will happen, like the fall of a shell upon the beach thisafternoon. Some people were close to it, according to the rumour; butluckily it did not explode."

  "How providential!" cried Mrs. Twemlow; "but the stupid people wouldhave gone without much pity, whatever had befallen them, unless theywere blind, or too ignorant to read. Don't you think so, Faith, mydear?"

  "I don't believe a single word of that story," Mrs. Stubbard cut shortthe question; "for the simple reason that it never could have happened.My husband was to direct every gun himself. Is it likely he would haveshelled the beach?"

  "Well, the beach is the proper place for shells; but if I had only knownit, wouldn't I have come a few hours earlier?" said Johnny. "Even nowthere must be something left to see; and I am bound to understand thatsort of thing. Ladies, I entreat you not to think me rude, if I goas soon as ever you can do without me. I think I have got you nearlyeverything you want; and perhaps you would rather be without me."

  With many thanks and compliments--such a pretty boy he was--the ladiesreleased him gladly; and then Mrs. Twemlow, having reasons of her own,drew nigh to Mrs. Stubbard with lively interest in her children. Atfirst, she received short answers only; for the Captain's wife had drawnmore sour juices than sweet uses from adversity. But the wife of theman of peace outflanked the better half of the man of war, drove in heroutposts, and secured the key of all her communications.

  "I can scarcely believe that you are so kind. My dear Mrs. Twemlow, howgood you are! My Bob is a nice boy, so manly and clever, so gentle andwell-behaved, even when he knows that I am not likely to find him out.But that you should have noticed it, is what surprises me--so fewpeople now know the difference! But in the House of God--as you so wellobserve--you can very soon see what a boy is. When I tell him that hemay ride your grey pony, I wish you could be there to watch the fineexpression of his face. How he does love dumb animals! It was only lastSaturday, he knocked down a boy nearly three times his own size forpoking a pin into a poor donkey with the fish. And Maggie to have aflower-bed on your front lawn! They won't let her touch a plant, at ourcottage, though she understands gardening so thoroughly. She won'tsleep a wink to-night, if I tell her, and I had better keep that for themorning. Poor children! They have had a hard time of it; but they havecome out like pure gold from the fire--I mean as many of them as can usetheir legs. But to be on horseback--what will Bob say?"

  "You must have met with very little kindness, Mrs. Stubbard, to attachany importance to such mere trifles. It makes me blush to think thatthere can be a spot in England where such children as yours could passunnoticed. It is not a question of religious feeling only. Far fromit; in fact, quite the opposite; though my husband, of course, is quiteright in insisting that all our opinions and actions must be referredto that one standard. But I look at things also from a motherly pointof view, because I have suffered such sad trials. Three dear ones in thechurchyard, and the dearest of all--the Almighty only knows where he is.Sometimes it is more than I can bear, to live on in this dark and mostdreadful uncertainty. My medical man has forbidden me to speak of it.But how can he know what it is to be a mother? But hush! Or darlingFaith may hear me. Sometimes I lose all self-command."

  Mrs. Twemlow's eyes were in need of wiping, and stout Mrs. Stubbard'sin the same condition. "How I wish I could help you," said the latter,softly: "is there anything in the world that I can do?"

  "No, my dear friend; I wish there was, for I'm sure that it would bea pleasure to you. But another anxiety, though far less painful, isworrying me as well just now. My poor brother's son is behaving moststrangely. He hardly ever comes near us, and he seems to dislike my dearhusband. He has taken rooms over your brave husband's Office, and hecomes and goes very mysteriously. It is my duty to know something aboutthis; but I dare not ask Captain Stubbard."

  "My dear Mrs. Twemlow, it has puzzled me too. But thinking that you knewall about it, I concluded that everything must be quite right. Whatyou tell me has surprised me more than I can tell. I shall go to workquietly to find out all about it. Mystery and secrecy are such hatefulthings; and a woman is always the best hand at either."